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Artificial sweeteners are developed in organic chemistry labs. Stevia grows wild in the rain forests.

Finally, a sweetener that I think has yet to show any real toxicity. It has been used for centuries by the Guarani Indians both as a sweetener and a medicinal. It does not have any calories, is suitable for diabetics and does not cause cavities. It is obtained from the leaves of the stevia shrub which grows wild in the Amambay Mountain region of Paraquay.

Introduced in Japan in 1970.

Stevia was first introduced to Japan in 1970 and by 1988 it represented 41% of the sweetener market in Japan. To date, there have been no ill effects or health related problems. It is also used in Japan, to sweeten other foods such as ice cream, bread, candy, pickles, seafood, vegetables and soft drinks. The safety of stevia is accepted in Japan. Besides being grown in Japan, it is now grown in China, Germany, Malaysia, Israel and South Korea.

1991 Stevia Banned by the FDA

Meditation students often come to me and ask what they can do to improve their meditation. Success in meditation is not the result of any one single factor but depends on sustained and systematic effort over a period of time. However, there are a few tips for meditation, that will help you to improve your performance, regardless of the meditation method that you follow.

1. Prepare your body for meditation

Your physical condition has a tremendous influence on your mind. This is true for your day to day activity, but even more so when it comes to meditation. You can prepare your body for meditation by eating the right food, and by coming to meditation with an empty stomach. Eating the right food, means food which strengthens the body but doesn’t have any adverse affect on the mind. If you consume products that make the mind dull or over-stimulated then it will be much harder to meditate. And whatever your diet is, when you sit down to meditate, it should be on an empty stomach. That is why one of the best times to meditate is in the morning, before you have had your breakfast. Another good time is in the evening, before the evening meal.

Each person is unique and it is that individuality that we as a whole draw strength from. We should use such advantages to our benefit. Plato often wrote about this in The Republic, that each member of a society ought to do what they are best at and be alleviated from responsibility of those things they are not good at, which can be done by others. The individual and the society gain the most using this methodology. Why have we not considered this wise advice in our culture? Instead we often put people into jobs they are unsuited for in patience, competence and ability. Who benefits? Would a Football team, which actually wants to win the game do that? After all; the guy with the strong foot and lanky build ought to be the kicker, not a lineman, for he would only be good for one play.

Yet as our world becomes more PC, we seem to be too worried about hurting feelings in the real world and try to make everyone equal, people are not equal; not genetically and certainly not through different experience of nurturing. For instance I am a terrible accountant and could be good at that but it would be a living hell for me to try. This would serve no one if I were assigned to that position, would it? An accountant may be less suited for the activities that I tend to excel in.

Try Not To Force Things Too Much

Often, when meditating, we try too hard to force a certain state of mind that we think we should have. We try hard to suppress thoughts, for example. This is just another thought, of course, and another obstacle to the peaceful state we are hoping for.

So how do you make things happen that can’t be forced? The question itself shows the need for another perspective. Some things can’t be forced to happen, and all struggles to do so only take you farther away. There are times when all you can do is prepare and wait.

The Dinner Invitation

Imagine a wonderful evening with new friends. You prepared dinner, bought a good bottle of wine, and cleaned the house. Now the guests are here, the conversation is great, and you are happy. Can you make this happen? Yes and no.

You can prepare in every way to make it a pleasant event, but in the end, the guests can decline your invitation, or not arrive, or show up late, right? You can’t force them to come, or if you try, you’ll ruin the atmosphere or even the friendship.

How To Defend Yourself

Do you ever find yourself feeling overwhelmed? Do you sometimes feel like you just have too much to think about? Does it make you tired, irritable, or even depressed? What can you do about it?

People rarely go to the doctor to say “I think I have stress,” and yet the National Institutes of Health say that 80% of illnesses are caused by stress, directly or indirectly. Hormones, such as adrenalin, are released into your blood when you’re stressed. This causes a rise in blood pressure, a faster heart and breathing rate, and faster conversion of glycogen into glucose. These are good things if you need to escape a charging grizzly bear, but when these effects are prolonged, the immune system is depressed, and your body suffers other negative changes.

Common effects of prolonged stress include fatigue, pain in the muscles and joints, headache, mental confusion, depression, anxiety, and irritability. Stress reactions cause your body to use too much energy, which can result in physical and mental weakness.

Managing Stress With Meditation

“We become sick because we act
In sickening ways.”
Louis Jourard

Modern medicine is based upon the notion of battle. We battle germs and fight for life. As soon as we feel pain or discomfort, we immediately try to change it. We feel we must conquer

This way of being leads to a never-ending struggle. After one illness or problem is conquered, another arises. Usually we expect the doctor to take control and make us well. We relinquish our part in the illness, deny the fact that it is up to us to stop, listen, and discover the lessons the illness has to teach us.

Healing from within brings inner peace with it. It arises from a different orientation towards all the experiences of life. We are taught to stop, pay attention, to respect what is happening ? to see our pain as a messenger. It is as if we were re-focusing a camera, receiving our experience through a different lens.

Pointer 1 See Your Pain As A Messenger Bringing Important News

Dialoguing With Your Pain

Learning To Be In The Moment

Imagine thinking clearly, and feeling relaxed at will. Could you get more done? Enjoy life more? Would you like to know how to do that right now? Start by learning how to put yourself more in the moment with a simple mindfulness exercise.

Basic Mindfulness Exercises

A basic mindfulness exercise begins with sitting down, relaxing and breathing deeply. Close your eyes and pay attention to your breathing, following the breath in and out a few times. Then move your attention to your body, one part at a time, noticing any sensations of cold, hot, tight, sore or anything you can identify. After a few minutes, start listening to the sounds of the room, without judging, criticising or thinking about them. Just listen for a minute.

Open your eyes and look around as if seeing for the first time. Rest your eyes on any object for half a minute. Examine it without talking about it in your mind. Repeat this with another object, and then another, while still maintaining an awareness of your body and breath. Continue this state of mindfulness until you’re ready to get up.

Is Meditation Too Much Time And Trouble?

If you haven’t meditated before, you might think it’s too much trouble to learn. If you do meditate, you know it can be difficult to find the time to do it consistently. So is there really a meditation you can learn right now that can be done in 45 seconds? There is.

Three Deep Breaths

Try this: breath through your mouth, and notice how your chest expands; then breath through your nose and you’ll notice how your abdomen goes out more. You see, breathing through the nose causes the diaphram to pull the air to the bottom of your lungs. This delivers a good dose of oxygen into your bloodstream, and into your brain. It also tends to relax you.

This is why meditators breath through their noses. It’s healthier, and it is the basis of this forty-five-second meditation. You simply close your eyes, let go of your thoughts (to the extent possible), and take three slow, deep breaths through your nose, paying attention to your breathing.

The Rest Of The Story

It is impossible to overstate the importance of daily meditation. The benefits are enormous. They are: improved physical, emotional, mental and spiritual health; greater personal power, enhanced creativity, increased ability to enact ideals and an enhanced sense of purpose and well-being.

Meditation is the art of stilling the mind. Contemplation often gets confused with meditation; but contemplation is not meditation. Contemplation is focusing the mind, while meditation is stilling the mind.

The normal waking operation of the brain is in the Beta State, which limits learning ability and full brain function. In this normal waking Beta State, the brain wave frequency is between 15 and 75 cycles per second, averaging 25 cycles per second. The mind is busy with about 60,000 thoughts per day passing fleetingly through consciousness.

The first level of meditation is the Alpha State, which facilitates faster and more complete learning. In this meditative Alpha State, brain wave frequency is between 7 and 14 cycles per second. Your mind becomes stiller, calmer and less busy, less noisy so that your ability to learn new information is enhanced.

I remember when I started trying to meditate. I would sit down, close my eyes, and try to be really calm (my definition of meditation at the time). That was hard: my head would burst with ideas, thoughts, solutions, problems? I would become agitated, and stopped generally after ten long minutes, if not less. It’s during my short "meditations" that I felt less? meditative.

I knew there was something for me to explore that was beyond the physical world. I knew I would unleash my potential, by "going within". And sitting meditation, as I knew it, was the #1 technique that would lead me there. Yet, I just couldn’t do it? I was inadequate.

No, I wasn’t - and neither are you, if you are experiencing a similar situation. It’s your definition of meditation that may be inadequate.

The idea behind meditation is not to sit on a chair, and close our eyes. Or to sit in lotus, and watch the leaves change colors. You can do all this if you feel a call to do so, but whatever technique you choose is just as relevant as the type of fork you eat your meals with. Forks, meditations, cars, are just tools that help us accomplish a specific task?