Here is the best of 2018 Intelligent Tuesday, containing the most reader favorited, commented, and personal favorites of self-development advice from 2018. To see past yearly editions, see below:

Best of 2017 Intelligent Tuesday
Best of 2016 Intelligent Tuesday

Best Productivity Resources

How to Make Yourself Stick to a Routine by Commit Action

There are some obvious, well-known techniques to stick to a new routine such as setting reminders, rewarding yourself, starting small, and one routine at a time. This post is about five much lesser known – and much more powerful – tactics for making your routine stick.

How To Stop Procrastinating Using the 70% Rule by Taylor Pearson

Taylor gets to the heart of why so many of us procrastinate, we think so many beginner tasks are beneath us and we should be working on more important tasks. Pair this with Deep Work author Cal Newport’s advice: “You can’t skip straight into a great mission without first building mastery in your field.” And building mastery often is unsexy, yet vital to finding a deeper purpose.

The 3 Absolute Worst Health and Fitness Goals You Must Avoid (Turning Bad Goals into Successful Habits) by Precision Nutrition

While yes, the main topic of this article is diet and fitness goals, this article serves as a master class of turning ANY goal from a “bad” goal into a “good” one. If you’ve been procrastinating in a certain area of your life (ahem, virtually everyone), this article will put you on track to take action.

Best Mindfulness Resources

This is What Self-Care Really Means, Because It's Not All Salt Baths and Chocolate Cake by Brianna Wiest

Where Should We Begin Season 3 by Esther Perel

Relationship therapist Esther Perel takes you into the lives of the relationships of others in this season exploring the arc of love. Through others, she will show you your soul. As she frequently says, the quality of our relationships determines the quality of our lives.

The Time You Have (in JellyBeans)

While the premise of the video may seem clickbait-y, the video hits you straight in the gut. It visualizes how we spend our time over the course of a lifetime using jelly beans. What you gonna do with the jelly beans you have left?

Best Books

Atomic Habits by James Clear

Hands down, if you want a simple, actionable, research based guide to everything you’d want to know about forming positive habits and stopping bad ones, read this book.

Self-Evaluation And Psychotherapy In The Market System by Kalman Glantz and J. Gary Bernhard

While the title and corresponding book cover is about exciting as dried toast, this book gets to the root of why so many of us keep achieving success (financial, world-impact, family, etc) yet remain unhappy. Instead of seeing a lack of self-esteem as the root of clients’ problems, Glantz and Bernhard argue that self-evaluation―the struggle to achieve a high opinion of self―exacerbated by the market system, leads to endless anxiety. The big shift: what if you gave up having an opinion of yourself at all? It’s a strange question that has profound implications.

Factfulness - Ten Reasons We're Wrong About The World and Why Things Are Better Than You Think by Hans Rolling

When holding polls around the world as to whether the world is getting better, staying about the same, or worse, the majority across the world says worse. And yet, from poverty, infant mortality, life expectancy, to access to clean drinking water, the world has gotten better, much better. The world still has real concerns, but this book will arm you with the facts that we are globally moving in a positive direction despite the alarmist media headlines. Even if you don’t read the book, we highly recommend you watch their TED talk.

SUCCESS CORNER (Editor’s Note)

Intelligent Tuesday has been running for over 2 years now. Clearly there is more information than you can take action on. Where to begin? What should you prioritize?

If you are aiming for the deepest life satisfaction, that answer has to be relationships. Yes, we want to advance in our careers, make more money, get more attention, travel more. However, in the midst of these personal endeavors, it can become all too easy for important relationships to slide to the backburner.

Relationships are complex. They are difficult at times, even more so for those you love. Those closest to us know our deep secrets that we rather not share on social media. And that’s what makes them so meaningful. They SEE us. ALL of us. The unedited, unfiltered version, and still, they are there for us.

Rarely can I think of a time this year where I spent quality time with friends that I regretted not building skills in my career or upping the $$$ in my bank account. Relationships are not a productivity hack to manage in order to up our happiness quotient. They are something to be enjoyed.

If I have one main hope for you going into 2019 is to reserve time in your schedule for dinner parties, impromptu get togethers, dates, meetups, anything in person where you connect with another human being. While I'd hope 2019 to be your most productive, most lucrative, most positive change filled year ever, even if you accomplish none of those, you’ll still have a tribe of people who love you. That’s a damn fine aspiration.

GOOD NEWS ROUNDUP

• Since 1990, the Global literacy rate jumped from 68% to 85% in 2014. (the last major survey was in 2015 at 86% literacy). (source)

• Approximately 90% of people worldwide now have access to clean drinking water, up from 80% in 1990. Even in impoverished sub-Saharan Africa, 75% of the population now drink clean water, up from 56% in 1990. All regions have seen progress. (source)
  
  
• The most rapid fall history of global poverty has taken place over the last 30 years. In 1990 for example, 35.5% of the world’s population (1.9 billion people) lived on less than $1.90 per day. By 2013, this had fallen to 10.9%, or just 782 million. (source)