Instagram is full of people in love with their image of reading.Reading for learning is not all coffee shops and cosy couches. Most of the time is pen and paper and rereading concepts that are difficult to grasp.You read because you want to know more, do more, grow more. You have a purpose. You're looking for things that could give you an edge, that you could later use in your purpose.

Reading with purpose

Connecting ideas can be a creative action.Use technology to put together ideas from different backgrounds and come up with new insights.

Learning like mixing music

An insight is an atomic self-contained re-usable unit of knowledge.It has emotional value. A gut feeling that you've stumbled over something really valuable.

What's an insight?

Atomic: Is the idea the smallest it can be? If you resonated to multiple items maybe you could capture them separately. Self-contained: The nugget should be valuable on its own. You should get most of the value by looking at it. This means short summarised notes work better than lengthy never-ending paragraphs. Re-usable: The insight needs to allow for methods of interaction. It should be classified in a manner that you recognise, it should point back to the source etc.

What makes a good IDEA?

We sometimes get lost in the process of reading. We go to slow or take too many notes. Here's how to read efficiently, remember & mix new concepts.

For most people music is one the most meaningful (if not the only) spiritual experience. Music can detach you from this world, making you feel a deep sense of harmony, letting you experience a state…

writing

Reading & Writing

education

Learning & Education

music

Music

creativity

Creativity

scienceandnature

Science & Nature

How to learn better by thinking like a DJ

In work he performed in 1896, the American zoologist Frederick Kenyon showed that the brain of the tiny bee was infinitely more complex than anyone had imagined, with thousands upon thousands of connection points, and also showed, for the first time in any organism, that neurons fell into clearly identifi­able classes. He died, forgotten, in a lunatic asylum.

Frederick Kenyon

“American writer and biologist Frederick Kenyon (1867–1941) was the first to explore the inner workings of the bee brain. His 1896 study, in which he managed to dye and characterize numerous types of nerve cells of the bee brain, was, in the words of the world’s foremost insect neuroanatomist, Nick Strausfeld, ‘a supernova.’ Not only did Kenyon draw the branching patterns of various neuron types in painstaking detail, but he also high­lighted, for the first time in any organism, that these fell into clearly identifi­able classes, which tended to be found only in certain areas of the brain.

The Inner Workings of the Bee Brain

One such type he found in the mushroom bodies is the Kenyon cells, named in his honor. Their cell bodies — the part of the neuron that con­tains the chromosomes and the DNA — decoding machinery — are in a peripheral area enclosed by the calyx of each mushroom body (the mush­room’s ‘head’), with a few additional ones on the sides of or underneath the calyces.

The Kenyon Cells

A finely arbored dendritic tree (the branched struc­ture that is a nerve cell’s signal ‘receiver’) extends into the mushroom body calyx, and a single axon (the neuron’s ‘information-sending output cable’) extends from each cell into the mushroom body pedunculus (the mushroom’s ‘stalk’).Extrapolating from just a few of these characteristically shaped neu­rons that he could see, Kenyon suggested (correctly) that there must be tens of thousands of such similarly shaped cells, with parallel outputs into each mushroom body pedunculus.

Shaped Cells

(In fact, there are about 170,000 Kenyon cells in each mushroom body.) He found neurons that connect the an­tennal lobes (the primary relays processing olfactory sensory input) with the mushroom body input region (the calyces, where the Kenyon cells have the fine dendritic trees) — and even suggested, again correctly, that the mushroom bodies were centers of multisensory integration.Kenyon’s 1896 brain wiring diagram [is a marvel]. It contains several classes of recognizable neuron types, with some suggestions for how they might be connected.

A Marvel

Many neurons have extensions as widely branched as full­grown trees — only, of course, much smaller. Consider that the drawing only shows around 20 of a honey bee brain’s ~850,000 neurons. We now know that each neuron, through its many fine branches, can make up to 10,000 connection points (synapses) with other neurons. There may be a billion synapses in a honey bee’s brain — and, since the efficiency of synapses can be modified by experience, near-infinite possibility to alter the informa­tion flow through the brain by learning and memory.

A Billion Synapses

It is a mystery to me how, after the publication of such work as Kenyon’s, anyone could have suggested that the insect brain is simple, or that the study of brain size could in any way be informative about the complexities of information pro­cessing inside a brain.Kenyon apparently suffered some of the anxieties all too familiar to many early-career researchers today. Despite his scientific accomplish­ments, he had trouble finding permanent employment, and moved be­tween institutions several times, facing continuous financial hardship.

Financial Hardship

Eventually, he appears to have snapped, and in 1899 Kenyon was arrested for ‘erratic and threatening behavior’ toward colleagues, who subsequently accused him of insanity. Later that year, he was permanently confined to a lunatic asylum, apparently without any opportunity ever to rehabilitate himself, and he died there more than four decades later — as Nick Strausfeld writes, ‘unloved, forgotten, and alone.’It was not to be the last tragedy in the quest to understand the bee brain.”

"Unloved, Forgotten, and Alone"

In work he performed in 1896, the American zoologist Frederick Kenyon showed that the brain of the tiny bee was infinitely more complex than anyone had imagined, with thousands upon thousands of…

religionandspirituality

Religion & Spirituality

history

History

artificialintelligence

Artificial Intelligence

In the quest to understand the bee brain …

Understanding the origin of Universe has raised the curiosity of generations before ours. There are several modifications and extensions of the theory of the origins that have been proposed, such as the steady state theory and the oscillating universe theory. However, none of these alternatives have been able to provide a better explanation of the observed data than the Big Bang theory itself. Overall, the Big Bang theory is supported by a wide range of observational and theoretical evidence, and it is considered to be the best explanation for the origin and evolution of the universe.

The Beginning Of Everything: A Look Into The Big Bang Theory And The Origins Of The Universe

The Big Bang theory is the current cosmological model that explains the origin and evolution of the universe. It states that the universe began as a singularity, an infinitely hot, dense, and small point in space and time. Approximately 13.8 billion years ago, this singularity underwent a rapid expansion, leading to the creation of all matter and energy in the universe. As the universe expanded and cooled, matter and energy began to condense into clumps, eventually forming the first stars and galaxies..


WHAT IS BIG BANG THEORY?

Cosmic Background Radiation: One of the key pieces of evidence for the Big Bang theory is cosmic microwave background radiation (CMB). This is a faint glow of light that fills the universe, and it has a temperature of about 2.7 Kelvin. The CMB is thought to be the afterglow of the Big Bang, as it has a nearly perfect blackbody spectrum and is almost, but not quite, the same temperature in all directions.

OBSERVATION SUPPORTING BIG BANG THEORY

Abundance of Light Elements: The Big Bang theory also predicts the relative abundance of light elements in the universe, such as hydrogen, helium, and lithium. These predictions agree very well with observations of the abundance of these elements in the universe.

Expanding Universe: The Big Bang theory also predicts an expanding universe, and Edwin Hubble observed in 1929 that galaxies are moving away from us, the more distant they are the faster they are receding. This is known as Hubble’s Law, and it is considered one of the strongest pieces of evidence of an expanding universe.

Many argue that the Big Bang does not account for the existence of dark matter and dark energy, and that this is a major weakness of the theory. They argue that there is no mechanism for the formation of these mysterious components of the universe in the Big Bang Theory. The Big Bang Theory does not attempt to explain the origins of dark matter and dark energy, as they were only discovered after the theory was developed. The theory does not require the existence of dark matter and dark energy, but it is compatible with their existence and predictions of their behavior have been observed.

WHAT ABOUT DARK MATTER AND DARK ENERGY?

Finally, some critics argue that the Big Bang Theory cannot account for the fine-tuning of the universe. One of the widespread misconceptions regarding the Big Bang theory is that it completely explains how the universe first came into being. The Big Bang hypothesis, however, describes the development of the current universe from an extremely dense and high-temperature starting state rather than explaining how energy, time, and space were created.

Conclusion

A Look into the Big Bang Theory and the Origins of the Universe – Big History

Is tea good for you? If this is a question that you often find asking yourself, you don’t need to look any further. In this article, we will learn about the extensive health benefits of tea so that you can incorporate it in your daily routine. Tea has been a part of folklore for time immemorial. Studies have shown that tea provides numerous health benefits, including boosting immune system, and reducing inflammation and chances of contracting chronic diseases like heart disease or cancer. The benefits vary from individual to individual. However, regular tea consumption can leave a lasting impact on your wellness.

If you're wondering whether tea is good for you, here are six health benefits of tea:

Health Benefits of Tea

To answer the question is tea good for you, it's most certainly yes, as tea helps in burning high amounts of fat and boosts metabolic rate. However, these benefits may vary from person to person.

1) Increases Fat Burning

Tea is e a great source of antioxidants, which help improve hair and skin health and protects against oxidative damage caused by chronic inflammation. It also helps in lowering likelihood of breast, colorectal, and prostate cancer.

2) Presence of Antioxidants

Tea helps reduce chances of contracting chronic diseases such as type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular problems. Green and black tea can help lower blood sugar level along with improving insulin sensitivity, reducing likelihood of type 2 diabetes. There are teas that help in preventing cardiovascular problems, like boosting antioxidants to lower bad cholesterol.

3) Prevents Chronic Disease

<a href="https://www.sportskeeda.com/health-and-fitness/green-tea-how-much-should-you-drink-per-day">Green tea </a>is good for weight loss and helps with weight management. Tea helps reduce fat and lowers chances of getting obesity. Studies have shown that people who regularly drink green tea have reduced belly fat, waist circumference, and overall fat. However, it varies from person to person.

4) Weight Management

There are several herbal teas available, which come with many benefits, such as: <ul><li>Chamomile tea reduces menstrual pain. </li><li>Peppermint tea provides relief in motion sickness and upset stomach. </li><li>Ginger tea helps reduce chronic indigestion. </li> </ul>

5) Herbal Tea Benefits

Tea has a health benefits. These include helping reduce weight, lower chances of chronic diseases like diabetes 2 and cardiovascular problems, helping <a href="https://www.sportskeeda.com/health-and-fitness/weight-loss-tips">lose weight </a>, and more. It can also help you lead a longer life by protecting against heart and cancer disease. Tea provides a wide range of health benefits already described above, so you should incorporate it in your daily routine. Black and green tea is good for cold, as it helps with sore throat.

6) Overall Health Improvement

However, there are some categories of teas that you should avoid. as they can be harmful for health for a variety of reasons, including high amount of sugar, no nutritional value, and probability of triggering allergies. Teas you avoid include trendy bubble teas, <a href="https://www.sportskeeda.com/health-and-fitness/7-health-benefits-detox-tea">detox teas </a>, fancy teas, and herbal teas, as they can trigger allergies.

Is tea good for you? If this is a question that you often find asking yourself, you don’t need to look any further.

food

Food

personaldevelopment

Personal Development

health

Health

exerciseandfitness

Exercise & Fitness

Is Tea Good for You? 6 Reasons You Should Drink It Every Day

“Typically, people who exercise, start eating better and becoming more productive at work. They smoke less and show more patience with colleagues and family. They use their credit cards less frequently and say they feel less stressed. Exercise is a keystone habit that triggers widespread change.”

Habits, scientists say, emerge because the brain is constantly looking for ways to save effort. Left to its own devices, the brain will try to make almost any routine into a habit, because habits allow our minds to ramp down more often.

Habits exist to save our brains effort

Biologically, we form habits to save energy, so anything we do regularly will become a habit.

Habits & Biology

This is how new habits are created: by putting together a cue, a routine, and a reward, and then cultivating a craving that drives the loop. Cravings are what drive habits. And figuring out how to spark a craving makes creating a new habit easier.

Cue, routine, reward

“The Golden Rule of Habit Change: You can’t extinguish a bad habit, you can only change it.”Habits are hard-wired into our brains. So while it would be nice to be able to erase this hard-wiring, it’s not possible. So we have to be intentional about changing our bad habits into good ones, rather than focusing on eliminating the bad ones from our system.

The Golden Rule

Rather, to change a habit, you must keep the old cue, and deliver the old reward, but insert a new routine. That’s the rule: If you use the same cue, and provide the same reward, you can shift the routine and change the habit. Almost any behavior can be transformed if the cue and reward stay the same.

How to change habits

“Champions don’t do extraordinary things. They do ordinary things, but they do them without thinking, too fast for the other team to react. They follow the habits they’ve learned.”

Why habits exist, how they work, and how you can change them - The foundational understanding required to create new habits that will drive your success and break old habits that are limiting your life.

Takes you to the edge of scientific discoveries that explain why habits exist and how they can be changed. This book brings to life a whole new understanding of human nature and its potential for transformation. It shows, by harnessing this science, we can transform our businesses, our communities, and our lives.

career

Career

motivationandinspiration

Motivation & Inspiration

habits

Habits

books

Books

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • This instant classic explores how we can change our lives by changing our habits. NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY The Wall Street Journal • Financial Times In The Power of Habit, award-winning business reporter Charles Duhigg takes us to the thrilling edge of scientific discoveries that explain why habits exist and how they can be changed. Distilling vast amounts of information into engrossing narratives that take us from the boardrooms of Procter & Gamble to the sidelines of the NFL to the front lines of the civil rights movement, Duhigg presents a whole new understanding of human nature and its potential. At its core, The Power of Habit contains an exhilarating argument: The key to exercising regularly, losing weight, being more productive, and achieving success is understanding how habits work. As Duhigg shows, by harnessing this new science, we can transform our businesses, our communities, and our lives. With a new Afterword by the author   “Sharp, provocative, and useful.”—Jim Collins   “Few [books] become essential manuals for business and living. The Power of Habit is an exception. Charles Duhigg not only explains how habits are formed but how to kick bad ones and hang on to the good.”—Financial Times   “A flat-out great read.”—David Allen, bestselling author of Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity “You’ll never look at yourself, your organization, or your world quite the same way.”—Daniel H. Pink, bestselling author of Drive and A Whole New Mind “Entertaining . . . enjoyable . . . fascinating . . . a serious look at the science of habit formation and change.”—The New York Times Book Review

Charles Duhigg is an American journalist and non-fiction author. He was a reporter for The New York Times, currently writes for The New Yorker Magazine and is the author of two books on habits and productivity, titled The Power of Habit: Why We Do What We Do in Life and Business and Smarter Faster Better.

Charles Duhigg

The Power of Habit

John Vervaeke, a cognitive scientist, gives us a taxonomy of the different kinds of knowing:<ul><li>Propositional knowing (knowing something is true). This is the stuff that's in the books or schools. But this is insuficient:</li><li>Procedural knowing (how to do something, our skills). "Knowing about bikes is different than knowing how to ride one"</li><li>Perspectival knowing (how it feels). Depending on our attention we can sense the room & make better decisions. </li><li>Participatory knowing (knowing how to be a participatory in an arena). I know how to play the father role at home and the leader at the office.  </li></ul>

4 Ways to Know

We tend to think knowledge is all about the books we read or diplomas we can collect. Not true. Our skills, our feelings, our being are forms of knowledge, even if they seem more subjective than their factual counter-part. 

John Vervaeke finally answers what we mean by "cognition."

problemsolving

Problem Solving

John Vervaeke’s Ways of Knowledge

<ol><li>Talent requires deep practice;</li><li>Deep practice requires vast amounts of energy;</li><li>Primal cues trigger huge outpourings of energy. Safety and future belonging are two powerful primal cues.</li></ol>

The Talent Code

<ul><li>Deep practice is built on a paradox: struggling in certain targeted ways—operating at the edges of your ability, where you make mistakes—makes you smarter.</li><li>Or to put it a slightly different way, experiences where you're forced to slow down, make errors, and correct them—as you would if you were walking up an ice-covered hill, slipping and stumbling as you go—end up making you swift and graceful without your realizing it.</li></ul>

Deep Practice 

<ol><li>Every human movement, thought, or feeling is a precisely timed electric signal traveling through a chain of neurons—a circuit of nerve fiber.</li><li>Myelin is the insulation that wraps these nerve fibers and increases signal strength, speed, and accuracy.</li><li>The more we fire a particular circuit, the more myelin optimizes that circuit, and the stronger, faster, and more fluent our movements and thoughts become.</li></ol>

How A Skill Is Formed? 

Because the best way to build a good circuit is to fire it, attend to mistakes, then fire it again, over and over. Struggle is not an option: it's a biological requirement : in order to get your skill circuit to fire optimally, you must by definition fire the circuit suboptimally; you must make mistakes and pay.

Why is targeted, mistake-focused practice so effective?

"Try again. Fail again. Fail better."

<ul><li>Because wrapping myelin around a big circuit requires immense energy and time. If you don't love it, you'll never work hard enough to be great.</li><li>The more we develop a skill circuit, the less we're aware that we're using it. We're built to make skills automatic, to stash them in our unconscious mind .</li></ul>

Why are passion and persistence key ingredients of talent?

Excellence is a habit.

Myelin wraps it doesn't unwrap. Like a highway-—paving machine, myelination happens in one direction. Once a skill circuit is insulated, you can't uninsulate it (except through age or disease). That's why habits are hard to break. The only way to change them is to build new habits by repeating new behaviors—by myelinating new circuits.

Why Are Habits Hard To Break? 

Every expert in every field is the result of around ten thousand hours of committed practice. Ericsson called this process "deliberate practice" and defined it as working on technique, seeking constant critical feedback, and focusing ruthlessly on shoring up weaknesses.

10,000 Hours Of Deep Practice 

“High motivation is not the kind of language that ignites people. What works is precisely the opposite: not reaching up but reaching down, speaking to the ground-level effort, affirming the struggle.”

<ul><li>ABSORB THE WHOLE THING. This means spending time staring at or listening to the desired skill.</li><li>It sounds rather Zen, but it basically amounts to absorbing a picture of the skill until you can imagine yourself doing it.</li></ul>

RULE ONE: CHUNK IT UP

<ul><li>There is, biologically speaking, no substitute for attentive repetition.</li><li>Myelin is living tissue. Like everything else in the body, it's in a constant cycle of breakdown and repair. That's why daily practice matters, particularly as we get older.</li></ul>

RULE TWO: REPEAT IT

"If I skip practice for one day, I notice. If I skip practice for two days, my wife notices. If I skip for three days, the world notices."

Deep practice is not simply about struggling; it's about seeking out a particular struggle, which involves a cycle of distinct actions.1. Pick a target.2. Reach for it.3. Evaluate the gap between the target and the reach.4. Return to step one.

RULE THREE : LEARN TO FEEL IT

<ul><li>Going slow allows you to attend more closely to errors, creating a higher degree of precision with each firing—and when it comes to growing myelin, precision is everything.</li><li>"I am slow to learn and slow to forget what I have learned," Lincoln wrote. "My mind is like a piece of steel, very hard to scratch anything on it and almost impossible after you get it there to rub it out."</li></ul>

Why does slowing down work so well? 

<ul><li>Ignition: The moments that lead us to say that is who you want to be. We usually think of passion as an inner quality. But it is something that came first from the outside world.</li><li>Future belonging is a primal cue. </li><li>It's not as simple as saying I want X. It's rather saying: I want X later, so I better do Y like crazy right now.</li></ul>

Future Belonging 

“See someone you want to become? Better get busy. Want to catch up with a desirable group? Better get busy.”

Brains are always looking for a cue as to where to spend energy now. Now? Now? We're swimming in an ocean of cues, constantly responding to them, but like fish in water, we just don't see it."

Ocean Of Cues

"If we're in a nice, easy, pleasant environment, we naturally shut off effort, Why work? But if people get the signal that it's rough, they get motivated now. A nice, well-kept tennis academy gives them the luxury future right now—of course they'd be demotivated. They can't help it."

Greatness isn't born, it's grown. Here's how.....

What is the secret of talent? How do we unlock it? This groundbreaking work provides readers with tools they can use to maximize potential in themselves and others. Whether you’re coaching soccer or teaching a child to play the piano, writing a novel or trying to improve your golf swing, this revolutionary book shows you how to grow talent by tapping into a newly discovered brain mechanism. Drawing on cutting-edge neurology and firsthand research gathered on journeys to nine of the world’s talent hotbeds—from the baseball fields of the Caribbean to a classical-music academy in upstate New York—Coyle identifies the three key elements that will allow you to develop your gifts and optimize your performance in sports, art, music, math, or just about anything. • Deep Practice Everyone knows that practice is a key to success. What everyone doesn’t know is that specific kinds of practice can increase skill up to ten times faster than conventional practice. • Ignition We all need a little motivation to get started. But what separates truly high achievers from the rest of the pack? A higher level of commitment—call it passion—born out of our deepest unconscious desires and triggered by certain primal cues. Understanding how these signals work can help you ignite passion and catalyze skill development. • Master Coaching What are the secrets of the world’s most effective teachers, trainers, and coaches? Discover the four virtues that enable these “talent whisperers” to fuel passion, inspire deep practice, and bring out the best in their students. These three elements work together within your brain to form myelin, a microscopic neural substance that adds vast amounts of speed and accuracy to your movements and thoughts. Scientists have discovered that myelin might just be the holy grail: the foundation of all forms of greatness, from Michelangelo’s to Michael Jordan’s. The good news about myelin is that it isn’t fixed at birth; to the contrary, it grows, and like anything that grows, it can be cultivated and nourished. Combining revelatory analysis with illuminating examples of regular people who have achieved greatness, this book will not only change the way you think about talent, but equip you to reach your own highest potential.

productivity

Productivity

Understand yourself and those around you.

psychology

Psychology

What is the secret of talent? How do we unlock it? This groundbreaking work provides readers with tools they can use to maximize potential in themselves and others. Whether you’re coaching soccer or teaching a child to play the piano, writing a novel or trying to improve your golf swing, this revolutionary book shows you how to grow talent by tapping into a newly discovered brain mechanism.Drawing on cutting-edge neurology and firsthand research gathered on journeys to nine of the world’s talent hotbeds—from the baseball fields of the Caribbean to a classical-music academy in upstate New York—Coyle identifies the three key elements that will allow you to develop your gifts and optimize your performance in sports, art, music, math, or just about anything.• Deep Practice Everyone knows that practice is a key to success. What everyone doesn’t know is that specific kinds of practice can increase skill up to ten times faster than conventional practice.• Ignition We all need a little motivation to get started. But what separates truly high achievers from the rest of the pack? A higher level of commitment—call it passion—born out of our deepest unconscious desires and triggered by certain primal cues. Understanding how these signals work can help you ignite passion and catalyze skill development.• Master Coaching What are the secrets of the world’s most effective teachers, trainers, and coaches? Discover the four virtues that enable these “talent whisperers” to fuel passion, inspire deep practice, and bring out the best in their students.These three elements work together within your brain to form myelin, a microscopic neural substance that adds vast amounts of speed and accuracy to your movements and thoughts. Scientists have discovered that myelin might just be the holy grail: the foundation of all forms of greatness, from Michelangelo’s to Michael Jordan’s. The good news about myelin is that it isn’t fixed at birth; to the contrary, it grows, and like anything that grows, it can be cultivated and nourished.Combining revelatory analysis with illuminating examples of regular people who have achieved greatness, this book will not only change the way you think about talent, but equip you to reach your own highest potential.

Daniel Coyle is the author of the upcoming book The Culture Code (January 2018). He is the New York Times bestselling author of The Talent Code, The Little Book of Talent, The Secret Race (with Tyler Hamilton), and other books. Winner (with Hamilton) of the 2012 William Hill Sports Book of the Year Prize, he is a contributing editor for Outside magazine, and also works a special advisor to the Cleveland Indians. Coyle lives in Cleveland, Ohio during the school year and in Homer, Alaska, during the summer with his wife Jen, and their four children.

Daniel Coyle

He published his for essential paper all in his one miracle year of 1905.He was 'meh' at poetry or violin playing. He refused the job of being the Israel's president (he didn't quite fit the job profile now, did he, with all that wild hair). :))

Was Einstein really all that smart?

Words cam with difficulty to him, but images came easier.He wasn’t mathematically brilliant, but could pull his weight. He was different. He had a clear way of thinking that wouldn’t register on an intelligence test. His first paper on special theory of relativity  can be understood by ordinary mortals: no jargon, just simple ideas, inescapable logic. Just brilliant in its simplicity.

Einstein was a bit of a weirdo.

He ran little experiments. At age 16 he wondered about riding alongside a ray of light. What does light look light for a moving observer? Light would always look like it was moving at the same speed. Other's were thinking about this also, but his thoughts were more visual.When thinking about theory of gravity, he imagined riding a falling elevator. He was also extremely stubborn. He didn't trust experiments not confirming his ideas. Trusting his instincts was mostly correct.

Einstein's way of thinking

Einstein seems like this larger than life figure, but his weirdness makes him likeable. Makes him more human and approachable.

How did a man who had been working as a patent clerk publish four groundbreaking papers about space, time, atoms and the strange nature of light -- all in one year? A look at Albert Einstein's unique intelligence. 

sciencefiction

Science Fiction

How Smart Was Einstein?

<a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/9484114-the-happiness-advantage">The Happiness Advantage </a>turns the tables on happiness, by proving it’s a tool for success, instead of the result of it, and gives you 7 actionable principles you can use to increase both.

Book Summary 

"I could care less about it's half full or half empty - as long as I can fill it up."-Shawn Anchor

Author Quote 

Since it was the next suggested book after <a href="http://fourminutebooks.com/happiness-summary/">Happiness </a>, and I told you yesterday that after reading that book you can go deeper into specific happiness tools and topics, <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/9484114-the-happiness-advantage">The Happiness Advantage </a> is a great next step. <a href="http://goodthinkinc.com/speaking/shawn-achor/">Shawn Achor </a> is one of the youngest happiness researchers out there, but his work in <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Positive_psychology">positive psychology </a> spreads like wildfire. It’s no coincidence he talks about the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Butterfly_effect">butterfly effect </a>, he’s living it – <a href="https://www.ted.com/talks/shawn_achor_the_happy_secret_to_better_work">his TED talk </a> is among the <a href="https://www.ted.com/playlists/171/the_most_popular_talks_of_all">20 most popular TED talks of all time </a>.

Book Overview 

<ol><li>Happiness comes before success, not after it. </li><li>You can train yourself to be optimistic with “The Tetris Effect”. </li><li>Fall up instead of down. </li> </ol>There are 7 principles in the book in total, but these 3 stood out most to me. Let’s take a look.

Top 3 Book Lessons 

This is the core message of the book. The book quotes a study done by <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_Seligman">Martin Seligman </a>, the “father” of positive psychology, where <a href="https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/wired-success/201007/how-workplace-happiness-can-boost-productivity">the happiness of 272 employees was monitored over 18 months </a>. Those who were happier before the study achieved more success later on. If you think about it, it makes perfect sense. Instead of trying to become successful, so you can finally be happy in the distant future, try to become happy right now, so you’ll be successful later .

Lesson 1: Happy people become successful, not the other way around.

Which sounds easier? Making a million bucks, or increasing your <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Serotonin">serotonin </a>levels a bit by watching a funny video, so you can score better on a math test later today, since serotonin also improves your memory? Of course this is oversimplified, but being happy is really all about your <a href="http://fourminutebooks.com/mindset-summary/">mindset </a>. You can’t always influence what happens to you, but you can change your attitude.

For example, <a href="http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/04/090417084115.htm">research has shown </a>that just anticipating something you’re looking forward to (like that funny video), <a href="http://www.sixwise.com/newsletters/06/04/12/get-ready-to-laugh-even-anticipating-laughter-raises-endorphin-levels.htm">can boost your endorphin levels by 27% </a>.

I had no clue about this. Really cool. <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tetris_effect">The Tetris effect </a> is what happens when you spend hours on end doing one particular activity. Your brain becomes so engaged, that the environment of the activity spills over to the rest of your life. Shawn Achor says this can be positive or negative. In the case of Tetris, people started optimizing their environment, and <a href="http://bmcresnotes.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/1756-0500-2-174">became more efficient </a>.

Lesson 2: Train your brain to spot positives with “The Tetris Effect”.

Similarly, you can train your brain to spot the positive things in your life,  in order to <a href="http://fourminutebooks.com/learned-optimism-summary/">become more optimistic </a>. For example you can start a gratitude ritual, where you write down 3 things you’re grateful for each day.  <a href="http://niklasgoeke.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/gratitude-streak.jpg">I’ve done this for 3 years now </a>and it puts a positive spin on your day, no matter what happened.

After each failure, crisis or catastrophe, 3 possible things can happen: <ol><li>Nothing changes. </li><li>You’re caught in a downward spiral, and more bad things follow. </li><li>You come back stronger than ever before. </li> </ol>

Lesson 3: Fall up instead of down, by using failures as a stepping stone.

Obviously, you have to shoot for scenario number 3 as often as possible. Speaking of scenarios: Following a bad event, your brain always makes up alternative scenarios. These are called <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Counterfactual_thinking">counterfacts </a>and this is where you get to take control. You have to choose to believe the alternative scenario, that will lead to you working harder, instead of less.

Here’s an example: When <a href="http://fourminutebooks.com/mindset-summary/">Michael Jordan was cut from his high school basketball team </a>, he could have believed that if only he was taller, he’d have been picked. But he can’t influence his height, so that would not have made him work harder. Instead, he believed that if only he was better, he’d have been picked.  This led him to practice like a madman the next summer and the rest is history.

<a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/9484114-the-happiness-advantage">The Happiness Advantage </a> was really cool. I didn’t expect the major insight here, which was that happiness must come before success.  The idea is radical and eliminates the common excuses along the lines of “I’ll be happy if X happens”. Some of the principles felt like additional tips for <a href="http://fourminutebooks.com/learned-optimism-summary/">Learned Optimism </a>, while others draw on the benefits of <a href="http://fourminutebooks.com/better-than-before-summary/">better habits </a> or your <a href="http://fourminutebooks.com/the-magic-of-thinking-big-summary/">perceived reality </a>.

The Happiness Advantage Review

As a video game nerd, I loved “The Tetris Effect”, and falling up, Achor has a great way of using metaphors and images to make his point. A great follow-up read to falling up instead of down is <a href="http://fourminutebooks.com/the-obstacle-is-the-way-summary/">The Obstacle is The Way </a>by Ryan Holiday. Very refreshing set of blinks, thumbs up!

The 40 year old parents, who won’t let their 12 year old be consumed by video games or another seemingly unimportant activity, the 64 year old, who’s just about to retire, but still keeps complaining about how terrible politics are, and anyone who goes to bed already worrying about tomorrow’s problems.

Who would I recommend The Happiness Advantage to?

The Happiness Advantage summary shows you it's a tool for success, instead of the result, and gives you 7 principles to increase both. Read in 3 minutes.

The Happiness Advantage Summary

Quantum mechanics or quantum physics, it is a theory that is concerned with studying the behavior of matter at the subatomic level, and interest in explaining everything related to the atom of components and particles such as electrons, protons, neutrons and other smaller particles such as quarks and gluons and describing their properties One of the most important departments of physics is classical physics. Classical physics is considered one of the branches of science specialized in studying and explaining the motions of large bodies such as planets, stars and Galaxies

Quantum Mechanics And Classical Physics 

But scientists found that the laws of classical physics do not apply to the subatomic world, and after attempts to search for a comprehensive theory and test it on a subatomic world, a new theory appeared to explain these phenomena, now known as quantum mechanics. One of the strange and interesting definitions that have been presented to mechanics is that it is the effect of consciousness on the observation process. From this standpoint, I will explain the most experiments that contributed to building this definition:

.The scientist Claude Johnson carried out this experiment to find out the behavior of electrons. Do they really behave like particles always? To describe this experiment, we take a device that throws electrons towards a wall with two slits, and behind this wall a screen is placed that can monitor the lines falling on it. We also know that electrons are physical particles, and therefore the result is expected in all cases. Two vertical lines (as the old expression says), but the result was stranger than imagination What appeared was that the entry of electrons through a double

Double-slit experiment

Quantum Mechanics 

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