Changing Default Karma: Morality vs. Magic

Q: I've heard a story concerning a very high lama whose wife prevented him from being in very serious car accident by smashing up the kitchen pots and pans (the smashing together of the pans substituted or fulfilled the karma for car metal smashing together). 'Can karma be eliminated by magic or physical intervention?'

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A: That's such an interesting story about the smashing of pots and pans. IMO what you're describing is an act of "sympathetic magic". Westerners wouldn't normally think in magical terms. The lama and his wife however probably do think in magical terms. That couple would accept image-matching-intervention as a compelling explanation of why the lama didn't get smashed up in a car wreck.

All sorts of systems work via sympathetic pairing of "matching energies. For example, homeopathic medicine and children selecting their parents! But IMO what you are describing is magic (working with matching images) and this simple tit-for-tat reasoning does not address the deeper level of karma.

(In the Christian tradition see, Matthew 5:17-19 , 1 Corinthians 8:9-13., many more for commercial-material vs. spiritual-ethical interpretations of Karmic Law.)

My own view is that human karma is not primarily a physical law of action-reaction, but it is primarily a moral law of action-reaction. Thus the time-honored rule of Karma can be phrased as "Do unto others as you would have done unto you." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethic_of_reciprocity

That is, it is a Law of Intent.

The purpose of the great karmic machine is to transform ignorance into wisdom. If smashing up pots did effectively eliminate karma, what wisdom would be gained? Very little, except learning to pay more attention to prescient dreams and acting on them in an image-matching fashion.
I'm a big fan of skillful magic but karma is much more serious and important than magic!

"Karma" is primarily a moral system

IMO karma is primarily a moral system, and the greatest of all the great privileges of a human birth is that humans are social animals but with individual souls. Animals and lower life forms have group souls, but humans have individual souls which means that every one of us must make his own choices.

Ignorance of the true value of life causes people to mistreat others. The actions which cause payback-reactions range from the severest ignorance of killing other people to lesser moral errors such as stealing to milder errors such as manipulation and deceit.

Signal and Counter-Signal

In every case, the culprit behind immoral action is the reptile brain. This old part of the human brain constantly signals each individual to survive at any cost, "whatever it takes". The reptile brain is constantly telling us to optimize personal survival. As a counter-signal, the human moral community with its religious traditions is constantly trying to get its members to treat each other with compassion and respect as the best path toward increasing the value of life.

It's a battle! But slowly, surely, the moral intelligence grows, and the native comes to choose the higher path. I personally think this is mainly a battle of the brain regions! Enlightenment actually occurs in the pathways of the brain, when we open up higher consciousness.

People moving forward into the higher paths quickly discover that during those previous lifetimes and lower moments in the current lifetime, many reptile-brain-mandated errors have occurred.

We have mistreated others intentionally or not. The record of that mistreatment of life is permanently stored in pranic form (the "Akashic Record"). The record states what happened and what has to be done to correct it.

Purpose of Karmic 'Taxation'

Now the purpose of correcting karma isn't just to satisfy some robot tax-collector of the Akashic Record. It's to help the enlightenment-bound person to "unburden" some of those old accruals and open up those brain pathways and increase their moral and spiritual awareness.

Some people can perceive the connection between their current events and their past events by this-for-that commercial logic. This type of believer interprets Karma entirely within the operations of human law. Karma is, in some ways, a very simple tit-for-tat exchange system. (That's why the simplistic magical approach can be valid for some believers.)

This level of believer is quite satisfied with the eye-for-an-eye type of justice, whether one is the criminal or the victim. This type of believer looks no deeper for explanations. That is fine until some massive injustice, which can't be handled in human law systems (e.g., genocides) has to be explained. At that point, the explanation of karma has to go deeper, into the realm of moral intelligence and the differences between human law and divine law.

However, most people are so driven by their survival anxiety that they don't think about any type of karma, human law or divine law, until those final 60 seconds before death, when all the connections roll out like a movie right before your eyes and its OMG I wish I had done things differently! At that extreme moment of death, it may become suddently clear how much future-life work one has created for oneself through lying, cheating, stealing, exploiting etc. in the current lifetime.

And some people don't appreciate that every action in the current life sets up the conditions for the subsequent life, until they're clear into the astral plane. Then, forewarned and fore-armed (or so it seems) they set a new agenda for a new lifetime knowing exactly what they're signing up for in terms of payback. One cheerfully accepts the privilege of a rebirth explicitly for the purpose of correcting that karmic backlog. Then one is reborn and promptly forgets the astral promise to fix those errors cheerfully and with gratitude. One slips again into a life of misery, resentment, and "why me?" self-pity.

Oy.

Karma: mechanical or moral?

I believe that while karma is indeed a mechanical system of action-reaction, the actions that karmic reaction is correcting are moral errors.

The purpose of the karmic system on Earth is to transform the destructive ignorance of the value of life - which is embedded in our animal bodies -- into the divine wisdom which recognizes the supreme value of all life (but especially human life!) The final result of a karmic error-correction payback must be the transformation of ignorance into wisdom.

This tranformation cannot be accomplished by magic. It must be accomplished with higher, reflective, rational, moral awareness.

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Hope this viewpoint is useful in furthering a very interesting discussion about tantra, magic, psychic imagery, and transference of subconscious instructions from one form to another form. IMO the magical processes involved are entirely valid, but a deeper conscious moral engagement with the concept of "necessity" (why does the native believe that such a thing "must" happen) should be in place before karma, or "reactivity" is fully released.

Sincerely,

Barbara Pijan Lama, Jyotisha
http://www.barbarapijan.com/

Changing Default Karma: The Big Secret

Question:

Respected Madam, Namaskar.

After reading all the knowledge of your writings, I have observed very closely that you have focused much in changing how one thinks and acts to shape the destiny. The planetary arrangements in charts and D-charts are stored events and thoughts meant to be fixed in lifetime.

My question is

how can one change his/her destiny by mere changing one's thoughts? For example, how is it possible for one to achieve materialistic gains by one's thoughts? Is it simply psychological approach of healing or one's thoughts changes planetary effects also?

Shri Deepak Chopra follows such approach, through Ayurveda. Several learned astrolgers, have focused similarly in changing the thoughts and behaviour patterns in improving one's destiny.

Best Regards, Jai Ganesha.

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Yes that is the big "secret".

Stored thoughts will act on their own programming through the motive force (momentum) of Karma. However human beings in partnership with the Divine are hugely blessed with the power to directly change the content of our thoughts.

Changing the thoughts, which are essentially the "program code" which directs the scripted narrative of the incarnation, can result in changed material experience.

Obstacles to changing one's Jyotisha destiny: doubt and negative attachment

There are two obstacles to changing the thoughts. The first is lack of faith ( = doubt), the second is ego attachment to the victim experience. Most people find, after working seriously upon the task of changing one or two life-definitive expectations, that it is quite difficult to change only one thought, because all of one's thoughts are subtly interconnected.

However, there is still much benefit to be gained not so much by completely eradicating a seed-thought (bija) but by increasing the virtuous qualities of the thought.

E.g., one can transform the poverty and slavery qualities of a severely oppressed Shani condition in the Jyotisha chart, into a lifetime of spiritual service with exceptional spiritual rewards (see the Jyotisha nativity of Mother Teresa of Kolkata, esp her awful karma of neechcha Shani + Chandra in Ari bhava).

Huge changes usually not needed

Most people find that, with some minor adjustments, the incarnation as originally configured is really OK. After eliminating guilt, grief, and the negative vibes or projected opinions of other people who are stuck in their own bitter negativity, most normal people truly do like themselves and their life situation, and most of the "default" thoughts are found to be really quite fine.

Unless one is a massively miserable fountain of vicious negativity (very rare), it's generally OK to let 90% of one's thoughts run on the default program.

Other People's Negativity - Housecleaning!

A large proportion of one's own perceived negative attachment is not deep attachment at all. It is one's hospitable willingness to host the projected negativities of others - such as, one's mother's unexpressed anger, one's father grief at a failed career, or some other business which is rather 'hitchhiking' on one's own psyche.

Unwanted Guests

After these unwanted psychic guests are cleared out, one can attend to one's own authentic programming - and that is serious work - but the amount of one's own authentic work is usually much smaller than originally felt when one was mixing up the projected toxicity of others that one has graciously agreed to "carry" with one's own true karma.

The task of improving the remaining 10% is quite demanding however, since the core "problems" tend to be rooted in negative expectations to which the ego is deeply attached. To release negative attachment to anger, rage, blaming, anxiety, guilt, etc. is to threaten the ego structure.

Avoid "becoming unglued"

To preserve basic social functionality, it is not a good idea to de-stabilized the ego structure, unless one has first established a supporting partnership with the Divine. Avowed Partnership with Divine means undertaking a profound and unshakable commitment to live in a state of faith. This partnership which provides a new, replacement "glue" of faith is essential to health during the ego-transformative process.

When the ego starts to crack up and break down as the "glue" of negative attachment starts to weaken, the native then can inject a substitute glue into the cracks and continue to function socially in the world of human law, surrounded by fear-driven people, and still continue working and communicating without "becoming unglued".

So the good news is that all negative attachment, including but not limited to the negativities seen in the Jyotisha charts, can be resolved by directly altering the thoughts which produce the material downstream. The bad news is that no one can do this work alone without risk of catastrophic ego breakdown.

Sangha

The best support is individual faith in the divine, and a strongly recommended additional level of support is the 'sangha' or community of the faithful, who can step in to help the native when one is enduring an identity loss caused by release of negative thoughts.

Most of the great religions have systems in place to reinforce individual faith while also keeping individuals of a spiritual nature in touch with each other, so that everyone stays mentally healthy.

"The Power of Your Subconscious Mind"

The best book I can recommend in practical modern English which describes in clear and plain language just exactly how to release negative expectations and replace these seed-thoughts with positive faith (I.e., how to create miracles) is "The Power of Your Subconscious Mind" by Joseph Murphy, Ph.D. (1966).

I very much recommend this book. In the US it sells for about $6 and many public libraries have a well-read copy. If you can find a copy of this book, you will own the basic instructions for creating precisely the life you want.

Why is something so simple such a "big secret"?

Be forewarned -- that this information is "secret" not because it is forbidden, but because so few people can understand it. It is extremely simple, and yet our material-survival-scarcity-fear programming which is based the reptile brain is so powerful that most folks simply cannot accept that simple faith in the divine could possibly solve even small problems, let alone the larger, "high-stakes" problems of life.

Yet, for those who are ready to hear the message (perhaps because they have tried the common human methods of hard work, anger, and guilt -- and failed), this is the big "secret".

Change the source, change the downstream

Deepak Chopra M.D., B.V. Raman Jyotishi, most reflective physicians, astrologers, true priests, mystical philosophers, will all recommend the method of changing the originating thoughts in order to change the downstream material experience.

As Trulshig Rinpoche says, That's the way it works!

All the best,

Barbara Pijan Lama, Jyotisha

www.barbarapijan.com

Changing Default Karma: Intuition vs. Negative Programming

Question:

Respected Madam, Namaskar.

I wish to understand this confusion. What is the difference btw negative thoughts and intuition,because intuition can be both negative and positive. Since I have strong Siddhamsha [D-24] lagna with four strong planets and in Vimshamsha [D-20] exalted lagna lord Moon. I have strong instincts and possibly intutive mind.

My Question

Due to extreme negative thoughts of Shani in Lagna, I fail to understand when the intuition is acting or the negative believes of Shani happening. I can encourage others with strong positive inspiration boosting, but ironically I fail with myself. Why such a mental programming is there?

Best Regards, Jai Ganesha.

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That is a very good question!

"Intuition" in English = "inner teacher". The inner teachings are authentic to the native. The inner teacher is the local voice of the Universal teacher. (As above, so below.) The voice of the inner teacher is always positive, always loving, always encouraging, always supportive and spiritually validating, always confident in the power of faith, always true and sweet. The character of intuition is entirely reliable and provides true guidance at all times.

The voice of intuition is always positive.

However your point about intuition being both negative and positive might refer to the content of intuition, where the actual instructions which emit from the inner teach might sound negative sometimes.

There can be for example a powerful positive signal from the intuition telling the native to leave a situation because it is harmful, to resist entering a building because of some danger there, or some other non-positive action. One who is accustomed to hearing the voice of intuition would probably not interpret this type of instruction as negative, because the voice itself is loving, caring, and accurate.

When the conscious mind does not detect psychic information that is implicit in a scenario, often the intuition will add more non-rational detail.

The classic example is "mothers intuition" for a child. Most mothers can "feel" their child's well-being even if the child is hundreds of miles away. A mother will know if the child needs help. Knowing that "my child needs help, my child is in trouble" might be perceived as a negative intuition. But really it is intuition *of* negativity in the intimate psychic environment. Intuition cannot be inherently negative, but intuition give directions, by telling the native that someone needs help.

Negative intuition?

In reality what seems like "negative intuition" is simply picking up the signal of someone else's fear (the child's in this case) and the native (mother) is moved by compassion to enter that child's fear space and skillfully help the child. Similar when the intuition picks up negative signals from others in the family, workmates, or even from a big group setting. That's intuition giving a knowledge of what others are feeling. It is not intuition causing one to feel reactive or negative oneself.

There may be fear and danger lurking in the environment. When the intuition picks up those psychic signals (perhaps even coming from the mind of a criminal) that does not mean that the native is living in fear or is the victim of negative programming. It means that their psychic radar is sensitive to imagery present in the environment.

Need for interpretive skill!

The good news about intuition is that it is always true. A compassionate person can use intuition to say or do just the right thing at the right time, and thereby have a much more fulfilling life.

The bad news about intuition, if you could really even call this bad news, is that after one receives intuitive information, one may feel compelled to act upon it. And if one does not have a high skill level for choosing right actions, strong intuition can create a "busybody" or someone who is always trying to help but in reality is a rather disruptive or socially clumsy person.

However IMO the downside of empowered intuition is very small, and any possible troubles that it causes can be hugely improved by just a little bit of training in discrimination and choice-making. The consequences of not having access to intuition are much more troublesome.

Negative programming

Negative programming is exactly as you note. Negative, destructive, rooted in fear. The voice of negative programming is by character criticizing, blaming, fearful, hateful, materialistic, doubtful (doubt is the greatest enemy of truth!) and bitter.

The core reality of negative programming is that it is not authentic. Negative programming is "outside stuff" which is not a genuine living component of one's true nature.

Karmic luggage

The good news is that negative programming is only karmic "luggage". Negative programming is not nourishing. We don't need it to live. It is not life-giving and not intrinsic to life. That is a good thing for us humans! Negative programming is not necessary for us to live. It is a karmic accrual, like a tumor. It can be cut off, dropped, released, left behind.

The native may at any time become "enlightened" by simply dropping the load of baggage.

Liberation: Dump and Run

One may decide to stop carrying the burden of other people's anger, fear, grief, guilt, resentment, bitterness, materialism, doubt, frustration, and blaming. This possibility exists in every and any moment of time.

Any human can realize that one is dragging around a huge bag of outdated junk, or pulling a cart full of manure, or pushing a massive stone up a hill (Sisyphus). There is always the "secret" option to just "dump and run".

Fear of weightlessness

Usually people get deeply identified, socially and psychologically, with their "suitcase" full of problems. The average person is actually scared to let go of the weight. Imagining the prospect of absolute freedom, and physically to live with that weightless feeling which might ensue after losing that big boat-anchor of the grounding baggage -- that weightlessness scares people to death!

The Slow and Careful Path to Unburdenment

As a result, few humans will do a radical release of the whole heavy pile of luggage all on one day. Those with a bit of consciousness might feel more safe to release one's bondage more slowly. These folks are on a path of 'slow and careful'.

They prefer to take a complete inventory of all the negative thoughts that are in the suitcase before even starting to release the weight. They write psychological books about the delicate distinctions between different varieties of fear and resistance. They develop detailed instructions for how to disengage from one stored-and-carried item at a time.

They like to catalog all their memories and the complexities of the fearful human relationships which bind one to earth (Jyotishi have the karma of doing this job...) before undertaking the single moment of total release. (Naturally Budha the list-maker and Shani the weight-carrier are good friends!)

The slow path is ... Slow.

The problem with the slow method is of course that it may require numerous lifetimes to catalog the entire inventory of accumulated memories and all the reactions to those memories. Naturally it is easier to just dump the whole suitcase and run!

The trick: living free of negativity compulsion, living with respect for negativity!

The trick for living successfully without personal bondage to negativity (or with reduced negativity, if one wants to keep some of it for "ballast") is to learn RESPECT for the negative programming of others.

Shani requires respect.

The physical body is part of the material world, the physical body's material survival need is programmed by the reptile brain on a bio-chemical level, and the physical world in general is the outcome of the combined thoughts of gazillions of beings. Much of the thought which brings the material world into being is "negative" that is, it is reactive and fearful. This must be respected.

This level of "natural" negativity that survival requires (food, clothing, shelter, social validation) is neither good nor bad. It simply "is". Survival fear is a natural part of human life. The trick is to manage it skillfully.

Living free but in the world: listen for the true voice of intuition

One will live a vastly better life through heeding the intuitive voice of God which lives in each human heart, while consciously releasing the historic negative voices which clamor loudly for attention.

One's own legacy karma in the form of reactive memories of old fears is constantly reinforced and complexified by the projected fears of those around us. Even if one is lucky enough to achieve the consciousness to learn to discriminate between the true, authentic intuitive voice versus the untrue, inauthentic voice of ignorance and fear -- even if one has earned this conscious intelligence -- it is essential to treat Other People's Projected Fears AND one's own survival programming, with the deepest respect.

Yes, intuition and negative programming are different

I hope this perspective is useful. If an inner voice seems spiritually validating, calm, and vivid - that is intuition. If an inner voice seems scared, anxious, and confused - that's negative programming. The bulk of negative programming is actually the projected fears of other people.

The good news is, it's easy to release attachment to this exhausting, heavy burden. But first, learn to distinguish the different 'voices' of the Nine Graha. Then, as St. Paul recommends, choose to follow the Voice of Life.

Sincerely,

Barbara Pijan Lama, Jyotisha
http://www.barbarapijan.com/

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Guru series: Guru in domain-6, Ripu Bhava

This commentary describes some general effects of Guru in occupation of domain-6, the house of "enemies, debt, and disease"

I hope within the next few months to post commentary on the effects of Guru in all twelve bhava.

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Famous personalities with Guru in domain-6:

• Prince Charles [Guru-Dhanau] - teacher-guide on pollution & environmental imbalance
• Al Gore, Jr. [Guru-Dhanau]- teacher-guide of pollution & environmental imbalance
• Oprah Winfrey [Guru-Rishabha] -teacher-guide of race, class, & relationship conflicts, ill-health, poverty & sensual imbalance

• Jiddu Krishnamurti [Guru-Mithuna] teacher-guide of imbalance in mental habits
• Edgar Cayce [Guru-Dhanau, + Mangala] philosophical teacher, medical clairvoyant
• Mrs. Tipper Gore [Vrischika] teacher-guide on psychologically invasive exploitation

• Maya Angelou [Guru-Dhanau, + Ketu + Shani] philosophical wisdom-teacher on caste conflict & exploitation
• Agatha Christie [Guru-Makara - neechcha] teacher-guide writing on criminal imbalance
• Sigmund Freud [Guru-Meena] professor-priest of conflict in the private imagination

• Martin Heidegger [Guru-Dhanau, +Ketu] professor-priest of philosophical conflicts
• Henry Kissinger [Guru-Thula] teacher-diplomat on matters of exploitation, conflict of interest, & war
• Mia Farrow [Guru-Kanya] teaching through argumentation (Kanya): anti-exploitation, anti-starvation activist

• Stevie Wonder [Guru-Kumbha] egalitarian teachings through song, on class conflict, poverty & exploitation
• Johnny Cash [Guru-Karkata - uchcha, maximum] emotional teaching through songs of relationship conflict, poverty and violent crime

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A Difficult Landlord

Guru as a tenant in the natural house of Brihaspati's enemy Budha will manifest the faith-vs-details conflict between this tenant and His landlord.

Budha's natural sixth house is a place of lost cooperation and broken agreements, resulting in deprivation of balanced pleasures and constant argumentation in an environment of toxicity and conflict..

When expansive Guru enters the maha-dusthamsha, the native takes on the problems of this world with an attitude of optimism and faith. One feels a religious impulse to help solve the systematic conflicts that arise from historic human karma as it has developed in the Earth.

The native becomes a guru to the conflict-ridden, preaching the way to greater wisdom on subjects of interpersonal and inter-tribal conflict, as well as the toxic mental conditions of chronic inner arguing which produce poverty and disease.

The native's argumentation style is open-minded, philosophical, and inclusive

Over-Expansion in the House of Conflict

Unfortunately, Guru is not a boundaries expert. He operates on faith, and He does not easily accept limitations. Therefore, outside of His natural houses (9 & 12, or Sagittarius & Pisces), He tends to suffer from over-expansion in areas of human life which do not respond well to simple optimistic faith.

In the maha-dusthamsha, Guru tends to over-estimate His ability to "solve" large-scale and historic cycles of exploitation and chronic imbalance, through the application of faith and positive intention.

Thus an individual tries to tackle a global problem.

Guru's proper role is to offer wisdom teachings. When wisdom teachings are addressed to the audience of conflicted & inharmonious denizens of domain-6, Guru's faith will indeed increase good-will understanding toward criminals, predators, balance-disturbers, exploiters, and their victims.

But Guru tends not to recognize the limits of his tolerance-teaching role. In the house of a hostile landlord, Guru tends to get overly involved with the petty material details (Budha) of the specific conflicts - and this is where the native's health problems begin.

Benefits to career, intuition, speech & wealth

Guru casts drishti upon domain-10 (professional service/career) and domain-12 (intuitive sense of direction due to psychic intuition, dreams) and domain-2 (hoarded wealth & ancient ethno-cultural knowledge, speech & language). These areas all expand in the lives of those with Guru in domain-6.

If any graha occupy domains 10, 12, and 2, those graha will also benefit from the auspiciously tolerant and wise drishti of Lord Guru.

Marriage Debility

For Mithuna lagna and Kanya lagna, Guru in domain-6 drags the spousal character into the house of argumentative conflict. Thus, Guru-in-Ripu bhava is unfortunate for marriage, at least the first marriage.

Sustained Optimism in the Face of Conflict

Develops a service of broad-minded and optimistic argumentation.

Faithful and cheerful even amidst deep toxicity and conflict.

This optimistic native may go where angels fear to tread. However, one must be positively vigilant about covering the "blind spot" - which is the "hole in the aura" by which the problems of the world enter one's individual physical and psychic environment.

One must guard the personal mentality and the fleshly body from invasion by global and historic human-condition problems. Offer the teachings, guide, mentor, and uplift - but, when the teaching job is done, one must close the gates to anxiety and worry.

Health Issues, and Why

Without quite comprehending what is happening, Guru becomes over-involved in the contentious mentality of the these chronic human-condition arguments, and the conflict-dynamics of domain-6 begin to manifest in one's own body. Specifically, in the digestive system.

Seeking leverage against the onslaught of negative mentalization, the native ingests too much food and medicine. Thus, ill-health caused by pharmaceutical toxicity and a stressed-out, overloaded digestive system.

Complications due to psychological conflict regarding children, and fleshly overweight.

The strongest effects of fleshly overweight occur when Guru occupies a rashi of oral-pleasures Shukra. The native eats as a way of bringing Shukra's soothing pleasures into the high-conflict zone of domain-6. Thus, diseases of excessive food-pleasuring (Oprah Winfrey)

This position of Guru/6 is associated with an unusual number & complexity of health problems, all based in digestive disorders.

Abundance of Physicians, Pets, Livestock, and Servants

The native enjoys an abundance of pets. Served by optimistic, faithful employees in the workplace and good servants in the home. Blessings through charitable service and ministry to the downtrodden.

One enjoys an abundance of physicians, but this is not always a benefit in the house of iatrogenic disease!

Gains from providing medical care to the underserved, yet one should personally avoid most medicines. Some benefit from nature cures, vitamin therapy, ayurvedic attention to a balanced diet. However most tangible benefit will come from boundary management and calming the scale of inner mental argumentation.

A Ministry of Service

Conflicted with priests, false guru's, and ritualized religion. Religious person, but view is more philosophical than ceremonial. If Guru is strong, broad & tolerant perspective on the chronic problems of the lower classes. Natural willingness to engage in service to those suffering from life imbalances. Can show the way out of darkness to those whose lives are locked in the struggle to achieve decency through balanced life practices and equitable social agreements.

One feels a priestly calling to protect Earth's natural environment from pollution & exploitation. Advocates for toxic cleanup and wiser lifestyle practices. Lives in both the city & the country. In 11th-from-8th, Guru gives profits from confidential information; catastrophic changes; detective work; & revealing of hidden truths.

Worshipped by the service class, protector of pets and livestock, profits and joy from animal breeding. Using loan money, makes profitable investments. Greatest prosperity flows from a ministry of service.

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Quotation on effects of Brihaspati in occupation of the sixth rashi bhava, from the writings of Das Goravani

"... renown & good finances, but your personal life has some turmoil & married life may be difficult. You may spend more than you make. You attend social functions that expands prestige and circle of friends. While you gain popularity & status, a sense of inferiority may bother you.

You like music & dancing. At times you feel defeated & some considerable disease has to be tolerated. You get support from brothers & sons. When ill, you are well taken care of & has a knack of showing others comfort in their time of need. In other words, you thrive when things are bad.

You can be a good healer or helper of others & you do better by serving others than through independence. Goodness comes to you through religion & philanthropy. Likes pets. You should watch out for irregular food habits as that might be the cause of health degradation.

You promote community spirit & reduce crime. You are a good fighter who is proud of your competitive abilities. It's very hard to win in most competitions against you. You should not expect others to live up to your abilities to serve and work hard."

Guru into Makara rashi - what does it mean?

It means entirely different things to different people.

In the most general terms, Guru enters an astrologically "neechcha" or "debilitated" condition in the rashi (sign) of Makara (Capricorn).

Why does Guru obtain "neechcha" status in Makara rashi? Because in Makara rashi, Guru the spiritual teacher gets trapped in Shani's land of Material Realism. Brihaspati's message of all-inclusive cosmic compassion is constrained and even falsified by Shani's "common sense" view that real power is, at bedrock, material power. (cf. Thrasymachus in Plato's Republic.) In Shani's world, Guru looks and acts like a pious, posturing fraud.

Guru is the expansive, inclusive Father-Teacher-Guide who preaches Acceptance of All Things. Guru doesn't have or need categories of 'proper' and 'improper', 'moral' or 'immoral'. In Guru's world, "it's all good." Yet in Shani's land, 'good' is the natural opposite of 'bad'. The concept of 'all-good' seems superficially cheerful, unrealistic, and just plain wrong.

From Brihas-pati's perspective, there is no need to discriminate between saint and sinner, criminal and victim, deity and devil. All phenomena (dharma) are equal in status and value as creations of Divine Intelligence.

But in Shani's territory, life is sharply divided into opposites: up-and-down, black-and-white, right-and-wrong, life-and-death. Oppositions and negations form the Structure of Reality under Shani's influence.

Imagine what happens when "All-One" Brihaspati, the Santa Claus of the solar system, enters Shani's Land of Opposites? There is so much "incommensurability" between Guru's wisdom and Shani's realism that neither approach can win. The human brain is programmed with fierce survival-driven instincts to discriminate between opposites. Earth's environment contains many dangers which punish poor discrimination with a painful death .

In Shani's terrain, Guru's "it's all OK, all the time" message is naturally met with disdain, disbelief, and even anger. Yet the human is also programmed with a [divine] capacity for trust and belief. Often the source of the disdain is that conflict in human nature between the desire to believe, but the fear-driven inability to really "let go and let God".

Shani's job is to operate a stable human society, by enforcing rules, reducing risk and minimizing change.

Shani is about the Letter of the Law. Guru is about the Spirit of the Law. (Guru is actually the Great Law Giver.) The letter of the law can certainly accommodate the spirit of the law, and vice versa. Shani and Guru are not fierce enemies. Yet each is distinctively constrained in the other's signs.

In Shani's organized society, Ju-Piter, the Father (piter) of the Gods (Ju-Zeus) and His spiritual business is accommodated in designated places where the spirit of the law is discussed. These places are the temples, universities, houses of philosophy & centers of worship in every religious tradition. However Shani does not wish for Guru's influence to exceed these carefully managed boundaries.

Outside the designated 'Guru-zones' , the Law-and-Order graha Shani rules with an iron fist. (Shani = Iron.) Shani is all about social control, social safety, survival of the species, and the Rule of Law. Shani's viewpoint is discriminatory, pragmatic, and fear-driven. Shani keeps us safe from the forces of evil, safe from the threat of change, and safe from the wildly unpredictable consequences of true faith.

When Guru trespasses into Shani's own signs, Shani's two henchmen - fear of life and fear of death - strip Guru of His credibility and His power to inspire.

Shani is the Law of Earth, including the laws of physics and the laws of human society. Shani is all about crime and punishment, social approval, hierarchies, pecking orders, distribution of food and military protection ... Shani rules all social control mechanisms, and He is organized!

Guru the all-inclusive wisdom-deity enters the rashi of Shani, and Brihaspati becomes a temporary visitor in a rather inhospitable land. Lord Guru is unable to fully express His perfect faith under Shani's regime of skepticism, realism, atheism, and fear. In Shani's world of law and order, check and balance, crime and punishment, right and wrong, have and have-not, great Brihaspati's "it's all Good" preaching falls on deaf ears. Shani needs this to be so, in order that Guru's influence does not spread where it does not belong.

Shani's world is oriented to physical survival, social organization, and mental realism. Shani does have a spiritual dimension, but Shani's spiritual perceptions are more focused on the awesome structural beauty of the Great Design. (Exalted Shani in Thula rashi rules social justice & architecture.) At rare levels of spiritual perfection, Shani represents the breathtaking Order of the Universe.

Guru's abundant, expansive personality is cramped during His once-every-twelve years journey through the rashi of Makara. In the land of Rules, restrictions, barriers, limitations, delays, and survival fears, Guru's message of faith-not-works and all-you-need-is-love sounds misleading, immature, trivial, and naive.

Guru in His transit through Makara is perceived as a fraudulent preacher; a charlatan; and a poseur. His words are not believed by those with no ears to hear.

In Shani's lands, Brihaspati appears to be using His message of faith and trust in Divine Guidance as deceptive camouflage for His "real" (Shani-defined) intention: to achieve the ultimate safe position, at the top of the social hierarchy.

In realistic, materialistic Makara rashi, Guru's purported religious truth suffers a lack of credibility. The native with uncompensated Guru in Makara rashi in any varga is perceived as over-confident, unrealistic, & presumptuous.

This native makes pious displays of faith which are understood or suspected to be mere cover-ups -- only a veneer upon one's underlying materialism. Faith is insincere or ineffective due to a fundamental positivistic materialism.

The Guru-in-Makara native may engage in convenient religious posturing, appearing as a great church-goer and pontificating moralist. By word, he is a well-wisher to all. Yet in his relationships, this one prefers the rich and well-positioned. The native supports a worthy cause - if important people will be at the fundraising party. He gives a charitable donation, if it buys him an income tax discount. In a word, his materialism creates a none-too-subtle hypocrisy. The hypocrisy leads to discreditation and disgrace.

The native is typically unaware (or in denial) about the depth of one's own religious falsity and corruption. He is not disturbed by his lack of true faith, because he does not miss something he has never known. He may preach upon "common sense" or "Just War" or "God's Will to punish, enslave, and annihilate those who are Different From Us." Indeed, Guru in Makara is karaka for a false religious teacher.

In neechcha bhanga condition, which is even stronger than exaltation, Guru in Makara gives extraordinary power. The native becomes a social hierarchical leader with a tremendous capacity to maintain order while moving large belief system toward a Higher Good. (Barack Obama and Queen Elizabeth II have neechcha bhanga Guru/Makara in positional strength, in radix lagna.)

How will the transit of Brihaspati through Maraka rashi affect Me?

During Guru's one-year transit through Makara, look to the house in your Jyotisha nativity through which Guru is moving. Unless Brihaspati's neechcha qualities would be canceled in this temporary home for Guru (for example if the house being transited by Guru is a kendra and is occupied by uchcha Mangala) , it would be wise to expect that matters of the affected house will be visited by some effect of over-confidence or false belief. It may manifest as fraudulence through mixing materialism with spiritual faith, through false religion, or through overly simplistic, unrealistic beliefs held by you, or attempts to impose those beliefs upon you by manipulative Others.

For example if the neechcha Guru transits one's navamsha lagna, expect to find oneself behaving a bit piously in intimate relationships; taking the moral high road as a way of escaping emotional accountability in marriage, or otherwise posturing instead of deepening true faith in the partnership.

If neechcha Brihaspati is traveling through one's fourth rashi domain, the educational credentialing and property-entitlement mechanisms of one's own society will produce false teachers or corrupt beliefs for about a year. Worst effects come from Guru transit through Makara rashi in dharma bhava, where the human spiritual teacher may lose credibility through his/her overconfident claims or actions.

Of course, other graha in the house, drishti, and divisional charts should always be considered. And most importantly, the full effect of any transit are felt ONLY if the transiting graha is also lord of the current bhukti.

In the nativities of those with neechcha Guru in kendra (such as Queen Elizabeth II and Barack Obama) there will be plenty of interaction with fraudulent religion (such as the demonic forces of terrorism hiding behind the beautiful religion of Islam). Yet when neechcha Guru gets bhanga (liberation, "unbungled") the native is empowered to bring out the best in traditional belief systems.

Despite the reality that the world's largest traditional belief systems form a convenient hiding place for some poisonously evil and corrupt people, the native with neechcha bhanga Guru in kendra will be able to preserve the social dignity of the religion while rooting out the evil-doers.

I predict that a war of true vs. false religions, specifically the true religion of compassion vs. the false religion of jealousy and hatred, is ramping up now in these early days of Guru's transit through Makara. There will be some show-downs, and many will try to "throw out the baby with the bathwater", claiming that the entire religious tradition must be discredited because some of its priests and preachers are terribly ignorant and causing serious planetary harm.

These priests of material power have become agents of hateful destruction in the same way as their evil tyrannical predecessors (Hitler, Stalin, etc.) They have been traumatized by generations of child-abuse in their native lands. They have been made to hate their bodies & their souls. They are programmed now to ravage, mutilate, murder, and destroy. They work like all demons, under cover of Religion.

Luckily, there are some gifted leaders with discrimination who are possessed of true faith. These leaders will guide the world along a dark but secure path, for the year of Brihaspati's travel though Shani's grim world of crimes and punishments.

ingress and egress of transiting Brihaspati

from: http://www.barbarapijan.com/bpa/Topics/Guru_gochara_transits_table.htm

calculated by Das Gorvani's Jyotisha software "Jyotish Studio 3" www.goravani.com

Name of Rashi	Retrograde	Date of Entry into Rashi	Date of Exit from Rashi
Taurus		06/02/2000	06/15/2001
Gemini		06/15/2001	07/04/2002
Cancer		07/04/2002	07/29/2003
Leo		07/29/2003	08/27/2004
Virgo		08/27/2004	09/27/2005
Libra		09/27/2005	10/27/2006
Scorpio		10/27/2006	11/21/2007
Sagittarius		11/21/2007	12/09/2008
Capricorn		12/09/2008	05/01/2009
Aquarius		05/01/2009	07/30/2009
Capricorn	R	07/30/2009	12/19/2009

Gochara Brihaspati enters Makara rashi

from the British National Space Centre (BNSC) ~~ http://www.bnsc.gov.uk/5945.aspx

• Distance from the Sun: Varies between 740 - 817 million km
• Satellites: 63 known including Io, Ganymede, Europa and Callisto

The largest object in our Solar System... More than a thousand Earths would fit inside it and Jupiter has moons larger than planets. It is also home to storms that have raged for hundreds of years. ... This enormous orange gas giant is made up of 90 per cent hydrogen.

...Although it takes 12 years to orbit the Sun, Jupiter only has a ten hour day. As a result, the planet rotates so fast that it produces violent winds, bulges 9,000 km at its equator and stretches the striped white clouds of ammonia ice. Its distinctive Red Spot is a 40,000 km storm system and could swallow the entire Earth." ~~ www.bnsc.gov.uk