Why Are We So Nostalgic?
Unveiling nostalgia’s cultural ascendanceNostalgia: a beautiful sight for sore eyes and a romantic feeling that few can adequately capture in words, song, or picture. Obscure emotions like nostalgia are beautiful to witness, but their ebbs and flows within individuals and groups can tell us quite a bit about those individuals and groups themselves. Let’s discuss the cultural ascendance of nostalgia and what that means about us as a culture and as individuals. Nostalgia sells like sex sells. N...
Why Are We So Nostalgic?
Unveiling nostalgia’s cultural ascendanceNostalgia: a beautiful sight for sore eyes and a romantic feeling that few can adequately capture in words, song, or picture. Obscure emotions like nostalgia are beautiful to witness, but their ebbs and flows within individuals and groups can tell us quite a bit about those individuals and groups themselves. Let’s discuss the cultural ascendance of nostalgia and what that means about us as a culture and as individuals. Nostalgia sells like sex sells. N...
The Placebo Mindset
How Holding Irrational Beliefs Can Be Good for YouHave you ever heard someone swear by a strange ritual? You know, those rituals that make us level-headed types roll our eyes at the superstitious. Where someone says their favorite shirt brings them luck. Or a new lifestyle change gives them energy. You might be inclined to say something nerdy like, “Well maybe that’s just the placebo effect. That shirt isn’t actually bringing you luck. It’s really just in your head.” If you think that is a re...
The Placebo Mindset
How Holding Irrational Beliefs Can Be Good for YouHave you ever heard someone swear by a strange ritual? You know, those rituals that make us level-headed types roll our eyes at the superstitious. Where someone says their favorite shirt brings them luck. Or a new lifestyle change gives them energy. You might be inclined to say something nerdy like, “Well maybe that’s just the placebo effect. That shirt isn’t actually bringing you luck. It’s really just in your head.” If you think that is a re...
Imaginary Stress Management
How to Handle Real Stress from Imaginary SituationsWithin the past 200 years, technology has granted us comforts beyond our ancestors' wildest imaginations. On the flip side, technology has plagued us with new stressors the human body has yet to accommodate. We don't have to run 12 miles every day for food, but chronic blue light exposure rots our eyeballs and disrupts our hormone cycles. While the human body requires acute periods of stress, the modern lifestyle exposes us to chron...
Imaginary Stress Management
How to Handle Real Stress from Imaginary SituationsWithin the past 200 years, technology has granted us comforts beyond our ancestors' wildest imaginations. On the flip side, technology has plagued us with new stressors the human body has yet to accommodate. We don't have to run 12 miles every day for food, but chronic blue light exposure rots our eyeballs and disrupts our hormone cycles. While the human body requires acute periods of stress, the modern lifestyle exposes us to chron...
Dealing with Regret
A Comprehensive Guide to RegretRegret is everyone's favorite topic. What is it? It is when the past invades the present. When a memory brings us such pain that we wish we could go back and change it. How do we free ourselves from this dragging emotion? Where memories float in without intrusion and we can laugh about our past blunders? Since regrets stem from painful memories, the first thing to help us deal with our regrets is a fundamental understanding of memory itself. First Principle...
Dealing with Regret
A Comprehensive Guide to RegretRegret is everyone's favorite topic. What is it? It is when the past invades the present. When a memory brings us such pain that we wish we could go back and change it. How do we free ourselves from this dragging emotion? Where memories float in without intrusion and we can laugh about our past blunders? Since regrets stem from painful memories, the first thing to help us deal with our regrets is a fundamental understanding of memory itself. First Principle...
Be Like Water Part 2
Internal Adaptability: a continuation of the core virtueThe world is complicated. As we’ve previously explored, this means that we cannot plan for every change around us. To flourish, we must be adaptable. The Six Pillars of Adaptability describe the skills necessary to adapt to the modern environment. Part 1 explores the first four pillars, which relate to changes in the external environment. In this post, we discuss the two pillars of adaptability that pertain to changes in your internal e...
Be Like Water Part 2
Internal Adaptability: a continuation of the core virtueThe world is complicated. As we’ve previously explored, this means that we cannot plan for every change around us. To flourish, we must be adaptable. The Six Pillars of Adaptability describe the skills necessary to adapt to the modern environment. Part 1 explores the first four pillars, which relate to changes in the external environment. In this post, we discuss the two pillars of adaptability that pertain to changes in your internal e...
