A Zen Mind

Holistic living means you have a healthy body, mind, and soul. Holistic wellness begins with the mind first, because the mind is the most powerful body organ that controls everything that the body does. A toxic mind often produces a toxic body that leads to a toxic soul. We are living in a toxic environment that may easily contaminate the mind with toxic thoughts, leading to toxic actions, resulting in toxic emotions and memories.

The human mind is most powerful in that it controls everything that the body does, and therefore determines the kind of life we are going to lead. According to Descartes, one of the great philosophers of all time, we become what we think; as evidenced by his famous statement: “I think, therefore I am.” Our thoughts shape us into who we are and transform us into what we have now become. In other words, our thoughts become our “realities.” The pivotal role of our thinking in holistic living cannot be overstated.

Be that as it may, our thoughts don’t tell us the whole truth about who and what we we think we are. That is, our minds may weave many self-deceptions that tell us everything but the truths, and they become our “realities.” The result is that we may self-doubt when we try to excel; we may feel confused and distracted when we try to concentrate; we may dwell on the past or the future when we try to focus on the present. In reality, many of us may have developed a compulsive mind that is constantly obsessed with past thoughts, which are often projected into the future as desires and expectations. A compulsive mind will not let us have holistic living because only a quiet mind will let us see the truths about what and who we are. A quiet mind is Zen mind..

What exactly is a Zen mind? A Zen mind focuses on quietude and spontaneity, which are attributes of internal peace and harmony of the body, the mind, and the soul. When the mind is quiet—in absence of the fear of the sound of silence—the mind can experience clarity of thinking, that may enable the understanding of spontaneity. Spontaneity is the wisdom of letting things follow their respective courses or their natural cycles, such as the four seasons, or life is always followed by death. Everything in life has its own natural cycle.

It must be mentioned that Zen is not a religion, although subsequently it became the source of Zen Buddhism. Zen is just a way of life, with its origin from the wisdom of Tao, which is based on the profound wisdom of the ancient sage Lao Tzu from China, who was the author of the immortal ancient classic “Tao Te Ching.”

A Zen mind is a mental condition in which the mind becomes totally relaxed, without regrets of the past and worries about the future. It is relaxed because it focuses on the present moment. Focusing on the present quiets down your compulsive mind so that you may objectively look at your own thinking mind to see if your thoughts are telling you the absolute truths. With clarity of mind, you may then be able to live as if everything is a miracle to get the holistic wellness of your body, mind, and soul.

Holothink Meditation can change your life forever. It is one of the best Zen meditation products in the market. Try it for free and see how and why.meditation may help you in holistic living.

To have better understanding of Tao wisdom, read my book TAO The Way to Biblical wisdom.

Stephen Lau

Copyright© 2018 by Stephen Lau

Eat Less, Not More

Calorie Restriction

Calorie restriction, which is eating less than you normally do, can improve your vision and other health issues. Calorie restriction is a conscious effort to eating less, first by eliminating all junk foods that give you nothing but empty calories, making you fat. Then slowly focus on nutrients that benefit your health. You can slowly and gradually change your taste buds.

Studies have repeatedly shown that calorie restriction, which means eating less, or less frequently, have long-term benefits in animals with respect to extending their lifespan. That is, animals are given less food (about 40 to 50 reduction in calorie consumption). In humans, a 20 percent reduction (e.g. reducing from  2,000 calories to 1, 500 calories a day is doable) may benefit diabetes, arthritis, Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s disease, and nearly all age-related degenerative diseases, including vision loss.

Likewise, many eye disorders are due to aging; therefore, calorie restriction may hold the answer to many age-related eye issues.

You can accomplish calorie restriction by simply eating less gradually; such as, fasting once a week; eating twice a day, instead of three times a day; intermittent fasting, which is eating only after an 8-hour period of food abstinence.

Calorie restriction can effectively repair your DNA, increase your antioxidant defense system, lower your blood pressure and inflammation (the underlying cause of physical and joint pain), improve glucose metabolism and insulin sensitivity. In addition, calorie restriction is instrumental in boosting your brain health. Don’t forget that your vision health is closely related to the neurons in your brain.

Stephen Lau     

Copyright© 2018  by Stephen Lau

Balance and Harmony Wisdom

Balance and Harmony Wisdom

In this day and age, living in different phases of life is challenging. For one thing, in this world of technology and information, many of us are addicted to speed, which seems like a prerequisite for success in career and in many others facets of life. As a result, stress is unduly created, which may lead to toxic actions, reactions, thoughts and emotions. Consciously and subconsciously we have created for ourselves a world in which our bodies, our minds, and souls have become toxic and we live as if nothing is a miracle.

To do just the opposite—living as if everything is a miracle—we have to rethink the mind, renew the body, and reconnect the soul. To do just that, you need wisdom to "rethink" your mind, which may not be telling you the whole truth about your thoughts and life experiences; you need wisdom to "renew" your body, which lives in a toxic physical environment; you need spiritual wisdom to "reconnect" your soul, which is the essence of your spirituality.

The bottom line: the mind, and the soul have to be in perfect alignment—which is internal and external balance and harmony wisdom.

The truth of the matter is that the body, the mind, and the soul work together as a system of life energy. The free flow or stagnation of this life-giving energy is dependent on the “state of being” of the body, the mind, and the soul at each moment. It is this moment-to-moment alignment in the body, the mind, and the soul, as well as their alignment with one another, that creates your unique state of being, which is a miracle in itself.

What is your current state of being?

If you are living your life as if nothing is a miracle, most probably your body, mind, and soul are in misalignment with one another. You might feel your life has little or no meaning, without a goal or purpose, strangled with sadness, and doomed to despair whenever you are confronted with life challenges and obstacles that are as inevitable as death. On the other hand, if your current state of being is one of joy, hope, and purpose, you are living as if everything is a miracle because your body, mind, and soul are not only interconnected, but also in perfect balance and harmony with one another.

Alignment or realignment is interconnection of the body, mind, and soul to achieve ultimately the becoming and being of an individual’s true self.

Alignment and realignment of your body, mind, and soul will bring about your becoming, which is more important than your doing. That is to say, the ultimate goal in believing that everything in life is a miracle is to discover your destiny, not in what you will do, but in what you will become. With a reenergized body, a rekindled mind, and a revived soul, you are now willing to become the person God wants you to be in order to discover what God wants you to do. Your becoming is your being.

Stephen Lau

Copyright© 2018 by Stephen Lau

Good Sleep and Feng Shui

Good Sleep and Feng Shui

Sleep is a natural human instinct. We go to bed when we are tired, or when it is bedtime. However, many people have problems with natural sleep: they go to bed, but they cannot fall asleep right away; or, worse, they rely on medications to put them to sleep. In other words, they have insomnia or sleep deprivation. 

With super-aging wisdom, you can acquire natural sleep through good feng shui, which is an ancient Chinese art based on the balance and harmony of yin and yang, and the Five Elements. Essentially, feng shui is the philosophical and scientific belief that there is an internal life energy, known as qi, that is responsible for bringing oxygen and nutrients to different parts of the human body for health and wellness. If there is any blockage or stagnation of this smooth and natural flow of qi energy, then health is significantly compromised, resulting in insomnia, not to mention disease and disorder.

Given that natural sleep is contingent on the relaxation of muscles, the regulation of body temperature and humidity, the optimization of breathing, and the stability of emotions, feng shui may play a pivotal part in the science of natural sleep.

Apply the following principles of feng shui to your sleep environment to enhance your natural sleep:

1. Your bedroom should be a square or a rectangle in shape to enable the free flow of qi. A bedroom too cluttered with objects or furniture does not contribute to an optimum environment for natural sleep.  If you sit on your bed and look around, you would be able to decide if there are items that have no place in the bedroom, such as a computer work station. Do you feel that there is any trapped qi in the bedroom that may create an imbalance of yin and yang? Do you feel that there are too many objects that visually clutter your bedroom.

2. According to good feng shui, you bed should be raised, that is, it should not be lying flat on the floor, in order to encourage the free flow of qi energy.

3. Your bed should be strategically placed in the bedroom. Do not place your bed between windows and doors, or between two doors, where energy will directly disrupt your natural sleep. Also, try not to place your bed in a spot of direct sunlight: the energy of the sun does not conduce to natural sleep.

4. You should avoid hanging mirrors on the walls. If you do need a mirror in the bedroom, do not place it directly opposite the bed. The reason is that you do not want the mirror to reflect the qi energy back to you while you sleep.

The above are some of the basic principles of good feng shui that can be applicable to your sleep environment to optimize your natural sleep.

To learn more about yin and yang, and the Five Elements, visit my web page: Chinese Healing.

Stephen Lau

Copyright© by Stephen Lau

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Feng Shui Secrets: Learn the no-nonsense ancient secrets of the Orient to improve your health, wealth, and even romance. Learn the secrets to change your life!

SleepTracks Sleep Optimization Program: The No. 1 sleepless and insomnia solution.

Use Your Intellect and Not Your Intellogence

According to recent CNN health news “Learn to Live with It: Becoming Stress-Free”, use your intellect, and not your intelligence, to manage and cope with your everyday stress.

Intelligence is knowledge, which doesn’t help you with stress; intellect, on the other hand, is wisdom, which may help you coping with stress.

Stress comes from the internal, and not the external. Stress originates from the ego-self. You have an ego, and therefore you “expect” things, people, and circumstances to do things your way to satisfy your ego. If they don’t meet your expectations, they become your stressors. NO EGO NO STRESS. You need intellect, which is essentially human wisdom, to let go of your ego in order to be stress-free. It’s just that simple.

Here is the health news on stress, which volumes of intellect vs intelligence:  

“People the world over believe that stress comes from external sources.

One complains of a nagging wife or hysterical husband. Another finds fault with the demands of work or the exploitation of management. Someone else grumbles at summer being too hot or winter being too cold.

Everyone thus lives with the belief that factors outside themselves produce stress -- so their entire focus is on correcting the external world. Yet despite our best efforts to fix these external factors, the problems remain unsolved and our minds continue to be consumed by stress.

Pleasure or pain, joy or sorrow, peace or stress—these are not found in external objects or beings. They are found in the relationship you have with those things.

For example one person finds pleasure in smoking cigarettes. Another detests them. One man may go to his lawyer to divorce his wife while another waits, desperately wanting to marry her. A cigarette produces pleasure to one, pain to another. The same lady produces joy for one, sorrow for another.

In life, be it with business or family, relationships matter. Lack of a proper relationship leads to frustration and builds up stress. Ironically, people take utmost care to choose the "right partner," but fail to set up the "right relationship" with that person -- and lose peace and harmony in the process.

It is not whom or what you meet in life that matters but how you meet it.

Your relationship with the world is entirely dependent on the nature of your inner personality. Your inner personality comprises two things: the mind and the intellect.

The mind desires and feels. The intellect reasons, judges, and decides.

When the intellect loses control over the mind's desires, you become disturbed. Stress is the mental agitation caused by unfulfilled desires. Thus the fundamental requirement for a stress-free life is to develop a strong intellect and control desires.

Intellectual strength is distinct and different from intelligence. Intelligence is mere storage of information—knowledge acquired from external sources and educational institutions, from teachers and textbooks. Any amount of intelligence cannot, per se, develop your intellect. The intellect is developed by individual effort through exercising one's faculty of questioning and reasoning.

With the lack of development of the intellect, people fail to understand that every human being is distinct and different from another—that each is governed by his or her own singular nature.

Therefore, we should assess the nature of each human individually. But few follow this practice in life. Without making individual assessments you are not able to relate to others properly. As a result, you expect one to behave differently from one's fundamental nature.”

The bottom line: Let go of your pre-conditioned mindset to think out of the box to attain intellect, and not intelligence, to live a stress-free life. Get the ancient Tao wisdom from China to have an empty mindset to reverse your thinking.

Stephen Lau

Copyright© by Stephen Lau

Winning the Game of Life

Life is a game in which there are always winners and losers. The secret to winning the game of life is to discover the secrets of living well, which are also the secrets of self-healing. Without healing, the game of life is over and lost.

Time

Time is a crucial factor in winning the game of life. Most of us live by the clock, and, worse, have the illusion that we must live by the clock. Unfortunately, we all have only 24 hours a day: time is an equalizer of man. Effective time management may help you only get more done within your time frame, but more is not necessarily better. Instead, learn to control your own experience of time--in particular, the experience of timelessness, which is the present moment. The past is gone, the future is unknown, and only the present is real. Learn to slow down and experience that timelessness by focusing on one thing at a time. In that way, you not only create your own rhythm of life but also enhance your acute awareness of time, which is the art of living well. As a result of doing one thing at a time, you will always have time for everything, including time for yourself. 

Attitude

Humans are mortal. As such, most of us have constant worries about getting sick and even thoughts of premature death. Living under the shadow of disease and death may cause hypochondria (vicarious experiencing symptoms of disease) in many individuals. Unfortunately, the disease symptoms are not only real but also debilitating.

Stop worrying about getting a serious illness: getting the disease symptoms does not necessarily mean going to get the disease itself. Instead, learn to decode your body language; it may be revealing some healing secrets to you through those disease symptoms.

Aspirations

Winning the game of life requires aspirations. Discover what you really want out of life. Life must have a purpose or dreams to go with that purpose. Identify your dreams, and pursue them with passion and persistence. 

The greatest asset in life is health. A winner in the game of life cannot do without it. 

Stephen Lau

Copyright© by Stephen Lau

The Thinking Mind and the Ego-Self

The human mind plays a pivotal role in life and living -- how an individual makes his or her everyday decisions and life choices, which become that individual's life experiences and memories that ultimately affect how that individual thinks. Thoughts are the raw materials with which an individual creates his or her ego-self. 

We all have an ego-self, which defines who we are. But an "inflated" ego-self may distort how we think -- transforming ourselves into someone that we are not. To protect or sustain that false ego-self, we often unduly create stress for ourselves.

Many people don't think; they simply react, and their actions or reactions are controlled by their subconscious minds, or how they perceive themselves. 

The bottom line: we must learn how to think effectively; just as Albert Einstein says: "Thinking is difficult, and that's why so few people do it."

No Ego No Stress is made up of 4 parts.

PART ONE: An Introduction to Stress

It explains how and where stress comes from; the damage and devastation of stress to human health.

PART TWO: Conventional Wisdom

The major life stressors come from career, money, relationship, adversity, and time. Conventional wisdom offers many strategies for stress relief, such as exercise, herbs, medications, meditation, and psychotherapies, among many others. Conventional wisdom may reduce stress levels, but it does not eradicate stress completely. Conventional wisdom only complements the ancient Tao wisdom for ultimate stress relief.

PART THREE: Tao Wisdom

This part not only explains what Tao wisdom is all about, but also contains the complete translation in simple English of all the 81 short chapters of “Tao Te Ching” which is one of the most translated works in world literature. Going through the whole script, interpreted and translated by the author, will enable you to understand the essentials of Tao wisdom for stress-free contemporary living.

PART FOUR: No Ego No Stress

Stress originates from the human mind: how it perceives and processes life experiences. What is stress to one individual may not be stress to another. This part explains in detail how having no ego can eradicate all stress related to career, relationship, money, adversity, and time.

Stress is one of the many underlying causes of human diseases, especially autoimmune diseases, and a major stumbling block in natural health and self-healing. Unfortunately, stress is common in modern living: it may come from careers, relationships, finance, and simply everyday living. To get rid of stress, you need more than just relaxation techniques to help you:  you need to get rid of your ego. Without your  ego, you have no stress. It's just simple!

Get your book: NO EGO NO STRESS.

Get Tao wisdom -- the ancient wisdom from China to learn how to cope with life's challenges and difficulties in order to live your life without stress as if everything is a miracle.

Stephen Lau

Copyright© 2018 by Stephen Lau

If You Just Don't Die!

IF YOU JUST DON'T DIE!

Human Existence

We all exist in this world. For the believers, their existence is a result of the Creator’s unfathomable plan for them; for the non-believers, their existence comes from their parents. No matter who we are, we don’t have much of a choice, except to continue to exist. According to a 2013 report of the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, nearly one in five American adults (43.8 millions) had some form of mental illness. Surprisingly, not too many of those who were depressed would want to commit suicide or end their lives prematurely; they just wanted to continue to live a life maybe that was different from what they were currently living. In other words, irrespective of our mental conditions or current situations, the majority of us would still want to continue to exist in this world—maybe just wishing we could continue living our lives in a happier and more contented way for a little longer.

The Unrealistic Quest

In ancient times, many individuals were in quest of immortality, especially those in power. For example, Qin Shi Huang (秦始皇) (259 BC - 210 BC), the First Emperor of China, had made many futile attempts to discover and access legendary sources of immortality during his relatively short lifespan. Another example, the ancient pharaohs of Egypt might not have been on a quest for immortality because they earnestly believed that they were already immortal; nevertheless, they had spent an enormous amount of resources into retarding the decay of their physical bodies, as well as into building spectacular pyramids and grand tombs in which they could preserve their wealth and riches for their immortality.

The Realistic Realities

Nowadays, we all know the reality that all humans are mortal and that death is as inevitable as day becoming night.

“Is there anything we can do about our mortality?” This might be the question that many of us would like to ask ourselves.

First of all, man’s perceptions of mortality always change with age and time. If you ask a young adult if he or she would want to live long, probably the answer is “I don’t know” or “I just don’t want to grow too old and decrepit, like my grand-parents.” The young adult’s perspective of mortality also explains why many of the younger generation are living a reckless lifestyle as if there is no tomorrow.

Naturally, their perception of mortality would change over the years as they grow older with a family of children, or if they have a successful career with all the trimmings of a luxurious lifestyle that they would like to continue. A longer lifespan would then become an extension of their own legacy or continuation of their enjoyment of the fruits of their own accomplishments. The inscription on the tombstone of Bruce Lee (李小龍), the Hollywood actor, reads: “The key to immortality is first living a life worth remembering.” That says much about the hope of many to extend beyond the grave.

As aging continues, the fear of death or the unknown might also dawn on humans, driving some of the elderly into craving a longer lifespan in order to delay and defer the inevitable.

Indeed, many people may have different perspectives of their own mortality, depending on their upbringing, the life experiences they have gone though, their religious beliefs, as well as the meanings of death and dying to them. As a result of the differences, some may focus too much on death to the extent of creating death anxiety, while others may deliberately deny the existence of death, just like the ostrich burying its head in the sand.

Since the beginning of the 20^th century, the life expectancy of Americans has significantly increased from 47 to almost 80. How long do you wish to live, if you just don’t die? And what would you do with your life, if you just don’t die?

The objective of this book is neither to convince you to crave longevity, nor to show you how to live to one hundred and beyond. It simply presents you with the consciousness of living the rest of your years as if everything is a miracle—if you just don’t die!

Stephen Lau

Copyright©2018 by Stephen Lau

Ancient Wisdom and Modern Medicine

Ancient Wisdom and Modern Medicine

Everybody wants to live not only a better but also a longer life. Living well is a common human pursuit, but it may often turn out to be only a carrot and stick-forever unattainable. Why? It is because living well is an art that requires profound ancient wisdom, not just the conventional wisdom of modern medicine, in order to live a disease-free life.

The human body has built-in body wisdom that keeps it young and healthy, that is, an innate awareness of its basic needs, as well as its warning signs and signals of internal disharmony that may lead to imminent disease and disorder. Therefore, wisdom is required to enhance this human consciousness to create a new environment in which the biochemistry of the body becomes the substance of awareness of beliefs, emotions, and thoughts, thereby instrumental in maintaining and sustaining the overall wellness of an individual to remain disease-free as much as and as long as possible.

Body wisdom is no more than everyday eating and living habits. Eating is a science, and living is an art; they complement each other, just as "yin" and "yang" do. Human wisdom is, essentially, the capability in creating and managing this art and science to live a better and a longer life.

Ancient wisdom, however, is not the same as contemporary wisdom. The former has more to do with the mind -- how it thinks and perceives; the latter focuses more on knowledge acquisition, and its practical applications in life.

A classic example of ancient wisdom is that of Lao Tzu, an ancient sage in China some 2,600 years ago. He was the author of the immortal Chinese classic "Tao Te Ching," which is one of the most translated and extensively read books of all time. According to legend, Lao Tzu wanted to leave China for Tibet, but he was stopped at the city gate, where he was forced to put down his wisdom in writing before he could leave. Reluctantly, he expressed his profound and eternal wisdom in only 5,000 words, and that was how "Tao Te Ching" came into being..

How does Tao wisdom help in living a better and a longer life?

Lao Tzu's wisdom is unique in that it emphasizes "reverse" thinking of the human mind, instead of the "conditioned" contemporary mindset. In other words, one must, first and foremost, have an empty mind before one can even think out of the box, not to mention creating one's own box in thinking. To illustrate, Lao Tzu's focus on "under-doing" (as opposed to "over-doing" or "the more, the better" contemporary mindset), "living in the present" (as opposed to "multi-tasking" modern lifestyle), and "no expectation of result" (as opposed to "goal-oriented" or "goal-setting" attitude of this day and age) is conducive to creating internal peace and harmony, which is the essence of living a stress-free life. The essentials of Tao wisdom are fundamental to the art of living well and the science of healthy living without stress.

In addition, Lao Tzu believed that true wisdom lies in internalizing and self-intuiting eternal truths. Unlike contemporary wisdom, Tao wisdom has no blueprint for all -- just as the health of an individual is based on the unique body chemistry of that individual; true wisdom, therefore, is acute awareness of the needs of the body, which is known exclusively only to that individual.

Another example of ancient wisdom is that of Hippocrates (377-460 BC), the "Father of Medicine." His basic principles of health and wellness are profound. For example, Hippocrates said: "Let food be your medicine and medicine be your food." His wisdom is quite contrary to the conventional wisdom of modern medicine, which overtly emphasizes the use of drugs. The United States is the riches but also the sickest country in the world, and our healthcare costs have skyrocketed in recent decades.

Hippocrates also expressed his wisdom in the art of living: "An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure." The wisdom of modern medicine focuses on cure through drugs and procedures, rather than prevention through a holistic approach to health and wellness of the body, the mind, and the spirit. The wisdom of modern medicine is simply on quick fixing the symptoms, instead of preventing their occurrence in the first place.

The wisdom of Hippocrates echoed that of Lao Tzu's "non-doing" or "under-doing" when he said: "To do nothing is sometimes a good remedy." According to Hippocrates, "everything in excess is opposed to nature" because of the presence of the innate body wisdom in self-healing. Unfortunately, modern medicine chooses to do just the opposite, and thus opening the Pandora's box, creating many more human diseases and disorders through toxic drugs and procedures.

The Bible is the Word of God. It provides the ancient wisdom of God for health and wellness in the form of principles for the body, the soul, and the spirit. For example, in the Old Testament (Genesis 1:19), God prescribed ancient Hebrews with instructions to eat plants and seeds. As a matter of fact, in Hebrew language, the word "meat" is essentially "food" and not animal protein. However, it does not mean that God would like the Hebrews to become vegetarians; rather, fruits, vegetables, and herbs would have to be their basic or first diet. The Bible, in many instances, reveals the ancient wisdom in healthy eating to maintain health and wellness.

To conclude, wisdom is about acute awareness and profound perception through the human eye to see things as they really are, without looking at them through colored spectacles. In Matthew 6:22, Jesus said: "The light of the body is the eye. If therefore your eye be single, your body will be full of light." True human wisdom is how we perceive and internalize our life experiences, based on an understanding of who we really are and what our essential roles are in this world, as well as of the natural laws of things. With this profound understanding, we will look at everything and everyone around us in perspective. One final word: without true human wisdom, it is difficult to understand the wisdom of God.

Stephen Lau
Copyright©2018 by Stephen Lau