Listening to stories and telling them helped our ancestors to live humanly — to be human. But somewhere along the way our ability to tell (and to listen to) stories was lost. As life speeded up, as the possibility of both communication and annihilation became ever more instantaneous, people came to have less tolerance for that which comes only over time. The demand for perfection and the craving for ever more control over a world that paradoxically seemed ever more out of control eventually bred impatience with story. As time went by, the art of storytelling fell by the wayside, and those who went before us gradually lost part of what had been the human heritage— the ability to ask the most basic questions, the spiritual questions.
Source: brainpickings.org
The poet John Keats once described the ideal state of the psyche as negative capability — the ability “of being in uncertainties, Mysteries, doubts without any irritable reaching after fact & reason.” “The truth of life is its mystery,” echoed Joyce Carol Oates. This comfort with mystery and the unknown, indeed, is at the heart not only of poetic existence but also of the most rational of human intellectual endeavors, as many of history’s greatest scientific minds have attested. And yet, caught between the opinion culture we live in and our deathly fear of being wrong, we long desperately for absolutism, certitude, and perfect truth.
“Old home movies are being used to help trigger the forgotten past of people with dementia and other memory loss.
It is part of a new project called Memory Bank developed by the Yorkshire Film Archive (YFA) along with healthcare professionals and carers.
Old films have been carefully selected to help participants remember the past.
YFA director Sue Howard said one user had said: “It’s like peeling back the years - the memories are still there, its just needs a trigger.”
The majority of the films being used are home movies shot in and around Yorkshire from the 1940s to 70s, all of which are housed at YFA which is based at York St John University.
The six-minute clips feature familiar subjects such as holidays, sports, school days, shopping and working life.
The YFA said they focus on everyday activities that participants will have experienced at one time or another in their youth.
Fashion mistakes
The films come in a resource pack, complete with notes and tips on what to discuss at various points.
Memory Bank follows an 18-month research project.
Organisers of the study said the films prompted conversations with the participants on everything from knitted bathing costumes, free school milk and 1960s fashion mistakes and clocking on at work.
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Professor Dianne Wilcocks, social gerontologistMemory Bank offers older people a compelling and fun tool to reclaim their lived past and to share it with family, friends and carers”
Ms Howard said: “Memory Bank is about opening up our collections to a huge range of old people, many of whom face a number of age-related challenges, and who often have very few opportunities to see and enjoy films such as these.
“Reminiscence therapy and memory work play an invaluable role in improving a sense of personal identity and well being, and stimulating communication and sociability.
“Memory Bank is a unique proposition - it uses films taken largely from our home movie collections, which are a fantastic visual record of everyday life over the decades.
“It is these films that trigger our collective memories.”
Social gerontologist Professor Dianne Willcocks, emeritus professor at York St John University, said: “Memory Bank offers older people a compelling and fun tool to reclaim their lived past and to share it with family, friends and carers.
“It works both for those living with dementia and for those simply living with rich memories.”
The project has been supported by the Screen Heritage UK programme, which is a partnership between the British Film Institute, Screen Yorkshire and English Regional Film Archives, to safeguard the future of the UK’s national and regional film collections funded by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport.” (via BBC News - Old films to help recover people’s forgotten past)
Source: BBC
Role of Meditation in Brain Development Gains Scientific Support - NYTimes.com
No surprise here, but important nonetheless. Meditating increases neurplasticity as you age!
Better to praise and share than blame and ban.
Life, Interrupted: Cancer Is Awkward - NYTimes.com: When the best thing to say is what’s honest and simple.
Source: The New York Times
Flowers in the Hospital - NYTimes.com : an ingenious art exhibit in a closing hospital.
Source: The New York Times
