If you follow me on Instagram you know that I’ve been on this kick recently of really trying to be a better listener. What follows is a parable that sums up why. A few weeks ago, I heard a conversation between critically-acclaimed psychologist Harriet Lerner and shame researcher Brené Brown that piqued my interest with […]
getting to know yourself
Try This Genius Hack for Calming Spiraling Thoughts
Spiraling thoughts are easily identifiable as any obsessive, repeating, or circuitous thoughts that grip your attention in a negative way. You become obsessed, and can’t stop thinking about that thing. This is a thought spiral, and they usually weigh you down. Spiraling thoughts make it so that it’s hard to focus on anything else, and […]
5 Proven Strategies for Building a Resilient Mindset
Resilience– also known as psychological resilience— is understood as a person’s ability to recover from setbacks and remain relatively unruffled by what life throws at them. It’s not really something you can measure so much as feel. We all have it, but like most aspects of mental fortitude, some of us are better at it […]
What This Epic Peanut Butter Taste Test Can Teach You About Life
Creating wonder is important, as awe and novelty are intrinsic to our lives and our mental wellbeing. This peanut butter taste test is a perfect example of a fun way to manufacture joy and wonder at home. (Because of the wild response I got for this peanut butter taste test on Instagram, I’ve shared all […]
Beautiful Life Lesson: Thom Yorke, Rothko, and How We Interpret Joy
Sometime in the year 2000, Radiohead frontman Thom Yorke sat for an interview on Dutch television about the making of Radiohead’s Kid A and the rough time he had separating his personal life from the world of celebrity after the monumental success of 1997’s Ok Computer. In this interview, Yorke relayed an anecdote that has […]
Watch Lady Gaga, Oprah Talk “Radical Acceptance” in Mental Health
Oprah’s 2020 Vision Tour is a series of conversations between Oprah and various innovators and change-makers in society. In a recent candid interview with Lady Gaga in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, the two spoke about Gaga’s career and also her focus on mental health. They also spoke about spirituality, and an innovative dialectical behavioral therapy concept […]
Why We Grieve People We’ve Never Met
The death of a beloved celebrity or public figure often brings with it intimate outpourings of grief— often from people who never met the departed. This begs interesting questions about the psychological impact of idol worship, public figures and relationships writ large, as well as our personal sense of wellbeing in the world. In the […]
On Building Confidence, and Why Confidence Isn’t a Destination
Building confidence is a lifelong pursuit that is often mischaracterized as something you can permanently achieve. In popular media, any discussion of self-improvement implies a conversion from one state of being to another, as if “becoming confident” is akin to graduating with a degree. One day, with enough hard work, you’ll miraculously wake up as […]