Rarely is the path to any goal or successful outcome an easy and direct ride. Yet the public most often sees or hears only about the end result and / or when the media picks it up. What’s missed and what the public often doesn’t hear about is all that happened in route, the work that was done, the sacrifices made, the life lessons learned, and the temporary setbacks that had to be overcome on the way to any given goal or destination.

My objective is that through these interviews, the reader will pick up pearls of wisdom and overriding universal life principles that they can apply to their own life regardless of their destination.

- Joseph Sale, Founder, Optimum Performance / Human Performance Systems

Joe Sale / John, on your website you talk about your passion for photography. What is your story leading up to your work as a photographer?

John Cooper / Ever since I was a child I have always been interested in photography. I used to shoot with those old 110 toy cameras and would have a stack of the cartridges laying around until my grandmother would go develop them for me.

I never really considered doing photography as a main profession growing up because I never wanted it to feel like work (or maybe I was just lazy because photography is WORK). I would just shoot what I could here-and-there and hope to capture something that interested me.

Anyway, I went on to study graphic design and worked for many years at a small advertising agency. I even started doing product photography for several of our clients but I was always more interested in shooting the tiny details of the product rather than a static, boring shot for an ad (which didn’t make the clients too happy).

I started taking photography courses shortly after and tried to learn as much as I could about the technical side of photography. I always felt I had a decent eye but I needed to improve my knowledge about how to get the most out of a camera.

In 2007 I began training in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu. I fell in love with the sport immediately and started attending tournaments, as a spectator.

One of the first tournaments I photographed was the 2009 Pan Jiu-Jitsu Championships. I had shot a couple of smaller tournaments but this was one of the big ones. The funny thing is I didn’t get too many photos because I would catch myself watching the matches rather than snapping photos. Besides, trying to shoot from outside the barricades with all those people around posed its own challenges.

Now I try to attend all of the major (and some smaller) tournaments on the west coast with plans of traveling to shoot the ones that are further away.

Joe Sale / John, I’ve see your Brazilian Jiu Jitsu photos on your website cooperfoto.com. In my opinion they are absolutely amazing. What are your thought processes as you shoot at a tournament?

John Cooper / Thank you. My main goal at any tournament is to shoot the emotion of the matches. Yes, I like to capture the takedowns, the submissions, etc but what’s more important to me is the emotional range that athletes go through during a match. My main goal is to capture that range. One of my favorite photos came to me by accident. It isn’t a technically perfect photo nor is it well composed but the photo tells a story. I was shooting a match right in front of me when I heard a scream from across the gym. Someone had just won a gold medal at the brown belt level. As I looked over, their backs to me, I saw his hand raised so I started snapping photos. He then runs towards the crowd and jumps into the arms of his coaches and friends. I shot the whole sequence not thinking much of it. When I got home and looked at the photos I noticed in the bottom left corner of the photo was the losing athlete with his head in his hands being contrasted by the winning athlete embracing the crowd in victory. I didn’t even notice the other athlete at the time I shot it.

Joe Sale / When you shoot a Brazilian Jiu Jitsu match how many photos do you come away with that are “A game” photos?

John Cooper / That’s a good question. During a single day tournament I will shoot upwards of 2000 photos. I try to eliminate the obviously blurred, etc photos during my down time so that number is probably higher. As far as ‘A’ game photos, I would take a guess at maybe five or so. These are the photos that I would call portfolio pieces. That isn’t to say the other photos are bad but these ones really stand out.

Joe Sale / How is shooting Mixed Martial Arts different from shooting Brazilian Jiu Jitsu?

John Cooper / The biggest challenge for me is the cage itself. I have not had the opportunity to shoot above the cage yet so I have only shot through the fence. Other than that, it is basically the same for me.

Joe Sale / What other sports do you shoot? How is shooting other sports different from Mixed Martial Arts or Brazilian Jiu Jitsu?

John Cooper / I have photographed football, basketball, soccer and baseball. The main difference is where the action is taking place and trying to anticipate that place. Of those sports, baseball is probably the easiest for me because the action is sporadic. Basketball is probably the hardest for me because it involves quick passes, running etc. (plus it is probably the sport I have the least experience shooting.

Shooting Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu isn’t like that. I know where the action is going to take place. Because I have trained I have an idea what to expect in certain situations (I am no expert though). And maybe just my passion for it makes it seem easier for me.

Joe Sale / John, your photos can be found on BJJ Legends and in GracieMag. I imagine it’s great to see your work out there. Please expand on that.

John Cooper / Yes it is. But not from an ego stand point. If I have a photo that I think is great I want to share it with everyone. I sometimes wish I could have everyone over to my house and watch a slideshow of all the photos just so that I am not the only one to see them. And I love when magazines like Jiu-Jitsu Magazine, Jiu-Jitsu Style, GracieMag or BJJ Legends call and ask for a photo of so-and-so from that one tournament because now everyone gets to see it, not just my wife (Sorry for the shameless plugs).

Joe Sale / John, on your website you say that “photography is about capturing and immortalizing those moments in time that can never be captured again, at least not with the same meaning.” I thought that was so well stated. Please elaborate on that.

John Cooper / Part of the reason I LOVE sports photography is that it is unscripted and once a moment happens it is gone forever. My job is to capture that moment. Yes, I can photograph 1,000 triangle chokes, but not one of them is the same. I don’t just mean from a technical stand point or and angle stand point. I go back to the emotion of the moment as well. What is going through the athletes head when he/she is trapped in the triangle (other than escaping)? What about the athlete who is on the verge of winning a championship? Hell, what about the white belt who is competing in his first tournament (and maybe only one) and he has that triangle locked tight! Wow! THAT is what I mean by it can never be captured the same again. You have one shot to capture it.

Joe Sale / John how can people or organizations contact you to book you for an upcoming event, photoshoot, or tournament?

John Cooper / You can contact me through my website, Cooperfoto or email me at john@cooperfoto.com. You can also ‘Like’ me on Facebook at Cooperfoto or follow me on Twitter @cooperfoto

Thanks so much Joe for the interview. I had a great time.

About John Cooper

John Cooper is an avid sports photographer and Brazilian Jiu Jitsu enthusiast. His work has been published in magazines, on websites, promotional materials and academy walls. He lives in Orange County, CA with his wife of 13 years and their two children Analiesa and Aedan. Look for him at a tournament near you.

Photo by Cooperfoto

More specifically, I will discuss the three macronutrients, proteins, fats, and carbohydrates and their functions for Brazilian Jiu Jitsu Practitioners and Mixed Martial Artists.

Let’s start with proteins. Proteins are made up of chains of individual amino acids. Different foods have different distributions and ratios of amino acids.

Amino acids can be categorized primarily as essential amino acids and non essential amino acids. The topic of amino acids is somewhat complex and will be covered in more detail in an upcoming article.

 As an example eggs are known to have the highest Biological Value / BV as a source of protein. In essence egg protein becomes the yardstick by which other proteins are measured. Another marker used to measure the quality of a protein is known as the Protein Efficiency Ratio / PER. More specifically Protein Efficiency Ratio / PER represents to what degree a given protein is a catalyst for muscle growth. In the case of eggs this simply means that the unique make up of amino acids found in eggs is highly recognizable and usable by the human body.

Is egg protein great for everybody?

No.

As I mentioned in an earlier article, people are, to varying degrees, biochemically unique. So, it’s not cookie cutter, one size fits all.

Protein and their corresponding amino acids are the major constituents involved in muscle tissue repair. For the Brazilian Jiu Jitsu Practitioner, Mixed Martial Artist, or any athlete that trains at an intense level, high quality protein used correctly is extremely important.

The delayed onset muscle soreness / DOMS that athletes experience about 36 hours after workouts is due to high intensity training.

It’s generally accepted in sports nutrition circles that the consumption of varying amounts carbohydrate with protein increases the release of insulin from the pancreas which acts to drive nutrients, such as amino acids into cells where they can do their work.

Next on the list is carbohydrates. Carbohydrates provide nourishment for the physical body as well as the brain. Carbohydrates range from simple to complex. They are an ultimate source of glycogen which is stored in both your muscles and liver and functions to meet energy needs, an obvious concern for Brazilian Jiu Jitsu Practitioners and Mixed Martial Artists.

Last but not least are fats. Fats have important functions as a macronutrient. Some fats are good while some do not support human performance. Monounsaturated fats, like olive oil are an example of healthy fats while trans fats / hydrogenated fats are now recognized as less than desirable.

An often overlooked function of dietary fats is its role of metabolizing the fat soluble vitamins. These include vitamin A, D, E, K.

 A more well known function of fats is as a back up energy system. It’s also important to note that from a caloric standpoint fats are a more dense form of calories at 9 calories per gram as opposed to proteins and carbs which weigh in at about 4 calories per gram each.

 Another overlooked benefit of healthy dietary fats is their influence on satiation. So for guys working to make weight for competition dietary fats are important which can be considered counterintuitive. As I mentioned earlier at 9 calories per gram, fats pack more calories per gram than protein and carbs but in very controlled volume, dietary fat will allow your brain to minimize the desire for more calories.

Another role of scientifically managed macronutrient consumption is it’s role in inflammation. As a Brazilian Jiu Jitsu Practitioner or Mixed Martial Artist preparing for competition, getting dinged up is par for the course. Most times it’s more than dinged up. At times guys go into fights already banged up. That’s rough. However, there are ways to manage macronutrient consumption to at least lessen the inflammatory load from wear and tear, and acute injuries during training.

Many Brazilian Jiu Jitsu Practitioners, Mixed Martial Artists, and athletes in general train hard but don’t pay attention to their nutrition.

I usually say, “If I can control it and if it’s a known influencer or cofactor in the success equation, then I pay attention to it.”

I met with Gustavo Dantas recently. He is a well known and well respected 3rd Degree Black Belt in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and President of Nova Uniao, USA. In our conversation I referred to well managed nutrition as a high percentage move for the Brazilian Jiu Jitsu Practitioner.

Gustavo Dantas Brazilian Jiu Jitsu is opening a new Academy in February of this year. Gustavo is known for producing many high end Brazilian Jiu Jitsu Medalists and he also enjoys helping people improve their lives through the practice of Jiu Jitsu. Gustavos programs also include Kids Jiu Jitsu and Womens Jiu Jitsu instruction.

It’s the finer nuances and finer distinctions of managing nutrition that can make a significant difference when it comes to Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and Mixed Martial Arts competition and in managing your body and mind as a human resource in both the short and long term.

Joe Sale, CNS, CSCS

Call Optimum Performance / Human Performance Systems today at 480-241-2621 and mention this article by Joe Sale, CNS, CSCS, Managing Whole Food Nutrition for Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and Mixed Martial Arts, and receive a free consultation with Joe.

About Joseph Sale

Joseph Sale, CNS, CSCS, is a board certified nutrition specialist and a nationally accredited physical conditioning specialist. His educational credentials include a Bachelor of Science and a Doctor of Naturopathic Medicine. Joe has been an adjunct faculty instructor and guest lecturer at numerous colleges, universities, and corporations covering human anatomy, physiology, performance nutrition, corporate performance, and precursors to musculoskeletal sports injuries among other topics. He’s been a guest expert on radio and television and is the author of the Optimum Human Performance Course.

In this interview with Azantis biotechnology, and Mickey Schuett we discuss new product development and the science behind nutraceutical ingredients in terms of how and why they influence human health.

- Joseph Sale, Founder, Optimum Performance Human Performance Systems

Joe Sale / Mickey, Azantis is a science and research focused biotechnology company. The growing Azantis portfolio includes Polyphenols, Carotenoids, Omega 3 Phospholipid blends and Fatty Acids that influence human metabolism and human performance. Please talk about the company, raw materials. and the clinical science and research behind the raw materials.

Azantis / Azantis is a company focused on innovation of science based products in the lipid area that include (but are not limited to) Astaxanthin, Krill Oil, Phospholipids, Liposomals (Vit C & Glutathione) & Algae. Most of the products that Azantis markets have clinical trials that have been done on the individual ingredients. Azantis puts these ingredients together to make finished products for its client base. There are years of research on all of the ingredients mentioned above.

Joe Sale / Liposomes which are made up of phospholipids are now being used as a nutrient delivery system for molecules with low bioavailability. In essence nutrients are embedded in the liposome to enhance delivery. Please discuss the benefits of the Azantis proprietary liposomes.

Azantis / Yes, the amazing thing is that the idea came from the pharmaceutical arena. Drug companies have been using liposomes to deliver very toxic cancer fighting therapies for some time. The pharmaceutical model uses synthetic chemicals to construct their liposomes. For their application this is fine, since they are delivering highly toxic drugs anyway.

We saw the potential of using natural liposomes to deliver healthy nutrition. It took several years to review the pharmaceutical model and convert the liposomes into totally natural ingredients. When we were done, we realized that our liposomes are made of such great materials, using phosphatidyl choline, that the liposomes themselves would be good for a person even if they didn’t have anything in them. So, we have the only totally natural liposomes on the market that specify the amount of PC (Phosphatidyl Choline) per dose (a generous 400 mg) and that use natural Phosphatidyl Choline.

A couple other people have had the idea. But they are using ingredients that don’t meet our quality standards. What they get is either an emulsion instead of a true liposome, or if they do get a liposome, they are using hydrogenated Phosphatidyl Choline. Phosphatidyl Choline is a lipid, or fat, so it can be hydrogenated. Everyone knows that hydrogentated fats aren’t the best choice. It goes clear back to the difference between genuine butter and margarine. Margarine is hydrogenated fat. It causes blocked arteries, high cholesterol. Not what I choose to put in my body) I should mention that we have seen a label claiming they use ‘hydroxylated’ Phosphatidyl Choline. This is just a trick to try to hide the fact that they are using hydrogenated Phosphatidyl Choline.

Anyway, back to the story: The hydrogenated Phosphatidyl Choline is likely being used because other companies haven’t figured out how to make stable liposomes using the natural Phosphatidyl Choline. We understand. We could have come to market 3 years sooner if we had lowered our standards and used the hydrogentated Phoshatidyl Choline. But we stayed true to our values and we took the time to make genuine liposomes that are made of truly natural, truly healthful materials.

To put it in just a few words, our liposomes are 1. Real liposomes, as opposed to others that are just emulsions (mixtures of oil and fat) masquerading as liposomes. 2. Totally natural, with 400 mg Phosphatidyl Choline per dose, so that the size of the liposomes will be correct.

Joe Sale / Does the liposome particle size influence nutrient bioavailability and nutrient absorption?

Azantis / Yes, it does. In fact, not only does it influence bioavailability, it is a good measure of whether you have true liposomes or just an emulsion. This is very important, because you don’t want to pay for liposomes if you are only getting an emulsion. You can buy emulsions at the grocery store, they are called salad dressing. The ideal size is between 100 to 400 nanometers. At this size, you have a pretty good indication that you have real liposomes and that they will absorb well. The small size allows them to absorb right at the villi in your intestinal tract. And the size also allows them to carry enough nutrient that you are getting a significant dose from each liposome. If the liposomes become too small, they won’t carry much inside them. Our liposomes are very tightly controlled to be just the right size, they average about 275 nanometers and fall within the ideal range of 100 to 400 nanometers. This indicates excellent formation and we believe it makes for the best absorption.

Joe Sale / What are the benefits of liposomes as a nutrient delivery vehicle?

Azantis / I can mention three great benefits.

One: They protect the nutrient inside them from the harsh conditions of the stomach. So delicate molecules aren’t pulled apart by the acid in the stomach. This is the case with glutathione. Glutathione is well known to have tremendous benefit for the liver. It is called the master antioxidant. If you google it you will see all kinds of wonderful things written about glutathione and what it does in your body. Protects your liver, is considered an anti-aging supplement. Good for the brain as well. You will also find multi-level marketing companies selling product that talk about glutathione. But when you look closer you see they are just selling milk protein. Well, I agree milk protein can be good for you. But the advertising is a bit misleading and they make no claims as to actual glutathione content. Then, if you look at the supplements, you won’t find glutathione. Why is it that glutathione isn’t sold everywhere? Because it breaks down in the acid of the stomach. So you don’t absorb it intact. This is a perfect application for our liposomes because the glutathione inside the liposomes is protected from the harsh stomach acid. So you can absorb it intact.

This works out quite nicely, because the only way people could take glutathione was to go to the doctor for a shot of it. Now, you can take it orally, every day. Obviously, a lot more convenient and less expensive.

Second: It can protect your digestive tract from a nutrient that might cause upset. A perfect example is vitamin C. There are lots of people who wish to take larger doses of vitamin C. At doses of several grams people start getting loose stools-the stomach just can’t handle that much acid being dumped into it. Also, studies show that larger doses aren’t absorbed well. So there isn’t much point. Again, the only way people can get a large dose is to go to the doctor’s office and get and intravenous injection. But inside our liposomes, the vitamin C doesn’t bother the intestinal tract even at 3, 4 and 5 gram doses. And you can take the 5 gram dose several times a day to keep the vitamin C levels extremely high in your blood stream. Our absorption studies show the vitamin C remaining at much higher levels with a single dose—up to 10 hours. This is all the natural function of a well made liposome—you absorb more, for a longer time. This is the ideal absorption method, and it is totally good for you.

Third: Our liposomes are healthy, even with nothing in them. The natural PC (phosphatidyl choline) is good all by itself. We know of famous clinics in Europe that use nothing more that PC injections to address all kinds of liver problems. One clinician I know describes it this way: These clinics are taking in alcoholics who drink until they can’t function any longer. They go in for two weeks of PC injections to regenerate their liver and they are good for another six months of drinking.

Of course, we don’t suggest doing such a thing, but it does show the power of PC and how it works in the liver.

Joe Sale / What are the benefits of Krill Oil as compared to Fish Oil on human metabolism and human health?

Azantis / Krill Oil is a highly absorbable type of Omega 3 fatty acid that happens to be in a phospholipid form. Most of the phospholipids are (P-Choline) needed by the body on a cellular level (especially the brain). Fish oil does not have such a make-up. The Omega’s in fish oil are higher in EPA/DHA but lower in absorption. Thus krill oil works different than fish oil and both have needed benefits.

Joe Sale / Mickey, thanks for taking the time to discuss your company, Azantis, and new developments in the arena of nutrient delivery for low bioavailability molecules, Liposomes, Omega 3 Phospholipid bends, Krill Oil, and Fatty Acids.

About Azantis Biotechnology

Azantis is a biotechnology company specializing in the discovery and development of  small molecules from sustainable natural biomass sources. Azantis products are aimed at improving human health and well being throughout the lifespan. As a research centered company Azantis core capabilities include discovery and screening, clinical research, process engineering, and product development.

Rarely is the path to any goal or successful outcome an easy and direct ride. Yet the public most often sees or hears only about the end result and / or when the media picks it up. What’s missed and what the public often doesn’t hear about is all that happened in route, the work that was done, the sacrifices made, the life lessons learned, and the temporary setbacks that had to be overcome on the way to any given goal or destination.

My objective is that through these interviews, the reader will pick up pearls of wisdom and overriding universal life principles that they can apply to their own life regardless of their destination.

- Joseph Sale, Founder, Optimum Performance / Human Performance Systems

Joe Sale / Kristina, allow me to run through a short list of your Brazilian Jiu Jitsu stats. You train under the expert Brazilian Jiu Jitsu instruction of Gustavo Dantas and compete at 129 lbs. You rank as a Purple Belt and have a current Medal Count of 47: 29 Gold, 6 Silver, 12 Bronze. Your team is Nova Uniao / Gustavo Dantas Jiu Jitsu. How did you become involved in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu?

Kristina Barlaan / I first started training at the Cesar Gracie Academy in Pleasant Hill, CA in 2006, but at that time, I only enrolled in the Muay Thai program. I really had no idea what Jiu-Jitsu was. My Muay Thai instructor, Dan Black, was a Blue belt under Cesar and was the first person to show me any kind of Jiu-Jitsu. He showed me some No-Gi moves and I remember I didn’t really care for it. It didn’t make any sense to me, especially since everyone was telling me that even though I was small, I could still be really good at Jiu-Jitsu. When I rolled, I just felt like a fish out of water. A year later, in 2007, one of my team mates loaned me his gi and told me to give Jiu-Jitsu another chance. I was hooked. All of a sudden, as soon as the gi was introduced, Jiu-Jitsu made sense. Jiu-Jitsu just felt really natural. After 8 months, I competed at my first tournament and I was a little surprised by how much I enjoyed competing. Now, it’s my life and sometimes I’m still in disbelief.

Joe Sale / Kristina, please talk about your “Inspire” project which I believe is a female only Brazilian Jiu Jitsu event.

Kristina Barlaan / Inspire is a female only Jiu-Jitsu open mat. It allows ladies from different schools, and even from out of state, to come together for a few hours to just train and build bonds with each other. Ladies who have never trained before are also welcomed to participate so that they can be introduced to Jiu-Jitsu in a way that I feel is less intimidating because of all the positive female energy. Younger girls are also able to participate. The best part too is that Inspire is, and always will be, free. My first Inspire event gathered over 50 ladies and the second event gathered close to 70 ladies. Although the female Jiu-Jitsu community is small, I’m happy to provide events, such as Inspire, which help promote the growth of the sport, especially among women. In the future, I hope to promote female only workshops, seminars, day camps, and competitions.

Joe Sale / In recent years do you see a growing interest in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu for women?

Kristina Barlaan / In my short 4 years of training, I have seen a huge growth in the amount of women training and competing in Jiu-Jitsu. Divisions are getting bigger at tournaments and I see more women training in class. It’s really great to see. In the years to come, I believe the women’s divisions at tournaments, especially in the higher ranks, are going to become stacked with many tough competitors.

Joe Sale / Kristina, are women who come to you for Brazilian Jiu Jitsu coaching more interested in competition or primarily self defense?

Kristina Barlaan / I feel like the majority of my students and female team mates are looking more to add something different, exciting, and challenging to their lives. Every now and then, I have women ask about self-defense, but unfortunately, most women are not comfortable learning the techniques because of the close-contact nature of Jiu-Jitsu. Most women want to learn how to knock a guy out with one punch or one kick, but that isn’t very realistic. Also, most women who start training don’t even consider competing right at the beginning. I was actually one of those women. I just thought Jiu-Jitsu was fun and I really enjoyed learning new things, plus I really got a kick out of being able to control men who were bigger and stronger than me. I think those qualities of Jiu-Jitsu are what attract women the most to the sport.

Joe Sale / I read about your story on www.GDjiujitsu.com Gustavo Dantas website. Please talk about the role Brazilian Jiu Jitsu plays in your life.

Kristina Barlaan / Jiu-Jitsu completely changed my life in the best kind of ways. For one, in order for me to even begin training Jiu-Jitsu, I had to end a 3 year relationship that was not very healthy. At the time that I started training, I was also in school to become a Registered Veterinary Technician. My decision to go to school for that profession came from me wanting to please my parents. I knew that I loved Jiu-Jitsu, but I had no idea or plan on how I could make a living from it. Then, I met Gustavo. He was the door that opened me up to many opportunities for Jiu-Jitsu. I had lived in the same city for my entire life and after only 6 months of being with Gustavo, I had decided to pack my things and move to Arizona to make my dreams a reality. Jiu-Jitsu is what gives me purpose and is what made it possible for me to live a life that is completely for me.

Joe Sale / I read that the first time you put on a gi was in October 2007. Please talk about that experience.

Kristina Barlaan / My team mate, Virgil Ortigas, offered to let me use his gi to try out a gi class. Although it was my first time officially taking a Jiu-Jitsu class, I had watched the warm-ups and drills many times before so I just did my best to mimic whatever everyone did. At that time, Caio Terra had just started teaching at the Academy and his English was very limited. I think for most that would be a hindrance to learning, but I found it helpful because all I would focus on would be where he was specifically placing his body, his grips, his hips and legs. Every small detail he showed, I made sure to note in my mind. I just remembered being amazed by all the things he could do by just shifting the angle of his body or changing the position of his limbs. Rolling was fun and exhilarating and when class ended, all I wanted was to do it again.

Joe Sale / Kristina, what are the biggest setbacks or challenges you have overcome in your life and in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu?

Kristina Barlaan / My whole life, I have struggled with depression and anxiety/panic attacks. I used to have to take medications and receive counseling, but I hated that I needed to depend on pills to “fix” my problem. Some days, my anxiety would exhaust me to the point where I would be unable to function normally. As soon as I started training, I noticed that my panic attacks were less and less frequent. Whenever I am injured and unable to train, I can feel myself sink into depression and again I become very anxious. Essentially, Jiu-Jitsu is the glue that binds me together.

Joe Sale / In closing, please share the most important life lesson or universal life principle that has had the greatest impact on your life and your success in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu

Kristina Barlaan / Anyone can achieve anything. Once an idea or dream is fully realized and set into motion, it is impossible to stop. It can be delayed or may not take a direct route, but if a person is willing to act, patient in time, and maintains their ability to keep dreaming, then their destiny is inevitable.

Joe Sale / Where do you coach Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and how can you be contacted for coaching requests?

Kristina Barlaan / I coach a women’s class and am an assistant coach for the kids class at the Gustavo Dantas Jiu-Jitsu Academy. Prospective students can contact me through my email, Kristina@gdjiujitsu.com.

Joe Sale / What is your website / blog address and Gustavo Dantas Jiu Jitsu website / blog address for those who would like to read more about you?

Kristina Barlaan / You can read more about me, my team, and school program at gdjiujitsu.com or you can follow my personal Jiu-Jitsu blog at tumblr.com/kbjiujitsu.

Joe Sale /Is there anything else that you would like to add?

Kristina Barlaan / I would like to thank my sponsors Amazon Forest Acai, CTRL Industries, FighterTech, CrossFit Southwest, Preferred Rehab, Many Weapons, and AGGRO Brand for their ongoing support and belief in my abilities. I would also like to thank Gustavo Dantas for all his instruction and guidance and for sharing his love of Jiu-Jitsu with me so that I may follow my dreams.

About Kristina Barlaan

Kristina Barlaan is a successful Brazilian Jiu Jitsu practitioner and competitor.  She represents Team Nova Uniao and trains under 2x World Champion and 3rd Degree Black Belt Gustavo Dantas. Kristina has taken State, National, and International titles at both her weight and the Absolutes, despite only being a Featherweight. Her most recent and prestigous wins are the 2010 Pan Am Jiu Jitsu, 2010 Rio International Open, and the 2010 American National Champion. She is Gustavo Dantas first female Purple belt in his 15 year teaching career.

Eggs are recognized as have an extremely high Biological Value / BV. Biological Value is a unit of measure used in categorizing the ability of a protein to be utilized in protein synthesis.

Eggs contain the fat soluble carotenoid antioxidants lutein and zeaxanthin

Lutein and zeaxanthin, are more specifically categorized as xanthophylls, which are a specific type of carotenoid.

The eyes contain high concentrations of these two nutrients, lutein and zeaxanthin, found in eggs,  which provide fortification against light induced oxidative damage.

Studies report high bioavailability from the lutein and zeaxanthin found in eggs.

Lutein and zeaxanthin are found in the egg yolks.

1 egg contains about 7 grams of protein

1 egg contains about 70 – 80 calories

Eggs contain high concentrations of lecithin / phosphatidyl choline

1 egg contains about 100 – 125 mg of choline which has a positive influence on cell membranes.

Eggs are a significant source of Vitamin B2 / riboflavin, B12 / Cobalamin, Selenium, and Vitamin D

Eggs are a substantial source of the nine essential amino acids, valine, leucine, isoleucine, lysine, methionine, phenylalanine, threonine, tryptophan, and histidine.

The term “essential” amino acids is used because the body does not have the ability to synthesize these amino acids so they must be consumed in the diet to receive them.

Eggs contain the branch chain amino acids, valine, leucine, and isoleucine which also fall into the larger category of essential amino acids.

Eggs are also a source of the non essential amino acids, arginine, glycine, proline, alanine, aspartic acid, asparagine, glutamic acid, tyrosine, cysteine, and serine.

The non essential amino acids are categorized as non essential because the human body can synthensize them.

Please visit the Optimum Performance Blog Menu for additional nutrition posts, interviews, and much more.

Call Optimum Performance / Human Performance Systems today at 480-241-2621 and mention this post by Joe Sale, CNS, CSCS, Facts You Should Know About Eggs, and receve 20% off your customized nutrition program.

Joe Sale, CNS, CSCS

A greater understanding of the shoulder and its components and complexities will help you to manage your shoulders better in both the short and long term. Since the shoulders take substantial wear and tear in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu as well as in other sports, the human shoulder becomes a resource that needs to be intelligently managed. The shoulder can become a rate limiting factor in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu meaning that it’s involved in almost everything you do on the mat, so maintaining shoulder health is important.

Most people think of the shoulder as one unit when it actuality it’s far from that.

The shoulder is often called the shoulder complex and that is an accurate descriptive term. Complex.

To start off, the shoulder has the largest range of motion of any joint in the human body. However with that large range of motion comes a greater capacity for shoulder problems.

The shoulder is made up of four joints, not one as is commonly assumed. They work in a synergistic manner in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and also in everyday life.

A dysfunctional state in one of these joints can lead to a dysfunctional compensation in the other joints of the shoulder complex.

For example, limited range of motion in the scapulothoracic joint of the shoulder due to injury etc is many times compensated for in the glenohumeral joint of the shoulder.

The four joints that make up the shoulder are the glenohumeral joint, acromioclavicular joint, scapulothoracic joint, and the sternoclavicular joint.

The 2 joints most commonly injured in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and other sports are the glenohumeral joint and acromioclavicular joint along with corresponding tissues and structures, for example tendons, ligaments, bursae, hyaline cartilage etc.

Injuries to each of these joints is explained or categorized with different verbage.

Sprains and strains can occur in the shoulder. Sprains involve ligaments, which attach bone to bone. Strains involve muscle or tendon. Tendons attach muscle to bone.

The rotator cuff of the shoulder is made up of 4 relatively small muscles and their corresponding tendon attachments. The rotator cuff muscles have a variety of functions and also provide stability to the shoulder.

The glenohumeral joint is known to dislocate. The acromioclaviclar joint doesn’t dislocate in the absolute sense of the word. First of all the acromoiclavicular joint is not a ball and socket joint like the glenohumeral joint. The acromoiclavicular joint is known to separate not dislocate and there’s a big difference.

The glenohumeral joint is like a golf ball on a tee with the tee being the socket and the ball being the head of the humerus. It’s  a very shallow joint unlike the hip joint / the acetabulum which has a deeper socket creating more stability.

In the sports world a well known case of shoulder dislocation occurred during the 2005 football season. Although not Brazilian Jiu Jitsu, it’s a great story of coming back from a significant shoulder injury. Drew Brees was the quarterback with the San Diego Chargers at the time. Tackled on a  play, his throwing shoulder was dislocated and his glenoid labrum was also torn. In addition he sustained rotator cuff damage. As I mentioned earlier, since the glenohumeral joint is an extremely shallow ball and socket joint  it derives some extra stability from the labrum, a fibrocartilagenous ring, similar to a washer.

Drew Brees made one of the more remarkable shoulder rehab comebacks out there regardless of the sport. First of all it was more than a dislocation. There was also damage to the rotator cuff, severe damage to the labrum, and the more obvious ligament damage that goes along with dislocation. Many people in the sports world didn’t think he could come back from such a severe shoulder injury, especially since it was his throwing shoulder and he was a quarterback. His work ethic during rehab was reported as outstanding. He exceeded expectations. We know the rest of the story. San Diego traded him to the New Orleans Saints and the Saints and Drew Brees eventually go to win the Superbowl.

The acromioclavicular joint is known to separate. The separation severity is usually graded anywhere from 1-5. This is concluded based on the space created between the acromium and the clavicle due to the injury as well as the degree of ligament damage. At the extreme level there is a complete rupture of the coracoclavicular ligament and the acromioclavicular ligament.

Intelligently applied strength and conditioning, fine tuned functional human movement exercise and high quality nutrition will go a long way in keeping you on the matts with healthy shoulders and in avoiding unnecessary and premature wear and tear problems.

In closing, one of the best and easiest things you can do to maintain healthy shoulders and healthy joints in general is to warm up thoroughly. One of the benefits of warming up is an increase of the movement and circulation of synovial fluid within the joint which reduces friction. Synovial fluid also acts as a transport medium for nutrients making their way to articular cartilage.

I addition, high quality Brazilian Jiu Jitsu coaching will pay dividends in the short term and long term. Gustavo Dantas Brazilian Jiu Jitsu in Tempe, Arizona has an excellent reputation. I’ve had numerous conversations with Gustavo as well as interviewing him. He is a 3rd degree Black Belt in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and President of Nova Uniao, USA. Gustavo Dantas knows Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and he knows the human body.

Call Optimum Performance / Human Performance Systems today at 480-241-2621 and mention this article on Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and the Shoulder and receive 10% off your customized sports nutrition program or functional conditioning program

Joe Sale, CNS, CSCS

About Joseph Sale

Joseph Sale, CNS, CSCS, is a board certified nutrition specialist and a nationally accredited conditioning specialist. His educational credentials include a Bachelor of Science and a Doctor of Naturopathic Medicine. Joe has been an adjunct faculty instructor and guest lecturer at numerous colleges, universities, and corporations. He’s been a guest expert on radio and TV and is the author of the Optimum Human Performance Course.

Rarely is the path to any goal or successful outcome an easy and direct ride. Yet the public most often sees or hears only about the end result and / or when the media picks it up. What’s missed and what the public often doesn’t hear about is all that happened in route, the work that was done, the sacrifices made, the life lessons learned, and the temporary setbacks that had to be overcome on the way to any given goal or destination.

My objective is that through these interviews, the reader will pick up pearls of wisdom and overriding universal life principles that they can apply to their own life regardless of their destination.

- Joseph Sale, Founder, Optimum Performance / Human Performance Systems

 Joe Sale / Bruce, please talk about your background and history leading up to the writing of your book Ethical Intelligence / Five Principles for Untangling Your Toughest Problems at Work and Beyond.

Bruce Weinstein / When I was in high school, one of our assignments in government class was to pick three books related to politics, read them, and write reports on each. One of the books I selected was something I’d seen in my dad’s home library and been intrigued about: Plato’s The Republic. I couldn’t believe how entertaining it was; not at all a dry, boring book of philosophy, it read like a great movie script, filled with terrific dialogue about things that matter. This experience prompted me to major in philosophy at Swarthmore College. (I’ll admit that another reason I chose philosophy as a major is because Steve Martin, one of my heroes in stand-up comedy, had done it!). This led to my decision to go to graduate school in philosophy at Georgetown University and eventually become a professor. But ultimately I wanted the world to be my classroom, so I left academia to become The Ethics Guy and teach ethics everywhere. My dream has come true; I live it every day.

Joe Sale / Why did you choose ethical intelligence as your specialization or focused area of expertise?

Bruce Weinstein / It’s simple, really: I can’t imagine anything more fascinating to study, write about, discuss, or teach than how we ought to live our lives. The ethically intelligent life is the best way to live.

Joe Sale / Bruce, do you believe there a relationship between ethical intelligence and work / life balance?

Bruce Weinstein / My friend Joanne’s grandfather Charlie prided himself on never having missed a day on the job. He had grown up in poverty and wanted to make sure that his family was provided for in a way that he himself had not been. The upside was that his family, which included Joanne’s dad, Brian, had a comfortable place to live, plenty to eat, and new clothes when they needed them. The downside is that Charlie missed all of his six children’s high school graduations. He never attended any of the kids’ baseball games, choral concerts, or swim meets. His son Brian grew up without seeing his dad very much.

Not surprisingly, Brian adopted the same work ethic, but with a twist: he did take time off for his two kids, but work was always involved in some way. Brian was the head of the PTA, a deacon of the church, and the coach of Joanne’s softball team. Late every evening, after a busy day at his job and various community activities, Brian would plop himself down on the couch to watch TV — and promptly fall asleep. Joanne’s memories of her father, now deceased, are usually associated with work of some kind. She loved her father dearly but wondered what he would have been like away from the many jobs he undertook. “I’m grateful for all he did for my brother and me,” Joanne told me recently, “but I wish we had just ‘hung out’ once in awhile. I would have liked that, but it’s too late now.”

No issue presents a greater challenge to our ethical intelligence than what is referred to as “work-life balance.” The way we approach it determines not only the quality of our lives but also the quality of the relationships we have with our family, friends, and community. Work-life balance is an ethical issue because a key principle of ethical intelligence, Be Fair, calls upon us to give others their due, and one of the things we owe to others (and ourselves) is our time. In fact, our time is the single most valuable resource we have because everything we do is based on its availability. It is also irreplaceable; once we’ve spent it, it’s gone for good. How we allocate our time between our careers and everything else speaks volumes about our commitment to fairness. It shows how ethically intelligent we are with respect to every important relationship we have.

I should say that I don’t like the phrase “work-life balance.” It suggests that we have our careers on the one hand and everything else on the other, but work is a part of life, not apart from it. Still, this is the term of art, so to be consistent, I do use it, under mild protest.

Joe Sale / How does ethical intelligence influence personal health, well being, and quality of life?

Bruce Weinstein / In the following ways:

• The principles of ethical intelligence help you make the best decisions possible, because they bring out the best in you.

• Life is easier when you’re honest, because you don’t have to remember which lies you told , when you told them, or who you told them to.

• Striving to live according to the principles of ethical intelligence –as difficult as this can be—is the best way to get the thing you want out of life.

Joe Sale / Bruce, What is the relationship between ethical intelligence and emotional intelligence?

Bruce Weinstein / Suppose that you and I know each other well and we meet for coffee one day. You ask me how I’m doing, and I say, “I’m fine.” But several signs suggest I’m anything but fine: I avoid eye contact, which is unusual for me; my voice is quieter than it normally is; I’m not smiling, which isn’t like me; and I seem unusually distracted. It is your emotional intelligence that allows you to notice these signs and to correctly conclude that I’m not fine at all. Someone who doesn’t possess your level of emotional intelligence (or any at all) wouldn’t notice that something is amiss when we meet.

But now comes a tough question: What should you do? The answer isn’t obvious. Is it better to mention the fact that I don’t seem all right to you, or should you just ignore it? If our chat over coffee doesn’t give you any useful information about what’s really going on, would it be right to follow up with a phone call or email, or simply say to yourself, “He’s an adult, and if he wants to tell me what’s going on, he will”? Emotional intelligence alone won’t — and can’t — tell you what you ought to do. That’s because emotional intelligence is a psychological matter, but the question “What’s the right thing to do?” is an ethical one. To be fully human, it’s not enough to have emotional intelligence. We need ethical intelligence, too.

Joe Sale / Bruce, in closing, please share one life lesson or universal life principle that has had the greatest impact on your life.

Bruce Weinstein / The best songs have music that amplifies, enhances, or suggests the lyrics. I Want to Make the World Turn Around, written by Steve Miller, performed by Steve Miller Band on Living in the 20th Century (Capitol Records, 1986) is one of those songs. I was in graduate school when this overlooked gem was released, and after I heard the lines, “Turn the darkness into light/turn the wrong into right,” I picked up the phone, called a volunteer hotline, and asked what I could do. I ended up working at the House of Ruth, a shelter for homeless women.

I’d been studying ethical theory for years, but it was a simple lyric in the context of a great chord progression that prompted me to actually do something for my community.

* * *

Postscript: I travel around the country speaking about ethical intelligence, so if you’re looking for a lively, interactive keynote speaker for your next meeting, I’d love to contribute! For more information, please contact Michael Frick of Speakers Platform: 877-717-5327 x101.

Ethical Intelligence is available now in paperback and eBook formats at Amazon.com http://tiny.cc/gu0h8 , Barnes & Noble http://tiny.cc/lssbw, Apple’s iBookstore http://tiny.cc/wjnf4 and your favorite independent bookseller!

About Bruce Weinstein

Bruce Weinstein, Ph.D., The Ethics Guy®, has a simple purpose in life: he wants to enrich your appreciation of ethics in everyday life and to help you make the best decisions possible. He writes the column, “Ask the Ethics Guy,” for BusinessWeek.com.

His clients include the National Football League, The National Guard (South Carolina Division), HDI, Vistakon/Johnson & Johnson, Pri-Med, the National Grocers Association, the Eastern Michigan University College of Business, and 300 other leading groups.

Dr. Weinstein appears as an ethics analyst regularly on CNN and has also appeared on NBC’s “Today Show,” ABC’s “Good Morning America,” MSNBC’s “Live,” FOX Business Network’s “Cavuto,” FOX News Channel’s “O’Reilly Factor” and “Fox & Friends,” CNBC’s “Capital Report,” Bloomberg Television’s “Personal Finance,” and NPR’s “Leonard Lopate Show.” Visit him online at The Ethics Guy.

To find out more about the book, Ethical Intelligence / Five Principles for Untangling Your Toughest Problems at Work and Beyond by Bruce Weinstein, please visit New World Library. 

Rarely is the path to any goal or successful outcome an easy and direct ride. Yet the public most often sees or hears only about the end result and / or when the media picks it up. What’s missed and what the public often doesn’t hear about is all that happened in route, the work that was done, the sacrifices made, the life lessons learned, and the temporary setbacks that had to be overcome on the way to any given goal or destination.

My objective is that through these interviews, the reader will pick up pearls of wisdom and overriding universal life principles that they can apply to their own life regardless of their destination.

- Joseph Sale, Founder, Optimum Performance / Human Performance Systems

 Joe Sale / Dorothea, allow me to share a short list of your credentials and background. You are a Diplomate in Comprehensive Energy Psychology. You have been a nurse clinical specialist and clinical psychologist for more than 30 years. Much of your practice is focused on mind / body / spirit integration. You are the author of 9 books covering the expansive topic of energy therapies. Please discuss your personal journey that has led to your career involving Energy Modalities / Healing Touch and the writing of your fascinating book Healing Touch / Essential Energy Medicine for Yourself and Others.

Dorothea Hover Kramer / Since childhood I’ve had a sense of human energies beyond just what the five senses reflect. I became a nurse to help people not just to give medications so I kept asking about how we could assist our patients in better ways to relieve emotional stress and lessen pain. After receiving a master’s degree in public health nursing and a doctorate in educational psychology and becoming a psychotherapist, I still wondered what would really help most effectively since humans are multidimensional—physical, psychological, and spiritual beings.

In the 1980’s change was afoot in healthcare with the emergence of holistic, integrative thinking and the first energy healing program, Therapeutic Touch, in hospital settings. Within the American Holistic Nurses Association, I encountered authentic nurse healers like Janet Mentgen with whom I helped to organize the Healing Touch educational program in 1989. The program currently has more than 100,000 practitioners and is known worldwide in integrative healthcare settings as well as mainstream hospitals. I moved on in 1999 to co-found the Association for Comprehensive Energy Psychology (ACEP) so that psychotherapists could also use energy-oriented modalities in their practices. Both of these networks are thriving because public interest in modalities that address the whole person has grown so exponentially.

Joe Sale / A good place to start is with foundational and functional definitions to lay the groundwork. For the readers that may not know, what is Energy Medicine, Energy Therapies, Healing Touch, and Energy Psychology?

Dorothea Hover Kramer / “Energy medicine” and “energy therapies” are the broad phrases used to describe all modalities that address human distress in which the practitioner uses one or more aspects of the human electromagnetic vibrational field to bring about relief. Energy psychology is the branch of energy medicine that is most focused on psychological well-being and uses resourcesof the human biofield, the meridian accupoints and/or the human energy centers. Healing Touch is one of more than 250 currently identified modalities of energy medicine that address whole person healing. It is the leader in energy medicine because of is well-defined and credentialed educational program, its large numbers of practitioners, and its worldwide outreach.

Joe Sale / Dorothea, in your book, Healing Touch / Essential Energy Medicine for Yourself and Others, you say that, “One of the most pressing realities of 21st century life is that most people are sadly disconnected from the awareness of their own bodies.” My question is a 3 pronged question. Why are people disconnected from the awareness of their own bodies? How do people become disconnected? How can people reconnect with the awareness of their own bodies?

Dorothea Hover Kramer / We live in a “high tech” world; most people spend more time seated in front of computers and TV’s than in building connection with others, using their own bodies, or the natural world around them. The brain seems to be all there is. In addition there is a tremendous focus on external events rather than on one’s inner being, values, and behaviors. Recapturing one’s true essence can be achieved by learning to listen to the body, taking attentive care of it, and learning to develop our own self-healing capacities.

Joe Sale / In your book, Dr Mehmet Oz is quoted as saying that “Energy Medicine is the next great frontier in medicine”. What do you see as the future for Energy Medicine, and all energy modalities like Healing Touch?

Dorothea Hover Kramer / The public is eager to learn how to stay well. The understandings of energy medicine put the power to manage one’s health into the hands of each person with its practical knowledge of self-care methods. The field of energy medicine will continue to grow as people come to realize the limitations of conventional medicine in addressing the issues of chronic illness and positive aging.

Joe Sale / What is the theory behind Energy Medicine and Healing Touch?

Dorothea Hover Kramer / The electromagnetic nature of the human body has been known in science for several centuries but has only come into actual use in medicine recently with instruments such as the MRI and EKG which measure vibrational frequencies. That these aspects of the human body could be enhanced directly through hands-on gestures or the presence of a centered practitioner is the basic theory of energy medicine and the practice of Healing Touch. Specific theoretical material, the scientific basis of the work and the current research are discussed at length in the book as well as actual methods for relief of stress, pain, or anxiety that anyone who is interested can readily learn.

Joe Sale / Dorothea, what is one concept or idea that a person can apply to their life today to improve their health, wellness and experience of life?

Dorothea Hover Kramer / Body and mind are closely intertwined. Every time you activate a positive thought such as “I am a loveable and capable person.. I deeply love and accept myself” you activate the neurological wiring, the body’s biochemicals, and cellular information systems to feel better. Adding touch to a specific area of the body, such as the heart center, further empowers this message. Repetition of the pattern begins to entrain your bodymind and replace negative patterns.

Joe Sale / Dorothea, in closing what is the one life lesson, life principle or universal life law that has had the greatest impact on your life?

Dorothea Hover Kramer / There is much I can do to help myself as I align my body, mind, and spirit with the beauty of the Universe and its many creative gifts for me even in the darkest times.

About the Author

Dorothea Hover Kramer, EdD, RN, DCEP, is a founding elder of Healing Touch and cofounder of the International Association for Comprehensive Energy Psychology ( ACEP ). Her other eight books include Second Chance at Your Dream and the current practitioners’ textbook entitled Healing Touch Guidebook. For more information on this book and Dorothea Hover Kramer’s work, please see healingtouchbook.com.

To find out more about the book Healing Touch / Essential Energy Medicine for Yourself and Others, please visit Sounds True.

Rarely is the path to any goal or successful outcome an easy and direct ride. Yet the public most often sees or hears only about the end result and / or when the media picks it up. What’s missed and what the public often doesn’t hear about is all that happened in route, the work that was done, the sacrifices made, the life lessons learned, and the temporary setbacks that had to be overcome on the way to any given goal or destination.

My objective is that through these interviews, the reader will pick up pearls of wisdom and overriding universal life principles that they can apply to their own life regardless of their destination.

- Joseph Sale, Founder, Optimum Performance / Human Performance Systems

 Joe Sale / Marc, a good place to start is at the beginning. You are most well known as the President and Publisher of New World Library, one of the leading independent publishers in the United States and an internationally renowned author of numerous books including Visionary Business and The Greatest Secret of All. How did New World Library come into being?

Marc Allen / It all started the day I turned 30 years old. I woke up in a state of shock, and realized I wasn’t a kid anymore. I was living in a little one-room apartment in a funky part of Oakland, California; I didn’t have a job; I had no savings whatsoever.

I spent much of the day pacing back and forth in my room, and I remembered a little game I had played back when I was 22 doing a back-to-the-land experiment (which lasted only 5 months, and was a disaster). One night we were sitting around a fire, and one couple said, “Let’s play a game we play at church camp. Let’s imagine five years have passed, and everything has gone as well as you can imagine — what would your life look like?”

We went around the circle and spoke. I don’t remember a word of what I said, so it obviously had no impact on my life, but the day I turned 30 I remembered the game, and decided to play it. This time I wrote it down: I took a sheet of paper, put IDEAL SCENE at the top, and imagined five years had passed.

Much to my amazement — mainly because I had had no interest in business up to that point — I imagined I had a successful publishing company, publishing my books and my friends’ work as well. I took another sheet of paper and wrote GOAL: CREATE A SUCCESSFUL PUBLISHING COMPANY at the top, and wrote the beginning of my first one-page plan to start and build the company.

Our first few books were fairly funky affairs. I wrote the first three we published (all now out of print), and then my friend and partner Shakti Gawain wrote Creative Visualization. The book started selling purely by word-of-mouth — the entire company was just the two of us, part time, and we had no marketing department whatsoever. But the book sales built and built and helped launch the company.

Joe Sale / Marc, in our earlier conversation we discussed work / rest balance. You have created unique personal work / rest systems that have worked great for you over the years and have been sustainable. For example, if I remember correctly, you always take Monday off and start your work week on Tuesday afternoon. Please talk about your personal work / rest systems in more detail and why they are effective for you.

Marc Allen / Looking back, the fact that I started the publishing company with the little Ideal Scene exercise I did kind of tricked me into creating something pretty remarkable, because I started by asking myself what my ideal company would be, and what my ideal life would be.

It was obvious, when I asked those questions, that — ideally — I didn’t want to work too hard; I definitely didn’t want to be a Type-A workaholic. In fact ideally I wanted a life of ease; I wanted to work only when I felt like it.

Once my company started doing well enough that I didn’t have to do outside work to support it, I was able to create my ideal schedule, which just kind of evolved naturally:

Sunday is family day, where I relax and hang out with the family and do whatever they want. Monday is my day — I never go to work on Mondays and never plan anything. I take the day entirely to myself, except for dinner and the evening with my family. It’s my favorite day of the week. Sometimes I do a lot of writing or working on some other projects; sometimes I do little or nothing. I always take at least one nap and have a meditation session (which I do flat on my back). One Monday I had three nap/meditation sessions.

I don’t do mornings, either. I like to sleep in, because it frees up my evening so I can stay up really late if I feel like it. I’ve never been a morning person, so now I usually sleep until 11:00 or so (though it varies day by day).

Tuesday afternoon, I’m ready for work. I go into my office at New World Library, and there’s no place I’d rather be. Wednesday and Thursday afternoon I’m usually at the office as well. Friday afternoon is flexible: sometimes I’m at the office, sometimes I’m in a recording studio or doing some other project.

Saturday I usually keep open, and do whatever I feel like. I often write on Saturday, or run around and do errands. On Sunday, I never work. I always take a break. That’s the schedule that works for me. It all just kind of happened as soon as I gave myself the freedom to work when I felt like it, and goof off when I felt like it.

Joe Sale /Buckminster Fuller is quoted as saying, “You never change things by fighting the existing reality. To change something, build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete.” Buckminster Fuller is also said to have made the decision to live his life like an experiment. You have said that in your early thirties you came to a similar conclusion. How did that play out?

Marc Allen / I remember it vividly: Again, it goes back to the day of my thirtieth birthday. As soon as I began to write my Ideal Scene — which required me to dream my greatest, most expansive dreams, because, after all I was writing down my ideal life — doubts and fears arose, full force. I was filled with vehement inner voices telling me it was all obviously a waste of time; it was impossible for me — someone who had failed at everything I’d tried — to become a successful writer, publisher, and musician. And it was all too much to shoot for — my inner voices told me to pick just one thing and focus on that. And then, when I wrote that I wanted to do it all in an easy and relaxed manner, a healthy and positive way, my inner critics and skeptics shouted “Impossible! It’s never been done in the history of humanity! You’ve got to work really hard to succeed!…” They went on and on.

Then I remembered a story I’d heard about Buckminster Fuller: When he was in his twenties, he said he decided to either commit suicide or else look at his life as a totally unique experiment. Fortunately, he chose the latter and near the end of his life summed it all up as a “fifty-year experiment.” I grabbed on to that word, and told all my doubts and fears that it would be a worthwhile experiment for me to go for my dreams — all of them, my entire ideal scene — and to do it in my own lazy way, working only when I felt like it.

My doubts and fears said, “Impossible!” I said to them, “Look, let me try it as an experiment for a year or two. If it doesn’t work out, I’ll be no worse off than I am right now.” Seeing I was flat broke, my doubts and fears had to agree with me. And so I started taking the first obvious steps in front of me to start a publishing company, write a book, record an album, learn something about real estate — doing it all the while in an easy and relaxed manner, a healthy and positive way.

Within a year, I could see my experiment might possibly work. It even started to dawn on me that working when I felt like it, in an easy and relaxed manner, was a lot better in the long run than pushing myself to work for forty or fifty hours a week. I have created a very successful company, and I’ve very rarely worked more than 25 hours a week focused on the business.

Joe Sale / In one of your books you mention how creativity comes from a place of ease. You have usually prefaced your affirmations with the phrase, “In an easy and relaxed manner, in a healthy and positive way, in its own perfect time, and for the highest good of all….” Those words alone seem to have a calming, parasympathetic effect in and of themselves and also project a tone of trust in the process. Please discuss this in more detail.

Marc Allen / I found that phrase in a book I read years ago by Catherine Ponder, a Unity Church minister. And I discovered that just repeating those words, In an easy and relaxed manner, a healthy and positive way, in its own perfect time, for the highest good of all, has (as you mentioned) a calming effect on the body.

When I was writing one of my books, I realized too that those four words — easy, relaxed, healthy, positive — in themselves overcame a huge number of the doubts and fears I was assailed with. What are those doubts and fears saying to us, after all? It won’t be easy; it’s hard; it’s complicated, it’s too much for you. And it’s stressful; life is a struggle — and on and on. I kept repeating that phrase as a little mantra, and it had a powerful effect helping to minimize and even overcome my doubts and fears.

Joe Sale / Sustainability is a word that is used quite often in today’s world in relation to environmental issues. The concept of sustainability also has its place in personal lifestyle systems and business systems. What are your thoughts on this?

Marc Allen / It’s totally obvious to me that working in an easy and relaxed manner, a healthy and positive way, is far more sustainable — and far better for your health — than working from stress, from pushing and forcing.

There is a time for everything. A time for activity, and a time for stillness. A time to work with focused laser-like energy and a time to goof off and do nothing at all. When you honor your body’s natural rhythms of high energy alternating with low energy, and when you take time to relax and rejuvenate when you feel like it, then you don’t burn out at your job, and you rarely get sick. You keep moving toward your goals and dreams, one step at a time — but you find you can do it in an easy and relaxed manner, a healthy and positive way.

Joe Sale / The process that you have taught for years includes 4 basic steps to create the personal life or business outcomes a person prefers.

The steps are:

Create your ideal scene

Write your goals

Create an affirmation for each goal

Write a 1-page plan for each affirmation

I mentioned to you in our earlier conversation that the process reminds me of a human technology / neurological technology or a way of operating the brain and nervous system in a very specific way in order to produce or at least have an influence on creating specific results or outcomes. Can you discuss this in more detail?

Marc Allen / You’ve put it very well. I stumbled onto something on my thirtieth birthday that was exceptionally simple and easy to do. It doesn’t take much time, and even a lazy person (like me) can do it.

I’ve come to believe that the simplicity of it all is one of the reasons it’s so powerful in helping us create change in our lives. The reason why, I think, is that it gives simple and clear instructions to our limitless subconscious mind. It gives our brains operating instructions, you might say.

We start by writing our ideal scene, daring to dream of the life we want five years in the future. Then we make a list of goals that are necessary to achieve in order to reach our ideal scene. Then I highly recommend that we rewrite each goal as an affirmation, as if it’s now coming into being, in an easy and relaxed manner, a healthy and positive way. Keep the affirmations with you and repeat them occasionally.

The final step is to take each of our goals, write them at the top of a sheet of paper, and make a brief one- or two-page plan to reach those goals. When we write this plan, we’re giving our subconscious minds operating instructions: This is the plan; this is what I intend. Then take the first obvious step in front of you, then the next. The journey of a thousand miles begins with one step.

Joe Sale / Marc, I’ve done substantial reading and research related to personality types and business / entrepreneurship. Richard Branson, Warren Buffet, Steve Jobs, Ray Kroc and others all appear to have different personality types yet have been successful. You also have built New World Library into a successful company. How would you describe your personality?

Marc Allen / I’m lazy, creative, easy going. I’m a dreamer. I write and play music. I read the movie and book review sections of the paper rather than the business section. I love creating new books and giving and recording seminars. I don’t have much energy for promotion and marketing, and almost no interest in the financial side of my company — except for keeping an eye on the bottom line!

Every one of us is a unique individual — I even feel that every one of us, in our unique way, is a creative genius. Real success, true success, is being who you are, fully and completely. Be unique! There’s no one like you — you’re an original.

Joe Sale / Marc, two of the more recent books you have authored are Visionary Business and The Greatest Secret of All. Please share a few key points from Visionary Business.

Marc Allen / The 12 chapters of Visionary Business are 12 keys to creating a success business and career. The keys that are fairly obvious and don’t require a lot of explanation are: Begin by imagining your ideal scene; write your plan as a clear and concrete visualization; discover your higher purpose; see the benefits within adversity, and keep picturing success; plan your work and work your plan; give abundantly and reap the rewards; and discover the core beliefs you have created about yourself and your world, and learn how to change those beliefs that are not supporting you.

For those that enjoy audio, I go into much greater depth in my Success with Ease Audio Course, a 12-download course you can get on my website, MarcAllen.com.

Joe Sale / In closing, please share the one universal life law or universal life principle that has had the greatest impact on your life.

Marc Allen / Within each and every one of us is a clear, calm visionary who can guide us through every minute of the day. Once we learn to connect with our inner wisdom — to ask ourselves questions and wait patiently for the answers to emerge — there is no obstacle too great that can prevent us from living the life of our dreams.

Look within and you’ll find

every answer you need.

About the Author

Marc Allen is an internationally renowned author and president and publisher of New World Library, which he co-founded (with Shakti Gawain) in 1977. He has guided the company from a small start-up with no capital to its current position as one of the leading independent publishers in the country.

Marc is a well-known musician and composer as well, having produced five albums of music for his label Watercourse Media.

His latest book is The Greatest Secret of All. It may be Marc’s most important book, because it gives us not only one of the clearest explanations of the “secret” of creating what you want in life, but also the far greater secrets of a life well-lived, a life of happiness, inner peace, ease, and fulfillment, where you contribute to making the world a better place for all.

Rarely is the path to any goal or successful outcome an easy and direct ride. Yet the public most often sees or hears only about the end result and / or when the media picks it up. What’s missed and what the public often doesn’t hear about is all that happened in route, the work that was done, the sacrifices made, the life lessons learned, and the temporary setbacks that had to be overcome on the way to any given goal or destination.

My objective is that through these interviews, the reader will pick up pearls of wisdom and overriding universal life principles that they can apply to their own life regardless of their destination.

- Joseph Sale, Founder, Optimum Performance / Human Performance Systems

 Joe Sale / Michael, please talk about your new book Creative Thinkering, as well as your background, history, and story leading up to the writing of this book.

Michael Michalko / As an officer in the United States Army, I organized a team of NATO intelligence specialists and international academics in Frankfurt, Germany, to research, collect, and categorize all known inventive-thinking methods. This international team applied those methods to various NATO military, political, and social problems. In doing so it produced a variety of breakthrough ideas and creative solutions to new and old problems. After leaving the military, I facilitated think tanks using these creative thinking techniques for government agencies and then later corporations.

I and my team in the military were imbued with a can-do spirit. Nothing was considered impossible. We never considered why something couldn’t be done. We always figured out how to get it done. It was this can-do attitude that influenced my life. I also discovered that creative geniuses have had this can-do spirit throughout history as well. Those who think they can, can. Those who think they can’t, can’t.

I discovered how easily you can resurrect your natural creativity by simply using the same creative thinking techniques that creative geniuses have used throughout history. I began to ponder questions such as: Why isn’t everyone creative? Why does education foster less instead of more ingenuity? Why is expertise often the enemy of innovation? Why is it that the people who know more create less, and the people who know less, create more? Why is it that the more expert one becomes in his or her area of expertise, the fewer ideas they have?

It is as though we’ve unlearned creativity. In school, we were taught how past thinkers interpreted the world. We were not taught how to think, we were taught to reproduce what past thinkers thought. When confronted with a problem, we were taught to analytically select the most promising approach based on past history, excluding all other approaches, and to work logically within a carefully defined direction towards a solution. Instead of looking for possibilities, we are taught to look for ways to exclude them. It’s as if we entered school as a question mark and graduated as a period.

Natural creative thinking requires the generation of associations and connections between two or more unrelated subjects. Those considered “geniuses” are those who have managed to retain their natural ability to generate associations and connections between two or more dissimilar subjects to create new categories and concepts. This process of “conceptual blending,” will reawaken the type of spontaneous and creative thought processes that give rise to original ideas and innovation in both business and life.

Joe Sale / Most, if not all of your books and your work have been focused on human creativity, brain function, cognition, and inventive thinking methods. Have you always been interested in these related topics?

Michael Michalko / We are tacitly taught that we exist and just are. We study atoms, for example, and are taught that atoms are all true to their own nature. An atom cannot change its nature. It just is. We have been taught that all people are true to their own genes, environment and nature. We are objects. We are taught to be “Me,” instead of “I.”

When you think of yourself as Me, you are limited. The Me is always limited. When you believe how others—parents, teachers, peers, colleagues, and others—describe you, you become that. You might want to be an artist, but others might tell you that you have no talent, training, or temperament to be an artist. The Me will say, “Who do you think you are? You are just an ordinary person.”

When you were a child you felt you were everything. There was no limit to what was possible. You formed the thought “this is who I am. I am the greatest. I am the best.” You interpreted your own experiences, because you were the subject of your own life. Remember when you were the subject of your life how happy, positive, and full of life you were? Remember feeling like the most important person in the universe?

We are born to be the subject of our life and to interpret our own set of experiences. It is not your experiences that determine who you are. It is your interpretation of your experiences that determines who you are. We are not taught this. Instead of being the subject of our life, we are tacitly taught to be the object. We are taught to be a Me instead of “I am.” Instead of interpreting our own experiences, we allow others to interpret our experiences for us.

I have learned that the artist is not a special person; but that every person is a special kind of artist. It is this knowledge that inspired my research and work in creativity, cognition and inventive thinking methods.

Joe Sale / Michael, what are the primary duplicatable patterns that you have found, that lead to high end creativity?

Michael Michalko / The primary duplicatable pattern that leads to creativity is synthesis. Synthesis involves lining up dissimilar subjects and combining parts of each into a new idea. This strongly resembles the creative process of genetic recombination in nature. Chromosomes exchange genes to create emergent new beings. Think of parts and counterparts of ideas as genes that combine and recombine to create new patterns which lead to new ideas.

It is not possible for the human brain to deliberately concentrate on two separate objects or ideas—no matter how dissimilar—without eventually forming a connection between them. No two inputs can remain separate in your mind no matter how remote they are from each other.

Try an experiment. Pick eight random words and give the list to someone or to a small group. For example: flower pot, baby, glass, grasshopper, coffee pot, box, toast, and garage. Ask them to divide the words into two groups without giving them any rationale for the division. You’ll discover that people will come up with some very creative classifications. They’ll group them according to words with the letter o, things that touch water, objects made in factories, and so on. No one ever says there is no connection, they invent them.

Though we seldom think about it, making connections in such a manner are conceptual creative acts. The thinking of individuals is riddled with creative acts. These small creative acts are close cousins to the most highly creative acts. They are just not on the highest plane.

The invention of the cash register is a good example of connecting a problem with an insightful solution from an unrelated field. Its inventor, Jake Ritty, was a restaurant owner from Ohio, who in 1879 hit upon the idea of a cash register while traveling on a ship for pleasure. During the voyage, the passengers were taken on a tour of the ship. In the engine room, Jake was captivated by seeing a machine which recorded the number of times the ship’s propeller rotated. What he saw in this machine was an idea of a machine that counts.

Back in Ohio, using the same principle as the ship’s machine, he made a machine which could add items and record the amounts. This hand-operated machine, which he started using in his restaurant, was the first cash register. Ritty told the curious business people who inquired about his invention, that he got the idea from “Divine Inspiration.”

Joe Sale / What is the biggest misconception about creative thinking that you have encountered in today’s world?

Michael Michalko / A simple belief. People who believe they are creative are creative; and people who do not believe they are creative are not. If a person believes he is called by God to be a priest and has the intention to become a priest he will become a priest by going through the motions of being a priest.

I have worked with countless individuals who were convinced they were not creative. Once they understood how creative geniuses lived, thought and worked and learned their creative thinking techniques that showed them how to think in different ways, they found that not only could they be creative but suddenly life and work became more fascinating and fun.

Joe Sale / Is creativity a capacity that everyone has but through lack of use can be lost or become atrophied like a muscle?

Michael Michalko / It’s not lack of use, it is a lack of understanding of what creativity is. The most creative force in the universe is nature. Think of nature and biological evolution. Creativity operates according to Darwin’s theory of biological evolution. According to Darwin, nature creates many possibilities through blind trial and error and then lets the process of natural selection decide which species survive. In nature, 95% of new species fail and die within a short period of time.

Genius is analogous to biological evolution in that it requires the unpredictable generation of a large quantity of alternatives and conjectures. From this quantity of alternatives and conjectures, the genius retains the best ideas for further development and communication.

An important aspect of this theory is that you need some means of producing variation in your ideas and for this variation to be truly effective, it must be blind. To count as blind, the variations are shaped by random, chance, or unrelated factors.

In nature, a gene pool totally lacking in variation would be unable to adapt to changing circumstances, with consequences which would be fatal to the species’ survival. In time the genetically encoded wisdom would convert to foolishness.

A comparable process operates within us. Every individual has the ability to create ideas based on his or her existing patterns of thinking, on the way he or she was taught to think. But without any provision for variations, ideas eventually stagnate and lose their adaptive advantages. In the end, if you always think the way you’ve always thought, you’ll always get what you’ve always got. The same-old, same-old ideas.

Joe Sale / Michael, is there a relationship between imagination, visualization, and creativity?

Michael Michalko / The explosion of creativity in the Renaissance was intimately tied to the recording and conveying of a vast body of knowledge in a parallel language; a language of drawings, diagrams and graphs–as, for instance, in the renowned diagrams and sketches of Galileo. It was Galileo who revolutionized science by mastering the subtleties of perspective by making his thought visible with diagrams and drawings, while his contemporaries used conventional verbal and algebraic approaches. His diagrams of celestial bodies unfolded a deeply visual logic that produced precise insights far beyond those achieved by his peers and changed the history of science.

Leonardo da Vinci also used drawings, diagrams, and graphs as a way to capture information, a way to formulate problems, and the means of solving the problem. It is obvious that in Leonardo’s notebooks, the diagrams and drawings are the focal points, not the words. That is, his pictures were not intended as simply illustrations of his notes; rather, the notes were intended as comments on the pictures. Language took such a secondary role for Leonardo da Vinci that he viewed it as a way to name or describe discoveries, not to make them.

In his essay, On Truth and Lies, German philosopher, Friedrich Nietzche, made a brilliant argument that a verbal description of reality was rendered impossible by the structure of language itself. It’s no wonder that many geniuses, such as the physicist, Richard Feynman, preferred to think visually. Richard Feynman’s great secret in putting quantum electrodynamics on center stage was that he developed a way to do it visually with diagrams, rather than writing down formulae as other physicists were doing. This led to the famous Feynman diagrams which everybody uses now for any kind of calculation in field theory. What Feynman did was to look at all the collected information, rearranged it into diagrams, and found the idea that had been lying dormant. His diagrams made it possible for physicists to look at a world that was previously unimaginable.

When Albert Einstein had thought through a problem, he thought in terms of visual and spatial forms rather than thinking along purely mathematical or verbal lines of reasoning. In fact, he believed that words and numbers, as they are written or spoken, did not play a significant role in his thinking process.

Words tend to impose strong, subtle pressures on us to see the world as fixed, fragmented, and static. Whereas quantum physics has demonstrated that the world is dynamic, fluid and constantly evolving. We were taught the world is a noun. Creative geniuses have always interpreted the world as a verb.

Joe Sale / Is there a relationship between feelings, emotions, and creativity?

Michael Michalko / When you look at the behaviors lives of creative geniuses throughout the history of the world, you will find that the form of their behavior and contents of their creativity are inextricably connected and can’t be separated. An example is Michelangelo, who was hired to paint the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel. His rivals persuaded Pope Julius II to hire him because they knew that the sculptor Michelangelo had rarely used color and had never painted in fresco. Fresco was a complicated process. First the artist mixed sand and lime and spread the mix over the wall. Next the artist applied colors but had to it fast, while the wall was still wet or fresh. When it dried, the colors fused chemically with the lime and called fresco. They mixed sand and lime and spread the mix over the wall. Next they applied their colors but had to do it fast, while the wall was still wet or fresh. When it dried, the colors fused chemically with the lime and became permanent. Michelangelo had never used color or painted in a fresco. His competitors were convinced he would turn down the commission due to his inexperience with fresco. If he did accept it, they were convinced the result would be amateurish and planned to use it to point out his inadequacies to the Pope and the art world.

Michelangelo believed he was the greatest artist in the world and he could create masterpieces using any medium. He acted on that belief by accepting the commission. He executed the frescos in great discomfort, having to work with his face looking upwards, which impaired his sight so badly that for months he could not read save with his head turned backwards for months. By acting upon his belief and going through the motions, he created the masterpiece that established him as the artist of the age. Another example is how Leonardo da Vinci created the emotions he wanted when he painted the Mona Lisa.

Leonardo da Vinci once observed that it’s no mystery why it is fun to be around happy people and depressing to be around depressed people. He also observed the melancholic atmosphere that painters usually give in many portraits. He attributed that to the solitariness of the artists and their environment. According to Giorgio Vasari (1568), Leonardo, while painting the Mona Lisa, employed singers, musicians, and jesters to chase away his melancholy as he painted. As a result, he painted a smile so pleasing that it seems divine and as alive as the original.

Joe Sale / A venture capitalist was quoted as saying that over 50% of new inventions come from individuals who are not directly in that field. This statement seems to line up with a question you ask in the Introduction of your book, Creative Thinkering, “Why is it that the more expert people become in their field, the less creative and innovative they become?” What are your thoughts on this?

Michael Michalko / Once we have a belief, we tend to look to confirm that belief by what we observe. Psychologists call this phenomenon “confirmation bias.” This is a phenomenon where people, once they believe a proposition is true will force everything else to add fresh support and confirmation for it. Think of the last new car you bought. Remember continuing to read ads and reviews about your new car, but avoiding all ads and reviews of other makes and models.

English psychologist Peter Wason in a famous experiment gave subjects the three number sequence, “2-4-6,” and asked them to guess the rule he used to devise the rule. The individuals were then told to generate and write down other triads of numbers as examples of the rule, and the experimenter would determine whether the triads were examples of the rule. Finally, the individual was told that when they were certain, they could state the rule.

Wason discovered that his subjects immediately assumed they knew the rule and generated triads that were consistent with their belief—they attempted to confirm their hypothesis. Typically, in his experiments subjects formed a wrong idea—counting by twos—and then searched for confirming evidence. For example, they would offer examples such as 6-8-10, 31-33-35, 102-104-106, and so forth. Each time Wason would say yes, it conformed to his rule. The rule that people believed to be true was numbers increasing by 2.

In the end, he would explain that all the subjects’ hunches conformed to the rule, but counting by twos was not the rule. The rule was simply numbers ascending such as 2-4-8, 1-2-3, 2-31-105, and so on. All one had to do to test the rule was to offer different examples of sets of three such as 4-5-6 or 10-8-6 to disqualify alternatives.

Since there was no penalty for being wrong, one could easily have discovered his rule had they not spent their time confirming what they had already accepted. Typically subjects formed a wrong idea —counting by twos—and then searched for confirming evidence. For example, 6-8-10, 31-33-35, and so forth.

All of the subjects’ responses were anchored by the belief of numbers increasing by two. In the same way, managers who believe in structured thinking and their own theories will only observe what they think confirms their theory and disregard the rest.

Einstein once called a person with thirty years experience a person with one year’s experience repeated thirty times. Thomas Edison once advised aspiring inventors to always ask an expert if something can be done. If they say “no,” the go ahead and do it. Sam Walton, founder of Wal-Mart, once told me that all he wanted in life was a Ben Franklin store franchise and a salary of $65,000 a year. He tried to change the way Ben Franklin retailed.

At that time the corporate executives ordered the merchandise and “pushed it” onto the franchises to sell. Walton wanted to “pull” the merchandise he needed from corporate. He told me that no matter what he said or did he could not get them to even consider his idea. “They,” he said, “forced me to go out and start my own retail organization and become the richest man in America.”

Joe Sale / What is the link, if any, between creativity and innovation? Can creativity and innovation be considered synonymous?

Michael Michalko / Creating and innovating are both verbs that mean, more or less, the same thing. In the military we called the process of creative thinking “improvising,” which to us meant creating something new out of whatever we had on hand.

Language predisposes our mind to a certain way of thinking. Consider a rose. Using words, one might say a rose is a red, pink, or white flower one gives to a beautiful woman, a pleasant hostess, or to a deceased friend. Notice how the tagging of a complex flower with a simple verbal description detours human curiosity by predisposing us along a certain avenue of thought. It’s as if the language we use draws a magic circle around us, a circle from which there is no escape save by stepping out of the circle ( language) into another. Consider the difficulties of physicists, such as Ernest Rutherford, in the early days of atomic physics. The word atom meant indivisible in Greek. The notion that the atom was indivisible was a fixed one, and it was only when physicists stepped out of their verbal-mathematical language circle of thinking and into the visual circle of thinking were they able to demonstrate graphically that the atom was a divisible unit of matter.

Joe Sale / Does the process of asking the right questions influence creativity?

Michael Michalko / Genius is often finding a perspective no one else has found. This entails not only asking multiple questions, but looking at the problem from multiple viewpoints. The key is to learn how to look at the same thing as everyone else and see something different.

Einstein was once asked what the difference was between him and the average person. He replied, “Ask the average person to find a needle in a haystack. He or she will stop when they find a needle. Me, on the other hand, will go through the entire haystack looking for all the possible needles.

Joe Sale / Can you comment on left brain vs. right brain dominance and creative thinking?

Michael Michalko / When it comes to creativity, myths keep giving most people reasons not to try. Only artists have creativity and creativity is rare, we’re told. Creativity is mysterious and magical and divine, people say. It’s in your right brain, the headlines swear.

None of these beliefs is true, not even slightly. The brain hemisphere distinction is based largely on clinical studies of about 40 “split-brain” patients–people whose brains were severed surgically in order to treat seizures or other neurological problems. The initial studies of such patients, conducted in the 1960s, seemed to show significant functional differences between the left and right cerebral hemispheres. In the 1980s, however, scientists began to reinterpret the data. The problem is split-brain patients all have abnormal brains to begin with.

As a practical matter, the right-hemisphere myth is nonsense because virtually no one has a split brain. The two halves of our brain are connected by an immense structure called the corpus callosum, and the hemispheres also communicate through the sense organs. Creativity has no precise location in the human brain, and people who promise to reactivate your “neural creativity zones” are just yanking your chain.

Joe Sale / Michael, in our previous conversation, you mentioned the concept, that all human experiences are neutral, and the related concept that all human experiences are only imbued with the meaning we give it. Can you elaborate on that? What is the significance of these concepts?

Michael Michalko / A field of grass is given its character, essentially, by those experiences which happen over and over again–millions of times. The germination of the grass seed, the blowing wind, the flowering of the grass, the hatching of insects, being beaten down by thunderstorms, the paths made by animals and hikers, and so on. It is a whole system of interdependent events that determine the nature of the field of grass.

It is also roughly true that the nature of our beliefs and perceptions are interpreted from our experiences. The field of grass cannot change its character. Grass cannot interpret and shape its experiences to create a different nature. We are not a field of grass. We can choose to interpret our experiences anyway we wish. You know as well as I do that few of us are even aware of what this means.

We automatically interpret all of our experiences without realizing it. Are they good experiences, bad ones, what do they mean and so on? We do this without much thought, if any, to what the interpretations mean. For instance, if someone bumps into you, you wonder why. The event of her bumping into you is neutral in itself. It has no meaning. It’s your interpretation of the bumping that gives it meaning, and this meaning shapes your perception of the experience.

You may interpret the “bump” as rude behavior. You may interpret her as being deliberately aggressive, or you may feel you are of such little consequence that you’re deliberately unnoticed and bumped around by others. Or you may choose to use the experience as an example of feminist aggression, or you may interpret the bump as her way of flirting with you. Your interpretation of the experience determines your perception.

Think of roses and thorns. You can complain because roses have thorns, or you can rejoice because thorns have roses. You can choose to interpret experiences any way you wish. It is not the experience that determines who you are; it is your interpretation of the experience. You do not see things as they are; you see them as you are.

We are each given a set of experiences in life. The experiences are neutral. They have no meaning. It is how we interpret the experiences that give them meaning. The interpretations of experiences shape your beliefs and theories about the world. Your beliefs and theories, in turn, decide what you observe in the world to confirm your beliefs which, in turn, reinforce your interpretations. It is the interpretation of these experiences that create your beliefs and perceptions of the world.

Once upon a time, two explorers came upon a spectacular, perfectly tended garden of vegetables in the middle of jungle. One explorer says, “What a beautiful garden. It looks so perfect. Surely, a gardener must tend this garden.” The other disagrees, “There is no way a gardener can tend this garden. It is in the middle of the jungle, hundreds of miles from civilization. There is so sign of human life anywhere. Surely, it is some kind of natural phenomenon.” After much argument, they agree to set up camp and watch the garden to see if someone shows up to tend the garden.

They stay for months and no one shows up. “See,” said the Doubter. “There is no gardener, for surely he would have appeared by now to tend the garden, which is still perfect. It must be a random creation of nature.” The Believer argued, “No, there must be a gardener. He may be invisible, intangible, and eternally elusive to our understanding. But it is not possible for such a beautiful, well tended garden to exist in the middle of the jungle without being tended. The garden, itself, is proof of the existence of the gardener, and I have faith that the gardener will return to his garden.”

Both the Believer and Doubter interpreted the garden differently, and these two different interpretations led to two different beliefs. When you believe something, you have the feeling that you chose to believe or not believe based on reason and rational thinking. But this is not so, your beliefs are shaped by the way you interpret your experiences.

How you interpret experiences also helps determine how you feel. Professor Kahneman of Princeton University while researching happiness and well-being discovered that when he asked college students if they were happy, most said yes. However, if he first asked how many dates they had in the last month and then asked if they were happy, most said no. Their interpretation of the questions determined how they felt.

Try this little exercise. Select something you “need,” and then tell yourself it is something you “should have.” Can you feel the shift in your psychology? Next select something you “should have,” then tell yourself it is something you “need.” Try the following:

Change something you have to do to something you choose to do.

“I have to go to work” to “I choose to go to work.”

Change something you have to do to something you want to do.

“I have to clean the house” to “I want to clean the house.”

Change something you ought to do to something you would love to do.

“I ought to write her a thank you note” to “I would love to write her a thank you note.”

Your theory about the world is deduced from your interpretations and beliefs. That theory then determines what you observe in the world. At one time, ancient astronomers believed that the heavens were eternal and made of ether. This theory made it impossible for them to observe meteors as burning stones from outer space. Although the ancients witnessed meteor showers and found some on the ground, they couldn’t recognize them as meteors from outer space. They only sought out and observed only those things that confirmed their theory about the heavens.

We are like the ancient astronomers and actively seek out only that information that confirms our beliefs and theories about ourselves and the world. Religious people see evidence of God’s handiwork everywhere; whereas, atheists see evidence that there is no God everywhere. Conservatives see the evils of liberalism everywhere and liberals see the evils of conservatism everywhere. People who believe they are creative see evidence of their creativity everywhere, and people who do not believe they are creative see evidence that confirms this everywhere.

Joe Sale / Michael, the chapter in your book, You Become What You Pretend to Be, is excellent! In it you say that “the human brain cannot tell the difference between an actual experience and an experience imagined vividly in detail”. Can you share the practical application of that principle and an example?

Michael Michalko / You become what you pretend to be. The surrealist artist Salvador Dali was pathologically shy as a child. He hid in closets and avoided all human contact until his uncle counseled him on how to overcome this shyness. He advised Dali to be an actor and to pretend he played the part of an extrovert. At first Dali was full of doubts as he began to act the part. When he adopted the pose of an extrovert and made it obvious to himself and others by acting the part, his brain soon adapted itself to the role he was playing. Dali’s pretending changed his psychology.

Another remarkable example is Victor Frankl’s account of being in a concentration camp in his book From Death-Camp to Existentialism. While most of his fellow inmates lost hope and died, Frankl reframed his experience and pretended to be an academic lecturer and occupied his mind creating lectures he would give after he was released from camp—lectures that would draw upon his experiences in the camp. He took a hopeless situation and transformed it in his mind to a source of rich experiences that he could use to help others overcome potentially deadening and hopeless situations.

An important point to remember is that you can synthesize experience, literally create it in your imagination. The human brain cannot tell the difference between an “actual” experience and an experience imagined vividly and in detail.

Another case in point is that of Air Force Colonel George Hall. He was a POW locked in the dark box of a North Vietnamese prison for seven grueling years. Every day Hall imagined he was a golf professional and played a full game of golf in his imagination. One week after he was released from his POW camp he entered the Greater New Orleans Open and shot a 76.

Another incredible account is that of Vera Fryling, a Jewish teenager on the run from the Gestapo, she lived undercover in Berlin during the Holocaust. During this time she imagined that she was a doctor, a psychiatrist in a free land. Overcoming the Nazis, Soviet army and a bout with cancer, Fryling ended up on the faculty of the San Francisco Medical School. “Imagination,” she says, “can help one transcend the insults life has dealt us.”

Joe Sale / Michael, in closing, please share the 1 life lesson, universal life principle, or universal law that has had the greatest impact on your life.

Michael Michalko / I met a Buddhist monk who was always joyful no matter how hard his life and become, and he was incredibly knowledgeable. He seemed to know a lot about many different subjects. I asked him what made him so joyful and knowledgeable. His reply was:

“Live every day as if you are going to die tomorrow.”

“Learn as much as you can as if you will live forever.”

The next week he was shot on his way to temple and died.

These principles have guided my life since then.

About the Author

Michael Michalko is the author of Creative Thinkering, Thinkertoys, Cracking Creativity, and ThinkPak. While an army officer, he organized a team of NATO intelligence specialists and international academics to find the best inventive thinking method. He has expanded and taught these techniques to numerous Fortune 500 companies and organizations. He lives in Rochester, New York. Visit him online at http://www.CreativeThinking.net.

To find out more about the book, Creative Thinkering, by Michael Michalko, please visit New World Library.