Switch Craft: The Hidden Power of Mental Agility

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In the summer of 1984, Elaine Fox was working as a chambermaid in a New York hotel. There, she became good friends with a girl called Jenny. One afternoon, Elaine bumped into Jenny at the beach – along with Jenny’s new boyfriend. She immediately felt that something was wrong. He was very handsome, charming, and friendly, yet Elaine couldn’t help but feel uncomfortable and wary around him. There was a subtle hostility in the way his eyes lingered. He didn’t do or say anything intimidating – it was just a feeling. Discover how expanding and improving your mental agility--your ability to flex your thoughts, feelings, and actions--can transform your life, bolster your resilience, and foster your zest for living. When you have a good understanding of your beliefs, values, and personality, you can start to truly know yourself. Then when acting with the agility of switch craft, you can be sure that your choices are the best – for yourself. Be in control of your emotions. Full of important insights…She shows how adopting a few key skills can transform your life in profound ways.’

For eight days Jennifer was held captive. Being a strong, no-nonsense woman, she suppressed her understandable fear and remained calm – closely observing her captors. She noticed an older man who seemed quite intimidating, so she was careful and polite around him. On the other hand, there was a younger man who seemed a bit less confident. This heightened understanding of your surroundings will work to enhance your switch craft, and help you make better, more agile decisions in this complicated world. SummaryWith that in mind, it is useful to be able to regulate your emotions, so you can react appropriately in a given situation. Sometimes it isn’t helpful to feel a strong emotion, which may cause you to act impulsively. If this is necessary, there are a number of ways you can control your emotions. Meet Paddi Lund. Paddi spent 10 years setting up and running an expansive and hugely successful dental practice in Brisbane, Australia. On paper his life should have been perfect – he was financially well-off and his business empire was thriving. Yet, Paddi was profoundly miserable.

Jennifer took a calculated risk, and would become angry at this man, shouting and demanding her freedom. She knew that this tactic probably wouldn’t work on the menacing kidnapper, but she figured she could unsettle the softer one.Professor Elaine Fox, a world-leading psychologist and performance coach has witnessed this time and again. In Switchcraft, she draws on 25 years of scientific research and coaching experience to develop a step-by-step guide to nurturing the skills you need to come out on top in an increasingly complex and uncertain world. Note: this Switchcraft fandom wiki is run and maintained by fans for fans, and is NOT sponsored, endorsed, or administered by Wooga GmbH. An enjoyable read, with lots of tangible tips for how to become more agile by broadening your experiences and improving your awareness of both internal and external states. As a psychology student, I don't read a lot of 'pop psych' books, but reading this book presented a good opportunity for me to learn more about science communication. Fox has done a great job of integrating psychology theories and research into a book targeted towards a general audience, whilst also including a detailed list of citations/recommended readings at the end for the more academically inclined. It was especially interesting to read the author's summary of research findings relating to 'staying vs. switching' and prediction error, since this relates quite closely to my own research on reinforcement learning. You could also try to change your way of thinking entirely. Maybe try to see things as if from an outsider's point of view, or look at the bigger picture.

When dealing with the complicated situation, Jennifer was able to understand and control her own emotions, while also accurately interpreting the emotions of others. It’s in this way that knowing your emotions can give you the agility to take a particular action to achieve the desired goal. The research on personality is extensive, though the current consensus is that it should be seen as a spectrum along five broad traits – conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, neuroticism, and openness to experience. While all of these are useful to know, it’s this last one – openness to experience – which is particularly important when it comes to switch craft. Sara added: "It’s always been an aspiration of mine to bring out a book in craft, and it’s something that I’ve been asked about too so I hope you love it!"Using switch craft as a tool to navigate the ups and downs the world offers can help you strengthen your ability to decide whether a situation calls for a switch in mindset, approach, or emotional response. Although the ability to switch from one task or thought to another can be difficult, learning switch craft will improve your quality of life over time. This idea of being self-aware – aware of your own thoughts, feelings, beliefs, goals – is the second pillar of switch craft. It is directly related to the first pillar – mental agility – that you learned about in the previous summary. How can you change to fit the situation if you don’t know your abilities or values? Paddi turned his life around by finding a creative and agile response to his stressful situation. This ability – called mental agility – is the first pillar of switch craft.

In this book, you will learn how to hone your switch craft by building and maintaining its four basic pillars. Through mental agility, self-awareness, emotional control, and intuition you can learn to flourish in this complex and rapidly-changing world.Over time you will see yourself develop and grow, and before you know it you will be acting with confidence and agility. About the author On the other hand, those who were happy and thriving were able to think about negative things without experiencing all the other negative biases. In other words, they were more agile in their thinking, leaving them in a more open and flexible frame of mind. Here’s a small exercise you can do to start being more situationally aware. Place a coin on the upper-left-hand corner of your desk. Tomorrow morning, and every morning after, move it to a different corner. While this may seem deceptively simple, it will slowly train you to be more aware of your immediate surroundings. Over time you will start to shift this awareness to other aspects of the environment. This heightened understanding of your surroundings will work to enhance your switch craft, and help you make better, more agile decisions in this complicated world. The study found that biases towards focusing on and remembering threatening or negative words and situations – and interpreting ambiguous situations negatively – were tightly connected in those who struggled with depression and anxiety. For example, triggering a traumatic memory is more likely to make you focus on and interpret negativity around you.