The Spiritual Perspective of Fact – It Is As It Is

How do you see a cup half filled with liquid - is it half empty or half full? I guess this question has been around for such a long time, that it is a cliche. Our trained response will be half-full of course. What if you don't like what is in the cup. Is it okay then to say that the cup is half empty? Or is it heaven forbid!

The crux of the matter is that perspective is a very powerful faculty of our mind. How we understand the world or view it in our mind determines how we act. If we like what is in the cup and decide that it is half full, well then at least we can enjoy that much, though we may be craving for more. If we despise what is in the cup, well at least we can console ourself that it is not a full cup of torture! Click Here To Read The Rest of This Insight @ MyHinduPage.org

Yoga Seminar 5: Love, The Essence of Spiritual Power - Part One

Love is one of the most abundant, easiest felt and easiest stimulated emotion. If you doubt this then observe young children and infants. Unencumbered by subconscious conditioning and limits infants and young children are full of love. They glow in it, and as much as we love children, in most cases, they have more love to give us than we have to give them. Children are so full of love that they can barely contain themselves as it flows out of them as their enthusiasm, exuberance and their ability to forgive. As they grow older children limit the spontaneity of their love based on their observation of life around them and what they are thought.

Click Here To Read the Contents of This Yoga Seminar on Love.

The Hindu View of Organ Donation

On July 14 2009, I was invited as a panelist in forum organized by the Nilai University College during its Ribbon Week. The Ribbon Week is an event initiative by the college to increase awareness in Malaysia on important health causes. There are four colour coded ribbons that represent:

White Ribbon: Maternal and Child Health

Pink Ribbon: Breast Cancer

Green Ribbon: Organ Donation

Red Ribbon: HIV and AIDS

The forum was to enlighten the public on the various religious points of veiw on the practice of organ donation. There was four of us, a Buddhist monk, a Christian Pastor, A Muslim lecturer and I of course represented Hinduism. Below is the introductory text of my opening for the Hindu Point of View on Organ Donation.

In my years of Hindu missionary work in Malaysia and abroad I have not encountered a situation where a Hindu leader or guru has forbidden organ donation or organ transplanting. However, no authority in Hinduism has come up with guidelines for this relatively new innovation in medical care. (Relative from the the point of view of human history). In general organ donation is considered the personal choice of an individual.

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Part Three: Disicpline - Willpower's Pace Setter

Amongst the 3D's (Desire, Determination and Discipline), discipline is the most simple element. Essentially it is following through on a plan. In fact, discipline does not play any role in either the cause (the role of desire) or stimulation (the role of determination) of willpower. Discipline, interestingly enough, is used to reign in willpower. However for any project to be successful, discipline is as important as the other 'Ds'. Disciplines main role is managing the powerful force of willpower. Before we get into the important subject of managing willpower, it is important that I share the spiritual understanding of discipline.

Click Here To Continue Reading the Contents of this Seminar

Q & A: Why did God make us intelligent?

Well the questions above is not exactly what my young friend Arulmoli asked. I paraphrased it for the title of this QnA. Here is Arul's original question:

The basic needs of men is food, and shelter. So, why are men given such a powerful mind to create so many great things like machines. Do men actually need all these things to live ..... no. Then why are we such an advance creation by god ? We should have just been monkeys.

This question came to Arul out of his enthrallment after viewing the trailer for the upcoming Transformer movie. I saw the trailer with Arul, it was impressive to say the least, especially how computer graphics have evolved over the recent years. Arul's question seemed appropriate. Click Here to continue with this QnA.

The Laws That Govern Life

The Laws That Govern Life

God created all the worlds and endowed them with laws to govern them. These laws govern everything from nature to the consequences of our actions and our perspective. Among the spiritual laws that govern life, three play the most prominent part in our life. They are maya, karma and anava. 

Click Here to Continue Reading this Hindu Philosophy Lesson

Yogic Personal Development Seminar 2: Willpower Pt.1

Part One: Desire, Willpower's Energy Generator

Seminars Two, Three and Four of the Yogic Personal Development Seminars are dedicated to the study of willpower. Willpower is a most crucial element in making all things happen in life whether they be for material or spiritual purposes. Willpower is comprised of three faculties and states of mind. They are desire, determination and discipline. In this first part, Desire is subject of exploration.

Click Here to Continue Reading Part One: Seminar on Willpower

The Recession from a Spiritual Perspective

I thought I would meditate on the current economic downturn to gain an inner perspective on this global situation. An inner perspective is looking at something from the 'inside out' as my guru used to say. The 'inside out' perspective is a meditative perspective. It can reveal surprising information and insight into a subject or situation that would otherwise escape us, as this perspective draws directly for the Omniscience of God.

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The Gayatri Mantra

The Gayatri mantra is a popular Vedic mantra. Gayatri is the mythical goddess of dawn. She represents the Sun as it rises. This mantra is a supplication to God to help us in our life. The Gayatri mantra is described in the Vedas to be used in a ceremony called the sandhya vandanam. Sandhya vandanam is performed in the morning as the first prayer after one bathes. In the old days people went to the rivers or the large temple water tanks for their bath. After their bath and before leaving the river (or any body of water) devotees will perform sandhya vandanam. The Vedas give these instructions on how to perform sandhya vandanam:

Standing knee deep in water while facing the rising sun, water is collected with both palms together. Then the while chanting the Gayatri mantra the water is slowly poured back into the river. This is repeated three times.

Click here to learn more about the Gayatri mantra and how to chant it.

Can women chant the Gayatri mantra?

A friend asked:

Why is there controversy over whether females can recite the Gayatri? Also, why do some people believe that you must have a "pure" body to recite the Gayatri i.e you must not eat meat, etc?

I am asking because I had discussed with a Hindu priest at the temple here that I like the Gayatri mantra (this was sometime last year) and he seemed to be shocked, and he said that it was not advisable for women to chant this mantra, and that it has adverse effects if they do. I then Googled it, and there were alot of conflicting information on the Web.

Read my response to this question here.

Flying A Kite

Kite Flying Isn't As Easy As It Seems

One of my 20009 new year resolutions was to fly a kite. The last time I had flown a kite was maybe 20 years ago. It didn't fare to well at it then. I ran with the kite, it flew and gained altitude quickly but fell to the ground just as quickly when I stopped running. Not enough wind perhaps.

This time around, I was at a beach. With my more mature understanding of the science of upwind and downwind, this time I was sure to succeed at getting the kite up. I was with my friends and their family in the island of Pangkor off the west coast of Peninsular Malaysia. It was a holiday get together but I took the opportunity to have fun with teaching yoga to my enthusiastic young students, children of my friends. I wasn't planning on the fulfilling my kite flying commitment but Kala had bought a kite for her kids to try it out.

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The Hidden Worlds

All religions teach about places we go to after death. Scriptures describe the two main places we may enter as heaven and hell. Heaven is a beautiful and divine place and a place where only righteous people live together with angelic beings and God. All things good and enjoyable are experienced in Heaven. It is a blissful place free from suffering. Hell on the other hand is a dark place. A place of torment, pain and suffering. The company in hell consists of those who lived sinful lives on Earth. It is obviously a place to avoid. This is generally used as a motivation by many religions to persuade its followers to live by the tenants of their religion and to do good to earn their place in heaven. According to Hinduism sum of the quality of our actions on Earth determine whether we go to heaven or hell.

Continue Reading This Hindu Philosophy Lesson Here

Guided Meditation: Internal Worship

This guided meditation is based on Pusalar’s story. When parents or teachers teach children this meditation, the parent or the teacher should instruct the children on what to do mentally as they sit in meditation. This meditation can be done in the temple or in the home shrine after ceremonial prayers. If you are doing this meditation in a children’s class, then it would be good to start with devotional hymns or songs to get everyone into a sublime mood.

Click Here to Learn the Steps of this Guided Meditation

Questions on Hindu Philosophy

• 9 Common Questions on Hinduism
• 5 Unique Questions on Hinduism
• Apostasy in Hinduism?
• Questions About God
• Questions About The Vedas
• Questions About Hindu History

Click here to read the MyHinduPage, Hindu Lessons, Questions and Answers Section.

Welcome to Hindu New Year 5111 Virodhin

Between Mid March and Mid April, different ethnic communities celebrate their New Years. For instance on March 29th the ethnics of Karnataka, Andhra Pradhesh, Sindhi and Maharashtra celebrate their New Years. The Telugu and Kannada people call it Ugadhi, whille Marathis call it Gudi Padwa. On April 13th or April 14th, the Tamils celebrate Puthandu, Malayalees, Vishu, Punjabis Vaishaki and Bengalis Bohaag Bihu. These vary new year days however share a common origin, which is Astrological.

In the Hindu Astrological system, Jyothisha, April 13/14 in the Gregorian (Western) calendar is the day when the Sun will have come full circle around the 12 zodiacs and restart the cycle in the traditional zodiac number one, that is Mesha, or Aries.

The differing dates among the different Indian Hindu communities reflect legends or important historical events of the community, such as the day God began His cycle of creation or the coronation day of an influential King of the community.

As with all new years, the Hindu New Year is a time of review and renewal. Traditionally households will spring clean their homes, wear new clothes and attend the temple at the crack of dawn for special prayers.

Continue reading this article on the Hindu New Year here.

Starving for Peace

Fasting for Peace

Fasting, as a spiritual practice is common among Hindus. Many Hindus fast weekly or as an observance during certain festivals. It is also a common practice to forsake meals as non-confrontational or non-violent protest against injustice or cruelty. Mahatma Gandhi for instance fasted numerous times during his campaign for an independent India, though not to protest the British government, but instead as atonement whenever his followers became violent in their campaigns. A couple of times he fasted almost to the brink of death, and only ended his fasts when his followers renounced violence.

Early this year a group of eight Tamil youth in America, touched by the tragedy befalling innocent civilians in Sri Lanka, decided that they had to do something. They called themselves, People for Equality and Relief in Lanka (PEARL) and came up with a campaign to fast 10,000 meals collectively as act of solidarity for all those suffering in the Sri Lankan conflict.

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Q & A: What is Deja Vu, and Why Does it Occur

Shyamini Questions:

Situation: You go trough life each day as it is.. somehow, sometimes during conversations had, you feel like you've already heard about a certain piece of news or information or story before this that's just been revealed when in truth, nobody has breathed a single word about it to you before this... not even the media! When you tell the others around you that you've heard about it before this or that the particular info is on the stale side, they give you a weird look and try to overlook this matter. This situation has occurred numerous times in my life. Sometimes i feel weird all around. Sometimes... just plain freaked out. In other words, its like we are having a conversation about a certain topic (that isn't necessarily covered by the media of course!) when suddenly, i feel like i've heard this particular conversation before. Word by word you feel like you're replaying the conversation for real...

Question: What does the above situation signify?
: How does 1 know if he/she is a reborn soul?
: How do you interpret dreams?

After my initial response, Shyamini replied asking for clarification on some of my answers. Her further questions are below. My posted response below will cover all the questions.

Shyamini Queries further:

Moving on to the questions I asked earlier. For the 1st one, u said it was dejavu and that 'we are able to see our near future based on karmas currently sprouting and prepare mentally for them'.
My question(s) this time is:
- How are we able to do so?
- What role does the karma play in this?

As for the third question i posted earlier, you wrote that 'Spiritual advice is that you don't linger on dreams and instead concern yourself with normal life'.
My next question is this:
-How can you just concern yourself with normal life, when you know some of these dreams replays itself from time to time?
- What if these 'dreams' involve real life people you know?

Click here to read the response

My Hindu Colouring Book

Hindu Children's Corner Content

My Hindu Colouring Book

My Hindu Colouring Book contains 47 panes of pictures for colouring covering Hindu subjects:

• Hindu God's, Mahadevas and Symbols

• Saint Auvaiyar's Aathi Soodhi Advice

• Puja Items

• Worship At Home

• Hindu Culture

• Musical Instruments

• Hindu Temple and

• Hindu Saints

The 47 panes are presented in 10 printable A4 sized pdf documents. Click here or on the title to go to My Hindu Colouring Book's download page.

Apostasy in Hinduism?

Recently a student from a college approached MyHinduPage to present the Hindu view of apostasy. It will be part of a research paper which deals with the interpretation of apostasy in different religions. Below are the questions and my reply to them.

1) Who/ What do you consider an apostate?

The concept of apostasy is not existent in Hinduism. I must note that Hinduism is not a religion. It is actually a family of different persuasions or sects that share similarities in belief and origin that have been grouped under the umbrella called Hinduism.

However, even among the sects of Hinduism there is no such thing as apostasy. A Hindu may change his or her sectarian views as one wishes, and formally enter one sect or another without need for excommunication or a declaration of apostasy.

The reason there is no such thing as apostasy in Hinduism is because of the belief that there is One Supreme God who is the God of all religions. Despite what people of other religions think, Hindus belief that we are all praying to the same God, Who appears in different forms. Therefore, even if one gives up Hindu practices and enters another religion, say Christianity, it does not mean that that person is 'leaving' God. He is still considered faithful to God, but simply worshipping and believing in God in a way more intune with his or her nature.

If there is anything remotely close to apostasy in Hinduism, it would be the recognition of atheism. Hinduism acknowledges atheistic beliefs as part of the spiritual evolution of the soul. Because of this, Hinduism recognizes atheism as a path of life. Yet a person may still continue following all the practices of Hinduism, even temple worship from a strictly cultural point of view, but maintain an atheistic point of view. However even in such a grey scenario of apostasy, excommunication is not necessary.

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Questions on The Colour Meditation

The colour meditation is a meditation technique that is explained in the Meditation Video Tutorial playlist No. 9. Recently I received an email from a MyHinduPage reader, Mr. Mandar, who has been practicing the colour meditation, with some questions and description of his experiences. I am including excerpts of his email, with his permission, and my response to him as I believe it will be helpful, especially the description of his experiences, for others who are practicing this meditation technique. 

Click Here to Read the Q & A on the Colour Meditation.