People usually learn things because they need to. They are either frustrated by something in themselves or the world. Maybe they're not making enough money to support their family, or a loved one is sick.  In these cases, they're entering a survival mode where they're urged to action. While survival mode learning can be effective, it is not sustainable or enjoyable in the long run.

Why people learn things

If we want an educated citizenry that enjoys learning and knows how to take advantage of all the available information on the internet, we need to inspire people. Education and learning theorists propose that students learn best when it is associated with strong positive emotions. But stress, boredom, confusion, low motivation and anxiety can interfere with learning. Schools have become stress incubators and condition students to associate learning with unpleasantness. Schools value rote memorization over people's ability to take action and to learn for the sake of knowing.

People are capable of extraordinary feats of learning

We can move to a system of inspiration by inverting the learning process. Instead of starting with the building blocks and moving towards curiosity, students should be guided by curiosity and then move toward the building blocks.  The benefits of memorization will become self-evident, and the motivation to learn can become intrinsic. However, the sad truth is that this way of learning is not scalable for an in-person curriculum where students must do the same thing at the same time.

Learning for the sake of learning

Schools should embrace entertainment because it lets you scale inspiration.  Entertainment is not amusement. Entertainment means engaging a person's attention in a way that makes the time pass pleasantly. The ancient Greeks knew this intuitively and wrapped their most important ideas in narratives instead of just giving dry facts. For example, plays like The Iliad and The Odyssey weren't just a form of entertainment. They provided cultural instruction too.

How to produce inspired learners

In our modern world, the masters of storytelling come from Hollywood and YouTube. These creators use many of the same tools the Greeks discovered.  But now it costs nearly nothing to spread great entertainment and education to the world.

Modern masters of storytelling

Favourite teachers usually care about their subjects and speak with excitement and enthusiasm. Physicist Richard Feynman was known for making physics come alive for many people. Watching his lectures inspires one to study physics. From Feynman, we've learned that education starts with inspiration.

Teachers have a responsibility to entertain

Why do people learn things? Usually, because they need to. They’re frustrated by something, either in themselves or the world. Maybe a loved one is sick. Maybe they’re not making enough money to support their family. In both cases, they enter “Survival Mode” and are spurred to action. When the pain of the status quo hurts more than the pain of discipline, people are capable of extraordinary feats of learning. But this isn't sustainable and it usually isn't fun. So how can we move to a better system of learning that works for everyone? LEARN MORE ABOUT WRITING: Beginner Writing Email Course (7 days): http://dperell.com/writing-course Advanced Writing Email Course (50 days): https://dperell.com/50-days MY WRITING: Monday Musings: http://dperell.com/monday-musings Friday Finds: http://dperell.com/friday-finds Collected Friday Finds Links: http://dperell.com/friday-finds-best Online Writing Email Course: http://dperell.com/writing-course Essays: http://dperell.com/essays Twitter: http://dperell.com/david-perell-twitter MY PODCASTS: North Star Interview Podcast: https://www.perell.com/podcast Write of Passage Podcast: https://www.perell.com/write-of-passage-podcast Recommended interviews: Seth Godin (Author): http://dperell.com/seth-godin Morgan Housel (Writer): http://dperell.com/morgan-housel Sara Dietschy (YouTuber): http://dperell.com/sara-dietschy Jennifer Morrison (Actress): http://dperell.com/jennifer-morrison Tiago Forte (Entrepreneur): http://dperell.com/tiago-forte-podcast MY COURSES: Write of Passage: http://dperell.com/write-of-passage Twitter Course: http://dperell.com/twitter-course RECOMMENDED COURSES: Building a Second Brain: https://www.buildingasecondbrain.com/ YouTube Academy: https://academy.aliabdaal.com/premium-edition-cohort-1-nov-dec-2020/s2wvk MY GEAR Video Gear: https://kit.co/david_perell/remote-work-video-equipment Podcast Equipment: https://kit.co/david_perell/computer-podcasting-equipment RECOMMENDED ESSAYS Short form: Learn to Write Fast: http://dperell.com/learn-to-write-fast The Public to Private Bridge: http://dperell.com/public-to-private-bridge Build a Personal Monopoly: http://dperell.com/build-a-personal-monopoly Long form: Peter Thiel’s Religion: http://dperell.com/peter-thiels-religion What the Hell is Going On: http://dperell.com/what-the-hell The Ultimate Guide to Writing Online: http://dperell.com/ultimate-guide-to-writing-online WHO AM I? I’m David Perell and I’m a writer, teacher, and podcaster. I believe writing online is one of the biggest opportunities in the world today. For the first time in human history, everybody can freely share their ideas with a global audience. I seek to help as many people publish their writing online as possible. Check out my newsletter: http://dperell.com/monday-musings and my online course, Write of Passage: http://dperell.com/write-of-passage Some of the links in this description are affiliate links for equipment, classes, and resources that I have found useful myself!

personaldevelopment

Personal Development

education

Learning & Education

travel

Travel

videos

Videos

Why do people learn things? 

Usually, because they need to. They’re frustrated by something, either in themselves or the world. Maybe a loved one is sick. Maybe they’re not making enough money to support their family. 

In both cases, they enter “Survival Mode” and are spurred to action. When the pain of the status quo hurts more than the pain of discipline, people are capable of extraordinary feats of learning.

But this isn't sustainable and it usually isn't fun. So how can we move to a better system of learning that works for everyone?

LEARN MORE ABOUT WRITING:
Beginner Writing Email Course (7 days): http://dperell.com/writing-course
Advanced Writing Email Course (50 days): https://dperell.com/50-days

MY WRITING:
Monday Musings: http://dperell.com/monday-musings
Friday Finds: http://dperell.com/friday-finds
Collected Friday Finds Links: http://dperell.com/friday-finds-best
Online Writing Email Course: http://dperell.com/writing-course
Essays: http://dperell.com/essays
Twitter: http://dperell.com/david-perell-twitter

MY PODCASTS:
North Star Interview Podcast: https://www.perell.com/podcast
Write of Passage Podcast: https://www.perell.com/write-of-passage-podcast

Recommended interviews:
Seth Godin (Author): http://dperell.com/seth-godin
Morgan Housel (Writer): http://dperell.com/morgan-housel
Sara Dietschy (YouTuber): http://dperell.com/sara-dietschy
Jennifer Morrison (Actress): http://dperell.com/jennifer-morrison
Tiago Forte (Entrepreneur): http://dperell.com/tiago-forte-podcast

MY COURSES:
Write of Passage: http://dperell.com/write-of-passage
Twitter Course: http://dperell.com/twitter-course 

RECOMMENDED COURSES:
Building a Second Brain: https://www.buildingasecondbrain.com/
YouTube Academy: https://academy.aliabdaal.com/premium-edition-cohort-1-nov-dec-2020/s2wvk

MY GEAR
Video Gear: https://kit.co/david_perell/remote-work-video-equipment 
Podcast Equipment: https://kit.co/david_perell/computer-podcasting-equipment 

RECOMMENDED ESSAYS
Short form:
Learn to Write Fast: http://dperell.com/learn-to-write-fast
The Public to Private Bridge: http://dperell.com/public-to-private-bridge
Build a Personal Monopoly: http://dperell.com/build-a-personal-monopoly

Long form:
Peter Thiel’s Religion: http://dperell.com/peter-thiels-religion
What the Hell is Going On: http://dperell.com/what-the-hell 
The Ultimate Guide to Writing Online: http://dperell.com/ultimate-guide-to-writing-online

WHO AM I?
I’m David Perell and I’m a writer, teacher, and podcaster. I believe writing online is one of the biggest opportunities in the world today. For the first time in human history, everybody can freely share their ideas with a global audience. I seek to help as many people publish their writing online as possible. Check out my newsletter: http://dperell.com/monday-musings and my online course, Write of Passage: http://dperell.com/write-of-passage

Some of the links in this description are affiliate links for equipment, classes, and resources that I have found useful myself!

David Perell is a writer, teacher, and podcaster. He believes writing online one of the biggest opportunities in the world today. For the first time in human history, everybody can freely share their ideas with a global audience. David seeks to help as many people publish their writing online as possible.

David’s online course, Write of Passage, has been taken by more than 500 students from more than 40 countries and from companies like Intel, Google, and Twitter. The five-week course draws on David’s experience writing online, building an audience, and his interviews with more than 100 people on his North Star Podcast. Each interview explores the methods and principles of successful creators, artists, and entrepreneurs. His podcast guests include astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson, author Seth Godin, and economist Tyler Cowen.

He also runs an online course for 9-11-year-old kids focused on creativity and entrepreneurship.

David Perell

How to 10x Your Learning Skills

<ul><li>Most big cities in the United States have a few of these Bitcoin machines</li><li>Identify yourself with a phone number and a Bitcoin wallet</li><li>You will be texted a code so you can move forward</li><li>Once you have put money into the machine, it will ask for the address of where you want it sent</li></ul>

How to Use a Bitcoin ATM

This is a way to get involved without having to risk identity theft by providing so much documentation to relatively new entities like Coinbase and BinanceThe Bitcoin ATM means you can put a little money in overtime, but stay away from identity risks exchanges representDo your own thorough research before making any investment decisions.

Why use one?

It is a legitimate question, Why use a Bitcoin ATM anyway? The fees seem higher than on the exchanges. One reason is privacy

crypto

Cryptocurrency

moneyandinvestments

Money & Investments

Why Use a Bitcoin ATM?

<ul><li>Your DNA dictates what you were born to do. Follow your passion, don’t listen to what society has to say about success.</li><li>There is enough success out there and if you want it badly enough, you will get it.</li><li>When building your personal brand, focus on the quality of the relationships with your followers and not on their numbers.</li><li>Be authentic and produce quality content.</li></ul>

Success Is In Your DNA

“There is no excuse for anyone living in the United States or anywhere else right now to slog through his or her entire life working at jobs they hate, or even jobs they simply don’t love, in the name of a paycheck or a sense of responsibility.”

Gary Vaynerchuk

“Quality is a tremendous filter. Cream always rises, my friends, no matter how many cups of coffee you pour.”

<ul>
<li>Plan to develop and grow your own brand and business alongside your current job. This is how you will open opportunities in the digital economy.</li>
<li>As long as you are working for someone else, you will never be living entirely true to yourself and your passion.</li>
<li>To monetize your personal brand, you need two pillars: product, and content. Great content is what will attract people to your blog.</li>
</ul>

A Whole New World

Someone with less talent and poor content can beat you if they work harder than you. Before you invest in yourself, you have to invest in your long-term future.When building your personal brand, focus on creating communities by starting conversations. Once you have created your online brand, do some online advertising. You can also engage in affiliate marketing.

Keep It Real

<ol><li>Identify your passion</li><li>Make sure you can think of at least fifty awesome topics and posts.</li><li>Answer the following questions: Am I sure my passion is what I think it is? Can I talk about it better than anyone else?</li><li>Name your personal brand.</li><li>Buy your user name.</li><li>Choose your medium: video, audio, written word</li><li>Start a Website.</li><li>Hire a designer</li><li>Select all of the platforms to which you want to distribute your content.</li><li>Post your content.</li></ol>

Your Personal Brand: Starting Your Thing

<ol><li>Start creating community by leaving comments on other people’s blogs and forums.</li><li>Find more blogs that are relevant to your subject on Google</li><li>Join as many active fan pages and groups relating to your blog topic as possible.</li><li>Repeat steps 11 through 15.</li><li>When you feel your personal brand has gained sufficient attention and stickiness, start reaching out to advertisers and begin monetizing</li></ol>

Your Personal Brand: Small To Big

Do you have a hobby you wish you could indulge in all day? An obsession that keeps you up at night? Now is the perfect time to take that passion and make a living doing what you love. In Crush It! Why NOW Is the Time to Cash In on Your Passion, Gary Vaynerchuk shows you how to use the power of the Internet to turn your real interests into real businesses. Gary spent years building his family business from a local wine shop into a national industry leader. Then one day he turned on a video camera, and by using the secrets revealed here, transformed his entire life and earning potential by building his personal brand. By the end of this book, readers will have learned how to harness the power of the Internet to make their entrepreneurial dreams come true. Step by step, Crush It! is the ultimate driver’s manual for modern business.

career

Career

mindfulness

Mindfulness

business

Business

books

Books

Do you have a hobby you wish you could indulge in all day? An obsession that keeps you up at night? Now is the perfect time to take that passion and make a living doing what you love. In Crush It! Why NOW Is the Time to Cash In on Your Passion, Gary Vaynerchuk shows you how to use the power of the Internet to turn your real interests into real businesses. Gary spent years building his family business from a local wine shop into a national industry leader. Then one day he turned on a video camera, and by using the secrets revealed here, transformed his entire life and earning potential by building his personal brand. By the end of this book, readers will have learned how to harness the power of the Internet to make their entrepreneurial dreams come true. Step by step, Crush It! is the ultimate driver’s manual for modern business.

Crush It!

FIRE is a financial movement of extreme savings and investment that allows proponents to retire far earlier than traditional budgets and retirement plans would allow.<ul><li>By dedicating up to 70% of income to savings, followers of the FIRE movement may eventually be able to quit their jobs and live solely off small withdrawals from their portfolios decades before the conventional retirement age of 65.</li><li>To cover their living expenses after retiring at a young age, FIRE devotees make small withdrawals from their savings, typically around 3% to 4% yearly.</li></ul>

Financial Independence, Retire Early (FIRE)

Borne out of the 1992 best-selling book "Your Money or Your Life" by Vicki Robin and Joe Dominguez, FIRE came to embody a core premise of the book: juxtaposing expenses and time spent at work against hours of your life. Every expense is compared to the time spent at work in order to earn the purchase.In more recent years, Millennials, in particular, have embraced the FIRE movement with the aim of retiring well before the traditional retirement age of 65.

How Financial Independence, Retire Early (FIRE) Started

<ul><li>Fat FIRE: an individual with a more traditional lifestyle who saves more than the average retirement investor</li><li>Lean FIRE: refers to stringent adherence to minimalist living and extreme savings, necessitating a far more restricted lifestyle.</li><li>Barista FIRE: refers to followers who have quit their traditional 9-to-5 job but still employ some form of part-time work to cover current expenses that would otherwise erode their retirement fund</li><li>Coast FIRE: also applies to followers with a part-time job, but these proponents do have enough saved to fund their retirement and current living expenses.</li></ul>

Variations on FIRE

Financial Independence, Retire Early (FIRE) is a movement that allows proponents to retire far earlier than the traditional retirement age.

artsandculture

Society, Arts & Culture

Financial Independence, Retire Early (FIRE) Definition

AI(Artificial Intelligence) has got a bad rep, mostly coming from movies(The Matrix, for instance) or news articles demonizing AI’s reach and scope, stoking fears ranging from privacy invasion to space wars.
AI, and technology itself, is a double-edged sword having the capacity to either overwhelm and overpower us or be a defence mechanism for the looming future threats, depending on how we use it.

The Fear Of AI

An ocean of data is now managed by powerful technology that was unimaginable a couple of decades before. Visionary men coined 'tech' laws half a century ago that is relevant even now.<ul><li>Moore’s Law states that computing power, that is the number of transistor circuits in each computer ‘chip’, doubles every two years.</li><li>Nielsen's Law states that internet bandwidth increases by about 50 percent every year for high-end users.</li></ul>

The Laws Of Technology

Facial recognition, having gone mainstream due to iPhones, helps everyday life in numerous ways like unlocking phones or verifying purchases. Millions of facial images can be harnessed by powerful AI algorithms to locate a missing person or a criminal suspect in a few minutes.Just like any tool, facial recognition technology can be used for nefarious purposes, like tracking anyone easily.

AI: Facial Recognition Technology

AI(Artificial Intelligence) can learn from experience and by processing new data sets, unlike traditional computers who are not programmed to self-educate themselves. Modern AI can sift through vast amounts of data to pull out the exact search result, even express uncertainty or confusion, and filter out data that is too personal.AI can act as a ‘failsafe’ to counter common errors we make, and cancel out the ‘human’ factors affecting decision making like bias, lack of attention, fatigue or emotion.

AI: Advantages Galore

To make AI(Artificial Intelligence) work safely and securely, it should be assistive, and not act like a master. It should be helping us save time, effort, energy and resources, and not become an all-powerful entity like in many Sci-Fi movies.The right human guidance is needed to make AI act as a positive force on human progress.

Assisting Vs Decision Making

If it’s designed in a way that respects human decision-making, AI can actually be a force for privacy.


artificialintelligence

Artificial Intelligence

scienceandnature

Science & Nature

How to make sure that AI isn’t invasive and creepy

<ul><li>Introspection is simply looking in. Stopping there not only limits your perspective, but it can also diffuse it. It can lead some to pessimism, or even depression. </li><li>Reflection is looking in so you can look out with a broader, bigger and more accurate perspective. Without reflection, your life becomes happenstance—activity without insight.</li></ul>

Reflection and introspection

Authenticity is about getting closer to our true identity.The more authentic we become, the more we are authoring our lives, and not simply living someone else’s script. And the more authentic you become, the greater is your sense of well-being.

Authenticity 

“To be authentic is literally to be your own author, to discover your own native energies and desires, and then to find your own way of acting on them.”

<ul><li>What are the five non-negotiable values in my life?</li><li>What would I do if I were guaranteed success?</li><li>What are the experiences I want to have?</li><li>What is on my schedule that doesn’t need to be there?</li><li>What am I doing that I don’t enjoy, and what am I doing that I love?</li></ul>Powerful insights will be generated through this reflection, without any need for additional information.

5 reflective questions

The famous Irish poet Oscar Wilde once said, "The final mystery is oneself." But how do you unravel the mystery that is you? This can't happen without self-awareness, and self-awareness won't happen without reflection. But what does reflection really mean? Reflection is different from introspection. Introspection is simply looking in.

motivationandinspiration

Motivation & Inspiration

communication

Communication

leadershipandmanagement

Leadership & Management

5 Reflective Questions to Discover Who You Are and What You Want

You can work towards having more productive and satisfying days. Caroline Webb believes it can be done by:<ol><li>Understanding how the brain works: the two-system brain, our discover-defence axis or mind-body loop.</li><li>Apply a series of practical advice</li></ol>

The secret behind having good days

Daniel Kahneman, Nobel prize winner, explains how our mind has 2 modes:<ul><li>Your deliberate system is responsible for sophisticated functions such as reasoning, self-control, and forward-thinking. It excels in handling anything unfamiliar, complex, or abstract. But it has limited capacity and gets tired quickly. </li><li>Your automatic system lightens the load on your deliberate system by automating most of what you do and taking fast shortcuts that filter out “irrelevant” information and options. But it inevitably leaves you with blind spots. </li></ul>We need to be aware of both systems to make good decisions.

The Two-System Brain

You’re constantly moving along a discover-defend axis in your daily life, as your brain scans for threats to defend against and rewards to discover.<ul><li>In defensive mode, you become less smart and flexible, as your brain devotes some of its scarce mental energy to respond to a potential “threat”.</li><li>In discovery mode, you’re motivating yourself with rewards: a social sense of belonging or recognition; a personal sense of autonomy, competence, or purpose; or informational rewards that come from learning or experiencing new things</li></ul>When we are in the discover, we are more likely to have good days.

The Discover-Defend Axis

You are not a mind trapped inside a body. You are a body and your mind is part of it. So if you want to change your mind, start with the body.<ul><li>The way you treat your body has a direct, immediate impact on your brain’s performance, affecting both its cognitive and emotional functions. </li><li>Your brain’s deliberate system performs far better when you’ve had enough sleep, some aerobic exercise, and a few moments of mindfulness. </li><li>Mimicking the physical actions associated with feeling happy, confident, and relaxed appears to tell your brain that you are in fact happy, confident, and relaxed.</li></ul>

The Mind-Body Loop

Caroline Webb recommends a few hacks to have great days:<ol><li>Single-Tasking: focus on thing at once. Multi-tasking is a myth.</li><li>Planning Deliberate Downtime: Take care of yourself.</li><li>Resolving Tensions: The social problems are gonna take a toll on you.</li><li>Reboot your energy</li></ol>

The tools for having great days

"Until you make the unconscious conscious, it will direct your life and you will call it fate."

There is no such thing as multi-tasking:<ul><li>Group together similar tasks (e.g., email, calls, and reading), so you’re not constantly switching from one mental mode to another. </li><li>Decide on the best time of day to tackle each batch of tasks. Create longer blocks of uninterrupted time for your most important work. </li><li>Minimize interruptions, to help you focus your attention on the task at hand. Which alerts can you switch off? Can you use an app to block access to certain websites? </li><li>Plan small rewards for good behavior. </li></ul>

Single-Tasking

"The main thing is to keep the main thing the main thing."

Your brain’s deliberate system needs regular breaks to keep it fully functional. When tired, we are more likely to make poorer decisions.Allow your brain a chance to step back and consolidate the experience. Plan for breaks between “zones” in your day. Refresh your mind after every ninety minutes.

Planning Deliberate Downtime

"In all the empirical studies on psychological well-being, one thing emerges as a reliable foundation for happiness: the quality of our relationships."

If you disagree on something:<ul><li>Articulate the other person’s perspective as if you truly believe it.</li><li>Identify what you both agree on.</li><li>Isolate the real disagreement; explore how you could both be right.</li><li>Decide what you can do based on what you agree on. </li></ul>

Resolving Tensions by Finding Common Ground

People are often good but their circumstances can change how they come out.Get clear on the “true facts”: what you know for sure. Then assume that the other person has good intent, and imagine the circumstances that could be causing his or her behavior.

Assume “Good person, Bad Circumstances”

For a complete and happy day, you need to focus on your energy and reboot it when needed.Know thyself by identifying where the typical energy highs and lows occur. Plan for the triggers and events around the highs and lows.

Knowing How To Reboot Your Energy

In How to Have a Good Day, economist and former McKinsey partner Caroline Webb shows readers how to use recent findings from behavioral economics, psychology, and neuroscience to transform our approach to everyday working life. Advances in behavioral sciences are giving us an ever better understanding of how our brains work, why we make the choices we do, and what it takes for us to be at our best. But it has not always been easy to see how to apply these insights in the real world--until now. In How to Have a Good Day, Webb explains exactly how to apply this science to our daily tasks and routines. She translates three big scientific ideas into step-by-step guidance that shows us how to set better priorities, make our time go further, ace every interaction, be our smartest selves, strengthen our personal impact, be resilient to setbacks, and boost our energy and enjoyment. Through it all, Webb teaches us how to navigate the typical challenges of modern workplaces—from conflict with colleagues to dull meetings and overflowing inboxes—with skill and ease. Filled with stories of people who have used Webb’s insights to boost their job satisfaction and performance at work, How to Have a Good Day is the book so many people wanted when they finished Nudge, Blink and Thinking Fast and Slow and were looking for practical ways to apply this fascinating science to their own lives and careers. A remarkable and much-needed book, How to Have a Good Day gives us the tools we need to have a lifetime of good days.

In How to Have a Good Day, economist and former McKinsey partner Caroline Webb shows readers how to use recent findings from behavioral economics, psychology, and neuroscience to transform our approach to everyday working life.   Advances in behavioral sciences are giving us an ever better understanding of how our brains work, why we make the choices we do, and what it takes for us to be at our best. But it has not always been easy to see how to apply these insights in the real world--until now.   In How to Have a Good Day, Webb explains exactly how to apply this science to our daily tasks and routines. She translates three big scientific ideas into step-by-step guidance that shows us how to set better priorities, make our time go further, ace every interaction, be our smartest selves, strengthen our personal impact, be resilient to setbacks, and boost our energy and enjoyment. Through it all, Webb teaches us how to navigate the typical challenges of modern workplaces—from conflict with colleagues to dull meetings and overflowing inboxes—with skill and ease.   Filled with stories of people who have used Webb’s insights to boost their job satisfaction and performance at work, How to Have a Good Day is the book so many people wanted when they finished Nudge, Blink and Thinking Fast and Slow and were looking for practical ways to apply this fascinating science to their own lives and careers.   A remarkable and much-needed book, How to Have a Good Day gives us the tools we need to have a lifetime of good days.

Caroline Webb

How to Have a Good Day

Decide whether what you're trying to improve is mostly a habit or mostly a skill: if your main problem is with doing something you already know how to do, but doing it consistently, that’s probably a habit. If your main problem is not knowing how to do something well enough, that’s probably a skill.

Habits or Skills

This process has 3 main parts: <ul><li>Define the habit you want to form clearly and consistently;</li><li>Condition it until it is relatively easy to maintain. </li><li>Maintain the habit by monitoring it. If you slip, push to reassert the habit quickly.</li></ul>

Improving a habit

The best strategy for getting better at skills is deliberate practice. A good way to work on this is to divide it into 3: <ul><li>Practice the skill. </li><li>Get timely feedback on how well you’re performing.</li><li>Focus on your weak points with selective drills and constrained practice.</li></ul>

Improving skills

How often do you catch yourself saying, "I wish I were better at _____." Maybe you want to be better at exercising regularly, your relationships or your work. Maybe you'd like to be more artistic, athletic or multilingual. Getting better at things requires work. It doesn't happen too often that you can immediately get better ...

habits

Habits

strategy

Strategy

problemsolving

Problem Solving

timemanagement

Time Management

A Simple Strategy for Getting Better at Things

Poetry has a reputation for needing special training to appreciate it. In the classroom, poems were often taught as if they were riddles. We were taught that poetry is inherently "difficult" and that it makes meaning by hiding meaning.
Real progress begins when we get literal with the words in the poem. Pick a word that you find interesting in the poem, and start to investigate that word.

Poetry begins with reading the words of the poems

Younger poets tend to try and demonstrate their ability by being deliberately obscure, but they unlearn this habit in time.
Good poets do not complicate their poetry. They make poetry feel the words mean what they usually do in everyday life and then move the words into a more activated realm. The placement of the word in the poem can make language come alive and shine forth.

Poetry makes language come alive

In school, the poet Matthew Zapruder writes, we are taught that poetry is inherently “difficult.” Focusing on one interesting word can change that.

writing

Reading & Writing

Understanding Poetry Is More Straightforward Than You Think

<ul>
<li>Emerged as a reaction to the Industrial Revolution of Europe</li>
<li>It embraces the aesthetic of the new industrial Europe</li>
<li>It features naturalistics but stylized forms that were often mixed with arcs, parabolas, and semicircles</li>
<li>Fond of natural forms that have been overlooked such as insects, weeds, and mythical fairies.</li>
</ul>

Art Nouveau

<ul>
<li>Emerged as a reaction to WWI</li>
<li>Its name was derived from the 1925 Exposition Internationale des Arts Decoratifs et Industriels Mondernes, that was held in France</li>
<li>It utilizes chrome, steel, and inlaid wood; when dabbled with natural materials it tends to be graphic or textural like zebra skin and jagged fern leaves</li>
<li>It features bold shapes such as broad curves, zigzags, and sunbursts.</li>
</ul>

Art Deco

The Quick Trick: It all comes down to "flowery" vs. "streamlined." Art Nouveau is the decorative one. Art Deco is sleeker.

How to 10x Your Learning Skills

Why Use a Bitcoin ATM?

Crush It!

Financial Independence, Retire Early (FIRE) Definition

How to make sure that AI isn’t invasive and creepy

Smoky Joe