Anika in conversation with Swami Sarvapriyananda

What a delight it was to talk to Swami Sarvapriyananda - btw, isn't his name so musical: Sarv-a-Priya-Nanda - its like so many names in one name, and a balance of male and female energy too! They say your name carries your vibration - in his case, it totally does. How else would you talk about consciousness at a science and tech conference and be the only person who gets a standing ovation - and mind you, these are all tech people and logical minds in the audience. He sure said something right!

Swami ji @swamisarvapriyananda is the spiritual head of the Vedanta Society of New York - and for him the debate between science and spirituality is a discovery around who we really are.

What I asked him in a personal conversation is this - in this technology & AI world, how do you return to love? His one word answer: attention. Technology damages our attention, we are not able to focus on one thing for very long. He explains: to love somebody - you need to pay attention to them. And it's not WHAT are we paying attention to, its HOW much attention we are paying. John Milton said, "the mind is its own place, and in itself can make a heaven of hell, and a hell of heaven." Meaning, if we pay attention to negative things, and if our attention is scattered, then we are living in hell. If we pay attention to positive things, and our attention is focussed and sustained - then we are living in heaven.

When I asked him about 1Ness - he said that modern technology fractures attention - and 1Ness is restored when attention is restored - 1Ness is restored to our life, 1Ness is retored to our relationships, and hopefully to our world, when we pay attention.

Swami ji, thank you for this important reminder: attention is the key to everything.

#ReturningtoLove #RTL #RTLTalks #Synapse2024 #swamisarvapriyananda #AI #ArtificialIntelligence #Technology