You have a deadline. You know you should get to work. But instead of focusing on what’s urgent and important, you spend your time on something else. Despite the inner voice telling us to get started and the rising anxiety, you keep on procrastinating. Humans have always struggled with procrastination. Thousands of years ago, the … Read More
Fear is a universal emotion. Fear of spiders, fear of crowds, fear of heights… There seems to be many types of fear, which makes it hard to know how to deal with them. Do you need a specific strategy for each unique fear you face? Fortunately, all fears can be divided into four broad categories … Read More
Cognitive distortions are thought patterns that can affect our perception of reality. One such distortion is emotional reasoning. This is a thought pattern in which our emotional reactions, or our feelings, lead us to believe that something is true even when the empirical evidence tells us otherwise. Emotional reasoning is very common in the workplace. … Read More
Can you imagine a pink elephant? Is it big or small? Hot pink or pastel pink? Does it look happy, sad, tired, or excited? Give your pink elephant as much detail as you can. Now that you have got your pink elephant clear in your head, it is time to stop thinking about it. Think … Read More
Self-love is seen by many as a futile, even narcissistic pursuit. With influencers urging you to love yourself without much substance to their advice, the concept of self-love may seem like an empty one. However, there is lots of scientific evidence suggesting that self-love can have a positive impact on your mental health, self-esteem, and … Read More
Welcome to this edition of our Tools for Thought series, where we interview founders on a mission to help us better manage our thoughts, emotions, and knowledge. Kai Koch is the co-founder of Ahead, a mobile application designed to help people master their emotions in just five minutes a day. Developed in partnership with psychologists, … Read More
The modern world operates in such a way that we all face a torrent of stressors throughout the day, at work and outside of work. Unfortunately, this means some of us live in a constant state of stress, which can lead to emotional, mental, and physical exhaustion. Emotional exhaustion is one of the most invisible … Read More
Have you ever found yourself ruminating over a mistake you made a while ago? Replaying in your head a conversation that didn’t go so well? That’s the negativity bias at play: not only do we register negative stimuli more readily, but we also tend to dwell on these events for longer. In general, negative events … Read More
“I would do much better!” you think, watching someone give a presentation about a topic you are familiar with. “I don’t feel like smoking at all, I’ll definitely be able to quit tomorrow,” you say with a relaxed tone, right after smoking a cigarette. These are illustrations of the empathy gap: our tendency to underestimate … Read More
Rationality and emotion may seem antithetic. One is objective, the other subjective. One relies on mental models, the other on gut feelings. When it comes to making decisions, we tend to favour the reassuring formal process of rationality over the impulse of our emotions. In school, we are taught how to think better, but rarely … Read More