Psychology Archives

How to Live Authentically: The Case for Being Yourself

You can heal with love. Discover how the love you feel in your heart can improve your physical health and help you overcome illness.

What does it mean to live authentically? How can choosing authenticity help you better cope with life challenges and achieve your goals? The more authentic you are, the more successful you feel. Being authentic frees up energy to deal effectively and appropriately with your environment, respond to situations spontaneously, express yourself confidently, and choose and reach goals that satisfy you. Here is how authenticity can make you feel and become more successful plus some suggestions on how to live more authentically.

Maxwell Maltz: How Self-Image Predicts Success

What does your self-image have to do with your goal-achieving potential? Do you think your self-image (the way you see yourself) helps or hinders your success potential? According to Maxwell Maltz, your self-image plays a key role in your ability to align your behavior with your goals. You need to examine what type of self-image you have so you can figure out if it’s working with you or against you. To this end, Maltz argues, you need to examine how your self-image is expressed through your personality (is it positive or negative?). In this article, we’ll take a look at the

The Psychology of Goal-Oriented Behavior

Why do we often act in ways that thwart progress towards our goals? What do people who act in accordance with their goals do differently? According to Maxwell Maltz, the author of Psycho-Cybernetics, the main reason people self-sabotage themselves by engaging in behaviors that directly contradict their goals is that their goals don’t align with their internal programming. This incongruence, he argues, is down to their self-image. In this article, we’ll explore the role of self-image in goal-oriented behavior.

Positive Feedback Loop: The Psychology of Habit Formation

What is a positive feedback loop? What role does a positive feedback loop play in habit formation? Positive feedback loops are at the core of habit formation. The concept is simple: when a behavior is rewarded, the subject’s motivation to perform the behavior increases as a bigger reward is expected. In this article, we’ll explore the concept of the positive feedback loop and the psychology behind it.

Popularity 101: How to Be Liked by Everyone

Liking Bias: Why We Ignore Faults in People We Love

How do you get people to like you? What is it about likable people that makes them that way? We all want to be liked and socially accepted—it’s a fundamental longing. Psychologist William James once said, “One of the deepest drives of human nature is the desire to be appreciated.” Though you won’t get everyone to like you, there are ways to make yourself into a person who gets along well with others, even if you’re not very social or are considered “difficult.” In this article, we’ll explore what it takes to become likable, drawing on sources from popular literature.

Maxwell Maltz: Why Do We Self-Sabotage?

Is there any goal that you want to achieve yet you keep sabotaging yourself by engaging in behavior that takes you further and further from the desired end result? Why do we self-sabotage? According to Maxwell Maltz, the author of Psycho-Cybernetics, people self-sabotage when their conscious goals are in contradiction with their internal programming. He argues that the reason this incongruence occurs is one’s self-image. In this article, you’ll learn how your self-image impacts your programming and, consequently, your progress toward achieving your conscious goals.

How to Heal Emotional Trauma: Forgive and Forget

How do people form emotional scars? Why do some people move on from emotional hurt relatively quickly while others form emotional scars that last a lifetime? Emotional scars—otherwise known as psychological trauma—result from situations that threaten your sense of emotional or physical safety. Psychologists argue that your subjective emotional experience of a situation defines whether you find it traumatic—the more powerless you feel, the more likely you are to feel traumatized and form an emotional scar. In this article, we’ll explore what determines your ability to heal from emotional trauma and how to speed up your recovery.

How to Build Trust in a Cognitive Culture

What is cognitive trust? How do cognitive cultures approach professional relationships? Erin Meyer, the author of The Culture Map, describes cognitive trust as trust that develops based on behaviors (as opposed to personal feelings). Cognitive cultures strictly delineate their personal and professional relationships. In this article, we’ll look at how members of cognitive cultures build trust and present some tips you can use to build trust in a cognitive culture.

How to Make Personal Connections: Acceptance Is Key

Do you struggle to make personal connections with others? What does acceptance have to do with connection? Whether it’s with a friend or with a date, making connections is important. There are several ways you can go about doing this, but the root of all connections is acceptance. Keep reading to learn how to make personal connections.

Communicating With High- and Low-Context Cultures

Do you often communicate with people from other cultures as part of your job? What differences have you noticed between different cultures’ communication styles? Learning how to communicate effectively is essential for good business. But contrary to popular belief, the techniques for good communication vary depending on the place you’re in. Cultural communication expert Erin Meyer places cultures on a communication spectrum and defines the two extremes as “high-context” and “low-context.” In this article, we’ll look at the difference between high- and low-context cultures and present some strategies for working well with people whose communication styles differ from yours.