beyond 1st world problems...

prescription healing...

On November 1, select doctors will be able to prescribe a visit to the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts under a new initiative. Physicians who are part of Montreal-based medical group Médecins francophones du Canadawill be allowed to send patients -- up to 50 prescriptions a year -- to the MMFA for free. Entry is good for two adults and two children age 17 or under.

Art heals.

That's the philosophy behind a new initiative from the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, which will allow doctors to soon be able to prescribe a visit to a museum.

"There's more and more scientific proof that art therapy is good for your physical health," said Dr. Hélène Boyer, vice-president of Médecins francophones du Canada and the head of the family medicine group at the CLSC St-Louis-du-Parc. "It increases our level of cortisol and our level of serotonin. We secrete hormones when we visit a museum and these hormones are responsible for our well-being. People tend to think this is only good for mental-health issues. That it's for people who're depressed or who have psychological problems. But that's not the case. It's good for patients with diabetes, for patients in palliative care, for people with chronic illness. Since the '80s we've been prescribing exercise for our patients because we know exercise increases exactly the same hormones. But when I have patients who're over 80, it's not obvious that I can prescribe exercise for them."

The Montreal Museum of Fine Arts announced Thursday that as of Nov. 1, physicians who are members of Médecins francophones du Canada will be able to send patients on visits to the MMFA, allowing patients, accompanied by caregivers or family members, to enjoy the health benefits of a free trip to see some art.

The museum says the one-year pilot project is the first such initiative in the world.

It will be used to deal with a wide variety of physical and mental-health problems.

Thomas Bastien, director of education and wellness at the Museum of Fine Arts, notes that the museum has been working with the medical community for 20 years to try to use art to help their patients. But this will be the first time that the doctors will be able to make museum prescriptions.

"We saw that the museum was good for people, so we decided to start this program with the doctors," said Bastien. "If you're suffering from breast cancer, you could come to the museum and you might feel better."

Doctors will each be able to assign up to 50 museum prescriptions over the course of the pilot project. Each prescription will allow entry for up to two adults and two children age 17 or under.

There are some anglophone doctors, who work in English and French, who are members of Médecins francophones du Canada.

sucked into the fire tornado...

sucked into a fire tornado...

carbon copy...

helmcken falls...

swimming in a canadian summer...

full throttle...

Circle Jerks - When The Shit Hits The Fan - live at Bullwinkles London Ontario Canada Dec 17 1985

In a sluggish Economy Inflation, Recession Hits the land of the free Standing in unemployment lines Blame the government For hard times

We just get by However we can We all gotta duck when the shit hits the fan

10 kids in a cadillac Stand in line for welfare checks Let's all leach off the state Gee! the money is really great!

Soup lines Free loaves of bread 5lb blocks of cheese Bags of groceries Social security Has run out on you and me We do whatever we can Gotta duck when the shit hits the fan

taking off together...

helmcken falls...

running on top of the world with a wrecking ball...

the big question on everyone's minds...

pm yoga...

Justin Trudeau retweeted this photo of himself in April 2013 after it was published by Ottawa-based photographer Gregory Kolz with the caption, 'JT is level-headed & able to bring Canada to new heights. That's why he's my choice for #Liberal Leader.'

Justin Trudeau retweeted this photo of himself in April 2013 after it was published by Ottawa-based photographer Gregory Kolz with the caption, 'JT is level-headed & able to bring Canada to new heights. That's why he's my choice for #Liberal Leader.' (Twitter/@gregkolz)

He can hold his own in a boxing ring, slay the bhangra, give Magic Mike a run for his money … and do advanced yoga?

Canada's "dreamy" Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is making the world swoon once again this week, simply by appearing in a photo from his own past — though, for most people, there's nothing simple about his feat.

The photo above, taken in 2013 by freelance photographer Gregory Kolz, shows the prime minister in the yoga pose Mayurasana.

Also called the "peacock pose," it involves placing your entire weight on the wrists and hands while keeping your body straight and parallel to the floor.

It requires a great deal of balance and physical strength to pull off this pose, and it "must only be attempted by advanced yoga students," according to the International Sivananda Yoga Vedanta Centres.

"Mayurasana is more than just an impress-your-friends-at-parties yoga pose," explains subtleyoga.com. "It is one of the original Hatha Yoga practices — one of the first 15 poses ever written down."

Impressive, but why is this three-year-old image going viral right now?

It appears that a Facebook post by Toronto yoga teacher David Gellineau is responsible. "Canada's Prime MInister #justintrudeau- practicing #mayurasana. Didn't we say...#canadalovesyoga," he wrote on the social network late last week, including the photo from 2013.

Now, nearly 5,000 shares later, every international news outlet from CNN to the Guardian has written about Trudeau the yogi, inspiring a new flood of Twitter posts about how hot the Canadian prime minister is.

It's not every day that the internet sees a world leader demonstrating such incredible core and upper-body strength (outside of Russia.)

While Trudeau has shown on several occasions that he knows a thing or two about yoga, it's unclear whether he learned this particular move in class, from his wife, Sophie (a certified yoga instructor), or from his father.

Former Canadian prime minister Pierre Trudeau, who himself was an avid practitioner of yoga, was photographed doing the peacock pose on the shores of the Nahanni River, N.W.T. in 1970, one year before Justin was born.

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start charging the corporate motherfuckers...