ingridAbout Ingrid

Ingrid Cummings is a journalist, essayist, independent scholar, communications expert, and international speaker. A Contributing Editor at Indianapolis Monthly magazine and an award-winning newspaper columnist, she also teaches college courses at Indiana University, produces a radio show called Rubicon Salon, and runs a PR/Media business called Rubicon Communications LLC. She calls upon all 20 years of her teaching and coaching experience to animate the Creative process through a variety of original workshops. Named one of “Eight to Watch in ’08” by The Indianapolis Star, her first book, “The Vigorous Mind,” is due out in Jan. 2009.

33927987-1About The Vigorous Mind: Cross-Train Your Brain to Break Through Mental, Emotional, and Professional Boundaries

The Vigorous Mind proposes that the way to health and happiness is to “cross-train your brain” by intentionally diversifying the portfolio of your activities. Using historical as well as contemporary “Renaissance people” as inspiration, the book argues for a return to a generalist gestalt during the hours of the day when we’re not pursuing ever-narrower career specialties. With a distinctive approach to time management, The Vigorous Mind puts a contemporary spin on what it meant to be “well rounded,” a notion that sounds delightfully quaint today.

The book taps into one of today’s hottest trends: The application of neuroscience to everyday brain health. Scientists are proving that strategically pursuing a broad spectrum of sometimes-counterintuitive activities can actually strengthen your brain and make you better at everything you undertake.

The secret is consistent, incremental “baby steps,” in the spirit of the newly popular Japanese belief system called Kaizen. Kaizen is an ancient Japanese Zen philosophy that advocates taking small, even trivial steps to accomplish large goals. The intention is for the reader to make accelerative progress toward their cross-training goals by committing just 20 minutes of concentrated attention per day (what the author calls “Triumph in Twenty”) applied to any topic of their choice.

Ingrid Cummings makes the case that through knowledge of seemingly unrelated fields and interests, readers can fortify themselves against burn-out, become more fulfilled, better at their jobs, and more creative — in short, develop a truly vigorous mind.

Ingrid Cummings TLC Book Tours TOUR STOPS:

Tuesday, January 20th: A Garden Carried In My Pocket

Wednesday, January 21st: 8Asians

Monday, January 26th: A Novel Menagerie

Tuesday, January 27th: Anniegirl1138

Wednesday, January 28th: She is Too Fond of Books

Friday, January 30th: So Not Zen

Monday, February 2nd: Simply Forties

Tuesday, February 3rd: life@work

Wednesday, February 4th: MidLifeBloggers.com

Thursday, February 12th:  Reading, Writing, and Retirement

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