A neuroscientist’s guide to fixing your mind in 15 mins

📈 We’re taught to chase promotions, achievements, and validation. But even when you reach the top of that ladder, it can feel empty. Why? Because it was never your ladder.

True fulfillment begins when you stop chasing approval and ask: What do I actually want—without the audience?

✔️ "What would make me happy, even if I forgot about the traditional definition of success?”

🔇 Not all struggles are loud. Some are silent, internal patterns:

Cynical Mindset: Low ambition + low curiosity. You’ve given up and judge others who haven’t.

Escapist Mindset: Curious, but not driven. You dream, plan, and avoid action.

Perfectionist Mindset: Driven, but joyless. You overwork, obsess, and lose all play.

The good news? These aren’t who you are—they’re just temporary states.

✔️ “These mindsets are not fixed traits. They’re fluid — and you can change them.”

🌱 Want to grow sustainably? Combine curiosity and ambition.

Instead of chasing outcomes, explore questions. Instead of fearing failure, treat it as feedback.

This mindset gives you permission to evolve, adapt, and change your path without shame.

✔️ “Having an experimental mindset means seeing failures as data points you can learn from.”

📝Plans are rigid. Pacts are dynamic. A pact is a mini-experiment with a purpose:

1. Pick 1 action.
2. Set a realistic duration.
3. Track whether you did it or not.
4. Then analyze how it felt and decide what’s next.

You don’t need to commit forever—just long enough to learn.

✔️“A pact is not a resolution. It’s not a habit. It’s a conscious test of what might work for you.”

🥺 Most people skip straight to habits or resolutions—but that often fails. Why? Because they don’t test first.

Let’s break it down:

Resolution: Grand goal with pressure (usually abandoned).

Habit: Long-term commitment to something you know works.

Experiment (Pact): A test run. You’re curious, not committed.

Experiments give you freedom. They let you explore what works before locking it in.

✔️ “A pact is not a New Year’s resolution. It’s not a habit. It’s an experiment to find out what works for you.”

😵 You can hit the metrics and still feel miserable. Anne-Laure built a successful YouTube channel—but hated the process.

So she quit.

That’s the magic of data: check both external results and internal experience. Alignment lives in the overlap.

✔️ “There’s no point being externally successful if it feels horrible to work on it.”

🚫 Let go of five-year plans. Let go of needing the whole map.

Design your life through curiosity-driven micro-experiments. What excites you? What feels good to try next?

You’re not lost—you’re exploring.

✔️ "Committing to curiosity means living your life — not the life others expect of you.”

👩🏼‍🔬 Your job, your friendships, your health routines—they’re all testable.

• Try walking 20 minutes a day for 20 days.
• Try writing to a friend weekly.
• Try a 10-minute creativity session after lunch.

Track it. Reflect. Decide what’s worth keeping.

✔️ "You’re not committing forever. You’re testing. And that makes all the difference.”

🧠 Neuroscience shows that thirst for knowledge lights up the same areas of the brain as thirst for water.

Curiosity is not a luxury. It’s a biological need.

And the more you follow it, the more your brain forms new pathways—hello neuroplasticity.

✔️ "When we thirst for knowledge, our brain acts just like when we thirst for water.”

✨Clarity doesn’t come before action—it comes from action.

You don’t need a guaranteed outcome to begin. You need a question, a hypothesis, and the courage to test.

That’s where momentum is born.

✔️ “You don’t need certainty. You need data.”