Magic is a great learning tool!


Rubber Band Penatration Explanation - Celebrity bloopers here

Time to bloom
Everything in it's own time - yes?
That is especially true of children.
They will learn that skill exactly when they are ready to and not on your fabricated schedule.

We don't rush up to a rose bud and because it is August, pull each petal open, forcing the flower to bloom. That doesn't work. Well it won't work on our children either!
Nowhere is it written what age your unique child will want to read or write or tap-dance.
Bear in mind that even if your reference "the experts" and their "bell curves" you still won't know when it is right for your child.

Have faith!

This is about integrity!

Follow through

Why do you need to follow through so much on a tennis or golf swing? After all, the ball is long gone.

Why do you have to honor a money back guarantee with a former customer who is never going to buy from you again (and it's six years later)?

Why do you have to reinvest and retrain an existing employee who needs some guidance when it would just be quicker and easier to hire someone new?

I think the reason is the same in all three cases. It's not because the thing you do at the end of your swing matters. It's because it's a slippery slope.

If you know that the last two inches of your follow through don't matter, then you'll start slowing down at three inches, or even four, and suddenly it does matter. If you draw the line on money back guarantees you'll keep sliding backwards, bit by bit, until it does matter. If you're quick to fire the employee who needs a lot of help, you'll be quicker with those that need just a little, and then, pretty soon, it's a very different place to work, isn't it?

Obsessing about the last inch of follow through ensures that the important parts of what you do get just as much (if not more) commitment.

From Seth Godin's blog

Wouldn't that be the ultimate school trip!!?

Spaceflight Ticket Prices

If you're planning a visit to the International Space Station, you'd better book your trip now - because prices are going up. A seat on the Russian Soyuz spaceship, the only flight available to space tourists, now costs $30 million, compared to $25 million earlier this year. Next year, the price will go up to $40 million.

Officials with Space Adventures, which organizes the trips with the Russian space agency, blame the falling value of the dollar for the price hike.

(Source: Associated Press and Early to Rise Newsletter)

Here is an interesting thought I gleaned from Wilbert Alix:

Without a sense of where you came from and a sense of connection with your ancestors you may be like a bonsai - tiny, stunted tree with no roots.

As home-schoolers we have a unique opportunity to research and really connect with our roots as families!

 Fear and the Creative Power of Your Mind

                     by Kathy Zant
             www.ZeroFearNow.com

Fear affects all of us. People talk about the
fight or flight response, but there's another
reaction that is even more common and
detrimental: becoming paralyzed, unable to move.
Thoughts about what may happen race through our
minds coming up with elaborate possibilities...
possibilities that will likely never occur.

Often when fear begins racing in our minds, waves
of emotion follow like a raging stream carrying
us away. Those emotions can be extremely
powerful. We begin to feel that the fears are in
fact truth, and that our visceral physical and
emotional reactions solidify our beliefs that we
can't move from where we are.

The emotions and physical reactions are very
real. The basis for those reactions -- the fear
-- usually is not. Those fear come from illusions
within our mind.

Isn't the mind wonderfully creative?

It can concoct elaborate schemes of what could
happen, and think through all of the ways you can
protect yourself like a chess game without an opponent.

Let's see if there are some ways we can use that
brilliant creative power of your mind to move you
forward, instead of erecting defense systems
against something that doesn't exist.

         How is fear keeping you stuck?

Do you want to ask for a raise, but you're afraid
of being denied?

Do you want to apply for a  more exciting job,
but you fear that you're not qualified?

Do you want to ask a pretty girl out for a date,
but the thought of her saying no makes your
stomach turn?

Do you want to lose weight, but inside there's a
quiet fear of the attention you might receive if
you do?

          Fear blocks your manifestation

No matter how much attention you might place on
achieving your goals, how much you want them,
hidden, unconscious fears often get in the way.
Then we end up feeling frustrated and angry that
our manifestation efforts aren't going the way we
planned or hoped.

                 Tips for overcoming fear

Explore your emotions. If you find yourself
within that raging stream of emotion, allow those
emotions to flow. But separate yourself from
them. Instead of following the current, pull your
conscious mind to the riverbank and watch the
emotions flow. You don't have to be carried away
by the river, you are not the river. But you will
learn a lot about yourself and your patterns by
watching your emotions flow through you. Perhaps
your intuition will show you where the basis for
those emotions exists within you, and you can
release the cause of your fears.

Separate your fear from the object of your fear.
If you fear being rejected, that may stop you
from asking for what you want or need from life.
The key is to not avoid the action that might
cause rejection, but to re-identify the problem
as the fear itself. Fear is the obstacle, the
rejection is not an obstacle. It's only feedback
that will guide you on the path to getting what
you want.

Re-address the consequences. What if your mind,
running off with possibilities, is completely
right? What is the absolute worst thing that can
happen from your worst fears coming true? If you
can find a place within yourself where the worst
possible scenario is somehow okay to you, then
the fear will dissipate. What if you are told
point blank that you're not qualified for the job
of your dreams? What happens next? Use your
mind's creative power to find ways where you can
be okay with the worst possible scenario. Perhaps
it means you take another course, or study at
home in the evenings, or manifest a job that's
more suited to your needs. The rejection is only
a problem if you don't have a plan of finding a
way to be okay no matter what happens.

Feel the fear and do it anyway. There are some
instances of fear-inducing situations where you
just can't find a logical way out. Your gripped
by fear, but you know that being stuck and
paralyzed is not an option. You have to move one
way or another. The only thing you can do is...
take action. You might be taking the "wrong"
action, but all you can do is move from the place
you were. When you can move, just a little bit,
you begin to develop momentum and the fear will
no longer be the primary driving force in your
life. You'll have moved from a place of inertia
into a place of movement, and you'll no longer be
blocked. That first step doesn't have to be a
huge step, it just needs to be A step.

from Mark Joyner:

Epigenetics is the study of how environmentally or behaviorally acquired traits can be passed on to future generations - without any change in the DNA of that organism.

Huh?

Yeah ...

Anyone paying attention to what's been happening in biology over the last 150 years just did a double take.

If this sounds to you like "Lamarckism" (the Lamarckism that you learned in High School was "disproven" by Darwinian/Mendelian genetics) you're exactly right.

Despite what has been believed as irrefutable biological truth, there is now a body of evidence that suggests that we didn't have the full picture. The study of Epigenetics shows that changes which occur to you as a result of your environment and behavior can be passed on to future generations. We don't fully understand "the how" yet, but the evidence of this phenomenon seems quite clear.

And no, these changes don't have anything to do with the way you treat your kids. They have everything to do with how you treat yourself.

For example, a cancer you get today could have been triggered by your great grand-mothers exposure to an industrial poison.

The passing of these non-genetic traits has been observed now across multiple generations of mice.

The implications are huge.

If these findings are right, then everything you do ...

... what you eat, your use of recreational chemicals (including alcohol and tobacco), where you live, your moods, your stress levels ...

All of these things can not only affect your health, but any adverse (or favorable) affects could be passed on to future generations as well.

If you've been looking for an excuse to change your lifestyle, I don't think you'll find a better one than that.

Stunning, isn't it?

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Welcome to Genius Sparks by Paul R. Scheele
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Do you ever find that you've adopted the
mannerisms or sayings of someone else --
without having realized it?

Perhaps it's a goofy face often exhibited by
a coworker seeking to ease a tense situation
or a common or quirky phrase of a close
friend or loved one.

The old adage "You learn from the company
you keep" is profoundly true.

As infants we learned by modeling those
around us. This natural learning method let us
acquire language, speech patterns, mannerisms,
and general orientation to our world.

You can use this same modeling technique
today to acquire new behaviors that help you
more effectively achieve your goals. It's a
process we use on our New Behavior Generator Paraliminal.

Modeling can help you develop personality
characteristics, patterns of self-motivation,
attitudes, and behaviors that distinguish
successful people from failures. Even highly
complex skills such as playing the guitar or
golf can be enhanced through modeling.

Here's how you do it.

* Identify a specific goal. Let's say you
want to improve your golf game by 10 percent or
give a presentation that will influence a
client to buy your product or service.

* Identify the behaviors that will lead you
to the goal. These could be personality traits,
emotional responses, or specific identifiable
actions, such as the body posture of a perfect
golf swing or the voice inflection of an
influential speaker.

* Select a model -- someone who consistently
demonstrates the behaviors that will lead you
to your goal. Ideally, this should be a
real person, possibly someone you personally
know, or someone you admire such as golf pro
Tiger Woods or the top account executive
in your company.

* Close your eyes, relax, and visualize your
model demonstrating the behaviors you have chosen.
Notice specific elements of behavior you desire,
the muscle movements, posture, rhythm, or voice.

* Now, see yourself in place of your model,
as if you removed their body and substituted yours.
Imagine you can see and hear your body, fully
demonstrating the exact behavior your model demonstrated.

* Finally, imagine stepping inside the image
of you to experience the new behaviors, the feeling
of your muscles, your posture, the rhythm and tempo
of your movements, or the quality of your voice.

Your brain can construct and step into any
resource. Modeling allows you to translate an
abstract set of neurological resources
into something more tangible. Your brain
accepts as fact that these behaviors can be
performed and will help you learn them.

Use this exercise to bring out your full
inner resources to achieve more success in
every area of your life.

fabulous link on children's vision.
http://www.childrensvision.com/learning.htm

Rules of Writing

One of the best ways to learn is by having fun. As you may know, I love playing with the English language. Here is a delicious set of rules created by Joe Hoare from the UK.
- Verbs HAS to agree with their subjects.
- Prepositions are not words to end sentences with.
- And don't start a sentence with a conjunction.
- It is wrong to ever split an infinitive.
- Avoid clichés like the plague.
- Also, always avoid annoying alliteration.
- Be more or less specific.
- Parenthetical remarks (however relevant) are (usually) unnecessary.
- Also too, never, ever use repetitive redundancies.
- No sentence fragments.
- Contractions aren't necessary and shouldn't be used.
- Foreign words and phrases are not apropos.
- Do not be redundant; do not use more words than necessary; it's highly superfluous.
- One should NEVER generalize.
- Comparisons are as bad as clichés.
- Don't use no double negatives.
- Eschew ampersands & abbreviations, etc.
- One-word sentences? Eliminate.
- Analogies in writing are like feathers on a snake.
- The passive voice is to be ignored.
- Eliminate commas, that are, not necessary. Parenthetical words however should be enclosed in commas.
- Never use a big word when a diminutive one would suffice.
- Kill all exclamation points!!!
- Use words correctly, irregardless of how others use them.
- Understatement is always the absolute best way to put forth earth-shaking ideas.
- Use the apostrophe in it's proper place and omit it when its not needed.
- Eliminate quotations. As Ralph Waldo Emerson said, "I hate quotations. Tell me what you know."
- If you've heard it once, you've heard it a thousand times: Resist hyperbole; not one writer in a million can use it correctly.
- Puns are for children, not groan readers.
- Go around the barn at high noon to avoid colloquialisms.
- Even IF a mixed metaphor sings, it should be derailed.
- Who needs rhetorical questions?
- Exaggeration is a billion times worse than understatement.
And finally...
- Proofread carefully to see if you any words out.

Enlightening quote from the guru's - Joe Vitale and Paul Zane Pilzer:

How many of us were told to go to school. We tell 10 years
old still today what do you want to be when you grow up. Notice you’re supposed to
study something in school, pick a career job, get out of high school or college, and do that
job the rest of your life. Have you met anyone Joe, who’s done the same thing for the
rest of their life?
Joe:
No.
Paul:
Yet we’re still teaching kids that way.
Joe:
Yes.
Paul:
It’s crazy, because what we should be teaching them is how to roll with the punches and
change their careers every 5, 10 years to learn new technology. Because today wealth
equals resources - physical resources, P, times technology, T, but the T is what matters
entirely and in almost any field, you’re in. You’re in the music business; you better learn
how to roll with vinyl records into digital CD’s and today into MP3’s, completely
different technologies, but still providing the end used product, music.