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MUST READ: Important Life Lessons Animals Can Teach Us!



1. Animals can teach us not to judge each other, not to be preoccupied with disabilities, but to focus on our abilities. You don’t see a three-legged dog or a cat with one eye feeling sorry for itself.

2. Animals are sensitive when we are sick and they offer physical comfort and emotional love. They can make us laugh, forget about our problems and be in the moment.

3. Animals do not over analyze situations; they are not attached to ego, status, looks or success, but instead offer an open curiosity and trust for physical and emotional attachment.

4. Animals teach us to be observant, to tap into all of our senses including our sixth sense.

5. We can learn how to be more committed to each other, to listen and watch out for each other just as animals do when they protect each other from predators.

6. Animals teach us to awaken deadened emotions through kindness, affection and respect by giving and accepting each of these without expecting anything in return.

7. We can learn how to communicate from animals, even without spoken words as their eyes, their body language and their touch tells you everything you need to know.

8. We can learn how to enjoy special moments, running free of superficial wants and desires. Animal play is much more obvious as they run, leap, shake heads, whirl around happy.

9. Animals teach us how to forgive each other after a conflict with true reconciliation, no hard feelings, no pent up resentment and anger, but a kiss and some tail wagging.

10. Animals teach us how to relax with no worries, anxieties and stress. Just look at a cat or a dog laying on it’s back with its paws wide open.  Watch how they breathe slowly and consistently as if they are meditating. We often hold our breath or take short quick breaths instead of long breaths that oxygenate our entire body.

11. Animals can teach us a lot about patience, compassion and gratitude. Just look into their innocent eyes when you give them a treat they have been waiting for.  We can learn to use the same lesson in our own lives when waiting for someone to call or meet us, even if they are running late.

12. We can learn to adapt to change and learn new tricks just like animals. Many people are unwilling to challenge themselves and fear that change is always negative when in fact it can be the greatest lesson of all.

13. Animals appreciate their surroundings and can be fascinated by the smallest object for hours. As people, we often have an insatiable appetite for more, better and different surroundings, objects of desire and materialistic things. We can learn to be thankful with less from animals.

Animals can teach us endless life lessons that we can use to make our lives happier and more fulfilling. What lessons have your learned from animals?

 

Why Do We Love Pandas?



(BBC News) For the first time in nearly two decades, two giant pandas will be brought from China to the UK, to live in Edinburgh Zoo. The project represents the culmination of five years of political and diplomatic negotiation at a high level. But why does the panda - unlike any other animal - have the power to involve and engage so much? And what is the key to its enduring popularity?


  • REASON 1: They remind us of ourselves!

The panda's eating technique reminds us of our own.

One of the main reasons we love pandas is that they remind us of ourselves, says Ron Swaisgood, Director of Applied Animal Ecology, San Diego Zoo Institue for Conservation Research.

"They eat sitting up using their hands and their special pseudo thumb, which is actually a modified wrist bone," he told the BBC News website.

Zoo visitors love to watch Pandas eating and are often amazed by the way they handle their food with considerable dexterity - thanks partly to that "pseudo thumb", which functions as a sixth digit.

The classic pose for a panda eating is one that resembles the way humans sit on the floor.


  • REASON 2: It's all in the eyes!

According to Mr Swaisgood, we also love pandas because of their distinctive eyes. Their eye patches make their eyes look bigger.

"People love big eyes because it reminds them of children," he says. "This is called neoteny in scientific terms."

Neoteny basically means keeping a juvenile appearance into adulthood.

According to the San Diego Zoo's website: "Our own young have characteristics that we humans respond to such as a big, round head, large eyes, a high forehead, and a roly-poly body. We are programmed to respond to these babyish looks. Babies just make us like them and want to care for them. It is part of our human makeup."

In the human world, panda eyes can take on a less appealing connotation, often being associated with badly applied make-up, or lack of sleep.


  • REASON 3:They make us laugh!

We just find pandas funny. But, according to Henry Nicholls, author of The Way of the Panda, they are undeserving of mockery. Indeed, pandas were not seen as figures of fun until humans failed to get them to reproduce in captivity.

Out of their natural habitat more than 60% of male pandas exhibit no sexual desire at all. In a bid to encourage them to mate, the Chinese have experimented with everything from what has been dubbed "panda porn" - explicit video of pandas mating - to traditional herbs.

 

  • REASON 4: After Chi Chi, people began to find pandas funny!

In the 1960s, attempts to get Chi Chi, a famous panda bought by London Zoo, to breed failed spectacularly.

"At the height of the Cold War, she was even flown to Russia to mate with a giant panda there. It was a very high-profile failure, sparking a rash of cartoons about the case and an explosion of humour that has never gone away," Mr Nicholls told the BBC News website.

But in fact, pandas' mating habits are only funny by human standards, Mr Nicholls points out, and the species is very effective at breeding in the wild. The female panda may only be fertile for a few days each year but during this period she will mate dozens of times, with multiple males.


  • REASON 5: They are shy!

Researchers go to great lengths to prevent panda cubs becoming familiar with the human form

The giant panda's enigmatic nature is in stark contrast to its sheer bulk and striking appearance. The few that remain in the wild are mainly scattered across six isolated mountain ranges across south-central China.

For researchers, it is a real challenge to find this extraordinarily elusive beast which moves away higher and deeper into the forest before long before humans can get anywhere near.

"There is some rather heartening that, in a very developed world, this species can still evade us and manage to carve out a space for itself," Mr Nicholls says.


  • REASON 6: They are cultural symbols!

The panda has been relentlessly made into a symbol since the 1960s. It's been used by the WWF to convince us about the importance of conservation.

According to San Diego Zoo's Ron Swaisgood, the fact that they are an icon of conservation helps boosts their appeal.

"People love to rally around an underdog," he says. "Good news is, it's working. China has now established more than 60 reserves protecting the remaining pandas and researchers have accumulated enough knowledge about their biology and behaviour to have a self-sustaining captive population and begin to adaptively manage the wild population toward recovery."

The panda has also been used by China to represent the potency of a nation.

Our love of pandas has also been used as a marketing ploy - their black and white folds used to sell everything from sweets and fizzy pop to Western consumer to cigarettes in China.

The giant panda is so linked to the idea of China that, unlike any other animal, it has become a political symbol. Decisions to lend and loan pandas take years of negotiations. Edinburgh Zoo was reportedly in talks with the Chinese for half a decade before the deal to house Tian Tian and Yangguang was sealed. And, unlike the exchange of any other animal, these deals often involve political negotiations at the very highest levels.


  • REASON 7: They are rare!

Giant Pandas are officially listed on the International Union for the Conservation of Nature's list of endangered species, which assumes there are fewer than 2,500 giant pandas in the world. The official figure is 1,596.

But, suggests Mr Nicholls, it is almost impossible to effectively document the actual number of pandas in existence, the animal is so elusive.

He says that such is the cultural and political power of the animal for China that is highly unlikely the number would ever be simply scientific.

"It has been suggested that with an animal this emblematic, politics gets in the way of the actual scientific decisions. A census which took place in the 1970s was highly massaged to get a sense of a species on the edge."


  • REASON 8: They are peaceful vegetarians!

Although giant pandas are classified as a kind of meat-eater, in the wild they eat almost exclusively bamboo, and a lot of it. The average giant panda can consume as much as 14kg (30lbs) of bamboo shoots each day. Because of this simple diet, which is low in nutrients, the panda conserves energy by limiting its movements.

But the diet is also linked to some of the giant pandas most distinctive features, including its round face with its powerful jaw muscles to crush the shoots.

In captivity, pandas enjoy a much wider variety of foods - including honey, eggs, fish and fruit and vegetables like oranges, yams and bananas.


Any other reasons come to your mind??

 

TURTLE DREAMER™!



Please let me introduce you to our June star – Turtle Dreamer™. He used to be just a normal green sea turtle from Costa Rica slowly swimming in the ocean, but pollution and oil spills has transformed him into a genius. Turtle Dreamer is now a scientist concerned with environmental issues and solutions for the turtle populations. For more information please read his bio: http://cutebrands.net/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=21&Itemid=38


Green sea turtles are reptiles whose ancestors evolved on land and returned to the sea to live about 150 million years ago. They are one of the few species so ancient that they watched the dinosaurs evolve and become extinct. They have witnessed the fall of the dinosaurs and the rise of humanity.  Now if we’re not careful and less selfish this ancient specie will become extinct...


Green sea turtle species are endangered by marine debris, disease, incidental capture in fishing nets, disturbance of nesting areas, and poaching of eggs and turtles. The age-old belief in the aphrodisiac power of turtle eggs sustains a thriving black market for the forbidden ovum throughout Latin America.


Let’s make more conservation efforts to protect turtles!! One way to do that is by donating to not-for-profit organizations (like WWF, WCS, etc) and also by supporting Turtle Dreamer™. A % of all Cute Brands annual sales will go to select not-for-profit organizations focused in preservation of endangered animals. Take action and vote in our Cute Shop... You have the power to care!!


Have a CUTE and HAPPY day!!


Cute Brands Team


 

Hello Cute Friends,

 


Today is a special day for our organization! We' re honored and extremely happy to share the good news… After many months of intense work, we’re very excited to inform everyone that today we are launching our brand-new website and visual identity. We dedicated an enormous amount of time into developing the website, and the end result is a product that we feel we can all be very proud of!


We invite you to visit us at www.cuteandhappy.com! Please take a look and explore the website, rate our Cute Friends™, add comments, upload pictures with our merchandise, participate as much as possible and you will be rewarded. We invite you to bring out the inner child, be joyous and free spirited… experience a completely New World where Happiness, Innocence and Cuteness rule! We hope our website and products will bring a smile on your face and will make everyone CUTE and HAPPY! Thank you.


Sincerely,


Cute Brands Team

 
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