Book Titles

The human being is the only animal that thinks about the future.

The greatest achievement of the human brain is its ability to imagine objects and episodes that do not exist in the realm of the real, and it is this ability that allows us to think about the future.

Forestalling pleasure is an inventive technique for getting double the juice from half the fruit.

Researchers have discovered that when people find it easy to imagine an event, they overestimate the likelihood that it will actually occur.

…people find it gratifying to exercise control – not just for the futures it buys the, but for the exercise itself.

Being effective – changing things, influencing things, making things happen – is one of the fundamental needs with which human brains seem to be naturally endowed…

…human beings come into the world with a passion for control, they go out of the world the same way, and research suggests that if they lose their ability to control thigs at any point between their entrance and their exit, they become unhappy, helpless, hopeless, and depressed.

…gaining control can have a positive impact on one’s health and well-being, but losing control can be worse than never having had any at all.

…the feeling of control – whether real or illusory – is one of the wellsprings of mental health.

People want to be happy, and all the other things they want are typically meant to be means to that end.