Playing death
Humor was once defined as “distance that approaches”. It is one of the best existing relieves for our tortured and overwhelmed left brain (more…)
Posts Tagged ‘Emotional intelligence’
Honor your unconscious
Only extreme ignorance or arrogance can lead to believe that one fully controls one’s behavior. To begin with, we are alive beings, and we don’t know what life is: scientists can describe its parts or modify its working, but they cannot explain life. What I am going to discuss here is Carl Gustav Jung’s basic ideas on the unconscious, and you may agree with them or not, but one fact is already undeniable: the unconscious exists. (more…)
How to become optimistic with very little effort
I have a retarded mind: I very often go through the best ideas in books and posts without noticing them right away. They usually become some sort of “seed” in my head and take 3, 4 days to fully grow, without me having the least intention to do anything about them. And then one day, as a flower that opens after a delicate nurture, I say: “wow”, and do something about it.
Writing the successes of the day was one of those great ideas. Simple, non-coded, very little time-consuming, it pays off in a way that is almost scary. (more…)
What to do with yourself when you’re mad
Here is the analogy that one of my teachers used to describe the human brain: he lifted his right fist and said: “this is a lizard’s brain”. Then he (more…)
Life right after removing the wrapper
It happened the other day. I was having the habitual fast-paced walk that is currently my sport of choice (remind me to recover my skates one of these days), when my way got obstructed by a family group. (more…)
Taking care of oneself
If you’re as lucky as me, you’ll have, or you’ll have had this fantastic relative (grandpa, an aunt or uncle maybe) who takes care of you in an almost frenzied manner. A sort of die-hard fan of yours obsessed with (more…)
E-mail: avoiding the “whoops effect”
In our modern, hurried days, there is always the risk of making an object of the people around us, turning our relations mechanical only because of the speed of things. Such risk is twice as common with electronic communication, whose immediateness, (more…)
Experiences in Fatherhood
It is always nice when a science guru ratifies something you had been doing merely by instinct. In “Emotional Intelligence” (chapter 14), Daniel Goleman talks about Jerome Kagan’s research on the effects of overprotective mothers on their children. In short, Kagan’s conclusion is that those mothers of very reactive children who try to protect them in excess (more…)