Why Wait in Line when you can Relax?

Ever flown on a commercial flight, landed, and been stuck in a line waiting to exit the plane while your head is awkwardly tilting to avoid hitting the ceiling over your seat?  I have had the pleasure to fly all over the world and there is something common in every culture or geographic region that I find so strange and interesting:  when the plane lands, everyone is in a mad rush to leave the plane.  The rush to get out usually starts when the seat-belt sign is lifted off but I've seen people springing up to get their bags from the overhead compartment even while the plane is still taxiing to its gate!

But why the mad rush to get out?  Why not just sit comfortably and wait for the line to get more sparse and then stand up?  Don't people realize that it doesn't make a difference if they get out first?  We've been sitting for hours, why not another few minutes?  If they get to the Immigration and Customs first, they will also get to the baggage conveyor belt first, which means they will simply have to wait there until all of the luggage gets out. Everyone's luggage comes out pretty much at the same time, so we're talking a matter of plus or minus a few minutes.  So everyone eventually ends up waiting for the baggage at the conveyor belt anyway so why not take a more relaxed approach to leaving the plane.

Similarly, while boarding the plane, everyone rushes to stand in line the moment the gate opens. Why?  Your seat's not going anywhere, it's reserved! Why not relax on the seats and just walk in as you see the line thin out.  Less stress, more rest, happy journey!

When we think we're saving time ... more often than not, we're probably just adding stress.  Taking time to do things can and will relax you.

Why do men wash their hands only after they pee?

I have always wondered why we do certain things a certain way even though it doesn't make sense.  One such example is the practice of men washing their hands only after they pee in a public washroom.  Why only after?   Why not before?  Here's my train of thought ...

You wake up in the morning and presumably, you go take a shower and clean yourself.  Your entire body is now clean, especially your genitals as they are covered and protected by your clothes.  Your hands meanwhile, are touching door handles, food, money, etc. all of which add many more harmful germs and bacteria to your hands, than your genitals.   In fact, your genitals are much cleaner than your hands at this time.  So why go into the bathroom and contaminate your genitals with your hands, and THEN wash your hands after?  If anything ... wash your hands BEFORE touching your privates, and yes certainly after as well, so as to respect the next person whose hands you will shake.

But ... if you have to pick one of Before or After peeing ... pick Before and keep your privates safe!

Is there a Formula to Calculate Prana?

After spending a month of being entirely vegetarian and learning about Ayurveda, the anatomy of the human body, yoga, and ideas like karma, non-violence, etc. I have found myself analyzing and even more so, “calculating” what I am eating.  Calculating what?  The best way I can explain it, is by saying that I’m forming a somewhat calculated opinion on how much “Prana” exists in the food I eat.  Prana is the Sanskrit word for “life force” or vital principle.  In yogic philosophy, Indian medicine, and martial arts, the term refers collectively to all cosmic energy, permeating the Universe on all levels.  Prana is often referred to as the "life force" and also includes energies present in inanimate objects.

So, how much Prana does the orange I just ate have? How much Prana does my chicken wing have?  I want more Prana in me, so I must know how much of it I’m taking in.  Well, unlike calories, carbohydrates, proteins, etc., Prana doesn’t have any units of measurement and the packaging on a box of chocolate milk doesn’t tell me how much Prana is included per serving under how much sugar it has.  I wish it were the case though … but that would be hard as we don’t yet know how to measure it.  So, this little essay is an open invitation to all scientists, nutritionists, and mathematicians out there to work with my train of thought below and come up with a formula that might calculate how much Prana food has!

Let’s break things down into Vegetarian and Non-Vegetarian so we can cover all foods.

Fruits, Vegetables, Roots, etc.

There are several key measurable variables involved here.

• Time:  The amount of time that has elapsed from the moment the vegetable is plucked to the moment it enters my digestive system and starts breaking down.  This factor should be at its minimum for optimum Prana.
• Energy Consumed to produce:  The amount of renewable vs. non-renewable resources used to create the energy used to produce the vegetable.  The higher the renewable factor, the higher the Prana.
• Energy Consumed to transport:  The amount of non-renewable energy used to transport the vegetable from the point it was produced to my digestive track.  This factor should be at it’s minimum for optimum Prana.
• Nutrients: The overall nutritional value of the food.
• Cooking Process:  If the item is cooked, the amount of Time (not energy) invested by one human being to produce 100 grams of that food.  This factor should be at its highest for optimum Prana.  So, 100 grams of mass produced fries would have less Prana than home-made hand-cut fries.

Meats

In addition to the factors above, there are a few more relevant to animals.

• “One Bad Day”:  Did the animal live as it was meant to live naturally on Earth, until the day it was killed?  Did it live to adulthood?  If a chicken was raised in a mass produced farm, ate where it excreted, didn’t move much while it lived, this chicken would have less Prana than one that was free range, ran around, lived the natural life of a chicken, until it had its “one bad day”.  Did the animal have “One Bad Day”?  “Yes” is desired for optimum Prana.

Perhaps there are more factors, maybe many more, but I wonder if it is at all something that can be calculated.   Maybe there is a business idea there as well: certification and validation of Prana!  I would love to see on food packaging, mention of how much Prana it contains in addition to carbohydrates.  Ironically, if the food is packaged, chances are it has low Prana.

Food for thought … :)

Reincarnation and the Rainforest

The concept that after dying, living beings come back to life in a new body as another living being, is something that most religions originating from India believe.  Millions of Hindus, Buddhists, Jainist, etc. believe that one’s karma dictates whether they come back to a life of either less or more suffering and that with every cycle of life, the being has another chance to practice life.

Inherently, every death of any living being, including all insects and animals, marks the end of one cycle of life and triggers the birth/start of another life/cycle.  It matters not, how long each life is, as encompassing all living beings makes time a relative term; a 24 hour day to humans could seem like a year to an ant.  Meaning, an ant could have ample opportunity to perform its karma for a life time, in that one human day.

I recently spent a month at The Sanctuary at Two Rivers in the Costa Rican jungle, an off-grid solar powered haven that exists in complete harmony with nature.  When walking and swimming through the jungle, I of course ran across probably millions of insects, countless amphibians, reptiles and other life forms, all of which participate in this phenomenon of reincarnation.  Although covering only 3% of our land today, the jungle is home to half of all of the world’s living species.  A single hectare of rainforest may contain as many as 250 species of trees.  Some live for years, some for mere days.  The Mayfly for example, only lives for a day and its sole purpose is reproduction; almost as if it simply exists as a venue for "rapid" reincarnation.  There are countless species of ants that live full lives, have roles and responsibilities within their communities, and serve a meaningful purpose in life until death.

In essence, where there is more life, there is more reincarnation happening.  An acre in  Manhattan would not be able to provide as strong a venue for life and death to occur when compared to an acre in the jungle, simply because there are fewer living beings.  The rainforest is essentially a hot bed for reincarnation!  This could be true for our oceans as well.

Is planet Earth one of many venues where souls are going through this process?  Was it given jungles and forests and oceans for this reason?  Are we slowing down the process of reincarnation whenever we cut down the rainforests to pave roads and cities through them?

An interesting juxtaposition to the train of thought above: What happened when I stepped on and killed a beetle that happened to be under my shoe as I walked to my bathroom in my jungle casita?  By shortening its life, did I, in essence, expedite its soul's transition into its next life?  If that is true, isn't excavating and paving an acre of jungle and killing many insects and animals helping?  Here is what I think.

When I killed the beetle, I did it inadvertently, so it affected my karma in a different way than had I used that analogy to justify excavating the jungle.  I may have been chosen by a higher source or intelligence to kill that beetle as it may have been its time to transition.  That is why it happened by accident.  Also, by paving the jungle I may speed up the process for countless living beings, but I'd also permanently eradicate the space remaining a living breathing hot bed for reincarnation and in turn affected my Karma negatively.

We could live harmoniously with nature just like every single other living being does.  If we take a tree out, we could plant another one.  We could choose to build cities in the desert where there is far less life happening.  We could choose to let rainforest remain a factory for re-incarnation!