Evolved Inspired

Evolved Inspired

Notes: The Art of Invisibility

This is the first section of key takeaway notes from The Art of Invisibility by Kevin Mitnik, a compelling source of information for a one wanting to understand the risks of not considering privacy online. Not just reserved for the Snowden’s of the world, it is a great read to help understand how your online accounts or identity can be used or stolen. These are essentially pen-notes for myself, rather than narrative on the topics covered.

Summary of Mindfulness Benefits

Mindfulness has been a great focus of research over the last couple fo decades. That said, the scientific research is lacking in rigour in some areas. Here are a few largely held believes on the benefits of Mindfulness. Improved well-being A habit of mindfulness creates a general improvement in well-being. The ability to consciously absorb more of what is happening in each moment leads to a greater sense of fulfilment and appreciation of events, people and achievements.

Background to Mindfulness

Our mind is a great time traveller. Our thoughts bounce between reflection and replay of the past and planning and forecasting the future. This storytelling mode of our mind sacrifices our time in the right now. This time right now, or present, is an already filtered state as our brain doesn’t have enough bandwidth to consume full input from all of our senses. Our brain has to filter out and discard what it believes is unimportant to allow it to process what it believes is essential.

Mindfulness Introduction Week 1

Session Start Welcome. This is week one of our ventures into Mindfulness. Each week we will focus on trying out at new techniques, building on techniques we already know and sharing our experiences and questions. First Practice, quick breathing exercise to bring us into the right state Sit with back away from back from the chair Feet on ground Rest on hand on the lap Place one hand across the tummy Gently close your eyes Take 6 slow, but comfortable breaths into your belly.

An open mind is an educated mind

It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it. Aristotle There is some speculation on the source of this quote. It is often attributed to Aristotle. More on that later. The essence of this simple reflection is separation from thought from the mind. We can grasp an idea and identify with it. The thought becomes us. The concept holds from the simplest of thoughts to our greatest ideas and perceptions.

Improving your Blog with Grammarly Free and Premium

There is much more to excellent blog writing than your browser’s spellchecker. WordPress options are limited. Grammarly Free (or Premium) results in a massive improvement in the written quality of your WordPress site for both human visitors and search engines. I have to admit a significant degree of scepticism on my part to the various advertisements for Grammarly over the past several months. After starting with Grammarly Free, I realized I’d wrongly based this judgment on other (looking at you Word auto-complete and spell-check!

Getting to know Seneca

Who was Seneca? Seneca was an influential and often quoted Stoic philosopher. Seneca was born in 4 B.C. in Cordoba, Hispania (modern-day Spain). Known as Seneca the Younger and Lucius Annaeus Seneca. Senaca, later raised in Rome, was a pivotal teacher and advisor to Emperor Nero. A rich and powerful man of Rome, Seneca narrowly escaped a death penalty in 41 A.D, endured exile and died by forced suicide in 65 A.