NARA'S NOTEPAD

VOLUME 3 JULY 2007 NUMBER 7

MEMO FROM NARA

Intelligence is not the sole property of good people alone. Some of the bad people are more intelligent than the goodies. Thieves are considered as bad people in our society. They plan very intelligently using their grey matter carefully to steal things from a house or shop or bank. They use their intelligence for stealing which is considered to be an anti-social activity not permitted by law. Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) is created to use their intelligence to catch these intelligent thieves. The question is ‘who is really more intelligent?’

Because of modern gadgets, intelligence has improved quite a bit. The improvement has been utilized effectively by the thieves as well as the CBI. Therefore ‘who is intelligent and what is bad intelligence and good intelligence? Are the funny questions we ask ourselves. We know some of the politicians, I need not name them, in the whole world are intelligent in escaping from their wrong doings, in spite of the existence of judiciary of high order. Hence good intelligence sometimes bows for the intelligence of bad people.

Strange! Isn’t it?

SUCCESS

The happiest people on this earth are those who have the most interesting thoughts. As you think so you become. One is verily the product of one's thinking. Saturate and soak your mind with the idea of success and success will automatically come to you. Sooner or later the man who wins is the man who thinks he can. Success is within everyone's reach, whatever be your physical, social, educational or economic limitations.

In fact, many have risen to fame and become great capitalizing on their drawbacks. Franklin D. Roosevelt got himself elected four terms in succession as President of the United States of America despite being a cripple. Thomas Alva Edision, the greatest of all inventors was stone-deaf and so was the world famous pianist and composer, Beethoven. Winston Churchill who led England from near defeat to glorious victory by his oratory was a pathetic stammerer at one time.

Success has to be earned and it demands sustained hard work and sacrifice. There is no success without some sacrifice. You get out o life only what you give to it.. If you want the good things in life you have to work for them. If you are willing to work diligently towards your goal, you will surely succeed. The good things in life can be yours if you have a truly strong motivation for achieving them. One's attitude determines one's future. You can always fashion your future the way you want. You need only the desire to change and the desire to forge ahead. And then, if you proceed in a logical manner, you will surely succeed.

- S. K. Sachdeva

BE HAPPY

From the beginning of human history we have been searching for happiness. Most of our daily functions and overall desires all revolve around "being happy." Being satisfied is a key goal in our current "materialistic society."

But something that the spiritually advanced noticed quickly was that everything material is impermanent. Like beauty fades, and youth withers away, so does everything material. So happiness cannot depend on the material.

So as this revelation was made clearer, many ancient traditions focused on the opposite, the spiritual. And thus, if you begin studying ancient texts and modern sciences, you'll notice their complexity. The more you learn the more you get confused. Eventually, the main goal, happiness (or personal contentment), is lost in the haze.

Some, the very adept, are able to reach that state of pure happiness through spiritual ascension, via ascetic practices. Going on retreat to the middle of nowhere and living in a monastery devoid of life's simple pleasures, does not seem like a practical option for a normal human being living in the 21st Century. For us, the normal human beings, spiritual ascension is a goal we might want but not at the expense of "living life to the fullest."

For most of us, our time is our most precious commodity. We love to live life in the moment and we enjoy life more when we are in action. We like doing, evolving, learning, interacting, being, moving; this is who we are. More important than spiritual ascension is personal contentment.

Only with personal contentment can you ascend spiritually. Personal contentment does not mean material or sensory satisfaction. Personal contentment means to be truly happy with yourself right here and now.

From this state of personal contentment EVERYTHING is possible. Personal contentment brings peace of mind.

– Urayaoan Paz

SURPRISING STATISTICS

17 billion dollars is the worth of India’s textile exports in 2006-07.

257 female pilots are working in civil airlines in India.

71 year – old Katsusuke Yanagisawa, retired school teacher from Japan, has become the oldest person to scale Mount Everest.

22 lakh pilgrims visited TIrupati temple between April 24 and May 23.

Rs. 25 crore was the hundi collection at the shrine during this period.

JUST TO LAUGH

A married couple went to the hospital together to have their baby delivered.
Upon their arrival, the doctor said he had invented a new machine that would transfer a portion of the mother's labor pain to the father.

He asked if they were willing to try it out.

They were both very much in favor of it.

The doctor set the knob to 10 percent for starters, explaining that even 10 percent was probably more pain than the father had ever experienced before.

But as the labor progressed, the husband felt fine, so he asked the doctor to go ahead and bump it up a notch.

The doctor then adjusted the machine to 20 percent pain transfer.

The husband was still feeling fine.

The doctor checked the husband's blood pressure and pulse and was amazed at how well he was doing.

At this, they decided to try for 50 percent.

The husband continued to feel quite well.

Since it was obviously helping out is wife considerably, he encouraged the doctor to transfer ALL the pain to him.

The wife delivered a healthy baby with virtually no pain.

She and her husband were ecstatic.

When they got home, the mailman was dead on their porch.

GRAPHENE

The research carried out in 2004 by Andre Geim and Kostya Novoselov at the

Manchester University, UK

on the isolation of graphene, a single layer of graphite is a breakthrough

in chip technology.

Graphene is the first isolated 2D nano-material.

By following the procedure of micromechanical cleavage, the top layers of highly

oriented pyrolytic graphite were peeled with a scotch tape.

The electronic structure and electron-photon inter actions are different for

single, bilayer or few layer graphenes,

approaching the 3D limit of graphite at 10 layers.

The one atomic thick 2D grapheme monolayer sheets are ultra thin and ultra

strong, can be make as highly insulating or highly conductive.

Graphene will soon replace the silicon-based semiconductor electronic devices.

10 Tips For Conquering Your Fears...

1. Recognize a fear is present

2. Declare you are going to conquer the fear

3. Expect to feel anxious, awkward and scared

4. Consider copying a style you like until you find your own style

5. Focus your attention

6. Motivate yourself with affirmations

7. Step into the fear with abandon

8. Let go and have fun! Remind yourself to keep breathing

9. Pat yourself on the back when it's over

10. Notice how much easier it gets

THEY SAID...

• Women will never be successful as men because they have no wives to advise them – Dick van Dyke
  
• To do nothing is sometimes a good remedy – Hippocrates (460 BC – 400 BC)
  
• Learning without thought is labour lost; thought without learning is perilous – Confucius (551 BC – 479BC)

NOTICE

Those who like to have NARA’S NOTEPAD issues of 2005 & 2006

please send Cheque or DD for Rs. 100/-

favouring A. Narayanan payable at Coimbatore

to the address given below.

"Don't think evil of others, in word, deed and mind."
Meet you next month –AUGUST, 2007

Prof. A. Narayanan, Ph. D., FISPP
# 19, Phase 5, Maharani Avenue, Vadavalli, Coimbatore – 641 041, Tamil Nadu
Telephone: 0422 – 2423017, Mobile: 98422 42301
E-mail: prof_narayanan_a@hotmail.com (or) arumugakannu@gmail.com

For NARA’S NOTEPAD visit: www.nara2007.blogspot.com
For NARA’S DIGEST visit: www. nara.tumblr.com

Flower gathering

FOR SALE... FOR SALE... FOR SALE...

NARA’S NOTEPAD was started in December 2004.

It had two forms: electronic and print.

I have the print issues for 2005 and 2006 (24 issues) containing the matter

published so far in a bound form.

Your may like to have a copy of it or you may like to present it to someone you love.

It would be a good collection of inspiring tit bits which will not lose its value over time.

It’s something like gold one likes to possess.

Therefore, I recommend for everyone to buy a copy of it for your use or your friend’s or relative’s use.

It costs you only Rs. 100/-

You may send the amount by demand draft or cheque favouring ‘A.Narayanan’ at Coimbatore. The copy will be sent to you promptly by courier.

MY ADDRESS:

Prof. A. Narayanan

#19, Phase 5, Maharani Avenue, Vadavalli,

Coimbatore - 641 041, Tamil Nadu, India

Our life is in a dynamic balance, based on our present thinking.

Meet you next month – JULY, 2007

Prof. A. Narayanan, Ph. D., FISPP
# 19, Phase 5, Maharani Avenue, Vadavalli,

Coimbatore – 641 041, Tamil Nadu

Telephone: 0422 – 2423017 Mobile: 98422 42301

E-mail: prof_narayanan_a@hotmail.com
arumugakannu@gmail.com

Visit my website NARA'S DIGEST: www.nara.tumblr.com

THEY SAID ...

To think is easy. To act is hard. But the hardest thing in the world is to act in accordance with your thinking. – Johann von Goethe

Nothing important was ever achieved without someone taking a chance. – H. Jackson Brown Jr.

I have more days behind me than ahead of me, I try to take up with a discipline of gratitude every day. – Bill Clinton

What no wife of a writer can ever understand is that a writer is working when he’s staring out of the window. – Burton Rascoe

EVERYTHING IN THE WORLD IS OURS!

The blue sky, the hot sun, the cool moon, twinkling stars, vast ocean, green plants, animals and birds, above all the human beings are ours.

Let us try to enjoy them by seeing touching and feeling. No one needs to possess them. They belong to us.

God has created for all of us.

When we fail to realize it, we lose our life.

Once we come to know they are ours we enjoy them. Then we really attain the supreme bliss of happiness.

EIGHT APPRECIATION LETTER TIPS TO CONSIDER...

1. Explain why you are writing to express your gratitude.

2. Be sincere--most people can sense when you are not being honest.

3. Write clearly and concisely; this is no time to be long winded or flowery.

4. Handwrite your personal appreciation letter on a sheet of stationery, but use customized letterhead for business correspondence.

5. Avoid thanking the person beforehand--for example: ‘Thanking you in advance for your help in this matter.’

6. Write the appreciation letter within a few days of whatever happened to inspire your gratitude.

7. Address your appreciation letter to a specific person, if possible, not just to the company or to the organization in general.

8. A sincere, well-written appreciation letter can create or strengthen interpersonal rapport and can open doors to other productive opportunities in the future.

THEORY OF COMMUNICATION

Expressing our wants, feelings, thoughts and opinions clearly and effectively is only half of the communication process needed for interpersonal effectiveness. The other half is listening and understanding what others communicate to us. When a person decides to communicate with another person, he/she does so to fulfill a need. The person wants something, feels discomfort, and/or has feelings or thoughts about something. In deciding to communicate, the person selects the method or code which he/she believes will effectively deliver the message to the other person. The code used to send the message can be either verbal or nonverbal. When the other person receives the coded message, they go through the process of decoding or interpreting it into understanding and meaning. Effective communication exists between two people when the receiver interprets and understands the sender’s message.

JUST TO LAUGH...

• A Committee is a group of people who individually can do nothing, but as a group decide that nothing can be done.
  
• Many folks want to serve God, but only as advisers.
  
• The fastest way to find something you've lost is to replace it.
  
• Definition of the word 'Adult': A person who has stopped growing at both ends and is now growing in the middle.
  
• Droughts are because God didn't pay his water bill.

SURPRISING STATISTICS

• 500 armed forces personnel are discharged from service every year for mental disorders and alcoholism.
  
• 10,908 crore rupees is the net profit of Reliance Industries in 2006 – 2007.
  
• 45,000 children go missing in India every year, says a National Human Rights Commission report.
  
• 15 million red blood cells are created and killed every second in the human body.

EL NINO

Ironically called after “Baby Jesus” by Peruvian fishermen, it is a disruption of the ocean – atmosphere system in the Tropical Pacific having important consequences for global weather and climate. El Nino conditions occur once water temperatures have warmed sufficiently enough (0.5 0C or more above normal) to alter normal patterns of cloudiness and rainfall in the Tropical Pacific basin. El Nino episodes occur roughly every 4 to 5 years.

In 1997-98, El Nino contributed to a global cost of about $34 billion with 24,000 deaths and 6 million people displaced on account of drought, storms etc.,

OPTIMISM

How can you boost your optimism to achieve greater health, wealth, and career success? Here are five immediately useful techniques. Each takes only one minute to do, so you can start fast and get results today.

1st Technique: Straight Posture and Big Steps
Optimistic people use straight posture, walk fast, and take big steps.
Pessimistic people slouch, walk slowly, and use small steps.

2nd Technique: Cheerful Voice
A lightning quick way to feel upbeat is to use a cheerful voice.

3rd Technique: Use Upbeat Words
You can use types of words: upsetting and upbeat. Pessimists relish using upsetting words, while optimists excel at using upbeat words.

4th Technique: Use Upbeat Attitudes
I find the chief way to become an optimist simply is to focus on solutions – and not focus on problems. Every time a difficulty pops up, immediately create solutions and put them into action.

5th Technique: Be a Magnificent Role Model
Remember a time you were a role model for someone. As you helped that
person, you also helped yourself.

-Michael Mercer, Ph.D.

MEMO FROM NARA

I received the following letter from my friend last week. I thought it’s an interesting one to share with you all. Here’s it.

"Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words can never hurt me." Do you remember hearing that on the playground as a child? Well, I do. And, as we all know, that couldn't be more wrong. Words can hurt, but they can also comfort, inspire, or make us laugh, cry, get angry. They're how we communicate and learn and express our feelings. Words have power to bring into being our thoughts and hopes and wishes.
Set aside some time and find a place where you can sit undisturbed. Then, gather together some old magazines, catalogs, and newspapers, as well as a piece of paper, scissors, pen, and a glue stick.

When you're sitting comfortably, take some long, slow, deep breaths, until you feel loose and relaxed. Then, page through the printed materials you have. Any time you see a word or phrase that seems to "jump out" at you, or that calls out to you or appeals to you in any way, use the scissors to cut it out.

When you have your collection of words or phrases, examine them and choose a few that really "speak" to you, and set the others to the side. Now arrange the ones you have chosen on the blank paper. You can write in a few words to make your words and phrases into a sentence. When you're satisfied with the results, glue the cut words and phrases on the paper.

Enjoy your wordplay!