"Doctors came to see her singly and in consultation, talked much in French, German, and Latin, blamed one another, and prescribed a great variety of medicines for all the diseases known to them, but the simple idea never occurred to any of them that they could not know the disease Natasha was suffering from, as no disease suffered by a live man can be known, for every living person has his own peculiarities and always has his own peculiar, personal, novel, complicated disease, unknown to medicine. "


Posts tagged with 'personality'

Arntz & Jacob's new book "Schema therapy in practice": some introductory comments

15th November 2012

Arnoud Arntz & Gitta Jacob's new book "Schema therapy in practice: an introductory guide to the schema mode approach" was published last month. The book's back cover states "Schema Therapy in Practice presents a comprehensive introduction to schema therapy for nonspecialist practitioners wishing to incorporate it into their practice. The …

Building willpower: the eight pillars

10th July 2011

(this post is downloadable as both a Word doc & as a PDF file.) In the earlier post "Self-control, conscientiousness, grit, emotion regulation, willpower - whatever word you use, it's sure important to have it" I described the extraordinary benefits achievable through increased self-control & willpower. I noted occasional downsides …

Building willpower: it's like strengthening and nourishing a muscle.

9th July 2011

(this post is downloadable as both a Word doc & as a PDF file.) "If you can keep your head when all about you are losing theirs and blaming it on you ..." "If" by Rudyard Kipling In yesterday's post on "Self-control ... the importance of training", I talked about …

Self-control, conscientiousness, grit, emotion regulation, willpower - the importance of training

8th July 2011

Over the last few days I've written a series of four blog posts on self-control - the first was "Self-control, conscientiousness, grit, emotion regulation, willpower - whatever word you use, it's sure important to have it" and the most recent "Self-control, conscientiousness, grit ... how do you measure it?". These …

Self-control, conscientiousness, grit, emotion regulation, willpower - how do you measure it?

27th June 2011

(the "brief self-control scale" is downloadable as either a Word doc or a PDF file; the "grit scales", assessing ability to commit to longer term projects, are downloadable as PDF files; assessment of the broader quality of "conscientiousness" as part of the big five personality assessment is downloadable as a …

Self-control, conscientiousness, grit, emotion regulation, willpower - possible adverse effects

22nd June 2011

(this blog post is downloadable as either a Word doc or a PDF handout). Over the last few days I've written two blog posts on the very many benefits of good self-control - see "Self-control, conscientiousness, grit, emotion regulation, willpower - whatever word you use, it's sure important to have …

Self-control, conscientiousness, grit, emotion regulation, willpower - more on the many benefits

18th June 2011

(today's & the first self-control blog post have been combined and are downloadable as either a Word doc or a PDF handout). In the recent blog post "Self-control, conscientiousness, grit, emotion regulation, willpower - whatever word you use, it's sure important to have it" I wrote about the recently published …

Self-control, conscientiousness, grit, emotion regulation, willpower - whatever word you use, it's sure important to have it

14th June 2011

(today's & the next self-control blog post have been combined and are downloadable as either a Word doc or a PDF handout). Professor Terrie Moffitt and colleagues' recent paper "A gradient of childhood self-control predicts health, wealth, and public safety" is another hammer blow highlighting the crucial importance of self-control …

Who can you trust ... and do they have to be boring?

10th June 2011

May's edition of the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology contains three articles on trust that got me thinking a bit. It's been said that the qualities that attract you to a potential partner (or friend) may well end up being the very issues that become most problematic in the …

Our life stories: needs, beliefs & behaviours - part four, "relationships"

14th September 2010

This is the last in a sequence of four blog posts on a "Needs, beliefs, behaviours" model that I often use to help guide psychotherapy work on longer term "personality" patterns. I've previously written about "Needs", "Beliefs" and "Behaviours". This post looks at the model's application to understanding our relationships. …