Let's say that you are training for a certain race and your schedule calls for a 10 percent increase in mileage this week, yet you're feeling a little pain in your legs. How do you respond? Do you go ahead and follow the schedule, or do you change it? You know the right answer. Yet many runners insist on sticking to the printed training schedule, since they believe that any change will ruin their chances of running a good race. In fact, the opposite is true. You would benefit more by giving your body a chance to recover. Training schedules are built on the assumption that you aren't experiencing any unusual pains before, during, or after the run. If pain or fatigue does strike, don't hesitate to change your workouts.

Most people don't realize that both help and harm come from within ourselves. Instead, they look to externals, attracted by appearances. Wise people, on the other hand, realize that we are the source of everything good or bad for us. They therefore don't blame and accuse others. They don't convince people they are worthy, special, or distinguished. If wise people experience challenges, they look to themselves; if they are praised by others, they quietly smile to themselves, unmoved; if they are criticized, they don't feel the need to defend their name. They exercise moderation in everything they do. They know that they only have to watch out for themselves and the direction of their own desires.

When selling our ideas, we tend to overpromise in our enthusiasm for our creation. In our vision of how we hope it will be, we leave no room for failure. The result will probably be disappointing. Not disastrous, but a little worse than expected. No one will say anything, but they just won't trust you quite as much next time. Basically, you've blown it. If instead you point out the possible weaknesses and how to resolve them, you are not only building a trusting relationship with your client but you're able to solve any problems. And if it does turn out the way you hoped, it is a bonus.

Marcia is a creativity coach. One day an amateur artist came to see her because she had difficulty creating imaginatively. The client always wanted to have a detailed plan of her work before she could begin. Marcia offered a number of approaches but the client couldn't commit to them. Finally, she asked her client to play with her painting tools for thirty minutes every day for a week with absolutely no plan in mind. She asked for more direction but Marcia told her there were no specific directions. This was so far out of her comfort zone, but she did play and had a breakthrough. Without a plan in mind, she created a piece that she liked.

The psychologist Gary Klein tells the story of a team of firefighters that entered a house where the kitchen was on fire. Soon after they started hosing down the kitchen, the commander heard himself shout, Let's get out of here! without realizing why. The floor collapsed almost immediately after the firefighters escaped. Only after the fact did the commander realize that the fire had been unusually quiet and that his ears had been unusually hot. Together, these impressions prompted what he called a sixth sense of danger. He had no idea what was wrong, but he knew something was wrong. It turned out that the heart of the fire had not been in the kitchen but in the basement below.

In prehistoric times, any attempt to harness nature meant forcing nature against her will. Nature had to be challenged, usually with some form of magic or by means that were above nature ― that is, supernatural. Science does just the opposite, and it works within nature's laws. The methods of science have largely taken away reliance on the supernatural ― but not entirely. The old ways persist full force in primitive cultures. They even survive in technologically advanced cultures too, sometimes disguised as science. This is fake science ― pseudoscience. The characteristic of a pseudoscience is that it lacks the key ingredients of science: evidence and having a test for wrongness. In pseudoscience, doubts and tests for possible wrongness are firmly ignored.

The graph above shows the result of a recent survey in which more than 40,000 museum visitors of different age groups were asked how they prefer to experience museums. Throughout all the age groups, audio tours are most preferred, followed by video clips, and then by computer interactions. Compared to respondents in their 30s, respondents in their 60s are more than twice as likely to prefer audio tours. When it comes to video clips, respondents in their 60s favor them more than any other age group. As for the under-30 group, their preference for computer interactions is lower than that of respondents in their 40s. Groups in their 50s and over show wider differences in preference between audio tours and computer interactions than the younger age groups.

Meteora, an area that attracts thousands of tourists from all over the world every year, is situated in central Greece. Meteora is famous for its monasteries that are built on high rocks. The name itself means 'suspended in the air.' In the past there were many monasteries but now only six are left. The climate here varies from sweaty summers to chilly winters and the area experiences rain all through the year. Tourists here can enjoy visiting monasteries, walking and exploring caves. The best way to reach the place is by taking a bus from Athens. The nearby places worth visiting are Mount Olympus, Kastoria, Thessaloniki and many more.

The essence of sports is competition. However, it is in the best interest of professional sports clubs for this competition to occur on the playing field, not in the marketplace. The reason is easily observable. Imagine that sports clubs competed for fans in purely competitive markets. The more successful clubs would sell more tickets and would naturally earn higher profits, which would allow these clubs to attract the best players through higher salaries. Over time, these clubs would become so much stronger than the less successful teams that competition on the playing field would become boring for spectators. Weak teams would eventually be forced into bankruptcy, and strong teams would lose fans. Therefore, a professional sports club's economic decisions and those of its rivals are interdependent.

Someone who really loves us will be honest with us but will also tend to see us through rose-colored glasses. Sandra Murray and her co-workers studied dating and married couples. They found that the happiest were those who idealized each other, who even saw their partners more positively than their partners saw themselves. When we're in love, we're biased to find those we love not only physically attractive but socially attractive as well. Moreover, the most satisfied married couples tend to approach problems without immediately criticizing their partners. Honesty has its place in a good relationship, but so does the presumption of the other's basic goodness.

Thinking is hard work. If you do not keep your working memory clear, then you are weakening your ability to think about what is going on in your class or meeting. This might seem obvious, but if you look around the room at many meetings, you will find yourself face-to-face with one of the true demons of modern life: multitasking. Sitting in a meeting, you will see that some people are taking care of work that is unrelated to the current meeting. Others are checking their e-mail. Still others are reading. Each of these activities takes up your working memory. You cannot maximize the quality of the new knowledge you are taking in if you do not give yourself every opportunity to pay attention.

An option is forced if not choosing to decide is somehow equivalent in its consequences to choosing not to decide. I recently debated buying a particular car that had just arrived at a local dealership. I looked at it for two days and test-drove it twice. I really liked it. It was an extraordinary deal because of some rare circumstances. But, as much as I liked it, and as perfect a deal as it seemed, I couldn't manage to form the positive belief that I should go buy it. The situation was such that this was equivalent to deciding not to buy it, as my hesitation allowed another interested party to snatch it away while I pondered the possibilities. If you are presented with a good job offer and given 48 hours to respond, then not choosing is equivalent in its consequences to a negative choice. It is a forced option.

When you are asked what you are thinking about, you can normally answer. You believe you know what goes on in your mind, which often consists of one conscious thought leading in an orderly way to another. But that is not the only way the mind works, nor indeed is that the typical way. Most impressions and thoughts arise in your conscious experience without your knowing how they got there. You cannot trace how you came to the belief that there is a lamp on the desk in front of you, or how you detected a hint of irritation in your spouse's voice on the telephone, or how you managed to avoid a threat on the road before you became consciously aware of it. The mental work that produces impressions, intuitions, and many decisions goes on in silence in our mind.

Making $1 million in one year, but nothing in the preceding nine, does not bring the same pleasure as having the total evenly distributed over the same period, that is, $100,000 every year for ten years in a row. The same applies to the inverse order ― making a bundle the first year, then nothing for the remaining period. Somehow, your pleasure system will be saturated rather quickly. As a matter of fact, your happiness depends far more on the number of instances of positive feelings, what psychologists call positive affect, than on their intensity. In other words, good news is good news first; how good matters rather little. So to have a pleasant life you should spread these small affects across time as evenly as possible. Plenty of mildly good news is preferable to one single lump of great news.

If you can find a pattern, rule, or underlying principle in the material, you will likely be able to learn it more easily. For example, if you arrange the number 376315374264 in four groups of three, it is easier to remember (376-315-374 -264). The task is even easier if you can see some patterns or relationships among the four groups. The first three groups all start with 3, and the first and third groups both have a 7 next; the second digits in the last two groups are only one digit apart (7 and 6), and the last digit is the same (4). Noticing such patterns helps make the number more meaningful. Similarly, looking for patterns in phone numbers, addresses, dates, or any other numbers will help you remember them.

In 1775, Typhoon Lengkieki crashed across Pingelap, an island near the equator and only about 20 out of the island's 1,000 inhabitants survived. In such situations, any rare genetic traits may spread. One did. The gene for total color blindness hid dormant in the DNA of the island's ruler. But as he and other survivors reproduced, and their children intermarried and reproduced, the rate of people with the gene on the island became much higher than in the outside world. The first color-blind children on Pingelap appeared in the 1820s. As they grew, it became apparent that they could not see colors and many could not distinguish letters. The people of Pingelap began to call their color blindness maksun, meaning not-see. One interesting thing is that those with maksun have proved to be skilled at night fishing, as they are particularly adept at seeing the faint gray flashes of fish swimming in the dark.

E-tail is obviously a massive trend but in many ways online shopping is still divorced from the real world. Online supermarkets are usually just text-based lists of products ― you can't walk through the store. Indeed, despite the convenience factor, online shopping has nothing in common with its real-world equivalent. For example, online you generally have to know what you're looking for and most people shop alone. In the real world, however, shopping is more of an event, an experience that is usually shared, and customers listen to the recommendations of friends and trusted experts. This hasn't escaped the attention of some savvy Internet retailers and we are therefore starting to see the emergence of social shopping sites. These are a mixture of search engines and social networking sites and allow shoppers to browse and buy based on other customers' recommendations.

Other people's views and troubles can spread like a virus. Don't damage yourself by adopting negative, unproductive attitudes when you talk with others. If you encounter a sorrowful friend, or a colleague who has suffered sudden trouble, be careful not to be overcome by the misfortune. Remember to discriminate between events themselves and your interpretations of them. Remind yourself: What hurts this person is not the occurrence itself but the response he or she has uncritically adopted. We do a good service to others by remaining detached and avoiding melodramatic reactions. Still, if you find yourself in a conversation with someone who is depressed, hurt, or frustrated, show them kindness and give them a sympathetic ear; just don't allow yourself to be pulled down too.

Several months ago, my daughter and I were taking a walk with a friend and her son. My daughter was distracted by the sound of frogs, so she walked over to see several of them by the edge of the water. Look at the frogs by the pond! she exclaimed excitedly, to which my friend replied, That's not a pond, that's a vernal pool. Perhaps I should be embarrassed to admit this, but I had no idea what a vernal pool was any more than my daughter did. I realize that as a devoted naturalist and environmentalist, she was trying to help my child widen her knowledge of the natural world. However, what happened was that my young child was confused and distracted from the important thing, which was admiring the frogs and their beautiful songs. My friend's good intentions of correcting my daughter's error only prevented her from learning something more important on her own. This is the way many of us unintentionally hinder opportunities in our everyday lives to help our children cultivate their minds. Of course, we need to give our children the vocabulary they need to talk about the world around them. However, we need to guard against our natural impulse to offer imprudent help to our children. They need the time, the silence and the mental space to think and learn things for themselves.

My father was not an easy man but I knew that he loved me and took a strong interest in my education. He placed a high value on his experience in the Navy and believed that a military-style education would be good for me. So, in October of 1947, I attended fifth grade at Georgia Military Academy. Watching me having a hard time with the tough students, however, he soon took some pity on me and had me enrolled in a public school in the east of Georgia the following year. It was great for me to be out of the confined boarding school environment and I enjoyed being able to spend more of my free time outside and in nature. But the brighter spot during that time was the arrival of a 21-year-old black man my father hired to take care of his new sailboat. His name was Jimmy Brown. On the day I first saw him, little did I know that he would be one of the most important men in my life. My father did not think about hiring someone for his new boat when he bought it, indeed. But soon, he realized that the new boat was going to be a lot of work and decided to hire Jimmy after several friends recommended him as a capable handyman. It did not take long for Jimmy to prove that my father's friends were right about him. My father trusted him more and more and allowed me to spend a lot of time with Jimmy. Because of the time we spent together, we became really good friends. Eventually, he became like a second father to me. My father taught me many things, always showing his interest in my education. But Jimmy taught me a lot more about nature. I loved every minute of the time I spent with him and he became one of my best friends. Because of my sincere friendship with him, I grew up without any prejudice.