Emma's soccer team was playing a game, with just three minutes left in the second half. Despite their best efforts, the game remained a 0-0 draw. Emma was exhausted and wondered if she could go on. With pain in her legs, she felt a sense of despair. Suddenly, their captain, Bridget, shouted, "Two minutes left! Two minutes is enough time to score a goal!" Inspired by her words, Emma's team gathered their strength and started running again with renewed spirit. Just before the final whistle, Emma scored a goal! With the roaring cheers of the crowd, she fully enjoyed the victory with her teammates.

There is no denying the importance of achieving a proper work-life balance. However, the optimal approach may not be what you think. For instance, many believe that a work-life balance is best achieved by having the flexibility to choose when or where to work. While this approach offers convenience, it can also make it difficult to separate work from our personal lives. A far better approach is to work less. Studies have shown that a four-day workweek is the best way to ensure a work-life balance. For workers, having three consecutive days off each week offers numerous benefits, including improved sleep, greater happiness, and stronger relationships with friends and family members. And this translates into higher levels of productivity in the workplace. In fact, companies that adopt a four-day workweek often report subsequent increases in profits due to improved employee performance.

In today's digital age, the spread of fake news through social media has become a widespread concern. Interestingly, this issue is not a recent development; its origins can be traced back through history. Deceptive information held significant power over people's beliefs and societies long before the rise of modern technology. One famous case involved Octavian, a skillful strategist in ancient Rome who cleverly used misinformation to manipulate public opinion. He told untrue stories to portray his rivals negatively and improve his own image. For example, Octavian claimed that his rival, Mark Anthony, intended to give Roman territory to the children of Cleopatra, the Egyptian queen that Anthony loved. Octavian used this story to convince the Romans that Anthony was no longer loyal to Rome, turning public support against him. This historical use of misinformation is reflected in the strategies we see in modern society.

American filmmaker Michael Todd was born in Minneapolis, Minnesota, in 1909, under the name Avrom Hirsch Goldbogen. He was the youngest of nine children from a poor immigrant family. After dropping out of high school, he worked in construction before moving on to the production of musical theater, where he produced 17 Broadway musicals. In 1950, Todd founded a company aimed at presenting movies using Cinerama, a widescreen film format using three different projectors to create a composite image on a curved screen. However, before the first film was released, Todd left the company to establish Todd-AO, another company that introduced their own widescreen format using 70mm film and special projectors. Todd produced Around the World in 80 Days using this format, and it earned him an Academy Award for Best Picture in 1956. Unfortunately, Todd was killed in a plane crash on his way back from visiting Albuquerque to promote the film in 1958.

When starting something new, our instinct is to create a plan. However, it is undeniable that schedules are not always followed as strictly as we project. We often allot too little time to complete tasks and find ourselves running behind schedule when we encounter delays. This phenomenon, which was named the "planning fallacy" upon its discovery in the late 1970s, is a natural cognitive error that no one can seem to avoid. So why does this error occur? From a psychological perspective, it's rooted in an optimistic bias. When we plan, we do so at a moment of high motivation and confidence in our abilities. We feel charged with energy, believing we can complete the task quickly. Unfortunately, reality often presents unexpected hurdles, causing us to become annoyed and frustrated. Our initial plans are built on best-case scenarios, but sticking to the intended schedule, when real-world challenges arise, becomes remarkably difficult.

The development of a new product or a scientific breakthrough often happens entirely by coincidence. Such developments may occur while pursuing completely different goals. For instance, in 1907, Leo Hendrik Baekeland was attempting to create a synthetic version of shellac, which was relatively expensive to manufacture. After combining chemicals and applying heat, the end result was nothing like shellac. But his experiment did lead to the first form of one of the most-used materials in the world: plastic. World-changing creations may also simply be the byproduct of a completely unrelated process. For example, when British pharmacist John Walker noticed some dried material on the stick he was using to stir chemicals, he attempted to scrape the material off. The material immediately ignited, becoming the world's first matchstick. These examples serve as good reminders that a successful outcome is not always the intended result.

It may seem like the frequency of sound changes, but it is actually movement that changes the way you perceive sound. Let's say you are standing at the side of the road, and an ambulance passes by. As it moves toward you, the pitch of the siren will seem higher. This is because the sound waves coming from the siren are compressed as the ambulance gets closer to your ears, leading to a shorter wavelength and a higher perceived frequency. Conversely, as it gets farther away from you, the sound waves are stretched out, resulting in a longer wavelength and a lower frequency. In other words, the pitch will sound lower as the ambulance moves away. In reality, the sound of the siren is constant, and everyone nearby would hear the siren at the same frequency if the vehicle was stopped. Your perception of sound thus varies based on where you are in relation to the source.