Tomorrow is another day...

Drug Addiction pt.1

Image taken from http://adoholik.com/wp-content/uploads/2007/12/paragon_antidrugs.jpg

I felt inspired to write an anti-drug article after my youngest sister had come home from Uni the other day, and told me how she was approached by a couple of teenage students who were campaigning against drug-driving.

What disturbed me about what she told me was that the guy who spoke to her didn't actually encourage her (and her friend who was with her) to not use drugs at all; rather, she shouldn't take drugs before driving. He gave her a list of drugs that the police in Australia test for when people are pulled up off the road, which narrowed down to only a very short list of drugs that she actually would be allowed take, should she decide to get high and then go driving on the road. He also explained how the trace of drugs can stay in your blood stream for a few days after you have taken them, so it would be best to take public transportation for a few days after you have gotten high, instead of hitting the road and getting caught.

My question is what are people teaching the kids of today? That it is OK to take drugs, just so long as you don't get into trouble with the law? That it is OK to kill your own brain cells while at the same time taking extra precautions not to harm others in the process? Shouldn't these people be telling our kids not to take drugs AT ALL???....

I don't think I need to rattle off here all the negative consequences drug addiction can have. We have all heard of them. Some of us might have experienced these consequences first-hand, maybe from seeing a friend suffer, or maybe struggling to overcome addiction ourselves. But why at the same time do we also hear the subtle, contradictorary message that drugs are OK to take, within moderation and without hurting others in the process? Why do we have this double-standard here?

I strongly urge parents who are reading this to not let society dictate to your kids whether or not drugs are OK, because it is apparent that society itself still hasn't made up its mind on the issue. Teach your kids about drugs for what they really are, and the consequences of taking them.

I have taken the liberty of searching for websites to help people combat drug addiction. I found the following to be very informative and very useful. I hope they will be source of help for anyone who is suffering from drug addiction, or who know of someone who is suffering from drug addiction:

http://www.timetotalk.org/?utm_source=google&utm_medium=ppc

http://www.familydrughelp.org.au/newsletter3july2001.pdf

http://www.dare.com/home/default.asp

http://www.drugfree.org.au/


(pt. 2 to follow)

Falling into the personal abyss

When times are tough, and the pressure starts to accumulate and you left it to late to handle the tasks at hand, then more likely than not you will crash and burn. I have seen it many time, and have felt it myself.

But it is important that when you fall, whether there be another person there to help you or not, you must get up and stand on your own legs. When you have you can walk, and then run again, perhaps later you can even do a somersault.

On the same note if you see someone falling, do you go over to them and lend them a hand, thus dissipating their embarassment or should you let them get up by themselves and laugh of their own negativity.

For me I would choose to stick my hand out, for I know what it is like to fall and not have anyone there by my side. For I believe that just because no one was there for me, why should I do the same things to them and it become an eye for an eye. Why not turn your cheek and show them the kindness you never received.

Searching for answers

One of the few things which I always wanted to know was why? or what? Such as why am I here? or for what purpose do I have? Though it is never truely is clear on the answers that I found, it did indeed answered some unasked questions. By living life and then looking at it as if a stranger in, I learn many a things about myself. What I seek? What I want? What I need? Experiencing the various ups and downs as a whole I have grown.

But yet still I could not find these answers and I realize then that the answers does not lie in just living life but how I live it. When I began to put that into practices I realize that the answers that I always wanted had always been there, in myself all along, it just took sometime in getting there.

So in closing, the answers you seek may be no further than the skin you wear, it is just through short sightedness on your part that you can not see past your skin. Experience all there is to experience and find what answers you did not ask and by elimination perhaps you will find your own answers in a question that you always had but did not know.

No Man is an Island....

Even when it can sometimes feel as though the whole world doesn't seem to care about you, there is always SOMEONE, SOMEWHERE, who thinks the world of you.......

A friend in need is a friend indeed

Envy

How often do we feel envious? Daily? What is envy? This is the feeling when someone has what we do not have, when someone lives as we would like, but we do not. But do the people really have what we do not? Are they really are, who we would like to be? Often we see only one side of the coin, only one half of human life. More than once have I heard that people are envy for the way that I live, because it seems that I am always happy. But those people did not see all of my sleepless nights deciding what I will do next. They did not see any of those days, when I withdrew, and granted one day at home, away from everybody. They do not see what is going on my inside. However, this is going on in each of us. We are all not so different as we think. We are all fighting our own internal battles, with our inner demons and enemies. Those who win more, for those we envy. However, how much do they really win? I once felt envious for a friend who is a successful actor. I feel envy for his major achievements and the respect that it provided around him, I thought that his life is perfect, and he lives the way he wants. But once we sat down together and began a discussion on the problems and the difficulties of our lives, when we shared our views on them, this friend said: “You know, I feel a little bit envious about the way you live.”. Imagine ... The man, whom I was envious to, was envious of me. Where is the logic? ;] I say, if someone does what you want to do, but do not, do not be envious, but let you be inspired by the activity of that other person and start doing something you would like to do yourself. Start to be the best you can be in this world and life. And do not envy ... Because you may never know when someone else is envious to you. Envy is a paradoxical feeling, do not give it too much though, but realize why are you envious and get rid of it. So before the next envy think again and to the person that you are envious of inspire you to enjoy and follow your own achievements.

Waiting for the End

If you search around the net, it seems the end is nigh. I just want to say that its all well and good to be interested in the end. But what one should be interested in is the continuing from the beginning. In all life there is a beginning and an end. But one must not be cripple by what one sees as the imminent end. If the ending is indeed nigh then one must use that time we have as much as possible, take life by the horn and steer it along the course which you can live with.

Stress, and how to cope with it.

Stress. Everybody has it, to some degree or another. Stress can actually be a good thing, in that it can give us that extra "push" to keep going and completing the set tasks we have before us. However, TOO MUCH stress can have the opposite effect. We feel tired and frustrated all the time, we can't cope with things as well as we would like, and we often tend to not show off our best selves when we are under too much stress.

Just look at the following pictures and see just what having TOO MUCH stress can do to you:







Not a pretty sight, is it?

The Study Guides and Strategies website gives us some really good tips on how to handle stress. Some of the tips they suggest that I highly recommend are these:

* Don't overwhelm yourself - I have learned (well, I'm actually still learning), not to take too many tasks upon myself and trying to do it all at once. One should take their time and manage tasks step by step. Have the courage to say "no" when you know that you already have too much on your plate.

* Learn how to best relax yourself - Remember that it's OK to take some "me" time, time to collect your thoughts and meditate. For some people, exercise and physical activity helps them reduce stress and helps them feel more relaxed.

* Get enough sleep - it can be stressful enough as it is dealing with just one thing at a time, let alone trying to deal with one thing at a time and having to cope with lack of sleep on top of it.

These tips are ones which I personally do not follow all of the time, but I do know that when I indeed follow these tips, they really can help reduce stress.

For more ideas on how to best cope with stress, you can visit the Studies Guides and Strategies website at http://www.studygs.net/stress.htm