Relax and do something different, a hobby that you love doing. Take time off for yourself. This will help boost your productivity during week days
10. Seek satisfaction
If you are disappointed with what you are doing, try to transform it into something you love. If you fail, it might be a good idea to do something different. As Confucius said: 'Choose a job you love, and you will never have to work a day in your life.'
Homelessness is not necessary. Unlike most other urban social problems, homelessness is something policymakers actually know how to address. The U.S. and Britain have slashed their rates of homelessness during the past decade. But in Canada, homelessness is on the rise; and in the Vancouver region, the official count of homeless persons almost doubled from 1,121 souls in 2002 to 2,174 in 2005.
PRICE OF HOMELESSNESS
In 2001, the B.C. Ministry of Community, Aboriginal and Women's Services published astudy examining costs of homelessness in B.C. It found:
Homeless people cost taxpayers up to $40,000 per year in service and shelter costs. By comparison, the costs of a person in supportive housing ranged to $28,000 per year. Normal Canadians spend an average of $11,200 a year on shelter.
Homeless people cost taxpayers an average of$11,410 a year in costs via the criminal justice system. The average taxpayer, by comparison, pays $362 a year to maintain the system.
Homeless people cost $7,893 a year in social services; the average taxpayer pays $179 a year to support those.
Homeless people cost $4,714 a year in health care; the average Canadian uses $2,633 per year in publicly funded services.
Homelessness is not cheap. Provincial taxpayers spend up to $40,000 annually per homeless person, according a 2001 study. That money is spent on police calls, hospital visits and other emergency social services. If there are only 2,174 homeless people in the Vancouver area (an official figure everyone in the field assumes is well below the actual total) and if each person uses $40,000 in services (a figure that did not include all local services), then British Columbia taxpayers are spending $86.9 million a year just to help people living on the streets stay alive.
Housing them all would cost less than half that much money, and numerous studies show that people who live indoors go to jails and hospitals far less than people who live on the streets. The average Canadian spends only $11,200 a year on housing. Even government-run supportive housing -- where residents get social services, such as counselling -- costs only $28,000 a year.
This essay highlights seven solutions to homelessness.
Each of these ideas is working somewhere.
Each is affordable, in that they will cost taxpayers less than the $86.9 million a year now being spent just on survival rather than solutions.
And while constructing new supportive housing is one critical component of an overall solution, none of the solutions presented here involve building anything new.
Also, none of the not-so-new ideas presented here is being proposed by either the Tories in Ottawa or the Liberals in Victoria; and only one is included in Vancouver Mayor Sam Sullivan's sweeping Civil City Project
America has the largest number of homeless women and children in the industrialized world. It’s a depressing statistic exacerbated by a housing crisis that forced thousands of families out onto the street. The stories of the 1.6 million children who experience homelessness every year—like that of Dasani, an 11-year-old homeless child profiled by The New York Times last year—are reminiscent of tales from developing countries or disaster zones.
In 2010, the Obama administration announced a plan to end homelessness among children, youth, and families by 2020—but, predictably, there have been spats over funding and how to best use federal dollars.
Now a rigorous report, the first large-scale experiment ever conducted to test the effectiveness of homelessness interventions for families, might have some clues about how to create meaningful change. The Family Options Study is a three-year-long evaluation of three types of ways to help homeless families, conducted by the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), Abt Associates and Vanderbilt University. It looks at 12 communities throughout a variety of U.S. cities—including Boston, Denver, Kansas City, Phoenix, and Honolulu—and involves 2,300 homeless families. The findings so far—the study is currently at its midway point—suggest some solutions for reducing homelessness and improving the lives of low-income families, even those who are currently housed.
“This is an incredibly exciting study,” said Kathy O’Regan, HUD’s Assistant Secretary for Policy Development and Research. “I think this is influencing the work we do immediately and in the future. You don’t have that many studies where you say that early on.”
The research is following families who were given different types of housing assistance. The first group received a Housing Choice Voucher (commonly known as Section 8), which provided them with a subsidy for permanent housing. The second group was given temporary rental assistance for housing in the private market, an option known in the housing world as rapid rehousing. The third group received time-limited housing in a setting that included services like medical assistance and counseling. The fourth group received the usual type of interventions that a homeless family would be given, such as some time in emergency shelters and whatever housing assistance they can find on their own.
After 18 months, families using the Housing Choice Vouchers are doing much better than those who received traditional interventions. Children in the families that were given vouchers moved schools much less frequently than they otherwise would have. These families spent less time in shelters, parents had fewer health problems and lower incidences of domestic violence, and they were mentally more stable than those who received typical interventions.
About one-quarter of the homeless families surveyed had spent at least one night in a homeless shelter in the past month; only about 10 percent of families using vouchers had. About 65 percent of homeless families in the usual-care group were food insecure; only about 10 percent of families receiving a voucher were. And about 4.6 percent of usual care homeless families said they were in fair or poor health; less than 1 percent of subsidy families were.
Women should be promoted to top jobs in business and politics before men”
Until the beginning of the 20th Century women did not cross the threshold and manage their right to vote. The dogged Suffragist movement were the trigger for the difficult race of equality of rights between men and women before the law. Much water has flowed under the bridge since then. So, have nowadays both genres – male and female – achieved the same opportunities in practical terms? Do women and men occupy a balanced number of high responsibility posts? Not at all, reality is that women are still quite far away from actual equality in our society.
Therefore, if we took the path of least resistance trying to compensate that unfair inequality, it would be an easy as choosing some selected and well-prepared women for the highest post in the economic and political spheres. However, would those proceedings work out?
As I anticipate the new adventures that lie ahead I have become acutely aware that there seems to be a lot of uncertainty out there right now, which brings me to a few questions.
1. How do we motivate ourselves to raise our spirits?
2. What can we do, to feel secure in our jobs?
3. Can our lives change overnight?
It is my experience that through the power of the Law of Attraction in which, “ like attracts like” and positive and negative thinking bring about positive and negative physical results, we can attract all that we desire for a joyful, prosperous life.
Learning to think positive thoughts and block out negative thoughts is key to achieving your maximum possibilities. This does not come naturally to most of us, it takes practice, and even those of us who have been using this method have to reiterate it every once in awhile.
Back in 1976 I read an amazing book that entirely changed my life. It was a step-by-step method for escaping the trap of negative thinking and taking control of my life.
That book really touched me. It changed my life and I haven’t looked back since. I have read hundreds of books since that time but I still pick up “Your Erroneous Zones” every once in a while because it brings back the stillness that I need in my life. To this day it still sits in my office with most of Wayne Dyer’s books.
I believe that I have read everything that Wayne Dyer has written and have come to know him almost as well I know my own brothers and sisters.
I realize that we all have challenges in our lives, but along with these challenges come many open doors with unending possibilities, if only we would venture through those doors and unlock the potential that lies beyond them. Sometimes those doors come in the form of a good book, a course we sign up for, a decision to make ourselves a priority or simply acknowledging that it’s all ours for the taking; regardless of the form it takes, we are all given free will and can actively decide to change our lives for the better.
With all the help that is available at our fingertips in today’s world letting ourselves get discouraged shouldn’t even be an option anymore.
As Wayne suggests in his book “Change Your Thoughts Change Your Life”
“Break down whatever it is to one thing that can be done today, right in this moment. Erase the big picture—simply do what you can do and let everything else fade. Write the opening paragraph of your novel. Lay out your blue print for the home you want to build. Sign up for one course at the local educational institution. Go for a two minute run. Be in the now. See how doing the Tio at this moment brings big results by paradoxically staying small and simple”.
This is powerful advice. Sometimes thinking small is the best way to get big things done.
Looking at the big picture can often be very overwhelming so breaking it down to baby steps makes it all very attainable.
I want you to fill your heart with passion and enthusiasm, find something you love, something you can get excited about. I want to help you make decisions that are right for you.
Go ahead and start by asking yourself some tie down questions (questions that demand a “Yes” response.)
Examples:
1. You can make this happen with practice, can’t you?
2. You’re job would be much more pleasant if you had something to be motivated about, wouldn’t it?
3. It would really feel good to be able to attract more of what you want into your life and less of what you don’t want, wouldn’t it?
4. If you had three months of really powerful coaching, understood the Law of Attraction, learned where you were most balanced in your life and had some help to set powerful goals, this would improve your life, wouldn’t it?
It is my hope that you make yourself and your goals a priority, and don’t lose sight of what is important in your life. All too often we put aside our own dreams and aspirations only to spread ourselves thin by assisting others in their quests.
We must remember that we are better equipped to help others when we are at our personal best!
Books will always exist - people like the feel of paper - a discursive essay
Many people enjoy reading books. For ones it could be a good way to relax. For others is a good solution to killing boredom. In fact, books are the mine of knowledge. They enrich a language and force us to use imagination. They have an enormous number of devoted fans all over the world in every age. However, is there any alternative which could displace a traditional book?
Many people haven't time for reading books. They prefer watching films becouse it takes less time than reading. What is more, there is a lot of films based on books. Nevertheless, during reading a book you're creating your own characters, landscapes and other things which make your imagination works.
Technological followers have their own method for reading a book. They use an e-book reader which is smaller than book, so, you can take it and use it wherever you want. A number of people who use an e-book reader is groving rapidly. On the other hand, a number of conservative people who doesn't like changes is huge either. Those people find pleasure in keeping book in hand. Likewise, books are cheaper and there are still more places to buy them. In addition to this, if you want to read a book you don't need an electricity. Except for light the lamp.
Nowadays, when people are running for their carrier, they have to let their hair down. The choise is big, for this reason, people shouldn't have a problem what to choose. Although, according to the statistics, traditional books are still number one. So that makes them irreplaceable and time spent with them is priceless.
It is often said “prison works”. It is less often said what it means for a prison to “work”. Traditionally prisons have been argued to serve at least one of three functions: to punish the prisoner, to protect the public, and to rehabilitate the offender to prevent them committing another crime. However, on closer inspection, the reasons given seem to have secondary important to the need for society to feel like something is being done, that justice is being served, that law and order is being kept, with near-total disregard for those who find themselves shut out of society with no hope of redemption.
The first function given for prison, punishment, has always seemed to have the least force. Setting aside the dubious civility of a society which seeks revenge upon its citizenry, is spending £30,000 a year on keeping someone in prison when most prisoners really hurting them, or us? (1) Rehabilitation, a far more worthy aim, is chronically underfunded and ultimately useless in a system which is often referred to as a “university of crime”, where young impressionable offenders quickly pick up new skills from veteran prisoners and criminals and escalate their offences when they are released. Which leaves the protection of the public as the remaining reason, and the reason that prisons came about in the first place. Imprisoning those who threaten others seems slightly more justifiable. But this has to be balanced with the human rights of those convicted of crimes themselves – can we justify the imprisonment of such people? Does our society ultimately benefit from keeping people away under lock and key?
In 1993, the psychologist Terrie Moffett published a paper in the Psychological Review that argued that there were two fundamental types of prisoner – the adolescent-limited and the lifelong-persistent. The adolescent-limited are young, primarily men, who commit crime to support themselves, for fun, as part of a gang, or other reasons, who eventually mature, settle down and give up the lifestyle that was contributing to their criminality. The second type, lifelong-persistent, are people who commit crimes casually and often, moving through the criminal justice system in a perpetual cycle of crime-arrest-conviction-incarceration-release-crime and rarely, if ever, breaking out of that cycle. There are a variety of reasons both types end up in prison, including poor education, drug addiction, racism (young black men are twice as likely to go to prison than to university. (2)) and mental health difficulties, which are again rarely, if ever, given the attention they deserve.
Neither type of prisoner are prevented from committing more crime or given the chance to change their lives through serving prison sentences. The adolescent-limited, young and not really thinking about the consequences of their actions, find themselves permanently disadvantaged for the rest of their lives; upon release from prison, they struggle to find housing, meaningful employment and integration into society. It becomes easier to continue to commit more crimes to support themselves. Some will settle down and find councils and employers to give them a chance in life, but their potential, especially the potential of young black men, is severely compromised by serving a prison sentence, a physical block to their life’s progress as well as a permanent addition to their CV. Likewise, the lifelong-persistent are let down by our society. To deal with the reasons for people returning to prison over and over again, we require drug treatment programmes, mental health treatment, adult education, housing programmes, and ways of giving people pride and hope in themselves. But, when regarding that list, how much of it can be achieved effectively in a prison?
However, the rhetoric of the redtops of this country considers such proposals merely “pampering criminals”. Their attitude is largely that prison is for punishing people that society disapproves of. But if by prison “working”, we mean “reduces crime”, the only crime reduced is that which the imprisoned would have committed while doing time – as mentioned earlier, the recidivism rate for people who have been to prison more than twice is nearly 70%, so clearly prison does not “teach people a lesson”. But most advocates of prison do not care about that: they want to “see justice served” as opposed to actually seeing crime reduced and those who commit crime changing their lives. Jon Venables and Robert Thompson were both locked up for ten years – one has now been rehabilitated and is trying to build a new life, one has gone back into prison for breaking his parole. The press wants to see them both imprisoned at great cost to the taxpayer regardless of their current circumstances, and with the broad support of their readers, it seems. With such calls, can we really say society cares about whether prison works or not?
Ultimately, the way we treat prisoners as a society reflect on our humanity. Dostoevsky famously wrote “The degree of civilization in a society can be judged by entering its prisons.” However, it is also the mark of a functional, thriving society that its citizens feel safe and protected from those who would do them harm. People who kill, rape, steal, assault and engage in other anti-social behaviour are causing us as individuals and as a community harm and need to be dealt with. We need evidence-based solutions to tackle the problems that leads people to commit crime. But is prison really effective at this? Can prison deal with poverty, drug addiction, racism, patriarchy, social breakdown, senses of insecurity, resentment, or entitlement? Unlikely. Perhaps prisons “work” to give us a sense of satisfaction that something has been done – but do prisons “work” to create a safer, more secure society that protects its citizens, prevents crime, and rehabilitates those citizens who find themselves on the wrong side of the law? The evidence would suggest that as a society we have got our definition very wrong.
Understanding Why We Keep Secrets
This is our ode to our humanity, our wellness, our intelligence.
This is our ode to our secrets.
We all think we have secrets; actually, they have us.
The number-one reason people keep secrets or lie is to “keep the peace.” We hold onto secrets to keep other people happy, safe, set in their vision of the world, and in their vision of us. After my friend Lauren Zander‘s 20 years of coaching people, she’s found “lies” to be the sturdiest walls that we humans erect within and around ourselves, thereby keeping ourselves trapped and wrapped in a wide range of limitations.
In the Handel Method, all the different types of lies are defined, from white lies, “Oh yes, I’ve read that book,” to the full-blown secrets that some of us call “those we take to the grave,” such as shameful abuse or cheating. In the gray area between those two extremes of lying is where we live most of our daily lives, with little, supposedly harmless untruths. All lies create the conflicted cast of characters within us, that each express their truth differently with different people.
Who better than a highly intelligent human being to justify why she’d never go into the horrific, disingenuous world of politics — yet won’t tell her husband that she bought shoes with cash, leaving the box at the store so he wouldn’t be mad?
Do you lie?
Do you want to say “no” immediately? Good, you’re in the right place. Everyone’s initial reaction is to plead, “No, not me, I’m no liar.” Mine was, too. One of my stories to Lauren when she first began working with me was, “I’m a yoga teacher. I don’t lie. I’m actually helping people. That justifies secretly enjoying a few cigarettes even though I’m teaching people how to breathe. They’re my little secret, and they help me stay sane.” Good one. So when she gave me permission to smoke only as many cigarettes per week as I’d have my 4-year-old son smoke per week, I was done. And then I realized that I wouldn’t want to practice yoga with someone who smokes.
Or lies.
Lauren marvels at how easily people shift gears once she defines what’s included in a lie: those little details we hide from others, because we’ve deemed them irrelevant; or the way we tell most of the story, depending on who’s listening. She and I teamed up to create a class for yoga teachers, having learned from my smoking situation, about the stark divide between the lies we’re telling and the teachings we’re sharing. I was a hypocrite, plain and simple. The smoking was one of my lies. Telling people I’ve read such-and-such book after having glanced at the chapter titles is another funny catch. All of it is lying. Now, if I catch myself in a lie of any kind, I have fifteen minutes to come clean, from the moment I recognize my skewing of the truth. And the coming clean is always exhilarating, and brings me closer to my heart every time.
Can you begin to see how your ability to justify everything you have to say is exactly how you’ve trapped yourself into the “you” you aren’t actually living up to?
In my example, Lauren pointed out yet another massive lie from my past: my infidelity. I was justifying it because I wasn’t going to tell anyone about it, ever, and I wasn’t going to leave my marriage; I told myself at the time I’d just needed more attention, which somehow made it okay. I hung that lie out as my “poor me” banner for months.
That story was about to become my son’s hidden, secret legacy. So around six months after the time that Lauren pointed this out to me, I apologized. My ex-husband told his own truth, and we’ve become dear, true friends. Most importantly for my son — I finally love myself past that destructive choice — instead of allowing that secret to erode my confidence and diminish my capacity to serve. I began telling on myself to anyone who would listen, in the hopes that others will find this healing freedom in their own lives. This is possible for all of us, no matter how horrible the prospect of telling the truth might seem. There are ways to frame and create conversations wherein everyone, ultimately, is healed.
Here’s the gold: my self-love and freedom come from the confidence I’ve gained in fully admitting how this lying lives in me.
Can you admit how your lies live in you now? Can you dare to make your own connection between your lies and a subtle but disconcerting lack of self-respect? No matter how well the secret is kept, it’s leaking somewhere, somehow, into your life. If you let the “real” you be a liar, then the person you’re showing the world is basically a people-pleaser, quietly stuck, keeping the peace, exactly like I was, slowly becoming more sad and unsettled.
Do you even care about having this level of self-love or freedom? If your answer is no, think about the people closest to you before you commit to that answer. My son was managing my wild pendulum of moodiness, all due to the fact that I was overseeing a collection of secrets that were making me terribly nervous and afraid to lose it all. I only saw that link once I confessed.
Now that I’ve come clean, my fear-filled fits of temper have (for the most part) shifted into constructive, caring conversations (I’m actively addressing this every single day). Instead of trying to dress up poison as poise, I want to offer him the full force of a grounded, gorgeous Mama who knows where she stands on planet Earth.
What if you had to make a list of your lies from your past? And then the list of the people with whom you’d be frightened to share them? That list is the exact formula for your access to real freedom; on the other side of your fear to tell, is your voice. The art and science of the truth is how we humans can make real magic.
Our ability to be confident and truly present rides on our having nothing left to hide
Don’t worry about what others think of you
by Tom Murcko
Be who you are and say what you feel because those who mind don’t matter and those who matter don’t mind. – Dr. Seuss
According to most studies, people's number one fear is public speaking. Number two is death. Does that sound right? This means to the average person, if you go to a funeral, you're better off in the casket than doing the eulogy. – Jerry Seinfeld
Are you who people think you are? Or do you let them see only a persona carefully crafted for likeability? Do you tiptoe through life, saying and doing only what passes through your internal social acceptability filter?
Fear of social judgment wears many masks: shame, shyness, etiquette, prudence, perfectionism. Whatever form it comes in, its impact is to limit, to constrain, to constrict.
People who fear social judgment miss out on much of life. Across the room they see what could be the person of their dreams, but they don’t approach because of what a roomful of strangers might think if they’re rejected. By caring what these strangers think, they’re allowing people they’ll never see again to control their behavior.
Fear of social judgment also makes people think small. Accomplishing anything big is going to annoy some people, who will try to deter you. To really have an impact, you can’t let them get in your way.
Why are we so concerned about what others think of us? As with so much else, we inherited this trait from our ancestors. The ancient world that shaped your genes was one of small hunter-gatherer tribes. Everyone in the tribe knew each other and built their lives together. Survival and reproduction were all that mattered, so people did whatever it took to stay alive and get the best mates they could. Status was pursued, authority was revered, and group cohesion trumped individuality, so fitting in and being liked were essential.
In that world, obsessing over every word and act was justified. Those who said or did the wrong thing could be ostracized from the group, which would be disastrous. Dreading public speaking, seeking approval from those with status, and tending to go along with the crowd are all ancestral relics.
These innate tendencies that served your ancestors so well do not serve you in our modern world. You can choose what tribes to belong to, and what roles to play in each. If you mess up with one group, it rarely affects your status in others. And you have far more potential romantic partners to choose from now than your ancestors did, and if you’re rejected by one it rarely affects your chances with others.
More importantly, while your brain is wired for survival and reproduction, you can choose to focus on other priorities. Survival is easy now, and reproduction is just one part of a well-lived life, to be weighed in the balance with other things you may choose to value, like happiness, meaning, beauty, or justice. Focusing on other values may help you worry less about what other people think.
When you stop trying to impress others, you can express your true self more fully and connect with people, more genuinely, openly, intimately. The less time and energy you spend on image management, on making your life presentable to others, the more time you can spend on things that really matter.
How can you stop worrying about what people think of you?
· Bring awareness to how your decisions are currently affected by what others will think of you.
· Be unswayed by social pressure, unaffected by criticism, immune to embarrassment. And take fewer things personally. We’re biased toward sensitivity to criticism, insult, and rejection. And when these biases affect our behavior, we cede our power to others.
· Don’t look to others for guidance on how to behave. And don’t wait for permission from others. It’s easier to get forgiveness than permission.
· Don’t be needy. If you don’t need anything, you don’t have a reason to try to impress people.
Be authentic. Have the courage to allow people to see the real you. Be willing to be judged, and even encourage it. It’s good for self-knowledge and for developing thick skin. As you become and express your best self, others will think great things about you, and the few that don’t won’t matter anyway. If all this is too extreme for you, start by taking small steps. Expect it to be hard, and show yourself some compassion; you’re swimming against ancient currents thousands of generations old. Rather than not caring at all what others think of you, start by just caring less. Be open to what they think and feel, and consider their opinions, but decide for yourself how to act. Care what the important people in your life think, but only those whose opinions you value. Strangers should not get a vote in how you live your life.