Positivity Weekly - Vol 4

Perceptions determine our thoughts, emotions, speech and actions. Let’s spend the next few minutes reading amazingly empowering stories and rediscovering the positivity all around us.

Positivity Weekly will appear on this blog around the weekend. I will bring the best of news from any and every source I can access. I will include my own personal experiences, if they fit. And if you have any apt stories, anecdotes or insights to share, I will put them here with pride. In the long run, your participation will determine the quality of this initiative. Do write in with your contributions and feedback to connect@eshwarsundaresan.com. And if you like this initiative, please share it widely.

Hello there, my friend! Ready to feel more positive? Let’s begin without further ado…

News from the public domain

Oh, what a winner!

All marathon winners stand out. But none more so than Lata Bhagwan Kare. This 61-year-old ran barefoot in a traditional nauvari sari and made more prepared participants look like laggards. And when she won the race, she left the crowd agape. How did she do it?

‘While running, I was talking to myself and telling that I want to win this race and I did it,’ she says. She thought it. She did it. Do read the DNA report about the race here.

Husband goes pink for ailing wife

Relationships are utterly complicated. Unless two people are truly in love. If they are, then relationships become easy as strawberry cream cake.

In this story, the wife is struck down with cancer. The husband decides to cheer her. Not once, not for a week. He makes it his life’s mission to keep his wife happy and positive. He dresses up in pink female attire, and then… well, you’ll have to watch the video to know the rest.

Now, that’s true love!

We are more beautiful than we think

Who is the person in the mirror to you? Your best friend? Or your worst critic? If you suffer from the trauma of incessant self-criticism, then this video is especially for you. Because while you are busy finding faults with yourself, others are noticing your beauty. So how about giving yourself a break? And becoming your own fan?

An angel is born in a garbage dump

We’ve all felt down in the dumps at some point in our lives. At such a moment, if an angel descends upon us and believes in our resurrection, magic begins to unfold. Do watch this video to learn how a man became an angel for a dog. Of course, the story doesn’t end there. You’ll have to watch the video to learn what happens next.

Women need no ILLITERACY

Once upon a time, a Nepali woman took her ailing mother to the local hospital. She was asked to take her mother to see the doctor in Room 105. Not having received education, she didn’t know how to identify the room. She and her mother returned home that day without availing treatment. That day, she realized that illiteracy was a millstone around her neck. Watch this amazing video to know what she did about it.

A precious carefree moment in Cancer

Patients of terminal illnesses are reminded of the inevitable all the time. While the rest of us are just as mortal as these souls, their mortality somehow begins to define them. The thought of perishing might rule their lives.

That’s why somebody decided to give these wonderful people a true gift. A gift of one precious carefree moment of aliveness. These people had fun experiencing that moment. I’m sure you’ll have fun watching it.

As told to me

All about the fun

This happened to my friend Vani when she was researching on her thesis at the university in Penang. Being obliquely associated with the human genome project, Vani’s days were spent poring into microscopes; her job was to try and decode a molecular-level mystery of the universe.

But on that fateful evening, some other mystery occupied Vani’s mind. A couple of seemingly reckless women – who behaved like typical teenagers – had insisted on taking her to town for some “special chicken curry”. So Vani waited outside her office for their arrival, feeling anxious. Her anxiety increased when a Honda City screeched to a halt inches away from her. Inside it were her two “chicken curry friends”, asking her to get in.

For the next couple of hours, the following events transpired:

• One of the ladies drove the car at F1 speeds and blamed every other driver in the vicinity for “being terrible lah”.
• Both ladies laughed off their back aches and knee pains as part of the scenery. “Why should a little pain stop us from having fun?” they kept demanding.
• En route, they picked up another friend – a lady in her seventies – and then called her a sissy for having so many fears.
• They kept mocking Vani for having a “less free soul” because she was married and had a kid. They, on the other hand, were footloose and in full control of their fun-filled lives.
•  After dinner, all four ladies drove to a Buddhist temple. Apparently, the fun-filled ladies wanted to donate some fruit. And while at the temple, they checked out some Buddhist priests and happily chatted up with those priests that caught their fancy.
• Later in the night, they made a stopover to buy cosmetics that were on sale.

By the time they dropped Vani back home, she was fatigued. But the two fun-filled ladies… they were still going strong.

What’s so remarkable about this story? Well, one of the two ladies (Aunt P) was 78 years old. Her friend, (Aunt T), was 84! And at that age, they were exhibiting so much zest for life. Says Vani, “From these young girls, I learnt the meaning and importance of independence, freedom and joy. They are my old-age role models. I hope I will age as gracefully as them. That I will be able to laugh at myself, keep the child in me alive, shrug off my health issues and drive as if I’m going somewhere.’

You can read Vani’s version of the encounter here.

In conclusion

Well, the conclusion is the same as always. If you wear pink-coloured glasses, the desert will look like cotton candy. Our perceptions rule us. Let’s choose them with care.

Until next time, I wish that your life too is filled with “special chicken curry friends”.

To read the previous volume of Positivity Weekly, please click here.
To read the next volume of Positivity Weekly, please click here.