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Empathy Is On the Decline in This Country. A New Book Describes What We Can Do to Bring It Back.
Written by Emma Seppala. Stanford neuroscientist Jamil Zaki’s new book, “The War for Kindness: Building empathy in a fractured world,” makes a powerful case for kindness and empathy — not only because they make the world a better place, but because the …
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Compassion in Business
Written by Susan Greene. Mention compassion to some leaders, and they recoil, visualizing a slide into poor productivity, lower performance and organizational entropy. The reality is quite different. Compassion isn’t a fluffy soft skill but courageous …
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Doctors Who Are Kind Have Healthier Patients Who Heal Faster, According to New Book
Written by Emma Seppala. Which doctor would you pick: a physician who is kind and warm, or one who is cold but graduated at the top of the class in medical school? A new book makes a strong argument for the ones who are kind and warm, not just because …
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Seven Different Ways Laughing Can Improve Your Prosperity/Wellbeing
Written by Valerie Cheers Brown. As per research at Standford Medicine, “Everybody appreciates a decent laugh, however, who really sets aside a few minutes for it in their lives? Without a doubt, we like hearing a clever joke, conversing with individua …
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Why Compassion Fades
Written by Joe Hefferon. One victim can break our hearts. Remember the image of the young Syrian boy discovered dead on a beach in Turkey in 2015? Donations to relief agencies soared after that image went viral. However, we feel less compassion as the …
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Expert Opinion: Four Steps to Reduce Workplace Stress
Written by Michael Stahl. As a manager or leader, the well-being of your staff should be of utmost importance. Workplace stress is detrimental to the overall health and productivity of employees. In recognition of April being National Stress Awareness …
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Shower Thought: How to Be Kind Without Being a Pushover
Written by Lara Mikocki. Having worked in various organizations with a blur of different personalities, I began to become fascinated with the important art of getting along, and the behavioral science behind it. One of the returning pieces of advice we …
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11 Signs You’re Going to Be Successful, Even If It Doesn’t Feel Like It
Written by Shana Lebowitz. If you’re pursuing your passions, if you’re learning, and if you’re forging meaningful relationships, you’re probably on track to do great things — even if you aren’t extraordinarily famous or wealthy. Below, we’ve listed a s …
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Time to Be Kind: Why Kindness Matters
Written by Gavin Haines. It was a quarter to midnight and Bernadette Russell was about to go to bed. But her hopes of an immediate date with the duvet were dashed when her partner asked a question: had she done her daily act of kindness? Weeks earlier, …
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Happiness Research: Being Too Busy is the Biggest Obstacle to Creativity
Written by Allen Zhu. Spending time each day to let your mind wander is one of the best ways to rekindle your inventive side. “The biggest breakthrough ideas often come from relaxation,” wrote Emma Seppala, Director of Stanford University’s Center for …
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Reconnecting By Disconnecting
Written by Sammi Sontag. In a world with relentless push notifications, text updates and breaking news alerts, releasing your self from the claws of social media is nearly impossible. Personally I’d love to break free from my social media sites, but it …
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How to Keep Your Cool at Work Like Gayle King
Written by Edie Ravenelle. When R&B singer R. Kelly jumped out of his chair and totally lost his cool in a recent interview with Gayle King, co-host of CBS This Morning, King became the real rock star. She unflinching held her composure and remaine …
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Spring Clean Your Routine: Four Ways to Boost Your Productivity
Written by Ernie Smith. Don’t just focus on your closet or your file cabinet: Spend some time this season working on ways to minimize distractions while maximizing productivity. You may think of spring cleaning as a phenomenon to do at home, but you mi …
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How Compassion Could Be the Cure for Chronic Stress
This much we know: Taking deep breaths relieves stress in your body; compassion relieves stress in your relationships. Both are psychophysiological phenomena. But what we’re learning beyond that may have far more global consequences. Current research l …
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Books That Move Us Forward
Written by Ken Trainor. In the past two years, I’ve been reading more. The following books were not only highly readable and influential, but in some cases even transformative. The Warmth of Other Suns, for instance, by Isabel Wilkerson, permanently al …
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The Art of Executive Feedback
Written by Rob Kramer. One of academe’s most glaring blind spots lies in how, and when, we evaluate our leaders. A recurrent problem, it’s even more acute now that higher education is constantly living under a microscope. We tend to leave gaping window …
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On Valentine’s Day, Learn to Love Yourself First
Written by Rhania Kamel. With Valentine’s Day being an unofficial American holiday, I understand that there’s this societal pressure to engage in romantic love and be part of a relationship that transcends the individual. For me, this day is an opportu …
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A Guide to Synthetic, AI and Human Voice for Your Brand
Written by Keaton. Fueled by the voice tech boom, everybody who’s anybody is building out a content audio strategy for their brand. Voice search and voice assistant technology using synthetic, artificial intelligence and human voices are becoming incre …
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Can Business Drive Meaning and Meaningfulness in the Workplace?
Written by Sesil Pir. Last week, the annual World Economic Forum (WEF) was once again held in Davos, Switzerland. A majority of us have the perception that the WEF is some kind of a billionaires’ club. In some ways, it is, though I discovered during la …
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Is Mindfulness Worthy of All the Hype?
Written by Emma Seppala. A British author friend, Ruth Whipmann, author of America the Anxious, was shocked by something when she moved the U.S.: Everyone was so busy going to their mindfulness class and yoga class that they didn’t have time to spend w …
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20 Things to Master Before You Turn 40
Written by Shana Lebowitz and Rachel Gillett. No one ever really feels like a “grown-up.” But if you’re approaching 40, well, you are one. And it’s high time you refined some crucial life skills, from staying healthy to saving money. Below, we’ve liste …
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8 Simple Steps to Improve Your Mental Health
Written by Doug Drinkwater. With one in four suffering a mental health problem in their lifetime, here are eight tips you can follow to improve your mental wellbeing. Check your diet We often assume that mental health problems may be triggered by relat …
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My New Year’s Resolution is Lovingkindness
Written by Stephanie Harper. I’ve always approached New Year’s resolutions with a certain level of discomfort. So often we resolve to quick fixes and instant gratification. Or we make goals that are either unrealistic or too nebulous, resolutions we’ll …
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Compassion is Good Medicine for Body, Mind, Spirit and Community
Written by Kory Wilcoxson and John Patterson. All religions share the common ethical principle of compassion, which is at the very heart of the Golden Rule: Do unto others as you would have them do unto you. The foundational precept of medicine and bio …
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When You and Your Friend Both Want the Same Promotion
Written by Emma Seppala and Christina Bradley. Research generally shows that having friends at work can increase productivity and engagement. However, a new study by Wharton researchers Julianna Pillemer and Nancy Rothbard finds that there can be a dar …
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