Nothing in your life is 100% certain. Not your job. Not your health. Not your relationships. Not your plans for next week. You know this. You’ve always known this. But you spend an enormous amount of energy pretending it’s not true. My work as a GP puts me face to face with uncertainty every single…
Most people who struggle to make progress aren’t struggling because they lack intelligence, talent, or desire. They’re struggling because they’re trying to do it alone, surrounded by the wrong people, in groups that are quietly working against them. We’ve already looked at some of the internal hurdles that keep you stuck: the stress that quietly…
Everything is your fault. That’s what you tell yourself. The argument with your partner, your fault. Your colleague’s bad mood, your fault. Your friend’s disappointment, your fault. The weather’s ruined the party, somehow, also your fault. You go through life saying sorry for things you didn’t do, taking responsibility for events you couldn’t control, and…
You want to change. You know you need to change. Maybe you’ve read the books, made the plans, set the goals. But when you try to actually do something different, your brain puts up a fight. Every single time. Often inconsistency-avoidance tendency is to blame, and it’s often the reason change feels so bloody difficult…
Give someone a little extra and often they barely notice, but try to take something away and you’ll fight like your life depends on it to get it back. That’s deprival super-reaction, and it’s probably controlling more of your decisions than you realise. We don’t react the same way to loss and gain. Have a…
You’re going to be fine. That’s what you tell yourself, you’re less likely to get lung cancer even though you smoke. You’re less likely to have a car accident even though you text while driving. You’re less likely to fail even though you haven’t prepared, you’re going to be the exception to the rule. That’s…
You perform at the level expected of you. Not at the level you’re capable of, not at the level you want to reach, at the level others expect from you, and more importantly, at the level you expect from yourself. That’s the Pygmalion Effect in action, and it’s either working for you or against you…
Perhaps you’re making the same mistakes over and over again. You know you are. Same arguments with your partner. Same problems at work. The same patterns repeating themselves in your life. The same poor decisions leading to the same disappointing outcomes. Why? Because you’re not reflecting. You’re just repeating. Reflection in its simplest terms is…
Feedback is said to be the food of champions. It’s a key to successful practice and an essential part of how any learner actually improves, that’s why higher level performers in almost any field actively look for feedback. Not because they enjoy being told what’s wrong with them, but because they’ve worked out that without…
“Try to pose for yourself this task, not to think of a polar bear, and you will see that the cursed thing will come to mind every minute.” Dostoevsky wrote that in 1863, and whether it be polar bears or purple elephants, often when we don’t want to think of something the reverse happens and…