Archive for July, 2007

Jul 31 2007

The World of Retouching…

Posted by JacQ

I have recently found my favorite new blog “diet blog.” It is filled with lots of helpful information for us who would like to lead a healthier lifestyle. I browsed through interesting articles from their archive regarding self esteem and dieting.

One of the funny thing I found there is the article called: Celebrity Retouching: 10 Reasons to Revise Your Reality

I have always known that there are retouching in every single advertising, fashion magazines and such. But never seen how the impact and work that has been put in to make things look good to the consumers’ eyes. The list below are examples from the article. Happy browsing.

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Retouch-o-rama
You’ll see stomachs flattened, skin blemishes removed, breasts made fuller, navels made ‘perfect’, limbs made skinny, and waistlines lose inches. Even a 12 year old boy can download a copy of Photoshop, grab a retouching tutorial, and create whatever they want.

Even Martha Stewart isn’t immune.
Newsweek pasted her head on top
of a model’s body for this cover

Read the rest of this entry »

No Comments » // topics: dieting, lifestyle //

Jul 27 2007

Beautiful Mind

Posted by JacQ

Jeremy and I have chatted among ourselves and friends about this topic recently. The mind and how to keep it active.

After watching the Last Mimzy, Kyle XY, and other few movies about people who use the full potential of the brain power. One would wonder how to make the brain more active and keep it active.

I found these exercises from the KEEP YOUR BRAIN ALIVE site. The information below is taken directly from that website.

What makes an exercise Neurobic?

Throughout the course of every day, your brain is activated by your senses, and you encounter new stimuli all the time. Why aren’t these Neurobic activities? What is it about the specific things we suggest that makes them neurobic?

To begin with, not everything that’s novel or new provides the kind or strength of nerve cell stimulation that is necessary to activate new brain circuits and enhance neurotrophin production. For example, if you normally write with a pen and one day choose to write everything in pencil, you’ve broken your routine and are doing something new. So, in some small way, you’ve changed the patterns of activity in the parts of your brain activated by touching. But such a small change wouldn’t recruit new sensory associations important enough to engage the circuitry required to really exercise your brain.

Contrast this with deciding one day to change the hand you normally write with. If you are right handed, controlling a pen is normally the responsibility of the cortex on the left side of your brain. When you change to writing left handed, the large network of connections, circuits, and brain areas involved in writing with your left hand–which are normally rarely used– are now activated on the right side of your brain. Suddenly your brain is confronted with an engaging task that’s interesting, challenging , fun and potentially frustrating.

Making multi-sensory associations, and doing something novel that is important or engaging to you –these are the key conditions for a genuine Neurobic exercise.

To be more specific: Read the rest of this entry »

No Comments » // topics: lifestyle //