Defining your nature

What does defining life mean?
Maybe it is something we learn from our surroundings.

You can always believe what your mother says and do as your parents told, but you don’t learn life in that way. It might be true what they say but once you explore and test your boundaries you realize there is so much more than what they taught you. It is like believing the first local person you meet in a new country. They only can offer their help from their own perspective, but if you don’t go and ask his neighbor you only see one ankle for the same situation. The best teacher in life as well as in traveling is you and your observations in life.

One of the best ways to break the rules is to do something completely different if there’s no harm in anyone else and if you do it within respect for the new culture. You never know for example if you can hitch-hike in India unless you have tried. Most of the people you meet don’t even understand what it means, but you can still try. I would try everything three times. That goes in hitch-hiking, eating three chocolate cakes in one night, smoking a joint even if it gave me headache in the first couple times, believing an Indian taxi driver and even dancing tango with Sikh (Sikh is a follower of Sikhinism).

Life should be enjoyable for all beings, but how do we know what we can have, be or do if we never gross the boarder. Though, there is really nothing we have to do or be to be loved and complete right now; still, just being is not of a active human nature. It is, though, highly appreciated, but modesty in all. That’s why we have so many extensions to try out all the great things in world.

Love, each moment. Love your neighbor’s point of views, love yours as well. And give space for others to be as they are.
After all, you define how you see things around and inside you. Some might need your help to see themselves in a better way. 

Once upon a time on a toilet seat of a three aisle-airplane to India--- A realization of life.

What bad can happen if you just trust yourself in the hands of the present moment? One may call it this trust as trusting to the Universe, to the God or to the faith. But something great is in that power.

One morning it just happened like some moments and days ago. It doesn’t matter that even after those moments I still had parts of the ego, parts of fear back, and it doesn’t matter if I occasionally still have those moments of ego back, but it has a huge importance in the life of a human that I really experienced what it is to see all the people in the world as my friends and feel love towards every being no matter how lost or mean they are. They are still a bit lost, but I do not worry. My job here in earth is to enjoy every moment of this life. And one morning couple days ago I really understood the meaning of it after reading the last chapter of Tomi Astikainen’s book Mind Your Elephant.
I went out having plans to go sightseeing, but I just started to cry in the metro or St. Petersburg, not out of sadness, but out of love. I couldn’t stop smiling. And I just decided to not stick with my plans because it seemed to be more important that day to ride in the metro and just smile to the people. So I did. I picked randomly a person and started following him to where ever he went. And when I finally lost sight of him I found myself somewhere in the outskirts of St. Petersburg taking photos and smiling to life, smiling to the moment that gave me the gift of life and love.

Few days after I realized just how much I had given up in order to give in to whatever happens. I took out of my laptop in the darkness of the falling night in the airplane that is on its way to India. I started to feel what the country is teaching to so many people even before I arrived to my destination.
Can you believe all the great things, all the small moment that you encounter if you just stop judging the situation and start being in the moment? Trust yourself a bit here. I found myself smiling thinking back to all those small signs universe gave me. I call them signs, because I choose to believe they are. Just like an atom that has been split but still rotating in the same direction with the other part. Isn’t that great! So I choose to believe in non accidents because of this particular scientific phenomenon.

I sat there in the toilet of the airplane and smiled to the current situation. Not long ago I was asking to myself in the lounge of the airport what more can I wish for but to feel this incredible freedom of not owning anything? It made me want cut my jeans, leave my backpack (which I still obviously not do because I love the laptop and I love to write and take photos to be able to share my happiness with all of you) and just yell out loud how much I loved life.

I know in India people are smiling and happy because one of the greatest Buddhist teachings are that whatever happens, it is in the arms of the Universe. So if we worry, it doesn’t help a thing because we all have a lesson to learn in life to be able to get closer to the Nirvana. Where ever we are heading to, I know the heaven is already here, on earth, in our hearts. And we learn it when we separate ourselves from our thoughts and start observing and taking in the current situation as it is, giving chance to the chance, giving chance to the moment giving chance to the person next to you as it was your best friend; to be there for him or her; to be totally honest in your mind and towards him, but also being polite enough to listen to his teachings even if you already understand them in your heart.

So, what more could I possibly wished for when I was totally free of my possessions and smiling to the realization of life? I found myself in the two aisle-airplane that I hadn’t been since 2002. And as I was taking a picture to my mom to send my greetings I found myself talking to my fellow traveler which is no by the way leaning on my shoulder and snoring. Few hours before he started to snore we were talking about the Great Spirit Indian people have. He started talking about his aerophobia and offered me some Ukrainian vodka and chocolate. I couldn’t refuse. I felt like he needed it as much as I needed him in my life to show me the incredibility of what more happiness can possibly happen. He turned out to be a Bollywood actor and a diplomat who was more than willing to invite me to Bollywood as his friend. Not that it has such a great meaning in life. I don’t care less if he’d be a millionaire or a normal business man as long as he was happy and as long as we realized to be friends. I don’t even care that what he spoke was just because he was afraid of the take off and had been drinking because of that. I don’t care the fact that most likely he wanted something more from me than friendship or even if his greatest fear of the airplane crash come true in this flight (which obviously didn’t happen) just as long as he is there on my side snoring and knowing we are here for each other. That is love.

So it seemed by finally realizing that there is nothing to hold us back, but our thoughts of being separate from others, I found was able to see the signs of the life I was living in. I saw everybody as my friends, and if there was money before to count my experiences and the cost of them, there were no numbers anymore. No age and no time. Like there is no time and no money in India =D Everything just happens and you start seeing signs and opportunities everywhere even if you had been robbed and had no money. Because if we’d all be friend no matter what we’d believe in would money really make a difference? I know it’s a fact that we’d only start appreciating all life around s and start finally doing something that we love doing and also helping others to find their calling in life. There would be no enemies, no boundaries, no poverty, and there could be enough for everybody because then everybody would see that the amount of things (like money) would not bring happiness but to find the happiness in that moment would suddenly make all the sense, since all the people would be in our side to help us, to love us.

And that is what I realized while walking to the airplane toilet with a huge smile on my face while looking at all the people smiling and hugging their spouses, their kids and mothers or even when they were looking at somewhere in the future as if they’d be waiting to the life to finally start in India after this flight. I even said a compliment about the great food they offered in the airplane to another fellow traveler who looked at me in astonishment. Airplane food good? I love what has been given. I love the food in hospitals, in development countries. Yes, it might not have been made with love but still, I appreciate it. I even found out a new taste combination while spreading jam on the fried potato slices while assuming it was herring. With a hint of pepper and salt I, by accidentally, found out something quite interesting that I will try again! Why not. It is all in our imagination and in our body what we like and can create! How can you say if you like it or not if you’ve never tasted!

I found incredible peace in this single moment of taking a deep breath and listening to what my body is telling. It is a feeling of peace that so many people find in church, in their relatives, during Christmas, when looking at the stars… And I, I know I can even find it while sitting in a toilet seat or an airplane!

How to lose weight, get sick and alienate yourself to be unhappy

I had a friend back in Turkey at the English course where I worked. She was an elderly, well eaten Turkish wife with a lot of bread behind her bellybutton. She saw me drinking my own herbal teas every day between the teaching hours. She asked me what is it that I drink and would it help to lose weight since I was in such a good shape. I replied I drink some peppermint teas sometimes to have a healthy digest. One day she came to me proudly showing the peppermint tea she bought and said she’d start a diet. All I could do was to knock my head for her encouragement.

I used to eat a lot of candy with a tv show on the background on a comfortable couch instead of a healthy breakfast with that morning tea. One can imagine that it’ll lead to a lot of problems in years, to a lot of doctor visits who’ll write you a lot of medicine’s to cure your body from flu’s, women problems and allergies you developed. This evening I consciously decided to return to my old habits of eating 100grams of candy. I did not have a craving for the sweets, but I wanted to remember the good old times when we used to sit with my mom on a Saturday evening with a bag full of candy watching tv. What used to be my normal doze of sweets followed by lying down in the couch and drinking coke now seemed like a self torture. After a half bag of candy I felt terrible. Drinking water and lying down in the couch did not take away the bad feeling that I sometimes had after a long bar night. With that amount of sugar at 1am I felt like running around in circle until throwing up.

One can now easily say it’s not that I need any more described or unsubscribed drugs in my body, but a chance of lifestyle. That’s something doctors never tell you. Instead we search help from the world outside, from self help books, and from the therapist office. We develop diets; ways of thinking that if I eat a candy I will get sick, if I eat bread I gain weight; so I should not eat them, but instead eat what they tell us in the guide book. Then one only see things that are forbidden and start graving them even more. One needs to see the whole picture and listen to his or her body. A healthy mind is a healthy body because healthy mind has no addictions to some foods and old styles of living. Changing the way you eat can help you chance yourself, or the other way around.

Before I could not tell the difference between what my body needs and my mind wants. Now it is somewhat obvious that it was my mind eating, watching telly and drinking the way it was. I have no wish to return to the old. And I had to prove my point by doing so. Now one piece of chocolate is more than enough sweets to threat myself sometimes.

I drink my morning tea every morning when I have the chance. But I know it is just a part of my healthy life. I never had diets before nor do I have one now. I just had an incredibly unhealthy way of eating which came from being sort of really disconnected from my body. It is obvious one cannot be cured from all illnesses by a miracle tea or a miracle medicine or a miracle died, but by the miracle of truly discovering what your body and mind needs to be healthy.

Living in a money prison

When we speak of freedom, what does it really mean? What is it that sets us free and what keeps holding us back? In so called modern society money is the tool that pays our way to be able to make decisions what to do in life. It also defines who are the ones that can choose freely and who cannot. To be extreme (but truthful), who can live, who dies.

Maybe it was a conscious decision to test how far can I go and how free I am as a European citizen, as a person from a wealthy country to travel freely. I was aware that I had stayed in Turkey over three months and that I should go to the boarder to re-enter the country, to get the fifth stamp on my passport. It felt like a joke to get a validation for my existence so I instead didn’t give it a thought. A was willing to accept the consequences of my freedom to choose whether to get that stamp or not. So, I preferred to wait couple months to exit the country to show my presence to my family.
As I was proceeding in the slow queue towards the passport control the thought of having some difficulties with the stamp issues came to my mind again. But instead of worrying or hurrying in the line I continued smiling and accepting the situation as it was. What else could I do but to smile? I indeed had troubles to exit the country. But the problems were mainly problems for the police officer as he didn’t quite know how to proceed. I either had to pay 600liras fee or 150liras to just get out of the country, but not being able to get back in five years. All I could do was to give all that I had in money, give my freedom to re-enter the country in five years with a smile on my face aware of the fact that nothing can take away the freedom to smile within to every person, every creature, item and happening in life. If we worry and feel sad of the things that happen, it will show on our face and will not help anybody.

The whole day traveling to the airport I was aware of how complex life can be if we continue blaming the system, the society, but do not act upon a better future for the sake of the happiness of all being on focusing how good life is whether it is in a crowded traffic bus or in the queue of passport control or even while paying your way to the country of your origin. In fact, my smile became even larger realizing how the serious police officer in the counter did not smile back at me while he was typing my name to keep me in the database for the next five years. Even the fact that I wished him good day from the bottom of my heart did not make him gaze up from his piles of documents. I was being categorized as an invalid human being because of my unwillingness to use money as a way to what one might call freedom... I’d like to know what would have happen if I’d say no for paying my way out as well… Actually I did, but the police officer seemed so confused after I mentioned that my plane was about to leave so let him out of the misery. I also didn’t want my parents to wait my arrival any longer. And while sitting in the plane I couldn’t help laughing. Still I had money in my pockets, paper that can pay your way to almost anywhere; money that gives me the chance to fly across Europe in few hours rather than hitch-hike in the during the cold season; money that can pay myself a good health which more than 80% of the population cannot afford.

I have to admit that I feel sad of the fact that I cannot re-enter Turkey. I cannot see the life lasting friends that I made there, share my presence with them, hug them; look at them. And it is my own choice of course, to push the limits, to see what happens to both in my mind and around me. But instead of feeling stressed and blaming the system, I can only smile to it. I realize how much liberty has been taken away from a person that has no rights at all. And if we more fortunate could only show these people that they can stand up for their rights instead of being victims of the system and the people who keeps it rolling, world could be much more enjoyable place for everybody. I know that we all do not want same things in life and thus there is enough for everybody, but by restricting the freedom of people will just make them want more of what they do not have.

If we would just begin to see each person as not an enemy or one more person left in the passport queue before us, but our friend, somebody to love, we would not spend so much time waiting the life to start or worrying about the things that happen or might happen because we would soon realize nothing bad can happen when we love each other. The best we can do is to truly help those in need and accept everything that happens.

After all, monetary system is something that I can observe and laugh about, not something that I desperately hold on to. It is a proven fact that money runs the lives of the world. Rich get richer, poor poorer. That way we’ll never have equal rights for all being. Money together with our ego continues to keep ourselves in this prison, if we do not become aware. I have been without money, without worries about what to eat. Still, I survived and kept smiling. The airline company even lost my backpack on my way to Finland, but instead of spreading negativity on my mind and around me I realized there’s nothing much I can worry; I had everything I needed right there: air on my lungs; smile on my face, and less weight on my shoulders. Well, the weight I gain back the next day, but at least the things that happen made me realize the things I owned ended up owning me. They ended up defining and holding me back.

The question is: would we be able to live in the world without money and identifying ourselves with it?

Universe, connecting people

"The ideas which had grown over two thousand years of observation have had to be radically revised. In less than a hundred years, we have found a new way to think of ourselves. From sitting at the center of the universe, we now find ourselves orbiting an average-sized sun, which is just one of millions of stars in our own Milky Way galaxy. And our galaxy itself is just one of billions of galaxies, in a universe that is infinite and expanding. But this is far from the end of a long history of inquiry. Huge questions remain to be answered, before we can hope to have a complete picture of the universe we live in. I want you to share my excitement at the discoveries, past and present, which have revolutionized the way we think. From the Big Bang to black holes, from dark matter to a possible Big Crunch, our image of the universe today is full of strange sounding ideas, and remarkable truth. The story of how we arrived at this picture is the story of learning to understand what we see."
-STEPHEN HAWKING

It is time to connect the east and the west

For years we developed a gap between races. What I have realized by meditating and studying cultures, biology, geography, religions and the whole universe is that we need to start connecting ourselves with the universe inside us and the universe outside.
The West has used technology to study and discover the life around us, the East use more natural ways, their observations to study the same things.

As a species with the skills to use our hands and minds to create we should connect the both ways to discover world, not to create a gap between them and thus creating even bigger gap between different races, the friend next door and even our family. We let our believes and religion stand in the way. Instead we can connect each other by seeing not the differences but the indifference's in species. We can teach each other on what we know and listen to what the other has to teach for us. I always say give people three chances. The same goes with all the new things you try or learn.

In Western society we have always tried to explain things we see by exploring it outside instead of observing it. But in Asia the same discoveries are made by observing ourselves (meditating) within. When we go deeper in us we realize our existence in a bigger scale also. Both ways of studying the world around us to understand, to satisfy the human need to explore are good, as long as we enjoy what we are doing and help to create a better universe to all of us to enjoy it equally.

Science and spirituality have been separated by Religion and believes. But I have been able to discover the world outside and within to see spirituality has nothing to do with religion. Religion is something your surroundings teach you; even your school teaches you. But spirituality is something that is lacking in the western education system. You cannot really study spirituality; you can observe it and guide other to observe themselves and the world around us through spirituality. It will set us free from the old habits of thinking and doing things and gives us more space to truly discover the universe using both modern technology and spirituality.
I realized we that we are all connected a part of a much bigger picture than we can ever explain through thinking. But we can understand it, understand how important it is to give importance and respect every aspect and everything involved in our lives by starting in this small tip of an iceberg called human body. Listen to it in silence. Then we can explore the same universe around us by using technology to see the other galaxies, maybe even other universes.

We are capable to create a space ship by using modern science and our hands and mind to travel to the space, but we are so many times missing the small things in life that are the key to a bigger inventions. We can connect dots and see starts billions of light years away from us, but we cannot yet connect our body to the earth, from where it came from, we are many times incapable to connect our love for the things we do to the love for our neighbor and our enemy. We can do so much more by just leave the old ways of thinking and doing in the past.

It is important to see the big picture, to discover the Big Bang in the Universe to be able to see how connected we can be in a small picture called human mind.
Like stars are born within a Big Bang, let yourself be created in the same way. Lose your thoughts of who you are to explore the Universe within. Nothing is what it seems, of what we have learned it to be. Question your mind, question the world around you!

“Pope Benedict XVI has denounced some of the gender theories, warning that they blur the distinction between male and female and could thus lead to the "self-destruction" of the human race. He warned against the manipulation that takes place in national and international forums when the term "gender" is altered. "What is often expressed and understood by the term 'gender,' is definitively resolved in the self-emancipation of the human being from creation and the Creator," he warned. "Man wants to create himself, and to decide always and exclusively on his own about what concerns him." The Pontiff said this is man living "against truth, against the creating Spirit".”

-CHRITICING GENDER THEORY (FROMWIKIPEDIA)