Books

Remember a week or so ago when I told you about my new bloggy crush, Havi Brooks? You all helped me take her teleclass webinar thingy on non-strategic marketing strategy, and it was really cool. Thanks!

Today, I’ve decided to shamelessly steal-borrow-adapt one of Havi’s other ideas - a weekly post that she calls her Friday Chicken/Checkin. It’s essentially a place and time where she rambles waxes eloquently about her week - the good, the bad, the painful, the beautiful. But because I’m me, and I have to be different even from the different, I’ve opted for a condiment cliche instead of a poultry pun. There’s a reason for my changing it up, too… it’s a reminder to me to catch-up on all of the things I should have told you about this week, and didn’t.

So here goes, your very first edition of Friday Ketchup!

First up? Some linkage for you:

[click to continue...]

This is Part Three of the Brain Rules for Bloggers series, based on John Medina’s Brain Rules. More links at the bottom of the post!

Brain Rules #5 and #6: Short and Long Term Memory - Repeat to Remember, Remember to Repeat (and become an unforgettable blogger)

What’s memory got to do with being a better blogger, you ask? I’d tell you, but I seem to have forgotten..

Ahem. Seriously.

Repeat visitors are essential for a successful blog - and that means you need your readers to remember to visit again, and again. Even in this age of RSS feeds, your audience needs to remember why they stay subscribed, why they click on your post titles, why they follow you at all. Both your branding and your content need to hit the “save” buttons in your reader’s brains, because, well… You may offer the best advice in the world, but if your readers forget about it as soon as they leave the page , the advice will never be applied - and your readers likely remember to come back, either.

By applying a little bit of knowledge about how our brains handle memories, you can make your blog and your content “unforgettable” - or at least, less forgettable. [click to continue...]

When most people discover a book that really connects for them, they can’t put it down. Me? I can’t keep it picked up!

Contrary, I know. But sometimes an author’s words hit all the right buttons, and my mental machinery gets all wound up and excited. It starts kicking out so many of its own ideas that I’m compelled to put the book down, pick up a pen and notepad, and scribble madly.

Brain Rules is one of those books. It sparked so many thoughts that I had trouble focusing on the book itself. My attempts to focus on a proper review have been even trickier. [click to continue...]

Here at MindTweaks, readers have come to expect an odd combination of humor, science and general advice about how to make your brain work better. A twisted few among you have even despaired that there is not more of this sort of mind-tweakish thing available on the web.

Despair no more, Brain Rules is here to save the day!

Seriously. (Or maybe not)

It’s a book. It’s a DVD. It slices, it dices, it amuses, and it informs.

“Brain Rules” is the brain-child of John Medina, a molecular biologist with a wicked sense of humor, and an interest in all things brain-ish. I think I have a new bloggy crush going on here.

But back to the product: through a combination of written and video materials, Medina presents his “12 principles for thriving at work, home and school.”

I’ll let you know more after my copy gets here, but for now, there’s a wealth of information and excerpts at the Brain Rules website. (I highly recommend the video on Rule #1: Exercise. I laughed outloud. Seriously.)

Or you can just trust your favorite brain-blogger’s instincts, and pick up your copy of this multimedia extravaganza at Amazon now. We’ll make it our own little book-club pick. Like Oprah, but with much cheaper shoes.

Order your copy here:
Brain Rules: 12 Principles for Surviving and Thriving at Work, Home, and School (Book & DVD)

Or Preview Audio/Video Excerpts At The Brain Rules Website

Promises, Promises. I’m full of them, aren’t I?

Last week I promised you my personal “awakening” story, as part of exploring the Oprah/Eckhart Tolle presentation of “A New Earth”.

But as I wrote, I realized I couldn’t reduce it to a simple one post undertaking. It’s a sub-series in it’s own right, and the first part is nearly ready to be posted.

Before I get to that, I did finish reading “A New Earth” and, surprisingly, I surprisingly have very few issues with it, in and of itself.

Here’s an edited version of what I said on the Oprah site: [click to continue...]