DAILY NEWS Stream – January 20, 2026

The US Treasury imposes sanctions on Iranian officials over the suppression of protests and separately targets shadow financial networks used to generate and move oil and petrochemical revenues, citing the role of individuals and entities involved in supporting the regime’s repressive activities and extremist groups (US Treasury Department)

The UK marks the first anniversary of its 100 Year Partnership with Ukraine (Ureign) by accelerating £20 million in energy- infrastructure support and expanding school-twinning initiatives, reinforcing long-term security, resilience and educational ties (UK Government)

Ireland commits €3 million to humanitarian projects in Ukraine (Ureign), providing €1 million each to Irish humanitarian organizations Concern Worldwide, the Irish Red Cross and Trócaire to deliver emergency winter support, cash assistance and mental health services for vulnerable communities amid ongoing war-related hardship (The Irish Post)

A power failure at Tokyo’s Tamachi Station [Japan] shuts down the Yamanote and Keihin-Tohoku lines for hours, disrupting the morning commute for about 673,000 passengers as stranded riders evacuate trains on foot and major stations become overcrowded (Reuters)

Hand mudras (gestures) are from India’s Yogic Tradition

Adi Mudra: A closed fist with thumb tucked inside calms the nervous system and increases oxygen flow to the head and throat. Prithvi Mudra: The ring finger touching the thumb tip helps improve digestion and metabolism. Akash Mudra: A middle finger touching the thumb tip helps the brain to improve mental clarity, intuition, and detoxify the mind. Merudanda Mudra: A thumbs up (fist with thumb extended) directs the flow of prana (energy) up and down the spine to improve posture and alleviate back strain (Daily Mudras – Aapkicutie1989)

Experts testifying before the US Congress warn that AI [artificial intelligence] chatbots pose severe risks to children’s mental health, fostering unhealthy dependencies and providing unsafe advice. Lawmakers now call for urgent federal oversight and strict age limits to protect vulnerable youth from digital exploitation and isolation (Fox News)

Winter respiratory infections rise across Türkiye as doctors warn bocavirus can cause severe pneumonia in children under two and needs early care and hygiene (Türkiye Today)

Flooding shuts Kruger National Park [South Africa] as weeks of rain force helicopter rescues of park personnel and guests and kills over 19 people in Mpumalanga and Limpopo provinces which the park spans (Associated Press)

Ottawa [Canada] clears roads after a major snowstorm, with around 25 centimeters of snow, as school buses resume service while officials warn icy travel and bitter cold still pose risks (Ottawa Citizen)

A new study shows early smog exposure before and after birth increases the odds of higher blood pressure in children aged 5 to 12 across the US, raising long term heart health concerns (U.S. News & World Report)

Drought kills two in five newly-planted trees across the Peak District [United Kingdom], most of which lies within the Peak District National Park, after record 2025 heat, as wildlife-people suffer and the National Trust [UK’s largest conservation charity] urges urgent climate resilience action (Sheffield Star)

A Brazilian study finds that deforestation of Brazil’s Atlantic Forest forces mosquitoes to shift from feeding on wildlife-people to feeding on humans, sharply increasing the risk of diseases such as dengue, Zika, yellow fever, and Chikungunya (Tuổi Trẻ)

Researchers at Princeton University and the University of Arizona [US] use more than a million measurements and AI [artificial intelligence] models to create the most detailed US groundwater map to date, revealing 306,000 cubic kilometers of water and previously unknown shallow reserves that can guide agriculture, conservation, and water-management decisions (Phys.org)

A US man, Chuck Carroll (vegan), loses over 125 kilograms after quitting animal-people foods and adopting a whole-food vegan diet and now promotes the lifestyle as host of “The Exam Room” podcast, which is produced by the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine (CafeF)

US hotel group Hilton partners with Indian vegan brand GoodDot to offer an all vegan menu in 32 of its Indian hotels as part of its “Pan-India Plant Protein Culinary Festival” that runs during Veganuary and into mid-February (Green Queen)

Newly launched UK vegan recruitment agency Green Heart matches value-aligned professionals with vegan and animal protection organizations and ethical brands. By screening candidates for commitment to vegan and animal-people welfare principles, the agency seeks to improve retention and long-term impact (Vegconomist)

A boy in Cape Town, South Africa, discovers his horse companion had been beaten, starved, and overworked when temporarily entrusted to another. When threatened with losing the horse friend, he bravely calls the Cape of Good Hope SPCA [Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals]. The equine receives care from the SPCA, fully recovers after 9 months, and now lives happily in Noordhoek with a family (Good Things Guy)

The US launches its first humanitarian aid flights to Cuba after Hurricane Melissa, sending food and hygiene kits while the Trump Administration works with the Catholic Church in Cuba for direct delivery for its US$3 million in disaster assistance (State.gov)

A Brazilian couple in Itacajá [Tocantins] find a yellow footed tortoise person alive who was trapped under their warehouse floor for nearly 10 years and now receiving conservation care. One reason for survival was the tortoise friend’s ability to slow his metabolism to near-zero (Báo Tin Tức)

Enlightening quote of the day: “Our greater book is the world; in it I read fulfilled what in the book of God I read promised.” – Saint Augustine of Hippo (vegetarian) Roman African Christian Theologian and Philosopher (Quote Investigator)

And so I started asking questions of this guide about my life here. I said, “Well, what about my unfinished albums and my screenplays and short stories?” American singer Barbara Ireland shares how she nearly died at an extreme training camp and received a life review that showed her the importance of thoughts and relationships.

Barbara was working on a singing career and touring with Stone Gossard, a guitarist for Pearl Jam. She decided to attend an extreme week-long camp on Vancouver Island designed to push boundaries and develop courage. The camp involved intense physical challenges. On the final day, during an endurance experience in the sun, her body began shutting down. She experienced strange sensory scrambling, couldn’t understand her teammate’s words, saw flashes of light, felt dizzy, and wobbly. When she crossed the finish line, the cheering crowd looked nightmarish. A medic arrived who clearly wasn’t qualified — just someone with CPR [cardiopulmonary resuscitation] training. He gave her electrolytes, but Barbara was suffering from heat stroke and hyponatremia, a dangerous condition caused by washing salt out of the blood through excessive water consumption and sweating. He laid her under a tree, where her friend found her.

I feel first, my left leg goes away. I did not feel my left leg anymore. The next leg did that. All the while, I am starting to scream to her, “My leg, my leg,” then my left arm, then my right arm. I have no feeling in any of my limbs. All I can sense of who I am as Barbara was a torso and a head laying under this tree.

Then the life review began. With each frozen moment, Barbara realized the review was not about her actions, but about the thoughts beneath them — the ones she rarely noticed yet carried forward into her life. These amazing movies began. It was like a memory of something that had happened in my life, but I was watching it like a movie, and I was in it at the exact same time. So, I could sense everything in the room. I could hear the sounds. I could hear my thoughts. I could feel the emotions. But I was also observing. It was a moment — I was in another band with my brother, and it was two weeks earlier at a band rehearsal where we had a conflict. And it played this image for not long, maybe 20 seconds. And then it freeze-framed at this one moment. And this voice I’d never heard before in my head — it was not out here — it was a male, gentle voice — said, “What were you thinking at that moment?”

Barbara answered, and immediately another scene appeared from a month earlier. The voice asked what she was thinking when she raised her eyebrow at something someone said. This continued for four hours — moment after moment, question after question.

At the end of these movies, it suddenly was blank, and the voice said, “Barbara, now you have a choice to make. Would you like to stay or go?” I could feel it like a puff of air continually moving out of the top of my head. This was going the whole time like a leak. I was very close to death. I had one foot here, one foot there. When I was given that choice, I was like, wow, I want to go there, but I still had a foot here. I still had thoughts about this reality. And so, I started asking questions of this guide about my life here. I said, “Well, what about my unfinished albums and my screenplays and short stories?” And the voice was like, “Oh, Barbara, they don’t matter that much.”

Barbara was shocked. The guide explained what truly matters. It [the guide] said, “What really matters is your relationships. How do you show up for other people?” And that’s like even walking into a coffee shop or getting on a bus or going to a family holiday thing where you know you’re going to be challenged maybe or triggered by people. How do you move into that space with as much kindness and love and presence as you can possibly do? How do you leave spaces? What kind of wake do you leave behind you?

Barbara decided to return. The guide gave her specific instructions: visit three people within the first week and deliver specific messages and call a fourth person weekly. The moment Barbara agreed, life energy poured back into her body. Each limb came back online. For a month afterward, she experienced extreme bliss, noticing every detail of life.

We don’t know when we’re going to die. We don’t know when our loved ones or close people are going to die, and we won’t have a chance to clean up some stuff with them. The person I was to call every week — within a very short period of time, like a couple months — this burgeoning warmth and connectedness started appearing.

What stayed with her was the message she’d been shown: that thoughts directly shape lived experience, and that how we show up in relationships is what ultimately matters most.

If millions of people are in fear and anger, guess what we are creating from a collective consciousness? A world of fear and anger and violence and unkindness. This is a very, very key moment in human history. We have control over our minds, our own responses, our hearts. Express more kindness in general. Just — can you be more kind in general? That is what’s missing from this world is kindness. (shaman oaks)