- published: 18 Jan 2013
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Abstinence is a voluntary restraint from indulging in bodily activities that are widely experienced as giving pleasure. Most frequently, the term refers to sexual abstinence, or abstention from alcohol or food. The practice can arise from religious prohibitions or practical considerations. Abstinence may also refer to drugs. For example you can abstain from smoking. Abstinence has diverse forms. Commonly it refers to a temporary or partial abstinence from food, as in fasting. In the twelve-step program of Overeaters Anonymous abstinence is the term for refraining from compulsive eating, akin in meaning to sobriety for alcoholics. Because the regimen is intended to be a conscious act, freely chosen to enhance life, abstinence is sometimes distinguished from the psychological mechanism of repression. The latter is an unconscious state, having unhealthy consequences. Freud termed the channeling of sexual energies into other more culturally or socially acceptable activities, "sublimation".
Abstinence may arise from an ascetic element, present in most faiths, or from a subjective need for spiritual discipline. In its religious context, abstinence is meant to elevate the believer beyond the normal life of desire, to a chosen ideal, by following a path of renunciation.
Oprah Winfrey (born Orpah Gail Winfrey; January 29, 1954) is an American media proprietor, talk show host, actress, producer, and philanthropist. Winfrey is best known for her self-titled, multi-award-winning talk show, which has become the highest-rated program of its kind in history and was nationally syndicated from 1986 to 2011. She has been ranked the richest African-American of the 20th century, the greatest black philanthropist in American history, and was for a time the world's only black billionaire. She is also, according to some assessments, the most influential woman in the world.
Winfrey was born into poverty in rural Mississippi to a teenage single mother and later raised in an inner-city Milwaukee neighborhood. She experienced considerable hardship during her childhood, claiming to be raped at age nine and becoming pregnant at 14; her son died in infancy. Sent to live with the man she calls her father, a barber in Tennessee, Winfrey landed a job in radio while still in high school and began co-anchoring the local evening news at the age of 19. Her emotional ad-lib delivery eventually got her transferred to the daytime-talk-show arena, and after boosting a third-rated local Chicago talk show to first place, she launched her own production company and became internationally syndicated.
Bristol Sheeran Marie Palin (born October 18, 1990) is the second child and oldest daughter of former Governor of Alaska Sarah Palin and her husband, Todd.
After Bristol Palin became a single mother at age 18, she began to publicly advocate teenage pregnancy prevention, and is now a paid speaker on the subject of teen pregnancy.
She competed in the fall 2010 season of Dancing with the Stars, where she received lower scores from the judges than some other contestants but was voted through week after week by fans. She reached the finals, finishing in third place.
Palin was born and raised in Wasilla, Alaska. She was named "Bristol" after the Bristol Inn where her mother Sarah was employed; Bristol, Connecticut, the headquarters city of ESPN, where her mother Sarah hoped to work as a sportscaster; and the Bristol Bay area of Alaska, where her father Todd grew up.
Beginning in 2005, Bristol attended Juneau-Douglas High School and began dating Levi Johnston. In 2008, she briefly lived in Anchorage with her aunt and uncle and attended West Anchorage High School. She returned to Wasilla, where she graduated from Wasilla High School in May 2009.