Blog Posts

Researchers who study optimism say the average person needs to triple their positivity. They measure ratios of positive-to-negative conversations in work teams, in marriages, and in the way we talk to ourselves, finding a massive gap between where we are and where we should be: Human flourishing starts at a 6-to-1 ratio and may peak […]

Are we developing wisdom for the challenges of life? Are we getting good at the chess game of success? There are several ways to develop the power of wisdom, and one of them is the amount of time we invest into “long-form” content. There’s a difference between sh0rt-form and long-form information, and they have different

Love. Hate. Happiness. Fear. Anger. These words represent powerful emotions that move us to action. They’re deep in human nature, and are constantly at work in one form or another. Unfortunately, many have a mistaken idea about emotion that misleads us into error, regret and pain. Here are some phrases that reveal the mistake: Love

How do I succeed? How can I find fulfillment? If there were a simple answer, I suspect everyone would be successful and fulfilled. But there isn’t. Ahh, an objector would say, but the great Chinese philosopher Confucius says, “Life is really simple, but we insist on making it complicated.” Then we find out that Confucius didn’t

We all know what fear feels like. That feeling in the pit of our stomach. The spike in heart rate. Our hands sweat. Our mind runs fast and furious. Fear is an “emotional response to a perceived threat.” Whenever we believe something bad is about to happen, we feel fear. But if we’re wise, we

Most motivators classify all fear as bad. This is a mistake. Why? Because some fear is good and some fear is bad. I’ve been blogging about the difference between useful and useless fear in several posts now: The subtle and deadly lie in every inspiring quote about fear and courage. Snake! Identifying and Eliminating Useless

Fear holding you back? Having trouble mustering the courage to do the right thing? Just bounce around online and you’ll find a crowd of inspiring quotes about overcoming fear. Here are a couple: Your largest fear carries your greatest growth. Do the thing you fear most and the death of fear is certain. While we

“Fake News” is all the rage. Wired contributor Henri Gendreau sums it up in a recent article. October 12, 2016, the Washington Post reports, “Facebook has repeatedly trended fake news since firing its human editors.” Fortune and Vanity Fair pick up the story. A week later, Buzzfeed reports, “Hyperpartisan Facebook Pages Are Publishing False and

Does the world seem like a dangerous place? Like everything is falling apart, like the planet is spiraling out of control? One blogger writes, “I see humans, but no humanity.” Another posts a quote that reads, “I’m just tired, I just want the world to be quiet for a bit.” Most of us feel that

Why are so many bad things happening around the world? When we look out and see all the violence and conflict and protesting and hatred, it seems like civilization itself is teetering on the edge of destruction. But I say, this view of the world is contrived. It’s a structural distortion of reality. The more