Adam Wik's Blog, page 11

The 330 Day Productivity Challenge

330 days of consistent productivity – can I pull it off?

It’s been a while since I’ve put myself up for any kinds of challenges so I decided recently that I was way overdue for one. The problem was, I wasn’t sure what kind of challenge I should take.

On top of that, things have been kind of crazy lately and my normal writing schedule has been completely obliterated. As a result I have a huge backlog of articles I’ve been wanting to write and publish, but haven’t been able to actually sit down a...

Workouts for Wimps: Your First Pull Up

Don’t look so down, you’ll get your first pull up eventually.

Pull ups are easily one of, if not the, most psychologically intimidating exercises for people who are just starting out.

If you grew up in the U.S. you may still be haunted by memories like mine – as a fat kid in junior high I was subjected to the most distilled form of public humiliation inflicted by a school upon its students, the Presidential Fitness Test.

The mile run wasn’t so bad, I managed to walk most of it and still get in u...

The Basics of Mindfulness & Moving Meditation

Mindfulness may have links to Buddhism, but there’s really nothing ‘spiritual’ about it.

Mindfulness has been becoming a bit of a ‘thing’ over the last few years and I think in many ways is becoming one of the next new buzzwords.

I’m conflicted in how I feel about this – on one hand I think mindfulness applied properly is an extremely useful tool in improving people’s lives and is genuinely something I feel everyone should practice, on the other hand I’m concerned about the corruptive process o...

What’s English Prime and Why Does it Matter?

No, E Prime doesn’t have anything to do with Transformers.

English Prime, or E Prime, is a constructed variant of standard English developed in the 60s in order to provide a form of English that reduced or eliminated any difficulty of the listener or reader to distinguish between fact and opinion and make the biases of the writer or speaker more evident.

Like most languages created for the purpose of promoting sweeping social and cultural good (cough, Esperanto, cough) it never really took off...

Using the New Memrise App to Learn Everywhere

Memrise’s new free app means you can learn efficiently anywhere. Except the bathroom – that’s weird.

To say that I am a big fan of learning would be a monumental understatement. I really think continued learning is one of the most important things you can do with your life.

That dedication to always learning new things means that when new tools come up to make it easier or more efficient I am all over them. The latest of those is the free app out now from Memrise – and it is fantastic.

Best of a...

Identity Based Habits 101 – How to Build a Habit Forever

The best way to form a lasting habit is to completely re-imagine your identity.

Anyone who’s ever tried to build a new habit from scratch knows – change is difficult.

Think about it, how many times have you gotten really fired up about wanting to start something new, whether it was a new exercise program, studying a second language, writing a book or even just getting in the habit of stretching a little each morning?

As fired up as you were, how long until that initial motivation wore off and yo...

How to Develop Ron Swanson Confidence

Were you born ready?

Note: This is a post about Ron Swanson. That means there’s a good chance there’s going to be a lot of fucking curse words. Hey, there’s one now. If that sort of thing bothers you, you might want to stop reading at this point and come back for the next post. Thanks!

Ron Swanson is confident.

The extreme way he exudes confidence is one of the biggest reasons Ron Swanson has become one of the biggest characters on Parks & Recreation – complete with his own cult following, tumbl...

The Epic Guide to Becoming Healthy and Achieving Your Fitness Goals

If you’re just starting out on the journey to change your health for the better – whether by shedding excess fat, gaining muscle or both – the sheer volume of information out there can be staggering. This is particularly frustrating when you don’t have any good way to sort out the good advice from the bad. We decided to help take some of that confusion away by condensing our tested and proven methods into one easy to digest guide.

This is a guide to our philosophy for attaining epic health and...

20 Easy Ways to De-Stress and Relax

Full moon and bonsai not required.

Are you stressed out?

I know, I know – stupid question. Everyone’s stressed out. It’s just a condition of modern life. We all have pressure from work, family, finances, health concerns and a million other things. There aren’t really many good options for escaping it.

The problem is being stressed out all the time can literally kill you or at least set in motion changes that can bring about a much earlier demise than would have otherwise been in your future. Hea...

How to Not Suck at Evaluating Claims

You don’t need all this stuff to properly evaluate the veracity of a claim.

Most people really suck at evaluating claims.

It’s not their fault – to be honest at least in the U.S. very little in our society or education systems properly prepares us to evaluate claims and make proper reason-based decisions.

The good news is, even if you’ve been awful at it your entire life, you can easily learn how to evaluate claims properly by starting to use some basic guidelines.

But first, why is it even impor...