Thought for Today

“Don’t be offended when people don’t seem to get you.Not everyone recognizes brilliance.”~

 Linda Poindexter

I am taken for granted

“I’m always taken for granted” is a very common line. So many people I meet feel that their entire life is spent taking care of others, catering to their needs, their demands and their wishes and that very rarely do they get even a degree of that in reciprocity.

Spiritually is said to be something that we should do for others without expectation of personal reward or gain. But then again… if we are going to be spiritual about it… where is the law of karma and why doesn’t it work here? Besides, we are human and we want to know that the person we are showing so much affection towards cares back.

I think giving is a healthy habit. Emotionally, physically or financially, being a giver is a great head space to be in. It makes you feel good, happy and positive about people and life. But it’s when you overdo the giving and feel saddened that people do not appreciate you adequately for it, that giving becomes toxic. The karma of positive giving is negated by not receiving in return.

You need to realise that everyone is playing a role and you have chosen yours. The requirements and boundaries of your role have been crafted by no one but you and you need to accept your role as your chosen responsibility. And if you choose to go beyond the requirements of that role and add frills and extras and it reaches a point that for whatever reason that the giving becomes painful, then simply stop it.

Every story of wisdom has a ‘moral of the story’ end note. The moral of the ‘story of giving’ is that no one forced you to do extra, no one is going to force you to stop, so simply stop. If it’s missed, they will make it worth your while to turn the tap back on.

I am a 33-year-old guy and my parents are looking out for a girl for me. However, I have been dating someone seriously for the past six months. Since she belongs to another caste, my parents are objecting to the match. I would really like to spend the rest of my life with her. What should I do?

Let them know you will be respectfully rejecting all proposals from other girls, to not waste their time. Have their close friends or family talk to them about how times have changed and that inter-caste marriages are not an exception anymore and neither are they harmful or unlawful. Ask them to meet her, get to know her and base their approval or disapproval on the kind of person she is and not what she was born into.

I am a 32-year-old woman and in love with a man who is 40-year-old. He wants to tie the knot with me soon but I am not in a hurry. How should I speak to him about the same? Please help.

Emotionally and physically let him know you are committed to him and verbally establish a time frame within which you will settle down with him. At least he will have some sort of parameters to work with and can adjust mentally too.

Happiness is just a touch or sound away!

Emotional flotsam looks for an anchor, and if you understand that and consciously choose your cues, you can be on top of your emotions and choose the way you feel at any time!

Have you ever experienced a fleeting, unattached memory that has surprised you, coming as it does from nowhere, often in the middle of an activity that is completely unrelated? For instance, sometimes, I suddenly remember the street corner my home was on several years ago; other times I am revisited by a clear vision of myself on the emerald greens outside a British castle I visited more than a decade ago! You wonder what triggered the memory of that seemingly inconsequential moment, but then shrug and move on.

However, several visitations later, you realise there must have been something special, almost magical about that moment, which visits you repeatedly across time and space, even though you cannot figure out what. Most probably, it was the emotion attached with it.

I have long wondered and worried about such emotional flotsam that evokes uncalled for memories or momentary emotions that pass on. In fact, science has a term for it ­ involuntary memory, when cues from everyday life evoke past recollections without any conscious effort on our part. It is almost like these moments or incidents are attached to a stimulant or trigger one is unaware of ­ ever heard of the concept of anchoring emotions? Experts explain that most of us can and do anchor emotions onto activities, even to simple acts.

Our sensory experiences get associated with incidents and trigger memories. Sometimes the intensity of a moment in which you were completely present in the `now’ gets associated with a smell, an action, a sight or a sound, which will always whisk you back to that moment. So the smell of a barbecue may remind you of a bad moment you had at a picnic many years ago where there may have been a barbecue around without your remembering it.The sound of a buzzing bee may transport you to a pleasant moment in childhood. Did you know, when a woman plunges her hand into her oversized bag and withdraws the exact lipstick she is looking for, she is relying on her haptic touch memory?

Scientists suggest that sensory memory -memories triggered by sound (echoic), smell (olfactory), sight (visual), taste or touch (haptic memory) -bypass the logical part of the mind and travel to the seat of instinct and memory, the primitive part of the brain. And so, sometimes memories and sometimes just the emotion associated with them can be vividly recalled upon being presented with the trigger. A study at the National Institute of Neuroscience in Turin, Italy, reveals that the same part of the brain involved in processing our senses is also responsible for storing emotional memories. So that effectively explains the involuntary memory recalls and fleeting emotional impressions we may get at times. Though mostly a subconscious association, therapists suggest this knowledge can be used to create voluntary connects that can help people. For instance, if while feeling an intense emotion such as happiness, you have been in the habit of rubbing your fingertips to your forehead, the same action in the future can instantly recall that happiness all over again even without any other trigger. This can effectively be used in moments when you desperately need a dose of happiness.

This ability helps patients in the process of recovering from emotional turmoil. Those affected are advised to avoid actions that are associated with memories that tear them apart. This lessens the frequency and intensity of the painful memories. And with a focus on actions or sensory experiences that evoke happy memories, the process of healing can be hastened. Experts suggest that this can be done by repeatedly recalling happy healing memories and associating them with an action such as, for instance, opening your hand wide and shutting it.

Thus, by turning involuntary memory into a process of voluntary, deliberate recall of happy memories, one can walk around with a bagful of happiness, calm, positivity and healing available literally ­ a touch, smell, taste, sound or sight away.

10 Signs That You Don’t Want to Be Happy in Relationship

1. You keep engaging in the role of being The Other Woman.

2. You only become involved with emotionally unavailable men.

3. You go out with Bad Boys or Bastards in the name of excitement.

4. You keep dating the same ‘type’ that makes you feel miserable.

5. You happily shelve friends and family, especially when the object of your affections is clearly unsuitable.

6. You meet decent, nice men who want to treat you nice and spend time with you and you call them ‘Assholes’ or claim that it must be an act.

7. You want to be in a steady, committed relationship but keep sleeping around or being used sexually by men which further erodes into your self esteem hence stopping you from getting the relationship you want.

8. You do things that involve you willfully self destructing your life.

9. You get the opportunity to break up with the guy that is mistreating you, but you eventually take him back because you don’t value yourself enough and think it’s better to be with him.

10. You actually believe that it’s better to be with somebody, anybody than be alone.