Dr. Ali "Victor" Binazir, Happiness Engineer

Modern Science and Ancient Wisdom for Living the Good Life

  • Three unexpected side effects of women’s progress

    Recently there’s been much encouraging news for the progress of womenfolk.  A study of US Census data* found that single women in their 20s living in New York City now out-earn their male counterparts by 17 percent.  Separately, Harvard Medical School has been admitting more women than men for some years now.  And all over the country, more women are earning college degrees than men.  Heck, women run companies, states, and even whole countries, as they should.

    This is certainly an improvement over the days when women were neither allowed to vote nor own property.  Empowerment of half the world’s population is a welcome trend, so hallelujah to that.

    But has there been a downside to this progress?

    One of the central tenets of Taoism is the principle of complementarity of opposites.  The principle manifests itself everywhere from elementary particle physics to human relations.  Electrons balance protons.  Sunlight creates shade.  Yin balances yang.  To every positive trait, there is a shadow side.  And every negative trait contains a hidden boon.  A coin cannot have only one side.

    Whatever force has brought about women’s progress — call it feminism, enlightenment, or simple economic imperative — has its shadow side.  In the case of the three things I’m going to tell you about, the downside is pretty high (more…)

  • The Art of Female Orgasm: Tue 21 June teleseminar with Nicole Daedone

    One of the remarkable people I met at the recent TEDx San Francisco was Nicole Daedone, who told me she was the founder of OneTaste.  I wondered: Is OneTaste a Buddhist organization?  Perhaps a new restaurant, with just one item on the menu?

    Well, sort of.  Nicole teaches orgasm meditation (OM), more infamously known as the 15-minute orgasm.  I realized I had already heard of her through Tim Ferriss’s latest book, The Four Hour Body, in which he declares that Nicole’s teachings “should be required learning for all men.”

    It should also be required learning for all women, especially those who are not having enough orgasms.  That’s pretty much all women. I mean, who can argue with more orgasms?  Exactly.

    Depending on how you approach Nicole’s work, you may find it revolutionary, subversive, kinky, spiritual, life-changing or just plain necessary.  Which is why I’d like you to listen to Nicole and decide for yourself.  Her book is Slow Sex: The Art and Craft of the Female Orgasm. She’s doing a mini-seminar for you guys free of charge, so write this down in your calendar:

    • Date: Tuesday, 21 June 2011
    • Time: 5pm Pacific, 8pm Eastern, 1am London
    • Call-in number: +1 218 862 1300, code 667202
    • Duration: 45min + 15min Q&A

    If you’re a woman, you obviously want to listen to this.  And if you’re a guy and interested in making women happy, you’ll want to listen to this, too.

    Nicole has taught hundreds of men and women, so she’s gleaned deep insights about male-female dynamics.  In fact, my favorite parts of the book are Chapter 6, ‘What Men Should Know About Women’ and Chapter 7, ‘What Women Should Know About Men’ — ten dead-on insights for each one.  I’ll endeavor to share some of those with you over the next week, and I want you to ask her about them during the call.

    Then & there,

    AB

    PS: The interview was fantastic!  Here’s the download link for your listening pleasure: Recording of interview with Nicole Daedone on the Art & Craft of Female Orgasm (15Mb)

  • Are you a miracle? On the probability of being born

    A little while ago I had the privilege of attending TEDx San Francisco, organized by the incomparable Christine Mason McCaull.  One of the talks was by Mel Robbins, a riotously funny self-help author and life coach with a syndicated radio show.  In it, she mentioned that scientists calculate the probability of your existing as you, today, at about one in 400 trillion (4×1014).

    “That’s a pretty big number,” I thought to myself.  If I had 400 trillion pennies to my name, I could probably build a decent-sized penny fortress with it.

    Previously, I had heard the Buddhist version of the probability of ‘this precious incarnation’.  Imagine there was one life preserver thrown somewhere in some ocean and there is exactly one turtle in all of these oceans, swimming underwater somewhere.  The probability that you came about and exist today is the same as (more…)

  • How to overcome negativity (audio)

    Recently I had the pleasure of giving a talk at First Tuesday, an outstanding service organization for women run by my good friend and colleague Marcy Cole.  The talk was about how to overcome negativity.  In a spirited 45min, I shared with the audience practical tools that take anyone’s state from ‘blah’ to ‘yeehah’ in mere seconds, including:

    • The ‘Yes’ technique
    • The pen technique
    • Anchoring
    • The FRC protocol (Feel-Rise-Choose)
    • The color-water-shape-number technique <– deadly effective!
    • Supremely corny jokes sure to lift your spirits (unless you’re a guy, ahem)
    • And precisely one wagonload more

    Right-click here to download: How to overcome negativity by Dr Ali Binazir (45min, 22mb)

    [Note: There’s a little bit of a rustling sound because the recorder was in my pocket, so I recommend that you listen to it without headphones for a more pleasurable experience.]

    Be sure to comment here and let me know how they work for you.  Here in the lab, we can use all the feedback we can get…

    Best, AB

  • How to get unstuck: the FRC protocol

    Have you ever had someone in your life whose voice alone was enough to put you on edge?  Someone in whose presence you behaved in ways you didn’t like?  Say, a coworker or relative?

    Have there been situations which consistently trigger behavior you’re not proud of?  For example, when someone cuts you off on the road and you turn into a cussing, frothing maniac?

    If so, congratulations!  This means you’re human, and we like you like that.  Nematodes and arthropods can be so dull sometimes.  And if you’d like to have more choice in how you respond in these situations, I’m happy to report that there’s hope.

    In fact, that’s one of the most common topics my hypnotherapy clients bring up these days.  I’ve been proposing a remedy for them which they’ve found useful.  I call it the FRC Protocol.  It stands for Feel, Rise, Choose.

    The first step is to Feel.  You’ve been conditioned to have a certain response to a given stimulus — say, the voice of your mom.  And you know what?  That’s okay.  You are allowed to feel.  Not feeling means you stop being human.  Suppressing the feeling is not the solution either — that just amplifies it and makes it pop up bigger and badder at inconvenient times, like a poorly trained pet dragon.  So go ahead and feel.

    The feeling part is important because it’s your reminder to go to Step 2, which is Rise.  Am I asking you to levitate?  Absolutely — and I know you can do it.  For some intriguing reason, we humans possess the gift of meta-cognition.  This is the ability to have thoughts about thoughts, feelings about feelings.  It may be the chief skill enabling enlightenment.

    So let the not-so-pleasant feeling in Step 2 be your trigger to ask yourself, “Okay, now I’m feeling vindictive /belittled /petty/ like I want to wring someone’s neck out.  How do I feel about THAT?”

    This is the act of meta-cognition: having a new feeling about a feeling.  And the funny thing about it is that (more…)

  • The biggest dating mistake men make?

    Have you ever been to a greyhound track?

    Once on a bachelor party in Daytona Beach — I will never forgive Johnny N. for picking that armpit of the universe for such a hallowed occasion — we went to the track for a little hangover therapy.  It was a fruitful expedition — not the least because in my few hours there, I developed some foolproof mathematical theories for dog-betting, namely P Theory.  It basically went like this: if a dog stops, lifts its leg and takes a whizz on the way to the start line, you should bet on him.  Why?  Because he just made himself a half pound lighter than all the other greyhounds, that’s why.  And if E=(1/2)mV², then at a constant E, a lower m (mass = total amount of greyhound = slightly less after a P, hence name of theory) you get a higher V — velocity = speed = winning!

    This trenchant insight netted me the princely sum of $5.35, which I then proceeded to blow on Bud Lite, which, albeit refreshing, did not win its race.

    But I digress — let’s get back to the dogtrack.  They get in their starting pens, and with the pistol — bang! — they’re off.  They’re running like their lives depend on it, chasing the rabbit.

    Except that it’s not really a rabbit.  It’s this mangy, grey, torn-up rabbit puppet that’s been stuck on a stick just in front of the doggies so they have something to trigger their chase that wascally wabbit instincts.  And if they were to actually catch up with it — man are they going to be disappointed.

    So why am I telling you this story?  Well, let’s think about the last time you saw a girl you liked at a party.  Your (more…)

  • If you think you’re in an abusive relationship, read this NOW

    Recently I read a moving, sobering article about a great woman who was stuck in an abusive relationship.

    I couldn’t believe what I read.  Here was a super-smart woman — a doctor, in fact — who was letting a man beat her up, literally and figuratively, for five YEARS.

    At various points, he kicked her, choked her, and even held a gun to her head.  Dr Karen E Johnson was fearing for her life.  And yet she still stayed with him.

    The pattern is a familiar one: he was ‘romantic’, made breakfast in bed, said sweet nothings to her, and did all kinds of other nonsense that sucked Dr Karen in and kept her with him.

    Let me make it clear: men should be the protectors and providers for women — not their attackers.  Any kind of physical violence means you need to get out.  IMMEDIATELY.

    I don’t know what it takes for a smart woman to wake up, realize that it’s not okay for a guy to raise a hand on her EVER, and walk out.  Or call the police.

    The statistic I heard was that it takes 5 attempts before a woman finally leaves her abuser for good.  And it almost always takes outside help — from a friend, family member, therapist, social worker, concerned neighbor.

    Whatever it takes, I want to take this opportunity to tell you that YOU CAN DO IT.  You have my full permission and support to break out of this.  To get you started, here’s an excellent article about the signs to look for BEFORE a guy gets abusive.  It’s well-researched and very insightful:

    Tell Somebody: 10 Surprising Signs You’re Dating an Abusive Guy by Liz Brody, Editor-at-Large of Glamour Magazine

    And here’s the link to Dr Karen E Johson’s website, where she has two free ebooks, Five Ways to Find Out if You’re In an Abusive Relationship and 5 Ways to Take Your Power Back: DrKarenEJohnson.com

    Here are some excerpts from her article ‘Secrets and Lies’ (more…)

  • How to get back the one that got away (AUDIO)

    I got a great letter recently asking about how to get back the one that got away:

    Dr. Ali –

    Writing a thank you note after reading a self-help book (in one sitting) isn’t usually my style, but in the spirit of gratitude and non-attachment, I wanted to thank you for The Smart Woman’s Guide to Being Absolutely Irresistible. I loved the references to some of my go-to books for wisdom – The Four Agreements (and my personal favorite agreement: take nothing personally) and Gottman’s work in particular. That you read and reference Gottman in particular lends a lot of credibility, beyond just the “oh yeah. I knew that, I just forgot it” passages. I very much needed the reminder of everything you put down and I’ve filled in the margins with my own notes.

    My lingering question has to do with recovery… I met someone and had a an amazing first date. Wasn’t clear on what I wanted, slept with him too soon, threw all my reserve out the window, and ended up coming across as needy, which isn’t my usual posture. As much as I’m sure it threw him (I haven’t heard from him since), it threw me twice as hard. Long story short, he didn’t see me at my best. Now that I’ve got my philosophy back, I would like a do-over. Is such a thing possible? If it is, will you either 1) give me a quick rundown on how to see him again – I can handle it once I’ve got a real human to work with rather than stupid texting – or 2) include the above information in the next edition of the book?

    Thanks again for the book. It was absolutely what I needed.

    Sincerely,

    Andrea.

    And this is what I said.  Even though the letter was written by a woman, the principles are about being human.  Since guys are also human, it applies to us smelly brutes as well.  Right-click to download:

    HowToGetThemBack_DrAliBinazir.mp3 (7.5min)

    What are your thoughts?

    Best

    AB

  • “What’s he thinking?” and the pitfalls of online dating (AUDIO)

    Ladies —

    This is one of the best letters I’ve gotten in a while, and in this podcast I’ll tell you why, and what an octopus (?!) has to do with it.  Jennifer had a summer romance with someone she met online, and then — things got weird.  Now she’s wondering whether it’s worth retrieving, and what the guy’s strange behavior means.  To get the full story, listen to the podcast — right-click to download (8mb):

    “What’s he thinking?” and the pitfalls of online dating

    Let me know what you’re thinking!

    Best, Dr Ali B

  • Guest article: How to get over a guy, by Evan Marc Katz

    Ladies –

    I’d like to introduce to you the work of my friend and colleague Evan Marc Katz.  Most recently, he released the ebook ‘Why He Disappeared’, which I liked a lot.  He talks exactly the kind of horse-sense that I dig, so I hope you find this useful.

    –AB

    I invite you to think of the last time you were emotionally invested in a man.

    It could have been a promising prospect you met online, it could have been your boyfriend of five months, it could have been your fiancé.

    The common denominator is that this man, who took your breath away and gave you hope, ultimately left you.

    I know how it feels. Most people do. You stake your dreams on the integrity of your relationship, only to find out that he had eyes for someone else, that he had major issues with you, or that wasn’t ready to commit to you.

    This can be devastating. It can make you mistrustful. It can make you lose faith. It can stop you from dating entirely.

    But the hardest part is how, far too often, you never (more…)