Book Review - Why Mindfulness is better than Chocolate : Your guide to inner peace, enhanced focus and deep happiness By David Michie

Why mindfulness is better than chocolate : Your guide to inner peace, enhanced focus and deep happiness explains the benefits of meditation and mindfulness. The benefits include-

• Reduced stress
• Lowers high blood pressure
• Boosted immunity
• Reduces health costs
• Helps manage chronic pain
• Reduces mortality
• Helps people suffering from chronic inflammatory conditions
• Helps manage and prevent anxiety
• Promotes good help
• Increases self compassion
• Helps you break bad habits

With all these benefits David Michie uses Buddhist teachings and contemporary science to discuss and explain a number of related topics in detail.

"David Michie demonstrates the knack for capturing the essence of this important topic and presenting it in a fun and accessible way." Dr Timothy Sharp, The Happiness Institute.

A very insightful and informative read. Anne

Film Review - Hatha and Flow Yoga for Beginners By Director Andrea Ambandos

This DVD contains two Yoga programs. The Hatha session relieves stress and promotes relaxation, static poses are used with a strap, belt or towel to aid stretching. The Flow stretching uses poses from Ashtanga yoga and the poses aid in weight loss, balance and mental focus. The workouts can be practised individually or together.

Hatha and Flow Yoga for Beginners is very relaxing and gentle, it will definitely become a standard in my exercise routine.
Anne

Book Review—How to thrive in a busy world of too much busy by Tony Crabbe

This book explains to us that busyness isn’t always essential. Tony Crabbe relies on psychological research and examples to deal with busyness in today’s world. He debunks the myth that you need to get everything done to feel content.

In 'How to thrive in a world of too much busy', Tony Crabbe describes 4 key strategies of-

• Mastery
• Focus
• Engagement
• Momentum

To function better and to achieve more. Tony talks about the positive to negative ratios, the Losada ratio which is very interesting. It is the number of positive to negative comments ratio 5 : 1 to predict strong healthy marriages or exchanges. Also the concept of’ happy attacks’ is novel.

I enjoyed the book, it is quite thorough with summaries and experiments to work through. Anne