Clive Simpkins

Why Celibacy?

sDisclaimer: Where I use the 'God' word, please interpret it as Allah, the Amadlozi (Ancestors), Buddha, God the Father, Hashem, Jesus, Krishna, your preferred Deity, the Higher Self, the Universe – whatever fits your concept or tradition. If you're an atheist, maybe regard it as your highest level of self-control.

Celibacy plays a crucial part in both western and eastern monasticism. The human sex drive is the most powerful of all apart perhaps from the basics of food and drink. So to sublimate (convert for a 'higher' cause), that energy, desire, lust, yearning, drive – call it what you will - is seen by very serious spiritual seekers as essential to attaining higher levels of self and mind control.

In the Hindu tradition, life is divided into four phases or 'ashramas': the first stage being the Brahmacharya (student, learning, development) phase. In its crudest interpretation brahmacharya means celibacy. The student (girl or boy) was/is 'expected' to maintain sexual chastity. In days of yore, that may have happened. But in the modern world, I imagine that masturbation if not actual sexual activity might play a role in the period of either gender's developmental and teenage years.

The second stage is Grihastha. That means married. St. Paul said to those who wished to walk a spiritual path, words to this effect: 'However, if they cannot control themselves, they should get married, for it is better to marry than to burn with passion'. (I Corinthians 7:9 International Standard version of Christian Bible 2008 edition). So provision is made – in many traditions. I believe such a provision could and should be included in the Roman Catholic priesthood today - but that's a topic for another posting.

The third stage is Vanaprastha in which the married individual reaches a point where they no longer have family responsibilities or obligations that will limit them from spending more time in contemplation, prayer, spiritual practice and meditation. Vanaprastha means 'wandering in the forest', which speaks for itself.

The fourth stage (even for previously married people) is called Sannyasa. That's the total irreversible renunciation of worldly obligations and dedicating oneself fully to 'God' or self realisation.

In the case of a monk, nun or priest, the celibacy component is there from moment one, via preliminary (postulant or novice) vows and then irrevocable, 'final' (Naisthika brahmacharya in the Hindu monastic tradition) vows.  

My Spiritual Preceptor, Swami Shivapadananda [pictured alongside with me (aged 25)], who was the 2^nd President and Spiritual Head of the Ramakrishna Centre of South Africa, defined the highest level of brahmacharya as this: 'If I forget about God for one second, I have broken my brahmacharya'. So celibacy is not about pure physical or even mental sexual restraint. It's about a continuum of self-awareness and mind management. It's a complete shift of focus to keeping the mind absorbed in mantra, prayer, contemplating one's true divine (according to that school) nature at all times. Even when engaged in work, service or other activity.

Bottom line to celibacy is this: It is only the very serious, totally dedicated spiritual aspirant who will manage to sublimate the senses to the point that she or he becomes manager of the mind and not the other way around. This concept may seem strange and attract ridicule from lay people who could regard it as 'abnormal'. But for those who choose to dedicate 100% of themselves to God, it's not abnormal or peculiar at all. Nuns refer to themselves as 'brides of Christ' in the Roman Catholic Christian tradition.

The enormous, if not insurmountable difficulties currently being faced by the Roman Catholic Church appear to be not just a matter of sense control but in many instances, paedophilia. Which is psychologically very different from homosexuality or lesbianism. At the heart of the problem though, is the issue of self-restraint and self-management of the sex impulse. In the context of spirituality, being gay is in no way an impediment to achieving the highest levels of realisation through the same disciplines as monastics or married people who go on to renounce. It is said that the 'soul' is genderless and therefore sexual-preference-less. (Let's not get into a secondary debate on this).

It does raise issues unique to homosexual orientation in that the male monk or priest would be living in a male-dominated environment. i.e. still in 'temptation-fraught' surroundings. The same problem would arise for a gay nun. However, heterosexual, homosexual, it doesn't matter: if the focus is truly on offering the highest sacrifice of oneself and one's desires to God, then the impulses can be slowly managed and converted. To the point where being exposed to what might previously have been a sexual temptation or attractive looking body, will immediately take the mind to God consciousness instead. Because we know that what we 'love' is not that body but something beyond it. This doesn't mean that the celibate can become complacent or ever think they've fully conquered the sexual drive.    Sri Sarada Devi (herself a nun) used to say that a monk should look at the feet of the gender to which he (or she, if a nun) is attracted. Perhaps not literally, but meaning: be careful where you allow your eyes to go, because your mind and senses will follow.

There are many techniques for sublimating and re-directing the sexual attention and energies and they're typically acquired over a long period of introspection, practice and mind control. The risk of a 'fall' on the sexual front for a celibate is there so long as she or he is in a human body and has not reached what the philosophers would describe as the pinnacle of self- or God-realisation.

So - if, as and when we're tempted to 'diss' or deride those who have chosen to offer their entirety to God's service, let's remember the difficulties inherent in their choice. Let's also not fall into the trap of tarring hundreds of thousands of genuine, disciplined priests, monks, nuns and devotees, on the basis of the hundreds or maybe even thousands, who have not or do not yet successfully tread that path.

 

http://clivesimpkins.brandyourself.com/

Clive Simpkins

My Damascene radio delusion

 On 23 March in the afternoon, driving back from a client meeting, I heard Zandile Nzalo (standing in for Jenny Crwys-Williams and doing a damn fine job) interviewing Louis Itumeleng Seeco [pictured below]. He's a marketing and advertising man and the author of a new book, Marketing the Same Difference, published by Knowledge Resources at R299. Louis' business website is www.elements.co.za The book is also available from Exclusive Books. What froze my brain in mid-meander was his comment that 'black people still use whites as the benchmark of quality and efficiency' or words to that effect. For a moment, I thought he was just yanking the listeners' chain and expected him to guffaw with merriment after an appropriate pause. But he didn't laugh. He was in deadly earnest.

Zandile tried politely pushing back on the issue but he was undeterred. He went on to say that because of advertising, marketing and media 'conditioning' (and also self-esteem issues) black people still rated white trends, opinions and skills very highly. Please remember this is my memory of what he said and not a verbatim transcript. But truly, I am not exaggerating.

In a state almost of shocked disbelief, I pulled my car to the side of the road so I'd be able to give my full attention to the call and dialled Talk Radio 702. What amazed me was that when I said what I wanted to discuss on air, the young producer began to argue on behalf of the guest, even saying that in Xhosa there was an expression of admiration, meaning something like; you've become so good you're just like a white person. She defended him by saying that if you had someone come to install a meter (electricity or other) in your house, you'd accept that the white guy knew what he was doing but might have reservations if it was a black handyman. My plumber is black. My electrician is black – and both do way better work than the unreliable white dude we used to use. And not at bargain basement rates either, mind! I began feeling like I needed therapy or anti-psychosis meds.

After an ad break, on air, I told Louis that I was a marketing and communications strategist and a former J. Walter Thompson and Ogilvy & Mather advertising man and that I simply couldn't believe my ears. He was polite but continued to insist that whites wouldn't and didn't understand the extent to which they were still held up as icons of efficiency, expertise, reliability and so on. The rationale got worse. He said that if a black person was about to undergo surgery and a black physician approached them, they might only be comfortable after the medic had explained his credentials and qualifications. I interrupted to say that one of the top radiologists in the country was in attendance at the Rosebank Clinic when I was there a few weeks back. No change. I actually felt a sense of disconnectedness and as if I'd been beamed backwards by Scotty into an Apartheid-era radio discussion in which the black guest was trying to schmooze the racist white host. But nope, this is a dyed-in-the-wool, seasoned marketing and advertising man.

I said to him that I felt there was a huge need to have a conference-type panel discussion, exploration or debate on the issue. I simply could not and cannot believe that in 2010 it's possible for black people - and young black people in particular - to espouse such thinking. What do you think?

Footnote: Please note - I am not in any way trying to 'get' at Louis in this post. I don't know him and we've never met. My intention is for the event to act as a catalyst for discussion.

SpeakZA - Bloggers For a Free Press

Contents kindly composed by Sipho Hlongwane.

Last week, shocking revelations concerning the activities of the ANC Youth

 League spokesperson Nyiko Floyd Shivambu [pictured] came to the fore. According to a

letter published in various news outlets, a complaint was laid by 19 political

journalists with the Secretary General of the ANC, against Shivambu. This

complaint letter detailed attempts by Shivambu to leak a dossier to certain

journalists, purporting to expose the money laundering practices of Dumisani

Lubisi, a journalist at the City Press. The letter also detailed the intimidation

that followed when these journalists refused to publish these revelations.

We condemn in the strongest possible terms the reprisals against journalists by

Shivambu. His actions constitute a blatant attack on media freedom and a

grave infringement on Constitutional rights. It is a disturbing step towards

dictatorial rule in South Africa.

We call on the ANC and the ANC Youth League to distance themselves from the

actions of Shivambu. The media have, time and again, been a vital democratic

safeguard by exposing the actions of individuals who have abused their

positions of power for personal and political gain.

The press have played a vital role in the liberation struggle, operating under

difficult and often dangerous conditions to document some of the most crucial

moments in the struggle against apartheid. It is therefore distressing to note

that certain people within the ruling party are willing to maliciously target

journalists by invading their privacy and threatening their colleagues in a bid to

silence them in their legitimate work.

We also note the breathtaking hubris displayed by Shivambu and the ANC

Youth League President Julius Malema [pictured] in their response to the letter of  

complaint. Shivambu and Malema clearly have no respect for the media and

the rights afforded to the media by the Constitution of South Africa. Such a

response serves only to reinforce the position that the motive for leaking the

so-called dossier was not a legitimate concern, but a insolent effort to

intimidate and bully a journalist who had exposed embarrassing information

about the Youth League President.

We urge the ANC as a whole to reaffirm its commitment to media freedom and

other Constitutional rights we enjoy as a country.

Blog Roll

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Comms trends and your business

The MD of a large communications company I work with takes pride in having a secretary print out his e-mails because he can't or won't use a computer. No, he's not seventy years of age – he's just a touch over forty. So what does he hope to accomplish by rejecting or resisting the advance of technology I wonder? As banks improve security on credit cards, using smart chips, and biometric identification devices (iris recognition, fingerprint scans, voice algorhythms etc.) proliferate, so technophobes (people who are afraid of technology) are going to find themselves a seriously disadvantaged minority.

Technology is doing for your business today what we couldn't, in our wildest dreams have imagined, even five years ago. If you lift static or electronic Billboards, outdoor or lamp post ads, point of sale (POS), magazines, newspapers, radio, TV, promotions and PR – and then push the Internet in underneath them – that's our communications foundation and media world of today. So the Internet acts as a superb technology platform on which everything else can function a whole lot more efficiently. The media-type becomes less important because the delivery mechanism is the same.

The best part of this shift is that you no longer need to waste energy, effort or money on mass communications in a shotgun fashion into the marketplace. You can do the old rifle trick of more accurately identifying a select and narrower target audience. Because of the Internet, you're can also direct highly-focused communication messages at that audience. The best part of all is of course, the extraordinary ease of access to and cost-effectiveness of using the Internet.

What does this mean for your business or practice today? Just one hugely important benefit: you can probably stop producing printed brochures. They're out of date almost the moment they come off the press. They're expensive and also generic – meaning they're not custom-crafted to the specific interests or needs of the individual to whom you give them. When you make the shift to an electronic template designed and loaded on your computer system, you can edit, custom-craft, drop in the logo of the prospect and tailor the information to address their unique needs.

The 'customer of one' and 'individuation' are presently two of the most important global business trends. As an example, when you go into a Seattle or other coffee shop, you're able to order a Cappuccino any of about a dozen different ways. Coffee shops identified the desire of the customer to choose the permutations and details themselves, way before bigger business started to recognise the trend. Use that same approach in your business. When you're designing and creating things specially for a client or customer, it's less likely that they'll walk away from your focused-on-them business, to a mass-market competitor. This is what gives you some degree of exclusivity and the much talked-about USP (unique selling proposition) – the 'something' that makes you stand out among the competitive clutter and gives you the edge of difference.

Get to understand social media and the role it can play in networking and marketing your business. Your website should move from being a static, useless electronic brochure into being a Blog (interactive weblog or website) in which you can engage your clients. If you look at a well-designed Blog today, it looks no different from a conventional website. Its advantage though is that you can update it as frequently as you wish. You can engage clients or customers in a forum or discussion. So you start what is the single-most important communications device in business today – a conversation. That's the basis of modern communications. Dialogue, two-way engagement. You talking with them and not at them.

Final thought: Doing just one or two big-bang customer relationship marketing exercises a year is not going to produce a sustainable result. Go for more frequent but shorter contacts, without becoming invasive or irritating. So you stay top of mind. An e-newsletter is a good option but it must be news- and not a history of your business or anything which is not of value to the customer. They must also not be able to read that same news elsewhere. Start thinking about this – it may be the kick start of a whole new era for you.

 

Harvard Med School on carbonated drinks and osteoporosis

 There's wasn't a postable link to this fascinating snippet - so here it is. For more excellent Harvard Health Reports on a wide variety of topics, go here.

Does carbonated water harm bones?

Q. I’ve heard that club soda, seltzer water, and sparkling mineral waters rob the bones of calcium. Is this true?

A. Warnings about the harmful effects of carbonated beverages on bone emerge from time to time. The theory is that the phosphoric acid (phosphate) used to enhance flavor in some carbonated beverages can interfere with calcium absorption and result in the loss of calcium from bone. Fortunately, there’s no good evidence that a high phosphate intake affects bone metabolism or bone density.

Still, carbonated beverages have long been associated with low bone density and fractures in adolescent girls. To investigate this association in adults, researchers at Tufts University examined data from 2,500 women and men (ages 49 to 69) involved in the Framingham Osteoporosis Study. They assessed dietary intake and measured bone mineral density (BMD) at the spine and hip.

Non-cola carbonated drinks were not associated with low BMD, but cola intake was associated with lower BMD at the hip (though not the spine) in the women, but not in the men. The more cola a woman drank, the lower her BMD. Women who drank more cola didn’t drink less milk, but they did have a lower intake of calcium.

In 2005, the British Journal of Nutrition published the results of a small clinical trial comparing healthy postmenopausal women who drank about one quart of noncarbonated mineral water daily with those who drank the same amount of carbonated mineral water. After eight weeks, blood and urine tests for bone turnover showed no difference between the two groups.

It looks as though drinking seltzer water doesn’t contribute to osteoporosis or increase fracture risk in women. The authors of the cola study suggested that the caffeine in the colas may account for the cola-drinkers’ lower BMD. Other studies have also reported an association between caffeine and lower BMD. In some cases, soft drinks displace calcium-rich beverages, such as milk, and experts think that this, rather than any direct effect of soft drinks on bone, may explain the effect on BMD in adolescent girls.

So feel free to enjoy seltzer water without worrying, but don’t overdo the caffeinated beverages, whether carbonated or not. And if you suspect that by drinking seltzer water, coffee, colas, or other soft drinks you may be reducing your intake of healthy beverages — such as calcium-fortified juices or vitamin D–fortified low-fat or skim milk — make sure you get enough calcium (1,200 to 1,500 mg per day) from other sources to compensate.

— Celeste Robb-Nicholson, M.D.
Editor in Chief, Harvard Women’s Health Watch