Day: April 19, 2019

April 19, 2019 at 12:34PM by CWC When it comes from the boring chore of blow drying my hair in the morning, I want to get the job done as fast as possible. If I were a better person, maybe I would use this time standing wet in front of my bathroom mirror to recite positive mantras or pray, but instead, I spend it flipping my hair around and trying to think of ways to cut the time down as much as humanely possible. It’s probably why the cool air button on my blow dryer goes virtually unused. To me, heat means the whole experience will be done faster. But it got me thinking (hey, I am just standing there), what exactly is that cold air good for anyway? (Besides a cool blast of blessed relief after a sweaty SoulCycle class.) To find out, I reached out to hairstylist extraordinaire Ashley Rubell. “Hot air is used to alter the hair,” she explains. “Hot tools change our texture from straight to curly, or curly to straight.” This, she says, extends beyond straighteners and curlers; it includes blowdryers too. “Temperature should really vary according to your hair type,” she adds. “If you have thicker, coarser hair you’ll need a higher temperature to work your strands, but with finer hair, or damaged hair, you want to keep your heat on a lower temp.” Celebrity hairstylist Bridget Brager adds that while blow drying your hair with hot hair may be faster, the heat can be

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April 19, 2019 at 12:11PM by CWC How many times have I’ve chatted up strangers and coworkers about the day’s weather report in an effort to make small talk? Mastering the art of going on and on about nothing is a gift some people posses in spades. Personally, I agree with Oprah—we should all be making our words a bit larger. To learn how to transform knee-jerk conversation starters (“How are you!?” and “Gee golly, wasn’t traffic terrible this morning?”) into more meaningful conversation, I asked How to Be Yourself author Ellen Hendriksen, PhD, for a few pointers to avoid canned opening lines. “We all know how small talk works,” she says. “It’s about the weather, traffic, or—if we’re a college student—it’s about finals coming up. It’s a way of connecting in a way that is known and safe.” Conversation offers a strong foundation for you to feel secure in your identity and emotions. If you’re simply sharing a 20-second elevator ride with a colleague, there’s no need to veer away from your tried-and-true topics. But if you find yourself out to coffee or lunch with someone you don’t know all that well, the improvisation technique of “yes, and” can help break the ice. In case you haven’t improvised since high school drama class, the “yes, and” rule means you should never just give a flat “yes” or “no” answer. The idea is to tack something onto your response that allows the banter to continue. Same goes with small talk. “That

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April 19, 2019 at 10:03AM by CWC There’s a scene in the *ahem* Pulitzer Prize-winning novel Fifty Shades Freed where the protagonist, Ana, is cooking and her husband, Christian, makes some comment about how he likes to see her in the kitchen. “Barefoot and pregnant?” she jokes. (I’m sure there’s a different pop culture moment I could reference to open up this discussion, but none are as embarrassing as one that admits to the entire internet that I’ve read all three Fifty Shades novels.) I remember reading that part and thinking, LOL if any man ever said that to me, I would not be down. “I could get used to you in the kitchen.” Blah. Invoking my safe word. My gut reaction to this scene is so strong because it immediately conjures images of the Mad Men era, during which time picture-perfect Betty Drapers, wearing waist-cinching aprons and pumps, were expected to make pot roasts and watch the kids while their husbands went off to work. Heck, even the Joan Holloways (women who had jobs) were forced to prepare the meals after spending all day at work. Because, for much of history, the kitchen has been considered “the woman’s domain.” To understand why this is, we have to back up a couple hundred years. Prior to the 19th century, there wasn’t this split between domestic spaces and public spaces (often called spheres), says Catherine Allgor, president of the Massachusetts Historical Society, who’s also on the board of directors for the National

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April 19, 2019 at 09:28AM by CWC The rules of society say I’m an “adult” now. My hopscotch and jump rope days are long gone, but I still find myself reciting an adolescent rhyme as I walk the streets of New York City: “Don’t step on a crack or you’ll break your mama’s back.” Superstitions tend to latch on to our belief system early in life. And new scientific research might explain why distrust of black cats, broken mirrors, twitching eyes, and the number 13 tends to spread like wildfire. In an analysis published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, a pair of theoretical biologists created a model based on game theory (a branch of mathematics that attempts to predict people’s actions and interactions) that answered the vital question: What are superstitions, and how do they become normalized in culture? They found that groups of individual that start with very different principals can mingle their way toward a shared belief system. “What’s interesting here is that we show that, beginning in a system where no one has any particular belief system, a set of beliefs can emerge, and from those, a set of coordinated behaviors,” Erol Akçay, PhD, an assistant professor of biology at the University of Pennsylvania. Someone tells us that walking under a ladder is a recipe for disaster, and before we know it, we’re not just believing their warning. We’re actively dodging ladders. “What’s interesting here is that we show that, beginning in a system

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April 19, 2019 at 07:50AM by CWC Social media is like trying to get as many people as possible to sign your yearbook. Human nature dictates that we should care what people think of our social media presence. But it’s a little game that no one really wants to play. The simple act of sharing photos and videos with friends has morphed into a most bizarre popularity contest that only serves to increase social media anxiety. When will we graduate from caring about being popular? It would seem that the creators of the major social media platforms understand they’re fueling an unhealthy obsession. Instagram is allegedly testing a new feature that to hides likes altogether, reports Mashable. And according to Twitter founder and CEO Jack Dorsey, there’s too much emphasis on the ‘likes’ among users of his platform. Scientific studies show just how much social media affects our mental health with a direct correlation between social media use and depression. It’s making us more anxious, too. Anecdotally, you’ve probably felt social media anxiety at some point. It’s been 15 minutes and this photo only has three likes—should I take it down? Instagram screenshots suggest how the company might envision the app without likes. “We want your followers to focus on what you share, not how many likes your posts get,” an in-app message says, alongside the screenshots. Asked about this major change, a spokesperson told Mashable that Instagram is “exploring ways to reduce pressure on Instagram.” This doesn’t mean you’ll

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