“Each time I reach out to a friend or family member or each time I respond when someone reaches out to me, I feel more ease and less stress. The experience has taught me that parenting at its best is a team sport.” – Vivek H. Murthy, Surgeon General of the United States of America […]

How would the world change if it was common practice to make “First do no harm” (Primum non nocere) a first principle in all that we do (not just medicine)? It wouldn’t be possible to realize this ideal perfectly since most actions entail mixes of benefits and harms that vary across contexts and stakeholders. Still, […]

The way we use the term “trigger” reflects something odd about the Zeitgeist of the early decades of the 21st century. As it became a common term in popular psychology, “trigger” could have taken on positive, neutral or negative associations. A trigger could have been any cue yielding any automated response. Yet somehow in popular […]

The behavioral economist Daniel Kahneman and the tennis philosopher W. Timothy Gallwey both argue that each of us is divided into two separate systems or selves – one conscious the other automated. While they both acknowledge the positive contributions of the automated self they are less aligned on the contribution of the conscious self, especially […]

Over the next couple of years, we’ll see a furious battle between those who divide medicine sharply between scientific and personal approaches. My experience tells me there is a place for both, and usually they work best in combination. Proactive personal experimentation sometimes reveals a change you can make to improve your own health and […]

‘There are two kinds of anxiety associated with learning: “learning anxiety” and “survival anxiety.”‘ – MIT organizational scholar Edgar Schein in 2002 HBR interview with Diane L. Coutu Edgar Schein suggested that acknowledging that anxiety is a natural part of process of growth can help us make sense of all those negative feelings so that […]

According to Mary Murphy, Professor of Psychological and Brain Sciences at the University of Indiana, to help individuals find a “growth mindset” we need to cultivate a “growth culture.” Our ability to maintain a growth mindset is influenced by how the people around us talk about growth. In a Hidden Brain interview, she explains, “The […]

The shift toward inclusion actually calls upon us to DO something. If focusing on inclusion actually induces us to ensure everyone’s inclusion (i.e. full participation in the belonging, learning, contributing and challenging activities of the society or organization they are joining), then putting more emphasis on inclusion than diversity could be broadly advantageous. After all, […]

“If you fall into the habit of getting angry and punishing your men, those who hear about it will not want to become your close retainers. Avoid humiliating them if they already have a sense of shame.” – Hojo Shigetoki (北条重時) in “The Letter to Nagatoki” (六波羅殿御家訓), circa 1240 AD Made sense in the 13th century; makes sense in […]

Recently, I’ve listened to a number of programs exploring how we EDIT the stories we tell about ourselves, others and the rest of the world. Ezra Klein did an interview on the role of the editor in creating coherent narratives in journalism and art. TTBOOK did a feature on how we have become a self-creating […]