Introducing: Poems as Teachers (ft. Wisława Szymborska) | Ep 1

Personal charisma and likeability are important for many different areas of life, from career success to navigating family and relationships. And at times, it can feel like you’re either born with it or without it—but this isn’t true. In reality, charisma is a skill like any other. In How to Become a People Magnet, motivational speaker and life coach Marc Reklau explains how you can improve your charisma and social abilities. His lessons are based on one main principle: People are mainly interested in themselves and what they can get from you. If you keep this in mind and tailor your conversations around it, you’ll start getting along better with others.

This guide covers Reklau’s main strategies for making positive first impressions, forming deeper connections, and persuading people. In our commentary, we’ll cover some of the psychology behind his advice and offer alternate perspectives on charisma and social success.

You may not realize it, but your brain has an extraordinary capacity for complex calculations. Simple tasks like stepping over a garden hose as you walk across your lawn require elaborate computations, and yet they seem easy because your brain does them intuitively.

Barbara Oakley wrote A Mind for Numbers to help you learn math and science well enough that they, too, become intuitive. In this guide, we will examine Oakley’s explanation of your brain’s natural capabilities, her strategies for remembering complex concepts more easily, her recommendations for building good study habits and avoiding procrastination, and a few other tips for succeeding in your studies. We’ll also examine the scientific basis of her recommendations and compare her strategies to those of other experts in learning and memory.

In When Things Fall Apart, Buddhist nun and teacher Pema Chödrön provides guidance on how to find courage and compassion amid pain, loss, and uncertainty. She writes that pain and suffering are inevitable parts of life but that these experiences can also be opportunities for growth and transformation. Drawing on ancient Buddhist wisdom and practices, Chödrön shows us how to cultivate self-awareness and acceptance and face life's challenges with grace and resilience.

In this guide, we explore Chödrön’s views on why we suffer—what causes emotional pain and perpetuates it during challenging times—and outline what you can do to turn these experiences into opportunities for growth and healing. We also compare Chödrön’s teachings to insights from other Buddhist teachers and mental health experts and provide additional context about Buddhism so you can better understand and apply these concepts to real-world challenges.

For millennia, humans struggled with three serious problems—famine, plagues, and war—which led to the deaths of millions of people and to the rise and fall of global empires. People coped with these problems and answered life's questions with religion. However, in the modern era, we no longer rely on prayer—we’ve mostly overcome these three problems through the development of technology and medical knowledge.

In Homo Deus, Yuval Noah Harari, a professor at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, envisions a future in which technology replaces humanist ideals and liberal government. Dissecting the concepts of religion, immortality, and technology, Harari argues that the world of the future may be run by advanced algorithms and artificial intelligence, not human beings.

No matter your current skill level, William Zinsser believes anyone can practice the craft of writing. On Writing Well offers a back-to-basics approach, focusing on honing essential writing skills rather than trying to employ complex stylistic techniques. Even if you’re not a professional writer, you’ll often find yourself in a position where you need to express an idea with words, and whether you’re crafting an email or a resume, you can apply Zinsser’s principles of simple, clear, and engaging writing. This book explores how to approach the discipline of writing and effectively put your ideas into words.

In this guide, we’ll explore Zinsser’s principles of simplicity, clarity, and identity, how to achieve each of them, and the specific challenges of creative nonfiction genres. Along the way, we’ll examine how his principles align with or differ from other writing experts, and we’ll provide actionable tips so you can apply Zinsser’s ideas to your writing.

Do you want to understand books better, and remember more of what you read? Do you want to better understand the author’s goal and be a better critic of what you read?

How to Read a Book is the classic guide to reading effectively. It teaches how to understand the crux of a book within 15 minutes, how to analyze a book intelligently, and how to synthesize multiple books together. If you read a lot of books, then it makes sense to learn how to read better and increase the value of your reading.