5 practices to adopt and 3 bad habits to avoid to improve mental clarity and decision-making. This episode covers some of the best lessons from Cal Newport's writing on Deep Work and Slow Productivity. We focus on becoming deeper thinkers who question easy answers and build opinions from a place of deep understanding. Top lessons: How to avoid shallow thinking traps Understand where your opinions come from Interval Training for concentration Ways to think like an intellectual Increase your worki...
Nov 15, 2024•39 min•Transcript available on Metacast Stop getting in your own way by spotting the lies your mind wants you to believe. Learn about the psychology behind the hidden biases that blind us from the truth. This episode explains the main reasons behind the biggest mistakes you make in life and how to overcome them. Takes homes: The link between IQ and the ability to lie to ourselves Warning signs that you aren't being truthful 3 biggest mistakes Sam made last decade 3 ways to catch your own ego This is a deceptively easy listening episod...
Nov 12, 2024•33 min•Transcript available on Metacast How to use AI to avoid lazy thinking traps and think deeper, faster, and with greater perspective. Tim O'Shea joins the podcast to talk about ways to genuinely improve your thinking with AI. Employing a self-improvement coach is expensive. As well as a writing coach or a therapist or a coder or an accountant or an SEO strategist. Generative AI has been heralded as giving us the tools to do all of these things on one simple interface. But the reality of using it can seem clunky and well-limited. ...
Nov 08, 2024•41 min•Transcript available on Metacast Mental models, hard truths & priceless wisdom I wish I knew 10 years ago. From how to really think about IQ or Money to establishing the point of your life in a confused society. This episode covers 34 of my favourite and unintuitive lessons this year for getting along in the world without regrets. Some of the main themes covered: Pursuing the right things Working with your emotions Improving your career and work life Making the most of your potential Building your own independent beliefs Focuss...
Nov 05, 2024•40 min•Transcript available on Metacast We celebrate 'hard work" but forget to consider the benefits of thinking "hard thoughts". This episode teaches how to navigate uncertainty without taking easy options by building a capacity for complexity. Allow doubt to improve our decisions Understand multiple causes behind outcomes Reduce judgement of others Improve your field of vision Weight statistics properly Take ownership of forming opinion without using others Accept lower confidence and greater accuracy The mind is full of complexity ...
Oct 29, 2024•35 min•Transcript available on Metacast A lot of the self-improvement industry and advice is backwards. The more books we read the further away from our goals we become. Ultimately we want to be happier yet we are accruing more and more things to fix before we are happy with ourselves. In this episode, we explore the biggest paradoxes where the work we do can make us more brittle and breakable: Effortlessness Paradox - The harder we try the harder we make it Happiness Paradox - Pursuing Happiness instead chases it away Validation para...
Oct 25, 2024•32 min•Transcript available on Metacast A masterclass on showing up as your best self. No toxic overworking or ultra-positive crap, but instead knowing and being yourself. We learn how to: Honestly understand our emotions Resist unnecessary mental time travel Distinguish our wants and our values Get a grip on reality and get a grip on yourself with this short episode with no punches pulled, only real and important lessons. Join host Sam Webster Harris on the Growth Mindset Pyscholgy podcast for an insightful exploration of mental stre...
Oct 22, 2024•27 min•Transcript available on Metacast Unconventional Strategies to finish important things and ease the overwhelm in your life. You might have a burning pile of unfinished side projects. For some reason reading another book on productivity doesn't solve the problem. This episode covers uncommon ideas that actually work even for people with ADHD. This episode will help you: Let go of baggage - cut the things slowing you down Stop fighting - Work with your energy and interests instead of against yourself Identify blockers - stop your ...
Oct 18, 2024•37 min•Transcript available on Metacast Win friends and influence people by being yourself, with style We all have different skills that are worth others knowing about. What isn't so easy is communicating those qualities in a believable, effective, and timely manner. Today's episode will show you how to build and tell your story whilst crafting a better presence: Psychology of authenticity Identifying your real strengths How to be memorable Why a little kindness does go a long way You don't need to change yourself but instead work on ...
Oct 15, 2024•26 min•Transcript available on Metacast Practical Psycholgoy lessons from Warren Buffet's business partner. Ideas used to create rational thinking and build a Trillion-Dollar empire. Today we dissect the best lessons from "Poor Charlies Almanac" A blueprint for rational thinking and sensible investing. Charlie Munger loved Psychology and wanted there to be a course on Practical Psychology to be taught at all universities. He believed it would make the world a better place. His book combines his favourite tools from psychology as well ...
Oct 11, 2024•41 min•Transcript available on Metacast Being who you were meant to be Vs. Choosing who you get to be. There is a lot of content about finding yourself. There is also a lot of content about success and greatness and how brilliant leaders forged a new path or "Put a dent in the Universe"... What if we are thinking about it completely wrong? In this episode, we explore different ways of thinking about success and the common connections between ideas and people who break out and defy the odds. From Hitler to Haribo and Jesus to Radiohead...
Oct 08, 2024•28 min•Transcript available on Metacast Navigate different challenges by building understanding, mental models and good strategy. In this episode of the Growth Mindset Psychology Podcast, host Sam Webster Harris dives into a range of listener questions: How do Auditory processing difficulties affect willingness to learn Does a lack of Enthusiasm indicate a negativity bias How do you stay organised and on time with big projects and avoid panicking and procrastination Why do I get scared of people who come across differently from my exp...
Oct 04, 2024•36 min•Transcript available on Metacast The anti-hustle guide to finding a balance that maximises happiness through intention and wisdom. Optimising every second of your calendar to the nth degree isn't a recipe for dreamlike productivity, it's a collision course for anxiety-riddled burnout. In our era of ever more time demands what are we to do? Oliver Burkman in his book 4,000 week presents a guide to living as a human being in a messy and demanding environment that allows you to prioritise what's essential in a calm and rational ma...
Oct 01, 2024•21 min•Transcript available on Metacast Identify scarcity mindsets and unpack your relationship with money, success and purpose. We revisit a discussion with Kyle Livingston that explores how we find meaning in our lives and where the biggest sources of stress and anxiety come from for many. Money and success. A story-powered episode where we travel through Kyle's journey as an abandoned orphan and living with anxiety to being able to calm himself from the constant stress and consistently create opportunities. Top lessons: How to make...
Sep 27, 2024•55 min•Transcript available on Metacast Stop Chasing the Self-Improvement Treadmill - Learn to focus on making the world a better place. We are drowning in self-improvement content to make us wealthier, wiser, more productive sexier versions of ourselves. Yet at the same time, it seems like humanity is going backwards. What gives? In the modern-day obsession with ourselves, we are missing out on the bigger picture of how to lead an impactful life that genuinely touches those around us. Yet if we want to be the most impactful version o...
Sep 24, 2024•23 min•Transcript available on Metacast Conscious experience is a result of our awareness, but how do we take back our free will from external drivers? This episode explores the links between the conscious experience and what Free will really is. Building on that we explore how the body deals with pain and negative emotions and how we can learn to carve free will, awareness and control into our day-to-day lives. Dr Stephen Porges is the father of Polyvagal Theory and how the body perceives threat and safety. His lessons are crucial fo...
Sep 20, 2024•26 min•Transcript available on Metacast Let's talk about Power Moves - Lethal Combinations of traits that can unlock your full potential Most of us have strengths and with each strength is a corresponding weakness. Says who? History has shown time and time again that embodying seemingly contradictory traits can result in outsized success. We look at the weaknesses we accept and how to overcome the fixed mindset, break out of our natural blockers, and become a spikey, unbalanced individual with additive strengths. Balancing lessons fro...
Sep 17, 2024•46 min•Transcript available on Metacast A masterclass on our hidden mindsets and diagnosing the real problems behind our internal blockers. Your mind lies to you about what you can and can't do and creates infinitely logical reasons to hide your real fears. To overcome the real blockers in achieving our goals, we need to spend less time diagnosing external problems and more time understanding what's happening inside us. Humans are ultimately driven by underlying fear and desire, coming up with reasons that ignore this is hiding the tr...
Sep 13, 2024•38 min•Transcript available on Metacast Anxiety is built into all our brains, examining the role of trauma in building fear responses helps us understand how to combat fear. We can also learn how trauma manifests in General Anxiety Disorder, Borderline (BPD), Narcissism (NPD) and ADHD. By studying the neuroscience of how fear and anxiety work in the brain we understand how life events and trauma shape our perceptions. To overcome the different fears we can learn from strategies required for individuals with specific disorders relating...
Sep 10, 2024•54 min•Transcript available on Metacast Learn the economics of satisfaction, according to psychology. Our earliest lessons in life include that money can't buy happiness. But is that completely correct? We explore tactics to change your spending that can boost your mood on both a daily level and additionally build a longer-term sense of content satisfaction. Learning how to escape the nudges of advertising and society's expectations of spending and instead live in line with your values and priorities. Everyone has different needs and ...
Sep 06, 2024•42 min•Transcript available on Metacast From deciding what to work on to overcoming blockers - All the questions from August were answered in the Ask Me Anything of the month. Free listeners will only have access to the first 20 minutes. Premium subscribers can listen to the whole episode and be able to submit their own questions for future episodes. Questions answered in this episode: What causes resistance to learning? How do you differentiate an indie podcast? (especially when many podcasts have backing by network / business) What ...
Sep 03, 2024•28 min•Transcript available on Metacast How to take the best shots in life and enjoy the process. In this episode of the Growth Mindset Psychology podcast, Sam Webster Harris delves into the psychology behind creating and seizing life's opportunities and overcoming the scarcity mindset. We are surrounded by pressures to achieve and plenty of people selling us the way, yet find ourselves going nowhere. Sam outlines practical steps you can take from any point in life to build a system around discovering opportunities and building a life...
Aug 30, 2024•46 min•Transcript available on Metacast Expand your perception of experience and build more flow and joy into your daily life. Many people hate time, it is a constant enemy we fight against. Yet it is simply a continuous element of the Universe that we can't change. However, like illusions that can make a straight line seem bent in our minds, we can use our own mind to bend time for ourselves. This episode expands on several psychological phenomena to help you build a better relationship with time: Live a life that feels longer, riche...
Aug 27, 2024•23 min•Transcript available on Metacast Channel productivity or creativity on-demand - experience more progress, positivity, and freedom using the power of your environment. In this episode of the Growth Mindset Psychology Podcast, we explore the significant impact of our environment on our overall mindset and actions. Delve into lesser-known productivity tips from neuroscience, psychology, and philosophy and the actionable take-homes you can directly apply to your own life. Key insights explained: Cathedral Effect - for creativity or...
Aug 23, 2024•25 min•Transcript available on Metacast 3 ways to stay dedicated to what is important in life, in a noisy world (and with a noisy mind). We are immersed in infinite options and distractions of alluring things we could be doing. Naturally we often find ourselves wanting to do all the things. A holiday in the Mediterranean, surfing in Bali or visiting pyramids - Why choose? Pursuing a career in finance, running a YouTube about cars, or becoming a teacher - Frustrating huh... Leaning into philosophy and the inner workings of our psycholo...
Aug 20, 2024•37 min•Transcript available on Metacast Live a life well lived by exploring the depths of Psychology and Polyvagal Theory with Dr. Stephen Porges. Join host Sam Webster on the Growth Mindset Psychology Show as he engages in a deep and enlightening conversation with Dr. Stephen Porges, the renowned researcher behind polyvagal theory. This episode delves into fundamental truths about psychology, societal norms, and personal growth. Dr. Porges shares insights on the body's physiological reactions to safety and threat, how they impact our...
Aug 16, 2024•1 hr 2 min•Transcript available on Metacast How to manage stress, build a calmer state of mind and create a foundation for growth and autonomy. Polyvagal Theory is an intriguing sounding term that holds a lot of answers to how the body perceives threats and gives a surprising amount of actionable take homes that we can use in our everyday lives. Join Sam Webster in this episode of the Growth Mindset Psychology Podcast as he dives deep into the fascinating world of fear, security, emotional intelligence and neuroscience. There are three ma...
Aug 13, 2024•1 hr 7 min•Transcript available on Metacast Principles to enhance learning, independent thinking, and problem-solving, whilst reducing the feeling of being lost. Ever feel like you're constantly consuming information but losing touch with your own thoughts? This episode takes you on a journey back to the essential skill of listening to yourself. We'll explore the impact of continuous content on our ability to think independently and how it can dilute our personal insight. Hear expert advice on creating the mental space necessary for profo...
Aug 09, 2024•25 min•Transcript available on Metacast Developing the freedom to choose how you respond to situations in life is a core part of building a growth mindset. A fixed mindset approach leaves you at the mercy of events in life that will make you angry or sad and blame your circumstances with no control from you. A growth mindset allows you to build the space to determine how you react in any situation and be the person you want to be rather than the person the world pushes you to be. To achieve that we examine: The nature of Free Will and...
Aug 06, 2024•58 min•Transcript available on Metacast Growth begins at the edge of your comfort zone. Learn to expand your mental horizons and build a healthy relationship with the fear of failure. To build new connections in the brain and learn we need to fail. Becoming an expert in anything requires being comfortable with being a crappy amateur. A great paradox of success is that it is built on a foundation of failure. Perfection is actually a common cause of fixed mindset attitudes and can block growth. Learn practical strategies to embrace the ...
Aug 02, 2024•22 min•Transcript available on Metacast