Creating Joy in Family Life

Today everyone has a chance to maintain links with the extended family through the internet. It is a nourishing and often supportive network. Today, however, the family, as the ‘shock absorber of society, to which the bruised and battered individual returns after doing battle with the world,’ in the words of Alvin Toffler in his landmark work Future Shock, is going through a transitional phase. The breakdown of the joint family has led to a loosening of extended family relationships. The powerful mother-in-law of the joint family is emerging as the subdued caretaker of children, helping the educated daughter-in-law augment the double income of all upwardly mobile young couples. The large, amorphous, supportive joint family that supported a wide variety of people and bestowed unconditional love for the crippled, the old and the helpless, has been reduced to the nuclear family where everyone is in sharp focus. Much like the modern corporation, there is no place to hide, no place for passengers, and everyone has to pull their own weight. It is our mission to restore to it its traditional role as a place of rest and healing, albeit in a new paradigm. There should be one person in the family who can cushion the blows of the outside world. Someone who is not too busy to listen, give support, and manage the daily tasks of living. This could even be a paid caregiver or cook. Networking with parents, in-laws, neighbours, domestic help and friends is the key for working mothers.

Well Being and Being Well

Well being is so much more than good physical health. It is a state of physical, mental, emotional and social well being. Improving well being is based on behavioural science and includes skills that can be learned. The elements of well being encompass many emotions ranging from gratitude and mindfulness to passion and grit. Witnessing the acts of kindness makes us feel inspired and elevated. This is why people react so positively to stories of Mother Theresa. Practising the Buddhist meditation of loving kindness and metta bhavana which is about enjoying the pleasure of other living creatures, does increase happiness. Passion for what we do is a good thing. It enables us to be more committed and persistent, more hopeful and optimistic. If however, this same passion becomes obsessive it can be harmful. So passion needs to be calibrated to be more flexible and healthy. Psychological well being may reduce the risk of chronic physical illness and promote a long life. Life satisfaction improved around age 50. Worry declined after this age. The frequency of negative feelings reduced in middle age. In spite of declining health and income, during this time, psychological well being seemed to increase! One needs to focus on ensuring health and economic adequacy during this period. Eudemonic well being, focuses on the meaning and purpose of life. A sense of purpose and the ability to move towards goals, can greatly improve life satisfaction at any stage in life. Taking up a meaningful goal at any age, can improve well being. Being paid, is not as meaningful as contributing meaningfully. Steps to well being • Exercise, also relax • Eat high quality food • Play and enjoy frivolously • Take in the sunshine • Get rid of negative emotions • Promote positive emotions • Sleep well • Learn new things • Be creative

Steps for Personal Health

1. Take care of your health. You cannot deliver a prize-winning performance with a broken-down body. 2. 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 die for a power-point presentation, seems slightly frivolous. 3. 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! 4. 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.

Proactive Change

The results of transformative change are all around us this summer. Sunflower plants busting out from seeds where they have slept tightly curled, butterflies leaving behind their worn out cocoons, flowers dressing up the bare limbs of trees. This time as the financial year begins it is the time for the 3Rs rest, relaxation and rejuvenation of proactive change. Change is the only certainty in an uncertain world. This year you will change merely because everything around you will change. What you can decide is whether you will lead the change or become a victim of it. Think about proactively changing things in the following areas of your life. 1. Personal 2. Family 3. Professional 4. Social Personal: Create goals that will improve your skills and build on your strengths. Tap into the passion that you have kept tightly leashed because you had no time. Did you always want to learn to play the guitar? Sign up now. Was Bollywood dancing what lights your fire? Do it. Sign up for a distance learning programme. Family: Ask your family members to suggest change each of them would like. Try to see if it can be done. Don’t be a casualty of the corporate rat race. Professional: Have a chat with your team mates. Volunteer for a tough blue sky job. Create a daily ‘huddle’ in your workplace so that everyone can meet and talk for a few minutes every morning. Make sure everyone participates. Work on making it a fun place. Social: Create a face book page for your family and friends. Keep in touch, share pictures, keep them informed and interested and involved in an interesting activity: a get-together for all your friends, an annual family reunion, a pot luck meet and eat for all your neighbours. Things will change anyway. Make sure they change in the way you want. And remember a butterfly is not an improved caterpillar. Just as a sunflower is not an improved seed.

season of Hope

Easter Sunday celebrates the themes of hope, regeneration, resurrection and the possibility of eternal life. The day is a joyous one, celebrated with a feast of Easter eggs, coloured red, hearty meals, games and family reunions. The Russian princesses exchanged golden jeweled eggs made by the fabled jeweller Faberge. This day follows 40 days of the Lenten fast. On a personal level, it reminds us of the cycle of time which moves inexorably from fasting to feasting, from sorrow to happiness, from defeat to victory, from darkness to light and death to eternal life. It is a reminder that neither good times nor bad are permanent. As the Bible puts it, “This too shall pass”. We can take the Easter message to heart as we dive into a new financial year on 1st April. Here are some of the lessons: 1. Everything changes 2. The kalachakra or wheel of life takes one through the ups and downs of life. Neither lasts. Both are temporary. 3. Have faith that good things are waiting round the corner. Meanwhile, work hard and hope. 4. Celebrate the dawn of hope and move forward. 5. Transformation is awaiting you if you are willing to allow your old self to die. Just like a seed transforms from being a seed, to become a plant and a mighty tree. So, roll up your sleeves, close your personal and corporate accounts as the March 31st deadline approaches. Pay creditors. Make up with those with whom you have had conflicts. Reach out to enemies, if any. Thank God for the blessings of the previous year. Get ready for a brand new future – the season of Hope! See how skillfully March 31st avoids major holidays like Christmas and New Year. Notice how it takes into account the unpredictable outcome of the February-March crop. Celebrate the past; clear the decks for a bright and prosperous, financial year ahead.

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.