I’m new to the site and just contributed my first post/comment yesterday! Now, do we just have the ability to reply to posts already written, or do we have the ability to write a brand new post on a new topic? Are the post topics controlled by the founders and then just commented on by us? Or, do we have the opportunity to start new discussion threads? Just wondering! BTW - thanks for creating this site, wonderful women! I first heard about it in an interview with Lesley Stahl!

Check out Comfort Zone, Feeling Younger Workout dvds. They’re great! (I should know, I produced them)

I’m having trouble uploading a picture, I’ve done it before with no mistakes but it won’t work this time..any advice?

Whoop!!!!! Where the hell are your eyebrows?????? LOL

How about an FAQ about who can post here - like anyone, not just women? I’d like to see that answered once and for all.

Lesley the sleep story was enthralling! I have a Brother-in-law who’s from Cuba, and has never slept very much, still doesn’t. Is retired now, but has been highly successful working for a large corporation, and for a Government agency. Ethnicity was mentioned only as possible connection to his not sleeping. In learning the precepts of Ayuirvedic Health in regards to sleep, I have gone from being a total night owl, to turning out the lights for a 10pm bedtime and a 6am wake up. This being optimum for rejuvenation and regeneration between 10pm and 2am, also for meditation early in the day, 7-8am, again at 5-8pm for 20-30 minutes. I feel best when I am in tune with Nature using these Natural rhythms. Also in the 60 minute story, it showed metabolism’s affect due to lack of sleep, and the increasing number of type 1 & type 2 diabetes developing. Since I developed type 1 diabetes as a 15 year old without any direct genetic cause, or any trauma, and being a good sleeper also, it is quite interesting. I’ll be awaiting further studies and stories in this regard, Keep up the fascinating work, Lesley! Sincerely, Ruthe Ellsworth

What a lovely, sad and yet inspirational story about Tanaquil Le Clercq. It was very nicely written and it made me want to read more about her. Julie McKelvey

No Lost Heroines this week? I can’t find it.

Husband found website. Thanks to Judith Martin. Looks extremely interesting. I registered and definitely will be back. Will have to cut down on chatting. LOL Thank you, Miss Manners. Carol

please ask everyone to read this: www.msnbc.msn.com/id/25571076. International resources are being used for this. Two questions: if inexpensive IVF is available, then why are most families charged $10K per attempt, and most importantly, why increase fertility in a continent that cannot sustain life now? and why not spend the money to train women to take care of themselves?

i cant change my display photo..whats up…help!!!

The Ever Elusive State of Happiness Are you happy? Me either and at 50 plus I thought I would be.. What exactly is happiness and how do we achieve it? Is it a gift we give to ourselves or is it part of a reward system? The intangible state of simply being happy is hard to find and there are no maps or GPS trackers to help us chart a course. My husband tells me I don’t allow myself to be happy. The word “allow” grates on my nerves and annoys me no end. Who doesn’t allow themselves to be happy?! I ask him. “You don’t,” he says. “Being simply happy is difficult for you and it shouldn’t be. Everyone deserves to be happy but you don’t allow yourself to be.” Stated like that, I grudgingly concede that there might be a modicum, just a very small kernel of truth, in what he says. Happiness has always been an elusive state for me. It is always “somewhere, out there” in my future. It isn’t that I don’t enjoy my life to an extent; it’s just that I always feel happiness is a reward for being “good.” For meeting that deadline, for losing those ten pounds, for being the good girl who does everything right. I can’t really begin to be happy until my life has met certain conditions and those conditions vary according to where I am. Home, work, leisure; every area has its own unique criteria for how and when I can be happy. I truly believe women have a harder time permitting themselves to be happy than men do. We’re people pleasers and, while that is great for our families, our co-workers, our friends, it is not at all good for us. Unlike men, we put our happiness last on the list. This is not to imply that our males are not giving creatures; they are. But happiness seems to come easier for them than for us. Their happiness is definitely not last on their “to-do” list. Men take pleasure in small, everyday things. For some reason, women don’t, won’t, or can’t. We are too busy being “the good little girl,” who must make sure everyone around us is happy first. Or worse, we see ourselves as an “unworthy,” not deserving of happiness until certain goals, usually totally unattainable and defined by others, are met. Women fall victim to what I call the “Goldilocks Syndrome;” everything must be “just right” in order for us to be happy. Of course everything is never, “just right.” Life isn’t like that. Ask any woman who has ever been the center of attention in a public setting; a work presentation or ceremony for example. Even if everyone assures her she was fantastic, she will be the one who notices the minute mistake she made or something she forgot to do or say. Nothing is ever “just right.” How we view happiness is a prime factor in achieving it. Are we looking for ecstatic, “jumping for joy” happy? Are we saying that once a certain thing happens we won’t ever be unhappy again? Despite whatever is going on in our lives, happiness isn’t something we should be putting “on hold” until certain “things” are right. Happiness should be attainable. It should be a feeling of satisfaction and joy for the good parts of your life and the knowledge that you are not just hanging around, waiting for something fantastic to happen. But that is exactly what I do. Making “being happy” conditional will never work. Trying to reach some unrealistic goal set bysomeone else won’t fly either. Conditions and other people cannot define or create happiness for us, only we can. It should be as natural a state as breathing. It should be, absolutely, but that is not how it is. When a friend with an eighteen month-old baby told me that her son wakes up happy every day, it struck me that I couldn’t remember the last time I had awakened happy! Wake up happy?! Was it even possible to actually wake up that way? What do I want? As women, what do we want? What will make us embrace happiness as easily as we embrace other aspects of our lives? Why can’t we be happy, damn it?! By all accounts, I should be happy. I am lucky enough to do work that I truly love and to be successful at it. I’m married to a funny, wonderful man, have good friends, and a great lifestyle. So what is it that stops me from being happy? I have no idea. If happiness is an intangible state of being, then, for me it may very well be ever elusive and hidden from sight. And I don’t want that to be. I want to be happy. Quite frankly, I’m unhappy that I’m not happy. How about you?