The other day I was listening to one of Oprah’s Master Class programs on OWN, her television channel. She was speaking about Dr. Jill Bolte Taylor; a neuroanatomist who suffered a hemorrhage in the left hemisphere of her brain (www.drjilltaylor.com).

Dr. Bolte Taylor appeared on Oprah’s show. She had a profound effect on Oprah when she said that during her hospital stay, she wanted visitors to be responsible for the energy they brought into the room when they came to see her. Be responsible for the energy you bring. Be responsible for the energy you bring. This had as profound an effect on me as it had on Oprah.

Clinging to memories of your pre-injury self and who you “used to be” keeps you focused on what has been lost. Focus determines where energy flows, so thinking this way keeps you stuck in the past, unable to move forward into whatever new life is possible. Instead, if you can own your story, even the parts you would prefer not to, you can make progress away from that stuck point. When you own your story, it doesn’t matter so much that you aren’t who you used to be. It matters much more who you are now and who you can become in the future.

I am an avid fan of journal writing. I have written about it many times because the benefits of journaling are phenomenal. The most obvious is that is a way to record time, keep track of our accomplishments, disappointments and transformations. The added benefits are very therapeutic. For example, keeping a journal to record your feelings and thoughts provides the writer with a safe, non-judgemental place to work through what is going on for them.

Life offers us many teachers, some quite unexpected, and if we pay attention, we can learn a great deal from them. After a brain injury, to yourself or a loved one, discovering our “teachers” and learning from them can help us settle into our new normal and continue to progress and grow. Journaling for a few minutes about these teachers can enlighten us and point us in new directions we hadn’t considered before.

Hope is that tense and exciting feeling we experience when desiring a positive outcome. At times, our sense of hope is backed with an expectation that whatever it is we are wanting is indeed attainable. Other times, our hope for something is more of a wish and often, undermined by a fear that the end result is unachievable.

The combined effects of traumatic brain injury and post-traumatic stress disorder or PTSD are creating new risks for service members as they come home and resume driving. Up to now, we’ve been focused on the risks of driving for adolescents and the elderly, but new concerns are arising for our veterans. Everyday traffic noises and sights can trigger flashbacks. Speeding, road rage and impulse control pose real dangers for the driver, passengers and pedestrians.

My name is Roger Rizzo. I have three college degrees and traveled around the world twice. I was a civil trial attorney for 13 years and successfully tried some of the largest cases in the United States.

On June 30, 2011, I was involved in a horrendous motorcycle accident in Tiburon, overlooking the San Francisco Bay. I was the passenger on the motorcycle and not wearing a helmet.

Work Comp Sucks! It sucks you dry. Work Comp sucks your energy, your finances, your physical and emotional wellbeing, your social life, your family life, and your friends. Work Comp depletes you of everything you knew or had before your injury. Work Comp sucks every ounce and every breath you think you have to fight a system that is suppose to help an injured worker, not suck you dry!

“First keep the peace within yourself, then you can also bring peace to others.”

~ Thomas Kempis, Catholic Monk (1380-1471)

We all understand what it means to keep the peace in our communities and in the world. It’s not only important, but it is also the law. However, keeping the peace within ourselves should be equally as important and be second nature to us.

It’s still January, still the beginning of a new year. The time of year we all get a do-over. People make promises to start over: lose weight, exercise more, get that promotion, or spend more time with family. They make these promises because they choose to. They make them because they want to.