Living with our decisions

Throughout our lives we meet all kinds of people -- some leave a bad taste in our mouths; some very sweet, while others can quite literally turn our lives upside down -- their impact is so powerful that we sometimes make decisions and take actions that are in many ways irrational or foreign to our normal way of behaving. This has now happened to me more than once and I am getting tired of it.

So how do we avoid these kinds of things happening? Well, for one thing, we have to take the time to learn from those earlier experiences. This may take the form of journalling or blogging, as I am doing now, or it may require sharing these experiences with your close friends and family to get their feedback and/or clarification on the subtleties of those experience. Because, sometimes, we get so wrapped up in our head, that we "cannot see the forest for the trees."

I have come to realise the importance of patience. It is too easy to jump to conclusions and assume things are as we expect them to be, even with very limited information and perspective. I guess this tendency comes from the need to feel in control of our lives, or to just feel like we have things all sorted out. Unfortunately, this is hardly ever the case. Even for a person with lots of experience, life's unexpected lessons can be a bitch. It is always better to wait and see. In other words, to just sit on something for a while, chew it over, and allow things to play out or mature before taking any major action or drawing and concrete conclusions. Sure, there will be times, when this attitude may cause us to "miss the boat" of opportunity, but I can assure you that those sorts of divine and serendipitous moments are few and far between. History confirms that to act in haste can sometimes lead to the greatest waste of time and resources.

So how do we recognise those divine moment -- the ones that really are "Opportunity" knocking at our door, from those other times when, "Opportunity" is really just a Will-o'-the-wisp nicely dressed to distract us from more important things? Certainly, with time comes the wisdom to know the difference, however, a good rule of thumb for discerning reality from illusion is to pause or reflect whenever there is any tinge of uncertainty. "Opportunity" may not give you the time you need to consult friends and family and cultivate the full faith and confidence you need to take confident action. So in these cases, just pause. Take a moment and be silent. Put your feet in the river or ocean, let your hair down, breathe deeply and pause. Carefully play the scenario out in your mind's eye and then see how you feel about it. Live the opportunity out as much as you can in your mind first.

Secondly, ask the question, "What if?" and see how you feel about the answer. Next, ask for divine guidance and sleep on it. At all costs, do not allow lust to dictate your decision.

Now, if you've already done that and you feel confident that the "Opportunity" is the real deal, then act with full conviction and enjoy every moment of the consequences. And if things don't pan out the way you imagined, then at least you can say that you tried.

My Birthday Wish

Cooking Australian bread "pockets" using scrap wood

Feeling very blessed today from all the love coming from so many distant friends. Thank you so much!

Just as nature evolves according to the fibonacci sequence, we also evolve by taking a lesson from the past and applying it into our future step forward. The important thing to remember throughout this evolutionary process is to not remain too long in the past, but rather to look back just enough to get perspective, just as one would do when looking into the rear vision mirror while driving.

Similarly, we should not reject the past, but rather burn it in the fire of life experience and wisdom. In other words, the old and used energy becomes the "fuel" for the torch that lights our path; the "fuel" to warm our body; and the "fuel" to create something new.

We are a product of the decisions, mistakes and lessons from the past and today I can honestly say that I am happy with my past and feel stronger than ever to become the best person I can possibly be. We are interdependent beings, and so my personal journey is filled with the mercy and guidance of so many great souls. Some of them came in the guise of ascetics, while many others appeared as ordinary people, animals and insects. Of course, no one is truly "ordinary". We are all sparks of a Divine Godhead, only covered in various layers of mental conditioning and karma.

Thank you to my spiritual teachers who blessed me from the start of my journey and who continue to pray for my success despite my shortcomings.

Thank you to all my spiritual brothers, sisters, uncles, aunties, partners and so-called "enemies", both inside and outside the Vaisnava tradition. You are many and so it will be impossible to thank you all by name. My body may be bound by the limits of this physical frequency, however, in spirit, my loving arms are wrapped around you, or my head is at your feet in absolute appreciation for the love and kindness you have shown me. Thank you. Every one of you who have helped me in some way or another to evolve.

If I have a benediction on this day, then let it be this: May all of you be blessed with peace, prosperity and the love of someone else.

We are never alone...just forgetful

One of the things that I keep reminding myself of is that I am never alone. It may seem at times that we are so disconnected from the world; no one understands us, or that we are not loved. It happens to all of us from time to time. I can only assume that this is all part of the grand illusion of this world to keep us fearful and bound to this physical frequency. Because essentially these concerns are fundamentally body-consciousness.

The more we can remember our true essence as eternal spiritual beings, characterised by the magnificence of godliness in all it's variety, that much more we will avoid the pitfall of loneliness. 

Every day we have to make the effort to refocus our consciousness on the higher frequency of spirit and cleanse the mind of the hankering and lamentations pertaining to the body. The fact is: we are not these bodies. That image looking back at you in the mirror is just a reflection of a temporary shell that is binding you to this dense frequency of matter. 

What stops this realisation from becoming fixed in our consciousness is a poorly trained mind that for countless lifetimes has been allowed to recklessly pursue the whims of this grand illusion we call physical life. Matter is just compressed energy and energy is constantly changing shape. Nothing remains the same. All things must change at every moment. There is no such thing as an absolute static state. Life is characterised by motion, in infinite cycles of birth and death. 

At some point in time, we throw our hands up and say, "what is going on here?" "Who am I?" What is the purpose of my life?" These are all valid questions that have bugged the greatest minds since the beginning of time. And there has never been a shortage of answers to those questions. However, ultimately, YOU are supposed to answer that question. YOU are responsible for your actions and reactions. YOU are the one that determines where you go from here. 

It is so easy to just point the finger at God or others as the cause of our mistakes and suffering. However, if we are honest, we will admit that we have always had a choice as to how we react to every situations we found ourselves in. Our God or gods are always there to guide us if we wish, but at no point in time do they interfere with free will. To do so would go against the very nature of love and happiness. Both of which can never be forced. They are both constitutionally, individual expressions  unbound by time, place, circumstance and the actions of others. Love and happiness are our nature as souls, and so these qualities spring from our very core. It is for this reason that we are able to have dynamic, loving, unconditional relationships in the first place.

We are all looking for love and happiness, but unfortunately we look for them in this illusory physical frequency that constantly changes shape. What we need to do is focus this noble pursuit exclusively on the domain that these qualities emanate from -- the frequency of spirit.  When we start seeing each and every human, animal, insect and plant as a spiritual being, we connect with the world at the deepest level. Then and then only can genuine love and happiness mature. 

Amy Dolby Gallery

The more we do just that, the less we will feel lonely and disconnected. On the contrary, we will bathe in an ocean of connectedness, love and gratitude. It is only then, that we can begin to appreciate God's love and our incredible potential as spirit souls. At this stage, life will cease to be a random and chaotic series of rollercoaster rides, but will morph into a divine play where the joy and wonder of life will inspire us at every moment.

Near Death Experience - What did I learn?

On Monday, July 25 around 3pm, I nearly died in China. Seriously. I was about 30 seconds from death. The hotel I was booking into in Guangzhou had just fumigated the rooms with some ultra toxic mosquito repellent that caused my lungs to collapse. At first it was just a tickle in the throat, but it became annoying to breath and I had to cover my nose with my shirt. I assumed that as soon as I got into my room all would be ok. I mean, even the lady at the desk was not bothered, but something felt wrong.

When I entered my room on the 5th floor, however, within seconds I began gasping and my body began heaving trying to expell whatever it was from my lungs. The heaving got more and more intense to the point where my lungs were not interested in taking air in, only getting air out! The room was a toxic minefield. With whatever air I had left, I said, "We have to get out, I can't breath". Then my lungs fully collapsed. I raced into the bathroom to splash water in my face to shock my lungs into working again. It enabled me a few more breaths. I then stumbled into the elevator. I was now wondering if I would make it out in time. I tried to calm myself down. I couldn't talk but tried to communicate with my eyes to my friends, "Please help me relax so that my lungs can take in air". I managed to squueze out "Krishna" with my last remaning air. One of my friends hugged me and rubbed my back...I started to relax.

We reached the bottom and I ran out of the elevator red faced, coughing, crying and my nose flowing with mucus. I just had to get as far away as possible. I raced up the street and sat down to recover.

I remember thinking while in the elevator, "this is not how I want to go." But you never know, do you?

Reflections
Looking back at that event, I am happy to know that at a time of great stress and confusion I remembered Krishna. I hope that this will be true every time I am tested like that. For as Krishna states in the Gita, one who remembers Him is guaranteed success. In fact, remembrance of Krishna is considered the principle instruction of all the Vedas.

Another interesting observation was that the people I was with, although my friends, were ultimately helpless to do anything for me. Death is something we all have to face alone, for we are the only ones standing at the doorway. In any case, the hotel was so saturated from the mosquito fogging that they too were coughing and struggling to breathe. Only in my case, my lungs completely gave out. The moment that I rushed into the bathroom to splash my face probably gave me an extra minute of time. As soon as I splashed I was able to take in extra air, just enough to get me downstairs. I remembered this technique from an earlier experience when I was living in an ashram in Sydney in 1984. One morning my friend (Nimai Pandit) awoke from sleep, gagging because his throat had become overloaded with mucus. His face went red and he had no idea what to do. In a panic he was jumping up and down trying to awaken us. One of the other monks (Jagannath) immediately rushed into the kitchen and splashed cold water on Nimai's face. The shock enabled Nimai to break his panicked state and clear his throat. That happened nearly 30 years ago, but the memory stayed with me all these years to help me at a critical time in my own life. There are so many things we forget, and we often wonder why we remember particular incidents and forget others. I now know why I remembered that one incident and have pretty much forgoten all others from that time.

The most obvious lesson to take away from this experience is that we have to appreciate every moment we have in life, for you never truly know when the last one will come. More importantly, these near death experiences help us to understand the importance of preparation and to be conscious at every moment. The highest state of consciousness is to be aware of your higher SELF and the omnipresence of God. Material bodies are temporary portals for us souls to express ourSELF for a predetermined number of breaths, according to our karma. We the "witness" of these life events live on and on until such time that we do NOT require another material form to carry us further. This can only come to pass if our consciousness is sufficiently purified of attachment to this material matrix and is fully aligned with (or vibrating at the same resonance as) the higher spiritual dimension. At this time, a material body made of earth, water, fire, air and ether becomes unnecessary.

The challenge for all of us is relearning the TRUTH of our higher existence. We do not belong here in this material energy, explains Krishna in the Gita, but are sourced from a higher spiritual energy. This whole material creation is a response to our desire to enjoy and control independently of Krishna. As soon as we awaken to our "sanatana dharma" or eternal nature of loving service, this material world and the elements that build it will literally dissolve before our eyes.

Every time we are forced out of a body at death, for at least a split moment we become aware of our divinity. However, due to attachment and lust we are forced once more to accept another material body. The solution therefore is to cultivate detachment from matter over your lifetime so that at the time of death you CAN let go. This will only be possible with a pure heart fixed on the divine, because unless we are able to replace our attachment for material things with attachment for the divine there is no question of detachment.

Every learned man knows very well that attachment for the material is the greatest entanglement of the spirit soul. But that same attachment, when applied to the self-realized devotees, opens the door of liberation. (SB 3.25.20)

This is exactly why the path of voidism is so flawed. A transcendentalists may be able to break out of this material matrix through renunciation and sense control, but eventually, because the soul's nature is to enjoy, they eventually come back to this material dimension to satisfy the enjoying tendency.

Krishna instructing Arjuna

Merely renouncing all activities yet not engaging in the devotional service of the Lord cannot make one happy. But a thoughtful person engaged in devotional service can achieve the Supreme without delay. (BG 5.6)

The path of bhakti, however, teaches the aspirant to learn to enjoy in service to the Supreme which is expressed in 5 principle rasas (tastes): neutrality, servitude, friendship, parental, and conjugal. Everything that we experience in this realm is a perverted reflection of a pure expression of that experience in the spiritual dimension. In other words, enjoying is not the problem; the problems start when we attempt to enjoy through matter and independently of the Supreme Enjoyer, Krishna.

These concepts of divine rasa may seem unattainable or unrealistic because of a conditioning that God is a vindictive and impatient patriarch. However, the Vedas declare that God by definition, is that person that is a supreme expression of all things great and wonderful in this world. Therefore, just as we are persons and can love another person in a variety of ways, similarly, we can have a loving relationship with a Supreme Personality of Godhead. Our relationship with God is uniquely personal.

You may recall in a previous posting on the sacred geometry of food, I shared the idea that we resonate to Phi or "fiveness" -- five fingers, toes, senses, etc, and here we see that even in spiritual relationships there are 5 primary tastes!

At this stage in my own spiritual evolution, I may not be aware of my eternal rasa with God, but some things I do know for certain:

1. I am NOT the supreme enjoyer, but God, by definition must be;
2. I am NOT the supreme controller of my destiny, but God, by definition must be;
3. God (HE/SHE) is my best friend!

In conclusion: I am so glad that I have been given another opportunity to cultivate purity and express my love and appreciation for all the blessings in my life. I apparently was not ready to go on that day, but hopefully when my predetermined number of breaths does run out, I will be fully ready to embrace the eternal reality and not come back here again for another round.

What it means to be a Food Yogi

Over the last 5 weeks I have been developing a Food Yoga workshop based on my yet-to-be-released book, The YOGA of EATING.

The response has been positive thus far and I am encouraged to think that with a little tweaking I will have a very effective presentation on the art and science of being a Food Yogi.

Essentially, what I am presenting in these classes is the ancient culture of spiritual hospitality combined with the lifestyle of a perfect prasadarian. A Prasadarian is someone that only consumes the most pure food, devoid of all suffering, toxins, and negativity. Prasadam is a Sanskrit word that means mercy, and specifically refers to food that has been prepared with loving intention and then offered in love to God. Naturally, such a gift of love must be physically and emotionally pure.

Because food is the most basic necessity of life it behooves us to honor the blessing of having food on our table, and even more importantly making sure that everyone else has food as well. This can only happen when we genuinely feel compassion and respect for all living beings and it is this universal respect that is fundamental to a Food Yogi lifestyle. A Food Yogi sees with equal vision, a dog, elephant, poor man, rich man, woman, child, bird, or insect, knowing well that all are equal in spiritual quality, although appearing externally different. The wisdom of equal vision is most naturally expressed in the sharing of food, simply because eating food is something we all have in common and no one should be denied.

Another pillar of the Vedic culture of spiritual hospitality is the policy of Atithi Narayan or the attitude of treating an unexpected guest like God. Atithi is a Sanskrit word meaning unscheduled, and Narayana is a name of Visnu (God). The purport of this policy is obvious: If you are supposed to treat the unexpected guest like God, how much more should we respect those that we invite to our homes!? You can just imagine how wonderful the world would be if this policy was common law.

Probably the most important lesson from the Food Yogi workshop is the idea that when we make an effort to be fully conscious of our food choices, preparations and eating—incredible and transformative things can happen to us.

When you are living consciously, beginning with conscious eating, you will do so in all your thoughts and actions. Your life will be consistent and in harmony with your environment. In other words, you will complement your environment and not disturb it. Rather than being a “spoke in the wheel” of Nature, you will be a welcome participant in the garden of unlimited possibility.

Food's only purpose is to nourish the body, mind and soul. Food, therefore, should give us life, cleanse our body and uplift our spirit. Eating food should never be just about fueling the physical body, it should always be viewed as an expression of consciousness.

Einstein was a vegetarian!

The journey of spiritual awakening begins with and ends with the tongue. Never underestimate the power of the plate or the power of the spoken word. What you put on your plate is as much a political statement as it is a mirror of who you really are. You can tell much about a person by what comes out of his mouth when he speaks and what he consumes as food. Food for Life founder Swami Prabhupada  often gave the example of a dog on a throne. “If you throw a shoe, then the dog will leave his throne to chew the shoe,” he chuckled. Similarly, although an individual may claim to be enlightened or a great moralist, actions speak louder than words, and soon enough those actions will always reveal their true nature.

The Bible says: “The tongue that brings healing is a tree of life, but a deceitful tongue crushes the spirit.”
The tongue will always lead the other senses either to purity and thus liberation, or to debauchery and thus perpetual entanglement in sin.

To be a Food Yogi is to walk in truth.

-------------------------------------------------

ABOUT THE FOOD YOGI WORKSHOP

Food Yogi Workshop is an introduction to the culture of spiritual hospitality and the importance of food on our spiritual journey. Students will learn how to achieve optimum health by practicing the Food Yogi diet and lifestyle, which includes, what to eat, when to eat, water therapy, food meditations and conscious eating.

• The meaning of Food Yoga
• Metaphysics of food
• Nature Meditation
• Food Alchemy
• Sacred Food and Super foods
• The importance of water
• Thoughts are energy
• Food Politics
• Spiritual Hospitality
• Food Offering Meditation
• Conscious Eating

To book your Food Yogi Workshop contact Priya at FFL.ORG

The Phi of the Maha Mantra

Energy In -- Energy Out,

"Forbidden fruit" is what it's all about,

Cloaked in a Torus -- it reveals its heart,

When cut horizontally and two sides set apart.

The apple's seeds -- form a perfect Pent,

Proportionate to Phi or the Golden Measurement,

The signature expression of nature and time,

Efficiency of form for the spirit sublime.

Starting as a "Torus" -- we evolve in Phi,

Then express ourselves physically through the number 5,

Five senses, five fingers, and five toes you see,

Our heart resonates to "fiveness" in numerology.

We are "Phi energetics" trapped within a "core",

A physical prison where karma is the law,

The secret to escape is to resonate once more,

With the magic of Phi within a transcendental score.

Of the five elements: earth, water, fire, air, and sky,

It is sky from where sound makes its entrance into Phi,

That creative force -- embalmed in pure sound,

Is essentially what makes the world go round.

And it is this cyclic metaphor that I introduce the Name,

The most transcendental sound of infinite fame,

A garland of beads -- a rosary if you will,

Holds the secret to emancipation and ultimate free will.

Reconnecting our hearts to the source of bliss,

An experience so divine we don't want to miss,

Of all the divine sounds -- the great mantra blooms as a rose,

In its purity, potency, and mathematical prose.

32 syllables of 3 Names -- Krishna, Rama and Hare,

108 beads forming one complete "rosary",

The multiplication of which generates a number of Phi,

3,456 transforms all like a butterfly.

Dividing C by 16 rosaries we get a harmonic of the speed of sound,

forming a perfect Phi harmony with 16 completed "rounds,"

And so now we know why -- Srila Prabhupada emphatically decreed:

"Chanting Hare Krishna -- is validated scientifically."

Phi relationship of light to sound to mantra?

The relationship of 108 to Phi was first discovered by Jain 108. For more information on the mysteries of 108 go to The Book of Phi - 108 Codes

"The theory of special relativity explores the consequences of this invariance of C (Speed of Light) with the ASSUMPTION that the laws of physics are the same in all inertial frames of reference."

"It is generally ASSUMED that fundamental constants such as C have the same value throughout spacetime, meaning that they do not depend on location and do not vary with time. HOWEVER, it has been suggested in various theories that the speed of light MAY have changed over time." - Wikipedia

Assumed Speed of light = 186282 miles per sec

Syllables in one 108 bead rosary of the maha mantra = 3456

Syllables in 16 rosaries of the maha mantra = 55296

Speed of light 186282 / 55296 = 3.36881510416 (rounded to 3.37)

Speed of sound in higher atmosphere is given as 0.18694. 

When divided by 55296 (16 rounds) = 3.38071, (rounded to 3.38)

However, since there is still some doubt as to actual speed of light, let's assume that C is a multiple of (108) or 186624 (which is very close to the assumed speed of 186282). If we divide this number (186624) by 55296 (syllables in 16 rounds of the maha mantra) we get a very similar number = 3.375 (which could round to 3.37 or 3.38)

Interestingly, the speed of sound varies according to the environment, but is fastest in the higher atmosphere.

Since there is no real certainty for the speed of light throughout all of spacetime and the Universe functions harmonically, we propose that the actual C (speed of light) could be 186624 miles per second and as a consequence, the optimum speed for sound must be 0.186624 miles per second.

In any case, even without using the 108 multiple number for the C, the current estimated speed for light and sound still form a nice harmonic when related to the total number of syllables within 16 rosaries (55296) of the maha mantra:

Hare Krishna Hare Krishna Krishna Krishna Hare Hare 

Hare Rama Hare Rama Rama Rama Hare Hare

* The key point to understand here is that 108 is related to Phi as discovered by my dear friend Jain 108 

(c) 2011 Priyavrata Das (Paul Rodney Turner)

Taichung, Taiwan, June 27, 2011

Comments welcome...

Sacred Geometry of Whole Foods

Excerpt from: 

The YOGA of EATING - Becoming a Food Yogi

A new book by Paul Rodney Turner

Who would have ever thought that an apple could hold the key to the secrets of the universe and our existence?

Vedic Mathematician and Sacred Geometrician, Jain 108 explains: “Our energetic body is a Torus; planet Earth is energetically a Torus, and the apple is a Torus.”

Jain proposes that the secret to this understanding begins with the fetus in the womb. “Before any of the limbs have developed, the human form is essentially shaped like a tube torus donut, illustrating clearly that the human body is based on the principle of energy in – energy out. The tube torus donut is the ultimate geometrical shape – expressing perfection in balance and efficiency,” he explains.

Like all spiritual traditions, Jain suggests that complete knowledge can only be obtained by turning inwards to access our core, as illustrated by the turning in of the apple. “Since ancient times the apple has symbolized the science of immortality, ‘Les pomme bleue’. In French the word ‘pomme’ comes from ‘Op Om,’ or Sun Ball. The word ‘Apple’ also denotes ‘Eye’, ‘Stone’ or anything round. The phrase: ‘You are the apple of my eye,’ therefore, has deep meaning, suggesting that in the center of our energetic torus is the self (eye).”

Sacred Geometrician and health researcher, Don Tolman, offers that if we could reduce all the knowledge of our body and the world around us, it would be: “Everything is a tube.” Our body and everything in it is basically tube-like. “Sickness is a result of blockages within ‘tubes.’” He says. It is this “tube” concept that also reveals the mystery of the apple.

Slicing the “tube-torus donut-like” apple in half reveals a pentagonal arrangement of seeds. This 5-pointed pentagonal formation is not exclusive to the apple, but is also found in a host of other fruits like the papaya, and in the flowers of all edible fruits. Tolman explains that the “pulsating rhythm of living growth follows the pattern of pentagonal symmetry,” and is most perfectly expressed in the golden measure or the divine proportion (phi) — a relationship between a small part and a large part of any whole, and mathematically expressed as the irrational number 1.618033… into infinity. In the simplest terms, the small part of a divine proportion is a scale model of the large part, which is a scale model of the whole.

The golden spiral is another aspect of phi’s transcendental character and can be seen all throughout nature, including the nautilus shell, ram horn, butterfly wings, tornadoes, whirl pools, ocean waves, spiraled galaxies and in the movements of birds, bees and schools of fish. Thousands of plant species exhibit the golden measure’s proportional spacing in the distribution of their seeds and leaves in what is also known as the Fibonacci[1] sequence. Indeed, even the roots of plants follow the phi ratio and most profoundly it can be seen in the distances between the planets within our solar system.

The human body also perfectly expresses the golden measure. “The body begins it’s existence in the spiral pattern of an embryo and when it has matured the body exhibits the phi proportion in the primary relationship of its parts,” explains Tolman.

Indeed, even our DNA resonates to phi. Our DNA is composed or two 3D spirals. Sacred Geometrician Stephen Skinner explains that, the geometry that governs these spirals can best be seen if you look vertically down them. “What you will see is a structure that is reminiscent of phi (Golden measure), a series of double pentagons that make up the composite axial view of the DNA double helix. Phi is closely related to ‘fiveness’ and it is integral to the construction of the pentagon,” explains Skinner.

It is for these reasons that perfect health is achieved when we satisfy the bodies yearning for balance, as perfectly expressed in phi (fiveness), by eating whole fruits and vegetables that naturally resonate to phi and arranging our lives in such a way that we honor and connect with each one of the five material elements (earth, water, fire, air, and ether).

Perfect health therefore can be as simple as embracing five key activities, that coincidently resonate with each of the 5 gross material elements:

1.     Eating whole foods (Earth);

2.     Drinking spring water (Water);

3.     Greeting the morning sun (Fire);

4.     Vitalizing the body with fresh air through stress-less exercise like yoga (Air);

5.     Exposure to positive sound vibration (Ether).

---

[1] Leonardo of Pisa, famous for introducing Arabic numbers to Europe and discovering the Fibonacci series where numbers unfold by adding the previous. Natural growth often conforms to the numbers found in this series.

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