Lecturer: Daily troubles have supernatural causes BY CHRIS GAETANO Staff Writer SOUTH BRUNSWICK - Are you troubled by persistent chest pains? Do you have an unhealthy addiction you just can't shake? Is your skin riddled with various diseases? Your problem might be ghosts. During a workshop at the South Brunswick Public Library presented by the Spiritual Science Research Foundation, it was said that roughly 80 percent of our difficulties in life have their root cause in the spiritual realm, with half - such as substance abuse and addiction - being caused entirely by spiritual matters. "All cases of drug addiction [are] due to possession by a ghost," said Bhavna Shinde of the Spiritual Science Research Foundation. According to Shinde, problems ranging from financial difficulties to global warming are, at least in part, due to spiritual difficulties found in the individual. These were discovered through spiritual research conducted by the foundation, she said. Spiritual research means researching the spiritual dimension and its effects upon us and the world. For example, spiritual research asserts that while there are particles in this world such as atoms and protons and neutrons, there are more fundamental building blocks that are ignored by conventional science. "Spiritual research shows us everything in this universe is made of three basic components," said Shinde. These three components are: sattva, which radiates purity and knowledge; raja, which causes action and passion; and tama, which is ignorance and inertia. According to Shinde, our perception of things as positive or negative can depend on which of these three components something is primarily composed of. As an example, she had the approximately 25-member audience contemplate a picture of a candle. After about five minutes, she asked audience members to raise their hand if they felt positive and pleasant toward it. Ten raised their hand and said they did. She then asked who felt unpleasant around it, and four raised their hand. She then asked who felt nothing at all, and 11 raised their hand. According to Shinde, someone with a keenly developed sixth sense will be able to see that the candle gives off raja-tama particles as well as tama frequencies. She contrasted this with a picture of a cup with sesame oil burning inside it. After contemplating this image, 15 said they felt pleasant, six felt unpleasant and five felt neutral. She noted that the contrast was due to the oil itself. "Among all oils, sesame seed oils are the most sattva-dominant," said Shinde. Science vs. spirituality A big problem, according to Shinde, is that people tend not to think their troubles might have a spiritual element, such as ghosts, when evaluating them. This leads people to deal with problems in life in one of two ways, she said. The first, which is the least effective, is the superficial approach, such as shopping or drinking. "It is the least effective because when you come back, you are still at square one," she said. The second way of approaching problems is the scientific approach, which was described during the event as identifying the problem, identifying the cause and applying the remedy. To illustrate, Shinde brought up the problem of the increasing intensity of natural disasters. The cause was postulated as global warming. The solution: reduce greenhouse gas emissions. According to Shinde, where the empirical, scientific reasoning falls short is with recurring and persistent problems, many of which, to Shinde, can only be solved through spiritual means. "When all else fails, some people turn to prayer," said Shinde. For example, she brought up the problem of depression. A possible cause might be marital disharmony. A scientific remedy may be counseling, but this ignores what might be the root spiritual cause of the problem. What is this root? According to Shinde, the ghosts of our ancestors are causing marital strife in order to contact their descendants for assistance in escaping from the lower planes. Many people, when they die, do not have the spiritual energy to escape the lower planes and ascend. In order to get out of this miserable state, Shinde said, they need someone living to perform a spiritual remedy in order to help them escape, and one's family tends to be the first place people, living or dead, turn to for help. The reason they cause us things such as financial difficulties, skin disease and lack of luck with the opposite sex is that they are just trying to get our attention, according to Shinde. "What language do we understand better than pain?" asked Shinde. "They are the most common types of problem." Of course, some spiritual problems with physical ramifications are due not to ghosts but the buildup of negative energies, Shinde said. Global warming was one example offered, which is caused, in addition to the scientific factors such as excessive carbon gas in the atmosphere, by a rise in the raja-tama basic component. "It's not just the rise in physical factors, it is in combination of the spiritual causes that causes global warming," said Shinde. Conversely, she said that just because something, at its root, has a spiritual cause, it does not mean that there are no physical, natural factors at all. "These are not mutually exclusive. Just because one thing has a spiritual factor does not mean that there is no physical factor," she said. People still living, according to Shinde, can also wreak havoc on our lives from anywhere in the world. Black magic and voodoo, she said, do exist and can be performed anywhere. Difficulties can also be caused due to an obstruction in the spiritual energy flow system, which can lead to things such as impotence, heart problems and an insatiable appetite. Combating evil energies In a world full of spiritual threats, defense might seem like a daunting task. However, Shinde and the Spiritual Science Research Foundation have developed several techniques for spiritual growth, which she articulated to the audience. One was chanting. Shinde offered audience members a long list of various chants and recommended that people use the chants of their birth religion, with recommended chants for Christians, Muslims, Jews, Hindus, Buddhists, Zoroastrians and others. She said that it is important that people keep their chants consistent and, ideally, to use the religion they were born into, even if they converted later in life, since that religion was what their destiny is, and it's not advisable for people to go against their destiny. "You can chant anytime, anyplace. You can be in the bathroom and chant," said Shinde. She recommended that people chant 972 times a day, which should take roughly an hour. It need not be tackled all at once and can be done in intervals throughout the day, she explained. Shinde led the audience through one such interval toward the end of the presentation, and said that people could also chant silently. Some people said they were deeply affected by this exercise. "I felt as though I was looking for ancestral problems, but what I got was gratitude, because my ancestors have been very good to me," Lynn Robbins said. Another method for spiritual cleansing and defense is salt treatment, according to Shinde. She said people should soak their ankles in a bucket of water with three to four tablespoons of rock salt in it. While touching their heels together, they should create a 2- to 3-centimeter gap between their toes, forming a "v" for 10-15 minutes and no more. This allows black energy, which ghosts use to cause damage to people's lives, to seep out of their toes, she said. This can be used to treat lethargy, reduction in promptness, inability to think, anger, stress, illness and excessive negative thoughts, she said. Still, while it might be tempting to dive right into spiritual practice, according to Shinde, it should not be undertaken without the help of an experienced spirit guide who has been there before. "In the spirit journey, it's so beyond the five senses we are used to using ... and it is easy to be led astray by negative energies," she said. The presentation sparked a positive reaction and additional interest in those attending. "I enjoyed it very much. ... A lot of these ideas I read about before, but it was nice to hear a human being talk about them. I'm going to try the chanting, too," said Ariel Sigle.