What effect is your smart phone having on your life?

Smart Phone Zombie

Hey you, 'Smart Phone Zombie',
Here's some advice for free:
A life in cyberspace,
Is a shocking disgrace.
Tonight there's a local dance,
Where you can find true romance;
Someone you can embrace,
With a real human face.

That screen is far too bright,
To let you sleep at night,
Don't put up with those alerts,
Or attacks by pop-up adverts.
You look far too stressed,
So give that phone a rest.
Don't let it heat up your brain,
Or give you eye strain.
Why tell everyone where you are,
Or risk crashing your car?
Now, get off that machine,
It hypnotizes with its screen!

STOP, don't you dare take that selfie,
You're obsessed and it's not healthy.
You'd gain hours each day,
If you just threw it away.
No wonder you're depressed,
Your life needs more zest.
Forget about your email,
Find fresh air to inhale.
TURN OFF that google app,
Here, try this paper map,
Climb to the top of that hill,
See a world that's not digital.
COME ON, be SMART,
Make a new start.
There's no need to be,
A 'Smart Phone Zombie.'

This poem is a bit cheeky as I tried to copy the style of Roald Dahl's 'Television'

http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/smart-phone-zombie/

Notes about cartoons:

The machine with a face of a duck is a popcorn maker I use frequently. Beside it is a candy floss machine. We enjoy eating pancakes frequently in our house.

Converting an ordinary household table into a ping pong table is pretty easy. For a net I use household objects of the right sort of height - they add a bit of spice to the game if there are gaps or funny shapes...

In the background are family photos of happy times. They are in a prominent place to remind everyone in the house of these occasions. It is amazing how beneficial such positive reminders are. 

http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/happy-times-in-prominent-places/)

The Healing Power of Stories (in Cartoon form)

Milton Erickson (1901-1980) was a famous psychologist, psychiatrist and hypno-therapist who believed in the 'healing power of stories'. I first read Milton Erickson's 'My Voice Will Go With You: Teaching Tales of Milton H.Erickson' whilst training to be a General Practitioner over 10 years ago.

The idea that I could heal my patients with stories without them even being aware intrigued me. The more examples I read, the more I became convinced of the power of our sub-conscious over our lives. Since then I have always tried to tell my patients the 'right' sort of stories during my consultations. If a picture is worth a thousand words then surely my favourite sort of picture, a cartoon, could be used to heal patients just as Milton Erickson did...

I spent a couple of years putting ideas that could make people feel happier into cartoon form with the help of cartoonist Swapan Debnath. Together I think we produced something Milton would have liked. I recommend any doctor, medical student, nurse, psychologist, social worker, carer etc read his book so they realise the profound influence their words and stories can have on a patient. I am eternally grateful to him.

Meditating with a Dandelion

I thought I'd share 10 minutes I spent in the garden this morning: A few minutes to forget busy thoughts and wonder at something beautiful. A famous psychologist, Milton Erickson once asked one of his patients to sit on a lawn until he made a fantastic discovery...

An hour and a half later he rushed back and said:
'Do you realise that every blade of grass is a different shade of green'
This story always struck me as an example of how we can lose track of time noticing the small things in life, a state that some try to achieve through meditation, others through fishing, knitting, stamp collecting...

The following poem describes how 10 minutes in the sunshine helped me achieve relaxation, and brightened the rest of my day.

Meditating with a Dandelion

I sat beside a dandelion in the shade,
(I'd missed it earlier with my spade)
And wondered how it had been made.
Why less popular than a rose,
And feared by those with patios?
I stared into a yellow centre,
To see the work of its creator,
Learnt how long and wide each strand,
Turned it gently in my hand,
And noticed how each stem bears,
Lots of tiny white hairs.
An elder sister looked rather odd,
A tightly packed green pod.
Her hair was a tuft of white,
Dreaming of future flight.

I picked up a nearby ball of seeds,
A wonder from this queen of weeds,
And plucked a single speck of brown,
To stare closely at its dainty crown,
Until it floated off into the air,
Lighter than a single hair.

I blew the rest towards the sun,
(Why let nature have all the fun?)
And watched them settle here and there,
You'd like it too if you'd dare.
Ten minutes of time well spent,
Has left me feeling quite content.
While seeds fly off to germinate,
I've learnt a way to meditate.

http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/meditating-with-a-dandelion/

Notes about cartoon:
Some culinary uses of dandelions are on the blanket in the background: dandelion wine, dandelion leaf salad and dandelion fritters.

Why can't we just decide to be happy?

We’re not in control of our lives as much as we think. Most of our actions are automatic. When you drive a car, walk or brush your teeth, the movements of your muscles and countless other activities are performed without thinking, by the sub-conscious part of your mind. It is this automatic part of our mind that decides how happy we feel. That is why you can’t just suddenly choose to be really happy.

So the real challenge is to convince our sub-conscious mind that we are happy. Unfortunately it only really pays attention to our old fashioned primitive senses. The kind of things a caveman might have seen, heard, smelt, tasted and touched. Like our caveman, our sub-conscious never learnt to read.

This is why you might find yourself reading a self-help book with lots of clever ideas but somehow you don’t end up putting them into practice. However after seeing a picture or film of someone enjoying a picnic on sunny summer’s day you can wake up one morning with an irresistible urge to go for a picnic.

This blog contains a few of 118 cartoons I have designed to show your sub-conscious ways of becoming happier. As a General Practitioner in the UK I’ve always enjoyed helping patients feel happier or less anxious using a variety of psychological techniques. You can choose to spend time thinking how each cartoon relates to your own life, or just quickly flick through them trying to spot mice. For your first time I would recommend looking quickly at a few cartoons and looking at a few more the day after. If there is one you are particularly drawn to, you might like to think why you like it so much.