Ask your brain
Knowing you can get smarter makes you ... smarter
Comparison.
If Einstein was your father, and everything else was the same, you would be smarter by having someone smarter than you as a role model.
Believe you can be smarter, and you will
Change
Change is substituting unfamiliar behaviors for behaviors that are older and more comfortable
What looks like laziness is often exhaustion
Monitoring your actions is mentally exhausting
What if you wanted to redesign your morning routine?
Radish eaters were not allowed to eat cookies
Cookie eaters were not allowed to eat radishes
After, both groups were asked to solve an impossible geometric puzzle
Cookie eaters tried for 19 minutes
Radish eaters tried for 9 minutes
The self control of not being able to eat a cookie made them more "exhausted" or "lazy"
Comparison
Put two things in people's minds: a large unwanted number and your number
eg: These golf clubs cost $1200, but now they are on sale for $599
Negative feelings
TODOs you feel bad about not doing will make you less productive
Let it go or do it, but don't linger
If you are a hammer, everything looks like a nail
Your mind tints everything towards what is around you. "Everybody is getting an Android phone" makes you want to get an Android phone, even if the 10 people in line at the coffee shop are all checking their BlackBerries.
Meditation helps
The human mind tends to spin off into unproductive cycles of worrying and wondering, but you can train yourself to focus on one thing, or no things, and get some actual relaxation and much-needed perspective.
Also known as meditation
You grow attached to items the more you touch them
If you clean out your room, you will likely spend time on items you hold that bring back memories