How to Change Your Astrological Fate, Fortune and Destiny … and Live a Wonderful Life along the Way

1. How to Change Your Astrological Fate, Fortune and Destiny … and Live a Wonderful Life along the Way Bill Bodri www.MeditationExpert.com 718-539-2811 USA

2. Outline of Topics • Shao Kang Chieh (Shao Yung) • Iron Abacus Numerology - Tieh Pan Shen Shu • Zen Master Yungu and Liao Fan’s “Ledger of Merits and Demerits” for “Governing My Mind” • Benjamin Franklin’s “Art of Virtue” Daily Diary for Moral Improvement • Frank Bettger, Frank McKinney, Dale Carnegie, Napoleon Hill and Brian Tracey on Creating the Future You Want • Goal Setting, Personal Productivity and Time Management • Zhunti mantra • Meditation Practice • Charity, Virtue and Merit Making • Summary for How to Keep Your Life on Track

3. 5 minute I-Ching (Yi-Jing) Lesson Yin-Yang The 64 hexagrams The 8 Trigrams Sample Hexagram

4. Shao Yung (Shao Kang Chieh) • Sung dynasty (1011-1077) • One of the 5 great Neo-Confucian philosophers: Chou Tun-Yi, Chang Tsai, Cheng brothers, and Shao Yung united Confucianism, Taoism and Buddhism • Studied the I-Ching (Yi Jing) under Li Chih Tsai in the School of Symbol and Number • Study in the hut, seeing the rat, breaking the ceramic pillow, finding the potter, visiting the old man, reading the book, digging under the bed, creating new ways of prediction • Plum Blossom Numerology (Kuan Mei Shu) • The Book of Great Philosophy (Huang Chi Ching Shih Shu )

5. Plum Blossom Numerology One evening at 4 pm on the 17th day of the 12th month in the Year of the Dragon, Shao Yang was looking at the blossoms on a plum tree. He saw two sparrows fighting in the tree and they fell to the ground. He predicted that a young neighbor girl would come to pick the plum blossoms and when threatened by the gardener, would fall from the tree and hurt her thigh. Day + Month + Year = 17 + 12 + 5 = 34 34 - 32 (4*8 trigrams) = 2 = Tui = Upper trigram Hour + Day + Month + Year = 9 + 17 + 12 + 5 = 43 43 - 40 (5*8 trigrams) = 3 = Li = Lower trigram Hour + Day + Month + Year = 9 + 17 + 12 + 5 = 43 43 - 42 (7*6 lines) = 1 = Moving Line Moving Line New Fate Hexagram Hexagram 49, Ko, Revolution Hexagram 31, Hsien, Influence

6. Hexagram # 49, Ko, Revolution Explanation Moving Line New Fate Hexagram Tui = young girl, metal, injury Hexagram # 31, Hsien, Influence Tui Chien Sun Ken Li = fire Nuclear Hexagram New Fate Hexagram Chien = old man (gardener), metal Sun = thigh, flower, wood Tui = young girl, metal Ken = Earth, which produces metal, so the girl will benefit in some way and the injury will not be serious Inner Trigrams The predictive hexagram, 49, is made up of the primary trigrams Tui and Li. Li, the lower trigram, contains the moving line so it is the fate and therefore Tui is the subject. The meaning of hexagram 49 is change and revolution, conflict and destruction. In I-Ching symbology, Tui stands for a young girl, injury and metal. Li stands for fire. Since fire destroys metal, this means a misfortune will occur. Therefore a young girl will be injured. A young girl (Tui) will pick a flower (Sun) and is injured (Tui) in the thigh (Sun) by an old man (Chien).

7. New Year’s Eve Prediction On New Year’s Eve, Shao Yang and his son heard a knock on their front door. A neighbor had come to borrow something. Shao Yang asked his son to predict what the neighbor wanted to borrow. Because there was 1 knock on the door, the son calculated Chien as the upper trigram, which is the first trigram. Chien stands for metal and short things. From the time, day, month and year he calculated the number 5, which is Sun, for the lower trigram. Sun stands for wood and something long. The son therefore predicted the neighbor wanted something with a short metal head (Chien) and long wooden handle (Sun), so he said a “hoe.” Shao Yang said, “He wants to borrow an axe. … When you predict, you have to use your knowledge and consider the time and situation. It’s winter time and it’s cold with snow on the ground. How could anyone use a hoe? Who can use a hoe on New Year’s Eve? On New Year’s Eve it’s a custom to build a fire in the house so he must need an axe.” Chieh = metal, short Sun = wood, long

8. Other Shao Yang Stories Once Master Shao bought a lantern and calculated from his purchase that it would be broken at 12:00 noon on a certain day, month and year. Just before it was to be broken, he put it on his desk in his study to watch it, curious to discover how it would be broken. It was lunch time and his wife called him many times but he wouldn’t respond or leave the room because he wanted to see the fate of the lantern. Finally, his wife came into the room, saw him absorbed in the lantern, and broke it in her anger. Shao Yang jumped up and said, “So that’s how it was to be broken.” Once 3 scholars were on the way to take the civil service examinations to become high officials, and asked Shao to predict whether they would pass or fail. He predicted they would all pass and took them for a tour around his property. When having lunch, Shao Yang constantly talked about his property, its history, whom he purchased it from and many other details. He mentioned them over and over again. After Shao died, one of his descendants was involved in a property dispute and the magistrate happened to be one of the scholars who had passed the exam. He remembered Shao’s conversation and how he talked about his property over and over again and now he knew why. He ruled in favor of Shao’s descendants. Other famous stories: The flowers trampled by a horse, historian Oh Yang Fei, the graverobber’s mother, the safety of Szechuan province, and loss of the Sung dynasty.

9. File Away for Your Reference Planets Changing Signs (Vedic) UranusNeptune 4/8/01 AQ 1/31/95 CP 7/22/01 8/3/95 1/26/02 12/3/95 4/5/09 PI 4/20/08 AQ 10/6/09 7/3/08 1/25/10 2/11/09 6/24/16 AR 10/7/09 9/3/16 12/2/09 Shao Yung’s Hexagrams 1995 - 4 2006 - 45 1996 - 7 2007 - 35 1997 - 33 2008 - 16 1998 - 31 2009 - 20 1999 - 56 2010 - 8 2000 - 62 2011 - 23 2001 - 53 2012 - 24 2002 - 39 2013 - 27 2003 - 52 2014 - 3 2004 - 15 2015 - 42 2005 - 12 2016 - 51 Note: China - Big political changes coming 2011-2013

10. The Chinese Nostradamus

11. Shao Yang’s Principles • “When there is no motion, no divination is possible. When nothing happens, one should not divine.” • Zen master Nan-Ch’uan’s predictable travel plans • Master Tung-shan and student Yun-chufed by devas • The Great god Indra scatters rice in order to see a Master • Story of Chinese Zen Master Nan Huai Chin • Story of Japanese Zen Master Bankei • “The path before you should be made broad, for if it is made too narrow there will no room even for yourself. How much the less can you then help others along it?” [Life springs from the dirtiest soil, water too pure harbors no fish.]

12. FAMILY • Your Father was born in the Year of the Dog, your Mother was born in the Year of the Tiger [1/144 chance since 12*12 =144] • Your mother is 34 years older than you [???] • You are born as the 4th son in the family [???] • The 1st brother was born in the Year of the Horse [1/12] • The 2nd brother was born in the Year of the Monkey [1/12] • The 3rd brother was born in the Year of the Pig [1/12] • There are 2 sisters in your family; You have younger sisters but no older sisters [???] • The brothers in the family get along with each other without disagreement • You most resemble your mother in appearance [1/2] • Your parents [at the time of this reading] are both still living [1/4] • Your parents [at the time of this reading] are not divorced [1/2] • Your mom and dad [at the time of this reading] are both healthy [1/4]

13. Liao Fan’s Four Lessons • Ming dynasty, Father passes away and Liao Fan starts to study medicine • Liao Fan meets Mr. Kong, from Yunnan, at Compassionate Cloud Temple: “You are destined to be a government official. Next year you will attain the rank of First Level Scholar. Why aren’t you studying for the imperial examination?” Kong states that he is supposed to transmit his prediction technique, from the line of Shao Yung, to Liao Fan • Liao Fan takes him home, and he and his mother test Kong on all sorts of predictions, large and small, always finding them accurate. So he decides to start studying again for the imperial examination. Kong says he will pass: • 14th in the county exam; 71st in the regional exam; 9th in the provincial exam • Next year he passes as predicted. Kong calculates his life predictions: • All the years he passes exams and in what place • The year he becomes a “Civil scholar” and the year he becomes an “Imperial scholar” • His final appointment as magistrate in Sichuan province for 3.5 years, retiring and returning home • Death at age 53 on August 14 between 1:00--3:00 am, without any male heir • Everything transpires as predicted, even the prediction of a promotion after 91 dan and 5 dou of rice (He was recommended for promotion after 70 dan but a new boss turned it down. Some years later a new Educational Commissioner promotes him and the original calculation, which had caused him to doubt the validity of Kong’s predictions, proved 100% correct.)

14. Aside ... • Hinduism - even the number of breaths you take is numbered • Your income, your bank account, stock market turning days, etc. can all be calculated … even lottery numbers • This means you have afixed amount of merit unless you are always working to replenish it. Many things can be computed because of karma, but when you act to do good deeds without a mind of clinging, you can create vast amounts of incalculable merit ... Because there’s no limit to your mind at the time of giving, so the rewards you will receive in response to the need will be just as great. A “penny gift” given with a sincere mind can indeed create a king, and a mud pie given to a Buddha can create an Emperor! • The key is don’t use up your merit foolishly like many rich people do! Don’t squander your time or resources foolishly but always be giving, especially to those IN NEED.

15. Liao Fan Starts Believing in a Sealed Fate and Unchangeable Predestination • Liao Fan then believes that life and death, promotion and demotion, wealth and poverty all come about in due time and are fated. So believing in fate, he begins to view everything in a detached manner and ceases to seek gain or profit. • After being selected as an Imperial student, he is sent to a university in Beijing for one year’s time. He starts meditating and makes some spiritual progress … he attains a degree of emptiness (where no thoughts arise). • Goes to Nanjing for one year, undergoes a Zen retreat with Master Yungu meditating for 3-days and nights without sleep: Master Yungu said: “The reason ordinary people do not become enlightened is because they have all sorts of wandering thoughts running around in their minds. In 3 days, I have not observed a single wandering thought arise in you. Why is that?” • Liao Fan replies: “Mr. Kong has predicted the entire outcome of my life. The time of everything is predestined -- life, death, wealth, promotion, failure. There is no need for me to think about or desire anything. There’s no room for other results.” • Master Yungu slaps him with words: “I thought you were someone of special capability. Now I see you are just an average ordinary individual.”

16. Master Yungu’s Teaching Ordinary people are forever involved with wandering thoughts, so naturally their lives are bound to chi, the forces of yin and yang, and fate. You cannot deny that fate exists, but only ordinary people are bound to it. Destiny cannot bind those who practice great kindness or great wickedness. For those who cultivate great kindness, the virtues they accumulate from kind acts is so great they can alter their original destiny for the better. The merits accrued can actually change their destiny from suffering to happiness, poverty to prosperity, and short lives to longevity. However, when a persons’ evil deeds are great and powerful, they will cancel out the fortune and prosperity predetermined in their original fate, and their life will be transformed from good to bad. … Now for 20 years you haven’t tried to change your fortune as predicted even one little bit, so how can you be anything other than just a regular commonplace individual?

17. If you seek within yourself, you will not only attain virtue, goodness and righteousness but also a good reputation, wealth and high status -- both internal and external benefits. If you do not turn within and examine yourself but merely chase after these things from the outside, then although you use intelligence to attain them,you can only attain at most what fate had entitled you to. You will lose both internal and external benefits; no benefits are derived from blind seeking. Mencius said, “In seeking one should follow the right path. In attaining, one attains what one’s destiny entitles one to.” … One who attains one million dollars in this life must have cultivated the good fortune worthy of that amount in the past. Those who have thousands of dollars must have cultivated the good fortune worthy of that amount. Those who die of starvation were in fact meant to die in that manner. If you have accumulated enough merits for 100 generations, you’ll have 100 generations of descendants, and the same goes for those with only 2-3 descendants. The fate of people is created by their own past thoughts and actions. Retribution is simply the fruit of their deeds. [Karma]

18. Sources of Authority • Book of Songs: “We create our own destiny.”I-Ching: “The family that accumulates goodness is sure to have superabundant blessings. The family that accumulates evil is sure to suffer superabundant misfortune.” Mencius: “Whatever is sought can be attained.” • Vedas: If we sow goodness we will reap goodness. If we sow evil we will reap evil. • Buddhism: “If one wishes for and seeks wealth, fame, children and long life than you can attain them.” (Master Yungu: “Buddhas and Bodhisattvas don’t lie and certainly have no reason to deceive us.”) • Bible: “Ask and it shall be given to you, Seek and you shall find;” “You do not have because you do not ask.”

19. Master Yungu teaches: “When trying to change one’s fate, not a single thought should arise. Then one will most easily receive a response. Where there is no sign of duality (between wealth and poverty, failure and success, life and death, that’s where we will be able to create and form our destiny. … When our cultivation reaches a certain level then our destiny will change. This change will depend upon the accumulation of merits, on seeking a response from the heavens.” [free will] • Master Yungu introduces a Merit-Fault chart, or daily ledger for recording one’s merits and demerits where one bad deed neutralizes one good deed. This is Liao Fan’s Ledger of Merits and Demerits which he calls “The Book of Governing my Mind.” • Master Yungu teaches Liao Fan to recite the Zhunti mantra

20. Liao Fan Decides to Change • Liao Fan regrets his past misdeeds and vows to reform. He writes down before the Buddha that he wishes to pass a higher imperial exam and pledges 3000 good deeds. • Kong’s predictions now start to lose their accuracy. Liao Fan takes the preliminary examination in which he is supposed to place 3rd, and takes 1st place. In the Fall he passes the real imperial exam, which Kong had not predicted he would pass. • 10 years later the 3,000 good deeds are accumulated and Kong dedicates them at a temple. Kong wishes for a son and vows another 3,000 good deeds. In 4 years, together with his wife, they are accumulated. • Kong vows 10,000 good deeds and asks to pass the jinshi imperial examination degree. After 3 years he passes the exam and becomes the mayor of Baodi but has few opportunities to do good deeds as before. He dreams that lowering the taxes for the county was equivalent to 10,000 good deeds, and asks visiting Zen master Huanyu for confirmation. Zen master Huanyu says, “One kind deed with a pure heart can be worth that much. In this case, since more than 10,000 people were benefited from heavy taxes being lifted, so of course the merit is that great.” • Kong predicted he’d die at age 53 without an heir, but he lives far past this allotted time, begets a son and achieves a high position far past what was fated.

21. Liao Fan’s Conclusions • Liao Fan concludes: “Destiny exists but is very difficult to be believed by people because it is changeable.” “Destiny is not set but is created and determined by ourselves.” The power to recreate destiny is in yourself. As long as you are willing to reform your ill ways, practice kind deeds and work to accumulate merit and virtues, there is nothing you ask that you will not receive. These are your own transactions to create good fortune, and no one can take them away. How is it possible you won’t get to enjoy what you create? • The I-Ching was written to help people bring about good fortune and avoid pain, suffering and misery. If everything is predestined, what’s the point of the I-Ching? [The same goes for astrology.] They were invented to help us change our fortunes, otherwise what’s the point? Therefore know that your fortune can be changed. • You can form your fate rather than be bound by it. Accumulating merit and meditation, reforming your faults and cultivating humility, are the keys. One should always reflect upon his own thoughts and actions to see if they accord with the way of heaven. If one practices such, then good fortune will come without being sought. The choice of whether to seek good fortune or bring about adversity is all up to you.

22. The Formula for Change • Recognize your faults and shortcomings (for not having a son, living long, or being promoted) and vow to reform them. Become aware of your errant thoughts and habit energies, and resolve to correct them as you would work to cure an illness. Use meditation to cultivate the awareness that lets you cut off errors and make amends. Be fearless not to cling to the past but be willing to change … Live as though the past does not exist and the future starts today. Now! • Develop your virtue and perform many good deeds and acts of charity. Diligently practice hidden kind deeds and work to accumulate many merits and virtues. These acts will accumulate the personal merit that will create your own good fortune. Start today. • While waiting, let go of the thought of desiring something you are not supposed to have and the thought of wishing to receive a reward. Because you cannot reach the state of no-thought emptiness, practice reciting the Zhunti mantra to reach the stage where you “do not recite while reciting and recite when not reciting.” When you no longer have wandering thoughts, the mantra will be successful and effective. Merit, meditation and supplication can evoke a response from heaven. Start on this path this very moment.

23. The “Formula” … Success, Goals, Achievement, Accomplishment, A New Life, Change Your Fortune and Destiny MERIT(practicing charity, good deeds, virtuous ways) + MEDITATION(awareness, cultivating emptiness) + MANTRA(asking for higher help, silencing the mind) + METHOD(a plan toward the goal, continuous discipline, massive intelligent action toward progress) + MEASUREMENT(track your progress toward success) = (1) Correct One’s Faults [cultivate awareness and virtue] and (2) Accumulate Merit

24. One of My Old Practice Schedules

25. Seeing the Fortune in Your Face or Palm or whatever ... • The Taoist Monk Ch’iu Ch’ang-Ch’un The lines of destiny written on your face are not true indicators of your destiny. For the true face is not your physical face but the face of your mind. And it is on the face of your mind that true destiny is written. Therefore, when the fortune-tellers say that a person has a kind disposition or a cruel disposition written on his or her face, they are really referring to a minor determinant of destiny. The major determinant of destiny is in the heart. If a cruel heart is tamed, or a kind heart becomes cruel, the external features will change. Therefore, the facial appearance is merely an indicator of the destiny written on the internal face, which is your heart. Our destiny is determined by our actions. People who were initially destined to die a violent death may die peacefully if they perform good deeds. Our destiny is in our own hands. • Story of the boy who saved the ants • Moses and Abraham Lincoln

26. The Two Brothers and the God of Wealth “Only if you practice generosity and giving can you become wealthy. Your previous karmic causality has made you poor because you did not practice generosity, offering and all forms of charity. That is why you are poor. So even though you ardently beg me day and night for wealth and riches, how can you obtain them without this karmic past? “Take for example a fruit tree. If it is winter time, you cannot obtain any fruit, no matter whether you served a thousand or a million gods to get it. The same principle applies to money. Because you previously did not develop any karmic causality, but yet you still beg me for wealth and riches, you cannot get it either. But when the fruit is ripe in season, you will naturally obtain it without even asking. Everything is obtained because of prior formations; to obtain something you must perform the appropriate actions and set the right formations into motion. What can imploring the gods do about it?” If you want to receive but you have not given, a billion prayers cannot make your dreams come true! If a request could be answered by prayer, it doesn't mean that a heavenly response comes free because acts of grace are still subject to causation; they are ultimately due to prior acts of sufficient merit. When you receive something seemingly out of thin air this is simply because your good karma has ripened.

27. Vasistha’s Yoga … What is called fate or divine will is nothing other than the action or self-effort of the past. The present is infinitely more potent than the past. They indeed are fools who are satisfied with the fruits of their past effort (which they regard as divine will) and do not engage themselves in self-effort now. If you see that the present self-effort is sometimes thwarted by fate (or divine will), you should understand that the present self-effort is weak. A weak and dull-witted man sees the hand of providence when he is confronted by a strong and powerful adversary and succumbs to him. Sometimes it happens that without effort someone makes a great gain: for example, the state elephant chooses (in accordance with an ancient practice) a mendicant as the ruler of a country whose king suddenly died without leaving an heir; this is certainly neither an accident nor some kind of divine act, but the fruit of the mendicant’s self-effort in the past birth. … The wise man should of course know what is capable of attainment by self-effort and what is not. It is, however, ignorance to attribute all this to an outside agency and to say that “God sends me to heaven or to hell” or that “an outside agency makes me do this or that”-- such an ignorant person should be shunned. -- Vasistha’s Yoga, SUNY, pp. 26-27

28. Alan Leo, an eminent astrologer of the West views karma and free will thusly: “The idea seems to be prevalent that astrology teaches fatalism. Those, however, who have studied the subject know that it does not teach absolute fatalism. We are not utterly bound; neither, on the other hand, are we entirely free. We are limited and restrained by ignorance. The impressions and samskaras are the primitive emotions and tendencies that motivate our lives. They are the impressions carried over from our past lives in our subconscious minds, which motivate desires, and in turn produce our thoughts and actions.” Put another way, man’s actions move on the lines that his own karma is tracing for him. But his will is free to fashion his karma. It is determinism to the extent that it is shadowed by the unchangeable laws of karma, but life which is guided by free will does not follow any preordained pattern. Determinism thus appears to function as the law which operates through changes according to the conditions of each person’s circumstances and environment. Vedic philosophy has always denied the existence of a merciless fate which would play with man as it pleases. On the contrary, the sages have undeniably declare that man has control over his actions, but his actions have no control over their results. -- Chakrapani Ullal