fabiochiu/medium-articles huggingface dataset:
The Breakthrough #3
By: Schaz Nightwalker
Tags: Productivity, Lifesyle, Improvement, Life, Better Living

Hello reader! How’s it going! Pretty well, right? No? Try implying my Deterioration Project , it’ll help. Anyways, long time no post, huh. And again, anyways, there’s been a few(at least) noticeable improvements in the past few days in my lifestyle. So, I’ll be starting from things from the past, then count the habits I picked up recently, that will give the crystal clear image of my changes over the weekend. Then I’ll set up strategy for the plans I’ll be following in future. Let’s get this started!

Previously

If I had to express I won’t be lying if I say it was a total mess of my life 3–4 weeks back. I was in depression to some extent. I was not fine both emotionally and mentally. I was unhealthy. Not waking up on time. Not eating on time, wasting time a lot. I was not doing anything productive. And you know what the worst thing that can happen to someone is? Being in a dilemma and knowing how to wrap all the mess up, yet not being able to pull your life together. All of it calls stress and frustration. I planned to meditate and then working out every single day after waking up, but I woke up late everyday, then thought I’ll do it later, then this later becomes more later and later and so my never-ending procrastination cycle went on and on.

Now

It’s been three days to be precise, I’ve been trying to wake up early. I’ve been meditating. Working out for a better physique. My current stamina is 8 minutes till I reach my limit, after continuously doing exhausting work. 8 minutes, sounds less, isn’t it? I know. But after it becomes a habit, the number’s going to increase exponentially. I can tell, when I was previously working out, I was worried about when I was not able to get tired and exhausted even after an hour of full body workout, after doing it consistently only a week! That’s that. Also, I’ve been tracking most (almost all) of the tasks I’ve been doing…. the productive ones. Which includes meditation, studying, singing, body posture, stretching, and things like that. I created a to-do list, a list of the books I’ve read so far and the list of topics I need to do some minor research on. I’m in a better mood now, I’m better emotionally and mentally. I do productive works. I also read books. I’m also on a No Nut challenge, which is real son of a bitch. And I plan to get better in the upcoming couple of weeks.

In the coming days…

I’ll be adding more details to the schedule I’ve created and try to reach the perfection. It’s like the process of songwriting. I’ve set the groundwork and now I just have to do corrections till it becomes the best it can ever be. I’ll increase my study time, reduce my Youtube and Anime time, read books more often, include more habits in my bucket list, modify the plans and create a more precise, day-to-day schedule, update my activities regularly and finding more ways of a better lifestyle in the meantime. Man!! I can turn out to be a good lifestyle blogger!
4 Simple Tricks to Improve Page Speed
Tags: Optimization, App Performance, Tips And Tricks, Improvements, First Contentful Paint

4 Simple Tricks to Improve Page Speed Vivek Follow Mar 4 · 2 min read

Page Load Speed

Performance is often considered a feature rather than an add-on. There are good reasons for it too. During development, we thrive on giving our best. Somewhere down the course of a product lifecycle, we tend to slip the performance. Don’t worry; we got you covered. The following minor tweaks can boost your page load speed to a greater extent.

Image Lazy loading

Lazy loading is a strategy to identify resources as non-blocking (non-critical) and load these only when needed. It’s a way to shorten the critical rendering path, which translates into reduced page load times. Just add loading="lazy" in your <img /> tags. That would do the trick.

Caching Images

High-quality images are enormous and consume more time to download. It is always better to have a caching strategy for the pictures. Caching will improve the download by more than 700% on consecutive user visits to the page. There is no obligation to reinvent the wheel. A lot of cloud solutions are readily available.

Preconnect and DNS Prefetch

An application will include a myriad of external resources for marketing, analytical, and error reporting purposes. It is better to inform the browser of these external resources so that the browsers can establish connections in advance. Use the tag preconnect sparsely because it could be counter-productive if overused. Do rely on the marker dns-prefetch for most of the resources.

Remove Unused Fonts

We developers love google fonts because of their simplicity and versatility. But we tend to overuse it a lot!!. Only add the fonts that the application requires. And also, be aware of the font weights; each extra font-weight you add is an additional resource, and there is a performance cost associated with it.

Conclusion

There you go. These are the proven four simple tricks that we have tested in Nirman Technologies' projects. Do share your valuable feedback and any technique that you use in your project to improve performance. Thanks to Varun A P for sharing his knowledge on page speed.
🐬Are you learning as effectively as a dolphin?
By: Benjamin P. Taylor
Tags: Organisation, Improvement, Learning

It could be the secret to success! There are two great stories…

In Hawaii, Gregory Bateson saw dolphins being trained to perform circus tricks. When trainers stopped rewarding the same old tricks, what happened?

The dolphins came up with new tricks of their own.

At the Institute for Marine Mammal Studies, scientists rewarded dolphins for cleaning garbage from their pools. And the number of pieces of garbage kept increasing!

A dolphin called Kelly kept a sheet of paper under a rock, so she could tear off one piece at a time.

It’s powerful to think of THREE levels of learning:

1-do our work better (single loop)

firefighters get better and better at saving people from burning buildings

2-reframe and rethink (double loop)

then they realised that it was better to *prevent* fires than save people! And began to work on that

3-change our identity (triple loop) — the self-image of the firefighter changed from macho hero (they’re still amazing people) to wanting to be great at engaging with people to help them make their houses safer

Learning can work at *all three levels* — do the thing better, do different things, AND be better…

Can you think of an example of double or triple loop learning?

endnotes:

By the way, I feel dolphins should *never* be kept in captivity. And the descriptions above are simplified for the sake of fitting into LinkedIn’s 1,200 characters.

The history of this is rich and I love all the intertwingling. Bateson’s ‘deutero-learning’ arose from the ‘double bind’ — a name for the psychological state when you are ‘damned if you do, damned if you don’t’ — and the need to get to a level above that kind of ‘Catch-22’ problem. Argyris and Schon credited Bateson, and both also link back to Ashby’s cybernetic thinking. There’s also a link to Bill Torbert’s Action Inquiry which explicitly operates at these three levels (and Bill is a published cybernetician too).

Argyris’ classic paper: http://6-30partners.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/Chris-Argyris-Double-Loop-Learning-in-Organisations.pdf

There is a lot more to be said about this — including whether, in such schemas, a ‘third loop’ is ever necessary…
Self-Improvement Tips for 2021
By: Steph Up
Tags: Development, Self-awareness, Improvement, Growth, Self Improvement

canva.com user-edited photo

You have to ask yourself, what can you do to improve yourself every day? And be a better person than you were yesterday?

Well, since we're now in 2021 and 2020 is already over, we should now get a head start by preparing what we are aiming to do this year, to improve and become a better version of ourselves.

Self-Improvement is necessary for our future as it allows personal growth that could help us develop the skills and discipline to make all of our dreams possible, and as we approach the end of the year, we should always do the right habits that will help us improve for the better.

Having said that, we should be ready to make changes in ourselves to be able to make successful changes in regards to our goals in order to possibly achieve them, because without changing, we are not allowing ourselves to improve and experience new things that we have yet to experience.

We should finally get out of our comfort zone because growth begins when we start to face new challenges and learn how to overcome them.

Do not be fearful of change because being fearful will only keep you out from living your best life.

The only solution to get out of feeling stuck is if you find ways to improve yourself each day and if you are willing to take a step towards a better life.

With that said, below are the 7 self-improvement tips to help anyone become their best selves in 2021

canva.com user-free photo

1) Review what you’ve done in the past year — review what you have done in the past year and think of the things that you aren’t successful with doing so you can think of ways how you can make it better in 2021 to be able to achieve them. In order to know what you need to improve, you must know your starting point. Take a moment to reflect on the previous year and assess where you are currently at in your life. You must know what you have already done and what you still want to reach, therefore, you would find new ways how to improve it.
Three Ways to Make Your Work Set-up Healthier
By: Dan Cayer
Tags: Productivity, Healthy, Improvement, Health, Work Space

Consider your office set-up and work habits like investing. Each day that you work has an effect on your body and, like our financial situation, ignoring the body doesn’t make it any less real! You can make a few changes that will be a long-term investment in your health (and therefore your ability to be productive and earn that $).

Raise Your Rump

Sitting with our legs and torso at 90° for long periods of time is normal nowadays, but physiologically unnatural. The reason that chairs use this 90° angle has everything to do with ease of stacking and cost of production, and very little to do with promoting healthy posture.

Instead of sitting, think perching. Get your hips higher than your knees (the angle between your torso and legs should be around 110–135°). This is easily done for around 50 bucks on Amazon with a buckwheat or firm cushion that you can drop right onto your seat. You don’t necessarily need to buy a new, expensive chair. The cushion solution is also portable. I dream of the day when people walk into a meeting with their favorite cushion in tow.

Here are three questions I recommend:

– If you’re around 6 foot or taller, you may want to try theSmile Cushionby Carolina Morning (choose the buckwheat version).

A somewhat more compact cushion, also made with buckwheat, is the Buckwheat Crescentcushion made by Samadhi Cushions.

A cushion that’s designed just for seats (unlike the two meditation cushions above) is this wedge-shaped cushionrecommended by a former student.

2) Use Your Skeleton

Too often, people misunderstand posture as being the result of incredible and constant exertion. Ask the next two-year-old you see with perfect posture how hard they are trying to sit up. Learning a few basic points about anatomy can help you rethink your posture and let your skeleton do the work. Here’s a short video and a four-point posture checklist.

3) You Need a Break

You need several breaks, actually. Getting up every 20 to 25 minutes for just a few minutes (i.e. walking to the water cooler and back) can help prevent repetitive strain injuries and also boost productivity and focus. A very easy, low-tech system is the Pomodoro Technique. This simple time management system also helps keep your body and mind stay fresh.

Pro tip: Drink lots of water. You’ll flush out the muscle waste and have to get up frequently!

Any questions? Drop me a line.
How To Speed Up Metabolism Fast — A Daily Checklist
Tags: Metabolism Diet, Metabolism, Metabolism Booster, Improvement, Energy Healing

Lifestyle changes to increase your metabolism

Photo by Zohre Nemati on Unsplash

1. Try getting a good night’s sleep

Sleep is fundamental to an optimised life.

Lack of sleep is linked to a significant rise in the risk of obesity¹. This may be partly due to the negative effects of sleep deprivation on metabolism². Lack of sleep can:

lower your calorie burn³

change the way you process sugar³

disrupt your appetite-regulating hormones³.

Aim to get 7–8 hours of sleep a night if you are looking to provide a boost to your metabolism.

2. Drink more water

People who drink water instead of sugary drinks have a better chance of losing and keeping weight off⁴.

Moreover, it doesn’t get any easier than this when it comes to losing weight.

Simply drinking more water increases the rate at which you burn calories and is a healthy metabolism booster. In fact, drinking two glasses (around half a litre) of water can speed up metabolism by 10–30% for an hour⁵.

Water can help you lose weight and maintain it. It is a perfect example of a healthy metabolism booster.

3. Try out High-Intensity Workouts

High-Intensity Interval Training (HIIT) is one of the best types of exercise for the body. It’s basically short bursts of intense activity. In other words, HIIT involves stringing exercises together and maintaining active rest to keep your heart and breathing rates up. Thus with HIIT you also get the benefits of aerobic exercise. Even after your workout, it can help you burn extra fat by raising your metabolic rate⁶.

Try HIIT workouts for just 10–15 minutes daily. The high-intensity workouts will help you burn fat and boost your metabolism.

Here’s a great 5-minute HIIT session for you to watch or bookmark for later!
The Silent Girl!!
By: Shalini Mahalingam
Tags: Self-awareness, Improvement, Students, Self Improvement, Mental Health

There were a group of girls standing,

They were talking so happily and joyfully.

A silent girl in the class joined the conversation, everyone stopped laughing and a silence prevailed.

They cleared the group and went off!

But this incident was never cleared in that poor girl’s mind.

The silent girl was good at studies, had good name with teachers and parents. But she was not liked by her fellow students for being weird, which she soon came to know by her only friend(she was talkative one ).

Many years later, when the silent girl turned into a talkative one, everyone in the troop( including those who ignored her) approached her and talked to her happily.

The silent girl was happy talking to those people and shared it with her mother that those who ignored , now started talking.

Even though , she was talkative , the silent nature inside her prevailed.

She started to think “ only if I hide my silent nature, people would start to talk me.”

She then, started to talk with everyone, became an extrovert.

At a point of time, everyone was enjoying with her , was happy with her presence.

But at the same time, they were people who criticized her for her over-friendly nature, her jokes, etc., anything they feel that they hate about her.

Hearing a lot of criticisms, she then began worrying about that.

‘Whether I be silent or talkative, the criticisms prevails, so why I can be who I am ‘ This incident changed her into an “extroverted introvert”.

She now knew where to talk and where to be silent.

Lesson learnt.
The 5-Y Technique!!
By: Shalini Mahalingam
Tags: Self-awareness, Self, Improvement, Self Improvement, Students

Scene: A counselling session( a student and a counselor are in a room ).

{ Representation, C: Counselor, S : Student}

The student opens up.

“I feel I can’t speak in speak in public. Public speaking is not my cup of tea “ says the student.

The counsellor clears his throat :“Lets examine your problem ”

Session starts with a bunch of questions,

C: why do u feel you can’t speak?

S: I stammer while I speak. People will not like it.

C: Why do you stammer?

S: I have a lot of fear while pronouncing the words. I pronounce the words improperly.

C: why do you pronounce it improperly?

S: If I mispronounce it, teacher would leave me and give me an excuse . So I don’t have to give the presentation.

C: Why do you need an excuse?

S: I can escape from that presentation task and I would get sympathy from teachers too.

C: Now, I get it . You are using an escape technique like stammering to escape from the tasks provided to you. And you got used to it.

So, from the conversation we can understand two things, one the student uses an escape technique as a protection and another thing is that the root cause of the problem is identified.

The counsellor uses a technique called 5-Y technique to analyze the problem.

The 5 why technique- is a brilliant tool to find the root cause of a problem.

So, If are struggling with a problem in mind , just asks why, why , why ….., till you find the root cause.
#1 Subjecting myself to your opinion
Tags: Medium, Improvement, Technology, Learning

For a few weeks now, I have been writing & publishing articles, here on Medium. The goals I am trying to reach by writing these stories are multiple, but the main ones are: talking about stuff I care about, getting better at writing in English and learning to summarize and organize efficiently my ideas.

Reading more and more articles, I have come to realize that if I wanted to improve quickly and have a chance to share my knowledge and learn from others as much as I can, I had to publish more, to subject myself to your opinion. This is why I am writing these lines.

From now on, I will be trying to write a little story, an anecdote about me, my day, or something I care about, as often as I have an idea for a story.

So, if you could be interested in spending 2 minutes reading my words every once in a while, here is who I am:

I am a French engineering student.

I am specializing in Information Systems Security.

I am interested in everything, one minute I can be watching a stupid vine compilation on Youtube and the next one cooking or going to see a play.

My fields of interest these days are, among others, understanding human behavior, solving programming challenges, learning Japanese and writing.

In upcoming articles of this format, I will probably talk about my view on topics like:

Team & project management, since I am a team leader at school this year

Sensibilisation to cybersecurity, because more than it being part of my studies, my personal beliefs and principles make it important to me

Programming & related stuff, because I love it. (I really wish I will say stupid and wrong things, that way you’ll react, correct me and I’ll learn things!)

I hope you will bear with me, see you soon!
So Far So Good
Tags: Development, Giveaway, Building, Improvement, New Year

And the year is 2020… music to our ears.

Is it too late to say Happy New Year?

Happy New Year! Welcome to a new year, a new decade and hopefully a new series of wins for you and yours. How is 2020 looking from your end? So far so good? Sweet.

At Kureen, we’ve been up and about, doing the work per usual and there are a number of new developments and improvements in the works. One of which are our new subscription packages.

(P.S: if you’re a mother, this might just be for you. Visit our website to sign up.)

As you all should know, in 2019 we expanded our services to include other home services such as laundry, gas refill, electricity supply and grocery shopping. Well, as the year ended we got some feedback and discovered that there was a lot of demand for a more personalized service where the user can select the particular services they want and how many times they need it.

So guess what? We heard you and we have built additional subscription plans which we call the “Maid For The Day” packages. With this plan you get to have one of our Kureeners for any 3 or 5 days of your choice from 6am-6pm. The services provided are dependent on the services you actually need. And this can range from nanny services to getting a car wash or grocery shopping, etc.

We’re excited about this new development as it promises to solve the problems of our users by meeting their specific home needs. We look forward to learning from this new process and offering our very best.

To an extent, I guess it’s safe to say that the year is 2020 and so far so good.

Till next time…

Oh and one last thing, if you’re reading this and you’re in Abuja, kindly visit our instagram page and comment ‘so far so good’ on any of our posts. We might have something for one of you in the New Year.

Till next time, stay peaceful!
Clarity
By: Ritupriya Debnath
Tags: Lifestyle, Clarity, Improvement, Business, Cultures Market Growth

Clarity

There’s nothing like being perfect in every way to everyone. You just have to know how and when to be, if only you can use the word ‘perfect’ as an adjective and a goal. RITUPRIYA DEBNATH Apr 22, 2020·2 min read

When you find yourself lost, there’s nothing wrong with it

To remind myself how to be productive in what I do or maybe completely do things out of curiosity depends on clarity.

Focus is the key, no matter what you do

When you have the facts right, it becomes easier to face the challenges. My best friend showed me that in a very peculiar way (which I find very interesting though), “We need to question ourselves in every step and prove ourselves wrong while searching for a conclusion.”

Be confident in the mistakes you make and try again to make it right

It doesn’t have to be right at one shot, you just have to work on it consistently making trials and errors.

Life is full of ups and downs. You get to be the change you wanna be. Go for it. Do it with clarity in the back of your mind.

Our mind is the magic box that only we can control. The way you feel, the way you think and the way you do almost everything depends on what you choose to be happy or maybe not.

Clarity gives you the basis to think, to feel and to do almost anything you want to do.

You, be You with Clarity.
Tired of being told about COVID-19 Direction Changes Every 2nd Day?
By: Meinhard Ploner
Tags: Covid 19, Statistics, Kpi, Improvement, Coronavirus

Number of Deaths

The effect shown for Confirmed Cases is also valid for the Deaths. We get the same advantage in applying the Rolling Average on that metric.

What causes the Weekly Pattern?

There might be different reasons for the (mostly weekly) patterns:

Fewer tests on Saturday and/or Sunday.

on Saturday and/or Sunday. Recording delays for tests performed during the weekend.

Even if the reason for the ‘seasonality’ is another one, smoothing the data by taking the 7-day averages makes the results much more stable.

Predictions

The existence of seasonal patterns in the data should also be incorporated in prediction models. Adjusting for the seasonality effect makes predictions more accurate and its credibility (or confidence) intervals narrower.

There are already a lot of very good forecasting models out there, e.g.

Estimating the number of infections and the impact of non-pharmaceutical interventions on COVID-19 in 11 European countries, 2020-Mar-30, Imperial College.

This study examines the different interventions countries have taken: event banning, school closures, lockdown, etc., and its impact measured in terms of reduction in the Reproduction Number R0 (or Rt). Very interesting read!

Photo by Noah Silliman on Unsplash

Final Notes

The average person has no advantage in seeing the COVID-19 numbers changing its direction every few days. It rather creates additional unnecessary panic and uncertainty.

After all, these quick shifts in direction have nothing to do with successfully implemented interventions (like “stay-at-home”) but are often an artifact of weekends. Therefore — again:
When and How to Start
By: Hide In A Chair
Tags: Productivity, Achievement, Improvement, Goals, Grit

If you are like me, someone who has a lot of wants and goals, but lack the act of following through, then you are probably struggling with a similar hurdle in life.

a person who lacks grit can be easily identified with having a strong mindset at the beginning and want to go full force on their goals, however tends to lean back when thing gets boring. Hopes and dreams tend to be abandoned and this stage and that person will try to find a different goal. Go on full force as usual and then quit in the middle, it is a vicious cycle that people must avoid.

So when? and how? one must stick to their agenda and actually go through with it, the answer relies on your organizational skills. I took the liberty to share my strategy on how to stick to a plan and don’t give up halfway.

Set daily goals. Surely you have a long term goal, and a big goal you are trying to achieve, however setting up a daily goal can really help you get there. Don’t take too long to do it, because you will eventually get jaded. Set an hour or half an hour each day to do your daily goal. For example, You have a dream to have your own clothing line business as your side hustle, spend a few hours everyday to do research on the details of your business, find out all the information. Once your set your daily target and make sure it is small doable, you can slowly build that knowledge. The 2 days rule. We as humans tend to have the feeling of laziness or boredom when doing something repetitive, and that’s okay, not doing your daily goal is okay if it helps with your mental health. The 2 days rule gives you a leeway to escape without quitting it for real. For example you have a goal to do the Chloe Ting challenge for 2 weeks, suddenly you wake up one morning and feeling super awful and just want to lay on your bed, do it, if you feel that it helps, however, don’t let yourself do it more that 2 days. On the third day, push yourself to get up and do it again, that way, you can get back on your feet and continue your habit. Start now. We need to stop making excuses and lying to ourselves that you need to do something before you plan your goals. The best time to start is now, and if you are scared, then start small. For example, you want to pursue a higher degree abroad, try to find information on scholarships and IElTS test as soon as you can, the longer you stall, the longer you will achieve your dream.

So there’s that, a concise strategy on how to start and when to start aiming for your goal. Start small and be consistent on your daily goal. By setting these strategy, you can start slowly and hopefully over time you can see the progress and your goals come to fruition. Good luck ^^
Deep Image — how Machine Learning improves your images
By: Antek Miłkowski
Tags: Machine Learning, Improvement, Photography, Artificial Intelligence, Tools

Deep Image by TEONITE — using ML algorithms to improve image quality

Let’s start with the fact that we are amazed and extremely grateful for how well received the Deep Image was. Thank you all for all the feedback, support and engagement. This is exactly what drives us to keep on creating stuff for you!

If you do not know what Deep Image is, let us bring you up to speed — in a nutshell — it’s an app, which uses machine learning algorithms to improve the quality of the enlarged picture.

Machine Learning algorithms improve the quality of enlarged picture

So, if you lost the original pictures and are left with poor quality digital copies, want to improve the quality of an old family photo, or for any other reason need to tweak the image, Deep Image is here to save the day! You do not have to install anything, just visit Deep Image website, choose the image file and start improving it.

If you want to know more about Deep Image (including a detailed explanation of how it works), or just read about bicubic interpolation and super-resolution — check out our previous blog post about Deep Image

Deep Image by TEONITE

Now the big news — due to massive popular demand we’ve decided to put some more effort and we will keep developing the Deep Image app for you! Feel free to use it, and share it with whoever might need it!

Also, if you have any feedback, feel free to contact us @ deepimage@teonite.com

or reach out to us on TEONITE’s facebook fanpage

Planned changes:

New and more efficient algorithms for Deep Image filters,

Brand new User Interface,

Better quality of enlarged images,

The app will be more user friendly with strong emphasis on user experience.

We hope that you will find all the changes awesome and keep using Deep Image, and if you haven’t used it yet, here it is: DEEP IMAGE
Improve Strategic Thinking
Tags: Strategy, Planning, Work, Improvement, Action

Analyzing, planning, and coordinating with peers will improve your strategies and the contributions you bring to the workplace.

​

Improve strategic thinking skills, revolves around exactly of how you’ll go about it word-by-word. In the current era of human civilization, strategic thinking skills are required at every level of an organization as if you conduct a survey or just converse with your peers about work environment, most employees are doing their job in a transactional manner , from one job to the next and to the next after that, this kills creativity in work and also hampers the individual from seeing the bigger picture . A simple thumb rule to tackle work is understand that everything deserves intellectual appreciation and another to improve your strategic thinking skills is to understand that the questions are the language of strategy. To further work on improving your strategic thinking skills,” sound strategic”, it may sound weird or just gibberish, but it helps you pave a way for you strategic thinking improvement. To sound strategic, try adding a structure to any formal written and verbal communication, keep the main point of the conversation in your mind and structure the entire ordeal to support and enhance the main point (but don’t focus hard on it , or be mindlessly repetitive). Always be ready for answers for all the questions that may arise. And Now, last but not the least, give yourself time and honor it, learn how to disconnect. Strategic thinking can’t be done when you are working every hour of the day and never streamlining anything. Learn how to manage, through Stephen Covey’s 2×2 Matrix or some other way. Strategize your improvement
How To Eliminate Procrastination Before It Gets You
By: Jeremiah Grigsby
Tags: Mindset, Advice, Improvement, Self Improvement

— — — — — — — -

Jeremiah Grigsby | August 23, 2021

Procrastination is something we all struggle with even if you think you’re the most diligent individual on earth. The mere idea of procrastinating is what we avoid, so how is it avoided?

There are several mental and physical cues that will help us tackle procrastination. First, we’ll start with mental.

Recognize When You Are Slacking

You may think it’s mundane, but recognizing when you are procrastinating is essential. Here are some mental cues that will help you: a task keeps popping up; you’re easily distracted throughout day; and you keep waiting to take action.

It is important to notice these sequences because they help you make that decision to get out the gutter!

A big mental component about procrastination is knowing when you are doing it, but never doing anything to stop it. We’re going to use this dynamic to our advantage.

Recognize and attack, not slack.

Don’t Overwhelm Yourself

Now that you know that you are habitually procrastinating; refrain from feeling overwhelmed. Feeling overwhelmed will ultimately bring you back to square one. It’s all about perception here.

Don’t concern yourself with [how] you will complete the task, instead; envision the completion of whatever you’re doing.

Keep in mind, since we’ve halted the slacking phase, you’re already ahead of the game so there is no need to stress!

Complete The Hardest Thing First

You’ve gotten your mind in order and you’re ready to go, so let’s get to work!

The most vital part to this whole process it to complete the hardest task first.

When you prioritize a work load from hardest to easiest, everything progressively becomes easier since you took the initiative to do what is hardest first.

If you’re having trouble deciding what is hard and what is easy, just do what you would least like to do first.

If you have one HUGE project, utilize a calendar and break the project down into smaller pieces. More importantly, make sure you write down a certain amount of work to be completed for that day, not started for the day.

We want to get out of habitual incompletion, and in habitual completion.

Recap

>Recognize when you are procrastinating. Recurring Task(s), Easily distracted, You keep waiting to take action.

>Refrain from feeling overwhelmed, it brings you back to square one.

>Don’t think about how “hard” everything is or how you’ll achieve everything.

>Do the hardest task first.

>If it’s a long project, break it down into smaller peices and schedule ahead
How to Regain Your Focus After Distraction
By: Abayomi Omoogun
Tags: Productivity, Work, Improvement, Growth, Life

Photo by Alex Kotliarskyi on Unsplash

Disruption of routines is a problem if we can’t manage our time properly. I find myself completely deviating from my to-do list plan for the day and I can’t help but wonder how much time I have lost.

I take my to-do list plan for the day seriously and all of a sudden something else caught my attention and took away all my time completely. I was really angry and mad at myself for not regaining control of my time till it was gone and because of that, I couldn’t even do a simple work from my to-do list as a result of activity disruption.

It is not easy to tell why I failed, I only lacked DISCIPLINE.

Discipline is like your will power to go on and do the things you set out to do irrespective of the outside forces out of your control.

Discipline is really needed in pursuit of whatever thing we want to do be it a small task or a large task and that was what I failed to put on which cost me dearly.

ways you can regain your Focus.

Reanalyze or re-strategize

If you find out you are deviating from your plan for the day because of outside forces out of your control, then re-strategizing is a good option or tool that can be used. But in most cases, if it is forces within your grasp or distractions, that is where the discipline and will come for you to leave and get back to your task. Discipline and will is something simple we claim we all have but it is the most difficult when we need to put in to use.

Photo by Sid Leigh on Unsplash

Take a break

Another way to regain focus after deviating from your plan is to take a break. Taking a break like a five to ten-minute walk, meditating, or reading are also ways to regain focus. I walk for five minutes anytime am distracted and can’t seem to get my mojo back while on work. After walking, my brain calms down and I get to regain my focus again.

Clear your desk and mind

When your desk is cluttered, your mind can be cluttered too. If you are feeling unfocused, take a look at your workspace if there is anything piled up. When we see a lot of papers and things pile up we immediately go into anxiety. If it is out of sight it is out of mind.

Drink a Glass of water

It may sound simple, but if you are having difficulty staying on a task, pause and drink a glass of water. Not only will getting up to pour yourself a glass force you to change your thought, and process, It will also keep you hydrated which makes you more alert.

There are other ways to regain focus these are just four simple steps I follow to regain my focus whenever am distracted.
Help me relocate & continue my healing journey
Tags: Faith and Life, Healing, Self, Improvement, Self Improvement

Hi, my name is Michel’le & for the past two yrs I have been on a self healing journey. I am 30 yrs old & since childhood, I have experienced so much abuse that at a point I thought it was normal. It wasn’t until I had nothing about two yrs ago I had enough, because my life was not changing for the better & I am a good person. I have a good heart & I help everyone. I have helped those that have stole from me, lied, betrayed, kicked me while I was down regardless of anything. The saddest thing is it’s coming from my family, my community, my environment. I know I have a greater purpose to continue my self healing journey so I am able to teach others to continue to heal, grow, & evolve despite of the odds. My goal is to relocate, and regain my peace & everything that I deserve. When I take that leap of faith believing in myself & actually healing others all around the world will see, YES it is possible. Do not allow fear or other people’s beliefs keep you from going after YOUR dreams.

My goal is to raise $10,000 towards my goal. Towards my relocating and starting my Business. I thank each & every person that took the time to read a part of my story. Please share my story if that is all you can do. I appreciate that as well. Any donations can be made Cashapp $let029

Venmo-msell25

Please follow me on IG: @Bossetteenterprises

Love, Light & Blessing! TY
How to Change Worlds
By: Josh J Cole
Tags: Philosophy, Change, Ethics, Improvement, Psychology

If you can’t change anyone’s mind but your own, how are you going to make a difference in anyone’s life? For every action someone takes, there are three steps.

First, they have an experience. Any experience we have is measured against our core human needs to be, belong, believe, and become. According to some theories, that’s literally how our brains take in the world.

“I’m hungry” is a simple and common experience within the “be” category.

When the experience enters your worldview, your mind does its best to explain it. It does this with stories — while reality is just a series of things happening, stories add color: “I want this but this is happening.”

“I’m hungry but there’s a line for the food truck” is a very simple story, but it’s much more useful than “I feel hunger and there is food in a vehicle and there are five humans standing near it and looking in its direction.”

Now you engage with that story. This is where we actually make decisions and act on them. Based on our mindset, we evaluate available options and decide which is the best means to our end. When we take action, we change the world around us. My choice becomes your new context.

In the food truck example, I have at least three options: wait in line, cut in line, or go find other food. Generally, humans will take the clearest and simplest route to their goal, based on what they think will work.

The only way to change how people choose to interact with the world is to work with these three “E”s.

Photo credit: João Silas

Here’s how:

Make experiences safer — This is often the highest impact option. When people’s brains feel safe and respected, they can see more options. When safety is threatened, we’re limited to fight, flight, freeze, or appease. Respect their explanations — People will not and cannot change their entire mindset in the moment they’re being asked to apply it. Teaching better mindsets will absolutely make a huge difference, but it won’t work in the moment. “Just don’t worry about it” is terrible advice. Engage with questions—Since people are always working against stories, you can improve their actions by improving those stories. But here’s the thing — it’s their story, so you have to let them do the work. “He didn’t mean that” isn’t as useful as “Why would he say that?”

I emphasize communication a lot because that’s how you learn things and change things. Without communication, you’re just interacting with your own little world.

If you want to change the universe, you’ll need to change a lot of universes — and that means understanding and respecting what’s going on in those universes.
Cultural investment key to the future of our cities
By: Bop Consulting
Tags: Cities, Culture, Improvement, Investment

New enquiry finds new opportunities for culture in cities

Image credit: Greater London Authority

Yesterday we were at the launch of the Cultural Cities Enquiry report, for which BOP were the working and research partner.

This UK-wide enquiry brought together cities, UK Arts Councils and leaders from the cultural, education, design, development, hospitality and technology sectors to investigate how culture continues to improve and enrich the lives of cities.

The overwhelming conclusion of the report was that smart investment through cultural activities can bring enormous benefits to our cities and their people across the UK. There is a huge opportunity to grow investment in culture across the UK, attracting and supporting diverse and talented people and ensuring that our cities thrive through social and economic growth.

The first key recommendation in the report was the creation of Cultural City Compacts. These will bring together civic leaders and partners from culture, business and education to make best use of resources and secure the social and economic benefits that come from embedding arts and culture in civic life.

These Compacts will deliver against local priorities, such as regenerating high streets and post-industrial quarters, establishing creative clusters, developing tourist revenue, supporting local creative talent and building civic engagement.

The other three recommendations were:·

Corporate Social Venture Funds — These will act as local vehicles for social investment into culture and creative organisations

— These will act as local vehicles for social investment into culture and creative organisations Creative Talent Pathways — The creation of coordinated approaches for the development of creative talent to meet local needs, which government could support by making apprenticeship levy rules more flexible

— The creation of coordinated approaches for the development of creative talent to meet local needs, which government could support by making apprenticeship levy rules more flexible Cultural property assets — Making strategic use of cities’ cultural property assets to revive high streets and city centres, as well as help prevent displacement of cultural activity after urban regeneration.

Debate about the UK’s future is intense. Our culture and our places are vital to this. While these debates continue, the Enquiry offers practical ways forward.

We will be exploring these four recommendations further in a series of forthcoming blogs.

Full report here.

- Jonathan Todd, Chief Economist
Why 66% of improvement programs fail?
By: Ginu Samuel
Tags: Transformation, Agile, Systems Thinking, Improvement, Digital Transformation

Most of our improvement programs / organizational transformations are focussing on a specific department or group of people. For example an agile transformations happening within IT or an agile transformation focussing a specific department. Due to this most of these initiatives are not getting the expected benefits or these initiatives can end up as complete failures

WHY???

William Edwards Deming, an american engineer,statistician and a management consultant highlight importance of systems thinking in the improvement programs.

Russell Ackof was the peer of Deming and says

A system is not the sum of the parts, it is the product of the interactions of parts.

Many organizations divided in to multiple departments and they dot get along for the optimizing the system as a whole.Rusell was highlighting an example of car to make people understand this concept. If you assemble best parts from different car manufacturer cannot give you best car since all these parts will not interact/ they are not compatible. So if you want best car, improve car as a whole,not a specific part.

Performance of the system is dependent on how the parts fit and work together

This is why the agile frameworks like scaled agile framework enforce the systems thinking principle.

Read more about Systems thinking at https://www.scaledagileframework.com/apply-systems-thinking/
Periodic Improvement
By: Tom Sommer
Tags: Investment, Performance, Improvement, Leadership, Periodic

Being confronted with a broken process, tool, or relationship we look for ways to improve the situation. Which we can either do as a once-off, or with ongoing investments. The latter is often labeled as continuous improvement — and it is a great concept and mindset. If we keep investing, it will always stay in good shape. I even put the concept in my Manager Readme (which I will have to update after this article).

Fixing a broken thing with optional continuous improvement

But it is unrealistic.

Always focusing on the same thing and trying to find ways to make it better and better is not only madness but also leads to diminishing returns. At some point, it — whatever it is — is good enough. And something else jumps up in priority.

Which means it makes sense to abandon continuous improvement (again). Not a bad thing for the moment because we did some good work in improving the quality of our process, tool, or relationship. However, we also miss the critical time when it is bad enough again. The point where it has degraded enough to warrant putting focus and effort back onto the topic.

And what happens when we miss this point? Yet another dumpster fire. Whether it is 6, 12, or 24 months down the track, someone notices how bad things are and everybody wonders how we ended up here. Did we not just fix this? I thought we came up with a good solution? Even worse, it could trigger a blame game and finger-pointing.
Happier
By: Keira Waters
Tags: Improvement, Self Improvement, Mental Health, Happy, Life

My mind is weighed down by a heavy cloud of fog. As a consequence, I can no longer hold my eyes in focus with the world around me. There is a dizzy feeling surrounding my presence that I cannot seem to shake. However, I do recall that I put myself in this position willingly.

Now, I write. I inhale the fog that surrounds me and lean into the sleepiness that pulls at my being, and I write. Because I want to? I think I want to.

But that doesn’t matter.

I feel I might vomit. But only hypothetically. I also drank a warm, old malt, which was not the move.

I might throw both my drinks away. They are no good for me.

Overall, today was a wonderful day. From waking up this morning to writing right now, I am pleased about what has happened.

Wow, the site is giving me an appreciative emoji! That has never happened before.

I finally feel that I am starting to become happier again. I’m so excited to feel this way.

Of course, I am not always happy, but I feel better. And that is all that matters. I’m having fun, and I love it!

Okay everyone, goodnight, and have wonderful dreams!

-Keira Waters