Author Archives: memoriesandsuch

World Mental Health Day

Posted on by
Reply
Source

World Mental Health Day, observed annually on October 10, serves as a global platform to raise awareness about mental health issues, reduce stigma, and advocate for better mental health care. Since its inception in 1992, the day has grown into a significant event, uniting individuals, organisations, and governments in a collective effort to prioritise mental well-being.

The concept of World Mental Health Day was introduced by the World Federation for Mental Health (WFMH) in 1992. Initially, the day lacked a specific theme, focusing broadly on promoting mental health awareness and education. However, in 1994, the WFMH introduced annual themes to address specific aspects of mental health. The day has since evolved into a global movement, supported by the World Health Organisation (WHO) and other international bodies. It now involves over 150 countries, with activities ranging from public awareness campaigns to policy advocacy. In some regions, the day is part of a broader Mental Health Week, further emphasising the importance of mental health in society. 

Mental health is a cornerstone of overall well-being, influencing every aspect of our lives, from how we think and feel to how we interact with others and navigate challenges. Prioritising mental health is not just about preventing illness; it’s about fostering resilience, enhancing quality of life, and enabling individuals to thrive. Good mental health enables individuals to cope with life’s challenges, build meaningful relationships, and contribute to their communities. Conversely, poor mental health can lead to a range of issues, including reduced productivity, strained relationships, and even physical health problems. Mental health conditions, such as anxiety and depression, are among the leading causes of disability worldwide. According to the WHO, one in four people will experience a mental health issue at some point in their lives, yet stigma and lack of resources often prevent individuals from seeking help.

Source

Failing to address mental health needs can have severe consequences. Untreated mental health conditions can lead to chronic physical illnesses, such as heart disease and diabetes, which are often exacerbated by stress and poor coping mechanisms. Additionally, mental health issues can impact educational and professional achievements, leading to reduced productivity and economic instability.

Stigma surrounding mental health further compounds these challenges, discouraging individuals from seeking help and perpetuating a cycle of suffering. This is particularly concerning in low-resource settings, where mental health services are often inaccessible or of poor quality.

Mental health profoundly impacts our ability to function effectively in daily life. When mental health is prioritised, individuals can better manage stress, make informed decisions, and maintain healthy relationships. Conversely, neglecting mental health can lead to difficulties in coping with life’s challenges, reduced productivity, and strained personal connections.

Source

Good mental health contributes to emotional stability and psychological resilience. It helps individuals maintain a positive outlook, manage anxiety, and cultivate a sense of inner peace. This emotional balance is essential for navigating life’s ups and downs, fostering self-esteem, and building meaningful relationships. Mental health also plays a critical role in how we perceive ourselves and our ability to achieve personal goals. A strong mental foundation enables individuals to stay motivated, pursue their passions, and realise their full potential.

The relationship between mental and physical health is bidirectional. Poor mental health can exacerbate physical conditions, while good mental health can enhance physical well-being. For instance, mental health conditions like depression and anxiety are associated with chronic illnesses such as diabetes and cardiovascular disease. Addressing mental health can, therefore, lead to better physical health outcomes.

Mental health significantly influences productivity and creativity, both in personal and professional settings. Individuals with good mental health are better equipped to focus, problem-solve, and innovate. In the workplace, prioritising mental health can lead to higher engagement, reduced absenteeism, and improved job performance.

Mental health also affects how we interact with others and contribute to our communities. Individuals who prioritise their mental health are more likely to build supportive relationships, engage in community activities, and foster a sense of belonging. This, in turn, strengthens social networks and promotes collective well-being.

Source

One of the most significant benefits of good mental health is the ability to develop resilience and effective coping mechanisms. Resilience allows individuals to bounce back from adversity, adapt to change, and maintain a positive outlook even in challenging circumstances. This is particularly important in today’s fast-paced, often stressful world.

Investing in mental health yields long-term benefits, including improved quality of life, greater life satisfaction, and a reduced risk of mental health disorders. It also helps individuals build a strong foundation for handling future challenges, ensuring sustained well-being throughout their lives.

To reap these benefits, individuals can adopt various strategies to prioritize their mental health:

  • Set Goals: Identify specific mental health focus areas and set achievable goals to address them.
  • Seek Support: Don’t hesitate to reach out to mental health professionals for guidance and treatment.
  • Practice Self-Care: Engage in activities that promote relaxation, such as mindfulness, exercise, or hobbies.
  • Build Resilience: Develop healthy coping mechanisms to manage stress and adversity.
  • Advocate for Mental Health: Share experiences and resources to reduce stigma and encourage others to seek help.
Source

Taking care of mental health is not a luxury—it’s a necessity. It impacts every facet of life, from emotional well-being and physical health to productivity and social connections. By prioritizing mental health, individuals can build resilience, enhance their quality of life, and contribute positively to their communities. In a world where mental health challenges are increasingly prevalent, recognizing its importance and taking proactive steps to care for it is more critical than ever.

World Mental Health Day serves as a call to action for individuals, organizations, and governments to prioritise mental health. Advocacy efforts include raising awareness, reducing stigma, and improving access to mental health services. Initiatives such as public education campaigns, community support programs, and policy reforms are essential in creating a society that values and supports mental well-being. 

World Mental Health Day is more than just a date on the calendar; it is a global movement that highlights the importance of mental health and the need for collective action. By understanding the origins of this day, recognising the significance of mental health, and addressing the consequences of neglecting it, we can work towards a future where mental well-being is a priority for all.

In My Hands Today…

Posted on by
Reply

The Sun Does Shine: How I Found Life and Freedom on Death Row – Anthony Ray Hinton, Lara Love Hardin

A powerful, revealing story of hope, love, justice, and the power of reading by a man who spent thirty years on death row for a crime he didn’t commit.

In 1985, Anthony Ray Hinton was arrested and charged with two counts of capital murder in Alabama. Stunned, confused, and only twenty-nine years old, Hinton knew that it was a case of mistaken identity and believed that the truth would prove his innocence and ultimately set him free.

But with no money and a different system of justice for a poor black man in the South, Hinton was sentenced to death by electrocution. He spent his first three years on Death Row at Holman State Prison in agonizing silence—full of despair and anger toward all those who had sent an innocent man to his death. But as Hinton realized and accepted his fate, he resolved not only to survive, but find a way to live on Death Row. For the next twenty-seven years he was a beacon—transforming not only his own spirit, but those of his fellow inmates, fifty-four of whom were executed mere feet from his cell. With the help of civil rights attorney and bestselling author of Just Mercy, Bryan Stevenson, Hinton won his release in 2015.

With a foreword by Stevenson, The Sun Does Shine is an extraordinary testament to the power of hope sustained through the darkest times. Destined to be a classic memoir of wrongful imprisonment and freedom won, Hinton’s memoir tells his dramatic thirty-year journey and shows how you can take away a man’s freedom, but you can’t take away his imagination, humor, or joy.

Poem: Dear Younger Me

Posted on by
Reply
Source

Looking back, we often wish we could whisper words of wisdom to our younger selves: offering comfort in moments of doubt, reassurance during hardships, and encouragement to embrace life fearlessly. The struggles that once seemed insurmountable became lessons, and the dreams that felt distant slowly took shape. This poem is a heartfelt letter to the past, a reflection on growth, resilience, and the journey ahead.

Dear Younger Me

Oh, little dreamer, wide-eyed and free,
There’s so much that I wish you’d see.
The world is vast, both kind and wild,
And you will stumble, my sweet child.

You’ll chase the stars, but some will fade,
Not every plan you make is laid
In stone, but trust, don’t be afraid,
For detours shape the paths you pave.

Hearts will break, and tears will fall,
Not every friend will heed your call.
But those who stay, through thick and thin,
These are where your truest joys begin.

You’ll doubt yourself on weary days,
You’ll fear that you have lost your way.
But strength is built in trials deep,
And dreams are sown in loss we keep.

So laugh too loud, and love so wide,
Take up space—don’t run and hide.
Mistakes will come, but they will teach,
That every goal is within reach.

And when you stand where I am now,
You’ll smile and see you made it, somehow.
For every tear and battle scar,
Became the light that led you far.

 2025 Week 40 Update

Posted on by
Reply

Namaskara from Bengaluru! I arrived in India’s Silicon Valley earlier this week to spend a few days with my parents. Because my father is ill with Parkinson’s Disease, not allowing him to move around, I am here to help them with bank work and taking them to the doctor and any other small jobs I can do to make their life slightly easier. It’s a lot easier for me to fly down from Singapore, as I am currently only working part-time from home than my sister, because it’s a lot easier and cheaper to fly from Singapore, and I also don’t have to apply for leave. So I decided to fly down to meet them since it has been almost a year since I last saw them.

American essayist, poet, and philosopher, and one of the central figures of the Transcendentalist movement, Ralph Waldo Emerson, highlights the dual nature of passion. On one hand, passion can be an unreliable regulator; it may lead to impulsive choices or unchecked emotions if not balanced with reason. On the other hand, passion is also a powerful driving force, like a spring that propels us into action, energising and inspiring us to pursue our goals and dreams. Emerson’s point is that while passion alone should not govern our lives, it needs balance with wisdom and discipline; it remains an essential source of vitality and creativity. Passion fuels ambition, innovation, and courage, giving life momentum and meaning.

I finished my epic walk this week! I started in January 2021 in the midst of the pandemic, when I was looking for motivation to get my steps in. Staying at home meant that I had to walk inside, and in 2020, I realised without any solid motivation, I could not find it in myself to walk. I started by deciding to walk to my home in Mumbai. I put the start and end destinations on Google Maps and started plotting my steps daily, weekly, and monthly. By the end of the year, I had reached India’s northeastern border in Manipur, where it borders Myanmar. By this time, my parents had decided to move to Bengaluru to a retirement community, so I adjusted my goals accordingly. The entire year of 2022, I was walking across India and reached my home state of Maharashtra in January 2023. From there to my home in Mumbai took me to about mid-February, and once I hit my home, I started walking to Bengaluru, which I reached sometime in August 2023. After that, it was time to head back to Singapore. Coming back, I took the east coast route, meeting the chicken neck and exiting India the same place where I entered it around the end of 2023 to early 2024. Then I spent time walking across Myanmar, Thailand, and peninsular Malaysia before reaching home sometime this week. To give some data, in almost five years, I walked about 14,500 km and more than 22 million steps! This was a good motivation for me, and I think I will do something similar but different to continue my momentum. 

Today’s motivation is about focusing attention in a difficult situation. When you’re in the thick of a difficult situation, you only have to focus all your attention on one thing. That is, releasing attachment to all types of dark thoughts. Do not believe anything your mind comes up with during this time. You don’t have to worry about finding the next course of action or coming up with an explanation for why things are happening this way. Simply let your thoughts go. Reset your mind. Leave no space for damaging stories or beliefs. These stories can limit what you believe is possible for you. Remind yourself that your circumstances will shift. You won’t always feel this way.

That’s all from me this week. Take care, stay safe, remain positive, and remind yourself that things won’t always remain this way; they will change and for the better!

In My Hands Today…

Posted on by
Reply

The Hundred Years’ War on Palestine: A History of Settler-Colonial Conquest and Resistance, 1917–2017 – Rashid Khalidi

In 1899, Yusuf Diya al-Khalidi, mayor of Jerusalem, alarmed by the Zionist call to create a Jewish national home in Palestine, wrote a letter aimed at Theodore Herzl: the country had an indigenous people who would not easily accept their own displacement. He warned of the perils ahead, ending his note, “in the name of God, let Palestine be left alone.” Thus Rashid Khalidi, al-Khalidi’s great-great-nephew, begins this sweeping history, the first general account of the conflict told from an explicitly Palestinian perspective.

Drawing on a wealth of untapped archival materials and the reports of generations of family members—mayors, judges, scholars, diplomats, and journalists—The Hundred Years’ War on Palestine upends accepted interpretations of the conflict, which tend, at best, to describe a tragic clash between two peoples with claims to the same territory. Instead, Khalidi traces a hundred years of colonial war on the Palestinians, waged first by the Zionist movement and then Israel, but backed by Britain and the United States, the great powers of the age. He highlights the key episodes in this colonial campaign, from the 1917 Balfour Declaration to the destruction of Palestine in 1948, from Israel’s 1982 invasion of Lebanon to the endless and futile peace process.

Original, authoritative, and important, The Hundred Years’ War on Palestine is not a chronicle of victimization, nor does it whitewash the mistakes of Palestinian leaders or deny the emergence of national movements on both sides. In reevaluating the forces arrayed against the Palestinians, it offers an illuminating new view of a conflict that continues to this day.