Look beyond the money:

Do We Work for Money or Love for the Job?

It has become more apparent that many people are driven by the desire of becoming wealthy, thus take on any job that can bring them that much closer to their reality.When choosing a career path, one needs figure out what things in life are important to you i.e. your goals for the future, what you enjoying doing.Obviously, the amount of salary that your chosen career provides, directly effects the kind of lifestyle you can live.

However, it is important not to get blinded by the potential amount of money any given career path might provide because choosing a career path is more than the money you can make. After all, if you do not enjoy what you are doing, at least on some level, you will not give it your all and giving it your best is the kind of attitude that will lead to promotions that subsequently lead to more money through promotions.

passion over money

I've always believed that it's really important to follow your heart when you're job searching. Do what you love and the money will follow. If you love what you do, it doesn’t feel like work.  One of the leading reasons why we get people who are incompetent in their work is because they chased paper instead of their passion, arriving at work moody ,angry and ready to do a rush job.You have to work your way up the ladder,no one becomes an overnight success!!!!

 

 

Arguments for Money:

■A job is a job and as long as you’re working, you might as well be making the most return for your time investment.

■When you follow a path that leads to money you are developing a skill set that is in demand in our society and have a much better chance of getting hired and keeping a job.

■Your job is your job. You should leave it at 5 PM and enjoy the rest of your life.

Arguments for Job Satisfaction:

■Your passion should be what you do with your time. Life is too short to pursue other people’s or employer’s goals. Pursue your own, and rich or poor, happiness will follow.

■What good is money if you don’t enjoy what you do?

■If you love something you can become really good at it and money will follow.



anti-social ?



The blurry lines of social media

Is social media making us more anti-social?        

We often praise the greatness of social media, but in our excitement we sometimes overlook the dark side of social media .With boundless power, comes great responsibility. We need to take the responsibility to look at, question and try to understand the role of social media in our lives and our societies.

I don’t see anything wrong with social media or social networking , more especially since it has become a great platform for public relations practitioners to build sustainable relationships and maintain effect communication channels  with their desired target audiences , however I must emphasis that there is so much communicated outside of text. Stats have shown that only 10% of communication is spoken through actual words, the other 90% comes through our tone of voice, our physical gestures, subtle eye movements and other things that a computer or cell phone cannot interpret, or represent .Honestly speaking, people are spending more time indoors than before, and when outdoors, they’re forever on their phones having meaningless conversations with people they barely see. Social media is slowly reducing face-to-face interaction, something needs to give…

bombarded with social networks

                                 

Westernisation getting the better of our cultures?

Lobola



Negotiations

There is no doubt that our rainbow nation is being westernised on a daily biases, however the question is “how well can we adapt to these changes?” We look at culture as a mere example, focusing mainly on Lobola. For African cultures, ilobola is a vital part of the customs for families to enjoy and for the man to thank his future wife's parents for raising her from a girl into a woman.This is a custom by which a bridegroom's family makes a payment in cattle or cash to the brides family shortly before the marriage.

There are two sides to the lobola debate. Some say the practise must be abolished because the tradition has lost everything it is  meant to stand for,thanks to western influences:with time,life has become more expensive and love is now for those with "good credit".There is some sort of sensation that tradition has become about greed and not nourishing a relationship between families,as was the original intention. The custom now warrants the parents to expect so much on their “return on investment”.

Some say that we cannot abandon this custom because if we do, we lose everything that is African about us. These are the people who are fighting against what they view as the increasing Westernisation strangulation of African customs.

 

The coming of two families

The process of lobola has been followed for years and I don’t believe it should be changed in any way. Roots are roots. If we are to continue honouring the tradition of lobola as it ought to be, it should be practised with the original intention and all malicious activities that are being attached to it eliminated.

As in any other religion there’s the possibility of abusing the practise of lobola. So it remains a societal responsibility to guard against such tendencies, the only way to go forward is for families to sit down and educate the young one’s what lobola really is or attend lobola lessons.

Weight loss surgery a short cut?



weight loss surgery



One may argue that weight loss surgery is a fast way ticket in weight loss and shouldn’t be recommended to just anyone unless it is really needed (life or death situations).

The decision to go ahead and have Weight Loss Surgery is one of the most important decisions you will ever make. Popular diets like Weight Watchers, Slender Wonder, Tony Ferguson, Dukan Diet and even The Atkins diet have shown to work in the short term. However, there is empirical evidence that shows that weight loss surgery is the most effective way of achieving medium to long term results. When compared to Gastric Bypass, Gastric Banding remains the safest surgical option. In, addition, evidence is increasingly showing that surgeons who provide the correct level of post op care will get significantly better results than those who don't. Gastric Banding or Lap Band Surgery, as it is commonly known, is just the first step on the road to recovery. It is therefore strongly recommended by leading obesity surgeons around the world that surgery be combined with a multi-disciplinary approach to weight loss to maximise results.

  



Adopting a healthy life style after the surgery
will bring in long term effect
and achieve objectives

I strongly believe that the surgical approach for each patient should be individualised "One type does not fit all" when it comes to the treatment of obesity. If the obese person fails to achieve weight-loss on their own, then I don’t see a problem in opting for surgery as long as the person is willing to adopt a new healthy life style. The disadvantages of weight-loss surgery are, it relies on the patients cooperation, long-term commitment and self-control.

A day in the mind of an obese person



constant judgement from society



I often ask myself what goes through the mind of an obese person, so I took it upon myself  to do some research. The questions that always seemed to linger in my mind are “How do obese people perceive themselves compared to others?”  , “Have they given up on life?”, “What lead them to let go of their bodies? “ I was always told from a young age that you are your own brand, and how you choose to build your brand and image is entirely up to you; your brand will carry you throughout your life ,first impressions always last and last impression linger the longest.

An anonymous blogger gives us a preview in a day of mind of an obsess person.



First to give you an update…. my new “Weight Watchers” motivation and hype has gone out once again… I do know that I still have to do something… and as I just continue gaining weight, this really is becoming more urgent with every passing day… somehow it still hasn’t hit me yet. Yes, seeing people laugh at me, talking about me behind my back and just giving me “the look” sure makes me want to lose weight, look normal and be a person they only look at because they think I’m “beautiful” but once I’m back with my friends that feeling ebbs too… sometimes I think having friends that accept you is a horrible thing.. Now don’t get me wrong... Obviously it’s the most perfect thing in the world but my brain works like this: If my friends can accept me like this – why can’t everybody else? And do I really need to lose weight to please those people? Every now and then a little depression runs over me… Well sometimes it runs... Sometimes it crawls… and sometimes it stays with me… It must like me more at some points in my life. Instead of letting my emotions do what they wanted (cry) I ate it all up in form of chips, chocolate, pasta, sweets – really anything I could find. Weird thing – I know it doesn’t help… I have done it many times and I only feel worse after. Not just after actually... Sometimes I feel like throwing up and I still continue eating… What in the world is wrong with me? 

This blog certainly shows us the struggles of being overweight or obese and how society perceives obese people, they are clearly marginalised. The obese blogger(and most obese people) knows that they are overweight and needs to address the problem as soon as possible but their will-power dies out very quick, depression kicks in and the cycle of seeking comfort in food gains momentum. This is a sad reality that most obese people go through daily, help from family and friends would be most ideal(exercise,healthy eating plan,motivation etc.) judging the person won’t do them justice as there is already a lot of confusion in their mind.



Has obesity become a norm amoung the African communities?



big is beautiful



To many black women, being overweight is desirable, astounding wouldn’t you say? This belief is now worsened by the idea that being thin can be equated with HIV/ AIDS virus infection. A qualitative study by Mvo et al. (1999) has shown that large body size in the African community in South Africa was perceived to reflect wealth and happiness; it is believed that if a woman is obese or overweight, the body size reflected on a husband’s ability to care for his wife and family. A man with a pot belly is considered wealthy (to a certain extent that they are given the name “Mr BEE”), these incorrect perceptions of body weight are outrageous and have all sorts of troubling implications for rapid increase in weight-related diseases.

All over the world, people go to incredible lengths to match up to the standards of beauty their culture endorses.  When a culture changes, its standards of beauty often change with it.  So to a certain extent, beauty is ‘democratic’, decided by whatever the people happen to prefer. So this brings me to ask the question “has obesity become a norm among the black community?

One of the major challenges with regard to the management and prevention of obesity in South Africa is the cultural variation in the perception of and preference for bigger body sizes, lack of education on obesity is another thing we need to look into among African communities.

Obesity: plays a big role in relationships



Depression and low self-esteem



Obese people may have fewer social and romantic relationships compared to the non-obese (http://www.tree.com/health/obesity-effects.aspx) .When it comes to finding a romantic partner, obesity appears to play a big role, especially for women. According to researchers at the Maricopa Integrated Health System in Phoenix, Arizona (2010), women are slightly more likely to be obese compared to men. Popular concepts of body image and thinness affect women more than men. Obesity self-image is more likely to be negative in women because of society's ideal of the thin woman, an ideal that doesn't have as powerful a male counterpart. For women the standards are much more restrictive. A woman with a wee bit of a round tummy might be judged negatively. There is a bit of a bias there.

It is also common for partners of overweight individuals to no longer find them sexually attractive because of weight gain. These emotions are usually denied or suppressed to prevent hurt and upset. In reality however, these emotions are blocking communication, and although difficult to confront, are only intensifying the problem further.

Address the issue



Constant fighting

Sit down and discuss the issue together, with each partner talking honestly about what you both want, and how you want to achieve it. Partners should remember to be sensitive but honest, at the same time as reassuring them that they will do everything they can to help, and that they are not alone.

Being obese can have a destructive impact on your relationships without you necessarily being aware with it. If you are unhappy about being obese you only have two options – you can either lose weight or learn to accept yourself the way you are. If you continue to allow the issue of weight to dominate your life you will never be happy and your relationships will suffer.