Join Dr. Philip Zimbardo at his home in San Francisco and learn more about his non-profit organization – The Heroic Imagination Project.

This doesn’t happen very often — in fact, this is the first time we have invited guests to Phil’s home to understand more about our important work… how we are teaching individuals to stand up, speak out and act with courage in challenging situations…all of this rooted in social psychology.

This is your shot. By supporting the Heroic Imagination Project with a few dollars, you and guest will be entered to win a lovely weekend in San Francisco and have dinner with Dr. Zimbardo!

Donate $5 or whatever you can today, and you’ll be automatically entered to win:

Pay it Foward

Thank you so much for your support. You can help us out even more by:

Sharing this opportunity with a friend. Send them a quick email linking them to this page.

Linking us to your facebook, twitter, or other social media site (you can use the buttons at the bottom of this page).

Entries must be received by August 15, 2012. One winner will receive the following prize package: round-trip tickets for winner and a guest to a San Francisco; hotel accommodations; and dinner with Dr. Philip Zimbardo on a date to be determined by Dr. Zimbardo (approximate retail value of all prizes $4,800). Odds of winning depend on number of entries received.

Similar to an exercise routine, the weekly challenges will cover strengthening and flexibility exercises such as practicing courageous conversations across a variety of social situations, taking the perspective of others, showing appreciation, and expressing gratitude.

We would love to hear about your experience in carrying out the challenge. Post your comments below.

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Weekly Social Fitness Challenge #15

Introduce yourself to someone in your neighborhood.

Do you know your next door neighbors? If not, that’s a great place to start this week’s challenge. Getting to know the people who live around you is the perfect way to start to build a strong community. By getting to know your neighbors, you are creating a support network of people who work together to protect and serve the needs of everyone in the group. And you never know – you might make a new friend!

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Learn more about Social Fitness and our Weekly Challenge by clicking here.

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Similar to an exercise routine, the weekly challenges will cover strengthening and flexibility exercises such as practicing courageous conversations across a variety of social situations, taking the perspective of others, showing appreciation, and expressing gratitude.

We would love to hear about your experience in carrying out the challenge. Post your comments below.

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Weekly Social Fitness Challenge #14

Listen carefully to someone without trying to solve his/her problem.

When someone comes to you with a problem or complaint, offer them a listening ear. To practice active listen you should 1) look into the speaker’s eyes, 2) tell her what you hear in your own words–as much as you can, put yourself in her shoes, 3) clarify by asking questions to ensure you understand the person fully, the whole picture, the points being made, and the meaning to the person, and 4) ask the speaker if she wants advice. If she accepts your offer for advice, then begin to reflect on the advice you would like to give her.

When you are thinking about what you are going to say to a person before he is finished speaking, you are going to miss significant information about his story. More importantly, people don’t always want advice. Sometimes all a person needs is someone to listen.

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Learn more about Social Fitness and our Weekly Challenge by clicking here.

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Similar to an exercise routine, the weekly challenges will cover strengthening and flexibility exercises such as practicing courageous conversations across a variety of social situations, taking the perspective of others, showing appreciation, and expressing gratitude.

We would love to hear about your experience in carrying out the challenge. Post your comments below.

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Weekly Social Fitness Challenge #13

On the way to and from work/school, use all five senses to take in information about your surroundings. Share what you notice with a friend.

Have you ever left a room and turned off the light, only to realize someone was still in there? Or maybe you took the wrong exit out of habit of driving to a certain location? Every day, you probably engage in acts that seem to occur automatically or unconsciously. Running on autopilot is normal and, in many cases, helpful. However, when you overly rely on automatic behaviors, you begin to miss important details in your environment. This week’s challenge is to encourage you to turn off your autopilot and observe your surroundings in a thoughtful way. You may notice the smell of a restaurant you didn’t know was there, the view from the bridge you drive over, or the grumbles of someone in need. Reinforce what you learned by sharing your insights with a friend. By being mindful of your environment, you are practicing an important trait of an everyday hero.

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Learn more about Social Fitness and our Weekly Challenge by clicking here.

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Similar to an exercise routine, the weekly challenges will cover strengthening and flexibility exercises such as practicing courageous conversations across a variety of social situations, taking the perspective of others, showing appreciation, and expressing gratitude.

We would love to hear about your experience in carrying out the challenge. Post your comments below.

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Weekly Social Fitness Challenge #12

Let someone else go first.

Whether it’s the line at the grocery store or merging on the freeway, take a few minutes out of your day to allow someone else to go first. Being mindful of the needs of those around you and practicing selfless acts of kindness are both behaviors that define an everyday hero.

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Learn more about Social Fitness and our Weekly Challenge by clicking here.

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Similar to an exercise routine, the weekly challenges will cover strengthening and flexibility exercises such as practicing courageous conversations across a variety of social situations, taking the perspective of others, showing appreciation, and expressing gratitude.

We would love to hear about your experience in carrying out the challenge. Post your comments below.

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Weekly Social Fitness Challenge #11

Write a letting telling someone how much you appreciate him/her.

Week 4’s challenge discussed the values and benefits of keeping a gratitude journal. This week’s challenge is another way to implement a practice of gratitude into your life.

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Learn more about Social Fitness and our Weekly Challenge by clicking here.

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Similar to an exercise routine, the weekly challenges will cover strengthening and flexibility exercises such as practicing courageous conversations across a variety of social situations, taking the perspective of others, showing appreciation, and expressing gratitude.

We would love to hear about your experience in carrying out the challenge. Post your comments below.

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Weekly Social Fitness Challenge #10

Have a conversation with someone you don’t usually talk to.

As humans, we tend to unconsciously group people into categories. This can cause us to treat certain people preferentially or with prejudice, without us ever realizing it. Any group of people that we feel that we belong to is considered an ingroup, and they are usually made up of people we feel united with due to a common origin, belief, goal, culture, or situation. People that we do not think of ourselves as being a part of are referred to as outgroups. The people whom we categorize into our outgroups are usually different from us in some fairly obvious (to us) way, such as appearance, culture, or religion. They also tend to be people that we do not know as well. Therefore, a great away to begin to break down outgroup prejudice is by having a conversation with someone you don’t usually interact with.

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Learn more about Social Fitness and our Weekly Challenge by clicking here.

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Similar to an exercise routine, the weekly challenges will cover strengthening and flexibility exercises such as practicing courageous conversations across a variety of social situations, taking the perspective of others, showing appreciation, and expressing gratitude.

We would love to hear about your experience in carrying out the challenge. Post your comments below.

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Weekly Social Fitness Challenge #9

Share your deepest values with someone.

Identify two or three values that are personally important to you. Share them with a friend and tell them why those values matter to you. It’s easy for anxiety and ambiguity to cloud your judgment in challenging situations, but reaffirming your values can offer clarity and direction when making decisions.

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Learn more about Social Fitness and our Weekly Challenge by clicking here.

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Similar to an exercise routine, the weekly challenges will cover strengthening and flexibility exercises such as practicing courageous conversations across a variety of social situations, taking the perspective of others, showing appreciation, and expressing gratitude.

We would love to hear about your experience in carrying out the challenge. Post your comments below.

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Weekly Social Fitness Challenge #8

Help someone feel included in a group setting.

Research initiated by psychologist, Henri Tajfel, in the 1970’s has shown us that all it takes for us to begin to carve out our social worlds into “us” and “them” is the random flip of a coin.

Only minutes after being divided into the A or B group by the coin flip, the participants in Tajfel’s experiment rated members of both groups on various attributes, such as intelligence and likability. Overwhelmingly, people rated the members of their own group as more likable and intelligent. They also rated the members of the other group as having less variety in personality than individuals in their own group. Within the span of only a few moments, these ordinary people began to stereotype the other group and to treat them with discrimination – even though the members of both groups were complete strangers at the beginning of the experiment. Tajfel called this phenomenon the minimal group paradigm.

Imagine how difficult it must be to break into an established social group, when the members of the “in” group have developed prejudices against those who are not members of their group. By reaching out to someone who is not a member of your social group, you can facilitate the group’s acceptance of new members.

Tajfel, H., Billig, M. G., Bundy, R. P., & Flament, C. (1971). Social categorization and intergroup behaviour. European Journal of Social Psychology, 1, 149-178. doi: 10.1002/ejsp.2420010202

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Learn more about Social Fitness and our Weekly Challenge by clicking here.

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Similar to an exercise routine, the weekly challenges will cover strengthening and flexibility exercises such as practicing courageous conversations across a variety of social situations, taking the perspective of others, showing appreciation, and expressing gratitude.

We would love to hear about your experience in carrying out the challenge. Post your comments below.

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Weekly Social Fitness Challenge #7

Practice asking for help.

This week’s challenge may sound simple. However, asking for help is not an innate ability at which all people excel. Asking for help is a skill that can be developed through practice. Everyone differs in the situations in which they feel comfortable asking for help. This week’s challenge is to encourage you to step outside of your comfort zone and ask for help in situations where you would normally avoid doing so.

In two experiments, social psychologist, Tom Moriarity, demonstrated the importance of asking for help in order for observers to feel personally responsible for your well-being. In the first experiment, New Yorkers watched as a thief snatched a woman’s suitcase in a restaurant, when she left her table. In the second, they watched a thief grab a portable radio from a beach blanket, when the owner left it for a few minutes. In each experiment, the would-be victim (the experimenter’s accomplice) had first asked the soon-to-be observer of the crime either “Do you have the time?” or “Will you please keep an eye on my bag/radio, while I’m gone?” Asking for the time elicited no personal responsibility and almost all of the bystanders stood by idly as the theft took-off. However, of the people who had agreed to watch the victim’s property, almost every bystander intervened. They called for help, and some even tackled the runaway thief on the beach!

The encouraging message is that we can often convert apathy to action and transform callousness to kindness just by asking for it. The mere act of requesting a favor forges a special human bond that involves other people in ways that materially change the situation. It makes them feel responsible to you and thereby responsible for what happens in your shared social world.

Moriarity, T. (1975). Crime, commitment, and the responsive bystander: Two field experiments. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 31, 370-376.

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Learn more about Social Fitness and our Weekly Challenge by clicking here.

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