All posts tagged psychology

Why even introverts should mouth off online

There was a post by Seth Godin some time ago that completely changed the way I act on the web (of course, now I can’t even find the blighter).

I went from passively lurking on Facebook and silently reading loads of websites to setting up three blogs, commenting on other people’s content, and starting to yammer on Twitter. Double-yammer in fact. Okay, I confess, triple-yammer.

So what happened? I have quite a lot of introverted qualities. I struggle a bit meeting new people, even talking to them on the phone, even chatting with them online. I’ll admit it – even playing anonymous multiplayer games.

When my friend Roger’s book about psychology and the teaching of Jesus was first published, he reacted to my congratulations by asking ‘is it too late to take it all back?’ That’s how I feel whenever I publish a blog post. Or send a tweet. Or ‘like’ something on Facebook.

It gets easier the more I do it, but the feeling is still there.

So why do I put myself through this? Why not slip back into the silent ranks of people who only watch from the sidelines, or who leave the arena completely?

The secret to being trusted, esteemed, and making others feel good

If I told you there was a simple, proven way to be believed and appear intelligent while leaving people feeling good about themselves – would you believe me? Or would you exit hastily muttering something about snake oil? What if I added that it was completely free, and that I would share this knowledge with [...]

How to blog consistently (note to self)

Happy new year everyone.

I have one goal for SmyWord this year: to blog more consistently.

Last year was great – launching SmyWord, having a couple of big content cheeses drop by in the comments, receiving positive feedback from customers. But if I could change one thing, I wished I had upheld my promise to post a new article once a week.

Increasingly businesses I do content work for want blogs on their web sites. A real, honest blog by someone who loves their work is a wondrous thing (especially if they’re not meta-careerists). And one of the fundamental pieces of advice I give them – one of the make-or-break keys to successful blogging – is to blog consistently.

Why appealing to your readers is not enough

Think about something good that happened to you recently. Something small, something significant, it doesn’t matter what. Can you remember exactly what occurred?

As the memory comes back to you, think about the nature of what you are actually remembering. Are you recalling the things that were said, and that you say to yourself about what happened? Or are you picturing it, and even visualising the concept of happiness? Or perhaps the memory brings up strong feelings that you can almost feel again right now in your body?

4 Stages of Any Change

Change comes to us in many forms in business. Usually it feels like just as we’ve got used to a way of working – something changes. New personnel, new roles, new management, new expectations, new clients, new equipment, new web sites, new applications, new policies; it can all become a whirl of chaos in which we wonder how we’re ever going to get anything done.

When Google released their new web browser Chrome a colleague of mine reeled with horror. ‘It has no home button!’ he shouted. ‘I hate change’. Being a developer, it only took him few seconds to add the missing feature himself. But his reaction was telling.