Author: Manny Kagan

Fridays with Manny

  

Would You Like to Live Longer
and Look Better?

I found the secret to longevity in the article titled, “Neuroscience Says Doing This 1 Thing Makes You Just as Happy as Eating 2000 Chocolate Bars”, written by Melanie Curtin, which first appeared in Inc. Magazine in September 2017, and has since been reprinted by many online venues. Turns out that based on the study in the UK, researchers who tested how “mood-boosting values” responded to different stimuli, realized that “one thing trumped all else. It emerged as giving participants the equivalent level of brains stimulation as up to 2,000 chocolate bars. It was just as stimulating as receiving up to $25,000. What was this magic stimulus? A smile.” 

According to the article, smiling makes you feel good even if you’re not feeling good in the moment. And smiling is also a predictor of longevity. Perhaps this is one of the reasons why I expect to live until I am at least one hundred and twenty. To ensure that this is going to happen, I constantly tell jokes for others to smile as well. After all, I would like to have the company of my friends in the years to come. Besides, when we smile, we look better to others. Perhaps this is why most of us like children. They smile as many as 400 times a day; while, according to the study, 14% of adults smile less than 5 times a day and 30% smile over 20 times a day. 

To help you to smile and to laugh more, I published “42 Encounters with Laughter”. If you want to live longer, please laugh more and share it with others. I hope that the two playing children will bring a smile to your face.

Enjoy and Share with a Friend!

www.encounterspublishing.com

Fridays with Manny

  

Where to Find Love

On my way to taking Max to his dog sitter a few weeks ago, I drove through Golden Gate Park. While driving, I noticed a man photographing a small tree covered with white flowers. After dropping off Max, I decided to return to photograph the same tree.

The grey sky created the perfect light for taking photos. I took a short walk close to the Japanese Garden and faced not one, but quite a few trees covered with spring blooms. While trying to find the right angle I moved closer, and I lost my sense of time. Suddenly, I was overwhelmed with emotions and my eyes became watery. In my heart I felt love.A love for the trees, flowers, nature and the beauty it brings to my life. 

Flowers will not last for long, but we are always surrounded by nature. Just go out and fall in love. In the meantime, take a look at the flowers I photographed for you.

Enjoy and Share with a Friend!

www.encounterspublishing.com

Fridays with Manny

  

What is a Moveable Feast?

While doing some research online, I found out that the Easter holiday belongs to the “moveable feast”. It got this name since Good Friday and Palm Sunday are celebrated on different dates each year, as the date is connected with the celebration of Jewish holiday, Passover. 

In one of the articles I read titled, “The Ancient Math That Sets the Date of Easter and Passover”, published in the Atlantic, Robinson Meyer shared a lot of interesting facts. Turns out that in AD 325, during the First Council of Nicaea, the Church leaders decided to set the date of Easter on the first Sunday following the first full Moon of Spring. Thus, instead of following the Gregorian calendar, the holiday follows a lunisolar calendar, similar to the Jewish calendar.

There are many traditions connected with Easter, such as the Easter Bunny. I found three of them in my neighbor’s yard.

Enjoy and Share with A Friend!

www.encounterspublishing.com

Fridays with Manny

  

How to Get Out From a Narrow Place

At sundown tomorrow, Saturday, March 27, Jews in all parts of the world are going to celebrate the first night of Passover; which, according to Orthodox Judaism, took place in 1312 BCE. In the spring of that year, Moses led the Israelites out of Egypt, after living there for 215 years (just for comparison, the United States is celebrating its 245th birthday this year). 

In Hebrew, Egypt is called Mitzrayim, which literally means narrow place. The place where thousands of Israelites were trapped to serve their Egyptian masters as slaves. Though thousands of years passed, the slave mentality is still with us. It is very difficult to get out from the narrow place in our minds because of perception, memories, habits, and even political influences. 

The Story of Exodus, which is repeated year after year during the Passover Seder (which means order), serves as a reminder that to feel free is not easy, even when God is trying to help us. Sometimes when you are in a narrow space, just read one of the jokes in “42 Encounters with Laughter” or look at the beautiful flowers.

Enjoy and Share with a Friend!

www.encounterspublishing.com

Fridays with Manny

  

Spring Is Back

I did not have to look at the calendar to find out that tomorrow, March 20th, is the first day of spring. The flowers in our garden informed me about it.

Spring of 2021 is not only bringing flowers; but also, a hope that soon our lives will get back to normal. However, for most people it cannot be normal in the same way as it was in the spring of 2020. Flowers were there as well, but a Coronavirus, which under the microscope looked like a flower, changed everyone’s lives all over the world. Suddenly, we could feel other people’s pain and suffering. We had to pray not only for ourselves, but for others as well. At the same time, last year gave many people the opportunity to evaluate their lives and perhaps even change their old “normal” ways of living.

While you are still waiting for a vaccine, for schools and businesses to re-open, and to be able to remove your face masks, you can still go out and enjoy beautiful flowers, like these three images of blooming magnolias.

Enjoy and Share with Friends.

www.encounterspublishing.com

Fridays with Manny

  

Vosoma Marta

When I was growing up in Riga, Latvia, one of the important holidays was Women’s Day, which was called by its date March 8th, Vosmovo Marta in Russian. It was a good excuse for men to drink vodka while toasting to women’s health.

Only after coming to the United States, I found out that this is known as International Women’s Day, and is a focal point in the movement for women’s rights. It was organized by the Socialist Party of America in New York City on February 28th, 1909. After the Russian Revolution in 1917, March 8th became a national holiday. The Feminist movement adopted it in 1967 and then the United Nations began celebrating the day in 1997.

Similarly to Valentine’s Day, some women are receiving boxes of chocolates and flowers. Since I celebrate Women’s Day every day including today, Friday March 12th, I present you with my three bouquets of flowers.

Enjoy and Share!

www.encounterspublishing.com