Guru Ratna, Rahu Ratna
Jewels for Jupiter and Rahu
Pukhraj (Yellow Sapphire) Not Suitable for Karkata Lagna
Gomedha (Hessonite Quartz) Not Suitable
Gomedha increases Rahu-Ketu psychic sensitivity
Q:
Note to a client who enquired whether a yellow sapphire (Pukhraj) for increasing the strength of Guru would benefit him.
A:
Namaste,
No, I would not recommend a pukhraj for you. My reasoning is that in radix, Guru is lord of your volatile Ari-sthana containing Rahu.
Why Gem Strengthening of Guru is Not Recommended for This Nativity
I personally would not want to give the 6th lord any more power than He already has, and I certainly would not want to increase Rahu's existing empowerment to amplify animosity, debt & disease in your life.
Yes, it's true that Rahu sometimes does good things in house-6 - e.g., He can bring wealth there, especially through international trade opportunities. However, overall -- IMO -- increasing the power of the 6th lord & thereby empowering the Lord of Rahu is playing with fire.
There can be a legitimate tantric use for amplifying L-6 or Rahu. If a reputable tantric guru prescribed such an effect and was willing to supervise its outcome, I could accept that. But for a normal person I would say no.
My second observation is that Brihaspati occupies Mithuna navamsha, which means that Vimshottari periods of Guru will also give the effects of Mithuna's lord Budha. Budha makes you intelligent & verbal while Budha's proximity to Shukra increases your handsome appearance. However, Budha is radix L-12, and also radix Budha has some quite difficult tenants in your vyaya bhava. It is best to "leave sleeping dogs lie".
In conclusion, IMO, strengthening Guru with a yellow sapphire would increase the effects of two dusthanas - 6 & 12. Gururatna would exacerbate a number of problematic angles in radix which are better left to resolve slowly, with natural age and spiritual deepening.
Compassionate Service is a Better Option
What I would recommend, to strengthen Guru's potentially positive effects without increasing the negative implications of His difficult houses, is compassionate service toward others in the specific areas that Guru controls.
Neechha Guru occupies yuvati bhava, your marriage house. Guru casts drishti from house-7 upon houses 11,1, and 3. This position typically gives a wife of lower social status than yourself. The spouse has affinity for low caste friends, which causes consternation in the higher-minded native, often leading to divorce.
Because you work in an educational environment, one possible way to pay off this historic karma, could be providing service of peer tutoring & counseling (7th house activities). The best recipients of your service would be persons who have enough good fortune (Guru) to enter university, for example, but not quite enough time management skill to complete their studies.
Typically this type of student has less privileged origins. They carry forward from those less privileged origins, the self-destructive habits of frequent drinking, dancing & copulating. The student rationalizes with the Guru attitude that "there is plenty of time". The sad Makara truth is, however, that the educational calendar is fixed.
When Guru occupies Makara, the native squanders their material assets in gaiety. They are the "grasshopper" in the tale of the grasshopper and the ant.
The Guru-Makara type is typically pleasant, friendly, & generous. They make materially self-destructive choices by sharing their Time socializing with others rather than dedicate their Time to isolating, self-promoting activities like Study. They often cannot tolerate being alone. But one must be alone to study!
You have a similar type of karma/inherited blind-spot evident in your kalatra bhava, regarding spousal choices & a tendency to accept poor advice. If you have the desire to undertake personal responsibility, & feel willing to offer service as a conscientious peer advisor, your previous-life ignorance which causes the Karmic obligation to re-enact old mistakes, can be eradicated.
If you can offer these Guru-Makara types a bit of supportive advice about balancing their social lives against their long-term goals for individual material success, you can help others while helping yourself. Guru favors the generous & compassionate helper!
Not only is selfless service cheaper than a pukhraj. It also has fewer dangerous side-effects!
Hope this is helpful,
Sincerely, Barbara Pijan Lama
Is a Gomedha stone suitable for me?
Q:
I was also prescribed a gomed for my Rahu at the beginning of my Rahu Mahadasha. I have finished about 9 years of Rahu period now, half-way through, with Rahu-Ketu period running currently.
I have had every possible financial & health problem during these Rahu years. My parents are desperate for me to get my life in order but despite my mature age I cannot seem to. I find myself surrounded with undesirable people & worrying about my future. I am an intelligent, well-meaning person but I am struggling with debt, health, and low companions.
A:
Jyotisha prescribes the ritual application and wearing of gomedha stone in order to increase the power of Rahu.
IMO remedial gomedha stone is only warranted if Rahu has become a weak benefic.
I subscribe to the Jyotisha practice of ONLY strengthening weak benefics.
Rahu is a natural malefic, but when Rahu occupies a kendra or trine AND Rahu's rashi lord is well situated it is POSSIBLE (although fairly rare) for Rahu to function as a benefic. When Rahu is functioning as a weak benefic there might be a reason to strengthen Rahu with gomedha.
There is a Jyotisha-gem school of thought, which actively tries to strengthen malefics. They have their own reasoning and they are correct theoretically. Under special, supervised circumstances, this tantric method of forcing the mind to go from bad to worse could succeed in forcing a bad planet to turn good. However this method requires direct supervision of a guru to prevent you from harming yourself or others during the exacerbation of malefic forces.
As they say on television, "don't try this at home."
If you are a normal modern person trying to manage work, education, and family raising, and you are lacking direct spiritual supervision of a lineage guru: I would say please do not strengthen your Rahu which occupies the worst dusthana in radix and whose lord Guru is neechha. Strengthening a malefic planet in aristhana invites increasing woes of mental & physical illness, anxiety, conflict, debt, and poor company - as you have noticed!
Sincerely, Barbara Pijan Lama
Q:
: I am wearing a gomedha during Rahu mahadasha. Rahu occupies Ripu bhava in the 12th house from Rahu's lord neechha Guru (see querent's D-1/D-9 above). Is this Gomedha making me attractive to crazy people?
I was prescribed a gomed at the beginning of my Vimshottari Rahu Mahadasha. I have an underlying mental illness which is usually fairly well compensated.
But I wonder, when I wear the gomed, is my mental illness more pronounced? Are unbalanced people able to sense me more,and am I also more sensitive & intuitive?
As an example, I was supermarket shopping the other day and a stranger approached me. He wanted my attention for something, I couldn't figure out what, and he was a lower class individual for sure.
He physically grabbed my arm, hard enough to hurt me, then muttered something and stumbled away. I get this sort of weird, unwanted attention from undesirables all the time, and have - since onset of Rahu mahadasha some decade ago.
Is the gomed I wear, in effect, advertising my auric weakness to these off-balance people? I hope that in these encounters I am paying off past karma by acting compassionately despite their assaults.
This constant invasion of my space, and feeling like I am some sort of prey for the unstable souls of this world, is very tiring & sometimes frightening!
A:
Well, you have put the Rahu/6 situation clearly indeed!
Rahu amplifies the house which He occupies. Rahu also amplifies the grahas upon which He casts drishti (esp. any graha yuti Rahu) Ari Sthana is the most severe dusthana. House-6 contains those aspects of life which are most intractably out of balance. (House-6 is 12th-from-7th. 7th is balance, partnership. 12th-from any house gives loss of matters of that house. Loss of balance is imbalance, conflict, illness, servitude, weakness, victim-mind.)
I agree that wearing a gomedha during Rahu mahadasha is psychically amplifying your "find me" signal - attracting much unwanted attention from other conflicted, unbalanced, victim-state people!
I respect your dedication to reacting compassionately to the unbalanced people who seem to seek you out. And I agree that the strategy of treating others compassionately will *always* give excellent results, so long as one is fully honest about distinguishing compassion from sympathy or pity. But do be aware that the intuitive "voice" of neechha Guru will generally make excuses rather than act with full, decisive energy.
Compassion is by definition *skillful*.
In authentically compassionate action, one acknowledges the inappropriate, invasive energy and takes skillful action to deflect it. The goal is to cause as little harm as possible while successfully protecting your psychic & physical space. If the invasive energy is still getting in because you find yourself feeling sorry for the invader, it is time to reinforce the protective energy in your aura. Ask your spirit guides to aid you. (Helpful entities will include whichever divine forces you offer puja to, trusted ancestor spirits, etc.)
As I mentioned previously, I would not prescribe a gomedha for your Rahu condition. I realize that it is common practice amongst traditional Jyotishi (primarily in India) to automatically prescribe the gem for one's current mahadasha. However, IMO, knowing that you have a pre-existing mental health issue that arose long before the onset of Rahu period, I would avoid exacerbating an already diagnosed imbalance. Especially considering that Rahu occupies a navamsha of Surya -- which means that Rahu's period will activate your 12th-house Ketu-related sensitivity and maraka L-2 issues also, I would refrain from increasing your sensitivity any further.
Selfless service - an excellent gemstone alternative
Selfless service is a wonderful and often much more effective alternative to remedial gemstones. I would recommend that as an alternative to wearing gomedha, you offer selfless service to those who have a similar mental health condition to yourself, only slightly more challenging than your own.
The most effective service offerings are made to those in our "downstream" who need a small, compassionate assist. Very few people are prepared to make major changes in their lives. Rather, small, incremental, realistic changes are the best gift. Don't expect to transform a person's entire life. Rather, expect to offer some sensible, targeted, specific aid that is useful to a person in their current condition.
"Paying off karma" = transforming ignorance into wisdom
If the karmic issue of Rahu mahadasha is mental health (a very broad term!) look to your own experience to find the proper target for selfless service to others. What are the central issues for you in managing your mental health challenges? Isolation & cultural denial? Access to medication? Access to therapy? Access to information? Transportation? Language translation?
Whatever it is (usually it's a collection of problems) somebody right "below" you on the karmic ladder is having a slightly harder time coping than you are. They have slightly less awareness and slightly more confusion than you do. Not a lot! Just enough that you have the experience to know where they are on their path (because you've recently been there) and what will probably help them. You learned from your own experience what works, & your karma improved. Now you are ready to learn more, by watching someone else accept help. The act of accepting help, that moment of humility when we accept the help offer by someone slightly ahead of us, is the act of loosening the ego's stranglehold on our perceptions.
- Accepting help is an act of wisdom.
- Offering help is an act of compassion.
Light a candle on your puja table with the wish that you will be connected to a small, realistic, but steady opportunity to offer service in the specific mental illness area that you understand so well.
Much of the suffering of mental illness arises from isolation & lack of access to medication, therapy, clinical aid, etc.
Perhaps in your experience, some caring person once helped you with transportation, a medical referral, or finding shelter. Or perhaps it was some other timely service that measurably helped you. Think of that act. Then, create a wish that you may have the opportunity to pass the gift along to another.
What better way to transform ignorance into wisdom (i.e., "pay off" the karmic obligation to have a certain type of negative experience) than to help people you truly understand!
As you can tell, I don't recommend gomedha for your Rahu situation.
The psychic effects of amplifying a malefic graha in a dusthana are too hard to control. That's why I prescribe enhancing gems only for weak benefics.
But I do vigorously recommend selfless service!
Sincerely, BPL
updated: 26 August 2008
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