Betterment

In response to a tweet of mine, someone pointed me to the thought-provoking 2001 paper Bad is Stronger Than Good: Bad emotions, bad parents, and bad feedback have more impact than good ones, and bad information is processed more thoroughly than good. The self is more motivated to avoid bad self-definitions than to pursue good ones. Bad impressions and bad stereotypes are quicker to form and more resistant to disconfirmation than good ones. … There appear to be more words for negative than positive emotions. … bad [news] events are more newsworthy and attract more reader attention.

There’s often a choice between following the cultural dictates of a given group or seeking out demonstrable facts and the scientific method. Which do you expect most people would choose? Whic…

Be kind to your future self — future-proof your notes to be of service to you.

Tufte sidenotes are a unique annotation method. They make notes more useful by providing additional info in the context of reading flow.

There are two kinds of coincidences. The first is the one that we often talk about. It’s the make-believe magic of two things occurring that we didn’t expect to occur. When you and your…

In the Orthodox Church, Easter and Christmas are preceded by 40-day seasons in which adherents forgo certain meals and abstain from particular foods. These fasts not only serve as a means of spiritual preparation; they also add poignancy to the feasts that follow. Our culture’s secular feasts, like Thanksgiving, are not preceded by fasts. Instead, […]

But not all real problems lead to good businesses. There are problems all around us. People need housing, health care and food. They want delight, belonging and status. When a company shows up in t…

It’s simple: This surgery will fix your problem and you’ll be better. It’s complicated: Changes in lifestyle, diet and attitude will, over time, help you feel better. Or… Ou…

What do we get in exchange for our work? There’s pay, of course, and the satisfaction of a job well done. There’s stress and human interaction, learning and physical exertion. We get th…

Browse any type of media from the last few days- TV, Twitter, Instagram etc- and you’ll see endless posts about the new Barbie movie. It seems the entire

Of course, we think we’re right. That’s why we’re sharing our opinion. But when there’s a disagreement, or we’re predicting the future, it’s likely that someone …

The podcast host and columnist caught up with GQ about his daily routine: the importance of sleep, (mostly) staying off Twitter, and surrendering the illusion of control.

When starting a new job as a software engineer, it’s natural to feel the pressure of delivering immediate value and meeting the expectations of your role....

If you can't do nothing, then don't expect to be able to do something.

As we accelerate into the age of AI, we need to think about what skills people will need to learn over the next decade.

The early adopter bought an iPhone in 2008 and never looked back. They played a few games of pickleball and then joined a club and bought the equipment. They picked up a new magazine on the newssta…

I defend the view that the mind is a computer, and why people who devote their lives to studying the brain believe it.

Johnny.Decimal is a system to organise projects (or your life, or anything else)

The trick is knowing where it is and using it well. Wanting control doesn’t always mean needing to have control. Sometimes it is simply a desire to be acknowledged. HT to Brian.

I’m told that the hardest part of being a teaching golf pro isn’t helping adult golfers develop a good swing. It’s getting them to stop using a bad one. Our position feels so frag…

Going on strike or getting furloughed may be preferable to losing a job—but no easier financially. Here’s how to survive during a prolonged loss of income.

The cool thing is always a little out of reach. And for most of us, once we get it, it’s not seen as cool any more. This is not an accident. One definition of cool are things that are just ou…

The world can be divided into agents and objects.  Things that make stuff happen, and things that have stuff happen to them. The shaper, and the shaped. The mover, and the moved. The driver, and the screw. No one is ever entirely one or the other, and you should be open to allowing positive influences […]

Posted on Tuesday 18 Jul 2023. 818 words, 12 links. By Matt Webb.

Like many American boys who grew up in the 1980s, I loved The Karate Kid. For months when I was five years old, I demanded that my family call me “Daniel-san” instead of Brett. Besides instilling in me a desire to crane-kick everyone, The Karate Kid also implanted a nascent interest in Japanese culture. When I […]

Growth usually feels risky. The feeling is a protection mechanism, a way to avoid failure or even the fear of failure. Of course, risk also feels risky (or at least it should). Differentiating betw…

Sociologist devised a robust way to test the cultural climate by focusing on information flow.

That’s not the same as raising the average. With the advent of the high jump, the idiom raising the bar became well understood: If you can’t jump over the bar that the current leader cl…