siva rathri or the night of siva and maha mrityunjaya mantra

now is Siva rathri.

a very auspicious day for spiritual pursuers.

i still remember my childhood, when the entire family, went without sleep, chanting siva panchakshari and mahamrityunjaya.

chanting mantras, keeping your stomach relatively empty is one sure way to center yourself.

i have countless examples of mahamrityunjaya saving people during very difficult periods of health.

i believe that mantras coupled with medicines work better than medicines alone.

Om traiyambakam yajamahe sugandhim pushtivardhanam

urva rukameeva bandhanath

mrityor muksheeya mamritath.

may i be blessed with vigour and vitality till my right moment to depart comes..

the mantra brims with courage..

we all need so much courage to live this life, don't we?

saturn or sani in 5th house or the house of intelligence

there is a dictum in astrology : mando alasa:

which poorly translated means sani is lazy.

saturn is actually the signifactor for discipline and hence for laziness also.5th house is the house of illumination and spontaniety.when saturn occupies this house, you tend to restrict your horizons of imagination, subconsciously, that you remain relatively closed to new ideas.

i have seen in many horoscopes that inspite of saturn being in 5th house, these people turned out to be superiorly intelligent or creative.

Mozart, Newton, Rabindranath Tagore, Bill Gates, Hitchcock, Jim Morrison, Bob Dylan...

so once again, we can see that just by applying one dictum, the astrologer shouldn't make statements like the person is not creative. One should consider the general nature and yogas of the horoscope. for eg. if there is an influence of shukra/venus in lagna, 4th or 10th it gives an artistic temperament.

yet, saturn and ketu in 5th house will surely give periods of dullness or at least lack of focus to the native.

dusthanas and spirituality

6, 8 and 12th houses of a horoscopes are called the difficult houses or the dusthanas.

these houses are called so, as they create so much difficulties in our material life.

but if you look at the positive side of it, these stressful houses give us enough opportunities to feel helplessly lost that you even stop looking for divine help!

but then with the support of 5th and 9th houses, the houses of wisdom and house of dharma,

sub-consciously you reach a phase that grace manifests by itself.

and you arrive!

take the case of ramana, osho, paramahamsa yogananda, swami rama..all these great masters' horoscopes had dusthanas in full action.

now, that's a real inspiration, isn't it?

Magha nakshatra, nobility and craving for greatness

These are few famous people with Lagna or Moon in Magha.

Winston Churchill, Alexander the great, Sri Aurobindo , Paramahamsa Yogananda , Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, J Jayalalitha, ..

Magha (0.00-13.20 Leo) is ruled by Pitris/Ancestors. It is a nakshatra governed by Ketu, in the sign Leo which is ruled by the Sun. Magha refers to Maghaban which is the cause of light and brightness.

Magha is also denoted by the words ‘benevolent’, ‘bountiful’, ‘magnificent’ or ‘mighty’. This constellation is symbolized by the palanquin/throne which is indicated by royalty, power, status and prestige.

The fierce element of Magha corresponds to Ketu/Sun. As a ferocious planet, Ketu can be as violent as the intense Sun. Again, the sun is also associated with authority/magnanimity and humility, or mercilessness and tyranny, leading to the natives being blinded by power. Magha is in fact a human asterism that fosters the humaneness of the esoteric Ketu.

The native is conscious of their social status and performance of duty, and in a negative context, can lead to over ambition. On a higher reality, Magha displays a high capacity for idealism, even when it is surrounded by material wealth.