The Monsters in My Head, Frank Langellas Essay

The Monsters in My Head, Frank Langellas Essay The Monsters of Life In Frank Langellas essay â€Å"The Monsters in My Head,† Langella describes fear as a monster our imagination that changes as we get older, Langella also describes how one should confront and control the â€Å"monsters† that are in our heads. I agree with Langella, that one should not fear the â€Å"Monsters† of life that one should confront or overcome fear itself because, if one does not overcome these monsters, these monsters will end up eating us or hunting us for the rest of our lives. In Langellas essay â€Å"The Monsters in My Head,† Langella describes that when he was a young kid, a mummy would come into his room every night to hunt him down, but then one night the mummy did not show up for its nightly routine, it had disappeared. Years and years passed till, one night when Langella already had a son, a four year old. Another monster showed up to eat up his sons sleep. Langella went into action with his macho strategy of fighting his sons monster with a pillow. So, from that night on he would always do his heroic achievement, fighting his sons monster off. After weeks of this continuing battle, Langella realized that the monster would return every time his son wanted it to return. Langella then reflected on his mummys disappearance and realized that his own monster had never gone away, it was always there next him, but it had changed shapes and sizes as rapidly as he grew older. As he grew older, Langellas monster went from a mummy to a flying object. The n it changed to a first date, a first rejection and then to marriage and now fatherhood. Then Langella told his son that he was not going to fight the monster anymore because it was his sons monster and he had to fight it himself since the monster was in his sons head, and only his son could control it. The monster never returned to hunt and eat up his sons slumber. It actually changed its form. The monster became his sons new favorite playmate. So, Langella attempts to suggest strategies to overcome and control the â€Å"monsters† or the fears of life. Langellas arguments of controlling and overcoming ones fears are true because I have experienced these â€Å"monsters† or these fears myself through my lifetime. When I was about ten, I used to dread watching horror films because after watching these gruesome-massacring films, I would always relive those scary-horrid scenes in my own dreams or as we well known them as nightmares. So, every time when my family wanted to watch these crimson-thrillers, I would just go to my room and watch cartoons to invade these things we call nightmares or monsters, that will come in the pitch-black night to eat us or hunt us down. One night, my uncle Rodolfo came over to watch the Boogeyman. My uncle told me not to be afraid of fictional-monsters that only existed in my head. So, I stayed that night to watch this terrifying -cliffhanger movie. As I anxiously watched the movie, I realized that the main character, Tim, was also afraid of this monster, the boogeyman, which Tim believed that it li ved in his closet, and would come out at night to terrify Tims sleep away. The point is that one day Tim decided that he wanted to confront this monster, so in other words he wanted to be brave and take control. As I watched the movie, I reflected and realized that I could also control and overcome my fear for screaming-suspense moving pictures or in other words horror movies. Then I told myself everything is in my head these monsters do not exist, they are imaginary. So, from that night on, I always enjoy the thrilling sensation of getting my hairs spike up after seeing a great scary movie without having any monsters invading my wondrous dreams. Like Langella said, we should overcome, control, and fight our own monsters, just like how I had to learn to fight and control my fear of having nightmares hunting me down after watching a horror movie. One has to always remember that these â€Å"monsters† or â€Å"fears† are just in our heads. Langellas argues that these â€Å"monsters† still stand next to us side by side every day, every hour, every minute that the clocks runs, these monsters never go away. They just change shapes and sizes. My monsters are always with me. They are my favorite companions with whom I go to school, my classes, and my every day activities. My monsters are my challenges and fears, my ups and downs; they are what keep me going. The â€Å"monsters† that only exist in our heads are what makes us better persons. Some of the many monsters that have accompanied me through my long journey of life range from high school to adulthood and now to UCR. High school was like that long double twisted rollercoaster that never ends but irony it went by in a flash. High school was like the â€Å"IT† of the wondrous carnival of life. The â€Å"monsters† of high school and adulthood were very judging and responsible for hunting me down but, I was able to conquer them by changing their appearances. High school became my stepping stone to high education and adulthood became my sense of responsible and maturity. Now UCR will become my dearest best friend and one of my new companions in this long journey. Like Langella said, we should not let the monsters in our heads control us we should take control of our fears of losing or failing. Therefore, Langellas suggestions on how the â€Å"monsters† in our heads are just fictional characters of our imaginations going wild. That change as we grow older in maturity and responsible. Lastly we should not let the â€Å"monsters† of life control us, we should actually take gear, control, and override them or else they will run us over.

Religious and Racial Discrimination in South Korea Essay

In August 2008, Buddhists from South Korea held a protest against Pro-Christian bias in the government of South Korean President Lee Myung-bak. Followers of Buddhism showed their discontent against Lee Myung-bak’s favoring Christians. The Chief Executive likewise received criticism for placing Christians in his Cabinet and choice spots (Kwang, 2008). The Buddhist protest began in June when the Ministry of Transportation scrapped Buddhist temples from electronic maps of South Korea’s public transport system. Compounding this hatred is the inspection of the car of Venerable Jikwan, who is chief of South Korea’s top Buddhist sects. Because of this, the approval rating of Lee Myung-bak decreased considerably (Kwang, 2008). Conclusion Imperialism had a major impact in the development of 20th century Korea. With some assistance from the US and Great Britain, Japan conquered Korea in 1910, which ended the latter’s existence as an independent state. Aiming to establish its own Empire, Japan modified Korean economy in order to manufacture its own agricultural products. Korean peasants were forced to leave their lands and by 1930s and 1940s, majority of Koreans were working in the mining or manufacturing sector of Manchuria, Japan, and Korea. South Korea is considered as one of the world’s most ethically homogenous nations. Koreans descended from the Neolithic people who migrated to the Korean Peninsula from the northeastern portion of mainland Asia. Consisting the biggest minority group in South Korea are people with Chinese descendants. Local residents include an increasing number of foreign nationals, including migrant workers from South and southeast Asia, entrepreneurs, diplomats, and other professionals from various parts of the world. Half of South Korea’s population actively practices their religion. Christianity and Buddhism dominate the religion of South Korea. Only 3% consider themselves as Confucians and the remaining 1% practices the traditional religion of Shamanism and Chondogyo. New religions also sprouted in South Korea. Majority of them are syncretic, which means that they have the ability to merge with different religious beliefs. The most prevalent among these beliefs is the Unification Church established by Sun Myung Moon in 1954. Chondogyo blends aspects of Confucianism, Daoism, Shamanism, Christianity, and Buddhism. References Background Note: South Korea (2008 March).Bureau of East Asian and Pacific Affairs- US Department of State. Retrieved October 2 2008 from http://www. state. gov/r/pa/ei/bgn/2800. htm. Hart-Landsberg, M (1989 July). South Korea: Looking At The Left. BNet Business Network. Retrieved October 2 2008 from http://findarticles. com/p/articles/mi_m1132/is_/ai_7768445 Kim, K. T. (2008 August 27). South Korea’s Buddhists March Against President. Las Cruces Sun News. Retrieved October 2 2008 from http://www. lcsun-news. com/ci_10313895 Peterson, M (n. d). South Korea. Microsoft Encarta Online Encyclopedia. Retrieved October 2 2008 from http://www. encarta. msn. com

John Hopkins OpenCourseWare (Free Online Classes)

John Hopkins University OpenCourseWare Basics: John Hopkins University offers dozens of free health-related courses as a part of its OpenCourseWare collection. Students can use OpenCourseWare material such as syllabi, lecture notes, and reading schedules to study topics such as nutrition and mental health. These are the same materials used in traditional courses offered at the renowned John Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.Like other OpenCourseWare initiatives, the courses available through John Hopkins do not provide interaction with instructors and cannot be used to earn college credit. They are designed for self-study. Where to Find John Hopkins OpenCourseWare: All free online classes can be found on the John Hopkins Bloomberg OpenCourseWare website. How to Use John Hopkins OpenCourseWare: Most John Hopkins OpenCourseWare classes contain a brief overview in the lecture notes, not an entire transcript. Since the lecture notes are limited, you may want to consider acquiring the suggested reading materials and following the syllabus to get a more complete understanding of the subject.Most lecture notes and readings must be downloaded to your computer in PDF format. If you don’t have a PDF reader, you may download one from Adobe for no cost. Top Free Online Classes from John Hopkins University: Self-learners have dozens of John Hopkins OpenCourseWare classes to choose from. Popular general interest courses include:Critical Analysis of Popular Diets and Dietary Supplements – An overview of scientifically proven weight-loss strategies preparing learners to analyze diet plans.Environmental Health – A survey of health issues in relation to the environment.Family Planning Policies and Programs – An explanation of family planning issues in developing countries. Students studying these materials study family planning as a human rights issue and learn how programs are implemented in poverty-stricken areas.

A Strategic Report for Mr Bean Group Ltd - Free Essay Example

Sample details Pages: 4 Words: 1241 Downloads: 7 Date added: 2017/06/26 Category Marketing Essay Did you like this example? INTRODUCTION Mr Bean Group Limited is a Singapore-based retailer and the fact that it was a stall in a hawker center before being a big company like right now. The Mr Bean was established in 1995 and it has grown really fast so far; therefore, it has become à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã…“the leading chain soya bean food and beverage retailerà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚  (mrbean.com.sg) in the Lion Island as well. The enterprise has opened up over fifty stores in only Singapore from the North to the South, the East to the West, and also in the central. Don’t waste time! Our writers will create an original "A Strategic Report for Mr Bean Group Ltd" essay for you Create order Besides that, it also has stores in foreign countries such as Korea, China, Malaysia, Japan, and the Philippines (International enterprise Singapore). As can be related from its name, Mr Bean sells products made all from soya bean. It yields various types of products such as milk, snacks, pancakes, as well as ice-creams. Since establishing until now, Mr Bean has achieved a few awards to record the success of it. The first award called à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‹Å"The 7th Singapore Prestige Brand Award 2008à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â€ž ¢ and the second was à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‹Å"Taiwan Overseas Entrepreneurs Award 2008à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â€ž ¢ (mrbean.com.sg). Although there were just two awards up to now, it still showed that the Mr Bean putted more efforts on their work because it was noted that Mr Bean was the only enterprise in Singapore achieved the second award. MAIN BODY: THE ANALYSIS OF SUCCESSFUL STRATEGIES It is clear that strategies play an important role in each and every company or organization, and because each company may use different ways in order to achieve the success in their strategies, so there may have many factors leading to successful strategies in those organizations or companies. A strategy is basically understood as a plan that a company plans in order to get long term outcomes. As explained in a paper, strategyà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â€ž ¢s only intention was to find a à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã…“uniqueà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚  locus for an enterprise à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã…“vis-a-vis that companyà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â€ž ¢s competitionà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚  (Ajit Prasad, 2010). What is more, the author also noted that in order to make the profits going beyond à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã…“the industry averageà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ , à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã…“the unique locus must lead to competitive advantage, which in turn has to be translated in the companyà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â€ž ¢s capabilityà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â€ž ¢s a core measure (Ajit Prasad, 2010); furthermor e, the employers seem to be given à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã…“an air of authorityà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚  by à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã…“using the strategy vocabularyà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚  (Robert J. Allio and Liam Fahey, 2012). A unique value proposition as compared to rivals The first factor was actually mentioned above and it is creating à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã…“a unique value proposition as compared to rivalsà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚  (solyp.com, 2013). Clearly, in nowadaysà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â€ž ¢ fierce market, companies always do their best to be better than their rivals and the outcomes are often seen in their final goods or services. Mr Bean seems to succeed in doing this. When people think of soya bean milk, people normally will buy in food courts or maybe old school stores which sell the old school and cheap food or drink; nonetheless, it is interesting that here in Singapore, whenever asking someone about soya bean milk, the answer seems to always be Mr Bean or they may say à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‹Å"Mr Beanà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â€ž ¢s super soya milkà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â€ž ¢ (Andrew Chow, 2009). One of the strategies of Mr Bean is to let people always remember their brand and create the trust to customers. Although there are quite a lot of stores selling soya bean milk or bean curd, most of them s eem to be not as big as Mr Bean, but it does not mean that those stores are not good. Some customers say that Mr Bean provides more and tastier flavor of soya bean products than other retailers in the same industry. A differential value chain representing choices about how a company or an organization operates differently in order to deliver on their value proposition à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã…“Value chainà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚  was the term used by the researcher, Michael Porter in order to depict a chain of à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã…“value-adding activitiesà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚  (Andrew Fearne, Marian Garcia Martinez and Benjamin Dent, 2012). Besides, according to Khaled Abed Hutaibatà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â€ž ¢s research paper, the value chain was also developed by Michael Porter to recognize the à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã…“core competenciesà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚  of companies or organizations; in addition, there is the contribution of the value chain in identifying à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã…“competitive advantageà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ . Thus, it is seen as a worthy tool à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã…“for recognizing, managing, as well as costing competitive advantageà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚  (Hutaibat, 2011). For Mr Bean, the company has also achieved this term when they changed their manners of thinking, planning strategy, as well as operation. The biggest strategy of the company is to à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã…“build a strong brand personalityà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚  (A ndrew Chow, 2009) by using healthy ingredients with high quality and more importantly, it is to make customers happy whenever they come to any store of Mr Bean. In terms of the companyà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â€ž ¢s logo, the company firstly impresses customers especially children by the image of a cute smiling bean because the Chief Executive Officer, Mr Kang Puay Seng said that they would like to make a new and vibrant image for the company, so he thought that the smiling bean is appropriate. Besides that, there was also changes in their store decorations as well as the packaging. Mr Bean makes smiling bean more animated by putting a wing for the bean on the packaging or à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã…“drawing very colorful flowers in the grassà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚  (Andrew Chow, 2009). Additionally, the company also produces graduated bean toys which attach with a certification. Furthermore, employees at Mr Bean stalls are friendly sellers and the interesting thing is that the managers of Mr Bean encourage their e mployees to be free in decorating for the stalls they work; therefore, there may have some differences in each store (Andrew Chow, 2009). By using distinctive ways, Mr Bean is getting dissimilar from its rivals, and those things do bring special value chains or maybe a special position in customersà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â€ž ¢ minds. The continuity in value propositions Another factor that can lead to the success of strategies is à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã…“the continuity in value propositionà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚  (solyp.com, 2013). Although the researcher, Michael Porter came up with the factor à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‹Å"continuity of strategic directionà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â€ž ¢, his advice for organizations or companies was to sustain à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã…“the continuity in value propositionà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ; nevertheless, continually advance how to do ità ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ( solyp.com, 2013). To keep comprehending about the strategic direction, the managers of the company often discuss with their workers about new strategies and how to implement it well. They also make sure that people in the company know what strategies are planned. Another Chief Executive Officer, Mr. Loh Jwee Poh said that all of staffs are their Research and Development team members (The Business Times, 2007). Pennie Frow and Adrian Payne (2011) found that à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã…“value propositions play an important role in the value à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â€ž ¢s co- creation between the stakeholdersà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ . Thus, the value propositions are also thought of by Mr Beanà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â€ž ¢s managers. Mr Bean keeps innovating by allowing each and every individual to come up with as many ideas as possible. They are free to talk about their ideas for new products and good and creative ideas for new products will be used. CONLCUSIONS In conclusion, there may have many factors that can make successful strategies for a company or an organization, but not all of those companies have all of such factors. For Mr Bean, they have created factors that objectively speaking, are good to make successful strategies. Although they are good, it does not mean that the company does not need to develop and improve more. Factors their selves cannot help much if the company does not know how to use and improve them for achieving success in the strategies. 1