If you are to connect more with anything this year, let it be nature. It will not only allow you to connect more to yourself but others as well. It is fuel for the soul. Increased vitality exists above and beyond the energizing effects of physical activity and social interaction that are often associated with our forays into the natural world.

There are many ways to connect with ourselves and others, but nature is certainly one of the best ways.

“Nature is fuel for the soul,” says Richard Ryan, lead author and a professor of psychology at the University of Rochester. “Often when we feel depleted we reach for a cup of coffee, but research suggests a better way to get energized is to connect with nature,” he says.“Research has shown that people with a greater sense of vitality don’t just have more energy for things they want to do, they are also more resilient to physical illnesses. One of the pathways to health may be to spend more time in natural settings,” says Ryan.

“Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one.” ~ Albert Einstein

Are you suffering from the debilitating illness known as seriousness? It is an epidemic in the world of today. By a certain age, if one is to be respected and taken ‘seriously’ by their peers, they must adopt a certain seriousness themselves. Things matter. Social standing, money in the bank, the ‘importance’ of your job or role in life, the public image of your family members — all of these are exceptionally important to a person’s sense of belonging and self-worth. Yet the price so often paid is one of the greatest: a loss of innocence, a loss of the ability to truly ‘play’. Ironically, however, the ability to play is of course the cornerstone strategy of some of the most successful people and companies in the world...

Evidence continues to emerge, both scientific and historical, suggesting that the way in which the majority of us currently sleep may not actually be good for us.

In 2001, historian Roger Ekirch of Virginia Tech published a paper that included over 15 years of research. It revealed an overwhelming amount of historical evidence that humans used to in fact sleep in two different chunks. (1)

In 2005, he published a book titled “At Day’s Close: Night in Times Past,” that included more than 500 references to a disjointed sleeping pattern. It included diaries, medical books, literature and more taken from various sources which include Homer’s Odyssey all the way to modern tribes in Nigeria and more.

“It’s not just the number of references – it is the way they refer to it, as if it was common knowledge.” – Ekrich (source)

Educating the mind without educating the heart is no education at all. – Aristotle

All human beings are born creators. If you don’t believe me, I urge you to recall when you were a child. Didn’t you love to paint and dance and sing? Didn’t you love to indulge in imaginary worlds you conjured up in your head? Children are naturally creative. It’s one of the things that makes us human. The problem is we’ve been cultured out of our creativity as we’ve grown older. The problem is we have been educated. As Ken Robinson says in his book, Out of Our Minds, ‘The dominant forms of education actively stifle the conditions that are essential to creative development.’

The education system is predominantly left-brain oriented. It rewards conventionality and discourages out of the box thinking. The tragedy of this kind of model is that not all children are left-brain learners, yet they are treated as such. When these children perform poorly within the academic mould they are often viewed as having a learning impediment...