James' World 2

Click the link below the picture

.

Whether in cinemas or on streaming, movies have give us a lot to thrill and think over in 2023.

Menace has been found in mothers, shadows, and a pretty little doll called M3GAN. Adventure has been charted around the globe in speeding cars, across the multi-verse by feuding Spider-Folk, and into a rousing world of knights and shapeshifters. Romance has blossomed in colorful settings and nightmarish sex scenes. And coming-of-age stories have taken us back in time, into butt-kicking fantasies, and under the sea.

Whether you’re seeking to laugh, cry, marvel, or lose your mind, we’ve got a movie that’s sure to please.

.

Credit: Composite: Mashable / Image: Sony Pictures / Focus Features / Universal Pictures / Focus Features / Searchlight Pictures

.

.

Click the link below for the article:

.

__________________________________________

Click the link below the picture

.

From the Louvre museum to the sculpted façade of Notre Dame to the quintessential six-story apartment buildings with their grey-beige blush, Paris is built of local limestone, extracted from quarries that thread beneath the capital like the holes of a Swiss cheese. But these tunnels have a culinary legacy, too. Within these catacombs, in dark, cavernous chambers, farmers once cultivated a button mushroom variety that bears the name of the French capital: the Paris mushroom.

The stone upon (and from) which Paris is built is known as Lutetian limestone, after the Roman name for Paris: Lutetia. While locals have used these natural resources since Gallo-Roman times, it wasn’t until the massive medieval churches (such as Notre Dame) were built that Parisians quarried underground—a tradition that continued for centuries as they expanded and beautified the city. Over time, they created another, cavernous city below the streets.

Parisians found uses for the quarries long after miners winched the last block of stone up through the deep wells. In the late 1700s, after several cave-ins at the Holy Innocents Cemetery, city officials disinterred what was left of the remains and transferred the bones to these underground tunnels. This set the stage for the ossuaries of the Catacombs of Paris, which now hold the remains of more than six million people, including prominent French revolutionaries. Two centuries later, the French Resistance used the abandoned quarries to organize the Liberation of Paris far from Nazi eyes. One lesser-known use? The cultivation of a unique species of mushroom.

Since the 17th century, gardeners grew what would become known as Paris mushrooms in the gardens at Versailles. King Louis XIV is said to have been a particular fan of what was then known as the “rosé des près” or “pink of the fields.” The name came from the mushroom’s color, which is oddly similar to that of Lutetian limestone. But in the 19th century, this culture moved underground.

.

Parisians built apartment with limestone from quarries below and around the city. Photo from  Daxis/CC BY-ND 2.0.

.

.

Click the link below for the article:

.

__________________________________________

Click the link below the picture

.

Christopher Benjamin was imprisoned in Ancient Egypt, alone, barefoot, and cold. The stone wall he leaned against felt frigid and bone dry. Through a small cutout in the high ceiling of his cell, a single beam of sunlight taunted him. Gazing up at the peephole, he sensed that the world on the opposite side was far warmer — but certainly not more welcoming.

“I felt like I had really screwed up because I told these people in charge what they were doing wrong,” Benjamin says. “I kind of shot my mouth off. … They did not like what I told them, and so they put me in this dungeon.”

Not a single soul was around to save him. “I’m screwed,” Benjamin thought to himself. “There’s no way out.”

Fortunately, in a version of reality more adherent to its traditional definition, there was an exit: his therapist’s office door.

The unsettling visions and sensations Benjamin experienced while imprisoned thousands of years ago were part of what he thinks may have been a past life. His mind traveled to that time and place during a session of past-life regression, a practice in which a person, under hypnosis or in a meditative state, experiences a memory that they believe is from a time when their soul inhabited another body.

Some who engage in past-life regression do so simply out of curiosity about their former selves, perhaps discovering they were a knight in shining armor — or the town wench who waited on one. But others hope to treat a range of mental health issues, including phobias, addictions, anxiety, and depression, which they believe could have sprung from a past-life trauma. By reliving their trauma’s origin story, they hope to better understand, and possibly ameliorate, the emotional damage lingering in their current life.

.

.

.

Click the link below for the article:

.

__________________________________________

Click the link below the picture

.

.

[Photo: FG Trade/Getty Images]

.

.

Click the link below for the article:

.

__________________________________________

Click the link below the picture

.

That insight comes from Gallup’s chairman Jim Clifton and chief scientist, workplace Jim Harter in their new book Culture Shock. “This approach fails to improve performance,” the write. “Just 19 percent of employees strongly agree that how they are managed motivates them to do outstanding work.”

Blame the wiring of the human brain, they write, which tends to focus on the negative. That tendency influences the way most leaders give feedback, targeting “opportunities for improvement.” While they may acknowledge strengths or performance improvements along the way, traditional management practices “rate and rank” employees, focusing on helping them improve in areas where they are weak. 

.

Photo: Getty Images

.

.

Click the link below for the article:

.

__________________________________________

Click the link below the picture

.

“I was intimidated for many years in the early part of my board career because I didn’t have a business degree and felt underprepared,” a female board director once told me. Another director, explaining that she “grew up in the shadows of a plantation” reflected, “It’s still very much a white male show, so the fact that I was the first African American female on the board was astounding to me.”

As U.S. practice leader of CEO and board services at Boyden, an executive search firm, I interact with hundreds of aspiring and existing directors. Questions about their qualifications for board service remain a concern for many of the people I talk to, particularly those from underrepresented backgrounds.

My experience aligns with research that shows that high achievers from underrepresented backgrounds often find themselves confronting imposter syndrome, or doubting their skills and achievements, or fearing being exposed as a fraud. Women and people of color may be more likely to feel they don’t fit in, they’re not welcome, and they don’t belong.

Imposter syndrome can be crippling mentally and emotionally, drain your energy and attention, and cause you to fall short of the performance you are capable of, thus, feeding the cycle of self-doubt. If you experience imposter syndrome, you may explain away your successes by thinking anyone could have done what you did, or thinking you just got lucky, or fearing that others are mistaken in believing that you’re talented. As if that isn’t bad enough, when you stumble or face challenges, your self-perceived incompetence looms larger than life — increasing your chance of failure and perpetuating the syndrome.

.

HBR Staff; Simone Wave/Stocksy; Vladimir18/Getty Images

.

.

Click the link below for the article:

.

__________________________________________

Click the link below the picture

.

Florida A&M University · Leon County – Jane Elliot: Sound On

.

Replying to @cosbytok #Janeelliot #shownomercy #😳 in her #blueeye #browneye #experiment #Part2 #critical #race #theory #america #knowledge #wisdom #history #teaching #truth to #reprogram and #heal #perspective

.

.

Click the link below for the video:

.

__________________________________________

Click the link below the picture

.

It’s a scary time for workers right now. Some are saying the recession will likely hit later this year and people are being laid off left, right, and center. Beyond Big Tech firms, Europe’s startups and scaleups have suffered. Since March 2022, at least 42,000 staff have lost their jobs; shockingly, more than half of these cuts came in the first quarter of 2023.

For those who survive, making it through a round of layoffs often means being on a smaller team that’s expected to keep the same output. Suddenly, the workload has increased alongside stress levels. The European Agency for Safety and Health at Work found that nearly half (44%) of workers claim that work-induced stress is on the up, as worries about work overload and time pressure increase. That’s the backdrop leaders and entrepreneurs are up against when it comes to motivating teams.

What a cheery start to this piece – but it’s not all doom and gloom. There’s a simple fix to boosting your team’s performance: Measure employees’ value using metrics beyond productivity.

There’s no ‘I’ in team.

When measuring value, you can’t look at one employee’s output without recognizing the impact they have on the wider team. After all, a successful business is like the human body: you wouldn’t embark on a marathon with a broken arm, no matter how fit you are. In an effective team, each part needs to work together.

.

Tom Werner | Getty Images

.

.

Click the link below for article:

.

__________________________________________

Click the link below the picture

.

If you’re looking to get hired, giving your LinkedIn profile some love should be on your to-do list. It’s likely that potential recruiters are going to find it and form impressions of you based on what it looks like, and what’s listed.

LinkedIn profiles with huge gaps or out-of-date information—or pages that look like they’ve been gathering virtual dust for years—aren’t going to show you in your best light. On the other hand, a profile that’s well maintained and has had some care and attention means you’re ticking some of the right boxes.

.

Illustration: gonin/Getty Images

.

.

Click the link below for the article:

.

__________________________________________

Click the link below the picture

.

When I was growing up, way before artificial intelligence captured the zeitgeist, applying for a job was relatively simple: Print out a fancy resume, dress smart, and be ready to interview, in person.

Those old rules no longer apply. 

Over the last two decades, digital technologies have radically transformed the employment landscape. Automated software, colossal professional databases, and one-click applications now dominate the hiring and recruitment process. 

If you’ve been job hunting recently, chances are you’ve interacted with a resume robot, a nickname for an Applicant Tracking System, or ATS. In its most basic form, an ATS acts like an online assistant, helping hiring managers write job descriptions, scan resumes, and schedule interviews. As artificial intelligence advances, employers are increasingly relying on a combination of predictive analytics, machine learning and complex algorithms to sort through candidates, evaluate their skills and estimate their performance. Today, it’s not uncommon for applicants to be rejected by a robot before they’re connected with an actual human in human resources.

The job market is ripe for the explosion of AI recruitment tools. Hiring managers are coping with deflated HR budgets while confronting growing pools of applicants, a result of both the economic downturn and the post-pandemic expansion of remote work. As automated software makes pivotal decisions about our employment, usually without any oversight, it’s posing fundamental questions about privacy, accountability, and transparency. 

.

Zooey Liao/CNET

.

.

Click the link below for the article:

.

__________________________________________