NIKE Co Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

NIKE Co - Research Paper Example They gain a better work-related understanding of their own behavior and that of others hence, motivate, influence, and to succeed. Nike Company is dynamic in that it obtains raw materials from the environment and processes them into finished goods or services that are returned as outputs to the environment. From finished goods and services, Customers create a continuing demand of Nike Company products resulting to a circle known as a value chain (Nelson, Debra & James 25). How Nike Company Functions Organizational structure of Nike Company is centered in managers and their team leaders who foresee efficient running of the company. Their nature of managerial work revolves around planning, organizing, leading and controlling. They execute informational, interpersonal and decisional roles. Informational roles is whereby a manager exchanges and processes information through team leaders and also liaise with the employees in decision making for the betterment of the company. Effective man agers must integrate technical, human and conceptual skills. As well they must be sensitive to workforce dynamics while consistently adapting to their environment and understand broad applications of technology, focus on quality and customer service. In Nike Company, emphasis on managing emotions both personally and in relationships with others, is considered an important leadership competency since a manager’s emotional intelligence contributes significantly to their leadership effectiveness (Nelson et al. 30-5). Emotional intelligence is the ability to understand and deal with emotions such as self-regulation, relationship management and self-awareness. Positive organizational cultures in this Company tap the talents, ideas of employees, and their potential creativity. Therefore it makes the organization a better employer and helps it to effectively compete more in the job market. Diversity programs in Nike Company includes; emphasis on recruitment, selection, and retention of potential employees who provide a basis for more effective job satisfaction and productivity. In order to accomplish the diversity management in Nike Company, all levels of management in the company must be committed across all functions of the organization in order to get the best from the company. Diversity therefore, promotes creativity and innovation, social responsibility, reduced legal noncompliance costs and appreciating differences /value of inclusion. The mission statement of Nike Company describes and helps focus on the attention on the company’s core purpose, vision and future aspiration in a way that inspires commitment, innovation, emotion, and courage (Nelson et al. 45-6). Attitudes and Job Satisfaction in Nike Company Attitudes play an important role in employees work output in Nike Company. Managers should therefore be interested in their employees’ attitudes since attitudes give warnings of potential problems and influence behavior. If managers in Nike Company can improve employee attitudes, it will likely result in heightened growth of the company’s effectiveness. The key managerial goal in Nike Company is the employee’s job satisfaction. This is assessed through managerial observation and interpretation of employee’s attitudes and behavior by use of job satisfaction interviews and administering of

Childhood obesity Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

Childhood obesity - Research Paper Example The obesity trends is rising day by day, and all that does emanate from the imbalance in the caloric content consumption. The trend has had detrimental effect to the children, exposing them to cardiovascular diseases, cancer and diabetes. The essay will expound childhood obesity with relation to classification, causes, effects and preventive measures. Obesity is determined by use of BMI in children who are two years or older. The center for disease control and prevention has come up with the acceptable body mass index from that that needs medical attention. A BMI of 18 to 24 is classified as a standard body mass index with 25 to 29 being overweight. Obesity sets in when ones weight and height ratio goes beyond 30. On the other hand, a BMI of less than 18 is classified as underweight as well (Anderson and Butcher). However, the United States preventive task force confirmed that high BMI can identify a health problem but does not mean that all children need to lose weight. The prevalence  of obesity in  childhood  is increasing in the world with the current estimates being in 42 million cases of overweight children (International Obesity Taskforce). According to (Force), the number of obese children has doubled from the ones in 1980 in all countries of North America that include Mexico, the United States, and Canada. Even though there is a decreased rate of childhood obesity development in the United States, the prevalence still remains high at 32.8 percent among children of age 6 to 11 years old, and 18 percent of the children with the age brackets of 6 to 9 years old (UniMelb Obesity Consortium). A myriad of factors often act in combination hence leading to the development of obesity among children. The mixture of elements that can result in the development of obese are termed as obesogenic in medical terms. One of the greatest risks of the child developing obesity is a situation whereby the parents to are suffering from the same condition. This can

The History Of Education

The History Of Education Education is one of the most important aspects of society and benefits the individual and society as a whole. It benefits society through economical, political and cultural means. But what has to be assessed is whether the aim of education is to benefit each individual, whether it is to further the development and production in society, or whether it is to do both, but in a fair and equal manner without causing separations and problems within society. Modern day society is ever expanding and globalization, which Coatsworth says is where the movement of people, goods or ideas among countries and regions accelerates, increasing. This then results in the world requiring a global workplace of people working for TNCs (Trans-National Corporations) across multiple continents in order to create the biggest amount of profit and spread of goods. Whether globalization is a good thing is one question but what is central, is whether education needs to be transformed to prepare children for this e ver developing market. Arguably, there are many different purposes of education. The Functionalist view is that education unifies and stabilizes society, it benefits society as a whole and is based on a meritocratic system. Education contributes towards social cohesion through shared experiences and a common curriculum. The expansion of education, for Functionalists, is directly linked to the requirements of industrial production. Therefore, the essential purpose of education for Functionalism is to keep society going by creating workers and people who can benefit society economically. The Functionalist belief is that each individual childs achievement is based on how hard the individual works (meritocracy) and whether they want to achieve highly. This is a very positive view of education but unfortunately, Functionalism fails to notice any negatives within society and education. It fails to recognize any exterior or genetic factors that can affect a childs achievement within education such as poverty, gen der or ethnicity. Karl Marx would argue that the purpose of education is to reproduce inequality and social hierarchy (keep the rich, rich and the poor, poor). What Marx says is that children are being labelled in school according to their social class and then the education system makes sure they are kept in that class to produce low-skilled workers and manual labourers for means of production within society. The bourgeoisie has torn away from the family its sentimental veil, and has reduced the family relation into a mere money relation (Marx, 1848). Making profit is more important to the capitalist society than the effective development and education of our future generations. One of the ways children could be kept in their social class within education is through language. Basil Bernstein said that humans use a restricted and elaborated language code depending on what social situation they find themselves in and with which types of people. The Restricted code is a simple understanding of language used with family and friends whilst the elaborated code is more abstract and complex and would be more commonly used within institutions. Bernsteins research found that working-class children had access to the restricted code whereas middle-class children had access to both the restricted and the elaborated code. It is the dominant use of the elaborated code within education though, that is disadvantaging working class children by affecting their understanding and ultimately resulting in lower achievement from them.(Bernstein, 1977). Marxism would argue that social class is based on the possession of means of production but in the modern day society class is based upon knowledge and wealth. Capitalism has created a society where knowledge creates wealth and power. Overall, the Marxist view would be that education is already preparing children for the global workplace by reproducing inequality and manual labourers who will be underpaid and mistreated in the workplace so that Trans-Na tional Corporations can make the biggest profits; whilst the middle class children shall become the management of the companies and the hierarchy shall be present in the global workplace as it was in school. Webers Interactionist theory examines how individuals and groups create patterns of behaviour which shape the systems. Beckers labelling theory explains how if a teacher labels a pupil negatively in school then a pupil will go on to fulfil that label. Labelling is an effect of the characteristics of a pupil on a teachers views of the student. If a child is labelled in school by a class teacher because they appear scruffy or lazy, this can be down to relative poverty in the home which could cause the child to be frequently tired and without the necessary resources to assist their learning. This can result in a teacher labelling a pupil as lazy, unenthusiastic or simply unwilling to learn, which then goes on to affect the childs achievement within school and possibly even later life. Labelling is potentially a major factor in working class children going on to perform manual labour jobs, making up the majority of a national and global workforce and remaining in their social class. Marx ism would maintain this is true and would state that this is the sole aim for the education system, to produce a global workforce that can benefit society economically. The world is in a transformation that means there is no longer a clear distinction between international and domestic, external and internal affairs (Rosenau, 1990). This statement by Rosenau explains how the world through modernisation is now merged into one global workplace. Globalisation has created a world where each individual country is now reliant upon one another for goods and services and so act not alone, but more as one. Globalisation has integrated rich, affluent, and educated classes, but has fractured working classes and marginalised the poor, who do not have the skills and economic clout to profit from open markets (Shalmali Guttal 2007). This statement from Guttal shows how Globalisation may be positive in terms of benefitting the rich and providing opportunities for the middle class but at the expense of the working class. Therefore if a student struggles academically and cannot go on to higher education, they should not suffer in todays society by not benefitting from the gains of globalisation. This is one way that Globalisation is creating inequality in society and if the education system was to prepare students for the global workplace then this would simply be reinforcing inequality in school. The purpose of education is to benefit the lives of all children in school not just to progress the lives of those children who have already been born into the middle and upper classes. Economic gain is not the vital target for the result of education. Globalisation enters the education sector on an ideological horse, and its effects on education and the production of knowledge are largely a product of that financially-driven, free-market ideology, not of a clear conception for improving education (Carnoy, 1999). Bowles Gintis explain how school relates to the workplace via the overt and the hidden curriculum. Orders are given by the teacher/boss to the student/worker to follow. The person in charge of the student/worker will have to give permission for the individual to use the toilet, when to go and return for fixed time breaks, will assign work tasks to the individual/group, give rewards for hard work, place emphasis on attitude towards tasks, give work to be done at home and discipline the students/workforce. Nearly every single thing a person will experience when they enter the workplace is imitated within the schooling system to prepare students for the global workplace. The restricted and elaborated language code explained by Bernstein not only puts working class children at a disadvantage in the schooling environment but also in the working environment and especially in the multi-national corporations of todays global workplace. If a working class child is underachieving in school because of the dominant elaborated language code used by teachers, then that student will not secure themselves a well-paid job in the management sector of TNCs because of their achievement academically and because of their dominant use of the restricted language code. In the global workplace, as well as in education, the elaborated language code is used. Therefore, the use of the elaborated language code in education and the global workplace is reproducing inequality by keeping the working class limited to the restricted code which results in them only gaining manual labour jobs and becoming the primary workforce of the global workplace. As a result of this, more emphasi s needs to be put on teaching children the elaborated language code in school before they reach the workplace, but in a gradual, subtle way so they can pick it up rather than being at a disadvantage right from the beginning of school. This is one major way that education needs to prepare students for the global workplace simply so that inequality is not being reproduced as a result of the schooling system. Bourdieus forms of capital can link to Bernsteins language codes in terms of class and social structure. Bourdieus says that a group or an individuals position in the social structure depends on three forms of capital: Economic, social and cultural. Economic capital is everything with a monetary value a person owns, social capital is what types of groups the individual may belong to and cultural capital is the way a person may have been cultured such as frequenting museums and art galleries as a child. These three forms of capital are something a child is either born into or not and as a result is crucial to the individuals position in the social structure as they grow up. It is also important to mention that economic capital can be converted into cultural and social capital by means of paying for a University degree from Kings College, London, and influencing the right to membership of an esteemed social group. A further form of capital that Bourdieu also explains is linguistic capi tal. If an individual is raised in a higher class family where the elaborated language code is used on a daily basis and the child even comes into contact with another language such as Greek or Latin, then that is going to raise their position in the social structure right from a young age (Bourdieu, 1986). Consequently, it is easy to see what role that child shall go on to take in terms of hierarchy in the global workplace and what role a child who has grown up without that form of capital will take. Harbison and Myers say that the role of education Unlocks the door to modernization. In terms of capitalism though, it is debatable whether modernization is a positive thing when it is reproducing inequality and reinforcing the class system. However, inequality is being reproduced not just now in a national sense, but a global sense where the poverty-stricken underclass are being exploited for cheap labor in third world countries by capitalist countries such as America. In conclusion, education is crucial to the development of society but not at the expense of the majority of individuals within that society. The rise of the global workplace through Globalization has created possibly more inequality and greed within the world and to prepare students for that in school would be ethically and morally wrong. It would be right to prepare students for the global workplace by dismissing social backgrounds, treating all equally and assisting those in more need. This could go on to reduce the gap in social class to create equal opportunities for all within the hierarchy of the global workplace. School already prepares students for the world of work in terms of its discipline and rules, and with the world becoming an ever increasingly multi-cultural place, schools are teaching children about other cultures. This therefore, is already preparing children for the global workplace. However, when there is so much inequality and exploitation in the global workplace , simply to enable cheap labour costs and higher profits, it is more important to focus on creating equality in the classroom and trying to make sure all children can achieve what they desire. Karl Marx- (1848), The Communist Manifesto. Margaret L. Andersen Howard F. Taylor, (2005) Sociology: understanding a diverse society. Fourth edition. Howard F. Taylor, (2007). Sociology: The Essentials. Cengage learning, P.425 S. Bowles H. Gintis, (1976). Schooling in Capitalist America. Basic Books Ltd. Shalmali Guttal, (2007). Development in Practice, vol 17, numbers 4-5. Taylor Francis Ltd. Bourdieu, P. (1986). The forms of capital. Reproduced in Ball, S. (ed.) (2004) The RoutledgeFalmer reader in sociology of education. London: RoutledgeFalmer, pp.15-29. Bourdieu, P. and Passeron, J.-C. (1977). Reproduction in education, society and culture. London: Sage. Layard, R. Dunn, J. (2009). A Good Childhood; Searching for Values in a Competitive Age. London, Penguin. Paul Willis, (1977). Learning to Labour: how working class kids get working class jobs. Columbia University Press; Morningside edition. Bernstein, B., (1977). Class, codes and Control vol 3. London: Routledge. Bourdieu, P., (1986). The forms of capital. Reproduced in Ball, S. (ed.) (2004). The RoutledgeFalmer reader in sociology of education. London: RoutledgeFalmer, pp.15-29.

The Rumba Dance Essay examples -- Afro-Cuban, Cuba

The rumba is a dance that rivets its image on the mind. Holding much history, it has been and is a dance of oppositions: love and hate, hostility and harmony, sensuality and prudence. Musically, it taps into the realms of technicality and improvisation. The dance and music is a marvel, leaving a lusty taste in its trail so that a natural tendency towards it never fades. The origins of the rumba stem from Africa. The steps and song of traditional rumba may have begun as remembered pieces of dance from the Ganga or Kisi people in Cuba, generalized groups of West Central African descent. Some prospect that the Sara peoples of northern Nigeria are the originators of rumba, a similar dance is of rows of boys in front of rows of girls, approaching one another in movement and then separating. In present-day Zaire, a traditional BaKongo dance called vane samba appears to directly link to rumba’s progenitors. A characteristic highlight occurs when the bodies of a dancing pair meet, or almost meet at the navel. This movement mirrors the rumba’s vacunao, a prominent feature in some forms of rumba. The name rumba possibly derives from the Spanish language, the word rumbo translates to route, rumba translates to heap pile, and rum is of course the liquor popular in the Caribbean. Any of these words might have been used descriptively when the dance was being formed. The name has most often been claimed to be derived from the Spanish word for carousel, or festival. Rumba developed in the 1850s and 1860s among free black slaves gathered to express their struggles with one another. Following the abolition of slavery in Cuba in 1886, poor Cubans dealt with a society still emphasizing color and class, by... ...national dance. As a native Afro-Cuban simply put, â€Å"This will never die. Nothing can stop it† (Farr 80). Works Cited Pà ©rez Jr., Louis A. On Becoming Cuban. Chapel Hill: The University of North Carolina Press, 1999. Daniel, Yvonne. Rumba: Dance and Social Change in Contemporary Cuba. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1995. Farr, Jory. Rites of Rhythm. New York: HarperCollins Publishers, 2003. Shepherd, Verene A., and Hilary McD. Beckles., ed Caribbean slavery in the Atlantic world. Kingston, Jamaica: Ian Randle, Oxford: James Currey, Princeton, NJ: M. Weiner, 2000. Moore, Robin Dale. Nationalizing Blackness: Afrocubanismo and Artistic Revolution in Havana, 1920-1935. Diss. U of Texas at Austin, 1995. Ann Arbor: UMI, 1995. 9534899. Roy, Maya. Cuban Music. Trans. Denise Asfar and Gabriel Asfar. London: Latin America Bureau, 2002.

Children’s learning needs Essay

As an early years practitioner it is your job to ensure that you meet children’s learning needs and understand and work with all children’s learning needs. It is important that you provide different kinds of opportunities also focus on individual children’s learning needs each and every child is unique and all learn at different rates. When in a setting it is important that you plan an enabling environment that children will find challenging but will allow them to learn in different areas. The United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC) is a legally-binding international agreement setting out the civil, political, economic, social and cultural rights of every child, regardless of their race, religion or abilities. The (UNCRC) was brought together to focus on children’s rights, it is there to show that children’s have rights and their safety is priority as they are more vulnerable. The (UNCRC) states that all children’s wants and learning needs should be met, also it has 5 core rights these being;- The right to life The right to his or her own name and identity The right to be protected from abuse or exploitation The right to an education The right to having their privacy protected To be raised by, or have a relationship with, their parents The right to express their opinions and have these listened to and, where appropriate, acted upon The right to play and enjoy culture and art in safety The (UNCRC) has two main articles that state that children have the right to an education so as a practitioner it is your job to ensure that you are meeting the educational needs for the children within your setting. (Article 28- Right to education)Every child has the right to an education. Primary education must be free. Secondary education must be available to every child. Discipline in schools must respect children’s dignity. Richer countries must help poorer countries achieve this. (Article 29-Goals of education) Education must develop every child’s personality, talents and abilities to the full. It must encourage the child’s respect for human rights, as well as respect for their parents, their own and other cultures, and the environment. https://www.unicef.org.uk/Documents/Publication-pdfs/betterlifeleaflet2012_pr  ess.pdf When in a setting it is important that you ensure that you and parents are working together to ensure that that child is learning the best possible way. It is key to ask parents to encourage their children and help their child out at home. As a practitioner it is your job to ensure that all children are learning some that you can do is send things home for the parent and child so they can learn and have fun at the same time. As an early years practitioner you will recognise that children’s play is closely linked to their learning and development. Children learn in so many different ways but you will notice that they learn mainly through play. When children are able to do many different activity’s that allows them to lean but have fun at the same time thy will find what they are doing fun and will engage the children. It is important that when in you your setting you set up a variety of educational activity’s this way the children will be able to choose freely what they want to do. Play is essential to every part of children’s lives and is important to their development. It provides the children with different ways of doing things children will want to explore and learn new things. The Early years Foundation Stage (EYFS) is a piece of frame work that relates to children from birth to five years old and id there to ensure that every child has the best possible start to in life and to make sure that all children are given support that enables them to fulfil the potential. It is important that as a practitioner you understand that children develop quickly and the children’s experiences between birth and age five have a major impact on their future lives. The EYFS specifies requirements for learning and development and for safeguarding children and promoting their welfare. The learning and development requirements cover: The Seven Areas Of Learning And Development which must shape activities and experiences (educational programmes) for children in all early years settings which are described below; The Early Learning Goals that providers must help children work towards. The goals summarise the knowledge, skills and understanding that all young children should have gained by the end of the Reception year, ie. the year that they turn five years old; Learning Goals. Assessment Arrangements For Measuring Progress when and how  practitioners must assess children’s achievements, and when and how they should discuss children’s progress with parents and/or carers. The Safeguarding and Welfare Requirements cover the steps that providers must take to keep children safe and promote their welfare. http://www.harwoodnursery.com/page_10.html Learning and development requirements There are six areas covered by the early learning goals and educational programmes: Personal, social and emotional development Communication, language and literacy Problem solving, reasoning and numeracy Knowledge and understanding of the world Physical development Creative development. http://www.playengland.org.uk/media/130519/eyfs-ofsted-childcare-register-summary.pdf There are many different theorists that relate to children’s play and provide the importance of it one of the theorists being Lev Vygotsky, Vygotsky believed that imaginative play was crucial to a child’s normal development also he believed that play and activity gives children much keener experiences of pleasure than play. He saw that play was important to a child he said that early years play built the foundations of a child’s early life due to the child being able to learn from all the different kinds of activity’s he stated that there was many different kinds of things that would act as the stepping stones of the child’s future development. â€Å"In play a child’s always behaves beyond his average age, above his daily behaviour. In play it is as though he were a head taller that himself.† https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=lev+vygotsky+quotes+on+play http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/education/1721196.stm Bibliography- https://www.unicef.org.uk/Documents/Publication-pdfs/betterlifeleaflet2012_press.pdf http://www.harwoodnursery.com/page_10.html http://www.playengland.org.uk/media/130519/eyfs-ofsted-childcare-register-summary.pdf http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/education/1721196.stm https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=lev+vygotsky+quotes+on+play

War in the World essays

War in the World essays On Aug. 2, 1990, Iraqi military forces, on orders from President Saddam Hussein, invaded and occupied the small country of Kuwait. The Persian Gulf War of 1991from January 16 to February 28was fought to expel Iraq and restore Kuwaiti independence. The war introduced several technologically advanced weapon systems. As well,the United States forged a broad-based international coalition that confronted Iraq militarily strategy. The military coalition consisted of: unni-versus-Shia (for and Arab-versus-Persian religious and ethnic disputes, to a personal animosity between Saddam Hussein and Ayatollah Khomeini. Above all, Iraq launched the war in an effort to consolidate its rising power in the Arab world and to replace Iran as the dominant Persian Gulf state. Phebe Marr, a noted analyst of Iraqi affairs, stated that "the war was more immediately the result of poor political judgement and miscalculation on the part of Saddam Hussein," and "the decision to invade, taken at a moment of Iranian Iraq and Iran had engaged in border clashes for many years and had revived the dormant Shatt al Arab waterway dispute in 1979. Iraq claimed the 200-kilometer channel up to the Iranian shore as its territory, while Iran insisted that the thalwega line running down the middle of the waterwaynegotiated last in 1975, was the official border. The Iraqis, especially the Baath leadership, regarded the 1975 treaty as merely a truce, not a definitive settlement. The Iraqis also perceived revolutionary Iran's Islamic agenda as threatening to their pan-Arabism. Khomeini, bitter over his expulsion from Iraq in 1977 after fifteen years in An Najaf, vowed to avenge Shia victims of Baathist repression. Baghdad became more confident, however, as it watched the once invincible Imperial Iranian Army disintegrate, as most of its highest ranking officers were executed. ...

The Writer Unplugged - Freewrite Store

The Writer Unplugged - Freewrite Store This is a guest post by Selena Chambers, who writes in Florida. Selena  is co-author of the Hugo and World-Fantasy nominated THE STEAMPUNK BIBLE (Abrams Image), and is currently writing a travel guide to STEAMPUNK PARIS (Pelekenisis Press) with Arthur Morgan out later this year. You can follow her at:   www.selenachambers.wordpress.com or steampunkparis.com. Distraction is the greatest form of resistance a writer faces on a daily basis. I’ve been struggling with it for years, and have come close to throwing my laptop in the trash and running as far away from the publishing game as possible. What kept me from giving up? Slowly realizing that other writers (especially those who seem like they have their act together in the public eye) and creatives struggle with the same issues. Evading distraction and finding focus is, of course, a personal journey and you have to find what works for you and your environment, but in speaking with my friends and gazing into my own navel, I have realized that distraction comes in two forms:   that which takes you closer to writing, and that which takes you away from it. The former is Life and all its abstracts:   birth, death, health, sickness, economy, employment, politics, friendship, family, solitude, love, sex, hate, education, and travel. True, not much writing is happening while undergoing these experiences, but they all inform it by putting you physically in the world to observe, absorb, and feel. It shapes your perspective, gives you an impulse and ultimately grants you something to say. The other kind of distraction, that which takes you away from your writing, are the activities designed for amusement and instant gratification and while relaxing, do very little to inform the work, even though we may trick ourselves in to thinking so. For some, it may be playing video games, binging on Girls, fingernails that need clipping, or in my case, going online.   By no means is this some kind of Jonathan Franzen rant. I love the internet. It is ubiquitous with all the things, and while that is a modern-day marvel, its pervasiveness can be a modern-day time sink. When I sit down to write, I have no problem ignoring my eyebrows and the cat bunnies blowing by like tumbleweeds under the A/C vents, because I can resist the urge to get up from my desk to go handle them. Not so the online â€Å"to-do† list, which is much harder to disregard because all the tools are right here at my fingertips. More often than not, on days when the writing is like digging into dry Georgia clay, I find myself mulling over this list. With a few clicks, I am out of Scrivener’s composition mode, and am in Safari riding the instant gratification wave of multitasking immediacy. I’ll send out queries, answer e-mails, answer social media direct messages, respond to tags and mentions, make a blog post, share the blog post, console in friends and families tribulations, cheer on peers and colleagues triumphs, read this timely article and discuss that timely article, read this stupid drama and discuss even more, scan recent calls for submissions, research a story idea, seek source texts, and when all of that is done, pay bills. I can kill a whole day checking things like this off and feel pretty good about myself. The next day, however, when I am back with that blank page, I would realize how much was left undone and how much more was now left to do. On on that next day, I try to unplug. To do this, I have to get completely away from the computer. Sure, you can deactivate your Facebook, turn off wi-fi, unplug the router, or install some sort of time management or focus software, all of which can be turned back on, plugged in, or disabled. If I really want to avoid distraction, I scrawl in longhand or peck on a typewriter. Even with these two methods, I inevitably come back to computer when I have to transcribe into Word, which sometimes feels redundant and archaic. Even so, at the end of the day I feel more accomplished and nearer to my true writing goals than all the networking, posting, and chasing I do online. Social media and the writer’s platform is one of the puzzle pieces to gaining and maintaining a successful writing career, but what has become even more bewildering is that unplugging and working with focus and without noise is even harder for the twenty-first century writer to navigate. The Writer Unplugged - Freewrite Store This is a guest post by Selena Chambers, who writes in Florida. Selena  is co-author of the Hugo and World-Fantasy nominated THE STEAMPUNK BIBLE (Abrams Image), and is currently writing a travel guide to STEAMPUNK PARIS (Pelekenisis Press) with Arthur Morgan out later this year. You can follow her at:   www.selenachambers.wordpress.com or steampunkparis.com. Distraction is the greatest form of resistance a writer faces on a daily basis. I’ve been struggling with it for years, and have come close to throwing my laptop in the trash and running as far away from the publishing game as possible. What kept me from giving up? Slowly realizing that other writers (especially those who seem like they have their act together in the public eye) and creatives struggle with the same issues. Evading distraction and finding focus is, of course, a personal journey and you have to find what works for you and your environment, but in speaking with my friends and gazing into my own navel, I have realized that distraction comes in two forms:   that which takes you closer to writing, and that which takes you away from it. The former is Life and all its abstracts:   birth, death, health, sickness, economy, employment, politics, friendship, family, solitude, love, sex, hate, education, and travel. True, not much writing is happening while undergoing these experiences, but they all inform it by putting you physically in the world to observe, absorb, and feel. It shapes your perspective, gives you an impulse and ultimately grants you something to say. The other kind of distraction, that which takes you away from your writing, are the activities designed for amusement and instant gratification and while relaxing, do very little to inform the work, even though we may trick ourselves in to thinking so. For some, it may be playing video games, binging on Girls, fingernails that need clipping, or in my case, going online.   By no means is this some kind of Jonathan Franzen rant. I love the internet. It is ubiquitous with all the things, and while that is a modern-day marvel, its pervasiveness can be a modern-day time sink. When I sit down to write, I have no problem ignoring my eyebrows and the cat bunnies blowing by like tumbleweeds under the A/C vents, because I can resist the urge to get up from my desk to go handle them. Not so the online â€Å"to-do† list, which is much harder to disregard because all the tools are right here at my fingertips. More often than not, on days when the writing is like digging into dry Georgia clay, I find myself mulling over this list. With a few clicks, I am out of Scrivener’s composition mode, and am in Safari riding the instant gratification wave of multitasking immediacy. I’ll send out queries, answer e-mails, answer social media direct messages, respond to tags and mentions, make a blog post, share the blog post, console in friends and families tribulations, cheer on peers and colleagues triumphs, read this timely article and discuss that timely article, read this stupid drama and discuss even more, scan recent calls for submissions, research a story idea, seek source texts, and when all of that is done, pay bills. I can kill a whole day checking things like this off and feel pretty good about myself. The next day, however, when I am back with that blank page, I would realize how much was left undone and how much more was now left to do. On on that next day, I try to unplug. To do this, I have to get completely away from the computer. Sure, you can deactivate your Facebook, turn off wi-fi, unplug the router, or install some sort of time management or focus software, all of which can be turned back on, plugged in, or disabled. If I really want to avoid distraction, I scrawl in longhand or peck on a typewriter. Even with these two methods, I inevitably come back to computer when I have to transcribe into Word, which sometimes feels redundant and archaic. Even so, at the end of the day I feel more accomplished and nearer to my true writing goals than all the networking, posting, and chasing I do online. Social media and the writer’s platform is one of the puzzle pieces to gaining and maintaining a successful writing career, but what has become even more bewildering is that unplugging and working with focus and without noise is even harder for the twenty-first century writer to navigate.