I am Stephan Oesterreicher, the founder of Mypalmleaf, and today I want to tell you a short version of the Mypalmleaf story. The detailed version would probably fill several volumes of books, but I’ll try to keep it brief.
In the summer of 1984, I was born near Stuttgart, in the southwest of Germany, and grew up there very protected. I enjoyed being close to nature, but I was also very fond of traveling from an early age, thanks in large part to my parents, who showed me the world early on.
As a rebellious teenager, I began to explore Europe myself and at 18, while still in school, I founded my first small company. I sold it later, but the brand still exists today.
When I first came into contact with meditation and yoga, my interest was immediately piqued, and I understood that a clear mind can bring the deepest experiences.
Although my parents often tried to persuade me to study at a university, fortunately, they let me follow my path, for which I am very grateful.
Because I knew that what I wanted to learn could not be found at any university or in any conventional profession. And so, I began my search.
In the summer of 2004, shortly after my high school graduation, the time had come, and I flew to India with a one-way ticket. A whole new world opened up.
The magic of India and encounters with monks in the Himalayas or yogis on the banks of the Ganges awakened in me the desire to fully devote myself to the study of spirituality and the search for the meaning of this life.
And that’s what I did. With all my heart.
A search that took me to the most magical places in the world.
On which I traveled to more than 60 countries and was allowed to learn from masters and scholars of all religions and traditions.
Guardians of wisdom and light. Sources of love and consciousness. I am deeply grateful to them.
I could write many books about these encounters. They deeply shaped me and gave me the courage to dedicate myself to this path.
A deep realization has defined these experiences and was embodied by many of these masters. The realization that all paths, traditions, and religions stem from the same source of infinite light and love and lead to the same experience.
This experience can have many different nuances and look quite different in various cultures. However, in essence, it is one: a consciousness, a love that connects us all.
To experience and understand this deeper and deeper, I learned from Buddhist monks, Hindu yogis, Christian mystics, Islamic Sufis, Shamans, and masters beyond conventional religions.
It ignited my love for meditation, for which I am especially grateful to my teacher Sahajananda, who embodies meditation with his whole life and has deeply inspired me.
This led to me spending a total of almost 500 days in silence retreats, where I fully devoted myself to meditation to explore consciousness and the deeper dimensions of life.
I am deeply grateful for these experiences, which made it increasingly clear to me that it is my task to help other people find the spiritual pearls within themselves.
As I write these lines,
I become once more aware of how grateful I am for this life and for all the opportunities that were given to me.
I am grateful that I had the inner and outer freedom to devote myself to this path.
After spending most of my time in Asia from 2004 to 2010, I came to Peru for the first time in 2010, which became an important chapter in my life.
It was here that I began to slowly move from being a “student” to teaching and implementing projects, which was not always easy at the beginning.
One day, I found a beautiful large house for rent in the Sacred Valley of the Incas, and I decided on the spot to make it an “Ashram.”
There was free accommodation, food, yoga, and meditation instruction for everyone. My business model was based on the motto: “God will somehow take care of us.”
Well… for a few months, it was a dream come true.
And then… you can probably guess… I had to close it because I could no longer pay the rent. A painful experience that taught me a lot.
That was the moment when I learned that it was important to deal with business and organizational development so that the projects I want to bring into the world are sustainable.
And so, I began to learn as an autodidact and taught myself many things, or I learned from experiences, conversations, books, videos, etc.
I also had many opportunities to apply this, as I built another meditation center in the Sacred Valley of the Incas in Peru, as well as another temporary center that hosted a three-day silent meditation retreat every month.
At the full moon. On an island. In Lake Titicaca. At 4000m altitude. Near millennia-old temples. A truly magical place that also deeply shaped me.
It was here that I received the inspiration to deal with technology and innovation, which brought me to Silicon Valley in California, where I gave meditation workshops for AI-oriented projects, among other things.
Thus, the Conscious Innovation Lab, the parent company of Mypalmleaf, was created, which is a story of its own…
You can see that Mypalmleaf has a long backstory…
For the first time, I visited a palm leaf library in India in 2009.
My palm leaf was not found at that time. Nevertheless, the place and the entire process felt so authentic that I could not forget it.
And then many years later…
It was in the autumn of 2020, I was in a difficult phase of my life, like many people during the Covid time. I had gone through a difficult separation, my projects in Peru were paused due to Covid, and I could no longer feel or see my path.
Depressed and aimless, I was visiting my parents when one morning I woke up
And had a crystal-clear insight:
“The palm leaves! I must find my palm leaf.” The thought was so strong that I googled it while still half asleep and found a provider who did the same work as we do today, namely helping people find their palm leaf. I immediately booked an appointment!
And then, a few weeks later, the time had come.
I was in Belgium, about to attend another 10-day Vipassana meditation retreat. In these retreats, everything practical is taken care of, and you can devote yourself to meditation from 4 in the morning until 9 at night. I was there because I felt that the retreat would help me find my way back to inner clarity. And it did, but in a different way than expected.
Because just before the retreat began, the moment of my palm leaf reading arrived. Sitting in my car in front of the meditation center, I had my first palm leaf reading with the palm leaf library.
It was a wonderful experience that I fully absorbed. Although it was sometimes difficult to understand the strong Indian accent (today, it’s much easier for me). I could feel how these wise words gave me solid inner guidance.
It was not just what the translator told me, but also the feeling of inner guidance that became stronger and stronger.
It was a long reading full of details, which I could not completely remember, but luckily, I also received a recording. However, I only listened to it several weeks later, because at the end of the reading, people from the Vipassana retreat came to tell me that I had to come now, as the gate would be closing.
So it fit perfectly, and I actually went directly from my reading into silence and spent the next 10 days meditating.
This time of meditation was very deep, and I felt not only a strong connection with the Rishis, the authors of the palm leaves, but also a clear call to work with the palm leaves and help other people find their palm leaf.
And that’s why you’re reading these lines right now 🙂
This was also hinted at several times in my reading. Although the word “palm leaves” was not specifically mentioned, my current work with Mypalmleaf was very well described.
When I left the meditation retreat after 10 days, I could see and feel my path more clearly again, and I knew I had to learn more about the palm leaves.
And so, I began to read everything about the palm leaf libraries I could find, contacted people who worked with them, talked to them, and increasingly felt that it was my task to tell people about the palm leaves.
However, I noticed that in my then environment in Germany, it was difficult for me to fully concentrate on this, so I spontaneously flew to Turkey and rented a room by the sea in a small town on the Mediterranean.
Interestingly, it was right next to an ancient Apollo temple, the Greek god who, among other things, symbolically stands for predicting the future.
There, I deepened my inner and outer research on the palm leaves and began to help the first friends find their own palm leaf.
However, during this time, the political mood in Turkey also became darker.
There were long lockdowns, which, however, did not apply to foreigners, so I sometimes walked through the empty streets of the city alone, contemplating the craziness of this world.
It became increasingly clear to me that I should leave Turkey and that I should travel to Mexico to meet my teacher Sahajananda and visit the Hridaya Yoga School. However, I also felt the collective fear, as there were only a few flights during this time and the world was still firmly in the grip of Covid.
I felt stuck and paralyzed by fear myself. And then one Wednesday…
In my palm leaf reading, I was recommended to perform a specific ceremony every Wednesday evening, which I always did very conscientiously.
Then one Wednesday evening, just before midnight, after I had performed the ceremony as recommended in my palm leaf reading, my mental state suddenly changed. The fear was gone, and I received the clear impulse to travel to Mexico. I booked a flight right after that. Less than 48 hours later, I was on a plane flying from Turkey to Mexico.
It was a strange journey in a strange time. However, it felt right, and Mexico welcomed me with open arms.
There, I arrived at the Hridaya Yoga School in the small village of Mazunte on the Pacific coast, which was a perfect place to devote myself to working with the palm leaves.
In a crazy world marked by fear, it was a small oasis where brave people from all over the world came together to devote themselves to their spiritual development and the vision of a better world.
So I could participate in the group meditation in the morning before sitting down at my desk overlooking the Pacific to work on Mypalmleaf.
It was also a perfect place to meet people who were interested in the palm leaf libraries and wanted to work on such a project.
So I was able to hire my first part-time “employees,” who were initially friends who were excited about the Mypalmleaf project. I am grateful to each and every one of them to this day, who helped the small, tender plant of Mypalmleaf grow in those first days, weeks, months, and years.
Sure, it feels good to be the founder of the wonderfully growing Mypalmleaf organization today.
However, I am fully aware that I could never have done it alone and that it took the “we” of our wonderful team to share the treasures of the palm leaves with the world. It’s fun to be in front of the camera, but the most important people in Mypalmleaf are actually those behind the scenes (Thank you Quetzal and Akiladevi and all the wonderful translators).
However, it didn’t just happen in Mazunte. Through my many travels, I have a very global network, and as if by magic, suddenly new and old contacts with people who also felt a call to work with the palm leaf libraries connected.
And so, from the beginning, people from all over the world came to us.
And so, to this day, we have already helped more than 3000+ people from 60+ countries, in 9 different languages, find and read their palm leaf.
After working with the palm leaf library for a few months, I was able to visit it for the first time at the end of 2021.
It was not easy to get to India, but eventually, I got a business visa, and together with my good friend and colleague Marina Zakharova from Mypalmleaf Russia, I visited the palm leaf library in southern India.
Its leader, Shyam, is today not only a good friend but also a great guide who showed us many magical places and with whom we undertook the Navagraha pilgrimage for the first time, which has become a small Mypalmleaf tradition.
The 9 Navagraha temples are each dedicated to one of the 9 planets.
We visited many wonderful temples, palm leaf libraries, the graves of old masters, and immersed ourselves in the world of luminous healing rituals, which were also often recommended in the palm leaf libraries.
It was good to experience all of this on-site, and also good that we brought time with us and could immerse ourselves fully in the world of the palm leaf libraries for several months.
This time has deepened my trust in the palm leaves even more, as I also had a certain skepticism at the beginning, which has now transformed into deep trust through many direct experiences with the palm leaves.
And so it is still today. Many wonderful chapters later.
In February 2024, as I write these lines in beautiful Bali.
I have just spent 2 intensive months in India, where I, along with some good friends, my “Mypalmleaf colleagues,” went on another Navagraha pilgrimage and made several visits to the palm leaf libraries.
Mypalmleaf has grown into a small but fine, professional global organization over the last few years, to which almost 40 people regularly contribute.
My life has changed in many ways, but in essence, it is still the same.
Still, my deep love for life and the awakening of our true nature is my deepest motivation, to which my life is dedicated.
Combining this with professional, sustainable structures and offering a unique service with the palm leaf readings fulfills me greatly.
And if you ever feel called to find your palm leaf, we at Mypalmleaf would be very happy to accompany you on the journey with the palm leaves. It is our task, which we gladly do from the heart.
See you soon
Stephan
Aarif, Abhilash, Aimee, Akiladevi, Allwin, Andrea, Archana, Ashok, Brita, Casey, Crystal, Dhanalakshmi, Dhyan, Emmanuel, Fatih, Hemaladkshmi, Jair, Janani, Jaya Balaji, Jayshee, Jeeva, Joe, Karnit, Katja, Katja, Katrin, Klaus, Kotomi, Kristian, Kyle, Lakshmi, Liam, Linda, Lokeshwari, Marcello, Marie, Marina, Mayuko, Nadine, Naveed, Nivethini, Pablo, Pavithra, Philip, Pradyumn, Priya, Quetzal, Ricky, Rostin, Saba, Sahil, Satish, Shiva, Shyam, Sonali, Spanda, Sreedevi, Stefan, Stephanie, Sudiipa, Sumithra, Thomas, Tom, Uelfide, Uma Devi, Vannessa, Vera, Vijaya Rani, Julien, Monchi.
