While we don’t celebrate Thanksgiving all over the world, we all acknowledge the importance of gratitude. Or sitting down with our friends and families and sharing a meal. Feasts are a time to acknowledge the plenitude of our lives as well as give pause to others less fortunate.

Here are some quotes on Thanksgiving in particular, which hopefully can be appreciated by all cultures.

A lot of Thanksgiving days have been ruined by not carving the turkey in the kitchen.
Kin Hubbard

An optimist is a person who starts a new diet on Thanksgiving Day.
Irv Kupcinet

Dear Lord; we beg but one boon more: Peace in the hearts of all men living, peace in the whole world this Thanksgiving.
Joseph Auslander

Even though we’re a week and a half away from Thanksgiving, it’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas.
Richard Roeper

From too much love of living, From hope and fear set free, We thank with brief thanksgiving Whatever gods may be that no life lives for ever; that dead men rise up never; that even the weariest river winds somewhere safe to sea.
Algernon Charles Swinburne

Gratitude is the inward feeling of kindness received. Thankfulness is the natural impulse to express that feeling. Thanksgiving is the following of that impulse.
Henry Van Dyke

I celebrated Thanksgiving in an old-fashioned way. I invited everyone in my neighborhood to my house, we had an enormous feast, and then I killed them and took their land.
Jon Stewart

I love chicken. I would eat chicken fingers on Thanksgiving if it were socially acceptable.
Todd Barry

If you think Independence Day is America’s defining holiday, think again. Thanksgiving deserves that title, hands-down.
Tony Snow

It is now common knowledge that the average American gains 7 pounds between Thanksgiving and New Year’s Day.
Marilu Henner

It’s like being at the kids’ table at Thanksgiving - you can put your elbows on it, you don’t have to talk politics… no matter how old I get, there’s always a part of me that’s sitting there.
John Hughes

It’s so warm now, and Thanksgiving came so early - is it just me, or does it not really feel like Ramadan?
David Letterman

My cooking is so bad my kids thought Thanksgiving was to commemorate Pearl Harbor.
Phyllis Diller

This story inspires hope as well as the stark realization of the pain and harshness endured by people and animals in war zones.

When Maj. Brian Dennis first spotted a scruffy German Shepard-Border collie mix at a fort in Iraq, the dog wasn’t interested in making friends. The dog, who lived in the wild with a pack of canine companions, had already been through a lifetime’s worth of pain and neglect. His ears had been cut off as a puppy, and he had been trained as a fighting dog. Now that he was finally free of his tormentors, the dog just wanted to be left alone.

But Dennis saw something special in the dog, which he nicknamed “Nubs,” because of his missing ears. It took some time, but eventually Dennis had the dog eating out of his hand. One day, when Nubs showed up one day with a deep wound in his side, Dennis nursed him back to health. Soon, Dennis and Nubs were inseparable.

Sadly, Dennis learned that his unit would be forced to relocate to a new base, and he wasn’t allowed to bring Nubs along. As he watched Nubs race alongside his Hummer as his unit drove away from the fort for the last time, he was sure that he would never see the dog again.

But two days later, a familiar face turned up at Dennis’ new base: Somehow, Nubs had managed to follow the Marine unit through the Iraqi desert on foot, all the way to their new base – 70 miles away.

“When he arrived he looked like he’d just been through a war zone.”

“I won’t even address the gauntlet he had to run of dog packs, wolves, and God knows what else to get here,” Dennis wrote. “When he arrived he looked like he’d just been through a war zone.”

Read more at Gimundo.

Stress, depression, anxiety, addiction, OCD - they all share a certain addictive thought pattern. So what are some techniques (note how I didn’t say “easy” - nothing simple about breaking well-worn, ingrained mental patterns) to help you breathe easier and get back to your life?

1. Breathe. Oh sure, you’ve heard it before. Too overly simplistic for you, you say? Well, try it. Now. For one minute. Do nothing but focus on taking deep, diaphragmatic breaths. By doing this exercise, you remind your body and mind that you can live in the moment. Plus, deep breathing is naturally relaxing and helps you detense.

2. Freak out. We live in very contained times. The idea of screaming or crying or thrashing about in the middle of your living room floor is, well, frowned upon. But why do you think children do it? It’s a natural way to release pent-up emotions and bring you back in the moment. Whether its a good cry or a scream into a pillow, tap into all that negativity and release.

3. Just say no. Negative cylical thinking feeds off of itself. Your mind wants nothing more than to fixate. Can you catch yourself, even if for a moment, and request a “rethought”? A rethought is simple a replacement thought. So if you’re obsessing about your partner who hurt your feelings, can you catch yourself and think “What do I need to get at the store this?” It derails that addictive thought and reminds you that YOU ultimately have control over your emotional state.

None of this is easy. But doing nothing or self-medicating or denying doesn’t help much either. Underneath all of that obsessive thought is usually some old grief and anger. When you realize the pain that really lies underneath, you suddenly begin to feel more in control and less at the whim of negative thinking patterns.

This article kind of blew me away today with its simplicity and relevance. We often see children act out and react accordingly. But did we ever think of teaching them about emotions and how to recognize how they’re feeling before they act out? Smart idea!

An educational approach known as social and emotional learning (SEL), being implemented in individual schools—and now, for the first time, whole districts—has proven effective at simultaneously improving students’ academic performance, behavior, and well-being.

SEL prescribes approaching students as complex human beings whose learning and behavior are just as impacted by their emotions—and their control over those emotions—as they are by the quality of instruction and discipline. Recognizing that intellectual and emotional faculties develop symbiotically, the approach involves teaching students how to recognize and talk about their feelings, empathize with others, and resolve conflicts peacefully as a way to strengthen both academic achievement and emotional stability.

SEL students exhibited markedly improved social and emotional skills, attitudes, and behavior, compared to similar peers who were not enrolled in SEL programs.

For example, the PATHs (Promoting Alternative Thinking Strategies) program teaches self-regulation to early elementary students with the “Turtle Technique,” which involves using self-talk to inwardly analyze emotions and come up with ways to express oneself other than acting out. Young students learn this technique through trainings on identifying and labeling emotions and using specific strategies to manage them.

Read more here.

Imagine what could happen if instead of focusing on worst-case scenarios and fears, we put our attention on what we deeply desire and are working toward?

Whether you are for or against the Occupy Wall Street movement, one thing can be agreed on: people have the power to make change globally. If you believe in what these groups are doing around the world, help them in whatever way possible. Here are some suggestions.

We cannot go on expecting solutions to come from the political and economic elites who ride in limousines with security guards. They are not exposed to the impacts of their policies, so the feedback loop has been broken by the concentration of wealth and power in a few hands. This is why so many people are out in the streets demanding a transition from the dominant system (guns and money) to a new system that will give social justice and environmental restoration a higher priority than corporate profit-making.

By Kevin Danaher – Co-Founder,  Global Exchange

Beth Mann, a popular online writer, recently published a piece about the therapeutic benefits of writing. Here’s an excerpt:

I equate writing with singing. People often won’t sing because at some point, usually during their formative years, someone told them they weren’t doing it right. They closed off their voice and became quieter.

Many think they can’t write, as if its a skill you either possess or don’t. My point? Who cares? Use it anyway. I write for my life now. It doesn’t have to be perfectly tailored pieces; it just needs to be released from my mind.

That’s why journaling is so powerful. There is no right or wrong to it. You simply need to move the thoughts from your brain onto paper. That’s it. Doesn’t sound very helpful, does it? But actually, its a tool by which you begin purging often-negative mental junk and clarifying the true, clear voice underneath.

If you make a practice of writing every day, you will see changes in your life. I promise. Its almost uncanny how accessible and simple of a life-changing tool it it, right at your disposal. It’s therapy on paper. It’s creativity refining itself into actual, tangible ideas. It’s release for a quieter mind.

Fill me with anything!

Singing is naturally therapeutic. And so many of us deny the opportunity to vocally release because we think we’re not good enough. Who cares what that music teacher told you in 7th grade? Sing anyway! Loud, proud and with spirit. Feel your emotions release.

You don’t have to be singing about love all the time in order to give love to the people. You don’t have to keep flashing those words all the time. - Jimi Hendricks

Singing is a way of escaping. It’s another world. I’m no longer on earth. - Edith Piaf

The Indian knew how to live without wants, to suffer without complaint, and to die singing.
Alexis de Tocqueville

People ask me where I got my singing style. I didn’t copy my style from anybody.
Elvis Presley

I like to sing ballads the way Eddie Fisher does and the way Perry Como does. But the way I’m singing now is what makes the money.
Elvis Presley

Anybody singing the blues is in a deep pit yelling for help.
Mahalia Jackson

Time is important to me because I want to sing long enough to leave a message. I’m used to singing in churches where nobody would dare stop me until the Lord arrives!
Mahalia Jackson

That was the big thing when I was growing up, singing on the radio. The extent of my dream was to sing on the radio station in Memphis. Even when I got out of the Air Force in 1954, I came right back to Memphis and started knocking on doors at the radio station.
Johnny Cash

Singing has always seemed to me the most perfect means of expression. It is so spontaneous. And after singing, I think the violin. Since I cannot sing, I paint.
Georgia O’Keeffe

Singing is the love of my life, but I was ready to give it all up because I couldn’t handle people talking about how fat I was.
Stevie Nicks

Read more: http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/keywords/singing.html#ixzz1dDye8uB0

A friend of mine is struggling with a break-up. This once-considerate man she dated suddenly seems like a real creep, ignoring her and distancing himself from her as if she were a stranger. She’s mad, hurt. She doesn’t want to remember him like this. She wants someone to be gentle with her feelings even while parting.

A mentor of hers suggested this technique: remember the most loving moments you felt with that person. Feel them completely, to the depth of your bones. Relive them. Feel the natural pain that comes along with letting go of someone you felt so strongly about. Remember the love and let it lead the way to healing.

I also suggested she recognize that everyone has the right to handle separation their own way. Because someone is distancing themselves doesn’t necessarily mean he or she has no feelings for you. Everyone is allowed to cope in their own way and each way should be respected, even if you can only muster a little bit of it. Someone people open up and release emotions during a difficult time while others retract or reject the feelings they may be experiencing.

Remembering love when you’re angry is no easy task; this isn’t spacey new age advice meant as an emotional placebo. It simply means, amidst your pain and anger, remembering the goodness of a loved one and allowing that to move the process forward.

Besides, we are never truly separated. Our relationships, on one plane or the other, go on and on and on and on and on….

Over the years, I’ve heard more and more people talk about the difficulty in adjusting to Daylight Savings Time. It’s as if we’ve become more sensitive to it. Some wonder why we break up our time cycle like this at all. But it is what it is, so here are a few pointers on how to adjust found in Gimundo this week.

(For me, exercise early in the day is key. Get that big blast of sunshine and take off the sunglasses sometimes!)

1) Use light therapy. Michael Terman, the director of the Center for Light Treatment and Biological Rhythms at Columbia University Medical Center, claims that using a lightbox first thing in the morning, or visiting a light therapist, can help your body adjust to changing sleep patterns and provide an energy boost. “And it has direct antidepressant properties, stimulating the same neurotransmitters as antidepressant medications,” he told Time.
2) Exercise. Regular exercise at a set time of day can help create a healthy habit. Ongoing aerobic workouts have been proven to reduce depression, so don’t make excuses: Hit the gym or a walking trail each morning for an all-day mood boost.
3) Get a massage. Booking a session with a local masseuse isn’t a luxury: It’s a proven way to treat depression. Massage can decrease the stress hormone cortisol, while increasing levels of serotonin.
4) Drink your coffee. A recent analysis from the Nurses’ Health Study discovered that women who drink more than four cups of coffee a day were 20 percent less likely to become depressed than women who drank less. So, if daylight savings is getting you down, an extra shot of espresso might be just the ticket to get you back on track.
5) Eat more seafood. Seafood such as salmon and sardines are rich in Omega-3s, which have positive effects on depression. A nutritional supplement called SAM-e can also provide a mood boost; talk to your doctor for tips on naturally treating the blues.

What’s positive about jealousy, you ask? Lots, believe it or not. All of our feelings have lessons lurking inside. Jealousy may feel uncomfortable but it may indicate something that you feel is genuinely lacking in your life, or the love you feel for someone, or insecurity issues that remain unresolved. Here’s what the experts have to say:

A competent and self-confident person is incapable of jealousy in anything. Jealousy is invariably a symptom of neurotic insecurity.
Robert A. Heinlein

A negative judgment gives you more satisfaction than praise, provided it smacks of jealousy.
Jean Baudrillard

Anger and jealousy can no more bear to lose sight of their objects than love.
George Eliot

Back then I didn’t think a woman like that, or a relationship like that, could exist with complete freedom and no jealousy or possessiveness. I thought it sounded too good to be true and I was certainly convinced it wasn’t the life for me!
Sylvia Kristel

Don’t waste time on jealousy. Sometimes you’re ahead, sometimes you’re behind.
Mary Schmich

From heresy, frenzy and jealousy, good Lord deliver me.
Ludovico Ariosto

I do not say anything from jealousy.
Anna Held

It is not love that is blind, but jealousy.
Lawrence Durrell

It’s amazing the clarity that comes with psychotic jealousy.
Rupert Everett

Jealousy - that jumble of secret worship and ostensible aversion.
Emile M. Cioran

Jealousy contains more of self-love than of love.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld

Jealousy is a dog’s bark which attracts thieves.
Karl Kraus

Jealousy is all the fun you think they had.
Erica Jong

Jealousy is both reasonable and belongs to reasonable men, while envy is base and belongs to the base, for the one makes himself get good things by jealousy, while the other does not allow his neighbour to have them through envy.
Aristotle

Jealousy is bred in doubts. When those doubts change into certainties, then the passion either ceases or turns absolute madness.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld

Jealousy is cruel as the grave: the coals thereof are coals of fire.
Solomon Ibn Gabirol

Jealousy would be far less torturous if we understood that love is a passion entirely unrelated to our merits.
Paul Eldridge

Jealousy, that dragon which slays love under the pretense of keeping it alive.
Henry Ellis

Jealousy… is a mental cancer.
B. C. Forbes

Life is one big road with lots of signs. So when you riding through the ruts, don’t complicate your mind. Flee from hate, mischief and jealousy. Don’t bury your thoughts, put your vision to reality. Wake Up and Live!
Bob Marley

Read more: http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/keywords/jealousy.html#ixzz1cYGqMHLR