Two Moms

Among the stuffs I read this week, two of them had something in common - a newborn. One was a news:

Last Sunday (October 23) a newborn baby girl was found abandoned in a Church premise, in Chicago.

Second was a mail from a friend of mine:

One of her (newborn) kittens died. She kept the body on a table and started digging to bury the dead kitten. When she came to pick it,  the body was missing. She looked around and found that the mother cat took possession the body and she was keeping it with her. Mom cat was crying in a different voice and kept on licking the dead kitten.

The Woodcutter and the Axe V 2.0

We all know the woodcutter story, the Aesop fable - Fable of the Woodcutter or Woodcutter and the Fairy or the Golden Axe or The Honest Woodman…

(He was cutting wood by the side of a river and his axe slipped into the river. He prayed and a fairy/river goddess came with a golden axe and asked whether it is his axe for which he said no. Then she came with a silver one and he said no. Finally she came with the iron one which the woodcutter was using and he said yes. Seeing his honesty, she gave all the three axes to him. Thus he became rich)

What happened then?

The woodcutter decided to visit Kerala, God's own country to watch Trissur Pooram, a famous festival also known for its crowd. He lost his wife in the crowd and he started praying. God (or the fairy that helped him last time) appeared and asked what happened. He told that his wife is missing. Then God came with the most beautiful woman in the world and asked: 

'Is this your wife?'

'YES' the ex-woodcutter replied.

Fairy became very angry and was about to curse him. Then he told to the fairy:

"Wait, don't curse me. I clearly remember what had happened last time. You came out with a gold axe and a silver one and then the iron one and you gave me all three of them. Now, if I say 'No', you will come with some other woman and finally, all of them will be on my head. And you don't know how much trouble I am having even with one..So, I am happy with this lady"

(As told by Swami Sandeepananda Giri; not verbatim)

Supplements

The other day I happen to read an article in Yahoo Health. It was about the 5 must have (food) supplements, written by a 'health expert' (who also is an author). He says he pops a handful of supplements every day and carries these 'must have' ones on long trips. According to him, everyone should take a very good multi-vitamin pill every single day.  This sounded sheer nonsense to me and I asked him why on earth a healthy human need a handful of supplements on a daily basis,  (he did not reply); especially in US where most food comes with added vitamins.

Take the popular cereal Honey Bunches of Oats for example. The carton says it contains:

Vitamin A, D, B6, B12, Iron, Thiamin, Riboflavin, Niacin, Folic Acid, Phosphorous, Magnesium, Zinc, Copper, Sodium and Potassium

More or less same with Froot Loops and Nesquick. Most milk brands has extra vitamin D. Americans generally eat meat/fish every single day and most people here includes some veggies and fruits in their every day meal (mostly in the form of a salad). So, when we pop a couple of supplement pills, there is this possibility of we taking excess vitamins. Some people believe our body is intelligent enough to take what it requires and flush out the rest in case of water soluble vitamins etc. But we need to understand that there is a mechanism which decides how much the body need and how much it need to flush out, even if that theory is right. This clearly means extra work for some of organs. 

Yesterday I read another article which says:

"Researchers say those who take multi-vitamins, folic acid and iron supplements may face higher risks of early death"

http://www.nbcwashington.com/news/health/Study-Finds-new-Dangers-in-Vitamins-and-Supplements-131518988.html

and

http://vitals.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2011/10/10/8256866-some-common-vitamin-supplements-could-increase-death-risk-study-finds

All these days (supplementing) Vitamin E was given this image of something which promotes prostate health (or prevents prostate cancer for that matter). And now there comes new enlightenment - It in fact has the potential to cause prostate cancer in men

http://vitals.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2011/10/11/8273189-more-bad-supplement-news-vitamin-e-may-be-risky-for-prostate

This clearly shows that the increased prostate cancer rate in the recent days has something to do with vitamin supplements. This reminds me of the similar cures similar principle of Homoeopathy. If 'something' has the potential to cure a disease, that 'something' has the potential to give similar symptoms of that disease in a healthy person (who do not have that disease).

One of the best and wise ways of finding a solution for (increased rate of) cancer is to invest money in finding the (man-made) causes than trying to find a cure.; so that we can prevent it, if it can be prevented. It sure do has something to do with what we eat (genetically modified food for example) and pop. 

As we can see, two third of American population takes vitamin supplements and thus contributes their share to this 28 billion (per year) business. It is not a matter of surprise when 1% takes decision on 99%.

I think we have reached a point where we can no more trust these researchers. It all depends on who is funding the research. There was a time we believed that if we eat fruits and vegetables, it will take care of our health, not anymore because most of these fruits and vegetable lost their sanity when we added or removed some genes.

So, it is wise to consult a medical doctor before popping a magic pill, if one is serious about health.

IRA planning the Doomsday style!

So, the world will end on next Friday, October 21 2011?. But so far, we did not hear anything from Harold this time. Many people even forgot about it. Where is Harold now? Well, it looks like he retired from his job and is in a nursing home. What happened to the money and assets those foolish people donated to him, that is worth millions? This is called a well planned retirement, the doomsday style. The cunning way of planning your IRA account.

When Steve Jobs died, a (new) Church openly said 'Thank God Steve Jobs is dead' and they said they will picket his funeral. They got the cheap popularity they wanted and it's time for donations.

'Watch out for false prophets. They come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ferocious wolves' - Matthew 7:15

Spirituality, again!

This is not the first time someone asking me this or me blogging about it - what you mean by spiritual and not religious?. I was asked this question recently when somebody read one of my profiles in internet. I thought I say something new than what I wrote before. 

Take this for example:

"You shall love your neighbor as yourself" Mark 12:31

What does that mean? Well, it looks kind of self explanatory unless one hates himself. Why should one do that?, love our neighbor as ourself? It is not that difficult to find an answer for that 'why'. (note that we are not asked to check our neighbor's religion/faith before we love them)

I personally think Mark 12:31is worth meditating. 

Let us look it closely.  When I read "YOU shall love YOUR.." it becomes "I shall love MY…", if that message is for me. Isn't it so? Then comes this big question - Who am I? There starts the spirituality or the spiritual journey. Don't you think Jesus is asking us to find who we really are?

When we look around and observe those religious people, we can see that, for them, religion is all about God or finding God or blindly following a scripture or attending a place of worship or considering themselves as a servant of God, speaking of 'their' God, following some customs, marketing 'their' God etc etc It happens so because their perception is different, when they read scriptures (when/if they read). I personally know some people who used to visit some particular temple on some particular day of the week. What if they miss a day and something went wrong? They would say it is because they missed the visit and God is angry..then they offeres some extra pooja to please the God. This will not happen with a person who has spiritual inclination though he has this habit of visiting a place of worship and miss a day. A spiritual person do not believe that God sits only in places of worship. 

Take the Hindu scripture Bhagavat Gita. There are over 500 translations in my mother tongue itself. Millions around the world read it, study it and many of them can recite it without referring the scripture. Who is Krishna? and Who is Arjuna? If anybody thinks Lord Krishna is  just a King (or the avatar of God) who lived 5000 years ago and he gave this pep talk to his buddy Arjuna before a fight and he is going to come again (even Jesus for that matter), I think they did not really get it. Of course Gita can be viewed that way. It is a HIStory book and it is a sanskrit text book too. But the spiritual way of looking at it is bit different. If we say Krishna or Jesus is not going to come again to save the world (the whole universe is HIS creation then who is coming to save whom?), it will create a big indigestion/anger/rage  for the religious people not to the spiritual ones.

At one point Jesus says he is the son of God and then we can see him saying he and the father are one. That is spirituality.