People talk of the new economy and of reinventing themselves in the workplace, and in that sense most of us are less secure.

You know, the standard state for people is 'mildly pleasant.' Negative emotions are quite rare, and extremely positive emotions are rare. But people are mildly pleased most of the time, they're mildly tired a lot of the time, and they wish they were somewhere else a substantial part of the time - but mostly they're mildly pleased.

Courage is willingness to take the risk once you know the odds. Optimistic overconfidence means you are taking the risk because you don't know the odds. It's a big difference.

In essence, the optimistic style involves taking credit for successes but little blame for failures.

Experts don't know exactly where the boundaries of their expertise are.

Odd as it may seem, I am my remembering self, and the experiencing self, who does my living, is like a stranger to me.

Money does not buy you happiness, but lack of money certainly buys you misery.