Positive Psychology: The woman who changed her brain by CNN

Sunday, September 9, 2012

The woman who changed her brain by CNN

Everyday I try to find something new and interesting. I like the stories where there is a triumph of will like this one!

The radio broadcast was difficult to download so this talk by Barbera Arrowsmith Young is on You Tube for our education and elucidation....

published on Jun 7, 2012 by ARockliffe

Barbara Arrowsmith Young is the Founder of the Arrowsmith Program, and the
author of The Woman Who Changed Her Brain

Category:

Education

License:

Standard YouTube License

Barbara Arrowsmith at her Arrowsmith School in Toronto. She teaches techniques she herself used to overcome a range of severe and unusual learning disabilities.

By Michael Schulder, CNN

(CNN) - Barbara Arrowsmith spent the first 26 years of her life unable to read a clock.
She spent the first 26 years of her life having to read and reread sentences dozens of times before she had a clue what they meant.

Barbara Arrowsmith had so many severe learning disabilities as a child that she would lay her school books neatly on her bed and cry over them until she had no more tears left. Then she would get to work. Barbara did have an excellent memory. That was her survival tool.

[1:49] "I had a verbatim auditory memory, so I could memorize things that I heard. And I had a photographic visual memory. So I really got by on memory and also on tremendous drive."

But she had physical disabilities that compounded her problems. The left side of young Barbara Arrowsmith’s body didn’t know where it was in space. So she got hurt so often her mother predicted she wouldn't live past the age of five.

[5:57] "The whole left side of my body was - tended to be quite bruised and I would never have any idea where I got those bruises. I have lots of scars on that side of my body as a result of accidents."

Nobody knew how to address Barbara Arrowsmith’s learning and physical challenges. So she fixed herself. She created exercises to change her brain – and now – the brains of the children who have the good fortune to enter the Arrowsmith School in Toronto.
Listen to the amazing journey of Barbara Arrowsmith in her own words. She is “The Woman Who Changed Her Brain.”

http://soundcloud.com/cnn/the-woman-who-changed-her

The woman who changed her brain by CNN

Link: http://cnnradio.cnn.com/2012/09/07/the-woman-who-changed-her-brain/?iref=obinsite

Positive Psychology given credence by Academia:

Positive psychology is the scientific study of the strengths and virtues that enable individuals and communities to thrive.

Commentators on the subject Martin Seligman and Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, note that:

"The field of positive psychology at the subjective level is about valued subjective experiences: well-being, contentment, and satisfaction (in the past); hope and optimism (for the future); and flow and happiness (in the present).

At the individual level, it is about positive individual traits: the capacity for love and vocation, courage, interpersonal skill, aesthetic sensibility, perseverance, forgiveness, originality, future mindedness, spirituality, high talent, and wisdom.

At the group level, it is about the civic virtues and the institutions that move individuals toward better citizenship: responsibility, nurturance, altruism, civility, moderation,tolerance, and work ethic."