‘What’s Killing Us’ – TED ebook examines our toughest global health problems

In the past decade, we’ve changed the way we collectively view the health of the 7 billion people who occupy this planet. Health issues were once seen as an isolated national or regional problem; now they are a global concern. In What’s Killing Us: A Practical Guide to Understanding Our Biggest Global Health Problems, 2011 TED Senior Fellow and healthcare expert Alanna Shaikh lays out the most important challenges and issues in global wellness – from tuberculosis and HIV/AIDS to flu, maternal mortality, and the diminishing effectiveness of antibiotics – while untangling the web of jargon that so often permeate those discussions. Shaikh, who runs the international development focused-blog Blood and Milk, also provides clear ideas about how these worldwide problems can be managed.

In What’s Killing Us, you concentrate on 10 major health topics. Why just 10?

Because they cover a wide and varied range of health issues. Understanding them will give you the background you need to learn about any global health topic. These are some of the most important issues that the human race is facing, although they’re just the highlights of the many health threats that endanger us.

What are the most promising initiatives you’ve seen to improve global health?

Although it has taken some criticism lately,  The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria has elevated global health to a consistent international priority. I am also excited about inviting more people into health care – training community health workers, giving nurses more responsibility, and teaching people to care for their own health. Making good health is everyone’s job, not just the job of physicians. Our new focus on improving health systems is also inspiring. Looking at health and health care in a broader social and national context makes a huge difference.

How real are the threats of a global pandemic?

Our globalized lifestyles mean that there is almost no way to stop infectious diseases from spreading rapidly and internationally. When a very contagious disease crops up, we’re all at risk. We got off easy with swine flu because it was highly contagious but was not all that dangerous once you had it. There is no guarantee the next pandemic will be as benign.

We see a number of philanthropists, Bill Gates among them, devoting a lot of time and cash to improving health. How important are these actions?

Tremendously important. Global health is a field where targeted international effort and investment has a powerful impact on human lives. Many global health problems are things we know how to solve if we just had the funding to do it.

What are the health issues that we should worry about the most in the next five to 10 years?

The two biggest are climate change and tuberculosis. Drug-resistant tuberculosis is the big one. Tuberculosis (TB) is evolving so that our current drugs can’t treat it. TB is also contagious through the air so it spreads in situations like crowded cities and public transport. And climate change will be the biggest single threat to human health, causing everything from famine to natural disasters to new infectious diseases. We should also worry about the growth of non-communicable diseases like cancer, diabetes, and heart disease. Rates of these diseases are rising rapidly. Finally, as the planet urbanizes we need to start make making good, deliberate choices about the design of cities. If cities just grow without any government thought about the health of people in them, it will be a health catastrophe.

What’s Killing Us: A Practical Guide to Understanding Our Biggest Global Health Problems is part of the TED Books series. They are $2.99 and are available for the Kindle and Nook, as well as for sale on Apple’s iBookstore.

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10 Ways to Find More Hours in Your Day

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The numbers behind the Copyright Math

Were you intrigued by “The $8 Billion iPod,” Rob Reid’s short TEDTalk about the new science of Copyright Math (TM)? We were. We needed to know more. More numbers, Rob! we said. And Rob (whose comic novel Year Zero comes out in July) sent us this treatise, a master class in creative mathematics:

A few weeks back, I gave a short TED talk about “Copyright Math.” Since TED draws both Hollywood and Silicon Valley bigwigs, I thought it would be a great venue for raising certain rights issues that have been a sore point between the two industries for years. But January’s brawl over the proposed SOPA law was a raw and recent memory. So I decided to make my talk playful, rather than sermonizing. Everyone can laugh at silly infographics. And who DOESN’T want to deface a Leave-it-to-Beaver-like Christmas scene with pirate-and-Santa graffiti?

Since the talk was so short, I couldn’t dive deeply into the numbers and sources that I based it on (which would have shattered the whimsical tone anyway). But even my silliest numbers were derived from actual research, performed by an actual Copyright Mathematician (me, that is). So I thought I’d use this blog post to put my sources and calculations out there for anyone who’d like to nerd out on the details.

First, the Motion Picture Association’s claims of $58 billion in actual US economic losses and 373,000 lost jobs came from this press release[1] (which can also be found on Scribd[2]). These numbers originated at a think tank called the “Institute for Policy Innovation” – an organization that Businessweek once profiled in an article called “Op-Eds for Sale.”[3] In it, an IPI analyst freely admitted to taking payoffs from disgraced lobbyist Jack Abramoff[4] in exchange for writing “op-ed pieces boosting the lobbyist’s clients.” The IPI’s president supported this behavior, saying it was neither wrong nor unethical, and dismissing those who apply “a naïve purity standard” to the business of writing op-eds.

This doesn’t necessarily mean that MPAA lobbyists paid the IPI to conjure up these numbers. But whatever their genesis, they’re not easy figures to support. In a February New York Times piece,[5] an MPAA spokesman did his best by attributing the eye-popping $58 billion sum to “piracy’s impact on a range of tangentially related industries — florists, restaurants, trucking companies, and so on.” Florists? Really? Exactly how many bouquets go unsold whenever someone swipes a copy of My Sharona?

Ignoring improbabilities like pirated steaks and daffodils, I looked at actual employment and headcount in actual content industries, and found nothing approaching the claimed losses. There are definitely concrete and quantifiable piracy-related losses in the American music industry. The Recording Industry Association’s website has a robust and credible database[6] that details industry sales going back to 1973, which any researcher can access for a few bucks (and annoying as I’ve found the RIAA to be on certain occasions, I applaud them for making this data available). I used it to compare the industry’s revenues in 1999 (when Napster debuted) to 2010 (the most recent available data). Sales plunged from $14.6 billion down to $6.8 billion — a drop that I rounded to $8 billion in my talk. This number is broadly supported by other sources, and I find it to be entirely credible.

But this pattern just isn’t echoed in other major content industries. My movie industry figures (showing significant growth from the rise of Napster to the present day) came from a meticulously researched report by BMO Capital Markets[7] called “Perspectives on the Filmed Entertainment Industry” which is sadly not currently findable on their website (and BMO — if you’re listening, please do the world a service, and at least publish “Exhibit 9” publicly!). My TV, satellite and cable figures (showing spectacular growth during the same period) came from the same outstanding report. I didn’t have time to discuss them during my talk, but numbers from local media analysts BIA/Kelsey showed robust growth in radio[8] in the years immediately following Napster’s debut. This was followed by a brief, agonizing contraction in the 2007-09 timeframe[9], which the organization attributes wholly to the recession, rather than piracy.[10]

So where is the missing $50 billion in piracy? It’s hard to accept that it’s foregone growth in markets that have grown in line with, or (in the case of the giant TV/ satellite/ cable market) far faster than historic norms. So we’re left looking for a market that has no historic norms. Because in such a case, one can tenuously argue that but for piracy, it might have grown at such a blistering rate as to make $50 billion in foregone sales at least hypothetically possible. So what significant American media market literally didn’t exist at all in the ’90s?

The best I could come up with was downloadable ringtones, which were first launched in Japan and Finland in 1998, [11] and didn’t appear on these shores until later.[12] Sure, citing ringtones was a punch line. But if the MPAA can document $50 billion in other pirated media, I’d love to hear about it.

And in case you’re wondering, at 30 seconds per ringtone, and $1.39 a pop (this was the lowest price I could find for ringtones anywhere, and I figured we’d get a bargain by buying in bulk), we’re looking at 34,218 years worth of ringtones — which, laid end to end, would stretch clear back to the late Neanderthal period.[13] And for you astrophysicists, the penny is ¾ of an inch in diameter.[14] 5.8 trillion of these suckers would therefore stretch for 68,655,303 miles, which can easily connect the Long Beach Westin to Mars when we’re on a close approach.[15] And for a mere $128, we could extend that journey clear to the auditorium that contains the TED stage. Meanwhile, my agricultural crop values all came from Wikipedia.[16]

As for the MPAA’s employment numbers, I compared them to data reported by the US Bureau of Labor Statistics in its 2010-11 “Career Guide to Industries.” This put the motion picture and video industry’s total employment at 361,900 jobs.[17] The 2000-01 edition of the same guide put employment at 270,000 in 1998.[18] The 2000-01 Guide simply uses “Motion Picture Production and Distribution” as the industry descriptor, but a close reading of both Guides seems to indicate that they’re talking about the same industrial sector, so I infer that the 1998 Guide used “Motion Picture” as shorthand for the broader filmed entertainment sector.

As for music industry employment, I took the average revenue per employee at Universal Music in 2010 (roughly $852,000),[19] at EMI in 2009 ($300,000),[20] and Warner Music Group in 2008 (about $875,000).[21] This gave me an average revenue-per-employee of about $675,000 throughout the industry. Applied to the industry’s 1999 revenue, this ratio implies total employment of about 22,000 at record labels, which I doubled to account for the retail side of the business as well. This is clearly an imperfect estimate, but even if it’s off by 100% (and I’m quite certain that it’s not), it doesn’t undermine my bigger point. In any event, I combined my music industry number with the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ filmed entertainment number to get my starting-point content industry employment. I then subtracted the claimed 373,000 in job losses to infer in the (obviously playful) “negative employment” statistic.

To me, the most depressing number in the presentation is the $150,000 maximum fine that Congress designates for “willfully” pirating a single copy of a single song under the Digital Theft Deterrence and Copyright Damages Improvement Act of 1999.[22] This number is grotesquely divorced from the actual damages and harm caused by a single instance of piracy. As such, it represents a naked perversion of “The Law” — turning it from a source of justice into a bludgeon for a powerful and cynical lobby. The music industry has sued more than 30,000 US citizens under this law. Since the consequences of losing would be bankruptcy in almost all cases, the crushing majority of defendants settled without daring to challenge the industry. As a result, the maximum $150,000 per-song fine has never actually been imposed (although one student is currently fighting a verdict of over $20,000 per song,[23] and a single mom was hit with an $80,000-per-song ruling,[24] which was later reduced, but is still being debated in appeal).

In determining a given device’s maximum capacity for infringing material, I assumed an average song length of three minutes, and an encoding rate of 128 kilobits/second. I went with 128 kbps because using the AAC codec,[25] this is the rate at which music achieves “hi-fi transparency[26] — which is to say, it becomes indistinguishable from CD quality in most listening environments. This rounds very closely to 1 megabyte of data per minute of music.[27] At 32 megabytes, the Rio (1999’s Christmas hit) therefore had room for about 10 songs, which, if pirated, could represent up to $1.5MM in liabilities under US law. Today’s iPod classic, with its 160GB capacity, can hold 53,333 songs, which at $150,000 a pop is precisely $8 billion. Incidentally, Apple markets the iPod classic as having room for just 40,000 songs, but by my math, that’s selling it short. I meant to note this in the presentation, but I was running way over time by then, and spared everyone the convoluted math (so if the leap from 40,000 songs to an $8 billion liability confused anyone, I apologize — I had meant to take a quick detour through that 53,333 figure!).

FINALLY: the 75,000 jobs figure was just a joke. I think that was probably obvious.

And as for alien music liabilities … well, that happens to be major area of interest and research for me. But I’ll leave that for another forum.

— Rob Reid

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Meet the 2012 TEDGlobal Fellows!

A Nigerian healthcare entrepreneur providing urgent air services across West Africa. A Lebanese-Egyptian Islamic art historian who uses ancient Arabic visual data to solve modern-day design issues. A British applied mathematician looking for ways to diagnose Parkinson’s disease by listening to patients’ voices.

The TED Fellows program — which honors world-changing innovators from around the globe and brings them into the heart of the TED community — today announced its new class of TEDGlobal 2012 Fellows. Hailing from 16 countries and covering a wide range of disciplines across the arts and sciences, the Fellows will attend TEDGlobal 2012 in Edinburgh this summer, where they’ll give TEDTalks in a special Fellows session, participate in high-level workshops, and join in the conversation with the TED community during the conference.

“The 19 Fellows who make up the 2012 TEDGlobal class have already demonstrated breathtaking accomplishment,” says Tom Rielly, director of the TED Fellows program. “We have a Kenyan self-taught sculptor who transforms ‘junk’ into art, including sublime eyewear, a Ugandan prison activist who works to reintegrate African prisoners into their communities and an American coral scientist who is studying the impact of climate change on marine life.

“All the Fellows are at dramatic inflection points in their careers, and we hope to help them accelerate their progress, no matter what their domain.”

The TED Fellows program helps to raise international awareness of Fellows as well as nurture their careers through ongoing coaching, mentoring and collaboration within the TED community. The TEDGlobal 2012 Fellows join a total of 287 Fellows to date from 75 countries.

See the full list of TEDGlobal 2012 Fellows >>

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TED’s Worldwide Talent Search: Sign up in Vancouver!

From April to June 2012, TED will be throwing 14 events around the world to search for unheard voices that need to be seen onstage at TED2013. Learn more about TED2013 Worldwide Talent Search >>

Just announced: Applications are open now to appear at the event in Vancouver! If TED@Vancouver is the closest event to you geographically, apply online to appear. Online signups for TED@Vancouver are open from now until April 12; to sign up, you’ll need to fill out a form and send a one-minute video.

Signups are also open now for Worldwide Talent Search events in:

Shanghai, China: Signups close March 29; event is May 17
Bangalore, India: Signups close April 1; event is May 20
Seoul, South Korea: Signups close April 4; event is May 23
Sydney, Australia: Signups close April 8; event is May 27
Tokyo, Japan: Signups close April 10; event is May 29
Vancouver, Canada: Signups close April 12; event is May 31

And coming up:

New York, United States: Signups open March 30 and close April 19; event is June 7
São Paulo, Brazil: Signups open April 4 and close May 2; event is June 11
Amsterdam, Netherlands: Signups open April 12 and close May 2; event is June 20

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21Tips For Building the Body of Legend Bruce Lee

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How to Become the Most Productive Blogger on the Block

So, you have finally found what you are passionate about, you blog about it regularly, you love to write and come up with new ideas, but nobody ever told you all the other bits that were involved in blogging. The guest posts, the commenting on other blogs, the social media requirements, the eBooks, the eCourses and that’s not including the other job you may be holding down.

So how can anyone become a productive blogger with all these tasks to perform daily?

The WritingThe ReadingThe CommentingThe MarketingThe Stats Checking

The cornerstone of what blogging is; writing. Bloggers have different schedules, some like to post once a week some more often but even if you just post once a week, we know that’s the tip of the iceberg when it comes to writing. Bloggers need to guest post, others regularly contribute to fabulous sites like Lifehack. Bloggers also regularly write free reports, eBooks and eCourses to help their readers fulfill their dreams and passions.

Bloggers regularly read large amounts daily, they read content from other blogs, they research the latest trends in how blogging is progressing and they openly read what the competition are writing.

They also read lots of blogs so they can comment on these blogs and spread their wonderful opinions around the blogosphere. Or rather they look for blogs with similar topics and comment regularly. When blogs use plugins like CommentLuv this helps drive traffic to their site as the last post will show up at the bottom of the comment.

Online and offline. Social Media helps to build connections and create relationships. Engaging readers in conversation can help to create a following necessary to grow a blog. Offline marketing can also help to drive traffic from other sources that you wouldn’t normally have access to online.

A killer habit in the first year of blogging. It’s so motivating to see that people are actually reading and even better subscribing to your blog, but how much time are you spending watching their actions? Yes, it’s good to know which posts are popular, but it’s also important to breathe and let it go.

Now we know some of the tasks we should all be doing as a blogger but the question remains, “how do we fit them all in?”

I know you know the answer to this one. Yes, you guessed it: we pull out the calendar and schedule time for all these tasks. But before we do that, let us look at the 80/20 rule and see how much time you are currently spending on these tasks and which ones are actually helping you grow a successful blog.

List out all of your daily blogging tasks and write down (honestly) how much time you spend on each one. Now look at all the tasks and critically assess which tasks are growing your blog. Which ones actually get you followers and subscribers? Which ones suck your time like a nasty time vampire? Could your work week in fact be reduced to a Four Hour Work Week?

Leo Babauta of Zen Habits would tell you to ditch the things that aren’t important, to focus on the writing, and that if you produce good quality content the traffic will come. While that may be true it’s important to note that when Leo started he wasn’t just writing one good quality post a week he was writing 10 of them. Although I do believe with Leo’s tactics, I also believe that a little of the other factors can help the rest of us carve out a space for our blogs on the internet. So if you want to follow Leo’s tactics of focusing solely on your writing you want to check out this post which will tell you how you can write lots of content in short periods of time.

What keeps most bloggers motivated and productive is the reminder of why they are doing what they are doing. Most of us started out with a mission. A vision to share our skills, knowledge or experiences with the world in the hope that they can make a difference in the lives of others. Reconnect with that passion daily, write it up over your desk if necessary and when you realize you have gone off track look up and get back to writing that good content that will make not just the most productive but the best blogger on the block.

(Photo credit: the word blog written with old typewriter via Shutterstock)

Ciara Conlon is a Personal Productivity Coach and author. Her mission is to help people achieve their best through working efficiently and being positive and present. “Through Productivity and Positivity I believe there is little we can’t achieve” go to Productivity & Positivity and get Free eBook called Clear the Clutter; Find Your Life

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7 miles down: James Cameron’s sub set to explore the Mariana Trench

Photo: James Cameron / Deepsea Challenge

Update: This Storify tells the story of the descent in tweets from around the world …

If all goes as planned, today James Cameron (watch his TEDTalk) begins an epic dive to the deepest point in the ocean — taking the director almost 7 miles down into the Mariana Trench.

Follow the Deepsea Challenge expedition >>

The Mission Blue ocean news site offers context on the expedition:

Cameron spent the last six years researching submersible technology and coming up with solutions to negotiate the Mariana Trench’s crushing 1,086 bars of pressure (roughly 1,000 times the pressure at sea level). He began building his vessel—dubbed the Deepsea Challenger—in secret in Australia. His effort resulted in a 24-foot-long craft that seats only one person and has no amenities. Now, he is ready to put that vessel to the test in a 6-hour solo dive.

On the ocean’s floor, Cameron plans to film what he sees (the sub is designed not to kick up clouds from the ocean floor) and turn his deep dive into a 3D film to share the wonderment of this almost-unknown part of the ocean.

Mission Blue asked ocean legend and TED Prize winner Sylvia Earle for her thoughts on Cameron’s epic exploration:

Earle thinks Cameron should receive the same level of recognition as the pioneering astronauts who returned with images of the Earth from afar. “The ocean is relevant to every breath we take, every drop we drink, and this provides incentive to solve problems and take the ocean seriously,” she said. “There’s a sense of urgency for exploring and gaining knowledge about the ocean so we can take action,” she added.

One other TED-related side note: Only two other humans have ever made this dive, US Navy lieutenant Don Walsh and oceanographer Jacques Piccard, in the Trieste in 1960. And now Piccard’s son, Bertrand Piccard, is attempting to circumnavigate the globe in a solar-powered plane — a plan he shared at TEDGlobal 2009. Watch Bertrand Piccard’s TEDTalk >>

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Video: Biking from SF to TED2012 (in 5 minutes)

Keeping with his annual tradition, Rickshaw Bags’ CEO, Mark Dwight, rode his bicycle more than 500 miles from San Francisco to Los Angeles in February to attend TED2012 in Long Beach — along the way raising more than $10,000 to help homeless youth via the I Think I Can campaign.

With a Go Pro camera on his handlebars, he collected over 40 hours of footage from the ride. Here is a compressed version of the highlights — from San Francisco’s Golden Gate Bridge to the Long Beach Performing Arts Center — in 5 minutes.

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15 Simple Changes That Will Quickly Improve Your Health

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A Powerful Three-Step Algorithm for Happiness

Today I’m going to share a really simple secret that can make your day instantly better. If you’re feeling down, it can make you happier, all day long.

It’s something I’ve been trying myself, with great results.

It’s three steps, and anyone can do them. This is an algorithm that can be repeated over and over, all day long. It starts with a basic assumption: that we are all human beings capable of goodness, of love, of pain, of broken hearts and passionate love. That we all have bad days, that inside our jaded exteriors is a person who just wants love.

It is based on my observation that we take other people for granted, and that we judge others and become irritated with them for almost no good reasons, and we expect everyone to make us happy or at least behave the way we want them to, and if they don’t, our day is ruined. That’s crazy. People are living their own lives, and aren’t trying to please us or act in accordance with our expectations, and once we accept that, we can be happy.

Here are the three steps. They might sound silly to some of you, but I urge you to give them a try. For just one day. Even just an hour. They are powerful, and they work.

1. Think “I love you, and I’m thankful for you” to every single person today. This sounds kinda silly perhaps, but it works. Seriously, try it. Look at each person you pass or encounter today, and think to yourself (as if you’re talking to the person you’re looking at), “I love you, and I’m thankful for you.” Try to say it with feeling. Mean it! Even to those you pass on the street, in the elevator, while you’re driving (you might only see them for a split second, from a distance).

2. Smile at that person, and look them in the eye. Many of us are used to not looking people in the eye, avoiding contact. But looking someone in the eye is acknowledging their existence and human-ness, and establishing a connection. Smiling helps pass your happiness on to others. Obviously you can’t do this if the person is far from you or driving past you, but when you can, apply this step.

3. If you feel comfortable, say it aloud to that person. Say, “I love you and I’m thankful for you.” You’ll probably only say this to people you know very well (though the bold among you might say it to strangers!). If you’re not comfortable with that, try to say it with actions instead of words. A simple hug, doing something nice, spending time with someone while treating them kindly, doing a favor without expecting a return favor, just being thoughtful. Obviously you can’t do this step with everyone you pass, but the more people you apply this step to, the better.

Try these steps, please.

Also know that I love you. And I’m grateful that you’re alive.

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How to Maintain a Blog AND a Full-Time Job

If you’re like me, you can’t spend every waking moment of every day writing, editing, polishing, Tweeting, and enjoying the fruits of your hard labor.

You have a life.

For me, that looks like a steady 9-5 job, during which I work on other stuff–my blog, writing, and life must take a back seat if I want to take home a paycheck.

So how can you maintain both? Losing sanity, to me, is not acceptable–I don’t want to pull my hair out trying to get everything done at once. And I really don’t want to lose any sleep–I’m a sleepaholic.

I’ve found that the best way to maintain an active lifestyle and steady job, while still consistently push out great content, is to plan better.

Specifically, planning the parts of the day that most people forget about.

Instead of:

Wake up at 6.Go to work at 8.Work until lunch. Take a one-hour break.Work until 5.Come home, watch TV, go to bed.

This is what a “normal” day could look like for me:

Wake up at 6. Try to get two or three blog posts finished.Go to work at 8.Work until lunch. Try to write 1,000 words (on anything: blogs, books, etc.)Work until 5. On the way home, brainstorm and plan the evening’s writing goals.Write until 8 or 9 pm (I like to do this in Starbucks, because everyone loves to make fun of writers in Starbucks).Go to bed.

You can see from the above list that I’ve blocked out the “major” chunks of my time, and filled them with some of the goals for my writing. But upon actual analysis of this method, it turns out that it’s still not an efficient-enough strategy if I expect to get a lot of writing done.

But by taking the above schedule and popping it into my favorite task-management software (Wunderlist is mine, but of course this can work with anything), I can “check in” to my progress throughout the day.

During the “brainstorming and planning” blocks, I plug in different tasks to my to-do list, like “write X post,” or “finish novel outline”When I wake up in the morning, I try to get a few blog posts written–I don’t worry as much about doing “structured” writing here–my brain is usually mush anyway until about 11:30.During lunch, I focus on knocking off as many items as possible from the ongoing list. I use the Pomodoro Technique for this.Throughout the day, I’ll have Wunderlist open (part of the reason I love it so much is that it’s literally on every device) and I’ll drop in new tasks and post ideas to work on sometime later.At home (or at the coffee shop), I’ll knock out two or three more tasks.

This whole plan may seem dauntingly obvious, but here’s the catch: I try to keep everything out of my head and in a tracking tool–pen and paper, Evernote, Wunderlist, whatever my preference happens to be that week. But I try to catch and “dump” every single task and item into a tool. Sure, the little things start to stack up after awhile, but there’s not much that motivates me more than knocking off a little item here and there.

So the plan is to block out major sections of time throughout your day first, then focus on writing everything down. When your “chunk” of time that you’ve allotted toward blogging comes up, you’ll have a nice, organized list of things to do. You won’t be worried with checking email, Facebook, or wasting time coming up with post ideas–your entire to-do list will be right in front of you, just waiting to be checked off as “complete.”

What do you think? What are some other ways of maintaining a successful work-life-blog balance?

Photo credit: Sami Keinänen (CC BY-SA 2.0)

Nick Thacker is a writer from Texas, and he's interested in hacking life to make it better. His posts are helpful for writers, bloggers, and pretty much anyone who wants to hack their life! Check him out on his website, where he talks about how to write and social media for writers. Also, be sure to grab the newsletter!

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21 Counter-Intuitive Break Ideas to Boost Your Productivity at Work

Every self-help program talks about the importance of taking a 10-15 minute break to boost your productivity.

Breaks give us much needed time to rest our eyes, move around, stretch our stiff muscles, get more blood and oxygen flowing to our brain, to unwind and obtain a fresh outlook on complex work problems.

There is just one problem – we often forget to take them. (Note: Going to the bathroom, grabbing a cup of coffee or checking Facebook updates does not count, as these activities hardly give us enough time to energize our body and restore our concentration and productivity.)

As strange as it may sound, taking regular breaks throughout the work day requires discipline and a little bit of planning. Actually, the reason why so many people push themselves to the limit of exhaustion is simple – they just can not think of any interesting activities they can do, during their break time. So they end up working for 4-5 hours straight until their body offers them a painful reminder.

If this sounds like you, here are 21 Counter-Intuitive Break ideas that help to restore your energy, sharpen your focus, boost productivity and avoid burnout at work.

1. Listen to a guided meditation. There are plenty of 10-15 minute meditations that allow you to trigger your creativity, let go of muscles tension and take your mind of the work at hand.

All you have to do is put on a headset, close your eyes and enjoy peace and relaxation even in the midst of work chaos.

2. Share your break with a co-worker. Alone, you might not always have the strength to pull yourself away from the computer, but if you have a friend taking breaks with you, it is much easier to stick with your break routine. In addition, it offers a great opportunity to bond with your colleagues and get to know them better.

3. Step outside for a fresh perspective. Leaving a stuffy office and letting yourself enjoy the warmth of the sunlight, the coolness of a breeze and the freshness of the spring air can do miracles to your mind and body. You will come back feeling rejuvenated and ready to approach your work with new energy and a fresh perspective.

4. Close your eyes and take 10 deep breaths. Stand up and walk away from your desk. Find a quiet place, where you can sit down, close your eyes, smile to yourself and take a few deep breaths. Imagine tension, stress and anxiety leaving your body as you breathe out, and peacefulness, positivity and relaxation filling your mind with every breath that you take.

5. Say NO to tension headaches. Slowly roll your neck to the right noticing a slight tension in your neck muscles. Hold this position for a count of 120 (2 minutes), then turn your head to the opposite side and repeat. Enjoy the feeling of warmth and flexibility return to your neck and shoulders.

6. Try people-gazing. Watching people walking down the street, chatting in a nearby café, and driving by, is meditation in itself. In addition looking outside the window helps to take the strain off the eyes.

7. Rock out to some great music. Music is a great mood changer, especially if you allow yourself to get up and move with it. Just a few minutes of humming and dancing can put a smile on your face and get your blood moving.

8. Take a Thumb and Pinkie Brain Break. This is a great break idea if you need a quick distraction from the problem at hand to get your creative juices flowing:

Take your left hand and have your fingers in and your thumb up.Then take your right hand and put all the fingers in except the pinkie. So in other words, your left thumb up and right pinkie out.Now switch the roles of your hands. And now try doing it faster.

Not as simple as it looked, right?

9. Delete some tasks from your to-do list. What can be more satisfying than taking a long hard look at your do-to list and crossing off a few unimportant tasks?

10. Eat an apple. S-L-O-W-L-Y. In the middle of a busy day, when you feel rushed, take a 2-3 minute break to eat an apple (or another fruit that you like). Just do it very slowly. Notice the flavor, the texture, the freshness. Doing something at a slow pace might feel weird, even annoying at first. But after a few minutes you feel much calmer and less stressed.

11. Say Thank you. Grab a notecard and your favorite pen and write a quick thank you to someone you appreciate. Then attach a stamp and go downstairs to put it in a mailbox. This simple act of gratitude will take your focus away from any pressing work problems and will put you in a good mood.

12. Take a “No Cell-phone Walk”. Leave your cell-phone in the office and head outside for a brisk walk. Shake off apathy and fatigue. Walk even faster, raising your heartbeat and letting the excitement and the sense of freedom re-charge your mind and body.

13. Read a magazine or a book. Pick a read that has nothing to do with your area of work or the latest news. Give your brain the pleasure of not to thinking, being stressed or making decisions.

14. Re-waterize yourself. First drink a full glass of water. Second splash some water on your face: warm to relax, cold – to wake up and energize yourself.

15. Make animals of the clouds. This is a great exercise to entertain your children, but it is also a great game you can play alone as it helps to tap into your creative potential and distract your mind from upcoming deadlines or customer complaints.

16. Pick up the pace. If you feel yourself tired and sleepy, deliberately pick up the pace, and try to move a little faster than usual. Type faster. Speak faster. Read faster. Make decisions faster. And, of course, go home sooner.

17. Laugh off the tension. You can start by simply saying, “Ha, ha, ha.” and keep repeating it, until you are really laughing. A few minutes of a good belly laugh help to get rid of tension, relax a lot of involuntary muscles and increase blood circulation.

18. Stretch out stiffness. Getting up from your desk to do a set of sun salutations or this might not be an option if you work in a room full of people. But it does not mean that you should deprive yourself of the pleasure of stretching your body and getting some exercise. Try a simple stretching exercise.

Plant your feet firmly on the ground, lift your arms and look at your palms.Stretch your spine for about 30-60 seconds, gradually increasing pressure, as if you were trying to touch the ceiling with your fingers.Relax, lower your arms and feel the energy moving up your spine.

19. Do something artistic. Write a short, funny poem and dedicate it to your co-worker. Draw a picture for your kids. Take a few photos of your surroundings. Let your creative side shine!

20. Unclutter your desk. A great way to take a much needed break, while looking “busy” is to unclutter your desk. Not only is it relaxing, it also helps to activate productive energy flow.

21. Juggle. Learning to juggle isn’t particularly difficult and it could be a great exercise to take during a break (maybe not in the office itself, but in a place, where balls flying left and right will not bother anyone). Juggling requires fine muscle control, timing and concentration. But most importantly, it is fun!

(Photo credit: Office Worker Holding Clock in Front of Face via Shutterstock)

Arina is a goal setting expert and an author of Real Goal Getting book. She blogs at http://www.arinanikitina.com/.

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9 Habits of Highly Productive Leaders

There are many definitions of leadership, many quotes from highly revered people that sum up the essence of leadership. Perhaps the most well know is Gandhi’s

“Be the change you want to see in the world.”

But as Leadership expert Robin Sharma has pointed out, you don’t have to have a title to be a leader. He tells us that we all must step up to the mark and be a leader in our own field, even if we work in a team or are self employed.

When it comes to self leadership it’s about taking control and responsibility for your own circumstances. It’s about stepping forward, instead of stepping back. It’s about raising your hand and not staying in the background. If everyone were to step up and take responsibility the world would be a better place.

For me Leadership and Productivity are very closely linked. Productivity is synonymous with getting things done but what few people consciously realize is that it is also synonymous with creativity; and these two elements are essential for effective Leadership. We all know that to achieve anything in life we need to get things done but if we are merely to complete tasks as they come our way this will amount to nothing. We need time for creative and strategic thinking. The most effective leaders are those who have the vision to make the world a better place and have the means through being highly productive to get the job done.

Here are 10 suggested habits that can help you become a more productive leader whether you have a title or not.

1. Have a clear Vision

Having a crystal clear vision of what you want to achieve which is communicated clearly to all involved will ensure the commitment and motivation are present to achieve the goal.

2. Have a Workflow System

A workflow system will allow you to work effectively and creatively by freeing up time to do the work the matters. Understanding the most effective flow of work will ensure that work is not duplicated or distractions don’t interfere with the work that matters.

3. Take Responsibility

Take responsibility for all of your actions and behaviours. Eliminate any victim behavior, Remember that you are the master of your fate.

4. Work Your Body

All of the worlds high achievers work out regularly, Obama, Bush, Branson, all know the benefits of regular exercise for stamina, for performance and for productivity. It is one of the best habits you can adopt to become more productive. The extra energy that you gain from working out along with the de-stressing effect will enhance your productivity and performance more than any other habit.

5 Relax Your Body

Along with exercise the body needs rest, relaxation and plenty of sleep to perform at its best. Meditation and Yoga can also help to relax and de-stress the body.

6. Value your Time

Delegate, outsource and share your work.

“Only do what only you can do.”

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Your time is too precious to waste so only use it to do the work that no one else can do for you.

7. Become a good Listener

If you lead other people it is essential to listen well but you will also find that if you listen well it can make you more productive by eliminating duplication of work or misunderstandings that can lead to unessential work being completed.

8. Be the best you can be

Always do your best and you will have no regrets. Success doesn’t come to those who sit and wait, it is necessary to work towards your vision. Engage with your vision, keep taking action.

“Nothing will work unless you do.”

Maya Angelou

9. Make time for Thinking

In order to excel at what you do, You must make time for thinking. Creative thinking and strategic thinking. This is one of the biggest mistakes people in business make. They are too busy with day to day tasks that they forget to plan, to innovate, to dream. And without these factors there will never be growth or involvement, simply stagnation.

So step up and take the lead and start to make your life make a difference.

(Photo credit: Number Rainbow Lights Glitter with Sparkles via Shutterstock)

Ciara Conlon is a Personal Productivity Coach and author. Her mission is to help people achieve their best through working efficiently and being positive and present. “Through Productivity and Positivity I believe there is little we can’t achieve” go to Productivity & Positivity and get Free eBook called Clear the Clutter; Find Your Life

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How to Find Happiness Without Buying It

Our materialistic society has led us to believe that happiness cannot be obtained without having money.

Rather than learning to be satisfied with what we have, we are taught to want more. We learn from advertising, and from the media, that we need to buy trinkets and toys in order to make ourselves happy, or to fulfill emotional needs, and that the purchases they are trying to talk us into will provide us with the psychological comfort we are looking for.
Unfortunately, as a society we have bought into these misguided messages and have come to believe that spending money on certain items will bring us fame, fortune, happiness, beauty, or popularity. We end up using money as a crutch to provide us with something we ultimately must find within ourselves. As we become caught up in this charade, we trade precious hours of our lives trying to earn the money we have been taught to covet so much. We trade hours of our lives working, sacrificing time that could have been spent with our families, for the pursuit of the almighty dollar.

In order to find true happiness, we first must learn to change our attitudes about money. We must learn that money, and the spending of it, provides only a temporary relief but does not present us with any real long lasting benefits. We end up owning something we either do not really want or do not really need, and the underlying emotional issues remain.

Rather than focus on the temporary satisfaction you may feel from spending money, try the following to bring you happiness without it.
Imagine Having no Money
Imagine what you would do for happiness if you had no money at all. Think about how you would spend your time, and what you would do for enjoyment. Change your focus from material possessions to other things that bring you enjoyment, such as spending quality time with your family and friends. Rather than focusing on the accumulation of possessions, concentrate instead on playing with or reading to your children, or spending time out enjoying nature.

Want What you Already Have
Society teaches us to want what others have. Instead, shift your thinking so that you are satisfied with, or want, what is already yours. What tends to happen is once we reach our goals in terms of owning personal possessions, we trade those old goals in for a set of new ones that involves bigger, better, and grander objects.

Goals are good to have because they motivate us to work, and to continue to strive for self improvement. The key is to find a balance between having worthy goals and recognizing when we are allowing the desire for possessions to overwhelm the importance of other aspects of our lives. Rather than constantly striving for things we do not have, we need to shift our focus to being thankful for the things we already possess.

Volunteer Your Time
One way to appreciate what you have is to work with others who have nothing, or who have disabilities that no amount of money can overcome. Volunteering time to work in a food bank, or to work with underprivileged children, can really alter your perspective on where you are in life, and can create a deeper appreciation for the gifts you do have in your life.

Helping others can boost your spirits as well. There is a great deal of personal satisfaction to be gained from giving aid to those who are in need of it, leaving you with a sense of satisfaction that will carry over into your own life. Use the experiences of helping others to teach your children compassion and civic responsibility.

There are a number of ways to enjoy life without the need for a great deal of money. Certainly, it is important to work and earn enough to provide for our basic needs and the needs of our families, but it is important to recognize when the desire for personal possessions becomes overly consuming. There needs to be a balance between a satisfying work life and a rich home life, and the best way to achieve such a balance is to ensure the drive for material possessions does not become all consuming.

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Are You Ready to Be an Independent Contractor?

Permanent employment may be disappearing faster than anyone thought. In recent weeks, both the Wall Street Journal and Harvard Business Review have published articles on crowd-sourced labor, or the hiring of a temporary team to accomplish a very specific task.

In increasing numbers, large organizations are using crowd-sourcing instead of permanent hiring to achieve their goals. AOL used it recently when it hired a team of contractors to build software to help the company best leverage its video assets. It makes sense if you think about it. For one thing, hiring and training new permanent employees is very expensive. For another, it’s difficult to get rid of them during financial rough patches or when they are no longer needed.

This is not a new idea. Futurist research has been saying for years that by 2025, the majority of us will be contingent workers, working from home or private offices and completing a variety of tasks for a variety of employers. For most, long-term, stable relationships with employers will in short-order be a thing of the past, and I suspect that, as individuals, we’re not ready.

I’m an independent contractor today, and I can tell you it took a lot of getting used to. I eased into this career over a period of four years, frequently returning to my large company of origin for some predictable work and comforting conversation by the water cooler. I’ve been a solo-preneur for a while now, and I still tire of the administrative nightmares and emotional hand-wringing that comes with having my own business.

Of course, working via crowd-sourcing has its advantages. Maybe you need to earn a little extra cash. Maybe you’re geographically challenged. Maybe you want to choose your own hours so you can pick the kids up from school. Maybe you want to work in your pajamas.  Contingent work allows for all of these things.

Even the benefits of having a single job with one employer are diminishing. We all know what happened to large company job security in 2008, and as HBR and the New York Times pointed out, that work for many “regular” employees (like those in retail) is just as unpredictable as the work for independent contractors.

However, working for yourself and being 100% in charge of your own career requires a skill set that is not native to most people. Not only do you have to be self-disciplined, deadline-focused, and skilled at developing virtual relationships, but you have to be able to manage your time on many different fronts simultaneously, and keep track of who needs to pay you and when. You have to be out there selling your work and getting your own training so you can stay ahead of the competition. With freedom comes responsibility. Lots of it.

Given where we are inevitably heading as a workforce, you might want to dip your toe in this kind of work before you are thrown in head first. You can start by doing an isolated project for another department or volunteer organization, and filling out your online profiles thoroughly so potential employers can find you easily.

(Photo credit: Person at the notebook via Shutterstock)

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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Don’t Be a Minimalist: Regain Focus With Technology

We all hear the “minimalist” zealots screaming at us from on high,

“Sell your stuff, get rid of everything that isn’t important, use paper for everything, and be as minimal as possible.”

All this so we can regain focus on an important project as well as the things we have to do.

Sounds like a great idea, that is, as long as you work for yourself and work to sell the idea of being minimal. Don’t get me wrong – I try to minimize certain things in my life, but there are times this idea can be taken too far. We all can’t get rid of everything and many of us have to focus on things that we don’t want to do.

Instead of getting rid of all your stuff and “going minimal”, here is how you can use technology to stay focused and productive.

If you want to stay productive and focused in your complicated life you need a system. We have discussed many times at nauseam how to create and use a personal productivity system. Some say that we should “toss productivity out”. I couldn’t disagree more.

As long as you are creating a system that is just complicated enough to support your complex life but isn’t overcomplicated, you are good. Use one of the many awesome productivity tools that you have at your disposal.

We here at Stepcase Lifehack prefer to keep notifications to a bare minimum, but don’t believe that they should be completely turned off (of course, that is other than email). What is more important is choosing your digital notifications wisely.

If you are working on a project during the day, it may be the best time to mute your phone or just turn it off all together. Maybe you want to turn email notifications off for a set period of time. There are also some awesome apps like Tasker for Android that allow you to setup all kinds of smart notification options based on time, calendar entries, and even location.

Distractions is in quotes for a reason. I consider a distraction anything other than important projects that I must get done. This can be Twittering, IMing, SMSing, chatting, etc.

One of the best things that I have tried to implement during my day is that instead of blindly checking RSS feeds or tweeting something that would piss someone off anytime I want, I schedule that time instead. Schedule it in to your calendar and have time setup to “distract” yourself rather than focus on a project.

This is the other side of the “distractions” coin. We have to make sure that we protect our productive times with our life and limb so we can keep our focus. If you work in an environment where others can see your calendar appointments, make sure to block out some time during your day as a “meeting” so you can get stuff done.

I’m a list maker, mostly because I can make them in almost any app I choose. Something that I heard on a recent The Accidental Creative podcase was from Peter Bregman about creating an “ignore list”. The idea is simple. Just make a list of all the things that you want to ignore. Done.

This is a great thing to do, especially if you are the geeky, technical, or creative type that wants to play and mess around with new stuff. That stuff wastes your time. Add them to your ignore list and then reevaluate the list every so often so you don’t break your focus.

Using technology to automate things that we can do mindlessly is a great thing. This helps us recoup time and energy for other things as well as keep our focus our currently active task. Actions like paying your bills online, renaming photos, and even filing digital files can all be done automatically now with help of online payment systems and tools like Hazel.

Of course there are going to be important things to think through, but you might as well use technology to automate as much as possible.

You don’t have to lose the shirt off your back and give up your iPhone to regain focus. You can simply use amazing tools that are at your disposal to keep your focus on the things that are important and that you must get done.

(Photo credit: Stack of grey massage stones via Shutterstock)

CM Smith is a technologist, writer, and husband. He holds a degree in MIS and CMPSC from Penn State. CM is also interested in personal productivity, creativity and how to use technology to get things done. Check out his writing at devburner.net or follow him on Twitter.

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Empty-Handed, Full-Hearted

We often load ourselves up when we travel, because we want to be prepared for various situations. This burden of being prepared leaves us with our arms full, unable to receive whatever is there when we arrive.

It leaves us tired from carrying, so that we are not happy when we meet someone new on our travels.

What if we traveled with empty hands, ready to embrace new experiences, receive new foods, touch new people?

We might feel less prepared when we leave, but the preparedness is an illusion. Stuff doesn’t make us prepared. Having empty hands but a heart that is full of love leaves us prepared for anything.

This doesn’t just apply to taking a trip, but to living each day. Each day is a journey, and we load ourselves up with material possessions, with tasks and projects, with things to read and write, with meetings and calls and texts. Our hands are full, not ready for anything new.

Drop everything, be open to everything.

Enter each day empty-handed, and full-hearted.

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The seers and oracles

An evocative passage from the 1976 book Hallucinogens and Shamanism about the use of the hallucinogenic Psilocybe mexicana mushroom by the Mazatec people of Mexico.

The Mazatecs say that the mushrooms speak. If you ask a shaman where his imagery comes from, he is likely to reply: I didn’t say it, the mushrooms did. The shamans who eat them; their function is to speak, they are the speakers who chant and sing the truth, they are the oral poets of their people, the doctors of the word, they who tell what is wrong and how to remedy it, the seers and oracles, the ones possessed by the voice.

Link to details of book.

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New from TED-Ed: Greg Gage and the cockroach beatbox

Throughout today and tomorrow, we’ll be sharing incredible video from our new TED-Ed channel.

By dissecting a cockroach … yes, live on stage … TED Fellow and neuroscientist Greg Gage shows how brains receive and deliver electric impulses — and how legs can respond to stimulation via sound. Length: 6:16.

This video is part of a TED-Ed series called Awesome Nature. Find other series on the TED-Ed channel on YouTube: youtube.com/TEDEd

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My Ideal Woman

… loves to learn, grow, explore, and share.

… would rather travel to more cities than buy more shoes.

… cares deeply about people, animals, and people who behave like animals.

… feels blissful being cuddled by a warm fire.

… enjoys breaking rules together.

… plays.

… stretches herself.

… loves being caressed in the bathtub.

… embraces truth even when she doesn’t feel strong enough to act on it.

… values contribution more than accumulation.

… likes active days and sensual nights.

… appreciates the gift of life.

… reads.

… forgives old bruises.

… makes healthy food taste yummy.

… tries new things just for the growth experience.

… communicates her desires openly and invites others to do the same.

… loves long walks under a starry sky, holding hands.

… bares her soul when making love.

… hugs.

… is selective about whom she lets in.

… is a crystal whose facets reflect light in ways which seem impossible.

… can be silly when she’s being serious, and serious when she’s being silly.

… accepts that I find her irresistibly attractive even when her body frustrates her.

… trusts in her heart enough to be spontaneous, but still consults her brain.

… doesn’t care what movie we’re watching as long as we’re touching.

… laughs.

… is a paradox.

… likes to meditate by candlelight.

… appreciates sincere reminders that she’s beautiful.

… enjoys hanging out with self-discipline one day and self-indulgence the next.

… likes making me feel powerful, though she can melt me with a glance.

… loves pausing to kiss on escalators.

… smiles.

If you've found this website helpful, please donate to show your support. The average donation is about $21.

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The Unpredictable Freedom and Sweetness of Chaos

‘You must have chaos within you to give birth to a dancing star.’ ~Friedrich Nietzsche

I’m going to share a productivity, planning and organizational hack that will change your life. It will yield some unpredictable results, but if you approach it the right way, it could bring some of the most amazing work of your life, along with freedom, joy, exhilaration.

What’s this miraculous hack?

It’s a simple one: let go. Let go of control and allow yourself to be swept away by the powerful currents of life. Let go of planning and embrace not know what will happen. Let go of productivity and be open to new ideas, new opportunities, spontaneous creativity.

Consider what we’re doing when we plan our day, our week, our year: we are trying to exert control over life, and predict with our plans the course our lives will take today, this week, this year.

We are saying: this is what I’m going to do today. This is how things will go. If I get these things done, life will be good. This is my idea of what this day will hold.

Now consider this: we have absolutely no idea if any of this is true. We cannot predict the future with any kind of certainty, and the idea that we can plan based on these shaky predictions is a nice fiction, but a fiction nonetheless. We do not know what will happen today, much less the rest of the week or month. Knowing what will happen this year? What a crock!

And consider: what if we could know? What if we could accurately predict every single day, and plan each day exactly? Would this be a great thing? I submit that it would suck infinitely more than not knowing. Having foreknowledge of the future means we know what will happen each day, which means not only will our days be ridiculously boring, but we’re stuck on one unshakable path. Foreknowledge means a crazy lack of freedom.

So we don’t know what will happen, nor should we want to. We can try to plan, but those plans are not based on real knowledge and probably won’t happen, so planning is a waste of time.

What can we do instead of trying to predict what will happen, instead of planning? Learn to embrace uncertainty, and be open to change. Learn to let go of control, and surf the ever-changing wave. Let unpredictability rule, let randomness be the force of our life, let spontaneity be the rule.

Some random thoughts based on my experiments with letting go:

Work is better with chaos. While the idea of having peaceful order to our workday is a nice one, it’s an illusion. And it’s frankly boring. Work based on fun, play, and spontaneity is more interesting. Imagine a project that is started with a spontaneous idea, and then changes course as you do it, embraces the ideas of strangers, ends up in a fantastic new place you could not have possibly foreseen when you started. This is how I did my last book, The Effortless Life, and it was one of the most fun I’ve ever had on a project. It’s how I’m doing all my projects now, actually.A year that isn’t planned. When I started Zen Habits in 2007, I had my year planned out in detail, with goals, actions and weekly plans. That, of course, was tossed out the door as soon as I started writing Zen Habits and meeting my first readers, who changed my life with their feedback and kind attention. My life was turned upside down, my plans became meaningless, and I learned that while life is unpredictable, that unpredictability can bring some amazing things.Be open to new possibilities. I learned, that first year of Zen Habits, to be open to new opportunities. Time and time again, new doors opened for me that I didn’t know — couldn’t know — would even be there. I saw the new door opening, considered it, and went in. That happened repeatedly, and taught me that there is no way to plan a path when you don’t know what each step will bring, what changes will happen to that path as you walk along it.Be open to strangers. Let’s say you plan your day rigidly. You’ve got your productivity system honed, you’re cranking out the tasks. You are a productivity machine! But now you randomly happen upon a stranger who says hi. You say hi back, and now you have a new opportunity: you can talk to this stranger, get to know him. But then you’d deviate from the plan! Do you stick to the plan, or talk to the stranger? Well, sticking to the plan would be more productive, and give you more control over your life. But if you talk to the stranger, you might make a new friend. You might learn something you’d never have learned otherwise. I’ve made some of my best friends like this, because I was willing to deviate from my plans and talk to a stranger.Chaos is creativity, and creativity is chaos. They are the same thing. Creative work doesn’t happen by plan and control. Sure, some of the worlds creative geniuses were detail freaks, but they didn’t make a plan to come up with a creative genius idea — it came to them because they were open to random thoughts, explored paths no one else had thought to look down, took an idea they saw from someone else and twisted it in a new way. Creativity comes from a place of chaos, and it’s only when you open yourself to this lack of control that you can come up with your best creativity.Some things to read: Two of the best books I’ve read recently embrace the idea of uncertainty, and they also happened to come at me from two of my best friends — both of whom I met almost randomly on the Internet. My friend Jonathan Fields wrote Uncertainty, and it’s a great exploration of some of these ideas. My friend Mary Jaksch sent me a book the other day called Bring Me the Rhinoceros that is an excellent use of Zen koans to explore similar ideas. Both books highly recommended.When we let go of our expectations that others will make us happy, we enjoy them more. We get angry and frustrated at people because they don’t act the way we want them to. We expect others to try to make us happy, to go out of their way to give us what we want. This is not why other people exist. When we let go of these expectations, we accept people for who they are, and learn to appreciate this uniqueness.If you don’t expect things to go as planned, you are open to the unplanned. Something might arise that is unexpected, and if you go with it, you’ll have to let go of your previous plans. This can be a wonderful thing. Many people (including the old me) get frustrated when new things come up that were unplanned, when plans go awry, but it doesn’t have to be frustrating. Just expect plans to change, or don’t really plan at all. Expect unplanned things to happen, and when they do, smile.Embrace not knowing what will happen. This is the ultimate freedom. You don’t know what you’re going to do today, nor what will come up. You are locked into nothing. You are completely free to do anything, to pursue any creative pursuit, to try new things as they come up, to be open to meeting new people. It can be scary at first, but if you smile when you think of not knowing, you’ll soon realize it’s a joyous thing.When you’re not focused on one outcome, you open the possibility for many outcomes. Most people are focused on specific goals (outcomes), and relentlessly pursue that outcome. They then dismiss other possibilities as distractions. But what if you have no predetermined outcome? What if you say that anywhere you end up could be good? You now open an infinite amount of possibilities, and you’re much more likely to learn something than if you only try to do the things and learn the things that support your predetermined outcome.

‘It’s a cruel and random world, but the chaos is all so beautiful.’ ~Hiromu Arakawa

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How 30 Minutes a Day Can Increase Your Intelligence

If you ask me, where humans go wrong is with their lack of patience. That, and their recent acquired taste for instant gratification.

The reality is that things take time. Richard Branson didn’t become a millionaire overnight. Madonna was not an overnight success. David Beckham was not born a superstar footballer.

That said, it’s actually pretty easy to improve yourself. Why?

Because most people don’t bother.

The majority of people don’t do a single thing to improve themselves. They just coast along expecting the world and everyone else to change for them and then get frustrated when they end up stuck in a rut.

So I’ve come up with a new theory: The Half Hour Theory.

I love it because it’s actually pretty easy to integrate into your life. The general idea is that you do one small thing every day for half an hour and then as time goes by you gradually improve. Sounds obvious, doesn’t it? You’d be surprised how many people don’t do the obvious. They do a lot of ‘talking about the obvious’ – but rarely do they take action.

This could take the form of half an hour’s reading every day. Doing so for one year will mean you have read the equivalent of 24 books – that’s more than most people read over a decade, let alone one year!

You may even want to improve the speed of your reading so you can learn faster. It could take the form of half an hour of study everyday – a new language or a new skill. This would equate to a full 6 week course by the end of the year.

This theory could even rely on you taking a half an hour every day spending time on the Internet, researching into something that really interests you. Doing this will ensure that you are always up to date with new trends and breakthroughs in your area of interest.

The point is that by dedicating a small amount of time every day to something that will expand your intelligence or improve your life in some way, you will (after a while) notice a large result.

Here’s how to implement The Half Hour Theory:

Pick something you’ve always wanted to learn or become more proficient in.Schedule in a half an hour everyday to devote to learning the new skill (early morning is often a good time as there are no distractions, times during a commute are also great as this is dead time).After a considerable amount of time (a few months at least) check in to see what you’ve learned. You’ll be surprised to see how much progress you’ve actually made.Don’t beat yourself up if you miss a few sessions – simply get back on track. Remember: you’re doing more than the average person even if you fall a little bit off course.Be patient. Don’t expect results overnight. It takes time to build up a new skill.

(Note: If you’re not sure how to get started, here’s a handy list of 60 ways to improve yourself in the next 100 days.)

(Photo credit: Post-It Note on Screen via Shutterstock)

Zoë B is a Life Strategist & the author of the Simple Life Strategies blog. Through her coaching programs and her blog, Zoë helps others to learn the strategies that exceptional people use to overcome things like stress, indecision, worries, boredom, procrastination & fear so that they can perform at their own personal best. Connect with Zoë B on Facebook, Twitter or LinkedIn.

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My passion for Pi: Chirag Singh on TEDxTalks

A Pi day special! At TEDxYouth@BommerCanyon, 9-year-old Chirag Singh confesses his irrational love for Pi — and not the kind you eat:

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2×4: An Interview With Stephen Hackett

2×4: One series that examines two topics, creativity and productivity, by asking those who make things on the web the same four questions on both subjects.

Many of us appreciate the devices in our hand, on our laps and upon our desks. Few understand their heritage. Now heritage may seem like a strange choice of word for describing technology, but as the industry of personal computing matures, its history becomes more and more important, as do the people who truly know and understand their evolution. One such writer, a man so dedicated that he has Clarus the Dogcow tattooed on his ankle, is Stephen Hackett of 512 Pixels fame. The site that is named after the number of pixels across on the original Macintosh (which boasted a 9-inch, 512×342 monochrome display for those of you who aren’t running to Wikipedia).

Now with heritage and history often comes with an air of pomposity. Hackett has none of this. In fact, in both his writing and his various podcasts, the guy is relatable, inventing and often outright hilarious. He has the knowledge, but not the airs. His passion for technology encourages you (or at least me) to learn more about the devices I take for granted on a daily basis. If you’re at all interested in technology, journalism or design, you won’t do better than his 512 Pixels blog. Or the newly created 512 Podcast along with fellow 2×4 alum, Myke Hurley of the 70 Decibels network for that matter. His passion for knowledge also goes beyond technology and into a variety of (often unusual) topics on his podcast, Ungeniused.

Without further ado, here’s a look at informative look at the world of Stephen Hackett.

Have you always considered yourself a creative person?

I have. As a kid, I always was writing or sketching.

What mediums and inspirations do you gravitate toward to realize your creative goals?

Sometime between 7th grade Art Club and giving up on my art degree two years in to it, I thought I could become some sort of artist as a living. You know, a hip graphic designer who could draw and paint, too.

It turns out while I am pretty handy with a Wacom tablet and Adobe software, I can’t draw or paint. Not even a little. I can, however, write. So I suppose my mediums of choice are the pixel and the written word.

If you had to point to one thing, what specific posts or creations are you most proud of and why?

2011 marked the first time I ever really wrote a lot of personal posts on 512 Pixels. That said, I am super proud of Two Years and The Fifth Floor, which are both posts about my wrestling with the fact that my three year old has brain cancer.

Any suggestions for those who feel they may not be creative enough to unlock their inner artist?

While I’m sure most people would say “Don’t give a shit about what others think,” for me, not caring what I think is more important in many ways. I often find myself dismissing one of my own ideas before I act upon it, censoring myself. Sometimes, that can be good, but for me, it often means that I don’t do things that I probably should.

Can you describe your current personal and professional responsibilities?

Sure. First and foremost, I’m a husband and the dad of two small kids. With our son still in and out of the hospital for various tests and things like physical therapy, we’re busier than the average 4-person family, I believe.

From 9-5, I work for The Salvation Army as the IT/Multimedia Director for The Ray and Joan Kroc Corps Community Center. The building is currently under construction, and is slated to open late this year. I oversee all of the IT, audio video and multimedia stuff. If it involves data, pixels or electricity, my department is there, ready to work.

How do you go about balancing the personal, professional and digital?

I get it wrong all the time. I am late to work because I can’t tear myself away from breakfast, but I check work email before bedtime. The system I outline below helps, and I’m trying to be more intentional about separating work from home.

What tools and techniques do you find yourself counting on to get through your workload?

I say this often: my life is in OmniFocus. I have folders for home, work and the website. Inside those folders, I have dozens of projects, with lots and lots of tasks.

For capture, I use Field Notes notebooks. There’s always one in my back pocket. A couple times a day, I take any tasks and move them in to OmniFocus. When in the car, I use that Siri-on-the-keyboard feature to get things in to my OmniFocus Inbox without crashing my truck.

Notes and reference information live as plain text files in Dropbox. I get to them via nvALT on my Mac and Notesy on my iPad and iPhone.

What is the best starting point for the unproductive amongst us, who are looking to get more organized?

Something like OmniFocus isn’t going to help you get off the ground. Get some colored index cards, assign a color for work, home and other and go to town writing stuff down.

Michael Schechter is a Mac geek who rambles about how technology impacts our productivity, our creativity and our lives. You can connect with him over on his blog or as @MSchechter on Twitter.

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Post-sex psychology

Slate has an article covering the growing research on post-sex behaviour – what we do after we’ve got it on and what it might mean.

To be honest, I had no idea that anyone was studying what people do after sex but it sounds like the science is well underway.

Counter to popular opinion, a dated study, and the great wisdom of many lady mags, researchers have not found that men fall asleep faster than women after sex. In fact, according to a recent study [pdf] of heterosexual pairings by Kruger and Hughes, a woman is just as likely as a man to be out first. But — and here’s the interesting part — regardless of gender, the partner who stayed awake longer reported that they weren’t getting enough post-sex hugging, kissing or talking – what evolutionary psychologists call “pair bonding” activities…

And what about the other activities people move on to after sex, like hanging out in bed, ordering Chinese food, or smoking a cigarette? Earlier in 2011 Kruger and Hughes published a report in the Journal of Sex Research, considering a wider range of after-sex impulses. In that case they found that our post-coital behaviors – again considering only heterosexual sex – tend to split along gender lines. Eating, fixing yourself a drink, smoking and asking your partner for favors – all activities that sound pretty good to me – were more likely to be taken on by the men. The women, in this case, placed greater importance on behaviors related to intimacy, like cuddling and “professing their love.”

From reading the article though it’s clearly a fascinating area, even if the research seems only to have looked at heterosexual sex so far.

Apparently though, my preferred behaviour, apologising, seems barely to feature at all.

Link to ‘After the Climax’ from Salon (via @QMUPsychology)

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New from TED-Ed: Questions no one knows the answers to

Throughout today and tomorrow, we’ll be sharing incredible video from our new TED-Ed channel.

In a new TED-Ed series designed to catalyze curiosity, TED Curator Chris Anderson shares his obsession with questions that no one (yet) knows the answers to. This introduction leads into two questions as follow-up films: Why can’t we see evidence of alien life? on.ted.com/AlienLife and How many universes are there? on.ted.com/HowMany … Length: 2:11.

This video is part of a TED-Ed series called Questions No One (Yet) Knows the Answers To. Find more series on the TED-Ed channel on YouTube: youtube.com/TEDEd

And if this talk inspires you to share your own lesson … or to animate a lesson … we want to hear from you!

Nominate an educator (including yourself) >>

Propose a lesson >>

Join our animation team >>

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