• It was widely known that, when measured in a doctor’s office, a patient’s blood pressure was often higher than when it was measured by the patient himself or herself at home or in other settings.
• They—the trained monkeys—regulated their blood pressure levels with brainpower alone.
• A passive attitude—not worrying about how well one is performing the technique and simply putting aside distracting thoughts to return to one’s focus.
• …to maintain a mental focus and be able to return to her focus when distracting thoughts interfered.
• …the Relaxation Response could be evoked with any number of techniques—Yoga or qigong, walking or swimming, even knitting or rowing. The person evoking it could sit or stand, sing or remain silent.
• 1. Repetition of a word, sound, phrase, prayer, or muscular activity.
  2. Passively disregarding everyday thoughts that inevitably come to mind and returning to your repetition.
• When other thoughts come to mind, simply say to yourself, “Oh well,” and gently return to your repetition.
• …the three-legged stool model would be incorporated; drugs, surgeries, and self-care would be used equally and appropriately.
• …when a person focused his or her mind and returned to the focus when interrupting thoughts occurred, a set of measurable, reproducible, and predictable changes occurred in the body, meeting the standards of scientific medicine.
• Guilt is not necessary.
• …when not used appropriately, which is most of the time, the fight-or-flight response repeatedly elicited may ultimately lead to the dire diseases of heart attack and stroke.
• …(1) a quiet environment; (2) a mental device such as a word or a phrase which should be repeated in a specific fashion over and over again; (3) the adoption of a passive attitude, which is perhaps the most important of the elements; and (4) a comfortable position.
• Atherosclerosis is the deposition of blood clots, fats, and calcium within the walls of the arteries, causing the normally soft, elastic, open arteries to become hard, inelastic, and partly or completely blocked…
• Tissues are simply a specialized group of cells with a common function. Different groups of tissues with a special function are organs.
• Our blood is part of that hypothetical sea. The circulation of the blood carries food particles from the digestive organs, such as the small intestines, and oxygen from the lungs to the cells. Special organs such as the kidneys developed to eliminate waste products, carried to them by the blood, which could no longer be eliminated by diffusion directly into the sea. In this circulatory system, the vessels that carry the nutrients from the heart to the tissue are the arteries; the veins, on the other hand, return the blood to the heart and lungs. The tiny vessels connecting the arteries and veins are the capillaries…The capillaries are very thin-walled. It is through the thin-walled capillaries that the blood and the cells exchange nutrients and waste products…The capillaries and the rest of the circulatory system transmit the “sea” to the cells so that they can maintain life.
• …it is believed that the lower the blood pressure, provided there are no adverse symptoms such as marked dizziness and fainting, the better off and the more protected you are from the ultimate development of atherosclerosis.
  The risk of developing atherosclerosis or hardening of the arteries is directly related to the level of blood pressure.
• …there remains the well-established direct relation between high blood pressure and atherosclerosis.
• …the lower your cholesterol, the lower the risk of developing atherosclerosis…as the amount of cholesterol increases, the risk of developing atherosclerosis is also greater.
• With high cholesterol levels, there tends to be more movement in than out of the arteries. Since atherosclerosis is in part the deposition of fat and blood clots within the arteries, and cholesterol is one of these fats, the ground is laid for the development of atherosclerosis.
• …one should avoid foods such as eggs, because the yolk has exceedingly high cholesterol; fatty steaks, which contain saturated animal fats, help raise cholesterol. Butter and rich desserts also have relatively high cholesterol levels or too much saturated fat.
• It also required the heart to pump blood at higher pressures, thus making the heart work harder. Pumping at higher pressures places an excessive strain on the heart and the heart grows larger, as would any muscle that is worked excessively.
• The enlarged heart is then more prone to have a heart attack, where heart muscle cells die because the nutrient demands of the heart are not met.  Why did it not get sufficient nutrients? At the same time that the heart, because of high blood pressure, enlarges and needs more blood flow to bring nutrients, the coronary arteries become progressively less able to carry larger quantities of blood, because of their inability to enlarge and also because of the increased development of atherosclerosis within these arteries.
  High blood pressure affects the brain either directly, through high pressure that leads to bursting of blood vessels, a brain hemorrhage…of indirectly, through the blockage of arteries by atherosclerosis. These events lead to temporary or permanent damage of brain functions called stroke or shock.  
• In the normal kidney, if blood pressure decreases to very low levels the kidneys secrete hormone substances that increase blood pressure. The kidneys therefore act as sensors to maintain adequate blood pressure. If a minimal amount of atherosclerosis develops in the blood vessels of the kidney, it will decrease the amount of blood flow to these organs, and the kidney will become shrunken…The blocked kidney vessel leads to lower pressure within the kidney, and this organ responds in turn by secreting hormones that raise blood pressure through the body.
• Borderline high blood pressure is considered to be either between 140 and 159 systolic or between 90 and 94 diastolic. Normal blood pressure is defined at lower than 140 systolic and 90 diastolic.
• The degree of high blood pressure among blacks is not simply genetic but probably is related to the living standards and stress under which black people exist.
• …hypertensive individuals are persons who do not deal with their emotions well or who cannot let out their emotions.
• …the chronic elicitation of the fight-or-flight response leads from the transient elevations in blood pressure to a permanent state of hypertension.
• When the fight-or-flight response is evoked, it brings into play the sympathetic nervous system, which is part of the autonomic, or involuntary, nervous system. The sympathetic nervous system acts by secreting specific hormones: adrenalin or epinephrine and noradrenalin or norepinephrine. These hormones, epinephrine and its related substances, bring about the physiologic changes of increased blood pressure, heart rate, and body metabolism.
• Since we cannot easily change the nature of modern life, perhaps better prevention and therapy of hypertension and other diseases related to the fight-or-flight response might be achieved by actively bringing forth the Relaxation Response.
• …he was able to slow his oxygen consumption, or metabolism, an involuntary mechanism partly related to the sympathetic nervous system.
• …Zen monks who meditated with their eyes half open developed a predominance of alpha waves, brain waves usually associated with feelings of well-being.
• Meditators are told to assume a passive attitude and if other thoughts come into mind to disregard them, going back to the mantra. Practitioners are advised to meditate twenty minutes in the morning, usually before breakfast, and twenty minutes in the evening, usually before dinner.
• …each cell makers use of the energy in foods by slowly “burning” the nutrients. In order to “burn” the nutrients the cell usually utilizes oxygen brought to it through the bloodstream. The sum of the individual metabolism of each of the cells utilizing oxygen constitutes the total oxygen consumption, or metabolism, of the body. The major physiologic change associated with meditation is a decrease in the rate of metabolism…
• …if you hold your breath, your tissues will continue to utilize the available oxygen at the same rate and there will be no change in the amount of oxygen you consume.
• Alpha waves, slow brain waves, increase in intensity and frequency during the practice of meditation but are not commonly found in sleep.
• Meditation is…not a form of sleep, nor can it be used as a substitute for sleep. Meditation evokes some of the physiologic changes that are found in sleep, but the two are not in any way interchangeable, nor is one a substitute for the other.
• If increased lactate is instrumental in producing regular attacks of anxiety, the finding of low levels of lactate in meditators is consistent with their reports of significantly more relaxed, less anxious feelings.
• The subject’s attitude toward the exercise, and this is absolutely essential, must not be intense and compulsive, but of a “let it happen” nature called “passive concentration.”
• The first element is a quiet environment. One must “turn off” not only internal stimuli but also external distractions…
  The second element is an object to dwell upon. This object may be a word or sound repetition; gazing at a symbol; concentrating on a particular feeling. For example, directing one’s attention to the repetition of a syllable will help clear the mind. When distracting thoughts do occur, one can return to this repetition of the syllable to help eliminate other thoughts.
  The third element is a passive attitude. It is an emptying of all thoughts and distractions from one’s mind. A passive attitude appears to be the most essential factor in eliciting the Relaxation Response. Thoughts, imagery, and feelings may drift into one’s awareness. One should not concentrate on these perceptions but allow them to pass one. A person should not be concerned with how well he or she is doing.
  The fourth element is a comfortable position. One should be in a comfortable posture that will allow an individual to remain in the same position for at least twenty minutes. Usually a sitting position is recommended.
• Because the mind is a wanderer, you know. Thoughts never stop following each other through your head, buzzing, preventing concentration, while in order to pray you need a great emptiness in your mind.
• The essence of Yoga meditation is concentration on a single point—for example, a physical object of a thought. By dwelling upon an object one may cancel out all distractions that are associated with one’s everyday life and thus achieve a passive attitude.
• The practice of checking vain thoughts is accomplished through a quite environment, a proper posture, and a passive attitude.
• Nor must one follow the mind in its excursions to everything outside itself and then chase that thought away. If the mind wanders far away, it must be brought back into its proper state.
• In sum, there appear to be certain common elements in almost all cultures which enable individuals to periodically change their everyday mode of thinking. We believe this mental process is accompanied by the previously described physiologic change of the Relaxation Response. Our usual thinking is concerned with events outside ourselves. Through our emotional attachments, our social feelings, our ideological beliefs, our sensory contracts, we are constantly diverting our thinking toward external factors. Any attempt to redirect this outwardly directed consciousness requires a different mental process.
• …the meditation had not cured them. The subjects’ lower blood pressure readings lasted only as long as they practiced the Relaxation Response regularly.
•  …the Relaxation Response decreases and counteracts the increased sympathetic nervous system activity that accompanies the arousal of the fight-or-flight response. This sympathetic nervous system activity is reflected in the measures…of oxygen consumption, heart rate, respiratory rate, and blood pressure, which increase with the fight-or-flight response and decrease with the elicitation of the Relaxation Response.
• It is unlikely that the regular elicitation of the Relaxation Response by itself will prove to be adequate therapy for severe or moderate high blood pressure. Probably it would act to enhance the lowering of blood pressure along with antihypertensive drugs, and thus lead to the use of fewer drugs or a lesser dosage. In the case of mild hypertension, the regular evocation of the Relaxation Response may be of great value, since it has none of the pharmacologic side effects often present with drugs and might possibly supplant their use.
• If high blood pressure can be alleviated by behavioral means alone, its cause may also lie in a behavioral mechanism.
• (2) A Mental Device
  To shift the mind from logical, externally oriented thought, there should be a constant stimulus: a sound, word, or phrase repeated silently or aloud; or fixed gazing at an object. Since one of the major difficulties in the elicitation of the Relaxation Response is “mind wandering,” the repetition of the word or phrase is a way to help break the train of distracting thoughts. Your eyes are usually closed if you are using a repeated sound or word; of course, your eyes are open if you are gazing. Attention to the normal rhythm of breathing is also useful and enhances the repetition of the sound or the word.
  (3) A Passive Attitude
  When distracting thoughts occur, they are to be disregarded and attention redirected to the repetition or gazing; you should not worry about how well you are performing the technique, because this may well prevent the Relaxation Response from occurring. Adopt a “let it happen” attitude. The passive attitude is perhaps the most important element in eliciting the Relaxation Response. Distracting thoughts will occur. Do not worry about them. When these thoughts do present themselves and you become aware of them, simply return to the repetition of the mental device. These other thoughts do not mean you are performing the technique incorrectly. They are to be expected.
  (4)… If you are lying down, there is a tendency to fall asleep.
• Practice the technique once or twice daily, but not within two hours after any meal, since the digestive processes seem to interface with the elicitation of the Relaxation Response.
• …when you fall asleep using the technique, you are not experiencing the Relaxation Response, you are asleep.
• From our personal observations, many people who meditate for several hours every day for weeks at a time tend to hallucinate.
• The fight-or-flight response is often appropriate and should not be thought of as always harmful. It is a necessary part of our physiologic and psychological makeup, a useful reaction to many situations in our current world.

1. Eons before there were any schools or printing presses, electric lights or moving pictures, the evolution of the eye was complete.
2. In hypermetropia (commonly but improperly called farsightedness, although the patient with such a defect can see clearly neither at the distance nor at the near-point) the eyeball is too short from the front to the back, and all rays of light, both the convergent ones coming from near objects and the parallel ones coming from distant objects, are focused behind the retina instead of upon it. In myopia it is too long from the front to the back, and while the divergent rays from near objects come to a point upon the retina, the parallel ones from distant objects do not reach it.
3. it is customary to instill atropine … into the eye, for the purpose of paralyzing the ciliary muscle and thus, by preventing any change of curvature into the lens, bringing out “latent hypermetropia” and getting rid of “apparent myopia.”
4. The instillation of atropine into the eye is supposed to prevent accommodation by paralyzing the muscle credited with controlling the shape of the lens.
5. During sleep the refractive condition of the eye is rarely, if ever, normal. Persons whose refraction is normal when they are awake will produce myopia, hypermetropia and astigmatism when they are asleep. Or, if they have errors of refraction when they are awake, these will be increased during sleep. This is why people awake in the morning with eyes more tired than at any other time, or even with severe headaches.
6. When the eye regards an unfamiliar object, an error of refraction is always produced.
7. A sudden exposure to strong light, or a rapid or sudden change of light, is likely to produce imperfect sight in the normal eye, continuing in some cases for weeks and months.
8. Noise is also a frequent cause of defective vision in the normal eye.
9. Under conditions of mental or physical discomfort, such as pain, cough, fever, discomfort from heat or cold, depression, anger, or anxiety, errors of refraction are always produced in the normal eye or increased in the eye in which they already exist.
10. It will be noted that they color is always less intense than when seen with the naked eye, and since the perception of form depends upon the perception of color, it follows that both color and form must be less distinctly seen with glasses than without them … However, if the sight is seriously defective, the color may be seen better with glasses than without them.
11. After people once begin to wear glasses, their strength in most cases has to be steadily increased in order to maintain the degree of visual acuity secured by the aid of the first pair … A person with myopia of 20/70 who puts on glasses giving him a vision of 20/20 may find that in a week’s time his unaided vision has declined to 20/200.
12. The strong concave glasses required by myopes of high degree make all objects seem much smaller than they really are, while convex glasses enlarge them.
13. But myopia is usually accompanied by astigmatism, and this, it is believed, can be overcome in part by alterations in the curvature of the lens.
14. In other words, it is assumed that the supposed muscle of accommodation has to bear not only the normal burden of changing the focus of the eye for vision at different distances, but also the additional burden of compensating for refractive errors. Such adjustments, if they actually took place, would naturally impose a severe strain upon the nervous system, and it is to relieve this strain-which is believed to be the cause of a host of functional nervous troubles-quite as much as to improve the sight, that glasses are prescribed.
15. Primarily, the strain to see is a strain of the mind, and, as in all cases in which there is a strain of the mind, there is a loss of mental control.
16. The remedy is not to avoid either near work or distant vision, but to get rid of the mental strain which underlines the imperfect functioning of the eye at both points.
17. By constant repetition and frequent demonstration and by all means possible, the fact must be stressed that perfect sight can be obtained only by relaxation.
18. The eyes are rarely, if ever, completely relaxed in sleep, and if they are under a strain when the subject is awake, that strain will certainly be continued during sleep, to a greater or lesser degree, just as a strain of other parts of the body is continued.
19. The fact is that when the mind is at rest nothing can tire the eyes, and when the mind is under a strain nothing can rest them.
20. No matter how good the sight, it is always possible to improve it.
21. Of two equally good pairs of eyes, one will retain perfect sight to the end of life and the other will lose it in the kindergarten, simply because one looks at things without effort and other other does not.
22. The eye with normal sight never tries to see … It never tries to bring out the point by staring at it, as the eye with imperfect sight is constantly doing.
23. The eye possesses “perfect vision” only when it is absolutely at rest.
24. The act of seeing is passive.
25. Mental strain of any kind always produces a conscious or unconscious eyestrain, and if the strain takes the form of an effort to see, and error of refraction is always produced.
26. Many children can see perfectly as long as their mothers are around, but if the mother goes out of the room they may at once become myopic, because of the strain produced by fear.
27. The health of the eye depends upon the blood, and circulation is very largely influenced by thought. When thought is normal-that is, not attended by any excitement or strain-the circulation in the brain is normal, the supply of blood to the optic nerve and the visual centers is normal, and the vision is normal. When thought is abnormal the circulation is disturbed, the supply of blood to the optic nerve and visual centers is altered and the vision is lowered. We can consciously think thoughts which disturb the circulation and lower the visual power; we can also consciously think thoughts that will restore normal circulation and thereby help to cure errors of refraction and many other abnormal conditions of the eyes. We cannot by any amount of effort make ourselves see, but by learning to control our thoughts we can accomplish the end indirectly.
28. If the relaxation is only momentary, the correction is momentary. When it becomes permanent, the correction is permanent.
29. This relaxation cannot, however, be obtained by any sort of effort. It is fundamental that a person should understand this; so long a she thinks, consciously or unconsciously, that relief from strain may be obtained by another strain, the improvement will be delayed.
30. When the mind is under a strain the eye usually goes more or less blind. The center of sight goes blind first, partially or completely, according to the degree of the strain, and if the strain is great enough the whole or the greater part of the retinal may be involved.
31. The muscles of the face and of the whole body are also at rest, and when the condition is habitual there are no wrinkles o dark circles around the eyes.
32. All the methods used in the eradication of errors of refraction are simply different ways of obtaining relaxation, and most people, though by no means all, find it easiest to relax with their eyes shut. This usually lessens the strain to see, and in such cases is followed by a temporary or more lasting improvement in vision.
33. This is done by covering the closed eyes with the palms of the hand (the fingers being crossed upon the forehead) in such a way as to avoid pressure on the eyeballs.
34. But even with the eyes closed and covered in such a way as to exclude all the light, the visual centers of the brain may still be disturbed, the eye may still strain to see; and instead of seeing a field so black that it is impossible to remember, imagine, or see anything blacker, as one ought normally to do when the optic nerve is not subject to the stimulation of light, a person will see illusions of lights and color ranging all the way from an imperfect black to kaleidoscopic appearances so vivid that they seem to be actually seen with the eyes. The worse the condition of the eyesight, as a rule, the more numerous, vivid, and persistent these appearance are. Yet some persons with very imperfect sight are able to palm almost perfectly from the beginning, and are therefore very quickly relieved. Any disturbance of mind or body, such as fatigue, hunger, anger, worry or depression, also makes it difficult for patients to see black when they palm, persons who can see it perfectly under ordinary conditions often being unable to do so without assistance when they are ill or in pain.
    It is impossible to see a perfect black unless the eyesight is faultless, because only then is the mind at rest; but some people can without difficulty approximate such a black nearly enough to improve their eyesight, and as the eyesight improves the deepness of the black increase.
35. The majority of such people may be greatly helped by the memory of a black object.
36. It is impossible to succeed by effort, or by attempting to “concentrate” on the black. As popularly understood, concentration means to do or think one thing only—but this is impossible, and an attempt to do the impossible is a strain which defeats its own end. The human mind is not capable of thinking of one thing only. It can think of one thing best, and is at rest only when it does so, but it cannot think of one thing only. A patient who tried to see black only and to ignore the kaleidoscopic colors which intruded themselves upon her field of vision, becoming worse and worse the more they were ignored, actually went into convulsions from the strain, and was attended every day for a month by her family physician before she was able to resume the treatment. This patient was advised to stop palming, and, with her eyes open, to recall as many colors as possible, remembering each one as perfectly as possible. By thus taking the bull by the horns and consciously making the mind wander more that it did unconsciously, she became able, in some way, to palm for short periods.
37. It is impossible for the eye to fix a point longer than a fraction of a second. If it tries to do so, it begins to strain and the vision is lowered … IN the case of a few exceptional people, a point may appear to be hold for a considerable length of time and the subjects themselves may think that they are holding it, but this is only because the eye shifts unconsciously, the movements being so rapid that objects seem to be seen all alike simultaneously.
38. But while the illusions of normal sight are an evidence of relaxation, the illusions of imperfect sight are an evidence of strain.
39. “flying flies,” … being symptoms of nothing except mental strain
40. In myopia it may be a benefit to strain to see fine print, because myopia is always lessened when there is a strain to see near objects, and this has sometimes counteracted the tendency to strain in looking at distant objects, which is always associated with the production of myopia.
41. If persons who find themselves getting presbyopic, or who have arrived at the presbyopic age, would, instead of resorting to glasses, follow the example of the gentleman mentioned by Dr. Hommes and make a practice of reading the fines print they can find, the idea that the decline of accommodative power is “a normal result of growing old” would soon die a natural death.
42. Muscae volitantes is simply an illusion resulting from mental strain.
43. The specks are never seen in other words, except when the eyes and mind are under a strain, and they always disappear when the strain is relieved.
44. When the eye looks at an unfamiliar object it always stains more or less to see that object, and an error of refraction is always produced.
45. It is impossible to see anything perfectly when the mind is under a strain, and if children become able to relax when looking at familiar objects, they become able, sometimes in an incredibly brief space of time, to maintain their relaxation when looking at unfamiliar objects.
46. When you have become used to the strong light, raise the upper lid of one eye and look downward as the sun shines on the sclera. Blink when the desire to comes, or when you lose the power of relaxation.

• Apnea (cessation of breathing) may occur at a relaxed moment (after a relaxed exhalation), or a very active moment (e.g., when you try to hold your breath as long as possible after a very big inhalation).
• Very shallow breathing, which causes only the first few ribs to move, more readily fills the top of the lungs.
• The most regular volume exchange occurs while sleeping.
• Even if you have exhaled as much air as you possibly can, e.g., coughing several times in a row without inhaling between coughs, there will still be a small amount of air left inside the lungs. This prevents the pulmonary alveoli from completely deflating and “sticking” together during exhalation, which would make it very difficult (if not impossible) to inhale again.
• To mobilize the ribs, it is important to exercise the ribs in both directions, especially when you are aware of a tendency to move them only in one direction.
• The mouth is not the preferred passageway for air during breathing.
• That the nerve endings of the olfactory nerve are stimulate more during nasal breathing, is especially true if you only breath in through one nostril because more air enters the nasal cavity.
• Inhalation into the clavicles by raising the top part of the chest is practically nonexistent in people who are stooped over or whose shoulders are bent forwards.
• Rectus abdominis is a good muscle to use when “sucking in the stomach” during expiration.
• Diaphragmatic breathing is most often practiced while practices while at rest, breathing normally.
• The abdomen resists forceful deformation, for example, when you wear tight clothing or a belt or girdle, or when the abdominal muscles are contracted and opposed any movement in the abdomen, or even in the case of obesity.
• It is possible to contract the abdominal muscles at different levels because they are enervated by motor nerves from different levels of the medulla.
• Instead of deforming the front of the abdomen, you can deform only the back by moving the “water balloon” posteriorly. This gives you the sensation of rounding the back.
• Costal inhalation is less efficient from a respiratory standpoint, because it requires greater muscular effort for a smaller air intake.
• Costal inhalation leads to a strong increase in muscle tone and can thus contribute to tension and stress.
• One way to “de-program” a person who is in the habit of doing paradoxical breathing is to have him or her start working on a abdominal exhalation techniques. This will immediately improve the mobility of the abdomen during the next inhalation.
• If repeated too often, paradoxical breathing brings about very strong contractions on the level of the thorax, which can make the area overly rigid.
• To exhale in tidal volume or IRV, it is not necessary to work the muscles because this type of exhalation is entirely due to the action of pulmonary elasticity.
• The moment which follows an exhalation of tidal volume and that precedes the next inhalation is a time of apnea (without respiratory movement). This apnea is not due to an obstruction or an active movement. It is a time when all the structures relax. Consequently, it is a time when the general body tension relaxes as well.
• The voice is produced during an expiratory action.
• That some people will arch their lumbar spine to make the abdomen bulge out is why it is important to start working with the back totally “glued’ to the floor.
• Avoid starting to inhale again too early, which happens often in coastal breathing and can produce hyperventilation (causing lightheadedness).
• During the times of stress, you will have the tendency to shorten the apnea following an exhalation and to start inhaling too quickly again.

• Doshas—Vata: Ectomorph (movement); Pitta: Mesomorph (metabolism); Kapha: Endomorph (structure)
• Vata in balance; other 2 2
• Pitta 2 stay out of sun
• Imbalanced Pitta-Vata exhibits Type A behavior
• Hot day / hot bath / anger / sexual passion increase Pitta
• Excess acidity—Pitta imbalance
• 4 Pita imbalance; no sour / fermented foods: Cheese, pickles, vinegar, sour cream, or alcoholic beverages
• Cannot push yr doshas into configuration better than U R born w/
• 4 Pita imbalance; no overeating, fermented bread yeast, food additives
• Rejuvenating herbs: Gotu kola / garlic 4 Vata; aloe vera / saffron 4 Pitta; elecampane / honey 4 Kapha
• Rasayanas—herbs 4 longevity, e.g., Chavnprash, Brahmi Rasayana
• More powerful rasayana:  Amla, guggul, shatavari, & ashwaghanda
• Quinine brings Pitta down promptly
• Pitta-Pacifying Diet
• Complacency, greed, & emotional dependency come from too much sweet
• In Pranayama, let breathing come naturally, a little slower / deeper w/o taking deep breaths
• ↓ tomatoes / lettuce in winter; ↓ grains in summer; no long-distance-shipped fruits, half-ripened

ü  Your body is aging beyond control because it has been programmed
to live out the rules of that collective conditioning.

10 Inherited Assumptions about Who You Are & What the True Nature of the
Mind & Body Is

1. There is an objective world independent of the observer,
   and our bodies are aspect of this objective world
2. The body is composed of atoms (?) of matter, separated
   from each other in timely space
3. Mind & body are separate, and independent of each
   other.
4. Materialism is primary; consciousness is secondary. In
   other words, we are physical machines to have learned to think.
5. Human awareness can be completely expanded product of
   biochemistry.
6. As individuals, we are all disconnect, self-contained
   entities.
7. Our perception of the world is automatic, can give us an
   accurate picture of how things really are.
8. Our true nature is totally defined by the body, ego and
   personality. We are wisps of memories and desires enclosed in packages of
   flesh and bones.
9. Time exists as an absolute. We are captives of that
   absolute. No one escapes that ravages of time.
10. Suffering is necessary. It is a part of our reality. We
    are inevitable victims of sickness, aging and death.

ü  Human aging is critically different from animal aging.

10 New Assumptions

1. The physical world including our bodies is a response of
   the observer. We create our bodies as we create the experience of our
   world.
   • Cf. chair
2. In their essential state, our bodies are composed of
   energy and information, not solid matter. This energy & information is
   an outcropping of infinite fields of energy & information spanning the
   Universe.
   • Entropy doesn’t apply to intelligence
   • Prana: flow of intelligence (life force)
3. The mind and the body are inseparably one. The unity that
   is me, separates into two streams of experience, thoughts & desires,
   & the experience of the body. It’s in the union of the two that we are
   all meant to live.
   • The decline of vigor in old age is largely the result of
     the people expecting to decline.
4. The biochemistry of the body is a product of awareness.
   Beliefs, thoughts, and emotions create the chemical reactions upholding
   life in every cell, and aging cell is the end product of awareness that has
   forgotten how to remain you.
   • You’re only as old as you think you are.
5. Perception appears to be automatic, but in fact, it’s a
   learned phenomenon. If you change your perception, you change the
   experience of your body & of your world.
   • Aging process has to be countered everyday.
6. Impulses of intelligence constantly create your body in
   new forms every second. What you are is the sum total of theses impulses,
   and by changing the patterns, you’ll change.
7. Although each person seems separate and independent, all
   of us are connected with patterns of intelligence that govern the whole cosmos.
   Our bodies are a part of universe body; our minds and aspect of a universal
   mind.
   • What makes us old isn’t stress so much as the perception
     of stress. Someone who doesn’t see the world out there as a threat can
     co-exist with the environment free of the damage created by the stress response.
   • The most important thing to experience the world without
     aging is to nurture the knowledge that the world is you.
8. Time does not exist as an absolute, only eternity. What we
   call linear time is a reflection of how we perceive change. If you could
   perceive the changeless, time would cease to exist as we know it. We can
   learn to start metabolizing non-change, eternity, the absolute. By doing
   that, we’ll be ready to create the physiology of immortality.
   • Choose time of day when you
     feel relaxed and unpressured. Sit quietly and place your watch nearby.
     Close your eyes. Be aware of your breathing. Imagine your whole body
     rising and falling with the flow of each breath. After a minute or two,
     when you feel settled and quite inside, peek at the second of your watch. → Time is a product of perception. Only time there is the one you’re
     aware of.
9. Each of us inhabits reality lying beyond all change. Deep
   inside us, unknown to the 5 senses, is an innermost core of being, a field
   of non-change that creates personality, ego and body. This being is our
   essential state. It is who we really are.
10. We are not victims of aging, sickness and death. These are
    a part of the scenery, not the seer who is immune to any form of change.
    This seer is spirit, the expression of eternal being.
    • If you want to change your body, change your awareness
      first.

Exercise 1 – Seeing Through the Mask of Matter

1. Look at your hand and examine it closely.
2. Holing the image of your hand in your mind’s eye, imagine
   that you’re examining it through a high-powered microscope.

Lessons

1. 3-D body, reported by the 5 senses, is a mirage.
2. Every solid particle of matter is composed of more than
   99.999% empty space.
3. The void between 2 electrons is proportionally as large
   and empty as the space between two galaxies.

Exercise 2 – Closing the Gap

1. Imagine two candles on a table in front of you.
2. Carry one candle outside at night, and hold it up against
   back against the background of stars.

Lessons

1)      No
matter how separate anything appears to the senses, nothing is separate at the
quantum level.

2)      The
quantum field exists in, around, & through you. The field is your extended
body.

3)      Each
of your cells is a local concentration of information and energy inside the
wholeness of information and energy of your body. Likewise, you are a local
concentration of information and energy in the wholeness which is the body of
the Universe.

Exercise 3 – Breathing the Field

Sit comfortably in a chair with your eyes closed. Gently and
slowly, inhale through your nostrils, imaging that you’re drawing the air from
a point infinitely far away. Now, slowly and easily exhale, sending every atom
of air back to its source infinitely far away. Feel each breath coming to you from
quantum field.

Exercise 4 – Redefining

Repeat the following statements silently to yourself: “I can use the power of my awareness to experience
the body that is flowing instead of solid, flexible instead of rigid, quantum
instead of material, dynamic instead of static, composed of energy and
information instead of random chemical reactions, in network of intelligence
instead of the mindless machine, fresh and ever-renewing instead of entropic
and aging, and timeless instead of time-bound.”