Achieving Our Goals

We all have goals, whether they are personal, financial, educational or professional. Some people seem to achieve all they set out to. Others seem to constantly dream and hope, yet never accomplish a thing. It is healthy to set goals, but we must follow certain guidelines to better ensure successful completion of such goals.

First of all, our goal must be conceivable. We must be able to identify what might be a first step. Most of our long term goals need to be broken down into smaller steps. Our focus should be on one step at a time, as to not feel overwhelmed. This technique also gives us a place to start and a specific end in sight. As each step is accomplished, you will feel success, and encouragement to continue.

Our goals should also be believable. We must truly believe we can accomplish the goal.

Goals should be achievable. We should be realistic in our expectations. For example, it would NOT be achievable for a person with no training to win an Olympic gold medal in figure skating.

Our goals should be controllable. This means that the goals should be made with regard to what is in control of each individual. The goal should involve your own behavior and not be contingent on the behavior of others. For example, a goal to marry into royalty would require the agreement of another party and therefore is not controllable.

Goals should be measurable in both time and quantity. For example, it is better to set a goal of cleaning the bathroom and kitchen by Saturday than to say you want your whole house clean. It is easier to accomplish the goal if it is for a specific time and quantity than general. Again, break your goal into measurable steps.

Goals should be desirable. Our goals should reflect what we want to do as opposed to what we feel we have to do.

Goals should have no alternatives. This means the goal should be simply stated with no “I will do -------------OR --------------. Usually when an “or” is involved, the person ends up doing neither.

Most importantly, goals should always be for our growth, and not destructive to ourselves, others or society. Keep a positive attitude, keep focused on the goal, and you will feel successful in no time!

Is Your Child Being Bullied?

Is your child being bullied? It is important for parents to understand bullying behavior and to discuss this topic with your child. Children often may know that they are uncomfortable with a person or situation, yet be embarrassed to bring it to an adult’s attention, or even feel as if they should be able to handle every situation themselves.

Who exactly is a bully? There is no physical description. A bully can be any age, tall, short, fat, thin, male or female. A bully is anyone who intentionally makes another person feel afraid, hurt or uncomfortable over and over again. The person who is the target of the bully is known as the victim.

Bullying behavior commonly takes place in the school setting, and can take place anywhere in school. This includes places such as the hallway, bathroom, lunchroom, gym, classroom and specials such as music or art, on the school bus, outside at recess or outside the school building before or after school starts.

There are numerous ways that someone can bully another person. One way is physically, in other words, using their body to hurt someone else. Examples of physical bullying are hitting, kicking, pushing, and using a weapon. Using words to hurt someone is another type of bullying. Examples include name calling, teasing, cursing, and insults. Other types of bullying can be less directly involved with an individual, but just as hurtful. These involve stealing from someone, ignoring, spreading lies, and consistently leaving someone out.

If your child is being bullied, advise him/her that it is best to at first ignore. Tell your child that it is difficult to do, but they should try to not listen or at least act like he/she does not care what is going on. Tell your child to keep a calm voice if he/she needs to speak or reply. They should smile as if they are not bothered. Sometimes being funny can diffuse a situation and take the bully off guard. Further advise your child to walk away, or more importantly, run if he/she is in physical danger.

Once your child is out of the situation, they must tell an adult. It can be anyone they feel comfortable talking to, and who will listen and act. If one adult doesn't listen or act ,they must not feel helpless, but rather, tell someone else. Advise them to bring a friend with them if they are uncomfortable speaking to the adult by themselves. Your child can write a letter to the adult if they have difficulty speaking to someone about the bullying, but remember they MUST tell someone!

Asperger Syndrome

Asperger syndrome is a neurophysiologic disorder that was accepted in the psychiatric community in 1994. It was identified by Hans Asperger, an Austrian doctor, back in 1944. Asperger syndrome and autism are examples of pervasive developmental disorders, commonly referred to as PDD, or PDD or Autistic Spectrum Disorders.

The DSM-IV (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fourth Edition, published by the American Psychiatric Association) identifies PDD as "characterized by severe deficits and pervasive impairment in multiple areas of development, including impairment in reciprocal social interaction, impairment in communication, and the presence of stereotyped behavior, interests and activities."

Children diagnosed as Asperger's have marked social inadequacies, meaning they have difficulty understanding and reacting to others appropriately. They have difficulty picking up nonverbal social cues such as facial expression and body language. They often have trouble maintaining eye contact. Quite often they have difficulty judging personal space. Asperger's children may also have sensory integration issues, such as only wanting to eat certain foods or wear certain fabrics. They also have difficulty with change or transition. Aspergers children tend to have their own set of rules, which may not be our rules.

Children with Asperger's generally have average and above IQ scores. They want to be socially accepted, however, because they are socially naïve and take things literally, they frequently get teased or bullied in school. It is difficult for them to make or maintain friendships. Their speech is sometimes characterized by repetition or abnormal inflections. Physical awkwardness is also common in Asperger's syndrome.

There is no specific medication to treat Asperger's, however, medication may be used to treat accompanying symptoms, such as anxiety, attention deficit, and obsessive- compulsiveness.


Thank you for reading

Family Meetings

Regularly scheduled family meetings can be a great way for families to touch base, make plans, resolve conflicts and to help build cooperation in your family. With everyone's busy schedules, whether it be work, sports, church or community functions, it is hard for many families to see each other all at once, and sitting down to eat dinner together and discuss the day is a thing of the past for many households.

The first step toward planning a family meeting is to make a chart of everyone's activities. Fill in your children's and your own schedule for the week. This will help you find or make time when all family members are free. Regular meetings will give everyone a chance to discuss good feelings, let families have more fun together, help families work as a team, teach family members about respect and problem solving, help parents learn effective discipline and give children a place they know they will be heard and loved.

A suggestion for a regular time might be once a week. Plan to have the meeting last from twenty to thirty minutes. Younger children may need shorter or more frequent meetings. Make a list of topics, or an agenda for the meeting. Post it (ie; on the refrigerator) so family members can add to it. You will then need to decide which topics will be discussed at the first meetings. Remember to leave time to make decisions. Take turns with different tasks during the meeting. One person can be leader and help stick to the agenda. Someone else can take notes. If a child is too young to write, they can retrieve the agenda or minutes from the last meeting. Everyone should get a chance to lead, even if they are young and need help. Another person can take notes, or minutes of the present meeting. When talking about something on the list, let your children speak first, so they can feel responsible.

Try not to let the meetings become complaining, or gripe sessions .Some things to be covered in family meetings include: kids' activities, allowances, errands, chores, rules when friends visit, weekend plans, rules for using the phone, computer, video games, etc., and homework.

Family meetings are for all families, one or two parent, one or many children, and stepfamilies as well.

A typical format for a formal approach to a family meeting is as follows:
-share good things that have happened for each family member
-read and discuss the notes from the previous meeting
-talk about things that were not discussed at the last meeting
-talk about new ideas your family want to discuss at this meeting
-plan a family activity
-summarize what all have agreed to. Ask members what they feel about the decisions reached.

Remember, don't expect the perfect family meeting. You are just beginning. The most important thing is for everyone to feel their ideas are important.

Thank you for reading,
Carol Bottstein

Managing Your Anger

When you feel angry, it is important to stop your anger and choose new thoughts. The following are suggestions for managing anger.

1. Deep Breathing-When you feel angry, silently tell your self to "stop". Take some deep breaths. It is best to breathe through your nose and out through your mouth and replace your thoughts with calmer thinking. You may have to do this several times before you feel your anger lessening.

2. Engage in Physical Activity- Run, walk, bike ride, garden, do chores around the house. Physical activity gives you a break from the anger and a chance to think. Studies show, however, that engaging in activities such as punching the pillow when angry actually increases angry feelings. So it is best to engage in productive physical activity. While your exercising, work on new thoughts.

3. Self-Talk-use calming phrases that you can say to yourself over and over to help you calm down. Use the deep breathing technique as you say these phrases. Examples ; Take it easy, Slow down, Relax, Stay calm.

4. Monitor Your Anger- There are varying ranges of anger, from mere annoyance to outrage. You can learn to score your level of anger on a scale of 1 to 10 . You will then learn which types of incidents you find the most difficult to tolerate. You will begin to see patterns in the types of incidents that anger you the most. The higher the score, the more effort needed to calm down. You can use a notebook to monitor your anger and keep a record of the incidents and corresponding scores. By monitoring your anger and keeping a record, you will be able to see if a certain incident occurs a few times a week. If the technique you are using does not work, then you need to try a different method. On the other hand, if the score lowers, examine your thoughts to see what new perspectives you have given yourself. If the score continues to rise or stay the same, you need to examine how you are continuously making yourself angry.

5. Think of Past Successes- Everyone has times where they are tempted to get angry and lose their cool, but they do not. Think of such times in your life. It may be helpful to record that time in your notebook. How did you keep yourself form getting angry? What were your thoughts?

6. Humor- You can use your notebook to write humorous messages to yourself for when angry situations happen. If you can see the humor in some aggravating situations, your anger lessens.

7. Keep a "to do" List- Keep a list of things to do when you start to feel your anger rising. You can incorporate things from this article as well include some of your own ideas. Keep the list handy so you can retrieve it the moment you start to feel angry.