The Non-Facebook Post #47

From Carol Dweck's TED talk The Power of Believing that You Can Improve

"...if you get a failing grade, you think, I'm nothing, I'm nowhere. But if you get the grade "Not Yet"you understand that you're on a learning curve. It gives you a path into the future."

"...the growth mindset, the idea that abilities can be developed."

"Here are some things we can do. First of all, we can praise wisely, not praising intelligence or talent. That has failed. Don't do that anymore. But praising the process that kids engage in: their effort, their strategies, their focus, their perseverance, their improvement."

"Just the words "yet" or "not yet," we're finding, give kids greater confidence, give them a path into the future that creates greater persistence. And we can actually change students' mindsets."

" ... every time they push out of their comfort zone to learn something new and difficult, the neurons in their brain can form new, stronger connections, and over time they can get smarter."

"This happened because the meaning of effort and difficulty were transformed. Before, effort and difficulty made them feel dumb, made them feel like giving up, but now, effort and difficulty, that's when their neurons are making new connections, stronger connections. That's when they're getting smarter."

The Non-Facebook Post #46

Why does no one stick to speed limits while driving?!

Everyone's surging way ahead on roads, way past the allowed speeds.

The Non-Facebook Post #45

It was too good to be true, just too good!

"Oh serendipitous, serendipitous day! When you go get your driving license renewed and, by happy accident, are also well dressed enough to not have a deer-caught-in-headlights headshot clicked for your new license!"
February 4, 2015. 11:51 am.

Yeah! Which is why Fate cruelly conspires with Bureaucracy to turn events around so that you're in a position of having to redo all your paperwork for the license, and get another headshot clicked. And lo and behold! Now, the picture of you that's to be printed on your new (yet again) license is how it should be - the ritualistic, ugly 'deer caught in headlights' sorta image. 

Well anyway, here's hoping four times is a charm and I don't have to go through the whole rigmarole again, for something as simple as being able to renew my driving license. You, Bureaucracy, I'm talking to you!

The Non-Facebook Post #44

"I was wondering if I could get her signature here to show I stopped by to deliver but he wasn't here?"

"Her?!"

"She's not mine! She's a stray!"

All in a day's work!

The Non-Facebook Post #43

"Learning has to include an amount of failure, because failure is instructional..."

Diana Laufenberg, TED Talk "How to Learn? From Mistakes"

The Non-Facebook Post #42

I need a standing desk!
I want a standing desk at my workplace!

The Non-Facebook Post #41

It's the sort of start to your day when you wake up, quite dreamily, and plunge into daydreaming right away. Daydreaming so intense, that you are barely conscious of the ticking time that's silently exhorting you to be ready for yet another day at the workplace. But the daydreams, as you go through the motions of brushing your teeth, showering, all of that - well, there they are showing you the path to your life's dreams, once again.

'Accha sochne se accha hota hai.' You attract the kind of energy you radiate.

Miraculously though, your daydreaming doesn't interfere with the pace of you readying yourself for the day. In fact, it speeds up the process. There you are, lost in moments cooked up by your abstractions that are pure joy and pure happiness because that's how you're envisioning your future. And you have a song on your lips too as you let the hot shower and your warm reveries relax your slightly strained mind and body because you plodded on through the yesterday - you decided to move forward, even if it was just inching ahead. The tortoise-walk onwards, gathering speed to become a hectic busyness by the end of the day that unravels into a heavy, dreamy sleep and which slowly blossoms into a musing-filled morning - you can say it's a good life.