Happiness Formulas

Imitation love is anything we substitute for the unconditional love lacking in our lives. This usually takes the form of power, pleasure, safety, and praise. Our addiction to imitation love keeps us alone and unhappy. Learn more from Dr. Greg Baer, M.D., a nationally recognized relationship expert at reallove.com. What is imitation love? On the other hand, anger is a very common condition, so common that we have come to accept it as almost normal. More>>

What is "imitation love"?

• Letting the Relationship Die
• Can others make us angry?

Happiness Formulas (FREE eBook)
(PRNewswire) To celebrate the "Summer of Happiness 2010," the Institute of Subjective Well-Being released a free eBook today, summarizing scientific research about happiness, how to measure and improve it. It describes several formulas for subjective well-being and advocates why understanding happiness requires a paradigm shift.

• Trying to find happiness on "The Hills": "This is what I chose, and there's nothing I can take back" - Heidi Montag (crying)
• "The Hills" ends with admission: It's all fake

Perfectionists: Researchers say they die sooner
(CBS) Maybe anti-perfectionist Homer Simpson will have the last laugh, if psychiatrists who are studying the positive and deleterious of perfectionism are right. It seems that being highly critical of yourself and others may cause such high levels of stress and anxiety that you are at a higher risk of early death than people who take it easy. "D'oh!"

Slackers, take heart!
Don’t work too hard! Perfectionists have an increased risk of premature death, according to research reported in LiveScience.com (via Msnbc.com).

• Shocking; Mother imprisoned for sex with teenage son
• Fears grow as millions of Americans lose jobless benefits
• Animal activists move into mainstream with slew of new laws

The Worst Breakup

Heidi Montag crying (socialitelife.celebuzz.com)

Life involves suffering. (That is, all conditioned formations are unsatisfactory and liable to alteration and unhappiness). This doesn't mean life is nothing but suffering, as some like to misunderstand, just that conditioned existence is incapable of fulfilling its promise to fulfill us.

It is unsatisfactory. That's what Spencer Pratt found out too late. We try to fight the inevitable truths, the Marks of Existence: impermanence, suffering, and egolessness. We get married.

We become attached in our resistance. We even have children as insurance to stave off the impossible possibility: It isn't real, it will not last, and we will be dissatisfied for having approached life in ignorance. Reality asserts itself. Heidi is leaving.

What can be done, can anything be done? Sure, a great deal can be done. We can communicate. We can treat ourselves and other people well. We are not "victims" of life. These are our present-actions (karma) playing themselves out, not our past-actions (phala or fruit). What is our purpose? What are we doing? Are we en-acting by deliberate intent or just re-acting?

Eckhart Tolle: automatic thinking and acting

Reality star Heidi says she's had it with husband Spence, and she's filed official papers for separation. They were only married a year. The reason? The same reason as always: irreconcilable differences. Will Spencer fight it? Was there a pre-nup? He has a month to get answers from her and decide. It's only a separation and needn't go to divorce.

"The filing comes just days after Montag reportedly moved out of the home she shared with her husband, whom she married in an elaborate Pasadena church wedding, taped for 'The Hills'..." Story

• PHOTOS: Heidi Montag and Spencer Pratt
• Heidi Montag was "addicted and obsessed"
• World's oldest leather shoe discovered - Heidi wants it

Web Buzz: UFO, Colby Curtin, Zicam

Colby Curtin, UFOs in Australia, pharmceutical Zicam's side effects

Some weeks of Internet Buzz are thrilling, others inspiring. However, the past week was filled with surprising news: UFO abductions are rampant in Australia; a child dying of cancer asked for (and received) a private screening of Pixar's "Up"; and the nasal spray you've been may have taken away your sense of smell.

• AUSTRALIA - A rash of alleged UFO abductions are striking Down Under.
• Something stinks in the Pharmaceutical Industry

Particularly when a chemical companies claim to make homeopathic products. So when will companies learn to stop trying to cure the common cold? Perhaps now after the FDA charged Matrixx, the makers of Zicam, with selling a product that robbed people of their sense of smell. Matrixx called the claim "unwarranted." But the news caused a shockwave as searches roared on "zicam side effects," "zicam recall," and "loss of smell zicam." An article from CNN Money explains that because Zicam was classified as a homeopathic remedy, it was able to be marketed without "government oversight." Perhaps that loophole will soon be closed?

• A child's last wish

10-year-old Colby Curtin died of cancer this week, but before she passed away, her final wish was fulfilled. The child had desperately wanted to see the new Pixar movie, "Up." Unfortunately, she was too ill to go to the theater. According to various articles within the Buzz, Pixar was told of Colby's illness. The company sent a representative to deliver a DVD for Colby to watch in her room. Though she could no longer see, her mother narrated the action. Colby died several hours after the movie ended, and searches on "up movie make a wish" and "colby curtin up" both soared.

Also buzzing this week...

• Al Roker took it to the Spencer Pratt and Heidi Montag on "The Today Show."

• The highly anticipated, if awkwardly named, iPhone 3G S hit store shelves.

• Slideshow