Last week’s review of Superabundance: The Story of Population Growth, Innovation, and Human Flourishing on an Infinitely Bountiful Planet generated a good LinkedIn discussion in The Letter Leader. Paul Born’s comment on Canada’s significant reduction in poverty rates is a great example of the progress documented in Superabundance. Here are a few quotes of note […]
Read post »As we look at a new year ahead, what do you think is the state of our world? Are we living in the best of times or the worst of times? Are these statements true or false? The poor are getting poorer as the rich get richer US carbon emissions are rising Home ownership is […]
Read post »In the Shakespearean tragedy titled after the main character, Hamlet ponders his imprisonment by Denmark and the King as well as in his own mind when he says, “There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so.” In my previous post in this series of posts on the nature of “reality,” we […]
Read post »A few years ago, I ran into an old acquaintance I hadn’t seen for a while. Our short conversation confirmed just why I hadn’t seen him — and wouldn’t again soon if I could help it! I started off with, “Hey Phil. How’s it going?” His response was, “Oh, you know; same crap, different day.” […]
Read post »Which dot is bigger? It looks like the right dot is quite a bit larger than the other one. But they are the same size. Go ahead, measure them. The framing around each dot changes our perception of its size. When hanging a painting on your wall, the size and color of the frame or […]
Read post »New Year, new newsletter! Since LinkedIn has become such a widely used professional network (nearly 800 million members), we’ve moved The Leader Letter to LinkedIn’s Newsletter platform. The Leader Letter will now become a “try-weekly” — I’ll try to post a weekly article. Each issue will focus on one of the personal, team, or leadership/organization […]
Read post »I’ve loved the Beatles for decades. Saturday has been Beatles Day at our house for many years. A big reason I subscribe to Sirius radio is because of Channel 18 — The Beatles channel. Our son, Chris, is now a Beatles fan after all those years of relentless exposure to their music. There are many […]
Read post »I kicked off 2020 with my sixth annual post on how our world keeps getting dramatically and relentlessly better and better and better. As in the five years before that, Lose those News Blues and Leave the Dark Side: The World’s Never Been Better, listed over 30 major improvements and 24 sources for further reading. […]
Read post »What a year!! 2020 is almost over… Like many of us, you’re likely going to stay up on New Year’s Eve just to make sure that old man 2020 is kicked out by a youthful and more hopeful 2021. These holidays will be different — and very memorable! Hopefully, you’ll have some time to pull […]
Read post »A few favorite excerpts (so many to choose from) of my review of Rutger Bregman’s Humankind: A Hopeful History. …to stand up for human goodness is to take a stand against the powers that be. For the powerful, a hopeful view of human nature is downright threatening. Subversive. Seditious. It implies that we’re not selfish […]
Read post »How many of these assumptions describe the reality of humankind: Corruption and cruelty lie just beneath the surface and can easily be pulled out of people. Civility is a thin veneer covering people’s selfish, sometimes evil tendencies. Laws and punishments are needed to curb dishonesty and violence. We’re all born into a world of sin […]
Read post »Wouldn’t it be nice if we all woke up this morning and the Coronavirus pandemic was a big April Fool’s joke? Unfortunately, it’s not and won’t go away soon. But it will go away. In 1848 William Blackwood wrote in Blackwood Edinburgh Magazine, “When an Eastern sage was desired by his sultan to inscribe on […]
Read post »As Heather and I work from, and stay home, to be part of the solution, I found myself gorging on way too much negative news. As my sleep and mood deteriorated, I went looking for an antidote to the pessimism plague. I began a search for reasons to be optimistic. One of the first articles […]
Read post »These comments and excerpts come from my last two blogs on Lose Those News Blues and Leave the Dark Side: The World’s Never Been Better and Don’t Start the New Year Losing Touch With Reality “In Christian tradition, the four horsemen of Famine, Pestilence, War, and Death usher in the apocalypse. Compared to 100 years […]
Read post »What if you invited me into your house and I sprayed a noxious gas that made you and your family sick? What if I also dumped a big barrel of stinking sewage on your kitchen floor? You’d likely have me arrested. You’d get out of the house until the mess is cleaned up and the […]
Read post »A few years ago, I facilitated a workshop with managers struggling to stay positive during a very difficult time. We discussed the choice we all have: either we can focus on a problem and let it overwhelm us, or we can keep things in perspective and re-frame what’s wrong within the much larger frame of […]
Read post »It’s time for our annual dose of reality. Let’s start the New Year with a perspective check. We’ve heard way too much from the “nattering nabobs of negativity,” purveyors of pessimism, and deliverers of doom. Let’s ditch the “crap glasses” and get real. Let’s look at what’s truly going on in the world. This annual […]
Read post »What do you see in this drawing? Tilt your head slightly to the left and look at this drawing. Do you see the rabbit? It’s facing to the right with its ears tilted horizontally behind its head on the left. Now tilt your head slightly to the right, and focus on the duck. It’s gazing […]
Read post »A few years ago, I ran into an old colleague I hadn’t seen for a while. Our short conversation confirmed just why I hadn’t seen him in a while. I greeted him with, “Hey Phil. How’s it going?” His response was, “Oh, you know; same crap, different day.” He then proceeded to proudly pile up […]
Read post »The Greater Good Science Center at UC Berkeley is part of the burgeoning research in the emerging field of Positive Psychology. Since 2001, the GGSC has been a leader in the “scientific movement to explore the roots of happy and compassionate individuals, strong social bonds, and altruistic behavior — the science of a meaningful life.” […]
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