Just have a really wonderful evening by listening to Ajahn's Brahm's talk with Yean. Just like any other talks by this great monk, it is full of inspirational quotes and hilarious jokes. And most importantly the Dhamma is really something related to how we are now: Being a Buddhist in a country where people may not know what religion it is and how should we behold ourselves and other non Buddhist friends and live harmoniously with one another.
Sometimes, we have to be innovative too!
" Whatever you expect it to be, it will always be something different."
"Doing a thing is easy, thinking is hard."
So, just do it! I shouldn't have keep thinking about doing revision but I should do it instead! Well, okay yes! Haha. There I go! :)
Tuesday, February 22, 2011
It's kind of amusing to look back the interaction between I and a friend by clicking "See friendship"in the facebook.
As I scrolled down, I realised that I kind of forgot around 60% what that post meant or what situation it was that make us commenting on it.
It is also an indicator of how a friendship grows, in the facebook.
I am actually searching for a piece of article written by an Ajahn which I could not remember his name. I never saw him neither. I was tagged on the article and read it months ago, but I didn't really make a note of it because I thought that it will just be easy to find it in facebook when I want to read it again. But after just a few months, now it is nowhere to be found, because there isn't an option to trace back all the links posted in facebook. The words from the article occasionally emerge from my mind but there is no way I can find back the complete version now. I learned my lesson for not cherishing such a nice article and make my effort to keep it.
So, is there is any article that you may come across somewhere, not written by you nor your close friends, if you appreciate it, remember to save it somewhere in your laptop. It is worth spending a few minutes doing it for a lifetime appreciation of the piece of work at different stages of life. =)
I can't write about love no more I should be feeling sad Now I know it wasn't you Who drove me mad
It was that chemical stuff in my head
Oh lalalalalalalalala Phenylethylamine Can't get enough Oh oh lalalalalala l'amour
Noradrenaline
Je comprends ~~
It makes me awake to have such an interesting lecture about amine neurotransmitters at 4pm when I am supposed to be half dead and it starts with this lyrics!
Got to know some trivias that might interest the Science students...
Noradrenaline (NA) is the love chemical!
It is said that feeling of being in love or in a crush is like having a NA rush in your body. Increasing NA in our brain gives us arousal and elevates our mood whereas depletion of it may be involved in depression. Sad to say, we are not able to increase NA concentration by taking tablets containing its precursors tyrosine because, the enzyme involved in the synthesis is saturated. So..what to do, you cannot create the feeling of being in love by taking tablets!
Dopamine is the addiction chemical!
DA is involed in the control of attention, emotion and reward pathway. Also, the regulation of DA system in our brain is related to addiction of human beings to cocaine, amphetamine, cigarette and alcohol. It is said that because these drugs abuse may increase DA activity, which is linked to the reward pathway giving us a sense of pleasure. Hmmm, poor people, fooled by our own brain.
5HT (Serotonin) is the happiness chemical!
Serotonin is what gives us the feeling of happiness! High level of serotonin makes us awake and according to my lecture notes, it also makes us eat less and lose weight! On the other hand, low level serotonin gives you sleepiness and sedation and stimulate the feeding centre, which you tend to eat more.
see this! http://www.cartoonistgroup.com/store/add.php?iid=39023#second
And finally Acetylcholine is the memory chemical!
Hahaha...Our brain is an amazing thing stuffed with all those complex systems of neurotransmitters! Hope there will be more fun coming on. hehehe.
Have been doing some readings about Parkinson's Disease, which is the topic of my PBL presentation in this term. Came across a term about " Reward Pathway" and thus try to wikipedia it to have a glimpse what is it about. It is really interesting to know some trivia facts about how our brain works in the reward system.
A psychological reward is a process that reinforces behavior — something that, when offered, causes a behavior to increase in intensity. Reward is an operational concept for describing the positive value an individual ascribes to an object, behavioral act or an internal physical state. Natural rewards include those that are necessary for the survival of species, such as eating, drinking, sex, and fighting. Rewards induce learning, approach behavior and feelings of positive emotions."
And most importantly,
"Rewards are generally considered more effective than punishment in enforcing positive behaviour.[2]"
This sentence reminds me of what Ajahn Brahm said before which sounds like this, " Forgive yourself of whatever mistakes you did before and set yourself free. You don't learn from your mistakes! You learn most from what that can inspire you most. "
Perhaps that can be quite true! Now looking back our education system, the exam system tend to deduct marks and punish those who make mistakes. Consequently, we as students are really scared to make even a single bit of error, because we are scared of losing marks. It is said that this forms a kind of habit of being afraid and avoiding making mistakes and hence we become less and less creative in our way of thinking. We are somehow trained to do things that we are familiar with, excellently, and we are so afraid of trying new things, exploring unknown stuffs because we are fear of the unknown that increases the possibility of making errors!
Anyway, I digress too much! I just found out that I lost quite some marks in my studies and I was in real grief about it. Now i am not inspired at all to be a better pharmacist from the mistakes i made. They should give me some rewards e.g. sweets, chocolate for realising my error instead of deducting my mark then. Hmph~ :P
他们的小食有：sticky rice
