LISTEN TO THIS | You Can’t Give More Than 100%

I’m a pod­cast junkie, and LISTEN TO THIS is a recap of my favorite tid­bits, sound­bites and short bursts of bril­liance that I can’t help but share with every­one who will lis­ten. After digest­ing hours and hours of pod­casts, here’s the best 9 min­utes from what I heard this week.

HE WAS A MAN WHO BELIEVED IN CURIOSITY

SCIENCE FRIDAY | Why Igno­rance Trumps Knowl­edge In Sci­en­tific Pursuit

Ira Flatow’s inter­view with neu­ro­sci­en­tist Stu­art Firestein, author of Igno­rance: How It Dri­ves Sci­ence, is a stim­u­lat­ing con­ver­sa­tion about cre­ative think­ing and inno­va­tion. I book­marked sev­eral quotes like this one about plac­ing too much empha­sis on answers and went back to lis­ten to them again and again. But my favorite sec­tion is the story Ira tells about physi­cist I. I. Rabi’s mother and the role she played in devel­op­ing the way Rabi approached prob­lem solv­ing. Start at 17:54 (or go straight to the direct quote from Rabi).

GIVING 110%

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE | The Hob­son and Holtz Report — Pod­cast #654: June 4, 2012

One of my biggest pet peeves is when peo­ple say they gave 110%. Maybe I’m too lit­eral, maybe I’m too much of a cur­mud­geon, but you can only give 100%. I know the phrase is meant to embody the notion of doing more than what was thought to be pos­si­ble, but to me it puts the empha­sis on the wrong ele­ment. It’s not that you did more than you could, which is impos­si­ble, it’s that you had the wrong assump­tion about what was pos­si­ble to begin with. That’s why the fun anec­dote from Steven Green at Tem­boSo­cial res­onated so well with me. It begins at 1:04:35 in the podcast.

BEN’S STORY

MARKETING OVER COFFEE | Con­ver­sa­tion with Simon Sinek

First off, I love how John Wall labeled this rerun as “From the Archives,” and sec­ond, I’m so glad he brought it back. I’ve seen Simon’s TED talk, and I’m famil­iar with his book Start with Why, but I had not heard this pow­er­ful human inter­est story of Ben who despite hav­ing cere­bral palsy still ran on his high school track team. The moral is not what you might assume. Stop what you’re doing, go this this pod­cast, jump to 23:40, and listen.

New Pod­casts I Tried:

1. The Thomas Jef­fer­son Hour — it’s a keeper and high my list. Thanks Patrick.
2. Stuff You Should Know — fun one that I hope to get my kids lis­ten­ing to. Thanks Ariadne.
3. Get-It-Done Guy’s Quick and Dirty Tips to Work Less and Do More — love these short and help­ful types. Thanks again Ariadne.
4. The Beerists Pod­cast — curi­ous but not sold. Will give it another week.
5. Run­Run­Live — I like run­ning, and I like lis­ten­ing to pod­casts, not sure I like lis­ten­ing to pod­casts about run­ning. Going to try a few more of John’s rec­om­men­da­tions to see for sure.

Unsub­scrib­ing from:

1. NPR: Snap Judg­ment — the sto­ry­telling tech­niques are overly dramatic.
2. Joy the Baker — too many inside jokes and not enough inter­est to invest in learn­ing them.

OTHER PODCAST POSTS YOU MIGHT ENJOY:

• Work­flow of a PODCAST JUNKIE
• LISTEN TO THIS | Anti-Poetry Deflec­tor Shields

What were some of your favorite lis­tens from the week? What pod­casts do you rec­om­mend? Let me know by leav­ing a com­ment. Thanks.