THE English adage attitude is everything holds true today just as it has done since time immemorial. Jeff Kelly further captures it so well by saying, Change your attitude and you change your life. Indeed, our generation today in times of the Covid-19 crisis can alter its life during and after this catastrophe by changing attitudes and thought process.

Robert Mandeya

It is no illusion that this disaster brought anger, denial, frustration, fear, uncertainty, anxiety and hopelessness upon us. This is indeed a sad situation which we have hopelessly watched as the crisis ripped into our investment of time, money, business, research, jobs and even lives.

Picking up the pieces

However, sulking or freaking over these misfortunes for hours, days and even weeks on end would not help anyone at this moment. It is time to let go of whatever heartbreaks pick the pieces and move forward in a new direction.

Easier said than done, of course, and it takes a great deal of effort, energy and power to pick yourself up and sail into a new direction all together. Believe me, in the course of this transition we are bound to make plenty of blunders and mistakes along the way but with the right frame of mind and enthusiasm coupled with appropriate actions you will soon attract positive results. This is only possible with a change of attitude a decision everyone in a situation of despair must make now!

Applying some life principles

Following certain life principles to develop and maintain a positive attitude will not only make you achieve some incredible breakthroughs but enable you to defy certain the odds in this period of devastating uncertainty.

I know from first-hand experience that the ideas I share in this article work have the power to literally transform your life! Please do not misunderstand me. I do not claim to be a know-it-all on this subject. Far from it!

I consider myself a work in progress and I continue to learn every day. However, I know what it is like to have a negative attitude, because that is the kind of attitude I had for the first 20 years of my life.

All of the positive changes that I have made in my life are the result of practicing the principles I will share in this and subsequent installments. The Master Action Plan, which I shared at the beginning of the Covid-19 lockdown, touched on three broad concepts: think, speak and act.

Success begins in the mind

Recovering from this crisis will surely depend on ones attitude and perspective of the environment around you. The power of attitude and belief to shape your destiny going forward will set you apart from the rest. Just recently, I had an interview with a friend, colleague and founder CE of the Astro Tech Group, Munyaradzi Gwatidzo, who spoke of psychological pivoting.

Basically, Gwatidzo was talking about how success depends squarely on the way that you think particularly in times of crisis. Attitude is the mental filter through which you experience the world. Some people see the world through the filter of optimism (the glass being half full) while others see life through a filter of pessimism (the glass being half empty).

The person with the positive attitude sees possibilities even when the chips are down. True to his word, Gwatidzo saw possibilities out of the current situation and he launched a product called e-shagi, a digital platform meant to ease peoples access to funding and business loans during and after this lockdown.

There is really not much we can do to control the circumstances facing us today but we can control our feelings and thoughts about this situation we are confronted with.

Attitude is like a window

Attitude is like a window through which we see the world. Just like any window, there comes a point where life starts throwing some dirt at our windows. The dirt may be thrown by very close people in our lives. This dirt might be in the form of criticism from our parents or teachers, ridicule from peers, rejection by those we love, disappointments in business or life, self-doubt in what we want to achieve and so on. This dirt keeps building up on our windows particularly if we choose not to do anything about it. In the end we will not see anything through that window.

By continuing to go through life with a filthy window, we lose our enthusiasm, get frustrated and depressed. And most tragically, we give up on our dreams all because we failed to clean our attitude window.

The Covid-19 crisis has literary thrown lots of dirt on our windows and the longer we take to clean it up the more we will not discern the possibilities out there in the midst of this crisis.

This is the road most of us find ourselves in at the moment. We are gripped in fear of the unknown and tangled in a web of uncertainty. The longer we stay in this conundrum, the filthier our windows get. We will not be able to see any possibilities. How could you see when your window is splattered with the mud of negativity?

Remember, crises provide a unique opportunity to refocus your energy, remap your entry back into business or work and to rebrand yourself. Mandeya is a certified executive leadership coach, corporate education trainer and management consultant. robert@lird.co.zw/ or info@lird.co.zw, Facebook: @lirdzim and Mobile/WhatsApp: +263719466925

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Attitude is everything: Rebooting from the coronavirus pandemic - Zimbabwe Independent

Stanbic IBTC Holdings Plc has urged Nigerians to maintain a strong mental attitude, which it stated is a major prerequisite for overcoming the global pandemic.

In a live video podcast on YouTube sponsored by Stanbic IBTC, the Blue Talk Show, Dr Sylvanus Jatto, a medical expert with the firm, said the lockdown offers the opportunity to reevaluate and restructure our daily routines, goals, and expectations. To relieve the psychological and mental concerns associated with the lockdown, he advised Nigerians to deliberately create a routine that enables them to go through what they have been doing before the lockdown and this routine could be spaced, to allow mental and physical relaxation. As a prerequisite for good mental health, he also advised Nigerians to exercise while staying at home and maintain a positive mindset, because this pandemic is but for a while.

Dr. Jatto further advised Nigerians to maintain a strong connection with their loved ones, even employers should consistently maintain communication with their employees, reassuring them of their commitment to their wellbeing. He further advised citizens to limit the amount of information being consumed especially from the social media space, as this information could affect them negatively.

On the economic impact of the Covid-19 pandemic, Jatto cautioned Nigerians to be financially prudent. During this period, Nigerians must be financially frugal in their spending, with much emphasis on priority rather than impulsive spending, to build resilience in this tough time, he said.

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Stanbic Advises on Positive Mental Health - THISDAY Newspapers

Motivation is volatile and not easy to sustain when cut adrift from the normal workplace. Photograph: iStock/Getty

Motivation is a slippery fish at the best of times. Its unbelievably fragile as anyone who has made and broken new year resolutions faster than the speed of light knows. But its also unbelievably powerful and can bring people through the most difficult circumstances.

One thing thats certain, however, is that motivation is volatile and not that easy to sustain when youre working remotely and cut adrift from the normal interaction of the workplace.

Motivation is a complex driver that governs our behaviour and this is underlined by the fact that it pops up as a factor across a number of disciplines, from management and organisational behaviour to social and educational psychology. It also plays a role in affective neuroscience and cognitive psychology, where academic Prof Kou Murayama, who heads the multidisciplinary motivation science lab at the University of Reading, says it has been normally treated as a nuisance factor that needs to be controlled.

Murayamas research is feeding into the emerging and stand-alone field of motivation science, which aims to take a multidisciplinary approach to understanding the different types of motivation and how they fit and function together to produce behaviour.

In his paper, The Science of Motivation (published by the American Psychological Society in 2018), Murayama points out that not all motivations are created equal and he also says that the use of competition a style often favoured by managers looking to improve performance doesnt work consistently as a means of increasing motivation.

Individuals differ when it comes to willpower and motivation but some people are called on to exercise both, to an extreme degree. Mark Pollock studied business and economics in Trinity College Dublin before losing his sight in 1998. Unwilling to be defined by what he couldnt do, Pollock, who was a competitive college rower, went on to win silver and bronze medals at the Commonwealth Games. He then threw himself into ultra-endurance sporting events and became the first blind athlete to race to the South Pole.

Pollock was subsequently asked to speak about his experiences to a corporate audience and one talk led to another. Over the last 10 years he has built a successful career on the international speaking circuit despite being paralysed in a fall in 2010. His TED talk about resolving the tension between acceptance and hope topped 1.5 million views within six months.

Pollock doesnt care for the term motivational speaker because he says gung-ho positivity is not his thing. Instead, he uses his own experience of coping with adversity to be thought provoking in a way that encourages people to take a step back, reflect and if necessary regroup.

Resilience and adapting to change are two of his main themes and he says what people need now is to regain their sense of proportion and control, as both have been thoroughly undermined by the pandemic.

Everything is suddenly on the table and people are constantly facing multiple choices which can be overwhelming, Pollock says. My advice is to narrow the focus of what youre trying to deal with. Resilience is about separating the internal and the external locus of controls and taking charge of what we can control we always have options.

Remote working has made it way more difficult to manage teams and keep everyone pulling together but Pollock believes its worth making a big effort to sustain team function because bringing people together is the best way to solve complex problems.

In this he speaks from the experience of having pulled teams together to take on extreme challenges, such as the race to the South Pole and running six marathons in seven days in the Gobi Desert. When individual endeavour is combined with others through collaboration, that is when major breakthroughs happen, says Pollock, whose personal quest is to help find a cure for paralysis in his lifetime.

Like many businesses, Pollocks was hugely affected by the coronavirus outbreak and, within a few days, all of his travelling engagements were cancelled. Almost overnight, he had to move online and he is now leading a series of 45-60 minute corporate webinars with co-host Paula Cunniffe, chief executive of Strive Management, covering topics such as resilience and motivation, coping with sudden change and unexpected challenges, charting some sort of a roadmap through the current uncertainty and dealing with fear and anxiety.

Pollock describes himself as a realist not an optimist and as someone who is at ease with the mindset of the ancient Greek Stoic philosophers. He has also been influenced by the Austrian neurologist and Holocaust survivor, Victor Frankl and by US vice admiral and Vietnam War veteran James Stockdale, after whom the paradox (why confronting reality is vital to success) is named.

Optimists rely on a positive mental attitude based on hope. Realists try to balance the tension between acceptance and hope, says Pollock, who is the co-founder of the global running series Run in the Dark and part of the World Economic Forums young global leadership programme.

Challenge is the opportunity and sometimes we choose our challenges and sometimes they choose us as were all experiencing right now. The starting point is to confront the facts and accept them and resilience starts from there. In a crisis, spectators sit on the sidelines while competitors show a willingness to pursue success at the risk of failure. The choice is ours.

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How to stay motivated while working from home - The Irish Times

News

MUMBAI: The good looking young actor Mohsin Khan of Ye Ristha Kya Kehlata Hai dotes on his mother Mehzabin Khan. On being asked if he is the pampered one he says, I am the eldest son so I was pampered a lot. Also I was quite weak and shy as a child so I am sure my parents had to take extra care of me. I had Asthma and abba (Abdul Waheed Khan) and ammi (Mehzabin Khan) had to take care of me day and night. Now I am cured of asthama. He further adds, We are a big family. I am the most pampered person among all".

On being asked about lockdown he says, "I am doing what everyone is doing waiting for situation to get back to normal. I request all my fans to stay at home and follow the guidelines. This too shall pass away. Nothing is permanent"'.

Speaking further about his mother he says, " I contribute in helping in house hold chores in the time of lockdown but ammi tries her best not to let me do. Sometimes without our knowledge she does everything and sometimes me and my brother does the same. I feel blessed to have her as my mother. Every day is mothers day for me.

On being asked what he has learnt from his mother he says, To stay positive and have patience at all times. One must keep the right mental attitude towards everything and one must live life one day at a time.

Mohsin had made a cake for his mother last month on her birthday and his mother comes across as a very happy individual whenever she is seen with him and her smile is infectious enough and Mohsin has retained the same charm in his smile.

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Every day is Mothers Day for me: Mohsin Khan - Tellychakkar

China and the USA will face each other in Sunday's Superfinal of theFIDE Chess.com Online Nations Cup. On Saturday, the USA lost toEurope in round one, but then they became the only team to beat China in the tournament. Thus, USA finished in a tie with Europe, advancing to the Superfinal due to scoring precisely half a board point more.

The Chess.com Day 5 Live Broadcast for replay.

The big clash between the USA and Europe was likely going to decide the fight for second place, considering the pairings for the final round where the USA would face the leader China, while Europe would play the Rest of the World.

After three tense games on the top three boards, where GM Maxime Vachier-Lagrave was closest to a win vs. GM Hikaru Nakamura, it was the ladies' board where this key match was decided. GM Nana Dzagnidze always had a slight edge, and she eventually outplayed GM Irina Krush in a rook endgame:

With no chance for qualifying for the final, team captain Vishy Anand and player Vishy Anand must have agreed that he could take the day off.

Meanwhile, GM Yu Yangyi was the absolute star player of this event. Well, at least for nine rounds. He improved his score even further to 6.5/8 with another excellent win, this time against GM Baskaran Adhiban.

In a match that was only played for the history books, GM Sergey Karjakin learned the hard way how fast GM Alireza Firouzja has improved lately. He was completely outplayed and then beaten with a kingside attack:

The legendary Judit Polgar joined our live broadcast for a bit during the break.

Europe was going into the final round a match point ahead of the USA, and as said, with a much better pairing. But the unthinkable happened.

While Europe couldn't win their match, the USA did manage, with GM Wesley So becoming the first player to beat Yu in this tournament and, with that win, securing the two match points.

So where did it go wrong for Europe? As always, it's a team effort, but the one board that was lost was GM Levon Aronian's game with Firouzja. Unfortunately for Aronian and his team, the Iranian star had his best day of the event as he scored 2/2 with two fine games:

In another match where not much was at stake, GM Vladislav Artemiev stole the show with a flashy attack on GM Vidit Gujrathi's king. The Indian player later apologized on Twitter for his disappointing level of play in the event.

FIDE Chess.com Online Nations Cup | Final Standings

Tomorrow's Superfinal will start an hour later, so7:00 a.m. Pacific / 10 a.m. Eastern / 16:00 CEST. China will have white on boards one and three. As the winner of the round-robin, China got to choose colors and also has draw odds in the one match that is the final.

In other words, the USA needs to do for a second time what no other team has managed: beat China.

The FIDE Chess.com Online Nations Cup is a team competition held from May 5-10, 2020 on Chess.com featuring Russia, USA, Europe, China, India, plus a team representing the "Rest of the World." The total prize fund is $180,000, sponsored by Chess.com.

The first stage consists of a double round-robin, with each team playing each other twice. The top two teams after 10 rounds qualify for a "Superfinal" match.

All matches are played on four boards: three with male players and one with female players. The time control for all games is25 minutes + 10 seconds increment per move, starting from move one.

Games Day 5 for replay/download

During today's live broadcast, the songwriter and musician Juga released her latest chess song.

Related articles

Excerpt from:

China, USA Will Battle In Sunday Superfinal At FIDE Chess.com Online Nations Cup - Chess.com

CHENNAI: India's top chess players, including talented youngsters such as R Praggnanandhaa, D Gukesh, Nihal Sarin and national champion Aravindh Chithambaram will take part in the Indian Chess.com League to be played online from May 15-17.

A total of 10 teams will take part in the tournament which will see the participation of over 25 Indian Grandmasters.

GM Priyadarshan Kanappan, the league commissioner said, "The Sports League was something that I had been very familiar with as I lived in the US where you had leagues for all sports; so I always used to wonder if we could replicate that format in India, and that's how this league idea happened."

"The lockdown helped us in a big way, as chess players have no avenue to play in over the board events, so we were able to convince the top players to play in an online league format," he added.

Praggnanandhaa and Chithambaram will turn out for Team Chess Gurukul to be captained by noted coach and Grandmaster R B Ramesh, while Gukesh, the world's second youngest Grandmaster, will play for Five Fighters, which would also include the experienced GM Surya Sekhar Ganguly, promising young Leon Luke Mendonca, Vishnu Prasanna (Captain) and Soumya Swaminathan.

Karthikeyan Murali, Aditya Mittal and R Vaishali will be the other members of Team Chess Gurukul.

Sarin will be part of Superkids team to be captained by Narayanan Srinath and also includes GMs Arjun Erigaisi, Raunak Sadhwani, Srinath and Divya Deshmukh.

Indian No. 6 S P Sethuraman will also be seen in action for Chess Pathshala which includes Swapnil Deshpande (captain), Sankalp Gupta, Krishnater Kushager and Mrudul Dehankar.

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Over 25 Grandmasters to take part in Indian chess league from May 15 - Times of India

Humpy Koneru v Mariya Muzychuk, India v Rest of the World, Nations Cup 2020. Indias world No2 Koneru could have reached the puzzle diagram, but missed Whites winning move. Can you do better?

Indias former world champion Vishy Anand stole the show at this weeks online Nations Cup as the 50-year-old veteran caught the world No 4, Ian Nepomniachtchi, with home prep and won in 17 moves as checkmate was imminent. The unsuspecting Russian blitzed out his replies until it was too late, and the entire fifth-round game was over in just five minutes.

Meanwhile, China remain the squad to beat in international team chess. Beijings elite players won both the open and womens gold medals at the 190-nation Olympiad in 2018 and they have taken a clear lead in the online Nations Cup with grandmaster and computer move-by-move commentaries.

The competition format, four-player teams including a womens board plus two alternates, strongly favours China, whose male players are the world title candidates Ding Liren and Wang Hao, the rising star Wei Yi, and the World Cup semi-finalist Yu Yangyi. Their womens board is shared by the world No 1, Hou Yifan, back in action after her academic year at Oxford, and the reigning world champion, Ju Wenjun.

After eight of the 10 rounds, which qualify two teams for Sundays final, China led with 15/16 ahead of United States 11/16, Europe 10/16, India and Russia 5/16, Rest of the World 2/16.

Europes team is led by Frances world No 5, Maxime Vachier-Lagrave, with Magnus Carlsen conspicuously absent. The tournament is being played on chess.com, the major rival to chess24.com which hosted last weeks Carlsen Invitational. Now chess24 is carrying the Nations Cup games, and providing an entertaining commentary by the world champion himself.

Why did he decline to play? I think for me it would have felt more important to play if I had been, lets say, American or Chinese or even Russian. Representing your country in such a tournament is huge, but representing Europe. I dont feel so strongly about Europe.

Chess.com has a different explanation, that Carlsen wanted a higher fee than other participants, but was turned down by Fides organisers.

Anands miniature, one of the fastest wins ever between elite players in major competition, will make the Nations Cup remembered. His trainer had found the idea recently, and a previous trainer had also done so many years earlier. It caught out the Stockfish computer on the chess24 website, which flashed an equal position right up to 15 f5!! when it suddenly changed to +6.

Blacks moves are natural, but after 13...Be6? (d4 or Nc6) Nepomniachtchi thought he was already lost. Near the end Black cannot escape by 16...Qb6 17 f6 Nd7 18 Qh6 Nxf6 19 Ng5 or by 16...Qd5 17 f6 Qe4 18 Rae1.

1 d4 Nf6 2 c4 g6 3 Nc3 d5 4 cxd5 Nxd5 5 Bd2 Bg7 6 e4 Nxc3 7 Bxc3 c5 8 d5 Bxc3+ 9 bxc3 Qd6 10 Qd2 0-0 11 f4 e6 12 Nf3 exd5 13 Bc4 Be6? 14 0-0 d4? 15 f5!! Bxc4 16 e5! Qd7 17 f6 1-0

Thank you for your feedback.

Players at all levels from club matches upwards now spend serious time preparing for the favourite lines of their opponents and hoping that one day they will hit the jackpot and bring off a homeworked victory, but few ever get the chance to do so in such spectacular style as Anand.

There was a bizarre sequel. For most of the match it seemed that Anands win would secure the match against Russia, until right at the end Indias No 2, Pentala Harikrishna, made a mouse slip in a drawn position and lost a piece and the game to Vladislav Artemiev.

The closing rounds of the Nations Cup can be viewed online on Friday and Saturday (2pm start) with the final at 3pm on Sunday.

3670: 1 d6! Qxd6 2 Qh8+ Ke7 3 Re1+ Kd7 (if Kf6 3 Rxe8 with a bishop up) 4 Bb5+ and wins.

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Chess: Vishy Anand ambushes Russia's world No 4 to win in five minutes - The Guardian

CHENNAI: Former world champion Viswanathan Anand on Thursday registered his first win in the ongoing FIDE-Chess.com Online Nations Cup, beating Russian Ian Nepomniachtchi in just 17 moves in a fifth round match that ended in a 2-2 draw.

In its second match of the day, India went down to USA 1.5-2.5 in the sixth round with B Adhiban's loss at the hands of Wesley So proving decisive.

Anand underlined his class by getting the better of Nepomniachtchi in just 17 moves to set the tone for India in the tie against Russia.

However, after Adhiban and D Harika drew their games against Sergey Karjakin and Olga Girya respectively, Vladislav Artemiev salvaged a draw for Russia with a superb win over P Harikrishna.

In other games in round five, China beat USA 2.5-1.5 while Europe defeated Rest of the World by a similar margin.

In the sixth round, China continued its domination by thrashing Rest of the World 3.5-0.5 to maintain its position at the top with 11 match points and 16.5 board points.

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Online Nations Chess: Anand wins but Russia hold India 2-2 - Times of India

5/8/2020 Many people are staying home now, more than ever. Baking bread has become a very popular activity in these times. Did you know that there is a cake recipe called the "chess pie"? Did you also know, that Robert Fischer has once received a cake, which looked like one of his played chess games? Chess can be such a sweet experience.

Master Class Vol.1: Bobby Fischer

No other World Champion was more infamous both inside and outside the chess world than Bobby Fischer. On this DVD, a team of experts shows you the winning techniques and strategies employed by the 11th World Champion.

Grandmaster Dorian Rogozenco delves into Fischers openings, and retraces the development of his repertoire. What variations did Fischer play, and what sources did he use to arm himself against the best Soviet players? Mihail Marin explains Fischers particular style and his special strategic talent in annotated games against Spassky, Taimanov and other greats. Karsten Mller is not just a leading international endgame expert, but also a true Fischer connoisseur.

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John Denver - Take Me Home, Country Roads

The chess pie is a southern pie from the United States of America, and that might be the only thingwe can say for sure about this piece of cake. Most of thesources on this pie lead to Martha Washington'sBooke of Cookery and Booke of Sweetmeats. The former first lady probably got this book out of England, where it was written in the 17th century, according to culinary historian Karen Loft Hess.

There are several funny and interesting theories of why the pie is called chess pie:

The most popular explanation is this one, taken fromSarah Belk [Simon and Schuster:New York] 1991 (p. 367-8) fromLynne Olver'sfoodtimeline.orgwebsite:

The cheese etymology seems the most likely one, because in old cookbooks, cheesecakes and pies that were sometimes made with cheese sometimes without (referring to cheese in the textural sense - lemon card, for example, is often referred to as lemon cheese), are often included in a single category. A selection of cheeseless "cheese" pastries inHousekeeping in Old Virginia(1879) are made with egg yolks, sugar, butter, milk, and lemon juice - very much like chess pie filling. Sometimes called "Cheesecake Pudding" (the filling is made of yolks, brown sugar, butter, nutmeg, and brandy or rum) is baked in a crust in small tins..."

Whatever the mystery about the chess cake origin is, it is no secret that it tastes delicious! Probably because it is mostly made of sugar...

A friend of mine gave me this recipe:

From Thelma's Treasures by Susanna Thomas

1 9" pie crust

recipe in the book

Filling:

Meringue Topping:

Furthermore, here is a YouTube video by Southern Living:

The amount of sugar at 0:40 makes me cry

Endgames of the World Champions from Fischer to Carlsen

Let endgame expert Dr Karsten Mller show and explain the finesses of the world champions. Although they had different styles each and every one of them played the endgame exceptionally well, so take the opportunity to enjoy and learn from some of the best endgames in the history of chess.

Bobby Fischer won the US Championship 1963/64 with 11/11 points! He was just 20 years old when this extraordinary result was accomplished. Never again could this 100% perfect score be reachedin the US Championship.

Game number ten against Pal Benko in particular is remarkable. So remarkable, that a chess cake with an actual position of the game was made for Fischer after the tournament.

Here is a tweet by Douglas Griffin with Bobby Fischer's chess cake.

Suren Aghabekyan tells us even more about the BobbyFischer chess cake story:

The US Championship table from the ChessBase Mega Database

All the games played in the US Championship 1963

And the special "cake" game

Excerpt from:

Chess pie and Fischer's cake - Chessbase News

We want to know your opinion! Which is the best game in history?

We are pleased to announce Chess.com's "Best Chess Game" tournament. We've identified 16 of the greatest and most acclaimed games ever and seeded them into our tournament bracket.

Every other day, we'll post a new battle on our social media pages, and YOU have to vote for the game that you think is best. We'll tally the votes and update our bracket here. Stay tuned to see the entire tournament progress!

Easy!We're going to post, every two days, a battle on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram at 9 a.m. Pacific Time / 18:00 Central European Time. If you want to vote, just follow the instructions in the battle and cast a vote with a like, retweet, or share. Votes will be tallied when the next battle is posted, and the winning game will advance to the next round in the tournament.

Easy, right?

Round of 16:

Quarterfinals:

Semifinals

Final:

Here is the games list with all the masterpieces (with a link to our analysis board) to decide the BEST game.

If you have any questions or doubts, please, post comments here.

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The Best Chess Game Of All Time Tournament - Chess.com