The science of willpower: Kelly McGonigal on sticking to resolutions It’s the second week in January and, at about this time, that resolution that seemed so reasonable a week ago — go to the gym every other day, read a book a week, only drink alcohol on weekends — is starting to seem very … hard. As you are teetering on the edge of abandoning it all together, Kelly McGonigal is here to help. This Stanford University psychologist — who shared last year how you can make stress your friend — wants you to know that you’re not having a hard time sticking to a resolution because you are a terrible person. Perhaps you’ve just formulated the wrong resolution. McGonigal has, for years, taught a course called “The Science of Willpower” through Stanford’s Continuing Studies program and, in 2011, she spun it into a book, The Willpower Instinct. The TED Blog spoke to McGonigal this week about how willpower is often misunderstood, and what we each can do to improve it. First question: why is willpower such a struggle? It’s a great question. Yes! Yes.
The Backfire Effect: The Psychology of Why We Have a Hard Time Changing Our Minds by Maria Popova How the disconnect between information and insight explains our dangerous self-righteousness. “Allow yourself the uncomfortable luxury of changing your mind,” I wrote in reflecting on the 7 most important things I learned in 7 years of Brain Pickings. It’s a conundrum most of us grapple with — on the one hand, the awareness that personal growth means transcending our smaller selves as we reach for a more dimensional, intelligent, and enlightened understanding of the world, and on the other hand, the excruciating growing pains of evolving or completely abandoning our former, more inferior beliefs as we integrate new knowledge and insight into our comprehension of how life works. That discomfort, in fact, can be so intolerable that we often go to great lengths to disguise or deny our changing beliefs by paying less attention to information that contradicts our present convictions and more to that which confirms them. So where does this leave us? Donating = Loving
William James on Habit by Maria Popova “We are spinning our own fates, good or evil, and never to be undone. Every smallest stroke of virtue or of vice leaves its never so little scar.” “We are what we repeatedly do,” Aristotle famously proclaimed. “Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.” I found this interesting not merely out of solipsism, as it somehow validated my having had the same breakfast day in and day out for nearly a decade (steel-cut oats, fat-free Greek yogurt, whey protein powder, seasonal fruit), but also because it isn’t a novel idea at all. When we look at living creatures from an outward point of view, one of the first things that strike us is that they are bundles of habits. James begins with a strictly scientific, physiological account of the brain and our coteries of ingrained information patterns, exploring the notion of neuroplasticity a century before it became a buzzword of modern popular neuroscience and offering this elegant definition: Donating = Loving Share on Tumblr
Fixed vs. Growth: The Two Basic Mindsets That Shape Our Lives By Maria Popova “If you imagine less, less will be what you undoubtedly deserve,” Debbie Millman counseled in one of the best commencement speeches ever given, urging: “Do what you love, and don’t stop until you get what you love. Work as hard as you can, imagine immensities…” Far from Pollyanna platitude, this advice actually reflects what modern psychology knows about how belief systems about our own abilities and potential fuel our behavior and predict our success. One of the most basic beliefs we carry about ourselves, Dweck found in her research, has to do with how we view and inhabit what we consider to be our personality. The consequences of believing that intelligence and personality can be developed rather than being immutably engrained traits, Dweck found in her two decades of research with both children and adults, are remarkable. For twenty years, my research has shown that the view you adopt for yourself profoundly affects the way you lead your life.
Introverts -- Portrait of an Introvert People don’t outgrow introversion, so the introverted adult was once an introverted child. What is true of one is true of both. Contrary to popular opinion, introverts are not asocial, nor are they friendless loners who lack social skills. They simply have different social needs and preferences. Friendships Sebastian Pfuetze/Taxi/Getty Images It is not easy for introverts to make new friends because getting to know someone takes so much energy. Social Preferences Introverts need a lot of personal space. Preferred Activities Introverts enjoy activities they can do alone or with just a few others. Social Behavior Introverts tend to be quiet and subdued. Social Interaction While introverts may appear to lack social skills or be antisocial, neither is true. Verbal Expression If given a choice, introverts would rather express their ideas in writing than in speech. Emotions and Emotional Responses Introverts become emotionally drained after spending time with others, particularly strangers.
10 Habits of Low Self Esteem | Positive Psychology Toolbox 10 bad habits of low self esteem The first step in improving your self esteem is being able to recognize the limiting behavior patterns. This can be difficult at first as behavior is unconscious to you. 1- Approval Seeking Habit This habit refers to always looking out for the best interests of the other person. If I express myself I may evoke disapprovalIf I love and affirm myself I may evoke resentmentIf I am too happy with myself I may evoke jealousyIf I stand out I may be compelled to stand alone Such people are frozen at times of challenge. Approval seeking results in very stable behavior. 2- Unable to Give or Receive Compliments Receive Compliments Some people act rattled when they receive a complement and they do not know what to say or do. Give Compliments On the other hand to give a complement is to express your opinion. 3- Seek out instant gratification Low self esteem individuals engage in instant gratification. 4- Feeling Guilty when you say “NO” 6- Inability to Handle Criticism
The Psychology of Self-Control by Maria Popova “Everyone’s self-control is a limited resource; it’s like muscle strength: the more we use it, the less remains in the tank, until we replenish it with rest.” Ever since psychology godfather William James first expounded the crucial role of habit in how we live and who we become, modern psychology has sought to figure out how we can rewire our bad habits, maximize our willpower, and use habits to optimize our productivity. And yet, if the market for self-help books and to-do apps and productivity tools is any indication, a great many of us still struggle with either understanding the psychology of habit and willpower or applying it to what really matters. In Making Habits, Breaking Habits: Why We Do Things, Why We Don’t, and How to Make Any Change Stick (public library), psychologist Jeremy Dean illuminates an important common misconception about how willpower shapes our habits and behaviors: Donating = Loving Brain Pickings has a free weekly newsletter. Share on Tumblr
Internal Time: The Science of Chronotypes, Social Jet Lag, and Why You’re So Tired by Maria Popova Debunking the social stigma around late risers, or what Einstein has to do with teens’ risk for smoking. “Six hours’ sleep for a man, seven for a woman, and eight for a fool,” Napoleon famously prescribed. (He would have scoffed at Einstein, then, who was known to require ten hours of sleep for optimal performance.) In fact, each of us possesses a different chronotype — an internal timing type best defined by your midpoint of sleep, or midsleep, which you can calculate by dividing your average sleep duration by two and adding the resulting number to your average bedtime on free days, meaning days when your sleep and waking times are not dictated by the demands of your work or school schedule. The distribution of midsleep in Central Europe. This myth that early risers are good people and that late risers are lazy has its reasons and merits in rural societies but becomes questionable in a modern 24/7 society. The scissors of sleep. Chronotypes vary with age: Share on Tumblr
How to Spot an Addiction and Get Help | Cultivating Contentment & Happiness There are few topics as loaded as addiction – especially if you’re talking with someone (perhaps yourself) who’s struggling with an unhealthy attachment to a substance (such as alcohol, drugs, or food) or behavior (gambling, sex, or shoplifting). We generally don’t like to feel as if we’re in the grips of a behavior that we can’t control. Not to minimize the potentially devastating effect of addiction, but it’s possible that at times this term is tossed about too loosely in our society. People talk about being “addicted” to chocolate or exercise, for instance, when they may merely be referring to a preference of theirs that harms nobody and is perhaps beneficial – but how to know when one crosses the line? Any activity in excess, and which preoccupies us to the extent of endangering our health, relationships, or ability to work, could be an addiction. The issue is not always how much or how often we engage in the behavior, but how it’s affecting us. Some questions to ask yourself: 1. 2.
The Psychology of Getting Unstuck: How to Overcome the “OK Plateau” of Performance & Personal Growth by Maria Popova “When you want to get good at something, how you spend your time practicing is far more important than the amount of time you spend.” “Any sequence of mental action which has been frequently repeated tends to perpetuate itself,” William James wrote in his influential meditation on habit, ”so that we find ourselves automatically prompted to think, feel, or do what we have been before accustomed to think, feel, or do, under like circumstances.” As we’ve seen, one of the most insidious forms of such habitual autopilot — which evolved to help lighten our cognitive load yet is a double-edged sword that can also hurt us — is our mercilessly selective everyday attention, but the phenomenon is particularly perilous when it comes to learning new skills. In the 1960s, psychologists identified three stages that we pass through in the acquisition of new skills. Color restoration of archival Einstein photograph by Mads Madsen The Mozart family on tour: Leopold, Wolfgang, and Nannerl.
8 Things Everybody Ought to Know About Concentrating “Music helps me concentrate,” Mike said to me glancing briefly over his shoulder. Mike was in his room writing a paper for his U.S. History class. On his desk next to his computer sat crunched Red Bulls, empty Gatorade bottles, some extra pocket change and scattered pieces of paper. Mike made a shift about every thirty seconds between all of the above. Do you know a person like this? The Science Behind Concentration In the above account, Mike’s obviously stuck in a routine that many of us may have found ourselves in, yet in the moment we feel it’s almost an impossible routine to get out of. When we constantly multitask to get things done, we’re not multitasking, we’re rapidly shifting our attention. Phase 1: Blood Rush Alert When Mike decides to start writing his History essay, blood rushes to his anterior prefrontal cortex. Phase 2: Find and Execute Phase 3: Disengagement While in this state, Mike then hears an email notification. The process repeats itself sequentially. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6.
How to Maintain Healthy Habits and Stop Sabotaging Yourself “You, yourself, as much as anybody in the entire universe, deserve your love and affection.” ~Buddha About two years go, I felt horrible about myself and where I was in my life: single, struggling to lose weight, miserable in my job (and no clue what to do about it), and unfulfilled in general. I kept trying to bully myself in order to be the person I wanted to be and have the things I wanted to have. I kept saying to myself, “I can’t believe you said/ate/did that. I thought the only way to get myself where I wanted to go was to strong-arm myself there. One day I came across a picture of myself at five years old. I looked at how I was living and saw how broken my relationship was with myself. I was permitting myself to do things no sane parent would allow their child to do while simultaneously yelling at myself for “being bad,” which any parent or child knows is the most ineffective form of motivation or cause for behavior change. 1. Take a moment. Here were a few of mine: 2. 3. 4. 5.
The metamorphoses of the self-employed And so it continues. Yesterday’s labour market statistics showed that the self-employment figures are up once again. Close to 75,000 more people became self-employed in the last 3 months of this year, which means we’ve seen an increase of around 340,000 over the last 12 months alone. A report we published a few weeks ago takes a closer look at who these people are, why they’re starting up in business, and what being self-employed means to them personally. While we dug much deeper than most – for example, by creating a typology of self-employed ‘tribes’ – it still feels as though we only scratched the surface of this group. A common theme that came up time and again in our interviews with business owners was that it took around 2 years for their venture to finally ‘begin working’. But it is not just the business that changes, it is also the self-employed themselves. Not every business owner will experience metamorphoses like these, of course. How do we do this?
SOCIONICS: Personality Types and Relationships