In my obsession to learn about and conquer the seemingly impossible hurdle of baby sleep, I just finished reading The No-Cry Sleep Solution: Gentle Ways to Help Your Baby Sleep Through the Night by Elizabeth Pantley. A lot of the suggestions I learned elsewhere were mentioned in this book, so there was a lot of reinforcement of what I learned from other people and classes. My biggest benefit from reading it was seeing the full menu of options and strategies available as well as the sample schedules and guidelines for nighttime and daytime sleep as the child ages.


​Recommends dr Sears parenting books

Part 1 10 steps

1 safety check

2 sleep facts
6 mo: 2 naps totaling 3-4 hr plus 10-11 hr nighttime sleep, total 14-15 hr
9 mo: 2 naps 2.5-4 hr plus 11-12 hr night totaling 14 hr
12 mo: 1-2 naps 2-3 hr plus 11.5-12 hr night totaling 13-14 hr
2 yr: 1 nap 1-2 hr plus 11-12 hr night totaling 13 hr
3 yr: 1 nap 1-1.5 plus 11 night totaling 12 hr
4 yr: no nap, 11.5 night
5 yr: 11 night
Sleeping through night defined by 5 hr stretch
Sleeping sounds vs awake sounds

3 create sleep logs
Nap log
Time fell asleep
How fell asleep
Where fell asleep
Where slept
How long
Pre bedtime routine log for hours before bed
Activity
Noise
Light
Night awakening log
Time woke up
How woke up
Your response
Time fell back asleep

4 review and choose sleep solutions 
Stick with any idea 1-2 weeks
Lovey
Warm bed
Bedtime 6:30-8
Earlier to bed means longer night
Regular feeding and napping schedule
Nap less than 1 hr in length don't help much
Regular naps
3: mid morning, early afternoon, early evening
2: mid morning, early afternoon
1: early afternoon
Nap should be immediately when shows signs of tiredness
Skip routine if looks tired
Nap routine different from night routine
Limit length of daytime naps
Develop key words as sleep cue like sh and melody and time for night night 
Repeat words when in that situation, not when crying
Music or sound
Gentle removal
Soothing pats
Verbally soothing baby
Comfort from outside doorway
Read books about bedtime to kids
Write own family book about sleep
Poster board
Take picture of baby
My sleep book
Pix of baby sleeping in crib
Show pics of exact bedtime routine you use
All about <baby name>
Book about baby's life
Finishing with bedtime routine
Take pic of baby doing each step of bedtime routine
Last pic is goal of final sleep
Example @ 2:27 remaining
Read book every night and talk about it
Helps with weaning from nursing at end of day
Write about how big boy
Bedtime poster that demonstrates steps to bedtime
Commit routine to chart
Can give tickets allowing child to get out of bed in night for certain reasons and drop number of tickets over time

5 create personal sleep plan
Summary of all tips and suggestions

6 follow sleep plan
Don't go out or schedule activities during planned sleep
10 day log important for not worrying about occasional bumps

7 do a 10 day log
Compare amount sleeping and naps to ideal
Night waking log
Compare how well bedtime routines were done, how quiet and dim

8 analyze your success
Consistently stick to plan even with disruptions like teething and sickness
Teething
Clean cool wash cloth
Cooled teething ring
Separation anxiety
Let them know u r nearby
More hugs during day
Big Photo of parents in nursery near bed
Lovey
Say goodbye
Make sounds or sing from other room so baby knows ur there
Developmental milestones and new skills
Goes away when skill mastered
Gentle pat when wakes or say key words
Illness
Let baby rest and don't plan activities or visitors 
Stay calm and peaceful
Provide lots of liquids
Pamper and cuddle
Clear nose using saline nasal spray and aspirator
Gas and colic
Ear infection

9 follow plan for 10 more days

10 complete log and analyze again

Part 2

11 Parent night waking
Stop worrying about sleep
Relax
Turn clock away from bed
Give self permission to sleep
Pay off sleep debt
Develop sleep routine
Set body clock
Keep consistent sleep and awake time
Organize your day and write down on calendar and todo list. Pad of paper near bed. 
Avoid caffeine late in day. Stays in blood 6-14 hrs. Better herbal tea or warm milk in evening. 
Make exercise part of your day. Maintain regular pattern. completed at least 3 hours before bedtime. Walk in indoor shopping mall when bad weather. 
Make sure bed environment comfortable
Temperature of bedroom regulated
Light
Noise
Have own bedtime routine
Avoid stimulating activities before bed
Eat light before sleep. Milk eggs cottage cheese. 
Focus mind on peaceful relaxing thoughts. Repeat meditative phrase. Feel weight of parts of body moving up. 
Engorgement adjustment
Apply warm compresses
Pump a small amount
Take warm shower

12 final thoughts

I heard about The Inevitable: Understanding the 12 Technological Forces That Will Shape Our Future, the latest book from Kevin Kelly, on Tim Ferriss's podcast.

It reminded me of Diamandis's book Bold, which I had read last year and enjoyed. This book similarly went over a lot of current technological trends and advances and how they will "inevitably" play out at a high level (the details are subject to change). I enjoyed the little descriptions in each chapter of "a day in your life" in the future.


Intro
Shift to processes from products
Services instead of finished products

1 becoming
Existence is chiefly maintenance 
Second law of thermodynamics 
Upgrade arms race 
Will remain endless newbies

2 codifying
Distributed intelligence
Adding net and data to everything
Deep learning, gpu
Human job is to give robot jobs
Success will be to whoever works best with robots 

3 flowing
Internet all about copying
Now all about flows and streams
Expect real-time results for everything
Just in time purchasing
Generative attributes cause people to pay for free stuff
Liquidity
Experiences
Personalization
Support, manuals
Immediacy
Patronage
Data and products changing from fixidity to fluidity
Stages of flow
Fixed, rare
Ubiquitous, commoditized
Flowing, sharing: breaking apart the product
Opening, becoming: audience is artist

4 screening
Screens over paper
Networked books
Screens on all objects

5 accessing
Instant borrowing
Dematerialization
Servicizing. X as a service. 
Realtime on demand
Rental model
Decentralization, blockchain
Platform synergy
Clouds

6 sharing
Socialism

7 filtering
Personalization
Technology will create things
People will create experiences

8 remixing
User content 

9 interacting
 VR and AR

10 tracking
Quantified self

11 questioning
Searches, queries

12 beginning
Singularity

I just finished reading Speak like Churchill, Stand like Lincoln: 21 Powerful Secrets of History's Greatest Speakers by James C. Humes, and while I felt it was a bit folksy at times, it had a number of useful lessons and nice personal examples from the author, who wrote speeches for five American presidents. My favorites: power pause, power poetry, and power dollar. All the stories of Benjamin Franklin were awesome too.

​​Intro
Leadership is selling and selling is talking
Power of personality

1 power pause
Generating audience anticipation 
Stand silent for a min before beginning speech
Stand and stare at audience and formulate words
Repeat opening words in mind as you wait silently
Stand stare and command audience

2 power opener
Don't start with boring trivial common stuff

3 power presence
Careful selection of clothing
Stance erect
Star style
Have own star suit, tailored
Create own signature style element, small accessory
Keep style simple and same so people identity it with u
Clean shoes and clothes

4 power point
Bottom line message
Figure out the power point first
Stop think and plan

5 power brief
Keep it brief
Less is more
Tell a story, not a speech
Surprise audience with brevity when expecting long speech
Short statement that can replace content of speech

6 power quote
Be comfortable with author and quote
Keep quote brief
Frame it and stage it: reading off card after putting on glasses even if fake
Cross quotes from opponents enhance credibility 
Dramatize and emphasize the quote
Use only 1 per speech 

7 power stat
A statistic should tell a story
Cite only 1 statistic dramatically off a card and after putting on glasses
Reduce number of stats given
Round off number to be more memorable. Prefer basic fractions out of 5 or 10 instead of exact percentage 
Relate statistic to a story
Use an odd number
Figures lie and liars figure

8 power outage
Can't yield leadership to slides
Slides not substitute for speaking
Slides as prop not crutch
Use only 1 visual at a time
Keep slides simple
Remove as soon as not needed anymore
If u have to spend a while explaining the slide, don't use it
Make slide captions slogans
Large font
Big illustration

9 power wit
Don't tack on or begin with jokes
Incorporate jokes into speech
Realistic humor
Relevant humor 
Don't read humor
Turn concepts into concretes through parable
Tell stories about yourselves

11 power gesture
Sincerity of tone
Body language signals
Concentrate on just one gesture

12 Power reading
Memorize then conversationalize
Never let words come out when not looking at audience
See stop say

13 power poetry
Internal rhymes
Parallelism
Alliteration
Rhythm
Use proper layout of speech like poem
Break line at comma
Long halt after period
Dashes instead of semicolon
Not about reading article

14 power line
Memorable lines
Contrast between beginning and end of sentence
Rhyme
Rhyming nine
Air
Aim
Ite
Ate
Oh
Ay 
Ake
Eam
Ain
Echo effect: repeat key words, nouns
Alliterate and activate
Series of b or p most powerful

15 power of question
Use once
Keep it simple
Rhetorical 

16 power word
Emphasizing one word by putting pause before it
Deliberate pause before unfamiliar word

17 power active
Avoid passive voice 
Look for to be words and remove them if passive voice

18 power dollar
Fundraising
Defiance: believe u r doing the investor a favor. 
Design: paint a picture
Donation: double the most u think u can ask for; consider ur costs not how much u can raise; know your number
Duel: wait until investor answers before saying anything else. Wait and stand like statue and stare. 
Ask prospect for advice first. 
Personal visits best
Call back at lunch to leave message as reminder to follow up on investment

19 power button
Phrase that illuminates the line that follows and prepares listeners to pay attention
The secret in X is simple. It can summed up this way: 
Let me repeat again what I always say about X:
Let me again assert my firm belief that
Just one per speech

20 power closer
Tear jerking stories

21 power audacity 
Surprise audience
Interesting stories
Stage the scene
Act out scene
Do unexpected