The Paradox of Choice

Instead of thinking of a cut-and-dry end goal to certain situations, creative people sit back and examine the problem in different ways before beginning to work.

If you find yourself stagnating by focusing on generic problems, try to re-conceptualize the problem by focusing on a more meaningful angle.

For example: Instead of thinking “What would be something cool to paint?” rather ask, “What sort of painting evokes the feeling of loneliness that we all encounter after a break-up?”

Creating “psychological” distance may be useful for breaking through a creative block.

Try to imagine your creative task as being disconnected and distant from your current position/location - this may make the problem more accessible and can encourage higher level thinking.

Electronic communication is efficient, but it's detached. Sitting at a computer screen, the need for tact and a respectful tone disappears.

• Being on the receiving end of such impoliteness can create lingering stress and negative emotions. The recipient may find it harder to stay engaged at work. The stress associated with e-mail rudeness can spill over into family life and, like a chain reaction, can send stress signals to other people.
• A subtler form of aggression is failing to reply to a request, in effect giving others the "silent treatment." Not responding to an email leaves people hanging and struggling with uncertainty.

With remote work on the rise, the use of electronic communication has allowed incivility to thrive.

• To mitigate the stress, managers need to set clear and reasonable e-mail expectations. Organizations should create meaningful opportunities for employees to build good working relationships.
• For employees, the best option to cope is to unplug from work after-hours.
• Regardless of your level of stress, remember the rules of netiquette. Spend time composing your e-mail and notice inconsiderate expressions. Acknowledge a request and let your co-workers know when you will get back to them. Perhaps keep caps lock off.

It's a thinking mistake and it occurs when we confuse selection factors with results. 

Professional swimmers don't have perfect bodies because they train extensively. Rather, they are good swimmers because of their physiques.

It plays on this tendency of ours to emphasize loss over gain.

The term sunk cost refers to any cost that has been paid already and cannot be recovered. The reason we can't ignore the cost, even though it's already been paid, is that we're wired to feel loss far more strongly than gain.

Bad habits don’t go away overnight. But, you can use strategies to give you that extra boost of self-confidence and self-control required to change.

Understand that sometimes you will fail and sometimes you’ll succeed. But no matter how long it takes to fail and get back up again, your patience and perseverance will soon pay off.

It gives you an automatic response to react to your cravings and makes it easier to replace a bad habit with a good one: 

• Identify the scenario that usually triggers your bad habit.
• Specify a different response to the trigger. Ideally, this should be a good habit that would replace and prevent you from falling into the temptation.
• Combine steps 1 and 2 into an “if-then” format.

Your first impressions are usually pretty accurate. But whether they are wrong or right, first impressions affect us in a big way and we are slow to change them.

You have to be willing to update them quite rapidly. 

• Studies show that if someone seems extroverted, confident, religious or conscientious, they probably are.
• We all pay more attention to pretty people, and so we tend to take the time to evaluate them.
• If you want to know if someone is good at their job, watch them do it for 30-60 seconds. 
• Funny people are smart: Effective humor production acts as an honest indicator of intelligence in humans.

• We get upset when someone doesn't fulfill a promise. However, if they do more than promised, we're not grateful enough for it.
• People learn more and faster from punishment and reward. If you have to pick one, negative feedback stimulates learning faster than positive feedback.

Do not do unto others what you do not want to be done unto you.

It is about focusing on eliminating the negative more than encouraging the positive. Because there’s abundant evidence from multiple sources that relationships are far more strongly affected by negative things than positive things.

Focus on baby steps. The key to new good habits is to do the minimum and be consistent.

Do not be ambitious at the beginning. That leads to failure. Consistency is what you’re shooting for, so make the hurdle as low as possible.

Thinking about the details makes you more likely to follow through. 

Just writing down your plan also makes a big difference in effectively committing to your goals.

A well-designed decoy can shift our decision making between two options as much as 40%.

For example, we are more likely to buy the large glass of juice at the counter when we have been provided with a choice in which the smaller glass is priced only slightly less. We tend to opt for the bigger glass (even if we don't need more juice) as it looks like a bargain.

• The Unattractive Third Option (The Decoy) has no real value in itself and is just placed to sway the decision maker towards the higher-priced option.
• The Decoy's only purpose is to make the expensive option appear like a bargain.
• This has also been widely used in subscription options of magazines and in the high-end diamond market.

Meditation improves your attention, focus, self-awareness, and lower your stress levels.

Meditating for even just a few minutes every day will help you to clear your head while activating the areas of your brain related to decision-making and emotions.

When we are stressed, we tend to unconsciously fall back on ingrained habits, whether they are helpful or harmful.

Creating good habits helps you get through stressful situations without affecting your willpower.