The document outlines key skills to succeed in today's fast-paced world, emphasizing the importance of mental outlook, energy management, and effective learning processes. It discusses strategies for improving sleep, exercise, and food habits to enhance brain performance while suggesting methods for behavior change and knowledge retention. Additionally, it highlights the critical need for making smart choices to combat self-destructive behaviors.

1. Exploiting the Brain
for Fun and Profit

2. Top 4 Skills to Succeed
Today
Mental Outlook
Energy Management
Learning Process
Behavior Change

3. Everyone with a Brain
Stand Up

4. Run in Place
“Awake and Alert”

5. PUNCHES
“listen, pay attention, follow through”

6. Read aloud
enthusiastic
motivational
fascinating
enjoyable
fun
humorous
useful
beneficial
simple
profitable
valuable
easy

7. talk this beneficial is
fascinating

8. PRIMING

9. Elderly Priming
Words: Old, Aged, Gray,
Twilight
Significantly longer to walk
to the elevator
Done on psychology students
Did the priming influence
you? NO
Why? Make things up
We don’t say “I don’t know”
instagram.com/ginalee/

10. The Brain Makes
Things Up

11. WE DON’T EVEN
REALIZE IT!

12. How do we use this to
our advantage?

13. You can’t always change a
situation, but you can
change your response
to that situation

14. Better Than Yesterday

15. Start with Why
Your purpose is
determined by
leveraging your skills
and aligning your
needs, values, and
aspirations with the
impact you want to
have on the world.
~ Simon Sinek ~

16. Managing the
Overwhelm

17. Bombarded with Information
Overload
new languages
new technologies
new approaches
books
articles
blogs
podcasts
twitter
conferences
email

18. We can’t multi-task
Cell phones prove this

20. Email is like Gambling
variable reinforcement

21. Attention is Precious
Selective Ignorance
Information Diet
Pick something you
care about
Skim the rest
Use your friends
Prune Aggressively

22. Turn off Interruptions
TV
Email
Facebook
Cell Phone

23. Quick Tip

24. External Brain
No, you wont remember.

26. Everyone with a Brain
Stand Up

27. Glad you could make it to the conference
Thanks for standing up with me
Keep up the hard work
I like your elephant

28. Energy Management
Sleep, Food & Exercise

29. What you do every
day matters more
than what you do
once in awhile.
~ Gretchen Rubin ~

30. SLEEP

31. -Leo J. Burke
"People who say they sleep like a baby
usually don't have one."

32. Question:
How much sleep do you get?

34. Sleep Experiment
Physical Affects
blood pressure
immune system
body temp
1 night, -30% cognitive
ability
5 days, mimics
Alzheimer’s
Hallucinations and
Paranoia
Factor to Obesity
metabolism
feel hungry
get cravings
longer to feel full

35. DIDN’T FEEL
IMPAIRED

36. Some people need less
insomniac gene

37. Probably NOT You!

38. Analyze
How much do you need, sleepcycle.com
Wake up at the same time everyday, even
weekends
- go to bed when you’re tired
Go to bed at the same time everyday
- wake up without an alarm
Write down how you feel, multiple times
- both physically and emotionally

39. When are you at your
best
morning lark (1/10)
night owl (2/10)
play to your
strengths

40. Sleep hacks
90 minute cycles
Create a routine
Turn off electronics or f.lux
Stop caffeine
Cool and Dark
Room/Bed is Sacred
SOUND
SMELL

41. Quick Tip

42. Naps Improve Performance
26 min nap = 34% improvement ~ army

43. Exercise

44. Why Exercise
improves blood flows
clears waste (in your brain)
improves performance
actually makes brain bigger

45. Walking
Walking Desks
Walking Meetings
Boeing
Mayo Clinic
Start your day
with Yoga

46. Quick Tip
Time Out App

47. Exercise for 75 min/week
to maximize mortality
reduction by 20%

48. Food

49. -Bill Phillips
"Food is the most widely abused anti-anxiety
drug, and exercise is the most potent yet
underutilized antidepressant."

50. Food as Fuel
Brain adores glucose
2% of mass
20% of energy
Your brain needs fat
Balance: carbs,
proteins and fats
Supplements
Caffeine and Alcohol are drugs, use carefully

51. Quick Tip
Change the way you think about food.
Find a good supplement

52. Everyone with a Brain
Stand Up

53. Learning Process &
Behavior Change

54. Knowledge
Learned
Integrated with existing knowledge
Remembered over time
Deployed as Behavior

55. Learned
Use multiple modalities
Attention needs engagement
Elaborate, Meaningful, Context
Stories and Examples

56. Integrated with
Existing Knowledge
Focus & Diffuse Mode
Make it yours - do something with it
Teach

57. Remembered Over
Time
Forgetting stuff is a feature not a
bug
Take frequent breaks
Follow up
Spaced Repetition
- The Mnemosyne Project

58. Deployed as Behavior
Start with Why
Have the right attitude
Make it a habit - habitica.com

59. Quick Tips
Learn something new before bed
Make up crazy story
Senses: including Smells and Sounds

60. Everyone with a Brain
Stand Up

61. Final Review
Mental Outlook
Mindful of Choices*
Start With Why
Get Moving
Sleep
Diffuse Mode
Limit Distractions
Build Habits

62. Resources

63. Books
Predictably Irrational
A Whole New Mind
Your Brain: The Missing Manual
Pragmatic Thinking and
Learning
The Secret Code of Success
Getting Things Done
The Happiness Project
Start with Why
Take the Stairs
Brain Rules
Mind Hacks
Sway
Nudge
Drive

64. Websites
brainrules.net
lifehacker.com
43folders.com/izero
MindHacks.com
FocusAtWill.com
ted.com
emotiv.com
OpenBCI.com

65. There’s an App for that
sleepcycle.com
f.lux
dejal.com/timeout/
habitica.com
coach.me

66. -Ralph Keeney, Duke University
America’s [and the rest of the world] top
killer isn’t cancer or heart disease, nor is it
smoking or obesity. It’s our inability to make
smart choices and overcome our own self-
destructive behaviors.

67. Choose One Small Step
Today

68. Alena Holligan
@sketchings
Wife and Mother of 3 young children
PHP Teacher at Treehouse
PHP Users Group Leader
https://joind.in/talk/61cf8