Reading, a tool for reducing stress!

I am going to recommend reading for stress reduction. I have used it to cure and reduce my stress in past couple of weeks. I was like madly searching for novels, and I completed like 9 novels, 3 days at max  for each. To me reading novels keeps your mind busy. People say that reading mostly  pleasurable novels is helpful, but sometimes reading depressive novels can lead you into thinking that your problems are much smaller than the problems of the charcters of these books.

According to research done at Sussex university, reading, even for six minutes, can reduce stress effectively. Psychologists believe this is because the human mind has to concentrate on reading and the distraction of being in a literary world eases the tensions in muscles and the heart. The research was carried out on a group of volunteers by consultancy Mindlab International at the University of Sussex.Their stress levels and heart rate were increased through a range of tests and exercises before they were then tested with a variety of traditional methods of relaxation.Reading worked best, reducing stress levels by 68 per cent. Dr Lewis, who conducted the test, said: "Losing yourself in a book is the ultimate relaxation. "This is particularly poignant in uncertain economic times when we are all craving a certain amount of escapism. "It really doesn't matter what book you read, by losing yourself in a thoroughly engrossing book you can escape from the worries and stresses of the everyday world and spend a while exploring the domain of the author's imagination. "This is more than merely a distraction but an active engaging of the imagination as the words on the printed page stimulate your creativity and cause you to enter what is essentially an altered state of consciousness." Studies reveal that listening to music reduces stress,  having cup of tea of coffee lower it  by 54 per cent and taking a walk by 42 per cent.

Stop and ponder

Sitting in the class where we were talking about religions a memory awakened in my mind. In order to make me understand that why do we need religion, my mother used to tell me when I was a child that whenever we buy a machine we are given a manual with it which explains how the machine works and what it can do, In the same way God is our Manufacturer and He has given us religion, and therefore a guide of how to spent our lives. We are made above all organisms because our brains not only process information, but also the ability to gain knowledge. Just because we have such a brain we go on in our lives and try to destroy nature. Just another day I was sitting in my geology class and my teacher, in a very light mood, said that an earthquake is nothing more than the relaxation of earth. This made me think of how trivial we are against all the things made by God. We cannot save ourselves from fire, water, earthquakes, volcanic eruption etc, not even from a mosquito with only one leg (I am referring to the death of the infidel Namrood by a one legged mosquito).  We are so trivial things and yet so proud of ourselves. We say that stars are not ever existing entities and they are continuously loosing energy. Why don’t we remember that our sun is also a star and is going to burn out someday? Like all things, the solar system will die.

We all know these things yet we behave like we own this world. We fight, we gamble, we put our elders into old houses, we lie, we cheat, we back bite, we make fun of others, we bully others, we hurt the people who love us and we do so many things that we can not even list them. We have very little time in our lives which is given to us so that we can please our God by doing good deeds. Good deeds not  only include  praying, but they also include helping others, being honest, following the rules, taking care of old people, taking care of the poor, helping others, etc.

We all aim to be a doctor, engineer, environmentalist, lawyer, G.M,  to be famous, to have a big car and lots and lots of money, but what we do not aim is to be a better person. When we do our daily routine by keeping it in mind that we want to please God and help His creations, then all the work that we do in our daily routine becomes a prayer.

Thinking Environmentally!

As I have told before, I am a student of Environmental Sciences. I chose this field more out of chance than choice. But with time I have started to think environmentally!



So true:-P

This picture shows that I have started thinking like an environmentalist. Really, it's just been 2.3 million years since human life began and look at the damage we have done already. We have intervened with everything. If ethicist say that all our policies are anthropocentric, then yes we are selfish. People throw the rappers in an area without laws for environmental protection, but where there are laws they act like the most civilized people. It was shocking to know that we are eliminating species at the rate of one specie per hour. This rate is alarming. We care about species that are not even known because their extinction can cause problem in evolution processes. Ecosystem has an intricate balance which  needs to be maintained.
We have to think about environment because nature is a gift. We cannot create replicas of nature. Due to ozone layer depletion our atmosphere is having dangerous effects. Global warming is also a very harmful phenomenon. By pollute freshwater we are lessening the 2% available water we have. We have to think before it is too late.
Here are a few things which can protect environment:
1. Every person should plant 1 tree in his or her   life.
2. Water use should be managed properly. Donot waste 2 gallons of water to brush teeth:-p.
3. Electricity should be used sustainably.
4. Food should be used in order to satisfy need rather than wants.
5. Air conditioners should be used at minimum  so that further depletion of ozone layer can be stopped.
5. Detergents should be avoided and eco friendly products should be used.
6. Use of nonrenewable resources such as fossil fuel should be done at minimum.