Ashleigh

[Alonso Gurmendi @Alonso_GD]

I am in awe of what South Africa is doing for Palestinians and frankly, for all the "others" of this world. What a historic role to play

[Sky News @SkyNews]

🗣 "We really have to stop burning fossil fuels and quickly," Dr Friederike Otto tells Sky News

@FrediOtto is the senior lecturer in climate change at @imperialcollege

https://t.co/PAiZ4D1jU3

📺 Sky 501, Virgin 602, Freeview 233 and YouTube

[Dr. Nicole LePera @Theholisticpsyc]

People pleasing isn't about pleasing other people.

It's actually about us trying to avoid guilt.

Why saying "NO" is one of life's most important skills:

[Megatron @Megatron_ron]

BREAKING:

⚡ 🇮🇱 Israel goes on trial for the Genocide it committed in Gaza

Israel will face accusations of Genocide in the International Criminal Court (ICC), which has scheduled a hearing next Thursday, for South Africa's lawsuit accusing Israel of genocide in Gaza.

Israel has confirmed that it will appear in the Netherlands next week to defend against the charges.

https://t.co/0LWwK3vm7y

[Kevin Farzad @KevinFarzad]

Was I very productive this week? No. But was I able to rest and relax? Also no. But was I gentle with myself about all of this? No

[Billy Oppenheimer @bpoppenheimer]

After observing a similar habit among highly creative people (Einstein, Mozart, da Vinci, etc), the neuroscientist Dr. Nancy Andreasen designed a brain-imaging study to understand the neural basis of this habit.

Essentially, these creative people all carved out time each day for...

“Free-floating periods of thought,” Andreasen writes in her book, “The Creating Brain: The Neuroscience of Genius.”

The mechanics of the habit differed from person to person.

Leonardo da Vinci, for example, would often sit in front of a painting “and simply think, sometimes for as long as a half day.”

Whereas Einstein had a wooden boat he called the “Tinef” (Yiddish for “piece of junk”) on which he liked to aimlessly drift wherever he could find a body of water. He had to be rescued by boaters or the Coast Guard so frequently that a friend eventually bought him an outboard motor for emergency use, but Einstein refused it.

“To the average person, being becalmed for hours might be a terrible trial,” the friend said. “To Einstein, this could simply provide more time to think.”

In any case, Dr. Andreasen conducted the first study of brain activity during these “free-floating periods of thought,” when the body is in a “resting state” and the mind is free of inputs, and therefore, free to wander.

“We found activations in multiple regions of the association cortex,” Dr. Andreasen wrote. “We were not [seeing] a passive silent brain during the ‘resting state,’ but rather a brain that was actively connecting thoughts and experiences.”

Essentially, Dr. Andreasen found that the brain defaults to creativity.

When the body is still and the mind is allowed to float freely, the brain engages in what she termed REST (“random episodic silent thinking”).

And during REST, Dr. Andreasen writes, the brain “uses its most human and complex parts...areas known to gather information and link it all together—in potentially novel ways.”

So whether it's sitting in front of painting in your office or on a piece of wood out at sea, if you want to be more creative, carve out time each day for “free-floating periods of thought.”

- - -

“Men of genius are sometimes producing most when they seem least to labor, for their minds are then occupied in the shaping of those conceptions to which they afterward give form.” — Leonardo da Vinci

Follow @bpoppenheimer for more content like this!

[sarah @sahouraxo]

Merry Christmas from Palestine 🇵🇸

[Channel 4 News @Channel4News]

"There was a girl with just her whole body covered in shrapnel. She was nine. I ended up having to change and clean these wounds with no anaesthetic."

Dr Ghassan Abu-Sittah, a surgeon who recently returned from Gaza after 41 days, describes the conditions at Al-Shifa Hospital.

[António Guterres @antonioguterres]

Our world faces a perfect storm:

Growing inequalities. Climate chaos. Conflicts & hunger.

#G20 members can help lead the way out of it in 3 areas:

Financial justice. Structural justice. Climate justice.

We are one earth with one future - let’s act like it.

[The Spectator Index @spectatorindex]

BREAKING: UN chief Antonio Guterres says 'We are witnessing a killing of civilians that is unparalleled and unprecedented in any conflict since I am secretary general'.

[ICRC @ICRC]

"In the last week I’ve had to tell a father that his child has non-survivable burn injuries. We’ve had to treat patients, young children, pulled out of the rubble after 48 hours"

Report from ICRC war surgery team, Gaza.

Footage for download #Newsroom
https://t.co/x6frThjhSR

[Sky News @SkyNews]

BREAKING: Conservative MP Paul Bristow has been sacked from his government post after calling for a ceasefire in Gaza
https://t.co/CVVwRbIYDp

[Ashleigh @AshRaptor]

I unlocked The Daily Dozen for tickets to see @WickedUK on @TodayTixUK! Tap to unlock: https://t.co/NRAO5ceUa4

[Al Jazeera English @AJEnglish]

This 12-year-old Syrian boy is making his own toys from scrap he finds in his camp for displaced people 👇

[Ashleigh @AshRaptor]

“I got too much in my pockets, I wish they were empty.”

[Sky News @SkyNews]

BREAKING: Neuroscientists and neurosurgeons have re-established communication between the brain & spinal cord allowing a paralysed person to walk again.

Latest: https://t.co/XqtBYib3Yl

📺 Sky 501, Virgin 602, Freeview 233 and YouTube

[Ashleigh @AshRaptor]

@MercyPhuphu The numbers aren’t working on WhatsApp. Please inbox me your address and the WhatsApp number again xx

[Ashleigh @AshRaptor]

@MercyPhuphu Will WhatsApp you now x

[Ashleigh @AshRaptor]

@MercyPhuphu Hi! Have you had anything to eat? Do you have WhatsApp? I can message you.