Things were going exactly as Srinivasan had feared, his Mother would come in from India and crush his American way of life under her strong South Indian influence. For a genetic scientist like Vasu, as Srinivasan was called by his friends, the only kind of order was disorder. So consumed he was by his research that the world and it's affairs mattered little to him. When his last girlfriend walked out on him, "Find a girl on planet Srinivasan," she had screamed as she stomped out.
Now Vasu's Mother had taken over the administration of the planet. It irritated him, this milk at night and chywanprash every morning. "Have you been wearing the same pair of Jeans for the past three days?" Mother was beginning her morning interrogation.
Vasu stared at the hot idlis in front of him, the chywanprash to follow and the wardrobe interrogation that had begun. Something snapped in his mind. "Mom I love you and I love that you come all the way from India to take care of me but plesse don't fuss over me! It irritates me! And then I cannot work!"
His Mother did not really care if Vasu was upset, "The idlis are getting cold," was her matter of fact response.
"You don't really care, do you Mom?"
"I care about you Vasu. The work you do is alright. If you don't do it, someone else will do it."
"Mom, I am genetic scientist. I am working on the evolution of man. Theory of evolution, Charles Darwin, have you heard of him? " Vasu was exasperated with her unwillingness to understand. His Mother sat down next to him and smiled, "I know Darwin, Vasu. I also know that what you think he discovered was old news in India."
" Yeah sure Mom!" Vasu said with sarcasm.
"Well if you are too smart then listen to this, " his Mother countered." Have you heard of Dashavatar? The ten avatars of Vishnu?" Vasu nodded. "Then let me tell you what you and Mr. Darwin don't know. The first avatar was the Matsya avatar, it means the fish. That is because life began in the water. Is that not right?" Vasu began to listen with a little more attention.
"Then came the Kurma Avatar, which means the tortoise, cause life moved from the water to the land. The amphibian. So the Tortoise denoted the evolution from sea to land. Third was the Varaha, the wild boar, which meant the wild animals with not much intellect, you call them the Dinosaurs, correct? " Vasu nodded wide eyed.
"The fourth avatar was the Narasimha avatar, half man and half animal, the evolution from wild animals to intelligent beings. Fifth the Waman avatar, the midget or dwarf, who could grow really tall. Do you know why that is? Cause there were two kinds of humans, Homo Erectus and the Homo Sapiens and Homo Sapiens won that battle." Vasu could see that his Mother was in full flow and he was stupefied.
"The Sixth avatar was Parshuram, the man who wielded the axe, the man who was a cave and forest dweller. Angry, and not social but the seventh avatar was Ram, the first thinking social being, who laid out the laws of society and the basis of all relationships. The eight avatar was Krishna, the statesman, the politician, the lover who played the game of society and taught how to live and thrive in the social structure. The Ninth avatar, the Buddha, the man who rose from Narasimha and found man's true nature. The nature of Buddha, he identified man's final quest of enlightenment. And finally, my boy, will come Kalki, the man you are working on. The man who will be genetically supreme."
Vasu looked at his Mother speechless. "This is amazing Mom, how did you.. This makes sense!"
There are certain places out there in our world where time has seemingly stood still for a century or more. The kind of places where you can find the pristine beauty of the natural world alongside cosy, almost fairytale-like houses, and where everything is shrouded in an atmosphere of peace and tranquillity.
We picked some the most gorgeous small towns villages where you’re guaranteed to be able to relax from the endless bustle of the big city. If we ever make it there, we plan on staying — forever!
2. How to cook. She should be able to prepare small snacks such as eggs, pasta, toast, sandwiches etc. My daughter loves to cook and letting them experiment enforces this life skill.
3. Body changes are coming and what to expect. She needs to know that along with these hormonal changes will come some emotional changes as well. I have bought my daughter a great book by American Girl called The Care and Keeping of You that breaks down the physical and emotional changes in a very easy to understand way. I highly recommend it or a book like it to assist in explaining all that is going to happen to their bodies in the next few years.
4. The harm of drugs. Unfortunately, no matter where you live, drugs are a threat to your child and it starts as early as 10 in some cases. Explain to them in no uncertain terms that no drugs are safe to try even once. Make them understand the tragedy that results in the use of drugs and how dangerous and illegal they are. I have made it clear to my daughter that friends will try to convince you to experiment and that she has to be strong enough to walk away, even if it makes her "uncool" to them. I have also let her know that when she gets older and is out and ever feels a situation is becoming unsafe or making her uncomfortable to call a parent to come get her no matter what.
5. At this age, it's important for them to know something about the facts of life. I know it's a tough convo to have, but you surely don't want them getting their info on the playground at school. I don't think they need every detail, but a small chat will help them feel more mature about body functions and will prevent crude talk about the subject that they may hear from other kids.
6. They should be aware how there are people all over the world and even in their own community who may not be as fortunate as they are.They should know that helping someone in need is a gratifying feeling and that the help they give may be the boost that person needs to turn their day around. Take them to a local animal shelter or a senior center and let them spend some time volunteering They will feel so good when they are done and it's a life long habit of helping everyone should practice.
7. Money doesn't grow on trees. I admit I'm definitely a shopaholic, but I try hard to make it clear to my daughter that nothing comes for free. I worked since I was 15 years old and that gave me the opportunity to shop and travel. She is aware that no work equals no money equals no fun. When she gets money for birthdays and holidays, her father has taught her to split it up into three funds: one to spend, one for emergencies and one for long-term goals such as college. She keeps three separate banks so as not to confuse her funds. It's a good habit for them to get into and will keep them on track later in life.
8. Appearance is important. She should know that personal grooming and appropriate clothing for different events are something that will be necessary throughout her life.
9. Everyone won't always be nice. My daughter is going into fifth grade and it's the time that all the nasty girl drama starts. It was already peeking its head a little in fourth grade, but I anticipate the next two years is when they really get catty. I have talked to her about what girls get snippy about and how to stay out of the drama. You have to stay true to your close friends no matter what, and don't be involved in groups that talk about other girls because eventually, they will talk about you, too. I've tried to teach her to be confident enough to hold her own, but aware of trouble makers and not afraid to report issues that seem dangerous, like extreme bullying or threats.
10. Life is not easy. There will be challenges she will face that will seem cruel and impossible. It will take her faith, her family and her perseverance to get through some of the things that life throws at her. It's important to know life is going to be a series of ups and down and be prepared to deal with both.
Learning these 10 things is a good base with which to begin the tough preteen and teen years. Helping our children maneuver life is our jobs as parents, even if we haven't quite figured it all out ourselves yet.
British psychologist Elizabeth Stokoe studies the patterns in talk that most of us don’t even notice. She explains how her research can be used to train people to interact more effectively.
People spend a good deal of time talking to one another, and in general we do it pretty well. We might feel excited, angry, embarrassed, or — if we’re lucky — loved, in the course of our daily conversations. So is there any benefit to thinking about a science of talk? Can we really gain anything from scientific analysis of something we “just do”?
I believe we can, and I’ve spent the last 20 years studying real talk from real people talking to each other in real time. And while the linguist Noam Chomsky once described conversation as a “disorderly phenomenon,” I can tell you that it’s no such thing. Conversation is highly systematic and organized … and it tells us an incredible amount about the power of language to shape our daily lives.
Take this ordinary telephone call between two friends, Nancy and Hyla, transcribed according to the standard conversation analysis transcription system, which includes intonation and the actual sounds being made rather than just the correct spelling of a word (lines under a word represent emphasis and different movements in pitch, the equals sign means that the turns are very rapid):
On the face of it, this is utterly mundane. There’s no science here! Well, actually there is. Conversation analysts have shown that, across settings including phone calls, face-to-face encounters, Skype calls and even instant messaging, conversations routinely contain three component pairs of actions: summons and answer (the opening — lines 1-2); greetings and identification (for Hyla and Nancy, just the sound of the voice is enough for identification — lines 3-4), and initial enquiries (the ‘how-are-yous’ at lines 5-6).
Perhaps this seems obvious. But now let’s take a look at the start of a call between boyfriend and girlfriend, Dana and Gordon.
Like Nancy, Gordon produces an answering “hello.” But rather than being met with a greeting, there is instead a gap of seven-tenths of a second. For conversation analysts, that’s enough of a delay to indicate trouble. Hyla and Nancy spoke rapidly, with a tenth of a second or less between their turns. In this instance, even though only one word has been uttered, we already know enough to expect that Dana and Gordon are unlikely to proceed smoothly through the next two pairs of conversational components. Here’s what Dana says next:
Dana returns the greeting, but rather than move into the “how-are-yous” portion of the conversation, she asks Gordon a question. It’s not an innocent question; it is antagonistic. As Gordon’s girlfriend, she implies that she’s entitled to know where he’s been “all morning”; she’s been trying to get him “all morning.”
That we can pinpoint moments of trouble so precisely has big pay-offs when it comes to understanding professional or workplace encounters. For example, we can search for silences and work out had happened previously to produce it. In my work with organizations from the police force to commercial sales teams, I’ve been able to show practitioners which words and phrases are most effective — and what does not work. Here’s a look at some of my more recent findings, as well as a great study by a pair of American conversation analysts.
1. Are you willing?
I’ve worked with mediation services that help people in a dispute with their neighbor, partner or colleague. By analyzing hundreds of calls between mediators and their potential clients, it became clear that some callers don’t really want mediation; they want a lawyer, police officer or housing company to arrest, evict or otherwise constrain the other party’s behavior. They have been referred to mediation as a last resort, and many callers reject it on the basis that the other party is the “kind of person who won’t mediate.” Without knowing how to overcome that hurdle, the call is over and the client is lost. However, I found that when mediators asked people if they would be “willing” to mediate, even resistant callers agreed to try the service. “Willing” was significantly more effective than other phrasing such as “might you be interested in mediation?” — and it was the only word that achieved a total turnaround from “no” to “yes.” My theory: it works because if the other party is the kind of person who won’t mediate, then the caller must be the kind of person who will…!
2. How did you hear about us?
When people telephone companies to buy things — in the case of my research, new windows and doors — the call is mostly about what the caller wants. But the company often wants something too — to know how the caller heard about them. After all, they’re invariably spending money on advertising, so what advertising space is worth buying? Some salespeople ask, “how did you hear about us?” at the start of the call. Others wait until the end of the call to ask, “just before you go, would you mind telling me where you heard about us?” Both questions deliver a request for information, but the first one is often followed by a long silence, which we know indicates trouble. The second one is followed by an immediate answer that indicates there was no trouble in asking it. Being careful about the placement and wording of requests can have an impact on the rapport between caller and salesperson; knowing what works can enable companies to optimize their calls.
3. Why were you arrested?
Police officers are trained to ask a certain type of question when they talk to arrested suspects. Training manuals recommend open-ended questions that don’t push for any particular information: “Tell me about your day from when you woke up this morning to the point that we met.” However, it turns out that a more specific format is far more effective in eliciting the sorts of accounts that police actually want from suspects. The question “can you tell me the circumstances in which you were arrested?” had better results than the training manual question, which could prompt people to describe what they had for breakfast! This is because, unlike the open-ended question, it focuses the narrative. Why is the more effective question not in the manual? Because this guidance is based on theory, not evidence. Much communication guidance is the same, which means people are often trained to do the wrong thing.
4. Any or some?
American conversation analysts John Heritage and Jeffrey Robinson examined the impact when doctors changed just one word in a question: “any” to “some.” The issue: Patients were frequently leaving appointments without voicing all of their concerns, resulting in dissatisfaction and inefficiencies. One reason might be that doctors’ opening questions, such as “What can I do for you today?”, typically elicit only one concern. Recognizing this problem, medical school training recommends that, after discussing the initial problem, doctors then ask, “is there anything else we need to take care of today?” However, analysts have shown that questions containing the word “any” typically receive negative responses. In Heritage and Robinson’s experiment, one group of doctors asked the “any” question; another used the word “some”: “Is there something else we need to take care of today?” That small change showed a statistically significant uplift in reported concerns. The finding tells us some other interesting things. First, while not every “some” works, outcomes cannot simply be attributed to style, personality or gender. Second, as with the examples above, it suggests what language should appear in communication training.
I developed a technique called CARM (the Conversation Analytic Role-play Method) to help people assess conversations and understand what a difference a word can make. What I love about conversation analysis is that often insights are just under our nose, waiting for close inspection to suggest a smarter way to communicate. As we saw in the “willing” case, the effective practice was right there all along.
Basil seeds and chia seeds have both been in the spotlight recently; largely due to the claim that they act as effective weight-loss aids, when consumed as part of a balanced diet. However, there seems to be a lot of confusion between the two; with some people even thinking they are one and the same.
In actual fact, there’s a lot of key differences between basil and chia seeds; and it’s a good idea to get the low-down on both food products before committing to buy.
Basil Seeds Vs Chia Seeds: The Key Differences
They’re from different parts of the world. Basil seeds derive (unsurprisingly) from the basil plant; which is native to both the Mediterranean and India. Chia seeds, on the other hand; hail from Mexico and Guatemala.
They’re consumed differently. This is the really significant difference. Basil seeds cannot be eaten raw. Instead, you’ll need to soak them for at least a couple of hours in water. However, chia seeds can be consumed both raw and soaked; depending on how you want to use them.
Appearance. The seeds actually look quite different when you compare them. Basil seeds are black, tiny and shaped almost like a minute grain of rice. Chia seeds are a little bit larger, more oval in shape, and come in a variety of colours; including grey, brown, white and black.
Nutritional content. Both seeds offer certain nutritional benefits, but it’s generally thought that chia seeds are ‘better’ for you; as they contain antioxidants, fibre, calcium, protein and many other key minerals. However, basil seeds contain plenty of iron.
Benefits to the body. Chia seeds help to maintain healthy blood pressure and blood sugar levels in the body. Studies conducted on animals also indicate that they help lower cholesterol and promote improved cardiovascular health. Basil seeds, on the other hand, function well as a diuretic and aid digestion. The richness of the iron in basil seeds also helps to improve quality of the blood.
Price. Basil seeds are more readily available, and as a result, are generally cheaper than chia seeds, which need to be imported all the way from Central America.
Are They Any Good for Weight-Loss?
Many dieters are interested in the weight loss benefits of both basil seeds and chia seeds. Both are repeatedly linked online with dieting articles; with many promising miracle results.
Whilst neither of these seeds will produce sudden, effortless weight-loss, both can certainly be used as an effective aid to support your efforts to lose the excess pounds. The main dieting benefit of the seeds are their ability to help you feel more easily sated after eating. In simple terms, they help to fill you up, thus helping you to avoid snacking throughout the day!
When added to water, both chia and basil seeds swell considerably; which helps to fill the stomach and keep your body hydrated. However, it’s important to note that they are not a substitute for healthy eating. To get the most from your basil seeds or chia seeds, you’ll need to also ensure that you’re enjoying a balanced diet.
- See more at: http://www.thenaturalhealthmarket.co.uk/blog/basil-seeds-vs-chia-seeds-a-complete-comparison#sthash.Jigdk089.dpuf
Who doesn’t love glowing skin? A correct sleeping pattern, CTM routine, maintaining the right diet, exercising and using the right rejuvenating creams are the key mantras for getting glowing complexion. However, it could not be possible for all of us to follow this routine perfectly. If you are pressed for time and are looking at options to get a glowing skin overnight, here are a couple of tried and tested natural ways for glowing skin that you could try.
Natural Ways to Get Glowing Skin
1. The Rice and Sesame Scrub:
This is one of my favourite and most simple home remedy to make scrub that gives you a glow instantly.
Soak equal amounts of rice and sesame seeds overnight
Grind to a fine scrub consistency in the morning
Apply over your body and face and leave it on for a minute or two
Wash off with cool water
While the sesame nourishes and moisturizes your skin, the rice grains will exfoliate gently. This is a perfect body and face polish.
Use Sleeping Packs:
Sleeping packs nourish your skin while you sleep. Here is how you can use this directly available product.
Wash your face clean, with a mild face wash and rinse with cold water
Remove all traces of make-up and pat dry your skin
Take about less than a teaspoon of the sleeping pack and massage it with upward strokes on your skin.
Since sleeping packs are easily absorbed in your skin, they won’t leave a greasy feel.
When you wake up in the morning, use a mild cleanser to clean your face and rinse with cold water.
Apply Milk:
Apply a very thin layer of low fat milk on your faceMilk is another wonderful natural way for glowing skin.
Massage with upward strokes, till the milk is totally absorbed by your skin
Wash your face with a mild face wash in the morning and pat dry
Milk not only helps to clear dark facial spots but also nourishes the skin as you sleep.
Tip:Use the honey pack again, post the exfoliation to get the extra glow.Use a mild exfoliator to cleanse your skin and pat dry
Remove all traces of make-up
Apply a pack of honey and fullers earth and leave it on for at least 15 minutes
When the pack dries, wet it using very little water and scrub slowly while massaging your face for at least 2 minutes
Rinse off with cold water. Pat dry and apply a thin layer of a rejuvenating night cream
When you wake up, use a mild exfoliator to clean your face.
5. For Your Eyes:
While you get the glow on your face, don’t forget the eyes! Constant exposure to computers and lack of sleep can leave you with dark circles. You can use these simple ways for healthy eyes:
Use a comforting eye contour gel that works on hydrating the skin around your eyes as you sleep
Use an eye mask to cover your eyes while you sleep
Wash your eyes with cold water when you wake up
Your dark circles would not have vanished, but your eyes will look fresh!
6. Face Oils:
Do you have any more natural ways to make your skin glow? Feel free to share them in the comment section below.In winters use pure Ayurvedic face oils that will nourish your skin with time and tested products. For dry skin, you can leave it overnight and wash off with a gentle scrub in the morning for a glowing complexion. For normal skin, leave it on for about an hour and wash off with a gentle scrub. Apply some face spritz before you sleep. When you wake up, use a mild cleanser free of parabens and SLS and wash off with cold water. Spray on the face mist to show off a visibly clear skin.
