More Motivation
Whenever I’m interested in learning something new, I fire up the internet and head over to my local library’s webs site. I then start searching for books on the topic and anything that looks remotely interesting, I click the Request button. Typically in a few days, a slew of books are waiting for me. I then go through the books looking for information. Some I’ll just glance at and return. Others I’ll actually read in depth. In the span of two weeks, I’ll digest a large amount of information on the topic and have a pretty good feel for whatever the subject is. Occasionally, something I’ll read will really strike a chord with me and I’ll make that important switch from passive reader to active participant. The interesting thing is; what is it exactly that flips that motivation switch? Read more »
Posted: August 27th, 2008 under Improvement.
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It’s true, Amy is an amazing cook. That is probably why we only eat out a few times a month. Shocking when compared to the average American who, according to various studies, eat 4 – 5 meals out a week. When I was single, I was a passable cook, relying on books such as “Where’s Mom Now That I Need Her” and “Cooking with 5 Ingredients or Less” to keep me from starving. It wasn’t that I did not like to cook, but it took a lot of time to cook and I would be frustrated by all of the lingo. Blanche, sauté, simmer, dice, julienne, broil, braise, brown, crumble, whip, etc. I’d read over a recipe and think “that sounds good.” The directions seemed easy until I came to the point of actually preparing the dish. Then suddenly I’d get hung up on terminology. I’d start to question what it meant or when a process was truly done. Did I sauté the onions long enough? Hard to tell when there is one little paragraph telling you how to make an entire dish. Thanks goodness for 
So a friend of mine, the one who started 
Yesterday was Hope’s first day of school in first grade. I took the day off from work and we made a big day of it. We took her to school, had lunch with her, and picked her up afterwards. She had a lot of fun and is excited about the new year. It reminded me of what first days of school were like. Every year you had to face this large unknown all by yourself. What would your teacher be like, who would be in your classes, would you have friends to sit next to at lunch? I can remember feeling the stress and nervousness of so many unknowns. I thought about how we rarely experience that in adulthood, the closest thing being starting a new job. It is almost too bad as we lose the ability to adapt over time. 
One of the more interesting aspects of Economics that I learned in my masters program was the obvious point that people generally make economic decisions that benefit them the most based on the constraints faced. This concept was the main focus of the best selling Freakonomics book a few years back. In it, the authors examined various behavior and using statistics tried to determine why two seemingly disparate pieces of information were actually related. It seems fairly common sense; after all you would expect people to take actions they perceive are in their best interest. Still, why are we surprised when it happens?