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For most people, the end of November is a time of gratitude. Thanksgiving Day reminds people to appreciate their friends and family, and the basic necessities they often take for granted. For the Woodhull community, November is a month of gratitude as we remember our wonderful teacher and friend Karen Kisslinger, who died on November 9, 2009.

Karen worked with Woodhull for seven years, teaching hundreds of women yoga and meditation. The meditation Karen taught us was what’s known as metta meditation ─ a loving kindness meditation that encouraged mindful compassion and allowed many of us to reconnect to the things we are grateful for.

Here are the words to the meditation she shared with us. This Thanksgiving weekend, carve out some time to remember Karen by doing this meditation. Karen encouraged us to say these words for ourselves, for someone we love, for someone we see every day but don’t know, and for someone we are having a conflict with. continue

One night this past summer, my friend Elisa saw something that shocked her. She told me she was at a bar when two women got into an argument and began yelling at each other as if they were children. The way the conflict ended? One woman threw her drink at the other woman.

“Can you believe that?” Elisa exclaimed. “I don’t think those women would have acted like that if it weren’t for reality TV. People are seeing this stuff on TV and thinking that’s an appropriate way to act!”

Over the last few years, I’ve had several conversations with friends about how damaging reality TV can be, but I lacked the information to make a strong case against it. That’s why I’m so excited about Jennifer L. Pozner’s new book Reality Bites Back: The Troubling Truth About Guilty Pleasure TV. Pozner spent hours upon hours watching and transcribing shows like The Bachelor, America’s Next Top Model, Flavor of Love, and Wife Swap to identify the media messages found in these popular, widely-watched programs.

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