Smart Phone Apps that Keep You Learning Behind the Wheel

If you are often mindlessly behind the wheel of your car logging windshield time, perhaps with the radio on or maybe in silence, you could be missing an opportunity to engage your mind with positive or enlightening messages. Last year I read something Larry Winget wrote in one of his books about using driving time as another chance to learn.

Since then, I have used several different apps with my Android smartphone to listen and learn while in the car. I commute to my teaching job 40 minutes each day, and the average nonfiction audiobook is six hours in length. If I play an audio book on my way to and from school for each of the 190 days I make the trip, over the course of the school year, I will go through roughly 21 books!

These are the best and most used free apps I use to beam content to my Bluetooth connected radio:

Overdrive Media Console. This app will connect to your public library's audiobook collection and play them with a very nice interface. You are limited to your library's offerings just like you would be for regular books to check out, but if your library has a decent stock of titles, you'll be set. There are over 22,000 libraries that use the system, so chances are good you're a member of one. The other nice thing is that the audiobooks are automatically returned if you don't renew them... No late fees!

Umano. This app is unique in that it offers a curated list of interesting articles from major publications on many different subjects narrated by professional voice actors. I have found many thought provoking and interesting items using Umano. The people employed to read do a quite respectable job. At one time, I had a search in place for inspirational items. The app didn't disappoint, offering a wide array of news and general interest items that fit the category.

uListen is my current "go to" app in the car. It is just great. There are thousands of videos on the youtube with motivating, inspiring, informational, and fascinating topics. Many of these videos are perfectly understandable with no video playing at all (like taped motivational seminars) or are already audio only. uListen will search all of YouTube and will play only the audio from any given video. On the road, cell towers can be spread out. No video means less bandwidth and a smooth playback experience despite poor reception!

Stitcher bills itself as a kind of internet radio. What it actually is is a streaming podcast app with a wide array of content in 18 different subject areas, from current events to religion and spirituality. I like Stitcher because of its streaming platform. Podcasted shows aren't downloaded and don't take space on my phone. Episodes are also dynamically refreshed to the most current without my help. The app also allows the creation of a list of "favorites" to return to time after time.

Do you have favorites in this genre of app? Please share below. I'd love to hear from you!

 

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Talk Positive to Me!

If I'm not careful, I can be a pretty negative talker. I can get down on the person I talk to the most, and can be a brutally negative force in his life. I'm embarrassed to admit it, but it's true.

And that person is me. All of us carry on more conversations with ourselves than with any other person. Of all the continual banter going on between the ears, a good portion of it can be quite negative.

• I'm not going to do well...
• I'm not ready for...
• I'm too this or I'm too that.
• I can't....
• This is too hard...
• I don't want...

A student who does well in her classes and studies hard for a big test may walk into the classroom on test day saying things like "I hope I do well. I'm not a good test taker." Or "I don't want to bomb this too badly!" That negative self talk programs the mind to go in the opposite direction of the desired result. Of course she wants to do well! In an attempt to lower expectations in her mind to cushion the blow of a possible lower grade, she is opening the door to poor performance. Instead, walking into the classroom with an attitude of "I got this!" leaves no room for negativity.

On the golf course, a golfer tees up the ball and promptly hooks it into the lake. Walking back the the cart he exclaims loudly, "I knew I was going to do that!" (In the interest of full disclosure, I have done AND said this a few times over the years...) Well goodness. If he knew he was going to do it while standing over the ball, why didn't he back away, set his mind on the positive thought of hitting it down the middle of the fairway, and let it rip? I can attest that clearing negative self talk usually works in this case!

To go one step further, imagine all your negative self talk and doubt projected externally to other people. Yuck! Why do you think it is that we can be so outwardly positive but so inwardly negative?
 
Keep your head full of positive information and positive messages. It takes work, but keep your noggin full of ideas from positive and motivating people. As Zig Ziglar was fond of saying, you are who you are and where you are because of what you've put into your head.

Read good books, read the Bible, find inspiration and keep the negative self talk at bay. in doing this, you will be able to more easily recognize then repell negative self talk when it creeps into your head.

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Digging for the Good

Andrew Carnegie was one of the richest men in the world at the beginning of the 20th century. He made his millions with keen business acumen and a sharp eye for developing the skill and effectiveness of the people around him. In fact, at one point, he had 43 millionaires working for his companies -- an unheard of occurrence back then. Depending on what index you look at, one million dollars in 1910 is the equivalent of between $25,000,000 (using the consumer price index) and $481,000,000 (as a percent of the US gross domestic product)!

Carnegie was once asked by reporter how he managed to hire 43 millionaires. He responded that none of them were millionaires when he hired them but observed that, "You develop millionaires the way you mine gold. You expect to move tons of dirt to find an ounce of gold, but you don't go into the mine looking for the dirt—you go in looking for the gold."

How often have we seen the "dirt" in other people and assumed that was all there was? How often do we stop digging and move on? Strip mining for gold creates holes in the earth thousands of feet wide and hundreds of feet deep using equipment larger than houses. Our personal gold digging landscape may look only like a sea of gopher holes in the grass.

The difference between the holes is belief. Gold miners dig broad and deep because they know gold is there. If it's easy to see potential gold in someone, we tend to dig deeper too. However, look for the gold in everyone, and not just the easy-to-see stuff. Invest and get digging!

 

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