Full moon day on December 14, 2016 is one of the best days to connect to higher planes of Cosmos and enter into the state of Bliss. This full moon day is also known as Kārtikā paurṇamāsya. This is the day in which both sun and moon are in rāśi cusps (rāśi refers to an astrological house; there are twelve rāśi-s corresponding to twelve calendar months). Sun will be in Scorpio and moon will be in Taurus (both at 28.19 degrees in the respective rāśi-s). In this situation, both sun and moon are exactly posited opposite to each other, which signifies full moon day or paurṇamāsya. This happens at 00.03 hours GMT on December 14, 2016 (IST 05.33 hours).

This day’s significance can be interpreted in two ways. As per purāṇa-s, it is the day on which Śiva slayed Tripurāsura, which can be interpreted to mean destruction of evil. There is a description of the chariot used by Śiva for this purpose. Vāyu (air, one of the five elements) attained the form of the chariot, sun and moon became its wheels and Brahmā became the charioteer. Meru became the bow and Viṣṇu became the arrow. Thus, Śiva, Śakti, Viṣṇu, Brahmā and all other gods and goddesses are present at the time of destruction in some way or other. This day is celebrated every year by lighting lamps. Purāṇa-s say that there were flashes of Lights at the time of annihilation of Tripurāsura and in order to signify this, lights are lit at homes. 

The other way of looking at this auspicious day is that both iḍa and piṅgala (iḍa represents moon and piṅgala represents sun) are equally balanced on all full moon days. When these two nāḍi-s are perfectly balanced, prāṇa begins to ascend through suṣumna, the spinal cord. This is explained in detail in part 10 of Kuṇḍalinī meditation series. In this ensuring Kārtikā paurṇamāsya day, if meditation is done at 00.03 hours GMT, (IST 05.33 hours), yoga of kālapuruṣa (personification of time; Śiva) can be felt in one’s breath due to perfect balancing of two important nāḍi-s, iḍa and piṅgala. A great scholar explained this as “Yoga and Jñāna leave their signatures on breath” at this time.

Therefore, to experience Bliss, we have to meditate during this time, December 14, 2016, 00.03 hours GMT. Meditation should commence ten minutes before this time and can be completed ten minutes after this time. This time should be the midpoint of duration of meditation. For example, if meditation is planned for twenty minutes, then we should commence meditation at 23.53 GMT and should end at 00.13 GMT. In India, meditation can be commenced at 5.23 hours and can be completed around 05.43 hours (5.43 in the morning).

INTERNATIONAL FULL MOON CALENDER