One of the best pieces of advice I ever received was to prioritize the big rocks. The concept of big rocks is attributed to Stephen Covey, the author of the wildly-popular book ‘The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People.’ Covey points out it’s common for people to focus on easy-to accomplish little things rather than…
Travel changes you in multiple ways: from how you interact with others to the way you think and make decisions. Travel might even make you healthier or more successful in business. Let’s examine the evidence… A 2013 research study compared the personalities of college students who studied abroad for at least one semester with those…
When I want to reinforce the need for critical thinking, I sometimes bring up the green coffee bean problem. In 2012, a research article entitled “Randomized, Double-Blind, Placebo-Controlled, Linear Dose, Crossover Study to Evaluate the Efficacy and Safety of a Green Coffee Bean Extract in Overweight Subjects” was published in the seemingly reputable journal Diabetes,…
Have you ever heard of Nordstrom’s? It’s a trick question. The name of the store is actually Nordstrom. There is no letter ‘s’ in the name. The same is true with Kroger and JCPenney. Even the president made the mistake with supermarket chain Meijer. So why do people add ‘s’ to store names? The most…
Chesterton’s fence principle can be explained as follows: Don’t take down a fence until you know the reason it was put up in the first place. In other words, don’t be so quick to tear down things you don’t understand. G.K. Chesterton was an early 20th century English writer best known for the Father Brown…
Q: How many randomly-chosen people would need to be in the same room to virtually guarantee two of them share the same birthday? A: 75 (99.9% probability) This unintuitive answer is known as the birthday paradox. The earliest known publication of the birthday paradox was in 1939 by the mathematician Richard von Mises. However, there…
Ever wonder why we say clocks go tick tock and not tock tick?Or why the music genre is called hip hop and not hop hip? If you ask most English speakers for a reason, they’ll likely respond it just sounds better that way. That may be true, but it turns out there is an actual…
Have you ever written a common word and momentarily questioned whether you spelled it correctly? If so, you might have experienced jamais vu. You’ll notice I wrote jamais vu, not the more common expression déjà vu. Déjà vu (French for “already seen”) is the feeling we’ve experienced something before when it’s actually new to us….
People have been hacking the English language for years but, at the end of the day, most of the attempts don’t slay. Instead, they are – wait for it – cringe-worthy. Since this is my side hustle, it’s time to obsess about the 2024 banished words. Since 1976, Lake Superior State University (LSSU) has compiled…
Despite the common saying, the early bird may not get the worm. The phrase ‘the early bird gets the worm’ suggests there is an advantage for doing something before anyone else. It’s so familiar that it’s often shortened to early bird; a term which can be used in the sense of getting up early (She’s…