Modern Health and Spirituality

When I was younger our parents would always tell us if we were not good little boys and girls we would not go to heaven. We would always ask where is heaven? How do we get there and can we go there now? The reply was always the same, just be good and you will reach heaven. Where is heaven? We then we went on ask the question what is paradise? Is there paradise on earth, how do we get there? What can we do when we get there?

Heaven

If you asked the question where is Heaven or what is heaven, no doubt you would get different answers from different people, here are some of the definitions I have heard used to describe heaven.

The sky, the firmament, the atmosphere enveloping the earth regarded as the region where clouds float, the wind blows etc, the abode of God and the blessed, the place of supreme felicity and any place or state of extreme joy or pleasure.

All of the above are good definitions, some are quite simple and blase and some based on religious teachings which tells you if you follow the right path here on earth there is a place waiting for you in heaven , you have deserved to have a place, you deserved to be there. The question is Who decides if you are deserving? What is the criteria on which you are judged? How do you know if you are in heaven?

These questions I have often asked myself. I guess I will never know until it happens, there is no guarantee one will get into heaven once at the pearly gates. I believe that heaven is inside us as is god, we need to look deep inside of us, get in touch with our soul and spirit, look toward our completion as a person, our physical being and then our spiritual being, find a purpose to why we are here after which we will be in heaven, the place that has always existed within us.

Paradise

Similarly, if you asked the question where is Paradise or what is paradise, no doubt you would get different answers from different people, here are some of the definitions I have heard used to describe paradise.

The garden of eden, a place or state of bliss, Heaven, a place or condition of perfect bliss, a park or pleasure ground.

Here again whilst growing up we led to believe that paradise is a place and like heaven a feeling of extreme joy.

The concept of paradise in my opinion is similar to that of heaven. Most people would describe paradise of being a place of breathtaking beauty with idylic surroundings and then events of unforgettable joy and pleasure. Paradise is used to describe a physical location, somewhere you can see, touch and feel, somewhere where all your senses are excited to feel the joy you feel deep inside.

Heaven is deep inside of us, Paradise is anywhere we want it to be, look inside yourself to see the beauty of what is around you, the world around has so much beauty to see and explore, take time to excite all your senses, to Hear, Smell, Taste, Touch and See all that nature brings us and has to offer, let’s be in peace with our surroundings.

I’m sure sometime during your lives most people had been on one kind of diet or another, whether we are counting the calories or eating like a rabbit on leaves and lettuce.

There has been so many diets out there, The ones I have come across through friends who have tried dieting are, the Atkins Diet, the GI diet and the Eat Right for your Type.

Atkins Diet

Unless you’ve been living on Mars, chances are you’ve heard of the Atkins diet – and probably know someone who’s tried it, if you haven’t done so yourself. After all, it’s a diet that sounds too good to be true.

 Nevertheless, the Atkin’s diet has captured the hearts – and tastebuds – of everyone from A-list celebs such as Jennifer Aniston and Renee Zellweger to business men, teachers and housewives. In fact, at its peak in late 2003, more than three million Brits were estimated to have tried the diet in an effort to shape up and slim down.

There are four phases to the Atkins diet. The first phase is called Induction, which must be followed for at least two weeks, although this phase can be continued for much longer if you can bear it! During Induction, you must severely limit your intake of carbohydrate.

The second phase, known as Ongoing Weight Loss, allows you to slightly increase your carb intake – by 5g daily for a week at a time – until you find your Critical Carbohydrate Level for Losing Weight. Bread, potatoes, rice, pasta and breakfast cereals are still off limits!

The third phase, called Pre-maintenance, once you have just 5-10lb left to lose. During this phase, you increase you carb intake by 10g each day for a week at a time. The idea is to slow down your weight loss to no more than 1lb a week in an effort to prepare your body for the final phase, weight maintenance.

The fourth and final phase, Lifetime Maintenance, aims to help you maintain your weight.

GI Diet.

GI stands for Glycemic Index and is a measure of the impact of food on your blood sugar. Foods with a high GI tend to quickly raise your body’s blood sugar levels, by contrast foods with a low GI will raise them more slowly and over a longer period.

Eating lots of high GI foods has two disadvantages:

1)      The rush of energy given by high GI foods does not last and is soon followed by an energy lull. So you get hungry and want to eat more.

2)      After eating high GI foods you will have a lot of readily available energy in your blood. Your body will use this energy first rather then other stores of energy like body fat. This makes it harder to loose weight.

By eating meals that have a low GI you will feel less hungry. This means that rather then controlling your cravings for food by will-power alone your are controlling them by satisfying your body. On the GI diet your desire to snack or over eat should be greatly reduced, therefore by eating fewer calories you can control your weight.

Unlike the Atkins Diet, which bans most carbohydrates, especially in the early stages, GI diets actively encourage you to eat many carbohydrates and antioxidant-rich fruit and veg. The diet is also high in fibre which means you’re less likely to get constipated and, because carbohydrate isn’t restricted to any great degree, you won’t get the other unpleasant side effects associated with the Atkins Diet, such as bad breath and headaches. GI diets also tend to follow healthy eating guidelines and are low in fat, especially saturates. And if that’s not enough, GI diets are much easier to follow if you are a vegetarian!

Eat Right for Your Type

A blood type diet is a nutrition plan based around your blood type. This kind of diet became popular with the release of Peter D’Adamo’s book Eat Right 4 Your Type. The book continues to be a bestseller. D’Adamo claims that the diet will not only bring about weight loss — but can assist with allergy and infection resistance, and will achieve overall good health.

Most of the population has blood type O. Here the prescribed diet is low-carbohydrate, high in proteins (such as meat and fish), and low in dairy products. The author suggests specific foods to avoid; such as avocados, brazil nuts, and oranges. Type O should also engage in lots of exercise.

Blood Type A should avoid red meat, eat plenty of fish and vegetables, with a low dairy intake. Light exercise only.

Blood Type B should avoid chicken and bacon, eat plenty of meat and dairy, some fish, and plenty of fruit and vegetables.

Blood Type AB combines the A and B diets.

The author claims that much of the recommendations are based on scientific evidence - but perhaps it is too early to make this claim. Metabolism and/or sugar/insulin sensitivity are probably key factors in deciding diet - not blood type. Two people can have very different metabolisms and have the same blood type.

Weight loss and other health improvements may occur on this diet - not so much because of blood type combinations, but because of a healthier diet! The author encourages people to cut down on processed and refined foods. Good advice for anyone regardless of blood type.

The book also includes low calorie diets that will probably bring about weight loss in anyone (once again, regardless of blood type).

Why diets don’t work?

All of the above may or may not work, each individual would give a different testimonial on the above diets.

In the world we live in food is freely available, to maintain weight loss by dieting requires a continuous effort to eat less, our brains will override our minds and make us eat. This is the nature of all beings, our brains dictates our behaviour. To alter this behaviour is not in dieting, when we diet we get to our desired weight then low and behold it comes back again, so go on another diet and this cycle goes on and on.

To avoid this yo yo syndrome we need to change the our response to the signals from the brain, it is a lifestyle and mindset change, these will allow you to eat what you want whenever you want and allow you to lose weight.

In my opinion a lot of dieting is psychological, if you think slim and visualise yourself being slim and keep that mental picture you are half way there and then off course exercise, things as simple as walking has a great effect on being slim and maintaining your natural weight, 45 minutes brisk walk is sufficient to lose those last 5 kg. It has also been reported that there are only four things you need to do to be thin for life:

1. Eat whenever you are hungry
2. Eat what you want, not what you think you should
3. Eat consciously and enjoy every mouthful
4. Stop when you think you’re full

Following the above you can end up eating the helthier foods as your body adjusts to form good eating habits .

Change your life style not your diet.

There has been some very controversial decisions that has been made over the past few weeks in the premiership, in fact it has been happening for a number of years. Is it not time that we look at using video playbacks during matches to help referees make the correct decision?

Controversy

Over the past few weeks we have seen penalties and goals given wrongly, the fact these decisions cost the clubs point and money it get highlighted, the amount of money involved in the game is astronomical, one wonders if all the money invested is justified when you see what is happening in the rest of the world, after all it is just meant to be a game, right !!!

Over the years referees were revered, they had more respect of the players and managers alike. Since the big money being invested by TV for live football coverage the pressure on clubs, managers, players and referees is immense. The fact that when you watch live TV there are so many cameras on the match they seem to get every angle covered, this was always going to undermine the referees decisions somewhat, they can only make a decision based on what they see and their interpretation of that particular incident.  

I am not trying to side with referees, we have to appreciate the difficult job they have now especially with all the scrutiny they are having to face.

To a certain extent the media has had a huge influence in what I say is undermining of the officials. The media seemed to highlight and criticise every decision a referee makes, I feel that the media has been instrumental in encouraging the lack of respect that the referees and officials have been facing. Having said that this season in terms of respect for the officials it appears to have improved.

There has also been certain changes in the rules and laws of the game, the interpretation of these changes has caused an inconsistency amongst the referees.

Video Technology

There are other sports who use video technology very effectively and with the minimum of disruption to the game. The use of video technology is wide spread in Rugby, Cricket and in American Sports like Basketball and American Football. There is an argument that these other sports have natural breaks in their game which allows and encourages the use of technology to be able to make informed decision.

In football the referee has the power to stop the game and go back to the incident, this in my view allows the 4th official to playback and view the incident, invariably when there is an incident during the game and at that point there is some form of protest, during this short period it can quite easily be conceived there is enough time to see the playback of the incident and relay this to the referee.

A few years ago it was muted that goal line technology based on the cyclops used in tennis would be used, had that been used then the Pedro Mendes goal for Spurs against Manchester United would have stood, that was the most obvious goal not to have stood, it was absolutely shocking.

Recently it had been reported that the use of goal line technology was actually stopped by none other than Michel Platini and unfortunately the individual football associations cannot bring in the technology without the agreement of FIFA.

Should Video Technology be used?

In my opinion video technology should be used, the use can be for many aspects of the game, not just for the obvious incidents such as penalty decisions, controversial goals but also for player discipline, catching the cheaters and simulators, I think video technology should be used retrospectively and the player punishment should be much harsher.

The fines being passed out to players are ridiculous especially with the amount money they are being paid, in most cases the fines should be supplemented by longer suspensions.

Let’s clean up the game, let’s help the referees to make correct decisions and play the game fairly.

I am a huge sports fan, I tend to follow most sports but have a greater passion for Football, the biggest sport on the planet as well as now being big big business.

The Premier League

The English premier league is probably the most richest league in the world, most definitely in Europe. Since the formation of the Premier League in 1992/1993 season there has only ever been four winners, Manchester United 10 times, Arsenal 3 times, Chelsea twice and Blackburn once.

The premier league became rich mainly due to television revenue, money put into it by SKY TV, a satellite television company, this took the game away from terrestrial TV. There was a huge demand for live football on TV and SKY captured the market and made it their own. This has now changed, there is no longer the domination by SKY due to new regulations. The rights for the premiership has been sold all over the world and no matter where you go you will see young children wearing replica shirts of their favourite premiership teams. 

There has been talk of there being a break away group which they are calling the big four, since 2003/2004 season the top four has been the same, Arsenal, Chelsea, Liverpool and Manchester United, just the positions have changed at the end of the season. Why have these four clubs been so dominant? The top four can attract any palyer they want, they have the financial backing and therby keep strengthening their team season after season. However, it’s not simply about buying new players all the time, it is the team, the coach and new players to improve on the previous season.

The Wealthy Clubs

The top four as described above are the wealthiest clubs in England and represent a majority in Europe and the world, the top four premiership clubs occupy 4 of the top 10 spots, English clubs have a high representation in the overall top 25, see below:

This is a list of the richest football clubs in the world in April 2008 as ranked by Forbes magazine on their worth in US dollars.^[1]

Rank	Team	Country	Value ($m)[2]	Debt as %of value[3]	% change on year	Revenue ($m)	Operating income($m)[4]
1	Manchester United	England	1,800	60	24	394	111
2	Real Madrid	Spain	1,285	27	24	474	112
3	Arsenal	England	1,200	43	31	329	77
4	Liverpool	England	1,050	65	131	269	60
5	Bayern Munich	Germany	917	0	9	302	72
6	AC Milan	Italy	798	0	-3	307	54
7	FC Barcelona	Spain	784	7	47	392	92
8	Chelsea	England	764	0	42	382	-5
9	Juventus	Italy	510	5	-10	196	35
10	Schalke 04	Germany	470	48	0	154	36
11	AS Roma	Italy	434	12	94	213	48
12	Tottenham Hotspur	England	414	15	70	207	64
13	Olympique Lyonnais	France	408	7	19	190	15
14	Internazionale	Italy	403	0	-27	207	21
15	Borussia Dortmund	Germany	323	57	63	122	31
16	Newcastle United	England	300	43	16	175	12
17	Hamburger SV	Germany	293	0	32	163	41
18	Werder Bremen	Germany	262	0	n/a	131	11
19	Valencia	Spain	254	159	31	145	-45
20	Celtic	Scotland	227	11	23	151	48
21	Everton	England	197	30	24	103	-1
22	West Ham United	England	195	23	25	115	-22
23	Manchester City	England	191	63	-8	114	27
24	Aston Villa	England	190	12	36	106	-40
25	Olympique Marseille	France	187	0	19	134	13

• Deloitte Football Money League
• List of Premier League football club owners

Notes

There is now a new player in the game, most recently Manchester City changed ownership and is now reportedly the richest club in the world, taking over the mantle from Chelsea, they are now owned by a Sheik from the emirate state of Abu Dhabi.

Manchester City have already flexed their financial muscle by spending heavily on players during the Transfer window.

Foreign Investment

The premier league as far as I am aware is the only league which has a foreign investment in terms of club ownership. There many foreign players here and high percentage of players make up the first eleven whereas in the other European leagues majority of the first team is made up of indigenous players.  I think this is good for the clubs but probably has an overall detriment to the fortunes of the national team.

There are a number of clubs who now have rich foreign owners, Chelsea, Liverpool and Manchester United are all benefiting from foreign ownership, and now we are seeing the other Manchester club gatecrashing the party.

There is talk that due to the investment in these clubs it is an unfair advantage to the smaller lesser known clubs as they cannot compete with the big boys, they cannot attract the best players from around the world, they cannot afford either the transfer fee or players wage demands. This is true and there is a gulf developing, however, the smaller clubs can do better by better management on and of the field. It has been shown that a smaller team with less money can succeed, Portuguese club Porto, French club Monaco both proved with good management on the field all is possible.

As football has become big industry, the clubs can and should be run as a business, a well run club can survive and compete at a high level, the model used by the Dutch club Ajax worked very well for a very very long time, they were producing many local young players who were sold onto bigger leagues around Europe, the club was still able to compete with the so called the power leagues like “La Liga in spain” and “Serie A in Italy” to win the Champions League (European Cup). Why has Ajax the club other clubs were looking to emulate, gone backwards?

I think that foreign investment is good, as long as everyone is playing on a level playing field. The investment has to be for a long term strategy, and should include the development of the academy. Not just set it up and leave it to rot. Take proactive action to build and sustain it for the future.

I also feel that there should some form of salary structure or cap and a sensible price tags on players, this will help the clubs to operate like a business by re-investing back into the club after paying the players salaries and overheads etc., the profits will go into maintaining the academy. The structure will allow clubs to make better use players from the academy, at the moment I feel Arsenal are the only club  trying to run a club the way I think it should be run. This would stop the smaller clubs getting into financial difficulties.

What is the real significance of Martial Arts? Have we lost the original meaning and sense of this art form?

Martial Arts

There are so many forms of martial arts out there, they all have differing benefits. Someone once told me that martial art is any of the various forms of single combat pursued as a sport. Over the centuries they have become a sport and in some cases employed in an aggressive and confrontational manner.

In my experience many students have not realised the purity of the martial art form, in the sense that most people see it as a form of self defence and not seeing the health and spiritual benefits of these so called sports.

Practising martial arts is to take on a philosophy for life, a life filled with peace, joy and spiritualism. In the East where it originated, peoples mindset is different to that of the west. Here in the west we have taken this art form and have butchered it. Martial arts has been made popular by films, starring the likes of Bruce Lee, Jackie Chan and Jet Li to name a few, although they have brought it to the masses, I feel the meaning has been lost, I have heard people saying “I’m learning Taekwondo, with this I can kick ass” it was not meant for that purpose, yes you can kick ass, but as a last resort, I have seen many people bragging about having a black belt in this and that only to come unstuck when they really needed to use it to defend themselves, the reason for this in my opinion was their mentality and stupidity. 

A martial art can only help you if you have the right mindset when using the techniques you have learnt. In my opinion someone practising martial art should strife to for humility, health, peace, spirituality and to lose the ego.

In my early days growing up I had tried various styles of martial arts, I tried Taekwondo, Sam Tu Dang, Kempo and Shao lin. I wanted to know more about the cultural and historical philosophy, the messages passed down from generations of these styles, but as I was doing more and more the other students used it as a form of bravado which put me off, however, I still maintained an interest in it.

I now practice DhanMuDo, which I am enjoying far more than the martial arts I had practiced when I was younger, this is more of what I was looking for and expecting.

DhanMuDo

“Only those who find the centre in their bodies can balance the world”

DhanMuDo is a comprehensive system of healing and martial arts that came from 5 thousand year tradition of healing and martial art training of Korea. DhanMuDo includes principles and practices for the enhancement of life energy (Ki/Chi/Qi) and the development of the capability to use energy. With enhanced energy-awareness and ability to use the energy, we can heal ourselves and others physically and energetically.

In DhanMuDo training, we learn how to use our body to enhance our mental and spiritual strength and integrity also. The ultimate goal of DhanMuDo training is to awaken and develop the integrity and wholeness within us in order to attain mastership over the body, mind and spirit.

Dhan in DhanMuDo means pure energy, which is the essence of life, permeates our body, keeps our life functioning, and integrate our body and consciousness into a living awareness.

Mu in DhanMuDo means ‘martial’ and ‘limitless’ . DhanMuDo is a discipline both to develop power and find limitlessness in us the limitless energy and limitless creative power. Eventually DhanMuDo is the art to attain limitlessness in awareness and energy, which is truly the source of freedom and creation.

Do in DhanMuDo is Tao which means the way, the ultimate truth and reality. 

In brief, DhanMuDo is a training system that enables people to develop their energy to reach limitlessness within them.

Benefits of DhanMuDo Training

The benefits are as follows:

• Align and correct the muscles and bone structure
• Strengthen the natural healing power and the immune system
• Build the internal energy
• Prevent osteoporosis
• Help diet and weight control
• Helps normalize blood pressure
• Activates brain cells and the brain’s left and right hemispheres
• Strengthens the self-confidence and enhances the self-esteem
• Improves learning ability and work performance
• Strengthens the lower body

As an exponent of DhanMuDo for a few years I have certainly seen the changes in me. I also now instruct occasionally and can see the improvements, especially in the more elderly students in the class.

There are so many vitamin supplements out there, do we really need them? Which one shall I take? These are questions I have asked not only myself but also friends and family.

What are Vitamins?

Vitamins are one of a number of naturally occurring substances which are necessary, though in small quantities for normal metabolism.

So far as is known for selected vitamins, their functions are:

• Vitamin A: Growth promoting and anti-infection
• Vitamin B1: Beneficial to nerves and bowels
• Vitamin C: Anti-scorbutic
• Vitamin D: Prevents rickets.

There are many more vitamins covering a wide range of benefits. All these vitamins are occurring naturally, if that is the case why do take them as dietary supplements? Would it not be better to eat more healthily and eat the right foods containing these vitamins?

Vitamins and Supplements

There are a variety of supplements and super foods out there, which is the best for you? Each one is trying to sell itself to you, they all have different qualities, enticing you with the benefits gained by using their product. So which one do you choose and why?

I was once told not to take any vitamins unless ordered by a doctor and then on the other hand, others have said as we get older we need to take extra vitamins.

I am of the opinion that we should only take vitamins if we have been diagnosed as being deficient in a particular vitamin. I do not necessarily agree we should take them just because we are ageing. I think we should continue to eat healthily to maintain good health, although these supplements maybe beneficial, there is nothing better than having a good balanced diet. Making sure we eat the right foods to give our bodies the right nutrients.

How to choose the right Supplement for you?

It’s not easy to be able to choose the right product, so how do we choose?

I have been fortunate to have a friend who is a Nutritionist and kniesiologist, she did various test with three different products and the reaction of my system to each product was noted and a recommendation was made for which would be the most beneficial for me.

Not everyone has the luxury of having a friend who is in the field of nutrition. My suggestion would be to get an allergy test carried out, these are not expansive, the results will tell you what you are allergic to and also if there are any deficiencies in your system.

I had one carried out many years ago, the results was quite conclusive, I had no major allergies but found out that I was deficient in digestive enzymes, so my quest was to find something to restore my deficiencies.

Armed with this knowledge you can now wade through the tons and tons of literature available both on the net and in health magazines on the numerous supplements that are widely available out there in the market place. So choose the one that is most beneficial four systems deficiencies.

Nutritional Supplements.

As I have mentioned there are numerous supplements out there, I have had experience with three which I will describe below:

1. Alveo

Alveo (in Latin means “To Be Well”) is a unique, high quality botanical food supplement blended from herbs, it is a balanced formulation to meet our needs from today’s demands. It is a superior blend of 24 herbs, made only from the highest quality botanical extract all organically grown and free from all chemicals and alcohol.

Benefits of Alveo:

• Brings balance and harmony to the systems within the body
• A complete nutritional supplement containing many of the components missing in our normal everyday diet
• Builds and strengthens immune system
• It is a guarantee to strong and long lasting health

The extraction of herbs in Alveo:

• Supports function of the immune system
• Supports the maintenance of a healthy heart
• Supports the digestive system
• Supports the intestinal micro flora and functions of the liver and gall bladder
• Supports vitality, healthy, active lifestyle and wellness
• Maintains joint flexibility and comfort

 2. Pro VITAMIN Complete

Pro Vitamin Complete provides delicious and complete liquid nutrition that helps take the guesswork out of what to meet your body’s needs. Most health professionals opt for liquid products since liquids naturally provide a superior delivery system and ultimately more bio-absorption.

Composition of Pro VITAMIN Complete:

• 13 Natural Vitamins
• 23 whole food greens blend
• 4 essential fatty acid blend
• 7 plant enzyme blend
• 63 ionic trace mineral blend
• 6 multi-fiber blend
• 28 fruit and vegetables phytonutrients
• 18 liquid protein amino acid blend
• 19 propriety herbal complex blend,

and Ellagic Acid from from red raspberry and pomegranate extracts in a natural cranberry flavour.

Benefits:

• 178 vital good-for-u ingredieints
• Nourishes your body snd soul
• Supports a healthy immune system
• Brings you the best of nature  through science

3. Mangosteen - XanGo^®  

XanGo^®Juice (derived from the words XANthones and manGOsteen) is the first, the original mangosteen beverage.

The whole-fruit formula of XanGo Juice delivers a host of essential and complementary nutrients, including the potent antioxidant properties of xanthones—a vigorous family of phytonutrients found abundantly in the rind of the mangosteen fruit.

To support the discovery and development of a singular dietary supplement with sensational taste, the founders of XanGo referenced decades of mangosteen studies. From ancient beliefs to modern research, the whole mangosteen fruit is regarded for its antioxidant powers and health-enriching attributes.

Dozens of studies demonstrate the incredibly beneficial properties of the whole mangosteen fruit. Research shows that xanthones—as found in the whole fruit formula of

Benefits of XanGo^® Juice:

• sustain a healthy cardiovascular system
• support cartilage and joint function
• strengthen the immune system
• promote a healthy seasonal respiratory system
• maintain intestinal health
• neutralize free radicals

The above in a nutshell are the benefits of the 3 different supplements, each claim to have benefits to enhance our well being.

I believe that everybody should take responsibility for their own health, living a life of health by eating healthily, exercising and if required taking a nutritional supplement.

We always make new year resolutions, we start diets, new exercise fads, for some reason we find it difficult to keep to them beyond 2 weeks. We start get some good results but often then not we go back to square 1, why is this? 

It’s not just resolutions, there are other areas of our lives where we just don’t seem to get what we want or be what we want to be, for example, why do we always fall for the same type of person? Why do we yo yo with our weight? 

Is it we lack the will power, don’t know how to change ourselves or is there something far more fundamental?

So why is it we can’t we keep our resolutions, stay slim or find someone different from the ones we have always fallen for?

I think it stems from our childhood, we are programmed to think in a particular way, this is basically the beliefs we take from our parents and the environment around us.

Our parents always said things like “You have to work hard to get on in life”, “No pain no gain”, “Money is the root of all evil”, “Money does not grow on trees” these are some of the things we heard when we were children growing up.

What are the significance of these phrases, how did we interpret them and how does it shape our thinking and therefore our futures? My analysis of these statments are as follows:

You have to work hard to Succeed

You have to work hard to get on in life or to succeed. What does that actually mean? We have all been told if you work really hard you will achieve what you want, we all go through life working hard during school and university so that we can get the grades we need to get a good job thereby have a good career and get the rewards, although this true to some extent.

What I feel is that we all work hard but some of us don’t necessarily get the rewards we believe we deserve. In all cases everyone thinks they work harder the the next person, although this maybe true there are other factors that needs to be taken into consideration.

The success within the corporate system is made from different and often complicated criterion and not everybody gets the promotion or the recognition they feel they deserve, so what happens, they get despondent and lose motivation and before you know it they go through a crisis in their life.

I have been quite fortunate that I had reasonable success within the corporate environment, I was given promotion and a more reponsible position without looking or asking for it. Why is this so? I learned somewhere along the way that for me to get on I had to work harder on myself than my job.

I remember talking to a salesman many years ago, he was telling me his story.

This is his story:

 ”I thought I was doing really well, I was working long hours and therefore working hard to get the results that I was getting. I was making enough money to get by, paying all the bills and having the holidays, but was not happy with my situation, I wanted more, I never won the salesman of the month.

Then I met someone who was very successful businessman by a chance meeting and he had a profound effect on me. He asked me “Are you happy with your life? What you are earning? Happy with your relationship?”

I told him my life was fine, that I was doing o.k. not earning greats amount of money but just comfortable and that I had a wife of 15 years and 2 children who did not know me. Over a period of 6 months we would meet often and he would give me his philosophy on life, which I had heeded.

He told me that I did not need to work harder on getting more sales but start working harder on how to be a better salesman, thereby increasing the amount of sales. I listened to him and after applying the philosophies he presented, I became the company’s best salesman and shortly after started my own business and am very successful.”

I did not go too deep into the story as the thing I took from that story was that I had to work harder on my self to succeed, it does not necessarily mean that I did not work hard at my job, it’s just I was performing better and it got noticed by my peers and management.

No Pain no Gain

I remember my father telling me  ”No Pain no Gain” It’s telling me that life is hard, we will only succeed if we go through some sort of suffering, so what do we do? we suffer. Life is not meant to be hard, we are not meant to suffer.

We start having this mindset life is meant to be hard and we carry this all the way through our lives, so when we are experiencing some sort of suffering we think it’s normal, we are meant to go through this adversity, it’s character building. Why do we still believe that there is no gain without pain? 

Money does not Grow on Trees, Money is the root of all evil.

What is money? Money is only paper, nowadays it’s just digital information. When we were told that money does not grow on trees, we were given the idea that money is scarce and hard to make, so what happens we start struggling for money.

Money is the root of all evil, this is implying that money is evil, it’s not good. How can this be? If money is paper or digital information how can this be evil? We start having a bad relationship with money and think of money as being bad, that all rich people have got rich by being evil. This could be the reason why you don’t have enough money.

If we changed our perception of money and not seeing it as an evil our relationship with money would change. If we think that if we had money we could do something good and positive with it, then we would change our mindset and money is something good, it can actually be used to do good.

Our futures have been shaped by these limiting ideas, these beliefs were passed onto us by our parents and our environment. We as human beings tend to have habits we always revert to, we need to break the cycle.  

I believe that life is a series of results. We take action, because of desire and our emotions which come from our thoughts.

I guess what I am saying is that our mind controls us rather than us controlling our minds. Unless we can control our unconscience we will not have free choice or be as successful as you want to be.

Here’s to taking back your mind and creating your life as you want it to be and breaking all those recurring habits.

I’m sure some where along the you have asked the question “Were is God when I need him?” Why do we ask the question?

In some respects it is a comical and funny question to ask. The fact that we live in a high tech world during an information age aside, the fact that you must ask implies you have never heard the gospel.

The fact that you are in need of God actually means that the defenses you have in place are keeping god out in your own mind.

So we are still asking “Where is God” or are ready to get honest with ourselves and grow up? Perhaps we should pause at this point in order to allow any mortals reading this the opportunity to leave least their status as a sub-human species be violated when they WAKE Up. So if any wish that their separation from God remain intact, please discontinue until such time as you can handle the TRUTH!!!! If this seems appropriate then perhaps you see the profound comedy, if not why did you not leave with the mortals? Where is God indeed, it’s a good thing they don’t shoot people for blasphemy because most mortals would all be standing before the firing squad.

So where is God when I need him? If you are ready for the only option to mortality then let us tell you. God is hiding inside of you because he is everywhere outside of you.

We like to think: God is omnipotent and omnipresent meaning he is everywhere and all powerful. But then they grovel before this idea in some kind of beggarly servitude persecuting all who would heal the separation between them and God. Now it may not seem like this is what we are doing unless you are among the religious elite, but they are the ones who trained you, so guess what, yes, that is what you do. If you have discovered Life in the Spirit and renounced religious servitude then congratulations, this does not apply to you.

If God is everywhere all the time, why is it, that he is suspiciously absent everywhere we go? Now if this doesn’t sound like the standard dilemma of all mortals, then we don’t have a clue as to what does. Since this does seem to be the standard let us assume that it is and begin our exploration here.

God is everywhere all the time but he is suspiciously absent wherever I go, this means that the thoughts you are thinking produce the absence of God in your experience. This is where it gets scary because this statement means that you will have to take responsibility for your creation and get honest with yourself about creating. It is so much easier to blame someone else and that is your right as a mortal who wants to stay mortal, but I thought we were beyond that by now. So like it or not responsibility is the First Immortal Law. If you are actually creating your experience (and you are) how can you blame it on someone else without being deceived, even if you call that deception truth? You just can’t do it and that is what we are talking about.

So then if every experience is a reflection of your thoughts and you have no thoughts of God within. Perhaps it’s time we give you some thoughts to think to overcome that handicap. Now we could go all off on a quantum fields and perceptual mechanics with a lot of hoopla and fanfare. But instead let’s try to keep this simple and as easy as possible.

Assuming you are a believer in the Bible as most claim to be, let us give you the single most important reference in the whole book that explains what the whole rest of the document is all about. “I HAVE Made you ONE with Myself” is the promise of God in New Covenant. Now so long as you relate to God as a mortal via the law of sin and death, I will not leave is your promise, but the reason he cannot leave is because he is you.

So where is God when you need him, right where he has always been in the Self that cannot be confined to an idea. That is why it is so hard to think about God because you cannot confine yourself to an idea. Otherwise you must think about God instead of thinking the thoughts of God.

To find God as self hiding deep in your heart of hearts is what you have known all along would be the answer but who wants to admit the truth, let someone else get honest with themselves and maybe then we will believe.

What is faith? What is Religion?  Why do we ask “What faith are you? or What religion are you?” and generally get the same answer. Is Faith and Religion interchangeable? At what point in life do we start believing in a faith/religion? Just some questions I often hear, not sure of a convincing argument or answer.

Faith

The assent off the mind to what is stated or put forward by another. Firm and earnest belief, spiritual apprehension, operative belief in the doctrines and moral principles forming a system of religion.

Religion

Belief in a superhuman being or beings, a personal god, controlling the universe and entitled to worship and obedience. The feelings, effects on conduct and the practices resulting from such belief. A system of faith doctrine and worship. 

The above are dictionary definitions for both faith and religion. It would appear that they can be interchangeable, they both use the words to define the word e.g when defining faith “operative belief in the doctrines and moral principles forming a system of religion” and religion “ A system of faith doctrine and worship.” you need have a faith and belief to follow a religion.

Why follow a religious path?

It has been increasingly clear to me that as we grow older or when we have children, we tend to gravitate back to our faith. I say back, because it started when we were children and probably didn’t really understand too much about religion and were expected to have faith in something we could not see or feel.

I believe we follow a religious path to give ourselves some kind of discipline, trust in a higher being to lead us in the right direction, to have higher moral standing and to live a full life with peace and love in our minds and hearts.

This faith and belief is passed down by our parents or in some cases we are born into the religion, nevertheless they are our point of influence. We then go through the teenage years where we start rebelling, ”I don’t want to go to church, mosque or temple, I find it boring, it’s a waste of time, I’d rather be with my mates playing football”. Our faith becomes less important, it starts to take a back seat to “being with friends, playing sports, going clubbing or partying” Why is this so?

The Experience

What did we learn about our religion or faith during our formative years? Why did we start to rebel? Did our parents and elders lose their ability to influence us? Were we searching to find ourselves? These are just a handful of questions I wanted to ask others to find out how it influenced their attitude to their faith, what is their view point now and how strong is their belief.

I shall try to answer these questions from my experience. I did not feel I had a good doctrine of my faith, frankly, I was not really interested, my parents tried hard to educate was but were on a loosing wicket, I did not see the need and was just going through the motions to please my parents. The way we (My brother and I) were taught about our religion was we got a religious teacher in house. Over the next 6 months it became clearer to the teacher that we were not interested at all, he tried to control us, but our spirit and enthusiasm for other things were overwhelming.

Although my parents practiced their religion, I was far removed, I had internal conflicts, did my religion allow me to get ahead in this society? Would I be alienated by the people around me as I was of a different creed and race? these were questions I would ask myself. I started to question myself and actually found an answer from an unlikely source, a group of people from the community I aptly named “The God Squad”

The God Squad

The god squad were a bunch of people who read everyone the riot act without looking in their own back yard. They were very moralistic, they would intimate that so and so from the community are sinners and that they would rot in hell.

I realised I not and did not want to be like them, even though they had their faith they were so empty, all they did was gossip in the name of god, I found them to be hypocritical. Had they not been hypocrites and explained the essence of the religion/faith then I probably would have followed that path to help me grow. I would have practiced my religion for the greater of human kind.

Chosen Path

So from that day onward, I chose not to follow the religious path completely, I would take the best bits from different religions, I would read books, making a comparison of the basic fundamentals of each religion, I would then conduct my life applying the different philosophies I read. Having made the choice, for a short while I started living life a little carelessly, I was falling into the peer pressure syndrome, I started to do things to fit in, a short while later I was constantly challenging myself by asking is this what I really want?

As I was got older, there was a shift to my way of thinking, I started to look inside me more, I was in that phase of being despondent of my surroundings and started to search for myself. I was on a journey, for I started my spiritual journey. My view is that I think that people have missed the point of religion, the spiritual side has been neglected. I am far more spiritual than religious, I am on the path of enlightenment, to complete my soul.

Influence

As we grow older our parents have less influence on us, we start to make decisions for ourselves, this is definitely the case when it comes to religion.

We see life from a different viewpoint, however, this goes full circle when we have children of our own. We do somehow show traits in ourselves we did not like in our parents.

This is my observation, as I do not have children but I have seen this in my siblings and friends who have children.

I still don’t know at what point we start believing, I think it’s in our DNA make up, all humans have a faith and wants to follow a spirit path, this is within us but lays dormant until the point we are ready to release and live a fulfilled life, after which we try to pass on to the next generation.

I am writing this as my mother is in hospital waiting to die. I say waiting to die tongue in cheek. God forbid should anything happen to her. In a way it’s a dig at the health system.

The story so far:

About a year and half ago my mother complained about chest pains so naturally we went to the GP and as per usual he could do nothing and so subsequently sent her on her merry way to the local A&E, she arrived and after about 2 hours of excruciating pain they saw her and took a few X-Rays found nothing wrong so sent her on her way home. On arrival at home she still felt a pain in her chest, which was getting increasingly painful. She could not sleep at all that night.

Next day she collapsed, so off to hospital we go, again. This time she was admitted into hospital and after further tests and there was still no conclusion, as a result of this it was agreed to conduct an angiagram. 

The Angiagram

It took some time, after lots of coercion, the doctors agreed to conduct the angiagram, on many occasions they would give some excuse as not to do it, my favourite one was a younger patient was in more need then my elderly mother, ageist or what? What happened to first on the list gets treatment, that is fine I guess as long as you are not old. The results showed there were blockages in her arteries and thereby requiring to have a triple heart bypass. She was now on the waiting list for the bypass procedure.

The Triple Heart Bypass

Fortunately she did not have to wait too long for the procedure. The procedure went well and she was still in hospital recovering. About three days later we found out that the wound got infected and she contracted MRSA septicemia, we thought here we go again, if it’s not one thing it’s another.

So after months of being in hospital she was discharged, great she can come home and we can look after her. For a few months it was great to have mum at home, she was feeling better and smiling again. We were happy and relieved.

The False Dawn (The Homecoming)

A few more months went by, everything appeared normal, we are joking and laughing, mum was enjoying being back with us her children and even more with her grand children. However, this was a false dawn, that evening she was restless and could not sleep. 

The next morning she could eat, did not want breakfast. The health visitor came, everything seemed o.k. the medicine was being administered by the health visitor and then it happened, suddenly she stopped breathing, we did not know what to do, we called the ambulance and got her to hospital.

This seemed a little serious, it transpires that her heart was not pumping properly leading to fluid in her lungs and subsequently backing up into her kidneys. She has been in and out of hospital three times with this condition, and is currently in hospital.

The Health Care

All through this saga the attitude of the doctors in my humble opinion was appalling, they were condescending, arrogant and frankly failed to communicate the issues properly, this not the level of care one expects from doctors, there was one incident in particular which frustrated my mother and angered me a little, it was when my mother was feeling hot and asked the doctor to turn on the fan for her, he was no more than 1 foot away, he had the audacity to say I’m too busy I’ll get the nurse to do it, who was in the next room. Is this the level of care we should have to put up with?

The thing that annoyed me the most is that the doctors still don’t know the real cause. They are doing test after test and getting the same result, which incidently is giving a clean bill of health, clearly this is wrong.

The question I have asked is how can you do these tests if you don’t know what you are looking for? I feel all these tests already carried out are superfluous, they don’t have a diagnosis so what are the tests really telling you?

I am perplexed, my mother is in hospital and we really don’t know why? She seems to be in pain and has difficulty breathing. The answer we keep getting is it’s a combination of things. Is it me or is it for real the new generation of doctors are less caring, with poor people skills and less knowledgeable than the doctors before them.

Is this how health care is meant to be? Are we waiting to die in the hands of our illustrious health care system.