How do you end your day? We pay so much attention to our morning habits, but finishing the day on a positive note is just as important when it comes to our well-being and success. And if youre going to implement one change to your nighttime routine, try journaling before bed to experience greater happiness and success.

Journaling at the end of the day gives you an opportunity to reflect on the day, says certified life coach Miruna Nica. It gives you the benefit of relaxing in a moment of introspection and seeing the highlights of your day with more clarity.

Studies have shown the practice can even help you sleep better. Journaling before bed also sets you up for success the next day, allowing you to clear your mind, celebrate wins, note areas of improvement and check in with your goals. Tools like the Five-Minute Journal make it easy to adopt a journaling habit, but you can also create your own routine and go more in-depth. Heres everything you need to know to get started.

According to Nica, journaling before bed will help you develop more self-awareness, learn from your experiences and find peace of mind. The more you review your decisions and actions on a daily basis, the more youll be able to connect dots and notice how certain thought patterns affect your reality. You can also evaluate what went well, what didnt go so well, and what kind of insights you can take away from your experiences so you can improve in the future. Finally, you can release stress and get a sense of closure by expressing your thoughts without censorship.

As with any new habit you want to implement, Nica recommends starting with your why. Why would this be important to you? What is your intention with this practice? Perhaps its monitoring growth, encouraging self-expression or keeping track of your daily routines. Or maybe you want to write down your brilliant ideas or expand your self-discovery, she says.

Now that you have a better idea of your intentions, figure out what kind of approach would work for you. Once your why is clear, jot down your what: Would your journal be more like an open book with blank pages to be filled with whatever is present for you at the moment or would it be more structured? Would you want to have categories in it? Then, implement and see happiness and success come in.

Be realistic about the amount of time you want to dedicate to your evening journaling routine, and choose a place and time where youll be most likely to take the time to write in your journal.

Nica embraces a semi-structured approach in her own evening journaling routine. I answer the same questions every night and add my own twists for that day, she says. She recommends the following prompts:

She also suggests following your journaling practice with a moment of deep breathing and relaxation. Set the intention to slow down, let go, and have a peaceful and restful night of sleep. You can, over time, see the success and happiness happen.

Continued here:
Do this 1 thing before bed for greater happiness and success - Ladders

If you like the idea of a weekend in the Hamptons but can't see yourself making it to Long Island any time soon, you could do much worse than a trip to Matakana.

Like the legendary New York holiday hangout, the region and its surrounds are a magnet for urbanites looking to get back to nature for a bit, safe in the knowledge they'll be able to get a good a good cup of coffee (or glass of wine) and something decent for lunch.

Both are home to small coastal communities with extra-large houses, long white-sand beaches, wineries with cheap (in Hamptonite terms) tastings, farmers' markets, art galleries and boutiques stocked with the kind of casual but costly clothing and homewares often on offer in affluent coastal towns. Visitors can sample a slice of rural life, essentially, safe in the knowledge they're unlikely to get dung on their designer city-slicker shoes.

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Matakana: Sophisticated but not snobby.

In some respects Matakana has the Hamptons beat. While the traffic from Auckland can be maddening, particularly on sunny summer weekends, it's usually not as bad as the hours-long commutes New Yorkers en route to the Hamptons endure. And you don't have to bookaccommodation and tables at popular restaurants a year in advance.

READ MORE: * Sculptureum: New Zealand's sculpture park with a difference * Five of the best Auckland wineries for a weekend drive * 20 reasons to visit Matakana this weekend

Unless you're an old-money Manhattanite, cashed-up corporate or real housewife of New Jersey or NYC, you're also likely to feel more at home in Matakana. Sophisticated but not snobby, it's as attractive to beach bums and surfers as those looking to indulge in fine wine or craft beer over a fancy long lunch.

Like a lot of Aucklanders, I've spent many a Saturday or Sunday in Matakana but the increasingly horrendous traffic jams have put me off going - on my last trip back, it took an hour just to get down Matakana Road. A solution is to take a leaf out of Hamptonites' book and spend a night or few - something I had the pleasure of doing for the first time fairly recently and have been hoping to repeat ever since.

Heading out of Auckland on a drizzly spring morning, the traffic was as close as it can come in the city to a dream (ie it wasn't a complete nightmare) and I made it to Matakana within an hour.

SUPPLIED

Matakana has one of the most diverse grape varieties grown in NZ.

The town's high population of talented artisans make its market worth travelling for and, thinking back to the apple, feijoa and Manuka honey liqueur I'd picked up on my last visit and couldn't stop pouring over ice cream, I was keen to stock up and see what new treats lay in store.

Even after a big breakfast, I found myself salivating at every other stall. Mahurangi oysters, mince and mozzarella pies, mallowpuff-sized balls of Swiss chocolate and salted caramel and buckwheat galettes oozing melted cheese had me reassuring myself there's nothing wrong with treating yourself to breakfast, brunch and lunch in one day from time to time. Especially when you know that exercising restraint is going to result in a serious case of FOMO.

Even at 10am, the booze also looked tempting. Along with the fruity wines and liqueurs produced by family-run Lothlorien in the nearby Ahuroa Valley - which, to the best of its knowledge, is the only certified organic feijoa winery in the world - were locally distilled Market Gin and Batch10 honey bourbon. The makers of the latter had teamed up with local ice cream institution Charlies to create a boozy frozen dessert so blissful - and potent - that has since had my entire family - adults and kids alike - bouncing off the walls.

LORNA THORNBER

The beaches and bush walks of Twharanui are a short drive away.

Feeling as fat at the smoked beef brisket burrito I'd stashed in my bag for lunch, I picked up a loose-fitting t-shirt made from colourful mismatched fabrics (it looks nicer than it sounds) at the neighbouring craft market and headed to Sculptureum, which co-founder Anthony Grant has dubbed "Disneyland for art".

Developed over more than a decade by Anthony and his wife Sandra, both of whom work as barristers in Auckland, the 10-hectare property is a gallery/amusement park of sorts with its three sculpture gardens, six indoor galleries, a vineyard, and restaurant and bar Rothko, which has quickly established itself as one of the best (posh) places to eat in town.

The some 400 works on display include "serious" pieces by such artistic superstars as Picasso, Cezanne, Matisse and Chagall along with offbeat, often in-your-face, sculptures likely to both amuse and bemuse. Think a family of hot pink giant snails, a sheepdog made from a mop enjoying the feeling of wind in its fur from an open car window, and curious hybrid albino creatures: one with the head of a cat and (naked) body of a woman and another with the head of a dog and body of an (also naked) man.

SUPPLIED

Roktho is one of many the many posh places to eat in the area.

The aim, Grant has said, is to sway those "who've been turned off art by boring displays and arrogant curators. I want to show them that art can be fun and it can enrich your life."

In the outdoor galleries, pathways wind their way past classical and country-style gardens; flame-coloured flax bushes; aviaries filled with finches, parrots, parakeets, golden pheasants and other colourful birds of a feather (flocking, of course, together); free-range giant flemish rabbits; written musings on art and gardening by centuries of intelligent sorts; and advice on self-improvement from the late Steve Jobs.

I spent so much time studying the latter in an attempt to decode the secrets to his multi-billion dollar success that the restaurant was closed by the time I'd finished. A good thing really considering I hadn't managed to resist that burrito in my bag.

SUPPLIED

Sculptureum has been dubbed 'Disneyland for art'.

From Sculptureum, it's just a short drive to Twharanui where, in summer, I like to work up enough of a sweat on the tracks that traverse rolling farmland and regenerating forest to feel okay about spending the rest of the day snoozing on the white-sand surf beach. With regular refreshment breaks in the marine reserve - also a popular spot with the likes of starfish, lobsters and bottlenose dolphins.

On that overcast but brightening spring evening though, I was the only person in Anchor Bay not wearing a wetsuit. Walking the Westend Track without another soul - saving the seal-like surfers bobbing far out to sea - in sight, the city and the stresses it brings seemed a million miles - although technically I was still within the supercity's limits.

Discovering I was in town during Feast Matakana, when local restaurants showcase their best locally grown and caught produce, I decided it would be remiss of me not to add a fourth meal to the day and headed to Matakana Market Kitchen where I had quite the feast indeed. Of Mahurangi oysters, baked flounder, prawns and salad, and a belly-bloating (but irresistible) medley of aubergine, red capsicums, other roast veggies and beans.

LORNA THORNBER

Twharanui: Just as pretty when you have it to yourself off peak.

Stuffed to the point of sedated, I waddled the few hundred metres or so to long-running B&B the Black and White Barn, which lives up to its name in terms of its colour scheme but bears no trace of having ever been used to house hay or animals. Founded by ex-Auckland Amy and Simon Hope, who absconded for a simpler life, its two suites and larger White Cottage offer everything those who dream of following in their footsteps (even just for a weekend) could hope for with their stylish monochromatic furnishings, cool contemporary artworks, natural Matakana-made toiletries and (most importantly) big comfy beds.

After a breakfast of the Puhoi yoghurt and fresh fruit left overnight in the fridge, I head to Pakiri, another of my all-time favourite Auckland beaches, where, feeling guilty about my gluttony, I ran across the fluffy white clouds reflected in the fine white sand until my legs and lungs commanded me to stop. And the end of the beach was still a distant speck on the horizon.

It was late afternoon by the time I made it to the Sawmill Brewery and Smoko Room which tragically went up in flames last October. Its owners for the past near-decade, Kirsty McKay and Mike Sutherland, hope the place will be back up-and-running by mid-year, and after the beverages and tapas-style dishes I enjoyed there I sure hope they're right.

SUPPLIED

B&B The Black and White Barn is rustic but, this being Matakana, upmarket.

Taking a seat on the sun-drenched deck of the former timber mill, I sipped on a light grapefruit- and pine-scented pale ale - one of 15 beers brewed on site - as I tucked into tamarind pork hock with kohlrabi, pea tendrils and peanuts and an heirloom tomato, baby beetroot and witloof salad.

The deck was full when I arrived with punters working their way through tasting trays and sharing plates and - by the time the sun had begun to slope toward bed - families; the parents working their way through jugs of beer as they chatted while the kids made a mess of themselves in the mud. As far as snapshots of New Zealand life go, this one was pretty idyllic.

While I can't say I would turn down a trip to the Hamptons, Matakana is certainly no poor man's substitute.

MORE INFORMATION

matakanavillage.co.nz and matakanacoast.co.nz

GETTING THERE

Matakana is about an hour's drive north of Auckland CBD.

STAYING THERE

The Black and White Barn down quiet Courtney Lane isa couple of minuteswalk from the markets, shops, restaurants and cafes on the main street. whitecottage.co.nz

The writer was a guest of Black and White Barn andVolkswagon.

LORNA THORNBER

Fourteen kilometre Pakiri is arguably one of Auckland's best beaches.

SUPPLIED

The Sawmill Brewery is expected to reopen this year after being devastated by fire.

Stuff

More here:
Is Matakana New Zealand's answer to the Hamptons? - Stuff.co.nz

Womens clubs arent a new idea. They gained much popularity more than a hundred years ago and played a large role in the suffragette movement. They have continued on in a variety of ways since and Mint Hill has its very own.

The Mint Hill Womens Club started in 1974 as the Farmwood Womens Auxilary and later the Farmwood Womens Club until the name finally changed to The Mint Hill Womens Club in 2005, when it grew beyond the Farmwood neighborhood and encouraged women from anywhere in the town to join.

The history of our club is rich and we love to honor it and our original members every chance we get, said Andree West, Co-President of the club. This year is our 45th anniversary and we are proud to be able to celebrate it with so many of the original members.

The club has one general meeting each month, the second Monday of the month, at 7 p.m. in Town Hall.

They follow this vision when deciding on activities and volunteer projects :

Service to community through volunteering and fundraising. One hundred percent of proceeds go back into the local community.

Fellowship to enrich old friendships and foster new ones.

Self improvement through guest speakers at monthly meetings and local trips that appeal to a wide variety of interests.

Throughout the clubs history, it has stayed true to this vision and has taken each pillar, service to the community, fellowship, and self-improvement seriously.

There are many opportunities for members to gather and meet each other in fellowship at a variety of times throughout the month to accommodate any schedule.

Many topics are covered at meetings and a variety of different activities and trips are offered so theres something for everyone.

Where the club really shines though is through their service to the community. So far they have put more than $100,000 back into the Mint Hill community. Funds have been raised through group activities and fundraisers like card and game parties, craft auctions, Christmas home tours, spring garden tours, yard sales, etc.

This year their annual fundraiser is a bit of a new endeavor for them, an event called, Sip, Savor, Support it is a wine and craft beer tasting event.

I think this event is the first of its kind offered in Mint Hill and we are very excited for it, said Marilyn Fargo, Co-President for the Club. We will have a fantastic selection of wines, craft beers and of course food for attendees. Plus we have gathered some amazing items for our raffle and silent auction.

The event will take place from 6 to 8:30 p.m. Thursday, Feb. 27th at Pine Lake Country Club in Mint Hill. Doors will open at 5:30 p.m. Tickets will be sold in advance.

More than 80 items will be up for raffle and silent auction with values ranging from $30 to $1500.

Messer Financial Group is the title sponsor for the event. Southern Trust Mortgage is also helping to sponsor.

We are so grateful to be partnered with such wonderful sponsors for this event and year-round, said West. Messer Financial Group has really stepped up to make sure this event will be amazing.

The proceeds from this event will be donated back to the local community in the form of scholarships to CPCC, or donations to organizations such as the Community Culinary School of Charlotte, Honor the Warriors, Healing Vine Harbor, Mint Hill Arts, Servants Heart, Idlewild Fire dept, and various other small organizations in the area.

No tickets will be available for sale at the event. Tickets can be purchased online MHWClub.com or through Kathy Raiano at mhwclub@gmail.com. Attendees must be 21.

New members are welcome to the club any time, if interested visit MHWClub.com or send an email to mhwclub@gmail.com

Originally posted here:
Mint Hill Women's Club celebrates 45 years of service and fellowship - Mint Hill Times

Celebrating 20 years of the series, Electronic Arts have revealed The Sims 5. With potential cross-platform on PC, PS5 and Xbox Series X, the fifth game in the famous simulation series is in development!

On February 4, 2020, The Sims franchise celebrated its 20th anniversary! The first simulation game was released in 2000 and fans have been waiting for the fifth of the name for more than 6 years now. Don't panic, The Sims 5 is in preparation and Electronic Arts says so! No official announcement has been made and we don't have a release date, but Andrew Wilson, EA's CEO, has finally spoken about The Sims 5.

It's the CNN website who interviewed Andrew:

As Maxis continues to think about The Sims for a new generation across platforms and a cloud-enabled world, you should imagine that while we will always stay true to our inspiration, escape, creation, self-improvement motivation, that this notion of social interaction and competition like the kind of things that were actually present in The Sims Online many years ago will start to become part of the ongoing The Sims experience in the years to come.

(Source)

Two things to remember, then:

Note that The Sims have always been released first on PC and then on consoles. This time, it seems that gamers will be able to enjoy The Sims 5 on PC, PS5 and Xbox Series right out with the release of the game. In addition, gamers from all over the world, and on different consoles, will be able to play together (cross-platform).

Maybe we'll learn more at the E3 2020?

Here you will find our calendar of new video game releases in 2020, for all major platforms PC, PS4, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch, Nintendo 3DS, Google Stadia and next-gen consoles when information is released.

Milkameluna

Pokmon || Animal Crossing || Harry Potter || Mobile Games || Top Games || Hytale || Minecraft

Go here to see the original:
The Sims 5: EA confirms game is in development, will be cross-platform - Millenium US

Accidental encounters with racists lead me to believe that they are open to neither reason nor self-improvement. I must conclude, then, that a book entitled How to Argue With a Racist will remain untouched by those who would most benefit from reading it. This is a pity, as there is a growing army who have succumbed to a phenomenon known as race realism. This is racism reinterpreted for the internet age: a heady brew of misunderstood science, ugly conspiracy and plain old prejudice that forms the basis of (usually) far-right and white supremacist thinking.

Race realism promotes the spurious idea that science has uncovered distinct and meaningful differences between races but that this truth is somehow suppressed by snowflake scientists in hock to political correctness. Those supposed truths are then contorted by their abusers into parodies of racial destiny: black men are born to sprint but not to swim; Jews are born into moneylending; and, of course, whites are born above all others. Black people are several rungs below white peers on the social ladder not because of systemic oppression and discrimination but because they are naturally more stupid.

It is a perverse system of thought that seeks to justify racial separateness and conveniently reinforce assertions of white superiority. This is an ideology treading water amid the flood of data pouring out of genetics studies and a mistaken concept of ancestry propagated by the consumer DNA testing market which happily nurtures fantasies of Viking descent.

The claim that genetics supports any form of racism or that it supports the idea of race as a biologically meaningful concept is a fallacy, argues the geneticist, author and Twitter warrior Adam Rutherford, in this slim, two-fingered salute to thehaters: The continual failure to settle on the number of races is indicative of its folly. No one has ever agreed how many races there are, nor what their essential features might be, aside from the sweeping generalisations about skin colour, hair texture and some facial features. The clear genetic boundaries that racists crave to bolster their narrative are simply absent from the analyses of our 20,000-odd genes and their variants.

Rutherford, a British science writer whose previous books include Creation and The Book of Humans, divides his analysis into chapters covering skin colour, ancestral purity, sporting prowess and intelligence. Just as you cannot tell the function of a room by the colour of its walls, skin colour is a rotten guide to the biological realities hidden within. The dominance of skincolour as a racial classifier is based on historical pseudoscience primarily invented during the years of European empire-building and colonial expansion, he summarises, having pointed out that the vasttapestry of pigmentation found in Africas 54 countries overlaps with Indians, aboriginal Australians, South Americans andsome Europeans.

When it comes ancestry, there is no such thing as purity. The mathematics of family trees, when traced back far enough, reveals convergence. There are isopoints, or nodes of origin, that propagated all the many branches we see today. For instance, everyone now alive is an ancestor of the global population 3,400 years ago, in which the blood of many different peoples hadalready mixed.

While some populations might have taken root in a particular geographical location over a few generations, the joy of sex meant our frisky forebears got it wherever they could. And so, Rutherford explains, every Nazi has Jewish ancestors and every racist has African, Indian, Chinese, Native American, aboriginal Australian ancestors there are no purebloods, only mongrels enriched by the blood of multitudes.

The idea of innate athleticism is complicated: it is true that Olympic sprinters tend to be of West African heritage, even if they come from the US, Canada or the Caribbean. But we can infer too much from too little, Rutherford maintains: all Olympians are outliers, and a statistically thin set from which to draw sweeping conclusions. If West African genes are the key to medal glory, why dont sprinters representing that region similarly excel? While one version of a gene called ACTN3 (sometimes called the speed gene) is common in sprinters and in people of West African descent, it is also found in other groups, and so by itself cannot explain outstanding performance. Why, he asks, do we not see many black swimmers, where athletic genes might also confer an advantage?

Rutherford concludes, quite reasonably, that it is environment, culture and role models that make the difference in sport; the dominance of East Africans in long-distance running can be ascribed to a running culture that has sprung up in Ethiopia and Kenya, both home to superstar endurance runners and intensive training camps for hopeful youngsters.

***

The most explosive issue in genetics and race is, of course, intelligence. It is almost impossible to do justice to his nuanced arguments in a paragraph, but here is a snapshot: while the UK shows a population average IQ of 100, meta-analyses suggest that countries in Africa are likely to score in the 80s. Genetic factors cannot be fully excluded, Rutherford says, but the enormous genetic diversity across that vast region suggests the discrepancy lies in the challenging local environment, with poorer schools and fragile medical care, rather than in the genes.

In fact, todays sub-Saharan countries are comparable, in socio-economic terms, to European countries in the first half of the 20th century. National IQs have a habit of gradually increasing, and the so-called Flynn effect might see the IQs in those countries lift over time. Even at the national level, he might have usefully added, poverty and disadvantage affects educational outcome.

Rutherford casts doubt on the assertion that Jews are intellectually gifted because of their genes, again invoking the Ockhams razor of culture to explain why Jewish people keep winning Nobel Prizes: The evidence for selection of genes for intellect in Jews is weak. Is it not simply more scientifically parsimonious to suggest that a culture that values scholarship is more likely to produce scholars? I begrudged, though, his continual digressions about whether scientists who held racist views such as the co-discoverer of DNA James Watson deserve to have their science trashed. It is entirely appropriate to interrogate a scientists motives for choosing a particular line of inquiry.

It is hard not to compare Rutherfords effort to Superior, the excellent book by Angela Saini on race science published last year. Rutherford makes no reference to it, although, by necessity, he references some of the same research. He is undoubtedly a gifted communicator, and his is the quicker, bolshier read, but Saini is a hard act to follow in laying out the misuse of science for racist ends. Not only did Saini courageously challenge some of the culprits, but she also set her critique in detailed historical context, explaining how race became embedded in the scientificculture of classification in the 18th and 19th centuries. That was the origin of eugenics: the idea that the genetics of the human race can be improved via selective breeding. Its shadow still hangs over us today, thanks to a small gaggle of fringe researchers who continue to drip-feed nationalist forums with a selective stream of misinterpreted data from population studies (biologists no longer study race, remember, but populations, because of the lack of clear genetic boundaries between people).

That said, writers such as Saini and Rutherford are needed more than ever in our confusing, polarised times. Charles Murray, the right-wing thinker who co-wrote The Bell Curve which, among other things, pointed to IQ differences between white and black people and discussed how this could affect social policy has a new book out that invokes genetics to challenge woke thinking on gender, race and class. Such prophets thrive in pop culture, exploiting the inevitable gaps and uncertainties in scientific data to fan the flames of division, and using the shield of free speech to brush off accusations of poor or selective scholarship.

My interpretation is that those whocovertly, or overtly, push the anti-woke agenda fear that their own status is threatened by positive social change. Society becomes a zero-sum game in which the rise of minorities must mean the fall of the majority. This fear is embodied inthe fixation on the demise of Western culture, which animates so much hostilitytowards minorities.

[White supremacists] fantasise abouta persecution of their people that will endin their extinction, or an erosion of their rights in exchange for the same rights afforded to people of different heritage, Rutherford observes. When all youve ever known is privilege, equality feels like oppression.

That is how I would argue with a racist who takes offence at modernity and social progress: the real problem is not that my skin is too dark but that yours is too thin.

Anjana Ahuja is a contributing writer on science for the Financial Times

How To Argue With a Racist:History, Science, Race and Reality Adam Rutherford Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 224pp, 12.99

Here is the original post:
The pseudoscience of hate - New Statesman

Data can be fun but it can also become a source of stress. Photograph: Guido Mieth/Getty Images

If you want to develop obsessive tendencies, there is an app for that. There are several, in fact. You may have downloaded a bunch of them on 1 January in a rush of resolution-making.

Fitness apps such as Strava, MyFitnessPal and RunKeeper can be useful tools for motivating you to start and stick to a workout regime. But, according to a study at the National University of Ireland, Galway, these apps can also encourage obsessive attitudes towards exercise. The study, which observed 272 cyclists who use Strava, found that people who predominately use the tool to show off posting their workouts to receive praise, for example are more likely to develop an unhealthy compulsion and high stress levels.

I mean this politely, but duh! It seems obvious that being able to track and share the tiniest details of your workout may not always be a positive thing. I had an eating disorder as a teenager and, for a very unhappy time, data dominated my life. I weighed myself several times a day. I calculated everything from how many calories were in one bite of an apple to how many extra calories I would burn by exercising in cold weather. I used analogue, in-brain calculating technology to track all this. Had I had access to the plethora of health apps that are available now, it would have taken me much longer to recover not only because these kinds of tools enable obsessive behaviour, but because they normalise and even glamorise it.

The concurrent rise of wellness and self-tracking technology has ushered in a sort of socially sanctioned technorexia. We live in an age where you can never be too rich or too fit. Calorie-counting, which was once considered Bridget Jones-style silly at best and neurotic at worst (largely because it was coded female), is now celebrated as a data-driven route to self-improvement (largely because Silicon Valley has coded it male). It is harder to spot the symptoms associated with eating disorders when everyone seems to be fixated on their fitness stats. Also, because eating and exercise disorders are still associated with women, it is particularly easy for problematic behaviour among men to fly under the radar.

As the authors of the Strava study note, the adverse connection between these technologies and wellbeing has received little attention. Only a handful of studies hint at the dark side of these devices. A 2016 study of female Fitbit users by CNN, for example, found that 59% felt as if their routines were controlled by their device, while 30% said their Fitbit made them feel guilty. A 2015 study at Duke University in North Carolina found that tracking can reduce pleasure in the activity being quantified and make people do less of that activity when they are not measuring it. Enjoyable activities can become almost like a job, by focusing on the outcomes of things that used to be fun, noted one professor behind the study. Going for a long bike ride can cease to be a pleasure in itself but an achievement to boast about online.

I am not saying that fitness apps are a bad thing. I am sure most people use them positively. That includes me; now that I am fully recovered, I find that trying to do 10,000 steps a day is a fun nudge to get me off the couch. However, as health-tracking technology becomes increasingly ubiquitous even kids use fitness apps it is important to be aware that quantifying every aspect of our lives is not necessarily healthy.

Arwa Mahdawi is a Guardian columnist

See the article here:
The obsession with posting workouts for praise is not a healthy fitness fad - The Guardian

Michelle Obama is a woman of leadership and a female rock star. Her autobiographical book, Becoming, tells the story of her journey, tells the story of her childhood in a close-knit and happy black middle-class American family in the 1960s and 1970s from a little girl born in South Chicago. Through her studies at Harvard University and her career as a lawyer, to her rise to the White House as First Lady,

Michelle Obama has always been known for her political convictions and her actions for her country and it is probably in these few pages that we better understand what made Michelle, the woman who has been and remains an icon for so many minority Americans.

For eight years, Michelle Obama was not just Barack Obamas wife, but an exemplary first lady, who did a lot for her country, with much dedication. Since the end of Obamas reign, she hasnt disappeared from circulation and still makes her voice heard, in different ways.

Its not about being perfect. Its not about where you get yourself in the end. Theres power in allowing yourself to be known and heard, in owning your unique story, in using your authentic voice. And theres grace in being willing to know and hear others. This, for me, is how we become. Michelle Obama

Having read Becoming I bought Becoming: A Guided Journal for Discovering Your Voice. Indeed, I always encourage my clients to journal as the more conscious one becomes of themselves and their actions, the more skilled they will become at getting out of their own way. I too have kept a journal on and off for the last thirty-five years. Journaling is one of the most successful development tools, if notthemost successful developmental tools I have discovered for myself and my clients. I believe that journaling is the most effective bedrock practice you can cultivate. It has helped me become more aware of my thoughts, my drivers, my behaviour, and my reactions. Plus, I periodically write down lessons learned and milestone moments passed so I have a reference, a record of what has happened and what worked so I may use it in the future.

Becoming: A Guided Journal for Discovering Your Voice has helped me capture my voice and journey so I too can nurture my sense of belonging. I use this time as an opportunity to look back on my personal and professional experiences and to feel empowered to take those next steps, wherever they might lead. I can only serve from a full cupBecoming: A Guided Journal for Discovering Your Voice Becoming: A Guided Journal for Discovering Your Voice and this book is not meant to provide quick fix; I dont believe in quick fixes, as they rarely work in the long term. Instead, it is a guide, for you to dip in and out of when you should need to. You will choose when you need it, and you will determine your progress. You will decide how much effort you will invest and how serious you are about your purpose.

People always ask me why Im so authentic, why people are in tune with me. I think its mostly because I like myself. I like my story and its hard knocks. They make me unique. Thats why Ive always been open with my staff, friends and young people.Michelle Obama

This guided journal presents inspiring questions and quotes from the book to help you reflect on your personal and family history, your goals, challenges, and dreams, what moves you and brings you to hope, and what future you imagine for yourself and your community. Above all, these pages help you capture your voice and journey so you can nurture your sense of belonging.

What I love most is that I love that your story doesnt have to be tragic or grandiose to be necessary. That anyones story can help impact someone else.

This book is an excellent tool for reflection and self-improvement. What you put into it is what you get out of it. This book will help you to have an enriched, deepened, and expanded vision for the most critical subject in your life: you.

Here is the original post:
What's your journey of becoming? - Thrive Global

Editors Note: This article was submitted in response to the call for ideas issued by the co-chairs of the National Security Commission on Artificial Intelligence, Eric Schmidt and Robert Work. It addresses the second question (part b.), which asks how should the government go about hiring and managing qualified people, and the fifth question (part a.), which asks how the federal government can rely on the private sector to develop its AI.

In the global race to dominate artificial intelligence (AI) technologies, talent is everything. Yet the U.S. government has proven unwilling or unable to do what it takes to hire and hold Americas top talent.

Russia and China have long mixed their public and private sector resources when it comes to cyber technologies. Russian organized criminal groups often lend their best hackers to work part-time for the Russian state, while the Peoples Liberation Armys concept of a modern peoples war designates experts from major Chinese technology companies and academia as assets for improving national military power.

The United States, as a democracy, has not responded with equally effective ways to leverage vastly superior capabilities present in its own private sector. Instead, the Defense Department directly competes with American technology companies for a limited pool of cyber and AI talent a competition it all too often loses. Once gone, tech professionals rarely return to government service and engineers with Silicon Valley experience almost never arrive to replace them.

To reverse these trends, the U.S. government should change the way it thinks about careers and embrace a lesson learned by leading tech companies that software talent comes and goes and thats a good thing. Skeptics will say that the Pentagon is different from any other institution and cannot succeed with a transient labor force that does not understand its way of doing things and doesnt have high-level security clearances. Certainly, when it comes to battlefield applications, sensitive intelligence, or operational tactics, the Pentagon has plenty to hide. And its most sensitive software will have to remain off-limits to all but the most carefully vetted employees.

But most of the militarys software powers an ecosystem of backend operations that are no different than those used by private companies. The Defense Department needs to recognize that most of its software is not secret just proprietary and modernize its employment practices accordingly. Hospitals, for example, use dozens of specialized software programs that need to be interoperable as the patient moves from the emergency room to the operating theater to the intensive care unit to discharge. Logistics companies, financial firms, and telecom corporations all use custom software for their specific needs. Even so, the private sector manages to build highly customized software applications that enable their businesses to thrive using software talent that comes and goes.

The Pentagon Should Embrace a Non-Careerist Workforce

The Defense Department could take three specific steps to modernize its high-tech labor force, and do so in a way that keeps the nation safe.

First, to tap software engineers with the requisite experience in cutting-edge techniques for creating computer software, the military should consider moving more of its software jobs to the tech capitals where the best software engineers and AI talent already live and mostly want to stay. While top software engineers routinely move between cities with the headquarters of a major software company, like San Francisco or Seattle, or leading computer science universities, like Pittsburgh or Boston, they rarely move to Washington D.C. As a result, the software teams completing federal contracts have often been isolated from emerging best practices in the industry or have limited experience actually implementing technologies that the private sector adopted years ago. For example, while the best software companies implemented distributed computing platforms and cloud technologies a decade ago, most U.S. military departments have just begun this transition. This lack of hands-on experience with technologies routinely used in the private sector means most of the Pentagon is planning to transition its software applications to the Cloud without actually redesigning them to take advantage of the Clouds primary features. As a result, each application will continue to work essentially as it did before and most of the potential gains from this transition will be lost.

Winning software companies have long understood that top talent has a force multiplier effect. Its worth paying more to acquire top talent. Unlike other industries, in which productivity differs only slightly from one employee to another, software firms believe their best engineers contribute ten or even a hundred times more to the success of the company than engineers of average skill. Flawed design choices made by poor coders can ripple through an entire team, lowering the productivity of every other programmer who must interface with their modules. Bad coders occasionally create bottomless pits of bugs and errors that can delay a product from shipping for weeks or months.

The establishment of Army Futures Command in Austin, Texas shows that the Pentagon can choose to set up shop in a city where software professionals want to live. Even better would be to locate acquisitions personnel who write the specifications for military software and oversee its implementation and operations researchers who need to turn data into action just as the private sector must in cities like Seattle that live and breathe software.

Second, the Defense Department should consider reforming its outdated expectation that tech specialists military or civilian will need to be careerists. Managers and leaders in the national security community often justify their aversion to pursuing potential hires from top-ranked computer science and data science programs by arguing that these employees will not stay for more than a few years if they can be hired at all. Instead, national security hiring managers often prefer employees whom they believe will stay with the military and deeply enmesh themselves in the particulars of the militarys culture and values.

This misunderstands the modern employment landscape. Tech workers turn over rapidly, even ones that are paid as much as corporations like Facebook,Apple, and Amazon are offering. These companies know and accept that their typical employee has worked for their company for less than three years. Recruits who can pass a rigorous technical screening are welcomed or welcomed back by any tech giant regardless of their career stage. The best companies always hold positions open at every level to soak up talent whenever and however it appears.

Facebook brags that its newly hired engineers push real code to production within their first week. New hires in the national security world typically wait half a year or more to get a security clearance. Then they suffer more delays as informal internal barriers block their access to data, and rigid and bureaucratic processes prevent the deployment of tools and programming languages that data professionals in the private sector take for granted.

The Pentagon should consider redesigning its personnel policies to accommodate a much greater degree of speed and permeability in its cyber and AI workforce, regardless of what pay and benefits it offers. Its new priority could be to create a working environment that will attract the best employees, allow them to contribute rapidly to the best of their ability, and encourage them to stay only as long as they believe it is in their best interest to do so.

Finally, the federal government could learn from industry models that do not rely on full-time employees to develop world-class software. The open-source community created much of the software that powers the internet, including the Linux operating system and the Apache web server. While the Pentagon might not want to expose the source code behind its software applications to the entire world, it can learn from a community that has managed to create free products that are competitive with the best efforts of better-resourced, for-profit companies even though many open-source teams pay no salaries, offer no benefits, and provide no career ladder.

The lesson is that most open-source, volunteer software engineers want to contribute to a worthwhile mission and improve the lives of their fellow human beings. Some have all the traditional employment benefits from their day jobs. Most feel empowered by the opportunity to code simply for the joy of tackling interesting and meaningful projects in their free time. Similarly, numerous servicemen, servicewomen, and Defense Department civilians would welcome the opportunity to learn a new skill, improve their day-to-day work environment, or simply explore a topic that interests them. A military version of the open-source model would connect volunteers from Americas best technology companies with the Defense Departments most talented and innovative personnel. Ideally, it would also create a community of data and software professionals who could share new successes, enshrine emerging best practices, and iterate on exciting ideas.

Adapt or Risk Losing Out to China and Russia

Ultimately, whatever specific mechanism it uses, the Pentagons success in deploying the most innovative AI technology will depend on its ability to embrace a culture of creativity, innovation, and self-improvement. If it is to succeed, it will have to find ways to encourage cross-pollination with Americas best-in-class software ecosystem and draw from the countrys immense and impatient talent pool. If not, it could be doomed to lose the race to dominate AI.

James Ryseff is a technical analyst with the nonprofit, nonpartisan RAND Corporation. He previously worked as a software engineer for 13 years at Microsoft, SAP, and Google, among others. He holds a bachelors degree in Computer Science from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and a masters in Security Studies from Georgetown University.

Image: U.S. Air Force (Photo by Jerry Saslav)

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How to (Actually) Recruit Talent for the AI Challenge - War on the Rocks

Serena Williams took to Instagram, where she put up a heartfelt post while mourning the tragic passing of basketball legend, Kobe Bryant, and all those who lost their lives in the fatal helicopter crash.

Tennis Champion, Serena Williams, recently took to her Instagram page to send her prayers to late Kobe Bryant, his daughter, Gianna, and other passengers that died after his helicopter crashed.

Williams shared a symbolic red picture that signified her grief while going on to pray for the departed and their families. Her caption read:

"I will continue to pray for the Bryant family, the Chester family, the Altobelli family, the Mauser family, and the Zobayan family and friends during this difficult time. Your legend will live on."

Both being sports celebrities, Kobe and Serena had a platonic relationship that had the two showing respect for each other on social media.

According to TENNIS WORLD, Bryant and Williams worked together on the Kobe and Anne Matthews book "Legacy and the Queen," which revolves around a tale of inspiration and self-improvement.

"Legacy and the Queen" was released last year, and while speaking about the book at Orange County Children's Book Festival, the Lakers star made it known that he drew inspiration from his daughters. He said at the event:

"I wanted (Legacy and the Queen) to be a great example for my daughters, for all the young women out there, that your sensitivity is where a lot of your power, your inner magic comes from."

With a five-time NBA championship accolade to getting dubbed 2008's Most Valuable player among many other winnings, Kove Bryant was an Icon.

But all these did not solely define him as he was a family man at heart. As a girl dad, Kobe loved his daughters and never hesitated to praise and show them off on social media.

According to TENNIS WORLD, the Basketball champion lost his life after his helicopter crashed at Calabasas, California, killing him and eight others, including his 13-year-old daughter, Gianna.

Kobe Bryant is survived by his wife, Vanessa Bryant, and three daughters, Natalia, Bianka, and little Capri.

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Serena Williams Sends Prayers to Families of Kobe Bryant & Other Victims Who Died in Crash - AmoMama

Conor McGregor may be the money fight in the UFC, but there are many reasons why a rematch with Khabib wont happen.

The Eagle submitted McGregor in the fourth round of their hugely tense UFC 229 bout in October 2018.

Although the Irishman and Dana White want to see that rematch, here are three reasons why it wont happen this year.

1. Khabib v Tony Ferguson

The lightweight champion already has a huge fight on his hands against Tony Ferguson in April.

El Cucuy is tipped by many to be the man to beat the Russian, meaning McGregor is the furthest thing from Khabibs mind right now.

Ferguson is hoping to spoil McGregors plans by defeating the 28-0 champion who has been dubbed the greatest lightweight of all time.

2. Ramadan

Five days after Khabibs huge bout with Ferguson is the start of the Islam tradition, Ramadan.

This is a time of spiritual reflection, self-improvement and heightened devotion and worship for Muslims.

Ramadan involves huge periods of fasting and most people eat before dawn and not again until after sunset, which would hinder Khabibs training for a fight.

3. Lack of interest

Khabib repeatedly insisted he wants McGregor to earn a rematch following his decisive victory in 2018.

The Russian recently claimed he wouldnt fight the Irishman for 100 million, reiterating that money doesnt motivate him.

Whether Dana White can convince Khabib is another thing but if it was down to the Russian the rematch wont happen in 2020.

Originally posted here:
Three reasons Khabib v McGregor rematch wont happen this year - Extra.ie