Tuesday, April 29, 2014

Whatever you are most afraid of, will plague you for life - not because others are free from it, but because they are not obsessed enough to notice it come and go.

Sunday, April 20, 2014

Happiness

My definition of happiness : the emotion invoked (1) by a memory associated with the release of dopamine, or (2) by the actual release of dopamine through the reward-motivation mechanism our brain uses to make us prefer actions that lead to decisions favorable for survival.

No happiness, no survival.

Monday, April 14, 2014

leadership

woke up this morning thinking, what is the most important skill leaders must have?

and it seemed to me today, that this is not engineering, not financial planning, not scientific belief, not cultural depth, but story-telling.

leadership falls apart once your people stop believing in your story. different cultures use different narratives, and the leader in  that culture must master that narrative.

and this leaves me with the thought - there's something very magical about royal families and monarchies, because instead of telling the story, they have become the story. they are the people's ideals, incarnated in flesh. there's something god-like in them, in both their charms and their failures... but of course the people have stopped believing in this story...

what is the story your leader is telling you today?
is it working?

Monday, April 07, 2014

Diversity

1
Is anti-diversity not a tolerable position in a framework for diversity?

2
If we got rid of all extremely extreme extremists, would moderately strong opinions get recalibrated as the new extremist? If that's a natural response I hope extremists stay as extreme as possible!