Triggers are stimuli that prompt a behavioural reaction. They can be beliefs, behaviours, or environments. Identifying triggers is useful in all interpersonal relationships and will help you to achieve success at work and home. It’s also important to know how to identify them and anticipate their changes so that you can be the best version of yourself as well as build stronger relationships with others.To change your behaviour for the better, you need to want to change and be willing to take responsibility for yourself.

Triggers: An Overview

Despite having a good life, enriched in all areas – the negative environment can impose depressive behaviour. Even these situations can have a positive effect if the person is willing to see beyond the challenging nature of things.The cause of pain is often self-created, don’t become a victim of your insecurity – be a wolf! “Triggers” is a representative of the relative nature of things, which can drive your life back and forward.

Be A Wolf!

We are surrounded by those kinds of triggers, which appear to be relentless and omnipresent – a cake that makes us forget the warnings about sugar content, a song that distracts us from a conversation.All these modify our behaviour in less than a second. The good news is that WE HAVE A CHOICE. We can control them.

We Have A Choice

A Trigger is a problem only if your response to it creates a problem.

Daily self-monitoring, through 6 “active”/engaging questions – questions that measure our effort, not our results:<ul><li>Did I do my best to set clear goals?</li><li>Did I do my best to make progress towards goal achievement?</li><li>Did I do my best to find meaning?</li><li>Did I do my best to be happy?</li><li>Did I do my best to build positive relationships?</li><li>Did I do my best to be fully engaged?</li></ul>

The Solution: Six Questions To Ask Yourself

Being too used to an environment may become risky and make you vulnerable in front of unexpected triggers. A good example is represented by successful people. Used to winning, they risk mismanaging their emotions when faced with environmental triggers.Five questions we should all ask ourselves:<ul><li>What’s my mission?</li><li>Who’s the customer?</li><li>What does the customer consider value?</li><li>What’s the goal?</li><li>What’s the plan?</li></ul>

The Habit Of Winning Has A Bad Side

<ul><li>Creating = Positive/Change</li><li>Preserving = Positive/Keep</li><li>Eliminate = Negative/Change</li><li>Accepting = Negative/Keep</li></ul>In order to understand how triggers influence our behaviour, we look at these six key clues:<ul><li>A behavioural trigger can be direct or indirect.</li><li>A trigger can be internal or external.</li><li>A trigger can be conscious or unconscious.</li><li>A trigger can be anticipated or unexpected.</li><li>A trigger can be encouraging or discouraging.</li><li>A trigger can be productive or counterproductive.</li></ul>

The Wheel Of Change Model

Overnight changes are a myth. Success is a sport. To achieve success, we have to practice every day. We have to build something great by making small efforts every day, efforts like these:<ul><li>Commitment.</li><li>Motivation.</li><li>Self-discipline.</li><li>Self-control.</li><li>Patience.</li></ul>Significant changes are necessary but also hard to do. Your level of determination is crucial.

Overnight Changes

Changing behaviour is difficult because people often don’t realize which behaviours they need to change or how their environment impacts those behaviours. People resist change due to overconfidence in their willpower, a belief that their behaviour isn’t as bad as others, and magical thinking that leads them to believe that changing is a finite destination rather than a continuous journey.Change requires effort and attention over time as well as directed thoughts about the changes that need to be made.

People Who Need to Change Often Resist It

Fate is the hand of cards we’ve been dealt. Choice is how we play the hand.

If I understand, I will do. Just because people understand what to do doesn’t ensure that they will actually do it.I have willpower and won’t give in to temptation. We not only overestimate willpower, we chronically underestimate the power of triggers in our environment that lead us astray.Today is a special day. If we really want to change we have to make peace with the fact that we cannot self-exempt every time the calendar offers us a more attractive alternative to our usual day.“At least I’m better than …” We award ourselves a free pass because we’re not the worst in the world.

Common Triggers: Belief

I won’t get distracted and nothing unexpected will occur. When we make plans for the future, we seldom plan on distractions.An epiphany will suddenly change my life. An epiphany implies that change can arise out of a sudden burst of insight and willpower.My change will be permanent and I will never have to worry again. If we don’t follow up, our positive change doesn’t last.My elimination of old problems will not bring on new problems. We forget that as we usher an old problem out the door a new problem usually enters.

Other Common Triggers

Self-discipline refers to achieving desirable behaviour. Self-control refers to avoiding undesirable behaviour

Changing our habits and behaviour, using awareness.

A renowned executive coach and psychologist shows readers how to recognize and overcome the emotional and psychological triggers that set off a reaction or a behavior that often is detrimental so that they can achieve meaningful and sustained change.

Stashed ideas

Triggers

Scientists studying this reflex have proposed several reasons for the phenomenon. A yawn is a reflex that may be triggered by sleepiness, stress, boredom, or seeing another person yawn. There are several reasons for yawning. snakes yawn to realign their jaws after eating and to aid respiration. Fish yawn when their water lacks sufficient oxygen. However, it is more difficult to pinpoint why humans yawn.

Everybody yawns

Cortisol levels increase after yawning and may increase alertness and the need for action. Psychologists think yawning helps improve blood flow to the brain. The premise is that stretching the jaw increases blood flow to the face, head, and neck, while the deep breath of a yawn forces blood and spinal fluid to flow downward. This may explain why people yawn when they are stressed.

Physiological reasons for yawning in humans

<ul><li>Yawning may serve a social function as yawning is contagious in humans. </li><li>Catching yawns may communicate fatigue or help people synchronize waking and sleeping patterns. </li><li>Contagious yawning may help group members become more alert to defend against attackers or predators.</li></ul>

Psychological reasons for yawning

Explore the reasons for yawning, including physiological and psychological factors. Learn about scientific studies that answer the question why do we yawn?

Why Do We Yawn? A Look at the Reasons

Although studies have found that both men and women with “attractive voices” are thought to be “warmer, more likable, honest, dominant, and <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/BF00996223">more likely to achieve</a>” — and they also have more sexual partners and may be more likely to <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S109051380400042X">engage in infidelity</a> — the qualities that make a voice attractive are slightly less clear.

A Great Voice In Men and Women

For men, an attractive voice is fairly straightforward: a lower one is good, as it indicates size, strength, and reproductive prowess (<a href="https://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2012/01/120105-deep-voices-sperm-masculine-men-women-science-health-evolution/">or does it</a>?), while hints of <a href="https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/why-women-like-deep-voices-and-men-prefer-high-ones-41492244/">breathiness</a> also seem to be preferable. But for women, it seems to be more complicated. Higher voices signal reproductive fitness, femininity, and smaller body size, and while it stands to reason that women would try to accentuate these qualities by speaking in correspondingly high voices — and some studies confirm this — other studies find that women tend to speak in lower voices around men they’re trying to attract.

The Paradox Of The Voice

<ul><li>There “appears to be a common stereotype in our culture that deems a sexy female voice as one that sounds husky, breathy, and lower-pitched.</li><li>Voice manipulation may be a learned behavior based on sexual voice stereotypes rather than actual vocal characteristics of attractiveness. </li><li>Perhaps when a woman naturally lowers her voice, it may be perceived as her attempt to sound more seductive or attractive, and therefore serves as a signal of her romantic interest.</li></ul>

Why Women Lower Their Voice

Men preferred the women with the lower-pitched voices. The researchers don’t quite know why, although they speculate that it could be in response to a woman signalling sexual interest and intimacy to a man, via our society’s current socially accepted methods. Or it could be in response to a woman communicating social dominance or a confident and mature persona, as people with low-pitched voices are often attributed traits such as competence, trustworthiness and leadership.

What Men Want

What makes a voice attractive? Research over the years has shown that while women prefer men with lower voices, and men sometimes prefer women with higher voices, men also generally prefer women who speak with lower voices. Why? 

Is My Voice Attractive?

The San hunter-gatherers of Namibia have no electric lights or new Netflix releases that keep them awake. Yet, they don't sleep more than the typical Western city-dweller who stays up doom-scrolling on their smartphone. <ul><li>Research shows that people in non-industrial societies average less than seven hours a night.</li><li>Chimps sleep around 9.5 hours out of 24. Three-striped night monkeys sleep for 17 hours a day. </li></ul> The various ways that human sleep is unusual. We spend fewer hours asleep than our nearest relatives, and more of our night sleep is spent in the rapid eye movement or REM phase.

Humans need less sleep

To learn about how ancient humans slept, anthropologists study contemporary non-industrial societies, such as the Hadza hunter-gatherers of Tanzania and various groups in Madagascar, Guatemala, and elsewhere. Sleep across all three groups averages around 5.7 - 7.1 hours, which is much less than primates. Evolutionary anthropologist David Samson thinks the evolution of human sleep is a story about safety in numbers when humans began sleeping on the ground and napping often.

The human sleep paradox is the result of our evolutionary history

The threat of predators may have led humans to sleep less than tree-living primates. Yet, scientists point out that existing data about sleep in primates come from captive animals, who may sleep more because the animals are bored. Having data from more wild animals would help sleep researchers although it is more challenging to do. If scientists had a clearer picture of primate sleep in the wild, it might turn out that human sleep isn’t as exceptionally short as it seems.

Human sleep isn't exceptionally short

How much we sleep is different from how much we wish we slept. Research from 2017 shows that out of 37 people, 35 said they slept just enough. On average, they slept about 6.25 hours a night. But they awoke frequently and needed more than 9 hours in bed to get those 6.25 hours. By contrast, a 2016 study of nearly 500 people found they spend almost all of their time in bed asleep and got about 7 hours of sleep, yet 87 percent in a 2020 survey said they didn't feel rested at least one day per week. A better understanding of how human sleep evolved could help people rest better.

Unsatisfied sleepers

Ancient humans may have evolved to slumber efficiently &#8212; and in a crowd

Why people sleep less than their primate relatives

When it comes to meeting new people, consider curiosity to be your secret weapon. Especially for those more formulaic, more introverted, or more methodical in your interactions, curiosity is the holy grail of rapport-building techniques.But curiosity is not always innate. It’s a skill which can be practiced. It can be broken down into certain techniques. Use these in conversations and admire the delight you bring to a new person.

Curiosity And How To Leverage It

<ul><li>Excitement is curiosity’s very close cousin. Your excitement shows intrigue. It shows enthusiasm for the other person.</li><li>To show excitement with your words, use positive language. Say words like, “wow,” or “amazing.”</li><li>Use phrases like, “that’s incredible” or “no way, that’s awesome.”</li><li>And most importantly, say these with a smile on your face.</li></ul>

Show Excitement with Your Words

<ul><li>There is no denying the connecting power of body language. When it comes to curiosity, there are certain techniques which demonstrate a desire to learn more.</li><li>First, practice leaning in closer. Move slightly nearer to the edge of your seat. Shift your body forward, especially your upper body.</li><li>Nod your head emphatically and rhythmically. Notice the parts of their story when you should nod in agreement quickly or the times when slow spaced out nods are necessary. </li><li>Practice a tilt of the head as well when puzzled.</li></ul>

Make Your Body Curious

As a curious person, you want to use a blend of open and closed-ended questions. But, open-ended questions are where the additional curiosity really comes in. They create the opportunity to use positive language and curious body language to further express your interest.Try to ask more questions starting with why or how as opposed to what, where or when.

Ask Open-Ended Questions

The natural flow of conversation will 99% of the time result in the other person asking you a question. Don’t panic! There’s no need to answer a question with a question. You don’t have to dismiss their question altogether in an effort to solely be curious about them and reveal nothing about yourself.Instead, include them in your responses. By weaving them into your responses, you allow for them to jump in and expand on what you’re saying. You’re talking about them after all! This technique takes a lot of active listening and practice, so be patient with it.

Relate Your Story to Theirs

It’s always best to be prepared. When interacting with new people, you’ll hit conversational lulls. There will be times when you genuinely do not feel curious. That’s okay. When in doubt, use your go-to phrases.“Tell me more.”“Go on.”“I’d be interested in learning more about that.”“What’s that like?”

Have Some Phrases in Your Back Pocket

<ul><li>Even if we don’t intend to be, if we’re not curious then we’re coming from a place of judgment. We are inferring that we already know or lack the interest in learning more.</li><li>If you’re not curious, you miss the big picture. And this can have negative consequences.</li><li>Ask more questions. Use positive language. Show curiosity with your body.</li><li>The more curious you can be with someone, the more likely you’ll have more conversations in the future.</li></ul>

Be Curious, Not Judgmental

The scene above from Coach Ted Lasso in the eponymous TV show pristinely demonstrates the importance of curiosity. We must seek to learn more. We must never assume we know everything. When it comes…

How to Be More Curious When Meeting New People

You have to be just as strong moving in reverse as you are going forward.<ol><li>Get stronger in reverse of what hurts.</li><li>Restore and train the full range of motion at a level that doesn’t hurt you. </li></ol> If you use only these two principles, you could create a system for just about any area of the body.

Two principles for developing full-body strength and fitness

“I deliver an incredible workout that also happens to be rehabbing your body…physical therapy and exercise don’t have to be two different things.” –

We want to gain strength in the areas where we’re generally weak or don’t normally train.  When we get stronger through a range of motion, we can exponentially reduce injury.

You can gain flexibility through strength exercises

Most trainers tell people, “don’t let your knees go over your toes." The reason for this advice is that when your knee goes over your toe, there’s more pressure on your knee. However, an Olympic trainer Charles Poliquin said the athlete whose knee can go farthest and strongest over the toes has the least chance of knee injury. If you’re not training with your knees over your toes through a full range of motion, you’re singling to your body that you don’t want that area to be robust with circulation and strength.

Knees over toes

Rehab can give you an amazing workout. Physical therapy and exercise don’t have to be two different things. Physical therapy and exercise combine well together. Combining physical therapy, exercise physical therapy and strength training can improve the mobility of younger people and prevent common sports injuries.

The mindset people need to be able to do rehab, the basic, boring stuff

Many people over attach their identity to the gym. But fitness is just one area of life.  When you’re in your late 20s or early 30s, you may shift your focus from physique to longevity. Be grateful that you can work out, not how much you lift. For example, lie in bed and imagine yourself without legs. It will help to ground your gratitude.

Be grateful that you can work out, not how much you lift

The person who wants to actively improve their resiliency and longevity needs a workout that also happens to be rehabbing their body. Improving your mobility allows you to access new muscle tissue that you couldn’t hit before. A full range of motion exercises increases not only flexibility but also strength. For example, the ATG (ass to grass) split squat is a good mobility exercise.

Flexibility & Strength

We may be at a point in life where we’re very weak and tender in some range of movement and start to avoid it. Instead, find the amount of load of full use that you can do and build up from there to what healthy people can do. <ul><li>		Backward sled drag: It forces your knees over your toes. Do ten minutes straight of backward sled pulls.</li><li>		ATG (ass to grass) split squat: It focuses on mobility. Do 5 sets of 10 reps at the lowest level you’re capable of</li><li>Tibialis raises strengthens the muscle underneath your kneecap. Do 3 sets of 20 reps</li><li>Hamstring work – curls or Nordic Bench. Do 3 sets of 10 reps.</li></ul>

Favourite knee exercises

Kids in their teens who are having shoulder surgeries are just not strong enough in reverse of throwing a baseball.  You need to be strong enough in reverse of motion that could injure you. <ul><li>Start strengthening your external rotation. </li><li>You can strengthen the lower trap muscles in the middle of your back.</li><li>Strengthen behind your shoulder blades.</li></ul>

Exercises for shoulders

With the amount of sitting we do in chairs, our hip flexors get very shortened. To get someone out of pain you need the ass to grass full range of motion. It’s found that people with less thoracic spine ability have a greater chance of lower back surgeries and shoulder surgeries.  People who get good at the astrograph split squat remark that when their hip flexors are lengthened out and strong through stretched positions.

Exercises for lower back pain

Ben Patrick AKA “Knees Over Toes Guy" is the coach and owner of Athletic Truth Group (ATG) Online Coaching, an online personal training program for strengthening knees and developing full-body fitness.

Ben Patrick (Knees Over Toes Guy) is an athletic coach and an author. Keeping our bodies bulletproof is something everyone wants as they age. Bad knees, backs and shoulders not only stop you from doing the things you want in sport, but then begin to suck the enjoyment out of your life too. Ben has some solutions. Expect to learn the 3 most important exercises to maximise your body's robustness, what Ben's biggest takeaways have been from Andrew Huberman, the relationship between flexibility and strength, how to make your shoulders more mobile and less painful, the optimal training frequency to see results and much more...  Sponsors: Join the Modern Wisdom Community to connect with me & other listeners - https://modernwisdom.locals.com/ Get a Free Sample Pack of all LMNT Flavours at https://www.drinklmnt.com/modernwisdom (discount automatically applied) Get 20% discount on the highest quality CBD Products from Pure Sport at https://bit.ly/cbdwisdom (use code: MW20) Get 15% discount on Craftd London’s jewellery at https://bit.ly/cdwisdom (use code MW15)  Extra Stuff: Check out Ben's website - https://www.atgonlinecoaching.com Buy Ben's book - https://amzn.to/37M5USu  Get my free Reading List of 100 books to read before you die → https://chriswillx.com/books/ To support me on Patreon (thank you): https://www.patreon.com/modernwisdom - Get in touch. Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/chriswillx Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/chriswillx YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/modernwisdompodcast Email: https://chriswillx.com/contact/ 

#467 - Knees Over Toes Guy - Building A Bulletproof Body

Sound moves quite slowly. An echo demonstrates how slowly it moves – shout at a distant building and you can hear your voice bounce back at you with a slight delay. It moves slowly enough (330m/s) that your brain can detect a time difference between the sound arriving at your left ear and your right ear. This is called the interaural time difference.

The Speed Of Sound

Stereo music uses interaural time difference to give the illusion that sound is coming from different directions, and headphones provide the best way to experience that illusion as they push the music directly to each ear. But to hear stereo properly, you need the headphones on the right way round, otherwise, all the sounds will be reversed – left will come from the right and vice versa, and sounds from the front will sound like they’re coming from behind you.

Stereophonic Sound: Use The Headphones In The Labelled Ears Only

It's worth paying attention to the way they're labelled.

Why is there a left and right on headphones? | BBC Science Focus Magazine

Bone by bone and study by study, palaeontologists are learning more than ever before about dinosaurs. But there are still many aspects of prehistoric biology that we know little about. In fact, some of the simplest facets of dinosaur lives remain elusive, like how they slept.A handful of fossils have shown us that at least some dinosaurs curled up just like birds.Many articulated dinosaur skeletons are found in the classic dinosaur death pose, with their tails tilted up and their necks thrown over their backs.

The Way The Dinosaurs Slept

Mei Long was a tiny, early Cretaceous, a feathery troodontid dinosaur with big eyes and a little switchblade claw on each foot. The foot-long dinosaur rested its head over its folded arms, and its tail wrapped around the dinosaur’s torso. Mei died sleeping in a roosting position similar to that of modern birds. The dinosaur’s name, which means “sleeping dragon,” is a tribute to the behavior.

Mei Long

Another Mei specimen has confirmed that the first find was not a fluke. Palaeontologists have described a second, slightly smaller Mei that was preserved in a nearly identical sleeping position. Much like the first, this Mei probably died in a prehistoric ashfall that both killed and preserved the dinosaur in delicate detail without jarring the snoozing troodontid out of position. Some feathery, non-avian dinosaurs not only looked like birds, but they slept like them, too.

The Second Finding

How Did Dinosaurs Sleep?

<ul><li>In the not-so-distant past, most American and European cities reeked of death, decay, and waste.  </li><li>However, these are just some of the many smells, both foul and fragrant, that helped determine the course of history.</li><li>From Roman funerals to Aztec chewing gum, the historic role of smell was much more important than we realize.</li></ul>

Key Takeaways

<ul><li>Most 19th century cities smelled like a combination of raw sewage, horse manure, piles of uncollected garbage baking in the sun, and, last but not least, the "odorous slaughtering and processing of animals"</li><li>Things weren't much better in Paris which, despite its reputation as the city of love, smelled like anything except roses</li></ul>

The Nose Knows It All

The Scientific Revolution introduced the now disproven but once widely accepted notion that illnesses spread through foul odours like those emanating from cesspools, garbage dumps, and animal carcasses. Doctors advised their patients to avoid these odours — known as “miasmas” — like the plague, and they continued to do so until germ theory became more widely accepted in the later half of the 19th century.

Foul Smell And Germs: The Miasma Theory

Miasma theory affected nearly every part of civilization, from politics to the economy. Perfumes made from animal musk — common in Europe since the early Middle Ages — disappeared in favour of floral scents. Instead of sniffing their own latrines, people now covered their apartments with various sweet-smelling plants to block out noxious gases from the outside world.

Bad Smells Everywhere

<ul><li>William Tullett, a history professor at Anglia Ruskin University, thinks modern media may have exaggerated the stench of past centuries.</li><li>Our obsession with stench may be rooted in some contorted form of xenophobia.</li><li>Recent global research suggests that the current literature on smell in history is not only too simplistic but also too Eurocentric.</li><li>While particular smells demarcated certain social standings in pre-revolutionary France, the same standards did not apply to other countries.</li></ul>

Smell Beyond Stench

<ul><li>Romans treated their dead with perfumes, ointments, and incense while they lay in state.</li><li>These fragrances combated the “pollution” inside the corpse.</li><li>Perfuming the dead was so important to ancient Romans that it often took precedence over other social customs.</li></ul>

Perfuming The Dead

Most cities reeked of death, decay, and waste. But these were only some of the smells that helped shape human history.

The foul and the fragrant: what did the past smell like?

<ul><li>Exposure to terrifying acts, or even the anticipation of those acts, can stimulate us</li><li>Fright can trigger the release of adrenaline, resulting in heightened sensations and surging energy</li><li>Another reason we seek horror is to gain novel experiences</li><li>Being adventurous in this way makes us feel more worldly or daring</li><li>Horror entrainment may help us (safely) satisfy our curiosity about the dark side of human psyche.</li></ul>

Why do we consume horror in the first place?

<ul><li>It's a catalyst for falling in love: Watching a horror movie together with a date may facilitate feelings of romance</li><li>Conduit for social bonding: Consuming horror in a group is a great way to bond and connect with our friends and family</li><li>Post-horror relaxation: While the experience allows for the post-pubertal release of oxytocin, which is often released when we are in frightening situations, it can also trigger a post-traumatic stress disorder </li></ul>The absence of any of these psychological protective frames in the moment reduces the preference for horror consumption.

Benefits of consuming horror

Some people spend $$$ to experience the thrill of a scare.

Bite-sized knowledge
to upgrade
your career

Brantley
@brantley

Triggers

Why Do We Yawn? A Look at the Reasons

Is My Voice Attractive?

Why people sleep less than their primate relatives

How to Be More Curious When Meeting New People

Bite-sized knowledgeto upgradeyour career

Brantley @brantley

Triggers

Why Do We Yawn? A Look at the Reasons

Is My Voice Attractive?

Why people sleep less than their primate relatives

How to Be More Curious When Meeting New People

Bite-sized knowledge
to upgrade
your career

Brantley
@brantley