How to Stop Fiddling With Productivity Tools To Get More Done

We purchase shiny new tools that promise us more, better, and faster in anything that we can conceive. The newest software vendors claim their tools are the missing piece of the puzzle and with them you can get more done with less effort. And if you don’t subscribe to a certain productivity methodology, you will be a lost soul in the see of knowledge work.

Is this something that you think about or battle on a regular basis?

I’ve been around the block when it comes to todo list apps, GTD apps, notetaking software, document management, and data management applications. I have tried countless pieces of sofware on Windows, Mac, iOS, Android, webOS, and even Linux that claim they will make me more productive and keep me “organized”.

The market for these types of apps is huge and it isn’t necessarily because people need more apps that can organize them better than any other one. It comes down to the fact the many people don’t use the tools that they have. Instead they fiddle, get used by the tool, and then look for something else because the tool that just used them “wasn’t good enough”.

Let’s get down to brass tacks.

You get you organized. You get you productive. A tool doesn’t “get” you productive or “make” you more productive. A tool doesn’t create productivity. A set of tools augments and enhances your productivity.

This is the reason why we productivity nuts obsess with tools and “fiddle” rather than work and be productive with what we have. We easily forget that it isn’t the tool that makes us productive. When we forget this and we start to try and “tweak” and “hack” the tool to fit our perceived needs. When it doesn’t fit these perceived needs we believe that the tool isn’t good enough and we start looking for something “better”.

It’s an endless circle of productivity pr0n that gets you nowhere fast. But there are some things that you can do to get yourself back on track.

Here are seven things that you can practice to stop tweaking your tools and trying to find the best productivity tool in the world before you can get any work done.

If you are an obsessive digital tool seeker, especially the GTD type, you may want to switch to paper for a while to go on a tool diet. The best way to describe this is to get “primal” with your system. Grab some crappy paper and a pen and get back to the basics of managing your life. Mike talks about the benefits of paper over at GTD Times.Take a productivity break. Stop reading articles on how to be more productive for a while. Don’t obsessively check productivity sites for a good week. Concentrate on your own system and make it work for you.Create a personal project for trying out a bunch of tools. Make the outcome of that project to pick a set of tools and stick to them for a year. I did this about 4 months ago and have stuck with OmniFocus (even during work at a Windows shop), Notesy, Outliner for iOS, text files, BBEdit, and a big ass Cahier Squared Moleskine Notebook.Do weekly reviews and purge stuff that you don’t need. “Cruft” is anything in your systems that just sits around, stagnating. This happens a lot with digital tools. Make sure to clean things up once a week. This will help you not have the perceived notion that your tools are failing you.If you subscribe to a certain productivity system like GTD, Master Your Workday Now!, ZTD, GSD, Getting Results the Agile Way, etc. take a step back and reread or revisit the literature about the system. Get back down to the basics and understand how the system can enhance your productivity. From this view, choosing a set of tools should be more clear.If you don’t know which tools to start with pick some from this list to check out. Don’t get too obsessive, kids:
OmniFocus
Toodledo
Remember The Milk
Evernote
Google Docs
OneNote
plain text files
SimpleNote
GmailRefine your system to make your tools work for you. Not the other way around. Paraphrased from Mr. Einstein:
“Everything should be made as simple as possible, but no simpler.”

Remember, the only reason you can’t find yourself productivity tools is because you aren’t making your current ones work for you. Don’t ever sacrifice your productivity at the whim of some tool that should be helping you. Always make sure that you are the one using the productivity tools, not the other way around.

Anyone else struggling with keeping their tool selection on an even keel?

Chris is a developer, writer, tech enthusiast, and husband. He holds a degree in MIS and CMPSC from Penn State Behrend. Chris is also interested in personal productivity and creativity and how to utilize technology to get more things done. Check out his tech writing at androinica.com where he writes about Android.

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About the Subjective Reality Workshop

We just finished another awesome Conscious Growth Workshop in Las Vegas this past weekend. I really have to thank those who attended for helping to co-create such an amazing experience. I appreciate all the warmth, encouragement, and hugs!

This CGW’s group energy was delightful to behold as it evolved from Day 1 to Day 3, and I’m happy to see the CGW friendship network continue to expand. As with all CGWs, this was a potent growth experience for me as well. It’s going to take me a while to process all the new realizations I had this weekend.

I plan to take a few days off now for some much needed R&R, and then I’ll start gearing up for the Subjective Reality Workshop (SRW), which is less than 5 weeks away.

For those who are considering going to SRW and haven’t signed up for it yet, I just want to remind you that the $100 early bird discount expires at midnight on Wednesday, September 21st. You’ll still be able to sign up after that, but the price will be $100 higher. I don’t intend to extend this discount since we already have more than enough people signed up to conduct a fabulous workshop. This one sure has been generating a lot of buzz.

Most likely you were raised to subscribe to an objective belief system, and you probably relate to reality through that lens without even realizing that it’s not the only useful lens available to you. Yet the subjective perspective remains an equally viable, internally consistent alternative.

Objectivity and subjectivity are both assumptions about the nature of reality, so neither systemis falsifiable. Hence it makes no sense to say that one is more valid than the other. That would be like saying that a set of wrenches is true and but a screwdriver collection is false. Similarly objectivity and subjectivity are best seen as toolset for interacting with reality, not as truths unto themselves.

To only have one perspective at your disposal throughout your entire life is unnecessarily limiting and perhaps a bit naive. That would be like only having wrenches but no screwdrivers in your toolbox. Perhaps you could turn a screw with the right wrench, but there are better tools for that kind of job.

At SRW our aim is to help correct this imbalance in your upbringing by educating and immersing you on the subjective perspective. This is meant to complement the objective perspective, not to replace it.

Anything that can be created or explained subjectively also has an objective analog, and vice versa. Both system are equally valid, just as a wrench and a screwdriver are both valid tools. But as with hardware tools, the objective and subjective toolsets each have their particular strengths and weaknesses. They’re more useful together than they are separately. You can accomplish more with a richer set of tools.

The aim of SRW isn’t to try to convince you that reality is subjective — that’s impossible for us to know for certain. Instead SRW is your opportunity to experience the subjective side in a rich and lively 3-day weekend. This will give you another complete toolset which you can use to further your personal growth.

Examples of useful objective tools include the Scientific Method, predictive reasoning, the laws of physics as we currently understand them. By using such tools, we can achieve a great many things.

What are the most powerful subjective tools? The Law of Attraction is one. The others will be taught at the Subjective Reality Workshop next month. I wouldn’t want to spoil the surprise.

Some problems are easier to solve using the objective tools. Others are far simpler to handle with subjective tools. And many problems are best solved using tools from both toolsets, such as creating financial abundance, overcoming fear, or attracting loving relationships.

Neither system is superior to the other. But since each system has different strengths, by learning both you can effectively became a lot more capable than you’d otherwise be if you were limited to using just one of these potent toolsets.

If you’re curious to learn more about Subjective Reality before deciding whether to attend SRW, you can find many articles on that topic in the Archives. A good place to start would be with the Subjective Reality Simplified article, which will give you a basic overview of it.

Even though I’m a bit spent from facilitating CGW this past weekend, I’m really looking forward to the Subjective Reality Workshop next month. I’ve been enjoying the mental challenge of figuring out how to define, structure, and interactively teach the subjective toolbox. If you’ve read my book Personal Development for Smart People, then you know how much I love to take abstract ideas and search within them for hidden structure and relationships in an almost mathematical way.

If you’re attending SRW, please make your hotel reservations at the Tropicana ASAP. A few CGW attendees waiting too long and then tried to get a hotel room the week before the event, discovering that a number of hotels, including the Tropicana, were fully booked. They had to scramble to find other places within their budgets, ending up miles away from the venue. It’s very common for hotel rates in Las Vegas to double or triple if you wait till the week before an event to register, so please avoid this situation and make your reservation now. It only takes minutes.

Please note that the cutoff date for our group discount rate for the Subjective Reality Workshop is September 23, so that’s only 4 days away. After that you may still be able to book a room there, but you could end up paying a lot more. So use the link below to book your room now.

Subjective Reality Workshop (Oct 21-23, 2011) – Tropicana Hotel Reservations (Group Code SSP1011)

Here are the links for booking your Tropicana rooms for the other two upcoming workshops:

Conscious Success Workshop (Jan 13-15, 2012) – Tropicana Hotel Reservations (Group Code SSP112)

Conscious Relationships Workshop (Feb 17-19, 2012) – Tropicana Hotel Reservations (Group Code SSP212)

If you miss the group rate cutoff deadline, you can still reserve a room through the Tropicana’s main website, but again, you could up paying significantly more.

You can also reserve your hotel room by calling the Tropicana directly at 1-800-634-4000 (or 1-702-739-2645 if calling from outside the USA). Just give the the appropriate group code as listed above.

The Tropicana recently underwent a $200 million renovation, so the hotel property and guest rooms are all nicely upgraded. I’m sure you’ll enjoy staying there.

Are you ready to start wielding conscious control over your current dream reality? If so, come to the Subjective Reality Workshop in October, and meet people who will finally admit that they’re characters in your dream world.

Otherwise, choose the blue pill instead, and you’ll wake up in your bed the next morning, forget all about Subjective Reality, and go on about your day within the matrix as usual.

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Defend Against Any Bully in 2 Simple Steps

Verbal Bully

If bullies were actually like Nelson from the Simpsons, they would be easy to avoid.  Unfortunately, most of the verbal abuse you will ever experience in life will come from co-workers, friends, or family.  The people you like or love are often the worst offenders, whether they meant to or not.  Even worse, most of the verbal attacks will not be obvious or cutting, but instead, they will be subtle and sarcastic.  Individually, small verbal stings may not feel painful, but over time, these stings can take a toll on your confidence, stress levels, and relationships.

You won’t have time to analyze the attack and think about how to defend against it.  That’s why it is important to have a response ready for any type of attack in any situation.  The following two steps will show you how:

You may be confronted with a snide remark such as, “Are you always this absent-minded?”

How would you respond?  Would you become defensive and say, “I am not absent-minded!”?

Many of us would be caught in the moment and become defensive.  Some of us would freeze and say nothing.  But the last thing you want to do is respond directly to their attack and give them the response they were looking for.

Your best initial move is to remove yourself from the position of the “victim.”  Place yourself above the attack.  Act like it doesn’t bother you.  Step outside of the attack altogether and comment about the content of the attack itself (this is sometimes referred to as Meta-Talk). Talk about what they said or how they said it.

Let’s take a closer look at some example defenses:

“Stupid? Is that the best adjective you could come up with?”

“Wow, that was so clever…how do you keep coming up with such great jokes?” (sarcasm)

“That sounded like it was meant to insult me…”

“The way you said that was kind of child-ish, did you mean to say it like that?”

“Absent-minded?  That’s a strong choice of words wouldn’t you say?”

“Wow, you sound so bitter…maybe you should go take a break for a minute.”

“You’re still hung up on pointing out my flaws, let’s try to move away from that and get down to the real issue.”

These defenses accomplish four primary objectives:

It demonstrates to the attacker (and the audience), that the attack did not bother youIt implies that you do not place much value on what the attacker saysIt implies that future attacks will not affect you eitherIn case the attacker did not mean to attack you, this defense makes them aware that they crossed over the line

By vocally analyzing and dismantling their phrase or their delivery, you can take away its power and place yourself above the role of a “victim.” If you step outside the attack, it becomes impossible to be hit by the attack itself.   In fact, not only are you avoiding the attack, but this type of defense can simultaneously mock the attacker at the same time.

If you’re faced with a relentless bully, you may want to add Step Two to your arsenal.  Not only do you want to avoid their stings, but you want to make them think twice about attacking you again in the future.

After you dodge the bullet, your next order of business is to shift the focus back on to your attacker.  Not much good ever comes from keeping the focus on yourself when a verbal war is being waged.

An easy way to place the target back on the attacker is by exposing their intentions.  You may be poor at comebacks and witty repartees, but that’s the beauty of questioning the attacker’s intentions – everyone has an intention.  You don’t need to know some special information or come up with a clever remark in order to complete this type of defense.

A bully may state, “You’re always so defensive.”

A poor conversationalist would take the bait and respond, “No I’m not!”

Instead, expose the source with one of these lines: 

“Were you trying to be funny just then?  I wasn’t sure…”

“Why are you trying so hard to point that out?  Do you need attention?”

“Are you trying to make me act defensive? Because it’s not going to work.”

“Are you obsessed with ________?  Can’t you think of something else?”

“Do you really think you can persuade me to ______?”

“Do you always side with ______?”

“Are you always this angry?”

“Oh, you’re trying to be funny now, huh?”

“You think you’re pretty clever don’t you?”

These verbal defenses can easily throw your attacker off balance.  When you question someone’s intentions in this manner, it can be very hard to come up with a good response.  And if they do manage a successful response, you can go back to Step 1 and make a comment about it!

It’s important to note that the two tips will be rendered useless if you become defensive or over-react.  Thomas Jefferson wisely said, “Nothing gives a person so much advantage over another as to remain always cool and unruffled under all circumstances.”  That is still true today.  The person who seems to maintain their composure always has the edge.  If you can remain cool, calm, and collected during a verbal battle, you will always have the upper hand.

Geoff Peart, M.Ed., is the author of the blog, mysocialupgrade.com, where people can learn how to improve their social skills and their lives. All of the content is free and updated weekly.

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Fellows Friday with Eric Berlow

Positive feedback loops can be found in even the messiest conflicts, ecosystems and corporations, according to Eric Berlow. The trick, he tells TED, is to not confuse the means with the ends.

Interactive Fellows Friday Feature:

Join the conversation by answering Fellows’ weekly questions via Facebook. This week, Eric asks:

Instead of narrow specialization, how can our educational system better train integrative, innovative, and adaptive problem solvers?

Starting Saturday, click here to respond!

You work on problems from a “network” or “systems” perspective. How has this practice evolved for you?

In the past, I’ve mostly focused on networks in nature: how species are interconnected. Then I began to see how networks could be applied more generically, and I got very interested in the potential applications network thinking had to other types of complex problems.

What are some of the complex problems you are working on now?

Currently, I’m working for a foundation on mapping the structure of successful non-violent movements in the Middle East. In particular, we’re focusing on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. What are all the moving parts of a successful non-violent movement? How are they all related? Are there some positive feedback loops, with points of entry that we haven’t thought of before?

I have also been working with a large corporation on the future energy supply and it’s relation to food and water security. If, for example, we replaced all fossil fuels with bio-fuels, they would conflict with land for food production. And if we powered everything with electricity, that would strain water resources, because a lot of electrical production, even renewable electricity, is water-use intensive. There’s a lot of interest in mapping out how we can meet our need for energy, food and water simultaneously.

Additionally, I’ve just started collaborating with an interesting start-up, Open Data Registry, on sustainable supply chains. For example, we worked with data from Patagonia’s Footprint Chronicles project. For a number of their clothing articles, you can go online and trace where the raw materials came from, how much energy and carbon emissions were expended, how much waste was produced, etc. We compiled all the data for all the supply chains of every product and mapped it as a clothing ‘ecosystem’. Then you can visualize the entire web for the whole corporation, and see which one aspect of the whole production would have the most impact in increasing efficiency for the entire company. Maybe there’s one factory or shipping route that, with increased efficiency, would change everything down the line from there.

To me, the most interesting thing about diving in to complex problems is that, on the one hand, one problem leads to many problems, but that also means that a single solution can cause many solutions.

I can think of lots of situations where one problem causes many others. Can you give an example where one solution causes many more solutions?

Some time ago I designed and built a house in the Eastern Sierra Nevada. I wanted it to be sustainably designed, but I had a very tight budget. It’s really a whole complex system of trying to figure out how to get the biggest bang for your buck when building a green home.

Many people would ask me, “Did you put in solar panels for electricity?” But actually, when you look at the whole system, that’s the last thing I’d do to get the most for my money. It turns out that the most important thing for achieving low-cost sustainable design is having a small place, that’s well insulated, with windows and overhangs in the right place for that location and climate.

The second biggest controllable cost was heating for the building, and for water. In that case, the cheapest thing was, in fact, to have solar thermal panels to heat water. The water goes through the concrete floors, the sun heats the concrete floors in the day in the wintertime, it heats the shower water, and also heats the hot tub on the way back. So, with one pretty low-tech and cheap system, I’m heating the house, the shower, and the hot tub — while saving hundreds of dollars a month in the wintertime on propane. I’d choose solar panels for electricity last, because with efficiency efforts my electricity bill is only $30 a month.

I give that example, because most people initially focus on the means, rather than the end goal. Amory Lovins has a great quote: “People don’t want gas and electricity. They just want hot showers and cold beer.” In my case, my goal was: comfortable temperature inside, with the minimum amount of energy input and a minimum cost.

So what’s your advice for the Average Joe who is overwhelmed by a complex problem?

Well, you can map things out till the cows come home, but as the Amory Lovins quote illustrates, if you don’t really know what your goals are, then there’s no point to it. More often than not, people get overwhelmed because they’re confused about what their goal is. They conflate a goal with an implementation strategy. A perfect example of that is when people have a goal to be happy, and they think the way to get there is to make more money. So making money becomes the goal, and they forget the goal was to be happy. Then they wonder why they’re disappointed later.

Do you actually use the kind of visual map that you used in your TEDTalk to solve the problems you work on?

Yes, though before I had those tools I did it more by hand.

The kinds of tools that I use now were developed by my good friend and colleague for food web visualization. If you have more than 10 or 15 moving parts, you can’t really visualize that in your head. When you have 100 moving parts that’s 10,000 possible connections, and it really pays to have some aid to plot it all out and let the patterns emerge out of the pile.

Once all those things are all plotted, the human brain is really good at detecting patterns visually. Think about how, in a room of 100 people, you can pretty quickly and instantly tell the difference between everybody’s face. Those are amazing visual recognition skills.

I do a lot of plotting of the who’s connected to who stuff visually, turn it upside down, look at it in different ways, and order it in different ways. That way I can quickly see where clusters emerge, where things pop out at the center, which are the most important, and that sort of thing.

There are many aspiring social entrepreneurs out there who are trying to take their passion and ideas to the next level. What is one piece of advice you would give to them based on your own experiences and successes? Learn more about how to become a great social entrepreneur from all of the TED Fellows on the Case Foundation’s Social Citizens blog.

I’ve been an academic researcher for years. But I have been seeing so much innovation and potential in the private sector. So a couple weeks ago I quit my university job in order to pursue these things more seriously. It’s scary, because I know how academia works, and it’s pretty secure, but I was feeling a little bit constrained in my ability to be creative and take risks.

So I’m just kind of jumping out there into the unknown. The main thing that I’m trying to focus on is my values. There’s definitely temptation and opportunities to just make money applying my skills. But I keep realizing that I really only want to work on projects that I feel have potential for exceptional social or environmental good. So remember to stick to your values and what’s really exciting to you. The more excited you are, the better you’ll do, and you’ll have infectious enthusiasm about what you do.

The other thing is, I’ve found doing my research that I’m most successful when I’m doing projects with people that I really like to work with. Life is short. We spend a lot of our time working. We may as well be working with people that are really fun, exciting and inspiring to work with.

Besides working, you also spend a lot of your time skiing. Why are you so dedicated to it?

I do spend a lot of time in the Sierra Nevada skiing, and I would say most of my good, creative ideas come while I’m skiing uphill. To ski uphill, you put what are called “skins” on the bottom of our skis, and your heel is free, so you walk uphill with your skis, take the skins off, and ski down.

I’m a very kinetic thinker … my entire mini-TEDTalk was written in my head while I was walking uphill. And I pretty much wrote all of the paper for my thesis that was published in Nature while skiing uphill.

How did the idea for your TED Fellows retreat, “Think Weird Go Big” get generated?

TED2010 was amazing and I loved it. Afterwards, I realized that my favorite part was actually meeting the other Fellows. I realized that as a group we were all doing such different things, but everybody was taking their little project to the next level, trying to go bigger with it. And it made me think, “I can do that, too.” That’s how Jessica Green (another TED Fellow) and I came up with the Think Weird Go Big project. The idea was to have a small self-coaching retreat to support each other in reaching our next goals.

We’re all at a place in our lives where we have similar kinds of constraints and obstacles. By hearing about one person getting past their obstacles, everybody else gets something out of it. Living together, cooking meals together and getting to know each other in that intimate setting, even for just a few days, makes it extremely easy to follow up with each other for advice and even collaborations .

My personal project that I discussed at Think Weird Go Big was figuring out how to use my background in ecology and network theory and apply it for social and environmental good in the private sector.

I also got feedback on the company I’m going to start, called Brazil Nut Effect. The name refers to when you shake a pile of mixed nuts and the large Brazil nuts rise to the surface. The company will create tools to help the important nuggets emerge out of the mess. I feel like I’m just at the beginning of this new phase in my life, and that’s pretty exciting.

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How to Create Emergency Kits for your Average Workday

People create emergency kits for car problems and bad weather, but few create kits to deal with more common but less urgent situations. In particular, misplacing a wallet or forgetting a work laptop at home can play havoc with a person’s workday.

With a little bit of planning, you can create emergency kits that will let you deal with these types of situations in a calm and productive manner.

Besides your keys, your wallet is probably your most important daily companion. Without it, you lack identification, money or the ability to access any of your financial services.

No money, means you are unable to buy the essential products that gets you through a workday, like gas, lunch or even a coffee.

Luckily, there are so many prepaid cards options available today that creating a wallet backup kit is an easy task.

MasterCard and Visa both make prepaid cards that are accepted anywhere normal credit cards are accepted. You can even reload the cards if you use them in an emergency.Use industry specific cards to make sure you can always get gas, food or make a long distance phone call.Request an additional debit card from your bank that attaches to a line of credit or checking accountApply for a low limit credit card that you only use for emergencies100 dollars in small denominations. The small denominations allow you to use a portion of the money without depleting your stash. Also, small denominations are accepted everywhere.

You can protect your kit by wrapping it in a dark water resistant bag and making it look as innocuous as possible. If you keep cleaning supplies in your car you can hide it in a wipe container or at the bottom of an road emergency kit. Most thieves are not interested in stealing road flairs and cleaning products.

Please make a list of the cards in the kit and their corresponding numbers. Consequently, you can reload prepaid cards with more funds and cancel cards if they are lost or stolen.

Forgetting your laptop or briefcase can be annoying in some cases and disastrous in others.

Therefore, it is a good idea to create a backup kit for the tools and information you use every day. No matter what happens, you want to enter the office, meeting or sales call as confident, organized and professional as possible.

Most modern cell phones have the same functionalities that a laptop has, including the ability to edit spreadsheets, create power point presentations and email PDF documents.

Make the most of these phones by adding applications that will allow you to access and edit your information anywhere you are.

Remote Desktop Applications allow you to connect to your home or office computer. These programs range from free applications like MS Remote Desktop to paid options like LogMeIN. The paid applications will also allow you to access remote computers through a web browser.Office suite applications like Documents To Go allow you to edit MS office documents. You can always access the files and then email them for printing.Document scanning software comes in handy when you only have a hard copy but need to send it off in a pinch. Programs like JotNot lets you export scans to multiple formats.Virtual Private Networks (VPN) applications help you protect your personal data when you use hotel Wi-Fi connections or a public computer.

Whether you are at home or at the office, you should always have an online backup you can access on your phone or a computer.

Carbonite is relatively cheap, works in the background without interrupting computer functionality or bandwidth speeds. While it creates a full backup of your computer, you can still access and restore individual files.Dropbox and Windows Live Mesh will allow you to synchronize your work across multiple computers and offers free online locker space. 2 Gigs for Dropbox and 5 Gigs on Skydive for Windows Mesh.  Both are accessible through mobile applications and through a web browser.Email your work to yourself after working on a file.Complete all your work on online office suites like Office 365, Google Apps or Zoho.Keep an extra set of home and auto keys at the office. You can hide them under your desk or within a file folder.Just in case you spill something on yourself or need to stay in a hotel room overnight, keep an extra set of clothes and a toiletries bag in the car.Create a backup business portfolio where you can keep marketing material, business cards, pens, pencils and a writing pad. You never want to enter a meeting or a sales call empty handed.

No matter how organized or prepared you are, there are always going to be times when things fall through the cracks. With a little bit of forethought you can create a emergency kit for any type of situation.

Philip Viana works as a Financial Adviser for a bank in Canada. He is hard at work developing the formula to a meaningful, mindful and happy life. He writes about productivity, financial advice, technology, and lifestyle at Burnthenegative.com or at his about.me page.

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Masters on the mind

Edge has just kicked off their 2011 Master Class with a fantastic course on ‘The Science of Human Nature’ delivered by an impressive line-up of leading cognitive scientists.

Princeton psychologist Daniel Kahneman on the marvels and the flaws of intuitive thinking; Harvard mathematical biologist Martin Nowak on the evolution of cooperation; UC-Santa Barbara evolutionary psychologist Leda Cosmides on the architecture of motivation; UC-Santa Barbara neuroscientist Michael Gazzaniga on neuroscience and the law; Harvard psychologist Steven Pinker on the history of violence; and Princeton religious historian Elaine Pagels on The Book of Revelations.

The first part is already online, where Daniel Kahneman gives a fantastic presentation on the counter-intuitive psychology of intuitive thinking, while the others will appear in the coming weeks.

And as always, I’m sure you’ll be pleased to hear the details of the expensive and exclusive location where the talks take place, lest you worry that the science was being toned down by sub-standard canopés, or God forbid, a pub.

Link to Edge Master Class 2011.

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Dance your Ph.D., win a trip to TEDxBrussels

Scientific Ph.D. dissertations are notoriously difficult to explain. That’s why, for the past three years Science Magazine has sponsored the Dance Your Ph.D. competition. Scientists, from graduate students to professors, are invited to film an interpretive dance illustrating their research. If that sounds crazy, well, that’s probably because it’s run by John Bohannon of Gonzo Labs, who specializes in crazy-sounding but effective ways to communicate science. Above is the winner of the 2010 competition. (Watch all of the 2010 and 2009 videos.)

Past winners have received subscriptions to Science, money and accolades. This year, Bohannon is speaking at this year’s TEDxBrussels event, and the organizers have offered to fly the winner out to attend the conference and receive their prize on stage.

The competition has become far more successful than anyone expected — the videos have collectively received about a million views, and the participants tell stories of reactions from excitement to job offers from people who’ve seen the dances.

So if you have a Ph.D. in science, get dancing. If you don’t, take a look at a new way to appreciate and maybe understand some cutting-edge research.

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Has Workplace Incivility Impacted Your Life?

My first boss disliked me so much I thought I had hurt one of her relatives.  She’d call me into her office and yell at me for dressing too casually, interrupting colleagues in meetings and other infractions real and imagined.  I didn’t know how to talk to her but I couldn’t stand the situation anymore, so I quit the job.

The next time I had to work with someone who was mean to me, I was stuck.  I really liked the job, and since he was an equal-opportunity offender, I knew his wrath wasn’t personal.  Others avoided him, but I sat down and asked how we could work better together.  My directness shocked him into better behavior from that point on.

In August, there was a flurry of press coverage around what the American Psychological Association deemed as an increase in “workplace incivility,” or a form of organizational deviance characterized by behaviors that violate respectful workplace norms – aka rudeness.

Weber Shandwick and Powell Tate’s Civility in America 2011 poll reported 43 percent of Americans as saying they’ve experienced incivility at work, and 38 percent as believing that the workplace is increasingly disrespectful.  Sixty-seven percent of respondents cited a critical need for civility training.

Civility training?  Is that a little extreme?  Not necessarily, as the workplace is undeniably rough these days.  Employees are doing the jobs of two, sometimes three people, and the environment is harried, stressful, and constantly changing.  Many haven’t received pay raises in a few years.  Unfortunately, employees are increasingly likely to take out their angst on each other. 

I recently had the chance to chat with Bob Sutton, a professor of management at Stanford University and the author of “The No Asshole Rule: Building a Civilized Workplace and Surviving One That Isn’t.” Bob assured me that he’d seen in his research that going through life angry causes long-term physical and mental problems, and that ridding oneself of dysfunctional conflict is a must.

Bob explained that many difficult relationships are the result of a vicious cycle of offense and revenge, or one person trying to one-up the other.  He suggested that we stop trying to win, or get back at the other person for behaving this way.  We must not take the situation personally and look at it as another workplace problem we need to solve.

The most effective way to do this is to listen to the other person and put yourself in her shoes.  Determine what’s meaningful to her and help her find ways to get it.   If things have escalated to the point where every interaction is painful, take her to lunch and address the conflict proactively.  Tell her that the relationship isn’t going as well as you’d like, and ask what you can do to improve things.

Despite how hard you try, some difficult people will persist in their negative behavior.  If you constantly feel personally attacked and it starts to take a toll on your well-being, look for ways to get out of the situation.  As Bob said, some people are so toxic they’re not worth it.

Alexandra Levit is a career and workplace expert at the Intuit Quickbase Blog , a daily source for advice on how to be exceptional at your job. You can follow her on Twitter at @alevit.

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Manage Your Energy so You Can Manage Your Time

sun pillar by tomhe

One of the greatest ironies of this age is that while various gadgets like smartphones and netbooks allow you to multitask, it seems that you never manage to get things done. You are caught in the busyness trap. There’s just too much work to do in one day that sometimes you end up exhausted with half-finished tasks.

The problem lies in how to keep our energy level high to ensure that you finish at least one of your most important tasks for the day. There’s just not enough hours in a day and it’s not possible to be productive the whole time.

You need more than time management. You need energy management

How many times have you heard (or read) this advice – wake up early so that you can do all the tasks at hand. There’s nothing wrong with that advice. It’s actually reeks of good common sense – start early, finish early. The thing is that technique alone won’t work with everyone. Especially not with people who are not morning larks.

I should know because I was once deluded with the idea that I will be more productive if I get out of bed by 6 a.m. Like most of you Lifehackers, I’m always on the lookout for productivity hacks because I have a lot of things in my plate. I’m working full time as an editor for a news agency, while at the same time tending to my side business as a content marketing strategist. I’m also a travel blogger and oh yeah, I forgot, I also have a life.

I read a lot of productivity books and blogs looking for ways to make the most of my 24 hours. Most stories on productivity stress waking up early. So I did – and I was a major failure in that department – both in waking up early and finishing early.

Energy management begins with looking for your most productive hours in a day. Getting attuned to your body clock won’t happen instantly but there’s a way around it.

Monitor your working habits for one week and list down the time when you managed to do the most work. Take note also of what you feel during those hours – do you feel energized or lethargic? Monitor this and you will find a pattern later on.

My experiment with being a morning lark proved that ignoring my body clock and just doing it by disciplining myself to wake up before 8 a.m. will push me to be more productive. I thought that by writing blog posts and other reports in the morning that I would be finished by noon and use my lunch break for a quick gym session. That never happened. I was sleepy, distracted and couldn’t write jack before 10 a.m.

In fact that was one experiment that I shouldn’t have tried because I should know better. After all, I’ve been writing for a living for the last 15 years, and I have observed time and again that I write more –and better – in the afternoon and in evenings after supper. I’m a night owl. I might as well, accept it and work around it.

Just recently, I was so fired up by a certain idea that – even if I’m back home tired from work – I took out my netbook, wrote and published a 600-word blog post by 11 p.m. This is a bit extreme and one of my rare outbursts of energy, but it works for me.

Once you have a sense of that high-energy time, you can then mold your schedule so that your other less important tasks will be scheduled either before or after this designated productive time.

Block them out in your calendar and use the high-energy hours for your high priority tasks – especially those that require more of your mental energy and focus. You also need to use these hours to any task that will bring you closer to you life’s goal.

If you are a morning person, you might want to schedule most business meetings before lunch time as it’s important to keep your mind sharp and focused. But nothing is set in stone. Sometimes you have to sacrifice those productive hours to attend to other personal stuff – like if you or your family members are sick or if you have to attend your son’s graduation.

That said, just remember to keep those productive times on your calendar. You may allow for some exemptions but stick to that schedule as much as possible.

There’s no right or wrong way of using this energy management technique because everything depends on your own personal circumstances. What you need to remember is that you have to accept what works for you – and not what other productivity gurus say you should do.

Understanding your own body clock is the key to time management. Without it, you end up exhausted chasing a never-ending cycle of tasks and frustrations.

About the author: Prime Sarmiento is a long time journalist and content marketing strategist for online tutorial company Ahead Interactive - provider of live, real-time, video-powered tutorials. You can follow her writing tips in twitter.

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How To Outsource Your Job Search

If there is one thing a reluctant job seeker needs, it’s this: someone or something that deals with all the cruddy aspects of the job search.

No time for sifting through all the online listings to find ones that match your interests, skills and experience? Hate tailoring cover letters for each job application you send off?

No problem! There’s an app for that. Kind of.

While there’s no magic job search widget that is sure to secure you an interview for your dream job, there are a couple of different ways you can outsource your job search and avoid spending time finding and pursuing leads that might not work.

Some people will tell you that outsourcing your job search is a horrible idea. Others will encourage you to explore it. Ultimately, it’s your call. But if you do want to minimize the time you spend before landing interviews, here are some resources you should know about and anecdotes from people who have done it successfully.

MyJobHunter.com is all about automating. You sign up, search all the major job search sites from their interface, check the listings you like, add your resume and cover letter one time, and it will do all the applying for you. It also allows you to activate a feature that will automatically find and apply to new jobs on your behalf. Since a computer is doing the searching, the cost is relatively low — $39.95 for the first month and then $9.95 per month after that.

As you can imagine, the computer doesn’t always get it right. One unemployed sales guy signed up for the service, and MyJobHunter.com sent his resume for a stylist job at the hair salon where his wife works. But the service ultimately did help him land a job even though he was unaware he had applied for it when he was called up for the interview, the Wall Street Journal reported.

That same WSJ piece also mentions JobSerf.com, which has been around since 2006. If the idea of a computer sending your resume out willy-nilly irks you, this could be a good alternative.

The company simply outsources the online job searching and applying to its staff in India. Depending on the package you choose, it’ll cost you either $49 or $98 per week. You send them up to five cover letters along with your resume and they will ship ‘em out to jobs they identify based on a data request when you first sign up. Cultural misunderstandings can arise, as the Journal article points out. But the service worked for one About.com writer who got “a couple of responses from employers” after just two weeks.

The workplace is a’changin’. We’re in the midst of a freelance surge, full of job jugglers and folks who are creating their own jobs. If you’re in this category, FlexJobs might be the answer. Anyone who has looked for a part-time or work-from-home position knows that many times “telecommute” in a job posting actually means scam. FlexJobs aims to solve that problem, by doing the vetting for you and listing “real” flexible jobs.

Back in April, Chelsea Gladden used the site, which costs $14.95 per month, to find a part-time position. “With all the positions hand-screened for me, it was almost as if I got a lot of the ‘pounding the pavement’ part out of the way,” Gladden says, who did not have a lot of time for job searching with five kids at home. She got a freelance writing job “immediately.” Then just a week later, FlexJobs announced they were looking for a director of marketing and PR. The timing was perfect for Gladden who was hired for the position.

We all know social networks can be an integral part of the job search — even if you outsource it. If you have the right connections, you can just crowdsource for your next position. Asking your Facebook friends for a job is certainly the lowest cost way to go about your hunt, and it can be very effective. Freelance screenwriter Natalia Lusinski says that working in the entertainment industry in Los Angeles means she’s often seeking positions that are word-of-mouth. “I have found many through posting a Facebook status telling people I am searching and what I am looking for. Each time I have done this, it has worked – someone has always known someone else looking for just the job I am seeking,” she wrote in an email.

Jaclyn Schiff, a writer/media consultant, is managing editor of Brazen Careerist's Brazen Life blog. Her work has appeared on NPR, PBS MediaShift, Mediaite, Kaiser Health News, UN Dispatch, Women’s eNews and other places. She is @J_Schiff on Twitter.

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Step-By-Step Plan To Get More Friends

"Friends" from L Lemos on flickr

One of the biggest fears about relocating to another town or city is having to start your social life again, especially if you don’t know anyone in your new destination. Even without the relocation factor, some people are just not natural social butterflies and as a result, find it tough to have many friends no matter where they live.

Since I’ve relocated to several different cities without knowing a single soul in each of my new destinations and have made lifelong friends in each place, I know a little bit about how to start over again. I came up with a step-by-step plan to get more friends even though I’m not really a social butterfly either.

I’ll illustrate these steps with an actual real life example of what I did after one of my relocations.

Everyone should think about what passions or interests they have. Very likely, most people will be able to come up with a few of these. Then it’s a matter of identifying a key activity from this list which other people will also be interested in. In this example, I came up with snow skiing.

So my next step was to find some type of group that involved snow skiing. I ended up finding an adult traveling ski club that had a large membership of almost 3,000 at that time. I visited one of their club meetings before the ski season started and liked what they had to offer. The members were quite friendly and welcoming so I soon signed up as a new member.

When the ski season started, I went on many of their weekend day trips to local ski resorts. The club had their own ski school with qualified instructors to teach the club members so I took as many classes as I could. The group classes and bus trips were quite conducive to meeting new people.

Conversation among new people was quite natural and easy since everyone had a common interest, which was skiing. Also, this was the furthest thing from a high pressure, meat-market bar situation. Some club members and ski instructors who have been around for some time even facilitated new members to get to know one another by introducing each other.

Participating in club events as suggested in the last step is great but the next step really takes it up a notch. This step involves actively volunteering for various roles within a club or group. Since the majority of special interest and social groups require volunteer members to help out, this is one of the best ways to start an active social life.

After getting comfortable enough with how the various things in the ski club works, I volunteered to lead bus trips and special committees like the club’s fitness division. I also made sure I attended as many of the general club meetings as possible.

I even volunteered to help organize special social and theme events throughout the year. Pretty soon, I was also chosen to lead groups on week long ski vacations to the Rocky Mountains.

Clubs can never get enough volunteers so the longer standing members welcomed my participation enthusiastically. The more I volunteered and the more active I became with the club, the more people I met.

Some members who were real social butterflies had private parties and other events outside the club. Because I became a visible member through my volunteering, I was soon invited to these outside events. These outside events featured both club members I already knew as well as other people who were not club members.

My social network grew even larger as a result of attending these outside functions and it was only natural that certain key people would develop as good friends. Even though some of these people, including myself, eventually left the ski club, several of the friendships I developed during my time there continue to this day.

So the actual step-by-step plan I used again was;

1) Identify a passion that others will also be interested in
2) Locate groups centered around this passion
3) Participate in group activities
4) Actively volunteer for various roles to help the group
5) Develop friendships over time with people you interact with

I used the same plan each time I relocated to a new city and with different interests as well. The steps are the same no matter what interest you use as long as it is one that can involve other people. Hopefully these steps will help you enrich your social life with new friends.

Clint Cora is a motivational speaker, author & Karate World Champion based near Toronto, Canada. Get his FREE 3-part Personal Development Video Series on how to expand your comfort zone and finally conquer even your most daunting goals in life.

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Five Cost-Cutting Features of the Future Small Business You Can Embrace Today

From Images_of_Money on flickr

The ins and outs of small business office savings can be tricky. There are the investments in the technology to worry about, the uncertainty of the economy to lose sleep over, and good old fashioned overhead to always keep in mind.

The entrepreneurial experience is currently undergoing a transformational period. Fading away are archaic methods of the past. Developing are the efficient ways of operating an enterprise that await us in the future. One of the best ways to ensure long-term cost-cutting on the small business level is to let go of the old ways of business management and embrace these new efficiencies in achieving entrepreneurial opportunity.

The following are five ways to start integrating innovation directly into your business budgeting:

Once upon a time, the most important decision a small business owner had to make when it came to IT was choosing whether or not to go with wired routers or switch to wireless. Data and software were by default something you kept close-by. But cloud technology is changing that.

These days you don’t need an IT team and independent server to manage a big online business. You can outsource these responsibilities to cloud storage services. You basically streamline your office IT to just the network and the computers. Data, software, and the products of combining both are all stored elsewhere, accessible immediately through an Internet connection. There’s a monthly cost, but compared to the costs of managing your own IT system it’s a definite money saver.

Even with the use of cloud services many businesses are still tasked with having to establish a network for employees to connect and coordinate their efforts through. Even your cheaper business networks are going to cost a pretty penny up front. If you “need” a network for communication and mass-notifications, then why not forgo your own network and use something like Facebook or Google+ instead? Every employee is sure to be a part of these free networks and unless there are specific tasks that must be completed through a custom-made network, why pay for something else?

Many offices have already banned the printer so it’s hard to call it a futuristic cost-cutter. But the day will come when businesses are nearly forced to give up paper because of costs. When starting a business, do so on the right foot by adhering to a no-paper rule. With the exception of hard copy contracts there’s nothing that needs to be printed in the office these days. Graphs can be instantly emailed, so can word documents and any other printable file type you can think of. Needless to say, the savings of not having printers and paper around are pretty high up there relative to the rest of your small business expenditures.

New York City has hundreds of thousands of office square feet currently sitting around not being used. Part of the problem is that an overwhelming chunk of office real estate in the city is sublet. This is happening in most American cities. Take advantage of the unending amount of office space by making your business easily transportable, from one to another. Six-month leases can give you more freedom to invest in other more important aspects of your business. With laptops, lightweight furniture and a web connection any space can be perfect for your office.

One day out of the week you should send your workers home. Paying for utilities four days less every month can shave off seriously dough. In addition, the lack of commute means workers will spend more time being productive. This isn’t just optimism; studies and surveys repeatedly indicate that workers perform better when they’re doing their tasks remotely. Save money and increase output by giving your workers a chance to do their tasks from wherever they wish. In the age of cloud computing and instant communication, does it matter where anyone is in relation to their co-workers anymore?

Entrepreneurs are going to have to think of an assortment of different ways to outmaneuver the draining realities of these tough economic times. No doubt many will come to embrace the cost-saving techniques that are inherent with advanced web access. There’s no reason not to believe that by the year 2020 nearly half of small businesses will be utilizing one of not all of the aforementioned methods of saving on a business budget. Therefore, there’s no reason why you shouldn’t be utilizing them today.

Chris Birk is a former journalist and director of communications for a pair of Inc. 500 companies, including Veterans United Home Loans, the nation’s leading dedicated VA lender. His work has appeared in dozens of publications, from the Chicago Sun-Times and the Huffington Post to Motley Fool and Read Write Web. He also teaches journalism and media writing courses at a private Midwestern university.

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Never Forget Your Past Successes

The first award I ever won in my life that I remember was a yellow second place ribbon for an egg and spoon race when I was in senior Kindergarten. I actually still have that ribbon among other similar little awards I received during my childhood years. They have been safely stored in a metal candy box all these years.

Significant certificates, diplomas and even university degrees have also been placed in file folders in my home office as well. Work related awards like plaques I received for corporate sales performance were bundled together in a tote bag. Although I use to display them on my wall when I was still in corporate life, I no longer have them out since I decided to go for a more artistic home styling with real artwork instead.

In my case, the bulk of my awards are in the form of a few hundred trophies of varying sizes from a few inches to a multilevel one that stands almost eight feet tall. These trophies plus many plaques and medals were won from my long career in martial arts competition that spanned over twenty years.

When I use to live in smaller high rise condo apartments, I had no choice but to have these trophies lined up a few rows deep that took up an entire living room wall. I even had some of the plaques in my bathrooms. Needless to say, this sight overwhelmed a lot of my visitors especially when they came to my place for the first time.

Although most of my guests were very impressed, I did receive some negative reactions, usually from girlfriends after a certain dating period. Once they were comfortable enough with me, a few of them actually told me that I should throw my trophies out since they were just taking up space and collecting dust.

These women were obviously thinking from a home decor point of view and in some ways, their point was valid. However, at the same time, they also completely missed out on something important. There is a reason why I, along with many other people in this world, have not thrown out the awards we have won. These awards are not simply just dust collectors.

Past awards and other mementos of our achievements serve as reminders of our past successes. Everybody goes through ups and downs in life. It is during those down periods when past successes become especially helpful.

Instead of just sitting there sulking when we are down and challenged by whatever life throws at us, we should be remembering how we have conquered obstacles to become successful in the past. We should recall despite the challenges, how we were able to work through them and still achieve victory.

Physical reminders of past victories such as trophies or certificates act to trigger these events back into our minds. We will then feel a surge of confidence as we realize that if we were successful before, then we can become successful again.

These reminders help us remember that although we might lose the odd battle, we can still win the overall war. Past successes do not have to be exactly related to current challenges either. My past successes in martial arts continue to help boost my confidence in many different challenges I face and many of these are not related to martial arts in any way whatsoever.

So keep all the reminders of your achievements so that you never forget your past successes, especially during times when you can really use a boost.  Although you don’t necessarily have to display them in prominent locations around the house, at least have them somewhere where you can easily access them to rekindle the wonderful memories behind them.

I did not keep my trophies to impress anyone. I kept them for myself as reminders of past successes when I need them. The only thing different these days is that I have a bigger house and therefore do not have to have my awards in my living room and bathrooms anymore. I now have a separate trophy room in my basement. This should keep the girlfriends from complaining.

Clint Cora is a motivational speaker, author & Karate World Champion based near Toronto, Canada. Get his FREE 3-part Personal Development Video Series on how to expand your comfort zone and finally conquer even your most daunting goals in life.

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Book Review: Five Laws of Success

Arnina Nikitina was shocked. “I felt sorry for the time I wasted trying to succeed without knowing the basics,” she recalls. “I was mad because I didn’t discover them before.”

She’s talking about her book Five Laws of Success: “From the beginning of time, there have been laws set in motion that automatically bring their results when we act in relation to them. And success is no exception.”

Law #1: The Law of Desire

“If you want something badly enough you will get it.”

The people who succeed in life are the people who want to. They make the conscious choice to go after their goals no matter what conditions they have to put up with or how many sacrifices they have to make. “If you want something badly enough, then quitting is simply not an option,” Nikitina writes. “You either find a way or make one. You pay the price, whatever it takes.”

You can test and strengthen your desire by getting in touch with all the reasons why you want to achieve your goal. The more benefits you can list and the more often you can review this list (every morning is ideal), the stronger your desire becomes.

Law #2: The Law of Belief

“Anything you believe to be true will be your reality.”

The mind is our greatest asset. And yet many of us constantly put ourselves down with limiting beliefs. “If you don’t believe that you can achieve your goal, you won’t,” Nikitina explains. “In order to achieve anything, you must believe it is possible.” Unless you’re 100% sure, the doubt will prevent your success.

Positive beliefs can be created by practicing visualization exercises every night before bed. Close your eyes and create a clear mental picture of success. See and feel it as though it already exists. Because our subconscious mind doesn’t know the difference between dreams and reality, consistently envisioning success will drive actions to create it in real life.

Law #3: The Law of Positive Attitude

“The way we think is the way we perform.”

We all have problems. But what determines success is how we respond to them. Since we can’t control the obstacles we encounter, we must control our attitude about them. “Positive attitude and optimism work like a magnet for success,” Nikitina points out. “If you maintain [a] positive attitude no matter what the situation is, success will come to you AUTOMATICALLY.”

Maintaining a positive attitude is easy if you:

Listen to yourself – pay attention to your “thoughts, ideas, beliefs and commentaries” so you can replace negative ones with positive ones.Get enough sleep – this will boost your energy and enable you to do what needs to be done without feeling tired, overwhelmed, or depressed.Put things in perspective – looked at in the grand scheme of things, most stresses aren’t worth the trouble and most problems aren’t that big.Take a break – sometimes it’s best to simply step back and relax so you can come back stronger to carry on.

Law #4: The Law of Persistence

“If you keep trying you will succeed.”

Success is never instant, which means we’re bound to go through a certain number of failures along the way. “They are a part of life,” Nikitina writes. Learning the lessons means we don’t have to keep repeating them while adapting our approach makes us stronger in the process.

Ultimately, failure is just a stepping stone that teaches us what doesn’t work and what we should do instead. “Fail or succeed, it doesn’t matter. Both of them will get you where you want to be.”

Law #5: The Law of Goal Setting

 “There is no achievement without goals.”

“Goal setting is the most powerful tool you have to achieve success,” Nikitina explains. Goals keep us focused and motivated. They also turn our dreams into reality because they are specific, in writing, have a deadline, and include a clear step-by-step plan.

Conclusion

What do you think? Which of the five do you struggle with most? And what can you do to change that? Please share your thoughts in the comments below!

Eugene shares his love for reading and personal development by publishing weekly book summaries and reviews at eugeneyiga.com. He’s also on a quest to read the 100 greatest books of all time before he turns 30 and gives away free stuff without making you join his mailing list. Follow Eugene on Twitter for instant updates and alerts.

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Teenage kicks

National Geographic has an excellent article on teenage risk-taking and adolescent brain development.

It goes some way to explaining both the dangerous mistakes that typically peak in the late teens and, I like to think, the bad fashion sense which seems to follow a similar pattern.

Importantly, the piece goes beyond the usually ‘well the frontal lobes are still developing, aren’t they?’ explanation that gets wheeled out whenever teen neuroscience is discussed and hits on some of the gritty details.

Are these kids just being stupid? That’s the conventional explanation: They’re not thinking, or by the work-in-progress model, their puny developing brains fail them.

Yet these explanations don’t hold up. As Laurence Steinberg, a developmental psychologist specializing in adolescence at Temple University, points out, even 14- to 17-year-olds—the biggest risk takers—use the same basic cognitive strategies that adults do, and they usually reason their way through problems just as well as adults. Contrary to popular belief, they also fully recognize they’re mortal. And, like adults, says Steinberg, “teens actually overestimate risk.”

So if teens think as well as adults do and recognize risk just as well, why do they take more chances? Here, as elsewhere, the problem lies less in what teens lack compared with adults than in what they have more of. Teens take more risks not because they don’t understand the dangers but because they weigh risk versus reward differently: In situations where risk can get them something they want, they value the reward more heavily than adults do.

Probably one of the most comprehensive introductions to teen risk you’ll read in a good while.

Link to National Gerographic on Teenage Brains.

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Unautomate Your Money

Every time we automate a process in our lives, we trade a piece of consciousness away for a piece of convenience.

This can be fantastic, as long as we ensure that we automate positive, sustainable habits.

The problem with automation comes when we try to apply it to areas in our lives that need more consciousness.

We run into trouble when we try to solve a problem by automating it.

Automation itself doesn’t fix anything.

In fact, automating a undesirable process only buries the problem even further.

“Problems can’t be solved at the same level of awareness that created them.” -Albert Einstein.

We cannot solve problems by trading away consciousness.

We need to reverse this trend. We need unautomation.

Unautomation is the act of deliberately trading back pieces of convenience for increased consciousness in return.

In our financial lives, there are plenty of examples were we can benefit from unautomation:

Creating a list of every item you own. While far from convenient, this will drastically increase the awareness of our clutter.Using a 30-day list for wants. Waiting 30 days to purchase an item can be a drag, but we’ll likely realize how little we really desired it in the first place.Tracking our spending with pen and paper. Carry a small pocketbook and record every purchase by hand rather than just on your plastic.Converting the cost of items into time we’ll need to work. This can be a tough exercise, but will put things in perspective quickly.Purging 2 items for every 1 you bring into your life. Yet another inconvenient (at times) rule-of-thumb that can raise awareness around just how much clutter we bring into our lives.Quit signing contracts. Until you’ve ever tried to quit signing them, you don’t realize how fundamental contracts are in our society.Spending with cash over plastic. Going without plastic isn’t easy, but you can’t get much more aware than we spending cold, hard cash.Taking public transportation. You may have to leave early or plan a little more in advance, but taking public transportation will open your eyes the other side of your daily commute.

These examples are only a handful of hundreds of money instances where we could benefit from a path of less convenience and more consciousness.

The next time you look to change a set of behaviors in your life, don’t turn to automation.

Start with unautomation.

Registration is now open for You Vs Debt, Baker’s 6-week online class with daily videos, challenges, and accountability forums to empower your battle against debt.

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Attracting Wealth - Nlp and Hypnosis to Learn How to Add Value to Others

Attracting Wealth - Nlp and Hypnosis to Learn How to Add Value to Others by Michael J. Emery, M.A., C.Ht., M.NLP - Personal Development Coach

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5 Shortcuts to Finding Your Passion

“Follow your passion.” It sounds so easy. So why do so many people struggle to find the career they’re excited to wake up to every morning?

Today, I held a free webinar with Jennifer Gresham, founder of the No Regrets Career Academy, called, “5 Shortcuts to Finding Your Passion.”

Jen took a thoughtful look at how to “follow your passion” and find your “fire in the belly” with confidence, and shared:

How to tell if your passion is career material or just a hobbyAnti-passions (and why you can’t ignore them)Why passion isn’t everythingThe #1 mistake people make when choosing a passionAdvice for the extremely passionate (do you have to choose?)

Jen and I also answered a ton of questions about finding your passion.

Watch the recorded videos here (go to the site if you don’t see the videos in RSS/email):

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The 6 killer apps of prosperity: Niall Ferguson on TED.com

Over the past few centuries, Western cultures have been very good at creating general prosperity for themselves. Historian Niall Ferguson asks: Why the West, and less so the rest? He suggests half a dozen big ideas from Western culture — call them the 6 killer apps — that promote wealth, stability and innovation. And in this new century, he says, these apps are all shareable. (Recorded at TEDGlobal 2011, July 2011, in Edinburgh, Scotland. Duration: 20:20.)

Watch Niall Ferguson’s talk on TED.com, where you can download it, rate it, comment on it and find other talks and performances from our archive of 1,000+ TEDTalks.

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TED Blog exclusive video: A new method for escaping tall buildings

Watch video >> Kevin Stone: A new method for escaping tall buildings

Exclusive video from TED2011: We’ve been building high-rises for a hundred years. But there’s still no good way, in an emergency, to get people out of tall buildings quickly. Kevin Stone asked: Why? At TED2011, he shares what his “Why?” led him to: the Rescue Reel. It’s an example of ingenuity driven by curiosity and passion.

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Attracting Wealth - Nlp and Hypnosis to Learn How to Add Value to Others by Michael J. Emery, M.A., C.Ht., M.NLP - Personal Development Coach

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A whiff of madness

For a short time, the scientific community was excited about the smell of schizophrenia.

In 1960, a curious article appeared in the Archives of General Psychiatry suggesting not only that people with schizophrenia had a distinctive smell, but that the odour could be experimentally verified.

The paper by psychiatrists Kathleen Smith and Jacob Sines noted that “Many have commented upon the strange odour that pervades the back wards of mental hospitals” and went on to recount numerous anecdotes of the supposedly curious scent associated with the diagnosis.

Having worked on a fair few ‘back wards of mental hospitals’ in my time, my first reaction would be to point out that the ‘strange odour’ is more likely to be the staff than the patients but Smith and Sines were clearly committed to their observations.

They collected the sweat from 14 white male patients with schizophrenia and 14 comparable patients with ‘organic brain syndromes’ and found they could train rats to reliably distinguish the odours while a human panel of sweat sniffers seemed to be able to do the same.

Seemingly backed up by the nasal ninja skills of two different species, science attempted to determine the source of the ‘schizophrenic odour’.

Two years later researchers from Washington suggested the smell might be triggered by the bacteria Pseudomonas aeruginosa but an investigation found it was no more common in people with schizophrenia than those without the diagnosis.

But just before the end of the 60s, the original research team dropped a scientific bombshell. They claimed to have identified the schizophrenia specific scent and got their results published in glittery headline journal Science.

Using gas chromotography they identified the ‘odorous substance’ as trans-3-methyl-2-hexenoic acid, now known as TMHA.

At this point, you may be staring blankly at the screen, batting your eyelids in disinterest at the mention of a seemingly minor chemical associated with the mental illness, but to understand why it got splashed across the scientific equivalent of Vogue magazine you need to understand something about the history, hopes and dreams of psychiatry research.

For a great part of the early 20th century, psychiatry was on the hunt for what was called an ‘endogenous schizotoxin’ – a theorised internal toxin that supposedly triggered the disorder.

A great part of the early scientific interest in psychedelics drew on the same idea as psychiatrists wondered whether reality-bending drugs like LSD and mescaline were affecting the same chemicals, or, in some cases, might actually be the ‘schizotoxins’ themselves.

So a chemical uniquely identified in the sweat of people with schizophrenia was big news. Dreams of Nobel Prizes undoubtedly flashed through the minds of the investigators as they briefly allowed themselves to think about the possibility of finally cracking the ‘mystery of madness’.

As the wave of excitement hit, other scientists quickly hit the labs but just couldn’t confirm the link – the results kept coming in negative. In 1973 the original research team added their own study to the disappointment and concluded that the ‘schizophrenic odour’ was dead.

Looking back, we now know that TMHA is genuinely an important component in sweat odour. Curiously, it turns out it is largely restricted to Caucasian populations but no link to mental illness or psychiatric disorder has ever been confirmed.

The theory seems like an curious anomaly in the history of psychiatry but it occasionally makes a reappearance. In 2005 a study claimed that the odour exists but is “complex and cannot be limited to a single compound, but rather to a global variation of the body odor” but no replications or further investigations followed.

I, on the other hand, am still convinced it was the staff that were the source of the ‘strange odour’, but have yet to get research funding to confirm my pioneering theories.

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‘Selling’ condoms in the Congo: Amy Lockwood on TED.com

HIV is a serious problem in the DR Congo, and aid agencies have flooded the country with free and cheap condoms. But few people are using them. Why? “Reformed marketer” Amy Lockwood offers a surprising answer that upends a traditional model of philanthropy. (Some NSFW images.) (Recorded at TEDGlobal 2011, July 2011, in Edinburgh, Scotland. Duration: 4:17.)

Watch Amy Lockwood’s talk on TED.com, where you can download it, rate it, comment on it and find other talks and performances from our archive of 1,000+ TEDTalks.

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