Health, Wealth and Strength

What a lot of people are worried about might be wealth, but what should bother them more is the concern about the health. There are surely a need to find the health, before we miss out on the same completely. Living in a busy world, it is really difficult to maintain one’s health, as there is rarely any time left for the same. Even when we have a holiday or two, there is always something else that comes to take away our time. Therefore, it is necessary that we come up with some idea to keep our life healthy, while not giving up on other things around us.

The one thing that I did without second thought is to keep bring vegetarian. It has surely helped to keep things in control. It made sure that I lost about eleven to fourteen kilograms of weight in a short period. There is something else that comes with being a vegetarian, and it is that we end up eating less. The fact that we eat more than we need is one of the reasons why we turn unhealthy. We think that we need more food, but the truth is that we don’t need that much, and this feeling that we need to have more and more is because it is the kind of food that we really love to have.

Well, this one stretches when there is the need, why don’t you?

Some regular exercise has always helped me too, especially with some badminton, and as long as we take every shot seriously, and play hard to earn every point, there is a lot of effort there, which will make sure that we don’t gain that much of weight. There might be other sports, but badminton becomes the easier and the most obvious choice as there is only need of two people, and less space. During those days when I used to have a lot of food, it was badminton that had kept me in shape – nowadays, it is the one thing that I miss the most and wish to get back to playing.

Doing some exercise at the same time as doing something else will also help the cause by saving some time too. I used to do some simple exercises while watching television, or some video on the laptop. It makes sure that no time is wasted in the name of exercise when we are struggling to keep things going due to the lack of time. Well, who has time these days – one has to wonder. Everyone is busy, and we wonder if some time later, people will just stop talking, and at some point will cease to recognize us, as we, our friends and relatives rarely meet.

An early walk or jogging can make sure that some of the health is regained or retained too. I used to walk a lot during my college days, as it also provided a certain chance of some exploration. If we have a large college campus, students and teachers do have that option easily, and we can always walk around the house, or apartments, and see the gardens or the surroundings, as well as talk to people. Having someone from the neighbourhood to keep talking while doing the same, will also be helpful. We see people taking that early morning walk together all the time.

There is one thing that we can avoid for sure, and it is to keep sitting at a place for a long time – it is quite common these days as people have to work in front of a computer the whole day. It is more or less sacrificing health when you look at it. Maybe, wealth seems to be more significant than health for many, but the question remains about where it would lead them. One would wonder what can happen without health, even if there is wealth. The loss of health in the name of earning money is not something positive, and it doesn’t matter what people say about earning more.

This one declares Badminton as her favourite sport! 😛

It is also the same reason why I left my job. My health was on the decline due to a job which had me sitting in front of a computer for the whole day. I finally decided to leave that job which had me stuck up on the same seat for the whole day including Saturdays and most of the public holidays. Now, I do feel better, both with my physical health as well as mental health. Maybe, I should have cared about my health much earlier. But it is better late than never, and hope everyone realizes the same soon enough too.

I am joining Saffola #ApneTareekeSeHealthy initiative and sharing my ways of being healthy in association with BlogAdda.

TeNy

Akshaya Patra: Feed a Child

I was sitting here idle not doing anything good with my life, writing something or anything. It was on such a day that Akshaya Patra really caught my attention for the first time when Nandhini, my fellow blogger friend told me about what they have been doing, even though I do read a lot of information about NGOs and did go through some of their work earlier. I also received an e-mail about their work and I was determined to place a widget/banner of them on my blog and go through the service which they have been doing.

Established in 2000, Akshaya Patra is a non-profit organisation which runs school lunch programme across India. From its humble beginnings, as of now, they are working in ten different states, twenty four locations, ten thousand eight hundred and forty five schools and serving 1.4 million children of our nation. Akshaya Patra dedicates its inception and work to the inspiring resolve of His Divine Grace A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada as the organization takes over the fine vision that “No child in India shall be deprived of education because of hunger”.

Akshaya Patra currently provides freshly cooked meal to children on all school days. This mid-day meal programme has a long history and we remember the mid-day meal scheme being introduced in Kerala in 1984 – the first of its kind can be traced back to the Pre-Independence era, but it will never be enough, and requires more and more help each day. The states covered by Akshaya Patra are parts of Andhra Pradesh, Assam, Chhattisgarh, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Odisha, Gujarat, Rajasthan, Telangana and Uttar Pradesh.

With its headquarters at Bangalore, Akshaya Patra attempts to make sure that no child has to skip school in case of an absence of food. It is a great idea in an environment when the children needs to go past hunger and malnutrition to reach their goals, along with what all factors that the society puts them though. Every child needs to study, and for the same, he or she needs to be free from the most basic problem, which is hunger. Education is the right of all children, and this surely helps a lot. Akshaya Patra has also won the 14th Mother Teresa Award in the Best NGO Category of 2014.

There are times when we want to do something good and we can’t because the situation doesn’t work in our favour. The opportunities to contribute rarely comes when we are looking for them. I was myself looking forward to see Akshaya Patra in Kerala, but it turns out that it isn’t there. Maybe it is because Kerala has its mid-day meal programme working well, and there are other places where the need is more and it is urgent. So, it is not that easy to do anything with Akshaya Patra staying right here, but in the case of the online option present, there is no such limitation.

There is the option to donate online through this link and it takes just Rs 750/- to feed a child during an year with Akshaya Patra. The children in need can use all the support that we can provide, and there is no small amount. Spreading the idea through the social media profiles is another fine act because not many things match spreading the word through Facebook and Twitter. We bloggers and website owners can also help by putting a banner/widget of Akshaya Patra and spread awareness that way.

You can see samples of the widgets on this blog as well as at my other blog, Movies of the Soul. As most of us are not able to change the code due to being hosted at WordPress.com, we can use the widgets on the sidebars – nobody can predict the what can bring the chance, a blog post, a widget or a banner! It will only take a small space among the rest of the things on display. Together, we have the chance to make a difference, an opportunity that may not always be there. So, lets use it right now, as nobody knows what tomorrow might bring.

***The images used in this blog post are from the Official Facebook Page of Akshaya Patra

TeNy

One Sweet Alternative

It is already July! Time does run very fast! And you know the season! After a tough summer, Kerala entered the monsoon season a little late and has had its effects of the heat for a longer time just like having those pre-monsoon showers a lot more than the last year. Yes, the temperature has indeed increased in the God’s Own Country, and it also feels a lot more hot than the recent years. There is a certain amount of burning feeling in the presence of only a lesser number of trees, especially in the towns and the cities.

Summer might be the best time for having those sip-ups and ice creams, as we remember those days from our school-time. But it is not summer any more, and one has to wonder what is to have during these monsoon days. It is surely not those milk shakes which made us feel awesome during those summers. Even with the rise in temperature, the rain cools things down all of a sudden. So, what would replace the ice creams? Well, there might be many options with sugar content, but honey is a lot healthier substitute to the same.

Honey makes sure that there are less calories involved and a better management of weight can be done; even skin got its advantages from honey. People spend too much time at the gymnasiums to reduce their fat and at the same time, they also end up reducing the weight of their pockets – not more fat wallets either. So, honey remains that fine source of energy and keeps you healthy and a bit more wealthier than having to go for fitness and eat those costlier things made of sugar.

Along with jaggery (known in Kerala as sarkara), honey can boast about its health benefits, and even above that, related to the lack of threats to one’s health. It is natural and is known factor that helps in digestion. Honey is known to make a difference in health not only in the Ancient Indian texts, but also in the Ancient Egypt as well as the Greek city-states. The ancient scholars from all religions were quite aware of the same, until science came up with other alternatives which were not natural.

Honey is also one of the panchamirtham. You can find something about honey in most of the religous texts and also the derived works. The Native American Civilizations, especially the Mayans knew it and so did the Chinese. Mayans actually considers the stingless bees of Central America as sacred. The myths all around the world give a special significance to honey. It is also a known fact that in the grand surviving text from the Roman Empire, Naturalis Historia by Pliny the Elder, we can see that the author dedicates a lot of area for the honey and its makers.

Honey is often considered as a good choice to make the immune system better, and people often use it against allergies even though done without certainty. People with throat problems are also known to have more of honey. I have a good number of aunties here who are always telling their children to have more and more honey. Some of them ask whether they have actually had honey on that day before talking about anything else. Honey is often like something which removes the worry of the parents who are concerned too much about what their children are having.

Dabur Honey thus becomes an interesting and valuable substitute for all the sugar that we take in, and the substitute can stop us from moving to the high blood sugar status, but we are all going towards the same. May be there is a point to stop and shift to a better alternative. It is the healthy and balanced diet that we all need. But the question still remains if we can follow that. May be with Dabur Honey popularizing the same, and honey getting to be an even more popular thing, it is still possible to have a Honey Diet!

You can check out Dabur Honey @ http://www.daburhoney.com/

***The images used in this blog post are from the Facebook Page of Dabur Honey and are used only for supporting this post.

TeNy

Closer to Radiance

There was a question which my mom used to ask me even from my schooldays. It was about how much water I managed to drink on a day. Drink more water for the skin was the idea. I never really managed to meet that requirement of twelve glasses of water and she decreased it to eight, and I still struggled to reach there. I cared very less about health at those days, and so the idea of giving the skin more water was rather lost on me. I hope to use that tip more in future though.

The next tip was to eat your vegetables, and you will be healthier and will look better with healthier skin. Then I was like, everybody knows that already and refused my vegetables as the grand non-vegetarian kid of the time. At that time, it felt cooler to refuse the vegetables, but not that much nowadays, with going semi-vegetarian. May be I should have done that a long time ago. It is good to eat some of those vegetables, and it is good for the skin as the earlier generation always used to say.

A few years ago, she had also adviced to eat less of the spicy food or it will show on the skin. She was against those grand Chicken Biriyani adventures which we friends had and had told to have vegetables meals even when we go on a trip. It sounded too much for us at that time, but nowadays, often I choose the meals instead of the spicy things. The non-vegetarian world was rather a smaller one, but it is the healthy one as she used to say.

There was also this advice from the past, about being stress-free, as higher the stress, more chance is there for skin problems, just like the problems inside our heads. The tip was to keep calm – never really worked out for me living a life surrounded by the pathetic relatives who judge people by money and job. Stress has been part of my problems, but may be if I could lie better, I could be further stress-free and live a happier life with better skin.

My parents had always adviced me not to play cricket at noon just because some World Cup or Mini World Cup is going on. This was kind of a regular advice given to me to save my skin from the sun, and even though it was repeated so many times, I used to play the whole day until late night at that time, something which started early morning. Yes, those days had me in direct contact with sun, and they were those moments which I could have avoided for the skin.

Mom had special concern for my Vitamin C. Yes, the fruits rich in that particular vitamin was a nice preference. It was something related to the human body’s production of collagen, and the skin was to benefitted from the same. I always loved the oranges, and so this skin-care tip worked in a much better way. Lime juice was also a regular drink which I had and so this one came naturally in favour of the skin.

#ComeCloser to Radiant Skin as VICCO Turmeric Cream could be a wonderful solution for the skin problems like oily skin, pimples and blackheads, and claims to have an Ayurvedic formula with special properties of turmeric; also known to prevent and cure skin infections, rashes and allergies, with some help in dealing with injuries too. There seems to be something quite interesting about it. Do check VICCO Turmeric Cream and the related products here at their website: http://www.viccolabs.com/product-turmeric-cream-with-foam-base.php

TeNy

The Need for Cleanliness

We ask for many things in this world. Isn’t cleanliness among them? My hope is that it will be a basic requirement soon, and people will get to realize the same. During my earlier visit to Singapore, I did wonder if India can one day have the same cleanliness. I wondered about what they had that India didn’t. I have found the state of Kerala cleaner as a whole, but never really steady in its cleanliness, especially these days as waste is indeed being thrown on the side of the roads. All photos used here were taken on my Sony Cybershot DSC W310 except for the one mentioned otherwise.

What is it that a beautiful country needs? It is not the tourist attractions, because nature and history has already provided the same as long as they are not vandalized. What every nation needs is cleanliness, as it is very important for the health and hygiene of the citizens of the nations as well as the visitors. Without good sanitation, we can’t say that we are good hosts and follow the policy of “Athithi Devo Bhava”. Yes, some people might think that we are awesome hosts just because there is a phrase about it, but the real fact is that we have to work on it.

Is it fair towards the animals? I don’t think so.

The first thing that can come to some people might be to act that they should try to create a show for the others, acting as if trying to clean, just because it is the trend. No, you are not doing any favour to the nation by doing so. The first thing to do is to keep your house and premises clean, and then your neighbourhood area. It is how the whole thing should begin. Haven’t we all heard about the saying “charity begins at home”? Well, so does the health and hygiene – we can’t make the society any better without changing ourselves, can we?

Our responsibility to our nation begins at home. Whatever we do at home is significant, even as not many people are aware of what we do in our room or on the backside of our house. It is what we practice at home that we take to the world outside. It is our actions between our own that is reflected even when we are outside and nobody is looking. Yes, this has to start with oneself, and not with a bigger group. If you walk around a broom and keep your house untidy, you are to blame despite what show you can come up with in the public.

Kitty caught in what humans litter (taken on my Galaxy Duos)

We have polluted our world, made it terrible for many creatures of nature, and it is all because we don’t care much. With that pollution, we have spread diseases, and these begin when we don’t care about waste disposal. Check all those rivers; are they any cleaner than they used to be? So much waste has been thrown into the rivers, and it is almost impossible to drink directly from there days or even clean. Even the holy rivers are not spared. This proves that clean India doesn’t mean that we should dispose our waste anywhere.

Yes, we have people who get rid of their waste by throwing it to the properties of others. We also have those who put their waste anywhere when nobody is looking. They are no lesser evil than those big industries which pollute our air as well as water, some of them even directly causing deadly diseases to humans and killing off a lot of creatures and plants. It is a need to raise our voice against these practices, but only when we keep cleanliness in our own home that we are worthy of the same, and it is what we should strive for.

This should be applicable everywhere, but why is that we need signs?

This blog post is written in relation to Dettol NDTV Banega Swachh India campaign in association with Indiblogger, and it is a much needed move towards a better India. Please check http://swachhindia.ndtv.com/ for more details, and lets contribute to making and keeping our nation clean not as something which we are forced to do, but as a part of our lives as a duty towards our nation and the fellow countrymen.

This initiative is a program to address the rising need of hygiene and sanitation in India. It will try to create awareness about the same, and will also work for construction and maintenance of toilets. The brand ambassador is none other than Big B – Amitabh Bachchan. NDTV Dettol – Banega Swachh India bus is supposed to cover about four hundred villages across eight Indian states – Haryana, Rajasthan, UP, Bihar, Jharkhand, Chattisgarh, MP and Maharashtra. With the same, they will create awareness around hygiene and sanitation through a number of ways which can connect the best with the common man.

Cheers to http://swachhindia.ndtv.com/.
TeNy

Past, Present and Health

We all have memories of our childhood, but mine actually started much later, but among those days which are part of the big memory train, are those early days of school and what followed the same. I was considered as a child for a pretty long time, and therefore I haven’t really kept the exact border for the moment which I ceased being a child, and that should indeed be debatable. All the pictures that I share below are scanned from my old photographs.

Among the things that I can remember from those days include a number of calcium tablets, and a few tablets for immunity, but there was always Dabur Chyawanprash which took the centre stage on a lot of occasions. I used to run away from anything which was said to be good for health, but this one did have an interesting taste at that time, even though I did ask for one chocolate after having the same just because it had become a routine for me.

I was pretty good at smiling those days 😀

The need for some extra immunity rises from the fact that these days, there is rarely the time for children at the hands of parents who both would be working, quite in contrast to that idea of having the mother always being present for the child. Yes, things have changed radically, and the need to improve the child’s immunity and protect him or her from illness now has more requirements, and parents might not be able to do the same.

This is where something like Dabur Chyawanprash would come into the picture. It has also happened in my case, and I didn’t have that much of a healthy childhood. Born to working parents, and with a father who is always working at one or the other corner of the nation, not really there when you needed him the most, and the mother struggling to handle two pesky kids (I was still the less mischievous one, even as irritating enough), it was never going to be easy to get the right nutrients to the kids.

Maintaining one’s health is extremely important, and there is no need for any text book to talk about the same. When a child gets sick, it destroys the flow of daily life and the problem takes over the whole household. The children can always be asked not to go outside to play or venture out when the climate could get bad, but the question is about why can’t there be the thought about increasing the child’s immunity rather than stopping him or her from enjoying life before getting stuck with a boring life that is to follow?

Still, one of the more dangerous kids around, of course 😀

Here comes Dabur Chyawanprash again with its offer of a better immunity. There is no time for the parents to see what all the children eat and drink, and they often let them have food from outside – but how can one be sure about what they are provided with in the canteens and restaurants with their friends or relatives? Even yesterday, there existed the news about a number of restaurants given notice for supplying old food – and most of the times, these people are repeat violators and we don’t even realize that. There is nothing that we can do about that.

Despite our hope for an immune India, the world around us won’t get any better, and the choices we would have can only get worse. Due to the same, it is only a very good option to choose something like Dabur Chyawanprash. After all, what we want is the best for the kids, and what is better than giving them protection, that supply of immunity which they need, and what parents have the duty to provide them? Let’s hope for the better days and healthier children on this wonderful festival of lights, and keep the faith alive.

*This post is specifically written for the Indi Happy Hours campaign, A HEALTHY CHILD MAKES A HAPPY HOME! Thanks to Dabur India and IndiBlogger for the opportunity. For more details, please visit the link below:
https://www.liveveda.com/daburchyawanprash/

TeNy