Andres Gutierrez

How to stay calm when you know you'll be stressed by Daniel Levitin

Halfway through the talk I realized that this was THE Daniel Levitin, author
of This Is Your Brain On Music, a book I studied in my Psychology of Music class
last semester and that I very much enjoyed. Levitin, a well-trained neuroscientist,
begins his talk by narrating an anecdote of him facing a highly stressful situation
which just kept getting worse due to the cloudy thinking

PROSPECTIVE HINDSIGHT GARY KLEIN (OR PRE-MORTEM) Look ahead and

try to figure out what could go wrong and strategize what you could do to prevent
them or to at least minimize the damage

Designate a place for things that are easily lost hippocampus (where
important things are located)

Cortisol is toxic and results in cloudy thinking

Decision making --- Number needed to treat (How many people are to be
treated before it works? 90% of drugs work in only 30 -50% of people) Ex. Statin for
cholesterol = 300 ppl need to be treated before 1 is helped.

Side effects? (5%)

During stress, a number of systems shut down = digestive, libido, etc .

AAAND RATIONAL THINKING!!!!

Think ahead and put systems in place. A cautious man is worth twice as
much.

The Secret of Becoming Mentally Strong by Amy Morin

The perfect friend with the perfect adventures and the perfect photos and blessings.

Envying friends on fb leads to depression (research) --- rolling eyes for 5 secs

What our bad habits cost us

3 kinds of destructive beliefs:

1. Unhealthy beliefs about ourselves. Self-pity. Magnification of misfortune. Why

me?
2. Unhealthy beliefs about others. Thinking others can control us. Its up to us
how to respond to seemingly abusive people.
3. Unhealthy beliefs about the world. We think the universe owes us something.
Andres Gutierrez

We all sooner or later hit a time in which we need all the mental health we can
muster.

Speaker talks about her mother having a completely unexpected brain aneurysm
and died from one day to another. 3 years later her husband had a heart attack at 26,
completely unexpectedly.

In tough times, good habits are not enough. It only takes one or two small bad habits
to bring you down.

Remarried, new husbands father is diagnosed with terminal cancer, dies.

Mental strength comes from the elimination of bad habits.

Resenting other peoples success.

Avoiding discomfort. Postponing it.

Compare yourself only against yourself yesterday.

Acceptance of lifes unfairness. Not necessarily rewarded for suffering or good

deeds.

The world is what you make it?! --- nah

Tiny improvements. No big heroic transformations.