The more committed we are to achieving a goal—catching a train, buying a movie ticket, getting groceries—the more likely we are to assume others have exactly the same objective. The new study by New York University psychology researcher Janet Ahn points to the types of assumptions we make about others’ behavior, which may have an impact on social interaction.
A simple experiment with a small group of college students suggests that punishments influence behavior more than rewards. In fact, punishments—in this case, losing money tokens—had a measured impact two to three times great than winning money. The results appear in the journal Cognition.
Life teaches us that we cannot be released from powerful, stressful emotions by resisting, ignoring, or repressing them – no matter how hard we try. In fact, life teaches us just the opposite. We learn from experience that resisting, repressing and ignoring unpleasant emotions just tend to make things worse.
I have been playing for around twelve years now, and I still take lessons. The best lessons I have are the ones in which I leave feeling like I don’t really know anything about playing at all. During those lessons, my teacher has identified yet another weakness in my playing. I have to learn new skills to overcome those weaknesses to get better.
“Deviant individuals can exist in almost every society, even in the most strict and ruthless ones such as Nazi Germany. These deviant group members serve as an opposition to the opinions of the majority and can also differ from the majority in their emotional experience.”
Billions of people enjoy music; many feel that they can’t live without it. Why? It’s a question that has puzzled scientists and philosophers for centuries. 2,400 years ago Aristotle wondered, “Why does music, being just sounds, remind us of the states of our soul?”
- By Ray Dodd
In order to change any of the beliefs that are holding you back from creating the life you want, it’s important to understand how they were formed and what got you to this point. For many years behavioral scientists have studied human infants to determine what their experience is and how they develop.
- By Alan Cohen
In the Book of Genesis we are told that “a deep sleep fell over Adam,” but nowhere in the Bible does it say that he woke up. We are all Adam, still immersed in the dream of limitation. We have become sleepwalkers, trudging through our days wondering who we are and why we are here.
In 1993, Conari Press published a book called Random Acts of Kindness. This book started a movement of people looking for ways to be kind to complete strangers. It was not at all unusual to see a bumper sticker on the car in front of you that read, “Practice Random Acts of Kindness.”
- By M.J. Ryan
I have tremendous patience with people. I can get occasionally frustrated, annoyed, or even angry, but ultimately my patience kicks back in. I simply refuse to give up on a living being. You too have enormous patience for something and the more you study what fosters your patience, the more you will...
Everything we do is a habit, in one form or another -- how we think, how we talk, how we react to criticism, which type of snack we instinctively reach for. Even when faced with a circumstance for the first time, we respond to it from habit...
- By Alan Cohen
The end of this year might be a good time to decide which stories you want to leave behind and which you would like to take into the new year and amplify. Some stories are worth telling and others are not worth telling. Some stories empower us and others disempower us...
- By Tim Ray
To become a VIP member of Club Shouldsville, you must constantly suffer from the belief that one "should" and "should not" say and do certain things in relationships. And since reality almost never lives up to most people's expectations and ideas about how...
I encourage you to realize that the most powerful thing you can do in every moment is to choose joy. Make the shift into joy your greatest priority. When you choose joy, your joy is a flint that creates a spark that ignites the fire of unconditional love that subsequently...
It crept up unexpectedly, little by little, until it was a full blown "mood". My ego tells me "It all started after the conversation with that person who was angry... it's all their fault." "Wait a minute," my Higher Self interjects. "You chose to adopt that anger and carry it with you. No one forced you or 'made you' angry."
by Sylvia Browne. There was one passage [in the Dead Sea Scrolls] that struck me as reflecting our philosophy so much: "An edict went out amongst the Essenes [later the Gnostics] that stated, 'Stop holding on. Quit having the stubbornness of guilt.'" It really struck me how tenacious guilt is. Guilt is a killer -- no doubt about it.
by Khenchen Thrangu Rinpoche. Generally speaking, all religions consider compassion to be important. Moreover, it is not just the religions of the world that consider compassion to be important. Ordinary, worldly people think so too. Generally, everyone feels compassion, but the compassion is flawed.
The world's favorite pastime is not football, soccer, or baseball but gossip. People love to gossip about one another. The next time you are at the check out line in your grocery store notice all the papers and magazines that thrive on gossip...