FIVE COMMON REASONS WHY YOU HAVE BACK PAIN

FIVE COMMON REASONS WHY YOU HAVE BACK PAIN

Back pain comes and goes, but when it does show up uninvited, we quickly remember how painful it is. We usually remember our favorite curse words around the same time as back pain showing up. Coincidence? Certainly not. Yet, the pain of back pain is not the only issue. It suddenly disables us from being to carry out everyday tasks and live our regular lives. Whether that’s working with our hands or weaving between pedestrians on our way to the office in the CBD.

When younger people get a bout of back pain, they usually brush over the issue and wait out the few days before things return to normal – which normally does happen. However, if you have no underlying medical issue and you do experience back pain every now and then, you may want to try and evaluate why you are getting it. Even though it may be a temporary problem for you now, experiencing back pain at a young age can be significant over the long term. Moreover, not preventing it from reoccurring can cause much worse issues as you age.

So, young millennials scrolling through social media with cave-man-like posture and professionals planted over there in your office chair – listen up. Let’s find out the real cause of your back pain before it gets worse.

1. TECHNOLOGY

We may have given this one away early and you probably already knew that technology is causing a sedentary lifestyle. However, you may not be aware of the best techniques and methods to reduce technology’s ability to cause you bad posture. Here are two of the best ones:

Put your smartphone in black and white – we are developing upper back pain and neck pain through too much use of our smartphones. One great way of using your smartphone less is by making it boring. And one way to do that is by making it black and white. Humans like colour and when we take that away we become less interested quickly. Try it for yourself.

Work standing up – many office dwellers often believe they cannot rid themselves of inevitable back pain because they have to work sat at a desk all day. This certainly is not the case if they worked standing up using a purpose-specific raised desk or crafted their ownstanding desk in another way. Just remember that too much standing can also give you back pain, so mix it up.

2. CONSIDER YOUR MATTRESS

Many people confuse firmness for support when choosing a mattress. If you think your mattress cannot be causing you back pain because you prefer and own a firmer mattress then think again. By all means, some firm mattresses are super supportive, but it is not that which you need to look out for when buying a quality mattress. Instead, get lumbar support from mattresses that offer memory foam technology or specific supportive aspects. If you want even more support, you may want to consider a magnetic mattress topper. These offer magnetic therapy while you sleep to reduce back pain and improve blood circulation.

3. EXERCISE

Exercise may also cause aches and pains but in very different ways. First of all, you may not be exercising enough. This is common and can cause unwanted tightness in muscles and gradually reduce your flexibility. If this sounds like you, try getting active more and maybe take up yoga or pilates.

On the other hand, you may be exercising too much or using the wrong form to execute certain exercises. If you exercise a lot and have been unable to identify the reason for your back pain then this may be it. It is most common when people are new to weightlifting. On many occasions, it is not caused during the exercises but when moving weights around and placing them back on their racks with the wrong techniques. Be safe in the gym.

4. THE WRONG FOOTWEAR

This one might sound odd but if you spend a lot of your time on your feet or stand in one place for long durations, then your footwear may be the issue. Many people believe that back pain is caused at the point of pain. However, this is not always the case. Some lower back pain is caused by problems at joints below the waistline including the hips, knees, and ankles. Due to the stability of these joints potentially causing back pain, you may need to look at how supportive your footwear is. If you wear flimsy trainers or fashion shoes then consider models which are more comfortable and supportive.

5. STRESS

One of the reasons for back pain that is most often left off peoples’ list of potential causes is stress. Many groups believe that stress and fatigue can contribute to physical pain, including back pain. The jury may still be out on this one but if you’ve been feeling under pressure lately why not take some time for yourself and dig out the good chocolate.

WRAPPING UP

It may be that one of the above is causing you minor problems for the time being and you are letting it pass without investigation, knowing it will ease up in a few days. Well, it’s time to ditch that attitude. With the younger generations predicted to have the worst posture in older age than any other generation, you cannot afford that attitude and you need to act now. Trial the above methods to discover which one will ease up your niggles. The perk when using a trial and error technique to identify the cause of your pain is that any of them are likely to improve your posture and make you appear more confident to others.

See the original source: Fitness in the City

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Google Assistant finally has access to your G Suite calendar

Google Assistant finally has access to your G Suite calendar

Google yesterday announced Calendar support via Google Assistant for G Suite customers at its Google Next event. This means employees and students using G Suite accounts will finally be able to edit, update, and check their Calendar using Assistant. It’s about damn time.

G Suite users have been forced to live with a crippled Assistant for years now, while regular Google account holders have existed in a paradise wherein phrases like “Hey Google, access my Calendar” would solicit a response other than:

But those of us using G Suite have glowered at our Google Minis and Assistant Apps for years awaiting the convenience of one of the few truly useful features of voice assistants. We’re sure Google had a perfectly good reason for Assistant’s absence in the workplace, but for now we’re just happy it’s finally here – unless of course your G Suite administrator hasn’t enabled it.

If that’s the case, rectifying the situation is pretty simple but you’ll need administrator access to your organizations Google Admin console. Once you have that, simply navigate to Google‘s step-by-step instructions on controlling which users have access to the Assistant.

Keep in mind that Assistant integration with G Suite is currently in beta, and only seems to work with the G Suite Calendar at the moment. Google‘s so far kept plans for further integration under wraps. The company did, however, announce several other quality of life upgrades for G Suite. These include:

• G Suite integration with Google Assistant (beta)
• G Suite Add-ons (beta coming soon)
• Drive metadata (beta)
• Hangouts Meet updates: automatic live captions (generally available), public live streaming (coming soon) and increased meeting participants (coming soon)
• Connected sheets (beta coming soon)
• Hangouts Chat into Gmail (beta)
• Office editing in Docs, Slides and Sheets (generally available)
• Visitor sharing in Drive (beta)
• Currents (beta)
• Security collaboration and automation (beta)

For more information, and the full list of G Suite updates check out Google‘s official Blog post here.

Click here for original Source: TNW

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Five Camp Stoves That Will Have You Cooking !

Five Camp Stoves That Will Have You Cooking 

Prepare to impress, my friends. Ditch the dehydrated meals and whip up a four-course gourmet meal, all without breaking a sweat. Camp stoves are like people in that they vary in size, shape, and maximum output, but the reality is that a good camp stove will make a world of difference come dinner time. Below I’ve listed my personal favorites that will turn you into an outdoor Martha Stewart (less the handcuffs) in no time.

Camp Chef Everest

This perennial favorite is tough to beat, and for good reason. This propane stove has two 20,000 BTU burners so you can cook a fair bit of food quickly. Simmer control works nearly as well as our stove at home which is great for soups. The entire stove is generously sized—it fits two 10-12 inch pans— but doesn’t weigh a lot, so it’s relatively portable for a frontcountry stove. Added bonus: the bang for your buck is high at that price point.

Coleman Fold N Go

There is something delightfully appealing about a camp stove you can fold up and carry like a purse, you know? Once unfolded, two large 10,000 BTU burners handle two 10-inch pans on an incredibly stable surface. Seriously, I wondered about the wobble factor but the Fold n Go stuck to the picnic table like glue. It takes up less space than a tradition stove but it also offers up less power, so consider which tradeoff works best for your camp style.

Jetboil Genesis Basecamp

If you come from the backpacking world, you’ve likely used a Jetboil canister stove once or 12 million times. They took that general concept and dove into car camping with the Genesis, an all-in-one camping system that includes two burners, a pot, and a pan. Everything nests together in a tidy storage system that thrills my husband. At first glance, the 10,000 BTU burners seem like they should be underpowered but since they are designed to work specifically with the pans, you won’t notice much of a difference when compared to higher-yield burners. And, surprise: all of this weighs less than 10 pounds.

Coleman Classic Propane

It can be frustrating when reviewers rave about budget items and you realize their bargain-basement price is more than your mortgage. Not so with the Coleman Classic. At less than $50, this camp stove is a heckuva deal. Two 10,000 BTU burners get the job done and while the controls aren’t incredibly dialed in, they are certainly adequate, especially considering the price point. Bottom line: if you want something to cook a meal without blowing the budget, this is your best bet.

Original Poster: theinventory.com

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The True Cost Of Public Cloud

CRN’s Steve Burke says it's vital for companies to have trusted cloud advisers to determine which solution will provide the most value.

"There’s a good reason why strategic service provider CPP Associates’ Infrastructure Anywhere assessment, which is aimed at determining where workloads should reside— on-premises or off-premises—is driving big sales growth.

It’s because CPP Associates is doing the hard work as a trusted adviser, crunching the real numbers to determine which solution will provide the biggest competitive advantage and the biggest bang for the buck.

“We’ve done 27 of these Infrastructure Anywhere assessments and almost every single one has turned out to be the same: On-premises done correctly is always less expensive than off-premises done correctly,” said Paul O’Dell, a director at CPP Associates, Clinton, N.J., which counts Hewlett Packard Enterprise, Amazon Web Services, Microsoft and VMware among its premier partners, along with nine software-defined data center partners, four networking/security partners and four cloud enablement partners.

“It’s a runaway landslide if off-premises is done incorrectly. The savings of 50 [percent] to 75 percent are very realistic. What we tell our customers is: ‘We believe in company-first, but not-cloud first.’ I can assure you that it is in their best interest to have us do one of these studies.”

The assessment is based on a several-week drill down into a customer’s IT systems and environment, including data collection for target workloads with detailed comparisons between public cloud infrastructure costs and on-premises HPE costs. The assessments helped drive 80 percent growth for CPP Associates on the HPE value portfolio in 2018 and 100 percent growth on that portfolio in the first fiscal quarter....."

Read more at the original Source: CRN News

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Facebook awards grants for social media and elections research

Facebook awards grants for social media and elections research

More than 60 projects from all over the world will have access to Facebook’s data.

Facebook is making good on its promise to better understand the complicated role it plays in global politics. The social media giant announced the first recipients of a grant that will allow researchers access to its privacy-protected data for the study of social media's impact on elections. More than 60 researchers from 30 academic institutions from 11 countries were picked by an independent peer-review review board. Grantees will have access to an unprecedented amount of data from Facebook and Instagram for their research; a total of 6.9 billion page posts, 1.2 billion group posts, 11.2 million verified profile posts and 1.6 billion Instagram posts.

While the projects are located all over the world and vary in their approach, they all align with the initiative's wider goal: to find out how fake news on Facebook impacts voting behavior. One study by the National Chengchi University in Taiwan will look at how link sharing influences Taiwanese elections. Another project from Sciences Po in France entitled "I Read It on Facebook": How Do Conversations on Social Media Escape the Agenda-Setting of News Media?" will analyze audiences for every French news outlet during recent elections. One from Ohio State University seeks to understand problematic sharing behavior on Facebook.
Read the complete article from its Original Source: Engadget.com 

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Man Loses 198 Pounds in a Year with the Help of Social Media, Goes Viral

Man Loses 198 Pounds in a Year with the Help of Social Media, Goes Viral

Back in November 2017, Vance Hinds, the district assistant attorney for Ellis County, Texas, weighed a staggering 470 pounds. But then he listened to an episode of The Joe Rogan Experience podcast in which comedian Bert Kreischer talked about running a half-marathon and giving up alcohol for Sober October, and felt inexplicably inspired to start his own weight-loss journey. He posted his very first video from the chair in which he usually sits watching
football, vowing to lead a healthier lifestyle.

Read the complete story at the Original Source: bestlifeonline.com

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Brand Your Personal Social Media Accounts

The personal brand is no longer the exclusive domain of thought leaders and CEOs. Everyone has an opportunity to educate others in their industry, but before you can do so, you need to develop your brand.

Personal branding is about controlling the way others see you. Allowing you to showcase your expertise, and make new connections. In this article, we explain how to brand your personal social media accounts.

Know Your Audience

Defining your audience is an important step toward building a personal brand. If you don’t know who you’re talking to, how can you connect with anyone? If you don’t know where to start, look at others’ profiles and see who they follow and what they talk about.

Who to look at:

• Influencers in the industry
• Colleagues in a similar role
• People who work for companies you’re interested in working for

Take note of who responds to posts, what questions the audience has, and what content people tend to share most.

It’s also worth joining some relevant groups. LinkedIn and Facebook make it easy to connect with others who share your interests and expertise.

Select Your Channels

Decide which social media platforms make the most sense for your personal brand. While all of them are free, there’s no reason to use every single channel. You’ll also want to consider what kind of content you feel most comfortable posting.

If visuals aren’t your thing, stick to LinkedIn and Twitter. Here, the emphasis is less aesthetic-focused and more about the content you share.

LinkedIn

LinkedIn is the most formal channel in the bunch, so be careful about following strangers or asking for recommendations. It’s better to prove your value first.

LinkedIn rules:

• Treat your profile like a digital brochure—it’s the first point of contact for potential connections
• Don’t blindly connect with people—take time to get to know them and send a personalized message.
• Ask for endorsements from your network

Twitter

Twitter is something of a catch-all professional platform. It might be best known for trolls and political troublemakers, but it’s also a great way to keep track of industry leaders and brands.

Twitter rules:

• Post things relevant to your industry
• Use hashtags: Hashtagify.me is a good resource for hashtags related to your field or job opportunities.
• Use industry chats to showcase your expertise
• Start conversations with the people you want to meet

Facebook

Facebook is more than a place to share fake news and get lost in old classmates’ vacation albums. It’s also a flexible platform where you can share videos, links, images, and more.

Facebook rules:

• Don’t be afraid to diversify your content mix
• Learn about your target audience
• Join groups and start your own
• Keep personal and professional separate—you may need to clean up your profile before kicking off your branding efforts.

Instagram

Instagram is best for those working in creative industries. It’s great for designers, artists, and people working in the food and beverage industry. 

• Don’t forget the hashtags
• Stay in your lane rather than straying away from your niche
• Post regularly
• Create an attractive bio

Establish a Tone

We get it, a lot of this “personal branding” stuff conjures up some cringeworthy feelings.

Establish a voice that both feels like “you” and fits in with your industry and audience. Are you the friendly expert, the cheeky and irreverent jokester, or perhaps, a bit more serious?

Social media is overcrowded with self-proclaimed experts, so you’ll need to position yourself in a way that differentiates you from your coworkers and competitors. Much like how corporate brands set social media goals, you’ll want to establish a few of your own.

Some potential goals:

• Build a well-connected network
• Attract a following for a blog or podcast
• Demonstrate expertise in your field

For example, if you want to be seen as an expert in the graphic design space, Google common phrases and start looking for articles, industry updates, and trends. From there, you can start writing your own posts or sharing your opinions about them on social media.

Embrace a Consistent Image

Think of any successful brand you’ve encountered—they have a distinct image and voice that spans platforms. Apple, McDonald’s, Coca-Cola. All of these achieve a certain consistency by using the same logo, colors, and tone across all representations of their brand.

To do this, brands create style guides with rules for everything from colors. You don’t need to write yourself an entire rulebook—but embracing consistency is one of the most important things you can do. It helps you build trust with your audience and make sure that they remember you long-term.

With that in mind, here are a few areas visuals can help communicate what you’re all about:

Headshots and Usernames Should Be Uniform

Keep it simple and use your first and last name as your username.

Your headshot and usernames should be the same (or similar) across every platform. While it might sound boring, it’s better to save your creativity for your actual posts.

This makes discoverability a breeze, allowing people to quickly identify you on Twitter, LinkedIn, or wherever else you hang out.

Be Sure to Get Your Bio Right

Your professional bio should be a clear, concise overview of your experience and expertise. This represents you across social channels, blogs, and websites, and serves as an online first impression.

Ann Handley’s two Twitter profiles (her business and personal) are a good example of using that same bio across different accounts.

People can quickly see that these belong to the same person based on her use of the same bullet points.

Choose a Color Scheme (And Stick With It)

Whether you think color psychology is bogus or a bonafide science, there’s no doubt that colors can visually communicate the personality you want to portray.

A good example of this is Rachel Parcell’s profile (pictured below). She sticks to this soft, feminine aesthetic, using pinks and whites throughout her feed.

Start by considering the colors you’re naturally drawn to, then think about how those colors fit with your brand.

Blue, for example, signifies clarity, intelligence, and authority. While red demonstrates power, attraction, love, and enthusiasm. Do you want to make people feel calm or excited?

We recommend selecting a color scheme, like this one from Design Seeds:

If you need help selecting your “paint swatches,” here are some tools to find beautiful color
schemes that do the heavy lifting for you.

Unite Your Feed with the Right Filter

Generally, you’ll want to polish off your pics with a unifying filter. Stick to one or two filters and use the same editing process for every image.

In general, built-in photo editors are best left to the amateurs. Create your own using an app like Lightroom or VSCO and save your settings for easy access. This gives you the ability to maintain a consistent “mood” with a single click.

The Same Goes for Fonts

As with colors, developing a font palette is essential for creating a cohesive brand. Limit your font use to two or three options to keep things consistent.

If your main channels are social (rather than a personal website) the font rule applies to your logo and any pull-quote visuals you post in your feeds.

Engage with Your Audience

Social media is supposed to be a conversation, so it’s crucial that you give and take. Make sure you respond to every comment you receive, even if it’s just to say thanks.

We get that after a certain point, this might not be possible, but in the meantime, it’s a good way to connect with your audience.

People don’t visit social media platforms to look at ads. As such, you need to make sure you’re sharing useful information that can help others. Do this consistently, and your followers will share your content with others.

Branding Doesn’t Need to Be a Big Deal

Unless your end game is becoming a social media personality, remember to treat personal branding as a stepping stone to better opportunities in real life.

While there’s a lot to take in, the main thing to remember is to be consistent—both in terms of aesthetics and tone. You’ll also want to make sure you post regularly and respond to comments as they come in. After the initial “remodel” phase, your brand should just need some maintenance here and there.

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Noam Chomsky - Behaviorism and A.I.

Noam Chomsky - Behaviorism and A.I.

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