Middle gate & Temple of Art Godess

Chuumon (middle gate) is one of the energy spots where many people feel an energy shift when they cross the gate. I felt like there was a cool breeze coming toward me every time I stepped inside of the gate. I would hear the sound of the wind when there was no physical wind blowing in the air. I went in and out of the gate to experiment little. Also another important thing to remember is not to step on the big wooden piece that is on a ground at the gate. The piece of wood that runs across the gate at ground level is placed here intentionally, so one must take care not to step on it, but step over it as you enter the gate.


Here is a Temple of Benzaiten. Benzaiten is another one of the Seven Deities of Good Fortune. She is the Goddess of music, poetry, learning, art, the sea, and the protector of children. Her temples and shrines are generally in the neighborhood of water - the sea, a river, or a pond. I stopped over there and paid my respects to the temple, wishing for good photographs from this trip from the art goddess. I felt like I had a tap on my shoulder from her.

Speical Edition: Reiki Prayer at Mt. Kurama

Thank you so much for those of you who requested the Reiki Prayer and ordered a pdf photo at Mt. Kurama.

I was able to send prayers on 3/29, 30 and 4/11 at various locations at Mt. Kurama. I was happy to hear when some of you reported that you did feel a shift in your life after the prayers. I hope you all enjoyed the energy from the Mt. Kurama.

Here are the choices of the photo designs for those of you who ordered a pdf photo.
Please follow the directions below.

1. Please select a design from above that you like and email me the title.
2. Please send your payment to photo@purplefishhealing.com through Paypal, $10 for English or Japanese only, $17 for one in English and one in Japanese.
3. You will receive an email with the pdf attached of a photo with your personalized prayer requested by you.
4. Print it out, frame it or do whatever you desire!


For those of you who did not have chance to order a pdf photo before, stay tuned for the Reiki Photography Store! More photographs in print, posters, postcard, Christmas cards and calendars to come!

The Land of 8000000 Dieties

After Yuki temple, the path gets very curvy. This part of the trail is referred as a Tsuzuraori Sandou (ninety and nine turns path). There are many hairpin curves and I started to get out of breath.

As you walk up the path, hidden from the view because of all the trees, is the statue titled “Life: Love, Light and Power” (picture above). Suddenly it appears before you as you come around the bend, it looks very modern and very different compared to what I have seen so far. This statue symbolizes the teaching of Kurama temple and the 3 deities that Kurama temple worships. Each ring represents one of the concepts of Love, Light and Power and the deities that go along with them.

Kwan Yin symbolizes Love and represents The Spirit of the Moon.
Bishamonten symbolizes Light and represents The Spirit of the Sun.
Mao symbolizes Power and represents The Spirit of the Earth.


Right across from the Statue of Love, Light and Power is the SouFuku (Double bliss) area. The Bridge connecting two temples is called SouFuku Bridge. One of the temples is Tamasugi Daikokuten and the other is Tamasugi Ebisuson.

Tamasugi is a cedar wood that has leaves curled up like a ball.

Ebisuson and Daijokuten are two of the Seven Deities of Good Fortune.
DaikokuTen is God of the Earth, Wealth, Prosperity, Farmers, Flood Control, Agriculture, Rice & the Kitchen.
Ebisu is God of Fishermen, Good Fortune, and Honest Labor.

I am started to notice how much Mt. Kurama is filled with different deities and spirits. I have gotten used to visiting Catholic or Christian churches who worship one God. I am starting to remember what it was like to be in a country where there are 8000000 gods (deities). There is god for everything. There is a prosperity god, a laughing god, and even a poor god and bad luck god that you want to avoid. Visiting all these small temples with different deities and spirits brought up my desire to study them when I go back to the U.S.

Yuki temple & 800 Years Old Japanese Ceder

This is the gate of Yuki Jinjya (Yuki temple). This temple is famous for their fire festival. It is also known as a temple for protecting you from fire disasters, helping have an easy childbirth, relationships, calming of disease, and getting rid of bad luck and bringing good luck in. It is also appointed as one of the national treasures.

As you can see in this picture and inside of the gate in the picture on a left is a tall Japanese cedar. This tree is worshiped as a sacred tree and also a tree that makes your wishes come true. It’s about 800 years old and 53 meters high. I really felt the energy of the tree and felt calm just standing in front of it.



This is the main temple building of the Yuki Jinjya. As we walked by, there were people inside the temple being blessed as you can see in this photo. You need to make a special arrangement to be blessed by the temple. It is 6000 yen (about $60) for once or 30,000 yen (about $300) for a whole year of blessings every morning.

They actually do have a live web cam set at four different spots at this temple. This is so neat! I feel like I am almost there without actually being there. It’s also a lot of fun to watch people pay their respects at the temple. I like to leave the site open at the corner of my computer screen while I am working and watch the people who come to visit and reminisce about my visit to the temple.
Just remember, if you live in the East Coast of the U.S, we have 13-14hrs of time difference. You get to see more people if you visit the site after our dinner time.

http://www.yukijinjya.jp/keidainew-live.html

Waterfall & Temple for the Warriors

Along the path a few minutes walk from Kushikura Inari sha Temple you see a little waterfall, “Mao No Taki” (Water fall of Mao). In a little temple on a cliff (see picture on left) is a statue of Mao. Mao is one of the 3 deities that is worshiped at Kurama temple. I will talk more about it when I get to the main temple where they keep all 3 statues.
It is a customary for people who are seeking enlightenment to sit under a waterfall for extended periods of time to meditate. Master Usui could have been there meditating almost a 100 years ago! However, the sign by the waterfall asks people not to go near the waterfall because a falling rock may hit you.


By the waterfall is the Kiichi Hougen Sha (Temple for Kiichi Hougen). Kiichi Hougen is a teacher of a famous historical warrior Yoshitune. Yoshitune grew up in Mt. Kurama and there are many spots that are dedicated to him throughout the Mountain. A year long television drama series about Yoshitune was aired from April 05-Mar 06, so there were many visitors coming to Mt. Kurama to see where Yoshitune was raised, probably a lot more than people who came to visit the place for Reiki. You would pay your respects to the temple in a same manner as before. Being that this temple is dedicated to someone who was a talented swordsmen and martial artist, many people who would like to improve their athletic/martial art skills comes to visit here.

Etiquette for paying respect at temples

This is Kushikura Inari sha (Temple for Kushikura the Fox Spirit). People come to worship at this temple to bring a good harvest.

The following is what I learned as the proper etiquette for paying respect at temples. You want to make sure you cleanse your hands before going to each temple. They normally have a water station dedicated for that right before the temple. (More detailed instruction at the bottom of Part 2)

Then, you can make an offering of money to an offertory box. I grew up being told that giving 5 yen is good luck because it is synonymous with a word that can be translated to fate, karma, relation, connection or ties. So, if you went to the temple to pray/wish for good health, you want to have that as a fate, karma etc. Some people say more the better and give 10000 yen or more, but I normally only give 5 yen, 50 yen or 500 yen (they are all in coins).

Now you want to bow twice. First one is for asking your spirit guide to be connected to God and the second one is for the God. (By the way, I used word God, but it can be anything or anybody that particular temple is worshipping. In this case the fox spirit. I am using and will be using word God loosely.)

Clap your hand twice. It’s kind of like ringing a doorbell at God’s home to let them know that you are here. It also helps cleanse the area.

Then you can have a conversation with God or most of the people make a wish here.

When you are done, bow once to show your gratitude.

Mt. Kurama: March 29: Part 4

Keep going up the stairs and you will see a Dougyou Rokutai Jizo Son(6 guardian deity of children in childrean form) by the Kurama Kindergarten. These are 6 figures of Jizo (guardian deity of children) in a child form and even have bib on them as you can see. This is to represent that kids are children of the Budda (God) and a gift from heaven and reflections of the parents. I fantasized about having a child one day and sending them here and visiting this kindergarten everyday.




Next comes the Hou Jyou Ike , which according to the sign, this is the pond where people used to do good deeds like letting a fish or turtle go free here to save their lives (upper picture). Also they would go under the waterfall and meditate (bottom picture). I saw some red coy in a pond. Some of them seem to have the same color red/orange as the lanterns throughout the temples, very scenic and calming spot.




As I was going up the stairs, I noticed that each of the stones that are used as the fence were engraved with a person’s name who has donated money to Mt. Kurama a long time ago, and the donation amount of a 100 Yen (which is about a dollar now, but could be worth a few thousand or few hundred thousand dollars depending on when it was donated). Each lantern has a name of a person who donated money as well. This made me think of all the people who have come here before me and cherished this place and made Mt. Kurama the way it is today.

Close up of the stone with engraving.

Close up of the lantern with name of the donor.