A lot of people are mind readers. Some people are even very proficient at it, reading minds of people every day, all day long. And most of the time, they get it so wrong. Mind reading is a dangerous trait.

The practice of mind reading

Of course I’m not talking about some supernatural phenomenon, a paranormal ability or extrasensory perception. I’m talking about a trait, or maybe a habit even. The habit of presuming to know what other people are thinking, without sufficient evidence of those thoughts. Some examples:

• “He must think I’m stupid for not knowing the answer to that question.”
• “When I ask for directions, she probably thinks I’m not man enough to take care of myself.”
• “If I’m not working full-time he thinks I’m not ambitious or that I’m taking advantage of his money.”
• “If I bring flowers, she probably thinks I have to make up for something.”
• “Oh my gosh he brought flowers…would that mean that…oh my gosh!”

Get the picture? “Reading” the mind of the other person, without knowing what’s really on their mind!

What makes matters worse is that people act upon those imagined thoughts, as if they were actual thoughts of the other! And that in turn might set off a whole series of events, leading to a great and possibly very damaging misunderstanding. I know, I’ve seen it again this week. Big time!

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Saying yes is easy, saying no is a skill. And an important skill too, because saying yes too often can get you into trouble and saying nothing is troublesome altogether. So saying no is an important skill to use on a regular basis. Saying no to yourself and saying no to others.

The skill of saying no

Saying no is often associated with negative feelings, like disappointment, anger and loss. That’s why it’s a lot easier to say yes all the time, because people like to avoid situations that evoke those emotions. But at the same time, we don’t feel proud or satisfied with saying yes. It’s a Catch-22, we don’t want to say no and we don’t want to say yes.

So often we reside to other options, but they prove to be even more troublesome than just saying no:

• Saying yes, doing yes
  This is authentic. If you say yes, do yes. People will know that you keep your word.
• Saying yes, doing no
  This is deception. You try to keep the relationship good at first, but don’t keep your word and end up damaging it in the end.
• Saying nothing, doing yes
  This is vague, but mostly if you do not answer people assume that you will say yes.
• Saying nothing, doing no
  This is vague and deceptive. People assume that you say yes, but you do the opposite. Plenty of room for an argument.
• Saying no, doing yes
  This is confusing to say the least. People will not know what your word is worth, saying no clearly does not mean no.
• Saying no, doing no
  This is authentic. If you say no, do no. You might disappoint someone, but you are clear and people will know that you keep your word.

Saying yes and saying no are the only two viable options in the long run. Saying yes is something that most people are very capable of, saying no on the other hand…

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Sometimes you just don’t feel like doing stuff. You sit on the couch and your body doesn’t seem to respond to your thoughts. No matter how hard you try to think yourself into action, you just sit there. Watching television, wasting time, idling along. How do you snap out of it?

If you don’t recognize this state of mind (or body), you’re lucky! I talked to quite a few people and this seems to happen to the most of us once in a while, and a lot to some. There are a lot of reasons why this might happen to you. In this article I’m making a list of helpful tips that have helped me overcome this phenomenon. The tips are both short term (immediate) hacks and habits that prevent it from happening.

Drink a glass of water (or two)
Mild dehydration takes away your energy to a great extent. To quote the Wikipedia page on Dehydration: 

Symptoms of mild dehydration include thirst, decreased urine volume, abnormally dark urine, unexplained tiredness, lack of tears when crying, headache, dry mouth, and dizziness when standing due to orthostatic hypotension.

Recognize some of these? The solution is simple, drink a glass of water or maybe two. Wait for 10 more minutes while you’re body rehydrates, refreshing you and releasing energy to go do stuff.

Since a couple of weeks I adopted the habit of drinking a big glass of water first thing in the morning. And about two hours later, when I have my first coffee I drink another glass. It really works.

Take a short nap
Another cause of inertia may be that you’re just tired, or even edging on sleep deprivation. The cure for this is simple, take a short nap. You can try a meditation nap, a power nap or use the salesman trick.

The latter you can use when you don’t have the time to take a long nap, but do have a spare moment. Just sit in a chair and take a your keys in one hand, now let the hand with the keys dangle over the side of the chair and doze off. When you get to deeper stages of sleep, your muscles will relax and you will drop the keys. That in turn will wake you up again. A simple yet effective way of taking a short nap. But it’s best to avoid the need for napping altogether.

Exercise in the morning
Doing a workout in the morning is very satisfying and helpful to maintain energized throughout the day. Even having done the exercise makes you feel good about yourself the rest of the day, but your body is also powered up and ready to go (that is, if you don’t overexert yourself).

Be sure to replenish your body after the workout, drink water, eat some fruit (if the exercise was cardiovascular) or eat some protein (if it was about building muscle mass).

(I really should do this more often…I’m no star on this habit)

Tell others
Make a public commitment of the things that you’re going to do (like your goals). This makes sure that you have an external and internal motivation to get going.

Avoid sugar rushes
When you’re feeling low on energy it’s tempting to take a dose of sugar, often in the form of a candy bar, or a high energy ’sports’ drink. It helps, but the effect is only temporary and aggravates matters mostly. Since they are ‘fast’ sugars it will result in a sugar rush. It will release a lot of energy in your body, and it will induce a spike in insulin to transport that sugar throughout your body. But as fast as the supply of sugar appeared, it disappears. This short spike leaves a surplus of insulin that needs to be fed with sugar.

Avoid this by eating foods with the right carbs: the ones with a low Glycemic Index. One of the ideal snacks in my opinion is a banana.

Just take the first step
Sometimes getting started is as simple as taking the first step. Stuck behind the television, just decide to turn it off (and do it!). It’s a small step, but it breaks the cycle in which you’re stuck. Stuck playing games on internet? Just hit that little red cross in the upper red corner, or the red dot in the upper left corner (if you’re on a Mac). Nobody cares about that high score anyway.

Have some tips of your own?
These are just six tips that I use regularly, but there are plenty other possibilities. What do you do to break out of idle mode? Please share in the comments.

Photo by Dogbomb

You’re approaching the new person you’re about to meet.

It’s nearly time to speak…time to announce to the new person who you are.

You swallow to clear your mouth…silently you rehearse what you’re about to say. The moment is nearly there!

You take a deep breath while you move your hand forward in an inviting manner. The hands touch, and you say your name, loud and clear so it can be remembered, while firming the grip of the handshake.

Aah…you did it! The tension fades away as you exhale while your name still echoes in the room…you did it again. You stated your name clearly, and you didn’t accidentally spit while you said it. Perfect!

Suddenly you feel the grip of the handshake lose strength…oh damn! Your heart skips a beat while you realize you missed the other’s name.

You remember hearing a murmur, but you were so busy being proud, that your attention slipped… boy! it’s gonna look stupid to ask for the name now…better avoid using names all together today.

Recognize yourself in this scene? It sucks, doesn’t it?

It’s amazing how many people follow this strategy. In their minds everything builds up momentum to the climax: introducing themselves! And in the short period of time when energy levels recover from such a big accomplishment, they miss the name of the other person. And that makes for a bad start in remembering names, I can tell you that!

But even if you have heard the name, will you still remember it 5 minutes from now? Or in an hour? Or tomorrow? And if you met 10 people in 5 minutes…would you still remember the names of all the people the next day? Odds are you can’t do it. Most people can’t. Or to be more precise, most people can’t do it YET. Click to continue »

When you are learning new stuff, there will come a time when you hit a plateau. At the plateau it feels like you’re not making any progress at all, no matter how hard you try. This can be a very frustrating experience, and unfortunately a lot of people give up learning and move on to something else (I know I have!). But the plateau is not an end, it’s a natural phase of the learning process and you are in fact still making progress.

Early stage learning
If we take learning a new sport as an example. When you first start you are a blank, you know nothing or not much about the sport. In the early months you will acquire new skills, learn the rules, experience the dynamics, and maybe even pick up some strategic insights. Progress is good! You see and experience that you get better at the sport every week and the progress satisfies you.

Hitting the plateau
But then slowly creeping in, your progress is not very visible anymore. You’re not learning a lot of new skills, you basically know them all already. There’s room for improvement, but you know the basics. You know the rules, have a feeling for the basic dynamics and crude strategies of the sport. You’re no longer a beginner, you are at intermediate level.

This is where you hit the plateau. The plateau is the experience where you feel that no matter how hard you try, there is no progress in learning. And even though this is not entirely true, the feeling is very real. Click to continue »