Soul sprinkles

Wonderful poems (inspirational and motivational):

(my pen name for poetry name is Aufie Zophy)

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Some beautiful inspirational quotes:

https://afishwithawish.blogspot.com/2020/08/a-fish-with-wish-whole-story.html

A fantastic short story:

Simply some essays about good things:

https://hansvro.wixsite.com/mysite-1/skies-seen-by-hans

Wednesday, 19 July 2023

In Japan, in the 1980s, Japanese doctors saw a lot of depression and high stress levels in their patients. They wondered if they get their patients back to nature, whether that would be helpful and they did research on the topic. Taking a "forest bath" was not only beneficial to the mental health of the patient but also physically the patients experienced lots of benefits in terms of blood pressure, heart rate and even blood sugar levels.

Forest bathing is not a hike for physical fitness or exploring the woods, it is merely spending time in nature, in the forest (or the park) and get your senses (at least 4 of them) to experience the calmness and serenity of nature. For sure visually is the easiest. Just taking the time to observe the beauty of a tree, the wonderful crown with the plentiful adorable leaves, the stem and the texture of the bark and the amazing roots. But then we can close our eyes and try to hear the sounds, the sounds from far away but also the sounds of the tree (the wind in the leaves, the birds in the crown,...) and feel the bark of the tree. Let the energy flow. Feel the air on our cheeks, in our hair. Taking a deep breath and feeling the air in our nose in our throat and in our chest. Taking in the smells of the tree, the smell of the woods, ... If we happen to find a chestnut, we can even taste the forest.

I love walks in the forest, I love walks on the beach. even before I read about the research of forest baths, I knew that walks in nature have powerful healing properties, especially for our soul, but also for our body, mind and heart.

If you have not tried a forest bath, please make some time for a walk in nature without other objective than to take in the beauty of it all. Not for fitness, not for exploration, just to enjoy the great pleasure of spending pure time in nature.

Monday, 10 July 2023

Dips and peaks

Our life is often made up of dips and peaks.

External circumstances vary and they may be not completely under our own control. But they can get so bad that we end up in a deep dip. I think that all of us are susceptible to some degree of dips. I do not use the term depression here, which is uncontrollable sadness, sometimes due to an organic brain problem, while during our deepest dips we may feel quite depressed.

A very strong characteristic of "dips" is that we do not enjoy the things we used to enjoy during other periods in our life. Amazing sunrises or sunsets may make your soul feel afloat during normal days. When we are in a dip, we notice the beauty but the beauty has trouble getting in, into our heart, into our soul. Have you experienced something like that? Things we love to do in normal days and bring us easily in a state of flow, may lose a lot of their appeal and we may hardly feel like even start doing them. Generally our energy levels may be low.

It is not easy to get out of a dip. But I think a reasonable start is to write down our feelings and become fully aware that we are in a dip. When we do that we start to remember that we have not always been like this and we may start to explore the reason or reasons why we feel like that. We blame it on a lack of energy or mild ailments that have occurred, but these may be a consequence rather than a cause of our dip. Let us search for the real, real cause(s) and they are often external factors that happened, that are not fully under our control.

These things may be not reversible or they may be. They may be a necessary thing in our life so we can move on to a next stage a next big thing, another door to be opened. We may not be able to see how we will get out of the problem(s) but out we will get. I think it is important that we do not keep trying to find joy in the things that brought us joy before, because the frustration of not getting the same joy as before may bring us down more. I really feel that the best thing to do, is to make it quiet within. We need some alone-time, on the beach, in the woods and think silently what is the best approach to our condition at this point. If you have faith, prayer may be truly useful. Not the prayer we say without thinking, but a prayer where we truly ask for guidance from our Creator, or guidance from the universe.

We may not understand why the bad situation occurred, but a sincere wish, prayer and desire for strength and a deep reflection in nature on what is the best way to build up our strength may be really helpful

If you are in dip right now, please pray for strength and make some time to reflect in nature.

If you are at a peak, right now, please write down about your aspirations, your motivation, your dreams, because if we do, these writings may be a good guide for us during a dip as well.

No matter what, I wish you strength and here comes a small poem of hope:

It is dark, no moon, no light
Just darkness, a starless sky
The wind blows, the waves break
A single firefly passes by

Soon the firefly is gone
Leaving me in the darkest of nights
The tiny fly made me anticipate
A sunrise with the finest of lights

Aufie Zophy

Wednesday, 10 May 2023

Fragrance

Making someone else feel good about themselves is like planting a flower along the path of your life.

Making someone else feel small or stupid is like throwing some toxic waste on your life's path.

If we look back at our yesterday's path does it carry the wonderful fragrance of flowers or does it smell more like toxic waste.

It does not matter too much. What really matters, is to ensure that today is filled with the amazing fragrance of making people feel good. 😀

Enjoy the path.

Tuesday, 9 May 2023

Number 1000

This is my 1000th post in this blog. It started in 2014 and I have written down quite a lot of ideas. Many of these ideas are bright, some may sound a bit eccentric, but I am sure that most can speak to the heart and soul of many people. Please do visit the archive after you have enjoyed today's soul sprinkle.

While we are in the game of life and society, we are sometimes in the illusion that we need to be equal to others, or if not equal, superior, but definitely not inferior. That game of comparing our situation with that of others, ignores and even deprives us of our own uniqueness. We are simply unique human beings, each with our own gifts, own talents, own limitations and that makes unique. We can simply NOT compare with others. It is time now to get out of the game of equality, superiority, inferiority. We are unique and that is what counts.

Let us celebrate our uniqueness and if we do so, we will move effortlessly towards abundance, love and prosperity. Not to be superior or equal to anyone else but to have this wonderful life of purpose leading to peace of mind and true happiness while making a positive difference to the world we live in. If every day for ten years we make a small positive difference, think how big this thing becomes over a period of ten years.

Enjoy, ...

Saturday, 6 May 2023

Watering plants

There are a few rules for watering plants effectively, like the best time is early in the morning; it is better to give fewer times a lot of water than more frequently small amounts; and a few other tips that are easily available on the web.

I am not writing this to provide tips for watering plants, but I want to address the simple joy it brings. We cannot water plants without imagining how it will benefit them. And that is such a joy. Even if we do something good for plants, the joy is ours as much as the benefits that go to the plants.

And that is so if we treat animals right as well. Feeding a stray cat, taking care of a pet. So much happiness hidden in these simple acts.

But the biggest joy and peace of mind still comes, when we do something nice for our fellow human beings. Random kind acts are so valuable to our peace of mind and happiness that it is difficult to live without them. Whether we are on the receiving or giving end, it always brings joy to both the giver and the receiver of kindness. Let us be fully aware this giant truth for the coming hour, the coming day, the coming week,...

😃

Monday, 10 April 2023

Sharing dreams

All of us tend to have a bigger purpose, aspirations of reaching and achieving some higher goals. If we keep this all to ourselves, we risk to lose our lofty goals along the way. But the risk to lose our lofty goals along the way is still much bigger if we share our bold plans with our family and friends.

Our purpose, our goals tend to carry some of our passion and attention. Attention and passion will make us see opportunities that will be met along the way. We are in charge and make it happen.

Once we share our plans with our close relatives or friends, it is not unlikely that we will get their critical opinion and express their disbelief about the mere possibility of our goals. Then our ego has to come in and start defending our goals. It is out of the realm of the passion and drive, and becomes an ego undertaking, proving our family members/friends we can do it.They may create doubts and point out obstacles that may or may not be there. Even if the obstacles are there and they are real, we may be able to deal with them when we encounter them.

So while ideally, sharing your dreams and lofty aspirations, may lead to extra motivation, more often the simple of act of sharing may push you in a defensive position, taking away the enthusiasm and energy that are so necessary in achieving anything.

Keep dreaming big, aiming high. But think twice before announcing your dream to the world.

Saturday, 8 April 2023

Treasures

Where do we build our treasures?

Do we build them in bank accounts? In gold vaults? In jewelry? In assets?

Our heart will be exactly there.

Do we build them in the realm of kindness, peace and beauty?

Our heart will be exactly there.

A bit of my heart is with my bank account, a bit in my assets

But the treasure hidden in my soul, carries my heart too.

The treasure of true virtue, of honesty and kind acts

The treasure of wisdom. I want to build them as much

as I desire that amount in my bank, my list of possessions

Ignoring the importance of physical needs may be not a wise thing to do

But ignoring the treasures of virtue and love within our soul is worse.

I pray to my Creator,

that I may appreciate and be grateful for the abundance that is around us that I may appreciate and work also on these soul experiences, on these soul moments

I love, I love, I love.

Lots of love from my heart to you.

Have a wonderful next minute, next hour, next week, next year :)

Friday, 7 April 2023

Changing the world, we do it!

When I was young, I wanted to change the world.

And sadly, in my early adulthood, I was (almost) convinced that I could not change the world.

But that is the biggest fallacy that we tell our youths.
We try to take away their ideals.
We try to "make them come to their senses"

We want them to see "reality"

I put the phrases above between double inverted commas because they are extremely wrong.

The worst thing we have done to this world, is not the wars we have fought, it is not the pollution of the seas; the very worst thing we have done to this world is making large numbers of young dynamic people with lofty great ideals lose these ideals in their early twenties, because we think they will be disappointed if we do not make them live up to our perception of reality.

If all youths with fantastic ideals and aspirations to make a huge positive change in this world, would have been encouraged to keep believing and live up to their ideals, the world would have been a very different place at this moment.

Am I a dreamer? Did I lost touch with reality, making the above statements? The answer is NO.

Every little thing we do in our lives is changing the world, for the worse or the better:

- yesterday i cut into the lane of another car; the driver became visibly upset with me; His wife and children were in his car. The upset driver spread negative emotions to all in the car and a spiral of negativity and problems emerged. I made my day a bit worse and their day a bit worse. I had changed a small part of the world I live in for the worse.

- today, I gave way to two girls standing in the middle of the road, waiting to cross the lane I was driving on to be clear of traffic. I stopped the car and let them cross. The smiles on their faces were wonderful. The small act of giving way, changed my day, their day and it may have caused a spiral of positivity in the small part of the world I live in.

If we are aware that we change the world we live in constantly by all we do and say, we may choose much more positivity than what we do or say routinely, impulsively.

Let us not discourage our youths, in the name of being "realistic". Instead let us inspire them to go and make lots of positive changes in the world on a daily basis and even if only two in a hundred thousand of these small changes lead to something bigger, just a few positive changes per day will result in a huge change over a life time.

The ideals, I had in my teens are more alive today than ever. I want to change the world. I want to make small positive changes every day. At the end of my life, I want to be happy with the life I lived and that will depend on how many small positive changes I made :)

Stopping the overthinking

We had done a research project on burn out among caregivers of severely disabled people. One person had a particular bad burn out and asked to get more help. The coordinator of the home care program, our psychologist, one psychology student and myself (a medic who had coordinated the research) were attending the session.

The person opened up and stated her problem clearly. We probed into what she had done or tried to do about it, and tried to help her think and discover some ways to find relief. When she got stuck in the process, some gentle suggestions were made, but 45 min into the session, it seemed we were making either very slow or no progress.

I had been mainly listening. I had been thinking what would be best to say, if I was to participate in the counseling, but I had no clue what to say or how to start.

Then I prayed. I emptied my mind and asked, with the deepest desire to help the caregiver, for help from our Creator. I got mentally disconnected from the session for awhile and then an idea entered my mind which I shared with the group in an empathic way and quite suddenly we seemed to make real progress.

I feel I had been overthinking for 45 min and after calming my mind through a heartfelt prayer, an idea seemed to cause a breakthrough. I think that for some of us, sincere and heartfelt prayer may at times, be an effective way to tap into positive intuition. :).

Saturday, 25 March 2023

Faster

The sun was moving faster
Than the clouds
A spectacle of superb skies
Rapidly changing

A red ball coming out
Of the deep sea
But quickly hiding
Behind a band of gray

The thunderous moisture
Getting orange spots;
Soon yellow rays
Seeping through

Bright areas of water
Glittering close to the horizon
And then the clouds suddenly
moved faster than the sun

Aufie Zophy

A small poem after an early morning beach walk.

Mornings have really some magic in them

The beauty of the light, of the trees, of the skies,

It feels like supernatural almost

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A look at some beautiful skies:

Beautiful flowers:

Wonderful poems (inspirational and motivational):

(my pen name for poetry name is Aufie Zophy)

-----

Some beautiful inspirational quotes:

https://afishwithawish.blogspot.com/2020/08/a-fish-with-wish-whole-story.html

A fantastic short story:

Simply some essays about good things:

https://hansvro.wixsite.com/mysite-1/skies-seen-by-hans

Saturday, 11 February 2023

Time for...

What do we use the bulk of our time for? A simple question that propped up in my mind.

While I have a deep conviction that pure peace and happiness lies more in altruism than in anything else, I have to admit that only fragments of my time are truly spent in selfless service.

Life is time and time is limited.

While we need to spend time for self development, self renewal at all aspects of life (physical, intellectual, emotional, spiritual,...), i decided to search in mind actively how i can optimize the use of my time.

I want to spend a bit more time in altruism, not the self aggrandizing type of philanthropy, but in simple kindness, in going the extra mile, in simple selfless service...

Saturday, 14 January 2023

The blessing in disguise

Quite often we experience setbacks that seem not fair at all. But quite often too, if years later we look back at the setbacks, they seemed to be necessary events for something better to happen. Here I share not a personal example, but an experience about a surgeon who did not complete his contract.

Our university hospital is located in a rural area of Malaysia. A few years ago we were so lucky to get an Italian Pediatric cardiac surgeon (a surgeon performing heart operations on children) who was very skilled. Within a year, he performed over a hundred complex surgeries on hearts of children and the mortality rate was lower than that of well established centers in the most developed nations.

The setback, we experienced was that his wife could not get used to the place where we are located and a family crisis forced our superbly skilled surgeon to break off his three-year contract after just more than a year. At that moment we felt pity for our patients, born with heart problems, since that would mean that we had again to send such patients to a far away center where the waiting list was sometimes long. The safety of the patients with the most severe heart problems was again compromised to a certain extent.

But what happened then? Our lovely Italian surgeon made arrangements with a charity organization to get a whole team of very well trained staff involved in cardiac surgery for children to come over to our place, up to three times per year. So, on these occasions, many of patients received their very much needed surgery, and our very own team of staff involved in these procedures, has had the benefits over the years to learn and keep learning new skills so that now our own team can perform quite a number of procedures by themselves and the learning process is still ongoing after more than 6 years.

So what happened more than 6 years ago, while definitely a serious setback at the moment, has turned out not too bad in the long run.

Many times, in the moment of a setback we cannot see what will happen next. If you get despondent or very depressed after a major setback, think about the high likelihood that within a few years time, you will look back and see how the doors closed, resulted in new opportunities, new open doors to make the situation better. :)

Friday, 30 December 2022

Dealing with harsh comments

Too many times people hurt us with harsh remarks.

But the way we handle harsh remarks can change the hurt. It can reduce it to virtually zero. The important premise is to understand why the person giving the harshness to us, is choosing harshness instead of friendly criticism in a constructive way.

The people who go around scolding others, are generally not too happy themselves. All too often they crave for being on top, for being better than others. And their, perhaps subconscious, perception is that if they put others down, it shows their own superiority. Nothing it further from the truth. Harshness, scolding merely is revealing our weakness.

Scolding is done by people with a twisted personality. If we are at the receiving end of a good scolding, we can listen to the content and see if we can learn something from it. But we do not have to let the harshness into our heart. I hear you think, that is easier said than done.

But in fact, it is not too difficult. It easy to feel pity for a person with a twisted back. It is also not too difficult to feel pity for a person with a personality so twisted that they feel the need to shout to appease their own ego into a feeling of superiority. If we understand that we can choose to pity that person for his or her inappropriate behavior, everything changes.

We do not have to accept the harshness, we do not have to let it into our heart. If I give you a pen and you refuse to take the pen, the pen remains with me. If someone calls you stupid and you do not accept the insult, you do not let it in, the insult, the stupidity stays with the giver of the insult.

So next time, you meet some harshness, do listen to the message inside the harshness. Then pity the person for his twisted personality, his lack of insight in how to create a harmonious relationship, do not let the insult into our heart and not even into our mind, let them keep the words they say and go on with our journey.

Try to practice this little gem of wisdom. It is a great way to deal with harsh people intending to hurt others.

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A look at some beautiful skies:

Beautiful flowers:

Wonderful poems (inspirational and motivational):

(my pen name for poetry name is Aufie Zophy)

-----

Some beautiful inspirational quotes:

https://afishwithawish.blogspot.com/2020/08/a-fish-with-wish-whole-story.html

A fantastic short story:

Simply some essays about good things:

https://hansvro.wixsite.com/mysite-1/skies-seen-by-hans

ENJOY

Tuesday, 27 December 2022

Lovely trees

I love trees. Do you love them too?

Just now at 10.15 PM, i thought for awhile about my day.

I became aware I had not taken even a minute to watch a tree.

So I went out, put on some garden lights and watched

I watched the beautiful majestic crown of a tree

Then its stem and I mused about how deep the roots must go.

The silence of the night, the scantiness of the garden lights

gave the whole scene a touch of magic.

It felt like my soul was ready to break its silence

and talk to me about the endless wisdom hidden

in the universe.

I love trees, do you too?

Sunday, 25 December 2022

A bit of rain and sun

A little ladybird sitting on the top of a low tree casts a shadow on the rose.
A dew drop tear rolls down the petals, a helpless fall
The soils gets wet, but the tear does not relieve its thirst.
Then there is a bit of rain, a bit of sun and the scene is filled with joy

Dear Friends,

I hope you enjoyed reading the little 'poem' above.

Sometimes a series of events paints a gloomy picture in our life

And then a small thing sometimes turns the tide.

A bit of rain, a bit of sun, are sometimes all we needed.

The key lies in being aware of the beauty in a bit of rain and sun...

Sunday, 11 December 2022

Bliss

Swallowing every day a bit of bliss, I try
Soft amazing light in the pastel morning sky
The song of a bird, singing passionately
The outline of a gently swaying tree

But if I wake late, all this beauty I may miss.
Then, at work, I still try to find some bliss
In the superb opportunities for caring
In all the love and kindness we are sharing

Still if at work, I was only busy and stressed,
The evening may be super blessed
The love of family, a toddler's kiss
Truly, every day, I try to get a bit of bliss.

For every day, every hour, I wish too
a truckload filled with bliss for you.

Friday, 2 December 2022

Kind math

If out of the more than 7 billion people in the world

there would be only one million people

who try every day to perform three random kind acts

That would amount to 3 million kind acts per day.

or more than a billion kind acts in a year.

How nice our world would have suddenly become

Let us start to become a member of the first 1 million.

If we are persistent the number will snowball

to many hundreds of millions soon...

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A look at some beautiful skies:

Beautiful flowers:

Wonderful poems (inspirational and motivational):

(my pen name for poetry name is Aufie Zophy)

-----

Some beautiful inspirational quotes:

https://afishwithawish.blogspot.com/2020/08/a-fish-with-wish-whole-story.html

A fantastic short story:

Simply some essays about good things:

https://hansvro.wixsite.com/mysite-1/skies-seen-by-hans

ENJOY

Friday, 18 November 2022

The mountain gone

My soul has no hands and no feet

but it ran over the mountain

that stood between you and me

It dug a hole in the soil

and planted a fine young tree

The roots soaked up all earth

that had made up the mountain

Soon the mountain was gone

and a majestic tree

provided some shadow

to love forever, you and me

in perfect harmony

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Small poem from the deepest of my heart.

Our soul can move mountains, if only we let it.

Harmony is possible, if we want it hard enough

Monday, 14 November 2022

The big pleasure

The big pleasure of giving

The big pleasure of serving

The big pleasure of loving

The big pleasure of kindness

WHO wants still to suffer in greed

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A look at some beautiful skies:

Beautiful flowers:

Wonderful poems (inspirational and motivational):

(my pen name for poetry name is Aufie Zophy)

-----

Some beautiful inspirational quotes:

https://afishwithawish.blogspot.com/2020/08/a-fish-with-wish-whole-story.html

A fantastic short story:

Simply some essays about good things: