by Barton Goldsmith, PhD, author of Emotional Fitness for Couples

I think it's easy to make things more complicated than they need to be. Here are some basic rules of the relationship road that will keep you headed in the right direction

There are no guarantees, but couples who practice these techniques have longer and stronger relationships than those who are not proactive in their love.

by guest blogger Susan Albers, PsyD, author of But I Deserve This Chocolate, 50 Ways to Soothe Yourself without Food, Eat, Drink, & Be Mindful, and Eating Mindfully

There are many ways to eat mindlessly. It's likely that you've been reading a lot about mindless eating in the news.

In my book Eating Mindfully, I outlined several different kinds of mindless eaters. See if any of these characteristics sound familiar:

A) I tend to eat when I'm nervous, stressed or bored.

B) I tend to overeat when I am with my friends or at parties.

C) I tend to eat whenever I see food, particularly if it smells or tastes good.

D) I tend to eat at the same time of the day whether I am hungry or not.

E) I'm too busy to eat, I squeeze it in between tasks or while I'm working.

F) I tend to automatically follow diet "rules" instead of thinking through whether I want it or not.

G) I tend to eat well at meals but have difficulty during the holidays.

H) I tend to eat well during the day but snack as soon as the sun goes down.

I) All of the above

Ever wondered which New Harbinger authors blog for Psychology Today? The answer is many of them!

Currently, thirty New Harbinger authors blog on topics including:

• mindfulness
• relationships
• depression & anxiety
• healthy eating
• procrastination
• teen issues
• ADHD
• personal experiences

Here are our Psychology Today blogs. Click on the links and enjoy each author's blog posts!

by guest blogger Rick Hanson, PhD is the author of Buddha's Brain and Just One Thing

Everyone messes up. Me, you, the neighbors, Mother Teresa, Mahatma Gandhi, King David, the Buddha, everybody.

It's important to acknowledge mistakes, feel appropriate remorse and learn from them so they don't happen again. But most people keep beating themselves up way past the point of usefulness: They're unfairly self-critical.

Therefore, you really need your inner protector to stick up for you: to put your weaknesses and misdeeds in perspective, to highlight your many good qualities surrounding your lapses, to encourage you to keep getting back on the high road even if you've gone down the low one, and frankly, to tell that inner critic to shut up.

by guest blogger Randi Gunther, PhD, author of When Love Stumbles and Relationship Saboteurs

Good long-term relationship partners have many of these traits. You can probably think of others that have special significance for you or your partner. The following short quiz will help you evaluate where you stand now on these fifteen.

The quiz is comprised of one summary question for each of the fifteen traits. Answer each question with a number corresponding to the following guide:

Most of the time = 5

Some of the time = 4

Occasionally = 3

Not often = 2

Never = 1

by guest blogger Raychelle Cassada Lohmann, MS, LPC, author of Anger Workbook for Teens

Sexting behaviors are experiencing rampant growth among college students. According to a study conducted by the University of Rhode Island, 4 out of 5 college kids have received sexually suggestive messages. Out of the 204 participants, approximately 56 percent reported that they have received sexual images and 17 percent of those surveyed have forwarded those messages to others.

But college students aren't the only ones sexting. Just recently there were about two dozen teenagers caught in a sexting ring in Vermont. The 17 girls that were in the pictures were ages 14-17. I would venture to say that none of the parents were aware that their daughters were taking risqué photos of themselves and sharing them with others. Likewise, I bet the boy's parents weren't aware that they were sharing these photos with one another via shared email accounts.

by Steven C. Hayes, PhD, author of Get Out of Your Mind & Into Your Life

The ninth Association for Contextual Behavioral Science World Conference (WC IX) was held in Parma, Italy, July 11 through 15. Organized by ACT-Italia, the Italian chapter of ACBS, it was the largest (596 registrants) and most diverse world conference ever—22 countries had nine or more registrants.

For those who attended, this conference had a tangible sense of a more matured and developed community—intellectually, socially, and practically. Many new datasets were shared, but there was a shift away from anxious questions such as, "Is ACT / RFT empirically supported?" toward more self-confident ones such as, "How can we advance this work?" or, "What are we missing?"

by guest blogger Ruth C. White, Ph.D., M.P.H., M.S.W. is the author of Bipolar 101

I am a strong African-American woman: I aced two challenging, concurrent grad school programs while pregnant; spent years of duty as a single, professional mother thousands of miles from family; backpacked alone through Central America in my 40s; soloed up 6,000-plus-foot mountains; worked as a social worker with challenging populations in Canada, the U.S.A. and the U.K.; rode the rapids of the White Nile in a tiny kayak and on a big rubber raft; got tenure; and started a highly successful maternal and child health project in Africa. I've earned a cape and a big "S" on my chest.

I am an African-American woman with a brain disorder, also known as a mental illness -- specifically, manic depression, also known as bipolar disorder. I have spent time in a mental health treatment facility, will probably need medication for a lifetime, and have spent many hours in a therapist's office. I've got a whole professional team that works with me to keep me sane.

I used to be ashamed and secretive of the reality described in the previous paragraph but proud of the life described in the first. Now it's an integrated whole. I know that taking off the cape and stripping my chest of the "S" doesn't make me any less of a strong African-American woman. Superhero status is not required. I cannot save the world, and sometimes I'm the one who needs saving.

by guest blogger Rick Hanson, PhD is the author of Buddha's Brain

As unique standing waves, you and I are constructed each moment by the currents -- the forces and factors, both internal and external -- flowing through us. We have no choice about being "lived" by these currents, continually giving over to them.

But we can choose to give ourselves over to the good ones.