Category: Chronic illness

Amrita Mandala, Art, Awareness, Beauty, Bodhidharma, Books, Buddhism, Chronic illness, Culture, Dharma, Dzogchen, Everyday life, Health, Hinduism, Meditation, Mental health, Motherhood, Neurodiversity, Neurological, People, Rinzai zen, Shamanism, Soto zen, Spirituality, Tantric, Taoism, Vajrayana, Yoga, Zen, Zen buddhism

Sunday Satsangs

Ask the Mountains

Just wanted to share the times and info for upcoming online satsangs* for 2026 if anyone would like to join these beneficial Dharma sessions 🙏🏼✨️

“Amrita Baba is the founder and head teacher of the international Amrita Mandala community. In Amrita Mandala we practice both buddhist and hindu tantra with the goal of supreme awakening (skt. anuttara samyak sambodhi) in this life for the benefit of all beings.

Baba, a direct disciple of Mahavatar Babaji and a dharma heir of Sivakami Om Anandi and Terayama Tanchu Roshi, is known for his extremely effective and direct teachings that have helped hundreds of people attain awakening and 20 people reach wisdom stage of full enlightenment. Baba’s books that are all freely available from Amrita Mandala-website have been downloaded over 20 000 times.

*Satsangs are meetings with truth, including practical advices and instructions. These sessions will include instructed meditations and are open to all! These meetings will take place on Zoom.

Fee & Registration:
First time join for free.

Please register on this link.

2026 Winter & Spring Schedule:
– Sunday 11 January 2026,  6.00-8.30 pm Slovenia Time Zone
– Sunday 8 February 2026, 6.00-8.30 pm Slovenia Time Zone
– Sunday 8 March 2026, 6.00-8.30 pm Slovenia Time Zone
– Sunday 22 March 2026, 6.00-8.30 pm Slovenia Time Zone
– Sunday 19 April 2026, 6.00-8.30 pm Slovenia Time Zone
– Sunday 10 May 2026, 6.00-8.30 pm Slovenia Time Zone
– Sunday 24 May 2026, 6.00-8.30 pm Slovenia Time Zone
– Sunday 14 June 2026, 6.00-8.30 pm Slovenia Time Zone

Wear light clothes for all sessions and have your yoga mat available for rest and physical practice.

Welcome!”

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A colourful death – Something greater

Ask the Mountains


If you knew that one day someone would be helped and inspired by exactly the trial you are going through now, would it then be easier to bear? I believe that the knowledge/thought that another person can benefit from your story; your experiences and how you solved problems and trials makes the burden lighter in a way; because then you are doing something for something greater than yourself. There is a self-sacrifice in the picture that gives momentum, and you no longer think only of “me and mine,” but also of the well-being of others. I don’t know if this makes sense – I think it’s the autumn and the colourful death and devotion of the plants to the cycle of the seasons that made me write this 🤭🍂💛

-M

Amrita Mandala, Art, Awareness, Beauty, Bodhidharma, Buddhism, Chronic illness, Culture, Dharma, Dzogchen, Everyday life, Japan, Jesus, Mahayana, Meditation, Mental health, Migraine, Motherhood, Neurodiversity, Neurological, Sápmi, Soto zen, Spirituality, Tantric, Taoism, Vajrayana, Yoga, Zen, Zen buddhism

How to Pray | Poem + video

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In a world that teaches
me first, me only, me always,
prayer is a quiet rebellion.
It begins with a bow,
a loosening of the fist
that clutches at control.

It dares to whisper:
I am not the center.
I am not the crown of all things.
I am a thread in the tapestry,
a note in the chorus,
a servant of something vast.
Something holy.

Prayer is an act of defiance
against the tyranny of ego,
against the hunger that never fills.
It topples the empire of the small self
and builds, stone by stone,
a sanctuary for all beings.

In prayer, we betray the myth of isolation.
We kneel not in defeat,
but in devotion and love.

Prayer is rebellion,
the most radical kind,
for it wages war not on others,
but on the walls within,
until only openness remains.

Through the power of prayer,
we can align ourselves with life and light itself. What a miracle.

We can call for the aid
of both ancient and recent Masters,
Beyond space and time.
Their luminous wisdom and boundless
compassion can touch our hearts as intimately as the Sun’s warmth opens flowers in the morning mist.

Prayer is not just mere words.
It is the trembling of the soul reaching for our wholeness, a candle lit in the dark, a river bending toward the ocean.
Prayer is tantra and transformation.

-M

Amrita Mandala, Awareness, Bodhidharma, Buddhism, Chronic illness, Dharma, Everyday life, Mahayana, Meditation, Mental health, Migraine, Motherhood, People, Rinzai zen, Shamanism, Soto zen, Spirituality, Tantric, Taoism, Vajrayana, Yoga, Zen, Zen buddhism

Trauma healing specials – try it now 🙏🏼

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Wanted to share this free online playlist on Youtube in six parts, focused on the healing of traumas in the psyche. It can be done sitting in a comfortable posture, or laying down if you prefer. It has been extremely helpful for me, so I share it in hopes someone else will benefit 🫶🏻

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Something old

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Bought a new diary, in hopes of finding time to write again; haven’t written anything in over a year. Initiated first page with this poem 😊🙏🏼💎

Arctic, Art, Awareness, Beauty, Buddhism, Chronic illness, Culture, Dharma, Dzogchen, Everyday life, Health, History, Landscape, Mahayana, Meditation, Photography, Tantric, Vajrayana, Yoga

It has to touch the heart

Ask the Mountains

When we are small children, it comes natural for us to think of others. We don’t see much separation between ourselves and others, and so wanting to be kind, to help and be generous comes as naturally as dusk and dawn.

As we age and experiences shape us, we get hardened. We are no longer soft and supple like babies, now we have frozen places in our bodies and mind that makes us feel and act in certain negative ways, or it even makes us ill. We get prickly edges, we might be ‘difficult’ for others to be around and as much as we wish to feel soft, authentic and playful again, it just don’t seem to happen by will alone.

This is where yogic practices (dharma) can help, because it targets and addresses both the physical body, and the subtle energy bodies. Focusing only on one aspect, will not be a holistic solution, in my experience. And focusing only on my own healing, without regard to others who are also suffering, is not sufficient; it has to be for the benefit of others – it has to touch the heart (bodhichitta).

Prayer flags in our garden

Here is the youtube channel and the website of the Amrita Mandala dharma lineage which I practice and which has helped me the most in my life and healing 🙏🏼

(Header image art of Isha Natha by MysticMantraGallery)

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Is the Ketogenic Diet Safe in Pregnancy? (Very Important)

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This short video really highlights something that is close to my heart; right nutrition in pregnancy. Am currently pregnant with our second baby, and since going keto, the difference before and after is like night and day. Especially if I compare to my first pregnancy 4 years ago when I was not in ketosis. I was binging carbs all day and gaining a lot of weight, and barely had any energy. At the end of that pregnancy, I had to use crutches and/or wheelchair. The really shitty thing about using glucose as main energy source is that the more carbs you eat, the more you crave. I’ve noticed that when switching to (animal) fat as the main fuel, I don’t have cravings, mood and energy level is quite stable and I can function a lot better as a mum and basically as a human being 😅 I can write a longer more in detail post about what exactly I eat to maintain ketosis and how it makes sense for me to do that both from a health perspective but also from an ancestral point of view.

(Pictured: beef tallow I eat every day.)

Xx Monica Amrita Mani

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Why be an artist?

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I am tempted to just answer my own question with “why not?”, but that is not satisfactory at all. Especially since there is a very good answer that comes to mind, although it is a cheesy one;

My soul needs it. It is who I am, and art helps bring out my authenticity. I feel ill when I have long periods of low motivation and inspiration, and thus don’t paint.

As probably many other children who loved art, growing up meant finding out how fragile art making can be. How vulnerable you make yourself. How other things in life seems to creep in and take over your time, to the point where there is not much time left for art making. All children are born with an innate sense of wanting to create and learn, and it can take a long time to find back to that once you have entered the hectic adult world of chores and time schedules. What a shame. But also, what a journey.

Like in all good stories, the main character loses herself at one point or many, and falls into some sort of despair and discontentment. She wants to find herself again and strives to get rid of the layers of inauthenticity she has adopted during adolescence and adulthood. Deep down, she knows herself, but too much junk has accumulated, and she feels frozen and trapped.

“Energy that is in motion, stays in motion”. In other words; just start something, and the momentuum will keep going by itself. The more we create, the more we want to create. Do 2 mintues of art making, and before you know it, time ceases and you enter the timeless realm of creativity, where it doesn’t matter how long you do it, all that matters is that you enjoy it and you feel yourself being in a flow state.

You may ask; why paint? Does the world really need another painting of a mediocre rose or the aurora borealis? The answer is No, it doesn’t. But the world needs your interpretation of a rose or the aurora borealis. Your superpower is and will always be that there is only one of you. When someone buys your artwork, takes it home and put it on their wall, they are bringing a piece of your soul home. They want that unique thing you made out of nothing to remind them of what they perhaps have forgotten themselves. Or, they wish to have a feeling or memory your artwork inhabits in their home through their eyes. This is a huge compliment for any artist.

You may also ask; but how do I find my own style? You don’t! It finds you. And you can’t get rid of it, even if you wanted to. Unique personal style is something that happens on its own. Don’t worry about it, it will reveal itself, if you just keep making stuff.

It’s hard being an artist. It can be lonely, it can be difficult to get into the desired state for creating, it can be challenging to make a studio/workspace, it can be close to impossible to find motivation some days and it can be a job in itself to make something out of thin air. But then again, it can also be the most rewarding soul nourishing work.

Xx, Monica

Adventure, Arctic, Beauty, Chronic illness, Everyday life, Indigenous, Landscape, People, Sámi, Sápmi, Siberian, Spirituality, Yoga

Nature heals

Ask the Mountains

Been spending most days outside this past few months, especially since we discovered that we have mold in our house, that has been contributing to my health issues, and resulted in me being diagnosed with CIRS/mold illness. It’s a hell of a thing to live with, and we are currently looking for treatment and a new place to live. I hope and pray these things sorts out, so that we can focus on our daily lives as a family and not live in a state of emergency.

In other news, I am (still) working on my film on remaining and recently extinct Arctic Indigenous languages in Europe and Asia. It will hopefully be done sometime soon, and I am so looking forward to share it with the world. I hope that it will be interesting and valuable information for people to watch.

Wishing you all a great and bountiful autumn (or spring if you are on the other side of the planet😅) 🙏🏼🍂🍁

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My creative energy

Ask the Mountains
Can I just say, this is the best photo anyone has ever taken of me? Susann, thank you for capturing my essence. Here I am wearing a headdress and silk liidni I sewed myself, and the gákti summer dress is made by Nadezda Johnsen.
Autumn wind…🧡🍂🙌🏼
Life is a lot of chopping wood and carrying water… I think that is how the saying goes 😉

“Your healing journey will, of course, include a consideration and use of all the best tools modern medicine can offer you, as well as the best tools holistic healing can offer you. From a deeper perspective, illness is caused by unfulfilled longing. The deeper the illness, the deeper the longing. It is a message that somehow, somewhere, you have forgotten who you are and what your purpose is. You have forgotten and disconnected from the purpose of your creative energy from your core. Your illness is the symptom: The disease represents your unfulfilled longing. So above all else, use your illness to set yourself free to do what you have always wanted to do, to be who you have always wanted to be, to manifest and express who you already are from your deepest, broadest, and highest reality. If indeed you have discovered yourself to be ill, prepare yourself for change, expect your deepest longing to surface and to be brought to fruition. Prepare yourself to finally stop running and turn and face the tiger within you, whatever that means to you in a very personal way. I suggest the best place to start to find the meaning of your illness is to ask yourself: “What is it that I have longed for and not yet succeeded in creating in my life?”’ (From Barbara Brennan’s book Emerging Light)

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Forgetting who we are

Ask the Mountains

“From the perspective of a healer, illness is the result of imbalance. Imbalance is a result of forgetting who you are. Forgetting who you are creates thoughts and actions that lead to an unhealthy lifestyle and eventually to illness.” – Barbara Brennan, Hands of Light

Healing can occur spontaneously and over time. The spirit has an innate ability and longing for healing, health and happiness. We can all access this healing ability, we just sometimes need some help to tap into that. Never think that healing is not an option for you, or that it’s too late. We can always be reminded of who we are, where our strength lies and how strong our spirits are.

I’d like to recommend 2 books that helped me: Healing back pain: the mind-body connection by Dr. John Sarno, and Hands of Light by Barbara Brennan.

Much healing love to anyone and everyone who needs it. -M

Pictured: me at age 10 ca., on a hiking trip with my family. 🖤