How Heavy Is It?

Maybe you’ve heard this story. It’s so good. Bears repeating. Here goes…

A professor once held up a glass of water and asked the class that very question.

“Eight ounces?” someone guessed. “Maybe twelve?” another said.

The teacher smiled and replied, “It doesn’t matter how heavy it is. What matters is how long I hold it. If I hold it for a minute, it’s fine. An hour, my arm will ache. A day, and I’ll collapse. The weight doesn’t change—but the longer I hold it, the heavier it feels.”

We’ve all heard versions of this story before—but it bears repeating because every one of us carries invisible glasses of our own. The worries, the deadlines, the what ifs. The longer we hold them, the heavier they feel.

It’s Not What Happens, It’s How We Hold It

Modern science is catching up with that timeless lesson. Stress, it turns out, isn’t just about what happens to us—it’s about how we hold what happens.

The American College of Lifestyle Medicine (2025) defines stress as a whole-body experience involving biology, psychology, and environment. When a challenge arises, hormones like cortisol and adrenaline surge to help us act. But when the “on” switch stays stuck, the system wears down. Chronic stress has been linked to inflammation, sleep problems, depression, and heart disease.

Even more interesting, recent research shows that how we interpret stress can change its impact. People who view stress as a signal to pause, breathe, and regroup recover faster than those who see it as purely harmful. Mindset matters—not just emotionally, but biologically.

Why It Feels Heavier Now

If you’ve felt more tense lately, you’re far from alone. A 2025 Managed Healthcare Executive report found that workplace stress and performance pressure are at record highs. “Nearly one in four young adults now report significant symptoms of burnout, according to the American Psychological Association’s Stress in America report.”

Outside of work, families are facing what The Guardian called a “stress crisis” tied to financial, health, and housing insecurity. And our kids and grandkids aren’t immune—student surveys show rising anxiety about everything from grades to global issues.

It’s as if everyone is holding their glass just too long.

What Happens When We Don’t Put the Glass Down

When stress becomes chronic, the nervous system forgets what “safe” feels like. The body stays on high alert—tight muscles, shallow breathing, scattered focus. It’s adaptive for a moment but exhausting over time.

Think of cortisol like caffeine: a little helps you focus; a constant drip leaves you jittery, sleepless, and drained. That’s the allostatic load—the wear and tear the body endures when recovery never happens.

As a psychotherapist and coach, I’ve seen how invisible this load can be. People think they’re fine until one small frustration—the email, the delay, the disagreement—tips them over. It’s not the event that breaks them; it’s the weight of everything they’ve been holding all along.

5 Science-Backed Ways to Lighten the Load

The good news is that stress is one of the most modifiable health risks we face. We can’t avoid all triggers, but we can change how we respond to them.

1. Small Pauses, Big Payoff

The 2025 UCS found that even five-minute “micro-moments” of rest—breathing, stretching, or quiet reflection—significantly improved mood and lowered perceived stress. You don’t need an hour of meditation; one mindful minute, repeated often, counts.

2. Move the Body, Free the Mind

Exercise remains one of the most powerful stress relievers. A brisk walk can lower cortisol within 20 minutes. Don’t think of movement as another task—think of it as emptying the glass a little before it spills.

3. Social Connect

The ACLM now recognizes social connection as a core pillar of stress management. A laugh with a friend, a quick call, or a shared meal all help to regulate hormones through oxytocin and parasympathetic activation.

4. Reframe, Don’t Deny

Pushing stress away doesn’t work—it just lodges deeper. Try naming it instead: This is stress, and my body’s doing its job. That simple acknowledgment engages the thinking brain and restores perspective.

5. Sleep Is Sacred

No amount of coffee can outthink a tired brain. Rest is recovery, not laziness. Quality sleep restores hormonal balance, clears emotional clutter, and lets the body repair the damage stress can cause.

For practical tips, the CDC’s “Managing Stress” guide offers accessible ways to reset during the day. And here is a fav of mine called One-Touch that I have written about before

The Challenge for High-Achievers

Many high-achievers—especially those who care deeply about doing things right—resist rest because it feels unproductive. But rest isn’t idleness; it’s essential maintenance.

When you rest, your nervous system recalibrates. Your thinking sharpens. Your ability to make decisions improves. Your emotional bandwidth returns.
And the problems that felt overwhelming suddenly become workable again.

The Reframe: Stress Isn’t the Villain

What if it’s a message rather than the villain we think it is?

What if it’s a message that Something needs attention. Maybe it’s too much, too fast, or too constant. When we listen, we can adjust. When we ignore it, it only grows louder.

The point isn’t to live a stress-free life—that’s not realistic. The point is to recognize it for what it is: information, not identity.

The weight of the glass, after all, was never the problem. The problem was forgetting or refusing to put it down.

The Real Lesson

Ask yourself: What’s in your glass today?

What thoughts, worries, or responsibilities are you carrying today that you could set down for another day, if not forever?

Take a breath. Stretch your shoulders. Call someone who makes you laugh. Step outside and feel the air. The science is clear: we were never meant to hold everything all the time.

So find something to set down. Rest your arm. You can always pick it back up if and when that’s the right thing to do.

And for help with this or something else contact me at weissmadelaine@gmail.com

Love,

Madelaine

What is Grit?

Grit is a psychological trait popularized by researcher Angela Duckworth’s bestseller: Grit: The Power of Passion and Perseverance. As the title suggests grit, “a combination of passion and perseverance for a singularly important goal—is the hallmark of high achievers in every domain.”

It is the resilience to keep pursuing your objectives over long periods, even when you are faced with difficulties, failures, or distractions. Duckworth’s research finds that grit is, therefore, more predictive of success than either intelligence or talent alone.

So, of course, grit is good for academic and career success, but that’s not all. Grit is good for just about every area of our lives. I can certainly think of times in my own life when resilience and persistence were my best friends.

Only one example would be the gusto with which I went after my hard and long treatment post-flesh-eating disease. Who knew if I would ever be able to use my right arm again? Who knew if I would even get to keep it? And if I did, who knew if I would be able to drive or work with whatever was left of it? And yet, I was determined that I would. So I could.

Every single one of us has survived everything we have ever been through to date, meaning chances are very good that you have your own examples of how grit helped you in some areas of your own life. For example…

What is Grit Good For?

Here are some areas where grit may have already, or can in the future, help you in your life.

• Academic Success: Students tend to perform better academically if they can persist through challenging coursework, setbacks, and failures. They are better able to maintain focus and motivation over the long term.
• Career Achievement: Here too, with career advancement and success, gritty people are more likely to overcome obstacles, take on challenging projects, and stay committed to their career goals.
• Personal Development: People who are more resilient in the face of adversity, are more likely to bounce back from setbacks and continue working toward personal growth and development.
• Health and Well-being: Individuals with grit cope better with stress, maintain healthy habits, and persevere through difficult situations, leading to improved overall well-being.
• Relationships: People with perseverance and commitment are more likely to invest time and effort into maintaining relationships, resolving conflicts, and overcoming relationship challenges.

Can you think of a time when your grit helped you in any of the areas above? And if you think that maybe you could use a little more grit, the good news is that you can grow it, and here is how.

How Can You Grow Grit?

A Norwegian pilot study found that participants who took a 35-40 online course grew their innate grit!

“We try to create an ‘I can’ attitude, a belief that they really will succeed. We also want to equip students with strategies that can help them evoke this feeling when they later find themselves in situations where they need it,” says Professor Sigmundsson.

Evoking this feeling over and over again can in itself strengthen the networks in the brain needed to develop greater grit over time.

As I have written about before, it also helps a lot to say “I get to” instead of “I have to” for whatever it is that you might be having trouble sticking with.

And for another easy DIY way to evoke this feeling of ‘I can” over and over again, you can try this:

Pause and Breathe: Take a moment to pause whatever you’re doing. Close your eyes if you feel comfortable, or simply gaze downward

Deep Breaths: Inhale deeply through your nose, feeling your belly expand. Exhale slowly through your nose, bringing your belly all the way back in.

Affirmations: Repeat affirmations related to specific tasks or goals you want to accomplish. For example:

“I am fully capable of completing this task with excellence.”

“I am confident in my ability to overcome any challenges that arise.”

“I am ready to take on this challenge and succeed.”

Visualize Success: Picture yourself, having completed the task at hand, feeling confident, focused, and accomplished.

Express Gratitude: Take a moment to express gratitude for the opportunity to work on this task or challenge, and for the skills and resources you have to accomplish it.

Return to the Present: When you’re ready, gently open your eyes, return your focus to present moment, feel the confidence and determination that comes from affirming your ability to succeed.

Practice, practice, practice… this mindfulness exercise whenever you need a motivational boost, or regularly to grow your grit in general for everything that may come your way.

For help with this or something else, Contact Me at weissmadelaine@gmail.com

With Love,

Madelaine

Why Do We Love Nature?

Some say it’s because landscapes remind us deeply of the lush habitat of the savanna – the favorable environment in which the biggest part of our evolutionary brain development is said to have taken place. There was 2016 research suggesting that just 30 minutes per week is enough to make a huge positive physical and mental difference in our lives: 

People who visit parks for 30 minutes or more each week are much less likely to have high blood pressure or poor mental health than those who don’t, according to new research by Australian and UK environmental scientists…. parks offered health benefits including reduced risks of developing heart disease, stress, anxiety, and depression. ‘If everyone visited their local parks for half an hour each week there would be seven percent fewer cases of depression and nine percent fewer cases of high blood pressure’.

It could be argued that our human fascination with nature is hardwired into our psyche, a relic of our ancestral past where green, open spaces signaled safety and abundance. These landscapes, often untouched by the crazy pace of modern civilization, offer a momentary return to simplicity and tranquility. The idea that a mere 30 minutes each week spent in such environments could significantly uplift our spirits and our health is not just intriguing, it’s almost magical, if not essential for our physical and mental health.

What the New Study Found

Now, researchers are finding that a 40-minute walk in nature significantly improves executive control. This includes, “working memory, decision making, problem-solving and coordinating disparate tasks,” things that matter a lot in work and life, as you know.

And no, it wasn’t just the 40 minutes of exercise, because the study controlled for that. Half of the participants walked in a nearby urbanized setting, with a similar elevation to the more natural setting, to make sure that results were not due to the exercise of the walk. Exercise has its benefits, of course, but not as much as when in nature, they found.

Now these University of Utah researchers are looking into which kinds of natural settings are best for optimizing the brain’s executive functioning, and how long the exposure has to be for there to be an effect that makes it worth your time.

Really, how many people can easily find 40 minutes to take a walk? Chances are that often enough in those moments when you most need your brain to be at its sharpest, you are also involved in something that makes it hard to find 40 minutes for a stroll, somewhere green out there.

Therefore, what?

What Else Can Help

What if you don’t happen to have a park nearby? Even if you did have a park nearby, first you’d have to get to the park and then you’d have to get back home or to the office, and that all takes time. Who has that kind of time? You do, we all do because if we can’t get to the park, well then we can just bring the park to us. Plants. Yes, plants help us de-stress too, and the Huffington Post even tells us exactly which plants to get.

This from an earlier post:

But maybe you travel or don’t have the right exposure for plants. Ok then, did you know that “Fireplace For Your Home” offers gorgeous greenery with a running brook, sound and all, which can be accessed on YouTube and Netflix. The funny thing about the brain is that as smart as it is, it can’t always tell the difference between what’s real or imagined.

 So, for example, when Harvard psychology professor, Ellen Langer, told hotel maids that their work was physical exercise their health measures improved, relative to the health measures of the hotel maids who thought they were just cleaning rooms. There were similar health benefits for seniors whom Langer instructed to imagine, and live for a period of time as if they had gone back in time and were much younger again.

Use your imagination. Bring to mind a time and place of green. Merge it with your breath. Breathing in through the nose, out through the nose. When the mind wanders bring the mind back to your beautiful green.

Practice, practice, practice, and see what happens… To work on this or something else, would love to hear from you weissmadelaine@gmail.com

Warmly,

Madelaine 

Photo by Freepik

Why Do People Procrastinate?

Just this week a couple of clients were suffering from procrastination. And just this week there was a study reported, on how to stay on task, that I believe can help us to get started on the tasks too. 

Naturally, I am intrigued by what makes it so hard to get started in the first place. After all, she put it on her list, she said she would do it, she even said that she wanted to do whatever it was, and then she didn’t.

It can be puzzling, if not deeply frustrating because they have no idea why they would behave so irrationally. But is it irrational, or is there something more going on? 

One of the first and best things I learned in business school was that people are rational.

Even if the reason is not conscious, still there is a reason ‘why not’ that is overpowering the ‘why’ they first wanted to do it at all. 

And what might that be? What is the reason for this mighty resistance to getting things done? 

Let’s talk about procrastination, something 94% of participants in one study said is ruining their happiness. From an earlier post on why so many people put off doing what they said they would:

What Causes Procrastination?

Go here if you want to read about the 2, 3, 4, 5, or 6 types of Procrastinators. I’m more interested in general causes than types, and found this great list, which you can unpack more here:

• • Abstract goals.
  • Outcomes that are far in the future.
  • A disconnect from our future self.
  • Feeling overwhelmed.
  • Anxiety.
  • Task aversion.
  • Perfectionism.
  • Fear(e.g., of failure, evaluation, or negative feedback).
  • Perceived lack of control.
  • ADHD.
  • Depression.
  • Lack of motivation.
  • Lack of energy.
  • Sensation seeking.

The list above got me thinking about someone I talked with just this week. Let’s call her Sue. 

Sue got called on the rug big time, by her director, for putting off things her director really wanted her to do. Turns out, Sue said that it was not that she didn’t like the tasks per se. Sometimes, that is the reason, task aversion, on the list above. But not in Sue’s case.

And, it was not that she had too much else to do. She did have other things to do, which she enjoyed more so she did those, especially since these other activities gave her a more enhanced sense of herself.-

I get Sue. A lot of adults don’t particularly appreciate being told what to do. They are adults after all. And they especially don’t like having whatever it is hanging over their heads, even if the nagging about things undone is coming from inside their own heads.

It’s intrusive and stressful. And they want it to go away, so they put it off, as if that will make it go away only it doesn’t. What we resist persists and only comes back stronger. 

And, it isn’t our most mature and effective shot to be digging our heels in like a 2-year-old when it comes to stuff we know we need to get done. 

What can we do instead?  

What to Do Instead of Procrastination

Not starting and not sticking with a task or commitment are 2 of the numerous types of procrastinating.

For both of these, instead of mindlessly (and/or willfully) procrastinating when we don’t feel like doing what we think we should—or said we would—what if we paused for a moment and asked ourselves what purpose would it serve to just get it done?

The University of Oregon study found that participants had a much easier time sticking with a task and with better performance when the task was associated with specific individual goals to pursue. Goal setting can knock out distractions that take us off task and motivate us in the direction of beginning tasks we have been putting off.

So, what about this? As only one example, what if a general purpose goal was that it simply feels terrific to get things done?

I pride myself on having the world’s shortest to-do list. I love how it feels to put my head on the pillow at night knowing I pretty much got it done, for not just myself but all the people counting on me too. Nobody is making me do anything. I am the adult, fully in charge.

And okay fine, sometimes I don’t get it all done, but it’s not like there is a big pile-up weighing me down and stealing my smile, because most things get done. And they get done because I want them to because it feels good. 

Maybe you can try this, or come up with a guiding goal that works better for you.

Practice, practice, practice…see what happens and let us know.

With love,

Madelaine

Photo by Freepik

What Drives Us?

Different people are driven by different things even though we all have the same drivers within us. And I have some examples for you. But first let’s unpack what we even mean by a driver.

Harvard Business School professors, Paul Lawrence and Nitin Nohria, detail our 4 basic human drives in Driven: How Human Nature Shapes Our Choices:

• To Acquire “objects and experiences that improve their status relative to others”
• To Bond “with others in long-term relationships of mutual commitment”
• To Learn “and make sense of the world and of themselves”
• To Defend “themselves, their loved ones, their beliefs, and their resources from harm”

The authors tell us that these capacities are deeply hardwired into our human brains because they improved our chances to survive and to thrive—and thereby to make more and more babies sharing these same traits. And here we all are. 

Although the drives are separate and the satisfaction of one does not directly satisfy the other, there is overlap. Take to learn. From the authors above: 

This drive is satisfied by a feeling of understanding, a feeling that things make sense…The theories of the world and of the self that the mind builds up will later, as a separate step, often be essential in guiding efforts to satisfy the drives to acquire, to bond, to defend.

Now here’s where we humans get into trouble. We get into trouble when one or another of these drives is running rampant and roughshod over all the other drives.  

This is because these drives are also our values. They are what we are designed to hold dear, to help guide our conduct in becoming the person we want to be, and in our interactions with the world in which we live. 

And, when we are driven by one at the expense of the others, we are denying and denigrating large swaths of who we are and what matters most to us.  

Moreover, the momentary high associated with satisfying a particular drive eventually fizzles out eventually. This is known as hedonic adaptation, which I have written about before, can be defined as:

… idea that an individual’s level of happiness, after rising or falling in response to positive or negative life events, ultimately tends to move back toward where it was prior to these experiences.

So because, by their very nature, drives are never really satisfied (or they wouldn’t be drivers anymore) we can find ourselves on a lifetime fool’s errand of more, more, more—with all of the low self-esteem and general unhappiness that goes along with it.

Let’s look at some examples.

Case Examples

One client is doing a great job advancing his career, but finding it hard to get “excited” about much of anything else in his life—family, friends, hobbies, self-care, and the like. 

His spouse has noticed and complained. Through our work together he has discovered an underlying irrational, intergenerational sense of financial insecurity fueling his drive to acquire beyond what makes sense and is good for himself and the ones he loves.

Another client is quite different in that she was raised in financial abundance, is also doing well in her career, and does not doubt for a second that she will live in financial abundance for the rest of her life.

But she can’t miss a party or a meeting, or any other opportunity to bond where others might be bonding without her. And she is exhausted to the bone, in what appears to be an unsustainable way.

Here we have social insecurity fueling her drive to bond in a way that could in time bring the house down on other areas of her life that are currently going well.

Yet another example is a woman who was so busy defending her beliefs that she was virtually blind to how much her defensive strategies were in the way of her truly deep wish to bond.

And, okay fine, here is mine—the drive to learn. A professor once even called it epistemic hunger so I guess it shows.  

One way that manifests with me is that I cannot take my eyes off of the news, trying to learn as much as I can, trying to make sense of it all, no matter how much we all know it cannot possibly be good to be immersing myself that deeply in the horrors of the day.

Notice I said that I cannot take my eyes off of the news. These drives can be so strong that it feels like a cannot when of course it is a can.

From Driven to Driving

How can we get our own hands on the driving wheel so that we are driving the drives instead of the other way around?

Studies show that the more we live in alignment with our true values, and not just one of them, the happier and healthier we are in work and life. Begin by:

• Making the unconscious conscious. Ask: In which of these 4 areas (acquiring, bonding, learning, defending) am I unconsciously, habitually, driven to put my own life far out of balance to the ultimate benefit of no one?

• Ask what’s at the root? Is there an insecurity from your childhood that is driving the drive? Reality test that. Is it really as life and death as it feels? Probably not.

• Then, ask what other area(s) of your life are being neglected by the current imbalance, and come up with some action steps to fortify those. Steps that are not too big, not too little, but just right to move you in a happier, healthier direction, respectful of all that you are.

Practice, practice, practice…and let us know what you find. For help with this or something else Contact Me at weissmadelaine@gmail.com

Love,

Madelaine

What’s Wrong with Meetings?

I actually love virtual meetings just as much as in-person meetings. Okay, maybe I love them more just because of how incredibly convenient they are.

Other people say they are tired of virtual. And, that could be because virtual meetings really do make our brains tired. That’s what researchers are finding. 

Before we get to that let’s talk a bit about the benefits. From an earlier post: 

…virtual meetings make it possible for different types of personalities to contribute in ways that suit them.

From a Harvard Business Review article: Hybrid or virtual meetings are inherently more inclusive than in-person ones, as they allow participation from all kinds of personalities — those who would raise their hand and speak and those who would prefer to chat in their comments.

And here are some fun facts from that same post:

• 71% of meetings are considered unproductive, costing $37 billion per year to American business.
• 55 million meetings per week in the U.S., 11 million per week, 1 billion per year
• 65% of employees agree meetings prevent work completion
• 41% multitask during meeting
• 91% daydream during meeting
• 55% think the meeting could have been an email

Studies have found that less than 2% of conversations end at a point when both people want them to, and that only about 10% of the time did both people wish the conversation had lasted longer.

Advice from Zippia:

The ideal meeting length is about 15 minutes. Studies show that in meetings that are no longer than 15 minutes, 91% of attendees are paying attention. This number steadily declines until it reaches only 64% in meetings over 45 minutes….You improve work meetings by determining the reason for the meeting beforehand, setting and distributing an agenda before the meeting, and limiting the meeting attendees to 10, maximum. As Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos says, “if you need more than two pizzas to feed everybody, there are too many people.”

Hope some of that helps with in-person getting together, in general. Now, what’s different about the virtual kind? 

What’s Different About Virtual Meetings?

Here is what the 2 studies found. One found that video conferencing was significantly more exhausting than the in-person kind, characterized by feeling tired and alienated. 

In addition to the subjective reporting of previous studies, these researchers tested the neurophysiology (EEG and ECG) of participants who either attended a 50-minute lecture in-person or by video conferencing, concluding that: 

A better understanding of videoconference fatigue is important, as this phenomenon has a far-reaching impact on the well-being of individuals, interpersonal relationships and organizational communication. 

The other study, reported by Science Daily at the same time, explored the drowsiness that occurred during 400 meetings of 44 knowledge workers. These researchers also used physiological methods, shadowed participants to link responses to events, and administered questionnaires to assess how engaged and enthusiastic participants were about their work.

What they found was that the better the participants felt about their work, the better they could stay actively engaged in a virtual meeting without fatigue. Less engaged and enthusiastic participants found virtual very tiring, and more tiring than the in-person kind. 

Here are some possible reasons.  Contrary to the commonly held idea that Zoom causes overload, if disengaged workers turn their cameras off, let’s say, the lack of cognitive and social cues can leave them underloaded (understimulated) instead. As in, bored. 

So they start multitasking, and it is straining to focus cognitively on more than one thing at once that exhausts the brain. The brain doesn’t do two things at once very well.  

For example, an MIT Neuroscientist explains what happens if we try to take a phone call in the middle of a writing project:

The brain has to stop focusing on writing, switch to listening, and then back to writing. But in returning to the first task, the brain has to use more energy to focus and get back into the flow. According to Professor Miller, the small interruption wastes time and increases the chances of making mistakes. 

And yet, we are wired to try anyway because, back in the day when the modern human brain was being formed, it was good to be able to pay attention to a few important matters at the same time. Food over here, danger over there—stop whatever you are doing, reproductive opportunity right now. 

Today, however, there are more than a few things calling on our attention, and the brain is just not designed to handle it all.  

So, what’s the takeaway? What can we do to improve virtual and in-person meetings, lectures, and any other occasions where we have to pay attention when we feel like doing anything but?

What is the Takeaway?

The authors of the second study say to walk. Walking is automatic so the brain doesn’t need to strain to make it happen. And walking can energize and assist rather than impede concentration. 

High-powered leaders must know this. “Walk with me,” they say. And it always seems so cool. But we can’t always do that. We can’t always invite people to walk around with us in the middle of a meeting, or a talk, or even to walk around going nowhere or somewhere ourselves. 

No worries, there is something else we can do anywhere, any time. And that is to laser-focus our attention on the one thing we are there to do. You may think that disciplining the mind that way will take more energy and make you more tired than if you let your mind wander around all over the place. But I bet you would be wrong 😉 

Practice, practice, practice…let us know what happens, and for help with this or something else, Contact Me at wessmadelaine@gmail.com

Happy Thanksgiving!

Madelaine

Photo by Freepik

What is a Promise? 

I just made a promise not to say anything else about something I have already said enough about, for now anyway. 😉 First and foremost, this is a promise I made to myself. I believe all promises are, first and foremost, promises to oneself to keep one’s word about whatever it was. 

Of course, when we break promises to others, we run the risk of damaging our reputations and relationships, so we don’t want to do a whole lot of that. Moreover, breaking our promises can deeply damage ourselves. Here, from a Huffington Post article, is how that works:

According to Self-Completion Theory (Wicklund & Gollwitzer, 1982), when we are committed to particular identity goals, like being a good parent, a talented artist, or a successful business person, we engage in a variety of activities in order to prove to ourselves (and to others) that we are in fact good parents, talented artists, or successful business people.

Some of these activities are essential to the identity — an artist isn’t really an artist if she doesn’t at least occasionally create some art. Other activities are purely symbolic — like self-praise (“Look at that brushwork. I am so good!”), or dressing the part by walking around in a paint-spattered smock. When we fail at some task that is relevant to our identity (e.g., a rejection from an art gallery, a bad review from an art critic), we feel a sense of incompleteness — saddened and anxious that we aren’t living up to our mental image of who and what we are supposed to be. 

Saddened, anxious, and more. It may not be conscious but deep-down people know that they are not living true to their word, and that if they are as good as their word, then they are not very good at all. They, therefore, think they are not deserving of much, like my client a long time ago who embezzled funds and then wondered out loud why he didn’t have a good woman in his life. Bingo, as he came to realize that deep-down he didn’t feel deserving of one. So, he suffered.

Fitness tutor, Allison Lambert, put it this way:

Think back to a time when you were stood up by someone. You felt sad, hurt, unimportant, and disappointed in the person who canceled on you. Whether or not you sit in these emotions when you break a promise to yourself is up to you, but you can’t deny their existence. You, often unconsciously, start to view yourself as unreliable, flaky, and believe the narrative that you aren’t important and worthy of this time for you. Eventually, you start to view every goal or commitment you make for your improvement as optional.

Studies on cognitive dissonance show that when people’s actions and beliefs don’t line up, they usually change their beliefs to match their actions. You may be slowly but surely telling yourself you don’t matter and don’t deserve the time you’ve tried to set aside.

Surely you have heard, ‘You are only as good as your word’ and ‘Say what you do and do what you say.’ Shakespeare’s Hamlet advised, “This above all: to thine own self be true, and it must follow, as the night the day, thou canst not then be false to any man.” The Bible tells us “Simply let your ‘Yes’ be ‘Yes,’ and your ‘No,’ ‘No.’” And, of course there is Aesop’s Fable about “The Boy Who Cried Wolf.”

From Merriam-Webster: A promise is “a declaration that one will do or refrain from doing something specified.” And, the idea that we are not supposed to break them goes back far, even to ancient Mesopotamia (~1754 BCE), with the Code of Hammurabi, consisting of 282 laws about everyday life, including one for what happened (hands cut off) if someone got caught breaking their word.

These people were all onto something that is studied to this day. In fact, modern-day science shows a clear distinction between the neural activity of promise keepers and promise breakers. Their idea here is to use such findings to further our ability to detect people who act well-meaning on the surface but turn out to be malevolent in the end.

But not all promise breakers are bad actors. Sometimes good people have their reasons, so what are some of the reasons even good people might, and even should, break promises to themselves and others sometimes?

Why Do We Break Them?

The definition above, “a declaration that one will do or refrain from doing something specified,” doesn’t distinguish whether the one making the promise is even aware they have made it. Here is an example of a promise I should have broken if only I had realized that I made it. From an earlier post on promises:

As only one example, I did not realize until long after big damage was done that I had made a promise to myself to maintain emotional composure no matter what.

So, when I was in the ER with not yet diagnosed flesh-eating disease and they kept sending me home, I should have thrown a fiery fit and refused to budge, but kept my promise to myself to be composed and cooperative instead.

Had I broken this promise to myself, I would not have a mark on me today, could have avoided the 7 weeks in the hospital, 10 trips to the OR, the $397,000 the healthcare system spent on my care…you get the idea.  

So here we have a perfect example of the Self-Completion Theory we talked about above. There I was keeping a promise to myself that was completely out of touch with the situation at hand, a promise I should have broken, just like Shirley MacLaine in Terms of Endearment, when out of control screamed “Give my daughter her shot.”

Now, what are some other reasons to break promises? Personal development coach, Jan Bowen, lists four, paraphrased here:

1. You honestly do have good intentions but something came up, like a family member got sick and needed your care.
2. You’re stating the behavior of the person you wish to be (the Self Completion Theory again), even though the commitment may have been unrealistic in the first place.
3. You don’t feel like ‘enough’ as you are so you overpromise, which seems very much related to #2 above.
4. You’re uncomfortable saying ‘no’, which seems key for all of the above.

Let’s just boil this down into two things to know.

Two Things to Know

Two things to know that might help a lot: 1) Know why we are saying yes, and 2) Know how to say no.

1) Know why we are saying yes: If possible, before you make a promise to yourself or another, check first to see how much the promise is meant to enhance your sense of self. That’s okay if it is—as long as the fulfillment of the promise is realistic as well. Then, of course, keep the promise, if you possibly can.

2) Know how to say no: For the times when we cannot make or keep a promise, it is helpful to remember that there are layers to promises. Whether it is a promise to oneself and/or another, the deepest and most important layer can be the promise of caring. Even when, especially when, we are unable to fulfill the actual promise, we can always fulfill the promise of caring by affirming that first.

I believe that buried within every NO there is a YES, and that we should lead with the YES. For deadlines, for example, ‘Yes I will definitely get this done (I care), but I’ve already said yes to these 2 other projects, so what is the latest date by which this must be done?’ Or ‘Yes I know how really important this (I care), but I’ve already said yes to these 2 other projects, who else can step in until I can?’   

For disappointing a friend or family member, YES to ‘I love you (I care), and am so sorry I could not XXX because of XXX; tell me how else I can help.’ And, for disappointing ourselves, sure why not, same thing, YES to ‘I love you (I care), and am so sorry I could not XXX because or XXX; tell me how else I can help.’

Practice, practice, practice…see what happens and let us know. For help with this or something else, Contact me at weissmadelaine@gmail.com

Warmly,

Madelaine

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What To Say in Terribly Tender Times?

The past week has been so hard for so many that I could not imagine posting any of the usual on what science can tell us about how to live more satisfying and successful lives. Who cares, I thought, what could possibly seem anything but tone deaf or out of sync with everything right now?

Not surprisingly, I just saw a tweet pointing out how strange it can feel to hear political speeches about some of the more mundane domestic issues in the context of what is going on in the world.

On Instagram last week, someone else struggling with what to say announced something like, ‘I’m out, I just can’t right now, nothing I would write about would seem anything other than ridiculous right now, so I’m out.’

Jen Gottlieb, author of BE SEEN: Find Your Voice, Build Your Brand, Live Your Dream, also posted a beautiful message last week on how awkward everyday business discourse may have felt at that time.

Some people are huddling with like-minded others, people with whom they can speak freely, but even with like-minded others there can be a question of how much is too much. And at work, or even in our own families and communities, there may be people who matter to us but simply do not see the current situation as we see it ourselves.

Not something I usually do, I ran the first draft of this post by two dear friends who see things very differently from each other right now. These are two people who matter to me a lot, and two relationships I very much want to protect in these terribly tender times.

One said she thought I was advocating for a kind of neutrality that she was not feeling. The other on what to say, said no words but sent an emoji with faucet tears that left me wondering whether she was laughing or crying, or both.

To be clear, I am not at all advocating for neutrality for people who are feeling anything but. And, if my other friend’s laughing or crying, or both, meant that she thought what I was proposing—a way for people to protect relationships that matter in these terribly tender times—is not possible, well then, there we have just another difference among friends.

On Intensifying Differences

Let’s start with the differences. This is a favorite story of mine on how differently we may each see the world and what goes on among us in it. It is the story of the Blind Men and the Elephant, as follows with a version from textbook editor and author James Baldwin:

The Blind Men and the Elephant is a parable from India that has been adapted by many religions and published in various stories for adults and children. It is about a group of blind men who attempt to learn what an elephant is, each touching a different part, and disagreeing on their findings. Their collective wisdom leads to the truth.

There were once six blind men who stood by the road-side every day, and begged from the people who passed. They had often heard of elephants, but they had never seen one; for, being blind, how could they?

It so happened one morning that an elephant was driven down the road where they stood. When they were told that the great beast was before them, they asked the driver to let him stop so that they might see him.

Of course they could not see him with their eyes; but they thought that by touching him they could learn just what kind of animal he was.

The first one happened to put his hand on the elephant’s side. “Well, well!” he said, “now I know all about this beast. He is exactly like a wall.”

The second felt only of the elephant’s tusk. “My brother,” he said, “you are mistaken. He is not at all like a wall. He is round and smooth and sharp. He is more like a spear than anything else.”

The third happened to take hold of the elephant’s trunk. “Both of you are wrong,” he said. “Anybody who knows anything can see that this elephant is like a snake.”

The fourth reached out his arms, and grasped one of the elephant’s legs. “Oh, how blind you are!” he said. “It is very plain to me that he is round and tall like a tree.”

The fifth was a very tall man, and he chanced to take hold of the elephant’s ear. “The blindest man ought to know that this beast is not like any of the things that you name,” he said. “He is exactly like a huge fan.”

The sixth was very blind indeed, and it was some time before he could find the elephant at all. At last he seized the animal’s tail. “O foolish fellows!” he cried. “You surely have lost your senses. This elephant is not like a wall, or a spear, or a snake, or a tree; neither is he like a fan. But any man with a particle of sense can see that he is exactly like a rope.”

Then the elephant moved on, and the six blind men sat by the roadside all day, and quarreled about him. Each believed that he knew just how the animal looked; and each called the others hard names because they did not agree with him. People who have eyes sometimes act as foolishly.

Thoughts are not facts. They are events of the mind, based on some mix of who we are when we come into the world and then all of what happens to us once we are here. Nature and nurture as they say.

But all day long they argued, as some now do too, about how much more right than the other they are sure they are.

One Way on What to Say 

What to say can be a dilemma. On the one hand, people are saying it is hard for them to talk about everyday things. Given the suffering we are witnessing, who are we to be complaining about our broken dishwasher or broken toe? Who are we to be talking about the great meal we just had on our glorious vacation, or the new program we just launched?

But then, when we talk about what we really feel about what’s going on in our nation and our world, like the blind men with the elephant we can wind up arguing with the very people we really don’t need to be in conflict with right now. 

Ohio State just published a new study on what to say when values clash. The study focused on values clashing in the workplace, but its findings may be applied in families and communities, if not universities, where ramped-up values clashing is all over the news.

From an article on the Ohio State study quoting the lead author of the study: 

“Organizations know that it is valuable to have employees with different perspectives. But if those with different perspectives feel they aren’t respected and so aren’t fully participating in their jobs, organizations aren’t fully reaping the benefits of their unique perspectives.”

For both the studies in the experimental lab and in real-life work situations:

The key in all the studies was the importance of people talking about themselves in the workplace—not about areas where they disagree, but just about their everyday life experiences.

In short, rather than retreat unto themselves when they don’t know what to say that is okay, to the detriment of themselves and their organization; nor, conversely, to openly engage in arguing about their differing beliefs on right and wrong—the ones who did talk personally about topics like what they did over the weekend reported feeling more respected, connected, and able to focus on doing good work.

And yet, that kind of small talk is exactly what some of us are avoiding. I’ve even heard people say they just can’t stand to listen to it right now. But maybe what to say doesn’t have to be either/or; that is, that either we talk about difficult things or we don’t talk at all.  

What if, first, we acknowledge openly what tender times these are, and that we would, therefore, like to chat about things that more bring us together than pull us apart.

If you think this might be worth a try, practice, practice, practice…let us know what you find, and for help with this or something else, Contact Me at weissmadelaine@gmail.com

Warmly,

Madelaine

Photo by FreePik

What’s Great About Walking?

Agency, among other things. Humans love agency. So many clients use the word. Merriam-Webster defines it as “the capacity, condition, or state of acting or of exerting power.”

A new study tells us that babies birth their agency very early on, as they struggle with and delight in their interaction with their brains, their bodies, and their environment. Learning to walk is only one example.

Walking is a superfood for the brain. From a recent New York Times report:

Researchers analyzed 17 studies that looked at how many steps people took, typically in a weeklong period, and followed up on their health outcomes after around seven years. They concluded that a habit of walking just under 4,000 steps per day reduced the risk of dying from any cause, including cardiovascular disease.

And how it makes us smarter and happier too is that walking is a hugely complicated cognitive task that:

…loosens us up to make new connections that help spark new ideas. It dampens down the stress and anxiety that keep us from curiosity and learning. It can even change your personality for the better over time.

And yet, despite how hard-won this superpower is, many who can walk take walking for granted. Walking has even become a should. Have to confess that I feel it myself every time my watch says it is time to get up on my feet. Why can’t I just sit?

What’s Wrong with Sitting?

From an earlier post on sitting too much:

It’s not just mental health. There’s a long list of physical problems associated with sitting too much:

• • Large leg and butt muscle weakening, which can result in more falls and strains
  • Bowel dysfunction
  • Weight gain and metabolic syndrome
  • Back and hip joint compression and degeneration
  • Varicose veins and deep vein thrombosis (clots)
  • Neck and shoulder pain
  • Cancer, e.g., lung, uterine, colon
  • Diabetes, 112% higher risk for sitters
  • Heart disease, 147% higher risk for sitters

Yikes. And what am I doing right now? Yeah, I’m sitting, which is how I love to write, with the laptop, well…on my lap.

There is something about sitting that I love. Rafael Leonardo (my Havanese puppy) doesn’t sit like I do. Only when he wants something. Then. He sits and stares to make it happen.

Animals in general don’t sit as much as we do. And why humans like to sit so much was nowhere to be found, not by me anyway, on the internet. So, if any of you know why humans sit so much do tell.

For now, I am just going to guess that sitting helped us to survive and thrive as a species because it’s the best of both worlds between lying down and standing. That is, sitting conserves energy (25%) at the same time that it keeps us upright enough to jump into action a lot quicker and easier than if we were lying down. That’s good but, as with most things, too much of this good thing could become not good at all.

What Are We Doing?

Here are some recent stats: Sedentary jobs have increased by 83% since 1950, and the average person sits 12 hours per day. Yeah, that’s not good. We can do better.

Even justsstand.org, and Ergotron site, wants us to not just use their standing desks but to get walking too, but they make the point that even if people have walking meetings, let’s say, this doesn’t prevent them from also sitting way too much. In other words, there is plenty of time in the day to take walks and also still sit too much.

Unless…we go with what The Mayo Clinic suggests, which is standing up every 30 minutes no matter what. Whether we are watching TV, taking a call, meeting with someone, or doing nothing much at all: Just. Get. Up.

Practice, practice, practice…and let us know what you find. And for help with this or something else, Contact Me at madelaineweiss.com

Photo by Freepik