This column will change your life
Oliver Burkeman investigates routes to mental wellbeing
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Genuine self-knowledge relies on coming to see yourself as a stranger
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Never put off till tomorrow what you can do now, especially if you’re holding back in the hope of doing it properly
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‘Nobody, even Trump, should be blamed for being mentally ill. But nor should we pretend mental illness affects only the nice’
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Worrying about the risk of future regret is a rubbish way to spend your time, and therefore something you’re likely to regret
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Empathy requires mental gymnastics at the best of times. Empathy for whole categories of people requires Olympic-level skills
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What if you could increase the attention you paid to every moment, no matter how humdrum?
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We fret about distraction, yet choose to allow a device in our pocket to beep or buzz whenever someone else decides it should
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When events seem too much, what better solace than a reminder that they are, if you zoom out to a different timescale, indistinguishable from nothing at all?
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Even among couples who share housework and parenting, subtler inequities persist
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‘Given the right (or wrong) situation, each of us might become anyone’
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Diagnosing yourself as having writer’s block, rather than just not currently writing, will make matters worse
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Why advice written 20 years ago feels more necessary than ever in these mean-minded days
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In all sorts of industries, analogue products are making a comeback
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Deliberate ignorance helps explain why people don’t go to the doctor or check their bank balance; in the short term, it’s more comfortable to stay in the dark
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Being outraged all the time won’t help you fight back
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You could argue that hypocrites lack self-discipline, which we think of as a moral failing – but that hardly seems a good enough explanation
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If you witness a mugging, then scribble a record of what you’d seen, you’d be more prone to misremember than if you’d written nothing
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A trouble shared is a trouble multiplied. Take a calm approach to other people’s stress and you’ll help them, and yourself
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A new app that enables you to email memos to yourself? How revolutionary. No, really…
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It’s a sign of weakness, not strength, to write off your opponents… stick to your beliefs but find room for others’
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The web is cluttered with listicles offering the supposedly reassuring information that, say, JK Rowling wasn’t a publishing sensation until, well, her early 30s
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People are happier when they talk to strangers, even when they predict they’ll hate it
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Beware of giving your kids treats for doing chores, or gold stars for work well done
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The new spin on loneliness is that we ought to welcome it, in modest doses
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Railing against minor irritations is like falling out with your partner, then picking fights, over and over, for the sake of it. And when has that ever helped?
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The most obvious case, it goes without saying, is that of the proto-fascist misogynist who’s running for US president
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Before a public talk, if I remember to stand up straight and broaden my chest, I feel more confident
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True fun involves diving in and embracing the situation you’re in, grappling with its built-in constraints, not pushing it away
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What a new study reveals about this so-called dilemma of happiness
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Too little self-control makes you impulsive and prone to taking dangerous risks, but too much isn’t great, either
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There’s a frustrating irony about rest and recuperation: why should you take a proper, wholesome break? Because you’re tired. And why do you fail to do so? Because you’re tired
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There’s such a thing as too obedient, as the Simple Sabotage Field Manual shows
Bored? Now you know why