The human brain is by no means fully formed at birth. It continues to shape itself through life, with the most intense growth occurring during childhood.

As much as 80% of adult "success" comes from EQ.

However, I began meditating at about that time and have continued on and off over the years.

Overloading attention shrinks mental control. Life immersed in digital distractions creates a near constant cognitive overload. And that overload wears out self-control.

There is a newly coined word in the English language for the moment when the person we're with whips out their BlackBerry or answers that cell phone, and all of a sudden we don't exist. The word is 'pizzled': it's a combination of puzzled and pissed off.

If you do a practice and train your attention to hover in the present, then you will build the internal capacity to do that as needed - at will and voluntarily.

The more time you put into practicing, then, the greater the payoff.