Tech Productivity Issue #240 (Use Your Body to Exercise Your Mind)

Issue #240 (Use Your Body to Exercise Your Mind) 09/18/23

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I'm not personally very big into exercise, but I do like to stay active usually via playing sports if possible. Maybe volleyball or tennis. But I have a number of friends who are into working out regularly and a few of them have expressed to me the importance of exercise for improving memory and just helping your brain in general.

A recent video from Big Think puts forth the same basic theory, that your brain's health is dependent on physical activity. It's called The #1 way to strengthen your mind is to use your body, featuring Wendy Suzuki, a professor of neuroscience and psychology at NYU.

In it she discusses something called 'the runner's high', she looks at the two parts of the brain that help with memory and focus/attention (the hippocampus and the prefrontal cortex), and brain plasticity.

Really great stuff in just a 6-minute video that's well worth a watch if you feel like your memory, attention, and focus are starting to dwindle.

Now on to this week's hand-picked productivity links!

Tools & Apps

LinkSpree — A link management platform to organize, access, and share your links/bookmarks via labels, colors, and icons.

Lens — Mac or Windows app that lets you turn your Zoom sessions into a masterclass by measuring attentiveness and engagement using leaderboards, Q&A, and quizzes.

This Productivity App Promises Balance — Sunsama is the daily planner for busy professionals – it helps you organize your tasks, meetings and emails all in one place. Our focus bar helps you keep track of your tasks and timer even outside of Sunsama. Try it and you don’t have to pay if you don’t save an hour every day. sponsor

Spoke.ai — A Slack plugin that allows you to get channel updates and info via customizable, scheduled channel summaries.

Humata — ChatGPT for all your files that allows you to get insights on lengthy technical docs 100x faster

Vocal — Send voice notes via email. record your voice and send audio messages in Gmail and Outlook.

Bardeen — Chrome extension to automate manual work, allowing you to connect 30+ apps, scrape websites, and create workflows via building blocks.

Articles & Resources

Why is it So Hard to Measure Productivity? — Is it necessary to measure productivity the same way we measure what makes a productive baseball team in the vein of Moneyball?

Three Steps to Increase Your Chance of Getting a Raise — Some simple suggestions that may help you when seeking salary increases, with more of a long-haul view in mind.

HubSpot Says Remote Employees are More Engaged, Just as Productive — A report from one company's success with remote workers, their satisfaction in the workplace, backed up by charts and data.

Bytes: Your Favourite JavaScript Newsletter — I subscribe to a lot of newsletters, but this is definitely one I look forward to. Entertaining with lots of cool and useful coding tidbits and tools. sponsor

9 Team Health Check Methods to Unlock Team Potential — This is a comprehensive guide that covers everything you'll need to know about doing regular team health checks, along with some real-world examples of health checks performed by companies like Spotify, Atlassian, and more.

11 Leaders Weigh In On Their Top Time Management Techniques — Some helpful insights for those in leadership roles on how to improve time management skills, gathered from various professionals, including founders, CEOs, and business coaches.

Slow Ideas — A long read from the New Yorker in 2013 on the history of how innovation can sometimes spread fast while at other times it spreads at a snails pace.

Suggestions?

Have a suggestion for a productivity-related tool, article, or other resource? Send me a direct message via X (@LouisLazaris) and I’ll consider including it in a future issue.

Stay productive!

Louis
techproductivity.co
@LouisLazaris

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