【推荐1】Some of us like to spend money as soon as we have it, while others like to hold on to money and spend it carefully. But for people who are very smart about their cash, there are a number of interesting ways to invest (投资) it and, if things go well, make a big financial profit (经济收益).

Buying stamps, wine, coins and books are all different ways of investing your money. It comes with risks but can be thrilling as, hopefully, you watch the value of your investment rise. However, you need to know what you’re doing and making a lot of money is not guaranteed (保证).

If you’re happy to take a risk, then one of the most well-known ways of investing is by buying artwork. By buying a painting and holding on to it, its value can increase greatly, but of course, only when you sell it do you feel the profit. Some people get quite lucky particularly when they don’t expect to make any money. There are stories of people buying a painting at an exhibition for peanuts only to find out it’s actually worth thousands of dollars.

Of course, investing in artwork is not a guarantee to make you a millionaire. Patrick Connolly, a financial adviser, says investing in art is too risky and he advises his customers not to invest in it because the downside is greater than the upside.

But if you’re still interested in it, there are art fairs (博览会), such as The Affordable Art Fair, and websites provide buyers with their affordable artwork. Patrick Connolly says the best way here is to buy something you like and can afford and “if it goes up in value, that should be just an added award.”

If this has destroyed your plans for your investment, maybe there’s more chance of winning big money by buying a lottery ticket (彩票)!

【推荐2】After years of observing human nature, I have decided that two qualities make a difference between men of great achievement and men of average performance — curiosity and discontent. I have never known an outstanding man who lacked either. And I have never known an average man who had both.

Together, these deep human urges (驱策力) count for much more than ambition. Galileo was not merely ambitious when he dropped objects of varying weights from the Leaning Tower at Pisa and timed their fall to the ground. Like Galileo, all the great names in history were curious and asked in discontent, “Why? Why? Why?”

Fortunately, curiosity and discontent don’t have to be learned. We are born with them and need only to recapture them. “The great man,” said Mencius, “is he who does not lose his child’s heart.” Yet most of us do lose it. We stop asking questions. We stop challenging custom. We just follow the crowd. And the crowd desires only the calm and restful average.

Most of us meet new people, and new ideas, with hesitation. But once having met and liked them, we think how terrible it would have been, had we missed the chance. We will probably have to force ourselves to waken our curiosity and discontent and keep them awake.

How should you start? Modestly, so as not to become discouraged. I think of one friend who couldn’t arrange flowers to satisfy herself. She was curious about how the experts did it.

The way to begin is to answer your own excuses. You haven’t any special ability? Most people don’t; there are only a few geniuses. You haven’t any time? That’s good, because it’s always the people with no time who get things done. Harriet Stowe, mother of six, wrote parts of Uncle Tom’s Cabin while cooking. You’re too old? Remember that Thomas Costain was 57 when he published his first novel, and that Grandma Moses showed her first pictures when she was 78.

However you start, remember there is no better time to start than right now, for you’ll never be more alive than you are at this moment.

In business, there is a speed difference: It’s the difference between how important firm leaders say speed is to their competitive strategy and how fast the company actually moves. The difference is important regardless of industry and company size.     1    

In our study of 343 businesses, the companies that choose to go, go, go to try to gain an edge ended up with lower sales and operating incomes than those that paused at key moments to make sure they were on the right track. What’s more, the firms that “slowed down to speed up “improved their top and bottom lines, averaging 40% higher sales and 52% higher operating incomes over a three-year period.

    2     They thought differently about what “slower” and “faster” mean. Firms sometimes fail to understand the difference between operation speed (moving quickly )and strategic speed (reducing the time it takes to deliver value ).Simply increasing the speed of production, for example ,may be one way to try to reduce the speed difference .But that often leads to reduced value over time, in the form of lower-quality products and services.

In our study, higher-performing companies with strategic speed always made changes when necessary. They became more open to ideas and discussion.     3     And they allowed time to look back and learn. By contrast, performance suffered at firms that moved fast all the time, paid too much attention to improving efficiency, stuck to tested methods, didn’t develop team spirit among their employees, and had little time thinking about changes.

Strategic speed serves as a kind of leadership.     4     That kind of strategy must come from the top.

【推荐2】Some people think if you are happy, you are blind to reality. But when we research it, happiness actually raises every single business and educational outcome for the brain. How did we miss this? Why do we have these social misunderstandings about happiness? Because we assumed you were average. When we study people, scientists are often interested in what the average is.

Many people think happiness is genetic. That’s only half the story, because the average person does not fight their genes. When we stop studying the average and begin researching positive outliers —people who are above average for a positive aspect like optimism or intelligence —a wildly different picture appears. Our daily decisions and habits have a huge impact upon both our levels of happiness and success.

Scientifically, happiness is a choice. It is a choice about where your single processor brain will devote its limited resources as you process the world. If you scan for the negative first, your brain really has no resources left over to see the things you are grateful for or the meaning embedded(嵌入) in your work. But if you scan the world for the positive, you start to acquire an amazing advantage.

I wrote the cover story for the Harvard Business Review magazine on “Happiness Leads to Profits.” Based on my article called “Positive Intelligence” and my research in The Happiness Advantage, I summarized our researched conclusion: the single greatest advantage in the modern economy is a happy and busy workforce.

A decade of research in the business world proves that happiness raises nearly every business and educational outcome: increasing sales by 37%, productivity by 31%, and accuracy on tasks by 19%, as well as a number of health and quality-of-life improvements.

【推荐3】Some educators told us that more years of school could help students get higher scores on intelligence tests.That was a finding of a study of teenage males in some countries.Now，another research shows that physical activity may help students do better in their classes.

The research comes as educators in some countries are reducing time for activities like physical education.They are using the time instead for academic(学术的) subjects like math and reading.The studies appeared between 2008 and 2014.They included more than 55,000 children，aged 6 to 18.

Amika Singh：“According to the results of our study，we can conclude that being physically active is beneficial for academic performance.There are，first，Physiological explanations，like more blood flow，and so more oxygen to the brain.Being physically active means there are more hormones(荷尔蒙) produced like endorphins(内啡肽)．And endorphins make your stress level lower and your mood improved，which means you also perform better.”

Also，students taking part in organized sports learn rules and how to follow them.This could improve their classroom behavior and help them keep their mind on their work.

The study leaves some questions unanswered，however.Ms Stash says it is not possible to say whether the amount or kind of activity affected the level of academic improvement.This is because of differences among the studies.

The researchers said they found only two high­quality studies.They needed more high­quality studies to confirm(证实) their findings.They also pointed out that “results for other parts of the world may be quite different”．

Still，the general finding was that physically active kids are more likely to do better in school.Ms Singh says schools should consider that finding before they cut physical education programs.Her paper on “Physical Activity and Performance at School” is published in the Archives of Pediatric and Adolescent Medicine.