Cordially Yours

In the movie "Meet Joe Black," Joe, played by Brad Pitt, visits a hospital where he comes across an elderly and sickly woman. He interacts with her and "Obeah mon; I gonna die" are the first words the Jamaican woman utters on seeing him. To this, he replies "Obeah evil; I no evil."  You may wonder what the word "obeah" means. According to African spiritual traditions, the word indicates evil. Though great philosophers like Aristotle, Socrates, Thoreau, and Emerson have profoundly dealt with the concepts of "what is evil and what is good," the word "evil" comes with a lot of subjective interpretation. But we, despite our naivety, can easily say that in the present-day context, nothing can be more evil than anxiety attacks . Such attacks have become quite common and are intruding into our lives more powerfully than ever. The harshest consequences of these attacks is that they harm us both physically and mentally. In fact, they a...

During the 1990s, I was an unhappy person. In fact, I was so unhappy that I used to wonder if my life had any meaning. I still remember how I would wake up in the middle of the night and spend the rest of the nights worrying - worrying about my future, worrying about my past and the mistakes I had committed, and worrying about my unfulfilled dreams. This had been going on until 1995. One fine day, I decided that enough was enough and I should put a stop to my worrying nature. If I did not do it, I would go insane, I thought. But I did not know how I should go about this. It was then I serendipitously discovered a formula that would help me lead a worry-free life .  It was not that I hit a jackpot and got troves of money that would solve all my financial woes. Neither did I get a magic wand that could drive out all the issues I was facing. But it was a chance meeting with one of my acquaintances that helped me make the discovery.  I was having a casual chat with this perso...

Do you have a scarcity or "have-not" mentality? If so, you may not be ready to believe that you can earn large amounts of money . Similarly, if you are in the habit of worrying about everything, you will never believe that there are people who are always happy regardless of the difficult situations they face in their lives.  What does this mean? This means that you are focusing on the wrong things. In the first instance, you are choosing scarcity instead of abundance. In the latter case, your focus is on difficulties and not on solutions. So, what is the remedy for this? It is by changing your mindset and focusing on the right things, you can have abundant wealth, enjoy great health, be happy always, and so on. Never forget the fact that what you focus on keeps expanding. But what are the ways to change your mindset? Hang around only those folks who are positive-minded. You should make it a point to hang around positive-minded people only. You may say that this is not possibl...

Not many people are comfortable with keeping mum and not speaking anything. But certain occasions demand it. Let us find out what those occasions are. Keep mum when you get angry or are anxious. Anger is an emotion that can rob the peace of mind of people. In fact, there are several families and people who have lost their career or development opportunities and even their lives thanks to the negative impact of this emotion. Even if you get angry with your enemies or those who have harmed you, it is not they who will be affected. It is you and your health that will be negatively impacted.  The most important point you should remember is that things may not always go your way. When such situations arise, the first emotion you will have is "fear." But why at all do you fear? It is because of insecure feelings you will start fearing. There may be several reasons for such insecure feelings. Jealousy, constant thinking about the future, and "comparison syndrome" are maj...

Almost all of us, at some point of time, realize that reality is vastlydifferent from what we have imagined . For instance, when we begin a certain task, we think that things will happen as we expect. But many a time, things may not work as we expect. Due to this, we may experience disappointment, anger and stress. Similarly, when you were about to finish your graduation, you might have thought that companies would queue up for offering you a job. But it might certainly not have happened. Likewise, when you have a business idea, you may think that there cannot be a better idea than that. But when you try selling that idea, you may find that there are no takers.  The point is that there is nothing wrong in imagining or dreaming but ensure to add a dose of pragmatism to your imagination so you will not be disappointed when your expectations remain just a pipe dream.  Aiming high is certainly good but aiming unachievable things can be counterproductive. On the ot...