By a large margin, Americans hate their jobs, according to a recent Gallup poll, which found 70 percent of the work force is either completely disengaged from or thoroughly despises their work.

"Since the 2008 economic crisis, millions of Americans have been hit hard in most aspects of their lives - their homes, their jobs, their personal lives. I was one of them," says Noelle M. Meade-Izzi, whose busy lifestyle in the corporate world, combined with the market crash and other negative forces, had been crushing her sense of well-being.

"Somehow, that was all changed by the tiniest bird known to man - a hummingbird I eventually named Artemis. She was building a little nest right next to my balcony. Witnessing her small yet heroic efforts to complete the nest for her chick and then raise it to maturity, all on her own, helped nurse me through a healthy and spiritual transformation."

Meade-Izzi, author of "The Hummingbird That Answered My Heart's Calling," (http://noelle-meade.squarespace.com) offers tips for those who are open to experiencing life's everyday miracles?seeing the extraordinary within the ordinary--in the midst of the stressors and strife that seem to inundate our lives. "Get in touch with your inner hummingbird," she says ...

· Find your Artemis: Meade-Izzi was at a low point in her life when she saw the little hummingbird - a species so tiny, many people never notice it. At one point, she heard the audible fluttering of wings outside her bedroom screen slider early in the morning. It was the hummingbird, who seemed to be summoning her. After following her to the nest, Meade-Izzi discovered Artemis' chick had hatched. "Did she really intend to show me what happened?" she asks. "I think so; we'd developed a palpable bond throughout the entire nesting process." Nature is everywhere and abounds with beauty and inspiration - you just have to look for it.

· Don't fear the quiet: Waking up before you're ready, making the coffee, rushing to work and getting inundated with complaints, getting stuck in traffic on the way home and, oh yeah, you have to stop at the grocery store ... Rinse and repeat on Tuesday. Sound familiar? Workdays don't have to be a grind! "Many of us have gotten so accustomed to incessant chatter in our lives - from our mobile smartphones to what's inside our own heads - that we don't know how to respond and appreciate silence," Meade-Izzi says. There are many ways to silence the chatter, which offers surprising renewal and fresh perspectives, she says. From meditation to yoga to simply enjoying the sound of rain on your roof, make time for quiet.

· Focus on empathy: It was the focus on something extraordinarily small and completely other than herself - Artemis - that helped Meade-Izzi find her deeper self. "Obsessing over what I didn't like in my life did not help me affect positive change - in fact, it made things worse," she says. Empathy helps us hurdle the very tall walls of our ego and puts us in the shoes of someone else and what their experience must be like. In turn, we gain perspective on our own unique lives and find them more manageable."

About Noelle M. Meade-Izzi

Noelle Meade-Izzi is a nature photographer by hobby and a professional graphic designer for the marketing and advertising industries. Her work has been recognized by the American Advertising Federation's (AAF) prestigious Addy Creative Awards for design excellence, including a Best in Show. Her experience featured in her book, "The Hummingbird That Answered My Heart's Calling," was featured in the United States Humane Society (USHS) publication, "All Animals."

Happiness isn't a state of being, says former Johnson & Johnson executive Lynda Wallace; happiness is something happy people do.

"Some may say that mimicking people is not good enough - that simply wearing Michael Jordan's jersey doesn't make you Michael Jordan - and they're right. But if you behave more like Jordan in his playing years, including practicing, competing, and working out, then you'll be that much better as a basketball player, and more like Mike," says Wallace, a certified positive psychology coach and the author of "A Short Course in Happiness: Practical Steps to a Happier Life," (www.lyndawallace.com), which topped Amazon's Self-Help Best Seller list.

Wallace describes four steps we can all take to live happier lives:

• Focus on the Positive: If you have only five minutes a day to dedicate to becoming a happier person, here's a great way to spend it. Each night, before going to bed, write down five things for which you feel grateful. As you write your list, take a moment to reflect on each item. Call up a picture in your mind and experience your gratitude in a heartfelt way. This is a great way to jump start gratitude, optimism, and kindness, all of which have enormously positive effects on our happiness.

• Cope Effectively with the Negative: Wallace quotes Thich Nhat Hanh, who said, "Don't wait until you have no more suffering before allowing yourself to be happy." Negative experiences are a part of every life. We do best when we are able to acknowledge and accept the difficult emotions that come with the experiences, see what they have to teach us, and then use coping skills such as reaching out to others, gaining perspective on our troubles, and actively engaging in the things we do that give our lives meaning.

• Develop Strong Relationships: No matter how much we may enjoy and need our time alone, the fact remains that we are an intensely social species, and that meaningful connections with other people are essential to happiness. In fact, research makes it clear that the single most important characteristic of very happy people is that they have trusting relationships at the center of their lives. Wallace says that those relationships may be with romantic partners, family members, or friends; it doesn't much matter. "What matters is that we take the time and trouble to nurture and appreciate our most important relationships, and that we don't allow other priorities to crowd out our focus on them."

• Pursue Meaningful Goals: "When I first began studying the positive psychology research," says Wallace, "one of the biggest surprises for me was just how important goal pursuit is to happiness." Goals focus and motivate us. They increase our resilience by giving us reasons to keep going following setbacks. And they give us a highly gratifying sense of purpose, forward motion, and meaning.
"One of the most important things to understand about goals is that making progress toward them actually contributes even more to our happiness than achieving them does. So it's important that we choose our goals well. Pursuing them doesn't have to be easy or entirely pleasant. In fact, we gain the most happiness from working toward goals that demand a lot from us. But they do need to fit well with who we are and what we value."

About Lynda Wallace

After 20 years as a highly successful executive with Johnson & Johnson, where she was responsible for a $1 billion portfolio of businesses including Band-Aid, Neosporin and Purell, Lynda Wallace changed careers to pursue her passion. She now helps individuals and groups apply proven insights and techniques to achieve greater happiness and success in their lives, families, careers, and businesses. She meets with local clients in her office in Montclair, NJ, and with clients from around the world by phone or at in-person engagements. Lynda holds an MBA from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania and is a certified positive psychology coach. She is also a sought-after speaker and the author of the No.1 Amazon Self-Help Best Seller "A Short Course in Happiness: Practical Steps to a Happier Life." More information is available at her website: lyndawallace.com.

Psychological abuse consists of impairing the mental life and impeding mental development. It creates distorted beliefs, taught by the abuser, about the world. Those beliefs become ingrained in the victim's mind and can interfere with the flexibility that needed to constantly assess the environment and respond appropriately. Knowing the signs of psychological abuse may save women from the physical abuse that so often follows.

I experienced psychological abuse through the eyes of a child -- part of the stories I share in "Believe in the Magic: Let the Tenacity of Mattie Fisher Inspire You," (www.mattiefisher.com), the story of my mother's remarkable journey.

I watched as my father systematically and maliciously attempted to drive my mother crazy. He would constantly move car keys and other items from the places she normally kept them. He would then pretend to find them in odd places, like the refrigerator. After playing the hero for a month or so, my father would start insulting my mom with degrading remarks.

After months of psychological warfare, with her mental state sufficiently weakened, my father would begin the physical abuse. For the rest of her life, my mother was inconsolable and shaky whenever something went missing.

Signs of psychological abuse include :

• Your partner uses finances to control you.
• He often threatens to leave.
• She seeks to intimidate using looks, gestures or actions.
• He smashes things.
• Your partner seeks to control you by minimizing, denying and blaming
• He makes light of the abuse and does not take your concerns about it seriously.
• You are continually criticized, called names and/or shouted at.
• She emotionally degrades you in private, but acts charming in public.
• He humiliates you in private or public.
• They withhold approval, appreciation or affection as punishment.

Effects of psychological abuse on the victim, from the Center for Relationship Abuse Awareness:

• A distrust of his or her own spontaneity
• A loss of enthusiasm
• An uncertainty about how she is coming across
• A concern that something is wrong with him
• An inclination to reviewing incidents with the hopes of determining what went wrong
• A loss of self-confidence
• A growing self-doubt
• An internalized critical voice
• A concern that she isn't happier and ought to be
• An anxiety or fear of being crazy
• A sense that time is passing and he's missing something
• A desire not to be the way she is, e.g. "too sensitive," etc.
• A hesitancy to accept her perceptions
• A reluctance to come to conclusions
• A tendency to live in the future, e.g. "Everything will be great when/after ..."
• A desire to escape or run away
• A distrust of future relationships

If you answered yes to even one, you may be in an abusive relationship. Get help!
Call the National Domestic Violence Hotline at 1-800-799-SAFE, or the National Sexual Assault Hotline at 1-800-656-HOPE.

About Dee Louis-Scott

Dee Louis-Scott is the author of "Believe in the Magic: Let the Tenacity of Mattie Fisher Inspire You," (www.mattiefisher.com), the story of her mother's remarkable journey. Louis-Scott retired after working 30 years as a federal employee. She has a Bachelor of Science degree in business administration. Scott has co-chaired the Black Family Technology Awareness Association's Youth STEM Fair for nine years; its mission is to encourage studies in the Science, Technology, Engineering and Math curriculum in urban communities. Twenty years since the death of her heroic mother, Mattie Fisher, Louis-Scott honors her life, which was experienced in a time in American history when it was a double-curse to be a black woman.

Unlike many of the most important events in one's life - graduation, marriage, having a child - almost no one anticipates a cancer diagnosis.

This year, nearly 239,000 U.S. men will be diagnosed with prostate cancer and more than 232,000 women will learn they have breast cancer, according the American Cancer Society. Over their lifetimes, nearly half of all men can expect a cancer diagnosis, and more than a third of women.*

"Thankfully, we now have many tools for detecting cancers early and treating them successfully. But learning you have cancer remains one of life's most frightening and stressful experiences," says cancer psychotherapist Dr. Niki Barr, author of "Emotional Wellness, The Other Half of Treating Cancer," (canceremotionalwellbeing.com).

"Developing ways to help patients address their emotional well-being throughout their medical journey, still lag behind medical advances, but physicians and psychologists recognize that healing improves when both the physical and emotional needs of patients are served."

In her years of clinical practice working exclusively with cancer patients and their loved ones, Barr developed an Emotional Wellness Toolbox that patients stock with what Barr has found to be the most effective tools.

Here are some of her tools for managing anxiety - a normal and emotionally healthy response to a cancer diagnosis, but one that can spiral out of control.

• Catch your anxious thoughts. Stop anxious thoughts - thoughts about fear, unease and worry -- before they lead to anxiety. Start by writing your thoughts down on individual note cards and identifying the first one that's leading to you feeling anxious.  Then the next one. When you've identified all of your anxious thoughts, go back to the first one and, on the card, write a new thought that will not make you feel anxious. It should be a thought that is confident and empowering. Continue down the list and do the same for each anxious thought.

• Erase 'what if' thinking. What if the cancer has spread? What if the treatment doesn't work? One 'what if' leads to another and often spirals into anxiety. Be aware when you start asking 'what if' and instead ask yourself, "Is this thought helping me or hurting me?" and "Is this thought moving me forward or backward?"

• Ground yourself. Interrupt a chain of anxious thoughts by focusing on details around you. Look at the color of the walls in the room you're in; take in the pictures on the walls, the books on the shelves and the titles on their spines; look at the person you're talking to, the color of their eyes, the clothes she's wearing. Being very focused on external details can derail anxious thoughts.

• Use distraction. Choose a favorite place and visit it. Absorb everything about it - the colors, smells, any people involved, the sounds, tastes, how it feels. Build it up very clearly in your mind, going over and over it, so it can become a distraction tool. When you're waiting for a medical test or procedure, undergoing a procedure, or any other time you need to "be" somewhere else, call up your distraction and visit.

Other tools for your box include meditation CDs that use guided imagery; favorite music CDs; and a journal to record your thoughts and feelings.

"Being able to manage your anxiety enables you to move forward through cancer whether patient, caregiver or family member," Barr says.  "Don't tell yourself you can't handle whatever you're going through. Yes, you can ... five minutes at a time."

*The data does not include non-melanoma skin cancers, the most common diagnosis.

About Niki Barr, Ph.D. (@NikiBarrPhD)

Niki Barr, Ph.D. founded a pioneering psychotherapy practice dedicated to working with cancer patients in all stages of the disease, along with their family members, caregivers and friends. In her book, she describes an "emotional wellness toolbox" patients can put together with effective and simple strategies, ready to use at any time, for helping them move forward through cancer. Dr. Barr is a dynamic and popular speaker, sharing her insights with cancer patients and clinicians across the nation.