The priests arrive today, nine in all, to conduct the final four days of holy homas and pujas to complete Iraivan's historic Pranapratishta consecration. Many are the items needed to conduct the elaborate rituals. These are being assembled in the yagasala today, and we give you a glimpse.We asked our Vivek Sivacharyar how many mantras he has chanted in the last 40 days and he said 120,000.

Satguru Bodhinatha Veylanswami gives his weekly upadesha in Kadavul Temple. It is part of a series of talks elaborating on the inspired teachings of Śivaya Subramuniyaswami as found in his book Merging With Śiva.

"It really hardens a person to live in the conscious mind all the time, because he has to build an ego shell around himself for protection, and that makes him insensitive and rough. One of the biggest protective influences of the conscious mind is anger. Anger makes a person cunning in his thinking, and of course the predominant underlying quality of anger is fear. He is always afraid of something. It is generally something that may happen or is going to happen. He is always in conflict with someone. These are the motivating forces of the conscious mind: anger and fear. Most people live in the conscious mind unconsciously. ¶The conscious mind is the area of the mind where memory and time are Gods, and reason is the Supreme Ruler. “If it is not reasonable, it is not acceptable,” declares the conscious mind, and “If we can’t measure it, it does not exist.” That is the conscious mind. It is active. It is alive. The conscious mind perpetuates itself, and we all help it to do that. It is carried on in ramification by its own novelty. We can always find in the conscious mind some distraction to please us, to intrigue us, to dominate our awareness of other states of consciousness. And we don’t have to look very hard to find it..."

Today we celebrate the 288th monthly Chitra padapuja for Sivaya Subramuniyaswami. Satguru, his monastics and our local members joined in Kadavul Temple for an hour long honoring of Gurudeva.

"Then there is the joy of the mysticism of Hinduism. It is the world's most magical religion, offering worlds within worlds of esoteric discovery and perception. The inner worlds are what Hindu mystics tell of in the greatest richness and freedom of expression that exists on the planet. Mysticism in Hinduism is more out-front than in all the other religions of the world. As a result, it is enjoyed by more of the people in our religion. Mysticism is discussed more broadly and not limited to a few great souls or a handful of pandits.The mysticism of Hinduism is for all the people; yet, too, in its esoteric aspect it is protected at its core and kept sacred by being kept secret. How grand is the Hindu mystical tradition, with its sadhanas and yogas, with its wealth of understanding of the etheric bodies, of the nadis and the chakras, of the aura and the pranas, of the various states of consciousness and levels of existence, and so much more. No other religion on the Earth can ever begin to equal Hinduism's mystical teachings; all that wealth is the rightful inheritance of each Hindu."

We have just six days before the final Iraivan Temple Mandala Pujas are performed by Kumar Gurukal and many accompanying priests. In the first two photos, Sivanadiyar Vatshalan and Malaysian taskforcer Sivajnani Nagappan work together on setup of the yagasala and audience tent.

Longtime sishya, Sivajnani Nagappan, is serving in the monastery's Siddhidata Kulam on our resident taskforce program for a few weeks. The timing works out well for him to especially help preparations for the Iraivan Temple final Mandala Pujas from May 8-11. Sivajnani has never husked a coconut before, so we gave him the opportunity to learn and husk one of the 250+- cocos that will be used during the upcoming pujas.

For a week now the editing team of Hinduism Today has been designing and editing a 12-page article on Rudrakshas, an untold story soon to be told. Our Nepalese writer/photographer flew to the remote valley (just 33 miles from Mount Everest) where Nepal's Rudrakshas are grown and marketed, and hers is a revealing story. Spoiler alert: Nikki reports that the most expensive single bead ever sold went to Chinese buyers for $84,000!

As the story comes together, we are again reminded of our own Sacred Rudraksha Forest and its natural beauties. So sharing some of that today.

Satguru Bodhinatha Veylanswami gives his weekly upadesha in Kadavul Temple. It is part of a series of talks elaborating on the inspired teachings of Śivaya Subramuniyaswami as found in his book Merging With Śiva.

"Observing the great vastness of the mind, we can draw another conclusion and say that there are five states of mind: conscious, subconscious, subsubconscious, subsuperconscious and superconscious. The first state is the conscious mind, in which we perform our daily routines. When awareness is in the conscious mind, we are externalized. This means we take our direction mainly from memory of past experiences, from other people, from newspapers, magazines, radio, television or our emotions. The average man is aware in the conscious mind from the time he awakens in the morning until he falls asleep at night. That’s what makes him average. Only when he becomes mystically inclined does he become consciously aware of some of the other four states."

For many years, perhaps 25, we have been growing mondo grass to one day be planted around Iraivan Temple. That day is here, and there is a team of island members who have determined to hand-plant an enormous amount. They have started the arduous project. When done, this will be a lush green sea. This grass, which technically is a Japanese lily, has the look of ocean waves when the tropical winds blow, giving a swaying look to the landscape. It will look, ultimately, like the temple is floating in a serene green ocean. The entire project will take months, but we are in no hurry. One of the unexpected boons is that the Sivathondars are able to hear the priests chanting nearby, so Sanskrit mantras fill the air each day. Aum Namasivaya!

Aum Namah Sivaya

We hope you enjoy these belated photos from the March Iraivan Event! As you can imagine we have a large amount of photos from the crystal installation. This collection is from Rajkumar Manickam. The live stream videos of the event can be seen on our youtube channel, but this is the first large batch of still photos we've released.

We're thankful to have had such a successful and historical event take place with the aid of the Shivacharya community and with help from many volunteers.

"Through temple worship, the three worlds become open to one another, and the beings within them are able to communicate. By means of the mystical arts of puja, the worlds act in concert, and prayers are received." - Gurudeva

Jai Gurudeva!
Jai Satguru Bodhinatha Veylanswami!
Jai Kailasa Parampara!

Through pouring abundance of rain, we see that the outside walls and roof of the Pillaiyar Kulam additional storage building are nearly finished. Now the contractors are framing inside and installing electrical connections