Tag: opinion

Posted in Personal Musings, poetry, Random Thoughts

Rest, not Stop

Posted on by Sugar and Spice..... Among Other Things

Enrolling my niece in the summer music school, my sister-in law was recounting her narrative about the classes, other students as well as hours of pickup and drop-time. Interestingly, the summer class saw young adults who had professional lives of their own. Their passion for their music, found themselves in the same school for the summer, either to learn or perfect their own art. Either way their enrollment showed that age and time are no barriers if one really wants to do something truly of own choice.

“Nothing in the universe can stop you from letting go and starting over.” Guy Finley

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As one goes through each year of time, we set limitations on own selves. Limitations are necessary when done so, in the right amount. Too much of them stifles oneself. On the other hand, none of it results in mass chaos and stones left half-turned, prone to cause danger at a later date. While limitations may be defined by circumstances or issues of that point in time, let it never stifle oneself in the later years.

“Be always at war with your vices, at peace with your neighbors, and let each year find you a better man.” Benjamin Franklin

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Each of us have our “bucket list” and the “list of dreams”. Let time nor age never stand in the way of doing what one dreams or even tries to do, at any point of time. Though things may never fall into place for the plans or dreams of those days, gather those dreams close, see their feasibility and when time permits, strike again and make a bit of it come true, one new day at a time.

Your Mission
by Ellen M.H. Gates

If you cannot on the ocean sail
among the swiftest fleet,
Rocking on the highest billows,
Laughing at the storms you meet;

You can stand among the sailors,
Anchored yet within the bay,
You can lend a hand to help them
As they launch their boats away.

If you are too weak to journey
Up the mountain, steep and high,
You can stand within the valley
While the multitudes go by;

You can chant in happy measure
As they slowly pass along–
Though they may forget the singer,
They will not forget the song.

If you cannot in the harvest
Garner up the richest sheaves,
Many a grain, both ripe and golden,
Oft the careless reaper leaves;

Go and glean among the briars
Growing rank against the wall,
For it may be that their shadow
Hides the heaviest grain of all.

If you cannot in the conflict
Prove yourself a soldier true;
If, where fire and smoke are thickest,
There’s no work for you to do;

When the battle field is silent,
You can go with careful tread;
You can bear away the wounded,
You can cover up the dead.

Do not then stand idly waiting
For some greater work to do;
Fortune is a lazy goddess,
She will never come to you;

Go and toil in any vineyard,
Do not fear to do and dare.
If you want a field of labor
You can find it anywhere.

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Posted in Reflections, Stories Around the World

Little of Reality, the Why and the Truth

Posted on by Sugar and Spice..... Among Other Things

With a little extra time at hand, thanks to the hours saved by missing out on the daily work-school commute (though one definitely misses them), reading those “snippets of information” makes one realise the gargantuan foundations laid not just by science, but also by reality and history. Embroiled in the fiasco of the present crisis, it looks like science and history have reinforced their teachings once again.

“Science taught…. without a sense of history, is robbed” I. Bernard Cohen

Reading up on these historical and scientific articles, one would understand that a lot of science is born from how one chooses to perceive reality. Take for instance, the fact that one has repeated bouts of morning coryza symptoms, on opening for that breath of fresh air. Some of us just pass it over, while few of us blame on the timings and the like. Yet a distinct set of people chose to ponder the whys and hows of it. So the options lie in not opening the window, or opening it another time. When the people who had the “whys” observes their hard facts, it led to the concept of “allergies”. Broaden it and includes not just the usual “hay fever” but also dust, pets or even upholstery fabrics as allergens. Record this over a length of time, and it leads to the study of allergies and the start to overcome them.

“You don’t get explanations in real life. You just get moments that are absolutely, utterly, inexplicably odd.” Neil Gaiman

Point of interest to note, is that one has to address. Just like the person with the “whys”, one needs to brood on their failures in life too. Success too requires it’s fair share of the “pats on the back”, but learning to address the falls helps one to get past them and back on our feet withe next single or couple of attempts.

Source:https://vk.com/pub_mdma
Source:https://vk.com/pub_mdma

As the spider says to try, try again; to do so, one needs to choose to inspect the facts, remove the inner emotions and face the hard reality. Once we join the dots and map out the course, each of our journeys will have something extraordinary and exceptional to offer, in the course of our own.

“If we knew what it was we were doing, it would not be called research, would it?” Albert Einstein

Ignaz Philipp Semmelweis was a Hungarian physician and scientist, now known as an early pioneer of antiseptic procedures. Described as the “saviour of mothers”, Semmelweis discovered that the incidence of puerperal fever (also known as “childbed fever”) could be drastically cut by the use of hand disinfection in obstetrical clinics. Puerperal fever was common in mid-19th-century hospitals and often fatal. Semmelweis proposed the practice of washing hands with chlorinated lime solutions in 1847 while working in Vienna General Hospital’s First Obstetrical Clinic, where doctors’ wards had three times the mortality of midwives’ wards. Despite various publications of results where hand washing reduced mortality to below 1%, Semmelweis’s observations conflicted with the established scientific and medical opinions of the time and his ideas were rejected by the medical community. Semmelweis could offer no acceptable scientific explanation for his findings, and some doctors were offended at the suggestion that they should wash their hands and mocked him for it. It much later that Joseph Lister and Louis Pasteur discovered that it was ‘germs’ (bacteria) that were responsible for the Puerperal fever. Source: Internet

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Posted in Daily, Life, Personal Musings, Photography Art, poetry, Reflections

To Fear, or Risk

Posted on by Sugar and Spice..... Among Other Things

Watching the late noon sky darkening with an unprecedented vengeance, the sudden disappearance of the bright rays likened to the hidden uneasiness present around us, most of these days. Certain days, those dark depressing thoughts come unbidden tot he mind, turning out the inner exuberance, either in a subtle manner or with all lights blaring. Some days, one is able to stamp out those thoughts. Yet on other days, we fall prey to them. What one should know, the fight is always between the fear and the risk.

“There are far better things ahead than any we leave behind.” C.S. Lewis

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Source:https://vk.com/pub_mdma

Whether it be the current scenario or not, there would have been many situations when we had to do away with the fear and take that chance. On few occasions it may have been the other way around; when we lost the chance thanks to the fear. The funny thing about fer, is that it always a part of life. The wise thing is not to do away with it, but to address it.

“I will love the light for it shows me the way, yet I will endure the darkness for it shows me the stars.” Og Mandino

When we learn to just put one step ahead of the present foot print, we move ahead. But stay still or look back, the prints ahead don’t happen. It is natural to develop the sense of trepidation and fer, if everything will be alright. Yet dwelling in it for too long, doesn’t really help. It is only we gather the courage to just put one step in front of the other, that fear takes a backseat. Then we move ahead.

Source:https://vk.com/pub_mdma
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Source:https://vk.com/pub_mdma

On looking back, one discovers that this was what “taking a risk all about”; the imperative to not let fear get the upper hand. Address our fears, but don’t let them hold us back. Time never stays still, neither should man with the huge potential and the gift of life that he has been fortunate to hold within each one of us, and be a part of.

Fear
Khalil Gibran

It is said that before entering the sea
a river trembles with fear.

She looks back at the path she has traveled,
from the peaks of the mountains,
the long winding road crossing forests and villages.

And in front of her,
she sees an ocean so vast,
that to enter
there seems nothing more than to disappear forever.

But there is no other way.
The river can not go back.

Nobody can go back.
To go back is impossible in existence.

The river needs to take the risk
of entering the ocean
because only then will fear disappear,
because that’s where the river will know
it’s not about disappearing into the ocean,
but of becoming the ocean.

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Posted in Life, Personal Musings, poetry, Reflections

Will to Go Ahead

Posted on by Sugar and Spice..... Among Other Things

Thus, here comes today, the entry of another month. Reflecting back on the happenings of this month past; none would have expected this year would turn out so. As the pandemic still goes on across the world and lock-down still continues, the start of another month is filled with trepidation and fear. Though hope still lingers that things would wind down, deep within one expects such an event to be quite distant.

When such feelings come on ahead, it would be the best time to reflect on His Love and the annals of history as documented over the centuries. As history always teaches us, kingdoms rise and fall, civilization stays and moves on; changes do come and go. Whether one gets to see the end of it, we don’t know. Yet what one does know is that all these things too shall pass.

“Every new season of your life will be an opportunity for you to learn and grow. Don’t celebrate the good without celebrating the bad because they both work together to prepare you for the next season of your life.” Theresa Lewis

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As we comes across various issues and events in our lives, be it big or small, simple or huge in magnitude; as long as we grow the courage to tackle them, one shall overcome and live through them all. What one must always realize is that each day is a gift and a blessing of a kind.

One of the biggest gifts one has learnt through this pandemic, is that life is definitely unpredictable. Each of us may have felt that fact before this event of now; though this pandemic brings this feeling to the forefront as an alarm to awaken us each morning. Time is precious and so is each moment in life. None of these things are reversible.

“The best is yet to come.” Frank Sinatra

Learning to live each day, doing our bit is what one should try to do in their best capacity possible. Keeping both family and work, ourselves and our loved ones; giving each of them a share of our time, helps one to realize the beauty of each day. Once we learn to live with this understanding in mind; one will discern the fact that the hidden blessings of the present is what will give the glimmer of hope and light for the future.

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HEARTWORK

Each day is born with a sunrise
and ends in a sunset, the same way we
open our eyes to see the light,
and close them to hear the dark.
You have no control over
how your story begins or ends.
But by now, you should know that
all things have an ending.
Every spark returns to darkness.
Every sound returns to silence.
And every flower returns to sleep
with the earth.
The journey of the sun
and moon is predictable.
But yours,
is your ultimate
ART.
― Suzy Kassem

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Posted in Life, Quotes, Random Thoughts, Stories Around the World

Move or Sink

Posted on by Sugar and Spice..... Among Other Things

One of the benchmarks of stepping into the “plus eighteen age” is the onslaught of decisions that have to be made. While some are quite straightforward and simple, others involve plenty of harrowing thoughts of “what-ifs”, attempts to envision the future probabilities and possibilities. Finally the choice is made and we move ahead. What happens if one just stays standstill, especially when caught in the quicksand ? Before one could completely comprehend and work out the situation, one may just sink.

“In any moment of decision, the best thing you can do is the right thing. The worst thing you can do is nothing.” Theodore Roosevelt

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One undergoes numerous points wherein decisions have to be made, whether they be big or small. While the small ones won’t take any time, the big ones are usually put off till an appropriate time. Though “the appropriate time” may be too late in certain scenarios. Decisions made at the right time or moment will only cause the right change or required effect. When one gets being too early or real late then the scales of balance may tip. At times the decisions made may be for worse than better, realized usually in hindsight; but other times it may be the reverse. The point is to make a decision, as and when required. Sitting on own hands doesn’t achieve any purpose, except for lost options.

“It’s better to be boldly decisive and risk being wrong than to agonise at length and be right too late.” Marilyn Moats Kennedy

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If those decisive changes may turn for the wrong side, face the problem head on and try to correct it. Unless one springs into action, nothing changes. Whether there be be plenty of words or thoughts, without the appropriate actions or behaviour; everything becomes null or void. Being caught in the situation and stubborn about making a move to get out, will result in irreversible damage as time runs real short. Knowing the art to adjust, adapt and improvise a lost situation with quick insight and decisiveness makes the murky situations of life, just a passing phase. As life teaches, getting caught in those tough moments requires one to spring in action, make the decisions and face the situation head on; for then the outcome will be a learning curve and tomorrow will exist.

Once the frog fell in a vessel of the hot water. The water was still on a gas stove. The frog still did not try to jump out of the vessel, instead just stayed in it. As the temperature of the water started to rise, the frog managed to adjust its body temperature accordingly. As the water started to reach the boiling point, the frog was no longer able to keep up and manage its body temperature according to the water temperature. The frog tried to jump out of the vessel but with water temperature reaching its boiling point, the frog was not able to bear it and couldn’t make it. What was the reason that a frog couldn’t make it? Will you blame the hot water for it? (Source: The Internet)

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Posted in Family and Society, Photography Art, Random Thoughts, Stories Around the World

Set by Own Standards

Posted on by Sugar and Spice..... Among Other Things

Restoring old family furniture involves plenty of planning. Depending on the requirement, design and the budget; the type of wood is selected and work starts at full swing. While some may be a “do-it-yourself” project, others require help from the experts. Which is why two weeks later, we had stopped by the local furniture centre to pick up our refurbished pieces. Imagine to our surprise when not only was the underlying rotting wood removed and replaced keeping the design and base structure intact, the upholstery was redone and the polish shining to reflect. While we didn’t expect such a beautiful restoration. The work they had done spoke volumes about their work ethics and principles. Regardless of the expense or the pay received, the work done went beyond it.

“What you do is what matters, not what you think or say or plan.” Jason Fried

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To do any task entrusted to one, requires one to be willing to work and see it through. Yet along the way, there may be unexpected glitches which may take one by complete surprise or they may be as or beyond the anticipated. The battle then ranges between completion of target deadlines to doing the project in the complete manner in the time available. Doing the job may be as per the required but the choice of going that extra mile depends on oneself alone.

“Persistence. Perfection. Patience. Power. Prioritize your passion. It keeps you sane.” Criss Jami

Not just as work projects alone; but whatever one does, one should learn to enjoy those little motions. Be it in making that single cup of morning coffee, washing the car, mowing the elderly neighbour’s lawn or giving a hand at the local fundraising garage sale, do it because one wants to help and do their best when in action. For while words and thoughts may fade away with time, the emotions left behind and the actions effected by them stay embedded for the years ahead. The care we have for another is shown not through words or deeds, but heartfelt actions or work that brings a smile on the faces around us.

“Even though your time on the job is temporary, if you do a good enough job, your work there will last forever.” Idowu Koyenikan

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One day a man was asked to paint a boat by an owner of boat. He brought with him paint and brushes and began to paint the boat a bright red, as the owner asked him. While painting, he realized there was a hole in the hull and decided to repair it. When he finished painting, he received his money and left. The next day, the owner of the boat came to the painter and presented him with a nice check, much higher than the payment for painting. The painter was surprised.”You’ve already paid me for painting the boat!”, he said.
– But this is not for the paint job. It’s for having repaired the hole in the boat.
– Ah! But it was such a small service, certainly it’s not worth paying me such a high amount for something so insignificant!

“My dear friend, you do not understand. Let me tell you what happened. When I asked you to paint the boat, I forgot to mention about the hole. When the boat dried, my kids took the boat and went on a fishing trip. They did not know that there was a hole. I was not at home at that time. When I returned and noticed they had taken the boat, I was desperate because I remembered that the boat had a hole. Imagine my relief and joy when I saw them returning from fishing. Then, I examined the boat and found that you had repaired the hole! You see, now, what you did? You saved the life of my children! I do not have enough money to pay your “small” good deed.”
Source: Social Media (The Internet)

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Posted in Life, Personal Musings, poetry, Quotes, Work

Through the Tenor

Posted on by Sugar and Spice..... Among Other Things

The morning work drive doesn’t fail to impress one each day. Yet there are those days when nothing fails to incite a response. Guess it is one of those times when the inner tenor is unbalanced and everything seems murky.

“The emotion that can break your heart is sometimes the very one that heals it…” Nicholas Sparks

Some days the music lives up to its beats. Some days it doesn’t. Some days one feels like dancing in the rain; other days we crib about the mud and the splatter on the shoes. Some days we live for the thrill of our work, though at times we long for a change of job. The truth is, we all have our own moody days and that’s okay. For working mothers, it is okay to miss a nutritious breakfast and make do with sugary cereal or just milk. Some days it is okay to get the laundry done at the dry-cleaners or just splurge on that expensive massage. Some days it is okay for dads to just hang out at the pub or just go for game night at a friend’s place. Some days it is alright for kids to enjoy a weekday movie and get up early for their homework.

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Source:https://vk.com/thesemagicmoments
Source:https://vk.com/thesemagicmoments

As nature shows through the tenors of the sea or the whine of the tempestuous wind, each element of life can be affected by the sway of the inner mind, circumstances of that moment and the feel within. One may feel happy a minute and melancholy the next couple of hours; but that is okay. Each of us need to experience our moods, listen to them and feel their cry. For only then, one can learn to get back on the balanced footing. It is okay to cry and laugh; scream and sing or stamp and dance.

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Source:https://vk.com/thesemagicmoments
Source:https://vk.com/thesemagicmoments

Being human, emotions are always a part of us. Not letting it control us completely is what is important. Just like how fast they come, they will be gone too. Yet it is through these turn of moods, one discovers the passion of life. Life on an even tone is bland. We need all the stuff that goes to give the special essence of life’s potpourri. And that, my dear readers, is what brings the momentum into our lives and the spring in our steps.

“The sea has its moods. Sometimes it is melancholic and morose, other times fierce and feisty. But always passionate. Even when calm, one can sense the depth of the sea’s passion.” Jocelyn Murray

Moods
by Jack London
Who has not laughed with the skylark,
And bid his heart rejoice?
Laughed till the mirth-loving heavens
Echoed his laughter back?
Joyed in the sheer joy of living,
And sung with gladsome voice,
Lays that were cheerful and merry,
And bid his heart rejoice?
Who has not frowned in the gloaming,
And felt the skies grow black;
While o’er him spread the dark mantle
Of sullen, solemn Gloom,
Whose mutterings broke the silence
Like echoes from the tomb –
Like echoes of lost endeavors –
Reproaches from the tomb?
Who has not cursed in his passion,
As Anger’s stinging lash,
Biting and smarting and racking,
Fell on his naked back?
Felt in his veins feverish tumult,
The strife, the savage clash,
As when hot steel, leaped from the scabbard,
Meets steel with crash on crash?
Who has not wept in his sorrow,
And looked in vain for morn;
Waiting with hopeless yearning,
The sun from out the bourn?
Heard from the world the sad sobbing
Of Faith and Hope forlorn?
Known that the sun had forever
Gone down into the bourn?

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