Empty Decks and Misguided Frugality | Retire29

Expense reduction and optimization isn’t about avoiding the daily Starbucks or always flying out on a Tuesday. Those things help, for sure, but you need to look at expenses the same way you look at saving (a penny saved is a penny earned, right?). Most financial gurus, and me, advise people to “making saving automatic” and to create streams of passive income. Expenses are no different. “Remove/reduce automatic expenses,” meaning, cut out those expenses that Read more…

If You Want Become an Expert At Something, Teach it to Someone Else

You don’t necessarily need to get a job at a university, and depending on how eclectic the skill is, you might find trouble finding willing pupils. However, the internet is always a good place to start trying to teach, and if nothing else you can always practice to yourself. The important thing is that you approach learning a skill with the mentality of teaching it to others. via If You Want Become an Expert At Read more…

Replacing Twitter with Phone Calls: An Adventure in Unplugging – 99U

Each time we check a Twitter feed or Facebook update, we encounter something novel and feel more connected socially… and get another dollop of reward hormones. But remember, it is the dumb, novelty-seeking portion of the brain driving the limbic system that induces this feeling of pleasure, not the planning, scheduling, higher-level thought centers in the prefrontal cortex. Make no mistake: email-, Facebook- and Twitter-checking constitute a neural addiction. via Replacing Twitter with Phone Calls: Read more…

How to Contact a Busy Person | The Art of Manliness

Start Contacting Busy People Remember: busy people aren’t selfish and inconsiderate; I’ve actually found the opposite to be true — that some of the busiest people are actually the most giving types of people. But they also want to be efficient with their time. Remember that the time they give to you is time they sacrifice from working on their own businesses or spending time with their families. So contact them in a way that Read more…

Most Affordable Online Colleges for 2015 – The Simple Dollar

Many of the cheapest online schools in the country also rank among the best-performing online schools in measures of faculty quality, technological capability, and student satisfaction. Ultimately, you want to go to an affordable online school that offers the bachelor’s or master’s degree program you’re looking for. In addition to the factors I already mentioned, all of the online schools that made my top 10 most affordable colleges list offer a variety of undergraduate and Read more…

Becoming a Millionaire Is a Letdown | Mr. Everyday Dollar

How to Track Your Spending, Income, and Investments I know what you’re thinking, boring! Nobody wants to plug numbers into a spreadsheet. I’m a weirdo because it might just be my all-time favorite thing to do. The reason I want you to start, or try it for one month, is because I guarantee you’ll learn at least one thing about your finances you didn’t know. via Becoming a Millionaire Is a Letdown | Mr. Everyday Read more…

You Are Not a Zoo Animal: How to Escape Human Captivity and Reclaim Your Primal Health | The Art of Manliness

An overhaul of the way we view what our bodies need in order to thrive is long overdue. The fitness viewpoint of compartmentalizing movement into a small box during the day isn’t working for us. When you go from stationary for 10+ hours to intense exercise, it just doesn’t work. What we need instead is a lifestyle — a nourishing movement diet — rather than a workout “supplement.” We need an approach where we’re moving Read more…

Chasing Electrical Demons to Cut your Power Bill by 80%

The performance looks even better when you compare against high-income households: one of my Canadian friends ruefully admitted that his power bill tops $900 per month every January as his electric heat pump fights to keep his large custom home warm in the face of Ottawa’s near-arctic winter weather. A Texan friend reports a $300 per month cooling bill for the hottest four months of the year, and even a fellow Coloradan uses over $200 Read more…

Oakland Police license plate reader data set handed to journalist | Naked Security

Such privacy is crucial for a number of reasons. For one thing, it shields us from persecution, whether it concerns our race, religion, gender, political orientation, or any other of a vast number of personal attributes. Can our geolocation reveal such things about us? Absolutely. Catherine Crump, a law professor at the University of California, Berkeley, made this point when talking to Ars: via Oakland Police license plate reader data set handed to journalist | Read more…