Cried after watching  P.S. I Love You or The Vow? Romantic movie with a touch of tragic stories, it can easily stir the emotions. However, the effect could be positive for your relationship with your partner.

Sad stories in the movies nuanced love it makes you think about personal relationships. The effect, you can be more positive view on relationships and more attention is being undertaken. This is according to research by a team from Ohio State University, USA.

The interesting thing is, you as the audience experienced a kind of film involved. For example, assume “my life is much better than the characters in the film”. According to Silvia Knobloch-Westerwick, head of research, a negative mood can make someone do introspection.

“Meanwhile, the positive emotions generally signal that everything is in good shape, you do not have any worries, so do not feel the need to think about problems in life,” said Knobloch-Westerwick, quoted from Glamour.com.

The research was conducted by analyzing 361 students feeling after watching the film Atonement. They were asked to rank the happiness, before and after watching the film. The film tells the story of the tragedy of romantic love against the backdrop of war.

The result, most of the students revealed that they appreciate the relationship that is being undertaken. Including, reflection and introspection

It’s about a boy called Maebara he’s originally from Tokyo but has to move to the country to a little town called Hinamizawa because of his dad’s job as an artist.  While there he has to go to a school with only one class, one teacher and a mixture of all kids of different ages.

He becomes good friends with 4 girls two who are around his age and two who are younger then him.  At the beginning of the story he wishes that his days of fun with everyone will carry on forever but it soon turns ugly very quickly.

In the Demon Arc he finds out more about the girl Mion Sonozaki, he discovers she has a twin sister called Shion who lives with their grandparents in Okinawa and she seems nice at first but as the story unfolds you find there’s a dark side to her personality.

It’s a bit like The Ring except there is no scary woman coming out of the TV, but there are mysterious deaths occurring during the town’s annual cotton drifting festival. A key part of this story is that 5 years before Maebara was there the whole town was under threat of a dam being built which would sink the town, but the town’s people managed to stop the construction, by any means possible.

After that when the Cotton Drifting Festival occurred an outsider to Hinamizawa would go missing after it.  The Cotton drifting festival is when the God Oyashiro-Sama would be given a sacrifice and the cotton is supposed to represent the body’s insides of the victim as they are devoured by the God. So the town’s people call the incident of the people disappearing Oyashiro-Sama’s curse because they the God Oyashiro is the one who kills the people.

  Another part of the legend is that during the festival one person ends up dying while another ends up missing, so when two people end up missing after the cotton drifting festival Maebara is sure it’s the work of Oyashiro-Sama…but is it?

The ending of this story is a bit messed up, the drawings make it even more so and I thought that this would be the end of the story, but there are apparently other versions of this story being told.  I think the main versions are: Demon Arc, Curse Killing Arc, Atonement Arc and Cotton drifting Arc.

There were two volumes to this Arc that I read, so it was great that I could get both of them from my local library and I was able to read the conclusion.  I actually can’t wait to read another version of this, it’s not really the horror that gets me, it’s the psychology of the story line itself.  What is Oyashiro-Sama’s curse? Why is there so much mystery surrounding the village and the people? And I think the most important question I want to find out is what is really going on?

1. Environment: This is the most important among all the major concerns of the world today. There are movies and documentaries that try to create awareness among the people regarding environmental problems and how to be careful about it. Pollution has created havoc in the minds of scientists and ecological officials of the world.

2. Financial Crisis: World finance is in a very difficult state. Globalization has really made it a global problem. Due to financial crisis there are other problems that creep into the scene, like low salary, retrenchment of employees etc.

3. Poverty: This is one of the biggest issues in the developing countries of Asia and Africa. The difference between the poor and rich is very high. And there’s inequality in the economy.

4. Wars & Violence: This is the worst of all. External and internal violence has jeopardized almost every nation in the world today. Terrorists and naxalites have really become the news heroes of today.

5. Health Issues: There are many health issues like AIDS, Cancer or any epidemic etc. also scare the country heads often.

6. Other Problems: There are other problems like, scarcity of natural resources, food & agriculture, unemployment, price hike, natural disasters, legalization of gay marriage, prostitution etc., also keep the world leaders on their toe.

The above problems of the world are really serious and always pressurize the leaders of this world today. I just wanted to appeal to the whole world asking them to pray for Mr. Obama and all the co-presidents and prime ministers of different countries as they combat daily all the above mentioned problems and many more problems not mentioned above. We should always join our hands to combat all these problems along with our leaders by praying for them and serving for the cause of the country .

Image by Yandle via Flickr

We always crave for an identity during our life time. In the days when there was no cell phones, no internet, people used to struggle to advertise themselves. Either their works and names used to flash in the newspaper, TV, Radio or they just used to do it to serve the human society without getting hyped.

But today there is no problem. Media has developed so much that we can reach from one corner of this world to the other in a flash. Internet! Internet has made it possible for the human society to be in touch. It has expanded a smaller society into a bigger one, a local community into a world community.

There are more than 150 social web communities listed in wiki. There may be trillions of blogs and websites on the web. And all these are free of cost. Every day may be millions of blogs are being created by many individuals all over the world. I personally have 7/8 blogs of myself.

I remember, I wrote one article on social networking, where I had mentioned 10 adverse effects of them. But everything has two sides, one bad and the other definitely good. Today I want to share few ‘benefits of social networking’ and ‘how to proceed,’ or ‘how to communicate to the world effectively.’ Those are as follows:

1. Your message get communicated: When we have a message then we can create a blog or share it on different social networks. Our message get easily connected or communicated to the whole world. Wordpress.com, blogger.com, webs.com etc., are few web hosting companies that offer us to create new website of our own free of cost. These are really very easy to create it. We can also have registered accounts in orkut, facebook, myspace, friendster etc., free cost and share our views and messages.

2. Makes us feel famous & Important: When we start sharing our views and messages on our personal blogs and web communities, many of the members or visitors start liking our views and giving their feedbacks which make us feel special and important.

3. Relieves our stress: Some times blogs and web communities play the role of a personal diary or friends with whom we share our feelings and emotion. And we know when we share our problems with others we feel relieved. Same thing happens when we share our feelings and emotion on our blogs we feel relieved. Even we get good amount of mental strength through our web community members.

4. Get opportunity to help: when we read some bad experiences of others we also try to offer our suggestion and we also try to comfort other by our counseling. Web communities and blogs really give us opportunity to help others too.

In conclusion I just want to say that internet is really good. Social networking and blogging has many advantages and benefits but still then we should be careful. It’s not always good to share our private identity and feelings on net every time and we really need to be careful what we share for our safety sake.

Communication is very important in today’s world. If you cannot succeed in making others listen what you have to communicate then you cannot grow and be successful in life. I am a composer. Once after listening to one my composition my cousin said ‘Bro! This song is not that good as the last one, which diverts our attention immediately towards it as soon as we hear to it playing.’ Our communication has to be like that song. It should divert others attentions towards the message as soon as you start communicating or delivering it.

There are five most important requisites of effective communication, which I have mentioned as follows:

1. Be Clear: when we want to communicate something, we should remember that we should be clear about what we really want to communicate. If we don’t understand what we’re going to say or communicate then we really can’t communicate to others.

2. Be in Command: we should have command over our speech whether we communicate in a big hall or communicate face to face, one on one. Our command in speech clarifies others doubts regarding our intended message.

3. Be Humble: we make think why we need to be humble…but we should remember that when we communicate loudly and boldly to convince what we think then we may seem arrogant to others. Humility can break that barrier.

4. Be Focused: so many times we get diverted from our own topic and start speaking something else which may seem lengthy to others. They may feel bored and uninterested. So let’s not be diverted but be focused.

5. Be a Good Listener: how’s that? We are going to communicate and how we need to be a good listener? It should be those who are listening to what we say. But friends! This is the most important aspect of effective communication. Unless we become a good listener we can’t make others listen intently what we say. We need to listen to their doubts regarding our message and clarify them.

There can be many other requisites of effective communication like, right information, getting rid of noise pollution etc. But above are the most important requirements of an effective communication.

Friends! Let’s communicate our messages effectively. God bless…!

Cruxifiction of Christ

The story of Easter begins before the cruxifiction when Jesus and his 12 Apostles (notice in the Bible these are not disciples as a disciple is simply a follower of Christ) went into the upper room of a house to have the passover feast.  This is the same time that Christ introduced the sacrament and began the process to fulfil the Law of Moses.  After the feast, all 13 traveled to the Garden of Gethsemane, where Jesus atoned for the sins of the world and took upon Him everything we will every do wrong or feel.  Following this Judas betrayed them and Jesus was arrested.  After some poor trials he was judged to be cruxified, whereupon he was placed on the cross on the Hill of Calvary.  Upon the cross, the Bible says Christ suffered the sins of the world again and finally annouced “it is finished” meaning he completeed the atonement.

The cruxifiction is not the important part of the Easter, we don’t celebrate the death of Christ.  However, it is important to understand these events as they are crucial still a crucial aspect of daily life – knowing that Christ suffered for us and that there is a reward for those who do follow Him.

Three Days Waiting

It is traditional accepted that the cruxification and death of Christ occured on a Friday being Day 1 of His death.  According to Jewish time, the new day commences when the sun goes down, so when the sun set on the Friday, Day 2 began.  It was on the third day (Sunday) that Christ arose from the dead.  During this time not much is known but speculation (by me and others I know) suggest that they were preparing the body of Christ for embalming, tending His family (mother, brothers ans sisters) and making known His death through the church.

Resurrection

Now here is the meaning of Easter for on the third day from the cruxification, it is recorded that Jesus Christ arose from the dead and received an immortal body of flesh and bone.  HE LIVES!  This is the great message of Easter that Jesus conquered death and overcome the grave.  Because of Christ through the atonement and resurrection, this is a gift that is freely given to everyone on the earth – that they too will one day be resurrected as well and receive an immortal body.  Christ paved the way for new life.  This is a glorious message and such a lovely meaning behind the original Easter story.

Once Christ was resurrected He showed Himself to His Apostles as well as many other people in Jerusalem and other countries.  He showed them that they more bear their own record of what they saw – that He really does live again.

Influences of the World

Unfortunately, over time, as the true church of Christ diminished with the deaths of the Apostles, the true meaning got destorted and coming to today, the true meaning is almost lost.  Easter tends now to be more of a commercial enterprise where shops can sell more items and market the idea of a chocolate easter, and workers have an excuss to have an extended holiday from work duties.  What a sad world we have come to live in, where the glorious message of Easter, Jesus, the resurrection and new life is almost like a whisper from history.

What will happen next?

In literature and on celluloid, atonement originates from pangs of remorse felt by an individual. When misguided and selfish actions are motivated by the obsession to conquer the object of “love”, or when desire for gain and power leads to evil acts, the settings for a great tragedy are laid. This consuming tragedy brings immense suffering to all parties concerned. Yet, some principal agents of tragedy survive though often perpetually haunted by remorse to set about seeking atonement.

In addition to the inner sanctum of the human psyche, atonement or at-one-ment can be seen as happening on the social scene. On the social scene, we have in the last few years seen leaders of nations apologize for the horrors (usually during war) caused by their predecessors. If this apology aims at reconciliation with a large group then an apology represents a symbolic gesture whereby the wrongdoer voluntarily lowers his own status as a person like West German Chancellor Willy Brandt kneeling at the Jewish victim’s memorial at Warsaw Ghetto in 1970. Quite often other attempts at such atonement are often mere words like the ubiquitous “sorry,” which means nothing.

History is always written by the victors of wars. By winning wars, the victorious groups raise itself above the loser and they thus are in no hurry to humble themselves voluntarily for the sake of atonement even if they have committed horrendous atrocities to gain victory. Winners usually get haughty, and arrogance prevents them from seeking any reconciliation with the vanquished except in rare cases. There is only one case in entire recorded history of a king having a genuine change of heart, after winning a battle. Appalled by the wanton violence and rivers of blood he caused, Ashoka (304-232 BC), the Maurya emperor of India, embraced non-violence and actively advocated atonement.

In various forums on the Internet many individuals are demanding two strong and extremely arrogant Western leaders to be tried as war criminals for two ongoing wars. But, these are individual sentiments not shared by the majority of voters. Political leaders hardly ever take responsibility for the consequences of their actions unless they are forced to by consistent and organised pressure from masses of their own constituents. Do many people in Belgium feel a burning need to atone because their king Leopold II sent about ten million people in Congo to horrible deaths for his personal gain?

In all the religious and spiritual traditions of humanity personal atonement is possible, in fact, a prerequisite for spiritual growth. But, collective atonement is a vision held up by religions originating in the Levant (Zoroastrianism, Judaism, Christianity, and Islam) but not in the Eastern, Native American, South American, African or Aboriginal traditions. The Levant religions, with a personal God, all have this vision that people of that group alone will be redeemed (after atonement) at a certain point in chronological time through the establishment of a supernaturally endowed “perfect” society or through a cataclysmic event of the judgement day. The “others” will of course perish by fire and brimstone during this event. But for the non-Levant traditions redemption takes place inside the psyche of the individual in a dimension transcending time and space. Levant religions also require a division of us -vs- them, “us” being the chosen group. The others, according to these religions are not the chosen people and shall not be redeemed. So why bother even thinking of group atonement, just say “sorry” if you really must?

If we would take snapshots of the world stage at different points of human history and compare it with our moment on the stage of history, we would notice that we are engaged in the same acts of war, depravation, violence, rape and pillage which people have done throughout. In spite of all the advances in technology, and liberalisation in the fields of social, political, and economic systems, our leaders today can still justify these atrocities with the willing support of majorities. The current political scene with constant blows and counter-strikes hardly makes a unilateral disarmament and turning the other cheek, seem a very viable option to belligerent partners across battle lines.

We can of course conclude that our leaders are no better than those of earlier times, but we shouldn’t forget that if we didn’t want our nations to wage wars to prevent vested interests we would need to make sacrifices e.g., in a lowering of living standards. Many of the powerful nations engaged in bloody wars might not survive in the battle for markets and resources if coercion would be impossible and the rules of the game would be fair play all the way.

If we are asking for atonement on a national scale for the sins of our fathers (or mothers for that matter) or if we are to stop using war as a means to secure ends, are we prepared for atonement in the form of higher prices for fewer goods, the huddled poor of ravaged shores moving in to share our spacious homes and clean cities? Shall we pedal our way on bicycles through wet and snowy streets to longer hours at work? Shall we agree to consume less when the hapless children of the teeming masses in impoverished countries with an abundance of natural resources claim the right to live as wastefully as we or our children?