Jain Digest 2004 11 Vol 23 No 4

Author(s): Federation of JAINA
Publisher: USA Federation of JAINA

Page 38

YOUNG JAIN PROFESSIONALS (YJP)
Sixth Annual Young Jain Professionals Convention
The 6th Annual Young Jain Professionals convention specializing in infectious diseases, called "What's 'in' for was held in San Diego from October 10 to 13, 2003. Jains the 21st Century? Jainism?!". This session challenged the from the US, Canada and England convened at the Shel- Cartesian mind/body model and posited the existence of ter Pointe Hotel and Marina and participated in scholarly the soul and the existence of vibrations that bring topresentations and team building activities for the week- gether the mind, body, and soul. end.
Next came a follow-up to the session "Re-branded The convention began Friday evening with icebreaker and Re-packaged: Jainism's Role in Reshaping Future Huactivities. The activities facilitated getting to know each man Thoughts", where the each of the groups presented other while challenging our minds. Saturday morning then their ideas on the topics they had been assigned to. Each began with a yoga session, where participants had the group had apparently put a lot of thought into their ideas chance to warm up for the day, led by Dinesh Shah of and recommendations. At the end, Yogendra Jain indiSan Diego
cated that these ideas will all be presented to JAINA in
hopes of actually implementing them. Thus the activity This was followed by a presentation by Yogendra Jain
was not only a thought provoking exercise for the paron "Re-branded and Re-packaged: Jainism's Role in Re- ticipants, but was also shown to have practical imporshaping Future Human Thoughts". This presentation chal- tance. lenged the notion that Jainism must be taught using traditional methodology and addressed the idea that Jain After lunch, the group headed off to Balboa Park, teachings could be made more appealing and more acces- where we met up with Team Building USA again for ansible to a Western population by implementing creative other afternoon of bonding activities. At the park, atideas such as a Jain theme park. Although some of the tendees participated in a scavenger hunt. After returnconcepts presented might not become reality in the im- ing from the park, Amar Salgia, presented a session on mediate future, discussing such ideas encouraged the "Balance in Anekantavada". This session explained the audience to think about these issues.
proper meaning of Anekantavada, helped dispel some of
the misconceptions about Anekantavada's meaning and Next was a presentation by Prem Jain, senior vice
purpose, and clarified ways of actually applying it in our president of Cisco, called "If Ken Lay were Jain... Would day-to-day lives we have had an Enron?" This presentation addressed the contradictions many of us face about maintaining Jain That night, many of the participants stayed up most values while working and excelling in the business world, of the night, enjoying their last hours together before such as promoting strengths and hiding weaknesses of having to go off in separate directions. A few even reproducts and creating stress in the family when working mained awake long enough to watch the sun rise. Monlong hours.
day, as everyone parted, many looked forward to seeing
each other at next year's YJP Convention. After a break for lunch was a session titled "Creating Inner Balance... Can it really be achieved?" presented
Another successful conference came to a close, with by Erik Sowder of Kaiser Permanente. This presentation
many strong bounds being formed and connections being
made. Thanks to the hard work of this year's Y JP Board: emphasized the importance of balancing physical, mental, and emotional energies. In this session, Mr. Sowder
Suchita Gala, Rajesh Shah, Dhaval Shah, Mruna Shah helped the audience understand the mind/body connec
and Paulomi Gudka. tion through biofeedback technology.
For more information about YJP please visit Sunday morning again started with yoga. This was www.ysponline.org. You will also be able to view some of followed by a presentation by Dr. Manoj Jain, a physician the presentation made at this year's conference.
36/JAIN DIGEST-Fall 2003
Jain Education Interational 2010_03