Stop this and stay healthy!

It is February everybody! Everybody seems to have been very busy from the beginning of the year, which is a good thing as long as we get the expected result while we stay healthy.

Talking about keeping healthy, from furthering your education and reducing cholesterol to quitting smoking and being open to new experiences, there are plenty of science-proven ways to stay healthy and add years to your life.

One of them is to stop checking your smartphone all the time, wow!

Comparing with say, eating a bad diet or a pack-a-day habit, checking your smartphone all the time may seem like a fairly innocuous pastime, but science disagrees. It turns out our smartphone addiction is more dangerous than we thought. Along with killing our mood, our manners, and our posture, studies have shown it also creates an imbalance in our brain chemistry. Not to mention of how many lives it has taken.

But there’s another problem. Our smartphone obsession is a massive drain on our most precious resource: our time. As you know that time is not only money, but time is life.

If you’re concerned and not sure about how to spend your new found free time, don`t worry. There are plenty of healthy alternatives to scrolling through your phone. Immerse yourself in real life, connect with people, take the time to actually enjoy your meal.

Like any addiction, ditching your smartphone habit won’t be easy right off the bat. Be patient with yourself. Take it slowly and stick with it. The more areas you deem smartphone-free zones, the jollier or happier and more liberated you’ll feel.

Best of all, you can revel in the fact that you’re staying healthy and adding years to your life. We celebrate with you if you were born in February.We wish you a fabulous birthday and a healthy year. Have a jolly month everybody!

Olusegun,

YAJ President

Jolly should be all the time.

Happy new year to you all! Now that the Holiday season has officially ended,or should I say after-party, and grudgingly prepare for the next day, the first work day of the New Year. During that day, everyone will talk about what they did on New Year's Eve and New Year's Day. The stories will range anywhere from trip to Las Vegas, to "We just stayed at home."I`m sure no one ever asks,

"What are you planning on achieving this year?" "How much of that weight are you going to take off this year?" "What will you do differently in the coming year that you didn't do in the past year that will make you jolly all the time?"But yes, I wish you a Happy New Year.Yes, I hope it's a healthy one and a successful one.But that is just a wish.I suggest that we all take the things that we love about the holidays or other special times we enjoy and make them part of our everyday lives throughout the year.Here are my top six suggestions for bringing the "cheer" to the rest of the year.

1.      Listen to Music That Makes You Happy. Whatever your musical choices, the songs we play tend to get us into the moods we enjoy, bring back memories of other happy times and generally make us feel good.

2.      Decorate Your House to Bring Inner Peace. I’m not recommending that you keep a Christmas tree up year-round, but why not have a few decorations you bring out for various times of year or simply focus on maintaining a clean and organized home.

3.      Get Together with Friends All Throughout the Year and that means associating Even if you have an already-full schedule of work and family commitments (or, I should say, especially if you have a schedule full of responsibilities), it is important to take time to nurture your relationships and have some fun.

4.      Maintain the Spirit of Giving You don’t have to wait for December or for your birthday to enjoy a treat; you can work these things into the rest of your year.

5.      Feel Gratitude in the New Year, All Year- round! Living a life filled with gratitude is easy. We can absolutely engage in gratitude-enhancing activities at any time of year. And we are absolutely better off if we do so.

6.      Maintain Spirituality, Manage Stress Year-Round. There is also a spiritual component of the holidays that deeply touches many people. It definitely worth mentioning that this spiritual connection can bring stress relief, life satisfaction and deep feelings of peace. Spirituality may look different for everyone, but the benefits are clear.

The reality is for you to have a healthy, happy, jolly and successful New year, You are going to have to do more than you did last year. You are going to have to harness the power of your work effort and your intelligence, and do your best to turn it into financial gain too.

We celebrate with you if you were born in January. We wish you a Jovial January.

Have a jolly January everyone!

Aare YAJ

Olusegun

Success & EQ

 It`s the last month of the year again everybody! Definitely, we all have something to be thankful for.

People who do not succeed have one distinguishing trait in common. They know all the reasons for failure, and have what they believe to be air-tight alibis to explain away their own lack of achievement. Some of these alibis are clever, and a few of them are justifiable by the facts. But alibis cannot be used for money. The world wants to know only one thing - HAVE YOU ACHIEVED SUCCESS? A character analyst compiled a list of the most commonly used alibis.

The philosophy presented by Napoleon Hill in his immortal book, "Think and Grow Rich" makes every one of them obsolete. Such as; IF I didn't have a wife and family . . ..IF I had money . . . etc.

IF * * * and this is the greatest of them all * * * I had the courage to see myself as I really am, I would find out what is wrong with me, and correct it, then I might have a chance to profit by my mistakes and learn something from the experience of others. For I know that there is something WRONG with me, or I would now be where I WOULD HAVE BEEN IF I had spent more time analyzing my weaknesses, and less time building alibis to cover them. The word "alibi" has been replaced by the word "excuse" but the meanings remain the same. As an individual in an association, and as a Yoruba man, do you remember this song “Yoruba Ronu”? Get organized! Get your act together! What is your contribution toward the success of the society, host nation and your association? What's your excuse for not achieving more, and How can you turn that excuse into positive action? Emotional intelligence can be a key differentiator. Again, efforts to build emotional intelligence can be a challenge, but the effort will most definitely be worth it. Come join us! Young or old. Let`s build the house!

We are helping you to count your blessings one by one, if you were born in December! Therefore, we celebrate with you and we pray that December ko ni di gbogbo wa meru lo (will not pack you and me with luggage).

Happy Holidays everybody!

Olusegun

Aare YAJ

Wabi-Sabi Intelligence.

Hello everyone!

It is November and we have less than two months to finish this year, unbelievable!

In traditional Japanese philosophy Wabi-sabi is sometimes described as beauty that is imperfect, impermanent, and incomplete. It means we always need to acknowledge that nothing lasts, nothing is finished, and nothing is perfect. Arts can exemplify a wabi-sabi aesthetic as in Honkyoku, Ikebana,  Bonsai etc. The wabi and sabi concepts are religious in origin, but actual usage of the words in Japanese is often quite casual. In today's Japan, the meaning of wabi-sabi is often condensed to wisdom in natural simplicity. A scholar once stated that wabi-sabi people can learn to live through the senses and better engagement in life as it happens, rather than being caught up in unnecessary thoughts. The idea is that being surrounded by natural, changing, unique objects helps us connect to our real world and escape potentially stressful distractions. Wabi-sabi can change our perception of our world (or individual lives) to the extent that a chip or crack in a vase ( as in changes we experience) makes it more interesting and gives the object greater meditative value. Similarly materials that age such as bare wood, paper, old buildings and fabric become more interesting as they exhibit changes that can be observed over time. This is the relationship between wabi-sabi and emotional Intelligence.

We celebrate with you if you were born in November. We pray that you will not be fed with eba because of illness this month ( won o ni f`eba nu o ni osu yi ) and always.

Have a wonderful month everybody!

Olusegun

Aare YAJ

Intelligence of Giving & Receiving.

  It`s October everybody! I hope you are rounding up the year little by little?

Are you a good receiver? It might sound like a funny question but it is an important one that each of us should ask ourselves. Strangely, most of us are better givers than we are receivers. We give to our children, our spouses, our friends, charities and, contrary to what we might think, most of us are actually very good at giving. But receiving is another matter. We often feel subtly uncomfortable when receiving. Even compliments get deflected when they come our way. Those people who have lived for long in Japan and understand their culture may get my point better. Someone pays us a compliment for helping them move or clean up the house and we say, “Ah, it was nothing.” Or someone compliments us on an outfit we are wearing and we feel inclined to mention how we bought it at a discount instead of simply enjoying the compliment and letting it nourish us. The compliment is a gift to us, and when we don’t receive it properly we are dishonoring the giver. We are taught that it is better to give than receive, there is nothing wrong with receiving either, in fact we want to receive more, let life shower us with gifts, pleasures, joys, surprises, both large and small. It is harder to receive than to give, and we need to work on this part of ourselves so that we become good receivers and givers, with both in balance. Receive it generously and abundantly, showing your appreciation every opportunity you can. This gratitude will send out vibrations of energy that will attract even more blessings to you. On this note we appreciate everyone present at our last event and all donors both within and without. We received with appreciation and hope to be able to reciprocate the good gestures. Thank you very much!

We celebrate with you if you were born in October. In this month Oko ota ko niba o o (enemy`s stone will not hit you).And to everybody, as Octopus has many hands, you shall receive so many helping hands in this October and always.

Have a wonderful month!

Segun,

Aare YAJ.

Intelligence of Giving & Receiving.

It`s October everybody! I hope you are rounding up the year little by little?

Are you a good receiver? It might sound like a funny question but it is an important one that each of us should ask ourselves. Strangely, most of us are better givers than we are receivers. We give to our children, our spouses, our friends, charities and, contrary to what we might think, most of us are actually very good at giving. But receiving is another matter. We often feel subtly uncomfortable when receiving. Even compliments get deflected when they come our way. Those people who have lived for long in Japan and understand their culture may have a better idea. Someone pays us a compliment for helping them move or clean up the house and we say, “Ah, it was nothing.” Or someone compliments us on an outfit we are wearing and we feel inclined to mention how we bought it at a discount instead of simply enjoying the compliment and letting it nourish us. The compliment is a gift to us, and when we don’t receive it properly we are dishonoring the giver. We are taught that it is better to give than receive, there is nothing wrong with receiving either, in fact we want to receive more, let life shower us with gifts, pleasures, joys, surprises, both large and small. It is harder to receive than to give, and we need to work on this part of ourselves so that we become good receivers and givers, with both in balance. Receive it generously and abundantly, showing your appreciation every opportunity you can. This gratitude will send out vibrations of energy that will attract even more blessings to you. On this note we appreciate everyone present at our last event and all donors both within and without. We received with appreciation and hope to be able to reciprocate the good gestures. Thank you very much!

We celebrate with you if you were born October.. In this month Oko ota ko niba o o (enemy`s stone will not hit you).And to everybody, as Octopus has many hands, you shall receive so many helping hands in this October and always.

Have a wonderful month!

Segun,

Aare YAJ.

Ubuntu & Emotional intelligence.

Hello everyone! It is September and the beginning of many holidays to round up the year.

Have you ever heard of Ubuntu?

Ubuntu is an ancient African word meaning ‘humanity to others’. It also means ‘I am what I am because of who we all are’. Ubuntu is not easy to describe. It is both a philosophy and a way of action. It is a distinctive African cosmological system of teaching each individual to appreciate and enjoy their life while caring, sharing and respecting others. Ubuntu belongs to no one tribe or no one religion or teaching. It is simply a way of living and being that allows our basic goodness to come forth.

A Xhosa proverb states, “Ubuntu ungamuntu ngabanye abantu.” People are people through other people. In other words we need each other to be fully human and alive. It is in our interaction with others that our humanness flourishes.

The values of Ubuntu manifest in good deeds, things like being sensitive to the needs of others, being compassionate, forgiving, caring and generous. They are pillars of Ubuntu living. This is where Emotional intelligence kicks in, because if applied properly, it will benefit us all. This is possibly the origin of democracy. If so, I think it is a great gift from Africa to the world.

Nelson Mandela was the embodiment of Ubuntu and he had spoken of it often, but because the term is not familiar to western ears, had gone unnoticed.

A human being from an Ubuntu perspective should be kind, generous, friendly, living in harmony with himself, the environment and others, and at one with the creator.

Come join us and be part of the Ubuntu movement.

We celebrate with you all born in September. Osu Kesaan a sanwa o !!! ( we will prosper in September).Remain remembered in the Ember months and beyond everybody!

Olusegun

Aare YAJ