The Power of Beliefs begins with a question that reaches far beyond positive psychology: how much of what happens next in our lives is influenced by the way we understand the world around us? In my conversation with Shawn Achor, the psychologist and bestselling author, we explore how beliefs shape the possibilities we recognize, the […]
How Your Beliefs Shape Your Future, According to Shawn Achor Read More »
When I think about how to build a life that matters, I increasingly believe the answer begins with a question that is both simple and surprisingly difficult to sit with: What makes me feel that my life, my choices, and my presence have significance? In my conversation with Mick Hunt on Mick Unplugged, we explored
Why do I feel like I don’t matter? I believe that question sits beneath many of the struggles we have learned to treat as separate problems. Burnout, loneliness, exhaustion, disconnection, and the persistent feeling that something is missing can look different on the surface, yet they can share a deeper human concern: the need to
Why Do I Feel Like I Don’t Matter? Understanding the Mattering Effect Read More »
How to Adapt Without Losing Yourself is a question I have been thinking about throughout The Adaptive Human series, and by the time I reached this finale, I realized that the question had become much deeper than adaptability itself. We tend to talk about adapting as though it were primarily a matter of speed: learning
How to Adapt Without Losing Yourself: Staying Human in a World That Demands More Read More »
Have you ever heard a song and suddenly found yourself standing somewhere you haven’t been in years? Maybe it was the song playing during your first road trip with friends. Maybe it reminds you of a childhood home, a relationship, a season of life when everything seemed simpler, or a person whose presence still feels
The Psychology of Nostalgia: Why Looking Back Can Help Us Move Forward Read More »
We live in an attention economy that constantly teaches us what to notice. Headlines flash across our screens, notifications interrupt our thoughts, organizations celebrate visible achievements, and social platforms turn other people’s lives into an endless stream of comparison. Over time, it becomes easy to assume that whatever captures our attention must also deserve it.
Are You Mistaking What Gets Your Attention for What Deserves It? Read More »
How to build courage is a question that can easily become abstract. We tend to associate courage with moments that are visibly difficult, dramatic decisions, public acts of bravery, or situations in which the stakes are immediately obvious. Gregory Stock and Scott Simon approach it from a more intimate direction. They suggest that courage often
Why Smart People Make Bad Decisions is a question that sits at the heart of Alex Edmans’s work on behavioral finance, because intelligence and sound judgment are not always as closely connected as we assume. In this episode of Passion Struck, Alex and I explore the psychological forces that shape financial markets and, more importantly,
The Psychology Behind Why Smart People Make Terrible Decisions Read More »
You can be loved, successful, surrounded by people, and still carry a quiet feeling that you are not worthy of connection. You can receive compliments and immediately question them. You can achieve something you worked toward for years and discover that the feeling of being “enough” still does not arrive. How to feel worthy when
How to Feel Worthy: Why Self-Esteem Fails and What Actually Heals Insecurity Read More »
At some point in your life, you may have wonder how to believe in yourself when other people doubt you, Cole Brauer’s story offers an unusually vivid answer. Her path into professional sailing was anything but predetermined: she grew up on eastern Long Island, discovered sailing relatively late, taught herself the technical skills required to
The question of how constraints improve creativity becomes more interesting when we stop treating creativity as an unlimited search for possibilities. In this conversation, David Epstein explores a different model: meaningful boundaries can give curiosity direction, make experimentation more productive, and help people recognize opportunities that remain invisible when everything is possible. His new book,
How Constraints Improve Creativity, Focus, and Innovation | David Epstein Read More »
What is agency in psychology? At its core, agency in psychology is the belief that your actions can influence what happens next. While pop psychology often treats personal agency as simple willpower or high self-esteem, clinical and experimental science defines it as something far deeper. Dr. Martin Seligman, the father of positive psychology and the
What Is Agency in Psychology? Martin Seligman on How to Change Your Future Read More »