Loss can be, and often is, life-altering. Coming to terms with loss takes time and effort. While each person’s process is unique, there are important shared commonalities. — In 1979, my mother lost her eight-year-long battle with lymphoma at the age of 43, leaving me, a shy and sensitive 9-year-old, reeling, grief-stricken, angry, and suddenly living in a confusing new reality. Fast forward 43 years to today (11/2), the anniversary of her death–she has been deceased about as…

By Grant H. Brenner and Santor Nishizaki Louder and louder voices are informing us of the importance of paying attention to quiet quitting and quiet firing. From a relationship point of view, silence in the workplace strongly suggests communication isn’t taking place, trust is broken, needs are unvoiced and unmet…

Quiet dynamics do not work for new generations of workers. — By Grant H. Brenner and Santor Nishizaki As the pandemic leaves behind the tenor of crisis, winding down into an endemic phase of vaccine boosters, and attention shifts to new global threats, the workplace-rattled by years of upheaval and economic instability-continues to roil with unpredictability as a young generation of…

We need to understand how lies spread in order to secure the truth. — Misinformation is like a disease. Understanding how it spreads is key for stopping it. Given the information environment we are in, getting a handle on what is true and what is misleading is not just a question of integrity and morality but a matter of survival. Disinformation kills people. Poor…

Romance and friendship clash in the boundary-blurring twilight of the friendzone. — Relationships are shifting, as noted by authors of a recent study of “friendzoning” (LeFebvre et al., 2022), in the journal Imagination, Cognition, and Personality: Consciousness in Theory, Research, and Clinical Practice: “People habitually do not process new information and use old stereotypes as relationship behavioral guides; as such, they are…

A new inventory serves as a foundation to further public health by identifying the many facets of maleficence. — “The history of man is a graveyard of great cultures that came to catastrophic ends because of their incapacity for planned, rational, voluntary reaction to challenge.” -Erich Fromm Questions surrounding the nature of evil have been of profound importance for humanity since time immemorial. When we try to make sense…

Research highlights the crucial connection between leader curiosity, psychological safety, and follower voice. — “The capacity to be puzzled is the premise of all creation, be it in art or in science.” -Erich Fromm Curiosity is a powerful driver of human behavior, necessary for survival from an evolutionary point of view, and considered to be one of the core motivational systems baked into the…

Research shows that interpersonal communication is complex — yet what impacts us most may be what comes out of our own mouths — How we communicate with others is integral to how satisfying and successful relationships with those others are. People in long-term romantic relationships know this to be the case, but research has for years sought to parse out precisely what the connections among different forms of communication and relationship satisfaction actually…

A growing body of research on subjective age is finding that feeling young at heart is associated with various indicators of health and well-being. How old do you feel? — The other day, I got on the elevator in my building with an endearingly eccentric older gentleman who lives on our floor. Over the years, we’ve had a few brief, largely one-sided conversations during which he shares deep proclamations in an incongruously mellifluous “radio voice”, but he generally keeps to…