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Recently, I watched a leader walk into a tense team meeting. The executive team was experiencing significant change and had some tough decisions to make. Emotions were running high, and everyone seemed to be waiting for someone else to speak first. Instead of pointing fingers or jumping into solutions, the leader opened with a simple line that instantly changed the room: "Together we can do this" You could feel the energy shift. Shoulders relaxed. People leaned in. The atmosp

There are seasons in life when the world tilts, almost imperceptibly at first, and suddenly the familiar landscape looks different. You wake up in the same bed, eat your same morning breakfast, wave to the same neighbors across the cul de sac, yet something inside you has shifted. These past weeks have been that kind of season for me. It began with my neighbors, Todd and Heidi, and their two young children. They are the sort of neighbors you hope for but rarely get. The kind

The holiday season rarely arrives quietly. It brings memories that are sweet and heavy all at once. It carries the smell of childhood, the ache of people we miss, the comfort of familiar songs, and the pressure to make everything feel magical. The brain remembers all of it. The holidays are never just days on a calendar. They are patterns learned over a lifetime, filled with belonging, comfort, happiness, and hope. The quiet truth is that the same circuits that make this seas

Header image by Freepik Airbnb CEO Brian Chesky recently asked his executives to name the company’s silent killers, what he called the “Fester List.” One answer stood out: too many leaders disengaged in meetings, distracted by phones and laptops. Chesky’s response? “I do it too.” His honesty underscores a truth: distraction isn’t just a junior-level habit, it’s a leadership failure. This isn’t new. JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon devoted part of his annual shareholder letter t

The Science of Stillness: Quieting the Brain We live in a culture that celebrates busyness. If you are not moving fast, it feels like you are falling behind. Yet neuroscience keeps proving the opposite: your brain performs best when you stop. Stillness is not wasted time; it is recovery time, the space your brain needs to connect ideas, restore focus, and spark creativity. When you pause, a network in your brain called the Default Mode Network turns on. It links past experien

Why You Don’t Need to Worry When Things Don’t Work Out We have all had those moments when life does not go according to plan. You pour your heart into something, a career move, a project, a relationship, and it does not unfold the way you hoped. It is that gut-punch feeling that this was not supposed to happen. And if you are like most people, your next thought is probably, What did I do wrong. Here is the truth: everyone experiences setbacks, losses, and disappointments. The

Personality tests are everywhere. From hiring decisions to dating apps to viral quizzes online, they promise to tell us who we are and how we fit into the world. There is something comforting about seeing ourselves reflected in neat categories, but the question is whether those categories are as accurate as they feel. The fascination with personality is not new. Ancient Chinese officials evaluated character for job placements more than 3,000 years ago, and Hippocrates linked

Be Yourself Is Terrible Advice: The Neuroscience of Authenticity You have probably heard the advice to “just be yourself.” It sounds inspiring on a coffee mug or a motivational poster, but when you actually try to live it out, you quickly realize it is not that simple. Authenticity is not a switch you flip on. It is a process, and often a difficult one. Most of us have spent years constructing a version of ourselves that is part real, part performance, and part survival strat

Smarter, Stronger, Sharper: The Science of Measuring and Improving Your Brain Health Most people only start thinking about brain health after something goes wrong, when memory slips, focus fades, or stress feels like a constant hum in the background. But what if we could measure how our brain is functioning long before decline begins, and even reverse the trend? That is the vision of Dr. Evelyne Bischof, a Harvard and Columbia trained longevity physician who merges neuroscien