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Doc Meek has passed away
May 13th, 2024 | 
Author: We are sorry to report that Dr. J. Collins “Doc” Meek passed away on May 7, 2024, following a battle with pancreatic cancer. He will be missed.
Doc Meek’s funeral was held on May 25, 2024 in Sherwood Park, Alberta, Canada. His obituary can be found here.
Doc Meek was very proud of his recently published book, What If You Are Smarter Than You Think?: 27 Ways To Outwit Learning Difficulties, which can be purchased from Amazon:
“Why do you work so hard to help kids overcome learning difficulties?” – Readers
“What if you are smarter than you think?”
Why do I work so hard to help kids?
So how did I get started?
I didn’t know what career to pursue
When I finished my grade 12 year, I wondered what I should take at University.
I loved the English language, and loved being a member of the debating club, so I thought I might make a good lawyer. I didn’t want to be a corporate lawyer. Too dry and dusty I thought. 🙂
I wanted to be a trial lawyer, to handle what I thought would be exciting litigation work in the courtroom. Dramatic arguments in front of the jury and all that. 🙂
But then I was concerned that if I went into criminal law, I might end up accepting tainted or stolen money in order to earn a living. So I set that aside.
I was drawn to the world of healing (perhaps because I was so sick when I was younger), so I wondered if I should try to get into medical school. My Dad, a journeyman electrician, had a modest income and I felt that even if I worked hard to earn extra money (which I was doing all along), I could probably not afford the high tuition fees demanded by medical schools.
I did not want to run up a $200,000 student debt as some of my friends were proposing to do. (The equivalent medical student loan now runs to $350,000 – $400,000, I’m told.)
Yes, I could repay the debt out of my future physician income, but I have always been pretty cautious about debt.
(A friend of mine ran up a huge student loan debt, and then was struck down with an extremely rare medical condition and was unable to finish his medical degree, so he was/is “toast” in terms of income, both present and future.)
As my dear friend said: “It’s difficult to predict… especially the future.” :O
What would have the most impact long-term?
I thought about the impact of being a good lawyer, or being a good doctor, and I felt that the effects of my work with my clients or patients might, in one sense, be relatively short-lived.
Because it began to dawn on me (maybe because of something I was reading) that teaching, even though it wasn’t necessarily well-paying, could have long-term or even permanent effects if done well. All through mortality perhaps, and maybe even on into eternity if I turned out to be an outstandingly inspirational teacher. 🙂
Provided the students were learning well. And loved learning.
I was always such a learning sponge, voracious reader, knowledge “addict,” and ultimately an enthusiastic lifelong learner, that I wanted that for everybody I guess!
I became a fiery advocate of lifelong learning for all, and I realized that for struggling kids in school, that wouldn’t happen if they were learning to hate learning.
All kids should have a chance to love learning!
Doc Meek, Sherwood Park, Alberta, Canada, Nov 25, 2014
Posted in learning, learning differences, Learning Difficulties, learning solutions, overcoming learning problems, Uncategorized | 
Tags: Doc Meek, Learning Difficulties, learning disabilities, lifelong learner, lifelong learning, love learning | 
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We Use Only 5% of Our Brain?
For many years, I started out my parent and student classes by saying, “According to one study, we use only about 5% of our brain.”
“In fact, the study nailed it right down to us using only 4.67% of our brain.”
After that “dismal” news, I would announce to the parents and students, “However, since everybody in this room is smarter than that, we’ll be using 10% of our brains and doing very well in this class.”
Smiles all around. 😮
The neuroscientist that called my remarks a “silly adage” is right in one sense. Multiple parts of our brain are involved in our daily activities, much more than 10%.
My teaching is that most of this daily brain activity is not in our immediate awareness, usually.
For example, we may think about what we are going to say, and we may even rehearse it very carefully in our mind before we say it. However, when we actually start talking the patterns of our speech are “looked after” for us by our “automatic brain.” We do not usually have to think about how to string an actual sentence together. We do not have to pause before every word to try and figure out what comes next, do we?
The same thing is true for walking, for example. We may think about where we want to go. We may even rehearse it very carefully in our mind before we start out. When we actually start walking, however, most of the activity is “looked after” for us by our “automatic brain.” We don’t have to say to our foot, “lift up” or to our knees, “bend please.”
Do we?
So the brilliant neuroscient and I are both right. His point is that we are constantly using a large percentage of our brain, even when we are asleep, even especially when we are asleep, eh?
I want to say more about the “fun” the brain is having when we are asleep in one of my future postings here.
My point to my parent and student classes, about us using only 5% – 10% of our brains is this: “Only a very small portion of what our brain is doing is in our immediate awareness. Our hair grows, our eyes shine, our hearts beat, and our food is digested without us having to think about it.”
Usually. 😮
In fact, one of the great ongoing challenges in psychology and brain science is the question of what our brains are doing that we don’t know about. At least at the moment.
“What is my brain up to that I don’t know about?” you may well ask.
I will address this in one of my future postings here.
Doc Meek, Inspiring Learning Strategies Specialist
Sherwood Park, Alberta, CANADA; and South Jordan, Utah, USA
