TO  HELP IMPROVE  OUR  LITTLE  ANGLES' LIVES  

   

SELF CONTROL

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Instructions

THE E-BOOK ON SELF CONTROL

This E-Book is based upon selected chapters from

the Full Length Book entitled:

HEALTHY JINGLES FOR THE MIND AND BODY,

This full length book covering many subjects may be purchased directly

from Amazon.com by clicking here--> BUY THE FULL LENGTH BOOK 

PUBLISHED BY HEALTHY JINGLES PUBLICATIONS LLC 2008

     

        Jingles are presented as an efficient and effective way to encapsulate self-help advice approved by medical authorities. Use of jingles makes self-help advice far easier and more enjoyable to read, remember and understand.

BY 

VERNON A. QUARSTEIN Ph.D.

Copyright © 2006 and 2008 by Vernon A. Quarstein 

All Copy Rights Reserved unless  purchased.

        The material in this electronic publication is protected under International and Federal Copyright Laws and Treaties, and as such, any unauthorized reprint or use of this material is strictly prohibited.

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THE E-BOOK ON SELF CONTROL

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INTRODUCTION

We all recognize that jingles usually reside in the domain of children’s nursery books because they are easy to understand and fun to say. Through repetition the jingle impresses messages contained in the jingle on a child’s mind. That is useful provided the message contributes to the child’s future—part of which is having fun.

In this chapter and book we extend the use of the jingle to all people, young or old, for the purpose of increasing their lifelong welfare. Most of the same reasons that jingles benefit children can also be applied beneficially to adults.

We expand the “One, Two, Buckle My Shoe” jingle to include actions to be followed in routine and crisis situations by young and old.  From this exercise we develop characteristics of jingles for use by grown-ups based upon a jingle for youngsters.

Follow-on e-books include many health and fitness jingles. Any one of these jingles can be used for early childhood development because they apply to both children and grown-ups. By doing so, beneficial messages contained in healthy jingles may be retained by children as they grow up and also may become impressed upon the grown-ups in the process.

Jingles for Routine Situations

Routine situations encompass learning how to take care through self-care. Self-care depends largely upon the written word but most medical paragraphs are tedious reading. For that reason this book offers many self-care and self-prevention jingles for easier reading.

The old familiar “1-2-3 Jingle” illustrates just what jingles can do in routine as well as crisis situations. For those who have not heard of the 1-2-3 Jingle, or for those who have forgotten it, the jingle goes like this:

THE 1 - 2 - 3 JINGLE [1]

(Anonymous author)

One, two, buckle my shoe,

Three, four, shut the door,

Five, six pick up sticks,

Seven, eight, lay them straight,

Nine, ten, a big fat hen,

Eleven, twelve, dig and delve!

 

Most people think of this jingle as a way to teach children how to count, and perhaps it was and may continue to be a way to do so in the future. But, actually, most of this jingle can be used for far more than just counting.

The 1-2-3 Jingle [1] may be interpreted as a subliminal way to impress good habits upon children and grown-ups. The jingle would remain unchanged except for expansion of the meaning of some lines (as illustrated below). Certain disciplinary messages to counter very common infractions of good discipline can then be conveyed with lasting effect:

THE 1 - 2 - 3 JINGLE for CHILDREN [2]

1  - 2 Buckle your shoe, means: “Put on or tie your shoes,”

3 - 4 Shut the door, which can mean: “Shut the door when you either come in or when you go out of the house,”

5 - 6 Pick up sticks, which can mean: “Pick up after whatever you are playing with is finished,”

7 - 8 Lay them straight, which can mean: “Neatly put away whatever you picked up,”

9 - 10 A big fat hen, which can mean: “Look for a reward like food for the body and soul” or “Come home in time for dinner,”

11 - 12 Dig and delve, which can mean: “Look into and think about what you have to do before you do it.”

Codification of Messages 

The 1 - 2 - 3 Jingle is usually used at face value but it can be expanded to codify messages to children. After teaching a child this jingle, whenever the child commits one of the common infractions of rules around the house, all a mother or father would have to say would be the odd numbers to jingle the mind.

This coding would cause the child to recall the meaning of the numbers and correct his or her wrongdoing.

If the door were left open, mother or father would just say “3, 4” and the child would, hopefully–but not the first time–go back and shut the door. If a parent said “5, 6” the child would pick up toys or whatever items were not put away. Then, if necessary, “7, 8” would cause the child to put things away neatly rather than throw them into a pile, and so on.

To simplify these instructions it is only necessary to say the odd numbers because they identify the action to be taken. The even numbers are not otherwise needed. A combination of numbers like “3, 4, 1, 2” could leave out “4, 2.” The numbers “3, 1” mean to the child that before leaving the house, he or she is to “shut the door and tie shoe laces before going out.” 

After this exercise in beneficial mental gymnastics is repeated for the child over time, the odd numbered cues spontaneously remind the child of self-help duties. The numbers “7, 11” mean “Put your things away properly, and next time think about what you do before you do it.”

Thus, a practical usage of the jingle would evolve if the child was brought up on the original jingle as a means of teaching counting. The result would be a fun game that child, mother or father could play without creating disaffection, to obtain the willful, even delightful, compliance of the child.

A habit of following the numbered rules would soon become ingrained or internalized.  The codes could become personal and even intimate.

This codification of instructions illustrates one characteristic of the jingle. After being internalized jingles can be used to jog the memory to encompass greater activity than that incorporated in the code.

In this case just one or two numbers can illicit immediate responses that obtain benefits for both the child and the adult.  This phenomenon represents the coding capacity possessed by a jingle that is useful in retaining a larger volume of information.

JINGLES FOR SELF-CONTROL

An adaptation of the 1-2-3 Jingle to handle a specific crisis further illustrates the usefulness of jingles to adults. Crises are very common in medicine so the problem of what to do under time constraints becomes very real and of vital importance. 

Instructions cast in jingle format would be far more effective during crises as procedures are more easily remembered in this format by persons responsible for their execution.

We have already written that medical students solve time constraints during their training by recasting medical information into jingles as an aid to memory so as to facilitate recall under the time pressure of examinations.

The following example uses this approach by applying a jingle in a crisis situation.  The example requires some imagination for anyone unfamiliar with recreational hunting. Knowledge of hunting is not necessary for the jingle’s interpretation.

THE NORTH WOODS SETTING

The setting is the North Woods up near and beyond the Canadian border during winter hunting season. We present this setting as a case scenario. In cold climates, the idea is to remember and instill upon hunters when they awaken on a cold, freezing night. Keeping the occupants warm throughout the night while housed under primitive conditions in the North Woods with a single wood-burning stove is the immediate problem.

Assume that a hunting party is holed up in a cabin in the deep woods. It is nighttime. Wood is available and some is still cut and piled outside. A huge winter blizzard ensues. All occupants are fast asleep as the fire burns down to embers at or around midnight. One of the hunters is the fire-stoker for the evening and is therefore in charge of keeping the fire going.

This situation calls for emergency action because of blizzard conditions and extremely low temperatures. We employ the same well-known procedures of the “One, Two, Buckle my Shoe” jingle used for the routine situation outlined above, but reinterpreted as for this crisis event. A portion of the instructions in the jingle have been somewhat altered for the purpose of this example.

REINTERPRETATION

Again, the 1 – 2 - 3 Jingle can be reinterpreted and adapted as a subliminal way of impressing good habits upon grown-ups as we have illustrated previously for children. The jingle remains the same except the meaning of some lines (illustrated below) are changed to apply to adults in a different situation–this time involving a crisis:

THE 1 – 2 - 3 JINGLE for GROWN-UPS [3]

 

1 - 2 Buckle your shoe, which can mean: “Put on your shoes or boots and buckle or tie them up,”

3 - 4 Shut the door, which can mean: “Shut the door when you either come in or when you go out of the house,”

5 - 6 Pick up sticks, which can mean: “Pick up wood from the woodpile and bring it into the shack,”

7 - 8 Lay them straight, which can mean: “Neatly arrange the wood you have brought in the wood box,”

9 - 10 A big fat hen, which can mean: “Look for a reward like food for the body and soul,” or “Don’t let the fire go out,”

11 - 12 Dig and delve, which can mean: “First investigate and then think about what you should have done to avoid crises.”

 

Given the 1 - 2 - 3 Jingle for Grown-Ups the following scenario describes what could happen without the jingle and what most likely would happen with the jingle:

1 - 2 Buckle Your Shoe:  The first line of the jingle is the major first step for the fire-stoker that could otherwise lead to a broken body, frozen feet or ruined shoes. Failure to buckle-up or tie-up could result in a plunge headlong down the steps while rushing out the door to obtain more wood. The first line of the jingle prepares the fire-stoker for this unwanted outcome.

3 - 4. Shut the Door: The second line of the jingle is also important both while the fire-stoker leaves the house to go outside to the woodpile and also when returning on each trip. Leaving the door open on a windy, snowy, cold, and freezing night would rapidly fill the main dwelling with snow with the door left wide open. Under even more severe conditions, the effect of a strong wind might repeatedly slam the open door back and forth and eventually tear it off of its hinges.  The second line of the jingle prepares the fire-stoker for this serious outcome.

5 - 6, Pick Up Sticks: Without the jingle as guidance, the fire-stoker could fall down the steps, break off the door from its hinges, and then lose his way to the woodpile. Under these conditions the jingle could have saved him from another crisis. Fortunately, the jingle gives the fire-stoker clues as to exactly what he must do to avoid disaster.

7 - 8, Lay Them Straight: Imagine the confusion that would result if each load were dropped helter-skelter in and around the wood box! The jingle provides a clear message that each stick needs to be laid straight. This practice would result in a tightly loaded wood box that would contain the maximum amount of wood for stoking the fire by just following the letter of the jingle.  

9 - 10, A Big Fat Hen: This line of the jingle reminds the fire-stoker that it is also his job to get some food for breakfast now, a task that he would have probably forgotten after the serious errors already committed. This line is used here to remind the fire-stoker to organize the work for the day.

11 - 12, Dig and Delve: After most crises an investigation is necessary to see what has gone wrong so that future crisis situations that may occur can be handled better than the present one. The fire-stoker must dig and delve into the problem to find out what went wrong. So, the fire-stoker reflects back on his activity and determines that if he had stocked up on wood for the fire the day before the blizzard the crisis would not have occurred. Without this step, the same crisis could happen again tomorrow or the day after.

Versatility and Power of Jingles

Knowing the 1 – 2 - 3 Jingle from childhood serves the fire-stoker well as only a few minutes would be required to familiarize its application to stoking the fire under conditions outlined above. The 1 – 2 - 3 Jingle illustrates the versatility and power of jingles to guide people under either routine or crisis conditions. 

This scenario does not imply that all emergency instructions should be cast as jingles. Such a practice could greatly increase the likelihood that emergency instructions would be followed.  The characteristics of jingles that include ease of learning, more interest in knowing, greater enjoyment in saying, and better understanding all argue that such a practice could be beneficial for everyone involved. A possible example of these phenomena would be to recast announcements on emergency procedures by airline flight attendants into jingle format—the passengers would smile and know what to do, rather than frown and not know what to do!  

In general, the jingle can be a useful tool for supporting wellness efforts by jingling the mind and thereby helping remember healthful rules or processes. Jingles can simplify and codify beneficial medical information. Repetition of a jingle over time causes messages to become fixed in memory so that they may be recalled whenever the cue to the jingle is activated.  Since jingles include rhymes, alliteration, and a definite beat they are easy to remember and fun to say to one self or out loud. Once familiarized and updated, jingles become instant guidelines regarding health to form a basis for a better life.

It is clear from the illustration using the 1 - 2 Buckle My Shoe jingle that jingles may be at least familiarized to be effective when situations present themselves as emphasized in this jingle on remembering things:

REMEMBERING THINGS JINGLE [4]

 

Rules and Tools Jingle [4.1]

Jingles help us remember rules.

Once a jingle is familiarized,

Jingles provide healthy tools,

Better yet when internalized.

 

Gluing and Clueing Jingle [4.2]

Jingles to memory become glued,

Through repetition for better recall.

Recall occurs when a jingle is clued,

Enabling a healthy practice to install.

 

The jingle serves as a code that can have different meanings depending upon the interests of the user. A jingle is not unlike a song. Think of the many songs we recognize and the messages that they portray. Music does not necessarily accompany a jingle, but the rhythm is still there. Jingles can be readily accompanied by a melodious hum or beat if helpful in the familiarization and internalization processes.

Of course, there are several ways that make remembering easier: (1) Use of  “Acronyms” that use the first letter of a series or group of words that captures the message to be remembered, (2) Use of “Sentences” that use the first letter of each word in the message that you want to remember, (3) The “Journey” method in which you imagine yourself walking along a defined route and placing objects you wish to remember along the way, (4) The use of “Stories” that incorporate things that you want to remember, (5) “Chunking,” which involves remembering large numbers by breaking them up into smaller chunks, and (6) The “Rhyme” as used in a jingle of two, four or more lines.[1] Jingles seem to us to be best suited for remembering self-prevention and self-help messages because a jingle’s rhythms seem to facilitate long-term memory of more complex information more efficiently than the other methods.    

USE of HEALTHY GOOD HABITS JINGLE

We have shown in the discussion of the 1 – 2 - 3 Jingle that healthy jingles are not only good habits or practices that are beneficial for children but also for adults. We turn now to a discussion of practices as they apply specifically to adults. Good habits are particularly amenable to expression through use of jingles. The usefulness of a variety of types of practices that mankind took part in over the centuries concerned life, death, mourning, grief, memories, and health. Many of these practices are alive and active in our lives today.

Changes from knowledge based on tradition to knowledge based on scientific evidence have occurred over time. The reality is that good habits are embedded in our culture but are difficult to acquire and retain. As people grow older more begin to see the benefits of healthier lifestyles, and bemoan the fact that we failed to undertake some form of self-prevention much earlier in life. Herein lays an important message for all: “Take responsibility for newly found and proven health and wellness strategies” and don’t necessarily say, “If it’s good enough for Mother and Dad it is good enough for me!”

Good ceremonial practices are common in most cultures and may relate to a variety of events, not only to practices associated with events like death and marriage. There are trivial good habits such as sitting down with our partner and sharing our first cup of coffee in the morning or tea at other times. There are even wellness-based habits such as an early morning or afternoon walk or exercises at home or at a health club. There are also event-based events such as births, birthdays, holidays, and other occurrences associated with the passing of members of a family or friends. These events tend to come and go if they lack an easy way of remembering them once they occur.

The trivial practices and wellness-based good practices or habits benefit us by lowering stress and by thus improving wellbeing. Timing is important so most events need to be scheduled so as not to be interrupted by other events. Good practices may be triggered by and thus repeated upon the occurrence of a particular date or time as in the case of an event based need. In the case of an exercise, health or nutritional practice, timing may occur daily, every other day, or on a weekly basis. These health-based practices are far more difficult to acquire than most event-based practices, but should, in any case, be based upon the best and most recent medical literature.

HABITUAL STATUS of HEALTHFUL PRACTICES

Habitual status does not mean that the jingles put forth in this series have to be memorized before being practiced. Rather, knowing about them is the first step, followed by familiarization through repetition in the same way we learned most things as we grew up from childhood. That is all that is necessary. Some of the healthy guidelines contained in these jingles are already part of an individual’s knowledge base, but have not yet attained the status of a life-saving practice.

The status of a good practice requires self-responsibility and thus a greater degree of commitment. Even then, one purpose of the jingle is to alert the mind to deviations from the course of the practice. That is, to follow the letter of the jingle. The objective is to consciously apply the healthy practices advocated in the jingle without overlooking important steps. When this objective is reached the practice achieves the highest status possible.

SELF-CONTROL IN CRITICAL SITUATIONS

For jingles to provide the many advantages mentioned above they usually require, in addition to the jingle, also a narrative explanation. This explanation is important to ensure that the codified meaning reflected in a jingle is accurate and complete. Jingles are thumbnail sketches and thus cannot capture all ramifications of a cure or a preventive strategy, but they can serve as an efficient reminder of related factors. Some jingles are self-explanatory so do not require narrative expression.

If appropriate the narrative expression or explanation offers the user the opportunity to expand knowledge on the cures or preventive strategies being addressed.  Healthy jingles are usually initially presented with narrative explanations. After this initial presentation, the entire jingle is in some cases reconstituted without the narrative explanations. This format affords readers an opportunity to review their level of understanding of each jingle without reference to information presented in the narrative explanations. Through repetition the jingle can readily capture this added information so reading it in narrative format over and over becomes unnecessary.

PRESENTATION STYLES JINGLE [5]

 

Presentation of information throughout this book will generally follow that illustrated below in the “The Lifestyle Jingle” and in the “New Practices Jingle.” Some jingles are presented without explanations because of their simplistic nature. When speaking of a cure or prevention for life one most definitely focuses upon positive lifestyle changes that work hand in hand with science, medicine and technology to achieve self-cure or self-prevention. This jingle goes: 

The Lifestyle Jingle [5.1]

Desire to live a better life?

Make positive lifestyle changes?

Commit to self-prevention,

Build knowledge up in stages.

         

Narrative Explanation [5.1]:

The first condition to meet before adopting any good practice is to have a desire to live a better and more fruitful and rewarding life. The general public has many tools and much information available about how to make positive lifestyle changes or changes in habits. Most people do not adopt good practices for these purposes. To assure a more fruitful life they should acquire required information and take actions necessary for proper nutrition, exercise, personal love, health, and happiness.

With a commitment to self-responsibility one can benefit from the endless options that are now offered by the medical professions and are now readily available. These health-based practices entail repetitious activities that help improve nutrition, exercise, health care, attitudes and behavior. Long-standing rites of passage are still widely practiced but many are obsolete.

New Guidelines Jingle [5.2]

Replace old with new and better,

Guidelines become outmoded,     

We don’t mean rites of passage,

But jingles newly loaded.

 

Narrative Explanation [5.2]:

Many new good practices are needed to incorporate new health and fitness guidelines that may have originated in the twentieth century but continue to be developed even at an accelerated pace in the twenty-first century. A person usually does not need to learn new practices concerning the rites of passage, for example, but improvement and changes in health and fitness practices are sometimes needed. They can be readily incorporated into new or revised procedures covering new self-care and self-prevention developments. This need for new practices is evidenced as many people continue to pursue health and fitness activities but often using outmoded guidance without the most advanced information regarding them. Newly loaded jingles are current or updated health messages.

Jingles possess certain characteristics or properties that can apply to a variety of situations and in particular to health issues. The jingles themselves possess the capacity to telegraph messages contained in medical literature by encapsulating them into direct and forceful language that is rhythmic and therefore memorable.

Some other properties illustrated in the 1-2-3 Jingle and in the discussion of good practices are summarized in this jingle:

 

THE CHARACTERISTICS OF JINGLES [6]       

Generating Enthusiasm Jingle [6.1]

Jingles are adept at generating,

Enthusiasm to seek and find,

Much more interest in knowing,

What keeps our systems aligned.

 

Music in Rhymes Jingle [6.2]

Much greater ease in learning,

With repetition over the years.

Far more enjoyment in saying,

Rhythm is music to the ears.

         

Recall When Needed Jingle [6.3]

Jingles provide most users with:

Better understanding when heeded,

Greater retention over time, and

Instantaneous recall when needed.

 

Dispel the Blues Jingle [6.4]

Coded jingles recall hidden clues.

Jingles help find the best way.

Jingle rhythm dispels the blues.

Easy and enjoyable to sing or say.

 

Encapsulating Jingle [6.5]

Jingles readily encapsulate:

Complex words and phrases,

Taken from wordy documents,

Into practice high in praises.

 

Narratives with Jingles [6.6]

When jingles with narratives jell,

Explanations come out very well,

Understanding improves the tell,

Both forms together excel.

         

Eliminating the Sad Jingles [6.7]

Healthy jingles join wellness forces,

When distinguishing good from bad.

If messages stem from valid sources,

Jingles help eliminate the sad.

 

The Wellness Jingle [6.8]

The feeling of some improvement,

That stems from doing right things.

By following the jingles advice,

Much joy to us wellness brings.

 

Helpful Jingles [6.9]

Crises require more knowledge,

Regarding actions to be taken.

When helpful jingles are available,

The bearer is far less shaken.

 

THE PRICE WE PAY FOR ILL HEALTH

 

          Healthy jingles are advocated for use by both adults and children but there remains an important concern for the wellbeing of younger people. Those who have not known the price they will pay for ill health from ignoring preventive strategies.

         Younger people and many older people do not yet comprehend how poor health habits and lack of knowledge of self-care and self-prevention can come back to haunt them as they age. For those readers who have doubts we outline what can be done earlier in life to avoid deadly diseases in the future such as strokes, cancer, diabetes, and Alzheimer’s disease.

 

          The purpose of a preliminary review of later chapters is to show readers just how important weight control, dieting, and exercising are not only when young but also as they age.

          Messages in jingles are important as they show outcomes that become more serious as one fails to follow the Healthy Jingle practices. Reading about the causes and effects of certain deadly diseases helps convince readers that jingles offered in these E-Books are so vitally important in preparation of parents and teachers prior to using the Healthy Jingles for Kids reading books.

        Even a cursory preliminary review of these chapters should help convince the reader that it is important to maintain body weight, to exercise, and to eat properly.

 

 Good practices in jingle format can help us build and adhere to a commitment to control weight and to adopt many other healthful practices (See Chapter 18 for discussion of the use of good practices.).

By following an adopted practice there is an intended stricture to “do it” every day, week or month, and to “stick to it” at the time, place, and in accordance with the prescriptions embedded in the best practice.

Those persons who are not habitually committed to a health and fitness program, such as the control of weight, usually fail to achieve their hoped-for goals. Habitual application of the jingles presented in these chapters will help build health and fitness through self-care and self-prevention, a longer, and more enjoyable life.

ADVANTAGES OF HEALTHY JINGLES

Healthy Jingles provide advantages in themselves when used. They represent an accommodation of tendencies on the part of many modern readers to avoid mental overload from long sentences, long paragraphs, or even lengthy words and phrases. The composition of a jingle is similar to advertisements as employed in short sketches on television or even in newspaper advertisements. T

his feature represents a “telegraphic” characteristic that permits the meaning incorporated into a jingle or advertisement to be quickly grasped and understood. This connection is confirmed by an Internet search that shows that 40 ad-jingles were requested or suggested by users during the month of June 2006 alone.

Added to the telegraphic characteristic of jingles is their rhythmic nature that compels attention and fosters remembrance. Avoidance of involvement in complex or even tediously written paragraphs and long treatises is thereby avoided through use of the jingle format. To accommodate these and other readers we have added explanatory paragraphs in narrative format following many Healthy Jingles.