Tag Archives: Self-Help

In My Hands Today…

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Trump Passion in the Quest for Work You Love – Cal Newport

In this eye-opening account, Cal Newport debunks the long-held belief that “follow your passion” is good advice.

Not only is the cliché flawed—preexisting passions are rare and have little to do with how most people end up loving their work—but it can also be dangerous, leading to anxiety and chronic job hopping.

After making his case against passion, Newport sets out on a quest to discover the reality of how people end up loving what they do. Spending time with organic farmers, venture capitalists, screenwriters, freelance computer programmers, and others who admitted to deriving great satisfaction from their work, Newport uncovers the strategies they used and the pitfalls they avoided in developing their compelling careers.

Matching your job to a preexisting passion does not matter, he reveals. Passion comes after you put in the hard work to become excellent at something valuable, not before. In other words, what you do for a living is much less important than how you do it.

With a title taken from the comedian Steve Martin, who once said his advice for aspiring entertainers was to “be so good they can’t ignore you,” Cal Newport’s clearly written manifesto is mandatory reading for anyone fretting about what to do with their life, or frustrated by their current job situation and eager to find a fresh new way to take control of their livelihood. He provides an evidence-based blueprint for creating work you love.

So Good They Can’t Ignore You will change the way we think about our careers, happiness, and the crafting of a remarkable life.

In My Hands Today…

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How to Be Well: Navigating Our Self-Care Epidemic, One Dubious Cure at a Time – Amy Larocca

Peleton. Pilates. Biohacking. Colonics. Ashweganda. Today the wellness industry is a $3.7 trillion-dollar behemoth that touches everyone. Journalist Amy Larocca peels back the layers behind the movement and reckons with its promises and profits. How did we get here, and how did the idea of wellness become integrated into people’s lives, especially women’s?

How to be Well takes readers into the communities that swear by their activated-charcoal toothpaste and green-juice enemas, explaining what each of these practices really are—and what the science says. Larocca holds a magnifying glass to alternative medicine and nouveau lifestyle prescriptions, delivering an incisive assessment of how the wellness industry embodies (gendered, class-based, racialized) perceptions of care and self-improvement, and how it preys upon an unshakeable fear of the unknown. She traces the history of how the beauty and fashion industries has peddled snake oil for decades—and why people keep coming back for more.

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Dopamine Detox : A Short Guide to Remove Distractions and Train Your Brain to Do Hard Things – Thibaut Meurisse, edited by Kerry J. Donovan

Do you keep procrastinating? Do you feel restless and unable to focus on your work? Do you have trouble getting excited about major goals?

If so, you might need a dopamine detox.

In today’s world, where distractions are everywhere, the ability to focus has become more and more difficult to achieve. We are constantly being stimulated, feeling restless, often without knowing why.

When the time comes to work, we suddenly find an excess of other things to do. Instead of working toward our goals, we go for a walk, grab a coffee, or check our emails. Everything seems like a great idea—everything except the very things we should be doing.

Do you recognize yourself in the above situation?

If so, don’t worry. You’re simply overstimulated.

Dopamine Detox will help you lower your level of stimulation and regain focus in 48 hours or less, so that you can tackle your key tasks.

More specifically, in Dopamine Detox you’ll discover:

  • what dopamine is and how it works
  • the main benefits of completing a dopamine detox
  • 3 simple steps to implement a successful detox in the next 48 hours
  • practical exercises to eliminate distractions and boost your focus
  • simple tools and techniques to avoid overstimulation and help you stay focused, and much more.

In My Hands Today…

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Life in Three Dimensions: How Curiosity, Exploration, and Experience Make a Fuller, Better Life – Shigehiro Oishi

For many people, a good life is a stable life, a comfortable life that follows a well-trodden path. This is the case for Shigehiro Oishi’s father, who has lived in a small mountain town in Japan for his entire life, putting his family’s needs above his own, like his father and grandfather before him. But is a happy life, or even a meaningful life, the only path to a good life?

In Life in Three Dimensions, Shige Oishi enters into a debate that has animated psychology since 1984, when Ed Diener (Oishi’s mentor) published a paper that launched happiness studies. A rival followed in 1989 with a model of a good life that focused on purpose and meaning instead. In recent years, Shige Oishi’s award-winning work has proposed a third dimension to a good psychological richness, a concept that prioritizes curiosity, exploration, and a variety of experiences that help us grow as people.

Life in Three Dimensions explores the shortcomings of happiness and meaning as guides to a good life, pointing to complacency and regret as a “happiness trap” and narrowness and misplaced loyalty as a “meaning trap.” Psychological richness, Oishi proposes, balances the other two, offering insight and growth spurred by embracing uncertainty and challenges.

In a lively style, drawing on a generation of psychological studies and on examples from famous people, books and film, Oishi introduces a new path to a fuller, more satisfying life with fewer regrets.

In My Hands Today…

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The Daily Laws: 366 Meditations from the author of the bestselling The 48 Laws of Power – Robert Greene

Over the last 22 years, Robert Greene has provided insights into every aspect of being human whether that be getting what you want, understanding others’ motivations, mastering your impulses, and recognizing strengths and weaknesses. The Daily Laws distills that wisdom into daily entries.

Each entry delivers refined and concise wisdom from one of his books, in an easy to digest lesson that will only take a few minutes to read, as well as a Commandment — a prescription or prompt for the reader to follow.

Not only is The Daily Laws the perfect entry point for those new to Greene’s penetrating insight, but it will also help the many Greene fans throughout the world understanding and internalizing the many lessons that fill his books. It is a guide to a lifetime of reading and re-reading about power, seduction, strategy, psychology and human nature.