Tag: #Bacon

Spiritual person

The Mindful World

The first thing that caught my eye about The Mindful World is just how beautiful their site design is. This is one good looking mindfulness blog.

It takes more than just good looks to be included in this list of the best spiritual blogs, though. And, indeed, The Mindful World has a lot of depth behind that pretty exterior.

The Mindful World is a group of individuals who are passionate about spreading mindfulness around the world. Their articles are very in-depth and some of the most professionally written pieces on any spiritual website.

Excerpt from CONFRONTING REALITY: The lie of Evidence-Based Treatment and how it affects psychological therapy for abused children

“The scientific process is supposed to be the golden standard for the pursuit of knowledge and truth. When asked to think of a scientist, many people will imagine a somewhat “nerdish” individual who’s often more comfortable with numbers than people.

We imagine these scientists as being wholly dedicated to their research and unwavering in their pursuit of the truth. The idea that many published scientists are heavily influenced by politics, that scientific journals often compromise their standards for publications, and that many universities look the other way to secure federal funding, often comes as a shock to most people.”

Change Your Energy

Change Your Energy is a spiritual healing blog. It reads like a self improvement blog, packed full of excellent advice on articles on all manner of self development topics. Every article is full of spiritual guidance and offers inspiration for developing your spiritual life. Change Your Energy is is also one of the most professionally presented spiritual blogs.

My favourite excerpt : From the article “Sing As If Speaking, Dance As If Walking”

“Do you pick up your smartphone, look for people to chat with, or go to the TV or Internet because time alone is lonely, strange, or difficult? You can be a wonderful friend to yourself, incomparably better than any person or any machine.

Here is a suggestion for enjoying spending time with yourself: Sing and dance for 30 minutes every day. Try to sing as if speaking and to dance as if walking.

Enjoy being immersed in yourself, regardless of what other people think. The time you enjoy spending with yourself is time for changing your energy and for accumulating energy. You can encounter your soul as you sing and dance.”

Mom On A Spiritual Journey:
Mom on a Spiritual Journey is the blog of Sarah Lawrence Hinson. Sarah gives spiritual coaching sessions and writes articles about both her personal life and about spiritual energy.
My favourite excerpt:
From “6 tips for driving your car as a spiritual practice”
“MAKE YOUR CAR A NO PHONE ZONE LIKE OPRAH SAYS.  I’ll be the first to admit that I am useless at using a phone and driving, in fact I’m a downright danger so don’t do it at all.  Just because you might be better than me doesn’t mean you should do it too though.  If the phone rings and I am alone, I pull over if I know I’m waiting for an important call.  If you work a lot on your phone, get hands free…it’s not the greatest idea but it could save your life.  If I have the girls in the car then they answer the phone for me.  When it’s their turn to learn to drive, texting and driving will not be acceptable because I DON’T DO IT

Spiritual Awakening Process:

Spiritual Awakening Process discusses many aspects of spirituality and offers practical advice to improve your spiritual life. The best part of Spiritual Awakening Process is the one hour sessions that can be booked and which offer help for you on your spiritual journey. Definitely a great spiritual blog.

LINK: SPIRITUAL AWAKENING

Favourite Except: From “Awakening”

“Life inside the awakening is a whole other beast. Many people focus on the singular point of awakening, that amazing “Ah-ha!” moment. However, while that is a critical piece of the awakening process, so is the transition from sleep-mode to every moment awakeness. The awakening ushers in a time of transition that is unsettled, unstable, and unique. It is a time of embracing new and amazing parts of you and then trying to crawl right back into bed. It is a time of expansion and contraction as you grow and then shrink back to the core issues that are still unresolved and holding you back.”

Spiritual Awakening Process:

Spiritual Awakening Process discusses many aspects of spirituality and offers practical advice to improve your spiritual life. The best part of Spiritual Awakening Process is the one hour sessions that can be booked and which offer help for you on your spiritual journey. Definitely a great spiritual blog.

LINK: SPIRITUAL AWAKENING

Favourite Except: From “Awakening”

“Life inside the awakening is a whole other beast. Many people focus on the singular point of awakening, that amazing “Ah-ha!” moment. However, while that is a critical piece of the awakening process, so is the transition from sleep-mode to every moment awakeness. The awakening ushers in a time of transition that is unsettled, unstable, and unique. It is a time of embracing new and amazing parts of you and then trying to crawl right back into bed. It is a time of expansion and contraction as you grow and then shrink back to the core issues that are still unresolved and holding you back.”

Tiny Buddha

Tiny Buddha is an absolutely wonderful spiritual blog that is mostly a mindfulness blog. It matches cuteness and fun with insight and wisdom. It’s also got more Facebook followers than anyone else on this list, partly because it was a pioneer of the whole spiritual blogging movement.

Excerpt from : Boost Your Happiness: 10 Mindfulness Tips for Busy People

“Do you ever feel as though you would be happy if only things were a little different?

You know that happiness is important, but you keep putting it on the backburner because there simply isn’t enough time to prioritize your own inner joy.

And at the same time, you know that meditation would help, but you can’t even imagine where you’re going to get the spare time you need to sit still and meditate.

In an ideal world, we would schedule moments every day in which to cater to our health needs, because health and well-being are paramount. Yet despite our best efforts we will inevitably face those times when we’re busy every minute of the day. I know I’ve been there.”

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Tips for safe internet banking

All through the year, banks and financial institution are taking up innovative measures to protect its customers from such banking frauds. But sometimes it’s our very own negligence that makes us fall prey to such thefts. Whilst, both the banks and financial institutions are doing their part, we should too adopt a cautious attitude to protect ourselves. So, to help you out in this process, we have a gathered a list of some tips for safe internet banking that you can consider doing.

Digital advancements have made our lives much easier, we can now order food or purchase things in the comfort of our homes. These rapidly evolving advancements are also transforming the banking and financial sector in India. Whether someone is transferring funds, paying a bill or applying for such loans such technologies are enabling customers to do it in a more efficient and effective way. The number of users opting for internet banking is expected to double by 2020, making India an important hub for financial innovation. However, internet banking, just like like any other medium if not done with utmost precaution can prove to be risky. There are scams like phishing( fraudulent means for attaining confidential information) associated with internet banking which enables a third-party to access and misuse your personal information.

Banking online has made managing money a lot more convenient than it used to be. We don’t have to visit the bank to transfer our funds, or wait for the next paper statement to know what the balance is. All that information is at our fingertips. But while online banking has made things easier for us, it’s also made things easier for thieves.

Criminals don’t need to plan a heist to rob someone’s bank account anymore. All they need to do is wait for you to let your guard down and expose your personal information, or send out a virus that will collect the information. The only way to avoid becoming a thief’s next victim is to carefully guard your personal information and always practice these online banking safety tips. 

1. Don’t access your bank accounts on public Wi-Fi

When you’re on public Wi-Fi, hackers can more easily access your computer and steal personal information from it. You should never access your bank’s website through a computer, tablet, or mobile phone unless you’re on a secure Wi-Fi network with a password, or using your own cell phone data connection. This is much more difficult for thieves to hack, so it keeps your information safer.

2. Avoid saving your login information

Some websites give you the option to save your login information for future use, but if someone uses your computer or mobile device after you, they could gain access to your bank accounts. To at least help prevent this from happening, many banking sites now time out after a certain number of minutes of inactivity, and do not save your information.

3. Use strong passwords and change them often

Strong passwords have a mix of upper- and lowercase letters, numbers, and symbols. Many banks now require your online accounts to carry a password meeting these requirements. You should also change your password every couple of months, and use different passwords for all of your online accounts so that hackers will have a more difficult time gaining access to your information.

4. Use two-factor authentication whenever possible

Two-factor authentication is the next level of security that many banks are now offering. Usually, you give your bank your phone number, and it texts a code when you log in online. Some banks also enable you to request a code via email or a phone call. You must enter this code in addition to your password to log in. This way, even if someone has stolen your password, they cannot access your accounts. It’s another hoop to jump through, but it could help keep your money safe, so set it up if your bank offers it.

The irrational things about trust

The obvious and rational equation is that being trustworthy plus being transparent will lead you to be trusted. Verification of trustworthiness should lead to trust.

This makes sense. Being trustworthy (acting in a way that’s worthy of trust) plus being transparent so that people can see your trustworthiness—this should be sufficient.

How then, do we explain that brands like Coke and Google are trusted? The recipe is secret, the algorithm is secret, and competitors like DuckDuckGo certainly act in a more trustworthy way.

In fact, trust often comes from something very different. It’s mostly about symbols, expectations and mystery.

Consider the relationship you might enter into if you need surgery. You trust this woman to cut you open, you’re putting your life in her hands… without the transparency of seeing all of her surgical statistics, interviewing all previous patients, evaluating her board scores.

Instead, we leap into surgery on the basis of the recommendation from one doctor, on how the office feels, on a few minutes of bedside manner. We walk away from surgery because of a surly receptionist, or a cold demeanor. 

The same is true for just about all the food we eat. Not only don’t we visit the slaughterhouse or the restaurant kitchen, we make an effort to avoid imagining that they even exist.

In most commercial and organizational engagements, trust is something we want and something we seek out, but we use the most basic semiotics and personal interactions to choose where to place our trust. And once the trust is broken, there’s almost no amount of transparency that will help us change our mind.

This is trust from ten thousand years ago, a hangover from a far less complex age when statistical data hadn’t been conceived of, when unearthing history was unheard of. But that’s now hard-wired into how we judge and are judged.

Quick test: Consider how much you trust Trump, or Clinton, Cruz or Sanders, Scalia or RBG. Is that trust based on transparency? On a rational analysis of public statements and private acts? Or is it more hunch-filled than that? What are the signals and tropes you rely on? Tone of voice? Posture? Appearance? Would more transparency change your mind about someone you trust? What about someone you don’t? (Here’s a fascinating story on that topic, reconstructed and revealed).

It turns out that we grab trust when we need it, and that rebuilding trust after it’s been torn is really quite difficult. Because our expectations (which weren’t based on actual data) were shown to be false.

Real trust (even in our modern culture) doesn’t always come from divulging, from providing more transparency, but from the actions that people take (or that we think they take) before our eyes. It comes from people who show up before they have to, who help us when they think no one is watching. It comes from people and organizations that play a role that we need them to play.

‘Of Studies’ by Francis Bacon.

We are told that studies are important but no one tells us why we should study, how we should study and what we should study. Francis Bacon’s essay ‘Of Studies’ answers all such questions. Firstly, 

“STUDIES serve for delight, for ornament, and for ability.”

When we read books in our leisure time, it brings us delight. When we use what we have learnt in our conversation, it decorates or graces our speech. When we apply what we have learnt in our judgement and business, it becomes our ability. While men of experience can carry out and judge only some particulars, the learned make the best plans and execution of affairs. This is not to say experience is not important. 

Though we are bestowed with inborn talents, we need studies to perfect them and in turn the studies are perfected by experience. Our inborn talents are like plants which require pruning and this the studies do. Though studies give all the directions, they are also bound to experience.

“To spend too much time in studies is sloth; to use them too much for ornament, is affectation; to make judgement wholly by their rules, is the humor of a scholar.”

While men of experience scorn studies and laymen look up to them, only wise men use what they have learnt. We shouldn’t read just to argue; neither to believe everything given in the text blindly nor to boast about what we have read, but to scrutinize and to regard them carefully.  

“Some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and few to be chewed and digested;”

There are myriads of books to read but how do we prioritise them? Bacon says that there are some books which only require some of its parts to be read, some books though read fully don’t demand close reading, but there are books which require our full attention and are to be read with diligence. 

“Reading maketh a full man; conference ready man; and writing an exact man.”

So, if a person writes less, he should have a good memory to remember everything he had read; if a person speaks less, he should have a quick wit so that he can escape his problems; if a person reads less, he should at least have wit enough to act like he knows the matter.  Bacon lists the advantages of studying each subject.

“Histories make men wise; poets witty; the mathematics subtile; natural philosophy deep; moral grave; logic and rhetoric able to contend.”

When we read about past ages and of men, we come to know why they failed or succeeded; when we read poems which expresses huge meanings in small words, we gain wit; when we study math, we become clever in analysis of the problems; when we read natural philosophy, we gain deep knowledge of the universe; logic and rhetoric helps us to win arguments.

“Abeunt studia in mores” means studies become habits. When we practice what we read, it becomes a part of us, Just like how there are different physical exercises to cure the diseases of different parts of our body, different studies cure impediments in our wit. If a man lacks concentration, he ought to study math because if he gets distracted while doing sums, he has to redo the whole sum else he won’t understand. If a person cannot distinguish what is right or wrong, then he ought to read philosophy. If a person can’t get to the root of the matters and cannot defend his stand, then he ought to read law.  

“So every defect of the mind, may have a special receipt.”