The last 7 years I had been able to participate in the annual retreat seminars of the World Teacher Trust (WTT) in India, under the direction of Dr. K. Parvathi Kumar, my spiritual teacher. And in two days, I will “jump” again across the continents via Dubai and Hyderabad to the city of Visakhapatnam, at the Gulf of Bengal.

I very much love the cordial and inspiring atmosphere of these meetings in the retreat centre of the WTT. A group af about 40 people is normally coming from different parts of the Western world to enjoy the meditations and the deep and brilliant talks of Dr. Kumar on the teachings of eternal wisdom, full of humour and profound knowledge. And we have also been doing excursions into the surroundings to WTT projects like the Planetary Healing Centre:

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Most of the participants come there every year, so that it is really a friends’ meeting. The climax of the retreats is always the participation in the Guru Pooja celebrations in Simhachalam, a village with a very old temple compound in the surroundings of Visakhapatnam. These celebrations are done in honour of Spiritual Hierarchy, and about 3-4000 members of the Indian WTT brotherhood are coming for these meetings. Here is a picture of a fire ritual 4 years ago:

This year however will be quite different, since our teacher had to undergo a surgery 2 weeks ago. Since he is in the process of recovering, he won’t be able to conduct the seminar. The group is nevertheless meeting there and besides the celebration we are going for a little tour, which has been organised by our Indian friends. So there might be no blog entries before the end of the month – unless I find time to write some thoughts from an internet café…

Two days ago I read an article in the Swiss collection “Marketing & Kommunikation 2007”, about a research on directing attention to the ad messages. Key remarks were: Without attention no advertising effect. And: Mere stirring of attention with sex pictures doesn’t work: Recent psychological researches have shown that women avoid looking at naked skin, and they react with tension on female eroticism. With men, naked female bodies work as “vampires of attention”, deviating the attention from the message of the ad. Viewers thus tend to forget quicker the message of the product. And without attention no conscious perception and thus no advertising impact.
The conclusion was: Erotic pictures should be used only very sparingly and only after intense pre-tests. It seems that the old marketing rule of “sex sells” has become obsolete, and this particularly with the female public.
Directing the attention is also a science in spirituality: To be able to enter into more subtle realms you have to learn to direct the attention inward. And when you are more stable in the inner, your outer attention cannot easily be diverted through outer “vampires of attention”. For this, you might like to read the Lunar Messenger on “Awareness and Thought“.

Two days ago I got a Powerpoint-presentation entitled “Does Evil Exist?” (1.7 MB), with beautiful photos. The story is supposed to be an incident from the life of Albert Einstein, but a look into Google quickly showed that it was an urban legend, using Einstein and the atheist professor as stereotypes. Nevertheless it is a nice story, and legends are also illustrating the search for truth. Here it goes:

The university professor challenged his students with this question. Did God create everything that exists? A student bravely replied, “Yes, he did!” “God created everything? The professor asked. “Yes sir”, the student replied. The professor answered, “If God created everything, then God created evil since evil exists, and according to the principal that our works define who we are then God is evil”. The student became quiet before such an answer.

The professor was quite pleased with himself and boasted to the students that he had proven once more that the Christian faith was a myth. Another student raised his hand and said, “Can I ask you a question professor?” “Of course”, replied the professor.
The student stood up and asked, “Professor, does cold exist?” “What kind of question is this? Of course it exists. Have you never been cold?” The students snickered at the young man’s question. The young man replied, “In fact sir, cold does not exist. According to the laws of physics, what we consider cold is in reality the absence of heat. Every body or object is susceptible to study when it has or transmits energy, and heat is what makes a body or matter have or transmit energy. Absolute zero is the total absence of heat; all matter becomes inert and incapable of reaction at that temperature. Cold does not exist. We have created this word to describe how we feel if we have no heat.”

The student continued, “Professor, does darkness exist?” The professor responded, “Of course it does.” The student replied, “Once again you are wrong sir, darkness does not exist either. Darkness is in reality the absence of light. Light we can study, but not darkness. In fact we can use Newton’s prism to break white light into many colors and study the various wavelengths of each color. You cannot measure darkness. A simple ray of light can break into a world of darkness and illuminate it. How can you know how dark a certain space is? You measure the amount of light present. Isn’t this correct? Darkness is a term used by man to describe what happens when there is no light present.”

Finally the young man asked the professor, “Sir, does evil exist?” Now uncertain, the professor responded, “Of course as I have already said. We see it every day. It is in the daily example of man’s inhumanity to man! It is in the multitude of crime and violence everywhere in the world. These manifestations are nothing else but evil.”

To this the student replied, “Evil does not exist sir, or at least it does not exist unto itself. Evil is simply the absence of God. It is just like darkness and cold, a word that man has created to describe the absence of God. God did not create evil. Evil is not like faith, or love that exist just as does light and heat. Evil is the result of what happens when man does not have God’s love present in his heart. It’s like the cold that comes when there is no heat or the darkness that comes when there is no light.”
The professor sat down.

The young man’s name – Albert Einstein.

We yesterday returned from a one week stay at my natal family in Germany. Three days ago my father, who had just read the new issue of the Lunar Messenger, said to me: “My mother would have said: ‘Just words’. I don’t really understand what this is about.”
I told him, “When you read a journal for specialists, like this technical journal, you also might not understand it.” Nevertheless he wants to continue reading the Lunar Messenger.

We can accept and understand what is compatible with our comprehension. It is my experience with the wisdom teachings that subtle aspects sometimes reveal their deeper dimensions only after long times of pondering, after years of spiritual practice. Many who are reading these teachings just remain casual readers – interested, but not working with them. The teachings remain abstract and theoretical, when you don’t work to integrate the basics into your life. Intuitively we might reject them, not because there is something wrong with them, but because the soil in us is not ready to receive.

Today is winter equinox day in the northern hemisphere, where the sun starts its northern journey again and the days will become longer. I just came today across an interesting educational website of NASA about Sun-Earth connection, where you find a beautiful Sun-Earth viewer, with visualisations.

On the site there is an area about Ancient Observatories – Timeless Knowledge, with image galleries to places of sun-worship, where you can zoom through the “House of the Magician” in Yukatan or see pictures of pyramids, Easter islands or Machu Picchu, Peru.

In spirituality the sun is seen as the central giver of Life and Light, but is only working like a mirror reflecting the energies of the central spiritual sun – like the physical body of man is the outer vehicle of the soul and the spirit. The month of Capricorn in the year is particularly suited for spiritual practice. It is the annual time of the dawn. See also the Lunar Messenger on “The Secret of the Dawn“(PDF) or send an e-card with the beautiful picture of a dawn in Mongolia (Click on the picture to send it as an e-card:

We might think that the outer space is an empty vacuum, but this is not at all the case. The “Space Weather Center” gives you daily forecasts and storm alerts, so that you can be prepared for your next trip:-) .

On the site you read: ” To the unaided eye, space appears to be a vast, dark void, and the Sun a tranquil sphere of light. But in fact, space is not empty because Earth’s orbit lies within the atmosphere of our dynamic Sun. Our solar system has the cosmic equivalent of wind, clouds, storms, and hurricanes called space weather.”
It is an educational website with interesting sections about plasma, “living within a star”, or the protective shield of our earth. On the site of the US-National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration website (NOAA) (: do they want to administer the oceans?) of the Department of Commerce you find links to a number of scientific sites about the atmospheric influences.

Last Wednesday there was an x-ray eruption on the sun with a related plasma shock wave, which is just causing a geomagnetic storm (see the sitebar of our blog for actual information). These storms are causing auroral activities and sometimes even breakdowns of electronic communication or electricity.

The sun has an 11 year activity cycle, and next May is expected to be the minimum. So modern science confirms what the ancient scientists of wisdom say, that space pulsates and is filled with innumerable waves of the ocean of the space waters.

Today a friend from Califonia sent me a link to a fantastic video (8-9 min.) of a pantomime/puppet act, if you can call it that. It is an art that leaves you wondering like a good magic show, but it has the beauty and awe of Cirque du Soleil. The artist is Jerome Murat, from France, also called “The Man with Two Heads”.

Pantomine is acting in silence, thus focussing on the action, and often like here masks are used to sharpen the focus. In the show Jerome Murat even reduces the colours and uses only white. This reduction to the essential is something very much needed on the spiritual path. Though here it is a pantomine “show”, it is showing very basic elements, playing with illusion. Enjoy and keep aware.

I just got a link from a friend of a beautiful animated short film (7 min) called “The Potter“, done by the young animator Josh Burton and a team of friends. The film was Josh Burton’s final senior thesis project for Savannah College of Art and Design completed in 2005.

The Potter is an ancient creature who gives life to clay. In his care is an apprentice who wants learn how. It is a story full of magic, about how to learn using the heart. Here it goes directly to the film.

Today the Bangladeshi banker and economist Muhammad Yunus and the Grameen Bank founded by him are jointly awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, “for their efforts to create economic and social development from below.” With his idea of giving microcredits to entrepreneurs who are too poor to receive traditional bank loans, he has given a concept that has spread to nearly all areas of the world affected by poverty, over 23 countries by now. According to the German “Spiegel” magazine, over 100 million peole have aready got a microcredit. To ensure repayment, the bank uses a system of “solidarity groups”, which apply together for loans and act as co-guarantors of repayment and mutual support in the effort of economic self-advancement.

(c). www.muhammadyunus.org

Yunus is a fervent opponent to traditional development aid: “Poor people are not asking for charity; charity is not a solution for poverty.” And: “Only thing we need to do soon, redesign our institution and policies. People can change their own life provided they got the right kind of institutional support.” His goal is to free humanity from poverty by self-empowering the people: “Poverty in the world is an artificial creation; it does not belong to human civilization. We can change it.”

Intelligent help is a major quality of good will and of practical spirituality in the service of humanity. Muhammad Yunus is an outstanding example for this.

I yesterday read in the Swiss Coop Consumer magazine – which is publishing besides theirs ads some contents of general interest to attract the attention of consumers – an article about the restauration of the papyrus of the Gospel of Judas (for details see the National Geographics article). In five years of a crazy detail work Florence Dabre and others have restored 66 pages of the old codex dating back to the 3th or 4th century a.d. which was about to decay. Part of it is now in the Bodmer Foundation near Geneva, where many original manuscripts are kept.

According to the canonical Gospels, Judas betrayed Jesus to the Jewish authorities, who then turned him over to the Roman authorities by whom he was crucified. This newly discovered Gospel portrays Judas as acting at Jesus’ request when he hands Jesus over to the authorities. Wikipedia says: “Like many Gnostic works, the Gospel of Judas claims to be a secret account, specifically ‘the secret account of the revelation that Jesus spoke in conversation with Judas Iscariot’.” And: “The Gospel of Judas describes Judas as being the favourite disciple of Jesus, just as the Gospel of Mary describes Mary as the favourite disciple, the Gospel of Thomas describes Thomas as the favourite disciple, and as the Gospel of John describes its author as the Beloved Disciple.”

This discussion reminds of the feeling of most of the jealous religious believers that their belief is the best and only right one and the others are wrong – an attitude which has to be overcome on the spiritual path. When seeing things from a synthetic point of view, you can discern what is right for you and respect what is right for the others without judging what is wrong and right. And you accept a multitude of different points of view as the many facets of the one reality.