There is something to be said about being a Hindu living in the West. India still is a hierarchical society, while it is changing it is moving quite slowly. Being in America that didn’t exist. It is a flat society with upward mobility, and while I do think that the American Empire is in decline, I do not think America itself is.

America has a lot of attributes that I think can be balanced by the ideas of Hinduism. America is a hyperindividual society, India is still a society built on family bonds. There is a constraint on what one can do in India or what the family wants, America is ideologically built on individualism and pursuing one’s own goals. I don’t think either one is right, and the balance of both is where things lay.

You need individualism to take the risk of starting a business or doing something entrepreneurial and different within the workspace, you need a moral bond that ties you to the family with the goal of uplifting the entire family up. Both are needed. I think we are weirdly returning to that equilibrium anyways with both societies chasing after the values of the other.

I do think America is going to become more conservative and religious over time. I do think India is going to become more individualist over time. But the goal is an equilibrium.

Modernity is not wrong, it is wrong when it is unconstrained like it has been in the West. Modernity has given immense progress, but has led people to unhappy within that progress. What we in America need is a moral footing.

| Worshipping the Idol is the first step; better than this is repetition of a | holy Name and singing of divine glories. Better still is dhyana or contemplation | and the last and the highest state is to realize ‘I am He’. -Tantrasara, | Meditation and Spiritual Life by Swami Yatiswarananda page 380.

So the way to read this is as follows:

1. Pray externally on an idol, an alter, or at a temple. The goal is to setup a dualistic entity that is outside of you as the basis for worship.
2. Japa and memorization of devotional songs.
3. Meditation in a Raja Yoga sense in a dualistic way
4. Jnana Yoga and understanding oneself as ‘I am He’

I’ve already noticed that the different forms take up different aspects of my life. All three are the same. Hanuman is an avatars of Shiva, Shiva is a Saguna Brahman, and Saguna Brahma leads to Nirguna Brahman. When I think of my body Hanuman plays a strong role. When I think of myself as a soul Shiva takes a strong role. However, in meditation it seems to bridge between Saguna and Nirguna.

So I do think the three forms are helpful in day to day life. While I return to my Ista mantra, I also find it helpful to have a mantra (Jain Shree Ram) for when doing something physical to light myself within. This focus on Hanuman at the physical level focuses the body and work as service to the divine.

The mantra repeatedly internally is to focus the mind on Shiva which leads to the oneness of Brahman in meditation.

I was under the impression that assigning multiple people to a project would be easy to manage but the result was the opposite. Adding multiple owners to a project led to confusion as to how to divide up work. The problem is that the owner should figure out how to divide up the work, no rely on someone above dealing with it. If a person above is splitting the work then there is actually no owner.

So I am stealing the Amazon idea of a Single Threaded Owner. Each owner is responsible for a single sakha or sangh. Every owner then runs the process top to bottom and the figures out how to optimize each piece and so on and so forth.

So I am now assigning owners to each product.

My role is changing and changing quite fast from working in the business to working on the business. I don’t think I thought I would be in this position and it shows. I am a bit inexperienced in this particular arena of organization, process management, and people development. Ironically, these are the areas that I need to work on the most for the growth not just in terms of professional but also in terms of personal life.

Whatever I do whether family, spirituality, or work these three skills are a big part of the challenge. As Swami Vivekananda says, “the whole secret lies in organization, accumulation of power, co-ordination of wills.” So my core focus is around these three things with the goal of delegating most everything else.

As a small business owner it is important to know all sides of the business but it is more important to setup the processes for things to happen repeatably. The repeatability reduces stress and allows you to have predictable outcomes.

As part of this learning my goal is to really dial in my focus:

• How to design organizations.
  • How to design for knowledge accumulation.
• How to setup good standard procedures.
  • How to ensure the standard procedures are working on the right thing.
• How to hire well.
  • How to train a team.

These are all questions that I want to learn better and then immediately put into practice. Further, as I have different types of companies I am working on each type of company has a different perspective.

As part of this I will be reading a few types of books:

• Biographies of Great Leaders
• Understand Organization of Great Companies
• Understanding Effective Project Management
• Effective Hiring, Training and Delegation

For a person of action Jnana Yoga and the nature of the self are difficult. Understanding the basic tenants of science including physics and chemistry I understand where Jnana Yoga is coming from. That the true nature of reality is none other that the universe and since we all came from the Big Bang that the universe and the individual are the same.

The energy that animates the universe is within us and we are part of it. It is beautiful, inspiring, and impossible to practice as a householder. While, Jnana Yoga appeals to the logical aspect of my brain, it is the Ista that I turn to in times of crisis. It is easier to mentally visualize and pray to an embodied representation versus a formless entity.

While Bhakti eventually leads to Jnana I do think I need to develop my heart through Bhakti. It is easier for me to think of myself as a servant than as the same as the Self. Ironically, I find that when I think of myself as the Self I become a bit more egoistic and lazy. As a servant I am motivated and have a purpose.

So I am putting my deep study of Advaita Vedanta on hold for a couple of years. While I will continue to engage with the Bhagavad Gita it will be at a higher level versus a deep philosophical inquiry. This will be the same for the Upanishads. If I find that I get more inclined towards Jnana Yoga in the future I will revisit it as I open up to it but I will not force it.

The core philosophy of Vedanta is immensely subtle and I don’t think I have the correct mindset or the predisposition to attack that path. But as a householder I think it is best to focus on Karma, Bhakti and Raja Yoga as my main paths. The Jnana Yoga will still be there to understand the ultimate nature of reality but I will not focus on it as a main path for now.

So for now I will focus on:

• Karma Yoga and Bhakti Yoga to purify my heart
• Raja Yoga to calm my mind

This is the study plan that Swami Chinamaya recommends within Kindle Life. This is a long term study plan that covers a wide variety of Vedantic texts and scriptures. It is an eventual goal to complete this study plan over a period of time.

I am at a point in my sadhana where I would like to build a sangh (community) of like-minded people. While my sadhana has been mostly individual focused, I feel the need to build a community for a few reasons:

1. Shared Motivation: Doing a sadhana alone is a bit solitary. Monks have their monasteries and ashrams, Hindu temples seem to have their own set of practices. It is not easy to stay motivated when you are doing it alone. So having a community of like-minded people can help keep the motivation high.
2. Collective Learning: I am trying to build a path that merges the modern world with the ancient wisdom of Sanatana Dharma. A lot of this is trial and error. I think having a community that can share their experiences and learnings can help refine the path.
3. Service and Outreach: A sangh can also help in doing seva (service) and outreach. The goal is to use Sanatana Dharma principles to help society, and with that to help Sanatana Dharma grow.

How are I different from say a Chinmaya Mission or a temple group?

• I am not focused on rituals or temple activities. While those are important, my focus is on individual sadhana based on the four yogas and the three shastras of Hanuman Chalisa, Yoga Sutras and Bhagavad Gita.
• Focus on modern life. I want to build a path that is relevant to the modern world so I will be pulling ancient Sanatana Dharma ideas and applying them to modern life.
• Simplicity. I want to keep the path simple and easy to follow. By limiting to the four yogas and three shastras, I want to create a simple framework that can be very effective within the modern world.

What I am not going to do:

• Limit anyone's individual sadhana. I just focus on the Four Yogas and the three shastras of Hanuman Chalisa, Yoga Sutras and Bhagavad Gita as a common ground. If someone wants to do additional sadhana I am not here to stop anyone.
• Create rigid rules. The idea is to have a simple framework that can be followed. I want a sanyasi-like simplicity, while living and working in the modern world.
• Focus on rituals. While rituals are a part of Sanatana Dharma, I want to focus on the core principles and practices that can help individuals grow. Individuals can choose to do rituals on their own if they wish.
• Create a sect. Sanatana Dharma is vast and diverse. I am not trying to create a new sect or denomination. I am just trying to build a community of like-minded individuals.

It is gotten confusing having a single ledger for everything. It makes it hard to know if a transaction is for a specific purpose or not. Also by combining all of it into one anything not tracked leads to a mess in terms of accounting. Simplifying the ledgers into specific purposes and business units makes it easier to track and manage funds.

As part of this release we are splitting the ledgers according to business units and anything under Yerra Capital is now tracked separately and is specific to the family. It makes it much easier to track and manage funds this way as the opsZero specific things can be delegated to the appropriate people without having to worry about the family funds.

When one releases their semen independent of their partner there is a loss of energy. Semen when released with a partner has a positive energy. A reason around this seems that semen released with a partner has a benefit of using the energy for the intended purpose of procreation. Creation has a positive energy.

Using semen and releasing it otherwise has a negative energy as the use of the semen is not for creation purposes. It does not push you to a higher plane. It keeps you at the plane that you are in or pulls you down when you are at a higher state. So semen seems to play a role in Sadhana as one needs to preserve it and store its energy for going to higher planes. If released without a partner you are pulled down to the lower planes.

Furthermore, the production of semen is a long process requiring a lot of energy and the release of this semen itself is a large source of energy expenditure.

A person should use the energy that is store in semen which is at the base that moves up the spine through the chakras of the kundalini for spiritual purposes or procreative purposes. The semen itself becomes a store of energy. When it is not being lowered by purposeless release can add energy through the spine awakening a person spiritually.

So semen used for procreation has positive energy and energy used by preserving semen has positive spiritual energy. Otherwise, semen wasted does not provide a benefit and is like throwing away a store of energy, like a battery. It has to be recharged. Because of this it makes you tired and irritable as your body has to use a significant portion of its energy on recharging this battery.

When this battery is being recharged it leads to a stalling of progress in spirituality as you don’t have an energy source to push you upward as Sadhana needs immense energy. In a way semen is like a capacitor that stores energy for spiritual progress.

So don't waste your semen. Use it for procreation or preserve it for spiritual purposes.

Jai Shree Ram

• Hanuman Chalisa (Karma/Bhakti): Devotion
• Yoga Sutras (Raja): Discipline
• Bhagavad Gita (Karma/Bhakti/Jnana): Wisdom

These three shastras encompass the spirit of the Four Yogas and it seems just understanding these three fully and deeply seems to be sufficient. As I stated on v0.11 that I was going toward this path but I didn’t fully understand the depth of each. Frankly, I didn’t think much of the Hanuman Chalisa and now have absolutely fallen in love with it.

The Hanuman Chalisa is not just a song but each sloka is a mantra and an aspiration of behavior that was exuded by Lord Hanuman. Each sloka has a depth of meaning of the trials of Hanuman and how he overcame them. It is in essence the ultimate in the Karma Yoga texts that are succinct to follow the understanding versus reading Ramakrisha or Vivekananda. While, Ramakrishna and Vivekananda act as gurus to guide us to the Four Yogas the Hanuman Chalisa is a condensed version of the values that they want us to lead.

The Yoga Sutras act as a means for disciplining oneself. If the Hanuman Chalisa teaches how to act outwardly then the Yoga Sutras teaches us how the inner world should be. The Yoga Sutras are a guide on how to structure and setup the inner world so that you can act like Lord Hanuman to always be focused on Lord Ram. Since Rama means “light within” it is also a representation the Brahman.

Lastly, the Bhagavad Gita acts as a bridge between the outer and inner world. While the Hanuman Chalisa deals with outer virtues, the Yoga Sutras the inner world, the Bhagavad Gita deals with the battlefield of life of how to deal with yourself as an individual in society at large. It has the ideas that are included in both the Chalisa and Yoga Sutras as well as the Upanishads. It acts as the source of Jnana Yoga encompassing the why of it all.

These shastras have a lifetime of study ahead of them and I am content knowing what I need to focus my energies around.

Jai Shree Ram