Nonfiction4Life

 SUMMARY

Little did Pushpendra Mehta know that by answering one simple question on Quora, his book, Observe to Unmask: 100 Small Things to Know People Better, would emerge.

The question: “What small thing can tell you a lot about a person?” Mehta’s answer would get over 1 million views and lead to his collecting bits of wisdom for understanding human nature. As a writer, marketer, and mentor, Mehta has been a lifelong observer, watching for subtle clues about people hidden behind their “masks.” Says Mehta, “Most of us wear a mask, a social mask to hide who we really are and what we’re feeling, to protect ourselves, to avoid conflicts, or to masquerade a personality trait that wouldn’t otherwise be appreciated or accepted. The fear that the world is going to find us out leads us to adorn a mask. This displays us in the best possible light—giving, kind, confident, secure, and humble.”

Although not backed by data or scientific evidence, Mehta’s experience and intuitive insights help us "observe to unmask."

KEY IDEAS FOR UNMASKING

• Gather as much information as possible about a person’s early years.
• Learn a person’s backstory by assessing his sense of humor.
• Notice body language for a tipoff for a person’s true nature and passions.
• Study social media posts that reveal who someone is.

QUOTES FROM MEHTA

• “Observe a person’s bookshelf or find out the type of books he or she reads, owns, borrows, or likes to discuss. It will tell you more about his or her personality, interests, and character.”
• “Ask a person to look back and share…the best and the worst days of his or her life. This will tell…a lot about what a person treasures most, what troubles them, and how they overcame crises and challenges.”
• “If you want to know a person really well, get the honest opinion of his or her parents, grandparents, children, siblings, spouse or partner—or ex-spouse or partner—best friend, household staff, executive assistant, or former friends.”

RECOMMENDATION

Listen to Nonfiction4Life Episode #110: The Book of Beautiful Questions by Warren Berger.

BUY "The Book of Beautiful Questions: The Powerful Questions That Will Help You Decide, Create, Connect, and Lead"

Connect with us!

• Facebook
• Instagram
• Twitter
• YouTube
• Website

Special thanks…

• Music Credit
• Sound Editing Credit

Giving hope to the average achiever, Rich Karlgaard shares his latest book, "Late Bloomers: The Power of Patience in a World Obsessed with Early Achievement." He observes, “We’ve created a new system of snobbery based on IQ scores and elite university degrees. To mitigate this crisis, we must stop excessively glorifying precocious achievement and seeing human development as a ‘fast track’ on ramp for early success. Not only is it unjust to the majority of us, it’s profoundly inhumane.”

Why? Because “it ignores the natural-born gifts that we all possess. It cuts off paths of discovery for our more latent or later-blooming gifts and passions. It trivializes the value of character, experience, empathy, wisdom, reliability, tenacity, and a host of other admirable qualities that make us successful and fulfilled. And it undercuts the majority of us who are potential late bloomers.”

Karlgaard warns, “We are in danger of losing a valuable narrative about our lives: that we are capable of blooming at any age and in any stage of our lives.”

KEYS FOR ENCOURAGING BLOOMING (at any age)

• Don’t buy into the national obsession with high IQ/SAT/ACT test scores.
• Nurture curiosity.
• Resist fast-tracking.
• Encourage gap years.
• Give self-doubt a name; consider it a superpower.
• Learn to reframe using positive self-talk.
• Embrace opportunities to fail.

KEY QUOTES FROM KARLGAARD

Why the push for early achievement?

• “In the past, success was not about becoming rich or famous, or about achieving as much as possible as early as possible. Rather, it was about having the opportunity to live to our fullest potential. It was about being appreciated for who we are as individuals. But that’s been corrupted by the Wunderkind Ideal and our obsession with testing, ranking, and sorting young adults; by our cultural fascination with youth, particularly youthful über-achievement; and by an increasingly algorithmic economy that rewards raw synaptic speed instead of experience and wisdom.”

What are the dangers of forcing early achievement?

• “We’re not wrong to recognize and congratulate early bloomers. Their achievements deserve acknowledgement. But our culture’s obsession with early achievement has become detrimental to the majority of the population—to the multitudes of us who develop in different ways and at different paces. It pushes the message that if you haven’t become famous, reinvented an industry, or banked seven figures while you’re still young enough to get carded, you’ve somehow made a wrong turn in life. This message, I believe, is far more dangerous than most people realize.”
• “By forcing adolescents to practice like professionals, to strive for perfection, and to make life choices in their teens (or earlier), we’re actually harming them. We’re stunting their development, closing their pathways to discovery, and making them more fragile. Just when we should be encouraging kids to dream big, take risks, and learn from life’s inevitable failures, we’re teaching them to live in terror of making the slightest mistake. Forging kids into wunderkinds is making them brittle.”
• “Early bloomers enjoy many advantages in affluent societies. But one huge disadvantage they face is that by dint of their youth and accomplishments, they give themselves credit for their success, more than the rest of us do.”

Why do most bloom late?

• “Truth is, many factors can slow our blooming early in life, including delayed physical or neurological development, early childhood trauma, nonstandard learning styles, socioeconomic status, geographical restrictions, illness, addiction, career turbulence—even plain bad luck. Many of us, growing up, are unable to reach our full potential at school—and therefore fall short of our university and professional potential—because we’re fed negative messages about our learning abilities.”
• “All of us know someone, care about someone, or love someone who seems stuck in life. The critical thing to remember is—we cannot give up on ourselves, or on others, even (and especially) if society has made it harder to catch up.”

When do people tend to bloom?

• “A parent might jump back into the workforce after a decade of child-rearing, feeling ten years behind but being ten years wiser. Or a retiree might find a deeper meaning in life by finally pursuing a childhood dream or mentoring others. Late-blooming can happen at any age, and it can happen more than once in a person’s lifetime.”
• “Every person needs to have the chance—multiple chances, really—to follow their unique timeline of evolving brains, talents, and passions.”

What are some characteristics of late bloomers?

• “Many late bloomers gain a greater sense of compassion. They show greater reflective thinking, diminished ego-centeredness, and a deeper appreciation of others’ challenges—what psychologists call greater prosocial behavior.”

BUY Late Bloomers: The Power of Patience in a World Obsessed with Early Achievement

RECOMMENDATIONS

• BUY The Soft Edge: Where Great Companies Find Lasting Success
• Check out Forbes “30 Under 30”.

Follow us!

• Facebook
• Instagram
• Twitter
• YouTube
• Website

Special thanks…

• Music Credit
• Sound Editing Credit

SUMMARY

Early childhood and parent educator Rahima Dancy encourages parents to trust themselves in the 3rd edition of her book You Are Your Child's First Teacher: Encouraging Your Child's Natural Development from Birth to Age Six. Since its first edition, the book now includes advice about technology and even how to teach while the children are around--an environment millions of parents find themselves in during the pandemic. 

However, long before this worldwide situation emerged, Dancy knew this: “In the nuclear or subnuclear family, far too much energy gets focused on the child because he or she is the most interesting subject around (try getting excited about waxing the kitchen floor!), but after a time many mothers find themselves getting cabin fever. It becomes increasingly difficult, both emotionally and intellectually, to be home day after day with this child. This is due, in part, to a lack of the perceived value of mothering, but also because children’s demand for attention expands to use up whatever might be available.”

So, tapping into the principles of Rudolf Steiner, educator and scientist who helped launch the now famous Waldorf Education, Dancy teaches us how to build the head, heart, and hands of our children. She rushes to our rescue, recognizing, “Our culture no longer provides a strong and unified message about how children should be raised. In addition, most of us live far away from our own parents or extended family, the people who traditionally provided wisdom, help, and continuity in rearing children.”

KEYS TO REPLENISHING

1. Being in nature
2. Sleeping
3. Meditative practice
4. Creating art

QUOTES FROM DANCY

• “The art of mothering has been replaced by the science of parenting, yet many parents have come to question the values their own parents embraced…they are at a loss as to what to do or wonder why being home with a young child can be so difficult.”
• “To expect a thirty-seven-year-old PhD candidate or a woman who has had an exciting career to be fulfilled spending her days in an apartment with a two-year-old is unrealistic.”
• “Modern life simply doesn’t support what young children need, which is to see us doing work that involves movement. What they actually see us doing isn’t satisfying to them. As a result, they seem to demand more attention, when in fact they are asking to observe us doing ‘real work’ that involves movement and transformation of materials—something they can both share in and then imitate in their play.”
• “Many parents try to develop their children’s emotions and their awareness of emotions by naming, expressing, and even practicing emotions with them. We also tend to expose young children to situations that are far too powerful for them emotionally; notice the unhappy children in the theater at the next movie you attend!”
• “One of our primary tasks as our children’s first teachers is to provide them with impressions of the world that are appropriate for them to take in and copy. This means guarding and protecting them from sensory overload in a world of urban frenzy, and surrounding them with experiences that teach them about the world in a gentle way by letting them do things directly themselves and later act them out in their play.”

Final words of comfort for parents:

• “Although you can’t go back in time and do things differently with your child, it is also important not to feel guilty about choices you have already made. You were just as good a parent then as you are now. You made the best decisions you could then, based on your knowledge and perceptions of your choices. Guilt only takes us out of the present moment and makes us less able to see what is needed now, thus perpetuating problems rather than leading to meeting the present creatively. If there is going to be the possibility of healing, it must take place in the present. We make the best choices we can for our children in each moment, just as our parents did for us.”

BUY You Are Your Child's First Teacher, Third Edition: Encouraging Your Child's Natural Development from Birth to Age Six

RECOMMENDATION
BUY Simplicity Parenting: Using the Extraordinary Power of Less to Raise Calmer, Happier, and More Secure Kids

SUMMARY

Early childhood and parent educator Rahima Dancy encourages parents to trust themselves in the 3rd edition of her book You Are Your Child's First Teacher: Encouraging Your Child's Natural Development from Birth to Age Six. Since its first edition, the book now includes advice about technology and even how to teach while the children are around--an environment millions of parents find themselves in during the pandemic. 

However, long before this worldwide situation emerged, Dancy knew this: “In the nuclear or subnuclear family, far too much energy gets focused on the child because he or she is the most interesting subject around (try getting excited about waxing the kitchen floor!), but after a time many mothers find themselves getting cabin fever. It becomes increasingly difficult, both emotionally and intellectually, to be home day after day with this child. This is due, in part, to a lack of the perceived value of mothering, but also because children’s demand for attention expands to use up whatever might be available.”

So, tapping into the principles of Rudolf Steiner, educator and scientist who helped launch the now famous Waldorf Education, Dancy teaches us how to build the head, heart, and hands of our children. She rushes to our rescue, recognizing, “Our culture no longer provides a strong and unified message about how children should be raised. In addition, most of us live far away from our own parents or extended family, the people who traditionally provided wisdom, help, and continuity in rearing children.”

KEYS TO REPLENISHING

1. Being in nature
2. Sleeping
3. Meditative practice
4. Creating art

QUOTES FROM DANCY

• “The art of mothering has been replaced by the science of parenting, yet many parents have come to question the values their own parents embraced…they are at a loss as to what to do or wonder why being home with a young child can be so difficult.”
• “To expect a thirty-seven-year-old PhD candidate or a woman who has had an exciting career to be fulfilled spending her days in an apartment with a two-year-old is unrealistic.”
• “Modern life simply doesn’t support what young children need, which is to see us doing work that involves movement. What they actually see us doing isn’t satisfying to them. As a result, they seem to demand more attention, when in fact they are asking to observe us doing ‘real work’ that involves movement and transformation of materials—something they can both share in and then imitate in their play.”
• “Many parents try to develop their children’s emotions and their awareness of emotions by naming, expressing, and even practicing emotions with them. We also tend to expose young children to situations that are far too powerful for them emotionally; notice the unhappy children in the theater at the next movie you attend!”
• “One of our primary tasks as our children’s first teachers is to provide them with impressions of the world that are appropriate for them to take in and copy. This means guarding and protecting them from sensory overload in a world of urban frenzy, and surrounding them with experiences that teach them about the world in a gentle way by letting them do things directly themselves and later act them out in their play.”

Final words of comfort for parents:

• “Although you can’t go back in time and do things differently with your child, it is also important not to feel guilty about choices you have already made. You were just as good a parent then as you are now. You made the best decisions you could then, based on your knowledge and perceptions of your choices. Guilt only takes us out of the present moment and makes us less able to see what is needed now, thus perpetuating problems rather than leading to meeting the present creatively. If there is going to be the possibility of healing, it must take place in the present. We make the best choices we can for our children in each moment, just as our parents did for us.”

BUY You Are Your Child's First Teacher, Third Edition: Encouraging Your Child's Natural Development from Birth to Age Six

RECOMMENDATION

BUY Simplicity Parenting: Using the Extraordinary Power of Less to Raise Calmer, Happier, and More Secure Kids 

Connect with us!

• Facebook
• Instagram
• Twitter
• YouTube
• Website

Special thanks…

• Music Credit
• Sound Editing Credit

SUMMARY

Reader, Come Home: The Reading Brain in a Digital World, by Maryanne Wolf, includes a treatise for deep reading in a world that has shifted from print to digital medium. In her book, Wolf addresses a myriad of attendant issues, concerns, and questions about the future of reading. While explaining the complexity surrounding the acquisition of reading skills, she also extols the virtues and joys of moving from information and knowledge to wisdom. Packed with research as well as sage insights from a multitude of sources, Reader, Come Home tackles themes “at the doorway of galactic changes over the next few generations” while also issuing the ever-alluring invitation to simply read.

KEY TERMS

• print medium – advantages slower, time-consuming, deep reading processes
• digital medium – allows for rapid skimming, word-spotting, and multi-tasking
• phonics vs. the whole language – “the debate that should never have been”
• deep reading – a system of inferential, abstract, empathic, critical analysis, perspective-taking processes
• neuroplasticity – brain’s ability to form new circuits by connecting older parts; “underlies just about everything interesting about reading”
• attention – concentration essential for developing deep reading skills
• annotating – (handwritten) slows us down; enhances reflection
• circuit-building – begins with lots of practice while learning foundational skills during learning-to-read phase; moves into reading-by and reading-to phrase and talking about the content
• biliterate brain – one that can switch between print and digital mediums

QUOTES FROM WOLF

• "Human beings were never born to read."
• “When language and thought atrophy, when complexity wanes and everything become more and more the same, we run great risks in society politic—whether from extremists in a religion or a political or, less obviously, from advertisers.”
• “There are no shortcuts to becoming a good reader.”
• “I want children to learn the capacity for…cognitive patience.”
• “Deep literacy is intrinsically connected to democracy.”

BUY Reader, Come Home: The Reading Brain in a Digital World

RECOMMENDATION

BUY Proust and the Squid: The Story and Science of the Reading Brain

Connect with us!

• Facebook
• Instagram
• Twitter
• YouTube
• Website

Special thanks…

• Music Credit
• Sound Editing Credit

SUMMARY

When Genevieve Piturro, jumped off the New York City corporate ladder, she didn’t know her burning passion to deliver pajamas and books to children in shelters would turn into the wildly successful, nationwide nonprofit Pajama Program. Her book, Purpose, Passion, and Pajamas: How to Transform Your Life, Embrace the Human Connection, and Lead with Meaning, tells the story of her rocky-road journey.

Since 2001, Pajama Program has delivered over seven million pajamas and books to children across the United States and Puerto Rico. Many of those children had never had a bedtime story; many had never owned a pair of pajamas. More than twenty years into her charitable endeavor, Piturro has become an international speaker, consultant, and author whose mission now includes inspiring others to find their purpose, pursue their passions, and find fulfillment.

KEY STEPS TO FINDING YOUR PURPOSE (“The Heart of the Matter”)

• Ask yourself, “Is this all there is to life?”
• Listen to your “heart-voice.” (Ask it to speak up!)
• Invite “that precious thing” into your life.”
• Write down five things that make your heart sing; winnow your list by giving time to the top three.
• Assemble a cheerleader squad to be on your side and to act as armor. 

QUOTES FROM PITURRO

• “You can’t ignore that one thing that is your calling.”
• “Many of us feel there’s something missing in our lives—and often, too, in our work. It’s human nature to seek meaning, to feel we have a purpose on this earth.”
• “We all want to share in doing something that extends beyond our own wants, something that soothes others and has a lasting impact.”
• “You don’t need to see the whole path before you—you just need to take the first step and trust that the next ones will be revealed.”
• “You may doubt yourself at first and others may doubt you, but you’ll also find people who will support you.”
• “Leadership is not measured by how much you advance, but by how much you advance other people.”
• “It may be difficult to top the highs you’ll experience from encounters with amazing individuals who have the ability to support you and multiply your reach tenfold, but you can harness that exhilaration to reach even further and change even more.”

BUY Purpose, Passion, and Pajamas: How to Transform Your Life, Embrace the Human Connection, and Lead with Meaning

RECOMMENDATION

Watch Genevieve Piturro on Oprah tell her story and get a big surprise!

Listen to a related podcast:

https://www.nonfiction4life.com/141-disrupt-yourself-whitney-johnson/

Connect with us!

• Facebook
• Instagram
• Twitter
• YouTube
• Website

Special thanks…

• Music Credit
• Sound Editing Credit

Nightingale Tales: Stories from My Life as Nurse, by Lynn Dow, spans 50 years of one nurse's career experiences–some funny, some sad, and all true. A registered nurse, Dow began her medical career reluctantly but eventually worked as a staff nurse, head nurse, teacher, and mentor at large medical centers on both the east and west coasts.

As handmaidens to physicians in the 1950s, nurses evolved into admired independent practitioners by the start of the new millennium. Nightingale Tales is a peek into that transition, as told by a nurse who lived it. Each chapter is a stand-alone story depicting the changes in the profession, brought about by time, the feminist movement, and advances in technology.

KEY CHANGES

• Recovery time: from weeks to days
• Smoking: allowed inside hospitals around machines and in breakrooms
• “Cracking the chest”: preceded CPR
• Hospital beds: manual cranks replaced with electric beds and remote controls
• Pharmaceuticals: borrowed from other patients or units; dispensed by nurses after 5 pm and weekends
• Uniforms: highly starched dresses and caps replaced with comfortable scrubs
• Gloves: rarely worn except in surgery; physician’s order required
• Leadership styles: dictatorial approach became more human and lenient
• Litigation: rarely used as an option for malpractice cases

KEY QUOTES

• “We had to do it all without ever losing sight of the fact that our primary concern was to nurture our patients. We did not have the high-tech equipment so common today when I first became a nurse; back then, we relied on our powers of observation. We looked at the patient instead of the computer readouts.
• “If aspirin were discovered today, it would most likely be banned by the Federal Drug Administration.”
• “I appreciate the advantages of technology, and no way do I wish nurses would go back to practicing the way I did—but I must admit, I long for a little more of the personal touch, a better understanding of what it is to be a patient. Machine-watching is important—but it would be nice if modern nursing involved a little more patient-watching as well.”

BUY Nightingale Tales: Stories from My Life as a Nurse

RECOMMENDATION
BUY The Checklist Manifesto: How to Get Things Right

Connect with us!

• Facebook
• Instagram
• Twitter
• YouTube
• Website

Special thanks…

• Music Credit
• Sound Editing Credit

SUMMARY

With one feature article in The New York Times, journalist Nikita Stewart began telling the compelling true story of Troop 6000: The Girl Scout Troop that Began in a Shelter and Inspired the World. The book actually weaves together three stories: the history of Girls Scouts, the story of a family navigating the New York City homeless system, and the larger homeless problem plaguing our nation.

Chelsea Clinton, a former Girl Scout calls Troop 6000 “a book about dreamers and builders, about mothers who never give up, and daughters who hope for and demand more.”

Troop 6000 is told principally through the eyes of Giselle Burgess, a young single mother of five trying to provide for her family while living at the Sleep Inn in Queens, a hotel turned into a homeless shelter. Imprisoned by curfews and lack of amenities, Burgess and her family need something to belong to, something to feel proud of while making real contributions to their community. So, with a handful of excited girls and with the support of dedicated parents and advocates, Burgess starts Troop 6000.

“In Troop 6000, readers will feel the highs and lows as some families make it out of the shelter while others falter, and girls grow up with the stress and insecurity of not knowing what each day will bring and not having a place to call home, living for the times when they can put on their Girl Scout uniforms and come together. The result is a powerful, inspiring story about overcoming the odds in the most unlikely of places.” ~from Amazon summary

Inspired by Burgess and their shared experiences of poverty and hardship, others have created troops for the homeless not only throughout New York City but also across the country.

BUY Troop 6000: The Girl Scout Troop That Began in a Shelter and Inspired the World

RECOMMENDATION

Watch Jimmy Fallon surprise Giselle Burgess with a holiday donation.

Connect with us!

• Facebook
• Instagram
• Twitter
• YouTube
• Website

Special thanks…

• Music Credit
• Sound Editing Credit

SUMMARY

J.W. (Terry) Freiberg, also known as “the Oliver Sacks of Law,” continues shedding light on connections in his latest “loneliness book,” Surrounded by Others and Yet So Alone: A Lawyer's Case Stories of Love, Loneliness and Litigation. Social psychologist turned lawyer and master storyteller, Freiberg explores chronic loneliness through five stories of faulty connections.

KEY POINTS

• Solitude is not the equivalent of loneliness.
• The word “loneliness” only came into the English language around 1800, probably because social structures did not leave much space for loneliness.
• John Cacioppo from the University of Chicago documented the lethality of loneliness.
• People are disinclined to admit their loneliness, often hiding it.
• Vivek Murthy, former Surgeon General and author of Together: The Healing Power of Human Connection in a Sometimes Lonely World brought to light the loneliness epidemic.
• Loneliness hurts.
• Children hone time-specific connection skills around non-sibling other children.
• COVID-19 is preventing proper social development.

QUOTES

• “Chronic loneliness has become a public health crisis of the first order.”
• “Just as you cannot study hunger without researching and reporting about the food supply, you cannot study loneliness without thinking about the connections that people make—or fail to make—with one another.”
• “Loneliness is not an emotion but is, instead, a sensation. Loneliness…is the sensation of inadequate connections to others, just as hunger is the sensation of inadequate nourishment and thirst is the sensation of inadequate hydration.”
• “You can talk yourself out of being angry (an emotion) but you cannot talk yourself out of being hungry or thirsty—or lonely (three of the sensations).”

BUY Surrounded by Others and Yet So Alone: A Lawyer’s Case Stories of Love, Loneliness, and Litigation

RECOMMENDATION

Go to Dr. Freiberg’s website, “The Loneliness Books,” and check out the button “Articles” to find the “UCLA Loneliness Scale” to help measure loneliness and the “The Relational Assessment Worksheet.”

Connect with us!

• Facebook
• Instagram
• Twitter
• YouTube
• Website

Special thanks…

• Music Credit
• Sound Editing Credit

SUMMARY

David Kamp shines light on a bright, optimistic movement in his book, Sunny Days: The Children's Television Revolution that Changed America.

When a group of progressive intellectuals, artists, and activists decided to focus on disadvantaged children, a children’s television revolution began. Driven by their agenda was to “do good,” this group also believed “the federal government could and should play a major role in early-childhood initiatives.” Fortunately, political winds blew in their sails, providing both funding and enthusiasm for a plethora of children’s television educational programming in the 60s and 70s.

Meanwhile, the social sciences were also gaining credibility, adding psychological and educational underpinnings to what may have otherwise been perceived as simply silly or fluffy. With the burgeoning popularity of Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) and the political will to provide free access to learning, children’s television enjoyed the “Age of Enlightenment, Jr.” Further fueling this critical movement were “media professionals, thought leaders, and politicians alike prioritizing children and education as they never had before—and in so doing, changing the lives of millions.”

In short, Kamp’s Sunny Days, substantiated by interviews and research, helps paint a picture of a rare time in history when people chose to put the public good above their own careerism.

KEY PEOPLE & PROGRAMS

• Joan Ganz Cooney & Lloyd Morrisette – led the charge to leverage television for preparing preschoolers for school
• Bob Keeshan - founder, creator, and main character of the show Captain Kangaroo; eschewed using children’s television to promote children’s toy guns and other toys
• Children’s Television Workshop (CTW) – original American nonprofit responsible for the production of several educational children's programs—including its first and best-known, Sesame Street
• Sesame Street – the granddaddy of all children’s television programs developed in the 60s and 70s
• Jon Stone – original conceiver and key showrunner of Sesame Street; brought a certain hipness to TV, making the show popular with children and adults alike
• Rowan & Martin’s Laugh-In – American sketch comedy show that inspired the pacing for Sesame Street
• Jim Henson’s Muppets – held magic in their abstract nature; stimulated imaginations
• Electric Company – a fast-paced spinoff of Sesame Street designed to teach
• Schoolhouse Rock – conceived by ad men at McCaffrey & McCall when they recognized children could easily memorize words to songs
• Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood - long-running children’s program conceived by Fred Rogers and informed by developmental pediatric psychiatrist Margaret McFarland
• Matt Robinson – creator of Muppet character Roosevelt Franklin whose mannerisms and speech were primarily representative of an African-American man
• Free to Be…You and Me – program hosted by Marlo Thomas; promoted a strong feminist agenda

QUOTE FROM KAMP

• “Children’s advocates…had high regard for children, believing them capable of intellectual and emotional engagement, and of seeing through cutesy artifice.”

BUY Sunny Days: The Children's Television Revolution That Changed America

RECOMMENDATION

BUY Puppet Pals, brightly-colored, oversized children’s puppets (designed and sold by Andrew Olsen).

BONUS PODCAST

LISTEN to a related Nonfiction4Life podcast: "The Good Neighbor: The Life and Work of Fred Rogers" by Maxwell King.

Connect with us!

• Facebook
• Instagram
• Twitter
• YouTube
• Website

Special thanks…

• Music Credit
• Sound Editing Credit

SUMMARY

One of 75 top-performing real estate brokers in the country for the past ten years, Tracy McLaughlin reveals industry secrets in her breakout book, Real Estate Rescue: How America Leaves Billions Behind in Residential Real Estate and How to Maximize Your Home’s Value. After spending more than two decades helping her clients buy and sell homes, McLaughlin has had the highest-grossing sales in Marin County, California for 14 consecutive years. Now, with her hard-won expertise, she shares essential tips and tricks for both sellers and potential homeowners. McLaughlin also writes to influence key stakeholders who have the power to elevate industry standards for agents and brokers.

KEY POINTS

• Three big mistakes sellers make: getting too emotionally attached to a home, resisting professional advice, and not keeping homes up-to-date.
• Low standards required to become a real estate agent blight the reputation of the profession.
• Every 8-10 years, there’s a swing in what’s considered desirable home design; buyers, not architects, drive design.
• Accurately pricing a home not only helps it sell but usually drives up its market value.
• Staging is very effective for adding value and decreasing time on the market.
• “Resto” – verb created to describe using the Restoration Hardware design as inspiration
• In the past 50 years, square footage has increased by 1000 feet, and living space for each person in a home has nearly doubled.

QUOTES FROM McLAUGHLIN

• “Residential property accounts for 75 percent of the global value of property.”
• “According to a study by the Bank of Montreal, 80 percent of homebuyers know if a house is right as soon as they walk in the door.”
• “Just because something is unique or rare…doesn’t make it valuable. The market must value it.”
• “Both millennials and baby-boomer parents embrace modernism.”
• “For every dollar you invest in prelisting preparation, you get about $3.50 in your pocket.”

BUY Real Estate Rescue: How America Leaves Billions Behind in Residential Real Estate and How to Maximize Your Home’s Value (Buying and Selling Homes, Staging a Home to Sell)

RECOMMENDATION

Watch Home Improvement, a family-friendly humorous sitcom.
BUY Home Improvement - Complete 1-8 Season Box Set [DVD] [2016] 

Connect with us on social media!

• Facebook
• Instagram
• Twitter
• YouTube
• Website

Special thanks…

• Music Credit
• Sound Editing Credit