Life and Spirituality

A Galaxy, one of many in the Universe. The Universe is the father of all life, Earth is the mother I n a previous post it was mentioned that the basic purpose of life appears to be to evolve. In ancient times when civilization began, humans applied their mind to this notion. They came up with a large number of practices designed to improve body, mind and soul of humans. Many such practices were described by a common name Yoga. There are very many different types of yoga such as hatha yoga, kriya yoga, karma yoga and so on for the ways to improve body, mind and soul are countless. This author has had deep interests in both physical sciences as well as spiritual sciences. As a result of this combination, the author had described a form of yoga that emerged from an intersection of both these sciences and gave it the name Entropy Yoga. It has been followed and taught by some in different parts of the world since it was introduced. An interested reader can find it in

T here are many articles in this blog about life and how to improve mind, body and soul so as to become a better human. Since the collection is rather large a reader may wish for a small list that can be read quickly and followed easily. Just five earlier articles are selected here that can set any person on a quick path of evolution while increasing happiness substantially. To begin with you may wish to read what the purpose of life is in this post: http://someitemshave.blogspot.in/2011/04/purpose-of-life.html Now if this article convinces you that it is the purpose of every life to evolve into greatness let us get started. A good place to start is a simple practice called entropy yoga. You probably already know of it and follow most of it anyway. It is described here: http://someitemshave.blogspot.in/2014/07/a-yoga-for-everyone-entropy-yoga.html The next step is a practice called mindful breathing that may now be added to your routine and you shall be on yo

The Turquoise lake of Nainital in Central Himalayas, childhood hometown of author T he Himalayan mountain ranges are full of snow capped peaks, majestic panoramas, lush green forests, lichen covered pine trees, lakes, rivers, springs, wild strawberry patches, wild roses and scented wild flower valleys. These have been a favorite haunt of spiritual mystics since ancient times. Among their many spiritual discoveries is one that although humans die after a certain number of years, in reality they never die because they possess an eternal soul. It is merely the physical body that dies. When a soul discards a body after death, it finds another to continue its endless journey through the universe. The new bodies need not be human. It could be that of an animal, a demon or a god born on Earth or elsewhere in the universe where such life forms exist. What is the purpose of it all? It was concluded in an earlier post that the purpose of life and soul within is to evolv

A s mankind burns fossil fuels to meet its energy needs, carbon emissions are added to the atmosphere. Some of them such as particulate matter are short lived but others such as carbon dioxide is a long lived component. A previous note explored the impact of carbon dioxide emissions on climate change: (http://someitemshave.blogspot.in/2014/04/a-new-perspective-on-climate-change.html )  It was concluded that a much higher level of around 1000 ppm of carbon dioxide appears to be beneficial for the green side of life – plants and trees – because carbon dioxide is to plants as oxygen is to animals. It was also stated that the full impact of such increases on global ecology is a matter for further study.   The present note touches upon a topic that has received little attention so far – The impact of increased carbon dioxide on human physical and spiritual evolution. It is assumed that both go hand in hand as regards humans. The present brief note merely makes initial comments with

  The first edition, 1992, of Mystic and the Blossoms I f one went about trying to define beauty, it would be very difficult to do so with precision. It is something like love that can be felt but not described. We know that birds and a variety of animals express tender love. It is heart breaking to see birds scream when their young ones are in danger, but it seems that they may be oblivious to beauty. Appreciation of  beauty is something that appears to need  evolution into a human or a godly being. Therefore an appreciation of beauty may be a mark of evolution. It is difficult to imagine gorillas and donkeys appreciating the beauty of a flower or a butterfly.  It is tragic to see that there are humans too on the planet that are quite oblivious of beauty. As a professor of engineering and a faculty member in three leading universities of our planet, my profession was to make scientific contributions and educate students of engineering. Some remarked that I was making a v

O ften at around five 5 p.m., I go out for an evening walk around my neighborhood or to a shopping area nearby. Yesterday as I was out on a walk, I spotted a group of around ten rural laborers returning from work at some construction site in the area. They were indeed a bubbly and cheerful lot, laughing and joking with each other as they walked briskly towards their temporary urban shelter. The exuberance was certainly far greater than other rich or middle class neighbors that I encounter on these evening walks. It is a common sight most evenings. These simple rustic labor folk that drop into the city from time to time from nearby rural areas do so to make some extra money. In recent years there has been much economic progress in India, but such progress is in the main confined to urban areas. In the villages, life has not yet changed substantially. Most villagers are farmers but their farm holding are small and they do not have money to invest in intensive modern farming. As a

I n some eastern spiritual texts it is mentioned that life is inherently full of sorrow. To support this contention the texts mention that sickness, death and old age are integral parts of human life. As an escape from this sorrow, texts suggest that humans should learn to banish their thoughts and desires through advanced yogic techniques. Eventually when all thoughts are stilled, all desires banished and consequences of all previous actions i.e. karma exhausted, it is said that the individual soul gets freed from this cycle of births and deaths. It then merges with the infinite consciousness from which it originally arose. In the absence of this liberation or nirvana the soul is subjected to repetitive births and deaths. Although an ardent student of spiritual philosophies, my own view differs somewhat from this philosophy. I believe it can even be misleading. The same spiritual texts clearly state that this liberation is achieved only by rare human souls, possi