A friend wrote me today:

“An investigation in USA of the most successful companies run by well-liked leaders showed that out of many questions there was only one to which they gave the same answer: they had all in the past experienced bad bosses! So, to become good on something you should first ask the Universe for the negative experience of that.”

A stone in a waterfall, picture from today’s excursion into the Kien Valley, Alps

It is a deep biographical truth – the so-called negative experiences with superiors in my life as well have given me an impetus what not to do in my life. And going through times of torrential changes and standing in them like the stone in the waterfall, just from one day to the other keeping the head high, gives a fruit of deep experiences. What was most important for me was (and is) to keep the link to the inner, through daily times of withdrawal within. If you don’t root yourself firmly, the tides will wash you away.

Yesterday afternoon we went half way across Switzerland to Einsiedeln to meet Sri Kumar, our spiritual teacher. Besides some administrave issues and watching a tennis match with Roger Federer at the TV, we had a meditation, a walk and a talk together. Again I was impressed by his deep spiritual wisdom expressing in minute details of day-to-day life.

We spoke about keeping the inner contact during the day. My wife told him that she experienced during the seminar we had attended last week a strong energy of presence that was brought in through him, and she asked him how he does it. He said that through opening up to the Presence and invoking the Spiritual Hierarchy, the energy starts flowing through.

We also spoke about meeting with adversaries. He told us that he had had in his life strong attacks from different sides, but he never acted against them. Instead, he neutralised the opposition by keeping silent and absorbing it. He said, it is his experience, when you don’t oppose to an adversary, this takes away the opposing energy. The person starts inquiring what is going on in the other, why he doesn’t strike back. When a person starts pondering, he stops attacking.

When people come and complain about others, he is trying to subtly show them the viewpoint of the other, so that they can come to a broader understanding. Actually we can be sure that we usually only know half of the truth or even less.

Kandersteg, May 27th, 07

I today met for lunch an old acquaintance, a counselor and supervisor, with whom I had been working over more than a decade and for whom I have great esteem. Two years ago he had “retired” from most of his assignments and focused on what he wanted to do in the remaining years.

There was a crisis of re-orientation, unless “by chance” he and his wife, a healing practitioner, had come across Cluster Medicine and Cluster Logic. (“ClusterMedicine – that is a method aiming at knowing the causes of both physical and psychic disorders that are standing behind the obvious symptoms and accordingly giving special therapeutic impulses. / ClusterLogics- that is a method aiming at knowing mental, social and emotional weaknesses and accordingly giving exact and strategic impulses.”, from the website).

It was for him an opening of a new dimension and a continuation of his search for development of his instruments. He has very good counseling skills and it was fascinating for me to see his enthousiasm for the application of the new approaches he is learning. Even though the body is growing older, his mind is radiant.

Fire at the end of a ritual in India, January 2006

Last week my eldest son (16) had to write a paper in high school about computer gaming addiction. For this he made an interview with a social education worker, a friend of my wife. They talked about different forms of addiction and from when on you cross the point of gaming for joy to gaming out of an addiction.
For him it was important to see that he himself doesn’t fall into the category of computer addicts – though he is gaming quite a lot in the multi-player online game Guild Wars and this since about 1.5 years. With the fighters of his clan he is running for hours through countries of digital magical imagination – forgetting dinner or anything around. But he is still having other interests in the “real” world as well, and school is also demanding its tribute.

There is such a pull of the pictures and action into these digital fantasy worlds, where the entire inner imagination is captured by the spell. It is like a more physical effigy of the worlds you enter through drugs. Also in meditation you come about strata of subtle imagination where you can lose yourself in esoteric fancies.

The awakening in life towards responsibility and commitment to some purposeful activity often takes a long time. Some people seem to evolve only parts of their inner flower of life, and petals remain closed till later years or never open. In my life the process of discovering the thread took quite long and was partly painful. But the pain pushed forward to change: “Change cannot happen, unless one yearns to change.” (K.P. Kumar: On Change)

Yesterday we were reconnoitering a spot for the Pentecost scouts’ camp of our son. They got the o.k. from a farmer to do the camp on a beautiful place called Angel’s meadow, in a forest on a hill. Since they wanted to place the kitchen tent in the forest to protect it from bad weather, they had asked the local authority to whom the forest belongs. The map showed stripes of about 10-15 m width going through the forest, and each stripe belongs to another owner. The owner of the nearest stripe refused the kitchen tent, the second allowed it. Now we had to see where there was a convenient spot. In the thick forest you just discover here and there a plug – and finally, wet from the rain, we located a spot for the tent. You think you are in nature, but is is full of mentally fixed divisions.

The same theme in a different setting:

When I was yesterday deleting old e-mails, I re-found a link about a website on Indo-European languages, which an Indian friend had sent me some months ago (fascinating how this big language group of several hundred languages has similar roots – the wisdom teachings trace the origins far more back than contemporary science).

The author of the site is a 25 year old American lady, Jennifer, who is an English Language Assistant near Annecy, France. In her blog she mentioned that she was just about to leave, because she was jobless at the moment, wasn’t allowed to work, since she didn’t have the permission, and that (yesterday) she would return back to the States. Permissions fix barriers, something so common, that we don’t even think about it and take these mental conceptions for natural.

I dropped her a note in a post. I was astonished about the parallels between her situation and that of a friend in the US. Her situation is reversed to that of Jennifer, and she also left a comment in Jennifers blog. She is studying Linguistics and Creative Writing and working as an assistant at the University of St. Cloud (and she had been helping for a while translating the Lunar Messenger). She might have to leave the US because of having just a student permission. Again mentally fixed barriers of the legal regulations.

There is so much regulation in every part of life that you forget that life as a whole is a unity, that our concrete mind is crystalising and segmenting. On the spiritual path you learn to come out of this fragmentation and at the same time live in it and learn to handle it in an intelligent way, changing thus ways of behaving.

The concrete mind – a storehouse of knowledge, of analysing and dividing

In the last weeks I had been working on compiling the elements for the Annual Report of the World Teacher Trust (WTT). Groups and individuals from different countries of the West, which feel related with this movement, have sent reports, about group livings (seminars) and about their good-will activities in different fields of social service activities as well as their spiritual work. The report is mostly in English, some contributions also in the local languages of the groups.

I have been doing the co-ordination and editing now since five years. Though it is quite some work, I like it. It is very inspiring to see the manifold good-will initiatives. In the course of the years several substantial activities have arisen out of the spiritual impulse of the WTT and our teacher, Dr. K. P. Kumar.

What fascinates me with this movement is that the focus on practice arises out of a deep spiritual impulse, and in general there is a hearty relation in the network of people. For me the annual report is an occasion to keep in contact with a number of persons. So it is a good networking instrument. It will be circulated to the groups and interested individuals in the course of May, but not in public. People committed to good work in silence don’t want their names to go out.

The report also makes me think of how difficult it is for many to establish a good balance between the different fields of life: Professional work for maintaining the living, family life, social contacts to keep good exchanges, then, for those who walk the spiritual path, maintaining a regular rhythm of inner work, plus some kind of a service activity. The report is for me a good testimony how people grow when they work with these essentials.

I come across others who lose themselves in fancies, in books and in imagining about sublime topics. Interested in many things they fail to focus on the essential and to go into depth. Respecting the basics is most important to gain a stable foundation. And building the foundation often takes years of perseverance.

The network of sprouting life

Our friend, a healing practitioner, whom we visited last weekend, has been involved with Qi-Gong since 1990 with Master Zhi Chang-Li. He had come to Europe in 1988 in order to spread here the teaching of Qi-Gong. Our friend told us that in the beginning of his teachings the Master still was hesitating a lot what to give out to the people seeking instructions and what not. For in the traditional teaching a teacher formed just one student, who had to undergo a very severe and long training. It is not possible to impart the teachings through mere teaching, but through intense integration into life. Master Li had been in a process of learning since his early youth, also during the times of the cultural revolution, when all spiritual tradition were violently suppressed in China.

One little story our friend told from Master Li was about how students were tested that they were mastering the life-giving energy Chi: They were brought to the snowy mountains and clad in wet towels to stay out there over night. Next morning the teacher was looking, not only if the student was having warm, but also how much snow around him he could get melted through the heat he had created in his inner…

I don’t want to retell here the stories about the life of Master Li our friend reported to us. What impressed me most was that through incredible hardships and strict training a process of deep transformation took place. Thus the wisdom slowly shone forth and found a living expression. It is like with carbon dusk being transformed under extreme pressure to a diamond. Chemically carbon and diamond have the same substance, but only through transmutation the brilliance is gained.

We had contacts with situations with persons exhibiting an outer facade of nice guys. Behind there were inner abysses, aggravated through the use of drugs. Here is not the place to go into details, but these situations showed once again: If your “pursuit of happiness” goes against laws of nature, the “ropes of life” are inevitably tightening you down. On the “downward slope” your understanding gets obscured and your discrimination twisted. Restlessness keeps you busy and obstacles after obstacles heap up on the path, holding you away from your inner self. No way to escape.

Nature isn’t gingerly in its teaching methods. It is “bent or break”. Either you learn or the suffering increases. Fear, pain, ill health, conflicts in the surrounding life are just some of the methods used.

The experiene is, the will to right action has to awaken, and before that the readiness to learn what is right. When this good will is still in an infant stage and vacillating, the help of a friend, a guide is inevitable. On the upward path, this guide giving guide-lines is necessary. He is somehow an outer “substitute” of your own self and will. However, he should never infringe upon your own will, but only help to strengthen it. This way the path to one’s own “inner fountain” can slowly be regained.

Finding one’s inner fountain

The Globe. A sculpture in the building of the United Nations in Geneva.

The teachings of timeless wisdom tell us, that there are traces of the teachings found everywhere on the globe, expressing through the Scriptures and spiritual teachings of many nations (see our booklet on H. P. Blavatsky).

Two days ago I got an e-mail from a friend living in Brazzaville, Congo, who wrote to me about fascinating parallels between the Eastern wisdom teachings and Kikongo, his mother tongue:

“All the material I receive from you helps me establish a link with the traditional religion of our ancestors akin to ancient Egyptian spiritual practices. Focus being made on positive aspects of course.

It is called “Kinzambi kia Kongo” meaning “Solar Religion”. Kikongo being my mother tongue it is also an ethnic group living in Central Africa: DRC, Congo, Gabon, Angola… and members can found in other areas of the globe: Southern part of African, Americas, Asia…

I also suspect some kinship between Sanskrit and Kikongo in terms of vocabulary and vibration. By way of examples the most sacred sound in kikongo is OMAKONGO (OM AKONGO think of the pranava OM). Again kundalini is to be found in kikongo too. Kunda is like the base or springboard from which the spine (kilini or lini in kikongo) can be activated.

In the same connection, KONGO is a sacred sound in kikongo meaning the Sun, Universe, God, Power , Love, Wisdom… is the highest title in Japanese Buddhism. Its equivalent in Sanskrit is Vajra.

As for Shamballa, traces of its origin can also be found in kikongo. Sha = city in old kikongo; mbala = name of a tribe with relations to divine power.

Melekisedeki. Mele = targeted towards, Kisedeki = Heart of the Sun.

NGUM & NZA in Kikongo means Solve & Coagula in Alchemy, Yang & Yin for Chinese wisdom. Ngum = Spirit and NZA= matter. In pronouncing this mantra you can feel similarities with HAM SA…

The sound NGUM (I found in some Buddhist texts that GUM is used to correct negative aspects of someone’s life) was vocalized by our ancestors to fight, clear negativity. The following mantra is OM GUM GANAPATAYI SVAHA dedicated to Ganesha is revealing enough.

A Six-rayed Star is said to be the symbol of Kongo people. One triangle represents GOD with his three attributes: LOVE, WISDOM and WILL; the other one three divine ancestors of kongo religion. Be it said by passing that Ne KUTUMI (similarities with Master KOOT HUMI) is one of the great divine ancestors in tradition.

In Avalokitesvara’s mantra OM MANI PADME HUM there is the word Mani. The same word in kikongo is regarded as the title given to an initiate who has attained enlightenment. Hence the term MANI KONGO given to the old king of Kongo Kingdom in the 13th century. He was said to have a divine consciousness while living on earth.

In Kukai’s mantra is NAMU DAISHI HENJO KONGO (Homage to Maitreya). we see the word KONGO. Kukai is the Highest Priest in Shigon.

In Bagavad Gita, Krishna says of letters: ” I am A”. In kikongo AKONGO (A KONGO) is the name of HIGH GOD. (AKONGO = OMAKONGO) .The first letter of the kikongo alphabet is “A”, just like in hebrew with Alef, latin Alpha. Kikongo alphabet has equally 22 letters just like hebrew. Think of the 22 chapters of the Book of Revelation in the Bible.

Maha in Sanskrit means Great; it is the same thing in kikongo. Hence words mahatma, MahaLowa in kikongo (Great Sun = Vairocana).”

He also gave me a text where he is going a bit more into details. I sent it to some friends who were very much touched by it. A friend from Argentina replied:

“Thank for sharing the African e-mail with me. It made my imagination fly to the planets interplay and Shiva’s dance. It is so joyful to find our common origin that we can hardly realize how the diaspora took place among the human beings. Everything has to be experienced, I guess. This reminded me when Roberto got in touch for the first time with Celtic music. He was astonished to find out that it contained even tango as well as tarantella in it. Going backwards, if possible, we should be able to trace the OM…
So many sounds have lost their significance, … that’s why the Master says that the degradation of languages shows the degradation of people. The pulsation, perhaps?”

Here is a fascinating video from YouTube of a talk of Steve Jobs from Apple to graduates of Stanford University. It just came to me via an e-mail sent by a friend, though Steve Jobs gave the talk already on June 12, 2005. He is speaking about his biography, his way he met with failures, love and death. He never graduated from university, dropped from college, met with great crises, when he was fired from Apple, the enterprise he founded, was confronted with cancer.

He learned many things like calligraphy (beautiful writing) which revealed only many years later what they meant in his life. He was following his intuition and fascination and came out of great transformation processes:
“Don’t let the voice of others’ opinions make you decide”, he told the students, “stay hungry, stay foolish”.

A beautiful inspiration for openness towards life and striving.

Here you find a transcript of his talk.