Had To Share: Great Post from leo of ZenHabits:Steps Towards a More Sustainable Life of Less | Zen Habits

This is great post from leo of zen habits, I agree with alot of his suggestions!, read the whole thing:

And while the last 70-80 years have advanced our lives in amazing ways, and there’s no doubt that the comfort and convenience of our lives have improved tremendously … we rarely stop to consider whether technology and consumerism have always changed our lives for the better.
I mean, I am as big a proponent of the miracles of the Internet as anyone, but have we given up too much of our lives that used to exist offline and outdoors? It’s great that we have such comfortable cars that can drive incredibly fast and take us anywhere we want to go in minutes … but have we thrown away the joy and the health benefits of walking places?
It’s great that we can communicate instantly from anywhere with our mobile devices, but have we given up personal face-to-face conversations and the pleasure of being outdoors, disconnected from the world?
It’s great that food is so convenient these days, but have we given up the pleasures of slow eating for fast food, the joys of cooking for microwaving, the wonders of real food for processed food?
It’s great that we can buy pretty much anything we want these days (and often do), but have we allowed the abundance of cash we’ve had (until recently, but even now we’re still pretty rich) to force us to have bigger houses just to store all our stuff?
Steps Towards a More Sustainable Life of Less | Zen Habits.

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Better Press Corp:Reuters and Inquirer Edition:Business – World economy to shrink below zero – INQUIRER.net

Reuters Group Limited
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I’ve got a beef with this title! World Economy to shrink below zero is obviously eye catching. You have a feeling that it is about growth but you have to read the second paragraph to be sure. This is shoddy writing!

World economy to shrink below zero
Reuters First Posted 15:12:00 03/10/2009
Filed Under: Unemployment, Economy and Business and Finance, World Financial Crisis
DAR ES SALAAM, Tanzania – (UPDATE) The world economy is likely to shrink to “below zero” this year, in what many are now referring to as the “Great Recession,” the head of the International Monetary Fund said Tuesday.
Business – World economy to shrink below zero – INQUIRER.net.

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rePost: 5 Years Late :BPO sector: English skills no longer enough – INQUIRER.net, Philippine News for Filipinos

Location of the Philippines
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It’s nice to know that the our leaders are finally thinking of the stuff I’ve been hearing form Indian Business leaders probably 5 years ago. Hope we could catch up.

“Labor arbitrage erodes over time. What we need are people who can contribute to the bottom line. Success comes from a combination of labor arbitrage and cost efficiency. These would make for a successful long-term play,” he added.
He said critical thinking was an important trait for BPO workers to imbibe, as this provided added value to what they could do. Beyond answering calls and doing basic voice functions, critical thinking could be applied to other aspects of the BPO chain.
BPO sector: English skills no longer enough – INQUIRER.net, Philippine News for Filipinos.

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rePost:Finding Happiness:Stumbling and Mumbling: Money, reputation and happiness

Heather Marks modeling for Miss Sixty, Fall 20...
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I suspect there might not be. One reason why I think I’m happier now than when I was younger (despite the U-shape in happiness over the life cycle) is precisely that I’ve stopped giving a damn what anyone thinks about me. If you care about your reputation, you end up worrying about things you can’t easily control. You become like Heather Mills, ranting hysterically about the press.
This is pretty much the exact opposite of Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi’s recipe for happiness – flow. He says we maximize happiness when we lose ourselves in an activity – playing music or sport say – when we are in control, and yet oblivious to our own ego.
Stumbling and Mumbling: Money, reputation and happiness.

Happiness is that thing that I yearn for and actually try to find. I haven’t but all good things take time. What am I trying to do to find happiness? Here are some:
-Trying out new thing. This includes hobbies etc. I am trying to skew towards activities that do.
-Connecting with people. Trying to interact with people and increase my circle of friends. This also include improving connections with my friends now.
-Connecting with your family. We tend to take our parent and siblings for granted. I try to smooth things over and try to maximize my time spent with my parents.
-Self Improvement. A most overused word but its overused for a reason you are never perfect. What you can be is a person that is totally comfortable with yourself! The best way (for me) to be comfortable with yourself is to face the harsh realities of life and your rough edges head on. This means being honest to yourself with the things taht are painful for you, the things that irk you, things that give you joy, the activities that gives you a lasting joy. The good thing about being honest to yourself is that when you do it often enough it becomes a habit thatbrings you closer

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rePost:Vesess » The Second Age of SMEs

elissa-179-1
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Explains why the authors think that the present financial crisis is the start of the Second Age of SME’s. Excellent read.

Think small. Think efficient. Share the returns.

The point we’re trying to make, however, is that in an economic climate like this, only a SME could afford to offer such discounts, and that it is precisely this ability that will enable such businesses to flourish despite the problems we face. For the first time in years, small businesses have the ability to truly shine, and we’d love to hear how some of our fellow players are using small and efficient business practices to attract customers and grow, despite everything going on around them.
Vesess » The Second Age of SMEs.

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-rePost-Paul Kedrosky's Infectious Greed: Y2K, the Credit Crisis, and the Rosencrantz Fallacy

Scarlett Johansson sketch
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I think one big thing that is different here is that in most of those systems the snowball effect is less than in the financial system. But I have to say that I feel for the sentiment and hope that the small individual actions of each company/individual/Government end up to be enough to fix things!

But then it didn’t happen. January 1st 2000 went by, and pretty much nothing happened. While some people then pronounced that the whole Y2K thing had been a fraud, the truth was much more interesting and important. It hadn’t been a fraud; there had been real and consequential risks in important and complex systems. If those problems hadn’t have been addressed, many of the consequences imagined by the apocalypticists might well have happened. We could, in the limit, have been facing real breakdowns in societal fabric.
So, why didn’t the worst happen? In part what happened is this: People acted. While they were late, slow, stupid, and error-prone, they did what people do when a big enough alarm bell is rung loudly and long enough: They tried to figure out what they could do in the time they had to reduce their risk, and they did those things. They didn’t think other people would get there, but they knew they would.
Paul Kedrosky’s Infectious Greed.

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Supply, Demand, and English Food

from Paul Krugman. His musings on bad English food.

So what does all this have to do with economics? Well, the whole
point of a market system is supposed to be that it serves consumers,
providing us with what we want and thereby maximizing our collective
welfare. But the history of English food suggests that even on so
basic a matter as eating, a free-market economy can get trapped for
an extended period in a bad equilibrium in which good things are not
demanded because they have never been supplied, and are not supplied
because not enough people demand them.
Supply, Demand, and English Food.

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Easy Way To Find Things To Do Great Work On (Advice from Paul Krugman)!

PRINCETON, NJ - OCTOBER 13:  Princeton Profess...
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I was, of course, only saying something that critics of conventional theory had been saying for decades. Yet my point was not part of the mainstream of international economics. Why? Because it had never been expressed in nice models. The new monopolistic competition models gave me a tool to open cleanly what had previously been regarded as a can of worms. More important, however, I suddenly realized the remarkable extent to which the methodology of economics creates blind spots. We just don’t see what we can’t formalize. And the biggest blind spot of all has involved increasing returns. So there, right at hand, was my mission: to look at things from a slightly different angle, and in so doing to reveal the obvious, things that had been right under our noses all the time.

From How I Work–Paul Krugman

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Forgive Me For Pettiness: Market turmoil caught us off guard: Manulife

Manulife Financial Corporation
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There is nothing wrong with highlighted (by me) text, just felt that when a century is 8 years++ old its like stating a milestone that really isn’t.

Executives at Manulife Financial Corporation (MFC/TSX) said they would use the funding from the country’s six largest lenders to help the insurer withstand one of the worst financial crises of the century.
Market turmoil caught us off guard: Manulife.

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The song I've been listening to most for the past 3 months!

John Mayer performing at the Crossroads Guitar...
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from here:
Title: In Repair
Album: Continuum
Artist: John Mayer
John Mayer Too many shadows in my room
Too many hours in this midnight
Too many corners in my mind
So much to do to set my heart right
Oh it’s taking so long i could be wrong, i could be ready
Oh but if i take my heart’s advice
I should assume it’s still unsteady
I am in repair, i am in repair

Stood on the corner for a while
To wait for the wind to blow down on me
Hoping it takes with it my old ways
And brings some brand new look upon me
Oh it’s taking so long i could be wrong, i could be ready
Oh but if i take my heart’s advice
I should assume it’s still unsteady
I am in repair, i am in repair

And now i’m walking in a park
All of the birds they dance below me
Maybe when things turn green again
It will be good to say you know me

Oh it’s taking so long i could be wrong, i could be ready
Oh but if i take my heart’s advice
I should assume it’s still unready
Oh i’m never really ready, i’m never really ready
I’m in repair, i’m not together but i’m getting there
I’m in repair, i’m not together but i’m getting there

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