Emotions

Emotions

Getting a Reaction from Someone—the Downside of Emotions

Nathanael Garrett Novosel, November 29 2023

Emotions are human responses to internal and external stimuli. They provide both a signal to react to certain conditions in your environment and a reward or incentive for beneficial behaviors (or punishment for harmful behaviors). Freud put it best in his Pleasure Principle that people seek pleasure and avoid pain, but to broaden that point out...

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Choice

What Underlies Bad Habits

Nathanael Garrett Novosel, November 8 2023

There are two famous books, The Power of Habit and Atomic Habits, that go into detail around how to break or change a habit. This won’t be a rehash of those books, though I do recommend reading them if you’re interested in how habits are formed and how they stick. All that is needed to know for this post is that a habit involves a trigger that...

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Emotions

Listening to vs. Following Your Emotions

Nathanael Garrett Novosel, October 18 2023

Roger Ebert (the movie critic) famously said, “Your emotions will never lie to you.” In an amusing coincidence, there are plenty of movies that talk about trusting your feelings and going with your gut. Star Wars, detective stories, and romantic comedies offer plenty of examples of tapping into your instincts or gut feelings to make the right...

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Emotions

Chicken-or-Egg Problem: Good Attitude or Good Life?

Nathanael Garrett Novosel, June 14 2023

Do you ever have the attitude of, “I’ll change when the world changes?” Yes, this attitude applies to arguments between people (e.g., “I’ll apologize when he apologizes.”) and individual’s behaviors (e.g., Michael Bolton’s “Why should I change? He’s the one who sucks.” in Office Space), but it also applies to your attitude toward the world. After...

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Emotions

Constructive vs. Unconstructive Caring

Nathanael Garrett Novosel, June 7 2023

I wrote in my previous post about how people focus more on screaming for others to change than thinking about things that they can do. There’s no doubt that most people care about issues—even though many are either pretending or grossly exaggerating their concern (The Office poked fun at this well when Ryan falsely professed his deep love for...

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Emotions

The Three Relationships Between You and Your Emotions

Nathanael Garrett Novosel, May 24 2023

Emotions are complicated and can be incredibly annoying if you’re trying to live your life and an emotional state is distracting you from it. It can be so difficult that people often ingest chemicals to manipulate or suppress them. Is there anything you can do about them that is a more healthy approach? Well, to do this effectively, you should...

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Meaning

First, Seek to Understand

Nathanael Garrett Novosel, March 8 2023

Resolving conflicts has never been easy, but it feels like in a world where you can live in your own world that you never have to talk to someone who ever disagrees with you. Even debates are no longer really two people having a conversation to try to influence each other but rather each person talking to an audience to score points and "own" the...

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Happiness

How You Can Choose to Be Happy

Nathanael Garrett Novosel, October 26 2022

“Happiness is a choice.” If you’ve ever listened to a self-help guru or optimistic person, you’ll have heard this statement. Many respond with, “Easy for you to say…you have ______. If I had that, I’d be happy, too,” or its opposite, “But you don’t have _______. If you had that, you wouldn’t be happy, either.” To many, happiness seems to be a matte...

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Emotions

The Ethics of Honesty and Openness

Nathanael Garrett Novosel, September 14 2022

“Honesty is the best policy.”  “Always tell the truth; that way, there’s less to remember.”  Everyone spouts the benefits and importance of honesty.  But is it really ethical to be open and honest all the time?  No, no it’s not.  Let me explain. There are two factors at play in this: ethics and emotions.  Ethics are rules you follow to minimize har...

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Emotions

Wanting and Feeling Good vs. Wanting and Feeling Bad

Nathanael Garrett Novosel, July 6 2022

Longing.  We all know the feeling: having a strong desire for something you can’t have.  But do you have to feel that way?  Let’s explore. I’ve been criticized in the past for stating what is basically common sense—of course, I’ve also had my brushes with people who vehemently oppose my “hot takes” (go figure).  One of those biggest hot takes come...

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