Author Archives: Jeremiah Stanghini

Jeremiah's primary aim is to provide readers with a new perspective. In the same vein as the "Blind Men and the Elephant," it can be difficult to know when one is looking at the big picture or if one is simply looking at a 'tusk' or a 'leg.' He writes on a variety of topics: psychology, business, science, entertainment, politics, history, etc.

The World — as we know it — is in its Infancy

After watching this week’s Crash Course: World History on decolonization and nationalism, I have a newfound understanding (respect?) for the current state of the world. I used to think, ‘my goodness, humans have existed for so long, why are we still fighting?’ This presupposes that the makeup of the world had stayed relatively the same. And this, of course, is wrong.

According to modern scientific thought, humans have been around for 200,000 years. I always thought that with our being around for so long, we would have ‘figured it out’ by now and would be “nice” to each other. After reading Wilber and delving into Integral Theory, it adds a unique lens on why some groups of people are different from other groups of people, with regard to their development. Still, that wasn’t enough for me to “get it.” I still thought that development should have “happened” such that we treat each other better.

It wasn’t until I watched “Decolonization and Nationalism Triumphant” yesterday afternoon that I realized how young the world is in its current form. At most, we’ve existed in this way for about 70 years. Crazy, huh? When it’s put in those terms, that’s less than a lifetime! It starts to make more sense that certain conflicts haven’t yet settled and that there is still a desire for guns.

Waking Up with Songs Stuck in your Head

When I woke up this morning, I was surprised to hear a song stuck in my head. I was less surprised that there was a song stuck in my head and more surprised about which song: “A Whole New World.” Remember that song? Remember Aladdin? My goodness — I haven’t seen that movie in ages, so I have no idea why that song would have been stuck in my head. Maybe it has something to do with what I was dreaming about – who knows.

The other odd part was that this wasn’t the only song stuck in my head. I also heard “Frosty the Snowman.” It was almost like the two songs were spliced and I’d hear a verse of Aladdin and then a verse from Snowman.

I don’t have anything profound to share about this experience, but I thought I would post the videos of the songs and give you a flashback to times when you were younger and saw the movie Aladdin or watched those Christmas specials on TV.

Update on Jeremiah Stanghini’s Blog: Corrected Deep Links and a New Category

So, when I moved all of these blog posts from Genuine Thriving to this site, I said that I wasn’t going to go and update all of the deep links on the site. Translation: I wasn’t planning on going through all of my old posts simply to update the links that I had used within the website. Meaning, if you clicked on a link in one of my posts that was to something I had written earlier, before about 15 minutes ago, it would have taken you to that version of the post over on Genuine Thriving. After watching some of the traffic for this site, I decided to go through and update most of the old links.

For just about every post on this blog, I’ve updated the deep links. The only ones that I haven’t: the series of “What’s on my iPod” and “Who I’m Following on Twitter.” That’s not to say that I won’t in the future, but for the time being, these are the only posts where there’s a link to a blog post on Genuine Thriving. On that note, if you happen to find a link to a blog post on Genuine Thriving, please leave me a comment, so I can update it.

In the meantime, why don’t you check out some of the other articles/series I’ve written. Here’s a smattering:

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I also wanted to let you all know that I’ve gone ahead and changed the category of (Genuine Thriving) to Wisdom. There were some posts that were “tagged” Wisdom, so I’ve shifted them into the category of Wisdom and now we’re up over 40 posts in the Wisdom category. Some of these may shift, but for now, I’ll leave it like this.

The Science of Procrastination and How to Manage It

Almost two months ago, I wrote a post about how much time you waste at work. I thought it would only be fair if I then wrote something about how not to waste so much time at work.

I came across a short two and a half-minute video detailing the science of procrastination and — more importantly — how to manage it. The techniques espoused in the video aren’t off-the-wall and they probably are things you might have heard. Though, take comfort in knowing that many people have used  The Pomodoro Technique with great success!

The Marshmallow Study Revisited: Context Matters!

Have you heard of The Marshmallow Study? It’s a classic experiment in self-control. All kinds of longitudinal research was conducted on those who weren’t able to “control themselves” and wait for the second marshmallow. In fact, there was even a movie that adapted the crux of the marshmallow experiment and used it as part of the plot.

A little over a week ago, the University of Rochester published some research that ‘updates’ the marshmallow experiment. I have to say, I’m quite pleased with the findings. Previously, it was thought that the participant’s ability to control themselves from eating the marshmallow in front of them and hold out for the second marshmallow was an indication that the participant may be more likely to succeed in the future. With this updated addendum, if you will, it now seems that there is more to the experiment than simply self-control.

When juxtaposed, my interpretation of the results of the original experiment from 1972 and the one discussed in the video is, quite simply: context matters.

Shutting Pitchers Down Early: A Creative Lesson in Long-Term Sustainability

I’d been meaning to write about this for the last few weeks. In fact, I first got the idea after the Washington Nationals made the playoffs for the first time in a long time. I immediately knew that there were going to be a number of articles written in trying to sway the management of the team to let Strasburg (the star pitcher) pitch in the playoffs. However, management had already decided that this particular pitcher had “reached his limit” and would no longer be pitching this season.

There are pros and cons to this, but I wanted to look at it for: “short-term gain vs. long-term sustainability.”

When we look at companies that have failed, often times, it’s because they sacrificed long-term sustainability for short-term profits. That is, they took a shortcut to make a quick buck without due consideration for how it was going to affect the company in the long-term. Or, maybe they did consider it, and just chose the short-term gains instead.

As I watched — painfully — the Nationals be eliminated from the playoffs a bit ago, I couldn’t help but reflect on this idea of short-term gains and long-term sustainability. Those folks who screamed for Strasburg to pitch kind of have a point. It’s possible that he Strasburg may get hurt at some point next season or the season after or that the Nationals will never get that opportunity to return to the playoffs. And it’s because of this that Strasburg should have been allowed to pitch.

Though, if I think about it from a ‘business’ perspective, the argument can be made that it’s best to “take care of your assets.” That is, if your company had a Ferrari, you wouldn’t necessarily overuse your Ferrari simply because you had a Ferrari. No, you would want to take care of that very expensive (and valuable) asset to reap the benefits over the long haul.

In sum, I don’t know how I would act if I were the General Manager of the Washington Nationals. However, I do think that this is a creative example in illustrating the difference between pursuing short-term gains or long-term sustainability.

Extra! Extra! Read All About It: Newness Abounds

Well this is an awfully new setup, isn’t it? My previous blog fell ill to some kind of malware. It was a bit upsetting because I spent two months setting up that website from scratch. Now, that website has not totally gone away nor will it. However, I have decided to move my blog from that site to this site because I presume that the content will be safe on this server.

In the transition from the old site to the new site, I lost a few of the blog posts (about 6), but just about everything made the transition. So, you’ll see all the same categories (including Genuine Thriving), along with all the same tags. I’ll continue to write under these same categories (but maybe not Genuine Thriving). As you can see from the menu bar, I’ve added a few other links: to Twitter, LinkedIn, and… my new Facebook page!

I wanted to change the way I interacted with the Internet, so I’ve changed my Facebook profile into a Facebook page. I hope that you’ll continue to interact with me on Facebook in this new way. I’ve also integrated Facebook and Twitter such that updates should cross-post.

In the coming weeks, look for a new header image to appear on this site. For now, “Jeremiah Stanghini” in text will have to do.

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On a side note: I will not go back and update all the deep linking and from all the posts I’ve written in the past. Unfortunately, that would just take too much time. Though, if you take the “title” of the link and search this site, there’s a high probability that you’ll be able to find the post.

The Never-Ending Quest for Balance

As part of the for the PhD program I was in a few years back, I had the pleasure of learning a martial art – . I’d already done quite a bit of training in martial arts when I was younger, but Aikido is quite different from . Not to descend too far down a tangent, but, in my understanding, Aikido is much more about blending whereas karate’s primary focus, again, in my understanding, is not blending.

One of the exercises we would often do to practice this sense of blending involved our partner (or partners as it was usually in groups of three or more!) to approach us as if they were attacking us. It was our job to then move out of the way, whilst staying centered. [Note: I couldn’t find any video of this particular exercise, as I think it’s quite basic. However, I was able to find of some of the basic Aikido exercises that are similar to the one I’m describing.] The tempo of this exercise usually started out really slow (intentionally). Though, as time passed, our partners would then speed up. You can imagine how it might be challenging to stay centered in this kind of an activity.

During these times of practice, I remember having a bit of an epiphany.

As my partner would approach me and I would step out of the way, I noticed that the quicker (and the more out of balance!) I was, the more out of balance I would be when stepping out of the way for the next partner who was approaching. Think about that for a second: as I stepped out of the way of one partner and I was off-balance, I was that much more off-balance when stepping out of the way for the next partner. It’s almost akin to the .

This may seem like a small thing to notice, but we can apply this lesson to a much broader (macro!) scope. Let’s think about this in terms of our own lives. When I am faced with one problem or issue and I “lose my center,” I will be that much more out of balance when approaching the next problem that comes my way. This sense of being out of balance seems to grow exponentially (see: the Bullwhip Effect).

We can apply this to an even broader scope (communities or countries). When a community/country reacts to a problem they are faced with, and they aren’t approaching the problem from a sense of balance (and they don’t maintain a sense of balance throughout the problem-solving process), there will usually be a sense of being out of balance at the end of the solution. Furthermore, by being out of balance at the end state, when the next problem approaches, there will be even more “out of balance.”

There’s just two more things I want to mention about my experience during this Aikido exercise. First, when I noticed myself starting to get out of balance during the exercise, I would often try really hard to get myself back in balance. This only made it worst. As I would try to get back to a sense of balance, I would often swing the other way, causing more imbalance, etc. And second, eventually, by being out of balance, I would fail the exercise. That is, by being so out of balance, I might not see one of my partners who was behind me.

The consequence of being out of balance in this exercise illustrates the inherent narrow-minded focus of one who is not centered.

How The Heck Does The Economy Work, Anyway?

A few months ago, I wrote a post about an online video series I’ve been following by John Green on world history. A few days ago, I learned that two economics professors at George Mason University were starting an online course in the same vein as Stanford. As they’re economics professors, naturally, you’d expect that the course is on economics (it is). In fact, the two professors (Alex Tabarrok and Tyler Cowen) describe the course as:

This course covers theory and empirics and history for the economic growth of developing nations.

I have to say, I’m really excited for this course and I think you should be, too. Similar to my comment about our need to understand the implications of history and the past, I believe we also should have an understanding some of the basic underlying theory of the economy.

There are a few differences between John Green’s crash course and the course being offered by Prof. Tabarrok and Prof. Cowen. First, as I referred to earlier, the economics course is more in the same vein of MOOC (Massive Open Online Course). Second, there aren’t any fun animations from the Thought Bubble (at least I haven’t seen any, yet). Third, there are multiple videos per lesson. With John Green’s course, there was only one video per week on a given topic. With this course from Marginal Revolution University, there are usually multiple videos for a given lesson. For instance, for the lesson on People (as in, leading thinkers on the economy), there are over 30 videos. Finally, there are practice questions. Practice questions? Yes, practice questions. Meaning, the professors have included practice questions along with the videos to help the viewer interact with the material.

I’ve included the introduction video below.

How To Get What You Want: Use the “As If” Principle

I don’t remember how many books I’ve included in the section that use the “As If” principle, but I do remember that Dooley’s books do ( and ). I’m a big proponent of Twitter as it’s where I get most of my news and updates on the topics that I’m interested in (, , , etc.).

I saw a this morning (from my psychology stream) of a psychologist in London, Richard Wiseman. The tweet included a video of the “As If” principle and the preview made it look like the video was going to be animated in the same way that the are animated (with a hand writing down words/pictures, etc.). This was part of the reason that I had bookmarked it to view later.

After having just watched the short (1+ minute) video, I felt compelled to write a quick note about it. Why? Well, I had forgotten that the “As If” principle started with William James (famous psychologist) from the late 1800s. Additionally, the narrator mentions that there is decades of research to support James’ “As If” principle.