Índice para May 2018 em Womankind

Why are ‘successful’ people often miserable? By that I mean people who have risen to the top of their field, be it in television, the arts, business, and so forth. Having reached the pinnacle of their careers, some frantically pen their memoirs revealing their inner turmoil, angst, loneliness, and frustration. “Oh, I was miserable,” they cry. “I was anxiety-ridden, and in despair”. A life coach warns on his blog: it’s a lonely road to the top. “Working towards your own aspirations in life can be very lonely”. As you venture on, he warns, you will begin to feel your isolation. If reaching the top of one’s career is often accompanied by loneliness and isolation, it makes me question whether our modern definition of ‘success’ - that being to toil away…

Since the 1960s, roughly twenty thousand papers have been written on creativity. And today, online bookstores list over 22,000 books on creativity alone: how to spark it, explain it, guide it, or find it. Creativity, it seems, is a hot topic not least for finding personal fulfilment and happiness, but more importantly as a strategy to overcome life’s hardships, illness, breakup, loss, grief. And it’s true, creative people with meaningful projects to engage in have an advantage over the rest of us. When life becomes too much - its injustice or cruelty, its inevitable disappointments - the creative person has the studio, the laboratory, the garage, or the study, to forget about life for a bit. But can the art of creativity be learnt by everyone? In the book Wired…

The mysterious bright lights over the North pole - the Aurora Borealis - is normally not any cause for alarm, until recently that is. The pale green, and at rarer moments red or violet, arcs and shooting rays come from solar winds hurtling towards the Earth, taking roughly 40 hours to get here. While these hurtling particles of plasma have not, in the past, affected people close by, police in South-West Iceland have recently reported erratic driving, swerving, and veering under the Aurora’s magnificent shield of light. Meaning the “dawn of the north”, the Aurora Borealis is matched by the Aurora Australis in the southern hemisphere. The Aurora’s eerie glow is a result of charged particles from the Sun’s atmosphere colliding with gaseous particles in the Earth’s atmosphere. While charged…

• Gyrfalcons are the largest falcon in the world. • They mostly prey on large birds such as ptarmigan and waterfowl, as well as some mammals. • Females weigh nearly twice as much as males. • Gyrfalcons come in many colours, not simply white with black spots. In North America, grey birds are more common than white or dark brown. • As birds of prey, gyrfalcons either fly high and attack from above or chase close to the ground. • Gyrfalcons are the national animal of Iceland. • As a hunting bird, humans have long associated with gyrfalcons in the sport of falconry. • Its only rival is the world’s fastest animal, the peregrine falcon. • In the medieval period, the gyrfalcon was considered a royal bird. • Scientists estimate…

As I hold my baby daughter at four in the morning, feeling the softness of her cheek against my own cheek, waiting for her breathing to settle into the regular rise and fall of sleep, the rightness of this scene feels self-evident. How could my life be any other way? Yet, less than 12 months ago, I knew frighteningly little about children, let alone babies. I didn’t know how to hold one, nor how to change a nappy, nor how loud a cry can be in the dead of the night. I certainly didn’t know about the heady mixture of love, responsibility and not-knowing-what-to-do that can strike at any time: watching her picking up slices of banana to shove by the fistful in her mouth, settling her down after a…

In my final year at high school, a career adviser sat inside a makeshift caravan for a full day waiting for students to file in, one by one. “What is your passion?” he enquired. “What are your goals? What are your strengths and weaknesses? What,” he asked, “is success for you?” Back in high school I liked reading a lot and playing sport, so the career adviser plugged these words into his computer and out spat an answer. I should pursue a career in sports journalism it recommended - not that I had any interest whatsoever in writing about sport. It was an attempt to match our skills and desires with the job market because, as we were all too keenly aware back then, success in life, or so wrote…

Hiding out of sight, Rob Palmer is frozen still. He is less than 100 feet from the falcon’s nest site. He waits for an hour, and then several more - sometimes as long as eight hours in a stretch, his eyes keen on the site. Palmer knows that once darkness falls, he must return to his hotel to prepare for another day. “The birds are very wary,” he says. And for this reason, he typically arrives on the scene with another person. “Then the other person leaves,” he says, “and the falcon thinks that the blind is empty.” He continues: “They don’t count very well.” In Nome, Alaska, Palmer returns to the hotel to sleep. He will drive and then hike back to the same spot in the morning. Back…

Your election followed the 1975 Icelandic women’s strike. Why do you think the people of Iceland elected you for this role? People knew me because I’d been on television programs and they knew what I had to say. Then, they also knew me as a theatre director (of the Reykjavík Theatre Company). So, I’m very proud of the fact that they had confidence in me. I have to stress I was never a politician though, and that the President of Iceland is not politically elected as in other countries. He or she does not belong to a political party. You ran against three male candidates while you were a divorced single mother. You were also the first single woman to adopt a child in Iceland. Did this have any effect…

It would have been cold on the June day in 1844 that the last great auk died. Even in midsummer Iceland’s weather is described as “cold, windy and cloudy”, with a daytime air temperature of 12°C and a sea temperature that hovers around 7°C. Nonetheless, almost 200 years ago twelve men rowed a boat through a heaving grey sea towards Eldey Island, 16 kilometres off the Reykjanes Peninsula on the volcanic southwest coast of Iceland, a journey that people today still describe as “dangerous and nausea-inducing”. They were in pursuit of a valuable prize, a great auk (Pinguinus impennis), but set out in hope rather than expectation, so rare had the birds become. They would not have known of the auk captured in Scotland four years earlier, kept alive in…

Some women say their first pregnancy was like starting a business or planning a wedding. “If I knew then what I know now, I would have done things differently.” As I watch a woman journey from pre-conception through to the terrible twos, it seems to me that few things can compare with the physical, intellectual, and emotional learning curve, and the sheer volume of information that she seems to assimilate in that time. At the first doctor’s visit they sit wide-eyed and a little shy. They are slightly surprised to find themselves pregnant, a little unbelieving really. “What do you know about being pregnant?” I ask. “Not much.” “Alright then.” So we talk supplements, exercise, the importance of avoiding cat litter and soft cheeses, and the two big secret symptoms…

I spent much of my childhood in the offices of the Icelandic Women’s Rights Association because my mother was the chairwoman between 1980 and 1985. She always worked full time, juggling three daughters, a husband, and a career. She was the manager of a large rescue association and a businesswoman. Seeing her busy all the time was normal for me but my friends with ‘at-home mums’ found it a bit strange. My father was always supportive. They shared roles within the home; for example, my father, who worked as a dentist, would take care of the evening meals three days a week and was always home when she was at work. A lot has changed since then in Iceland; now we have a good daycare system and so most women…

Womankind received an unprecedented number of entries to Photographers’ Award XIV, on animals, which demonstrates how much we care about the many ‘non-humans’ who share this planet with us. Photographers were asked to focus on animals in the wild, as well as domesticated animals, and many entries were simply breathtaking. WINNER The winning photograph is I am here by Daphne Wu. The photograph was taken at the 2017 Golden Eagle Hunting Festival competition in Mongolia. Here “a young eagle huntress showcases her eagle and looks on tentatively while surrounded by several of her fellow male competitors,” notes Wu. “To become an eagle hunter,” continues Wu, “a successful hunter must capture a female golden eagle and build a symbiotic relationship of trust and communication that takes years to master.” SECOND PLACE…

FESTIVAL Reykjavík, Iceland Reykjavík Arts Festival 1 - 17 JUNE 2018 The Reykjavik Arts Festival is a biennial multidisciplinary festival with exhibitions and performances of contemporary and classical works in major cultural venues and unconventional spaces throughout the city. Since its inception in 1970, Reykjavík Arts Festival has invited hundreds of artists from all parts of the globe to perform or exhibit at the festival. Through this activity, the festival has helped to create a vast network of connections between national and international artists, been a catalyst for the creation of new works, and a major force in the development of cultural diversity in Iceland. MELBOURNE MUSEUM Melbourne, Australia Vikings: Beyond the Legend UNTIL 26 AUGUST 2018 The world’s biggest collection of Viking artefacts will be exhibited at The Melbourne Museum, featuring over 500 artefacts…

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As you think, so you become. Avoid superstitiously investing events with power or meanings they don’t have. Keep your head. Our busy minds are forever jumping to conclusions, manufacturing and interpreting signs that aren’t there. Assume, instead, that everything that happens to you does so for some good reason. That if you decided to be lucky, you are lucky. All events contain an advantage for you - if you look for it. Epictetus, The Art of Living…

While there’s plenty of literature on why distraction is bad for our brains, there are occasions when it’s not so bad to be distracted. Sometimes mulling over a problem for hours is not the answer. If a solution simply can’t be found, psychologists advise getting up and doing something unrelated - allowing the problem to incubate at the back of your mind. The theory is that by distracting your conscious mind, your subconscious has time to think it over. And more often than not, it will guide you to the solution you were looking for.…

My husband and I had always meant to live ‘abroad’, as if abroad were a place, defined only by not-Englishness. Scotland might have done, France would have been better, Denmark or especially Sweden, headquarters of Nordic social democracy, would have been ideal, but meanwhile I kept an eye on academic jobs in the US, Canada, and Australia. We settled in Kent, less than ten miles from where Anthony had grown up. We owned a house. The children started school. We had interesting jobs at comfortable salaries. It was all perfectly nice, and there was no reason why it shouldn’t continue to be perfectly nice for the next thirty years. Then Anthony lost his job. Max was unhappy at school. Iceland, sang a newspaper feature read late one night while the…

Details Closing date: 31 August 2018 Format: One photograph per entry. Applicants: Open to all amateur and professional photographers. Entries must also include a separate photo of an edition of Womankind. File size: Please send large file sizes (larger than 3,000 pixels wide, 300dpi). Entries must be provided in file sizes suitable for publishing. The theme of this quarter’s award is botany, which is the study of plant life. Photographers may focus on plants including leaves or flowers, or smaller plant life such as algae or moss. Win $500 and get published in the next issue of Womankind magazine. OPEN TO ALL READERS. For full details visit: womankindmag.com/award Send to: award@womankindmag.com…

What would happen if women stopped work? If they refused to go to their jobs in offices, hospitals, cafés, schools, and banks? If they refused to pick up the children, do the washing, cook the dinner, make the bed? What would happen if fifty per cent of the population went on strike? That scenario was tested just under half a century ago when the women of Iceland, for one day, walked out on their everyday lives. Proposed by the women’s movement the Red Stockings, the 1975 strike was a way to force men to recognise the value of women’s paid and, critically, unpaid labour. Dubbed “Women’s Day Off”, women from all walks of life - young and old, working class and upper class, and all sides of the political spectrum…

You are Canadian, yet relocated to Iceland, another cold climate… I moved to Iceland for love. My husband and I met in graduate school in England and if we were going to be together it was going to be in Iceland. But maybe the fact that I know winters, I know cold climates, it’s just something that’s in my bones; I’m used to it. Dark winters have taken some adjustment. Also, I have always enjoyed Iceland’s open-minded, welfare-state mentality. We have four children and I have always found Iceland to be a wonderful place to raise a family. How difficult was it adjusting to life in a new country? One thing I did immediately, sort of upon arriving here, was to try to put a big effort into learning to…

ROWAN MONTGOMERY Day one: This morning I have to get to Cambridge for work, so last night I carefully wrote down my ticket reference number and train schedule, but still, the anxiety hits me as soon as I get to the station. Without music in my ears to soften the stress of a crowded commute, and citymapper to secure me when travelling somewhere new, I’m an anxious mess, eyes darting and feet shuffling on the platform. By the time I arrive in Cambridge two hours later, I feel equal parts proud for not reaching for my phone and terrified that I have to do that journey sans phone and sans security blanket on the way home.  Day two: My phone sends me to sleep at night, wakes me up in…

On October 24, 1975, we did not go to work. We did not do any housework. We did not cook. We did not look after children. I was 21 years old. I was standing in a sea of women at the biggest demonstration in Iceland’s history. We went on to the streets to protest wage discrepancy and unfair employment practices. We demonstrated how important women were for the economy and society. Honestly, we had no idea how this whole thing had set off. And it felt normal. I thought, “Wow, I’m not alone, we all feel this way”. I realised that we could find ways to channel this power. And I realised that I would never return to feeling like I was the problem. I discovered that it was society that…

After 200,000 years of modern humans on a 4.5 billion-year-old Earth, what does it mean to have arrived at this point in history, the Anthropocene? The change has come upon us with disorienting speed. It is the kind of shift that typically takes two or three or four generations to sink in. Our best scientists tell us insistently that a calamity is unfolding, that the life-support systems of the Earth are being damaged in ways that threaten our survival. Yet in the face of these facts we carry on as usual. Most citizens ignore or downplay the warnings; many of our intellectuals indulge in wishful thinking; and some influential voices declare that nothing at all is happening, that the scientists are deceiving us. Yet the evidence tells us that so…

“If you have a garden and a library, you have everything you need.”Cicero A Woman’s Crusade: Alice Paul and the Battle for the Ballot By Mary Walton Alice Paul began her life as a studious girl from a Quaker family in New Jersey. In 1907, a scholarship took her to England, where she developed a passionate devotion to the suffrage movement. Upon her return to the United States, Alice became the leader of the militant wing of the American suffrage movement. Calling themselves “Silent Sentinels”, she and her followers were the first protesters to picket the White House. Here is the inspiring story of the young woman whose dedication to women’s rights made that long-held dream a reality. Independent People By Halldór Laxness From the Nobel Prize-winning Icelandic author,…

Solutions to the food and ecological crisis facing us today Ecofeminist Dr Shiva Vandana, a food and agriculture activist, describes how industrial farming is causing climate change, water pollution, water waste, and is destroying biodiversity, farmers, and public health. She calls for a more holistic approach to food, where growers and consumers forge closer ties. Inside Job Before the turn of the century, Iceland was one of the wealthiest and most developed nations in the world. In 2000 Iceland’s government deregulated its three largest banks, resulting in soaring debt and a bubble unlike any witnessed before. Inside Job is a documentary about the 2007 financial crisis. Do the Math Climatologist James Hansen wanted to investigate how much carbon in the atmosphere is too much. His team found that a carbon…

“One of the most powerful wellsprings of creative energy, outstanding accomplishment, and self-fulfilment seems to be falling in love with something - your dream, your image of the future.”– E. Paul Torrance We spend about one third of daily life thinking beyond the here and now - a form of mental time travel where we ruminate on past events and contemplate our impending future. But according to a study by psychology researcher Jonathan Smallwood at the University of York, low moods make us more inclined to go backwards in time rather than forwards, and this mental regurgitation can cause depressive symptoms. The paper titled Imprisoned by the past: Unhappy moods lead to a retrospective bias to mind wandering suggests that while it’s normal and healthy to reflect on past events,…

A few years back, positive thinking was all the rage, but recently psychologists have started documenting some downsides to adopting an overly sunny perspective, especially when it comes to setting and achieving your personal goals. Being overly positive about your ability to attain your goals, it is found, can make you less likely to achieve them. Gabriele Oettingen, a professor of psychology at New York University and the University of Hamburg, recommends adding an extra column to your personal goal spreadsheet. While it’s fine to list your major goals in life - learn to speak Icelandic, or write the great science-fiction masterpiece, or even just to get fit - also remember to add a list of the major obstacles you foresee in their attainment. Terming it “mental contrasting”, Oettingen found…

Someone once told me that no matter how many lanes you add to a freeway they’ll eventually be full of traffic. Build a two-lane freeway and by the end of the year it’ll be at peak capacity - a slow, painful crawl for commuters into work and back home again. Build a six-lane freeway, and more people will decide to drive around the place and within no time, it’ll be full too. But that doesn’t stop more freeways, even larger freeways with even more lanes, being built each year. This contempt for nature - that lives and breathes underneath these vast bitumen tracks - makes me angry. But what can I do? In the 1970s, a number of women writers tried to describe this situation - that is, the powerlessness…

For years my mother warned me. “Before you know it,” she’d say, “they’ll be off and away.” But I never believed her. How could I? My kids were in the middle of everything, of the everything that was my life. For twenty years it felt natural to drop everything when the school nurse called, when my kids wanted driving lessons, when an open-ended conversation in the hall needed more time. Just like her brother, like a trout ready to spawn, jumping the rapids, my daughter is getting ready to swim upstream. It’s not for me to ask where she’s going, rather to marvel that she’s going. Just as I hoped, eighteen years ago, that one day she would. “You won’t know yourself,” Mum would say on the phone, the night…

Tell us a little about yourself. I live in Marietta, Georgia, United States, a suburb of Atlanta. Fortunately for me, my favourite thing is painting. I always drew and painted but never considered it as a career until 18 years ago at age 50. Tell us a little about your everyday life as a painter, and the view from your window. I rise early, usually by 5am. I let my dogs Lily and Annie out, feed them, make coffee while they’re eating. I settle in my library on the old beat-up loveseat, start drinking my coffee, share a gingersnap with the girls, check messages on my phone, and then do my ‘morning pages’ (three long, hand-written pages, as prescribed by Julia Cameron in The Artist’s Way). I’ve been doing this practice for more than…

In Icelandic we have the saying: “Vits er þörf, þeim er víða ratar, daelt er heima hvað”, which more or less translates to: “Those who remain homebound are bound to remain ignorant”. I think this outlook on travel is rich in Icelandic culture. We are isolated, sometimes only 50 people can populate a tiny fjord village, and we want to know what lies beyond. I grew up in Reykjavík but I too wanted to learn what lies beyond. I have been to every continent of the world except Antarctica. At age 18 I went to Barcelona and met musicians. In Buenos Aires, I learnt to dance the tango. In Hemsedal, I worked at a ski resort and spent my free time snowboarding. In Tallinn, I attended seminars at a drama…