We all have teachers that have helped us to grow, to learn and to transform into the people we are today. Sometimes our teachers are obvious to us, we may have spent lots of time with them or we could have actively sought them out for specific guidance. Other times this student/teacher relationship is beyond our awareness. We have people and circumstances that sometimes unexpectedly offer an opportunity to learn, or to receive help in seeing a greater truth about ourselves and the world we live in. This serendipitous exchange can elude us in the moment and it could take many years of growth before our awareness reveals that we were actually a student in the thick of receiving a valuable lesson from a person who happens to be playing the role of the teacher.

Guru means remover of darkness. Purnima means full moon 

The full moon in July is a day of celebrating the teacher, the remover of the darkness of ignorance,  the ones that shepherd us towards a greater understanding of life and where we stand in it all. 

We all have been guided at times in the past and this is our opportunity to send a wave of gratitude into the hearts of those that we have been so fortunate to cross paths with, the ones we remember, the ones we don’t and the ones that are still to come.

Happy Guru Purnima

What is transcendence? 

Words, that are the trending favourites of the spiritual chowder, can easily and often become saturated with associative meaning. Either enticing or triggering, and quite often not actually being understood at all. An almost violent sense of repulse can sometimes arise and deprive people of tasting the true meaning of what is being spoken. It seems the more a word grows in popularity the more it loses its unique flavour, taking on the aroma and smack of the stuff around it.  Since having kids that now ask questions about words as they pop up in books, I have realised how much of a victim I am to this loss of deep understanding of language, in exchange for a broad and often very loose context. So it’s important to get back to the truth even within the specific context of meditation when we talk about ‘transcendence’.

Transcending is not limited to the practice of eyes closed meditation. Going from eyes open experience of life into a meditative state is definitely an act of transcending, however, it does not mean that transcendental experience is limited to the eyes closed state. It is not a word that is owned by a technique or experienced exclusively by a particular group of people. It’s a word that describes the action of ‘going beyond’ a particular experience.   

People that don’t have an eyes closed practice still experience transcending however meditating gives us the opportunity to gain mastery over the action and then the capability to use it in a highly effective and efficient way to improve our lives.  

There are many things that can be tools of transcendence. Prior to meditation, surfing was it for me. It was the thing that would shift any pattern of thought allowing me to experience a change of mind. Grumpy and dark one minute, happy and clear the next. This is transcending. Retiring from one layer of thought into another and experiencing a complete shift. Problems are limited to the layer of thinking that created them. “what was I worried about?”.. no longer relevant.  

When we start our training of transcending thoughts through meditation, it begins with the dive inwards. Waking state, 5 sensory experience which is the state of consciousness we experience when we are not in deep sleep or dreaming, is transcended, we go beyond that experience of reality and enter a different state. We retire into a state known as Turiya (deep meditation). What this does is expose a reality of existence that is beyond the reach of the senses. This is a completely bazaar experience when it first occurs and is hard to ever forget. WTF was that! 

It’s this first fully fledged experience of going beyond all thought, all mind, and yet still ‘experiencing’ that we could call the ‘Big Transcendence’. From that point on through consistent practice we begin to lose an extremely limited perspective of reality, one that is at the mercy of the thoughts that rattle through our minds. “I am my thoughts” makes way for “I am the Knower” the witness of my thoughts.
The authoritarian mind is relieved from its tiresome duties of flying the plane solo and begins to settle into its preferred position as co-pilot. The ‘trusty companion’ that in the company of the true captain can be free to think whatever it wants without putting the whole plane at risk. This is the difference between reactive behaviour of the lower mind and its conditioning and the action born of a deeper knowing (wisdom). 

With the knowledge of our true nature born out of the experience of going beyond thoughts we loosen the grip of the mind and find it easy to transcend at any time, not merely in meditation but also in every day life. Moving beyond one level of thinking and the accompanying reality. Instead of being powerless, dominated by our thoughts and emotions, We become empowered with the skill of change. 

We see our elders as vulnerable, susceptible and at risk, and this may be the case right now with this pesky germ wreaking havoc. 

But having made the decision to do what we need to as a society to keep everyone safe I think we can then go one step further. Rather than fan the flame by focusing on the weaknesses of the older generations we could pay our attention to their strengths. There is something I see in my 83 year old Oma and others of her generation that I don’t see in the “young healthy” people, including myself. A word that pops to mind is resiliency. They are far more experienced in this thing called life than any of us. They have lived through pandemics, wars and recessions. They have watched the world move from hand written letters to live streaming video they have seen humanity move from walking pace into a high speed sprint. They have done what they need to do to adapt, transform and change, again and again. 

If there is one thing we should all be doing right now it is asking our elders for advice. Even if you don’t feel you need it, a genuine inquiry about life is a much nicer offering than projecting our fear and worry into their world. The news does enough of that. 

I would imagine genuine questions about their life experience would be incredibly refreshing to the ears of these old-timers that are probably sick and tired of being “the sick and tired”. They are the powerful minds of a generation that can teach us newbies some things. If we are lucky enough to have any of these people in our lives we should make the most of it. 

Today I tried something different in my approach as I chatted to my dear old Oma, I asked her for advice. As I awaited her response, I noticed, that in that moment I didn’t see her as weak or vulnerable, I saw her as strong, tough and unshakable. I saw her resiliency, staying power and enormous heart. 

I trust that by seeing these qualities in her, she saw them too 
Thanks Oma. 

Mass upheaval of stress in the collective consciousness is felt by all.
All the ancient traditions recognise our interconnectedness, not only to our fellow human kind but to all of creation. The Modern science of Quantum mechanics presents different language to describe this same thing - the unified field, one indivisible whole consciousness. There is no escape from our connection to one and other and thats beautiful knowledge to have. As Thoreau says “Solitude is not measured by the miles of space that intervene between a man and his fellows”. If we can find solitude in a crowd, we can find connection in isolation. Space does not separate, it connects. 

We can feel this cosmic connectivity trembling at our core when things hit the fan on a global scale. One tremor ripples across the entire web, permeating the minds of every individual. United in this experience of feeling, divided only in our interpretation and response.

Rather than fighting each other and engaging in heated debate over the appropriate response to what we are all feeling, we can turn within ourselves. Feel deeply into that place that inspires action that is right for you and you only, and act accordingly, without shame or fear of being judged. Can we then, as we carry out our activities, observe the actions of others without judgment?

Our different beliefs form the line in the earth, the illusionary divide. It is the line that splits the ‘one’ into ‘two’, and it’s inside this furrow of turned up dirt that seeds are sown. Watered in under the pressure of two opposing forces that rain down and give life to the forests of multiplicity, the story of life. There would be no calm without chaos, no up without down, no good without evil, no inside without outside and no healthy without sick. What a boring play this life would be if we all felt, interpreted and responded in unity at all times. ‘One’ consciousness experiencing itself as ‘one’, is not a story. One consciousness forgetting its ‘oneness’ in order to experience a different point of view is creation.. creation of a story. The play and display of life. The vedas call this “Lila Shakti”.

Standing up for your beliefs is important but can we accept that the beliefs across the line from you also have their purpose? Can we fight for what we want to see in the world without forgetting that beneath the illusion of many we are one. As Krishna says to Arjuna when instructing him to destroy his enemies “do it smilingly”. Anchored in being perform the action, allow it to flow forth with love, love for the opposition who in collaboration is  helping you to create an epic story.

We can all live an exemplary life where we are the hero of our own story. It’s the challenging times that offer up the opportunity for you to stand into your power. Make the decisions that allow you to feel alive and inservice to this role. Where am I needed right now? In nearly all stories the hero is seen making decisions that defy the status quo. They move when everyone is too scared to move and they stay still when everyone is moving too quick. They fearlessly act in response to a voice deep within that speaks only to them. It is their actions that inspire and uplift others to also change direction. Heroes help people break free of fear, the fear of the unknown.   

What we can do, is what we are trained to do, which is to make contact with this subtle field within that connects us to everything. Through meditation we ‘de-excite' our mind, that like all other minds is being stimulated by the current drama and sent into a spin. When we settle into this space within, our senses are heightened allowing us to then discriminate between the inner intuitive voice and the noise of the collective stress. By strengthening our capability to hear our inner truth we build confidence to act on it.

The Veda teaches that what you do as an individual impacts the collective, our thoughts and actions feed into the unified field, either adding to the turbulence or helping to calm it down. Taking your consciousness, your loving awareness and pouring it within for 20 minutes twice a day is our offering, our contribution to both the little self (individual) and big self (Collective). 

Meditation helps to establish your role as the hero and identify where your service is required. It may be to create a safe environment for children to be children or to help someone get their groceries or innocently listening while someone releases some stress. Those seemingly small actions are all part of what makes you a hero. We don’t need to do anything other than respond to the need of the time and that is why we meditate, so we know what that is.  

When does our practice start and when does it finish?
If you sit down to meditate, closing your eyes could be seen as the start. 
If you intend to practice for 20 minutes then that last minute would be the end.

Any practitioner of meditation could probably relate to the experience of being interrupted mid session. With kids in the picture this is quite common. In the early days of practice this mid med interruption can be seen as a disaster and ironically a meditator that has been deprived of their full practice can become not so nice to be around.
Its a good reminder to know that we don’t meditate for the experience of meditation we meditate for the experience of life. Getting shocked out of mediation is part of the practice as much as the eyes closed sitting part is. 
Its a lesson in surrender.
Can I adapt to the flow of life and respond to its needs with grace? 
There will always be more opportunities to sit down and close the eyes so go with the flow.
Creatively fulfil the demands of life, tend to the kids and gracefully move from one state to the next. 

The practice is life.

I spent 10 minutes walking around under a banksia that had a passionfruit vine twisted through its canopy. I was looking for the perfectly ripe fruit to pick. Most of them were under ripe but I managed to find one that looked almost ready. It was high up so I had to get crafty with my approach. I eventually got to it and bent the branch enough to pick it. When I grabbed the fruit and its stem broke free, the branch flung back to its upright position shaking the entire tree. 2 seconds later a big ripe passion fruit fell to the ground. It was much bigger and riper than any I was able to spot, it was nestled high, hidden from view. Had I settled for any of the underripe low lying fruit, that was much easier to reach, I doubt this blessing would have occurred. I smiled when I picked it up and thanked the tree for the lesson.

You deserve the best.
Never feel unworthy or 
not justified in having the best.
I tell you, this is your heritage;
but, you have to accept it.
You have to expect it; 
you have to claim it.
To do so is not demanding too much.
Guru Deva,
Swami Brahmananda Saraswati

There was a man walking the track from the beach on his way home from an early morning surf. Droplets of water free-falling to the sand with every step. I passed him by in the tunnel of trees forming the gateway between suburbia and wilderness. We made eye contact. “ how is it? “ I asked. To which he replied with a smile that pressed tiny crystal like spheres of sea water into the creases around his eyes. “its always good”.

How was your day?
What a terrible question to ask a 6 year old, or anyone really. So broad and lifeless. It lacks any genuine curiosity and does nothing to stimulate a response. It’s like taking every colour of the rainbow, mixing them all together into a brown soup and asking someone to use it to paint a colourful picture.
Good.. is the only response I ever get. sometimes he might manage to use my brown pot of a question and paint an interesting stain but even that is a laboured effort on his behalf.
I’ve recently embarked on a quest to delete this mundane question from our lives and introduce creative ones.
Yesterday I asked him, “did any animals visit you at school today” he looked at me with a smile and laughingly said “no”. I could see his mind journey into the past and the conversation that followed was delightful.
It’s incredibly refreshing to break free of the patterns that dominate our behaviour. Simply changing the way we approach conversation with intention laden speech rather than automatic programming. Conscious questions get conscious answers. The possibilities are endless ⚡️

We have a pot plant in the corner of the living room. It’s a big beautiful fiddle leaf fig that is now about 2 1/2 meters tall, surrounded by glass and sunlight. Right now there are wood chips and dirt all over the ground around the pot and a trail leading out to the middle of the room.

My 11 month old baby loves this pot plant more than any of us. He stands there grabbing its trunk and talking to it multiple times through the day. He then eats the dirt and throws the wood chips all over the floor. When he first started doing this I would run over and move him, offer him a toy as a distraction and continue doing what I was doing. The only problem is he would soon remember what he was trying to accomplish and return to the pot to complete the task. Again I would move him, right before he got his fat little hands into the dirt. This would go on all day and it would frustrate the hell out of both of us. He wanted the dirt and I wanted hime to leave it alone. 

One day I decided to let him get to the dirt and complete his mission. He grabbed it, ate it, threw it around, looked at me and smiled a smile of pure delight, then moved on to do something else. Job done. 

I cleaned up the mess and that was that. 

It made me realise that I was getting in the way of a desire of his and until it had been satisfied he was not going to let up. The time and energy expended preventing him from fulfilling this desire was pointless. 

Sometimes we think we know what is right for someone, we use all our energy to convince them to abandon their desire and pursue something “better”. However in most cases they need to satisfy themselves first. 

I let him eat the dirt and when he turned to me with glassy eyes and wood chips stuck in his 5 teeth I was there, waiting, smiling, holding a banana. He was stoked and accepted. The banana, I think, tasted much better after the dirt than it would have before. 

I was sitting down on the couch getting frustrated at my creative process of writing.

I would write a sentence, stare at it, delete and repeat. 

Mia, who was working on a painting, sat back and said out loud “I ruined my painting! I liked it much more before” 

It made me realise how easy my process of typing was in comparison to hers. If I made a step in the wrong direction I could go back with no problem. She had to repaint an entire section, 15 minutes to paint it, 15 minutes to paint over it and then she was back to where she was 30 minutes earlier. 

I stopped whining immediately and got on with it. Perspective.

We arrived at the top of a cliff over looking a right hand point break and decided we had found the place to post up for a few days. We grabbed our tent from the car and skipped off over the dunes to find a protected place to pitch up. Our tent, which we had emptied our pockets to purchase, was a traditional round, single poled, canvas Bedouin tent. We had ordered it as a custom and waited two days for it to be finished by the local maker prior to hitting the deep desert of the western Sahara.

It was hot and windy on the sand as we unraveled the olive green canvas. Fatigue from traveling across the desert mixed with heat and airborne sand made solving the puzzle extremely challenging. The source of our confusion became clear when after 10 minutes of struggling in the wind to make sense of this tent the aha! Moment dawned. Almost in sync with the moment my pants ripped in half, leaving my bare arse hanging in the wind, we realised that our tent was “very traditional” so traditional that it required a seperate structure to make it work. It had no floor! It was a glorified umbrella, a castle in the sky. It needed thick moroccan rugs and material to hang off it to make it a home. 

So there we were in the hot sand, our house had no bottom, mine was getting scorched through the gaping hole in my only pair of trousers and the sun was beginning its decent. 

We aborted ship and trucked back an hour or so to a nearby town to sleep.

We then carried this tent with us for the rest of the trip and at every opportunity I would fortify the seam in my pants with a needle and thread. 

What was point in all this? 

5 years later I threw the mouldy canvas tent in the bin and laughed a big beautiful laugh at our misfortune that we were fortunate enough to experience. 

Information that inspires a shift in the way we think can sneak up and strike at any time, in any form. I had a nice piece of mind altering info come my way yesterday when I tuned into a radio segment. Mia and I were driving to meet some friends for dinner when I switched on the radio. There was a woman talking about turtles and rain storms which made no sense as an entry point. I soon got swept into the flow of this woman's story, which turned out to be about living simply and connecting with nature. She really hit home and sparked a ripple of gratitude that rolled up my spine when she said “I don’t understand this idea of escape. Saving up money for a holiday in order to escape everyday life. It doesn’t seem right to me. I don’t ever want to escape my life, I love my life”

This profound message inspires fearlessness and creativity. The life you actually want to live is yours to create, don’t settle for a life that you want to escape from.

A great place to start is with paying all your attention to the parts of your life that you already love. Water the flowers, not the weeds. 

I recently had the pleasure of introducing a young man aged 14 to Vedic meditation. "It's like being a diver, diving for pearls that lay in the deep stillness of the mind." One of the many wise and beautiful ways in which he expressed his experience of the meditative state.
What we share with others in our every day interactions is dictated by our quality of mind. If we only experience stress and worry than that's all we can offer. We all have an infinite supply of pearls waiting to be shared with the world but it's up to us to dive within and collect them. Daily meditation allows us to move beyond the stress and worry that occupies the busy surface of the mind and drift into the calm, clear and creative waters of our oceanic mind. This daily dive allows us to enter the market place of life offering bags of pearls, rather than bags of stress. Fulfilment traders

Its been 10 years since I learnt Vedic meditation and I can honestly say that all the goodness I've experienced between then and now has come to me through the door that this technique opens for me each day. All the limitation that had crept its way into my life began to dissolve and new exciting opportunities started to emerge and continue, even more frequently to this day. Through simply sitting, closing my eyes and practicing this effortless technique daily, i’ve witnessed an insane amount of growth! Not only in my own life but also in that of my friends and family who also tap into the ‘med zone’.

I snuck out of the house like a ninja! It’s a glorious win that I have every so often, the win of skilfully exiting a silent home without waking any sleeping children. It’s the dance of the midnight thief, it’s art in motion. So much at risk!! One misplaced step on a creaky floorboard and its over. This morning was seamless, up and out, speeding down the moonlit road that leads to my beloved ocean. No one in the carpark, and no one in the waves, only me and the fish. 

Surfing alone is an absolute joy but it can also be a little intimidating. The only way I feel comfortable when I’m bobbing around before sun up is connecting with how my body feels. It’s almost a guarantee that when I see fish splash around me or mysterious shadow under the surface that my mind will jump to the conclusion that I’m about to get eaten. If I listened to this mind of mine every time I was alone in the ocean I would never last long enough to make it a worthwhile surf. 

I once chatted to a surfer from Western Australia about surfing after there had been numerous shark attacks “You really have to listen to your intuition, that feeling that tells you to ‘get out now'. It’s different to the voice that is always scared of stuff; It’s the inner feeling, that tingle up your spine that precedes the voice that says its no longer safe”  

Today I was surrounded by a bait ball, my mind was screaming get out but there was no tingle of fear up my spine, I felt good. So I enjoyed a long surf and pacified my mind with wave riding and sun gazing, trusting in this body of mine that is highly sensitive to its immediate environment  “Shut up and enjoy yourself” says the heart to the mind.

In the weeks leading up to the birth of my second child I crafted a huge list of things that we needed to do to be ready for another child to enter our world. Every time I ticked something off, another two things got added. 

3 weeks before the Due date of our baby, and list deadline, Mia went into labour. We were about to go to the farmers market for the morning when she entered the trance like state of birth. 

We were both completely caught off guard, we didn’t feel ready at all. 

I hadn’t done any of the really important things on that list. Like all lists of mine, the easy, not important things got done first. 

No birth pool, no birth bag, no birth plan, no nappies and no food in the house.

A few hours later he was in my hands under the water in our family bath, which is about 1/3 of the size of a birth pool and an extremely awkward shape to deliver a baby in. Mia was in our bed with our healthy baby boy on her bare chest when the midwife team arrived at our house. He wasn’t waiting for anyone! 3 weeks earlier than expected and 30 minutes before the birth team. 

The next day, which was my birthday, I woke up and walked to our fridge. There front and centre was my enormous list titled “Pre Baby List” I plucked it down and threw it in the bin. What a great gift! 

The lesson Mia and I learnt from all this was; Being “ready” is a state of mind not a completed list.  

My baby boy gave me 3 weeks worth of time for my birthday. He saved me from doing all those things, that as it turned out, weren’t important at all. He offered me a holiday from my frantic planning for the future and transported me to the present moment and while everyone else forgot about my birthday that year, ill never forget it. 

Be ready NOW and everything else will fall in place.

Becoming a teacher of Vedic meditation was for me a beautiful extension of my own personal practice.
I was one of the most enthusiastic practitioners of VM, handing out numbers of teachers to anyone that showed the slightest interest and following it up with reminders to call them. Have you learnt yet? What are you doing mate?? Basically giving people the same amount of push that I received from a good mate (absolute legend) who pushed me to commit to the same course of instruction years ago, while also being slightly careful to not become a full blown pest (apologies if I was a pest).
After about 8 years of doing this I received the next big push from a friend to start teaching it myself. Now getting to introduce people to this technique, knowing how much transformation and growth it has created for me, is the most rewarding thing I could ever imagine doing. This technique has been handed down through time, from its origins in Ancient India some 5000 years ago to be available to us all now. So to play a small role in peoples journeys of self enquiry and self development by passing on these ancient skills is something I am deeply grateful for.
Every time I get to teach this technique it re-inspires my own practice which is a huge gift in itself. To everyone that has granted me the pleasure of introducing them to this practice, and to the people that will in the future, i'm truly thankful for the experience!

I think the best thing we can teach our kids is that the way you live your life is your greatest work, your creative masterpiece and it’s up to you as an individual to put the time and energy into shaping your reality. Seeing you succeed, seeing you fail, seeing you put time and energy into shaping your dreams is much more inspiring than watching you succumb to the pressures of life and enter a life of mediocracy, doing what society says you should do as a family.
Most people (myself included) have or had an idea implanted that children bring about the destruction of opportunity that is available to young singles or couples. I’ve witnessed the opposite. Yep, it’s way more challenging with kids, but life is so fulfilling witnessing their sparkling eyes soak up the magic that surrounds us in every moment. Don’t be afraid to continue doing what you’re doing, the little ones will follow you anywhere and learn from the experience

Today after a little deliberation I decided that I would go check what the ocean was like. The plan was to go for a quick surf or at least a swim. It took some convincing to pacify the part of my mind that was desperate to avoid the ocean and get a head start on work. 

When I got to the ocean the waves looked incredibly fun. I took a short video to send to my friend who wanted a report and sent him a few texts that did nothing to hide my enthusiasm. I was amped!!! 

I ran to the car to put my wetsuit on. Right before I grabbed my surfboard from the back, a car left from a nice shady spot under a tree, I saw it and decided to take it. I slammed the boot, with my board in the car and ran around to the driver door to jump in….Locked! No No No NOOOOO!

There I stood, in my wetsuit, with my board, clothes and keys locked in the car. I suddenly realised my phone was in my hand and quickly pressed the button in hopes of a solution, a lifeline, but what I saw was the folioing sequence; 1% battery, spinning wheel of death, black screen, reflection of disappointment.

Late the previous night I had watched a short video by Michael Singer, author of The Untethered Soul and The Surrender Experiment. Where he talked about his experience of becoming aware of the internal dialogue of the mind and how if unnoticed and left to its own, will make all the decisions in our life. He talked about an experiment he did with this voice in his head “I stopped listening to that, and started listening to life instead. What if the events unfolding in front of me were more important than whether I liked them or not.”

I was standing in my wetsuit at the beach, with no transport and no phone. My mind was a hive of noise, MY BOARD, MY WORK, MY CAR… BAHHHHH! 

Rather than being absorbed by my minds struggle with an expectation that was no longer attainable, I decided to tune into the information life was feeding me right then.

I laughed, ran to the ocean and had a great long body surf. Hours I spent floating around catching waves with nothing other than my own physical body driving me upon wave after wave. Body surfing is a love of mine but I often will favour taking a board, so this was great having that option removed. I also would usually finish when I got tired, but seeing as I had nothing else to do I pushed myself further and got a great physical workout. My friend eventually came and after an epic surf together, he gave me a lift back to my house to grab my spare key. When I got my phone back on I had a message saying my meeting had been pushed back an hour, so I was not late and even had time to eat lunch. 

Now on one hand I was even further behind schedule with work, but on the other I was feeling topped up and inspired. When I did get into my work, everything I did was in flow and what could have been just another work day became a great day! A day well lived!  

Its not a bad thing to fall off every now and again as long as when you do its in the name of research rather than relapse.

The phrase “fallen off the wagon” is believed to have evolved from the late 19th century to describe a relapse into drinking alcohol after abstaining for some time. In that time there were water carts that would spray water on the dusty roads to keep the dust from becoming airborne. “im hoping on the cart” was a term used to suggest that the person was climbing up to drink only water from now on. 

The water cart can symbolise any upgrade in life, a big move towards a more sustainable, pure way of life.

When you first learn to meditate, a reservoir of nectar is found within. You climb on the “bliss cart” and begin sipping it up. Its a life changer. 

The new experience of riding this wagon is great and the idea of falling off it is ludicrous, however when you have been latched to the hose that is drip feeding you bliss for long enough it becomes normalised and we forget that its there.

Something about the old ways seems to entice us and before we know it “we’ve fallen off the wagon” to revel in the less sustainable activities. This can at first feel great as we are still running off the healing waters of the cart we’ve been on for months and the new/old program has yet to impact our upgraded state of wellbeing. Its inevitable that it will begin to fade and the experiences that motivated us to get on the cart to begin with will return and send us crawling back. 

Revisiting the old life, the one prior to hoping on the meditation wagon can offer some great insight. Its the research program we may have needed to draw an accurate conclusion. “Yes it is much better for me to stay on the wagon”.

The trick is to keep this research and the results handy so that we don’t have to keep doing the same research over and over and over. 

But if you are still convinced, even with research papers stacked as thick as a phone book, that you need more evidence to prove you’re on the ultimate program. Make sure that you at least become more effective and spend less time gathering the data. 

“Get straight back on the wagon”