environment – Page 265 – Take off with Natarajan

Joke of the Day…” A Talking Greyhound… ? ” !!!

March 10, 2015NatarajanLeave a comment

Two rather old retired racehorses are in a bar getting totally drunk. After about two hours the first racehorse says “You know…. when I was a young racehorse…from one hundred starts, I won (hic) 90 races, got 5 seconds and 5 thirds…. I am without doubt the greatest racehorse that ever lived….blah blah blah…”

In response to this and approximately a half an hour later the second racehorse responded, “Oh yeah…when I was a young racehorse…from one hundred starts, I won (hic) 95 races, got 2 seconds and 3 thirds…. I am the greatest racehorse that ever lived…. blah blah blah…”

Now it was about this time that the bartender (a greyhound) decided that they were drunk enough so he said, “I am sick of you two telling one another how great you are, you are both drunk and I am throwing you out of the bar, but before I do I want to let you know that when I was a young greyhound, from one hundred starts, I won 100 races, no seconds and no thirds.”

The two racehorses were shocked and for 5 minutes sat with their mouths open until the fist racehorse finally said, “Isn’t that amazing (hic)…a talking greyhound!”

SOURCE:::: http://www.joke a day.com

Natarajan

Message For the Day…” Feeding of Stomach is also a part of Worship…”

March 9, 2015NatarajanLeave a comment

In order that one might do selfless service (seva), a little eating(bhoga) has to be gone through. Such eating is a part of sacrifice(yajna). To make this body-machine function, the fuel of food(anna) has to be used. Food is not sacrifice, but it makes sacrifice possible. Therefore, eating food is not to be laughed at as catering to greed, as feeding of the stomach. It is part of worship. Worship(puja) is not merely plucking a flower and placing it on top of the image; the gardener who toiled to nurse the plant that gave the flower is also a worshipper. Even the means for a sacrifice is an offering. Eating doesn’t mean placing food on the tongue; it is worthwhile only when chewed, swallowed, digested, assimilated into the bloodstream, and transformed into muscle and bone, into strength and vigour. So too, spiritual understanding must permeate and invigorate all moments of life. It must be expressed through all the organs and senses.

Sathya Sai Baba

8 ways to Make Your Most of the Day…

March 9, 2015NatarajanLeave a comment

Plan how you’re going to spend the day and stick to it.

Avoid checking e-mails first.

Use the first one hour of your day to review your pending tasks and finish them….

Productive time management is the new age tool for planning your success ahead of time.

Here are some tricks to help you increase your productivity

Tune off Whatsapp for the first half

Is your phone humming for attention?

Avoid using WhatsApp to delegate work if you are stuck in a traffic jam.

Use it to share information, read a light note and share updates.

You may use your commute time to connect with your family and friends.

While you’re at work, prioritise and tune away from groups and chats.

Avoid checking e-mails first thing

Plan how you’re going to spend the day and stick to it. Avoid checking e-mails first.

Use the first one hour of your day to review your pending tasks and finish them.

“Mornings are fresh and I usually come to work with a positive attitude and spend the first two hours speaking and connecting to the customers,” shares Pooja Arora, HR at Bisleri India, Mumbai.

Tony Robins, American life coach and author of Unlimited Power, Unleash the Power Within and Awaken the Giant Within, suggest setting up an “hour of power”, “30 minutes to thrive” or “15 minutes to fulfilment”.

Review your calendar, call list and respond to customer feedback.

If something else needs your urgent attention, you will receive a call anyway.

You are not a juggler

Most organisations assume multitasking as a skill required.

In the long run it will lead to little or lack of focus on one task.

Multitasking is like regulating attention, it is addictive and feels like a superhuman that is incredibly efficient but eventually leads to a burnout.

Break the habit and your brain will thank you.

I am a compulsive multi-tasker yet there are activities I do not prefer to multi task like reading, studying and contemplating, says Rajesh Kamath, partner MTHR Global, an HR consulting firm in Pune.

Too much multitasking can add to your anxiousness and hypertension to meet the finish line, the idea is not get trapped into it.

Select the tasks that are in line like a chef who multi tasks to cook well.

Get the monkey off your back.

“I know — I have to finish this; it’s important. But where do I begin?” says, Delhi-based creative writer Rashmi.

“I often find myself struggling with multiple tasks that should have been finished yesterday. I just keep procrastinating because it’s tough.”

Keep your tough tasks on a high priority and complete them the first thing.

Mornings are a great time for creativity; use it to leapfrog to the rest of your day.

Procrastinating what you least enjoy will only keep you trapped.

Accomplishing the hard tasks will not only give you time to enjoy other task but will also keep you motivated.

As the popular writer, Stephen Covey says “Eat the ugliest frog first”.

Finish the two-minute tasks

How often do you say “Hey just give me two minutes to finish this”.

To raise your productivity ensure that you immediately finish the two-minute tasks, like responding to an e-mail, making a phone call, setting reminders etc.

If not addressed, these tasks get piled on to become stress later.

Most of these tasks require urgent attention which is why they pop up the last minute.

Meet over coffee

Share the morning coffee to discuss ideas, plans and your schedule.

Keep away from unwanted discussions around politics, cricket and office gossip.

Reserve these discussions for lunch.

One of the biggest issues in Indian workplaces is unscheduled, unplanned meetings and discussions.

Respect other people’s time says Sushma Sonty, a Mumbai-based freelance HR professional.

Spend some time interacting directly with your colleagues and peers for healthy relationships.

Use technology for good

Are you a super social buddy who likes to show off a bit, great?

Keep a few tools handy to stay on top of all that you flaunt.

It’s great to be a buddy, but it can get tricky for you may get addicted to it.

Consider HootSuite, which offers central dashboard for managing all your social media accounts.

Save your good reads, articles and interesting features with Pocket, Feedly and Evernote.

Cloud On allows you to use Microsoft word, Excel and PowerPoint to create documents on the go using a hand-held device.

Take a break

Short breaks when timed well in between bursts of high intensity work rejuvenates you like nothing else. The thumb rule is 75:10.

Take a 10-minute breather for every 75 minutes worth of high pressure work.

A quick walk down the stairs, soaking in the sun, getting some fresh air are all great ingredients that act as a catalyst to the short break.

The bottom line is, when breaks are timed well, there can be nothing as effective as them.

Now, go and take a well deserved break!!

The author of this piece works with a leading travel and leisure company and can be reached at deeksha.nagi@gmail.com.

Photograph: Ryan Ritchie/Creative Commons.

SOURCE:::: http://www.rediff.com

Natarajan

Joke For the Day… ” That is Bravery …” !!!

March 9, 2015NatarajanLeave a comment

The Meaning of Bravery.

A British SAS squad and an American Marines squad are together in the middle of a city. The commanding officers of each group are discussing the merits of SAS vs Marines: these officers have reputations for being the strongest, toughest and most feared men in the whole of the armed forces.

The American squad leader turns to the British officer and says, “My Marines are so much braver than your SAS.”

“I doubt that very much,” says the SAS officer.

“They are much braver,” says the American. “Watch this.”

The American squad leader turns to one of his Marines and shouts, “SERGEANT!! Climb to the very top of that building and jump off.”

“SIR, YES SIR,” shouts the sergeant. The sergeant runs inside the building, runs to top and without a second’s thought, jumps off the top of the building and smashes into the ground. He survives but is very badly injured and gets taken away on a stretcher. The American leader turns to the SAS officer and says, “Now that’s bravery.”

“Yeah? Well watch this,” says the British officer. He turns to his men and bellows at the top of his voice, “YOU, PRIVATE, CLIMB TO THE TOP OF THAT BUILDING AND JUMP OFF.”

The private looks at the officer and says, “Sir, GO AND TRY YOURSELF, Sir.”

The Officer turns around to the American and says, “You see? THAT’S bravery.”

SOURCE:::: http://www.ba-bamail.com

Natarajan

Magical Flight Of Starling Murmuration… Watch the Startling Video Clip… !!!

March 9, 2015NatarajanLeave a comment

Watching a Starling Murmuration in Flight Is Simply Magical….

A flock of starlings is called a murmuration. These flocks may include other species of starlings and sometimes species from other families. This sociality is particularly evident in the their roosting behaviour; in the non-breeding season some roosts can number in the thousands of birds. They will travel many miles to get to their food, and all stay together for the warmth and safety of a large groups. Their movements are so precise, so coordinated, that the group of thousands seems like a single entity, moving this way and that. It’s a sight to see for all nature lovers, and one of the many miracles of life.

At dusk on a winter evening in southern England a flock of 200,000 European starlings congregate to soar in breathtaking formations before roosting for the night. These incredible displays of aerial precision and biological engineering are captured in this memorable sequence from FLIGHT: THE GENIUS OF BIRDS.

SOURCE::::www.you tube.com

Natarajan

Joke of the Day…” Three Flat Tires and Two Headlights…” !!!

March 9, 2015NatarajanLeave a comment

A young waiter just had his first customer, which turned out to be a BIG BURLY truck driver.

The young man walked up to the table where the truck driver was sitting and asked; “Can I take your order sir?”

The truck driver replied, “Sure kid, I want three flat tires and two headlights.”

The young man was very puzzled and said, “I beg your pardon?”

The truck driver said again, “Look kid; I want three flat tires and two headlights.”

The young man was still puzzled, but replied; “Yes sir, whatever.”

The young man then took the request to his boss who was the head cook.

He told him about the truck driver’s order, and that he wanted three flat tires and two headlights, “I think he’s in the wrong place.”

The head cook said, “I know what he wants, he wants three flap jacks and two eggs sunny side up; the truck driver is just trying to be smart, I know him.”

The cook said to the waiter “Here, take this bowl of beans, give it to him and say this.”

The truck driver said, “Listen kid, I didn’t order this; I said I wanted three flat tires and two headlights.”

The waiter replied, “Well sir, the head cook said while you wait for your parts, you can gas up!”

SOURCE:::: http://www.joke a day.com

Natarajan

Message For the Day….” Significance of Mantra ‘ Om Tat Sat ‘…”

March 9, 2015NatarajanLeave a comment

When you perform an activity (kriya) as an offering to the Lord, your own good, what is good for others, and the highest good(swartha, parartha, and paramaartha) all merge! First, you and I become we. Next we and He becomes One. The individual soul, the ‘I’ (jiva) should accomplish identity first with the creation (prakriti) and then with the Supreme Divine (Paramatma). This indeed is the significance of the mantra Om Tat Sat (which connects the identity of the individual with the UniversalBrahman). ‘He’ and ‘I’ are always there; the spiritual practice(sadhana) is always there too. Just as the sun is inseparable and is never apart from its rays, under no circumstances should any aspirant part with one’s sadhana. It is only then they can be said to be one with Om.

Sathya Sai Baba

Image of the Day…Frozen Sea Waves…. !!!

March 8, 2015NatarajanLeave a comment

View larger. | Slushy waves on a Nantucket beach, February 20, 2015. See the complete collection here. Photos byJonathan Nimerfroh.

Sure, the ocean freezes. But this photo of partly frozen waves – caught by photographer and surfer Jonathan Nimerfroh – fascinated even the experts

As you well know if you live there, the eastern United States has been in a deep freeze throughout February, 2015. Wave after wave of ice and snowstorms have hit the region, and NASA says that hundreds (maybe thousands) of records have been set for daily low temperatures. Now, from a photographer and surfer in Nantucket, Jonathan Nimerfroh, we have this amazing photo from February 20, 2015 of an ocean wave, just before it freezes solid. He calls it a slurpee wave.

The New York Times has a great article about this photo and these slow-moving waves of slush. Jonathan’s photo has also been on the Weather Channel and other places (I first saw it on Facebook; thanks, Beverly Spicer!). Nimerfroh told the New York Times:

I just noticed a really bizarre horizon. The snow was up to my knees, getting to the water. I saw these crazy half-frozen waves. Usually on a summer day you can hear the waves crashing, but it was absolutely silent. It was like I had earplugs in my ears.

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Of course, the ocean does freeze. Salty sea water has a lower freezing point than the ice in your home freezer, not 32 degrees F but instead about 28.4 degrees F. And it was colder than that on that day in Nantucket, somewhere around 10 degrees F. Still, these waves are something very special, and even experts commented that they had not seen them before. Helen Fricker, a glaciologist at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography in La Jolla, California, who studies the dynamics of ice flows in Antarctica, told the New York Times that a full scientific explanation was “outside her expertise.” Erin Pettit, a glaciologist at the University of Alaska, Fairbanks, added that waves in Alaska tend to break up sea ice and said:

I have never seen frozen waves like this.

Nimerfroh said he returned the following day to the same beach. That day it was a few degrees colder still and the water had completely frozen. He said:

Nothing was moving. There were no waves anymore.

Shop the complete collection of Nantucket Slurpee Wave photos at Jonathan Nimerfroh’s website.

Bottom line: Wave caught in the act of freezing at a Nantucket beach, February 2015, by Jonathan Nimerfroh.

SOURCE::: http://www.earthskynews.org

Natarajan

One Year on, This Chennai Family Waits for MH 370 Passenger… Whole World Still Looking For Clues…

March 8, 2015NatarajanLeave a comment

Chandrika Sharma(L)was one of the 239 people on board the ill-fated MH370 flight that disappeared while on its way to Beijing on March 8, 2014. In this photograph, she is seen with her daughter Meghna and husband Narendran.

KS Narendran, Chandrika Sharma’s husband, is a shattered man. His wife was one of the 239 people on board the ill-fated MH370 flight that disappeared while on its way to Beijing, one year ago on March 8, 2014.

Sharma had taken the flight on her way to Ulan Bator to participate in a Food and Agriculture Organisation conference to represent the NGO she worked for. Narendran, a management consultant, is a quiet man and has since chosen to keep to himself.

A colleague of Sharma at the NGO she worked at, International Collective in Support of Fishworkers (ICSF), said Narendran did not want to be disturbed. “Till date he has not received any death certificate,” the colleague added

The couple’s only daughter is studying in a Delhi college and is currently preparing for her annual examinations.

On Friday, Narendran was present at a workshop organised by the NGO where Sharma’s co-workers and government officials paid tribute and spoke about her commitment to the cause and dedicated service to the people.

A stoic Narendran looked on as speaker after speaker narrated their own experiences at the NGO and shared their thoughts about Chandrika Sharma. The ICSF in its website homepage has a section titled “Waiting for Chandrika Sharma”.

If the massive undersea search for Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 turns up nothing by the end of May, the three countries leading the effort will go “back to the drawing board,” Malaysia’s transport minister said on Saturday.

Liow Tiong Lai told a small group of foreign reporters on the eve of the anniversary of the plane’s disappearance that he remains cautiously optimistic the Boeing 777 is in the area of the southern Indian Ocean where the search is ongoing.

Despite the exhaustive search for the plane, which disappeared last March 8 during a flight from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing, no trace of the jet has been found. Malaysia’s government on January 29 formally declared the incident an accident and said all 239 people on board were presumed dead.

“By the end of May, if we still can’t find the plane, then we will have to go back to the drawing board,” Liow said.

Asked if Malaysia might stop the search if there are no new leads by the end of May, when bad weather usually sets in, Liow said it was “too early to pre-empt anything now,” and that the government would continue to rely on the group of experts leading the hunt.

“We stand guided by the expert team,” he said.

“I am cautiously optimistic it should be in this area,” he said, adding that “we need directions, we need plans, we need to review all the data that we have.”

Ships looking for debris from the plane on the ocean floor off the coast of western Australia have so far scoured 44 percent of the 60,000-square-kilometer (23,166-square-mile) area the search has been focused on, Liow said. In the latest report he received Friday, he said the search team had identified 10 hard objects that still need to be analysed.

Such findings, which often include trash and cargo containers from passing ships, have been common during the search, and so far no trace of wreckage has been located.

Liow said that Australia, Malaysia and China would meet next month to discuss the next steps in the search. Most of the plane’s passengers were Chinese.

Australian transport minister Warren Truss said last week that if the plane isn’t found by May, one option is to expand the hunt beyond the current search zone to a wider surrounding area.

Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott said on Thursday, “I can’t promise that the search will go on at this intensity forever,” but added that “we will continue our very best efforts to resolve this mystery and provide some answers.”

Liow said an interim report on the investigation – a requirement under international civil aviation regulations – would be presented to the Malaysian government on Saturday and released to the public on Sunday. He didn’t comment on it.

But he outlined measures his government has already undertaken, including plans to upgrade radar systems to cope with bigger traffic volume and a new tracking system on Malaysia Airlines flights that sends aircraft data every 15 minutes, instead of the previous 30 to 40 minutes.

Liow said the government has allocated 700 million ringgit ($190 million) for the improved radar.

He said that the radar upgrade had been in the works even before Flight 370 disappeared. The plane dropped off civilian radar when its transponder and other equipment were switched off shortly after takeoff from Kuala Lumpur, but was tracked for some time by Malaysia’s military radar as it headed south across the country toward the Indian Ocean.

SOURCE:::: http://www.hindustantimes.com

Natarajan

Message For the Day…” The Sense of ‘Mine’ is the bond of Deluding Attachment…’

March 7, 2015NatarajanLeave a comment

A bird in flight in the sky needs two wings; a person walking needs two legs; an aspirant eager to attain liberation needs two qualities: renunciation and wisdom — renunciation of worldly desires and wisdom to become aware of the Atma. When a bird has only one wing, it can’t rise up into the sky, can it? In the same manner, if one has only renunciation or only wisdom, one cannot attain the Divine. The sense of ‘mine’ is the bond of deluding attachment. How long can one cling to what one fondles as mine? Someday you must give up everything and leave, alone and empty handed. This is the inescapable destiny. Hence give up as quickly as possible assumed relationships and artificial attachments through rigorous analysis of their nature. Attachment breeds fear and egotism. The wise will never bow to the fancies of objective desire. Constantly stick to the everlasting truth and adhere to the immortal virtues that the Atma represents.

Sathya Sai Baba