Category: personal-development
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How to Disagree
To aid the understanding and construction of quality arguments, Paul Graham has created a “disagreement hierarchy”: a study on how (and how not) to disagree. We can use this classification system to ensure that when we respond to a person’s reasoning, we respond to it in a way that is constructive for the conversation (by…
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How to Be Interesting
Russell Davies offers ten activities that will lead to you being more interesting; including Start a blog, Keep a scrapbook, and Read. I believe you can sum them up into one piece of advice: Do something. Davies compiled the ten activities, believing they will make a person more interesting, based on two assumptions. However I believe the two assumptions…
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Perceived Complexity and Will Power
While willpower and dedication matter considerably in sustaining a resolution and reaching a desired goal, the perceived complexity of the process can have a big influence on whether we are likely to achieve that goal or not. This conclusion comes from a study showing how the subjective “cognitive complexity” of a diet was a major factor…
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Advice from Economists
Jim Rogers—co-founder of the Quantum Fund (with George Soros), economic commentator, guest professor of finance at Columbia University and author of A Gift to My Children—provided a short interview with the FT discussing his thoughts on making that first million, on travelling, and some general advice to the next generation. What is the secret of your success? As…
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Eliciting Quality Feedback
Feedback is important, there’s no doubt, but obtaining quality feedback that is honest and of use can be difficult. After spending an evening with a person “oblivious to the social dynamics” of a situation, Ben Casnocha provides tips on obtaining honest feedback: For feedback on specifics — such as your participation at a dinner or a…
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Self-Awareness and the Importance of Feedback
It comes as no surprise to hear that we are poor at perceiving how others view us and are poor at recognising the true personality traits of those we observe, but it’s the extent to which this is true and methods we can use to overcome these ‘personality blind spots’ that I find interesting. When…
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Applying Knowledge and Not Understanding Ourselves
One of my favourite reads–the British Psychological Society’s (BPS) Research Digest–has recently published its 150th issue. To observe this occasion, Digest has asked what twenty-three psychologists still don’t understand about themselves. I’ve mentioned a number of the featured psychologists here before, including Robert Cialdini, Alison Gopnik and Richard Wiseman. As Vaughan notes, many of those contributing to…
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Fixed-Schedule Productivity: Fix the Schedule, Don’t Compromise
In a guest post for I Will Teach You To Be Rich, Cal Newport of Study Hacks discusses fixed-schedule productivity: a productivity system whereby you set a schedule of work (and play) between certain hours and stick to it ruthlessly. Tim Ferriss aficionados will note that this system relies on a premise that Ferriss heavily depends…
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The 50th Law
Power is greater than happiness, contends Robert Greene in an online discussion with Eliezer Yudkowsky about Fear, Power and Mortality (quality summary thereof), as happiness is fleeting and unremitting. Also discussed in this conversation is strategist Robert Greene’s latest book, The 50th Law: 10 Lessons in Fearlessness, which is the result of an unlikely collaboration with hip…
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Time Needed to Form a Habit
How long does it take to form a habit? By studying 96 people as they each attempt to start a new habit, the answer comes out as between 18 to 254 days, with a mean of 66. Some good news and caveats: Missing a single day did not reduce the chance of forming a habit. A…