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Contemplation Meditation News People Reading Relationships

LISTENING IS THE KEY TO LEARNING

 

 

Reviewers have written about Listen Learn Share

“What the book ‘The Secret’ is to intention, ‘Listen, Learn, Share’ is to positive thought process and awareness.”

“Liked James R. Martin new book “Listen, Learn, and Share”. An impressive collaboration of eastern and western thinking, there is much to learn from it about the world as a whole.”

The stated purpose of this book is to share some simple truths to help people along their life paths. The book delivers on this purpose in a clear, gentle, and compelling way, providing many helpful insights into how to think about and consider our thoughts and feelings...”

 

It’s very easy to lose or shut down your learning ability. You can’t grow or make changes to your life if you’re not listening. Without listening and learning you keep creating similar outcomes, which are not always what you desire.

It’s like the sound of a recording, a word or note, stuck on the same glitch in the track, repeating itself endlessly, unable to get passed the glitch.

You can’t reset the recording if you don’t hear the glitch. You can’t move ahead if your tires are spinning.

You need to stop looking in the rear-view mirror, while you try to drive forward.

Listen, Learn, Share is a book that will help you get unstuck. It explores this phenomenon, exposing the causes of not moving forward, as it reveals how to move your mind into the present.

 

LISTEN LEARN SHARE IS AVAILABLE ON AMAZON AND APPLE iBOOK

Listen Learn Share: How & Why Listening, Learning and Sharing can Transform Your Life Experience In Practical Ways

 

 

ALSO BY James R Martin Available on Amazon

Actuality Interviewing and Listening: How to conduct successful interviews for nonfiction storytelling, actuality documentaries and other disciplines … (Documentary and Nonfiction Storytelling)

 

Categories
News Orlando People Politics

Barack Obama in Orlando Florida May 2008 Campaign Stop

In 2008, early in his campaign for President, Barack Obama made a campaign stop in the  Greater Orlando Florida area suburb of Maitland. The event was organized by local Democrats. Excellent turnout.  Listening to Obama’s speech reminds that he did accomplish many of the things he campaigned on and would have done more with the cooperation of the Senate and Congress for all eight years.

Categories
News Observations People Politics

Hurricane Coverage — “Just The Facts Mam, Just The Facts…”

I’m in Orlando, Florida. Over the past week or longer I have listened to hurricane Irma news that has become thinly masked hysteria and propaganda. After watching hurricane Harvey devastate Huston and parts of Texas, I decided to be fully prepared for a possible hurricane in Florida this time of year. Having gone through a number of storms including Charley, right here in Winter Park, Florida, I knew how to prepare. Still, I’m grateful for the information communicated on television and online. It is important everyone be prepared and knows what to do.

Except for periodic checks, I am keeping TV news and the Weather Channel turned off. I appreciate this hurricanes severity and I believe everyone should take it seriously. Most reporters mean well, but there seems to be some hysterical reporting of events and tracking data on television. I have watched the predicted tracks of Irma for a week; the European Model, American models etc. and every day they have been predicting an imminent northward track for the storm. First it was up the east coast of Florida, then the center, and now the western coast. But hurricane Irma just keeps heading west. All of the predictions based on the computer models continue to be wrong. The only thing they got correct is that Irma is headed west. If this storm should head west into the Gulf of Mexico, few people will ever trust these forecasts in the future. Even now a well-known AM talk show radio host was claiming it is all “fake news,” before he evacuated the state.

Hurricane Irma is a force of nature and as such unpredictable in a total sense. It is a huge hurricane, 400 miles wide they keep saying, while they show a huge cone sweeping up the Florida peninsula to the north practically to Pennsylvania. Yes the storm is 400 miles wide, but the highest hurricane force winds only extend out about 70 miles from the eye of the storm.   In addition that’s 200 miles on each side of the center. The cone covering the anticipated but speculative track of the storm is misleading.

On Saturday afternoon, September ninth, the storm’s winds dropped to 135 mph and the hurricane became category 3. They are still predicting a northward turn up the west coast of Florida. Currently the storm is heading west, battering Cuba not showing any sign of turning north. Will it ultimately turn north? Probably it will do so, but where and when is not known. What should be said by the coverage is “we really don’t know where this hurricane will go. But here’s our best guess.”

All of the reporters and experts were quick to say that no one should be complacent, the hurricane could still be a category 5 when it goes through the straight and gains strength when it turns North and devastates the entire state of Florida, including Tampa and Orlando. But if the eye of the storm goes over Tampa, there will not be the same impact on Orlando as Tampa.

The governor of Florida is constantly saying “catastrophic,” “life threatening,” and “devastating.” “Worse hurricane in the history of mankind!” And won’t we be grateful and amazed at how well he handled this catastrophe and elect him to the senate. It is obvious that everyone, from politicians to television outlets have decided to purposefully exaggerate conditions in the name of “it’s better to be prepared.” “People won’t take things seriously enough if we tell them the truth or include any optimistic predictions.” It may be true that some “people” will do that. But facts are either true or false. Opinions should be voiced as opinions not reality.

I listened to a reporter on the weather channel increase numbers substantially from what was just reported by the channel’s weather expert. She quickly rounded off the numbers higher. Even the width of Florida shrunk from about 145 miles to 130 miles. Hmm, at the bottom of the peninsula it’s only a few feet! This “spin” of facts is not good. In the end it destroys trust in the reporting. It causes hysteria and panic.

Warnings are fine. But the facts should not be distorted for any reason, however important anyone may think it is to motivate viewers. Distorting and exaggerating the facts causes panic and hysteria. Like people fighting over water and stocking up on enough food for weeks. Of course if you live next to the ocean and a hurricane is approaching you should evacuate of find a shelter. But you need to be able to trust the information is factual and make an informed decision about what you will do. Because of all the spin and hype people just don’t trust what they are hearing.

I am prepared for this storm hitting Orlando in the next couple days. I’ve taken in all the furniture and other things from balconies and front porch. I stocked up on water, spare batteries and food. I am ready. I will work and/or relax. If I need a break read a book or as long as there is electricity find a movie to watch that is not apocalyptic. Definitely do some meditating.

J R Martin

Categories
People

Never Ending Tribalism

Personally I mourn the loss of life in Paris, Beirut, in the sky over Sinai, and everywhere else,  to violence. These acts, murder and war diminish the human spirit. Every time something like this happens it dulls human consciousness and we lapse into the debilitating grayness of wrong thinking.

America does not need ISIS or any other foreign group to commit acts of terror here. We do it to ourselves. It is Americans who have killed people in theaters and innocent children at school shootings. Homegrown terrorism. Armed to the teeth we shoot each other every day in random acts of violence and anger.

When I look around each day I can’t help but be grateful for my life. Grateful I was born in America where I have had a good life full of opportunity. I acknowledge that America is not perfect, we are an experiment in progress. There are those within our own country who would use fear to manipulate us for their own goals during the fog of war. The battle cries and tribal drumbeat rally the masses into a frenzy of revenge against the uncivilized barbarians. Isn’t this the same drumbeat to which the barbarians are marching?

I have been in the military and believe in self-defense. But I also believe that human evolution holds something for us beyond our current stone-age reactionary minds. As a species, we can’t evolve unless we take risks to go beyond this never-ending cycle of tribalism that clearly seems to be leading humanity to extinction.

j r martin

Categories
Film Health People

YOUR INNER FISH

Your innerfishYour Inner Fish is a well made television style documentary, three episode series.  Episode 1 – Your Inner Fish, Episode 2 – Your Inner Reptile and Episode 3 – Your Inner Monkey.  All three episodes are entertaining, informative, and offer a trip through time going back to when prehistoric fish swam in the oceans and animal life on dry land apparently didn’t exist. The story delves into areas of research that have changed what was thought to be true up until now.

The Your Inner Fish  series is one from which everyone can learn. The documentary presents facts and offers evidence to support the ideas explored.  In addition to Neil Shubin, a Fish Paleontologist, a number of well know specialists in related areas are interviewed or are followed as they go from lab to remote locations to do their work of scientifically exploring the origins of the human primate. Paleontology, Anatomy, Biology and other disciplines are relevant, important contributors to understanding human evolution.

TO VIEW ENTIRE REVIEW GO TO: JRMARTINMEDIA.COM

Categories
Arts Fine Arts People Reading

CREATIVITY – the perfect crime

CreativityPhilippe Petit does not try to define creativity or offer a plan for being creative. Petit is an inventive problem solver who, in is own way, includes the reader of Creativity – the perfect crime in a documentary style, personal process of creation.   Artists of all types, writers, filmmakers; anyone involved in being creative in their occupations and lives will find this book inspirational.

“With the reader as his accomplice, Petit reveals fresh and unconventional ways of going about the artistic endeavor, from generating and shaping ideas to practicing, problem-solving and ultimately pulling off the “coup” itself—executing a finished work.” — Creativity – the perfect crime book cover, inside front flap.

Petit writes that creativity is a “criminal activity,” that early on he dropped the conventions and ethics of society, went outside the restraints culture imposes, invented his own rules and rebelled against a repressive environment. In fact Petit reminds us,  that his evolution is universal for creative people. Critical inventive problem solving must break established rules, laws and convention. In that respect it is, as Petit writes, “a criminal activity.”

“Develop unabashedly your own set of morals, cling to your own logic, inhabit your own universe: teach yourself as you let life teach you.”  — Philippe Petit – Creativity — the perfect crime.

The structure of this book is documentary in nature. There are a number of parallel themes interwoven though out Creativity – the perfect crime. Anecdotally the author creates a first person narration, his personal journey in life along with the way he has learned to solve life’s obstacles through invention, breaking some rules, observation, intuition and thinking beyond the constraints that surround him. Another theme layered throughout  is a case study of his high wire walk between the twin towers in New York City in January of 1974. Numerous other experiences also bring out concepts and ideas that form the creative process for Petit. The author has also created hand drawn illustrations that graphically bring to life many of the notions and points he is making.

Tower walk NY City 1974
Tower walk NY City 1974

Creativity — the perfect crime is a story that both entertains, educates and informs the reader.  It will inspire creative souls with more information than they can absorb all at once.  It is a book that should be read slowly and more than once.  Appreciated the same way a good glass of wine is observed and appreciated with all the senses. Philippe Petit advises: “Learn and teach, teach and learn. Who dares to teach must never cease to learn.”

Philippe Petit is a performing artist who started out teaching himself to juggle, then do tight rope walking.  He has been a street performer, a magician, writer and teacher. Creativity — the perfect crime, is not a text-book in any  conventional sense.  But it could be a great addition that expands any type of arts curriculum.  Students of the arts, writing and film, at all levels of learning, will benefit from the wisdom in this book.

Review by James R Martin at J R Martin Media, author Create Documentary Films, Videos and Multimedia.

 

Philippe Petit at TED

BOOK LINKS

[amazon_image id="1594631689" link="true" target="_blank" size="medium" ]Creativity: The Perfect Crime

Create Documentary Films, Videos and Multimedia: A Comprehensive Guide to Using Documentary Storytelling Techniques for Film, Video, the Internet and Digital Media Projects.