Supritha S

I have no problem waiting five or ten minutes for menus, or even longer. I’m not desperate to eat, I’m desperate to be free of the existential limbo of not knowing whether we’ve been completely overlooked. Human needs are strange—I could fast for twelve hours with little discomfort, yet sometimes it’s amazingly difficult to bear a tiny uncertainty... See more

Why is it so difficult to do what we say we’re going to do?The lizard brain.

However (and this is crucial to understand) follow-up research has discovered implementation intentions only work when you focus on one thing at a time. In fact, researchers found that people who tried to accomplish multiple goals were less committed and less likely to succeed than those who focused on a single goal.

Are there certain beliefs or reasons that are behind the bad habits? Is there something deeper — a fear, an event, or a limiting belief — that is causing you to hold on to something that is bad for you?

Sometimes you have to unlearn the things that you believe to be true. You don’t have to see the world the same way you’ve always seen it. Just because it was true in the past, doesn’t mean it’s true today. And just because you learned something one way doesn’t mean you learned it the best way.

Schemas can be like this sometimes. You have old beliefs and experiences that tend to push you in a certain direction or color your thoughts in a certain way … but they aren't necessarily serving you anymore.

First, if you can convince yourself that a given problem is caused by bad people, then it means someone else is responsible for it.

For example, researching good jokes each day is simple, but you’re never going to write a joke by merely researching. That's why the process of writing is a better choice. Writing can actually produce a meaningful result, even when it's done in small doses.