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Let’s start by defining what energy is at the core with something I learned from an incredible, life transformational program I attended this past January: ULTIMATUM. The seminar is led by the wizardly Donny Epstein, a man who Tony Robbins has accredited for having created some of the most powerful, revolutionary methodologies for personal transformation. At the seminar, Donny said, “Energy is the context to all content.” What does that mean? It means that every single thought, feeling, action, concept, idea, creation, emotion, and decision we make is influenced by the amount of energy available to us. Energy is the unit for all creation and life. We need physical energy so that our body can function properly. We need emotional energy for rapid changes in behavior. In fact, emotion is a code-word for energy in motion. We need mental energy to create and formulate higher order thoughts, concepts and a vision for our life. We need the energetic of Soul for the knowing and expressio...

Turn on interior lights when you are away in the evenings. Make sure that your main entrances, porches and front walkways are well-lit. Criminals generally chose homes that are in dark or poorly lit areas; it is because there they can easily do their work without being noticed. Same rule apply for parking. Park your car in a well lit area and no one will ever dare to touch it.  Also, criminals are less likely to attempt to break in if they think that people are around. That's why you should leave some lights or the TV on. If you're staying in a hotel room, try placing the "do not disturb" sign on door so it looks like you’re in there, even when you're not.  Be aware of your surroundings while using ATM. If the machine is poorly lit, or is in a hidden area, use another location. And never count your cash while standing at the ATM.  Always keep the grass and bushes trimmed that are right in front of your windows and doors. They can prov...

I've been working from home, and leading teams remotely for many years.  Here are some of the things I've learned during that time.  I hope you can find some benefit from it... 1. Start your day off right. Get up, have breakfast, take a shower, put on something other than pajamas, etc. – you get the idea. Remember, how you treat yourself on the outside reflects what you are thinking on the inside. Be good to yourself and it will show in your communications. Remember, when you work from home you only have your voice and tone, so everything you say and do will be scrutinized. 2. Create a dedicated work space with a door you can shut. You need a place where you do work that you can leave at the end of the day. To work from home successfully, you need to maintain a strong mental focus on what you do. You don’t want to have your work everywhere around your house, and you definitely want a door you can shut when needed.  It’s also a good idea to conduct a ...

The two types of courses are knowledge courses and Math related courses. For courses that are heavy on memorizing knowledge: Use the memory palace or Method of Loci, to commit new information to memory faster and reduce the repetition needed to remember it. To understand concepts faster, try to relate it to everyday things and try to teach it. To review everything you learn and only study what you have forgotten, use flashcard apps that have the forgetting curve algorithm built in, like Anki. 1) The memory palace method , of Method of Loci, is a fantastic way to store hundreds of pieces of information. Joshua Foer's book Moonwalking with Einstein is a good book to read on how to utilize a memory palace. The general principle is to have a layout of place you know well (like your home) and put information in different places. The reason why it works so well is that our brain is built to remember spatial memory (memory for orientation and environment). For ex...

If the goal is not just the understanding and use of the information, and you need to remember it and to be able to recall it after, there are some ways to improve the process of learning, which can help you spend the time more efficient. Short basic info: The brain creates connections between neurons, but they are short-term until person gets some sleep. After the sleep they become stable, and after some time after learning they start fading. They become easier to access every time person repeats this info, or tells about it, or even thinks about the information and manipulates it in mind. Emotions make the connections stronger as well. Brain uses up to 1/4 of glucose in a blood, that's why good nutrition is also important. So, the main rules are: 1. Build a model of information. You need it to keep the hierarchical relations clear, and for better understanding of causal connections. So, if you forget some specific fact, you are able to guess it and to recall it faster, havin...

1) Excel at being Lazy.   A good developer knows exactly how to use his/her tools to maximize the amount of time spent creating a solution.  If you can counjour up a magic key press that loads in your project, cleans the build then rebuilds your solution in half the time, then it's worth your while to do it. You might only save 3 key presses, but at 10ms each that's 30ms extra thinking time to be ready for the build being finished. The best solutions, produce the maximum amount of output for the least amount of input, but without sacrificing quality (In other words, don't cut corners in the process) 2) Automate everything you can. If you can put it in a shell script, then do so, tools like grunt, gulp and plethora of others go a long way to helping with this, but don't stop there.  Why not for example get your git hooks to automatically run a grunt task when you check something in? 3) Step away from your code for at least 5 minutes every hour and a ha...

One of the best ways to use your time wisely is to have a plan of action. We  used to call it an OpPlan for Operations Plan. If you know what you’ll  be working on tomorrow, you’ll develop the mindset of productivity to  get er done. It also keeps you from thinking about work during your  “off” time. Here are some great tips to do at the end of your work day. Set aside  a few minutes when you’re done with work to make sure these things are  in order. When you get up the next day, ready to work, you’ll already be  ahead by having this lined out. 1. Put away and tidy all of your work materials so they are ready for the next day. No one wants to walk into a cluttered office to work. This steals  your work time because you need to get it organized before you can even  concentrate on work. Take care of this at the “end” of the work day so  it’s all set up when you return to your desk the next morning. 2. Look over the next day...

Even if you visit parlors/saloons thousand times and color your hair, your age is going to show up. Even if you follow trendy wears and cargo pants; you will fall short of breath at staircases and even forget you have done trekking in college days. So what to do? Yes, something is possible, here is how. SHIFT+ DELETE - Clean Up Your System:   Do you have old messages and phone numbers in your mobile, piling up year on year? Delete everything immediately …what about your mind, is it same as that? Old days, old arguments and poignant memories...SHIFT + DELETE. Don’t you need space in your memory to save fresh and new things? Clean up and update your system. Watch Your Company, Have Positive People Around You:   With whom you have the friendship, the one who always complain about something or everything OR the one who thinks about, everything around them is unfair, and how everyone is behaving badly. Will these people hammer you, now and then with their pes...

I always was looking for ways to motivate myself to work hard, "no pain no gain" I used to say, reading motivational quotes and etc. Until one day I found the formula I am going to share with you that helps me to motivate myself and doing things in EASY, NATURAL and FUN way. Human motivation really can be explained very easily: it is the pain-pleasure principle by Fried. We tend to move toward the things we like, love doing, good feelings we experience and we will move away from the painful staff, things we don’t want to do and the bad emotions we experience. The secret is to make those “hard” things and make them fun and enjoy the process. When you can`t see the difference between what you love doing and what you call work then you don`t have to motivate yourself, you have do NOTHING because this process happens automatically. “The master in the art of living makes little distinction between his work and his play. He hardly knows which is which. He simply pursues his vi...

I had a time in my life that I was responsible for the growth of a startup in London, was giving consultancy to an eCommerce and working on my side project, all at the same time. I knew that if I wanted to keep doing everything and not lose my sanity, I would need to manage my energy wisely. By doing some research and experimentation, here's what worked best for me: Eat a Breakfast Low on the Glycemic Index What do you eat for breakfast? How does it make you feel during the day? Does it give you a boost of energy but then after a few hours you're begging for your bed? If your energy levels start to drop at 11am, can you imagine how it will be when you arrive home at 7pm after a long day of work? How can you find energy to work on your side project in that situation? That's why it's highly important to eat a breakfast low on the glycemic index.  The glycemic index or glycaemic index (GI) is a number associated with a particular type of food that indicates the foo...

Being able to think is what separates us from remaining creatures on this planet. Unlike remaining creatures, our actions are based on our thoughts and sometimes our actions are based on our thoughts. If any action gets accomplished, there will be three elements behind it.   (Karta) . The person who does the action (Karma) . The action itself and its bounded ramification. (Kriya) . The type of action performed / work done. Karma plays very important role in our life. Because which ever action we do, there will be a result of that. The result may vary with time or intensity. Example, If you put your finger in a current passing electric board, you will get shock. Here the result is instant. The company where in you work if you gossip about your team leader to your colleague who you assume as your friend, may report that to your team leader adding his own masala, which may effect your salary hike. You don't know why you didn't get appropriate hike. In this ...

Between 16 and about 30, life gives us incredible energy.  After that, we have less energy and less time.  As Franklin said, "Do ye love life?  Then do not waste time, for that is the stuff life is made of."   A great lesson of Western Civ is to delay gratification in hopes of a better reward down the road. Hence, the many compelling time-wasters of our day (mindless internet surfing, video games, texting, reality TV, endless social media use, bad relationships etc.,) --these are all a slow drip of poison for the life you hope to have. You can never get back those many hours wasted. What should one do instead?  Read, study and build skills. Listen to old people.  Hone your ability to concentrate. You are now in the 'habit-forming' time of your life, that will carry forward for many years. Guard your integrity: your word, the quality of your friendships, the interests you allow yourself. Be fully in the moment; life is more interesting that ...