Vitamin F

I loved this and wanted to share it with you...         

Why do I have a variety of friends who are all so different in character? How can I get along with them all? I think that each one helps to bring out a "different" part of me. With one of them I am polite. With another I joke. I sit down and talk about serious matters with one. With another I laugh a lot. I listen to one friend's problems. Then I listen to another one's advice for me. My friends are like pieces of a jigsaw puzzle. When completed, they form a treasure box. A treasure of friends! They are my friends who understand me better than I understand myself. They're friends who support me through good days and bad. Real Age doctors tell us that friends are good for our health.
Dr. Oz calls them Vitamin F (for Friends) and counts the benefits of friends as essential to our well being. Research shows that people in strong social circles have less risk of depression and terminal strokes.

If you enjoy Vitamin F constantly you can be up to 30 years younger than your real age. The warmth of friendship stops stress and even in your most intense moments, it decreases the chance of a cardiac arrest or stroke by 50%.
I'm so happy that I have a stock of Vitamin F!

In summary, we should value our friends and keep in touch with them. We should try to see the funny side of things and laugh together and pray for each other in the tough moments.

Some of my friends are friends on line. I know I am part of theirs because their names appear on my computer screen every day and I feel blessed that they care as much for me as I care for them. If ever you don't see my name on your screen please remember that it is not because I have forgotten you but because something has happened to me. I know as we age we cannot be on line forever but we are making the best of it while we still can. While there is breath in me I will always keep in touch, as often as I can, and will not forsake you Ever.

Thank you for being one of my Vitamins!

Indians Abroad Who might not have made it to the top if thery where in Indians in India!

 The Blow are not my thoughts. I read this on a email fwd and I kind of agree with the facts that this email states. In India you cannot just come up with your own footsteps, you need few hands to help you....




WHY? is my question. I live outside India and I am proud to say that what ever I have earned let it be people, status and/or money is with my own deeds. I can say it proudly as I have worked hard for this....


Any way... there are loads of people who might disagree with me... 


Read below...

ALL INDIANS MUST READ THIS

I would like to sum up our performance in the 20th century in one
sentence.Indians have succeeded in countries ruled by whites, but failed in
their own.

This outcome would have astonished leaders of our independence movement. They
declared Indians were kept down by white rule and could flourish only under
self-rule. This seemed self-evident The harsh reality today is that Indians are
succeeding brilliantly in countries ruled by whites, but failing in India. They
are flourishing in the USA and Britain.

But those that stay in India are pulled down by an outrageous system that fails
to reward merit or talent, fails to allow people and businesses to grow, and
keeps real power with netas, babus, and assorted manipulators. Once Indians go
to white-ruled countries, they soar and conquer summits once occupied only by
whites.

Rono Dutta has become head of United Airlines, the biggest airline in the world.
Had he stayed in India, he would have no chance in Indian Airlines. Even if the
top job there was given to him by some godfather, a myriad netas, babus and
trade unionists would have ensured that he could never run it like United
Airlines.

Vikram Pundit has become head of Citigroup, which operates Citibank one of the
largest banks in the world.

Rana Talwar has become head of Standard Chartered Bank, one of the biggest
multinational banks in Britain, while still in his 40s. Had he been in India, he
would perhaps be a local manager in the State Bank, taking orders from babus to
give loans to politically favoured clients.

Rajat Gupta is head of Mckinsey, the biggest management consultancy firm in the
world. He now advises the biggest multinationals on how to run their business.
Had he remained in India he would probably be taking orders from some sethji
with no qualification save that of being born in a rich family.

Lakhsmi Mittal has become the biggest steel baron in the world, with steel
plants in the US, Kazakhstan, Germany, Mexico, Trinidad and Indonesia. India's
socialist policies reserved the domestic steel industry for the public sector.
So Lakhsmi Mittal went to Indonesia to run his family's first steel plant there.
Once freed from the shackles of India, he conquered the world.

Subhash Chandra of Zee TV has become a global media king, one of the few to beat
Rupert Murdoch. He could never have risen had he been limited to India, which
decreed a TV monopoly for Doordarshan. But technology came to his aid: satellite
TV made it possible for him to target India from Hong Kong. Once he escaped
Indian rules and soil, he soared.

You may not have heard of 48-year old Gururaj Deshpande. His communications
company, Sycamore, is currently valued by the US stock market at over $ 30
billion, making him perhaps one of the richest Indians in the world. Had he
remained in India, he would probably be a babu in the Department of
Telecommunications.

Arun Netravali has become president of Bell Labs, one of the biggest research
and development centres in the world with 30,000 inventions and several Nobel
Prizes to its credit. Had he been in India, he would probably be struggling in
the middle cadre of Indian Telephone Industries. Silicon Valley alone contains
over 100,000 Indian millionaires.

Indra Krishnamurthy Nooyi has become since 2006 the CEO Of PepsiCo Inc., a
Fortune 500 company.


Sabeer Bhatia invented Hotmail and sold it to Microsoft for $ 400 million.Victor
Menezes is number two in Citibank. Shailesh Mehta is CEO of Providian, a top US
financial services company. Also at or near the top are Rakesh Gangwal of US
Air, Jamshd Wadia of Arthur Andersen, and Aman Mehta of Hong Kong Shanghai
Banking Corp.

In Washington DC, the Indian CEO High Tech Council has no less than 200 members,
all high tech-chiefs. While Indians have soared, India has stagnated. At
independence India was the most advanced of all colonies, with the best
prospects.

Today with a GNP per head of $370, it occupies a lowly 177th position among 209
countries of the world. But poverty is by no means the only or main problem.
India ranks near the bottom in the UNDP's Human Development Index, but high up
in Transparency International's Corruption Index.

The neta-babu raj brought in by socialist policies is only one reason for India
's failure. The more sordid reason is the rule-based society we inherited from
the British Raj is today in tatters. Instead money, muscle and influence matter
most.

At independence we were justly proud of our politicians. Today we regard them as
scoundrels and criminals. They have created a jungle of laws in the holy name of
socialism, and used these to line their pockets and create patronage networks.
No influential crook suffers. The Mafia flourish unhindered because they have
political links.

The sons of police officers believe they have a licence to rape and kill (ask
the Mattoo family).Talent cannot take you far amidst such rank mis-governance.


We are reverting to our ancient feudal system where no rules applied to the
powerful. The British Raj brought in abstract concepts of justice for
all,equality before the law. These were maintained in the early years of
independence. But sixty years later, citizens wail that India is a lawless land
where no rules are obeyed.

I have heard of an IAS probationer at the Mussorie training academy pointing out
that in India before the British came, making money and distributing favours to
relatives was not considered a perversion of power, it was the very rationale of
power. A feudal official had a duty to enrich his family and caste.

Then the British came and imposed a new ethical code on officials. But, he
asked, why should we continue to choose British customs over desi ones now that
we are independent?

The lack of transparent rules, properly enforced, is a major reason why talented
Indians cannot rise in India. A second reason is the neta-babu raj, which
remains intact despite supposed liberalisation. But once talented Indians go to
rule-based societies in the west, they take off. In those societies all people
play by the same rules, all have freedom to innovate without being strangled by
regulations.

This, then, is why Indians succeed in countries ruled by whites, and fail in
their own.

Top five regrets of the dying

Top five regrets of the dying | Life and style | guardian.co.uk

There was no mention of more sex or bungee jumps. A palliative nurse
who has counselled the dying in their last days has revealed the most
common regrets we have at the end of our lives. And among the top,
from men in particular, is 'I wish I hadn't worked so hard'.

Bronnie Ware is an Australian nurse who spent several years working in
palliative care, caring for patients in the last 12 weeks of their
lives. She recorded their dying epiphanies in a blog called
Inspiration and Chai, which gathered so much attention that she put
her observations into a book called The Top Five Regrets of the Dying.

Ware writes of the phenomenal clarity of vision that people gain at
the end of their lives, and how we might learn from their wisdom.
"When questioned about any regrets they had or anything they would do
differently," she says, "common themes surfaced again and again."

Here are the top five regrets of the dying, as witnessed by Ware:

1. I wish I'd had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the
life others expected of me.

"This was the most common regret of all. When people realise that
their life is almost over and look back clearly on it, it is easy to
see how many dreams have gone unfulfilled. Most people had not
honoured even a half of their dreams and had to die knowing that it
was due to choices they had made, or not made. Health brings a freedom
very few realise, until they no longer have it."

2. I wish I hadn't worked so hard.

"This came from every male patient that I nursed. They missed their
children's youth and their partner's companionship. Women also spoke
of this regret, but as most were from an older generation, many of the
female patients had not been breadwinners. All of the men I nursed
deeply regretted spending so much of their lives on the treadmill of a
work existence."

3. I wish I'd had the courage to express my feelings.

"Many people suppressed their feelings in order to keep peace with
others. As a result, they settled for a mediocre existence and never
became who they were truly capable of becoming. Many developed
illnesses relating to the bitterness and resentment they carried as a
result."

4. I wish I had stayed in touch with my friends.

"Often they would not truly realise the full benefits of old friends
until their dying weeks and it was not always possible to track them
down. Many had become so caught up in their own lives that they had
let golden friendships slip by over the years. There were many deep
regrets about not giving friendships the time and effort that they
deserved. Everyone misses their friends when they are dying."

5. I wish that I had let myself be happier.

"This is a surprisingly common one. Many did not realise until the end
that happiness is a choice. They had stayed stuck in old patterns and
habits. The so-called 'comfort' of familiarity overflowed into their
emotions, as well as their physical lives. Fear of change had them
pretending to others, and to their selves, that they were content,
when deep within, they longed to laugh properly and have silliness in
their life again."

What's your greatest regret so far, and what will you set out to
achieve or change before you die?