Water Activity and the Yogi

I recently read an article about a Yogi from India who claimed to have not eaten or had anything to drink in 70 years. Researchers put the Yogi to a test recently where they monitored him for three weeks. During the three weeks he had nothing to eat or drink. S

cientist are still not convinced that he was able to live without food or water for 70 years, as they continue to fall short of believing because of their limited lens. According to what I have read about the Yogi Master he lives with a completely empty stomach providing no ingested nutritional value to his mind and body. Yet his brain and body are that of a twenty year old. Complex cellular structures require water to survive, this has been objectively concluded upon by the scientific community.

The dehydration process in jerky manufacturing removes most of the moisture in the strips of beef to make them “shelf stable and ready to eat”. There is much more to it than that, but, moisture removal is probably one of the most important steps in processing jerky.

Moisture in beef is measured as a Water Activity variable, (AW) and is comparable to relative humidity. Pathogens such as Salmonella, E.Coli, and Listeria require more that .85 AW to be able to survive. If you remove moisture to a water activity level of below .80 AW, then the pathogen will not survive. Not even the hardiest of pathogens will be able to proliferate under these conditions. So in essence, we deplete pathogens of the ideal environment and conditions to survive.

So how is it that the Yogi master is able to survive with a presumed AW of less than .80? Could there be a spiritual realization that can only be subjectively understood? I don’t have the answers to these questions, but do understand that all of the things that truly matter in life such as love, can only be understood in the subjective, not in the objective. Science can only make sense of a world that is of the objective realm.

The Yogi believes that his energy source is sent to him from space in the form of a couple of drops of nectar. Is this far from what other cultures perceive about their god? The Mayans, Toltec, Egyptians, to mention but a few, believe that their life source came from the Sun. The Sun was their god.

Again, only understood as a matter of faith in a subjective sense, but, a powerful means nonetheless. Love is not quantifiable, but yet we feel its enormous value to living in a world with so much objectivity. It is the water to our soul, it is the food to our spirit and it is the ideal condition for the human species to continue to survive, for without it, we die.

My life source is my family. My children provide me with the essential elements to want to keep going. This source of inspiration can not be measured in a laboratory, but it is measured in the orbit of my mind and it is real.

So – Do I believe the Yogi? It is not for me to say, but, I do aspire to possess his allegiance in seeking truth in a higher order of peace and love. The ultimate conditions for survival, in my world, require FAMILY. PEACE AND LOVE to all.

The 3M Concept

The 3 M’s of the model are movement, money and marketing. The focus of the concept is on these three separate members being an amalgam of one force. Small business owners often venture to sell a product or service but may fall short because they do not truly consider the other elements of 3M. For me, the “trinity” must be satisfied equally for business to truly succeed.

The “movement” is the product or service that the business intends to “move” or sell. For us, of course, it is the jerky products that we manufacture.

The second tier is money. Money speaks to following it from beginning to end, in all areas of the operation. It is all about accurate accounting. Without proper accounting a business will fail.

Lastly, marketing! Marketing your product with proper intent is as important, if not more important than the money aspect. There must be a balance of the 3M’s in order for a small business to truly succeed. Advertising with truth and integrity is essential. Not promising more than you can actually deliver but remaining loyal and consistent to selling exactly what you are is very important.

Consistency in relationships with customers advances trust. And trust advances confidence. If a business falls short of one or the other then they must act diligently to fill in the need as quickly as possible. BALANCE is what you must seek in all walks of life.

Immediate Feedback

Why have a contact page? Why have a blog? The answers to these questions may seem obvious, but the reasons we have for this go a little deeper. For us the answers to these questions lie in the faith that we have in you, our customers. In an previous blog, I write about the idea of “legitimate authority” as it applied to decision making, but more importantly as it applies to listening to you the customer. In the book, “FLOW”, Dr. Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi defines 8 dimensions that must be satisfied to achieve a state of flow in achieving a goal. The second dimension is described as setting your goals with some set factor of immediate feedback. Immediate feed back is necessary because it acts like a “gauge” in alerting us to what we are doing wrong and what we need to change in our pursuits. The only way one grows is through the feedback loop. But one has to be prepared as to what feedback you are going to receive and not take things personally. But that is another blog altogether. So for us the contact form and the BLOG serve as tools for us. They serve as a means to obtain the most integral form of feedback. That is, feedback from our customers so that we may use it in our constant pursuit of excellence. Your comments serve as that second dimension to achieving FLOW at the Lights Jerky Company. And for that, we Thank You.