Nearly six months ago, I received a parcel sent by friends from an island in Thailand. It contained a small wooden box with 91 rudraksha beads and a rudraksha necklace, beautifully decorated with a piece of tree bark from a fallen branch of a rudraksha tree, a red tissue and a thread.

Two years ago they found a first rudraksha in a waterfall area on Koh Phangan island and then started exploring the beauty and depth of rudrakshas in different parts of Thailand. They are publishing information about rudrakshas and other trees and plants and are exploring their sacred vibration and beauty. They are also giving courses on how to use rudrakshas. On the website inaturalist.org, they are maintaining a section “Rudraksha Planet” about observations concerning this holy tree. Originally from Russia, they are working in Thailand with a NGO based in Scotland, Kalos Fund. It is a very inspiring mission.

In a talk in Miami February 2018, Master Kumar spoke on using rudrakshas in the course of a question-answer session, see below. And he has published a booklet on Rudra (more; see here the PDF) explaining more about this lord of Will and of Fire, causing the vibration in the ether

“Question: I have been asked by several people about what you have mentioned that we should soak the rudraksha and change the water daily. The question is: should we drink or not drink that water?

Answer: Drink the water. A rudraksha carries vibrations. Rudra stands for vibration. The vibrations will rearrange the energies in you. That is the beauty of Rudra. There is a book on Rudra so you can look through. The Rudras, they destroy the darkness and build a field of light through their vibrations. A Rudraksha has the impact of these vibrations. That is why a lot of people wear these rudrakshas in the East. A tacha rudraksha daily is very very beneficial. Many people hold it like a chain with the rudrakshas touching their vibrating center at the heart. You daily touch a rudraksha and offer water to it, because it is a very vibrating energy, it is kept cool, kept in poise with water; and water is also electrical. The higher dimension of water is that it is electrical. That is how we originally produced hydro electricity because in the water there is electricity. So, it is electrical and if it is kept cool though you are very vibrant you remain cool. This is the idea of holding a rudraksha. So, daily relating to rudraksha will enable you to gain the vibrations. So, it is the matter of respect that every day you change the water for it.

In the morning you can set it in water and utter forth the mantra for Rudra, OM NAMO BHAGAVATE RUDRAYA. That is the mantra. A much more powerful mantra for relating to Rudra is, YO RUDRO AGNO YO APSUYA OSADISU, YO RUDRO VISWA BHUVAN AVIVESA TASMAI RUDRA YA NAMO ASTU. Like this, there is a mantra, which I also gave here before. In there it says 3 times to utter the mantra Rudra. Do it saying it 3 times, or 5 times or 7 times, maximum 11 times. Eleven are the Rudras. If you can do it, you do it. Otherwise you hold the rudraksha daily, change the water and the vibrations will be there at home.

Everything should be optional; nothing should be compulsory in spiritual practice. But once we accepted to do it, then you have to follow a rhythm. It is like a marriage. Once you are married you are committed. Isn’t it? You can’t change it. Like that, with any practice you can keep it at a optional level or at a level of consecration and commitment.”

In the early morning hours of 18 February 3102 BC, Lord Krishna dropped his physical body in a forest near Dwaraka at the west coast of India. His departure happened after a bloody massacre where all men of the Yadu clan had killed each other. It was the end of an incredible incarnation and a turning point of human history. This moment is seen as the beginning of the present dark age, of Kali Yuga.

The date is given in the prefaces of the books “Music of the Soul” and “Man Sacrifice” of Dr. Ekkirala Krishnamacharya (Master EK) and, with some more details, in the biography of Sripada Srivallabha. There it says:

“The demise of Sri Krishna took place during 3102 B.C., 18th day of February, during the night at 02 hours 27 minutes and 30 seconds. It happened in the year named Pramadi, in the month of Chaitra, Padyami of the first fortnight of the lunar month, Friday, and Ashwini star; Kali entered after the niryana of Sri Krishna.”

Sri Kumar (Master KPK) explained in 2014:
“The Kali Yuga is said to have begun in 3102 BC and most of you know the period of this Yuga as 432000 years. We have Dwapara, Treta and Kruta yugas as twice, thrice and 4 times the period of Kali Yuga. All the 4 Yugas added together is called Maha Yuga and 1000 such Maha yugas form 1 manvantara and 14 such manvantaras form one day of Brahma, 360 such days of Brahma form 1 year and 100 such years is the life time of Brahma.”

If you are interested in more details, please read the related chapter in “Man Sacrifice” – how Krishna instructed Lord Maitreya before his departure and what happened afterwards.

Pisces symbolizes the eternal flow of energies. It is a cyclical movement in which the energies come down into the objective manifestation of creation; they develop and finally dissolve again to give way for new manifestations. This is called the movement of the waters of life. We can visualize it as a circular flow of water. It is also regarded as the wheel of creation, the descent and ascent of manifestation. This subtlest form of water is called spiritual waters or electric fire.

During some weeks of November and December 2018 I was in a rehabilitation centre in the Bernese Alps to recover from a cerebral bleeding. From my room there, I was looking over the Lake Thun to the Mount Niesen. The air was full of vibrant vital energy. The mount with its prominent pyramidal shape seemed to be an epitome of matter rising towards the spirit and spirit descending towards dense manifestation. The meeting of spirit/space and matter culminates in the nightly light on the top of the mountain. The lake and the lights of the town of Spiez at its foot receive the vastness of space and reflect the cosmic fire.

At the top of the image I put the arc of a nightly rainbow as a portal towards space. I increased the light spot on the mountain top and surrounded it by a sphere of light penetrating matter. I duplicated the reflections of the city lights to form an embrace. Then I covered the whole picture with a photo of a downpour of water from an old fountain.

See more pictures on the site with my paintings. If you want to print the image, you can download the file in medium and high resolution format.
The different zodiacal signs are clustered in groups – you can see here all my Pisces paintings.

The video:

Three weeks ago, I returned from this year’s journey to India. It started already six weeks ago, at Christmas. This time, I did not write any blogposts – I was still a bit groggy from my time in hospital and a heavy cold I caught in Bengaluru. However, it was a beautiful time with profound teachings and rituals, interesting exchanges with group members and some excursions into the surroundings.
It started with the December Call celebration in Bengaluru. End of December we flew to Visakhapatnam for the seminar with members from the West. It started on 1 January and ended on 9 January. This year’s topic was “The Ashwins – Healing Devas”. About 70 members from various countries of the West participated.
There were two excursions, one to Hamsavanam / Ramadri, an environmental development area with a school for poor children, a garden with sacred trees, and a meditation centre amidst small temples. The other to the Annavaram temple, which is located south of Visakhapatnam.
Before the start of the Guru Puja celebration we visited, like in the previous years, the Simhachalam temple, this time accompanied by Master Kumar. It is a spiritually very vibrant temple on a hill above Simhachalam. Then followed the 3.5 days of the Guru Puja celebration, which are always very intense, filled with rituals, presentations and exchanges. The days were long and the nights were short. It is a kind of intense inner cleaning and charging of the batteries.
When on 14th, 15th January we set out for our journey’s home, we all felt filled with profound experiences.

The symbol of Aquarius is a man who carries a water jug. From the opening of the jug, water continuously flows out without new water flowing in. We only see the water existing as a potential at the moment when it manifests itself. These are the waters of life that bring forth new unfoldment every moment.

The figure of the Aquarius in the picture was created with the help of photos of a fountain in Valencia, Spain, and the head of a statue of the Sun God in the Capitoline Museums, Rome. Water and stars emerge from the jug and glide into the waters of space.

Various NASA and ESA star images were used for the background. The constellation of Aquarius in the upper left corner resembles a lightning bolt or an electric fire: The energy of the Aquarius flashes like a lightning. On the right, Uranus, the regent of Aquarius, appears in the waters of the space in which countless suns move.

See more pictures on the site with my paintings. If you want to print the image, you can download the file in medium and high resolution format.
The different zodiacal signs are clustered in groups – you can see here all my Aquarius paintings.

The video:

Capricorn is the dawn of the year. For spiritual purposes, Capricorn relates to the higher heart centre, where there is the eight-petalled lotus. The heart chakra of twelve petals is ruled by Cancer and it governs the activities of respiration and circulation. The higher heart centre is the seat of the Lord. The spiritual student is recommended to meditate the Lord as a beautiful form of deep electric blue colour and to invoke the sound ‘Narayana’. It is not a name but a vibration that can help us reach the centre of existence, where we merge with the light.

 For the background of the image I used the photo of a sunrise taken around winter equinox in Brazil. I transformed the photo of a wooden Buddha statue and integrated a picture of Ishwara, the Master principle.The light of the Sun is penetrating through the shape. The heart centre was created with a picture of a blue diamond. Inside, there is the deep blue form of the Lord as the inner essence of the outer meditator. White rays radiate into the surrounding space.

9 September 2018, pencils and photo work

See more pictures on the site with my paintings. If you want to print the image, you can download the file in medium and high resolution format.
The different zodiacal signs are clustered in groups – you can see here all my Capricorn paintings.The video:

The rehabilitation clinic Schönberg is about 45 km away from the Inselspital Bern, located at a beautiful spot on the northern side of lake Thun. There is a fantastic view of the Bernese Alps, especially of Mount Niesen lying on the opposite side of the lake. Very often, I absorbed this breathtaking view changing in the course of the days – with the change of weather from brilliant sunshine to fog, storm or chasing clouds.

However, I was not here for holidays but for rehabilitation. I had to re-learn keeping balance while walking, not losing equilibrium while quickly turning around the corner or moving the head, walking up the stairs or ascending the path to the beautiful park behind the clinic.

On the day of my arrival I came to know that the health insurance had granted me  three-weeks-stay. In a first medical assessment the doctor-in-charge defined together with me the goals of my stay: regaining strength and perseverance, improvement of balance, secure and painfree movements.

My program consisted of physio-theropeutical exercises, massages, esp. of the feet, and using training devices but of a soft kind. While these were individual exercises, I rarely was alone during this time: I always shared my room with another patient. The first colleague had very serious health handicaps which made me feel grateful of not having to endure such difficulties in handling my body. I also saw many, mainly elderly, people most of them either with crutches or in wheelchairs.

The normal length of a stay in the clinic is two weeks, partly three weeks, rarely longer. To have a good and regular exchange, we were arranged to sit together in a group of four men during lunch and dinner; for breakfast, we could chose our places ourselves. It was interesting to have some looks into other lives and destinies. Most of the people were 75+, so I felt quite young.

I was sleeping much more than I normally do, quite often about 10 hours/day. But the body required a lot of rest. There remained little time for “normal” meditation, just early in the morning. It is another kind of inner alignment during these days of intense inner withdrawal.

Tomorrow morning will end the three weeks’ stay at the clinic Schönberg, and I will return home again. I have been living in a kind of cocoon the last eight week; another phase of life will now start again, after a profound time of inner and outer transformation work.

I thought it would be just a short surgery of the left ear – implanting a stapes prosthesis to allow better hearing – when I entered our local hospital mid-October. The surgery went well the doctor said when I returned back to consciousness. Everything is fine.

I came back home two days later but I did not feel stable – there was a constant feeling of vertigo. It increased over the next days. The surgeon had a look at the ear and decided to send me to the university clinics of Berne. The computed tomography did not show anything special but they decided to open the ear again. It turned out to be a second surgery, where I got a new stapes prosthesis, a smaller one, and three days later I came home.

The constant feeling of vertigo continued or became even worse. I hardly could eat and felt like vomiting. I could not leave the bed alone and the control of my legs went from bad to worse.

After four days, my wife called the ambulance. Two ambulance persons carried me down and and drove me to the emergency room of the university clinic of Berne, the Inselspital. There were ENT specialists but they could not identify the reason of my collapse. A lady doctor from the Neurology department supposed that there might be blood in the brain and initiated doing a lumbar puncture. It showed that there was blood in the brain.

Next morning they did a CAT with contrast agent. It showed the blood in the brain. They inserted a tube into the back to reduce the perssure in the brain. Within a few hours, this brought a significant improvement. For the next 8-12 days I was under constant observation – I had to lie constantly in bed. Slowly the situation seemed to become more stable, and so I came into the neuro-chirurgical department. Though I was far from moving myself, the doctor was very optimistical and said that the health progress is going on well.

One week later, I entered the rehabilitation clinic Schönberg at the lake Thun.

The symbol of Sagittarius is the bow and the arrow. In spiritual astrology, Sagittarius is located at the base centre in the human body. The arrow is seen as the vertebral column, where you find the column of light called sushumna. When the higher consciousness awakens, the power of kundalini moves upwards through the sushumna in a spiral manner. The science of yoga describes the sushumna as the central balancing energy line surrounded by ida and pingala, the energies of materialisation and spiritualisation.

The bow to shoot the arrow of consciousness upwards to the head centre is the sacred word OM. With every OM we can visualise the upward path of kundalini through the sushumna to the head and beyond. OM exists as the triple aspect of spirit, soul and matter, represented as ida, pingala and sushumna.

I depicted the arrow of consciousness as being surrounded by two energy lines and going through the etheric centres. The centres are formed out of the whirlpool of the etheric plane, for which I used a picture of the solar plasma. The bow is symbolised by the blueish horizon. In the sky you see Jupiter, the lord of Sagittarius, and the Great Bear. This constellation is linked to Sagittarius as the birthplace of the seven judges which bring down through Sagittarius the seven states of consciousness in man.

9 August 2018, pencils and photo work

See more pictures on the site with my paintings. If you want to print the image, you can download the file in medium and high resolution format.
The different zodiacal signs are clustered in groups – you can see here all my Sagittarius paintings.

The video:

I just refound a picture taken on 5 Dec. 2017 from a page of “Letters of Helena Roerich” Vol. II, 17 May 1937, where a rainbow formed from a prism in the window while reading the text:

“Indeed, all can be achieved through the striving of the heart, but do not forget the most essential quality – patience. ‘The great man is he who is strongest in the exercise of patience.’

If you realize that each obstacle is a benefit for the growth of the spirit, you are already on the Path. It is said in the Teaching: ‘Let us refer, with regret, to the generally accepted idea of comfort and security. In it is contained torpor and vacuity. We learn to welcome all inception of thought, and We always esteem the pressure of a forward striving. A multitude of examples may be cited from physics and mechanics showing pressure as a motive force. For many, it is not easy to agree that pressure is but the gateway to progress. But if humanity will recognize this truth, in so doing it will also understand the meaning of progress. From the point of such cognition it is not far to Brotherhood.’

I appreciate that you understand how overloaded I am by work. Indeed, if I do not answer, it is only because of the complete inability to do so, otherwise I am always glad to answer questions. I do not like meaningless letters. When there are questions, it means one is thinking, which is especially valuable, for the development of mind and incisive thinking brings us closer to the Higher Consciousness, and great Collaboration becomes possible.”

© 1967 by Agni Yoga Society. Published 1967.

The text was published 30 years after Helena’s writing the letter; my reading it happened to be 50 years after the print, 80 years after the writing. Time guards jewels.