Always Be Better

Hello and welcome to "Always Be Better" with Mel Windham. Today, I'd like to share another book that has changed my life: Carl Sagan's COSMOS . A decade before the book came out, my father had instilled in me a love of the stars and planets. He would show me the heavens through his telescope, and we'd watch rocket launches on TV. So, I was ready when we learned astronomy in the sixth grade. That year, our teacher, Barry, told us about this new show coming on PBS called COSMOS  by Carl Sagan. I had never heard of the guy, but I obeyed and watched the show "live" -- all thirteen episodes, which came out one episode a week.  Near the end of the first episode Carl showed us a gigantic calendar representing the whole life of the universe, and he walked over to a little square at the end of December 31, and said: "This tiny square, just a few minutes on the last day of the year, is our whole human history." And it floored my little sixth grade brai...

Hello and welcome to "Always Be Better" with Mel Windham. Today I'm going to introduce you to the Drake Equation. This will require us to venture out into space. I know. Sounds exciting? For decades, scientists have been listening to the cosmos, trying to find signs of life, only to find none. Back in 1950, a scientist by the name of Enrico Fermi asked the question "Where is everybody?" and then Fermi's Paradox was born. Seeing how quickly life had come to existence on our planet, it seems reasonable to believe that there are many planets throughout our galaxy capable of supporting life able to send intelligent signals. You may have heard about the Arecibo radio telescope that collapsed a couple of months ago. It was strong enough to pick up radio signals from a big chunk of the Milky Way, and yet, none of the signals show any sign of intelligence -- just pulsating stars and other naturally occurring signals. EDIT: The Arecibo telescope was strong enough to...

Hi, and welcome to "Always Be Better" with Mel Windham. Today we're going to talk about disagreements, but first a quick update. A couple of weeks ago I mentioned an upcoming episode on Drake's Equation, which will be my first presentation featuring graphics. But unfortunately, it's not quite ready yet. I've already poured hours into it, but it's turning out to be a massive learning curve. You probably won't think it's that much when you see it, but I'm certainly having fun with the preparations. Look for it coming shortly. So, changing the order a little bit, today I'm going to breach the topic of disagreements. It's inevitable -- if it hasn't already happened, you're going to eventually disagree with something I say, especially when we get to the higher level topics. Or I'm going to disagree with one of your comments, but you know what? That's perfectly okay.  My goal today is to emphasize this: That it's okay to ...

Hi, and welcome back to "Always Be Better" with Mel Windham. This week I'm going to introduce you to The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen R. Covey. This book has changed my life, and you'll hear plenty from it throughout this series. I should probably mention, first, that this is not a paid promotion. Rather, this is a book I want to share, because I've learned that it works. I owe a lot of my success to following its precepts, and I believe it can help you, too.  But before I dive into introductions, I'd first like to pause and ask: do you notice anything different this week? It may be too subtle, but I've learned that videos with more contrast get more likes and views. Evidently high contrast triggers the "ease" factors in our brain. So, I'm trying out a high-contrast filter. You'll have to let me know if you like it. So, okay -- 7 Habits . You've heard of it, and you've probably seen different flavors of these ...