Why I Left Germany for Ecuador – The Story of a Radical Transformation
It's 6 AM in San Felipe de Oña, Ecuador. The mountains slowly emerge from the mist. Ahead of me lies a day of intense training – physical and mental. What was once a challenge has become medicine. Without this practice, I would not be the person I am today.
This story is not about a spiritual ascent. It's about the price that real transformation demands – and why I had to pay that price.
Phase 1: The Success (1998-2013)
In 1998, at 23 years old, I learned the blueprint of my life at the seven-day event "Buddha's Path to Happiness" under the patronage of the Dalai Lama in Schneverdingen: Service before status. Substance before ceremony. While 11,000 people attended the sacred ceremonies, I took on the practical work: building parking lots, greeting early guests, taking responsibility for the security of the tent city at night.
On the day of the mandala dissolution climax, a brother in work clothes asked: "Let's sort garbage." I said: "Dude, now is the climax in the tent!" He replied: "The initiation lies in the compassionate heart of the Buddhas." So we sorted the garbage. One of the gifts I received in my life, looking back.
15 years later, I seemed to have achieved everything. My Suryashakti Yoga School in Hannover was flourishing, I taught daily and developed business and coaching programs for high-profile financial institutions and business people. 20 years of experience in martial arts and spiritual practice. Secure income, respected position, comfortable life.
"You are in danger of living a life so comfortable and soft that you die without ever realizing your true potential." – David Goggins
But there was this vision from 1998 that I had in Schneverdingen, that wouldn't disappear: The Prophecy of Condor and Eagle. A call to South America that defied all logic. What I didn't know then: According to indigenous prophecy, this was the perfect timing. The fourth Pachakuti (1490s-1990s) was the time of Eagle dominance over the Condor. The fifth Pachakuti (1990s-today) is the time of reunification of Mind (Eagle/North) and Heart (Condor/South) into a higher consciousness. My vision came at exactly the right time.
When I sold everything in 2013, my students threw four farewell parties. They collected money for my journey. It wasn't a desperate departure – it was a courageous leap into the unknown, carried by a community that believed in my vision.
I thought the hardest part was behind me. I had no idea.
Phase 2: The Destruction (2013-2021)
Ecuador was to teach me what my spiritual path had always taught: that real transformation has a price. The following years showed me sides of myself I never wanted to see.
The first lesson came quickly. Relationships I thought were stable proved deceptive. People I trusted acted from other motives. Projects I had poured my heart into fell apart. What looked like a series of bad luck from the outside was actually a systematic breakdown through sabotage by people I trusted. The lesson was brutally simple: Acknowledge. Don't argue. Let go. Work harder than ever before. Move forward. No drama, no endless analysis – just the pure decision to respond through work.
"You have power over your mind – not outside events. Realize this, and you will find strength." – Marcus Aurelius
While I immersed myself in spiritual practice – Temazcal ceremonies at sacred waterfalls, Vision Quest in the mountains, work with the great master plants San Pedro and Ayahuasca – one world after another collapsed around me. The chaos was complete.
But that was just the beginning of a process I didn't understand at the time. Every weakness, every unresolved pattern, every spiritual immaturity came to the surface. Ecuador had not come to comfort me – it had come to burn everything that was not authentic.
Years of encounters with indigenous cultures, wisdom keepers and their sacred places at the fire of wisdom in the mountains, jungle and Pacific coast taught me a humility that cannot be found in any book. The ultimate key to my understanding of the indigenous soul was Taita Querubín Queta Alvarado and the wisdom keepers of the Secoya.
Taita Querubín (1913-2024) was not just any shaman – he was a living legend. Living to 110 years old, he successfully fought against the patenting of Ayahuasca by an American (1986-1999) and spoke before the House of Lords in England. He was the highest spiritual authority of the Cofán and taught me the realization that spiritual development does not proceed linearly, but through cycles of destruction and rebuilding.
I went through years of deep challenge. Yet something in me held steady. The spiritual practice I had cultivated for decades carried me through this time. Then, in early 2020, something unexpected happened: For the first time in years, I felt ground under my feet again. Not because the chaos was over, but because I had finally learned to stand in the storm.
Phase 3: The Rebirth (2020-today)
2020 began the phase of integration. Not because I had spiritually "arrived," but because I finally understood what spiritual work really means.
Four years later, I practice intensive internal arts daily at one of the most sacred places on Earth. Not from discipline or to measure progress – but because it has become my medicine. Every challenge demands a corresponding response.
People who have known me for years see the authentic change, the grown calm, the clear insights. What they don't always see: the daily process of working on oneself, the continuous refinement that never really stops.
In 2021 I moved to San Felipe de Oña – and only later understood that this was not a random place. Here, at 2,350m altitude, I live at a power place with 12,700 years of continuous human presence. The paths I train on lead to Ecuador's oldest metal smelting furnaces in Putushío and to the Paleo-Indian settlements of Cubilán. The Cañari ancestors walked here, long before the Inca came. They knew: Transformation is not a wellness program. It is a battle for the soul.
"You are not just the drop in the ocean, but the whole ocean in every drop." – Rumi
Training at altitude, the cold of mountain streams, the thin air – everything is part of a holistic process of self-knowledge that became my ultimate medicine. Zhang Zhuang, the 2,700-year-old "standing meditation," I practice daily among the 29 sacred lagoons of Comuna Marcos Pérez de Castilla. Extreme circumstances require extreme strategies – burning everything that does not correspond to human nature.
Science confirms what the ancient masters knew: Zhang Zhuang corrects postural damage, opens energy channels, optimizes oxygen supply and can heal chronic diseases. At 2,350m altitude, it becomes the perfect medicine for modern man.
During these years I learned Yang Tai Chi of the IWKA from Sifu Sergio Iladorola. After three decades of various martial arts, everything finally found its place. But not as the crown of success – as a tool of continuous purification.
The condors circling over my training know it: This is "Condor Land," where the condors make their nests. The 2013 vision was real – it led me to one of the last sacred places on Earth.
What Really Emerged
Today I work with people who sense that superficial solutions are not enough. Who understand that real transformation has a price. Not everyone has to come to Ecuador – but everyone must be ready to let go of what keeps them small.
The system that emerged unites Yoga, Martial Arts and Calisthenics into a holistic practice – Eastern internal arts, Andean wisdom and modern insights. But it is based on a realization that no technique can replace: Real transformation only happens when we are ready to lose everything we think we are.
I am not a guru, not an enlightened master, not a spiritual teacher in the traditional sense. I am a student who by God's grace went through hell and survived. Who falls daily and gets up daily. Who found his medicine and shares it with others who are ready for the real price of transformation.
My work is passing on what eight years of destruction and four years of rebuilding have taught: that we are all full to the brim with what separates us from our best vision of ourselves. And that there are methods to burn this veil that obscures our true nature.
The Call That Only Few Hear
The Prophecy of Condor and Eagle is 2,000 years old and describes exactly our time: the fifth Pachakuti (1990-today), where Mind and Heart, technology and wisdom, North and South can reunite. We live in the time of the great reunification.
If you sense that more is possible in your life, but don't know how to find the strength to let go of everything that keeps you safe – then you might understand why I share this story.
Not everyone has to go to Ecuador. But everyone who seeks real transformation must be ready for their own rock bottom. For their own medicine. For their own path through destruction to rebirth.
The condors that circled over my tree during my 2013 Vision Quest here in the mountains where I live with my family already knew: You are in the right place at the right time. Even if it feels like hell.
Today I know: The call from 1998 that I heard in Schneverdingen was real. Ecuador didn't just call me – it saved me. Through destruction. At a sacred place where for 12,700 years people have sought their transformation.
There are no shortcuts. There is only the path through the fire. And on the other side awaits a life you could never have imagined.
Are you ready for your own path through the fire?
Written from the Andes of Ecuador, where the condors fly and the ancestors speak. Where 12,700 years of human wisdom meets modern transformation. Where every day is a battle for the soul – and a victory for those ready to pay the price.
