How Much Common Sense Do You Have?

Do Smart People Have Less Friends?

It’s always been said that who you surround yourself with is important to who you are as a person. The character of your friends says a lot about your character. A new study from a couple of evolutionary psychologists, Satoshia Kanazawa and Norma Li, is taking the link between friends and intelligence a step further and suggesting that intelligent people prefer to have fewer friends.
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Different Vision

At first glance, the study doesn’t suggest intelligent people are anti-social or have social deficiencies in any way. It’s more likely that intelligent people have a problem connecting with other people because they see the world differently. They take a deeper look at the things around us that most people just wander by. They are more likely to engage in anti-social hobbies like reading. I say “anti-social” meaning they are done alone, by the way – not that reading makes you anti-social. It’s just not a group activity.

Intelligence Varies

Another very important aspect of the theory that intelligent people have fewer friends hinges on the fact that there are many different forms of intelligence. Dr. Robert Sternberg from Cornell University, an expert in relationships and intelligence said, “There is no psychological meaning to the word ‘highly intelligent.’ In my own theory of successful intelligence, I distinguish among analytical intelligence (IQ), creative intelligence, and practical intelligence (common sense). High IQ does not guarantee either of the latter two. Our schooling so rewards kids with high IQ that those kids have little incentive to develop high social/emotional/practical intelligence, with unfortunate results.”
2 Separate Studies Conclude Friendship is the Key for a Successful Relationship

Savanah Theory

A very interesting aspect of the study was what the authors called the “Savannah Theory”. Basically, the Savannah theory suggests that the hunter-gather nature of our ancient ancestor created the foundation for what makes us happy now. Our ancient ancestors were more worried about survival than they were about having a good time, so if you weren’t a contributing to the group in some way you were useless. Relationships weren’t important to our ancestors outside of eating, surviving, and reproducing. The authors suggest, “Situations and circumstances that would have increased our ancestors’ life satisfaction in the ancestral environment may still increase our life satisfaction today.”

Not only did smarter people have fewer social interactions, but the more they had the less satisfaction they got out of life. The researchers found that People who lived in densely populated areas had lower life satisfaction overall, but people who had more social interactions with close friends were generally happier. What was surprising was that highly intelligent people showed the opposite. According to the study, “The effect of population density on life satisfaction was, therefore, more than twice as large for low-IQ individuals than for high-IQ individuals. More intelligent individuals were actually less satisfied with life if they socialized with their friends more frequently.” In other words, the smarter you are the less you like interacting with people – even your friends…
Friends Who Grow Up Together Stick Together

The findings are controversial, to say the least, but make sense in a way. I think that highly intelligent people, genius level intelligent, tend to lack the same social skills of people of average intelligence. That particular correlation has been proven throughout history. We all have our own quirks and intricacies that make us who we are, and personally don’t take offense to the fact that smarter people are considered less socially active. Again, it boils down to your lifestyle more than anything else. If you are in a lab working on developing the next medical revolution in nanobot technology, chances are that you’re not going to be found at the local pub drinking a beer on a Friday night.

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Award-Winning Architects have Huge Plans for Central Park

Set in the middle of the sprawling urban jungle of Manhattan, Central park is one of the most recognizable landscapes in the world. This 1.3 square mile natural oasis sits among some of New York’s tallest skyscrapers and most densely populated areas. Central park was actually the first landscaped public park in the US. Millions of people travel to Central Park every year from all over the world, not to mention the millions of local New Yorkers who go there on a daily basis to escape the city. After almost 200 years of being an iconic American park, two award-winning architects have a plan that could revolutionize what has already been a revolutionary piece of land.
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Yitan Sun and Jianshi Wu say in their award-winning proposal, “only a fraction of them can enjoy Central Park’s natural environment on a daily basis, and most of the population either live or work beyond the walking distance from it. Is there a way to make Central Park available to more people?” Their answer to this question comes in the form of an amazingly grand idea to excavate the current park to the bedrock exposing the mountains that are buried under the current landscape. Sun and Wu describe this as a “hybrid multi-functional mega structure. Not by building up, but by digging down, it reveals the bedrock (mountain) that was hidden under Central Park, and creates space along the new cliff. The ambition is to reverse the traditional relationship between landscape and architecture, in a way that every occupiable space has direct connection to the nature.”

The excavated park would be surrounded by 1,000-foot tall reflective glass walls, essentially turning Central Park into the world’s largest sunken living room. The designers claim that the excavation would provide “a total floor area of 7 square miles, which is about 80 times greater than the Empire State Building. Wrapping all four sides of the new Central Park. This system breaks the traditional perception of large-scale skyscrapers without taking valuable ground area of Manhattan.”

Check out this video from GeoBeats News which highlights the stunning visuals created by the design team.

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Incredible Edible Cutlery Could Reduce Plastic Garbage in India by 100 Million Tons (Or More!)

Break Out of Your Shell! Five Ways to Build Social Confidence

Being introverted or shy has a lot of benefits, but social confidence doesn’t tend to be one of them. If you often feel left out, alone, ignored, or hypersensitive to the people and circumstances around you, you could be lacking social confidence. Social confidence is exactly what it says it is: the ability to feel good about yourself and integrate well in social situations. Extroverts seem to have it in spades, while introverts…well…not so much.
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Fortunately, there are ways you can begin to build your social confidence and feel more comfortable in social situations. It may not be the easiest thing you’ve ever done, but as introverts are often excellent at building rapport with people and listening, you might find that you have more strengths here than you previously thought.

Don’t take yourself too seriously.

It can seem like a huge part of who you are to take yourself and the situations around you seriously, but really, letting that go a bit can be extremely helpful in social situations. Learning to laugh at yourself and your insecurities can seem a bit weird and even inauthentic, but if you start practicing it you’ll find it becomes easier over time. The trick is to remember that everyone else is laughing too. You’re the only person taking yourself, your situation, your world so seriously, so perhaps a shift in perspective is in order. You might even consider doing something silly in public to really put yourself out there.

Stop being so judgmental.

Especially of yourself. We’re all our own worst critics, but shy people tend to be particularly brutal with themselves. Try letting go of some of those filters you’ve been clinging to that aren’t working except to keep you from saying anything, and join the conversation! People want to hear what you have to say, and by constantly judging your ideas, opinions and perspective you’re excusing yourself from the conversation. You can make this even more effective by joining groups that require your participation, like Meetups or Toastmasters.
Read: 6 Ways to Build Confidence that will Make You Truly Unstoppable

Relax and take it easy.

This one is alternately phrased as “don’t give a $h!t about anything!” but this author likes “relax and take it easy” a bit better. You don’t have to invest yourself in every little thing that comes along in life. Decide on a few priorities and focus on those: family, friends, work or school, your home life, and self-improvement are all good ones. As for everything else: let is go. Life is tough sometimes and sometimes it’s not, but the key to living life on life’s terms is to relax and take it easy.

Practice, practice, practice.

Just like the old joke about how to get to Carnegie Hall, you have to practice. Again, joining groups that require your participation can be helpful. Networking events, singles events and organizing events for your friends are all ways you can further practice your developing social skills. Practice at every opportunity: engage the cashier at the grocery store in a conversation (they will SO appreciate it), chat with your bank teller, be the person telling the best story at the party. Any interaction is an opportunity to put your new social confidence skills to use, and you can only sharpen them by doing so.
Read: 7 Unconventional Tips to Build your Self-Confidence

Work on yourself

Self-improvement is sometimes dismissed as unnecessary, but the fact of the matter is we can all be working on being our better, best selves all the time. Doing so dramatically improves your social confidence. How, you ask? By working on yourself you automatically cultivate confidence in who you are. Your own investment in yourself is the greatest asset you have to building your confidence. By doing so, you improve your ability to interact effectively in social situations and voila! You’ll be a social confidence champion in no time.

Now go forth and socialize!

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3 Struggles that Only People who are Truly Awake Will Understand

One topic I read about in my personal life a lot is the concept of being “awake”. I’m not talking about literally not being asleep, I’m talking about being awake to the world around you. Wakefulness is a combination of mindfulness, consciousness, and awareness on a very deep and often spiritual level. Imagine walking around with your eyes open in a world full of people with their eyes clenched shut. That’s honestly what it feels like. The more I study, meditate, and really search my soul – the more I realize that this mentality isn’t the norm. No matter how much I wish it was. If you’re like me and consider yourself to be awake in a world full of people with their blinders secured tightly to their heads, then you’ll understand the following struggles just as much as I do.
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Seeing the Forest for the Trees

Of all of the aspects of wakefulness that I struggle with, this notion is #1 on my list, and the entire reason for me writing this post. You’ve heard the cliché of people “missing the forest for the trees”, meaning that when you look so intently at that one tree – you don’t notice that you’re surrounded by them. If you’re truly awake, or at least well on your way to being awake, you see the forest from an aerial view. You see the connections between people and actions in ways that other people don’t understand. A big part of wakefulness to me is understanding people and human nature in general. Intuition has a lot to do with it, but studying psychology, spirituality, and the human mind has given me a different perspective. I have always wanted to know what makes people tick outside of the actual physiological components. That’s why I write a lot about emotional intelligence; because I think it is the first step in being awake. If you consider yourself to be emotionally intelligent, then you understand how many people are emotionally ignorant. This is where the forest and trees come in…

As someone who is awake, you see the actions of people and understand why they do them. For me, it is seeing the underlying reasons for people’s actions. Perfect example: I have a friend who is passive aggressive to a fault. But when he gets behind the wheel of a car, he turns into a road rage machine. Not because the people around him are really driving badly – but because there is a wall of metal and glass around him that prevents others from hearing him express himself. All of those frustrations that get bottled up throughout the day, get unleashed as a torrent of ranting and cursing that would make a sailor blush. And for what? Nothing really. It doesn’t solve any of the issues that have been bottled up. Hell, it doesn’t even address them. Now, I know that there has got to be a pressure valve somewhere, in all of us. Seeing this behavior, I know exactly what is going on but never bring it up, which brings me to my next point:
Read: 4 Struggles of Creative People in an Uncreative World

People Don’t Want to Hear the Truth

Most people are completely comfortable with their blinders. Thos blinders provide a sense of safety and security. One of the hardest things people can do is focus their gaze inward. The general consensus seems to be that if you’re looking for answers to the way that you are, that something must be wrong with you. Nothing could be farther from the truth. That’s like saying that you are exploring a coral reef because there is something wrong with it. The human psyche is fascinating, and there is nothing more fulfilling than exploring your own. Again, there is a very strong parallel here to emotional intelligence. There is a difference in knowing what you feel and knowing why you feel it.

When you have this understanding of the human psyche, even on a basic level, you see those “forest and trees” connections. For people who choose not to see those connections, the last thing in the world that they want to do is hear about them, let alone understand them. People take evaluations of their actions and emotions as criticism. If you say, “you do (this) because you do/feel (this),” people get the notion that you are psychoanalyzing them. They don’t want to focus that microscope on themselves because they are afraid of what they might find. Tearing apart your own psyche and peeling back the layers of how your mind works and why isn’t a comfortable process. No matter how fulfilling it is in the end. So, then you find yourself understanding the thoughts and actions of the people around you better than they understand them themselves. That’s when the hard part comes in:
Read: Real World Struggles of Dreamers

The Fear of Expression, and the Consequence of that Fear

Knowing that people don’t seek the same enlightenment for themselves that you seek in yourself leads to a condition where you want to express yourself about someone’s actions, but you fear the defensive nature that comes with it. Have you ever tried to tell someone that their behavior is a result of an emotional condition that they don’t care to understand? It’s like telling an alcoholic that they drink too much. SO in an effort to avoid those defensive repercussions, you end up biting your tongue, which only leaves your blood in your mouth.

There are so many situations in my everyday life where I see the underlying emotional connections to people’s actions and choose not to say anything about them, that the end result is nothing but stress. Stress, for me, often manifests itself physically, so the more stressed out I am – the worse I feel. I just want to snap, and yell at people to stop projecting their emotional ignorance in the form of finger-pointing and deflection, and address their own issues. But…I simply don’t. I reflect on how their actions make me feel, and I ruminate on the things I wish I could say, and I’m the one that ends up absorbing it. For instance, have you’ve ever been around a coworker that treats you like crap because of some other aspect of their lives outside of work? You worry that if you point out that you aren’t the problem – they are, there could be repercussions from you expressing yourself. So you end up in a terrible work environment, fully aware of why this person treats you the way they do, knowing it’s not your fault, and afraid to do anything about it. That’s a very general example of wakefulness, but the reality of it is universal. The struggle is all too real.

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6 Signs that You’re an Absolute Sapiosexual

Some people consider the term “sapiosexual” to just be the newest buzz word when it comes to dating and relationships. But if you are like me, and are attracted intensely to someone because of their mind, then you understand that this isn’t just a passing trend. Sapiosexuality is a real thing. So how do you know if you are a sapiosexual? The first, most obvious place to look is your dating habits:
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Book Stores over Bars

I use the example of bookstores and bars because it’s a common enough cliché, but the point here is that you care about where you go. One thing about sapiosexuals that rings true across the board is that they are into substance. Not just in how they spend their time, but in who they spend it with. If you’d rather spend a day wandering through a new museum than spend a night getting hit on by jerks, chances are, you’re more of a sapiosexual than you think you are.

Witty Banter over Mundane Conversation

Conversations on dates, especially first dates, can be the highest form of tedium known to modern man. First dates are more like job interviews most times. The sapiosexual in us need not only good conversation but truly witty banter. Banter meaning you are trading comments like boxers trade jabs. Banter isn’t just talking, it’s thinking on your feet in vocal form. The key here is not just that you can communicate, but that you can do it creatively. If sarcasm is the language in which you choose to communicate in, chances are, that you are a sapiosexual.
Read: Sapiosexuality: Why Some of Us are Attracted Purely by Intelligence (backed by science, of course)

Silence over Small Talk

Sometimes, the best conversations are the ones where nothing is said at all. This is the case when you’re actually in a relationship with someone and there isn’t a need to fill every single moment of silence with conversation. Sometimes you just want to be in your own head for a minute. To think, or daydream, or just relax and enjoy the moment. If the idea of being able to snuggle on a couch and read together is your idea of heaven, chances are, that you are a sapiosexual.

Substance over Popularity

The last thing most people who qualify as sapiosexuals are interested in is whatever is trendy. Sure, you might find a sapiosexual at a night club, but I can almost guarantee they don’t want to be there. Sapiosexuals don’t always run with the “pack” like others do. Again, it boils down to how you spend your time that matters the most. Sapiosexuals tend to care about what the people they date are into, because it is a sign of who they are as a person. If you’ve ever ranked a date based solely on the choice of location, chances are, that you are a sapiosexual.

Taste over Trends

Again, sapiosexuals tend to value substance over what is popular. This means they prefer things like a live music venue made for 100 people listening to a band no one has ever heard of, over a stadium rock show with some top 40 band. Individual taste is important. You have to make sure that the person you are dating, at the very least, has similar tastes if only to ensure that you can go on a road trip together with having to endure terrible music. More importantly, taste in music and movies is all about who you are as an individual. If you’ve ever quit talking to a potential mate based on their CD collection, chances are, that you are a sapiosexual.

Grammar over Selfies

This is a weird one, but a big one for some people. With the advent of texting, I think it is important to maintain control over the written language. There are few things that turn me off quite like a text that requires a Rosetta stone and a search on Urban Dictionary to decipher. Don’t even get me started on emoji’s… If nothing is sexier to you than the correct usage of “there” and “their”, chances are very high that you are a sapiosexual.

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New Research Shows the Depression Fighting Power of Exercise

New research is suggesting that there is such a thing as “mental fitness” that is derived from exercise. Richard Maddock, a professor from the UC Davis Health Systems, recently published a study in the Journal of Neroscience that is suggesting that vigorous exercise has the same effects on depression that anti-depressant pharmaceutical drugs do. The key is an increase in the brain’s production of two neurotransmitters: glutamate and gamma-aminobutyric acid (GABA).
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Scientists have always known that that the brain is a very energy-hungry organ and requires glucose and carbohydrates to support itself. What’s surprising about this particular study is that it showed exactly what the brain does with all of that energy when we exercise. The brain has it’s own metabolism, and exercise ramps it up just like our body’s metabolism. Maddock says, “From a metabolic standpoint, vigorous exercise is the most demanding activity the brain encounters, much more intense than calculus or chess, but nobody knows what happens with all that energy. Apparently, one of the things it’s doing is making more neurotransmitters.”
Read: Medical Breakthrough! The ONE Prescription that Cures Anxiety, Depression, and Exhaustion

Another interesting aspect of the research showed that the phenomenon of “hitting the wall” when you are exercising and are extremely fatigued could have nothing to do with our muscles. Maddock says, “It is not clear what causes people to ‘hit the wall’ or get suddenly fatigued when exercising. We often think of this point in terms of muscles being depleted of oxygen and energy molecules. But part of it may be that the brain has reached its limit.”
Read: Surrounded by Jerks: One Cause of Depression that No One Talks About

Shedding light on the effects of exercise on the brain could actually help develop treatments for depression and other neuropsychiatric disorders that are a result of lower levels of neurotransmitters. According to Maddock, “Major depressive disorder is often characterized by depleted glutamate and GABA, which return to normal when mental health is restored. Our study shows that exercise activates the metabolic pathway that replenishes these neurotransmitters.” He went on to say, “We are offering another view on why regular physical activity may be important to prevent or treat depression. Not every depressed person who exercises will improve, but many will. It’s possible that we can help identify the patients who would most benefit from an exercise prescription.”

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5 Keys to Tame a Wandering Mind

The topic of ADHD is a touchy one for a lot of people, myself included. Mainly, because I think that it is an over-used diagnosis in kids and now even in adults. I’ll admit, the first time I heard about “adult-level” ADHD I thought to myself, “gee, that sounds like me.” Not being one to self-diagnose, I thought about it and came to the conclusion that there is nothing wrong with my brain, I just have a wandering mind. I know this isn’t a boat that I am alone in, either. Our minds tend to run around like a herd of cats, and those same mental tendencies that made it difficult to study as children now make it hard to perform tasks as an adult. There is even research that suggests that a wandering mind can lead to depression and anxiety. Sure, I bet there is a pill you can take that will help wrangle in that wandering mind, but at what cost? Over the years, I’ve put together some tricks that can help reign in that wandering mind of yours and help you succeed in whatever it is that you set out to do.
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Define your Objective

Whether you are setting out to accomplish a task for work or a more personal goal, the key here is being specific about what is that you are setting out to do. Setting out to “be better” at something isn’t a goal that you can easily track. You need to define exactly what it is that you want to succeed at before you can take any other steps towards achieving that goal. Think of the difference between having a defined destination on a map and just heading in a general direction in which to travel. Yes, if you just strike out in a direction you might get to where you are going, but when you have a destination you can figure out exactly how to get there.

Build your WorkfLow

I harp on workflows a lot with people, simply because we all work differently. The important thing about workflows is to establish when you do things, not how. For instance, if your brain is clearer in the mornings before the day has time to pile up on you, that’s when you should focus on creativity or detail work. If you are more scatterbrained in the afternoons, that’s when you should focus on mundane, less detail-oriented tasks. Everyone if different in this regard. I personally am more creative at night, which is when I write. Find the when of your workflow to use your brain’s natural cycles to your advantage.
Read: Research Shows that Keeping a Journal is Great for the Mind, Body, and Soul

Make Success Tangible

One thing I have always said about making goals a reality is to make them tangible. I am a huge fan of lists. I make lists for everything, both through apps like Wunderlist and even just on pieces of paper all over my desk. There is something about making a list and clearing it that makes whatever you are working on tangible. Each checkmark is like a little victory. Where it really comes in handy with a mind that wanders around like a vagrant, is that you can easily look back at what you’ve done and what still needs to be done no matter how far your mind has careened off-topic.

Make Yourself Accountable

I am a huge fan of journaling, and I always have been. One thing that can keep your mind on track is to make yourself accountable. This can come in the form of status updates via email to coworkers involved in your project, or even just a personal blog to keep track of progress for personal goals. Sometimes knowing that even one other person is keeping an eye on your progress can be motivation enough to keep you going. We all need a certain level of that “pat on the back” validation from others, it’s in our nature.
Read: 20 Amazing Facts To Blow Your Mind.

Set a “Finishline”

Just as it is important to define what you want to do, it is equally important to figure out when you are done. For some things, like a project at work, this is easy because the task is finished. But, for goals of a more personal nature – you need to be able to define what is done and what needs to be finished. I have always been guilty of starting 5 projects at once and not finishing any of them. Define what you want to do, and follow through its completion.

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Evidence of Evolution that you can See on Your Own Body

The most famous theory of evolution, which was presented by Charles Darwin in 1859, has been a hot topic since the book “On the Origin of Species” was published. It’s been scrutinized and argued for over a century now, and there are still those that quickly dismiss the logic for a myriad of reasons. Despite what you think of Darwin’s theory, the evidence of evolution is right in front of you – on your own body.
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Take for instance the goosebumps you get when you get a chill. Goosebumps are caused by a tiny muscle contraction on the surface of the skin that makes our hair stand up straight. This was useful when our ancient ancestor’s bodies were covered in thick hair because a thicker layer of hair created a better layer of insulation. Granted, not all of us have that same layer of body hair, but the tiny muscles in our skin still contract the same way. They also contract when we get a proverbial “chill” like hearing a noise in the middle of the night. That same muscle contraction would have made our, now non-existent, body hair puff out like an angry cat.
Read: There Are Only 5 Types Of People In The World According To Psychologists. Which One Are You?

In the following video, you will see other examples of evolutionary evidence that you can check yourself for. Most notably, the presence of a vestigial muscle in your forearm known as the palmris longus. This muscle is one that has slowly disappeared from about 85-90% of people over time, but some people still have it. If you lay your arm flat on a hard surface, touch your pinky and thumb, and slightly curl your wrist up – if you have this evolutionary holdover you should see a tendon right in the middle of your wrist. Don’t fret if you don’t see the tendon, it has nothing to do with hand strength. If you do see it, even just in one arm, you are one of the rare people that still have this trait of our ancient ancestors.

Check out this video for other sign of human evolution that may still exist in your body:

Thanks to VOX for the image and wonderful video.

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Friends Who Grow Up Together Stick Together

As I get older, I’m beginning to realize that one thing that will constantly change as an adult is your group of friends. Changes in your life, location, family, etc. all lead to an ever-evolving social group. People come, people go, people get “voted off the island”. It’s all part of this adulting thing that some of us have been forced into. But when I think about my real friends, they often times aren’t always the people around me. They are the people I grew up with. I think the friends that we have through our “formative” years are the most important and the very best friends that we will ever have, and here is why:
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The “Formative” Years

Most people consider our “formative” years to be the years where we really become who we are as a person. That weird combination of nature and nurture and all of the external stimuli that mold our impressionable little psyches into the person we are. Now, some experts claim that the “formative” years are the first few years of your life, because this is the very basic foundation of development. I personally think your “formative” years don’t end until you are at least 30. Somewhere in the middle is that whole pre-pubescent to adolescent to teenager period of time that often times has the biggest impact on who we turn out to be as adults. For some people it is grade school, for others, it can be the first couple of years of college. Think back to your childhood friends and think about how many “firsts” you experienced together. First concerts, first loves, first anything. No matter what you consider the definition of “formative” years to be, the people that go through these years by your side are some of the biggest influences on you, and you on them. This mutual impact is what forges life-long friendships.

Trust

Let’s face it, the people that grew up with you know way more about you than your friends you just met last year. You may be all straight-laced and business-like today, but your friends who you grew up with have seen you at your grittiest. Whether it was your elementary school friend who found out the hard way that you were a bed wetter until you were 12, or your college roommate who saw/heard the scandalous things you did after a night of drinking. And you know the same things about them. That level of knowledge builds a level of trust that is on par with the “mutually assured destruction” theory of nuclear armament.
Read: Loners Tend To Be More Intellectual and Loyal Friends.

Time or Distance isn’t a Factor

On thing, that really proves that your childhood friends are the best friends you will have, is that even as you grow up and apart from each other – that friendship never changes. We all have that childhood friend who we haven’t talked to in a decade that could show up at our front door right now, and it would be a blessing. Yet we have acquaintances in our lives, who if we go a week without seeing, we get upset at for not staying in touch. There is no distance or span of time that can come between our real friends.

The “Bond”

A big part of the first three things I’ve listed here is the unspoken, yet seemingly tangible bond you have with these friends. Again, this comes from those “formative” years and experiences. You see the same results from men and women who have served together in the military. That is because the military, in and of itself, is a “formative” experience just like school was when you were a kid. You walk into a new place with a bunch of total strangers, and as you’re broken down and put back together with each other, you all form – together. That bond that you have with the people that you go through those types of formative processes with is unlike any bond you’ll have with any other friend.
Read: 2 Separate Studies Conclude Friendship is the Key for a Successful Relationship:

Watching Each Other “Grow”

The reason that the bond between you and the friends that you have while growing up is so important is because “growing” has nothing to do with age. Your friends that went through those formative years with you know you both as who you were and who you became. Knowing who you were is what will always separate them from your other friends, and vice versa. Your new friends will never be able to be able to look back with pride and say “wow, I remember who he/she was, and I am proud to see who they have become.” I have a childhood friend who is a very successful attorney who, while growing up, was way more likely to have needed a lawyer than to become one. Your friends see those same changes and feel that same pride in you because they knew who you were before, and have become a part of who you are now.

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With over 200,000 Species of Edible Plants, Why Do Humans only Consume 200?

Even in the most developed countries in the world, there are still issues with food supplies and g. Now, maybe I’ve been watching too many episodes of The Walking Dead or paying too much attention to the GMO debate, but I am more anxious to get my garden started this year than I have been in years past. While doing some research into how I can be nearly completely self-sufficient at providing my own food, I came across an interesting statistic. According to most scientists, there are roughly 400,000 species of plants on the planet. Of those, at least half of them are edible.
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What shocked me was the fact that, being the silly human beings that we are, on average we only consume 200 of these edible plant species. Even at the most generous of estimates, that is 0.1%. Of that 0.1%, there are 3 crops – corn, rice, and wheat – that make up 50% of the calories that the entire planet gets from plants. Yes, half of the calories from plants that the entire population of the planet comes from 0.0015% of the plant species available to us. Let that sink in. Well, as absurd as it sounds, there are actually a couple of good reasons why we are so seemingly picky as a species.

The Evolution of Cultivation

As our ancient ancestors developed their diets, they had to be extremely efficient at figuring out what we could eat and what we couldn’t. That makes sense, right? If you ate a toxic plant you died. As our ancestors became hunters and gatherers, chances are that they weren’t very adventurous. Even then, there are plants that we eat every day that are technically toxic to the body. Peppers, for instance, are spicy because it is a defense mechanism for them. Tomatoes, potatoes, and other root vegetables contain cyanide. Keep in mind also, this is before we even get to the question of flavor. Basically, once early man figured out which plants tasted good and had a lower chance of killing them, they just kind of quit looking for alternatives. Hey, if it’s not broken – don’t fix it.
Read: Nature’s Social Network: How Plants Actually Communicate

The Complex Sex Lives of Plants

With the advent of farming came a new challenge: pollination. Pollination is literally how plants breed, and some of them have very strange sex lives. Scientists believe that plant species have co-evolved with the insect species that are responsible for their reproduction. Take orchids for instance: although there are 25,000 individual species of orchids, most of them have very complicated reproductive processes. Think of the orchids as the kinky flowers of the plant world. If you are looking to grow a crop to sustain a food supply, the last thing you need is a plant that has a complicated reproductive cycle. Those same 3 crops I mentioned earlier are also the easiest to pollinate – and that’s not a coincidence.
Read: A Metaphor for Life: “Changing Your Soil”

So, as absurd as the percentage of edible plants that we actually consume may be, in the end, you have to think about the viability of production. There could be the most delicious fruit known to man deep in the Amazon jungle, but chances are that it is so tightly interwoven into its particular ecosystem that it would be impossible to produce anywhere else in the world. I would have to venture a guess that mother nature’s tastiest treats have the most complicated reproductive processes – because that is her sense of humor.

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Destruction of the Ego: The Rise of Self-Compassion

Historically, when it comes to self-development, one of the major themes has always been a cheerleader-like mentality of boosting one’s own self-esteem. When life gets tough, or we are faced with a challenge, we are told to boost ourselves up. “I’m good enough, I’m smart enough, and goshdarnit, people like me.” Yes, there is a function for self-esteem, and it is a necessary aspect of the human psyche. The problem many experts are realizing about the emphasis on self-esteem is two-fold: 1. Self-esteem is based on judgment, namely the judgment of one’s own worth. 2. Self-esteem is usually based on other people’s opinion of you. Self-esteem relies heavily on validation. Because of these fundamental flaws with the concept of self-esteem, there is a shift occurring in modern personal development.
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The shift involves moving away from self-esteem and ego and toward self-compassion. The current paradigm suggests that self-love or self-compassion is synonymous with narcissism and selfishness. But what scientists are finding is that self-compassion is actually better for people as a collective. When people have the ability to self-nurture, they are not only better equipped to handle life’s challenges, they become more empathetic by nature.

Self-compassion isn’t about building yourself up and overcoming your downfalls, it is about accepting yourself for who you are. It’s about accepting your faults, and understanding them. For some people, this sounds like making excuses for failures. It’s not. Self-nurturing is all about acceptance, not deflection. Instead of saying to yourself, “I am strong, I can do anything, I am bulletproof,” instead be realistic: “I have strengths and I have weaknesses. My weaknesses are… My strengths are…”
Read: Multipotentiality: Why Having More Than One True Calling Could Be a Good Thing

Kristin Neff, from the University of Texas, writes in her article Self-Compassion: An Alternative Conceptualization of a HealthyAttitudeToward Oneself, “Self-compassion, therefore, involves being touched by and open to one’s own suffering, not avoiding or disconnecting from it, generating the desire to alleviate one’s suffering and to heal oneself with kindness. Self-compassion also involves offering nonjudgmental understanding to one’s pain, inadequacies and failures, so that one’s experience is seen as part of the larger human experience.”

Self-compassion is a mindset. There isn’t one specific thing you can do, but first and foremost:

Be Honest With Yourself

We all have that friend that tells it to us exactly like it is, despite whatever impact that might have on our fragile egos. In fact, this is often something we look for in a friend. There is no reason that you can’t be that person for yourself. This isn’t a process of self-depreciation, it’s a process of self-evaluation. You have to be honest with yourself and how you feel, way before you can ever identify where those weaknesses that we all have really are. That is important, because until you know what those weaknesses are, you can never address them.

From that honesty, comes a major aspect of self-compassion:

Self-Compassion Becomes Self-Awareness

As you become more aware of yourself, your feelings, your struggles, and your strengths – an amazing thing happens: you become more aware of those same strengths, weaknesses, and struggles in others. If you walk around the world thinking that you are bullet-proof, you get this mentality that because other people aren’t – they are weaker. There is no such thing as bullet-proof in life, so by realizing that – it levels the playing field for how you see the people around you.
Read: Avoid Labels, Screw The Media, And Be Happy

In the end, keep in mind:

There is Strength, Even in Your Weakness

Most importantly, by addressing your feelings instead of detaching from them, you will learn where you fit in best in any situation. This is a combination of the two items listed above. Example: in a business setting, if you know that having to be authoritative makes you uncomfortable, you’ll make a better team leader than a manager. My business partner and I call this the “good cop, bad cop” approach. I’m the carrot, he is the stick. I don’t beat myself up for being “too nice”, I put myself in a situation where that perceived weakness becomes my strength.

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Are You Part of the 1% of People Who can Pass This Test?

Imagine being able to look at a picture and instantly have it converted to memory, having the ability to recall it in perfect detail on command. Now, imagine that everything you see in life is that way: stored like a digital photo in you brain that can be recalled at any point. This idea is what people consider an eidetic or “photographic” memory, and people that have it are extremely rare. Scientists have been studying the notion of photographic memories for decades, but there is no concrete evidence that it actually exists. Sure, some people have better memories than others, but that typically just has to do with an individual’s brain just like having a talent or skill does.
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That being said, there have even been people who have exhibited signs of having a truly immeasurable memory. Tesla, for instance, claimed to have a photographic memory that allowed him to memorize entire books. President Theodore Roosevelt had the ability to recite entire pages of the newspapers that he read. He also read on average 2-3 books a day, some believe as a result of his incredible memory. The only person to ever show signs of a truly eidetic memory is a woman named Elizabeth who actually has the ability to look at two separate patterns of dots and combine them in her mind like one of those “Magic Eye” pictures.

The idea of having a truly “photographic” memory is both fascinating and scary. Imagine being able to remember in intense detail every bad thing that you’ve ever experienced. One of the most important things a mind can do sometimes is to forget something. Then again, imagine never having to study. All you would have to do is take a glance at a page, and you’d know everything you needed. The implications of truly having a photographic memory may seem awesome on the surface, but could be mentally traumatizing.

Below is a simple test from Playbuzz that will test how “photographic” your memory really is.

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The Single Biggest Threat We Face as a Species

We, as a species, are much more fragile than we think. It’s easy to assume that I am making that statement based on my love for fiction and sci-fi books, where the demise of the human race is just an inter-galactic spaceship or super virus away. No, the real demise of the human race is right in front of us every single day and we willingly ignore it. So what could possible spell disaster for us fragile humans faster than aliens or the zombie apocalypse? The outright abandonment of intellectualism.
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Anti-Intellectualism

So what exactly do I mean by “Anti-Intellectualism”? I am talking about the exaltation and embrace of ignorance. Ignorance in all forms. Sure, those skits you see on TV where people get interviewed on the streets and asked simple questions that they miserably fail at answering are funny to an extent, but they are also scary. I mean, a recent poll from Newsweek showed that 30% of Americans can’t name the vice president. It’s simply not cool to be smart anymore. People are more concerned with fitting in than they are about being aware of the world around them, and it’s leading to dumber and dumber generations. We are literally developing a culture of acceptable ignorance.

The Facets of Anti-Intellectualism

Apply this culture of ignorance to out lives, and what do you get?

Racism

What could be more ignorant than judging a person based on the color of their skin or where they are from? This is an old ignorance that, somehow, certain parts of the world have never been able to shake. I always hear people use the term “racial issues”, especially here in the US. You know what makes race an issue? YOU DO. By mentioning it. Violence is violence, hate is hate, intolerance is intolerance – no matter what the color of the skin of the people perpetrating it. Race simply becomes jet-fuel on an already stupid fire.
Read: The Exhaustion Cycle and How to Break Free from It

Religious Intolerance/Fanaticism

This is another very old ignorance that, again, we as modern humans haven’t been able to shake. I don’t know of a religion that doesn’t teach tolerance. So why is it that there are certain factions of major religions that are so intolerant of others that they resort to violence. More people have been killed in the name of religion throughout history than for any other reason. Now, I am in no way saying religion is bad, I think we should all be able to believe in what we want to believe, and that others should be understanding and accepting of that. Again, isn’t that what all the major religions tell us?
Read: Unlocking the Secrets of how Our Brains Make Complex Decisions

Hyper-Nationalism

Trust me, as an American and a Texan, I understand this one all too well. I get being proud of where you are from, and I believe wholeheartedly in national pride. But being so ignorant as to not like a person because they are not where you are from is as far from intellectual as it gets. Our cultural ignorance has gotten to the point where it extends into both racist and religious misguidance. You see examples of this all the time when you see someone of Middle Eastern decent being tagged as a “terrorist”. Not everyone from the Middle East is a Muslim, and not all Muslims are fanatical. Save the “my country is better than your country” rhetoric for a soccer match.

General Ignorance

Okay, so let’s take all of the obvious factors out, and look at the everyday ignorance that is all around us. Things like people not knowing what it is that they are eating. I love using the example of gluten. At my local grocery store, they have little “gluten-free” signs all over the place. I’m pretty sure that I know there isn’t gluten in my chicken breasts. But then, I have to remember that there are people who have no idea what gluten is – they’ve just been told it is bad for them. That kind of basic ignorance about something as simple as our food shocks me. Whether you believe that GMOs are bad for you or not, the MAJORITY of people don’t even know what they are – yet they will buy something that is GMO-free over something that isn’t because that is the popular thing to do.
Read: Setting These 4 Limits in your Life can Truly Set You Free

At its heart, anti-intellectualism is a willing lack of awareness. People are quicker to make a decision based on what they see in their facebook newsfeed, rather than what is in their head. It’s easier that way. I challenge each and every person that reads this and agrees that anti-intellectualism is killing us, to share something informative today. I’m not saying you have to beat down people with your opinions, I’m saying expose someone to something informative. Awareness is the only way to break the cycle of ignorance that we seem to be spinning in. The movie “Idiocracy” wasn’t just a funny movie, it was a warning.

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Research Shows that Problem Children make Better Adults

My favorite kind of research that I come across is research that pertains to me specifically. Obviously, I mean it’s the easiest type of research to relate with and understand right? Well, I recently came across an article over at Inc.com that basically suggests that bad kids make better adults. I am also fully aware that my parents read just about everything I write and, no, this is not a written form of justification for my actions as a kid.
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Being the “Class Clown” Leads to Being More Connected

A Recent study shows that the kids that act out in class, even the ones that do so to the point of being a distraction, are actually more engaged. It seems counteractive, but the study suggests that these children acting out shows that they have a better sense of what is going on around them – like their classmate’s reactions, as well as more highly developed communication skills.

Talking Back Leads to Better Choices

For parents, there are probably few things that drive them crazier than a child that has a tendency to talk back. For teenagers, there are probably fewer things that drive them crazy than their “overbearing” parents. As it turns out, that talking back that spurs so many arguments between parents and kids serves to strengthen those teen’s resolve as they get older. Researchers found that teenagers who talked back on a regular basis were more likely to establish better boundaries for themselves and gave in less to peer pressure.
Read: Too Much “Screen Time” is Making Kids Angry, Lazy, and Moody

Breaking Rules Leads to Being Successful

For some reason, it turns out that kids who defy authority on a regular basis turn out to be more successful as adults. An article that was published in the journal Developmental Psychology suggests that there is a link between kids who are habitual rule-breakers and success as an adult. Some experts speculate that the connection has to do with people’s willingness to step outside the box as adults and in business.
Read: The Vitality of Recess: How Giving Kids A Break Improves Everything

Being A Daydreamer Leads to Being Independent

One seemingly “bad” trait children can have is having their heads in the proverbial clouds. But sometimes that’s the best place for their young minds to be. Kids that spend time off in their own little world are flexing their imaginations, and as adults that make them less reliant on the people around them for entertainment or validation.

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There Are Only 5 Types Of People In The World According To Psychologists. Which One Are You?

The Five-Factor Personality model has attracted an immense amount of interest recently. Some say that this new system of personality modeling replaces the older, well-known Myers-Briggs personality testing system in ways that are increasingly universalized and more efficient. Others say that the test only applies to certain societies. What’s the big deal about this new system and why do we even need one? And most importantly, where do YOU fall in the Big Five?
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First of all, the Myers-Briggs test -developed by venerated personality psychologist Carl Jung and Isabel Myers-Briggs – has been sharply criticized of late. And by “of late” I mean “for the past three decades”. Psychologists have shown that problems with the Myers-Briggs test are not insubstantial, attacking its reliability to the exclusivity of its results to its relative uselessness in determination of personality for type of work…despite its heavy use -thanks to excellent marketing- by employers in evaluating potential employees. So the old test is shot through of holes. So what? What’s so important about personality anyway?

Well. Your personality is basically everything about who you are, so…yeah. It’s pretty important. And where the Myers-Briggs test fails, the Big Five is more efficient and demonstrates consistent results across race, age, ethnic group and nationality. While the Myers-Briggs tests sorts participants into different personality “types” -kind of like a Jungian sorting hat- the Big Five model shows areas of strengths and weakness across its factors. Those factors -Openness to Experience, Conscientiousness, Extraversion, Agreeableness, and Neuroticism- are simply that: factors in determining the participant’s personality. There’s no cut-and-dried “typing”, which is helpful, as while I can think of plenty of people who might test highly for Neuroticism, I can think of no one who would want that to be their hard-and-fast personality “type”. The Big Five allows for a degree of flexibility never achieved with the Myers-Briggs test because it accounts for factors that might seem self-cancelling under other testing methods, such as a person showing introverted traits in one area of their personality and extraverted traits in another.
Read: Study Shows People Who Use Swear Words Have Bigger And Better Vocabularies

Like any psychological testing system, though, it has its own flaws. The modeling seems highly functional across educated, more affluent cultures, but trying to use the modeling in indigenous cultures has, in its limited application, proved nearly impossible. The Five Factor Model applies, it would seem, more cohesively only in more highly-industrialized populations in more developed societies with greater access to higher education.
Read: 4 Steps to Detox your Life, Starting Today

So how do you figure out where you fall in the Big Five? Click here to take the test now; with only 41 questions it takes just a few minutes (compared to the 116+ questions on the Myers-Briggs). You can even decide whether or not to share your results with the scientific community. While it’s an incorrect conclusion to say there are now only five personality “types” that’s probably just us journalists getting carried away with exciting research. The really exciting part is that there aren’t really five personality types because we all test with nuances and differences that are ascribed to who we uniquely are.

(This author, by the way, tested highly for extraversion, agreeableness and openness to experience, and low for neuroticism and conscientiousness.)
References: myersbriggs.org

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Unlocking the Secrets of how Our Brains Make Complex Decisions

Every day we are faced with two basic types of decisions. The first is know as a habit-based decision. There are things like our morning routines or commutes to work that our brain essentially powers through without much input from us. Have you ever been half-way to work in the morning and don’t remember leaving the house? That’s a habit-based decision. Scientists have understood these types of decisions pretty well for years because, on a neurological level, they are easy to map. The other type of decision is known as a goal-based decision, and they are much more complex. researchers believe that understanding how our brains make these complex decisions could open up a whole new treatment option for people who suffer from neurological conditions like OCD and even the mental impairments associated with Parkinson’s disease.
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Goal-Based Decisions versus Habit-Based Decisions

The easiest way to think of habit-based decisions is to think of them like the cache on your computer. They are very basic, repetitive decisions that our brains keep readily available to access. On a neurological level, they are easier to map and understand because of the way that our brains access them. Goal-based decisions are different because they deal with changing factors and the added complexity of experience. Take for instance that morning commute I talked about earlier that is almost automatic and throw in some heavy traffic. Now your brain has to analyze the delay, remember potential alternate routes, and fall back on experience to get you through what is normally an automatic process. This type of decision making remains somewhat of a mystery to scientists.

Recently, researchers at the University of Cambridge set out to create a real-life mathematical model that was not only able to predict potential behavior in complex decision making, but also showed how the process works on a biological level. The study, which was published int he Journal of Neuroscience, is one of the most comprehensive of its kind into the science of the decision-making process. According to Dr. Johannes Friedrich of Columbia University, “A goal-based decision is much more complicated from a neurological point of view because there are so many more variables – it involves exploring a branching set of possible future situations.”
Read: THIS is Your Brain on CBD

The Secret to Complex Decisions

Dr. Friedrich and his co-author, Dr. Máté Lengyel believe they have unlocked the secret into how our brains make complex decisions. The key, according to them, is how a network of neurons connects correctly to make the best decision based on the factors and previous experiences. They were able to even create a mathematical model to predict these connections in the brain. Dr. Friedrich says, “Constructing these sorts of models is difficult because the model has to plan for all possible decisions at any given point in the process, and computations have to be performed in a biologically plausible manner. But it’s an important part of figuring out how the brain works since the ability to make decisions is such a core competence for both humans and animals.” He went on to say, “By combining planning and learning into one coherent model, we’ve made what is probably the most comprehensive model of complex decision-making to date.”
Read: Sex on the Brain: The Evolutionary Link between Intelligence and Sex Drive

The Potential for Understanding

The real potential for understanding how our brains make complex decisions has two applications. The first is applying the mathematical algorithms that the research developed and applying them to computer technology. Dr. Lengyel says, “What I also find exciting is that figuring out how the brain may be doing it has already suggested us new algorithms that could be used in computers to solve similar tasks.” The second application for this research is a better understanding of how our brains make decisions overall. This includes neurological conditions like OCD. Having an understanding of the more complex neurological aspects of decision making can aid in understanding impaired decision making that has been linked to things like addiction and suicide attempts.

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Bananas: The Magic Bullet for Melanoma

A common enzyme in both banana skin and human skin is helping scientists get a jump on skin cancer. What’s more, the new detection method pioneered as a result of this analysis is non-invasive and may eliminate the need for skin biopsies in the future.
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The enzyme tyrosinase causes both the brown spots on bananas’ skin as well as humans’ skin. In humans who have melanoma, the deadliest form of skin cancer. The researchers conducting these studies, under the direction of Hubert Girault at the Laboratory of Physical and Analytical Electrochemistry at Sion, posit that when tyrosinase malfunctions, it causes disruption in melanin, the chemical responsible for skin pigmentation. This disruption results in brown spots…and the spots are about the same size on both humans and bananas.

By analyzing the growth of the spots on bananas researchers were able to draw parallels between the spots’ appearance and distribution on bananas’ skin and skin samples from cancer patients. These parallels allowed scientists to draw conclusions based on the spot pigmentation and distribution and the stage of cancer. In Stage I melanoma, the level and distribution of tyrosinase isn’t apparent, but the levels and appearance change through stages 2 and 3. Armed with this knowledge, the research team was able to design a scanner that passes over the uneven skin and, using an electrochemical response mechanism, measures the amount of tyrosinase present, as well as its distribution. This gives researchers the ability to determine the stage of skin cancer present.
Read: The 7 Surprising Health Benefits Of Whisky That Will Blow Your Socks Off

Next on the agenda: create a scanner based on the one used for diagnosis for treatment of cancerous tumors. This could eliminate the need for biopsies or chemotherapy. “Our initial laboratory tests showed us that our device could be used to destroy the cells,” Girault stated. While this device is still in the conception stages, it could give a lot of hope for cancer patients to receive much less-invasive and potentially more targeted treatment of skin cancer than current methods.

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Is Zika A Mosquito-Born Pandemic?

Over the past month or so, the Zika virus -a virus spread by mosquitos of the Aedes family that usually causes fairly mild, flulike symptoms in those infected with it- has taken the world by storm. The World Health Organization (WHO) has deemed that it is “spreading explosively” across Central and South America. In the case of this virus, however, it’s really a matter of what we don’t know…otherwise the WHO and the American Center for Disease Control (CDC) wouldn’t be raising alarms over a virus that doesn’t seem to really do much to its victims.
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Zika has, however, an interesting pedigree: infection from the Zika virus has been implicated in thousands of births where the infant is born with microcephaly, or a very small head. Microcephaly is a birth defect that can lead to a host of brain and developmental problems and even result in death. And in terms of what we don’t know, there’s a lot. We don’t know how it spreads to target the fetus’ development. We don’t know how long its incubation period lasts. We don’t know how long it is spreadable: that is, easily transmitted between partners. The amount of information we don’t know is a bit terrifying compared to what we do know: we know that it can be sexually transmitted, and we know that standard prevention methods against mosquito bites is effective. As with many viruses, prevention is the best cure.
Read: Scientists are Planning to Awaken 30,000-Year-Old “Giant Virus”

There’s no treatment or vaccine for zika; the virus presents such mild symptoms in adults that it doesn’t require treatment, and while a vaccine is being developed, it will be years before it even reaches the clinical testing phase. At present, the best treatment is prevention. Women who are pregnant or trying to get pregnant are strongly discouraged from traveling to Zika-prone areas. And with the Summer Olympics coming up in Rio de Janeiro this year, researchers are deeply concerned about the potential for the virus to turn into a global epidemic, as Brazil is one of the largest contaminated areas. Nearly 5000 cases of microcephaly have been reported in Brazil, a nation which usually reports about 150 during the same time frame.

What do we know, then, besides the importance of avoiding mosquitos and traveling to Zika-affected places? A fair amount, actually. Scientists have recently posited -using lab modeling- that the virus infects the outer layer of the brain in developing fetuses, which makes the brain more susceptible to other viruses, underdevelopment and even death. And some cases of Zika causing cerebrospinal infections in adults and older children have now been reported, such as the cases of an 81-year old man in France who was diagnosed with meningoencephalitis and that of a 15-year old girl in Guadeloupe, in the French Caribbean, who was diagnosed with acute myelitis. Both infections involve attacks on the brain and/or spinal cord.
Read: Unlocking the Secrets to a Longer Life

This all seems quite scary and it might just be the tip of the iceberg. But a vaccine is in the works and prevention methods are extremely effective. The vaccine has already been pushed to an estimated completion within ten years to three years, which shows how seriously this virus is being taken. In the meantime, arm yourself with long sleeves, long pants and bug spray, and try to avoid traveling to Zika-prone areas. There are lots of other lovely places to explore in the world.

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The Truth About Coffee and Alcohol

The Internet has been abuzz lately with the news that coffee reverses the effects of alcohol. If you’re just skimming headlines, you might think that your morning cuppa can cure your hangover and protect you from any other damage created by alcohol.
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This is, of course, incredibly false. News headlines are designed to attract your attention: that’s what they do. The point of getting your attention, however, is that you continue to read the article following the headline. Coffee doesn’t reverse the damaging effects of alcohol on the human body by a LONG shot. Heavy alcohol consumption is linked to myriad ill effects such as heart disease, pancreatitis, cancer, dementia and much more.
Read: 10 Scientific Ways To Detox From Sugar Addiction (Before It Kills You)

The health benefits and consequences of coffee are well-documented and the benefits greatly outweigh the consequences. Coffee is also fairly well-tolerated by most people. It’s a source of potent antioxidants and trace minerals, and in most individuals it gives a pretty substantial energy boost. People who love the stuff often don’t start their day without a cup (the author of this article included). Coffee has been shown to combat stress, fatigue, Parkinson’s, Type II diabetes, liver heart disease and more.
Read: Studies Find Psychoactive Drug Safer Than Alcohol When Driving

Recent studies have shown a significant new benefit of coffee: the ability to combat liver disease, especially the disease alcoholics often contract: cirrhosis.  Analysis of previous studies encompassing 430,000 participants showed that two cups of coffee per day reduces the risk of cirrhosis by up to 44%. While this is excellent news for alcoholics whose abuse might otherwise result in cirrhosis, it doesn’t mean that you can abuse alcohol and swig a couple of cups of coffee daily and not feel any negative effects. As Samantha Heller, a senior clinical nutritionist at New York University Langone Medical Center in New York, said, “Unfortunately, although coffee contains compounds that have antioxidant effects and anti-inflammatory properties, drinking a few cups of coffee a day cannot undo the systematic damage that is the result of being overweight or obese, sedentary, excessive alcohol consumption or drastically mitigate an unhealthy diet.”
So for now, it’s still a good idea to consume alcohol in low to moderate quantities: one drink a day for women and two for men. And if you’re drinking more than that, you might want to consider reducing your intake or, if you find that you can’t, getting some help to stop drinking. Many people have found this program useful, for example, and many other treatment options exist.

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New Headphones are Designed to Keep you High on Dopamine

I’ve said many times that music is one of the most powerful influences in my life. Music can elevate your mood, transform your outlook, and take you places without you ever leaving your chair. Music is powerful. I listen to music easily 8-10 hours a day. Music keeps me going. So what could make music even better? How about a blast of dopamine? That’s what the developers from Nervana, a Florida-based tech startup, figured. Imagine all the fun of a post-work dopamine high – without the workout.
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How It Works

The Nervana system is pretty ingenious for a couple of reasons. First off, at its heart, is the Nervana Generator: A device that can be paired with any music player, and then attached to the special Nervana headphones. The generator and headphones are designed to emit a low-level electrical impulse to your ear canal, which stimulates the vagus nerve. The pulses, which are timed to match the beat of your music, cause the vagus nerve to signal the brain to release dopamine, serotonin, and oxytocin. There is also an “ambient” mode that you can use at concerts and such that give you the same vagus stimulation using the generator’s built in mic to get that dopamine release even with live music.

The Science

Vagus nerve stimulation isn’t a new concept. In fact, vagus nerve stimulation (VNS) is a common treatment for certain types of epilepsy. A typical form of VNS device, according to the Epilepsy Foundation, is “sometimes referred to as a ‘pacemaker for the brain.’ It is placed under the skin on the chest wall and a wire runs from it to the vagus nerve in the neck.” The difference between other forms of vagus nerve stimulation and Nervana is that Nervana is non-invasive.
Read: Diet Disaster: Lack of Sleep gives your Brain the “Munchies”

The Potential

One amazing aspect of the Nervana system, aside from getting the “runner’s high” without having to run, is the potential to treat conditions like mild depression without introducing pharmaceuticals. The creators of Nervana admit that there are no peer-reviewed studies concerning their products, but at last years Consumer Electronics Show, several people tried them out and could attest that there was definitely something at work with Nervana. Amanda Gutterman, a writer for Futurism, quoted a colleague who tried Nervana as saying, “I felt the electricity go into my arm, and everything was tingling there, but the best moment for me was afterwards when I finished and stood up. I felt like I reached a personal high point. I couldn’t stop smiling or laughing. I was like, ‘Oh wow’. For about five minutes, my happiness level was a 10 out of 10. Then it got foggier, but I was still unusually happy for about an hour.”
Read: 5 Ways that Emotional Intelligence Will Make You More Successful

Personally, I think combining the natural mood elevation that music can bring with the power of vagus nerve stimulation is absolutely brilliant. I also think that I have a birthday coming up if anyone is wondering what to get me.

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