But no matter how much chocolate we eat, how bright our flowers, how much we say that it’s a silly holiday, or how happy or unhappy we are about the state of our relationships, this love celebration often comes with some serious pangs of loneliness.

While we might fantasize that love is a cure for loneliness, and imagine that someday we’ll stop feeling lonely, or that other people don’t feel lonely, the reality is that love and loneliness go hand in hand; when we open our hearts to feel love, we also open our hearts to feel loneliness.

Loneliness does not mean that we are doing something wrong or that there is something wrong with us. Loneliness is not a contagious disease that we can ward off by never being alone or manically pursuing relationships. Loneliness is not a sin. Loneliness does not mean we are ungrateful. Loneliness is not reserved for single people, depressed people and introverts. Loneliness is a part of every human’s experience, whether we are looking for a partner, married, the life of the party, or a certifiable hermit.

There is the loneliness of having a secret we are afraid to tell, the loneliness of illness, and the loneliness of being misunderstood. There is the loneliness of having a face, body, or brain that looks or behaves differently from the people around us. There is the loneliness of looking around at our family and wondering ‘who are these people? Was I switched at birth?’

There is the loneliness of feeling disconnected from our spouse, invisible to our partner, ignored by our lover. There is the loneliness of being the one who is financially responsible for our family and the loneliness of being financially dependent on a spouse. There is the loneliness of feeling imprisoned in a box of other people’s expectations and the loneliness of yet another ‘eat your carrots’ negotiation with our 3-year-old.

There is the loneliness of having to keep on living without that someone who is suddenly, or not so suddenly, just not there anymore. There is the loneliness of caring for someone who used to care for us, or for someone who no longer even recognizes us.

There is the loneliness of not having our perspectives on politics, religion, or life in general shared by other people. There is the loneliness of trying so hard to have our gifts and work valued by others, and still feeling unrecognized, unappreciated, and unseen. There is the loneliness of being alone on our path of life, with no one showing us the way forward, or telling us it’s going to be okay.

There is the loneliness of bad things happening and wondering why we seem to have been forgotten by God or the universe, or wondering why we are being singled out and punished. There is the loneliness of coming home to no one and the loneliness of feeling like we are trapped behind glass while the world goes on around us.

There is the loneliness of feeling disconnected from our own thoughts, feelings, and sense of self — a loneliness that comes in the shape of confusion, scattered energy, and a sense of being lost.

So, on this Valentine’s Day, as we open our hearts, let us also open our eyes to see that life is an endless arc between loneliness and love. We are capable of love because we know loneliness, and we know loneliness because we are capable of love.

It takes courage and strength to keep swinging on the pendulum. We may wish that we could stop time and hold on to that moment of love, and when we can’t hold on, we may be tempted to throw our hands up and simply define ourselves as all alone. But time marches on, and swing we do, in a journey through loneliness and love that is fluid and complex. We are alone and we are fully connected. And we are, all of us, in it together, everywhere in between.

1. Know how your partner likes to be loved.

Partners have different needs and find different things appealing. For one partner, a bouquet of flowers is a special gift. For another, flowers are meaningless but a book makes their heart skip a beat. (Honey, if you’re reading this, you know I appreciate both!)

This is where your partner’s “love frame” comes in. This term originated from psychologist George Bach, according to Bill Cloke, Ph.D, a psychologist in private practice in Los Angeles for over 20 years and author of Happy Together: Creating A Lifetime of Connection, Commitment, and Intimacy. It simply refers to how you show love to your partner along with how you feel most loved.

“Knowing what your partner likes to receive when they want to feel loved can create a very special feeling because they sense that you know who they really are and love them for it,” Cloke said.

2. Make your gift personal.

“A simple handwritten note telling your partner why you’d still choose him or her if you had to do it all over again says ‘I love you’ much better than a box of candy,” said Terri Orbuch, Ph.D, psychotherapist, researcher and author of the forthcoming book Finding Love Again: Six Simple Steps to a New and Happy Relationship.

3. Give the gift of giggling.

As long as it isn’t at your partner’s expense, a silly gift — along with a more serious one — can be a fun way to express your love, Cloke said. “I remember when a girlfriend of mine gave me a birthday gift of a small leaded glass case with marbles inside and the word replacements lettered on the top,” he said.

4. Give the gift of touch.

Touching, such as kissing, hugging and cuddling, is another great way to express your love, Orbuch said.  “Even if you’re not romantic, everyone needs and responds to the loving touch of a partner,” she said.

5. Remember that money isn’t meaningful.

With all the ads and commercials about presents, there’s a lot of pressure to spend and spend big on Valentine’s Day. This might lead you to spend money you don’t have or turn you off from the holiday altogether. But remember that romance doesn’t have a price tag, Cloke said.

Instead of viewing Valentine’s Day as a wily marketing ploy, Orbuch suggested seeing it as an opportunity for quality time. And this means different things to different couples. For instance, you might want to dine out at a nice restaurant or stay in and cuddle on the couch, she said.

6. Fill a need for your partner.

“If mushy romanticism isn’t for you, think of something your partner really needs,” Orbuch said. This might be anything from getting his car detailed to replacing her tattered briefcase, she said.

7. Muse over your magical moments.

As Cloke said, “All relationships have unforgettable moments or you wouldn’t be in it.” Take the time to talk about those special moments when you were first falling in love. You can even write them down, and exchange your lists, Cloke said.

In fact, just talking with your partner for 10 minutes about any topic — aside from kids, work, finances or household chores — can boost your relationship, Orbuch said. Her long-term marriage study found that talking to your partner every day for just 10 minutes increased intimacy, bonding and happiness.

That’s how I think of the relationship between religion and depression: like the chicken and the egg debacle.

I can’t say which came first in my life, because they were both there from the start. And you need only read through a few of the lives of the saints or walk the exhibition aisles at the Religious Booksellers Trade Exhibit to see that holy people aren’t all that happy much of the time.

How is it that we depressives tend to be more spiritual? Or is it that the more religion you get in your life, the more depressed?

Beliefnet approached me to write Beyond Blue more than five years ago because they learned that so many of their readers suffer from depression. Articles about depression and anxiety were among their most popular.

I believe people with depression are more spiritual because we are more aware of that human restlessness or inner void than our happy counterparts, or maybe we are more restless AND more aware of our unease. And we want to fill that void and settle the restlessness ASAP because it feels about as good as cow droppings on our heads.

So we pray. And we inhale frozen Kit Kat bars. Because both are like sucking on a pacifier to satiate the inner longing temporarily (prayer the preferred method, of course). Until our Prozac poops out (and our brain’s wiring and chemistry changes), and we need another kind of cocktail. At which time some of us head to daily Mass or join religious congregations, and others go to the hospital, and some (like me) do everything and anything as long as it’s not Vinyasa yoga (it hurts).

According to St. John of the Cross–the Spanish mystic who experienced something far worse than cow pies when he was harshly imprisoned in Toledo–the purpose of the dark night is all for love: to become better lovers of God and one another. Furthermore, the dark night takes us from isolation to creativity, from withdrawal to contribution.

“Obscurity and attachment, followed by God-given clarity, liberation of love, and deepening of faith, are consistent hallmarks of the dark night of the soul,” writes Gerald May in his fascinating book The Dark Night of the Soul. “Often this liberation results in a remarkable release of creative activity in the world.”

Consider for a moment the three Teresas (not including me) who experienced dark nights of the soul: Teresa of Avila emerged from hers and became the founder of the Discalced Carmelites, a prolific author, and the first woman Doctor of the Church; St. Therese of Lisieux is so popular, dubbed the “greatest saint of modern times” by Pope Pius X, largely due to her articulation of her crisis of faith in the pages of her autobiography, “The Story of a Soul.” And now, with the publication of some of Mother Teresa’s personal writings, we are learning about the modern saint’s personal agony that fueled her mission and incredible contribution to goodness, hope, and love on earth.

I keep pondering Archbishop Perier of Calcutta’s response to Mother Teresa concerning her darkness:

This is willed by God in order to attach us to Him alone, an antidote to our external activities, and also, like any temptation, a way of keeping us humble . . . to feel that we are nothing, that we can do nothing. . . . My only wish and desire, the one thing I humbly crave to have is the grace to love God, to love Him alone. Beyond that I ask for nothing more.

I’m not sure I agree with him. Because if I did, I wouldn’t have sought treatment in the 58,094 ways I did. I believe God wants me to be as healthy, happy, and productive as possible, and that he’s on the side of recovery, not illness. However, I can’t deny that my depression has been a refiner’s fire, impassioning my faith one profanity at a time. I can’t help compare it to the way a writer-mom, Linda Eyre from Salt Lake City, described motherhood:

We start our mothering careers as rather ordinary-looking clay pots with varied shapes and curves—and march directly into the refiner’s fire. The fire, however, is not a onetime process but an ongoing one. Every experience that helps us to be a little more compassionate, a little more patient, a little more understanding, is a burst of fire that refines us and leaves us a little more purified. The more we filter, strain, and purge through the experience of our lives, the more refined we become.

If I weren’t always so restless, I might be tempted to sleep in on Sundays more often, to listen to music during my run instead of pray a novena. I wouldn’t think to thank the big guy for a day without tears, to bless him for 24 consecutive PMS-free (hormonally balanced) hours. I’d be less aware of the rose gardens I walk by to get to the kids’ school (but also less hyper about the bees on the buds). I’m pretty sure that I’d be less spiritual and less inclined to gorge on dessert.

Photo courtesy of The Guardian.

This latest fake news cycle started on Thursday, apparently with the release of a Reuters news story from Kate Kelland. Kelland notes the newest concern comes from “Liverpool University’s Institute of Psychology at a briefing in London about widespread concerns over the manual.” There’s no link to the briefing. And I’m not sure what a “briefing” is — a press conference? (And since when is a press conference a news item? It’s not really equivalent to a new research study, is it?)

Kelland fails to note that Europe and the U.K. don’t actually use the DSM to diagnose mental disorders — it’s a U.S. reference manual for mental disorders diagnosis. So while it’s nice that some Europeans are expressing concern about this reference text, their concern isn’t exactly much relevant. Context is everything, and Reuters failed to provide any useful context in that article.

Sadly, Reuters is a brand name. And once you write an article under that brand name, it cascades down an entire news cycle. Let’s follow it for fun!

Reuters begins with:

Millions of healthy people – including shy or defiant children, grieving relatives and people with fetishes – may be wrongly labeled mentally ill by a new international diagnostic manual, specialists said on Thursday.

In a damning analysis of an upcoming revision of the influential Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM), psychologists, psychiatrists and other experts said new categories of mental illness identified in the book were at best “silly” and at worst “worrying and dangerous.”

Wow, glad there’s no fear-mongering going on there. A nice, balanced approach to the news.

These are the same “experts” who have been beating their drum all fall and winter, but who decided to convene a press conference in the UK last week to generate more press. And more press they did generate.

The Kelland article again regurgitates half-truths about the issue, such as this beauty:

More than 11,000 health professionals have already signed a petition [...] calling for the development of the fifth edition of the manual to be halted and re-thought.

Apparently Reuters doesn’t do any fact checking any longer. As we discussed more than a month ago, not all of the “signatures” are mental health professionals — only approximately 88 percent self-reported they were. Sloppy reporting from Reuters.

The rest of the “briefing” was simply rehashing all of the same old arguments that both we and many, many others have already covered. It’s silly and a little demeaning to try and argue these things in the press, over and over again, because it comes down to one set of professional opinions against another. Whose set is “better” or more legitimate? Nobody can tell, because nobody has access to the future.

Oh. Except for Allen Frances, M.D. He has apparently left his position as a doctor and taken up residency as a psychic, because he told the U.K.’s Telegraph,

“DSM5 will radically and recklessly expand the boundaries of psychiatry. Many millions will receive inaccurate diagnosis and inappropriate treatment.,” said Allen Frances of Duke University, North Carolina.

Wow, really? You always seem to miss mentioning how the current DSM-IV — overseen by the same Allen Frances — has done exactly the same thing (according to its critics).

Because this press conference — uh, I mean “briefing” — was conducted in the U.K. by U.K. organizations, it was picked up in the U.K. media. (Here’s a nice summary of the coverage.)

Now, in order to capitalize on this new news cycle in the U.S., American outlets needs to bring their own sexy angle to the story.

A day after the UK press conference, ABC News took the bait and Katie Moisse wrote it up as though the petition was a new thing (it was started in October 2011 and had 10,000 signatures two months later, in December 2011). Our knight in shining armor against the DSM-5, Allen Frances, again is liberally quoted:

“You can’t have one professional organization, like the American Psychiatric Association, responsible for something so important,” he said.

The change of heart is amazing. When the APA was signing checks to Frances, he had no problem supporting them. Now that he’s out of the process, he suggests the APA shouldn’t be the one publishing the reference text.

Keep in mind, the use and adoption of the DSM is completely a market-driven, voluntary choice. Nobody is demanding professionals use the DSM to diagnose mental disorders in the U.S. Another international system already exists called the ICD-10, and is used throughout the rest of the world. All the 600,000+ U.S. mental health professionals need do is agree to start using that instead of the DSM. It doesn’t require government intervention, and it doesn’t require endless hand-wringing.

The NY Daily News ran with the latest news cycle today with their own unique spin. This newspaper initially claimed that “DSM-5 lists Internet addiction among mental illnesses.” The headline was later changed to, “DSM-5, the new mental illness ‘bible,’ may list Internet addiction among illnesses.” Note that “may” was slipped in, and of course, typical of Internet news articles, no mention was made of the edit to the headline to reflect that absolutely nothing has changed about the status of Internet addiction in the new DSM-5. It will still likely not appear except in a general “behavioral addiction” disorder category — something we’ve known for about 2 years now.

Probably mostly unnoticed in this latest blip in the DSM-5 news cycle is this thoughtful article over at Medscape about the bereavement exception for depression. Well worth a read, as it actually is a nicely balanced piece of actual journalism. It’s thoughtful, examines both sides of the issue without bias, and presents a wealth of data to let the reader draw their own conclusion.

A refreshing change from the dribble passing for journalism from Reuters and others these days.

So a quick recap — no new news has occurred with the DSM-5. Some professionals who started a petition back in October 2011 held a press conference, and some news media attended it, and decided to write up these professionals opinions. These opinions are in opposition to other professionals’ opinions.

I will make a prediction right here and now, much like the psychic Allen Frances: When the DSM-5 is published next year, the world will not end. We will not face a new epidemic of diagnoses of any of the disorders listed therein. And mental health professionals will adapt to the new changes with little effort on their part.

For further reading…

Read the Reuters story: New mental health manual is “dangerous” say experts

Read NY Daily News story: DSM-5 lists Internet addiction among mental illnesses

Read the ABC News story: American Psychiatric Association Under Fire for New Disorders

Read the Fierce Pharma story (with links to UK coverage): Psychologists petition against DSM-5 revisions

If you had a busy week, you probably missed out a few of Psych Central’s most interesting news stories. But, do not fear: I’ve summarized three of our top brain, tech, and workplace news stories in this week’s “Week in Review” video podcast. In this episode, we answer the following questions:

• How do metaphors affect your brain?
• Can a Smartphone determine when you’re depressed?

• What causes a loss of $225.8 billion per year in the US alone?

Check out our latest video podcast below for the answers:

• Metaphors Can Light Up Brain’s Sensory Area

• Harnessing Smartphones, Apps to Beat Depression
• Co-Worker Support Reduces Workplace Stress, Ups Productivity
• Submit Your Psychotherapy Stories

Also, if you answered our question about Valentine’s Day this week on our Facebook fan page, you’ll definitely want to watch this video — your comment might be included in the final segment!

The death of Guillaume Apollinaire at this time made a very serious difference to all his friends apart from their sorrow at his death. It was the moment just after the war when many things had changed and people naturally fell apart. Guillaume would have been a bond of union, he always had a quality of keeping people together, and now that he was gone everybody ceased to be friends.

The “quality of keeping people together” seems an important and rare attribute, and although it doesn’t come naturally to me, I’m trying to do a better job of it myself, and also to appreciate more the work of the Apollinaire-ish types whose efforts benefit me.

This quality has been on my mind since the sad occasion of a memorial service of a friend. I knew her in a work context, but at the service, I realized from the tributes of her college friends that, along with many other wonderful traits, she had the “quality of keeping people together” from that time.

My sister is this way, too, and from watching her in action, I know how much energy and time it takes to act like glue, to make the efforts that allow people to stay close.

Who coaxes people into showing up to the reunion? Who remembers everyone’s birthdays, and insists that everyone get together to mark the occasion? Who plans the promotion celebration? Who organizes the group wedding gift? Who keeps track of everyone’s addresses? Who sends out the group emails? It doesn’t sound very hard—until you’re the one doing it.

And although it’s a lot of work, it’s all too easy for people to take these efforts for granted, or not to realize how important one person is to the strength of a particular web of relationships. In fact, that person might well be teased for these efforts, and instead of people being appreciative and cooperative, they might act jaded and superior to such gung-ho antics.

Ancient philosophers and contemporary scientists agree: one of the keys—perhaps the key—to happiness is strong relationships, and the often unsung work of such folks to keep up a “bond of union” makes a tremendous difference to everyone in their circles.

How about you? Do you have the “quality of keeping people together”? Do you feel that your efforts are appreciated? If you don’t naturally play this role, have you found strategies to work at it?

I love cruising around Parent Hacks—which “collects and shares parents’ tips, recommendations, and bits of wisdom—their hacks—so we can all benefit.”

So we’re putting out a call for any and all psychotherapy stories — from therapists, psychologists, psychiatrists, counselors, clients and patients. If you have a story you want to tell and can do so in under 1,400 words, we’re interested.

We’re not looking (just) for salacious stories. We’re looking for stories that show the personal nature of therapy, and how it can help people.

Read on for details…

We are looking, first and foremost, for your psychotherapy story (or that of a loved one; or if you’re a professional, one involving your psychotherapy session with a client). We don’t want fictional stories. We also don’t want you to tell your story in public if you’re not ready to share it and have it be read by thousands of people.

We are also looking for submissions that meet our editorial guidelines. These include:

• Good English grammar.
• Simple formatting — no indenting, but please use paragraphs and spaces between your paragraphs.
• Spell-checking before you send.
• Make the details anonymous. We don’t want you to be too personal with your details, to ensure no one recognizes you (or your client) from the story.
• Taking 5 minutes to proof-read your submission before sending it to us, making sure it reads well and makes sense.

All entries will be published anonymously, unless you specify otherwise.

There may be a small stipend involved if your submission meets our editorial guidelines and is a story we end up publishing. If this is the case, we will contact you for your billing details. (We’re not guaranteeing any stipend or giving details about it, because we prefer people do this for sharing their story, not for the money.)

Submit Your Psychotherapy Story

Ready to go? So are we! So go ahead and send us your best story about psychotherapy to:

(We can take any format you care to send it in.)

The Fine Print:
Any submission to Psych Central grants us a royalty-free, perpetual, irrevocable, non-exclusive right and license to use, reproduce, modify, adapt, publish, translate and distribute such material (in whole or in part) worldwide and/or to incorporate it in other works in any form, media or technology now known or hereafter developed for the full term of any copyright that may exist in such material. Authors may retain their original copyrights if they so desire. Psych Central has the option, but not the obligation, to publish any material it receives at this email address.

You may find over time, however, that these so-called “negative” events rarely stay this way. If we let things be without judgment, they may reveal themselves to be benign. I’m surprised how often I have had to learn and relearn this simple fact. That things like a breakup, a friend fall out, or loss of a job that seemed to be bad luck at the time, eventually ended up being the best thing that could ever happen to me.

It’s never the events in our lives themselves that have the power to break us. It’s the assumptions we make that have the greatest potential to lift us up or propel us into a downward spiral. What we do with what we are given will determine how we live our lives.

This week our posts are all about helping you live a happier life by shaking up your previous beliefs on topics like passion, anxiety and acceptance, treatment for addiction and bipolar disorder and private practice marketing. It’s all about letting go of our judgments and assumptions about what we label as “negative” or “challenging” or “uncomfortable.” What seems impossible now, could be very possible with the passing of time. We just need to see them through to the end to find out.

What Are You Deeply Passionate About?

(Adventures in Positive Psychology) – Maybe you believe that passion is not a necessity. You don’t have time for it or you don’t know what you’re passionate about. This post is a great reminder of why it’s important to make pursuing your passion a priority.

When a Loved One Has Anxiety: Acceptance Goes a Long Way

(Anxiety & OCD Exposed) – If your loved one has ever come to you with a problem, it’s normal to want to soothe or coach them to better mental health. But there’s something else you can do that will have the greatest impact on those struggling with anxiety. Read how acceptance can help you grow closer while enabling your loved one to make positive changes in his or her life.

The Challenges Of Treating Addicts With Borderline Personality Disorder

(Addiction Recovery) – Did you know that addicts with co-occurring borderline personality disorder are known as some of the most difficult patients to treat? This post is for mental health professionals and individuals with dual diagnosis of addiction and borderline personality disorder. Although there are obvious challenges, successful treatment is possible.

Private Practice Marketing Made Easy

(Private Practice Toolbox) – If marketing and therapy seem to be opposing forces that are not supposed to go together, get ready to be challenged. In this post, Julie Hanks addresses your discomfort and intimidation by revealing the facts behind private practice marketing.

Guidelines for the Diagnosis and Treatment of Bipolar Disorder in the US and UK

(Bipolar Beat) – Do you know the difference between the DSM and the ICD? This post compares the two in the perspective of diagnosis and treatment for bipolar disorder.

This, of course, is a Big Deal, since one of the major stumbling blocks of the thousands upon thousands of health apps are their need for something or someone to input personal health data. Without personal health data, health and mental health apps are generally pretty useless.

The method to measure one’s psychological well-being (or, as we more commonly refer to it, one’s happiness) passively is to use whatever metrics are available through the phone. Since phones generally only have a limited amount of inputs — voice, video, geo-positioning (GPS), and an accelerometer — your choices as a researcher interested in personal health data are pretty limiting.

Using only these four physical measurements, is it really possible to accurately and reliably measure a person’s well-being? Let’s find out.

In the research I’ve read on this issue, the researchers focused on three components: social interaction, as measured solely by the amount of talking done (through the phone’s microphone); sleep/wake patterns (through the accelerometer); and physical activity (through the accelerometer and geo-positioning).

Let’s look at each one of these characteristics in turn.

1. Social Interaction as Measured by Talkativeness.

Slowed speech or a reduction in the amount of speech (from whatever the person’s original baseline was) can be one part of one symptom (of the 9 symptoms) of depression. It is, however, also a symptom of many, many other disorders. Slowed speech, or a reduction in the amount of speech is part of a larger symptom cluster in depression, called “psychomotor agitation or retardation.” The DSM-IV makes clear that this slowed speech or reduction in the amount of speech can’t just be a subjective feeling — it has to be severe enough to be observable by others.

It’s also important to note that since people vary widely in terms of their social outgoing-ness (extroversion) and talkativeness, anything that seeks to measure how much a person is talking throughout the day is going to have to understand that individual’s personal talkativeness baseline level.

For instance, if I usually say about 20 sentences a day, and then I go down to 10, that might be an important change. But the app would have to know my baseline first. If it just assumes that I’m like an average person who says 200 sentences a day (or whatever the real number is) and sees I’m not meeting that average, it’s going to be wildly inaccurate.

Last, the most obvious problem with trying to measure social interaction or isolation through sound alone is the reality of how we conduct ourselves through technology. Much social interaction done today is done silently, through our smartphones and keyboards. It also assumes that simply sitting in the same room quietly with another person is the same as sitting alone in your own room. Being together with others, but not necessarily talking, is the New Togetherness.

Researchers can also look at “stress levels” in one’s speech. I suppose that could indeed give you an immediate, real-time reaction to things happening in the world around you. But good mental health isn’t based upon simply your levels of stress — it’s based on how resilient you are and what you do with such stress later on. These are vital components a smartphone or iPhone simply can’t measure.

2. Sleep/wake patterns.

Problems with sleeping aren’t going to be detected by the app, since it can’t tell when you’re sleeping or not (unless you pick up your smartphone every time you wake up). What it can do right now within 1 and 1/2 hours of waking is to determine if you’re awake or not (because you start using your phone). An hour and a half is a huge degree of error, and can easily be the difference between you getting a normal night’s sleep (8 hours, say) and not (6 1/2 hours).

The sleep/wake cycle is also impacted by dozens of other variables that may have nothing to do with your overall well-being or happiness. These include things such as a change of season, change of working times, change in relationship status, change of child rearing duties, change in physical health, and about a half dozen other mental health concerns.

It could also include a new exercise routine, getting married, or moving into a new house — all things that most people would think of as positives and increase happiness. Yet the app would see them as negatives, since they all might impact your normal sleep schedule.

An impact in your sleep schedule is not really a sufficient indicator of much of anything — other than you have trouble sleeping. It could be caused by so many different things as tying it to just one thing is simply not very reliable — or scientific.

3. Physical activity.

Physical activity is correlated positively with increase happiness, as well as greater overall health. People who engage in regular physical activity indeed may feel better about themselves and have a better mood.

In fact, if there’s one thing you want to do today — right now! — to make yourself feel better, go take a walk.

But a lot of people’s physical activity is pre-determined by the type of work they do and the lifestyle they lead. So if you’re tied to a desk all day, chances are your physical activity measurements are always going to be worse than someone who works outdoors all day. Even if you work-out on a regular basis.

Physical activity alone is not really a good measurement of mood. And while someone who engages in more physical activity should be at lesser risk — population-wise — for depression or other mental health issues, it can’t speak at all to an individual’s risk. After all, a professional athlete who is engaged in physical activity almost every day can still become depressed.

Can an iPhone Measure Your Mood?

Which brings us back to the original question… In reviewing what we know about mental disorders, depression and happiness, is any smartphone or iPhone app really going to be an accurate measure of those things?

Probably not. While researchers may find some weak correlations with some of these things and mood, I have my doubts about whether such an app can be robust and personalized enough to actually give most of us meaningful information.

So do we need an app to tell us we’re depressed? Most of us are already quite well enough aware of when we’re feeling down, socially isolate, or don’t feel like talking to others.

And an app is especially ironic, given the active initiative you would have to take in order to use it. You would need to download and install the app first — suggesting you already have a certain amount of insight into your own mood or psychological needs.

For further reading…

• Get Some Therapy From An App That Reads Your Feelings Through Your Voice

• Web-based counseling — Telepsychiatry — is taking off

Of all companies you’d think might be smart enough to “get it,” Google would be at the top of my list.

But in a demonstration that apparently some companies don’t really give much thought to such things, Google decided to shut down the popular SuperPoke Pets game, after buying the company that owned it. (Which begs the question — why buy a company only to shutter its popular products?)

The real problem for users of SuperPoke! Pets (SPP) is that the game featured a virtual economy full of virtual goods. Virtual goods that people paid real money for. And of course with pets, one can become emotionally attached to them (yes, even virtual pets).

A new lawsuit just announced features a group who are suing Google over the game’s shutdown — and the loss of meaningful interaction with their virtual pets.

Google made the announcement of the shutdown back in August 2011, and now as the March 6, 2012 shutdown date approaches, users have had enough of the company’s tactics. They are suing Google to recover the money spent in the online social game. A lot of people still play Superpoke Pets, including a substantial handicapped population that are limited to playing only games that are adopted for their use.

But I suspect another strong motivating factor behind the suit is because of the specific makeup of the game. That is, the creation and enhancement of emotional objects — in this case, pets.

Apart from being upset about lost money, and having been misled about how long the game would continue, SPP users are sad and angry about the loss of a valued community and the social aspects of a game that appealed to children as well as adults and was accessible to and enjoyed by handicapped users.

Surprise, surprise. Develop a game that encourages you to bond emotionally with objects you create in the game, and a lot of users will develop a strong emotional bond with those objects. This is a core component of game dynamics in modern gaming, making games “addictive” (in the sense that a person wants to play frequently and for longer periods of time). Mess with that emotional bond and you’re messing with people’s emotions.

Google does allow you to download your virtual objects and interact with them on your computer, but that’s not really the same thing, is it? The game is a social game, and it’s not very social to interact with virtual objects by yourself. (To add insult to injury, the software that allows this interaction is apparently buggy as well.)

This isn’t the first time Google has said, “Eh, we’re not interested in this product or service after all. Take your data elsewhere.” Google Health users were stuck with a set of health data that they could download but no longer interact with. (Others did even worse, offering PHR users only a PDF download).

This event offers a few pieces of wisdom for the rest of us:

1. Don’t buy virtual goods in a social game expecting it to last forever — there’s no guarantee the company backing up that virtual economy will be around in a year (much less 5 or 10 years) from now

2. When you offer your users something that encourages an emotional attachment, don’t be surprised when your users form an emotional attachment to that object (virtual or otherwise)
3. Think twice about selling your company to Google if you want your products or services to have a bright and successful future

RIP SuperPoke! Pets.

Read the full article: Social Game Players Sue Google.

You got together with your life partner for many reasons: shared perspectives and outlooks, physical attraction, shared spirituality, shared professional lives, etc. But you also enjoyed one another’s company because it’s fun! In the beginning, you did not have much but each other, but it was enough. There were sweet words, long phone talks, walks and candlelit dinners. You had meaningful conversations, shared your dreams and goals, planned your future together.

What is your relationship like today? Does it still include fun times and romance? Or have you resorted to talking about and handling chores and responsibilities related to children, career and other duties of adult life?

When fun leaves a relationship, it can be a sign that the relationship is heading toward the rocks. Fun is a part of life and it’s definitely a part of any healthy relationship. It’s something that brought you together, made you want to stay with each other. It is something that helps you stay together, survive life’s hardships and forgive each other in bitter moments.

When life gets difficult, it puts a heavy weight on your scale of marital balance, dragging it down. Good times together is the weight that you put on the other side of the scale, to give you a much-needed internal lift. It helps you put things in perspective, balance it out and feel good about yourself, your partner, and your life together.

The way you and your significant other define fun is up to you, but it’s important to keep doing it even as your relationship matures. Love to dance but haven’t been in years? It’s time to make a new dance date. Liked watching movies together, but haven’t made time to do it in months (or years)? Pick a night and head to a theater or rent a movie. Have dinner in a restaurant or cook a meal together at home.

Remember that in our most bitter moments, what we crave is some sweetness. In the midst of busyness and stress, we desperately desire lighthearted fun and relaxing moments. You don’t have to wait till things get tough to consider bringing fun back into your life.

Nor do you have to wait for a special day, like a birthday or Valentine’s Day, to become romantic and create special memories for the two of you. Do these things for you, for your spouse, for both of you as a family every day, starting now. If you’ve noticed that your family bank of fun is depleted, begin depositing happy tokens today.

So how does a relationship recover from cheating? How do you make amends with it personally?

I’m pleased to introduce the second in a series of interviews and conversations with two of our resident therapists about a wealth of mental health topics. In this installment, Marie Hartwell-Walker, Ed.D. and Daniel J. Tomasulo, Ph.D., TEP, MFA answer the question of how to recover from cheating in this latest video from Psych Central.

Can your relationship survive cheating? What about the forbidden fruit in relationships? When does flirting turn into cheating?

Dr. Marie and Dr. Dan will be hosting many future videos on relationship and mental health topics in the weeks to come. We will post them here as we publish them, or you can check them out on our new YouTube channel. Want to learn more about Dr. Marie and Dr. Dan?

What do you think about their advice? Please leave your thoughts in our comments section.

Q. Why doesn’t the current model of treating obesity — only telling people what and how much to eat — work for most people?

A. Great question, because the current model definitely doesn’t work. I can’t remember who said it, but there’s a saying that if you want to gain weight, go on a diet. Diets have a failure rate of about 95 percent. People may lose weight initially but then they usually gain it back and then some.

So this model doesn’t work for many reasons. For one thing, genetics plays a prominent role in our weight. This is why you can have two people who eat the same foods in the same quantities look very different. One may be thin; the other may be considered “overweight.” Our bodies are more complicated than the “calories in, calories out” equation assumes.

Instead of putting people on diets, which don’t work anyway, why not promote engaging in healthy behaviors directly? (By the way, many people have to do some pretty unhealthy things to lose weight and maintain that weight loss.) Instead of focusing on weight loss, focus on moving your body by doing activities that you enjoy — research has shown that fitness is critical for health — eating nutritious foods, getting enough sleep and listening to your body, along with other healthy self-care habits. Practicing these habits does help a person become healthier, whether they lose weight or not.

On a side note, there are plenty of skinny people who aren’t healthy, who smoke, lead sedentary lives and don’t nourish their bodies. But because they’re genetically predisposed to a slimmer frame, we don’t single them out and just assume that they’re healthy. The key is to encourage everyone to engage in healthy habits.

Health At Every Size is an approach that shifts the focus from weight to health. You can learn more here.   Also, check out these interviews on Weightless with Linda Bacon, author of Health At Every Size: The Surprising Truth About Your Weight — Part 1 and Part 2 and Evelyn Tribole, co-author of Intuitive Eating: A Revolutionary Program That Works — Part 1  and Part 2.

I also just wrote a post about healthy eating  on Weightless, which readers might be interested in.

Q. Are there reliable predictors for individuals who may become anorexic or bulimic?

A. Eating disorders are complicated and serious illnesses. A variety of complex factors contribute, including genetics, neurobiology and the environment. There’s a saying that genetics load the gun, and environment pulls the trigger.

Eating disorders tend to run in families. Also, traits such as perfectionism and cognitive rigidity can increase risk. Our appearance- and diet-obsessed culture serves as a trigger along with dieting. For people who are genetically and biologically vulnerable to eating disorders, dieting can serve as a gateway to an ED. But, again, there must be a genetic or biological vulnerability in order for the environment to play a role.

Q. Is there a relationship between ethnicity and anorexia? Or ethnicity and bulimia?

A. In the past, eating disorders were thought of as illnesses that solely strike white women. While the rates of eating disorders seem to be lower in ethnic groups like Asians and African-Americans, eating disorders can affect anyone, regardless of race, ethnicity, age, income, size, shape or sex. As one of my fave bloggers, Carrie Arnold of ED Bites, wrote in a post, “If you’re human, you can get an eating disorder.”

Q. What is the most commonly diagnosed eating disorder? Is there a substantial difference between the number of men and women diagnosed?

A. The most common eating disorder is binge eating disorder. According to the Binge Eating Disorder Association, it affects more than eight million men and women.

In general, more women do struggle with eating disorders. But plenty of men do, too. We used to think that about 10 percent of people with eating disorders were men. But it may be as high as 25 percent. Again, anyone can struggle with an eating disorder.

Q. What is your resolution for the new year?

A. My resolution is to listen to myself and my needs more when it comes to the decisions in my life, big or small. It could be everything from moving my body to eating to pursuing certain creative projects.

Q. Where do you see yourself in five years?

A. I see myself running after a few kids and writing my heart out.

I did ultimately give her a little bit of money, but what I was really struck by was her overall concern that I would laugh or make fun of her current anxious state. “I’m sure you must think I’m crazy approaching strangers, but I’m just so nervous,” she said. Although she was in a rather desperate situation, which can surely call for communicating with strangers, she was focused on how others would perceive her outreach.

This woman at the train station is certainly not different from you and me. To an extent, we all care what other people think of us. In fact, it permeates every facet of our being, and we typically are not even aware of it. Caring about what others think infiltrates ordinary, everyday aspects of our lives, whether it may be tending to our physical appearance, making certain life choices, or selectively choosing the words we say to those around us.

Social networking sites probably only enhance the need for approval, and Facebook is a prime example.

While some individuals create a Facebook page purely to keep tabs on friends and family, it predominantly serves as a platform — a platform in which we play a ‘role’ that entertains an audience willing to listen. We know what we’re doing when we upload certain photos, post expressive statuses, and write specific sentiments on various walls; not only do we crave attention from others, but we want others to see us in a particular light.

According to an article by Tom Perry, CEO of YourCoach, the need for approval has been conditioned within us since birth.

“Approval from others gives us a higher sense of self-esteem. We’re convinced that their recognition matters to our self-worth and how deeply we value ourselves.”

While seeking approval from others may be inevitable, problems may arise depending on how far one goes down that road. When caring how other people perceive us interferes with our own intuition, that’s when you may need to simply follow your heart and do what you feel is right. If you find yourself biting your lip from saying a quirky comment out of fear that others will raise their eyebrows in judgment, maybe that’s a time to try to bury that mindset and just be yourself.

By the same token, caring how others perceive us isn’t necessarily all negative. It does make sense to censor what we say to spare hurt feelings, to act appropriately at a religious affair, or to dress a certain way to fit into a designated environment. (Wearing a low-cut top on a job interview at a corporate office may not be the best way to impress the company’s president.) In other words, there are lots of gray areas and it’s up to you to decide if you care too much what others think.

As the woman at the train station walked away to share her story with someone else, I smiled to myself, knowing that I did not roll my eyes at her account. Evidently, those actions would have indeed affected her, and I did not wish to be a source of her angst. See how it comes full circle?

My only regret is not recommending the pina colada smoothie for her next Penn Station venture.

It’s easy to feel frustrated that you’re not where you want to be. But it’s way too early in the game to know how it will end. Part of the path of change requires a tiny shift, baby steps in the right direction until small change leads to big momentous events. Just keep trudging along and you will see.

I love these posts because they teach us that there is no such thing as “never.” For example, if you’ve caught yourself saying, “I’ll never make a difference in the world” or “I’ll never learn what I need to know about starting a private practice” or, “I’ll never get over what he or she did.” These statements contribute to a feeling of hopelessness and the erroneous belief that change is not possible. But it is. Read our posts this week to get a dose of hope, motivation and information to get you back on track, moving you in the direction of where you want to be.

You Have More Power than You Think: How to Change the World One Small Step at a Time

(Adventures in Positive Psychology) – You’re just one person, but you have the power to not only influence your own life, but the lives of others. In this post, Joe lists six ways you can begin to change yourself and the world.

Forgiveness Versus Letting Go

(The Gentle Self) – Forgiveness isn’t easy and may feel impossible when the person you’re trying to forgive significantly harmed you. But holding hurt and anger in can cheat you out of a happy life. Here, you’ll learn the difference between forgiveness and letting go as well as determine when you should give up hope for the former and begin to work on the latter.

Mindfulness And Multitasking: Can You Do Both At Once?

(The Therapist Within) – You may think you’re getting a lot done by multitasking, but here’s why doing several things at once is not only impossible, but attempting to try it will drain your energy and focus.

Understanding the Levels of Validation

(The Emotionally Sensitive Person) – If you are an emotionally sensitive person or know someone who is, you will benefit from reading this post. Learn how validation can help to manage your emotions better and what you need to do to begin validating yourself and others.

What They Don’t Teach You In Grad School

(Private Practice Toolbox) – You won’t learn everything you need to know about going into private practice in grad school. That’s okay because Julie shares the top 5 things she’s learned in 17 years of practice that you may not learn anywhere else.