Happy New Year

Idiomatic Antonyms

Add the right words to complete the pairs, and the initial letters reading download will spell an appropriate word:

1  _ _ _       or    NONE

2   _ _          or   YES

3   _ _ _ _    or   FALSE
4   _ _          or   OFF
5   _ _ _       or   OLD

6   _ _ _ _ _  or   OLD
7   _ _ _ _     or   LESS
8   _ _ _ _ _  or   LARGE

Complete the following idioms by adding a word that is opposite in meaning to the word in the phrase:

1   Stop and _____________
2   Lost and______________
3   Ups and ______________
4   Do's and ______________
5   Friend or ______________
6   For better or ___________
7   This or _______________
8   Hit or ________________
9   Heaven or ____________
10  Win or ______________

Animal Words

Match each word or phrase in the first column with the word or phrase in the second column that produces a proverb or idiom:

1    A barking dog                                                                   a   the dog

2    Never look a gift horse                                                      b   out of the bag

3    Curiosity killed                                                                  c   but you can't make him drink

4    Dog eat                                                                             d   lie

5    You can't teach an old dog                                                 e   never bites 

6    Let sleeping dogs                                                                f   new tricks

7    When the cat's away                                                           g   of a different colour

8     Let the cat                                                                         h   horses

9     There's more than one way                                                 i    hog

10   It's raining                                                                           j   dog

11   You may lead a horse to water                                            k  to skin a cat

12    Go to                                                                                 l   in the mouth

13    Go whole                                                                            m  the mice will play

14    Hold your                                                                            n   cats and dogs

15    That's a horse                                                                      o   the cat

Match each word in the first column with it's correct definition in the second column:

1   hog                                                                           a   to reveal secret information

2   buffalo                                                                      b  full of spite, malicious

3   bear                                                                          c  timid, fearful

4   mousey                                                                      d  nonsense

5   catty                                                                          e  to confuse or baffle

6   rat                                                                              f  to take selfishly
7   bull                                                                             g  something difficult

Bird Words

Match each word or phrase in the first column with the word or phrase in the second column that produces a common saying or idiom:

1   a bird in the hand                                                  a    goose
2   birds of a feather                                                   b    peace
                                   

3   bird-                                                                     c    the chicken or the egg
4   stool                                                                     d    is worth two in the bush
5   bird's eye                                                              e    owl
6   to kill two birds                                                      f    one's neck
7   silly                                                                        g    catches the worm
8   which came first                                                     h     pigeon
9   he eats                                                                   i     with one stone
10 what's sauce for the goose                                      j     brain
11 wise old                                                                 k    like an ostrich
12 bury one's head in the sand                                     l     like a bird
13 crane                                                                      m   is sauce for the gander
14 dove of                                                                   n    view
15 the early bird                                                           o    flock together

Match each word in the first column with its correct definition in the second column:

1   birdie                                                                       a    foolish, or inept person
2   chicken                                                                    b    objectionable or worthless
3   turkey                                                                      c    lower the head or body to avoid collision with                                                                                               an object
4   cuckoo                                                                     d    repeat by vote
5   duck                                                                         e    a golf score of one stroke less than par
6   parrot                                                                        f    timid, cowardly
7   for the birds                                                               g   silly, a little crazy

How to stay motivated

Sustainig motivation can be taught under the best circumstances.So how can you stay motivated when your "to- do list" runs to 4 pages, you just got another rejectionletter, your adult child announced his plans to move back home, the car and washing machine went on the fritz at the same time and tou ca't find time in the day to work on your own personal project? Everybody knows those pop-psych directives to put a photo of you at your most fit on the fridge or write yourself a check for 1 million dollars and tape it to your computer monitor or plaster your mirrors with affirmations like "I attract my perfect soul mate".

Motivation is not a magic.THERE IS NO LITTLE BLUE PILL FOR IT. But it's somethingyou can tap into by design than harness. Every inspirational author, speaker and life coach has his own tips, but over some decades of observing supersuccessful, high-achieving people, scientists came up with the list of 7 things that are fundamental to sistaing motivation, whether you're trying to finish a 10,000-piece jigsaw puzzle or climb Kilimanjaro.

7 Steps to Staying Motivated:

1 Set a goal and visualize it down to the most minute detail.

2 Make a list of the reasons you want to accomplish the goal.

3 Break the goal down into smaller pieces and set immediately targets and rewards.

4 Have a strategy but be prepared tochange the course.

5 Get the help you need.

6 Pre-determing how you will deal with flagging motivation.

7 Continually check in with your reasons for carrying on.

You have to be very internaly driven! But my favourite commentary comes from Dalai Lama- when asked what surprised him most about humanity, he answered, "Man."-"Why?"-"Because", sais his Holiness, "he sacrifices his health in order to make money. Then he sacrifices money to recuperate his health.And then he is so anxious about his future that does not enjoy the present; the result being that he does not live in the present or in the future; he lives as if he is never to die, and then dies having never really lived."

The law of 33%

Phobia

A phobia in the context of clinical psychology, is a type of anxiety disorder , usually defined as a persistent fear of an object or a situation, often irrational.If a person suffers from phobia, he starts to distress his organism and this behaviour leads to significant interference in social or occupational activities. If a phobic stimulus , whether it is an object or a social situation, is absent entirely in an environment - a diagnosis can't be made. Phobias can be divided into social  (and public) and specific phobias . Specific phobias are such phobias as arachnophobia or acrophobia which are considered to be specific from the point of view of psychology and social pfobias are phobias within social situations such as public cpeaking  and crowded areas. In other words specific phobias are said to be based on a single specific panic trigger such as spiders , snakes dogs etc.
Symptoms of a phobia:
- sweating
- nervousness
- fast heart beat
- heavy chest
- shaky voice, legs or hands
- breathlessness
- nausea
Causes of phobia: 
Unconscious or emotional learning takes place to keep us safe. When coming into contact with something dangerousthe mind would create the optimum state for survival- a panic attack. In the past, an immediate phobis response to a predatory or poisonous animal was exceedingly useful. In today's complex world this learning mechanism often works in an inappropriate way, thus making us become phobic. You can also generate a phobia throughthe miuse of imagination, or by seeing your parent having a phobia.

The most common phobias: 
1 Arachnophobia ( a fear of spiders)
2 Ophiophobia (a fear of snakes)
3 Acrophobia  (a fear of heights)
4 Agoraphobia (the fasr of changing a place)
5 Cynophobia (a fear of dogs)
6 Astraphobia (the fear of lightning)
7 Trypanophobia (A fear of injections)
8 Mysophobia (the fear of germs and dirt)
9 Pteromerchaphobia ( the fear of flying)

Fears of famous people 
David Beckham has a fear of diorder. He's said to line soda cans in the fridge.

Madonna is afraid of thunderstorms.

Orlando Bloom has the fear of pigs.

Nicole Kidman is afraid of butterflies.

Kim Besinger has the fear of open spaces.