#and since we don’t really culturally do a lot to incentivize knowing the difference and we do encourage thinking it’s always the same

[mariacallous]

Until the dramatic departure of OpenAI’s cofounder and CEO Sam Altman on Friday, Mira Murati was its chief technology officer—but you could also call her its minister of truth. In addition to heading the teams that develop tools such as ChatGPT and Dall-E, it’s been her job to make sure those products don’t mislead people, show bias, or snuff out humanity altogether.

This interview was conducted in July 2023 for WIRED’s cover story on OpenAI. It is being published today after Sam Altman’s sudden departure to provide a glimpse at the thinking of the powerful AI company’s new boss.

Steven Levy: How did you come to join OpenAI?

Mira Murati: My background is in engineering, and I worked in aerospace, automotive, VR, and AR. Both in my time at Tesla [where she shepherded the Model X], and at a VR company [Leap Motion] I was doing applications of AI in the real world. I very quickly believed that AGI would be the last and most important major technology that we built, and I wanted to be at the heart of it. Open AI was the only organization at the time that was incentivized to work on the capabilities of AI technology and also make sure that it goes well. When I joined in 2018, I began working on our supercomputing strategy and managing a couple of research teams.

What moments stand out to you as key milestones during your tenure here?

There are so many big-deal moments, it’s hard to remember. We live in the future, and we see crazy things every day. But I do remember GPT-3 being able to translate. I speak Italian, Albanian, and English. I remember just creating pair prompts of English and Italian. And all of a sudden, even though we never trained it to translate in Italian, it could do it fairly well.

You were at OpenAI early enough to be there when it changed from a pure nonprofit to reorganizing so that a for-profit entity lived inside the structure. How did you feel about that?

It was not something that was done lightly. To really understand how to make our models better and safer, you need to deploy them at scale. That costs a lot of money. It requires you to have a business plan, because your generous nonprofit donors aren't going to give billions like investors would. As far as I know, there's no other structure like this. The key thing was protecting the mission of the nonprofit.

That might be tricky since you partner so deeply with a big tech company. Do you feel your mission is aligned with Microsoft’s?

In the sense that they believe that this is our mission.

But that's not their mission.

No, that's not their mission. But it was important for the investor to actually believe that it’s our mission.

When you joined in 2018, OpenAI was mainly a research lab. While you still do research, you’re now very much a product company. Has that changed the culture?

It has definitely changed the company a lot. I feel like almost every year, there's some sort of paradigm shift where we have to reconsider how we're doing things. It is kind of like an evolution. What's more obvious now to everyone is this need for continuous adaptation in society, helping bring this technology to the world in a responsible way, and helping society adapt to this change. That wasn't necessarily obvious five years ago, when we were just doing stuff in our lab. But putting GPT-3 in an API, in working with customers and developers, helped us build this muscle of understanding the potential that the technology has to change things in the real world, often in ways that are different than what we predict.

You were involved in Dall-E. Because it outputs imagery, you had to consider different things than a text model, including who owns the images that the model draws upon. What were your fears and how successful you think you were?

Obviously, we did a ton of red-teaming. I remember it being a source of joy, levity, and fun. People came up with all these like creative, crazy prompts. We decided to make it available in labs, as an easy way for people to interact with the technology and learn about it. And also to think about policy implications and about how Dall-E can affect products and social media or other things out there. We also worked a lot with creatives, to get their input along the way, because we see it internally as a tool that really enhances creativity, as opposed to replacing it. Initially there was speculation that AI would first automate a bunch of jobs, and creativity was the area where we humans had a monopoly. But we've seen that these AI models actually have a potential to really be creative. When you see artists play with Dall-E, the outputs are really magnificent.

Since OpenAI has released its products, there have been questions about their immediate impact in things like copyright, plagiarism, and jobs. By putting things like GPT-4 in the wild, it’s almost like you’re forcing the public to deal with those issues. Was that intentional?

Definitely. It's actually very important to figure out how to bring it out there in a way that's safe and responsible, and helps people integrate it into their workflow. It’s going to change entire industries; people have compared it to electricity or the printing press. And so it's very important to start actually integrating it in every layer of society and think about things like copyright laws, privacy, governance and regulation. We have to make sure that people really experience for themselves what this technology is capable of versus reading about it in some press release, especially as the technological progress continues to be so rapid. It's futile to resist it. I think it's important to embrace it and figure out how it's going to go well.

Are you convinced that that's the optimal way to move us toward AGI?

I haven't come up with a better way than iterative deployments to figure out how you get this continuous adaptation and feedback from the real end feeding back into the technology to make it more robust to these use cases. It’s very important to do this now, while the stakes are still low. As we get closer to AGI, it's probably going to evolve again, and our deployment strategy will change as we get closer to it.

[knowlesian]

one of the most valuable life skills is discerning the difference between “this is bad” and “this is not for me”

[endsvilleborn]

Hiatus time. Rant time. Don’t know when I’m coming back, but I’ll check back once in a while for messages. The blog may not be active anymore but the mun absolutely will be.

tl;dr is at the bottom.

I might honestly just put my blog on indefinite hiatus. I just got guilted and blocked by someone that wanted a different interaction from me that I didn’t feel like giving, and frankly it’s probably the final straw that broke this camel’s back.

The entire time I’ve been on Tumblr it’s been growing progressively less and less incentivizing to stay and it’s made me very unhappy. It is incredibly cliquey, icons are getting smaller and smaller and squinting hurts my eyes, roleplay posts are getting formatted to the point where it looks like one of those “serial killer letters made of clippings of word-art from magazines barely held together by a stick of glue” and it overwhelms me, blogs are harder to navigate which hinders my need to read and study your guidelines, people are making other people fill out application forms to write with them which creates distance between muns that shouldn’t be there, people are still Highlandering (bullying same-muse blogs by pushing superiority), people are actually giving each other a hard time or guilting each other because they have a preference for canons or original characters or cartoons or live-action, there is no personality or open communication here-- And I mean absolutely no communication, I’ve met THREE autistic people over the past month that see social boundaries blurry whom are all incredibly anxious from writing here because nobody wants to respect their disabilities. Some people here are actually wondering why this roleplaying community isn’t as active as it was 5 years ago. 👈 This. This is why. Literally insert the person-putting-a-stick-in-their-bike-wheel meme here.

This website made me cry too many times and I was in a very bad place emotionally since I started writing late 2012, and it is not getting better here. I gave this site a second chance because I’ve grown up a lot over the past few years and I’ve discovered myself, and I still wanted to create some dope stories with some dope people. I’ve had therapy, still need more, and a lot of my trust issues stem directly from simply being here, and it’s because of this lack of communication and understanding that so few people want to give to each other. Which is ridiculous considering how a lot of people here are more than happy to tag moving pictures and mun selfies with trigger warnings, why can’t we have that same kind of sensitivity towards communication and culture a warm, welcoming, and healthy roleplay environment for everyone? Including autistic people like me? (Seriously, the way the majority of this community handles interacting with autistic people really breaks my heart.)

Why can’t there exist a single place where people can roleplay and not have a laughable or harmful community? Is that even possible?? It seems so easy to do, but so few people will put in the legwork to make it happen. And I’m extremely grateful to know some of these exceptional people. (Seriously, when I’m financially stable, I’m buying you a game on Steam for being so great to me.)

tl;dr - I’m switchin’ to Discord for roleplay, it’s way better, shoot me a DM if you have some dope ideas you wanna write with me and we’ll exchange contact info! Check out the Tupperbox bot too and consider inviting it into your private roleplay server between you and your buddy/buddies, you can post under another muse with it ezpz and you can register these in literally 20 seconds.

[100dad]

The 6 things that crushed dads in the last 50 years.

The 6 things that crushed dads in the last 50 years.

This experiment is over. It is a complete disaster. A failure. Single moms are not the answer to a better society.  Stupid dads are not the answer for a more united America. Locked-up dads are not the answer.  Uninvolved dads are not the answer.

The studies are boring to read but unanimous. When dad is in the home (regardless of the quality of dad) kids perform better in school and achieve higher education than their peers with no dad in the home. Income is higher in a home with a dad in it than in homes without a dad. Poverty rates skyrocket when there is no dad in the home. Dependence on welfare skyrockets when dad is no in the home. Crime rates are crazy high in households that do not have a dad present. Kids raised in a home with dad present have much more opportunity in life.

Teenage pregnancy skyrockets in households without a dad, leading to a continued cycle. Mental health issues are much higher in homes where dad is gone. The odds are ever in your favor when Dad is home. Your odds tank when dad is gone. That is white paper research. Decades of studies. Government-funded. From many many different research organizations.

This is what we have done over the last 50 years to destroy the family unit and take Dads out of the home.

Shift in Workplace

The shift in economics was a real cause. Dads were home and their presence was felt. They were often farmers or local merchants. As the world shifted so did families. Small farms disappeared. Industrial Revolution called for workers to spend long, hard, dangerous days away from the home. Eventually, companies became bigger and bigger with national reach. Local shops shuttered in exchange for big box stores. Sales became a leading career. Dads traveled, they moved, they spent more time away from their families. No more working side by side in the fields. No more being taught how to fix things and make the farm run. No more stopping by dads store and spending time learning the family business. Now dad was either out of town or working for a company where having your family stop by would be frowned upon.

Let’s not forget more and more women going into the workplace. Which often meant more and more influence in raising kids not coming from the parents. Even with Dad gone, to some extent, mom kept his memory alive in the house. “Our” rules were still enforced. Our values. And Mom was gonna tell dad when he did get back home.

Move to Public Education As the world keeps on spinning most people go with it. And public education became and has become a massive influence in American lives. I’m not going to bash public education because education truly is important. There are other options, and our family has avoided the public-school route. Education in small schoolhouses was a much different picture of education than it is today. Today’s kids spend an incredible amount of time inside the school system and much of that time is not productive. Todays students graduate not nearly as educated as they should be. The US ranks very poorly in worldwide education standards despite being the heaviest spender. Regardless of my views here 2 things come from this shift. A massive amount of the day is spend being influenced by people who are not Dad (or Mom). And since teaching is a field dominated by women there are arguments that the shift of so much time without male role models is the reason masculinity has declined and become attacked.

Court Systems

Ask any dad that has had to go through the court system and he will admit the deck is stacked against you. Courts have predetermined that Dad is not important and his value is in check writing. “And if you force our hand then fine---here are some days you can see your kids. Be thankful for the scraps we just tossed you.” – Signed family judges everywhere

Family Courts have crippled Dad's influence in kids' lives. And its politicians that create the laws and incentives Judges follow. Did you know states receive federal dollars based on how much they are having to collect in child support. If you want to know why courts stack against dads and care mostly about child support.......there is some real incentive for states to get the child support number as high as they can.

My other target is Dads here. As much as I am disappointed in the judges. Dad allowed the situation to get to a point where a judge decides what he can and can’t do. I know moms are at fault too. But this is a dad page. Dad’s – Sex can make babies. Stop having sex with crazy women. Marry women you want to spend your lives with. Make sure you guys are on the same page with life- how to manage money, how to raise kids, how many kids, what faith you are and want to raise kids in, how involved in-laws can be in our lives…. these are some of the biggest issues. Some of these divorce stories I hear, ya’ll can do better.

Politician Passing Stupid Laws

I do not like politicians. I think they are all slime balls. Even the ones you like. Especially the ones you do not like. They make incredibly stupid laws. Lets call out these idiots for a bit, not that they will be held responsible or even accept blame.

Child support is collected by states and used as the measuring stick for how much federal money states get. States get more money from the federal government when they collect more child support. Wonder why dads don’t get custody when they should? Wonder why Dads get stuck with a heavy bill and limited contact?

Welfare rules and government incentives finance the breaking up of families because hell the government will pay you for that. Politicians create laws that incentivize the breaking up the family unit especially in low-income and minority families. There has been a real effort to replace the husband and the father with a government handout.

There is a lot of chatter about laws passed that disproportionately took minority fathers out of the home and into jail for relatively minor offenses. I haven’t seen enough to make a judgment, but I would not be surprised at all.

Remember while there is always someone to blame-- we can take power out of the courts and politicians' hands by making good decisions and not ending up reliant on government money or stuck in their courts. When dads step up and become great we make all this way less relevant.

Entertainment Finds Ratings in Crushing Dads

Gone are the true role models of Dads. The Leave It to Beaver type dads are gone. The Dad with high integrity, that did not get caught up in drama, and was always good for dispensing wisdom and seriousness.  Now the leading TV dads are the butt of the joke. While I admit it's often funny. I’m also certain we are a culture easily influenced by entertainment and the stigmas in tv influence generations and how they act. Now they are idiots. Mom is the smart one that really does everything. Dad drinks beer, watched tv, groans about doing any work, loves sports more than his family, and is clueless and clumsy. Luckily, mom is there to do literally everything. No respect, No honor, no integrity. Let’s be honest…. that doesn’t get laughs. Decades of that humor on top of not actually having dads in the home and a dramatic rise in how much we watch tv has reshaped what many men think a dad should act like and be like. It’s a wrong interpretation and families are paying the price. It must be recognized that tv dads are punchlines, not actual real dads that should be modeled after.

Feminism

Before I get torched let's clarify a few things. Women are great. Women are strong. Women are smart. Women are capable. I am not saying otherwise. Feminism was needed for the evolution of the world because there was no voting for women and workplaces shy’d away from women and certainly would not pay them well. And at higher levels of business, they were being turned down opportunities when they were more qualified and talented. It was needed. Some feminists have taken the cause way further. The ones saying women should be single and not get married. Single moms are better than married moms. Career women are better than stay-at-home moms. This is where the rest of the world rejects the cause. Now feminists divide and attack women. It's more that men are evil and toxic. These views attack marriage, child-raising, and healthy families. That’s simply wrong.

You tie all these together and you see how they feed each other. The feminist desire to put all women in the workplace means there’s more burden on school systems to raise kids. The courts and politicians feed the "see men are bad" crowd. Entertainment rears a generation that is not influential and present in their kids lives. The cycle turns and turns spewing out more and more kids born out of wedlock. Not raised in the family unit. More likely to be raised and influenced by underperforming schools and disappointing entertainment options.

Dads – Break the cycle. Avoid this fate. Be a prominent and influential role model. Stay away from the courts and politicians. The more we know and recognize the more we can fight against this rigged system. Just because the deck is stacked against you doesn’t mean you won’t come out on top. Shoulder back, head up high, power forward. You got this.

And to the rest of the world. This is a stupid trend. If you want to make a world a better place with less crime, poverty, less welfare, fewer taxes (because of reduced crime and welfare), better communities, better education….it goes on and on….DO EVERYTHING YOU CAN TO KEEP FAMILIES TOGETHER!!!!!!

Make Dad the center of the family. Make dads the source of wisdom and influence. It solves so many problems in this country!!

Follow 100% DAD on www.100dad.com & Social: Instagram: @100Dad Facebook: @100Dad TikTok: @100Dad YouTube: 100% Dad Twitter: @The100Dad

[belonglab]

Growing Up Brown in America: When Every Day is Halloween

By Neha Sampat, Esq.

October 16, 2018

(Previously published in News India Times, The Teal Mango, and Thrive GlobaI)

Sometimes, taking off the mask is what is really scary.

I’ve been working on that the past few years. I found myself struggling to process a personal loss, mainly because I was more worried about how others perceived my loss and my reaction to it than allowing myself to just feel what I felt and honor those feelings. I realized I had become so swift to gauge others’ needs and so preoccupied with telling them what they wanted to hear, that I had forgotten in some ways who I was. I had covered myself in a cloak of expectation, carefully crafted over four decades of my life, and it was suffocating me.

“How did I get here?” I wondered. I thought back to kindergarten, when I proudly raised my hand when the teacher asked who knew the alphabet. Upon her request, I began to recite it, but was brutally stopped at “H” by my classmates’ uproarious laughter. I couldn’t comprehend why they were laughing at me, which only added to my distress. Finally, someone explained to me that it was pronounced “aych,” not “etch,” as my mom had taught me through her Indian accent. From there sprouted a seed of self-consciousness, a ceaseless suspicion that there was the equivalent of a “Kick me” sign taped to my back, and the silencing shame of being different.

I started to adapt by downplaying my differences. I figured I had to try to be like them in order to be with them, and I had to say what they wanted to hear so they would listen to me. And thus, I gathered the fabric of fitting-in and the string of assimilation, and I began to assemble my costume.

Once I had a passable prototype, I began to perfect it with the right props. For me, one such prop was the simple fork. In my Indian-American family, I remember from early childhood eating with our hands. My mom and grandmother would use their hands to carefully and evenly work warm jaggery into crumbled wheat rotis to create glistening spheres of goodness, which they would lovingly pop into my mouth. Even in the moments we resorted to silverware, we went straight for the spoons, effectively cutting food by forcefully and frantically sawing with the spoon’s side. When invited to a white friend’s home for a meal, I initially feared the fork. I would meticulously study how my friend’s family ate, marveling at their mastery of interchangeably using three utensils in one meal, and I would bring home with me those lessons in “civility, normalcy, and good manners.”

In middle school, I was thrilled to discover another useful prop: Lip gloss in the perfect shimmery shade of frosty pink. It made all the white girls look so shiny-sparkly-good, and that’s what I needed to be! But with my darker lips asserting themselves from beneath the cotton candy sheen, I couldn’t quite achieve the desired effect. Yet, there was no room in my world for the question my mom gently proffered as to what was the right shade of lip gloss for me, so I persisted with the pink.

Thankfully, we all grew out of the Bonne Bell stage. But for many of us brown folks, that just meant our costumes needed to be updated. I observed with an eagle-eye every expression, every choice, every quiet movement made by my white counterparts, and I plotted how I could improve my costume to make it more real and more believable. I started to become more accustomed to wearing the costume and, soon enough, was rarely taking it off. In the safe space at home with my Indian-American friends, I thought I was taking the costume off, but I realize now that remnants of the deception remained: an expression, a choice, a quiet movement.

All of this seemed to work well enough for me as I graduated from my educational endeavors and entered the professional world. I knew how to dress like a white girl, talk like a white girl, and for the most part, act enough like a white girl to get by. And trust me when I tell you that this is what it takes to get by in many professions. Even worse is that in most professions, mimicking a white girl isn’t even enough to excel, due to a cultural bias against women leaders.

In spite of this set-up, I took some risks. Once, when I was a summer intern at a law firm, I asked my assigned mentor attorney if I could wear an Indian outfit to an off-the-clock gathering at a law firm partner’s house. My mentor shook her head incredulously and issued a resounding “Noooooo!” Curiously and quite distressingly, despite my consistently well-received work product, I later was denied a position with the firm for reason of “not being a good fit.” It doesn’t take more than one or two outcomes like that to shake your confidence and chase you right back into your costume, which then is what begins to feel like the safe space.

Without even consciously realizing it, my M.O. became more and more about flying under the radar. If they didn’t notice me, it meant that I was fitting in. That my disguise was working.

Eventually, my costume started to fray from overuse, and the seams started to split to reveal more of my true personality, which, as it turns out, does not want to fly under the radar. I want to do something big and important! I’m tired of the same ineffective solutions to the same problems in business and society, particularly when it comes to diversity. And I’m tired of listening to people tell me their stories and then walk away before hearing mine.

I’ve tried to share with some people how much I was bullied as a child because I was different, but I often find they start to get visibly uncomfortable or try to tell me that my race may not have been a reason, for they, too, were bullied for being nerdy or not wearing the right clothes. I’ve learned through my now well-honed observational skills that people don’t really want to hear me talk about how I was called a “sand n_____” by my elementary school classmates. Or how, even after being the last one picked in 6th grade gym class, my square dance partner considered my brown skin too dirty to even touch, and we both miserably do-si-doed with a deep, dark chasm between our outstretched hands. Or how my high school English teacher told my mom that my potential was less than that of my white classmates since I was “English as a second language.” All of those stories make people break eye contact with me, wriggle in their seats, and try to change the subject.

I have this friend who is Jewish. She and I often have connected over some of the similar traits of our cultures. She is a gifted storyteller who doesn’t shy away from questions that help her understand others’ experiences, and I accordingly have found her to be compassionately and sincerely open to my stories. I recently relayed to her a detailed version of the story about my request to wear Indian clothes to the law firm gathering. Her eyes welled up as I related the events that led to me being dinged from the firm. I could see that it was hard for her to hear. As it should be, because it was hard for me to tell and even harder to experience. In fact, there was a new pain I felt in relating that experience. It was the pain of knowing better. It was the ache of wisdom telling me that I shouldn’t have put up with that and regretting that, as a young, female law student of color eager to make a good impression, I felt disempowered and showed up to that event costumed up, asking them to drop a treat in my bag.

Unfortunately, yet understandably, this form of disempowerment is common among minorities and women. In the 1960’s, sociologist Erving Goffman coined as “covering” this behavior of a known stigmatized individual attempting to mitigate the obtrusiveness of the stigma. It is difficult to metrically ascertain the impact of covering, when it includes lost professional opportunities, decreased confidence, identity and self-worth, and a whole lot of cognitive dissonance. But as law professor Kenji Yoshino recognized, “covering” amounts to a civil rights issue: African-Americans have lost their jobs over wearing their hair in cornrows; Women have been demoted for choosing to become mothers; and Jews have been terminated from the military for wearing yarmulkes. Professor Yoshino explains that courts are willing to protect immutable traits such as the color of one’s skin and one’s sex, but “will not protect mutable traits, because individuals can alter them to fade into the mainstream…If individuals choose not to engage in that form of self-help, they must suffer the consequences.” Such consequences are too often dire in these days of rampant racial profiling, especially for our African-American brothers and sisters who might wear a dark hoody on a candy run. And so, as incentivized by some of our classmates, teachers, neighbors, mentors, and bosses, and also by the law of the land, we cover, hiding our true selves behind masks of the majority and resigning our society to a persistent and oppressive homogeneity.

Abby Norman, in her article about liberal progressives not enrolling their children in her predominantly black neighborhood school, asks, “Really, if we are experiencing diversity on white terms, what good is that diversity anyway?” I’d guess that Ms. Norman and I would agree that the answer is, “not very good at all,” but you don’t have to take our word for it; the data speaks loudly and clearly. In spite of ongoing claims of diversity as a top value and mission of many organizations, African-Americans and Latina/o-Americans remain significantly underrepresented in many industries, even more so in senior leadership roles. Even in a legal profession charged with upholding justice, barely modest strides have been made in diversity metrics.

Clearly, “success” needs to be redefined when it comes to diversity, and innovative and diverse approaches must be welcomed, supported, and earnestly attempted to reap the many benefits of diversity and inclusion. To genuinely engage our underrepresented brothers and sisters, we all must battle our own implicit biases, in part by expanding our own social networks to be genuinely inclusive of others who have different backgrounds and experiences from us. If organizations truly seek diversity and inclusion (and that is a question meriting candid organizational introspection), they must make space for everyone, especially minorities and women, to bring their true selves to the table. Most, like me, have learned the art of “covering” to survive in organizations because that is what our society has required of us. It is now on our society and our organizational leaders to undo that to allow minorities and women to thrive and offer their unique perspectives and ideas for assured organizational and societal improvements. Seats at the table aren’t enough; organizational leaders must warmly and earnestly ask minorities and women to share their stories and then must listen, especially when it is painful and uncomfortable.

At the same time, we minorities and women must be more aware of and intentional about when we put on our costumes. There always will be some amount of care and strategy we employ in determining with whom, in what scenarios, and to what extent we show our true colors. However, it is important that we not be scared by past risks that didn’t pay off and continue to share our stories with the people in our lives who will be moved and impacted, and who will remind us of the power of our true narratives.

For me, that means remembering the way food always tasted better to me as a child when it was fed to me by my mom’s or grandmother’s hand instead of a cold-clawed fork. And it means acknowledging that the pretty pink lip gloss made me look like the living dead.

I’ll save that costume for Halloween.

Neha Sampat is founder, consultant, trainer, and coach at GenLead|BelongLab, where she collaborates with clients through consulting, training, and individual coaching to innovate approaches to leadership, inclusion, and professional development that are both data-driven and grounded in the subjective experience. Her best Halloween costume to date was Buffila Slayerjee (the South Asian vampire slayer), and when she wears lip gloss, it is in the shade of coco plum. Find her on LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram (@belonglab) and Twitter (@nehamsampat and @BelongLab).

[moodboardinthecloud]

Esther Perel Is Fighting the “Tyranny of Positivity”

The famed relationship therapist talked to GQ about relearning social skills, pandemic breakups, and why “how was your pandemic?” is a lame question.

BY CLAY SKIPPER

July 19, 2021

https://www.gq.com/story/esther-perel-interview

Within the first 60 seconds of our conversation, the psychotherapist Esther Perel introduces me to a concept she calls “enforced presentism.” It’s a feeling you might know well from the pandemic. “You can't think two days ahead,” says Perel. “Everything is in the moment, and you're dealing with this chronic unpredictability and stress.”

You might expect Perel to be better equipped than most to deal with such turbulence, given her experience in navigating romance and relationships, surely one of the most troubled and anxiety-inducing human experiences. Over the last four decades, she’s become one of the world’s most renowned relationship therapists, writing two bestselling books about couples, desire and sexuality, Mating in Captivity, and The State of Affairs, and hosting two podcasts, Where Should We Begin? And How’s Work? (Both invite listeners into sessions she conducts between people who are romantically or professionally connected.)

But Perel says her pandemic got off to a difficult start. First, she was scared. Then, she had to come to terms with the fact that, according to the covid classifications, no matter how she thought of herself, she was technically elderly. In the next phase, she coordinated a yoga group with friends on three continents. She started going on hikes and walks. She recorded seasons of both of her podcasts.

“Then, one day I woke up and I said, I want to create a game,” she remembers. “I want to create a happy project. I can’t deal with the loss, the sadness, the grief, the uncertainty—those existential aspects. I also want to deal with the part of us that keeps us connected to playfulness, to curiosity, to the unknown.”

That turned into a card game (also) called, “Where Should We Begin? A Game of Stories”. Filled with thought-provoking prompts—think “I’ve always wondered if it’s normal to…” and “The last promise I broke was…”—it’s meant to facilitate connection by getting people to tell stories that they might otherwise hide behind conversations about the humidity. More importantly, it’s as an antidote to the fog of enforced presentism, and a buffer against the atrophied social skills we might all carry into the world as it lifts.

Here, she talks about entering back into the world, the proliferation of the term “trauma,” fixing our work-as-identity problems, and why we need to retire the idea of the soulmate.

GQ: Based on what you’ve seen in your work—and just anecdotally or personally—what are the things, relationships-wise, that people have most been struggling with in the last 18 months? What do you think will continue to be issues as we re-emerge into a sense of normalcy?

Esther Perel: Big crises always operate as relationship accelerators. Especially a pandemic and a disaster says, "Life is short. Life is fragile. Things could end any moment." People articulate the awareness of mortality—we usually try to not be too aware of it. So you instantly begin to sharpen your priorities and you start to disregard the superfluous and the unimportant and the misguided.

You begin to say, "What am I waiting for? Let's move in together. Let's have the babies we've been wanting to have. Let's get married. Let's move.” Or: "I've waited long enough. I'm out of here. This is no longer sustainable to me." It goes in those two directions. It's what I want and what I no longer want.

So at this moment, most of my colleagues, we are talking about the avalanche of disruptions that have taken place in relationships, and the consequences thereof. I would say there's been a lot of different kinds of disruptions. Collapse of boundaries: people have never worked as hard, and they have had to turn their house into a gym, a restaurant, an office, a school, all of it, while sitting on the same chair. That's been a real challenge for people.

Why is it so hard for us to hold all of our identities at one time in one space?

In the same way we need reality and imagination, and we need groundedness and we need adventure, we need structure and spontaneity. Our rules structure us, and those rules are structured in time and in space. You came to work this morning, you dressed up a certain way that made sense for you, that is different than if you go to the gym, that is different than if you go to a club. The clothes go with the place where you go, with the building that you enter, with the way that you behave. A rule is a complex set of things that organizes you. That gives you a sense of how to behave, what to do, how to think, how to relate to people. When you don't have any of that—you are a partner, a parent, a lover, a friend, a son, an employee, a manager—and it's all happening at the same table in the same sweatpants, it becomes like a fog. You start to experience a type of lethargy. You start to lose the pleasure of what you do.

It strikes me that this could be a moment where we might begin to realize all the identities we’re performing, and maybe actually become more conscious or aware of these roles in a healthy way.

Yes. First of all, a lot of people slowed down enough that they could pay attention. People became more observant of the rhythms of their lives—of the trees around them for that matter. We slowed down for the first time in a long time. Since the early 1900s, all we have done is gone fast.

Except when you sit in your mindfulness moments. These mindfulness and meditation incursions into Western culture are all in response to the degree of acceleration that our culture has experienced.

What do you think of the American imperative to be happy?

Happiness used to belong in the afterlife. In Heaven. People suffered when on earth, especially good Christians, so that they could maybe be rewarded later. This is the first time in history that you ask Western parents what they want for their children, and the first thing they say is, "I want them to be happy." They don't say, "I want them to be healthy, alive," because child mortality has gone down. They don't say, "I want them to be good people." They're supposed to talk about, "I want them to be happy."

The tyranny of positivity is a burden. Happiness is an outcome, not a mandate, because the mandate of happiness makes you constantly have to wonder, "Am I happy? Am I happy enough? Could I be happier? Should I leave this relationship? I'm happy, but maybe I could be happier somewhere else." So it becomes, how do I know? And then it becomes massive uncertainty, massive self-doubt.

Happiness comes in a moment, where I finish an interview with you, or you with me, and maybe we say, "That was really good. I'm happy. I'm glad. I'm pleased." And then off we go. it's a moment. It's not, "I am happy in my life. I'm a happy person." I'm a person with a range of emotions.

The depression and anxiety of today is the mirror response to the pressure on happiness. You can't be sad. You can't be blue, melancholic. Then you get the permission to be sad if you're depressed. So let's pathologize it. And if depression isn't enough, let's say you’ve had trauma.

Trauma is the licensed language to talk about pain and suffering at this moment. That doesn't mean there is no trauma, but it means that if we say the word trauma, it gives me permission to say, "I have pain and I have suffered, and it was hard, and I have legacies from it."

I think it's good that we're recognizing trauma on a larger scale, but I’m curious at what point it’s almost rendered meaningless.

In a society that mandates happiness, the suffering doesn't disappear, but you need to find a new legitimacy. So if you put it in the framework of trauma, it becomes legitimized.

So because we're so obsessed with happiness, we can't just say, "I'm sad,” we need to have some reason to feel sad?

That’s right. A framework that gives it permission and legitimacy. That’s the framework of trauma. That doesn't mean there are no developmental traumas—let's be very clear. Trauma is not what happened, trauma is your reaction to something that has happened over time. We've expanded the word trauma from big, terror-inducing, helplessness-inducing events, to what we call today the traumas with small t’s, which are the developmental traumas. These are super, super important. But in society, there is a direct correlation between the pressure to be happy and the release valve that comes through the trauma. I'm allowed to say that I'm not happy, because I had trauma.

So what is the goal behind the card game? What's the ultimate desire for you?

The game is a game of stories. I have a podcast that tells stories about our lives. Our relationship stories are the way we make meaning of our life. Stories are the way we connect with people. Stories are the way we tell ourselves. I ask questions in my practice where people are invited to rewrite their stories so that they don't stay stuck there, because the story is connected to your core beliefs. So the game is a game of stories and it incentivizes people to tell stories that they rarely tell.

At this point, just because of the timing, it's become a game for connecting and reconnecting. It's a game where people can really overcome their social atrophy and the social anxiety that some of us are experiencing. It gives you a sense of how you reenter, how you have those small conversations that then become deep conversations sometimes.

What are some of the things people should look out for with regards to social atrophy?

“So how was the pandemic?” This is a question that I've heard quite a bit. [laughs] As if you just came back from some trip! And even when you come back from a trip, most of the time people are not interested in you talking more than one sentence. They don't really want to know, "First we went here and then we did that. And you won't believe this and then..." People know that they've gone through something big. They don't really know what they can ask. They don't know how much others really want to know. That’s a big one.

You’ve offered interesting perspectives on a lot of the Western myths we have. What do you think are some of the American myths that undergird our society that were most exposed by the pandemic and by COVID?

Self-reliance, effort, optimism, "Roll up your sleeve, get to work. There is nothing you cannot solve, if you put your mind to it." This “it's all on you, try harder mentality.” A pandemic will definitely highlight the notion of interdependence. Public health is a conception of interdependence. You do something not just for you—you do something because it protects others. That notion of interdependence has taken a beating over the last [several years]. It's all self-help, self-love, self-compassion. Self is in front of a lot of things, and that ultimately ends up creating a self focus. That doesn't mean self is not important. But it also comes to self and other. It's I and thou. We don't exist separately from our connections with others.

What else?

The soulmate myth. The soulmate has always historically been God. One and only meant the divine. When you start to turn a human being into God-like, and you collapse the social and the spiritual, you set yourself up a little bit. Relationships are sustained by the community that they live in. Not being alone doesn't mean being two. And people here do not have enough social support, no matter which way you turn. They don’t have enough confidants, or people they talk to. Lots of things they bring to therapists should be shared in community settings. Couples don't tell the truth to anybody. Your best friends, when they may divorce, you didn't even see it coming.

The next myth, at this moment, is the centrality of work. On the one hand, work is very liberating. You come to America and if you work hard, you can make it. At the same time, when people lose their jobs, especially men, they're willing to jump off the roof. There needs to be other sources of meaning and other sources of values that isn't just about success and money and all of those things. All the research asking people what they would have wanted to do differently, not a single one says, "I would have wanted to work hard."

So with these myths in mind, what would you advise people to do, coming out of the pandemic, to try to counteract them?

There's no greater antidepressant than doing for others. Instead of just thinking about self-care, take care of others. When you do for others, when you see other people's pain, experiences, hunger, you name it, you feel like you matter. You derive meaning when you are important to others. Your meaning doesn't just come from what you do for yourself.

In terms of the soulmate, one person cannot give you what an entire community should provide. That is bound to create a crumbling of too many expectations on one unit. So do not give up your friends. A wedding is not saying goodbye to your circle or to these relationships. They're super important, and especially the men. The men, particularly guys in straight relationships, lose massive amounts of social connections once they get married. But this is for people in all types of relationships. One person cannot give you what a whole village should provide.

Then for work, work as identity is where it's going. Love and work are replacing traditional communal structures and religion. But think about other sources of purpose and meaning, and put them in place. What else matters in your life? If it's only work, when work doesn't go well, mental health problems are very close around the corner.

This interview has been edited and condensed.

[tsuna-mayos]

honestly, coming back to tumblr after a few years away has been really comforting. i migrated to instagram and twitter for a while because my irl friends were using those more, but in the last 2-3 years they just made me miserable. whether i liked it or not, i spent so much time staring at the metrics and performance rather than just enjoying what i posted. the more i reflect since i came back here, there are huge points i have for continuing to use tumblr and effectively abandoning the other socials

tumblr doesn’t force me to give up my personal information. i can be anonymous. i don’t have to tag locations, provide my legal name (this sucks when you are trans and haven’t been allowed to change your name!), post photos of myself, and most importantly - it doesn’t secretly begin collecting information from the app that auto-finds and recommends people i know from other apps. i can’t tell you how harmful that is when you wish to keep your socials away from family and the workplace. i genuinely denied all permissions on facebook to search my phone and despite not having any family added and having a fake name it still found my cousins and recommended them to me even though i had not searched them - meaning they could see my info just as easily as i saw theirs.

tumblr doesn’t actively tell people whether i am online or not. generally speaking i don’t have the spoons/mental energies to talk to people 24/7. sometimes i like to come online and decompress and scroll content for a short while after a particularly stressful period of time. people seeing a green dot or seeing when i was online last is too much of a violation of my privacy.

tumblr doesn’t monetize or incentivize popularity. you can’t see how many followers someone has, and there is no verified check. anyone can be a peer, rather than a follower or an “influencer”. there is more a sense of a community of like-minded individuals because of that. plus, it doesn’t force you to post on a daily schedule and then penalize you when you don’t post for a while. on instagram pre-pandemic i used to post regularly and my engagement was through the roof but when i stopped posting for a while it has never recovered and i’ve given up trying to keep up with inhumane practices towards the creative mind. here, every post has equal opportunity, and growth is natural. for such a long time, i struggled to find self-confidence on instagram because people who were my peers were outperforming me, and i unfairly attributed it to my shortcomings when it was completely out of my hands.

tumblr doesn’t really have an algorithm the way other sites do. it still runs in chronological order and the only algorithm i see running is suggested accounts to follow and the trending topics on the explore page. i only have to see what i want to see.

tumblr is oriented towards reblogs and replies more than anything else. this system keeps people engaging with each other. in contrast, instagram is more focused on the individual and promoting yourself like you’re a product. here, it is more of a dialogue with others.

tumblr is less aggressive. twitter, in comparison, cultivates content that is pretty much geared to turn people against each other in open hostility. i can’t explain how it turned out that way but it genuinely feels completely different. here, we can have differing opinions in an open, honest and fair discussion. on twitter you just can’t have that. people are just automatically ready to call you a slur for having minor differences in opinions.

tumblr is just a lot more comfortable for people outside of the cis-het-white-abled culture. we feel more safe to talk about ourselves with little to no persecution as backlash to that. the added anonymity helps too. plus, because we have more of a voice here, we can discuss media we enjoy without it being the same mainstream things that cater to categories we don’t exist in, and discover things that don’t get any promotion. i’ve discovered so many movies/shows/podcasts through here that are diverse that have zero promotion on other sites.

of course it’s not a perfect situation. as much as i like that the site hasn’t changed much in the last ten years outside of a few major things, it still needs some tlc.

we don’t reblog as much as we used to. it’s really noticeable in older blogs that look at their metrics. reblogs go a long way towards getting work out there and reaching each other. maybe people are too concerned with cultivating an aesthetic, but we should actively work to reblog each other more than simply liking posts.

how have we still not been given a way to search multiple tags at once???????????

the messaging system isn’t ideal. personally i don’t mind all that much because i dislike messaging for the most part (i find it hard to deal with, especially if people instant-reply) but i know a lot of people socialize through them and it hasn’t been updated since - what - 2013?

the random kinks that show up like how recently a lot of older blogs just randomly have been disappearing and nobody understands why etc.

i really hope no one finds a way to monetize this site. even the ads are funny to see because they are so bizarre. i want to stay here as long as possible.

[easyfoodnetwork]

Keba Konte’s Caffeinated Revolution

The coffee industry can be a hotbed of exploitation and exclusion. Red Bay Coffee is pushing for change

One of the walls at Red Bay Coffee headquarters is taken up by a huge living sculpture of Africa, all sorts of plants dangling from the continent’s outline. The space, on a quiet block in the Fruitvale neighborhood of Oakland, California, is both cafe and coffee roastery. The hum of machines joins with the buzz of conversation as the space fills up and a line winds out the door. This is a community hub for the neighborhood. That’s fitting, since Red Bay isn’t an ordinary coffee company.

Started in 2014 by Oakland artist and entrepreneur Keba Konte, Red Bay is in many ways a response to the failings of third-wave coffee culture, which saw an increased emphasis on the quality of coffee and its sourcing, but resulted in mostly white-owned cafes and often-underpaid employees. Konte’s mission is to adjust how coffee is treated every step of the way. He wants more demand for high-quality coffee in the countries where it’s produced, so farmers depend less on exploitative overseas markets. He wants customers who haven’t felt comfortable dipping their toes into the world of fancy coffee to have a place to ask questions and sip in peace. He wants to create a home behind the counter, where queer folk, people of color, and those who have been incarcerated can learn a skill and make a meaningful income.

If that sounds like a lot for one coffee company to tackle, that’s because it is. But as Red Bay quickly grows, Konte is well on his way to realizing this vision, setting a new standard for the coffee industry. Red Bay is the product of Konte’s ideas about how the world of coffee could be. So when I started thinking about the future of food, and of the restaurant industry, Konte was the first person I called.

Eater: What are the weaknesses and the biggest issues that you’re seeing right now in your industry?

Keba Konte: The industry still lacks Black leadership at the highest levels. At a Peet’s, at a Starbucks, and even some of these other third-wave roasteries and companies, you’ll see more and more Black and brown baristas: The front line almost feels like it’s getting a little bit more integrated. And we’re still talking about integration. But when you look past the veil at the leadership roles at most of these coffee companies, we’re still looking at mostly white men who are the decision-makers, who are driving the culture at these places. That’s a problem.

There’s still a lot of exploitation that happens at the farm level. That’s probably the single biggest challenge and weakness of this entire industry. The people who are doing by far the most labor-intensive portion of the entire supply chain are at origin, and they’re getting the smallest piece of the pie in terms of compensation and how the dollar is divided up. The level of exploitation and poverty that exists for the farmers and producers is a tragedy.

When you look at these issues from the origin through production to the baristas, where and how do you see Red Bay and yourself intervening?

It doesn’t stop at the barista. It starts, obviously, at the farm and all the way through the value stream, from the importer to the exporter to the local trading houses to the individual roasters to the QC [quality control] and production and the marketing and then, the barista. After that, it is the spaces: From the coffeehouses to the streets and the consumer. I make that distinction because a couple of years back in a Starbucks in Philadelphia, they called the police on these two [Black] guys who were just there for a meeting.

Where we intervene — starting at the very end — is creating spaces that are flipping the script by making our spaces unapologetically welcoming to Black and brown people: By putting Africa on the wall, by not exploiting our farmers with pictures of them smiling with sweat and dirty hands that they’re not directly benefiting from. We are hiring some of these underrepresented and underestimated communities at every level of production. That includes roasters.

And we’re not just talking about race. Race is definitely one major component, but we’re talking about gender, we’re talking about LGBTQ people, we’re talking about disabled folks, we’re talking about the formerly incarcerated. We are very intentional about creating opportunities for folks with unnecessary barriers to entry into the industry. Sometimes, those barriers are people not getting promoted from barista to a trainer to a manager. Sometimes, those barriers are not getting hired in the first place. They might be in a wheelchair or have a police record and have to check that box on the application: Have you been convicted of a felony? Sometimes, the barrier is none of those things; it’s just that when they walk into these spaces, it doesn’t feel welcoming.

Us breaking down these barriers is incentivizing our farmers for quality and paying them even more than fair-trade rates. It’s meeting people where they are with their coffee education. We use our platform to let Black people know, to let African Americans know that coffee came from Africa and that this is our heritage. That is our inheritance. Since we’ve been under the Red Bay brand for 6 ½ years, we’ve seen an emergence of a Black coffee movement. There are coffee shops opening up that are not just owned by Black people, but are also unapologetic about claiming their culture and flexing it within the coffee space.

So what should the coffee industry look like in 2025? And what would it actually take to get there?

Well, it is going to take a struggle. These things don’t just happen by themselves. Let me first address our crystal ball and [the idea of] looking into the future: We’re going to have to think about wages. We’ve been paying a minimum of $15 per hour as our starting wage for our employees, baristas, and production-line crew, ever since the minimum wage was $10. Now that the minimum wage has caught up to what we have been paying for the last six years — and we’ve made incremental increases there — we’re trying to raise the bar again. We would like to continue to push the envelope in terms of wages.

I would like to think that in five years’ time, there will be a growth in the consumption of coffee in origin countries around the world: That means more coffee shops, coffee culture, and coffee business in countries like Kenya, Colombia, Mexico, and Guatemala. What that does is drive the price up, and it makes those coffee producers less dependent on exporting to Europe, America, and Japan. We really have to get that right.

Right now, farmers are being paid at almost an all-time low. The commodity price is under $1 for one pound of coffee. It’s hard to explain how much work goes into processing one pound of coffee, and the farmer, the producer, and the collective has to share that dollar.

The Black Lives Matter movement has hit a chord that is reverberating globally. This is not just a blip; this will continue. Those changes are starting to impact corporate movements, decisions, and structures. The first layer is more surface-level talk and brown-washing, if you will. [Corporations are] reaching out to companies like Red Bay to become the face of a campaign or an ad. We’re participating in some of these campaigns. There are also other initiatives where they’re actually starting to really consider Black businesses as vendors. So now, we’re getting opportunities from [some of the traditional gatekeepers] to become coffee providers — Good Eggs, Thrive, Target. I think if they’re reaching out to us, they’re reaching out to others, as well.

Even before this last wave, Starbucks hired a chief operating officer who is a Black woman. You’re seeing more infiltration on the upper corporate level. That’s the more critical part of the diversity piece. I think that will continue to happen, and it will happen because people are pushing for it — not just Black people, but the mainstream of America are pushing for some of these changes.

Do you see space for there to be a major change in how a wider swath of people is interacting with coffee?

What comes to mind is whenever you have Black people taking over in an industry, or really influencing that industry, Black people have this certain sort of swag, a certain way of doing things and including different flavors. So many things in this industry — for example, tasting notes on a coffee or a wine — are so subjective and they’re so culturally based.

When you’re trying to taste and identify a flavor, all you have is the references from your own personal experience. We’ve had experiences in the cupping lab when we’re tasting coffee and — one example, we had this Navajo brother, Kelvin, and when we were talking about tasting notes, he started talking about saddle leather and the morning smell of riding a horse through a forest, and roasted yams. People will bring their life experience and it’s what you’re missing when you don’t have that diversity of culture and cultural references.

But who knows? We’ve been trying to do the best we can — we introduced a candied yam latte a couple of years ago that Jessica helped create. We are working on a cocoa butter product right now. We’ve been doing a charcoal black latte. We’ve got a couple more things in the pipeline with traditional African spices. I’m not sure what everyone else is planning, but I know they’re going to bring it.

This interview has been edited for clarity and length.

Michelle Min is a food and travel photographer based in San Francisco.

from Eater - All https://ift.tt/32RFJTY https://ift.tt/2EFsqOm

The coffee industry can be a hotbed of exploitation and exclusion. Red Bay Coffee is pushing for change

One of the walls at Red Bay Coffee headquarters is taken up by a huge living sculpture of Africa, all sorts of plants dangling from the continent’s outline. The space, on a quiet block in the Fruitvale neighborhood of Oakland, California, is both cafe and coffee roastery. The hum of machines joins with the buzz of conversation as the space fills up and a line winds out the door. This is a community hub for the neighborhood. That’s fitting, since Red Bay isn’t an ordinary coffee company.

Started in 2014 by Oakland artist and entrepreneur Keba Konte, Red Bay is in many ways a response to the failings of third-wave coffee culture, which saw an increased emphasis on the quality of coffee and its sourcing, but resulted in mostly white-owned cafes and often-underpaid employees. Konte’s mission is to adjust how coffee is treated every step of the way. He wants more demand for high-quality coffee in the countries where it’s produced, so farmers depend less on exploitative overseas markets. He wants customers who haven’t felt comfortable dipping their toes into the world of fancy coffee to have a place to ask questions and sip in peace. He wants to create a home behind the counter, where queer folk, people of color, and those who have been incarcerated can learn a skill and make a meaningful income.

If that sounds like a lot for one coffee company to tackle, that’s because it is. But as Red Bay quickly grows, Konte is well on his way to realizing this vision, setting a new standard for the coffee industry. Red Bay is the product of Konte’s ideas about how the world of coffee could be. So when I started thinking about the future of food, and of the restaurant industry, Konte was the first person I called.

Eater: What are the weaknesses and the biggest issues that you’re seeing right now in your industry?

Keba Konte: The industry still lacks Black leadership at the highest levels. At a Peet’s, at a Starbucks, and even some of these other third-wave roasteries and companies, you’ll see more and more Black and brown baristas: The front line almost feels like it’s getting a little bit more integrated. And we’re still talking about integration. But when you look past the veil at the leadership roles at most of these coffee companies, we’re still looking at mostly white men who are the decision-makers, who are driving the culture at these places. That’s a problem.

There’s still a lot of exploitation that happens at the farm level. That’s probably the single biggest challenge and weakness of this entire industry. The people who are doing by far the most labor-intensive portion of the entire supply chain are at origin, and they’re getting the smallest piece of the pie in terms of compensation and how the dollar is divided up. The level of exploitation and poverty that exists for the farmers and producers is a tragedy.

When you look at these issues from the origin through production to the baristas, where and how do you see Red Bay and yourself intervening?

It doesn’t stop at the barista. It starts, obviously, at the farm and all the way through the value stream, from the importer to the exporter to the local trading houses to the individual roasters to the QC [quality control] and production and the marketing and then, the barista. After that, it is the spaces: From the coffeehouses to the streets and the consumer. I make that distinction because a couple of years back in a Starbucks in Philadelphia, they called the police on these two [Black] guys who were just there for a meeting.

Where we intervene — starting at the very end — is creating spaces that are flipping the script by making our spaces unapologetically welcoming to Black and brown people: By putting Africa on the wall, by not exploiting our farmers with pictures of them smiling with sweat and dirty hands that they’re not directly benefiting from. We are hiring some of these underrepresented and underestimated communities at every level of production. That includes roasters.

And we’re not just talking about race. Race is definitely one major component, but we’re talking about gender, we’re talking about LGBTQ people, we’re talking about disabled folks, we’re talking about the formerly incarcerated. We are very intentional about creating opportunities for folks with unnecessary barriers to entry into the industry. Sometimes, those barriers are people not getting promoted from barista to a trainer to a manager. Sometimes, those barriers are not getting hired in the first place. They might be in a wheelchair or have a police record and have to check that box on the application: Have you been convicted of a felony? Sometimes, the barrier is none of those things; it’s just that when they walk into these spaces, it doesn’t feel welcoming.

Us breaking down these barriers is incentivizing our farmers for quality and paying them even more than fair-trade rates. It’s meeting people where they are with their coffee education. We use our platform to let Black people know, to let African Americans know that coffee came from Africa and that this is our heritage. That is our inheritance. Since we’ve been under the Red Bay brand for 6 ½ years, we’ve seen an emergence of a Black coffee movement. There are coffee shops opening up that are not just owned by Black people, but are also unapologetic about claiming their culture and flexing it within the coffee space.

So what should the coffee industry look like in 2025? And what would it actually take to get there?

Well, it is going to take a struggle. These things don’t just happen by themselves. Let me first address our crystal ball and [the idea of] looking into the future: We’re going to have to think about wages. We’ve been paying a minimum of $15 per hour as our starting wage for our employees, baristas, and production-line crew, ever since the minimum wage was $10. Now that the minimum wage has caught up to what we have been paying for the last six years — and we’ve made incremental increases there — we’re trying to raise the bar again. We would like to continue to push the envelope in terms of wages.

I would like to think that in five years’ time, there will be a growth in the consumption of coffee in origin countries around the world: That means more coffee shops, coffee culture, and coffee business in countries like Kenya, Colombia, Mexico, and Guatemala. What that does is drive the price up, and it makes those coffee producers less dependent on exporting to Europe, America, and Japan. We really have to get that right.

Right now, farmers are being paid at almost an all-time low. The commodity price is under $1 for one pound of coffee. It’s hard to explain how much work goes into processing one pound of coffee, and the farmer, the producer, and the collective has to share that dollar.

The Black Lives Matter movement has hit a chord that is reverberating globally. This is not just a blip; this will continue. Those changes are starting to impact corporate movements, decisions, and structures. The first layer is more surface-level talk and brown-washing, if you will. [Corporations are] reaching out to companies like Red Bay to become the face of a campaign or an ad. We’re participating in some of these campaigns. There are also other initiatives where they’re actually starting to really consider Black businesses as vendors. So now, we’re getting opportunities from [some of the traditional gatekeepers] to become coffee providers — Good Eggs, Thrive, Target. I think if they’re reaching out to us, they’re reaching out to others, as well.

Even before this last wave, Starbucks hired a chief operating officer who is a Black woman. You’re seeing more infiltration on the upper corporate level. That’s the more critical part of the diversity piece. I think that will continue to happen, and it will happen because people are pushing for it — not just Black people, but the mainstream of America are pushing for some of these changes.

Do you see space for there to be a major change in how a wider swath of people is interacting with coffee?

What comes to mind is whenever you have Black people taking over in an industry, or really influencing that industry, Black people have this certain sort of swag, a certain way of doing things and including different flavors. So many things in this industry — for example, tasting notes on a coffee or a wine — are so subjective and they’re so culturally based.

When you’re trying to taste and identify a flavor, all you have is the references from your own personal experience. We’ve had experiences in the cupping lab when we’re tasting coffee and — one example, we had this Navajo brother, Kelvin, and when we were talking about tasting notes, he started talking about saddle leather and the morning smell of riding a horse through a forest, and roasted yams. People will bring their life experience and it’s what you’re missing when you don’t have that diversity of culture and cultural references.

But who knows? We’ve been trying to do the best we can — we introduced a candied yam latte a couple of years ago that Jessica helped create. We are working on a cocoa butter product right now. We’ve been doing a charcoal black latte. We’ve got a couple more things in the pipeline with traditional African spices. I’m not sure what everyone else is planning, but I know they’re going to bring it.

This interview has been edited for clarity and length.

Michelle Min is a food and travel photographer based in San Francisco.

from Eater - All https://ift.tt/32RFJTY via Blogger https://ift.tt/3jyp1j2

[fpetradev]

Can gaming become the happy-hour for remote teams?

Remote work is here to stay, and we are just starting to explore how to make it better. In this article I will try an approximation to the question: could games be a piece in the puzzle to foster socialization? After a small intro into remote work, I invite you to explore the idea of gaming as a way to get to know your teammates better. As Balaji states: “Maybe informal socialization for remote teams means video games and social networks?” After all, we are Homo Ludens.

We can see an increasing number of fully remote companies and hybrid companies, with important in-office work, such as InVision, HubSpot and Stripe. Working remotely brings lots of benefits and forces some processes to be better. Benefits can be on a range, from moving with your family if a new opportunity arises to be able to put the laundry while in a break. In the processes side, it really helps everyone to be results-oriented, instead of getting fooled by who spent most hours at the office.  But it has its downside as well. The most important challenges to overcome are hiring, communication, culture, collaboration and if the team is international, paying everyone can be a pain as well (huge opportunity for crypto). In this article, I’m going to focus on communication and culture that are tightly correlated in any company, and highly so in a remote team or startup. Communication plays a huge role in every type of organization since its the lubricant of coordination. As a Gitlab post states this is a challenge in a remote company: “For all-remote companies, leaders should not expect informal communication to happen naturally. There are no hallways for team members to cross paths in, no carpools to the office, etc.”. 

So what are we missing in today's remote teams? We need spaces to interact, talk and enable serendipity. Apple’s new headquarter is thought to make people encounter in different places, even if they don’t work on the same team. Thinking casual encounters can be more challenging in a remote setting. Having an “excuse” to meet can go a long way. A typical way to do it is to have a watercooler in a communication channel, and it sort of works, but it has the same problem as the IRL watercooler if you don’t have and excuse can be kind of awkward, we need a starting point to interact. Also is pretty common to get matched weekly through a “mixer” to meet someone -probably online- you still don’t know or if you are more proactive, being incentivized to schedule the meeting yourself, but none of those options sound as natural as we wish. Another way to do it is to implement off-sites, this helps everyone to spend time together sharing day to day stuff, like cooking or playing a board game, doing something special as skiing or kayaking and getting some work done, analyzing past performance, planning, to get some sense of IRL work to understand each other better. This is an expensive option, but if the startup isn’t paying for an office (at least for a part of the workforce), it can be almost the same. I think it’s important to state that even people like Reed Hastings, who thinks a company is a group of people that gets together to do excellent work, and do not intend to become a group of friends -even less a family- know is important to build bonds and understand each other to work better.

So, where has the “happy hour” gone? Of course, you can go to a co-working space and socialize in a bar, coffee or meet-up after work, and we will probably still do that anyway, but we will keep working with strangers in our day to day lives. Games seem like a good place to start exploring socialization for remote companies, and we can see I’m not the only one with this idea gaming has been part of IRL offices all along with Google and even top-performing teams such as Elon Musk’s SpaceX team used to play games in the office. 

Here are my two cents about what kind of games to play, and two possible ways to implement it without friction:

Collaboration games: Here we can find Escape Games and co-creating games. This seems like a great fit to include everyone, and enable interactions, but most of these types of games seem very niche and not high-quality games.  Both options could become more entertaining if VR keeps moving forward, and people can “share a space”, adding a lot to the experience.

Team-based: This group involves a team playing against either other internal teams or teams from other companies. This can be really fun, there are many games that can be played like CS, Fortnite (PvP Squad mode), League of Legends and many others. A downside is that these games are really intensive, so there’s not a lot of room to go deep into socialization, but can be a jumpstart. Also, most of these games have some waiting time between rounds.

All against all: This seems like the most competitive option. Games that fit this category are Fortnite (PvP Alone mode). Most “board games” fall into this category as well, but there need to be more online options. Avalon which isn’t currently online seems like a great way to get a sense of how other team members behave outside of work, in a more relaxed environment.

As a disclaimer, I’m not a game geek, so for sure there are many other ideas to explore, but I do care about how people organize and the products that enable them to do it better while improving each member’s life (at least at work), so please share your ideas. The implementation has two paths that vary substantially in complexity. The first one is to create a Slack channel or to create a room for each game using Tandem, showing when people are willing to play, adding more spontaneity. Those approaches would work but there’s still lots of room for improvement, so let’s explore the second approach. We could take advantage of the fact that people are already at their computer to enable a frictionless experience mixing people into groups, enable a doodle-like way to coordinate the best time to set a raid. This would probably be a service by itself and could be integrated into everyday work as a SlackBot. Also, we could gamify the process (kind of redundant, but anyway…), and enable leaderboards, tournaments and even a more advanced version could enable playing against other companies’ teams. 

One of the possible downsides is that people could get too competitive and how the formal structure of the organization and the gameplay blend together, we want to foster cohesion, no rivalry. Another thing to keep an eye on is the level gap between players, so everyone can have fun. Also, the founders (or management if it’s a bigger company) should signal that this is something good, encourage it. We don’t want to get back to judge people by how much time they spend working, but by the quality of their output. We still have much space to experiment and learn to create a better remote office, but we are moving forward and new tools are on their way. Let´s “press start” to begin!

[batterymonster2021]

COST of MEDICAL SCHOOL | How to SAVE $250,000

New Post has been published on https://hititem.kr/cost-of-medical-school-how-to-save-250000/

COST of MEDICAL SCHOOL | How to SAVE $250,000

As you are already well mindful, medical tuition in the united states is ridiculously high-priced. The ordinary cost is $60,000 per yr for public clinical schools, and even higher for confidential clinical schools. The traditional debt for scientific scholars graduating in 2017 was practically $200,000. I was once fortunate sufficient to graduate with without a doubt very little debt. I’ll show you the best way to do the equal. What is going on on guys, Dr. Jubbal, MedSchoolInsiders.Com. Quick shout out to the Patreon supporters that voted for me to make this video.If you want to vote for upcoming video issues and get a bunch of other perks, discuss with the Med college Insiders Patreon web page. Hyperlink within the description under. Now the dollars to pay for scientific university will come from one among three sources: you and your family’s pockets, loans, and scholarships or promises. You want to decrease the primary two and maximize the latter, which is free cash. Let’s go over each one. First, most faculties will ask for your and your mum and dad’ monetary know-how. Despite the fact that your moms and dads usually are not going to make contributions a dime to your scientific education, faculties by and large require their tax knowledge in opting for who they must present economic aid to. Recall, your mom and dad will not be required to make contributions to your clinical university education costs, so be very grateful in the event that they make a contribution at all. My mother and father were not competent to make a contribution to my university or clinical tuition costs, however I was once nonetheless equipped to grow to be a health practitioner with little or no debt eventually.We will get to how I managed to do this shortly. Subsequent, loans. There are three principal categories of loans: federal, institution, and confidential. Federal and college loans typically have extra favorable phrases, reminiscent of longer durations of deferment and lower interest premiums. Personal loans have one of the vital worst phrases, and will have to be refrained from. Best signal personal loans when most likely imperative. When you start medical college, you’ll be able to be served a monetary support package if you want to summarize your tuition’s choices for federal and college loans, supplies, and scholarships. It’s main to create a realistic finances for your self and handiest take out loans for the sum of money that you simply honestly want. You’ll be able to be paying curiosity on each dollar you’re taking out. Once more, best take the quantity you sincerely need. I originally used to be planning on supplying you with a specific summary of every form of loan and the most reliable method in signing up for loans to diminish your long run cost and curiosity.However, I wasn’t equipped to fit all of that on this video. When you would me to cover these topics in a future video, leave a comment down beneath in order that i will gauge interest. With contemporary alterations in the education budget on a country wide level, federal loans aren’t just about as favorable as they were a couple of years in the past.However, some backed institution loans is not going to accrue any curiosity for the duration of medical university, and mostly even by means of residency. That’s correct, you don’t even need to pay again for inflation! These are outstanding loans, so in case you are offered them, I incredibly recommend taking them. Exclusive loans more often than not have the absolute best interest rates and will not be included in most forgiveness applications.Mortgage forgiveness applications are a preferred method to slash your overall mortgage burden. They are finest for pupils with big debt. The way in which it really works is inconspicuous – you work for a group, company, or software for a suite period of time, and in return, you acquire either partial or complete mortgage forgiveness or mortgage reimbursement. The department of education’s Public carrier mortgage Forgiveness application presents mortgage forgiveness for working in the executive or non-revenue organizations.After making 10 years of month-to-month payments, the remainder mortgage balance is forgiven. The country wide health service Corps offers a loan reimbursement program for those in important care specialties practicing in beneath-served areas. There are also a few options by means of the army. Now on to the fun phase, free money. The primary intent I was once competent to graduate with such little debt is through acquiring scholarships and supplies. While you first get accepted to clinical university, I endorse accomplishing out to the fiscal help place of job, even earlier than courses begin, and asking them about what scholarships or offers are offered.Most medical faculties preserve a record of annual scholarships and gives you, a lot of which you will be eligible for. Awards are not only for good grades. Eligibility criteria largely varies – some may be targeted to a designated heritage or ethnicity, strong point or observe variety, religion, residence town or location of delivery, and so on. Additionally to attaining out to your school’s financial aid workplace, obviously search online for medical pupil furnish and scholarship offerings. I’ve hyperlinks to internet sites and assets I for my part determined valuable down within the description beneath. Now the juicy phase. Here is a bit of identified secret that may make the difference of enormous quantities of hundreds and hundreds of dollars: when you get permitted to a couple of medical faculties, let them incentivize you to come back to their college over others with scholarship presents.Definitely, you need to me permitted to more than just one medical college. Simply send an email to the admissions place of work, give an explanation for you have an interest of their software however are weighing other acceptances as well. Ask if there are any scholarship or gives you they may be able to present to diminish your out of pocket fee. After sending out these emails to the universities I was approved to and fascinated with, I was once equipped to get nearly all of my medical school paid for. Had I no longer despatched out these emails, I could have been in thousands of 1000’s of bucks in debt. Now i’m going to say this to not toot my own horn however for full transparency: I used to be a totally competitive clinical institution applicant, acquiring interview offers at the majority of colleges I applied to, interviewing at lots of the prime clinical faculties, together with three of the top four, and gaining acceptances to a number of. Finally, I went to a application I was once desirous about on the grounds that of its place, the people, and the culture. And did I mention the vicinity? They also furnished me their very best merit based scholarship and i only took small loans to quilt a component of my living expenditures.The various biggest scholarships, like the one I bought, are benefit based, and are furnished to scholars with stellar medical tuition functions. This means having a prime MCAT, GPA, study, and being good rounded with impressive extracurriculars. A compelling private statement and crushing it on interview day with refined interview competencies are also primary. You need to be a beast of an applicant.And that i want to support you be that stellar applicant. Now whilst its not possible to assurance benefit founded scholarships, a couple of advisors on MedSchoolInsiders.Com additionally earned tremendous and even full ride scholarships to scientific university. These are actual medical professionals who have been prime performers. At MedSchoolInsiders we don’t accept anything much less. We can exhibit you precisely how we did it, and coach you from our possess first hand experience of success.If you wish to be a stellar applicant and obtain one-on-one advising, tutoring, interview guidance, private assertion or secondary editing, mentorship, or any of the opposite offerings we present, seek advice from MedSchoolInsiders.Com. Our services will support you grow to be a so much improved applicant, which increases the possibilities that you too will receive scholarships. And that suggests saving some huge cash. Talk about a just right investment. Examine out these emails I recently bought from YouTube subscribers. These had been fanatics who watched the channel who went to the website and purchased our services. The intent they’re so blissful is since of our results. We’re one of a kind from some other scientific tuition admissions consulting manufacturer for two explanations. First, our advisors are all real medical professionals who’ve performed above all of their field. And 2nd, unlikeany different organization, we’ve got a proprietary systematic methodology that ensures the fine feasible outcome. We align your ambitions and interests with these of our advisors – theydon’t handiest love mentoring and paying it forward, they’re additionally incentivized to give you the high-quality feasible service.That is why so many of our advisors go above and past what they may be asked for, and why our buyers had been so impressed. For a confined time, use the coupon code SCHOLARSHIP15 for $15 off your purchase of $100 or more. As continuously, thank you all so much for observing. Let me comprehend within the feedback beneath if you want me to make a video going into more element concerning the extraordinary varieties of loans, or any other video requests you will have. If you know anyone else going to clinical university and you need them to have not up to $200,000 of debt, please share this video with them. When you liked the video, make sure you press that like button. Hit subscribe if in case you have no longer already, and i will see you guys in that subsequent one. .

[desertsolitaire1-blog]

Capstone Process Blog 02/19/19

Keenan Hursh

EDPX - 3990

Research and Inspiration:

N/A for this past week. I have been developing and polishing my assets.

Progress and process:

I Have written and implemented a narrative into my film:

I wanted to open with the portrayal of our current situation as a species and then address exactly why the Mycelium Collective exists and what we plan to do to address said situation. I want this video to be short, sweet, and to the point. It should highlight and communicate exactly what we do in a simple and effective manner 

(each bullet point is an individual scene)

As a species and planet, we currently face a growing and imminent threat.

Earth’s climate is warming and changing faster and more unpredictably than ever before.

Our planet, the only home we have ever known, is on a grave and deteriorating path.

If we stand any chance of saving our world and all of Its beauty

We need to act now!

We need to collaborate and innovate together!

The Mycelium Collective is a brand-new platform that connects and supports our worlds creators.

We support any medium of creation that is themed around environmental sustainability or the outdoor world.

If you have a story to tell or a perspective to share, please reach out!

We’re looking for as many artists and activists as possible to address our collective future.

The Mycelium Collective (all white logo)

Connecting and Supporting our Worlds Creators

example of closing scene with the all-white logo and our slogan.

I have also started reaching out to potential collaborators within my immediate social circle. I plan to build the base platform and develop credibility utilizing my own personal connections before expand outwards and beyond to other artists. The first creator I plan to collaborate with is my friend Josh Bennett who is an avid photographer and photojournalist. He takes beautiful photos of natural environments and does an exceptional job of telling his own story of a place. Josh has a unique perspective and eye, and I believe he will make an excellent collaborator who will produce intriguing and beautiful content. 

Here is a link to his website:

http://joshbennettphoto.com/new-cover-page-2

Here are some screenshots of his work:

I have also updated and simplified the website based on feedback from last weeks critique. I agree that I was spread to wide and thin, and need to focus and expand on fewer, more essential aspects of the platform. I removed the “shop/support” page as well as the “public/blog” page. These could potentially be avenues to explore in the future but for now I agree that they are distractions from the purpose of this platform. 

Reflection:

Over the past week I have been refining and simplifying the website. I removed a couple of unnecessary sections/pages that are more or less distractions at this point. I need to simplify the website and strengthen the few sections that are currently there. In order to do this I have began reaching out to potential collaborators within my social network. I have reached out to a couple photographers and videographers and have one confirmed collaborator. I plan to continue to find artists so that I can not only fill the platform/website with assets but also support like-minded individuals. 

Feedback from Last Week:

Laleh and Cherish:

right now the website is a big mix of things. Need to simplify and unify.

Get rid of the shop section, it is too much and takes away form your concept and legitimacy 

Need to more clearly communicate your mission and goal. Need to clarify what the collective is themed around or is focusing on

Get rid of the public/blog section. It is also too much right now. Not necessary at this point and is kind of distracting

Some of your shots and text have too long of a run time. Need to shorten some stuff so that the video doesn't drag on.

Keep the text but also add narration/audio as well. This adds a human element 

Maybe add your face to the video to make it more personal

Need a human element, looks too corporate right now. Too basic

The shots I have are effective and work well. Keep moving in the same general direction 

Class Feedback:

I think the font might look a little too stretched for the logo (stretched is fine, but it is obvious here). I am also wondering what your intention behind using the Yin / Yang symbols is. I would just be careful because it can be a very culturally significant symbol, and if you're not using it right, it might come off the wrong way.

 Your website is very clean and has lots of different aspects to it. I would maybe consider lessening all the tabs you have and instead focus on adding more to the tabs you have left. I like that you are trying to create a cohesive website for artists to be able to use, share, and experience. The video you have for your website, is it connected to the overall website or is it more of just an example of a video that can be on it? I think it would be really cool if you created more of an abstract video about the environment to really display your EDP skills. Another idea for the final would be to display your website on a tv screen so everyone can see it and scroll through it. Or maybe find a way that people can interact with the website itself and see other people interact with it during the final.

 I feel like the headings are too big right now. Once more content is included I think they should be minimized so that the user is not scrolling through a huge image before reaching the actual content.

 I really enjoyed the drone shots in the intro video. I'm wondering if you should have a whole tab dedicated to talking about the copyright involved on this site. A lot of photo-sharing sites like Unsplash completely rip the rights from the photographer, but I think for your purposes you should really address valuing the artists work and what copyright would look like on this kind of platform.

 Your website is looking really good so far, my recommendation is to showcase your skills from EDP in an abstract video that represents the environment.

 The layout of the website is very pleasing to the eye. I think you’re really starting to do well making a brand for it. I really wanna see some promotion like lots of twitter and Facebook stuff and to get the word out there.

 I think your greatest obstacle is something you actually can't control: interaction of other artists and engagement from the public. How are you going to incentivize artists to join your collective? How are you going to gain public awareness/prestige? These are questions that need answers, and honestly I don't even know how to begin answering them, not being a business person. The "success" of your capstone project very much depends on factors only other people (the other artists, the public) can control...and to me that strikes me as really risky. I really liked your company's logo, the graphic design there is nice, but right now you have that large white chunk around it at the top of your homepage...that didn't strike me as impactful. I think you might be better off with a natural image at the top of your page (since your focus is on climate art) with the logo floating on top, maybe on a white circle so it stands out. I also liked your video...but in the section of it you showed there was actually a minor text error. It should be "Earth's," not "earths." Definitely have your stuff proof-checked for things like that - we all make mistakes! Finally, personal opinion here, but I think you're kind of missing the mark by having a slightly dated meme as your motif for your sticker/advertising. "Lost in the Sauce" was funny, sure, but I think it has little to nothing to do with your aims as a company, and seeing a meme as your only product will kind of lower people's interpretation of your professionalism and the sophistication of your brand.

 I think your website is professional and contained lots of the information. I like your introduction video. The drone shot is very cool. I think lessening the tabs could help the viewers reaching the actual content in a shorter time.

 I think your website is a good start but i think you can definitely push the boundaries of Squarespace to make a more unique looking aesthetic. It just feels a little generic (obviously you're going for a minimalistic look, but i think you can make it a little more individual beyond your logo). There were also just generally too many words in the video, the sentences felt a little clunky.

 Your website template looks like an inviting design, easy to read, clear layout, but still intriguing enough to want to know more. For the logo, I like the different concepts you incorporated and it’s a really cool design, but I’m not sold on the color choice. It looks nice but is there a reason you choose those blues and purples. I know its been done so much, but you are talking a lot about the world and the environment, and purple doesn’t normally have that connotation but green does, or even a darker blue. For the video I thought it was really well shot, I think audio/narration like Laleh said would help a lot, and in a couple shots be careful where you place the white text cause it was moderately difficult to see against some backgrounds.

 So far, I love the design of the website, but I agree with Laleh on the critiques she gave about different sections. What I would suggest is that you revisit the video/videos as well as the pictures and think about how their design could be more indicative of the nature of your collective. It's a collective of environmentally-conscious artists, but the videos and photos don't read that way to me. They're very simplistic nature shots which are beautiful, but not reflective of an artist collective. It'd be nice to see more interesting and dynamic videos, photos, and other projects on your page!

 I like that I’m finally getting to see this collective come together. Your piece is more of a business idea than an artwork, so it’s cool to see that perspective. However, I think that in pursuing the business side of things, you’ve lost your artistry. In the video, if the collective is about artists and their artwork, show some artwork—even if its your own, or from EDP students. I agree that a voiceover will help, and having a face to the brand will also help. I also agree with Laleh in that the website has too much going on, and that you should narrow it down. Remember that you can always add things later after you get it off the ground. There’s something about the text in the logo that looks strange to me, like it’s too puffed up or something, I’m not sure, but maybe take a look at editing the design. I think something like a logo should really reflect your brand, and right now it reads like a logo from a website that is just getting started—and you don’t want that. I think you’re at the point where you should start contacting artists about featuring them on your site. You can message people through their websites, their Vimeo, etc. I think having actual artwork there will help.

 I think you have a really strong concept for your project! I love the idea of creating a collective. The website has a clean & professional design layout. I think the logo looked balanced in white/black but felt a little chaotic in colors. I wonder if changing gray scale instead of color would have a stronger impact on the logo (maybe not just a thought)

 Your website looks great. You have so much information available and it has a great personal quality. This being said I think the colors of your logo are out of place. The entire look of the website is so fresh and clean, but the logo has a cheesy 80s vibe. I love it, but it just doesn't work with everything else especially since this is such a hip company!

 I think the color choice you have incorporated into your website fits perfectly with the concept of the collective. I think the submissions for art on your site is an exceptional idea for so many people have no clue where to put their artwork. Of course there is red bubble and etsy, but no where specific to nature and sustainability, at least that I know of. I really liked the video you composed for the website as well. I did agree with some that it kind of looks like a welcome to Colorado video, specifically. It would be amazing if you could somehow get some beach shots or even go to a reservoir to get that kind of aesthetic.

[nevinitambay-blog]

Close Reading *The Silenced* (2015), or: What doesn’t kill you might still kill you later.

Hey, everyone! I hope you all had a good week investigating the virtues of suspenseful storytelling, or, at least, a good week of writing some tasty red herrings! This week, I’m in the mood for doing a close reading of a dystopia, so I searched Netflix and came up with the film The Silenced. From the beginning credits, I think this is a Korean film, but I’m not sure, and I don’t want to go spoiling the movie for myself by looking it up. Be that as it is, if I make any cultural misinterpretations, feel free to correct me in the comments. Also, keep in mind that, as writers, we are responsible artisans who can create stories while being cognizant of their potential interpretations from various audiences. More plainly: we can write stories that anticipate varying interpretations from different audiences. (I’d actually like to see a text that is addressed equally to two or more different cultures with the expectation of two different interpretations. That’d be some potentially prize-winning writing, in my opinion.) Let’s begin!

Alright, I’ve gotten about ten minutes into the film and it is apparent that I’m missing a lot of meaningful signals, so I’m just going to embrace it and do an American reading of the film. Again, if I make a mistake or miss something important, please let me know.

Right out of the gate, we are getting some classic horror and dystopia signals in the film. The first signal is the distance from civilization: the car is traveling through a heavily wooded area to a gated building that is completely surrounded by nature (as opposed to other houses or a city). This signal is important in horror, because it usually indicates that outside help will not be an option for our protagonist. This also hints that our protagonist will need to escape something over the course of the film. The gated entrance reinforces the isolation signals with the implication that escaping will be difficult (i.e. actively impeded/prevented). Finally, on the horror side, we see that the building is a “sanitorium” which evokes both a hospital and an insane asylum. Hospitals are scary, because they are places of death, and places where a certain group (doctors and nurses) holds power over most others (patients). Asylums are scary, because being diagnosed as crazy often renders a person subhuman in regular society, people have been falsely imprisoned in asylums throughout history, and it is a magnified hospital problem where the patients have fewer means of fighting back against mistreatment.

The dehumanization associated with actual or alleged mental illness is also a prevalent signal in dystopian fiction, but it isn’t usually used on the protagonist so early. In a dystopia, mental illness is usually used to discredit people who notice that their society is a dystopia or people who drop from government service with knowledge of the same. However, in this film, it is used on the apparent main character, thus obfuscating whether or not she is a reliable narrator (since this movie is in close third person point of view) in the first place. Instead of the narrator being discredited in the story (which is common in dystopia narratives), she is discredited outside of it (which is common in horror narratives).

We get a more solidly dystopic signal when one girl tells another that she doesn’t like that there will be a new owner for the vacant bed at the end of the row. This implies that there was a previous owner of the bed who is now being replaced. This sort of exchangeability between people is common in dystopias where bodies are more important than individuals and worth no more than a payment from a wealthy family or the government. This reduction of the value of a person to dollar signs, productive output, etc. dehumanizes the person, which is a very dystopic thing to do.

While on the topic of dehumanization, there are a few more things that happen to the protagonist that fall squarely under “dystopian”:

1. All of her belongings are taken away due to “regulation”. (In a society that allowed for personal belongings, having them taken away is dehumanizing. This is a classic transition-to-dystopia move.)

2. She is struck on the face and ordered to behave. (She is being punished for not complying with a rule that makes little sense due to the first point.)

3. She is made to wear a uniform and her hair a certain way. (This erases the individual wearing the uniform.)

4. She is expected to write in a journal and hand it in each day (presumably to be read by the headmistress or the nurses). (Bad governments tend to surveil their citizens to ensure compliance.)

5. She is expected to contribute to an embroidery project that will be sent to Japan in exchange for increased chances of traveling to Tokyo (for an undisclosed reason). (The incentivization of pleasing overlords is used here to control the interaction between the rulers and the ruled; people don’t think about rebelling when they are directly focused on working towards a specific reward.)

6. She was assigned a new name.

As the movie continues along to the disturbing scene with the bloody apparition, I’m beginning to think that this film isn’t really a dystopian fiction. The notes are still there, but they seem to be more about the relation between the school in Korea and Japan than the relation between the girls and the school. Since the dystopic elements aren’t directly driving the story at this point, I’m going to treat the remainder of the film as a horror narrative.

Just as I say that, Shizuko shows some superhuman strength and abilities, and is taken to a secluded room by the doctor where she is strapped to a chair. Going back to dystopia, then, we have the arrival of a person in a military uniform, which indicates that this is some sort of military experiment. Soon after Kazue remembers what happened to the previous Shizuko, it is revealed that the military person was at the school because the doctor was not following her instructions about administering an experimental drug.

Now that we know for sure that this film is a dystopian horror story, it is time to take what we know in order to figure out what criticism or warning it is trying to convey. First, we have a school of sick girls who are taken under the pretext of being cared for until they are well again. Second, the sick girls are being experimented on with a drug intended to turn them into super-soldiers. Third, the experiment is being carried out for the Japanese military in the 1930s (so it might have something to do with World War II). Fourth, the head doctor was replaced by her lieutenant at the first sign of her resistance to the military man’s brutality towards the girls. Concentrating all this down to the simplest parts we have:

· the devaluation of the sick to the point of using them in human experiments without their knowledge and against their will

· the devaluation of the young ‘’

· the devaluation of girls ‘’

· the devaluation of Koreans ‘’

· the ruthlessness of imperialism

· the ruthlessness of the military

· the betrayal of allies

Without knowing much more, this story seems to be a warning about the continued military relationship between South Korea and the United States. Unfortunately, without more cultural context, I can’t really tell how accurate this guess is. Due to the treatment of sick young Korean girls, it seems the film is criticizing racist treatment of Koreans by the American military. Due to the doctor sacrificing young girls for her career, and the doctor being replaced by her assistant, it seems the film is criticizing the self-serving betrayal of vulnerable groups of Koreans by not-as-vulnerable groups. I’ll have to ask around /r/South_Korea to see what they think.

I’d like to take a moment to point out how this is a great example of a dystopia, as opposed to the shadow governments popular in American youth fiction at the moment. The government isn’t bothering with a sorting ceremony that tells you what your career is going to be; it is ruthlessly and aggressively trying to create super-soldiers. There is no individual choice or freedom. There is no privacy. There are no forced professions. There are no patrols. This series of events was not the result of misguided choices for the greater good, or a situation with good intentions that just got out of hand, or an attempt to preserve humanity as a species. This was the ruthless pursuit of military power. Remember that dystopia fiction is always a commentary on some existing practice, policy, or culture that is detrimental or wrong, not some wishy-washy thing that results from trying to do good things, but sucking at it.

Now that that is out of my system, one thing that I found particularly interesting about this film in terms of storytelling is that it is set in the past, not the future (like most other dystopian fiction). It makes sense for dystopias to be a near future problem, but to have already been a problem is fascinating in that it recognizes that the fate depicted in the film was a distinct possibility, thereby showing that the behaviors being warned about are reoccurring. It indicates something that American fiction tends to lack: that people from the past also made dystopia-causing mistakes. It is interesting to think of history in terms of narrow misses instead of successful avoidance.

This movie really was good, but I could have lived without the jump scares. Now I’m dead. It’s true! This whole article was written by me, a spoooooooky ghost! Happy writing!

What did you think of this week’s movie? Did you find a new technique for storytelling in it? Do you have questions for me? Is there a movie you would like me to write about? Let me know in the comments, tweet me (https://twitter.com/NeviniTambay), message me through Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/nevini.tambay), message me through Google+ (https://plus.google.com/u/1/104262718026029613816), or shoot me an email (nevinitambay@gmail.com)! I look forward to hearing from you! I post new articles on Wednesdays. Please remember to upvote, like, subscribe, and/or follow me on other social media if you find these articles useful and want to see more!

[docayin-blog]

The Hunter Decline and How We Can Fix It

WE'VE LOST 2.2 MILLION HUNTERS SINCE 2011. HERE'S HOW TO HELP SAVE HUNTING.

Doug Hinkle has a trophy room full of shoulder mounts, a lifetime Missouri hunting license, and the Savage 99 lever-action rifle that belonged to his grandfather.

Doug's father gave him the rifle, chambered in .300 Savage, when the pair shared their first deer hunt, back in 1969, just as whitetails were returning to their county in northern Missouri after a century of depletion. Doug has hunted with the rifle a couple of times since, but the Savage has migrated farther back in his gun safe as Doug has added synthetic-stocked bolt guns and semiautomatic rifles to his firearms collection.

These days, there's no shortage of whitetails around Doug's place. In fact, when we hunted together two Novembers ago, we each could have hung our tags on mature bucks within the first hour of the season. What's lacking in Doug's life isn't deer or guns; it's somebody to pass that Savage 99 down to.

Doug's kids don't hunt. His neighbors have leased their farms to out-of-area hunters who don't bring kids when they come twice a year, once for bow season and again for the rifle season in November. The closest Doug, who just turned 60, can get to a gun-worthy heir is his sister's husband, but he's nearly Doug's age and lives a couple states away.

"I've thought about just giving Granddad's rifle to one of my kids in the hopes that maybe they'll have kids who hunt or shoot, but that seems really unlikely," Doug told me. "My kids were raised as hunters and shooters, but I don't think my grandkids will be."

The License Cliff

You may think you encounter too many camo-clad competitors in the places you hunt, whether it's a public duck marsh or a limited-draw elk unit. But the reality is that the number of licensed hunters is down across the country. Hunter numbers peaked in 1982, when around 17 million of us bought licenses. I was a high school sophomore in rural north Missouri that year, and it seemed like every one of my friends — including Doug's cousins — hunted every chance they got. Full disclosure: I killed my second whitetail with Doug's grandfather's Savage, so its fate is personal to me.

Since 1982, hunting participation in America has declined steadily. In 2016, the last year for which the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service has data, only 11.5 million hunters were counted, a drop of 2.2 million from the USFWS's 2011 survey.

Sure, that's still a lot of hunters, and on opening day of deer season, it can seem like most of them are in your county. We're accustomed to demonizing these anonymous competitors for stealing "our" opportunity, but take a closer look at them. Chances are they look a lot like you: middle-aged white guys craving a chance to do what they love to do.

This is the second problem with America's population of hunters. Not only are we getting fewer, but also we're getting older. According to the USFWS, back in 1991 52 percent of U.S. hunters were between the ages of 25 and 44. Demographers consider this the most productive segment of society, comprising members who are disproportionately physically healthy and actively contributing labor and economic benefit to their communities. By 2011, the percentage of hunters in this age bracket had dropped to 33 percent of the whole. The percentage of hunters aged 45 — 64 had climbed to 44 percent. More troubling is the percentage of hunters over age 65 — 11 percent in 2011 (up from 6 percent in 1991). State wildlife agencies figure that most hunters stop buying licenses when they hit about age 70.

If you are silently cheering this trend because you think it will create more opportunities for the rest of us, consider that as both the absolute number and percentage of hunters decline, so do license sales that support wildlife management in America. So do the markets for guns and bows and the habitat-enhancing excise taxes their sale generates. And so do political and cultural support for hunting.

Statisticians call this decline the "license cliff," and the current trajectory shows the slide accelerating and steepening. Factor in another demographic trend — the urbanization and cultural diversification of America — and it's easy to imagine a future in which hunting is considered a quaint curiosity of a bygone era and not a dynamic part of the modern American culture, economy, and landscape.

Recruitment Redux

Demographic trends are a little like battleships. They take a long time to gain momentum, but once they establish direction, it's hard to influence their trajectory. Will we ever again be a country of 16.7 million hunters, as we were in 1982? Probably not. But Eric Dinger is convinced that we can stabilize the slide toward oblivion and even add hunter numbers, if we do one simple thing.

"We have to replace ourselves," said Dinger, the cofounder and CEO of Powderhook, a digital app that aims to connect hunters and anglers with people who don't currently participate regularly in either activity. Powderhook intends to help create three million new hunters in the next five years, mainly by making it easier for us to talk to each other, help each other, and feel more like companions than competitors.

The idea is that as each of us ages out of hunting we will have recruited someone to take our place, someone who in turn feels both obligated and eager to replace themselves, creating a chain reaction with our hunting heritage as its fuel rod.

"If every one of us took just one person hunting next year that number looks completely different," said Dinger.

In recent years, conservation organizations — most notably the National Wild Turkey Federation, National Shooting Sports Foundation, Sportsmen's Alliance, and the NRA working through the Families Afield initiative — have worked to lower barriers to hunting participation. But many of these efforts have focused on youth and haven't adequately followed up to ensure that activated kids continue to buy licenses and hunt when they become adults.

"That's a key point," said John Frampton, president and CEO of the Council to Advance Hunting and the Shooting Sports and one of the national leaders of the

accelerating R3 movement. R3 stands for Recruitment, Retention, and Reactivation.

"We have to reach out to the population of adults who may have been introduced to hunting earlier in life and have fallen away from it [reactivation] or who have never been introduced to it in the first place [recruitment]. These are people with disposable time and income and who can understand and appreciate that hunting is an activity that can improve their quality of life, provide them with high-quality food, and give them a connection to the natural world."

After years of stop-and-start work aimed at slowing the decline of hunters, this appears to be the year of intentional R3-ing. Commissions are studying the problem. Symposia will discuss solutions. But Dinger says one demonstrated way to fix the slide is to do what hunters do best: talking passionately about hunting.

Digital Mentoring

Don't underestimate the power of connection, even in the relatively anonymous ether of cyberspace. Once hunters start talking to would-be hunters, Dinger says, it's a relatively easy next step to bring the relationship into the real world, one that can blossom on a clays course or in the turkey woods.

Prospective hunters need real-time local answers. They don't want to scour the Internet to piece together the answer to a question. And often they want to communicate anonymously. The Powderhook app enables all those dynamics by incentivizing the exchange of information. By participating in this exchange, digital mentors can earn status points that they can trade in on products or reduced prices at retailers.

But Powderhook's main role is as a virtual campfire, a place to foster dialog between those who have information and those who hunger for it. In simpler days, that relationship was called mentoring and apprenticing.

The idea of Powderhook's app is to give prospective hunters a "mentor in the pocket," a connection not only to knowledgeable individuals in real time, but also to organizations with deep resources. So far, Ducks Unlimited, the NWTF, National Deer Alliance, Quality Deer Management Association, and Union Sportsmen's Alliance are partners of the app, along with brands such as Cabela's, Yamaha, and Federal Premium ammunition.

"Those partners are critical to our work and amplifying the message," said Dinger. "One day, when someone says, 'I'd like to learn to hunt,' I'd like the reflexive response to be, 'You gotta get Powderhook.' Not because we're going to do all the work, but because we can empower everyone to do some of the work."

Will my buddy Doug Hinkle download the Powderhook app? When I asked, he was both candid and dubious — two qualities that define most of the hunters I know, especially those from the Show-Me State.

"Do I wish there were more hunters in my world? Yeah, I do. I'm starting to feel like the only guy around who hunts," said Doug. "Am I gonna give my Savage to a guy I meet online? Not likely. But I've got a lot of deer, and I wouldn't mind helping somebody get their first buck. It honestly doesn't sound like that hard a thing to do."

[coachingreviewsite]

Helping You Understand The World Of Leadership

New Post has been published on https://personalcoachingcenter.com/helping-you-understand-the-world-of-leadership/

Helping You Understand The World Of Leadership

No business can succeed and grow in the absence of skilled leadership. However, precisely what goes into demonstrating the right sort of leadership can sometimes prove a bit mysterious. Keep reading to learn more about the things effective leaders tend to have in common and what things they generally try to avoid.

Offer incentives to employees who continually perform well. You can use a standard model with known rewards or surprise good employees with some type of recognition and bonus. Be sure you don't make promises that you can't keep. Always encourage your employees to do their best work and make sure each one understands their role in your organization.

    To better your leadership skills, don't act like an expert in everything. Seek advice from your coworkers and listen to their ideas with an open mind. They may be able to provide ideas to facilitate your plans or identify issues that may arise during implementation of them.

  Treat all of your employees well and never get involved in office gossip. Employees are usually happier in an environment where their work is appreciated and valued on the same level as any other employee. Spend time working with all of your employees so that you understand each person's contribution.

  3 Stepping Stones to Better Habits

www.jackcanfield.com

"How many things do you do every day without even really thinking about it? It’s so easy to walk up to the counter at the coffee shop and order a pastry to go with that highly sweetened coffee. Or, to flop onto the couch when you get home instead of taking a detour toward the Read More The post 3 Stepping Stones to Better Habits appeared first on America's Leading Authority On Creating Success And Personal Fulfillment – Jack Canfield." https://www.jackcanfield.com/blog/better-habits/

Promotions, bonuses and raises should always be fairly distributed and based on performance. Don't simply promote the person who has been working with you the longest or hand out the biggest raise to a family member. Your employees will be more motivated when they know that they can earn tangible rewards for working hard.

  Remember that you are not someone who is perfect. Even as a leader, you still have things that you can learn, and you don't singlehandedly own all the intelligence in your company or organization. Stay humble enough to realize that you are still going to need help every now and then, and the people you lead will think highly of you.

  Do not be afraid to jump in and help. This is much easier if you work on site with your team, but is possible from afar if you are creative. If any person from your team needs help, jump in and give them a hand. You may learn a lot from the experience.

  To be a good leader, it's a good idea to learn how to listen to the people who work for you. Subordinates have the ability to run with your broader ideas and take them in entirely new directions. After people listen to what you need to tell them, listen back to see if they have anything to add so you can be more successful.

  Although it's a good idea to incorporate innovative ideas and continue to evolve your business plan, you need to stick to your original plan. Continuing to work towards a specific goal helps build your credibility and makes others confident in your abilities. Remember that your plan can be improved upon without changing completely.

  The 7 Seductions of Leadership

leadershipfreak.blog

"Position, status, and success don’t magically make you superior to others. Know-it-all leaders become less than they could be. The 7 seductions of leadership: Knowing ‘about’ is the same as knowing ‘how’. Position… Continue reading →" https://leadershipfreak.blog/2019/07/31/the-7-seductions-of-leadership/

Keep in mind that hope is not always a good thing. If you or your business are involved in a situation that has an inevitable and bad ending, do what is necessary to terminate the situation and move on. Employees will never forgive blind optimism in such circumstances, and it's better for everyone to have a bad situation behind them as soon as possible.

  Remember that no matter how much you care for a business you work for or own, many of your subordinates are just there for a paycheck. This means that their daily behavior will often just subconsciously mimic and even amplify your own. That means that your good mood and passion can be contagious. On the other hand, so can your malaise and stupidity.

  You should never procrastinate if you want to be seen as a great leader. When people think of having a boss, they imagine someone that is in charge and knows how to get down to business. Putting off projects and not following through is not the best way to present yourself to people.

  Try adding value to people every single day. Several great leaders will take a minute to sit and think about whether or not they have added value to another person the same day. Leadership can make a difference and break a deal since it;'s what makes organizations grow. It impacts lives. Remember that it's not just an idea that's talked about, but it's an action that you need to live out.

  First Look: Leadership Books for August 2019

www.leadershipnow.com

"Here's a look at some of the best leadership books to be released in August 2019. Don't miss out on other great new and future releases. Transforming Legacy Organizations: Turn your Established Business into an Innovation Champion to Win the Future by Kris Østergaard Transforming Legacy Organizations provides real-world advice and research-based information on how to grow innovation by employing new technologies, improving processes, and establishing a culture of creativity and forward momentum. Conventional business wisdom views innovation as the biggest advantage startups have over large, established organizations, often referred to as legacy organizations. This belief is false, especially when considering that 70% of all startups fail within 20 months of their first venture round. The truth is innovation initiatives of legacy organizations have far better chances of succeeding.

Ultralearning: Master Hard Skills, Outsmart the Competition, and Accelerate Your Career by Scott Young

In these tumultuous times of economic and technological change, staying ahead depends on continual self-education—a lifelong mastery of fresh ideas, subjects, and skills. If you want to accomplish more and stand apart from everyone else, you need to become an ultralearner. The challenge of learning new skills is that you think you already know how best to learn, as you did as a student, so you rerun old routines and old ways of solving problems. To counter that, Ultralearning offers powerful strategies to break you out of those mental ruts and introduces new training methods to help you push through to higher levels of retention.

The Chaos Parallel: How To Overcome The Life-Altering Effects of Insecurities by J Alex Geesbreght Everyone has insecurities. Like with most insecurities–especially those that are not self-inflicted–we don’t tend to “fix” or “get over” them; they are always with us and a part of who we are. However, if we are honest with ourselves, we can recognize them, understand them, and seek to find a way to live our most authentic lives free from the chaos they often create.

Flip the Script: Getting People to Think Your Idea Is Their Idea by Oren Klaff Oren is throwing out the old playbook on persuasion. Instead, he'll show you a new approach that works on this simple insight: Everyone trusts their own ideas. If, rather than pushing your idea on your buyer, you can guide them to discover it on their own, they'll believe it, trust it, and get excited about it. Then they'll buy in and feel good about the chance to work with you. That might sound easier said than done, but Oren has taught thousands of people how to do it with a series of simple steps that anyone can follow in any situation. And Oren has been in a lot of different situations.

The Optimist's Telescope: Thinking Ahead in a Reckless Age by Bina Venkataraman Instant gratification is the norm today—in our lives, our culture, our economy, and our politics. Many of us have forgotten (if we ever learned) how to make smart decisions for the long run. Whether it comes to our finances, our health, our communities, or our planet, it’s easy to avoid thinking ahead. The consequences of this immediacy are stark: Superbugs spawned by the overuse of antibiotics endanger our health. Companies that fail to invest stagnate and fall behind. Hurricanes and wildfires turn deadly for communities that could have taken more precaution. Today more than ever, all of us need to know how we can make better long-term decisions in our lives, businesses, and society. Bina Venkataraman sees the way forward."

https://www.leadershipnow.com/leadingblog/2019/08/first_look_leadership_books_fo_125.htmlhttp://www.leadershipnow.com/cgi-bin/mt/mt-atom.cgi/weblog/blog_id=1/entry_id=1748

Always be clear. It doesn't matter how good your workers are if you aren't communicating your ideas efficiently. Be sure to explain your goals and any deadlines that need to be reached. Make sure that your workers understand what you expect from them, and be available to answer any questions they might have.

  Establish clear communication channels. Your team should always be fully informed of every aspect of the project, including any deadlines that need to be met. Having good communication with your team will help establish your credibility as a leader and gaining their support. Your team should also feel free to contact you with questions or constructive feedback.

  Find out what motivates your employees. Using the right type of motivation will improve productivity. Remember that not all employees are motivated by the same type of incentive. Besides motivating your employees, you need to support them by standing behind them, helping them reach their business goals and helping them solve problems effectively.

  The difference between a charismatic leader and a self-aggrandizing leader is the former's ability to back up his or her claims. While the charismatic leader does take pride in these accomplishments, the key reason for sharing them is to inspire others. Try to use your past successes and experiences to give others the confidence they need to achieve their own goals.

  The lynchpin of any winning business is strong, decisive leadership. Without a forceful leader at the helm, the chances of true success dwindle rapidly. By learning the fundamentals of leadership and applying them liberally, it really is possible to take the business world by storm. The article above was meant to help readers do just that.

[personalcoachingcenter]

Helping You Understand The World Of Leadership

New Post has been published on https://personalcoachingcenter.com/helping-you-understand-the-world-of-leadership/

Helping You Understand The World Of Leadership

No business can succeed and grow in the absence of skilled leadership. However, precisely what goes into demonstrating the right sort of leadership can sometimes prove a bit mysterious. Keep reading to learn more about the things effective leaders tend to have in common and what things they generally try to avoid.

Offer incentives to employees who continually perform well. You can use a standard model with known rewards or surprise good employees with some type of recognition and bonus. Be sure you don't make promises that you can't keep. Always encourage your employees to do their best work and make sure each one understands their role in your organization.

    To better your leadership skills, don't act like an expert in everything. Seek advice from your coworkers and listen to their ideas with an open mind. They may be able to provide ideas to facilitate your plans or identify issues that may arise during implementation of them.

  Treat all of your employees well and never get involved in office gossip. Employees are usually happier in an environment where their work is appreciated and valued on the same level as any other employee. Spend time working with all of your employees so that you understand each person's contribution.

  3 Stepping Stones to Better Habits

www.jackcanfield.com

"How many things do you do every day without even really thinking about it? It’s so easy to walk up to the counter at the coffee shop and order a pastry to go with that highly sweetened coffee. Or, to flop onto the couch when you get home instead of taking a detour toward the Read More The post 3 Stepping Stones to Better Habits appeared first on America's Leading Authority On Creating Success And Personal Fulfillment – Jack Canfield." https://www.jackcanfield.com/blog/better-habits/

Promotions, bonuses and raises should always be fairly distributed and based on performance. Don't simply promote the person who has been working with you the longest or hand out the biggest raise to a family member. Your employees will be more motivated when they know that they can earn tangible rewards for working hard.

  Remember that you are not someone who is perfect. Even as a leader, you still have things that you can learn, and you don't singlehandedly own all the intelligence in your company or organization. Stay humble enough to realize that you are still going to need help every now and then, and the people you lead will think highly of you.

  Do not be afraid to jump in and help. This is much easier if you work on site with your team, but is possible from afar if you are creative. If any person from your team needs help, jump in and give them a hand. You may learn a lot from the experience.

  To be a good leader, it's a good idea to learn how to listen to the people who work for you. Subordinates have the ability to run with your broader ideas and take them in entirely new directions. After people listen to what you need to tell them, listen back to see if they have anything to add so you can be more successful.

  Although it's a good idea to incorporate innovative ideas and continue to evolve your business plan, you need to stick to your original plan. Continuing to work towards a specific goal helps build your credibility and makes others confident in your abilities. Remember that your plan can be improved upon without changing completely.

  The 7 Seductions of Leadership

leadershipfreak.blog

"Position, status, and success don’t magically make you superior to others. Know-it-all leaders become less than they could be. The 7 seductions of leadership: Knowing ‘about’ is the same as knowing ‘how’. Position… Continue reading →" https://leadershipfreak.blog/2019/07/31/the-7-seductions-of-leadership/

Keep in mind that hope is not always a good thing. If you or your business are involved in a situation that has an inevitable and bad ending, do what is necessary to terminate the situation and move on. Employees will never forgive blind optimism in such circumstances, and it's better for everyone to have a bad situation behind them as soon as possible.

  Remember that no matter how much you care for a business you work for or own, many of your subordinates are just there for a paycheck. This means that their daily behavior will often just subconsciously mimic and even amplify your own. That means that your good mood and passion can be contagious. On the other hand, so can your malaise and stupidity.

  You should never procrastinate if you want to be seen as a great leader. When people think of having a boss, they imagine someone that is in charge and knows how to get down to business. Putting off projects and not following through is not the best way to present yourself to people.

  Try adding value to people every single day. Several great leaders will take a minute to sit and think about whether or not they have added value to another person the same day. Leadership can make a difference and break a deal since it;'s what makes organizations grow. It impacts lives. Remember that it's not just an idea that's talked about, but it's an action that you need to live out.

  First Look: Leadership Books for August 2019

www.leadershipnow.com

"Here's a look at some of the best leadership books to be released in August 2019. Don't miss out on other great new and future releases. Transforming Legacy Organizations: Turn your Established Business into an Innovation Champion to Win the Future by Kris Østergaard Transforming Legacy Organizations provides real-world advice and research-based information on how to grow innovation by employing new technologies, improving processes, and establishing a culture of creativity and forward momentum. Conventional business wisdom views innovation as the biggest advantage startups have over large, established organizations, often referred to as legacy organizations. This belief is false, especially when considering that 70% of all startups fail within 20 months of their first venture round. The truth is innovation initiatives of legacy organizations have far better chances of succeeding.

Ultralearning: Master Hard Skills, Outsmart the Competition, and Accelerate Your Career by Scott Young

In these tumultuous times of economic and technological change, staying ahead depends on continual self-education—a lifelong mastery of fresh ideas, subjects, and skills. If you want to accomplish more and stand apart from everyone else, you need to become an ultralearner. The challenge of learning new skills is that you think you already know how best to learn, as you did as a student, so you rerun old routines and old ways of solving problems. To counter that, Ultralearning offers powerful strategies to break you out of those mental ruts and introduces new training methods to help you push through to higher levels of retention.

The Chaos Parallel: How To Overcome The Life-Altering Effects of Insecurities by J Alex Geesbreght Everyone has insecurities. Like with most insecurities–especially those that are not self-inflicted–we don’t tend to “fix” or “get over” them; they are always with us and a part of who we are. However, if we are honest with ourselves, we can recognize them, understand them, and seek to find a way to live our most authentic lives free from the chaos they often create.

Flip the Script: Getting People to Think Your Idea Is Their Idea by Oren Klaff Oren is throwing out the old playbook on persuasion. Instead, he'll show you a new approach that works on this simple insight: Everyone trusts their own ideas. If, rather than pushing your idea on your buyer, you can guide them to discover it on their own, they'll believe it, trust it, and get excited about it. Then they'll buy in and feel good about the chance to work with you. That might sound easier said than done, but Oren has taught thousands of people how to do it with a series of simple steps that anyone can follow in any situation. And Oren has been in a lot of different situations.

The Optimist's Telescope: Thinking Ahead in a Reckless Age by Bina Venkataraman Instant gratification is the norm today—in our lives, our culture, our economy, and our politics. Many of us have forgotten (if we ever learned) how to make smart decisions for the long run. Whether it comes to our finances, our health, our communities, or our planet, it’s easy to avoid thinking ahead. The consequences of this immediacy are stark: Superbugs spawned by the overuse of antibiotics endanger our health. Companies that fail to invest stagnate and fall behind. Hurricanes and wildfires turn deadly for communities that could have taken more precaution. Today more than ever, all of us need to know how we can make better long-term decisions in our lives, businesses, and society. Bina Venkataraman sees the way forward."

https://www.leadershipnow.com/leadingblog/2019/08/first_look_leadership_books_fo_125.htmlhttp://www.leadershipnow.com/cgi-bin/mt/mt-atom.cgi/weblog/blog_id=1/entry_id=1748

Always be clear. It doesn't matter how good your workers are if you aren't communicating your ideas efficiently. Be sure to explain your goals and any deadlines that need to be reached. Make sure that your workers understand what you expect from them, and be available to answer any questions they might have.

  Establish clear communication channels. Your team should always be fully informed of every aspect of the project, including any deadlines that need to be met. Having good communication with your team will help establish your credibility as a leader and gaining their support. Your team should also feel free to contact you with questions or constructive feedback.

  Find out what motivates your employees. Using the right type of motivation will improve productivity. Remember that not all employees are motivated by the same type of incentive. Besides motivating your employees, you need to support them by standing behind them, helping them reach their business goals and helping them solve problems effectively.

  The difference between a charismatic leader and a self-aggrandizing leader is the former's ability to back up his or her claims. While the charismatic leader does take pride in these accomplishments, the key reason for sharing them is to inspire others. Try to use your past successes and experiences to give others the confidence they need to achieve their own goals.

  The lynchpin of any winning business is strong, decisive leadership. Without a forceful leader at the helm, the chances of true success dwindle rapidly. By learning the fundamentals of leadership and applying them liberally, it really is possible to take the business world by storm. The article above was meant to help readers do just that.

[nancygduarteus]

Instagram Has Closed the Beauty Gap Between Celebrities and Regular People

Michael Apa remembers the first time a patient told him she wanted her teeth fixed because she didn’t like the way they looked in selfies. It was 2015, and Apa’s patient was Huda Kattan, who had good reason to care about her smile: Kattan has leveraged her popular beauty blog and millions of Instagram followers to build a global cosmetics brand, Huda Beauty. In the process, her path to success has been dotted with thousands of close-up images and videos of her own face.

In order to perfect her teeth, Kattan opted for porcelain veneers, a procedure which has exploded in popularity in the last 10 years. Apa, an aesthetic dentist with a quarter million Instagram followers of his own, documented her procedure on his YouTube channel. Although veneers been used less glamorously for decades to help non-famous people with serious size or shape problems in some of their teeth, they can also be used to perfect someone’s already-nice smile beyond the capabilities of traditional orthodontia. Veneers start around $1,000 per tooth, and for top-tier aesthetic dentists like Apa, they can easily hit $3,000 to $4,000 apiece.

For years, using veneers to perfect already-good teeth was mostly confined to the professionally attractive and fabulously wealthy. They started to gain wide favor among traditional celebrities in the late 1990s, and might have stayed confined to those rarefied circles, were it not for Instagram. The platform’s cabal of mostly young, mostly female, mostly preternaturally attractive power-users, often referred to as “influencers,” are under immense pressure to meet the same beauty standards as their traditionally famous—and often far wealthier—Hollywood counterparts. Now Apa hears the desire to look better in selfies all the time, from people with all kinds of jobs. “Every cosmetic procedure has just gone crazy in popularity since Instagram became a thing,” he says.

These influencers have a different, more intimate relationship with their fans than the celebrities of the past, which has helped Instagram collapse any remaining gap between the things actors and models do to their bodies and what young consumers will aspire to (and spend money on) for their own. As a result, influencers have begun to normalize a whole host of cosmetic procedures, including veneers, for a generation of young consumers.

Dental veneers date as far back as 1928, when the pioneering aesthetic dentist Charles Pincus was asked by Hollywood studio execs to perfect the look of an actor’s teeth. That version of the procedure was temporary, and actors could pop off their perfect smiles at the end of the day. Now, veneers are more permanent. Thin porcelain covers are glued to the fronts of teeth that have been sanded down to accommodate the addition, and they last at least 10 years on average. They’re in a tier of cosmetic procedure common among influencers, alongside things like lip injections and Fraxel laser treatments: more invasive and long-lasting than a good makeup application, but not as extreme or expensive as plastic surgery.

“[Influencers] have to perform traditional beauty,” says Brooke Erin Duffy, a communications professor at Cornell University. “If they don’t do enough and aren’t looking great, they’re going to get called out.” At the same time, there’s also a risk of doing too much and looking too fake, which can turn fans against them, Duffy says. That puts Instagram stars into a bind that the veneers tier of procedure can ease: Audiences want to feel like they’re following someone authentic, but also someone who’s authentically prettier, richer, and happier than anyone they know in real life.

“Part of this is a push to stick with aesthetics that are safe and which do well, metrics-wise,” says Emily Hund, a doctoral candidate at the University of Pennsylvania who studies Instagram influencers. For many women whose accounts focus on fashion, beauty, or lifestyle, that includes adhering to basic norms of feminine grooming: flowing hair, even skin, a small waist, manicured nails, plump lips, and a straight, white smile. According to Hund, achieving those features drives positive engagement and helps accounts gain new followers, which in turn better situates an influencer to make sponsorship deals and earn an income.

Often, the easiest way for these influencers to generate money is to sell the tools of their own aesthetic achievement back to their followers, giving fans a way to replicate the look they admire. Kattan, for instance, started a beauty company that’s now worth a billion dollars by selling her own line of false eyelashes to her followers. But usually this strategy means partnering with a third party to endorse a product or service, which the influencer then receives for free, often in addition to payment for posts. That dynamic has helped a lot of influencers end up with a new set of pearly whites, free of charge.

“It’s almost hard to find an influencer without veneers now,” Apa says. When he expanded his New York City practice to include an office in Dubai in 2014, inviting the region’s Instagram stars in to get their teeth done was the primary way he built a new client base, he says: “It just completely changed the landscape of how I thought of attracting business and patients.” Apa notes that now up to 90 percent of his business in both offices comes from people who know about him from Instagram, and influencers and traditional celebrities alike seek him out. (The actress Chloe Sevigny and the reality-TV star Kyle Richards both recently appeared on his account.)

On Instagram, anything beloved by celebrities quickly finds a huge audience of normal users, hungry to experience the lifestyles of the rich and famous. “It’s mind-blowing how much influence social media has on people,” says Anabella Oquendo Parilli, a dentist and the director of New York University’s aesthetic-dentistry program for international students. While most people can afford a new lipstick or an occasional new pairs of shoes, selling $10,000 of new teeth is something else. But social media is an environment where users expect to get a more intimate view of a person’s life, which sets the stage for influencers to recommend more than just clothing or makeup to their followers.

To meet that expectation, beauty and lifestyle influencers have created a class of Instagram-famous medical professionals like the plastic surgeon Dr. Miami or the dermatologist Simon Ourian, who now have millions of followers in their own right. Being their patient has become a widely understood luxury good, like a designer handbag for your corporeal form, and it’s increasingly common to see cosmetic procedures advertised in the same ways as more traditional high-end status accessories on social media. A pair of Christian Louboutin shoes and a set of plumped-up lips cost about the same, and for a lot of young social media users, they feel like similar consumer decisions.

Taking a medical procedure and recasting it as a marketable consumer good isn’t a simple process, but it’s one for which Instagram’s structure and culture work almost perfectly. It’s where you see what your friends had for brunch, one tap away from an internet celebrity showing off her new teeth. People’s ability to process those things separately just hasn’t caught up to the technology we now have at our disposal. “We use the framework we’d use for our friends and neighbors” when evaluating posts from influencers, says Duffy. “We have this expectation that social media gives us a glimpse into the ‘real’ person behind the scenes.”

Social-media users now also live in an environment where they have far more opportunities to judge their own appearance than previous generations did. “You really get to see yourself age over however long you’ve had one of these phones,” says Apa. That creates pressure on regular users to perform to the same standards as the famous and wealthy. Those standards are aesthetic, but they’re also socioeconomic: It costs a lot of money to be that pretty. Instagram rewards people who perform beyond their economic lot in life, which incentivizes a whole host of purchases and can push people to less experienced, less expensive practitioners. Oquendo Parilli and Apa believe comparison photos on social media paint a vivid picture of what’s possible, but they warn that most depict work performed on someone who had good teeth to begin with. “A lot of people can take okay teeth and make them look white,” Apa says, “When there’s real complications, it becomes much more evolved and complicated, and requires much more experience.”

On the vast, unmediated plane of the internet, influencers do serve an important function that a lot of users find valuable. They’re a moderating force, filtering all the available products, services, and experiences that regular people don’t have the time to investigate fully. If you can find a couple Instagram stars who share your personal style, they can help you redecorate your bedroom or pick a new winter coat.

But as consumers become more comfortable with Instagram as a place to shop, its ability to sell things spreads into more and more areas of life. The faux intimacy of influencer relationships and Instagram’s quick, seamless shopping infrastructure make the platform an effective advertising backdrop for all kinds of things, says Hund. “If you’re following an influencer and they tag their makeup artist or dermatologist, you can instantly click over to that person’s profile and maybe get an appointment.” It can be an irresistible combination of forces, even if you’re fully aware of how they all work. I may like my teeth just how they are, but I did look at them a little more closely in my bathroom mirror last night.

from Health News And Updates https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2019/02/dental-veneers-instagram-teeth-teeth-teeth/582010/?utm_source=feed