Archive for October, 2009

Soft Drinks – Powerful Damage to Your Health

October 27th, 2009



One of the worst things you can do for your health is regularly consume soft drinks. When you understand what is in the average soft drink and what those ingredients can do, you may just want to stay as far away from them as you can!

The average soda has no nutritional value. Most contain only sugar, carbonated water, caramel coloring, flavoring, caffeine, and high fructose corn syrup. Dark colored soft drinks such as colas also contain phosphoric acid. Clear soft drinks (lemon-lime flavored) have citric acid.

Now, let’s look at some of those ingredients individually. The pH of phosphoric acid is very acidic, at 2.8. A substance of this pH can dissolve a nail in about four days. It can also clean the corrosion off a car battery. The only reason that the acid in soda doesn’t dissolve parts of your body after ingesting it is that your body makes a powerful base to neutralize it. Numerous studies have indicated that the sugar and acids in soda may cause tooth decay. In high concentrations, phosphoric acids block calcium absorption and flush calcium out of your bones, making them weak and prone to fracture. The phosphoric acid in soft drinks is also so strong that it reacts with the aluminum inside the cans, dissolving microscopic bits of aluminum right into the soda.

Many sufferers of Alzheimer’s disease have unusually high concentration of aluminum in their brain tissue, suggesting a link between aluminum toxicity and the disease. In some states, highway patrol officers keep cola in the trunks of their cars to clean blood off the highway after an accident. Cola drinks can also loosen rusted bolts nearly as well as silicone spray. In fact, the distributors of some cola drinks have been using it for over twenty years to clean the engines of their trucks. These trucks, by the way, must display hazardous material signs reserved for highly corrosive materials. According to some household cleaning websites, soda can even be sued as a toilet cleaner and grease remover.

An average can of soda has 35 mg of caffeine, and most energy drinks contain about 80 mg caffeine, along with other stimulants such as guarana and ginseng. Some energy drinks even contain up to 280 mg caffeine. This is triple the amount of caffeine found in a cup of coffee. These drinks boost heart rate, raise blood pressure, increase anxiety, dehydrate the body, and cause insomnia.

All soft drinks contain sugar, high fructose corn syrup, or artificial sweeteners. Most soft drinks contain around 13 teaspoons of sugar. Soda adds more sugar to a typical two-year-old’s diet than cookies, candy, and ice cream combined. High amounts of sugar entering the body quickly cause your pancreas to release high amounts of insulin, which turns the sugar into fat. To get rid of this fat, your body stops burning stored fat for energy and starts burning the new fat made from sugar. Since you don’t need that much energy, the new fat is stored in your fat cells, causing you to gain weight. In fact, the risk of childhood obesity increases 1.6 times with each additional daily serving of soda consumed. Over time, multiple daily insulin surges can cause insulin resistance and diabetes.

Diet sodas are not a safe option, either. Your body detects the sweet taste, and produces the same insulin response as in the non-diet drinks. Artificial sweeteners also contain chemicals that break down in the body and cause neurological damage.

Drinking the average soft drink adds 200 extra calories to your diet. If you drink two soft drinks per day, the extra calories alone will cause you to store an extra pound of fat every ten days. For every two soft drinks you consume, the average person would have to run six miles an hour for over an hour to burn them off.

Now, let’s look at a much better alternative beverage–water. Seventy-five percent of Americans are chronically dehydrated. In 37% of Americans, the thirst mechanism is so weak that it is often mistaken for hunger. (Any possible correlation to our obesity rates?) Even mild dehydration slows down one’s metabolism as much as 3%. Dehydration has been shown to be the number one trigger of daytime fatigue. A mere 2% drop in body water triggers sluggish short-term memory, trouble with basic math, and difficulties focusing on the computer screen or a printed page. Some research has shown that drinking 64-80 ounces of water daily can significantly ease back and joint pain for up to 80% of sufferers. Drinking 50 ounces of water daily has been shown to decrease risk of colon cancer by 45%, breast cancer by 79%, and bladder cancer by 50%.

The more you know about what you put into your body, the better able you will be to make healthy choices and feel better about yourself. Now, the next time you are thirsty, which will you grab—a soft drink or a glass of water?

References: Fredericks-Franklin, Rachel, DC. “How Much Water.” Handout, Jan 2002. Martino, Russell J., Ph.D. “Colas, Soft Drinks, and Your Health.” Found online at Total Health Dynamics, June 2007. “Ten Reasons to Stay Away from Sodas and Energy Drinks.” To Your Health, June 2007.

By: Jessica Heller, DC, CSCS

Developing Will Power and Self Discipline

October 25th, 2009



Most people admire and respect strong individuals, who have won great success by manifesting will power and self discipline. They admire people, who with sheer will power, self discipline and ambition, have improved their life, learned new skills, overcame difficulties and hardships, reduced their weight, rose high in their chosen field or advanced on the spiritual path.

The truth is that everyone can reach high levels of will power and self-discipline through a practical method of training. These inner power are not reserved for a few special people.

Will power and self discipline are two of the most important and useful inner powers in everyone’s life, and have always been considered as essential tools for success in all areas of life. They can be learned and developed like any other skill, yet, in spite of this, only few take any steps to develop and strengthen them in a systematic way.

What is will power?

It is the inner strength to make a decision, take action, and handle and execute any aim or task until it is accomplished, regardless of inner and outer resistance, discomfort or difficulties.

It bestows the ability to overcomes laziness, temptations and negative habits, and to carry out actions, even if they require effort, are unpleasant and tedious or are contrary to one’s habits.

What is self discipline?

It is the rejection of instant gratification in favor of something better. It is the giving up of instant pleasure and satisfaction for a higher and better goal.

It manifests as the ability to stick to actions, thoughts and behavior, which lead to improvement and success. Self-discipline is self-control, and it manifests in spiritual, mental, emotional and physical discipline.

The purpose of self-discipline is not living a limiting or a restrictive lifestyle. It does not mean being narrow minded or living like a fakir. It is one of the pillars of success and power. It bestows the inner strength to focus all your energy on your goal, and persevere until it is accomplished.

Both of these abilities are required for daily actions and decisions, and also for making major decisions and attaining major success. They are required for doing a good job, for studying, building a business, losing weight, bodybuilding and physical exercises, maintaining good relationships, changing habits, self improvement, meditation, spiritual growth, keeping and carrying out promises and for almost everything else.

One of the most simple and effective methods to develop will power and self-discipline is by refusing to satisfy unimportant and unnecessary desires. Everyone is constantly confronted and tempted by an endless stream of desires and temptations, many of which are not really important or desirable. By learning to refuse to satisfy every one of them, you get stronger.

Refusing and rejecting useless, harmful or unnecessary desires and actions, and intentionally acting contrary to your habits, sharpen and strengthen your inner strength. By constant practice your inner power grows, just like exercising your muscles at a gym increases your physical strength. In both cases, when you need inner power or physical strength, they are available at your disposal.

Here are a few exercises:

- Don’t read the newspaper for a day or two.

- Drink water when thirsty, in spite of your desire to have a soft drink.

- Walk up and down the stairs, instead of taking the lift.

- Get down from the bus one station before or after your destination, and walk the rest of the way.

- For one week, go to sleep one hour earlier than usual.

- If you like ice cream, don’t have any, for a day or two.

These are only a few examples of the many exercises that can be conducted in order to develop will power and self-discipline. You might think that practicing these exercises is being tough on yourself, but they add much to the storehouse of your inner strength. By following a systematic method of training you can reach far, have more control over yourself and your life, attain your goals, improve your life, and gain satisfaction and peace of mind.

Show and prove to yourself that you are strong and in control, and practice the above exercises for a little while, before passing any judgement.

© Copyright Remez Sasson

By: Remez Sasson

Chiranjeevi’s Soft Skills in India’s ‘Hard’ Politics!

October 23rd, 2009



The icon of post-globalisation politics has arrived at last. Chiranjeevi, popularly known as ‘Chiru’ to his fans and well wishers, finally put the curtains of suspense down and plunged into the world popular corrupt politics of Andhra Pradesh, which is one of the largest and alphabetically first state in India. Two hands only can create claps. If the other side is not in a confrontational mode, no one can do anything. The days of ‘verbal duel’ and ‘provocative’ politics are not possible with Chiranjeevi kind of politician. He has proved this with his ‘entry’ speech into politics. He has not criticized anybody. Moreover, he has given ‘ideal’ speech with his own ‘ideas’ with the idealism inspired by globally well known Social icons like Mother Theresa, B.R.Ambedkar, Mahatma Jyoti Rao Phule. He has praised the matinee-idol turned politician Dr.N.T.Rama Rao as his ideal and declared that Dr.A.P.J.Abdul Kalam, former President of India inspired his entry into politics. National level political parties in India like Congress and BJP are very much concerned about the entry of Chiranjeevi into Politics as it may impact adversely on their vote bank.

Incidentally, may be these are the days of Politicians who believe in Hanuman globally and locally also. Barack Obama is carrying the symbol of Hanuman with him during all his Presidential campaign and poised to become President of USA. Chiranjeevi, who started a new party called ‘PRAJA RAJYAM’ in Andhra Pradesh, India, is also a staunch devotee of Hanuman. Who knows, he may become Chief Minister of Andhra Pradesh after the coming elections.

Chiranjeevi has projected himself as one of the most ‘democratic’ politician, which endeared him to the people who like the style of living life with ‘Soft Skills’. He has asserted that he knows the pulse and problems of farmers and he too did farming and his father got five acres of farming land. He also projected himself as ‘apostle of solutions’ to all the social problems. He asserted that he will find out a solution to all the social and political evils with the consensus from all the ‘learned’ politicians joining him and also with due scientific studies and methods.

Post-globalisation, in the wake of the advent of IT industry in India which has created uproar across the globe grabbing the jobs of even Americans, Indian Managers are full of soft skills with their humble presentation of themselves to the world. Indian Managers are much in demand worldwide because of their exceptional soft skills or familial skills, which they imbibed with their disciplined upbringing with ethics, values and morals of Indian Society. Chiranjeevi represents these kinds of Managers who is able to manage soft-entries into hard waters of politics. Chiranjeevi has successfully managed his ‘grand’ entry into politics with a simple press meet. Chiranjeevi represents this class of middle class who are ambitious, smart working not hard working, positive, proactive, progressive, flamboyant and ideal in their presentation to the public. This very attractive and most sought after demanding quality of post-globalisation has reflected in the speech of Chiranjeevi while introducing himself to the public as well as old generation of politicians. Three decades of Chiranjeevi’s experience in the glamour world also helped him to present himself as the most civilized and sober politician of new age. Chiranjeevi has initiated an eventful entry into the world of politics by creating a benchmark with his ’signature speech’, which has stunned the old age politicians who always indulged themselves in confrontational and mud-slinging politics for more than six decades. Chiranjeevi’s soft skills are so hard that even Congress leaders are directing their cadre not to criticize him, as he is not in critical mode.

If one observes his kind of creating solid foundation and curiosity by continuously observing the feedback and reactions of the public by sending his ‘relatives’ only i.e. brother-in-law, brothers and his only ‘Mitr’ Dr.Mitra to understand the ‘pulse’ of people’s response, is exactly like cinematic way of creating a ’story line’ to take it to logical or illogical conclusion of climax. In the second phase, in one or two places where he attended public functions, he reiterated and asserted that he will announce his entry into politics in right time and created more anxiety among public with date and time of entry. Public waited anxiously as they wait for the police entry in the scene of crime in films.

Chiranjeevi’s leadership qualities and glamour quotient is evident in the way he attracted the not so popular leaders cum left wing lyricists and litterateurs like U.Sambasiva Rao, Katti Padma Rao, J.Gowtham, who represent the craving minds of people who are anxiously waiting for a leader who can help them grab power to show their might. Who knows ‘Mahajana Party’ till it merged with the not yet born party of Chiranjeevi? The response to Chiranjeevi kind of politics and his ‘enlightening’ entry, is more from the public or from his fans than from his ‘parent industry of glamour’, which helped him create this kind of mileage with his three decades of association.

Corporate world always reiterates that soft skills are most important than ‘hard skills’ for a job seeker to grab a job of his or her choice. Chiranjeevi has proved that even to carry on with the job of entering into politics also needed soft skills with his non-confrontational style of announcement of ‘enter’ politics and ‘exit’ cinemas.

The most important soft skills which results in ‘Chiranjeevi’ kind of success are Leadership Skills, Persuasive skills, Assertive Communication Skills, Initiating Skills, Sense of belonging and inclusiveness, Analytical abilities, People Management, Planning, Directing, Organising and controlling. Being an elder in the family has its own advantage and his humble and middle class family background helped him to learn and imbibe all these familial skills from his disciplined ‘Police’ father and encouraging mother who added fuel to the fire of his dreams. Chiranjeevi also announced and asserted that his fans and party workers are being trained in ‘Personality Development’ also, which reflected his style of managing politics. Chiranjeevi’s campaign to register voters also is a sign of his farsighted strategy to come out as a winner in these days of vote politics.

Like Hanuman, his favourite God, Chiranjeevi jumped into the devilish and murky waters of Politics. He has shown strong ‘Servant Leadership’ qualities like Hanuman, by expressing in public that ‘I am not your Nayak; but Sevak’. He has adopted the symbol ‘Sun God’ who is also happened to be the Guru of Hanuman. Hanuman came out successfully though he faced many obstacles while flying through the sea to find out Sita. The whole world is watching whether Chiranjeevi will excel as a Politician with his ‘cheerful’ nature in these days of ‘cruel’ politics. Hope Chiranjeevi will find his dream ‘pearl of power’ after scanning the ocean of politics and screening the hearts of the people and his fans for votes to become the second matinee idol who came to power defeating the most manipulating oppositions of Andhra Pradesh.

By: Challa S.S.J. Ram Phani