Sometimes I think we learn the deepest lessons through negative examples. You do not get the love of a mother, so the lesson is to understand how it feels like and learn. So that when you become a mother yourself, you decide that you cannot let your child feel that same ‘non-love’ as you did.

Can you rise above your personal bad experience and give better to others? This is the final test.

I have seen several examples in my practice where children were ignored or bullied by their parents and there was no one who believed them. These children grew up with deep seated traumas. Accepting that parental neglect is the root of the present problem is very difficult. Especially in Indian society where we consider our parents divine. So here are a few ways..

1. Let go emotionally. Take care of them as per your personal sense /conscience and do your duty as a child, maybe take them to a doctor etc. But forgive them (read this) and emotionally stop expecting love from them. They have failed in their duty as a mother/father, but you should not fail in your duty as a child in their old age. Else this cycle will continue in your next life too. Do that much for them as much as your conscience requires. Remember you are doing this so that you can set yourself free.
2. Transfer your longing and emotions for a mother/father to your favourite deity/Universe or your higher Self. You are your own mother/father. Understand that you have taken birth because of your own wishes. These parents are for this one life time. You have been born so many times, you have had so many parents. You yourself are your own creator. Your actions/karma have given birth to you.
3. Love yourself, you are the Ultimate yourself. But now go out and buy that icecream, the one your mom never brought for you, and as you eat it feel the satisfaction. Give yourself gifts, tiny indulgences which you wanted as a child. You might think you are an adult now what will you do with a pack of stickers? But holding those stickers in your hand will heal.
4. If you know Reiki you can use the sequence, Hon sha zhe sho nen, cho ku re, dia ko mu, sei hi ki, dia ko mu, cho ku re, Hon sha zhe sho nen, to go back in time/space and love your self as a child. Use sei he ki strongly to love and relax your child self. Do this before you sleep for 21 days.
5. If you do not know Reiki then just relax, think of your child self, visualise picking up that child, kissing it, telling it that its all ok and you love it. This may sound silly but it helps, on a very deep level. The simplest things work. Do this for 21 days.
6. And finally enjoy your own child’s childhood with him. Do all those tiny things you wanted your mom/dad to do with you. And as your child laughs with joy, feel the happiness within you. You have aced your test! You are a good parent, your child loves you and you have broken the cycle of karma.

You take birth in a family, as a ‘soul group’ to clear off the karma together. There is always some karma linked to the mother/father/ancestors. And we are all rebalancing continuously. When someone goes against his own conscience and commits crimes like abusing and torturing living beings, being intentionally cruel, stealing, cheating, lying, breaking up relationships, etc very high intensity ‘moral wrongs’, it lays very severe bindings on the soul. The Karma has been created by actions so deeply against the Dharm that he has suffer through a portion of the misery that he has inflicted on others and then only some can be repaid by mantra and other energy. These are called pitr dosha/problems due to ancestors. If you are going through a rough patch and you chance upon some ritual that makes sense to you, maybe it is time. Now to rebalance and for the finishing touch.

This is ‘Tarpan vidhi’, is done by the men, the oldest male in the family does this, not women. You repay the energy due to your ancestors using the mantras of the Tarpan. The most effective way of rebalancing pitr related karma. In doing so the mantras act upon your own astral self and set things right within you too. If you are a woman suffering in such a family, when your husband/father/brother/son does this Tarpan, the energy is transferred to you too. The best is to go to Brahmakapal, Badrinath, Uttarakhand, India and do a Tarpan Vidhi. There are several pandits there who specialise in this type of ritual. There are other places too in India which are well-known for this ritual, but the best is Brahmakapal, the river Sarasvati flows here very briefly before it vanishes as a undersurface flow. This can be done at any time during the year. If you cannot travel so far then you can contact your local pandit and perform it at the nearest place with flowing water or the seashore.

If this is also not possible and you are sure of the power of your thought and intention, you can do this brief ritual yourself during the Mahalaya Amavasya/no moon day (will be in Sept/Oct, both Sun and Moon in Virgo as per Vedic calendar).

• For the man of the house, take a coconut, remove the husk so that it looks like this, a small tuft left at the place where it has its ‘eyes’. It should have water in it, shake it to check. Keep it in your altar/puja ghar, put some flowers, turmeric, vermillion etc on it, pray to your favourite deity and your higher self, request help. Intend sincerely, very strongly that karma gets balanced. Face south, hold it in your hands, pray to your ancestors and then dash the coconut on the ground so that it breaks. It requires strength and it has to break in one dash. Do not eat this, dispose it in some place, under some tree where no one will step on it or in the water .
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• Then cook food, the woman of the house has to do this, one dish made of pumpkin, one kheer (rice/milk/sugar – dish), one-curd/rice and any other vegetarian items that you can cook with your hands. Lay these offerings on a banana leaf/or a clean dish with a cup of water in the open. Face south, pray to your ancestors and sprinkle some black sesame seeds on it. Request your ancestors to have this food/energy and then leave this Martya-lok/our dimension and go to their Pitra-lok. Intend disconnection, turn back, do not look at the dish and come inside your house.
• Black ravens come to eat this food charged with these energies never other birds. If black ravens eat it your work is done.
• (If there is any other ritual in your culture where you offer food/energy etc to your ancestors, perform that too.)

If you dream of your ancestors who have passed away, you recognise them from the photographs or they tell you their name in your dreams. Or you see black ravens around your house. It is a message from the ancestors. In this case, the easiest option is making a chapati or a ball of raw kneaded wheat dough mixed with jaggery and feeding this to a cow with your hands.

Now the other way, doing charity, both men and women can do this. I have written about this in my earlier posts. E.g. distribute sweets/fruits at an orphanage, stand in the background anonymously and observe the caretakers distributing the food to the children. Be compassionate, intend happiness for these children in hard circumstances, bless them with your heart and come away. Thus you will also heal.

And finally do some pujas, auspicious rituals, fire rituals, anything in which your entire family is involved. e.g the Bhagwat katha, Satyanarayan puja, Chandi Homa, Rudrabhishek, etc. These are positive energies and general pandits can do it easily. Do this in your house so that the energy from the mantras enters your house and cleans off the negativity.

Now how about some spiritual practice for yourself? At least 15 mins a day? You can recite the Gayatri mantra 108 times. Or do Dhyan. Or even self-reiki, or surround yourself with pran? I have written about so many tiny activities you can do, just do some practice regularly everyday. Give yourself these 15 mins so that you can heal yourself deeply.