Read the Vimshottari sequence

First, look at the clock face. The arrows matter as much as the numbers.

Ketu 7 → Venus 20 → Sun 6 → Moon 10 → Mars 7 → Rahu 18 → Jupiter 16 → Saturn 19 → Mercury 17 → repeat

The numbers total 120 years. This fixed order is Vimshottari dasha. Ketu always follows Mercury when the cycle repeats; Mars always leads to Rahu.

The list does not tell you that every life begins with seven full Ketu years. The starting lord comes from the Moon's birth nakshatra. This exercise then uses a common modern calculator convention: apply the untravelled angular fraction of the Moon's equal 13°20′ nakshatra segment to that lord's full period. It is a declared method, not a convention-free fact.

A quarter of Moon is not ten years

Our invented practice chart supplies these facts:

• the Moon is in a Moon-ruled nakshatra;
• 25% of that nakshatra remains untravelled at birth; and
• Moon's full Vimshottari period is 10 years.

So the balance at birth is:

10 years × 0.25 = 2.5 years of Moon mahadasha remaining

After that balance, the fixed sequence continues with Mars for 7 years, then Rahu for 18 years. We did not derive a Moon longitude from a birthday; the exercise gave us the starting lord and fraction.

Begin somewhere other than Moon

Suppose a training output instead says:

Nakshatra lord: Venus · untravelled fraction: 10%

Venus has 20 years in the fixed cycle, so the birth balance is 20 × 0.10 = 2 years. The next full period is Sun, not Ketu and not another 20 years of Venus.

Try it before you reveal it

Try this before revealing: a synthetic output gives Mars as the nakshatra lord and 40% untravelled. What is the birth balance, and which lord follows?

Your attemptI made the attempt mentally instead.

Compare your attempt

Worked answer

Mars has a 7-year full period, so 7 × 0.40 = 2.8 years remain at birth; Rahu follows. If you answered seven years, you used the full period instead of the supplied balance. If you answered Ketu next, you restarted the printed list instead of continuing from Mars.

A likely mix-up

The birth period is only its remaining balance; the sequence does not restart at Ketu.

Try a fresh case

Start from Saturn with half its period remaining, then continue the sequence.

Restart at Saturn

Start with Saturn and 50% untravelled. Record the balance and the next two lords. Keep the multiplication on the page, then explain why “everyone starts at Ketu” cannot be inferred from the way the sequence is usually printed.

Here the boundary is unusually simple. Calculation covers the supplied nakshatra lord, fraction, and multiplication. Tradition supplies the fixed order and full-period lengths. Interpretation is not needed to read the sequence. Uncertainty returns when the Moon position or method setting is unknown—especially near a nakshatra boundary—so the dates should not claim more precision than the inputs and year convention support.