Humans are social, relational animals. We need each other. But do we perform tasks better when we are alone? Does thinking about how other people perform them raise our anxiety levels and take our energy away? And is it possible to act just as effectively as if we were alone, even with others around?

Do some people need to feel anxious? Is it an addiction, a comfort, or just a crippling affliction? Is there a way of finding out what we really need and like, when free of the constant worry and fear?

Stop holiday stress from turning into holiday blues with these five tips — and get back to what the season can be all about.

How many times have we heard the tired advice “take care of yourself”? Great…but how are we supposed to do that when work seems to consume all our time? Here’s how I developed my own “me time” bit by bit over the years.

The recent blockbuster film Inception asks “how can we tell the difference between dreams and reality?” But how often are we “dreaming” with our eyes open each day? Without effort, we can not only lose touch with what’s going on around us, but sink deeper and deeper into troubling worlds of our own construction.

We can be so focused on the perceived shortcomings of our bodies — too thin, too fat, too big, too small — that we fail to appreciate what an extraordinary means we have at our disposal to experience the world around us — our body’s sense of Touch.

Wanting something very badly — a change of career, a dream holiday, praise for a job well done — does not necessarily equip us with the skills or confidence to have a go at achieving it. Sometimes the first step is to acknowledge our fears and anxieties and give ourselves permission to back out of the whole process; only then can we settle down to the tasks in hand.