A new picture is emerging of the way that the brain manages the body's resources and how this can be swayed by our motivation, and by our broader beliefs about our capabilities and the task ahead.These new insights offer enticing strategies that we can all use to boost our performance and improve our experience of exercise.

Fatigue Is A Mind Thing

Caffeine, for instance, has long been considered a muscular stimulant that can enhance performance in many sports - yet that is largely a product of our expectations about what it can do.According to multiple studies, people can benefit from so-called open-label placebos, even though they know they are taking an inert substance.

Placebos: We Think We Are Getting Better, And We Do

There is no substitute for auto-suggestion, or self-belief.Understanding the power of mind-over-muscle might lead us to reconsider some of our core underlying beliefs about our fitness. For manifold reasons, we might assume that we simply aren’t cut out for exercise. We may have had poor experiences in gym classes at school, for example, and our feelings of inadequacy could then be exacerbated as we compare ourselves with the stronger and faster gym bunnies around us.

The Expectation Effect

Scientific research <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6874306/">shows</a> that negative beliefs about our capacity for exercise can <a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32062021/">reduce</a> our endurance and increase our discomfort. This will naturally make it much harder to summon the will to work out in the future.We can also look out for ‘catastrophic thinking’ while we go about the exercise, and try to interpret feelings of exertion more objectively. If you have a dim view of your fitness, you might currently interpret the natural aches and pains and feelings of fatigue as a sign of your own ineptitude.

The Negative Thought Spiral

The idea of ‘mind over muscle’ is more than motivational rhetoric – exercise science shows how the brain manages fatigue

mindfulness

Mindfulness

health

Health

mentalhealth

Mental Health

scienceandnature

Science & Nature

Physical fatigue is in the brain as much as in the body | Psyche Ideas

<ol><li>Smile</li><li>Exercise</li><li>Get plenty of sleep</li><li>Eat with mood in my mind</li><li>Be grateful</li><li>Give a compliment</li><li>Breathe deeply</li><li>Acknowledge the unhappy moment</li><li>Keep a journal</li><li>Face stress head-on</li><li>Declutter</li><li>See friends</li><li>Plan your week</li><li>Ditch your phone</li><li>Get into nature</li><li>Explore meditation</li><li>Consider therapy</li><li>Find a slef-care ritual</li><li>Give back</li><li>Take yourself out</li><li>Create a thought list</li><li>Take time to reflect</li><li>Reevaluate your goals</li><li>Take care of your body</li><li>Let go of grudges</li></ol>

Summary

Happiness can feel impossible, but it's always within reach. We'll break down 25 science-backed habits to help you get you mood on track.

personaldevelopment

Personal Development

habits

Habits

How to Be Happy: 25 Habits to Help You Live a Happier Life

"So wake me up when it's all over, when I'm wiser and I'm older, all this time I was finding myself and I, didn't know I was lost."Wake Me Up

Tim Bergling, "Avicii" 1989-2018. He was just ten years older than me. People shouldn't die this young.

"Hey brother, there's an endless road to rediscover."Hey Brother

Avicii was an inspiration. I wouldn't be listening to EDM if it weren't for him.

"It's not too late, it's not too late, I see the hope in your heart."Broken Arrows

I wish I could've gone to one of your shows. Meeting you would've been awesome. You may be gone, but your music lasts forever, and I'll never stop listening to it.

"Oh, sometimes, I get a good feeling."Levels

Avicii's music makes me feel better. It gives me a good feeling.

"I'm gonna tear this city down without you, I'm going Bonnie & Clyde without you."Without You

The world has to go on without you, and so do I. It was such an honor to remix one of your songs. And I've got a feeling your songs will be making appearances in my mash-ups for years to come.

"...Thursday waiting for love, waiting for love. Thank the stars it's Friday..."Waiting For Love

Last night, 4/19, I randomly got the song "Waiting for Love" in my head. Then today, 4/20, I find out the creator of that song has died at age 28. Life is crazy.

Avicii's songs easily number among my favorites of all time. There's something about his music that's just joyful, whether you listen to EDM or not. We lost a titan of the music world today, and I will always remember you.

"One day you'll leave this world behind, so live a life you will remember."The Nights

Yesterday marked the 4-year anniversary of the death of Tim Bergling, more widely known as Avicii, a producer, songwriter and DJ and a pioneer in the Electronic Dance Music industry. These are some of my thoughts I posted on Instagram that day back in 2018, four years ago.

motivationandinspiration

Motivation & Inspiration

music

Music

AVICII FOREVER: In Memoriam

According to the Mayo Clinic, laughing has short- and long-term effects on our health. As we bring in more oxygen, it stimulates our heart, lungs, and muscles. Laughing increases the endorphins that are released by our brain, and it cools down our stress response. Over a longer period of time, laughter can improve our immune system, relieve pain, and increase personal satisfaction.

Laughter Can Be Good Medicine

While it’s easy to laugh at something funny, the ability to laugh at yourself can help you address the challenges that could be holding you back in your career and life, says Dr. Brian Kaplan, author of Almost Happy: Pushing Your Buttons with Reverse Psychology.“To laugh at one’s self is an excellent thing,” he says. “Humor can be a very powerful way of helping people, proving that helping doesn’t have to be a solemn experience.”

Helping Doesn’t Have To Be Solemn

Kaplan studied the work of Frank Farrelly, an innovative therapist who founded Provocative Therapy in the 1960s. Provocative Therapy uses humor and reverse psychology to provoke people to change. With the person’s explicit permission, you repeat what you hear their “sub-selves” saying and you do it with humor, warmth, and affection.

Provocative Therapy

Provocative Therapy is a system of psychotherapy in which the therapist plays the devil’s advocate, siding with the negative half of the client’s ambivalence toward his life’s goals, his relationships, work and the structures within which he lives. The provocative therapist also plays the Satanic role by facetiously agreeing with the doom and gloom feelings and expectations of the client, and “tempting” him to continue his “sinning,” his self-defeating attitudes and behavioral patterns.

Whose Side Are You On?

“We all have sub-selves, or sub-personalities, such as our inner child,” says Kaplan. “That’s a nice use of a sub-self. But we also have sub-selves that dominate us. They’re loud, grab the microphone, and dominate the whole personality.”For example, you may relate to a sub-self of the workaholic. You could justify that you need to work 15 hours a day because you’re paying for your children’s education, a new house, or a vacation home.

Our Sub-Selves

Laugh at yourself by reaffirming the workaholic’s devotion to work. For example, you can tell yourself, “You should definitely spend all your time focusing on making more money and acquiring more businesses or investing in the market. Your children will be judged by their clothes and vacations. They don’t need you; they need your money.”

Self-Subversion How-to

“When you can laugh at that side—especially when it’s a bit over the top—then you can laugh at that part of you that’s sabotaging yourself,” says Kaplan. “That moment of laughter provides a window of opportunity to recognize what’s holding you back and prescribe your own solution. And laughter and the warmth of it is like a medicine that allows you to deal with something that’s often quite painful.”

Laughter And The Warmth Of It

In his book, Kaplan identifies more than 100 sub-selves that could be holding you back. For example, you may be a procrastinator. In this case, you can talk to yourself by saying, “Never underestimate the power of tomorrow!” “Always make magnanimous resolutions on your finest night, New Year’s Eve.” And “Meditate on the many horrible consequences of most impulsive decisions and actions.”

Sub-Self: The Procrastinator

Another sub-self is the grim executive, which Kaplan calls “the stone-faced men and women of big business. Anyone feeling the burden of being held responsible for profit and loss.” In this case, you can call out the sub-self by saying, “It’s a badge of honor to look ten years older than you are. Don’t forget your annual visit to the cardiologist.”Other sub-selves include being a people pleaser, robot, doormat, critic, and ego maniac.

Sub-Self: The Grim Executive

“Mark Twain once said, ‘Against the assault of laughter, nothing can stand,'” says Kaplan. “Once you’re laughing at the sub self, you’re acutely aware of it. Normally, you don’t think of the trait as a sub-self. When it takes you over, you think ‘I’m angry’ or ‘I’m under stress,’ because the sub-self has taken your whole personality there. When you can identify it as a part of you and not your entire being, you can quiet it down.”

A Part, Not The Whole

If you find it hard to laugh at yourself, I would be happy to do it for you.

If you would not be laughed at, be the first to laugh at yourself.

We probably all know what it’s like when others push our buttons and drive us crazy. What if we pushed our own buttons and drove ourselves happy? 

The ability to laugh at yourself can help you address the challenges that could be holding you back in your career and life, says Dr. Brian Kaplan.


Understand yourself and those around you.

psychology

Psychology

How (And Why) We Should Learn To Laugh At Ourselves

<ul><li>For humans, rats, and all animals , the desire and motivation to pursue sex arise largely from a neurochemical called dopamine.</li><li>Dopamine amps up the centerpiece of the primitive part of the brain—the reward system. It’s where we experience cravings and pleasure, and where we get addicted.</li><li>At the top of our human reward list are food, sex, love, friendship, and novelty. These are called ‘natural reinforcers,’ as contrasted with addictive chemicals.</li><li>Sexual stimulation offers the biggest natural blast of dopamine available to your reward circuitry.</li><li>Dopamine’s nickname is molecule of addiction.</li></ul>

More Dopamine, Please!

"I count him braver who overcomes his desires than who conquers his enemies; for the hardest victory is over self"

<ul><li>Excess consumption (food or sex) is the signal to your primitive brain that you have hit the evolutionary jackpot. With continued daily over-consumption, high levels of dopamine trigger the production of the protein DeltaFosB. </li><li>DeltaFosB acts on the reward circuit, stronger nerve connections are behind all learning. This process is called neuroplasticity. The more intense the experience, the stronger the connections. The stronger the connections, the easier it is for electrical impulses to travel along this new pathway.</li></ul>

More Pleasure Seeking Leads To Less Pleasure 

<ul><li>This habit distracts the person towards his/her goals, dreams, better life and good mental health.</li><li>This addiction at any age can ruin the relationship between couples, in career or social life. Many a times one is unable to realize this.</li><li>Sex is a powerful motivational force which plays a vital role in evolving human race but due to the frequent watching of porn and masturbation, the quality of sex decreases.</li><li> It decreases human connection and people are becoming uncomfortable becoming social. This happens because one creates a different world in his/her brain and is most comfortable in it</li></ul>

Impacts

<ul><li>Men who developed an understanding of how their brain worked and how they were reinforcing negative, self-destructive habits were able to cut pornography out of their lives completely. They were once again attracted to their wives and girlfriends, and the symptoms disappeared. </li><li>The brain is changeable - you can reverse your symptoms and replace your negative habits with positive ones.</li><li>People find after quitting that their social anxiety and shyness disappears. </li><li>They can look people in the eyes again, have higher self-esteem and better senses of humour, and have increased female attraction.</li></ul>

Free From Porn

<ul><li>Self-esteem increases</li><li>Good at management in emotional level</li><li>Energetic at every work</li><li>Positivity and sociable easily</li><li>Concentration increases</li><li>Comfort zone increases with talking to people</li><li>Relationship benefits</li><li>No more guilt </li></ul>

Benefits Of Not Watching Porn

<ul><li>Delete all pornography.</li><li>Change your environment.</li><li>Keep a journal and record your progress.</li><li>Engage in regular exercise. Exercise distracts your brain from urges, improves self-confidence and fitness, helps improve your mood.</li><li>Try out cold showers.</li><li>Get outside in nature, walk through the park, breathe the fresh air.</li><li>Get outside and socialise.</li><li>Meditation and prayer help repair the control centre of your brain.</li><li>Engage in exciting, meaningful and productive habits and activities.</li><li>Learn more about what’s happening in your brain and how addiction works.</li></ul>

Tips and Strategies For Overcoming The Addiction

<ul><li>For the start, at least for one month or seven days one has to stay away from sexual activities. One has to be consistent in it. This period may be tough but this is the rebooting period for a better and healthy future.</li><li>In this period, one has to rediscover one’s existence in the life without porn. By this one’s mind will shut down and restart.</li><li>It’s Ok to relapse, Start again with greater enthusiasm.</li><li>DON’T GIVE EXCUSES!!</li></ul>

Reset Your Brain

“We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence then, is not an act, but a habit.”

The internet has made access to sexually explicit content radically more easy than ever before. This book is essential reading for those who are troubled by their own relationship with pornography, and for those who want to understand the world we now live in. Republished with extensive revisions in December 2017.

books

Books

Over 100,000 copies sold! When Your Brain on Porn was first published the porn industry and its lobbyists reacted with outrage. How could a commodity so popular - and so profitable - be a problem? But evidence of porn's addictiveness has been accumulating ever since. In February 2022 the peer-reviewed journal Psychological Medicine published a large-scale, longitudinal study that confirmed what many users and former users of digital pornography had figured out for themselves: 'porn - a male-dominated industry that targets a male-dominated audience - is associated with the erosion of the quality of men's sex lives.' In the same month the World Health Organization issued a clarification to its diagnosis of Compulsive Sexual Behaviour Disorder. Contrary to the claims of a vocal group of sexologists, the WHO insisted that the disorder 'may be expressed in a variety of behaviours, including sexual behaviour with others, masturbation, use of pornography, cybersex (including internet sex), telephone sex, and other forms of repetitive sexual behaviour.' Compulsive porn use is now recognised as a pathology by the world's leading health experts, in the most widely used diagnostic manual on the planet. This should not be surprising. As soon as high-speed internet became widely available a decade ago, growing numbers of people began to worry that their porn use was running out of control. Far from preparing them for fulfilling relationships, viewing an endless stream of porn videos led to unexpected adverse effects. Perhaps most surprisingly, for the first time in history erectile dysfunction was becoming a pervasive problem for young men. This led to one of the largest informal experiments in the history of science. Tens of thousands of people have tried abstaining from sexually stimulating material in a process they call 'rebooting'. Many of them reported startling changes, from improved concentration and elevated mood to a greater capacity for real-life intimacy. The late Gary Wilson listened to the stories of those who have tried giving up internet porn and related them to an account of how the reward system of the brain interacts with its environment. A growing body of research is definitively confirming what these pioneers discovered for themselves - internet pornography can be seriously addictive and damaging. No doubt the porn lobby will continue to try to sow doubt and distraction. But the evidence of both formal science and lived experience is now overwhelming. In Your Brain on Porn Gary Wilson draws on both first-person accounts and research findings. In a voice that is generous and humane, he offers advice for those who want to stop using internet pornography. The publication of Your Brain on Porn is a landmark in our attempts to understand, and remain balanced in, a world where addiction is big business. Praise for Your Brain on Porn In Your Brain on Porn Gary Wilson sets out to explain how abundant free pornography is causing serious problems for thousands of, mostly young, people. Your Brain on Porn gives guidance on how to break out of addictive porn use. - Dr Nicole Oei PhD, Addiction, Development and Psychopathology (Adapt) Lab, Department of Psychology, University of Amsterdam Your Brain on Porn is the most considered, thorough and accurate account of internet porn addiction that exists at the time of writing.- Anthony I. Jack, Professor of Philosophy, Psychology, Neurology and Neuroscience, Case Western Reserve University

Gary Wilson

Your Brain on Porn

The Frankfurt School had the luxury and misfortunate privilege of existing in unique times. During the Interwar Period (1918-1939) in the heart of rising Fascism an incredible group of academics and scholars found each other in Germany with a like-minded goal: to provide societal research and reach greater understanding. These are the goals of philosophy in a nutshell. Erich Fromm was part of this group.

What Was The Frankfurt School?

A little perspective is required to understand Fromm’s pursuit and interest in Love. Erich Fromm grew up and got a Ph.D. from the University of Heidelberg in Germany in 1922. He wrote his final dissertation, “On Jewish Law”, as a nod to his Jewish parents and roots.Those aware of history know that this time of the Interwar period is one of the single worst examples of persecution in recorded history. Erich Fromm dealt with this hatred over the next 20 years of his life, and his experiences are key to the fundamental premise of his work entitled The Art of Loving, published in 1956.

Erich Fromm - The Art Of Loving

Erich Fromm was forced to flee Germany during the Fascist takeover in the 1930s. He first went to Geneva, ultimately finding residency at Columbia University in New York.During this time Fromm began wondering about what was wrong with humanity.The fundamental problem of humanity, according to what Fromm learned from his colleagues at The Frankfurt School, is divisiveness. More importantly, as conscious and rational creatures we notice that we are fundamentally separate. As a result, we face a deep existential loneliness, which is behind many of humanities’ problems in contemporary times.

The Fundamental Separateness

This existential loneliness that affects humanity comes from our ability to judge and be aware of our own actions. Our search for a tribe or a group often finds us excluding those not in that tribe. Some of the time the tribe we want to belong to excludes us or perhaps we are within the tribe but do not feel the inclusion we thought we would find there.

The Search For A Tribe

Yet, Fromm noticed something unexpected while working on the problem facing humanity. Everybody was already searching for Love. People were obsessed with the idea. Books on Love were being taken off all the shelves in every book store. Singles clubs were rapidly becoming popular and romantic ads filled newspapers.So, what was wrong? Why were people not finding the Love necessary to combat this feeling of separateness? Like realizing that fire can not fight a fire, Fromm realized feelings could not stop feelings. Fromm concluded that Love had to be a type of practice.

Looking For Love In All The Wrong Places

<h4>“Immature love says: ‘I love you because I need you.’ Mature love says ‘I need you because I love you.”</h4>What Erich Fromm means by immature love is love generated from a point of narcissism. The most narcissistic facet of this type of love is a transactional relationship. This is exemplified by turning the loved one and relationship itself into a commodity.

Mature and Immature Love

Our contemporary understanding of love and how we find love falls into this category, as illustrated by our use of dating app sites that specifically limit the number of matches that you can have or profiles that you can see based on the level of income and other filters. Fromm would see this commodification as an institutionalization of Immature Love, a path that surely drives existential loneliness to new extremes.

The Commodification And Institutionalization Of Immature Love

The answers to these issues with love and loneliness are found in The Frankfurt School and Erich Fromm’s other major work, Escape from Freedom (1941). In this work, Fromm describes a problem we can still see in contemporary society: Individuation. This individualization that occurs leads society right back to that problem of love and separateness. Our existential loneliness leads us to make decisions that temporarily remove that existential loneliness. We strive to be free of loneliness, even if only for a while.

Erich Fromm - Escape From Freedom

Negative Freedom according to Erich Fromm is the “freedom from”. This type of freedom has been gradually increasing within society ever since the time of hunter-gatherer tribes, where humanity started. It represents the removal of things that can control us entirely: freedom from hunger, freedom from preventable diseases. These types of things that our society has given us are all negative freedoms.

Negative Freedom - Freedom *From*

Positive Freedom, on the other hand, is a sort of “freedom to”. For example, we have the opportunity to choose what things we pursue. If we have “freedom to” then we are not restricted to a life of needs; we are not limited to a caste we may be born into. We have a reasonable amount of goods to get us through life – food, water, shelter, and other basic things we need to possess. Having covered our basic needs, society now provides near endless opportunities to people in a society that has positive freedoms. Yet, we still have a problem.

Positive Freedom - Freedom *To*

Those who find this “freedom to” in front of them may have a negative response to opportunity. They may see all that opportunity and freedom and wish for a more rigid way of life, a life where choice is limited in advance instead of the weight of endless possibilities they can choose for themselves. Fromm believed that these people are sadomasochists.

Positive Freedom Has Opponents

Sadomasochists wish for there to be an order or hierarchy that limits the access to positive freedom; they are more comfortable when there is an order and ranks within society. In agreeing to this rank they submit themselves to hierarchy and restrictions in life. This is the masochist in them. The sadist in them is the part that uses their position in this hierarchy to control those beneath them with less “freedom to”.

Freedom From, Freedom To, And Sadomasochists

Here, it’s easy to see the correlation between the philosophy Erich Fromm developed and the life he lived in Germany. Seeing his country tear itself apart with authoritarian principles and people willfully submitting to and using the power of hierarchical society to feel less existential loneliness for themselves was jarring to all the scholars of The Frankfurt School.

Shying Away From Freedom, To Submission And Abuse

This submission to social hierarchy is easy to see in retrospect, but during the time Fromm was living in it was much harder. Erich Fromm put forward this idea of people shying away from freedom and leaning toward authoritarian principles in the late 1920s. The original argument by The Frankfurt School was that if 15% of the population were adamantly democratic and only 10% of the population was adamantly authoritarian, then the country would be fine, as there would be 75% of people in the center to lean in favor of democratic principles.

Seeing the Problem Ahead of Time

Erich Fromm argued that if the people in society that are part of the 75% – the neutral, majority party – had a fundamental misunderstanding of Love and Freedom, which they did, then the 75% would be more likely to fall into authoritarianism. This is because authoritarianism pushes you into a group or at least into a group role. Being part of a group always feels better than the loneliness you face when you’re alone, unless you are comfortable with loneliness.

Authoritarianism Pushes Us Into Tribes 

Erich Fromm believed that the solution to this behavior in society and to our existential loneliness that causes it is one the same thing: it is to Love effectively. Shockingly, Fromm’s idea for this solution started ironically: Love should begin with being comfortable with loneliness. Being comfortable with loneliness means being comfortable with yourself. This is a sign of personal strength according to the thinkers of the Frankfurt School.

The Solution: To Love Effectively

This comfort with loneliness and ourselves helps us see that everyone is struggling with the same things. Every race, sex, gender, and all peoples live in a society.Everyone within society struggles with loneliness and finding a place to fit in. Noticing this truth is the first step to real love.

To Love Effectively Is To Be Comfortable With Loneliness

When we have humility we can avoid the egoism that plagues most relationships, romantic or otherwise. We should avoid the commodification of both ourselves and the other person by seeing that they do not need to justify themselves and prove their worth to remove your loneliness. This is because your loneliness is part of you and their loneliness is part of them. This is the first, and most important, aspect of Love to Erich Fromm.

The First Aspect Of Love - Humility

The next two aspects of love that are required to change our understanding go hand in hand: they are courage and faith. Courage to Fromm is by far the most difficult of the aspects to achieve. Most likely you and all of us are part of the neutral group of society that simply does not wish to be affected by ideological principles of the extremes in society. If you then try to change your understanding of love and begin to see people for who they are you will begin to give out love selflessly to everyone that you meet.

The Next Two Aspects Of Love - Courage And Faith

No one needs to justify themselves to you and this creates an atmosphere of sincerity; and sincerity is love. More importantly, that is where the faith aspect comes in for Fromm. Anyone who gives out love to everyone they meet does not commodify their fellow members of society and trusts that this understanding will spread and benefit everyone who understands and partakes in it.The fourth aspect of Love is diligence and this is the aspect that keeps love going and changes the individual’s life as well as the society they live in.

Loving: Good Faith, Fair Dealing, Due Diligence

This understanding and practice though will inevitably face backlash. People will fight against it because it is scary. Our society, and the society that The Frankfurt School was a part of in the 1930s, have institutionalized the commodification of the people within themselves. Fighting against that institutionalization requires the courage to continue even when you face extreme hatred, as Erich Fromm did when he was labeled a political dissident and forced to flee his nation.

The Persecution Of Bona Fides Love

Many of the descriptions used by Fromm have parallels to our society today. We are feeling more and more lonely in a world that is more and more interconnected. We are seeing into each other’s lives in ways that are inherently commodified. We subscribe to a “grind” mindset that tells us things are either assets or liabilities, defining everyone around us by what they can provide to us and how we can use them. This mindset creates a hierarchical system of values that we apply to people and results in larger and larger groups of people that suffer from existential loneliness.

Erich Fromm: Love in Our Modern Age - Assets And Liabilities

Getting away from this mindset by treating Love not as a feeling and commodity but as an art is the key. Pursuing an art requires courage to continue, humility to understand that you are just beginning in this practice and faith that if you practice with diligence you will become a master of the craft. Becoming a master in the craft of Love will make being in love all the more worth it.

Love As Art - Something To Pursue, To Practice, To Master

Love is a decision, it is a judgment, it is a promise. If love were only a feeling, there would be no basis for the promise to love each other forever. A feeling comes and it may go. How can I judge that it will stay forever, when my act does not involve judgment and decision?

Love is not primarily a relationship to a specific person; it is an attitude, an orientation of character which determines the relatedness of a person to the world as a whole, not toward one “object” of love. If a person loves only one other person and is indifferent to the rest of his fellow men, his love is not love but a symbiotic attachment, or an enlarged egotism. Yet, most people believe that love is constituted by the object, not by the faculty.

Nationalism is our form of incest, is our idolatry, is our insanity. 'Patriotism' is its cult...Just as love for one individual which excludes the love for others is not love, love for one's country which is not part of one's love for humanity is not love, but idolatrous worship.

Love means to commit oneself without guarantee, to give oneself completely in the hope that our love will produce love in the loved person. Love is an act of faith, and whoever is of little faith is also of little love.

One of the main scholars of the Frankfurt School was Erich Fromm, an intellectual who, faced with hatred and being labeled a political dissident, chose to study the opposite of what he saw as the main problem facing all of humanity: hate, segregation, and divisiveness. He chose to study Love. 

Erich Fromm was a scholar who fled Germany during the Fascist takeover. This experience gave him a whole new perspective on love.

communication

Communication

loveandrelationships

Love & Relationships

The Frankfurt School: Erich Fromm’s Perspective on Love

An alarming trend that continues to rise is workplace burnout. Organisations should understand this phenomenon, evaluate the risks and be intentional about lowering and controlling them to protect their employees and businesses. Burnout is a form of job-related stress that has not been successfully managed. It consists of five stages that individuals and organizations must assess and then take action to reduce the symptoms.

Workplace burnout 

Stress comes with the newness of a big challenge or career advancement. Most people adjust with minor bouts of stress.
Company leaders must provide clear expectations, upskilling opportunities, support resources, and a commensurate level of autonomy to help employees manage burnout risks.

Stage 1: The honeymoon phase

Stress onset can show up as nervous anxiety, irritability, fatigue, or disorganization. Employees must prioritize their work and deal with it appropriately. Meditative box breathing and other simple techniques can help to reduce stress. Company leaders can assess employee stress through regular 1:1 meetings, daily huddles, and pusle surveys. Leaders can eliminate work bottlenecks, improve clarity on strategy, reduce emails, and invest in wellness workshops.

Phase 2: Onset of stress

When stress levels rise faster, and more frequently, employees could reach a dangerous tipping point. Stress causes cognitive overload and can reduce the focus needed to make sound business decisions or perform tasks. Employees should make use of medical benefits, employee assistance plans, or local counseling. Companies can invest in automation. Digital platforms can connect your teams, automate workflows and communications, and integrate safety and incident management.

Phase 3: Chronic stress

If employees reach the point of burnout, they can experience critical symptoms like cynicism and pessimism about their work, feelings of incompetence, unwarranted fears, strong desires to escape or self-isolate and other serious physical conditions. This can cause workplace accidents, injuries, disputes, violence, poor decision-making, decision avoidance and impulsive behaviours. Employees experiencing true burnout should ask if this is really the job for them. Companies can prevent burnout with better strategic planning and health resources.

Phase 4: True burnout

In this stage, one’s harmful physical and emotional symptoms impact their quality of life. For example, chronic sadness or depression, mental exhaustion, low self-efficacy, and suicidal ideation. Employees: National resources at <a href="https://www.samhsa.gov/find-help/national-helpline">Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration</a> (SAMHSA) and the <a href="https://suicidepreventionlifeline.org/">National Suicide Prevention Lifeline</a> can lend support. Companies must create safe, diverse, inclusive workspaces led by well-trained, empathetic leaders. High rates of habitual burnout warrant an evaluation of key leadership, budgets, workflows, technologies, and more.

Phase 5: Habitual burnout

Princess Castleberry maintains it’s possible for a person to experience burnout in a job they like and want to keep and leaders are encouraged to watch for all the signs.


How to manage each of the 5 stages of burnout

Have you ever tried to relax, only to find yourself overwhelmed with feeling stressed and having negative thoughts? Turns out a lot of us experience this—which is why some have coined it “stresslaxing.”Even though stresslaxation is a new term, it describes relaxation-induced anxiety, which has been studied for years. This is shown to happen to between 30% and 50% of people when they try to do relaxing things, causing symptoms of stress (such as rapid heartbeat or sweating).

Relaxation Causing Stress

Pretending that a problem doesn’t exist—also known as denial—is one of the least effective coping strategies for stress. In the case of stresslaxing, this might be denying you’re stressed to begin with.Short periods of denial can actually help us adapt to change. For example, denial can help a person cope with their emotions after experiencing the death of someone close. But when denial is used frequently to deal with daily stressors, it can leave people feeling perpetually stuck in a rut.

Reason For Stresslaxation: you’re Denying You’re Stressed

Acknowledge that the stress symptoms can be helpful. Your body is trying to alert you that a problem needs fixing, so it’s activating all its physiological resources to help you do this.Write down your deepest thoughts and feelings associated with your stress. This will help you understand the source of your stress so you can tackle it. Think outside the box. When we’re stressed, we might think only certain activities (such as meditation or exercise) can help us relax.

How To Fix Stresslaxation Denial

Most of us have something we’re passionate about—whether that’s our work or even a hobby. But the reason you’re motivated to do these things is important.Some people pursue their passion because they want to—whether it’s to improve themselves or learn a new skill. But others may only pursue their passion because they want recognition from other people. People with certain personality types may be more prone to obsessing over their passion. Others may simply follow a certain pursuit to get praise from their colleagues or even to prove their worth to friends or family.

Reason For Stresslaxation: Worrying About Others

When making a decision, some people can’t help but explore all possible options available to them—known as maximizing thoughts. This can even happen when trying to pick something relaxing to do. Even after picking something, you may instead think about the other options, wondering if something else would’ve helped you feel more relaxed. So instead of relaxing your mind, you’re stressing yourself even more.Unfortunately, maximizing leads to self-blame regret, no matter what option we choose. It’s also sometimes associated with lower well-being.

Reason For Stresslaxation: You Can’t Make up Your Mind

Limit the number of decisions you need to make on the day you want to do something relaxing. Or even plan when you’re going to do something relaxing (such as watching a movie or meditating) and how long you’re going to do it for. This may make it easier to relax when the time comes as you’ll know you aren’t putting other things off.Remember why you’re trying to relax. Your health is important, so remembering this may help you feel less stressed while trying to do a relaxing activity.

How To Make Up Your Mind

Relaxation-induced anxiety is shown to happen to between 30% and 50% of people when they try to do relaxing things. This is a practical guide to help deal with it.


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‘Stresslaxation’ is real. Science explains why it happens and how to get past it

We all get anxious, it’s a part of life, yet how we deal with it is critical. If we don’t know how anxiety shows up or why, we might get caught up in temporary distractions or short-term fixes that actually feed it, creating bad habits in the process (have you ever eaten ice cream or cookies when you’re stressed?). Or we might spend our whole lives adding to our anxiety by trying to cure it (why can’t I just find why I’m anxious and fix it?).

Anxiety hides in people’s habits

The anxiety and its close cousin, panic, are both born from fear. It's well known that fear’s main evolutionary function is helping us survive. Fear is the oldest survival mechanism we’ve got. Fear teaches us to avoid dangerous situations in the future through a brain process called negative reinforcement. Evolution made this really simple for us, we need only three elements in situations like this to learn: <ul><li>an environmental cue</li><li>a behavior</li><li>and a result</li></ul>

Anxiety and its close cousin

Sometime in the last million years, humans evolved a new layer on top of our more primitive survival brain; neuroscientists call this the prefrontal cortex (PFC).  From an anatomical perspective, this “newer” brain region is located just behind our eyes and forehead. Involved in creativity and planning, the PFC helps us to think and plan for the future. The PFC predicts what will happen in the future based on our past experience. Yet critically, the PFC needs accurate information to make accurate predictions.

The prefrontal cortex

If information is lacking, our PFC plays out different versions of what might happen to help us choose the best path forward.  It does this by running simulations based on previous events in our lives that are most similar. For example, trucks and buses are similar enough to cars that we can safely assume we should look both ways to avoid any fast-moving vehicle.

The lack of information 

Anxiety is born when our PFCs don’t have enough information to accurately predict the future Without accurate information, our brains found it easy to spin stories of fear and dread, based on the latest reports that we had heard or read. And because of the way our brains are wired, the more shocking the news, increasing our sense of danger and feelings of fear, the more likely our brains are to remember it. When we can’t control our anxiety, that emotional fever spikes into panic (defined online as “sudden uncontrollable fear or anxiety, often causing wildly unthinking behavior”).

Anxiety

We map out how the pieces fit together and drive one another. Sometimes simply becoming aware of the habit patterns helps us step out of them, with significant results. At other times, we need a little hand-holding along the way. How often have you struggled to force yourself to overcome old habit loops and failed? How can you fix something if you don’t know how it works? Mapping out habit loops is an obvious place to start. This mapping effort is defined as the first gear.

Mapping a habit

In neuroscience, the default mode network (DMN), or anatomically the medial fronto-parietal network (M-FPN), is a large-scale brain network primarily composed of the medial prefrontal cortex and the posterior cingulate cortex and angular gyrus. The DMN was discovered by Marcus Raichle and his crew at Washington University in St. Louis. It was called the default mode network because this is what our minds go to whenever they are not engaged in a specific task. The DMN gets activated when our mind is wandering, thinking about things in the past or future, caught in repetitive thought

The default mode network

The instant New York Times bestseller A step-by-step plan clinically proven to break the cycle of worry and fear that drives anxiety and addictive habits We are living through one of the most anxious periods any of us can remember. Whether facing issues as public as a pandemic or as personal as having kids at home and fighting the urge to reach for the wine bottle every night, we are feeling overwhelmed and out of control. But in this timely book, Judson Brewer explains how to uproot anxiety at its source using brain-based techniques and small hacks accessible to anyone. We think of anxiety as everything from mild unease to full-blown panic. But it's also what drives the addictive behaviors and bad habits we use to cope (e.g. stress eating, procrastination, doom scrolling and social media). Plus, anxiety lives in a part of the brain that resists rational thought. So we get stuck in anxiety habit loops that we can't think our way out of or use willpower to overcome. Dr. Brewer teaches us to map our brains to discover our triggers, defuse them with the simple but powerful practice of curiosity, and to train our brains using mindfulness and other practices that his lab has proven can work. Distilling more than 20 years of research and hands-on work with thousands of patients, including Olympic athletes and coaches, and leaders in government and business, Dr. Brewer has created a clear, solution-oriented program that anyone can use to feel better - no matter how anxious they feel.

Unwinding Anxiety

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