Let’s take spirituality up a notch

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In the past, I have previously written many articles regarding spiritual life. What I have previously written has been an introduction to see the difference between material and spiritual life. So, now I’m gonna take it up a notch.

One of the main aspects is understanding that everything animate or inanimate that is within the universe is controlled and owned by the Lord. That being so, one should therefore accept only those things necessary for himself, which are set aside as his quota, and one should not accept other things, knowing well to whom they belong.

Vedic knowledge is infallible because it comes down through the perfect disciplic succession of spiritual masters, beginning with the Lord Himself. Since He spoke the first word of the Absolute Truth, the source of this knowledge is transcendental. The words spoken by Him are called ‘apauruseya’, which indicates they are not delivered by any mundane person.

A living being living in this mundane world has four defects: (1) he is certain to commit mistakes; (2) he is subject to illusion; (3) he has a propensity to cheat others; and (4) his senses are imperfect. No one with these four imperfections can deliver perfect knowledge.

This knowledge was originally imparted by the Lord to the first created living being who then disseminated to his sons and disciples, who handed it down through history.

Since God is all-perfect, there is no possibility of His being subjected to the laws of material nature, which He controls. But, both the living entities and inanimate objects are controlled by the laws of nature and ultimately by God’s potency.

In the Seventh Chapter of the Bhagavad-gita As-It-Is (7.4-5), ‘para’ and ‘apara’ are discussed. The elements of nature –earth, water, fire, air, ether, mind, intelligence and ego – all belonging to God’s inferior, material energy (apara), whereas the living being, the organic energy, is His superior energy (para). Both of these energies are the property of the Supreme Lord.

Because the Supreme Lord is the complete person, He has complete and perfect intelligence to adjust everything by means of His different potencies. He is often compared to a fire, and everything organic and inorganic is compared to the heat and light of that fire. Just as fire distributes energy in the form of heat and light, He displays His energy in different ways.  He thus remains the ultimate controller, sustainer and dictator of everything and is full of inconceivable opulence, power, fame, beauty, knowledge and renunciation.

That being the fact, one should therefore be intelligent enough to know that except for Him no one is a proprietor of anything and that is why one should accept only those things that are set aside by Him as our quota. That being said, we should be satisfied with those things He has kindly set aside for us, and we should always consider to whom those things we possess actually belong.

Where you live is made of earth, stone, iron, cement and so many other material things that we cannot produce. We can only bring these building materials together and transform them into different shapes by our labor. But, a laborer cannot claim to be a proprietor of a thing just because he worked hard to put it together.

The human race should not quarrel over material possessions. They should be satisfied with whatever privileges are given to him by His mercy. How can there be peace if the communists, or capitalists or any other party claims proprietorship over the resources of nature, which are entirely the Lord’s property?

Capitalists cannot curb the communists simply by political maneuvering, nor can the communists defeat the capitalists simply by fighting for stolen bread. If they do not recognize the proprietorship of the Lord, all the property they claim to be their own is stolen. That being the case, they will be liable to punishment by the laws of nature.

Human beings are not meant to quarrel like cats and dogs. Cats and dogs can kill other animals for food without incurring karma. But, if a man kills an animal for the satisfaction of his uncontrolled taste buds, he is responsible for breaking the laws of nature and must be punished.

The standard of life for human beings cannot be applied to animals. Despite what the animals eat, none of them transgress the laws of nature, which have been ordained by the will of the Lord. Human life alone is a life of responsibility. Therefore, only human life is subjected to karmic reactions. When you kill anything you pay the price.

In the Bhagavat-gita As-It Is (9.26), the Lord clearly states that He accepts only vegetarian foods. Therefore, a human being should not only become a strict vegetarian but should also become a devotee of the Lord and offer Him what he eats. By offering his plant-based foods to Him he is freed of the karmic reactions manifested in the killing of the plant-based foods.

Only those who act in this way can properly discharge the duties of human life. Those who do not offer their food to Him eat nothing but sin and subject themselves to various types of distress, which are the results of sin (Bhagavat-gita As-It-Is (3.13).

The root of sin is deliberate disobedience of the laws of nature through disregarding the proprietorship of the Lord. Disobeying the laws of nature or the order of the Lord brings ruin to a human being. Therefore, one who is sober, who knows the laws of nature, and who is not influenced by unnecessary attachment or aversion is sure to be recognized by the Lord and become eligible to go back to his eternal home in the spiritual world.

Bear in mind, there are 8,400,000 forms of life on earth. The only form that can bear karma is the human form. So, the choice is, do you want to go up or down and wait until you can attain a human form and start over again?

In the past, we have all been in lower forms. Through transgression we have obtained the human form. The human form is a blessing as it gives us the choice of going down to the lower forms again or eventually obtaining residence again in the spiritual world. Unfortunately, that only happens when we abide by His laws.

To connect with Him, one can chant His various names like Gopala Govinda Rama Madana Mohana. As long as you can hear you saying it, it’s good.

One thing to realize is that while we have to be in the world, we do not have to be of the world. That means that while we do everything that our neighbor does, we are always trying to develop a pleasing relationship with God.

Namaste (accept my respects) and Haribol (praise the Lord)!

Sources: (Vedic Scriptures)

Sri Isopanisad

Bhagavat-gita As-It-Is

Hesh Goldstein
When I was a kid, if I were told that I'd be writing a book about diet and nutrition when I was older, let alone having been doing a health related radio show for over 36 years, I would've thought that whoever told me that was out of their mind. Living in Newark, New Jersey, my parents and I consumed anything and everything that had a face or a mother except for dead, rotting, pig bodies, although we did eat bacon (as if all the other decomposing flesh bodies were somehow miraculously clean). Going through high school and college it was no different. In fact, my dietary change did not come until I was in my 30's.

Just to put things in perspective, after I graduated from Weequahic High School and before going to Seton Hall University, I had a part-time job working for a butcher. I was the delivery guy and occasionally had to go to the slaughterhouse to pick up products for the store. Needless to say, I had no consciousness nor awareness, as change never came then despite the horrors I witnessed on an almost daily basis.

After graduating with a degree in accounting from Seton Hall, I eventually got married and moved to a town called Livingston. Livingston was basically a yuppie community where everyone was judged by the neighborhood they lived in and their income. To say it was a "plastic" community would be an understatement.

Livingston and the shallowness finally got to me. I told my wife I was fed up and wanted to move. She made it clear she had to be near her friends and New York City. I finally got my act together and split for Colorado.

I was living with a lady in Aspen at the end of 1974, when one day she said, " let's become vegetarians". I have no idea what possessed me to say it, but I said, "okay"! At that point I went to the freezer and took out about $100 worth of frozen, dead body parts and gave them to a welfare mother who lived behind us. Well, everything was great for about a week or so, and then the chick split with another guy.

So here I was, a vegetarian for a couple weeks, not really knowing what to do, how to cook, or basically how to prepare anything. For about a month, I was getting by on carrot sticks, celery sticks, and yogurt. Fortunately, when I went vegan in 1990, it was a simple and natural progression. Anyway, as I walked around Aspen town, I noticed a little vegetarian restaurant called, "The Little Kitchen".

Let me back up just a little bit. It was April of 1975, the snow was melting and the runoff of Ajax Mountain filled the streets full of knee-deep mud. Now, Aspen was great to ski in, but was a bummer to walk in when the snow was melting.

I was ready to call it quits and I needed a warmer place. I'll elaborate on that in a minute.

But right now, back to "The Little Kitchen". Knowing that I was going to leave Aspen and basically a new vegetarian, I needed help. So, I cruised into the restaurant and told them my plight and asked them if they would teach me how to cook. I told them in return I would wash dishes and empty their trash. They then asked me what I did for a living and I told them I was an accountant.

The owner said to me, "Let's make a deal. You do our tax return and we'll feed you as well". So for the next couple of weeks I was doing their tax return, washing their dishes, emptying the trash, and learning as much as I could.

But, like I said, the mud was getting to me. So I picked up a travel book written by a guy named Foder. The name of the book was, "Hawaii". Looking through the book I noticed that in Lahaina, on Maui, there was a little vegetarian restaurant called," Mr. Natural's". I decided right then and there that I would go to Lahaina and work at "Mr. Natural's." To make a long story short, that's exactly what happened.

So, I'm working at "Mr. Natural's" and learning everything I can about my new dietary lifestyle - it was great. Every afternoon we would close for lunch at about 1 PM and go to the Sheraton Hotel in Ka'anapali and play volleyball, while somebody stayed behind to prepare dinner.

Since I was the new guy, and didn't really know how to cook, I never thought that I would be asked to stay behind to cook dinner. Well, one afternoon, that's exactly what happened; it was my turn. That posed a problem for me because I was at the point where I finally knew how to boil water.

I was desperate, clueless and basically up the creek without a paddle. Fortunately, there was a friend of mine sitting in the gazebo at the restaurant and I asked him if he knew how to cook. He said the only thing he knew how to cook was enchiladas. He said that his enchiladas were bean-less and dairy-less. I told him that I had no idea what an enchilada was or what he was talking about, but I needed him to show me because it was my turn to do the evening meal.

Well, the guys came back from playing volleyball and I'm asked what was for dinner. I told them enchiladas; the owner wasn't thrilled. I told him that mine were bean-less and dairy-less. When he tried the enchilada he said it was incredible. Being the humble guy that I was, I smiled and said, "You expected anything less"? It apparently was so good that it was the only item on the menu that we served twice a week. In fact, after about a week, we were selling five dozen every night we had them on the menu and people would walk around Lahaina broadcasting, 'enchilada's at "Natural's" tonight'. I never had to cook anything else.

A year later the restaurant closed, and somehow I gravitated to a little health food store in Wailuku. I never told anyone I was an accountant and basically relegated myself to being the truck driver. The guys who were running the health food store had friends in similar businesses and farms on many of the islands. I told them that if they could organize and form one company they could probably lock in the State. That's when they found out I was an accountant and "Down to Earth" was born. "Down to Earth" became the largest natural food store chain in the islands, and I was their Chief Financial Officer and co-manager of their biggest store for 13 years.

In 1981, I started to do a weekly radio show to try and expose people to a vegetarian diet and get them away from killing innocent creatures. I still do that show today. I pay for my own airtime and have no sponsors to not compromise my honesty. One bit of a hassle was the fact that I was forced to get a Masters Degree in Nutrition to shut up all the MD's that would call in asking for my credentials.

My doing this radio show enabled me, through endless research, to see the corruption that existed within the big food industries, the big pharmaceutical companies, the biotech industries and the government agencies. This information, unconscionable as it is, enabled me to realize how broken our health system is. This will be covered more in depth in the Introduction and throughout the book and when you finish the book you will see this clearly and it will hopefully inspire you to make changes.

I left Down to Earth in 1989, got nationally certified as a sports injury massage therapist and started traveling the world with a bunch of guys that were making a martial arts movie. After doing that for about four years I finally made it back to Honolulu and got a job as a massage therapist at the Honolulu Club, one of Hawaii's premier fitness clubs. It was there I met the love of my life who I have been with since 1998. She made me an offer I couldn't refuse. She said," If you want to be with me you've got to stop working on naked women". So, I went back into accounting and was the Chief Financial Officer of a large construction company for many years.

Going back to my Newark days when I was an infant, I had no idea what a "chicken" or "egg" or "fish" or "pig" or "cow" was. My dietary blueprint was thrust upon me by my parents as theirs was thrust upon them by their parents. It was by the grace of God that I was able to put things in their proper perspective and improve my health and elevate my consciousness.

The road that I started walking down in 1975 has finally led me to the point of writing my book, “A Sane Diet For An Insane World”. Hopefully, the information contained herein will be enlightening, motivating, and inspiring to encourage you to make different choices. Doing what we do out of conditioning is not always the best course to follow. I am hoping that by the grace of the many friends and personalities I have encountered along my path, you will have a better perspective of what road is the best road for you to travel on, not only for your health but your consciousness as well.

Last but not least: after being vaccinated as a kid I developed asthma, which plagued me all of my life. In 2007 I got exposed to the organic sulfur crystals, which got rid of my asthma in 3 days and has not come back in over 10 years. That, being the tip of the iceberg, has helped people reverse stage 4 cancers, autism, joint pain, blood pressure problems, migraine headaches, erectile dysfunction, gingivitis, and more. Also, because of the detoxification effects by the release of oxygen that permeates and heals all the cells in the body, it removes parasites, radiation, fluoride, free radicals, and all the other crap that is thrust upon us in the environment by Big Business.

For more, please view www.healthtalkhawaii.com and www.asanediet.com.

Namaste!