A few months ago, I went day drinking with a group of unnaturally attractive humans, the kind of people who look good in baby bangs and low rise jeans. Im a 7, a girl with a sleeve full of tattoos announced. Same, I agreed, assuming she meant shoe size and thrilled that we had something in common. Then a large man offered that he was a 4, and I realized we werent talking about feet.

In a second, Id learn that we were talking about Enneagram types, a range of nine personalities that has become a kind of Whats your sign? for the influencer, or influencer-adjacent, set. Someone passed me their phone and I took a 10-minute test which asked questions like whether Im more relationship or goal oriented and whether Im methodical and cautious or adventurous and a risk-taker.

Wanting to seem Totally Chill for my new, seemingly-poreless friends, I lied, punching in that I am spontaneous and fun-loving and romantic and imaginative. According to 9Types.com, this indeed did make me a 7, or an Adventurer, known for being energetic, lively, and optimistic, someone who wants to contribute to the world. (Who doesnt? I silently countered to myself.)

Later that night, alone, my truest self bathed in computer bluelight, I retook the test. With no one to impress, I was a 4, the Romantic, basically a needy little bitch with sensitive feelings. Under How to Get Along With Me read truths like, Give me plenty of compliments. They mean a lot to me and Dont tell me Im too sensitive or overreacting!

Rude of the Enneagram to drag me like a runaway Clydesdale, but true.

The Enneagram has a hard-to-trace early history. The pseudosciences nine types allegedly have roots in fourth-century Christian mysticism, but it really became popular after the Armenian writer George Gurdjieff, who died in 1949, mapped out the geometric, constellatory figure. Gurdjieff taught the Fourth Way, a supposed path to enlightenment championed during the New Age by the Bolivian philosopher Oscar Ichazo.

Jesuit scholars in the 1970s also adopted the Enneagram in their teachings, and today the practice occupies a curious place in the cannon of self-help literature. Some therapists use the Enneagram to encourage self-reflection. Evangelical Christians believe the number can strengthen their relationship with God. Plenty of gurus use it to sell their pop psych books.

Few things can unite the religious right and Marianne Williamson supporters like the Enneagram does, probably because regardless of politics, people just like talking about themselves.

A lot of people will often feel like they are somehow unique and alone in their experience, they are somehow out there, and not normal, Kim Schneiderman, a New York therapist, told me. For those people, I find that with the Enneagram, they begin to realize certain aspects of themselves in the descriptions of personality types.

Just as the zodiac or crystal healing has helped many a nebulously spiritual person find clarity amidst the chaos, the Enneagram has also developed a very online following. This presents a new cottage industry of influencers like Ashton Ober, who runs @EnneagramAshton while working her day job at the Pennsylvania Coalition Against Rape.

In middle school, Ober lived for the days she her mother would drive her to Barnes and Noble, where she ran straight to the personality test book section. I was a diehard, Ober, now 30, told me.

The enneagram tells you the motivations behind your behavior. It tells you why you do the things you do. Its more of a tool for self-growth instead of just like, here are your results, thats that

She first learned about the Enneagram two years ago, while finishing up her masters program. Ober discovered that she is a 2, or a Helper, a type known for its need to give and feel loveperhaps unsurprising, given her career in social work.

Unlike the Myers Briggs Type Indicator, another character assessment Ober admits to being obsessed with, the Enneagram provided not just an evaluation, but an explanation. The Enneagram tells you the motivations behind your behavior, Ober said. It tells you why you do the things you do. Its more of a tool for self-growth instead of just like, here are your results, thats that.

Of course, that is only if one cares to deep dive into what things really mean. Others, like my day-drinking companions, might be fine explaining away their behavior with, Im such a 9.

Ober posts color-coordinated info-graphics that are ripe for comments, offering guidance and relationship advice for different types. The point of these posts are, of course, to engage, and nothing gets Enneagram fans talking more than a joke that makes them feel seen or read.

The Enneagram is not a comfortable thing, Ober said. It draws out characteristics about ourselves that are not always really great. A few of us who take the test are willing to go further with the results, but a lot of people dont.

I am trying my hardest, but I am not a lifestyle blogger, not going on there and saying, Look what I bought today at Target

Last summer, Obers account hit 20,000 followers. Today, it has over 190,000. She credits a willingness to start posting more about her personal life for that rapid growth. I started to show myself and my face more, Ober explained. I hit 40,000 in September, then 100,000 in November and 175,000 in January.

Still, Ober realizes that her content is very niche, and hard to monetize in the usual influencer way of sponcon and partnership deals. I am trying my hardest, but I am not a lifestyle blogger, not going on there and saying, Look what I bought today at Target, Ober said, though she has done some marketing for various life-coaching companies. By her own estimation, the following is like, 96 percent women.

Ginny Blake, 22 and a law student in West Virginia, says the Enneagram helped her through anorexia recovery. It ended up being a helpful tool to help me analyze triggers and thinking patterns Id been having for years, but now through a new lens, she said. Anorexia is largely driven by anxiety [and] I find I am most likely to relapse when I feel as though Im losing control over some aspect of my life. Restricting becomes a default mindset in order to restore some type of control.

Things clicked when she learned she was a Type 8, or the Asserter, a personality which generally fears a loss of agency. Reading up on the ways Type 8s respond to stress has been really interesting, because its like getting a peek at my brain. The Enneagram became a tool in my belt to help me begin to acknowledge and unravel harmful thought patterns, Blake said.

Blake now runs @EnneagramAndMemes, another popular account with over 160,000 followers. She believes it is like gently roasting yourself and your friends. Blake hopes that if she can make her followers laugh, she can inspire them to learn more about their types.

Everyone carries with them a story that shaped and molded them into who they are [and] learning someones type is like getting an itty-bitty glimpse of that story, Blake added. Learning someone shares your type is really special, too, because all of a sudden you realize someone else thinks like you.

Sarahjane Case, 33, runs @EnneagramAndCoffee from her home in Asheville, North Carolina. She first learned of the different types five years ago, while discussing her then-boyfriend, now-husband, with a friend. After annoying everyone she knew with facts about the Enneagram, Case began posting on Instagram in December 2018.

Were in this season of life right now where we are asking everybody to own their stuff, Case said. Really look at yourself and think about what you bring to the table and what is serving the world, and own that. The Enneagram basically asks you to do that directly.

Case said that her following of nearly 560,000 is made up of a lot of people in Nashville, with New York and Texas being other major hubs. Despite the interest, she is adamant that you dont have to be your number.

A lot of times we think that the whole point of the Enneagram is that we have to be this in order to be loved, be OK, and be safe, Case said. So when we over-identify with our number, there is a sense of, I do not need to change this part of myself. I want more for people than that.

John Luckovich, a 32-year-old teacher at New York Enneagram, has followed the practice since a canoe trip he took as a high schooler in north Georgia. I was friends with this woman whose dad was friends with Don Riso [who wrote the book Personality Types], and she goes, John, youre a 4, Luckovich said. It ruined my life. It started this obsession that I have not diverged from at all.

Luckovich is deeply involved in the Enneagram workshop and speaking circuit, even meeting his wife at a conference held near the Swiss-Italian border. Hes a searcher, someone who believes people need to spend years studying the Enneagram to truly understand it.

Im very snotty, he joked. With the Instagram stuff, some of the memes are funny, very feware, but some are. There are a couple of accounts I follow, but most of it makes me cringe.

He chalks the Enneagrams newfound prevalence down to widespread generational feelings of hopelessness about the future.

I think theres also a real interest in checking out whats going on beneath the hood? How do I find something thats fulfilling? Whats actually real?

I think people can instinctively feel that the Enneagram has a lot of substance to it, but its a far cry from recognizing that something has substance versus being able to extract that substance, Luckovich said. But I think theres also a real interest in checking out whats going on beneath the hood. How do I find something thats fulfilling? Whats actually real?

And of course: Some people are attracted to the Enneagram out of pure narcissism and fascination with oneself, and thats fine. If thats where youre at, thats where youre at.

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What's Your Number? Meet the Enneagram Personality Type Influencers - The Daily Beast

If you find yourself at an airport, youll likely notice two types of travelers. Theres the person struggling with the overstuffed suitcase (or three) right alongside the traveler handling little more than a light duffel.

Of course, they might be heading to totally different destinations for totally different lengths of time and under totally different circumstances, but its clear that a persons packing style whether they pack light or pack heavy is a distinctive personality trait.

It turns out that how much we pack has more to do with our personal travel experiences, including our destination, luggage type, and even social standards. Packing, whether it be for a weekend trip or a two-week vacation, is a highly personal act and can create a fair amount of pressure. Were expected to be effective and efficient travelers who can determine the most important items we need for the entire length of time were away from home. I personally find comfort in bringing more than I need, just in case.

When were traveling, our emotions can feel more polarized since were experiencing a stressful situation, Lara Fielding, a clinical psychologist and author of Mastering Adulthood, told me. Our stress levels increase because were not in our comfort zone, and [because we] are surrounded by uncomfortable, different people.

A popular travel stereotype is that women tend to pack more than men, which is an old clich that Fielding suspects originated nearly a century ago, when women wore more elaborate outfits. Women are also more accustomed to carrying some sort of bag, since womens clothing tends to have small, inadequate pockets. Although those expectations have changed, it takes awhile for these stereotypes to dissipate, Fielding added.

Our stress levels increase because were not in our comfort zone, and [because we] are surrounded by uncomfortable, different people

From Fieldings point of view, how a traveler chooses to pack ultimately comes down to their past travel experiences. A persons behavior is influenced consciously or subconsciously by what theyve encountered before, and most people are aiming to cover their butts when they pack.

There are plenty of smart packing and self-help guides for overpackers, but Jan Chipchase, founder of the design firm Studio D Radiodurans, says luggage design can also influence a persons packing behaviors. Chipchase, who also designs and sells lightweight luggage at SDR Traveller, classifies himself as a no-wheels traveler and has spent the past decade studying peoples packing behavior around the world.

Contrary to popular belief, Chipchase believes wheeled luggage is not a convenient invention for travelers, but rather constrains them during their trips. People see wheels as a way to get their luggage from point A to point B, but the moment theyve chosen wheels, theyve cut down the travel options that are open to them, he said.

For example, it would be much harder for a tourist to navigate a new citys public transit system with a wheeled suitcase than it would be with a small backpack. A backpack also allows for more spontaneous travel, Chipchase argued, since a person only has to worry about whats on their back.

The first wheeled suitcases were sold in 1970, but the concept faced resistance early on salespeople didnt think men wanted a suitcase with wheels. In the decades following this invention, however, designers fine-tuned the standard model of rolling luggage were familiar with today: a suitcase with two tiny wheels and a retractable handle.

Wheels give the illusion of weightless luggage and, according to Chipchase, lead people to pack more. In a 2015 blog, he wrote that when people are packing at home, theyre focused on fitting everything they need within the bag. Only after the trip has started, when the drawback of that extra bulk is apparent, is the desire for remedial action, the clear-out, triggered. By then it is too late.

His reasoning makes sense to me, a chronic overpacker. For a recent weekend trip to San Francisco, I unnecessarily packed a full suitcase and ended up trying to make the stuff I brought fit alongside whatever else I accumulated during my two-day stay.

As a frequent traveler, Chipchase is on the road anywhere from six to nine months a year, a lifestyle that requires him to be minimalist and intentional in his packing. In manifestos and blogs online, ultralight packers say this preparation method helps them think more deeply about the trip on which theyre about to embark.

In an essay for BuzzFeed News, reporter Alison Willmore wrote that the real trick to traveling light requires only that you accustom yourself to leaving things behind things that you bought because you thought you needed them, but now know you can get by without.

In a way, packing light is counterintuitive to what most of us have been conditioned to feel about entirely new environments. Even if youre an experienced traveler, youre likely to have a higher stress response, and the desire to make yourself more comfortable intensifies, said Fielding, the psychologist.

This is a mindset that most seasoned travelers, like Willmore and Chipchase, have attempted to overcome. However, Willmore wrote theres a reason for our attachment to heavy suitcases, that the amount of excess stuff we carry is an attempt to cope with the distance from home: The emotions carried in that heavy suitcase remain the desire to bring something of your life to a new place and to take something similar back.

Theres no right answer to whether a person should pack light or heavy, although the travel industry is encouraging fliers to travel with less. Checked-bag fees are on the rise, and airlines have adopted less-expensive ticket tiers like basic economy that limit travelers to only a small bag.

Its difficult to find that sweet spot if youre an infrequent traveler, but whatever your default packing behavior, it likely isnt a personality flaw, Fielding told me: Its a safety prediction based on your needs for whatever lies ahead.

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How much should you pack for a trip? The psychology behind how much a person packs. - Vox.com

It takes two hours to spot-treat a growing zit with a pimple patch. It takes 20 minutes to de-puff the eye area with a mask. It takes only 10 to give your complexion a shot of hydration with a sheet mask.

Fifty years ago, or as recently as 10 or even five, one skin-care product could last you a few weeks or sometimes months. Now, beauty companies feed our single-use behavior the super-convenient way of using something only once before discarding it with a flood of non-biodegradable, non-recyclable disposable products.

Not only is there an abundance of sheet masks, but there are also derivatives sold to target specific areas like laugh lines or your derrire or your nether regions. There are cleansing wipes available from nearly every brand on the market. And there are zit stickers that come packaged in multiple layers of plastic.

People havent been made as aware of the impact of beauty, said Freya Williams, the chief executive of Futerra North America, an agency that helps companies with sustainability efforts. Were taught in school to recycle, but its focused more in the kitchen than in the bathroom, so it doesnt seem as important.

The single-use phenomenon is a fairly recent development, Ms. Williams added. And, she said, its happening without anybody realizing how much these items are taking over.

Its hard to resist innovative product introductions, seasonal trends and the promise of clearer, tighter, smoother skin. At the peak of the K-beauty trend, a 10-step beauty routine was not only heralded as the answer to a flawless complexion, but it also came to exemplify one form of self-care.

We saw an uptick in the number of skin-care products consumers used at the height of the Korean skin-care trend, with many adding an additional mask or product, said Larissa Jensen, the executive director and beauty industry analyst at the NPD Group market research consultancy.

Every extra serum or mask comes with problematic side effects, of course. Without our even realizing it, were driving up the environmental impact.

Elizabeth Mullans, a dermatologist in Houston, believes that a streamlined anti-aging regimen can be boiled down to three essential products: sunscreen with an SPF of 30 or higher, an over-the-counter retinol or prescription-strength retinoid, and a vitamin C serum.

I dont think you can use too many products they will all be absorbed into your skin but these three are going to help the most, Dr. Mullans said. Other products can be added to target specific concerns, like benzoyl peroxide or salicylic acid for acne, or hyaluronic acid for irritation or dryness.

Stay away from any product that contains collagen because the molecules are too big to be absorbed, she said. Its basically a glorified moisturizer.

Many believe the industrys biggest culprit and most challenging hurdle is packaging, with luxury brands being the greatest offender. The way brands create luxury is through layers of heavy packaging, which is often not recyclable and is being discarded, Ms. Williams said.

Already we have reached a point at which overpackaging no longer feels luxurious. The industry watchdog Estee Laundry, an Instagram account that calls out bullying, copycats and social injustices, has long put brands on blast for waste. A recent target was Pat McGrath Labs and the excessive amount of plastic that comes with a single beauty product.

Making sustainability synonymous with luxury is an opportunity, and its something were starting to see in fashion, Ms. Williams said. Invest in something thats worthy of your time and money.

Investing in waterless beauty products is one example. Anhydrous formulas eliminate water as a key ingredient to deliver on three things: higher potency (and in turn, greater efficacy); a longer shelf life (without water, there is less risk of bacteria growth); fewer toxins (because there is no longer a need for parabens or preservatives); and water conservation.

Clean beauty is expected to generate nearly $25 billion by 2025, according to a report from Grand View Research. That may be only a fraction of the beauty industry (an $863 billion business by 2024, according to Zion Market Research), but the demand for products that are marketed as clean or natural continues to be strong.

This focus on ingredients and whether theyre good if theyre harmful to your skin or the environment is why theres a big movement toward clean beauty, Ms. Jensen said. Clean beauty ties into the wellness movement and the wellness movement ties into the environment, because its about whats good for you and the planet.

She added that demand for such products may help explain an NPD 2019 market report (from January to September) indicating that the skin-care category was up 7 percent in sales, while makeup was down 5 percent.

And as Gen Z consumers, whose priorities include transparency and sustainability, gain spending power as they age, this movement will likely accelerate.

If you look at beautys impact as a whole, the challenge can seem overwhelming. Everything how ingredients are sourced, carbon emissions in production must be considered lest it lead to harmful social and environmental impacts.

Products that use plastic, like glitter or microbeads, can contribute to ocean waste; certain chemicals in sunscreens can harm marine life; and if an ingredient is not sourced responsibly, it can to environmental destruction, like deforestation.

Some companies are making an effort to effect change. Unilever recently pledged that all Dove bottles will be composed of recycled plastic, that the Dove Beauty Bar will be plastic free later in 2020 and that refillable stainless steel deodorant sticks are in the works in an effort to reduce its use of virgin plastic by more than 20,500 tons per year.

For many digitally native, born-good start-ups, sustainability is embedded in their DNA, like By Humankind, a personal care brand dedicated to reducing single-use plastic by introducing plastic-free shampoo and conditioner bars and refillable deodorant containers.

LOLI, a zero-waste clean beauty brand, bottles its formulas in food-grade glass yogurt jars, which can be reused in the kitchen.

Cadence, a company committed to eliminating travel-size plastic, will begin selling its refillable containers on Jan. 21. They allow users to decant their products into durable, leakproof vessels, a percentage of which is made from consumer waste.

Travel-size versions of beauty products are especially wasteful, said Stephanie Hon, the founder of Cadence. By delivering what you love your beauty routine were allowing you to bring what you want in a more sustainable way.

She has a point: Consumers are fiercely loyal to their routines (its why the beauty industry has historically been immune to recession), which means it is that much harder for them to give up their products for a more sustainable option.

Even though 75 percent of consumers believe sustainability is very important, its the key purchasing criterion for only 7 percent, according to a study by Boston Consulting Group.

Consumers think companies arent willing to change, and companies think consumers arent willing to change, so its a stalemate, Ms. Williams said. Once consumers arent forced to choose between sustainability and performance, thats when youll start to see solutions taking off.

There are, however, small actions you can take now: Look for packageless products (Lush has long championed them); avoid single-use products; swap disposable cleansing wipes and cotton pads for reusable ones; and recycle whatever you can. (TerraCycle offers programs for cosmetic products.)

Were nowhere near where we want to be, but taking the right steps is all we can do, Ms. Jensen said. At the end of the day, there are companies that are making money without any changes, but when it starts to affect a companys bottom line, thats when things are going to start to change.

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This Is the Cost of Your Beauty Routine - The New York Times

Our brains are wired to make sense of things by drawing connections between thoughts, ideas, actions, and consequences. But sometimes, they can be straight up wrong, negative, or misleading.

Cognitive behavioral therapists call these instances "cognitive distortions." These traps cause us to perceive reality differently than how it really is and the most successful people have learned how to recognize and avoid these errors in thinking at all costs.

While writing my book, "The More or Less Definitive Guide to Self-Care," I researched and interviewed psychologists to learn how these thought patterns can get in the way of our health, happiness, and ability to past struggles and achieve our goals.

Here are some of the most common mental traps that hold us back from success and how to overcome them:

Mistaking our emotions as evidence for the truth is one of the most common mental traps we fall into.

Example: "I feel like my ideas are worthless, therefore I shouldn't share them in this meeting."

Emotional reasoning can often cause us to make poor choices. In his 2015 letter to shareholders, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos warned against the dangers of letting emotions overwhelm you when making important decisions, rather than taking a step back and trying to learn what you can about a problem.

"Some decisions are consequential and irreversible or nearly irreversible," he wrote. "These decisions must be made methodically, carefully, slowly, with great deliberation and consultation."

To combat emotional reasoning, cognitive therapists suggest asking yourself questions like, "What are the facts that support my emotionally-based determination?" Or, "Is it possible that my feelings are clouded by some bias that ought to be reevaluated?"

When you stop transforming your feelings into truths, you gain the logic and clarity that will allow you to make smarter decisions.

We engage in blaming when we hold others accountable for our own actions and feelings.

Example: On your way out to work, your cat escaped through the door. "Great," you say. "Now I'm going to be late, and it's the cat's fault."

We often blame others because it helps us "preserve our sense of self-esteem by avoiding awareness of our own flaws or failings," according to Susan Whitbourne, a Professor Emerita of Psychological and Brain Sciences at the University of Massachusetts Amherst.

But failing to take responsibility for the consequences of your own behavior means you're not learning from your mistakes. And being able to grow through your experiences, especially the unpleasant ones, is crucial to success.

"Playing the blame game is irrational, and it stigmatizes the other party," says Gustavo Razzetti, author of "Stretch Your Mind." He suggests that practicing empathy can help you quit the habit of blaming. "Focus on understanding the other person. Try walking in his or her shoes. Get rid of the 'right-wrong' approach."

Many of us have fallen down the negative spiral of expecting disaster to strike, no matter what.

Example: The news reports that a storm is approaching. You start to imagine all the bad things that can happen: "What if my house gets destroyed?" "What if someone I love gets hurt?" "What if I get hurt?"

Fear, especially irrational fear, plays a big part in catastrophizing, researchers have found. But always anticipating the worst possible outcome is far from useful. In fact, studies show that it can lead to anxiety and depression.

Psychologist Judith Beth, best known for her work in cognitive behavioral therapy, recommends listing the advantages and disadvantages of putting your time and energy into catastrophizing. Or, she says, it may help to play "devil's advocate," and list all the best-case (or even OK-case) scenarios. You may find yourself in a calmer, less anxious, and clearer state of mind.

In the fallacy of fairness, a person believes that every situation should be determined by what is fair.

Example: You're bitter that your colleague got a promotion and you didn't. You complain to yourself that it isn't fair: "She rarely shows up to work on time and I probably work much harder than her."

But guess what? As you've probably been told several times as a child: Life isn't always fair. When engage in the fallacy of fairness, you're more likely to wind up feeling angry, resentful, or hopeless.

Psychology professors at Brigham Young University-Idaho suggest that stating your feelings as preferences can help change the way you feel about a situation.

So instead of letting yourself be consumed by bitterness, tell yourself: "It would be nice to get a promotion, but I don't always have control over that. Perhaps I can talk to my boss about how I can get one next year."

Personalization involves taking everything personally or assigning blame to yourself, without any logical reason.

Example: "My son got an 'F' on his final exam, and it's all my fault. I should've spent more time helping him study."

Psychologists have found that personalization can lead to guilt, shame, and feelings of inadequacy. To work through this cognitive distortion, take a step back and think about what part you played in the situation. Then consider how you might not be entirely to blame.

By looking at things from an outsider's perspective, you may discover that there were a variety of factors at play, and that the outcome is not a direct reflection of you.

Anna Borges is a writer, podcast host, mental health advocate, and author of "The More or Less Definitive Guide to Self-Care." Her work has appeared in Cosmopolitan, The Outline, SELF, and more. She lives in Brooklyn, New York with her two cats. Follow her on Twitter.

Don't miss:

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5 mental traps that successful people never fall for, according to psychologists - CNBC

It wasnt that long ago that Instagram was flooded with saturated filters and low-resolution photos. But then the gaudy, maximalist look of the 2000s faded out of style and was replaced with an interest in clean lines and mature color palettes. Seemingly overnight, the platform became an ode to minimalismfilled with interior design and lifestyle posts from influencers anchored by organic, nautilus-shaped forms and eggshell-colored walls. Everything on the grid was carefully curated to be monochromatic, uncluttered, and uniform.

[Cover Image: Tree Abraham/courtesy Bloomsbury]Minimalism has been eagerly adopted as an aesthetic by Instagram users and pretty much everyone else not on the social media application, too. Marie Kondo teaches us that minimalism is getting rid of anything that does not spark joy. Other influencers (and brands) suggest that its having a hyper-curated closet of a few basics, or a simple skincare routine featuring only three all-natural products. Minimalism has become a visual manifestation of wellnessa lifestyle trend rooted in conspicuous consumption.

But this loose misinterpretation belies its roots as a decades-old architecture and design philosophy. In his new book,The Longing for Less: Living with Minimalism, out from Bloomsbury January 21, culture critic Kyle Chayka investigates how weve veered away from minimalisms true origins, and converted it intowhat can be reduced toa look. Here, Chayka helps dispel the four biggest myths of minimalism.

Minimalisms recurrence as an idea, in both society and art, reveals the philosophys central paradox: It is a quiet celebration of space, but bold in the way its simplicity overwhelms. In the time right after World War II, minimalism was a popular aesthetic because its a perfect, utopian style that everyone can access, Chayka says in a phone interview. Soon after, in the 1970s, the idea of simple living began to take hold, which is the last time eco-conscious consumer practices (less consumption, more self-reliance) were as in vogue as they are today. I think the internet and social media and the financial crisis is what really caused the super popularity of minimalism this time around, Chayka says.

Its not difficult to imagine why we, as a society, long for less. Our lives are dominated by dizzying screens, which have forced us to prioritize images over the humanness of real life. So much of our visual experience is on the internet now. Thats the container of our experience, Chayka says. And so it makes sense that the spaces we occupy would be very simple because we spend so much time on our phones.

In an attempt to counteract the harm technology has done to our ability to focus, rest, and enjoy experiences, people have adopted minimalism as a visual aesthetic. Its blank, inoffensive, natural. Its even been marketed as a form of self-help.

But according to Chayka, minimalism is about experiencing the world directly and engaging with your surroundings. ConsiderAgnes Martins austere canvases or Donald Judds spacious constructions in Marfa, Texas. In architecture, minimalism has roots in Japan, where theres a real interest in very refined textures and creating experiences with light and shadowan architecture of ephemerality that modernism doesnt really have, Chayka says. In short, there was once a spirituality to minimalism that has been lost in its current expression. The style now seems more like numbing yourself and creating a protective environment, Chayka says.

Minimalism these days has an aura of moral superiority. Minimalism has always been associated with moral purity or a sense of existing outside of society, whether thats during the midcentury modern movement or the Voluntary Simplicity Movement of the 70s, Chayka says. The problem with luxury minimalism today is that the style is associated with moral purity and outsiderness but its being adopted by the most insider people possiblewealthy women and tech billionaires. The style of minimalism [we see today] is a reality thats not very minimal at all. Clearing out ones home for the sake of more space is not radical if theres a financial safety net in place to buy it all back again, if one should so choose. (Steve Jobss uniform of black turtlenecks and jeans was not minimalist as much as it was a decision to not be burdened with variety.) So the suggestion that someone owning fewer objects is healthier and more put-together overlooks the fact that participating in the trend is less about the inward journey than it is about appearances. Nothing morally superior about that.

Todays Instagram-ready minimalism couldnt have been born anywhere other than in the United States. I think the commodification of minimalism has been very American, Chayka says. The idea of an entirely minimalist lifestyle is deeply American . . . we consume everything to excess, even minimalism. Home organization entrepreneur Marie Kondo seems to have tapped into this American Achilles heel; her pivot to selling home goods reflects a genius awareness that consumers are eager to buy objects that represent an ideology, even though they are a shallow appropriation of it. This makes minimalisms success on Instagram plain, too; it is now an element deeply embedded into a platform that has become synonymous with a certain brand of conspicuous consumption.

Sometime soon, the minimalism trend will likely slip out of the mainstream consciousness again, just as it has in the past. I think weve hit peak minimalism and [are now moving] past it . . . minimalism is a trend and a style and it comes and goes in waves. We start obsessing over it and then find out that it doesnt solve our problems, Chayka says. For most people, minimalism is simply not a realistic lifestyle, because the very structure of our capitalist society relies on constant consumption and an attitude of overindulgence. To put it simply, minimalismas it exists in the culture todayis a privilege. Its the difference between an Apple Store and a Zen temple, Chayka says. The Apple Store never changestheres perfectly clean glass and steel and empty space. But if you think of the rock garden in the Zen temple, its always changing and moving with time . . . its more interesting and sustainable than creating something that never changes.

Buy The Longing for Less: Living with Minimalism, by Kyle Chayka, designed by Tree Abraham, Elizabeth Van Itallie, Mia Kwon, and Patti Ratchford for Bloomsbury on Amazon.

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Everything you think you know about minimalism is wrong - Fast Company

Mild winter sunlight streamed through the banyan trees under which Dhana Anjaria sat cross-legged with two other pregnant women of Dumuriput village in Koraput district, 500 km west of state capital Bhubaneswar. They were listening with rapt attention to tips on nutrition for pregnant women.

Monomita Nag, 35, a community resource person, was instructing the group on the importance of dietary diversity using a booklet coloured orange, green and white. These are the colours of the tiranga or the Indian flag, but Anjaria, who knew the booklet by heart, had decoded other meanings from it. Orange is for milk, egg, meat and pulses, white for roots, tubers and cereals, and green is for vegetables, said Anjaria, 21, seven months pregnant with twins.

Anjaria had conceived within the first year of marriage. She could have been among half of all Indian women who are anaemic and one-fifth who are thin. But she is neither, and also confident that her children will be born healthy.

The nutrition advice she was getting from Nag started long before her pregnancy. It began during a meeting she had with Nag as a newly-wed along with her husband. Anjarias mid-upper arm circumference or MUAC used as a rapid assessment of her nutritional status measured 22 cm. An MUAC under 23 cm indicates risk of malnutrition in women.

Anjaria followed Nags advice, went from eating twice a day to four times, including non-vegetarian foods and also started resting more. She was particular about not skipping her calcium or iron folic acid tablets. Over months, her weight increased from 41 kg to 54 kg.

Nag conducts monthly meetings in the village of self-help groups on microfinance activities as a part of the Odisha Livelihoods Mission, started in 2006, an autonomous body under the panchayati raj department that implements diversified livelihoods to reduce rural poverty.

Womens collectives have proved effective in driving nutritional outcomes earlier too the idea has been implemented along with economic empowerment through community conditional cash transfer programmes in Indonesia, Bangladesh and Nepal.

In India, this strategy was adopted in Keralas Kudumbashree programme, Andhra Pradeshs Society for Elimination of Rural Poverty Project , in parts of Telangana, and Jamkhed in Maharashtra too. Without health, livelihood [programmes] cannot work, said Saroj Kumar, block project manager, OLM, Angul. Most poor lose a lot of money in [buying] medicines. When they save this money, they can save it or use it for income generation.

IndiaSpend visited Koraput and Angul districts to understand how the Swabhimaan programme an umbrella of community-led interventions across Bihar, Chhattisgarh and Odisha is being implemented as a part of OLM and to study its impact. We found behavioural change and increased knowledge about health and nutrition among adolescents and women in villages covered by the project.

Self-help groups have become critical instruments of change in Odisha. It is the first state to use these to reduce poverty through the National Rural Livelihoods Mission there are 385,382 such groups in the state with 4.1 million members and they reach 2.8 million households. Generally, each household has at least one woman member of a self-help group and there are 10-12 such groups in each village.

Since 2016, Nag, part of the Swabhimaan programme, has been working as a poshan sakhi or nutrition buddy, trained to conduct meetings and hold awareness activities to improve the nutritional status of adolescent girls and women. Working in four districts across these states Purnea in Bihar, Bastar in Chattisgarh, and Koraput and Angul in Odisha the programme reaches over 356 villages and 125,097 households. Till now, 5,824 girls and women have benefitted from the programme in 39 gram panchayats of Odisha.

Swabhimaans focus is on adolescent girls, newly-wed couples, pregnant women and mothers of children younger than two groups that are most vulnerable to malnutrition. The aim is to improve nutritional intake, reduce instances of anaemia, increase the demand for health services, improve sanitation and hygiene and prevent unwanted pregnancies.

Poshan sakhis conduct monthly gatherings called maitri baithak or friendship meets with newly- wed couples and adolescents to deal with these health and nutrition targets. They also help local women set up kitchen gardens that can help improve the familys dietary diversity.

The benefits of the programme are measured through a randomised control trial where the impact is measured by comparing two groups, one benefiting from the intervention and the other not covered by it, in research parlance called the control arm.

A midline survey conducted in 2018 in Angul and Koraput districts among 1,191 adolescent girls, 614 pregnant women and 1,183 mothers of children under two years, showed improvements in several areas: Increased use of sanitary napkins among adolescents, their re-enrollment in schools, improved diet and increased intake of iron and folic acid tablets among pregnant women and greater participation in community health and sanitation events.

The full impact of the work will only become visible after the endline survey in 2020.

Poshan sakhis also encourage women to attend village health and nutrition days also known as Mamta Diwas or Mothers Day when they are screened for anemia and blood pressure, weighed and given calcium and iron folic acid tablets. These events are undertaken jointly by accredited social health activists or ASHA, auxiliary nurse midwives or ANM of health department, and anganwadi workers or AWW of women and child development department.

There is an advantage in having poshan sakhis deliver the programme they live in the same villages as the participants, while ASHAs and ANMs are often live elsewhere, said Meena Khora, master book-keeperin-charge of maintaining OLM records in the gram panchayat. This helps them in attending to the needs of the women, taking them to the PHCs, she said.

Across the three states, State Livelihoods Missions, in this case OLM, anchor the programme with the departments of health, civil supplies for public distribution system, social welfare, agriculture and public health engineering. The technical and financial support for the programme is provided by UNICEF, which is also involved in capacity building.

When Rima Rani Behera was 16, her parents arranged for her to marry a 26-year-old man. Three days before her wedding, Behera managed to stall the rituals by calling her cousin who brought in the police. I had told them that I do not want to marry, I want to study but they didnt listen, said Behera, now with her uncle in Dumuriput and dreaming of becoming a police officer. She could not continue her education because her parents would not allow her to collect her school leaving certificate after class 10 and threatened to get her married by age 18.

In Koraput, one in every three women 34% in the 20-24 age group is married off before 18 a 13 percentage point higher incidence than Odishas average as per the National Family Health Survey data. Our bodies are still growing in the teens, getting married and having children when our bodies arent fully grown is not good, said Harpriya Behra, 18. She is the secretary of the kishori samooh or adolescent girl group formed as a part of the Swabhimaan project to spread awareness about sanitation, health and nutrition.

The lives of young women here have changed in other ways. We used to use cloth pads before, it was uncomfortable but we didnt know any better, said Sumitra Khillo, 22. Now women get pads from ASHA and ANM workers though there are not enough to last the entire menstrual cycle, they said. The practice of keeping women out of the house during the menstrual cycle too is changing slowly, we found.

Some entrenched beliefs have yet to change. Though most households have latrines, villagers often defecate in the open. It is too small, I dont like using it, said one teenager of the toilet in her home, adding that three of her relatives also do not use the toilet.

Most of the girls in the village travel by bus to schools and colleges but have had to negotiate with their parents for the freedom. We know why we must marry after 18, said Behra, 18, secretary of the committee, and clearly the leader of the group. [But] I will get married at 30, after I get my PhD.

The poshan sakhis we spoke to pointed out that it was hard for young girls to upset their families by insisting that weddings be put off till age 18, but in most instances parents agreed. It was common for girls to marry at 16 and 17 here, said Nag. But in the last few years, this is changing. Even if the girls marry [at] 18, they want to wait till 20-21 to have children.

After the Swabhimaan intervention, 39 adolescents in two blocks of Pallahara and Koraput sadar rejoined schools, according to the midline survey shared by UNICEF. Also, there was a decrease in the number of adolescents living in homes where open defecation was practised and an increase in the number of teens consuming iron folic acid tablets and taking their own decisions on education and expenditure.

However, there was a drop in the number of adolescents who thought they could decide who to marry and reported dietary diversity. Also, similar trends of improvement showed up in both areas with and without intervention in many indicators. This is because Pallahara and Koraput blocks, where the study was undertaken are categorised as intensive gram panchayats getting more focussed government attention where all ongoing welfare schemes are doing well, said Sourav Bhattacharjee, chief nutritionist, UNICEF, Odisha.

An example from Kaliakota, a village with 1,439 residents in Handapa gram panchayat of Angul district, showed why it is critical for communities to engage with health, nutrition and sanitation. For a year, the pregnant women and lactating mothers of Kaliakota did not receive any iron folic acid tablets, putting their health at risk. There had been no village health and nutrition days and no antenatal check-ups because the assigned ANM had died and not been replaced.

The community then sat together and discussed the health, nutrition and sanitation challenges facing them as part of a micro-planning exercise. This involves an annual discussion spread over around 12 days across three months on issues that the women wish to prioritise. This could be the availability of latrines, access to public distribution system or drinking water or iron folic acid tablets.

When Kaliakotas women spoke of their problems, their CRP took their concerns to the block development officers who then assigned an ANM for the village. These meetings bring together officials of the public distribution system, women and child development and health department to find solutions.

In another case, sanitary napkins, available at the community health centre, could not be brought to the school in Pallahara block in Angul because there was no money for it. A meeting threw up a solution the napkins would be transported with public distribution supplies.

Micro-planning also increases the demand and utilisation of public services, showed the midline survey. For example, mothers living in households with access to public distribution system increased in the intervention arms from 68% in 2016 to 99% in 2018, and those who received supplementary food went up from 66.7% to 96.7% in the same period.

A fresh crop of cauliflowers was waiting to be harvested in the two-acre farm behind 22-year-old Tikina Pradhans home in Kishorenagar, Angul district. Saibalini Amanta, a poshan sakhi, collected several vegetables and fruits from Pradhans garden and put them on a plate to explain to Pradhan why she, seven months pregnant with her second child, needed to have an array of homegrown vegetablesmoringa leaves, green papaya, lemons, chillies and cauliflower.

We had everything, but we didnt know how to have a balanced diet, said Pradhan. She now has a varied diet of eggs, meat and green vegetables supplemented by calcium and iron supplements, as instructed by Amanta. While Amanta already had a vegetable farm, most women in self-help groups are encouraged to grow vegetables in their own backyards to ensure food security and dietary diversity. Given the fertile soil and availability of water, most of the households in Angul had patches of vegetables before, but they were often grown without much thought to it.

Earlier women grew only brinjals or only cauliflowers, now they are growing all kinds of fruits and vegetables, said Amanta. Also, most of the nutrigardens are organic without any chemical fertilisers or compost.

There was a 5.9 percentage point reduction in pregnant women worried about insufficient food in from 2016 to 2018, as per the survey. Also there were more women in 2018 than 2016 consuming a variety of foods and having at least three meals a day.

This article first appeared on IndiaSpend, a data-driven and public-interest journalism non-profit.

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Self-help groups in rural Odisha are helping women avoid malnutrition and unwanted pregnancies - Scroll.in

WE have in our leading article referred to that part of the interview granted by him to a New India representative, in which Mr. Shastri expressed his disappointment with the Congress resolution on the Government of India Act. In a subsequent passage, Mr. Shastri explained the ground for this disappointment. The first essential for working the new Reform Act, he said, is to get the people to enter upon the new era in a proper spirit. I am afraid the Congress resolution does not help us very much in that direction. It seems to concentrate rather on the further stages than on the full utilisation of the Reform Act. Parts A, B and C of the resolution occupied disproportionate space. Our partial agreement with Mr. Shastri is confined only to his last statement. We do think that part B ought to have been so expanded as to make it clear that the Government of India Act, though unsatisfactory, was an advance upon present conditions and a real step towards full responsible government. But subject to this observation, we fail to see why the Congress resolution should not be regarded as a substantially correct lead to the country. Mr. Shastris objection that the Congress resolution seems to concentrate rather on the further stages than on the full utilisation of the Act is clearly based on a misapprehension. Are not the two in this case intermingled? Is it possible to utilise the Act without having the further stages constantly in our mind? Is not the process of conscious evolutionand surely Mr. Shastri would not have of the day throughout dominated by the consciousness of the end, and is it not the fact that the stronger, the more vivid and the more pervading the consciousness of the end, the surer and speedier is the process? On the other hand, who among us really believes that the further stages can be obtained without our fully utilising the Reform Act?

Continued here:
Mr. Shastris Objection to Congress Resolution. - The Tribune

BlackRock Chairman and CEO Laurence Fink is interviewed by Maria Bartiromo on Fox Business Network's "Opening Bell with Maria Bartiromo," Wednesday, March 26, 2014 in New York. (AP Photo/Mark Lennihan)

Superlatives make me suspicious, so color me skeptical when one of the worlds biggest money managers talks about a fundamental reshaping of finance.

That was the headline on a letter that Larry Fink, chief executive of BlackRock Inc., sent this week to CEOs of major companies. The letter said climate change and sustainability have become central to BlackRocks investment strategy.

You may not have heard of BlackRock, but the CEOs certainly have. Finks company manages $7 trillion in assets, and it voted against 4,800 directors at 2,700 companies last year. Finks letter said it will increasingly use its voting power when companies are not making sufficient progress on sustainability.

The firm plans to introduce sustainable versions of its iShares index funds. Instead of weighting investments by market capitalization, the new funds will concentrate money in companies that get high scores on environmental, social and governance issues.

Over time, Fink predicts, the sustainable funds will become BlackRocks flagship offerings, with traditional index funds fading in importance.

Finks letter comes as Australian wildfires dramatize how climate change can affect a national economy. But will it send CEOs scurrying to make their companies greener? Are his superlatives justified?

Originally posted here:
Nicklaus: The greening of Wall Street is more evolution than revolution - STLtoday.com

Jazz musicians have always placed a premium on saying something. Technique, training, and theory will only get you so far, and may even lead you in the wrong direction; what matters is the ability to hit on an emotion or an idea that feels at once familiar and revelatoryto speak a common language in a decidedly uncommon way.

From this standpoint, few musicians have said more than the saxophonist Pharoah Sanders. Born in Little Rock, Arkansas, the son of a school-cafeteria cook and a city employee, Sanders moved to New York in 1962, at the height of jazzs postwar avant-gardealso known as free jazz or the new thingwhich was spawned by the late-fifties experiments of the saxophonist Ornette Coleman and the pianist Cecil Taylor. Sanderss dbut album, recorded in 1964 for the ESP label, garnered little attention, but his playing caught the ear of John Coltrane. Coltrane invited Sanders to join his band in 1965. The following year, Impulse!, the label that had been exhaustively documenting Coltranes evolution, gave Sanders another chance to record as a leader. The result was the surging and expansive Tauhid, an album that positioned Sanders as both Coltranes foremost disciple and an artist with ideas of his own.

Coltrane died in 1967, and Sanders recorded some with his widow, Alice Coltrane, a multi-instrumentalist and composer, before returning to the studio for Impulse! two years later, with his own group. The resulting album, Karma, set the template for a remarkable five-year run. While remaining as fiery as ever, Sanders had developed an interest in soaring, magisterial melodies, and the rhythms of his recordings, while dense and multi-layered, often hewed toward a steady groove. He also incorporated unexpected elements: non-Western instruments, yodelling by the sui generis vocalist Leon Thomas. As the title of Karma suggests, Sanders, like Coltrane, felt that music had a spiritual dimension. The whole musical persona of Pharoah Sanders is of a consciousness in conscious search of a higher consciousness, Amiri Baraka later wrote.

Subsequent Impulse! releases, such as Jewels of Thought, Thembi, and Black Unity, extended a musical quest that has now, in one form of another, lasted more than fifty years. But for someone who has said so much through music, Sanders has said very little to the press, doing only a handful of interviews in the course of his career. I spoke with Sanders earlier this fall, in Los Angeles, where he had just celebrated his seventy-ninth birthday by playing two shows in the area. Sanders still projects a distinctly Southern brand of soft-spokenness, one thats equal parts humility and aversion to fuss. Although he is an acknowledged master who has been honored at the Kennedy Center, he speaks of himselfand seems to sincerely regard himselfas just another working musician trying to make a living.

We talked about his beginnings as a musician, his approach to recording over the years, and his collaborations with jazz legends. But Sanders was more inclined to reflect on the challenge of finding a good reed than to dilate on his legacy. What really mattered, it seemed, was his feeling that he could never get it right. Over the course of the conversation, it became clear that he wasnt being compulsively hard on himself or willfully oblivious. Rather, he was still searching, possibly for something that he knew he would never find.

The interview has been edited and condensed.

You just had your seventy-ninth birthdayhappy birthday!

Thank you.

What keeps you going, musically? Why are you still out there touring?

Well, I still try to make a living. I havent retired. Im not working that much, but, you know, jobs come through.

What are you trying to accomplish artistically at this point?

Right now, I dont even know myself!

Your sets these days touch on all the different things youve explored in your career. I saw you play in Portland earlier this year, and you played some standards and ballads as well older, more open-ended material, like The Creator Has a Master Plan,1 from Karma.

I just play whatever I feel like playing. Its hard to keep a band together these days, so I never know most of the time whos going to be in the band. Whoever I decide to use, if I can use them, well, thats it!

Lets go back to the beginning. Before you took up the saxophone, you played the clarinet in church?

I started playing drums first.

Oh, I didnt know that.

Then I wanted to play clarinet. I went to church every Sunday, and there was this memo up in church that someone had a metal clarinet. That person just passed away maybe a few days ago. He was about ninety-three or ninety-four. Thats how I got my first instrument. Seventeen dollars!

When did you switch to saxophone?

Well, in high school I was always trying to figure out what I wanted to do as a career. What I really wanted to do was play the saxophonethat was one of the instruments that I really loved. I started playing the alto. Its similar to the clarinetif you can play the clarinet, you can play the saxophone.

Why did you switch to tenor from alto? What did you like about the sound?

Tenor was the most popular instrument at that time to get work. I would rent the school saxophone. You could rent it every day if you wanted to. It wasnt a great horn. It was sort of beat-up and out of condition. I never owned a saxophone until I finished high school and went to Oakland, California. I had a clarinet, and so I traded that for a new silver tenor saxophone, and that got me started playing the tenor. The minute I bought it, I wanted an older horn, so I traded my new horn for an older model.

I read that you went to Oakland because you were studying art and you were going to go to art school.

I was painting all the time, pictures. I got into music very late. I used to do all that kind of work.

Have you painted at all since then?

No, I havent done anything for many, many years. Ive wanted to go back into it, but I just havent.

After just a couple of years in Oakland, you moved to New York. Had you decided to focus exclusively on music?

I had to get it all together. I didnt know enough about lots of thingsbasic things. I knew I needed to get some studying in, in order to get into playing saxophone, because I wanted to play jazz. So I had to cut out a lot of activities that I was doing and spend more time practicing scales and stuff like that.

Is it true that you were homeless when you first moved to the city?

I didnt have nowhere to stay. Everybody was talking about, You should go to New York. They said, Thats the place to go! So thats the reason I went to New York. I hitchhiked a ride to New York.

What year was this?

1962.

So, when you get there, the avant-gardeor whatever you want to call itis in full swing. Its been three years since Ornette Colemans residency2 at the Five Spot.3 Sun Ra has moved the Arkestra4 from Chicago to New York. Were you following all of this?

I didnt know what was going on. I was trying to survive some kind of way. I used to work a few jobs here and there, earn five dollars, buy some food, buy some pizza. I had no money at all. I used to give blood and make fifteen dollars or ten dollars or whatever. I had to keep eating something.

But you managed to establish yourself as a musician.

I always wanted to work with my own band, so I got some guys together and started working down in New York, in Greenwich Village. I could pick up a few little weekend jobs. You had to do something to survive.

Who was in that band with you, your first band?

I would ask around for some musicians, and we playedI didnt even hardly know their names.

Was Billy Higgins5 in that band? I read that you two knew each otherand that he was homeless, too.

Billy Higgins, he would come around in that location a lot, in the Village. I met him, and I heard him play. On occasion, we kind of talked a little bit about the music, and I found out how great he was. I started listening to some of his recordings. Like I said, all the time, I was still trying to find some type of job or workit didnt matter whether it was playing music or whatever it was. There was one time I got a job being a chef, cooking, in order to survive.

You started working with the Arkestra in 1964, and then, in September, 1965, you joined Coltranes band.6 That was a lot of peoples first exposure to you. Do you know why he chose you?

I dont even know the reason myself. I dont feel like he needed me or another horn. I think he just felt like he was going to do something different.

What was it like to work with him? Theres an idea of him as this saint-like figure.

His whole demeanor reminded me of a minister. He didnt act like a lot of musicians that Ive met in my life. John, he was always extremely quiet. He didnt say anything unless you asked him something. I never asked him anything about music.

Really?

Never.

But he was making a conscious choice to work with younger musicians.

He always had some kind of a way of looking to the future, like a kaleidoscope. He saw himself playing something different. And it seemed like he wanted to get to that level of playingI dont know if it was a dream that came to him, but thats what he wanted to do. I couldnt figure out why he wanted me to play with him, because I didnt feel like, at the time, that I was ready to play with John Coltrane. Being around him was almost, like, Well, what do you want me to do? I dont know what Im supposed to do.

He always told me, Play. Thats what I did.

What was your relationship with him like?

I loved being around him because I dont talk that much, either. It was just good vibes between us both. We were just very quiet. All the time that Id been listening to John, Im hearing something else, just being around him. He would never start some kind of conversationhe would say something, but it wouldnt last that long. He never would elaborate, or go deep into it. He said a few words, and that was it.

Was he funny at all? Did he ever joke around?

He had a sense of humor about him, I think. One time, Jimmy Cobb was playing with him, and his stick got loose, and it went across to John and hit him, or something. John said, Yeah, hes just trying to get back at me.

His sense of humor was in his music. Sometimes hed remind me of Monk.7 John would play things Monk would play, but it was a little bit different, faster. Id turn around and look and say, Oh. O.K.

Monks music is definitely humorous, but I dont think many people hear that in Coltrane.

He got a lot of stuff from being around Monk. He didnt sound like Monk, but he understood the humor.

After John passed away, you continued recording with Alice Coltrane.8

You know, her playing was amazing. I loved what she was doing. But I always felt like what I was doing wasnt good enough. Maybe I was playing a little bit more dominant than what she wantedshe seemed more intellectual than I was. But I tried to play something close to the concept that she was doing.

At one point, I had told her, I dont know if you like the way Im playing or not. I dont know whether this fits, or what. She said, Youre doing O.K. Just keep on playing. Keep on blowing.

Around this time you also start leading your own bands, and you start recording for Impulse! as a leader. Did you feel like you knew what you were doing then?

No, I dont think I was really ready. But I had to go on anyway, and study while I was trying to get it all together. I knew I had to be better than what I was. I had to keep moving. I learned a lot from John. I remember I used to talk to Philly Joe Jones.9 I talked to a lot of different people.

On those Impulse! records, youre experimenting a lot with non-Western instruments, finding ways to use vocals in a freer context, and getting into more groove-oriented rhythms. Were you thinking through things in advance or just figuring them out in the studio?

We just worked it out while we was there. That kind of spontaneous move.

You started working with some musicians who people didnt know well at the time, like Leon Thomas,10 Lonnie Liston Smith,11 Sonny Sharrock.12 What were you looking for when you heard them?

I was looking for musicians who played with lots of energy. I wanted to be able to play that way myself. In order to do that, I had to find musicians to work with who had that kind of energy.

You were making incredibly intense music during this period, on albums like Jewels of Thought and Thembi. Was that just where your head was at that timeconstantly in a kind of heightened state?

I dont know. I was still trying to reach for something, I didnt know what.

Today people call this music spiritual jazz. But it wasnt like anyone sat down at a table and said, Lets invent this whole new kind of music.

It just happened. Thats the way I look at it. It just happened. I was never satisfied with my playing, for a long, long time. Still sort of have problems like that.

Still? Do you feel like youve ever had a moment, or a record, where youve been, like, I got this one right?

No.

Really?

I used to hear other bands, other groups, when they were making a recording. And a lot of musicians Id hear would be working on one song maybe for, could be a week, or a few weeks. Make sure everything is right.

You, on the other hand, were recording two or three albums a year with Impulse! Was that how often the label wanted you in the studio?

Well, they wanted a certain number of records a year, being signed with somebody. The thing you dont want to do is make them too close together, playing the same way as you were before. Youve got to do something fresh. Some people like to wait for that kind of thing to happen.

But thats not how you approached it.

I just felt like going in there and doing what I wanted to do.

Would the label give you any direction, or were they hands-off?

They tried to let you know how many songs to play. I just kind of ignored it. Sometimes, I would just play one tune for the whole side. I just kept on playing, like it was a suite. Looking from one thing to another. If youre in the song, keep on playing.

Did you rehearse?

No, we never rehearsed.

Did you ever do more than one take?

Maybe on a few things we did, something where I didnt really like the way I first got started up and started out playing. But whenever I heard it back, I kind of liked it, so I said, Well, I should have kept it. Anyways, its too late now.

It kind of taught me something else. It made me think, Why do I have to do it this way? Lets keep on playing until it all comes together. Thats what we did. Thats what I always do. You know, try to keep on creating.

Youve mentioned several times now having not liked how your playing soundedthis seems tied into the idea of your always searching for something new. Is there any recording where youre happy with your sound?

I havent made it yet. Sometimes on my horn, a couple of notes, Im feeling satisfied with it, but the rest of the notes just is not sounding right. So Im still working on that.

I have a problem with finding the right reeds, and the right mouthpiece, the right horns. I used to buy boxes of reeds, and if they dont play right Id just throw them right on the floor, put them in the trash. Maybe a box of threes, or a box of fours. They never sound the same.

Do you think most musicians think this way? Are you all just perfectionists?

I dont know. I know when I listen to other musicians, they sound beautiful to me. When I hear myself playing, I sound like They sound beautiful. I just wonder, what are they all using?

What do you listen to these days?

I havent been listening to anybody.

Not even older stuff?

I havent been listening to anything.

I listen to things that maybe some guys dont. I listen to the waves of the water. Train coming down. Or I listen to an airplane taking off.

Have you always been listening for sounds like that?

Ive always been like that, especially when I was small. I used to love hearing old car doors squeaking. Maybe its something youre really into, then maybe youll get a sound like that. I just wondered, Would that be a good sound?

Sometimes, when Im playing, I want to do something, but I feel like, if I did, it wouldnt sound right. So Im always trying to make something that might sound bad sound beautiful in some way. Im a person who just starts playing anything I want to play, and make it turn out to be maybe some beautiful music.

When you were first in the public eye, with Coltrane, people didnt get that.

I dont know if I got it myself.

Do you go back and listen to your recordings?

Read the original post:
If You're in the Song, Keep on Playing: An Interview With Pharoah Sanders - The New Yorker

Dr. LaPerla takes a more comprehensive approach to mental health and getting vital information to ... [+] masses of people.

When psychologist Nicole LaPerla started sharing some of her insight on Instagram to an audience of a few hundred, her only goal was to create the content that she needed on her own healing journey. That audience has now grown to over a million and a half strong, and LaPerla is sticking to her principles. Im very connected to my community, she shared with me. I spend a ton of time in the comments and the DMs, and that is what helps me create thing that might bring the most value.

Youve probably heard of LaPerla, or at least, seen her posts shared by one or more of your friends. Her work has gained a cult following for being, well, that good.

Born and raised in Philadelphia, LaPerla always knew she wanted to be a psychologist. Her fascination with the human mind and behavior, as she describes it, made it the perfect fit.

However, through her training, LaPerla found fault with the traditional mental health education system, citing the major problem being the disassociation between mind and body. Its focused on the diagnostic model, she explains, which means labeling symptoms as disorders. I was trained that all people can do is basically manage symptoms. I wish I had been taught more about trauma, epigenetics, and the importance of conscious awareness.These are things I teach every day now because they lead to immense healing.

The main issue with clinical psychology is there is a lack of empowerment.We are now showing people the power of choice, habit, and environment that they can change if they do the work.

She believes that trauma is at the root of our mental health crisis.

We have more mental health practitioners than ever, and yet mental health issues are on the rise, which is something we need to look at, she says. We are alsojust now beginning to talk about things like polyvagal theory to understand how trauma impacts the body and entire nervous system.Many of us are living in bodies that keep us stuck in states of disease, and we arent even aware of them.

LaPerla shared that she perceives the biggest mental health misconception to be that mental illness is a genetic chip that we are destined to live with forever. Our symptoms are powerful messengers from the body trying to get our attention, she said. Ive seen radical healing so many times from people who were told there was no hope.There is hope for everyone who commits to their healing.We need more practitioners speaking this truth.

Right now, LaPerla is leading that movement, and innovating the way we access information in the process.

Recognizing the natural and inevitable evolution of the digital age, she believes that the Internet should rightfully play a role in mental health counseling and the promotion of better education. Therapists are creating amazing content every day.Never in history have people had free access to such valuable content that can actually help them heal from things they may never even knew they needed to heal from, she said.

Its no secret that therapy is expensive and out of reach for many people.Of course, social media is no substitute for therapy, but it does give people tangible tools to create deep change in their life.

LaPerla recognizes that her field is at a pivot point. This is a very important time of waking up to the reality that we need a collective healing, she says.Its not something we can outsource to anyone else, though of course professionals can be a help to us on our journey.We need to be active participants in our own healing, or these numbers will just continue to rise.Thats the message I am passionate about getting out there.

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Nicole LaPerla, The Holistic Psychologist, Is Radically Changing The Business Of Mental Health - Forbes