Don't Undermine People Quotes

Dignity /ˈdignitē/ noun 1. The moment you realize that the person you cared for has nothing intellectually or spiritually to offer you, but a headache. 2. The moment you realize God had greater plans for you that don’t involve crying at night or sad Pinterest quotes. 3. The moment you stop comparing yourself to others because it undermines your worth, education and your parent’s wisdom. 4. The moment you live your dreams, not because of what it will prove or get you, but because that is all you want to do. People’s opinions don’t matter. 5. The moment you realize that no one is your enemy, except yourself. 6. The moment you realize that you can have everything you want in life. However, it takes timing, the right heart, the right actions, the right passion and a willingness to risk it all. If it is not yours, it is because you really didn’t want it, need it or God prevented it. 7. The moment you realize the ghost of your ancestors stood between you and the person you loved. They really don't want you mucking up the family line with someone that acts anything less than honorable. 8. The moment you realize that happiness was never about getting a person. They are only a helpmate towards achieving your life mission. 9. The moment you believe that love is not about losing or winning. It is just a few moments in time, followed by an eternity of situations to grow from. 10. The moment you realize that you were always the right person. Only ignorant people walk away from greatness.

I don't understand exactly what's going on, but Goodreads shouldn't be deleting reviews, period. People are smart enough to look at them on their own and make up their mind, and deleting reviews undermines the integrity of the site.

Fear can make you do more wrong than hate or jealousy. If you’re afraid you don’t commit yourself to life completely; fear makes you always, always hold something back. You shouldn’t be alone. It’s killing you; it’s undermining you. All the time, every day, you should be somewhere with people.

When people dis fantasy—mainstream readers and SF readers alike—they are almost always talking about one sub-genre of fantastic literature. They are talking about Tolkien, and Tolkien's innumerable heirs. Call it 'epic', or 'high', or 'genre' fantasy, this is what fantasy has come to mean. Which is misleading as well as unfortunate. Tolkien is the wen on the arse of fantasy literature. His oeuvre is massive and contagious—you can't ignore it, so don't even try. The best you can do is consciously try to lance the boil. And there's a lot to dislike—his cod-Wagnerian pomposity, his boys-own-adventure glorying in war, his small-minded and reactionary love for hierarchical status-quos, his belief in absolute morality that blurs moral and political complexity. Tolkien's clichés—elves 'n' dwarfs 'n' magic rings—have spread like viruses. He wrote that the function of fantasy was 'consolation', thereby making it an article of policy that a fantasy writer should mollycoddle the reader. That is a revolting idea, and one, thankfully, that plenty of fantasists have ignored. From the Surrealists through the pulps—via Mervyn Peake and Mikhael Bulgakov and Stefan Grabiński and Bruno Schulz and Michael Moorcock and M. John Harrison and I could go on—the best writers have used the fantastic aesthetic precisely to challenge, to alienate, to subvert and undermine expectations. Of course I'm not saying that any fan of Tolkien is no friend of mine—that would cut my social circle considerably. Nor would I claim that it's impossible to write a good fantasy book with elves and dwarfs in it—Michael Swanwick's superb Iron Dragon's Daughter gives the lie to that. But given that the pleasure of fantasy is supposed to be in its limitless creativity, why not try to come up with some different themes, as well as unconventional monsters? Why not use fantasy to challenge social and aesthetic lies? Thankfully, the alternative tradition of fantasy has never died. And it's getting stronger. Chris Wooding, Michael Swanwick, Mary Gentle, Paul di Filippo, Jeff VanderMeer, and many others, are all producing works based on fantasy's radicalism. Where traditional fantasy has been rural and bucolic, this is often urban, and frequently brutal. Characters are more than cardboard cutouts, and they're not defined by race or sex. Things are gritty and tricky, just as in real life. This is fantasy not as comfort-food, but as challenge. The critic Gabe Chouinard has said that we're entering a new period, a renaissance in the creative radicalism of fantasy that hasn't been seen since the New Wave of the sixties and seventies, and in echo of which he has christened the Next Wave. I don't know if he's right, but I'm excited. This is a radical literature. It's the literature we most deserve.

Sorry,” Kiersten says to Lake and I. “Mom says the FCC is responsible for inventing cusswords just for media shock value. She says if everyone would just use them enough, they wouldn’t be considered cusswords anymore and no one would ever be offended by them” This kid is hard to keep up with! “Your mother encourages you to cuss?” Gavin says. Kiersten nods. “I don’t see it that way. It’s more like she’s encouraging us to undermine a system flawed through overuse of words that are made out to be harmful, when in fact they’re just letters, mixed together like every other word. That’s all they are, mixed up letters. Like, take the word “butterfly” for example. What if someone decided one day that butterfly is a cussword? People would eventually start using butterfly as an insult, and to emphasize things in a negative way. The actual WORD doesn’t mean anything. It’s the negative association people give these words that make them cusswords. So if we all just decided to keep saying butterfly all the time, eventually people would stop caring. The shock value would subside…and it would just become another word again. Same with every other so-called bad word. If we would all just start saying them all the time, They wouldn’t be bad anymore. That’s what my mom says anyway.” “Kiersten?” Eddie says. “Will you be my new best friend?” Lake grabs a french fry off her plate and throws it at Eddie, hitting her in the face with it. “That’s Bullshit,” Lake says. “Oh, go BUTTERFLY yourself,” Eddie says. She returns a fry in Lakes direction.

There certainly are some women who treat their male partners badly, berating them, calling them names, attempting to control them. The negative impact on these men’s lives can be considerable. But do we see men whose self-esteem is gradually destroyed through this process? Do we see men whose progress in school or in their careers grinds to a halt because of the constant criticism and undermining? Where are the men whose partners are forcing them to have unwanted sex? Where are the men who are fleeing to shelters in fear for their lives? How about the ones who try to get to a phone to call for help, but the women block their way or cut the line? The reason we don’t generally see these men is simple: They’re rare. I don’t question how embarrassing it would be for a man to come forward and admit that a woman is abusing him. But don’t underestimate how humiliated a woman feels when she reveals abuse; women crave dignity just as much as men do. If shame stopped people from coming forward, no one would tell.

People in love overvalue their heart and undervalue their mind.

There are people who fantasize about suicide, and paradoxically, these fantasies can be soothing because they usually involve either fantasizing about others' reactions to one's suicide or imagining how death would be a relief from life's travails. In both cases, an aspect of the fantasy is to exert control, either over others' views or toward life's difficulties. The writer A. Alvarez stated, " There people ... for whom the mere idea of suicide is enough; they can continue to function efficiently and even happily provided they know they have their own, specially chosen means of escape always ready..." In her riveting 2008 memoir of bipolar disorder, Manic, Terri Cheney opened the book by stating, "People... don't understand that when you're seriously depressed, suicidal ideation can be the only thing that keeps you alive. Just knowing there's an out--even if it's bloody, even if it's permanent--makes the pain bearable for one more day." This strategy appears to be effective for some people, but only for a while. Over longer periods, fantasizing about death leaves people more depressed and thus at higher risk for suicide, as Eddie Selby, Mike Amestis, and I recently showed in a study on violent daydreaming. A strategy geared toward increased feelings of self-control (fantasizing about the effects of one's suicide) "works" momentarily, but ultimately backfires by undermining feelings of genuine self-control in the long run.

There are so many bad people in the world. They'll treat you badly, they'll haggle and undermine your worth. They'll calculate what they can get without thinking about what to give. That's the world. Very seldom, you'll find someone who will not undermine and haggle your worth, who will take risks for you, who will think about what they can give to you and how they can make you happy. So you see, the rule goes like this— when you find such a person, you don't let go of them. You stay with them and they stay with you.

And you are very capable. Don't let a tiny group of people with no idea of how to reasonably voice their opinions undermine your confidence.

The real test of this country's perimeters of freedom of speech will be found if or when a person can freely discuss racism without being subject to intellectually dishonest attempts to undermine their arguments. If free speech, as so many insist, includes being prepared to hear opinions that you don't like, then let's open up the parameters of what we consider acceptable debate.

Golden eagles don`t mate with bald eagles, deer don`t mate with antelope, gray wolves don`t mate with red wolves. Just look at domesticated animals, at mongrel dogs, and mixed breed horses, and you`ll know the Great Mystery didn`t intend them to be that way. We weakened the species and introduced disease by mixing what should be kept seperate. Among humans, intermarriage weakens the respect people have for themselves and for their traditions. It undermines clarity of spirit and mind.

If you care about other people, that's now a very dangerous idea. If you care about other people, you might try to organize to undermine power and authority. That's not going to happen if you care only about yourself. Maybe you can become rich, but you don't care whether other people's kids can go to school, or can afford food to eat, or things like that. In the United States, that's called "libertarian" for some wild reason. I mean, it's actually highly authoritarian, but that doctrine is extremely important for power systems as a way of atomizing and undermining the public.

How big a war?" "A worse one than the one fifty years ago, I expect," said Cheery. "I don't recall people talking about that one," said Vimes. "Most humans didn't know about it," said Cheery. "It mostly took place underground. Undermining passages and digging invasion tunnels and so on. Perhaps a few houses fell into mysterious holes and people didn't get their coal, but that was about it." "You mean dwarfs just try to collapse mines on other dwarfs?" "Oh, yes." "I thought you were all law-abiding?" "Oh, yes, sir. Very law-abiding. Just not very merciful.

Believing that the world is fair, people fail to note the various land mines in the environment that can undermine their careers.

A good negotiator prepares, going in, to be ready for possible surprises; a great negotiator aims to use her skills to reveal the surprises she is certain to find. Don’t commit to assumptions; instead, view them as hypotheses and use the negotiation to test them rigorously. People who view negotiation as a battle of arguments become overwhelmed by the voices in their head. Negotiation is not an act of battle; it’s a process of discovery. The goal is to uncover as much information as possible. To quiet the voices in your head, make your sole and all-encompassing focus the other person and what they have to say. Slow. It. Down. Going too fast is one of the mistakes all negotiators are prone to making. If we’re too much in a hurry, people can feel as if they’re not being heard. You risk undermining the rapport and trust you’ve built. Put a smile on your face. When people are in a positive frame of mind, they think more quickly, and are more likely to collaborate and problem-solve (instead of fight and resist). Positivity creates mental agility in both you and your counterpart.

Leadership is often misunderstood. When people hear that someone has an impressive title or an assigned leadership position, they assume that individual to be a leader. Sometimes that’s true. But titles don’t have much value when it comes to leading. True leadership cannot be awarded, appointed, or assigned. It comes only from influence, and that cannot be mandated. It must be earned. The only thing a title can buy is a little time—either to increase your level of influence with others or to undermine it.

But in modern America we often shame the wrong people. Instead of deterring behavior that undermines the common good, shame is too often deployed against people who don’t fit in—to ostracize them even further.

Angry now? My, yes, you would be… angry that you fucked up. Angry that you’re not as clever as you think. Angry that the gods gave lots of other people the same sort of brain they gave Locke Lamora. Quite the pisser, isn’t it?... 'He doesn’t rule his graveyard by logic, boy; he rules it by fear. Fear of him keeps the older sprats in line. Fear of them keeps little shits like you in line. Anything that undermines that fear is a threat to his position. Enter Locke Lamora waving the idiot flag and thinking himself so much cleverer than the rest of the world!' 'I really… I don’t… think I’m cleverer than the rest of the world.' 'You did until three minutes ago.

We who have the power to make choices disproportionately shape outcomes and limit options for people who don’t have the power to make choices. It follows that if we don’t share the power to make choices, we will never see a change to those things we say are bad or unacceptable to our society. When those of us who have the means maximize our own children’s and our own families’ advantages, we are contributing to strengthening norms about achievement, success/failure, that undermine our fellow citizens’ well-being.

Talk about how various people have been “winners” in “the lottery of life” or have things that others don’t have just because they “happen to have money” is part of the delegitimizing of property as a prelude to seizing it. Luck certainly plays a very large role in all our lives. But we need to be very clear about what that role is. Very few people just “happen” to have money. Typically, they have it because their fellow human beings have voluntarily paid them for providing some goods or services, which are valued more than the money that is paid for them. It is not a zero-sum game. Both sides are better off because of it—and the whole society is better off when such transactions take place freely among free and independent people. Who can better decide the value of the goods and services that someone has produced than the people who actually use those goods and services—and pay for them with their own hard-earned money? Luck may well have played a role in enabling some people to provide valuable goods and services. Others might have been able to do the same if they had been raised by better parents, taught in better schools or chanced upon someone who pointed them in the right direction. But you are not going to change that by confiscating the fruits of productivity. All you are likely to do is reduce that productivity and undermine the virtues and attitudes that create prosperity and make a free society possible.

Abusive Relationships There is a knot of injustice that sits in your stomach. You know how you are being treated is wrong, but you don’t know how to word it. And even if you could put it into words, you don’t know how to make people listen. And the only one who will listen, is the one who is responsible for your suffering. And the only one who understands you, is the one who undermines you. And your abuser has created a world where the volume is turned all the way down so even if you ever found your voice, no one would hear it.

Most people don’t get (or want) to look at old news footage, but we looked at thirty years of stories relating to motherhood. In the 1970s, with the exception of various welfare reform proposals, there was almost nothing in the network news about motherhood, working mothers, or childcare. And when you go back and watch news footage from 1972, for example, all you see is John Chancellor at NBC in black and white reading the news with no illustrating graphics, or Walter Cronkite sitting in front of a map of the world that one of the Rugrats could have drawn–that’s it. But by the 1980s, the explosion in the number of working mothers, the desperate need for day care, sci-fi level reproductive technologies, the discovery of how widespread child abuse was–all this was newsworthy. At the same time, the network news shows were becoming more flashy and sensationalistic in their efforts to compete with tabloid TV offerings like A Current Affair and America’s Most Wanted. NBC, for example introduced a story about day care centers in 1984 with a beat-up Raggedy Ann doll lying limp next to a chair with the huge words Child Abuse scrawled next to her in what appeared to be Charles Manson’s handwriting. So stories that were titillating, that could be really tarted up, that were about children and sex, or children and violence–well, they just got more coverage than why Senator Rope-a-Dope refused to vote for decent day care. From the McMartin day-care scandal and missing children to Susan Smith and murdering nannies, the barrage of kids-in-jeopardy, ‘innocence corrupted’ stories made mothers feel they had to guard their kids with the same intensity as the secret service guys watching POTUS.

you haven’t experienced anything resembling empathy since the first few weeks of the relationship; you feel chronically undermined, dehumanized, and invalidated; you no longer trust your own decisions; you have withdrawn from other people who matter to you and do not really feel confident enough to push yourself; and you may even be depressed.

I think there has never been a more misunderstood phrase than drama is conflict, conflict is drama. Instead of thinking of conflict, I like to think of dialectic, a need for opposites that undermine each other. Or, I think about the need for contrast in painting. Paintings don't need large family fights and mudslinging, but they do need contrasts of color and shade. Of course, watching people insulting other people is entertaining, as are arm wrestling, bearbaiting, and the like. But I'm not sure that it's necessary to the drama, for drama is also a spectacle, A thing of interesrt, a thing happening , an event eventing, which us not necessarily a thing fighting. Though fighting can certainly be dramatic, it is not a necessary precondition to the dramatic.

The issue is your undermining of the authority of rational argument. What it liberates people to do is to act on their deepest prejudices, without having to justify them rationally. Don’t assume that what they do then will be politically acceptable to you. If they feel liberated to choose injustice and cruelty, you may not like the results. You may be the first to be lined up against the wall and shot.

Avoid the anonymous “we” and “they,” because they mask personal responsibility. Things don’t just happen by themselves—they happen because specific people did or didn’t do specific things. Don’t undermine personal accountability with vagueness. Instead of the passive generalization or the royal “we,” attribute specific actions to specific people: “Harry didn’t handle this well.” Also avoid “We should . . .” or “We are . . .” and so on.

What shapes the best in us dies when the best education dies! The best in us shall always be undermined when they that are responsible for shaping the best in us are always undermined! I stand for a different education: a different education where students will not just learn books but life! I stand for a different education: a different education where students will not just learn moral principles, but they shall be living examples of moral principles. I stand for a different education: a different education where students don’t just understand what they learn, but practice what they learn with understanding! I stand for a different education: a different education where students will not just learn about people of different beliefs, culture and backgrounds, but how to live with people who don’t share common perspective with them and know how to show their emotions of bitterness and misunderstanding rightly! I stand for a different education: a different education where students will be perfect ambassadors’ of God on earth and live their daily lives with all due diligence! I stand for a different education: a different education where students will understand why we all breathe the same air, sleep and wake up each day in the same manner to continue the journey of life! I stand for a different education: a different education where students will learn with inspiration even in their desperations! I stand for a different education: a different education where teachers are seen as true epitome of education! I stand for a different education: a different education in which the value of the teacher is well understood and the teacher is well valued as a treasure! I stand for a different education: a different education where students will not just learn, but they will reproduce great and noble things with what they learn! I stand for a different education: a different education where students will understand the real meaning of integrity and responsibility and with true courage and humility be that as such! I stand for a different education: a different education where education means creativity! Education is the spine of every nation! The better the education, the better the nation! The mediocre the education, the mediocre the nation! A good nation is good because of how education has shaped the perspective and understanding of the populace! A nation that does not know where it is heading towards must ask the machine that produces the populace who drive the nation: education! Until we fix our education, we shall always have a wrong education and we shall always see a wrong nation!

No amount of black girl magic, no repeated proclamations of our worth can fully treat the wound – although acknowledging its persistence is a beginning. The ultimate remedy, as I see it is supernatural. I look daily toward heaven for restoration, for spiritual healing. My true identity isn’t rooted in our history, grievous and glorious as it is. It is grounded in my designation as a Child of God, the Daughter of the Great Physician. In His care I find my cure. My hope for you is the same one I carry for myself. I pray that amid the heartache of our ancestry you can grant yourself the grace so seldom extended to us. I pray that you can pass that compassion on to your children and to their children so that it slathers comfort on our sore spots. I pray that, as a people, we can give ourselves a soft place to land. I pray even as we rightly express our fury as being regarded as sub-human, that we don’t dwell in that space. That we don’t allow anger to poison our spirits. That we embrace love as our One True Antidote. I hope, too, that you recognize your specialness, the distinctiveness the Creator has imbued us with. I see you as clearly as history has, and in unison with it, I nod. I know that swivel in your hips, that fervor in your testimony, that ebullience in your stride, that flair in your song. The fact that others are constantly trying to diminish you, ever attempting to dismiss your talents even as they mimic you, is proof of your uniqueness! No one bothers to undermine you unless they recognize your brilliance. More than anything, I pray that you can carve out a purpose for yourself, a calling beyond your own survival, a sweet offering to the world. You gain a life by giving yours away. Not everyone is meant to raise a picket sign, and yet each of us can choose a path of impact. Rearing your children with affection and warmth is a form of activism. Honoring your word impeccably is a way to raise your voice. Performing your job with excellence, with your chin high and your standards higher is as powerful as any protest march. Sowing into the lives of young people is a worthy crusade. That is what it means to leave this world of ours more lit up than we found it. It’s also what it means to lead a magnificent life, even if an unlikely one.

In my experience, conservative Christians often think they are accepting others, but then they undermine that alleged acceptance by saying that they, “Love the sinner, but hate their sin.” Genuine empathy doesn’t mean, “accepting” the person while criticizing everything about that person. As Thomas Merton put it, “The beginning of love is to let those we love be perfectly themselves, and not to twist them to fit our own image. Otherwise we love only the reflection of ourselves we find in them.

You know, of course, that as prophesied by Moroni, there are those whose research relating to Joseph Smith is not for the purpose of gaining added light and knowledge but to undermine his character, magnify his flaws, and if possible destroy his influence. Their work product can sometimes be jarring, and so can issues raised at times by honest historians and researchers with no “axe to grind.” But I would offer you this advice in your own study: Be patient, don’t be superficial, and don’t ignore the Spirit. In counseling patience, I simply mean that while some answers come quickly or with little effort, others are simply not available for the moment because information or evidence is lacking. Don’t suppose, however, that a lack of evidence about something today means that evidence doesn’t exist or that it will not be forthcoming in the future. The absence of evidence is not proof. . . . When I say don’t be superficial, I mean don’t form conclusions based on unexamined assertions or incomplete research, and don’t be influenced by insincere seekers. I would offer you the advice of our Assistant Church Historian, Rick Turley, an intellectually gifted researcher and author whose recent works include the definitive history of the Mountain Meadows Massacre. He says simply, “Don’t study Church history too little.” While some honestly pursue truth and real understanding, others are intent on finding or creating doubts. Their interpretations may come from projecting 21st Century concepts and culture backward onto 19th Century people. If there are differing interpretations possible, they will pick the most negative. They sometimes accuse the Church of hiding something because they only recently found or heard about it—an interesting accusation for a Church that’s publishing 24 volumes of all it can find of Joseph Smith’s papers. They may share their assumptions and speculations with some glee, but either can’t or won’t search further to find contradictory information. . . . A complete understanding can never be attained by scholarly research alone, especially since much of what is needed is either lost or never existed. There is no benefit in imposing artificial limits on ourselves that cut off the light of Christ and the revelations of the Holy Spirit. Remember, “By the power of the Holy Ghost, ye may know the truth of all things.” . . . If you determine to sit still, paralyzed until every question is answered and every whisper of doubt resolved, you will never move because in this life there will always be some issue pending or something yet unexplained.

Here is the paradox that libertarians just don’t get: the Internet was conceived and paid for by the US government. It was not a product of the free market as we think of it today—the realization of some young entrepreneur’s dreams. It was painstakingly researched and executed by a bunch of academics for whom IPO billions weren’t a reason to work. Rather, these people were fundamentally convinced that they could make the world a better place with their inventions. Every piece of code—HTML, TCP/IP—was donated to the ARPANET project royalty-free.

Trump represented a broader trend in international politics, toward what has been labeled populist nationalism.1 Populist leaders seek to use the legitimacy conferred by democratic elections to consolidate power. They claim direct charismatic connection to “the people,” who are often defined in narrow ethnic terms that exclude big parts of the population. They don’t like institutions and seek to undermine the checks and balances that limit a leader’s personal power in a modern liberal democracy: courts, the legislature, an independent media, and a nonpartisan bureaucracy.

If you care about other people that’s now a very dangerous idea,” Noam Chomsky suggests. “If you care about other people you might try to organize or to undermine power and authority. That’s not going to happen if you care only about yourself. Maybe you can become rich, you don’t care whether other people’s kids can go to school or afford food to eat or things like that. In the United States that’s called libertarian for some wild reason. I mean it’s actually highly authoritarian but that doctrine is extremely important for power systems as a way of atomizing and undermining the public.”3

For a lot of people identifying problems is difficult to do. Most people would rather celebrate all the things that are going well while sweeping problems under the rug. Those people have their priorities exactly backward, and there is little that can be more harmful to an organization. Don’t undermine your progress in pursuit of a pat on the back; celebrate finding out what is not going well so you can make it go better. Thinking about problems that are difficult to solve may make you anxious, but not thinking about them (and therefore not dealing with them) should make you even more anxious.

Free speech is a fundamental foundation of a free and fair democracy. But let’s be honest and have the guts to unpick who gets to speak, where, and why. The real test of this country’s perimeters of freedom of speech will be found if or when a person can freely discuss racism without being subject to intellectually dishonest attempts to undermine their arguments. If free speech, as so many insist, includes being prepared to hear opinions that you don’t like, then let’s open up the parameters of what we consider acceptable debate. I don’t mean new versions of old bigotry. I mean, that if we have to listen to this kind of bigotry, then let us have the equal and opposite viewpoint. If Katie Hopkins, with help from the Sun newspaper, publishes a column describing desperate refugees trying to travel to Britain as cockroaches, then we need a cultural commentator that advocates for true compassion and total open borders. Not the kind of wishy-washy liberalism that harps on about the cultural and economic contributions of migrants to this country as though they are resources to be sucked dry, but someone who speaks in favour of migrants and open borders with the same force of will with which Hopkins despises them.

Authoritarians rise when economic, social, political, or religious change makes members of a formerly powerful group feel as if they have been left behind. Their frustration makes them vulnerable to leaders who promise to make them dominant again. A strongman downplays the real conditions that have created their problems and tells them that the only reason they have been dispossessed is that enemies have cheated them of power. Such leaders undermine existing power structures, and as they collapse, people previously apathetic about politics turn into activists, not necessarily expecting a better life, but seeing themselves as heroes reclaiming the country. Leaders don’t try to persuade people to support real solutions, but instead reinforce their followers’ fantasy self-image and organize them into a mass movement. Once people internalize their leader’s propaganda, it doesn’t matter when pieces of it are proven to be lies, because it has become central to their identity. As a strongman becomes more and more destructive, followers’ loyalty only increases. Having begun to treat their perceived enemies badly, they need to believe their victims deserve it. Turning against the leader who inspired such behavior would mean admitting they had been wrong and that they, not their enemies, are evil. This, they cannot do.

Jordan B. Peterson says self-esteem doesn’t exist… and that SE training mostly results in narcissism. Jack Canfield says he wrote his first book about it. And guess what? They’ve BOTH been to Harvard! What are we to do in this confusing world? I started going to AA meetings and people there tell you to find a loving God… and then to get a job at the Kroger… Something’s wrong with this picture. If self-esteem exists, and I pray to God that it does, I cannot possibly find a job that will pay me enough money without undermining the dignity of my work, after all this Spirituality, and Sobriety, and Self Esteem & Therapy I've accumulated.... don't make me laugh. And I’m a bright guy, too. Officially.

Party tactics?” “People like your wife are dangerous.” “Why?” Hamilton asked. “They don’t belong to any group. They fool around with everything. As soon as we turn our back—” “So you destroy them. You turn them over to the lunatic patriots.” “The lunatic patriots,” McFeyffe said, “we can understand. But not your wife. She signs Party peace petitions and she reads the Chicago Tribune. People like her—they’re more of a menace to Party discipline than any other bunch. The cult of individualism. The idealist with his own law, his own ethics. Refusing to accept authority. It undermines society. It topples the whole structure. Nothing lasting can be built on it. People like your wife just won’t take orders.” “McFeyffe,

Fighting for something you believe in isn't easy. If you hit a sore spot, people are going to swipe at you, gripe at you, try to undermine you, infuriate you, try to shut you up and put you back in your box. I was starting to learn that was a sign you were asking the right questions, picking the right scabs. And though it's easy to lose yourself along the way, and start focusing on all the people who don't want things to change--for whatever broken, messed-up reasons of their own--you can easily find your way back. By listening to the people giving you a hand up. To the people who have your back. To the people who don't think you're a raving lunatic. Let them be your mirror--not the haters. Let them give you the strength to get the job done.

1.The moment you realize that the person you cared for has nothing intellectually or spiritually to offer you, but a headache. 2. The moment you realize God had greater plans for you that don’t involve crying at night or sad Pinterest quotes. 3. The moment you stop comparing yourself to others because it undermines your worth, education and your parent’s wisdom. 4. The moment you live your dreams, not because of what it will prove or get you, but because that is all you want to do. People’s opinions don’t matter. 5. The moment you realize that no one is your enemy, except yourself. 6. The moment you realize that you can have everything you want in life. However, it takes timing, the right heart, the right actions, the right passion and a willingness to risk it all. If it is not yours, it is because you really didn’t want it, need it or God prevented it. 7. The moment you realize the ghost of your ancestors stood between you and the person you loved. They really don't want you mucking up the family line with someone that acts anything less than honorable. 8. The moment you realize that happiness was never about getting a person. They are only a helpmate towards achieving your life mission. 9. The moment you believe that love is not about losing or winning. It is just a few moments in time, followed by an eternity of situations to grow from. 10. The moment you realize that you were always the right person. Only ignorant people walk away from greatness.” ― Shannon L. Alder

food has played a central role not only in my professional but also in my emotional life, in all of my dealings with loved ones and most of all in my relationship to myself and my body. I am what feeds me. And how I feed myself at any given moment says a lot about what I’m going through or what I need. I don’t believe I am alone. Yes, we eat for our stomachs, but we hunger with our hearts. Like most people and many women, I think about what to eat all the time. I am constantly plotting my next meal, planning how and what I will shop for, and ever hatching new plans to avoid the foods I know will undermine my well-being. Foods are like men: some are good, some are bad, and some are okay only in small doses. But most should be tried at least once.

Ditch the hedges. When the goal is to convey confidence, avoid words and phrases like “may,” “could,” and “in my opinion,” which suggest that things, and the people saying them, are uncertain Use definites. Rather than hedging, use definites instead. Words like “definitely,” “clearly,” and “obviously,” which suggest whatever was said isn’t just an opinion, it’s an irrefutable truth. Don’t hesitate. Ums and uhs are natural parts of speech, but too many of them can undermine people’s confidence in us and our message. So cut the fillers. To decrease hesitations, plan what to say in advance or pause to collect your thoughts when needed. Turn pasts into presents. Using the present tense can communicate confidence and increase persuasion. So to signal certainty, rather than using past tense (e.g., “I loved that book”), use present tense (e.g., “I love that book”) instead.

If you talk to these extraordinary people, you find that they all understand this at one level or another. They may be unfamiliar with the concept of cognitive adaptability, but they seldom buy into the idea that they have reached the peak of their fields because they were the lucky winners of some genetic lottery. They know what is required to develop the extraordinary skills that they possess because they have experienced it firsthand. One of my favorite testimonies on this topic came from Ray Allen, a ten-time All-Star in the National Basketball Association and the greatest three-point shooter in the history of that league. Some years back, ESPN columnist Jackie MacMullan wrote an article about Allen as he was approaching his record for most three-point shots made. In talking with Allen for that story, MacMullan mentioned that another basketball commentator had said that Allen was born with a shooting touch—in other words, an innate gift for three-pointers. Allen did not agree. “I’ve argued this with a lot of people in my life,” he told MacMullan. “When people say God blessed me with a beautiful jump shot, it really pisses me off. I tell those people, ‘Don’t undermine the work I’ve put in every day.’ Not some days. Every day. Ask anyone who has been on a team with me who shoots the most. Go back to Seattle and Milwaukee, and ask them. The answer is me.” And, indeed, as MacMullan noted, if you talk to Allen’s high school basketball coach you will find that Allen’s jump shot was not noticeably better than his teammates’ jump shots back then; in fact, it was poor. But Allen took control, and over time, with hard work and dedication, he transformed his jump shot into one so graceful and natural that people assumed he was born with it. He took advantage of his gift—his real gift.   ABOUT

Does it undermine my image as a warrior to be with you?' 'No. Does it undermine Feyre's when she's seen with Rhys?' Her stomach tightened. Her heartbeat pulsed in her arms, her gut. 'It's different for them,' she made herself say as they reached the end of the bridge and turned to walk along the quay flanking the river. Cassian asked carefully. 'Why?' Nesta kept her focus on the glittering river, vibrant with the hues of sunset. 'Because they're mates.' At his utter silence, she knew what he'd say. Halted again, bracing herself for it. Cassian's face was a void. Completely empty as he said, 'And we're not?' Nesta said nothing. He huffed a laugh. 'Because they're mates and you don't want us to be.' 'That word means nothing to me, Cassian,' she said, voice thick as she tried to keep the people who strode past from overhearing. 'It means something to all of you, but for most of my life, husband and wife was as good as it got. Mate is just a word.' 'That's bullshit.' When she only began walking along the river again, he asked. 'Why are you frightened?' 'I'm not frightened.' 'What spooked you? Just being seen publicly with me like this?' Yes. Having him kiss her and realising that soon she'd have to return to the world humming around them, and leave the House, and she didn't know what she would do then. What it would mean for them. If she would plunge back into that dark place she'd occupied before. Drag him down with her. 'Nesta. Talk to me.' She met his stare, but wouldn't open her mouth. Cassian's eyes blazed. 'Say it.' She refused. 'Say it, Nesta.' 'I don't know what you're talking about.' 'Ask me why I vanished for nearly a week after Solstice. Why I suddenly had to do an inspection right after a holiday.' Nesta kept her mouth shut. 'It was because I woke up the next morning and all I wanted to do was fuck you for a week straight. And I knew what that meant, what had happened, even though you didn't, and I didn't want to scare you. You weren't ready for the truth- not yet.' Her mouth went dry. 'Say it,' Cassian snarled. People gave them a wide berth. Some outright turned back toward the direction they'd come from. 'No.' His face shuttered with rage even as his voice became calm. 'Say it.' She couldn't. Not before he'd ordered her to, and certainly not now. She couldn't let him win like that. 'Say what I guessed from the moment we met,' he breathed. 'What I knew the first time I kissed you. What became unbreakable between us on Solstice night.' She wouldn't. 'I am your mate, for fuck's sake!' Cassian shouted, loud enough for people across the river to hear. 'You are my mate! Why are you still fighting it?' She let the truth, voiced at last, wash over her. 'You promised me forever on Solstice,' he said, voice breaking. 'Why is one word somehow throwing you off that?' 'Because with that one word, the last scrap of my humanity goes away!' She didn't care who saw them, who heard. 'With that one stupid word, I am no longer human in any way. I'm one of you!' He blinked. 'I thought you wanted to be one of us.' 'I don't know what I want. I didn't have a choice.' 'Well, I didn't have a choice in being shackled to you, either.' The declaration slammed into her. Shackled. He sucked in a breath. 'That was an incredibly poor choice of words.' 'But the truth, right?' 'No, I was angry- it's not true.' 'Why? Your friends saw me for what I was. What I am. The mating bond made you stupidly blind to it. How many times did they warn you away from me, Cassian?' She barked a cold laugh. Shackled. Words beckoned, sharp as knives, begging for her to grab one and plunge it into his chest. Make him hurt as much as that one would hurt her. Make him bleed. But if she did that, if she ripped into him... She couldn't. Wouldn't let herself do it.

■​A good negotiator prepares, going in, to be ready for possible surprises; a great negotiator aims to use her skills to reveal the surprises she is certain to find. ■​Don’t commit to assumptions; instead, view them as hypotheses and use the negotiation to test them rigorously. ■​People who view negotiation as a battle of arguments become overwhelmed by the voices in their head. Negotiation is not an act of battle; it’s a process of discovery. The goal is to uncover as much information as possible. ■​To quiet the voices in your head, make your sole and all-encompassing focus the other person and what they have to say. ■​Slow. It. Down. Going too fast is one of the mistakes all negotiators are prone to making. If we’re too much in a hurry, people can feel as if they’re not being heard. You risk undermining the rapport and trust you’ve built. ■​Put a smile on your face. When people are in a positive frame of mind, they think more quickly, and are more likely to collaborate and problem-solve (instead of fight and resist). Positivity creates mental agility in both you and your counterpart. There are three voice tones available to negotiators: 1.​The late-night FM DJ voice: Use selectively to make a point. Inflect your voice downward, keeping it calm and slow. When done properly, you create an aura of authority and trustworthiness without triggering defensiveness. 2.​The positive/playful voice: Should be your default voice. It’s the voice of an easygoing, good-natured person. Your attitude is light and encouraging. The key here is to relax and smile while you’re talking. 3.​The direct or assertive voice: Used rarely. Will cause problems and create pushback. ■​Mirrors work magic. Repeat the last three words (or the critical one to three words) of what someone has just said. We fear what’s different and are drawn to what’s similar. Mirroring is the art of insinuating similarity, which facilitates bonding. Use mirrors to encourage the other side to empathize and bond with you, keep people talking, buy your side time to regroup, and encourage your counterparts to reveal their strategy.

Insecure leaders are dangerous - to themselves, their followers, and the organizations they lead. That's because a leadership position becomes an amplifier of personal flaws. Whatever negative baggage you have in life only gets heavier when you're trying to lead others. Unsure leaders have several common traits: 1. They don't provide security for others - To become an effective leader, you need to make your followers feel good about themselves. 2. They take more from people than they give - Insecure people are on a continual quest for validation, acknowledgment, and love. Because of that, their focus is on finding security, not instilling it in others. 3. They continually limit their best people - Show me an insecure leader, and I'll show you someone who cannot genuinely celebrate victories. The leader might even take credit personally for the best work of the team. 4. They continually limit their organization - When followers are undermined and receive no recognition, they become discouraged and eventually stop performing at their potential. And when that happens, the entire organization suffers.

Imagine the following. Three groups of ten individuals are in a park at lunchtime with a rainstorm threatening. In the first group, someone says: “Get up and follow me.” When he starts walking and only a few others join in, he yells to those still seated: “Up, I said, and now!” In the second group, someone says: “We’re going to have to move. Here’s the plan. Each of us stands up and marches in the direction of the apple tree. Please stay at least two feet away from other group members and do not run. Do not leave any personal belongings on the ground here and be sure to stop at the base of the tree. When we are all there . . .” In the third group, someone tells the others: “It’s going to rain in a few minutes. Why don’t we go over there and sit under that huge apple tree. We’ll stay dry, and we can have fresh apples for lunch.” I am sometimes amazed at how many people try to transform organizations using methods that look like the first two scenarios: authoritarian decree and micromanagement. Both approaches have been applied widely in enterprises over the last century, but mostly for maintaining existing systems, not transforming those systems into something better. When the goal is behavior change, unless the boss is extremely powerful, authoritarian decree often works poorly even in simple situations, like the apple tree case. Increasingly, in complex organizations, this approach doesn’t work at all. Without the power of kings and queens behind it, authoritarianism is unlikely to break through all the forces of resistance. People will ignore you or pretend to cooperate while doing everything possible to undermine your efforts. Micromanagement tries to get around this problem by specifying what employees should do in detail and then monitoring compliance. This tactic can break through some of the barriers to change, but in an increasingly unacceptable amount of time. Because the creation and communication of detailed plans is deadly slow, the change produced this way tends to be highly incremental. Only the approach used in the third scenario above has the potential to break through all the forces that support the status quo and to encourage the kind of dramatic shifts found in successful transformations. (See figure 5–1.) This approach is based on vision—a central component of all great leadership.

Most of them seem to be at it in the roof-garden. Want to go and watch,get some pressure up for later?” “I think these cigarettes are horrible. Made my throat so sore. And my guts are all sour and nasty. Did people really use twenty in a day?” “They call it streamlining, of course, but what it comes down to is they’re undermining my responsibility in the firm and I’m going to fight tooth and claw to hang on to what I’ve got. If I have to play it dirty that’ll be their fault, not mine.” “It makes genuine three-dimensional poetry possible for the first time in history. Right now he’s experimenting with motion added, and some of the things he’s turned out are hair-raising.” “You hold the knife this way, see?” “Refuse to teach their children to read and write, say it handicaps them for the post-Gutenberg era.” “Not many people have spotted it but there’s a loophole in the Maryland eugenics law.” “A polyformer for water-sculpture, quite new.” “Of course I don’t love Henry the way I love you but the shrinker did tell me I ought to occasionally.” “I’m just cutting jets for a prayer or two but I’ll be back—don’t get involved with anyone else.” “That makes seventeen different mixtures I’ve tried, and I’d better have some antalc, right away.” “I think it was bitchy not to tell Miriam it was pig-meat.

I began to see that the stronger a therapy emphasized feelings, self-esteem, and self-confidence, the more dependent the therapist was upon his providing for the patient ongoing, unconditional, positive regard. The more self-esteem was the end, the more the means, in the form of the patient’s efforts, had to appear blameless in the face of failure. In this paradigm, accuracy and comparison must continually be sacrificed to acceptance and compassion; which often results in the escalation of bizarre behavior and bizarre diagnoses. The bizarre behavior results from us taking credit for everything that is positive and assigning blame elsewhere for anything negative. Because of this skewed positive-feedback loop between our judged actions and our beliefs, we systematically become more and more adapted to ourselves, our feelings, and our inaccurate solitary thinking; and less and less adapted to the environment that we share with our fellows. The resultant behavior, such as crying, depression, displays of temper, high-risk behavior, or romantic ventures, or abandonment of personal responsibilities, which seem either compulsory, necessary, or intelligent to us, will begin to appear more and more irrational to others. The bizarre diagnoses occur because, in some cases, if a ‘cause disease’ (excuse from blame) does not exist, it has to be 'discovered’ (invented). Psychiatry has expanded its diagnoses of mental disease every year to include 'illnesses’ like kleptomania and frotteurism [now frotteuristic disorder in the DSM-V]. (Do you know what frotteurism is? It is a mental disorder that causes people, usually men, to surreptitiously fondle women’s breasts or genitals in crowded situations such as elevators and subways.) The problem with the escalation of these kinds of diagnoses is that either we can become so adapted to our thinking and feelings instead of our environment that we will become dissociated from the whole idea that we have a problem at all; or at least, the more we become blameless, the more we become helpless in the face of our problems, thinking our problems need to be 'fixed’ by outside help before we can move forward on our own. For 2,000 years of Western culture our problems existed in the human power struggle constantly being waged between our principles and our primal impulses. In the last fifty years we have unprincipled ourselves and become what I call 'psychologized.’ Now the power struggle is between the 'expert’ and the 'disorder.’ Since the rise of psychiatry and psychology as the moral compass, we don’t talk about moral imperatives anymore, we talk about coping mechanisms. We are not living our lives by principles so much as we are living our lives by mental health diagnoses. This is not working because it very subtly undermines our solid sense of self.

Wil shook his head. “He really had you hooked.” “What do you mean?” “You should have seen your energy field. It was flowing almost totally into his.” “I don’t understand.” “Think back to Sarah’s argument with the scientist at Viciente.… If you had witnessed one of them winning, convincing the other that he was correct, then you would have seen the loser’s energy flowing into the winner’s, leaving the loser feeling drained and weak and somewhat confused—the way the girl in the Peruvian family appeared and the way,” he smiled, “that you look now.” “You saw that happening to me?” I asked. “Yes,” he replied. “And it was extremely difficult for you to stop his control of you and to pull yourself away. I thought for a minute you weren’t going to do it.” “Jesus,” I said. “That guy must really be evil.” “Not really,” he said. “He’s probably only half aware of what he’s doing. He thinks he’s right to control the situation, and no doubt he learned a long time ago that he could control successfully by following a certain strategy. He first pretends to be your friend, then he finds something wrong with what you’re doing, in your case that you were in danger. In effect, he subtly undermines your confidence in your own path until you begin to identify with him. As soon as that happens, he has you.” Wil looked directly at me. “This is only one of many strategies people use to con others out of their energy.

June 7 Someone Who Believes In Me "Just for today I will have faith in someone in NA who believes in me and wants to help me in my recovery." Basic Text, p. 96 Not all of us arrive in NA and automatically stay clean. But if we keep coming back, we find in Narcotics Anonymous the support we need for our recovery. Staying clean is easier when we have someone who believes in us even when we don't believe in ourselves. Even the most frequent relapser in NA usually has one staunch supporter who is always there, no matter what. It is imperative that we find that one person or group of people who believes in us. When we ask them if we will ever get clean, they will always reply, "Yes, you can and you will. Just keep coming back!" We all need someone who believes in us, especially when we can't believe in ourselves. When we relapse, we undermine our already shattered self-confidence, sometimes so badly that we begin to feel utterly hopeless. At such times, we need the support of our loyal NA friends. They tell us that this can be our last relapse. They know from experience that if we keep coming to meetings, we will eventually get clean and stay clean. It's hard for many of us to believe in ourselves. But when someone loves us unconditionally, offering support no matter how many times we've relapsed, recovery in NA becomes a little more real for us. Just for today: I will find someone who believes in me. I will believe in them.

It looked as though knowing that you were right meant nothing; they all knew they were right. Weeks had no intention of undermining the boy's faith, but he was deeply interested in religion, and found it an absorbing topic of conversation. He had described his own views accurately when he said that he very earnestly disbelieved in almost everything that other people believed. Once Philip asked him a question, which he had heard his uncle put when the conversation at the vicarage had fallen upon some mildly rationalistic work which was then exciting discussion in the newspapers. "But why should you be right and all those fellows like St. Anselm and St. Augustine be wrong?" "You mean that they were very clever and learned men, while you have grave doubts whether I am either?" asked Weeks. "Yes," answered Philip uncertainly, for put in that way his question seemed impertinent. "St. Augustine believed that the earth was flat and that the sun turned round it." "I don't know what that proves." "Why, it proves that you believe with your generation. Your saints lived in an age of faith, when it was practically impossible to disbelieve what to us is positively incredible." "Then how d'you know that we have the truth now?" "I don't." Philip thought this over for a moment, then he said: "I don't see why the things we believe absolutely now shouldn't be just as wrong as what they believed in the past." "Neither do I." "Then how can you believe anything at all?" "I don't know." Philip asked Weeks what he thought of Hayward's religion. "Men have always formed gods in their own image," said Weeks. "He believes in the picturesque." Philip paused for a little while, then he said: "I don't see why one should believe in God at all.

Creating “Correct” Children in the Classroom One of the most popular discipline programs in American schools is called Assertive Discipline. It teaches teachers to inflict the old “obey or suffer” method of control on students. Here you disguise the threat of punishment by calling it a choice the child is making. As in, “You have a choice, you can either finish your homework or miss the outing this weekend.” Then when the child chooses to try to protect his dignity against this form of terrorism, by refusing to do his homework, you tell him he has chosen his logical, natural consequence of being excluded from the outing. Putting it this way helps the parent or teacher mitigate against the bad feelings and guilt that would otherwise arise to tell the adult that they are operating outside the principles of compassionate relating. This insidious method is even worse than outand-out punishing, where you can at least rebel against your punisher. The use of this mind game teaches the child the false, crazy-making belief that they wanted something bad or painful to happen to them. These programs also have the stated intention of getting the child to be angry with himself for making a poor choice. In this smoke and mirrors game, the children are “causing” everything to happen and the teachers are the puppets of the children’s choices. The only ones who are not taking responsibility for their actions are the adults. Another popular coercive strategy is to use “peer pressure” to create compliance. For instance, a teacher tells her class that if anyone misbehaves then they all won’t get their pizza party. What a great way to turn children against each other. All this is done to help (translation: compel) children to behave themselves. But of course they are not behaving themselves: they are being “behaved” by the adults. Well-meaning teachers and parents try to teach children to be motivated (translation: do boring or aversive stuff without questioning why), responsible (translation: thoughtless conformity to the house rules) people. When surveys are conducted in which fourth-graders are asked what being good means, over 90% answer “being quiet.” And when teachers are asked what happens in a successful classroom, the answer is, “the teacher is able to keep the students on task” (translation: in line, doing what they are told). Consulting firms measuring teacher competence consider this a major criterion of teacher effectiveness. In other words if the students are quietly doing what they were told the teacher is evaluated as good. However my understanding of ‘real learning’ with twenty to forty children is that it is quite naturally a bit noisy and messy. Otherwise children are just playing a nice game of school, based on indoctrination and little integrated retained education. Both punishments and rewards foster a preoccupation with a narrow egocentric self-interest that undermines good values. All little Johnny is thinking about is “How much will you give me if I do X? How can I avoid getting punished if I do Y? What do they want me to do and what happens to me if I don’t do it?” Instead we could teach him to ask, “What kind of person do I want to be and what kind of community do I want to help make?” And Mom is thinking “You didn’t do what I wanted, so now I’m going to make something unpleasant happen to you, for your own good to help you fit into our (dominance/submission based) society.” This contributes to a culture of coercion and prevents a community of compassion. And as we are learning on the global level with our war on terrorism, as you use your energy and resources to punish people you run out of energy and resources to protect people. And even if children look well-behaved, they are not behaving themselves They are being behaved by controlling parents and teachers.

also been a white-collar worker in my career. In my experience, there are two types of people who do this type of work: Achievers and Hiders. Achievers are the people who want to perform at a high level. They are ambitious, motivated and energetic. They are full of ideas and want to move up the corporate ladder, which are great attributes to have. But there is a downside for the Achiever. The moment a person decides to be an Achiever, they become a target. Their boss sees them as threatening to their job, so they start to hold them down or take shots at their reputation. Their peers see them as a person who will either embarrass them or keep them from getting a promotion, so they start to do what they can to undermine their accomplishments. So, to remain an Achiever and survive in this hostile environment, a person must become good at one thing that has nothing to do with their productivity—and that’s politics. They must learn how to navigate the political world by diminishing their enemies and strengthening their relationship with powerful people. In fact, some of the most successful people in the corporate world aren’t Achievers at all. They are pure politicians. So if you decide to work in the corporate environment and to be an Achiever, you must accept the fact that you must become a good politician also. Now, let’s talk about the Hiders. These are the people who HATE politics, but still need a job. They learn not to be the ambitious Achiever. They don’t stand out. They don’t speak up in meetings. They don’t bring new ideas. They HIDE. They keep their heads down and do as they’re told. They do just enough so that they aren’t talked about negatively. They survive. And this has worked for decades. But in the New Economy, it’s becoming much more difficult to hide. And people are running out of time. So, back to our Perfect Career List: Can a white-collar job deliver on the list? Again, the clear answer is no—certainly not in very many areas. Sales

Never treat your launch team like a core group. It’s not. Your launch team is a time-limited, purpose-driven team. It ends with the debriefing session following your launch. At that meeting, release the launch team members to join a ministry team of their choice. Your launch team will not stay with you over the long haul. Many church planters make the mistake of thinking that the people from their launch team (whom they have grown to love) will be the same people who will grow the church with them in the long term. That is seldom, if ever, the case. While it’s sad to see people go, it’s part of God’s process in growing your church. So, expect it, be prepared for it, and be thankful that you have the opportunity to serve with so many different people at different points along the journey. Preparing a launch team to maximize your first service is first and foremost a spiritual enterprise. Pray and fast—a lot. Don’t be fooled into thinking that being a solid leader undermines the spirit of teamwork. You can lead a team, hold people accountable and ensure that things get done in a way that fosters teamwork and gives glory to God. So get ready. show people your heart before you ask for their hand. People want to know that you care, and they want to be part of something bigger than themselves. If you can articulate your vision in a way that excites people, they’ll want to be on your team. The launch team is not a democracy. Don’t vote. You are the leader. Lead. While it’s true that you want to share the gospel with as many people as possible, you will need to develop a clear picture of the specific demographic your new church is targeting in order to effectively reach the greatest number of people. Diffused light has little impact, but focused light has the ability to cut through steel. Take time to focus so that you are able to reach the specific people God has called you to. 1. Who Are the Key Population Groups Living in My Area? 2. What Population Group Is Not Being Reached Effectively? 3. What Population Group Do I Best Relate To? Healthy organisms grow, and that includes your church. If you feel stagnation setting in, your job is not to push growth any way you can but to identify the barriers that are hindering you and remove them. The only people who like full rooms are preachers and worship leaders. If you ignore this barrier, your church will stop growing. Early on, it’s best to remain flexible. The last thing you want to do is get in a position in which God can’t grow you because you aren’t logistically prepared. What if twice as many people showed up this Sunday? Would you be ready? When a lead pastor isn’t growing: The church stops growing, the sermons are stale, The staff and volunteers stop growing, The passion for ministry wanes. Keeping your church outwardly focused is just as important now as it was during your prelaunch stage. Make sure that you are continually working to expand God’s kingdom, not building your own. A healthy launch is the single greatest indicator of future church health.

Another dangerous neoliberal word circulating everywhere that is worth zooming in on is the word ‘resilience’. On the surface, I think many people won’t object to the idea that it is good and beneficial for us to be resilient to withstand the difficulties and challenges of life. As a person who lived through the atrocities of wars and sanctions in Iraq, I’ve learnt that life is not about being happy or sad, not about laughing or crying, leaving or staying. Life is about endurance. Since most feelings, moods, and states of being are fleeting, endurance, for me, is the common denominator that helps me go through the darkest and most beautiful moments of life knowing that they are fleeing. In that sense, I believe it is good for us to master the art of resilience and endurance. Yet, how should we think about the meaning of ‘resilience’ when used by ruling classes that push for wars and occupations, and that contribute to producing millions of deaths and refugees to profit from plundering the planet? What does it mean when these same warmongers fund humanitarian organizations asking them to go to war-torn countries to teach people the value of ‘resilience’? What happens to the meaning of ‘resilience’ when they create frighteningly precarious economic structures, uncertain employment, and lay off people without accountability? All this while also asking us to be ‘resilient’… As such, we must not let the word ‘resilience’ circulate or get planted in the heads of our youth uncritically. Instead, we should raise questions about what it really means. Does it mean the same thing for a poor young man or woman from Ghana, Ecuador, Afghanistan vs a privileged member from the upper management of a U.S. corporation? Resilience towards what? What is the root of the challenges for which we are expected to be resilient? Does our resilience solve the cause or the root of the problem or does it maintain the status quo while we wait for the next disaster? Are individuals always to blame if their resilience doesn’t yield any results, or should we equally examine the social contract and the entire structure in which individuals live that might be designed in such a way that one’s resilience may not prevail no matter how much perseverance and sacrifice one demonstrates? There is no doubt that resilience, according to its neoliberal corporate meaning, is used in a way that places the sole responsibility of failure on the shoulders of individuals rather than equally holding accountable the structure in which these individuals exist, and the precarious circumstances that require work and commitment way beyond individual capabilities and resources. I find it more effective not to simply aspire to be resilient, but to distinguish between situations in which individual resilience can do, and those for which the depth, awareness, and work of an entire community or society is needed for any real and sustainable change to occur. But none of this can happen if we don’t first agree upon what each of us mean when we say ‘resilience,’ and if we have different definitions of what it means, then we should ask: how shall we merge and reconcile our definitions of the word so that we complement not undermine what we do individually and collectively as people. Resilience should not become a synonym for surrender. It is great to be resilient when facing a flood or an earthquake, but that is not the same when having to endure wars and economic crises caused by the ruling class and warmongers. [From “On the Great Resignation” published on CounterPunch on February 24, 2023]

Eight months [after 9/11], after the most intensive international investigation in history, the head of the Federal Bureau of Investigation informed the press that they still didn't know who did it. He said they had suspicions. The suspicions were that the plot was hatched in Afghanistan but implemented in Germany and the United Arab Emirates, and, of course, in the United States. After 9/11, Bush II essentially ordered the Taliban to hand over Osama bin Laden, and they temporized. They might have handed him over, actually. They asked for evidence that he was involved in the attacks of 9/11. And, of course, the government, first of all, couldn't given them any evidence because they didn't have any. But secondly, they reacted with total contempt. How can you ask us for evidence if we want you to hand somebody over? What lèse-majesté is this? So Bush simply informed the people of Afghanistan that we're going to bomb you until the Taliban hand over Osama bin Laden. He said nothing about overthrowing the Taliban. That came three weeks later, when British admiral Michael Boyce, the head of the British Defense Staff, announced to the Afghans that we're going to continue bombing you until you overthrow your government. This fits the definition of terrorism exactly, but it's much worse. It's aggression. How did the Afghans feel about it? We actually don't know. There were leading Afghan anti-Taliban activists who were bitterly opposed to the bombing. In fact, a couple of weeks after the bombing started, the U.S. favorite, Abdul Haq, considered a great martyr in Afghanistan, was interviewed about this. He said that the Americans are carrying out the bombing only because they want to show their muscle. They're undermining our efforts to overthrow the Taliban from within, which we can do. If, instead of killing innocent Afghans, they help us, that's what will happen. Soon after that, there was a meeting in Peshawar in Pakistan of a thousand tribal leaders, some from Afghanistan who trekked across the border, some from Pakistan. They disagreed on a lot of things, but they were unanimous on one thing: stop the bombing. That was after about a month. Could the Taliban have been overthrown from within? It's very likely. There were strong anti-Taliban forces. But the United States didn't want that. It wanted to invade and conquer Afghanistan and impose its own rule. ...There are geostrategic reasons. They're not small. How dominant they are in the thinking of planners we can only speculate. But there is a reason why everybody has been invading Afghanistan since Alexander the Great. The country is in a highly strategic position relative to Central Asian, South Asia, and the Middle East. There are specific reasons in the present case having to do with pipeline projects, which are in the background. We don't know how important these considerations are, but since the 1990s the United States has been trying hard to establish the Trans-Afghanistan Pipeline (TAPI)from Turkmenistan, which has a huge amount of natural gas, to India. It has to go through Kandahar, in fact. So Turkmenistan, Afghanistan, Pakistan, and India are all involved. The United States wants the pipeline for two reasons. One reason is to try to prevent Russia from having control of natural gas. That's the new "great game": Who controls Central Asian resources? The other reason has to do with isolating Iran. The natural way to get the energy resources India needs is from Iran, a pipeline right from Iran to Pakistan to India. The United States wants to block this from happening in the worst way. It's a complicated business. Pakistan has just agreed to let the pipeline run from Iran to Pakistan. The question is whether India will try to join in. The TAPI pipeline would be a good weapon to try to undercut that.

Promotions Every time your company gives someone a promotion, everyone else at that person’s organizational level evaluates the promotion and judges whether merit or political favors yielded it. If the latter, then the other employees generally react in one of three ways: 1. They sulk and feel undervalued. 2. They outwardly disagree, campaign against the person, and undermine them in their new position. 3. They attempt to copy the political behavior that generated the unwarranted promotion. Clearly, you don’t want any of these behaviors in your company. Therefore, you must have a formal, visible, defensible promotion process that governs every employee promotion. Often this process must be different for people on your own staff. (The general process may involve various managers who are familiar with the employee’s work; the executive process should include the board of directors.) The purpose of the process is twofold. First, it will give the organization confidence that the company at least attempted to base the promotion on merit. Second, the process will produce the information necessary for your team to explain the promotion decisions you made.

LOW IDENTIFICATION WITH MALE IMAGE Are you usually more concerned about another’s feelings than your own? Do you find yourself always going out of your way to help other people, even if you don’t want to? Do you wish that you could say no to people? Are you overly concerned with what people will think about you? If so, you may be have a low degree of identification with the male image. As a result of your past experiences, you may be more likely than other men to fear rejection and thus are more willing to take on the problems and concerns of others as a way of feeling needed. You may also be concerned about whether you are masculine enough. You don’t jump right into many of the things that other men do or take for granted. Your concerns are usually a combination of masculinity and your dysfunctional background. There are three types of silent sons having low identification with male image. THE PASSIVE SON I had many conflicts, particularly in adolescence, with my father, always verbal. I always lost or was put down. This undermined my self confidence in my mental abilities. Although I have above-average intelligence and a master’s degree, I am extremely cautious about expressing my own opinions even when I have strong ones. Also, I have a lot of trouble being creative.

Here are some of the key lessons from this chapter to remember: ■​A good negotiator prepares, going in, to be ready for possible surprises; a great negotiator aims to use her skills to reveal the surprises she is certain to find. ■​Don’t commit to assumptions; instead, view them as hypotheses and use the negotiation to test them rigorously. ■​People who view negotiation as a battle of arguments become overwhelmed by the voices in their head. Negotiation is not an act of battle; it’s a process of discovery. The goal is to uncover as much information as possible. ■​To quiet the voices in your head, make your sole and all-encompassing focus the other person and what they have to say. ■​Slow. It. Down. Going too fast is one of the mistakes all negotiators are prone to making. If we’re too much in a hurry, people can feel as if they’re not being heard. You risk undermining the rapport and trust you’ve built. ■​Put a smile on your face. When people are in a positive frame of mind, they think more quickly, and are more likely to collaborate and problem-solve (instead of fight and resist). Positivity creates mental agility in both you and your counterpart.

They believe in human development. And these are the hallmarks: They’re not constantly trying to prove they’re better than others. For example, they don’t highlight the pecking order with themselves at the top, they don’t claim credit for other people’s contribution, and they don’t undermine others to feel powerful. Instead, they are constantly trying to improve . They surround themselves with the most able people they can find, they look squarely at their own mistakes and deficiencies, and they ask frankly what skills they and the company will need in the future.

You might also expect resistance from friends and family and co-workers. (Homeostasis, as we’ve seen, applies to social systems as well as individuals.) Say you used to struggle out of bed at 7:30 and barely drag yourself to work at 9:00. Now that you’re on a path of mastery, you’re up at 6:00 for a three-mile run, and in the office, charged with energy, at 8:30. You might figure that your co-workers would be overjoyed, but don’t be too sure. And when you get home, still raring to go, do you think that your family will welcome the change? Maybe. Bear in mind that an entire system has to change when any part of it changes. So don’t be surprised if some of the people you love start covertly or overtly undermining your self-improvement. It’s not that they wish you harm, it’s just homeostasis at work.

Why don’t successful people and organizations automatically become very successful? One important explanation is due to what I call “the clarity paradox,” which can be summed up in four predictable phases: Phase 1: When we really have clarity of purpose, it leads to success. Phase 2: When we have success, it leads to more options and opportunities. Phase 3: When we have increased options and opportunities, it leads to diffused efforts. Phase 4: Diffused efforts undermine the very clarity that led to our success in the first place. Curiously, and overstating the point in order to make it, success is a catalyst for failure.53 Author and philosopher Robert Brault said, “We are kept from our goal not by obstacles, but by a clear path to a lesser goal.

but money is not the primary driver for either. We focus on adding value to our readers, listeners, viewers, followers, clients, and customers without undermining our values. We treat our employees fairly and pay them fair wages. We focus on quality, not quantity. We don’t run advertisements on any of our platforms.

Be yourself. You shouldn’t be afraid of who you are. When you know your Identity and know who you are. When you know your religion, culture and heritage. You are strong and nothing or no one can take that power away from you. That is why when they colonies you. They shame your culture and undermine it, so that you might think it is not important. They want you to forget your culture and heritage of which it is your power. Losing your identity is losing your power. It will make you vulnerable. Leaving you learning other cultures and you will never stop learning. They will be leading by living their culture and you will be doing catchup. To them you will never be perfect, because that Is not who you are. They will always be superior, because It is them who are giving teachings. They will be like gods to you ,because you are learning their ways, culture and heritage and on how to be like them. When you forsake your own culture and heritage and follows someone. They become your master, you are bound to worship them and everything they do. But , when you don’t follow them. You become your own master. Your own culture , heritage and identity is your power, Don’t be fooled.

If we can stop undermining our self as Africans and start valuing who are and what we have. We must stop it ,with the mental of thinking that people who speaks their native tongue. Who following their tradition, practices their culture and value their heritage . Don’t know things, are lame, boring, retards, not interesting, not modern, not clued up and not Important enough. Thinking that they are behind, slow, old fashion and school, because they don’t know western or they don’t know the things we know or following up with trends ,fashion and western as we do. Invest In yourself by embracing who you are.

If we can stop undermining ourselves as Africans and start valuing who are and what we have. We must stop it ,with the mental of thinking that people who speaks their native tongue. Who following their tradition, practices their culture and value their heritage . Don’t know things, are lame, boring, retards, not interesting, not modern, not clued up and not Important enough. Thinking that they are behind, slow, old fashion and school, because they don’t know western or they don’t know the things we know or following up with trends ,fashion and western as we do. Invest In yourself by embracing who you are.

Wil shook his head. “He really had you hooked.” “What do you mean?” “You should have seen your energy field. It was flowing almost totally into his.” “I don’t understand.” “Think back to Sarah’s argument with the scientist at Viciente.… If you had witnessed one of them winning, convincing the other that he was correct, then you would have seen the loser’s energy flowing into the winner’s, leaving the loser feeling drained and weak and somewhat confused—the way the girl in the Peruvian family appeared and the way,” he smiled, “that you look now.” “You saw that happening to me?” I asked. “Yes,” he replied. “And it was extremely difficult for you to stop his control of you and to pull yourself away. I thought for a minute you weren’t going to do it.” “Jesus,” I said. “That guy must really be evil.” “Not really,” he said. “He’s probably only half aware of what he’s doing. He thinks he’s right to control the situation, and no doubt he learned a long time ago that he could control successfully by following a certain strategy. He first pretends to be your friend, then he finds something wrong with what you’re doing, in your case that you were in danger. In effect, he subtly undermines your confidence in your own path until you begin to identify with him. As soon as that happens, he has you.” Wil looked directly at me. “This is only one of many strategies people use to con others out of their energy. You’ll learn about the remaining ways later, in the Sixth Insight.” I wasn’t listening; my thoughts were on Marjorie. I didn’t like leaving her there. “Do you think we should try to get Marjorie?” I asked. “Not now,” he said. “I don’t think she’s in any danger. We can drive out tomorrow, as we leave, and try to talk to her.” We were silent for a few minutes, then Wil asked: “Do you understand what I said about Jensen not realizing what he was doing? He’s no different from most people. He just does what makes him feel the strongest.” “No, I don’t think I understand.” Wil looked thoughtful. “All this is still unconscious in most people. All we know is that we feel weak and when we control others we feel better. What we don’t realize is that this sense of feeling better costs the other person. It is their energy that we have stolen. Most people go through their lives in a constant hunt for someone else’s energy.” He looked at me with a twinkle in his eye. “Although occasionally it works differently. We meet someone who at least for a little while will voluntarily send us their energy.

What really irks this woman, I’ve come to realize, is that I appear to be enjoying myself. I have veered off the narrow path laid out for women to be successful in the world, and it turns out I’m fine. Sometimes better, sometimes worse, but mostly fine. Which inevitably throws a question mark at the end of her decisions. I mentioned this to Nina once, and she understood immediately: “We’re an attack on the value system of certain people.” As if my, or our, enjoyment undermines the hard work they have devoted to staying the path. And worse, calls into question the rewards that path offers. If I don’t feel bad about my life, how can they feel good? I used to feel the need to launch a rousing defense of myself in the face of this, but that’s gone away. It feels like enough that my life is no longer a question mark to me. Here at this table, I don’t need to answer for myself.

Principles are the first thing dictators attack. Various “Putins” around the world are undermining principles in their societies through propaganda and repression so that people cannot stand up for what they believe in. And then, when the dictatorship gains strength and resources, it tries to export its lack of principles, creating gray zones devoid of values. Europe has had to face this many times. Now we are experiencing another defining moment. Russia is trying to convince nations that it is easy to compromise principles—that they can ignore international law and turn a blind eye to injustice if it will supposedly bring stability. This is Moscow's main message - Putin invites everyone to forget about their principles, to show no resolve, to give up Ukrainian land and people, and then, he says, Russian bombing will stop. But throughout history, every time such agreements have been made, the threat has returned even stronger. Today, we have a chance to win in Eastern Europe so that we don't have to fight on the northern or other eastern fronts—in the Baltic states and Poland, or in the south—in the Balkans, where it is easy to ignite a conflict, or in African countries, whose problems are much closer to European societies than it may seem. We have to stand up for international law and the values on which our societies are built. We must be decisive. People matter. The law matters. State borders and the right of every nation to determine its own future matters. And while we know that Putin is threatening leaders and countries who can help us force Russia to peace, we must not give in. I thank you for every package of defense assistance to Ukraine. Every weapon you have provided helps to defend normal life—the kind of life you live here in Iceland or in any of your other countries, a life that no longer exists in Russia, where basic human rights have been taken away. We are now in the third year of a full-scale war, and our soldiers on the front lines need fresh strength. That is why we are working to equip our brigades. This is an urgent need. We are already cooperating with others—France has helped to equip one brigade, and we have an agreement on another. We invite you to join us in creating brigades, Scandinavian brigades, and demonstrate your continued commitment to the defense of Europe. I am grateful to Denmark and other partners who invest in arms production in Ukraine. Artillery, shells, drones—everything that allows Ukraine to defend itself despite any logistical delays on the part of partners or changing political moods in world capitals. We see that Putin is increasing weapons production, and rogue regimes like Pyongyang are helping him with this. Next year, Putin intends to catch up with the EU in munitions production. We can only prevent this now (...). - Translated from Ukrainian

Who Are Your Stars? That is the first question I ask when a boss has performance problems, is plagued by caustic conflict, or is losing good people at an alarming rate. I want to know if the anointed stars enhance or undermine others’ performance and humanity. Unfortunately, too many bosses have such blind faith in solo superstars and unbridled competition that they hire egomaniacs and install pay and promotion systems that reward selfish creeps who don’t give a damn about their colleagues. Or, even worse, they shower kudos and cash on credit hogs and backstabbers who get ahead by knocking others down. As

When my own personal grasp of the gospel was very weak, my self-view swung wildly between two poles. When I was performing up to my standards—in academic work, professional achievement, or relationships—I felt confident but not humble. I was likely to be proud and unsympathetic to failing people. When I was not living up to standards, I felt humble but not confident, a failure. I discovered, however, that the gospel contained the resources to build a unique identity. In Christ I could know I was accepted by grace not only despite my flaws, but because I was willing to admit them. The Christian gospel is that I am so flawed that Jesus had to die for me, yet I am so loved and valued and that Jesus was glad to die for me. This leads to deep humility and deep confidence at the same time. It undermines both swaggering and sniveling. I cannot feel superior to anyone, and yet I have nothing to prove to anyone. I do not think more of myself nor less of myself. Instead, I think of myself less. I don’t need to notice myself—how I’m doing, how I’m being regarded—so often.

When everyone in a group always agrees, it may mean they don’t have many ideas. Or it may mean that avoiding conflict is more important to them than generating and evaluating new ideas. It may even mean that people who express new ideas are ridiculed, ostracized, and driven out of the group. Regardless of the reasons, lack of conflict and dissent means the group is unlikely to express and develop many valuable new ideas. Groups—and societies—that stifle people with new, untested, ideas undermine both imagination and personal freedom.

My hands were trembling out of anger and distress by the time I reached the end. When I finally raised my eyes to his, Narian answered my unspoken question. “These have replaced the High Priestess’s laws everywhere they were posted.” He turned from me to address Cannan. “The regulations as they were intended still stand, and will be enforced whether or not the people are aware of them. Inform any who might have had a hand in mocking the High Priestess’s rules that their game is putting their countrymen at greater risk.” Cannan remained silent in face of the order, and Narian did not wait for a reply. With a quick, respectful nod toward me, he departed, Rava at his heels, and the office door closed resoundingly behind them. I stared at the parchment I still held, unable to keep it from shaking, and my vision blurred. It was foolish to be hurt, for this blow was not aimed at me, but yet the insolence of the document stung. “Steldor and Galen did this?” I demanded. “So it would seem.” “Why?” My throat and jaw were tight. “Why would they do this, undermine my authority? They’ve taken what I’m trying to do and ground it underfoot. The Cokyrians will be furious. They’ll bear down harder than ever.” I whisked the moisture from my eyes, taking deep breaths to calm myself. “How can they think this will help?” Cannan sighed and leaned forward, assuming a more fatherly posture. “They’re allowing the people to dissent. They’re showing that we can still laugh and, most of all, that we haven’t been forgotten. I don’t approve of the method, either, Alera, but what they’ve done may not be all bad.” I forced myself to nod, struggling to control my raging emotions. The hard work had scarcely begun, I knew that, but to see what I had accomplished tempered with and ridiculed was painful, even with Cannan’s assurance that it could be taken in a positive light. Then London’s words about being neither too cooperative nor too defiant returned to me. Perhaps this was what my bodyguard had meant--opposition, but on an isolated scale. “You’re right,” I finally said. “This might not be all bad, provided it doesn’t escalate.” “I agree. I will, however, talk with them.” “Thank you,” I murmured, and he rose to see me to the door. As I crossed the Hearing Hall toward my study, I debated whether I should be the one to talk to Steldor, all the time knowing he would probably deny any involvement if I broached the topic. No, he was far more likely to listen to his father. When had he ever been open to listening to me on matters affecting the kingdom?

That law that created the native corporations was the idea of tanik American corporations to undermine tribal integrity.” “What do you mean?” Bertie asks. “Everywhere else in the U.S., tribes have their own government, their own land, and their own money.” “They have a monopoly on casinos, you mean,” Bertie says cautiously. “Whatever it is. Our tribes in Alaska don’t have nothing. It’s the native corporations who have all the land and the money, and they’re the ones making decisions.” “But don’t you think they’re making decisions in the best interests of their shareholders, the native people?” “They’re just making money for their shareholders like any other corporation,” Mandy says. “And they hire taniks in Anchorage offices to carry out their business. They don’t care about whether people up here are taking their dividends and drinking them away. I hate to say it, but I got to agree with Luther. It’s a long, slow genocide, all done under the corporations’ laws.

From the Bridge” The Importance of History Not all that many years ago the Importance of history would have been a “no brainer!” People understood that there was very little new under the sun, and history was a good barometer to the future. “Those that fail to heed history are doomed to repeat it, “was an adage frequently heard. It gave us a perspective by which to stabilize our bearings and allowed us to find one of the few ways by which we could understand who we are. The myth that George Washington, not being able to lie, admitted to chopping down his father’s favorite cherry tree helped us create a moral compass. Abraham Lincoln’s moniker “Honest Abe,” took root when he worked as a young store clerk in New Salem, IL. The name stuck before he became a lawyer or a politician. His writings show that he valued honesty and in 1859 when he ran for the presidency the nickname became his campaign slogan. However, apparently ”Honest Abe” did lie about whether he was negotiating with the South to end the war and also knowingly concealed some of the most lethal weapons ever devised during the Civil War." These however, were very minor infractions when compared to what we are now expected to believe from our politicians. Since World War II the pace of life has moved faster than ever and may actually have overrun our ability to understand the significance and value of our own honesty. We no longer turn to our past for guidance regarding the future; rather we look into our future in terms of what we want and how we will get it. We have developed to the point that we are much smarter than our ancestors and no longer need their morality and guidance. What we don’t know we frequently fabricate and in most cases, no one picks up on it and if they do, it really doesn’t seem to matter. In short the past has become outdated, obsolete and therefore has become largely irrelevant to us. Being less informed about our past is not the result of a lack of information or education, but of ambivalence and indifference. Perhaps history belongs to the ages but not to us. To a great extent we as a people really do not believe that history matters very much, if at all. My quote “History is not owned solely by historians. It is part of everyone’s heritage,” was written for the opening page of my award winning book “The Exciting Story of Cuba.” Not only is it the anchor holding our Ship of State firmly secure, it is the root of our very being. Yes, history is important. In centuries past this statement would have been self-evident. Our predecessors devoted much time and effort in teaching their children history and it helped provide the foundation to understanding who they were. It provided them a reference whereby they could set their own life’s goals. However society has, to a great extent, turned its back on the past. We now live in an era where the present is most important and our future is being built on shifting sand. We, as a people are presently engaged in a struggle for economic survival and choose to think of ourselves in terms of where wind and tide is taking us, rather than where we came from. We can no longer identify with our ancestors, thus they are no longer relevant. Their lives were so different from our own that they no longer can shed any light on our experience or existence. Therefore, in the minds of many of us, the past no longer has the value it once had nor do we give it the credence it deserves. As in war, the truth is the first victim; however this casualty threatens the very fabric of our being. When fact and fiction are interchanged to satisfy the moment, the bedrock of history in undermined. When we depend on the truth to structure our future, it is vital that it be based on truthful history and the honesty of those who write it. It is a crime without penalty when our politicians tell us lies. In fact they are often shamefully rewarded; encouraging them to become even more blatant in the lies they tell.

Smart conservatives know that you can’t stop change but you can slow it down. That way people have time to get used to new ideas, and you don’t suffer an angry reaction. Liberals make the mistake of demanding radical change now, and that undermines them.

The antithesis of a wealth mindset is a poor mindset. Most who have this "poor mindset" or “poverty mentality” don’t even realize they have it. A poor mindset generates the thinking that attaining wealth is impossible, that it can be done without effort, or that one just does not have the special sauce it takes to become wealthy. This mindset undermines our goals and will actively drive wealth away from us unless we work to counteract it.

Smart conservatives know that you can’t stop change but you can slow it down. That way people have time to get used to new ideas, and you don’t suffer an angry reaction. Liberals make the mistake of demanding radical change now, and that undermines them.” “Try putting that on a T-shirt.” It was one of Milt’s sayings. He believed that few voters understood anything that could not be put on a T-shirt. The fact that Milt was so often right made him more obnoxious.

of “to-do” behaviors (say please and thank you, be more patient, treat others with respect) have a more difficult time changing than those who focus on a few “must-stop” behaviors (stop sharing your opinion on everything, quit taking other people’s work for granted, don’t claim credit you don’t deserve). Even the simple injunction to “stop being a jerk” is often more effective than itemizing desirable behaviors to try out. Sally has also seen how the bias for action can undermine the ability of people to let go of behaviors that no longer serve them. A vivid example came during a recent client call about a leadership workshop she was scheduled to deliver. After she had sketched out the program, the head of the planning committee spoke up. “The most important thing is that your program should be immediately actionable,” she said. “We have a very proactive culture around here, so we want to make sure you give people plenty of to-dos. The ideal would be for participants to walk away with five new things they can do Monday morning.” Sally had heard such requests in the past and tried to accommodate them. But now she pushed back. She noted that in her experience the last thing most people in organizations need is five new things to do on Monday morning. With employees already overloaded, adding new items to

Earlier today—at the loft,” he said, pulling back to meet my eyes. Unflinching. Open. “I didn’t mean to insult her.” “I’m sorry I snapped at you.” He lifted a dark brow. “Why in hell would you be? I insulted your sister; you defended her. You had every right to kick my ass for it.” “I didn’t mean to … undermine you.” Shadows flickered in his eyes. “Ah.” He twisted toward the Sidra, and I followed suit. The water meandered past, its dark surface rippling with golden faelights from the streetlamps and the bright jewels of the Rainbow. “That was why it was … strange between us this afternoon.” He cringed and faced me fully. “Mother above, Feyre.” My cheeks heated and I interrupted before he could continue. “I get why, though. A solid, unified front is important.” I scratched at the smooth wood of the rail with a finger. “Especially for us.” “Not amongst our family.” Warmth spread through me at the words—our family. He took my hand, interlacing our fingers. “We can make whatever rules we want. You have every right to question me, push me—both in private and in public.” A snort. “Of course, if you decide to truly kick my ass, I might request that it’s done behind closed doors so I don’t have to suffer centuries of teasing, but—” “I won’t undermine you in public. And you won’t undermine me.” He remained quiet, letting me think, speak. “We can question each other through the bond if we’re around people other than our friends,” I said. “But for now, for these initial years, I’d like to show the world a unified front … That is, if we survive.” “We’ll survive.” Uncompromising will in those words, that face. “But I want you to feel comfortable pushing me, calling me out—” “When have I ever not done that?” He smiled. But I added, “I want you to do the same—for me.” “Deal. But amongst our family … call me on my bullshit all you want. I insist, actually.” “Why?” “Because it’s fun.” I nudged him with an elbow. “Because you’re my equal,” he said. “And as much as that means having each other’s backs in public, it also means that we grant each other the gift of honesty. Of truth.

Black people suffer poor mental health as a result of the grind of surviving in a space that seems to act against you, undermining you, pushing you aside, sometimes unconsciously, making you feel as if you’re living in a different reality. Rather than listen to what Black people have to say, they are shouted down, their experience is denied, and it becomes too exhausting to address the ignorance. This may be the most ‘open and tolerant’ country, but tolerance isn’t enough when it comes to racism. People need to call it out or at the very least acknowledge its existence or we will be speaking with a completely separate set of facts. Being challenged on the existence of racism is tiresome, psychologically debilitating, and deeply depressing. I’m not surprised that so many of us break down living here in the UK.

In recent years, a robust body of new research has demonstrated that when we experience distress, engaging in introspection often does significantly more harm than good. It undermines our performance at work, interferes with our ability to make good decisions, and negatively influences our relationships. It can also promote violence and aggression, contribute to a range of mental disorders, and enhance our risk of becoming physically ill. Using the mind to engage with our thoughts and feelings in the wrong ways can lead professional athletes to lose the skills they’ve spent their careers perfecting. It can cause otherwise rational, caring people to make less logical and even less moral decisions. It can lead friends to flee from you in both the real world and the social media world. It can turn romantic relationships from safe havens into battlegrounds. It can even contribute to us aging faster, both in how we look on the outside and in how our DNA is configured internally. In short, our thoughts too often don’t save us from our thoughts. Instead, they give rise to something insidious. Chatter.

Kiersten nods. “I don’t see it that way. It’s more like she’s encouraging us to undermine a system flawed through overuse of words that are made out to be harmful, when in fact they’re just letters, mixed together like every other word. That’s all they are, mixed-up letters. Like, take the word ‘butterfly,’ for example. What if someone decided one day that ‘butterfly’ is a cuss word? People would eventually start using the word ‘butterfly

I will NOT be loyally to no party before my freedom! Any party that attack my 1st and 2nd amendments right is a dangers party to vote for! I lived in a communist country and I defected from them because they did what Democrats are trying to do! Remember Communism don't come in one day, it starts with socialism. Than they move forward censoring and seizing guns than they move forward seizing your properties than the dictate over people with IRON FIST! Vladimir Lenin said " Socialisms is the road to the communism" I can tell you from my own personal life experience living under communist IRON FIST! You are free to vote for communism in a free country. But try to be free, and vote out of the communism! You have to shot yourself out like I did! Through bullets I defected communist regime after after being screened and backwound check. I spending few months in a concentration camp waiting to be approved to come legally to America, and today Democrats are opening the borders and letting illegal's come straight into America, cutting in front of the line of the other immigrants/refugees who are waiting for months and years to come legally to the USA! This is what I call undermining the democracy! Country with our a borders is not a country just how a house with out walls is not a house! They say fences makes a good neighbors!

I will NOT be loyally to no party before my freedom! Any party that attack my 1st and 2nd amendments right is a dangers party to vote for! I lived in a communist country and I defected from them because they did what Democrats are trying to do! Remember Communism don't come in one day, it starts with socialism. Than they move forward censoring and seizing guns than they move forward seizing your properties than the dictate over people with IRON FIST! Vladimir Lenin said " Socialisms is the road to the communism" I can tell you from my own personal life experience living under communist IRON FIST! You are free to vote for communism in a free country. But try to be free, and vote out of the communism! You have to shot yourself out like I did! I was only 23 years old when through bullets I defected communist regime and landed to the neighbor country before I immigrated to the USA! After being screened and back round check. I spending few months in a concentration camp waiting to be approved to come legally to America, Today Democrats are opening the borders, and letting illegal's come straight into America, cutting in front of the line of the other immigrants/refugees who are waiting for months and years on line to come legally to the USA! it is not cool! This cheating and undermining our democracy! A country with our a borders it is not a country, just how a house with out walls it is not a house! They say fences makes a good neighbors!

It was hard, the authors said, to put a cost on the damage that gambling causes, but politicians needed to recognise that there was a trade-off. If you allowed gambling in order to raise revenue, you were causing damage to people’s lives by doing so and ultimately undermining society. Unlike insurance or other productive financial services, this is a zero sum industry: bookies’ profits are simply gamblers’ losses, and there is no broader societal benefit.

officials in an incumbent administration, entrusted with the most sensitive law enforcement and intelligence tools of government power, might abuse them to spy on their opponents and inject their own proclivities into the political process under the guise of national security. The risk is not just that they might attempt to advance their own partisan political preferences, but also there is a more subtle form of corruption: that officials take on a “praetorian guard” mentality—a smug self-assurance that they know what is best for the country and can justifiably use their powers to prevent the people from making mistakes. The risk is that officials like this, convinced they have a higher duty to protect the country from itself, use the government’s security apparatus to undermine candidates whose fitness for office or whose policy proposals don’t measure up to their standards.

First, we don’t know how to deal with rumors. Rumors that confirm people’s biases are now believed and spread among millions of people. Second,… we tend to only communicate with people that we agree with, and thanks to social media, we can mute, un-follow, and block everybody else. Third, online discussions quickly descend into angry mobs.… It’s as if we forget that the people behind screens are actually real people and not just avatars. And fourth, it became really hard to change our opinions. Because of the speed and brevity of social media, we are forced to jump to conclusions and write sharp opinions in 140 characters about complex world affairs. And once we do that, it lives forever on the Internet.… Fifth—and in my point of view, this is the most critical—today, our social media experiences are designed in a way that favors broadcasting over engagements, posts over discussions, shallow comments over deep conversations. It’s as if we agreed that we are here to talk at each other instead of talking with each other.

Every man worthy of the name,” Orsini repeated, almost with despair, with a last outburst of rage and scorn; and he was silent for a long time, as if to emphasize the enormity of such a claim. It proclaimed, also, he then went on, after taking a deep breath, that "the time for pride is finished, and that we must turn with far more humility and understanding toward the other animal species, “different, but not inferior” "Different, but not inferior,” Orsini re- peated again, with a kind of exasperated relish. And it went on like that; “Man on this planet has reached the point where really he needs all the friendship he can find, and in his loneliness he has need of all the elephants, all the dogs and all the birds . . Orsini gave vent to a strange laugh, a sort of triumphant sneer, entirely devoid of gaiety. “It is time to show that we are capable of preserving this gigantic, clumsy, natural splendor which still lives in our midst . . . that there is still room among us for such a freedom” He fell silent, but they could feel his voice lurking in the blackness, ready to hurl itself on the first prey that offered. There you had a man, he resumed, who for months had been«going about the bush, who penetrated to the remotest villages and who, having learned several dialects while he fraternized with the natives, was devoting himself to an obstinate and dangerous work, undermining the good name of the white man. Western civilization was obviously being represented to the Africans as an immense bankruptcy from which they must at all costs try to escape. They were not far from being begged to go back to cannibalism as a lesser evil than modem science with its weapons of destmction, or from being encouraged to worship their stone idols, with which indeed, as if by chance, people like Morel were stuffing the museums of the world. No, mademoiselle, I don't capture elephants. I content myself with living among them. I like them. I like looking at them, listening to them, watching them on the horizon. To tell you the truth, I’d give anything to become an elephant myself. I’ll convince you that I’ve nothing against the Germans in particular: they’re just men to me, and that’s enough. . . . Give me a rum.

They can even end up pitting coworkers against one another, accidentally promoting behaviors that undermine the progress of the group as a whole. One of my favorite examples comes from the heady days of America Online (AOL). The company would routinely send out CDs in an attempt to get people to sign up for its product. One group within the company, responsible for acquisitions, was given financial incentives for hitting subscription goals. And so all tactics were designed to do just that: sign people up. There were offers of 100 free hours in the first month, which became 250 free hours, then even 700 hours. I remember when the offer got to 1,000 free hours, as long as they were used in the first 45 days (which left 1.7 hours of sleep per night for anyone who could take advantage of the promotion). It worked. Whatever tactics the acquisition group members developed were designed to do one thing and one thing only—maximize their bonus. The problem was there was another group responsible for retention; they had to find ways to get all the people who had canceled their subscriptions to come back. By creating a system in which each group was preoccupied with its own metrics without concern for anyone else’s or even what would serve the company best, the leaders of AOL had effectively incentivized their people to find ways to cost the company more money.

What lot of people don’t know is that. It is possible for someone to choose to support and promote their favorite thing, person or artist, Without dragging, maundering, shaming, disrespecting , undermining, bashing other things, people or artists, and without using other people or artists names.

Today we are celebrating days of reconciliation, but the problem is we still have people who want apartheid back. People who think apartheid is the way and they don’t see anything wrong . They think they are superior and are better than other races. They still want to continue doing what they had been forgiven without asking for forgiveness. We have those who think apartheid or racism is their culture. They teach it, share it and laugh about it amongst themselves. They tell themselves they are good and God’s people, while they mistreat , slave, disrespect, abuse, kill, undermine, torture other races that are different than them. Apartheid or racism is crime against humanity. You don’t have to say it or show it. But if in your heart and mind you are racist. Then you are evil , bad and committing crime against humanity .It doesn’t matter how you are justifying it to cleans your heart or trying to get away in doing the most evil, inhuman thing on earth. We are all equal, We are all the same. We are all humans. Let's respect and love each other, embracing our differences without offending one another. Happy Reconciliation day.

We want Next Jump to be a company that our mothers and fathers would be proud of us for building,” says Kim. And a large part of making our parents proud comes in the form of being a good person and doing the right thing. And so he implemented a policy of Lifetime Employment. Next Jump might be the only tech company in the country to do such a thing. No one will get fired to balance the books. And even costly mistakes or poor individual performance are not grounds for dismissal. If anything, the company will spend the time to help figure out what the problem is and help its people overcome it. Like an athlete who goes through a slump, a Next Jumper doesn’t get fired, they get coached. About the only situation in which an employee would be asked to leave is if someone worked outside the company’s high moral values or if someone actively worked to undermine their colleagues.

It's funny how some people refuse to do the work and come towards you as they process a fail through their ego. So they come to you from their ego, believing that they'll succeed 'this time' except that they won't because they are still their toxic self coming with their BS. And you can tell through and through. But they are convinced that you won’t be able to tell, still undermining you in their head and taking you for a dense fool, thinking that they’ll have you all wrapped up around their little finger. That is how such people become the biggest lessons and eye-openers in your Life. Through them, you realise exactly what you don't want and you are reminded of what you truly deserve because they never came to you correctly. So in the end, they really are/ were the biggest losers. And it is what it is.

The pinnacle of the struggle for attention, which we are promised will surely pay off through wealth and fame, is the TED Talk. Purposely informal and limited to eighteen minutes, these punchy, pithy talks are meant to inspire and entertain. They don’t invite deliberation or debate. They don’t demand immersion or even background reading. They are capsules of knowledge. To deliver a TED Talk, however, is the apex of self-branding. And, not coincidentally, one of the major ways people discover TED Talks and other self-promotional videos is through Facebook.

For all of us, there are also likely times when therapy simply doesn't seem to move forward as we imagined it would. At this crossroads, we often question ourselves or blame our patients. Between what our culture requires and what we have experienced in childhood, we might go either direction. We have a particular challenge to feeling competent right now. Our left-centric society has done its best to codify the healing process, leaving us with a set of procedures and expected outcomes that don't welcome the individuality of our people of the fluidity of each person's unpredictable and unique process of recovery. This is doubly difficult, because when we follow the course culture provides, safety is already undermined to a greater or lesser extent. I believe it wounds us when we feel we aren't helping a person because we set out with such good hearts to relieve suffering. A well-practiced practitioner might try to guard our hearts by blaming our people's resistance. When a wounded part of us is afraid we are inadequate, this often generates a critical protective voice to try to urge us toward a better performance. In both instances, our ability to be present for our people gets lost in the need to protect. How can we hold these experiences kindly, recognizing that they are part of the human experience? Right now, we might be able to open the arms of inclusion to these parts of us.

Empirical evidence is not what counts. Rational proof is the only acceptable criterion of truth. If you cannot provide a sufficient reason for an argument you make, you do not have an argument. Sensory evidence is not a sufficient reason. It is not an argument. Sensory evidence is simply raw data. A million people could provide a million different ways of interpreting it, hence it’s meaningless. It has nothing to do with proof. “Evidence” concerns an appearance from which inferences may be drawn. It concerns that which is obvious to the eye. Yet what does “obvious” mean? What is obvious about sensory data? Color blind people don’t know what “blue” is. Tetrachromats, with four cone types in the eye (cone cells are responsible for color vision, while rod cells code for monochromatic vision) see color radically differently from normal people (i.e. trichromats with three cone types). People with synesthesia have drastically different sensory experiences from normal people. So, everything about the senses is mired in ambiguity, uncertainty and subjectivity. These are no organs for truth, i.e. organs that show us the truth of a thing, exactly what it is and everything about it. We see things in our dreams even though our eyes are closed. How can we see without eyes, how can we sense without sense organs? What’s for sure is that scientific empiricism and materialism won’t be furnishing any answers.

When people hold prejudice toward a rival group, they’re often willing to do whatever it takes to elevate their own group and undermine their rivals—even if it means doing harm or doing wrong.