Tag Archives: Inspiration

Day 147

To effectively communicate, we must realize that we are all different in the way we perceive the world and use this understanding as a guide to our communication with others. – Tony Robbins

It’s 10: 01 PM on day 147 of my journey towards independence and I’ve managed to brush my teeth, feed myself a bread and lattice sandwich – my mother had originally put something made of chicken in it luckily for me I remembered my meat-free Mondays resolution before I took a single bite – for breakfast while watching TV, tweet about my Clean Water For All Campaign for a few hours – today I woke up to find that the person who had promised to make a donation the previous day had in fact done so – I was REALLY surprised not because I thought he wasn’t a man of his word but because I hadn’t met prior to him telling me that he would make a donation – nice to know that there are people out there who give for the sake of giving 🙂 – feed myself rice and curry vegetarian-style – it taste quite as bad as I thought it would 🙂 – and exercise for 10 minutes.

As you may or may not know I am not big on getting or giving material possessions – there’s just something about going to a store and buying a gift-wrapped present that seems so impersonal to me – and because of that every time I saw a guy giving a girl a present on TV or in a movie I thought to myself why don’t you write her a letter or something and looking back on it now I realize that not everybody will express their feelings exactly the way I do with that said if you’re planning to buy your significant other diamonds this Valentine’s Day I urge to visit Charity Diamonds – 50% of the profits are donated to charity (Note: estimated shipping time is 2-4 days). Is your inability to communicate effectively causing you to judge other people harshly?

Day 146

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There comes a time in everybody’s life where you have to decide that people are going to treat you with dignity and respect or not at all – that’s what I learned today 🙂

It’s 9: 38 PM on day 146 of my journey towards independence and I’ve managed to continue reading The Last True Cowboy by Kathleen Eagle, brush my teeth, feed bun and baked beans for breakfast, played host to our family members who came for the prayer in memory of my grandfather – it is annually event that takes place usually of the anniversary of my grandfather’s death but this year we postponed it for two days because everybody’s had prior commitments on the actual day – we are Jacobites [pronounced yacobites] – one of three denominations of Christianity in Kerala – our place of origin – and as such we believe that it is necessary for us to pray for the souls of the deceased in order for them to be accepted through the gates of Heaven – tweet about my Clean Water For All Campaign for a few hours – somebody – you know you are – promised to make a donation – I am SO happy 🙂 – feed myself rice and curry for dinner and exercise for 10 minutes.

Today I was lying on the bed minding my own business when my mother waltzes in and announces that we – all five of us – might be going to India in June or December and in that moment I suddenly had a flashback to a few months ago when I BEGGED my father with tears eyes to take me to my cousin’s wedding in India and when I finally snapped out of it I realized that my father was my father so long as he didn’t have to be seen with me and I knew I deserved more than that so I decided to sever my relationship with him before it eroded my whole heart. Do you put up with disrespect from those you love because you want them to be a part of your life? 🙂

Day 145

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Every birthday, you decide whether to mark it the end of your greatest days or the beginning of your finest hour. – Oprah Winfrey

It’s 11: 30 PM on day 145 of my journey towards independence and I’ve managed to watch Inception on DVD – it was MIND-BLOWING – there was so many layers to the story I would recommend it to anyone who likes a movie that makes them think because it was written in such a way that you – the audience – felt compelled to connect the dots – brush my teeth, feed myself Chapati – an unleavened flatbread – and beef curry for breakfast, tweet about my Clean Water For All Campaign for a few hours – no luck today – feed myself bun and baked beans for dinner, exercise for 10 minutes and continue reading The Last True Cowboy by Kathleen Eagle – I couldn’t finish reading it last year because my sister had to return it to the library when her school term ended but on the plus side I’m only a hundred or so pages from finishing it 🙂

As you may or may not I’m turning 20 on March 25^th and although I don’t usually make a huge fuss about turning a year older this year I wanted to do something truly global to commemorate the occasion so with that in mind I asked my Twitter and Facebook friends to do something nice for someone else in the next 48 days leading up to my birthday and it is my greatest hope that you will do the same. Do you embrace your birthday or resist it? 🙂

Day 144

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An idle youth becomes in age a beggar. – Latin Proverb

It’s 9: 04 PM on day 144 of my journey towards independence and I’ve managed to brush my teeth, tweet about my Clean Water For All Campaign for a few hours – two donations were made today – the first one was a $53.85 donation from Wayne of the Jindalee Foundation who by the way has donated to my campaign not once, but THREE times – thanks Wayne 🙂 – and the second one was a $5 donation I made on behalf of the person who made a donation via PayPal – which brings the grand total to $58.85 – I know I don’t get any of the money and yet I am SO happy 🙂 – exercise for 10 minutes while watching TV, hung out with my little sister – she actually turning into quite a woman I wonder if she knows how proud I am of her 🙂 – and feed myself pizza for dinner.

I’ve always wondered why some kids, like my sister, were straight-A students while others of the same age were drug-addicts and as I watched her sitting on the bed singing along to One Way by Hillsong United (see below) I finally figured it out – everybody wants to belong to something – chess club, debating, church, etc – and when they don’t they fall into the ‘bad crowd’ simply by default. Are you setting your kids up to be beggars in the future by not giving them enough to do in the present? 🙂

Day 143

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We cannot always build the future for our youth, but we can build our youth for the future. – Franklin D. Roosevelt

It’s 11: 08 PM on day 143 of my journey towards independence and I’ve managed to brush my teeth, tweet about my Clean Water For All Campaign for a few hours – no luck today 🙁 – feed myself a fish finger sandwich for brunch while watching TV, exercise for 10 minutes and feed myself rice and curry for dinner.

Today as I was chatting to @PrachiRai (Prachi) – whom I assume is a teenager simply because she shares most of the same interests that other teenagers do – I had an epiphany – change begins with children – think about it if every parent taught their child/children to give and not take love and not hate world peace would be automatic. Are you raising tomorrow’s world leaders? 🙂

Day 142

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A riot is at bottom the language of the unheard. – Martin Luther King, Jr.

It’s 11: 42 PM on day 142 of my journey towards independence and I’ve managed to brush my teeth, tweet about my Clean Water For All Campaign for a few hours – no donations were made today but somebody – you know who you are – sent $5 to my PayPal account so that I could make a donation on her behalf – which I will do ASAP 🙂 – feed myself bun and chicken nuggets for brunch while watching TV – I decided to postpone this week’s meet-free day to Saturday 🙂 – exercised for 10 minutes and feed myself rice and curry for dinner.

Today as I watched the chaos in Egypt through the 7 o’clock news I was so filled with outrage because at the end of the day being President is about putting the needs of your people above your own and sadly for the people of Egypt Mubarak has proven time and time again that he is incapable of doing so and to make matters worse his actions have jeopardized the stability of countries like Jordan who were otherwise peaceful. If you held the highest office in the land and your people no longer felt you were serving them well would you hear their voices and step down or turn into a dictator and stand your ground?

Day 141

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In seeking wisdom thou art wise; in imagining that thou hast attained it thou art a fool. – Rabbi Ben-Azai

It’s 11: 15 PM on day 141 of my journey towards independence and I’ve managed to brush my teeth, tweet about my Clean Water For All Campaign for a few hours – I woke up to find that somebody – you know who you are – made a $5 donation to my campaign and I swear I was happy for the rest of the day 🙂 – feed myself Chapati – an unleavened flatbread – chicken curry and tomatoes for lunch – it was my birthday and I didn’t have the heart to tell her that I had decided not eat meat today – hopefully the environmental Gods will forgive me LOL 🙂 – exercised for 10 minutes while watching TV, feed myself a banana for dinner and made some changes to this site (look to the right of screen).

Today sitting in front of my laptop I was torn as to whether or not I should create a separate Twitter account for this blog so I decided to ask my Twitter followers and I got a response from @notjustagranny (Cindy) saying advice from someone who did it….don’t spread yourself too thin. Focus on one you get a better result 🙂 good luck honey and as I read that I realized that I could learn from the successes and failures of others without actually going through it. Are you foolish enough to think you know everything or wise enough to admit that you know nothing? 🙂

Day 140

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Every truth has two sides; it is as well to look at both, before we commit ourselves to either. – Aesop

It’s 9: 51 PM on day 140 of my journey towards independence and I’ve managed to brush my teeth, feed myself bun and chicken for brunch while watching TV, send my reverend an email telling him about my campaign – he replied back a few hours later saying that he admired my efforts and somehow I didn’t think he got what I was getting at so I sent him a more direct email with another link attached whilst making it clear to him that I would understand if he said no – I sure hope that he makes a donation though 🙂 – feed myself Litchis for dinner – as I was eating the litchi I remembered the chicken I had for brunch and I was mortified because I remembered that today was supposed to be meat-free Monday – oh well I guess just for this week I can do it on Tuesday LOL 🙂 – tweet about my Clean Water For All Campaign for a few hours – I thought I was going to cry I sent out tweet after tweet after tweet with no luck and eventually I decided to call it a day 🙁 – and exercise for 5 minutes.

A few months ago I had watched a documentary on Al Jazeera about Somalian pirates and why they do what they do and despite my best efforts not to I began to feel a great deal of empathy for them – these men had no food, water, shelter or clothing – and I thought to myself maybe there’s a huge gray area between and wrong, but today as I watched two South African families pleading with the Somalian pirates for the safe return of their loved ones on the 7 o’clock news I realized that there’s never a right reason to do the wrong thing. When you do something that you know you’re not supposed to, do you only see your side of the truth?

Day 139

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Holy books of every religion are designed to lead humanity in humanity in the right direction – that’s what I learned today 🙂

It’s 9: 00 PM on day 139 of my journey towards independence and I’ve managed to brush my teeth, go to church – it was the weirdest thing I felt like the sermon was meant just for me our reverend was saying stuff like sometimes you’ve got to do what makes you uncomfortable because you know it’s the right thing to do and even with that directly prompt from God I couldn’t do it and for the first time in my life I knew what it felt like to disappoint God – it was the WORST feeling ever 🙁 – go visit my cousin who was leaving for university – I thought I would cry because I suddenly had flashbacks of the little boy who nobody thought would grow past the 1 meter mark LOL 🙂 – feed myself Nina’s Pizza – for lunch – I had never seen anything quite like it, it was a square- shaped pizza with four different kinds of toppings in each row – best pizza I’ve tasted in a long time 🙂 – go visit my other cousin – she told us a few days ago that she’s moving – everybody’s leaving must be something in the water 🙁 – and feed myself Chapati – an unleavened flatbread – and chicken curry for for dinner and tweet about my Clean Water For All Campaign for a few hours – still no luck I must do something different before time runs out and I need another extention but the question is what.

Today as I sat in church trying to drown-out the words of our reverend which by the fifth minute of the sermon had already started needling at my very soul I heard him say today’s reading is taken from Romans 12: 9 – 21 (see below) and despite the fact that I was really annoyed with my reverend I decided to listen because I felt that God deserved my full attention and looking back now I am so glad I did because I realize that the words uttered by God in those twelve verses applied to people of all religions, not just Christians. Are you guided by the words of your holy book or the pursuit of wealth? 🙂

⁹ Love must be sincere. Hate what is evil; cling to what is good. ¹⁰ Be devoted to one another in love. Honour one another above yourselves. ¹¹ Never be lacking in zeal, but keep your spiritual fervor, serving the Lord. ¹² Be joyful in hope, patient in affliction, faithful in prayer. ¹³ Share with the Lord’s people who are in need. Practice hospitality.

¹⁴ Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse. ¹⁵ Rejoice with those who rejoice; mourn with those who mourn. ¹⁶ Live in harmony with one another. Do not be proud, but be willing to associate with people of low position. Do not be conceited.

¹⁷ Do not repay anyone evil for evil. Be careful to do what is right in the eyes of everyone. ¹⁸ If it is possible, as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone. ¹⁹ Do not take revenge, my dear friends, but leave room for God’s wrath, for it is written: “It is mine to avenge; I will repay,” says the Lord. ²⁰ On the contrary:

“If your enemy is hungry, feed him;
if he is thirsty, give him something to drink.
In doing this, you will heap burning coals on his head.”

²¹ Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.

Day 138

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The hardest part about alive is that people will never get to see life through your eyes – that’s what I learned 🙁

It’s 8: 32 PM on day 138 of my journey towards independence and I’ve managed to brush my teeth, feed myself bun and chicken nuggets for breakfast, go visit some people – I was SO board 🙁 – feed myself crumbed fish for lunch, and feed myself mangoes for dinner and tweet about my Clean Water For All Campaign for a few hours – still no luck 🙁

Today we went to visit a family in our community to bid their eldest son goodbye – he is leaving for college tomorrow – and although they said everything and did to make us feel welcome every time the aunty turned to talk to me I could hear the change in the tone of her voice – she spoke to me like she would a five-year-old – I smiled ,nodded and played along for the duration of the time that I was there, but as soon as I got home I went to my room, shut the door behind me and cried into my pillow for the way I would never be treated. Do you ever wish that you could borrow your perspective to everybody around you? 🙁