Stressing

Good afternoon, everyone! At least it is afternoon for me.

Some of you will see, today I am late to publish an update, but it is alright…I am well! Continuous computer problems (though this is a minor annoyance), a lot of work in the office (big annoyance, because we are short handed at the moment), try to convince my friends to dress up on Halloween, organize next week's mini vacation… (shhhh, I'm going to Tampa for the weekend!).

In short: I have not had much time for anything–not even to sleep and eat properly–not that I am missing it (hahaha, yes I am).

So, I know you are also busy, everybody has a thousand different things to do, today I will share with you one of the simplest, cheapest and most useful lifehacks I have ever come across.

Has it ever happened to you that you've run out of your shoes. Maybe I should explain. Have you ever lost a shoe on the street? I mean, has one ever fallen off (breaking a heel is the samething) as you were rushing around? Well if you have not, that my friends, is a terrible experience. First because, because you walk with a disproportionate tension, walk far and your feet and legs suffer a lot. Needless to say that this is hard on the whole body.

And that's not counting the shame of losing a shoe or the humiliation of falling down in the middle of the street, both of these things have happened to me.

It happened to me recently with a pair of shoes, which, after sending them to have their heels lowered (for a change), were super comfortable and I put them with a lot of different outfits: combining them with red, with white, with gray, with brown, with other shades of blue…they were almost perfect, but they were still too big. And it is unlikely that my feet will grow into them.

But I had the problem with them slipping off at the wrong (aren't they all wrong) time.

All we need to get the shoe to stay on when we're in a hurry is a short piece of elastic. For the color, choose the one that you like the most: the same as the shoe or go for contrast, I found it cost about 40 cents per pair of shoes, and you can pretty much find an elastic band in any haberdashery and you will also need a little glue, Super Glue of some type.

The process is simple and is as follows:

First: we put on the shoe and measure where we want to put the elastic;
Second: we make a mark with a pencil at the position on the shoe where we will attach the band;
Third: with glue, we apply a small amount on one of the sides;
Fourth: Once it is fully dried we put the shoe back on and measure the width that we are going to need, without it tightening the shoe too much, but enough so that it holds well;
Fifth: we mark on the other side of the shoe where the rubber will go, we cut the leftover and glue it t the shoe.

TIP: try to get the elastic band to almost go below the sole of the foot, so that we will not rub the skin on the back of our heel. I buy the super soft elastic and just replace it when it gets old.

And voila! How long did it take? Something like five minutes. And we just got to give a new pair of shoes, actually an old pair that we turned into a comfortable pair.

Can you think of any other ideas for fixing uncomfortable shoes? You know I love your comments, don't keep your ideas to yourself!

So if you liked this lifehack share it with your friends!

And enjoy, it's finally Friday!

A Thousand Ways Of Revisiting Our Roots: The Garden Dandelion

I am thinking about looking at all of the ways we have developed as a society, the things that

Their seem to endless uses at the table for various plants that today are now no longer seen as foods.

The dandelion is one of those.

On spring days, the wind blows seeds. Among the many seeds that will come to touch the earth, there are the seeds of the "blowers". The ones we all blew as kids.

It's dandelion seeds, Taraxacum officinale. An extraordinary vegetable with excellent sensory qualities. Rich in minerals, fiber and vitamins.

Normally it is considered a weed, perhaps because it is tenacious and like few others, it resists stubbornly in the garden. Perhaps by changing our strategy we would be able to make it attractive in our eyes unlike what it appears to us today. For it once was a common summer green. Not without its fabulous quality to regrow once it has been cut.

Let's use it in the kitchen and grow it in the garden or even in pots on the balcony.

First of all the seeds are free and second it is one of those vegetables of which you can use the whole plant.

What parts of the dandelion are used in the kitchen you may ask:

flowers
leaves: eat young tender leaves in salad, or sauté then in a pan
flower buds: pickled and preserved like capers
the root

First the seeds can be recovered (some garden catalogs also sell the seeds), but how?

When you see the big beautiful puffy heads in the fields and grassy areas it's time to collect seeds. Bring along a nice piece of paper to collect all the seeds. Once you get home, make a nice ball with all the seeds from the "blowballs" or "clocks" (that is, the tufts with which the seed is carried by the wind ). Rub the seeds well using the two palms of your hands against each other. You will see all the seeds dropped on the table. Pick and sow them in pots or in the garden.

Remember the dandelion is a vegetable that you can harvest practically all year round, without interruption, because with each cut it will grow back without problems.

They have been used in the kitchen since the Middle Ages and probably long before that.

Embracing Love’s Embrace

Does he hug you when you sleep or turn his back on you?

Hugging has been proven to have health benefits. One study has shown that hugs increase levels of oxytocin and reduce blood pressure.

Through sleep, both men and women unconsciously take the position expressed by their attitude towards their partner. What does your sleeping body language have to say? We all sleep in different ways, but each one has a favorite position where he likes to fall asleep.

Psychologists agree that the position of our body through the night can tell a lot about the character of the person and their attachment to their partner. If one's dreams can be called a monologue, those of two together can be called a dialog.

Scientists found that the way people sleep, indicates something about how they relate and which feelings govern between the two. So, what's our body language trying to tell us?

The main orientations while sleeping are:

Back to back. They sleep with their back to their partner, that is they are touching from behind, facing away from the other, but they maintain contact behind. These couples feel a strong sexual attraction to one another, although they value their independence, they give great importance to feeling the closeness of the other.
Spoon position. One partner is supposed to hug the other from behing. This position is also called the back hug by my boyfriend, when the man embraces the woman, it means that he is willing to protect her from all evil, and if the woman embraces the man, it means that she enjoys his confidence. In this case she represents emotional support for her partner.

They say that this position ensures harmony and is often thought of as showing trust, a good thing for the future and progress of a relationship.

Facing hugs. The lovers sleep face to face towards each other, hugged. The legs may be tangled, indicating the desire to belong to each other and other strong bonding feelings. The heads may be at different levels and can be uncomfortable to sleep like this.
Separately. Partners do not touch each other during sleep. It indicates difficulties in the relationship of couple and lack of mutual understanding in waking life.
Side hugs. Research made by an English sexual health center interpret 3 variants of this position:

Variant 1. The man is on his back and hugs/cradles his partner who rests beside him. The position indicates that he is willing to give emotional support and harbor his partner in life from harm.

Variant 2. One of the couple is on their back, and another on their side in an fetal position. This has been translated that the latter needs the support, but for some reason cannot say it openly.

Variant 3. One is on the back, and the other next to your belly, placing a leg or arm on the partner's body. According to psychologists, the latter has the subordinate role in the relationship.

It should be noted that the poses of couples, who have lived together for a long time, are more reserved than newlyweds. If the newly involve embrace the whole body and their bodies get very entangled during sleep, those who have had a long relationship together, are more reserved and will lock a foot or hand when seeking contact. Psychologists recommend that all couples sleep in the same bed. The fact is that if they separate to different beds, their incomprehension grows and negatively influences the relationship. Scientists explain that the person is more sincere in sleep and does not depend so much on their ego as in wakefulness.

Cooking for a Large Family

It was in the fall of 1993 that I attended my first cooking course. It was organized at the local community center by a man who had recently opened an Italian restaurant in town. I am really not certain what the intent was because he was teaching us how to cook thw same food that you could order at his restaurant. It always sort of felt like he was creating his own competition. Regardless, we learned a lot and had fun doing it at the same time.

This morning I was leafing through my collection of recipes and I found some that lead me to remember his course. They were remarkable because they changed the way I felt about cooking, especially for large gatherings; cooking the Italian way, I suppose you could say, it became fun. Of those courses, one image remained alive in me for quite some time, it was the great passion the kitchen our teacher had. One that was not only about nourishment but a kitchen that is place of celebration, a small party, a kitchen that has its own culture, a laboratory in which to create new flavors, an art, a kitchen that brings family together, that enhances events and punctuates the greatness and importance of sharing a meal… in short, he had a deep feeling, a way of loving the kitchen that I had never known. It was of this passion that I thank, it has allowed me to develop on my culinary journey.

I learned that t was regardless of how simple or complicated the recipe was the same journey is taken each time and our kitchens come alive.

The Feeling of Love

How can you define love? Into which box do you place it?

What is love?

According to philosophy, human or religious judgment, love is related to the affection and attachment that is experienced towards a person. This leads to passionate emotions and intimacy. According to science, it is only a state of primitive evolution of survival that facilitates the continuity of species.

We have multiple ways to look at love, but on an inner personal level few would define it so clinically.

So how would you describe love to someone?

In psychology, the terms affection and love are of great importance. As all intellectual phenomena have been classified as sensations by scientists, all emotion is perceived as a simple mental affection, the element by which all emotional manifestations are greatly pronounced.

The psychologist Henry Murray (1893-1988) developed an organized personality theory in terms of motivations and needs. According to Murray, these psychogenic needs function mainly through unconsciousness, but play a major role in the personality of individuals. Murray categorizes these five needs of affection:

Affiliation: spending time with other individuals;
Nurturing: caring for another person;
Play: having fun with others;
Social rejection: rejection of other individuals;
Protection: be useful or protective of others.

So affection is a feeling of love, and yet as a mere type in the very broadest sense: a positive feeling therefore that like other forms of love makes us wish for the well-being or happiness of others, or even pushes us to participate as best we can. One can compare affection to friendship or tenderness, and its expression to benevolence or simply to kindness. A person with affection is said to be affectionate.

Affection has sparked a number of studies in philosophy and psychology concerning the feeling itself (popularly love, devotion, etc.) as well as the influence of this state of mind.

Oh, How Sweet Your Kiss

What is kissing? Is it simply touching with the lips, one of the many signs of love, friendship or reverence. Is there a difference, are different types of kissing between a couple used to show one's feelings? For some kissing is kissing something or someone with repetition, vehemence and passion.

So, what is kissing?

What does it mean to you?

The kissing action in itself is simple. We even have examples of kissing in this basic form that have traversed time and space; the best known kisses are basically: the one that is called the "Judas kiss" because it is given as a false manifestation of affection and that of peace, which is given as a sign of affection and friendship.

When two people start a relationship, kisses are given all the time and anywhere, because it's the only intimate contact they can have; but as time goes on, kissing becomes a habit of structure with the importance of maintaining the sensation of unity within the relationship.

The kiss is the first step on the road to love and is the indispensable, creating a bond for a couple, besides that it gives a certain magical touch to a relationship and makes an avenue for greater passion, the desire to feel your partner's embrace, and through this deeper feelings arise. The longer it lasts, the more the blood vessels dilate, the more the receptors become sensitized and therefore the greater the pleasure it gives.

Apart from pleasure, performing this "habit" continually has its positive side:

It is the best way to fill a relationship with energy.
You can express a hello, I missed you, I love you, or I want you.
A kiss says more than a thousand words.
Give reassurance and the renewed feeling of being loved.
It's a way to relax.
Kissing can make the negative aspects of life fade even for an instant or for the duration of the kiss.
The exchange of saliva is a sign of maximum confidence and desire for sublime fusion.
It is the prelude to further embrace.

There are no special techniques, no recipes, no kissing rules; the essential thing is that it is given with tenderness and affection even when passion intervenes.

Some types of kisses include:

Soft and sweet kiss: expresses tenderness, can be accompanied by caresses and delicate looks.
Romantic kiss: it is given with all the strength of the love felt towards the other person
Sensual kiss: it's a way of flirting and incites passion and sensual contact
Encompassing Kiss: it takes your breath away, denote desire and show anxiety about possessing the other.
Passion kiss: it is much deeper and the caresses become more intense.

It's said that kissing is the thermometer of the relationship, so if you ever stopped wanting to kiss your partner, start worrying. Once married, perhaps that need to have maximum contact will fade away as you receive deeper understanding but it maintains the same gravity when kissing begins.

Here are some suggestions maintaining the passion:

Kiss your partner at every opportunity you have.
If you want to kiss in a public place, do so.
Focus on kissing and caressing without thinking about what follows.
Invent a code communication through kissing.
Understand that you do not need to have sex to feel pleasure; there are caresses and kisses that can produce unimaginable sensations.
Whenever you kiss, do it with tenderness, affection, respect but especially with love.

Fun facts about kissing in different cultures:

In Eastern culture, kissing is giving and receiving spiritual energy.
Contests of longer kisses have been held. One is the Kissing Tournament held in Mexico a few years ago.
It is said that if you manage to tie a knot with the cherry stem only with your tongue without touching it with your hands, it means that you know how to kiss well.

Don’t Be Afraid – Show Your Love

The opposite of war is love and the opposite of love is not hate, it is fear.

What is love? Love is the basis for a healthy relationship, and every healthy relationship is a garden, a mystery that happens, for example, between two people, a garden that depends on both people to flourish. In this encounter where a new universe is created, in that encounter where phenomena happen and where both people are exchanged and transformed. This is a lot easier than it sounds when you understand love, what it does for you and how one embraces it inside the context of a relationship.

When two people meet they are two separate worlds, how they meet and if they hit it off is something sometimes tremendously complex. Each person is a world unto themselves, a complex mystery throughout their past and their finite future.

When we enter into a relationship, no matter how close, it is initially located on the periphery border of our experiences. If it is allowed to grow it will reach intimacy, it will become deeper, and it will have an impact on our future. If you are in your center and the other person is at its center, those two centers will begin to get closer and closer and something we call love with unite the two. This is the opposite of war, which tears apart and destroys it does not create.

When the encounter is peripheral we can say that we are only befriended. Even here we can touch each other, we can even have sex, but it will be from the edges of our borders, that's an intimately close acquaintance This "friend with benefits," should not be seen as somebody we are in love with, as intimacy and lust is something else entirely when it does not flow from love.

No, love is so much more than simple lust or desire.

To get to know a person, to reach that center is to go through a great change personally, something that takes time; this profound inner revolution which occurs because if you want to get to know a person at their center you will have to allow this change to happen. And that change is the longing, the with that we all make, to get to know that person, to let them help us get another perspective, a companion for life who helps us avoid the holes and heal wounds that we all have.

If you want a relationship, one that is deeper, that it is not a peripheral but profound you have to allow that person to also get to know you (the real you), for which you must become a vulnerable, open person, and this demands a greater risk, it is dangerous because you never know how much that person could harm you by knowing your deepest secrets, everything that we have hidden for a long time, not only to others, but to ourselves and now that can be exposed, and that's where fear comes in, so it's not very easy to open up, because fear directly touches our vulnerability, our feeling of rejection, of failure. It leaves us thinking "I'm going to expose myself and they may leave me."

What we're hiding is an idea of what's inside of us, maybe it's not good and, when they really know me, maybe they're going to "abandon me," so there are so many people who have this mechanism of protection that rationalizes ending relationships before anything happens, before that idea has to end the relationship, people who stay on the periphery border because they are unable to deepen a relationship, because deep down the relationship has never taken hold, leave the relationship before the relationship has a chance to leave them. This is to abandon before being abandoned. Why? Because we want to be hurt, we are not willing to risk finding out.

There are married couples, there are lovers both who have been together for many years and who are only known on that superficial level, who have never really connected with each other; and there are situations where the more you live with someone, the more you forget that center of balance you built with your partner early on. They remain lovers on the periphery of their lives, even if they are lovers of years they know nothing about each other.

Sex is the same, as it can be making love on the periphery. Unless the centers are united, sex results only in the encounter between two bodies and not at the soul.

Sex is only love when both people feel it in a sexual relationship, when the are at their center truly in love, in that case not only is sex love, but sex is sublime, it is eternal.

And when we allow someone to enter our center:

We're without out fear.

The person oriented towards love is someone who does not fear the future, who does not fear the one who stands next to them, who opens up, who is exposed and does not fear the result or the consequences of opening themselves up to someone else.

Milka: The World’s Best Milk Chocolate

I love Milka, for me there is rarely a chocolate that lives up to the taste and texture of the Milka chocolate. But while I love it, I am often (still) surprised to learn that not everyone knows about it. SO I am trying to fix that today. No they haven't bribed me with a truck load of chocolate (hint, hint, nudge, nudge) but they don't need to either. It has established itself in my life since I was a child. It was the first (that I remember) chocolate that my grandmother bought me. And it has been our special treat ever since.

With this original bars getting popular again it appears that Milka aims to give value to the brand beyond the one it already had, they want the brand to be associated with tenderness, good gestures with friends and family, as well as remembrance (my grandmother and I fit into this category).

In addition, it appears that they carried out another promotion recently they embrace the act of sharing. Specifically, the commercial with the last piece of chocolate. Showing that the last ounces of chocolate are just as important as the first and have quite a lot of value when they are allowed to. For me it stated that if you share it with someone it will be because you really care.

With these messages at the heart of Milka's intentions, it is clear to see that they are regarding the brand, the value given to the consumer is pretty clear. In addition, Milka has focused on "tenderness" which as been the main theme since the 1960s, they want the public not to think of Milka as a simple brand of chocolates, rather the brand comes to mind from a loved one and their endearing actions, this tenderness that is imparted through their intentions.

That is an idea I can fully support.

Age Disparity in a Relationship

Today I wanted to hit on a topic that still seems un-addressed. Age disparity in relationships that cause a power imbalance. The list contains ten reasons why it's wrong to fall in love with someone older… This contributes to a theory several friends and I came to several years ago, which we began to see embodied in how many of us date.

The age difference in a sexual relationship is a common feature in many modern relationships. Social acceptance of age difference and concept about what is considered a significant age difference has varied over time, and also depends on different cultures and different legal systems, not to forget ethical reasons.

According to a 2010 study of 22,400 subjects in North America, Europe, Australia, and Japan, women showed no preference for much younger men. According to this study, women are generally interested in men of the same age or slightly older. This study also supports the different types of relationships (e.g. Enjokasai, Sugardaddy, Trophy Wife) that younger women with older men enter into for various reasons. An earlier study had also shown this result.

While the findings are more favorable for this construct we as a society often look less favorably toward the reverse.

While terms like mistress and girlfriend are the common words used to describe an older man and younger woman. Woman are see as cougars, sugar mommies (with Boy Toys), or MILFs. This is how our culture describes different types of women's interests in younger male sexual partners or vice versa, and are supported, for example, by a 2003 study by the American Association of Retired Persons (AARP). After that, 34% of women over the age of 40 meet with younger men. Likewise, many older women have been paying younger lovers for sexual adventures in many of the tourist resorts in the Caribbean, Asia and Africa for several decades.

According to another 2003 study by the Office for National Statistics for England and Wales, the number of women married to younger men rose from 15% to 26% between 1963 and 1998.

According to the US Census Bureau, there were fewer than half a million couples in the United States in 1997 with an age difference of at least ten years. In 2003, however, there were about 3 million couples in which the man was at least six years younger than the woman. International online dating services, such as match.com with about 20 million members, note an increase in the proportion of women in their databases who would like to meet a man who is at least ten years younger.

In today's Western society, many divorced older women are socially and financially independent.

Whether or not this type of relationship structure will become more normalized in our society is yet to be seen.

One point that is still relevant, however, is the problem that age disparity (10 years) plays in a relationship.

Well Dressed

A while ago I heard someone say (or I might have read it in some magazine (or saw it in a movie…)) that "you must dress for the job you want and not for the one you have".

Alright I thought, how do dress if you want to become Queen of England?

Seriously though, I think that the logic is pretty sound, but what if your budget doesn't for allow it? Let's remember that we don't have that dream job yet…so if you don't have it you can't exactly dress for it without hurting your bank account.

What if you don't have the figure to wear the kind of clothes you're supposed to wear? The problem was one that I wrestled with for a while. Because, let's admit, not all clothes are suitable for all jobs. And not all jobs allow you to wear the most suitable clothes. Beyond that I need to take my body type into consideration.

What if we weren't born with that innate grace to style our hair or combine pieces to make amazing styles? For example my hair never wants to cooperate, so in the end I chose to cut my hair shorter so I don't have to worry.

I am sure that both you and I, have a lot of clothes in the closet that we do not like for one reason or another. For example I have plenty I am not able to combine–purchased only because I was thinking that it will look great for work, or to go out, or to just be me! Don't you hate sales! Now instead of hanging on the store rack it is their, hanging on yours and taking up space.

And what have I decided? After taking an inventory on my closet craze I have decided to make a radical change, to it and to my style, and the way I buy. And I intend to apply the 3 simple rules to do it:

Reduce–Recycle–Reuse.

So I'm minimizing the purchases I make (both clothing and accessories) and reusing and recycling clothes I already had in the closet: lengthening dresses, shortening sleeves, adding DIY details to customize the accessories… I even started to make my own jewellery!! This has given me a better idea about accents, so that I am not wrong when it comes to combining an outfit.

Finally I hope that by sharing this with you, what I was able to learn, you are encouraged to follow a similar path (if, like I, you were lost), and help you get the most out of your closet. I am satisfied.

A big greeting and a big hug, thank you for stopping by and I hope you enjoyed my post.

Love Coma

The is your wake-up call