The Eternal Bliss

(Speech)
Exxon Valdez oil spill in which 10.8 million U.S.gallons of oil were spilled, Chernobyl accident which caused 56 direct deaths and 4,000 extra cancer deaths, Three Mile Island tragedy and the Challenger shuttle explosion – BBC Science—attributes sleep disorder as an important causation factor .

Fellow toastmasters and distinguished guests, good evening.
Haven’t many of us felt drowsy and sleepy even after having slept for more than 10 hours? Haven’t many of us have felt we have slept so little and still not able to sleep..? Haven’t many of us dedicated weekends exclusively to catch up lost sleep?

My dear friends, what matters is not the quantity of our sleep but the quality of our sleep. I shall bring to your notice 3 things that we need to do to improve the quality of our sleep and why it will improve the quality of sleep. Thereby you will be able to reduce the sleeping hours and still feel so rejuvenated after the sleep.

The first point is that sleep happens in five cycles. The first two stage makes up the initial phase, three and four make up the deep and the last stage is the Rapid eye movement stage – the stage when see dreams. For a sleep to be called successful we should have maximum deep sleep as this is the stage where the entire body gets energized. You might have even observed some illness vanishing over sleep—deep sleep is responsible for that. But before sleep if take heavy food, most of the energy will used for digestion—there will be nothing to be distributed and the deep sleep will not prolong. And if we don’t drink enough water the body will be dehydrated and the energy supply during the deep sleep will not reach the entire body. Hence to improve deep sleep we must drink a lot of water and avoid taking food that takes long to digest.

The second point is the sleep distribution through the different stages happens through cycles. As you can see in the picture, it happens in cycles. And this cycle though it will vary from individual to individual it tend remain the same for an individual until something drastic happens. What is the take home from this? Sometimes you would have felt so energetic and ready to go after you woke up. That’s because you woke during the REM stage close to the awakened state. So try to get up in the REM cycle probably during the stage after 5 hours; because the rest of the sleep doesn’t offer much value as there is hardly any deep sleep after that. By trial and error we should find the right time to wake up.

The third and last important point is our sleep is regulated by the circadian rhythm—that’s our body temperature variation. Unlike the popular belief our body temperature is not constant. When the body temperature is low we sleep. For this while we are awake we should have sunlight and when asleep it should be dark. Another aspect apart from the body temperature which determines sleep is Melatonin, the hormone which synthesized in the pineal gland and, to a lesser extent, in the retina. Melatonin is responsible for putting you to sleep. While we get sunlight, the production of melatonin is inhibited and in darkness in its production improves. So it’s quite important to get enough sunlight while we are awake and enough darkness while we sleep – because of the body temperature factor and the melatonin factor.
To conclude we must attempt three steps to improve the quality of our sleep.
1.drinking lot of water and having food easily digesteable before sleep.
2.getting up during the REM cycle.
3.getting enough sunlight while awake and sleeping in darkness.

By following these steps we can ensure that the eternal bliss we are blessed with is used for our benefit and never under used and over used.

Over to you toastmaster.

(Figures ans matter adapated from various textbooks on sleep)

(Project 8 of CC)

We Can Preach

(Speech)

“First you practice, and then you preach”. This is one of the most misused statement in the entire history of humanity.

Fellow toastmasters and distinguished guests, good evening.

Even when I am opposing this adage, I agree that this principle is applicable to the practice of existing laws. Like we cannot go and ask everyone to pay tax without ourselves paying the tax. But the concept that we ought to understand is that the principle of “First you practice, and then you preach” is applicable only to such existing laws. Nevertheless we extend it to all walks of life as a suppressing tool.If we don’t extend the usage to any other areas I see two immediate advantages: 1) It will help idea evolution 2) It can aid people to improve.

Attacking an established age old adage is not easy. My first contention is: on restricting its usage we will help idea evolution. Lets consider this.In my company, lunch is provided free of cost. But now as you know, because of the economic crisis, the company is inviting ideas from employees for cost cutting. My suggestion was to charge for the lunch. One of my colleagues who particularly likes the lunch didn’t like the idea. He said, “First you practice what you preach; pay for your lunch”. I was shell shocked. One must understand that I am ready to pay for the lunch when the company introduces it as a policy. If we are adamant on rebuking by the practice first principle, people will not dare to throw up new ideas .To appreciate better,imagine we have formed an idea totally against coco-cola. We are preaching never to have it. Now, we are in a hot desert with no water but coco-cola. What would we do? If somebody drinks coco-cola in that situation lets not question their integrity saying he doesn’t practice what he preach. Let’s not get that tough on life; let’s not get that tough on people; let’s not get that tough on ideas.

My second contention is : if we restrict from using this adage it can help improve our performance. We at the toastmasters club are the living example for this. For instance, when a trembling table topics master urges the speakers to be confident, nobody jumps up from the audience and blurts out “Hey, why don’t you first feel confident and then advice us”. Toastmasters never do that. We just take the message in its spirit and try to improve ourselves. Interestingly when the message to be confident gets accepted by the benevolent toastmasters, it gives the table topics master a positive energy to subdue fear and he will gradually improve as he feel that it is his idea not to fear behind the lectern. See the advantage we have reaped for ourselves by restricting the use of practice first before preaching principle. Apart from this I had a personal experience of this sort. A friend of mine had advised me when I lost 1 paper during engineering. I wanted to retort to her “Hey you lost six papers and you are advising me”. But as I was down and out, I hadn’t had the energy for it and kept quite. Interestingly when the next semester’s result came she came and told me “Hey Jindow, I cleared all the papers. When I advised you that day and when you accepted despite I having lost six papers, it gave me the confidence and I myself really understood the need to study well”. I was so happy and also so thankful that on the day when she advised me, I kept my ever wagging tongue under control. I still carry that joy in my heart in the same measure though it reduced a little when she introduced another guy as her boyfriend.

Remember for those people who are preaching without practice, their mind is willing but their body doesn’t permit or their circumstances constrain them. And we speak continuously on the will of our mind our body and the rest of the circumstances will succumb. Lets us not be the ones to down trod, character assassinate and throw others out of their lives. Lets keep inviting ideas and lets keep improving.Over to you toastmaster!!

Watch the video at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nOUxcmLT05E

The Science Of Life

(Speech)
I was deeply troubled by the problem of burping. I went to a doctor. He suggested me not to worry. “There is intake of air and it needs to be released. There are only two ways for that- one is through the mouth.” The other words of the doctor fell deaf into my ear. I had no solution for my problem.

Fellow toastmasters and distinguished guests, a form of complementary and alternative medicine called Ayurveda came to my rescue.

I shall today talk about the important influences in ayurveda, the general principle of ayurveda which states that our body constitutes of vata, pitta and kabha and finally the day to day usability of ayurveda – the science of life.

Ayurveda traces its origins to the Atharvaveda .But the methodical organization and the central concepts evolution happened under the Buddhists philosophers, especially Nagarjuna.The middle path (madhyamika) of the Buddhists led to the Ayurvedic emphasizes on moderation in food intake, sleep, sexual intercourse, and the intake of medicine

Three forces known as the three doshas or simply tridosha regulates every physiological and psychological process in a living organism. A harmonious state of the three doshas creates balance and health; an imbalance, which might be an excess or deficiency manifests as a sign or symptom of disease.

Let’s discuss more on these doshas.
1) Vata -- It is responsible for all movements in the mind and body: the movement of air in and out of the lungs, the flow of blood through the circulatory system, nutrients through the alimentary tract, and thoughts through the mind.

2) Pitta--It carries the meaning of "that which digests" and is associated with the idea of being yellow-tinged or bilious. Charaka Samhita, an ancient Ayurvedic text, teaches that pitta functions in digestion, heat production, providing color to the blood, vision, and skin luster.

3) Kabha-- derives from the Sanskrit word "shlish" which means "that which holds things together.” It governs immunity and resistance against disease.

Restoring these doshas into a balance is the technique of ayurvedic treatment Now, I shall point out certain instances where Ayurveda came to my rescue or where I personally witnessed the fruitfulness of it. I already mentioned the gastritis associated burping which I had. Black pepper, long pepper and ginger were mixed to get ‘trikatu’ which cured my gastric disorder. Four years ago when I was new to Bangalore, I was affected by jaundice. And as you know there is no effective medicine for jaundice in allopathy. The root of shoe-flower plant was grounded and mixed with butter milk. I drank this for 1 week and my bilirubin count subsided considerably. To add one more of the many instances, my mother was affected by chronic back pain for a while. She drank coffee mixed with grounded fenugreek for few months continually and she claimed remarkable improvement. Of course ayurvedic massage is also an option for this.

Hearing stuffs of this sort,people often wonder on the scientific basis of ayurveda.I have heard about my grandmother talk about her grandmother’s uncontrollable cough.She recovered from that when she drank a glass of milk for few days with a teaspoon of turmeric powder mixed in it.But the university of Mississippi Medical centre applied for patent on the use of turmeric for healing in December 1993.And of course the patent was granted.The allopathy division , infact after sometime may discover the presence of some ‘chloro fluro carbo methyl octane’ chemical in all medicinal herbs which attribute to their medicinal value.We need not wait for such a dsicovery. We have proven track record spanning centuries on the effectiveness of Ayurveda.The point is not to approach ayurveda when we require a bypass surgery but there are instances where ayurveda have proved itself like the ones I cited previously.In these cases you can fall back to the the soothing arms of ayurveda to find solace.
Over to you toastmaster.
(Reference: Various texts/scripts on Ayurveda)
(Project 7 of CC)
Watch the video at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LZ8CvC4jj64

Our Approach To Life

(Speech)
Mahatma Gandhi , an iconic figure of the 20th century, is not an example for an Indian but an exceptional Indian . Why ? Fellow Toastmasters and distinguished guests good evening.

The approach to life made him exceptional.What is our approach to life.Lets rewind our life and check out. Remember that afternoon after school when we were waiting for our father to return with a bicycle.Hours seemed like days.Otherwise we never bothered when he used to come.And finally we heard the voice of the rick coming.Eyes widened and the face lit up on seeing the cycle.But ,its a ladies cycle.Our life had always been this , like a donkey chasing a carrot.The faster we approach the faster it moves away.When we went to the ground for playing cricket,before being aware of the situation we dropped the catch and were chased away. “ I will show you” we said to them. I will study and prove myself and prove these people wrong. We study very hard and also help a very foolish friend of ours.When the result came, ya our own foolish friend had score 2 marks more than us. No this whole examination system isn’t fair.He didn’t know anything.On moving to college,we find the love of our life.On the day we decide to propose her we see our best friend eloping with her. No this isn’t life.In the young age itself we realize that life is a like bull but then we are so bold and decide to fight hard with it. And the result - the bull ran over us. Some of us married that bull only. And we will say “ bulbul , get me a coffee”. This is what makes us to say life is like a wife with a knife. At final ages we decide to buy a secluded farm house and enjoy the beauty of life but a sense of loss somehow overcomes us.Even just before the death we will be saying “ This isn’t life”.Why this dissatisfaction? Because we live in the future- palnning about the future, worrying about the future , hoping for the future and when the future comes it doesn’t match our expectation. We have to live in the present— right now right here.

Let us move to our second fundamental issue- lack of owning responsibility.Let me illustrate this in the highlight of the recent terror strike in Mumbai.When kerala CM visited Sandeep Unnikrishnan’s house ;Sandeep’s father said “ I don’t want to see any dogs”.Kerala Cm went back to his state and retorted “ No dog would have gone there but not for Sandeep’s house”.Ironically , all these dialogues happened in Malayalam which is incidentally fighting for the classical language status.Opposition leader urged CM to resign on this dog issue.God’s own country became dog’s country.Everybody is in the blame business.The media lashed out at the politicians.The NSG came out against media in not behaving in a restrained manner.The common man wanted an immediate war with Pakistan.Some people went to the kitchen and drew out their knife ready to be part of the war.Its heard that their wives were really excited to see them in the kitchen atleast for this.Nobody wants to own the responsibility. India is sitting like fat duck before the hunter ; now the duck is lame too.Unless the responsibility is owned by each and everyone, for any situations for that matter,things wont improve.The technique for owning responsibility is to avoid reasoning.For instance if we are late for an occasion let’s give up reasoning like heavy traffic, dog came to bite us,wife burnt all our clothes, etc. Whatever happens in life we should be able to say that it happened in our life because we chose for that.

The solutions offered here belongs to one of the many successful way of approaching life—Ontology – the science of being. Its upto to an individual to decide whether this ontology will help them to actualize their fullest potential. But one thing is sure;we need to attain our fullest potential.Mahatma Gandhi got his revelation when he was thrown out of the train . Bangaloreans – what are you waiting for—for the metro rail to come is it ?
Over to you toastmaster.
(Some of the ideas in the speech are inspired)
(Project 6 of CC)

Watch the speech video at : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bo3F_gSaU7c

Keep Laughing !!!!

Do you all love to laugh? ….
So we are all lovers of laughter.. You know how a lover spend most of his time? Yes..Thinking of the loved one.Being lovers of laughter ,then don’t we need to think about laughter? Homour loving toastmasters and distinguished guests,Good evening.

Before I plunge into discussing why we laugh, for instance hearing a joke,let me remind you something. Laughter also happens when tickled. Also, the deadly disease called Kuru results in uncontrollable laughter. We do not have to account for these cases of physiologically induced laughter, any more than an account of crying would have to explain crying while peeling onions . Hence we will restrict our discussion to homourous laughter.
In heaven there is no laughter,declared Mark Twain.He reasoned “The secret source of humor is not joy but sorrow”.He was guided by the thoughts of Plato and Aristotle who believed that laughter is derision or the expression of superiority.
A man spoke frantically into the phone, "My wife is pregnant and her contractions are only two minutes apart!"."Is this her first child?" the doctor asked. "No, you fool!" the man shouted. "This is her husband!"
Why did we laugh..? Because we felt superior to those humans who were weaving confusion through the phone.We believe we would have done far better.This thinking though implicit, makes us laugh. Hobbes , a philosopher explained superiority as eminency in ourselves, by comparison with the infirmity of others, or with our own formerly. This also explains why we are able to laugh at the earlier blunders we committed. We believe we are superior now compared to our earlier state.
All these thinkers from Plato to Aristotle to Mark Twain to Hobbes attributed laughter to superiority theory. But,the theory of laughter that is now appreciated throughout is called incongruity theory.It explains laughter this way. When our minds have suddenly moved from one state to another and if we enjoy this movement , we laugh.There is a classic example used by many thinkers to explain incongruity theory
The bronchial patient is visiting the doctor.A bronchial patient’s talk will be like he is whispering because his voice is affected by the disease.
“Is the doctor at home?” a bronchial patient asked in his bronchial whisper. “No,” the doctor’s young and pretty wife whispered in reply. “Come right in.”

The doctor’s wife is expecting the visit of her illicit lover. She expects the lover to whisper ,well ,for reasons well known.Here, the bronchial patient and the illicit lover are the incongrous states..There is a sudden shift in our mind due to the trasition from the state of ‘brochial patient’ to the state of ‘illicit lover’ through the connecting factor “whispering”. Our mind is incapable of taking such sudden shift and the energy hence created is release as laughter as the shift is a pleasant one..

Don’t feel that these theories have no practical aspects.There are joke machines-i.e automated computer programs based on these theories that can generate jokes.What more, then we can also possibly create jokes and make others laugh based on these principles.Well, overnight you may not become as great as joke machines like Rajdeep Manwani and Chendil Kumar.But its worth a try.

We have now thought of laughter in two modes – the superiority mode and the incongrous mode.And why did we think of laughter? Because we are lovers of laughter. In real life situation the lover girl will get angry if the lover boy forgets to call her as promised.And when she enquires about it , if the the answer she gets from lover boy is like “ I was thinking about you and hence forgot to call you” would make her doubly angry .Simliarly we, the lovers of laughter ,also should not forget to laugh by becoming busy thinking of laughter. It can make laughter angry.Hence lets all laugh , laugh and laugh to make laughter,our lover ,happy.Waste no time.Start laughing. Over to the ever smiling toastmaster..

(Project 5 of CC)

Watch the video at : http://in.youtube.com/watch?v=ErvEEuxDFHQ

From Failure To Success

(Speech 5-7 min)
“If you study well, you will get good marks” said one of my teachers during her last class for us before our 12th standard exam. Innocently, one of my friends shouted from behind “That we know, Madam”. Fellow toastmasters and distinguished guests, the unknown fact is how to study well amidst fear of failures. Generically put the fact unknown is how to fine tune our mind to amuse its engine, the body, to perform the desired tasks when the ghostly eyes of failure stare on.
It was the winter of 1306, and Robert Bruce, newly crowned king of Scotland, sat shivering and hungry in a tiny hut on an Irish island. He had lost six battles against King Edward 1 of England. In the hut Bruce saw a small spider busily at work making her web. He watched as she struggled to attach one of her strands to a wooden rafter. Again and again, a blustery wind would sneak through the cracks of the hut and shake the thread loose. Again and again, she would begin the task of attaching it once more. “You’ve also tried six times and failed, my friend,” Bruce told her. “Why don’t you give up?” But she seemed not to hear. Patiently, a seventh time, she spun a thread, drew it to the rafter, and this time . . . it held! “My most humble apologies,” said Bruce. But when he said his apologies his face beamed with confidence and enthusiasm. The inspired Robert Bruce returned to Scotland, gathered his men and eventually defeated the English.
When the king sat shattered in the hut, can you imagine the situation if somebody would go and tell the king “If you fight well you will win the battle”. The King definitely would have started a battle not with the English, but with the person who told so. In reality, the king had the spider as his model to look upon for encouragement, motivation and inspiration to move from failure to success.
The king was inspired but the inspiration was not build to a beautiful web as the spider did. He scaled up his source of inspiration – the spider-his model and went on to win the war. Modeling need not be in this same fashion .It could be an exact replica – like getting inspired from the elder brother to get first rank in the class .It could even be scaled down version .For instance a person who look upon the former president of USA, Abraham Lincoln .He may eventually be inspired to win the post of Panchayat President. There is no point in saying one mode of modeling is better than the other. If anything that can provide you that instantaneous spark of inspiration that is the best. If that does not happen naturally you need not sit idle waiting for that moment to happen. You can choose an appropriate model and start giving positive suggestion to your mind until you derive that spark.
How the modeling is done also assumes significance. A person trying to be patriotic may opt Bhagat Singh as model. But if the suggestion he gives to the mind is like “he had to suffer a lot and finally had to bear the pain of gallows”; his patriotism may not blossom. But the same case can be paraphrased as” he sacrificed his life for the country and the fruit of that sacrifice is our freedom”. Our mind is more likely to take this suggestion positively and the person would be inspired to be more patriotic.
It is true that some failures can condition your mind to failure. Modeling is a suggestion to the mind which can effectively decondition the state of failure.Lets have a model to admire and our state can change.After some failures you may be thinking “If there ever was a time to give up, this is it.” But like Robert Bruce who modeled the spider let your thought also transform by this modelling. “If there ever was a time to make one more try, this is it!” Now is the time. Over to you toastmaster

(The description of the spider story is inspired)

(Project 4 of CC)

Watch the video at : http://in.youtube.com/watch?v=7CSoHfz63CU

On Creativity

Speech (5-7 min)

During fifteenth century AD about 550 million people were living in this world. Almost 550 years later, in 2008 we still are very familiar with a person who lived during that period and we horripilate on seeing his paintings- the name Leonardo da Vinci. Why? Creativity distinguished him from the rest. Fellow toastmasters and guests, I address you on a unique human ability that can help us endure over and beyond our lifetime— the ability called Creativity.

All creations do not involve creativity. For instance a man digging to create a hole; there is no creativity involved in that. Such mundane tasks do not call the creativity in us into action though they result in creations. Creativity requires thought process. Not all thinking is necessarily creative. If you are trying to solve a mathematical equation like finding the hypotenuse of a triangle you are not involved in creativity. Such thinking is called convergent thinking. Thinking which lead to a sought after solution is referred by this name- that it converges into a solution. These are more methodical. The other form of thinking is divergent thinking-famously called out of the box thinking or as Edward de Bono called it - lateral thinking. Not all divergent thinking is creative thinking. Bored of all the regular colours, when I want to paint my house say I decide to create a new colour by mixing 17% blue 23% red and 60% of green and obtained a new beautiful colour. This is divergent thinking in the sense that we are thinking something other than the normal– but there is no creativity involved. We have just mixed existing things randomly. So when can we say that creativity is involved in thinking? Creativity blossoms only when the creation of elemental ideas happen .Like creating a new primary colour apart from blue ,green and red—something very elemental is created. Of course this creation has to be original to be said as an act of creativity.

Like the seed is separated from the chaff we have now separated creativity from rest of the skills. Not that rest of the skills are inferior. But creativity is the mother of all skills. Mother is a mother because she delivers a baby and not just because she bore a baby. Similarly, though creativity is a mental process, creativity is acknowledged as creativity only when it is rendered to the rest of the population. Like the wrap of the chocolate entices people to buy it, the way creativity is rendered make people appreciate it. So the way you present your idea, the way you sing the tune you composed, the way you paint in the canvas the mental image you conceived are all important. These modes of output like singing, drawing, speaking, to name a few, requires practice. Apart from refining the modes of output one needs to supply the information that can aid mental processing. Quite a good reading/seeing/hearing is required for this. But the most crucial step is the processing stage as this is the step where we take the essence of input and give it as output. To aid the processing, i.e. thinking, learn to be happy in solitude, and then engage in solitary dialogue. Because in group people seldom think not to mention the case while that group is chattering.

It is neither face nor physique that makes a person unique-- yeah you guessed it right, it is his creativity. Though the creative ability is innate in all human beings, the creativity that could be derived out of that common creative ability makes us unique in this world- that makes the existence of our individual self, irreplaceable in this world. The world needs you to be creative. Have you experienced the joyous situation of becoming parents? Well, err, I haven’t but I have witnessed the beaming faces of the parents in the maternity ward. So if this, creation without creativity can create such huge happiness, you can imagine the happiness creation with creativity can bring you; you might have already experienced. So not that the world alone needs you to be creative you too want yourself to be creative for being happy. Over to you toastmaster.

(Project 3 of CC)