It’s Who You Think You’re Not

Learn from your mistakes, have no regrets, move on, and look forward to the future.

The past may be painful, but we can either run from it, or we can learn from it.

It is better to have one moment of wonder than a lifetime of nothing special.

We should live our life so that we earn and keep the respect of those people we respect.

Be like the stars, shine your own light and don’t be afraid of the darkness.

It’s not who you are that stops you risking something, it’s who you think you’re not.

Our uniqueness is God-given, never compare yourself with others.

Reduce Salt And You Reduce Deaths

Reducing salt intake by a third would save millions of lives worldwide.
The three-gram cut, or half a teaspoon less each day, would prevent 20,000 deaths by strokes and heart attacks in the UK alone each year, say scientists.
And with three-quarters of the salt coming from processed food, they want limits on how much producers add to their products.
The same three-gram cut in the USA would result in up to 120,000 fewer cases of coronary heart disease, up to 66,000 strokes and 99,000 heart attacks annually.
Evidence from a very wide variety of studies shows a consistent direct relation between salt intake and blood pressure.
Researchers say targeting consumers is not enough as most salt is added before products are sold.

Is There A Great Deal Of Difference Between MPs And Looters?

During the expenses scandal, Theresa May told Question Time: “What happened from a lot of MPs was simply an assumption that the money was there”.
Labour MP Tom Harris put the mass theft down to a “Culture of entitlement”.
And Hazel Blears waved a cheque, offering to pay back all she’d taken, in the hope we could put it behind us.
In the cold light of day, is there a great deal of difference between MPs and looters – apart from the fact that the politicians needed the booty much less and should have known much better?
Most looters are being sent to a house of correction while most of the guilty MPs were sent back to the House of Commons to moralise about the underclass.
Shameless.
(Brian Reade)

Every Ending Is A New Beginning

Just because someone doesn’t talk about their problems, doesn’t mean they don’t have any.

Forget what’s gone, appreciate what you have now, and look forward to what may come.

It really is a big world out there, stuffed with possibility and other people, and our life, our routine, is a mere speck.

The best feelings in life are those that have no words to describe them.

The only things we should regret in life are the risks we did not take.

Every story has an ending, but in life every ending is a new beginning.

Those who we think are strong may cry themselves to sleep, and those who we think are weak may slay dragons.

I Need To Be Able To Breathe

I need to feel free, to know I can move on to new things, that there are options.
I hate that archaic view that you can only do one thing.
I never understood, way back when I was in Neighbours, why some people thought I couldn’t move from acting to singing.
It’s the same in relationships – don’t box me in.
Maybe that feeling has affected my attitude to marriage.
But it isn’t about fearing commitment – I am committed.
I’m a serial monogamist and I have never run off.
It’s just that I need to be able to breathe.
I don’t know how better to explain it.
(Kylie Minogue)

The Man I’m Becoming Is Strong And True

There is a person that I know,
Who’s helped me find the way to go.
The tools I’ve been given will do just fine,
Though using them all is gonna take time.

The man I’m becoming is strong and true,
And when he is whole the struggle he’s through.
But without this person and the others around,
I know that the new man I would not have found.

So this poem I dedicate to all those who,
Helped me to find the right thing to do.
Even though all the time the answers were there,
I would not have found them without those who care.

So when on your journey if you ever should meet,
This person who helped me to make self complete.
Spare them a thought for the way that they care,
The way that they give and help you to share.

I know that this rhyme is rather mushy,
Sort of soppy and rather slushy.
But I don’t care what you may think,
You would know what I mean if you’ve been on the brink.

My journey is long, and the road far from straight,
And the first step has been to open my gate.
So thank you to you and what you have done,
For now I am the person, Parent, Adult and Son.

Alan Payne.

The Japanese Didn’t Need Radar

During the Thirties and Forties, while Britain and the US focused on radar, the Japanese largely ignored the technology – they were so far ahead in binoculars they felt they didn’t need it.
Their huge brass-and-steel instruments (many built by Nikko, a military supplier which became Nikon) were often big enough to fit a human head inside, with lenses that absorbed up to 980 times more light than the naked eye, offering views of objects up to 20 miles away.
Many Americans took pairs home as trophies after World War Two.

Love Whispers To The Soul

We love being loved, but we love being told we are loved more.

Love can sometimes free us from our pain and suffering , and give us total control over our body and our lives.

Love is the triumph of imagination over intelligence, and the triumph of dreams over reality.

The human heart, at whatever age, opens its gates when love comes knocking.

Love whispers to the soul, and the heart shouts at the sky.

Love joins our hearts and our souls together, and sprinkles them with stardust.

Love is the immortal flow of energy that nourishes and preserves life.

I Wasn’t Cool And I Wasn’t A Nerd

At primary school I behaved terribly.
I was always in trouble, always causing trouble.
When I went to Tonbridge I just continued along the same path.
Anything I could do to rebel, I would.
At the age of eleven I was about 6ft tall and my voice had completely broken.
That caused problems.
I was this gangly, spotty, very unattractive kid.
I wasn’t cool and I wasn’t a nerd.
I didn’t even want to fit in with anyone.
I’ve never tried to find my real parents.
I’m very grateful to my Mum and Dad for adopting me – they’re completely incredible people.
It was my dad who encouraged me to question everything, to forge my own path, to think, to read.
I always felt it was my right to question everything.
(Dan Stevens)

Thalidomide Makers Refuse To Accept Responsibility

Marketed at the end of the 1950s as a ‘wonder drug’ for pregnant women suffering from morning sickness, Thalidomide was withdrawn from the shelves of British chemists in 1961 after it was found to cause debilitating birth defects.
The UK government only apologised for its part in the scandal last year when it finally set aside compensation money for the victims.
Of the approximately 2,000 babies born with Thalidomide–related deformities in the UK between 1958 and 1961, fewer than 500 are alive today.
Although they were not expected to live beyond the age of 25, they are now middle-aged and still battling the disabilities caused by the drug.
As well as living with shortened limbs, some have also endured malformations of the eyes and ears, heart, genitals, kidneys and the digestive tract.

The drug was developed by German pharmaceutical giant Grunenthal in 1953 and brought on to the German market in 1957, then internationally the following year.
By the end of 1959, the first clear reports of nerve damage in Thalidomide-users reached the company.
Although Grunenthal was pressured to establish a trust fund for German victims in 1970, the company has never acknowledged any error, or established any compensation for those affected in 46 other countries.

Distillers, the British distributor of the drug, did set up a compensation fund back in 1968.
The company, now part of Diageo, paid £2.8 million a year to the Thalidomide Trust and back in 2005 earmarked an extra £150 million to be given to survivors.
Campaigners also received a boost in January 2010 when the UK Government expressed its “Sincere regret” for failing to protect consumers and set up a health fund so survivors could adapt their homes.

The drug continues to be manufactured as Thalomid by the US corporation Celgene.
It has been shown to be effective in the treatment of leprosy, but the fact that the drug continues to cause birth defects means that its use remains risky and controversial.