Ayurvedic Magazine - Joyful Belly Journal

Paintings are subtle like altars. Modern art never appealed to me before but revisiting the Guggenheim and MOMA of New York the aura of the paintings reveals more than the picture itself.

If you haven't yet seen the "bodies exhibit" of cadavers frozen in time hold your heart during the exhibition; it's eerie but fascinating. The inside of the body is an important journey for meditation.

Our living bodies are made of water and sweetness. We were so happy to stay with Anya and Raghu. She says that pink lets the good energy in but without the bad energy. It makes me think of a painting by Georgie O'keefe.

Dogwoods, elderberries, black cherries, and crab apples were fruiting in central park. In the cracks of the sidewalk, beautiful medicines and grains are growing. Amaranth, mugworts, smartweeds.

I ate the best cannoli of my life (again) at cafe Reggio after visiting a Chinese market under the brooklyn bridge.

As I return to my family home I recognize old patterns. I trust myself and believe I've already shed the layers and try not to be afraid. If I look closer at my surroundings I realize I am "seeing myself". Bless the reminders.

Large Italian American Families. Grandpa is doing okay after his heart operation; he comes over for dinner and we trade recipes like eggplant parmesian. As I spend time with him I am also reminded the only way to experience true love is by loving my family; because true loves eventually become family...

The next month I'll be traveling to Boston, New York City, Pennsylvania, and New Paltz. Let me know if you'd like to enjoy a meal or a few moments together.

Some new links...

Joyful Belly Journal
* Handouts for ayurvedic diet / food / notes
* Ayurveda for New York City, Asheville
* Highlights of Ayurvedic / Yoga Psychology

Joyful Belly
* My favorite Joyful Belly recipe this month is saffron and walnut bread!
* New Joyful Belly recipes include ayurveda notes about health.

Love,
Joseph

Every day I'm learning. I still feel like a new student of vedic psychology. Here are some hints that are helping me on me way, given to us by our beautiful, saintly teacher Dr. Vasant Lad.

Watch the watcher. The watcher is the mind and the body but spirit is beyond both. Watch thoughts as if they are a movie. You will see what is inside you.

Organs create emotions and the brain searches for a thought. So mind is in the organ. We make a decision then create the rationale. Mind is body and brain. Mind is also the universe around us that we created. Yoga psychology cleans the mind by cleaning organs. Yoga squeezes the blood out of organs and then opens them up again. It clears the channels.

When the body wants change it creates a thought. A thought indicates discomfort or toxins in the body. When the body is content there is no thought. Bliss is the state without thought. If we are quiet we can sense thoughts coming before they happen. It feels like a vibration. We bless the thought and bring attention back to the breath.

We can't know the truth but we can be with the truth. We merge with the unfolding dynamic. Joy of the sunset happens before we realize it. The moment we become conscious joy is a memory and becomes desire. Desire is the memory of past pleasure.

I see the tree and the tree is me. The internal is the macrocosm. The universe my creation. God is the creator but I am the hand. This chair, I brought my body to this place and the chair became manifest. This bird that chirps in the wilderness, my echo chirping in the wilderness. Where is the tree? My eyes catch light and the tree appears, from photo cells I recreate the tree in my mind. The tree that I see is the one in my mind. Do you see the same tree?

All of creation is a manifestation of God. Evil thinks that it exists but in yoga there is no separation from the divine. When you become the tree and the tree becomes you there will be no violence. If I give my attention to the darkness, it creates the darkness. If I give my attention to the light it creates the light.

Experience nourishes the ego. Adam and Eve ate from the tree of knowledge and were cast from the garden. Knowledge is knowledge of difference, comparison, measuring, separation. The mind wants to have experiences because it wants to know. God is beyond knowledge. God is being without a thought; God is the act of listening.

All effort denies the existence of God. Creation happens. Love accepts all things. Love is listening. When we try to change creation, that is effort. Thoughts are effort and effort comes from ego.

The mind creates the abyss and the heart crosses it. The mind is comparison which is separation and measurement. Comparison is judgment and judgment is violence. Comparison is desire. The mind is the cause. With meditation all thoughts can be digested into pure love. It is the heart.

An emotion comes to us. We healed it through the body with yoga. We healed it in the mind through the breath. We healed it in the spirit through prayer and meditation. Body, mind, then spirit. Speech is surgery. We release our frustrations upon the world but the world is us. We cut open the external with a word. Speech comes last, last resort. Emotion the root cause of disease. World change is not the objective of yoga; it is the by product of self-awakening.

Traditionally, yoga is preparation for prayer and meditation. Meditation has no purpose or goal. It cultivates 'is-ness'.

This journal entry is a work in progress. Please send your ideas to joseph@greenbookcafe.com.

Today, Father Roy picked dogwood fruits and ate them. They were sweet and we were surprised. Figs ripen next to the church. Tasty acorns fall and we bake them into cornbread. Overhead, monarch butterflies are heading south. And grapes hang from a vine, reaching for the sky.

Oren and I walk to a hilltop near New Paltz. This feels like a holy ground to us. In the setting sun mountains darken and become silhouettes. He leaves for Yeshiva next week.

In Boston, Guy Mendilow rehearses classical and folk music traditions from around the world. Shari and I are experimenting with pesto lasagna topped with almonds. Their cat Basil overhears us talking about the her childhood home, New Orleans.

It’s early September, the world’s fair in Jamaica Plain ushers in the autumn season to the sounds of Latino, Brazilian, and world fusion music. A baker is selling home made donuts and leaves are already changing colors. Apple orchards can hardly bear the weight of their fruits.

The Fung Wah bus pulls into Boston and the city is crisp, clean. We pass my college dorm and a bank downtown where I once worked. I buy a new 'Charlie Card' for the red line subway to Central Square, a samosa from Shalimar’s and walk up Norfolk to JB’s house. It’s great to see Mindy again and their sweet little one growing up starting to speak.

Kevin Sheehan introduces his new book to me, "A Leader Becomes a Leader". We sit in Cafe Algiers enjoying toasted pita bread with apricot jam and mint tea. He quotes Thoreau, “In an imperfect work, time is an ingredient. In a perfect work, time is not an ingredient.” Cooking, ayurveda. I think, "devotion to the sacred lessons of those two arts really can become 'perfect'".

I’m struggling in the Northeast with the illusion of wanting to be successful. And remembering a radical, powerful act of healing - looking out the window for a half hour during sunset. Then remembering Dr. Lad: Life begins in the belly, the placenta. Not a heart button, not a head button, a belly button. Belly, the place of our being. And when we come home to ourselves, we come home to our belly. That is how we relax in the city.

Some new links

http://www.joyfulbelly.com
* My favorite addition to Joyful Belly this month is the "Threads of Cooking"
* Or, try a search on "vata-" for recipes that pacify vata.

http://www.guymendilow.com/
* Guy Mendilow's Band

http://www.yogaspiritstudios.com/KimValeri.htm
* Valeri Kim’s Yoga Teacher Training

http://www.flashearth.com
* Search for Pune, India and zoom in. We'll be living there until mid-December, studying ayurveda with our teacher Dr. Lad. With a great faith we are peaceful and confident in our journey to India.

Keep in Touch,
Love and Light,
Blessings on our Journeys,
-Joseph