#16

Welcome to Weekly Whispers #16

I’ve reverted back to the previous format, after a slightly different look last week.

Did you hear anything from #15?

I was particularly struck by the number of you who reached out either with comforting words or who had been touched by the same circumstance. We’re in this together… but only all of us 😊.

Apart from the note above what else has struck me this week?

1. How old are you?

It was my birthday last week, and of course everyone wants to know how old I am. Ironically, what if how old we were – beyond chronology – was influenced by our mindset?

It would appear that it is. Ellen Langer, a Harvard psychologist conducted a very famous experiment called the Counterclockwise Study and completed a series of experiments to reverse the aging process.

Articles on the study can be found in Harvard Magazine, Business Insider and NY Times.

Her studies were never published in a peer-reviewed journal and never replicated. That said, those who’ve seen the ABC TV show Old People’s Home For 4 Year Olds will have watched with fascination as the elderly come to life surrounded by 4 year olds.

Science may yet catch up and prove that our mindset affects not only how old we feel but how old we actually are.

2. Kevin Kelly

It was Kevin Kelly’s birthday recently too. Nope, I didn’t know who he was either until I subscribed to Tim Ferriss’ 5 Bullet Point Friday and found these.

68 Bits of Unsolicited Advice

99 Additional Bits of Unsolicited Advice

I can guarantee there’s a whisper in there for everyone.

3. Quote of the week:

"Our comforting conviction that the world makes sense rests on a secure foundation; our almost unlimited ability to ignore our own ignorance. We love to make sense of things; we’re programmed for it, we see confusion, we are compelled to solve it; we look again, we see pattern. Phew, relief, the world makes sense.” Daniel Kahnemann

Or does it? Perhaps we’re making sense of things too quickly. What if we pondered more? What if we allowed things to evolve more? What if we were patient with how circumstances might be shaped by other events?

Are you making (non) sense of things too quickly?

4. Question of the Week: What do you come from?

I read this in a Billy Connolly autobiography. Often we’re asked, “Where do you come from?” as people can be interested in location, any potential connection, and it’s an easy question to answer.

Being interviewed about his knighthood, Connolly was asked, “This must mean a lot to you, with you coming from nothing?“. He looked at the interviewer, laughed, and said, “I didnae come from nothing. I came from something”. What he came from influenced who, what, and how he was.

So ponder on the question – What have you come from?

5. Freedom Fridays - My weekly experiment with time and focus

My intention is to openly share a change I’m making within my life. I’m hoping you can take the lessons learnt and apply it to any change you want to make.

This week is birthday week!

Check out Episode #14.

That's all for this week and I hope you enjoyed Weekly Whisper #16.

Feedback is my fuel so if you have any comments please hit reply and let me know your thoughts.

Cheers

Pete