June 2012 by 16Rounds

www.16ROUNDS.com June 2012

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<(previous issue's cover)>

INTRO

INGRATE A story from Ramayana

Once there was

a Brahmana who was very poor. He had a friend, Baka. On visiting the Brahmana Baka inquired as to his welfare and the Brahmana replied that he was suffering from acute poverty.

16Rounds to Samadhi 16Rounds is published: ● To propagate spiritual knowledge and to educate all people in the techniques of spiritual life in order to check the imbalance of values in life and to achieve real unity and peace in the world. ● To bring people closer together for the purpose of teaching a simpler and more natural way of life. ● To expose the faults of materialism. ● To bring about the well-being of all living entities. 16Rounds is an independent magazine compiled, written, and published by a few Hare Krishna monks. It is produced in an attempt to benefit its readers, for our own purification, and for the pleasure of our spiritual grandfather, His Divine Grace A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada, the founder and spiritual guide of the International Society for Krishna Consciousness (ISKCON). The first copy is free. Additional copies of the same issue are $10 each. © 2012 16Rounds to Samadhi. All rights reserved.

16Rounds Staff: Editor: Mahat Tattva Dasa Mahat is a monk and the president of the ISKCON monastic community in San Diego. Layout: Bhismadeva Dasa Bhismadeva has been a monk since 2008 and is currently living in the ashram at the Hare Krishna temple in San Diego.

Cover graphic: Nick Pritchard Visual artist and creative director at Epitaph Records. www. Metrosea.com. Recently married.

"Don't worry" said Baka "I have some friends who are Raksasas (human-eaters), go see them, introduce yourself as my friend and they will solve your problem." Trusting his friend Baka, the Brahmana visited the Raksasas who were pleasantly surprised to see that a Brahmana was visiting. Being human-eaters they thought that lunch had been delivered with no effort on their part. But as soon as the Brahmana mentioned his friend Baka the mood of the Raksasas changed and they immediately saw him as their own friend and asked how they could help him. The Brahmana told them of his plight. He had scarcely finished speaking when the Raksasas said that his problem was already solved and he just had to go home to see for himself. When he arrived home he could see that all wealth had been showered on him.

they were human-eaters they did not want to eat the Brahmana because he was an ingrate.

So the Raksasas dragged his corpse to the jungle where some cannibals were living and offered the body of the Brahmana for them to eat. Knowing that the Raksasas too were human-eaters the cannibals questioned them as to why they themselves were not eating the Brahmana. When the Raksasas told them the story the cannibals replied: "Oh, he is an ingrate - we also do not eat ingrates. Dispose of the body somewhere else." The moral of the story is that being an ingrate is such a dirty condition that even Raksasas and cannibals are disgusted. �

However, when Baka came to visit his friend the Brahmana, the Brahmana was very proud and impudent and forgetting how much he owed Baka he argued with him and killed him. By their mystic potency the Raksasas could immediately understand that their friend Baka had been killed by the Brahmana and they angrily appeared on the scene to chastise the Brahmana.

"Only because you called yourself friend of our friend Baka did we spare your life and showered you with all opulence. But you were so ungrateful to your friend Baka that you have killed him. Now we shall avenge our friend." Saying that they killed the Brahmana. But even though

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Once Lord Brahma told an ungrateful person, 'The means of atonement has been prescribed for the killer of a cow, a drunkard, a thief, or for one who has broken a sacred vow, but there is no expiation for an ungrateful soul!'

MEANING OF “16ROUNDS” Yoga is a Sanskrit word that means “union” or “linking.” Meditation is a process of yoga by which the spiritual practitioner achieves union with the Divine. The recommended process of meditation for the age we are currently living in is mantra meditation. This process involves chanting of mantras. The Upanishads, the classical spiritual texts of ancient India, say that the best mantra is the Hare Krishna mantra: hare krishna, hare krishna, krishna krishna, hare hare, hare rama, hare rama, rama rama, hare hare. A “Mala” is a set of 108 beads strung on a thread, sort of like a rosary. The spiritual practitioner prayerfully and with great concentration recites/chants the whole mantra once for each bead of the mala. The mala or the string of beads is held in the ﬁst of the right hand and is meant to help us count how many times we chanted the mantra. It also helps engage the sense of touch in the process of meditation. Once we have chanted the mantra 108 times, or once for each bead, we have completed “one round.” Serious practitioners of this spiritual discipline take a vow to chant at least sixteen times round the mala every day; thus the name “16 Rounds.”

PHOTO CREDITS ©1 flickr.com/ghalog ©2 flickr.com/ralphhogaboom ©3 flickr.com/redskynight ©4 flickr.com/9619972@N08 ©5 flickr.com/lehcar1477 ©7 flickr.com/thomashawk ©8 flickr.com/vipez ©9 flickr.com/robinzblog ©10 flickr.com/pip_r_lagenta ©11 flickr.com/insightimaging ©12 flickr.com/qmechanic ©13 flickr.com/meetthemediaguru ©14 flickr.com/the-g-uk ©15 flickr.com/keamysparadise ©16 flickr.com/nuwomb ©17 flickr.com/caseydavid ©18 flickr.com/schtumple

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SOCIETY

THE FAILURE OF LIBERATION MOVEMENTS When Struggle For Freedom Ends In Bondage By Howard J. Resnick Ph.D

We conscious beings march to Washington to demand our rights. We, who are consciousness, form liberation movements because it is the nature of consciousness to seek freedom. If we misidentify ourselves as molecular machines, then we fall into the bondage of gross ignorance, specifically that ignorance perpetrated by the worst type of people, those who would conceptually annihilate the soul and God and obliterate forever the only real basis of peaceful society—namely, mutual respect for the sacred status of all life forms and all living beings, based on their common quality of being emanations from God. In other words, it is my strong contention that to irrationally assume that every living being is identical with the physio-chemical body renders meaningless in an ultimate sense any attempt to establish a moral, just, or liberated human society. Unfortunately, liberation movements tend to intensify the false egoistic identification with the material body and thus themselves contribute enormously to the conceptual and psychological basis of social exploitation and manipulation. This point can be analyzed as follows.

Modern

history is full of liberation movements. Even the American revolution and the formation of the American nation can be seen as a type of liberation movement that signaled the eventual collapse of European colonialism. In America, modern liberation movements have sought to free blacks, latinos, homosexuals, females, and so on

from the social dominance and economic exploitation of so-called "normal" white Americans. Unfortunately, almost all these liberation movements seem to reinforce rather than transcend a materialistic view of personal identity and thus unwittingly contain within their ideology the seeds of prejudice, exploitation, and bondage—the very things they are fighting against.

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This can be explained as follows.

Modern scientists tend to define reality exclusively in terms of the laws that govern matter. Biologist John Maynard Smith of the University of Sussex declares, "The individual is simply a device constructed by the genes to insure the production of more genes like themselves." According to Dr. Richard L. Thompson, a

mathematician at the State University of New York at Binghamton, "This statement conveys in a nutshell what modern science has to say about the meaning of human life." Unfortunately, modern liberation movements seem to accept this superficial definition of life. In the Unity Statement of the Women's Pentagon Action, we find the following statement: "We are made

of blood and bone, we are made of ... water."

Obviously, we are not blood, bone, and water, since blood, bone, and water are unconscious material elements that would hardly march to the Pentagon to secure political and economic rights. We are consciousness, and therefore we are aware of, or conscious of, the blood, bone, water, and so on that make up our body.

The material body desires sex, food, shelter, and defense, and the material mind desires prestige and the sense of superior status in society. A person dominated by the material body and mind must become an exploiter or manipulator of the material world, since such a person is driven to seek personal gratification either as an individual or through an egotistical collective identity. The first stage of liberation is understanding that I am not a bag of molecules, I am not blood, bones, stool, bile, mucus, and so on: I am pure consciousness. The Bhagavad-gita teaches us to understand our spiritual identity and gives the fol-

Cont'd on pg. 7 ›››

SOCIETY

THE HEART OF DARKNESS More Than Mere Bioethics By Devamrita Swami

Never has

there been a time when humans are so intelligent and advanced, right? Led by our fearless scientists, technologists, and politicians, how can we lose? Well, check

this out from the advanced scholars and medical ethics experts of Oxford University, the University of Milan, and the University of Melbourne.

Doctors should have the right to kill newborn babies because they are disabled,

too expensive, or simply unwanted by their mothers, say these academics on the cutting edge. “Babies are not real people.”

everything and everyone is only matter, then why not tidy up the piles of matter known as human beings by throwing out, like the garbage, defective or unwanted matter? If there is no spirit soul, then what does anything matter? There's no difference between a beer can and a person. Francesca Minerva, a female medical ethics specialist, argues a young baby is not a real person and so killing it in the first days

fore, the interests of “full humans” should come first, especially since the baby, though a human, is not a person yet. Why should handicapped infants live? The practical reality of creating a family, the researchers point out, is that often parents are unaware their child is disabled until after it is born. Although a handicapped child may be happy, it will not reach the potential of a normal child. “To bring up such chil-

We should note that this is an honest materialistic conclusion because, after all, if

THE GROWNUPS HAVE TAKEN THE MONOPOLY OVER THE WORLD AND ARE DECIDING ON OUR BEHALF WHETHER WE HAVE THE RIGHT TO LIVE.

EPHIALTES - ABANDONED CHILD OF A SPARTAN FAMILY. SCREEN SHOT FROM A SCENE IN THE MOVIE "300." after birth is little different than aborting it in the womb. What's more, even a healthy baby could have its life snuffed out, if the mother decides she can’t afford to look after it. Writing in the Journal of Medical Ethics, Dr Minerva and co-author Alberto Giubilini, a University of Milan bioethicist, argue that “afterbirth abortion” should be permissible in all cases in which abortion is.

They state that like an unborn child, a newborn has yet to develop hopes, goals and dreams; so, while clearly human, he or she is not a person, someone with a moral right to life.

The concern is that parents, older children in the family, and society as a whole have aims and plans that could be affected by the arrival of the child. There-

dren might be an unbearable burden on the family and on society as a whole.”

Why be squeamish and sentimental? The logical defense given is that society aborts millions of unborn children even though the fetuses, if left undisturbed and allowed to depart from the womb, have the potential to live a full human life.

Consequently, the experts say, there is no real difference between eliminating a child living in the womb or recently out of the womb. In both cases the full person is not yet developed; therefore, parents and society can freely do what they see best to do. Be progressive, be practical. The bioethics experts are also in favor of liquidating a healthy baby when the woman’s circumstances Cont'd on pg. 15 ›››

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SOCIETY

CORPORATE WAISTLINE

The Fat Fight Against Fat Cats By Matthew McManus

In a report

publicly released by leading health researchers and pundits, forty-two percent of Americans were projected to be obese by 2030, a rise from thirty-two percent today based on the current growth rate.

BMI

The definition of obesity is 30, or greater. The number signifies the division between one’s body mass in pounds by height in inches squared, and is technically called body mass index, or referred to simply as BMI. Although it does not calculate body fat percentage directly, scientists accept it as one of the best heuristic formulas for determining one’s level of girth based on measurements of height and weight.

IMMEDIATE AND REMOTE CAUSES

The BMI scale demarcates if one is underweight, normal weight, overweight, obese, or morbidly obese. Since we know the scale is based on the BMI formula, can one simply fudge the formula and hope to solve the problem of obesity by creating wider scales whereby those deemed fat will instead be labeled normal? The issue can be solved by changing the statistics, right? After all, are not these disparaging statistics the cause of the report that was released, which has sparked national concern? Furthermore, perhaps we

be completely real and true but having no objective validity. That same fallacy can hold true for one person or for multitudes of people; there is no restriction on ignorance.

BLAME GAME

CHANGE OF BEHAVIOR BY THE GROUP BEGINS WITH THE SINCERE SELF-REFLECTION OF THE GROUP. have unfairly associated the moniker of ‘obese’ to be notoriously concomitant with disease and shortened life. Change the definition, change the paradigm. If we can give the dog a bad name and hang him, why not take him down, give him a new identity, and pretend like it never happened. By changing the definition of obese (which when quantified is completely subjective anyway) the problem is solved by dint of negation through modification. No one has to worry about obesity any-

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more or the $550 billion in projected medical costs. Such a solution is so attractively fallacious and ineffective; it is practically political. Yet, the same methodology is used among decisionmaking intelligentsia with little or no effect. Unfortunately, failure to look intelligently at the root cause can be overshadowed by immediate causes, some of which are not true causes in themselves, and only create further illusion and confusion; however, in

a socio-political landscape of competing factions for limited land, labor, and capital, truth for truth’s sake is more often than not deemed a superfluous luxury. Furthermore, when one is in the darkness of ignorance, ‘reality’ or ‘truth’ could in fact be something completely different and our relationships with those things could also be perverted or concocted. For example, in a state of confusion one may mistake a rope for a snake or falsely judge a genuine friend to be a foe, thinking both cases to

News media point to so many different sources as causes to this obesity epidemic, but fail to look at the root cause. To say that one’s being overweight is due to lack of exercise, poor diet, or psycho-physical maladies are a superficial understanding. Those are ancillary causes. Context is the crux in determining the motive of any action. Take a criminal trial, for instance, where no direct evidence is available; the defendant’s level of culpability to the crime in the eyes of the judge and jury is contingent on so many contextual clues related to time, place, circumstance, relationship to the prosecutor, et cetera. The more one can

uncover and piece together these pieces of information, the more lucid the understanding of what actually happened that led to the crime as well as the psychological mindset of the defendant in relation to these contextual clues.

Half of the root cause stems from the culture itself with its unabashed, perverted messages on happiness and reality, which when taken unbolted by an ignorant, undiscerning public, promote an unhealthy lifestyle. Unless one is directly involved in what the media reports on either personally or through personal ties, our source of information on current news must come from media sources under the assumption that what is being reported on is objectively accurate and valid. Needless to say, those who control the channels of communication are in a position of great influence

SOCIETY to shape the viewers’ conception of reality. Of course, Big Brother wants you to believe the contrary because their power derives from the public, but it is clear as we see case after case of excessive greed, their motives are selfishly driven. ‘Just believe the hype and give me your money’ is the subtle message – the ideal picaresque society.

MCDONALD’S CULTURE

With the mantra of ‘bigger is better,’ fast-food franchises have steadily increased the sizes of their meals. Beginning in the 1970’s, there has been a trend in growing BMI due to an increase in caloric intake. Between 1970 and 1980, calorie intake was relatively stable, rising only 1.2 percent. The following decade consumption ballooned 9.6 per-

cent. Finally, from 1990 to 2008, the number of calories ballooned another 11.4 percent. These are staggering increases – with a grand a total of 2,673 calories consumed per person on average, 23.3 percent more than 1970. Rises in caloric intake among the population were directly correlated with an increase in portion sizes offered by the major food chains.

When the McDonalds chain opened in 1955, the size of their main menu items: hamburgers, French fries, and fountain soda, were 1.6 oz., 2.4 oz, and 6 oz., respectively. Fast forward to today and they have increased to 8 oz., 7.1 oz., and 32 oz., an increase of 500%, 457%, and 250%. Similar increases in food portion sizes are found in other major fast food chains like Wendy’s, and Burger King, which sell the same main menu items in similar portion sizes. Take Wendy’s large French fries for example, which are 6.7 ounces for a large, as compared to Burger King’s 6.9 ounces. Although smaller sizes are available for purchase, these ‘king size’ and ‘supersize’ options have the greatest value based

on cost, and for that reason, they are the most attractive to purchase.

Fast food is a popular mainstay of American culture. Of all Americans, 25% eat at fast food establishments every day. There is no shortage of locations either. An estimated 50,000 chains are scattered throughout the US. It is undeniable that the values and ideals such corporations imbibe also resonate in the cultural framework of its consumers. The message is clear that quantity reigns supreme, more is better, and the consequences of such narrow thinking (health risks, environmental hazards, brutish way of life, et cetera) are negligible until proven guilty.

BMI: BODY MIND INTELLIGENCE

From the body, the mind, and the intelligence there has to be harmony in one’s values and actions otherwise there is an upsetting conflict that arises in the self, often referred to in psychology as cognitive dissonance. To prevent cognitive dissonance and subsequent neuroticism, one must abide by a philosophy that governs how they interact with their environment and think about the universe. Therefore, in order to facilitate a corporate lifestyle, there must be a corporate paradigm. Practically one can see

FAST FOOD IS A POPULAR MAINSTAY OF AMERICAN CULTURE. OF ALL AMERICANS, 25% EAT AT FAST FOOD ESTABLISHMENTS EVERY DAY.

this from a more technical level. When the mind is convinced through discrimination of the intelligence, the next natural sequence is to act on that information.

From a subtle level, the acceptance of an unhealthy lifestyle is heavily proselytized through the incessant blitzing of advertising messages. According to longitudinal studies taken from the 1970’s up until contemporary times, the amount of advertising messages people receive on a daily basis has increased by 900%.(shooting up from an average of 500 to 5000) – ads that are increasingly piquant to promote gorging, prostituting, and abusing. Mentally the mind is allured by what will taste good, smell good, feel good, sound good, and look good. Let’s be honest, we are searching out for pleasure at every moment, and for the average Joe with little self control, discipline, or austerity, and what to speak of knowledge of how things are working in life, any little push towards sensory stimulation just adds gasoline to the flames.

NURTURING WHAT IS NATURAL

It is the paradoxical situation for those inured to the modern lifestyle of having to promulgate that which is already akin to the human being: living a peaceful, healthy, and happy life. However, in a widespread social system that conditions one again, and again, and again to interact with artificial, materialistic stimuli, demarcating between ‘natural’ and ‘unnatural’ becomes exceedingly difficult. One’s own real welfare and sense of welfare are jeopardized by social influences which bring to mind the cliché, ‘if [blank] jumps off a bridge, will you too?‘

Today’s world is operated under hegemony of monopolist corporations

Cont'd on pg. 13 ›››

THE FAILURE OF LIBERATION MOVEMENTS Continued from pg. 4 lowing example: We once had a baby body, and then we had the body of a child, an adolescent, and finally an adult. Despite the fact that the body changes its biological elements every seven years, forming in this time span a new physical entity, we remain the same person. That continuous person is the self, or the soul.

If I free myself from the illusion of being a biological machine, the illusion that my existence as a conscious person is not ultimately real since it can be reduced to impersonal, unconscious entities, namely atoms and molecules—if I can thus free myself from the big lie of some modern scientists, then I can free myself from the exploitative, self-centered desires that plague the material body and mind. This is real liberation. A liberated person can deal with any man or woman without trying mentally or physically to utilize that person as an instrument of personal gratification. A liberated person sees all the creatures of the earth, those appearing in human society, animal society, bird society, fish society, insect society, plant society, or even mineral society, as eternal spiritual entities temporarily encased in various material coverings. Thus a liberated person sees that every living entity is equal to his or her self in a spiritual sense. In other words, the liberated person sees that every living entity is equal spiritually and is thus worthy of respect and concern. A liberated person cannot view any living entity as a mere object of heartless consumption or manipulation. A liberated person

opposes the inexplicable brutality of the slaughterhouse. A liberated person opposes the cruelty of the hunters, who slaughter innocent creatures for sport, and he opposes the publishers who devastate millions of trees to produce paper on which they print their pornography, their trivia, and their materialism.

First we should free ourselves from the vicious illusion that we are material machines. Next we should free ourselves from the selfish desires that pollute the material body and mind. And finally we should free ourselves from the misunderstanding that we are meant to be lords of the earth. The earth does not belong to human beings, either individually or collectively.

Systematic exploitation of the earth, the bodies of others, or even one's own body constitutes grave irresponsibility and duplicity, since the actual proprietor of the body has not been conceptually established. Upon arriving in a particular country, our primary concern is to understand the laws that govern that place. Such laws are not merely the ordinary physical laws that govern material objects but also the acceptable and unacceptable modes of bodily and verbal behavior in a particular nation that are enacted and enforced by those who govern. Recognition or awareness of these laws is of primary and not secondary concern to a citizen.

Similarly, knowledge of the laws that govern the universe is of primary concern to every human being. To suggest that we put these questions aside Cont'd on pg. 13 ›››

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SOCIETY

HOODWINKED Your Life After Trayvon's Death By Devin James O’Rourke

One man,

upset about the way he had been treated by his class mates and administrators, returned to the small college he had recently been dismissed from, and gunned down seven people 'execution style'. CNN.com has its story of these events: “College shootings called 'cold-blooded'” listed atop

the 'Latest News' heading amongst fifteen other stories, including 'Dick Cheney released from hospital,' and 'Transgender contestant back in pageant.' Further reading will be required to determine any correlation. All this news can be found at the bottom left of the screen. CNN thinks two stories need no category to entice clickers. Tornadoes that

WHEN TAP WATER IS PUT IN A PLASTIC BOTTLE AND NAMED SOMETHING THAT MAKES YOU SAY 'AH' (DASAHNI, AQUAFINAH, EVIAHN) PEOPLE ARE HAPPY TO PAY 1900 TIMES MORE THAN THEY WOULD FOR A DRINK FROM THEIR OWN SINK.

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have torn through Texas garner roughly one-third more screen space than Obama saying 'Romney' for the first time on camera. Both are given prime retinal real estate at the top center and top left of the screen, respectively.

Finally, there are twelve or so stories that are 'featured' on the page. These are centered, include pictures along with caption, and many bear the play triangle, indicating video content. The top piece amongst these details is the 'competing evidence in the Martin case.' Martin who, you ask? No, of course you know. Martin, as in Trayvon Martin, is the seventeen year-old, unarmed AfricanAmerican boy who was shot by one George Zimmerman on the auspice of self defense. As Anglo as his name is and the story may indicate him to be, Zimmerman himself is a twenty-eight yearold, Hispanic male.

Nonetheless, many feel a mocking bird has been killed, and Zimmerman's self-defense story is a weak attempt to cover up a murder he committed because of racial stereotyping. It’s hard to disagree with this assessment. Trayvon was unarmed, undersized com-

pared to Zimmerman, and was simply walking back to the house of his father's fiancée at the reasonable hour of 7pm, having bought Skittles and a drink at the local 7/11. Zimmerman claims, as the neighborhood watch leader, he noted suspicious behavior on the part of Martin and was attacked when he approached him for questioning. That seems to be the icing on the case; a self-righteous buffoon, who is allowed to have a gun because he lives in Florida, saw his archetypal suspicious character strolling down the street and got trigger happy. But the cherry on top... Martin was wearing a hoodie, an article of clothing donned by every person whom has ever walked into a 7/11 to steal Skittles. Never mind that it was raining; Zimmerman watched what he wanted; his trifecta of trouble young, black, hoodie'd..

Martin’s death is certainly a tragedy; but, it wouldn't be a travesty without the hoodie. When tap water is put in a plastic bottle and named something that makes you say 'AH' (DasAHni, AquafinAH, EviAHn) people are happy to pay 1900 times more then they would for a

MARTIN WAS WEARING A HOODIE, AN ARTICLE OF CLOTHING DONNED BY EVERY PERSON WHOM HAS EVER WALKED INTO A 7/11 TO STEAL SKITTLES. drink from their own sink. And when you dress a racially charged case up in an article of clothing everybody owns, like the hoodie, you invite a circus to town that never actually left.

NBA teams, US Senators, and supermodels have all taken the opportunity to publicly sport hoodies since the story broke out. Thousands of hooded sympathizers have assembled across dozens of America’s major city centers in protest of the incident’s aftermath. President Obama, known for his background in genetics, took

some of his precious time at the pulpit to let us all know, “If I had a son, he'd look like Trayvon.”

Jessie Jackson, the self-appointed face of the ongoing civil rights movement has taken this case as an opportunity to remind us 'Blacks are under attack,' and he has described the young Martin as a 'martyr.' He also perceives it as an appropriate time to 'reinstate the Civil Rights Commission.' I wonder who he'd suggest head up such an endeavor? Remember kids, the exterminator doesn’t want to kill

SOCIETY all the termites, just the ones in your house, and just long enough that you'll still call him when they come back.

Granted, the police in Sanford, Florida have botched this case big time. Zimmerman has been charged with a crime nearly two months after the incident, and procedures for gathering and processing evidence were done haphazardly. But let’s look at all the facts before we again start paying attention to the likes of Jesse Jackson on a regular basis. February 26 is the day Trayvon was killed, and a day prior, two more Americans were murdered. But they weren't on home soil. They were in Afghanistan, and a native militant shot them in retaliation for the burning of the Quran on a U.S. military base, which took place under the sanction of American officers. The burning of the Quran, which most Americans might equate to playing TBall with a statue of Jesus, is the most recent in a long list of instances that demonstrate American’s complete lack of understanding, respect, or even tolerance of Islamic culture.

Of course, President Obama's apology for the matter assured everyone that the opposite is the case, but the 10,000-30,000

Afghani civilians who have died since 2001 as a result of this most recent 'conflict' in the Middle East might have something different to say. If that number seems a bit vague, please remember that it’s very difficult, and also fruitless, to count people that are hardly considered as such in the first place.

Thirteen years ago Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold entered their High School in Columbine, Colorado armed with a shot gun and a 9mm each. By the early afternoon twelve students, one teacher, and two gunmen were dead. Twenty-one more were injured during this, the forth deadliest school shooting in America’s proud history. That also happens to be the day the U.S. took the opportunity to drop more bombs on Kosovo than any other time during that 'conflict.' I wonder how much news coverage was given to those events that evening. Notice a trend? I'd like to call Afghanistan, Kosovo, or for that matter Vietnam, Korea, and the rest of our recent conflicts 'war' like most media outlets do. But that would be admitting that the U.S. Senate passed a declaration of war for those 'conflicts,' which is something that hasn't actually been done since WWII.

In the Sanskrit language there is a word, 'maya.' In his purport to the thirtyfifth text of the fifth chapter of Bhagavad-gita As It Is, Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada explains the word literally translates to ma (not) and ya (this); not this. Practically, the word is used to describe persons who are confused about the actual state of things. Persons who believe what is factually not true are said to be in maya or illusion. Particularly, the Bhagavad-gita uses 'maya' to reference the idea that the body is the end-all, beall plane of existence. This philosophy is a very convenient one for the established structures of society to perpetuate. Media outlets are designed to spin countless threads of discourse about race, gender, height, weight, age, et cetera. You can't find one article regarding Trayv o n

Martin and George Zimmerman that doesn't focus on these discrepancies because otherwise there would be nothing to write about. Governments can speak of justice for all their people and simultaneously get away with dropping thousands of bombs indiscriminately on 'others,' because of arbitrary borders they themselves distinguished. Similarly, celebrities and charlatans can manipulate the masses for their own advances simply by wearing a sweatshirt. This is called 'maya;' illusion, that which is not. The reality of Trayvon Martin’s death is that it resulted from one of the unlimited number of violent acts Americans perpetrate on each

Cont'd on pg. 17 ›››

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COVER STORY

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COVER STORY

NDAA'LAY THE INEVITABLE Federal Courts Give Citizens a Few More Days of Freedom By Devin James O’Rourke

“At 11.40

pm (ship's time), lookout Frederick Fleet spotted an iceberg immediately ahead of Titanic and alerted the bridge. First Officer William Murdoch ordered the ship to be steered around the obstacle and the engines to be put in reverse, but it was too late; the starboard side of Titanic struck the iceberg, creating a series of holes below the waterline. Five of the ship's watertight compartments were breached. It soon became clear that the ship was doomed, as

she could not survive more than four compartments being flooded. Titanic began sinking bow-first, with water spilling from compartment to compartment as her angle in the water became steeper." - A quote from Robert Ballard’s The Discovery of the Titanic.

“Today I have signed into law H.R. 1540, the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2012. I have signed the Act chiefly because it authorizes funding for the defense of the United States and its interests abroad, crucial services for

service members and their families, and vital national security programs that must be renewed. In hundreds of separate sections totaling over five-hundred pages, the Act also contains critical administration initiatives to control the spiraling health care costs of the Department of Defense, to develop counterterrorism initiatives abroad, to build the security capacity of key partners, to modernize the force, and to boost the efficiency and effectiveness of military operations worldwide.” - The opening paragraph of Presi-

TITANIC DURING CONSTRUCTION

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COVER STORY dent Obama's signing statement regarding the NDAA. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome aboard the Titanic.

“The statute at issue places the public at undue risk of having their speech chilled for the purported protection from al-Qaeda, the Taliban, and foreign terrorist organizations. The vagueness of Section 1021 does not allow the average citizen, or even the government itself, to understand with the type of definiteness to which our citizens are entitled, or what conduct comes within its scope. Please read Section 1021 as 'That part says that the government can arrest whoever they want, whenever they want just because.'” The last quote was from the opinion of U.S. District Judge Katherine Forrest. A crew of seven notable, civil dissidents, Noam Chomsky among them, called the Federal Government's bluff and sued them on grounds that the NDAA, and particularly this troublesome Section 1021, is unconstitutional. They won, this time. But the damage has already been done. It was three hours after the iceberg gouged its hull that the Titanic sunk; maybe this country has three years. The NDAA is the most recent but surely not the last acrimonious acronym designed to complete the deAmericanization of America. It was the positive strep test

confirming the presence of unwanted things our sore throat, gushing nose and fever were already indicating. But despite the fact that it does nothing short of create a police state where everybody's previously inalienable rights can be shunted at any time for whatever reason; still, you will hear a lot more griping about gays losing their tax breaks or women who can't get birth control than you will about all of us being an ill-advised Google away from indefinite detainment.

This NDAA is the type of legislation whose potential to effect your life is directly correlated to how much you already know about it. I only know that farm subsidies pass every year; for what, where, and how much is the concern of people living in states with names that end in ‘ansas.’ The types of people the NDAA authorizes detention of are exactly the types of people who already know everything I could say about its political, social and cultural implications. Conversely, the people whom think NDAA a typo meant to reference a prominent intercollegiate athletics organization are already locked up. I'm not one to pander or patronize; so, please forgive me for not taking the time to explain times tables to either calculus students or kindergarteners. However, I would like those familiar with asymp-

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totes to consider we're all in prison already. If we are living in a place where such a bill as the NDAA could even be considered publicly, let alone passed, then does it matter which side of the incarceration line we're on? The material circumstance of our bodies may not indicate detainment, but the minds of most Americans are indeed; they were submitted to hand cuffs and jail cells made of bread, circus, and Starbucks years ago. I once heard a Vaisnava monk characterize government more aptly in one sentence than all the Locke's, Nietzsche's and Stephanopoulos' could ever hope to in a thousand election cycles. It was the kind of profundity that could only come from an intelligence completely removed from the situation at hand, like a mom talking about her neighbor’s babysitter. “Government's are what people use to decide who owns what,” he said with the nonchalant attitude that we might have when buying toothpaste.

As a monk, his sole concern is the soul, which has nothing to do with the body and its material circumstance. As C.S. Lewis put it, we don't have souls. We are souls, we have bodies. The Bhagavad-gita As It Is, the Bible for a Vaisnava monk, explains that the soul changes bodies like we change clothes each day. That means all the stuff that

comes along with the body (home, car, bank account, caucus, et cetera) change too. So what’s the use of being so concerned with them?

Animal life, the Bhagavadgita calls it. Eating, sleeping, mating, defending, these are the only concerns of cats, dogs, and increasingly, Americans. Dave Matthews had a redeeming song called “Ants Marching” that ironically the ants loved. Practically, what is the difference between the ants faithfully moving this grain of sand from here to there day after day and the man or woman whom moves this copy to that office pay period after pay period? Such a limited scope of endeavor is true imprisonment. Unable to act on a plane beyond the temporary, we are constantly frustrated by our circumstances when we are concerned merely with things on the platform of the body. Can our car ever be new enough? Is our grass green enough? Our iPad sleek enough? Concerning ourselves with matters of the soul means developing a consciousness that becomes impervious to external agitation. Human life begins only when our desires for the procurement of stuff have ended. Nelson Mandela was a political prisoner in his homeland of South Africa for twenty-seven years. Four years after his release, he was elected president of

U.S. DISTRICT JUDGE KATHERINE FORREST: " THAT PART SAYS THAT THE GOVERNMENT CAN ARREST WHOEVER THEY WANT, WHENEVER THEY WANT JUST BECAUSE." the country. When we rise above the concern for our immediate material circum-

stance, we can perceive the world to be about more than who owns what. �

[ X ] CORPORATE WAISTLINE

THE FAILURE OF LIBERATION MOVEMENTS

Continued from pg. 7

who easily commandeer the multitudes of people. How? Because they are distracted by economy, inured in exploitation, emotionally desensitized, and retarded by shortsightedness and sensory overload. When there is a problem on a large scale – in this case a universal scope – other crises are spawned, and in the confusion of the moment, what is of immediate concern is taken as

priority, but oftentimes the origin or catalyst is neglected. Therefore, whatever the public eye sees to be a social pandemic or any sign of inauspiciousness, is an integral, albeit tumorous part of the society itself, and any solemn change of behavior by the group begins with the sincere self-reflection of the group. Subdivided further are the members themselves who must also be

SRILA RUPA GOSWAMI, A SAINT AND SCHOLAR, WITH HIS BROTHER SANATANA

Continued from pg. 7 willing to practice what they preach. That’s the second half of the root cause: the self-control of the individual – the self-incriminating, direct evidence.

Srila Rupa Goswami, a great saint and scholar that lived around 500 years ago, in his spiritual guide book, Upadesamrita or The Nectar of Instruction, gives clear instruction on self-control and discipline. He enjoins that one’s ultimate benefit comes in being able to control the urges of the mind and senses. Explaining further, Srila Rupa Goswami scientifically describes that the tongue, belly, and genitals are situated in a line on the body, and controlling all three begins from the top down. In other words, one must first be able to control the first and most voracious of them all, namely the tongue. Thus the belly and genitals will more easily be tamed, and the carnal urges of lust, greed, and anger will be properly pacified.

Peace with one’s self and other living entitles is the natural sequence for one whom properly uses the senses. As stated in the Bhagavad-gita (5.7), “One who works in devotion, who is a pure soul, and who controls the mind and senses is dear to everyone. Though always working, such a person is never entangled.” �

reveals a bewildered sense of conceptual priority and procedure.

If we claim that we will first solve the immediate problems of the body, we are presupposing that the body, and not consciousness, or the soul, is the essential identity of the entity and therefore worthy of our first concern. We assume that we are bodies and that perhaps we have a soul, rather than that we are consciousness, or self, or soul, and that we have a body. If there is no soul, then control or manipulation of one person by another is merely a biophysical event without ultimate meaning. Morality and justice are then mere inventions of selfrighteous entities, who are themselves expressing the propensities of their genes and whose anger and indignation at social injustice can be described through the symbols of mathematical expression as neuro-chemical brain states.

Thus the attempt by a people or social class to free itself from oppression or to achieve justice, in the materialistic concept, becomes a mere test of political strength for personal gratification and resembles the model of social Darwinism, which in itself is the model for unrestricted exploitation by the most vulgar means.

We living beings dwell within our bodies as consciousness, and other living beings dwell without, perceiving our bodies from without. What is the absolute logic or moral imperative that assigns the privilege of ownership to the internal and not the external entity? If we accept the principle that the body is to be exploited for selfish gratification then how do we establish that the body should gratify the internal rather than the external controller of the body?

The real tyranny is the tyranny of illusion, which keeps us perpetually in the ignorance of materialistic consciousness. Those who are exploited or oppressed should not struggle to become equal exploiters of the earth—to have a fair share of ignorance. If we maintain a society of big exploiters or of many little exploiters, the result will be the same. If we try to adjust and integrate a planet full of billions of little gods, the result will be ludicrous, disastrous, and useless. The urge to exploit matter for bodily or mental gratification, and thereby to gratify one's false ego, is like a germ. As long as a single cell of this germ remains within one's mind, it has the potential to continue to grow until it produces a Hitler or a Stalin.

The rulers of society are ignorant and falsely accept the material body as the self and humans as the rulers of the earth. Like animals, such persons think that their native land is their property, their families are their property, their personal bodies are their property, and that one may enjoy or exploit in any obscene way without consideration of an objective morality to govern their behavior. Unfortunately, many liberation movements accept these basic illusory principles but make the following demand: that the big exploiters of the earth be replaced by the many little exploiters—that exploitation be opened to all, on an equal basis. Many liberation movements directly or indirectly, consciously or unwittingly, nullify the very basis of respect among all creatures, namely, recognition of the sanctity of all life. They do this by attempting to define immediate reality without reference to a transcendental source of existence. �

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SOCIETY

HIGH LIVING, LOW THINKING Fine Solutions for Gross Problems

By Matthew McManus

IN THE POPULAR ENDEAVOR TO PUSH THE ENVELOPE FURTHER THAN THE PREVIOUS GENERATION, I PETITION THE INTELLIGENT AND BROAD-MINDED, WHEN THEY ATTEMPT TO THINK ‘OUTSIDE OF THE BOX’, TO ALSO THINK OUTSIDE OF THE MATERIAL REALM OF THE SENSES, THE MIND, AND INTELLIGENCE.

SOCIETY HAS A SPECIOUSLY SOUGHT OUT ASPIRATION TO BE A COCKAIGNE

By Matthew McManus

Society

, in its speciously sought out aspiration to be a Cockaigne, contains manifold institutions delivering diverse services to a wide range of folks – from the courthouse delivering justice, to the lawmakers and enforcers providing security, to the microcosmic level of small and large businesses providing all means of sense gratification; as well as to the blighted, unemployed, and other living entities who employ the services of philanthropists seeking to help them. There contains a wide net of paths for a wide group of personalities and interests. In a naïve way, there is an attempt

for harmony here…there must be, in so far as these reciprocal exchanges can take place. After all, in order to live in the society and satisfy desires, one must be able to render service to the society and have service rendered back unimpeded, depending on a network of individuals to provide you amenities – underscoring the popular cliché, nothing is free in this world and perpetuating the belief that economic development is the salvation of human society. In a feeble attempt to control the status quo, we can find many trammels that have been imposed to regulate the ‘free’ market; to solidify it so that in the course of working to fulfill one’s desires, the layman

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and CEO alike need not feel as much anxiety about losing a plumy position within society (although to think in these terms today is considered unrealistic even by the dreamy eyed and optimistic) or its concomitant plush or paltry rewards. Because to work in a society that upholds the value of quid pro quo as its infallible foundation for all dealings is to always be anxious about one’s own selfish interests to a certain gradation. If part of this network of people are shackled and indentured to it, then where’s the freedom or harmony? How can I morally seek to be a part of something that is directly and indirectly causing the sufferings of other people? Even if I want to

enjoy, how can I enjoy when it causes such tangible backlash? And if I am suffering, then what is the quality of service that I am rendering to society?

When the intelligence is clouded over with the desire to enjoy, there can never be a prudent decision made because it is always tainted with ephemeral attachments that can be used to control and corrupt. That is why every attempt at working within the framework of materialistic thought will never bring about the lasting changes we desire to see and experience on both a personal and universal scale. That deep sense of connective harmony we search for through trade unions in business, United Nations in

politics, girlfriends or boyfriends in romance, et cetera.

The Srimad Bhagavatam (2.5.32), an ancient Vedic text from India, explains in a clear, scientific, and cogent way why we continue to experience seemingly recurrent hardships and anomalies in everyday life very nicely:

“The living condition in material existence depends more or less on one’s intelligence and powerful living energy. Intelligence to counteract the hard struggle for existence is assisted by the senses for acquiring knowledge, and the living entity maintains himself by manipulating the active organs, like hands and legs.” After having analyzed the symptoms of the disease, Doctor Srila Prabhupada, a

spiritual preceptor and the founder of the Hare Krishna movement, in the commentary to the next verse explains the root cause:

“The different types of bodily construction of the living entities are exactly like different types of motorcars manufactured by assembling the allied motor parts. When the car is ready, the driver sits in the car and moves it as he desires… The living entities, however, are not the bodies; they are separate from the cars of the body.” To conclude, misidentifying the self to be something categorically different in every way from its true position is the origin of the problems we see mani-

Cont'd on pg. 17 ›››

PHILOSOPHY THE HEART OF DARKNESS Continued from pg. 5

have changed: she no longer has the time, money or energy to care for it.

They argue that while adoption might be a mother’s option for the child, it could cause undue psychological distress to the mother.

Early Western civilization teaches us. Remember the illustrious predecessors, the classic Romans and Greeks.

In Roman times, disabled infants were often abandoned after birth by parents who did not want or could not afford the financial burden. The child would simply be left outside to die from starvation and the elements in a practice known as “exposure”. It was an established and acceptable procedure.

In the ancient Greek citystate of Sparta, there was little choice in the matter. Newborns were seen as the property of the state and all babies were inspected by a community leader. If the child showed signs of deformity or ill-health, the parents were ordered to expose it. In these foundational societies of Western culture, leaving the child to the elements was the preferred method to "dispose" of the child because it meant the child died of natural causes—a more “moral” death than directly killing

the child.

Without a comprehensive spiritual science of the self and the Supreme Self, this is where society must inevitably head: gross, demonic materialism, devoid of "sentimental niceties." Time and time again the same ugliness pops up, century after century. �

COMMENT BY ROBERT MORRILL The logic can be extended. If the measure for abortion is "until the child can survive outside the womb (the current measure used in USA law - that is how they came to the point of allowing abortion through the 2nd trimester of the pregnancy) then logically you could kill the child up to six or seven years old. If it was earlier than that the child could not really survive on his or her own. By six or seven the child could probably rummage in dumpsters and survive in some kind of feral state. What about the retarded, seriously handicapped, or chronically ill? What about those healthy now but by testing their DNA we can see that they are prone to MS, Lou Gehrig's disease, or early on-set Alzheimer's? Welcome to Nazi Germany or Brave New World. �

LESSONS FROM A HAWK I reme

mber once, I was sitting on the banks of the river Ganga. Up, above me, I looked in to a cloudless sky, and soaring was a hawk. Its feathers of brown, gold, and red seemed to be illuminated by the sun. It was circling lower, and lower, and lower, till it was just a few feet above my head. I looked up at this hawk and saw its yellow eyes intensely gazing into the river, looking for something. Suddenly, the hawk dove head first right into the river Ganga. Then there was a skirmish, there was splashing. The hawk was under water and a few seconds later came out with a flapping fish in its claws. The

or death itself. Perhaps I was thinking at the time that the lesson is we should not be complacent. We should take the opportunities we have in our spiritual life very, very By Radhanath Swami seriously. One of the greatest enemies for a yogi is procrastination. We just get into the fish was struggling and squirming for groove of our lives and we put the most its life as the hawk flew into the forest, important things off for another day, out of sight. but we do not know that this yellowThat fish was just swimming along eyed hawk of fate may come for us at like any other day. With friends and any moment. family, looking for food, having fun, But then there was another lesson; if swishing around, it didn't expect anythat fish swam deeper, the hawk could thing traumatic to happen. But suddenly it was ripped right out of its real- not have caught it. In the same way, if ity, away from everything it identified we go deeper into our spiritual practices, deeper into our meditation, our with. It was about to die. satsang, our kirtan, absorb our minds Isn't that a potential situation for to that deeper place within our heart everyone? We just go about our lives where there is real fulfillment, then like any other day and the hawk of fate whatever situation that may come strikes - there's a death in the family, upon us in this world cannot really afthere's a traumatic experience, disease, fect us. �

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OPEN MIC

SPIRITUALITY IS A SCIENCE Assortment of Laboratories By Ryan Hazlett

THERE ARE ALL KINDS OF GURUS! ÂŠ12

When one

wants to learn physics, one must approach an authority on physics, a professor. Someone who is really smart can learn physics just by reading books and doing their own experiments at home, but even those rare geniuses are taking instructions from a professor through at least his or her books. Almost everyone else has to enroll in a university and take many different classes related to the field of physics. Now, just what is the usual process for mastering (getting a master's degree) physics? One must approach a learned guru, I mean a professor, and humbly, I mean respectfully take instruction from him or her.

The professor then tells the student which spiritual texts, I mean text books, to study. These texts reveal to one many difficult to understand and apply truths about the physical universe. One who understands these truths, has realization of them through experience, I mean experiments, and having done great things in the field of physics, is truly worthy of our respect.

Now, generally one has a lot of respect for the professor and the text book, and so they have faith, I mean confidence that whatever the books or the professor say is true. The student has never seen, and has little knowledge of the vast reaches of the universe, but they trust that the authorities in the field of physics have a lot

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of knowledge and practical experience of physics. The student also trusts that in many cases the professor has actually seen, with a telescope or microscope, spiritual realms, I mean amazing subatomic or galactic structures.

A serious physics student will only take instruction from a professor whom, when he was young, took instruction from his professor/professors, who took instruction from their professors. A serious student would only become a member of a genuine, I mean accredited, disciplic succession of learned gurus and disciples, I mean physics department at a university. After taking instruction from the text books and the professor, and gaining

a preliminary understanding of the ideas involved, one is instructed to apply the theories to reality - in other words, perform experiments. If one does their experiments properly, carefully following the instructions of guru and scripture, I mean the professor and the textbooks, then the experiments should turn out a success. Following this process, the serious student will advance steadily in self realization, I mean getting their masters degree in the field of physics. When an advancing physicist matures in his or her field they are ready to take disciples, I mean teach students. This is the general process for attaining a masters degree in physics, and making

ÂŠ13

further progress in the field. But, what if one who has never, or only vaguely studied physics, proclaimed that they knew just as much as any senior physicist? What if they went on to say that ac-

tually everyone is just as advanced, I mean everyone has the same amount of theoretical knowledge and experimental experience in the field of physics as scientists with masters degrees and

LIFESTYLE doctorates? This would be foolish. Similarly, to assume that everyone, regardless of their habits, moral character, or knowledge of spiritual science, is just as spiritual as any advanced yogi, is just not rational.

Advancing in yoga/selfrealization/enlightenment, is a science just as much as any other science. In fact the process is more or less the same for mastering any scientific discipline. The guru and spiritual texts give one theoretical knowledge of reality. They tell one that if they do this, this, and that, then it will change one's consciousness in specific ways. Similarly, the college professor and textbooks say that if one mixes these ingredients and heats them to a certain temperature for a certain amount of time, then it should produce a certain result. The difference between spiritual science and material science is simply the difference between experimenting with consciousness versus experimenting with matter. �

HIGHT LIVING, LOW THINKING Cont'd from pg. 14

fested in the public sphere today; because of such ignorance (i.e. thinking oneself to be the body and one’s bodily possessions to be their own), every endeavor will be met with concomitant frustration no matter how cleverly we attempt to move matter to fit our megrims. Therefore, in the popular endeavor to push the envelope further than the previous generation, I petition the intelligent and broad-minded, when they attempt to think ‘outside of the box’, to also think outside of the material realm of the senses, the mind, and intelligence. These things are on the physical field, and to go beyond is to approach that which is more subtle than the subtlest matter: the numinous, of which the soul is but a tiny part, but one’s true ego. �

HOODWINKED

Continued from pg. 9 other and 'others' everyday, not merely Feb 26, 2012. Its perceived significance as an event highlighting an escalating trend of violence and racial injustice is an idea being perpetuated by those who want you to remain unaware of the fact that violence and discrimination are the cultural norms and not the exceptions. The Vedas, our world’s oldest and most comprehensive tomes on spirituality and consciousness, describe violence as any act which encourages a person to identify exclusively with their body. By that definition, every action encouraged by America's main stream is a violent one. Buy this facial crème if you're this old and that one if you're that old. This television entertainment is for Blacks only. You want the ball to go in this hole if you're from this city, and that hole if you're from that city - any questions?

Subtle violence, much more insidious in nature, leads to acts of gross violence like in the case of Trayvon Martin. The Bhagavadgita explains that rather than being a summation of our temporary designations, we are actually eternally conscious beings experiencing a temporary reality. It is identification with this temporary reality that brings about so much suffering; so, by encouraging identification with a person's transient qualities, we are committing a violent act. Old age, disease, and death are scourges that do not discriminate. Though Martin's was untimely, the upset caused by his death can largely be understood when we acknowledge that everyone knows they will die and most people are pissed about it. White, Black, fat, thin, rich, poor and, as this case has reminded us, old or young. The end can come at any moment. Once your body is in a hole six feet underground, what

does the make of your car or the complexion of the president matter? What has the summation of your life's endeavors to accumulate so much material distinction amounted to?

Knowledge of our eternal nature is completely discouraged and suppressed in our society. Though a recent Pew poll shows nearly onethird of Americans believe in reincarnation, still the only religious paradigm spoken of in popular culture is the one-and-done Christian dogma. Could you think of a better value system to teach people if you wanted them to be impressionable, short sited consumers with no regard for the well being of any being but themselves? Me neither. Actually, calling George Zimmerman a criminal gives him way too much credit. He's just an idiot. He was and is swept up in the bodily stereotypes that we are all bombarded with from every end by a society hell-bent on being a living hell. Of course, there are a few people who benefit and subsequently encourage this adverse arrangement. Most of us learned how to catch these true criminals way back in elementary school. From time to time the air would suddenly become putrid. Noses would crinkle, pencils would stop moving as a tense silence would build... and then.... 'EWWWWW.' Just remember, 'He who smelt it, dealt it.' �

HELP—MY MIND'S A MESS!

By Devamrita Swami

No greater

enemy than the uncontrolled mind? Really?

Ask around. Do people feel like their mind is untamed?

Generally not, because society has normalized wild mental conditions as the plain vanilla of daily living, especially as global consumerism/sensualism becomes the planetary religion. "That's life"—in other words, unregulated expression of material desires is now like breathing and eating. Watch material cravings zoom around in our mental space. See how the mind drags the intelligence down beneath it, pounding it and holding it hostage. Gradually our intelligence becomes indistinguishable from all the mental junk.

"YOU WILL NEVER FIND TIME FOR ANYTHING. IF YOU WANT TIME, YOU MUST MAKE IT." -CHARLES BUXTON Here's how the chain reaction continues our disarray: the material mind becomes a warehouse storing all the ideas of sense gratification you encounter in life. This accumulated stock of mental concoctions loads up the mind with lust. Seeking release from the mind by surging through our senses, the lust intensifies dramatically.

Note, however, that the bhakti-yoga definition of lust doesn't simply refer to carnality. The term applies to the whole mission, desire and effort to enjoy the material world, whether subtly or grossly. In the Bhagavad-gita, Krishna gives some crucial GPS locations and points out the traffic jam: "The senses, mind, and intelligence are the sitting places of this lust.

Through them lust covers the real knowledge of the living entity and bewilders him."

Crazed in this way, the originally pure self stalls on the highway of conscious development, prolonging materialistic existence, the urge for self-realization destroyed, all by "normal, routine lust."

Krishna's special devotee, Uddhava, wants to know why we become so victimized. Inquiring at the very beginning of Kali-yuga, the current age that compromises one of the four cosmic cycles of time, he was obviously referring to a higher culture, which unlike today possessed at least some ba-

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Cont'd on pg. 19 ›››

LIFESTYLE

SELF-CARE The Three Pillars of Health By Sara Bock

Life in the

city can get busy to the point that we neglect our most basic human needs – proper eating, sleeping, and right use of energy. It is not uncommon in our culture to take meals while driving, grab fast food and eat it while sitting at the computer, neglect sleep and rest to study, work, or party, and spend so much time taking care of others that we forget to take care of ourselves.

According to Ayurveda, the three pillars of life and good health are proper eating, sleeping, and proper use of energy (traditionally known as bramacharya or celibacy, but also referring to not overspending energy on sensual pursuits in general). Ayurveda is a science of health that teaches people to prevent disease by living a right lifestyle, and aims to heal diseases, at their root cause, rather than treat the external symptoms alone,

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without asking people to change their disease-inducing habits. It is easy to take a pill to reduce painful symptoms, but for ideal health, we ultimately need to take responsibility for the daily choices that we make in terms of food, rest, attitudes, exercise, and lifestyle.

Our society values money, work, outward beauty, and material success. While trying to achieve these values, we work hard, yet may neglect basic practices of selfcare. America then spends trillions of dollars each year on healthcare, wondering why our country suffers from so many stress and diet-related diseases. Last week, while driving through northern California, I saw one billboard promoting cancer research, while the next billboard advertised steak. This is not to say that eating one steak will cause someone to develop cancer, but that in general, despite our country’s health issues, we are still fed the message through billboards and ad-

vertisements that fast food, crash diets, red meat, and so forth are things to be desired. Can we see the connection between lifestyle and health? In addition to advocating for the research of treating diseases through medicine, let us change our habits and values, and treat diseases at their root cause, by creating daily habits that create good health, mental peace, and longevity. Following are some details about the three pillars of health, and some simple intentions we can create around them to try to live healthier lives. 1) Eating:

Eating should be regular, with meals taken around the same time each day, and with the main meal taken at lunchtime. It is optimal to allow 4-5 hours to pass between large meals so that the food has time to properly digest before new food is taken in. Saying some form of grace before each meal, and eating mindfully (not while watching TV, talking,

working, walking, or driving) increases proper digestion. Improper digestion is a root cause of many health problems, as food not properly digested can turn toxic, and these toxins can spread to various areas of the body and even the mind. Food should be fresh (canned or frozen food lacks prana, or life energy), organic when possible, chemical free, and prepared consciously and with love. Processed foods do not give our bodies the nutrients and life energy that our bodies require. The purpose of food is to nourish our bodies and minds, not to just satisfy the taste buds alone, so focus on choosing nutritious foods, and listen to your body’s internal wisdom, telling you what it wants. You deserve to eat healthy food. Spending money on healthy food is an investment into your lifelong energy and strength. Your health is your wealth! 2) Sleep:

Restful sleep (at the proper time) is vital for allowing the tissues, muscles, and organs of the body to relax, rejuvenate, and restore themselves. Poor sleeping habits, repeated over time, can contribute to disease and health problems. The sun tells us when it is time to wake and time to sleep. Sleeping before 10 PM and rising early with the sun (or before sunrise if you are doing

early morning meditation or prayer) is ideal for optimum health. Creating nighttime rituals can be helpful, such as avoiding TV and computer usage right before bed, drinking bedtime or chamomile tea, taking a warm bath or shower with lavender oil, doing pranayama (breathing exercises), meditation, reading positive, inspiring books, or journaling before bed can all be helpful in putting us in a relaxed state of mind ideal for restful sleep. 3) Proper use of energy:

Our senses (sight, sound, touch, taste, and smell) certainly need a healthy degree of stimulation; however, overindulgence in the senses is a misuse of human energy and can lead to disease or ill health over time.

Moderation is a key word – knowing when enough is enough, and learning to listen to our bodies’ cues to know when it needs a break from our sensual endeavors. For example, after working on a project for a few hours at a desk, we may feel some neck and back pain. Rather than listening to the body telling us it needs a break, we pop a pain killer and keep on working. Or, the body tells us it is full, but we keep eating because the food tastes good. We should listen to our bodies’ wisdom, and respect our bodies’ limitations. Give the senses enough stimulation to stay healthy, but look inward for happiness rather than trying to satisfy the senses to the point of overindulgence.

In summary, your human body is a precious gift. You alone are responsible for the choices you make in your daily life in terms of what you ingest, how much you rest, and in putting your sensual self-control to the test. You choose your lifestyle – your work, your recreation, your relationships, your diet, exercise, and so forth all of which can enhance or decrease your health. Make your health a priority! Take simple, daily steps toward better self-care and feel the difference. Start with one change, and gradually increase until you are always treating your body the way it deserves to be treated – with love, care, and respect. After all, your body is a temple of the soul. �

HELP—MY MIND'S A MESS Continued from pg. 17 sic insights into material realities: "My dear Krishna, generally human beings know that materialistic life brings great future unhappiness, and still they try to enjoy it. How can one in knowledge act just like a dog, an ass, or a goat?"

Next, as He did in the Bhagavad-gita, Krishna delivers an amazing analysis of the deadly lust sequence: "My dear Uddhava, a person bereft of intelligence first falsely identifies oneself with the material body and mind, and when such false

knowledge arises within one's consciousness, material passion, the cause of great suffering, pervades the mind, which by nature is situated in goodness. Then the mind, contaminated by passion, becomes absorbed in making and changing many plans for material advancement. Thus, by constantly thinking of the modes of material nature, a foolish person is afflicted with unbearable material desires." How do we get out of this mess?

As Krishna says at the end of the Bhagavad-gita's fourth chapter: Steady the

wild mind with deliberative bhakti (spiritual) intelligence. He is telling us to direct that spiritual intelligence toward our pure, spiritual identity.

Yes, I know, a concentrated bhakti-yoga process takes time out of our busy schedule and ordinary ambitions, and time today is a scarcity. If you want, though, you can indeed find the time. Discover the time, save the time, make the time—however the factory of your lifestyle functions, you will see that Krishna's magic works. �