On April 21, 2012, I attended Brain Expo 2012 at the COEX (Korea Exhibition Center). It was hosted by the Korea Institute of Brain Science and the International Brain Education Association. There I had the pleasure of meeting Natalia Avseenko, a world-renowned free diver who was featured in a two-part documentary on breathing produced by MBC, a major Korean television network.

I often show a clip of Natalia from that documentary in which she swims underwater with whales in arctic temperatures for over ten minutes. She does this without any special equipment or clothing; she simply practices special breathing techniques that help her stay underwater longer and maintain her body temperature. I was delighted when I saw this video because it seems like an extreme and distinctive example of the importance of conscious breathing and of challenging what we believe are the limits of the human body. I find that overcoming our physical and mental limits offers us great satisfaction, more confidence, and even pleasure.

Upon returning to Russia after the expo, Natalia sent me this letter of thanks, for which I am very grateful:

“Dear Mr. Ilchi Lee,

A lot of love!!!”

By the Editor

Many events are being held by partners of the International Brain Education Association’s (IBREA) in different parts of the U.S. around Earth Day, which this year is April 22nd. Two of the largest are the ‘Meditate and Make a Difference’ Earth Awareness Campaign and the Earth Citizen Walk.

‘Meditate and Make a Difference’ Earth Awareness Campaign

From April 8th to April 22nd, Dahn Yoga Foundation is hosting a ‘Meditate and Make a Difference’ Earth Awareness Campaign that is co-sponsored by Dahn Yoga & Health, Inc., Body & Brain centers, and LifeParticleTV.com. Dahn Yoga Foundation is a 501(c)(3) tax exempt charity that believes it can help people take more significant action for the Earth through meditation. It will direct donations to IBREA and EarthShare New York. Donors will be eligible to receive a complimentary 1-year PLUS Membership to LifeParticle TV.

As part of this campaign, Ilchi Lee will give a live teleseminar to LifeParticle TV PLUS Members on Thursday, April 19th at 8 PM EDT. He will talk about earth awareness and will guide listeners in an earth meditation. Listeners will be able to ask Ilchi Lee questions through twitter by adding the hashtag #earthdaymeditation to their posts. Lee will answer a few select questions during the teleseminar. A link will be provided on the main page of LifeParticleTV.com directing listeners to the broadcast.

The teleseminar will be rebroadcast on the 19th at 8 PM in the U.S. Central, Mountain, and Pacific time zones. It will be available on demand on the site as well on April 21st.

Guided meditations based on Ilchi Lee’s teachings have been uploaded once a week during the campaign on LifeParticle TV. Individual Dahn Yoga and Body & Brain Centers will host Earth Day parties during the final days of the campaign and are actively seeking donations. Interested people can find out if a center near them is hosting an event by visiting www.dahnyoga.com or www.bodynbrain.com and calling a specific center.

About the campaign beneficiaries:

• • The International Brain Education Association (IBREA) is a UN-affiliated, non-governmental organization that aims to bring the social benefits of meditation and breathing through a system called Brain Education to school systems in developing countries and struggling communities.
• • EarthShare’s goal is to educate and engage individuals and organizations in creating a healthy and sustainable environment.

Earth Citizen Walk in Rockland County, NY

On May 6, 2012, hundreds of people will gather to celebrate the Earth Citizen spirit by walking around Rockland Lake in Valley Cottage, Rockland County, New York. Registration will take place from 8:30 to 9:30 AM EDT and the walk will begin at 10:00 AM EDT. People of all ages can walk from one to three miles. You can pre-register for the walk for $20 or pay $25 at the event. For more event details and to register online, you can visit http://www.ibreaus.org/earthcitizenwalk/.

New York Donations will be raised for IBREA’s Brain Education project in El Salvador, where IBREA began teaching Brain Education at a school in the Centro Escolar Distrito Italia in San Salvador. In addition to the BE classes, IBREA is fulfilling a request of the school to build a swimming pool on the site.

Brain Education was born with a big purpose, a huge dream. By awakening to the value of our brain and working towards actualizing that value, we become aware of what our human nature is really like. We realize that we have a desire to be beneficial to all life. Immediately then, we start to take action to actualize that awakening. That is the Earth Citizen spirit. Brain Education is a methodological tool to help raise 100 million Earth Citizens in 100 countries around the world.

According to psychology, our consciousness has three parts: the conscious, the unconscious, and the super-conscious. All of the memories and information that you’ve accumulated over your lifetime is stored in both your conscious and unconscious mind. Those are the things that shape your current reality. When you see or hear or feel something and respond to it, it’s not your eyes or your ears themselves that are responding. Your response to external and internal stimuli is based on the information in your mind. Therefore, all of the responses and thoughts and actions you’ve had are what shape you. Your future will be shaped by everything that’s being recording right now in your mind.

If we had only positive information stored in our consciousness, then that would be great. But there’s also negative information there—information you really want to forget. Sometimes there are moments in our past that give us chills when thinking about them. You might want to erase those memories. But some people live with those memories and hold on to them their entire life. Then when they are working hard and trying to live their life to the fullest, often it’s those memories that hold them back.

But it’s not just our own memories that affect our lives. Each of us has an individual unconscious, but there’s also a collective unconscious. Although it may seem like individuals are separate and distinct, when you enter the world of the unconscious mind, you find that we are all connected. Just as your external environment affects your energy, the negative information of the unconscious mind of someone who is really close to you can influence you. That’s why it’s necessary to know ourselves and the information we have in our unconscious.

Meditation, especially energy meditation, enables us to look deep into our consciousness and get to know ourselves. Energy meditation takes you into a state of consciousness that’s deeper than when you’re asleep, except you maintain the awareness of when you’re awake. In that state you can pull out all of your negative memories and ideas from the past. In the process of doing that, you discover the strength and power to control your emotions and feelings, which means you can control your energy and manage your life. That power is an innate function of your brain; it doesn’t come from anything outside of you. Therefore, as long as you’re awake, you can make positive, healthy energy anytime you want. That’s something only you can do. Nobody else can do it for you. That’s one reason I wrote The Call of Sedona—to share energy meditation so people can find themselves and manage their energy.

I spent so much time in my life lost and wandering. I searched for something to do that made me feel that even if I were to die doing it, I could die happy. I finally found it, but there wasn’t anybody who showed it to me. My parents, my teachers at school, even religions or organizations or different meditation groups I went to couldn’t help me find my path to work I was passionate about.

In order to find it, I had to find my true self through meditation. I learned you have to know your true self well. Only when you find yourself will you find your path.

It’s not something you can locate because somebody tells you to go there. It’s something your soul has to discover. You have to find it for yourself.

Ask yourself, “Isn’t there some kind of path like that I could find?” Listen to the answers provided by your mind and heart once you’ve cleared them of extraneous thoughts and emotions.

You know you’ve found your own path when you’re able to say, “If it’s for this work, I’m willing to stake everything on it.” At just the thought of going down that path, you can feel electricity running through your whole body.

For the last 30 years, I’ve worked hard on the path I chose—the path of helping people find themselves, find their own path, and find health, happiness, and peace through meditation and breathing. I will continue to work hard in the future, living every day with work I could die happy doing.

Despite limited resources and the dependency every person has on it, the earth is not being managed as a whole. A management system for the earth right now is simply non-existent. We have national governments, and we have countries fighting against each other. Does that make sense? If we were managing the whole earth, then we wouldn’t have 16 thousand children starving every day.

I think it’s time for people who have power and influence to get together and create some kind of system for managing the earth. I feel like that’s our responsibility as people who are living on the earth today. Our problems will not be solved simply by sitting around and praying. We’ve been praying for peace for humanity for thousands of years.

There seems to be many people who say we’re going to see the end of the world. However, I have hope. I have the hope that it’s possible for us to initiate a new system of earth management. I saw that hope through meditation. I still haven’t figured out the specific steps for how it’s going to happen. But I believe that people hold the answer. The answer is found in our brain.

In the end, it’s about each and every individual finding themselves, thereby attaining the power to change their energy. When those kinds of people get together, they can come up with great ideas—just as many people came together to put a man on the moon.

People like Benjamin Franklin, who had the brilliance to harness electricity into something useful, have received certain messages from the world of their unconscious mind. Even now, there are people everywhere who are aware of the power of the unconscious mind and the need for earth management. They are starting to mobilize loosely. It’s a new spiritual movement. I feel that it’s critical.

That’s why, to manage the earth and create a positive future from the brilliance of our brains, we need to change the consciousness of all humanity. To do that we need two things: to strengthen our sense of humanity and to restore the earth’s natural environment to its original healthy state. If we can achieve these two things, then I feel a golden millennium awaits us.

There’s not a lot of time in which we can make changes. But you can still find the work that you need to do and take part in the solution. You’ve received a lot of things after coming to this earth; you’re indebted to the earth. We’re all indebted to the earth, so I hope you can work for the future of the earth for as long as you have life in your body. That’s the way you can grow your soul. Can you really feel comfortable saying, “Oh, I’m done now. I just want to live a comfortable life,” when we have 16,000 children starving to death every day? Would you be comfortable just because you close your eyes and your ears?

I feel we can find the answer in our brains. When we take the approach that each of us has a responsibility as an individual, we can find solutions we seek.