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The owner of Happier Human is Steve Scott. Steve is an author who is also the owner of the popular blog DevelopGoodHabits.com. Steve has long been interested in positive psychology and specifically its applications to increase happiness.

Are You an Overthinker? You’ve Been Poisoned

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Feeling anxious, upset, or sad? Natural.

Feeling reflective? Non-productive?

You may be overthinking. Overthinking is:

  • Going over a failure or conflict, again and again, to see how it could have gone better.
  • Ranting and raving about the wrongs that have been done to you.
  • Trying to figure out why life isn’t living up to your expectations.
  • Constantly reflecting on your sadness.

Overthinking is so common that many consider it natural, sometimes even productive.

No. Sorry. Overthinking is not productive.

Overthinking is a modern phenomenon that's unnatural and counterproductive.

Overthinking? Don't you mean correct thinking? It's better to confront a problem than to ignore it.

Sidebar: One of the simplest ways to stop overthinking is to declutter your mind. This book can help you make that happen.

Spend more time thinking about it and you’ll discover an insight you missed.

That's why your attention keeps coming back to it. The underlying concerns and emotions haven't been addressed.

No.

Overthinking is poison.

Ruminating and venting isn't processing. It’s pouring fuel on the fire. (1, 2)

Most problems have causes which no amount of reflection will uncover. (3)

And what you'll learn in this post – overthinking was designed by evolution to trigger depression and abandonment, not effective problem-solving. (4)

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The 4 Things You Need to Know About Meditation

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Meditation is HARD. Keeping still and staying focused is so unnatural that most who give meditation a try don’t keep it up. So it’s important to understand a few things about meditation: Does it work? Better than other techniques? How quickly? Is one type better than another? If we meditate for 50 hours but see … Read more

The 6 Simplifications of Positive Psychology – The Hot Mess of Measuring Happiness

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An assumption underlying the science of positive psychology is that happiness can be measured.

There is the Bhutan Happiness Scale. There is the Subjective Happiness scale. And there are constant studies that measure happiness. But nothing really measures your personal happiness very well. So all measures of happiness are based on averages from what people report during interviews with psychologists after specific experiments.

We are guild of it here on DGH too. Just look at some of the articles we have where we talk about ways to increase happiness.

Gratitude journals increase well-being…
Money does little for happiness…
Positivity can prevent divorce…
Yelp is more trustworthy than your brain…
Buying many small items is better than buying a few large things…

Prove that assumption false, and hundreds of research findings fall apart into meaningless garble.

In this post, we will take a deep look at the science behind measuring happiness and see if it is these measurements have any value at all…

 

 

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Approach or Avoidance?

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What is better when setting goals, approach or avoidance? Is it better to focus on avoiding things you hate and want to avoid or focus on the positive things you want from life? This post takes a deep look at approach vs avoidance to find out if it is more motivating to set goals that … Read more

The Myth of Inspiration – Why Feeling Excited Isn’t Enough

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You're excited. You feel that this time will be different.

I want it bad enough. I can do this.

You start making plans. Maybe, you take the first step.

But then its gone. After a few hours or a few days, you're back to normal. Feeling mundane, doing the mundane.

Why?

Two reasons.

Problem 1. Inspiration escapes as quickly as it enters.

Hunger is natural. When we ignore it, it gets stronger and stronger until all we can think about is food.

Inspiration is unnatural. With the passage of time, it leaks out of our body, as if it doesn't belong.

No surprise – it doesn't.

Hunger comes, whether we want it to or not. Inspiration doesn't.

That's why we read inspirational books and videos, again and again and again and again. But watching inspirational videos and reading uplifting stories takes time and has an inconsistent effect, sometimes getting us excited, other times leaving us bored.

That's why personal coaches and motivational speakers are so fond of positive visualization. Of imagining your desires having already come true. That's inspiring.

Unfortunately, inspiration isn't enough.

Problem 2. Inspiration unconverted to motivation feels good but doesn't lead to action.

How often have you felt excited and then done nothing to show for it?

There isn't some sort of excitement threshold, past which you actually start getting your goals done. Excitement is like salt water – by itself, completely useless. It takes a purifier to change it into something useful.

Goal setting isn't primarily effective because it's inspiring, but because it converts transient desire into long-term focus and commitment. It's a purifier.

But often, it's not enough.

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Difficult, Not Easy

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The harder the goal, the smaller the motivation. Right? Unless the reward also got better, the effort wouldn’t be worth it anymore. That’s why I use to choose easy over difficult. When trying to accomplish difficult long-term goals, I would break them up into easy sub-goals. Easy means reason for optimism and less effort. That … Read more

Now, Not Later

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Everyone I've met has at least one realistic dream they'd like to see come true.

They'd like to have a good body. Or be nicer. Or learn a hobby.

But when I ask them what they're doing to make it come true, almost always, stripping away the wishy-washy, what I hear is “nothing”.

Not surprising. Our brains were wired to be short-sighted.

Procrastination isn't a mark of the lazy. It's the default, a mark of normality.

Animated Hyperbolic Discounting - now not later

Although college kids are the most likely to wait until the last minute, the problem is universal. According to online goal setting community 43things.com , stop procrastination is the third most popular goal (no surprise, lose weight is #1).

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The World’s Best (Free) Guide to Goal Setting

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Dream big dreams; only big dreams have the power to move men’s souls.

-Marcus Aurelius, Emperor of Rome

It's a paradox. It's the big goals that excite us and get us to stop hitting the snooze button. They make us feel alive. They make the boring interesting, and the frustrating exciting.

But it's the big goals that are the least likely to end up accomplished.

After a short burst of energy, the excitement and interest fizzles. And then, maybe, you get excited once again. And then, just like last time, after a short burst of energy, the excitement fizzles and takes you back to where you started, with little or no progress to show for it.

For much of my life, I've set only realistic goals. Goals that could be easily accomplished. After all, what's the point of dreaming big if the obvious result is failure?

But I've gotten greedy. I'd rather get work done AND feel inspired.

I don't want to have just enough motivation to get by. I want as much as possible. More motivation equals more energy and more life.

Are you greedy too?

Do you want more accomplishment, more energy, more happiness, more life?

Then welcome to the world's best free guide to goal setting.

Inspiration Rollercoaster

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A 2 x 2 Achievement Goal Framework

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Learn about the 2X2 achievement goal framework and understand a better way to view (and plan) your goals. What is the 2×2 achievement goal framework? Until 2001, when this study was published, goals were divided into three types: mastery, performance-approach, and performance-avoidance: Mastery Performance-Approach Performance-Avoidance I will score higher than last time. I will score … Read more