Rakesh Sethi, BS, CAHP
Wellness Speaker/ Author/
Ayurvedic Practitioner
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Archive for the ‘Relationship Advice’ Category
How Often to Have Sex to Stay healthy & Age Gracefully?
How often is it healthy to have sex? Is it beneficial to have more or less often? What is sex? The act of sex connects two beings physically, emotionally, and spiritually. However, if sex is reduced to just a physical act between two beings, its subtle underlying benefits diminish significantly. Human beings like physical touch, emotional engagement, and even spiritual connection. Sex is the only act during which two human experience oneness of all physical, emotional, and spiritual beings. Each being for those brief moments cease to exist by itself. During these moments, is it a human being having a spiritual experience or a spiritual being having a human. You decide. But either way sex plays an important role in our health and aging gracefully. Health and wellness is promoted from the most subtle spiritual levels to gross physical levels of our being.
What Constitutes Sex?
Sex between a loving couple is an intimate expression of love. Sex is often mostly associated to having “hot and steamy” intercourse. This is due to our culture creating such an image about sex. While at times a couple will have such enjoyable moments but the sex is not just restricted to that. In fact, if you live with such expectations, you could be in for a big disappointment. Especially as you age, the sex drive you had at the age of 30 will not be the same at the age of 60. However, the inherent drive for being intimate to give, and to receive love and affection is just the same. It is up to two people to decide how they would like to express their love and sex can take many forms. So continuously redefining your sexual intimacy can not only bring you pleasure but it is also good for your health and aging gracefully.
How Often to Have Sex?
This of course is a very personal preference. However, ancient medical system- Ayurveda offers some general guidance here. For a healthy person, it is based on how much sexual tissue a person can afford to lose in a particular time of the year (or season). Our body’s nature inside behaves according to the natural cycle outside. (however, our mind- that’s a different story) So follow the guidance below:
- In the fall/winter, body is in the fast “build & store” mode to deal with winter. If you lose sexual tissue, it is replenished quickly. So in the fall/winter you can enjoy sex once per day.
- In the spring, body is slowly relinquishing fat stored during winter to become light for summer. If you lose sexual tissue, it is replenished slowly. So in the spring you can enjoy sex twice per week.
- In the summer, body naturally wants to eat and stay light. If you lose sexual tissue, it takes a lot longer to replenish the tissue. So in the summer you can enjoy sex twice per month.
Note: Diet should be modified to match the seasonal requirements. Also age and other personal health conditions should be considered in forming your sexual habits. Going against the natural cycle means depleting your sexual tissues. The consequences of living with depleted sexual tissues is decreased immunity, infertility, and decreased energy. This in turn will make you susceptible to diseases, loss of health, and speedup aging.
When we follow the rules of how often to have sex, sex is not only a pleasurable activity that supports aging gracefully but also promotes health and wellness from the most subtle spiritual levels to gross physical levels of our being.
Health Tip: Use Amrit herbal formula to rejuvenate and build all tissues, including reproductive. Both men and women can take this as directed.
“Young Man Kissing his lovers neck” Image courtesy of stockimages at FreeDigitalPhotos.net
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How Do I Save This Marriage or a Relationship? Part 3
This is third article in this series. (Click here to read Part 1.) Both partners form a certain image of the other and along with that create certain expectations in their minds. However, it is next to impossible that partners will meet expectations as per the image in their mind about the other. This is one of the ingredients in the recipe for unhappy relationships and marriages. The fact is each person is bound to act with the nature he or she is born with. Can you ever expect a tiger changing its nature to a deer and vice-versa? You can not! However, lucky for us, to some extent humans can change their nature overtime. To save this marriage or relationship, you can try to change your partner, but understand the changes may come slowly or may not come at all so be prepared to accept your partner as they are.
I am not suggesting you accept your partner blindly. Or on the other hand look for another partner because new partner will come with new differences so in either case you would have to deal with differences in nature. My suggestion is, if you would like to save this marriage or relationship, carefully analyze and understand your partner’s nature, try to make changes where your partner is willing change, and adapt yourself to deal with your partner’s nature, where he/she you know will not change.
The other common mistake is partners enter into a relationship with an attitude that they have a right over the other partner to place demands; after all, they have earned this by committing rest of their life to this relationship. Such dictatorial attitude only creates resentment in the other partner. Overtime, this sinks a marriage or any relationship. To save this marriage or any relationship, you must form an attitude of duty and service and NOT of rights and demands. You must think in terms of your duty towards your partner and how best you can serve your partner. Such an attitude from both partners can bring happiness and harmony to marriage or any relationship.
You might say what if I do it but my partner doesn’t reciprocate in the same way. While in this case, it can be difficult to save your marriage or relationship, but always remember this; a true service is done without the expectation of any thing in return and second no action goes unrewarded. Every action has an equal and opposite reaction. Somehow through society or others goodness will come back to you. This is the law of nature. You can see this law in action by looking at the lives of many famous people, for example, Gandhi, Martin L. King, who gave without expecting anything in return and they received multifold in return. I am only mentioning theses examples to substantiate that the nature’s law works and it will work for you as well.
I hope you will reflect on the wisdom behind these suggestions. Once you connect with the wisdom in these higher values, your intellect strengthens your resolve with the support of your consciousness. With this strength, you can control your mind’s whims and demands that create disharmony within you. This, I hope, in turn will help you create harmony and happiness in any unhappy relationship and save this marriage.
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Unhappy with Marriage: Try Using the Right Emotions Part 2
This is a second article in this series of articles (Click here to read Part 1.) People, unhappy with their marriage, often try to save the marriage or relationship by indulging in sensual pleasures or using sense objects to please each other. This works like a magic when genuine emotions are propelling these actions. Though your intent and emotions are genuine, but what about when and how often you should indulge? Many people overindulge in the sensual and material pleasures and go on indiscriminately pleasing their partner. At surface, this appears wonderful and frankly who wouldn’t love to receive more attention and pampering, especially when unhappy with marriage. But let us take a closer look.
Keep in mind that all sensual acts (like sex) and sense objects pleasing to your five senses come with a diminishing value. Meaning the first experience is always more thrilling, exciting, and pleasing than the each subsequent one. So overindulgence and indiscriminate use of sensual acts and objects diminishes the sensual pleasure you draw from them and gradually all pleasure is disappears. Subsequently, you end up indulging in such acts not to draw pleasure but only to avoid pain and discomfort. This is nature’s law that governs our five senses and you can not change it. So use this knowledge to when you are unhappy with marriage or relationship in the right way. Use your intellect to control your tendencies to over please your partner indiscriminately.
Another mistake people make is over expressing their love or in other words “pouring it on too thick” indiscriminately. Imagine, if you are on the receiving end of it, it would be uncomfortable and difficult to reciprocate. The saying is so true that it is far more difficult to receive love than to give. Especially, when you receive indiscriminately you also begin to question its genuineness. So you must refrain from throwing around loving emotions on any chance you get, otherwise you will loose the significance of this emotion to your partner.
Your goal is to genuinely connect emotionally and uplift your partner but know your limits. You must exercise balance on how often you indulge in sensual pleasures and when it is appropriate to indulge. Indiscriminate and over use of the sense objects and emotions create feelings of obligation, cast doubt on genuineness, and create unnecessary weight on a receiving partner. Unintentionally or intentionally when you are unhappy with marriage and you behave in this way, it could backfire. It may turn even a happy marriage into an unhappy marriage much less fixing the unhappy marriage. Let your intellect be vigilant and exercise control over indiscriminate and excessive use of pampering & sensually stimulating emotions. Please proceed to Part 3 in this series of articles (will be posted in 4 days)
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How to Create Happiness When Unhappy in Relationship or Marriage? Part 1
People enter in a relationship or marriage with an expectation that a new relationship will bring happiness. But the fact is a new relationship by itself neither comes with happiness or unhappiness. To start a relationship with such an expectation can set you up for a disappointment and make you unhappy in relationship from the very beginning. Think of a relationship like a number “zero” and what you make of it from there, it depends on you. If you place this “zero” in the right place, the value of a number is increased. Similarly how you position relationship in your mind, the happiness in your life is increased or decreased. Happiness is a state of mind. The mind has such power that it can turn heaven into hell or hell into heaven. When your mind lives in balance and harmony, you will create happiness even out of the most unhappy situations.
What throws your mind out of balance and harmony? A short answer is your impulsive desires. A mind is always full of wants, needs, and constantly places demands that pull you in all different directions. You will often find that a lot of these desires and demands are not important and they are only creating disharmony. This is where your intellect must step in and control the mind so it does not take off in all directions indiscriminately. The following example illustrates this phenomenon very well.
However, a person whose intellect is strong will be able to control the mind and maintain balance & harmony in inner self. A person with harmony in inner self will also produce happiness and harmony in outside relationships. The inner self, mind and intellect, of a person plays significantly more important role than the outer “shell”, body, in creating a happiness and harmony in unhappy relationship. If you have a strong mind but weak intellect, that will create disharmony and imbalance in you. How can you expect to create happy and harmonious relationship or marriage if your inner self is living in disharmony?
You must develop a stronger intellect to keep mind in check and maintain harmony in the inner self. Thus first important step in creating harmony and happiness when unhappy in relationship or marriage is to create harmony in your inner self. Please follow to the next article part 2 on this subject.
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What is Unconditional Love and Its Role in Our Relationships?
What is unconditional love? Simple as it may appear, it is perhaps the most misunderstood & misused phrase in our relationships. Unconditional love is a benevolent feeling that emerges from deeper level of our Consciousness (our life coach) for all of creation- rocks, plants, animals, human beings, etc., regardless of their shape, size, color, nature, or actions in the nature. 
It is because every one of us has the same Universal Consciousness that is pervading through all life & nonlife forms connecting all of creation to ONE source.
Observe nature & you will find Universal Consciousness expressing Itself differently through each entity in creation depending upon what “clothing” it’s wearing and what role it’s playing in the nature. Thus the Universal Consciousness is conditioned by the “clothing” it is wearing. Once we understand this truth, living with unconditional love for all forms & beings becomes not only easy but brings peace to us as well.
What is unconditional love in our relationships with other beings and creation around us? Well, let me try to answer this by telling an interesting mythological story. A very long time ago a king cobra snake ruled good middle portion of the forest by using his wits & scary tactics. Most people & animals were scared of him and tried to take different trails to avoid confronting him. One day the snake overheard some people travelling thru the forest about a great saint. Out of curiosity, snake decided to go and listen to what this saint had to say. Snake didn’t want to create any trouble around so many people so he hid himself between the rocks where he could still clearly hear the saint. The saint spoke truths about of Universal Consciousness, unconditional love, and peace. The message resonated with snake and from that day forward he decided to change his behavior towards his fellow beings. The snake started to approach all passing through with politeness & affection but much to his dismay he met with rejection and even got stones thrown at him. Injured, bruised, & with tears in skin, snake was lying on the side of a trail when the saint just happen to pass thru there. Saint asked the snake what happened. After listening to the snake’s story, saint clarified that first you must know who you are before jumping into showing unconditional love to just anyone.
The story makes a point, even though unconditional love resonates at our consciousness level, we can not relate unconditionally at the physical level. First we must know our own conditioning, what “clothing” are we wearing, and then be aware of what “clothing” a person or creation in front of us is wearing. So while the Loving can and should be unconditional, the Relating at physical level can not be unconditional. If we do not follow this nature’s rule we will be battered, bruised, abused, and left in misery in our relationships.
One Notable Exception– This rule doesn’t apply to a Self-realized person. Such a person has merged & become one with consciousness. His thoughts & actions are no longer conditioned by his own (ego) body mind & intellect. Loving & relating for such a person has transcended all physical conditioning & is seen & felt by others simply as pure consciousness. Examples are Christ, Buddha, & a few others.
So before we reach the Self-realized state, what can we do?
As long as we engage in life thru our physical body, mind, and intellect, we see ourselves as separate & distinct from others and our outward actions are conditioned with our desires and ego. Inadvertently, this makes the relating with the outer physical world conditional as well. Therefore, for now we must utilize our Unconditional Love (life coach) to guide our actions to be selfless and harmless to others and environment around us. As a result, one can imagine harmonious relationships, peace, and promoting health & wellness in their lives.
What Do You Think? Feel Free to Speak Your Mind
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