The Grass Is Always Greener: A Scientific Illusion
Why do we think the grass is always greener in some other pasture? This powerful and ubiquitous experience is rooted in a human nature tendency called the focusing illusion. The focusing illusion describes how humans make judgments. Generally, we focus on a subset of...
Sporting Resilience
Most countries have a manor day on their sporting calendar. In the USA, it is the Super bowl, in the UK the FA Cup final and here in Australia it is the AFL Grand Final. It is fair to say that there are more pressing issues in the world today then who can throw or...
A Healthy Triumph: Shifting To Self-Acceptance
Let me ask you a question: What is optimal health to you? When I ask this question, I usually get some variation of “The guy with the 6-pack abs” or “The waif-thin actress.” Part of creating optimal health and weight loss involves making healthy lifestyle choices...
Cold Facts
If you make the same prediction often enough in a recurring event, there is a likelihood that one time you will be right. This is not a reflection on cleverness. Each year we get a prediction that the upcoming flu season will be terrible, possibly the worst ever. Most...
Mindset Shift: If You’re Doing Housework, You’re Exercising
What if I told you that when you do housework, you’ll get fitter? And on top of that, it’s as effective as going to the gym. Think about it. You’re putting in a lot of physical effort when doing household chores. That effort burns calories and gets your body into good...
Unsettling Science
Last week I wrote about the PURE study which followed over 135,000 people in 18 countries for seven years. It found that current dietary guidelines are essentially wrong as there was an increased rate of heart disease stroke and mortality associated with low fat...
Resilient Doctors Or, Doctors On Fire?
There is a lot of talk in recent times about doctors needing to be resilient to be able to handle the stresses and strains of the job better, rather than getting depressed or suicidal. I welcome the attention that is being brought to these important issues. It is...
Pure Galileo
There was a time when we believed the earth was the centre of the universe. To be honest, it was not unreasonable for people in the dark ages to accept this. The technology of the time was limited. When Galileo Galilei proposed that the earth revolved around the sun...
7 Strategies To Cope With Stress
We all know that experiencing a high degree of stress, especially for a prolonged period can be debilitating and even deadly. Scientists have known for some time that conditions such as cancer and heart disease can be induced by living a stressful life. Stress can...
Fathers
There are very few certainties in this world. There are even less in medicine. Yet one absolute is that to create a new human being requires a male sperm and a female egg. This is regardless of whether it occurs naturally or has medical assistance. It is also not...
Rest In Peace – The Art Of Medicine
At the graveside they still talk about judgement, intelligence, and the wisdom that is the practice of medicine. Deans and healthcare leaders wax poetic as they tell stories of great cures to lift in memoriam remarkable healers. Yet, though we bow to Hippocrates,...