Wait your turn!

Take what vaccine comes your way first!

I’ve kept my mouth shut thru the entire COVID crisis, not one post. Today is my day. 

In order for the WORLD to kick the COVID  19 virus and prepare for the next killer virus, 70-80% of the world population has to take the vaccine to stamp it out! That’s a TON of vaccines. That’s a TON of science behind creating a vaccine in under 10 years. It’s a TON, a logistic nightmare that is not managed in a central process under a standard set of rules.

Each state, county, and city can do their own processes, they are given guidance by the CDC, which by the way is the leading scientific organization we have in America, but each entity who thinks they know better can serve the vaccines as they wish.

I know you’ve heard all this information in bits every day but the bottom line is there are so many moving parts and time is still only 24 hours in a day. We have several promising vaccines and possibly one getting approval this week. We still need millions and millions of doses and companies and time to make enough for everyone to get a vaccine.

Why am I stating the obvious, I just need to vent. There are people who truly need the vaccine first, and even if you don’t or I don’t agree, which may be on a number of issues, there are some clear lines. Even with what I see are clear lines, my state, county, and city may not administer exactly as I would prioritize. That is life!

Dr. Fuchi has made it clear when he thinks we will all have a chance to get vaccinated, there are logistic hurdles in there beyond his control but I buy into his theory that by the end of this year everyone that wants a vaccine will have a chance to get one. Last week I heard him say a much more aggressive timeframe but I’m not buying into or repeating that one. I work hard to deliver no FAKE news here.

Everyone will get a shot, we have to wait our turn and realize science is already working at warped speed and our day will come.

If you’ve already received your shot, Thank GOD! You’re a good American and a smart person. I look forward to my day, I’m on the High-Risk list but no vaccine has been available to me yet. I will be in line with pride, with my MASK ON to take my shot and kick COVID 19 in the ass.

Melinda

We regularly think of our home as one big building. We tend not to even think of our gardens as being truly part of the property per se. This is because it’s easy to become more attached to the space that we live in day after day than the space that we hardly visit. This could be solved by sitting in our gardens for more times of the year but that’s not the issue that is being looked at. We are going to focus on what types of outdoor living structures could be best for your home and why? It’s quite simple. We want to look at the cost of building, space and leisure as well as style.

Garden home

A garden home is separate from the home. It’s not attached (usually) and it can be styled in a totally different way to your main property. It’s usually for guests as it will provide one bedroom, a small kitchen that is probably linked to the living room. It makes sense to have an open plan for this just so there is a feeling of more space. It should be seen as about half or maybe two-thirds of the space that a normal ground floor would provide. But what can you do about it? Well, it’s best used as an extra space that can be converted into a different kind of space when needed. It can be a game or entertainment area. Maybe it could be a play area for your small children, or maybe, a guest room. 

An annexe

An annexe is linked to the main home. This means it will have a hall or corridor that allows the occupant to enter the home directly, from the annexe. Many people might not understand why this is so, but when you see this granny annexe explanation, you’ll understand why. It helps older people to essentially move into your home, without actually, living inside it. They will have their own bedroom, kitchen, bathroom or shower but they won’t have a lounge area or dining room. Usually, this kind of property may cost anywhere from about £5,000 to £30,000. However, the living conditions are excellent and there is a separation that you can create, physically, so you have privacy and space for yourself.

Cabin option

The next best option aside from these two is the log cabin. This is great for properties that are by waterfronts such as lakes, rivers, or streams. But it can also double as a cabin for a home that is in the forest or countryside. It’s cheap to build as the materials are essential, insulation in themselves. Logs don’t need insulation like a normal house with hollow walls does. To build a cabin, it might cost anywhere from £5,000 to £15,000. It provides space for one or two people. It can be a two-story building or just a bungalow.

What is your favorite type of outdoor property? We think that space and leisure are a delicate balance, but the cost always plays the deciding role.

This is a collaborative post.

Melinda

Hereditary 

The most common reason for hair loss is genetics. If you have a history of hair loss in your family, it is more likely that you will lose your hair. 

This is known as pattern baldness, both male and female. It will often start slowly and in patterns, such as thinning hair and bald spots at the crown or a receding hairline. Most of the time, people who have a family history of baldness will expect hair loss, but this doesn’t make the initial occurrences much easier to confront. 

Stress 

Just like stress can cause your hair to turn gray, it can also contribute to hair loss. Too much stress leads to your hair thinning out, and you will usually find it most frequently when washing your hair in the bath or shower. 

Such stress can come from a traumatic event, and the hair loss symptoms will usually last for at least a few months after. However, the good news is that this is usually temporary. 

Treatments, Shampoos, Products

Some hair treatments, such as certain hairstyles or products you use in your hair can also contribute to hair loss. The more strain your hair is put under, the less healthy it becomes, and this can cause the hair follicles to fail, causing your hair to fall out. 

Chemicals can also impact the thickness of your hair, but like stress, this can be temporary is you catch it early enough. If you experience hair loss after changing shampoos or testing new products, go back to your previous products to see if there is a difference or consider searching for PRP (Platelet Rich Plasma) treatment to help slow and stop hair loss. 

Medical Conditions

Hair loss can also happen as a reaction to certain illnesses and medications, such as cancer, arthritis, and depression. Often, this is a side effect of medication you take for the illness, although the stress of the sickness can also be a factor. 

There are also medical conditions like alopecia related to your immune system and leads to hair falling out in patches, ringworm, a scalp infection, or even chronic hair pulling, a disorder also known as trichotillomania. 

Is Your Hair Tied To Your Identity

For anyone who considers their hair part of their identity, suddenly losing hair can make you feel entirely unlike yourself. It can cause stress, lack of confidence, and affect your mental wellbeing. However, if you can understand why you are losing your hair, you can come to terms with it more comfortably and even consider ways to prevent or halt losing more hair. 

This is a collaborative post.

Melinda

IDEAS.TED.COM

Feb 9, 2021 / Briar Goldberg

This post is part of TED’s “How to Be a Better Human” series, each of which contains a piece of helpful advice from people in the TED community; browse through all the posts here. 

Here we are, over a month into 2021 and I’m feeling cautiously optimistic.

I’m hoping that we’ll soon be able to enjoy some of the simple, daily routines we took for granted before the pandemic.  But — and I hate to break it to you — there’s one 2020 routine that appears to be sticking around for the long haul: Virtual presentations.

I’m the Director of Speaker Coaching at TED, and before I joined TED, I was an executive communication coach and speechwriter. I’m telling you this because for me, this shift to virtual presentations is a hilarious career irony. I’ve spent so many years hating on webinars and begging the speakers and executives I’ve coached to avoid video communications whenever possible.

But virtual meetings, speeches, presentations and conferences are, in fact, the new normal. So if that’s the way it’s going to be, let’s do our future audiences a favor and polish up our virtual communication skills.

Even though so many of us have been spending so much time on Zoom in recent months, I’ve noticed there are some common mistakes that people — even experienced communicators — are still making. Here they are, along with my favorite tips and tricks to fix them all.

Mistake #1: Not enough eye contact with the audience 

The fix: Look at your camera, not your screen

We’ve all heard that eye contact is important. But do you know why? Direct eye contact can influence your audience’s perception of your credibility, trustworthiness, even your ability to lead.  But most importantly, your audience will try harder to stay focused if you appear expressive and look them in the eye. In the great battle for attention between you and your audience’s Insta feed, eye contact is one weapon that could tip the scales in your favor.

The only way to make eye contact with your virtual audience is to look directly at the lens of your camera. Trust me: This will feel really strange at first, because we’re used to looking at our screens during video calls so we can see what everyone else is doing (and see how we look). But if you want your audience to remain engaged and attentive, you’ll need to sacrifice your own desire to look at their faces.

My general rule is to keep your eyes on the lens 90 percent of the time and use the remaining 10 percent to look around and make sure your audience is smiling and following what you’re saying. To understand the difference — which is subtle but significant — check out these two photos:

Mistake #2: Vocal monotony 

The fix: Make sure there’s variety in your voice  

When we talk to our friends and family, there’s a lot of natural variety in the speed, volume, pitch and inflection in our voices. That variety is really important, because it adds context and meaning to our words — and it adds interest and drama.

But when we’re nervous or reading from our notes, we can often lose that variety. This can be a big problem in a virtual setting where the other non-verbal cues that add context, such as hand gestures and facial expressions, are harder to see.

One way to inject vocal variety into your virtual presentation — or any presentation, for that matter — is to use words and phrases that feel comfortable to you. Practicing beforehand also helps ensure your voice maintains its natural spontaneity, and even just one out-loud rehearsal can make you feel less nervous and less dependent on your notes.

Mistake #3: Winging it or reading from your notes 

The fix: Rehearse in advance 

Speaking of practice … yes, you still have to practice even though you’re presenting over Zoom. As a communicator, your number-one priority should be your audience’s experience — regardless of the setting. And you can’t focus on their experience if you’re too busy thinking about what to say next or fumbling with your script.

Think about it this way: Your audience is taking time out of their busy days to listen to you. So the very least you can do to honor their time is to practice a little in advance. Just because you could turn your laptop or your phone into a teleprompter doesn’t mean you should. 

Mistake #4: Going overboard on slides 

The fix: Use your slides effectively 

As we all know, it’s so easy to get distracted when watching a virtual presentation. So when you’re speaking virtually, you want to do everything in your power to keep your audience’s eyes on you and off of their phones. One way to do this is to make sure you’re using slides effectively.

Remember, you’re the main event: Only use slides if they will actually help your audience better understand what you’re presenting. While this is true when you’re speaking in person, I’d argue it’s even more important over video. If your entire presentation is slides — and the audience can’t see your face — they’ll feel less accountable and off to Instagram they’ll go!

Simplify, simplify, simplify: If your audience is forced to make a choice between reading a dense slide or listening to you speak, they’ll go for reading almost every time. In order to maintain control of your presentation, you should limit the amount of information you put on each of your slides. Yes, you’ll have more slides, but they’ll be easy to digest, so that’s OK.

Practice the technical aspects too: Before your virtual speech or presentation, rehearse toggling in and out of “share screen” mode so your slides won’t be projected throughout your entire presentation. Because eye contact helps your audience stay focused, you want your face front and center as much as possible.

Use black slides: Sometimes you’ll have several slides that you want to share in a short amount of time, which means toggling back to full video isn’t an option. However, keeping an old slide up could be distracting. In these cases, here’s a pro-tip: Add blank, black slides in between your content slides so you can essentially click to black and get the audience to refocus on your voice. I prefer black slides to white slides, because black makes it look like you’ve intentionally turned off the slide-sharing feature.

Mistake #5: Inviting your audience to look at all the titles on your bookshelf 

The fix: Choose a non-distracting background 

I’ll be the first to admit how much I’ve enjoyed peeking into so many different people’s homes as a result of virtual meetings. But I’ll be honest, I do have concerns about how many people sit in front of their bookshelves  so it ends up being their background.

If your goal is to keep our audience engaged and focused, you want to make sure your background isn’t accidentally distracting. At the same time, sitting in front of a plain white wall looks a little bleak. If possible, select a background that’s familiar but not too busy. If sitting in front of a bookshelf is your only option, consider sitting a little further away so you’ll still have a colorful background but your audience won’t be able to read the titles while you’re speaking.

Mistake #6: Lighting that’s too bright or too dark 

The fix: Sit in the right spot in your room  

A little lighting can go a long way towards making you look polished and prepared when speaking to a virtual audience. While there are many great lighting products and devices you can buy, you don’t have to spend money to light yourself well.

The key is to make sure your primary source of light is directly behind your camera, throwing light on your face. So you might choose to position yourself in front of a window or a lamp or both. Here are a few photos of the lighting setup that I use when I teach TEDTrainings from my living room.

I face the window and the lamp, and then I use the fireplace as my background

Mistake #7: Letting everyone turn off their video 

The fix: Encouraging your audience to stay on camera

There are a handful of communication truths that I’ve been preaching my entire career, and one of them is that I believe it’s always the speaker’s responsibility to keep the audience engaged. If the audience’s attention starts to wane, it’s on the speaker to adjust.

But virtual speaking adds a little wrinkle to my belief — as a virtual communicator, it’s often  impossible to know if your audience is paying attention when you can’t see them! So, in Zoom land, it’s 100 percent OK for you to ask your audience to turn on their cameras. And if you want to be very polite, send a note asking for on-camera attendance in advance. That way, your audience can plan!

Speaking of being polite, we can also choose to show up on camera when we’re in the audience. You would never show up to an in-person meeting with a paper bag on your head, but it seems that in our new virtual normal, many of us feel pretty comfortable showing up incognito.  So why don’t we make a little pact right now?  Since virtual communications are here to stay, let’s all agree to be on camera as often as possible when we’re a member of a virtual audience.  That way, when it’s our turn to present, we’ll be able to see everyone’s messy homes and pandemic hair without having to ask.

Here’s to hoping that sooner rather than later, we’ll all find ourselves fending off stomach butterflies backstage before we speak in front of real, live, in-person audiences. But until then, I’m wishing you the best of luck in all of your virtual speeches, presentations, meetings and cocktail hours.

Watch this TED-Ed Lesson on effective rhetoric: 

Watch this TED Talk from Julian Treasure: 

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Briar Goldberg is the Director of Speaker Coaching at TED. 

Thinking of moving into a new relationship after a split is a great feeling. But, first, consider the status of the family assets from the broken marriage. You will need to sign a prenup for the children before getting into another relationship.

To attain family peace, have this contract to ease financial pressure, know how to handle the kids in the new formation, and for alimony settlement. Getting into a new marriage without an agreement could paralyze the relationship before it even starts.

Here are few tips to consider when going for a prenuptial agreement:

Be Keen During the Negotiations

Before getting into marriage, you need to be honest in all open discussions relating to finances and liabilities. And, highlighting your financial expectation from the partner is essential. You should ask the partner if they’re willing to sign the agreement. 

You never know; some people are easily offended by the idea, not to mention the document itself. Often such people perceive it as a lack of trust. For this reason, this is a delicate topic that requires a lot of caution. If the partner isn’t willing, know what to do and remember that the agreement doesn’t have security in removing separation court battles. 

Have Compassion

Even though you desire to get into another relationship, understanding your partner is essential. Prenuptial agreements are strict, and once this discussion comes to the table, don’t get hurt by your lover’s suggestions.  

 Know the Power Imbalances

Most prenup agreements come into being when one partner has more property or assets than the fiancée. In most cases, it shows an imbalance during the negotiation process. And you can use divorce solicitors to help you in case you’ve kids with the property shares. 

You can settle the imbalance with straight talks – openly discuss the leverage and power disparities for amicable understanding. If done the right way, the final agreement document won’t be coercive but rather good. 

Understand that prenups vary

Ideally, these types of agreements are necessary when you’re getting into a marriage with assets and properties made before the partner’s existence. So, you have to agree on how to plan everything and so forth. 

It’s not necessary if both of you own nothing. You can plan with your partner on sharing expenses.

Consider Mediation

When signing a prenup, a mediator is inevitable. You can consider bringing a divorce mediator on board to help with vital information. These people have vast experiences and knowledge on what contributes to a marriage failure and the successful ones. 

In most cases, people sign the agreement to help if a divorce arises, making divorce mediators the best professionals for the task. They will help you determine solutions on how to share the assets or properties when a split strikes. 

While these tips place you in a better position of signing a prenuptial agreement, you must also consider a professional mediator’s input in the process. You wouldn’t want to carry the burden of overlooking the expert input aspect.

Besides, you can search through and find the best advice fitting your situation with the partner. From there, please consult a professional to help you in signing this vital life document.

This is a collaborative post.

Melinda

How To Find The Luxury Home Of Your Dreams

https://unsplash.com/photos/KtOid0FLjqU

We all have a dream home in mind. Even if you don’t exactly know what it looks like, that’s okay. Most of us just know that there’s a certain style of home or caliber of property that we’re aspiring to. Whether it’s something that you want to start thinking about now, or it’s a property that you want to work towards in the future. It’s nice to know exactly what you’ll need to do to be able to make it happen.

If you’ve ever bought a property before, you’ll find that you know what the process is like. It can take time. You may spend months or years trying to find the right place. Or maybe you’re just not sure how to find it. Let’s take a look at what you can do to find the luxury home of your dreams.

Work With An Agent

First of all, you might want to think about working with a specialist to help you here. You may find that working with the best real estate agents is going to be the key. They know the market the best and they may even know about houses for sale that aren’t listed yet. This could be the simplest option to start with.

Find An Area You Love

From here, you might want to think about finding an area that you really love. It might be the case that there are certain luxury apartment communities that you know about and want to explore. Knowing the area is always a good start. So this is important to keep in mind.

Build It Yourself

It could even be that you decide that you want to find the house of your dreams by building it yourself. Sometimes, you just won’t find the house you want already out there. Or maybe you are inspired by a range of properties you’ve seen and you want to combine the things you love? When you build your dream home, you get to bring everything you want together for all the modern conveniences you desire. So this might be the option for you.

Make An Offer

Sometimes, you don’t find your perfect home through the traditional route at all. It could be that you actually know which home you want to live in. Maybe it’s in your area or you’ve seen it before. It could be that it’s not actually for sale. But sometimes, you can actually reach out to the owners and make an offer. It’s obviously not the traditional thing to do, but it happens and there is no reason why you can’t ask. Sometimes it will mean that you get to live in the house you’ve always wanted to.

Final Thoughts

Searching for a luxury home isn’t always a quick process. When you have high standards and you know what you’re looking for, it can take time to find the right place. But with one of these options, you should be able to find your perfect luxury home.

This is a collaborative post.

Melinda

3 Things to Consider in a Legal Separation

Did you know that for you and your spouse to be considered legally separated, you should have been living apart for six months? Additionally, while pursuing a separation, there should be no possibility of reconciliation. With 50% of marriages in the United States ending in separation and divorce, it helps to arm yourself with some knowledge on what this entails. Read further to find out the things to consider when seeking a legal separation.

Child visitation and custody

Image Credit

Although it’s a legal separation, the law demands that both parents decide on custody agreements and child visitation rights. Regardless of the circumstances behind the marriage’s breakdown, your young children (under 18 years) should come first in this decision-making process, primarily for their mental and emotional well-being. No matter how low the marriage has sunk, your utmost concern should be creating a stable and balanced family for the kids in question. You should always try to make your children feel safe and secure in every situation.

Remember also that whatever you agree to concern child custody can continue to remain so when the divorce is finally granted, the only exception being when there’s irrefutable proof or evidence of one partner being abusive. In other cases, when a party has a criminal record that bars him or her from getting full custody of kids (biological or adopted), the court can grant supervised visitations.

Hire qualified legal representation

Indeed, the procedures, processes, and countless paperwork necessary in legal separations are complex. It can be an arduous emotional and mental journey getting through with each stage. With the associated stress and emotional torture that comes with it, you’ll find it worthwhile to seek a qualified family law attorney. Most importantly, your lawyer can represent you in court, which can save you countless courthouse sessions.

If you’re already on the lookout for such help, you can Google “divorce solicitors Manchester” and reputable firms such as Bannister Preston will be among the results. They are a group of lawyers with decades of experience in family law with trusted solutions for your legal challenges. Getting useful legal advice and representation in a trying period such as this can help smoothen the process. As already indicated in earlier paragraphs, legal separation can be intense, and you need experienced hands to help you set the right plan in motion.

Create an asset inventory

Image Credit

This is one of the essential parts of any legal separation and divorce. Dividing assets is a stage every couple seeking separation and divorce will arrive at, at some point. Make a rough list of properties (moveable and unmoveable) you own, ranging from houses, land, bank accounts to vehicles.

Everything both parties own should be listed and valued appropriately, as this is usually the stage notable for contention during the legal separation and divorce proceedings. It’s better to declare everything you both own as a couple to avoid any further strife.

Separation and divorce are not things people willingly look forward to. Unfortunately, circumstances leading to the total breakdown of the marriage may bring couples to this point.

So, assuming you have no choice but to go down this path, make sure it’s done within the confines of the law.

This is a collaborative post.

Melinda

IDEAS.TED.COM

Feb 8, 2021 / Carol Bruess PhD

Maria Medem

Have you ever been asked “What’s your love language?” 

Chances are, you have. Because the concept — first created by counselor and pastor Gary Chapman, unpacked in a series of books, and picked up by many others — has spread far and wide. The five love languages refer to the five simple ways that we want love to be shown to us and the ways that we show others love.

I’m a relationship researcher, and while I haven’t empirically studied the love languages concept, other academics have. Some of the published studiesconfirm the validity of love languages, revealing they can increase people’s relationship satisfaction and longevity.

What I find so helpful about love languages is that they express a basic truth. Implicit to the concept is a common-sense idea: We don’t feel or experience love in the same way. Some of us will only be content when we hear the words “I love you,” some prize quality time together, while some will feel most cared for when our partner scrubs the toilet.

In this way, love is a bit like a country’s currency: One coin or bill has great value in a particular country, less value in the countries that border it, and zero value in many other countries. In relationships, it’s essential to learn the emotional currency of the humans we hold dear and identifying their love language is part of it.

No matter your situation — whether you’re living alone, spending 24/7 with a partner or roommates, living with adult kids or steering younger kids through virtual school —  the five love languages are a highly effective set of tools to have in your relational toolkit. When we know what another person’s love language is, we can choose the gestures that will most resonate with our partner, friend, parent or child. And when we know which actions speak make us feel loved, we can ask other people for exactly what we need.

While there are plenty of online quizzes to tell you what your love language is, it’s easy to figure out yours and what your loved ones’ are by looking at what lights them up, what presents they give you (since many of us bestow on others what we would most like), and what their perfect day would look and feel like.

Here’s a look at the five languages and how they can be applied and optimized — even during a pandemic.

Love language #1: Words of affirmation

Those of us whose love language is words of affirmation prize verbal connection. They want to hear you say precisely what you appreciate or admire about them. For example: “I really loved it when you made dinner last night”; “Wow, it was so nice of you to organize that neighborhood bonfire”; or just “I love you.”

For the people in your life that you’re not seeing in person because of the pandemic, you could film a short video to send them. My kindergarten-aged goddaughter and I haven’t been together  in 7+ months, but we text each other silly videos of us saying — or even singing — what we miss most about each other.

And for the people you are seeing all of the time these days, remember that even making tiny gestures matters. This is my primary love language, and my husband of 29 years knows it. I’ll often wake up and go into the kitchen to find a sweet post-it note next to a glass of ice water on the counter (which is another love language — an act of service).

Love language #2: Acts of service

Some of us feel most loved when others lend a helping hand or do something kind for us. A friend of mine is currently going through chemotherapy and radiation, putting her at high risk for COVID-19 and other infections. Knowing that her love language is acts of service, a group of neighbor friends snuck over under the cover of darkness in December and filled her flower pots in front of her house with holiday flowers and sprigs. Others have committed to shoveling her driveway all winter. (It’s Minnesota, so that’s big love.)

In your home, you could be proactive and do something that eases your person’s daily grind. Why not take on the chore that everyone avoids doing, whether that’s cleaning the oven, changing the litter box, scraping ice off the car, or filling and running the dishwasher? For anyone whose love tank is filled up by people pitching in, seeing someone intentionally scanning the environment to figure out what they can do to make their environment better sends a clear and loving message to them.

Love language #3: Gifts

Those of us whose love language is gifts aren’t necessarily materialistic. Instead, their tanks are filled when someone presents them with a specific thing, tangible or intangible, that helps them feel special. Yes, truly, it’s the thought that counts.

When you’re out grabbing groceries for your family, pick up your roommate’s favorite kombucha or seltzer and drop it by their door. Our daughter — whose love language is gifts — is a junior in college and we know she’ll adore what’s in the box soon to arrive in the mail: a small package covered in valentine stickers and containing her favorite chocolates, gift cards for coffee and a framed picture of our family dogs, Fred and George. It’s an act of love that will fill her mailbox and her emotional bank account.

Love language #4: Quality time

Having another person’s undivided, dedicated attention is precious currency for the people whose love language is quality time. In a time of COVID-19 and quarantining, spending quality time together can seem challenging. But thanks to technology, it’s actually one of the easiest to engage in.

Make an intentional effort to have Zoom coffee dates with the colleagues you’ve been missing, or go on distanced walks with your in-laws. Put a good old fashioned phone call each week on the calendar with your best friend, or schedule an in-house date night with your partner or spouse — no phones or “I’m just going to turn on the TV for a second” distractions allowed. Nothing says “I love you” in quality time language better than them being the only thing on your agenda.

Love language #5: Physical touch

Expressing the language of physical touch can be as platonic as giving a friend an enthusiastic fist-bump when she tells you about landing an interview for a dream job or as intimate as a kiss with your partner to mark the end of the workday.

I know that for some parents with young children, spending too much time in the same small space has created a rub — literally. They’d do anything to have fewer people touching them fewer hours of the day. At the same time, for those living alone or those self-isolating because of their exposure or health risks, they’re experiencing the painful opposite: a lack of touch.

While there are no easy solutions for either case, we can get creative. If you know someone who’s overwhelmed by the small hands reaching for them, you might offer to take the kids to a park so they can run off some of their energy. For loved ones who are touch-deprived, try emailing them an outline of your hand and instruct them to lay their hand on the image while imagining your hand on theirs. Even thinking about a warm embrace — something you can do by texting friends and family members with the hug or hugging face emoji and telling you wish you could be doing this in person — can cause their brain to produce some of the same endorphins as an actual hug would.

Love languages are a worthwhile concept to become fluent in during this pandemic time — and at this time in the world. Long before COVID arrived on the scene, we were already living through an epidemic of loneliness. Loneliness is not just about being alone; it’s about experiencing a lack of satisfying emotional connections. By taking the time to learn each other’s love languages and then using them, we can strengthen our relationships and our bonds to others.

Watch Carol Bruess’s TEDxMinneapolisSalon Talk here: https://www.youtube.com/embed/oOnl76UqUcw?version=3&rel=1&showsearch=0&showinfo=1&iv_load_policy=1&fs=1&hl=en-US&autohide=2&wmode=transparent

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Carol Bruess PhD Carol Bruess (rhymes with “peace”) is professor emeritus at the University of St. Thomas, Minnesota; resident scholar at St. Norbert College, Wisconsin; and forever passionate about studying and improving relationships. She is fluent in emoji, loves parentheticals (it’s what all the cool kids are doing), and is happy-dancing her way through empty-nesting (although don’t tell her kids; they think she’s all weepy). Check out her five books and sewing/design shenanigans over at http://www.carolbruess.com