From 600+ conversations with the world’s leading thinkers.
Too often when we find someone disagreeing with us, our question is about why. Why do you believe this ridiculous thing? What tends to work better is a how question... This kind of approach helps to view the real complexity of a situation and reveals gaps in knowledge.
Dyslexics, like me, often possess above-average intelligence, but we grapple with sequential thinking. Instead of thinking linearly from A to B to C to D, we jump from A to B to Z. Over time, I've learned to turn a perceived 'weakness' into a strength.
The human mind can shape itself – the human mind can take itself as an object and change – no other living creature on the planet can do that, and it gives me tremendous optimism.
The experiences you have in dreams, measured by brain activity and glucose consumption, are remarkably similar to those you would have while awake. Whether you're running the London Marathon in reality or dreaming about it, your brain's electrical and metabolic patterns are nearly identical.
My mindset changed from thinking that tomorrow I may be freed, to realising that unless I did something myself, nobody would come and rescue me. One of the ways I gathered strength was by constantly plotting my escape.
Confidence, after all, is simply one's belief in their own ability to accomplish a task or achieve a result. It's an elusive and abstract feeling. In my experience, many of the individuals I work with, including Olympians, often lack this so-called essential trait. My approach is always to redirect their focus from this nebulous concept of confidence to the concrete tasks at hand.
When it comes to claims like 'pets alleviate depression,' there's really no solid evidence. In fact, the findings so far are pretty ambiguous. And—I don't really want to tell you this—but in one study that found no significant overall effect, cat owners were actually more depressed than the control group.
One way that we deal with the accelerating rate of change is by sort of riding on top of that tsunami of change rather than being crushed by it.
In a peculiar way, failure can sometimes be simpler to grapple with. You can simply resist it, dismiss it with a defiant 'to hell with this, to hell with them', and return to square one. Conversely, success can be considerably more subtle and insidious.
You feel like a product when you're on these things. You feel like you're selling yourself. But what's amazing is that when you get people in person, actually interacting, much of the time they don't do that same optimisation, especially if you give them just a few nudges.
I began a conversation with my future wife in January 1983 and 38 years later, that conversation ended when she drew her last breath at 7.30 in the evening on the 2nd of September 2021. To be truly and completely seen, understood and loved by another Human Being, was her greatest gift to me.
Individuality is my biggest fight, not #MeToo. People need to realise their own power, their own freedom, and their own ability to be better.