573. The Illusion of Control

Summary

---

The Brainy Business Podcast – Episode 573

"The Illusion of Control" with Dr. Wolfgang Linden

Date: April 16, 2026
Host: Melina Palmer
Guest: Dr. Wolfgang Linden, Clinical Psychologist & Author

---

Episode Overview

This episode delves into how our perceptions of control—especially the illusions we carry—affect stress, productivity, emotional wellbeing, and workplace satisfaction. Melina Palmer is joined by Dr. Wolfgang Linden, an expert in clinical psychology and the author of The Illusion of Control, to unravel the subtle ways our thinking traps us, why we often feel powerless, and how reframing these patterns can improve both our professional and personal lives. Together, they explore expectations, thinking errors, the power of focusing on behavior, and counterintuitive coping mechanisms like deliberately scheduling “worry time.”

---

Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. Understanding the Interconnectedness of Stress, Emotions, and Health

• Dr. Linden explains (05:15–06:15) that high stress is linked to poorer relationships, hormonal and cardiovascular changes, and diseases like heart disease and cancer—largely through chronic inflammation.
• Quote: “Very high stress levels interfere with sleep, personal relationships … linking high stress with heart disease, also with cancer.” (05:15, Dr. Linden)

2. What Really Drives Stress? The Role of Perceived Control

• Stress is not just about the stressor; it’s about one’s ability to cope.
  Soldiers in the same situation can have vastly different outcomes depending on age and background (06:38–08:37).
• Quote: “It’s not so much the stressor ... but their ability to put up with it.” (07:20, Dr. Linden)
• Age matters: younger brains are more vulnerable to trauma and stress.

3. The Human Need for Control & The Cost of Illusion

• Early experiences shape our control-seeking behavior.
  Those raised in unstable environments crave control to feel safe, but repeated failed attempts at control can increase anxiety (09:28–10:39).
• Quote: “It’s the ones who are desperately trying to control things who are particularly insensitive to processing what’s not working.” (09:50, Dr. Linden)
• Melina notes that busyness and multitasking often feel productive but actually cause more stress and contribute to overwhelm. (10:41–11:41)

4. The Power (and Pitfalls) of Expectations & To-Do Lists

• Setting realistic expectations is a form of regaining control.
  Overloading a to-do list guarantees feelings of failure, even if significantly more is accomplished (11:53–14:21).
• Quote: “The very first thing you do have control over is how many things you put on the list.” (13:30, Dr. Linden)
• Both Melina and Dr. Linden highlight that business productivity is less about quantity and more about framing and achievable targets (14:21–16:41).
• Quote: “If you put 20 on the list and do eight ... it’s, ‘Oh my God, half of the stuff I wanted didn’t get done,’ when you’ve worked just as hard.” (15:52, Dr. Linden)

5. Coping When Control Feels Impossible at Work

• Influencing expectations through communication:
  Advocated for open discussions with supervisors to prioritize tasks. In toxic workplaces, lack of honest communication leads to burnout and turnover (17:10–18:11).
• Even if job demands are set externally, individuals retain some agency in how they respond and communicate about workload.

6. Behavior-First: The Best Starting Point for Change

• The "triangle" model:
  Feelings <-> Thinking <-> Behavior.
  Starting with behavior shifts can generate change in thoughts and emotions (18:31–21:08).
• Quote: “You have way more impact on your thinking and feelings by changing your behavior first than the other way around.” (19:59, Dr. Linden)
• Real-world example of facing fears—Dr. Linden’s own hot air balloon ride in Turkey—and the lesson that action sometimes matters more than immediate catharsis.

7. Small Steps Beat Giant Leaps

• Tiny habits are more effective than massive, intimidating goals, especially for those feeling stuck or anxious (22:05–23:31).
• Quote: “Pick something you really will do, because that has more beneficial impact than picking a big one that you don’t do.” (22:25, Dr. Linden)

8. The Prison of Absolutes ("Always," "Never," "Can’t") and How to Escape

• How categorical language traps us:
  Framing anything as “I always fail” or “They never listen” can reinforce learned helplessness and decrease perceived control (23:31–25:30).
• Quote: “It creates a cage you can’t live up to … so, you know, build a door in the cage.” (24:30, Dr. Linden)
• Challenging these beliefs can reveal broader possibilities and build actual agency.

9. Breaking Negative Spirals & The Golden Cut

• Mood and the “golden cut”:
  A simple majority of good moments can tip the balance in overall mood, even if negatives remain memorable and sticky (29:14–31:41).
• Quote: “If you keep the job, it’s because it gives you more rewards than punishments.” (31:12, Dr. Linden)
• Melina’s “cockroach in the cherries” analogy: Negativity bias makes one bad comment or experience much more salient than a dozen positives (31:41–32:09).

10. Scheduled Worry Time & The Paradox of Letting Yourself Worry

• Counterintuitive intervention:
  Assigning a set time of day to worry helps contain anxiety, shifting the experience from constant rumination to managed reflection (35:37–41:17).
• Quote: “If I encourage you as a therapist to worry for 30 minutes, I’m telling you it’s okay to worry … you have license to distract, which is a solution.” (37:18, Dr. Linden)
• Research and therapist anecdotes confirm its surprising effectiveness.

11. Flipping Control Through Radical Permission

• Anecdote:
  Therapist instructs a procrastinating student to deliberately stay in bed even longer—thereby giving them agency and flipping the whole control dynamic (41:17–43:15).

12. Micro-Steps & Chunking Big Projects

• Practical writing and work strategies:
  Break down big, intimidating projects into tiny tasks. Get something—anything—written or started (45:27–46:51).
• Quote (from Cass Sunstein): “You can’t edit a blank page.” (45:50)
• Collect material, organize, and let momentum build incrementally.

---

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On stress and health:
  “We have quite clearly shown ... linking high stress levels with heart disease, also with cancer, although not as clearly.” (05:15, Dr. Linden)
• On expectations and self-framing:
  “If you go into the day and say, ‘I just need to get this one thing done,’ and at the end of the day you got three or four things done, you feel like, ‘Whoa, I’m a superhero!’” (14:21, Melina Palmer)
• On breaking thinking traps:
  “Categoricals ... create a cage ... so, you know, build a door in the cage.” (24:30, Dr. Linden)
• On worry:
  “You can schedule worry time ... Spend half an hour ... get the worrying out of your system.” (35:37, Dr. Linden)
• On micro progress:
  “Pick something you really will do, because that has more beneficial impact than picking a big one that you don’t do.” (22:25, Dr. Linden)

---

Timestamps of Important Segments

• Intro & framing the Illusion of Control: 00:01–04:58
• Stress, emotions, health connection: 04:58–06:38
• Stress tolerance & individual differences: 06:38–08:38
• Control, busyness, and productivity spirals: 09:28–11:53
• To-do lists, expectation-setting: 11:53–16:41
• Workplace realities, reframing external control: 16:41–18:31
• Behavioral change & agency triangle: 18:31–21:08
• Tiny habits vs. big leaps: 22:05–23:31
• Language traps & absolutes: 23:31–25:30
• Challenging entrenched beliefs: 25:30–29:14
• Negativity bias & the golden cut: 29:14–32:09
• Scheduled worry time: 35:37–41:17
• Permission and flipping control: 41:17–43:15
• Micro-steps, chunking projects, writing tips: 45:27–47:54
• Summary, takeaways, and where to find Dr. Linden: 47:54–51:36

---

Additional Resources

• Dr. Linden’s Book: The Illusion of Control – links in show notes
• Other works: Book on stress management, undergraduate clinical psychology textbook
• Find Dr. Linden: Wikipedia page, academic email (not shared, but readily found online)

---

Conclusion & Key Takeaways

• Our beliefs about control tangibly shape our stress, productivity, and satisfaction.
• Focusing first on what you can control—your own behaviors and reactions—can help break out of negative cycles.
• Frame expectations realistically; setting yourself up for achievable wins matters more than piling on impossible to-do lists.
• Language matters—challenge absolutes and open the “cage door.”
• Try scheduling dedicated “worry time” as a counterintuitive but effective strategy to manage rumination.
• Progress is made one micro-step at a time: start, no matter how small, and let momentum build.
• Ultimately, shifting perception is a form of regaining real control.

---

“Sometimes the most powerful change we can make isn’t in controlling everything around us, but just in adjusting how we interpret what’s happening and set those expectations.”
—Melina Palmer, 52:28

---

Transcript

[Melina Palmer]

Hey there, Melina. Here.

[Melina Palmer (Podcast Host - Narration)]

If you've been feeling like things are changing faster than you can keep up, you're not alone. I hear it all the time. Smart people doing good work but feeling unsure of where to focus next, it tends to show up in places like your pricing, sales, conversations, messaging, competing priorities, even the experience you're creating for your team and customers. Your brain wants clarity, but when it doesn't have it, everything feels heavier than it should. And that kind of uncertainty keeps businesses stuck and you don't want to be left behind. So if you've been craving a bit of a reset, a way to step back, get clear, and feel confident in what you should be doing next, I'd love to help. I work with two to three clients each month, from solopreneurs to global teams to translate behavioral science into practical, usable strategies you can apply right away. So customers buy and employees buy in. If that sounds like what you need, head to the brainy business.com contact and book a discovery call to start the conversation. Again, that's the brainy business.com contact. I can't wait to hear from you. And hopefully work together. And when you're ready, let's start the show. Welcome to episode 573 of the Brainy Business Understanding the Psychology of why People Buy. In today's episode, I'm excited to introduce you to Dr. Wolfgang Linden, author of the Illusion of Control.

[Melina Palmer]

Ready? Let's get started.

[Podcast Announcer]

You are listening to the Brainy Business podcast where we dig into the psychology of why people buy and help you incorporate behavioral economics into your business, making it more brain friendly. Now, here's your host, Melina Palmer.

[Melina Palmer]

Hello. Hello everyone.

[Melina Palmer (Podcast Host - Narration)]

Name is Melina Palmer and I want to welcome you to the Brainy Business podcast. Have you ever noticed how often we say things like I'll never get this done or they never listen to me or I always mess this up? Those kinds of thoughts feel harmless in the moment, but they can quietly shape how we see our work, our relationships and our own abilities. And when we feel overwhelmed, stressed or out of control, our brains often fall into patterns that that make things feel even more difficult than they already are or have to be. Understanding how those patterns form and how to shift them can make a huge difference in everything from productivity at work to relationships at home and everything in between. And today, I'm excited to introduce you to Dr. Wolfgang Linden. Wolfgang is a clinical psychologist, professor emeritus and researcher whose work has focused for decades on the connections between stress, emotions, health and human behavior. He's led clinical training programs worked extensively in therapy and research and authored multiple books including the Illusion of Control, which explores how our beliefs about control shape our thinking behavior and well being. In this conversation we talk about stress, expectations, productivity, worry, and the thinking patterns that can quietly trap us in the cycles of frustration or anxiety and and what we can do to change them. As you listen, keep this question in mind. Where might you be giving away control in your own thinking without even realizing it really quickly? Before we get into the conversation, I want to be sure you know that there are links in the show, notes for my top related past episodes and

[Melina Palmer]

books, ways to get in touch, and more. It's all within the app you're listening

[Melina Palmer (Podcast Host - Narration)]

to and atthe brainy business.com573 now let's jump right in. Dr. Wolfgang Linden, welcome to the Brainy Business Podcast.

[Dr. Wolfgang Linden]

Good morning to you and I'm very excited to be here with you.

[Melina Palmer]

Yes, same. I'm super excited for the conversation. I know it's going to be a fantastic one. Before we jump right on into that, though, for everyone who doesn't yet know you, can you share a little bit about yourself and the work that you do?

[Dr. Wolfgang Linden]

Well, for one thing, as you can probably figure by hair color, I've lived a pretty good sized life already. And I've learned that the older I get, the more I learn, but the more I learn, the more I feel compelled to share them with somebody instead of just walking away. So wrote a book about it, but that kind of summarizes really all the things that I've learned in being mostly academic clinical psychologist, but I've also been director of a training clinic and had a small private practice. And most of the things that I've dealt with deal with the issues of stress, emotion and physical disease and how they all tie together. So it's a pretty broad picture of the various topics I've covered over time.

[Melina Palmer]

Yeah. For those who would say those things aren't connected, can you give a little synopsis, knowing that's not the main point of the conversation today? But like you said, stress and disease and how these things are connected. What what can you share with the audience about insights from that?

[Dr. Wolfgang Linden]

Well, what everybody would love is very simple causal models. A causes B. If A figs B disappears, wouldn't that be nice? But we do know that very high stress levels interfere with sleep personal relationships. You can track it by looking at hormonal changes in the human body, cardiovascular changes, and we have quite clearly shown how you have much of it, likely through chronic inflammation in the body Linking high stress levels with heart disease, also with cancer, although not as clearly as it is with heart disease. We know that stressful events trigger asthma impacts, interferes with healthy eating. I mean, the list goes on and on really.

[Melina Palmer]

And so with that, is stress something that you'd say is the like if there's a keystone item to kind of focus on that can help alleviate some of the others, is that where people would maybe start of being, trying to be less stressed or it's kind of different for everybody. Or you can start with sleep. Is there something that's a, a good point to kind of focus on?

[Dr. Wolfgang Linden]

Well, the thing with stress is that people struggle with a definition at a superficial level. I think it's incredibly clear what it is because everybody's gone through it. But the bottom line is that you have to differentiate what is the stimulus, what's the stressor and what's the person and their ability to deal with the stressor. These are two different things that together make a process. So you can have, for example, soldiers go through wartime stories and really terrible exposures and they do well, and you have others who go through the same scenario and they develop full blown ptsd. So the question is not so much as a distressor, which is possibly the same for both of those individuals, but their ability to put up with it. So in this particular case, for example, we know that age matters dramatically. So 18 year olds going through wartime experiences are dramatically more likely to develop PTSD because their neocortex is not fully formed. 25 year olds do way better. And the same thing would go with high work demands and at the workplace. So if there's a huge amount of demand on the individual, some of them thrive on it because that's their personality. It also matters whether the expectation at work are matched to your ability. Occasionally people get promoted, Peter principle to levels of jobs that they actually can't handle. But they were the relatively best person to be given the job because they're kind of next in line, but it's too much for them. Or you have employers who decide to cut jobs and simply take the workload of two or three people and dump it on the shoulders of one single person, and that's just too much. They can't hack it.

[Melina Palmer]

Yeah, yeah. And so we'll get into if there are ways we can kind of help to identify, you know, who might be more receptive or things like that kind of later on in the conversation. But let's talk a little bit about that core work element and thanks for starting that Piece of the conversation. When we think about what we can control and stress and like a lack of control is something that people, you know, we're wired to not like. Right. That uncertainty is something we don't tend to gravitate towards as humans. And so how does this idea of wanting to control things impact how we show up and how we may feel stressed in life and work?

[Dr. Wolfgang Linden]

It's worth it to look back at how much control would you need to settle your own emotional struggles? Somebody who grew up with a relatively stable environment likely anticipates stability and they may get thrown off a bit like everybody does when there is change. But somebody who grew up with a horrendous amount of instability will desperately try to create more control because it makes them feel safe. But if they then find out again and again and again that this attempted control doesn't work, they get more and more anxious. So you kind of get set up for one style versus the other by. Via early life experience. And of course, it's the ones who are desperately trying to control things who are particularly sort of insensitive to processing what are all the things that are not working when you control them so desperately? I mean, in fact, desperation is just not a good thing. It's just not a fine emotion to have.

[Melina Palmer]

Yeah. Not. Not ideal. That's not really kind of where we want to be. I think that a lot of people end up with the. And so you talk about this later on in the book, but we'll jump into it now because it feels like the right segue to me. But what it feels like at work, we have so many things we're supposed to be working on. I have multiple bosses, I have multiple projects. I'm not sure what's important anymore. I haven't talked to this person in a month. And we procrastinate and we don't know what the prior are supposed to be. And it's like there's a bit of feeling like you control the idea of what you want to be thinking about or something. And that you can feel like people actually kind of like the idea or the way it feels to be juggling things. Right. That busyness can feel productive in a lot of cases, but it actually is. It's causing more stress and it's harder on you as a person. And it kind of can spiral out of control very quickly.

[Melina Palmer (Podcast Host - Narration)]

Can you speak to kind of how

[Melina Palmer]

people get stuck in that sort of dynamic first? And then we can talk a little bit about how to get out of it, how to not get so stuck.

[Dr. Wolfgang Linden]

Yeah, I mean, there are a lot of angles to this, and one of them maybe we can start with is just the whole notion of expectations. So if you think that these 20 ideas you want to work on will all happen to have to come about within one day, then it matters. Well, what are those 20 expectations? Are they small projects, big projects? Do they require other people or not? And how you prioritize and how you create your to do list. And I'm a total fan of to do lists. Not everybody is, but I am. But there's an incredible art to create a to do list and then to work your way through it. And the very first thing you do have control over is how many things you put on the list. So if you put way too many things on that couldn't possibly get done within the same day, of course you're going to feel burned out at the end. I mean, you're toast. So you decide how many you put on there, and you decide on which ones are the really important ones, and you decide which ones you're going to work on. On first. You work on cleaning your desk, which is nice. It can increase productivity, but it doesn't really get you big results. So all of that matters. And then just being realistic about how much time you have. I bet your life is different than mine in many ways, but probably similar in that we used to think, oh, great, I've got eight hours, I could do productive things. In reality, no, you're going to have three, four, feel lucky because there's all kinds of stuff coming along. People you work with tell you, I've got this problem. You're the only one who can really help me with it. And there you go. And you do it because you like the people or what they're working on is important to you as well. So you help out their crises, little things. Somebody changes a software in your computer and you have to get used to the new software, which will take you hours or sometimes more before you get back to the same level of productivity. So there's a ton of stuff there that you can do right and wrong, and it'll make a difference at the end of the day, even though what you can get done and will get done, it's the same. It's just how you frame it, how you create your own anticipatory model.

[Melina Palmer]

Yeah, I loved seeing that you talked about this in the book. Because one, I totally agree. And I talk about this and say exactly, almost. It's weirdly almost verbatim the same thing that I say to people all the time. And so it was really cool to see of like, I knew we were like minded anyway. But seeing it in there is good. But in that idea of, yeah, so one, like eight hours is not eight hours. You need to plan in time for the extra stuff that's going to come up, external factors and internal stuff extra. And also, like, you're gonna get distracted. You should take a break. You need to eat food sometimes, like, these things matter. But then also, and I talk about it for anchoring purposes is the kind of the concept that I've tied it to. But like, if you go into the day and say, I just need to get this one thing done. This the most important thing. And at the end of the day you got three or four things done, you feel like, whoa, I'm a superhero, I'm amazing. Whereas if you go into the day with 15 things on your to do list and you got the same three or four things done, you feel like you're the worst. Right. I'm terrible. And it's just because you set the wrong anchor like you said, you framed it wrong. And that anticipation just sets everything up. And where you can either be having that, like, virtuous cycle, like, yay, me, I'm so good, or that vicious cycle of, oh, man, I'm so useless, I can't believe I can never get anything done. Everyone else so productive, you can just spiral in kind of either direction.

[Dr. Wolfgang Linden]

Yeah. Oh, absolutely. And the nice thing is, I mean, I push in the book the idea that there are a lot of things we struggle to do that we don't have control over. But this one you have control over. You decide how many plans you make for the day. And if you learn it's a Skill to put eight things on your list, do all eight and two extras. You think you're a hero, but you put 20 on the list and you do eight, just like go or 10 of them. It's, oh, my God, half of the stuff I want to do never got done. So you feel terrible, but you've worked just as hard. You should be able to get the same kind of brownie points in exchange. It just won't. Not if you set it up to be unreasonable to begin with.

[Melina Palmer]

Yeah. So what advice would you give for the people that I am guessing we're listening and having it, whether it's like internally or they actually shout it aloud to the podcast as they're listening to say, but like, no, my boss or bosses put these unrealistic expectations for me. Someone else is putting 15 projects or deadlines or whatever it is on my to do list. I don't have control over that. How would you respond?

[Dr. Wolfgang Linden]

It's a little bit of a question of, you know, do you have an organization that allows proper flow of information from the top to the bottom and the bottom to the top. If you have good supervisors, you ought to be able to go to them and say, look, I've put in all the hours and I put in overtime. I cannot get all these things done. So can we sit down together, look at all the things that are expected of me and let's work out a priority list about this is what I should work on first, this, what's next. And if these things don't get done right away, that is okay too. So you have a clear organizational framework or set of expectations so that your boss knows you are doing the best you can. I suspect there are some workplaces where they just don't want to hear it. They just want to say you're supposed to be a hero and do all these things. And I suspect that company will have a very high rate of ascensionism or people quitting and walking away.

[Melina Palmer]

Right? Yeah. So there can be some opportunity to control, even if it feels like you don't have it, in which case we've got a good segue into what can we actually control? What do we have control over in our lives at work or otherwise?

[Dr. Wolfgang Linden]

Well, in that scenario, I've pitched the idea which are very strongly supportive of that. The very first thing you can control is your behavior. You can decide to get off your chair and walk around the block or drink a sip of water. You can decide to call a friend and say, look, this little tiff that we had, we don't really need to have it. I think we can talk about it. And people who are incredibly anxious can deal with scary kinds of objects. It doesn't necessarily settle everything. I can remember I have a bit of a fear of heights. So at some point I took a hot air balloon ride in Turkey where they got this crazy landscapes. And I was quite anxious the night before. I remember that I said, okay, once I'm in there and we're doing this, I'm going to be totally habituated afterwards. I wasn't. That's an open air balloon with nothing really to hold on to 5 or 9 meters up in the air. So yes, I settled a little bit, but I probably won't do that. But I did it. So you can't do tons of things even while you're Anxious or while you're depressed. And you have way more impact on your thinking and on your feelings by changing your behavior first than the other way around. So. And as director of our clinic, one of the first things I did in the clinic is we put whiteboards in every therapy room because a lot of good therapy is teaching. And if you're teaching, then your clients are way more accepting of what you're doing, because teaching is not stigmatized. Teaching and learning is. But if I was, you know, going around and then it is. It's stupid what you did. Or of course, then they're going to get peeved and, well, probably want to walk out on you. They should, because that's terrible therapist behavior. But then I use a triangle where feelings affect thinking, and thinking affects behavior, and behavior affects feelings. All three are connected. But the best to start is behavior. So if you thought you can't do it, but get your butt out of the chair, walk around the block and, you know, smell the roses, you've kind of proved the idea that you can't do it wrong. And that's a pretty convincing way of implementing step one of change.

[Melina Palmer]

Yeah. And in that way, potentially, as we bring it to that work aspect we were talking about of maybe it feels like I just can't get through the to do list. I can't tell my boss I need more time. I can't do these sorts of things by trying, like, one thing a little bit differently. But, like, what's. Would you kind of lean into an aspect of kind of tiny habits or what have you? Like, it's kind of like, what's the smallest thing you can do to just get started, like you said. Right. It's like, I can't get up. So you get out of the chair. You don't have to go, you know, run a marathon. You can just kind of like walk around the block or go to the mailbox or whatever that thing happens to be. It's like if you do a little something to kind of get that movement, then you can do a little bit more. Perhaps the next time. Or is it more of a do a really big thing to kind of shock the system? Yeah, you.

[Dr. Wolfgang Linden]

You won't. Yeah. If, let's say you, you. You work with a student, and I mean, I have. Who has real trouble to get any projects done and let's say college university student. Right. So they get up and they look at all the things they're supposed to do, and in the end they don't do any of them. So if you work with them and set up some gigantic unreasonable goal. Nothing is going to happen. But you ask them, what do you think you really can do? They say, yeah, I could spend 15 minutes reading this piece of Shakespeare's Macbeth or some poem by another writer and write a bit of a summary of it. That's it. That's all. I just want you to pick something you really will do because that has more beneficial impact than picking a big one that you don't do. That's a wrong message. So it's a very gradual kind of a buildup that helps. But much of the time it is also about just sharing your strategies with a friend, a colleague, a supervisor. Don't just hang onto it yourself and play around and set yourself up for games that you ultimately lose.

[Melina Palmer]

Yeah, definitely. And in that way, potentially, people may be telling themselves some of these kind of the categorical, which I loved as you talked about those through the book. But to say, like, I will never. I can't. I always can. You share a little bit about that type of language and how people kind of get stuck in it and why it's not beneficial, both when we think about our own selves, but also about other people.

[Dr. Wolfgang Linden]

I don't know whether everybody reacts the same, so I have to be upfront about that one. But if you use any of those categoricals, there is a red flag going up inside of me. A politician who says, I will never lie to you. That's a good one. Of course you will. Are they really big lies? Are they really important lies or not? I don't know. My wife told me, you never take the garbage out. You can be darn sure. I remember some date when I did. And I will bring that back as a topic just so that those words don't get expressed. And I mean, the absolutely silliest example I can think of when a categorical is justified. Your Honor, I have never killed anybody. That's a good time to use an absolute, but that's about it. Somebody said, have you ever lied in your life? Sure you did. Maybe a very nice social white lie to keep the peace. We do that. Is that perfect? No, but it might be the better solution than creating a big crisis that you then have to work out. So it creates a cage that you can't live up to. Or this game. Sorry, can't you break out of lousy allegory here? Can't break out of. But it's your own cage. So, you know, build a door in the cage.

[Melina Palmer]

Right.

[Dr. Wolfgang Linden]

Give yourself some breathing space.

[Melina Palmer]

Right. And so you know, things like I always stutter when I try to do a presentation. They never listen to me. I, my boss will always give me more work than I can do. Whatever. All of these things, things people think all the time, that we kind, we, like you said, we put ourselves in these cages. What would be a way that if we pick one of those or something else that speaks to you in this example. So what's the problem with me thinking my boss never listens to me? And what's the benefit of kind of like breaking out of that? Like, what can. Can I accomplish if I get out of that sort of categorical mindset to move forward? And like, what, how can that give me some control? Like, am I. Am I taking control away from myself? Or does it feel like I'm giving myself control when I say that they never listen, or I will always do this sort of thing. Like, how does that all tie into this idea?

[Dr. Wolfgang Linden]

Well, first and foremost, so my boss never listens to me. Well, how do you know? Is it possible that this person never says that they heard what you said, but it influences them anyway? Or they might assign a good idea to somebody else simply because they like that person better. But it still was your idea. That can very well happen at the workplace. You hear something being given credit to by 2 person XYZ say, oh, that was my idea. So, yeah, somebody listened to you. They just didn't give you credit, which is kind of ugly. But I mean, I would have a Socratean dialogue. If that's therapy about, you know, where's the proof? Are there alternative theories for it but you can outright test it again? I mean, what's that workplace atmosphere? If you really think your ideas don't work, then, I mean, if it was therapy, as a therapist, I say, well, if nothing you say has a positive impact at work, why does the boss keep you out? So the very fact that you have a job and keep the job means there's something good happening here. Now, the message, of course, that you're saying is I don't feel appreciated enough, where people don't tell me enough that I'm doing a good thing. And you could again have a good supervisor. You can approach a supervisor and say, I don't really hear often enough what you think is a good idea or not. And I don't mind constructive criticism, but give me a bit more feedback, it gives me more motivated at work. And I think good supervisors either know that already or else will listen and respond because it's likely going to improve. Sorry, the Productivity of your work unit, so in which case the supervisor profits from it too.

[Melina Palmer]

Right, Right. And potentially be thoughtful that when we open the door to say I want more feedback, that they might give you more negative than you expected, but it's not necessarily meaning that that's all they see. You know, you talk, you share some good biases and things and thinking erro and whatnot that come up throughout the book and examples there. But there's a bit of that can of worms that can open up when we ask for it is.

[Dr. Wolfgang Linden]

But again, we have sort of thresholds for a lot of things rather than where things really do flip. And one of those in Mood is what architects and artists call the golden cut here. You're familiar with the idea.

[Melina Palmer]

Yeah, but go ahead and explain it for the audience. For sure.

[Dr. Wolfgang Linden]

With the Golden Cut, you are comparing what are the more dominant, less dominant themes, let's say, in a piece of music or in a painting. And artists, not that I'm pretending to be an artist, but they don't like to put the main object in a picture smack in the middle. And most audiences, it's been tested, say that's boring. So what you do is you have a dominant portion of a picture and a minor one. The minor one makes the bigger element richer, but it's clearly minor. And where we draw that line is about 61% where the longer part is proportional to the smaller part, to the bigger part. And the same thing happens with Mood. You can track this in psychotherapy, that if you ask somebody who's depressed, are you depressed all the time? If they keep a record, and we make them keep a record sometimes in therapy, they'll find out that they were depressed maybe 80% of the time, so. Which is, of course, totally dominating your emotional tone. But 20% that weren't. So can you grow that 20%? And if at some point the language changes. Right. So somebody will come back. So how do you feel? And say, well, I still feel like I'm not really good at this, but I realize every once in a while things are working out after a while. So this is the shift. And then they come back. Well, yeah, most of the day was awful. The good part of the day was awful, but most of it was okay. Then you've made a huge progress in therapy and in the mindset of the person. And that's really all you need. You need to swing it from the minor to the major one. It's like even people who love their jobs will almost guarantee to be finding something about the job they don't like. But on balance, if you keep the job, it's because it gives you more rewards than punishments.

[Melina Palmer]

Yeah, I know we mentioned negativity bias in there, and I love the explanation from that. One of my favorites being that a single cherry does nothing for a bowl of cockroaches, but one cockroach can ruin an entire bowl of cherries. Right.

[Dr. Wolfgang Linden]

It's got punch.

[Melina Palmer]

So with that, like, though to say, like, eventually, if we keep adding more cherries, you know, we can kind of help on the one side, I guess, but also to. To take that and know when there is the one thing, we can dwell on it. Right. Like, I've given examples before of, like, I get. I've. When I worked in more of that corporate space, you know, you get your feedback, your annual review and whatever, and had plenty of wonderful things said about me over the years. And I don't remember exactly who said what, but the one person that had the neg thing that they said, I remember 10 years later, like, who it was, what they were talking about, whatever else.

[Melina Palmer (Podcast Host - Narration)]

Right.

[Melina Palmer]

So we do tend to kind of dwell on some of those negative aspects, and they have more resonance and, like, stickiness for us. And so in that way, even if the. The bad stuff is only a couple of things, if you allow yourself to kind of spiral on it and you're trying not to think about it, this can be. We could talk white bears, which I think is. Was really one of my favorite things too. If we. If we try not to think about the thing, potentially we think more about the thing, and then it can feel like it's bigger than it really is, and we can maybe shift our attention to something else. Can you share a little bit about, you know, how that might be beneficial for people?

[Dr. Wolfgang Linden]

Well, again, if I have the luxury of somebody in therapy who clearly wants help, and I got a whiteboard and they're telling me that they get both good and bad feedback at work, I'll literally have them go up to the board, put up two columns, and say, what are the good things and what are the critical things? And hopefully, I mean, I don't want blow this thing into tiny little bits, but the good ones list is longer. And they say, look at it. You made those. You wrote the list. I didn't write the list. This list is longer. So if the negative stuff bothers you, remember you had a column on the other side that was quite a bit longer, and it came from you. It's in there. You just didn't pay attention to it. So that's the other thing. I mean, you can change your behavior and you can decide what you pay attention to. You cannot force yourself not to think something like, I gotta fall asleep. I gotta fall asleep. It is not working. But you can get up, do something different than go back to bed later, whatever. And. People do the most amazing things. And I learned that from a colleague, Tom Borkovac, that you can schedule worry time for people that are super anxious. And the first time I proposed this to somebody, I thought, you're crazy as a therapist to even come up with an idea like that. They'll write you off snotty. No, that worked just fine. Spend half an hour, you could write about it. You could have a diary or talk with somebody, or just really spend your time thinking about this stuff. Just do it after dinner for half hour so you get the worrying out of your system. And then you can spend the rest of the time doing more productive things. And people actually do it and it helps.

[Melina Palmer]

Yeah. And so in that way, to the point of like, someone who is very anxious and maybe worries about stuff peripherally all day long, but they're trying not to worry so much. But in that way of. In the idea of you tell someone not to think about white bears. It's like, all we think about is white bears. And your brain is like, confirming, I'm really not thinking about the thing I'm supposed to not be thinking about. Keeps bringing it up again and again. Right. And so when you're trying not to think about the thing, you potentially think about it more. And so giving yourself some permission, like you said, to say, I get 30 minutes of dedicated worrying time every day that I'm just gonna sit and worry so that I don't have to worry the rest of the day. It feels like, like you said, it shouldn't work because I worry all day long. How one. Like, how is 30 minutes gonna be enough or whatnot? But also when you allow yourself to just focus on it, like, can you share, I mean, from what, what you know, from, you know, prescribing this for people. And then also other research of, like, is it like, you allow yourself the time to kind of like, close those tabs and like, chapter. When you fully consider it in a way that you like, do you have to be thoughtful about the way that you worry in those 30 minutes for it to be more impactful or just sort of when you have the permission to get it out of your system, you've, like, reduced your own stress. Do you know what's going on there of why that kind of works for

[Dr. Wolfgang Linden]

people to do a bit of guessing here.

[Melina Palmer]

Yeah.

[Dr. Wolfgang Linden]

What actually drives it. I think it's good to have permission because if I encourage you as a therapist to worry for 30 minutes, I'm telling you it's okay to worry so you don't feel so stupid about doing it. But if you know you have the time to do it, I would hope also that you then give yourself permission for the rest of the day to distract with something more constructive. Because it's a distraction that you have control over. You can distract yourself, but you may not want to distract yourself. You feel guilty if you don't deal with it ever, but you are dealing with it. So that then gives you license to distract, which is a solution.

[Melina Palmer]

Yeah, right. And then it feels like I at least have some control over something too. Right. And I'm delaying the time. Say I love the phrasing. I talk a lot about this power of not yet. Right. And so it's not to say that I can never worry about anything. Right. Like that line in the sand, you know, our categoricals again, like the no's we don't like. But to say I like it pops in our brain. It is going to, especially as we're trying to change that habit initially. Like if you are someone who's anxious and worries a lot, those thoughts are going to pop up a lot. And if you say no, I never am supposed to worry like that. It's just going to keep coming up. But potentially if you say, hey, not yet, my dedicated worry time is at 6:30 and I'll worry about that in 45 minutes. It gives you a little, like you said, the permission to worry later, to know there's nothing wrong with it. But like that's something to do later and I'm guessing potentially too, when you do go to pick it back up, when you get out of that like kind of hot state moment of the fear, and you're just kind of now looking at it more like, so what am I worrying about now? It actually feels less worrisome when it wasn't prompted by whatever initially triggered it, you know, earlier in the day. So it can kind of help you feel like you have some of that control and it can, you know, have a positive snowball effect.

[Dr. Wolfgang Linden]

Yep. Yeah. Oh, I totally agree. And I, I can even see that if you have this explicit half hour where you could worry, worry has in principle a constructive function. Right. To, to anticipate or prevent future trouble from arising. So maybe you feel then a Bit of an obligation that, oh, I've got a half hour to worry about it. So maybe I could think about also what would be a solution and say, okay, I've got a half hour to look for a solution and maybe you'll find something, have a small action program and say, okay, I'm going to try this. And then tomorrow when I come back, I'll ask myself, did it work?

[Melina Palmer]

Yeah, right. It's funny because like I said, for someone who worries all day long, on the one side it feels like, well, you know, just 30 minutes for my

[Melina Palmer (Podcast Host - Narration)]

worrying, but also like 30 minutes is

[Melina Palmer]

a long time to dedicatedly worry about something. I bet you your brain will get kind of bored when that's all it's allowed to do in that.

[Dr. Wolfgang Linden]

Well, then maybe you decide that you, you can finish the worrying in less than 30 minutes.

[Melina Palmer (Podcast Host - Narration)]

Yeah.

[Melina Palmer]

And, and then we move on. Right. Like, I, I love that. I think that is a really useful tool for people. And something, like you said, it's counterintuitive, but you know, something that you can test, that's one of these behaviors, like we're saying, right. You can change your behavior to say, you know what, I'm going to start just having a dedicated worry time, you know, and that's something that you can do whether it's, you know, first thing in the morning or right after dinner. You know, pick a time, that's your worry time. That could be something that people can kind of try as they go along.

[Dr. Wolfgang Linden]

There are also some really clever therapy things on this one. One I learned from a hypnotherapist many, many years ago I was reading about. This is a college student who goes to see the hypnotherapist and says, I'm bombing in college, I've got lousy grades, I'm going to get kicked out if I don't bring my grades up. But I can't get myself to work. I'm in bed in the morning, 10 o', clock, 11 o'. Clock, I miss my classes, I just can't get going. And so therapist kind of nods the head says, well, I want you to promise me to do for a week what I'm going to tell you next, but I want you to commit to it before you know what it is. Okay? Cat in the bag. This is kind of a tricky thing. So client says, okay, because I'm desperate, I need help. I asked you for help, right? So I trust you. So the therapist says, well, what I want you to do is next week when you have trouble getting out of bed. And let's say it's 10 o', clock, I want you to stay in bed for an hour longer. And so you probably smell where this one is going because the client comes back a week later and said, yes, I did what you told me, what I agreed to do for the first two or three days. And then I got up early because basically I shifted around. Do I have control load? If I have control to stay longer, I kind of also have control about staying shorter. And so it just flipped, flipped. The whole control perception and problem largely solved. So goes the story. Could fall under urban myth or therapy myth. But I like this story.

[Melina Palmer]

Yeah. And I think we can see how nice thing is people can go test it for themselves. Right. The thing that it might not be about staying in bed longer. Right. But it's about how much time for a project or if you feel like you need, you know, X amount of time to do something, like give yourself more than that even and just like do it, then see how much time you really need it. Often I know I have found a lot that thing that is where it feels like it's the really big scary email or the pitch that's going to take a long time or how long to make the slides or do whatever the thing is, the thing that you're putting off and you keep looking at and seeing in your inbox, thinking about and feeling like, I need so much time and then I'm worried that I didn't respond and they're going to be mad and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Like when you actually sit down then and do it, it takes like 15 minutes, baby. Like maybe not for creating a presentation. Right. That could take a little bit longer, but it's typically less than you think. If you just can go, you know, take the time and do whatever that happens to be. So there's a little bit of just jumping in and doing that thing and

[Dr. Wolfgang Linden]

you have again control over how you parse it out. So sometimes I find that if you have a task that's particularly scary that you might think takes longer than this, just start writing a few words. You could write the middle part of an argument or the end of an argument or the solution, and then create the rest later. You know, I'm old enough to have spent my early life writing by actually writing. And you had to write at the beginning, start at the beginning because there was no computer available. But now you can do the opposite. You can write bits and pieces, just get them out on paper, a few ideas, even if they're Wildly incomplete and incoherent. But when you go back to it, you have a little bit of a foundation you can work with. No, I should move that idea. Before that idea or this particular one isn't well developed. I got to spend a bit of time on it. So the moment that first step is taken, the project already looks more manageable because you're kind of on the move.

[Melina Palmer]

Yeah, I'm all about breaking things into those micro steps. Right. And to be able to look, especially. I know you've written a book, right. And going through that process. I've written a couple of those myself. And if I was to say, you know, no, I have to start with word one, best opening ever. Whatever, never would have happened. Right. But there. Yeah, there's quite a bit of, like, if I look at my outline and stuff that's here, what feels like something I can write right now, like, what's a point I want to make? What's a sentence I want to say? What's a thing I can just get into? And I always go back to when Cass Sunstein was on. I love where he had said, you know, you can't edit a blank page, right? So get something out there. And I'm sure other people have said similar things before, but I always attribute that to him. And often I found, you know, you go back and see the thing the next day that you think was just terrible. You go, oh, I'm just gonna go to bed. This is no good. And you wake up and you read it and you go, hey, I'm actually kind of smart. That. That sounds pretty good. And then you can just. And I got one thing done, right? And then I can build, I can start to edit that. It gets the flow going again, and you can kind of keep going. So understanding those steps and just starting to chip away at them, pretty soon you realize, hey, I'm a third of the way through this thing. Right? And you can just work on that momentum.

[Dr. Wolfgang Linden]

Well, I mean, similarly, I don't know what your strategy was, but when. When I do books, especially with the last one, because there was no particular pressure on it. I didn't have a contract yet. I was just having boxes with what I thought were going to be chapters. And every time I saw something on the web or heard a story, just scrap the piece of something, dumped it into that box. And then at some point, I pulled out the box and, okay, how many pieces do I have? Can I write some rough first chapter on this? And for a good book proposal, the publishers want to see Typically like three chapters. So you've collected a lot of material and you have some idea for chapters and okay, these three are the most developed at this point and they're going to put that forth and then presumably you get some feedback about, yeah, those are good chapters or there's a good order in presenting them. So it's a gradual process and literally, I mean, you see that your boxes are filling up and it's comforting.

[Melina Palmer]

Yeah, definitely. I did some virtual. I used Stormboard for at least for the first book and it was like, I know I have all these things and I think they maybe go here. I made a bunch of digital post it notes and then can start to kind of group them together and have kind of ideas in that way that helped to figure out where they might go and you can kind of shuffle them around. But yeah, yeah, definitely, like links. I have so many folders and things that I have dedicated to something I think could be an interesting post someday or that might go into a book or whatever that happens to be so important to keep all those organized. But that's my additional not yet stuff of like someday I need to pick this up and look at it, but I can't allow myself to do that right now because I have something more important to do. So what I do love about the Illusion of Control, the book you do. As you said at the beginning of our conversation here today, I can really feel the compilation of so many aspects and thoughts of how, you know, control ties into, you know, personal relationships, work relationships, getting kids to eat broccoli or whatever else and understanding our own thinking errors and to know how that can show up with. We think about weight loss and like you said, stress and sleep. Like there's so many aspects of this, but it has a really thoughtful flow that it builds in a way that we're learning and can see how things connect. I think it's a really delightful walk for people to be able to go on the journey and see how it applies in all these different areas and all that interconnectedness. And so of course I highly recommend for everyone listening to go check out and get their copy of the Illusion of Control. It was a really wonderful book to read and I'm sure you were. They were inspired by hearing you speak today as well. We will put links in the show notes to make it easy for everyone to get that. But you know, for those who are just, you know, wanting to jot something down or know where to find you, what's their best path to. To follow you or connect get the book. Any of those things?

[Dr. Wolfgang Linden]

Well, I mean, I have written other things as well. I mean, I have a book out on stress management. I've written an undergraduate textbook in clinical psychology. So people with those interests can follow them up if you want to have a little bit more background. I have a Wikipedia page so people can learn a bit more that way. Other than that, I'm terribly easy to find, way too easy because lots of people send me things. Can you review this for me for free and. Or journal this and that. So if you, you know, punch my name and unfortunately my email probably comes up way, way too often. But that doesn't mean, you know, that I wouldn't, wouldn't answer, you know, forget interesting and fair questions. I'll deal with them and be happy to have a chat with people.

[Melina Palmer]

Perfect. Well, we won't put your email address out into the world, but like you said in the, in a land of being an academic, I think you're typically reasonably easy to find. Having worked at a university and whatnot. People could typically find your. Your email. But we will put other links and things for people to be able to find and follow you and of course, to get the illusion of control and where they can check out your other books as well. So thank you again for joining me today. It was really delightful to chat with you.

[Dr. Wolfgang Linden]

It was a pleasure.

[Melina Palmer (Podcast Host - Narration)]

Thank you again to Dr. Wolfgang Linden

[Melina Palmer]

for joining me on the show today.

[Melina Palmer (Podcast Host - Narration)]

What got your brain buzzing in today's conversation? For me, it's kind of a simple thing, but it really boils down to knowing that how we frame our experiences changes how we feel about them. We talked about something really simple, but also really powerful. The expectations we set for ourselves and how they are impacting our lives all the time. You know, if you start the day with that to do list with 15 impossible tasks on it, getting three things done feels like a failure. But if your expectation is one meaningful task and you complete the same three things, you could feel like a hero. The work didn't change, but that framing, the anchoring did.

[Melina Palmer]

I love that both Wolfgang and I

[Melina Palmer (Podcast Host - Narration)]

have used that same example in different contexts. And coming at it from different angles,

[Melina Palmer]

I think is really cool.

[Melina Palmer (Podcast Host - Narration)]

Our brains are constantly interpreting reality through the lens of what we expected to happen. And believe it or not, we can shift those expectations for ourselves and really change everything. Sometimes the most powerful change we can make isn't in controlling everything around us, but just in adjusting how we interpret what's happening and set those expectations. I also really loved this suggestion of scheduled worry time. It's such a funny thing, but realizing that once you give yourself the permission, it can really change the entire approach. Like if what is your brain really getting in that moment, right? Like what is it doing for you? And if you allow it to have as much time as it wants, if you can not yet those worries as something you can look at later when it's their time to shine, as it were, and then you can really like close that box until the next day. It can have such an impact on your overall productivity when you know you have time to worry and then maybe you don't want to do it as much. Like it doesn't have that same impact on your whole life. I thought that was just really fascinating and interesting to see. If you have ever tried that yourself, I would love to hear about it. And so please do come share share that or anything else with me on social media.

[Melina Palmer]

Of course, if you don't feel like sharing that publicly, you can also just

[Melina Palmer (Podcast Host - Narration)]

email me melina@the brainybusiness.com but as you think about what resonated for you during the episode, come share that too.

[Melina Palmer]

It could also be an answer to

[Melina Palmer (Podcast Host - Narration)]

a question like where in your life might a small shift and expectations completely change how the day feels?

[Melina Palmer]

Whatever those things you feel like sharing, love to hear from you. So please do come share on social media. You're going to find me as the

[Melina Palmer (Podcast Host - Narration)]

Brainy Biz pretty much everywhere and as Melina Palmer on LinkedIn.

[Melina Palmer]

There are links in the show notes to make it easy, as well as

[Melina Palmer (Podcast Host - Narration)]

links to my top related past episodes and books including the Illusion of Control, Ways to Get in Touch, and more.

[Melina Palmer]

It's all waiting for you in the

[Melina Palmer (Podcast Host - Narration)]

app you're listening to and atthebrainybusiness.com573

[Melina Palmer]

and

[Melina Palmer (Podcast Host - Narration)]

thank you again to Dr. Wolfgang Linden for joining me on the show today.

[Melina Palmer]

It was a delight to chat with

[Melina Palmer (Podcast Host - Narration)]

and learn from you.

[Melina Palmer]

Join me next time for another Brainy

[Melina Palmer (Podcast Host - Narration)]

episode of the Brainy Business Podcast.

[Melina Palmer]

It's going to be a lot of fun. You don't want to miss it.

[Melina Palmer (Podcast Host - Narration)]

Until then, thanks again for listening and learning with me and remember to be thoughtful.

[Podcast Announcer]

Thank you for listening to the Brainy Business Podcast. Melina offers virtual strategy sessions, workshops and other services to help businesses be more brain friendly. For more free resources, Visit the Brainy Business.com.

[Melina Palmer (Podcast Host - Narration)]

Hey, before you go, quick reminder that we do have a couple spots open right now for that Brainy reset. If you've been feeling stuck or just want to move forward with more clarity and confidence, I'D love to talk. Head to the brainy business.com contact to get started. Even if you're on the fence. No pressure. It's just a conversation with me. Thanks so much for listening. I appreciate you. What do you think? Another episode?