Tag Archives: Body

Sleeping in the right direction

18 Friday Apr 2014

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Do you know which direction you keep your head when you sleep? If you don’t know, then you must! Sleep is one of the most important part of your daily activities that you do. The direction where you place your head plays a big part in maintaining a good health and being successful overall. It also influences your character, mind and hence thinking process. Also your relationship with other people! This has been explained in detail in the Vaastu Shashtra. I read somewhere that approximately 90% of the people do sleep in wrong way or direction. We do work for all day and our muscles get tired and lot of energy is used for all day working. To recharge the body again or to give rest to the muscles we need to take rest in the form of sleep. Sleep deprivation causes many diseases in our body. We will deal with one of the main aspect of sleeping right – the right direction to keep your head!

Sleep right

There is a Tamil proverb going thus – “Vaaraatha vaazhvu vanthaalum vadakke thalai vekkakudaathu“. Which means – “Even if one gets good fortune, one should not sleep with head in the north direction“. There are many such proverbs in many cultures about what is the right direction to keep the head. Event the Mahabharataha says – “Men become wise sleeping in the eastern or southern directions“. There is a direction for everything in the Indian culture and good reasons too! The physicians, at least Ayurvedic ones, make their patients sit facing east before diagnosis and give them medicines. There is a direction for brides and grooms to be seated in the marriage. Corpses are placed with their head in the south direction. So there is a direction for everything!

Coming back to sleeping, the recommended direction is placing the head in the east or south direction. The reason for the southern direction is because of the magnetic property of the earth and human body. The earth we are in is subjected to all kinds of energies from the sun going from east to west. By this, earth is magnetized with the north pole becoming the north pole or a magnet and south pole being the south. Since our human body is also a magnet – our head is the north and feet being the south, when we place our head in the north direction, then we the opposite poles repel each other thus destroying the natural polarity of the body. This natural polarity of the human body is key to happiness and health. The body is hale and healthy if the natural polarity that we acquire during the day is preserved in the night. That is the reason our elders warned us from keeping our head in the north! On placing it in the south, there is attraction between the earth poles and our parts of the body. Thus the polarity of the body is still intact.

There are special instructions given to married couples, single person, head of the house hold ,etc. on which direction to sleep. Here is one interesting one – Married couples are better off keeping their heads in the southern direction because it increases the attraction between them :)! It helps one to have positive thinking and sincerity in behavior. Not only this, South direction enhances one’s self confidence and leadership qualities. You can read more on the source links i provided below.

As for the eastern direction, the current of electricity passes over the earth from east to west. When the current passes from one body to another body then it influences the body that it enters and leaves inflammation in the body which it leaves. When we place the head in the west and feet in east, then the current passing through feet and leaving the head leaves inflammation in the head. Which means we get up with a headache which affects how we function. Having the head in the east is more auspicious and conducive for better thinking.

Regarding the positions of sleeping, there are two positions that are recommended – The first position is sleep turning left side (baal aasana) and the second position is sleep straight (shava aasana).When wake up in the morning first turn right and then get up from the bed. In both the above positions our spine will remain straight and we will never have a health problem if we sleep in the above two positions.

 

So BOTTOM LINE is – Dont keep your head in north or west and get up in morning turning to the right side. 

[Courtesy : http://www.healthnaturaltips.com/2012/10/what-are-right-position-to-sleep-well.html, http://queenofsleep.wordpress.com/2010/10/23/feng-shui-is-your-bed-positioned-facing-the-right-direction%5D

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The Mahabharata within you! – Part 1

13 Sunday Apr 2014

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Two families. Five brothers against a Hundred. A story spanning four generations. Aerial attacks, Ufos, Aliens, Atomic bombs and many many more. That is just a part of the Mahabharata for you. If you have not had the chance the read it, here is the Mahabharata in 36 tweets for you.

The author of the epic used the real incident and weaved  symbolic images to reflect our own inner conflicts. Using these images if we dive deep into our inner self, we will be able to appreciate the mystery of our own mind and life. Recently, I had a chance to read many versions of it with their story changed. Even though there were good efforts with good intentions, I felt that a lot of people haven’t explored the inner essence and symbolism of the characters, events, their interactions, etc. It is imperative to know the inner symbolism of the characters and its representation to grasp the immensity of Mahabharata. I have been wanting to write on it but had to do some research on it to get it right. So here is a write up of what the characters meant and why is it important to know this. To deal with all the characters at once would be over whelming. We will take a group of characters and few events in a series of posts. Lets deal with the Kauravas first.

Cast of the Mahabharata series

Cast of the Mahabharata series

Dhritarashtra – The blind king of Hastinapura represents the our mind. More than that – our blind mind. Without the intellect’s discriminating power. Hence the blindness. His wife Gandhari represents the intellect power. The intellect can see. However, when the intellect gets smitten with emotion it gets blinded too. This is indicated by Gandhari blinding herself after being married to Dhritarashtra. The result is devastation and destruction. The blind mind has got many desires and tendencies in it and is the abode of emotions and feelings.

Five are senses of knowledge or perception the eyes, nose, ears, tongue and skin (Gnanendriyas). The other five are the senses of action-mouth, hands, feet, genital organ and anus (Karmendriyas). There are 10 directions north, south, west, east, north east, south east, south west and northwest and up and down. When the mind and intellect run blindly in all 10 directions and functions through 10 sense organs , give rise to hundred desires, thoughts, ambitions, expectations and dreams. These are the children of the mind and symbolized as the 100 sons in Mahabharata.

Duryodhana – the first son. The main thought of the mind is always ‘I, me, Mine’. This is called the ego. So he represents the first and fore most thought of the mind – the EGO. The mind cant control the ego very easily. That is why Dhritarashtra couldn’t control Duryodahana and always swayed by his son’s wishes. ‘Duh‘ means difficult and ‘yodhana‘ means to fight. Ego is something that was difficult to fight against. It is the Ego feeling or  “I” thought that craves and falls into addiction. All mental and physical problems stems from the “I” feeling.  The “I”  feeling instead of helping the body, ruthlessly rips off health of the body.  “I” want to experience  spicy taste no matter my stomach hurts and develop ulcers.  “I” want to experience to “refresh” with coffee no matter if it dehydrates my body  and make my body cells suffer in thirst. “I” want to experience dull-mindedness with alcohol  no matter if it hurts my liver and all other body organs. I want to do something even though my doctor has asked me not to because I already booked it! (targeted remark). 🙂

The moment the Ego gets the mind to dance to its whims and tunes, the body is completely forgotten. That is why Dhritarashtra was caught completely in the whims of Duryadhana and gave in to most of his wants. As a king, he didnt listen to his subjects which represent the body. The blind mind always tries to give importance to its ego – Dhritarashtra wants his son to be crowned as the prince of the kingdom. Like this you can find so many instances of how the mind empowers the ego and the ego runs rampage in our mind. This is so beautifully portrayed in the mahabharata with various events. The next time you read the mahabhrata, see if you can relate to the same happening with in you.

Dhritarashtra had a son named Yuyutsu with a vaishya(worker) clan woman. Yuyutsu was always on the path of dharma even though he was with the Kauravas. He does defect to the Pandavas just before the war. Kind of an equal to Vibhishana of Ramayana. He represents the desire to give psychological battle to the bad things the mind comes up with but is not as powerful as the ego and desires. This shows the mind is capable of producing good thoughts but these are not strong enough. In my next post, I will bring out the Pandavas and many other events within the mahabharata and its significance.

[COURTESY : Discourses on Bhagavad Gita by Paramahamsa Prajnanananda, Bhagavad Gita by Eknath Eswaran and Symbolism of Mahabharata article]