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Author Archives: Rima Desai
The health secret long forgotten, save your bills and trips to the doctor
Get to every video with one click. Many world secrets revealed about astrology, health, life-coaching, dating and more: Get to every video with one click. Many world secrets revealed: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCps8gUnc4Zfp3xKw62fp4_g
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What to do and not do to have that partner you are craving for
This post does not apply to fun flings ;)
Get to every video with one click. Many world secrets revealed about astrology, health, life-coaching, dating and more: Get to every video with one click. Many world secrets revealed: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCps8gUnc4Zfp3xKw62fp4_g
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Zero Membership, Full Benefit!
It is so easy to say – “You should meditate” but it is so hard to actually do it, in fact, even want to do it. Meditation has that boring, serious or ‘difficult’ connotation to it which gets us to push it to – “Maybe someday I will do it, but not today!” If you have been in this in-between of knowing how great meditation can be and yet not sure if you want to do it, this is the article for you. In this article I will briefly describe meditation, how to and touch on my recent experience with Vipassana meditation. I have a video at the end of the article which explains my views on all these in greater detail.
Why Meditate / What is Meditation?
Just like we exercise our body to strengthen our muscles and body immunity, we meditate to strengthen our mind muscles and be stronger. We need to build our mind muscle by stillness of the mind. Quiet and stillness gives our mind a break from non-stop working. Imagine a car engine that never stopped, what would happen to it? Can you guess the average number of thoughts we think in a day? Know the answer in my video.
In short, meditation is silence of the mind, not silence of the tongue or stillness of the body. We may not speak but yet our mind may continue to work. Especially at night when the body rests, the mind decides to remove all of its collected waste. That we call either anxiety, worry, dreams or insomnia. These conditions come about when our waste basket hasnot been emptied on a regular basis and results in over spilling.
How to Meditate?
Hence, for daily mind clearing, a few minutes of meditation is a must. Why ignore our mind when it is so simple? Let’s say we have no more than 5 minutes a day. For that, all we need to do is, find 2 minutes of silence twice a day. In that silence, we must close our eyes and focus our mind on our breath and feel free of any things planned for the day. This can be done while travelling to work / home or just before lunch, before bed time, etc. This is the simplest way to meditate and yet very effective if done twice a day, daily.
With more time, say more than 5 minutes, one can even play meditation music on YouTube and sit in a comfortable place of privacy. Just close one’s eyes, with a straight back (take back support if needed) and hear that music for as long as one wishes.
The 3rd easy way to meditate is ‘Aum’ chanting. Sit in a comfortable position with straight back and chant A-u-m by pulling the sound from one’s navel / stomach. It gets better with practice and some youtube videos may be available for the same. Chant with an emphasis on A sound first and less of U and M. Repeat that. Then move to short A sound but longer U sound and short M sound (repeat it). Last go to M sound for the longest time and repeat that. Do as many Aum repetitions as needed. It is ok to do a short Aum chant to start with. Our breath may not permit a longer chant and that is ok. It gets better with daily repetitions. We must not do more than what our body permits.
The next level of meditation is sitting in complete silence and allowing our thoughts to come and go without any focus on them. This is the best way to remove ‘mind waste’ and create a space for deeper introspection. Through that one builds mental strength and self-awareness of deeper emotional layers.
There are many other ways to meditate but the above 4 are the simplest. If one likes chanting mantras, one can do mantra meditation to increase mental power.
For increasing focus, concentration and memory:
1. YouTube – Look at the changing designs of mandalas for as long as you can, you can YouTube Magic Mandalas or Mandala meditation.
2. Fix one’s gaze on a candle’s wick.
3. Color Mandalas with intent and focus.
4. Labyrinth – Walk a labyrinth.
There are several other types of meditation. Just like different types of medicines or fitness regimes suit different people, same is with meditation.
Vipassana Meditation:
This week I visited Belapur center for Vipassana Meditation for the 10 day course. The accommodation and food facilities at the center are awesome and overall the atmosphere feels conducive for meditation. However, like I had imagined, Vipassana is not a course of complete silence. While students remain silent, the group meditation (about 3 hours a day in total) involves teacher’s constant instruction played through a recorded tape, first in Hindi, followed by English repetition. Besides that, there is a discourse daily and recorded audios focusing on karma theory, moral values, how Vipassana helps, etc. In my video I have mentioned in great detail, the truth that I felt about Vipassana and in comparison to other meditation techniques.
Brahma Kumaris
Personally, I am in love with Brahma Kumaris. To avail of their meditation services, we must first do a 7 day course (which is just 1 hour a day of meditation for 7 days) and then attend any center for meditation whenever we feel like. Their audio which states – “Om Shanti Om, I am a peaceful soul” is my most favorite audio for meditation.
Do watch my video link which will be added here soon. You can even YouTube Rima Desai or Google – Rima Desai YouTube to find all my videos. Remember to meditate at least 2 minutes a day. Your lovely self deserves at least that much pampering. How much do we all do for others throughout the day? Let’s do some for ourselves too!
Important Points:
Never meditate right after a meal
Never force yourself to meditate no matter what others say
Meditation is joyful experience, not a serious, sad matter!
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Masala Chai: Delish Indian, Ginger Tea
Tea or Coffee it is that divides the world into two seemingly equal halves. I have seen the steaming coffee mugs make their way to the wake up alarm for a millennium in USA, ‘Masala Chai’ aka Spice Tea is the magic mantra in India. From little kids to adults, it is the rave in all Indian Households and few like me are the ‘weirdos’ who have departed the eternal bliss before even dating it. The chai walas – hawkers on streets that sell these in little glass mugs could be called the popular anchors for soap opera discussions, office conversations or a ‘hot date’.
Here is the recipe of Typical Indian tea that most west-east, north and south Indians drink daily morning and evening. You are lucky! This article comes with my YouTube tutorial
INGREDIENTS TO MAKE FOR ONE PERSON:
11/4 cup drinking water
1 inch piece of ginger
2 pinches of tea spice
1 Tbsp of INDIAN Tea Leaves – any brand but Indian tea only
3/4th to 1 Tbsp of Sugar
BEGIN
I 1/4th cup drinking water
Start to boil
Grate 1 inch piece of ginger in the water
Add 2 pinches of tea spice = chai (tea) masala to the water ~ buy from any Indian grocery store or online
Simmer 3 minutes
Tea leaves 1 Tbsp
Sugar 1 Tbsp – More or less may be added as per requirement. No sugar won’t bring out tea’s flavor. Some sugar is needed. Please don’t use zero calorie sugar or honey!
Boil and then simmer for 5 to 10 minutes. The more you simmer, the stronger the taste. I prefer just 7 minutes
Add 1/2 cup milk – 2% cow’s milk: doesn’t matter organic or non-organic
Boil, allow to rise, reduce stove to slow – medium
Simmer 5-7 minutes
Strain using minute net strainer
Serve hot with tea biscuits (cookies)
FOR 2 PEOPLE: 2 1/2 cups water, 11/2 Tbsp Tea leaves and same quantity of sugar, ginger and spice.
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HOW CRUCIAL IS IT TO HAVE MORE THAN ONE CHILD?
Are you worried to have just ONE CHILD? Read my article below to know how it is O-K-A-Y to have NONE, ONE or MORE CHILDREN. You are not the one WHO DECIDES THEIR DESTINY.. read the powerful article by me from my other blog link below:
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who is god
#Religion #Fanatic beliefs #Meat or No meat? Who is #God?
Very annoyed with a Parent who has been teaching this Child all kinds of
DONT- DOs because GOD WILL GET ANGRY if you DO!!
What is the concept of God you paint in a child’s mind? And the reasons you give a child for not doing something? Think again when you tell your child – “Don’t eat meat because God will be angry.” Really?! Seriously? This your so called Strategy?” Tell the child, not to eat because it hurts animals, not because s/he has to PLEASE GOD. And saying that God gets Angry and Judges your actions cancels the concept of God totally! It is funny what we teach our children. . . and as they grow into adults, leave the choice to your children. There is ZERO point in FORCING anyone to do anything.
If you yourself as a Parent, don’t eat meat because your religion tells you that you will go to HELL, well, HELL and HEAVEN are in our minds. If inside your mind you feel that you want to eat meat but this is the only reason you don’t, then you are SUPPRESSING your desires and gaining no PUNYA out of it.
No religion on Earth ever, ever, ever teaches to do something by FORCE. Never ever! All those shanatic beliefs about what religions says YOU MUST AND MUST DO are CREATED and Passed on by Humans.
And there are 1000s of people who don’t eat meat but have the cruelest thoughts and intentions. They think ill and do ill to others, what is the point then?
I grew up seeing some of these highly NAME-SAKE religious people with the dirtest minds.. and they would be chanting in the temple and at the same time judging every1 who entered the temple and torturing people who live with them.
Would you rather vote for someone eating meat who is genuine, honest, kind and good overall Or some1 who doesn’t eat meat but is greedy, selfish, cruel to others?
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SILENCE, SUB-CONSCIOUS and SCREAMS
Midnight empty roads – the time when the damp air is caressing the exhausted roads while the walls SCREAM out the Stories of the Day ~ everything becomes CLEAR in Stillness … ~ I could hear it all, how beautiful are the roads rt now :)
…Kinda like the Sub-Conscious Mind which starts SPEAKING OUT while we rest our Conscious / Awake Mind and it can N-E-V-E-R lie.
So what does your silence scream out? ~ hidden under the cushions of a busy life?!
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The Numbers Magician: Teaching Children Math Skills, Part 1
This is a re-post of my article from Parent-Edge Magazine: Sep 28, 2015
http://parentedge.in/the-numbers-magician-teaching-children-math-skills-part-1/
Math is one subject we cannot distance ourselves from – whether we make a career out of it or not, Math is an essential part of life. Math is more than just mastery over basic number functions. It is not all about + – x and divide. It is about understanding how numbers ‘fit’ into our day to day lives and the environment around us.
Does an early schooler notice car number plates and their function? Does she recognise the changes that an added family member brings into the home? Does she notice the change in weight before and after eating? Or how one apple relates to a bean, or a pencil in terms of volume and weight? I wasn’t fortunate enough to get that understanding of math until the time I learnt a new approach to Math.
This article is inspired by the teaching at my daughter’s school – Great Hearts Archway. I thank them for introducing these concepts to me. They follow Singapore Math as their module for teaching Mathematics.
In Singapore math, they focus on laying a strong foundation of Math concepts. The chart you see below is called a ‘Ten’s Frame’. In a Ten’s frame, there are 2 rows of 5 blocks and rows are filled with varying number of black dots. One block has one big black dot. Children are taught to understand how many dots are there without counting on their fingers.
E.g. in Fig. 1 kids are taught to see that all 5 blocks on top are filled; which makes 5 + one block at the bottom which makes 1. Hence, 6 blocks out of 10 are filled and 4 are empty. They are also taught to approach this problem in multiple ways. One could see it as 6 filled out of ten or 4 less than 10 or as times 5, where each row is seen as a multiple of 5.
In Fig. 2, there are 3 dots filled out of 5 at the top. Remember that always, the blocks on the top are filled FIRST before filling blocks in the bottom. However, kids are challenged to think in different ways to fill 3 in blocks of ten. So the teacher will typically discuss how the same 3 dots could be placed in any of 10 blocks below.
In Figure 3, one is filled and 9 are empty.
In Fig. 4, I have shown a 20s frame. After the ten’s frame concepts are founded, one can move on to the 20s frame. I have noticed how quickly kids are able to pick this concept. I observed 4 kids and it took them less than 5 secs to say 16! They did not have to wait to count on their fingers. Here they are quick to see 5 + 5 + 5 + 1
GAME
The Ten’s Frame War game is a game my daughter’s teacher plays in school. It is an excellent way to repeat and integrate that concept while also challenging them to be quick to evaluate without counting on one’s fingers.
Split kids in pairs. Make an equal number of ten’s frame cards and give each child a pile. Have them open the top card and call out their number quickly without counting. The one who has the bigger number gets both the cards. You can decide who wins – the one with the most or the one with the least number of cards.
MATH FOR BABIES AND TODDLERS
For pre-schoolers, there is a different way to introduce this math concept.
Make cardboard or hard paper squares approximately palm sized, each with different number of dots, beginning from 1 to 50. Start out with holding card dots of 1 to 10 in your hand in front of your child at his or her eye level. Face the child and show him one card at a time, quickly moving on to the next one. With each dot, say the number aloud.
E.g. – This dot below is number 1. Hence, just say ‘1’ while showing it and so on.
After 15 days of repetition, increase the number from 10 to 15 or up to 20 based on the child’s attention. Repeating this activity with infants starting 4 months, can strengthen math concepts early and set the stage for greater math understanding.
Remember that for children of any age, do not do math and reading activities when they are tired, hungry, sleepy or frustrated. It beats the purpose and is energy wasted because the brain is too busy to fix on something else and cannot attend to the learning.
Another way to teach Math is through ‘Hands-On Learning’. When teaching 2 + 2, have concrete objects to show them. 2 spoons + 2 spoons makes a lot more sense to any brain than just the numbers 2 + 2.
You can further have 4 toys on one part of the sofa or on a chair on inside a hoola hoop. Then show the kid what it looks like when 1 is removed and then another 1. Then put the 2 removed toys on another part of the sofa, chair or into another hoola hoop. Now the child knows concretely what 4 looks like and how it can be divided into 2 groups of 2.
You can also teach measuring skills from 2 years onwards. One can use one’s palm stretch from the thumb to the pinky finger to measure a table or a pencil. One can use a pencil to measure the length of the scale, the hand, the chair. Then one can weigh objects on both palms or on a weighing scale. How many erasers does it take to measure up to an apple? Do all apples measure the same? And so on. Measuring tapes and scales for real measuring are fun too. Kids love it! Measure their dresses, their favorite toys and even measure them while standing, sitting or sleeping.
We shall continue our math concepts in the following month’s article…
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The Numbers Magician Part 2: Teaching Children Maths Skills through Board Games
This is a re-post of Oct 28-2015 article from ParentEdge magazine.
http://parentedge.in/the-numbers-magician-teaching-children-maths-skills-through-board-games-part-2/
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The Numbers Magician: Teaching Children Maths Skills through Board Games, Part 2
Last month we learnt about introducing ‘Singapore Math’ and ‘Hands-on Math’ concepts to toddlers, preschoolers and kindergartners (Age 2 to 6 primarily).
Today we shall explore some excellent board games for ages 3/4 to 8 years that teach kids geometry and algebra while also being fun. The games and books I mention here are just a few examples to explore from an array of options available in the market today. My daughter has played all these games, and hence I can assure you of their usefulness from my own experience.
GAME: 123’s
Age 3+
If your child has a good understanding of numbers from a young age, you can introduce this fun card-game. Kids are required to match the numbered card with the equivalent picture card. Numbers go up to 15. You can also play ‘memory’ or ‘treasure hunt’ with these cards. Better still, carry them in your purse while travelling long or short distances and play even while you are waiting for traffic to clear!
GAME: Ludo
Age: 4+
Ludo is a traditional and popular game. Kids learn to roll and read the dice, and count the number of spaces to play and move. They learn to follow a certain direction for their player to move forward. Directions like these help us understand the physical world of math around us.
GAME: Crystal Climbers
Age: 3+
This is a wonderful geometrical game. There are different shaped crystals made from plastic. Kids much match pieces to each other to make numerous designs or objects. This game improves gross motor movements and eye-brain co-ordination as well. You can teach children, in a hands-on way, about 3-dimensional shapes like cube and 2-dimensional shapes like circle and triangle.
GAME: Cash Register
Age: 3+
The Cash Register is an addictive toy for many kids. They fancy being able to scan items and collect money especially if they repeatedly ‘witness’ their parents paying the cashier at different shops. Younger kids may tear the paper notes or swallow coins. You can laminate paper notes and keep the coins away until age 5.
The register can be used to ‘simulate’ a shopping experience. Let your children set up a soft-toy shop and you can go buy something from there. Allow them to do a simple transaction. Teach them to scan, open and close the cash box. As they grow older, you can teach them about currency and do several types of money transactions which involve addition, subtraction, etc.
(E.g.I have Rs. 20, if I have to pay you Rs. 10, how much will you return?)
The same currency can be used to make rows of ascending and descending notes. You can also make this experience more real by having your child pay real money at the billing center and also shop something for themselves and pay from their piggy bank or pocket money.
GAME: The Mighty Mind
Age: 4/5+
The Mighty Mind gives excellent exposure to geometrical thinking. There are different shapes that are used to make simp
le to complex designs. Beginning cards show kids which pieces they will need to use to make a shape. As you can see in the circle shape in the image, the card shows two red semi-circle pieces to be used. The cards are numbered and increasing numbers depict higher level of difficulty in making shapes. The same shapes are also available in magnetic form with a magnetic board and kids can use the shapes freely as well, to make any pattern they wish.
GAME: Dominoes
Age: 5+
Dominos and The Mexican Train are great ‘algebra’ games. The coins represent numbers by the number of dots on them. Players must match same number dots together to form connected series. You can also challenge kids to quickly state the number of dots on each peg. Or ask them to match the number on a dice.
GAME: monopoly
Age: 5+
From 5 years onwards, kids can start playing Junior or Regular Monopoly based on their abilities. Monopoly has a ‘real’ time s
ense to how transactions occur in the world. This helps kids get a great understanding on the use of money and numbers in the real world. You need not stick to the rules of the games or the length of the game. The purpose is to expose them to number understanding.
Lastly, I would like to share with you this wonderful book which teaches kids to count by 2s, 5s, and 10s in a simple, easy and fun way. There many sites, books and resources which we can use to teach math concepts to our kids.
I hope you received some fun math ideas for your kids today.
Rima Desai's: Scuba Diving into the Mind's Pool 