Ideas are free, execution is priceless.

History repeats itself over and over. The rhythms of time never stop beating. And yet, humans have notoriously short memories. Our brains are liars. We easily and rapidly reimagine experiences to fit our preconceptions, rather than accurately recording what happened. I read a popular study from a psychology journal showing that our brains generate false memories of events mere seconds after they have occurred. We paraphrase, distort and misremember…

Empowerment is the ability to take personal agency. This is what living life fully is all about. I was reading a paper in an analytic philosophy journal, and the researcher made a distinction between two forms of empowerment. Hypoagency and hyperagency. Hypoagency means that anything bad that happens to us isn’t our fault. It was society, or culture, or some outside influence that made us do it. Hyperagency means…

A linguistic element for navigating fear is using evaluative language. The goal is to create a sense of urgency. To prompt ourselves to critically assess our choices and motivations. Using such phrasing encourages our emotional shift from passive acceptance to active evaluation of our actions and their consequences. A question we can learn to ask ourselves is this: Would it serve me more to avoid temporary discomfort here, or…

Rhetorical questions are the most underrated linguistic tool in our arsenal. They’re powerful because they’re more about making a point than getting an answer. Such language stimulates introspection, which is an invaluable asset when navigating fear. We need to learn how to deploy that within on a moment’s notice. During the pandemic, I remember reading headlines each day, seeing the same doom and gloom everyone else did. But there…

Here is a useful framework for freeing ourselves from fear. This tool contains four elements. Dichotomy, rhetoric, evaluation and empowerment. Dichotomy presents us a choice between two contrasting options. This trait prompts us to reflect on our own beliefs and encourages critical thinking. Dichotomy helps to break free from binary thinking and open up possibilities for more nuanced understanding. For example, late one night, our relative sends us a…