Mastering any physical skill, such as playing an instrument or throwing a baseball, takes practice. Practice is repeating an action with the goal of improvement.

Mastering a skill

Our brains have two kinds of neural tissue:<ul><li>Grey matter processes information in the brain</li><li>White matter is mostly fatty tissue and nerve fibres.</li></ul> For our bodies to move, information needs to travel from the grey matter down the spinal cord through a chain of nerve fibres (axons) to our muscles. The axons in the white matter are wrapped with myelin. This myelin covering seems to change with practice. Added layers insulate the axons, eventually becoming a superhighway for information connecting your brain to your muscles.

Myelin during practice

Mastery is not just about the hours of practice. It's also the quality and effectiveness of that practice that plays a role.Effective practice is <ol><li>consistent</li><li>intensely focused</li><li>targets content or weaknesses</li></ol>

Effective practice

<ul><li>Focus on the task at hand.</li><li>Minimise distraction. Turn off the TV and put your cellphone out of reach. Studies show that the interference of laptops and smartphones caused students to stay on task for only six minutes at a time.</li><li>Start out slowly. Coordination is built with repetitions, whether correct or incorrect.</li><li>Frequent repetitions with allotted breaks. Studies show that many top athletes, musicians, and dancers divide their time used for effective practice into multiple daily practice sessions.</li><li>Mentally practise with vivid detail. </li></ul>

How to get the most out of our practice time

View full lesson: http://ed.ted.com/lessons/how-to-practice-effectively-for-just-about-anything-annie-bosler-and-don-greene Mastering any physical skill takes practice. Practice is the repetition of an action with the goal of improvement, and it helps us perform with more ease, speed, and confidence. But what does practice actually do to make us better at things? Annie Bosler and Don Greene explain how practice affects the inner workings of our brains. Lesson by Annie Bosler and Don Greene, animation by Martina Meštrović.

Stashed ideas

How to practice effectively...for just about anything - Annie Bosler and Don Greene

Tedcore is a sub-genre of self-help books that uses feel-good philosophy to turn our anxieties into our identity. It combines the comforting vocabulary of modern therapy with grand pseudoscientific theories on human behaviour. Books such as Atlas of the Heart, Atomic Habits, The Body Keeps The Score, Attached, and Mating in Captivity market feel-good versions of philosophy that don't challenge our conceptions but validate our feelings. Many of these authors have given Ted talks and ensures everyone leaves feeling smarter and more special.

Tedcore

Tedcore is a product that falls under “self-care” and “affirms” our identity. It operates through a system of wellness: processing your trauma is vital. Yet it ignores everything that actually produces anxiety in our society, such as unstable economies, war, mass migration, climate change, and tearing social fabric and families.  All these theories of an abnormal self are indebted to Freudian psychoanalysis, yet it is rarely mentioned or only in passing.

Tedcore makes you feel good

The solutions these Tedcore books offer consistently encourage us to look outward, take yoga, get over our exes, and process our trauma by directing our energy towards something new. Mason describes the “value of suffering”. That “happiness requires struggle”, and something wonderful awaits you on the other side of feeling sorry for yourself. Yet you sit alone in your apartment or next to your sleeping partner, scanning the pages of a self-help book for mentions of the one thing you really care about: you.

Tedcore solutions

Bestsellers like Atlas of the Heart and Atomic Habits use feel-good philosophy to turn our anxieties into our identity

Tedcore: the self-help books that have changed the way we live, speak and think

<ul>
<li>If you have an absolute secret you don’t want your negotiating opponent to discover, construct several “false walls” that you can allow them to “breakthrough”.</li>
<li>Breaching the “false walls” gives them the pleasure of getting something, which will help you to protect your most precious negotiating points.</li>
</ul>

The Three Secrets Of Negotiation: Constructing False Walls

<ul><li>When faced with an opponent who has superior leverage, cooperate with them, and work collaboratively to find out what they really want.</li><li>Ask questions to better understand what the other person desires.</li></ul>

The Three Secrets Of Negotiation: Collaborate And Infiltrate

<ul><li>Realize that you likely won’t be able to get everything that you want.</li><li>However, if you pay attention to what your opponent wants, then you can control the frame by “printing the label” on each negotiating point to achieve your objectives within the terms of their rules.</li></ul>

The Three Secrets Of Negotiation: The Limits Of Negotiation

Roland Frasier is a phenomenal negotiator. Not only was he a business lawyer for 12 years, but Roland has also founded, scaled, or sold 24 different 7 to 9 figure businesses ranging from consumer products to industrial machine manufacturing companies with adjusted sales ranging from $3 million to $337 million. You don’t manage that kind of success without knowing a thing or two about negotiating. So listen in today for some excellent principles to help guide you through a tough negotiation.  If you enjoy this podcast, be sure to subscribe on ApplePodcasts, write a review, and share this episode with your business-minded friends. If you find yourself needing to do some negotiating right now, you may also find this episode, and this episode (both with Roland) useful. The Bouchard Story Back in World War 2, in the 1940s, the Nazis occupied France, and parts of Burgundy were under their control. Orders were given to appropriate large quantities of lower quality French Burgundy for the troops, and higher quality wines were to be purchased and sent to Germany for the officers and higher-ups. To save as much of their better wine that had not already been designated “Grand Cru,” several of the local producers gathered and established a new designation, “Premiere Cru,” to permit that wine to avoid appropriation. The plan worked, and that saved quite a bit of wine. But, the best wine of the region was also at risk, and even if the wine was being purchased for the officers, the French didn’t want all of it to leave their region to be lost forever. Several of the winemakers built false walls in their large, sprawling cellars beneath the city of Beaune in the heart of Burgundy to hide their most precious wines. Among those was Bouchard Pere et Fils (which Roland recently had the pleasure of visiting). Bouchard has an immense underground cellar that covers several blocks beneath the city above, and this cellar stores millions of bottles dating back to the mid-1800s. They chose one of their off the beaten path cellar rooms that held about 35,000 bottles as the primary storage spot for their best wines and then built a false wall behind which to hide their liquid treasure. However, false walls were not uncommon, and the Nazis knew that they were likely to exist in cellars, so they were not shy about breaking through walls at the end of cellar corridors to check and see if anything was hidden behind them. So, when they arrived at Bouchard’s cellars, the Nazi soldiers did indeed knock down and break through the false wall Bouchard had built. However, rather than finding the most precious wines, they found a cache of lesser wines instead and, delighted that they had foiled the winemaker’s attempt to hide these bottles, took them all away. What they did not know, however, was that Bouchard had built not one false wall between its prized 35,000 bottles and the main cellar, but three, and cleverly stashed a large quantity of lesser wine bottles behind each false wall so that the Nazi’s would believe they had found the best wines and not go any further. Fortunately, the soldiers were not well-versed in French Burgundy terroir and therefore were unable to discern the quality level of the wines they found hidden behind the first wall. The plan worked, and thankfully, the most prized bottles survived throughout the war, hidden safely away behind two additional false walls. There are several lessons in business and negotiation that we can take from what Bouchard did. Lesson #1: Construct “False Walls” Whenever you have an absolute that you cannot give on and do not want your negotiating opponent to discover, take the time to construct several “false walls” that you can allow them to “breakthrough.” This will allow you to give them the pleasure of getting something in return as you concede the issues that you are perfectly comfortable conceding, which will, in turn, be more likely to allow you to protect your most precious negotiating points. Listen for Roland’s examples! Lesson #2: Collaborate & Infiltrate The French resistance could have opted to take a stand in the cellars and fight it out with the Nazis, but that would have risked the destruction of the cellars and the wine within, as well as the loss of hundreds of French lives. When faced with an opponent who has superior leverage, cooperate with them, and work collaboratively to find out what they really want. You can usually learn quite a bit by asking questions to get to the bottom of what your opponent really wants. Remember, humans are emotional creatures, and often there is some emotion underlying every human desire. Your opponent may not even know the thing they actually want from the negotiation. In the case of the Nazis, they wanted wine for the troops and themselves, to escape the horrors of war and to fulfill the orders of their commanders. They didn’t necessarily want or need the very best wine the French had created. Giving them something that fit the rough description of the physical thing the Nazis wanted (wine in bottles) satisfied the desire for something with enough alcohol to provide an escape and physical bottles to send to their superiors back home in Germany. “In your negotiations, always ask questions. The person on the other side may tell you they need a $2.5 million purchase price for their company. Still, by asking questions, you may find their real underlying desires are to escape the monotony of a business they no longer enjoy and to provide $250,000 to start the new venture they are salivating to start.” Roland Frasier If you can satisfy their emotional needs to leave the existing business and start the new one by providing them with $250,000, you have a good chance of drastically reducing the purchase price, maybe even by as much as 90%! Lesson #3: “Print the Label” In the case of Bouchard, they were well-aware that they would have to give up much of their lesser wines to the invading Nazis. They knew that they couldn’t protect everything. So, they accepted that fact and created a dividing line between their most sacred bottles (the 35,000 Grand Cru hidden behind the three false walls), their medium quality wines (the ones they hastily designated Premiere Cru), and their least valuable, and most easily replaceable table wines. The Nazis made the rule that Grand Cru was not to be appropriated and sent to the troops. The French did not want to destroy their designation system by suddenly elevating all wines to Grand Cru, so they literally printed a new label with a new premium wine designation (Premiere Cru) to protect the wine from appropriation. As you negotiate, realize that you most likely won’t be able to get everything that you want, but if you pay attention to what your opponent wants (see Lesson #2 above), then you can control the frame by “printing the label” on each negotiating point to achieve your objectives within the terms of their rules. Listen For Roland’s Examples! Conclusion Take these three negotiating lessons from Burgundy, the Nazis, and the 3 Walls and use them in your day-to-day negotiations. Construct “false walls,” collaborate and infiltrate, and print the label. Whether you’re negotiating corporate acquisitions or just trying to get kids to do their homework, this stuff works and can help everyone reach a happy agreement faster. Click to find us on Apple Podcasts and other podcast players.  Contact & Follow Roland On Facebook  On Instagram  Through his Website  Follow Business Lunch Podcast On Twitter Thanks so much for joining us this week. Want to subscribe to Business Lunch with Roland Frasier? Have some feedback you’d like to share? Connect with us on ApplePodcasts and leave us an honest review! Your feedback will help us improve the show, and connect us with more high flyers like you. Click to find us on Apple Podcasts and other podcast players.

3 Negotiating Lessons from Burgundy

These days, practically anyone can be an inventor. You don't have to be an expert in a field to contribute. You can become an inventor simply by having an idea and refining it.

Anyone can be an inventor

Inventions start with a good idea. And a good idea comes from inspiration. Advice from successful entrepreneurs and invention experts:<ul><li>Limor Fried, Founder and Lead Engineer at Adafruit, states that he gets inspiration from a Show and Tell they do every Wednesday in a live Google+ hangout.</li><li>Eric Hintz from The Smithsonian's Lemelson Center for the Study of Invention and Innovation says history shows that inventors often find the world irritating and want to fix it.</li></ul>

Ideas on ideation

Step 1: Research and modelInventors start with representations before they make something.<ul><li>Research to find available materials and possible technologies to use.</li><li>Draw the idea with a pencil on paper.</li><li>Make a model using cardboard, tape and hot glue.</li><li>Create a 2-D and 3 D digital model.</li></ul> Step 2: ExperimentTest your prototype, improve it, then test again until there is no room for improvement. Use milling machines or 3-D printers. Step 3: FinalizeThe final prototype should be presentable to potential investors and customers. Hire expert help with your final creation if it's needed.

Prototyping

Most inventions that die do so because they lack funding. Funding options include: <ul><li>Crowdfunding.</li><li>Competitions. In 2007, NASA used a competition to design the next generation of astronaut gloves.</li><li>Self-funding.</li><li>Investors. The best way to pitch your idea is with a personal connection or introduction. However, many VCs and angels publicly post their emails or are active on Twitter.</li><li>Outsourcing. License or sell your intellectual property as it can help others to apply your idea to their own needs.</li></ul>

Funding

Ideally, you will have a community of true believers who support your product. They should get your prototypes first as they will give valuable feedback and promote the product. <ul><li>A broader reach is possible by spreading information at conferences, meetups, and hackathons and write about it in forums and blogs.</li><li>The media is also a valuable source to reach new audiences.</li><li>Grab every opportunity for an interview.</li><li>Use feedback and market research to determine demand and set the pace for scaling up.</li></ul>

Product to market

All inventions start as an idea—here's how to make them happen.

The inventor's handbook

In these dark days, the world is full of profound and deepening problems. Some leaders realise the need to work differently to achieve their goals and impact the world.
Public problem-solvers possess a skill set that can be applied to any public problem for making measurable change. However, public problem solving is not yet a defined field. Some people use the term "social innovator" or "change agent."

Public problem solvers

<ul><li>Problem definition: Defining and resolving an urgent problem that matters to people.</li><li>Data-analytical thinking.</li><li>Human-centred design: Abandoning closed-door practices of the past, and establishing a partnership with affected people.</li><li>Collective intelligence: Adopting more participatory and democratic ways of working to build the collective intelligence of communities.</li><li>Rapid evidence review: New technology is used to find the best ideas and people.</li><li>Powerful partnerships: The know-how to build teams across multiple disciplines.</li><li>Measuring what works: Using experimental techniques and collaboration.</li></ul>

Tools for solving public problems

Public problem solvers are willing to innovate while holding fast to the values of the public interest. Yet, they are not reckless.  They are conscious of the requirements of process and equity. They don't just comply with rules but act with ingenuity and integrity while focusing on solving the most urgent challenges. They also systematise a process that others can imitate and scale up.

Public problem solver traits

Problem Solving

7 skills every public problem solver needs

Many of us prefer complicated solutions and explanations over simpler ones. This cognitive error is known as the Complexity Bias.
We don’t listen to simple, basic advice to be productive and healthy, like doing regular exercise or rising early every morning. Our mind gets attracted to complex procedures and ideas like intermittent fasting, keto diet, and other finicky solutions that dazzle us with their twisted ways.

The Complexity Bias

<ol>
<li>Move towards action by doing more and researching less. Follow the ‘Just Do It’ mantra.</li>
<li>Choose one system that works with your natural inclination, even if it isn’t the best way.</li>
<li>Occam's Razor states that the explanation which is the simplest and has the least number of assumptions is more likely to be true. Embrace this mental model in your daily decisions.</li>
</ol>

Avoiding Complexity Bias

Too much complexity in our daily decisions and routines could lead to avoidance of work, and though complexity keeps life interesting, we need to embrace it only when we enjoy the process.

Habitually Complex

Complexity bias is a cognitive error that describes our tendency to prefer complicated solutions and explanations over simple ones.

Complexity Bias: Why We Overcomplicate Our Lives

A recent theory on forgetting states that everything we learn remains in storage inside our memory, but our ability to recall and retrieve that information fades if we do not practice fetching information.

Everything Remains In Memory

Spaced Repetition Time Intervals can be practiced using:
<ul>
<li>The Analog spaced Repetition System: Making flashcards or 'boxes' of study material to review daily, weekly or bi-weekly.</li>
<li>The Digital Method: Use an App like Anki, or SuperMemo.</li>
</ul>

Spaced Repetition Learning Systems

Studying takes too much time, and there is only a limited number of hours. Spaced repetition method uses time intervals and makes you recall more information, using less time.
The spacing effect maximizes learning and your study becomes more efficient and consumes less time.

A New Way To Study

If there's a test coming up in the next 7 days, the recommended way to study: 3 to 4 sessions with spaces in between, instead of studying non-stop for 7 days.
This way, you study less, yet retain more for the day of the test.

Study Gaps

“Work involving higher mental functions, such as analysis and synthesis, needs to be spaced out to allow new neural connections to solidify. New learning drives out old learning when insufficient time intervenes.”

C.I.G. is supported in part by its readers. If you buy through our links, we may earn an affiliate commission. Read more here. A New Theory of Forgetting The Best Spaced Repetition Time Intervals The Analog Spaced Repetition System Spaced Repetition App Recommendations I'll just say what we're all thinking: studying takes too much time.

How to Remember More of What You Learn with Spaced Repetition

When you deal with a crisis, you need managers and employees that can think on their feet and act fast without first looking for an instruction manual. It means that you need skilled improvisers.
Capable improvisers will steer their companies through crises, paradigm shifts, technological breakthroughs and environmental disasters. But employee training programs seldom focus on becoming better improvisers, and hiring teams don't often screen for improvisation skills.

Skilled improvisers are necessary

<ol>
<li>Imitative improvisation. A person will observe what more-experienced people are doing and copy their responses with minimal variation. This is an effective starting point for people with limited experience.</li>
<li>Reactive improvisation: Using inputs from the environment and other people to develop your own reaction to an unexpected situation, without relying on other's actions. It is generally developed after you have already mastered imitative improvisation.</li>
<li>Generative improvisation. It is about proactively trying new things to anticipate and catalyse what could happen (rather than react).</li>
</ol>

Three types of improvisation skills

A key factor in determining how improvisation skills develop is the extent to which an individual was competitively vs collaboratively oriented.
<ul>
<li>Competitive individuals generally develop reactive improvisation faster since they grab every opportunity for themselves. This approach tends to alienate others and impede the longer-term development of generative improvisation skills.</li>
<li>Collaborative individuals take longer to develop reactive improvisation because they first watch how others react to new environmental cues. They gain social connectedness and mutual trust to improvise generatively.</li>
</ul>

How different skills develop

<ul>
<li>Build awareness of how different types of improvisation skills are developed. Educate yourself and your team on the kinds of improvisation skills. Newcomers could be paired with more experienced improvisers.</li>
<li>Balance collaboration and competition. Managers need to push employees to develop collaborative skills without impeding the competitive instincts of newcomers.</li>
<li>Nurture social structures. Managers should create a psychologically safe environment of rich social interactions that engenders trust and collaboration - especially when working remotely.</li>
</ul>

How to foster improvisation skills

Researchers studied how people developed improvisational skills by observing live-action role playing games over two years.

Improvisation Takes Practice

There is a view that sees self-control as a battle between impulsivity and deliberate foresight. This idea has roots in ideas from ancient Greeks.
The International Society for Research on Impulsivity defines the desire for smaller rewards available now over larger, but later rewards as a type of impulsivity that involves a lack of planning and regard for future consequences. But, this view rests on a false dichotomy between foresight and impulsivity.

A popular view of self-control

People can use their foresight to prioritise the present. Many behaviours that seem like a lack of willpower are not caused by a reluctance to plan ahead. Instead, they come from our capacity for long-term thinking.
For example, our decision-making can be influenced by the motivation to avoid future regrets about missing out. People foresee their own reliable tendency to spend money on boring essentials. Pre-committing to indulgences forces us to have some fun.

Pre-commitment to be indulgent

People living in poverty tend to favour smaller immediate rewards over a larger delayed payoff. 
A possible reason for this is if you live in a highly uncertain environment or where people tend not to keep their promises, a farsighted view will lead you to get what you can now. Even children will use background information when forming expectations about whether their patience will pay off.

Choosing immediate rewards

Metacognition - the ability to reflect on our thinking - plays a large part in our decision-making processes.
We don't only have emotions or desires that drive us. We also reflect on our emotions, regret our decisions, and try to work around them to pursue our immediate and delayed goals.

Metacognition affects our decision-making

The label of 'failure' when people don't opt for delayed gratification is often completely misleading, such as when someone chooses immediate rewards because they don't trust the promise of a delayed reward. 
Prescriptive moulds that say how people are supposed to act is unhelpful. Instead, the goal should be to understand the actual reasons for decision-making within the broader context.

It is not a failure to opt for immediate rewards

When people prioritise the present, it’s not because they’re being short-sighted – quite the opposite could be true

Prioritising the present doesn’t mean you lack willpower | Psyche Ideas

These terms sound very similar and are often used interchangeably in everyday conversations.
<ul>
<li>Efficacy means getting stuff done. (Related question: Is it working?)</li>
<li>Effectiveness means doing the right things. (Is it working well?)</li>
<li>Efficiency means doing things right. (Is it working in the most economical way?)</li>
</ul>

Efficacy, effectiveness, efficiency

Efficacy is mostly used in a scientific setting. Efficacy is the ability to create an anticipated effect.
For example, a specific medication that improves a patient's symptoms in an ideal environment has demonstrated efficacy.

Efficacy: Getting stuff done

Efficacy is not always enough. Medication that improves a patient's symptoms under ideal conditions is technically getting things done, but not always the right things. 
Effectiveness in clinical trials is about how well a treatment works in the real world, not just in perfectly controlled conditions.

Effectiveness: Doing the right things

Once you find an effective solution, you can try to improve it, or make it more efficient.
Efficiency is about doing this in the most economical way in terms of time, energy, or money.

Bite-sized knowledge
to upgrade
your career

Graham A.
@gra_maa

How to practice effectively...for just about anything - Annie Bosler and Don Greene

Tedcore: the self-help books that have changed the way we live, speak and think

3 Negotiating Lessons from Burgundy

The inventor's handbook

7 skills every public problem solver needs

Bite-sized knowledgeto upgradeyour career

Graham A.@gra_maa

How to practice effectively...for just about anything - Annie Bosler and Don Greene

Tedcore: the self-help books that have changed the way we live, speak and think

3 Negotiating Lessons from Burgundy

The inventor's handbook

7 skills every public problem solver needs

Bite-sized knowledge
to upgrade
your career

Graham A.
@gra_maa