Your attention determines:<ul><li>what you perceive, learn, and remember;</li><li>how steady or how reactive you feel;</li><li>which decisions you make and actions you take;</li><li>how you interact with others</li><li>your sense of fulfillment and accomplishment. </li></ul>No matter how much I tell you about how attention works and why, and no matter how motivated you are, the way your brain pays attention cannot be fundamentally altered by sheer force of will

Introduction

<ul><li>Attention simultaneously highlights what’s important and dims distractions so we can think deeply, problem-solve, plan, prioritize, and innovate</li><li>It threads together the moment-by-moment colors, flavors, textures, insights, memories, emotions, decisions, and actions that create the fabric of our lives</li><li>What you pay attention to is your life</li></ul>

Attention Is Your Superpower

<ul><li>attention biases brain activity. It gives a competitive advantage to the information it selects. Whatever it is you pay attention to will have more neural activity associated with it. Your attention, quite literally, alters the functioning of your brain at the cellular level. It truly is a superpower.</li></ul>

(continue)

The Flashlight<ul><li>Where you focus to, that point become clearer. Other than that point, become suppressed. Like a flashlight</li><li>Called orienting system</li></ul>The Floodlight<ul><li>Opposite of flashlight, this subsystem is broad and open. Your attention is ready for any input within your vision</li><li>Called alerting system</li></ul>The Juggler <ul><li>To direct, oversee, and manage what we’re doing, moment to moment, as well as ensure that our actions are aligned with what we’re aiming to do </li><li>This is the overseer that makes sure we stay on track</li><li>Called central executive</li></ul>

3 Brain Subsystems 

<ul><li>Attention never vanishes, even though it might feel as if it does when you’re struggling to focus and simply can’t</li><li>The amount of attention you have remains constant. It just gets used differently, and maybe not how you want it to be used</li><li>You always use 100 percent of your attention. Attention always goes somewhere. So the question becomes: Where?</li></ul>

Load Theory: Attention Is Not A Gas Tank

Any tasks you do over a period of time:<ul><li>Performance declines</li><li>Errors goes up</li><li>Response becomes slower and more variable</li></ul>

The Vigilance Decrement

<ol><li>Get ready, sit in an upright alerted posture, shoulder back chest open and be comfortable.</li><li>Tune in to the breath related sensation, imagine the air entering your lung as you breathe in slowly, and exit your lung as you breathe out</li><li>Notice when your mind wander and focus back to the breathing exercises. It's normal to wander and always use constructive words when trying to refocus</li></ol>

Core Practice: Find Your Focus

<ul><li>When we try to do two things at once that both require our attention, it’s really hard to do either of them well</li><li>Think of it this way: You only have one flashlight. Not two. Not three. And your one flashlight can only ever be shining at one thing at a time</li><li>When you’re trying to accomplish multiple tasks at once that require your focused attention, what you’re actually doing is moving your flashlight from one thing, then to the next, then back to the first</li></ul>

Don't Multitask

To get a sense of what this means for your cognition, imagine a studio apartment. There is only one room. Every time you want to use the room, you have to completely change out the furniture. Want to sleep? Set up a bed and nightstand. Want to host a party? Take down the bedroom and set up couches and coffee tables. Need to cook? Drag that all away and set up a stove, counter, and cooking supplies. Sound exhausting? It is! And it’s the same for your cognition, when you switch from task to task.

Multitasking Metaphor

<ul><li>Working memory is where you hold the micro-intentions and deliberate aim of having a desired outcome for each and every task you engage in</li><li>All the decisions, planning, thinking, actions, and behaviors you do over the course of a day: anything you set out to do</li><li>You lean on your working memory to maintain your goals and subgoals, update them, and scrap them for a different goal, on a continuous, moment-by-moment, task-by-task basis.</li><li>Hold a goal in mind, and then take action based on that goal. That’s how working memory works, and also why it impacts you so profoundly</li></ul>

Working Memory

Working memory is the essential partner to attention: it’s what allows you to actually do something with the information your flashlight focuses on. But if attention keeps piping in salient and distracting content, that will become a big problem for goal maintenance, let alone goal accomplishment. Why? Because you only have so much space to work with. Just like a real-life whiteboard, your working memory has limits

Continue

The flashlight encodes information and maintains it in working memory, “retracing” it on the whiteboard to keep it there for longer. — Key vulnerability: Bait and SwitchWhen your attention is automatically “captured” or yanked by something salient, this more exciting (to your attention) content overwrites what was being maintained. Voluntary attention then starts retracing this new content. The prior information is lost forever, gone without a trace.

The Flashlight

The floodlight gains access to the whiteboard to accomplish an urgent goal. Under acute threat or stress, your alerting system temporarily blocks access to working memory to ensure that your brain’s action systems prioritize basic survival behaviors (fight, flight, freeze) over any other goals or plans. — Key vulnerability: Road BlockThe alerting system can be set off by feelings of threat, even when there is no real danger. This temporarily cuts off access to working memory and impairs any functions that rely on it (like long-term memory, social connection, and emotion regulation).

The Floodlight

The juggler keeps your current goals active on the whiteboard, and updates these goals as circumstances change. — Key vulnerability: Ball DropOverload, blanking, and distraction in working memory all derail the central executive’s juggler, leading to lost goals and misguided behaviors. The juggler drops the ball.

The Juggler

1. Repeat the previous steps. We begin the same way we did with the basic Find Your Flashlight (find where your thoughts focus on), by sitting in a chair, comfortable but upright, resting your hands in your lap, and closing or lowering your eyes (to limit visual distraction). Again, select prominent breath-related sensations. Remember the metaphor of your attention as a flashlight, the beam pointing toward your selected breath-related body sensation. When your flashlight drifts to something else . . .

CORE PRACTICE BOOSTER: WATCH YOUR WHITEBOARD

2. Notice where it goes. This is a new step! In the first exercise, I asked you to notice if attention wandered away, and if so to immediately move your flashlight back to your breath. This time, I want you to pause for a moment and observe where the flashlight is now directed.

3. Give it a label. Identify what type of distraction has appeared on your whiteboard. Is it a thought, an emotion, or a sensation? A thought could be a worry, a reminder, a memory, an idea, an item on your to-do list. An emotion could be a feeling of frustration, an urge to stop doing the practice and do something else, a twinge of happiness, a swell of stress. A sensation is something in your physical body: An itch. A sore muscle. Noticing that your back hurts from sitting there, or noticing something you heard, smelled, touched, or saw (such as a door slamming, food cooking, cat jumping).

4. Make this a quick process. Notice if you begin going down a rabbit hole of elaborating on the distraction, or asking why you are thinking about this particular topic, or defaulting to unsupportive habits like chastising yourself for getting distracted in the first place. It is not your job right now to answer these questions or reprimand yourself. Now is actually the time to notice what is on your whiteboard but not to engage with it. Just label the contents as best you can from these three categories: thought, emotion, sensation. And then . . .

5. Move on. Come back to the present moment, back to your breath, after every instance of labeling. If it’s a strong experience, it might pop up repeatedly—then just label it again.

6. Repeat. Each time you notice yourself mind-wandering, tag the content of your mind-wandering (as thought, emotion, or sensation) and then come back to your breath.

your memory for experiences, involves selective encoding of only those aspects of experience that were most attended to and held in working memory. Translation: you’ll only remember what you focused on and “wrote” on your whiteboard—not everything that occurred. And further, your episodic memory doesn’t merely involve the external aspects of events (who, what, where, and so forth) but is deeply wrapped up in your autobiographical take on what you experienced. So—was the experience happy? Sad? Interesting? Tense? Your emotional experience will influence what you focus on.

Episodic Memory

your general world knowledge, for facts, ideas, concepts—is similarly selective. What you remember is based on what else you’ve previously learned.

Semantic Memory

Do these three critical things:1. Rehearsalwhen you studied with flashcards, that was rehearsal2. Elaborationrelating new experiences or facts to knowledge or memories you already have3. ConsolidationThis is what happens as you’re performing the above two functions, and it ultimately leads to the memory being stored. As the brain replays information, it’s laying down new neural pathways and then going over them, strengthening those new connections

How To Make Memory

Certain things may become “sticky” on our whiteboards because of generalization. We can make generalizations about the behavior and intentions of others (“She never supports me”) or regarding ourselves (“I will never amount to anything”). An incident where you made a mistake becomes “I always get this stuff wrong—I’m such an idiot!” It’s not the incident itself that takes center stage on your whiteboard: it’s the generalization you derived from it. The oversimplified packaging allows it to remain in working memory with minimal effort: it’s short, it’s clear, and it probably isn’t accurate.

Get ready . . . This time, stand up! You can always sit if you prefer, in the same way as with the previous practices. But I usually recommend doing this practice in what is commonly known as Mountain Pose. Stand comfortably, your feet shoulder-distance apart. Let your arms relax at your sides, palms out. Close your eyes or lower your gaze.

CORE PRACTICE: RIVER OF THOUGHT (1)

Get set . . . Find your flashlight and direct it toward prominent breath-related sensations for several breaths. This is always where we’ll start with any practice. And at any point in this exercise if you feel yourself getting drawn away (for example, getting caught in a ruminative loop), you can always anchor back on the breath. Flashlight on the breath is your home base—return to it whenever necessary, and reset.

CORE PRACTICE: RIVER OF THOUGHT (2)

Go! Now broaden your awareness so that you are not selecting any target object. Instead, use the metaphor of your mind being like a river. You’re standing on the riverbank, watching the water flow by. Imagine your thoughts, memories, sensations, emotions—whatever arises—as if they are flowing past you. Notice what appears there, but don’t engage with it. Don’t fish it up, chase it, or elaborate on it. Just let it flow by.

CORE PRACTICE: RIVER OF THOUGHT (3)

Keep going. You’re not going to be actively “labeling” the stuff that you notice on your whiteboard, nor returning to your breath once you do. Your job right now is not to be making distinctions between which content is useful or relevant, and what’s mind wandering. You’re not even going to try to stop your mind from wandering. The river will keep flowing—there isn’t anything you can or need to do about that. This is the key to open monitoring: you allow your mind to do what it will do. Your job is simply to observe that flow, at a distance, without engagement or participation.

CORE PRACTICE: RIVER OF THOUGHT (4)

Troubleshooting. If you have difficulty letting things pass you by, come back to your breath. Imagine your breath sensations as a boulder in the middle of all that flowing water. Rest your attention on that stable, steady object; when you feel ready, broaden your attention again and go back to monitoring.

CORE PRACTICE: RIVER OF THOUGHT (5)

(1) Stop the inner war against the actual circumstances—just accept them. It is what it is. Let me be clear: this does not mean that you are “all good” with the situation. It has nothing to do with your judgement about the actual event. It just means that you are accepting the actuality of what has occurred.

Decenter - Skills To Control Your Emotions

(2) Drop the story—your assessment of this situation is merely one story. Not the only one.

(3) Roll with it—keep going, keep moving, get curious about what the next moment will bring.

Decenter - Skills To Control Your Emotion

During a difficult interaction, take a moment to pause. It can be the length of one breath. Or, before a difficult interaction, take a moment and picture this person. Then, remind yourself: “This person has experienced pain, just like me. This person has experienced loss, just like me. Joy, just like me. Was born from a mother, just like me; will die someday, just like me.” If these phrases don’t resonate with you, feel free to substitute with other phrases that emphasize the common humanity we share with others.

On-Demand Practice: “Just Like Me”

<ol><li>Begin this practice as you have the others, sitting comfortably yet alert. Anchor on your breath and focus on breath-related sensations.</li><li>Now shift to bringing a sense of yourself into your mind, at this very moment in your life.</li></ol>

CORE PRACTICE: CONNECTION PRACTICE

3. Silently repeat the following phrases to offer yourself well-wishes (three min). Remember: the point is to offer yourself well-wishes, not make requests or demands for them. Saying these phrases supports that: May I be happyMay I be healthyMay I be safeMay I live with easeThe phrases and their order are not important. Some people may say, May I be free from suffering instead of May I be safe. Others may wish to say, May I find peace instead of May I live with ease. The important thing is that you choose phrases that resonate with you and that convey a feeling of goodwill to the recipient.

4. Next, while allowing this sense of yourself to recede from your focus, call to mind someone who has been very good to you in this life, very kind and supportive, someone you might describe as a benefactor. Silently repeat the phrases below, offering them to this person: May you be happyMay you be healthyMay you be safeMay you live with ease

5. Now, letting your sense of this person recede, bring to mind the image of someone with whom you have no real connection and for whom your feelings are neutral. It could be someone you see now and again but don’t have strong feelings for, one way or another. Perhaps it’s a neighbor you pass while walking your dog, a parking lot attendant you see daily, or a grocery store clerk. Mentally offer them the phrases.

6. As a sense of this person recedes from your focus, next bring to mind an image of someone with whom things are challenging at this time in your life. This is often called a “difficult person” . Remember, you are not endorsing their view and are not necessarily even forgiving their actions in the past. You are simply offering kindness to them as a practice aimed at strengthening your ability to take another’s perspective, realizing that—like you—they too wish for happiness, health, safety, and ease. With this in mind, mentally offer them the phrases.

7. Now move on to everyone in your home, community, state or province, and country, and continue to expand outward until you include all beings everywhere. Spend a few moments visualizing each place (your home, your community), and then offer the phrases to everyone there.

8. Throughout this practice, notice when your mind wanders away from the chosen focus, and gently guide your attention back.

9. When you’re ready, spend a few moments anchoring on your breath to end the practice.

How to train your attention and be more productive

STOP FOR A MOMENT. Are you here right now? Is your focus on this page? Or is it roaming elsewhere, to the past or future, to a worry, to your to-do list, or to your phone? Whether you’re simply browsing, talking to friends, or trying to stay focused in an important meeting, you can’t seem to manage to hang on to your attention. No matter how hard you try, you’re somewhere else. The consequence is that you miss out on 50 percent of your life—including the most important moments. The good news: There’s nothing wrong with you—your brain isn’t broken. The human brain was built to be distractible. The even better news: You can train your brain to pay attention more effectively. Stay with me a little longer and soon you will be able to: Focus without all the struggle. Take back your attention from the pull of distraction. And function at your peak, for all that truly matters in your life.

productivity

Productivity

exerciseandfitness

Exercise & Fitness

scienceandnature

Science & Nature

***NATIONAL BESTSELLER***STOP FOR A MOMENT. Are you here right now? Is your focus on this page? Or is it roaming elsewhere, to the past or future, to a worry, to your to-do list, or to your phone?Whether you’re simply browsing, talking to friends, or trying to stay focused in an important meeting, you can’t seem to manage to hang on to your attention. No matter how hard you try, you’re somewhere else. The consequence is that you miss out on 50 percent of your life—including the most important moments.The good news: There’s nothing wrong with you—your brain isn’t broken. The human brain was built to be distractible.The even better news: You can train your brain to pay attention more effectively.Stay with me a little longer and soon you will be able to: <ul><li>Focus without all the struggle.</li><li>Take back your attention from the pull of distraction.</li><li>And function at your peak, for all that truly matters in your life.</li></ul>

Amishi P. Jha

Peak Mind

<ul><li>January is considered one of the most stressful months of the year for several reasons. One of the biggest: <a href="https://www.verywellmind.com/new-year-resolutions-for-stress-relief-3144722">New Year’s resolutions </a>.</li><li>Well-intentioned goals become a source of stress—stress that prevents you from moving forward and achieving your goals. </li><li>For each common resolution, look for ways to achieve it in a way that is positive and affirming instead of stressful.</li></ul>

January- The Most Stressful Month Of The Year?!

<ul><li>The most common New Year's resolution has to do with getting in shape. </li><li>If you're trying to hit the gym to improve your health, enlist a friend to exercise with you. </li><li>A workout buddy means you have an incentive to exercise, along with built-in social support.</li><li>Fitness technology can also help you stay on track. </li><li>Having all your information in one place and readily available can help you be more aware and get closer to your fitness goals.</li></ul>

1. Get Fit?!

<ul><li>You know you should save. Sometimes this is easier said than done. </li><li>But when you look around and it seems like no one else is doing it, you feel alone. </li><li>Furthermore, it can be stressful to try to find the money to save. </li><li>But budgeting for your future doesn’t have to be a stressful task.</li></ul>

2. Save Money 

Turn your weight-loss resolutions into <a href="https://www.verywellmind.com/smart-goals-for-lifestyle-change-2224097">SMART goals </a>. SMART is an acronym that stands for Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-Bound. Here are some SMART weight loss goal ideas:<ul><li>I will lose one pound each week until I reach XXX pounds in eight months.</li><li>I will lose six pounds a month until I reach XXX pounds in one year.</li></ul>

3. Lose Weight 

<ul><li>Losing weight is a very popular New Year’s resolution, and it's usually a great idea for overall health as well as for the fun of fitting into better clothes.</li><li>However, especially with certain types of diets, the first days of a new diet can bring frustration (from feeling "deprived" of favorite foods), moodiness (from biological changes in your body), and the loss of a coping mechanism (for emotional eaters who can no longer eat to deal with the stress).</li><li>It can be as stressful to be around a person who is trying a new diet as it can be to be that person, so stress management is key here as well.</li></ul>

4. New Diets 

<ul><li>No matter what the specific change you’re attempting, New Year’s resolutions can be stressful if tackled with the traditional method of setting a high goal and trying to attain it immediately. </li><li>When people fail once, they tend to give up. </li><li>This makes keeping resolutions an exercise in perfectionism, which can be stressful for anyone. </li><li>If you’d like to maintain resolutions with less stress, create a different format for your goals. </li><li>Take baby steps, build in rewards for your progress, and make a few other minor changes and you will see greater success with less stress.</li></ul>

5. Resolution Perfection

Stressed about resolutions? Learn common sources of New Year's Resolution stress and find strategies for stress relief.

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Personal Development

health

Health

habits

Habits

New Year's Resolutions: From Stressful to Stress-Relieving

Eliminating sugary drinks, this includes sugar-sweetened beverages, sugary sodas, fruit juices, and various high sugar sports drinks.Keep in mind that none of this applies to whole fruit, which are extremely healthy and have plenty of fiber that mitigates the negative effects of fructose.(Sugar is half glucose and half fructose. When you eat a lot of added sugar, the liver gets overloaded with fructose and is forced to turn it into fat.)


1. Minimizing the amount of sugar in your diet 

Eating plenty of protein can boost your metabolism and reduce hunger levels, making it a very effective way to lose weight. Several studies suggest that protein is particularly effective against abdominal fat. They also provide for good calories.

2. Increase Protein intake

Just avoiding the refined carbs — like sugar, candy, and white bread — should be sufficient, especially if you keep your protein intake high. Low carb diets have many other <a href="https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/10-benefits-of-low-carb-ketogenic-diets">health benefits </a>besides just weight loss. For example, they can significantly improve health in people with type 2 diabetics.

3. Cut down on carbs

They dramatically slow the movement of food through your digestive system. They can also slow down the digestion and absorption of nutrients. The end result is a prolonged feeling of fullness and reduced appetite. The best way to get more fiber is to eat a lot of plant foods, including vegetables and fruit. Legumes are also a good source, as well as some cereals, such as whole oats.

4. Increased intake of soluble fibres

Weight training and cardiovascular exercise will reduce fat across the body.Aerobic exercise — like walking, running, and swimming — can allow major reductions in abdominal fat (<a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3568069/">32</a>Exercise also leads to reduced inflammation, lower blood sugar levels, and improvements in other metabolic problems associated with excess abdominal fat<a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3568069/"> </a>

5. Exercise

Tracking food intake doesn’t mean you need to weigh and measure everything you eat. Tracking intake every now and then for a few days in a row can help you realize the most important areas for change.Planning ahead can help you achieve specific goals, such as boosting your protein intake to 25–30% of calories or cutting down on unhealthy carbs.

6. Tracking your diet

Here are some tips to reduce abdominal fat, the accumulation of which is linked to life threatening cardiac diseases. Not only that, eating healthy always manifests itself with an overall improved mood.

Belly fat is the most harmful fat in your body, linked to many diseases. Here are 6 simple ways to lose belly fat that are supported by science.

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Food

6 Simple Ways to Lose Belly Fat, Based on Science

What you do really matters when it comes to your health. Morning stretches are important for your body to help kick-start your <a href="https://megabloginfo.com/pre-workout-smoothies/">energy levels </a>and to help circulation. Your level of physical activity, along with your <a href="https://megabloginfo.com/what-to-eat-before-the-morning-workout/">dietary choices, affects your daily perform</a>ance<a href="https://megabloginfo.com/what-to-eat-before-the-morning-workout/"> </a>and your risk of a number of diseases, including <a href="https://megabloginfo.com/unhealthy-eating-habits-diseases/">heart disease and some types of cancer</a>. 5-10 minutes Stretching early in the morning in bed can be a safe and beneficial activity for healthy adults and seniors that will help you improve.

Morning Stretches

Lie on your back, bend your knees and place your feet on the floor. With your hands, pull both knees towards your chest at the same time until you feel a stretch in the lower back. Hold both knees for 2-3 seconds and take 6-8 breaths. Repeat 3-5 times daily in the morning.steps:<ol><li>Lie on your back with feet on the floor</li><li>Pull both knees with your hands towards your chest</li><li>Hold for 4-5 seconds until You should feel a mild lower back by this stretch</li><li>Repeat 3-5 times every day</li></ol>

Double Knee-to-chest stretches

Morning stretches are important for your body to help kick-start your energy levels. Can help Reducing pain, chronic and mental conditions

7 Simple Stretches You Can Do Every Morning in Bed - Health fitness blog info

It's time to ramp up your pull-up. Pauses will help you gain strength in parts of the pull where you're weak instead of relying on momentum. Also, it'll stop you from swinging during the movement, forcing you to stay super strict. Just pause each rep in the middle on the way up, at the top, and in the middle on the negative.

Controlled Reps

Strict for is very important to me in my training. 

Get stronger by adding pauses to your pull-ups. Pause halfway up, at the top, and again halfway down.

Strict Pause Pull-Ups

NPB = MPS - MPBNet Protein Balance (skeletal muscle mass, for our purposes here) = Muscle Protein Synthesis – Muscle Protein Breakdown.You have to eat right to build your muscle tissue back up after destroying it in the gym. That's muscle building 101. Under normal conditions, skeletal muscle has a high turnover rate – in the range of 1-2% of muscle proteins are being synthesized and broken down daily.Both training and nutrient intake are potent activators of protein synthesis, although nutrient-induced increases are short-lived.

Maximize Protein Synthesis

The importance of protein in building muscle is key!

Building muscle boils down to getting on the right side of the protein synthesis balance sheet. Here's how to do it.

IT’S NOT ENOUGH THAT YOU READ A LOT. TO DO GREAT THINGS, YOU HAVE TO READ TO LEAD.”Reading to lead or learn requires that you treat your brain like the muscle that it is—lifting the subjects with the most tension and weight.For me, that means pushing ahead into subjects you’re not familiar with and wrestling with them until you can—shying away from the “easy read.”

How To Digest Books. (CLASSIC'S) 

The way you learn to read in the classroom is corrupted by the necessity of testing. Tests often have very little to do with proving that you know or care about the material but more about proving that you spent the time reading it. Forget everything but the message and how to apply it to your life.

Break out of the School Mindset

We haven’t time to spare to hear whether it was between Italy and Sicily that he ran into a storm or somewhere outside the world we know—when every day we’re running into our own storms, spiritual storms, and driven by vice into all the troubles that Ulysses ever knew.

When I start a book, I almost always go straight to Wikipedia (or Amazon or a friend) and ruin the ending. Who cares? Your aim as a reader is to understand WHY something happened, the what is secondary.You ought to ruin the ending—or find out the basic assertions of the book—because it frees you up to focus on your two most important tasks: What does it mean?, Do you agree with it?Your energy needs to be spent on figuring out if he’s right and how you can benefit from it. Plus, if you already know what happens, you can identify all the foreshadowing and the clues the first read through.

Ruin the Ending. 

Find out what the people who have already read it felt was important. From Amazon to the New York Times, read the reviews so you can deduce the cultural significance of the work—and from what it meant to others. Also, by being warned of the major themes, you can anticipate them coming and then actually appreciate them as they unfold. Tip if you agree with someone’s assessment of the work, go ahead and steal it once you’ve finished. You can’t copyright an opinion—this isn’t school, this is life.

Read the Reviews

READ THE INTRO/PROLOGUE/NOTES/FORWARD.I know, I know. It infuriates me too when what looks like a 200-page book turns out to have 80 pages of translator’s introduction, but that stuff is important.Every time I’ve skipped through it, I’ve had to go back and start over. Read the intro, read all the stuff that comes before the book—even read the editors notes at the bottom of the pages. This sets the stage and helps boost your knowledge going into the book.Remember: you need every advantage you can get to read a book above your level. Don’t skip stuff intended to add context and color.

The book itself…

If you’re reading to lead, you’re going to come across concepts or words you’re not familiar with. Don’t pretend you understand. Look it up. I like to use Definr or I use my phone to look stuff up on Wikipedia. With Military History, for instance, a sense of the battlefield is often necessary. Wikipedia is a great place to grab maps and to help understand the terrain.

Look It Up

I love Post-It Flags. I mark every passage that interests me, that makes me think, or that is important to the book. When I don’t have them, I just fold the bottom corner of the page. If there is something I need to look up, I fold the top corner of the page and return to it later. I carry a pen with me and write down whatever thoughts, feelings, or connections I may have with a passage.It’s much better to do it in the moment than to risk losing the contemporaneous inspiration. Don’t be afraid to tear the book up with tags and notations—books are a cheap.

Mark Passages

Go Back ThroughI have the same schedule with every book I read. After a mandatory 1–2 week waiting period after finishing, I go back through the book with a stack of 4×6 index cards. On these cards, I write out—by hand—all the passages I have noted as being important.It might seem strange, but it’s an old tactic used by everyone from Tobias Wolff to Montaigne to Raymond Chandler, who once said, “When you have to use your energy to put those words down, you are more apt to make them count.”

After you finish…

You highlight the passages for a reason. Why type the quotes if you aren’t going to memorize and use them?Drop them in conversation. Allude to them in papers, in emails, in letters, and in your daily life.

Apply and Use

My advice is really this: what we hear the philosophers saying and what we find in their writings should be applied in our pursuit of the happy life. We should hunt out the helpful pieces of teaching and the spirited and noble-minded sayings which are capable of immediate practical application—not far far-fetched or archaic expressions or extravagant metaphors and figures of speech—and learn them so well that words become works.

Books give delight to the very marrow of one’s bones. They speak to us, consult with us and join with us in a living and intense intimacy.

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Philosophy

writing

Reading & Writing

education

Learning & Education

READ TO LEAD. Classics for Life. 

Everybody who works out wants an impressive set of biceps.Whether you’re male or female, a good set of arms, toned or huge, makes a statement about your physical condition. Without wearing ridiculous clothing, your arms are usually the most visible part of your musculature.This article is about the best exercises you can do to add size to your arms in the shortest time possible.

BIGGER  ARMS  IN  LESS  TIME

If you go to a gym you’ll see more variations on the biceps curl than just about any other exercise. Curls in the squat rack, concentration curls, curls with cables, curls with dumbells, curls lying down, curls standing up, curls on an incline bench, preacher curls, EZ bar curls, curls on the medicine ball, ad infinitum. It’s ridiculous and it’s misguided. Curls are not the most effective way to train the biceps, and the amount of training most people engage in is counterproductive.

Vanity is the mother of invention

If you had to pick one exercise to grow your thigh muscles, would you pick an isolation exercise like leg extensions, or would you pick squats? How about your chest muscles, would you pick cable crossovers or a bench press? Most people will pick the compound exercises (squats and bench press) and that’s the right thing to do. But that line of thinking goes out of the window when it comes to training arms.Compound exercises generate more growth than isolation exercises. Bicep curls and all of their variations are isolation exercises. The best compound exercise for your biceps is the chin up.

Compound VS Isolation

To paraphrase Arthur Jones; ‘if you can do 20 chin ups and 20 dips, there’s not much more you can do for your arms’. Mr Jones may have been a thoroughly unlikeable character, but we shouldn’t let that blind us to his insights. A lot of people find chin ups hard, and they are, but that doesn’t mean they’re not superior to curls. As well as being the best single exercise for adding size to your biceps, chin ups help to stabilise and increase the range of motion in the shoulders, they are a good core exercise, and they’re a great back exercise.

Good  Advice

Whether you’re male or female, a good set of arms, toned or huge, makes a statement about your physical condition. Without wearing ridiculous clothing, your arms are usually the most visible part of…

Bigger arms in less time

Shift your thinking from couch potato mentality to thinking like an athlete. This may sound like a big challenge, but it’s not as big a leap as you think. Essex, Massachusetts mom April Bowling, 33, stopped using her busy life as an excuse not to exercise. After the birth of her children (now ages five and three), Bowling started viewing exercise as a way to set a strong example for her kids.Whether you need to put an “I’m lucky” sticky note on the mirror, or you can see the power of health in your children’s eyes, committing to a fitness routine begins in your head.

1. Change your perspective

There’s nothing more motivating than that first 5K looming in bold letters on the calendar. Register early and commit to an exercise program that will get you in shape by race day.“Set realistic goals that include clear milestones, and as you progress toward your goal, you’ll find a ripple effect occursThe goal doesn’t even have to be an organized race. Maybe it’s a mission to fit into that bikini by the annual beach vacation or that old pair of jeans buried in your closet. Whatever it is, define it, write it down and revisit it daily.

2. Set a goal

Most committed exercisers do it every day before the sun rised or late at night when the kids are in bed. Sit down with your weekly schedule and try to build in <a href="http://www.gaiam.com/discover/183/article/15-easy-ways-healthier/">an hour each day </a>to be good to your body.If you convince yourself you’ll fit in a workout some time after that last meeting, once the kids go down for a nap or when your spouse arrives home on time, failure is certain. Chances are a last-minute invitation will come along; or the kids won’t nap. Write your workout on your calendar and rearrange things around this one hour as if it were any other important appointment you have to keep.

3. Schedule a regular workout time

By nature, humans <a href="http://www.gaiam.com/discover/256/article/10-tips-help-keep-new-years-resolution/">need change and variety to stay motivated </a>. We also need to have fun — even while we’re working hard. Do both!Listen to your inner voice when choosing the best workout for you, says Fowler. Workout variety also challenges your body in unique ways, which may introduce you to new muscle groups you didn’t even know you had. Consider disciplines that give you more bang for your buck, suggests Haberstro. <a href="http://www.gaiam.com/discover/468/article/differences-tai-chi-qigong/">Ta’i chi </a>and yoga, for example, serve dual purposes as mental therapy and physical activity. Or try a workout DVD to help you shake up your routine.

4. Think fun and variety

In America, some tend to have trouble asking for help, says Bowling. Yet in order to stick to a fitness program, we need buy-in and encouragement from other people.“Exercising is built into our family life," Bowling adds. “We view it as a necessity. Sometimes it takes the place of watching TV together.”Consider joining a online community with fitness trainers and nutrition experts — and support from other people trying to maintain healthy eating and exercise routines. People who get this kind of online support are proven to lose up to three times more weight than people going it alone.

5. Reach out to others for support

These seems to be perfect for motivating one to workout daily. Some of these helps me to do that. 

To be successful at a fitness routine, you have to employ a variety of tactics to keep yourself motivated and inspired. Here are some tips proven to help make a lifetime commitment to fitness a reality.

5 Ways to Stay Motivated to Exercise Regularly

- Eat within 30 minutes of waking up- Ideal time to have breakfast is 7- 8 am- Do not delay breakfast later than 10am- Make sure you have protein in your breakfast

Breakfast

- Ideal time to have lunch is 12:30 - 2 pm- Try and keep a gap of 4 hours between your breakfast and lunch- Do not delay lunch later than 4pm.

Lunch

- The ideal time to have dinner is before 6-9 pm- You should keep a gap of 3 hours between your dinner and bedtime- Do not delay dinner later than 10pm- Eating close to bedtime can interfere with the quality of sleep

Dinner

- Never workout (especially weight training) on empty stomach- The right pre-workout meal could be protein sandwich (with chicken, tuna etc), protein shake, scrambled egg with whole wheat bread, peanut butter sandwich

Workout Meals

Eating food may sound very simple in itself but it's the simple mistakes we make that make a huge difference. It is important to know that when it comes to eating, the timing of meals is the key.

Eating all day, all time can get in you deep trouble. Here are some specific time schedule to have your meal that proves best.

The best time to eat!

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