I also read nonfiction self-help books from time to time. Consider this my review of the ones that have seemed useful. Mediated through bedtime songs.
I can't go straight from verse 1 / chorus to verse 2 of one of the songs I sing. There's a mental blank. After verse 1 / chorus, I quietly cycle through the openings to verse 4 and verse 3, landing on verse 2, and start singing.
This is a habit. It's part of the cue/routine/reward habit cycle that Charles Duhigg outlines in the The Power of Habit.
If I wanted to, I could change the habit, and indeed can change almost any parts of my behavior/personality. Because in general most of our characteristics and preferences are mutable, rather than immutable. Or so I was informed by Carol Dweck in Mindset: The New Psychology of Success.
And of course if changing that habit, or adjusting my mindset in another way seemed hard, I could listen again to Kelly McGonigal's The Willpower Instinct for techniques to increase my willpower. (which isn't quite the right way to look at it, but close enough).
Or I could just sing to my daughter, little idiosyncrasies intact.
(Note that the reason I have a separate blog about parenting is because this is the parenting version of this post.)
(Note that the reason I have a separate blog about parenting is because this is the parenting version of this post.)
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