Conscious Water

On Monday Sept 29, here in London at St. James’s Church near Piccadilly Square, we heard a talk on conscious water. No doubt such a topic would raise the eyebrows of many ‘mainstream’ people, whether in the sciences or not. Dare I say they would take a dry look at such a topic?

But hey, if we have consciousness in our human mind, is it separate from our physical body? Are we not affected, both mentally and physically, by what our body receives, perhaps in the form of heat or cold, sun or clouds, aridity or humidity? Are we not affected, both physically and mentally, by compliments or insults, growling dogs or purring cats, Bach or Black Sabbath?

A major part of the thesis at this talk, presenting the works of Dr.MasaruEmoto, seemed to be that the human body is made up largely of water and that this has implications for both our personal life and for society. I don’t recall the exact percentages that the speaker mentioned, but young babies are more than 90% water, which goes down with age, so that elderly people may be just 60% water.  And if water can absorb states of consciousness, of being, of moods, then that will naturally affect us in some ways.

Dr.Nemoto, a staff member of Dr.Emoto’s team (they are not related, and Dr.Nemoto joked that the ‘N’ at the start of his name meant that he was ‘Not Emoto’) was speaking for Dr.Emoto, who was too ill to travel to Europe now.

He emphasised several times in his presentation that he is the only scientist on Dr.Emoto’s team. (Dr.Emoto has a degree in Alternative Medicine, from an institute in Sri Lanka.)

Thus I think that Dr N, coming from a background of the physical sciences, did not emphasise enough what I think was Dr.Emoto’s main thesis, that, if I may paraphrase an old saying, ‘we are what we absorb’. And if our drinking water is filled with emotional negativity (again, my term) then that can naturally affect our mood, our perception of the world, and, as may be obvious, our actions in the world.

Dr.Nemoto did emphasise that these theories are not yet proved or even accepted by much of the scientific community.

He did give a thoughtful example of how we are affected by our attitude towards our selves (which is something I regularly bring up in my talks on meditation). He suggested that if we get up in the morning and look at ourselves in the mirror and feel joy or good cheer towards ourselves, this will give us a great psychological boost for the day.

And then there were the photographs. Dr.Emoto’s work comes to the public largely through his photos and his interpretation of them. Water crystals are photographed from different perspectives. Dr.Nemoto showed photos of water crystals from the public waterworks of various cities, such as Tokyo, London, Paris, Berlin, etc. These crystals generally did not look healthy or happy. How, can a water crystal look healthy or happy [or sad or ugly, or any other mood)? It is of course subjective, but as we saw quite  anumber of photos, we could see that some water crystals were not shaped very well, out of balance, with scattered geometrical shapes, at least according to common views of beauty. Others were like pieces of symmetrical art, such as we might see in the mosaic of a church window. These were, by general consent of the audience, as far as I could tell, more pleasing to the eye, to the mood, than were the ‘out of shape’ water crystals.

My friend and I discussed this afterwards. We wondered if a photo of a water crystal exposed to pleasant music represented the shape of all the water crystals (or atoms of water) in that particular container. After all, not all people will be affected the same by a piece of music, so will all atoms of water in a container be affected in the same way? I may feel deep joy from listening to Beethoven, where someone else may feel bored or anxious, for example. Thus, does a photo of one water crystal, from a bottle of water, represent how each crystal looks?

Also, Dr.Nemoto gave examples where a positive or negative word (happy, idiot, free, hate, etc) were written on a piece of paper and that paper taped to the side of a glass container of water, with the words facing inwards. The results were that the water containers that were exposed to positive words elicited beautiful, symmetrical, flowing forms of water crystals and the containers with negative words had distorted, inharmonious shapes.

The conclusion that the words affected the shape of the crystals was not easy to accept, though I’ve run across somewhat similar occurrences. Years ago two of my friends, L and F, were living together in south London. They had some left over rice after dinner one night. They decided to put some of it in one container, with a drawing of a frowning person taped to the container, and some in another container with a smiling person drawnon that container. They put them some distance apart on their long kitchen counter. Every time they walked past the first container they shouted something like “I hate you”. And when they walked past the second container they said something like “I love you.” They found that the rice in the first container went bad well before the rice in the second container.

Their experiment is of course, not considered as solid science.

I also understand that more and more chefs are realising that the mood they are in when they cook affects the quality of the food.

So there seems to be a more subtle relationship between mind and matter than many of us realise.

Neither Dr.Nemoto, nor, as far as I can tell, any of the writings of Dr.Emoto, refer to the work discussed in the 1970s best seller, “The Secret Life of Plants”, which seems to have a similar argument. The book claims that plants are sentient, conscious beings that respond to stimuli that may cause pleasure or pain. The research in the book is not accepted by many scientists as of yet.

Perhaps, as with Dr.Emoto’s work, more experiments will confirm that there is a consciousness in not only people and animals, but also in plants, and yes, water.

The last part of the presentation by Dr.Nemoto was of a more scientific nature, largely dealing with research by Dr. Gerald Pollack, a professor of bioengineering in the USA. Dr Pollack proposes a ‘fourth state of water.”

His thesis can be found on the internet. Though it seems an intriguing idea, it was rather hard to follow for much of the audience.

In the last part of the evening we learned of Dr.Emoto’s intense desire for world peace. It was not made explicitly clear what is the relation between world peace and his research with water and consciousness.

World peace is certainly a noble goal.

I’ll drink (a glass of water) to that!

by Dada Jyotirupananda

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Don’t Stress Over It

According to the Huffington Post, 54% of Brits say their stress and anxiety levels are increasing. A good bit of that seems related to work, as one-third of the adults they surveyed think about work from the minute they wake up and many people don’t ‘switch off’ till they go to sleep. More than half their respondents say the stress has impacted on their personal relationships and their health.

A vivid example, though not from UK, is cited in my book, “Meditation: Searching for the Real You”: “Dr. Andrew Weil tells of Mr. Shinichiro (Shin) Terayama, formerly a physicist and management consultant in his native Japan. For years he was on call 24 hours a day, sleeping little, drinking ten to twenty cups of coffee daily with a poor diet. After some years, he developed kidney cancer and though it was checked, the quality of his life kept deteriorating. Once he dreamt he attended his own funeral.”

I’ll complete the story later, but first, what is stress? It can be defined simply as ‘wear & tear.’ Dr. Hans Selye say it is: ‘the response of the body to any demand, when forced to adapt to change’. It also applies to the mind.

The Mental Health Foundation sees it as: the way you feel when you’re under abnormal pressure.

Cures? How about quitting your job, or moving to the countryside, or taking up that dream of being an artist, or a mountain climber or starting your own company?

Not bad, but not always possible. Granted that much stress nowadays comes from outside pressures we can’t always control, still, we can control our responses, somewhat, as Shin found out. To continue his story:

“Finally Shin realised he had to make drastic changes in his lifestyle. He found an alternative therapy so he could become involved in the healing process. The next day, thanks to his new attitude, he saw life as ‘unbearably beautiful.’ God seemed to be everywhere. He later realized that he had created his own cancer. Now Shin has vigorous health and is an accomplished cellist and counsels cancer patients. Weil emphasizes that the quality of Shin’s life did not improve so much due to the fact that he recovered from cancer, but because he had undergone a ‘psycho-spiritual transformation.’ “

There are of course a number of approaches to dealing with stress. Broadly, you may need to re-balance or re-focus your life and your priorities.

Specifically:

- some foods can help us, others can hinder us.
- exercise is important.
- mind practices such as meditation can help.

Some tips include:

- Changing your diet

Some of the main foods to help combat stress include asparagus, avocados, almonds, walnuts, berries, chamomile tea, oatmeal and oranges. A number of websites discuss these and other foods and of course you might want to consult a dietician or doctor.

Exercise:

According to the UK National Health Service (NHS): Research shows that physical activity can boost self-esteem, mood, sleep quality and energy, as well as reducing your risk of stress, depression, dementia and Alzheimer’s disease.

They suggest 150 minutes of “moderate-intensity aerobic activity” weekly, meaning you're working hard enough to raise your heart rate and break a sweat.

Examples include:

• walking fast
• water aerobics
• riding a bike on level ground or with few hills
• playing doubles tennis

There are of course a number of other exercises that qualify.

Meditation

In a study quoted in Huffington Post, lead researcher Dr Madhav Goyal, from Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine in Baltimore, US, said: "In our study, meditation appeared to provide as much relief from some anxiety and depression symptoms as what other studies have found from antidepressants."

He added: "A lot of people have this idea that meditation means sitting down and doing nothing, but that's not true. Meditation is an active training of the mind to increase awareness.”

You can observe your own lifestyle to see if you are doing your best to minimise damaging stress, but consulting with a qualified therapist may be a good idea for you also.

To Health!
Namaste,
Dada Jyotirupananda

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Guest Post: Best All-Natural Facial Masks for Spring

As beauty and skincare are not my area of expertise, I asked my friend and beauty aficionado Liz to share her favourite tips on the blog, starting from facial masks. Liz’s passion from skincare started in her teens, when she dealt with acne – as many adolescents do. She did a stint at leading organic skincare store Content Beauty & Wellbeing and now continues writing about beauty products on her blog.

As I am a firm believer in natural products - from food, to clothing – I am sure that when it comes to skincare, keeping things as natural as possible and avoiding harmful chemicals is also for the best. Here are her all-natural recipes for great skin.

Skin is the biggest organ in our bodies, so it’s only fair that we treat it with the love and respect it deserves. Especially when it comes to our faces.

In fact, we women LOVE skincare so much that we have a tendency on experimenting with many different products, in order to find “the one”: in total, we spent almost a whopping 1billion in skincare in the UK, last year alone. Not only is this habit bad for our wallet, but switching between products can also induce more damage to our skin than we realise: firstly, our skin is delicate and the constant change can disrupt its natural balance and strip it of oils, resulting in what is known as “beauty editor’s skin” with redness and spots. Slathering ourselves in many products is also harmful, as we don’t actually know what they contain half of the time. Unfortunately, the cosmetics industry is still largely unregulated (look out for the word “fragrance” on labels: it can be just about anything) and it is estimated that the average skincare products can contain a myriad of harmful ingredients: from parabens to petrochemicals. Moreover, many of the ingredients found in skincare can be harmful for the environment, such as palm oil, which is the cause of deforestation in many and orangutan’s decimation. Recent findings also show that there are alarming levels of ‘exfoliating’ plastic micro-beads contained in facial scrubs and toothpaste, ending up in lakes and sea. Fish or small animals can mistake these microbeads for food and as a result, the chemicals they carry can get passed up the food chain until they get to humans. So when it comes to skincare, there is definitely more than meets the eye when it comes to choosing your cosmetics wisely.

There are a few ways to get around this: firstly, learn how to read the labels on your beauty products, so you can choose products that are EcoCert and not tested on animals. While it is a romantic idea to switch to homemade, all-natural skincare products, or only-organic products, I understand that in most cases this is not an option due to time and financial constraints. So where you can, why not opt for an all-natural beauty treatment at home? Face masks are a great way to do so and very fun to put together. You can utilize ingredients found around your house to feel the same benefits as an expensive facial mask. It’s quick and easy!

Here are my favourite facial masks according to skincare, try these for instantly glowing and soft skin. Ensure you have a clean skin before applying and avoid the eye area. It’s better to use these fresh, but if sealed properly in a plastic containers and kept in the fridge, you can use again for up to 1 week.


Dry Skin:

Banana & Honey Mask:

- 1 banana
- 1 tablespoon honey

Banana is rich in vitamin A, so it restores moisture to dry skin, while honey softens the skin. Mix the two in a processor or in a bowl, ensuring it doesn’t go too liquid. Apply to face for 15 minutes and rinse well with warm mater.

Avocado & Honey Mask

- Half ripe avocado
- 2 tablespoon honey

Avoicado is rich in omega oils and highly moisturizing. Honey is softening and soothing, so combined they are great for chapped, dry skin.

Mash in a bowl, then stir in honey until smooth. Apply for 15 minutes and rinse with warm water.

Oily Skin: Tomato Mask

- 1 tomato
- 1 egg yolk
- 1 teaspoon cornstarch

Tomato is highly acid, so it’s great for clearing oily skin, while egg yolks soften the skin. Use cornstarch to bind these.


Mix tomato and white egg yolk in a blender. Pour in a bowl and add cornstarch slowly to thicken. Apply for 20 minutes, then use warm water or muslin cloth to remove.

Clay & strawberries

- 1 tbsp Clay
- Few drops of lemon juice
- 8 strawberries

Clay is fantastic for oily skin as it is drying and absorbs impurities. You can purchase pure clay and add the natural ingredients for a fantastic mask. Mix all of them together, apply for 20 minutes to face and neck and rinse with cool water.

Sensitive skin:

Oatmeal mask

- 1/3 cup of oatmeal
- 1 teaspoon honey
- 2 teaspoons full fat, organic milk

Oats are ideal to soothe skin conditions. Mash up the oatmeal by hand or using a food processor until powdery, then add the honey and milk and stir to thicken. If it is too thick, soften with more milk. Apply for twenty minutes to face and remove with warm water.

Papaya & Pieneapple

- 1/2 fresh papaya, peeled and seeded
- 1 cup fresh pineapple
- 1 tablespoon honey (optional)

Pineapple is rich in antioxidants, so great for anti-ageing, while papaya exfoliates the skin. Honey is soothing. Mash the fruit by hand or put it in a blender, then strain the pulp. If you have a juicer, use that instead. Then, add the honey. Apply with a cotton ball to chest, neck and face. Let it rest for 15 minutes, then rinse with cool water.

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You are what you Eat - Conscious Choices for a Good Diet: The 5 secrets of Dietary Success (Part 2)

Perhaps it’s obvious that just as the environment affects our food (droughts and floods, or alternatively, sun and moderate rain bring us less or more food) our food habits affect the environment. Though these points may not seem as essential or immediate as food nutrition and food budget, which we discussed in the first food blog, they are important factors.

Thus, here I’ll write about:

• How your food choices affect the environment 
• How your diet affects other living beings 
• How suitable your diet is for your mental balance and for your peace of mind.

There is of course just a limited amount of land on which we can grow our food. As I note in my book, Mediation: Searching for the Real You, if land is used to grow plant-based protein, rather than raising cows for food, we save a lot of land. If we give a steer one acre of land to graze on, that land will produce less than one-half kg of protein from the steer. Planting soybeans on that same acre can produce eight kg of protein. On top of that, Dr. Jean Mayer of Harvard estimates that reducing meat consumption by just 10% would release enough grain to feed 60 million people.

As well as affecting the health of the land, our diet also affects other living beings. Much of the modern vegetarian, or plant-based movement has been built on concern for other beings.  This attitude has a long history:in Europe, philosophers as far back as Pythagoras (born about 570 BC) and Plato, Plutarch & Epicurus took up vegetarianism as a statement against animal sacrifices of the day. They believed in the kinship of all beings and saw this diet as part of their search for principles of cosmic harmony.

In recent times, plant-based diets (especially veganism) have become popular for a variety of reasons. Bill Clinton took it up for health reasons, Paul McCartney and Morrissey more for ethical reasons and Al Gore, (Clinton’s Vice President) for ecological reasons. And no less of a modern philosopher than Jay Z, who along with his wife Beyoncé, took up veganism as an experiment. He said, regarding the benefits of the diet: "Foods… should satisfy not only the body, but also the spirit. We believe that the right attitude and approach to healthy living can positively affect the world."

Food affects the mind as well as the body. “You are what you eat” suggests to me that our mental balance or harmony is affected by food.Yogis, who tend to be aware of the flow of the mind, have studied the food-mind relationship for eons and through experience and research they developed a diet that works for both physical health and mental balance. As one modern Indian yogi wrote: “The types of food a creature eats varies in proportion to its evolution.” Thus, he notes, lower developed insects or animals can easily digest garbage or rotten food. The higher the evolution, he says, the more subtle their food needs.

Thus, as written more extensively in my book, eating foods that support both our mental development and our overall health are the best. The best diet, called ‘sentient’ (‘aware’) are foods that support us in moving toward greater consciousness and refinement.The good news is that sentient foods are also good for physical health, taste great and are available anywhere.  Sentient foods include virtually all grains, legumes, vegetables, fruits, nuts and dairy. For more information about sentient, conscious food choices you can see my book, or various websites such as: 

http://www.gemstories.com/vegetarianism_b.html
http://kitchenoflove.org/sentient-vegetarian-diet/the-three-food-categories/
http://amwellness.org/articles/vegetarianism

Being vegetarian or vegan will put you in the company of a steadily growing number of people worldwide, including more than a few people you’ve probably heard of, such as Natalie Portman, Jared Leto and Thom Yorke of Radiohead.

Namaste,
Dada Jyotirupananda

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Eight Simple Tips to Detox Your Body Daily

As the latin saying goes: “Mens sana in corpore sano”- meaning “a sound mind in a healthy body”- wellbeing starts from the inside out. While emotional and psychological health is important, it is also essential to maintain a healthy body to maintain a good balance.

Detoxing is a great way to restore balance in your body. All too often, detoxing is associated with deprivation, but the truth is that you can detox easily and for optimal health, without taking the extreme route.

Here are eight of my favourite gentle detox tips:

1.   Drink a glass of lukewarm water with the juice of half lemon every morning.

Enjoy this drink ten minutes before you eat your breakfast, it’s truly refreshing and energizing! There are a myriad of health benefits, as lemons are packed with Vitamin C, calcium, iron, magnesium, fiber, vitamin B complex and potassium. It will give your immune system a boost, cleanse your system by helping to flush out toxins, aids digestion and help reduce inflammation. The anitoxidants in the lemon juice are great for skin too.

2.   Drink more water

Your body is made of 70 per cent water and you need to keep it hydrated to help flush out toxins. The European Food Safety Authority recommends that women drink about 1.6 litres of fluid and men about 2.0 litres of fluid per day. That's about eight 200ml glasses for a woman and 10 200ml glasses for a man. If you don't like the taste of plain water, try sparkling water or add a slice of lemon or lime. Cucumber is very refreshing too.

3.  Use a body brush
Skin is your largest organ, so give it the care it deserves and help discharge waste through daily body brushing. Before you take a shower or a bath, use a body brush- preferably made using firm, natural bristles - and sweep it over your body in the direction of your heart, working from the feet up, with firm strokes. Exfoliating with a body brush will help improve blood circulation and immune system, as well as the appearance of your skin.
4.  Drink a green juice daily 
     This recent health-fad is not unfounded: green juice benefits are numerous. Green juices are alkalizing, cleansing, healing, hydrating and restorative. They are also packed with chlorophyll, which helps purify your liver and regulate digestion. They are also nutritious,yet help keep blood sugar levels low. There are plenty of great combinations to play with, but a personal favourite is kale, celery, apple,cucumber, parsley and ginger. Replace your latte with these and you’ll be surprised at the benefits. 
5.  Cut down on caffeine, alcohol and nicotine 
     Avoid drinks such as coffee, tea and cola, as well as fizzy drinks. These can all dehydrate the body, leading to migraines and luring your body into false feelings of hunger. Caffeine stimulates the central nervous system, so cutting down can help reduce anxiety levels and lead to better sleep.
     As for alcohol, drinking regularly can cause serious health problems: from liver damage to a greater risk of having a heart attack. It’s also empty calories, which will leave you bloated. And we all know why smoking is bad, so kick your habit for good with appropriate medical support. Cutting out all of the above will leave you with more energy and less cravings. 
6.  Avoid processed foods 
     Stick to foods that are as close to their natural state as possible, such as organic fresh fruit and vegetable, nuts, gluten-free whole grains, seeds and organic meats. Try to eat dinner at around 7pm and keep it light, as your digestions slows down throughout the day and it will disrupt your sleep. Speaking of… 
7.  Get plenty of sleep 
     Did you know that the deep, most regenerative sleep occurs between the hours of 10pm and 2am? This means that after 2am, your sleep is superficial. If you lack sleep, you will still feel fatigued in the morning. Make a conscious effort to switch off electronic devices after 9pm and get into bed with a book, perhaps.
8.  Move your body 
     Do this daily. Moving does not have to involve an intense workout. Simply leaving your desk and heading out for a walk throughout the day to release tension and take some “me” time, to focus on the present and practice mindfulness. I like to start my day with some gentle yoga and meditation. The benefits are truly wonderful. For a mental detox, meditation is essential. I explain why I meditation works in this blog post.

Would you like to try a yoga or meditation class? Find out more information here or contact me at dadaj@londonandmeditation.org.uk

Namaste,
Dada Jyotirupananda

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You are what you Eat - Conscious Choices for a Good Diet: The 5 secrets of Dietary Success

Misao Okawa took a long time to become famous. Maybe she had a bad press agent, for she didn’t make any headlines till she was well over a century in age. On March 5, 2014 she turned 116, and became the world’s oldest person.

Her secret for longevity, as reported in the Huffington Post is: “Eat and sleep and you will live a long time.” Also: “You have to learn to relax,” she said. In the busy modern world that we live in, it may be hard to get the eight hours of sleep per night that she recommends, or to eat three large meals a day, as she does. Relaxing? Well, I’ll cover that in another blog post.

As for food, I think that many of us can make better choices. Food is not a matter of ‘one diet fits all’. There are numerous reasons why we eat what we eat. Unfortunately, not all of our food choices are good for us. I choose my food not just for nutrition (though that’s important), but for a few other reasons. Consider this list when you make up your shopping list:

First of course, is nutritious food

Second,it might be your food budget

Third, how your food choices affect the environment

Fourth, how your diet affects other living beings.

Fifth: how suitable your diet is for your mental balance and for your peace of mind.

The first two factors are familiar to most of us. But the other three, even if they do seem a bit ‘out there’ to you, are actually quite down-to-earth considerations.Altogether, this menu of conscious, healthy living will be good for you, for the environment and for society.And the foods you’ll use are generally easily available.

In this blog post, I’ll deal with just nutrition and budget. From 40 years’ experience and research, I’ve found that a plant-based (vegetarian) diet is best for complete wellbeing. I spend less on buying food, my food has more complete nutrition (that my body can easily absorb) and since I made the switch, I take virtually no sick time from work (or from holidays either!).

In my book, Meditation: Searching for the Real You I describe some of the history of vegetarianism, and many of the reasons and benefits of such a diet.
According to the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics* :“…Vegetarian(ism is) associated with improved health outcomes including lower levels of obesity, a reduced risk of heart disease and lower blood pressure. Also, vegetarians tend to consume a lower proportion of calories from fat and fewer overall calories, and more fiber, potassium and vitamin C than non-vegetarians. These characteristics, plus lifestyle factors, may contribute to the health benefits among vegetarians.”
Also, the American Dietetic Association sees a vegetarian diet as: “Nutritionally adequate, and providing healthful benefits in the prevention and treatment of chronic diseases.”
There are many examples of people who have significantly improved their health after taking up a vegetarian diet. We’ll discuss such examples another time.

As for cost benefits, I’ve found that I can enjoy a great and healthy diet for less money than my non-vegetarian friends. But cost isn’t only about my pocketbook. According to Dr. Neal Barnard, et al, writing in Preventive Medicine in 1995: “The total direct medical costs in the USA attributable to meat consumption were estimated to be $30-60 billion a year, based upon the higher prevalence of hypertension, heart disease, cancer, diabetes, gallstones, obesity and food-borne illness among omnivores compared with vegetarians.”
While that was about 20 years ago, I suspect the story is still similar, not only in the USA.
While going completely meat-free may not sound like an appealing or easy option to meat-lovers, being mindful of where food comes from and eating consciously is important: keep a predominantly vegetable-based dietand consume organic meat wherever possible. Conscious choices about your diet can have a great positive impact on your life and the life and wellbeing of many others.

Namaste,
Dada Jyotirupananda

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Why Meditate?

“With our thoughts we make our world.” – Buddha
“Life is all about...”
 – “Success.”
 – “Happiness.”
– “Wealth.”
 “To make the world a better place we need...”
 – “Peace.”
 – “Social security for all.”
 – “An improved environment.”

This is a summary of typical Q&A's with students in my meditation classes. Some of the answers are fairly tangible: we can envision 'wealth' perhaps as income or property. 'An improved environment' may conjure images of verdant forests, clean rivers and clear skies. However, answers, such as 'success', 'happiness', 'peace' are not easy to measure.But both the tangible and intangible ideas have something in common: they emanate from the mind, from our ideas and attitudes.

For example, does success come from money, fame or social position? Or all of these things? Actually, one may have all these things and still not enjoy them: that’s because success isn't an absolute state. It's all in the mind. For example, there is a wonderful saying I like: “The happiest people don’t necessarily have the best of everything, but they make the most of everything." Then there's peace. Calling for “world peace” is a mantra of many public figures. But what is peace? Here’s an example: I'm in a country where I don't know the language. I go out for the day and my hosts ask me to bring back some mangos from the marketplace. I've never heard of mangos, don't know what they look like and think maybe it's a fruit, but it could be a vegetable, a drink, a type of bread. So, what are the chances that I'll bring back mangos? Just so, if I call for peace in the world, but I have no sense of peace in my life and in my mind, can I find peace and 'bring it back home'?

Meditation is an excellent tool to help us find inner peace. Yogic philosophy notes that the essential nature of humans is to be happy. We all want to be happy so that we can feel inner peace or harmony. Yogic meditation brings inner peace through a gradual process, with results evident along the way. My school of meditation follows a system similar to Patanjali's original Astaunga Yoga (according to this philosophy, there are eight steps toward enlightenment). The early stages of this path deal primarily with meditating on a simple mantra, which has a sublime meaning. This first stage has various benefits, such as better concentration, less reaction to stress and improved health. In a second stage, one learns a deeper mantra and some techniques that help withdraw our attention from the distractions or attractions of the world during meditation. In both cases the mantra is one that is charged with a subtle but vital energy through a process that I explain my book Meditation: Searching for the Real You.

One essential quality of any mantra is its meaning. As your mind goes deeper into a quiet, aware state, you can identify with the positive, uplifting meaning of the mantra. It reminds us of one's true self, of the 'real you'. With that sense of true self, you can work for true peace because you can now identify it in yourself. Now, that's success. If you wish to learn meditation, join my free meditation classes. For more information, visit our website here or contact me at dadaj@londonandmeditation.org.uk

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