My wife is a piano teacher. Yesterday evening she told me that one of her students just had been very fascinated. The student had experienced that she was using different faculties in playing – imagination, hearing, sense of touch – and my wife had explained her how there is an interplay of these. The student was very grateful and told my wife: “You are always giving me so much.” My wife answered: “I give what I have, and in giving it starts flowing. When you keep it to you, the flow is stopped, and also when you just keep on receiving without giving.” And she told me: “It is like a lying 8, the sign of infinity. It keeps in motion, when you give, without expectation to receive something in return. It is an energy circulation.”
In the “Spiritual Psychology” meditations by Dr. Ekkirala Krishnamacharya, one meditation says: “Bliss lies in giving, not in taking…” It is a deep principle and only little understood today. Many are craving for getting and taking – money, power, love, ideas, emotional affection… In this attitude the free flow is absorbed by you. And when you give out of an expectation to get something in return, you get frustrated, when it doesn’t happen and feel burnt out.
Some time ago I had issued a number of the Good Will in Action on Giving and Taking, where you find some more thoughts about it.

The last weeks when I am going to work I come across a series of road works. Shovel excavators are digging up the roads. Even in a park next to my office all the paths are are closed and are being redone.
What about the inner roads? It seems that there is also need for some repair work from time to time. I feel that I am getting sometimes into habits, which, though subtle, need a repair. When there is too much “business” in the mind, the mindfulness for what is essential and what is just a side-road. The last days my wife and I had observed with some friend, who seems to have a so-called heavy load to carry with her family and social situation. However, with a closer look the situation seems to be self-chosen, and there is no will to do repair work with the roads. The wisdom teachings tell us, that from a larger perspective encompassing the soul’s experience over many incarnations all our life situations are self-chosen. I have come across a lot of people who prefer staying in a situation which for me seemed to be unbearable. But at a closer look a change in the style of living appears to cause more fear for them than to remain stuck in their situation.
Let some road repair work go on from time to time

Two days ago I got an e-mail from a Canadian friend with a link to an article on an American website called “Death made in America”, with photos of freak embryos allegedly caused by the Americans using uranium weapons in Afghanistan, where an author said he writes he took them during a journey to Afghanistan from Pakistan.
I don’t put a link to that site, for it is not my intention to increase sensational agitation or get into the trap of political propaganda. Some time ago I had seem fake pictures which were circling in European muslim communities about an alleged transformation of a girl into a freak because of her refusal to follow the Quran.
Images can be used and misused. The images of the freak creatures create a sensation of a terrible horror, of unbelievable depths of individuals or groups fighting against people with other beliefs. The wisdom teachings say that here not humans are at work, but demons incarnated in human bodies. This makes sense to me, for a human, humanitarian attitude can never accept causing such deep hurts to others.
There is an intense fight going on on earth between the different ideologies, often fighting in the name of God. It is an increadibly strong glamour, holding in sway millions of people. The wisdom teachings say we are living in the dark age, in certain strata and cycles of consciousness evolution. 12 years ago I translated a book by Dr. E. Krishnamacharya, Man Sacrifice, the German version of it will be published end of this month. In this book events of a time 5000 years ago are reported, which are also mentioned in the ancient Indian Puranas, about the beginning of the dark age, and that freak creatures because of living against the cosmic laws are described. At the same time you see there how to keep inwardly aligned to the divine in spite of all horrors. Not by closing one’s eyes, but by seeing the deeper causes and by attuning to the divine you can transform the evil, at least the one in yourself.

Yesterday morning I went by car to pick up our eldest son and his computer equipment from a friend’s house, where he had spent the night. They wanted to do online games, but the line was broken. He just had upgraded to a new version of his favorite game Guild Wars, and he is bent on diving into the new dimensions of this virtual world, where a great number of people are participating. When he is gaming, it is just his body sitting in front of the computer, his mind is far away.
He is absorbed for hours, and getting him out for meals or for other things is quite difficult. Where is an individual in such a state? It seems that the mind is linked off from the physical, forgetting its needs. I myself am working very much with the computer, though not gaming, but following my lines of professional or spiritual work. I also experience this state of absorption in a way, and I often ponder on what is happening through the virtual spheres intermingling with the outer physical worlds. There are so many strata of human consciousness and interests reflected in the ocean of bits and bytes. It is like a concretisation of the emotional and the mental plane, being made visible on the screen, showing a spectrum of the mental focus, often circling around the famous triangle of money, sex and crime.
The transitions between the gross outer and the more subtle world of the virtual sphere are floating. Yesterday evening we ha a visit by a couple from a South-East European country, who had come into contact with us via our good-will website. We had a fascinating exchange. The exchange will continue via the digital channels. Where does the outer, where the digital start and end? It is the same with the subtle states of consciousness you experience in meditation. It also acts upon the grosser spheres, when you regularly attune to it. this principle of interchanging the spheres allows you to live in a higher state of consciousness and at the same time be active in an outer activity.

Yesterday evening I finally finished reading the book “Nonviolent Communication – A Language of Life” by Marshall B. Rosenberg. I was fascinated by the very human and compassionate approach towards solving conflicts and towards understanding one’s own real needs and that of others. The method had helped me in handling conflicts with my sons (15/13 yrs), especially with my younger one. (Last week in Berlin, my friends had a mug with a picture of one of the Simpsons saying “The I haven’t done it boy”, reminding me of the many little conflicts about computer sharing or “littering” at home…)

It had taken over 10 years from the first contact with Nonviolent Communication until now: I remember having heart about it when doing the German translation of the book “Spiritual Politics – Changing the World from the Inside Out“, by Corinne McLaughlin and Gordon Davidson in 1996 (for which I hadn’t found a publisher however, in spite of intense search). Then I got some insights in 97/98 at a conflict resolution training course of the Swiss Red Cross, where I was at that time head of a psychosocial couseling centre for migrants and refugees.

The book even came to me in 99, when at an international conference in Geneva a participant from Los Angeles gave it to me. My wife later started reading it and was enthusiastic about it, applying the concepts in her dealing with our chidren and neighborhood help. 6 months ago she went to a training of the Centre for Nonviolent Communication in Basel and even organised a course with a CNVC-trainer in a neighbor village. She tried to do it again the last weeks, but two days ago they had to cancel it because of too few registrations.

We had quite some discussions at home about the nonviolent way of dealing with conflicts, and I had to realise that very often I took me quite some time to understand my behaviour in the little daily conflicts with the children and finding a more intelligent attitude in seeing what are the hidden needs behind a situation. I hope my eyes have been sharpened by reading the book, which for me is a very practical approach of applying spiritual principles in everyday life.

At the moment I am working in my free time at the annual report for the Western groups of the World Teacher Trust, a socio-spiritual movement, with which we have been associated over the last 9 years. It is fascinating to get a little insight into the work done by various groups in Europe, North and South America, who, inspired by the wisdom teachings, are trying to integrate regular meditation and study with some volunteer service activity, besides the activities for one’s own economic indepency.
Balancing all these aspects is quite a challenge in modern life, which has quite other priorities. Our spiritual teacher, Dr. K. Parvathi Kumar, is an outstanding example of this intelligent integration – as a business man working actively in the economic, social and cultural fields, with spirituality as the basis.
Each group has quite another approach and a quality of its own. The intergroup networking to gain an insight into these service activities is only possible due to the use of our electronic equipments via computer, web-telephone, or the “classical” phones. This kind of co-operation would’t have been possible only a few years ago. It creates a new quality of interlinking in a free good-will work on the basis of a spiritual impulse, which the general commercial world with its economic power has already adopted in a highly sophisticated manner.

On our way back from Berlin, on a highway rest stop somewhere in Germany: We were making a pause in a restaurant. In the corner there was a man sitting in front of a gambling machine. The lights were running in circles, the man was staring at the numbers, waiting for a little luck. He stood up to get some more coins, then continued his game. He was like an icon of the pursuit of happiness – waiting for an easy fortune, but losing in the end.
Many are looking at the twinkling wheels of life, waiting for some good luck, hypnotized by the desire for wealth. A stale taste remains in the end, for the outer little joys keep on fleeting ways. The source of joy is in the inner, the treasure of silence. With the years of regular meditation this has become a growing experience.
The wisdom teachings tell us that it is o.k. to have the money for a good living but that the search for joy in the outer will remain an unsatisfying craving. The inner light is stable and fulfilling, the outer lights keep on circling round like those of the gambling machine.

Our last excursion in Berlin brought us to the Brandenburger Gate and the Reichstag building, the old and new seat of the German government. Both places next to each other reflect more than any other place the dramatic history of Germany and of the meeting point of hemispheres. In a side part of the Branderburger Gate there is now a Room of Silence, like the silent core in the inner of our being, where you find the inner peace of the Eternal. We sat down there for a short meditation.
At the Reichstag we went up with the elevator to the great glass dome located directly over the plenary hall of the Bundestag. There you have a very impressive sight over Berlin. Since olden times a cupola represents the head and the cosmos. A government is the head centre of a country. Here the head is not of stone, but of glass, and in the middle of i t there is a vortex-like structure with mirrors directly in the middle. This lightful structure full of transparency expresses very well the trend of time into the Aquarian age, where matter becomes lighter and more light-infused. The mirror-vortex reminded me of the sahasrara, the human head-centre of subtle energies, which in an enlightened being is open to the energies from above and distributing them to the surrounding life. It is the apex of the vertical line starting from the base of the spine.
May the work being done here at the bottom of the vortex, in the plenary hall, be inspired from the cosmic law and energies. So when descending the spirallic pathway from the top of the dome, we sang in a low voice the sacred word OM.

The newspaper headlines yesterday were speaking about a rassist assault on a German with African origin 3 days ago, replacing the previous days’ headlines of a court-case about a murder of a Turkish origin woman by her brothers, to reestablishing the “family honour”. On our way for a visit of Schloss Sanssouci in Potsdam, a Unesco World Heritage castle where the Prussian kings had resided, we came along the ancient barracks of the British military administration, where now an electronic supermarket and other shops were located. We passed the ancient border between East and West, where the change in the architecture marked still visibly the difference between the worlds. During our walk through the Sanssouci Park one of our German friends told me that she was half Cherokee, being the child of a mother from Berlin and a high-rank American military official, whose remains now are resting on the famous Arlington cemetary in the States. In the Sanssouci park we saw statues of Greek gods and heros and China-inspired temples. From another friend we heard the life-story reflecting the time of the East German communist rule, with events of the “Stasi” secret service and the individual experiences during the dramatic fall of the Berlin Wall.
The recent world history is so present here, most controverse influences reflect in the lives of the citizens. Lines of past and present destinies focus in speedily pulsating rhythm. What is one’s own, what is the foreign, the influence one wants to keep out?
The rassist assault mentioned above bears witness of the fears caused by non-integrated forces. My spiritual teacher Dr. Parvathi Kumar says “Integrate, do not disintegrate”, and he told me two months ago: “It is much more difficult to integrate than to exclude.”
To be able to integrate I have to be integrated within myself, to be in connection with my self, my soul. When I am well linked-up, I can be open and bear the controversies in the currents of the outer world, without being washed away by them.

In a few hours we will be going for a week to Berlin. Many times I have been crossing the border from Switzerland to Germany. Each time I notice this strange change of qualities characterizing the national entities, this being so also when crossing other borders.
I know that some call it the national spirits, others say it is just an imagination or so-called cultural differences. For me it is a change of energy patterns, which I inwardly sense. They are also changing in smaller regional or geographical localities, towns or cities, but the change is more obvious when coming from one country into another. People seem to be entirely enveloped by their “own” areal qualities and often develop likes and dislikes towards other ones. National entities are controlling their own areas of influence, their cell membranes, to ward off unwanted elements…
It is a fascinating play of energies, though not so easy to locate. I wonder what kind of experiences we are coming across on this journey. It is also always a crossing of inner borders to other fields of experience.