Spiritual Magazine | Wellness Magazine

Interview, May 2019, VOLUME 4 / 28 Apr 2019
The art of farming
JOY JOYCE is a novice organic, biodynamic vegetable farmer – a farmer of the soil and an artist. The soil is her palette. Her paint is compost, organic amendments and holistic sprays. Her brushes come in the form of shovels, rakes, pruners and cultivating tools. She shares with us her passion for farming as an art of the soul. Q: Every artist has a unique story. Can you briefly walk us through yours? JJ: My first desire was to become a landscape designer. I studied Ornamental Horticulture in high school. I have art in my blood, be it singing, drawing, crafting or landscaping. My love of being outdoors and working with my two best tools (my hands) gave me the assurance that landscaping was the right path for me. I spent a brief period of time working alongside a landscape designer and realized how much of what they do is behind a drawing board, not in the field. This quickly re-directed my future career path. In the interim I returned to the restaurant business where I had started when I was 16. Eventually I became a restaurant manager. About five years into my career, my father passed away from terminal cancer. This shook my world. During his service, my mother placed a token from each of us kids in my father’s suit pocket. My token was a small wooden saw that I had painted as a child. On this saw I had painted a farm scene. Soon thereafter I had health challenges of my own and knew I needed to spend more time outdoors and feel Mother Nature’s healing presence. I searched Google for days looking for any way I could volunteer in an outdoor setting. I didn’t care if it was a nursery, conservation group or farming. I was…

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Focus, May 2019, VOLUME 4 / 28 Apr 2019
The art of being
BIANCA GLAVA shares with us her experience of a Himalayan Retreat, where she was led to discover her real, simple nature – her authentic self. Life is so amazing and so simple. Yet the most difficult thing is to grasp this very simplicity and purity. We spend so much time complicating our lives, following rules and living in cages created by our own minds, until one day we cannot breathe anymore. We are suffocated by struggle and pain, forsaking our beliefs and obeying others – so much doing and so little being. And when we are unable to live in this illusion anymore, we have a choice: to commit to our truth or watch our soul die. I think it is all about loving ourselves, and this does not mean that we are being selfish or that we are taking away from anyone else’s happiness. On the contrary I think that if we prioritize happiness, it will overflow within us and this light will lead those who live in darkness out of it. We can show others how to be happy through the clarity of our own example, and joy is the only motivating force in this universe that can save us. A happy life is nothing more than a succession of happy moments, but most of us cannot see the happy moments because we are too busy trying to have a happy life. I have always wondered: What is my purpose in this world? In the moments spent alone in my Himalayan retreat, I realized that the meaning of life is contained in every single experience and all I have to do is train myself to see beyond. There is no better way to make a difference than letting my own life be a message to the world. There…

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May 2019, Thought in action, VOLUME 4 / 28 Apr 2019
The heartful leader – part 4
Extraordinary outcomes through inspiration SUCCEED THROUGH RELATIONSHIPS In previous articles, RAVI VENKATESAN introduced the Heartful Leader framework and took a deeper look at Reputation and Trust. In this article he explores the topic of Relationships. Building great relationships is core to Heartful leadership. There are no doubt great things that can be accomplished individually, but when it comes to leadership, it is all about accomplishing great things collectively, and this requires building and managing relationships. Relationships are fluid and have a certain lifecycle. Awareness of vaccines, diseases and cures for relationships can help tremendously in managing them the right way. DISEASES There are many diseases that erode relationships. Here are the main ones: 1. Misunderstanding: We all run stories in our minds constantly. More often than not, our minds are wired to think through negative scenarios. Call it our inherent survival instinct. For example, observe your thoughts before going to an important business meeting or even a parent teacher meeting at your child’s school. You will notice that you are thinking through points and counterpoints that assume the worst from the person with whom you will interact. After this, observe the actual meeting and check how many of the things you anticipated actually came true. Were you negatively biased? While there are some who train themselves to be overly optimistic and positive all the time, most of us suffer from this tendency to think negatively. This predisposition on the part of both parties leads to misunderstanding, which causes poor interactions and eventually damages relationships. 2. Lack of Responsiveness: Many times we don’t respond because we don’t have a positive response. We don’t realize that a polite and appropriately contextualized negative response is much better than no response. Think of the times when a friend approached you for donating to a…

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It changes everything, May 2019, VOLUME 4 / 27 Apr 2019
The role of laughter in a marriage
I have been observing long-term marriages that seem to be happy marriages, and wondering what it is that keeps them together in this turbulent world we live in, where the divorce rate is high. I found a common denominator: they laugh a lot. The couples have incredible senses of humor. Then, I watched some successful executives. The culture in their companies was not as stressed as one would expect. They were really not that sophisticated in their management or leadership either. The common denominator? They had a great sense of humor. What is going on? Humor disarms. Laughter is evoked when one exaggerates a phenomenon until it looks ridiculous. The phenomenon has, at its core, something which is true, which is then exaggerated. It becomes like a cartoon. Thus, it is funny. Humor relaxes. Humor releases negative energy. If you can laugh at your destiny, you can be happy because nothing is so serious that it calls one to suffer. I said to myself, “I’d better try that in my marriage.” While in the past I would get into an argument with my spouse over something that might become increasingly heated, I now try to see what is funny in it and react in a way that makes her laugh. When I succeed, she laughs and then hugs me. What in the past was a cause for not speaking to one another for days is now a cause for hugging and laughing, and realizing nothing is worth being in pain over. All problems are laughable if you put your mind to it (I am not referring to tragedies). If you can laugh at yourself, you can overcome much of the travails of modern life. Humor relaxes. Humor releases negative energy. If you can laugh at your destiny, you can be happy because nothing…

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Be inspired, May 2019, VOLUME 4 / 27 Apr 2019
Yogic psychology
In this series of articles, DAAJI explains the fundamental principles of yogic psychology, with its foundation in Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras. He explains Patanjali’s descriptions of the human mind and the various mental imbalances, and furthermore he also gives us solutions to create mental well-being through yogic practices. In this article we start to explore the kleshas, the five afflictions to mental well-being. The first of these is avidya, meaning ignorance, the mental defect where one is unaware of the most vital and the most essential. Part 5 – AVIDYA Let’s first remind ourselves of the fundamental principle of yogic psychology: that our original inner mental state is one of purity, stillness and Samadhi, which is also the ultimate goal of Yoga. It is the pure state of no-vibration that lies at the center of our existence, beyond the field of consciousness. It is the healthy mental state. Yogic psychology has never been based on pathology, but on attaining that pure state, which is the baseline for mental well-being. This field of no-vibration, no-thingness, or the original void, is present in every fiber of our being. In Yoga we return to that baseline, the ultimate state of the vibration free stillness. It was our starting point and will eventually also be the ending point of our existence. If we are able to master that state while we are alive, we transcend the need for the cycle of birth and death known as reincarnation, as we go beyond consciousness to something more profound and more beautiful. In his Yoga Sutras, Patanjali codifies the various modifications and vibrations that arise in our field of consciousness; all those things that take us away from the balance and stillness at our center, the soul. The process of refining these modifications is what Yoga is all…

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In the Field, May 2019, VOLUME 4 / 27 Apr 2019
Heartfulness in schools
Education is undergoing a revolution in India today, as classrooms expand their vision from an academic process of rote learning to include a broader all-round focus on the holistic education and well-being of both teachers and students. ELIZABETH DENLEY shares some of the work that is being done by the Heartfulness Education Trust in this rapidly evolving field. In the last three years, Heartfulness Education Trust has developed a noticeable presence in the schools of India. Heartfulness first offered value-based life skills programs for school children in the late 1980s, and since then the program has evolved enormously over the years to the point where, in 2016, it blossomed into a large-scale project to cater to the demands from schools for a more holistic approach to education for both teachers and students. The Trust was born from the vision that the most effective way to transform society in a generation is to provide teachers with the opportunity and tools for change, and empower them to transform their students. Here are some of the programs that are offered. FOR TEACHERS Heartfulness Teacher Training focuses on the qualities and skills of a heartful teacher. So who is a heartful teacher? A Heartful Teacher A Heartful Teacher will be a role model, one who is inspired and nurtures inspiration in students. Here are some specific qualities. The program for teachers is called the HEART Program, and is designed to develop the social, emotional and cognitive abilities of teachers. These are important qualities for leaders in today’s world. It is a multi-step year-long journey comprised of the following programs: You can learn more about the HEART Program and each of its components at https://heartfulness.org/education/ training-and-curriculum/. FOR STUDENTS The Heartfulness Way Curriculum for Years 1 to 9 This suite of activities for school children has…

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THIS MONTH'S ISSUE

It changes everything

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in It changes everything, May 2019, VOLUME 4

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In this series of articles, DAAJI explains the fundamental principles of yogic psychology, with its foundation in Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras. He explains Patanjali’s descriptions of the human mind and the...

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Interview

The art of farming

in Interview, May 2019, VOLUME 4

JOY JOYCE is a novice organic, biodynamic vegetable farmer – a farmer of the soil and an artist. The soil is her palette. Her paint is compost, organic amendments and...