Health & Balance
1. A must read. All of it.
Relationships, Communications
…people who are generally cheerful are not so great at reading other
people's negative emotions, though what's especially interesting is
that they think they're very good at it.
3. 10 psychology studies every lover (or just human) should know. #6, 7, 8, and 10 are about healthy relationships in general.
Health & Balance
1. According to the new research, sleep position might affect how efficiently the brain clears waste. The article includes an illustration of the recommended pose.
2. An alarming article on what insomnia might mean and what the lack of sleep can lead to. Bottomline: get enough sleep, no matter what — it will either save you from a neurodegenerative disorder or delay its onset.
3. Keeping a (kind of) one-sentence journal will make you happier.
Hi there. Since the last post I've finished (!!!) 2 guides:
But the biggest one is still coming. And growing unmanageably…
Media picks from the last ~30 days:
3. What it’s like to have ADHD as a grown woman
Turns out, symptoms can be different for women.
4. A great health check for the quality of your learning & habit development:
What have I changed about myself in the past 12 months?
(via)
5. Self-knowledge: an advanced version of MBTI test, with clear and well-structured explanations (Strengths & Weaknesses, Friendships, Career Paths)
Labeling can be limiting, tests can be unreliable, but while reading my profile I got reminded of some of the weaknesses and strengths I'd long lost awareness of, which has been helpful in my decision-making as of lately. Try it, that test isn't time-consuming. And is free.
6. Life of introverts, in graphs.
7. Science says that lonely people's brains work differently:
When people feel most alone, these results suggest their brains are not tuned in to smiles and laughter, they’re switched on to frowns and snarls — they’re vigilantly looking out for negativity without really knowing it.
8. It's the end of summer already and the air is getting cold, so… this.
I'm always looking for visual hooks. My daughter has a particular thing she does with her mouth. If there’s several people who could be her, I look for the mouth thing. If she's nervous, or she's irritated, one side of her mouth goes up. She's done it since she was a baby. She doesn't like having her photograph taken, so when I look at a group photo, I look for the kid with the smirk and I know it’s my daughter.
Blessing does not mean approving; you can wish people well while also disengaging from them.8. Video, first 44 seconds: Richard Branson' advice.
Fundamentally, blessing means treating another person as a “thou” not an “it,” not a means to your ends. Think of “thou” as a verb. To bless people is to thou them.
I’ve reflected a lot on my childhood, and I have an accurate, well-rounded understanding of the ways that my parents and other key caregivers related to me – especially as a young child – and how this affected me while growing up.
When you recognize the deeper wants of others, they feel seen and are less likely to be reactive.5. "The price of admission" in long-term relationships.
The day is the only unit of time that I can really get my head around. Seasons change, weeks are completely human-made, but the day has a rhythm. The sun goes up; the sun goes down. I can handle that.3. What pushes scientists to lie? in The Guardian
…We’re all busy, but we all get 24 hours a day. People often ask me, “How do you find the time for the work?” And I answer, “I look for it.” …You find it in the cracks between the big stuff—your commute, your lunch break, the few hours after your kids go to bed. You might have to miss an episode of your favorite TV show, you might have to miss an hour of sleep, but you can find the time to work if you look for it.
…Not only are most experiments not reproduced, most are probably not reproducible. This statement will shock only those who have never worked in a wet lab. Those who have will already suspect as much.A reminder to be sceptical if there is only one study that supports an interesting finding.
…In anonymous surveys, almost 2% of scientists actually admitted to falsifying data at least once in their careers, and about 14% had witnessed others doing so.
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.
