WATER

WATER

Water attracts my attention this morning as I turn to read the Great Book. It literally pulls me to itself with an enormous magnet. What grips me is not just plain H-2-O, we use several times from morning till evening without thinking, but the mysterious phenomenon that reflects divine attributes. It is the substance that infuses life into all living beings and moves essential substances up, down, right and left in the bodies of plants and animals.

On casual touch it is soft. It’s so very soft that my hand goes right through it in a pot full of water. With little effort I can scoop it out, splash it, sprinkle it, drink it or spill it. It is very smooth and adaptable. If you put it in a pot it instantly takes the shape of the pot and fills it to the maximum. I do not get hurt if someone hits me hard with it. It splits, divides, flows, and easily goes between rocks or any other obstacles.

Water racing down hill in torrent can instantly level anthills, beaver dams and the mightiest structures built by man. Even natural hills do not stand much chance against a mighty flood. Whole cities can be washed away in a short time without leaving any debris as trace. Floodwater can bring or take away millions of tons of soil in a short time. Glacier fed rivers start from the top of the Himalayas and works their way to the oceans through hills, huge rocks, swamps, sand, forests and human infested areas.

When heated, water turns to steam. At very high temperatures steam can move million ton ships, turn huge turbines, and put giant machines to work. Steam can also soothe with warmth, cook, burn or cause destruction.

Water has completely different qualities when it is frozen at low temperatures. Ice can be hard as granite and cause serious damage on collision. Billions of cubic meters of water can be frozen and put in reserve in the tundra and the same can then melt and remerge into the ocean.

There are many other subtle, small or mighty things water can do. Their number is so large that it would take a library of books to list them. Humans find some of these acts destructive and others beneficial. But they are not known for a wide view.

Since this morning I have been reading about water in the Great Book. It has so inundated me with joy and wonder that I feel satiated.

Partap Aggarwal

June 4, 2011

The Surya (Sun)

The Surya (Sun)

Okay, Great Book, here I come and stand before you with folded hands. Tell me how to begin. I know you are not a ‘book’ and are not organized into numbered chapters. One does not begin reading you from chapter one. For you are an undivided whole. One can start anywhere and connect with all of you. Also there are no words, no one language. I am confused. Please, kindly guide me.

I wait a long moment and then feel a presence. Something comes and seems slowly to speak to me in English. “Buddhu Ram ji, it is I, that you call the Great Book. I can guide you if you give me your full attention. I know you wish to start with the Sun. I understand. It is the first thing you see every day. Just start and put down what you see written on me. Have no fear. I am with you every day, every week.

So I feel reassured and move. Oh sun I saw you early morning as you rose in the east. You were wrapped in red cool glow as a newborn baby. You rose slowly and the whole scene before me lit up. As you went up your red wrappings began to peel off and you became thin, smaller and warm. And then your light became brighter and hotter. I try to read the Book.

This Sun came first. Earth spun off it as a blob of red-hot molten lava. As it had come off the sun it began to orbit around its source. Then it cooled and became hard surfaced. Water appeared and filled most of it. But few dry spots remained. Then life began in water and marine animals and plants evolved. They took many shapes and filled the oceans. Slowly some sea animals were attracted to dry land and became amphibians. With time some of them adapted to living on the land.

The Sun continues to give light and warmth to all animals to those that live on dry earth and others in the oceans. All of them need light and warmth. If it stopped coming all beings would die. Imagine the sun’s responsibility and for how many billions of years this great saint has carried it!

Sun is the living model of what the Hindus call Dharma (appropriate action). It cannot be defined or canonized as dogma, for it is never the same for every individual.

All beings of the world began to wake up and start doing their assigned work. In my tradition we say we perform our dharma, that is, to do what we are able to do for the community of life according to the abilities given to us. We don’t think only of ourselves, for we are not alone. We exist only as long as life around us exists.

This is what the sun does. He distributes light and warmth among all living things. These are the two things he has and he given them without restraint to everyone. He does not care whether it is a king or a cockroach. He gives equally to both. Recipients have different attitudes. Some meet the sun every morning and meet it with an offering of water. They bow several times to show gratefulness. Others curse the sun for giving too much heat or blinding light. But the sun gives to both for it is his dharma.

The sun rises every morning right on time no matter what. He never says let me not rise today for I am tired or sick today. People on earth may not sometime see it because of the clouds, but the sun is there above the clouds without fail. This being sun’s dharma, he does it with all his might and skill.

Our sages of the old used to call the sun the great guru of dharma. They also said that when God created Dharma it was taught first to the sun. Since then he rises every morning with his message written on his whole face. It is easy to see and read by all. An ant can read it as also a dung beetle, an elephant, and a human being. Knowingly or inadvertently, one can fail to live by one’s dharma but as long as the sun rises in the morning and goes known in the evening, they cannot say no one made me aware.

Partap

28 May 2011

The Great Book

The Great Book

All living beings in this world inherit an invaluable gift from nature. It is a book filled with timeless wisdom distilled from lives lived by countless species over millions of years. Mutations of the body and behavior patters adopted to cope with the environment were lived and tested. The ones found harmful were automatically dropped and forgotten. The remaining ones of proven survival value were preserved. These nuggets of wisdom were written down in the Great Book for the guidance of coming generations.

This Great Book was written for the benefit of ALL living beings, including the minutest of organisms everywhere, worms and insects in the soil, mammoths like elephants and hippos in the forest, all plants, and, of course, for us humans. Therefore the language used in this book is such that it can be read and understood by all. Obviously, it cannot be read like the books written by us humans on paper. Its message can be understood with the help of all the different senses that living organisms have.

The Great Book is not written on paper, bound, and kept on a shelf in a library. That kind of a book would fail to serve its purpose. So, it is written on water, soil, earth, sky, moon, sun and all the places contacted and experienced by life.

The Great book is extremely complex and extraordinary. It cannot be defined in words. The best way to know it is to try to read or experience the book bit by bit. Therefore I am going to try to read a page or a paragraph every week and write it down on Saturdays. I will then share the narrations with you friends via e-mail. It will be like the stories I used to write.

Bless and encourage me in this new venture.

Thanks.

Partap

May 21, 2011, my 80^th birthday

My Personal Fasting Experience

My Personal Fasting Experience

My mother observed a one-day fast about ten times a year. Later my sisters did the same. I noticed that women in most of our related families fasted similarly. Very few men ever fasted. To me the idea sounded good, so following my mother’s example I fasted occasionally. I was not conscious of its health benefits.

However, I heard that cows and buffalos stopped eating when they were ill and they started eating as soon as they got well with or without home treatment. Nine times out of ten they recovered. Only old animals with severe illness died. Later in America, where many people keep dogs, I heard that dogs also fast when they are sick. There was an obvious connection between health and fasting. But I must admit I didn’t see it at that time, nor did I suspect that this might be true for all living animals and plants.

After college I worked for about a year at Wardha and 4 years at Rasulia. At both these places I got a chance to know and work with many outstanding men and women. One thing out of many that I learned from them was to avoid taking medicines. To stay healthy I must regularly use and exercise all parts of my body, eat right food in moderate quantity, and make my immune system strong. Most of my life I have followed this advice and have not eaten pills except when it was absolutely essential.

About 20 years ago, in 1990, I visited Ateeta Ashram. My stomach was upset and it had been sick for a whole month. I consulted Swami Sahajananda. He asked me to fast for three days. I agreed. On the third day he brought some cooked ridge gourd for me to eat. But after hearing what was going on inside me he said I should not eat and stretch my fast for 2 more days. Again on the 5^th day he advised continuing fasting for 3 more days. So I broke the fast after full 8 days. Silently, he made me a friend and a convert to the idea of fasting for healing. He shared his knowledge with me and gave me a good book to read.

Two days later I noticed I was passing two kinds of excreta with a 15 minute gap: first the regular stool and then old, hard, reddish, and sticky stuff. I showed them to Sahajananda. After looking closely he stood up, smiled and shook my hand. “You are lucky,” he said. “Your stomach was healed in the first two days of fasting. But you were still fasting and available for more toning work. Your body took up the work of cleaning the intestines. It is a major cleansing job that doctors rarely undertake in hospitals on very serious patients. They often remove up to 2 kilograms of muck.”

The work in my stomach continued for one full month. I could feel it and actually locate where it had reached. After cleansing was done I felt lighter, cleaner, and better able to digest and absorb food. I noticed that I needed to eat smaller quantity than earlier. I was much healthier and felt ten years younger. Twenty years later till today the effect still continues.

As you would imagine, this was a major enlightening experience. All my life’s observations and experiences jelled to give me a clear and powerful view of the marvelous immune system that nature has built into each one of us in this community of life. I also learned that our immune system works at its peak when we fast.

All animals know it and particularly in the wild they maintain optimal health with minimum of outside assistance. When they are hurt or fall sick they fast and take complete rest in some comfortable place. In this way they send a signal to their own immune system to use its full wisdom and energy to heal and tone up the body. I have seen dogs badly hit by cars heal deep wounds and broken bones in this way all by themselves. They eat nothing for days on end and come out fully healed and only slightly limping from their hiding places.

Only city dwelling human beings have deviated from nature’s simple and effective rules. They overeat and do no physical work. When they fall ill they run to the doctors who normally prescribe antibiotics and other factory made medicines. In the process our own wondrous immune system becomes weak for it feels spurned and unwanted.

In the last twenty years I have cured myself by fasting and have not eaten any pills. Only on four occasions when I had minor operations (hernia, prostate, and cataract) when the doctors made me swallow pills mainly to adhere to required procedures.

I believe we can all benefit by learning more about our immune system and the techniques of fasting and resting. It is very simple and everyone can learn it.

Partap Aggarwal

June 7, 2010

Reconnecting with Rati Ram

Rati Ram is my street dog friend. We met last year and for many months saw each other every morning. I wrote about him and our meetings for many weeks. Then, suddenly, I lost contact with Rati and wondered if he was dead or still alive.

Many months passed. To my joy, the other day, I noticed him, went close, and said hello. Rati is not exuberant like my earlier dog friend Kalu. He wagged his tail indicating that he was glad to see me again. But he did not jump at me and ask where I had disappeared. Knowing him, I too did not ask where he had been. We were together and that was good. We accepted the break in our meetings as a thing that happens in life. We traverse different routes and our paths sometimes do not cross. Now we are together and feel good about it.

Rati Ram began to appear regularly to walk a small distance alongside my friend K.T. and I. But he would stop at an invisible line. On our return from the newspaper stall he would often be gone, but occasionally still waiting. K.T. has been keeping dogs for years and is more familiar with dog behavior than I. He told me Rati Ram seems now to move within a narrower territorial boundary. This perhaps relates to his getting older and weaker. He is wisely avoiding conflict with younger, stronger, and more assertive dogs.

K.T. felt that perhaps Rati Ram would like me to give him some food. So I began every morning to buy a bun from a bakery and feed it to him slowly by hand. He liked the gesture and began accepting the offering with grace and love. I noticed that he receiving the food from my hand with perfect dignity and great care.

Now he takes each morsel from my hand taking care that his teeth would not touch my finger and accidentally hurt me. He is also careful not to wet my hand with his lips or tongue. I also notice that he relishes homemade bread or Roti more than buns.

For some time out meetings were irregular because Rati was not in his usual place. Now I find him in one specific spot outside a little meditation center waiting for my arrival with healthy whole wheat bread.

I am often amazed to notice how intelligent Rati Ram is. He makes it clear that he likes and appreciates my gift of food every morning. But he does not think of it as something extraordinary. He seems to take the whole thing naturally. We are friends and visiting each other. He is hungry and has to wait till someone comes along to feed him. I have access to food and I give him some. This is the law. Food is for the hungry and the two aught to meet when they are near. And that is what is happening.

Rati Ram knows we are friends. He wags his tail to show happiness when he sees me. He accepts food from my hand. He walks short distance with me often. But he never indicates a desire for to be taken to my home and adopted.

Partap Aggarwal
May 8, 2010

Part of the whole

Here is a beautiful spiritual message from Einstein. Many people do not know him other than only a scientist.

He talks of humans living in a prison of personal desires and attachment to a narrow circle of relatives and friends.

Indeed our task must be to free ourselves from the prison. But it is difficult when we live in a man made environment.

It would be mush easier in a forest, ocean or some other natural place.

I give you Albert Eienstein.

A human being is part of the whole.
called by us as ‘universe.’
a part limited in time and space.

He experiences himself, his thoughts and feelings
as something separated from the rest
-a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness.

This delusion is a kind of prison for us,
restricting us to our personal desires and
to affection for a few persons nearest to us.

Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison
By widening our circle of compassion
To embrace all living creatures
and the whole of nature in its beauty.

- Albert Einstein, 1950 -

Enjoy.

Partap Aggarwal
May 1, 2010

Part of the whole

Here is a beautiful spiritual message from Einstein. Many people do not know him other than only a scientist.

He talks of humans living in a prison of personal desires and attachment to a narrow circle of relatives and friends.

Indeed our task must be to free ourselves from the prison. But it is difficult when we live in a man made environment.

It would be mush easier in a forest, ocean or some other natural place.

I give you Albert Eienstein.

A human being is part of the whole.
called by us as ‘universe.’
a part limited in time and space.

He experiences himself, his thoughts and feelings
as something separated from the rest
-a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness.

This delusion is a kind of prison for us,
restricting us to our personal desires and
to affection for a few persons nearest to us.

Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison
By widening our circle of compassion
To embrace all living creatures
and the whole of nature in its beauty.

- Albert Einstein, 1950 -

Enjoy.

Partap Aggarwal
May 1, 2010

God as Silversmith

"He will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver." Malachi 3:3

This verse puzzled some women in a Bible study and they wondered what this statement meant about the character and nature of God.

One of the women offered to find out the process of refining silver and get back to the group at their next Bible Study.

That week, the woman called a silversmith and made an appointment to watch him at work. She didn't mention anything about the reason for her interest beyond her curiosity about the process of refining silver.

As she watched the silversmith, he held a piece of silver over the fire and let it heat up. He explained that in refining silver, one needed to hold the silver in the middle of the fire where the flames were hottest as to burn away all the impurities.

The woman thought about God holding us in such a hot spot; then she thought again about the verse that says: "He sits as a refiner and purifier of silver." She asked the silversmith if it was true that he had to sit there in front of the fire the whole time the silver was being refined.

The man answered ‘yes,’ he not only had to sit there holding the silver, but he had to keep his eyes on the silver the entire time it was in the fire. If the silver was left a moment too long in the flames, it would be destroyed.

The woman was silent for a moment. Then she asked the silversmith, "How do you know when the silver is fully refined?"

He smiled at her and answered, "Oh, that's easy -- when I see my image in it."

If today you are feeling the heat of the fire, remember that God has his eye on you and will keep watching you until He sees His image in you.

This very moment, someone needs to know that God is watching over her.
And, whatever she’s going through, she'll be a better person in the end.

Partap Aggarwal
March 27, 2010

Shake It Off and Take a Step Up

One day a farmer's donkey fell into an abandoned dry well. The animal cried piteously for hours as the farmer tried to figure out what to do. He finally decided the animal was old and the well too, needed to be
filled up. So it just wasn't worth it to try to retrieve the donkey.

He invited all his neighbors to come over and help him. They each brought a spade and began to pour dirt into the well. At first the donkey wailed horribly. Then, he quieted down.

The farmer peered down into the well and was astounded by what he saw. With every load of dirt that hit his back, the donkey was doing something amazing. He would shake it off and take a step up.
Pretty soon the donkey stepped up over the edge of the well and walked off. All the men were astonished.


The moral of the story is obvious. Life is going to rain all kinds of dirt on you. The trick is not to let it bury you. Shake it off and take a step up. Treat each of your troubles as a stepping-stone.

We can get out of the deepest wells just by shaking off the dirt and taking a step up! The trick is just never to give up.

Partap Aggarwal
March 20, 2010

Healing a Chronic Boil By Fasting

Mukand Lal (name fictitious), a man about 50, came to Atheeth Ashram one afternoon in 1991. He lived in Delhi and ran a training institute for young men where he taught them stenography, typing, and accounting.

Mukandlal had a boil on the right side of his chest for more than two decades. He had tried many different treatments but none had worked. The boil was dormant most of the year but it tended to flare up every summer. Then it pained terribly and oozed pus and blood. At times it burst and made real mess.

Noticing that the head of the Ashram, Swami Sahajanand, offered treatment for various ailments by right food and fasting, Mukand told Swamji about his boil.
Since he spoke English with heavy Punjabi accent I was asked to interpret.

We learned that Mukand was a heavy eater from childhood partly because of his love for food and also because he was taught that it was desirable to eat a full stomach. The food he ate was cooked in ghee. Milk, buttermilk, and butter were part of his daily diet. In the mid-60’s he learned to eat meat. It soon became regular habit. Once, or sometimes twice a week, he ate mutton, chicken or fish with friends. Although he liked meat, his body was not easily digesting it and converting part of it into toxins. The boil in his chest was to expel the poisons. None of his physicians had seen the connection between the food he ate and the boil but to Swami Sahajanand it was obvious. He was asked if he would fast for three days. He agreed. The effect was immediate. His boil loosened up and drained in the evening of the second day. Third day his pain almost disappeared. He stayed in the Ashram for a week and ate very light South Indian style food.

Mukand agreed with Swamiji’s diagnosis and promised faithfully to observed his instructions; i.e. eat only light vegetarian food and fast when the boil reappeared. A year later he wrote to inform Swamiji that the boil did not come.

Partap Aggarwal
March 13, 2010