Pitching for the Swami (Again)

The person I most enjoy promoting when I'm not promoting myself is Swami Beyondananda aka Steve Bhaerman. He never fails to perk me up when I'm feeling blah. Let the good Swami show you how to activate your clown chakra...



Lose Weightiness Now!

"I lost weightiness ... ask me how!" ~ Swami Beyondananda

In these stressful times, it's easy to gain weightiness. Weightiness gain is not your fault!

Work ... the economy ... and now the election season ... and pretty soon ... yes, that's right. You've gained weightiness. Well, if gravity's got you down, let levity lift you up!

Here are just some of the serious problems that can be caused by overweightiness:

* Irregularhilarity.
* Humorrhoids.
* Irony deficiency.
* Truth decay.

Absolutely FREE here is Swami's 5 step program to lose weightiness now!

1. Take a vow of levity! Remember, levity will help you rise above whatever is bringing you down. In a toxic situation? Laughter will keep you from taking it poisonally. Feel the levitational pull uplifting the corners of your mouth into a smile. You want to uplift humankind? Uplift your face first! Here is the levity vow: "All for fun ... and fun for all!"

2. Don't Get Even - Get Odd. Instead of staying stuck in dueling dualities, use your one-of-a-kindness to find the odd solution that beats the heck out of getting even.

3. When You See a Sacred Cow Milk It For All It's Worth. When our sacred cows give the milk of human kindness, we are fortified to take the bull by the horns.

4. Enlighten Your Load. Is your life stuffed with stuff? Unstuff it! Stuff is a major cause of weightiness. You'll be surprised that the more liquid you get, the more solid you will feel.

5. Wake Up Laughing, and Wise Up Loving. Time to wake up. You'll never lose weightiness if you keep hitting snooze. Wake up with a laugh, and end the day with an embrace, and if you are alone ... embrace yourself, and immerse yourself in a warm solution of love.

And in addition to these five steps toward fool-realization, a vital laugh force, and fully opened clown chakra, here are four things you can do every day!

Daily Weightiness Loss Exercise Plan.

1. Wake up laughing. As Swami says, "If you wake up with a funny feeling ... go with it." If you don't immediately laugh upon rising, then rise and start laughing. Nothing funny? Go look in the bathroom mirror. If you're still not laughing, pretend you're looking at someone else. Do that, and you'll laugh.

2. Do Ha-Ha-Ha Breaths. Very important to move the laugh force early in the day to insure regularhilarity. So, we use the vowel sounds, and we put a h- in front of it ... so we begin way up here at the top of our heads with a hee-hee-hee. Then we move down to the throat and we chuckle a heh-heh-heh. Next, down to the heart for some hearty laughter, ha-ha-ha, and now the belly laugh ho-ho-ho. and way down to the bottom hoo-hoo-hoo ... and now move the vowel sounds back up hoo-hoo-hoo, ho-ho-ho, ha-ha-ha, heh-heh-heh, hee-hee-hee ... ah, nothing like a good vowel movement early in the day.

3. Enlighten Up the News. You want to know where most weightiness gain occurs? In the morning, eating breakfast and watching the news or reading the paper. Why? All the studies are conclusive: The news puts on weightiness, and is a major factor in truth decay. That's why we recommend using mental floss after every serving of mainstream media. Just put your thumb and forefinger about six inches from each ear. Ready? Then, with a gentle back and forth motion, dislodge all the illogical logic, all the petrified bullshit, and every dysfunctional belief masquerading as reality. Ahhh ... you will feel so much better. Your synapses will start synapping again.

4. Play at Work, Work at Play. You know what the secret of a happy life is? To be able to answer yes to the question, "From this you make a living?" If you aren't doing what you love - or at least loving what you do - you are slathering on pounds of excess weightiness! So ... if you can't be with the work you love, love the work you're with. And if you hate the work you're with, love hating it. Invent a hilarious character, and use that character to complain loudly about everything you hate. Then laugh.

Note: If you begin feeling lightheaded due to sudden weightiness loss, simply surrender to the levitational pull. If symptoms of ascension continue, consult your metaphysician.

Help Others Lose Weightiness Too!

During this contentious election season where it's hard to escape barking dogmas and dueling dualities - not to mention feud poisoning - it's so very important to maintain regularhilarity. That's why we've extended Swami's Cosmic Comedy Specials throughout our upcoming Wake Up Laughing Wise Up Loving Tour.

First of all, you can order the Fool Enchilada Special for the very special price of just $59 (includes U.S. shipping) and get $112 value! That's more laughs per penny than the high-priced laughsitive!

And ... if you want to go audio only, you can order all four of Swami's hilarious CDs for just $39 (includes U.S. shipping).

If you want to immerse yourself in the what's, how's and why's of creating cosmic comedy, there is the Wake Up Laughing e-book, AND a four hour teleclass A Course In Laughter available for download for just $15.

And ... if you're in a really generous mood, you can be part of our Buddysattva program and get the Wake Up Laughing e-book for a dozen of your friends. Hey, that hole in the Bozone Layer that has compromised our planet's clown chakra can't heal without your help!

And remember, when it comes to laughter what goes around, comes around. The laugh you save may be your own!

Check out Swami Beyondanda's Ompage!

[First posted 1 October 2010, reposted 18 may 2016]

Wisdom of the Ridiculous: 3 timeless lectures by Alan Watts (repost)

Alan Wilson Watts (6 January 1915 – 16 November 1973) was a British philosopher, writer, and speaker, best known as an interpreter and populariser of Eastern philosophy for a Western audience.

Born in Chislehurst, he moved to the United States in 1938 and began Zen training in New York. Pursuing a career, he attended Seabury-Western Theological Seminary, where he received a master's degree in theology. Watts became an Episcopal priest but left the ministry in 1950 and moved to California, where he joined the faculty of the American Academy of Asian Studies.

Living on the West Coast, Watts gained a large following in the San Francisco Bay Area while working as a volunteer programmer at KPFA, a Pacifica Radio station in Berkeley. Watts wrote more than 25 books and articles on subjects important to Eastern and Western religion, introducing the then-burgeoning youth culture to The Way of Zen (1957), one of the first bestselling books on Buddhism.

In Psychotherapy East and West (1961), Watts proposed that Buddhism could be thought of as a form of psychotherapy and not just a religion. Like Aldous Huxley before him, he explored human consciousness in the essay, "The New Alchemy" (1958), and in the book, The Joyous Cosmology (1962).

Towards the end of his life, he divided his time between a houseboat in Sausalito and a cabin on Mount Tamalpais. His legacy has been kept alive by his son, Mark Watts, and by many of his recorded talks and lectures that have found new life on the Internet. According to the critic Erik Davis, his "writings and recorded talks still shimmer with a profound and galvanizing lucidity."

NOTE: These brilliant lectures were digitally rescued from analog audio recordings and made available to the present generation by Mark Watts, keeper of his father's wisdom archives. I suggest you bookmark this post and return to it from time to time - whenever you feel prompted to lean back and be reassured by a warm, human voice of crystalline intelligence, mental clarity, infinite compassion, spiritual depth, and supreme eloquence.

Alan Watts & The Skin-Encapsulated Ego

Several decades ago I stumbled upon the writings of a wry English theologian and philosopher named Alan Watts (1915-1973).

I owe Alan Wilson Watts a huge debt of gratitude for having provided me effortless access to the essence of Eastern mysticism as expressed in the Tao Te Ching and the basic tenets of Zen. Ironic, isn't it, that someone like me whose physical body can be categorized as "Asian" has to engage the timeless teachings of Eastern mystics through the medium of an Englishman's mind?

The most endearing - and enduring - quality of Alan Watts's writing is its elegant, poetic lucidity, and the tangible warmth of his exquisitely noble personality. Watts had the uncanny knack of drawing his readers gently into his private thought-streams and lofty musings minus the intellectual haughtiness of so many run-of-the-mill academics.

[Read the rest here.]

[First posted 11 May 2012. Reposted 2 July 2017]