Light is a powerful stimulus for our mental and physical health.  Light controls when we are asleep and when we are alert. Lights directly affect how our nervous system functions.

Light affects your sleep and your energy levels


Wake up, go outside and get 5 - 20 minutes of bright light exposure. 	If you get up before sunlight, use bright artificial lights.  The aim is to get as much bright light during the day and as little as possible between 10 PM and 4 AM. This will have enormous physical and mental health benefits. Bright light exposure through windows or windshields doesn’t work as they filter the light that activates your neutrons. Blue light is great to create alertness and well-being throughout the day.

The best way to get sunlight exposure

Cortisol is a key hormone for health. Every 24 hours there is a peak cortisol release. This wakes you up in the morning and gives you focus. If you wake up early, you will get a peak early in the day. But when cortisol arrives later in the day, people get mood issues. Late-shifted cortisol is also contributing to depression.

Cortisol in the body

Your peak of alertness happens about 90 minutes before your natural sleep time. While it will pass, it can give you a useful indicator of your optimal bedtime. Before bedtime:<ul><li>Taper off thinking and anticipation.</li><li>Non-sleep deep rest (NSDR) is a powerful tool that helps you relax, and reduce stress and anxiety. </li><li>Yoga Nidra and Reveri (a self-hypnosis app) can help you relax your nervous system before you go to sleep.</li></ul>

Evening routine

Behavioural tools are the foundation of sleep and wakefulness. When you learn progressive relaxation techniques, you get better at falling asleep and feeling alert when you wake up.Supplements and prescription medication can be great, but they don’t rewire your brain as behavioural tools do. Supplements that can help with depth and transition to sleep:<ul><li>Magnesium threonate or magnesium bis-glycinate (100 to 200 milligrams)) makes you feel drowsy.</li><li>Apigenin (50 milligrams) is taken 30 - 60 minutes before sleep.</li><li>Theanine (100 to 400 milligrams) has positive effects on jitteriness and anxiety.</li></ul>

Behavioural tools before medication and supplements

Ideally, you should sleep in a cold room and cover yourself with warm blankets. If you get too hot, you can jump heat by extending your feet or hands. Take a cold shower or ice bath to heat up in the morning. You will experience a dopamine increase. When you expose yourself to cold water, you build a reservoir of heat generation.

Temperature is an important stimulus for wakefulness

Naps should be shorter than 90 minutes. Most of the rewiring and neuroplasticity occurs during deep sleep and also during a short nap. Short naps accelerate neuroplasticity and learning, especially if you nap after an intensive learning session. If you have problems with the afternoon slump, delay your morning caffeine for 90 to 120 minutes after waking.

The short nap

The two most common reasons for waking up at night:<ul><li>Too much or too little exercise throughout the day. Generally, 150 to 180 minutes per week of zone 2 cardio and resistance exercise 3 or 4 times a week is sufficient.</li><li>Going to bed too late. Every hour of sleep before midnight recharges you deeper than the hours after midnight.</li></ul>

Why people wake up in the middle of the night

Caffeine creates wakefulness in the body and brain. It also increases the sensitivity of the dopamine receptors.<ul><li>It makes us more motivated to go out and pursue goals.</li><li>It makes us focus on things outside our immediate experience.</li></ul>However, try and taper off caffeine toward the afternoon for better sleep.

Caffeine boosts adenosine

The Basal ganglia are important for controlling and integrating thought and action. Some of the circuitry in basal ganglia pathways are involved with the “go” action and “no-go” suppressing functions. As children, we learn no-go behaviours (don’t interrupt, sit still). As adults, everything is “go, go, go” and we seldom rehearse the no-go functions.  We need to continue to keep the no-goes circuits in working order., e.g. resisting the urge to pick up your phone.

Tips to control bad impulses

Dr. Andrew Huberman explains how small behaviours can make a huge impact on your health. 

 Leading neuroscientist and Stanford University School of Medicine professor Dr. Andrew Huberman goes in-depth on how small behaviors can make a huge impact on your health.  Dr. Huberman offers essential insights into how light affects your sleep and your energy levels, which supplements actually work, tips to control bad impulses, exercises to slow the aging process, and so much more.   Dr. Huberman has made numerous significant contributions to the fields of brain development, brain function and neural plasticity, which is the ability of our nervous system to rewire and learn new behaviors, skills and cognitive functioning. Huberman is a McKnight Foundation and Pew Foundation Fellow and was awarded the Cogan Award in 2017, given to the scientist making the most significant discoveries in the study of vision. His lab’s most recent work focuses on the influence of vision and respiration on human performance and brain states, such as fear and courage.    --  Want even more? Members get early access, hand-edited transcripts, member-only episodes, and so much more. Learn more here: https://fs.blog/membership/ Every Sunday our Brain Food newsletter shares timeless insights and ideas that you can use at work and home. Add it to your inbox: https://fs.blog/newsletter/ Follow Shane on Twitter at: https://twitter.com/ShaneAParrish 

Stashed ideas

#133 Andrew Huberman: The Science of Small Changes

The Graphics Interchange Format was a technological solution developed by Stephen Wilhite.<ul><li>In the 1980s, Wilhite was the lead engineer on a team at CompuServe tasked with finding a way to quickly distribute “high-quality, high-resolution graphics” in color.</li><li>Developing this became an obsession for Wilhite, who would perfect the product at home.</li><li>The result, GIF, was released in 1987, but its commercial success is due in large part to Netscape, which, in 1995 added the ability for GIFs to loop.</li></ul>

The GIF backstory

<ul><li>With the rise of GIFs came a historic internet debate: whether it’s pronounced “gif” (with a hard G, like “gift”) or “jif.” </li><li>In 2012, Oxford American Dictionaries named “GIF” its US Word of the Year, accepting both pronunciations.</li><li>In 2013, Stephen Wilhite old The New York Times, “It’s a soft ‘G,’ pronounced ‘jif.’ End of story.</li><li>It was a baller move, but despite his clarification, the debate seemingly continues to this day.</li></ul>

GIF vs. JIF

The most ubiquitous platform for GIFs today is Giphy, used by 700m+ people and said to come 2nd only to Google in search engine activity.According to Giphy, the 1st GIF ever uploaded to the internet, by Stephen Wilhite himself, was of a plane over rolling clouds.

The impact of GIFs

The man behind the looping graphics synonymous with internet culture passed away this week.

The enormous impact of Stephen Wilhite, inventor of the GIF

When we nap, sleep pressure is released, increasing cognitive function, performance and memory while reducing stress and sleepiness.A successful power nap should leave you feeling refreshed and prepared to cruise through your to-do list in no time.

Power Naps

Enjoying a coffee 15-20 minutes before lying down helps to prevent the brain from absorbing adenosine, a chemical that causes drowsiness and sleep. By the time you wake up, the caffeine will have kicked in, providing an extra jolt of energy.

Start with a Cup of Coffee

<ul><li>Noise-free, dark and cool (60-67 degree Fahrenheit/15-22 degree Celsius) environments are most conducive to productive sleep. </li><li>Try to wind down before attempting to sleep. Perhaps try a short meditation, go for a walk outside, or listen to calm music.</li><li>If you have been trying to fall asleep for longer than you’d like, but still can’t seem to relax and go to sleep, it can be a good idea to get up.</li><li>To aid sleep, the sleeping space should be used for sleeping, and when we can’t sleep and start to worry, we start to relate that place to worry instead of the ability to relax and to sleep.</li></ul>

Set the Stage

Naps that exceed 20 minutes can increase sleep inertia, or in layman’s terms — give you that heavy feeling after you wake up. Sleep inertia happens when you awake from a deep sleep. <ul><li> To ensure you are hitting the power nap ‘sweet spot,’ set your alarm for 15-20 minutes. The exception to this rule is if you’re sleep-deprived and have the luxury of being able to nap long enough to complete a full sleep cycle, which is at least 90 minutes.</li><li>The best time to nap is between 1PM – 3PM when most of us experience a natural dip in energy. </li></ul>

Timing is Everything 

Did you know there are a few things that could be hindering your power nap? The next time your post-lunch yawn sets in, consider these three go-to tips.

Mastering the Art of the Power Nap: 3 Go-To Tips

<ul>
<li>People don’t use their words, they are used by their words.</li>
<li>Upgrade the culture. Tribal Leadership focuses on language and behaviour to upgrade the culture.</li>
<li>Together is better. We start to overcome Stage Three by recognizing that there is no legacy in going at it alone.</li>
<li>Values come first. Wildly successful organizations talk about values even when it appeared they could least afford to do so.</li>
<li>Be great at something, world-class if possible.</li>
</ul>

The Five Key Takeaways

Tribal Leaders focus their efforts on building the tribe – or, more precisely, upgrading the tribal culture.Tribal Leadership works when the leader upgrades the tribe as the tribe embraces the leader. Tribes and leaders create each other.<ul><li>A tribe is any group of people between about 20 and 150 who know each other enough that, if they saw each other walking down the street, would stop and say “hello.”</li><li>They are likely people in your cell phone and in your email address book.</li><li>A small company is a tribe.</li><li>A large company is a tribe of tribes.</li></ul>

Corporate Tribes

<ul><li>Without the leaders building the tribe, a culture of mediocrity will prevail. Without an inspired tribe, leaders are impotent.</li><li>You can predict the performance of the tribe by counting the number of people who speak the language of each stage, and noticing who is in positions of leadership.</li></ul>

The Tribe: Five Stages

<ul><li>Very few professionals operate in Stage One, less than 2 percent.</li><li>If Stage One were a t-shirt, it would read “life sucks.”</li><li>People in this stage are despairingly hostile, and they band together to get ahead in a violent and unfair world.</li></ul>

Stage One

25 percent of workplace tribes display Stage Two as their dominant culture.“My life sucks” is the adopted attitude.People are passively antagonistic, no passion, laughter is quiet, sarcastic and resigned. They expect failure.There is little to no innovation and almost no sense of urgency, and people almost never hold one another accountable for anything.

Stage Two

<ul><li>This stage is the dominant culture seen in most workplaces (49%).</li><li>“I’m great, and you’re not” is their slogan.</li><li>Doctors, professors, attorneys, and salespeople are prone to operate at this level.</li><li>Knowledge is power, and so people hoard information.</li><li>They complain about not having enough competent support.</li><li>Common in companies where success is measured on an individual basis.</li></ul>

Stage Three

There’s a big gap between Stage Three and Stage Four culture.Stage Four is characterized by “we’re great, and they’re not” and represents 22% of the workforce.People feel free to be fully themselves. Everyone seems happy, inspired, and genuine.The bigger the foe, the more powerful the tribe at Stage Four.

Stage Four

<ul><li>“Life is great” is the T-shirt slogan for this level.</li><li>Less than 2% of workforces operate at this level.</li><li>Their language revolves around infinite potential and how the group is going to make history – not to beat a competitor, but because doing so will make a global impact.</li><li>This stage is pure leadership, vision, and inspiration. Innovative breakthroughs happen at this level.</li></ul>

Stage Five

About 75% of workplace tribes operate at Stage Three or below. The goal of this book is to upgrade your tribe to Stage Four.You determine what stage your tribe is at by listening to how most people talk and noticing how most people structure their work relationships.<ul><li>Each cultural stage has its own way of speaking, types of behaviors, and structures of relationships.</li><li>Tribal Leaders do two things:</li><li>Listen for what cultures exist in their tribes</li><li>Upgrade those tribes using specific leverage points</li></ul>

The Tribal Leadership Navigation System

When people at this stage cluster together, their behaviour expresses despairing hostility.Leveraging Points:<ul><li>If the person is willing to move forward, encourage him to go where the action is. This means having lunch with coworkers, attending social functions, and going to meetings.</li><li>Further, encourage him to notice ways in which life itself works. </li><li>Encourage him to cut ties with people who share the “life sucks” language.</li></ul>Success Indicators:<ul><li>A shift in attitude away from despairing hostility to more passive apathy.</li><li>Cutting social ties with other people who are in Stage One.</li></ul>

Stage One: On the Verge of a Meltdown

Stage Two has an ineffective relationship with values that comes across as cynicism, sarcasm, or resignation.They accept obstacles as the way it is and the way it always will be. They give up, and they band together in a sort of support group for the oppressed.They spend a lot of time making fun of bad managers – “idiot bosses”Stage Two wants to avoid accountability at all costs and will invent reasons to remain disconnected and disengaged.

Stage Two: Disconnected and Disengaged

<ul><li>Encourage the team member to make a friend. To establish dyadic (two-person) relationships.</li><li>Encourage the team member to establish relationships with people who are at late Stage Three – people who are eager to mentor others into becoming mini-versions of themselves.</li><li>In one-on-one sessions, show the team member how the work that they do does make an impact. Show them areas where they are competent and where their strengths are. Point out abilities they have that are not yet developed, but be careful to make the tone of these discussions positive.</li></ul>

Stage Two: Leverage Points

<ul><li>Stage Three is the zone of personal accomplishment.</li><li>It’s also an area where people tend to feel let down by others.</li><li>There’s a perception that people are where they are because they worked for it, and others aren’t there because they gave up.</li><li>People in the middle of stage three have an intense focus on time management since they believe that they can rely only on themselves.</li><li>When people at Stage Three get together, they try to outperform each other.</li></ul>

Stage Three: The Wild, Wild West

<ul><li>Encourage projects that are too big to be done alone.</li><li>Point out that the next level of success is going to require a different style than going at it alone.</li><li>When they complain that they (1) don’t have time and (2) other people aren’t as good, show them that they’ve crafted their work life so that no one can really contribute.</li><li>Coach him that real power comes not from knowledge but from networks and that there is more leverage in wisdom than in information.</li><li>Encourage them to manage using transparency.</li></ul>

Stage Three: Leverage Points

<ul><li>Nothing that matters is personal.</li><li>Stage Three has no legacy.</li><li>To win at Stage Three is to win small.</li><li>I now see I have been a manipulator, not a leader.</li><li>I’m tired; isn’t there some other game to play?</li><li>I see myself through others’ eyes, and I don’t like what I see.</li></ul>

The Tribal Leader Epiphany

Rules for Brainstorming:<ul><li>Stay focused</li><li>One conversation at a time</li><li>Be visual</li><li>Go for quantity</li><li>Defer judgment</li><li>Encourage wild ideas</li></ul>

Stage Four: Establishing Tribal Leadership

<ul><li>Get a group of like-minded people together and ask how to create or expand a business.</li><li>Look for a group of people within a Stage Three organization who want to play a Stage Four game.</li><li>Ignore organizational boundaries and use tribal antennae to find people who want to create a Stage Four tribe, allowing them to guide the development of the group.</li></ul>

Stage Four: Establish The Culture

<ul><li>A key point for companies that want to attain Stage Four is to go for values now.</li><li>Almost without exception, we found that wildly successful organizations talked about values when it appeared they could least afford to do so.</li><li>In every case, “we’re great” cultures rested on core values and reached toward a noble cause.</li><li>Many mergers fail because analysts and executives do not consider values and culture but rather think only about the compatibility of business models and balance sheets.</li><li>Tribal Leaders follow the core values of the tribe no matter what the cost.</li><li>Core values are the fuel of a tribe.</li></ul>

Core Values and a Noble Cause

<ul><li>Keep asking, “In service of what?”</li><li>Ask the Big Four Questions</li></ul><ol><li>What’s working well?</li><li>What’s not working?</li><li>What can we do to make the things that aren’t working, work?</li><li>Is there anything else?</li></ol>

2 Ways to Set a Noble Cause

<ol><li>A Tribal Leader tells a value-laden story, which triggers others to tell similar stories about their values.</li><li>Ask open-ended questions such as, “What are you proud of?”</li></ol>

2 Ways to Seek Core Values

<ul><li>A chance for tribal members to revisit what’s happened, understand events from all sides, resolve issues, and remove any process, system, or habit that’s inconsistent with its values and noble cause.</li><li>Ask the Big Four Questions together as a team.</li><li>Anything not consistent with the core values and noble cause must be reworked or pruned.</li></ul>

Quarterly Oil Change

<ul><li>Empower others to resolve conflict by reminding them of their shared values.</li><li>Stable triads resolve incidents and free the time of Tribal Leaders to focus on strategy.</li><li>Stage Four organizations actively pull in resources, approaches, consultants, ideas, or anything else that will build the tribe.</li><li>The next time you go to Starbucks, take two friends, not one.</li><li>It’s time for consulting, as an industry, to transition from “consultant-as-expert” to “consultant-as-partner.”</li><li>Stage four assumes trust; they don’t earn it. People grant trust from the beginning.</li></ul>

Triads and Stage Four Networking

<ul><li>Get to know the values and current projects of every person in your network.</li><li>Before facilitating an introduction between two people, you have to have the credibility to pull it off. Build credibility through “the theory of small gifts.” Do little things for people, like sending them an article that is about one of their interests, remembering their birthday, etc.</li><li>Be great at something, world-class if possible.</li></ul>

Preparing for World-Class Triading

<ul><li>Values</li><li>Noble cause</li><li>Outcomes</li><li>Assets</li><li>Behaviors</li></ul>

5 Components of Tribal Strategy

<ul><li>A goal is off in the future. It implies failure in the present. “when we achieve the goal, we will have stopped failing” is how many people relate to the goal-setting process.</li><li>In contrast, an outcome is a present state of success that becomes an even bigger victory over time. An outcome says, “This is what it looks like at this point in the process.”</li><li>Outcomes must be measurable, with a deadline.</li><li>Assets: The Potential for Continued Greatness</li></ul>

Outcomes Vs. Goals

<ul><li>Ask: "What do we have?"</li><li>Core assets are so central to the tribe that they may be invisible to the people inside. Ask, “What do we have a knack for doing better than anyone else?”</li><li>Common ground is another asset that answers the question, “How are we seen by those with whom we want to transact?”</li></ul>

Assets: The Potential for Continued Greatness

<ul><li>Ask: "What should we do to accomplish the outcomes?"</li><li>Don’t write down behaviours people are already doing. Focus on behaviours that will bring the outcomes to life.</li><li>Don’t assume everything will go perfectly according to plan. It won’t.</li></ul>

Behaviours: Strategy in Action

There are five stages of tribal leadership and each can be identified by the words people use to communicate. This book teaches us to focus on language and behavior to transform disjointed, selfish individuals into a cohesive, selfless team.

“Tribal Leadership gives amazingly insightful perspective on how people interact and succeed. I learned about myself and learned lessons I will carry with me and reflect on for the rest of my life.” —John W. Fanning, Founding Chairman and CEO napster Inc. “An unusually nuanced view of high-performance cultures.” —Inc. Within each corporation are anywhere from a few to hundreds of separate tribes. In Tribal Leadership, Dave Logan, John King, and Halee Fischer-Wright demonstrate how these tribes develop—and show you how to assess them and lead them to maximize productivity and growth. A business management book like no other, Tribal Leadership is an essential tool to help managers and business leaders take better control of their organizations by utilizing the unique characteristics of the tribes that exist within.

Tribal Leadership

We have ways to hack anything nowadays. Neurohacking is a broad term involving the manipulation of brain functions or brain structures to enhance our experience of the world around us.
Neurohacking treats the brain as a piece of hardware that can be upgraded and modified using several mind-blowing techniques!

Neurohacking

<ul>
<li>Brain Stimulation: Using magnetic equipment in a certain region of the brain to amplify the signal, to treat migraines and OCD(obsessive-compulsive disorder).</li>
<li>Neurofeedback: Using an external electromagnetic device to measure brain activity.</li>
<li>Reduction Of Cognitive Load: Tools that assist the mind and let it function naturally instead of focusing on technology and the many distractions.</li>
</ul>

Techniques Of Neurohacking

Sleep Monitoring: Apps like Sleep Cycle let us track our sleep patterns so that the jarring alarm does not go off when we are in deep sleep or are dreaming, but during light sleep.
Microdosing: Drugs have a bad reputation, but micro-dosing on LSD, ecstasy or other psychedelics is known to enhance brain activity, focus and improve energy levels. The trick is to have a tiny dose occasionally.

Recreational And Other Uses Of Neurohacking

Although at one point, “hack” referred to a creative solution to a tech problem, the term can apply to pretty much anything now. There are kitchen hacks, productivity hacks, personal finance hacks. Brain hacks, or neurohacks, are among the buzziest,…

Can we actually hack our own brains? A neuroscientist breaks it all down

In the late 1700s, Europeans thought tomatoes were poisonous. Aristocrats got sick and died after eating them. It was later discovered that the pewter plates used by wealthy Europeans were high in lead content. The high acidity of tomatoes would leach lead from the plate, resulting in death from lead poisoning.
In 1597, the tomato was classified as deadly nightshade where the whole plant was toxic. This view prevailed in Britain and the British North American colonies for over 200 years.

The "poison apple"

Tomatoes were also thought to be eaten in hotter countries, like in Mesoamerica, where the tomato originates from. The Aztecs ate tomatoes and called it the 'tomatl', but it wasn't grown in Britain until the 1590s, and then only for ornamental purposes. The tomato slowly became an acceptable edible fruit, but rumours of the plant's potential poison lingered despite the hundreds of tomato recipes that started to circulate.

Tomatoes as ornamental plants

By the 1830s, the love apple was cultivated in New York, but a new fear emerged. A tomato worm, thick-bodied, three or four inches long with a horn on its back. It was believed that brushing against the worm could result in death. One Dr Fuller in New York said it was "poisonous as a rattlesnake." Contact with the spittle would make the victim swell up, and within a few hours, the victim would die. But entomologist Benjamin Walsh insisted that the tomato worm couldn't hurt a flea.

The green tomato worm

Once the fear of the tomato plant subsided, farmers began exploring different varieties. By 1897, innovator Joseph Campbell found a way to can tomatoes and popularised condensed tomato soup. Today, a variety of tomatoes are grown, such as heirlooms, romas and cherry tomatoes. Over a half-billion tons of tomatoes are produced commercially every year.

Countless tomato varieties consumed

Why the Tomato Was Feared in Europe for More Than 200 Years

Goal setting is an incredibly powerful tool for achieving results. However, goals can inadvertently lower our flexibility.<ul><li>The first key to maintaining focus and flexibility is awareness. </li><li>The second key to maintaining flexibility and focus is to accept growing pains.</li><li>The final key to maintaining flexibility and focus is to just do the best you can at the time.</li></ul>

Balancing Focus And Flexibility

Self Improvement

If we don’t stay aware of our life’s progression at the highest level, it is easy to lose either focus or flexibility. Progress doesn’t matter if it isn’t in the right direction.<ul><li>Regular reviews are critical for improving awareness. </li><li>Spend more time in reflective thought. By thinking about our own growth and other high-level issues more, we can increase our own awareness.</li></ul>

Increasing Awareness

<ul><li>Growing pains occur when the goals we set previously simply don’t reflect the higher level of consciousness we now have.</li><li>If we stubbornly keep our goals despite our change, growing pains results. We will feel incredibly unmotivated to work on our goals and will likely feel a whole host of negative emotions.</li><li>In these situations our focus stifles our ability to be flexible. We remain locked into our goals. By casting off these goals we can regain our flexibility. </li></ul>

Accepting Growing Pains

Aiming for a perfect solution will likely delay the action we need to create any solution at all. Just make the decision now. If you make a mistake, then quickly attempt to correct it.

Do The Best You Can At The Time

Flexibility VS Focus

<ul>
<li>Vacations aren’t what they used to be.</li>
<li>Social media, email and business communication services like Slack make it harder for working professionals to be disconnected even outside of working hours.</li>
<li>Apart from Blackberry phones which started this always-connected trend, we have ourselves to blame as we don’t understand or realize how important a sabbatical, or a purposeful, year-long disconnection from work to do something else, is to our health and productivity.</li>
</ul>

Vacations Are Out Of Fashion

A sabbatical is no longer just logging off from work or taking a vacation. Instead of being absent from work, sabbaticals are now an active pursuit of purpose.
Modern-day sabbaticals have the employee taking time off on company expenses to do something for social welfare (like helping an environmental company), pursue a skill development course, or travel the world to gain perspective.

The New Meaning Of Sabbatical

<ol>
<li>Write a book and publish it for free on Amazon Kindle.</li>
<li>Start a consulting side-hustle, provided the work does not clash with your current job profile.</li>
<li>Do volunteer work.</li>
<li>Seek higher education, like an accelerated MBA program or an e-course. You could even listen to podcasts and set up your own, going wherever your curiosity takes you.</li>
<li>Pick an unreachable goal that you could never have done due to lack of time or resources. Get out of your comfort zone and grow taller.</li>
<li>Pick a contractual working assignment outside your field that requires travelling to different cities or countries.</li>
</ol>

Six Innovative Ways To Use Your Year-Long Sabbatical

Sabbaticals are no longer defined by the absence of work - in fact they are defined by the presence of it. Sabbaticals aren’t just another word for vacation. They’re the new word for an active pursuit of purpose.

6 Modern Sabbatical Ideas | Remote Year

We know about atoms because of scientists and electron microscopes, but the idea goes back to the ancient Greeks. 
Democritus first articulated the idea of atoms. He argued that it must exist. If we continually halved something, there would be no endpoint. Therefore, there must be a fundamental unit to the world from which everything else is made.

Democritus and the existence of atoms

Sciency

One of Democritus' question was how atoms made objects. He noticed that the world is constantly changing, dying, growing. The worlds flow, therefore atoms must flow. They can't just be still.
Democritus reasoned that atoms join into various combinations, then emit eidôla (composite blobs of atoms) outward, like ripples in water. This atomic radiation is then picked up by us and translated into ideas or sensations.

Democritus on how atoms formed objects

<ol>
<li>The world as we know it doesn't really exist. It is just incomprehensible atoms, and our minds create a reality out of these atoms.</li>
<li>The world is entirely made up of atoms.</li>
</ol>
Democritus was then the first "determinist" in that he stated that there could be no free will or choice - we are just moving to the laws of physics. His conclusions about atoms could only be proven millennia later.

Two implications to Democritus' theory about atoms

The idea of the atom goes as far back as the ancient Greek philosopher Democritus in about 400 B.C.E. This led to his "theory of eidôla" to explain how our minds create the illusion of reality. Democritus was one of the first determinists, arguing that a world made only of atoms and controlled by the laws of physics left no room for free will.

Ancient physics: How Democritus predicted the atom

<ul>
<li>Notes extend your memories: writing can be seen as an external enhancement of your brain, allowing you to think more complicated thoughts and solve harder problems.</li>
<li>Notes enhance your focus: The act of taking notes ensures your mind isn’t wandering and facilitates deeper understanding of what you're reading.</li>
</ul>

Note-taking: a powerful tool for learning

<ol>
<li>Figure out your purpose.</li>
<li>Choose a technique that maximizes your focus on what is most relevant for your purpose. </li>
<li>Decide whether to optimize for review or retrieval practice. </li>
<li>If you do need to go back into the text again and again, create clues in your notes that can help you find what you’re looking for faster.</li>
</ol>

How to take notes while reading

Ask yourself why are you reading:
<ul>
<li>What am I trying to remember? </li>
<li>How am I going to use this information? (e.g. on a test, cited in an essay, etc.)</li>
<li>What do I plan to do with the notes later? Will you be studying off of them extensively? Or maybe you’re just taking notes to stay focused, and it’s highly unlikely you’ll look through them after?</li>
</ul>

Figure out your purpose

<ul>
<li>Jot notes in the margin. These aren’t particularly searchable, but they allow you to reiterate the main idea.</li>
<li>Keep a small notepad on the side, take breaks each section to jot down the main ideas. </li>
<li>Create flashcards. In the rarer situations where memorization of details is important, then a simple strategy can be to just create flashcards while you take notes.</li>
</ul>

Strategies for note-taking

Decide whether to optimize for review or retrieval practice. 
<ul>
<li>For docs you don’t plan to extensively study, review is the obvious choice. </li>
<li>For texts you need to master perfectly, the Question Book Method (for big idea) or flashcards (for details) saves time.</li>
</ul>

Review vs. recall

<ul>
<li>Digital: systems like Evernote, make note-taking easier. Although, even the simple note-taking features on Kindle can work quite well.</li>
<li>Paper: you can even put little sticky tags on the book to mark passages that refer to that.</li>
</ul>

Creating clues for future searches

Note-taking is a powerful tool. But it can be hard to take notes while reading. Here's how you can maximize your ability to remember, reference and learn.

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Salma
@salma_ss

#133 Andrew Huberman: The Science of Small Changes

The enormous impact of Stephen Wilhite, inventor of the GIF

Mastering the Art of the Power Nap: 3 Go-To Tips

Tribal Leadership

Can we actually hack our own brains? A neuroscientist breaks it all down

Bite-sized knowledgeto upgradeyour career

Salma @salma_ss

#133 Andrew Huberman: The Science of Small Changes

The enormous impact of Stephen Wilhite, inventor of the GIF

Mastering the Art of the Power Nap: 3 Go-To Tips

Tribal Leadership

Can we actually hack our own brains? A neuroscientist breaks it all down

Bite-sized knowledge
to upgrade
your career

Salma
@salma_ss