Moment 197: The 10-Minute Rule That Beats ANY Bad Habit & This Weird Trick Forms Good Habits Instantly! Professor Steve Peters & Nir Eyal

Each of us houses a psychological Chimp inside our brains, primitively reacting to the world and spurring us to act emotionally, impetuously, and irresponsibly. If you’ve ever struggled to stay in control of your urges, succumbed to temptation, or sabotaged your own success, your Chimp has probably taken the reins for a bit. Fortunately, our brains also have an inner Human who, when functioning properly, keeps our inner Chimp under control and allows us to interact with the world in a stable, positive, productive way.

In The Chimp Paradox, psychiatrist Steve Peters outlines a mind management program that can help you manage your inner Chimp and lead you to happiness, success, and a sense of balance between your emotional and thinking selves.

The Happiness Hypothesis explores the nature of human happiness, blending the philosophical and theological wisdom of ancient thinkers with insights from the field of positive psychology. Our satisfaction is driven by how our mental filters interpret the events in our lives, with the human brain perpetually divided against itself in the struggle between the desires created by our emotions and the attempts of reason to control them. The key to happiness is to use reason to focus the mind away from desires that will only bring fleeting happiness, while giving in to those desires that will bring lasting fulfillment.

We’re so self-confident in our rationality that we think all our decisions are well-considered. When we choose a job, decide how to spend our time, or buy something, we think we’ve considered all the relevant factors and are making the optimal choice. In reality, our minds are riddled with biases leading to poor decision making. We ignore data that we don't see, and we weigh evidence inappropriately.

Thinking, Fast and Slow is a masterful book on psychology and behavioral economics by Nobel laureate Daniel Kahneman. Learn your two systems of thinking, how you make decisions, and your greatest vulnerabilities to bad decisions.

In Be Your Future Self Now, Benjamin Hardy argues that true success requires living up to your full potential—that is, becoming the highest version of yourself. Anything short of this is a form of failure. However, becoming the person you want to be is one of life’s most difficult challenges. Hardy explains that it requires knowing exactly who your higher self is, identifying the big, life-changing goals that will get you there, and dedicating yourself to those goals above everything else.

In this guide, we’ll present Hardy’s argument for why you should commit to becoming your higher self now. Then, we’ll explain how to identify your higher self and Hardy’s recommendations for adopting the mindset and dedication needed to become this person. We’ll supplement Hardy’s ideas with those of other success experts including Daniel Walter (The Power of Discipline), Gary Keller (The One Thing), and Darren Hardy (The Compound Effect).

Is there something you indulge in more often than you'd like? Maybe it's checking social media, eating junk food, or binging shows and movies on streaming platforms. In Dopamine Nation, addiction treatment specialist Anna Lembke explores what causes these behaviors and how you can take back control. She explains both the neurological and emotional causes of overindulgence and provides clear actionables to help you stop.

In this guide, you'll learn about how pleasure and pain motivate you to consume, strategies for keeping your brain’s natural chemicals in balance, and solutions to the psychological reasons so many people have a hard time stepping away from their favorite indulgence. Our guide supplements Lembke’s advice with targeted strategies while placing her principles in context with broader conversations on the nature of addiction.

At least 40% to 50% of the things you do and the decisions you make every day are driven by habit, according to experts like Charles Duhigg (The Power of Habit) and James Clear (Atomic Habits). Thus, even small improvements in your habits can have a big impact on your productivity and quality of life. But how do you change them?

In Shortform’s Master Guide to changing habits, we’ve collected the best answers to this question from five best-selling authors and experts on the subject. You’ll learn what habits are, why they’re so hard to break, and how to identify the triggers and behaviors that keep you stuck in the same self-defeating patterns. Then, we’ll share evidence-based strategies and advice for creating a personalized plan, whether you’re looking to cultivate good habits, break bad ones, overhaul your life, or simply tweak the habits that make up your daily routine.

In The 15 Commitments of Conscious Leadership, Jim Dethmer, Diana Chapman, and Kaley Klemp argue that many leadership models are unsustainable because they don’t prioritize self-management and maintaining a healthy work-life balance. This causes leaders to burn out, lose their passion, and succumb to an unhealthy culture of competition and greed. As a result, employees disengage, turnover soars, and organizations break down from within. To overcome these issues, the authors argue that leaders must learn to understand and manage their emotions and mindset, communicate effectively with others, and align their actions and behaviors with their goals and commitments.

Dethmer, Chapman, and Klemp present 15 commitments that conscious leaders must uphold to run an effective organization, which we’ve synthesized into eight primary behaviors. We’ll explain what each behavior is, why it’s important, and how to put it into action. In our commentary, we’ll further discuss how to improve your leadership abilities and adopt the authors’ recommended behaviors, citing experts like Brené Brown (Dare to Lead) and Eckhart Tolle (A New Earth).