Hello, how was your July? Are you doing the things you wanted to do this summer?

Below are a couple of items that caught my attention this month:

• A TED Talk about the importance of caring for your emotional health.
• An article about we why should all read more!

 
TED Talk: Why we all need to practice emotional first aid by Guy Winch: “Why is it that our physical health is so much more important to us than our psychological health?” A talk about how emotional injuries stay with us unless we treat them as seriously as physical injuries.
 
Article: Why reading books should be your priority, according to science. Reading is good for your health: “...the practice of reading books creates cognitive engagement that improves lots of things including vocabulary, thinking skills, and concentration. It also can affect empathy, social perception, and emotional intelligence…” A great excuse to pick up a (fiction) book! (See the article for an argument to read more fiction.)

Happy fall! I’m sharing a few things that I hope you’ll find interesting.

• A book recommendation about becoming a better conversationalist.
• A TED talk about getting things done.
• A podcast about family.

Book Recommendation:
If you’ve ever wondered about what you can do to improve the way you communicate, We Need To Talk: How to Have Conversations That Matter by Celeste Headlee offers some great tips. Headlee discusses what we can do (and not do) in order to better engage in conversations as we speak and listen to each other in ways that really help us connect. 
 
TED Talk:
Sometimes dreams can seem daunting and out-of-reach. In this TED talk, Stephen Duneier talks about breaking down big goals into tiny, manageable chunks.

Podcast:
In This American Life Episode #360: Switched at Birth, the story of two families is told. Two baby girls were accidentally switched at birth. One mother realizes it right away and mentions it to her husband, but doesn’t tell the girls until 43 years later. A fascinating look at nature vs. nurture, and how the mothers, siblings, the community, and the daughters themselves respond to this revelation.