The little kid inside of a grown man

My husband suddenly paused eating and didn’t make conversation with me this evening.  I noticed him looking lost. He seemed to be trying to find a way to say or do something. 

After observing him in that situation for a few minutes, I asked my husband what he was thinking about. He smiled, and told me:

 

“I’m trying to figure out how to avoid eating this awful food you’ve given to me without making you scold me back.”

 

My husband’s response made me laugh. I found his arguments so funny that I couldn’t stop laughing for at least ten minutes. 

 

For the first time in my entire life I saw the other side of my husband. I always thought he was strong, demanding, and got everything he wanted from me or anyone else. I never knew the little kid residing inside of him.

Culture and Character

Build your character not your personality. Character strong on at least one ethical ground, “ethical” such as “s/he doesn’t lie” or “we can count on her/his words” or “s/he can keep secrets,” are built into your character. These personal traits help others understand who you are and how they should treat you.

These traits are instilled in us by our family and also by our close circle of friends. These traits are later reinforced by the society in which we live. We carry these personal traits with us wherever we go. 

We also carry some outward character traits to which I call "personality traits". Traits such as giving, kind or politeness help us make our living because our societies like them.  Although, our societies are fooled time and time again by the people who carry these traits (the deceivers), the only way to find out who they are is to deal with them and learn for the future.

Personality traits and Character traits sound like a person’s identity, but they’re not!

I see Cultures the same way: There are phony cultures and there are real ones. How do we know which one is which?

All cultures started with the “paganism”. Paganism is the oldest non-categorized, non-politicized and none manipulated religion in the world. This is the original  and most authentic religion in my opinion!

Pagan religion is based mainly on nature. Followers of paganism focus on nature and spirituality, not so much dogma and doctrines. 

Most literatures define paganism as “not one of the main religions,” because they only recognize events from the medieval period. But the human history didn’t start from the medieval period. Even with the “black hole” period, a lot had happen on the earth and some of them were recorded. Unfortunately, these records located outside of the Western world. Because of that the western literates rather ignore them!

Since religion is one of the major issues of cultural equation, I want to  establish a simple definition of religion before moving into what I want to say about a real culture and a phony ones. 

Most of the visual cultures posted on the FB are based on the phony religion which are based on certain gods/goddesses. These cultures are based on a lot of dogmas and doctrines.

But think about those personal traits for a minute. Do you like if somebody says something and does something else? Do you feel like going back to the person who deceives you not once but two or three times?

Similarly, why do my immigrant friends living with the “failed-culture” that you thought was not good for you? 

You left your birth country to start a brand new life in a “just” society where you and your family would make a better life. But if you build a society just like the one you left behind, what mission have you accomplished?

I termed failed culture because you youself have talked so much against your birth-country. You’ve said the people there being dishonest, family-values being broken up, politicians taking part in crimes and corruptions… 

Hypocrite maybe too strong word to call you, but how do I describe you if you've two standards: One for you and another for others to follow?  

7 habits of highly effective people

The meaning behind the Character Ethic and Personality Ethic is so compelling and profound for me. I had read Stephen Covey’s 7 Habits quite a few years ago and thought I had understood what they meant. But I had not!


I accidently opened THE site gain this morning: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WFc08j9eorQ and realized how much more there is for me to learn from Mr. Covey’s principles.


If you’re new to these principles, pay special attentions to his 4 quality of a good characteristic person under his Character Ethic category. However, you must read everything under his “Character” and “Personality” ethics to understand character ethics are rooted in a person’s character, while personality ethics are only seen on the surface but not under a person’s value system. This, I found as profound as the Law of Attraction is!


The four ethics under his Character Ethics are as follows:


#1. Integrity

#2. Humility

#3. Courage

#4. Modesty




Under the Personality Ethic, there are the:


#1. Public Image

#2. Social Interaction

#3. Appearance




While the personality ethic can be used to build your character, most people use them to manipulate others, which in the long run others will find out who the person is.


There are so much more you can learn from Mr. Covey’s principle than I can write here. I hope you visit the site and enjoy the presentation here. I do hope you chose to be the “Will Smith” and make this world better than what you were handed on before you leave .


Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WFc08j9eorQ

Working to live or live to work?

There’s a man who works to live

Who works to live, he works to live!

There is a man who lives to work

Who lives to work, who lives to work!

There’s a man who loves to work

Who loves to work, who loves to work!

There’s a man who thinks he knows

Who thinks he knows!

There’s a man who believes he does

Who believes he does!

There’s a man who he thinks he is

Who he thinks he is!

There’s a man who forgets who he is 

Forgets who he is!

There’s a man who hates to quit

Who hates to quit!

There’s a man who’s overly hardwired, or

Ridgely programmed or ridgely programmed!

He thinks of the Gates and the Buffet

He thinks of the Chomsky, but not the Polansky!

There's a man with is own philosophy, 

who loves his work and lives to work!

Today's Seniors: The Prospects and Problems

Our government and the Canadian households are challenged by the burgeoning seniors’ population and their problems associated with them. For example, a Canadian survey in 2014 showed, over 6 million Canadians were aged 65 or older, representing 15.6 percent of Canada'spopulation. The survey predicts that 23 percent of the Canadianswill be seniors by the year 2030. Another study shows that loneliness/boredom is the number one concern with the elderlies. What can we do to tackle these problems and harness the prospect associated with our seniors?


Government of Canada has made every effort, ensuring that the seniors have access to information, services and benefits they need. But the seniors have many other needs, apart from the financial and healthcare benefits. Although, many seniors can't survive without the government's financial and healthcare benefits, they've other needs also. For example, studies shows that most of the seniors are bored and lonely. In today's nuclear family system, most senior can't expect to be looked after in their own home by their own family members. Invariably they end up taking refuse in some Centre when they reach to their end-of-life-cycle.


But most seniors are better off financially than the younger generation according to Maryalene LaPonsie who writes for the US News. Marylalene sites "In 2000, 45- to 54-year-olds topped the index, with 75 percent being financially secure. By 2014, that group dropped to 68 percent, while the score for 65- to 74-year-olds increased to 69 percent. The group with the lowest financial security is 25- to 34-year-olds, with only about half (56 percent) being financially secure in 2014".


So, today's seniors don't just impose problem on the younger generation, they bring job prospects for the young people also.


Furthermore, taking care of seniors shouldn't just be government's responsibility. The family members and the public at large need to remember their own responsibilities with regards to their seniors. Since both of these groups benefits from the seniors' saving and tax payments, government alone shouldn't be the one to blame for our elders' problems including their boredom and looniness.

Tracking down my ancestry

My father was aloof and didn’t share much about his past with us, his children. He didn’t talk about his family either. The few stories he shared with us were not pleasant and, since, his only sibling died when I was very young, I really didn’t know about his side of family until a few month ago.

I thought I didn't care about my parents’ root until a few months ago. Then, I got a chance to visit my father’s birthplace and discovered very intriguing family history:


My father’s great great-grandfather moved to Dhading from Gorkha destrict five generations ago. His name was Laxmi Nath Adhikari, but he is mostly known as the “jame budha” in Dhading. Jama means long skirt and budha means an old man in Nepali. So, if my father’s great great-grandfather wore long skirt, was tall and fair and his last name was “Adhikari”, there is a fair chance that he came from a Rajput family in central and northern ancient India.


I don’t know exactly what year my ancestor had left India, but it should have been during the Growth of Muslim Population in Medieval India around 1500 AD. Since the Islamic rulers treated all the non-Muslims (Hindus, Buddhists and Jains) awfully and forced them to pay taxes or face the prosecution (if they wanted to keep their religious freedom in India), my Rajput ancestors must have fled to Nepal to avoid all that and to raise their family peacefully.


The fact that my father's last name is Adhikari could be another clue that my ancestors were the Rajputs.  Adhikari in Sanskrit means the one with power (adhikar) over someone of something. Since the Rajputs ruled some central and northern parts of ancient India, their descendants are called the “sons of the king” or Adhikari!


Another reason for me to think about my ancestors that was is that two of my great aunts lived in Tripureshwor, Kathmandu. Tripureshwor was already a fully developed town by the time I came to know these aunts. Since they lived inside the crowded allies, my great aunts were fair-skinned and delicate.

But my parents had moved to a suburb and won several plots of land. That meant we grew our own food, sun-dry some of them for later use when I was growing up.  So, when our  aunts visited us in the village they helped us sun-drying the grains and collect them from the straw-mats wearing their face masks.

Two other clues were that one of my father’s relatives lived in a palace-look house near Gorkha (the Shah Kings’ palace at the time). My mother said the family of this relative spoke the “palace-language” and lived luxuriously!

And, of course, my own father was raised by the “hajuria”. Hajuria is the title given to a king’s close-encounters or advisor. In my father’s case, his god-father played cards with the “second-king” of Nepal, Juddha Samsher Jungha Bahadur Rana.

The second clue is that my father’s family belong to Rishi Kashyap. Kashyap rishi was one of the seven original rishis who supposedly wrote many of the stories (hymns) for the Upanishads.

For example, it is believed that all Hindus are the off springs of the original seven rishis or “Saptarishis”. It is also the belief that our “gotra” tells us which rishi was our forefather, since gotra is the term used to indicate our family linage.

So, my father’s side of family came from the Rishi Kashyap and they carry Kashyap gotra. Knowing I could be the descended of Kashyaparishi and my ancestors may have ruled some parts of ancient India was pretty cool!

Past life connection

I’m very close to two younger ladies. One of them could be less than half of my age and another one could be a few decades younger. They’re hardworking, conscious and kind. I met them at a friend’s place a few years ago. I didn’t make special efforts to be their friend, they just like my company and I like theirs. Was I related to them in my previous life, I wonder?

One of them calls or texts me to say "good morning" or "good night" every single day. She shares her stories with me freely and offers her love and understanding to me also. With all the other people in her life, why me? I wonder why she put so much trust on me?

I’m a believer of past life connections and the notion of reincarnation.  I believe that people return to the earth to finish their unfinished business in their past life, or the  universe brings them back to keep the world go round and around. Either way, it proves that our soul never dies. It keeps returning to the earth and the cycle of birth and death continues.

When we think the birth and death cycle this way, we can understand why we meet with some people, like or dislike them, accept or reject them, etc. 

The notion of "karma" also makes sense when we think about the cycle of birth, death and the incidences in between these periods. Karma justify our fortune and misfortune. Karma explains why we think of the way we do. Karma also tells us why we meet someone and stick with that person even when we dislike that person so much. So much so, that some people refuse to give up their relationships with their husband or other family members, boyfriends, or whoever even after suspecting that they maybe murdered one day from their very hands! 

I think there are reasons for everything happening in my life or anyone else's in this matter. We're here in this world either to payback or to get paid. In another word, we're back to balance our accounts of our past life and create new ones for the next life.