2. H EALTHY R ELATIONSHIPS Education for Life

3. What is the Definition of Choice? Why is Choice Important? Remember Your choices are Your Choices; and Your choices make you who you are. The right to choose means the need to know !

4. B RAIN TIPS Only during the past 10 years have scientists been able to use new technologies such as MRI(Magnetic Resonance Imaging) and FMRI(Functional MRI), and PET (positron emission tomography scans) to study the brain in groundbreaking ways. We are learning how the brain develops over time and what is happening in the brain as we experience different things in life. For example, one fascinating finding, which we will talk about later, shows that the brain center for “Infatuation” is different than the brain center for “love.”

5. B RAIN T IP # 1 T HE N EUROSCIENCE OF B RAIN M OLDING Mirror Neurons So what Neuroscience has been able to show is that our brains are truly being molded by: life experience. chosen behaviors, whether the choice was conscious or unconscious

6. S O THE O LD SAYING ; Y OUR F RIENDS E FFECT Y OUR F UTURE IS V ERY T RUE  If you don’t design your own life plan, chances are you’ll fall into someone else’s plan. And guess what they have planned for you? Not much.

7. B RAIN T IP #2 Y OUR P REFRONTAL C ORTEX Source of: sound judgment anticipating how behavior today can affect one’s future moral intelligence abstract thinking/seeing what is not obvious rational behavior and decision making setting priorities 1. Weinberger, et al. The Adolescent Brain, 2005

8. Who are you? K NOW Y OURSELF

9. P. I. E. S. S. D IMENSIONS OF M ATURITY PIESSPIESS hysical ntellectu al motional ocial piritual / values

10. W HO A M I & W HERE A M I G OING What are some things that you hope to accomplish in your lifetime? Education Work/career Family Travel Hobbies

11. W ORDS T HAT D ESCRIBE M E Reliable Fun Responsible Loyal Dependable Energetic Kind Has Goals/Drive Nurturing Trustworthy Thoughtful Punctual (on-time) Organized Funny Creative Good with people Helpful Caring Good Parent Polite Positive person Courteous Outgoing Caring Motivated Enthusiastic Peacekeeper Friendly Courageous Problem-solver Loving Problem-solver Open-minded Flexible (handles change, goes with the flow) Inspires others Independent Professional Brave Laid back Stays busy Babysitter Faithful Athlete Physically Fit Understanding Ambitious Hardworking Confident Honorable Respected Takes initiative (does what’s needed; no need to be told) Follows instructions Role model to others Optimistic (looks on the bright side, hopeful) Efficient (gets things done) Quiet & thoughtful Innovative (comes up with new ideas)

12. M Y V ALUES Principles Standards Morals Ethics Ideals

13. Focus not on seeking out the perfect dating partner, but first focus on becoming the perfect dating partner.

14. P ARENT -T EEN A CTIVITY With this handout have a conversation with a Parent or other respected adult about the values and character qualities that have become important to them. Have them explain why.

15. True love doesn't come to you it has to be inside you. Day 2

16. W HAT DO WE NEED TO LIVE ? Needs Desires

17. W HAT IS L OVE ? 7 C HARACTERISTICS 1. Kindness: the joy of meeting someone else’s needs before your own simply for the sake of the relationship. 2. Patience: allowing someone to be imperfect. 3. Forgiveness: being able to give and ask for forgiveness 4. Courtesy: The act of treating everyone as a personal friend. 5. Humility: a peacefulness of heart that allows you to stand aside in order to affirm te value of someone else. 6. Generosity: Giving your attention, time, abilities, money, and compassion freely to others. 7. Honesty: Always revealing who you really are.

18. Love is a choice! “No matter what our backgrounds are, being a loving person does not come without work. Something in our make up as humans fights against our desire to love authentically.” We do not have to be taught to lie, or to act selfishly for some reason it just comes naturally and for many of us it becomes our way of life. But the truth is we are all drawn to true love. “True love serves others because only in serving do we find satisfaction in relationships. Whether we are conscious of it or not, when we act without love, we are not being true to our core identities. Because we are made for relationships, when we offer authentic love to someone, we are being who we really are. So cultivating the seven characteristics of love helps us build the strongest possible relationships.” When we make the CHOICE to truly love, our desire to grow in love and show our true selves begins to flow more naturally. Our goal needs to be to open our hearts and minds daily to look for opportunities to share love with others. The more we do this, the more easily we love others and receive love from others.

19. 3 Q UESTIONS Here are three questions you can ask yourself on a regular basis to help cultivate a loving life style: 1. What can I do to help someone today? 2. How can I make someone's life easier? 3. How can I be a better ( friend, boy/girlfriend, daughter/son, student) today.

20. B ASIC H UMAN N EEDS Physica l Emotional SocialMental

21. U NMEANT NEEDS

22. T HE POWER OF OUR WORDS  “Words Kill, words give life; they’re either poison or fruit-you choose.” (ancient proverb)  “The good person brings good things out of the good stored up in their heart, and the hurting person brings hurtful things out of the hurt stored up in their heart. For out of the overflow of our heart our mouth speaks.”  Listen to your words; Own them. If they bring hurt to others take the time to figure out what is going on in your heart that makes you use your words to hurt others.  We will never have healthy, happy, long lasting relationships until we deal with our own hearts/hurts.

24. Copyright © 2007 by Marline E. Pearson. All Rights Reserved.

25. S TEPS OF I NTIMACY 1. Eye to Body 2. Eye to Eye 3. Voice to Voice 4. Hand to Hand 5. Hand to Shoulder 6. Hand to Waist 7. Face to Face 8. Hand to Face 9-15 Final Steps: Intensely Intimate— Reserved for Marriage!

26. B RAIN TIP #3 D OPAMINE : Our Brains have several Neurochemicals that play amazing exciting, and almost unbelievable roles in our thinking, desires, and behavior. Dopamine is one of them It is the messenger chemical. Basically dopamine rewards us by producing a feeling of excitement and well-being when we do something thrilling or rewarding.

27. The Brain Chemistry of Love For weeks or months you get a big shot of the “love chemicals.” Those chemicals make it easy to slide into a risky or poor relationship and make poor sexual choices. Slide 3.21

29. F A TI N U A T I O N

30. A LWAYS REMEMBER THAT YOUR FEELINGS CAN AND DO LIE TO YOU ! I NFATUATION IS REAL. I T IS WHAT GETS LOVE GOING, BUT IT IS NOT REAL LOVE ! R EMEMBER I NFATUATION MAY GROW INTO A REAL LOVE BUT IT CAN ALSO FADE AS FAST AS IT RISES.

31. Testing Your Love Smarts – True or False? 1. There is probably only one person meant for you. 2. Breaking up should be done slowly so you don't hurt the other person too much. 3. If you feel the "chemistry," i.e., intense attraction, it's probably love. 4. If you find the right person you will be happy. 5. Opposites attract. 6. Happy couples have fewer differences and argue less than unhappy couples. 7. On average people have one serious romance before they find someone they want to marry. 8. Living together before marriage is a good way to reduce your chances of divorce later on.

32. D ECIDE DON ’ T SLIDE

33. F OUNDATIONS OF A H EALTHY R ELATIONSHIP Talk

34. F OUNDATIONS OF A H EALTHY R ELATIONSHIP Talk Taking time to become Friends Sharing Experiences Shared Values, Honoring Boundaries Dating Similarities in Backgrounds Similar Expectations/Prioritie s Trust Commitment/ Marriage Sex Shared goals

35. W HAT DO MOST OF T ODAY ’ S R ELATIONSHIPS LOOK LIKE ?

36. Sex

37. One- Sided Meant something only to one person

38. Sex One- Sided Meant something only to one person Communication Not so great

39. Sex One- Sided Communication Not so great Few Common Interests, Time Together Not Much Fun Not much there Meant something only to one person

40. Sex One- Sided Communication Not so great Not much there Doesn’t Feel Like a Friend Not really Meant something only to one person Few Common Interests, Time Together Not Much Fun

41. Sex One- Sided Communication Not so great Not much there Not really You Have No Commitment/Trust Non e Meant something only to one person Few Common Interests Time Together Not Much Fun Doesn’t Feels Like a Friend

42. Inverted Relationship Pyramid Not Really Mature No Development One-Sided One-SidedRelationship No Positive Starters Communication Not Great Few Common Interests; Time Together Not Much Fun Doesn’t Feel Like a Friend YOU HAVE NO COMITMENT, NO TRUST! SEX SEX No Foundation

43. 7 P RINCIPLES FOR SMART RELATIONSHIPS 1. Seek a good match-someone with common interests. 2. Pay attention to values. 3. Don’t try to change someone into someone they are not. 4. Don’t change yourself to get someone’s love or friendship. 5. Expect good communication. 6. Don’t play games, be phony, or pressure someone. 7. Expect respect. Have standards for what you expect.

44. “Y OU ARE HERE TO ENRICH THE WORLD, AND YOU IMPOVERISH YOURSELF IF YOU FORGET THE ERRAND ” (W OODROW W ILSON ). Our purpose here is to help you focus your attention on the greatest thing in the world, giving love to others through healthy relationships. The truth is nothing will bring greater satisfaction to your life, in time and eternity, than giving and receiving authentic love.

45. P ARENT T EEN C ONNECTION A CTIVITY Infatuation or Love conversation

46. Y OUR MUST H AVES AND I CAN ’ T D EAL W ITH

48. D AY 3

49. OXYTOCIN ANOTHER ONE OF THOSE N EUROCHEMICALS Oxytocin Is released in a girls brain when she:  Gives birth  Breast feeds her baby  Is involved in intimate touching with someone  Has sexual intercourse

50. W HAT DOES OXYTOCIN DO ? Oxytocin is a bonding chemical. Can I get a guy volunteer to help me out?

51.  So, when a girl engages in touching in an intimate way, dopamine and oxytocin, increases her desire for more touch and causes a real bond to the boy she is with.  The important thing to recognize here, girls, is that the desire to connect is not just an emotional feeling. It is a real chemical bonding. The severing of the bond is what cause the incredible pain you often feel after a break up. And you many be actually seriously damaging the bonding mechanism that you were born with, a mechanism put there to allow you to, in the future, have a healthy bonded marriage that is a stable relationship and provides a healthy home for you and your children..

52. Oxytocin helps explain the remarkable propensity of battered women to return to the very men who abused them. Our hormonal response to touch, to sex, and to proximity is so powerful it can trump our better judgment about what is truly in our best interests.”

53. The “trust” impact of oxytocin is so pronounced that Louann Brizendine, M.D., a neuropsychiatrist at the University of California says “from an experiment on hugging, we also know that oxytocin is naturally released in the brain after a 20 second hug from a partner – sealing the bond between the huggers & triggering the brains trust circuits; so girls don’t let a guy hug you unless you know you can trust him.” O XYTOCIN ALSO CREATES FEELINGS OF T RUST

54. Oxytocin is also values- neutral

55. V ASOPRESSIN : T HE GUYS N EUROCHEMICAL The guys brain has many more receptors for vasopressin then the girls. Sexual intercourse releases large amounts of vasopressin into the guys brain. Vasopressin in the guys brain promotes bonding with his sexual partner. Studies have shown that it also helps to bond a father to his children.

56. D OPAMINE, V ASOPRESSIN AND T ESTOSTERONE Cause boys to be aggressive and territorial and crave sexual contact with women. What you guys need to remember is that if you fall into a pattern of being intimate with one girl and then moving on to another you experience only one form of brain activity common to humans involved sexually-the dopamine rush of sex.

57. S O R EMEMBER, THE IMPACT OF D OPAMINE, O XYTOCIN & V ASOPRESSIN For both girls and guys the inability to bond after multiple partners is almost like tape that loses its stickiness after being applied and removed multiple times.

58. I T IS N ATURAL FOR GUYS AND GIRLS TO DESIRE EACH OTHER, THAT IS HOW WE ARE MADE US. The thing is you gotta use your Self-Control! You have the gifting of the ability to choose.

59. L ETS TALK CONSEQUENCES

60. I hope that you are beginning to see that there are many unconscious influences that direct our sexual behavior. Most of us think of our choices as being influenced by some kind of love or emotional feeling. Instead, it’s more likely that our choices are being strongly influenced by a neurochemical, that requires clearheaded discernment.

61. B ROKEN B ONDING H ELPS E XPLAIN A DOLESCENT D EPRESSION According to a national survey on teen health, those who were sexually active were 3 times more likely to be depressed than those who were abstinent.

62. Suicide is attempted more often by sexually active teens than those who have not had sex; 3 times more often by girls 8 times more often by boys 1. Hallfors DD. Am J Prev Med 2005 2. Rector RE, et al. The Heritage Foundation 2005

63. What science is now showing us is that slow healthy progression in a relationship strengthens the brain cell connections associated with “attachment”, helping to ensure the permanence of the relationship that finds its healthiest expression with sexual consummation in marriage.

64. W HAT I AM NOT TELLING YOU

65. S TEPS OF I NTIMACY 1. Eye to Body 2. Eye to Eye 3. Voice to Voice 4. Hand to Hand 5. Hand to Shoulder 6. Hand to Waist 7. Face to Face 8. Hand to Face 9-15 Final Steps: Intensely Intimate— Reserved for Marriage!

66. F OUNDATIONS OF A H EALTHY R ELATIONSHIP Talk Dating Shared Experiences Shared Values Being Friends Similarities in Backgrounds Honoring Boundaries Similar Expectations/Ambitions Trust Commitment/ Marriage Sex

67. F IRE A NALOGY

68. W HO SAYS IT ’ S OK TO HAVE SEX BEFORE M ARRIAGE ? What is the motivation?

69. W HO ADVISES YOU TO WAIT ? What is the motivation?

70. F REEDOMS Y OU C AN E NJOY BY S AYING “N O ” TO S EX AND “Y ES ” TO R ELATIONSHIPS ! Physical Intellectual Emotional Social Spiritual Financial

71. H OW W OULD Y OU L IKE TO H AVE A F RESH S TART ?