July 12, 2006

How to Have a Better Brain

I’ve been doing a lot of looking lately at what people can do to improve their brains. Does that sound strange? Perhaps…but think about it. We spend tons of time and money as a culture on improving all sorts of other parts of ourselves. Think how much money is spent on skin care or on making our bodies more asthetically appealing (the plastic surgery industry is HUGE). Yet, what affects our mood and happiness more than our brain?

I think most people feel that there isn’t much you can to improve your brain. From what I’ve been learning lately I beg to differ. I tihnk there is actually a ton of stuff that people can do to improve brain chemistry and mood. Unfortunately the vast majority of our culture turns to chemicals to do this. Either prescription drugs (“improving” brain chemistry is basically what anti-depressant drugs do), legal drugs (like alcohol or nicotine) or illegal drugs (I heard recently that cocaine is a $100 billion industry in the U.S. alone!!!).

What are some non-chemical ways to improve brain chemistry? I’ve listened a couple of Dr. Daniel Amen’s audiobooks recently and there are some good suggestions in there. Currently I’m listening to Making a Good Brain Great and while I haven’t gotten to the part that talks about improving the brain yet there are some pretty strong warnings about what not to do. For instance, while football and soccer are great sports, the number of head injuries that are incurred can lead to major psychological problems later in life due to the brain damage that can occur. That’s something I’ve never thought of. Anyway, for a free preview of Amen’s stuff check out this speech he gave on IT Conversations.

One practice that has been shown to improve brain function is meditation (see a couple of stories related to this here and here). I’ve been experimenting with different types of meditation and contemplative practice lately. One of the best ways to introduce yourself to meditation is through guided meditation audio. A couple of titles that I’ve tried recently include some of Bodhipaksa’s stuff and Andrew Cohen’s Meditation audiobook. Meditation requires a lot of patience but based on everything I’ve been reading lately the benefits are tough to deny.

Of course another common sense way to improve brain function is to make sure the brain is getting plenty of oxygen. In fact, the brain loses consciousness after being deprived of oxygen for just 8-10 seconds. There are a couple of things that you can do to ensure that you are getting plenty of oxygen to your brain. The first is deep, diaphragmatic breathing. This is pretty simple to do (just take deep breaths and make sure that it’s your abdomen and not your chest that is moving). However, one tool that I’ve found that helps with this is a bio-feedback device called Wild Divine. It’ll help you monitor and regulate your breathing patterns. I’ll often hook this up when I’m reading or watching a movie (yup, I’m a dork) and it’s interesting to see times when I’m breathing free and easy and other times when I’m breathing more shallow or even holding my breath.

Of course another way to ensure good blood flow to the brain is through exercise. There are dozens of ways to exercise but one of the best I’ve found for this purpose is yoga. The combination of cardio work and deep breathing can produce an “oxygen high” of sorts that feels pretty damn cool. I’m fortunate enough to have one of the world’s best yoga studios in my backyard but for those who don’t the audio versions of yoga courses can be a great substitute.

So those are a few ways to “have a better brain.” No doubt there are many more. If you have any suggestions feel free to post in the forums. I’m a junkie for anything I can do to improve the most valuable part of my body. 🙂

July 5, 2006

10 Cures for the Summertime Blues

Summertime is in full swing. It’s a great time for traveling and relaxing of course but it’s also the perfect time to start audio learning. Listening to books and podcasts is an excellent way to pass time while you’re at the beach or in your car on the way to Grandmother’s house. To help you fight off those summertime blues I’ve put together a list of 10 free downloads for you to throw on your iPod or other MP3 player this summer. Enjoy!

10. Ted Talks – The good people from the TED Conference have just posted a bunch of free downloads from their most recent conference including talks by Al Gore and
Tony Robbins. Considering that the conference normally cost $4,400 to attend this is quite the deal.

9. Podrunner and fitPod – Exercising this summer? (I hope so. 🙂 If so, download these mixes to your MP3 player. They have different bpm timings to match the pace of your workout. A great way to keep motivated and in rhythm.

8. Guided Meditation from Meditainment – Summer is all about relaxing right? Why not put a meditation track on your iPod for those moments when life gets a little to stressful.

7. 50 Things I’m Going To Do Today – It’s a great time of the year to build habits, especially if you’re a little less busy. 50 Things is a great free audio download that will give you some suggestions for positive habits you can build into your life. I probably listen to this once every couple of weeks and never fail to be reminded of something I should be doing.

6. Free Culture – Summer seems to be synonymous with freedom for many people. After all you’re free from school and usually free from work at least for a little while. Spend some of your free time listening to Free Culture, Lawrence Lessig’s seminal work on copyright and intellectual property. The chapters are read by people like Doug Kaye and Dave Winer.

5. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn – What could be a more classic summer read than Huckleberry Finn? Now, thanks to the fine folks at Literal Systems you can listen to it for free…the full 9 1/2 hour unabridged version.

4. Learn a Foreign Language – Summer is the perfect time to spend learning or brushing up on a foreign language. There are a ton of free language learning podcasts including InstaSpanish, The French Pod Class and Let’s Speak Italian!.

3. The Founding Documents of the United States of America – We just passed July 4th, the date we celebrate our Independence here in the U.S. Last month we recorded many of the Founding Documents of our country onto audio including the “Give Me Liberty or Give Me Death” speech, the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. Whether you’re a history buff or buff-to-be, these are worth the download.

2. Cal-Berkeley Course Podcasts – Wait a minute. Wasn’t summer the time to take a break from all that schoolwork? Sure…but think about it this way. It’s also a great time to listen to a course you didn’t get to take during the school year or always had an interest in. Berkeley has put a ton of their courses available online for free. Introduction to Computers, Wildlife Ecology, Existentialism in Literature and Film and more!

1. Jon Udell’s Summer Listening List – Jon Udell writes for Infoworld and has posted a list of five “Summer Listening” podcasts. It’s a really good list covering everything from ending the oil addicition and blended value to the wealth of networks and biomimicry.

So that should keep your ears busy for a while. If you’re still looking for more check out our Free Audio and Video Directory which now contains over 1,000 free resources for you to learn from. Enjoy your summer and keep Learning Out Loud!

May 14, 2006

LearnOutLoud in the New York Times

We got a cool mention in the New York Times Travel section today in an article entitled “New Audio Books Pack a Lot More Prose.” Here’s the link but you’ll have to register to read it. It’s actually a cool article in that it talks about digital rights management and mentions LearnOutLoud as one of the only companies selling DRM-free content. Here’s a bit from the article:

For travelers who are interested in self improvement or concerned about proprietary formats, the portal LearnOutLoud offers MP3-based audio content at www.learnoutloud.com. MP3 is a common file format for digital music and audio files. “LearnOutLoud focuses on the educational market — not K-12, but adult, life-long learners,” said Jon Bischke, its founder and chief executive. While you won’t find blockbusters like the Harry Potter books there, LearnOutLoud offers something that few other sites offer — downloads in MP3 format, making it easy to copy the files to just about any device (May’s free download is “The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin”).

We’re getting the vibe from a lot of people that they’re getting more and more interested in getting their content on MP3. One of the reasons for this is that people don’t know what kind of device they may want to listen to audiobooks on in the future and worry that if they purchase a book in a proprietary format it might not be compatible. For instance, let’s say you get a new phone a year from now that plays MP3s. If you buy audiobooks from other companies you might not be able to play them.

Anyway, it was a great article and hopefully will bring a few more people to our site.

May 5, 2006

WIE Unbound and the Webby Awards

It’s been a while since I’ve blogged about WIE Unbound, the audio and video service from the good people over at What is Enlightenment? magazine. It’s a great service that features interviews with leading thinkers like Deepak Chopra, Andrew Cohen (whose new Meditation title is available for download from LearnOutLoud here), Jon Kabat-Zinn and many others. $10 a month gets you the whole kit and kaboodle. Definitely a great investment.

I also wanted to encourage fans of What is Enlightment? to vote for them in the upcoming Webby Awards. They’re up for a Webby for best Religion and Spirituality web site. Here’s the link where you can give them your vote:

http://www.wie.org/home04i/offsite.asp?oid=webby

Kudos to Laura and the rest of the gang over at WIE for producing a ton of compelling audio and video content for your learning out loud pleasure.

Have a great weekend everyone!

Update: Since this blog we’ve added a number of What is Enlightment? audio programs (now called EnlightenmentNext)

EnlightenmentNext Audio Downloads

May 2, 2006

Complete Noam Chomsky Audio & Video Resource

With the recent release of Chomsky’s latest audio book Failed States, we decided it was time to put together the ultimate audio and video resource on this linguist and political activist:

www.learnoutloud.com/chomsky

Chomsky has written dozens of books but only his most recent, Failed States and Hegemony and Survival, have been made into audio books. Another recent release called Imperial Ambitions contains over 5 hours of interviews of Chomsky conducted by radio journalist David Barsamian since 9/11.

In the last few decades Chomsky has also delivered 100s of lectures, speeches, and interviews that have been captured on audio and video, many of which are available for free. We’ve featured the majority of Chomsky’s free audio & video programs here along with some that are on sale on CD and digital download. The most complete listing of Chomsky audio and video can be found at Chomsky.info Audio N’ Video which includes all of his appearances on Democracy Now as well as other radio programs. So check out all the audio & video resources from one of the most prolific and renowned intellectuals of our time.

April 29, 2006

Dave Sifry Gets It

As I’ve mentioned before, the Venture Voice podcast just keeps getting better and better. The most recent episode is with Dave Sifry, the CEO of Technorati. His mission in life?

To be of service.

When you listen to him talk you’re listening to what I feel will be the future of business and entrepreneurship. Strive to serve first. Everything else (including profits) will come out of that.

Sifry’s passion is infectious. We need more entrepreneurs like him. I hope (and think) that podcasts like Venture Voice will help to encourage that.

April 28, 2006

What’s the World’s Most Popular Language?

Did you guess English? If so you’re wrong. 500 million more people claim Mandarin Chinese as their first language. That blew me away. Actually, the entire article entitled “The Mandarin Offensive” that I read tonight blew me away. I really don’t we fully realize the impact that China is going to have on the rest of the world. It’s going to be truly mind-boggling.

And it’s a wake-up call I guess to go out there and learn at least a bit of Mandarin. I tried to do this a couple of years ago and I’ll admit that it wasn’t the easiest thing in the world. It’s definitely a lot more difficult (coming from an English background) than trying to learn French or Spanish.

Now I might be a bit biased but I think one of the best ways to learn a foreign language (or to supplement your learning) is through audio. I know that both my Spanish and French (Disclaimer: I’m not anywhere near fluid in either language.) have been helped a lot over the years by listening to tapes and CDs. And when I made my attempt at learning Chinese a couple of years ago, listening the Pimsleur Mandarin Chinese course did help a lot.

If you’re in the process of learning a language I would definitely recommend adding audio material to your plan of attack. We’ve got a ton of language learning material listed on our site so you should be able to find something that suits your needs. The best part about audio is that it’s easy to repetitively drill the stuff into your head. Plus, it usually costs a fraction of what you would pay for classes or a private tutor.

April 26, 2006

Feynman Rocks

Richard Feynman rocks.

I love Signal vs. Noise, the blog from the peeps over at 37Signals. One of today’s posts included this quote from Feynman on the subject of awards:

“I don’’t like honours…. The prize is the pleasure of finding the thing out, the kick in the discovery, the observation of the people who use it. Those are the real things!”

http://37signals.com/svn/archives2/sunspots_kick…

How cool is that?

I noticed that David has been putting up some new Feynman titles. Check them out here. Good stuff…

April 23, 2006

The Wisdom of Crowds and Content 2.0

So I was doing some unpacking today and managed to crank through about two thirds of James Surowiecki’s excellent book The Wisdom of Crowds. The fact that I was able to get over halfway done with this book on a day when I was doing mundane stuff around the house is Reason #163 that I love audio learning. Seriously, this is a book that given my current schedule I would not have had the time to read anytime soon.

But something else struck me when I was listening to it. A couple of weeks ago I listened to a presentation that Surowiecki had given at South by Southwest (listen here). In it he hits most of the highpoints of The Wisdom of Crowds book. And he does it in less than an hour (contrast this with the unabridged audiobook which runs about ten hours).

Which of these has more value to the listener?

That’s a really good question. Although I’m a big fan of unabridged audiobooks that fact of that matter is that the SXSW presentation hit the key points and anecdotes in the books, was delivered by the author himself and cost…nothing.

If this was the first time that I had encountered something like this it might not have registered for me. But it isn’t. I’ve come across this before from people like Thomas Friedman (The World Is Flat), David McCullough (1776) and Malcolm Gladwell (Blink). Indeed, all of these (free) presentations by the authors do a pretty good job of summing up their books.

My gut is telling me that there’s a new form of content emerging here. It’s shorter than Content 1.0 (think one hour presentation from the author rather than ten hour unabridged audiobook). It’s more personal than Content 1.0 (think the author talking about her book in her words rather than her book read by a narrator). And it’s quite possibly more entertaining than Content 1.0 and certainly more efficient (I could listen to 10 author presentations in the same time that I could listen to one unabridged audiobook).

It’s not Cliff Notes. It’s not Soundview Executive Book Summaries. It’s something entirely new (at least I think so). I’m going to call it Content 2.0 and leave it at that for now. But I’ll be back with more later… 🙂

April 10, 2006

Why I love LearnOutLoud

OK, I’m a bit biased here perhaps. 🙂 But one of the things that I love about this site is that every time we ship an order or serve a download it’s a product that we’re all proud to sell. When we started LearnOutLoud we made a conscious decision that we weren’t going to carry every spoken word audio title out there. Rather we were going to focus on the highest quality educational and inspirational material. If you’re looking for romance or crime or mystery that’s totally cool. You just won’t find it here.

A glance at our top ten best-selling titles reaffirms for me that the decision to only sell high-quality stuff with substance was the right one:

1. Meditations for Manifesting – By far our best-selling title. And for good reason. If you’re interested in learning Japa meditation there’s no better way than this audiobook.

2. Energizing the Body – We’ve been selling a lot of Dan Millman’s titles and this one has proved the most popular. Definitely worth checking out if you would like to have more energy. Uh, that would be all of us…

3. English for Portuguese (Brazilian) Speakers – This is our #3 best seller? Who would have thunk it? I will say though, there’s no better way to polish your language skills than with audio learning.

4. The Purpose-Driven Life – Rick Warren’s mega best-selling book is also a hit on audio.

5. The Science of Getting Rich – This title is actually on our top 10 twice. The Brian Johnson narrated version edges out the Gildan Media version to date.

6. The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People – An all-time favorite from Steven Covey.

7. The Science of Getting Rich – The other Science of Getting Rich in our Top Ten.

8. The Chronicles of Narnia CD Box Set – The best value audiobook ever. 31 discs for $52. That’s a great deal! 🙂

9. The Twelve Gateways to Freedom – Another Dan Millman title. This one is excellent. Highly recommended.

10. English for Spanish Speakers – Suprise, surprise, more language training.

So that’s our Top Ten. Every one of those titles has the power to improve your life in some way. That’s what I love about this site and learning out loud in general. It’s self-improvement without taking time out of your day. Now what could be better than that?