There’s a great TED talk available by psychologist Mihaly Csikszenmihalyi, the author of “Flow.” He dissects what makes us feel fulfilled and why, and defines what its like to experience a state of “flow,” or optimal performance and fulfillment.

Here is an adaptation of his last slide that I did for a recent presentation:

As challenge and skills rise together, we enter into a state he refers to as “Flow.”

I read this Jay Leno quote recently in a book called “Comic Insights” (it was his response to the question “Are you a workaholic?”):

“No, but you have to understand that I went through most of my life not being able to do anything particularly well. I wasn’t any good at sports, I wasn’t very good at anything, and my main problem was that when I did something I would always be thinking of something else. Like when I was in school, I would be thinking of being out of school. My attention span was short. Whereas when I got on stage, that was the first time where I did something where I did and thought about it at the same time. That was the only time I was ever focused, and it’s still true today.” (Comic Insights by Franklin Ajaye, p. 127)

When are those moments for you? What are you doing where you cease to notice things around you, time goes by extremely quickly, and you feel a profound sense of fulfillment?

When he used to work for Apple, Garr Reynolds had a whole entire wall that was a whiteboard. Rob Bell has the same thing. When I first heard that, I was pretty jealous. I love brainstorming with whiteboard, because I’m a big mind-mapping fan. WHen I was in Home Depot the other day, I saw some paint that was “Chalkboard” paint. You paint it on and it makes a chalkboard surface. So I asked a Home Depot employee if they had the same thing for whiteboards, but he didn’t think they did. I looked up a few shelves higher, and there it was- “Dry Erase paint”! I couldn’t believe it. It was about $20 and makes a 7′ by 7′ surface. I’m buying another box, and I’m gonna have whiteboard heaven in China!

This is the paint you can use to make a GIANT whiteboard

My wife got me this pen for Christmas last year. Ever since day one I’ve been amazed by it. So when I discover something new it can (or will be able to) do, it impresses me even more! I love using it for learning Chinese, because my teacher’s explanations are synchronized with the notes I was writing at the time.

I just discovered the demo of translation software a couple days ago. Hopefully the full version will be available soon! Check out this video for a preview.

If you haven’t read the book yet (I highly recommend you do) then you’ll at least want to sign up for their newsletter, because it gives you access to their free resources. I’ve checked them all out and I found them really worthwhile. In my opinion Made to Stick is one of the best books I’ve read on the topic of communicating ideas.

I’ve been working on a presentation in Keynote recently, and I don’t really prefer to use the built-in Keynote themes. Even if I do end up using their theme, I don’t need all the different Master Slides, so I want to delete or modify them. I just couldn’t figure out how.

Not long ago I tried to make my own theme, but every time I modified the slides and saved them as a theme, when I reopened them they hadn’t really changed. But recently I came across the two articles below, and found out how to modify the Master Slides. Once you do that, then you save it as a new theme (File>Save Theme.) The image below shows how to uncover those hidden Master Slides. You need to move the little handle next to where it says “Slides” on the side down to uncover the masters. Who knew?

This guy did, fortunately, and here was the only similar post I could find.

Sneaky Master Slides

This is my version of Tim’s four steps of the reading process.

• Collect good, worthwhile books
• Read them. Interact with them by taking notes
• Reflect. Internalize, compare, challenge and add to the content
• Spread the idea(s) worth spreading- Blog it, teach it, converse about it, email it

Recently I’ve struggled with our modern summaries of the Good News, but hadn’t been able to articulate an alternative very well. I came across this book a few weeks ago, and I feel like James Choung is on to something.

You can also download a pdf version of his interview with Christianity Today here.

Please share your thoughts. . .

Here is an overview of a talk I have been putting together. I welcome any feedback. It was sparked by my thoughts on how our definition of holiness needs to move more towards what we are set apart FOR instead of only being about what we are set apart FROM, and the book “The Power of Full Engagement”. Keep in mind, this is far from polished: it is purely my brainstorming and working towards a structure and flow.

When I was little I learned to recognize words and their meaning, and even how to pronounce them correctly for the most part. But Im realizing there are many aspects of reading (which happens to be a very crucial aspect of my life) that I wish I had learned a long time ago.

Here are some takeaways from the second chapter of Tim Sander’s first book, Love is the Killer App (Tim Sanders was my favorite speaker at the Willow Creek Leadership Summit 2004).

• Have a good, useful and efficient note taking system
• Own the Big Thought of the book (practice explaining it. Verbally is best, but writing will work too)
• Take some time right after reading to reflect, connect the book to other things you’ve read. Its also okay to let your mind wander
• Choose well which books you will read
• Review a section or chapter before you move in to the next one
• Review your notes from 1 or 2 previous books every week
• Get a tagging/cataloging system (I use Microsoft OneNote)
• Write a review or summary (or a blog post)

If you have any reading tips, please share.

Here are some things I have been referencing a lot recently for the bettering of my own presentation/speaking style:

Slide Design/Presentations:
www.presentationzen.com- great stuff on slide design and presentations in general. Check out his stuff about how to use PowerPoint (and how not to). Also a book by the same title, hopefully I’m getting it for Christmas. A good summary of his ideas can be found here in his talk to Google- try to watch it in high quality, I had trouble loading the regualr quality version.
Along the same lines is www.slideology.com. Similar topics, also a book (Slide:ology). A great friend got me a copy, and although I read through the whole thing in four days, I will reference it every time I work on a presentation.

Public Speaking:
sixminutes.dlugan.com – has tons of articles, a section of speech critiques, and stuff on how to evaluate speeches.
Anything from www.toastmasters.org. They have an online magazine that you can download for free in PDF, they are the public speaking pros.

Some great books:
Communicating for a Change by Andy Stanley
Made to Stick- by Chip and Dan Heath. Check out the summary here.
Brain Rules by John Medina. The website is extremely useful. Also, there is a presentation put together by the Presentation Zen author Garr Reynolds about Brain Rules. Notice the way Garr uses Powerpoint.

What are some other must-reads in the presentation/public speaking realm?

I’m terrible at processing my thoughts while typing, but I travel too much to carry around tons of notebooks. So I can’t wait to use this thing. My wife’s parents got it for me for Christmas, and I will definitely put it to good use (especially if I need to write 20 page papers next year for my Masters)!

Along these lines, I’m working on putting this together for teaching (thanks Brent for passing on the video.)

Here are links to some of my favorite travel gear/accessories:

MagicJack- $40 for the first year, $20/year after that for unlimited internet calls to the US and Canada from a phone connected to the computer or through your computer’s speakers and mic, or a headset.

Phillips DVD player with iPod dock- . Our sanity when traveling with our son. This one has an iPod dock also so it doubles as an iPod speaker while on the road

Eagle Creek Wallaby 2 toiletry kit and Eagle creek travel pillow.

Camelback backpack and water bottle. The water bottle is especially great for road trips because you dont need to take the lid off but it won’t spill if it falls over.

And if you’re buying new luggage, here are some things I suggest keeping in mind:

Look for a lifetime warranty
Replaceable wheels
Make sure the wheels are not sticking completely out of the bottom (if they break off that’d be a bummer. I’ve seen it happen.)
Factor weight in, and look for a good material (like ballistic nylon).
Rolling duffels are great for fitting a lot of stuff and keeping the weight down.

I always love hearing about cool travel gear, if there’s something you think I should add or take a look at let me know.

My son has been on about 50 flights. He turned three two months ago. I’ve been traveling fairly consistently for the last eight years. Its something I love and the more convenient I can make it, the more enjoyable it is. Here are some things I think can help when traveling, in no particular order of importance.

I put any books that I will check in into plastic bags. Some of mine have been ruined due to my luggage being out in the rain.

Its important to me to get my miles, no matter how short the flights or how seldom I think I will use that airline. I learned not to wait until after my travel to request my mileage credit, I do it before my first flight. Once I missed a chance for about 20,000 miles flying to Africa and back because I waited too long.

I wear flip flops when flying (unless its absolutely too cold outside). This makes going through security quicker, and helps for when my feet swell up on the plane. I pack a pair of socks in my carry-on because they usually have the air conditioning blasting.

Speaking of carry-ons, its a good idea to pack a pair of underwear and essential toiletries in your carry-on in the case of lost luggage. I have had my luggage delayed up to a week at one point. Now I pay for my tickets with a credit card that has lost/delayed luggage insurance and we got about $300 when our luggage was just over 18 hours late.

Speaking of air conditioning, on overnight flights I usually put a blanket on even when Im planning on falling asleep, even if Im not cold. When we sleep our body temperature drops a little and the last thing I want is to wake up from being cold and have to try and get comfortable again. I have an inflatable neck pillow from Eagle Creek that helps me sleep alright (usually aided by the Unisom).

I always try to get a bulkhead seat, so that I get legroom galore. Bulkhead window is heaven.

I make it a priority to bring baby powder (mostly for the flight), shout wipes, and snacks (food on planes is not getting cheaper).

Anyone else have habits similar to mine? Any other tips to share?

I was playing tennis with my little brother a few days ago and he hit a shot that went long by quite a bit. He quickly commented “my racket didn’t put enough top spin on it.” “You should have a pep-talk with your racket” I offered (I couldn’t resist).

Jim Collins in his book Good to Great gives a leadership principle he calls “the window and the mirror.” His suggestion is that when things go well in leadership, good leaders look out the window and give the credit to others. But when things don’t go well, a sign of good leadership is that we look in the mirror and personally take responsibility.

This can be taken to a unhealthy extreme, where we never give ourselves credit (where it is due) for a job well done, or where we take too much responsibility upon ourselves for negative things beyond our control. But in general and when used to a healthy extent I find this to be a useful principle. If its the racket’s fault that my brother hit the ball out, how can my brother improve that besides buy a new racket? Now, I realize he was not literally saying it was the racket’s fault, but what I’m getting at is how that mindset could affect him. There’s something significant about taking responsibility so that we can make the necessary changes.

Christians especially can be seen going two different directions with this, often towards unhealthy extremes:

“I’m having a really bad day. I’m having a hard time being nice to people. It’s just spiritual warfare.” Or they draw a different conclusion: “God is just testing me, showing me what I’m really like without Him.”

Could all of those conclusions have some truth in them? Possibly. But I am trying to start as close to home as possible- with me- and ask “what do I need to do differently here to help things go better?” Maybe I need to work on my topspin or reflect on my responses to people before I react.

Empathy has a been a key idea for me lately, in my marriage, parenting, leadership and friendship circles. Its something I feel I can never have enough of.

I was watching a TEDtalk yesterday and Tim Brown, the presenter, had some really good uses for empathy. Garr Reynolds pointed out this example based on the talk: the people who design the seats and spacing in the economy section of large airplanes- Did they really sit there for 12 hours straight? Another application was someone who took a video camera to the Emergency Room (he wasn’t injured, just trying to put himself in other patient’s shoes). The majority of his footage? The off-white ceiling. At least 20 minutes of it. Seth Godin recently asked two related questions concerning airports: why is there nowhere to lie down? Why is there no one to ask why there is nowhere to lie down? Did the airport designers have an overnight layover with small children and still decide to do it the way they did?

If you’re a communicator, can you put yourself in the shoes of someone listening to your talk? Reading your blog? Your memo or document? What would they want you to change?

If you’re a leader, how can thinking of empathy like this effect your leadership?

What are some other industries that could use more empathy? Other creative applications for empathy?