Subramanyam
November 11, 2008
November is the month for Subramanyam; son of Shiva and brother of Ganesha. He is known by many different names, Skanda, Murugan and Subramanyam being the most common. The images of him always include the vel (spear) and a flag (dwaja) with a rooster on it.
During some preparation for this month’s Skanda Shasti yagyas I came across a story about him that made me laugh out loud. It is from one of the puranas (Bagavata Purana maybe?) and goes like this;
Because he is the son of Shiva and Parvati he is immensely good looking with a strong male character. Astrologically he embodies the essence of Aries and the planet Mars. Impulsive, enthusiastic, charming, full of energy, and of course ready to fight at any time. His main purpose was to kill a particular demon who was causing trouble…but there was time before then when he was living in the heavens.
He was so good looking that none of the goddesses could possibly resist his charms, and so he spent his time sleeping with all the wives of the gods! Eventually, this started to cause problems, and his mother Parvati took him aside to have a few words about his behavior. “You need to stop this behavior,” she said. “Why?” was his reply, and he refused to change his errant ways.
So Parvati, whose power is unmatched in the universe, made it so that when he looked into the eyes of a woman all he saw was that the essence of the woman was that of his mother. So no matter where he went, he saw the universal mother as the essence of their soul.
Problem solved…behavior changed.
Proof positive!
November 7, 2008
When people ask me if the yagyas “work” it is always very difficult to know what to say. In the largest sense it is like asking how you can measure spirituality. I am not sure there really is a way, at least objectively. One is always limited to either a subjective judgment (I feel better) or a vague statement (my life is going more smoothly). Neither of which will really satisfy a skeptic.
But lately I have a new tactic. I show them this photo. It is a picture of my seat in Kanchipuram. There is absolutely nothing special about it. It is about 6 inches high and maybe 20 inches deep, made out of mango wood, I think. But here’s the thing, I travel all the way to the other side of the world to very very happily sit on this seat from 8 AM to 2 PM every day, with less than 45 minutes of break during that time. While seated here I am listening to the Vedas for roughly 5 hours a day for an average trip of two weeks. And nothing I have ever done makes me feel so at peace, so happy, and much like my life is absolutely on-track.
I can’t watch TV without a clicker, I can’t chill. I have to be productive, focused, and active almost all of the time. But I can sit in that seat like a pro. Listening to the Vedas being chanted, watching the pujas, and being in that atmosphere is real. Difficult to describe and quantify, but there is that unmistakable <something> that is very real. And, to mangle an old phrase, the proof is in the sitting!
Yagya results - what to expect.
October 21, 2008
The reasons that people do yagyas and the benefits that they experience are widely varied. Some people have very specific experiences during the day, during meditation, etc. Others feel a general sense of support and protection. Some people find that they notice nothing much, although over time it seems that nothing goes wrong! Or things don’t go as wrong as they are used to. It is really all over the map.
In some ways I think it is also like my own practice of meditation. I have been doing my practice for so long that if you asked me what the benefits were I would be stuck because, for me, it is all about moving towards enlightenment (the big picture). As you well know, people can start a spiritual practice for such minor reasons as to sleep better or just relax, but then over time the experience and emphasis changes. It is like that with yagyas as well.
In the simplest terms, the yagyas are an upwelling of sattwa, and the more “pure” our awareness the fewer the problems, and when the problems arise they are easier to solve or are less overshadowing. My experience is that during a yagya “papas” the Sanskrit word for seeds of bad karma, are being roasted….so they can’t sprout into misfortune. The thing is that we can’t really know how much bad karma there is waiting for us. So, it seems to me that the “results” from a yagya show up when we have made a dent in the karmas that we have.
That is why I see the yagyas as a part of a “process” very much like the old analogy of watering the root so that the entire tree is nourished; roots, trunk, leaves, etc. All in proper proportion.
I frequently joke that my children seem to be the primary beneficiary of the yagyas. Even in spite of my fatherly blindness that makes them close to perfect, I realize that they have been spared so many of the troubles that their peers are going through. Certainly something is there that is beyond my “skill” as a parent. I see huge benefits from the yagyas, but that doesn’t mean that my son won’t suffer when his girlfriend breaks up with him, or that my younger son won’t be stuck in the “World of Warcraft” game for days on end. They have a life to live and some things we can change and some we can’t.
The questions that most people have about yagyas and results are very understandable. Everyone wants to “feel something”, to have some feedback or a sign that the yagyas are doing something. Some people…or I would say that most people do have experiences that encourage them to continue. Sometime the experiences are very dramatic and sometimes it is sense of support or protection. Given time, it seems to be rather consistent.
Of course, all that we can do is to make certain that the yagyas are performed in the most proper traditional manner possible. The results, as the priests say, are up to the Divine.