Conquer Perfectionism

High standards are great. Perfectionism? Not so much. In this class, we’ll take a look at why it’s so important to embrace the constraints of reality as we have fun incrementally optimizing–aggregating and compounding tiny improvements over time to create magic!

It's time to quit being a perfectionist and start being an optimalist. And Tal Ben-Shahar, the former Harvard (Positive Psych) Professor shares why we should care, and how we can look to our ideals as guiding stars rather than distant shores. If you, like me, have perfectionist tendencies, you'll love the book and you'll love the Note as we explore some Big Ideas on how to embrace the constraints of life as we get our inner-optimalist on!

Kristin Neff established self-compassion as a field of study almost a decade ago—bringing the Buddhist practice of self-compassion into her labs so the benefits could be empirically validated. In this Note, we explore the three core elements of self-compassion (self-kindness + common humanity + mindfulness) and why it's so important for us to cultivate!

Carol Dweck, Ph.D is a Stanford Professor and one of the world’s leading authorities on the science of motivation. She tells us that our “mindset”—how we see the world—determines a *huge* part of our overall happiness and well-being and achievement. In this Note, we’ll explore the difference between a “fixed mindset” and a “growth mindset” and some Big Ideas on why we want to learn how to live from a growth mindset. And, of course, how to do it!

Carol Dweck is one of the world’s leading researchers on the science of motivation. This book is a collection of brief essays on various aspects of “self-theories.” It’s essentially a bridge between her extensive academic research studies and her popular book Mindset. It’s amazing. Big Ideas we explore include the two frameworks (entity vs. incremental) and their two goals (performance vs. learning), attributional retraining (aka learning the best way to respond to failure!), and moving from contingent self-worth to wholehearted self-esteem.

You ever struggle with perfectionism? If so, it’s time to learn how to be an imperfectionist! Stephen Guise (author of Mini Habits), shows us the way. Big Ideas include being a poser, living within floors and ceilings, thinking vs. doing, pulling the lever, and cultivating result apathy.

This book is not only a golf/sports psychology classic, but a great primer on approaching life with the right mindset. If you’re into golf, you’ll love it. Big Ideas we explore include: Being an expander rather than a shrink, smaller targets leading to greater focus, the importance of your short game (in golf AND in life), fear vs. nervousness, paying a caddie to berate you and expectations: the good and the bad.

You're imperfect. (Hate to break it to you!) And that's awesome. Brene Brown, TED-talk rock star and all-around awesome human being also happens to be one of the world's shame and vulnerability researchers who stumbled upon the secrets of what she calls Wholehearted living. In this Note, we'll look at the Dos and Don'ts of rockin' it as we cultivate courage, connection and compassion to put our soul in a great mood.

Tim Grahl is one of the world’s leading book-launch marketing gurus. To put it in perspective: At one point, his clients held FIVE spots on the New York Times bestseller lists. (To be clear: That’s REALLY (!!) hard to do. Like, almost impossible.) But get this: That week when he achieved the pinnacle of success? He was miserable. And this book is his inspiring, super-vulnerable story of how he moved through many dark nights of the soul as he ran down his dream—to not only create a business and body of work that he’s proud of but, much more importantly, a LIFE of sustainable meaning and mojo and joy. Big Ideas we cover include: a practice to eliminate the nonessential, the fact that everyone is pretty much always (!) editing their lives, making it all one big experiment, scraping away the plaster to reveal your already-perfect Golden Buddha essence and the true joy of running down your dream!

Angela Duckworth is the world’s leading authority on the science of grit. In fact, she pioneered the field and, as Daniel Gilbert says on the cover: “Psychologists have spent decades searching for the secret of success, but Duckworth is the one who found it.” In this Note, we explore the two facets of grit (hint: passion + perseverance, why they’re important and how to cultivate them.

ACT. That’s where it’s at. This is our second Note on Russ Harris and his great introduction to Acceptance and Commitment Therapy. (Check out the Notes on The Confidence Gap as well.) In this book, Russ walks us through how we get caught in the happiness trap and, more importantly, how to free ourselves. We’ll take a quick look at the myths of happiness, the six principles of ACT, how to deal with emotional quicksand, how NOT to visualize (and what to do instead), and writing down your values (← science says that’s wise).