Need a quick mood booster? Research shows that people are happiest when they’re surrounded by living plants and verdant colors. Spending time in nature activates positive pathways in your brain, rather than allowing it to focus on upsetting experiences. Outdoor exercise increases creativity, provides stress relief, and restores energy. Going outside for small amounts of […]
How to Handle Feedback
We need other people’s feedback to make ourselves (and our organizations) better. But what many people fail to realize is that collecting feedback is only one step in a longer process of self-improvement. The next two steps in the feedback loop, processing and responding, are must not be forgotten. Feedback needs to be heard, yes; […]
Do You Have a Motive?
People are motivated by many kinds of desires. To sell something, first you need to get to know your audience—especially what motivates them. Understanding the psychology of motivation is the key to the art of persuasion. People are much more apt to buy into ideas and personalities than they are to buy products or plans. […]
Control the Wheel of Fortune
Napoleon Hill was one of the first celebrity self-help authors. His quintessentially American philosophy of self-reliance set a standard that continues to dominate the field today, some 50 years after his death. One of Hill’s core beliefs was that thoughts of success eventually lead to that success. The inverse is also true, in that fear […]
Stop Obsessing Over Your Mistakes
Have you found yourself staring at your own image during a Zoom call, worried about how silly or tired you look? Self-consciousness is part of human nature, but most of the time it doesn’t serve us well. Giving a presentation can make us hyper-aware of every mistake or near-mistake, for example. Letting yourself feel embarrassed […]
How to Get What You Want
Strategy. Power. Human nature. Self-help author Robert Greene has written about them all. In The Art of Seduction, Greene takes a deep dive into the intricacies of social power. According to Greene, natural charisma isn’t everything. In fact, charisma exists on a spectrum, which means that it’s a quality that can be cultivated. To amplify your […]
Unfinished Business
It’s much easier to start a new project than to finish an old one. Our open tasks can accrue over time, piling up until they become intimidating to address. Such unfinished business can become a mental roadblock. Tackling unfinished work may feel overwhelming at first, but if the task is broken into smaller steps, you […]
Your Guide to a Better Life
No one else can do it for you. To be happy, you’re going to have to put in the work. In A Guide to the Good Life, William B. Irvine’s advice is to adopt a Stoic approach to daily living. Irvine says that the ancient Stoic philosophy is the best way to combat the challenges of modern […]
This Is How You Win
They say that desire is the mother of invention. The adage may sound like a cliché, but it happens to be true: desire is a powerful motivating force. Having the desire to achieve a specific goal will cause you to think about it all the time. These thoughts will eventually produce your best insights and […]
What’s Your Blind Spot?
What you can’t see can still hurt you. Sheryl Sandberg learned this principle early in her career at Google, where her personal experience directly informed institutional policy. In 2004, she became pregnant with her first child. With this experience came a revelation: there should be special parking privileges for pregnant women. Since Sandberg was a […]
