It’s been said for a long time that laughter is the best medicine, and research is now proving that it does indeed have many benefits, for both physical and mental health. On its own, it’s not a cure-all, of course, but it can boost your health so you’re less likely to get sick and make it easier to recover if you are.

It is well-known that having a pet has great positive effects on mental health, and that's especially important in the current COVID climate. Did you know all these ways your pet could be helping you now? We take a look.

A well-known dog charity tells us that puppies are not just for Christmas but for life and ideally therapy is the same. Not just a quick fix that improves things for a while, but real and long-lasting change. But at some point, nearly everyone begins to wonder whether the results they’re getting while they're seeing me will last. Here are five top tips to help make sure they do.

Do you find yourself stressing over things that go right? Do you self-sabotage, delay or distract yourself, make excuses for lack of progress, or even just seem to forget to take action when you had planned to do so?

Keeping your brain healthy is just as important to your overall wellbeing as keeping your body healthy, and doing each one can help with the other. And it’s quite easy to work brain maintenance into your schedule by adding small tasks or making slight changes to things you already do. Maintain healthy habits now to give your brain a long, healthy life.

Almost all of us have experienced a fear that our successes are due to a fluke.luck or other people, rather than our own hard work or skills. It’s not normally an issue, but if it becomes overwhelming, it might be what’s sometimes referred to as ‘Impostor Syndrome’. This has been mentioned briefly in previous blog entries, but I thought it was worth looking at in a bit more detail.

Reverend Robert Shields of Dayton, Ohio, is a contender for the world’s longest diary, spending four hours each day recording what happened every five minutes of every day for twenty-five years, and producing thirty-seven and a half million words. You don’t have to spend quite so much time on it to see the benefits of keeping a journal, though. Here are some reasons to give it a go.

Do you find yourself dismissing your efforts if they aren’t 100% right? Most of us recognise that perfectionism can make it harder to achieve anything, but recent studies have shown there is a better way. Healthy striving is the positive version of perfectionism, and it leads to a healthier state of mind. Want to know how?

My teen-aged daughter claimed that if she tidied her bedroom she no longer knew where things were – the clutter, at least according to her, was ‘organised’...