Article and photo from Consider Me Inspired 

 

When things in your life seem almost too much to handle, when 24 hours in a day is not enough, remember the mayonnaise jar and two cups of coffee.

 

A professor stood before his philosophy class and had some items in front of him.

When the class began, wordlessly, he picked up a very large and empty mayonnaise jar and fills it with golf balls.

 

He then asked the students if the jar was full. They agreed that it was.

 

The professor then picked up a box of pebbles and poured it into the jar. He shook the jar lightly. The pebbles rolled into the open areas between the golf balls.

 

He then asked the students again if the jar was full. They agreed it was.

 

The professor next picked up a box of sand and poured it into the jar. Of course, the sand filled up everything else.

 

He asked once more if the jar was full. The students responded with a unanimous "YES".

 

The professor then produced two cups of coffee from under the table and poured the entire contents into the jar, effectively filling the empty space between the sand. The students laughed.

 

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Written by: Dan Krumholz

           

Use It or Lose It is a well-worn phrase that serves as a timely reminder for a variety of situations. There's even an app for that. The Use It or Lose It app not only helps you not lose certain belongings but it also helps you lose those no longer needed. The app is intended to help keep track of and catalogue your possessions and de-clutter your life of those you can live without. As you read this article you may decide that it is better to skip the Use It or Lose It app and instead exercise that powerful app in your head called the Brain.

           

  Use It or Lose It in the work place normally refers to the company's paid time off policy.   You are entitled to so many days each year and you are not allowed to carry them over to the new year. Most companies actually want you to use that well-earned free time as they understand the mental health and related benefits of a job hiatus. Taking a vacation from work reduces stress and anxiety, and it can temporarily boost your brain power and thus your productivity. As they say, all work and no play make Jack and Jill dull children.   However the opposite can be true after you leave the work force on a permanent basis. Once you have concluded that it's time for redirection (my preference vs the term retirement), too much free time can become counterproductive.   Specifically I am referring to retaining and maintaining your mental acuity.  

             

Use It or Lose It is also the title of an article in Psychology Today (1) written by Dawn C. Carr, PhD, a social gerontologist and research associate at the Stanford Center on Longevity. She cites research done by Rohwedder and Willis proposing that maintenance of cognitive performance takes practice.  They indicate that there is an "impressive" decrease in cognitive performance that comes with retirement.   Research suggests that this is because when we stop engaging in cognitively complex tasks, the brain is no longer challenged enough to maintain cognitive function.   Retirement can be problematic because it results in a shift in which we are no longer using our brains at a high level on a regular basis.

             

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