Today we discuss lifelong learning and what it means to us. With the advent of technology there are many ways to explore our interests from using youtube, chatGPT, audiobooks and podcasts. The barrier to entry to exploring our curiousites have never been lower.

Some of the benefits we believe that come with being a lifelong learner are:

Ultimately I believe that being a lifelong learning is taking the initiative to take your curiosity to the next level.

When we set a goal we want it to be SMART:

What is our target in what phase of life?

What do you want in life?

Joyce - putting a 6-12 month time frame on her goals

Goal Categories

Malai - Mission Statement: To be an impactful leader who inspires other, and myself to achieve great things. And to be a loving supportive mother to my family.

Craig -

Goal Categories

Financial

Family

Fitness

Interpersonal

Growth

Habits as a goal - having good habits

Sub goals within the goals

Minimum effort to reach our future goals.

Mike -

What is hedonism? hedonism bot - Futurama - the pursuit/indulgence in pleasure.

These desires and emotions drive our behavior - maximize pleasure, minimize pain

where does it come from? cultural/environmental (extrinsic) vs intrinsic

Why are we talking about it:

The hedonic treadmill is a psychological theory that suggests that humans have a tendency to return to a relatively stable level of happiness or subjective wellbeing, despite changes in their circumstances or external conditions.

I was wondering would we be able to reframe it for positivity?

What is the principle of neuroplasticity

The term “neuroplasticity” (or “brain plasticity”) refers to the ability of our brains to reorganize, both physically and functionally, throughout our lives, due to our environment.

Some quotes in the show:

Shaolin Monk - What is the meaning of life? Life is the result of the actions we take.

“The way of Dao is simple stop striving, defeat desire, in absence of striving there is peace. In absence of desire there is satisfaction.” Tao te jing - Lao Tzu

Philip Zimbardo - The Stanford Prison Experiment

There have been controversy around this experiment.

"He who has a why to live for can bear almost any how.” - Freidrich Neitzsche

It is commonly attributed to Viktor Frankl in his book “A Man’s Search for Meaning.” Where having a why gave the prisoners of war a reason to live, where as others who did not tended to lose their lives.

Bodhizfa IPA - Bodhisattva is one who has not reach enlightenment. Spiritual enlightenment sponsored by Georgetown brewing.

Calculated risks - action or strategy that is pursued after considerations of risks involved

Mitigating risks to achieve the outcomes you want. Going through the cycles of failure to learn and understand the risks involved to learn and progress.

Taking more time to make a decision gives us the chance to give more thought to the action.

Risk Tolerance - I didn't really think of this as risk taking but Justin helped frame this really well. Our immigrant parents coming to America to provide for us and family back home is huge risk taking and a high level of risk tolerance. They made it to give us the foundation of where we now are in our lives.

Deliberate practice - recording and reviewing footage and seeing where and how we can improve.

Reflecting on actions and decisions made grants us the ability to make a choice. As we get better at recognizing the triggers and reactions we have, we can make better choice and focus our energy into growing.

I cringe at the first story I share. But it isn't all bad. It helped me to find fuel me to be better.

We discuss often times we find that an emotional trigger is what starts us down the path of questioning ourselves and decisions we made or didn't make. Whatever action or inaction we take next is ultimately our choice.

Having a moment a time to reflect can help bring a mirror to ourselves and have us question why and what are we doing.

Correction, it was a Soviet Naval officer, Vasili Arkhipov who is known for preventing a Soviet nuclear torpedo launch during the Cuban missile crisis. Which ultimately people have speculated that he prevent the start of another world war and potentially a nuclear war.

Ultimately we ask these two questions:

Mike: Reflection gives us a choice. Pain is a common trigger - conditioning to think and reflect on what could be wrong here?

Craig: Reflection is triggered by a feeling of emotion. Trying to understand what caused that emotion, peel back the layers to understand the core of the decision. Being honest with your emotions and yourself.

Create some time in the week, reflect on how it went. Are you moving the direction you want to go?

On this episode of the pod, I discuss with Ellison and Larry the idea of the locus of control. We discuss our perspectives on the locus of control, how our belief on the direction of our lives were affected internally or externally. And how it is more of a balance as both internal and external factors can be true.

Locus of control refers to the degree to which an individual feels a sense of agency in regard to his or her life.

A person with an internal locus of control will believe that the things

Inspiration - The excitement of the mind or emotions to a high level of feeling or activity.

Today’s podcast, we recorded in late March with Josh before he left for Australia. We discuss Josh’s vision for a series, what inspired him to get started with creating the movies, having ideas and continuing to evolve them. We briefly touch on the idea of purposely failing, and the fear of putting ourselves out there.

Josh’s process includes - Inspiration, Creativity, Innovation

He had to learn how to actually work through the process to get into the film industry. The longest piece to making things happen was simply moving the pieces into place to start Uceon Studios. He believes inspiration does not come unless you have a low point in life. The low point being the catalyst in life. Everyone’s pain is different but it provides a catalyst. Josh’s catalyst spurred him to focus his energy in the right direction.

The suck (the catalyst), embracing the suck, realizing what you still have, and realizing what is actually important, and start building from there.

If you or someone you know is experiencing a crisis, please contact the 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline if you are experiencing mental health-related distress or are worried about a loved one who may need crisis support.

Connect with a trained crisis counselor. 988 is confidential, free, and available 24/7/365.

On this episode of the podcast, we actually wanted to show an example of failure. How we used the time to speak constructively and challenge each other to be more prepared for the next episode. Remember by the definition of failure is the condition or fact of not achieving the desired end result or goal.

We share some thoughts behind the scenes and run with it since we had the time to record anyway.

Enjoy!

On this pod one of my closest friends joins me on the pod to talk about self-care. Join us as we explore our thoughts on self-care as we've grown over time. We'll cover the following:

What is self-care?

When did we learn about self-care?

What are the different types of self-care?

Is self-care selfish? (It's not!)

Alone time is necessary to invest back into yourself

Who are we? Learning to unlearn and relearn

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