From 600+ conversations with the world’s leading thinkers.
There is a phrase, tell me what you pay attention to, and I will tell you who you are. That is how I would see the quest for authenticity.
We all inhabit distinctive inner universes. We all see and experience the world in a slightly different way. Understanding perception has a lot of consequences for understanding who we are.
When you're training in the martial arts, you always want to be getting beaten in the practice room. That signifies you're fighting good people. When you're getting beaten, you're getting better, you're learning.
The most corrupting idea about power is that it gives you a set of techniques to enable you to get more of what you want, no questions asked. If we think about power in that way, our soul will get eroded.
If someone is commanding in their presence, it directly correlates to how a group judges their skill level! Someone who is commanding in presence is often followed over someone who is far more effective but who is quiet, hesitant, or timid.
Our knowledge of the world is always fragmentary and incomplete and our explanations of how the world works have therefore to be considered as provisional. This means we have to accept that sometimes we will turn out afterwards to have been wrong.
Fear is a great weapon, and tyrants use fear against their people to encourage them to vote for increases in military spending, even when infrastructure, education and healthcare are suffering.
My early experience as an unaccompanied child refugee on the Kindertransport brought me to England in 1939, evading Nazi Europe. That really had an enormous impact on me, everything was different. It was such a big change, that change doesn't throw me anymore. I've learned to enjoy change, I like to do new things, make new things happen.
The brain doesn't make a distinction about whether it's work or home. The key is to practice, practice, practice so that the skills become spontaneous and automatic.
We found that those who enjoyed the best health, and not just the greatest happiness, were the individuals who had nurtured stronger relationships with others. From this, we deduced that those who put considerable effort into maintaining their relationships navigated life's challenges with greater ease.
I have learnt that situations in themselves are not inherently stressful. Our perception of situations is what creates stress for us. Some players thrive in the biggest sporting occasions and others struggle to cope.
Modern society, specifically the modern economy, is very mobile. Our friendships and social networks become very quickly dispersed. At any one time, we build friendships and relationships with people and, for example, due to work, move on.