The Importance of Roughhousing | Art of Manliness. A How-To Guide: Accelerated Learning for Accelerated Times. The above video is a short presentation I gave at The Next Web Conference in Amsterdam. It covers a basic framework for mastering any skill quickly, including languages, music, dance, and more. What skill have you put off learning for longest… and why? Let me know in the comments. Perhaps I (or other readers) can help. Second, if you could learn one skill in the next six months, what would it be?
Important afterword: NOTE — For my competition launched last week (not too late to join), roundtrip airfare is covered for all four winners. Related content:The 4-Hour Chef and Meta-Learning — 200+ pages on all I know about accelerated learningTotal Immersion: How I Learned to Swim Effortlessly in 10 Days and You Can TooScientific Speed Reading: How to Read 300% Faster in 20 MinutesHow I Deconstruct Languages (scroll through the list) The Art of Storytelling - creating and improvising stories for children. Creating and Improvising Stories for Children There are lots of easy ways to improvise and create stories for children. This is something that most of us have had quite a bit of experience with when we were children ourselves.
Any time we were playing with other young children, we were usually 'in a story'. It was easy then and it can be easy now. What would make it easier now? Don't worry about content. As adults we often make it hard for our selves by trying to get it right or making sure that the content is ideologically sound, or interesting, or grammatically correct, or logical. You can help you and your audience get into a playful frame of mind by playing some games or singing some silly songs first. The magic words - 'Once upon a time' - are an incantation, an invitation to suspend logical belief and enter the world of fantasy and fun. Forget about where the story is going to. Listen to your audience having fun or reacting to the latest part of the story. Now add a character. 33 Teachers Who Got The Last Laugh. 5 Habits Of The Most Creative People. What do a startup king, a social network innovator, a hip hop prince, perhaps the best actor on television, and two absolutely hilarious dudes have in common?
They're all among the Most Creative People—and we can learn quite a bit from the way they work. Max Levchin: Always be asking questions We talked to PayPal founder Max Levchin about how he keeps snagging startup ideas. Turns out it's a lot about controlling chaos in ways we've discussed about why ideas come at random and why you need to document everything. Levchin's method is like this: He talks to tons of random creative people, asks them questions about their craft, takes extensive notes of their quandaries, and then compiles—and reviews—all of his research.
What comes out of it? Companies—like his new mobile payment solution Affirm—and loads of paper. Kirthiga Reddy: Go flat "You're not here to do just what you're told," she says. Kendrick Lamar: Be an example Bryan Cranston: Keep consistent How does it work? When Simplicity Is the Solution. A Year in the Life of a Full-Time Traveler. You are here: Home / Blog / A Year in the Life of a Full-Time Traveler All my life, I’ve dreamed of traveling the world. And in 2011, I achieved what I once thought was impossible without winning the lottery: I became a full-time traveler.
And it wasn’t how I pictured. You DON’T need to be insanely rich to travel the world. So I may not be able to jet anywhere I want at a moment’s notice. Here is what a year in the life of a full-time traveler looks like! January: Thailand, Laos, Vietnam I rang in 2011 on Khao San Road in Bangkok. There was a two-day interlude in overrated Luang Prabang, and then I entered Vietnam (not without almost getting refused to the border). After recovering, I got to know Hanoi better — drinking snake blood was one way — and then experienced Halong Bay on the greatest party cruise of all time!
February: Vietnam, Cambodia After returning to Hanoi, I hopped on an overnight bus to the imperial capital of Hue. March: Cambodia, Thailand, Singapore, Indonesia I was home. IQ Test Labs - free online testing.
Teaching. 20+ Ways to Learn a Language Online. Earlier today we mentioned a plugin for AIM that would translate what you type on the fly into another language. That's an exceptionally useful tool, but the far more fluid and accurate way to speak to people in another language, is to actually learn the language. Thankfully, there are a wide variety of ways to learn languages online, many of them available for free. Below is a list of more than 20 ways you can go from knowing how to say "Hello" to fluency. Language Lessons Now that you've learned the basics, you need to practice. Practice Speaking SharedTalk: A language exchange covering 113 languages from the makers of the popular RosettaStone language learning software.xLingo: A language exchange that lets users create and share flashcards with each other.Palabea: Reviews of language learning software in addition to an online language exchange.iTalki: A language exchange with a Yahoo!
How to Find Your Purpose and Do What You Love. “Find something more important than you are,” philosopher Dan Dennett once said in discussing the secret of happiness, “and dedicate your life to it.” But how, exactly, do we find that? Surely, it isn’t by luck. I myself am a firm believer in the power of curiosity and choice as the engine of fulfillment, but precisely how you arrive at your true calling is an intricate and highly individual dance of discovery. Still, there are certain factors — certain choices — that make it easier. Every few months, I rediscover and redevour Y-Combinator founder Paul Graham’s fantastic 2006 article, How to Do What You Love.
What you should not do, I think, is worry about the opinion of anyone beyond your friends. More of Graham’s wisdom on how to find meaning and make wealth can be found in Hackers & Painters: Big Ideas from the Computer Age. Alain de Botton, modern philosopher and creator of the “literary self-help genre”, is a keen observer of the paradoxes and delusions of our cultural conceits. How to Build Self-Discipline. Discipline is freedom. You may disagree with this statement, and if you do you are certainly not alone. For many people discipline is a dirty word that is equated with the absence of freedom. In fact the opposite is true. As Stephen R. Covey once wrote, “the undisciplined are slaves to moods, appetites and passions”. And in the longer term, the undisciplined lack the freedom that comes with possessing particular skills and abilities – e.g. to play a musical instrument or speak a foreign language.
Self-discipline involves acting according to what you think instead of how you feel in the moment. Work on an idea or project after the initial rush of enthusiasm has faded awayGo to the gym when all you want to do is lie on the couch and watch TVWake early to work on yourselfSay “no” when tempted to break your dietOnly check your email a few of times per day at particular times If you struggle with self-discipline, the good news is that it can be developed. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. Will Power / Discipline. 25 clever ideas to make life easier - StumbleUpon. Via: amy-newnostalgia.blogspot.com Why didn’t I think of that?! We guarantee you’ll be uttering those words more than once at these ingenious little tips, tricks and ideas that solve everyday problems … some you never knew you had!
(Above: hull strawberries easily using a straw). Via: apartmenttherapy.com Rubbing a walnut over scratches in your furniture will disguise dings and scrapes. Via: unplggd.com Remove crayon masterpieces from your TV or computer screen with WD40 (also works on walls). Via: athomewithrealfood.blogspot.com Stop cut apples browning in your child’s lunch box by securing with a rubber band. Via: marthastewart.com Overhaul your linen cupboard – store bedlinen sets inside one of their own pillowcases and there will be no more hunting through piles for a match.
Via: realsimple.com Pump up the volume by placing your iPhone / iPod in a bowl – the concave shape amplifies the music. Via: savvyhousekeeping.com Re-use a wet-wipes container to store plastic bags. Via: iheartnaptime.net. The Meaning of Life: An interview with Professor A C Grayling. PETER BRIETBART meets world-renowned philosopher, humanist and atheist A.C. GRAYLING, Professor of Philosophy at Birkbeck, University of London and a supernumerary fellow of St Anne’s College, Oxford. He is a prolific author, whose works include Against All Gods, Liberty in the Age of Terror and Ideas That Matter, and he is a regular contributor to the Guardian newspaper. Their discussion ranges from burqa bans to circumcision, free will, great literature and the right to die. The interview is split into four parts, which will be published across the week. Here in part 1, we ask Grayling about purpose in life, what inspires him, if he thinks a ban on the burqa would be justified and how he responds to the idea that science is “unweaving the rainbow”.
PB: The universe can be a difficult and confusing place. How are we to find direction or purpose? ACG: The direction and purpose of individual lives are a function of the work that an individual puts into creating them. Professor A. Next part. Don't Mistake Intelligence for Laziness.