5 Reading/Listening Tips For Week 20 2022

How Emotions Are Made — Lisa Feldman Barrett

If you think emotions are innate, uncontrollable reactions in the body, think again.

The psychology professor and neuroscientist Lisa Feldman Barrett has compiled a large set of research, both from her own lab and others’ lab. All of them show that emotions are predictions. They are not universal across cultures, but learned. They are interpretations of your body’s internal state, whether in energy, pain or other signals.

This is great news because you have the control over your emotions. Here are two action steps you can do right away:

• Learn multiple words for emotions. The richer your vocabulary is, the more control you have over them
• Observe what is going on in your body while you have particular emotions, and notice the triggers. Interpret them differently next time and you will not have the negative emotions.

This book deserves a summary of its own. Meanwhile, you can read it here (affiliate link).

Thinking In Systems — Donella Meadows

The definitive book to learn everything about system thinking and how complex systems (including us) behave. The author presents certain 12 leverage points and their effectiveness, from changing the variables to transcending the paradigms. I aspire to do a Twitter thread about these soon. You can read it here (affiliate link).