Popular Issues

Voting with your dollars- How to take the world back

On March 7, 2011, In Health and Wellness, Popular Issues, By Pedram

The world we live in is filled with massive corporations that have huge departments dedicated to studying one thing: your behavior. Yes, they want to know exactly how you think, what you like, what drives you to purchase, and where/when you like to spend your money. Why? Because they want it! They want to position themselves between you and your perceived needs so that when time comes to swipe that card or ring that till, its their product you go home with that day. It boils down to animal survival. Corporations take on the life of their own (and have legal rights like people do), and their nature is to grow and thrive. There’s nothing implicitly wrong with that.

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Tantra – The Spirituality of Sexuality

On March 2, 2011, In Popular Issues, Tantra, Taoist Philosophy, By Pedram

In the West, we have had so many waves of puritanical restriction put on our notion of sexuality that we are a culture of confused and repressed people. Look at what sells on TV….its all working with a sexual undertone because so many of us have unfulfilled sexual energies and we have cordoned that power off to the realm of fantasy and pornography. There can be nothing more perverse than the distortion of our understanding of Who we really are and how our sexual energy relates to that. In Tantra, the ancient Eastern art of sacred sexuality, there is no distinction between the different aspects of ourselves. Everything is God, everything is Tao. Our sexual drive is the essence of our life force and it is the power we use to transmute into deep spiritual understanding.

Tantra is practiced in the Hindu Yogic tradition as well as the Chinese Taoist tradition. The essence is the same- refine the sexual energy, work to cultivate the forces of Yin and Yang as a pair, and raise the vital qi or kundalini energy up the spine to activate and enliven each of the chakras (Hindu) or danitens (Taoist). The essence of this practice is a celebration of Who we are and an act of worship and collaboration between lovers- recreating and participating in the ritual which creates all of life. It is an act of Creation in which we participate.

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Tagged with: chakras • danitens • Hindu • kundalini • Qi • sexuality • spiritual • Tantra • Tao • Taoist • Yogic

Time Management, Anxiety, Depression, and Stress – Tips for staying in balance and not getting overwhelmed

On December 27, 2010, In Anxiety and Depression, Popular Issues, Time Management, By Pedram

Time Management is an art of Event Management. When we become conscious of the events we commit to in life, we learn that we are the ones who have allowed the stress in. In the video above, Pedram discusses some of the main hangups people have and how people will get into trouble by not realistically managing their expectations of themselves. Time Management is an art and it requires awareness of what we are signing on to. Setting priorities in life and establishing value for the important people in our lives will help us navigate these waters much better.

Anxiety, depression, and stress are all byproducts of our inability to negotiate our interface with time well. Learning to meditate and do yoga or qi gong is helpful but it is impossible to offset the root of the stress which leads to the anxiety and depression without effective understanding of time management. This, again, should be more accurately called event management!

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Tagged with: anxiety • Depression • Event Management • meditate • stress • Time Management • yoga

Teenage Depression – Why Anxiety and Depression are plaguing our kids

On December 23, 2010, In Anxiety and Depression, Health and Wellness, Popular Issues, By Pedram

Anxiety and Depression are taking over in the modern era. Teenage depression has been increasing at alarming rates and parents are panicking about what to do about it. Many are racing to psychiatrists asking for drugs while others are searching for more natural approaches. Either way, parents are looking for answers because nobody wants to see their kids suffer. So why teenage depression?

Well, let’s think about it for a minute. These kids are being raised in a hectic, chaotic world where nothing makes sense yet they are being forced to fit in, finish their didactic homework, dress nice, and put a smile on their faces. Heck, I’d be depressed too! The problem with teenage depression is that we are trying to force these poor kids to fit into an insane world and wondering why their free and pure spirits resist.

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Tagged with: Anxiety and Depression • Consciousness • Meditation

Being in the “No”- Establishing Boundaries for a Healthy Life

On December 20, 2010, In Health and Wellness, Popular Issues, Vitality, By Pedram

One of the major lessons I end up teaching students when they fist start is how to establish and maintain healthy boundaries. Most people I meet are terrible at this! They have been taught to be nice and accommodating all of the time and this attitude has led to a cascade of problems in their lives. Why? It’s because they have not learned the value of the word “No” and what it can do for them.

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Tagged with: acupuncture • boundaries • interpersonal relationships • LIBERATION • Meditation • meditators • prefrontal cortex

Raising Your Child in the United States: How to Avoid Making your Child a Slave of the Corporations

On November 2, 2010, In Health and Wellness, Popular Issues, By Pedram

The human brain is the most pliable and amenable to suggestion at an early age. The suggestions we receive before the age of seven get deeply embedded in our psyche and, we have come to understand that subconscious programs run over 80% of our daily functions. They become the foundation of who we are, how we see the world, and what type of genetic expression we manifest well into our adult lives. They become our beliefs and our underlying programming which determine our reality.

The one thing that has become so appalling to me as I have been watching several loved ones raise their children is the degree of influence and control the media and large corporations have on our lives. (more…)

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Tagged with: children • Consciousness • goals • Happiness • happy • Health • large corporations • Life's Purpose • media • nature • raising children • subconscious mind • united states

AMEX Black Card: Modern Day Version of Frodo’s Ring of Power

On October 26, 2010, In Health and Wellness, Popular Issues, By Pedram

How does the AMEX Black Card relate to your happiness?

In the classic series of “The Lord of the Rings”, J.R.R. Tolkein had created a masterpiece of literature and allegory. I remember reading a bit from an interview with him once and was interested in his description of Frodo’s Ring of Power. For those of you who have not become familiar with this work yet, drop everything and go read those books!

In the interview, Tolkein kept referring to the ring as “The Machine”. (more…)

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Tagged with: AMEX • black card • black cards • capitalism • commerce • Consciousness • credit cards • goals • Happiness • happy • Health • Life's Purpose • philosophy • the machine • vitality

Energy Drinks- Borrowing from Tomorrow’s Energy Today

On October 6, 2010, In Health and Wellness, Meditation, Popular Issues, Qi Gong, By Pedram

Every day I spend in the clinic, I encounter a handful of patients who walk in with their expensive coffees. They slap them down on the table along with their other precious valuables- their keys, wallet, etc. Somehow it has become commonplace for everybody to be walking around with a cup of crack in our society. It is simply assumed that the logic of “if tired, then coffee” is a foregone conclusion. I’ve been watching it for years, brushing it off as a necessary evil of our hectic post-modern society. Everybody is doing it so it must be tolerated- it must be OK…

It’s not. The more I compare adrenal profiles and lab work on people, the more I see these people slipping into oblivion. It is like America trying to solve its financial problems by getting into further debt financing. (more…)

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Tagged with: energy drinks

End of the world: coming, here, or just a hoax?

On October 1, 2010, In Popular Issues, Taoist Philosophy, By Pedram

There has been so much said in the past decade about the world coming to an end that many people have become desensitized. As we are rounding the corner into 2012, we approach the dreaded date of December 21, 2012- the “end” of the Mayan Calendar. Many people have speculated about what is to happen then. Will it be a sudden flash? Will the poles shift causing massive earth changes? Will we nuke ourselves to smithereens? Or maybe we’ll perish via increased solar flare activity and magnetic field fluctuations which many claim are already happening.

What if, like the dreaded 1/1/2000, nothing at all happens? It could…I mean, it just happened to us a decade ago right?

In my opinion, something is happening and it is big. (more…)

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Tagged with: 2012 • end of days • iron age • kali yuga • Life's Purpose • materialism • mayan calendar • Taoist

On Being Happy: True Happiness (Part II)

On September 29, 2010, In Health and Wellness, Meditation, Popular Issues, Taoist Philosophy, By Pedram

post continued from Part I…

…Continued from [this post]

… Think of it like math. Most people hate math growing up. There is a given problem and we all think- oh no! Problem! But the answer to this problem is a given solution set that teaches us about the nature of this query and it teaches us how to come to a solution for this problem. Once solved, not only is the problem over, we also have learned how to solve similar problems to it! Imagine that- we actually develop a skill set that renders us more efficient at this kind of problem- we are a problem solver!

As we get better and better, we move to higher math and more complicated “problems”. So, back to your life- once you crack the code and learn how to get things done, the next thing gets easier and easier. The path to mastery starts with baby steps and, the solution set I put to you, hides in our relationship with time. Learn to adjust your expectations of yourself in time and you can do anything. This is what we see when a master performs a task effortlessly. It is a state of complete relaxation- effortless action. How we get there is (more…)

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Tagged with: ancient wisdom • Consciousness • Depression • effortless action • goals • Happiness • happy • personal mastery • philosophy • Taoist • time • vitality

Voting with your dollars- How to take the world back

Tantra – The Spirituality of Sexuality

Time Management, Anxiety, Depression, and Stress – Tips for staying in balance and not getting overwhelmed

Teenage Depression – Why Anxiety and Depression are plaguing our kids

Being in the “No”- Establishing Boundaries for a Healthy Life

Raising Your Child in the United States: How to Avoid Making your Child a Slave of the Corporations

AMEX Black Card: Modern Day Version of Frodo’s Ring of Power

Energy Drinks- Borrowing from Tomorrow’s Energy Today

End of the world: coming, here, or just a hoax?

On Being Happy: True Happiness (Part II)

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