The Teenager Today has been more than just a publication over the last 61 years. It has been, like the flamingo in the story, a beacon of inspiration and knowledge for countless teenagers and young adults all over the world fostering personal growth and helping in personality development. But, the magazine has faced lately insurmountable challenges, particularly since the Covid-19 pandemic. Despite our best efforts to increase the subscriptions, the financial losses incurred have been unredeemable.

Therefore, it is with profound sorrow that we have to take this hard and painful decision of the closure of The Teenager Today with the current September issue. This decision was taken after various discussions, negotiations and long deliberations. We are aware of the impact that The Teenager Today has had on its readers at large over these long years across generations. We deeply regret for any disappointment or inconvenience this may cause you, our dedicated team, and our loyal patrons.

We would like to take this opportunity to express our heartfelt gratitude to everyone who have been contributing to The Teenager Today over the years. The unwavering dedication and loyalty from our talented writers and editors to our passionate readers and supporters have been the driving force behind the magazine’s success these past 61 years.

While the print edition of The Teenager Today may come to an end, we remain committed to our mission of empowering and inspiring young minds especially through its sister publication Inspirational Quote. We are exploring alternative ways to continue delivering value based content and resources to teenagers and young adults, albeit through different platforms or formats.

Once again, please accept our heartfelt apologies for any pain or disappointment caused by this hard decision. We are immensely grateful for your understanding and support during these challenging times. Thank you for being part of The Teenager Today family over the years.

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The Happiest Man on Earth is a profound and moving memoir that recounts Eddie Jaku’s experiences as a Holocaust survivor and his journey to finding happiness. Jaku, who survived the horrors of Auschwitz and Buchenwald, shares his incredible story of resilience, hope, and the power of positivity.

Jaku reflects on the immense suffering he endured during World War II, but more importantly, he emphasizes the lessons he learned about the value of education, family, and friendship. The book is filled with moments that highlight the strength of the human spirit and the importance of gratitude.

Despite the unimaginable challenges he faced, Jaku chose to live his life with a positive outlook. He believed that happiness is a choice and that by focusing on the good, we can overcome even the darkest of times. His story is a testament to the enduring power of hope and the impact of a positive mindset.

This book is an inspiring read for teenagers, offering valuable life lessons on resilience, compassion, and finding joy in everyday moments. Eddie Jaku’s wisdom and optimism serve as a powerful reminder that even in the face of adversity, we can choose happiness.

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In the world we live in, it’s easy to get caught up in the past, dwelling on missed opportunities, regrets and failures. However, living in the present is essential for personal growth, happiness and overall well-being. 

Here are 10 practical tips to help you live more fully in the present:

1. Acceptance
Begin by accepting that the past is gone and cannot be changed. Embrace the lessons it has taught you and use that knowledge to fuel your growth.

2. Practise Mindfulness
Cultivate mindfulness by bringing your awareness to the present moment. Practise meditation and pranayama to help you focus on your breath and the sensations in your body.

3. Be Grateful
Focus on the positives in your life by practising gratitude. Acknowledge the blessings you have received and the progress you’ve made.

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By nature, humans are friendly, pleasure-seeking, compassionate, kind, giving and forgiving creatures. Our “nature” or personality really comprises of unique inclinations that we cultivate in our thinking, feeling, and behaving to serve ourselves as well as connect with the larger world around us. Yet, from infancy and childhood, as we advance into teenage and adulthood, seeds of negativism begin to sprout. And some of them blossom into large spanning trees that colour our thoughts, emotions, and behaviours negatively. This unconstructive thinking clouds rational judgement and interferes with personal, academic, and interpersonal advancement.

You don’t feel good when you’re angry, sad, frustrated, upset, jealous or aggressive, right? By repeatedly feeling these negative emotions you could develop a thinking error that is commonly called a negativity bias. Like an anchor that locks the ship at sea, this makes you focus on that one bad thing even if there is a mountain of good things right in front of you. Think about the following situations:

• When your teacher (who always loves your work) told you once that your assignment wasn’t good enough, you can’t stop thinking about how bad you are.
• When your best friend’s invitation to a party does not reach you due to a technical glitch, you think that your friendship has ended.
• When you were asked to speak in front of the class, and your mind went blank, and you could not think of what to say, you felt like you were stupid.
• You said something about a friend in front of everyone that embarrassed him, and now you feel you cannot face your friends anymore, ever again.
• Your parents did not acknowledge your dance performance and you thought that nobody ever appreciates you or notices that you’re good at what you do.

All of them may have made you feel like you are not good enough or others are insufficient and that the world is an unfair place. You could become cynical and passive-aggressive too. You might change your outlook towards yourself and others and become pessimistic or negative. However, with deliberate effort and practice, you can learn to let go of negative thoughts and create a more optimistic outlook towards your life, irrespective of the bad that happens to or around you.

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Foolish are the ones,
Who don’t know
How much power,
Gratitude holds.

Love conquers,
Above all.
The only thing,
Standing tall.

Show it to everybody,
Even your worst enemies.
If they can’t show it to you,
Then they are weak certainly.

Life has many policies,
Gratitude is one of the several.
Standing between the good and the evil,
Making the prior special.

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The surprised reporter was curious, and he queried, “How can you afford to share your best seed corn with your neighbours who are also in competition with you?” “Why, sir?” The farmer replied, “Don’t you know one of the important facts of life? The wind picks up pollen from the ripening corn and swirls it from field to field. If my neighbours grow inferior varieties of corn, the cross-pollination will steadily degrade the quality of my own corn as well. If I am to grow good corn, I must help also my neighbours grow good corn. This is the truth of life that I have learnt — in order to get the best out of life, I need to give my best to others.”

We live in a world of tough competition and at a time of endless grabbing and hoarding of material wealth, even of wars to protect one’s own goods and people. It is at this juncture that once again Christmas comes with its great message of caring, sharing, and gifting. At Christmas, we celebrate God’s greatest giving of His Son Jesus to the world — to save humans from their sins and to change them into persons of love, forgiveness, and selfless giving.

As we share with others, we do not become impoverished, but, instead, we become more enriched in our inner happiness through the happiness of others. In his famous prayer Saint Francis of Assisi reminds us, “It is in giving that we receive!” When we share the good things with others, the happiness and joyfulness of others become ours as well.

Nature around us is filled with amazing specimens of this caring and selfless giving. The sun, sky, trees, plants, rivers, oceans, and mountains endlessly give us good things, expecting only one thing — not to destroy them. Take for example, a tree — it provides us shade, flowers with honey for the bees, fruits for us and birds. Its roots hold the ground together protecting it from soil erosion. It purifies the air, and its branches are home to birds. Yet it expects nothing from its beneficiaries.

As we end the year 2023 giving thanks to God, nature, and everyone around us, we can all try to be not only beneficiaries but benefactors as well in the New Year!

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As the pandemic swept over the world, country after country, first wave, second wave and so on… one thing was clear, whether 6 or 60, life was getting tough and uncertain.

Children were not able to go to school, friendships had become just fond memories, loneliness and stress were creeping in at alarming rates, sitting long hours within the confines of four walls and in front of the computer screen was becoming more and more depressing, and jobs in many sectors were dwindling.

In the face of this reality, once again we humans proved our mettle. Our determination and will-power proved stronger than the virus. We were not only able to defeat the virus to a great extent with vaccines but were able to find silver linings, positive impacts and happy moments in the face of the pandemic. Spending more time with parents and siblings, eating well, learning new skills, taking up interesting hobbies were becoming more and more enjoyable.

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In life, we often have to seek help from one another to meet a variety of our needs. With seeking help, comes also gratitude to the person who helped us. The giver isn’t aware whether the help given enabled the recipient to complete the task successfully or not. This is where the concept of Cycle of Gratitude comes in.

Gratitude is a basic virtue taught to us by our parents and in our value education classes. Thankfulness is the lesson of saying “Thank you” to someone who helped us in time of need. It feels gratifying to receive the same from someone whom we have helped. Imagine if the person whom we helped finished his task and called us to say: “How successfully I’ve completed the job with your help” or simply what went right or wrong in the task he just finished with your help. Doesn’t it feel great? Of course, it does! The gratitude that emanates from the person you helped is much more intense and you now value yourself a little more.

Saying thanks, expressing how the help enabled you in moving an inch closer to your goal shows that you truly value the help beyond the initial trust you had in it. And when you value the help, you value the person too, completing the cycle of gratitude. When you complete the cycle of gratitude, you incite a feeling of accomplishment in the person who has helped you, thus magnifying also your gratefulness.

What if a help enabled you to solve just a small part of the task? Does that mean the help is too insignificant to be valued and that a mere “thank you” at the time of help suffices? The help, however small it may have been, has enabled you to complete the task without a glitch. Without that, your work would still be unfinished with minor loopholes.

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It’s when I brush my teeth that I think! Yes, that’s a bit strange isn’t it? But the comfortable feel of toothbrush bristles on my willing-to-be-massaged teeth lull me into a relaxed state, and that’s when ideas, thoughts and plots jump out of my mind, waiting to display themselves on my laptop or a white sheet of paper.

But today, those creative juices stopped as I was suddenly shaken awake from my toothbrush reverie. I realized with a start that something was missing, and realize that there was no pain!

No pain, you ask?

Yes, for days on end a cap had fallen of a tooth, which started hurting as soon as the bristles rubbed against the open tooth. “Ouch!” would scream a million or maybe a trillion nerve endings, and “Ouch!” would scream the owner of those trillion painful nerves! And in a jiffy, the toothbrush would be out, along with a rinsing with cold water from the tap, which stilled the pain to a certain extent.

A visit to the dentist the day before had capped the tooth, and now, I realized my early morning episodes with pain!

And as my creative thoughts started coming back today to their normal time-table, my toothbrush stopped as also those thoughts, as a spirit of thankfulness came over me, because of the lack of pain.

How soon I’d forgotten how painful the last three mornings had been!

How soon before I’d got back to my old ‘normal’!

As I put my toothbrush back into my mouth knowing there was no need for cold water today, I started wondering at the many times we forget to be thankful when we get back to the ‘normal’?

I remember a few months ago, as my doctor wife lay sick with Covid-19, and I had spent restless and nervous nights and days partitioned away from where she lay, how terrified I’d been, but was I thanking God today for the ‘return to normal’.

And as the toothbrush made its mandatory rounds inside my thoughtful mouth again, I thought of other instances which had so quickly been forgotten, and where a spirit of thanks had disappeared.

I started feeling thankful; I started whispering a ‘thank you’ to a God above.

It seemed my toothbrush joined in the thanks as it beat a happy rhythm against the insides of my mouth.

“Be careful!” hissed a devilish voice into my ear, “You may break a tooth with your happy brushing!”

“No I won’t!” I said. “Such thankfulness only drives those mishaps away!”

And my toothbrush agreed, as my teeth and the new cap on one of them, sparkled with joy!

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