Get your brain in motion

Tag: personal growth

7 tips to improve your memory

Can’t find your car keys? Forget your grocery list? You’re not alone. Everyone forgets things occasionally. Still, memory loss is nothing to take lightly. Although there are no guarantees when it comes to preventing memory loss , certain activities might help.

This article provides seven simple ways to sharpen your memory:

1. Include physical activity in your daily routine: Physical activity increases blood flow to your whole body, including your brain. This might help keep your memory sharp.

2. Stay mentally active: Just as physical activity helps keep your body in shape, mentally stimulating activities help keep your brain in shape.

3. Socialize regularly: Social interaction helps ward off depression and stress, both of which can contribute to memory loss.

4. Get organized: You’re more likely to forget things if your home is cluttered and your notes are in disarray. Jot down tasks, appointments and other events in a special notebook, calendar or electronic planner. Keep to-do lists current and check off items you’ve completed. Limit distractions and don’t do too many things at once.

5. Sleep well: Sleep plays an important role in helping you consolidate your memories, so you can recall them down the road. Make getting enough sleep a priority.

6. Eat a healthy diet: A healthy diet might be as good for your brain as it is for your heart. Eat fruits, vegetables and whole grains. Choose low-fat protein sources, such as fish, beans and skinless poultry. What you drink counts, too.

7. Manage chronic conditions: The better you take care of yourself, the better your memory is likely to be.

Image source: PixabayTumisu

Hot To Make Stress Your Friend

Stress makes our heart pound, our breathing quicken and our forehead sweat. But while stress has been made into a public health enemy, new research suggests that stress may only be bad for us if we believe that to be the case.

In this TED Talk, Psychologist Kelly McGonigal urges us to see stress as a positive, and introduces us to an unsung mechanism for stress reduction: reaching out to others.

Why Attitude Is More Important Than Intelligence

It’s easy to think that people blessed with brains are inevitably going to leave the rest of us in the dust. However, the latest studies from Stanford University, summarised in this article, show that your attitude is a better predictor of your success than your IQ.

In particular, people’s core attitudes fall into one of two categories: a fixed mindset or a growth mindset. Those with a growth mindset believe that they can improve with effort. They outperform those with a fixed mindset, even when they have a lower IQ, because they embrace challenges, treating them as opportunities to learn something new.

There are some strategies that will fine-tune your mindset and help you make certain it’s as growth oriented as possible:

  1. Don’t stay helpless
  2. Be passionate
  3. Take action
  4. Go the extra mile (or two)
  5. Expect results
  6. Be flexible
  7. Don’t complain when things don’t go your way

Image source: EffortJM Fumeau (CC BY-ND 2.0) 

The Little Prince puts on his tie


How many people have read Antoine de Saint Exupery’s masterpiece “The Little Prince”? Probably a correct guess would be several million. In fact it is rather surprising how few people know its business version “The little prince puts on his tie” by Borja Vilaseca.
Based on true events of the author himself, this tale is a story of a young Spanish maverick who, after having explored Madagascar, becomes the new human resources manager at a software company ruled by conflict and persisting poor economic results. Shortly after, the main character, Pablo Prince (Borja Vilaseca) realizes that the working environment is seriously damaging the company and its outcome, since it is based on the fear of the bosses, passive acceptance of the status quo and widespread distrust among colleagues.
Prince decides to challenge this instability by organizing a human development course asking people to follow it skeptically and not to take any idea for granted but, at the same time, to try to follow his methods with a correct attitude before evaluating them. His theory develops on innovative approaches based on self-knowledge and personal growth. He is convinced that people cannot change the external environment where they have little or no control at all but they should try to change what they really can, themselves. He wants his colleagues to proactively engage in their working situations and to not just accept them passively but to remove their personal constraints that obstruct their potential. How? According to Prince, emotions such as fear and happiness are based on how somebody decides to interpret external events and everybody should be conscious that those can be molded to his advantage and his personal development.
Despite being a new hire, Prince decides to confront his bosses about allowing more free time to his colleagues for a better work-life balance, specifying individual tasks clearly for better understanding of their role and giving them greater responsibility so they feel a more relevant part of the organization. His colleagues slowly realize they could be free from stress and deadlines thus releasing their creative energy and their full potential. Employees start to feel that the company is the place where they can learn, improve and fulfill their professional goals. Therefore, the old idea of the company as a “prison” becomes outdated. Prince understands that his colleagues were using their external problems and excuses to justify their working behaviours rather than learning from their mistakes and nurturing greater self-awareness and conscience.
The process of change and transformation of the company comes true developing the potential, talent and creativity of its employees. By changing mentality, leadership and business culture, eliminating conflict and dissatisfaction and managing emotional intelligence, Prince shifts the main objective from company’s results to its employees’ personal results.
If you are interested in reading this noteworthy book you chose wisely and you should probably stop reading right here.
In case you are curious to know how it finishes, I’ll fast forward to its end. The company started to be profitable after five years of losses reaching its highest ever turnover without investing any economic resources. It did not raise salaries, guarantee promotions, relocate its offices to new exotic locations nor distribute prizes. The miracle happened thanks to a young visionary human resources manager who was able to work on people’s happiness, talent and creativity. But if you want to know precisely how he did that and if you want to know and improve yourself, then you should probably read this book.


« The whole world steps aside for the man who knows where he is going »
ANTOINE DE SAINT-EXUPÉRY

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