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Date: March_30_2001
Title: Nature of the Soul
Category: Soul
Duration: 1 min., 22 seconds
Date Given: March 21, 2001

A cyberspace cadet, who has had the satisfaction of having a few questions answered, asks another one, from Kentucky, the United States of America. Sean wants to know about the nature of the soul. He is aware he is not his physical body, this is his earthly experience. "But how about the mind and emotions? Do we carry them with us? What is the nature of the soul?"

The nature of your soul, Sean, is absolute bliss, perfection, solidarity, alertness. The mere fact that you can make the remark, "My mind wanders all the time." What is seeing the mind wander is the eye of the soul that is not wandering.

I just finished a wonderful book, 'Living with Siva', over a thousand pages, explaining in detail more about the nature of the soul and how you can minimize emotions, get control of thought, and realize that you are a pure, untarnished soul, that has a mind, that has emotions, that has a physical body. The soul has these three great tools.
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Sadhaka Thondunatha says: "Having the whole monastery work one day is worth two full time staff members, because these men all have such diverse talents and we can put them to work on projects that otherwise our department would never be able to accomplish on our own."

We were honored with a visit from a representative of Banta Publications Group who prints Hinduism Today in Liberty, Missouri. This is Judy Harness who was the Customer Service Representative at Banta when Hinduism Today converted from a newspaper to a color magazine in 1996. She worked with our team over the phone for nearly two years and was instrumental in helping us get started. This is the first time a Banta rep has come to visit our monastery. Banta Publications has been doing an outstanding job with the pre-press, printing, addressing and distribution of the magazine and we can't thank everyone at Banta enough for the great job they do and the wonderful attitude of service and "problem solving" spirit that they bring into the relationship.

Our 11-acre village in India is home to 75 Indian master craftsmen who live there and work each day on the carving of the sacred white granite Siva Temple which will soon be shipped soon to Kauai and assembled. See our latest February 2001 Building Fund Progress Report and join our family of contributors today!

The Iraivan Temple work site outside the city of Bangalore in the state of Karnataka, South India, is in a dry cool area. Here 11 acres were kindly granted to the project by His Holiness Sri-la-Sri Balagangadharanathaswami who is the head of the Adichunchanagiri Mutt. This is a very large monastic institution in Karnataka which manages 100's of smaller institutions throughout the state including numerous hospitals, orphanages, homes for battered women etc.

After the land was chosen, in 1991 we went to Balagangadharanathaswami's office with a map of the site and a water "dowser" was brought in. Using a pendulum, he carefully went over the map of the land (this event took place many miles away from the site itself.) until the pendulum's movements indicated to him where the location of water was. Both Acharya Ceyonswami and Acharya Kumarswami were also present at this event.

Our workers went to the site and drilled a well right at that location on the map and lo! water was found. Since this area is relatively dry, this was a great find and the water that was found at the temple worksite now serves the needs of the people in the surrounding area, as well as provides for the needs of the lovely gardens that have been propagated by our temple manager family, Jiva Rajasankara and his wife Kanmani and sons Thuraisingam and Sentiladhiban.

Wrapping stones... you can see parts of pillars on either side.

Now to loading into the container.

We need your help! The final phase of the temple which is the jointing and erection of the already carved stones is soon to begin on Kauai. Please donate generously.

Into the container.

Ready for Kauai. If you are a temple donor and would like to join us for the first stone laying ceremonies, please contact Acharya Ceyonswami for details.

12 Glorious Days, 8 Enchanting Countries and One Chance in a Lifetime! Imagine spending 12 days with one of the greatest spiritual leaders of this century. Satguru Sivaya Subramuniyaswami will be leading this exotic educational and spiritual voyage himself combining the mystical path of Indian spirituality with a superlative retreat from it all. Take advantage of this one chance to be in close proximity with a living master. Come with us on an inner and outer voyage to Northern Europe and Russia. www.innersearch.org