Some science-proved advice on healthy long-term relationships (marital, but the advice seems totally applicable to any long-term relationships with humans). 3 most useful things from there:
- A clear definition of what healthy kindness is ("Kindness doesn’t mean that we don’t express our anger… but the kindness informs how we choose to express the anger. You can throw spears at your partner. Or you can explain why you’re hurt and angry, and that’s the kinder path.").
- A surprising fact: the research shows that, for relationship quality, it's more important to support person when they get good news than when the things get rough.
- The classification of (1) passive destructive, (2) active destructive, (3) passive constructive, and (4) active constructive ways of responding to each other’s good news, with examples (one should aim for an active constructive way, “That’s great! Congratulations! When did you find out? Did they call you? What classes will you take first semester?”).
2. Hit the Reset Button in Your Brain, The New York Times
Finally, a clear explanation of why it's important to do similar things in batches, apart from the benefit of saving time.
My collaborator Vinod Menon, a professor of neuroscience at Stanford, and I showed that the switch between daydreaming and attention is controlled in a part of the brain called the insula, an important structure about an inch or so beneath the surface of the top of your skull. …If the relationship between the central executive system and the mind-wandering system is like a seesaw, then the insula — the attentional switch — is like an adult holding one side down so that the other stays up in the air. The efficacy of this switch varies from person to person, in some functioning smoothly, in others rather rusty. But switch it does, and if it is called upon to switch too often, we feel tired and a bit dizzy, as though we were seesawing too rapidly.
…If you want to be more productive and creative, and to have more energy, the science dictates that you should partition your day into project periods. Your social networking should be done during a designated time, not as constant interruptions to your day.
Email, too, should be done at designated times.
3. Pitchfork's interview with Bjork (The Invisible Woman: A Conversation With Björk)
It turned out to be a perfect preparation for listening to her new album (I actually learned about its existence thanks to that text), and some songs from the album immediately (!) brought me back to my core. I didn't even realize that I had been lost.
4. This Old Man, The New Yorker
What it's like to be 93 in a first world country (because, based on what this man tells about his heart condition, if he had lived in my town or other part of the country even, he'd already be dead; and there would be no dating-sites visits). The surprising things are the "unceasing need for deep attachment and intimate love" that old people apparently have, and the author and his wife' confidence in how important it is for the surviving partner to remarry.