Love & Work
A notebook about how we work, learn, love and live.
I certainly cannot say it better than Oprah. Celebration of the new year gives us a whole new chance to get it right.
Happy New Year.
How We Live
What if bad news wasn’t the only news?
Image: David Wimble
"If you were asked to list the top global news stories of 2021, off the top of your head, what would they be? Chances are you’d come up with some combination of COVID-19, economic woes, political conflict, Afghanistan, natural disasters, and maybe some space billionaires and Free Britneythrown in for good measure. Oh, and don’t forget the Suez Canal!
"What’s probably missing from your list is any good news, which seems pretty strange. Even in the midst of a global pandemic, surely a few positive things happened this year? Researchers would say it’s because of our negativity bias — we’re wired, apparently, to pay attention to and remember things that are shocking or scary. What if there’s a simpler explanation though? What if the reason we can’t remember any good news is because nobody reported it in the first place?" - Angus Hervey
Article: 99 Good News Stories You Probably Didn’t Hear About in 2021
How We Live
A new project measures ways to promote positive social relations among groups who have a history of discord.
"Today, the misery of war is all too striking in places such as Syria, Yemen, Tigray, Myanmar and Ukraine. It can come as a surprise to learn that there are scores of sustainably peaceful societies around the world, ranging from indigenous people in the Xingu River Basin in Brazil to countries in the European Union. Learning from these societies, and identifying key drivers of harmony, is a vital process that can help promote world peace.
"Unfortunately, our current ability to find these peaceful mechanisms is woefully inadequate. The Global Peace Index (GPI) and its complement the Positive Peace Index (PPI) rank 163 nations annually and are currently the leading measures of peacefulness. The GPI, launched in 2007 by the Institute for Economics and Peace (IEP), was designed to measure negative peace, or the absence of violence, destructive conflict, and war. But peace is more than not fighting. The PPI, launched in 2009, was supposed to recognize this and track positive peace, or the promotion of peacefulness through positive interactions like civility, cooperation and care.
"Yet the PPI still has many serious drawbacks. To begin with, it continues to emphasize negative peace, despite its name. The components of the PPI were selected and are weighted based on existing national indicators that showed the “strongest correlation with the GPI,” suggesting they are in effect mostly an extension of the GPI. For example, the PPI currently includes measures of factors such as group grievances, dissemination of false information, hostility to foreigners, and bribes.
"To fix these deficiencies, we and our colleagues have been developing an alternative approach under the umbrella of the Sustaining Peace Project. Our effort has various components, and these can provide a way to solve the problems in the current indices. Here are some of the elements...." - Peter T. Coleman, Allegra Chen-Carrel, Vincent Hans Michael Stueber
Article: Peace Is More Than War’s Absence, and New Research Explains How to Build It
Learning
The Twitter thread of the year?
Twitter Thread: Things I Have Learned About the General Public Whilst Working at the Library
How We Live
Changes small and large—parklets, outdoor restaurants, bike lanes—could remake our relationship to cities (and help fix climate change).
Son Eunkyoung for the NYT
To save restaurants and give homebound families some space, in 2021 "city planners did something that had been unthinkable, or at least undoable. Being outdoors seemed to be far less risky than being in an unventilated indoor space, so leaders started up or expanded nascent programs that converted parking spaces along streets into outdoor dining areas for restaurants, point-of-sale space for shops, and mini-parks—'parklets.' They closed some residential streets to cars so people who lived nearby could have safe access to outside space. It happened all over—Vancouver, San Francisco, New York, New Orleans, Los Angeles, Denver, Philadelphia, Chicago.
"Academics, activists, and interest groups have been trying to make this happen for decades—to take streets away from cars and parking and give them over to anything that wasn’t just 2 tons of steel moving 40 miles an hour. That’s because cars and parking are catastrophes for cities. In the mid to late 20th century, the construction of parking lots and freeways destroyed the downtowns of dozens of American cities and ploughed through or razed nonwhite neighborhoods...." - Adam Rogers
Article: The Pandemic Might Have Redesigned Cities Forever
Related Article: The Simplest Tool for Improving Cities Is Also Free
Economics
We don't need to sacrifice prosperity, but to redefine it.
Demonstrators take part in the Global Climate Strike in Manhattan on September 24, 2021 in New York City. Spencer Platt/Getty Images
"Many scientists, politicians, and commentators have disparaged degrowth as unrealistic, and asserted that there simply isn’t enough political will to pursue it. We must act on climate now, they say, and we must act within the parameters of our current economic system. There is no time for a revolution.
"This, arguably defeatist, perspective is in part the result of a misunderstanding of what degrowth really stands for. Degrowth doesn’t imply a radical decline in living standards, as some commentators have suggested, nor does it mean that poor people would become even poorer. This is because degrowth calls not only for reducing the extraction of resources but also for distributing those resources more equitably. Neither does degrowth mean that all sectors of the economy would shrink; sectors less dependent on resource extraction, such as education and health care, could keep expanding.
"But even more importantly, degrowth is too often portrayed merely as an economic idea when it is, in fact, just as much a cultural notion. The culture of degrowth calls for us to view ourselves as stewards of the planet. It pushes us to recognize that our relationship with the natural environment is a two-way street — that we must take care of nature if we want nature to take care of us. And it calls for us to respect our planet’s limits, to look out for other species, and to recognize that our own fate is tied up with the health of the ecosystems we inhabit.
"A culture of degrowth sees justice as intergenerational, and respects the rights of the world’s future inhabitants.
"What would it take for society to embrace degrowth as a new cultural paradigm?" - Peter Sutoris
Article: ‘Degrowth’ Isn’t Just About the Economy. It’s About Culture.
How We Work
Best of 2021's new tools
The E-Cat: A retrofittable electric-powered wheelbarrow wheel
One of the skills that makes humans special is our ability to make and use tools. Core77 has cataloged some of the best ones introduced this year. They've sorted them into "eight categories of tools: Hand tools, power(ed) tools, multi-tools, specialty tools. And also tools for moving stuff around, tools for getting you up, down or around, fastening devices and shop fixtures." We can be so smart.
Article: Best of Cool Tools (and a few Goofy Ones) Spotted in 2021
Branding
Really? When your hard-earned name brand becomes a liability because of your deaf-ear labor practices, just drop it? Ouch.
Twitter: @Nevada_Man
Last week the Kellogg Company surrendered their most valuable asset: they removed their name and logo from the packaging for Pop Tarts.
Some context first, from the Kellogg Company website:
"More than 100 years ago, W.K. Kellogg founded our company through his belief in nutrition and dedication to well-being.
"Motivated by a passion for people, quality and innovation, he created the first-ever breakfast cereal and then shaped an entire industry. Kellogg soon became a household name; his signature, a trusted mark.
"Today, W.K. Kellogg’s legacy continues to inspire us. Working together, we create moments of delight for people around the world with our well-loved brands.
"And as our company continues to grow, our people grow with it. Through our values-based culture, we create a stronger future every day — enriching communities and nurturing careers by putting people first in everything we do."
Today their belief in nutrition is represented by their Mini-Wheats, Fudge Shoppe, CHEEZ-IT, Chips Deluxe and FROOT LOOPS offerings.
And their dedication to their "values-based culture" is clearly shown in their current fight with many of their workers. "The move comes amidst a months-long strike involving about 1400 workers across four cereal plants, but Kellogg's says the design decision is about 'simplified' design, not a last-ditch effort to get around consumer boycotts."
How do you spell short-term profit? It's easy if you ignore long-term value.
Post: Kellogg's Removes Its Logo from Pop-Tarts Boxes
Oneliners
Article: A New Way to Inoculate People Against Misinformation
Article: If They Only Knew: Brits Rank Museum Curators Among Top 5 Most Trusted Professions
Article: Winnie-the-Pooh, an Ernest Hemingway Classic and a Massive Library of Sound Recordings Will Enter the Public Domain on January 1
Article: December Marked the 30-Year Anniversary of the First Website in North America.
Playlist
Not only is this a masterful and beautiful performance, there is also an inspiring lesson on learning. In it, Yo-Yo Ma talks about his very first lessons on the cello. He says: "All of you have done homework. Somedays, it's easier than others. 'Oh. It's like yesterday, but slightly different.' So, it's not actually painful to learn something, if you do it incrementally."
About this 2018 Tiny Desk Concert, Tom Huizenga said: "Cellist Yo-Yo Ma brought his great inspiration, and in turn part of his own life story, to an enthusiastic audience packed around the Tiny Desk on a hot summer day. Ma is returning, yet again, to the Six Suites for Unaccompanied Cello by Johann Sebastian Bach, a Mount Everest for any cellist. He has just released his third studio recording of the complete set and is taking the music on a two-year, six-continent tour. Ma's first recording of the Suites, released in 1983, earned him his first Grammy.
"Ma has played the music for 58 years and along the way it's become something of a practical guide to living, pulling him through hardships and celebrating times of joy. 'It's like forensic musicology,' Ma told the Tiny Desk audience. 'Embedded in the way I play is actually, in many ways, everything I've experienced.'"
Video: Yo-Yo Ma: NPR Music Tiny Desk Concert
Image of the Week
The Image of the Week is titled "Smelt Fishing". It's by Tatsuya Tanaka 田中達也. He calls himself a "Miniature & Mitate Artist". He says: "I make miniature art every day."
Instagram Page: Tatsuya Tanaka 田中達也
What's Love & Work?
Love & Work is the weekly newsletter by me, Mitch Anthony. I help people use their brand - their purpose, values, and stories - as a pedagogy and toolbox for transformation.
If you get value from Love & Work, please pass it on.
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