Having tuned into the Psychologies theme of friendship in recent weeks, I came across a quote from Orson Welles, which is both profound and thought provoking. 'We're born alone, we live alone, and we die alone. Only through our love and friendships can we create the illusion for the moment, that we're not alone' I like the quote, but take issue with the word illusion. I will explain why.

I have had the pleasure of working with many talented, often inspirational people over the years, who personify vitality in their careers. They seem to enjoy hard work, have an uncanny ability to give you their undivided attention no matter how much is going on around them and have a presence and charisma which is often infectious. These are the things which I have learned from them, and which help me to inspire happier lives and careers.

As an ex head-hunter and now coach and mentor, I often come across people who are prone to self limiting assumptions and sadly, these often become self fulfilling. For some people these derive from a pessimistic mind set and for others, they are picked up along the way, through adverse childhood or career experiences for example. Once you have identified the tendency, the harder question is what to do about it?

This quote appeared on social media recently and maybe familiar to many of you. It is new to me although its message is not. The words are so profoundly relevant to the world we live in today that I will repeat them, and then reflect on them from a personal perspective.

I recently witnessed an extreme case of road rage, where two guys got out of their cars and came close to physical violence. Their inner chimps had become raging baboons and it was not good to see. We all know how road rage can surface and what it feels like to be cheated out of a parking space or right of way. This incident led me to reflect on why some people are better than others at managing their inner chimps and how best to foster calm minds and harmony, in all aspects of our lives.

I listened to an interview with the writer Jon Ronson, who described one of the dangers of social media, and particularly Twitter , as akin to 'sleepwalking into a surveillance society'. He was referring to some of the high profile cases where ill advised tweets have led to trial by the mob. Here are some of my reflections on the issues, pitfalls and benefits of social media, for young and old alike.

If you read enough self help and positive psychology material, you could be forgiven for thinking that we could all be super optimists if we only put our minds to it. Whilst I share the sentiment, lets not forget that Pessimism is not an affliction and without it the world would be a less ironic, funny, diverse and interesting place.