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Look closer at the stress in your own life and you can identify that negative emotions are always built on counterfactual statements.

Andrew Bernstein

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Andrew Bernstein
Age: 65
Born: 1959
Born: June 6
Author
Philosopher
University Teacher
Emotions
Negative
Built
Stressors
Emotion
Identify
Look
Closer
Looks
Statements
Always
Life
Stress

More quotes by Andrew Bernstein

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To believe that your husband, wife, parents, kids, boss, job, bank account, or body is even partly responsible for your emotions, to think that there are bullets 'out there' that you have to contend with, that there are stressful life events to overcome, is to miss something vital.
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Some people are so used to experiencing stress that they don't remember what life was like without it.
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Stress is not the spice of life any more than arsenic is. And without it, you won't feel bored.
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Even in this secular country, the threat posed by religious fundamentalists is never very far away. Every major religious text exhorts the same principles - that of unyielding obedience to a supernatural being, and renunciation of the intellect and personal aspirations.
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Statism – the subordination of the individual to the state - leads inevitably to the most hideous oppression.
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A hero has faced it all: he need not be undefeated, but he must be undaunted.
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The less you think counterfactually, the less you experience stress. Stress, in this light, isn't a bad thing. It's simply a warning system telling you that your mind has lost touch with what's real.
Andrew Bernstein
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During the financial crisis, I worked with hundreds of executives who struggled as a result of their thoughts about job security. When their beliefs changed, so did their emotional experience - and they were then able to focus on the task at hand more effectively.
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You can't tell yourself that your stress is produced in your head and feel better. You still need to learn how to create a change.
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If you're successful and stressed out, you're succeeding in spite of your stress, not because of it.
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Throughout history, independent minds have carried mankind forward. Whether they identified how to make fire or manufacture tools, develop rational philosophy or create man-glorifying art, pioneer scientific knowledge or invent the electric light, independent thinkers have created the goods on which human life and prosperity depend.
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You might think that shifting your thoughts is as easy as setting your mind to it. But stressful thoughts aren't held in place through choice or will power. They're held in place through perceived truth value.
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Negative thoughts stick around because we believe them, not because we want them or choose them.
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We need to distinguish between stress and stimulation. Having deadlines, setting goals, and pushing yourself to perform at capacity are stimulating. Stress is when you're anxious, upset, or frustrated, which dramatically reduce your ability to perform.
Andrew Bernstein
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... statism systematically violates the rights of individuals and is, therefore, immoral. Because it suppresses the mind and violates men's rights, it thereby causes abysmal poverty and is utterly impractical.
Andrew Bernstein
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We all enjoy pushing ourselves to accomplish our objectives. But we don't need stress to get there.
Andrew Bernstein
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Altruism demands that an individual serve others, but doesn’t stipulate whether those others should be one’s family, or the homeless, or society as a whole. Collectivism states that, in politics, society comes first and the individual must obey. Collectivism is the application of the altruist ethics to politics.
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People around the world now complain about stressors everyday, and the word shows up throughout professional and lay literature. But in reality there is no such thing as a stressor. Why not? Because nothing has the inherent power to provoke stress.
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A hero holds purposes appropriate to man and is, therefore, a thinker.
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The elusive truth is that there is nothing stress-producing in the physical world. Things simply are. Molecules move. Light and sound appear.
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