WHAT IS GOD?

GOD is not a person. That is one of the greatest misunderstandings, and it has prevailed so long that it has become almost a fact. Even if a lie is repeated continuously for centuries it is bound to appear as if it is a truth.
God is a presence, not a person. Prayerful is needed, not prayer. There is nobody to pray to; there is no possibility of any dialogue between you and God. Dialogue is possible only between two persons, and God is not a person but a presence – like beauty, like joy.
God simply means godliness. It is because of this fact that Buddha denied the existence of God. He wanted to emphasize that God is a quality, an experience – like love. You cannot talk to love, you can live it. You need not create temples of love, you need not make statues of love, and bowing down to those statues will be just nonsense. And that’s what has been happening in the churches, in the temples, in the mosques.
Man has lived under this impression of God as a person, and then two calamities have happened through it. One is the so-called religious man, who thinks God is somewhere above the sky and you have to praise him, to persuade him to confer favors on you, to help you to fulfill your desires, to make your ambitions succeed, to give you the wealth of this world AND of the other world. And this is sheer wastage of time and energy.
And on the opposite pole the people who saw the stupidity of it all became atheists; they started denying the existence of God. They were right in a sense, but they were also wrong. They started denying not only the personality of God, they started to deny even the experience of God.
The theist is wrong, the atheist is wrong, and man needs a new vision so that he can be freed from both the prisons.
God is the ultimate experience of silence, of beauty, of bliss, a state of inner celebration. Once you start looking at God as godliness there will be a radical change in your approach. Then prayer is no more valid; meditation becomes valid.
Martin Buber says prayer is a dialogue; then between you and God there is an ”I-thou” relationship – the duality persists. Buddha is far closer to the truth: you simply drop all chattering of the mind, you slip out of the mind like a snake slipping out of the old skin. You become profoundly silent. There is no question of any dialogue, no question of any monologue either. Words have disappeared from your consciousness. There is no desire for which favors have to be asked, no ambition to be fulfilled.
One is now and here. In that tranquility, in that calmness, you become aware of a luminous quality to existence. Then the trees and the mountains and the rivers and the people are all surrounded with a subtle aura. They are all radiating life, and it is one life in different forms. The flowering of one existence in millions of forms, in millions of flowers.
THIS experience is God. And it is everybody’s birthright, because whether you know it or not you are already part of it. The only possibility is you may not recognize it or you may recognize it.
The difference between the enlightened person and the unenlightened person is not of quality – they both are absolutely alike. There is only one small difference: that the enlightened person is aware; he recognizes the ultimate pervading the whole, permeating the whole, vibrating, pulsating.
He recognizes the heartbeat of the universe. He recognizes that the universe is not dead, it is alive. This aliveness is God!
The unenlightened person is asleep, asleep and full of dreams. Those dreams function as a barrier; they don’t allow him to see the truth of his own reality. And, of course, when you are not even aware of your own reality, how can you be aware of the reality of others? The first experience has to happen within you. Once you have seen the light within you will be able to see it everywhere.
God has to be freed from all concepts of personality. Personality is a prison. God has to be freed from any particular form; only then he can have all the forms. He has to be freed from any particular name so that all the names become his.
Then a person LIVES in prayer – he does not pray, he does not go to the temple, to the church. Wherever he sits he is prayerful, whatsoever he is doing is prayerful, and in that prayerfulness he creates his temple. He is always moving with his temple surrounding him. Wherever he sits the place becomes sacred, whatsoever he touches becomes gold. If he is silent then his silence is golden; if he speaks then his song is golden. If he is alone his aloneness is divine; if he relates then his relating is divine.
The basic, the most fundamental thing is to be aware of your own innermost core, because that is the secret of the whole existence. That’s where the Upanishads are tremendously important.
They don’t talk about a God, they talk about godliness. They don t bother about prayer. their whole emphasis is on meditation.
Meditation has two parts: the beginning and the end. The beginning is called dhyana and the end is called samadhi. Dhyana is the seed, samadhi is the flowering. Dhyana means becoming aware of all workings of your mind, all the layers of your mind – your memories, your desires, your thoughts, dreams – becoming aware of all that goes on inside you.
Dhyana is awareness, and samadhi is when the awareness has become so deep, so profound, so total that it is like a fire and it consumes the whole mind and all its functioning. It consumes thoughts, desires, ambitions, hopes, dreams. It consumes the whole stuff the mind is full of.
Samadhi is the state when awareness is there, but there is nothing to be aware inside you; the witness is there, but there is nothing to be witnessed.
Begin with dhyana, with meditation, and end in samadhi, in ecstasy, and you will know what God is. It is not a hypothesis, it is an experience. You have to LIVE it – that is the only way to know it.

Method to stimulate each of the 7 Chakras

Chakras or our body’s energy centers have been identified in different ancient cultures like the Indian and Greeks. They are key to the flow of energy that vitalizes the physical body and brings about the development of our self-consciousness. The seven main chakra centers are aligned along the spinal column and each of these seven chakras is associated with different auras (energies) from our environment, people around us, sounds and colors. Let see them one by one in detail, which help everyone to stimulate there vital chakras energy.

1. Muladhara - Root Chakra:

The 1st chakra is also referred to as the "root" chakra. The Sanskrit name for it is "muladhara" which means root/base. It is located at the base of the spine. There is an energy stored under this chakra which is often referred to as the "coiled serpent." Kundalini yoga focuses on stimulating this energy.

Governs vigor, heredity ,survival, security ,passion , trust, feet, & legs. Your relationship with money, home, and job.

Known as: Root Chakra ,Muladhara , Kundalini

Muladhara = Base (mula - root adhara - support), Foundation.

Location: Base of Spine, at the tailbone base of spine

Colors: red, black

Earth Element, Mineral kingdom, Bones, Flesh, Skin, Nadis and Hairs of the Body.

Attributes: Patience and Greed.

Desire: Survival.

Activity: Collecting and Saving.

Sense: Smell

Deities: Each Chakra has a Manifestation of the Shiva and Shakti Deities. Baby Brahma - Ever watchful creator, brings peace of mind and calms fears. Dakini Shakti - Protectress, Creator, Preserver, Destroyer. Alravata the Elephant - Vehicle of the Bija Mantra-Lam, Searches for food and takes orders.

Symbol: Yellow Yantra Square, surrounded by Four Red Petals represents the Four Directions of Earth.

Mudra for Root Chakra: Let the tips of your thumb and index finger touch.

Concentrate on the Root chakra at the spot in between the genitals and the anus.

Chant the sound LAM.

Mantra: Repetition of Bijan Mantra-Vam, opens up blocks in the lower body. Each petal has a Sanskrit letter (Varn, Sarn, Sharn, Sxarn). Kundalini Shakti lies coiled like a snake in a downward pointing triangle. Meditation of the 1st Chakra awakens the Kundalini and starts the upward flow.

Yoga Poses for Root Chakra:

• Lying flat on your back, hands palm down by your sides, bend your knees and bring your feet close to your bottom making sure your feet are parallel on the yoga mat.
• Pressing your feet firmly against the ground, lift your hips up towards the ceiling.
• Interlace your fingers under you, straighten your arms and press them down on the to mat to raise your back and chest higher.
• Roll your shoulders and draw your chest towards your chin.
• Stay and breath
• Release the pose, by releasing your hands back into the palm down position beside you, then bringing the your upper, middle then lower back and hips down. Knees are still bent
• Allow your knees to touch and rest

Life & Death in Somali

About 750,000 people could die in East Africa over the next four months due to famine, if enough aid didn't reach the famine-stricken region, the UN has warned.

According to the UN, about 12 million people across the region, and four million in Somalia alone, are in need of food aid, Daily Mail reported.



Getting aid to the starving is a 'race against time', said a top humanitarian official for Somalia, while also warning that the famine is likely to spread before the end of the year.

Mark Bowden, who heads the UN office coordinating humanitarian aid to Somalia, said: "This isn't a short-term crisis."



There are fears as many as 750,000 people could starve to death. This is a rise of 66 percent from July. Hundreds of Somalis are dying every day, at least half of which are children.Bowden said the four million Somalis in need of aid represented more than half of the country's entire population.The southern Bay region is the latest to be declared a famine zone.Nearly 60 per cent of people there are acutely malnourished - four times the rate at which an emergency is declared.



"I've not seen anything like it," said Grainne Moloney, the head of the food security unit.

Famine has now affected six areas, including four southern Somali regions and two settlements of refugees.



The UN says tens of thousands of people already have died in Somalia due to the severe violence, drought and famine.Over 150,000 refugees have sought aid in the last few months. Families in Kenya, Ethiopia and Djibouti have also been affected.



Source: IANS