December 18, 2012

Interview with Dr. Kevin Leman, author of the book What a Difference a Mom Makes: The Indelible Imprint a Mom Leaves on Her Son's Life

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Mike Carruthers:
Where you fall in the family’s birth order does seem to make a difference in how you turn out.

Dr. Kevin Leman:
The first 23 astronauts in outer space guess what - 21 first born and 2 only children not a middle or a baby in sight.
 

December 14, 2012

Interview with David H. Freedman, co-author of the book A Perfect Mess: The Hidden Benefits of Disorder - How Crammed Closets, Cluttered Offices, and on-the-Fly Planning Make the World a Better Place

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Mike Carruthers:
Neatness counts - we've heard that since we were kids and it's imbedded in our brains.

David H. Freedman:
Which really goes back to books like The Cat in the Hat, which we read a million times as kids. The Cat in the Hat is a story about two kids left alone in a house that gets messy and they're terrified their Mom is going to come home and not love them anymore because of their messy house.
 

December 12, 2012

Interview with Kathryn Tristan, author of the book Why Worry?: Stop Coping and Start Living

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Mike Carruthers:
Worrying is fine; worrying too much is a problem.

Kathryn Tristan:
1 out of 2 Americans will suffer at some time in their life from anxiety, from depression or from addiction. And that stems back to how we’re thinking about our challenges and how we worry – this is a huge problem.
 

Kathryn Tristan, author of the book Why Worry?...

A lot of times this is learned from childhood. Some scientists say that your mind is like an idling car it always has thought patterns in the back that were running that are ready to kick into reality once something happens. And if you are trained and wired to be a worrier and a worry wart then that is going to be your modus operandi that is what you’re going to kick into.

When you start to worry obsessively, Kathryn says, it helps to get very specific, write it down or say it out loud, give voice to your worry then you can question it.

Turn it around instead of thinking I’ve got a headache maybe it’s a brain tumor and I have cancer you think is that an actual thought, no I actually disagree with that. So you turn your situations around but you also are realistic and you’re solution-oriented.

If your mind is occupied with positive things it can’t be worrying. And then there’s that big never changing statistic.

Science has shown that 85% of what we worry about never happens. So we have the choice of using that idea to try to help us decide if what we’re worrying about is reasonable or not.
 

December 10, 2012

Interview with Howard Dvorkin, author of the book Credit Hell : How to Dig Out of Debt

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Mike Carruthers:
If people are going to over-spend on their credit cards this is typically the time of year that they’re going to do it.

Howard Dvorkin:
When they whip out that piece of plastic there’s very little pain that happens until the following month when the bills come in and then they can’t afford it.