Mental Toughness

The recent essay "15 Critical Habits of Mentally Tough People" by Travis Bradberry offers a list — flawed, but fascinating — of characteristics that perhaps are correlated with happiness, health, productivity, and self-actualization:

• They're Emotionally Intelligent
  • "... fully understand and tolerate strong negative emotions and do something productive with them ..."
• They're Confident
• They Neutralize Toxic People
  
• They Embrace Change
  • "... flexible ... constantly adapting ..."
• They Say No
  • "... honors their existing commitments and gives them the opportunity to successfully fulfill them ..."
  • "... delay gratification and avoid impulsive action ..."
• They Know That Fear Is the #1 Source of Regret
• They Embrace Failure . . .
  • "... frustration that forces you to think differently, to look outside the box, and to see the solution that you've been missing ..."
• . . . Yet, They Don't Dwell on Mistakes
  • "... a sense of personal efficacy, which produces positive emotions and improves performance ..."
• They Won't Let Anyone Limit Their Joy . . .
  • "... you don't have to compare yourself to others, and you can always take people's opinions with a grain of salt ..."
• . . . And They Don't Limit the Joy of Others
  • "... don't pass judgment on others because they know that everyone has something to offer ..."
  • "... don't need to take other people down a notch in order to feel good about themselves ..."
• They Exercise
• They Get Enough Sleep
• They Limit Their Caffeine Intake
• They Don't Wait for an Apology to Forgive
  • "... life goes a lot smoother once you let go of grudges and forgive even those who never said they were sorry ..."
• They're Relentlessly Positive

Not a great taxonomy — too much fuzziness and redundancy — and full of assertion with no citations to real evidence. The article also includes an optimistic Thomas Edison quote, likely apocryphal, when he witnessed his factory complex destroyed by fire: "There is great value in disaster. All our mistakes are burned up. Thank God we can start anew." The New York Times article on 1914-12-10 doesn't mention those words or anything close to them.

But nonetheless: some good advice!

(cf. Optimist Creed (1999-04-16), Thirty Things (2013-10-01), ...) - ^z - 2015-12-06