In Robert M. Pirsig's 1974 book, Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, the author describes a device he calls “the old South Indian Monkey Trap.” It consists of a hollowed-out coconut with some rice inside, chained to a stake. The coconut has a hole in the top just large enough for a monkey to insert its hand but not big enough to remove a fistful of rice. While villagers watched from a distance, Pirsig writes, a hungry monkey would reach in and become trapped, unable or unwilling to give up its handful in exchange for its freedom. The villagers could then walk right up and take the monkey away.
Read MoreWhen I look at that chair, it reminds me of my school days including elementary, middle and high school. At that time, I lived in Suwon, Gyeonggi Province. My family and I used to sit in those robust red chairs when we ate meals every day. My father was a silent person. He used to say that we should not talk a lot while eating. That is the way he had been raised and educated by his own grandparents from his childhood. It must have been due to Confucianism. My mother was also very silent; she did not speak out loud.
Read MoreAs #2 on Forbes 400: The Wealthiest in America list for 15 years straight and a net worth of $73 billion, Warren Buffett (aka the Oracle of Omaha) seems to know what he’s doing in the business world (to say the least). The chairman, CEO and largest shareholder of Berkshire Hathaway, Buffett is one of the most successful investors in the world.
But, his cleverness goes beyond smart investing – he’s also an incredible manager and has been able to recruit and build a team of people that have helped lead his company to success. And, he’s done this by focusing on three particular traits in potential hires:
Read MoreAfter amassing 14 years of coffee roasting expertise in Paju, Gyeonggi Province, Ilsan Coffee Factory’s head roaster and CEO Jung Kang-jin launched a showroom called Standard System in Seoul’s Cheongdam-dong this past August. Until then, Ilsan Coffee Factory’s roasts were only available wholesale or online. “We received a lot of requests from our regulars to open a showroom for a very long time,” Standard System brand manager Lee Ji-hye, 33, explained in an email interview.
Read MoreInteresting people have a special magnetism. They tell incredible stories and lead unusual lives. But what exactly makes them so captivating?
They’re curious more than anything else. An interesting person is always excited to explore the world, and this energy radiates outward.
Some people are naturally interesting, but there are also ways to learn to be more engaging. Dr. Clair Nixon is known throughout Texas A&M as an incredibly interesting accounting professor (an oxymoron if there ever was one). Accounting is a difficult subject to make interesting and fun, which is what makes Dr. Nixon so special. He’s so good at making things interesting that he doesn’t just teach accounting, he also gives lectures on how to be more interesting.
Read MoreIn the century since his arrest on Aug. 12, 1920, Charles Ponzi’s name has been linked to the scam that led to his eventual conviction and imprisonment. At its essence, a Ponzi scheme involves a phony investment in which early investors are paid with the investments of later investors making the enterprise appear legitimate. But Ponzi was neither the first nor the last, by far, to perpetrate this type of fraud.
Read MoreScreen time at night keeps adults from falling asleep and sleeping well. Your brain’s electrical activity increases and it prevents you from calming down into a peaceful state of mind for sleep. In addition, responding to an email, text, or video increases the tension in your body which results in stress. Your body then produces the stress hormone, cortisol.
Read MoreSay no to tobacco. Falling into peer pressure can be the worst thing to do. Society can talk you into doing it without even saying a word. That’s why I’m here to persuade you not to start smoking. Many people do smoke, but that doesn’t make it the right choice. You shouldn’t start smoking because it can cause lung cancer, it causes others around you to be in danger, and it can cost an outrageous amount of money.
Read MoreGreek yogurt didn't receive much attention until a local cable TV program talked about its nutritional benefits. The yogurt is known to be healthy, and a great diet food due to its low calories. It contains double to triple the amount of protein and calcium than that of ordinary yogurt and higher amount of lactic acid bacteria thus strengthening the immune system and helping digestion.
Read MoreOccam’s Razor states that among competing hypotheses, the one with the fewest assumptions should be selected. That is to say, All things being equal, the simpler explanation is generally better than a more complex one. William of Ockham, an English Franciscan friar, came up with this brilliant revelation way back between 1287 and 1347 (the years he was alive).
Read MoreAt an animal sanctuary in the Congo, several dozen Congolese schoolchildren are getting a crash course in bonobos. These gentle, endangered apes, who resemble chimpanzees, are "our closest cousins," educator Blaise Mbwaki tells the students in French. "They have a human character, and they are Congolese." "So if you eat a bonobo," Mbwaki says, "you are eating your cousin. It is cannibalism."
Read MoreIn one of the most famous scenes from the Harry Potter series, a group of kids, new to the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, line up before an old and crumpled wizard's hat. It is the sorting hat. The hat will tell them which house they'll belong to during their Hogwarts education.
Read MoreDoug Falter returned home on the evening of February 3, 2018, teary-eyed and exhausted. The 33-year-old professional photographer had just run from one end of Hawaii’s Waimea Bay to the other—the length of three football fields—while frantically scanning the water like a starving seabird in search of a fish.
Read More“Find a mentor.” It’s a piece of career advice so commonplace many of us have never given it a second thought. But does it hold up to scrutiny? What does the evidence tell us about the perks of mentorship? Until recently, nothing conclusive. Some scholars even suggested that mentorship had troublesome side effects, including favoritism and “cloning,” mentors’ tendency to push protégés toward career paths exactly like their own.
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