Recent Articles
The Psychology of Self-Motivation: Breaking Through Mental Blocks
Discover the psychology behind self-motivation. Learn to identify and break through mental blocks and overcome emotional barriers to achieve your goals. Join us as we explore powerful questions and visualization techniques to unlock your inner drive and take empowered action.
Back To Work After Maternity Leave: Pumping Tips
Our Pumping and Feeding Guide For Returning To Work After Maternity Leave, helps moms who are breastfeeding continue to provide for their babies with a guide that includes discussions with employers, creating pumping schedules, and staying hydrated. The Leva Platform for New Mothers offers additional resources and support.
Retaining Employees After Parental Leave: Creating A Customized Plan to Increase Retention and Engagement
Learn how to retain your employees after parental leave by providing meaningful work and supportive policies. Discover the key factors that contribute to employee retention and the benefits of investing in your employees.
Mama, You're Not Alone: How to ask for Help
As a new mom, it's important to remember that you don't have to do everything alone. Asking for help is not a weakness but a sign of strength and self-awareness. It's common for new moms to feel like they should be able to handle everything on their own, but the truth is that it's okay to ask for help.
Bouncing Back from Layoffs
I have been laid off during every single recession. That’s three times total in my life so far. I guess that makes me a layoff expert. Let me share with you how I have gotten through these experiences. I hope it helps!
Why We Need Our Tribe
From the dawn of time, women needed each other to share the heavy burdens that fell upon them. They helped each other through the pains of childbirth. They joined forces in feeding and nurturing their families. They were "the village" we speak of when we say it takes a village to raise a child because they all looked after each other's children in their village. They shared their fears, dreams, hopes, sadness, and pain, but most of all, they shared their strength.
To Be or Not to Be a Stay-at-Home Mom
Sometimes, the stay-at-home option works better for moms and their families as it reduces the stressors influencing their daily life. Multitasking can take its toll on the mother's mental health. By letting go of job-related stress, moms can shift their focus to their families. Read more about the advantages and disadvantages of being a working vs. non-working mom.
Britney Spears’ Conservatorship - A Denial of Basic Human Freedoms?
After 13 years of behaving under the conservatorship rules, performing on stage when she is told to, and paying the people that have control over her life huge sums of money, all she wants is to end the inappropriate control over her life and finances. At age 39, she is urging the courts to give her the freedom to make her own decisions and live the life she wants to lead. It seems like a reasonable request.
Feeling Insecure at Work
Insecurity is a widely common feeling, and most of us experience it at some point. It is especially present at the workplace, where our abilities are constantly tested, and we have to defend or justify our work. When we feel insecure, we tend to shy away from uncomfortable situations, avoid confrontation, or stop ourselves from speaking our minds. Insecurity can even lead to us questioning our own skills and ability, which can ultimately decrease job performance. Contrary to what some may think, we are not born insecure. We should therefore acknowledge where this feeling comes from so we can deal with it.
Enjoy the Journey
We live in a world where the norm is to be driven by our constant quest for the ultimate state of happiness. However, happiness is different for different people. So how do we define happiness? Some would say that happiness is defined by the goals we set for ourselves and our ability to achieve them. These could be related to our careers, our families, or even material gain. Across the board, though, the common denominator is a constant endeavor to reach those goals.
How You Can Change Your Experience of Pain
Pain is a survival instinct. It tells the brain to switch on our fight or flight response. The brain processes this message and sets in motion all the necessary physical and chemical responses, such as activating the correct muscles or increasing the heart rate to cope with the crisis. The transition of the high alert message that something is wrong from the point of injury through the nervous system to the brain is the biology of pain. If we didn’t feel pain, we would land up impaled on a knife or frozen to death within days.
Control the Controllable
When you’re experiencing a crisis or going through a difficult time, coping with the uncertainty of a situation can be really hard. Most of us crave predictability. We thrive on structure and want to know what’s going to happen, when it’s going to happen, and what the outcome will be. We want to be in control. Think back on your life and how continuously doing exercise improves your muscle strength. Practicing controlling only those things in your life over which you do have control is the same.
How Slowing Things Down Can Make You More Productive
Modern lifestyles are becoming increasingly busy and difficult to balance. We work longer hours, and we take on more responsibilities and commitments. This way of working and living is detrimental to our mental health, physical health, and even productivity levels. It might seem counterintuitive, but having a super busy schedule won’t help your productivity. Instead, slowing things down a little bit can have a positive effect on your performance.
How To Turn Anger into Passion
Getting angry is a natural response and one of the most basic human emotions. It is an intense experience that gives you a big energy boost to change whatever is agitating you. However, if you let anger take control of yourself, it can lead to inappropriate or harmful reactions that can damage you and those around you.
Done is Better Than Perfect
Perfectionism, as defined in psychology, is the desire to be without any flaws or to achieve exceedingly high standards in everything you set out to do. At a first glance, it should be a positive characteristic, shouldn’t it?
How does Meditation Improve Sleep?
We all know the impact that a night of poor sleep has on our daily performance. That is why insomnia and other sleep disorders mean a real threat to our well-being and can aggravate stressful situations. Sleeping problems are common during pregnancy and postpartum, which can lead to great discomfort and stress. Meditation has been associated with positive changes in sleep patterns and has been proven a solid alternative to traditional insomnia treatments.
Why New Moms Are Not OK
Being a new mom hard because there is nothing out there that can truly prepare you for what you are about to experience. The transformation from being a young adult to a young parent is one of the most difficult challenges of our lifetime.
Parenting During A Pandemic
There are many ways to sum up the pandemonium that was the year 2020, but top of the list is “change”. It changed the way we think about the world, the way we feel about others, the way we work, and most importantly the way we parent. For those of us who usually wake up, put on our business hats (suits), and drive a few miles to our office, one of the biggest upsets was the transference to teleworking. It effectively fused those two different facets, our work life, and our home and parenting life, into one very messy and muddled blend of benefits and challenges alike.
Why Self-Compassion Is the Key to Success
Having a lot of confidence in yourself (in other words, having high self-esteem) has a lot of benefits to your own well-being, of course, but it doesn’t necessarily help in personal growth or learning. Breines and Chen point out in their article that some previous studies show how self-enhancement might lead to inflated self-evaluations that, in turn, lead to greater defensiveness, lower resilience, and poorer academic results.
Sharing the Parental Load
We are still in the grips of the historically imposed rules where women (no matter their career status) are in charge of the domestic duties, while men are free to prioritize their jobs. Furthermore, all the "behind the scenes" work, crucial in raising a child, is barely recognized and appreciated by the general public or those on the receiving end. Read on to find out more about how parents can share the parental load.