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Keeping it Together: I'm taking this advice to heart and trying to trust myself more

Sara M Moniuszko   | Paste BN

It's easy to doubt yourself – at least, it is for me.

When this happens, I usually turn to loved ones for guidance. But there's a difference between seeking advice and relying on others to make your decisions for you.

This is something I've personally been working on being more aware of, which is why I loved this week's Millennial Therapist column by Sara Kuburic.

In the piece, she shares a few things to consider before automatically turning to your friends for advice. Ask yourself: 

  • Does this person have my best interest in mind?
  • Does this person understand my situation adequately to offer advice?
  • Is this person only going to  tell me what I want to hear?
  • Is there someone more objective (such as a professional) that I  can speak with?

But what struck me the most was her section on when to ask for advice:

It can be helpful to ask for advice once we’ve already spent time thinking about the situation. So many of us are quick to seek the opinions of others in order to avoid having to come up with our own. Advice is always more useful when the person offering it has an understanding of our inner process, understanding and positioning. Requesting advice shouldn't involve asking someone to tell us what to do or think. We should seek guidance and perspective that can help us be the most authentic version of ourselves – not the best version of someone else.

If you also struggle with trusting yourself, I hope this helps. I'm personally challenging myself to do more self-reflection before turning to others to weigh in.

To read Sara's full column, which has even more tips, click here.

Suicide leaves us asking 'why?' In new memoir, journalist looks for answers

I wanted to share a book I'm excited to read from Paste BN Life's Managing Editor Laura Trujillo, titled "Stepping Back from the Ledge: A Daughter's Search for Truth and Renewal."

In a recent article about the book, my colleague Alia E. Dastagir writes how Laura bares herself in the pages in an effort to better understand her mother's suicide. 

"I wanted to know everything," Trujillo wrote. "Like a lot of people who lose someone they love to suicide, I had been shocked. Numb. Now I wanted to understand how this could have happened and what I could have done differently, what we all might have done differently to help her."

Trujillo examines suicide, but also the grief it generates. She writes of the immediate anguish, "I couldn't think, couldn't process order or time," and the lingering kind, when she was functional but utterly lost: "Back then, if you took the GPS away from me, I couldn't tell you where I was, much less feel my way home." 

To read more of Alia's story, click here.

We've long been told salt is bad for you. Is it really?

In this week's medical column, Dr. Michael Daignault is making us realize we may have a misguided view of salt and sodium. Here's a snippet of what he shares:

For years now, we’ve continued to debate whether salt is actually “bad” for our health. And in discussing healthy diet and lifestyle choices with both my ER patients and friends alike, the common thread is the failure to distinguish between salt and sodium. They are often incorrectly used interchangeably.

Sodium is a mineral and metallic element symbolized by “Na” on the Periodic Table. It is an essential nutrient and ion necessary to maintain our body’s fluid balance, contract and relax muscles, and conduct nerve impulses. But we need only a minimal amount of daily sodium to accomplish these goals.

Salt is a chemical compound of only 40% sodium and predominantly 60% chloride, or “NaCl.”

But it’s not necessarily the salt that’s dangerous for your health. A landmark meta-analysis published in the Journal of the American Medical Association in 2011 involving a combined 6,250 participants showed there’s no convincing evidence that cutting salt intake reduces the risk for heart attacks, stroke or death in people with normal or elevated blood pressure.

However, excess sodium has been linked to elevated blood pressure, heart disease and stroke. The strongest evidence links elevated sodium intake to high blood pressure and the inverse – reducing sodium intake lowers blood pressure. 

The bottom line is that we can make healthy food and lifestyle choices to significantly reduce our sodium intake. This can be done primarily by avoiding processed foods. Further reduction can be made by switching to Himalayan salt, which has less sodium than table or sea salt, and includes trace amounts of other key elements. Also consider increasing your potassium with fresh fruits and vegetables – high dietary potassium intake can relax blood vessels and help excrete sodium while decreasing blood pressure.

To read the full column, click here.

Today's reads

Today's pets

Meet Uli and Kitzel.

We have double doggos again this week! Thanks Claire Mayers for sending in this photo of your fur daughters.

Thanks everyone for reading! Do you have cute pet photos to share? Please send them to our email here so we can feature them in an upcoming newsletter!

Wishing you all the best, 

Sara Moniuszko

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