Parents today put themselves in two categories- one who considers children a boon and others who feel that it is simply too difficult to raise a child. In a world of unfulfilled potentials, parents often transfer the dreams they once had and expect the children to fulfil it.

This often adds immense pressure to the children. While some thrive in this set of conditions, because of the belief that they are born to be special instilled in them early on, many fail under this kind of pressure.

What can you do as a parent to ensure that you are not putting overdue pressure on your children?

People can often be hypocritical about their parental approach. You cannot expect your children to be angels when you weren’t one during your childhood (harsh, but a fair opinion)

Today, let’s talk about some unfair expectations you can have from your kids.


1. Be grateful to you

Everyone expects their children to be grateful. After all, you are the ones that brought them to the world, took care and provided them food, shelter and amenities. But in all honesty, none of it matters, if you are not there.

If you are a parent who spends very less time with your children, don’t expect them to be any grateful to you. When you are not spending time, understanding their day and their progress each day, you are just a person who is providing them with materials which they can’t procure, for now.

As soon as they start earning, they are going to forget you because remember, you were not there in the first place. A grateful child is one who has been given enough memories and experience to cherish and live life. If you haven’t done that, please do not expect gratefulness.


2. Do as I say

Another expectation that most parents have for their children is utmost respect and humility. Also, listen to your advice without thinking about it.

It does not work like this anymore. Children take in less of what you say and more of what you do. If you are wasting away life, expect them to do the same. If you are strong willed, hard-worker, expect them to be the same.


3. Never mess up.

It can be frustrating how much kids mess up. Whether it’s broken devices or coloured walls, children are going to mess up because they are doing everything for the first time. There will be no kid who did not mess up, not even you. So stop trying to hold our kids to a standard that we can’t maintain ourselves. Mistakes happen, we ALL mess up, that’s life. Children mess up. They lie to us, they’re sneaky, they don’t listen and they know how to push all the wrong buttons. Don’t hold being human against your children.


Children are the blessings of Earth. The undying wellness and hope that they stand for, can only be strengthened by their parents. Stand by them, stand for them. Expect them to be good humans and everything will turn out just fine.

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When you choose to serve someone other than yourself, you are
actually creating a positive environment for yourself. It is this
environment that plays a vital role in building a foundation that
helps you achieve long lasting success.


Let’s put ourselves into perspective. Are you truly happy? When
was the last time you were of service?


Being of service can be anything from showing love to a dog in the
neighborhood to giving food to people in orphanages. It is an
action that will leave you filled with satisfaction and the other
person filled with happiness.


Contribution, to other than yourself, keeps your life in check.
When you choose to be someone who only takes from the world
you live in but no contribute, you are never advancing. You are
going to be forever stuck in survival-mode. This is because you
will choose spend on things you don’t need anyways.


Everyone is living in two states of life today – one where you are
competing. Competing to get what others have.


State 1 – “Saw my friend on Insta stories visiting M&M museum in
London. Saving up for that now”


State 2 – “Now I have worked my whole life and have all the
money I want, but what do I do? I am stuck with myself”

I am not trying to portray travelling is bad, but how about travelling
to Italy, learning the language and coming back to teach poor kids
who can then make a good life out of it?


People are rather choosing to go to factories of colorful packaged
chocolate and this is where the problem lies.


The sheer reality is that, to be truly fulfilled and not have simply
moments of fleeting happiness, we cannot be living just for
ourselves.


You are never going to real satisfaction from simply working in a
high-paid job.


Imagine, I told you that I will pay you 10 lakh rupees a month for
simply making burgers for rich people. You will be excited and happy in the beginning, but what after the routine of flipping burgers is continued for three years and lot of money made?

You are sure to wonder, isn’t life more than this?
Yes it is.


Now imagine being paid 5000 rupees, after all these years, to flip
burgers for poor children in slums around the world? How happy
will you be serving people who would be having the tastiest meals
in their lives?


Start doing things that can impact 10 other lives. Learn not your
self but for others. Live for others. Feed Others. Love dogs that
are on the street, adopt animals. Protect the world. Consume less
plastic.

Become more sustainable. Use water as if it is going to
end tomorrow. Learn to cook and feed poor kids and dogs. Cook
for yourself.

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Time for some truth.


The mediocrity principle is a gift of the philosophers and astrophysicist to the modern world. It states that wherever you look in the universe, by extension, you are unalterably average.


When thought more – “The Mediocrity Principle is a philosophical notion that states that most of what happens in the universe is a consequence of natural and universal laws. These are rules that apply everywhere and to everything and everyone.”

Now let’s talk about what this should mean to you.


It simply means that everyone you see around you is a consequence of their
actions. They are born average, after which they either chose to outgrow
themselves or stayed exactly the same or worse just degraded over time.
When I talk about the Mediocrity Principle, I wait back to hear their opinions to understand what they have taken away from it. Almost all accept that, YES they are mediocre but yet there is nothing that can done about it. What the principle screams from the other side is the fact that while YES, everyone is born average, you need not die average. You can become whomever you truly wish to be.

The mediocrity principle can free you from all of the modern social pressure to become someone famous or someone special.
The need to feel special forces you to compare to others. Being special is claiming that you are superior and better than others. It’s feeling entitled to
deserve greater things than other people. Or believing that nothing bad
should ever happen to you.


It’s important to remember that you are different from everyone else- not superior.

Feeling superior changes you in ways that will not ever bring
happiness. Get rid of this mask. When you stop trying to be special, you
become your authentic, BEST self. The simple fact about this world, is how it can be moulded and bended according to our will. The best example is Daniel Ludwig.

Most of the people have never heard of him. Even his own neighbours since decades did not know much about it. Daniel Ludwig living like a normal working class American. The only difference between him and other neighbours- He was a few billions rich.

Daniel Ludwig was the richest man in America in the 30’s and 40’s. He
constantly stayed out of the spotlight and often paid the PR firms to keep his
name out of the papers. Daniel Ludwig got out of school and started working in the docks at the age of 9.

He went on to become the biggest manufacturer of salt in the world, opened the biggest pulp factory in the world right in the middle of Amazon. “The Secretive Billionaire” is a book that explores his life. It talks about how Daniel successfully shaped his life from nothing. It talks about how he prioritised hard work and becoming the best version of himself, rather than media spotlight and attention.


Daniel Ludwig believed that you can transform the world just through the way you see yourself.

See yourself as average, someone on whom works needs to be done – ON A DAILY BASIS, then and then alone can you bend this world to your will.

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Afraid of looking stupid?

What is the number one killer of dreams in today’s world?

Doubt not, for it’s the fear of looking stupid.

Rooted in this problem is the fact that often the people who you think will make you feel stupid, or actually do criticise you might the very last people in the world qualified in the world to do so.

When Jenny Quan Zhiya, the high flying tech executive of a Chinese Car rental company decided it was time to go out on her own, most would have considered her venture doubtful. After all who wants to start a coffee chain to beat out Starbucks?

Especially considering the fact that Starbucks partnered with Alibaba to open exclusive Starbucks stores to make you feel that you are in 2040 already. But that did not stop Jenny Quan Zhiya, often known as the woman with the face of Buddha but works works like a thunder, from going after her dream of building up a brand to put up a major challenge against Starbucks.

Fast forward 18 months, Luckin Coffee has 2370 stores ie one store opened every 3.5 hours. It is the first Chinese unicorn in the coffee industry, and Jerry still has a long way to go.

But what if she thought at the start that this was a foolish endeavour?

What if she believed that Starbucks can never be put up to a challenge?

We would never have the worlds first cashless coffee chain with more than a 1000 stores. Most people are living lives in someone else’s terms. Living a life where they try their best to avoid fear, risk or resentment of any kind.

In most of the cases this has been culturally ingrained in us, other times it is childhood memories that haunt us into this hole.

Why you shouldn’t fear looking stupid?


‘Even if a man fails again and again to accomplish his purpose ( as he necessarily must until his weakness is overcome), the strength of the character gained will be measure of his true success. This character will be the basis for his future power and triumphs” – James Allen.

Failure is direct feedback. Failure is knowledge. Failure is true progress.
Life is not about failing or looking stupid, it is about improving a little every single day, because remember, we don’t have the lifespan of a firefly.

The recipe for permanent failure is the expectation of instantaneous success and the resentment that comes along because success never happens on your timeline.

“Do not focus on the outcome, focus on the effort you put into the process. This way you can feel less anxious and less scared, and redirect all that negative energy to building something positive.

Easier to say that done right? Yes, but it is the simple truth too.
“If someone is better at something, it is likely because they’ve failed at it more times than you” – Mark Mansonan

It’s illogical that people are fine looking good in mediocrity than taking the effort to look stupid on the grand road to success. These are the people who have taken embarrassment to be part of their process.

To summarise this with a beautiful quote – “You can’t be an important and life-changing presence for some people without also being a joke and embarrassment to others” -Mark Manson

Fail big, fail fast, all day, everyday.

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Prevent Suicidal Thoughts

As we reach mid-way of 2019, one shocking study we came across is the suicide rates among young people.

Suicide rates have reached its highest peak since the start of the 20th century. In the last twenty years most of the studies have focused female suicide rates, but the latest study confirms the worst fears that has been lurking around for a long time.

In 2018 alone, there was a 21 percent rise in suicide rates among male teens, from 2017. This study, conducted by the Harvard Medical School, conducted the study with the premise that even thought the female suicide rates have been increasing, the rise in the suicide rates among males is quite unprecedented.

Various studies have been conducted in the 15-19 age group for long. The collection of data among this age group has been extremely difficult simply due to the fact that the warning signs of depression ie. moodiness and withdrawal is often associated with hormonal changes that the teens go through. Also it is not possible to look out for pin-pointed symptoms, while looking out for depression. While for one person it may be manifestation of anger, in another it can be headaches while another can be excessive crying.


How can one prevent thoughts of suicide?

We gave it a long thought, discussed, read and here are our best suggestions.

1. It’s okay not to be okay

Yes. It’s okay not to be okay. “Happily ever after” might be the goal for everyone in life, but the simple fact is that you cannot ever cherish happiness or for that matter anything in life, without getting to know the opposite of it. When you are sad, or feel that you are in depression, take a moment to breathe out and understand that this is just a phase. Just like every phase, it moves on and all you have to do is last until it does.


2. Look out for others

Help others in need, for nothing will give you a bigger purpose that that. When you look out for others, you can yourself throw the negative thoughts of suicide out of your mind.

There are innumerable number of examples of people who have attempted suicide and failed at it, who comes out of the shell and understand the true value of life. A huge percentage of these people have dedicated their lives to helping people who are going through the same pain. Almost all of them acknowledge about how lucky they are to be present here in flesh and also that they find salvation in helping other people going through suicidal thoughts.


3. Seek Help

Periods, Sex and Suicide. These are the taboos in society that are never talked about. Please do not put yourself in this baseless ideology and make sure to seek help.

The professionals out there can break across the clutter of your thoughts/ symptoms and give you clear cut directions on how to improve your life. Their advice and help can be considered invaluable.


4. You are needed.

The feeling of being unwanted, the most common symptom of both suicidal thoughts and depression, is also one of the biggest lies that your mind plays on you. While your mind makes up these thoughts to protect you from perceived danger, its your responsibility to quieten it down and make it understand that you are truly needed <3


PS- If you are ever in need or seeking help, please do not hesitate to call me on +91-9819888048.

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Postpartum Depression is one of the most widely reported cases of depression in India. It is the depression that occurs after childbirth.

Although 10 million cases are reported in India every year, most of the women and sometimes even men going through this phase do not seek help.Unlike the baby blues, postpartum depression rarely disappears on its own. The condition can occur days or even months following the birth of your child and last for many weeks or months without treatment.

Let us first talk about the most important point first –


Postpartum Depression happens due to hormonal changes. It does not make you a bad person and for that reason do not be hard on yourself. The biological and bodily changes are the reason that you are facing this.
Postpartum Depression is curable. Please consult a doctor to get a detailed plan but below we are offering you a couple of points to keep in mind to cope with postpartum depression.

1.Eat and Sleep right


Consuming a diet rich in omega-3 fatty acids, which are found in oily fish such as herring and salmon, during pregnancy may lower the risk of postpartum depression. It is also a good alternative for treating postpartum depression

2.Also Nap

While many moms will be rolling the eyes here, it is really important you squeeze in as much sleep as possible.

3.Bond With Your Child


Emotional bonding is highly important between newborn babies and their
parents. The bonding eases out the child and it goes beyond just the initial days. Successful bonding allows the child to feel safe enough to develop fully, and having this bond will affect the way in which they communicate and form relationships throughout their life.

A secure bond forms when you tune in and respond to your child’s needs or emotional cues, such as picking them up, soothing them, and reassuring them when they cry. Being a dependable source of comfort shows your child to learn how to manage their own feelings and behaviors, which, in turn, helps to strengthen their cognitive development.

4. Start exercising


Multiple studies have shown that exercise can successfully combat postpartum depression. It helps ease out the symptoms as well as help you achieve a better psychological state.Walking is a good starting point, with the added bonus of being able to push your stroller at the same time. Aim to be active for around 20–30 minutes per day. Even exercising for 10 minutes can benefit your body.

5. Breast-Feeding


A study on breast-feeding concluded that it may reduce the risk of PPD. This protection can help you until the fourth month after delivery.

There have been some cases where women develop depression symptoms
while breastfeeding. Known as Dysmorphic Milk Ejection Reflex or D-MER, you might experience sudden feelings of sadness, agitation, or anger that last several minutes after your milk lets down.

Conclusion


A proper diet, constant consultation 6 months into the birth of the child, sleep and breastfeeding should keep PPD away.

If you are still feeling the effects of it, please do consult the help of a professional.

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Ways to Beat Depression

Depression is a state of mind. This devious one, whose side-effects can often discourage you from taking actions or seek help for recovering. People in depression experience lack of energy, low self-esteem and excitement levels that are taking a plunge on a daily basis.

For anyone going through anything relatable, understand that depression is curable. Just like taking medicines to kill off your diseases, understanding and reflecting on your mental state is how you’re calm your mind, and thus your body from depression.

Here are some ways you can curb out depression out your system :

1. Understand Self – Attacks

Depression is the time when your mind is on the attack mode on the self. You are made to believe that you good for nothing, or you are physically fit or a hundred possible attacks on the self.

WRITE THIS DOWN. Yes, write down each and every attack on the self.

Understand if these attacks on the self is fair. Understand if there is reason going behind these attacks. Understand if these weaknesses that you believe actually will make you weak in real life or is it just in your head?

If you understand that this voice inside of you is simply a sadistic version of yourself, then kill it immediately. It’s your true ENEMY.


2. What should you be angry at?

For many out there, depression is the lack of feelings. They don’t feel happy, angry or sad anymore. This happens when one spends too much of their lives suppressing some of the feelings which they were not comfortable feeling. This cycle leaves you with only one emotion and that is anger. Anger aimed at someone else or an event in your life, for which you are angry and disappointed with yourself.

Understand by going in deep about yourself, asking where this anger and negativity is coming from. Going to the root of the cause and getting a closure on it, can make a massive difference in your everyday lifestyle.


3. Things you used to do?

Used to love playing football everyday in the evenings? Shut in your room because you are depressed and hardly feel any energy to play?

Get out and play.

Doing things which you used to loved to do, is a great way to fight depression. Understand that it is state of mind and that it can be altered. Go out, breathe some fresh air, do what you love and replace the bad vibes with good memories. Things ALWAYS turn out to be for GOOD.


4. Watch a Funny Movie or Series

Don’t brush this away immediately. Nothing is more immensely powerful that this. Convincing your mind through laughter and smile, you are cutting your brain off the depression cycle it is going through. Do it enough number of times and your brain will be tickled with laughter, and out of depression.



5. Work

This is one of the best advices that one can get. Throw yourself at a passion of yours during depression. Vent your anger through it, beat yourself everyday at performing better than the previous day.

Go ALL OUT on your passion if you believe you are going through depression. When you do this, you are shifting all your focus onto it, drying out your brain to do the harmful self-talk and cutting yourself off the depression cycle.

None of these methods to cure depression will be of enough help, unless one understands that depression is a state of mind  and that it can be altered. Eat well, exercise and even though hard, try to get some sleep. Sleep can be a major problem during depression, thats why we suggest your exercise in the evenings and mornings- 15 min each. This routine can help you sleep in the night easily.


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Workplace Stress

As millennials are getting into jobs for the first time in their lives, they are facing for the first time in their lives – workplace stress.


Workplace stress is common. Though some organizations, like Alibaba and Tencent, warrant and demand it through 699 (6 days a week, 9am to 9pm) to achieve the tremendous growth that it has, workplace stress has recently turned into workplace depression. Stress is good for the body. It keeps you alert, motivated and primed to respond to danger. But too much stress may lead to depression in susceptible people.


Stress might be necessary for extracting the best out of oneself, but the moment it turns into depression, the employee can have serious health and life risks attached. More importantly, the productivity of an employee who is in depression can be questionable. The modern conveniences have made it easier to work easily at any time of the day. Unless you are loving
your work, replying to emails while walking your dog can easily turn into a stressful event.
Lack of Empathy among co-workers and bosses has been stated as the main reason for employees going into depression. Long hours and lack of vision of how the inputs of the employees are going into the betterment of the overall company output are some of the other most commonly stated reasons.
It can be safely assumed that work stress is inevitable. So what is important in this scenario is building a support system. Whether it might be in the form of a person or a journal where you can write down your thoughts and feelings. Writing on a piece of paper of what you are feeling
has never been more underestimated anymore than in this generation than any other. Writing down can help settle one’s thoughts, open up new ideas and figure out solutions to the problems that one is currently going through.

It is also important to understand the criticism. Criticism is inevitable in a growth-oriented organization. One should always possess a critical understanding of whether understanding is constructive or not. If you are observing an environment where non-constructive criticism is being offered more than anything, it is important that you do yourself a favor and let the management know it. If it persists it is always healthy that you select a different pathway. This is because the criticism being offered is not providing any value other than the obvious mental harm which comes with it.
Even in tough times, you should always remember to keep self-belief of your skills and value. Nothing is more important than keeping up your self-esteem. Human beings, by their very DNA, want to be successful and add value, in everything that they do. But in a workplace that is constantly changing and where the goals keep changing, regrets and burnout can easily set in. This, in turn, can lead to anxiety, depression and, if employees
have poor coping strategies, addiction issues like drinking and smoking. It may also increase employees’ risk of developing lifestyle-related illnesses such as diabetes.

How to cope up with this stress?
Understand the importance of self-talk, reflection through writing and finding someone to open up about the worries you are facing. Get in a routine, eat healthy, exercise. Take a walk when you can; a light jog or run can churn up endorphins to ease some depression symptoms. When you need to take a day off, you do that without fear. Come back to work when you can give it a 100 percent again.

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social media and depression

Social media got out of the small bubble of Orkut and Myspace into the lives of more than 2 billion people with the rise of Facebook and Twitter. It fueled further with the acquisitions Facebook made over the years of Instagram and Whatsapp.


The biggest users of social media today is that of Generation Y. Generation Y is defined as those born between the mid-1970s and the early 2000s. This population has grown up with a majority of the technological advances, such as computers and the Internet. They have established relationships with technology and strongly understand its various uses.

70% of Generation Y uses social networking sites and about 65% have an online profile. 63% of this population go online on a daily basis. Social Media addiction is real and it is a new age problem which we are still diagnosing.

The University of Maryland once conducted a study but blacking out 200 students of any type of social media for 24 hours. A major percentage of these students showed different types of anxiety, restlessness, and jitteriness throughout the day. With the rise of social media, our lives
have become less about accomplishments over a lifetime and rather about our everyday picture-worthy adventures on a 3*3 grid on Instagram.

Social media is also turning out to be a major distractor at work. The rise of notifications and the constant addition of devices from everywhere to the hand to the years, we are told to believe that every single notification is important enough not to be missed. Teens who are spending more than 5 hours a day online have been shown to have 71% more chances of dying in a suicide attempt. While this is a scary statistic, measures have recently started coming up to better serve the users of social media.


Is Social Media becoming unhealthy? Yes, it is. But is it all that bad and messed up? No.

All major social media applications have come up with the reminders and time spend features to better educate its users about the time they are spending on the applications. We can also not rule out the good effects of social media, in relaying information that was otherwise not available. The last 5 years saw the rise of hidden of the Gen Y, and they have successfully harnessed the power of social media through Instagram pages like KidsEatInColor to better parenting.


The one fact that we should understand is that Social Media is inevitable and the truth is that it is going to be there every single day you wake up. Avoiding social media completely in today’s world can be a little difficult.

We simply cannot deny the fact that it truly does help in connecting
in a much better manner than 10 years ago. The only way to counteract the bad effects of social media is putting up some guidelines for yourself, and strictly following it on a daily basis.

There are apps like Forest, used by companies around the world, to block out all of the social media during work hours. Putting up reminders of half an hour on all major social media applications can be the healthiest way to go forward.

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