Category: All

How You Can Burn More Calories

Posted on by Senia

What contributes the most to how many calories you burn each day?
a) your basal metabolic rate (click here to calculate yours)
b) the “thermogenic” effect of the food you eat (i.e. celery is negative calories, vegetables take a lot of effort to digest, sugar goes through immediately and doesn’t take much effort)
c) exercise
d) non-exercise movement throughout the day

Ok, which one?
And which is next, etc.?
If you said your BMR (basal metabolic rate) is the highest, you would be right – that is the energy required for core bodily functions and it accounts for about 60% of all energy expenditure. Then, the thermogenic effect of food has a small effect – only about 10% of your energy expenditure is affected. Then movement takes up the remaining 30% of energy expenditure. But which movement – exercise or non-exercise movement?

A study in this issue of the Mayo Clinic’s Endocrinology Update[i] describes that non-exercise movement can have a much larger effect than exercise, and be almost the entire remaining 30%!

“NEAT” Effect on Your Body

Non-exercise movement is referred to as “NEAT” – Non-Exercise Activity Thermogenesis. It turns out that for two adults “of similar size, daily energy expenditure varies by as much as 2,000 calories per day.” 2,000 calories per day difference!!! And since the BMR and effect of food is approximately the same in two adults of the same size, then that entire 2,000 calories difference can be due exclusively to movement!

But, Dr. James Levine of the Mayo Clinic says that most of the world does not exercise and he cautions, “Even for the minority of people who do exercise, for most of them, exercise accounts for an energy expenditure of 100 calories per day. Thus, NEAT explains why an active person can expend 2,000 calories per day more than an inactive person of the same size.”

Lean People Naturally Build More Movement into Their Lives

16 lean volunteers were taken and overfed by 1,000 calories per day. Some of them naturally increased the amount of activity they were doing – they naturally increased their NEAT in response to the calorie increase. Those who most increased their NEAT did not gain fat, even with overfeeding. On the other hand, Dr. Levine wanted to study how obese people move during non-exercise.

Obese People Tend Not to Move as Much
Dr. Levine and his colleagues put microsensors into the tightfitting clothes of obese and lean people. These microsensors measured movement every half-second for ten days. The result? Obese people are seated on average 2.5 hours per day more than lean people!

So, do get up to take breaks at work!
And do park your car further from the entrance to the mall so that you have to walk.
And maybe even start fidgeting.
And definitely get up from your seat to get more drinking water regularly.
And use the stairs whenever you have the chance!

————————
[i] The “NEAT Defect” in Human Obesity: The Role of Nonexercise Activity Thermogenesis. Endocrinology Update. Mayo Clinic. 2(1). 2007

Full article as it appears in the American Heart Association is here.
Non-Exercise Activity Thermogenesis: The Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon of Societal Weight Gain by James A. Levine; Mark W. Vander Weg; James O. Hill; Robert C. Klesges

Friday, I’m speaking at the Business Women’s Growth Summit

Posted on by Senia

This Friday (April 27), 10:30-11:30am EST, I’m speaking at the Business Women’s Growth Summit.

This is a virtual conference. Here are the bios of all the speakers, and here is the list of talks.

My talk is “The Science of Happiness for Business Owners.”
Click here to register.

“The Science of Happiness for Business Owners”
Presented by Senia Maymin

There is a field that is even younger than the Internet – Positive Psychology! Positive Psychology was launched in 1998 as a branch of psychology that focuses on what is right with people. Just as Psychology after World War II studied diseases and illnesses, so now too, Positive Psychology studies optimal human functioning – happiness, success, and productivity. Senia Maymin is a graduate of the first-ever worldwide Masters’ Program in Positive Psychology at UPenn in 2006.

In this workshop, Senia discusses the main findings of Positive Psychology, the so-called “Science of Happiness,” and specific applications for business owners. Further bolstering the research findings by her own experience as a serial entrepreneur and as an Executive Coach to entrepreneurs, Senia creates an interactive workshop that gives participants actual take-away techniques to apply to their lives and their businesses.

Your Advice – The Tagline!

Posted on by Senia

Hi. I’d really, really like your advice. How can we describe as concisely as possible what Positive Psychology News Daily is all about?

The phrase I most like right now is: “Positive Psychology News Daily – your research-based daily boost of happiness.”

How does this work for you?
I like “daily boost of happiness” and I like “research-based.”

Other thoughts? Other ideas? More about Positive Psychology News Daily is here to give you a sense of why we started the site and who the authors are.

THANK YOU HUGELY!!!!

To Boldly Go

Posted on by Senia

“To boldly go where no man has gone before.”
~ Star Trek

“Go confidently in the direction of your dreams! Live the life you’ve imagined. As you simplify your life, the laws of the universe will be simpler.”
~ Henry David Thoreau*

“Whatever you can do, or dream you can, begin it…Boldness has genius, power, and magic in it.”
~ Goethe

“Do not yield to misfortunes, but advance more boldly to meet them, as your fortune permits you.”
~ Virgil

“It has been my philosophy of life that difficulties vanish when faced boldly.”

~ Isaac Asimov

“You must play boldly to win.”
~ Arnold Palmer

——————–
A friend of mine once started a company whose name was a play on the word BOLD. That’s the way to live life – boldly.

* This quote is quoted differently on the 43 things site of what people what to do. It reads here as, “Go forth boldly in the direction of your dreams; live the life you’ve imagined.”
Henry David Thoreau on 43 things

The “When I feel like it” Reason

Posted on by Senia

The “When I feel like it” reason sounds like this:

“I know. I know that’s important. But to call that person – that requires some guts. That requires some pushing of myself. I’m not sure. I know I’ll do it. Maybe tomorrow. I just feel that I have to feel confident before I make that call. I feel like I have to be sure of it.”

Surprise, surprise! Nothing in life in certain. Nothing in life is sure.

What are you going to do later today? And after that? How about even later?

Daniel Gilbert writes in Stumbling on Happiness, “Later! What an astonishing idea. What a powerful concerpt. What a fabulous discovery. How did human beings ever learn to preview in their imaginations chains of events that had not yet come to pass?”

Gilbert says the reason that “the human being is the only animal that thinks about the future” is that we have a well-developed frontal lobe. Alvaro and Caroline write wonderful entries about the interesting aspects of the frontal lobe all the time at SharpBrains (see here, here, and here). Gilbert says, “The frontal lobe – the last part of the human brain to evolve, the slowest to mature, and the first to deteriorate in old age – is a time machine that allows each of us to vacate the present and experience the future before it happens.”

Why do we care about the frontal lobe anyway? It turns out that without the frontal lobe, a person would not be able to plan. The words “today” and “later” would be blank concepts. A patient who suffered frontal lobe damage in a car accident at age 30 was asked to describe what he thinks about when he is asked to describe what he is doing tomorrow or even the concept of the word “tomorrow”: “Blank, I guess … it’s like being asleep … like being in a room with nothing there and having a guy tell you to go find a chair, and there’s nothing there….”

We think about “tomorrow” and “later” because we can – because our well-developed frontal lobes love that kind of activity, says Gilbert.

So, back to the original question: suppose you know that something is important. Suppose you know that you ought to do something. But you want to WAIT until…. until you’re better prepared, until you feel more confident about it, until someone else suggests that you do that action….

Let me tell you something briefly – the only context in which “until” is a beautiful word is in this quote by Jim Rohn:

“How long should you try? Until.”

If you don’t want to do the task that you know needs to be done… if you want to wait until you’re better prepared, you can blame your frontal lobe for its imagining just how prepared you’ll be tomorrow, and the day after that, and the day after that. It does a great job of imagining – down to the details like the stains on the carpet if you’re imagining giving a speech… BUT… but your imagination can be very-very-super-very wrong, says Gilbert. “Imagination works so quickly, quietly, and effectively that we are insufficiently skeptical of its products.”

The next time you want to wait until –

  • You’re better prepared
  • You’re dressed better
  • You have your materials with you
  • It’s sunny outside
  • It’s exactly 2pm when you place the call
  • Your voice sounds good

– the next time any of that happens, just stop yourself, and say, “Why not now?”

Waiting for the Muse
Once of the most interesting pieces of advice I ever received was from a former reality-TV-star who I knew from years back, who said, “You know people can’t really tell if you’re having a bad hair day, or if you haven’t shaved… those things that to you seem like a big deal and a big difference relative to how you like to present yourself, are just a SMALL, SMALL PART of what other people see about you. So there’s no point wanting to look perfect before you walk up to someone. Go up to that person the way you are.”

Try this. Avoid the “when I feel like it” reason. This is the what Dave Seah writes about here on waiting until you’re motivated (Hint: this is part of a list Dave comments on; the list is “10 Steps to Guarantee Failure”).

Try avoiding using the “when I feel like it” reason. Try using the “I will do it anyway” reason. Try it – see how you like it!

Image: Waiting for the Muse

What about the AFTER-life?

Posted on by Senia

Hey, hey, hey, what about the AFTER-life? No, not the afterlife and reincarnation. But the AFTER-life…. the little self-talk you have and I have, saying things like,

  • “Well, if I have a great house, I’ll be happy.”
  • “Once I lose 12 or 20 or 50 pounds, I’ll be happy.”
  • “After I finish my dissertation, I’ll be happy.”

The “after-this” and “after-that” life.

There are CERTAINLY times in your life when it’s effective to focus on your goal, and to say, “I am not going to dilly-dally on this yellow brick road. I am full-steam focused ahead, and I’ll be pushing on this project until I complete it.” Yes, yes, and yes! I am all for focus and self-regulation.

At the same time, what are you doing in the now-life to make yourself happy?

You will always have goals, you will always have deadlines, and you will always have emergencies. What are you doing to enjoy life in the midst of all this? Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi said on a panel at the Gallup positive psychology conference in Fall, 2005 that if he could ask every person on the earth one question, the question that he would ask is, “To what extent are you fully alive?”

What am I talking about? No, not pretty words and affirmations. I am talking about enjoying the now, noticing the now. More than anything, I am talking about you getting your personal enjoyment from the now!

  • EXAMPLE: How exciting is brushing your teeth? However, Dr. Kathleen Hall of the Stress Institute says that you can make it alive and exciting by thinking about your great smile and how much good chewing your mouth has done for you all your life. This particular detail may not work for you, but what ideas like this do work for you to make a tedious, regular task feel good, feel healthy, or feel alive in some way?
  • COUNTER-EXAMPLE: Like Seth Godin writes here, many of us would have walked by a world-class violinist if we heard him on our daily morning commute. And that’s what may make us sad about the Washington Post article, he writes: that we would probably not have noticed him either.

The main thing that I can tell you about enjoying the “now” (even in the midst of deadlines towards the “after”) is that Barbara Fredrickson’s research all points to the fact that when you are in an emotionally open state, you are both more creative and productive (broaden) and you have more reserves to deal with anything that the world throws upon you (build).

Welcome to Friday questions. Today’s question is:
What are you doing in the NOW-life to make yourself happy?

Psychology in the News, 4-10-07

Posted on by Senia

Your Material, Emotional Brain

In an article on Brand-bonding driving desire, author Jean Brandolini Lamb writes (bold added):

Recently I heard Don Diforio, senior vice president of research for the Advertising Research Foundation, speak at Columbia University about the new neuropsychology theories that are replacing the old consumer behavior beliefs. No longer is it believed that consumers think, feel, do, or follow AIDA (awareness, interest, desire, action) buying patterns. Rather, according to those who look inside the brain to study the connection between physiology and psychological responses, we are all driven first by emotion. This emotional connection leads to brand desire, which ultimately leads to demand. Granted, convenience factors and rational concerns play a part in the decision-making process, but it is a feeling that acts as the initial spark of interest. Given the masses of information that we keep in our brains, we all still act based on primitive, emotional instincts. It seems we’re just cavemen with cars after all.

This is what I believe about Intuition too: there is some emotional trigger that drives the moment of “aha.”

Happiness is Hard Work

In The Science of Lasting Happiness, author Marina Krakovsky describes mainly Sonja Lyubomirsky’s research on happiness to conclude that happiness takes some significant work! This is a worthwhile article, and I highly recommend you see it. It also describes the research of Lyubomirksy, Sheldon, and Schkade on where happiness comes from. Their results: 50% is genetically determined, 10% is caused by the environment, and 40% is about how happy you make your mind up to be, i.e. the specific techniques you use to conjure your happiness.

Especially interesting in this article, and non-expected, is a technique that Lyubomirsky studied: writing down your blessings. It turned out that every night is not the optimal timing for happiness – weekly is the optimal timing. And it turned out that variety in using your techniques is highly important!

Write faster, Read faster, Know more

Posted on by Senia

WRITE FASTER
Here’s a post by Angela Booth on FAST WRITING (via Anne). Angela recommends creating a checklist for yourself, a process. She suggests a process in which she brainstorms, writes an outline, gets data, writes more of a draft. A key component of her list that I want to point out is “leave it for a day or longer.” Then she returns and completes other editing. Using her system, you would probably re-read the intro paragraph, say oh, five-twenty times. That would mean that you’d have five-twenty opportunities to rewrite something! Maybe writing faster is not about speed, but about easy editing. Like putting on layers of clothing before going outside in the winter, maybe writing faster is about putting on layers of betterment to your writing. And the more layers, the more opportunity to improve.

READ FASTER
Here’s a post by Idea Matt on FAST READING (these specific ideas are from Jason Womack). Jason says “he reads a book four times:

  1. Table of contents, glossary, index.
  2. Anything in bold, titles, and subtitles.
  3. First line of every paragraph.
  4. Entire book

Here’s the twist: Steps 1-3 should only take about 10 minutes.”

Ok, see the similarity to the faster writing? You may be starting to suspect that the above two tips are not only about faster writing and reading, but also about more thorough writing and reading. Why are the above two methods more thorough? Because you review the material again, and again, and again. In the outline, in the TOC, in re-reading the same sections when you edit.

So…. there’s a fun little conclusion we can make from the above two faster tips.

KNOW MORE
You know more when you review material fairly frequently. Here’s an example: I put together a workshop on “Why Optimism Is Good for your Health” last week. I put the workshop together in a week and presented it. Then I think back to it today to review it in my head in preparation for giving the workshop again to a new audience, and – guess what?! – it’s a little hazy. Not a lot hazy. I could probably recreate the slides without looking at them again, but a bit hazy – it would take me time. Why is this? Because I did my presentation writing and rewriting and creating all in one fell swoop. I didn’t really break it up into segments or smaller chunks. I didn’t do the “let it sit for a day or two.”

Here’s a question for you:

If you have a choice of repeating something MORE OFTEN or FOR A LONGER PERIOD OF TIME, which do you think will help you know the information better?

Bing bing bing! You got it. MORE OFTEN. You can see what I wrote here about the immense, powerful benefits of daily action. Remember, musicians often recommend that you practice in two sessions of 15 minutes rather than in one of 30 minutes.

Do whatever is important to you – do that repeatedly, regularly – do it so it’s second nature. :) ENJOY!