(outlink) Talent Development Resources - the psychology of creative expression and personal development

Talent Development Resources - the psychology of creative expression and personal development is a blog dedicated to various forms of self development, with a focus on classical psychology. Nice.

For the would-be seducers out there, their pick of Christina Baldwin on the Power of Story seems nice (directly here).

Story — the abundance of it, and the lack of it — shapes us. Story — the abundance of it, and the lack of it — gives us place, lineage, history, a sense of self.

Story — the abundance of it, and the lack of it — breaks us into pieces, shatters our understanding and gives it back over and over again, the story different every time.

Story — the abundance of it, and the lack of it — connects us with the world and outlines our relationship with everything.

When the power of story comes into the room, an alchemical reaction occurs that is unique to our kind: love or hate, identification or isolation, war or peace, good or evil intent can be stirred in us by words alone.

(outlink) Forgetting May Be Part of the Process of Remembering - New York Times

Forgetting May Be Part of the Process of Remembering


Whether drawing a mental blank on a new A.T.M. password, a favorite recipe or an old boyfriend, people have ample opportunity every day to curse their own forgetfulness. But forgetting is also a blessing, and researchers reported on Sunday that the ability to block certain memories reduces the demands on the brain when it is trying to recall something important.


I thought this was fairly well-known already, actually, based on some form of brain damage actually leading to perfect memory - and hampering a lot of other processes. Anyway, it means that when I don't find my sunglasses it is really a sign of intelligence, and it's quite comforting to get that sign several times daily. Or something.

Schema Therapy and The Work

Schema Therapy is a new form of therapy that supposedly is good for handling personality disorders and chronic depression. It is described as integrating elements of cognitive therapy, behavior therapy, object relations, and gestalt therapy into one unified, systematic approach to treatment. The website includes free slideshows describing the treatment form.


On the subject of new therapy forms, I've recently been experimenting with using The Work of Byron Katie with a few people with problematic family relationships. I've seen improvements in all the cases, including one where the father had asked two days after "What's happened to you? You're all different towards me."

I'm very excited about The Work; I don't really know much I can say about it beyond Try It! The book Loving What Is says more than enough to get you started. And, of course, feel free to post questions, and I'll answer as well as I can.

(outlink) The Farrelly Factors

Frank Farrelly is the originator of the "Provocative Therapy" school of therapy, based on bullying the patient until the patient gets well. Well, it's slightly more structured and thought through than that - a really interesting form of therapy (and one of the major inspiration sources for Richard Bandler).

Jaap Hollander has modelled Frank Farrelly, and have written an article called The Farrelly Factors, detailing 39 behaviours Frank Farrelly uses when treating clients. I find having read the book Provocative Therapy by Frank Farrelly and Jeff Brandsma useful for understanding these patterns; it might be essential.

(outlink) Zen Stories to Tell Your Neighbors

Food for thought: Zen Stories to Tell Your Neighbors (by way of pimpdaddy)

(outlink) The Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP) Research Centre: Linking NLP to Academic Research

I just came across this quite interesting reference page: The Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP) Research Centre: Linking NLP to Academic Research

Tip 'o the hat to Andy Bradbury - I found it through his NLP research page.

(outlink) Elaboration Likelihood Model

The Elaboration Likelihood Model is a model of persuasion, one attempting to be all-encompassing. The description include (under "Variables", of all things) good summaries of the more well-known mini-theories of persuasion (e.g, reactance, congruity, classical conditioning), so even if the theory should turn out to be less than useful (it's been around since 1982 and I haven't heard of it), the summaries are good :)