Stick with It – by Dr. Sean Young

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Most of us know the theory when it comes to building new habits and/or replacing old ones, and maybe we even implement those ideas. So why is our success rate still not as high as we think it should be?

Dr. Sean Young is here to do science to it!

This book comes with advice and explanations that rely a lot less on “that sounds reasonable” and a lot more on “in this recent high-quality study, researchers found…”

And, at 10almonds, we love that. We’re all for trying new things that sound reasonable in general… but we definitely prefer when there’s a stack of solid science to point to, and that’s the kind of thing we recommend!

Dr. Young is big on using that science to find ways to trick our brains and get them working the way we want.

Each chapter has lots of science, lots of explanations, and lots of actionable step-by-step advice.

Bottom line: if you’re all over “Atomic Habits”, this one’s the science-based heavy-artillery for your practical neurohacking.

Click here to check out “Stick With It” on Amazon today, and start enjoying the much easier (and more lasting) rewards!

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  • Waist Size Worries: Age-Appropriate Solutions

    10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.

    It’s Q&A Day at 10almonds!

    Have a question or a request? You can always hit “reply” to any of our emails, or use the feedback widget at the bottom!

    In cases where we’ve already covered something, we might link to what we wrote before, but will always be happy to revisit any of our topics again in the future too—there’s always more to say!

    As ever: if the question/request can be answered briefly, we’ll do it here in our Q&A Thursday edition. If not, we’ll make a main feature of it shortly afterwards!

    So, no question/request too big or small

    ❝My BMI is fine, but my waist is too big. What do I do about that? I am 5′ 5″ tall and 128 pounds and 72 years old.❞

    It’s hard to say without knowing about your lifestyle (and hormones, for that matter)! But, extra weight around the middle in particular is often correlated with high levels of cortisol, so you might find this of benefit:

    Lower Your Cortisol! (Here’s Why & How)

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  • The Science Of New Year’s Pre-Resolutions

    10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.

    The Science Of New Year’s Pre-Resolutions

    There’s a military dictum that “prior preparation and planning prevents piss-poor performance”.

    Would it surprise you to know that soldiers going on the attack are not focused on the goal? Rather, they are focused on the process.

    With drills and mnemonics, everything that can be controlled for in advance is; every action, every reaction, everything that can go wrong, and all the “if x then y” decisions in between pre-battle PREWAR and PAWPERSO and post-battle PACESDO (all mnemonic acronyms; the content is not important here but the principle is).

    In short: take Murphy’s Law into account now, and plan accordingly!

    The same goes for making your plans the winning kind

    If you want your resolutions to work, you may need to make pre-resolutions now, so that you’re properly prepared:

    • Do you want to make an exercise habit? Make sure now that you have the right clothes/shoes/etc, make sure that they fit you correctly, make sure you have enough of them that you can exercise when one set’s in the wash, etc.
      • What grace will you allow yourself if tired, unwell, busy? What’s your back-up plan so that you still do what you can at those times when “what you can” is legitimately a bit less?
      • If it’s an outdoors plan, what’s your plan for when it’s rainy? Snowy? Dangerously hot?
      • What are the parameters for what counts? Make it measurable. How many exercise sessions per week, what duration?
    • Do you want to make a diet habit? Make sure that you have in the healthy foods that you want to eat; know where you can and will get things. We’re often creatures of habit when it comes to shopping, so planning will be critical here!
    • Do you want to cut some food/drink/substance out? Make sure you have a plan to run down or otherwise dispose of your current stock first. And make sure you have alternatives set up, and if it was something you were leaning on as a coping strategy of some kind (e.g. alcohol, cannabis, comfort-eating, etc), make sure you have an alternative coping strategy, too!

    See also: How To Reduce Or Quit Alcohol

    We promised science, so here it comes

    Approach-oriented resolutions work better than avoidance-oriented ones.

    This means: positively-framed resolutions work better than negatively-framed ones.

    On a simple level, this means that, for example, resolving to exercise three times per week is going to work better than resolving to not consume alcohol.

    But what if you really want to quit something? Just frame it positively. There’s a reason that Alcoholics Anonymous (and similar Thing Anonymous groups) measure days sober, not relapses.

    So it’s not “I will not consume alcohol” but “I will get through each day alcohol-free”.

    Semantics? Maybe, but it’s also science:

    A large-scale experiment on New Year’s resolutions: Approach-oriented goals are more successful than avoidance-oriented goals

    Why January the 1st? It’s a fresh start

    Resolutions started on the 1st of January enjoy a psychological boost of a feeling of a fresh start, a new page, a new chapter.

    Similar benefits can be found from starting on the 1st of a month in general, or on a Monday, or on some date that is auspicious to the person in question (religious fasts tied to calendar dates are a fine example of this).

    Again, this is borne-out by science:

    The Fresh Start Effect: Temporal Landmarks Motivate Aspirational Behavior

    Make it a habit

    Here be science:

    How do people adhere to goals when willpower is low? The profits (and pitfalls) of strong habits

    As for how to do that?

    How To Really Pick Up (And Keep!) Those Habits

    Trim the middle

    No, we’re not talking about your waistline. Rather, what Dr. Ayelet Fischbach refers to as “the middle problem”:

    ❝We’re highly motivated at the beginning. Over time, our motivation declines as we lose steam. To the extent that our goal has a clear end point, our motivation picks up again toward the end.

    Therefore, people are more likely to adhere to their standards at the beginning and end of goal pursuit—and slack in the middle. We demonstrate this pattern of judgment and behavior in adherence to ethical standards (e.g., cheating), religious traditions (e.g., skipping religious rituals), and performance standards (e.g., “cutting corners” on a task).

    We also show that the motivation to adhere to standards by using proper means is independent and follows a different pattern from the motivation to reach the end state of goal pursuit❞

    Read: The end justifies the means, but only in the middle

    How to fix this, then?

    Give yourself consistent, recurring, short-term goals, with frequent review points. That way, it’s never “the middle” for long:

    The fresh start effect: temporal landmarks motivate aspirational behavior

    See also:

    How do people protect their long-term goals from the influence of short-term motives or temptations?

    Finally…

    You might like this previous main feature of ours that was specifically about getting oneself through those “middle” parts:

    How To Keep On Keeping On… Long Term!

    Enjoy!

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  • Paris in spring, Bali in winter. How ‘bucket lists’ help cancer patients handle life and death

    10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.

    In the 2007 film The Bucket List Jack Nicholson and Morgan Freeman play two main characters who respond to their terminal cancer diagnoses by rejecting experimental treatment. Instead, they go on a range of energetic, overseas escapades.

    Since then, the term “bucket list” – a list of experiences or achievements to complete before you “kick the bucket” or die – has become common.

    You can read articles listing the seven cities you must visit before you die or the 100 Australian bucket-list travel experiences. https://www.youtube.com/embed/UvdTpywTmQg?wmode=transparent&start=0

    But there is a more serious side to the idea behind bucket lists. One of the key forms of suffering at the end of life is regret for things left unsaid or undone. So bucket lists can serve as a form of insurance against this potential regret.

    The bucket-list search for adventure, memories and meaning takes on a life of its own with a diagnosis of life-limiting illness.

    In a study published this week, we spoke to 54 people living with cancer, and 28 of their friends and family. For many, a key bucket list item was travel.

    Why is travel so important?

    There are lots of reasons why travel plays such a central role in our ideas about a “life well-lived”. Travel is often linked to important life transitions: the youthful gap year, the journey to self-discovery in the 2010 film Eat Pray Love, or the popular figure of the “grey nomad”.

    The significance of travel is not merely in the destination, nor even in the journey. For many people, planning the travel is just as important. A cancer diagnosis affects people’s sense of control over their future, throwing into question their ability to write their own life story or plan their travel dreams.

    Mark, the recently retired husband of a woman with cancer, told us about their stalled travel plans:

    We’re just in that part of our lives where we were going to jump in the caravan and do the big trip and all this sort of thing, and now [our plans are] on blocks in the shed.

    For others, a cancer diagnosis brought an urgent need to “tick things off” their bucket list. Asha, a woman living with breast cancer, told us she’d always been driven to “get things done” but the cancer diagnosis made this worse:

    So, I had to do all the travel, I had to empty my bucket list now, which has kind of driven my partner round the bend.

    People’s travel dreams ranged from whale watching in Queensland to seeing polar bears in the Arctic, and from driving a caravan across the Nullarbor Plain to skiing in Switzerland.

    Humpback whale breaching off the coast
    Whale watching in Queensland was on one person’s bucket list. Uwe Bergwitz/Shutterstock

    Nadia, who was 38 years old when we spoke to her, said travelling with her family had made important memories and given her a sense of vitality, despite her health struggles. She told us how being diagnosed with cancer had given her the chance to live her life at a younger age, rather than waiting for retirement:

    In the last three years, I think I’ve lived more than a lot of 80-year-olds.

    But travel is expensive

    Of course, travel is expensive. It’s not by chance Nicholson’s character in The Bucket List is a billionaire.

    Some people we spoke to had emptied their savings, assuming they would no longer need to provide for aged care or retirement. Others had used insurance payouts or charity to make their bucket-list dreams come true.

    But not everyone can do this. Jim, a 60-year-old whose wife had been diagnosed with cancer, told us:

    We’ve actually bought a new car and [been] talking about getting a new caravan […] But I’ve got to work. It’d be nice if there was a little money tree out the back but never mind.

    Not everyone’s bucket list items were expensive. Some chose to spend more time with loved ones, take up a new hobby or get a pet.

    Our study showed making plans to tick items off a list can give people a sense of self-determination and hope for the future. It was a way of exerting control in the face of an illness that can leave people feeling powerless. Asha said:

    This disease is not going to control me. I am not going to sit still and do nothing. I want to go travel.

    Something we ‘ought’ to do?

    Bucket lists are also a symptom of a broader culture that emphasises conspicuous consumption and productivity, even into the end of life.

    Indeed, people told us travelling could be exhausting, expensive and stressful, especially when they’re also living with the symptoms and side effects of treatment. Nevertheless, they felt travel was something they “ought” to do.

    Travel can be deeply meaningful, as our study found. But a life well-lived need not be extravagant or adventurous. Finding what is meaningful is a deeply personal journey.

    Names of study participants mentioned in this article are pseudonyms.

    Leah Williams Veazey, ARC DECRA Research Fellow, University of Sydney; Alex Broom, Professor of Sociology & Director, Sydney Centre for Healthy Societies, University of Sydney, and Katherine Kenny, ARC DECRA Senior Research Fellow, University of Sydney

    This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

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Related Posts

  • Treat Your Own Hip – by Robin McKenzie
  • Hair Growth: Caffeine and Minoxidil Strategies

    10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.

    Questions and Answers at 10almonds

    Have a question or a request? You can always hit “reply” to any of our emails, or use the feedback widget at the bottom!

    This newsletter has been growing a lot lately, and so have the questions/requests, and we love that! In cases where we’ve already covered something, we might link to what we wrote before, but will always be happy to revisit any of our topics again in the future too—there’s always more to say!

    As ever: if the question/request can be answered briefly, we’ll do it here in our Q&A Thursday edition. If not, we’ll make a main feature of it shortly afterwards!

    So, no question/request too big or small

    Hair growth strategies for men combing caffeine and minoxidil?

    Well, the strategy for that is to use caffeine and minoxidil! Some more specific tips, though:

    • Both of those things need to be massaged (gently!) into your scalp especially around your hairline.
      • In the case of caffeine, that boosts hair growth. No extra thought or care needed for that one.
      • In the case of minoxidil, it reboots the hair growth cycle, so if you’ve only recently started, don’t be surprised (or worried) if you see more shedding in the first three months. It’s jettisoning your old hairs because new ones were just prompted (by the minoxidil) to start growing behind them. So: it will get briefly worse before it gets better, but then it’ll stay better… provided you keep using it.
    • If you’d like other options besides minoxidil, finasteride is a commonly prescribed oral drug that blocks the conversion of testosterone to DHT, which latter is what tells your hairline to recede.
    • If you’d like other options besides prescription drugs, saw palmetto performs comparably to finasteride (and works the same way).
      • You may also want to consider biotin supplementation if you don’t already enjoy that
    • Consider also using a dermaroller on your scalp. If you’re unfamiliar, this is a device that looks like a tiny lawn aerator, with many tiny needles, and you roll it gently across your skin.
      • It can be used for promoting hair growth, as well as for reducing wrinkles and (more slowly) healing scars.
      • It works by breaking up the sebum that may be blocking new hair growth, and also makes the skin healthier by stimulating production of collagen and elastin (in response to the thousands of microscopic wounds that the needles make).
      • Sounds drastic, but it doesn’t hurt and doesn’t leave any visible marks—the needles are that tiny. Still, practise good sterilization and ensure your skin is clean when using it.

    See: How To Use A Dermaroller ← also explains more of the science of it

    PS: this question was asked in the context of men, but the information goes the same for women suffering from androgenic alepoceia—which is a lot more common than most people think!

    Don’t Forget…

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  • Who Initiates Sex & Why It Matters

    10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.

    In an ideal world, it wouldn’t matter any more than who first says “let’s get something to eat” when hungry. But in reality, it can cause serious problems on both sides:

    Fear and loathing?

    The person who initiates gets the special prize of an n% chance of experiencing rejection, and then what? Try again, and again, and risk seeming pushy? Or leave the ball in the other person’s court, where it may then go untouched for the next few months, because (in the most positive scenario) they were waiting for you to initiate at a better time for them?

    The person who does not initiate, and/but does not want sex at that time, gets the special prize of either making their partner feel unwanted, insecure, and perhaps unloved, or else grudgingly consenting to sex that’s going to be no fun while your heart’s not in it, and thus create the same end result plus you had an extra bad experience?

    So, that sucks all around:

    • Initiating touch (sex or cuddling) can feel like a test of being wanted, whereupon a lack of initiation or response may be misinterpreted as a lack of love or appreciation.
    • Meanwhile, non-reciprocation might stem from exhaustion or unrelated issues. For many, it’s a physiological lottery.

    10almonds note: not discussed in this video, but for many couples, problems can also arise because one partner or another just isn’t showing up with the expected physical signs of physiological arousal, so even if they say (and mean!) an enthusiastic “yes”, their body’s signs get misread as a “not really, though”, resulting in one partner feeling rejected, and both feeling inadequate—on account of something that was completely unrelated to how the person actually felt about the prospect of sex*.

    *Sometimes, physiological arousal will simply not accompany psychological arousal, no matter how sincere the latter. And on the flipside, sometimes the signs of physiological arousal will just show up without psychological arousal. The human body is just like that sometimes. We all must listen to our partners’ words, not their genitals!

    The solution to this problem is thus the same as the solution to the rest of the problem that is discussed in the video, and it’s: good communication.

    That can be easier said than done, of course—not everyone is at their most eloquent in such situations! Which is why it can be important to have those conversations first outside of the bedroom when the stakes are low/non-existent.

    Even with the best communication, a more general, overarching non-reciprocity (real or perceived) of sexual desire can cause bitterness, resentment, and can ultimately be relationship-ending if a resolution that’s acceptable to everyone involved is not found.

    Ultimately, the work as a couple must begin from within as individuals—addressing self-worth issues to better navigate love and intimacy.

    For more on all of this, enjoy:

    Click Here If The Embedded Video Doesn’t Load Automatically!

    Want to learn more?

    You might also like to read:

    Relationships: When To Stick It Out & When To Call It Quits

    Take care!

    Don’t Forget…

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  • Break the Cycle – by Dr. Mariel Buqué

    10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.

    Intergenerational trauma comes in two main varieties: epigenetic, and behavioral.

    This book covers both. There’s a lot more we can do about the behavioral side than the epigenetic, but that’s not to say that Dr. Buqué doesn’t have useful input in the latter kind too.

    If you’ve read other books on epigenetic trauma, then there’s nothing new here—though the refresher is always welcome.

    On the behavioral side, Dr. Buqué gives a strong focus on practical techniques, such as specific methods of journaling to isolate trauma-generated beliefs and resultant behaviors, with a view to creating one’s own trauma-informed care, cutting through the cycle, and stopping it there.

    Which, of course, will not only be better for you, but also for anyone who will be affected by how you are (e.g. now/soon, hopefully better).

    As a bonus, if you see the mistakes your parents made and are pretty sure you didn’t pass them on, this book can help you troubleshoot for things you missed, and also to improve your relationship with your own childhood.

    Bottom line: if you lament how things were, and do wish/hope to do better in terms of mental health for yourself now and generations down the line, this book is a great starting point.

    Click here to check out Break the Cycle, and do just that!

    Don’t Forget…

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    Learn to Age Gracefully

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