The Best Minute: On what to say, charities and money, and blind spots

2 QUOTES FROM OTHERS

I. Courtney Ellis ON one of the most loving things we can say to a person grieving the death of a loved one:

“‘Would you tell me about them?’ Not how they died. Too many people pry for gossipy, painful details. But what they were like in life.”

II. Dan Pallotta on how we wrongly view charities and nonprofits:

“In the for-profit sector, the more value you produce, the more money you can make. But we don't like nonprofits to use money to incentivize people to produce more in social service. We have a visceral reaction to the idea that anyone would make very much money helping other people. Interestingly, we don't have a visceral reaction to the notion that people would make a lot of money not helping other people. You know, you want to make 50 million dollars selling violent video games to kids, go for it. We'll put you on the cover of Wired magazine. But you want to make half a million dollars trying to cure kids of malaria, and you're considered a parasite yourself.”

2 IDEAS FROM ME

I. Everyone has their own biases and blind spots. To assume only those with a faith belief are “blinded” by their beliefs and others are not stifles meaningful debate. When we recognize we all have deeply embedded ideals, then we can have meaningful conversations on an even playing field.

II. When I was a kid, my dad would intentionally plan to spend 15 minutes playing with us every weeknight. It’s amazing how a small, consistent, and intentional amount of time can make such a big and lasting impact. Small consistencies over time produce the biggest results.

1 RANDOM FACT

We take in information better when it’s visual.

It’s often said that about half of your brain is directly related to processing visual information. It’s tricky to generalize about the brain because so much of it is doing multiple things, but according to Discover, neurons devoted to visual processing take up around 30% of the cortex. That’s a huge portion of your brain power essentially just for your eyes and the processes in your brain that turn what you see into information.

Source: Discover magazine