Damon D'Amore

* Avoiding Bad Decisions: “Our evolutionary programming conditions us to do what’s easy over what’s right. After all, it’s often easier to signal being virtuous than to actually be virtuous.”

* Pure Downside, No Silver Lining: “Pessimism is usually just extrapolating bad events without considering the offsetting reactions that push things in the other direction. That’s why it’s often wrong.”

* On Going Deep Versus Going Broad: “Depth wasn’t so much a game of persistently striving to top myself, it was more like a new lens for looking at the tools and opportunities that had always been there.”

* On Being Alone: “I don’t believe it’s a sign of weakness to feel lonely.”

* The Velocity of Skill Development: “Focused repetitions give you feedback. Feedback makes you better. Each repetition builds upon the ones you’ve already done. This is how greatness happens.”

* Good And Bad Procrastination: “I think the way to “solve” the problem of procrastination is to let delight pull you instead of making a to-do list push you.”

* Goldilocks of Giving: “I encourage everyone to accept themselves and to accept others as they are. However, true growth comes from having a continuous and honest conversation with yourself. Self-evaluation can guide your path, and help you bloom.”

* The Science Behind Journaling: “By knowing who we were, it’s easier for us to reflect on who we want to become, providing us a clearer picture of the future and allowing us to map out exactly how to get there based on all that we’ve learned from before until now.”

* How to Do the Things You Keep Avoiding: “Tasks you’re avoiding never leave your consciousness for long. They hang there like clouds, some distance away, watching you.”

* Solve Problems Before They Happen: “It’s worth asking why, if we think something is worth saving, we don’t put more effort into protecting it ahead of time.”

* Best Story Wins: “Not who has the best idea, or the right answer. Just whoever tells a story that catches people’s attention and gets them to nod their heads.”

* On Regret: “We all have joys, hopes, fears, and longings that never go away no matter how old we get.”

* How To Be Angry: “At its core, your anger is telling you that there’s a problem. One way to productively express it is to use the energy it provides to solve that problem.”

* The Days Are Long But The Decades Are Short: “A friend asked me if I’d figured out any life advice in the past decade worth passing on.”

* The High Price Of Mistrust: “Right now, polarization and social distancing have forced us apart from any sense of community to a degree that can seem irresolvable.”

* Why You Should Practice Failure:

“How many of us make deliberate mistakes? How often do we try to fail in order to learn from it?”

* On Cultivating and Sustaining Love:

“Love is losing yourself in the process of caring about and showing undivided attention to someone or something, through ups and downs. It’s as simple and as hard as that.”

* On Planning For The Ups and Downs of Happiness

“There are time when all the lies you have told yourself about yourself just fall away.”

*Clean the Tiles – Not the Floor:

“The real pain of many tasks is psychological, arising from the way the mind processes them, not so much from the actions that constitute the tasks themselves.”