Simon Sinek

Simon Sinek

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The Heart of Innovation: 50 Awesome Quotes on Vision

November 18, 2010
50 Awesome Quotes on Vision

1. "If you can dream it, you can do it." - Walt Disney

2. "Whatever you can do or dream you can, begin it. Boldness has genius, and magic and power in it. Begin it now." - Goethe

3. "The greatest danger for most of us is not that our aim is too high and we miss it, but that it is too low and we reach it." - Michelangelo

4. "It's not enough to be busy, so are the ants. The question is, what are we busy about?" - Henry David Thoreau

5. "You don't lead by pointing and telling people some place to go. You lead by going to that place and making a case." - Ken Kesey

6. "Your vision will become clear only when you look into your heart. Who looks outside, dreams. Who looks inside awakens." - Carl Jung

7. "The empires of the future are empires of the mind." - Winston Churchill

8. "If you want to build a ship, don't herd people together to collect wood and don't assign them tasks and work, but rather teach them to long for the endless immensity of the sea." - Antoine de Saint-Exupery

9. "Vision is the art of seeing things invisible." - Jonathan Swift

10. "Management has a lot to do with answers. Leadership is a function of questions. And the first question for a leader always is: 'Who do we intend to be?' Not 'What are we going to do?' but 'Who do we intend to be?' - Max DePree

11. "Vision without action is a daydream. Action with without vision is a nightmare." - Japanese Proverb

12. "The best way to predict the future is to create it." - Alan Kay

13."Where there is no vision the people perish." - Proverbs 29:18

14. "Vision without execution is hallucination." - Thomas Edison

15. "Leadership is the capacity to translate vision into reality." - Warren Bennis

16. "If you limit your choices only to what seems possible or reasonable, you disconnect yourself from what you truly want, and all that is left is a compromise." - Robert Fritz

17. "Create your future from your future, not your past." - Werner Erhard

18. "To the person who does not know where he wants to go there is no favorable wind." - Seneca

19. "You've got to think about big things while you're doing small things, so that all the small things go in the right direction." - Alvin Toffler

20. "To accomplish great things we must dream as well as act.: - Anatole France

21. "A possibility is a hint from God. One must follow it." - Soren Kierkegaard

22. "A leader's role is to raise people's aspirations for what they can become and to release their energies so they will try to get there." - David Gergen

23. "The very essence of leadership is that you have a vision. It's got to be a vision you articulate clearly and forcefully on every occasion. You can't blow an uncertain trumpet." - Theodore Hesburgh

24. "Determine that the thing can and shall be done and then we shall find the way." - Abraham Lincoln

25. "Dreams are extremely important. You can't do it unless you can imagine it." -George Lucas

26. "Cherish your visions and your dreams as they are the children of your soul, the blueprints of your ultimate achievements." - Napoleon Hill

27. "Pain pushes until vision pulls." - Michael Beckwith 

28. "Vision animates, inspires, transforms purpose into action." - Warren Bennis

29. "The master of the art of living makes little distinction between his work and his play, his labor and his leisure, his mind and his body, his education and his recreation, his love and his religion. He hardly knows which is which; he simply pursues his vision of excellence in whatever he does, leaving others to decide whether he is working or playing. To him he is always doing both."  - Buddha

30. "Rowing harder doesn't help if the boat is headed in the wrong direction." - Kenichi Ohmae

31. "It's not what the vision is, it's what the vision does." - Peter Senge

32. "In the business world, the rearview mirror is always clearer than the windshield." - Warren Buffett

33. "A leader will find it difficult to articulate a coherent vision unless it expresses his core values, his basic identity. One must first embark on the formidable journey of self-discovery in order to create a vision with authentic soul."  - Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

34. "The best vision is insight." - Malcolm Forbes

35. "You have to know what you want. And if it seems to take you off the track, don't hold back, because perhaps that is instinctively where you want to be. And if you hold back and try to be always where you have been before, you will go dry." - Gertrude Stein

36. "The gift of fantasy has meant more to me than my talent for absorbing positive knowledge." - Albert Einstein

37. "I try to learn from the past, but I plan for the future by focusing exclusively on the present. That's were the fun is." - Donald Trump

38. "Every man takes the limits of his own field of vision for the limits of the world." - Arthur Schopenhauer

39. "People only see what they are prepared to see." - Ralph Waldo Emerson

40. "The most pathetic person in the world is someone who has sight, but has no vision." - Helen Keller

41. "Good business leaders create a vision, articulate the vision, passionately own the vision, and relentlessly drive it to completion." - Jack Welsh

42. "A vision is not just a picture of what could be; it is an appeal to our better selves, a call to become something more." - Rosabeth Moss Kanter

43. "If I have seen farther than others, it is because I was standing on the shoulders of giants." - Isaac Newton

44. "The future belongs to those who see possibilities before they become obvious." - John Scully

45. "If one advances confidently in the direction of his dreams, and endeavors to live the life which he has imagined, he will meet with success unexpected in common hours." - Henry David Thoreau

46. "Keep your eyes on the stars and your feet on the ground." - Franklin D. Roosevelt

47. "Looking up gives light, although at first it makes you dizzy." - Rumi

48. "You cannot depend on your eyes when your imagination is out of focus." - Mark Twain

49. "In order to be a realist, you must believe in miracles." - - David Ben-Gurion

50. "The real voyage of discovery consists of not in seeking new landscapes but in having new eyes." - Marcel Proust

Big thanks to Val Vadeboncoeur for locating most of these quotes.

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Posted by Mitch Ditkoff at November 18, 2010 02:34 PM

Quote I've always liked in this regard is...
"One day Alice came to a fork in the road and saw a Cheshire cat in a tree. "Which road do I take?" she asked. "Where do you want to go?" was his response. "I don't know," Alice answered. "Then," said the cat, "it doesn't matter." 
- Lewis Carroll 

Posted by: Alan Kerr at November 18, 2010 06:30 AM

I like what Senge says about vision: "Visions are exhilarating. They create the spark, the excitement that lifts an organization out of the mundane."
Dr. Lynn K. Jones, Certified Personal and Executive Coach
www.lynnkjones.com

Posted by: Lkjonesdsw at November 18, 2010 01:36 PM

29. "The master of the art of living makes little distinction between his work and his play, his labor and his leisure, his mind and his body, his education and his recreation, his love and his religion. He hardly knows which is which; he simply pursues his vision of excellence in whatever he does, leaving others to decide whether he is working or playing. To him he is always doing both." - Buddha

For sure!

Posted by: Joyce at November 20, 2010 04:33 AM

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What Are The Benefits Of Warm Water?

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If you kickstart your day by drinking a glass of pure warm water, fat deposits and toxins circulating in the blood are eliminated from the body. It can help you assist with nasal/throat congestion, ease constipation (add lemon and honey to it!), boost digestion. It is an easy tactics to crank up your metabolism to aid weight loss goals and reduce cholesterol quickly.

Water is truly the elixir of life! Up to sixty percent of your body is water, playing a role in everything from digestion, absorption of nutrients and even excretion. It also helps to maintain a normal body temperature and is critical in eliminating waste material from the body.¹ And warm water, research shows, can take these benefits up several notches. But is it worth giving up your cold water and switching to warm water instead?

Bid Mucus Accumulation Goodbye

A warm beverage can decrease the accumulation of mucus in your nose, throat and gastrointestinal tract, lowering the chance that viruses or bacteria will grow there. This was established in a study on the effect of hot water, cold water, and chicken soup consumption. Sipping on hot water helped improve nasal mucus velocity up to 8.4 mm per min, compared to its earlier 6.2 mm per min, indicating the utility of drinking hot water in keeping mucus moving.²

Boost Digestion

Warm water can have a mild vasodilatory effect, that is, it causes blood vessels to dilate and lowers blood pressure, which in turn improves digestion. Because the temperature of your stomach is generally high, when you drink a warm beverage along with your food, it helps to break it down more easily.³

In addition, warm water can ease swallowing for some people. A study has found sipping hot water helped people with esophageal motility disorders. The condition causes you to regurgitate food and makes it difficult to swallow. Cold water doesn’t help the swallowing, but drinking hot water does.⁴

Improve Metabolism

Drinking warm water can increase body temperature, which inches your metabolic rate up. It also helps your kidneys and your gastrointestinal tract do their job better. And that’s good news for anyone hoping to crank up their metabolism or lose weight.⁵

Drink Warm Water For The Pleasure Of It

Warm water doesn’t just feel good to a sore throat or on a wintry day. As it turns out, it can actually make you feel pleasurable sensations anytime! When you drink hot water, receptors in your mouth and throat, and intestines and stomach, stimulate the pleasure center in the brain. Most of us naturally crave the comfort of a warm beverage in the morning. Did you know that just holding a warm beverage in your hands can make you a friendlier person? The theory is that our brain processes warmth in the same area that processes our judgments about other people. So holding a warm drink can make you think that other people are “warmer.”⁶

Relieve Constipation

Homeopathy recommends drinking warm water for anyone who has a constipation problem. It also advocates adding honey or lemon to warm water to ease constipation. The British Homeopathic Association suggests having a glass of warm water as soon as you wake up before you have breakfast.⁷

Cleanse And Purify Your Blood

Ayurveda, the Indian system of holistic medicine, advises you to start the day with a drink of warm water that has been kept in a copper vessel overnight. This is supposed to help purify the blood and eliminate waste. Copper has a cooling effect on the liver and anti-aging properties.⁸

It also advocates sipping hot water throughout the day. Doing this helps the body stay hydrated and flushes out waste. It is thought that heating the water speeds up all the processes involved.⁹

Fight Obesity And Cholesterol Problems

A glass of hot water with a teaspoon of lime juice and a teaspoon of honey mixed in, taken in the morning, is considered useful for obesity and cholesterol.¹⁰

Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) also advocates drinking warm water to improve digestion and keep the bowels healthy. According to TCM, warm water can also help break down fats in your food and keep you slim. To consume it the traditional way, keep a flask of hot water at hand through the day, pouring it over tea leaves and drinking between meals whenever hunger strikes. Do not drink it right after a meal, keeping a bit of a gap for best effects.¹¹

View Article References (+)

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1.	↑	Phyllis A. Balch. Prescription for Nutritional Healing. Penguin.
2.	↑	Saketkhoo, Kiumars, Adolph Januszkiewicz, and Marvin A. Sackner. “Effects of drinking hot water, cold water, and chicken soup on nasal mucus velocity and nasal airflow resistance.” CHEST Journal 74, no. 4 (1978): 408-410.
3, 5.	↑	Patel,Suchita,Jinal Patel, Mona Patel, and Prof. Dr. Dhrubo Jyoti Sen.“Say yes to warm to remove harm.”EUROPEAN JOURNAL OF PHARMACEUTICAL AND MEDICAL RESEARCH 015,2(4):444-460.
4.	↑	Triadafilopoulos, George, H. Peter Tsang, and George M. Segall. “Hot water swallows improve symptoms and accelerate esophageal clearance in esophageal motility disorders.” Journal of clinical gastroenterology 26, no. 4 (1998): 239-244.
6.	↑	Williams, Lawrence E., and John A. Bargh. “Experiencing physical warmth promotes interpersonal warmth.” Science 322, no. 5901 (2008): 606-607.
7.	↑	Top tips for aiding digestion, British Homeopathic Association.
8.	↑	Gowans, Shanti. Ayurveda for health & Well-Being. Jaico Publishing House, 2004.
9.	↑	Selby, Anna. Complete Ayurveda Workbook: A practical approach to achieving health and wellbeing with Ayurveda.Pavilion Books, 2012.
10.	↑	Lad, Usha, and Vasant Lad. Ayurvedic Cooking for Self Healing. Motilal Banarsidass Publishers, 2005.
11.	↑	Water consumption and health. Is 8 fluid ounces, 8 times a day the best advice? Institute for Traditional Medicine.

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The End of Identity Liberalism

November 18, 2016

Opinion

It is a truism that America has become a more diverse country. It is also a beautiful thing to watch. Visitors from other countries, particularly those having trouble incorporating different ethnic groups and faiths, are amazed that we manage to pull it off. Not perfectly, of course, but certainly better than any European or Asian nation today. It’s an extraordinary success story.

But how should this diversity shape our politics? The standard liberal answer for nearly a generation now has been that we should become aware of and “celebrate” our differences. Which is a splendid principle of moral pedagogy — but disastrous as a foundation for democratic politics in our ideological age. In recent years American liberalism has slipped into a kind of moral panic about racial, gender and sexual identity that has distorted liberalism’s message and prevented it from becoming a unifying force capable of governing.

One of the many lessons of the recent presidential election campaign and its repugnant outcome is that the age of identity liberalism must be brought to an end. Hillary Clinton was at her best and most uplifting when she spoke about American interests in world affairs and how they relate to our understanding of democracy. But when it came to life at home, she tended on the campaign trail to lose that large vision and slip into the rhetoric of diversity, calling out explicitly to African-American, Latino, L.G.B.T. and women voters at every stop. This was a strategic mistake. If you are going to mention groups in America, you had better mention all of them. If you don’t, those left out will notice and feel excluded. Which, as the data show, was exactly what happened with the white working class and those with strong religious convictions. Fully two-thirds of white voters without college degrees voted for Donald Trump, as did over 80 percent of white evangelicals.

The moral energy surrounding identity has, of course, had many good effects. Affirmative action has reshaped and improved corporate life. Black Lives Matter has delivered a wake-up call to every American with a conscience. Hollywood’s efforts to normalize homosexuality in our popular culture helped to normalize it in American families and public life.

But the fixation on diversity in our schools and in the press has produced a generation of liberals and progressives narcissistically unaware of conditions outside their self-defined groups, and indifferent to the task of reaching out to Americans in every walk of life. At a very young age our children are being encouraged to talk about their individual identities, even before they have them. By the time they reach college many assume that diversity discourse exhausts political discourse, and have shockingly little to say about such perennial questions as class, war, the economy and the common good. In large part this is because of high school history curriculums, which anachronistically project the identity politics of today back onto the past, creating a distorted picture of the major forces and individuals that shaped our country. (The achievements of women’s rights movements, for instance, were real and important, but you cannot understand them if you do not first understand the founding fathers’ achievement in establishing a system of government based on the guarantee of rights.)

When young people arrive at college they are encouraged to keep this focus on themselves by student groups, faculty members and also administrators whose full-time job is to deal with — and heighten the significance of — “diversity issues.” Fox News and other conservative media outlets make great sport of mocking the “campus craziness” that surrounds such issues, and more often than not they are right to. Which only plays into the hands of populist demagogues who want to delegitimize learning in the eyes of those who have never set foot on a campus. How to explain to the average voter the supposed moral urgency of giving college students the right to choose the designated gender pronouns to be used when addressing them? How not to laugh along with those voters at the story of a University of Michigan prankster who wrote in “His Majesty”?

This campus-diversity consciousness has over the years filtered into the liberal media, and not subtly. Affirmative action for women and minorities at America’s newspapers and broadcasters has been an extraordinary social achievement — and has even changed, quite literally, the face of right-wing media, as journalists like Megyn Kelly and Laura Ingraham have gained prominence. But it also appears to have encouraged the assumption, especially among younger journalists and editors, that simply by focusing on identity they have done their jobs.

Recently I performed a little experiment during a sabbatical in France: For a full year I read only European publications, not American ones. My thought was to try seeing the world as European readers did. But it was far more instructive to return home and realize how the lens of identity has transformed American reporting in recent years. How often, for example, the laziest story in American journalism — about the “first X to do Y” — is told and retold. Fascination with the identity drama has even affected foreign reporting, which is in distressingly short supply. However interesting it may be to read, say, about the fate of transgender people in Egypt, it contributes nothing to educating Americans about the powerful political and religious currents that will determine Egypt’s future, and indirectly, our own. No major news outlet in Europe would think of adopting such a focus.

But it is at the level of electoral politics that identity liberalism has failed most spectacularly, as we have just seen. National politics in healthy periods is not about “difference,” it is about commonality. And it will be dominated by whoever best captures Americans’ imaginations about our shared destiny. Ronald Reagan did that very skillfully, whatever one may think of his vision. So did Bill Clinton, who took a page from Reagan’s playbook. He seized the Democratic Party away from its identity-conscious wing, concentrated his energies on domestic programs that would benefit everyone (like national health insurance) and defined America’s role in the post-1989 world. By remaining in office for two terms, he was then able to accomplish much for different groups in the Democratic coalition. Identity politics, by contrast, is largely expressive, not persuasive. Which is why it never wins elections — but can lose them.

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The media’s newfound, almost anthropological, interest in the angry white male reveals as much about the state of our liberalism as it does about this much maligned, and previously ignored, figure. A convenient liberal interpretation of the recent presidential election would have it that Mr. Trump won in large part because he managed to transform economic disadvantage into racial rage — the “whitelash” thesis. This is convenient because it sanctions a conviction of moral superiority and allows liberals to ignore what those voters said were their overriding concerns. It also encourages the fantasy that the Republican right is doomed to demographic extinction in the long run — which means liberals have only to wait for the country to fall into their laps. The surprisingly high percentage of the Latino vote that went to Mr. Trump should remind us that the longer ethnic groups are here in this country, the more politically diverse they become.

Finally, the whitelash thesis is convenient because it absolves liberals of not recognizing how their own obsession with diversity has encouraged white, rural, religious Americans to think of themselves as a disadvantaged group whose identity is being threatened or ignored. Such people are not actually reacting against the reality of our diverse America (they tend, after all, to live in homogeneous areas of the country). But they are reacting against the omnipresent rhetoric of identity, which is what they mean by “political correctness.” Liberals should bear in mind that the first identity movement in American politics was the Ku Klux Klan, which still exists. Those who play the identity game should be prepared to lose it.

We need a post-identity liberalism, and it should draw from the past successes of pre-identity liberalism. Such a liberalism would concentrate on widening its base by appealing to Americans as Americans and emphasizing the issues that affect a vast majority of them. It would speak to the nation as a nation of citizens who are in this together and must help one another. As for narrower issues that are highly charged symbolically and can drive potential allies away, especially those touching on sexuality and religion, such a liberalism would work quietly, sensitively and with a proper sense of scale. (To paraphrase Bernie Sanders, America is sick and tired of hearing about liberals’ damn bathrooms.)

Teachers committed to such a liberalism would refocus attention on their main political responsibility in a democracy: to form committed citizens aware of their system of government and the major forces and events in our history. A post-identity liberalism would also emphasize that democracy is not only about rights; it also confers duties on its citizens, such as the duties to keep informed and vote. A post-identity liberal press would begin educating itself about parts of the country that have been ignored, and about what matters there, especially religion. And it would take seriously its responsibility to educate Americans about the major forces shaping world politics, especially their historical dimension.

Some years ago I was invited to a union convention in Florida to speak on a panel about Franklin D. Roosevelt’s famous Four Freedoms speech of 1941. The hall was full of representatives from local chapters — men, women, blacks, whites, Latinos. We began by singing the national anthem, and then sat down to listen to a recording of Roosevelt’s speech. As I looked out into the crowd, and saw the array of different faces, I was struck by how focused they were on what they shared. And listening to Roosevelt’s stirring voice as he invoked the freedom of speech, the freedom of worship, the freedom from want and the freedom from fear — freedoms that Roosevelt demanded for “everyone in the world” — I was reminded of what the real foundations of modern American liberalism are.

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Two Problems That Can Sink Any Leader

Tuesday, November 1, 2016

I remember my days as a young leader.  Some days, it seemed like I was on top of the world. Other days, I wanted to beat my head against the wall in my office!  More often than not, my problems stemmed from people. But what I learned one day in 1989 would rock my leadership world and save my head from being used as a hammer!

You see, prior to 1989 I was steering the “ship” of my business, but I had run aground on an “iceberg”.  And that iceberg was the cause of many of my frustrations and limited my effectiveness as a leader. This iceberg that threatened my leadership, and my business, was the Iceberg of Ignorance.

What is the Iceberg of Ignorance?

This principle is powerfully illustrated by the acclaimed study by consultant Sidney Yoshida. As shown below, the study concluded: “Only 4% of an organization’s front line problems are known by top management, 9% are known by middle management, 74% are known by supervisors, and 100% are known by front line employees.”

In October of 1989, I attended a three-day workshop called TRAC 5000 led by Jim Lundy.  During that workshop I learned that I was standing on the Iceberg of Ignorance, unaware of most of the problems lurking beneath the surface in my organization. 

Based on the statistics revealed in Yashido’s work, it’s likely that you too, have “cold feet” standing on top of your own similar iceberg. Take heart, fellow leader, what I’m about to share with you is the first step toward developing a leadership approach that effectively melts the Iceberg of Ignorance.

Every leader can be most effective by avoiding two common problems.

The First Problem

The first problem is that most leaders “don’t know what they don’t know.”

And they think they know all of the problems, challenges, and opportunities of their organization.

This thinking is the strongest among founders or leaders who have been in the organization for many years and are bright and knowledgeable.

Also, they tend to think that their problems and frustrations (a symptom) stem from their employees.

That is, until these leaders finally look into the mirror and recognize, that they are the problem (the root cause).

“Everything rises and falls on leadership.” 

– John Maxwell

I have found that most leaders don’t ask their employees to offer input for ideas to address the problems, challenges, and opportunities they are experiencing on the front line.

However, part of these leaders’ current frustrations comes from unawareness of the real underlying problems in their organization.

Regardless of whether their business is just treading water or enjoying smooth sailing, little do they know that they just may be steering their “ship” right toward an iceberg.

Like that fateful night with the Titanic, their lack of knowledge could wind up sinking their business.

The Second Problem

The second problem that I have found is that some leaders think that they do include their people as they make decisions but, in reality, don’t truly involve their people in a meaningful way.

These leaders ask (on a limited basis) their employees to offer input for ideas to the problems, challenges, and opportunities they are experiencing on the front line.

They might engage their people in conversation when they cross paths in the office and other work areas.

They might even call folks, one at a time, into their office to solicit opinions and advice.

These leaders are, in fact, learning about some of the underlying problems in their organization as they go about talking to various individuals in the workplace.

But they are missing the significant improvements that result from group discussion and brainstorming around the challenges and opportunities that exist and lie ahead.

Why are these findings important? 

Because if the problems, challenges, and opportunities remain unknown to the leadership, this ignorance will impede the execution or diminish the results of even the best-laid plans.

The bad news is that most leaders don’t notice these fundamental problems with their current leadership approach; they think that their own skills and expertise are good enough to navigate the waters of business.

The good news is that there is a lifeline of valuable information and insights right under the nose of most leaders—in their front-line employees. Changing the way you lead takes some intentional decisions on your part. Be assured that I will be here, to show you what worked for me and explain how it can work for you!

Is your leadership jeopardized by the Iceberg of Ignorance?  What about the second problem? You can share your comments <here>. Please share this blog post with a co-worker and a friend. 

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Young men giving up on marriage: ‘Women aren’t women anymore’

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Young men giving up on marriage: ‘Women aren’t women anymore’

While more young women say that having a successful marriage is important, fewer men share that goal. 

Fewer young men in the US want to get married than ever, while the desire for marriage is rising among young women, according to the Pew Research Center.

Pew recently found that the number of women 18-34 saying that having a successful marriage is one of the most important things rose from 28 percent to 37 percent since 1997. The number of young adult men saying the same thing dropped from 35 percent to 29 percent in the same time.

Pew’s findings have caught the attention of one US writer who maintains that feminism, deeply entrenched in every segment of the culture, has created an environment in which young men find it more beneficial to simply opt out of couple-dom entirely.

Suzanne Venker’s article, “The War on Men,” which appeared on the website of Fox News in late November, has become a lodestone for feminist writers who have attacked her position that the institution of marriage is threatened, not enhanced, by the supposed gains of the feminist movement over the last 50 years.

“Where have all the good (meaning marriageable) men gone?” is a question much talked about lately in the secular media, Venker says, but her answer, backed up by statistics, is not to the liking of mainstream commentators influenced by feminism.

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She points out that for the first time in US history, the number of women in the workforce has surpassed the number of men, while more women than men are acquiring university degrees.

“The problem? This new phenomenon has changed the dance between men and women,” Venker wrote. With feminism pushing them out of their traditional role of breadwinner, protector and provider – and divorce laws increasingly creating a dangerously precarious financial prospect for the men cut loose from marriage – men are simply no longer finding any benefit in it.

As a writer and researcher into the trends of marriage and relationships, Venker said, she has “accidentally stumbled upon a subculture” of men who say “in no uncertain terms, that they’re never getting married.”

“When I ask them why, the answer is always the same: women aren’t women anymore.” Feminism, which teaches women to think of men as the enemy, has made women “angry” and “defensive, though often unknowingly.” 

“Now the men have nowhere to go. It is precisely this dynamic – women good/men bad – that has destroyed the relationship between the sexes. Yet somehow, men are still to blame when love goes awry.”

“Men are tired,” Venker wrote. “Tired of being told there’s something fundamentally wrong with them. Tired of being told that if women aren’t happy, it’s men’s fault.”

Click “like” if you want to defend true marriage.

Feminism and the sexual revolution have simply made marriage “obsolete” for women as a social and economic refuge, but this is a situation that should not be celebrated by feminists, Venker says.

“It’s the women who lose. Not only are they saddled with the consequences of sex, by dismissing male nature they’re forever seeking a balanced life. The fact is, women need men’s linear career goals – they need men to pick up the slack at the office – in order to live the balanced life they seek.”

A cross section of research data from the Pew Research Center for the last months of 2012 shows the alarming trends for marriage and child-bearing in the US. One report published in mid-December said that the latest census data showed “barely half” of all adults in the United States are currently married, a “record low”. Since 1960, the number of married adults has decreased from 72 percent to 51 today and the number of new marriages in the U.S. declined by five percent between 2009 and 2010.

Moreover, the median age at first marriage continues to rise with women getting married the first time at 26.5 years and men at 28.7. The declines in marriage are “most dramatic” among young adults. Just 20 percent of those aged 18 to 29 are married, compared with 59 percent in 1960.

“If current trends continue, the share of adults who are currently married will drop to below half within a few years,” the report said.

Moreover, the link between marriage and childrearing has become disconnected in the minds of the so-called Millennial generation, those between 18 and 29. While 52 percent of Millennials say being a good parent is “one of the most important things” in life, just 30 per cent say the same about having a successful marriage, an attitudinal survey found.

The gap, of 22 percentage points, between the value Millennials place on parenthood over marriage, was just 7 points in 1997. The research found that Millennials, many of whom are the children of divorce and single-parenthood themselves, are also less likely than their elders to say that a child needs both a father and mother at home, that single parenthood and unmarried couple parenthood are bad for society.

OPINION: Why young Christians can’t grasp our arguments against gay ‘marriage’

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5 Plants For Your Bedroom To Help You Sleep Better!

CureJoy Editorial

Are you unable to sleep well? Let’s try and change the air of your bedroom. These five plants would help you get a peaceful sleep tonight:

1. Aloe Vera

An indoor plant which is easy to keep alive, aloe vera has shown to emit oxygen at night, and may help you combat insomnia and improve your overall quality of sleep. It has been listed by NASA as one of the best indoor plants to improve air. It reproduces easily, doesn’t need much direct sunlight, and does not need much watering.

Read More: Aloe Vera – The Wonder Plant: Its Uses, Benefits And Side-Effects

2. Lavender Plant

It is one of the well-known plants when it comes to inducing sleep and reducing anxiety. Lavender smell slows down your heart rate and reduces anxiety levels.

In a study, it revealed that the smell of lavender increases light sleep, and decreases rapid-eye movement (REM) sleep, and amount of time to wake after falling sleep. It has also shown to reduce crying in babies.

Read More: 18 Amazing Healing Powers of Fragrant Lavender Oil

3. Jasmine Plant

Jasmine smell has been been shown to improve the quality of your sleep, and increases your alertness and productivity. This plant may also help to reduce anxiety. It’s smell has a soothing affect on your body and mind, and it has shown to reduce anxiety levels, leading to a great quality of sleep.

4. English Ivy Plant

This one is another favorite of NASA. English ivy is easy to grow and is the best air-purifier of all. It may be beneficial for those who have breathing problems and asthma. Studies show that English ivy can reduce air molds to 94% in 12 hours. You can hang it in a pot inside your house, or place it on a ledge where the leaves can trail down.

5. Snake Plant

A popular indoor plant choice by many, snake plants are very easy to keep alive and great for interior decorating. They improve the quality of air and overall atmosphere at home. They are easy to grow and care, and one of the most recommended plants of all. It emits oxygen in the night time while you’re asleep, taking carbon dioxide from the air inside your house. They also filter nasty household toxins from the air.

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Here’s What Happened When Millennials Put Pen to Paper for a Week

Tue Nov 01 2016

Writing things down doesn’t have to be sentimental. Journaling — in the form of writing, doodling, list-making and more — can help us process emotions, and it’s a simple way to tap into the imaginative part of our brain. With these benefits in mind, we partnered with the Paper & Packaging — How Life Unfolds ™ Campaign to explore how journaling would affect an array of B+C staffers.

The Paper and Packaging Board’s latest campaign, Letters of Peace, is all about encouraging people to express themselves creatively using paper. We were particularly curious to see how journaling with paper and pen could help us with self-reflection and creativity. Participants had one rule: They must journal 20 minutes every day for a week using a notebook and a pen. Two designers, one analyst, an editor and the President and GM of Media volunteered. We’re fascinated with the results!

MARIANNE, THE VISUAL THINKER

Meet Marianne Koo, warmly known to her B+C pals as “Koo,” “Koo-licious,” and as a genius industrial designer with a heart of gold. Given her profession, it’s no surprise that she’s a visual thinker. We regularly catch Koo hand-lettering for our Instagram and blueprinting future company projects. For Marianne, we were particularly interested to see how carving out 20 minutes of *personal* creative time each night would affect her. Let’s find out!

What did you journal about?

“I journaled about EVERYTHING! I tried to let myself dwell a tiny bit on even the smallest thoughts. It feels like a good way to give something the time it deserves; then I can allow myself to move on. It’s something I’m trying to be better about, because I often let thoughts build up and they fuel my anxiety.”

How did you journal? 

“I did a bit of lettering, writing and doodling. Sometimes it felt easier to express how I was feeling that day with a diagram, other days I felt like I really needed to articulate myself with large chunks of text.”

What time of day did you usually journal?

“Usually in the evenings after work, but some days I woke up and immediately started journaling. One morning in particular, I woke up from a dream with the most amazing textile. I dreamt that a good friend’s grandmother hand-embroidered this intricate blanket and she was showing me every detail of it. It was insane. I woke up and knew I had to sketch it out. Maybe one day I’ll recreate it.”

Did it feel like a chore? Why or why not?

Some days writing did feel like a chore, but I had to remind myself that it’s such a healthy release. Again, it’s so necessary for me to give myself the space to think about something, and then to let it go. It’s a way for me to exorcise the negative thoughts that would otherwise stress me out.

Was it easy to fill the full 20 minutes every day? Did you? 

“20 minutes felt like a lot of time! Some days it felt like I had zero thoughts in my head. With my creative job, I’ve been conditioned to feel that 20 minutes is more than enough time to crank out a concept sketch or to write an email, so it was definitely challenging to spend 20 minutes on one thing strictly dedicated to my personal life.”

Did you find yourself thinking in a new or unexpected way? 

“Expressing myself in diagrams is definitely an interesting way to think. I don’t think anyone naturally breaks themselves up into bits of information, so learning to do that was SO weird. Like is this percentage of me really angry? Or sad? On a scale of 1-10, how excited was I today?”

What was your overall experience with this challenge? Any big takeaways?

“The big takeaway is that it’s difficult to make time for a designated activity every day, but the payoff can be so rewarding. Ultimately, writing and drawing in a journal is dedicating time to reflect on yourself, and I think it’s a form of self-care that’s often overlooked.”

How do you think using pen and paper affected your journaling? 

“Woof, have you ever considered how much your handwriting deteriorates after using a computer for X amount of years? Yikes! It was scary to think that a pen on paper felt foreign, and some days my writing was complete chicken scratch. As a visual person, that drove me crazy and made me want to practice and work on that muscle memory a bit more.”

What word/phrase comes to mind to sum up this experience? 

“Therapeutic.”

EMILY, THE #GIRLBOSS

Next up, Emily Smith! As our President and GM of Media *and* a mom of three, it’s no surprise that Emily is a very busy person. We were curious to see how designating a chunk of time to creative self-reflection would impact her week. Take a look.

How did your week with journaling go? 

“Last week was completely nuts and I found it impossible to journal during the week. However, feeling bad about that, I doubled down and journaled all weekend. If I left the house, I slipped my journal into my purse so I would have it handy. It basically never left my side.”

How do you think using pen and paper affected your journaling? 

“I have tried journaling in apps a few times recently, and I really enjoyed using paper instead. With apps, you end up drifting over into other digital distractions, such as email, texts, news alerts. But with paper, I found myself staying in the moment a lot more. I also liked documenting the daily details — writing in pen made the whole weekend feel more permanent and memorable.”

What did you journal about?

“I cooked a lot and entertained this weekend, so my poor journal is covered in cooking debris and smudged with dirty fingerprints. I wrote down menu plans, to-do lists, and groceries that I needed. As I cleaned up from my daughter’s earlier birthday party, I clipped samples of her gift wrap so I could remember the day. On Sunday night, I cranked out a list of all the things that happened that weekend.”

Did you find yourself thinking in a new or unexpected way? 

“In some ways it was a perfectly normal weekend, but I knew it was filled with the kinds of things I would forget over time. Some mundane — my son’s soccer game got rained out; some amazing — my daughter’s friend brought over a puppy and we had a puppy play date that was about the cutest thing ever; some awful — our neighbor got robbed (in her home while she was there!) and a police officer came over to ask if we had seen anything unusual. I wrote it all down in my journal.”

Will you continue to journal now that the exercise is over?

“I will definitely keep it up!”

What word or phrase comes to mind to sum up this experience?

“It made the little things matter more.”

JEFF, MR ANALYST

Jeff Kneis is quite literally analytical — his job at Brit + Co is to decipher our content analytics across the web. If you asked someone else, he’s very creative — heck, he has the most expansive knowledge of GIFs and memes I’ve ever seen, and knows the perfect moment to share the virtual gems. IMHO, that’s definitely a form of creative thinking ;) But Jeff was certain he’d have the least creative POV when it came to his journaling. Let’s see what happened.

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What did you journal about? 

“I journaled about different topics each day, through a mixture of drawing and writing.”

Did you find yourself thinking in a new or unexpected way? 

“I did feel more creative, mostly when drawing. I found it difficult to break out of my analytical mindset and think of ideas, so I drew images inspired by other artists instead. But it definitely made me think about things in a different way. Journaling forced me to use parts of my brain that I didn’t use regularly. I think (especially with work the last few years) I have really focused on thinking analytically. I lost some of the creativity I might have had in college when I was reading and writing more often.”

Was it easy to fill the full 20 minutes every day? Did you? 

“It was pretty easy to take up 20 minutes. I probably ended up journaling for more like 30 minutes a day without even realizing it.”

Did it feel like a chore?

“It did feel like a chore on the weekend and one day during the week. It was good to set some time out of the day to just relax and do something different. It only felt like a chore when I had a lot of other things going on.”

What was your overall experience with this challenge? Any big takeaways? 

“I think it was a nice challenge. I always knew this would be a little harder for me than a lot of people here at Brit + Co. It’s just not something I do too often anymore. The patterns were a nice transition though. That helped me ease into it.”

What word or phrase comes to mind to sum up this experience? 

“Interesting and challenging. It was harder than I thought it was going to be to break my analytical thought process.”

CORTNEY, THE WRITER

Disclaimer: Cortney Clift is a writer, and a good one. In fact, she’s authored more articles on Brit + Co than anyone else! With a job where she literally writes all day, we were curious to see what she’d take away from solo creative journaling. Take a peek.

What did you journal about?

“I’ve recently read about how doodling can be cathartic. Since I rarely draw on a regular basis, I decided to do different doodles of things I had done each day.”

Did it feel like a chore? 

“Actually no! By the third day I was looking forward to it. It was nice to exercise that part of my brain that I haven’t really used since art school. I think I actually journaled more than 20 minutes each night.”

Did you find yourself thinking in a new or unexpected way? 

“Any time I draw, I have to think differently and kind of stretch a different creative muscle. So, yes!”

How do you think using pen and paper affected your journaling? 

“For me, journaling on pen and paper is very therapeutic. It’s nice to see it actually on the page. It’s also really nice for me to purposefully spend some time away from my phone/laptop/tablet.”

What word or phrase comes to mind to sum up this experience?

“Cathartically creative!”

MARISA, RESIDENT B+C DOODLER

Next up, Marisa Bo Kumtong! She’s an incredibly skilled visual designer that’s a master of doodling and graphic design. Her whimsical illustrations can be seen all over brit.co, our Instagram and even in our coloring book. Another reason we adore this girl: She’s like, permanently wearing her dancing shoes. Let’s see how her week with journaling went!

What did you journal about? How did you journal?

“I always started off the journal with how my day went, and it would usually stem off from something that happened that day. I would start by writing, then I’d spend the last few minutes drawing either how I felt that day or just with shapes and embellishments that would help the page come to life a bit. The drawing part was a good closer to each day’s journal entry.”

What time of the day did you usually journal?

“I usually journaled about an hour before I went to bed. When I’m done with work, I’m either at the gym, watching TV or working on a project, and I liked to clear my head right before I head to bed. My mind is still going hours after the work day and I took these 20 minutes as a cool-down and a time to reflect about the whole day.”

Was it easy to fill the full 20 minutes? Did you?

“I found myself not checking on the timer too often, which was pleasantly surprising. Before I started the first entry, I didn’t think I would make it to 20 minutes every day, but I actually did and it felt like just the right amount of time to sit down, get settled, get in the mode of writing and clear almost everything out of my head.”

Did you feel creative while journaling?

“I didn’t feel creative until the drawing part that happened at the end. The writing portion was just plain writing for me, a way to dump everything from my mind onto paper. I felt creative with some of my drawings at the end because I knew there was no pressure to make it look good, because it was for my eyes only. I feel like projects that I know won’t be critiqued by others are precious; that’s when I feel the most creatively free.”

Did you find yourself thinking in a new or unexpected way?

“Journaling always helps me think in a new way. I made it a point last year to start writing out my thoughts every day before I went to sleep because that was a time when I was going through something stressful — and it was hugely helpful! Writing it out is a good way for me to get all my crazy thoughts out of my jumbled brain. I think when I see something written out, I’m able to take a step back and realize that my fears and thoughts may be exaggerated, so it helps me realize how outlandish I might be at that moment.”

How do you think using pen and paper affected your journaling?

“I actually thought about this the second day of this exercise — like would this be any different than if I were to be typing this on a computer? Maybe that’s something I’ll try in the future. My guess is that writing with a pen and paper is more thoughtful and it takes more time to write something out than to type it out, so you choose your words more wisely. Also, maybe I’d feel less connected to the journal entry if it was typed out. There’s something magical and precious about being connected to something that’s tactile and that you can hold in your hand.”

What was your overall experience with this challenge? Any big takeaways? 

“The overall experience was very positive. I want to remember how good it felt to force myself to sit down for 20 minutes and have a chance every day to reflect on my day.”

Will you continue to journal now that the exercise is over?

“YES, or hoping to at least :)”

What word/phrase comes to mind to sum up this experience? 

“Emotionally releasing.”

The verdict? Journaling helped every participant think creatively and reflect on his or her week. For professional creatives, it served as an outlet for personal creative thinking; for busy-bees, it was a relief to designate a period of time for self-expression. Using paper and pen bolstered the practice — compelling the participants to think visually and focus on the exercise at hand (literally). Four of the five B+C staffers are planning on making journaling a daily practice; how awesome is that? I’d say this challenge was a success!

Want to participate in the #LettersofPeace campaign? Share images of your journals and paper projects with us on Instagram so we can take a look! 

Production + Styling: Maddie Bachelder

Participants: Marianne Koo, Jeff Kneis, Emily Smith, Marisa Kumtong + Cortney Clift

Photography: Brittany Griffin

Lifestyle

Not All Clutter Is Bad for You and Here’s Why

Krista Gray Fri Nov 25 2016

If you’ve ever leafed through a copy of one of Marie Kondo’s life-changing books or actually tried the #KonMari method, it’s a pretty safe bet that you’ve purged a bunch of stuff. Her crackdown on getting rid of things has become a trendy take on organization. It reinforces the belief that less is more — especially when it comes to a clean home (bedroom organization hacks FTW), closet or Insta-worthy workspace. While we can totally admit that decluttering can feel like a relief, we’d be lying if we said parting with things we’ve collected over the years was easy. That’s why we were so intrigued when we heard about a different perspective, one that says clutter can actually inspire creativity and bring you joy. To learn more, we chatted with Christina Waters, Ph.D., the author of the brand-new book Inside the Flame: The Joy of Treasuring What You Already Have. Read on for six reasons why she always advocates for keeping some clutter around.

1. Clutter stimulates creativity. As Albert Einstein famously asked, “If a cluttered desk is a sign of a cluttered mind, of what, then, is an empty desk a sign?” Christina echoes his sentiments, saying, “An eclectic landscape of paper, pens, plants, old photos, sketches and other items is like a bustling city, filled with cultural richness and sensory stimulation.” She even tells us that keeping stuff around has been proven to help feed your creative potential. “Pages torn from magazines, Post-its filled with poems, colored pens, a postcard from Rome — all of those things stimulate your mind and help keep it limber and flexible,” Christina says.

2. The things you keep reinforce your identity. We bet that if you strip a space of everything you love and have collected, you’ll feel like you’ve stripped it bare of your identity. Christina explains why: “The constellation of objects orbiting our workspace evolves and changes in sync with our desires, interests and lifestyle. This means that your ‘clutter’ actually acts as a mirror in which we can identify and reassure ourselves of who we are and what we like.” Whoa!

3. Familiar things preserve special memories. Think about the handmade jewelry box you picked up in Paris or the pillows you scored at an Egyptian souk, Christina says. “Call it ‘clutter’ if you must, but the critical mass of collected objects and souvenirs reminds us of irreplaceable times in our lives. Sentimental clutter? Maybe, but still packed with powerful emotions.”

4. Clutter forces you to be present. Christina admits, “My stuff, even if it’s as mundane as a stack of business cards or an antique vase, organizes and articulates my space.” She elaborates, “Basically, meaningful odds and ends punctuate a workspace, giving it different dimensions AND layers of meaning.” She tells us that you can read those objects as signposts to our spatial location and that objects in your fave colors can help ground you in the present. “Write a reminder and keep it in view. It will launch an action in real time,” she promises.

5. Your stuff can be a legit conversation starter. “The offbeat objects or unique trinkets that have colonized your life (or desk, walls and shelves) not only add their energy to a visual landscape, but they can also amuse guests and spark awesome conversations,” Christina reminds us. “You’ll get questions like, ‘What’s that little red thing?’ or ‘Where did you find that amazing rug?'” Let the convos and storytelling commence!

6. Clutter is FUN. It’s easy to forget that not every minute of life has to serve a specific purpose. Christina agrees, saying, “Having fun is one of the best ways of knowing that we’re alive, and it’s a much-needed antidote to any regimented, 24/7 work schedule. So, yes, keep that old love letter around, or the silly LED Easter bunny you love out.” These are ways that you can totally defy “adult drudgery” without any consequences at all. She proclaims, “Nobody’s stopping you!”

Does clutter impact your creativity? Tell us about how you work best and what your stuff means to you @BritandCo!

(Photos via Getty)

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