Existence is made out

Joy is the stuff existence is made of. So whenever you are moving towards becoming more existential, you will be becoming more and more full of joy and delight, for no reason at all. If you are moving into detachment, love will grow, joy will grow, only attachments will drop because attachments bring misery, attachments bring bondage, attachments destroy your freedom. Indifference is a pseudo-coin — it looks like detachment, but it only looks like detachment. Nothing will be growing in it. You will simply shrink and die.

Don’t try to achieve happiness

When you are trying to achieve happiness you will miss. The very effort to achieve happiness is absurd because happiness is here: you cannot achieve it. Nothing has to be done about it, you simply have to allow it. It is happening, it is all around you; within, without, only happiness is. Nothing else is real. Watch, look deep into the world, into trees, birds, rocks, rivers, into the stars, moon and sun, into people, animals — existence is made out of the stuff of happiness, joy. Relax and it fulfills you.

Love is not attachment

Love knows no attachment, and that which knows attachment is not love. That is possessiveness, domination, clinging, fear, greed — it may be a thousand and one things, but it is not love. In the name of love other things are parading, in the name of love other things are hiding behind, but on the container the label ‘love’ is stuck. Inside you will find many sorts of things but not love at all.

Are you afraid of aloneness?

Watch. If you are attached to a person, are you in love? Or are you afraid of your aloneness, so you cling? If the person dies or moves somewhere else or falls in love with someone else then you will kill this person or you may kill yourself and you will say, ‘I was so attached that I couldn’t live without her or without him’.

It is sheer foolishness. It is not love, it is something else. You are afraid of your aloneness, you are not capable of being with yourself. And you use the other person as a means for your own ends.

To use another person as a means is violence

Immanuel Kant has made it one of his fundamentals of moral life. He used to say that to treat a person as a means is the greatest immoral act there is. Because when you treat another person as a means — for your gratification, for your sexual desire, for your fear — you are reducing the other person to be a thing, you are destroying his or her freedom, you are killing his or her soul.

Courtesy Osho International Foundation/ www.osho.com

Slowly start unfolding the spiritual self

he beginning of a new year brings new resolutions, a desire to give direction and control to life.

So, it was that the family sat huddled, reviewing the year gone by, discussing resolutions, setting goals and methodology to achieve them. Looking back, year after year, we had fixed physical, professional, financial, social, family and intellectual goals. Many were achieved, some goals became meaningless and new ones emerged.

It becomes apparent that a major portion of time was spent on fulfilling responsibilities and equipping ourselves to live more comfortably and peacefully. 'Intellectual goals' were the ones which stood out: reading, reflection and analysis were in the realm of challenging the mind and understanding life.

The most interesting aspect of looking back is that 'yoga' gently entered life under the head 'physical goals' and slowly made way to 'intellectual goals' in terms of understanding life and self. And, finally, yoga emerged as a means of 'spiritual goal', adding a new dimension to our lives. In some ways, intellectual and spiritual goals merged.

Over the years, this 'nectarine' aspect of life, though always present and experienced in parts, was not fully tapped. Yoga brings with it a lifestyle based in the 'spirit of the self' which pervades all other aspects of life.

Yoga teaches us that this body is essentially an instrument for realising the ` Param Atman' . Besides the physical body, there is an immensely powerful yet soft and gentle `spiritual body'. To build a spiritual body is a goal. The question is how to put this concept in 'actionable'? Here is where yoga as a discipline and as a 'body of knowledge' comes to our help.

Though conceptually, the spiritual body would be one 'established in its pure pristine self' we can take its outward manifestation and try to achieve them. Thus, a well-developed spiritual body would manifest in this world with the following attributes: i) Calm, ii) Serene, iii) Magnetic, iv) Efficient, v) Dynamic, vi) Tranquil, vii) Joyous, viii) Pure, ix) Disciplined, x) Graceful, xi) Physically fit, xii) Focused, xiii) Constantly learning and improving.

This list is not exhaustive. It is just a means to understand that deep within when the spiritual body will evolve what would be its manifestation in outer physical world. So, the output would be the list stated above. What would be the inputs to nourish the spirit so that the spiritual body develops? Yoga and 'yogic living' give us 'tools' to nourish our spiritual self. The list here is: i ) Mantra, ii) Jap, iii) Asana, iv) Pranayama, v) Pratyahara, and vi) Dharana .

Also develop i) Vivek or discrimination, ii) Vairagya or non-attachment, iii) Always make a conscious 'sattvic' choice, iv) Complete listening, and v) Considered speech. The above inputs and assiduous development of vivek, vairagya , always making conscious sattvic choice and considered speech would lead to an output of a calm, serene, emotionally stable, physically fit and a magnetic personality which is constantly learning and improving itself.

The 'mantra' breaks the emotional, mental and physical knots or barriers within. The vibrational powers of mantra make the spirit free-flowing. The 'jap' of 'guru mantra' pervades the spiritual self and connects the spirit of self to a very powerful source of energy and intelligence. The 'asanas' done with awareness make the body a more efficient machine. The 'pratyahara' leads to the journey within and 'dharana' leads to a focused efficient mind.

In the physical world, a person who is established in 'vivek' and 'vairagya' is like a magnet to others. The self comes nearer to its internal self, our spiritual body. The journey begins from the physical to internal with changed understanding of life. The new unfolding is that of the 'spiritual self'.

Love lessons from nature

To feel love and compassion for all, observe nature with totality of mind without letting it get affected by any previously constructed image,opinion or past knowledge.

Look around to observe things as if you are seeing them for the very first time. Become one with the object of observation.

The sun provides light and warmth irrespective of who benefits from it. It shines on all. The clouds, rivers, mountains and jungles follow the same example of universal love. Trees provide shade, fruits and flowers for healthy environment and food for hungry with the same unattached benevolence for all. They do not demand any favour in return. The earth matures the seeds into healthy plants irrespective of who planted the seeds or who will benefit from them. This truly is like mother's love which is equal and forgiving for all children even when some are the cause of hurt to her.

If one learns from nature, the world will be a much better place as the destructive tendencies like jealousy, envy, hatred and selfishness will be eliminated. A new era of mutual love and trust will dawn on earth. All differences of caste, colour, race, gender and age will melt away. Most of the modern age problems have arisen because we have stopped learning from nature and caring for it.

Imagine the blissful feeling one gets when listening to the chirping of birds at dawn, observing the river flowing its course, looking at the snow-clad peaks of mountains, taking a stroll in a forest with majestically standing tall trees and looking at the moon on a full-moon night or a star-studded sky on amavasya night. The divine feelings generated by such experiences compel one to ponder over the meaning of life, our place in the universe, and create an urge to become one with the Divine to experience eternal bliss. Live with nature, love nature, protect nature, learn from nature and you will soon rise above all parochial tendencies and become a votary of universal love.

Since long, we have been drawing spiritual inspiration from nature. According to Buddhist guru Daisaku Ikeda, who is also a keen photographer, response to nature's beauty is not merely aesthetic but reflects an ability to discern a deeper meaning and interconnectedness in things. With its universal language, the photographer of nature's beauty serves as a bridge connecting the hearts of people everywhere.

Osho in his discourse on 'Intuition' quotes the haiku of Basho the Zen mystic and master:

"When I look carefully I see nazunia blooming by the hedge!"

Osho says that the deep meaning of it cannot be understood intellectually but only intuitively. The idea Osho wants to convey is that one can draw deep spiritual inspiration even from simple things like looking at an ordinary flower and pondering over its beauty, its divine message, the mystery of creation.

The main cause of discontent of mind, heart and spirit is to spend too much time indoors and being away from the nurturing restorative powers of nature. So, try to get back to nature in some way. Give yourself some time in the woods, mountains, open meadows or walking barefoot on the beach. Drink in the beauty of nature as much as you can. Even if you live in the city, go and walk on the grass in a park. You will feel more complete, rejuvenated and blissful.

What bliss it is to love and be loved

Love is the most natural emotion of life. Love is the most euphoric, ecstatic, overwhelming joy one can
ever experience.

God has just dipped us into the nectar of love, which is the spice of life. Why does a newborn baby start crying the moment she comes into this materialistic world? How does a baby recognise her mother? Why does she sleep peacefully in her mother's arms?

A mother's womb for a baby is nothing less than a temple, for there is only love. Enjoying life in such a sweet atmosphere, the baby feels safe in her mother's womb. God resides in a temple, so a foetus is regarded as an incarnation of God. And when a baby comes into the world, she is separated from the spiritual world of freedom.

Every breath of the mother is connected to the breath of the baby. Every beat of the mother's heart is connected to the heartbeat of the baby. Why then shouldn't she recognise her mother? This is true love. When the universe was created, God showered his pure love on everybody. His love for us is boundless. We pray to God because we are grateful to him.

We tend to forget God in times of happiness. Most of the times we do not show kindness to others once we get happiness. God wants us to put our feet on the ground and live a life of love. Serving the children of God is the best way to love God. No human being should be deprived of love and kindness.

Kindness and courage both are different dimensions of love. Kindness is the virtue of being compassionate and merciful towards others, be it to our own baby or someone else's, be it our friend or a stranger. Every living being in some way or the other is an image of God. By showing love towards all we can hope to achieve this quality. In the same way, courage in troubled times is not everybody's cup of tea. Just as we should love others, it's also important to love ourselves and the life given to us by God. The holy spirit of God within us is called the soul. Hence, it is God who is responsible for every good deed that we do.

Joys and sorrows are like day and night. Joys or sorrows... we must welcome every emotion that God wants us to experience, with courage. Nothing is permanent, neither joys nor sorrows. No matter how dark the night, it is followed by day. No matter how painful the sorrow is, joy is bound to follow. Overcome sorrows with courage.

Nowadays there is terrorism in the name of religion. Terrorism is a dimension of hatred. God is a symbol of love. Spreading hatred for the sake of God is not justified since God can never ever be happy to see bloodshed. Gandhi fought for love and unity through the peaceful way of satyagraha . Unity cannot exist without love. Anything that brings us closer to God is love. Classical dancers worship God through their dance. Through this they gain wisdom and attain the highest spiritual freedom.

All her life Meerabai loved Krishna, she worshipped Krishna. She did not bother what the world would say about her. She just wished to be close to God, she just wished to be close to love. She is remembered as a great devotee of God. One should always choose the right path and then have the conviction and belief to tread it. This is what Meera did. Think of Krishna, and Meera comes to mind. True love brings us closer to God. God is love. Man, too, can become love.

Live life joyfully!

If you are reading this, you have many more reasons to be joyful than you might think. You are alive, which is probably pretty basic, but all too often we don't realise that it is the most basic things that bring us the greatest joy.

We often forget to celebrate the things that are most important because they are so much with us. One of the few really wise people I have ever met once asked with great puzzlement, “Why isn't everyone dancing with the sheer joy of being alive?” Everything we do celebrate is a celebration of life, whether it is a birth, a wedding, or an anniversary. Religious festivals all celebrate some aspect of life as represented by the attributes of the deity, or the passage of some event of our lives. What we need to do is remind ourselves to consecrate every day, take time out at least once a day to quietly experience being alive. And the simplest way to that is to just pay attention to our breathing, which is another wonderful reason to be joyful.

Breath is the key to life and almost every spiritual discipline starts and ends with the breath, as does life itself. Every moment we are meditating. With every breath we are partaking of all the mysteries of the universe. Mathematically there are six molecules of Buddha in every square foot of air. A foolish friend of mine used to like to breathe in real deep to try and get some Buddha in him.

It seemed to work for him. Just for a few minutes pay attention to a gentle indrawn breath. Within that action is the key to sustaining our life. How does that happen? Whenever I think I need a miracle just to keep going, I stop and pay attention to one or two breaths. Each breath feeds the fire of the heart. Amazing.

Odds are that if you're reading this you have enough to eat. Most of us don’t eat gourmet food three times a day, but we are blessed with sufficient food, and I don’t just mean enough to provide the basic calory intake to keep us alive. We are blessed with all the associations of a loving mother that comes with the taste of some food, the memories of discovering new wonderful tastes every time we eat them again, and the love that we imbibe with food made by those who care enough about life to prepare good food, a spouse or a friend. I believe that food made by people who love to feed people has special nutritional properties.

If you think that nobody cares enough about you to prepare delicious food, let me invite you to go and get a banana, and pay attention to it. What a marvel of packaging, flavour and nutrition. I am not implying that that particular banana was grown just for you as an act of love, or may be I am. It grew, it made its way to you and it will sustain you. Now I can hear you arguing that it was provided by a chain of commerce.

What if that chain was forged to get that banana to you without any of the links being aware of the chain’s purpose? Might be, and even if it isn’t, the banana is still pretty amazing in its color, utility, taste and ability to keep us alive. I once knew a man named Rudy who only ate bananas, all different kinds and he was very healthy. And think about bread. I know that it is not much more than grain and salt and water but think about what that means. Bread, naan , chapatti, tortilla, pain, hobz, brot, or whatever you call it provides us with the elements of the earth. The process of growing, threshing and milling the grain transforms the earth into a form that we can use.
Sit in a comfortable chair with a large glass of water and take a small sip of water. Notice something about the water as you swallow. Feel it with you, feel the water’s presence. Take more small sips, noticing something different about the water each time until you drink one third of the water. Now take more small sips, this time noticing something about yourself each time. Keep sipping and noticing until two thirds of the water is gone. Now spend time with the remaining third of the water, notice its relationship with the glass, its relationship to you and your relationship to other things in the room.

So, there are a number of really elemental reasons to be joyful. Celebrate them everyday. Is this simple? Yes, but that doesn’t mean easy. We are all too often caught up in the drama of the day, our pain, the effort of work, the demands of family and friends to be full of joy. Yet, we each have a few minutes to celebrate the fire, earth and water and remind our selves to dance.

But there are more than elemental reasons to be joyful. You’re reading this in the my blog, which means you know English and most likely at least one other language. Every language is the key to wisdom that only that key can open. Whole worlds are yours to explore, and I don’t just mean Shakespeare or the Vedas, you also have the keys to the Marx brothers and humour in Hindi, Marathi, Kanada, French or whatever language you might know. Laughing can cure more things than you think.

Rise in Love

Man needs to be needed. It is one of the most fundamental needs of human beings. Unless one is cared for, one starts dying. Unless one feels that he is significant to somebody, his whole life becomes insignificant.
Hence love is the greatest therapy there is. The world needs therapy because the world is missing love. In a really loving world no therapy will be needed at all; love will be enough, more than enough.
Hugging is healing
Hugging is only a gesture of love, of caring. The very feel of the warmth flowing from the other person melts many illnesses in you, melts the ice-like, cold ego. It makes you again a child. The psychologists are well aware of the fact now that unless a child is hugged and kissed, he misses some nourishment. Just as the body needs food, the soul needs love. You can give to the child all the physical comforts, but if the hugs are missing the child will not grow into a wholesome being.
A patient can be cured by love
You can know all there is to know about therapy, you can become an expert, but if you don’t know the art of love you remain only on the surface of the miracle of therapy.
The moment you start feeling for the patient, for the one who is suffering out of 100 cases, 90 people are suffering basically because they have not been loved. If you start feeling the need for love of the patient, and if you can fulfill the need, there will be almost a magical change in the condition of the patient.
Two dimensions of love
Love can exist in two dimensions: either as horizontal or as vertical. We are acquainted with the love which is horizontal. That is also the dimension of time; the vertical is the dimension of eternity.The yearning in the heart is not for permanency; there you have misunderstood. But that misunderstanding is almost universal because we know only one plane: the horizontal, the dimension of time. In that dimension there are only two possibilities: either something is momentary or permanent.
Let love be born out of meditation
I can teach you meditation, and out of meditation a different quality of love will happen. Then it is not fooling around. Then it is wisdom, not foolishness. Then you don’t fall in love, you rise in love. Then love is a quality to you. Just as light surrounds a flame, love surrounds you. Then it has eternity. It is unaddressed. Whosoever comes close to you will drink out of it. Whosoever comes close to you will be enchanted by it, enriched by it. A tree, a rock, a person, an animal, it does not matter. Even if you are sitting alone...

Happiness means tremendous depth

Understand the very motivation of all ideas, thoughts, desires. It is a seed-like thing. Watch inside — why can’t you be here now? Why is it always that you are thinking of somewhere else? Why can’t you be happy as you are? Why are you thinking that tomorrow you will be happy? How can you be happy tomorrow if you are not happy today? Because tomorrow is going to be born out of this moment.

Today is a parent of tomorrow
If you are unhappy today, you will be more unhappy tomorrow. By that time you will have learned many more tricks to be unhappy. You are practising it, and you hope tomorrow to be happy? Then you are in a hopeless rut. You desire for tomorrow and you are continuously missing all that is here, and that is the only reality there is. If you can even for a single moment put aside desiring, then the projector stops, and the dreaming stops, and you are able to face reality.

Maturity happens when you start living without hope

Hope is childish. You become mature when you don’t project hope into the future. In fact, you are mature when you don’t have any future; you just live in the moment because that is the only reality there is. In the past, religion used to talk about the hereafter. Those were the childish, immature days of religion. Now religion talks about here now; religion has come of age.

The new religion of here now

Now another sort of religion is asserting itself all over the world, and this religion is about here-now. There is nowhere else to go and there is no other space and no other time to live, only this space and this time, here and now. Life has to become very intense in this moment. A man who lives in hope dissipates life. He spreads it too thin. Happiness means intensity, tremendous depth.

Drop hope and live intensely

When I say drop all hope, I mean be so intense in the moment that there is no need for the future. Then there is a turning, a transformation. The very quality of time changes for you it becomes eternal. What can you do with hope? In fact, what can you hope? You cannot hope for the new. You can only hope for the old, that which has happened before — maybe with a little modification here and there, a little more decorated.

But hope is nothing but past: you have lived something, you have experienced something, and you again and again hope for it. It is a repetition; it is circular.

Real joy comes from within

Joy is not happiness, because happiness is always mixed with unhappiness. It is never found in purity, it is always polluted. It always has a long shadow of misery behind it. Just as day is followed by night, happiness is followed by unhappiness.

Joy is a state of transcendence

Then what is joy? Joy is a state of transcendence. One is neither happy nor unhappy, but utterly peaceful, quiet, in absolute equilibrium; so silent and so alive that his silence is a song, that his song is nothing but his silence. Joy is forever; happiness is momentary. Happiness is caused by the outside, hence can be taken away from the outside — you have to depend on others. And any dependence is ugly, any dependence is a bondage. Joy arises within, it has nothing to do with the outside. It is not caused by others, it is not caused at all.

Joy is the spontaneous flow of your own energy

If your energy is stagnant there is no joy. If your energy becomes a flow, a movement, a river, there is great joy — for no other reason, just because you become more fluid, more flowing, more alive. A song is born in your heart, a great ecstasy arises.

It is a surprise when it arises, because you cannot find any cause for it. It is the most mysterious experience in life: something uncaused, something beyond the law of cause and effect. It need not be caused because it is your intrinsic nature, you are born with it. It is you in your totality, flowing.

The flow is always towards the ocean

Whenever you are flowing, you are flowing towards the ocean. That is the joy: the dance of the river moving towards the ocean to meet the ultimate beloved. When your life is a stagnant pool you are simply dying. But when you are flowing, the ocean is coming closer every moment, and the closer the river comes, the more dance there is, the more ecstasy there is.

Your consciousness is a river

It is a continuity, an eternal continuity, an eternal flow. Buddha has never thought about you and your being as something static. In his vision, the word "being" is not right. According to him, being is nothing but becoming. He denies being; he accepts becoming, because being gives you a static idea of something inside you like a rock. Becoming gives you a totally different idea: like a river, like a lotus opening, like a sunrise. Something is constantly happening. You are not sitting there like a rock, you are growing.

The principle is that the body always follows the mind.

In modern terms this means romance, and many of our reader's are looking for some ideas and we have some great ideas for to start thinking about:

* IDEA # 1 If your partner is going away for a few days, tell her that you are worried about her so you have organized a bodyguard to look after her. Then give her a small teddy bear.

* IDEA # 2 Buy a packet of glow in the dark stars and stick the stars on the roof above your bed to spell out a message such as "I Love You" When the lights go down, your message will be revealed!

* IDEA # 3 On a special occasion, buy your partner eleven real red roses and one artificial red rose. Place the artificial rose in the center of the bouquet. Attach a card that says: "I will love you until the last rose fades."

* IDEA # 4 Buy the domain name of your partner's name if it is available for example www.TanyaJohnston.com. Create a web page containing a romantic poem and a picture of a rose. When your partner is surfing the web, casually ask whether she has ever checked to see whether her domain name is taken. Let her type it in to discover her page.

* IDEA # 5 Buy a stylish hand mirror and give it to your partner as a gift. Include a card in the box saying "In this mirror you will see the image of the most beautiful woman in the world."

How yoga is usefull in sex

But, as Courtney is quick to point out, words are not the only way. Take the time to be fully present—no mental grocery list, no daydreaming, no anxious gathering of fears and insecurities. Look your partner in the eye, spend time on every caress and every kiss.

If you fall into a pocket of inhibition, consider ahimsa, one of the first principles of yoga, which translates roughly to non-violence or compassion. Refraining from all judgment—of yourself and your partner—is a form of compassion that will help to make your sexual romps more liberating.

“Most people say the two things they want from sex are pleasure and closeness. But they often focus their attention on extraneous things like wondering, ‘does this position make my butt look big?’” says Klein.

So, the next time you’re in downward dog, make it a sensual experience. “Feel each finger pressing into the floor, notice changes in temperature, subtle muscular shifts, and energetic movements,” Courtney says. Your yoga practice will become so much more than mere exercise or a simple stress reducer. And your sex life may very well reap the benefits. “Some people consider the breath to be sacred and the body a temple,” says Courtney. “If you consider the sexual act in the same way, you’ll undoubtedly raise the frequency of the experience

“Yoga focuses people on how they feel, which is something they don’t do enough during sex,

You spend an hour testing your strength and flexibility in pretzel-like positions. Your skin is slicked with sweat and your heart is pumping. Resting afterward, you feel elated, inspired, and energized. Is it yoga or sex? How about both?

While it’s easy to associate yoga with striking contortions—think scorpion and wheel—the practice can also enhance your intimate encounters (and we’re not just talking flexibility here). That’s because sex and yoga are a divine pairing. At once physical and emotional, uplifting and challenging, they both use the body to calm the mind and stimulate the spirit. And just as a fulfilling yoga practice is based on physical agility, mental clarity, and spiritual openness, every successful sexual union relies on a similar set of artfully orchestrated characteristics. “When you start thinking of sexual energy as sacred, things begin to shift,” says Kevin Courtney, a yoga teacher based in New York City. In other words, bringing increased awareness and sensitivity into each sexual experience will enhance your pleasure.

“Yoga focuses people on how they feel, which is something they don’t do enough during sex,” says Dr. Marty Klein, a sex therapist and author of Beyond Orgasm: Dare to be Honest about the Sex You Really Want. “During sex, people tend to think more about what they imagine the other person is looking at or thinking about. Yoga brings the mind away from judgments, thoughts, speculations, assumptions, anxieties—things that interfere with physical response and emotional satisfaction.”

Whether you choose Hatha, Vinyasa, or Ashtanga, a consistent yoga practice will cultivate greater awareness of your body and any other body you choose to get close to. “The more receptive you are to yourself, the more receptive you’ll be to another person,” Courtney explains.

In the bedroom, this increased attentiveness helps you recognize subtle shifts in your partner—a level of focus that will put you on the fast track to becoming a world-class lover. “You will be tuned in to what feels good and what doesn’t—for yourself and for someone else,” Courtney adds. Even with awareness and receptivity, communication is still crucial for a supersatisfying sex life.

yoga and sex

If health and fitness aren't enough to get you to exercise, how about improving your sex life? Sure, exercise can help you look good and maybe that will help you get more sex, but I'm talking about increasing your potency and making sex more fun. You already know why exercise is so important for your health, but you may not know that studies have found a direct correlation between physical inactivity and a lack of potency. So, exercise can increase your potency, and it can also make your sex life more enjoyable. Here's what you'll need to get the most out of your sex life.

For enthusiastic sex, you'll need some cardio endurance. It won't be any fun if you bonk out halfway through. Shoot for 3 or 4 days of cardio exercise like running, walking, swimming or whatever floats your boat and your partner will thank you.

Sex also requires a little endurance. You may find yourself holding...er...unusual positions for short periods of time, so conditioning your body can be a plus for longer lasting sex. For endurance, you'll need to lift lighter weights for more repetitions. Check out some endurance workouts here and get conditioned for sex.

As long as we're talking about holding yourself in position, we might as well cover muscular strength, which is something else you'll need. Your muscles will be contracting like crazy no matter what position you're in, so it pays to be in shape to avoid nasty leg or foot cramps. For strength, you'll need to lift heavier weights for few repetitions. For some ideas, visit my Workout Center.

Flexibility can enhance anyone's sex life by making it a bit easier to get into your favorite position with a minimum amount of fuss. Why not try a little Yoga to get you in the mood? Or try these stretches to get you ready for the most vigorous sex.
Keep in mind that both sex and exercise have been proven to help reduce stress, so doing both on a regular basis should help you stay relaxed and happy. Exercise also helps increase your sexual desire. Tamar Love, About's former Sexuality Co-Guide, points out that low sex drive is often caused by stress and fatigue. When you're tired, you just don't feel like doing it, right? Exercise, along with a healthy diet and adequate sleep can boost your libido so you're up for anything.

Don't forget that sex burns calories! Okay, so it has to be fairly vigorous to get your heart rate going, but calories are calories right? A 130-lb person can burn about seven calories per five minutes of vigorous sex. Keep it up for two hours, and you'll burn off 177 calories...enough to get rid of those cookies you ate after dinner. Plus, you will impress your mate with your incredible endurance!

Yoga plays an important role in shaping our love life.

Yoga plays an important role in shaping our love life. There can't be two opinions about the fact that our life is shaped by our thoughts and the way we interpret things and situations. All thoughts, feelings and emotions manifest in one form or the other in our body and life. As you become more sensitive to your inner feelings you notice nice thoughts coming to your mind. All this leads to one simple truth; nice thoughts generate nice feelings. Here comes the importance of Yoga. The primary and most important theme of yoga is learning to love and be loved. Yoga helps the energy of love to flow freely through you once you start practicing it.

The power of love is so strong that you begin to see things in different perspective. Today, when the world is racing ahead with cut throat competition, Yoga assumes a bigger role. Through the power of Yoga we can preach love and reality to people all around the world. One needs to have that receptive mind to know the charisma of love and care in life. Yogic practices help us in doing this. You can visualize a whole new world with the help of Yoga. Yoga makes you feel that there is, indeed, genuine cause for hope and joy and an optimistic point of view. The more realistic you are, the more optimistic you become. The power of love clears your mind of all the prejudices, beliefs and misconceptions. Another great virtue of Yoga is that you learn to forgive others for their mistakes.

LOVE is a feeling that clings materialistic mind on one single object

There are many things you can do to manifest an amazing intimate relationship, yet one of the fastest and most effective methods is keeping your attention on what you LIKE about the person, instead of what you DON’T like. Whatever you put your attention on expands and grows, so why not look for what is Divine rather than hideous? Whenever you find something negative in someone there's that judgmental part in you secretly holding an attachment to what they “should” be. Everybody is exactly the way they need to be right now. The Universe is always exactly the way it should be in every moment! Realize the deeper truth in this and you'll free your energy up to attracting that amazing intimate connection that feels like you're living in that sacred special loving paradise everyday.

"We waste time looking for the perfect lover, instead of creating the perfect love."

The Universe is really quite brilliant in many amazing ways. It is designed to awaken each of us to our infinite path, purpose and potentiality. If you are going to discover your deepest spiritual depth and truly learn all the life lessons you are here to learn, you MUST open up and deepen in intimacy with someone. An intimate open loving relationship is your ULTIMATE teacher, because it forces you to go deeper inside and heal all those wounded parts that feel unworthy of love. Without true intimacy the mind will just make up stories that your relationship is O.K. as it is and while deeper inside you really feel disconnected from your partner. Only through opening up to deeper intimacy can you discover total healing and the real reason why you are on this amazing journey called Life.

"If you want a place in the sun, you have to put up with a few blisters."

Intimacy (into-you-me-see) can be uncomfortable at first, especially when you have to look at parts of yourself that you don't like to look at. Yet, it invites you to release attachment from any protected, defended, velvet rut of an ego-trip, and forces you to reveal the most Divine aspects of your Being. Sharing your heart openly, vulnerably and freely with another is the strongest and most courageous thing a person can do on this Earth. The ultimate result is total freedom from suffering. Sure, intimacy is like anything in life, it contains both the negative and positive aspects depending on how you view it. Yet, on the path that truly fulfills your soul, intimacy creates a depth in understanding your real self that goes beyond anything you can do in your cave alone.

If you want to start manifesting a more intimate relationship today, here are some helpful techniques to get you started:

1. Ask the Universe for what you want! Yes, go ahead and simply ask for more intimacy (and the courage to ask for it) instead of just settling for the connection that you may be tolerating and coping with. If your relationship is not satisfying to your soul, you are not standing up for what you want. Imagine what that connection FEELS like and request the Universe sends it your way A.S.A.P! Be brave! Start by first focusing on the highest Source of consciousness, ask it to help you find what you honestly want, know that the Universe is listening and trust in whatever happens next!

2. Create intimacy with yourself first. A deeply intimate loving relationship with anyone always starts with discovering a intimacy within yourself. You can only attract intimacy on the outer if you find it first on your inner world. Someone can only love and respect you when you love and respect yourself. If you are afraid of getting hurt by opening to more intimacy, it means you haven't yet been intimate with this part of you that is still afraid and protecting itself from being hurt. By being intimate with your inner world, you open the door for others to come inside and help you to discover the Divine Being you truly are.

3. Practice being more intimate everyday. One thing we don't have is a shortage of human beings on this planet. There are over 6 billion people here today and some will instantly be intimate with you, while others currently have the ability to be cold, distant, prickly and protected. You deserve the fuzzy warm heart connection you want today! Affirm to the Universe that everyday you are opening to more intimacy with whomever can open to you. Don't wait forever for the one you are in relationship with to open up to you. If they are blocked, send them lots of love, be with them as deeply as they'll allow you, and continue on your journey to discover who you truly are. Once they see that you are FREE and finding heart opening connections with others they will have to break through their inner armor and melt those barriers to love inside. Finding intimacy for yourself helps them to initiate their healing process.

4. Let go of ALL expectations. Your mind probably has many preconceived ideas of what intimacy should and should not look like.