hat does a memory champion do to keep his brain quick, healthy and sharp?

1. I exercise my brain
2. I watch what I eat

Studies tell us that as we age one of the best things that we can do to prevent Alzheimer's and brain dementia is to fuel our brain with good foods and exercise our brain. In regard to brain foods, there is evidence that dark chocolate, red wine, clams, asparagus, walnuts, cherries, turmeric and apples are all good nutrients for your brain. A short list of bad brain foods are alcohol, artificial flavors, artificial sweeteners, corn syrup and energy drinks.

Exercise your brain with games such as crossword puzzles, word finds and Sudoku, and activities such as gardening. There are many resources online dedicated to helping you not only maintain but also increase your mental abilities. The main objective is to stay active, both mentally and physically!

Here’s a healthy challenge? The fastest I have ever memorized a deck of cards is 1 minute and 1 second. Can you beat my score? Have fun!


1. Einstein's Ability to Risk and Willingness to Be Wrong by Ron White

The early life of Einstein gives us some clues to the great man he would become. He was never one to dominate conversation to prove his intellect. Even as a child he didn't talk much. It has been said that he didn't talk until the age of 3 (there are conflicting accounts on this). But it took him a little longer to talk than the average child. Yet, we must remember that Albert Einstein was far more than average.

Einstein's parents hardly coddled their firstborn. They gave him tremendous freedom to roam and grow. This no doubt had a positive outcome on his development. When he was just 4, he was allowed to roam the neighborhood alone. Believe it or not, his parents even encouraged him to cross the street on his own at this young age. They watched the first few times to ensure that he looked both ways, but soon he was on his own.

Now keep in mind, when he was crossing the street, he wasn't dodging Fords, Chevrolets, Mercedes or cars with a lot of horsepower. He was dodging only true horse power! In other words, he was dodging horse-drawn carriages. But, it was still very dangerous for the young child. In our world today, I would not encourage my 4-year-old to roam the neighborhood alone or even allow him near the street. That being said, the principles of self-reliance and risk that Einstein's parents implemented in his life are ones we can perhaps model on a smaller scale. Einstein certainly modeled this behavior with his own son on a smaller scale.

In his late 20s, Einstein moved to Zurich with his first wife, Mileva, and their son. Friedrich Adler was living near Einstein and they became great friends. They would often get together to share ideas. Oftentimes their sons would get rowdy and it would be hard for the two men to talk. Other parents might barge in and tell their sons to be quiet, that they are having a meeting. Not Adler and Einstein. These great thinkers would climb into the attic to carry on their conversation. They allowed their boys to grow and explore even if they were noisy.

His freedom as a child and the freedom he gave his son were in part due to his attitude on failure. He was not afraid to fail. After all, he tackled some of the most perplexing questions of our universe. Many would have shied away from tackling these questions simply because the rate of failure seemed extraordinarily high. However, it is evident that Einstein was not afraid to be wrong or to fail.

When Einstein was 50, reporters were hounding him for an interview during the time in which he was working on a unified field theory. Put into layman's terms, this meant he was working on a theory that would explain the entire universe in a single mathematical equation. He had the attention of the world. Reporters parked outside his home in the vain hope for an interview. Many kept all-night vigils waiting for the story. As a rule, Einstein did not chase the spotlight and dodged the requests often. It was the same in this instance as well. He did, however, allow an interview with one reporter from The New York Times. You see The New York Times was edited by Carr Van Anda, and Van Anda had found an error in one of Einstein's previous equations. Imagine that! The editor of The New York Times finding an error in the math of Einstein! Don't you think that Einstein must have been irate that the editor would point this out? He must have been insulted. Actually, on the contrary, Einstein was impressed and that is the reason he allowed an interview to the reporter from The New York Times. You see, Einstein was not afraid to be wrong, and when corrected he was not insulted.

At Princeton, Albert Einstein was more like a kindly uncle. When he arrived in 1935, he was asked what he would require for his study. He replied, "A desk, some pads and a pencil, and a large wastebasket—to hold all of my mistakes."

Albert Einstein spent his last two decades trying to reconcile quantum physics with relativity. His Holy Grail—a so-called "Unified Field Theory"—eluded him. He once casually mentioned to a colleague that he was on the verge of his "greatest discovery ever," before admitting that "it didn't pan out" just two weeks later.

One day in his twilight years, he received a letter from a 15-year-old girl asking for help with a homework assignment. She soon received a curious reply: a page full of unintelligible diagrams, along with an attempt at consolation: "Do not worry about your difficulties in mathematics," Einstein told her, "I can assure you that mine are much greater!"

The man who was the greatest success at mathematics also failed a lot at them. But that didn't stop him from moving forward.

Not only was he willing to take risks in math, he also risked when he gambled. While attending a physics symposium in Las Vegas one year, Albert Einstein, to the astonishment of many of his sober-minded colleagues, spent a fair amount of time at the craps and roulette tables.

"Einstein is gambling as if there were no tomorrow," an eminent physicist remarked one day. "What troubles me," another replied, "is that he may know something!"

Too often in life, we attempt to spend all our energy demonstrating how we are right instead of accepting constructive criticism and getting better. This is not true of Einstein. Not only was he not afraid of being wrong, he was not afraid of being corrected. Ask yourself honestly: How do you respond when you are corrected? Do you lash out or are you grateful?

If you want to develop the mind of Einstein. You must not be afraid to fail; allow yourself the opportunity to fail. Herman Melville put it this way: "He who has never failed somewhere, that man can not be great."

Thomas Edison, when he was constructing the light bulb, built 1,000 prototypes that did not work before he successfully built the one that we still use today. A reporter asked Edison how it felt to fail 1,000 times. Edison replied, "You misunderstand. I did not fail 1,000 times. I successfully found 1,000 ways that the light bulb would not work." Edison, like Einstein, did not view failure the way so many do. They viewed it as acceptable and a way to learn and grow.

The fear of failure could have paralyzed Einstein and Edison, yet it did not. What about you? Are you so paralyzed with fear that you have settled for mediocrity? Don't allow that to happen. Embrace risk and failure. Learn that it is OK to be wrong, and run headlong into the rewards of risk as Einstein did.

—Ron White


2. Quotes of The Week

Challenges

"Contentment is for cows; a challenging purpose is for people." —Denis Waitley

"Problems are only opportunities in work clothes." —Henry J. Kaiser

"The most rewarding things you do in life are often the ones that look like they cannot be done."
—Arnold Palmer

"When you've got something to prove, there's nothing greater than a challenge."
—Terry Bradshaw

"Great spirits have always encountered violent opposition from mediocre minds."
—Albert Einstein

"There aren't any great men. There are just great challenges that ordinary men like you and me are forced by circumstances to meet." —William F. Halsey

"I will say this for adversity: people seem to be able to stand it, and that is more than I can say for prosperity." —Kin Hubbard

"When we long for life without difficulties, remind us that oaks grow strong in contrary winds and diamonds are made under pressure." —Peter Marshal

"Challenges make you discover things about yourself that you never really knew. They´re what make the instrument stretch—what makes you go beyond the norm." —Cicely Tyson

"A feeling of confidence and personal power comes from facing challenges and overcoming them." —Brian Tracy

"Strength does not come from winning. Your struggles develop your strengths. When you go through hardships and decide not to surrender, that is strength." —Arnold Schwarzenegger

"The walking of Man is falling forwards." —Ralph Waldo Emerson

"Fortunately, problems are an everyday part of our life. Consider this: If there were no problems, most of us would be unemployed. Realistically, the more problems we have and the larger they are, the greater our value to our employer." —Zig Ziglar

"You may have to fight a battle more than once to win it." —Margaret Thatcher

"The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy."
—Martin Luther King Jr.


3. Riding the Mo Train by John C. Maxwell

Albert Einstein once made a wonderful point about his theory of relativity: He only came up with it once, but it kept him in pipe tobacco for years.

Einstein realized what more leaders need to discover: that a major breakthrough can launch an organization from good to great, so great leaders always push for that breakthrough.

Breakthroughs occur when we continually:
1. Meet needs (which allows us to stay in the arena);
2. Improve ourselves and our team; and
3. Succeed. It's a fact that there is no success like success.

Pushing for a breakthrough generates a leader's best friend—momentum. Momentum makes your work or your mission easier to accomplish than anything else. I often tell leaders that momentum is worth three staff members. In fact, if some leaders would get rid of the right three staff members, they might instantly get some momentum.

Momentum is the great exaggerator for both the good and the bad. When you have no momentum, things look worse than they really are. And when you have momentum, it makes things look better than they ever seemed to be.

So you've got to push for the breakthrough—from buildup to breakthrough, from good to great. Good is buildup; great is breakthrough.

But there's a temptation that comes with a breakthrough and the momentum that comes with it—the temptation to ease up and celebrate the victory. You just kind of want to sit back and say, "Wow! Aren't we good?" It just feels good to know you've achieved something. And while it's OK to celebrate the touchdowns, we have to remember that the next play in the game just might get us beat.

In fact, dancing in the end zone is exactly the opposite of what you should do. When you have a breakthrough, that's when you spend more time, more energy and more money. Once you have that ball rolling, the compounding effect is so huge you don't ever want that ball to stop.
Instead, the time to ease up is when things have slowed down. When you don't have momentum and when you don't have a breakthrough—when the train already has stopped—get off and take a rest. You weren't going anywhere anyway!

But once the train gets going again, don't get off. When you've got momentum and the breakthrough, it's dangerous to jump off. You could hurt yourself. You could hurt your organization.

So if you want to go from good leadership to great leadership, keep pushing toward a breakthrough. And when momentum arrives, either because you are near the goal or because you've broken through, don't ease up. That's when you push the pedal to the metal.