Overcoming Negative Emotions ~ Ajahn Brahm

Antidotes to overcome our Anger & Stress! Words of Wisdom by Ajahn Brahm at Renci Hospital Auditorium.

Just like at S'pore Buddhist Lodge, audience overflow to the stage with 1st class seats just a feet away from Ajahn Brahm. Real Live Show!

Some extracts from the talk (pardon is sought for any wrong remembrance or misinterpretation summarised below):

Using his past experience of traveling at village trucks, whereby he will be hit by the truck-metal tops whenever the trucks travel over holes, he learnt from his fellow local monks that instead of swearing, he laughed, he realised that, "Laugh when you are in pain, it hurts less".
Life is much peaceful when you don't complain, Laugh is the best emotional medicine.

Accept mistakes, Lower your expectations.
Buddhists' aim is to obtain happiness, don't get angry with one-another.
How to measure wealth? He does not have a penny to his name, but he has lots of caring friends taking good care of him when he travels.

The goal of life is to spend quality time with each other.
Q: Why kids or adults nowadays obsessed with hp, ipad etc, instead of communicating to each other in a house.
A: Because we did not employ the right engagement to attract the attention of kids or audience. Engage in something that is more interesting than ipad to have real interaction.
(His talk on an IT convention was commented that people got engaged in his talk that they put down their communication tools and concentrate on his talk, so get something interesting) 

Old story of boy last in class motivated via analogy of being a Bodhisattva deliberately sacrifice his own happiness to be last in class so nobody has to suffer. However, Be a Bodhisattva in this aspect once, haha, let others have a chance too.

Then the relation of year-end performance appraisal by Top tier, Middle Tier & Bottom.
Good Buddhist adopts the Middle path, haha:-)
Quite true, the top and bottom are the extremes analogy.
Why jealous of colleagues who got promotion? there are greater responsibilities, more stress and problems; higher pay? there is never enough money no matter how much you have. 
Be happy in the way you are. Have more time versus money to knock off work early and enjoy Ajahn's Talk. ;-)

What if you feel negative to your boss?
His analogy of requesting for mosquito repellents rejected by his teacher, Ajahn Chah.
Call mosquitoes Ajahn, they teach you;
Likewise, irritating bosses --> Ajahn bosses, they teach you.
In life, learn to be immune to irritation.
Once to go in and out: Yes boss, Yes Darling...
Don't take it too personal, just carry on doing what needs to carry out :-)

If one has done wrong, learn from mistakes.
Stepped on dog poo, take it home & leave it with trees or plants. They flower or bear fruits years later.
Similarly, if you had done something bad, that equates dog poo, take it into your heart, learn from it and grow your wisdom, you will become one wiser, and more developed person who grow from mistakes.  (Example mentioned of drug/gang prisoners doing a better job educating young children/teenagers to avoid repeating their mistakes from personal experience.)

Q: How to overcome sadness?
A: One gets sad easily as the body is tired and lacks sleep.
Take a break and sleep, relax and be kind to your body.
Ask your body what it wants, sleep or food and give it.
Once you relax & rested enough, sadness reduced.
Why people gets "burnt up" from work nowadays? Because they are tired, they never rested enough.
A good holiday is a relaxing one and not on daily rush to sight-seeing that needs one wake up even earlier than working days.It should be pure relaxing for one to think of nothing but just relax and sleep to fullest capacity, something like his Thailand meditation retreat which is for relaxing and resting the body and mind.
(True, agree from personal experience from last relaxing outdoor meditation organised by DDMS which is the first time I really feel relaxed and recharged without having to travel overseas)

Life is never organised. Accept it.
Love your anger, Accept your anger and then learn to accept other people too.
Analogy of village celebration noise pollution to the monastery by Ajahn Brahm but his teacher wisely pointed out: It's not the sound that disturb you. It's you who disturb the sound.
~ It's not the world who disturb you, it's you who disturb the world...
It's life: trains will break, husbands are selfish, wives are naggy, dogs will bark, we are imperfect, why get angry... :P

Love his talk, simple analogies, and I feel much better, blues chased away from sandwiching stress.

飲食得宜,健康得益

Healthy tips received from emails...
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從營養角度出發 不同蔬菜有不同的生吃方法

在西方飲食中，蔬菜生食的情況相當多見，而按中國人的習慣是將蔬菜烹製後食用。其實，從營養和保健(保健食品)的角度出發，蔬菜以生食最好。

不同的蔬菜有不同的生吃方法

新鮮蔬菜中所含的維生素(維生素食品)C和一些生理活性物質十分嬌氣，很容易在烹調中遭到破壞，蔬菜生食可以最大限度地吸收其中的各種營養素。蔬菜中大都含有免疫物質干擾素誘生劑，它可刺激人體細胞產生干擾素，具有抑制細胞癌變和抗病毒感染的作用，而這種功能只有在生食的前提下才能實現。

生吃蔬菜首先要選擇新鮮的蔬菜（在冰箱中已經存放了 一兩 天的蔬菜不適合生吃），儘量選綠色無公害產品，食用前用鹽水浸泡10分鐘，能去掉部分有害物質。

不同的蔬菜要選擇不同的生吃方法。

芹菜、白菜、黃瓜等蔬菜可以做成新鮮的蔬菜汁直接飲用；

捲心菜、甜菜、西蘭花等，非常適合絞碎後放置一段時間食用，因為這些蔬菜在放置過程中，可以發酵產生一種對身體非常有好處的活性酶；將新鮮蔬菜涼拌，加上醋、蒜和姜末，既能調味，又能殺菌，但要少放鹽，加鹽過多會導致蔬菜不新鮮，營養成分流失。年輕人更喜愛的生食方法則是蔬菜沙拉：吃主食之前，若先以沙拉打底，可以使每頓攝入的熱量減少10%左右。

在準備蔬菜沙拉時，最好不要將蔬菜切得太細，每片菜葉以一口能吃下的大小最佳，以免因其太細吸附過多的沙拉醬，而吃進去過多的油(油食品)脂；葉菜最好用手撕，以保新鮮；在沙拉醬中加入少許鮮檸檬汁或白葡萄酒，可使蔬菜不變色。

能夠食用的蔬菜中70%都是能生食的，如黃瓜、番茄、柿子椒、萵苣、白菜、捲心菜、茄子、菜花、辣椒、洋蔥、芹菜等，但也有些蔬菜不宜生食，土豆、芋頭、山藥等富含澱粉的蔬菜必須熟吃，不然澱粉粒不破裂，人體無法消化(消化食品)；豆芽等豆類食品，因含有抗營養成分的物質，只有在加熱後才利於營養的吸收。

Good old gold

Found books that had accompanied me throughout my different phrases of life during recent house-cleaning exercise.

From Enid Blyton which had built up my English foundation and creativity with the magical fantasy stories to the Adventuring Nancy Drew series and Game books, I have my wonderful mum to thank in building up my interest in reading from young.

Thereafter, moving on to Novels during secondary and tertiary days and eventually, motivational books to spur me through the tough worklife and finally to Dharma books of Wisdom, what a library of books I have. Many books gotten in recent years are still unread, so one of the new year resolutions is to slowly read a few pages per day.

Haha, found this Ah Q Garfield card amongst my forgotten treasures:-)