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Ozan Varol Quotes

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Famous Ozan Varol Quotes

“Research shows that people are biased in their expression of empathy. The members of our own tribes get empathy. Others get a punch to the gut. We belittle them (I told you so). We ostracize them (If you’re not with us, you’re against us). We ridicule them (What an idiot). We see others, not as people trying to make sense of the same elephant from different angles, but as morally corrupt or unintelligent.”

PsychologySelf HelpEmpathyTribalismAwaken Your Genius
Book:Awaken Your Genius: Escape Conformity, Ignite Creativity, and Become Extraordinary
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“Reality begins to emerge only when we set aside our tendency to think in clean categories and realize that almost all things exist on a continuum. Along that continuum, answers change depending on time and context. An answer that’s closer to right today could be closer to wrong tomorrow.”

PsychologySelf HelpAwaken Your Genius
Book:Awaken Your Genius: Escape Conformity, Ignite Creativity and Become Extraordinary
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“If you can let contradictory thoughts dance with each other without your head exploding, they’ll produce a symphony brimming with additional music—in the form of new ideas—far superior to the original. When you adopt this mindset, you gain the magic of perspective and see through the smoke and mirrors created by one-dimensional stories. In the end, there’s so much beauty in complexity. A world of multitudes is far more interesting—and accurate—than a world of certitudes.”

PsychologySelf HelpAwaken Your Genius
Book:Awaken Your Genius: Escape Conformity, Ignite Creativity, and Become Extraordinary
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“It took the most trivial of distinctions for the participants to divide themselves into “us” and “them.” Simply telling people that they belonged to one group and not the other was sufficient to trigger loyalty toward their own group and bias against the other.”

PsychologySelf HelpAwaken Your Genius
Book:Awaken Your Genius: Escape Conformity, Ignite Creativity, and Become Extraordinary
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“Tribalism becomes dangerous when it turns rivals into enemies, when it suppresses diverse thinking, and when it pushes individuals to do things they wouldn’t do on their own. This type of dangerous tribalism thrives in a sea of disconnected people looking for belonging. And who doesn’t crave belonging these days? We are disconnected from our neighbors, disconnected from nature, disconnected from animals, disconnected from the universe, and disconnected from most things that make us human. Tribes are the magnet that attracts the metal of our craving to belong. They assure us that we’re right and morally superior. They force us into a different reality where it becomes impossible to see—let alone comprehend—another worldview. We become “the Few, the Proud, the More or Less Constantly Appalled at Everyone Else,” as David Foster Wallace put it.”

PsychologySelf HelpTribalismAwaken Your Genius
Book:Awaken Your Genius: Escape Conformity, Ignite Creativity, and Become Extraordinary
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“Over time, the tribal identity becomes our identity. Once identity and tribe fuse, we let our tribe determine what’s appropriate for us to read, watch, say, and think. We pick up social-media cues about what our tribe is thinking, and we toe the line. If our tribe hates Joe Rogan, we hate him too. If our tribe believes that immigrants are destroying our country, we believe it too. We forfeit our voice. We forfeit our choice. That warm, fuzzy, satisfying feeling of belonging trumps everything else—including thinking for ourselves.”

PsychologySelf HelpTribalismAwaken Your Genius
Book:Awaken Your Genius: Escape Conformity, Ignite Creativity, and Become Extraordinary
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“Be careful if you find yourself in a place where only acceptable truths are allowed. Taboos are a sign of insecurity. Only fragile castles need to be protected by the highest of walls. The best answers are discovered not by eliminating competing answers, but by engaging with them. And engagement happens in groups built, not on taboos and dogma, but on a foundation that celebrates diverse thinking.”

PsychologySelf HelpSocial MediaInsecurityTabooCritical ThinkingTribalismDogmatismRadicalizationAwaken Your Genius
Book:Awaken Your Genius: Escape Conformity, Ignite Creativity, and Become Extraordinary
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“Unless you consider the best-case scenario along with the worst, your brain will steer you toward the seemingly safest path—inaction. But as a Chinese proverb goes, many a false step was made by standing still. You’re more likely to take that first step into the unknown when there’s the proverbial pot of gold awaiting at the end.”

WorstSafeGoldBestUnknownStand StillScenario
Book:Think Like a Rocket Scientist: Simple Strategies You Can Use to Make Giant Leaps in Work and Life
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“THERE’S A DIFFERENCE, as Morpheus said, between knowing the path and walking the path. Once you’ve stress-tested your ideas by trying to prove yourself wrong, it’s now time to collide those ideas with reality in tests and experiments.”

RealityPathKnowIdeaWalkTestExperiment
Book:Think Like a Rocket Scientist: Simple Strategies You Can Use to Make Giant Leaps in Work and Life
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