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So far 2010 has been the year of gradual improvements in life, health and productivity.  I made most of these changes based on what I learned in Brain Rules.  Here is a snapshot of my changes so far:

Read more on How I engineer my life for maximum productivity…

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Several months ago I finished reading Brain Rules by John Medina and I’ve been raving about it ever since.  Medina is a noted brain researcher and the book contains the 12 things he wishes the lay public knew.

The 12 things (with my notes in bold and italic)

1. EXERCISE | Rule #1: Exercise boosts brain power. – The most important chapter.  Short version – if you exercise your brain will be smarter and it won’t get dementia.  I’ve put this to the test, and I am more focused with exercise than without.
2. SURVIVAL | Rule #2: The human brain evolved, too. – Not that memorable, good background information.
3. WIRING | Rule #3: Every brain is wired differently.- Not that memorable, good background information.
4. ATTENTION | Rule #4: We don’t pay attention to boring things.- Intuitive,  and general background information
5. SHORT-TERM MEMORY | Rule #5: Repeat to remember. – Important, counter intuitive info on memory.
6. LONG-TERM MEMORY | Rule #6: Remember to repeat.- Important, counter intuitive info on memory.
7. SLEEP | Rule #7: Sleep well, think well. – The second most informative chapter.  I had always thought of sleep as a time of rest, it turns out to be a very active process for the brain.   Sleep is when the brain cleans and restocks itself.
8. STRESS | Rule #8: Stressed brains don’t learn the same way. – I had no idea that stress was the physical reaction that it is.  This is the third most important chapter.
9. SENSORY INTEGRATION | Rule #9: Stimulate more of the senses. – Good advice for graphic designers.
10. VISION | Rule #10: Vision trumps all other senses. –  mostly background information.
11. GENDER | Rule #11: Male and female brains are different . – we knew this already, but Medina tells us how male and female brains differ.
12. EXPLORATION | Rule #12: We are powerful and natural explorers. –  mostly background information.

From this book I have made the following changes in life Read more on Everyone should read Brain Rules by John Medina…

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I came across some of Richard Florida’s work online yesterday (Florida is the author of “The Creative Class” and the creator of the notion that creative people should self-segregate) and I began wondering: why do Ivy League institutions produce so few creative people? Read more on Is an Ivy League education pointless for creative people?…

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After reading this article on the phenomenon of Farmville I revised my notions of wealth.  I previously categorized wealth in the following two ways:

• Owning Money – how much money do you have in the bank account, or can be converted to cash quickly.  Most people regard money wealth as the only wealth
• Owning Time – How much time do you have in the average week/month/year that is under your control?  Do you spend 90 hours a week working in a job you hate?   Do you spend 30 hours a week doing housework, maintaining electronic gear, smiling at people you don’t care about, or commuting?   If so, you possess little time, no matter how much money you can spend.  Tim Ferriss is the best explainer of this notion.  Read his blog (and book).  (I include  his book, The Four Hour Workweek on my all time top ten list of books.  I intend to write a time-wealth calculator at some point.)

Up until reading the Farmville article I limited my definitions of wealth to the above two categories.  Reading the article crystallized my notion of clan wealth.

Please note, I’m using the Southern American definition of Clan, which I define as a group of people related by blood, marriage, friendship, or history of friendship which has an intricate network of mutual obligations and debts and acts as one unit on divisive issues.  (Please also note, nothing in this post relates to the KKK).  In American pop history the Hatfield and the McCoy groups serve as the best example of clans.

Read more on The three types of wealth – Money, Time, and Clan…

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I read the Wikipedia entry on Joseph Kennedy (JFK and Ted’s father) and his business life fascinated me.  Particularly I was struck by the following passage (describing his time in the stock market in the Great Crash) as :

Kennedy survived the crash “because he possessed a passion for facts, a complete lack of sentiment and a marvelous sense of timing.”

The above tendencies are usually descibed as “shrewd”, but it is informative to see the tendencies listed out like that. Read more on Lessons from Joseph Kennedy…

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Over the years I have met many alumni of the Turner Empire (CNN/Turner Broadcasting/Turner Enterprises/WCW/TBS/Braves/Hawks, etc) and most of them have told me some version of the following story.

[Setup - In the early days of CNN and Turner Broadcasting Ted Turner would prowl his office building and drop in unannounced into random meetings.   One day he walked into a meeting where people were planning a cross-channel week-long special on dinosaurs] Read more on The Turner Rule in Marketing and Branding…

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Via some Twitter link I can no longer find, I stumbled across these two posts.

• Nootropics: their effects, their risks, and where to get them – I think I’ll be picking up some Thiamine and sticking with that, as the others seem a bit scary.  It is a fascinating bit of research though.  Nootropics are “Smart Drugs”

Read more on Ways to be smarter – I’ll be testing some of these soon…

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While pondering installing Visual Studio 2010, as well as thinking how all software is moving to a subscription basis, I had the thought – why not do two predictable releases a year?  The first release, say in January, would be whatever new features were in place by that date.  The second release, say in July, would be a pure performance and usability release, as the development team would spend half the year optimizing and tweaking the code, as well as fixing all bugs.  Any new “Features” would have at least six months to cook in the minds of the developers and would be implemented on a much stronger code base. Read more on Thoughts on predictable software scheduling…

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Last night I read Hugh MacLeod of GapingVoid.com on Global MicroBrands.  Today I had the thought that I need to establish a non-denominational reference site for social network theory to support Stronico, as well as to help push the theoretical edges of the web application.  Then I remembered that I was going to do some turning on the new lathe tonight.

Then I had the thoughts: Read more on Global microbrands, free stuff, and a new idea…

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I have the idea for a quick and easy to build social network theory site, in deference to the Turner Rule – I got to buy SocialNetworkTheory.com – and it’s already taken.  In fact, it’s pretty interesting.  Check it out at SocialNetworkTheory.com.

Read more on Social Network Theory…

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