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How your thinking works

Start here if you know something’s wrong, but you’re not sure what. We’ll help you understand how invisible thinking patterns and mental hang-ups can do real damage and how thinking better can get you better results.

  • Elephant Chain Syndrome

    When an elephant is young, a common practice historically was to attach its hind leg via a chain to a strong unmovable post or tree, so that when it’s chained up, it knows it can’t get away. It takes about two months for the young elephant to stop struggling against the chain, and from then…

  • Why You’re Stuck: And What It’s Really Costing You

    Most people who are stuck don’t think of themselves as stuck. By its very nature, a problem can get you stuck. Problems are just dilemmas, a hurdle to jump, an obstacle to overcome, and for most of us life is just one problem after another. Most of the time we deal with them and move…

  • Reactance Bias

    Reactance bias can help or hinder us in life. Use it the right way, and it’s a powerful driver. Get it wrong, and we’re going to stubbornly hang on to the bad stuff in our lives just because we can. Let me tell you a story that shaped my entire career. When I was a…

  • Why Most Approaches to Self-Development Don’t Work

    There is no shortage of self-help material. Books, courses, podcasts, seminars, apps, coaches, therapists. The industry is enormous, and it keeps growing. And yet the number of people who feel genuinely stuck, who can’t seem to change despite real effort, who try one approach after another and end up back where they started, doesn’t seem…

  • Making Mountains out of Mole Hills

    In this article, we’re going to discuss the subject of worry, and specifically we’re going to talk about worrying excessively and the harm that this mental trait can cause. Because here’s what I need you to understand right from the start: worry is useful in small doses and unhelpful in large ones. There are things…

  • How You Actually Think: The Two Systems Running Your Life

    Have you ever driven somewhere familiar, arrived at your destination, and realised you can barely remember the journey? You stopped at the right junctions. You indicated at the right moments. You navigated the route correctly. But consciously? You were somewhere else entirely. Thinking about work, replaying a conversation, planning your evening. The driving just happened.…