But while it’s true that helping other people makes us happier, and that people feel a distinct helper’s high, it’s also true that when people are unhappy, they often find it tough to help others. If...
And of course, arriving at one goal usually reveals another, yet more challenging goal. Publishing the first book means it’s time to start the second. There’s another hill to climb. The challenge, the...
A willingness to be pleased requires modesty and even innocence--easy to deride as mawkish and sentimental.
70 percent of long-term gym memberships are mostly unused, but a dog needs walking every day.
«Живите в реальном мире.Закройте электронную почту, отключите телефон и интернет.
A quotation from Lewis’s brilliant essay On Three Ways of Writing for Children: When I was ten, I read fairy tales in secret and would have been ashamed if I had been found doing so. Now that I am fif...
Thoreau admonished, Our life is frittered away by detail.… Simplicity, simplicity, simplicity! This longing for simplicity is so powerful and complex that it needs its own term, much like nostalgie de...
There are many compelling reasons to exercise, but study after study shows that weight loss isn’t one of them. The way to lose weight is to change eating habits.
One-Coin Loophole: Whether we choose to focus on the single coin or the growing heap will shape our behavior.
On Three Ways of Writing for Children: When I was ten, I read fairy tales in secret and would have been ashamed if I had been found doing so. Now that I am fifty I read them openly. When I became a ma...
I’ve learned to put great store in my own observations of everyday life, because while laboratory experiments are one way to study human nature, they aren’t the only way.
It struck me as poignant that my long relationship with my beloved grandparents could be embodied in a few small objects. But the power of objects doesn't depend on their volume; in fact, my memories...
If I feel anxious about the fact that I haven’t started, I become even more reluctant to start, which just makes me more anxious.
I sat on that crowded bus, I grasped two things: I wasn’t as happy as I could be, and my life wasn’t going to change unless I made it change. In that single moment, with that realization, I decided to...
I later changed my passwords to a goal I’ve been working on, or an achievement I want.
Habits speed time, because when every day is the same, experience shortens and blurs; by contrast, time slows down when habits are interrupted, when the brain must process new information.
For most people, whenever possible, important habits should be scheduled for the morning. Mornings tend to unfold in a predictable way, and as the day goes on, more complications arise—
For Moderators, the first bite tastes the best, and then their pleasure gradually drops, and they might even stop eating before they’re finished. For Abstainers, however, the desire for each bite is j...
Each day gave me a new opportunity to push the task off until tomorrow. Tomorrow, I’d feel like dealing with it. Start now, I finally thought. Just take the first step. I started with the smallest pos...
Also, accomplishing small tasks boosts our sense of self-efficacy. The more we trust ourselves to follow through on our own commitments, the more likely we are to believe that we can keep an important...