Life at Up Up and Away Investment Management International: Chapter 27 Mindfulness: Opiate for the employee?

Chapter 27: Mindfulness as an opiate for the employee?

As for the individual, it is my view that mindfulness can be a double-edged sword. I say this because being able to control your mind better enables you to respond to situations instead of reacting to them. Instead of your mind being cluttered with irrelevant thoughts and fears you can more clearly see the true issues. But it also enables you to deflect a certain amount of stress but note I say” a certain amount”. And if you manage stress for largecorp this means you can accept more responsibilities and tasks. In their eyes you are an endless receptor of stress. In effect you are being manipulated by largecorp should they offer you mindfulness training.

One potential problem with mindfulness is that there is a danger of accepting negativity and avoiding demanding situations by escaping to the present moment, so you can be with the calmness of your breath and body. Or you can end up accepting negativity under the guise of it just being caused by your “wandering mind” and then tuck it away and ignore it. I would not be full of praise for a way of thought that has you accept or avoid negativity which is not what mindfulness should be but this is what largecorp wants it to be. Mindfulness should not be about escapism but equip you to better deal with your environment.

Perhaps the biggest factor in mindfulness is that it is a highly individual practice. There is no call to arms and manning of the barricades. There is no social movement demanding societal changes perhaps many of which would alleviate the human suffering mindfulness sets out to cure. Mindfulness creates no threats for largecorp and to the delight of the Senior Management Team the effects of largecorp induced stress are attributable to the malfunctioning mind of the employee. The employee is the problem as the employee is incapable of bearing or “managing” a crushing load of stress.

I am not saying that mindfulness will transform you into the placid zombie like the pictures of people on mindfulness Facebook pages. There may be your own personal revolution and I hope there is one and that it is highly positive but again you’d need a huge part of the population to be mindful, so self-awareness, kindness and compassion replace greed, egoism and war. That isn’t going to happen at least in the foreseeable future.

From what I have read and participated in from an Up Up and Away Toronto mindfulness programme makes me feel that if you can’t handle, stress, depression, obsessive compulsive disorder or anxiety it is your personal problem. Therefore, if you are horribly stressed at work due to the fact the Senior Management Team needs to make a salary that is 209 times greater than yours which causes them to trim jobs and outsource putting unreasonable demands on you it is your fault that you could not manage the stress and ended up on short term or long-term disability with your brain and soul depleted.

It is ironical that the more humane largecorp wants to be perceived as caring and responsive while it ruthlessly outsources, squeezes employees and downsizes placing an enormous amount of fear and pressure amongst the survivors….” Am I the next one to go?”

Just imagine with stress reduction how much more stressful situations largecorp can heap on its employees. Up goes the profit and down go the disability claims. Largecorp can have its cake and eat it too. And a word to the wise. If largecorp offers you a mindfulness programme grab it. If you don’t it is evidence against you in any disability claim you make related to workplace stress, anxiety or depression.

Largecorps are introducing mindfulness programmes not so much for the well being of employees but to reduce disability claims from over stressed employees and an opportunity to place more work on the employee’s back. The reality of these mindfulness programmes for largecorp is that the individual needs therapy. There is something wrong with the employee that can be subject to a mindfulness fix.

The patient may be healed by mindfulness, but social and economic structures remain unchanged. Is mindfulness a secular religion under capitalism? Will it develop into a new form of ideological domination that encourages and enables people to endure the alienating conditions of capitalism without calling for material revolution, redistribution of wealth or institutional change?

As religion is both dwindling in adherents and in many cases, such as radical Islam, is perceived as threatening, is mindfulness a new form of secular religion? Have we capitulated to capitalism! Are the psychological casualties of our economic system maladaptive degenerates?

Do we add up all the mindful people decades from now and hope instead of zombies we have a population that sees how to change society to improve it? I certainly hope this will be the result of mindfulness but the hijacking of mindfulness by largecorps and its commodification as a for profit industry doesn’t give me much hope.

In the end it is up to you to derive whatever benefit you can from mindfulness and as for the rest of the world hope for the best.

A significant moral problem to be raised here is “Whose side is mindfulness on anyway? Largecorp or employee?”

Perhaps both benefit, particularly if the employee is mindful enough to realize mindfulness was never designed to exploit and increase the productivity of an employee facing jobs cuts and working under chronically stressful conditions. As a final parting thought and spoken from personal experience. Mindfulness can only go so far in stress reduction. At one-point chronic stress is incapable of being managed by mindfulness

Chapter 27

Largecorp mindfulness: Opiate for the employee?

As for the individual, it is my view that mindfulness can be a double-edged sword. I say this because being able to control your mind better enables you to respond to situations instead of reacting to them. Instead of your mind being cluttered with irrelevant thoughts and fears you can more clearly see the true issues. But it also enables you to deflect a certain amount of stress but note I say” a certain amount”. And if you manage stress for largecorp this means you can accept more responsibilities and tasks. In their eyes you are an endless receptor of stress. In effect you are being manipulated by largecorp should they offer you mindfulness training.

One potential problem with mindfulness is that there is a danger of accepting negativity and avoiding demanding situations by escaping to the present moment, so you can be with the calmness of your breath and body. Or you can end up accepting negativity under the guise of it just being caused by your “wandering mind” and then tuck it away and ignore it. I would not be full of praise for a way of thought that has you accept or avoid negativity which is not what mindfulness should be but this is what largecorp wants it to be. Mindfulness should not be about escapism but equip you to better deal with your environment.

Perhaps the biggest factor in mindfulness is that it is a highly individual practice. There is no call to arms and manning of the barricades. There is no social movement demanding societal changes perhaps many of which would alleviate the human suffering mindfulness sets out to cure. Mindfulness creates no threats for largecorp and to the delight of the Senior Management Team the effects of largecorp induced stress are attributable to the malfunctioning mind of the employee. The employee is the problem as the employee is incapable of bearing or “managing” a crushing load of stress.

I am not saying that mindfulness will transform you into the placid zombie like the pictures of people on mindfulness Facebook pages. There may be your own personal revolution and I hope there is one and that it is highly positive but again you’d need a huge part of the population to be mindful, so self-awareness, kindness and compassion replace greed, egoism and war. That isn’t going to happen at least in the foreseeable future.

From what I have read and participated in from an Up Up and Away Toronto mindfulness programme makes me feel that if you can’t handle, stress, depression, obsessive compulsive disorder or anxiety it is your personal problem. Therefore, if you are horribly stressed at work due to the fact the Senior Management Team needs to make a salary that is 209 times greater than yours which causes them to trim jobs and outsource putting unreasonable demands on you it is your fault that you could not manage the stress and ended up on short term or long-term disability with your brain and soul depleted.

It is ironical that the more humane largecorp wants to be perceived as caring and responsive while it ruthlessly outsources, squeezes employees and downsizes placing an enormous amount of fear and pressure amongst the survivors….” Am I the next one to go?”

Just imagine with stress reduction how much more stressful situations largecorp can heap on its employees. Up goes the profit and down go the disability claims. Largecorp can have its cake and eat it too. And a word to the wise. If largecorp offers you a mindfulness programme grab it. If you don’t it is evidence against you in any disability claim you make related to workplace stress, anxiety or depression.

Largecorps are introducing mindfulness programmes not so much for the well being of employees but to reduce disability claims from over stressed employees and an opportunity to place more work on the employee’s back. The reality of these mindfulness programmes for largecorp is that the individual needs therapy. There is something wrong with the employee that can be subject to a mindfulness fix.

The patient may be healed by mindfulness, but social and economic structures remain unchanged. Is mindfulness a secular religion under capitalism? Will it develop into a new form of ideological domination that encourages and enables people to endure the alienating conditions of capitalism without calling for material revolution, redistribution of wealth or institutional change?

As religion is both dwindling in adherents and in many cases, such as radical Islam, is perceived as threatening, is mindfulness a new form of secular religion? Have we capitulated to capitalism! Are the psychological casualties of our economic system maladaptive degenerates?

Do we add up all the mindful people decades from now and hope instead of zombies we have a population that sees how to change society to improve it? I certainly hope this will be the result of mindfulness but the hijacking of mindfulness by largecorps and its commodification as a for profit industry doesn’t give me much hope.

In the end it is up to you to derive whatever benefit you can from mindfulness and as for the rest of the world hope for the best.

A significant moral problem to be raised here is “Whose side is mindfulness on anyway? Largecorp or employee?”

Perhaps both benefit, particularly if the employee is mindful enough to realize mindfulness was never designed to exploit and increase the productivity of an employee facing jobs cuts and working under chronically stressful conditions. As a final parting thought and spoken from personal experience. Mindfulness can only go so far in stress reduction. At one-point chronic stress is incapable of being managed by mindfulness

Life at Up Up and Away: Chapter 26:The mindfulness craze hits largecorp; What exactly is it?

Chapter 26 The mindfulness craze hits largecorp. What exactly is it?

As long-term disability claims mount at largecorp well then word is out in the street just how stressful the largecorp is, employee satisfaction shrinks and stress levels skyrocket illustrating the dismal failure of managing by the Senior Management Team. So largecorp has latched on to the mindfulness craze that is sweeping the industrialized world as an attempt to mitigate employee stress hence ultimately to increase its productivity. The only compassion the SMT has is for profits not for humans.

When taught properly mindfulness is self liberating as it can free you from your mind’s unhelpful workings.

The more you delve into a subject, as is often the case, the less you really know about it. It has got to the point that all levels of educational institutions have latched on to mindfulness and are teaching their students how to think and act mindfully. The University of Toronto and the University of Leiden (amongst a whole host of organizations) offer mindfulness certification courses!   Psychologists and psychiatrists are recommending it as therapy and in some cases as an alternative to anti-depressants. The qualifications of those running mindfulness sessions is totally unregulated. Debate and discussion rages over the meaning of mindfulness.

The best advice I can give you is do not think that things are as they appear. Between reality (if there is such a thing) and your mind there is an open space and it is in this space there is what and where I think mindfulness lies.

Perhaps one of the most powerful statements on mindfulness comes from Professor Chris Goto-Jones        (Guest professor at Honours Academy at Leiden University (NL)) where he comments on Daoism and its link to modern construct mindfulness. “There is a real sense in philosophical Daoism that human civilization per se, might be the origin of all our suffering, clumsiness and immorality. Humans are maladapted to their own civilizations. Institutionalized human cleverness or civilization is precisely that layer of veneer that prevents us for directly accessing reality. It conditions us from the day we’re born to think in terms of categories, discriminations and preoccupy our attention in place of direct experiences of the world around us.”

Put another way there is an experience in the present moment which we fail to take the time to think about and in an unthinking way slot it into our ideological system. It is as if we are preconditioned to slot experiences into a comfortable cubbyhole without truly experiencing what they are and what they feel like.

So, I am sorry I can’t give you a clean and precise definition of mindfulness. But based on my experiences and studies I can make some observations.

  1. Mindfulness is categorized into “state mindfulness” and “trait mindfulness”. State mindfulness involves various meditative practices that train the mind to focus on the experience and to discipline the mind from unnecessary wandering that detracts from the experience and may cause suffering. This is known as being in the present moment. Trait mindfulness goes beyond meditation and asks if your character is mindful.
  2. What mindfulness is ultimately is for you to decide. It is the sum totality of your practice. If it works BRAVO! If it does not it is because you have not put the effort into it or have been improperly taught.
  3. Construct mindfulness is broken into MBSR (Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction) and MBCT (Mindfulness Based Cognitive Therapy). MBSR is a method of relieving stress and anxiety for healthy individuals. MBCT is used as a therapy for mentally unhealthy individuals who, for example, may be suffering from amongst other conditions, obsessive compulsive disorder, anxiety and depression.
  4. Mindfulness may cause psychological disturbances that may cause you harm. If you are suffering from mental illness consult your psychiatrist or psychologist before taking any mindfulness course.
  5. Mindfulness involves discipline. Regular meditation has been shown to modify the brain in many ways almost always beneficial. You must be committed.
  6. Mindfulness meditation need not be sitting in a lotus position. Any position in which you feel comfortable works. Almost all meditators engaged in serious meditation do so with closed eyes.
  7. Mindfulness is not some form of Orientalism although it has Daoist and Buddhist traditions.
  8. Be open to competing arguments as to mindfulness. Marxist ideology seems to state if you are mindful you are no threat to capitalist society as you are simply trying to adapt to an exploitative economic system. Mindfulness is the new opiate of the masses. Be aware of commercial interests that exploit the mindfulness trend. Drinking mindfulness tea or meditating on a mindful mat aren’t necessarily going to make you mindful.
  9. Today’s society seems tilted against failure. Mindfulness involves being kind and compassionate to yourself and third parties. I am now reading a book by Thupten Jinpa, monk and the former translator for the Dalai Lama, “A Fearless Heart” that suggests to me compassionate cultivation training is the next big thing! Thupten Jinpa writes, “Compassion for ourselves and for others-takes courage to take care of ourselves, to make decisions in our best interest and not let fear of what other people think throw us off course. It also takes courage to care what people think, to have compassion for the effects of our actions on others. Compassion requires us to pay attention and engage with other people’s troubles and suffering when it might be easier to ignore them or to otherwise make do with the status quo.”One must ask is largecorp showing any compassion for its employees or are they simply as Karl Marx would say “means of production”?
  10. Don’t fall for those who purport to define mindfulness is a few sentences. There are holes galore in the definitions I have seen. You have the challenging task of determining what it means for you. The starting definition of mindfulness is that of John Kabat-Zinn, “The awareness that emerges through paying attention on purpose, in the present moment, and non-judgementally to the unfolding of experience moment to moment”.
  11. Stay off automatic pilot which means reacting in the same way and in the same patterns without thinking. Response as opposed to reaction is always to be preferred.
  12. How you relate to experiences that might be unpleasant depends on how you react to them. You are shot in the ankle by an arrow by an enemy tribe. That is painful but instead of dealing with the pain you go into a series of automatic unkind and uncompassionate thoughts about why you were wearing a highly visible outfit and hanging out with a nefarious bunch of thugs. Your reaction in effect has unleashed a whole hail of additional arrows. You must try and respond the present moment of being wounded rather than heaping on additional self-criticism.
  13. In mindfulness, you learn to cultivate an increasing awareness of your experiences in a moment-by-moment way. The more aware you are of what is unfolding for you the less you are controlled by your experiences and the more choices you can make.
  14. In mindfulness, hopefully you will learn that thoughts are not facts. Some thoughts are totally untrue, some partially true and some are true. Even if it is true and a negative one for you there is no need to get totally caught up in it so that it becomes destructive. You are only human.
  15. You’ll be aware that there is a voice in your head that never shuts up unless you try to control it. That voice is planning, criticizing, warning, advising etc. Hopefully, you gain the ability to recognize these voices and then respond by choosing to ignore, agree or disagree with them.
  16. Mindfulness should teach you how to take care of yourself. Your mind can only take so much punishment and negativity. You must learn to replenish and reinvigorate it with things that give it pleasure. Do I really have to stay all day in the office when I can go out for a walk with the children, have a great dinner and watch a family movie? Perhaps take 20 minutes each morning to enjoy a coffee with a friend or go for an hour long walk with a friend at lunch and discuss life instead of being hunched over at your desk eating lunch. Let largecorp just drain you until you are dry? That shows you have no compassion for yourself.

“Psycho Goreman”: Not Quite What you Expect

Director of “Psycho Goreman” Steven Kostanski may think he has it over me as he seemed to be a great horror movie aficionado of horror movies from the 80’s and mid 90’s. As Kostanski says, “As a kid, the relationship between John Connor and the T-800 Terminator in Terminator 2 amazed me, this kid could relate to with a badass killing machine as his pal, Skeletor, Cobra Commander, Megatron…I would actually imagine hanging with these guys.”  Not having seen Terminator 2 I can’t relate to what he is saying although growing up in the 60’s and 70’s I have seen many a horror movie including the less than sophisticated horror movies of the 50’s. And Psycho Goreman (PG for short) to me looks like a sophisticated alien type monster from the 50’s! So having seen “The Night of the Living Dead” and other Hollywood B horror movies I am not a newbie to horror films.

For me this is a unique gem of a horror movie because interspersed with the horror the film takes on great comedic angles if not a touch of sarcasm to the horror movie genre. You may even rightfully say it borders on the absurd.

PG is an exile from the planet Gigax a former slave of the Templars who acquires super strength through a glowing jewel. Although he liberates Gigax he is undercut by his army who opt for a power sharing deal with the Templars and PG is sent to some distant planet and buried. That distant planet so happens to be earth. The galactic assemblage of rulers become alarmed when pre-teen brother and sister Luke (Owen Myre) and Mimi (Nina-Josee Hanna) dig a huge hole in their backyard and accidentally liberate PG but Mimi has his power source, the jewel. PG is one badass killing machine and looks like a 1950’s reptilelike monster except much better made up. The galactic council of Gigax is terrified that PG will destroy the universe. But Pandora, a Templar, vows to go to earth and destroy PG.  If PG is not stopped his goal is to annihilate the universe.

Mimi is a spunky girl with a don’t push me around attitude and when first confronted with PG gives him a piece of her mind but in effect controls him as she has the jewel. This brazen girl controlling a horrific killing machine! It’s absurd but Mimi has the jewel. Mimi is also a bit of a bully especially toward her brother Luke.

Remnants of PG’s former army arrive on earth and odd-looking creatures they are. Fantastic and innovative costuming and humorous looking creatures some of them are. They want PG eliminated as he would threaten the balance of power on Gigax. He defeats them but suffers a serious wound and only the jewel can restore him. Should Mimi give it to him as he had often threatened to kill all earthlings including Mimi and Luke whom he promised a particularly miserable death. And talk about bad timing as Pandora a powerful Templar warrior arrives on earth vowing to annihilate PG.

So does tough little Mimi give PG the jewel? Can this brazen little girl trust a nasty monster and save his life by giving him the jewel? Well she does and PG is restored so he can defeat Pandora in an epic battle. PG admits he has discovered the power of love and Mimi has repaired her relationship with Luke . What a happy ending. Mimi, Luke and their parents are spared so we should all be smiling thinking a fitting end to a good movie. Well director Kostanski has other ideas and we could become existential and query what was all this intervening plot about. Enough said. How can I categorize the ending? It seems to be possibly an intended jab of a 50’s and 60’s horror film. I may not be of Kostanki’s era but my enjoyment of those poorly constructed movies (e.g. “The Blob”) served me well for this movie and made the ending perfect.

I agree with Kostanski when he says, “ I also like the dynamics of these two opposites-PG and Mimi. One’s the most terrifying creatures in the universe, the other is a child whose naïve confidence allows her to boss him around. That relationship is really the movie’s heartbeat.”

The movie is supposed to open throughout Canada on January 22 in theatre but given the trajectory of COVID-19 that seems doubtful. The film will be available for streaming on January 22 via iTunes, Cineplex, Bell, Rogers, Shaw, Telus and Vimeo.

In my opinion not suitable for young children.

A thoroughly enjoyable movie.

You can catch the trailer here https://www.dropbox.com/sh/3b06e0azir03vfw/AACKsmf_UCkfBctpi1lxBrWoa?dl=0&preview=PG_TRAILER-CINEPLEX.mov

Life at Up Up and Away Investment Management International: Chapter 25 Megastress Largecorp

Chapter 25

Megastress Largecorp

Mental illness is the leading cause of disability claims in Canada. Is this because stress is now more widely recognized or is it because largecorp’s Senior Management Team mismanagement has created an increasingly stressful environment? I’ll vote the latter.

In a recent study of the Canadian workplace by the employee benefits consulting firm Morneau Shepell it was found that 43% of managers and 34% of employees reported suffering from extreme levels of organizational stress with both groups ranking workplace stress over that of personal stress.57% of both these groups indicated that they are currently suffering or have in some point in the past suffered from a mental health issue or sleep related disorder. The clear majority of respondents felt employers should take an active role in supporting distressed employees.

So why is largecorp to blame for workplace stress? I think it is often to be found in a previous chapter where we discussed what it takes to advance up in the ranks of largecorp. These same events are frequently the events that cause stress for the largecorp employee.

  • Downsizing

If downsizing was a form of magic the employee downsized would be dispensed with like a junkie’s syringe at a safe injection site and that employee’s job function and task would mysteriously disappear. However, the job function remains without an employee to perform it. Someone must fill in for the departed employee! Impeccable logic demands that these functions be transferred to the remaining employees.

Now imagine after successive rounds of downsizing the unassigned work just adding up and being “reassigned” to the remaining employees. Is this a neutral emotional and physical event? Or is it an event that heaps more responsibility, work and stress on the survivors of downsizing? The answer appears quite apparent. Load them up and hope they don’t buckle is the hope of the compassionate and caring Senior Management Team of largecorp.

Trust me on this but there is a breaking point for everyone. I think the SMT’s strategy is to let the weak ones be culled and quit or go on long-term disability. As most long-term disability programmes are funded by insurance companies retained by largecorp severe employee burn out is no longer an out of pocket expense of largecorp unless stress claims skyrocket and insurance premiums payable by largecorp increase! Largecorp pays short term disability but usually for 10-20 weeks but after that it progresses to long term disability which most often is paid out of the insurance company’s pocket.

  • Outsourcing

At first blush one would think outsourcing might reduce stress as the job function is removed to a foreign jurisdiction. However are the outsourced employees in these foreign jurisdictions not also subject to stress albeit at a cheaper cost to largecorp? Stress is transferred not eliminated.

And given the different time zones of the outsourced destinations the difficulty in managing this at “head office” is not easy. Staggered supervisory shifts are required at “head office” subjecting the supervisors to the night shift stress factor previously thought restricted to the industrial night shift worker.

  • The unhealthy work ethic

Largecorps, particularly those with head offices in the United States, have a very unhealthy work ethic. Slavery may have been abolished in the United States but there remains a slavery-based work ethic that drains and depletes. Americans are the highest forfeiters of vacation in the world and what is good for America is good for Canada or whatever branch plant or office largecorp has on the go.

In my experiences at Up Up and Away America many of my American counterparts worked throughout their vacation. Mobile phones were always at hand. To hell with family commitments. The attitude was pride at being shortchanged and manipulated by Up Up and Away America. Dummies. And of course, heading out for lunch is a deadly sin. Chained to your desk was in vogue at Up Up and Away New York but never fully embraced at Up Up and Away Toronto.

I remember receiving many a mobile phone communication at early morning hours over a “big deal” for an “important client”. Time is always of the essence unless it was your time in which case it had no value for largecorp.

  • The do-it-yourself mentality and the “liquidation” of administrative assistants

You know when I started with CRAP and Up Up and Away Toronto there were omnipresent “admin assistants” to assist you whether it be photocopying, printing, processing expenses, making travel arrangements and often CYA. These admin assistants were liquidated over the years and suddenly you as a lawyer or senior manager were stuck with performing administrative tasks that were not germane to your function. You spent more time on functions not related to your job and had less time to accomplish your tasks. Put crudely you were paid $200 an hour to do $15 an hour tasks but expected to continue doing the $200 an hour tasks as if you still had a $15 an hour admin assistant doing those $15 an hour tasks. Incompetence of the SMT. Talk about a waste of resources. Where on earth were these SMT members educated? Perhaps at the in the pocket schools of business funded and controlled by a cabal of largecorps?

Illogical and stupid yet these folks at the SMT are almost immune from corporate hits so what do they care about heaping admin assistant’s jobs on overworked employees? An example of cost saving being an unwise decision but as we know bad management decisions are the hallmark of an SMT. Is it right you spend half a day trying to process expenses for a $1,500 three-day business trip on a faulty based expense reporting system monitored by poorly trained employees in Mumbai?

  • Bureaucratization of employee performance reviews as largecorp protection

In my father’s era you did your job and went home. You either did a decent job or bad job. You did a bad job you were fired. You either completed your work or didn’t. If you didn’t you were fired. Clean and simple.

Largecorp, stung by litigation over wrongful dismissal, has developed an elaborate performance appraisal system that at Up Up and Away forced upon all employees on a bi-annual basis using unfriendly and complicated software on an “employee dashboard”. Pardon me but what turkeys developed such an unfriendly and utterly stupid system? Employee goals for Up Up and Away Toronto Legal were set by Up Up and Away in New York with no local input. Do as you are told naughty little foreign boy! No democracy here!

  • Silent ageism

Being over 50 at largecorp is a bit stressful unless you are in the SMT. You feel like an outsider and a relic. If largecorp had any compassion it should take a gun to your head like a horse with a broken leg and shoot you to put you out of your misery. Instead to avoid paying out a severance package it will freeze your salary and hope you get so pissed off you’ll quit. Yes, Up Up and Away had a definite unwritten procedure to follow once an employee reached 55 years of age.

  • Insufficient resourcing

Quite closely linked to downsizing but not always is insufficient resourcing. We will delve into this a bit later but I can tell you at Up Up and Away Toronto I covered for three disability leaves and two maternity leaves for fellow colleagues in my Legal Department. This caused an enormous strain on me.  Sally Self offered no competent resources to assist me despite for the last fill in I had advised her I had been diagnosed with workplace stress and anxiety.

  • The urgent need to participate in corporate initiatives

It is the Human Resources Department of largecorp that revelled in promoting totally facile, transparently foolish and timewasting programmes. I have mentioned Global Inclusion and Celebration of Differences as one programme.

Up Up and Away also required all its employees as part of their performance assessment goals to “volunteer” for two philanthropic events each year. A wonderful idea but the software programme to obtain approval was so complicated and flawed it took hours to figure out how to get approval. Why not just ask your boss and get a verbal OK? No, as everything had to be documented so it could be measured and used as a valuable PR tool by Up Up and Away. Despite having to endure the agony of having employees take two days off a year Up Up and Away was trying to convince existing and prospective clients just how community minded it was and it needed some measurable facts to be able to do so. Considering how badly it treated its own community of employees I don’t think it fooled anyone. Most clients really could not care if they were fooled as long as matters looked authentic! Perception as opposed to reality is the name of the game for largecorps.

  • Measurable objectives

Intricately linked to part 5 of this Chapter at the end of my tenure at Up Up and Away Toronto the Legal Department in New York and Toronto was challenged by Up Up and Away New York’s SMT to prove its worth in measurable ways. This is not an easy task as Legal Departments do not produce widgets and in-house corporate counsel don’t mine billable hours like law firms do. Horrifically complicated Excel spreadsheets were created to note whether key contractual clauses were contained in negotiated contracts. Contractual phrases were measured like widgets. Were key contractual terms included in each contract?  If not, was management approval obtained? It was getting so complicated and time consuming that despite hiring some 50 junior lawyers (at an enormous expense) in New York to help with inputting these contractual terms on the Excel spreadsheet this measurability project was beginning to choke all Up Up and Away Toronto’s and New York’s legal departments. The result was further bureaucratization of Up Up and Away’s legal departments so that a decreasing amount of time was spent dealing with legal issues and more on reporting and documenting what the lawyers had negotiated.

 I recall driving into work one night and hearing a radio special on stress in the workplace. The expert interviewed said quite simply stress is an inability to reach a goal due to interruptions. The goal of Up Up and Away’s lawyers was to solve legal problems and negotiating contracts. This contract measurability project was an interruption to these goals. Up Up and Away’s legal departments were operating under extremely high stress levels.

  • Yankee imperialism raises its ugly head in Canada

I think I have said I understand that many a largecorp is controlled by Americans. That is fine with me. However, I become uncomfortable when American law imposes obligations on Canadian subsidiaries such as Sarbanes Oxley legislation. U.S. extra-territorial legislation has no place in Canada but tell that to Up Up and Away New York who scrambled like a chicken with its head cut off to have Canada comply with Yankee legislation. And by God yet another round of exhaustive of projects were launched to the point 75% of my time was devoted to “administration” as opposed to doing my core job function. Servicing Canadian clients had no relevance. Obeying Yankee legislators was Numero Uno! A sad by product of American imperialism was subjecting its foreign operations to American law. Having American law apply required a detailed analysis of where it should apply then determine how to make it apply. Hundreds of hours were consumed!

Does Sugar Contribute to Gut Inflammation?

Curr Dev Nutr. 2019 Jun; 3(Suppl 1): nzz040.P20-041-19.Published online 2019 Jun 13. doi: 10.1093/cdn/nzz040.P20-041-19PMCID: PMC6575000

Sugar-sweetened Beverage and High Fat Diet Consumption Harmfully Alters Gut Microbiota and Promotes Gut Inflammation (P20-041-19)

Woo-Jeong Shon, Min Ho Jung, Eun Young Choi, and Dong-Mi ShinAuthor informationCopyright and License informationDisclaimer

Abstract

Objectives

It is clear that epidemiologic trends document a dramatic increasing incidence of inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) paralleling global westernization. Despite strong tie among diets, gut microbiota (GM) and IBD, the exact mechanisms causing IBD remains incompletely understood. Here we hypothesized that changes in the gut immune system, in response to changes in gut microbiome induced “Westernized diet”, would be sufficient to trigger IBD.

Methods

We set out to test this hypothesized by analyzing the changes in gut microbiota composition induced by feeding mice with High sugar-solution or/and High fat and demonstrated their causal roles through high-throughput microbiome analyses. We further assessed changes in inflammatory cell recruitment using flow cytometry, and performed transcriptomic profiling analyses of intestine tissue to identify altered gut microbiota deliver changes in intestinal innate immune and adaptive T cell homeostasis. Importantly, to identify the role of the microbiota in directing host immune responses, fecal microbiota transplantation (FMT) experiments were conducted.

Results

The microbiome analyses results showed that Prevotella, Betaproteobacteria, and Cytophaga, which are a well-known the most representative species in IBD, was significantly enriched only in the HF-Sugar group, suggesting that addition of high-sugar to high-fat diet may reshape the GM by favoring colonization of pathobionts. Also, transcriptome and FACS profiling results showed, among others, high sugar synergistically changes intestinal transcriptomic signature related Inflammatory/Immune Response induced by several pro-inflammatory cytokines and induces expansion of inflammatory DCs and T cells driven by the high fat diet. By using FMT, we prove that host immune traits can be regulated by altering the GM.

Conclusions

Together, our large-scale profiling analyses may uncover an interaction between dietary alterations causing IBD and gut microbiota and provide helpful information regarding the microbiota plays a critical role in programming the immune phenotypes of the host.

Funding Sources

This research was supported by Basic Science Research Program through the National Research Foundation of Korea (NRF) funded by the Ministry of Education (NRF-2018R1D1A1B07048023).

Articles from Current Developments in Nutrition are provided here courtesy of American Society for Nutrition

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Is there a link between sugar and cognitive impairment?

Clin Interv Aging. 2019; 14: 1331–1342.Published online 2019 Jul 22. doi: 10.2147/CIA.S211534PMCID: PMC6662517PMID: 31413554

Habitual sugar intake and cognitive impairment among multi-ethnic Malaysian older adults

CP Chong,1S Shahar,1H Haron,1 and N Che Din2Author informationArticle notesCopyright and License informationDisclaimerCopyright © 2019 Chong et al.This work is published and licensed by Dove Medical Press Limited. The full terms of this license are available at https://www.dovepress.com/terms.php and incorporate the Creative Commons Attribution – Non Commercial (unported, v3.0) License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/3.0/). By accessing the work you hereby accept the Terms. Non-commercial uses of the work are permitted without any further permission from Dove Medical Press Limited, provided the work is properly attributed. For permission for commercial use of this work, please see paragraphs 4.2 and 5 of our Terms (https://www.dovepress.com/terms.php).This article has been cited by other articles in PMC.Go to:

Abstract

Background: Sugar is widely consumed in Malaysia, and the excessive intake of sugar has been associated with cognitive functions. However, the association between sugar intake and cognitive impairment among Malaysian older adults is yet to be determined.

Purpose: The objective of this study was to evaluate the associations between types and sources of sugar intake and cognitive functions and to identify their risk in predicting cognitive impairment (MMSE score <24).

Subjects and methods: A total of 1,209 subjects aged ≥60 years were recruited through multi-stage random sampling from selected states in Malaysia. Dietary intake was derived using a 7-day dietary history questionnaire and supplemented with a quantitative food frequency questionnaire for added sugar intake.

Results: The prevalence of cognitive impairment as defined by Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE) less than 24 was 31.9%, while the prevalence of mild cognitive impairment was 13.1%. The median (IQR) for total sugar intake was 44.60 g/day (26.21–68.81) or 8 tsp, and free sugar intake was 33.08 g/day (17.48–57.26) or 6 tsp. The higher intake of total sugars, free sugars, sucrose, lactose, sugar-sweetened beverages, sugar-sweetened cakes, and dessert was found to be significantly associated with a lower MMSE score, after adjusting for covariates. On the other hand, the consumption of cooked dishes and fruits was significantly associated with a better MMSE score. The adjusted OR for risk of cognitive impairment (MMSE score <24) was 3.30 (95% CI 2.15–5.08) for total sugars and 3.58 (95% CI 2.32–5.52) for free sugars, comparing the highest with the lowest intake percentiles.

Conclusion: Excessive sugar consumption among older adults showed a notable association with poor cognitive functions, but longitudinal studies and clinical trials are further needed to clarify the direction of causality and to investigate the underlying mechanism.Keywords: sugar intake, free sugar, sucrose, cognitive functions, older adultsGo to:

Background

Sugar, in the form of glucose, is the primary energy source for cognitive functions. However, excessive sugar consumption may lead to impaired memory, and link to an increased risk of dementia.1 WHO (2015) recommended “free sugar” intake of 25 g per day for an adult of normal BMI and the Malaysia dietary recommendation suggested intake of <10% of the total calories from total sugar.2 Nevertheless, the Food Balance Sheets showed that the amount of available sugar (kg per capita per year) has risen by 91% from 22.51 kg in 1963 to 42.96 kg in 2013. At this level, Malaysia ranks among the topmost countries in Asia concerning the availability of sugar.3 This dietary pattern that involves the rapid escalation of the availability of sugar is quite alarming, as it is related to an increase in the prevalence of obesity and type 2 diabetes.4,5

Sugar intake has also been linked with high blood glucose,4 high blood pressure,6 dyslipidemia,7 and a constellation of these metabolic risk factors, ie, the metabolic syndrome.8 Metabolic syndrome has been linked with cognitive impairment and type 2 diabetes is also considered to be a significant risk factor for impaired cognitive function. However, the effect of sugar consumption on cognitive health continues to be a controversial topic.

Data from animal studies have suggested that sugar intake might play a role in cognitive impairment. Studies have examined the effect of sugary diets on spatial learning and memory in the Morris Water Maze found that feeding rats with sugar solution (notable sucrose) showed impaired spatial learning and memory,9–12 while fructose-fed rats showed poorer long-term spatial memory with peripheral metabolic dysfunction (elevated serum glucose, insulin, and triglycerides).13 Accordingly, the results from animal studies provide strong evidence that sugar impairs spatial memory via damage to the hippocampus, a region known to be integral to spatial learning and memory.14

The limited human studies investigating high sugar intake also concurred that sugar consumption could have a significant impact on one’s cognitive abilities. A population-based study among Puerto-Ricans aged between 45 and 75 years old found that total sugars, added sugars, sucrose, glucose, added fructose, and sugar-sweetened beverages were each significantly inversely associated with cognitive function as assessed using Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE).15 Additionally, in a dietary pattern study, Gustaw–Rothenberg investigated the dietary pattern of Alzheimer’s disease (AD) patients characterized as having a high intake of meat, butter, high-fat dairy products, eggs, and refined sugar as compared to the control.16 Similarly, Power et al, in a community-dwelling of an elderly Irish cohort found that the consumption of a high glycaemic diet was associated with impaired cognitive performance as assessed by the MMSE.17 Recently, a double-blind, placebo-controlled, cross-over experimental study was undertaken suggesting that the ingestion of glucose and sucrose led to lower performance of cognitive tasks, ie, simple response time, arithmetic, and Stroop interference.18 Most studies used a single test to determine the cognitive functions. Thus, the present study was conducted to determine the association between sugar intake and cognitive functions as measured by a series of cognitive tests ie digit span, Rey’s auditory verbal learning test (RAVLT), MMSE, Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA), digit symbol, and visual-reproduction test (VR) among multi-ethnic Malaysian older adults.

Sugar in excess may lead to mental disorders

Fructose and uric acid as drivers of a hyperactive foraging response: A clue to behavioral disorders associated with impulsivity or mania?

Author links open overlay panelRichard J.JohnsonaWilliam L.WilsonbSondra T.BlandcMiguel A.LanaspaaaFrom the Division of Renal Diseases, University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus, Aurora, CO 80045, United States of AmericabNew England Inpatient Specialists, North Andover, MA 01845, United States of AmericacDepartment of Psychology, University of Colorado Denver, Denver, CO 80217, United States of America

Received 2 May 2020, Revised 27 September 2020, Accepted 28 September 2020, Available online 1 October 2020.Show lessAdd to MendeleyShareCitehttps://doi.org/10.1016/j.evolhumbehav.2020.09.006Get rights and content

Highlights

•

Recent studies show that fructose is a unique nutrient that stimulates an innate survival pathway for many species that involves the foraging for food with storage of the energy as fat.•

In Western Society the high intake of sugar has placed this survival pathway in overdrive, leading to an increase in obesity and diabetes.•

Excessive fructose intake may lead to a hyperactive foraging response, contributing to behavioral disorders such as attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, manic depression, and aggressive behavior.

Abstract

Several behavioral disorders, including attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), bipolar disorder, and aggressive behaviors are linked with sugar intake and obesity. The reason(s) for this association has been unclear. Here we present a hypothesis supporting a role for fructose, a component of sugar and high fructose corn syrup (HFCS), and uric acid (a fructose metabolite), in increasing the risk for these behavioral disorders. Recent studies have shown that the reason fructose intake is strongly associated with development of metabolic syndrome is that fructose intake activates an evolutionary-based survival pathway that stimulates foraging behavior and the storage of energy as fat. While modest intake may aid animals that would like to store fat as a protective response from food shortage or starvation, we propose that high intake of sugar and HFCS causes a hyperactive foraging response that stimulates craving, impulsivity, risk taking and aggression that increases the risk for ADHD, bipolar disease and aggressive behavior. High glycemic carbohydrates and salty foods may also contribute as they can be converted to fructose in the body. Some studies suggest uric acid produced during fructose metabolism may mediate some of these effects. Chronic stimulation of the pathway could lead to desensitization of hedonic responses and induce depression. In conclusion, a hyperactive foraging response driven by high glycemic carbohydrates and sugars may contribute to affective disorders.

Life at Up Up and Away Investment Management International: Chapter 24 Largecorp’s contract game

Chapter 24

Largecorp’s contract game

Accompanying the downsizing and outsourcing largecorp is embracing the concept of contract employment. In many cases I have friends who have been on continually renewed contracts for over a decade.

There are several advantages to largecorp in availing itself of this strategy. It’s very easy to terminate a contract employee as in almost cases they have signed an employment offer and relinquished any rights they have to common law notice. This makes them cheaper than terminating non-contract employees. Additionally, there are no medical or pension benefits to pay a contract worker.

Not having the benefit of any meaty severance rights makes the contract employee very expendable and insecure. Ultimately cheap employees help the bottom line of largecorp. Yet to be determined legally is whether a decade long contract employee is and should be treated like a full-time employee.

Of course, on the downside largecorp realizes its contract employees have no loyalty and will hire themselves out to the highest bidder. Many continue to search for full time employment so one wonders what attention span they have while working at largecorp.

This expansion of a contract-based workforce is part of a strategy to strip out a full-time workforce to pave the way for artificial intelligence to replace almost all employees. In many cases this holding a contract employee in suspense until and if the contract renewal occurs is cruel. On the positive side they are free from the largecorp programmes and bullshit foistered on full time employees. And many can incorporate and deduct expenses from their income. These contract workers also not slaves to largecorp’s unpaid overtime abuse.

However you slice and dice it a new class of largecorp employee has been created. A second-class free agent employee devoid of control of the ideological tentacles of largecorp. No allegiances. Distrust of largecorp. Again, we must ask if this is only part of the beginning of the end for largecorp. My view it is a shameful ploy to emasculate its workplace, save money and treat contract employees in a more cattlelike manner than regular employees are.

Let’s not forget the lavish employment contracts members of the Senior Management Team receive when they are terminated which in their sphere is often referred to as “retiring”. Often a “consulting contract” is offered for up to a couple years to help “transition” the SMT member function to a replacement SMT member. They are offered as hush money in the form of a generous severance package which under the guise of these consulting contracts help them “save face” and avoid high level litigation that may cause reputational damage to largecorp. Treat a regular joe like an expendable commodity that is fine but mistreating a high level management employee is more likely to hit the media.

Life at Up Up and Away Investment Management International: Chapter 23 Outsourcing and downsizing as largecorp’s biggest products of Misery

Chapter 23

Outsourcing and downsizing as largecorp’s biggest products of misery

Not being a business school graduate, I am uncertain where the terms “outsourcing” and “downsizing” originated. They are somewhat neutral but hide a good deal of misery. I can say however that I have lived through both and they continue to be the nasty underside of largecorp and most likely will be a force in their demise.

Downsizing means mass firings. The fact downsizing occurs is frequently the result of poor management of the Senior Management Team. Had they been managing largecorp properly there would be no need for downsizing. The excuse most often pointed to is “rising expenditures” which reduce profits and get the analysts all lathered up. The goal is to become “more competitive”.

I have been through mass culls by CRAP and Up Up and Away where thousands were fired. The untold and incalculable misery caused by downsizing is massive. It hurts both victims, spouses, the family and the communities they live in. It shatters the confidence of the remaining employees as they wait bathed in fear and stress for their heads to be on the chopping block during the inevitable next round of downsizing. Further stress is heaped upon them as someone must fill in for the tasks formerly done by the victims.

A companion to downsizing is salary freezes, a frenzy of activity over cutting expenses and often hiring freezes. All these compound the misery of the survivors.

Strangely the SMT incentive payments and enhanced pension benefits keep rolling in and increasing at that!

Then a few years later hopefully profits increase and hiring freezes are maintained as why not keep the remaining employees working to the bone? Work them until they break like mules.

I think a few wise employees realize that the goal of largecorp is to have artificial intelligence reduce as many employees as possible, so downsizing will continue until machines and computers replace employees and create a mass of unemployed and a small group of wealthy senior management types. Social unrest will increase, and a social revolution will take down largecorp and its fat cats or alternatively the revolution will be defeated and the financial tyranny of largecorp will be augmented by political tyranny.

Largecorp creates the seeds of its downfall as the victims see largecorp for what it is. Any trust and respect for all largecorps by its employees and now the general public is transformed into a fiery ball of cynicism and disgust aimed right back at largecorp. Many of the victims of largecorp do end up working for another largecorp but they become actors playing a role solely for the pay. Loyalty is but a joke. Dislike and distrust for the SMT runs rampant. Retirement is an escape into freedom from the tyranny of largecorp ad the welcome bliss of a government pension income below the poverty line.

Outsourcing is more of a silent killer unless it results in downsizing. However, in many cases it means not hiring a local employee but instead hiring a dirt-cheap foreign employee. The central idea is the same and that is to reduce costs. Pay a Mexican assembly line worker $2 an hour which is much cheaper than the $35 an hour the unionized Canadian worker is paid not to mention a generous benefit package tacked onto that nice hourly wage.

In the long run increasing outsourcing raises the standard of living of the foreign workers until at a point they become too expensive for largecorp who then looks to source a new cheaper labour market. As India becomes too expensive the outsourcing then shifts to China or the Philippines. At one point will there be no cheap labour markets so that outsourcing is no longer useful to largecorp?

I note former President Trump’s attempt at bringing back jobs to the United States. Outsourcing is becoming a big American political theme. I recall the Governor of New York and the Mayor of New York City praising the CEO of Up Up and Away New York for being a big New York State employer while it was setting up huge outsourcing operations in Warsaw, Shanghai, Mumbai and Punnai. And when artificial intelligence replaces any need for employees this will include outsourced employees. Many politicians are about as stupid and incapable of management just like the SMT of a largecorp.

It is probably too late to do anything about stopping downsizing and outsourcing. I am not sure what Bully Trump and his successors could do to stop the bleeding? About the only solution I can think of is establishing a punitive tax regime for largecorp that downsize and outsource and a favourable one for largecorps that refrain from outsourcing and downsizing. The result is a more impoverished Third World that will not doubt lead to political and religious radicalization threatening the New American Dream.

Now in Up Up and Away New York’s case its first outsourcing location was Canada! The Canadian dollar was weak and the Toronto workplace was highly educated and culturally and linguistically Canada was very similar to the United States.800 jobs in Toronto were created servicing clients throughout the globe.

Some outsourcing is necessary as many countries in which Up Up and Away America operated in did not have English as their first language, so some local servicing and administrative type employees were required. Additionally, some legislation in these jurisdictions required a local corporation to be set up and locally licensed employees to provide regulated services to clients.

Yes I was downsized by CRAP as my gut feeling was , which turned out to be correct, they were selling my division to a competitor and close to 100 of my fellow employees followed me out the door. I remember being humiliated and very angry. Although if it were to happen again just give me my severance package and good riddance. Of course, may Felicity Poker and her henchman at Ooze & Ooze, Brian Cochon, rot in hell. And I am not going to tell you what I plan to do on their gravestones.

Life at Up Up and Away Investment Management: Chapter 22 Twelve Tips for getting ahead at largecorp

Chapter 22

Twelve tips on how to get ahead at largecorp

1. Never complain or criticize

Be very careful about criticizing or complaining about largecorp in a public forum whether it be in the workplace or social media. This may constitute a valid reason for your termination. To the world you will communicate that largecorp is a wonderful place for you to work at. Remember the phrase used in repressive political regimes namely that, “The walls have ears”. Who knows who what informant might be within largecorp.

2. Praise your Senior Management Team

Your Senior Management Team is bursting with brilliant ideas that are going to increase profits. It is irrelevant for your purposes to note most of the profit ends up in their pockets. Put another way do not bite the hand that feeds you. Like a dictatorial political regime the only news permitted by the SMT is positive news unless it comes from within the SMT. Look at poor Winston and Julia in George Orwell’s “1984”.

3. Work like a dog

Forget any baloney you hear from the largecorp Human Relations Department about how you should lead a balanced life. Never take a full maternity or parental leave. Best to limit your family life or pursue any hobbies so go ahead and hire a nanny. Working out is seen by largecorp as acceptable as it builds your resistance to stress at little or no cost to largecorp. Some week-end work is mandatory. Late nights too! Of course, the more you do the more is expected of you. Don’t think of this as a vicious circle that will take a physical and mental toll on you. Why do you think you have disability and medical plans?

4. Be kind to the peons below you

Your Human Resources Department does not like difficult to get along with people. Let the nastiness amongst the SMT remain within the SMT or be directed towards low life employees. Respect is the right attitude towards those who report to you and work with you.

5. Skip coffee breaks and lunches

Unless you are expected to lunch with clients it is best to avoid taking a lunch hour or coffee break. Nothing smells more like a unionized attitude. Largecorp hates unions unless its leaders are in the SMT pocket in which case unions are ideal for keeping employees in line. Speaking of lunches, no alcohol. Boozy lunches are a thing of the past. It’s Perrier for you. Eating lunch at your desk wins you points. Interesting that it is an established fact from the medical community that that lunch and coffee breaks increase productivity. The failure by the SMT to encourage breaks once again illustrates their poor management skills.

6. Easy on the shrimp!

At client receptions sponsored by largecorp eat no more than three shrimp and make that glass of wine last a long time. You are not there to eat and have an enjoyable time. Networking is the name of the game.

7. No personal use of the internet

Big brother can monitor you.

8. Forget having an affair

They tend to blow up in a messy fashion, so you are taking a chance. You should prefer your reputation as opposed to your lust.

9. Be helpful and available

Sally Self was a master of portraying an image of helpfulness and availability. And her fellow SMT members took away a very positive view of this particularly useful behaviour as it was also solely directed to her fellow members of the SMT and not to her staff.

10. Do not die on the job nor contract a fatal disease

These are career limiting moves. Being a victim of workplace stress and going on disability is just about equal to dying however on the bright side at least you get paid for it if your largecorp group insurer if largecorp has a short- and long-term disability plan.Good luck on prying out and long term disability payments!

11. Do not outshine your boss

If your list of accomplishments begins to start looking superior to the person you are reporting to then you risk a jealous revenge which in my case with Felicity Poker along with some blackmail by Brian Cochon resulted in my termination from CRAP.

12. Take those internal training courses

Eagerly enroll in courses offered by largecorp. Remember you are a team player. Not taking them reflects negativity on your attitude towards self development.