Welcome Anti-Covid-19 Vaccines

 

 

Welcome Anti-Covid-19 Vaccines

It is an auspicious Saturday (Jan 16, 2021) in so far as the two Indian vaccines Covishield  and Covaxin have been put into use as the first effective measure for the prevention of Covid-19 infection.

 The virus which emerged about one year ago and gripped the whole world is still terrific.  Lots of human beings are still falling a prey to it. At  the same time the inventive efforts of the medical scientists and  researchers have been equally tireless and some countries including India have succeeding in producing vaccines which are believed to be considerably effective.

Hats off to all the world medicos who are striving day and night to defeat  Covid-19 and liberate mankind from its  deadly clutches.

The exact impact of the vaccines introduced till today will take sometime to reflect itself.  However, it is normal to bring out their revised and improved versions after getting the feedback, and make them 100%  safe and effective both as a preventive and curative measure.

While we thank the medical fraternity nationally as well as  globally, let us also extend our thanks to God Almighty without whose infallible blessings nothing moves in this world.

We live on a planet of opposites , namely, of night and day, pain and pleasure, health and sickness.  Likewise, the most important opposites --- life and death.

Whenever anti-life foes attack this world, LIFE FORCE does not take too long to use its weapons to defeat them and give mankind a time of good health, peace and prosperity. However, it is through the struggle of  human beings that LIFE FORCE acts and ensures that their struggle should not fail.

Before I conclude, let me reproduce here a deeply optimistic poem by the English poet Arthur Hugh Clough (1819-1861) for your delight and instruction:

 

 

 

 

Say Not the Struggle Naught Availeth

Say not the struggle naught not availeth,

The labour and the wounds are vain,

 

The enemy faints not, nor faileth,

And as things have been they remain.

 

If hopes were dupes, fears may be liars;

It may be, in yon smoke conceal’d,

Your comrades chase e’en now the fliers

And, but for you, possess the field.

 

For while the tired waves, vainly breaking,

Seem here no painful inch to gain,

Far back, through creeks and inlets making,

Comes silent, flooding in, the main.

 

And not by eastern windows only,

When daylight comes, comes in the light;

In front the sun climbs slow, how slowly!

But westward, look, the land is bright.

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16^th January 2021                                                                          G. R. Kanwal    

 

ARE YOU A LEADER?

 

 

         ARE YOU A LEADER?  

 

IT is said that leaders are born, not made.  But we can certainly do much to develop within ourselves the qualities of leadership.  These usually reflect an attitude which inspires confidence, not only in our skill and efficiency, but also in our ability to assess a situation and organize the means of dealing with it.

 

Try this test to see how you stand.  Answer “Yes” or “No” to the questions before turning to the key at the end.

 

1.     Have you plenty of physical and nervous energy, and are you the type who does not tire easily?

 

2.     But when you are tired or have a cold or a headache, can you stay cheerful and keep going on an essential job?

 

3.     Do you study to improve yourself and keep abreast of modern developments, especially in your business, profession, or trade?

 

4.     Are you enthusiastic about your work and interests?

 

5.     Do you find it easy to infect others with your enthusiasms?

 

6.     Is it easy for you to get people to work willingly with and for you?

 

7.     Do they automatically turn to you for guidance and encouragement?

 

8.     Do you welcome and enjoy responsibility?

 

9.     Are you able to express yourself clearly, simply, and exactly, in speech and writing?

 

10. Would you say that you are not easily put off or discouraged?

 

11. Have you enough self-confidence to carry on in the face of criticism, disapproval, opposition, ridicule?

 

12. Do you possess enough courage to stand up to a bully or to unreasonable people?

 

13. 13. But do you also possess enough charm of manner and sufficient tact to get along with most people?

 

14.  

 

15. Are you quick to sum up a situation and evolve a plan to meet it?

 

16. Is your judgment usually sound?

 

17. Can you always see the humorous side, even when things are grim?

 

18. Can you make a mistake or look silly without getting miserable or bad-tempered about it?

 

19. Are you quick to share the praise with others?

 

20. Are you equally ready to share blame?

 

21. Are you always just and reasonable in what you ask and expect from others?

 

Count five marks for every “Yes.” A score of 70 and over shows that you have the makings of a good leader; 60-70 means that you have the right idea although you need to develop it further; 50-60 is fair----a lot of self-discipline and hard work is required before you will make the grade.  Under 50 is not satisfactory.

 

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MUSINGS OF GREAT MINDS

 

MUSINGS OF GREAT MINDS

 

Joseph Mazzini on The Family. The family is the country of the heart.  There is an angel in the family, who by the mysterious influence of grace, of sweetness, and of love, renders the fulfillment of duties less wearisome, sorrows less bitter.  The only pure joys of unmixed with sadness which it is given to man to taste upon earth are, thanks to this angel, the joys of the family.  He who through fatality of circumstances has been unable to live the serene life of the family, beneath the wings of this angel, has a shadow of melancholy resting upon his soul, and a void in his heart which nothing can fill. Bless God who created this angel, oh you who have the joys and consolations of the family.  Do not hold them of little account because you imagine that you can find elsewhere more ardent joys or more immediate consolation for your griefs.  The family contains an element of good rarely found elsewhere, constancy.  Its affections wind themselves slowly around you, unheeded, but tenacious and enduring as the ivy round the tree; they follow you hourly, and identify themselves silently with your life.  Often. you are not aware of them, because they are a part of yourselves; but when you lose them you feel that an indefinable something, something intimate and necessary to your existence, is gone.  You wonder restless and uneasy.  You may still be able to find brief joys or consolations; but not the supreme consolation, not calm, the calm of the wave upon the lake, the calm of trustful sleep, the sleep which stills the child upon its mother’s breast.

 

The angel of the family is woman. Mother, wife, or sister, woman is the caress of life, the soothing sweetness of affection shed over its toils, a reflection for the individual of the loving providence which watches over humanity.  In her there is treasure enough of consoling tenderness to allay every pain.  Moreover for every one of us she is the initiator of the future.  The mother’s first kiss teaches the child love; the first holy kiss of the woman he loves teaches man hope and faith in life; and love and faith create a desire for perfection and the power of reaching towards it step by step; crate the future, in short, of which the living symbol is the child, link between us and the generations to come.  Through her the family, with its divine mystery of reproduction, points to eternity. 

 

(Joseph Mazzini was born at Genoa in 1805.  He was educated at the university there.  In 1830 he joined the secret society of the Caronari and was consequently banished from Italy.  He settled in London in 1837, but soon returned to the continent to spend the rest of his life and instigate revolutionary movements.  He died at Pisa in 1872.)

 

 

ARNOLD TOYNBEE ON THE WORD ‘LOVE’.  In modern Western languages the word love is used in two meanings that are not only different but are actually antithetical.  In both meanings, love means desire, but in one meaning it means a desire to give and to help, while in the other meaning it means a desire to take and to exploit.  Two different words are needed.

 

I agree that, in the modern world, even the kind of love that means giving, not taking, tends to evaporate through being made impersonal.  Impersonal love seems to me to be a contradiction in terms, because self-devoting love, as we know it from experience, is a personal feeling.  One person experiences it for another person, and that experience leads him to take action---if necessary at extreme cost to himself---to help the other person. 

(Toynbee, Arnold Joseph (1889-1975) was an English historian and reformer.  He is known for his 10-volume “A Study of History” (1934-54).

 

HAVELOCK ELLIS ON DANCING.  Dancing and building are the two primary and essential arts. The art of dancing stands at the source of all the arts that express themselves first in the human person.  The art of building, or architecture, is the beginning of all the arts that lie outside the person, and in the end they unite.  Music, acting, poetry proceed in the one mighty stream; sculpture, painting, all the arts of design, in the other. There is no primary art outside these two arts, for their origin is far earlier than man himself, and dancing came first.

 

That is one reason why dancing, however it may at times be scorned by passing fashions, has a profound and eternal attraction even for those one might suppose farthest from its influence.  The joyous beat of the feet of children, the cosmic play of philosophers’ thoughts, rise and fall according to the same laws of rhythm.  If we are indifferent to the art of dancing we have failed to understand, not merely the supreme manifestation of physical life, but also the supreme symbol of spiritual life.

 

The significance of dancing, in the wide sense, thus lies in the fact that it is simply an intimate concrete appeal of a general rhythm, that general rhythm which marks not life only but the universe, if one may still be allowed so to name the sum of the cosmic influences that reach us.  We need not, indeed, go so far as the planets or the stars and outline their ethereal dances.  We have but to stand on the sea-shore and watch the waves that beat at our feet, to observe that at nearly regular intervals this seemingly monotonous rhythm is accentuated for several beats, so that the waves are really dancing the measure of a tune.  It need surprise us not at all that rhythm, ever tending to be moulded into a tune, should mark all the physical and spiritual manifestations of life.  Dancing is the primitive expression alike of religion and of love----of religion from the earliest human times we know of and of love from a period long anterior to the coming of man.  The art of dancing, moreover, is intimately entwined with all human tradition, of war, of labour, of pleasure, of education, while some of the wisest philosophers and the most ancient civilizations have regarded the dance as the pattern in accordance with which the moral life of men must be woven.  (Havelock Ellis (1859-1939) was an English psychologist and writer).

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THUS SPAKE MAHATMA GANDHI

 

 

 

 

THUS SPAKE MAHATMA GANDHI

                    (2.10.1869-30.1.1948)

 

ON SEX EDUCATION: The sex-education, that I stand for, must have for its object the conquest and sublimation of the sex passion.  Such education should automatically serve to bring home to children the essential distinction between man and brute, to make them realize that it is man’s privilege and pride to be gifted with the faculties of head and heart both, that he is a thinking no less than a feeling animal, and to renounce the sovereignty of reason over the blind instincts is, therefore, to renounce a man’s estate. (Harijan, 21.11.1936).

 

As about the children’s curiosity about the facts of life, we should tell them if we know, and admit our ignorance if we do not.  If it is something that must not be told, we should check them and ask them not to put such questions even to any one else.  We must never put them off. (The Diary of Mahadev Desai).

 

Children know more things than we imagine.  If they do not know and if we refuse to tell them, they try to acquire the knowledge in a questionable manner.  But if it has to be withheld from them, we must take such risk.  If they ask us about the sexual act, we must not tell them.  (The Diary of Mahadev Desai).

 

If children watch the berhaviour of birds, and want to know I should tell them and take the opportunity to teach them a lesson in Brhmacharya (chastity).  I would emphasise the distinction between men and beasts or birds.  If men and women behave like beasts, they are only beasts in human shape.  This is not vituperation but a bare statement of facts. We are endowed with human shape and reason in order that we may subdue the beast within.  (The Diary of Mahadev Desai).

 

Boys and girls cannot remain innocent for all time, no matter how hard we try.  Therefore, it is advisable to tell them the facts of life at a certain age.  If this knowledge leads any of them to misbehave themselves, we must not mind.  As a matter of fact, such knowledge ought to strengthen ones will to chastity.  That is my own experience, at any rate.  (The Diary of Mahadev Desai).

 

Some acquire this knowledge to feed the animal passion; others come to know in the natural course of things; still others equip themselves with information in order to control passion and help others to do so.  This knowledge may be imparted only by those who are fit to do it.  (The Diary of Mahadev Desai).

 

SEX URGE. Today, our entire environment – our reading, our thinking, our social behaviour  - is generally calculated to subserve and cater for the sex urge.  To break through its coils is no easy task.  But it is a task worthy of our highest endeavour.  (Harijan, 21.11.1936).

 

Sex urge is a fine and noble thing.  There is nothing to be ashamed of it.  But it is meant only for the act of creation.  Any other use of it is a sin against God and humanity.  (Harijan, 28.3.1936).

 

God has blessed man with seed that has the highest potency and woman with a field richer than the richest earth to be found anywhere on this globe.  Surely, it is criminal folly for man to allow his most precious possession to run to waste.  He must guard it with a care greater than he will bestow upon the richest pearls in his possession.  And so is a woman guilty of criminal folly who will receive the seed in her life-producing field with the deliberate intention of letting it run to waste.  Both he and she will be judged guilty of misuse of the talents given to them, and they will be dispossessed of what they have been given. (Harijan, 28.3.1936). Courtesy: The Encyclopedia of Gandhian Thoughts published by AICC (I), New Delhi.

 

HIGH BLOOD PRESSURE

 

High blood pressure is not a disease but a symptom.  It indicates some malfunctioning in the body.  The abnormality in the blood pressure is a warning that one should get one’s physical system thorough checked to know which organ is not functioning properly.

 

According to Rehberger blood pressure may be due to heredity such as goiter, tendency to worry, stocky build, short neck, obesity, or advancing age, mental and muscular exertion, excitement, anger and fear, cold temperature, acute pain, over-indulgence in eating and drinking, excessive use of spices, constipation, sedentary habits, alcoholism, tobacco consumption; gout, diabetes, migraine, convulsions, hysteria, plumpism (overweight), scarlet fever, measles, pneumonia, meningitis, pregnancy, chronic infections such as tuberculosis, pyrrhoea, sinusitis, chronic appendicitis, chronic prostatitis, kidney ailments, tumour, asthma, myocardial insufficiency, etc.

 

The treatment therefore lies in exact diagnosis.  The organ affecting the system and giving rise in blood pressure has to be taken care of.  Functional rise in blood pressure does not need organic treatment.  If a man raises his blood pressure because of anxiety, fear or anger, he has to control it emotionally.  Yoga, meditation, positive thinking, a healthy philosophy of life will bring blood pressure back to normal.  A sedentary person has to take exercise such as walking and jogging or cycling and thus expel the wastes from his body and feel normal.  But before starting any exercise, medical guidance must be obtained.  An overweight person has to control his weight.  If he stops overeating or taking fatty foods or abstains from consuming spices or gives up smoking and  drinking, his blood pressure will automatically decline.  It has been noticed that diet control results in marvelous change in blood pressure.  Within a few days of discarding fats, sweets, sugar, cholesterol-rich dry fruits, eggs with yolk, high dose of salt, too much tea and coffee one starts feeling the difference.

 

 Drinking plenty of water and endurable walks are very useful ways of discharging toxins from the body and thus removing some of the causes of high blood pressure.

 

Vegetarian diet is an effective way of controlling blood pressure.  Fresh fruits, vegetable, potatoes in place of cereals, spinach, lettuce, broccoli, string beans, green peas, lima beans, apples, citrus fruits, melons, papaya, onion and garlic taken in sufficient quantities lower blood pressure.  However, diabetes patients have to consult their physicians about the selection of fruits.  White bread should be discarded.  Tea should be taken in moderate quantities and preferably with little or no milk.  Sugar may either be avoided on reduced quantitatively as a sweetener.  Butter is dangerous and so is the yolk of the egg as it increases cholesterol.  Curd is better option than milk.  No soft drinks because of them contain sugar and caffeine,  Pickles, pepper, hot sauces of all sorts have also to be excluded from diet.

 

Constipation is a major cause of high blood pressure.  It can be avoided by taking liver-friendly and laxative foods.

 

Relaxation is the key to good health.  Those people who do not relax, remain tense or exhaust themselves through hard and continuous work enhance their blood pressure.  Proper sleep for at least six to seven hours a day is essential.  Inhaling of fresh air is life-giving.  Excitement aggravates blood pressure.  While light exercise is desirable, rather essential, taxing exercise like dancing, running, and playing of strenuous games are full of high risk.

 

Jealousy, rivalry, competition, over-attachment, overwork, emotional excitement, fears of all sorts and physical indulgences that imbalance one’s mental poise are hazardous.

 

Pollution --- especially air and noise pollution is instant raisers of blood pressure.

 

Don’t hate but love.  Don’t impatient.  Practise tolerance.  Be generous, charitable and sympathetic.  These positive attitudes generate nourishing chemicals in the body.  Enmity, hatred and the attitude of retaliation or causing injury to anybody including your enemy breeds toxic atmosphere within the human body.  A healthy philosophy of life based on friendliness, charity, compassion, cooperativeness, sympathy, understanding, mutual cooperation, love of harmony, give rise to sweetness and light and keep hypertension away.

 

If rise in blood pressure is due to some malfunction in your system which needs thorough investigation, it is advisable to consult a specialist immediately.  Neither diagnosis nor the treatment of the disease should be avoided or delayed because it can be risky.

 

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SACRED THOUGHTS

 

SACRED THOUGHTS

HUMAN beings the world over need freedom and security that they may be able to realize their full potential.  The only real prison is fear, and the only real freedom is freedom from fear.----AUNG SAN SUU KYI

 

WE should know that all things are the works of the Great Spirit.  We should know that He is within all things: the trees, the grasses, the rivers, the mountains, and all the four-legged animals, and the winged peoples; and even more important, we should understand that He is also above these things and peoples.----BLACK ELK 

 

HUMAN affairs are like a chess game: only those who do not take it seriously can be called good players.  Life is like an earthen pot: only when it is shattered, does it manifest its emptiness.----SENECA

 

LIFE must be measured rather by depth than by length: by thought and action, rather than by time.----LORD AVEBURY

 

GOD is the best to take care of man, and He is the most merciful of those who show mercy!  THE HOLY QUR’AN

 

BREAD of deceit is sweet to a man; but afterwards his mouth shall be filled with gravel.----PROVERBS 20.5.17

 

A LIAR lies to himself as well as to the gods.  Lying is the origin of all evils; it leads to rebirth in the miserable planes of existence, to breach of the pure precepts, and to corruption of the body.---MAHARATNAKUTA SUTRA 27.

 

YOU have got a good body.  That’s not enough.  You have to have the heart and soul to go with it.---- LEE HANEY

 

THERE is no doubt that creativity is the most important human resource of all.  Without creativity, there would be no progress, and we would be forever repeating the same patterns.  Without creativity one creeps along far behind experience, with creativity one pushes ahead of it.  Creativity involves breaking out of established patterns in order to look at things in a different way.  Removing the faults in a stage-coach may produce a perfect stage-coach, but it is unlikely to produce the first motor car.----EDWARD DE BONO

CORONA-VIRUS PANDEMIC

 

CORONA-VIRUS PANDEMIC

It was on 22^nd March 2020 when a 24-hour voluntary curfew was observed all over the country at the instance Prime Minister. It was followed by a 21-day nationwide mandatory lock down from March 24 onwards. The reason was  the emergence of a new virus termed as invisible and spreading from man to man and was incurable through existing medical treatment.

The outbreak of this new virus was made public on 31^st December 2019  when China informed the World Health Organisation about a group pneumonia cases of an unknown cause in Wuhan city in Hubel province. Quite alarmingly the disease gripped not only some other provinces of China but also many other countries causing a huge number of deaths.

The World Health Organisation (WHO) declared it a pandemic and name the virus as SARS-COV-2 which is now called as COVID-19.

The Corona pandemic has upset the normal life of all the countries. It has seriously hurt their economy because of continuous lock-downs and shutting up of most of the business, manufacturing, social, academic, hospitality, entertainment, travel,trnsport and other activities. Work at home and online meetings became the new normal. Large gatherings became unlawful. Sanitisation, social distancing, face-masking, became compulsory as a preventive measure.

The only hope for riddance from this pandemic was the production of effective vaccines.

However, the pandemic has already affected about 9 crore people globally and killed about 02 crore people. The worst hit nations are: US, India, Brazil, Russia and UK. China, too, has not been less affected.

Vaccines have now been created by several countries. Russia is using Sputnik V. U.K. is using Moderna. U.S.A. is using Pfizer. India will be using Co-Vaxin from January 13. There are 172 countries in the world. Each of them will be choosing a vaccine according to its own needs.

A priority schedule for vaccinating people has been drawn. First: Health and front line workers; then elderly people with co-morbidities; then people above the age of 50, lastly the remaining people.

The Government of India has created Co-Win for all sorts of information about the vaccination programme.

The efficacy rating of the available vaccines ranged from60-70 to 90 plus.

That the vaccines will overcome the pandemic quickly and permanently is not assured at all.

In spite of vaccination drive, USA, UK, Scotland, Russia, China are having thousands of new cases.

In U.K. there is a mutant form of the virus which is fast spreading. India has as on 6^th Jan 2021 73 such cases.