Dear Zindagi - A ray of hope to live

Dear Zindagi,

                        I have already told you how you’ve made me experience such beautiful phases in my life and here I want to discuss some personal experiences when people have felt that you don’t hold any importance for them and have become a burden for them. It’s not a story about people who are unknown but these have been my near and dear ones.

                        Suicides…This term itself makes us feel depressed and we do not even like to talk about it. We never discuss these cases with our family members and we never even expect any of our family members to think about such a thing ever but this crime cannot be ignored or avoided.

                        If I check the suicide stats, there are cases recorded every 40 seconds which means that out of 1,00,000 people, 16 people commit suicide. This is saddening to hear but it does happen. Every case has something to say and we feel that these things can never happen to our families. However, we need to speak out our minds to our closed ones to make them realize what we feel about life, what we feel about zindagi and discuss these basic things.

                        There are so many people who criticize those who kill them selves as it’s the most easiest step to take but we should consider those reasons that have made them take such a drastic step. We need to hear their story and that’s what I did when my close relative shared her story with me. She told me that she has been through hell all her life and how she had lost trust in the term LIFE. It had become a burden for her as she had not only been ill treated by her parents and in laws, but her husband had too been rude to her and used to physically abuse her since she got married. She told me how to she went through so much pain all alone and she also tried to take her own life when she was expecting since 3 months. She went to the tracks to take her life but as she walked to the railway track, her inner voice stopped her from proceeding and this inner voice came from her stomach. The unborn baby called her back and asked her to not take away its life as it had not even seen the real world and experienced life. This was a purpose that she had got to continue her life and she came back and walked to survive for her child. She restored her belief in you and the reason was the new life that was dependent on hers.

                        There are many cases where people who lose hope in you (in life) come back and those steps that they take to come back to life are the ones that make them strong to live and it gives them a reason to live. We all must have experienced this in our life and must have felt depressed at times (may the reasons be lost love, unemployment, health-related issues or personal problems) and some people stand strong through these issues while some just lose hope and give up. Giving up does not mean they are weak but it’s the purpose of living that has been taken away from them.

                        Zindagi, through this letter, I wish and pray that people do not lose hope in you and you give that purpose to them so that they too trust you. I hope you can give it to them so that there are no more suicides that take place.

-          Richard

I am writing a letter to life for the #DearZindagi activity at BlogAdda

Phases of my Life - Dear Zindagi

Dear Zindagi,

                        Watching the trailer of Dear Zindagi movie has made me run through so many thoughts and memories of my life and it feels nostalgic to feel how you have made me overcome my difficulties and made me strong all these years. Talking about the various stages of you, I will quickly rush you through those important moments and make you feel what I’ve felt all these years…

As a child…

The small Richard in me is still alive and it can never die as I’ve captured those moments in the form of photographs and videos that I’ve managed to take. As a child, I’ve always thought of you as a beautiful feeling. I can’t see you but you are present with me as a friend, as a parent, as a flower, as a present, as a pet and every form of you has been the most amazing feeling for me. You were present near me and life is something I just learned about but being immature, I could not understand what it actually means.

As a teenager…

As a teenager, I became serious about you as I had lost both my parents. Living you along made me realize that I need to learn many things now and I can’t just let you pass by. I studied hard and never got to experience my college life at all. Those 7-8 years just passed and I never had any happy moment in my life except for the result day where I got to know that I completed my graduation.

As a brother…

I did not ever experience how it was like being a son as my parents died when I was 6 and 12 but I learned how to experience you as a brother. My elder sister treated me like her son and I was by then a responsible working man and brother and you were too with me to guide me through every step I take. I was alone but being a brother was the best feeling as you know what are your responsibilities and living life alone teaches you to cope up with difficulties as well.

As a husband…

Being a husband made me experience you in a new and unique way. My wife has been a big support system for me and this phase did change my perspective towards you. I was not so much serious about my life earlier as I was alone and my sister was married and happily settled but now my wife had made me live for myself and her and start a family. I

As a father…

Entering the new phase of fatherhood and brining a new life into this world made me again realize that life which I always considered so complicated and serious was so beautiful too. My world was my family, my children and these moments that I spent with my kids have been the best ever moments in my life. Life goes and life comes back too and I saw my life in my kids.

These were the important phases of you, Zindagi, and I want to thank you for all that you’ve given me till today.

-          Richard

I am writing a letter to life for the #DearZindagi activity at BlogAdda

A Perfect Woman in My Life

                                                         'A Perfect Woman'




Yes, I know this woman who is perfect in all respects in my eyes. This woman has gone through three important stages in her life and has been perfect all together.

⦁    Daughter: As a daughter, she has been a special member of her family. There is a saying that “A son is a son till he gets himself a wife but a daughter is a daughter all her life”. I truly believe in this as this woman was her dad's dearest child who not only completed her education with first class but when she got her first job, she gave the entire first salary to her mother and father and felt so proud that she was independent and able to take their responsibility. This was the first time she felt like a woman and a responsible member of my family.
⦁    Wife: As a wife, she has many duties towards her spouse and his family and it is her test as she has to leave her house and stay with a new family, learn to adjust in a new environment, make some sacrifices and she managed to do this well. She took care of this family and her parents as well as she had a duty as a daughter towards the one who brought her in this world. She referred to both her mothers as MOM and her husband had to ask her who was she referring to and this is what made her perfect. This was the second time she felt like a woman and learned how to manage my work and the household duties together.
⦁    Mother: This is the stage of this women’s life when she considered herself complete and when her daughter was born, she felt proud as now she's to give the same advice she had received from her parents to her new born child. Being a mother is a tough job but she did not ever makes this look as one. She planned her household duties, work and her responsibility towards my daughter in a way that she could manage all three with ease. She gave her daughter the right education, values and made her an independent woman like she was.


After passing these stages of her life, there can be nothing that can seem imperfect about her and this women is none other than my WIFE.


This post is a part of Write Over the Weekend, an initiative for Indian Bloggers by BlogAdda.

Food and Exercise Go Hand in Hand

For a healthy heart, three things are very important and they together can decide the health of your heart. We need to work on three important parts of our body: Stomach, Mind and Heart and hence here are three steps that I've taken:


Steps to have a better diet:

Fish - Fish is rich in omega-3 and it's the best food that can reduce irregular heart beat problems. It's recommended to eat fish 2-3 times every week for a healthy diet. Mainly fatty fish needs to be consumed.

Oats - Oatmeal is a fiber that reduces cholesterol by soaking it and prevents it from being absorbed into the blood, thus protecting the heart. The oats that contain the entire grain and are not among the instant foods need to be consumed (those that do not contain sugar).


Yogurt - Fat free yogurt and milk can help to reduce cholesterol and fat. We need to make sure that the milk we consume is high in potassium as that helps our blood pressure. Other items that contain potassium can include bananas, oranges and potatoes.



Steps to stay active:


Big Toe Pose (Padangusthasana) - This is a very easy asana in which you need to stand straight and the bend your body in such a way that your legs remain straight on the ground while you are able to touch your feet with your fingers. At first, it's tough to touch your feet with your fingers but with practise, it becomes easy.

Benefits: This posture helps to regulate your blood pressure and increases the flow of blood to your brain and helps in reducing any stress and anxiety problems.

Experience: I practise this asana every weekend and it has helped me to reduce my weight and has relieved my blood pressure problems.

Head-to-Knee Forward Bend (Janu Sirsasana) - In this asana, you need to sit straight on the floor with your left leg is stretched at a 90 degree angle and the right feet is pressed into your left thigh. You need to then bend and hold your left feet with both your hands and pull your toes backwards and this should continue till 6-10 breaths.

Benefits: This works the best for high blood pressure patients and for those who suffer from headaches, depression, insomnia and fatigueness.

Experience: Practising this daily in the morning has helped the stretching of my muscles and since I travel daily for 4 hours, I don't feel tired nor suffer from headaches due to this exercise.

Bridge Pose (Setu Bandha Sarvangasana) This asan is a bit tough to practise at first. In this you need to first lie down on your back and make sure the surface that you lie on is dry and flat. Then you need to bend your knees and lift your back without the help of your hands as your hands need to be stretched out under your body. Your head should be resting on the floor as you practise this exercise about 3-4 times.

Benefits: This asana helps spine problems and stimulates organs like the abdomen, lungs and thyroid. It's the third asana that helps blood pressure patients.



Steps to stay happy:

 Along with having good sleep and practising yoga, I've learnt how to stay calm when I have too many things on my mind. It's true that life is always complicated and we have too many challenges to face from time to time and the only way I've found to lessen my worries is music. Music is something that motivates me a lot. Music for me means emotions. I am an emotional person and I like to listen to different genres of music depending on my mood. For me music is an art form that helps to sooth a person when a person feels low or when a person is happy. Music brings people together and makes them enjoy the moment. There are many songs that are special to me and my family and when we listen to these songs, it brings back the memories we have spent together. Music is a way we can enjoy life and every song has its own meaning for every person. I hear songs without lyrics and I've also insisted my office employees to support the playing of music in the background as it really helps to complete our work in time and live life as it comes. Music is just magic and everyone should learn its importance.




I am joining the Saffolalife #ChhoteKadam initiative in association withBlogAdda and follow these small steps for a healthy heart.

How to lead a healthy life

Saffola has always come up with advertisements that make us aware of controlling our cholesterol and protecting our heart. Here I would like to share some tips that have been useful to me and how I have managed to maintain a healthy diet all these years.




Being Happy:

The formula to be happy is to get good sleep as I used to remain all grumpy and tired if my sleep wasn't complete. While being a member of a health forum, I learned how important sleep is for a healthy life, for a happy day and for a good heart too. I used to barely sleep for 5-6 hours daily but I read on the forum that our body needs 8-10 hours of good sleep. By good sleep I mean that we shouldn't only be resting but it should be a good sound sleep. Some methods that I would like to share that helped me get complete sleep are:

1. Read books before sleeping.
2. Count numbers from 100 to 1.
3. Imagine a blank line while closing your eyes and keep concentrating on it.




Staying Active:

I don't go to a gym but believe in Yoga a lot and this is the best way to stay active for me. I find this exercise the best and most easiest among all other exercises as there are asanas like baddha konasana, virasana dandasana in which we need to sit in the given posture. Besides these asanas, the 3 asanas that help to keep our heart healthy are:

Padangusthasana
Janu Sirasana
Setu Bandha Sarvangasana
(More about these asanas in the next blog)

All these exercises have helped me to relieve my stress and balance my cholesterol level.

Eating Better:

I suffer from high blood pressure problems and hence I am advised to consume very less oil and salt for a better health. It is very important that we keep a track of the amount of oil we eat and after 45, it becomes a vital part of our life to consume food that is good for our immune system. Cutting down is salt is the first step we need to take if we suffer from BP problems, although it's tough to eat food with minimum salt. The best method I've found is to eat fruits most of the time and consume oats and meals that contain almost zero amount of salt. The more we can control our blood pressure, the better it is for our heart.


I am joining the Saffolalife #ChhoteKadam initiative in association withBlogAdda and follow these small steps for a healthy heart.

Have you ever witnessed or ever reported any crime?

This happens in many families. I also have witnessed many such crimes against women and these have not been reported. The women who suffer this keep quite as they do not want their children and family to break but they need to understand that today it is happening to them and tomorrow this can happen to their children and others too. Even if we want to help them out, they do not want to help themselves. As a result, they keep getting exploited and beaten up and their children too loose respect for their parents and continue the same with their wife and children in future. There is a saying that the person who commits a crime is at fault but the person who is not reporting the same and continuing being a victim is also responsible.

We always put blame on the Police and Government for our safety and protection, but we need to understand that when we see anyone in pain on the road being beaten up or molested or wounded, we need to at least contact the police and report the incident if not help. If today we help another person, tomorrow if we are in trouble someone will help us. There are so many cases when people get wounded on the road and all people pass by them and they keep lying and crying in pain and people just ignore. It’s very sad that even one person does not go forward and reach that person to hospital instead they take pictures on their mobile phone and try capturing the scene and have a laugh at it as it happen in a case in July 2012 where many people kept recording the crime but none came forward to stop it.


As much as we feel bad hearing about crimes, we should go ahead and try to stop such crimes or atleast report these crimes to the Police and make an effort. This can be the first step we can take to make our conscience feel that we have done something to stop a crime. Let's start doing it from today.

WOW Entry: A conversation with nature

What if our nature can't communicate with us? Does it mean it doesn't have a voice or it tries to tell us and communicate with us but it's just we who cannot understand it?

Let me share a imaginery conversation with you all and give out my opinion about what our nature thinks about humans:

Me: Hello nature.

Nature: Hello dear.

Me: I am contacting you as I am really heartbroken with the recent incidents that have been happening. Floods in Uttarakhand, earthquakes in Nepal and hurricane in Florida are just few of them and these natural calamaties have taken so many human lives that I feel that you are angry with humans.
Nature: No dear. I  can never be angry with any human being. You'll are a part of my creation and how can I cause harm to you.

Me: Then why nature? Why did you take so many lives? You have given us all birth and our end shouldn't be so cruel.

Nature: I know there have been so many tragedies in the past few years but these haven't happened as I was angry. It happened because I couldn't control them. I was suffering all these years and recently, I was too weak to even bear the pain.

Me: Pain? What pain, nature? Did we give you any pain that made you suffer so much? I know that we have not being taking proper care of you but we too love you nature. You have kept me alive, you have kept all of us alive. Why would we mistreat you? Please don't harm us. We are trying our best in making you have the same glow as before and have many Greenery campaigns too.

Nature: I know, dear. I can see your efforts and even acknowledge the same. However, it's not always as you have been taking care but at the same time causing harm to my creations too.

Me: Harm to your creations? How?

Nature: My creations such as food, air and water but as time is passing me, I am finding it very hard to provide these resources. When I see chemicals being added in my plants, vegetables and fruits, it kills my children as they are poisoness. I have lost millions of my children in these years and as a mother, I can't see them die. Humans are too my children and how can I choose between one child and the other and how can I keep producing healthy food for you all? When I see factories releasing harmful gases in the air, my lungs get poluted and I can't see humans inhaling such polluted air and dying. My water sources also are no longer pure and considered the only source of drinking as today people keep throwing their waste matter in the water which has made it hamrful for drinking. You only tell me how can I continue this way?


Me: I know that we have been very cruel towards you and you're absolutely right in that. But we are still trying our best by improving crop production, harvesting water, purifying the air and trying to protect our environment. We love you nature and we are trying sincerely as we know the result. But however, we can't rectify the past mistakes.

Nature: But you can desfinitely prevent the new mistakes, right?

Me: How nature? What new mistakes are you talking about?

Nature: I am talking about the celebrations that are going to start from tomorrow. Ganesh Chaturthi celebrations. I can see that every year idols are immersed within my rivers and the rivers are getting polluted due to this. The color that's thrown into the air too causes pollution and even my fish are other sea creatures are dying. I don't say that you'll should stop celebrating, but just to take care that I and my creations aren't harmed.

Me: I am sorry to hear that, nature. We are making sure to use Eco-friendly idols this time and not pollute the waters.

Nature: But the major problem is that humans are not united. I can see only a handful of humans trying to save me but what about others? If the others harm my creations, the consequences too are unavoidable. I can't see myself being killed each second and I can't even see you'll suffering by your own actions.

Me: I can understand the same, nature. Unity lacks between humans and I promise that I'll try my best to make people aware of what harms are we causing you as we can understand your pain. You too love us all and I am sorry for being rude to you.

Nature: You don't need to be sorry, dear. It was a fact that I used to keep reminding my children all the time but since I had no voice, my children couldn't hear me. I hope that in the years to come, we all live happily and have a healthy life.


This post is a part of Write Over the Weekend, an initiative for Indian Bloggers by BlogAdda.