Saturday, February 25, 2012

DAY 3 AND 4

Day 3 (yesterday)

Yesterday was a busy day for me, and I reaped the rewards of not being so tied to food, particularly the cooking of it.I got home late from work and had to be somewhere a mere half hour later. So I picked up some fruit, changed pants, and headed out without worrying about what to eat for dinner. I ate roughly eight tangerines, three apples, and two bananas, without feeling like I was struggling or hungry all day. When hunger did arise I ate an apple, or banana. It felt very clean and freeing from the usual, "oh no I'm starving, what am I going to eat?" dilema.

Day 4

Up to this point I have been doing the fruit cleanse by myself. My significant other has been away on a job, and he came home today and also started to eat only fruit. I wondered at how this was going to work with us, being especially sensitive to the fact that I can't give off any "I've been doing this longer then you and therefore am superior vibes".  This wasn't an issue today and we had a good day of catching up while eating bananas. I do feel a certain loss at the bonding that takes place during a meal and even during the cooking of it, but feeling energized and generally uplifted makes up for it. I'm shown that the authentic bonding that we so long for has nothing to do with dinner plates but with the harmony that arises from resonating with the vibration of love or peace or any of those warm and fuzzy frequencies.
I did feel a stangeness when T (my other) suggested that we cook the breadfruit he bought in coconut milk with a fresh papaya added into the stew. It 's all fruit, but cooking the things seemed like cheating a bit. However, given the special circumstances, I didn't see a reason to make a big deal about it, and T made a wonderful hot meal for us. I ate it with pleasure, mindful to enjoy but remain detached from fulfilling further sensual desires. Once you do that there's never an end to the wants. You end up chasing one pleasure after another on a continuous roller coaster ride of highs and lows. There's nothing wrong with that, but I have decided for myself to seek freedom from such bondage, and so here I am, watching my desires with pleasure. I think that's the freakiest part of this so far. I am actually enjoying myself. Its not a struggle or a test of will power. Its a pleasure to dive into this bottomless well and get lost in the unbearable lightness of being. What could be better then that. Pizza?

Thursday, February 23, 2012

Fruit Fast: Day 2

Day 2 was a bit harder then day one. The morning was pretty good, I only craved hot tea, which evidently is a no -no, but after some gentle yoga I went right into meditation. I then  experienced quite a bit of pain around the chest and back area and continued my meditation laying down. That was a bit strange. I'm chocking it up to purification.

I went to work today and it couldn't have been a more miserable day there. We're under some deadlines,  and since we just moved into the new warehouse, everything is still looking like a small tornado passed thru a circus, scattering props, masks, and general crap everywhere. This does not contribute to a calm state of mind for anyone, but especially someone fluttering from a fruit fast. I think fluttering is a good word to use here, as I noticed that I'm feeling a slight buzz, like a mild caffeine rush, that makes me overly sensitive and dramatic. I'm watching this in myself, noticing that my tendency to get irritated is amplified, and I'm praying that I will not get carried away with a co-worker with whom I am having some difficulty. I 'm wondering how to  best approach him, when it dawns on me that the best way to approach him is with unconditional love and compassion. I visualize us giving each other a hug after our "talk" and strengthening our friendship thru this little hiccup. He's avoiding me most of the time, and when I do see him, I flutter into a state of anger and anxiety, and hugs seems like a long way off. I decide to let the matter rest for the time being and go home. Perhaps tomorrow I will be able to approach him from the heart, the vulnerable soft heart, not the angry wounded heart.

So I went home and spent a glorious afternoon walking my dog and  shopping on the internet.  To reward myself for putting up with that job another day, I bought some things I've been long hankering after, including some bulk herbs that I am very excited to brew into various teas, enemas and douches, yup that's how I roll.

So to sum it up, Day 2 had me craving Snickers as I passed a gas station, battling more dramatic emotions then usual, and asking why I don't just curl up in bed with a big bowl of chili tonight. The answer? "Painted cakes don't satisfy Hunger", that's what Ram Dass said when I asked his book. Hmmm....

Wednesday, February 22, 2012

The Fruit Cleanse

The timing seems perfect. The new moon on Ash Wed. seems like a perfect time to give up sensual eating habits in favor of a cleansing fruit diet. Purification, of both body and mind, is critical on the spiritual path. I've been noticing my habit of over eating or eating for pleasure, or out of boredom etc. and have become quite disgusted by it. Not disgusted enough mind you to stop at the third plate of shushi at the Chinese buffet, for which I paid for later by a bloated stomach and a general uncomfortable disposition. So when is enough enough? I have been tossing around the idea of dealing with this addiction for months, but because the thought of giving up muffins for Divine Communion seemed so hard, I procrastinated. Until now.

Today is the first day of my 7 day fruit fast. Although not a traditional fast when one takes nothing but water, a fruit fast consists of just that, fresh fruits and fruit juices. The cleanse is beneficial to the whole system, but especially good for cleansing the blood. And like Jethro Tull, food guru way beyond his time, said in his awesome book "Back To Eden", "it is impossible for  disease exist in an organism whose blood is pure and alkaline." To achieve this, he recommends the fruit cleanse at least once a month, which a special focus on large quantities of oranges and orange juice, whose acidic properties disinfect the stomach and bowels.

Fasting has been cited in every major spiritual tradition as a way to get closer to the Divine. Recently I watched on documentary on my newly favorite movie site (cultureunplugged.com) and heard the scientific reason as to why this might be. In short, studies showed that rats who ate less, lived longer. These results, after multiple trails, showed that the digestion process itself releases toxins into the body that cause the deterioration of cell tissue. So if purity is a prerequisite for Divine Communion, then it makes sense that fasting would be a highway on the Path.

As I have not committed to a fast (yet) I loaded my shopping cart with tangerines, bananas, apples, pears, grapefruit, grapes and Simply Orange juice. The total came to around $20 more then I expected to pay for a fruit haul, (I did think that the fruit cleanse would also help out my wallet but this is not the case so far.) and headed back to the boat. I noticed that even though I worked almost all day, am getting over a cold, and had three apples all day, I was slightly buzzing with energy. It was then something occurred to me. You know that feeling you get when you're really hungry, and your body almost trembles? Perhaps you're not dying of hunger, like I always assume, but being awakened to a new type of energy, more vibrant then the usually overfed cells are used to. Its a workable theory, and anyway we'll see what day two brings.

Happy renouncing! 

Friday, February 3, 2012

Stop Telling God What to do With His Dice

Eistein was beside himself when he inadvertently opened the door to the world we now know as Quantum Physics. His Theory of Relativity (1905), probed at the nature of time, ultimately discerning that time is relative to the speed at which one is traveling. Up to that point, people thought of time as constant, moving in a steady and predictable rhythm. Einstein showed that time in fact slows down when we travel faster. What does this have to do with Quantum Physics?

The Theory of Relativity, depended on a constant, and this constant was the speed of light. Einstein's investigation into the nature of light revealed what he called the Quantum Particle of Light - or the photon. This discovery established the fact that light is both a particle and a wave, and lead to the famous equation of E=mc2.

In this landscape of energy = matter (E=MC2), subatomic particles behave in unpredictable ways, ways that were unacceptable to Einstein. He was in fact a great believer in order, feeling that if we understood the laws behind all phenomena then we would be able to predict their outcomes. Quantum Physics did not satisfy his mathematical symmetry. He continued to look for the one theory that would unite the world of subatomic particles and the world of large bodies. He believed that gravity and electromagnetism would explain the unpredictability of Quantum Mechanics, but his Theory of Everything was doomed from the start because he chose to ignore his own findings of the Quantum world.

In the end Einstein became an irrelevant fogie in the scientific circles unable to cope which a changing landscape that contradicted his belief in Divine Order and predictability. "God does not play dice" was his famous response to Quantum Physicist Niels Bohr. "Stop telling God what to do with his dice" was Bohr's sharp come back.

Despite Einstein's resistance, Quantum Physics changed how we see the world. No longer is matter made from solid hunks of matter, but rather from light which is energy. Few of us can really comprehend this, after all we are walking in a world of solid objects.

There are however some people who can see energy. They say we can all do this naturally and we are taught to forget, taught to be snared by Mara, the Buddhist's term for illusion.

One of these people is Donna Eden. She was raised by a mother who was an orphan, ignored and left to herself, who grew up seeing energy. She encouraged her three kids in expresing what they saw and all three of them see the energy around and within us.  Donna Eden, is one of the three who chose to use her gift in healing, and after listening to an interview with her on sounds true I was intrigued. Below is one of her earlier video's of an energy practice I'm going to try. Einstein would probably hate this, but then again perhaps death made him a bit more open-minded.