Mental Healthiness

11/13/2025

Surprise isn’t a small emotion. It’s one of the most powerful signals the mind has—an alert that our predictions didn’t match reality.

In neuroscience terms, surprise is a “prediction error,” a moment when the brain realizes its internal model is wrong and needs to update. In psychological terms, it’s the mechanism of learning. And in human terms, it’s often the start of humility, curiosity, and growth.

But we’re living in an environment designed to hijack that signal. Clickbait, misinformation, and deepfakes create endless manufactured surprises that keep us reactive but teach us nothing. When everything is shocking, nothing truly surprises us anymore—and we lose the ability to distinguish noise from information.

My new essay explores how surprise actually works, why it feels like everything from mild confusion to full-blown shock, and why our ability to tolerate it is foundational for good judgment, emotional intelligence, and honest self-reflection.

If you’re interested in how emotions shape thinking, behavior, and decision-making, this is part of my broader Feelings, Explained series—recently including anger.

Surprise isn’t a glitch — it’s how the brain learns. Explore how surprise works, why it matters, and how it sharpens emotional intelligence and self-awareness.

10/28/2025

We’re not meant to think the same. Some minds hold the world steady; others move it forward. Both are necessary. Our differences aren’t flaws to fix — they’re features of design.

New essay: Difference Is Not Divisive — It’s Design.

https://mentalhealthiness.com/2025/10/28/difference-is-not-divisive-its-design/

10/08/2025

Beneath the neon chaos and viral soundtrack, KPop Demon Hunters isn’t just another animated hit—it’s a mirror. It’s about masks, music, and the courage to be seen. In a world obsessed with perfection, it reminds us that belonging doesn’t come from passing—it comes from showing up real, flawed, and golden....

Explore how KPop Demon Hunters transcends its animated roots, blending music and character depth to challenge norms and spark connection.

09/29/2025

Anger isn’t the enemy. Misunderstanding it is.

Most of us are taught to fear anger. We flinch when we see it, and we flinch when it rises in us. We associate it with violence, danger, loss of control.

But what if that fear isn’t really about anger itself?

What if it’s about the conditions under which we’ve seen anger go wrong—when it’s bottled up, ignored, or punished until it explodes?

In a well-fed world, hunger is a normal cue. In a starving world, hunger becomes terrifying. Not because hunger is bad—but because deprivation is.

The same is true for anger.

This new essay is about reclaiming anger as something more than a threat. It’s about seeing anger as a moral emotion—one that signals when something important has been violated. Anger can be loud, yes, but it’s often the voice of care: “This isn’t okay. This matters.”

The post covers:

• Why we’ve learned to associate anger with violence
• How anger is actually a social emotion meant to protect values and restore justice
• Why “We can talk when you’re calm” says more about our discomfort than the angry person’s credibility
• What happens when anger is heard instead of silenced
• How anger fits into the emotional arc of healing—alongside relief, satiety, and redemption

If we keep treating anger as a sign of immaturity or irrationality, we lose access to one of our most powerful tools for connection, accountability, and repair.

But if we learn to listen to anger—ours and others’—we might just find the spark we need to make things right.

Explore the misunderstood nature of anger and learn how to transform it from fear into empathy for emotional healing and justice.

09/18/2025

Back in 2014, I wrote a four-part series called How Do We Grow? Part 1: How “I” Change — insight, intention, iterations, and integration. Part 2: Authenticity Matters — why our insights need to be true. Part 3: Best Intentions — how determination and meaningful goals sustain us. Part 4: Finishing What We Started — the role of neuroplasticity, growth mindset, and grit....

Explore how external barriers and support shape personal growth, emphasizing community and collaboration over individual grit.

08/28/2025

What if lifestyle wasn’t just prevention—but treatment?
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We’re taught that health is a personal responsibility, a matter of making the “right” choices. But what if that framing is incomplete—or even harmful? What if food, movement, rest, and relationships weren’t just wellness buzzwords, but clinically validated interventions for conditions like heart disease, depression, and even early-stage Alzheimer’s?
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I recently read a study confirming that lifestyle interventions can reverse cognitive decline in Alzheimer’s. And while some may find that revolutionary, it reflects something many cultures have long known: how we live shapes how we heal.
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But here’s the catch—none of it works in isolation.
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You can’t eat well if you live in a food desert. You can’t manage stress if you’re working two jobs while caregiving. You can’t “just exercise” without time, safety, or support. And you can’t build strong relationships in a culture that rewards productivity over presence.
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In this essay, I explore four pillars of health—Eat Well, Move More, Stress Less, Love More—and then widen the lens to show what really drives sustainable change: community scaffolding, cultural context, and structural support.
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Health is not a virtue. It’s not just about willpower. It’s the outcome of systems designed to either support or erode it.
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We treat healthiness like a side dish when it should be the main course.
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If we’re serious about medicine, we must be serious about collective care.
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Discover how lifestyle changes can combat early Alzheimer’s and improve overall health through communal well-being and relational care.

08/18/2025

I don’t like the way I’ve been feeling lately. Manipulated. Forced into decisions I’m not comfortable making. Unsure who to trust. I’ve developed tools and habits that feel necessary just to decide whether something is true or false, real or fake. And I also know that feeling this way doesn’t feel like me.

Which is what made me realize: maybe it isn’t just about me at all. Maybe it’s about my environment.

In my Impact of Environment series, I’ve explored how wealth and culture shape what we believe is possible, normal, or personal. This time, I’ve turned to something subtler—but maybe more insidious: bias.

Bias isn’t a character flaw. It’s a feature of how the brain works. As Daniel Kahneman explains in Thinking, Fast and Slow, our minds run on two systems: one fast and intuitive, the other slow and analytical. The fast system is efficient, but it relies on shortcuts—availability, confirmation, anchoring, narrative—that keep us moving, but often lead us astray.

That wasn’t such a problem when “the news” meant a few nightly anchors and a shared set of facts. But today, politics, media, and algorithms are designed to take advantage of our biases.

👉 Politicians like Newt Gingrich learned to weaponize language, turning opponents into “enemies” and framing compromise as weakness.
👉 Social media algorithms learned to amplify outrage and confirmation, feeding us more of what we already believe—and less of what challenges us.
👉 Billionaire-owned media outlets learned to shape not just how events are covered, but whether they are covered at all.
👉 And now, generative AI is learning to mirror us, to be “helpful,” often reinforcing what we already assume rather than nudging us toward harder truths.

Each of these forces plays on the same architecture: the invisible shortcuts of human cognition. The result isn’t just misinformation—it’s the erosion of trust, the hardening of certainty, and the loss of a shared reality.

So what do we do? We can’t erase bias, but we can recognize it. We can resist the comfort of only hearing what flatters us. We can value honesty over agreement, and expertise over charisma. We can practice tolerating discomfort and ambiguity, because clarity often requires friction.

Bias has always been with us.

But never before has it been so precisely engineered, so deliberately shaped. Knowing that doesn’t free us—but it does give us a fighting chance.

That’s what this essay is about: how politics, platforms, billionaires, and AI are no longer just reflecting our divisions—they’re designing for them. And how honesty might be the last act of resistance we have.

Explore how bias shapes our perceptions and choices, influenced by media systems, technology, and cultural dynamics in today's world.

07/29/2025

ADHD: Ten Years Later
✨ What’s changed, what’s held true, and why the conversation is finally catching up.

In 2015, I published a two-part series on ADHD: what it is, what it isn’t, and how environment and expectation shape how symptoms show up. Ten years later, I’ve revised both essays—and added a new third installment reflecting what the past decade has taught us.

🔹 Neurodiversity has reshaped how we frame ADHD—not just as a disorder, but as a cognitive difference deserving support, not shame.
🔹 New research confirms stimulant medications remain safe and effective, with some evidence of small height impact—but no support for the idea that they fuel addiction.
🔹 Hormonal shifts matter, especially for women and girls. Medications may work differently across the menstrual cycle, and ADHD care needs to reflect that.
🔹 More adults are being diagnosed—not because ADHD is “spreading,” but because people are finally being seen.
🔹 The online prescribing boom had flaws, but it didn’t create an addiction epidemic. If anything, well-managed treatment reduces long-term substance risk.

This isn’t a retraction of what I once said—it’s a reflection built on 20+ years in practice, updated science, and a more human understanding of what support should look like.

Updated in 2025, this third installment explores how our understanding of ADHD has evolved over the past decade—highlighting neurodiversity, new research on medication safety, s*x differences in treatment response, and why more adults are being diagnosed than ever before

07/28/2025

What 3 Body Problem Teaches Us About the Moral Cost of Conviction

Minor spoilers for Season 1 of the Netflix series.

We often assume that when the stakes are high, the right path becomes clear. But 3 Body Problem challenges that belief at every turn.

Based on Liu Cixin’s visionary trilogy, the show introduces an unsolvable crisis—a centuries-long countdown to alien contact—and forces its characters (and us) to grapple with what doing the right thing even means.

Some respond with cold calculation. Some with idealism. Some with despair.

None of them are entirely wrong. And that’s what makes the story so unsettling.

In this essay, I reflect on three central characters—Ye Wenjie, Thomas Wade, and Jin Cheng—and how each one represents a different survival psychology:

The Strategist
The Witness
The Empath

It’s not just a sci-fi thought experiment. It’s a mirror.
Because we, too, are living through an age of unsolvable problems:
🌍 A climate crisis we struggle to emotionally register
🤖 The rapid rise of AI we can’t fully comprehend
🏛 The erosion of democratic norms many still deny

We’re not just being tested by events—we’re being tested by what kind of people we become under pressure.

What do we hold onto when the future is uncertain?
What values survive when the clean solutions run out?

I don’t pretend to know. But like Jin, I believe holding onto care—even when it’s not the most efficient or effective path—is still worth something.

If this resonates, I’d love to hear your thoughts or have you share.

https://mentalhealthiness.com/2025/07/28/facing-the-unsolvable-moral-choices-in-3-body-problem/

07/21/2025

We’re not thinking beings who happen to feel. We’re feeling beings who sometimes think—and not always well.

That idea might sound provocative. But it’s also backed by neuroscience, psychology, and an honest look at how most of us actually make decisions.

Too often, we imagine that human progress is a story of increasing rationality. Thinkers like Steven Pinker argue that reason and Enlightenment values are what have pulled civilization forward. It’s an appealing narrative—one that celebrates logic, science, and the power of clear thinking.

And yet, when we examine that story more closely, something feels off.

Because thinking does matter—but it’s not always as clean or noble as we imagine.

In my latest essay, “How to Think Better: The Difference Between Analytical and Critical Thinking,” I explore the crucial distinction between two kinds of thought:

🧠 Analytical thinking breaks things down. It’s about structure, pattern, logic, and problem-solving. It’s what we do when we analyze symptoms, debug code, or map a timeline.

🧭 Critical thinking questions assumptions. It asks whether something is fair, ethical, valid, or missing something important. It’s what we use to challenge systems, interrogate bias, or decide whether a “logical” plan is also a just one.

Both are essential. But too often, especially in public discourse, we reward sharp analysis without deeper critique. We celebrate tidy graphs, linear progress, and clever arguments—without asking whose story is being told and what’s missing.

And when our information is incomplete or emotionally skewed, even precise thinking can lead us astray.

That’s why I use Steven Pinker’s work as a case study. His arguments are cleanly constructed and data-rich—but they often rest on narrow assumptions about history, culture, and what counts as “progress.” His optimism isn’t wrong because it’s hopeful. It’s problematic because it’s selective.

Ultimately, the essay isn’t about criticism of public intellectuals. It’s about reclaiming what it really means to think well and why it's important to do so.

To be a good analytical thinker, we need humility, precision, and openness to revision.

To be a good critical thinker, we need courage—to surface discomfort, examine power, and question even the most elegant narratives.

Clear thinking helps us solve problems. Honest thinking helps us live with them.

And in a world flooded with misinformation, confident half-truths, and emotionally charged “logic,” both are more essential than ever.

Explore the critical difference between analytical and critical thinking, and learn how each informs our understanding and decision-making.

07/14/2025

Most of us don’t think about culture unless we’re outside of it.

But culture doesn’t just shape what we wear or celebrate. It shapes what we believe counts as normal. It shapes how we understand emotion, personality, morality—even mental health.

When I was a kid growing up bilingual and bicultural, I learned early that the same behavior could mean different things in different contexts. At school, it was good to speak up and be independent. At home, it was good to listen and contribute.

That wasn’t confusing. It was clarifying. It taught me that behavior only makes sense inside a frame—and that frame is culture.

As a psychiatrist, I see this everywhere. Culture shapes how symptoms get described, which emotions get validated, and whose distress gets pathologized. Most of the time, that influence is invisible. But it’s always there.

We often assume psychology is about universal truths. But much of the research behind it comes from WEIRD samples—Western, Educated, Industrialized, Rich, and Democratic populations. That’s about 10% of the world. And yet, we’ve treated those norms as the human default.

The consequences are real. From how we interpret anger in different racial contexts, to how we assess personality, to which syndromes get fully recognized in the DSM and which ones are relegated to the appendix—culture quietly determines the frame. And that frame decides what we see as legitimate.

In my latest essay, I argue that culture isn’t an overlay on top of psychology—it’s the infrastructure underneath it. From the rise of eating disorders in reductionist food cultures, to the different national responses to COVID, to the way emotional expression is rewarded or punished based on race, class, or geography—we are all shaped by an environment we rarely see.

This piece is part of my series on The Impact of Environment, but in some ways, it’s the core of the whole project. Because culture is the one environment we inherit before anything else. It defines our defaults—often before we even know we have them.

If you've ever felt misread, mislabeled, or misunderstood—not because something was wrong with you, but because the lens wasn’t made for you—this essay is for you.

Explore how culture influences mental health, shaping emotions, personality, and societal norms beyond WEIRD biases.

06/30/2025

Built for the Wild, Born in Captivity

What if the modern human condition isn’t defined by stress or speed—but by misalignment?

We’ve evolved for connection, rhythm, reciprocity. But we now live in environments designed for productivity, performance, and constant stimulation. Like zoo animals in carefully constructed enclosures, we’re fed, housed, and entertained—yet often restless, anxious, and emotionally adrift. Not because we’re weak, but because the world we’ve built no longer fits the nervous systems we inherited.

We didn’t get here overnight. In a new essay, I trace the major adaptations that brought us to this moment:

- Agriculture, which turned relationships into roles and introduced inequality.
- Industrialization, which severed us from natural rhythms and treated time like currency.
- Capitalism, which commodified labor, care, and even rest.
- Digital life, which overwhelms our social brains with constant stimuli and disembodied communication.

Each breakthrough solved problems—but also created new ones. We’ve survived. But are we thriving?

This isn’t a call to escape or romanticize the past. It’s a call to adapt with wisdom. To remember what kinds of environments allow us to feel fully human—and begin redesigning the ones we live in.

If you've ever felt like you're doing everything "right" but still feel off, disconnected, or inexplicably tired—this piece is for you.

We’ve adapted to modern life—but at what cost? Explore how comfort, capitalism, and digital life have reshaped our minds, bodies, and sense of meaning.