Random Blog Post - Stephen Curry

Stephen “Chef” Curry of the Golden State Warriors is arguably the greatest 3-point shooter in NBA history. While that may seem like a generalization, Curry has been reinforcing this idea since the 2015-2016 NBA season began in October. Numerous pundits and basketball “gurus” have argued that Curry is changing the game of basketball and claiming his spot amongst the greats. In order to evaluate whether Curry is indeed the best shooter ever, we will look at both statistical and anecdotal evidence.

From a statistical perspective, it is evident that Curry is the best 3-point shooter in NBA history. One telling statistic is 3-point field goals made in one season. Even though is only 27 year old and has only been in the NBA for six seasons, he has the top three places of 3-pointers made during a season. He broke his own record on February 27, 2016, by making 288 3-pointers. More impressive is the fact that he broke that record with 24 games remaining to play in the season. Curry is also tied with the most 3-pointers made in a single game with 16. Curry also holds the record for most 3-pointers made in the NBA postseason, as last season he made a remarkable 98. This is 40 more in one NBA postseason than Reggie Miller, who is in second place.

(As a side note, I did not mention 3-point field goal percentage above because there minimum requirement is 5 shots. Thus, because the sample size is so small, the statistic is not relevant or insightful.)

Clearly the numbers back up the idea that Curry is an elite, if not the greatest, 3-point shooter ever. It is easy for the average basketball fan like myself to believe Steph is amazing. But what do NBA Hall of Famers and greats believe? Magic Johnson, a consensus top-5 basketball player in the history of the sport, has said: “If @StephenCurry30's game winning 3-pointer doesn't prove he's the greatest shooter we've ever seen, I don't know what will!” When Lebron James, another major authority in basketball, was asked about Steph Curry, he said “Never before seen someone like him in the history of ball!” Reggie Miller, a consensus top 3-point shooter in NBA history, has praised Curry as well. In a December interview with the New Yorker, Miller said:

He still has a lot of chapters to write … but, right now, you could certainly consider him among the top five shooters of all time. The streak that Steph has been on since last season rivals the greats of the game. It’s hard to say he’s better than Larry Bird or he’s better than Steve Kerr, his coach, because those guys did it for much longer. But for this short a period he’s in that group. And he keeps improving. If he can beat his own record for most threes in a season, then you’ve got to consider him one of the best ever.

Overall, while it is hard to prove that Stephen Curry is outright the definitive best 3-point shooter in NBA history (as judging is semi-subjective) it is evident he is a great player. 

Growing a Farmer - Final Thoughts

Reading Kurt Timmermeister’s Growing a Farmer has changed my perspective about farming and the immense amount of work required to make a natural product. The book has also changed my perspective on happiness and what it means to be fulfilled – both professionally and personally.

From a high level, Kurt’s willingness to change careers and take a big risk in starting his farm is impressive. From my personal experience, I was too afraid to change majors during my freshman and junior years of college. I cannot imagine being a 40 year old adult and suddenly moving away from my home and business to start a new life. But Timmermeister does this and shows the reader that while the future is uncertain, you can look at the unknown with a “glass half full” approach. While Kurt explains how innumerable ideas did not go as planned – such as selling vegetables through a farmers market and annoying process of lawfully producing raw milk – he did not quit when times were tough, This ultimately inspires me, as there are many challenges in life, but like if you can have positive expectations for the future, things will work themselves out for the best.  

My favorite quote from the book is: “As I began to work on the land, clearing scrubby trees, improving the soil, I started to feel a responsibility toward it. I am protective of this parcel, possessive of it, but I am aware that I do not own it. No one can own land. We are all mere stewards of the land. I have an obligation to pass this farm on to someone in better condition than when I first set foot on it. I want to leave it cleaner, less polluted and more productive when it's my time to go." I believe this quote shows Timmermeister’s sense of humility because although he owns the farm, he alludes to the fact that he is just another living organism that happens to sleep and work on a piece of land. This philosophy extends to all aspects of his farm, from the vegetables, to the pigs, and of course to the cows. Kurt takes utmost care of every living entity on the farm and tries to be respectful. 

Overall, I believe that Growing a Farmer is an inspiring book that urges the reader to reconsider their lives and what makes them happy. I would love to one day visit the farm. 

Exercise and the Brain: The Many Benefits

Exercise and the Brain: The Mental Benefits

How cutting-edge research is showing the positive mental effects of moving the body.

Nearly every American can probably remember their doctor telling them to exercise, but for what reason? Many people think that this recommendation simply benefits the physical body. For instance, people may lift weights to look muscular or run for miles to burn the pizza they ate last night. However, in his groundbreaking 2013 book Spark: The Revolutionary New Science of Exercise and the Brain, Dr. John Ratey from Harvard Medical School explains that the true benefits of exercise are found within the brain. While there are physical benefits, these pale in comparison to the profound mental benefits exercise causes.

In this article, I will explain the numerous benefits of exercise. First, I will describe how exercise is scientifically proven to increase learning and motivation. After that, I will discuss how exercise is as effective in treating problems like depression and stress as prescription drugs. Lastly, I will talk about what you can do to reap the positive mental benefits of exercise. 

Learning and Motivation

The objective of most gym classes is to get children to move around and improve students’ physical well-being. However, the paradox is changing to shift PE programs from sports based to intensive fitness exercise based. In Naperville, Illinois, one such fitness based physical education program began in the early 1990s with the intent to stress fitness. What exactly does “fitness based physical education” look like? The teachers use heart rate monitors to track the physical workload of students as they exercise aerobically, whether this be while students run miles or exercise on high-end Schwinn stationary bikes. The monitors allows teachers to track the intensity of the students’ workouts (relative to their maximum heart rate value).

Heart rate monitor. Courtesy of heartratemonitorz.com

Since the program’s implementation, not only have the Naperville students become physically fit, but their tests scores increased along fitness level. As Ratey explains, “When the students in Titusville or in Naperville go for a mile run in gym, they are more prepared to learn in their other classes: their senses are heightened; their focus and mood are improved; they’re less fidgety and tense; and they feel more motivated and invigorated.” Why has students’ learning increased as they have exercised more? Exercise literally creates new nerve cells from stem cells, thus creating new mental capacity (New York Times). “In addition to priming our state of mind, exercise influences learning directly, at the cellular level, improving the brain’s potential to log in and process new information.” (Ratey) There is education data to backup this theory. The Naperville 203 school district scored number one in the world in math and number six in the world in science for the TIMSS education test. For context, the average US school scored eighteenth in science and nineteenth in math relative to the world.  

Regulating Emotions

Another non-physical, mental benefit from exercise is its ability to combat stress, anxiety, and depression. When people are stressed out, the brain gets locked into a pattern of stress. Over time, this pattern can be damaging and makes people feel like the stress will never end. However, moving the body can combat the stress. Exercise controls stress on a cellular level, thus leaving people feeling emotionally and physically because the cells repaired while the body moves. Due to the fight-or-flight phenomenon, in which human beings evolved to either fight or run during stressful situations, when people exercise when stressed, they actually are doing what the human body was built to do. This is a main reason why moving the body can help relieve stress.

Approximately 18% of the US population suffers from anxiety. In the brain, anxiety is when the sympathetic nervous system and the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis increase activity. As doctor Ratey explains, “By using exercise to combat the symptoms of anxiety, you can treat the state, and as your level of fitness improves, you chip away at the trait. Over time, you teach your brain that the symptoms don’t always spell doom and that you can survive; you’re reprogramming the cognitive misinterpretation.” Overall, exercise while anxious provides a distraction, reduces muscle tension, builds brain resources, teaches different outcome, reroutes your circuits, and improves resilience.

With the emergence of function MRI and PET scans, scientists have been able to see what depression looks like in the brain. Essentially, depression is a change to the “emotional circuitry” of the brain and its messengers such as norepinephrine, dopamine, and serotonin. This leads to a breakdown at the cellular level, in which the brain is trapped in a negative cycle it cannot work its way out of. Dr. Ratey finds that exercise is as good if not better of a prescription for a person suffering from depression than modern drugs like Zoloft or Lexapro. Scientific literature reinforces this idea. In fact, “a review of studies stretching back to 1981 concluded that regular exercise … may play a supporting role in treating severe depression” (Harvard).

What Kind of Exercise and for How Long?

After reading about the numerous positive effects of exercise, you might wonder what types and for how long you should exercise. Unfortunately, it is not clear which type of exercise brings about the best mental benefits. As a rule of thumb, some exercise is better than nothing and more is better than less. Research has shown the more in-shape you are, the better your cognitive health (Wall Street Journal). A variety of studies have shown that aerobic exercise can increase capillary volume in the memory area of the hippocampus, increase neurotransmitters and neurotrophic factors, and encourage neuroplasticity. There is essentially a positive relationship between mental and physical strength. So whether you run, cycle, or swim, you should mix up medium intensity workouts and high intensity workouts to gain the benefits of exercising different muscle groups.

As previously mentioned, although exercise has many physical benefits, there are numerous mental benefits too. Exercise has the ability to help people learn better and increase their motivation. Furthermore, exercise can combat problems such as stress, anxiety, and depression.

Works Cited

"Exercise Boosts Brain Power." Wall Street Journal, 11 Feb. 2011.

Ratey, John J., and Eric Hagerman. Spark: The Revolutionary New Science of Exercise and the Brain. New York: Little, Brown, 2008. Print.

"Regular Exercise Changes the Brain to Improve Memory, Thinking Skills - Harvard Health Blog." Harvard Health Blog RSS. Harvard, 09 Apr. 2014

Reynolds, Gretchen. "How Exercise Could Lead to a Better Brain." The New York Times. The New York Times, 21 Apr. 2012. 

Exercise and the Brain: The Many Benefits Draft

How cutting-edge research is showing the positive mental effects of moving the body.

Nearly every American can probably remember their doctor telling them to eat their vegetables and exercise, but for what reason? Most people think that these recommendations benefit the physical body. For instance, people lift weights to grow muscle or run miles burn the pizza they ate last night. However, in his groundbreaking 2013 book Spark: The Revolutionary New Science of Exercise and the Brain, Dr. John Ratey from Harvard Medical School explains that the true benefits of exercise are found within the brain. While there are physical benefits, these pale in comparison to the profound mental benefits exercise causes.

Learning and Motivation

Gym class at most schools are named physical education (PE) programs. Whether it is playing soccer or capture the flag, the basic goal behind these programs is to get children to move around. However, the paradox is being shifted towards fitness based PE programs, in which the focus of these programs is fitness exercise with an intention to improve brain function. In Naperville, Illinois, one such fitness based physical education program began in the early 1990s with the intent to stress fitness and the positive benefits of the brain receives from fitness. What exactly does “fitness based physical education” look like? The teachers use heart rate monitors to track the physical workload of students as they exercise aerobically, whether this be while students run miles and exercise on high-end Schwinn stationary bikes

An image of the typical heart rate tracker

Not only did the Naperville students become physically fit due to the high intensity workouts, but their tests scores increased along fitness level .As Ratey explains, “When the students in Titusville or in Naperville go for a mile run in gym, they are more prepared to learn in their other classes: their senses are heightened; their focus and mood are improved; they’re less fidgety and tense; and they feel more motivated and invigorated.” Furthermore, exercise literally creates new nerve cells from stem cells, thus literally creating new mental capacity.  The astonishing part is there is education data to backup this theory. The Naperville 203 school district scored number one in the world on the math and number six in the world on the TIMSS education test. For context, the average US school scored eighteenth in science and nineteenth in math relative to the world. “In addition to priming our state of mind, exercise influences learning directly, at the cellular level, improving the brain’s potential to log in and process new information.”

Regulating Emotions

Another non-physical, mental benefit from exercise is its ability to combat stress, anxiety, and depression. When people are stressed out, the brain gets locked into a pattern of stress. Over time, this pattern can be damaging and makes people feel like the stress will never end. However, moving the body can combat the stress. Exercise controls stress on a cellular level, thus leaving people feeling emotionally and physically because the cells repaired while the body moves. Due to the fight-or-flight phenomenon, in which human beings evolved to either fight or run during conflict, when people exercise when stressed, they actually are doing what humans evolved to do. This is a main reason why moving the body can help relieve stress.

Approximately 18% of the US population suffers from anxiety. In the brain, anxiety is when the sympathetic nervous system and the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis increase activity. As doctor Ratey explains, “By using exercise to combat the symptoms of anxiety, you can treat the state, and as your level of fitness improves, you chip away at the trait. Over time, you teach your brain that the symptoms don’t always spell doom and that you can survive; you’re reprogramming the cognitive misinterpretation.” Overall, exercise while anxious provides a distraction, reduces muscle tension, builds brain resources, teaches different outcome, reroutes your circuits, and improves resilience.

With the emergence of function MRI and PET scans, scientists have been able to see what depression looks like in the brain. Essentially, depression is a change to the “emotional circuitry” of the brain and its messengers such as norepinephrine, dopamine, and serotonin. This leads to a breakdown at the cellular level, in which the brain is trapped in a negative cycle it cannot work its way out of. Dr. Ratey finds that exercise is as good if not better of a prescription for a person suffering from depression than modern drugs like Zoloft or Lexapro. Not only can exercise treat depression, but it is actually effective at preventing depression.

What Kind of Exercise Regime Is Best?

After reading about the numerous positive effects of exercise, you might wonder what types and for how long you should exercise. Unfortunately, it is not clear which type of exercise brings about the best mental benefits. As a rule of thumb, some exercise is better than nothing and more is better than less. “Research shows that the more fit you are, the more resilient your brain and the better it functions both cognitively and psychologically.” A variety of studies have shown that aerobic exercise can increase capillary volume in the memory area of the hippocampus, increase neurotransmitters and neurotrophic factors, and encourage neuroplasticity. There is essentially a positive relationship between mental and physical strength. So whether you run, cycle, or swim, you should mix up medium intensity workouts and high intensity workouts to gain the benefits of exercising different muscle groups. 

Growing A Farmer

Kurt Timmermeister’s Growing a Farmer is an eye-opening read about a Seattle restauranteur’s journey from operating a café to creating a viable farm. Kurt’s portrays his path to creating Kurtwood Farms as spontaneous. He describes in the book how as a twenty-four year old, he created a successful small café in downtown Seattle that is the center of his universe. This is impressive because I can’t imagine opening my own business, let alone a restaurant, as a twenty-four year old. The restaurant business is notoriously difficult to make a profit and stay afloat too. Another surprising fact is that Timmermeister did not have a lot of training or experience in the business. In fact, he studied international affairs at the American College in Paris. I find his inexperience and non-traditional background inspiring, as it shows that passionate people can be successful even when “cards are stacked against” them.

As Kurt progresses into the body of the book, it becomes clear that his approach to life allows him to succeed during every day and unclear situations.  For instance, even before Kurtwood Farms becomes an operating ecosystem, Kurt buys the cheapest piece of land outside of downtown Seattle. What is so unique and fascinating is he never had the intention to create a farm. He wanted to create a home. Each day, Kurt improves the house and land. For example, the author talks about discovering blackberries, apples, and winter bananas. This discovery ultimately peaked Kurt’s interest and he begins to plant other items such as walnuts and plums. I feel like Kurt views life through a prism in which “the glass if half full” – meaning that he is positive and tries to create the best possible outcomes from regular situations. Also, in a world in which people tend to overthink decisions, I respect how Timmermeister goes about making decisions naturally without delving too much into the consequences.

In terms of my own life, Timmermeister actually has become a great example of somebody who I admire. I am guilty of trying to plan my life out far in advance and over-analyzing every day decisions. Kurt shows that if a person lives in the present and has a positive outlook on life, great outcomes are possible. Another reason I admire Kurt is because instead of following a career in international affairs, he follows his passion and chooses to work in the food industry. That type of decision seems intimidating to me, especially after attending college for four years with the intention to use my degree. However, the author makes me question my future path in the business world and pushes me to discover my true passion.