Great Hidden Brain podcast on the benefits of focus time and deep work. Plus practical advice on how to protect your deep think time.
As a side note, deep work seems to make people happier too. 😊
Hidden Brain: Deep Work
Tag: psychology
LetGrow – “Always helping our kids isn’t always helping them”
As a parent, I love Let Grow. They are saying that we need to do less for our kids. Step back, trust your kids, and let them figure some stuff out on their own. They will gain skills, true confidence, and inner strength. 💪🏻
Doing a little less for our kids is not negligent or lazy. It is a vote of confidence in them
👉 Let Grow
The winners in business, love, and life are comfortable with a bit of risk, and able to deal with disappointment (even the lack of a trophy). They listen, argue, work things out. They are open to change. They pivot.
How Getting Older Makes You Tougher and Wiser
Getting older is good! Well, not in every way — I’m getting near-sighted and having trouble bending my legs. 🤷🏻♂️ But in more significant ways, aging makes you better.
I don’t love the name of this article, but I do like the observations it contains.
👉 The Incredibly Harsh Lessons You Learn with Age
These are some great lessons learned from aging, and I agree with them all.
- Nothing is ever “done”
- Success increases with your ability to be vulnerable
- There is always another struggle coming next
- You always have more to learn
- Being uncomfortable feels the best
I especially like the last one.
As you age and you understand the struggle never ends, you learn to move closer to uncomfortable situations because that’s where progress is unlocked and fulfillment can be found.
The 50/50 Rule and Why I Blog
My blog’s current tag line is “This is not a blog.”
Originally, this site was intended as a way to keep track of links to interesting or useful things, like glorified bookmarks. But since then, it has evolved to serve another purpose: to make me think and communicate about stuff.
See, as I was bookmarking stuff, I found myself adding little bits about why I liked the link or context about how I found it. Over time, I found that when I would link to an article, I would sometimes want to add a summary about the article to help me process it and remember it better.
A better way to learn, process, retain and remember information is to learn half the time, and share half the time.
If I take two seconds to effortlessly save a bookmark, then the information is saved and soon forgotten. If I add even a quick post about it, giving it a title and some context or a summary, then that post is now a part of me. And as a bonus, I get to share it with other people.
So I was happy to see this article, which makes me think I am not wasting my time.
👉 The 50/50 Rule (How to Retain And Remember 90% of Everything You Learn)
It basically says that if you make yourself talk about something, then you come to understand it or appreciate it better. Spend half you time learning and half your time explaining what you learned.
According to the article, I would be serving myself better by writing out my notes by hand. It seems people type too fast for their brain to absorb what they’re doing. And simply by writing that, I now remember that fact. But I’m typing this anyways because you can’t tag, search, and share your paper notebook. 🤷🏻♂️
And yes, this article is so meta.
“Happiness isn’t a choice… it’s a habit.”
Happiness isn’t a choice, or meaningfulness or something that you arrive at once you achieve something; it’s a habit.
10 Habits of Consistently Happy People
Okay, here’s another one of these lists of things that happy/confident/successful people do. I’ve been generally skipping over these since they’re getting repetitive. But I saw this one and liked that it was emphasizing that these are not big, grand things, but little things to do consistently every day. (In that sense, it’s similar to being physically fit and eating right.)
👉 10 Habits of Consistently Happy People
Summary: be optimistic, don’t compare, be grateful, be kind, maintain friendships, cope, forgive, pursue goals, be physically active, cultivate your sense of self.
But remember, pessimism has its place. 🤷🏻♂️
Mental Break Town 