Alnoor's Diary: December 2012

Dear Santa:

I hope you are well. I know this a really busy time for you and this is a little last minute but, I am writing to let you know that I have really tried to be my best this past year and had a few things on my wish list.

The list is not really just for me, but for the all the people in the world:

To eliminate all illness (natural and manmade).
To eradicate poverty and hunger. We can go to the moon, and we can create multi-nationals which claim billions, even trillions in profit, but we cannot (or will not) eradicate hunger and poverty.
To be rid of personal and corporate greed, and especially of those companies that thrive on war.
To rid the world of organizations that prey on the ignorance of man.
To hypnotise all terrorists into believing they are actually monks.
To ban the manufacturing and use of arms, along with weapons of mass destruction and the need to bear arms so that innocent men, women and children do not become victims to the evil in men.
To remove all geographic borders and have all people become citizens of the world.
To unite all faiths and religions and put a stop to all religious bickering, disagreements and resulting wars; after all, their teachings really are all the same.
To be rid of hate or the need for revenge, and spread only love and brotherhood.
To achieve racial, sexual and social equality in every corner of the world.
To remove the illusion that `the Holidays` are a time for unnecessary gift giving and excessive materialism.
To educate ignorant humans that love and only love is greatest gift of all and that we always need to keep our nearest and dearest close to us.
To instil the values of being kind, helpful and respectful to others and to have good positive thoughts for oneself and others, regardless of religion, race, creed, sex or sexual orientation.
To understand that we need to waste less, spend less and learn to be happy with what we have - to learn the elusive art of contentment and to rid us of all selfish illusions of materialistic grandeur, fame and fortune.
To foster good, kind thoughts for all, even those who have harmed us - it is not what others do to us that matters, it is what we do to and for them.
To realize that it is not our place to judge people for what they do and for who or what they are. Instead, we can live by what a very wise man once said – “Let he who is without sin, cast the first stone”. We need to ‘remove the planks in our own eyes before removing splinters from the eyes of others’.

I realize that this is may be a difficult list but these are the shackles that stop us from being human. Please help us break free of them.

I have written to God but he seems to have left it all to humans, who have made all the wrong choices. Despite their apparent intelligence, most have forgotten who they really are. They have become insensitive, selfish, vengeful, glory seeking, materialistic, vain, jealous, complacent, ungrateful, wasteful and most of all unkind and unloving.

This is probably what the Mayans meant as ‘the end of the world’. It was the end of `humanity`.

Since Christmas is a time for Santa’s little miracles, I thought maybe you could help remind people of charity, selflessness, sympathy humility, kindness, acceptance, forgiveness, contentment, gratefulness, and love; for these are basically decent people living in an indecent time. They just need a little reminder.

Then and only then will we experience the true spirit of Christmas – Peace and Love for All.

Sincerely,

Alnoor

My Favorite Quotes

Life is a sum of all your choices

- Albert Camus

Silence gives rest to the mind and this means giving rest to the body. Sometimes rest is the only medicine needed.

- Robert Foster Bennett

Surely, education has no meaning unless it helps you to understand the vast expanse of life with all its subtleties, with its extraordinary beauty, its joys and its sorrows.

You may earn degrees, you may have a series of letters after your name and land a very good job, but then what?

What is the point of it all if in the process, your mind becomes dull, weary, and stupid?

Krishnamurti

Expect Nothing

And you will not be disapponted

Anonymous

Why do I judge my day by how much I have "accomplished"? Hugh Prather

The doctor of the future will give no medicine but will interest his patients in the care of the human frame, in diet, and in the cause and prevention of disease. Thomas A. Edison

Life

It may as well be

A dance of unrehearsed steps

A random collection of movements

Some planned

Most unplanned

Alnoor Rajan Talwar

Honest disagreement is often a good sign of progress.
-Mohandas (Mahatma) Gandhi

You never really learn much from hearing yourself speak.
-George Clooney

If there is any one secret of success, it lies in the ability to get the other person's point of view and see things from that person's angle as well as from your own. - Henry Ford We see life through the fun-house mirrors of our own point-of-view.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

As we work to create light for others, we naturally light our own way. - Mary Anne Radmacher

As we let our light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence actually liberates others.
- Marianne Williamson

Lord, make me an instrument of your peace,
Where there is hatred, let me sow love;
where there is injury, pardon;
where there is doubt, faith;
where there is despair, hope;
where there is darkness, light;
where there is sadness, joy.
- St. Francis of Assisi

Know that darkness is merely the absence of light. You can be the small candle that defeats the vast darkness.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

It is not the man who has too little, but the man who craves more, that is poor.
- Lucius Annaeus Seneca

The simplification of life is one of the steps to inner peace. A persistent simplification will create an inner and outer well-being that places harmony in one's life.
- Peace Pilgrim

It is of the small joys and little pleasures that the greatest of our days are built.
- Mary Anne Radmacher

He who is contented is rich. - Lao Tzu
God grant me the serenity To accept the things I cannot change; Courage to change the things I can; And wisdom to know the difference. - Reinhold Niebuhr

Any fool can criticize, condemn and complain and most fools do. - Benjamin Franklin

Never succumb to the temptation of bitterness. - Martin Luther King, Jr.

Don't Complain! If it's important enough to complain about, it is important enough to take action on. Either accept it, or change it. Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life. Don't be trapped by dogma - which is living with the results of other people's thinking. Don't let the noise of others' opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary. - Steve Jobs

My Letter to Santa..............................