Now is the time when our decisions and choices in life start to catch up with us. Life is all cause and effect. Or as that famous Yogi in the Bible put it: ‘Whatsoever a man soweth that shall he also reap.”

We see this theme of cause/effect in nearly all religions in the world, in classic Newtonian physics and now more than ever, quantum physics has proved that “life is in the eye of the beholder.”

In short, “thoughts become things” so “Keep thy heart with all diligence, for out of it are the issues of life.” (Prov. 4:23)

One of my main goals in life is to spread Awareness. I am not perfect, but I try very hard to cultivate a very intentional, powerful, creative life and through those ventures, I have discovered a great deal of knowledge available to anyone with a library card. Seeking spirit or not, we are all human so inevitably we are all graced with life’s ups and downs, all the while, revealing the human experience.

As I’ve approached this milestone marker of my fortieth birthday and looked in the mirror, I’ve been thinking about what key decisions I have made that have contributed most to my healthy state of being.

That being the case, here are 11 lifestyle choices to help inspire tomorrow with healthful and wealthful giving to thyself today, as to reap that health and wealth tomorrow. The choices fall into three main categories: Body, Mind and Spirit:

Body:

#1 – Your body is your Temple, treat it with the greatest respect

In 2003 I interviewed acclaimed jazz pianist Brian Hass for Meniscus Magazine and he told me something that turned into a piece of my existence: Haas said:

“Jesus said, your body is a temple. If you treat your body like a temple, it spreads into the rest of your life. Every aspect of your life becomes holy; everything you do is holy.

“The mind, body and soul are connected,” Haas continued. “If you don’t allow your body to operate at its full potential, how do we even know what our minds are capable of? I’m all about living like a real human and realizing my full potential..I want to be the best human I can be…We have to turn ourselves into superheroes, we have to turn ourselves into ultra-humans. We have to find our true potential.”

The best way to keep the temple clean, is to understand you have control, which leads us to step #2…

#2- Discipline the Robot

Your body is a robot and you have to make the choose whether you are going to tell it what to do, or it is going to tell you what to do.

There are terrible epidemics of obesity, cancer and heart disease in this country and much of it has to do with food addictions.

Most people are addicted to food. That few seconds of flavor from that bite of potato chip, bacon, corn bread, cup cake, doughnut, soda…all of that highly addictive junk food eventually will catch up to the body in the form of obesity, diabetes, heart disease, cancer not to mention your body and mind will be clogged full of junk. “You are what you eat” so those who thrive on processed food will constantly be “over fed and under nourished” and will never reach their full potential.

So you have to make a choice: Am I going to let the robot control me via my tastebuds?

My choice has been to eat a macrobiotic diet consisting of vegetables, whole grains and a little fish; no meat or dairy. The stuff I eat is probably “earthy” to most people. However because I have trained my tastebuds to appreciate the nutrients and not the sugar, it is delicious. On the contrary, if I eat a Duncan Doughnut or God forbid a diet soda, all I can taste is the chemicals. I don’t taste any real food, and my body is trained to reject it.

#3 Fast and Detox your Temple

The best way to reset your control over the robot and cleanse the body is to fast. I know, this sounds crazy, “not eat for 3-6 days?! How is that possible,” you ask? “I get light headed after missing dinner for 1 hour!”

By abstaining from food for significant periods of time, your body has a chance to turn its immune attention towards breaking down toxins in the system that, if left unattended to, could manifest into any number of diseases.

As Paul Bragg explains in The Miracle of Fasting, there is a Vital Force that is used every day of your life to maintain your body’s processes. In addition to pushing blood through millions of filters in your kidneys and exchanging oxygen for carbon dioxide in your lungs, a large percentage of this energy goes towards digesting food through your 30-foot digestive tract. Once you stop eating, this Vital Force begins recharging and is freed up tove move throughout the body breaking down poisonous residues that have built up. Even after just 24 hours, the body is able to begin rebuilding Vital Force.

Aside from fasting, there are many ways to detox on a regular basis. One of my favorite, easy things to do is this: Each day upon waking, drink a pint of water in the morning with a tablespoon of apple cider vinegar or lemon juice, one hour (or as long as possible) before your coffee or breakfast. (Make sure you use a straw and brush your teeth after the mixture! The acids can be bad for your tooth enamel.)

You can also find natural, herb-based cleanses on the market like this seven-day cleanse from Arbonne.

#4 Cultivate Awareness

Now that you’ve got your body cleaned out, you’ll start to see you have a very clear mind, which brings us to the next stage in the positive cause/effect cycle: Awareness. Actually, more specifically the best place to start here is awareness of awareness.

Now that you have control of the robot you can start taking control of other rituals that may or may not be spinning your cause/effect cycle in a positive direction.

- Exercise: There is no shortage of benefits to exercise, get yourself on a schedule and train the robot to get out there at least a few times a week.
- Negative people: Who in your life is it time to step away from? Your awareness will help you see the cause/effect they have on you.
- Emotional intelligence: Knowing that we are emotional creatures, when do you need to step away from a situation before it drives you to a regrettable outburst. (I.e. An “amygdala hijacking”)
- Career navigation: Once you have this awareness, you can start to see how other people’s robots react to professional situations. If you rise above and always make your moves from a very intentional, logical place, you’ll start to see you have more professional freedom than before—to get a raise, to move companies, or to move into new industries all together.
- Helping the whole planet: The best benefit comes when we all have a greater Awareness of how our daily choices affect the planet, and therefore every one of us, especially our future generations.

The benefits of Awareness are endless, and the next step is to start to refine how you incite Action into the universe to get what you want. The gateway to this manifestation is of course, the mind.

Mind:

Einstein proved that everything is made up of energy in his famous equation E=mC2. We also know the human mind can affect energy.

As far back as the early 1800’s, Quantum physics established that the behavior of particles actually changes depending the observer.

In 1803, Thomas Young discovered what would become the cornerstone of modern quantum physics. In his double-slit experiment, he shot a single particle of light towards two slits in a plate. He was trying to determine whether light traveled as a wave or as a particle. What he found is that when he changed his hypothesis, the particle would change its path.

This experiment opened up many questions. What the quantum physics community determined since then is that the physical world of matter and energy respond to our thinking on a subatomic level.

The mind is part of the robot. Most people think their mind is them, but it is actually just another organ running in the background like your liver, kidneys and heart. Now that we have a clean temple, and the power of Awareness, we can start crafting the mind to support our positive cause/effect cycle.

#5 Work with your subconscious mind

Florence Scovel Shinn, a pioneer of the New Thought movement, stated that “The imagination has been called, ‘The Scissors of the Mind,’ and it is ever cutting, cutting, day by day, the pictures man sees there, and sooner or later he meets his own creations in his outer world.”

And to know what creations we should expect in our outer world, she reminds of us what the Greeks said: “Know Thyself.”

What we are creating in our imagination is not always a conscious decision. The subconscious mind is running in the background at all times. It is the operating system that you don’t even see. So if your operating system is running a poverty mantra, or a guilt complex, or a I-don’t-deserve-it paradigm, our power as creators will manifest that poverty, guilt and lack in our lives. However if we program our subconscious with positive mind treatments and acknowledge our place in the universe as acting with and as a part of God, then we can harness the creative power of the universe.

As Earnest Holmes said, “Whatever the mind of man can conceive, it can achieve.”

More on this topic soon, as a part of my new 40 goals, I am going to work on getting more of this information out, stay tuned.

#6 Know that God is within (and feel good about that!)

To truly bring divine power to your creative ability, know this:

There is one Divine power and presence in life. You can call It God, Infinite Intelligence, the Force, what ever you connect with. That Infinite Intelligence is operating in, around and through you. You are in a divine partnership with that Divine Intelligence and every part of your life is one with God. Embrace this Divine presence and know that the creative power of the universe is within you. Your job is to direct It’s creative potential in any way you would like. Just know that you direct that Divine Creative Power whether you are aware of that or not. So think good thoughts, and Good shall come.

I have never been all that religious. In fact, I don’t like organized religion at all. It started with good intentions many centuries ago, but now most world religions are loaded with dogma and limitation that does not serve our highest potential. That said, I do study the world religions to find the needles of wisdom among the haystack of the ages.

One of those great gems is this statement by JC, He said: “Seek ye first the Kingdom of God and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you.”

For some reason, when I bring this up in conversations with Christians, they have a lot of resistance to that idea that the Kingdom was within man. To me, it is crystal clear: God is within, so instead of praying to some entity out there in the sky, we pray with every word we speak, every day: “By your words ye are justified and by your words ye are condemned.”

As Shinn pointed out, “There is always plenty on man’s pathway: but it can only be brought into manifestation by desire, faith or the spoken word. Jesus Christ brought out clearly that man must make the first move.”

“Ask, and it shall be given you, seek, and ye shall find, knock, and it shall be opened you.” (Mat. 7:7)

#7 Meditate

So now that we know that the mind can literally affect the subatomic particles that make up everything around us, and we understand that the Infinite Divine power of creation is within, how do we clean out that subconscious mind and start churning out some positive cause/effect into our life?

One of my favorite yoga instructors, Yogi Charu, once said something that really stuck with me: “We brush our teeth, we wash our hair, but we never clean our mind.” Of all the important bodily functions, most of us do not consider our “mental hygiene.”

The only way to calm the mind down and actually see it for what it really is, is to meditate.

The most frequent response I get when talking about meditation is “I can’t do it—I can’t sit there and think about nothing for more than a few seconds.” What I would say to that is, it’s not about the result of having a clear mind, free from thoughts, it is about the practice of watching the mind in action and from there we’ll be able to start seeing the mind for what it is: another organ in our body.

We are not our mind.

The best analogy I’ve heard about meditation is to picture yourself laying on your back watching the clouds go by on a blue sky. Each cloud is a thought. Now ideally you sit down and focus on the breathe and try and just look at the blue sky, the silence, the breath. Only the breath. However as far as I know that is impossible. Inevitably there is a cloud that comes by, interrupting the azure above. That’s ok, a thought comes in, you watch it go across your purview, then it is gone, and back to blue sky.

The reason that is so powerful, is you start to realize there is something outside of your brain that is You. There is your mind and then there is You, which you start to get to know once your mind finally shuts the hell up for a moment. (Damn thing is running non-stop! Shut up brain!

In this way, there is nothing as powerful for understanding the mind than meditation.

This is such an important step in cultivating your super powers as a human being.

Spirit:

#8 Acknowledge the Spirit

The other cardinal cornerstone of the happy life is acknowledging and working with the spirit. About an arm’s length around our physical body is our spirit body. If you cleanse your body, purify your mind and spend enough time meditating, you can start to connect to the more subtle energies of the spirit realm. Ask me to define what that really means? I can’t. But I do know it is worthy of a lifetime of study.

Call it God, call it the Universe, the Force, what ever you will, it is the everything that is all, that is One, that is no thing. And if you follow Quantum Physics into it, you will see the mystics have been correct this whole time:

We are all connected by an unseen force.

Take some time each day to connect with that greater Source energy and greater synchronicity will start to unfold, allowing you to bring out the gifts that only you bring to the world.

#9 Beware of The Illusion

Now that we have Awareness of our power to control the body, purify the mind and work with the spirit, we can start to step out of the day-to-day distractions that constantly pull us back into mental chaos and drama.

There are a million things out there to distract us. Thousands of products vying for our dollars. We’ve got Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and Snapchat. Drama playing through people’s emotions that have little or nothing to do with what is happening right now. News media inciting fear and prejudice on a 24-hour cycle. Doctors prescribe drugs to dull the psyche, put us to sleep, or make us “normal.” Energy vampires seeking to suck your energy and pull you down.

Through the tools we’ve discussed, you now have the ability to see through what the Hindu mystics call the Illusion, or the Maha Maya. The more you use the tools of Awareness, Meditation and harnessing of the Divine within, the more your own intuition will heighten and it is in there, that you’ll discover the gifts you have to give to the world.

Think of the illusion as the flock of sheep being led off a cliff. All of the sheep think it is the cool thing to do because they are following the sheep in front of them. And it creates a great deal of effort to turn around and go against the flow. But so long as you stay part of that flock, the only footsteps you’ll tread are ones that have already been beaten down by minds before you.

#10 Don’t do what you’re told

From the moment we are born, people have an opinion about what they think is best for us. Growing up, our parents want us to follow a certain path, go to an in-state college (because they love us :), our friends encourage us to do what’s cool, we want to be accepted, society reinforces our existing paradigms, and marketers push trends.

If you are going to find out who you really are, you can’t blindly follow what other people expect of you. Do not obey. Don not do what you’re told. Do not stay in your comfort zone. Move out of state. Travel internationally. Don’t marry “in your tribe”. Read lots of books from people you agree with and disagree with. Do not discount anyone or any thought based on what “they” think.

No one who ever did anything revolutionary followed the rules. Some of the greatest minds of our time went against the grain and dropped out of school despite everyone telling them it was a bad idea. Albert Einstein, Thomas Edison, Benjamin Franklin, John D. Rockefeller, Walt Disney, Richard Branson, Steve Jobs and Bill Gates all went against popular advice and dropped out of school.

Get out of conventional wisdom as much as possible and then you’ll start to welcome the insight from within, to be the best person you can be.

After all, if you do not bring your own gifts to the world, no one else will. Each one of us has something unique to bring to the planet, and no one finds that unique gift without a healthy sense of adventure and discontentment of how things are now.

#11 Love

The final, and perhaps most important trait to living a healthy, wealthy, joyus, blessed life is love. All of our decisions in life either come from a place of love or a place of fear.

My favorite Beatle Yogi said it best:

“That’s it really; it’s all love, whichever way you look at it, it’s all love. How much you can Get from each other and that’s determined by how much you’re Giving to each other… But it all starts Within our self and then it spreads to those around us, Good & Bad. But basically that’s it, I think it’s the Love that we can generate is = to the Love that we get back.
Amen”
― George Harrison, Cloud Nine

40 years, in conclusion

I have done my best to search out and follow these 11 approaches to life. I constantly work to cleanse the body, cultivate the mind and embrace the spirit and as I turn this grand milestone of 40 years old, I am enlivened by the thought of life. I want us all to be the superhumans that we were born to be.

Every birthday, just like every day, is a new opportunity to set new cause/effect into motion.
I wish you all the best of success in building a healthy, wealthy, joyous, blessed tomorrow by planting the seeds of body, mind and spirit today. I encourage you to harness your Divine partnership with the great Infinite Intelligence in the universe, to be present and live intentionally each and every day, to tap into the greater Spirit to find out who you truly are, and to give your unique gifts to the world.

God Bless and good luck!

- By Jon Heinrich

Hosted by Stephanie Ruhle (managing editor anchor for Bloomberg Television & co-host of Market Makers). Speakers (from left to right): Jessica Seinfeld (author of three NY Times bestselling cookbooks on healthy eating, founder of Baby Buggy non-profit organization dedicated to families in need), Gary Hershberg (co-founder & chairman of Stonyfield Farm), and Ken Cook (president and co-founder of the Environmental Working Group a non-profit organization dedicated to protecting human health and the environment).

As you probably have heard, GMO (Genetically Modified Organism) food is currently not labeled here in the US. Yet citizens of 64 other countries, including Russia and China have this right.

It is believed that, GMO’s have lower nutritional quality than natural foods making the nutrients unavailable or indigestible to humans. Additionally, the effects of ingesting such foods loaded with herbicides and toxins in the GMO’s may cause diseases such as Cancer, Parkinson’s, Allergies and Autism to name just a few.

There is also speculation that bacteria living in the digestive tracts of humans and animals could build up an antibiotic resistance gene from a GMO plant. Currently 60% – 100% of the rainwater in the midwest is already contaminated with the powerful herbicides like Roundup used to grow GMO crops.

The corporations behind the GMO foods are very powerful and wealthy. They are quickly buying up established healthy brands such as Annie’s and Quaker, which was recently purchased by Pepsico. Once purchased they change the traditional ingredients to GMO’s, which is more cost effective for them and dangerous for us. But, they are currently not required to label GMO ingredients.

We deserve to know what we are buying and eating by demanding transparency in our food system, our health and ultimately our lives depend on it. We need to take a stand for mandatory GMO labeling in the US.

Just Label It!

The good news change is happening, recently the progressive restaurant chain Chipotle has committed to remove all GMO ingredients from it’s food. Mandatory GMO labeling would be a huge step in the right direction.

As Margaret Mead said, “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has.”

Please go to www.justlabelit.org and take action today.

by Judith Longo

Judi with Jessica Seinfeld

You are not alone. In this interview with Prosumer Coach, Jon Connors, we explore how that is all changing.

Fortunately for all of us, there is a new economic system generating momentum that represents an evolution of the knowledge and technology we have created as a human race.

Introducing Prosumerism: the combination of the Producer and Consumer

Prosumerism was first coined by futurist Alvin Toffler in the late 1970’s but the history goes much farther back. In what Toffler refers to as First Wave, timed in the Agricultural Era, people produced what they consumed.

In Toffler’s Second Wave, the era of Industrialization, we saw a split from the producer and the consumer. Now fast forward 60 years and this is where we are at right now, where the majority of the world are consumers. Unfortunately, it is not sustainable and most money and resources are centralized to a few mega-corporations and banks.

Right now with the Information Era upon us, we have the opportunity to evolve—to once again combine the producer and consumer while bringing a new level of actualization because of humanity’s great technological innovations. Prosumerism is how we capitalize on all progress we have made as mankind and will usher in a new era of abundance for everyone who participates. This is our chance for an industrial leap forward!

Here is Prosumer Coach Jon Connors on Prosumerism Defined:

Moving forward, Meniscus will be working with Mr. Connors to dissect the different components of this philosophy and you are invited to join the journey forward, out of the current crumbling political economic era of the Second Wave—where we are forced through our distribution system to support companies that we may not believe in. Instead we are moving to an economy where people only support with their wallets, companies and people they resonate with.

Jon Connors walks through the foundations of Prosumerism, in the first video in the series above. Next, stay tuned for the next installments, “Why ‘The Third Wave’ is Coming and No One Can Stop It” and “‘The Lean Startup’- Innovation Accounting to Build ‘The Third Wave.’”

As for now, take note how you are prosuming right now—on social media! Think about it, we share stories, spread the ideas of others, and sometimes we directly prosume products and services from our friends. Your homework is to think about what ‘best practices’ we use in social media that we should employ to create a new prosumption marketplace. We can all contribute and benefit from this new way of thinking, please join us!

-An interview with Jon Connors by Jon Heinrich

Get in touch with Jon Connors on Linkedin, Facebook or Vimeo.

- Photo by Jon Heinrich

How is she still at the top of her game after all these years of success? How is she this timeless wonder still producing such modern, fashion-forward designs while maintaining her ageless physicality? I recently attended an evening event lead by the one and only Norma Kamali in her ultra clean, bright, white lacquered boutique on West 56th Street in NYC.

Surrounded by her plethora of passions including her powerful women’s clothing line, gorgeous bottles of olive oil and gourmet raw food, the picture of grace, elegance and modernity appeared. Enter Norma Kamali. She and her ultra-polite team gathered on this night, with an all female audience to discuss and interact on perhaps the most important of her passions, the end of the objectification of women.

She spoke with honesty and strength about redefining the modern woman. Norma Kamali created short film titled “Hey Baby” about the way women are treated by men as we walk down the street. She pointed out that we are so much more than our body image, the clothes we wear, our breast size and yet we are all judged by these physical aspects.

Norma shared her own stories of objectification and explained that, through sharing them with other women, we can empower ourselves. This is so huge for women, we all have these experiences and we usually keep them buried deep down inside.

Wellness and Women

As the night came to a close, I took my selfie with Norma Kamali and I realized she is far beyond a fashion icon. Norma Kamali truly is a superhero, a powerful woman who designs contemporary, gorgeous women’s clothing, who is devoted to eating healthy and most importantly, she is at the forefront leading the way for women in the face of objectification coming from our culture.

Norma Kamali is quietly breaking down this barrier in her graceful, elegant, modern way.

If you live in the New York area, keep an eye out for future events on thewellnesscafe.com so you share your experiences and share in the growing empowerment. You can also get involved at www.stopobjectification.com.

- by Judith Longo

Incidentally, this particular workshop was a fortuitous one to be a part of. In the middle of one of the meditations, Mas received what he describes as an “energetic upgrade”. In the middle of the Seven Deadly Sins workshop, Mas dropped to his knees and dropped into a deep state. Source energy was working on him to bring him up to a new state.

This is the first time an upgrade like this has happened in public, normally it happens in the middle of the night when he’s doing one of his 3 AM meditations. The process is typically the same, he falls to his knees or falls down because he can’t even control what is happening.

Mas explains that when we connect to Pure Source, at those levels it is difficult to control your body because you are so high up into your spirit level that your body starts to disappear. The spirit does not want to be in your body, it is so expansive outside it.

The amount of information coming in during an upgrade is like being plugged into a massive transformer with much higher voltage than you are used to. The energy went out like a sonic boom, going through the room bringing the energy not just to Mas, but everyone in attendance.

He likened the higher realms of consciousness to an upside down pyramid, where the level of information you can access expands the higher you get. Most people on the planet are not even at the very tip in terms of conscious awareness, but Mas continues to go higher and higher with every upgrade.

Back—twice—for a reason

When Mas came back to life after his second near death experience, he came back to do what no other person on the planet is doing right now. Mas connects with Pure Source in a way that has never happened before in any other realm in any other individual. It is a different process than what was previously on the planet like Jesus or Buddha. It is difficult to describe exactly what that means and is out of scope for a conversation based in physical reality.

In a recent interview with Alan Steinfeld, Mas was asked why he was chosen for this path. “Good question,” said Mas. “This has been my life purpose,” he explained. From his ability to see a more omnipotent perspective of life and the universe, he is able to see that ever since he came into the physical plane as a being human, he wanted to get back to the spirit plane. In past lives he knows that he was around Jesus and was a sage. It has been his life’s purpose for many lifetimes.

With the upgrade comes powerful detoxing

As mentioned in our first Meniscus article about Mas, detoxing is an important part of the healing process. Now after the upgrade, people are detoxing more rapidly, more intensely than before. Because of the more powerful frequencies Mas is bringing down now, it facilitates shifting from A to Z a lot faster.

To stay in that space, you have to let go of all the heaviness all the frequencies that can not exist in that space. You have to let go on emotional, spiritual, physical levels. Now the healing that used to take place over 1 ½ hours, now takes 5 minutes.

Awakening the spirit

Even beyond our physical existence, the spirit comes with ideological and habitual baggage like we do on this plane of existence and that is what the detox is—awakening the spirit to its truer form, where you let go of everything to be at that level.

Among other areas of your life, the detox can play out in relationships. If the people around you can not handle the higher vibration you are at, they will disappear from your life. It could be your best friend or your spouse if there is not a good frequency match. However others who are vibrating on a similar level will come into your life.

You will let go of old notions and ideologies, and there will be newer thoughts and people in your life to help you ascend higher.

Experience your upgrade

Mas Sajady came back from two near death experiences to share a gift, a new frequency for those of us who choose to venture towards their higher path. It is not an easy journey, it requires letting go of issues that are too heavy for the higher realms of physical consciousness. But the more people who venture out as pioneers with Mas, to face their issues, and accept the detoxing that comes with it, they will pave the way for the planet to move further towards a kinder, brighter future.

If you are near New York City, you have the opportunity to experience the energy of Mas Sajady in person at the New Life Expo on October 17-20th where you can listen to Mas and other intelligent experts on how we got here and where we are going, and also see if this man can change your life in 30 minutes or less.

If you ask me, I’d vote for yes, with my own life being a testament of a massive transformation since I originally experienced Mas and his upgrade in June of 2014. I invite you to join us to continue the transformation whether joining in person or remotely in NYC next week. Or as Mas says: “Change your frequency, change your life!”

-by Jon Heinrich

massajadyevents.com/nyc-oct/

Walking into a workshop with Damien you will find this powerful yet grounded soul has set up a beautiful energetic environment before the arrival of the guests. As the workshop commences, he scans the room to see where everyone is at, then brings everyone to what he calls the zero point and the agenda is set by what is needed in that room.

Right now in this highly transformative, energetic time, many people are working through similar issues. Over many lifetimes, our perceptions of reality and our own power have been “programmed” by society and by the power structure in place. As we move into this new era of consciousness, many of those programs are being cleared, and Damien helps not only energetically, but psychologically to work through them.

We all have issues, and he helps in a profound way to “break the habit of being yourself”. As each of us bring our own vibration up to a higher level, we open up the Field for the rest of the planet to follow. In this way, those energetic pioneers who willingly face their own issues pave the way for the rest of the collective consciousness to grow.

Expansion Topics

While his work is constantly evolving, topics he has covered in workshops include:

- Work with issues around sexual abuse, criticism, blame and guilt. We have all lived many, many lifetimes and if any of those involved sexual abuse (giving and/or receiving), a residue remains on your soul that causes feelings to linger from lifetime to lifetime. Damien helps release those energetically and by talking through it.

- Damien accesses our ancestors and brings them back into the correct genetic “seat” of the family to clear the DNA. For example, maybe the mother is trying in the wife seat. Sometimes the roles as male and female in a relationship are mixed up. Other times you have a grandparent who has moved into an genetic role that is not appropriate, even if they have passed on. Damien helps participants connect with their ancestors through their own heightened intuition and brings alignment back to family genetics.

- He helps participants give back heavy emotions inherited from our parents. We often take on topics from our parents that do not belong to us and weighs us down. For example: “Mother, Father, all the feelings of anger, frustration and resentment you felt from being unappreciated and unaccepted by your parents, I give those feelings back to you with love and respect. They are too heavy for me. They do not belong to me. I give them back.” Through this process it allows the proper ownership of issues and helps to clear them both from your field and also the field of your parents.

- In the workshops, Damien works with deceased ancestors to help them ascend to the light instead of lingering around in a purgatory that will be unhealthy for everyone.

Breathe

Damien’s presence and method is very powerful. He brings light to issues common among our collective programing. He moves the topics from the head to the heart, then helps us to breathe through them and cleanse the cells in our body. He brings attention to the cleaning of the blood and brings space between the cells in the body. He is truly a loveable character, his Irish accent, his wisdom from traveling all over the planet doing his work and helps people find their true potential.

Damien’s home is currently in Berlin, Germany but he travels all over the world to help people do what they need for themselves. He reminds us to always say to our higher self “please take care of me.” He teaches us not to try and change people if they don’t ask for help, but rather to support them. “I am here to support you. I am here for you.” Because in the end, we can not work on anyone but ourselves.

I would highly recommend going to one of Damien Wynne’s workshops if he is in your area. You can find out more about him on his website here: damien-wynne.de/
or his Facebook page as well: www.facebook.com/LightGridsHealing
If you are in the New York City area, you can find out about his events at www.sacredgatheringsandevents.com/

In the end, the most powerful statement you can make is: “I Am that I Am.” Collect the fragments of your soul that have been misplaced, own what is in you and you will transform.

Done!

- by Jon Heinrich

One of the best ways to allow your body to cleanse is by fasting. By abstaining from food for significant periods of time, your body has a chance to turn its immune attention towards breaking down toxins in the system that, if left unattended to, could manifest into any number of diseases, even cancer.

Fasting has been around for centuries. Most people only hear of it in regards to the 40 days of fasting Jesus performed during lent, in preparation of his public ministry. The bible describes the fasting experience as a personal matter: “But when you fast, anoint your head and wash your face, so that you may not appear to be fasting, except to your Father who is hidden.”

Traditionally, fasting is viewed as a spiritual experience. By abstaining from all solid food, you are taking control of the robot that is your body, by not letting it control you. When this occurs, you begin to see through the cycles of everyday life and realize what is truly important in the world. By choosing to let the spirit guide us, and not the flesh, you break through materialism and realize the body’s addiction to food and harmful substances we consume everyday.

In the Essene Gospels, Jesus explains, “the body is the temple of the spirit, and the spirit is the temple of God. Purify, therefore, the temple, that the Lord of the temple may dwell therein and occupy a place that is worthy of him.

“Renew yourselves and fast. Go by yourself and fast alone…great shall be your reward…. Fast and pray fervently, seeking the power of the living God for your healing.”

Fasting: Why do it for your health?

As Paul Bragg explains in The Miracle of Fasting: Proven Throughout History for Physical, Mental, & Spiritual Rejuvenation, there is a Vital Force that is used every day of your life to maintain your body’s processes. In addition to pushing blood through millions of filters in your kidneys and exchanging oxygen for carbon dioxide in your lungs, a large percentage of this energy goes towards digesting food through your 30-foot digestive tract. Once you stop eating, this Vital Force begins recharging and is freed up tove move throughout the body breaking down poisonous residues that have built up. Even after just 24 hours, the body is able to begin rebuilding Vital Force.

With the aid of lots of water and a herbal laxative, fasting also allows your body to pass the remaining food that has accumulated in the colon over years. The average person on a western diet has up to eight partially digested meals residing in their digestive tract at any time. Think about that! This undigested food does exactly the same thing it would if it weren’t in your body: it rots. If you’re wondering what that would look like, try taking a bowl of freshly cooked food and instead of eating it, put it in a moist 98.6 degree environment and check on it in three days.

What if you are sick right now?

Now that we’ve looked at the natural powers the body has, you can apply it to life, and help save loved ones that suffer from debilitating diseases such as cancer.

Brian Haas, in the midst of spreading consciousness expanding music with Jacob Fred Jazz Odyssey, explains what he would do if the human being he loved the most, was diagnosed with cancer. “The first thing I would tell her, is to never go back to the hospital.”

With a demanding severity in his voice he continued, “Never talk to another doctor; never take another test; and never set foot in another western medical facility.” Then he would remove from her diet, anything that feeds the malignant cells in the body including four main items: sugar, dairy, carbohydrates, and alcohol. This leaves vegetable, and organically-raised meat protein as the sustaining diet while the body boosts its own healing abilities. Throughout the process take a trace mineral supplement, and juiced wheat grass, what Haas considers to be nature’s best medicine.

Then, over five days time, diminish the solid food intake until you were consuming only juiced fruits and vegetables. At the conclusion of this five-day rev down process, Haas would have her fast, consuming nothing but water, for two weeks. After this treatment, he is emphatic in his stance that the cancer would be gone.

If you decide to try fasting, keep in mind a few guidelines:

- It is best to diminish your intake slowly, working your way down to leafy greens.
During the fast drink as much water as possible to flush as many toxins as possible, out of your revitalizing system.

- You may want to try some detoxifiying herbal tea or other methods such as the “Master Cleanser”, a mixture of freshly squeezed lemon, grade B maple syrup, and cayanne pepper in warm water.

- When you begin to eat again, avoid high-protien foods and bananas at all costs. Your sensitive liver will be much happier if you begin with leafy greens first.

- Do your research, pick up The Miracle of Fasting by Paul Bragg so you know what to expect.

Would controlling my diet to control cancer work, you may ask? At age 60, with no grey hair to show, his own mother has survived a bleak 5 percent chance given by her doctors. Haas’ mom is a testament that it can be done.

Fasting is certainly one powerful option to allows your natural body to take care of itself. The most important thing to realize, is that your vessel has remarkable healing capabilities especially when we give it a rest.

Please, think about what you put into your temple, for the sake of your loved ones, and for the sake of evolution.

- by Jon Heinrich

Photo by Arturo

Bibliography:

Bragg, Paul ND, Ph.D, Patirica Bragg ND, Ph.D. The Miracle of Fasting. Santa Barbara, CA: Health Science.

Gorbach, Sherwood. “Antimicrobial Use in Animal Feed—Time to Stop”. (Editorial). The New England Journal of Medicine, October 18, 2001. v345i16 p1202(2).

Haas, Brian. Interview. October 16, 2003.

Melina, Vesanto M.S., R.D. Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine. Healthy Eating for Life: To Prevent and Treat Cancer. John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 2002.

Nixon, Daniel W. M.D. The Cancer Recovery Eating Plan: The Right Foods to Help Fuel Your Recovery. Times Books, Random House, 1994.

Pianin, Erik. “EPA Won’t Regulate Use of Dioxin-Laced Sludge as Fertilizer”. The Boston Globe, October 18, 2003.

Quillen, Patirck Ph.D., RD. CNS. Beating Cancer with Nutrition. Tulsa, Oklahoma: Nutrition Times Press, Inc., 1994.

Robbins, John. Diet for a New America. Walpole, NH: Stillpoint, 1987.

Tagilaferri, Mary, Issac Cohen and Devu Tripathy. Breast Cancer Beyond Convention.

Vogin, Gary MD. WebMD, December, 2001. http://my.webmd.com/content/article/9/1811_50449.htm?lastselectedguid=%7B5FE84E90-BC77-4056-A91C-9531713CA348%7D

Watson, Rory. “EU Says Growth Hormones Pose Health Risk”. British Medical Association, British Medical Journal, May 29, 1999. v318i7196 p1442.

Having been writing for over ten years, initially Lynnda did not know what shape it would eventually take on, originally thinking it would be a play before it took shape as a fictional novel. She wrote the original draft stream of consciousness as one long manuscript with no chapters, however the inspiration for the writing was truly remarkable.

Feeling the deep nuances of her main character, Lynnda let Addie Mae tell the story in her deep elderly southern African American accent. In a relationship that we will never understand “until we join the Invisibles,” Addie Mae shares an epic tale of how the truth and hardship can show the willing soul just what it needs to see to find life’s purpose.

As Lynnda shares in the Prologue,

…I awoke into the fleeting voice of an elderly, Southern, African American woman. For a moment, she helped me understand everything…and then it was gone. As sleep escaped and the dream and its memories evaporated, she showed me a mountain I would climb. I never saw her face but her presence felt familiar. My heart pounded, only the fragrance of her words remained.”

Throughout our journey, Addie Mae was my guide, assurance that someone had gone before me. Whether it was by chance or fate, or lives touched. Addie Mae generously decided to share what she knew. She gently guided me into experiences that brought me closer to her understanding, closer to her wisdom, to the wisdom of the Invisibles. Close enough so on that one magical day, I could hear her whispers.. and was finally ready to listen.

No matter how lonely and scary the path seemed at times, she let me know I was not the first traveler. I was never alone.

Neither are you.”

Lynnda’s grand tale through Addie Mae’s journey entices the reader through their own journey of transformation and acceptance of divine timing. Through the many layers of the story, the lessons of Trusting the Currents come subtly through in this mystical search for truth.

- by Jon Heinrich

Friedrich Nietzsche coined the term sexual sublimation, explaining that a sexual impulse could be channeled into a creative spiritual activity instead of being “discharged” in the normal sexual fashion.

Small pellets of dry ice sublimating in air, (Photo Credit: “Dry Ice” by APN MJM)

Napoleon Hill also spoke of this “sexual transmutation” in his famous masterpiece, Think and Grow Rich. “Sex desire is the most powerful of human desires.” Hill explains, “When driven by this desire, men develop keenness of imagination, courage, will power, persistence…which may be used as powerful creative forces in literature, art, or in any other profession or calling, including, of course, the accumulation of riches.”

Centuries before that, the ancient Taoists also believed in emission control as a pillar of a healthy long life. Their belief lies in the science of how much essence and energy a man must expend to replenish emissions and rebalance hormones after a man has a release. When a man releases too frequently, it can lead to chronic fatigue, irritability and energy deficiency and in extreme cases, premature senility, memory loss, confusion and hypersensitivity to sunlight.

Benefits of sexual sublimation

The school of Taoism believes that retention of a man’s vital essence when reabsorbed into the body, provides a rock solid basis for a man’s creative energy pool. This is partially because the most common liquid in the body is cerebrospinal fluid, which is one of the most energetic substances in the body. Reabsorption will increase the amount of this highly energetic, nutritive fluid that surrounds the brain and spinal cord, causing more nutrition and power liquid around the central nervous system, which in turn benefits cognitive abilities.

Perhaps that is why the French call it, la petite mort, or “a little death.”

Secondly, from a sexual standpoint, having a full supply of this vital essence will be reflected as power and longevity during love-making.

Building the discipline and strength of the “mula bandha”, or perineum is part and parcel of the retention technique and worthy of a lifetime study. Not only will this play out in the bedroom for pleasing your goddess, clamping the mula bandha will allow that kundalini energy to move up the spine, bringing energy to your higher chakras.

The practice of “locking the gate” is an exercise involving body, breath and mind—or as the Taoists refer to it, the Three Treasures, essence, energy and spirit—and will be addressed in more detail in a subsequent post.

Finally, very literally the vital essence is a man’s creative power. In its original sense, it is to create a child. But from an artistic sense it also is the power to create literature, art or, as Napoleon Hill described, the accumulation of riches. So the retention of the vital essence will boost the resiliency of the disciplined man and instead of leaving him tired and empty, he will feel strong and powerful to tackle his life pursuits.

After the art of retention is developed, women too will notice. They have a sixth sense that we men can not understand, but once a man starts practicing this retention, he will have much more attention from the ladies than before. Women are much more intuitive than men and can sense the strong from the weak.

And if that interest plays itself out onto the “flowery battlefield”, the most powerful of mystic gentlemen will continue to retain the vital essence even during a “poetry writing session” so that he may please his lady over and over again instead of the alternative of falling asleep after climax.

One great book that goes into much greater detail is The Tao of Health, Sex, and Longevity: A Modern Practical Guide to the Ancient Way (Fireside Books (Fireside)) by Daniel Reid, which is highly recommended as a manual to assist the evolved male in the ancient bedroom arts, as well as other topics around health and wellness.

We will continue to explore ways of sharpening the sexual sword in other chapters of The Gentleman’s Guide, but for now we will leave you with some guidelines passed on from the Yellow Emperor aforementioned Tao of Health, Sex and Longevity:

Some men are strong, some are weak, some men are old and others are in their prime. Each should live according to his own vitality and not try to force the joys of sex. Forcing joy is harmful. Thus, a robust male of 20 may ejaculate once a day, but an emaciated one should do so no more than once daily.
A 30-year-old male may ejaculate once a day, but only once every two days if he’s an inferior specimen. A flourishing man of 40 may emit semen once every three days, but if he’s weak he may do so only once every four days.
A robust man of 50 may ejaculate once every five days, but only once every ten days if he is weak. A 60-year-old man in good health may emit once every ten days, or once every 20 days if his health is poor.
At 70, a robust man emit once a month, but a weak one should no longer emit semen at all.

And another important guideline from Master Liu Ching from the Han Dynasty described the cycles of nature as an important factor:

In spring, a man may permit himself to ejaculate once every three days, but in summer and autumn he should limit his ejaculations to twice a month. During the cold of winter, a man should preserve his semen and avoid ejaculation altogether. The Way of Heaven is to accumulate Yang essence in winter. A man who follows this guideline will live a long and healthy life. One ejaculation in cold winter is one hundred times more harmful than an ejaculation in the spring.

There is much more detail in this book, The Tao of Health, Sex, and Longevity: A Modern Practical Guide to the Ancient Way (Fireside Books (Fireside)), highly recommended!

- Article and photography by Jon Heinrich

Bibliography:

Image of dry ice: “Dry Ice” by APN MJM – Own work. Licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons

Power down and live in the moment.

So now that I am back off my digital detox, seeing throngs of New Yorkers glued to their phones everywhere they go, I have made a decision to consciously cultivate a healthy relationship with my phone to avoid being a digital zombie. Here are a few methods:

- Either walk or text, never both. Not only is it annoying, it is dangerous! People get hit by cars! (Same goes for driving, one or the other!)

- Don’t mindlessly hit the refresh button in trains, cars and elevators. When you are surrounded by metal, you are inside what is known as a faraday cage. You may have seen cool tricks on the science channel where people stand inside one while effectively getting struck by lightening. They are protected because the metal cage forces all the positively charged ions to repel each outher to the outside of the cage. It also makes it tougher for electromagnetic signals to get through–like your cell signal. When your phone can’t connect, it tries even harder, this blasting you with more electromagnetic radiation, of which the effects may be cancerous tumors and other maladies.

speaking of…

- Don’t carry your cell in your pocket–especially on subways and elevators. To protect yourself against radiation, it is best to keep the phone a distance from your flesh, your organs and especially from your private parts (if you value your fertility that is.) The signal power follows the law of electromagnetic field strength, which is exponential. The power is inversely proportionate to the square of the distance. What that means is even a few inches can reduce the signal strength significantly, although to truly have the “safe” distance, it would be best to carry your phone in a Radio Flyer red wagon behind you.

- Don’t use headphones: ironically those don’t help, they act as antennae to concentrate the signal right into your head. Instead try a Native Union Pop phone which blocks radiation, or other alternatives like the Smart&Safe Hollow Air Tube Hands-free Headset.

Most of all, instead of obsessively checking for who across the globe “liked” your post, try being present and talking to the people in the room. I have found the synchronistic in my life have occurred when I am most present.

If you live in New York City, check out Sunset Switch-Off Tuesdays, an event hosted by the W Hotel downtown where guests are encouraged to to power down their phones and live in the moment. (Think about bringing a notebook and a pen in case you meet anyone interesting!)

The Smartphone is an incredible tool if we use it well, full disclosure, I wrote this post on the way home on the train in notepad, haha. I use the camera, the voice recorder, the MP3 player, it has replaced a whole army of devices. But it is also very addictive, so join me in developing a healthy relationship with your phone. It does not need to be always-on.

- by Jon Heinrich