1) WINIFRED GALLAGHER, Attention, our most valuable resource. 2) TIM RYAN, former Ohio Congressman on meditation

Written on March 3rd, 2023
The world is a crazy place and the battle for our attention has never been more fierce. (1) In 2009’s RAPT: Attention and the Focused Life, WINIFRED GALLAGHER argues that the quality of your life largely depends on what you choose to pay attention to and how you choose to do it. Worth paying attention to. (2) Former Ohio Congressman TIM RYAN – lost 2022 Senate race to Hillbilly Elegy author, election denier J.D.Vance – urges the practice  of meditation in A MINDFUL NATION: How a Simple Practice Can Help Us Reduce Stress, Improve Performance, and Recapture the American Spirit.  

Q&A: WINIFRED GALLAGHER, Author – Understanding Our Need for Novelty and Change

Written on January 31st, 2012

 

Aired 01/29/12

Though change has never been as rapid as it is today, adapting to new circumstance is so crucial to our survival that “love of the new” is hardwired into our brains at the deepest levels. The number of new things we confront – from products to information – has quadrupled in the last thirty years with no signs of slowing.
In NEW: Understanding Our Need for Novelty and Change, WINIFRED GALLAGHER points out that 15% of us are “neophiliacs,” biologically predisposed to passionately pursue new experiences. Another 15% are “neophobes” who resist change. Most of us fall in the middle.

WINIFRED GALLAGHER has written for magazines from The Atlantic Monthly to Rolling Stone. Her books include Just the Way You Are: How Heredity and Experience Create the Individual, a New York Times Notable Book of the Year, The Power of Place: How Our Surroundings Shape Our Thoughts, Emotions, and Actions; and Rapt: Attention and the Focused Life.