Sacred way of Eating

• Sit down peacefully to eat. Close your eyes and allow your mind to leave all other subjects and return to the food before you. • Choose the fuel for rebuilding your body with care. • Thank the universe for creating the food that will give you the energy to accomplish your goals. • Focus on the sight, smell, feel, touch, and finally the taste of the food you are eating. As you chew, be completely assured that the food is gently repairing all the cells of your body.

The Basis for Life

Food brings people together, allows human beings to feel satisfied and comfortable, connects us with the earth and provides us with health. You are what you eat. Eating should be regarded as a sacred act. In an orthodox Hindu home, food is offered to the family deity first and is then consumed as prasad or offering with the diety’s blessing. There is a basic similarity between the rituals observed in offering food to the deity and those in eating oneself. In both cases, food is offered as an oblation to the five pranas which are regarded as five fires. Even if one does not follow this ritualistic concept, one should make eating a fully conscious and peaceful act. Hurry, worry, anger, distractions and chattering should be avoided while eating.

Live Happily and Healthily

Norman Cousins, editor of the Saturday Review in USA, published a convincing account of his dramatic recovery from a debilitating and incurable disease of the connective tissue in the book, “Anatomy of an Illness”. ‘Many activities create the chemicals of happiness and tranquillity in the body.’ Wise gurus, and now modern research, both believe that meditation can contribute enormously to an individual’s psychological and physiological wellbeing. It reduces stress, hypertension, high blood pressure, high cholesterol, depression, improves cardiovascular health, memory and concentration, work efficiency, and immunological resistance to diseases. As a result, some form of meditation has become an essential part of most holistic health programmes. Your Happiness Quotient is directly affected by your physical condition. Health is the foundation for a feeling of wellbeing and joy. It is difficult to be full of energy and enthusiasm if you are not in a state of positive health.

A Holistic Approach to Health

Sushruta Samhita, the ancient Indian work by the physician Sushruta, describes perfect health as a state where all body parts function at their optimal level and wherein the body, mind and spirit are in perfect balance and in a state of bliss. This is the highest goal. The World Health Organisation (WHO) defines health as a state of physical, mental and social wellbeing, not merely an absence of diseases or infirmity. Really speaking, health is not a state but a continuous adjustment to the changing demands of life and the environment. Positive health implies perfect functioning of body and mind in a given society. Ayurveda defines health as: Svasthya—to be one’s own spiritual self. It is a state of balance between the three doshas (which are mind body energies: vata or wind; pitta or bile; and kapha or phlegm) that govern our external and internal environment, leading to a contented state of the senses, mind and soul.

Focus on happiness

Focus on happiness, not the lack of it. I believe the focus on stress and unhappiness should be turned upside down. Instead of attracting unhappiness, we should plant a garden of happiness, by welcoming the positive emotions into our lives—love, compassion, wonder, courage, laughter and peace. Focusing on our unhappiness only helps to accrue more power and attention to the negative person, event or object that causes it. Focus on cultivating happy people and avoid toxic people. Build protective walls against toxic events that threaten your tranquillity.

The Sixth Radiant Action For Social Bonding

No man is an island, but a part of the Main, wrote the pensive poet John Donne. Man is a social animal and needs to live in harmony with fellow human beings. Interpersonal intelligence is the ability to understand other people, to communicate effectively with them, to identify what motivates them, and to work cooperatively with them. Intrapersonal intelligence is the inward ability to understand and form an accurate model of one’s self and to operate that model effectively to live life. Professor Howard Gardner of the Harvard School of Psychology says that the two aspects of personal intelligence, interpersonal and intrapersonal, form the most important foundation for a happy, fulfilling life. For those who define success as happiness, these two elements are essential to learn and practice.

Focus on happiness

Focus on happiness, not the lack of it. I believe the focus on stress and unhappiness should be turned upside down. Instead of attracting unhappiness, we should plant a garden of happiness, by welcoming the positive emotions into our lives—love, compassion, wonder, courage, laughter and peace. Focusing on our unhappiness only helps to accrue more power and attention to the negative person, event or object that causes it. Focus on cultivating happy people and avoid toxic people. Build protective walls against toxic events that threaten your tranquillity.