Learning Challenge: Happiness Jar revisited

Heart in a jar (Dreamstime)

Surprise! I've been keeping track of all the things I thought made me happy for the past two months or so. Looking through it, it's mostly stuff like "finally finishing x homework" or "buying a new x" though, haha. But more importantly to me, whenever I draw stuff I write down what I'm drawing in my journal. I write down how far I've gotten and what I want to do next, etc. I know these aren't things that explicitly make me happy on their own, but when I look back at these, I feel like I've achieved a lot since then. I can really see my own growth in the palm of my hand. I save old artwork too (though I've always done that) and it's always fun to look through and remind myself how far I've made it. It kind of inspires and motivates me to push even farther. I recommend everyone try this with their hobbies, actually.

Learning Challenge: Article

Daydreaming (Times of Israel)

I read Daydreaming is good: It means you're smart by Science Daily

I've always thought of daydreaming as being creative with more active daydreaming corresponding to higher creativity, and it looks like empirical data was gathered to help corroborate the belief. I wonder just how much daydreaming and intelligence/creativity are linked. Does daydreaming increase creativity or does it just act as a signal that suggests the person is creative? Anyways I believe that creativity and intelligence can be developed and trained, so I wonder if I'd start daydreaming more as I develop. This is all given that I don't play with my phone immediately when I get bored, which I think has largely replaced daydreaming in recent years.

Learning Challenge: Sitting Article

Chair in use (Wikipedia)

Though I knew that prolonged sitting was bad for you, I didn't know that it was as bad as the article says it is. The article has good advice to get up and walk around or stretch every 30 minutes or so, and I think I'll take that advice. Maybe not as often as 30 minutes though, since sometimes I get into 'focus mode' and end up doing stuff for a long time. I'm still young though, so I should be fine not stretching or moving too often.

Article: https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2017/09/04/547580952/get-off-the-couch-baby-boomers-or-you-may-not-be-able-to-later

Learning Challenge: I wish my teacher knew...

Chalkboard (Eagle Country Online)

I read "What Kids Wish Their Teacher Knew" by Donna De La Cruz.

I think this article brought to attention a very good idea. Having these anonymous forms for kids to fill out ends up in some really eye opening responses. It shows that a lot of kids go through some rough times and are often hindered by them. This kind of activity encourages people to minimize assumptions about other people and increase empathy. A good way to practice compassion while respecting privacy is, of course, to throw out any assumptions you might make about someone. I haven't participated in anything like this, not as far as I can remember at least.

Learning Challenge: Time Management Article

Stopwatch (Wikipedia)

I read 'Being Busy Is Killing Our Ability To Think Creatively' by Derek Beres

What I knew going into this was that distracting yourself was a bad thing for productivity. I didn't know that distracting yourself and being busy all the time could deeply affect your creativity, but it makes sense in hindsight. The article gives some suggestions on how to disconnect from all these things making us busy, such as taking a long walk or doing stuff that isn't that intellectually demanding. I think I'll take a few sporadic breaks everyday from now on and turn to my canvas so I can keep my creativity up.

Learning Challenge: Learning about sleep

Hotel Bed (Wikipedia)

I read this article from The Atlantic.

One of the things that was confirmed that I already knew about was that the reason for why we sleep isn't fully understood and there are a lot of theories. I also knew it was bad for your health to be sleep deprived. What I didn't know that getting 6 hours of sleep a night every night can count as chronic sleep deprivation and can cause serious health problems. One thing that I'm going to try to do is get more sleep than I've been getting recently and seeing if I feel better and healthier throughout the day.

Time Challenge: Schedule Review

Clock (Public Domain Pictures)

I have to say I'm definitely on track to finish the class a little bit early, or rather, I have enough extra credit to save myself if I miss some assignments, haha. The problems I've been having with time management is that some of my other classes are pretty unpredictable in terms of workload. Sometimes an assignment in one class takes 30 minutes to do then the next one takes 6 hours. It's pretty frustrating and I always end up pushing my Indian Epics assignments back until deadline, when I absolutely must finish them. Other than that though, I think I could afford to be less lazy over the weekend and stop doing all my work on Sunday.

Learning Challenge: Deskercise

The coveted treadmill desk (Flickr)

https://smallbiztrends.com/2015/10/deskercise-desk-exercises.html

So I'm already doing arm stretches, since sitting in a chair makes you kind of want to do that, doesn't it? The shoulder and neck stretches are also pretty satisfying and get you a little bit more energized. I also do wrist stretches occasionally since I can tire them out through drawing and typing. Don't want to develop carpal tunnel syndrome now. Some of these workouts seem really odd though and I wouldn't do it in public. I mean, could you imagine someone throwing windmill punches in their chair like they're trying to pulverize the air or something?

Learning Challenge: Happiness Jar part 2

Heart (Wikipedia)

So I ended up keeping track of things that made me happy in a journal, along with recording other stuff that was noteworthy. Among the things that made me happy were finishing my homework early, watching Made in Abyss with a friend (or maybe that made me sad?), getting a high grade on my presentation, and drawing a lot of stuff (still haven't started any big projects though). I think it's a nice thing to do, since we usually focus on the negative things that happen to us.

Learning Challenge: Happiness Jar

Sticky Note (Flickr)

I think I'm going to keep a list of things that made me happy on my phone's note app. I'll update it every night with what's made me happy that day. I can write down stuff like "I finally finished x assignment" or "I played x game with x and x happened" or "I went out to eat at x with x", or "I finally learned to play x on piano". Though if I do this I might as well just keep a regular journal.