Learning when retired not easy but worth it.

 Many people think of the brain as a mystery. We don’t often think about what intelligence is or how it works. When you do think about what intelligence is, you might think that a person’s intelligence is predetermined at birth – either you are a “math person” or not – and stays that way for life. New research shows that the brain is more like a muscle – it changes and gets stronger when you use it. Scientists have been able to show how the brain grows and gets stronger when you learn. Everyone knows that when you lift weights, your muscles get bigger, and you get stronger. A person who can’t lift 20 pounds when they start exercising can get strong enough to lift 100 pounds after working out for a long time. Muscles become larger and stronger with exercise. When you stop exercising, muscles shrink, and you get weaker. That’s why people say, “use it or lose it.”

Most people don’t know that when they practice and learn new things, parts of their brain change and get larger just like muscles. This is true even for adults. So, it’s not true that some people “just can’t learn.” You can improve your abilities as long as you practice and use good strategies. People aren’t “smart” or “dumb” at math. At first, no one can read or solve equations. But with practice, they can learn to do it. The more a person learns, the easier it gets to learn new things – because their brain “muscles” grow stronger. This is true even for adults who have struggled for a long time to learn something. A scientist from Wake Forest University said, “We used to think adults couldn’t form new brain connections, but now we know that isn’t true… The adult brain is like a muscle, and we need to exercise it.”

People who don’t know this can miss out on the chance to grow a stronger brain. They may think they can’t do it, or that it’s too hard. It does take work to learn, just like becoming stronger physically or becoming a better juggler does. Sometimes it even hurts. When you feel yourself get better and stronger, you realize that all the work is worth it.

Take my brother, for example. When he retired, he decided to take up learning Italian and playing chess. At first, he could barely understand a word of Italian, and his chess skills were rudimentary. But he committed to practicing both every day for about 20 minutes each. Now, he can speak and understand Italian to the degree that a 5-year-old could, and he has become very proficient at online chess.

Every morning, he starts his day with a cup of coffee and an Italian language app. He practices speaking, listening, and even reading simple Italian stories. It’s not easy, and there are days when he struggles with pronunciation or understanding a particular phrase. But he keeps at it, pushing through the challenges. Over time, he has noticed improvements. He can hold basic conversations, order food in Italian restaurants, and even enjoy Italian films with subtitles.

After his language practice, he moves on to chess. Initially, he was frustrated by his frequent losses. Chess, with its strategic complexity, seemed daunting. But just like with Italian, he approached it with patience and persistence. He studied different openings, learned from his mistakes, and gradually improved his tactics. Today, he enjoys playing chess online and often wins against players from around the world.

My brother’s journey illustrates how the brain, like a muscle, grows stronger with use. His daily practice has not only made him proficient in Italian and chess but also kept his mind sharp and engaged. He proves that it’s never too late to learn something new and that with dedication, anyone can grow smarter. His story is a testament to the incredible plasticity of the adult brain and the power of consistent effort. So, if you think you can’t learn something new, remember my brother. With patience and practice, you too can strengthen your brain and unlock new potentials.

Those who are right vs those who are wrong

 The world is divided into people who think they are right. ~Tara Brach

If I divide the world into those who are part of my group, however, I define the group and those who are not part of my group it becomes easier to malign those not part of my group. It is easy to make the others out to be liars, bad people and evil. Having this view of others is easy because it requires no thought, to need to think for oneself and no need to grow and learn.

When I was young, we lived in a small farming community that did not welcome change or newcomers, after a few years I was accepted by the group and for a time became suspicious of those not part of the group and part of our image was that our world outlook was the only one that was correct.

I soon outgrew that position but when I look around, I see too many buying into the idea that their world view is the correct view. The quote emphasizes what could be at the root of many of the problems that range from the personal and professional to the political to horrific acts of violence and cruelty among peoples and nations.

As humans, we need to understand that “our truth” is not “The Truth”. My truth may be wrong or only partially true. It is important for us to help others understand that we are eager to hear other views and that we open to being influenced by them.

G. K. Chesterton said, “There's a lot of difference between listening and hearing.” In society today we need to hear more and remember that our truth begins with a lowercase “t”, not an Upper case “T”. and that difference is meaningful.

Do you make decisions based on logic?

In his book “Predictably Irrational”, Dan Ariely details how humans believe that they are rational and make decisions based on logic and reason, however, in reality, we are totally illogical and act on emotion. In fact, a case can be made that humans use the logical part of our brain to justify the irrational decisions we make.

Behavioural Finance looks at the decision-making process that we go through when making an investment. One of the strongest factors influencing our decision making is loss aversion. We’d rather choose something of lesser value or quality that we know will not negatively impact us rather than choosing something that has the potential to positively impact us. Guaranteed products play right into our loss aversion behaviour.

A guaranteed investment is fairly straightforward. Most guaranteed investments are fixed for a 5-year term, capital is guaranteed, and the return is not allowed to drop below a certain percentage. It sounds like a winning formula until you look a little deeper. The investment is a business transaction and the asset managers need to ensure that they are getting paid and earning the return that they need to. What do the asset managers do? Well, they often smooth the returns.

For example, you take out a guaranteed investment for $10,000 that says that your return cannot be negative. Your money is invested in a variety of investments including cash, bonds, equities, and property. The upper limit of the return is set up by the asset manager at 5% per annum. In this hypothetical example, after five years the investment would have grown to $12,762.82, however, the actual return on the investment was 7% or $14,025.52, with 2% going to the asset manager.

Some investors seek comfort in these products even if for a short term when markets are volatile. Extensive research done over decades shows that, over time, investing in equities delivers the best return.

However, there are certain situations when a guaranteed product is beneficial for an investor. A guaranteed investment protects investors against downside risk, but at the cost of any upside. The guaranteed investment does have a place in a retirement plan for most investors that have not saved enough for retirement, or early retirees that have years ahead of needing an income. The bottom line is that medicine has evolved, and people are living longer so some investors get comfort in this type of investments, but there is a price to pay so always check with your financial advisor and consider your risk aversion.

Do you have any biases? 2

 03 Authority bias

Airline pilots wear smart uniforms for a reason. Not because they belong to a military order. They don’t. But because they want to imply authority. This is great for controlling passengers. They obey. The problem is, so do co-pilots. The writer Malcolm Gladwell in his book Outliers suggest the Korean Air flight 801 crashed because the co-pilot was too reticent to challenge the pilot about his decisions. Post-crash, British investigators demanded the airline “promote a freer atmosphere between the captain and the first officer” to permit questioning. The air of authority can dupe the best of us. A flash of military insignia, or sharp suit, can short-circuit our normal capacity for analysis.

04 Conservatism bias

It’s a misconception that the right approach to risk is solely to minimize it. Risk is a vital and necessary part of life. Conservatism bias is what happens when this is not well-understood Conservatism bias is why Blockbuster video turned down the acquisition of Netflix for $50 million. The management found it easier to do nothing than embrace risk.

05 Triviality law

It’s exhausting to think about complex issues. Given half a chance, the human mind will make a break for a simpler, trivial issue to distract itself. Politics is dominated by this effect. Major issues, such as a politician’s view on the national debt, are rarely discussed or reported. Too hard. Instead, the focus is on trivial issues, such as whether they can eat a bacon sandwich with dignity. This is a serious issue in risk. It takes effort to get people to think about critical issues. Given the chance they’ll veer off and focus on something fluffy and trivial, to spare their grey cells.

06 Risk compensation

The British Medical Journal recently came out against bicycle helmets. It’s not that helmets don’t work. Fall off and you’ll be grateful your fragile skull is encased in protective plastic. Rather, the phenomenon of risk compensation negates the benefit. Data from multiple nations shows that when cyclists feel safer, they compensate, by taking extra risks, cutting in front of cars and not looking at junctions. Individuals with documented helmet use had 2.2 times the odds of non–helmet users of being involved in an injury-related accident. Furthermore, mandatory helmet wearing reduced cycling, adding to negative effects.

07 Social proof

There is a beguiling power of effects such as social proof. Do you remember some years ago when one oil company bought a fertilizer company, and every other major oil company practically ran out and bought a fertilizer company? And there was no more damned reason for all these oil companies to buy fertilizer companies, but they didn’t know exactly what to do and if Exxon was doing it, it was good enough for Mobil, and vice versa. If someone in authority is doing or saying it you have a social proof and will consider whatever it is acceptable.

08 Charm pricing

Human reaction to numbers is riddled with quirks. Discount stores use charm pricing, knocking a penny off to end in “99”. When I worked in retail many years ago, we knew the value of having a price ending in 99. In an informal survey 50% of consumers when asked saw prices ending in 99 cents as more value for money, while the remainder saw prices as higher. Charm prices were 9 percent more likely to be seen as good value than the rounded prices. A disproportionately large improvement for a 1 percent price drop.

09 Overconfidence bias

There is an idea that dim people overestimate their skills, while bright people doubt their abilities. But could it be that even experts are overconfident? Alas yes, especially when forecasting. Economist Philip Tetlock spent 20 years studying forecasts by experts about the economy, stock markets, wars and other issues. He found the average expert did as well as random guessing or as he put it “as a dart-throwing chimpanzee

If you have been taken aback when you observed that someone was “assuming the worst intentions of others and have struggled to understand how someone could create in their mind such a different narrative of past events, despite seeing the same evidence. that you had seen. Hopefully, this will explain some of why people do what they d

Do you have any biases? 1

Nine cognitive biases you should know because if you don’t you may make foolish decisions. In Dr. Kahneman’s Thinking Fast and Slow he explains that we have a Two System way of thinking.

The first is the intuitive, “gut reaction” way of thinking and making decisions. The second way of thinking is the analytical, “critical thinking” way of making decisions.

In the first way of thinking, we form “first impressions” and when we use this type of thinking we often jump to conclusions. Our second method of thinking does reflection, problem-solving, and analysis. However, we spend most of our time in thinking fast while we identify with our second type of thinking. Most of us consider ourselves rational, analytical human beings. Thus, we think we spend most of our time engaged in logical analytical thinking.

Actually, we spend almost all of our daily lives engaged in emotional thinking. Only if we encounter something unexpected, or if we make a conscious effort, do we engage Logical thinking?

These biases have evolved over thousands of years, we are pattern-seeking primates, which is useful for hunting prey, but terrible for complex tasks. So, we are now regularly prone to hundreds of biases, too deeply ingrained to overcome without removing the human from the process. Reading the book is not enough.

One of the biggest problems with emotional thinking is that it seeks to quickly create a coherent, plausible story — an explanation for what is happening — by relying on associations and memories, pattern-matching, and assumptions. When we use this type of thinking we will default to that plausible, convenient story — even if that story is based on incorrect information.

This type of thinking is highly adept it automatically and effortlessly identifies causal connections between events, sometimes even when the connection is spurious.

This is the reason why people jump to conclusions, assume bad intentions, give in to prejudices or biases, and buy into conspiracy theories. They focus on limited available evidence and do not consider absent evidence. They invent a coherent story, causal relationships, or underlying intentions. And then we quickly form a judgment or impression, which in turn gets quickly endorsed by our logical thinking.

As a result, people may make wrong judgments and decisions due to biases. There are several potential errors in judgment that people may make when they over-rely on emotional thinking:

01 Law of large numbers

People don’t understand statistics very well. As a result, they may look at the results of a small sample — e.g. 100 people responding to a survey — and conclude that it’s representative of the population. This also explains why people jump to conclusions with just a few data points or limited evidence. If three people said something, then maybe it’s true? If you personally observe one incident, you are more likely to generalize this occurrence to the whole population. For example, imagine two maternity hospitals, one large, one small. In a week, 60 percent of births are female. Which hospital is more likely to be the venue? It takes time to figure out… the smaller one. Small sample sizes suffer more from deviation from the mean.

02 Gambler’s fallacy and the Illusion of understanding:

The original sin is the tendency to assume that bad luck will be compensated by good luck. Karma. Alas, we are frequently crippled by the belief that life will magically auto-correct to compensate us for previous losses. People often create flawed explanations for past events, a phenomenon known as a narrative fallacy. These “explanatory stories that people find compelling are simple; they are concrete rather than abstract; assign a larger role to talent, stupidity, and intentions than to luck; and focus on a few striking events that happened rather than on the countless events that failed to happen. Good stories provide a simple and coherent account of people’s actions and intentions. You are always ready to interpret behaviour as a manifestation of general propensities and personality traits — causes that you can readily match to effects.”

Communications

Communications between people is a strange thing sometimes. Most of the time we forget that 93% of how we communicate is through non-verbal communications.  Albert Mehrabian's a professor at UCLA quantified how we communicate as follows: words, our tone of voice, and body language respectively account for 7%, 38%, and 55% of personal communications. 

Body language is important, yet we continue to believe that we know or can infer what another person is thinking. The reality is that whatever you think someone else is thinking, they're probably not. 

Many of us think we are very good at reading body language and some of us may have that skill. Even if you are very good at reading body language, you have to realize that body language is communicating about 55% of what the person is trying to say to you. Even experts cannot be right all of the time, given those percentages.

If you want to understand what the other person is saying, or more importantly have the other person understand you, your words, tone and body language have to be in sync.

Confusion often arises because your audience is receiving signals about what you think they're thinking. Of course, they are almost always wrong, just as you are almost always wrong about what they are thinking if they and you are relying only on body language to interpret communication and thinking.

The interesting fact is that your signals about they are thinking, could change what they’re thinking.

Acts of kindness

Not that you haven't figured this out, but the person who can point to their own acts of kindness, no matter how plentiful, is not necessarily a kind person; who can point to their own acts of thoughtfulness, no matter how plentiful, is not necessarily thoughtful; who can point to their own acts of generosity, no matter how plentiful, is not necessarily generous... and so on. 

Yeah, they still rock. As do you. 

I love dragonflies,

Every watch a dragonfly? I have and they, in my opinion, should never be able to fly, but they do. So why is it that so often, those who are extremely successful in virtually everything they do are so unable to see that this is the case? 

Yeah, you might not be the right person to ask. Dream big, and capture life as we live out the last decades of our life.

Dreams are important

Dreamers, dream big, and those who dream and follow through on their dreams are rewarded. The dancer who created the music she moves to; the painter who manifested the mountains he captures; the tycoon who built the empire before there's a dime. They realized that the dream comes first, followed by hard work and holding on to the vision.

Whatever you want, let it exist first in your mind, imagine every nuance and consideration, let the walls have substance, the halls have depth, and the money have weight in the palm of your hand, and then all that's necessary to bring it to pass will be drawn unto you. 

Did you every notice?

Did you ever notice that:
Young souls lean on science
Mature souls lean on faith. 
Old souls like me, prefer long walks 
short talks; 
whistling to hip-hop, 
country, or rock; 
and on occasion, 
tree spotting. 

There! 
On the horizon! 
Oak! 

Do you aspire to?

I find it interesting that many people become so mesmerized by the gold medals, trophies, and daunting heights they aspire to, they tend to forget that their heroes and heroines, more often than not, started with far less than they now have. 

The overnight sensation or the hero who appears on the scene has worked hard and long for the recognition they receive. We tend to forget that any thing we want to do well, requires hard work, dedication, and passion. We should not focus on the gold medal, the trophies or the daunting heights, but instead focus on our passion, while we strife to perfection. 

Did you ever notice

Did you ever notice  that whenever you see people in love, they literally glow? You probably did at  one point in your life and you may even remember the glow today. 

But did you know that the glowing is actually made up of zillions of minute sparkles?

That these sparkles receive as much energy as they create? 

Because of this energy exchange you completely stop aging and look younger? 

Abundance is immediately drawn to you? 
Healing powers fill you? 

Muscles are strengthened, pounds are shed, and your vision improves? 
Lingering questions are answered? 

New friends are summoned? 
Old friends are poked? 
Problems are solved? 
And maple syrup tastes more maple-y? 

All when you feel love. 

It's true, 

Changing attitludes

"The greatest discovery of this generation is that human beings can alter their life by altering their attitude." William James

I truly believe this, and over the years as I have taught thousands of students I have seen how a change of attitude can alter a person’s approach to a problem. It has happened countless times. 

What most people fail to realize is that your attitude not only impacts your happiness and success of all the people around you... your family, your friends, and your peers at work. 

Attitudes truly are contagious, and time to time we need to ask ourselves... "is mine worth catching?"

Our attitudes are the mental filters through which we choose to view our world. Our attitudes are shaped by the paradigms or rules that we set for ourselves. What is important is to realize that everyday is your day. 

Only you have complete control over how you decide to view what is happening in your day. Make it the way you want it to be. Make your days fun, energising, happy and enjoyable.

Survival

It seems that what's really going on is about survival, individual and group survival, and to that end:  the greater the mass the greater the  manipulation.

In 1960 the world population was 3.036 billion. In 2011 the world's population was 7.125 billion Today it is 7.4 billion and growing. For more a figures on what's going on look here: http://www.worldometers.info/

Author: Worldometers.info, Publishing Date: 3 May, 2016, Place of publication: Dover, Delaware, U.S.A.

In 2016 human beings, as a whole, I believe are smart enough to deal with the complications involved in surviving this highly differentiated world. Individuals, cultures and civilizations will unite on the way to a unification (a wholeness) that may or may not come within our lifetime.  

We're still experimenting with ourselves and nature. Many of the world's people (including many in the US) are panicking for fear that time will run out and they will run out of resources, while they and their descendants are alive or anticipated. 

There is a belief in chaos because nobody with the means has the answer to one question: How do we supply enough food and safe water to feed everyone without jeopardizing our current "necessities" (cars, electricity, healthcare). It's a big two-sided question, and major and minor factions will keep trying to manipulate the public to join their side.  

When we look at other statistics we see that for example there are more overweight and obese people than there are undernourished people in the world. Humans are inventive and creative and are on their way to finding solutions to the major problems in the world. We have to have faith in our fellow humans.

771,979,621 Undernourished people in the world

1,624,735,342 Overweight people in the world

651,143,601 Obese people in the world

Author: Worldometers.info Publishing Date: 3 May, 2016, Source http://www.worldometers.info/ 

Place of publication: Dover, Delaware, U.S.A.

Impatience is a sign of...

Impatience is a sign of hurrying, hurrying is a sign of worrying, worrying is a sign of fear, and fear is a sign that someone has forgotten that it's never too late to change their thoughts and, therefore, their "things." Glad we could straighten that out so take a deep breath and remember it is never to late to change your thoughts and your life.

Zen meditation helps us

An interesting post by Wayne Codling, which helps to remind us about the teachings in the new testament,  to read more go here

In Buddhist terms, Jesus was the variety of saint known as the bodhisattva. The term means "awakened being." Doctrinally, a bodhisattva is a Buddhist adept who vows to never cease teaching the middle way until all beings are enlightened and only then accept nirvana. Jesus didn't think that way at all, of course, but he behaved like a bodhisattva in that he aligned himself with all people, especially the marginalized and outcast people in his world. He went so far as to say that the treatment of the least of us is equivalent to how we treat him. It's clear; Jesus takes it very personally when the poor and the ill and the elderly and the eccentric are treated with suspicion and enmity; like thieves or liars. Jesus wanted them to be treated as reverentially as he was.

This is worthy of emulation about Jesus; the biblical Jesus is not an elitist. Indeed, he challenged the elitist leaders of his own religion. Jesus was friendly with outcasts and prostitutes.

These are the people he was referring to when he taught this esoteric message of reverential equivalence. The least among us are the ones who live under bridges, or who are addicted to powerful substances. These are the ones who are treated all too often like something repulsive; something that their betters might scrape off their shoes.

Having said that, it should be noted that, in our community and most of our country, the ones who feed the hungry and clothe the naked and shelter the homeless are the followers of Jesus. Indeed, Buddhists could learn a thing or two about how charity and love work in society. Once you look beyond the level of the street, though, the notion of reverential equivalence rapidly loses potency. This is because this spiritual condition is challenging; it requires renewal. It is more than an intellectual idea.

Establishing reverential equivalence is a meditation skill. Zen meditation facilitates the restoration of equivalence in all relationships. To bring into being a genuine reverence that has zero bias between Jesus and the least among us is attainable through meditation, even by the greater among us. This is something that Buddhism, as a meditation culture, has to offer modern, western life.

Our cultural ancestry is bereft of subtle skills such as the doing of not doing. Yet, this is the power and efficacy of equivalence. It does this by intentionally setting all parameters to zero, another way of speaking of the skills of relinquishment and cessation.

Not everyone can work the streets and actualize the fundamental point that Jesus was making with his reverential equivalence. But the spiritual imperative remains, and the more elevated our social position, the more difficult and elusive this teaching becomes. Didn't Jesus even point out that the likelihood for their salvation is akin to a camel passing through the eye of a needle? To me, meditation is the best solution to an endemic dearth of equivalence and everyone can do it.

Wayne Codling is a former Zen monastic and a lineage holder in the Soto Zen tradition. He teaches Zen-style meditation in various venues around Victoria

Giving praise to grandchildren

As a new grandparent, I am learning  about how exciting life is all over again as I watch my  grandson. All of us at one time were excited about life and the new adventures we experienced everyday and I am glad  to have the chance to relive some of that magic. As my grandson learns new skills and demonstrates his love of particular activities I am learning how to give praise that will allow him to learn some patterns of thinking that will help him as he moves through life. Here are some of my thoughts. 

I: 

have to help him internalize by saying you should be proud of yourself for what you have done.
need to be specific in my praise
should reinforce effort, not necessarily the end result.
should ask questions about how and why he did what he did and have him explain his thought processes as best as he can
should  interest and reinforce the actions he does
need to give direct praise of the effort used to complete the artwork, or the new activity, not over praise the outcome.
need to say I love you a lot

Change is

Why Some Change is Scary Part One

First let me say that people are not afraid of change. People change all the time. Human beings are wired to change. We’ve been changing for millions of years. And our capacity for adaptation is only accelerating. The impulse to evolve and the motivation to improve are wired into our brains and bodies. We are more naturally oriented to change than resist. When you study unsuccessful change efforts up close, one common pattern emerges:

1. The more obvious, tangible, and relatively easy-to-address aspects of the change are tackled. So I want to change, I will focus on the aspects that I want to change. What will it cost me and what will my reward be for changing? How will I know that I have achieved change? What do I have to change in my life to be successful? Is it my thinking, my diet, my friends, my home, my personal beliefs?
2. Once I have settled on what I need to change then I can start the process of deciding how I will make the changes.

All these elements are tangible, hard stuff, factual, and objective and so I start to work on these elements but if I don’t pay attention to the intangible aspects of change then I will fail in my attempt to change. The invisible, intangible, risky, and ultimately most powerful Aspects are ignored at my peril.

The intangible aspects of change are factors are:

Purpose

Values

Passion

Alignment

All these elements are intangible, emotional, and subjective. These intangible elements make or break change our change efforts. When we ignore them, they come back to bite us. This soft stuff has a real, hard and tangible impact on results. When people are passionate and committed to a result, they make it happen. When people are aligned around a common purpose, they move mountains.

Part Two tomorrow

Choosing

Ever have to make a tough decision? I have known over the years some people who find it really hard. They are afraid  to make the wrong choice so they analysis the facts to death. It's really easy to suffer from what is called Analysis Paralysis - the inability to make a decision or move forward because they are perpetually stuck in the analysis phase.


When it comes to choosing  analysis paralysis can be a very real problem. You don't want to make "the wrong" choice.  You don't want to look foolish. You don't want to regret your choice. However, life is all about choice and some choices you will regret and others you will celebrate. Here is a technique to help

STOP your analysis and think about something else,

Breathe don't panic, take the time to calm the voices inside your head

Sleep on the decision because you want to be rested and clear when you make the decision.

Make the decision, and remember that ultimately, you have to listen to your heart and trust your own judgement,

If you are wrong, then you most likely always always have the opportunity to correct or take responsibility for your action and once you have done that celebrate and enjoy life.

If you are right, celebrate and enjoy life

Social Media

Interesting Youtube presentation on the current state of social media and its use. This is a must see
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ILQrUrEWe8