Showing posts with label interesting. Show all posts
Showing posts with label interesting. Show all posts
Tuesday, September 10, 2013
Monday, September 9, 2013
Wednesday, August 28, 2013
This Bill Watterson Tribute Has All the Life Wisdom You'll Ever Need
"Creating a life that reflects your values and satisfies your soul is a rare achievement in a culture that relentlessly promotes avarice and excess as the good life....
To invent your own life's meaning is not easy.. but its still allowed..... and I think you'll be happier for the trouble"
- Bill Watterson (creator of Calvin & Hobbes)
http://gawker.com/inspirational-bill-watterson-speech-turned-into-watters-1217668306
To invent your own life's meaning is not easy.. but its still allowed..... and I think you'll be happier for the trouble"
- Bill Watterson (creator of Calvin & Hobbes)
http://gawker.com/inspirational-bill-watterson-speech-turned-into-watters-1217668306
Sunday, April 14, 2013
The Politics Of Rage: Why Do They Hate Us?
Very interesting Read! Although dated, still vry valid.
http://www.thedailybeast.com/newsweek/2001/10/14/the-politics-of-rage-why-do-they-hate-us.html
http://www.thedailybeast.com/newsweek/2001/10/14/the-politics-of-rage-why-do-they-hate-us.html
Monday, March 12, 2012
360° Aerial Panorama
AirPano is a noncommercial project focused on high resolution 3D aerial panoramas. AirPano team is the group of russian photographers and panorama enthusiasts. During the next 2-3 years they plan to shoot the aerial panoramas and create the virtual 3D tours of the most interesting places of our planet.
Very Impressive!
Very Impressive!
Thursday, August 25, 2011
Being in the Moment - Finding Happiness Now
When people complain about not having a moment to themselves, I often ask if they live in that moment when they do get one… and usually get a funny look for my trouble.
Taking life for granted is all too common, and when we do, we are missing tiny moments of pure joy every day. We could be having a moment right now.
But instead we say "I'm just too busy". We focus only on 'arriving' and forget about the actual journey while we rush from A to B. We work, come home, make dinner, do the housework, iron, clean, shop, bath the kids; always filling each and every moment, but forgetting all the while we are doing these things to 'be' in those individual moments. During our day, we could be gleaning pleasure from many of those tiny moments. They can even make all the difference to raising our overall level of happiness if we practice awareness and living in the moment. We don't have to become Buddhist monks, meditating all day long, just focus on what we are doing instead of letting our minds race forward to the next chore.
Truly being in the moment is about bringing our awareness into this moment right now, and giving whatever we are doing at any given time our fullest attention. (Even if it is the washing up!)
We all want to be happy, but do we know that happiness is a choice? Happiness isn't elusive, always just out of our grasp. We say; "I'd be happy if only I had X Y or Z" but we all have the potential to be happy right now, regardless of what we do or don't have.
By starting with the tiny moments, we can eventually link them all up into a happier overall existence.
What could you do right now to move your level of happiness up a tiny bit?
Here are some in the moment things I do:
If the sun is shining I open the back door and stand outside barefoot and stretch upwards, arms in the air, looking at the sky, breathing in deeply and listening to the sounds of the day. Only takes seconds but it invigorates me. Standing on grass or stone barefoot in dry weather makes me feel instantly connected to the earth.
Looking at the moon and stars on a clear night, preferably outside.
Thinking of the last thing that made me laugh out loud and allowing myself to laugh all over again. (Not advisable in company unless sharing the story!)
Singing at the top of my voice in the car to a song I love, feeling the happiness bubble up and admiring the scenery. If in a grotty place with no view, stuck in traffic, I look at the sky.
Hugs. If you love someone, hug them. No time like the present!
Duvet moments – If I have our bed to myself for a moment, I roll up in the entire duvet, taking a moment to experience the comfort and softness of the fabric, from my face to my toes!
While I'm washing up or cleansing my crystals I run water over my hands, feeling the temperature and the softness of the water, watching how it plays over my fingers, how it splashes, how the light catches it.
If I notice a bird singing outside my window, I stop and really listen to it.
Meditation. Even 10 mintes a day will make a difference to your ability to let the small stuff go over your head and will increase your sense of calm and wellbeing.
But instead we say "I'm just too busy". We focus only on 'arriving' and forget about the actual journey while we rush from A to B. We work, come home, make dinner, do the housework, iron, clean, shop, bath the kids; always filling each and every moment, but forgetting all the while we are doing these things to 'be' in those individual moments. During our day, we could be gleaning pleasure from many of those tiny moments. They can even make all the difference to raising our overall level of happiness if we practice awareness and living in the moment. We don't have to become Buddhist monks, meditating all day long, just focus on what we are doing instead of letting our minds race forward to the next chore.
Truly being in the moment is about bringing our awareness into this moment right now, and giving whatever we are doing at any given time our fullest attention. (Even if it is the washing up!)
We all want to be happy, but do we know that happiness is a choice? Happiness isn't elusive, always just out of our grasp. We say; "I'd be happy if only I had X Y or Z" but we all have the potential to be happy right now, regardless of what we do or don't have.
By starting with the tiny moments, we can eventually link them all up into a happier overall existence.
What could you do right now to move your level of happiness up a tiny bit?
Here are some in the moment things I do:
If the sun is shining I open the back door and stand outside barefoot and stretch upwards, arms in the air, looking at the sky, breathing in deeply and listening to the sounds of the day. Only takes seconds but it invigorates me. Standing on grass or stone barefoot in dry weather makes me feel instantly connected to the earth.
Looking at the moon and stars on a clear night, preferably outside.
Thinking of the last thing that made me laugh out loud and allowing myself to laugh all over again. (Not advisable in company unless sharing the story!)
Singing at the top of my voice in the car to a song I love, feeling the happiness bubble up and admiring the scenery. If in a grotty place with no view, stuck in traffic, I look at the sky.
Hugs. If you love someone, hug them. No time like the present!
Duvet moments – If I have our bed to myself for a moment, I roll up in the entire duvet, taking a moment to experience the comfort and softness of the fabric, from my face to my toes!
While I'm washing up or cleansing my crystals I run water over my hands, feeling the temperature and the softness of the water, watching how it plays over my fingers, how it splashes, how the light catches it.
If I notice a bird singing outside my window, I stop and really listen to it.
Meditation. Even 10 mintes a day will make a difference to your ability to let the small stuff go over your head and will increase your sense of calm and wellbeing.
Why not give some of these things a go, and think about your own list.
Tuesday, May 17, 2011
Nick Risinger's Milky Way Panorama Created From 37,440 Exposures (PICTURES)..
Courtsey Huffington Post.
SEATTLE -- Nick Risinger has always gazed up at the sky. But last year the amateur astronomer and photographer quit his day job as a Seattle marketing director and lugged six synchronized cameras about 60,000 miles to capture an image of the entire night sky.
Risinger, 28, set up his rack of cameras in high-elevation locales in the Western U.S. and South Africa, timing photo shoots around new moons when nights were long and dark. He programmed his six cameras to track the stars as they moved across the sky and simultaneously snapped thousands of photos.
He then stitched 37,440 exposures together into a spectacular, panoramic survey sky that he posted online two weeks ago. The photo reveals a 360-degree view of the Milky Way, planets and stars in their true natural colors. Viewers can zoom in on portions of the 5,000-megapixel image to find Orion or the Large Magellanic Cloud.
"I wanted to share what I thought was possible," said Risinger, a first-time astrophotographer. "We don't see it like this. This is much brighter. On a good night in Seattle, you'll see 20 or 30 stars. This, in its full size, you'll see 20 to 30 million. Everything is amplified."
Other sky surveys have preceded this one, including the Digitized Sky Survey, a source for Google Sky. Many serve scientific purposes and were shot in red and blue to measure the temperature of stars, Risinger said. He shot in a third color, green, to give the photo added depth and richness, he said.
"What a labor of love it is!" said Andrew Fraknoi, senior educator at the Astronomical Society of the Pacific. "Professional astronomers are now doing much deeper surveys of small regions of the sky, using big telescopes. But every once in a while it's nice to step back and have such a beautiful photographic record of the whole sky."
"This is not a scientifically useful image. This is for educational and artistic appreciation," Risinger said, adding that he wasn't motivated by money but hopes to sell prints and other products to keep the website running.
To capture the entire night sky in a year, Risinger plotted out an exact schedule of images he needed from both the northern and southern hemisphere. He divided the sky into 624 uniform sections and entered those coordinates into the computer.
"The sheer amount of work was mind-boggling," he said at his apartment in Seattle. "It's not a wing-it kind of project. You have to plan how you're going to get the entire sky. And you do that by dividing it up into pieces and knowing what time you need to collect those pieces because as the Earth goes around the Sun, things come in and out of view."
In March of last year, Risinger and his older brother, Erik, traveled to the desert near Tonapah, Nev., and took the first photos of what eventually would become his Photopic Sky Survey.
When he realized the work was too monumental, Risinger quit his day job as a marketing director of a countertop company to devote himself full-time to the project. He also persuaded his retired father, Tom, who lives in Gig Harbor, Wash., to join him.
In the U.S., he and his dad would often drive all day and set up and take photographs all night. They chased ideal windows of opportunity to catch the night sky at its clearest.
Their travels took them to dark places where light pollution was low and higher altitudes where there was less water vapor – near the Chiricahua Mountains in Arizona, near Fort Davis, Tex., and Lassen National Forest in California. He found himself staking out stars in freezing temperatures in Telluride, Colo., and amid stars in South Africa where none of the constellations were recognizable to his northern hemisphere-trained eyes.
Each night, Risinger set the six cameras – high-end monochrome astrophotography imagers equipped with different filters – to point in the exact same spot and continuously feed his laptop with images. He monitored the photographs in real-time and passed the dark hours eating sunflower seeds. Meanwhile, his dad slept.
Back in Seattle, Risinger began piecing the panoramic image together in January. He used a computer software program to scan each frame, recognize the pattern with a database of stars and then match them with the other colors and frames. That got projected onto a sphere.
"Making an atlas of the night sky is something that mostly professional astronomers would have done in the past," said Fraknoi, who is also chairman of the astronomy department at Foothill College in Los Altos Hills, Calif. "With new computer tools at our disposal, it's remarkable what amateur astronomers can discover."
Risinger finished the project a couple weeks ago, and has been getting thousands of hits on his website.
"It was always hard to describe what I was doing that would make sense to people that aren't familiar with astronomy. But once they see it, they get it."
View Risinger's incredible panorama (below), and visit SkySurvey.org for a firsthand account of the project.
SEATTLE -- Nick Risinger has always gazed up at the sky. But last year the amateur astronomer and photographer quit his day job as a Seattle marketing director and lugged six synchronized cameras about 60,000 miles to capture an image of the entire night sky.
Risinger, 28, set up his rack of cameras in high-elevation locales in the Western U.S. and South Africa, timing photo shoots around new moons when nights were long and dark. He programmed his six cameras to track the stars as they moved across the sky and simultaneously snapped thousands of photos.
He then stitched 37,440 exposures together into a spectacular, panoramic survey sky that he posted online two weeks ago. The photo reveals a 360-degree view of the Milky Way, planets and stars in their true natural colors. Viewers can zoom in on portions of the 5,000-megapixel image to find Orion or the Large Magellanic Cloud.
"I wanted to share what I thought was possible," said Risinger, a first-time astrophotographer. "We don't see it like this. This is much brighter. On a good night in Seattle, you'll see 20 or 30 stars. This, in its full size, you'll see 20 to 30 million. Everything is amplified."
Other sky surveys have preceded this one, including the Digitized Sky Survey, a source for Google Sky. Many serve scientific purposes and were shot in red and blue to measure the temperature of stars, Risinger said. He shot in a third color, green, to give the photo added depth and richness, he said.
"What a labor of love it is!" said Andrew Fraknoi, senior educator at the Astronomical Society of the Pacific. "Professional astronomers are now doing much deeper surveys of small regions of the sky, using big telescopes. But every once in a while it's nice to step back and have such a beautiful photographic record of the whole sky."
"This is not a scientifically useful image. This is for educational and artistic appreciation," Risinger said, adding that he wasn't motivated by money but hopes to sell prints and other products to keep the website running.
To capture the entire night sky in a year, Risinger plotted out an exact schedule of images he needed from both the northern and southern hemisphere. He divided the sky into 624 uniform sections and entered those coordinates into the computer.
"The sheer amount of work was mind-boggling," he said at his apartment in Seattle. "It's not a wing-it kind of project. You have to plan how you're going to get the entire sky. And you do that by dividing it up into pieces and knowing what time you need to collect those pieces because as the Earth goes around the Sun, things come in and out of view."
In March of last year, Risinger and his older brother, Erik, traveled to the desert near Tonapah, Nev., and took the first photos of what eventually would become his Photopic Sky Survey.
When he realized the work was too monumental, Risinger quit his day job as a marketing director of a countertop company to devote himself full-time to the project. He also persuaded his retired father, Tom, who lives in Gig Harbor, Wash., to join him.
In the U.S., he and his dad would often drive all day and set up and take photographs all night. They chased ideal windows of opportunity to catch the night sky at its clearest.
Their travels took them to dark places where light pollution was low and higher altitudes where there was less water vapor – near the Chiricahua Mountains in Arizona, near Fort Davis, Tex., and Lassen National Forest in California. He found himself staking out stars in freezing temperatures in Telluride, Colo., and amid stars in South Africa where none of the constellations were recognizable to his northern hemisphere-trained eyes.
Each night, Risinger set the six cameras – high-end monochrome astrophotography imagers equipped with different filters – to point in the exact same spot and continuously feed his laptop with images. He monitored the photographs in real-time and passed the dark hours eating sunflower seeds. Meanwhile, his dad slept.
Back in Seattle, Risinger began piecing the panoramic image together in January. He used a computer software program to scan each frame, recognize the pattern with a database of stars and then match them with the other colors and frames. That got projected onto a sphere.
"Making an atlas of the night sky is something that mostly professional astronomers would have done in the past," said Fraknoi, who is also chairman of the astronomy department at Foothill College in Los Altos Hills, Calif. "With new computer tools at our disposal, it's remarkable what amateur astronomers can discover."
Risinger finished the project a couple weeks ago, and has been getting thousands of hits on his website.
"It was always hard to describe what I was doing that would make sense to people that aren't familiar with astronomy. But once they see it, they get it."
View Risinger's incredible panorama (below), and visit SkySurvey.org for a firsthand account of the project.
Friday, March 4, 2011
Wednesday, March 2, 2011
Beauty of English..
Professor Ernest Brennecke of Columbia is credited with inventing a sentence that can be made to have eight different meanings by placing ONE WORD in all possible positions in the sentence: "I hit him in the eye yesterday".
The Query: What is this word?
The Query: What is this word?
The Answer: The word is "ONLY".
The Message:
- ONLY I hit him in the eye yesterday. (No one else did.)
- I ONLY hit him in the eye yesterday. (Did not slap him.)
- I hit ONLY him in the eye yesterday. (I did not hit others.)
- I hit him ONLY in the eye yesterday. (I did not hit outside the eye.)
- I hit him in ONLY the eye yesterday. (Not other organs.)
- I hit him in the ONLY eye yesterday. (He doesn't have another eye.)
- I hit him in the eye ONLY yesterday. (Not today.)
- I hit him in the eye yesterday ONLY. (Did not wait for today.)
Tuesday, March 1, 2011
Conservative v/s Liberal
A young woman was about to finish her first year of college. Like so many others her age, she considered herself to be very liberal, and among other liberal ideals, was very much in favor of higher taxes to support more government programs, in other words redistribution of wealth.
She was deeply ashamed that her father was a rather staunch conservative, a feeling she openly expressed. Based on the lectures that she had participated in, and the occasional chat with a professor, she felt that her father had for years harbored an evil, selfish desire to keep what he thought should be his.
One day she was challenging her father on his opposition to higher taxes on the rich and the need for more government programs.
The self-professed objectivity proclaimed by her professors had to be the truth and she indicated so to her father. He responded by asking how she was doing in school.
Taken aback, she answered rather haughtily that she had a 4.0 GPA, and let him know that it was tough to maintain, insisting that she was taking a very difficult course load and was constantly studying, which left her no time to go out and party like other people she knew. She didn't even have time for a boyfriend, and didn't really have many college friends because she spent all her time studying.
Her father listened and then asked, "How is your friend Audrey doing?" She replied, "Audrey is barely getting by. All she takes are easy classes, she never studies and she barely has a 2.0 GPA.
She is so popular on campus; college for ! her is a blast. She's always invited to all the parties and lots of times she doesn't even show up for classes because she's too hung over."
Her wise father asked his daughter, "Why don't you go to the Dean's office and ask him to deduct 1.0 off your GPA and give it to your friend who only has a 2.0. That way you will both have a 3.0 GPA and certainly that would be a fair and equal distribution of GPA."
The daughter, visibly shocked by her father's suggestion, angrily fired back, "That's a crazy idea, how would that be fair! I've worked really hard for my grades! I've invested a lot of time, and a lot of hard work! Audrey has done next to nothing toward her degree. She played while I worked my tail off!"
The father slowly smiled, winked and said gently, "Welcome to the conservative side of the fence."
If you ever wondered what side of the fence you sit on, this is a great test!
She was deeply ashamed that her father was a rather staunch conservative, a feeling she openly expressed. Based on the lectures that she had participated in, and the occasional chat with a professor, she felt that her father had for years harbored an evil, selfish desire to keep what he thought should be his.
One day she was challenging her father on his opposition to higher taxes on the rich and the need for more government programs.
The self-professed objectivity proclaimed by her professors had to be the truth and she indicated so to her father. He responded by asking how she was doing in school.
Taken aback, she answered rather haughtily that she had a 4.0 GPA, and let him know that it was tough to maintain, insisting that she was taking a very difficult course load and was constantly studying, which left her no time to go out and party like other people she knew. She didn't even have time for a boyfriend, and didn't really have many college friends because she spent all her time studying.
Her father listened and then asked, "How is your friend Audrey doing?" She replied, "Audrey is barely getting by. All she takes are easy classes, she never studies and she barely has a 2.0 GPA.
She is so popular on campus; college for ! her is a blast. She's always invited to all the parties and lots of times she doesn't even show up for classes because she's too hung over."
Her wise father asked his daughter, "Why don't you go to the Dean's office and ask him to deduct 1.0 off your GPA and give it to your friend who only has a 2.0. That way you will both have a 3.0 GPA and certainly that would be a fair and equal distribution of GPA."
The daughter, visibly shocked by her father's suggestion, angrily fired back, "That's a crazy idea, how would that be fair! I've worked really hard for my grades! I've invested a lot of time, and a lot of hard work! Audrey has done next to nothing toward her degree. She played while I worked my tail off!"
The father slowly smiled, winked and said gently, "Welcome to the conservative side of the fence."
If you ever wondered what side of the fence you sit on, this is a great test!
If a conservative doesn't like guns, he doesn't buy one.
If a liberal doesn't like guns, he wants all guns outlawed.
If a conservative is a vegetarian, he doesn't eat meat.
If a liberal is a vegetarian, he wants all meat products banned for
everyone.
If a conservative is down-and-out, he thinks about how to better his
situation.
A liberal wonders who is going to take care of him.
If a conservative doesn't like a talk show host, he switches channels.
Liberals demand that those they don't like be shut down.
If a conservative is a non-believer, he doesn't go to church.
A liberal non-believer wants any mention of God and religion silenced.
(Unless it's a foreign religion, of course!)
If a conservative decides he needs health care, he goes about shopping!
for it, or may choose a job that provides it.
A liberal demands that the rest of us pay for his.
Sunday, February 20, 2011
Sunday, January 9, 2011
Who Built Bombay?
According to ancient history, a grouping of seven islands comprising Colaba, Mazagaon, Old Woman's Island, Wadala, Mahim, Parel, and Matunga-Sion formed a part of the kingdom of Ashoka the Great of Magadh, ironically in North India .
The Bhaiyas and Biharis whom the Thackerays accuse of being outsiders in Mumbai, come from the region, which was a part of Ashoka the Great's empire.. We judge everything according to history and the history of Mumbaiproves that its earliest known ownership was with a North Indian.
The seven islands of Mumbai passed through many hands, the sultans of Gujarat , the Portuguese and the British. Every ruler left behind proof of residence in Mumbai.
The Mauryans left behind the Kanheri, Mahakali and the caves of Gharapuri more popularly called Elephanta. The sultans of Gujarat built the Dargahs at Mahim and Haji Ali, the Portuguese built the two Portuguese churches, one at Prabhadevi and the other St Andrews at Bandra.
They also built forts at Sion, Mahim, Bandra and Bassien. The Portuguese named the group of seven Islands 'Bom Baia', Good Bay . The British built a city out of the group of seven islands and called her Bombay .
The original settlers of the seven islands, the Koli fishermen, worshiped Mumbaidevi, her temple still stands at Babulnath near Chowpatty. The Kolis called the island Mumbai, 'Mumba, Mother Goddess'.
In 1662, King Charles II of England married the Portuguese Princess Catherine of Braganza, and received the seven islands of Bom Baia as part of his dowry. Six years later, the British Crown leased the seven islands to the English East India Company for a sum of 10 pounds in gold per annum. It was under the English East India Company that the future megapolis began to take shape, after the first war for independence Bombay once again became a colony of the British Empire .
History has forgotten this but the first Parsi settler came to Bombay in 1640, he was Dorabji Nanabhoy Patel. In 1689-90, a severe plague epidemic broke out in Bombay and most of the European settlers succumbed to it. The Siddi of Janjira attacked in full force. Rustomji Dorabji Patel, a trader and the son of the city's first Parsi settler, successfully defeated the
Siddi with the help of the Kolis and saved Bombay .
Gerald Aungier, Governor of Bombay built the Bombay Castle, an area that is even today referred to as Fort. He also constituted the Courts of law. He brought Gujarati traders, Parsi shipbuilders, Muslim and Hindu manufacturers from the mainland and settled them in Bombay .
It was during a period of four decades that the city of Bombay took shape. Reclamation was done to plug the breach at Worli and Mahalakshmi, Hornby Vellard was built in 1784. The Sion Causeway connecting Bombay to Salsette was built in 1803. Colaba Causeway connecting Colaba island to Bombay was built in 1838. A causeway connecting Mahim and Bandra was built in 1845.
Lady Jamsetjee Jeejeebhoy, the wife of the First Baronet Jamsetjee Jeejeebhoy donated Rs 1, 57,000 to meet construction costs of the causeway. She donated Rs. 1,00,000 at first. When the project cost escalated and money ran out half way through she donated Rs 57,000 again to ensure that the vital causeway was completed. Lady Jamsetjee stipulated that no toll would ever be charged for those using the causeway. Today Mumbaikars have to pay Rs 75 to use the Bandra-Worli Sealink, connecting almost the same two islands. Sir J J Hospital was also built by Sir Jamsetjee Jeejeebhoy.
The shipbuilding Wadia family of Surat was brought to Bombay by the British. Jamshedji Wadia founded the Bombay Port Trust and built the Princess Dock in 1885 and the Victoria Dock and the Mereweather Dry Docks in 1891. Alexandra Dock was built in 1914.
A Gujarati civil engineer supervised the building of the Gateway of India . The Tatas made Bombay their headquarters and gave it the iconic Taj Mahal Hotel and India 's first civilian airlines, Air India . The Godrejs gave India its first vegetarian soap.
Cowasji Nanabhai Daver established Bombay's first cotton mill, 'The Bombay Spinning Mills' in 1854. By 1915, there were 83 textile mills in Bombay largely owned by Indians.
This brought about a financial boom in Bombay . Although the mills were owned by Gujaratis, Kutchis, Parsis and Marwaris, the workforce was migrant Mahrashtrians from rural Maharashtra . Premchand Roychand, a prosperous Gujarati broker founded the Bombay Stock Exchange. Premchand Roychand donated Rs 2,00,000 to build the Rajabai Tower in 1878.
Muslim, Sindhi and Punjabi migrants have also contributed handsomely to Mumbai.
Mumbai is built on the blood and sweat of all Indians. That is why Bombay belongs to all Indians.
Apart from its original inhabitants, the Kolis, everyone else in Mumbai, including Thackeray's 'Marathi Manoos', are immigrants.
The "Mumbai for Marathi Manoos" war cry has once again been raised to shore up the sagging political fortunes of the Thackeray family.
When the Shiv Sena-BJP combine came to power in 1993, under the guise of reverting to the original name they replaced Bombay with Mumbai.
I wonder when they will discard the anglicized Thackeray and revert back to their original Marathi surname Thakre?
This article was written on February 7, 2010 by Tushar Gandhi, founder/president, Mahatma Gandhi Foundation, and the grandson of Gandhiji.
The Bhaiyas and Biharis whom the Thackerays accuse of being outsiders in Mumbai, come from the region, which was a part of Ashoka the Great's empire.. We judge everything according to history and the history of Mumbaiproves that its earliest known ownership was with a North Indian.
The seven islands of Mumbai passed through many hands, the sultans of Gujarat , the Portuguese and the British. Every ruler left behind proof of residence in Mumbai.
The Mauryans left behind the Kanheri, Mahakali and the caves of Gharapuri more popularly called Elephanta. The sultans of Gujarat built the Dargahs at Mahim and Haji Ali, the Portuguese built the two Portuguese churches, one at Prabhadevi and the other St Andrews at Bandra.
They also built forts at Sion, Mahim, Bandra and Bassien. The Portuguese named the group of seven Islands 'Bom Baia', Good Bay . The British built a city out of the group of seven islands and called her Bombay .
The original settlers of the seven islands, the Koli fishermen, worshiped Mumbaidevi, her temple still stands at Babulnath near Chowpatty. The Kolis called the island Mumbai, 'Mumba, Mother Goddess'.
In 1662, King Charles II of England married the Portuguese Princess Catherine of Braganza, and received the seven islands of Bom Baia as part of his dowry. Six years later, the British Crown leased the seven islands to the English East India Company for a sum of 10 pounds in gold per annum. It was under the English East India Company that the future megapolis began to take shape, after the first war for independence Bombay once again became a colony of the British Empire .
History has forgotten this but the first Parsi settler came to Bombay in 1640, he was Dorabji Nanabhoy Patel. In 1689-90, a severe plague epidemic broke out in Bombay and most of the European settlers succumbed to it. The Siddi of Janjira attacked in full force. Rustomji Dorabji Patel, a trader and the son of the city's first Parsi settler, successfully defeated the
Siddi with the help of the Kolis and saved Bombay .
Gerald Aungier, Governor of Bombay built the Bombay Castle, an area that is even today referred to as Fort. He also constituted the Courts of law. He brought Gujarati traders, Parsi shipbuilders, Muslim and Hindu manufacturers from the mainland and settled them in Bombay .
It was during a period of four decades that the city of Bombay took shape. Reclamation was done to plug the breach at Worli and Mahalakshmi, Hornby Vellard was built in 1784. The Sion Causeway connecting Bombay to Salsette was built in 1803. Colaba Causeway connecting Colaba island to Bombay was built in 1838. A causeway connecting Mahim and Bandra was built in 1845.
Lady Jamsetjee Jeejeebhoy, the wife of the First Baronet Jamsetjee Jeejeebhoy donated Rs 1, 57,000 to meet construction costs of the causeway. She donated Rs. 1,00,000 at first. When the project cost escalated and money ran out half way through she donated Rs 57,000 again to ensure that the vital causeway was completed. Lady Jamsetjee stipulated that no toll would ever be charged for those using the causeway. Today Mumbaikars have to pay Rs 75 to use the Bandra-Worli Sealink, connecting almost the same two islands. Sir J J Hospital was also built by Sir Jamsetjee Jeejeebhoy.
The shipbuilding Wadia family of Surat was brought to Bombay by the British. Jamshedji Wadia founded the Bombay Port Trust and built the Princess Dock in 1885 and the Victoria Dock and the Mereweather Dry Docks in 1891. Alexandra Dock was built in 1914.
A Gujarati civil engineer supervised the building of the Gateway of India . The Tatas made Bombay their headquarters and gave it the iconic Taj Mahal Hotel and India 's first civilian airlines, Air India . The Godrejs gave India its first vegetarian soap.
Cowasji Nanabhai Daver established Bombay's first cotton mill, 'The Bombay Spinning Mills' in 1854. By 1915, there were 83 textile mills in Bombay largely owned by Indians.
This brought about a financial boom in Bombay . Although the mills were owned by Gujaratis, Kutchis, Parsis and Marwaris, the workforce was migrant Mahrashtrians from rural Maharashtra . Premchand Roychand, a prosperous Gujarati broker founded the Bombay Stock Exchange. Premchand Roychand donated Rs 2,00,000 to build the Rajabai Tower in 1878.
Muslim, Sindhi and Punjabi migrants have also contributed handsomely to Mumbai.
Mumbai is built on the blood and sweat of all Indians. That is why Bombay belongs to all Indians.
Apart from its original inhabitants, the Kolis, everyone else in Mumbai, including Thackeray's 'Marathi Manoos', are immigrants.
The "Mumbai for Marathi Manoos" war cry has once again been raised to shore up the sagging political fortunes of the Thackeray family.
When the Shiv Sena-BJP combine came to power in 1993, under the guise of reverting to the original name they replaced Bombay with Mumbai.
I wonder when they will discard the anglicized Thackeray and revert back to their original Marathi surname Thakre?
This article was written on February 7, 2010 by Tushar Gandhi, founder/president, Mahatma Gandhi Foundation, and the grandson of Gandhiji.
Wednesday, January 5, 2011
From Papyrus to Gutenberg to Kindle..
Very nice and interesting article in favor of embracing new technology.
Courtsey The Wall Street Journal
--------
From Papyrus to Gutenberg to Kindle
Those who scorn e-readers should remember the Sumerians and their clay tablets.
By LIBBY MALIN STERNBERG
Kindle, schmindle, say steadfast lovers of DTBs ("dead tree books"). These readers value books as objects, not just as a means of communicating a story. Perhaps some historical perspective can help them adjust to our new era, when electronic reading devices will be king.
***
From a fifth-century A.D. Sumerian clay tablet discovered in the Euphrates delta, remarkably intact except for the salutation and signature:
"A thousand pardons for hitting young Jezebel in the head with my last note.
I am sure no one will notice the scar after it heals. You do keep your tent very dark; she will still find many suitors. (Editor's note: It is unclear if the writer is saying "suitors" or "donkeys" here as the words are very similar in cuneiform.)
Please do not worry about the new papyrus we have heard so much talk of. The clay tablets we provide for the village elders are far more durable. They have a rich earthy smell and make for heft in one's hands. Papyrus will never take the place of clay.
So confident am I that clay will never be replaced, that I have taken a loan from Old Fatima-mae to make some improvements to my tent. I will be able to pay it off quickly with the delivery of our next set of tablets.
But please stop using the clay to write down what you are calling 'poems.' It is a waste of precious material, my cousin. No one wants to read those when they can hear them round the fire at night."
***
The following appears to be a clandestine letter written by an Egyptian scribe to his wife. Although the date is missing, experts peg its provenance somewhere between 500 B.C. and 200 A.D.:
"If I've told you once, I've told you a thousand times: Look at both ends of the scroll to see which one is the beginning of the story. It's no wonder that Nanatu, the Story Seller, would not buy my latest effort. You presented him the scroll with the ending first!
And no, my dearest one, I refuse to try that product they are calling parchment. It is thin and one must use many separate sheets of it, which can easily become lost. If one scroll confuses you now, what will you do with many single pieces? I can see it clearly—parchment blowing every which way in the wind like the petals of a flower during a sandstorm, and you giving Nanatu one of my stories with half the pieces missing.
Nanatu is temperamental enough as it is. If I hear him say once more that he wants a story with a boat journey in it like the one that Homer fellow told, I will scream. Putting my stories on parchment will not make the difference; getting rid of the likes of Nanatu will."
***
Fifteenth-century epistle from an older monk at an Alsatian monastery, Schwer-an-Bier, to another younger monk in a nearby German abbey:
"Please try harder to color within the lines, dear Frère Aefle. Your latest efforts were a strange mess of colors in odd cube-like forms that reminded me of images seen through shards of glass. But I must say at least it was better than the blurry pictures you did on the previous manuscript. That one created mere impressions, rather than a specific image. It made one feel as if one were viewing a landscape through wine-besotted eyes.
Abbot Pierre exclaimed after seeing it: Je vais chercher du bon vin à la cave. (Editor's note: The loose translation for this phrase is: "Wine is good. Very good. Very, very good. Is it five o'clock somewhere?") Such shoddy workmanship on your part will only feed the talk that our efforts are useless decoration and unnecessary toil, especially now that villagers are all in a fever over the printing machine you described.
Gutenberg, Schmutenberg, I say, Frère Aefle. Even your most pitiful illumination efforts are more vibrant than the cold black and white letters I've seen coming from his machine.
Rest assured, nothing will replace our artistic efforts. And even if Herr Schmutenburg's device takes hold, I have been told by Friar Chuck that such 'presses' will still need laborers like us. He has devised a plan to work together with the Gutenbergs, something he is calling 'the agency model,' providing manuscripts to the presses for distribution. It is very complicated. But the important thing to remember, mon Frère, is to keep toiling away, perfecting your craft and trusting Friar Chuck and all the Abbots to look after us."
***
Just as well-meaning scribes adjusted to papyrus and the printing press, so too will we authors, publishers, readers and agents make the change as e-readers become ever more popular and e-books make up a larger share of the book market. The reading and publishing world marches onward. Kindle-bashers should jump in line.
Ms. Sternberg, a novelist in Lancaster, Pa., is launching a new digital press called Istoria Books.
Courtsey The Wall Street Journal
--------
From Papyrus to Gutenberg to Kindle
Those who scorn e-readers should remember the Sumerians and their clay tablets.
By LIBBY MALIN STERNBERG
Kindle, schmindle, say steadfast lovers of DTBs ("dead tree books"). These readers value books as objects, not just as a means of communicating a story. Perhaps some historical perspective can help them adjust to our new era, when electronic reading devices will be king.
***
From a fifth-century A.D. Sumerian clay tablet discovered in the Euphrates delta, remarkably intact except for the salutation and signature:
"A thousand pardons for hitting young Jezebel in the head with my last note.
I am sure no one will notice the scar after it heals. You do keep your tent very dark; she will still find many suitors. (Editor's note: It is unclear if the writer is saying "suitors" or "donkeys" here as the words are very similar in cuneiform.)
Please do not worry about the new papyrus we have heard so much talk of. The clay tablets we provide for the village elders are far more durable. They have a rich earthy smell and make for heft in one's hands. Papyrus will never take the place of clay.
So confident am I that clay will never be replaced, that I have taken a loan from Old Fatima-mae to make some improvements to my tent. I will be able to pay it off quickly with the delivery of our next set of tablets.
But please stop using the clay to write down what you are calling 'poems.' It is a waste of precious material, my cousin. No one wants to read those when they can hear them round the fire at night."
***
The following appears to be a clandestine letter written by an Egyptian scribe to his wife. Although the date is missing, experts peg its provenance somewhere between 500 B.C. and 200 A.D.:
"If I've told you once, I've told you a thousand times: Look at both ends of the scroll to see which one is the beginning of the story. It's no wonder that Nanatu, the Story Seller, would not buy my latest effort. You presented him the scroll with the ending first!
And no, my dearest one, I refuse to try that product they are calling parchment. It is thin and one must use many separate sheets of it, which can easily become lost. If one scroll confuses you now, what will you do with many single pieces? I can see it clearly—parchment blowing every which way in the wind like the petals of a flower during a sandstorm, and you giving Nanatu one of my stories with half the pieces missing.
Nanatu is temperamental enough as it is. If I hear him say once more that he wants a story with a boat journey in it like the one that Homer fellow told, I will scream. Putting my stories on parchment will not make the difference; getting rid of the likes of Nanatu will."
***
Fifteenth-century epistle from an older monk at an Alsatian monastery, Schwer-an-Bier, to another younger monk in a nearby German abbey:
"Please try harder to color within the lines, dear Frère Aefle. Your latest efforts were a strange mess of colors in odd cube-like forms that reminded me of images seen through shards of glass. But I must say at least it was better than the blurry pictures you did on the previous manuscript. That one created mere impressions, rather than a specific image. It made one feel as if one were viewing a landscape through wine-besotted eyes.
Abbot Pierre exclaimed after seeing it: Je vais chercher du bon vin à la cave. (Editor's note: The loose translation for this phrase is: "Wine is good. Very good. Very, very good. Is it five o'clock somewhere?") Such shoddy workmanship on your part will only feed the talk that our efforts are useless decoration and unnecessary toil, especially now that villagers are all in a fever over the printing machine you described.
Gutenberg, Schmutenberg, I say, Frère Aefle. Even your most pitiful illumination efforts are more vibrant than the cold black and white letters I've seen coming from his machine.
Rest assured, nothing will replace our artistic efforts. And even if Herr Schmutenburg's device takes hold, I have been told by Friar Chuck that such 'presses' will still need laborers like us. He has devised a plan to work together with the Gutenbergs, something he is calling 'the agency model,' providing manuscripts to the presses for distribution. It is very complicated. But the important thing to remember, mon Frère, is to keep toiling away, perfecting your craft and trusting Friar Chuck and all the Abbots to look after us."
***
Just as well-meaning scribes adjusted to papyrus and the printing press, so too will we authors, publishers, readers and agents make the change as e-readers become ever more popular and e-books make up a larger share of the book market. The reading and publishing world marches onward. Kindle-bashers should jump in line.
Ms. Sternberg, a novelist in Lancaster, Pa., is launching a new digital press called Istoria Books.
Monday, December 6, 2010
A Short Neurological Test
(1) Find the "C" below.. Please do not use any cursor help.
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOCOOOOOOOOOOO
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
(2) If you already found the C, look for the "6" below.
99999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999
99999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999
99999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999
69999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999
99999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999
99999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999
(3)- Now find the "N" below. It's a little more difficult.
MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMNMM
MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM
MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM
MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM
MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM
This is NOT a joke. If you were able to pass these 3 tests, you can cancel your annual visit to your neurologist. Your brain is great and you're far from having a close relationship with Alzheimer.
Congratulations!
On to another one:
Eonvrye that can raed this rsaie your hnad.
To my 'selected' strange-minded friends: Only great minds can read this. This is weird, but interesting! If you can raed this, you have a sgtrane mnid too. Olny 55 plepoe out of 100 can.
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOCOOOOOOOOOOO
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
(2) If you already found the C, look for the "6" below.
99999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999
99999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999
99999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999
69999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999
99999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999
99999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999
(3)- Now find the "N" below. It's a little more difficult.
MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMNMM
MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM
MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM
MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM
MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM
This is NOT a joke. If you were able to pass these 3 tests, you can cancel your annual visit to your neurologist. Your brain is great and you're far from having a close relationship with Alzheimer.
Congratulations!
On to another one:
Eonvrye that can raed this rsaie your hnad.
To my 'selected' strange-minded friends: Only great minds can read this. This is weird, but interesting! If you can raed this, you have a sgtrane mnid too. Olny 55 plepoe out of 100 can.
I cdnuolt blveiee that I cluod aulaclty uesdnatnrd what I was rdanieg. The phaonmneal pweor of the hmuan mnid, aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it dseno't mtaetr in what oerdr the ltteres in a word are, the olny iproamtnt tihng is that the frsit and last ltteer be in the rghit pclae. The rset can be a taotl mses and you can still raed it whotuit a pboerlm. This is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the word as a wlohe. Azanmig huh? Yaeh and I awlyas tghuhot slpeling was ipmorantt!
Wednesday, November 24, 2010
Thank You. No, Thank You
An excellent article. Courtsey The Wall Street Journal.
------
It turns out, giving thanks is good for your health. A growing body of research suggests that maintaining an attitude of gratitude can improve psychological, emotional and physical well-being.
Adults who frequently feel grateful have more energy, more optimism, more social connections and more happiness than those who do not, according to studies conducted over the past decade. They're also less likely to be depressed, envious, greedy or alcoholics. They earn more money, sleep more soundly, exercise more regularly and have greater resistance to viral infections.
Now, researchers are finding that gratitude brings similar benefits in children and adolescents. Kids who feel and act grateful tend to be less materialistic, get better grades, set higher goals, complain of fewer headaches and stomach aches and feel more satisfied with their friends, families and schools than those who don't, studies show.
"A lot of these findings are things we learned in kindergarten or our grandmothers told us, but we now have scientific evidence to prove them," says Jeffrey J. Froh, an assistant professor of psychology at Hofstra University in Hempstead, N.Y., who has conducted much of the research with children.
"The key is not to leave it on the Thanksgiving table," says Robert Emmons, a professor of psychology at the University of California-Davis and a pioneer in gratitude research. And, he notes, "with the realization that one has benefited comes the awareness of the need to reciprocate."
Philosophers as far back as the ancient Greeks and Romans cited gratitude as an indispensable human virtue, but social scientists are just beginning to study how it develops and the effects it can have. The research is part of the "positive psychology" movement, which focuses on developing strengths rather than alleviating disorders. Cultivating gratitude is also a form of cognitive-behavioral therapy, which holds that changing peoples' thought patterns can dramatically affect their moods.
It's possible, of course, to over-do expressions of gratitude, particularly if you try to show it with a gift. "Thanking someone in such a way that is disproportionate to the relationship—say, a student giving her teacher an iPod—will create resentment, guilt, anger and a sense of obligation," says Dr. Froh. Gratitude can also be misused to exert control over the receiver and enforce loyalty. Dr. Froh says you can avoid this by being empathic toward the person you are thanking—and by honestly assessing your motivations.
In an upcoming paper in the Journal of Happiness Studies, Dr. Froh and colleagues surveyed 1,035 high-school students and found that the most grateful had more friends and higher GPAs, while the most materialistic had lower grades, higher levels of envy and less satisfaction with life. "One of the best cures for materialism is to make somebody grateful for what they have," says Dr. Froh.
The researchers randomly divided more than 100 undergraduates into three groups. One group was asked to list five things they were grateful for during the past week for 10 consecutive weeks. The second group listed five things that annoyed them each week and the third group simply listed five events that had occurred. They also completed detailed questionnaires about their physical and mental health before, during and after. Those who listed blessings each week had fewer health complaints, exercised more regularly and felt better about their lives in general than the other two groups.
Drs. Froh and Emmons conducted a similar study with 221 sixth- and seventh-graders from Candlewood Middle School in Dix Hills, N.Y., an affluent area on Long Island. Although the effects weren't as dramatic as with the adults, the students in the gratitude group did report a higher level of satisfaction with school and more optimism than the students who listed irritations, according to the study in the Journal of School Psychology in 2008.
As simple as it sounds, gratitude is actually a demanding, complex emotion that requires "self-reflection, the ability to admit that one is dependent upon the help of others, and the humility to realize one's own limitations," Dr. Emmons says.
Being grateful also forces people to overcome what psychologists call the "negativity bias"—the innate tendency to dwell on problems, annoyances and injustices rather than upbeat events. Focusing on blessings can help ward off depression and build resilience in times of stress, grief or disasters, according to studies of people impacted by the Sept. 11 terror attacks and Hurricane Katrina.
Can people learn to look on the bright side, want what they have and be grateful for it? Experts believe that about 50% of such temperament is genetic, but the rest comes from experience, so there's ample opportunity for change. "Kids and adults both can choose how they feel and how they look at the world," says Andrew Greene, principal of Candlewood Middle School, who says that realization was one of the lasting legacies of
Dr. Froh's research there.
Some experts believe that children don't develop true gratitude until they can experience empathy, which usually occurs around age 7. But researchers at Yale University's Infant Cognition Center have shown that infants as young as 6-months old prefer characters who help to those who hinder others. To help lay the groundwork for gratefulness, Dr. Froh says he asks his 4-year-old son, James, each night what was his favorite thing about the day and what he is looking forward to tomorrow.
For older children and adults, one simple way to cultivate gratitude is to literally count your blessings. Keep a journal and regularly record whatever you are grateful for that day. Be specific. Listing "my friends, my school, my dog" day after day means that "gratitude fatigue" has set in, Dr. Froh says. Writing "my dog licked my face when I was sad" keeps it fresher. Some people do this on their Facebook or MySpace pages, or in one of dozens of online gratitude groups. There's an iPod app for gratitude journaling, too. The real benefit comes in changing how you experience the world. Look for things to be grateful for, and you'll start seeing them everywhere.
A Buddhist exercise, called Naikan self-reflection, asks people to ponder daily: "What have I received from…? What have I given to…? and What trouble have I caused…?" Acknowledging those who touched your life—from the barista who made your coffee to the engineer who drove your train—and reflecting on how you reciprocated reinforces humbleness and interdependence.
Delivering your thanks in person can be particularly powerful. One study found that fourth-graders who took a "gratitude visit" felt better about themselves even two months later—particularly those whose moods were previously low.
Adopting a more upbeat mind-set helps facilitate gratitude, too. Instead of bonding with friends over gripes and annoyances, try sharing what you're grateful for. To avoid sounding boastful, focus on giving credit to other people, as in, "My mom took a whole day off from work to get to my game."
Studies show that using negative, derogatory words—even as you talk to yourself—can darken your mood as well. Fill your head with positive thoughts, express thanks and encouragement aloud and look for something to be grateful for, not criticize, in those around you, especially loved ones. New York psychiatrist Drew Ramsey says that's an essential tool for surviving the holidays. "Giving thanks for them helps you deal with the craziness that is part of every family," he says.
Last, if you find you take too much for granted, try the "It's a Wonderful Life" approach: image what life would be like without a major blessing, like a spouse, a child or a job. In a 2008 study in the Journal of Personal Social Psychology, researchers found that when college students wrote essays in which they were asked to "mentally subtract" a positive event from their lives, they were subsequently more grateful for it than students whose essays simply focused on the event. The "George Bailey effect" was modest, the authors noted, but even small boosts in positive emotions can make life more satisfying.
------
Thank You. No, Thank You
Grateful People Are Happier, Healthier Long After the Leftovers Are Gobbled Up
It turns out, giving thanks is good for your health. A growing body of research suggests that maintaining an attitude of gratitude can improve psychological, emotional and physical well-being.
Adults who frequently feel grateful have more energy, more optimism, more social connections and more happiness than those who do not, according to studies conducted over the past decade. They're also less likely to be depressed, envious, greedy or alcoholics. They earn more money, sleep more soundly, exercise more regularly and have greater resistance to viral infections.
Now, researchers are finding that gratitude brings similar benefits in children and adolescents. Kids who feel and act grateful tend to be less materialistic, get better grades, set higher goals, complain of fewer headaches and stomach aches and feel more satisfied with their friends, families and schools than those who don't, studies show.
"A lot of these findings are things we learned in kindergarten or our grandmothers told us, but we now have scientific evidence to prove them," says Jeffrey J. Froh, an assistant professor of psychology at Hofstra University in Hempstead, N.Y., who has conducted much of the research with children.
"The key is not to leave it on the Thanksgiving table," says Robert Emmons, a professor of psychology at the University of California-Davis and a pioneer in gratitude research. And, he notes, "with the realization that one has benefited comes the awareness of the need to reciprocate."
Philosophers as far back as the ancient Greeks and Romans cited gratitude as an indispensable human virtue, but social scientists are just beginning to study how it develops and the effects it can have. The research is part of the "positive psychology" movement, which focuses on developing strengths rather than alleviating disorders. Cultivating gratitude is also a form of cognitive-behavioral therapy, which holds that changing peoples' thought patterns can dramatically affect their moods.
It's possible, of course, to over-do expressions of gratitude, particularly if you try to show it with a gift. "Thanking someone in such a way that is disproportionate to the relationship—say, a student giving her teacher an iPod—will create resentment, guilt, anger and a sense of obligation," says Dr. Froh. Gratitude can also be misused to exert control over the receiver and enforce loyalty. Dr. Froh says you can avoid this by being empathic toward the person you are thanking—and by honestly assessing your motivations.
In an upcoming paper in the Journal of Happiness Studies, Dr. Froh and colleagues surveyed 1,035 high-school students and found that the most grateful had more friends and higher GPAs, while the most materialistic had lower grades, higher levels of envy and less satisfaction with life. "One of the best cures for materialism is to make somebody grateful for what they have," says Dr. Froh.
Much of the research on gratitude has looked at associations, not cause-and-effect relationships; it's possible that people who are happy, healthy and successful simply have more to be grateful for. But in a landmark study in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology in 2003, Dr. Emmons and University of Miami psychologist Michael McCullough showed that counting blessings can actually make people feel better.
The researchers randomly divided more than 100 undergraduates into three groups. One group was asked to list five things they were grateful for during the past week for 10 consecutive weeks. The second group listed five things that annoyed them each week and the third group simply listed five events that had occurred. They also completed detailed questionnaires about their physical and mental health before, during and after. Those who listed blessings each week had fewer health complaints, exercised more regularly and felt better about their lives in general than the other two groups.
Drs. Froh and Emmons conducted a similar study with 221 sixth- and seventh-graders from Candlewood Middle School in Dix Hills, N.Y., an affluent area on Long Island. Although the effects weren't as dramatic as with the adults, the students in the gratitude group did report a higher level of satisfaction with school and more optimism than the students who listed irritations, according to the study in the Journal of School Psychology in 2008.
As simple as it sounds, gratitude is actually a demanding, complex emotion that requires "self-reflection, the ability to admit that one is dependent upon the help of others, and the humility to realize one's own limitations," Dr. Emmons says.
Being grateful also forces people to overcome what psychologists call the "negativity bias"—the innate tendency to dwell on problems, annoyances and injustices rather than upbeat events. Focusing on blessings can help ward off depression and build resilience in times of stress, grief or disasters, according to studies of people impacted by the Sept. 11 terror attacks and Hurricane Katrina.
Can people learn to look on the bright side, want what they have and be grateful for it? Experts believe that about 50% of such temperament is genetic, but the rest comes from experience, so there's ample opportunity for change. "Kids and adults both can choose how they feel and how they look at the world," says Andrew Greene, principal of Candlewood Middle School, who says that realization was one of the lasting legacies of
Dr. Froh's research there.
Some experts believe that children don't develop true gratitude until they can experience empathy, which usually occurs around age 7. But researchers at Yale University's Infant Cognition Center have shown that infants as young as 6-months old prefer characters who help to those who hinder others. To help lay the groundwork for gratefulness, Dr. Froh says he asks his 4-year-old son, James, each night what was his favorite thing about the day and what he is looking forward to tomorrow.
For older children and adults, one simple way to cultivate gratitude is to literally count your blessings. Keep a journal and regularly record whatever you are grateful for that day. Be specific. Listing "my friends, my school, my dog" day after day means that "gratitude fatigue" has set in, Dr. Froh says. Writing "my dog licked my face when I was sad" keeps it fresher. Some people do this on their Facebook or MySpace pages, or in one of dozens of online gratitude groups. There's an iPod app for gratitude journaling, too. The real benefit comes in changing how you experience the world. Look for things to be grateful for, and you'll start seeing them everywhere.
A Buddhist exercise, called Naikan self-reflection, asks people to ponder daily: "What have I received from…? What have I given to…? and What trouble have I caused…?" Acknowledging those who touched your life—from the barista who made your coffee to the engineer who drove your train—and reflecting on how you reciprocated reinforces humbleness and interdependence.
Delivering your thanks in person can be particularly powerful. One study found that fourth-graders who took a "gratitude visit" felt better about themselves even two months later—particularly those whose moods were previously low.
Adopting a more upbeat mind-set helps facilitate gratitude, too. Instead of bonding with friends over gripes and annoyances, try sharing what you're grateful for. To avoid sounding boastful, focus on giving credit to other people, as in, "My mom took a whole day off from work to get to my game."
Studies show that using negative, derogatory words—even as you talk to yourself—can darken your mood as well. Fill your head with positive thoughts, express thanks and encouragement aloud and look for something to be grateful for, not criticize, in those around you, especially loved ones. New York psychiatrist Drew Ramsey says that's an essential tool for surviving the holidays. "Giving thanks for them helps you deal with the craziness that is part of every family," he says.
Last, if you find you take too much for granted, try the "It's a Wonderful Life" approach: image what life would be like without a major blessing, like a spouse, a child or a job. In a 2008 study in the Journal of Personal Social Psychology, researchers found that when college students wrote essays in which they were asked to "mentally subtract" a positive event from their lives, they were subsequently more grateful for it than students whose essays simply focused on the event. The "George Bailey effect" was modest, the authors noted, but even small boosts in positive emotions can make life more satisfying.
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