Living a Life in Full Quarterly Winter 2016

Living A LIFE IN FULL

QUARTERLY Winter 2015

Be More Productive See the World Have More Fun Live More Fully Get in Great Shape Do Good in the World Increase Your Literacy Rock Your Relationships Better Manage Your Money and Gain many more great tips, tools, and advice in order to live A Life in Full…

Please be in touch: DrChrisStout@gmail.com ALifeinFull.org

Volume 1, No. 2

Contents What’s going on?

See page 2

200+ Podcasts, 100+ Articles…In 11 Bullet Points

See page 3

Travel

See page 7

Fitness

See page 10

Productivity

See page 21

Career

See page 26

Leadership

See page 30

Tech (Dark Web)

See page 32

Intellectual Fun

See page 34

Humanitarian Tools

See page 38

Note from the Editor Do you know the feeling when you've read a great book or seen a great movie or the need to forward a great video? That's how I feel about many of the things I have experienced, read, learned. I've been a graduate or medical school professor for 30 years and I L-O-V-E to teach and engage others in sharing cool finds and helping to make them better, smarter, and more successful. A Life in Full now brings these passions together to a wider audience. I am sharing my life’s work to augment yours. Please be in touch and let me know how I can be of help.

This Quarterly magazine is a heavily curated collection of the best-of-the-best ideas, thinking and content available—all in one handy, actionable digest. Always free, all the time.

Should you like the content in this magazine, you can get more frequent contact and engage in an evergrowing community with over 2100 likeminded of thought leaders, innovators, wonks of various stripe, entrepreneurs (serial and first-timers), adventurists, humanitarian interventionists, record breakers/holders, ultra-athletes, students, humble alpinists, authors (and those soon-to-be), clinicians in every specialty, and other various and sundry interesting people that’d you’d love to have a coffee with, then join our Facebook group at: https://www.facebook.com/groups/ALifeInFull. You can also learn more at http://ALifeInFull.org Back issues are available at: https://www.pinterest.com/drchrisstout/a-life-in-fullquarterly-magazine/ If you found this issue to be helpful you may be interested in accessing exclusive, members-only curated content that doesn’t appear in this Quarterly or the website links.

A one year All-Access Pass Subscription is $75 or a One-Time/Life-Time Subscription is $150. Just send an email with your request to DrChrisStout@gmail.com and you’ll receive the PayPal instructions and your “Library Card” for immediate access. You have a 30 day, money back guarantee if you are not satisfied with your Subscription for any reason, no questions asked. We’ve got your back!

Please let me know what more you’d like to learn about and I guarantee the top requests will be thoroughly researched and published herein.

You have the power to become what you want to become and to do. The following content is just what you need. I’m happy to share and help!

Thanks!

“I have no special talent, I am only passionately curious.” – Albert Einstein

200+ Podcasts, 100+ Articles, 20+ Books…

In 11 Bullet Points For the past 8 months, I have spent my time doing what I’ve wanted to do for years: listening to podcasts, reading books, and reading articles.

In total, I listened to 207 podcasts, read 22 books, and read 113 articles. All on the topics of business, marketing, and self-help.

I wish I could say this was some sort of “divine pilgrimage” I set out on. Truth is, I recently graduated college and am now starting my career. I wanted to learn as much as possible about business in order to equip myself for the workplace and beyond.

So I did — and still do.

I’m not bragging about it. That’s not what this article is about.

During the journey, I began to notice a number of common themes frequently rising up. Those trends were, for the most part, habits that had made successful people successful, along with lessons they decided to pass down to lucky people like us.

Gary Vaynerchuk, Seth Godin, Tim Ferriss, Lewis Howes, Mike Dillard, Arianna Huffington, Mark Cuban, John C. Maxwell, Napoleon Hill, Nir Eyal, Neil Patel, Anthony Frisella, and others.

These people have become my Aristotle; my Shakespeare. Unfortunately, and fortunately, no SparkNotes exist for this literature. I cannot take credit for any of the knowledge that I’m about to share with you. If it means anything, I suppose I can take credit for the effort. Maybe even the love.

Here they are: 1.) You will struggle.

All of the successful people I’ve studied have said this in one form or another. It is practically inevitable. In the past 8 months, I’ve heard countless stories of sleeping on friend’s couches, not being able to afford rent, living in a crowded apartment, having $60 in a bank account, and more. The fact is, in order to make something you must give something up. Occasionally, a life of fulfillment may come at the expense of a life of comfort. How bad do you truly want to achieve your goals? If you had to, how much comfort would you willing to give up achieving those goals?

2.) You will fail.

Failure is practically inevitable, no matter who you are or what you do.

The key is to start viewing failure as educational as opposed to purely detrimental.

Mark Cuban has a terrific way of looking at failure: “No one counts your failures. Only your victories. The cool thing is that you only need one victory.” -Mark Cuban There you have it. Don’t be frightened of failure. Welcome it — of course don’t encourage it, but you know what I mean — and learn from it. Maturation is pivotal on the journey to achieve your “best self.”

3.) Networking is everything.

“Your network is your net worth.” -Porter Gale If you don’t know about Lewis Howes, please take a moment to read about him. You can follow this link to do so: http://lewishowes.com/blog/ If you don’t feel like doing that, I can summarize it here: constantly network — or try to — with people “higher up the totem pole” in the industry you are pursuing. Go to as many networking events as possible (I suggest using Meetup.com for this), reach out to one or two industry leaders per week by email or LinkedIn, and hang out at bars/cafes where these people might go to.

Above all, you must be relentless and you must be shameless. Period. Don’t be afraid to talk to anybody.

4.) No one else cares.

Humans are selfish. In order for people give a shit, you have to give them a reason to give two shits. And even after they give two shits, they will continue to talk shit.

Join the crowd, and live for yourself. What brings you happiness? What brings you the most excitement?

After you’ve found that, then find a way to monetize it.

5.) Have a morning ritual.

Listen to a podcast — whether it’s Tim Ferriss, Lewis Howes, Mike Dillard, or another — you will observe a common question emerging in the interviews: “What is your morning ritual?”

Not “Do you have a morning ritual?”

Not “if you had a morning ritual, what would it be?”

I see a pattern arising…

Every successful person I have studied has a morning ritual. This could be a meditation, writing in a journal, working out, or anything else.

The purpose behind a morning ritual is to provide yourself with “Me Time”. During normal hours of the day, it can be difficult to control where your time and energy is expended. You may get pulled into a meeting that isn’t worth your time. You might need to attend that networking event an hour’s drive away. You may get chewed out by your boss. The list is endless.

Your mornings are something you can control. No one can tell you what to do. No one can take away your valuable time. No one steer you away from your goals.

Why, you ask? Because they’re asleep!

In addition, your morning ritual should be absolutely non-negotiable. Even to your loved ones, including significant others.

6.) Consistency is everything.

Gary Vaynerchuk had a YouTube series called Wine Library TV back in 2007*. Gary made daily videos for Wine Library TV. For a year and a half straight, the videos would receive anywhere from 300 to 500 views*.

That’s a long long long time to do daily videos. He weathered through the slow times of the channel by being consistent. Eventually, the web series landed him a spot on the Conan O’Brien show, the Ellen show, and the Today Show.

The next time you find yourself ready to give up on your blog or your business or another venture, think of Gary. Think of consistency.

7.) Exercise.

For the most part, people who care about their body care about themselves. Exercise seems to be a trend among entrepreneurs now more than ever.

Regular exercise can make you live longer, make you feel “better” about yourself, and exponentially increase your productivity. Try it for yourself, if you don’t already.

It’s important to note that exercise doesn’t have to mean daily gym sessions. Find any physical activity that you actually enjoy doing, then do it often.

8.) Never stop learning.

Do what I did. Start reading as many books as you can. If you don’t have time or the resources to do this, then listen to free podcasts on your commute to work or school.

“But Dakota, I can’t listen to podcasts because I have an Android phone.” Well, there’s a wonderful resource called Stitcher for that, which is the app that I use.

Mike Dillard makes $600k+ per online course he creates. He is one of the top online marketers in the business. Even after all of his success, he still spends $100,000 per year on his education: conferences, online courses, networking events, books, and more. Learn, learn, learn.

9.) Find a mentor.

This one can be tough. With the proper drive, perseverance, and mindset, however, it can be done.

Finding a mentor can tie into the point on networking. By reaching out to 1 or 2 leaders in your industry per week, you are increasing your chances of getting a mentor. Use LinkedIn to message them. Dig up their email. Send them insightful questions that shows you have done your homework.

Your personal experience with a mentor might not be the Obi-Wan/Anakin relationship that you’ve always dreamed of. It might take the form of listening to someone’s podcast, reading their blog, tweeting them questions, etc. And that’s completely okay. Not everyone can be as lucky as Anakin.

In addition, you can refer to resources such as Everwise.com to find a mentor. Think of Everwise as the “OKCupid” of mentor-mentee relationships.

10.) Before all else, provide value to others.

This point struck me as the most helpful and least intuitive. When I first heard it though, it made complete sense.

Your value is equal to the amount of value you provide to others.

You are what others think you are. Your product or service is, and the price tag along with it, directly correlated with how valuable others think that product or service is. To achieve greater financial success, provide greater value to others. The money will come along with it. Such a simple principle, yet so powerful.

11.) If you chase money, money won’t come.

The fastest road to money is passion, and genuine love for what you do. Doing something simply for the money will, more than likely, not give you enough fuel to weather through the many challenges you’ll face along the way.

Becoming successful is tough. You’ll have terrific days and you’ll have terrible days. Will the thirst for money be enough to push you to persevere even on the worst days?

Follow your passion. Become superb at it. Provide value to others along the way, and then the money will follow closely behind.

We are fortunate enough to live in an era of accessibility. Knowledge formerly confined to those wealthy enough to afford it is now available to anyone with an internet connection.

Meticulously study the leaders in the industry you choose to pursue. Study them Study them like a young Kobe would study Magic Johnson; like a young Lebron would study Kobe Bryant. Learn from them as if they were your own mentor. By studying the leaders in your industry, not only are you equipping yourself with

invaluable knowledge, you’re also letting them make mistakes so you don’t have to. Do you really want to spend 10 years learning a lesson you could’ve figured out from watching a 5-minute YouTube video?

Dakota Shane Nunley

Storyteller and Entrepreneur. I write both formal & comedic pieces on Marketing, Business, & Lifestyle. Co-founder of Arctify Marketing. Onboarding at WriteLab. SOURCE: https://medium.com/life-learning/200-podcasts-100-articles-20-books-in-11-bullet-points-e9593b520187#.6islbewax

Travel “Travel makes one modest. You see what a tiny place you occupy in the world.”

– Gustave Flaubert

Why The Best Way To Earn Miles & Points Still Hasn’t Changed I’m a big fan of Chris Guillebeau. Love his work, read what he writes and apply what he suggests. Went to his WDS in 2015 and took my daughter. What follows is some of his latest travel hacking advice. I highly recommend it. CES I’m always on the lookout for new travel hacking opportunities. Even though I don’t need to earn as many miles and points as I used to, it’s still fun. Way back in the day, I had more than 20 active cards. Yes, really— and my credit score is 750+. It’s largely a myth that more accounts damages your credit score, as long as you pay off the balances and continue to live responsibly.

These days, life is simpler. I still have a bunch of different cards, especially for various business expenses, but almost all of my personal travel goes straight to my Chase Sapphire Preferred, and I’m something of an evangelist for it.

Despite many other changes happening in the travel hacking world, there’s no better single offer. If you can only get one card, this is the first one to look at.

So, Why Is This Card So Great? Here Are a Few Reasons  You’ll earn 40,000 currently 50,000 Ultimate Rewards points after spending $4,000 in purchases within the first 3 months  You can also earn an extra 5,000 points when you add an authorized user within the first 3 months and they make a purchase of any amount (there’s no charge to add an authorized user, and no minimum spend to earn the additional bonus)  Ultimate Rewards points transfer (usually on a 1:1 basis) to nearly a dozen travel partners, including United, Hyatt, Marriott, British Airways, Korean Air, Singapore Airlines, and Southwest Airlines  You’ll earn 2X points on travel and dining at restaurants & one point per dollar spent on all other purchases (very helpful the next time you visit 12 restaurants in one day)  There are no foreign transaction fees (that’s why this is my primary card for travel)  The annual fee of $95 is waived for the first year (and if you want, you can cancel before it shows up in year two—though for many of us the card is well worth keeping) Again, there are other good cards. But people often ask me for a single recommendation, and unless you have a compelling reason why something else would be better, this is a great first start. Link: Chase Sapphire Preferred (50,000 Points Bonus) SOURCE: http://chrisguillebeau.com/best-way-to-earn-miles/

Tools I Use To Learn, Work And Travel Anywhere I often get asked what apps, services and tools I use to learn, plan, track habits, manage time, travel, write, read and more.

I’d like to emphasize one thing, it’s not about the tools, it’s about your results, personal preference, and efficiency. If you work best with a pen and paper, there is no need to try and adopt a digital tool that doesn’t feel right for you, just because your peers or someone you admire uses one or the other tool you shouldn’t force yourself to use it just to be cool.

Traveling I love traveling and try to do it as much as possible. To make my travel experiences more pleasurable, I research and plan a lot. Check out some of the tools and services I use.

Google Flights — a great tool for checking the world map with available flights to numerous destinations and prices.

Momondo — a smart tool for searching cheapest flights.

JetRadar — another great tool to search various airlines and find cheapest tickets.

Nomad List — useful tool for finding where to go next as a digital nomad, find prices of accommodation, weather, community.

Agoda — find cheap hotels, a quite good value in Southeast Asia.

Airbnb — find accommodation anywhere in the world, get $20 credit for your first stay.

Booking — find and book cheap hotels, what I like about Booking is that it allows you to reserve a hotel without payment, you can pay once you arrive.

Google Maps — no introduction needed for this amazing service for finding your way anywhere in the world.

Foursquare — great app for discovering coffee shops, restaurants, gyms, bars and more.

Planning It’s incredibly important to plan things. Your personal life, professional career, holidays, weekends and more.

Just having a goal without a plan is just a wish. Even though you will not have a clear plan or the plan will change along the way it’s still good to have a direction to go to.

Pen and paper — old school pen and notebook work well for quick sketching or daily planning.

Toggl — simple and easy to use time tracker.

RescueTime — analytics software that tracks everything I do on my laptop and shows a productivity score.

Trello — a great tool for planning your projects and managing tasks with a team.

Apple Calendar — part of OSX operating system, works and synchronizes very well with my MacBook and iPhone.

Apple Notes — another native OSX app that works very well on MacBook and iPhone.

Evernote — a great tool for taking notes, saving PDF’s, scanning and saving receipts.

Swipes — to-do list app with intuitive user interface.

iDoneThis — tool for daily progress logging.

Coach.me — organize and track your habits, set goals and find a coach to help you achieve your dreams.

Speedtest — best tool to quickly evaluate if a cafe or restaurant has a fast WiFi for working.

Social Media Social media has changed the way people interact with each other, discover news and make connections. It certainly has changed my life, I meet new people, have interesting conversations, find jobs and get discovered on social media. Below are some tools I use to analyze, track, create and moderate my social media accounts.

Buffer — a handy tool for scheduling social media updates.

TweetDeck — easily manage multiple Twitter accounts.

Klout — analyze, measure and track your social media presence.

Finances PayPal — get paid from anywhere in the world and pay for services online like hotels, flights etc.

Wave Accounting — best free accounting and invoicing software.

Scannable — scan and save business cards, documents, receipts and more directly to Evernote.

Learning I am constantly learning new things, self-development is one of the most interesting fields for me. From design to web development to business to marketing to writing to speaking, most of my learning comes from the following sources.

TED — amazing and inspiring videos Duolingo — learn Spanish, French, German, Portuguese, Italian for free. I’m currently learning Spanish.

Skillshare — high-quality courses for creatives and entrepreneurs.

Udemy — thousands of courses on every imaginable subject.

Codeacademy — interactive and free coding courses.

Medium — a platform that connects amazing storytellers and readers seeking for inspiring stories.

Books I’ve not been a huge reading fan when I was in school, but after I got the right book in my hands, I’ve made reading my priority. You can follow my reviews and reading list on Goodreads.

How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie — it is mostly common sense but principles in the book work like magic.

The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho — this book transformed my way of thinking about pursuing my dreams.

The 4-Hour Work Week by Timothy Ferriss — a book that will inspire you to take action, start optimizing your work and escape the 9–5 trap.

The $100 Startup by Chris Guillebeau — Chris shares inspiring stories of people who started a business and redesigned their lifestyle with little to no money.

Start With Why by Simon Sinek — learn how to find clarity in your actions and inspire people.

Start Something That Matters by Blake Mycoskie — a touching story of TOMS Shoes, building a social business and making a positive impact in the world.

Willpower by Roy F. Baumeister — willpower must be the most important factor in making you successful.

Emotional Intelligence by Daniel Goleman — being intelligent is not enough, you have to learn to handle your emotions and read people.

The Tipping Point by Malcolm Gladwell — virality is not an accident, there is a well-prepared process behind the big movements.

Blink by Malcolm Gladwell — you might be overthinking in your daily life when making decisions. This book shows the power of thinking without thinking.

Inspiration Dribbble — a great way to explore how other designers work and learn from most talented designers in the world.

Product Hunt — a powerful tool for discovering hottest products in the world voted by the community of tech experts, investors and general public.

StumbleUpon — a free web-browser extension which acts as an intelligent browsing tool for discovering and sharing websites.

Random Useful Websites — hit the button and get a random useful website, surprisingly works like magic.

Nuzzel — social, real-time platform that allows you to see the news that your friends share.

Prismatic — choose topics you are interested in and get the best content recommendations.

Muzli — an add-on for Google Chrome that provides you inspiration and useful resources for designers every day.

Podcasts The School of Greatness with Lewis Howes — Lewis interviews bestselling authors, top athletes, successful entrepreneurs and other inspiring individuals.

The Tim Ferriss Show — Tim talks with scientists, authors, entrepreneurs and people who change the world.

Topics range from neuroscience to psychology to business and more.

The Jacquesvh Podcast — Jacques interviews inspiring entrepreneurs and creatives, also talks about marketing, entrepreneurship and motivation. Check out an interview with me.

The $100 MBA Show — real life business lessons in short form episodes with Omar Zenhom and Nicole Baldinu.

The Fizzle Show — fun, actionable and inspiring show for creative entrepreneurs.

The Cubicle Crashing Podcast by Lydia Lee — Lydia interviews creative entrepreneurs and individuals about unconventional lifestyle and escaping 9–5. Check out my conversation with Lydia.

Entrepreneur on Fire — John Lee Dumas interviews most inspiring and successful entrepreneurs.

Communication Slack — messaging app for teams. Get focused on work and reduce email communication.

Calendly — a tool for scheduling meetings, calls.

Skype — free software for instant messaging and video/audio calls.

Gmail — I use Gmail for personal email and Google for Business for Despreneur. Even though, Google for Business costs $5/person/month it’s definitely worth it.

Blogging WordPress — a blogging platform that powers 25% of the internet. This blog is built on WordPress too.

Bluehost — affordable and reliable hosting for your blog or small project.

MediaTemple — more powerful hosting for bigger blogs and projects.

ThemeForest — Photoshop and HTML templates, themes for different content management systems (CMS), such as WordPress, Shopify, Drupal and more.

MaxCDN — a content delivery network which makes your website load significantly faster.

Grammarly — a fantastic tool that will make you a better writer. It checks your spelling, grammar and suggests fixes instantly.

MailerLite — email marketing software with super easy to use interface and affordable pricing.

MailChimp — another email marketing software. Good for smaller projects, an account with up to 2,000 subscribers is free.

SumoMe — online software for growing your website’s traffic and subscribers.

Creative Market — market for design resources like fonts, templates, themes and more.

Unsplash — high-quality free photos to use for personal and commercial projects.

StockSnap — this tool allows you to search for free stock photos that don’t suck.

Plugins Google Analyticator — an easy way to install Google Analytics on your website.

Search Meter — this plugin tracks what your readers are searching for on your blog.

WP External Links — open external links in a new window or tab, add “no follow”, set link icon, styling, SEO friendly options and more.

Akismet — blocks incoming spam to your blog.

WP Smush — reduce image file sizes, improve performance and boost your SEO. Yoast SEO — the ultimate all-in-one SEO plugin.

W3 Total Cache — easy web performance optimization using caching: browser, page, object, database, minify and content delivery network support.

Photo & Video iPhone 6 — this powerful device fulfills all my photo/video needs.

ScreenFlow (for Mac users) — the screen capture software I’m currently using for screencasts.

VSCO Cam — I don’t use any other software for editing my photos, this app for iPhone is all I need.

Instagram — a great source of inspiration as well as a medium to share my travels and daily life.

Flickr — great for storing photos online. Flickr gives you 1,000 GB for free.

YouTube — great for watching videos, listening to music but also for storing all videos from my iPhone, upload, set to private and save.

Podcasting Samson C01U Microphone — affordable USB microphone, quality is quite good if used it properly.

Logic Pro X — professional audio editing software for Mac users.

SoundCloud — great service for storing audio files, discovering new music and listening to podcasts. iTunes — listen to internet radio, music on your computer and discover new podcasts or submit yours.

Business Dropbox — easy to use cloud storage for your files. I store my projects on Dropbox.

Google Docs — free online alternative to Microsoft Word, Excel, and Powerpoint. The best part that it allows live collaboration.

Google Analytics — free online software for tracking, measuring and analyzing website content.

Gumroad — great online software for selling anything online.

Focus Headspace — I recommend this app for everyone who wants to try meditation.

ZenFriend — after my Vipassana experience I no longer use guided meditation, ZenFriend provides a simple timer I need.

StayFocusd — block distracting websites and have a limited time a day to access them. I’ve blocked Twitter, Facebook, and some news websites.

AdBlock — an add-on for Chrome that blocks ads on the websites, including video ads on YouTube.

Spotify — millions of songs for free. I have different playlists for different moods so I can get into the zone easier.

By Tomas Laurinavicius Subscribe to his email list for more inspiring stories.

How do you get things done? What tools do you use? Please share your arsenal and tweet at me @tomaslau.

Source: https://medium.com/digital-nomad-stories/tools-i-use-to-learn-work-and-travel-anywhere-b3b8d3aa259d#.tifg4xp3y

Fitness Physical fitness is not only one of the most important keys to a healthy body; it is the basis of dynamic and creative intellectual activity. –John F. Kennedy

Basic to Beast Complete Bodyweight Workout Program Too many trainees and athletes are quick to overlook (and sometimes forget) about bodyweight training.

Even so, you can become very strong when training with just your bodyweight. Bodyweight training is all about the basics and the truth is, no matter how advanced you are, your body will always fall back on its base level of strength. Your overall bodyweight strength will always serve as the foundation and bridge to your other strengths. When it comes to the basics of bodyweight training, you should be familiar with all of the essential movements: squats, lunges, pushups, pull ups, rows, and plank variations. You should also have the ability to climb, crawl, sprint, and jump. These are primal movements.

Obviously there are hundreds, if not thousands of different variations for each of the basic bodyweight training movements out there, but no matter what, all of them come back to being able to perform the basics.

Bodyweight training serves as your foundation and is the driver of all of your other strengths and skills.

Strength tools such as kettlebells, dumbbells, barbells, and sandbags are useless without having the proper bodyweight strength and conditioning foundation.

One of my biggest pet peeves is when young athletes or new clients come into my gym and they get frustrated when I don’t quickly put them under a heavy barbell to see how much weight they can lift.

Most of my clients (and even advanced athletes) have HORRIBLE form and technique when they first come in; this is totally normal, and quite frankly, all too common.

I’ve always made it a point to go bodyweight training first and to make my clients prove to me and themselves that they are strong enough to handle their own bodyweight correctly and efficiently before using other strength tools extensively.

Bodyweight Workout Program for Strength and Conditioning: Bodyweight Standard The rule of thumb I have for my clients and athletes is that they have a solid level of bodyweight strength before they go on to any external types of resistance. You should easily be able to perform the following: 1. Standing Poses – Build leg strength as well as flexibility in the hips and hamstrings.

2. 25 “Ass to Grass” Bodyweight Squats.

3. 5 Chest-to-Bar Pull Ups (any variation).

4. 25 Chest-to-Deck Push Ups 5. 25 Lunges per Leg Non-Stop.

6. 3 Handstand Push Ups OR 5 Pike Presses.

7. 20 Recline Rows.

8. 10 Hanging Knee Tucks.

9. 90 sec Basic Plank Hold.

The Bodyweight Gauntlet One of the best types of tests that I like to put my athletes and clients through challenge their general bodyweight conditioning and strength levels is the Bodyweight Gauntlet.

I’ve always been a huge believer of training aggressively and pushing your body to the limit in order to take your results to the next level. Yes, there are progressions to follow, but the bottom line is that in order to get the best results possible, you must attack your workouts relentlessly.

Basics are always important, but intensity and focus should be number one over everything else!

The Bodyweight Gauntlet features four essential movements: 1. Push Ups – any variation 2. Strict Pull Ups – all grips and variations 3. Squats – ass to grass only!

4. Burpees – chest to floor with a jump at the top Perform an all-out, three minute set of each exercise and keep track of all of your reps.

For a beginner, this can get brutal real quick. As a person progresses overtime, they’ll start to see the differences in strength and overall conditioning quickly.

I don’t recommend an absolute beginner to take this on. I’ll usually have a complete beginner progress through each of the four basic movements first to get a solid base of bodyweight strength and conditioning built up before I let them loose on the Bodyweight Gauntlet.

While this may look like nothing more than a simple conditioning test, the real key to success is having a solid base of bodyweight strength to begin with. From there, it’s all about improving on this strength and increasing your efficiency of each movement over time.

Try it out and take the test to see where you’re at. Are you as BEAST or just a Proven Soldier? Leave your comments and score!

Beyond Bodyweight Training Basics Now, beyond the basics of bodyweight training, you must understand that in order to get stronger with your own bodyweight, you must start to progress in difficulty.

Being able to bang out squats, pushups, lunges, and pull ups by the dozens or even hundreds is pretty good, but to what point? This will indeed help you achieve more conditioning-wise, but overtime, you won’t get that much stronger maximum strength-wise.

In order for your training to be truly effective in helping you gain more strength, you must start to build more strength with more progressed movements over time.

This is where different forms of advanced bodyweight exercises come into play.

A great way to enhance your training and make it more advanced is to make it explosive by increasing the speed of the movement.

While this won’t work strength directly, it will help the body move with more force and speed which will ultimately crossover into helping you increase in overall strength. The faster you can move, the better.

One of my main coaching cues to my athletes and clients is to always be as explosive as possible with your movements during the concentric phase. I want my people to be thinking about lifting fast, never slow.

Obviously, I want people to be under control during the eccentric portion of the movement, but when it’s time to contract, you must contract with speed!

An example of this would be the push up. Imagine yourself at the top of the movement; as you descend down into the push up, you want to keep your whole body tight from head to toe (core especially).

A key point is that your whole body should work as one solid unit, never in parts, so keep your whole body engaged throughout the movement. As you come down you want to be in control.

You don’t have to go slow, but make sure to be under control. This is the eccentric portion of the movement. Now, as you come back up, you want to imagine moving your body as fast and as explosively as possible.

This is the concentric portion of the movement and you always want to focus on moving as fast as possible here.

Once you start to really slow down with your movement and you can’t move as fast as you know you can, (i.e. you start to grind out your reps), that’s a good point to stop your set.

This is known as “submax” training and this is a very important key to focus on to help increase bodyweight strength overtime. I refer to this point a lot when training push-ups, pull ups, and rows.

I see too many people do these movements to failure, and when you train like this all the time, you fry out your central nervous system.

To make a long story short, it takes your central nervous system a lot longer to recover than it does for your muscles, so whenever you train to failure, it’s going to take your body a lot longer to recover from your workout.

Recovery and Bodyweight Training Getting stronger requires your body to recover, and if you’re always cashed out from taking all of your movements to clear failure, you’ll be struggling at getting stronger, faster.

The overall point of this is to focus on being FAST with your movements and avoiding taking your sets to failure most of the time. Be efficient and crisp with your movements and you’ll continue to progress. Just think: quality over quantity.

Another way to increase your overall strength is to use advanced variations of movements.

Obviously, if you’re not someone who can do advanced movements, you need to work through your progressions.

When it comes to building up more strength via bodyweight movements, it should be a no-brainer to make the movement harder.

One of the simplest ways to make a bodyweight movement more advanced is by moving the positioning of your feet or hands.

I’ll use the push up as an example again: a simple beginner’s push up would be your regular push up from the floor, the next level would be a push up with your feet elevated on a box.

You could also implement the use of a suspension trainer and do pushups while holding the straps or having your feet suspended in the straps. You could also do extended range of motion push-ups with your hands on medicine balls or boxes.

There’s pretty much a limitless amount of things you can do to progress.

You can implement speed and power into the mix by doing explosive plyometric pushups which would be another way to make your normal pushups even harder.

One of the top progressions would be to totally remove the opposite arm out of play and perform single arm pushups.

The point is, there are literally thousands of ways you could progress your different bodyweight training movements to make them harder.

The harder you make them, the more strength you’ll build up in the end.

Switching over to the lower body, another example would be squat progressions. Obviously, you would start off with your basic bodyweight squat, making sure to always get your “ass to the grass” first and then progress from there.

One of the first things you could do to make it more difficult is to add an explosive jump at the end of your squat. This would be another example of manipulating the speed of your movement.

You could also hold your hands overhead in a prisoner position or an overhead position to make it more difficult. To take things up another notch, implement the single leg squat (also known as a pistol squat).

Bodyweight Standard Tips and Tricks 1. Focus On The Basics First Master your basic squat, push up, pull up, row, lunge, and your abilities to sprint, jump, climb, and crawl.

Once you get those down, you can then move on to the more advanced movements.

2. Train FAST Focus on performing your movements as crisp, clean, and explosive as possible.

3. Avoid Failure Grinding out reps by going to complete failure will have you regressing in the long run. Leave a few reps left in your tank each set. This will keep you fresh and allow you to train aggressively more often.

4. In Reference To The Bodyweight Gauntlet Make sure you only do this type of challenge every 4-6 weeks since you will be pushing yourself beyond failure when doing so. Doing the Bodyweight Gauntlet or a similar type of extreme workout too much and too often will result in a decrease in overall results.

Bodyweight Workout Programs The following are three different levels of workouts: Beginner A and B, Intermediate A and B, and Advanced A and B. The workouts are progressive in nature, so if you are a beginner, you would want to start on the beginner workouts A and B and then progress to the intermediates then hit up the advanced.

The workouts are set up in such a way that you’ll first hit an explosive/plyo-type movement to get the body moving fast, hyping it up for the rest of the workout.

From there, you’ll hit a few non-combative supersets using a mixture of upper and lower body strength movements, then you’ll end your sessions off with some core work. The advanced workouts end off with a short conditioning interval via a Tabata set.

If you wanted to use these workouts as a whole program, spend four weeks on each level like this: Week 1 – A, B, A Week 2 – B, A, B Week 3 – A, B, A Week 4 – B, A, B With this, you would hit each workout six times, giving you plenty of time to increase efficiency on the different movements contained in each workout. After the fourth week, I would take an off-week to allow the body to recover, then come back with the next set of workouts at the next level.

By Travis Stoetzel If you’d like to learn more or see videos of the exercises, please use this link: https://www.onnit.com/academy/basic-to-beast-complete-bodyweight-workoutprogram/?a_aid=DrChrisStout and you can also signup for Onnit Academy. Check out Onnit for the best tools to Optimize your workouts and your life. If you are serious about fitness, then you'll love this site...! https://www.onnit.com/?a_aid=DrChrisStout

Productivity

How I Became a Morning Person, Read More Books, and Learned a Language in a Year It wasn't as hard as it sounds: I used four principles to start small habits that built into big, long -term outcomes. Here's how.

You’ll notice that I made the title of this post sound quite impressive (at least I hope I did!). But the great thing about this story is that anyone can have such an impressive outcome, and it’s not at all as daunting as it might sound. In fact, all these outcomes came from doing small things every day over a long period.

I’m a big fan of working smarter, not harder and finding small ways to make my work more efficient. As I became Buffer’s first content crafter about two years ago, I got the chance to explore these topics quite a lot.

Now I’m excited to be back to show you exactly how I came by these wins in 2015.  From a habit of practicing French for just five minutes a day, I can now read, write, and speak basic French.  From a habit of reading just a page every night, I managed to increase my reading list by five times over the past couple of years.

Basically, I used small, everyday habits to build up into big, long-term outcomes. There are four principles I try to stick to whenever I’m building a new habit. Through everything I’ve tried, these are the principles that seem to work every time.

1. Start Small: Repeat A Tiny Habit Daily When I first started to focus on building healthier habits a few years ago, one of the biggest mistakes I made was to ask too much of myself. I would go from reading hardly ever to attempting to read one book

per week. Or from getting up at 9 a.m. most days to trying to roll out of bed before 6 a.m. every morning. The distance between where I was starting and where I wanted to be was so great that I would fail a lot. And each failure made it harder to succeed the next day.

At their heart, as James Clear explains, habits are about routines.

And what I really needed were small wins and visible progress to help me create new routines I could keep every day. Finally, I came across this idea of starting small. The point is to focus on repeating the habit every day, but not worrying about how effective that habit is. In other words, quantity first; quality later.

A great example is flossing. Say you want to floss every night, but you haven’t flossed for years. If you take up flossing out of the blue and expect to spend 10 minutes doing it every night, you probably won’t last more than a week. It’s a very big ask.

But starting small is so effective, it’s almost like a super power. Here’s how it would work for flossing: You take the tiniest part of the habit you can work with—in this case, it would be to floss just one tooth.

It’s still considered flossing, but you won’t make huge leaps in dental hygiene this way.

But here’s where it gets powerful: At first, you focus on just flossing one tooth every night. And you stick with it for more than a week. Then, more than two. Then three, four weeks. You can stick with this habit because it’s so easy. There’s barely any effort involved with flossing one tooth, so it’s hard to make an excuse not to do it. And once it’s become easy and automatic to floss one tooth, you start flossing two.

For a while, you floss two teeth every night. Then, you increase to three. And slowly you work your way up, never taking such a big leap that it becomes a chore. By starting small you focus on making the behavior automatic, before you worry about making the behavior big enough that it produces a useful outcome.

As Scott H. Young says, we tend to overestimate how much we can get done—especially when we’re stepping into the unknown. Scott suggests planning as if you can only commit 20% of the time and energy you’d like to, in order to be more realistic.

Here’s how I applied the "start small" process to my habits in 2015.

Reading: One Page a Night I started by reading just one page of a book every night before bed. Often I would read more, but if all I could manage was one page, I would count that as a win. Later, when the habit was already strong, I would put on a timer and read for 15 minutes, and eventually I was reading for 30 minutes before bed and another 30 minutes most mornings.

Just starting with one page added up: In 2013 I read seven books. In 2014, 22. In 2015, 33. That’s almost five times what I read in 2013. I worked on this habit over about a year and a half. That probably sounds like a long time, but it only seems that way in retrospect. When I’m working my habit, all I think about is how much I need to read today to count a win. It’s always a small, daily effort that I focus on. But when I look back on my progress, I realize what big achievements those daily habits have developed into.

French: One Lesson Every Morning I had dabbled in French before, but I wasn’t very good at sticking with it. When I decided I really wanted to improve my French, I started by building a habit of doing just one Duolingo lesson every morning while I drank my coffee. (If you haven’t tried it, Duolingo is a free web and mobile app to help you learn lots of languages.)

One lesson takes around five minutes, so it’s a tiny commitment, and quite easy to do when I’m sitting around drinking coffee anyway. Eventually I started doing more than one lesson—two, three, sometimes even four or five, if I was enjoying it.

I did as many as I felt like, but I always did at least one. Only one lesson was required to check off that habit for the day, so it was easy to stick to, even when I didn’t feel like doing any more than that. These days I also use Babbel (a paid web and mobile app for language learning) to get a better idea of the grammatical rules and structures of French, and I’ve finished the whole French section in Duolingo.

According to Duolingo, that means I know about 41% of French! That’s a big achievement from just five minutes a day!

2. Focus on One Habit at a Time One of the hardest things for me when it comes to building new habits is to not take on too many at once. I always have such grand plans for the things I want to get better at, and so much enthusiasm when I first start out, that I want to build several habits at once.

Every time I’ve tried that approach, I end up failing. Usually a few of the habits don’t stick, but sometimes none of them do. It’s just too much to focus on at once—a bit like multitasking, where your brain has to switch contexts constantly, because you really can’t focus on multiple things at once.

So my new rule is to work on just one habit at a time.

Only when that habit is so automatic I can do it every day easily do I start on a new habit. With the example above, I was reading every night before I started focusing on French. And I was easily doing a French lesson every day before I started focusing on getting up early.

Sometimes building a habit can take a long time. Getting up early was one I really struggled to do consistently. I spent around four months focused on that same habit: trying different approaches, tracking my progress, and reporting in to friends who helped keep me accountable. I was determined to make it a consistent habit, but that meant not building any other habits for months.

These days I’m glad I committed to building that habit for so long, because I get up early almost every day without even trying. It didn’t come easy, but it was worth the effort.

How long it takes you to build a habit will vary, so four months might be longer or shorter than you need. We often hear the idea that it takes 21 days to build a habit, but studies have shown we all take different lengths of time to build new habits. In one study, the average time it took to build a new habit was 66 days—about two months.

The lesson I’ve learned is to treat each habit differently, depending on how hard you find it to stick to consistently, but also to focus on just one habit at a time so it gets your full attention and energy.

3. Remove Barriers: Have Everything You Need At Hand I find it much easier to complete my habits when the equipment I need is at hand. For instance, having my phone in my hand already while drinking coffee made it easier to build a habit of doing a quick French lesson at that time. Reading a page of a book every night became a lot easier when I kept the book by my bed.

Malcolm Gladwell calls this the tipping point. It’s that small change that tips you over from making excuses to taking action. One great example of the power of a tipping point comes from a study of tetanus education at a university. The study tested whether trying to induce higher levels of fear about tetanus would encourage more students to get vaccinated against it. The fear level of the education program didn’t seem to make any difference, but one surprising change did: adding a map of the university campus showing the health center and the times vaccinations were available increased the vaccination rate from 3% to 28%.

The tipping point is that tiny change that makes it easy enough to take action that you’ll actually follow through. I like to think of it as removing any barriers that make it easy to not follow through on my habits.

One habit I want to build in 2016 is to play piano more often. Right now I play whenever the mood strikes me, which isn’t often enough to get a lot better. But I have noticed that I tend to play more often when the piano is easily accessible. Right now it’s in a corner of our lounge/dining/kitchen area, so I can easily sit down and play a little while waiting for something to cook, or when I visit the kitchen for an afternoon snack.

Another habit I want to focus on this year is exercising more regularly. I’ve noticed that once I put on my exercise clothes, it’s pretty much certain that I’ll go outside for a run, but until those clothes are on, it’s a lot easier to think of excuses for not going out. Getting out my exercise clothes the night before and putting them on quickly in the morning before I can think of excuses tends to help me get out the door faster. This is something I plan to do more regularly when I’m focusing on building this habit.

4. Stack Habits: Build New Routines Onto Existing Ones One of my favorite ways to build new habits is to stack them onto existing habits. This builds up several habits into a routine, and each habit acts as a trigger for the next one.

The cool part about this is you already have lots of habits you probably don’t realize. Brushing your teeth before bed, getting out of bed in the morning, making coffee at the same time every day—these are all existing habits. As long as you do something at the same time every day without thinking about it, it’s a habit you can stack others onto.

If you do your new habit after completing an existing one, you can rely on the strength of your existing habit to help keep your new habit on track. For example, when I get out of bed, the first thing I do is go downstairs to make coffee. When my coffee is made, I start my French lesson. My existing habit of making coffee acts as a trigger to complete my French lesson.

And when I go to bed at night, I open the book sitting by my bed. Getting into bed and seeing the book acts as a trigger to do my nightly reading.

Research has shown that a cue to work on your new habit may be the most effective way to ensure you stick to the habit long term. When you stack habits, you use the existing ones as cues for each new habit you want to build.

Over time, you can keep stacking new habits onto your existing ones to take advantage of automatic behaviors you’re already doing.

Building new habits has become something of a hobby for me. It’s exciting to think of all the skills I can gain and improve over time, just by building tiny habits that I repeat every day. It makes huge accomplishments seem much more achievable.

By B e l l e B e t h C o o p e r SOURCE: http://www.fastcompany.com/3056613/how-to-be-a-success-at-everything/how-i-became-a-morning-person-read-more-books-and-learned-

Career

16 Lists to Make to Jump-Start Your Career in 2016 If you want to get a head start on your New Year's resolutions, it's time to get organized….This story first appeared on The Muse, a Web destination with exciting job opportunities and expert career advice.

There's nothing I love more than a good list, especially at the end of the year, when reflecting and resolution-making abound.

You, too? Then here are 16 lists to make in 2016 that'll help you do both of those activities, plus get a head start on that job search or promotion you're planning to ask for.

Make one, or make them all--I promise every single one is more fun than your to-do list.

1. Companies you want to work for.

This is a no-brainer if you're actively job-searching: Having a list with your favorite companies, their websites, any contacts you have there, and links to their jobs pages makes hunting for openings a whole lot easier. But even if you're not, this is good to have as part of your career emergency plan. (You have that, right?)

2. 10 innovative ideas off the top of your head.

I got this idea from Muse master coach John Gannon: Start each day by writing down 10 ideas you have about a specific subject--something related to your job, an industry trend, whatever. As he writes, "[Entrepreneur James Altucher] says that if you generate 10 ideas a day, every day, for six months straight that you will become an 'Idea Machine'--someone who can come up with great ideas in any situation about any topic. And you can use these ideas for your own benefit, or send the list to someone who could use them--whether that's your boss, another team at work, or a friend."

3. People you should know to get ahead.

Think: People who work for your dream companies, people who would be awesome mentors, people further ahead than you on your career path--really anyone who will inspire you to push yourself.

Having this makes networking a whole lot more efficient. Oh, and don't be afraid to put a few "reach" people on your list, too! Arianna Huffington was on mine, and I met her at an event a few months later.

Click on the image to visit the site or http://flevy.com/strategy-frameworks?ref=DrChrisStout1 4. Books you want to read.

Because next time you need a good read, you don't want to spend hours browsing Goodreads when you could be deep into Chapter 3. Want a ready-made list to make your life even easier? Here are 20 books the world's most successful people recommend you pick up.

5. What you want to happen in 2016.

A lot of us set resolutions for the year ahead, but I like framing this exercise as: What do I want to happen in the next year? Feel free to include both work-related goals and personal goals. And then couple this list with...

6. What you want to leave in 2015.

Are there bad habits you want to give up, work responsibilities you'd like to trade for more advanced tasks, even people you'd like to stop talking to? Add them to a list as a reminder that, come 2016, your time and energy is better spent elsewhere.

7. Your career bucket list.

Once you've done your annual planning, now's the time to dream big. Do you want to work abroad? Write a book?

Start a company? Found a nonprofit? Have a corner office with a view of Central Park? Add it to this list, then keep it somewhere you can refer to when you're feeling aimless.

Click on the image to visit the site or http://flevy.com/powerpoint-toolkit?ref=DrChrisStout1

8. "Got a minute?" to-dos.

There are plenty of times you have a few minutes to spare--like when you're on hold or waiting for a meeting to start. Rather than wasting those moments on Facebook, make a list of tiny to-dos you could get done. Here's a starter list you can build from.

9. "Got a slow day?" to-dos.

There also might be times you have a few hours--even a full day--to spare. (Stuck in the office during the holidays, anyone?) Make a list of back-burner projects at work (or at home) that you want to get done...someday.

10. A "not right now" list.

Speaking of someday, if you want to achieve all those goals you've set out, you're likely going to need to deprioritize less important tasks. So think of this an opposite-day list: Add things you're absolutely, positively not going to spend time on--for now. As entrepreneur Frank Addante writes for Inc.: "It's a list on which you put things that you don't have time to work on right now, but you don't want to take off your todo list. As the adage says, 'Out of sight, out of mind.' If you unclutter your mind, you'll be more effective in getting things done."

11. Your biggest accomplishments.

Start by making a list of 10 things you accomplished in 2015 that you're really, really proud of. Then, every time you do something awesome this year, add it to the list. It's a great motivator when you're feeling like nothing's going right, and it'll make updating your resume a whole lot easier.

12. Lunches to make.

In 2015, I had a goal to bring my lunch to work more. (I didn't do as well as I'd liked.) But what helped the most was creating a list of recipes I could make, complete with the ingredients I needed to add to my shopping list. It's sort of like your own little menu. A few of my favorites? Healthy lasagna, mason jar salads, and Thai chicken lettuce wraps.

13. What you're grateful for.

You've likely read about the benefits of focusing daily on the things you're thankful for. Make that easier on yourself by turning them into a list and posting it someplace you'll see often. (Bonus career karma points if at least a few of them are work-related.)

14. Things you do better than most people.

This idea comes from Inc.com writer Minda Zetlin: Create a list of "your core competencies, the things you can build your success on." This has several benefits (other than a confidence boost). For starters, it'll help you really focus on what sets you apart from others when you're writing cover letters, your LinkedIn profile, or your personal website copy. It's also a good gut check--if you realize that your current job rarely lets you utilize your top skills and abilities, it might be time for a change.

Click on the image to visit the site or http://flevy.com/strategy-development?ref=DrChrisStout1

15. Things you want to try.

There are probably activities you've thought about trying at some point--learning Photoshop, trying public speaking, mentoring a junior employee--but you don't put them on any of these other lists because, well, you don't really know if you'd like them. Put those activities here as a reminder, and next time you're feeling bored, give one of them a whirl.

16. Sayings to live by.

This final idea comes from Artjournalist (which also has a great list of list prompts): A "Manifesto list." The author asks, "What are some words and phrases to live by that are part of your life's manifesto? Make a list of sayings to live by."

By Adrian Granzella Larssen The Muse@adriangranzella Source: http://www.inc.com/the-muse/16-lists-to-make-to-jumpstart-your-career-in-2016.html

Leadership

Decision Making I love Farnam Street (https://www.farnamstreetblog.com) and I bet you will too. Here is a sampler from a recent email from them.

Avoiding Stupidity is Easier than Seeking Brilliance — If you’re an amateur your focus should be on avoiding stupidity.

How We Can Improve Our Decisions — My keynote speech at the Pender Investment Conference.

Decisions Under Uncertainty — We often think we're making decisions involving risk when really we're dealing with uncertainty.

How Using a Decision Journal can Help you Make Better Decisions — “Odds are you’re going to discover two things. First, you’re right a lot of the time. Second, it’s often for the wrong reasons.”

Daniel Kahneman’s Favorite Approach For Making Better Decisions — The premortem.

Click on the image to visit the site or http://flevy.com/browse/business-document/complete-consultingframeworks-toolkit-644/ref=DrChrisStout1 Your Environment Matters If You Want To Make Better Decisions — It's hard to make rational decisions the way most of us work.

What You Can Learn About Making Better Decisions From One of Baseball’s Greatest Hitters — "the single most important thing for a hitter was to get a good ball to hit."

A Two-Step Process For Making Effective Decisions — "One approach is rationality-the way you’d work out a bridge problem: by evaluating the real interests, the real probabilities and so forth. And the other is to evaluate the psychological factors that cause subconscious conclusions-many of which are wrong."

How to Make Better Decisions In Life And Work — Most of us rarely use a process for thinking about things. If we do use one it’s likely to be the pros-and-cons list. While better than nothing, this approach is still deeply flawed because it doesn’t really account for biases.

What Matters More in Decisions: Analysis or Process? — “Our research indicates that, contrary to what one might assume, good analysis in the hands of managers who have good judgment won’t naturally yield good decisions.”

Making Smart Choices — "We have found that even the most complex decision can be analysed and resolved by considering a set of eight elements. The first five—Problem, Objectives, Alternatives, Consequences, and Tradeoffs—constitute the core of our approach and are applicable to virtually any decision."

What happens when decisions go wrong? — "When a decision goes awry, we tend to focus on the people who made it, rather than on the decision itself. Our assumption, which is really unwarranted, is that good people make good decisions, and vise versa."

Click on the image to visit the site or http://flevy.com/business-frameworks?ref=DrChrisStout1

Click on the image to visit the site or http://flevy.com/business-toolkits?ref=DrChrisStout1

Tech

By Joe Mcgauley @JWMCGAULEY At 3pm on October 1, 2013, the then-29-year-old self-styled entrepreneur and investment advisor Ross Ulbricht was spending an otherwise uneventful afternoon browsing San Francisco’s Glen Park Library. By 3:15pm, he was in FBI custody, accused of running a black market website known as the Silk Road, which had generated more than $1.2billion in revenue in just two years.

How, you ask? Selling heroin, ecstasy, cocaine, and practically every other illegal drug on the planet to over 1 million users via a shadowy, anonymous part of the Internet known as the Deep Web. Okay, not “part” of the Internet -- it’s more like the majority. The Deep Web occupies roughly 96% of the entire Internet, and you can't find any of it using a standard search engine. So what the hell goes on in the deep depths of the Internet that Google can’t show you?

You probably used it several times today Since the Silk Road bust, the Deep Web has been cast as some nefarious digital wasteland where basement-dwellers go to buy drugs, hire hit men, and exchange kiddie porn. And sure, that’s not entirely untrue, but there’s plenty more to it than what made headlines.

In fact, if you’ve ever checked your bank account online or composed a message in Gmail, you’ve been on the Deep Web. WIKIMEDIA

If you think of the Internet as we know it, or the “surface web” -- Google, Wikipedia, this website, and most others you visit every day -- as the Milky Way galaxy, the Deep Web is what makes up the rest of the Internet universe. What's in it? Academic databases, government records, personnel files, internal corporate networks, and your own private accounts protected by a log-in (e.g., your bank account). Plus, a huge chunk of unique URLs containing complex scientific data collected by the likes of NASA that would be indecipherable by you or I. But then, things get dark An even tinier blip in this Internet universe is where you'll find the Dark Web, which was home to the Silk Road. Silk Road may have been shuttered by the feds (and Ulbricht sentenced to life in prison) but other even more heinous sites continue to thrive.

Using special browsers that cloak their IP addresses, anyone can gain access to these sites and buy every illegal item under the sun. Drugs are just the tip of the iceberg. Guns, sex slaves, assassins, stolen credit cards, passports, horrific pornography -- there are black markets lurking for all of them.

Of course these sites aren’t dumb enough to incriminate themselves with standard payment methods.

Instead, they keep transactions anonymous using Bitcoin. In fact, the Dark Web is such a flourishing community of Bitcoin users that when Silk Road shut down, the cryptocurrency temporarily dropped $500 million in value.

NASA wants to make it searchable By nature, all of this content (good and bad) is unsearchable, but NASA and DARPA are out to change that. The two agencies have been working together on a project known as Memex, which would essentially serve as a search engine for everything on the Deep Web. It would make it easier for citizens and scientists alike to dig up data sent back from spacecraft, which is a big part of what’s floating around in there. And while it will be helpful in that regard, it’s already been used to comb the worst corners of the Dark Web to catch human traffickers.

But currently, the guaranteed anonymity also makes it a haven for less-than-evildoers, including dissidents and whistleblowers like Edward Snowden who rely on the Deep Web to safely pass information to sources.

Go see for yourself... just don't do anything stupid You’re welcome to scope things out, since it’s totally legal to access the Deep Web. All you need to do is download one of the specialized browsers, like Tor, which enable you to browse the encrypted sites anonymously by scrambling your IP address via a series of networked servers around the world. Beware though: there are plenty of sites on the Dark Web that aren’t legal to access, and the NSA and other government agencies keep close tabs on what’s going on down there.

Your identity can be easily tracked down if you make a wrong move in covering your tracks. But you’re not a sketchball looking to buy sex slaves online so you have nothing to worry about, right?

Intellectual Fun

The Free Documentary List

By Nzube George Okoye (I own a tech blog called ZUBYSNOOK feel free to check it out) Here is a list of over 100 amazing documentaries you can watch for free online. This list helps those searching for more knowledge on their path to enlightenment and understanding more about life. With more than 80 hours of content it’s a smorgasbord of fascinating subjects to learn about and surely will be of great help to you. Take your time when watching these. Some of them are worth a re-watch also. Enjoy..!

CREATIVITY AND DESIGN Everything Is A Remix The Creative Brain: How Insight Works Teaching to See Design: The New Business PressPausePlay: Art and Creativity in the Digital Age Infamy: A Graffiti Documentary Influencers: How Trends and Creativity Become Contagious RIP: A Remix Manifesto Design: e² — Sustainable Architecture The Genius Of Design

DIGITAL REVOLUTION Download: The True Story of the Internet The Age of Big Data Resonance: Beings of Frequency Life In A Day Networked Society: On The Brink Us Now: Social Media and Mass Collaboration WikiRebels: The WikiLeaks Story The Virtual Revolution: The Cost of Free How Hackers Changed the World POLITICS Owned and Operated UnGrip The Power Principle The True Story of Che Guevara Earth Days Capitalism Is The Crisis WikiLeaks: The Secret Life of a Superpower The Putin System The War On Democracy Rise Like Lions: Occupy Wall Street and the Seeds of Revolution TECHNOLOGY Ray Kurzweil: The Transcendent Man How Robots Will Change the World Human 2.0: Mind Control Machine Technology of the Future Trance-Formation: The Future of Humanity The Venus Project: Future By Design Bionics, Transhumanism And The End Of Evolution The Singularity Is Near Car Technology Of The Future Powering The Future: The Energy Revolution ART Lord Of The Rings: Facts Behind The Fiction Cosm: Alex Gray’s Visionary Art Jean Michel Basquiat: The Radiant Child New Art and the Young Artists Behind It Salvador Dali: A Master of the Modern Era How Art Made The World: More Human Than Human The Day Pictures Were Born Guns, Germs and Steel

Off-Book: Digital Age Creativity This Is Modern Art Human CORPORATE MEDIA Weapons of Mass Deceptions Secrets of the Superbrands Orwell Rolls in his Grave The Esoteric Agenda Propaganda The Myth of the Liberal Media: The Propaganda Model of News Manufacturing Consent: Noam Chomsky and the Media Symbolism in Logos: Subliminal Messages or Ancient Archetypes Edward Snowden: A Truth Unveiled Outfoxed: Rupert Murdoch’s War on Journalism HEALTH The Human Brain The Truth About Exercise How To Live To 101 Globesity: Fat’s New Frontier The War On Health The Beautiful Truth Food Inc. The Truth About Food Addicted To Pleasure: Sugar The Living Matrix DRUGS The Union: The Business Behind Getting High The Drugging Of Our Children How Marijuana Affects Your Health Making a Killing: The Untold Story of Psychotropic Drugging Clearing the Smoke: The Science of Cannabis LSD: The Beyond Within The War on Drugs: The Prison Industrial Complex Are Illegal Drugs More Dangerous Than Legal Drugs?

The Prescription Drug Abuse Epidemic Run From The Cure: The Rick Simpson Story PSYCHOLOGY How Smart Can We Get? The Science of Lust DNA: The Secret of Life

What Are Dreams?

A Virus Called Fear Beyond Thought (Awareness Itself) The Human Brain Superconscious Mind: How To Double Your Brain’s Performance How Does Your Memory Work?

Secrets of the Mind ENVIRONMENT Earthlings Blue Gold: World Water Wars Tapped Shift: Beyond the Numbers of the Climate Crisis All Things Are Connected The Fight For Amazonia Flow: For Love Of Water Here Comes the Sun The World According To Monsanto The Story of Stuff

Humanitarian Tools Many of you know me from my work at the Center for Global Initiatives, a 501(c ) non-profit, nongovernmenal organization wioth a focus on global heal and helping provide tools and resources freely to those also working in that space. We have a monthly newsletter (Tools for Change) that’s availabe for the asking (DrChrisStout@gmail.com) and backissues are archived here https://www.pinterest.com/drchrisstout/tools-for-change-the-cgi-newsletter/

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And you can get more immediate updates and share your own posts at our Facebook page, where over 2000 other likeminded folks participate: https://www.facebook.com/groups/CenterFor GlobalInitiatives/ Note about curated content: Photos and content were sampled from public, non-subscription websites and are thus assumed to be in the public domain. All original authorship is properly attributed and transparently sourced and this document serves as yet another avenue to publicize the authors’ works and is noncommercial. Disclosures and Fine-print