Random musings: January 2022

Thursday - "Finally Understand How to Keep a Bullet Journal #TBT" This is a really interesting post on using a bullet journal. "Here are a few features that make the Bullet Journal unique among other journaling systems"

Interesting days

Today - National Dress Up Your Pet Day, International Kite Day, National Hot Pastrami Sandwich Day and National Organize Your Home Day

Tomorrow - National Hat Day, National Bagel Day, National Strawberry Ice Cream Day and National Pothole Day

Next Friday - Hugging Day, Playdate Day, International Sweatpants Day, Granola Bar Day and Squirrel Appreciation Day

Week long celebrations:

Jan 17 - 21: Family Mediation Week

February 14 - Valentine's Day, Ferris Wheel Day, Donor Day, Cream-Filled Chocolates Day, International Book Giving Day and Pet Theft Awareness Day

Thursday, January 13, 2022

Finally Understand How to Keep a Bullet Journal #TBT

Today's blog post was originally published two years ago:

Today's blog post is from an article in The Art of Manliness. I wrote about bullet journaling a couple of weeks ago.

Do you have aspirations of journaling more? Me too. Of getting more organized and being able to cross more to-dos off your list? Ditto.

While finding just the right journal or system isn’t always the answer, sometimes it can give you the nudge you need.

That’s where the Bullet Journal comes in. If you’re a web surfer in any regard, you’ve likely seen that term pop up now and again as a new method of journaling that combines a traditional diary with calendaring, to-dos, capturing ideas, etc. While you can buy an official branded Bullet Journal, you can also create the template yourself using just about any notebook. Many people prefer a dot grid layout to lined (for doodling and adding more creative flare), but it’s certainly not a requirement.

While there’s an entire book on how to “properly” use the Bullet Journal methodology, it’s an easy system to learn with just a few pointers.

Below you’ll find why I enjoy it and some fundamental tips that make the Bullet Journal a uniquely useful tool.

As I said before, I'm just using an 89 cent spiral bound notebook.

So, what is a bullet journal? (This is AoM's take on the subject).

Here are a few features that make the Bullet Journal unique among other journaling systems (plenty more on all of these below):

Starts with an index. At the very start of the journal is a detailed index with page numbers so that everything in the journal is easily findable.
Includes monthly/daily logs for planning, productivity, note-taking, and journaling.
Makes use of various bullet points within those logs in order to signify tasks (and if those tasks are done, delegated, incomplete, etc.), events, ideas, and more. Hence the name “Bullet Journal.”
Includes any number of “Collections” — pages that center on various subjects and which function for any purpose you’d like, from book lists to workout/food tracking to idea capture and more.

That’s a rough idea of what comprises a Bullet Journal. Next, a few reasons why I and many others utilize this system.

I also wrote about how to use BuJo specifically for journaling here.

Here are some benefits of bullet journaling:

Works with other journaling/to-do systems.
Combines lists/notebooks into a single “file.”
Organizes your jottings.
Totally customizable.

AoM then goes into the above items in much more detail. I highly recommend that you read the article here.

I know this may seem like a lot of organizational ideas thrown your way at once, so here’s a quick recap:

Put an index at the start of your notebook or journal which captures the page numbers for everything being written down.
Create a monthly log to get a broad overview of the big events/to-dos/goals for each month.
Create a daily log to do the same thing on a smaller scale.
Use the various bullets and signifiers to jot down to-dos, events, notes, etc.
Use short daily planning and review sessions to migrate notes, to-dos, and ideas so that they don’t get lost in the jungle of a well-filled notebook.

One thing that I noticed that isn't included in this article are future logs. The video in my blog post shows how to use them.

Go ahead and check it out.

Interesting days

Today - National Sticker Day, National Rubber Duckie Day, Public Radio Broadcasting Day, Make Your Dream Come True Day, World Skeptics Day and National Peach Melba Day

Tomorrow - National Dress Up Your Pet Day, International Kite Day, National Hot Pastrami Sandwich Day and National Organize Your Home Day

Next Thursday - Disc Jockey Day, Cheese Lovers Day, Camcorder Day, Day of Acceptance, Buttercrunch Day and Penguin Awareness Day

Week long celebrations:

Jan 17 - 21: Family Mediation Week

February 13 - Radio Day, Tortellini Day, Madly In Love With Me Day, Employee Legal Awareness Day and Get A Different Name Day

Week long celebrations:

February 9 - 15: Kraut and Frankfurter Week

Wednesday, January 12, 2022

More on habits

Here's a lot more information about habits and their neurochemistry. The first two videos are from Andrew Huberman. I discovered him just a few weeks ago. The videos are very informative but they each last about 90 minutes. The first one has some good habit building techniques and the second one goes more in depth about dopamine.

And here's a much shorter video that talks about the relationship between dopamine and serotonin:

Check out last week's blog post for more on habits.

Interesting days

Today - Kiss a Ginger Day, National Marzipan Day and National Pharmacist Day

Tomorrow - National Sticker Day, National Rubber Duckie Day, Public Radio Broadcasting Day, Make Your Dream Come True Day, World Skeptics Day and National Peach Melba Day

Next Wednesday - National Popcorn Day, National Tin Can Day and Museum Selfie Day

February 12 - Darwin Day, National Lost Penny Day and National Plum Pudding Day

Week long celebrations:

Feb 6 - Feb 12: National Secondhand Wardrobe Week

Feb 6 - Feb 12: Boy Scouts Anniversary Week

Tuesday, January 11, 2022

Your weekend guide to interesting days - January 8, 2022

Week long celebrations:

Feb 1 - Feb 7: Cheerleading Week

Feb 1 - Feb 7: Patient Recognition Week

Feb 1 - Feb 7: School Counseling Week

Feb 1 - Feb 7: Solo Diners Eat Out Week

Feb 1 - Feb 7: African Heritage and Health Week

Feb 6 - Feb 12: National Secondhand Wardrobe Week

Feb 6 - Feb 12: Boy Scouts Anniversary Week

Feb 7 - Feb 11: Pride In Foodservice Week

Friday, January 7, 2022

The week in review - January 7, 2022

Monday - "All the ways to win - updated" As it looks right now, the updated part will end tonight. "You get one entry for each session you watch at www.CryptoFreeTrial.com, there is no need to pre-register,"

Tuesday - "The Tiny Habits That Change Everything" From The Art pf Manliness. "This is always a good time of year to talk about habits...whether creating new ones or eliminating old ones!"

Wednesday - "The Rationality of Emotions" Can emotions be rational? "Next week I'll talk about the chemistry of emotions, and the roles that dopamine, serotonin and norepinephrine play in emotions and motivation and how they tie back into habits."

Thursday - "No #TBT today" Oops "The pickings were very sparse for this date and there was nothing relevant."

Interesting days

Today - Tempura Day, Bobblehead Day, Harlem Globetrotter’s Day, I’m Not Going To Take It Anymore Day and Old Rock Day

Tomorrow - Bubble Bath Day, Joy Germ Day, Show & Tell At Work Day, Argyle Day and Earth’s Rotation Day

Next Friday - National Dress Up Your Pet Day, International Kite Day, National Hot Pastrami Sandwich Day and National Organize Your Home Day

February 7 - Play More Cards Day, National Send a Card to a Friend Day and World Ballet Day

Week long celebrations:

Feb 1 - Feb 7: Cheerleading Week

Feb 1 - Feb 7: Patient Recognition Week

Feb 1 - Feb 7: School Counseling Week

Feb 1 - Feb 7: Solo Diners Eat Out Week

Feb 1 - Feb 7: African Heritage and Health Week

Feb 6 - Feb 12: National Secondhand Wardrobe Week

Feb 6 - Feb 12: Boy Scouts Anniversary Week

Thursday, January 6, 2022

No #TBT today

The pickings were very sparse for this date and there was nothing relevant.

Interesting days

Today - Cuddle Up Day, Bean Day, Apple Tree Day, Shortbread Day and Three Kings Day

Tomorrow - Tempura Day, Bobblehead Day, Harlem Globetrotter’s Day, I’m Not Going To Take It Anymore Day and Old Rock Day

Next Thursday - National Sticker Day, National Rubber Duckie Day, Public Radio Broadcasting Day, Make Your Dream Come True Day, World Skeptics Day and National Peach Melba Day

February 6 - National Yorkshire Pudding Day, Dump Your Significant Jerk Day, National Frozen Yogurt Day and Lame Duck Day

Week long celebrations:

Feb 1 - Feb 7: Cheerleading Week

Feb 1 - Feb 7: Patient Recognition Week

Feb 1 - Feb 7: School Counseling Week

Feb 1 - Feb 7: Solo Diners Eat Out Week

Feb 1 - Feb 7: African Heritage and Health Week

Feb 6 - Feb 12: National Secondhand Wardrobe Week

Feb 6 - Feb 12: Boy Scouts Anniversary Week

Wednesday, January 5, 2022

The Rationality of Emotions

Another one from The Art of Manliness. The plan is to tie yesterday's blog post and the next few together. Today's post is kind of a stepping stone.

Emotions have gotten a bad rap these days. We’re frequently told we should mistrust them, ignore them, even f**k them. It may seem that humanity, especially the male segment of it, has always evinced this level of skepticism towards our feelings, viewing them as unreliable guides — womanly disrupters of our happiness and tranquility.

But the role of emotions in the lives of men and women alike has not always been viewed so dubiously by everyone, in every time; instead, distrust in feelings waxes and wanes according to the level of uncertainty in society. When life is unpredictable, chaotic, and troubling, people retreat inwardly, batten down the hatches, seek to turn themselves into stone. It seems too risky to expose one’s true feelings, to let anything but cold hard logic dictate one’s decisions. Because, the thinking goes, emotions are essentially irrational.

Yet there have been periods and philosophies that have seen emotions and reason not as contradictory but complementary. Thinkers as different in outlook and era as Aristotle, Nietzsche, and C.S. Lewis all argued that feelings have their own intelligence and wisdom, are necessary in order to participate in the human experience at its most dynamic and incandescent, and must be intertwined with our rational faculties in order to achieve the good life.

Today we’ll unpack the premises of this perspective, and how emotions can be rational, in that they have rationality in themselves, can align with rationality, and can be harnessed towards rational purposes.

From other articles that I've read, the ideas of emotions and feelings are distinct. Emotions are physical responses to stimuli, either internal or external, while feelings are the attributes that we assign to those emotions. Here's an excerpt from Six Seconds;

Emotions come first, then feelings come after as the emotion chemicals go to work in our bodies. Then moods develop from a combination of feelings.

Emotions are chemicals released in response to our interpretation of a specific trigger. It takes our brains about 1/4 second to identify the trigger, and about another 1/4 second to produce the chemicals. By the way, emotion chemicals are released throughout our bodies, not just in our brains, and they form a kind of feedback loop between our brains & bodies. They last for about six seconds – hence the name of our organization.

Feelings happen as we begin to integrate the emotion, to think about it, to “let it soak in.” In English, we use “feel” for both physical and emotional sensation — we can say we physically feel cold, but we can also emotionally feel cold. This is a clue to the meaning of “feeling,” it’s something we sense. Feelings are more “cognitively saturated” as the emotion chemicals are processed in our brains & bodies. Feelings are often fueled by a mix of emotions, and last for longer than emotions.

Moods are more generalized. They’re not tied to a specific incident, but a collection of inputs. Mood is heavily influenced by several factors: the environment(weather, lighting, people around us), physiology (what we’ve been eating, how we’ve been exercising, how healthy we are), and finally our mental state (where we’re focusing attention and our current emotions). Moods can last minutes, hours, probably even days.

The AoM article is too long to present the entire thing o I'll list the subsections. You can read the article if you'd like to learn more.

Emotions Are Meaningful Judgements

Emotions Discern Value

Emotions Are Trainable

Emotions Are the Engines of Action

I've read that emotion can be thought of as energy in motion.

Emotions Are Strategic

Emotions Create Meaning

If emotions are rational to the extent that they further our ultimate ends, and nearly everyone desires a life of great meaning, then choosing to embrace your emotions — even, ironically, those of an intensity that leans to the “irrational” — can be the most rational decision you could possibly make.

Next week I'll talk about the chemistry of emotions, and the roles that dopamine, serotonin and norepinephrine play in emotions and motivation and how they tie back into habits.

Interesting days

Today - Whipped Cream Day and Bird Day

Tomorrow - Cuddle Up Day, Bean Day, Apple Tree Day, Shortbread Day and Three Kings Day

Next Wednesday - Kiss a Ginger Day, National Marzipan Day and National Pharmacist Day

Week long celebrations:

Jan 29 - Feb 5: Cordova Iceworm Festival Week

Feb 1 - Feb 7: Cheerleading Week

Feb 1 - Feb 7: Patient Recognition Week

Feb 1 - Feb 7: School Counseling Week

Feb 1 - Feb 7: Solo Diners Eat Out Week

Feb 1 - Feb 7: African Heritage and Health Week

Tuesday, January 4, 2022

The Tiny Habits That Change Everything

This is always a good time of year to talk about habits...whether creating new ones or eliminating old ones! Today's blog post is based on a podcast from The Art of Manliness:

We’re a month into the new year now. How are you doing on your resolutions? Have you already fallen off the wagon? Maybe the goal you set for yourself was just too big to successfully tackle. You need to think smaller. Tiny, even.

That’s the argument my guest makes. His name is Dr. BJ Fogg, and he’s the founder and director of Stanford’s Behavior Design Lab, as well as the author of the new book Tiny Habits: The Small Changes That Change Everything. Today on the show, BJ walks us through the three components that drive our behavior, including the simple yet overlooked relationship between motivation and ability. He then explains how to build habits that feel easier and require lower levels of motivation by picking behaviors that are good matches for you and breaking them down into smaller parts. We also talk about the need to tie your habits to turnkey prompts, the importance of celebrating your successes, no matter how small, and the way tiny habits can lead to bigger changes. We end our conversation with why you should think about the process of getting rid of your bad habits as untangling them rather than breaking them.

I've talked about habits before and also about motivation and ability.

No wonder this podcast seemed familiar! I actually wrote about it before...you can access it at the link for motivation and ability above. I go into more detail in that post, so why don't you go ahead and check it out.

Interesting days

Today - Trivia Day, World Braille Day, Spaghetti Day, Pop Music Chart Day and Hypnotism Day

Tomorrow - Whipped Cream Day and Bird Day

Next Tuesday - National Step in a Puddle and Splash Your Friends Day, Heritage Treasures Day, World Sketchnote Day, Poetry at Work Day, National Milk Day, National Learn Your Name In Morse Code Day and National Hot Toddy Day

Week long celebrations:

Jan 29 - Feb 5: Cordova Iceworm Festival Week

Feb 1 - Feb 7: Cheerleading Week

Feb 1 - Feb 7: Patient Recognition Week

Feb 1 - Feb 7: School Counseling Week

Feb 1 - Feb 7: Solo Diners Eat Out Week

Feb 1 - Feb 7: African Heritage and Health Week

Monday, January 3, 2022

All the ways to win - updated

The original version of this post was published last week:

You may have caught my Facebook Live yesterday where I talked about the new $25 and $100 American Express gift card giveaways. If not, now you will.

But first I'm going to talk about all the ways you can get entries into the brownie giveaway:

The first way, and most of you have already done this is to watch an 11 minute video, what you may not have noticed was an invitation to join a Facebook group. Both of those activities are worth 1 entry each. Plus, if you share the video (which I know some of you have done), the person who you shared with gets an entry for watching the video and another for joining the FB group. And you get an additional entry to match each of theirs!

The next way is a biggie...you get 5 entries for watching a live IM Academy presentation. These presentations last about 20 - 30 minutes. There are 3 opportunities a day - at noon, 5:00 and 8:00 PST every Monday - Friday. And everybody who watches gets 5 entries (and so do you). So, make some popcorn and sit down with your spouse...you'll get 5 entries for watching, your spouse will get 5 entries and you'll get 5 more entries because your spouse watched. Be sure to share with your parents, siblings, adult kids, friends and neighbors. Here's the link...the password is IM. It may just ask for your email address. Don't worry...they won't spam you. These presentations will be going on for the foreseeable future.

If you can't make one of the live presentations (or even if you can), you can watch a recorded version of a presentation. This is worth 3 entries in the drawing. And yes, you can watch both a live presentation and the recorded version.

So, by yourself you can get up to 10 entries in the drawing, plus you can double, triple or quadruple the number of entries. You're saying to yourself that the brownies are good, but they're really not worth that much effort. That' where the gift cards come in. On the first Saturday of every month, starting this Saturday, I'll be putting the names of all of the brownie winners into a bowl and drawing at least one name to win a $25 AmEx gift card. And on the first Saturday of a new quarter (starting in April), the winners of the $25 gift cards will be placed in a bowl and at least one person will win a $100 gift card.

But wait! What if I don't win brownies? Does that mean I'm out of luck for the gift card drawings? Absolutely not! There are ways to get entries directly into the gift card drawings.

First, to get entered into the $25 monthly drawing, you can do a 3 way Zoom with me and my mentor, Darla DiGrandi-Aguilera. She's much better at explaining all of this than I am! But please, only do this if you're willing to learn more about the academy. Darla's time, and your time, is too valuable to waste if you're not the least bit curious. You'll get one entry into the $25 AmEx gift card drawing when you do this. Again, if your friends and family are interested they can get an entry and you can get additional ones. But again, only if they're interested in learning more.

And how about the $100 drawing? Become an IM Academy student. For every month that you're a student, you'll get an entry into the drawing. And between now and the end of the year, you can get a $50 rebate! You DO NOT get additional entries when other people sign up but there are other benefits offered directly form the academy. Want to learn more? Book a Zoom with Darla and me...just reach out to me and I'll set it up.

And I did a FB Live yesterday discussing a way to earn up to 5 more entries: