A group of prestigious and internationally recognized leaders in physics, biophysics, astrophysics, education, mathematics, engineering, cardiology, biofeedback and psychology (among other disciplines) have been doing some brilliant work over at the Institute of HeartMath. The Institute of HeartMath is a (well recognized) non-profit research and education organization dedicated to helping people reduce stress, self-regulate emotions, and understand something that is commonly overlooked in mainstream biology: the intelligence of the heart and its effect on the brain.

A large portion of their research dives into heart and brain interaction, how they communicate with each other and how that affects our consciousness. For example, when a person is feeling really positive emotions like gratitude, love, or appreciation, the heart beats out a different message, and because the heart beats out the largest electromagnetic field produced in the body, the institute has been able to gather a significant amount of data.

Researchers from Oregon State University (OSU) have recently patented a strain of red marine algae; it’s called dulse. It grows very quickly and is jam packed full of protein, but that’s not even close to the most exciting part about it. This seaweed, when cooked, tastes like bacon! Vegans rejoice! Meat-eaters should be happy about this as well, as it is a much healthier alternative to that beloved taste. Some scientists are even going as far as to call it “God’s Vegetable.”

This seaweed grows in the wild along the Atlantic and Pacific coastlines. In dried form it is sold for around $90 a pound. Traditionally it is sold as a nutritional supplement (as it is a great source of iodine) or a cooking ingredient. Researcher, Chris Langdon and his colleagues at OSU’s Hatfield Marine Science Center have now created a new strain of dulse, that they have been growing for the past 15 years.

“But even in the much-publicized rebellion of the young against the materialism of the affluent society, the consumer mentality is too often still intact: the standards of behavior are still those of kind and quantity, the security sought is still the security of numbers, and the chief motive is still the consumer’s anxiety that he is missing out on what is “in.” In this state of total consumerism – which is to say a state of helpless dependence on things and services and ideas and motives that we have forgotten how to provide ourselves – all meaningful contact between ourselves and the earth is broken. We do not understand the earth in terms either of what it offers us or of what it requires of us, and I think it is the rule that people inevitably destroy what they do not understand.” –
Wendell Berry, The Art of the Comonplace: The Agrarian Essays

REI, an outdoor retail chain just announced that its 143 stores will remain closed on Black Friday, the biggest shopping day of the year.  Furthermore, the Seattle-based company will be paying its 12,000 employees  to not participate in black Friday, and spend the day outside instead.

We are having Full Moon in Taurus on Tuesday, October 27th at 12:05pm Universal Time. It is a Super Moon which is when a Full Moon is closer to the Earth than normal in its elliptical orbit.

Full Moons are the peak of the Moon cycle, as this is when the light of the Sun completely fills the Moon and marks the beginning of the following 2 week period when the light starts fading. This is known as the waning phase. Symbolically, because this is when the light begins to recede, this represents a time of release. Full Moons are generally the most intense and lively time of the Moon cycle.

The astrological themes for each Full Moon can start to be felt in the week leading up to it. The events and circumstances that occur in our lives on the exact day usually challenge us. The Sun and Moon are opposite each other, so whatever signs they are in will most strongly influence the themes.

The building where I used to run a meditation group was on the same street as a fire station; one could almost guarantee that sometime during the meditation a fire engine would come rushing past, sirens wailing. Not surprisingly, people would afterwards complain: “How could I meditate with that going on?”

How often have we felt something similar? There’s an unspoken assumption that the mind can only become quiet if the world around it is quiet. We imagine the ideal meditation setting to be somewhere far from the madding crowd—a retreat deep in a forest, a peaceful chapel, or the quiet of one’s own bedroom, perhaps. It is much harder for the mind to settle down in a noisy environment. Or is it?

I suggested to the group that the next time a fire engine came blasting by they look within and explore whether the sound really was that disturbing? After the following meditation, a participant reported how the noise no longer seemed a problem; it was there, but it didn’t disturb her. The disturbance, she realized, came not from the sound itself, but from wishing it weren’t there.