Research & Rescue

Video: Dragonboy

A knight. A princess. A dragon. Three little kids. One school play. An epic battle for love and honor.

Be strong - even when it seems the crowds are cheering on the other guy.

Dragonboy from Dragon Boy on Vimeo.

Hat tip @shortfilmfest on Twitter for this short video that was released about two weeks ago.

Video: Think Different

I've mentioned Michael Lloyd-Billington before, a wonderful, inspiring man who has a personal training and yoga business up in Fort Collins. This is a beautiful short vid he shared on Facebook this week and I will share it with you.

Be who you are. If you want to change something - in the world or in just yourself, work to do that - even if there are saboteurs looking over your shoulder. Chances are that you're not as crazy as people make you out to be.

Video: Jessica's Daily Affirmation

So, I took the first in a series of coaching classes this past weekend and I thought I'd share a video that embodies the excitement I'm feeling inside. (Hat tip: CTI Blog)

Truly disconnecting

You who know me know that I am far from having the fortitude to pull off SocMe entirely but I try to take block out to just pick up a book and read or set down the blasted iPhone when visiting with friends (not a master, still a grasshopper). What William Powers says here is too true. While I don't want "bad internet days", I also don't want to disconnect from the deeper conversations that let us really see each other and know each other. In Twitter's defense, being a telecommuter a lot of the water cooler aspect of work out of my day and I've been very fortunate to have Twitter at night to meet people in NM and have developed some wonderful friendships here because of it. But those in person interactions, when they come along are so much better than conversations that are limited to 140 character responses.

Powers' book, Hamlet's Blackberry, is on the stack and I hope it will help me break free of some acquired bad habits I've developed living mostly online.

On one level, it makes perfect sense that we never go anywhere without our gadgets. They perform all kinds of useful tasks for us and enrich our lives in countless ways.

But they also keep us connected to everything we’re trying to escape. Having a screen along for the ride changes the nature of the ride. A quiet afternoon of fishing isn’t the same when your inbox is buzzing every five minutes. Getting lost in a wonderful book is impossible if you’re simultaneously fielding tweets and Facebook updates.

By staying connected all the time, we ensure that we never truly go “away.” And the resulting losses are massive. Our souls crave the release summer once offered. We need to cut loose now and then, sit quietly, take naps, dance in the moonlight. Those moments are exceedingly rare now, yet this is barely discussed, like a dirty secret nobody wants to mention.

William Powers is the author of the new book “Hamlet’s BlackBerry: A Practical Philosophy for Building a Good Life in the Digital Age.”

Read the rest of Powers' piece at www.pbs.org

World's cleverest man Grigory Perelman turns down $1million prize for solving one of world's hardest puzzles 'because it's unfair' | Mail Online

Some of my faith in humanity has been restored. There are some reasons I can't share yet; there are some reasons that deserve a well-written blog post and I don't have time at the moment. This, however, I can share now. Wow:

A Russian mathematician is rejecting a $1million (£666,000) prize for solving one of the most challenging problems because he considers it unfair.

Said to be the world's cleverest man, Dr Grigory Perelman, 44, lives as a recluse in a bare cockroach-infested flat in St Petersburg.

He was awarded the $1million in March by the U.S. Clay Mathematics Institute for solving the Poincare Conjecture, which baffled mathematicians for a century. Dr Perelman posted his solution on the internet.

But he told the institute, based in Cambridge, Massachusetts, that he was turning down the prize.

Perelman was quoted by Interfax as saying he believes his contribution in proving the Poincare conjecture was no greater than that of U.S. mathematician Richard Hamilton, who first suggested a program for the solution.

The Poincare conjecture deals with shapes that exist in four or more dimensions.

After the prize was announced in March, he said: 'I have all I want.'

via www.dailymail.co.uk

Is non-profit necessarily a better world?

I had an interesting discussion last Friday with some local business people and artists about irritating things that happen in corporate culture - the kinds of things that make you feel as if you're a Dilbert character. One of them astutely pointed out that small businesses come with their own share of idiosyncrasies. I have been there too and will verify that. I think that many of us in the corporate world fantasize about "giving up the rat race and doing something that matters". While that's important and perhaps even noble, it's also important to remember that human nature is at play in whatever work environment you are. I have been on some volunteer endeavors that were worthy of psychoanalysis. There can be just as much cattiness, sniping, incompetence, etc. than anywhere else.

Rosetta Thurman has some great related advice for those seeking positions in the non-profit arena. The grass is not always greener.

A friend of mine just decided to quit her nonprofit job. It was making her so miserable that it would sometimes bring her to tears. As I spoke with her, I was reminded that many people think just because you work for a good cause, your workplace will always be hunky-dory. You’ll come into the office or program site in the morning and everyone will be smiling and jumping up and down with excitement about saving the world. And your boss and board members will be just swell people of the highest character. While these are all nice sentiments about nonprofit work culture, they’re just not always true. Nonprofit workplaces can be plagued with the same irritations as for-profit companies: office politics, incompetent bosses, lying, stealing, lazy co-workers, etc. But if you don’t go into it with rose-colored glasses, you can avoid hating your nonprofit job.

Read the rest at www.rosettathurman.com

Video: Mike Rowe on hard work

Those of you know me personally know what a TEDhead I am. Yesterday evening, I spent some time rooting around the TED site because I saw that there was something called an associate membership that included shipments of books (!). The price was daunting, so I decided to root around some more to find the book list. As far as I know, there isn't one. So, I set out to make one and will share when I'm done. BUT... while on my quest for speakers' books I came across this gem. Who would have thought that Mike Rowe would be a TEDster? Actually, it looks like it's a TED partner conference on entertainment but still.

It's a great video, though I didn't really care for his statements about OSHA and I have a feeling that many of the people to which he refers (saying they don't think it's important) agree with me. If you think I've misinterpreted what he said, set me straight. I may be oversensitive. At any rate, Rowe's anecdote about his show on sheep is hilarious and this one's well worth your time.

Clutter Removal

 
 

If a clean desk is the sign of a messy mind, my brain is presently a void. It's pretty well-known that having a cluttered environment can be an anathema to one's well being and there's no end of self-help books and even a monthly magazine devoted to simplifying. Although, frankly the magazine would be simpler if it weren't probably 60% ads for things that are supposed to help but are usually containers to put more clutter in.

I have found personally that I'm just not as productive if I'm constantly trying to find a notepad or having to move something for writing space and eventually I have to take an hour or so just to get my bearings again and start with a fresh desktop. My strategy that I had planned to use for this desktop and the other built-in desk is to completely empty the surface onto the loveseat and then start putting things back/away or toss them as needed. This is also the tactic presented in Lifehacker today in its post The End-All Guide to Getting Out From Under Your Office Crap.

The big question is whether to recover space on the right side of the desk by removing the cat bed, which is one of the major selling points of a home office:

Sir Ken Robinson TED Talk and book

I would have normally passed by The Element in a store as self-help fluff but the video below, which is a TED Talk by Ken Robinson, convinced me to download it to my Kindle last week. As you might guess by the full title - The Element: How Finding Your Passion Changes Everything - has to do with how many people don't really recognize what their true calling is. According to Robinson, our school systems encourage conformity and actually kill creativity in our youth. I see this in the corporate world, as well, and the sad thing is that most adults simply accept it and either suppress their calling to do what lies in their hearts or, sadder still, never bother to figure out what that is.

Legal but risky

Hat tip Drake Intelligence Group for the link. One had to anticipate the eventual use of social media in an entirely inappropriate manner. In my humble opinion, this is the business equivalent of breaking up with your high school sweetheart via text message. Have we become this crass?

Firing staff through social media legal but risky - Business - News