This pleasure, appears as poison in the beginning but is like nectar in the end, comes by the grace of Self-knowledge.
~ Bhagavad Gita
Love is the energizing elixir of the universe, the cause and effect of all harmonies.
~Djalal ad-Din Rumi
How would you like to transform ordinary food into healing elixir Ambrosia? Like Greek gods and goddesses, you have the power to transform everyday food into nourishing nectar through the healing power of intention. More than its biological effects on the body, food contains divine essence, your source. A loving, meditative awareness of food, when consciously cultivated, becomes a bridge to Mother Nature, the Divine, the mystery that is life itself.
Spiritually imbued food is food that has been transmuted with loving, healing energy. Your thoughts and state of mind directly influence other living beings, such as soil, plants, and animals. Likewise, you can transfer energy within your own system into your food, changing it from one form to another.
Spiritual ceremonies (chanting, rituals, prayers, cooking) initiate this transformation of energy from one form to another. By viewing food preparation as a sacred ritual, you can use loving intention to improve the quality of food for healing. In his book Messages from Water, Japanese scientist Masuru Emoto had amazing results in his experiments on water. He discovered that water exposed to limiting thoughts deformed crystals, while water exposed to loving thoughts created beautiful crystals. Does this inspire you to set your loving intention before cooking?
Like a divine offering to the gods, food transformed by love provides nourishment for the spirit. So, when you sit down to eat, say a prayer to acknowledge the contribution of all living beings to the food: sun, wind, rain, soil, plants, farmers, animals, friends and family. After all, much love went into transforming your food into Ambrosia!
The power of love to change bodies is legendary, built into folklore, common sense, and everyday experience. Love moves the flesh, it pushes matter around…. Throughout history, “tender loving care” has uniformly been recognized as a valuable element in healing.
~Larry Dossey
The founder of macrobiotics, George Ohsawa, said that it is very easy to cure a disease with macrobiotics, but it is much more difficult to cure the person. He meant that just by following the principles of macrobiotics and eating healthy foods, the person will cure her illness, but if she holds resistance in his body, she will go back to old habits and the dis-ease will return.
Let’s look at the underlying cause of dis-ease, which is the belief that you are separate from the whole. You must be willing to undergo a transformation on all levels for healing to occur. Because thought is the catalyst for action, it is a your thoughts that manifest dis-ease, and if these thoughts are not changed, you will continue to be stagnated.
Your thoughts have the power to affect your choice of food to eat. By managing limiting thoughts, you can make better choices in terms of food and lifestyle, change your eating habits, and achieve a healthy body. Eating energetically balanced foods strengthens your aura, which in turn helps you continue to manage your thoughts. In this way, healthy food is the foundation for spiritual thinking. For example, in Hinduism, those who meditate avoid eating garlic and onions, because these foods carry a certain energy which agitates the mind.
Energetically balanced food is important to keep your body strong to achieve all you want to accomplish. Your body is a tool, which will manifest your ideas, if you take care of it. If your body is healthy, your mind will be healthy, as well, since the energy of body, mind, and spirit are merged and influence each other. When your organs are healthy, your emotions will also be balanced. Spiritually speaking, food carries the essence of the universe, which nourishes you on many levels. When one level is imbalanced, it affects the other levels, and you become unable to function wholistically. Thus, you may see yourself as a victim, choosing to become dependent on others to make choices for you. However, when you are healthy, you can make decisions for yourself and participate in the growth of society.
Besides providing important nutrients, such as protein, carbohydrates, vitamins, and minerals for healthy organ and immune functions, the role of food in health is important in maintaining overall energetic balance of the body. Cooking is an alchemical process, so you can adjust your cooking styles to balance the constitution and condition of your body to prevent and recover from illness.
You can also eat according to the seasons, which imbue food with certain energetic qualities that nourish your energetic body. As each season unfolds, plants absorb the energy of the sun and environment. This seasonal energy is incorporated into the leaves, which is then transmuted into your aura when you eat them. Just as miso is aged for two complete summers to produce the full enzymatic activity necessary for fermentation, plants contain the activity of all the seasons.
Your energetic body is fluid and changing in response to the subtle frequencies of the universe. This energetic body manifests as your physical body. So, if your main channel of receiving universal energy is blocked, then growth of your body is stunted and illness develops. Healthy food and loving thoughts help unblock your meridians and nourish your main channel (spine), so that you can receive universal energy and live in harmony with nature.
When you forget or choose not to listen to your intuition, you rely on information from outside sources for guidance on your food choices. When your energy is out of alignment with nature, your body can become weak and vulnerable to attack from viruses and bacteria. But when you live in harmony with the environment, you can learn to listen to your intuition. An energetically balanced diet allows you to receive energy from the universe so that you can communicate with your inner guides. By listening to your intuition, you can regain health by eating foods that balance your constitution and condition and your immune system and organs clean up cancer-causing toxins and pathogens.
Your awareness of your Oneness with nature becomes clear when your universal antenna is open. Eating food that is balanced and avoiding extremes allows you to be grounded, while aligning our energies with that of the universe. By eating food that is clean of toxins that create stagnation, your body is able to receive universal energy to manifest health in the wholistic sense. This health and wholeness is true wealth, because it is not achieved through any material object. So, remember to include some good old fashioned TLC in your cooking!
Keep Your Motor Running
When it comes to living a wholistic lifestyle, a change in diet is oftentimes the hardest part of the transformation. I know that sometimes nothing tastes better than a Big Mac, but our bodies naturally crave something much more nutritionally balanced than cheap meat topped off with random condiments and out-of-season vegetables. So if it is not enough for you to think of all of the advantages you can get by eating a better macrobiotic diet, think of all the disadvantages you can avoid by making some simple dietary adjustments and becoming one with nature and with yourself.
You are director and main character in your movie. Whatever you want to have happen will happen under your direction. All the world is your stage and the props and extras are waiting for your cue to perform the drama of your dreams. What message do you want to convey to your audience? What is the theme of the movie, your legacy that you want to leave behind for future generations?
Scripting is a useful tool to help you become clear about what you want. Scripting is a personal expression of your passion and sets up divine right timing to create a flow of energy straight to your door. When scripting, it is important to connect with the essences of your feelings and passion. This opens up communication with Spirit using Universal Language. There is no right or wrong way to script. I like to include gratitude and thanks for the gifts that are on their way to me. I also write in the present tense to emphasize that the gifts are already being given; it is up to me to be open to receiving them.
Recipe for Success: Writing Your Screenplay
Letter Format to Spirit
Date ___________
Dear Divine Team,
Write a divine incantation.
Begin in gratitude for your blessings.
Write your inner and outer intentions for today. The inner intentions focus on the spiritual essences (love, peace, joy, freedom) of how you want to feel on the inside. The outer intentions are what you want to intend on the outside.
Script your day. Begin with gratitude and focus on spiritual essences of how you want to feel. Use the present tense. Visualize your day in Technicolor.
Acknowledge Spirit in granting your gifts.
State that it is done.
Sign your name as if closing a letter.
Example of Screenplay
1-5-10
Dear Divine Team,
Om Shanti, Shanti, Shanti. Om Peace, Peace, Peace.
I begin in gratitude for my Divine Team, my Blessed Life, and my Abundance which overflows as Love and Light.
Today, my intention on the inside is to be open to Divine Inspiration and on the outside to connect with Higher Self in each person to meet, to have fun, and serve Humanity in the Highest Way possible.
I am so happy and grateful now that I am co-creating with Love a delicious macrobiotic meal. I am so happy and grateful now that my loved ones and I are connecting on the level of the Heart, and we are giving and receiving Love in the perfect amount. I am so happy and grateful for the Abundance of Life that is flowing to me.
In gratitude, I decree IT IS DONE. And SO IT IS. Amen.
In Love and Light, Julie S. Ong
Hollywood Feature
In Hollywood, every movie comes with a full production team. When it comes to your life, you have to play the leading actor, director, producer, and everything else. You get to set the lighting, design the set, pick the wardrobe, and choose your own props. Use all of these choices to your advantage! You’re playing by your rules to create the best life movie that you possibly can. So get out there and win yourself a metaphorical Emmy, because you certainly deserve it!
This above all: to thine own self be true,
And it must follow, as the night the day,
Thou canst not then be false to any man.
~William Shakespeare in Hamlet
Some people say that we must not be attached to our expectations. However, it is important to think about the end result, because the level of thought is how the visualization materializes. There is a difference between being attached to the end result and being focused on creating. Focusing on creating the goal with passion and emotion allows universal energies to flow, bringing about circumstances for the image to appear on the physical plane. But attachment to the goal with fear that it will not materialize creates suffering and blockages in the flow of universal energy through the energy centers of the body, called charkas. Focusing on what you desire rather than how it may appear moves you ahead with greater efficiency.
Move from holding onto the past to creating new opportunities and experiences in the present moment. Live from your true self, which knows no judgment and preconceived limitations. This your Life, and you are one with the Divine, living in the eternal present without boundaries of any kind.
There are four levels of living your truth. First, do what you can, setting aside the time and energy to create your dreams. Second, do what you must, performing the actions and priorities that define your life as you see it. Third, do what you love, following your calling and reason for living. Finally, be Love, just resting in your being-ness as human being, not human doing. At the fourth level, you realize your true self and co-create with the universe. What is your passion? Passion drives your soul to choose your experience. If you determine what you are passionate about, you will have the motivation to see it manifested.
Actors have the great challenge of incorporating a role so well into their being that they become the part. They take on the core character and identity so well, in fact, that they think, feel, and behave as if they had been born for the role. People who live from their passion are open to universal energy, and thus integrate their power and confidence to manifest their dreams. To create your vision, you must take on the core character, the feelings, thoughts, and behaviors, of your true identity. The first step is to unveil your authentic self.
Recipe for Success: Unveiling Your Authentic Self
Ask yourself these questions to help you uncover your Authentic Self. Remember to write your answers in your journal.
What is your passion? If you had all the resources (money, time, etc.) in the world and could create anything with your life, what would you do?
What is stopping you from living your life to the fullest now? What are your fears and limiting beliefs?
What are your perceptions of who you are? What role are you playing now?
What role do you want to play? Who is your role model? Tune in to the energy of the person. As if you were researching a role for a play, observe how your role model acts and lives. Take notes and pictures. Practice that person’s movements and dress in every detail.
Remember to follow the great Indian Guru Paramahansa Yogananda’s advice: “Do not take life’s experiences too seriously. Above all, do not let them hurt you, for in reality they are nothing but dream experiences. If circumstances are bad and you have to bear them, do not make them a part of yourself. Play your part in life, but never forget that it is only a role.” Now is your chance to let your true self shine. You are beautiful!
Secrets from My Macrobiotic Kitchen with Julie S. Ong 