This month marks the 50th anniversary of the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr. I’ve been watching a series of TV specials marking the anniversary: I Am MLK Jr, King in the Wilderness, and Hope & Fury. I’ve read many books on Dr. King and the civil rights movement, but it’s…
A couple of months ago, I wrote a post about Investing in Time Rather than Things, for Happiness after I read about a study showing that using money to buy yourself more time results in greater happiness than using money to buy things. It’s especially beneficial to invest in freeing…
I have frequently written about the power of smiling. When we smile, there is a chemical reaction which causes us to think we are happy, even if we were not feeling happy before that moment. In addition, smiling at others usually causes them to smile back at you. (In fact,…
Freakonomics, which I read many years ago, remains one of the most entertaining books I have read. Stephen Dubner, one of the book’s authors, hosts the Freakonomics Radio podcast, which I don’t regularly listen to (because I listen to too many others). The podcast’s web site describes it this way:…
Just over four years ago, I sold a company I had been involved in starting 25 years earlier. Over the many years I ran that company, we considered mergers & acquisitions as a way to grow. I ended up not pursuing that avenue for growth because I had heard too…
This is a guest post by Dr. John Izzo. Today we’re constantly bombarded with messaging about how we should live. We’re told to work harder, dress better, be fitter, have better relationships, and show more gratitude. So how are we supposed to decide what really matters in life? The answer…
A friend of mine was studying for a licensing exam. She had completed all of her schooling, and when she passed the exam she would be able to begin her career. During the couple of months when she was studying and dealing with its attendant stress, someone shared with her…
I read in the New York Times some disturbing information about people not wearing bike helmets. According to the article, head injuries account for three-fourths of the nearly 700-plus bicycle deaths that occur each year nationwide. In New York City, 97% of cycling deaths and 87% of serious cycling injuries…
This is a guest post by Ryan Snow. Screens are everywhere. You can’t make a call or even make your coffee without looking at a screen. After reading Kevin Kelly’s book, The Inevitable, where he writes about the future of screening, I decided to examine my own use of screens.…
In the past, I wrote about Being Present in a Smartphone World. On a related note, I read a piece in the New York Times where they reported on these survey results, which might not be very shocking: We check our phone an average of 47 times a day. Eighty-two…
In an op-ed piece in the New York Times, David Brooks wrote about Pope Francis’ New Year’s Eve commentary that the people who have the most influence on society are “normal folks,” and their everyday gestures of kindness make them “artisans of the common good”. The pope used driving, of…
Because gratitude, happiness, and positive leadership are favorite subjects of my blog posts, I was given the opportunity to read a pre-publication edition of The Kindness Cure, by Tara Cousineau, PhD, which will be published on February 2. "Be Nice" is the second of my Six Simple Rules and when I…