Mountains and Forests

Warrier's Collage 15092020 : Mountains and Forests The Himalayas https://youtu.be/YzBNRM5C3qI Don't miss : Himalayas Secretaries from Palghat : C1 Gir Forest Visit : D3 Advice : D1 Posted by : M G Warrier A Interaction 1) K S Iyer *Very nice article by Khushwant Singh. Preserve this .* 😊 *How To Live & Die* I’ve often thought about what it is that makes people happy—what one has to do in order to achieve happiness. 1- First and foremost is good health. If you do not enjoy good health, you can never be happy. Any ailment, however trivial, will deduct something from your happiness. 2- Second, a healthy bank balance. It need not run into crores, but it should be enough to provide for comforts, and there should be something to spare for recreation—eating out, going to the movies, travel and holidays in the hills or by the sea. Shortage of money can be demoralising. Living on credit or borrowing is demeaning and lowers one in one’s own eyes. 3- Third, your own home. Rented places can never give you the comfort or security of a home that is yours for keeps. If it has garden space, all the better. Plant your own trees and flowers, see them grow and blossom, and cultivate a sense of kinship with them. 4- Fourth, an understanding companion, be it your spouse or a best friend. If you have too many misunderstandings, it robs you of your peace of mind. It is better to accept the differences than to be quarrelling all the time. 5- Fifth, stop envying those who have done better than you in life—risen higher, made more money, or earned more fame. Envy can be corroding; avoid comparing yourself with others. 6- Sixth, do not allow people to descend on you for gossip. By the time you get rid of them, you will feel exhausted and poisoned by their gossip-mongering. 7- Seventh, cultivate a hobby or two that will fulfill you—gardening, reading, writing, painting, playing or listening to music. Going to clubs or parties to get free drinks, or to meet celebrities, is a criminal waste of time. It’s important to concentrate on something that keeps you occupied meaningfully. 8- Eighth, every morning and evening devote 20 minutes to meditation or introspection. In the mornings, 10 minutes should be spent in keeping the mind absolutely still, and five listing the things you have to do that day. In the evenings, five minutes should be set aside to keep the mind still and 10 to go over the tasks you had intended to do. 9- Ninth, don’t lose your temper. Try not to be short-tempered, or vengeful. Even when a friend has been rude, just move on. 10- Above all, when the time comes to go, one should go like a Person without any regret or grievance against anyone. 🎄👉 *It is not just a forward but means a lot* 👍 (Pranam and Thanks from Collage, IyerJi, for sharing this. Collage has been trying to say one or some of these things everyday. You have brought the "10 Commandments" in one place. This will be the best takeaway Collage could ever offer to its readers. See D1 also-Warrier ) Vathsala Jayaraman adds : " Very valuable advice! Items 5 and 6 rule over many, though they have all other good characteristics because comparison is the essence of life. I feel women have more of this comparing tendency that makes children hate her. Be careful, mothers! (And grandmothers, adds Collage!) 2) E T Rajendran, Chennai "Reshmy Warrier’s blog ‘My Take’ on Speaking Tree : Very nice opening up of imaginations by multi-talented daughter of a proud father who is the architect of Collage. Keep it up, Reshmy. B. Narration on Divisions of Kerala by Shri V. Babusenan: I never knew about erstwhile Poozhinad and Karkanad divisions. I belong to Poozhinad. It is also quite interesting to know about ‘Akam’ ‘Puram’ anthology of poems in Sangham literature. Wealth of knowledge from Babusenan Sir." (Thanks-Warrier) 3) C V Subbaraman " Rajan's willingness to come back and the unwillingness of the governments to listen to the Central Bank advices. What is the connecting point of this willingness and the unwillingness? Will the twain ever meet? It requires considerable political will and courage and shedding of ego on the part of the Delhi Mandarins to give due credit and ears to the Central Bank. For developing this rare quality, they in Delhi need some education, counselling and courage building exercises. It all is not impossible, yet there is as always a great dampening "But" follows." (I thought you are little harsh. Then I read what I wrote in 2012. Here's the link to my article in Moneylife : https://www.moneylife.in/article/a-finishing-school-for-politicians/28234.html Warrier) 4) Dr Deepali Pant Joshi "As a nation are we so intellectually bankrupt that we need outsiders to assist us? Interesting that the plight of the poor is not as overwhelming a concern as the need to reassure Investors. No, I don't think we need such persons." B Mountains and Forests 1) Forests in India https://www.holidify.com/collections/forests-in-india 2) 7 Mountain Ranges in India https://www.indiatoday.in/education-today/gk-current-affairs/story/seven-major-mountain-ranges-of-india-969214-2017-04-03 3) Naval Academy, Ezhimala https://www.ina.gov.in/?q=History_of_region Seven Hills, history. 4) Trees : Symbolism http://www.fao.org/3/y9882e/y9882e08.htm A research article. 5) Mysterious Mountains https://www.speakingtree.in/blog/attaining-the-wisdom-of-the-mystery-of-divine-himalayan-mountains Just glance through this article. That's what I've done. If you apply your own understanding of reality you may get stuck midway. C Readers Write 1) K Ramasubramanian Secretaries from Palghat "Thanks for the interesting stenographer Mr. Kuppuswamy Anna. My uncle was a stenographer to the CEO of WIMCO. This uncle Vaidheeswaran named so since he was frail and had infant health issues. It is a strong faith that if you visit vaidheeswaran temple and sprinkle pepper and other salt etc in the temple tank all health issues will be resolved. So they named the child also with the name of the presiding deity. That is about his name. True to Palakkad agraharam culture, as soon as he wrote SSLC he joined the typewtiting institute to learn typing and shorthand writing. By the time results of SSLC came he has passed lower exam of typing and shorthand. That was adequate to take a ticket to Bombay then and another village friend is ready to share accommodation alongwith 6 other bachelors in a matunga 14×10 attached bath room in a shared accommodation. Society of Matunga was providing food for nominal rates. The south indian concerns blossomed much later to compete with society. The usual Tamil Mallayalee differences brought in the concerns. He got the job on third day of just landing, in WIMCO and was on probation for two years to cross 18 years of age. On probation he completed higher in typing and shorthand and acquired a .minimum speed of 80 words for typing and 120 words in shorthand. Competitor in all speed shorthand tests. The secret of his success as told by him is that he will read all the editorials of English papers, write them in shorthand and type from shorthand and compare with original editorials. 100% agreement of his typing and the text. Many a time he will correct the editorials and write to Times. While leaving India, the CEO, besides other gifts, presented his personal German pen which he used for signing all the documents typed by Uncle. Now the CEO and Uncle are no more, but the German pen stands as a permanent monument of a great Palakkadan who stood for perfection and devotion to his chosen career." 2) V Babusenan Pathittuppathu Among the eight anthologies in the Sangham literature, 'Pathittuppathu' is the one that is entirely devoted to the first Chera Dynasty that flourished in Kerala. The peculiarity here is that it is not from history that these poems are derived but, on the contrary, history is derived from these poems. Each set of ten songs speaks about one Chera king and thus this anthology, known as 'Pathittuppathu 'sheds light on the personality, chivalry, generosity, exploits and mode of administration of each of the ten kings. But the delight of the historian is not full. The 'Tens' about the first and last Chera kings are lost. Their details are recreated from other 'Akam ' and 'Puram' poems and other sources. One poet wrote about one king. Thus 'Pathittuppathu ' is the collective contribution of ten Sangham poets. Who wrote the first 'ten' is not clear. All the ten kings about whom 'Pathittuppathu' speaks did not actually rule. Some of them, in fact ,actively assisted the king in reigning. There was not a single ruler who behaved cruelly to his subjects. All of them invariably loved their people and worked for their welfare. One noteworthy feature was that they encouraged and respected poets and rewarded them handsomely. For instance, the fourth king, Naarmudi Cheral, is said to have gifted 40 lakh gold coins to his Court Poet and elephants to other poets. These Chera kings were generally known with some good or chivalrous actions of theirs attached to their names. The first Chera king was known as 'Perunchottuthian Cheral Aathan' on account of frequent sumptuous sadyaas he gave to his people. The second king was hailed as 'Imayavaramban' because of his success in extending his kindom to the Himalayas(a poetic exaggeration). His son was given the epithet 'Kadal Pirakottiya' presumably because he had constructed seawalls to prevent erosion. This way of adding epithets to Kings'names ended with the waning of poetic influence. No later kings,even the kings of the second Chera dynasty, were known from their names for any special characteristics, the exceptions being Dharma Raja of Travancore and Sakthan Thampuran of Cochin. Here is one of the ten poems on the sixth Chera king by the woman poet Kakkaipadiniyar Nacchellaiyar: His armies love massacre, he loves war, yet gifts flow from him ceaselessly. Come, dear singers, let's go and see him in Naravu * where, on trees no axe can fell, fruits ripen, unharmed by swarms of bees, egg-shaped, ready for the weary traveller in fields of steady, unfailing harvests; where warriors with bows that never tire of arrows shiver but stand austere in the sea winds mixed with the lit cloud and the spray of seafoam. There he is, in the town of Naravu, tender among tender women. *Kadalundi . The above translation is that of A.K.Ramanujan, the well-known Indian-English poet, who did sterling service to Sangham literature by introducing it to the West." 3) Vathsala Jayaraman Forgive and forget "Forgiving others is essential for spiritual growth. Your experience of someone who has hurt you, while painful, is now nothing more than a thought or feeling that you carry around. These thoughts of resentment, anger, and hatred represent slow, debilitating energies that will dis-empower you if you continue to let these thoughts occupy space in your head. If you could release them, you would know more peace”. – Dr. Wayne W.Dyer If we decide to hurt someone verbally in response to his/her verbal assault on us,it creates further negative emotions inside of us having hurt someone in response to what he or she said to us. Resentment doesn’t happen because of what someone told or did something to us and it thrives and survives because we voluntarily decide not to end the altercation. It is possible to lead a life of no resentment towards anyone despite them saying or doing things that are not palatable to our mind,provided we decide to forget and forgive. But forgiving has wider angles and much more corners than meets the normal eye There are petty issues like remarks on complexion, failure in exams, joblessness, delay in marriage, not blessed with children etc. But there are more severe issues like rapes, acid attacks, murder for gain or revenge or causing irrepairable damage to life, prestige etc even for a simple 'intercaste marriage' It is very nice to forgive, forget andresume the relationship as though nothing has happened.But everyone needs sometime ,some space to get healed and forgiveness cannot be rushed through so easily. Once you've had some time to sort through your emotions, you can identify what it is exactly that hurt you so much.Now it may be easy to forgive. Ordinary family circumstances of forgiving and forgetting may not be an issue at all, because it runs round some angry remarks or physical hurts. But in an institution,errors of competence can definitely be forgiven and not those of character and integrity. This will set up a wrong precedence. Just because one feels highly relieved of tension and pressure and it gives a relief and peace of mind, process of forgiving need not be or should not be recommended. Many researchers and psychologists opine that it is wrong to assume that forgiveness is always the right answer and that someone who failed to offer forgiveness is “not a good person or a mentally healthy person.” It’s a good thing and a blessed thing to forgive, but it is not an absolute universal truth. Saying that people should automatically be forgiven, doesn’t do justice to different moralities. When one is affected by loss of precious lives and your life has been totally altered and devasted, and you have lost your whole identity --it is extremely difficult just to forgive and proceed- notwithstanding volumes of instructions to forgive and forget. On many occasions the victims are pressurised to forgive,or otherwise face worse consequences. They are trapped once again and criminals flourish with the crimes. What law is this! There is no second opinion as to'forgiveness is divine' and it gives lot of comfort and solace and brings positivity in life. But it is our moral and social responsibility to ensure that forgiveness,though with good intention, does not nourish the bigger crime at home, office or society. Forgiveness can never be considered as having justified the mistake. The karmic theory that all the mistakes and sins committed will be properly accounted for in their next lives, should not be a ground or contributory factor for forgiving one and all. Then there may not be any necessity of Law, rules of conduct and penal clauses. Forgiving does good to the forgiver upto a certain point. If he is taken advantage of and hurt very often, patience reaches the saturation point. I am reminded of what Ramakrishna advised the snake "I advised you to desist from biting. But I never asked you to remain calm without hissing'. There is a dire necessity to show the protest so that we are not branded dull headed and incapacitated and are being humiliated on and often. Article 21 of the constitution talks about 'right to live' and let others live a life of dignity. Giving punishment is one aspect. Everyone knows that punishment cannot be deterrent always. It is true that we should ignore insults and get along, simultaneously realise our follies and go smooth. If everyone does this, there is no problem at all. There is no need for laws and penal codes. A small insulting word from a washerman made Shri Rama banish Sita the entire life.Even the blemishless Sita Suffered because Rama wanted to protect Raja Dharma. This incident may be viewed in both the angles. Had Rama been strict with people with wallowing tongues he would not have punished Sita . Or had Rama been satisfied with Agni Pareeksha already done, Sita would not have been punished second time for the same mistake, if at all she was considered guilty. Forgetting and forgiving may be solution for individuals. But it is never a solution in administration, judiciary and defence particularly. They have to keep a proper record of pattern of attacks, behaviour of terrorists, systematically analyse them, keep a vigil and protect the nation. This revising the history itself cannot happen if we follow the strict principle of 'forgive and forget'." D Blogs and Links 1) Accept good advice : M G Warrier https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/readersblog/warriersviews/accept-good-advice-without-questioning-26004/ Inspired by A1 2) Hamsa : Swan, not Mr Hamsa! https://www.speakingtree.in/blog/mystery-about-swan-can-it-separate-milk-from-water Interesting. 3) Visit the Gir Forest with the President of India https://youtu.be/lbC8ISF9t0Q