Diwali & Dushara Celebration

Om Cafe On Courage

Emerging young leaders (ages 13-35 yr) are invited to join like-minded souls in a cafe-style setting to explore, express and exchange values that hold the potential to create a new story for humanity. Light refreshments served.

Talk on Happiness Index

Date: Sun, Sep 11;
Time: 11:30am onwards; Followed by lunch
Place: East Bay Hindu Temple, 595 School St., Pittsburg, CA 94565

Stay On The Path To Success

All of us wish to succeed in our life in the face of difficult and challenging situations. When faced with such a situation, we should ask ourselves if we are ready to face the situation or we are waiting for the situation to change. Those who just wish and pray for the situation to change find themselves using up all of their energy trying to escape from the situation, languishing in their success.

Majority of us start with enthusiasm to overcome the challenges and change the system but on the way to success, we come across many hurdles and we feel that we cannot continue forward and abandon the efforts. A few of us, however, keep faith, continue their progress in the face of obstacles and reach their destiny successfully with the same enthusiasm as when they started.

This raises a million-dollar question: What is the difference between these two types of people? The answer in short is, “Those who reach their destination successfully know how to keep their spirits alive through the tough times and how to cope up with the changing situations. They know how to increase their inner powers when needed.” In fact those of us who use their inner powers to face the challenging situations in the positive way find themselves becoming more powerful with every new situation that they face.

If you find a challenging situation difficult to face, think about how your loving family or a company of a friend with experience will support you and encourage you during these tough times and then develop courage and determination to navigate through the challenge. Yes, power of loved ones and the company of experienced people are great gifts only lucky ones have.

In Sangham yug we are blessed with such elevated company of GOD and his Family. He bestows on us 8 powers (The power to Withdraw, Tolerate, Discriminate, Judge, Accommodate, Face, Co-operate, Pack Up) to destroy our vices and make us victorious. This Dushera and Navratri, while we worship and praise Goddess Durga, the powerful 8-armed one, let us discover our own hidden powers that we could use in a practical way to achieve the aims we have set for ourselves. All of us have powers within ourselves, like weapons, which we can use according to the need and time to successfully achieve our aims.

Personal happiness & success are related to how well we align ourselves with ideals and what we believe to be true with our actions. Practice the methodology based on ideals that motivate your journey forward to a higher aim. An understanding of these powers, regularly practicing them and keeping them handy is the key to success in facing all challenges successfully and confidently.

For better understanding of such inner powers, call us to attend Raj Yoga Foundation course.

Ganesh Chaturthi

Raksha Bandhan

Date: Sat, Aug 13;
Time: 10:00am - noon
Place: Jain Temple Auditorium, 722 S. Main St., Milpitas, CA

Note: Registration required. e-mail at contact@bksiliconvalley.org

Real Freedom

Freedom! Wow, the word itself generates a pleasant feeling in our heart. One of the innate aspirations of the people today is to be free. When we are free, we can listen to our own feelings and follow our own heart to lead a life with purpose and reach our destiny in our own unique style. In short, we want freedom to choose, to take risk and to succeed.

Happiness we get from this process of deciding (“what we want to do”,” how we want to do it”) and doing it successfully on our own is a great feeling. There is no better sense of fulfillment in the world! But to experience this freedom, we have to first free our mind from many restraints we have imposed on ourselves, for example:

1. Restraints of Attachment: a) Attachment to Name: your fame makes you think, “What will others think if I do this? “and it stops your free thinking; b) Attachment to POSITION: when we get attached to a particular position, we become dependent and subservient to our superior in organization. These restraints of attachment create negative traits in us such as jealousy, hatred, ego, etc. These negative traits will imprison our thinking pattern, thereby making us a life time prisoner.


2. Impressions of the past and worries of the future.


3. Influence (but not inspiration) of friends and family members who have dominant presence on our thoughts and actions. Inspiration is great thing but not Influence. Influence is a subtle restraint which makes you dependent whereas inspiration frees you and motivates you to do and achieve something bigger and better than you ever thought possible on your own.

How do you break free of these restraints?

1. Self-Belief: Believe in yourself; set time for your hobbies and listen to songs of your heart.


2. Knowledge and wisdom: Gain enough knowledge and wisdom from all available sources.


3. Self-Mastery: Train yourself and become master of your mind, feelings and emotions.


4. Spirit of Adventure: Get out of your inertia and develop new ideas, plans and take calculated risks. Do not worry of failures; a person who never failed is person who never tried anything in life.

Freedom, however, is also a word that is highly misinterpreted and has led to many problems and wars. Freedom brings responsibility. Experiencing and enjoying Freedom is just like freedom of driving an automobile to the destination of your choice via the route you prefer, subject to the traffic laws while driving to your destination. Freedom requires you to respect the rights, values and freedom of others while you are enjoying your own Freedom.

Real freedom is achieved when we are free from within. Real freedom is when we are masters of our own mind and we value others freedom too.

So drive your vehicle (life) carefully; decide your destiny with self-belief and gain wisdom to reach there and have a spirit of adventure to face the situations and obstacles on the way to your destiny; remember to yield or stop to avoid accidents with drivers of bad sanskars on the way.

Talk by Sister Jayanti : Is God Listening?

Is God Listening?

All of us at some point of time in our life have asked this question "Is God listening?" For few us it's a question? For few them its exclamation! "Oh wow I wish something and its happening "Is God listening to me!" Both the phases are amazing experiences provided we see them as detached observer and Yogi.

It's kind of tricky to understand this when we are undergoing tough phase where we really want something to happen and have put lot of effort but are yet not seeing results! Here we question "Is God listening?" But it's also an amazing phase because we get to understand ourselves, God, His role and principles with which this world drama is operated during this time.

Now an important thing to Cogitate! How do we face this tough phase?

1. First become detached observer. This gives strength to look into situation with more clarity and presence of mind.
2. Believe in yourself and connect the God and follow the directions you are receiving
3. Trust this principle "God always answers Sincere efforts filled with positive thoughts ( i.e., thoughts filled with Faith , Enthusiasm , Courage without any emotions of doubts, duality of mind )

But other interesting aspect to ask ourselves is "Are we Listening to God?" Are we catching his signals and directions properly? Are we having three things which are needed to catch and understand his signals

• Honesty
• Trust
• Patience?

Only an Honest person can listen to his own inner voice and God's voice. Trust is Sine qua non for any successful relation and patience is a key for completing any work. Even when a seed is sown it takes time for fruits to come -its law of nature. Only thing farmer can do is to sow the right seeds at right time. So trust your-self in tough times and sow right seeds and be patient till the results come.

Born To Be Creative

All of us in our life's at some moments have experienced this beautiful AHA moment where we felt we touched the best within ourselves while doing something new or innovative....We smile at ourselves and cheer ourselves by patting our back saying humm wow I can do this ...That's wonderful thing I could do and you are happy like child filled with happiness when he first learns to ride bike.

More Interesting thing is these acts might not always be big ones they can be as simple as doing a small presentation in new way or solving a complicate problem with simple idea or some changes in the way house is organized or bringing home new the flowerpots/trees to make your home special or even making your own songs list.

It's very much true that one of our innate urge is to be creative, innovative and do something new to make changes and bring freshness in life. If we like all this creative process so much why we are not able to do it at all time? To understand this lets see the process which is source of all this creative moments.

We are born innovative and if observed every moment we spend in our life we are involved in beautiful process... A process which continuously makes us creative or sometimes destructive or even dull depending on our choices! Its process which we can't escape or stop and it's responsible for everything surrounding our lives...It's our thought process.

Things which make this process dull are:

1. Thinking about others: (why so and so is like this ...if he is like this)
2. Thinking about past & worrying about future. This might appear simple things but observe how much of your time is invested in it every day.

Things which make it destructive:

1. Jealousy
2. Hatred
3. Ego
4. Selfishness etc...

Things which make it creative & innovative:

1. Feeling of love (unconditional)
2. Thoughts of doing something good without any specific expectancy of name or fame
3. Thoughts of enjoying together etc...

Developing creativity: Getting quiet and exploring stillness is one of the fastest and most successful ways of touching creative peak within you. Yogic principles & mediation help in getting this calm and stable mind to experience the present and to expand our horizons. Among other thing recommended: Dream. Imagine. Play sports. Pretend you are again a child discovering your world. Take risks. And risk again. Dare to fail. Practice your craft.

Om Cafe

Value Your Values

Do you believe in yourself? Do you Value your values?

"Museebat mein shareefon ki kabhi izzat nahin ghat'ti. Jalaa bhi daalo sone ko magar qeemat nahin ghat'ti" - Nama'loom

Translation -

"The honor of good people doesn't decrease during tough times. Even if you burn gold, its value is not decreased."

Sometimes in journey of life offers us challenging opportunities which help us in increasing the faith in ourselves and in values which we believe as core of our character. For example there comes a situation in work or personal life which demands you to make a key decision and all your key contacts or sources and so called "PRACTICAL think tanks" are suggesting you to do something which you are not convinced completely i.e.,. though it appears as logical thing to do yet somewhere in your heart you are not comfortable. You feel it's not in alignment with your core values and as a result you sense some uncomfortable feeling to take that route.

Hope you can co-relate such situation where you start asking yourself? Is it the right decision? I'm I taking right path? I'm I being stupid in following my core values and not being practical like all my friends and co-workers? etc...

At these times remember the quote in beginning Museebat mein.... Become alert during these challenging times and tell yourself its opportunity to test your faith in your own value system. Believe that it's your character( not your money, friends, family) which will protect you in toughest of tough times. It is easy to say that these moments of decision are great opportunities which build our character but when we undergo them personally we realize how tough it's to have faith in our own self and follow our values instead of following steps of society (path of least resistance).

Life is filled with such moments but what happens generally is either we are ignorant to our own core values or never have time to be in peaceful& courageous stage to listen, understand and follow our own conscience. We are often busy and carried away by currents of media/friends etc...

That's why when Baba descends onto this earth first thing HE reminds is our original self and our core values. He gifts us awareness through knowledge and powers (Peace ,Courage etc) through Yog. This helps us to come out of darkness of ignorance and limited thinking and makes us believe in righteous path to help ourselves and entire Human civilization by taking up unlimited (Behad) responsibility towards entire world and prakriti.

Wish you all a great empowering time where you redefine your values, responsibilities and self-faith in your own self's.

Age of Information or Ignorance

We all know the story behind the discovery of light. It's unbelievable for few to know that this amazing discovery of modern era which left the world, a different place to live, was by a person who just had few months of formal education and was almost all deaf. Yes we are speaking about Thomas Alva Edison... (Tom).Interestingly when Tom had an opportunity to have an operation that "would have likely restored his hearing," he flatly refused to act upon the option.... His rationale was that he was afraid he "would have difficulty re-learning how to channel his thinking in an ever more, noisy world." This choice of Thomas Edison raises the question in our Mind, "Are we ourselves lost in the noisy advanced world ", "Are we in the AGE of Information or Ignorance "

Today we are advanced to get information of everything we want through web within seconds, yet very few really can understand the problems/challenges we face in this world. It's because we have information in pieces and have never connected the links between them to see the holistic picture.

Consider simple problem of population Growth : Human Civilization reached it's 1 billion mark in 1800 AD( i.e. It took thousands of years to reach this population), but amazingly it just took another 130 years to become 2 billion (i.e. by 1930) , more amazingly just another 30 years to become 3 billion; Today we have population of 6 billion.
Problem today: We are too many people, using too many resources too fast; A United Nations group called "Millennium Ecosystems Assessment" did a 4 year study, the biggest study of ecosystems ever done on earth which involved 1300 scientists from 71 countries. At the end of the Environmental Conference in March 2005 they came up with a report which showed staggering destruction of ecosystems and the services these ecosystems provide for us. As a result, we started to see many Global Natural calamities.

If we carefully join all this pieces of information using our common sense we can easily figure out that the problem, is not the problem of shortage of oil & natural resources, not the problem of Technology, not the problem of too much Carbon dioxide, not the problem of global warming; all of these are only symptoms of problem. The Problem is the way we are all thinking; it's fundamentally a cultural Problem. It's at level of culture that these mistakes are happening. Our culture is being shaped by corporate companies who are in race of unlimited economic growth at the cost of everything (including even themselves). We have now products of 500 billion dollars of advertising, By the time a child comes to college or goes to school he might have seen thousands of hours of television; an average 2-3 hrs of television per day, as result he can identify hundreds of corporate logos but fewer than 10 native plants of the place. We have not only become consumers but have become ignorant by the terms we live on the earth.

To bring cultural shift we have to first change the way we think as Society, only then a new culture can be formed. How do we bring this change? Even when we fix a mechanical problem we follow simple steps like

1. Understand true nature of product and it's ideal behavior; Observe the deviation from ideal
2. Know who is the right expert in that area and contact him to get the solution
3. Understand the circumstances which lead to this problem for proper understanding
4. Take necessary action.

Similarly as human civilization we are in a situation where a change is required and even this change follows similar process

• Know Your True self
• Know the Creator of all of Us
• Know the Eternal world drama
• Act to the "Call of time"

Once we realize above 4 things it's easy to reopen and imbibe the spiritual principles & virtues innate within us. Some might ask "is it possible even as a dream?" We can give one simple example: When Bapu Mahatma Gandhi first had vision of independence of India with NON-VIOLENCE as weapon people might have got similar questions as above but today we cant question it anymore as it was made true.

"Everything is difficult before it is easy. - Italian proverb"

Now PARAMPITHA PARMATHMA Shiv (father of all souls) has taken birth and has envisioned the establishment of new era with new culture on Earth. It's HIS vision to get us out, from this Night of Ignorance to Beautiful morning. Let us keep our intellect awaken during this process and fast from all negative things to extend our support to HIM in bringing the Transformation.

100 Benefits of Meditation

Physiological benefits:

1. It lowers oxygen consumption.


2. It decreases respiratory rate.


3. It increases blood flow and slows the heart rate.


4. Increases exercise tolerance.


5. Leads to a deeper level of physical relaxation.


6. Good for people with high blood pressure.


7. Reduces anxiety attacks by lowering the levels of blood lactate.


8. Decreases muscle tension.


9. Helps in chronic diseases like allergies, arthritis etc.


10. Reduces Pre-menstrual Syndrome symptoms.


11. Helps in post-operative healing.


12. Enhances the immune system.


13. Reduces activity of viruses and emotional distress.


14. Enhances energy, strength and vigour.


15. Helps with weight loss.


16. Reduction of free radicals, less tissue damage.


17. Higher skin resistance.


18. Drop in cholesterol levels, lowers risk of cardiovascular disease


19. Improved flow of air to the lungs resulting in easier breathing.


20. Decreases the aging process.


21. Higher levels of DHEAS (Dehydroepiandrosterone).


22. Prevented, slowed or controlled pain of chronic diseases.


23. Makes you sweat less.


24. Cure headaches & migraines.


25. Greater Orderliness of Brain Functioning.


26. Reduced Need for Medical Care.


27. Less energy wasted.


28. More inclined to sports, activities.


29. Significant relief from asthma.


30. Improved performance in athletic events.


31. Normalizes to your ideal weight.


32. Harmonizes our endocrine system.


33. Relaxes our nervous system.


34. Produce lasting beneficial changes in brain electrical activity.


35. Helps cure infertility (the stresses of infertility can interfere with the release of hormones that regulate ovulation).


Psychological benefits:


36. Builds self-confidence.


37. Increases serotonin level, influences mood and behaviour.


38. Resolve phobias & fears.


39. Helps control own thoughts.


40. Helps with focus & concentration.


41. Increase creativity.


42. Increased brain wave coherence.


43. Improved learning ability and memory.


44. Increased feelings of vitality and rejuvenation.


45. Increased emotional stability.


46. Improved relationships.


47. Mind ages at slower rate.


48. Easier to remove bad habits.


49. Develops intuition.


50. Increased Productivity.


51. Improved relations at home & at work.


52. Able to see the larger picture in a given situation.


53. Helps ignore petty issues.


54. Increased ability to solve complex problems.


55. Purifies your character.


56. Develop will power.


57. Greater communication between the two brain hemispheres.


58. Respond more quickly and more effectively to a stressful event.


59. Increases one’s perceptual ability and motor performance.


60. Higher intelligence growth rate.


61. Increased job satisfaction.


62. Increase in the capacity for intimate contact with loved ones.


63. Decrease in potential mental illness.


64. Better, more sociable behaviour.


65. Less aggressiveness.


66. Helps in quitting smoking, alcohol addiction.


67. Reduces need and dependency on drugs, pills & pharmaceuticals.


68. Need less sleep to recover from sleep deprivation.


69. Require less time to fall asleep, helps cure insomnia.


70. Increases sense of responsibility.


71. Reduces road rage.


72. Decrease in restless thinking.


73. Decreased tendency to worry.


74. Increases listening skills and empathy.


75. Helps make more accurate judgments.


76. Greater tolerance.


77. Gives composure to act in considered & constructive ways.


78. Grows a stable, more balanced personality.


79. Develops emotional maturity
    
    Spiritual benefits:
    
    
80. Helps keep things in perspective


81. Provides peace of mind, happiness


82. Helps you discover your purpose in life.


83. Increased self-actualization.


84. Increased compassion.


85. Growing wisdom.


86. Deeper understanding of yourself and others.


87. Brings body, mind, and spirit in harmony.


88. Deeper Level of spiritual relaxation.


89. Increased acceptance of one self.


90. Helps learn forgiveness.


91. Changes attitude toward life.


92. Creates a deeper relationship with your God.


93. Increases the synchronicity in your life.


94. Greater inner-directedness.


95. Helps living in the present moment.


96. Creates a widening, deepening capacity for love.


97. Discovery of the power and consciousness beyond the ego.


98. Experience an inner sense of “Assurance or Knowingness”.


99. Experience a sense of “Oneness”.


100. Leads to enlightenment

To top it off, meditation has NO negative side effects

Shivratri Celebration