NEW: What is consciousness, really?

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I am here, waiting for the cable man to fix my internet. It"s been down since yesterday afternoon.

It is hard to remember what we did with our lives before the internet... for me it"s been 18 years. It is hard to figure out what I can do that does not involve the internet... Finally I settle on writing, editing, and such.

It"s 11:30 am. The repairman was scheduled to be here at 11. I am sitting here, uncharacteristically anxious, contemplating that the man won"t even show up, that he will lie, that I will have to be another day without the ability to work.

It"s excruciatingly painful. I am diligently making room for the bad feelings, including them, breathing normally. Then I have a suspicion: is this mine? I normally don"t get anxious: I take life as it comes.

Turns out I tuned into the repairman: it"s his anxiety. Hm.

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NEW: 10 of the Most Surprising Findings from Psychological Studies

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Psychology has a reputation for being the science of common sense, or a field that simply confirms things we already know about ourselves.

One way of battling this misconception, explains Jeremy Dean — a PhD candidate in psychology and master of ceremonies at the always-awesome PsyBlog — is to "think about all the unexpected, surprising, and just plain weird findings that have popped out of psychology studies over the years." Here are ten of his favorite examples.





Cognitive dissonance

This is perhaps one of the weirdest and most unsettling findings in psychology. Cognitive dissonance is the idea that we find it hard to hold two contradictory beliefs, so we unconsciously adjust one to make it fit with the other.

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