Elevate everyday experiences to the level of sacredness!

When work is done with love, it fills the body and mind with bliss and transforms any place into a sacred space.  As Khalil Gibran writes in The Prophet, “What is it to work with love? It is to weave the cloth from the strings of your heart, as though your Beloved were to wear it.” What is required to fill your blood with the chemicals of bliss is an attitude transplant.  Soar on your positive attitude.

Decide to approach all events, all people, and all things with affection, reverence and ‘Sraddha.’ This reverence is due to all, because of the divine spark that dwells in everyone whether he is a legend or a failure.  Sometimes it is obvious. It is the silent flame of consciousness that reaches out to you from a flowering creeper or a healthy pet.  Sometimes this life force has lost its vitality and is dimmed by dirt, lethargy and lack of care. Clean the glass of your Life’s lamp.  Make the light shine through.

It is essential to look into our emotional, mental and psychological environment, as our thoughts and emotions directly contribute to our wellbeing or otherwise. Meditation can clean up the field and contribute enormously to an individual’s psychological and physiological wellbeing.

Action Plan to Enhance Positives

• Write a love letter to your parents
• Buy tickets to a music concert and give away some of it.
• Treat yourself to a full moon dinner with loved ones.
• Take your dog to the beach.
• Plant a tree and take care of it (a tree is an oxygen factory).
• Give away seeds. The monsoons are awaiting to make them grow
• Feed the birds. Do God’s work

The Blank Slate

The year ahead is a blank slate. A white page. The events to come are offstage, waiting in the wings. You have an opportunity to reengineer, to reinvent, to restructure your life. So let’s start the makeover, the new you.

Remember your dreams, your aspirations, things you have always wanted to try, to learn. Listen carefully to yourself. Talk to a friend. Take notes. Look at the four quadrants of your life – family, work, social and personal.

Start with ‘personal’: Before you are a parent, a team member, an elder, you are a person. Usually, people give their own needs the lowest priority. Here are a few suggestions:

Personal goals

Improving health, eating healthy, exercising daily by going for a walk for atleast 45 minutes. Practicing yoga, meditation. Make friends with a young doctor. Find a new hobby or go back to an old one.

Family

Spending more time with family, doing more fun things together, having meals together at least once a day without the distraction of TV, cell phones or newspapers. When you can talk and listen to members of the family, even the small children.

Work

Expanding your sphere of influence, attending training programmes. Reading and trying to improve your wealth of knowledge, or learning by being attentive to other people.

Social

Keeping in touch with the extended family, Meeting old friends. Becoming involved in an NGO or neighbourhood organization to help others, while you spend your spare time usefully. Be decisive do not postpone taking decisions.

During the coming year, identity your new work life balance. Approach it like a menu. See what you want to add and what you want to remove

Study your life for strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats. Pay attention to what is happening to the environment around you. Perhaps a new opportunity awaits in the wings. Be prepared to grab it as walks past!

Many may tell you money is not important. I disagree. You need to fuel your goals with the liquid stuff. What are the new skills you need to operate in the changed environment? Get the training required. Get organized. Get networked. You will need a lot of help to make things happen. Make a plan. Find a way to measure progress and readjust as you go along to reach the goals you have identified. Get set for the New Year!

Celebrate the Positives

Celebrate the positive in all interactions. Rest assured that God did not create you for the sole purpose of correcting others or making them unhappy. When we say namaste, we say ‘I bow to the Divine in you’. ‘Vasudeva Kutumbakam’ say, our holy book – the whole world is your family. Imagine the rich network of love you could create, where your children can be nurtured if you believed and practiced this.

The most inexpensive ticket to happiness is helping others and making others happy. So spread happiness like Amul butter on bread. It will stick to your fingers. Create a happiness committee in your street, which meets every month to create a happy street. Every month as you decide to install comfort touch, celebrate Diwali or have a painting competition for kids, neighbours become friends.

Take them everyday!

1. Take short relaxation breaks, at least thrice a day.

2. Eat fresh, energy-giving foods.

3. Take a walk outdoors during lunch break.

4. Stay away from politics and back-biting.

5. Involve your spouse and children in your work. Bring them to the office during lunch break or on a Saturday.

      6. Spend time reading and improving your mind.

7. Get involved in activities that will benefit others.

8. Develop an absorbing hobby or skill—driving, dancing, gardening, carpentry, painting, amateur radio, etc.

9. Keep in touch with your close friends and extended family; use the power of the internet.

10. Plan to cut off from work on weekends.

Steps to increase everyday happiness

·         Do the crossword as you age

·         Take up a course of study that will improve your work skills: may be computer literacy

·         Eat a piece of dark chocolate 4 times a week.

·         Have at least four interesting, intimate conversations with family and friends every day.

·         Spend at least two hours outdoors.

·         Participate in at least one group activity.

·         Have a good belly laugh.

·         Forgive and forget and what you cannot forgive, forget.

·         Find a meaningful job to do, even if unpaid.

·         Live in the present and enjoy it.

World Kindness Day

The world kindness movement began incorporating NGO’s on November 13^th 1988. The actions on this day make everyone feel that kindness is cool. Young, trendy people, caring adults, celebrities participate to make kindness so viral.

Corporates who participate in my year long Innovation Initiatives have a Make Things Better (MTB) Board in the front office. Anyone can post a note which says ‘You made things better by ………………, about a team member’. The person who gets the maximum MTB notes, is recognized, as also the person who posts the most MTBs.

Kindness, generosity and co-operation can spread faster than violence or hatred. A study conducted by San Diego and Harvard Universities provide laboratory evidence that co-operative behavior is contagious.  When the people benefit from kindness, they “pay it forward” by helping others who were not originally involved, and this creates a cascade of collaboration that influences dozens more in a social network.

Research and Shakespeare have both shown that kindness benefits both giver and the receiver, filling the blood stream with neurotransmitters of relaxation and contentment. Serotonin and endorphins elevate the mood. Doctors have to do less when people are kind and content. Friedrich Nietzsche wrote about the ‘most curative herbs and agents’ of gentleness and kindness is ensuring health and well being.

So on World Kindness Day, start a daily, lifelong habit of kindness.  Let’s start to:

1.       Hug all the loved ones in your life who rarely get a hug – your parents and grandparents.

2.       Write love letters to them recording how you feel, before it is too late!

3.       In Singapore, they gave away 45,000 yellow flowers last year.

4.       Canada had a Kindness Concert.

5.       Put out grains and water for birds to feed.

6.       Adopt a elder who has no visitors and cheer up that elder by visiting him once a week or fortnightly or monthly – whichever is feasible.

As the Dalai Lama said, “My religion is simple. My religion is kindness.” Send this to all your friends. Let’s go viral with this.

Social Bonding

No man is an island, but a part of the Main,’ said the pensive poet John Donne.  Man is a social being, and interpersonal intelligence is the ability to understand other people.  It is to be able to see what motivates them, how they work and how to work cooperatively with them.  Interpersonal intelligence is the inward sense of being able to understand oneself, to form an accurate model of oneself and to operate that model effectively to live life.  Professor Howard Gardner of the Harvard School of Psychology told me that the two aspects of personal intelligence, interpersonal and intrapersonal, form the most important foundation for a happy, fulfilling life.  To those who define success as happiness, these two elements can be the bedrock of a happy life.

Sensitive people can empathize with others.  They can understand the feelings of others as though they were feeling it themselves.  This skill involves being able to pick up subtle verbal, tonal and non–verbal signals from others.  Charismatic leaders are able to reach others by breaking the barrier that exists between people.  A charismatic speaker can make thousands of people react like one mind.

The Upanishads say that the divine spark or life force exists in all—the leader, the leper, the judge and the criminal.

The concept of a life force is recognised in all cultures. It is called Chi by the Chinese; Light, or Holy Ghost, by Christians; Prana by the Hindus; Mana by the Kahunas and; Bioplasmic Energy by Russians researchers.

Learn to Deal with Others and their Feelings

A drug addict once explained the difference between sympathy and empathy. He said, ‘You can never feel anything but sympathy for me and what I need is empathy.’ The he said, ‘Empathy is the capacity to feel my pain in your heart.’ To be ‘socially tone deaf’ * can lead to a life littered with broken relationships. Develop the capacity to pick up subtle verbal, tonal and non-verbal signals from others. Learn also the ability to send out soothing, nurturing signals to others, thus creating a positive interpersonal field.

Unlike in a magnetic field, where positive attracts negative and vice versa, a positive, emotional and spiritual field, attracts positive people and events and, in addition, transforms even a normally negative person into a positive one.

‘How can I develop this skill?’ I ask. ‘Practice working with people and listening to them with the same attitude as you would towards a beloved child, or respected parent. Your word, tone, your very glance should be completely focused on the person. Don’t dilute the interaction by playing with your Blackberry, talking on your cellphone or fiddling with your laptop. When you are with someone, pay complete attention. Anything less will only elicit a lukewarm response. Those who can create positive fields around themselves attract and build lifetime relationships.’  

Healthy home nurturing positive mindspace

A healthy home would be a healing space, a nurturing positive mind field. It can be a place where all wounds are healed. Alvin Toffler wrote ‘The family is the giant shock absorber of the family to which the bruised and battered individual returns after doing battle with the world!’ If your home is not a sanctuary but a battle-field do something about it. Get help, maybe professional help. Reserve time for laughter and happiness—schedule time for it, like you do for your work.

Have a rule to avoid difficult topics during meal times or bed time. Music, if is soothing, can be a powerful force for peace. The very walls absorb the vibrations of the music. Mantras can do the same for your home. I sometimes feel that if music can be infused into the mindspace so that it plays quietly in your mind, as the background to your day, it can have a really soothing affect. Avoid violent, depressing programs. Just as you would not allow a terrorist into your home, do not allow such programs into the sacred space of your home. You surely are the protector of the field that exists in your home. Make your home fragrant with incense. Clean and sparkling and beautiful. Respectful of the sacred forces that can animate your home.

Smile with happiness.

Here are some reasons to smile and make others smile:

• Smiling Makes Us Attractive
• Smiling Changes Our Mood
• Smiling Is Contagious
• Smiling Relieves Stress
• Smiling Boosts Your Immune System
• Smiling Lowers Your Blood Pressure
• Smiling Releases Endorphins, Natural Pain Killers and Serotonin
• Smiling Lifts the Face and Makes You Look Younger
• Smiling Makes You Seem Successful
• Smiling Helps You Stay Positive

The Economics of water degradation

The south Indian town of Tirupur is probably one of the richest towns in the world, producing tee shirts and other garments. The dyestuff from manufacturing soaked into the earth, so that all the water turned to the colour of dyes. Few of us are aware of how waste affects our precious, finite water resources. Water cleans and purifies. But water itself can be so polluted that it can become a pollutant or a poison instead of being the world’s best cleanser and drink.

The river passively accepts any garbage when people dump their daily waste into the river; the chemical composition of the water itself is changed. Animals, aquatic creatures, birds and people are harmed by drinking such water. Untreated sewage from cities enters many water bodies. Here micro organisms begin to decompose organic matter like vegetable and household waste. A lot of oxygen is consumed by micro organisms in this process. As oxygen level fall, many types of fish and other aquatic life die. As oxygen levels touch zero, the water becomes septic and foul smelling. Our cities need to recycle sewage before it leaches into rivers.

As in the case of industries like the leather industry, hazardous chemicals leach into the soil and become part of growing plants and crops. Imagine the effect of eating the food from these places. The sad part of this story is, that it is all invisible. When pure rain falls on garbage, it is dissolved and ground water and soil become poisoned.

The economics of water degradation are obvious. Cities that invest in proper recycling and waste control, create jobs in these areas. They also attract prosperous people to live there. Pollutants can also seep down and affect the ground water deposits. City sewage is treated correctly in India only in 10% of the cases. Industrial waste flowing into rivers, is what makes it so tough to clean holy rivers like Ganges. Agriculture chemicals – fertilizers and pesticides find their way through water into rivers and finally into our homes.

Efficient water management, composting and waste control, has to start in homes. Each of us makes a difference!

Regards,

Dr. Rekha Shetty

Water Warrior

Give Generously, Live Abundantly

Laila Alva, a fifth grader sent US$ 20 to RBI Governor Rajan during the September foreign reserves crisis . “I saved this on my last trip abroad with my parents. I thought I could use it but the country needs it more than I do!” she wrote. The Governor, while appreciating her gesture, promised better times.

This attitude of giving and sharing can have viral impact on the community. During, the season of harvests, Apostle Paul says whoever sows generously will also reap generously.  Giving he says, “Should be cheerful and not motivated by guilt”. He says that if we sow generously we will reap the ultimate blessings - a bumper crop of righteousness!

So what can you give this year?

·         You can give your time – the most precious of human assets. Give time to those who need it: lonely people who have lost hope, and are troubled.

·         Give your talent, whether it is playing cricket or music or dance, teach it to youngsters, educate a child out of school.

·         Give your ideas and thoughts to create clean, green streets.

·         Give your treasure, your money, to the extent you can, help others to develop skills.

Giving generously is a blissful, joyful activity. “Give others all that is alive in us – our interest, understanding, knowledge, humor, everything in us that’s good. In doing so, we enhance the sense of aliveness in others while enhancing our own. When we give, we get a “heightened vitality” of what it means to be human.” – Erich Fromm

Give laughter, smiles, blood, a gift, an invitation, share a meal, offer good advice when asked, give forgiveness, love and caring unconditionally, especially to those who deserve it least.

Listen to Your Body

Physical transformation is possible, if like the ancient yogis, we follow the actions of young animals. The mountain pose in the suryanamaskar is derived from the back stretch of the dog. Watch the young dog. It is always in movement and bouncing and stretching. Make physical movement a part of your daily life. As the salesmen say ‘Cover territory instead of covering your chair’. ‘Use it or lose it’ said Jane Fonda. Violent physical exercise once a week is no use, if you’re just vegetating for the rest of the week in front of the TV or computer. Listen more and bark less, use non verbal actions to show unconditional affection to family and friends.

Listen to your body. If you are tired, rest. If you are hungry, eat. If you are lonely, communicate, ask for a hug. If you are angry, deal with your anger constructively, resolve it. The body is our vehicle for the journey of our soul in this world. You may be an immortal soul who happens to own a body, but the body-vehicle has to be maintained in good condition, so that we may achieve the goals for which we were created.

Give Yourself a Hug

Soon you will be looking at March, 31^st the time of financial reckoning and feeling completely drained and knocked out. You are overworked and exhausted and you don’t like the person you see in the mirror. Your doctor does not like the person he sees in your medical reports.

Now turn inward and start a personal affirmation account for yourself.  Give yourself a big hug for being the most hard working, kind and special person in your life. Invest in a note book which will document your love affair with yourself.

v  Write a love letter to yourself. Recognize your unique beauty, your capacity to do your best and all the gifts that make you such a fabulous person. “Love yourself first and everything else falls into place,” said Lucille Ball.

v  Start a gratefulness dairy where you record all the things you are grateful for. Thank God for His blessings.

v  ‘I can,’ is a hundred times more important that IQ. Celebrate your smallest successes. Stop that nagging, critical voice in your head that keeps picking on you. Speak to yourself kindly and lovingly.

v  Stop worrying. The way to be happy is to stop worrying about things which cannot be changed.

v  Plug into the Source of all power, through prayer and meditation and acknowledge that you are a child of God, made in his own image.

v  Explore, dream, discover: at the end of your life do not regret all the dreams you have failed to pursue.

Take care of your body. It is the only home you have: nourish it, nurture it, exercise it. Make friends with a young physician. Focus on it, love it! Have fun! Because as Oscar Wilde said, “To love oneself is the beginning of a life-long romance.”

Give Yourself a Hug

Now turn inward and start a personal affirmation account for yourself.  Give yourself a big hug for being the most hard working, kind and special person in your life. Invest in a note book which will document your love affair with yourself.

v  Write a love letter to yourself. Recognize your unique beauty, your capacity to do your best and all the gifts that make you such a fabulous person. “Love yourself first and everything else falls into place,” said Lucille Ball.

v  Start a gratefulness dairy where you record all the things you are grateful for. Thank God for His blessings.

v  ‘I can,’ is a hundred times more important that IQ. Celebrate your smallest successes. Stop that nagging, critical voice in your head that keeps picking on you. Speak to yourself kindly and lovingly.

v  Stop worrying. The way to be happy is to stop worrying about things which cannot be changed.

v  Plug into the Source of all power, through prayer and meditation and acknowledge that you are a child of God, made in his own image.

v  Explore, dream, discover: at the end of your life do not regret all the dreams you have failed to pursue.

Take care of your body. It is the only home you have: nourish it, nurture it, exercise it. Make friends with a young physician. Focus on it, love it! Have fun! Because as Oscar Wilde said, “To love oneself is the beginning of a life-long romance.”

Women’s Day

Mothers, sisters, daughters and other women beloved to us make March 8^th a special day of celebration, a day to show, respect, appreciation and love to women. This day cannot be dismissed like all the other days that make Archies cards such a successful business.

Even before women appeared on the corporate scene, women were the secret, hidden ingredient that made life worth living. So all of us, men and women, should use this day to write letters of appreciation to all the special women in our life, for the beauty they bring into our lives, for their delicat,e subtle strength and grace under pressure, for their tact and capacity to love, care and selflessly give, till there is nothing left to give. Thirty countries observe it as a National holiday. It is a day to celebrate beauty and motherhood! In Portugal a ‘Girls night out’ is customary.

It is a day for us women to enjoy the fact that we are beautifully different from men. Our brain’s communication centre is much bigger. We love to discuss our problems, we are biologically wired to avoid conflict, we care more about character and the capacity to care, than about good looks. We are better at reading between the lines. In short our EQ (Emotional Quotient) is better. Vive la difference!

Enhance Family Attachment

The family provides the love and nurturing required for the survival of children. Affirmation is important when people in our lives appreciate us and express it verbally, tonally, non-verbally. It is important to make sure you give affirmations to all members of the family, particularly the ones to whom you usually send devastating Heat Seeking Missiles (HSMs) like, ‘Why is your room like a pig sty?’ ‘Why do you always forget everything I tell you?’ Make every day an occasion to show how important your family is to you.

Children need the security of a simple, dependable schedule. Ambiguity or lack of dependability in family life is known to affect the individual’s capacity to live in a secure long-term relationship in the future. Be a mindful parent. So parents need to devote time on quality food and lifestyle. 

Know Your Potential

The mind is the only place where you can examine a germinal, fragile new idea, stretch it without breaking it or explore an explosive new idea without having it blow up your face. Use thinking tools and imaging to analyse, reinvent and recreate life as it is today.

You are a powerhouse of potential. The great Michelangelo was once asked how he created great statues. Old and half blind, Michelangelo stood before a block of marble, scarred and muddy from the quarries of Carrara. He said quietly, ‘I have never created a statue. I just stand before a block of marble and study it with reverence. For I, know that within every block of marble, there lies a statue, waiting to be liberated by the touch of the Master’s hand.’

Within each one of us lies hidden masterpiece waiting to be liberated by the magic touch of attention. Only you can do it. Be your own ‘expert’. Do not build negative ideas about yourself through the comments of others. Your self-talk should be calm, happy and elevating. Choose to see and hear what is beautiful and encouraging. When you are wounded, learn to soothe yourself by using these affirmations.

Positive self-talk

yourself to heal. Young Siddhartha, the eponymous hero in Herman Hesse’s book, is asked by his prospective employer, Kumaraswamy, ‘What  do you know that I should give you a job?’ Siddartha answers, ‘I can wait, I can fast, I can pray.’ He gets the job and achieves

excellence in it. 

With affection and compassion, we can make our field a happy one by spreading like a fragrance to embrace all those around us. Everyone has only two choices—life-enhancing and life destroying. An event is not as critical as is your reaction or perception of it. It continues its life inside you, a nuclear landmine of memories that wreak far more destruction than the actual event. The more mind space you allocate to unhappy memories, the more time you spend in the past while being a spectator in the living present, the more you miss the joy the present moment offers.

We need to change the way we talk to and treat ourselves. All of us need a tender, loving caretaker within who nurtures us, not an internal drillmaster who victimizes us in an insulting and disparaging tone, sucking out all our energy, enthusiasm and happiness. Positive self-talk helps in such situations. Be prepared to sacrifice, to wait and do not rush to gratify every desire. Continue with your life’s work and you will be healed.

How to Deal With Loss

How to handle failure, loss, death—how to solve problems in thegreat textbook of life? There is no use solving problems in other people’s books. Concentrate on passing your own exams. Your life provides you with a chance to achieve the highest in yourself, by using pain as stepping-stones to enlightenment.

No one can avoid bad times, but you can ensure that you look at this time as a time for growth and learning. When the mind numbing pain that immediately follows loss has subsided, you can take proactive steps to provide emergency attention to heal your body, mind and spirit.

Pour music into your soul. Touch people who love you. Explore new places. Reach into great books and study alternate futures. Pamper yourself and ask your loved ones for hugs. Meditate. Be silent. Plug into the universe. Let go. Let God catch you. Your sankalpa or intention must be pure. Be clear about your goal. Be non-judgemental. Love and seek to understand with tenderness. Learn and immerse yourself in knowledge. Learn all you can about your chosen field from books, internet, from people, competitors. Remain focused. Never give up. Never,  ever.Help others, motivate them! Let others achieve their targets. Say no to negative people and emotions. Everything life offers is prasad—blessed by the gods. Good and bad experiences, people who love you and those who hate you, are all sent here to teach you. Go on to achieve your highest potential. Look for the highest in others. Know your purpose on earth, the

highest that God created you to become Question injustice. Stand up for those who cannot fight, speak for those who have no voice. Speak gently and with love. Receive this prasad, compliments, gifts and encouragement with grace. 

Necessary Steps to Increase Personal Happiness

    The world is in your drawing room, it is clamouring to change your life with more and more sophisticated toys. As a popular saying goes, ‘What separates the men from the boys is just the price of their toys.’ Simplify and go home to what you really need.

   The world is like a buffet counter at a five-star hotel. Let’s not grab everything on our plates. Let us be choosy, so that we may avoid spiritual indigestion and physical exhaustion.

·         Let us replace stress with positive emotions that engender joy. Let us increase our Happiness Quotient (HQ).

·         Finding a job you love is one of the ways you can immunize yourself against heart problems.

·         A good marriage is a protective shield against heart attacks.

·         Merely avoiding negative emotions is not enough; one should consistently cultivate the positive emotions of love, compassion, courage and peace.

The Ideal Householder

The ideal householder leads on earth a consecrated life, not unmindful of any duty to the living, or to the departed. His wife, the glory of his house, is modest and frugal, adores her husband, guards herself, and is the guardian of his house’s fame. His children are his choicest treasures; their babbling voices are his music; he feasts with the Gods when he eats the rice their tiny fingers have played with; and his one aim is to make them worthier than himself. Affection is the very life of his soul, of all his virtues the first and greatest. The sum and source of them all is love. His house is open to every guest, whom he welcomes with a smiling face and a pleasant word, and with whom he shares his meal, courteous in speech grateful for every kindness, just in all his dealings, master of himself in perfect self-control, strict in the performance of every assigned duty, pure, patient and forbearing with a heart free from envy, moderate in desires, speaking no evil of others, refraining from unprofitable words, dreading the touch of evil diligent in the discharge of all the duties of his position, and liberal in his benefaction, he is one whom all unite to praise. 

Tips to Assess family welfare

Here are some questions which helps you to understand your family welfare.

1. Is your family important to you?

2. Do you spend quality time with members of your family?

3. Would you like to increase the amount of quality time you spend with your family?

4. Does your family include those outside the nuclear family?

5. Is your family linked together through the internet, letters or phone calls?

6. Is respect from your family important to you?

7. Do you show appreciation for things your family has done for you?

8. Do you seek to make your family life different from what it is today?

9. Do you do things to bring about a happier marriage and family life?

10. Do you seek out books and classes that would help you to be a successful parent?

11. Do alcohol and tobacco play a part in your life? Is it a problem?

12. Do you speak up too much or too little in your family?

13. Is there too much fighting in your family?

14. Do you have a bad temper?

15. Does your family do fun things together?

16. Are you considerate in handling of misunderstandings between family members?

17. Do you come from a broken or divorced family?

18. Given the present situation, is there anything you could do to strengthen family ties?

19. Could you possibly use outside help such as counsellors and friends, to assist you in attaining a solid family now or in the future?

a. Good: More than 10 Yeses

b. Adequate: More than 6 Yeses

c. Poor: Less than 5 Yeses

Good out of Bad

Our life provides us with a chance to achieve the highest in ourselves, by using pain as stepping-stones to enlightenment. No one can avoid bad times, but we can ensure that we look at this time as a time for growth and learning. When the mind-numbing pain that immediately follows loss has subsided, we can take proactive steps to provide emergency attention to heal our body, mind and spirit. Pour music into soul. Touch people whom we love. Explore new places. Reach into great books and study alternate futures. Pamper yourself and ask your loved ones for hugs. Meditate. Be silent. Plug into the universe. Let go. Let God catch you. Our sankalpa or intention must be pure. Be clear about the goal. Be non-judgemental. Love and seek to understand with tenderness. Learn and immerse yourself in knowledge. Learn all we can about our chosen field from books, internet, from people, competitors. Remain focused. Never give up. Never, ever!

Traditional Systems

The indigenous health-care system is commensurate with the traditional habits, lifestyle and value systems of a particular culture from where it has evolved.  For example, the Keralites, in spite of coming into contactwith western culture, do not endorse its systems, and hold on to their own traditions. Perhaps that is why their age-old habit of using a high cholesterol diet has not resulted in an increased incidence of heart disease. The indigenous systems of medicine continue to have

a stronghold in Kerala.

All health-care systems, including modern medicine, are in agreement today over the issue that a patient’s psychological state has much to do with the healing process. Minor activities like taking

part in a satsang, singing a tune you enjoy, and dancing for fun to your child’s delight can make you feel contented and allow the good chemicals flow.

Religion

Religion, said the communists contemptuously, is the opiate of the masses. But if religion can calm the mind and slow down the heart and pulse rate, if it can make the engine of life work sturdily and longer, why not adopt it?

Sri Aurobindo writes about a grand spiritual concept of health:

For nearly forty years I believed them when they said I was weakly in constitution, suffered constantly from the smaller and greater ailments and mistook this curse for a burden that Nature had laid upon me. When I renounced the aid of medicines, then they began to depart from me like disappointed parasites. Then only I understood what a mighty force was the natural health within me and how much mightier yet the Will and Faith exceeding mine which God meant to be the divine support of our life in this body…

Negative emotions—anxiety, fear, depression, anger, impatience, hostility, aggressiveness,  over indulgence of any desire—cause imbalance. Moderation leads to harmony.   An integral view of health demands an integral view of life.

To attune the different elements of our nature around this central nucleus is the next step. Without such a reorientation and reorganisation of our life, it will not be possible to establish in ourselves the law of harmony and peace which is so necessary a condition for integral health. 

Your Family Health Assessment

Here are few questions to judge about your family health and by answering these questions, you can analyze your family health conditions and you can improve the health.

Answer Yes (Y) / No (N)

1. Is your family important to you?

2. Do you spend quality time with members of your family?

3. Would you like to increase the amount of quality time you

spend with your family?

4. Does your family include those outside the nuclear family?

5. Is your family linked together through the internet, letters or

phone calls?

6. Is respect from your family important to you?

7. Do you show appreciation for things your family has done for

you?

8. Do you seek to make your family life different from what it is

today?

9. Do you do things to bring about a happier marriage and

family life?

10. Do you seek out books and classes that would help you to be a

successful parent?

Do alcohol and tobacco play a part in your life? Is it a

problem?

12. Do you speak up too much or too little in your family?

13. Is there too much fighting in your family?

14. Do you have a bad temper?

15. Does your family do fun things together?

16. Are you considerate in handling of misunderstandings

between family members?

17. Do you come from a broken or divorced family?

18. Given the present situation, is there anything you could do to

strengthen family ties?

19. Could you possibly use outside help such as counsellors and

friends, to assist you in attaining a solid family now or in the

future?

Score

a. Good: More than 10 Yeses

b. Adequate: More than 6 Yeses

c. Poor: Less than 5 Yeses Score

Taming Water

Water is the giver and taker of life, as we in Chennai know, as the monsoon approaches. Over 2500 years ago Mohenjo-Daro was built in the middle of the Indus valley civilization. Engineers brought water to streets through covered drains and enormous pipelines. Water has many uses: water for transport, for electricity and energy, for chemistry and industrial production, for leisure and recreation, for health and cleaning. All this makes water planning an aspect of development itself.

In 40 AD, Sextus Julius Frontinus observed that the true miracle of Egypt was not the pyramids but its water systems. So too Rome known for its Colosseum and Pantheon, was made possible by its aqueducts and hidden water pipelines.

It is working with water that has made human civilization possible. In the desert of Africa, in Libiya, engineers have found a hidden underground pool the size of Germany. They started working on piping it to where most of their people live, on the shores of the Mediterranean. This is called The Great Man Made River project, which is expected to be as long as the Rhine. It will eventually cover 3,380kilometers. Where did this water come from? Ten thousand years ago, the Sahara was a green savannah with animals like giraffes and elephants. This is the hidden ground water stored from those distant times, under the desert sand. The quadruple aged water aquifers that were uncovered in the 50s had projected sizes varying from 4,500 to 20,000 cubic kilometers. The majority of this water supply was accumulated almost 15,000 to 25,000 years ago, while some water tanks are believed to be a few thousand years old. It was bombed by Nato and nearly 50% of the people had no running water. Today it has been repaired.

The growing water scarcity of the North China plains and the sinking groundwater table that threatens the very existence of Beijing as a capital, have led them to revive a gigantic plan, first suggested by Mao Zedong in 1952. The project will take 5 per cent of the Yangtze’s flow and pump it hundreds of kilometres to the water-thirsty cities and farmlands of the north – as far as Inner Mongolia.

Man has built 45,000 dams over 15 meters high. Over 4, 00,000 sq. kilometres are flooded by this dammed water. Water rich countries like Iceland was working on entering the hydro age when everything from cars to factories will be driven by water. More than 2000 years ago, Pausanias, the Greek Geographer, declared that no city can call itself one, unless it has an ornamental fountain! Man has tried so hard to control water. But water effortlessly takes back control!

Nurturing the Workplace

 Gandhiji knew it when he filled the streets with people singing Vande Mataram. A national anthem celebrates nationhood, the blood, sweat andtears of creating a country. It aims to transcend logic and unleash the tigers of passion. The Americans stand there, hand on heart, before their flag and sing the Stars and Stripes. It creates a wave of national pride and primes people for leadership. The Japanese use this same force to create love for the company they work in. Vivekananda carried the message of India to the world with his matchless talk which starts, “Arise, Awake, stop not till the goal is reached”!

Words absorb and radiate power because of their meaning and usage. Gandhiji created a few words, “bullets” of truth that turned a large passive lake of humanity into a tsunami, which forced the British to leave India. They were:

• Quit India!

• Do or Die!

• Purna Swaraj! (Total freedom)

• Vande Mataram!

• Jai Hind!

• Be Indian, Buy Indian!

• Swadeshi!

• Satyameve Jayathe!

Mantras or brief prayer-words were created by ancient seers to enter the heart and regenerate the awareness of the soul.’ When you infuse a sense of pride and joy in what you do, it becomes a joyful experience, instead of a chore. To work at something you love, to be “self-actualised”, in Maslow’s terms, is to protect yourself against dying young.’ ‘People can be very happy if they love their work.

Secrets to Increase Family Bonding

Every day, at an appointed hour, sit peacefully with your eyes closed and breathe. Then repeat the following affirmations.

 I have a safe and happy home.

 I enjoy unconditional love.

 The food I eat and the water I drink here nourishes me.

 God blesses us and keeps our children safe.

 This home is a sanctuary and a refuge.

 All conflicts can be solved.

Create Positive Field to have a Ideal Home

Fill your home with affirmations, positive strokes, a peaceful atmosphere and a nurturing space that enhances prana. Make it sparkling clean, fragrant with incense and flowers, and beautiful. Be respectful of the sacred forces that can animate it.

Avoid violent, depressing television programmes. Just as you would not allow a terrorist into your home, do not allow them into the blessed space of your home. Surely you are the protector of the field that exists in your home.

A healthy home is a healing space, a nurturing positive mind-field. It can be a place where all wounds are healed. If your home is not a sanctuary, but a battle-field, do something about it. Get help, maybe professional help. Family dynamics can cause disease or reverse it.

Reserve time for laughter and happiness—schedule time for it, like you do for your work. Laughter, smiles, compliments and hugs create a powerful positive field in the home.

Involve in Happiness Creating Activities

• Singing together.

• Thanking your gurus.

• Being loving and giving affirmations to parents and elders.

• Forgiving those who harmed you in your life—let go.

• Calling forth the highest from others.

• Thinking of God, the source of all abundance.

• Celebrating Abundance. Praising God.

Tips to be healthy

•    Take care of your health. You cannot deliver a prize-winning performance with a broken-down body.

• Force the world to look at issues like: What kind of world are we leaving for our children? Where have leisure, poetry and caring been banished? Why has the door been shut on the smiles and joy of our children? Why do we have no time for our friends or small acts of kindness? Why are deadlines so terrible that they extract death as the price? None of us would mind dying for great causes, but to diefor a power-point presentation, seems slightly frivolous.

• Do not get stereotyped into how others see your role: as a mother or an all forgiving rescuer in the workplace. Encourage men to discover their so-called feminine qualities of sensitivity and caring. Do not

stereotype men!

• Affirm women who are role models instead of trying to find chinks in their armour. Network with them. There is a queen-bee complex, which causes successful women managers to surround themselves

with male managers and discourage the entry of women. Identify this and speak up when required.

• There are points in a woman’s life-cycle when her intensive physical presence is needed. There are high priority interactions which cannot be delegated. Build a support system with family, household staff, neighbours and friends to help you enjoy these times. Men too have been deprived of active participation in these peak experiences in the past. Make your company recognise and

respond to these realities.

• Hitch your wagon to the pursuit of daily and consistent learning. Be Saraswati. Bring your heritage of creating wholeness from leftovers, and wealth from waste. Be Lakshmi. Call forth the courage to speak, write and act for what is true and good for all. Be Shakti. Be all woman. Be all human. Celebrate the fact that you a woman.

Happiness Mantras to Improve our Wellness

*  The world is like a buffet counter at a five-star hotel. Let’s not grab everything on our plates. Let us be choosy, so that we may avoid spiritual indigestion and physical exhaustion.

*  Let us replace stress with positive emotions that engender joy. Let us increase our HQ.

*  ‘I felt like a waterfall,’ said Diane Roffe-Stainrotter, gold-medallist skier in the 1994 Winter Olympics. The joy of a job perfectly executed, fills the body with the chemicals of bliss.

*  Professor Mihalyi Csikzent speaks about a state called the flow, which athletes, musicians, surgeons—in fact everyone—experiences when they are at their best. It is the experience of doing your job with

*  total immersion in it. So absorbed are you, that there is no place for anxiety or niggling worries.

*  Finding a job you love is one of the ways you can immunise yourself against heart problems.

*  A good marriage is a protective shield against heart attacks.

Ardhanareeshwara Model

The new millennium is a time for growth and promise for women. It is time for them to emerging from the stereotypical role of how others see them: as a mother or an all forgiving rescuer in the workplace. Men too are replacing their conventional roles as the bread-winner or boss with the ‘Complete Man’ image, where it is permissible for them to cuddle babies and shed tears, and discover their so-called

feminine qualities of sensitivity and caring. The sharp man/woman divide, the Mars/Venus chasm has been miraculously bridged by the challenge of the times. It is a time to build partnerships and collaboration. To be ‘ardhanareeshwara’ is the challenge all human beings face today. This is why the ratio of men to women in the IT industry begins to approach that magical figure of perfect collaboration, fifty-fifty.

contentment is happiness

Dr Dean Ornish, MD, the founder and president of the nonprofit Preventive Medicine Research Institute in California, and author of six best-selling books, says that men who feel that their wives love them are much more likely to reverse heart disease than those who feel the opposite. The home can be the cause for disease. It can also be the safe sanctuary for healing and reversal of disease. Everyone talks of quality time nowadays. Once, a girl from Kuala Lumpur told me about her exciting marriage to a man from LA. ‘We have a really good time on holidays,’ she said. Another bright young yuppie from a major bank said her husband worked for the same bank in another city. ‘We meet on weekends and feel just like we did when we were dating!’ she said her eyes shining. Is this looked forward-to weekend the alternative to the solid permanence and possible boredom of a traditional marriage? Are the constant travels away from each other the basis for the ‘open birdcage’ marriage to which the bird always returns from its travels? Today, when we look back, we believe that contentment is happiness

Celebrate Everyday

The poorest among mankind celebrate and give thanksgiving to the gift of life and the bounty of Nature. All over the world, harvest is a time for rejoicing. In early January, the whole village celebrates Pongal in Tamil Nadu. The four-day long festivities are like an island of joy in the midst of life’s stormy business. All old things are burnt in a huge bonfire. New clothes are worn. Overflowing joy and good fortune are celebrated by the Pongal pot of plenty which boils over with rice and jaggery that will be eaten at the celebration. The house is newly painted and decorated. A whole day is devoted to tending to cows. Their horns are painted and bodies decorated, and they are given rest and good food. The last day is devoted to going out and seeing friends and relatives, watching movies and generally celebrating life. The saying is that when the ‘Thai’ month (that starts in mid-January every year) is born, a way will be found to solve all problems.

Celebrations lift you out of the trough of despondency. They fill you with the energy to make a new beginning with the help of God and the family. Why can’t we make every day an occasion to rejoice? It is up to each family to celebrate and enjoy life on a regular basis. A special movie on television can be celebrated with hot popcorn, dinners on Saturday nights can be an opportunity to dress up. We can make affirmations for the family a way of life.

Principles of Emotional Well-being

•Listen to yourself.

• Live in the present moment. Now. Every minute.

• Discipline yourself—it will give you true freedom.

• Do not pretend to be in total control.

• Allow yourself to be vulnerable sometimes.

• Ask for help. Network.

• Reinvent and renew yourself periodically.

• Explore the concept of acceptance of self.

• Love yourself. Accept yourself, your body and mind, as you are.

• In your quest for self-improvement, affirm and love yourself as you are today, here and now.

• Accept your life, good and bad as it is now, as a divine gift.

• Love another. A gift of yourself is the greatest gift you can give.

• Keep the child in you alive. Cuddle, nurture and liberate the baby in you.

Principles of Healthy Living

·         Start the day with a glass of warm water and a dash of lime.

·         Eat only freshly-cooked meals, not refrigerated leftovers.

·         Include one green vegetable and one yellow vegetable in every meal.

·         Go on a ‘juice fast’ for a day. Start with vegetable juice, and sipfruit juice for lunch and dinner.

·         Kick the old coffee-drinking habit. Have a glass of fresh fruit juice instead.

·         Make every meal an enjoyable experience. Set dishes out attractively and chew slowly to appreciate the full flavour of the foods you eat.

·         Make every meal an enjoyable experience. Set dishes out attractively and chew slowly to appreciate the full flavour of the foods you eat.