Category: Thoughts and Feelings
Emotion, cognition and the machinery underneath both. What the evidence says about how we think, what we feel at work, and the biases that shape decisions we believe we made rationally.
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Feeling Understood – A Starting Point for Connection
The sense of feeling understood by other people can be very powerful, and can be a key starting point for improving our mental health and thriving in what we do. Being Understood We were very struck by a comment by Peter Fonagy in a BBC radio 4 episode of The Life Scientific. […]
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Play Personalities – What is your style of play at work?
Play and playfulness yield great benefits for individuals, teams and organisations, but not everyone plays in the same way. There are thought to be eight distinct play personalities. Understanding them can help improve your own and your team’s playfulness. Play Personalities Play is an essential part of human behaviour. It serves as […]
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Negative Thinking Patterns – Unhelpful distortions in our thinking
Negative thinking patterns are often unhelpful traps our minds fall into in which we unhelpfully reinforce negative thoughts and feelings. They are often unhelpful for our actions, behaviours and wellbeing. Negative Thinking Patterns Negative thinking patterns, often referred to as cognitive distortions, are common ways that our minds convince us of something […]
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The Wolf Parable – A Parable of Mindset
The Wolf Parable is story about the inner conflicts we face in how we approach others and our personal agency in choosing and shaping how we approach the world. The Wolf Parable The wolf parable is a story that bounces around the internet and which often appears in the world of personal […]
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Flow – Moments of Optimal Experience
Flow is the term used by psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi to describe moments of heightened focus and immersion in activities that are both challenging and rewarding. It’s those moments of deep focus, where you’re lost from the world and time flies past as you’re absorbed in what you’re doing. Flow Flow is the […]
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Celebrating Success – A Key Activity for Engagement and Wellbeing
Celebrating your own and other’s work and personal successes is a key part of improving our positivity and experiences at work, as well as being a great way to strengthen team connections and relationships. Celebrating Success Celebrating success in the workplace is a key part of creating a good place with a […]
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Wheel of Wellbeing – Vitality in the World of Work
By focusing on behaviour changes across a combination of physical, cognitive and emotional and social factors, we can increase the likelihood of creating lasting improvements to our wellbeing and resilience. Wheel of Wellbeing The ‘Wheel of Wellbeing’ is a term and image we use to explain, coach and facilitate conversations in relation […]
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Circle of Influence – Focusing on what you can control or influence
The ‘circle of influence’ is a simple tool to help you visualise and recognise the things in life you have some influence over, and the things that are outside of your influence. You should focus on the former, and try not to waste energy thinking about the latter. Circle of Influence Once […]
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Values in Action Strengths – A Positive View of Core Strengths
Martin Seligman and Christopher Peterson propose that there are 24 human character strengths that we all have in some level. Understanding which of these are strongest in us can help improve our experiences, performance and happiness at work. Values in Action Strengths Values in Action (VIA) strengths are a concept that was […]
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How Emotions are Made: Lisa Feldman Barrett’s Constructed Emotion Theory
In her book, “How Emotions are Made, the Secret Life of the Brain”, Lisa Feldman Barrett lays out her model of constructed emotions in an accessible way. It says that our emotions are not universal and that, instead, they are a product of our cultures and experiences. She also says they are […]
