Professional coaching is no longer an exclusive perk for select employees courtesy of Bravely, a cloud-based platform that delivers workplace guidance on-demand to more workers. The New York-based startup provides coaching to employees in numerous industries, including professional and financial services, hospitality, retail, and high technology.

Bravely co-founders, Sarah Sheehan (L) and Toby Hervey, have a shared mission to make coaching available to workers at all levels of the business.

Everyone should have a trusted, skilled coach to help them navigate important make or break moments at work, said Toby Hervey, co-founder and CEO at Bravely. Supporting an employee at moments that matter fundamentally transforms their long-time success and viability, as well as company culture.

Business benefits from coaching for all

Sarah Sheehan, co-founder and president at Bravely, said the coaching platform reflected people-first workplace trends.

Forward-thinking leaders know employees need hard skills and relationship-building expertise to achieve goals together, she said. Using technology, companies can cost-effectively give more employees access to coaching. This reduces employee stress and prevents burnout for improved mental health leading to higher productivity.

Not surprisingly, Bravely helps companies address business commitments to inclusion and diversity. This is something that the co-founders live every day; Hervey is a gay man, and Sheehan is a new mother.

We see strong usage of our coaching among groups such as women, LGBTQ workers, and people of color who are underrepresented the higher up you go in many organizations, said Hervey. We want to be a force for behavioral change across the board, and equitably support people at every level.

Just-in-time coaching

Bravelys network of rigorously vetted, certified coaches stands ready to serve employees across 30 countries 24/7. Using the app, employees can schedule confidential sessions within personalized timeframes. Someone might need some quick coaching to clarify talking points for a difficult conversation with a manager later that day. They may want to prepare for an upcoming performance review, strengthen relationships with peers or direct reports, or develop a long-term plan for a promotion or success in a new role.

Data tracks eye-opening people insights

Based on post-session reports, 91 percent of employees intend to take a next step. Clients also report lower HR caseloads, freeing those teams up for strategic responsibilities. Over time, companies use anonymized data from Bravely to surface information leaders might not otherwise hear about.

Data from coaching sessions at one company revealed employee perceptions that people couldnt move up because the organization tended to hire externally for management positions, said Hervey. HR changed those perceptions with an educational program on upward career paths.

Deeply personal journeys behind Bravely

Sheehan and Hervey are both New York transplants from Florida, where they were born and raised in cities close by unbeknownst to each other. After first meeting as colleagues at a New York-based startup, the two created Bravely from a shared vision.

As the daughter of an employment lawyer who primarily represented women and people of color, Sheehans dinner table conversations while growing up were often about workplace issues. Pursuing her career in human resources (HR) and sales, she considered herself fortunate to have had support from the accomplished people who surrounded her. She wanted to help others tap the same power.

Like many young women, I struggled to find my voice, and challenge myself to climb the ladder, she said. I wanted to extend career support, offering something historically available only to people at the highest levels of an organization.

Hervey channeled into Bravely his lifelong startup mentality, a trait he honed as the son of entrepreneurial parents. He began working at his familys pet care company at the age of 11, eventually moving into customer service. Later in New York, after various positions at technology companies, including a telemedicine startup that matched healthcare providers with patients who needed urgent care, Hervey had an epiphany about bringing a similar concept to employees.

Bravely connects all the different threads in my life, including building something from scratch, using technology to scale resources, and helping people navigate interpersonal dynamics to reach larger goals, said Hervey.

SAP is perfect partner

Bravely recently participated in the latest healthcare-focused accelerator program at SAP.iO Foundry New York. It was one of seven up and coming startups working with hospital system providers, employee health and wellness solutions, medical devices, and health IT.

We learned a lot about our go to market strategy, including how to meet the multi-faceted needs of enterprises in many industries that are managing diverse, global employee populations in different environments, said Sheehan.

Downloadable on the SAP App Center, Bravely is integrated with SAP SuccessFactors. The app features triggers for HR-related events like performance reviews or starting a new position.

Our partnership model with SAP has opened the door for new ways to engage and support employees, said Hervey. SAP is recognized as a top place to work and for its commitment to diversity and inclusion, and products like ours support that mission.

Originally posted here:
Startup Brings Personalized Coaching To Every Employee - Forbes

IMPACT 100 Pensacola Bay Area, a local womens philanthropic organization, announced Wednesday that its 2020 Membership Driveconcluded with a total of 1,166 members. IMPACT 100 will give back $1,166,000 by awarding 11 transformative project grants of $106,000 each to nonprofit organizations serving Escambia and Santa Rosa counties on October 11.

This is the 17th anniversary year of IMPACT 100 awarding grants to local nonprofits. After awarding the 2020 grants, IMPACT 100 Pensacola Bay Area will have funded 120 grants, totaling $12,830,000.

The tremendous generosity displayed by the women in our area never ceases to amaze me! It is what has continued to make IMPACT 100 Pensacola Bay Area the largest Impact organization in the world, but more importantly the one that has given back the most to our community. The philanthropy of our members and the power of collective giving allows us to continue to fund transformative projects of nonprofit organizations that serve our area and make a positive difference for us all. Reviewing the new project ideas submitted is always exciting and we look forward to the opportunity to help bring many of these to fruition, said Brigette Brooks, President of IMPACT 100 Pensacola Bay Area

Two grants will be awarded in each of five focus areas: arts and culture; education; environment, recreation and preservation; family; and health and wellness.Due to the overwhelming response to the membership drive, one additional grant will be awarded in one of the five focus areas for a total of eleven transformative grants.

IMPACT 100 Pensacola Bay Area is hosting a free nonprofit workshop on Thursday, April 16 at Brownsville Community Center, 3200 West De Soto Street Registration is at 8:30 a.m. with the workshop held from 9 a.m. until 12:15 p.m. Guest speaker Cathy Brown, associate director of education at The Fund-Raising School, Lily Family School of Philanthropy at Indiana University, will present Building Blocks for Sustainable Success. All nonprofit organizations in Escambia and Santa Rosa Counties are invited to attend and learn about the grant process, get tips for writing a successful grant and be inspired to create a winning project for the 17th year of giving.

Written by William Reynolds Filed Under FRONT TOP

See the article here:
IMPACT 100 Announces $1.1 Million In Grants To Be Awarded To Community Groups - NorthEscambia.com

One of the last remaining male bastions that quite a few women have broken into Indias wealth management industry has seen a reasonable representation of women money managers. Of these competent wealth managers, here are five women, whose trail-blazing achievements could inspire many more women to enter the field.

Apart from their own riches, these women manage other peoples wealth as well. With their knowledge spanning the entire gamut of financial products and their understanding of the markets, they aim to break the proverbial glass ceiling.

But what sets them apart from many of their male colleagues is this: the ability to convince women in households they advise, to come out of their shells and play a more active role in their families and their personal finances. Women in families need to take an interest in investing decisions along with the men.

Moneycontrols Women In Power campaign highlights women who lead by example and can also teach men a thing or two about investing and financial planning for family goals. And what better way to demonstrate these than with their own examples. Here is what they have to say.

Shilpa Maheshwari, Executive Advisor,Matrix Partners India

#Mantra:Sow the seeds of independent financial decisions in your daughters early on.

As the saying goes, charity begins at home.Just likeother good habits that parents want their children to inculcate, theyshould alsoencourage themto take interestinmanaging money at home. Financialplanners say that this would inculcate a sense of financial independence and discipline early on in them.

Shilpa Maheshwari,Executive Advisor, Matrix Partners India,recallsher experienceonhow parents can sow the seeds of financial discipline and independence in their children early on.When she was justoutof schooland had migrated to a newcityfor college, she remembers her dad handing her a cheque for her expenses through the year. Now, the catch was that she did not have a bank account nor had she handled her expenses independently earlier. So, not only did she have to figure out how to open a bank account on her own, but also to manage her expenses within the funds available, as that was the allowance for the full year.

It was a full years allowance and my father made it clear that extra money wont be available,she recollects.That was her first step in learning to manage funds wisely.

This episode got her to learn the nitty-gritty of personalbanking, make budgets andmanage expenses.This way, her parentsnot only encouraged her to be independent, butalso taught herhowto manage funds and her expenses very early on. Itactually shaped her thought process on financial independence and how it could be a game changer in how you decide to lead your life.

Shilpaadds that her mantra for life isBelievein yourself andyourcapabilities. If you dont,no one else will.

Shivani Bhasin Sachdeva, Founder and CEO, India Alternatives

#Mantra: Start investing early and take financial decisions jointly in a family.

Women should start investing early in their lives instead of waiting to accumulate a certain pot of money in their bank accounts. In fact, many financial planners say that right from the time you get your first salary, you should start investing a small sum. With the financialisation of savings taking off in India, there are enough investment products available to cater to varying risk profiles. Mutual funds also offer systematic investment plans that allow people to invest as little as Rs 500 every month.

Shivani Bhasin Sachdeva, Founder and CEO, India Alternatives, says that a womans financial journey shouldnt come to a halt even after marriage. She says that every woman must be an equal partner in marriage, even when it comes to household finances and money management.

Dont fall prey to the stereotype that only men should handle household investments. Thats an outdated theory. In a traditional household, both men and women should take financial decisions together, she says.

Shivani says that in a family, the husband must take an equal interest in household budgets and women must take an equal interest in financial investments. Both the spouses should work jointly towards the familys financial goals. Its a team effort, she reminds us. Increasingly more and more financial planners insist on women playing an active role in a households financial portfolio and even reviews. Do not forget to get an adequate life and health insurance schemes for both spouses individually and also collectively as a family, she says.

Supriya Rathi, Director and Principal Officer, Anand Rathi Insurance Brokers Pvt Ltd

#Mantra: Learn from your mistakes during investment journey.

Many of us remember falling while learning to ride a bicycle. But thats how most of us learnt it. Financial planners constantly remind us that, similarly, its okay to make mistakes even in managing your own money. Its okay to fail and fall. But that should not deter us from continuing to manage our money.

Supriya Rathi, Director and Principal Officer, Anand Rathi Insurance Brokers Pvt Ltd, had started investing her money on her own sometime around 1995-96. During her post-graduation years, she had begun taking a keen interest in equities. She started by reading books and newspapers on stock investments. But she made losses soon, because equity markets fell on the back of the South-East Asian financial crisis. This investment decision turned out to be a mistake, but it was still an exciting learning experience for her. She was not discouraged by it and did not give up.

Supriya says, While investing, you need to understand your risk perspective, encumbrances and capital requirements over the years. Then plan to invest accordingly with a broad financial plan rather than investing only in equities and limiting investment to a few stocks. Asset allocation is also important because it strikes a balance between risky and less-risky assets in your portfolio.

Arpita Vinay, Executive director at Centrum Wealth Management

#Mantra: Avoid investing in exotic investment schemes.

Many investors expect magic with their investments, when there is no scope for any such an outcome. Thats the simple and straight-forward financial advice from Arpita Vinay, Executive director at Centrum Wealth Management. Arpita says that there are some investment opportunities out there that, at first glance, look tempting enough to make you invest in them. When you make investments without understanding the basic underlying construct and therefore the risks that such products come with, you could end up making big losses.

There are some products that are probably meant only for the relatively sophisticated investor. They require a high degree of familiarity, knowledge and experience and can be based on certain views and assumptions. Any change of context can lead to very different outcomes and these can come as a rude surprise for the uninitiated investor.

Arpita says, It takes very little time for exotic investment schemes to become crazily toxic. Anything that promises to double overnight can harm overnight. In the past few years, many people put their money in products and schemes that they did not fully understand. Things were not questioned when the going was good, but when the context changed, people realised that these fads werent quite the investment opportunity that was suitable for them.

The world of investments is becoming more and more complex. Investing time and effort in understanding markets and products is not only interesting but can also be very rewarding. It is always a good idea to seek professional help while making ones investment journey.

Nisreen Mamaji, CFP Founder and CEO, MoneyWorks FA

#Mantra: Diversify your investment portfolio and consult a certified financial planner to get down to the nitty-gritty of investments.

Daughters should be encouraged to manage their own money earned or inherited. Every parent should resolve to empower girls with financial wisdom."

Women should decide on their goals and their timelines, and start investment plans early, on their own. It's better to make your own mistakes rather than suffer due to someone else's.

My financial journey started with investment in mutual funds, which were actually redeemed when we purchased our own home. This personal success prompted me to help other women and families through financial planning.

Dont put all your eggs in one basket is a common saying that weve all heard of. In the context of financial planning, this means that one should not invest in a single asset, since there are certain risks involved when investing money, which are beyond ones control. Financial planners always advice investors to put their money in a basket of instruments. So, if one asset or instrument goes down, your entire portfolio doesnt go down as well.

Nisreen Mamaji, CFP Founder and CEO, MoneyWorks FA, says, The biggest safety mechanism is diversifying investments across various investment avenues. Nisreen doesnt just advice diversifying into different instruments, but also across asset classes. For instance, dont put all your money in just equities or debt, she says.

Being a financial planner herself, Nisreen strongly advocates women taking charge of their own finances. She says that women should be encouraged to manage their own money, be it their own earnings or inheritance.

The rest is here:
Meet 5 women who manage other peoples wealth - Moneycontrol.com

Chris O'Meara/Associated Press

20. Derrick Henry, RB, 26 years old

Henry has the question of running back value reopened for debate (if it was ever closed). Sure, there's a lot more to rushing production than the guy carrying the ball, but after watching Henry get the Titans to the AFC Championship Game with 446 yards in the postseason alone, it's a topic worth discussing.

Other running backs might not be worth the investment. But Henry's size, running style and ability to impact games as they go on makes him different.

19. Philip Rivers, QB, 38 years old

The narrative on Rivers is that he can't push the ball deep anymore. There may be some validity to that, but he was still 13th in the league in completed air yards per completion. So he can still get the ball downfield when he needs to, but what he really brings is experience, leadership and production that most teams could use in the quarterback room.

His 20 interceptions in 2019 are concerning, but that's the third time in his career he's done that. That's just who Rivers is, not necessarily a sign of aging.

18. Anthony Castonzo, OT, 32 years old

Castonzo has been one of the best values in the league for the Indianapolis Colts. For an average salary of $10.9 millionper year, they have received solid play from the left tackle spot. He was PFF's seventh-rated tackle last season and played 100 percent of the snaps there. He's a little older than the offensive linemen ahead of him on this list, but at 32 years old, it's conceivable he has enough gas in the tank for multiple strong seasons ahead.

17. Arik Armstead, EDGE, 26 years old

There's a lot to like about Armstead. He's just 26 years old, so he could be signed to a long-term deal that expires before he even turns 30. There arealso some red flags, like minimal production until his contract year. He had 10 sacks this season, but only had nine in the previous four campaigns combined.

Some of that can be chalked up to injuries. He only played six games in 2017 and eight in 2016. Still, the former first-round pick can play the run well and handle multiple roles along the front. That versatility and upside should get him paid.

16. Jack Conklin, OT, 26 years old

Good help at tackle is hard to find, but the team who signs Conklin is getting it. Unlike most of the tackles on the market, Conklin is young enough to be a foundational piece for years to come. PFFnoted that Conklin was graded sixth in zone run-blocking and 14th in gap-blocking this season, so he is suited to play in any scheme.

15. Cory Littleton, LB, 26 years old

Littleton went from largely being a special-teamer in his first two seasons to being a cornerstone of the Rams defense over the last two. Heplayed more than 1,000 defensive snaps in 2019, andin those snaps, he provedto be a capable coverage linebacker with solid skills against the run. At 26 years old with only two seasons as a starter under his belt, he could still have a higher ceiling.

14. Chris Harris Jr., CB, 31 years old

Harris' numbers don't look great.He allowed opposing quarterbacks to complete 67.1 percent of their passes and gave up 10.0 yards per target.But that belies the fact that Broncos head coach Vic Fangio often tasked Harris with shadowing the opponent's No. 1 receiver. In 2018, those numbers were 64.8 percent and 7.0 yards per target. His coverage ability still makes him a top free agent, but at 31 years old, it's fair to wonder how long he can keep it up.

13. Jameis Winston, QB, 26 years old

Winston has had five seasons to prove he's a franchise quarterback, and the results still feel inconclusive. He started his own club in 2019 as the only quarterback in NFL history to throw 30 touchdowns and 30 interceptions in a single season.

Of course, he did haveLASIK eye surgery this offseason."Jameis Winston drastically cuts interceptions after having surgery to actually see the field" feels like the 2020 season's funniest storyline already.

12. Hunter Henry, TE, 25 years old

Hunter Henry and Austin Hooper are clearly the class of the tight end group this season. Much like Hooper, Henry is young enough to play a full long-term contract before turning 30, so the timing is right for a team to lock him up. The thing that separates him from Hooper is his work as a deep threat.

Only Jared Cook and O.J. Howard had a higher average of yards before the catchper receptionlast season. Henry offers the versatility to play as an in-line tight end, in the slot or even as outside receiver.

11. Brandon Scherff, OG, 28 years old

When it comes to pure performance on the field, Scherff is just as good as any of the offensive linemen on the list. Injuries have become a concern, though. He missed eight games in 2018 and an additional five this past season. At 28 years old, those injury concerns aren't going away.

Still, Scherff is an instant upgrade for anyone looking to bolster the offensive line, especially in the run game.

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The Top 50 Players on the 2020 NFL Free-Agent Market - Bleacher Report

Ballast for the brain

Always read something that will make you look good if you die in the middle of it. P.J. ORourke

To get an idea of what books mean to McIlroy, consider the fourth hole in last years final round. It was a cloudy 59 degrees and nearing 2:30 p.m. ET. He was crushing the driver he would trail only Tommy Fleetwood in Strokes Gained: Off the Tee and liked the course better in March than in May, as he could see it better from the tees. TPC Sawgrass had over-seeded and thus created sharper definition between fairways (lighter) and rough (darker).

The fourth is not hard if you hit the fairway, but from the right fairway bunker or the rough, it can be tricky to hit the green, which is guarded by a moat. One stroke behind Jon Rahm entering Sunday, McIlroy had already worked his way into the lead but found the right rough off the tee. Now, with a wedge, he swung and watched in horror as his ball came out left and soft.

Splash.

It was cold; even though sunrise had been at 7:33 a.m., he had not had much chance to show off the green St. Patricks Day shirt under his blue pullover. Jason Day waited as he took a drop.

There were a lot of places McIlroys mind could have gone. Having been in contention but not won in his previous five TOUR starts, all top-six finishes, he could have thought,Here we go again.

He cant close, he cant play on Sundays, McIlroy said later, describing the noise that had seeped up from the muck. Blah, blah, blah.

Here was a player who could do no wrong as he won the 2011 U.S. Open, 2012 PGA Championship, and 2014 Open Championship and PGA, but now he apparently could do no right.Here we go again? Yeah, McIlroy could have gone there.

Reading, though, had steeled him.Avoid the big reaction.Thats one of the tenets of one of McIlroys favorite authors, Ryan Holiday, who espouses the stoicism of figures like Marcus Aurelius in The Obstacle is the Way and The Ego is the Enemy.

Not giving in to your emotions, says McIlroy, who in the last year has befriended the author. (They trade the occasional email.) Not being impulsive, being a little bit more rational, taking a step back to think about things logically. Thats what has helped me.

I mean, if you go back to THE PLAYERS, he adds, I went from leading or tied for the lead to a couple behind, but I didnt impulsively go and chase some birdies. I was like, OK, this is fine, weve got a lot of holes left. Theres a lot that can happen, stay patient, and show poise, and all the P words that I like to use. All of that comes from reading and a little bit of inward reflection and figuring out what I need to do to get the best out of myself.

In the end, McIlroy recovered to win the TOURs signature event.

On a wild day in which a half-dozen people had a share of the lead, he accepted his double and turned in 1 over, then made four back-nine birdies to post a 2-under 70 and win by a shot over Jim Furyk. His best shot, he said later, was the 6-iron he hit out of the fairway bunker at the par-4 15th, his ball stopping 14 feet from the pin before he made the putt. His most important shot, though, might have been his gaffe at the fourth, the fulcrum on which his week and perhaps his entire season could have swung one way or the other.

If you dont like to read, you havent found the right book. J.K. Rowling

Tiger reads a lot, says McIlroy, who also has read popular novelists like J.K. Rowling and Dan Brown. But he reads a lot of, like, the medical journal and studies that have been published and stuff like this. Hes a big reader, but I dont know if hes a big reader of books, per se.

Lucas Glover is a reader. He went through a large chunk of the Jack Reacher series by Lee Child, and is now onto The Body, by Bill Bryson. Sometimes, Glover talks books with Peter Malnati, also a reader. David Duval had a bookish side even in his prime.

The written word is alive and well. Asked at the Masters last year to name the best book hed read in the previous 12 months, McIlroy was surprisingly expansive.

The Greatest Salesman in the World, by Og Mandino, thats one that I sort of refer back to every now and again, replied McIlroy. Either of the Ryan Holiday books are pretty good, The Obstacle is the Way or Ego is the Enemy. Just started on Steve Jobs biography by Walter Isaacson, so getting into that. Theres four.

He later mentioned a fifth, Digital Minimalism by Cal Newport. McIlroy, who has deleted several apps from his phone, wonders what all of our screens are doing to us and tries to go low-to-no-tech during tournament weeks, preferring jigsaw puzzles and, yes, books.

But why? Its not that McIlroy, an only child, staved off loneliness with his books. Nor was he ever obsessed with academia. It was never my forte, he said in a lengthy interview with the Irish Independent. I was good enough to get by, but I never excelled.

Its more accurate to say he was seeking ballast amid the pitching and yawing of life as a public figure. Was he a good person because he was winning golf tournaments? Was he a bad one when he wasnt? Even amid his dazzling early success, he felt slightly unmoored.

One thing I used to do in the past is let what I shot that day influence who I was or my mood, McIlroy said last season, when he also led the TOUR with 14 top-10 finishes and won the Byron Nelson Award for adjusted scoring average (69.057). Its something I worked hard on because who I am as a person isnt who I am as a golfer.

In other words, at 30 he has become acutely aware of the perils of accomplishment. Regarding the Jobs biography, McIlroy was struck by the Apple major domos failures and comebacks and achievements, but also by the rare glimpses into Jobs humanity.

It seems like he was a pretty hard guy to like at the start, and I think thats why I found the book so slow-going, he says now. I was like, I dont know if I like this guy. And then as it goes on and he gets sick and starts to appreciate his family more, you get a sense that hes turned the corner a bit, and there are things he values maybe more than just trying to create another cool product.

If you are going to get anywhere in life, you have to read a lot of books. Roald Dahl

At the Ryder Cup in France in 2018, McIlroy came upon another favorite author: Mark Manson, author of The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F---: A Counterintuitive Approach to Living a Good Life, followed by Everything is F-----: A Book About Hope. As the titles suggest (weve, ahem, slightly altered them), his books are equal parts profound and profane. Theyre also very funny.

(European Captain) Thomas Bjorns partner, Grace, gave Mark Mansons (Subtle Art) book to all the wives, McIlroy says. My wife read it before I did and gave it to me and said, I think you should read this. Its really good. Its an important book to me.

The title was part of the initial appeal, and thats because, McIlroy admits, Sometimes I care too much about too many things. But theres more to it than that.

In The Subtle Art, Manson writes about humankinds misery amid a long list of advances (from the Internet to eradication of disease) that one might have thought would have made us happier. One culprit: the idea that we can have it all, and everyone can be a superstar.

The key to a good life, he writes, is caring about only what is true and immediate and important, and not getting caught in what philosopher Alan Watts called the backwards law, the trap of pursuing feeling better/richer/thinner only to reinforce a feeling of dissatisfaction.

The desire for more positive experience is itself a negative experience, Manson writes. And, paradoxically, the acceptance of ones negative experience is itself a positive experience.

Perhaps this is what McIlroy was thinking of when he told Ewen Murray of The Guardian that the last step for him was mindset, i.e., when you are in contention, not giving a s*&% if you win or not. In other words, a sports psychologist might say, its important to just let it happen.

He talks about how everyone wants to get smarter, more attractive, richer, McIlroy says of Manson, and theyre not going deep enough to ask, Why do I want these things? Whats wrong with who I am right now? Its people thinking that all these things will make them happier at the end of the day. With this book, its getting happiness from the simple things in life.

For instance, he adds, I get to go grocery shopping on the Monday when I get home from a tournament, and that to me is fun. Thats very mundane for most people, but for me its a little perk for having a week off, going to Whole Foods and doing the grocery shopping.

Some of the rules in the books McIlroy reads can be contradictory. While Holiday preaches stoicism, Manson points out in Everything is F----- that its impossible to completely remove emotion, lest one turn into a potato.

McIlroy may have been wrestling with this paradox last summer. Having decided to treat every round the same, he lost a head-to-head battle with then-No. 1 Brooks Koepka at the World Golf Championships-FedEx St. Jude Invitational. (Koepka shot 65 to win, McIlroy 71 to finish T4.)

When they met four weeks later in the final round of the TOUR Championship, McIlroy vowed not to treat the final round as just another day. He would give it special reverence. It worked out nicely as he shot 66 to win, while Koepka slumped to a 72 for a T3 finish.

The lesson: Emotion is bad, except when its good.

When it was over, McIlroy tried to accept his victory the way Holiday would, the way Marcus Aurelius would: without arrogance, just as he should let his setbacks go with indifference. Rory would still be just Rory to the organic apples and the rest of it at Whole Foods, and to his wife, and their library of books at home. All awaited his return as conquering hero or not.

For Rory McIlroy golfer, reader, citizen of the world it was on to the next chapter.

View post:
Rory gets a good read - PGA TOUR/Perform Media

Baruch Spinoza, one of the great rationalists of 17th-century philosophy.

The recent no-platforming of social historian Selina Todd and former Conservative MP Amber Rudd has reignited the debate about protecting free speech in universities. Both had their invited lectures cancelled at the last minute on the grounds of previous public statements with which the organisers disagreed.

Many people have interpreted these acts as hostile behaviour aimed at silencing certain views. But is this primarily about free speech?

The debate about no-platforming and cancel culture has largely revolved around free speech and the question of whether it is ever right to deny it. The suggestion is that those who cancel such events want to deny the freedom of speech of individuals who they take to be objectionable.

Most of us surely agree that freedom of speech should sometimes be secondary to considerations of the harm caused by certain forms of speech so the question is about what kinds of harm offer a legitimate reason to deny someone a public platform. Since people perceive harm in many different ways, this question is particularly difficult to resolve.

But perhaps the organisers who cancelled these events were not motivated by the desire to deny freedom of speech at all. Todd and Rudd are prominent people in positions of authority so cancelling their events, while causing a public splash, is unlikely to dent their freedom to speak on these or other issues at other times and in different forums.

Read more: Two arguments to help decide whether to 'cancel' someone and their work

But these acts have a significant effect on others, who may feel unable to speak on certain issues from fear of similar treatment. Perhaps the no-platformers cancelled Todd and Rudd, not because they wanted to deny them their freedom to speak, but because they didnt want to listen to them. Perhaps they were motivated not by a rational consideration of potential harm, but by an emotion: the desire not to listen to something with which they disagree.

The 17th-century Dutch philosopher Baruch Spinoza has a name for this emotion: ambition. Nowadays we think of ambition as the desire to succeed in ones career. But in the 17th century, ambition was recognised to be a far more pernicious and far more political emotion. As Spinoza wrote in his Ethics (1677), ambition is the desire that everyone should feel the way I do:

Each of us strives, so far as he can, that everyone should love what he loves, and hate what he hates Each of us, by his nature, wants the others to live according to his temperament; when all alike want this, they are alike an obstacle to one another.

Spinoza sees the emotions, or passions, as naturally arising from our interactions with one another and the world. We strive to do things that make us feel joy an increase in our power to exist and flourish and we strive to avoid things that make us feel sad or cause a decrease in our power.

We naturally desire and love what we believe others desire and love. It is therefore natural that we want others to love what we do and think what we think. For if others admire and approve of our actions and feelings, then we will feel a greater pleasure with a concomitant increase of power in ourselves.

Ambition is not simply wanting to feel esteemed it is wanting others to love and hate exactly what we love and hate. It is the desire to cause others to think and feel exactly as we do. It is the desire to avert from ourselves those who cannot be convinced to do so for those dissenters diminish our sense of self-worth.

Spinoza would have recognised the desire not to listen to dissenting views as a species of ambition. Disagreement is perceived not as a reasoned difference of views, but as a threat: something that causes sadness and a diminishing of ones power something to be avoided at all costs.

Somebody who feels differently threatens our sense of the worthiness of our own feelings, causing a type of sadness. Spinoza stresses that we strive to destroy whatever we imagine will lead to sadness. Thus ambition leads to a desire to change peoples views, often through hostile, exclusionary, destructive behaviours.

Not only that, but someone in the grip of ambition is likely to be immune to rational argument. Spinoza argues that passions are obstructive to good thinking: reason on its own has little power to shift a passion that has a strong hold on us.

Most of us have had negative experiences on social media with people who disagree with us on politically charged questions. Instead of engaging with our arguments, they point out that we are immoral or unfeeling for holding a different view. Really, what our opponents find intolerable is our failure to feel the same about the issue as they do.

Refusing to hear an argument and seeking to silence it is a mild form of no-platforming, motivated not by the desire to quash free speech, but by ambition. Our failure to share in the political feelings of others leads them to experience a loss of power, and they respond by attacking the cause of the loss. Ambition makes rational debate impossible, even when our freedom to speak remains perfectly intact.

Continued here:
Spinoza and no platforming: Enlightenment thinker would have seen it as motivated by ambition rather than fear - The Conversation UK

Senator, and presidential hopeful, Bernie Sanders enticing blend of progressivism (which claims reason and science as justification) and socialism (which is skeptical of both) gives cause to inquire into the foundations of his redistributive political mindset.

Sanders politics echo the social ideology of Herbert Croly, whos book, The Promise of American Life (1909), introduced a progressive liberalism that lost its intellectual respectability decades ago (for more on this loss, see The End of Liberalism: The Second Republic of the United States, 2nd edition [1979], by Theodore Lowi). Croly, in turn, was influenced by the positive polity of French philosopher Auguste Comte, who coined the term altruism to denote the personal sacrifices that his social ideology entailed. Comte claimed to disdain utopian social visions, yet proposed (across numerous volumes) the wildest of them all. By his lights, [o]ur harmony as moral beings is impossible on any other foundation but altruism. Nay more, altruism alone can enable us to live, in the highest and truest sense (see Comtes primer, The Catechism of Positivism, 1858 [1852], 310311).

The ethicist and philosopher of economics John Mueller offers a distinction between altruism and everyday generosity: benevolence [altruism], or good will, can be extended to everyone in the world, and beneficence [generosity], or doing good, cannot (Redeeming Economics: Rediscovering the Missing Element, 2010, 36). Yet sociobiology, evolutionary psychology, and economics teach that sacrificial altruism among humans occurs naturally only within the family. Voluntary generosity, by comparison, usually entails no true sacrifice (see my 2018 paper, Altruism: From Pagan Virtue to Political Biology, Essays in the Philosophy of Humanism 26: article 4, 119).

Croly echoed Comtes call for altruistic social policies:

The Promise of American life is to be fulfillednot merely by a maximum amount of economic freedom, but by a certain measure of discipline; not merely by the abundant satisfaction of individual desires, but by a large measure of individual subordination and self-denial. [...] To ask an individual citizen continually to sacrifice his recognized private interest to the welfare of his countrymen is to make an impossible demand, and yet just such a continual sacrifice is apparently required of an individual in a democratic state. The only entirely satisfactory solution of the difficulty is offered by the systematic authoritative transformation of the private interest of the individual into a disinterested devotion to a special object [e.g., a truly democratic state]. (The Promise of American Life, 1909: 22; 418, italics added.)

Croly, like Comte, embraced Enlightenment progressivism, by which Robespierre attempted to lead the people by reason and the peoples enemies by terror; the peoples reason ultimately led Robespierre onto the guillotine. The other Enlightenment choice available was classical liberalism, from which Americas early political fabric was woven. (For historical analysis of these developments, see two books by Jonathan Israel, Democratic Enlightenment: Philosophy, Revolution, and Human Rights, 17501790 [2012] and The Enlightenment that Failed: Ideas, Revolution, and Democratic Defeat, 17481830 [2020].)

Altruism and progressivism necessarily entail coercion. The historian Vegas Liulevicius shows that [a] clear connection exists between 20th-century plans for utopias and use of terror to bring them about. [... Terror was necessary] because plans for perfection encountered either passive or active resistance (Utopia and Terror in the 20th Century, 2003, Part 1). The harmony that Comte imagined would flow from altruism was illusory.

The prominent academic psychologist and avowed Enlightenment humanist Steven Pinker characterizes modern altruism as [t]odays Fascism Lite, which shades into authoritarian populism and Romantic nationalism, [and] is sometimes justified by a crude version of evolutionary psychology in which [...] humans have been selected to sacrifice their interest for the supremacy of their group (Enlightenment Now: The Case for Reason, Science, Humanism, and Progress, 2018: 448). The prominent evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins sides with Pinker on the facts, but differs with him on the spirit: Human superniceness is a perversion of Darwinism, because, in a wild population, it would be removed by natural selection. [...] Lets put it even more bluntly. From a rational choice point of view, or from a Darwinian point of view, human superniceness is just plain dumb. But it is the kind of dumb that should be encouraged (Science in the Soul: Selected Writings of a Passionate Rationalist, 2017: 276277, italics added). Dumb behavior and impossible demands are unlikely means for perfecting individuals and societies.

The Roman Stoic philosopher Lucius Annus Seneca wrote of generosity that people must be taught to give benefits freely, receive them freely, and return them freely and to set themselves a grand challenge: not just to match in actions and attitude those to whom we are obligated, but even to outdo them, for the person who should return a favor never catches up unless he gets ahead (On Benefits, n.d.). Seneca argued that an upward eudmonic spiral results whenever benefits are given and reciprocated voluntarily.

Generosity and reciprocity nevertheless arise most often as instrumental means to purposeful ends. The philosopher Thomas Hobbes aptly argued that No man giveth but with intention of good to himself, because gift is voluntary; and of all voluntary acts, the object is to every man his own good; of which, if men see they shall be frustrated, there will be no beginning of benevolence or trust, nor consequently of mutual help (Leviathan, 1651). Ayn Rand similarly saw, in the grace of reality and the nature of life, a rational selfishnesswhich means: the values required for mans survival qua manwhich means the values required for human survivalnot the values produced by the desires and feelings, the whims or the needs of irrational brutes, who have never outgrown the primordial practice of human sacrifices, have never discovered the industrial society and can conceive of no self-interest but that of grabbing the loot of the moment (The Virtue of Selfishness, 1964: 31).

Sanders, like Comte and Croly, proposes to perfectioneer society through the kind of altruistic policies that, since the late eighteenth century, have wrought havoc on mankind.

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Altruism, Generosity, and Selfishness in the Age of Bernie | James A. Montanye - The Beacon

Rather than fight vitriol with vitriol, a Muslim politician who is running for a seat in Congress responded to some deeply hurtful anti-Muslim tweets with compassionand it completely changed the dialogue.

Qasim Rashid, a Democratic attorney who is running for Congressman in the 1st district of Virginia, was perturbed to receive a series of racist messages from a conservative constituent on Twitter.

The man in question was a 66-year-old Fredericksburg resident named Oz Dillon.

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Dillon has been struggling to pay the bills since his wife suffered a pulmonary embolism that wiped out their retirement savings. In addition to having a modest income of just $38,000 per year, Dillon and his wife have been coping with soaring insurance rates and a house that is not handicap accessible.

When Rashid learned of Dillons financial difficulties on Twitter, he donated to Dillons GoFundMe campaign and encouraged his community voters to do the same.

Inspired by Rashids kindness, many of his social media followers did indeed donate to the crowdfunding page, leaving Dillon in awe.

Dillon later sent Rashid an apology for his earlier insults and thanked him for showing such compassion.

Mr. Rashid, You humble me sir, with your graciousness, and surprisingly kind words, he said in a message to Rashid. You cannot imagine how uplifting it is, to see gifts such as yours starting to come in! Given how I have misspoken about you in posts on Facebook, I am truly shocked, that you have shared my wife and my plight with your supporters. I must now reassess my opinion about you, and your platform, come November.

He also published a note of thanks to his benefactors on GoFundMe.

An amazing week of eye- and heart-opening enlightenment, that I used to always have before 9/11, he said A Christian Muslim, Qasim Rashid, who I had previously opposed politically just because of the word Muslim, has opened my eyes that there are GOOD people in all walks of life.

LOOK: Descendants of Slaves and Slave-Owners Are Bonding at South Carolina Plantation Where They Share Their Painful Past

He shared our plight with his followers, who in turn donated nearly $1,000 dollars to help Terri and I get rid of this crushing debt. I owe him, and everyone in fact, a deep debt of gratitude, and pray you are all rewarded tenfold, for your generosity.

Dillon and Rashid eventually met in person so they could develop their newfound friendship. Since their story has been shared on social media and news outlets, Dillons crowdfunding campaign has raised more than $20,000.

However, Dillon now says he only plans on keeping enough of the funds to get himself and his wife out of their financial rut before he donates the rest to St. Judes Childrens Hospital, The American Heart Association, and their local food bank.

Be Sure And Share This Inspiring Story With Your Friends On Social Media

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Politician Helps Pay Off Crushing Medical Debt for Man Who Sent Him Racist TweetsAnd They're Now Friends - Good News Network

Lin Yutang's MingKwai typewriter is perhaps the most well-known and most poorly understood Chinese typewriter in history.

By: Thomas Mullaney

We learn with mingled emotions transcending dismay and yet appreciably milder than despair that Dr. Lin Yutang, our favorite oriental author has invented a Chinese typewriter. So began a 1945 article in the Chicago Daily Tribune that revealed to an American reading public the quixotic new pursuit of a celebrated cultural commentator, and beloved author of the bestselling titles My Country and My People and The Importance of Living. So allergic were they to this startling news, the authors explained, that at first they simply did not believe it. The news would have been incredible, they stressed, if it had not come directly from Lins publisher. Seeking additional enlightenment, the reporters continued, we consulted our laundryman, Ho Sin Liu.

Tell us, Ho, about how big would a Chinese typewriter need to be to cover the whole range of your delightful tongue?

Ho, ho! Ho replied, wittily punning his name into an English exclamation point. How indeed shall I answer such an interrogation unless with another? Have you seen the Boulder dam?

Lin Yutang was born in 1895 in Fujian province, the same year that Taiwan was lost to Japan following the humiliation of the first Sino-Japanese War. Raised in a Christian household, Lin entered St. Johns University in Shanghai in 1911, the year a republican revolution delivered the death blow to an already weakened Qing dynasty. His educational career was marked by distinction, continuing at Tsinghua University from 1916 to 1919, and then Harvard in 1919 and 1920. By 40 years of age, Lin was a celebrated author in the United States and beyond, becoming one of the most influential cultural commentators on China of his generation.

Years before his breakout English-language debut, Lin Yutang began to contemplate a question that exerted a magnetic pull on the minds of many: the question of how to develop a typewriter for the Chinese language that could achieve the scope and reputation of its Western counterpart. With these inspirations, Lin set off down a path that many years later would lead to perhaps the most well-known, but also most poorly understood, Chinese typewriter in history: the MingKwai or Clear and Fast Chinese typewriter, announced to the world starting in the mid-1940s.

When MingKwai made its first appearance, the writer at the Chicago Daily Tribune and his laundryman would be proven wrong: MingKwai was considerably smaller than the Boulder Dam. In fact, it looked uncannily like a real typewriter. Measuring 14 inches wide, 18 inches deep, and nine inches high, the machine was only slightly larger than common Western typewriter models of the day. More notably, MingKwai was the first Chinese typewriter to possess the sine qua non of typewriting, a keyboard. Finally, it would seem, the Chinese language had joined the rest of the world by creating a typewriter just like ours.

MingKwai may have looked like a conventional typewriter, yet its behavior would have quickly confounded anyone who sat down to try it out.

MingKwai may have looked like a conventional typewriter, yet its behavior would have quickly confounded anyone who sat down to try it out. Upon depressing one of the machines 72 keys, the machines internal gears would move, and yet nothing would appear on the papers surface not right away, at least. Depressing a second key, the gears would move again, yet still without any output on the page. With this second keystroke, however, something curious would happen: Eight Chinese characters would appear, not on the printed paper, but in a special viewfinder built into the machines chassis. Only with the depression of a third key specifically one of the machines eight number keys would a Chinese graph finally be imprinted on the page.

Three keystrokes, one impression. What in the world was going on?

What is more, the Chinese graph that appeared on the page would bear no direct, one-to-one relationship with any of the symbols on the keys depressed during the three-part sequence. What kind of typewriter was this, that looked so uncannily like the real thing, and yet behaved so strangely?

If the fundamental and unspoken assumption of Western-style typewriting was the assumption of correspondence that the depression of a key would result in the impression of the corresponding symbol upon the typewritten page MingKwai was something altogether different. Uncanny in its resemblance to a standard Remington- or Olivetti-style device, MingKwai was not a typewriter in this conventional sense, but a device designed primarily for the retrieval of Chinese characters. The inscription of these characters, while of course necessary, was nonetheless secondary. The depression of keys did not result in the inscription of corresponding symbols, according to the classic what-you-type-is-what-you-get convention, but instead served as steps in the process of finding ones desired Chinese characters from within the machines mechanical hard drive, and then inscribing them on the page.

The machine worked as follows. Seated before the device, an operator would see 72 keys divided into three banks: upper keys, lower keys, and eight number keys. First, the depression of one of the 36 upper keys triggered movement and rotation of the machines internal gears and type complex a mechanical array of Chinese character graphs contained inside the machines chassis, out of view of the typist. The depression of a second key one of the 28 lower keys initiated a second round of shifts and repositionings within the machine, now bringing a cluster of eight Chinese characters into view within a small window on the machine a viewfinder Lin Yutang called his Magic Eye. Depending upon which of these characters one wanted one through eight the operator then depressed one of the number keys to complete the selection process and imprint the desired character on the page.

In creating the MingKwai typewriter, then, Lin Yutang had not only invented a machine that departed from the likes of Remington and Underwood, but so too from the approaches to Chinese typewriting put forth by the many designers before him. Lin invented a machine, indeed, that altered the very act of mechanical inscription itself by transforming inscription into a process of searching. The MingKwai Chinese typewriter combined search and writing for arguably the first time in history, anticipating a human-computer interaction now referred to as input, or shuru in Chinese.

Thomas S. Mullaney is Professor of History at Stanford University and the author of The Chinese Typewriter, from which this article is excerpted.

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The Uncanny Keyboard - The MIT Press Reader

A woman has her legs slung over the shoulders of a man, bent backwards like a stone comma. One of her feet is on the mans headdress, while he rests his chin on her yoni. Im hunkered down on my knees in a back room of the British Museum, staring at a carved depiction of oral sex. Not your typical Tuesday.

My guide tells me that the statue is 11th century, possibly from the Elephanta cave temples near Mumbai, and came to the museum in 1865. It venerates the vulva, or the source of creation, she explains, even though oral sex was considered transgressive at the time. On the other side of the sculpture, a woman stands between two men, one impressive lingamheld between her breasts.

The carving is called erotic maithuna, a Sanskrit term often translated as sexual union. It is just one of the items that will be on display in the museums upcoming tantra exhibition. Im getting a sneak preview of Tantra: enlightenment to revolution, which opens on 23 April. It promises to be the first exhibition to look at the whole history of tantra, from ancient inception to impact on global modern culture.

The rest is here:
Sting, Shakti and sex: The exhibition changing our understanding of tantra - The Independent