Mind Space – Things Are Good

Feeling Overwhelmed? Hit the Floor

Simply lying down on the floor can help calm you down if you’re getting overwhelmed. It sounds too good to be true that simply lying down can work, but the science is there and there’s hundreds of years of observation too. The act of lying down is a yoga pose (probably the easiest yoga pose too) that has been proven to change your physical and mental wellbeing almost instantly.

next time the weight of the world has got you down, let it push you to the floor. Then you can get back up again!

When you’re having a bad day, “floor time is the ultimate grounding technique,” Daryl Appleton, EdD, chief wellness consultant and Fortune 500 executive coach, told Business Insider. Research shows that grounding can reduce inflammation, pain, and stress, which may improve sleep and blood flow.

Compared to when you’re sitting or standing, lying on the floor maximizes your contact with the ground. You may notice your muscles releasing tension with your back and legs supported.

“Getting on the ground outdoors is even better because it allows your nervous system to recalibrate,” Appleton said. Physically connecting with the earth can boost your mood and help you relax and regulate your emotions.

When You Read, Do You Hear Voices?

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Do you read fiction? Do you find yourself ‘hearing’ the different character voices as you read them (other than audiobooks, naturally). Do you picture the world the story is set in great detail? These are the sort of questions that Reader Bank is all about. It’s a new research project looking into longitudinal behaviours of readers and how it relates to, well, who readers are and how they think. It’s an ambitious project that you can be a part of no matter how much or little you read. Maybe doing their studies will motivate you to read more.

ReaderBank is the world’s most ambitious study of reading, imagination, and wellbeing. Every day, readers around the world lose themselves in novels or poetry, but how and why that happens can be mysterious and unexpected. With ReaderBank, we are aiming to collect a variety of information on what it is to read and imagine. From lively festivals like the Edinburgh International Book Festival and Jaipur Literature Festival, to our own workshops and projects, we collate stories of how literature touches lives across the globe.
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ReaderBank explores reading experiences to understand how we imagine, how we think, how we feel, and how we inhabit our everyday worlds.

Babies Make Dads Change

Some researches have been asking a simple question that has led to complex insights: what changes does the male body go through when they have a child? Indeed, there are some physical changes like producing less testosterone and more oxycontin, but it’s what goes on in the mind where researchers are finding the complexity. The fathers with lower testosterone spent more time with their children and the more time that fathers spent with their infants the lower their testosterone became. Fathers experience mental changes during their partner’s pregnancy and even men who just spend a lot of time with babies experience mental changes too.

Saxbe has been investigating whether the consequences of these hormonal shifts leave their marks on dads’ brains. “I thought fathers are actually a very interesting, almost a special population in the sense that they experience the transformations of parenthood without biological pregnancy,” she told me.

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In Father Time, she argues that as humans evolved into more complex societies, it was collective care that made humans flourish. It was valuable to have men that could provide primary care for a baby, and so we developed a capacity to do so – one we still keep.

Smarter Kids Emerge From Montessori Programs

If you’re looking for opinions on education all you need to do is ask parents what they think. If you want actually useful data to plan policy then talk to experts on how children learn. Those experts will all agree that inquiry based learning is the way to go. A recent study confirmed that the inquiry approach is the best way, and that following the tried and true Montessori methods is best for children and even cheaper for society.

By the end of kindergarten, children who won a random lottery to attend public Montessori preschools outperformed their peers in reading, executive function, short-term memory, and social understanding—all while costing approximately $13,000 less per child than traditional preschool programs.

Those costs do not include anticipated savings from improved teacher morale and retention, a dynamic demonstrated in other data.
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“These findings affirm what Maria Montessori believed over a century ago—that when we trust children to learn with purpose and curiosity, they thrive,” said Angeline Lillard, Commonwealth Professor of Psychology at the University of Virginia. “Public Montessori programs are not only effective but cost-efficient.”

Want Above Average Intelligence? Study Philosophy

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The humanities have been pushed to side due to the praise and perceived wealth that STEM education gets. This is not good for a vibrant and diverse society as the humanities provide people with knowledge that can expand minds and sway cultures. The field of philosophy is one such domain that provides people new ways of thinking, and a multitude of ways to question their own thoughts and those of others. Philosophy means practicing logic and exploring new ideas, which is perfect for setting people up for success in a world of information.

In a world filled with lies and other misinformation, content generated by AI, and malicious state actors swaying geopolitics, it’s more important than ever to posses critical thinking kills that studying philosophy provides.

According to the University of Illinois, the average salary for a philosophy graduate who finds work within six months of graduation is $60,069. This puts them above economics majors and just below physics majors. Other sources report similar figures.

They also enjoy a respectable increase when one considers mid-career earnings. The median philosophy major can expect to earn a salary of more than $80,000. This is higher than that earned by business management or chemistry majors. And according to data from Payscale, those with only an undergraduate degree in philosophy rank 16th for mid-career median earnings.