Texas, 1985. Seventeen undergraduates sit in a university laboratory, trying not to think of an Ursus maritimus—otherwise known as a polar bear. Five minutes earlier, a researcher named Daniel Wegner had given the instruction, “For the next fifteen minutes, please try not to think about white bears.” [1] “The mere act of trying not to […]

A four-person team was standing in front of a box of assorted items. The challenge was simple: the team needed to build the tallest free-standing structure, they could, using: Twenty pieces of uncooked spaghetti; One yard of tape; One yard of string; and One marshmallow. The team had eighteen minutes to complete the task, and […]

On May 1, 2015, Dave Goldberg died suddenly while on vacation in Mexico. His wife, Facebook’s Chief Operating Officer Sheryl Sandberg, found her husband lying face down on the hotel gym floor, unresponsive and not breathing. He was 47 years old. Consumed with grief, Sandberg sought support from her close friend, Adam Grant, who shared […]

Ever heard the one about the policeman and the drunk? A policeman sees a drunk man searching for something under a streetlight and asks what the drunk has lost. He says he lost his keys, and they both look under the streetlight together.  After a few minutes, the policeman asks if he is sure he […]

Derek Sivers had a problem.  A few months earlier, Sivers had agreed to speak at a conference in Sydney, Australia. As the date drew closer, however, Sivers, based in New York, USA, at the time, realized he had overcommitted.  “When it actually came down to it, I was just like, ‘Man, I don’t really want […]