Choose one place nearby that you have never been. It could be a new café, or a new park, or even a monument that has been there for a hundred years. And, like every good holiday, don’t forget to take photos and post on social media – you might inspire others to do the same.

Pineapple is not only a perfect snack or dessert, it also has surprising health benefits.

It contains an enzyme called bromelain, which has two seemingly different benefits, it’s good for your digestion, and good for tenderising meat: Bromelain breaks down proteins, so it helps your gut digest your dinner AND helps soften that piece of chicken on the BBQ.

Some studies even indicate that bromelain can reduce inflammation, swelling and bruising after injury or surgery. It’s even thought to help with pain relief.

Pineapple is also high in vitamin C. In fact, one cup of fresh pineapple chunks will give you more than 130 per cent of your daily vitamin C requirements. And it is full of other goodies such as thiamine, manganese, vitamin B6, folate and antioxidants.

How to avoid pineapple tongue burn

Ever eaten fresh pineapple and felt as though your taste buds have been wiped out? That’s the bromelain. It breaks down proteins, including the protective mucus that coats your tongue. To avoid this problem, while gaining the many benefits of pineapple, you could try one of these tricks:

• Soak the fresh pineapple in salt water first
• Eat the pineapple with diary such as yoghurt
• Cook the pineapple, as this destroys the bromelain (but also reduces the benefits)
• Cut out the tough core, where bromelain is the most concentrated.

Luckily, there are proven ways to speed up your learning, so you can achieve more in less time.

1. Keep a beginner’s mind

Even if you have been studying this field or skill for years, try to approach your next learning like a beginner. When you see yourself as an expert, you tend to be blind to unusual happenings, you assume things are a certain way. Beginners are more open to alternative ways of thinking and ask more questions.

2. Use a digital brain

A whole range of apps exist on your phone – use them. Not to procrastinate or distract yourself, but to help you remember things. A digital brain is like a second brain you can use to capture, organise, retrieve, and archive information, ideas and thoughts. If you use an online calendar, or master password app, you are tapping into your digital brain, but there is so much more you can do. You can use apps to remember to do lists, facts, formulae, links to read later, and you can even record someone delivering a presentation or speech (with permission of course). Try an app such as Evernote, Bear or OneNote.

3. Spaced Repetition

You know how your high school teacher told you to revise regularly and often for exams? They were right. The best way to remember information is to recall it soon afterwards. Spaced repetition looks like this:

• Within 24 hours of learning something, write down notes for yourself and then review them by reading those notes then looking away to recall the most important points.
• Within 48 hours (ie. the next day), try to recall the information with minimal reading of your notes.
• Within 72 hours, recall the information again, as you go about your day, eg while waiting in line or walking to the station.
• A few days later, read through the information all over again.

4. Break it down

Trying to learn something new all at once can set you up for failure. Say you want to learn how to surf. Expecting yourself to be able to stand up on a surfboard right away and catch a wave will only make you feel overwhelmed. Instead, break down each task into manageable bits. For example, start by learning how to jump up from lying to standing. Then learn how to swap your feet. Practice each skill with full attention before moving onto the next.

Listening does not come naturally. We want to be heard far more than we want to hear.

It’s rarely ill-intentioned. Often, we enthusiastically want to relate and show we understand or share their concern, or have had a similar experience. However, the outcome is the opposite: the relationship suffers, and the other person feels less connected, and more frustrated.

To improve your active listening, try these tips from experts:

1. Stop talking. The simplest but hardest tip of all. Give the other person space to talk, even after they seem to run out of puff. Often people only get to the real point after they have covered the superficial talk. Use the acronym WAIT to remind yourself: W.A.I.T stands for “Why Am I Talking?”

2. Clear your mind. Adam Bryant, author of The Corner Office and The CEO Test, says we should “think of listening as a form of meditation. You have to clear your mind of everything else, so you can focus entirely on what the other person is saying.” Bryant advises putting your phone down, and if you are at your desk, turning your chair around so you are not looking at the monitor.

3. Don’t jump ahead. “The best kind of listening is about being comfortable not knowing what you’re going to say next, or what question you might ask,” says Bryant. Have faith in your ability to respond naturally and sincerely to the other person, without formulating your response while they are talking.

4. Remove judgement. “Listening, done well, is an act of empathy. You are trying to see the world through another person’s eyes, and to understand their emotions,” Bryant says. Judging the other person for their words, tone of voice, actions or reactions is not going to help you achieve empathy.

5. Aim to learn. Use every conversation as a chance to learn more – about a topic, about a person. Billionaire venture capitalist and co-founder of LinkIn, Reid Hoffman, says the most important quality he looks for in employees is an “infinite learning curve.” “I’m looking for an ability to be learning constantly, and fast.”

Bryant adds, “If you show interest and energy, people will respond and share what they know and how they learned it. It’s a fast and free education, plus you’ll build relationships.”

Common listening mistakes to avoid

• Getting distracted. Someone is talking, but you are thinking about what to cook for dinner. You could be making eye contact and saying “yeah” and “OK” in all the right places, but you are not really listening.
• Adding your anecdote. We often want to show we understand, and that we have shared a similar experience, and so off we go with a “yes, the same thing happened to me!” story, and we have hijacked the other person’s conversation.
• Waiting to talk. You know how it feels: you get the very clear sense that the other person is just waiting for your noise to stop, before they say their piece. They haven’t listened, they just want to make their argument, or say something clever.