What matters in Spirituality - Your Effort or Grace?

Sadhguru on why Maha Arati procession is taken every month for Linga Bhairavi Devi.

Sadhguru : Here in Isha, Dhyanalinga is that tower of energy.
I do not know how many of you experience it that
way. One lady from the United States said, “All I
see is one big black peanut.” Since this phenomenal
tower of energy has to last very long, it has to be
subtle. Anything that you make outwardly energetic,
like Devi, will not last long, unless you maintain it
every day. You must recharge her on a daily basis –
otherwise, she will not live. That is why those who
are around Devi need a lot more dedication and
devotion to keep her going.

People who take care of the Dhyanalinga temple
only take care of the temple, the premises, and
the people who come. They do not take care of
Dhyanalinga in any sense, because he does not need
any care. If no one takes care of him, he will still be
the same. This is a completely different format. But
with the Devi temple, it is not just the temple and
the people – Devi herself is being taken care of on a
daily basis. And if you do not take care of her well,
she will go into a fit. I hope they will have the sense
to see to it that she does not go into a fit.


tower of energy – Dhyanalinga. That is why she
is positioned the way she is. Everything else we
create now, wherever we put it in the world, also
draws sustenance from that. Dhyanalinga is a fullfledged life.
Practically, there are difficulties, but in
theory, if we want, we can build a body of flesh and
bone for him, and make him come alive. When we
explored these things in great detail about 20 years
ago, during the Wholeness Program in 1994, people
said, “Sadhguru, you must make him alive.” I said,
“No,” because if you make him alive, then he will
have to go for dinner; he will want to sleep. All the
problems that you and I have, he will also have.

Devi exists by drawing sustenance from the main
As a life without a body, he has no physical issues,
which is good. He is a full-fledged life – all the seven
chakras, and more. Devi is only three-and-a-half
chakras. She is half a life, but a vibrant half – you
cannot miss it. You may not experience anything in
the Dhyanalinga because he is subtle. Devi is like
a slap in your face – you cannot miss it. However,
that kind of vibrance cannot stay for long unless it is
recharged on a daily basis.

Once a month, she comes out and makes direct
contact with Dhyanalinga because her sustenance
depends on that. Forever, the future generations
who will be here must ensure she always comes
to Dhyanalinga on full moon days and makes that
contact. No matter if rain is pouring, there is a flood,
or whatever else – she must still come. Whoever
will be around must maintain that, because this is
essential for her. Not that there are no other ways
to stay in contact with Dhyanalinga – there are –
but the procession is an important part. She has
to constantly stay in touch with Dhyanalinga –
otherwise, she will deplete. She likes to be strong,
energetic, and beautiful – if you make her deplete,
she will go into a fit. No one should be around when
she goes into a fit.

How to Deal with an Exploitative Spouse? Sadhguru

Sadhguru on the approaching hour of Death

Sadhguru : One more aspect is, if you have a certain thought at the moment of death, it becomes the quality of your future birth. We must create an atmosphere of peacefulness and wellbeing for people during the dying process because whatever is the dominant factor in their mind and emotions in the last moment will become the quality of their future lives. That is the reason why in this culture, we always said you should not die among your family. People used to go to the forest to die – this is Vanaprastha. Even emperor Dhritarashtra, his queen Gandhari, and Kunti went into the forest after the Kurukshetra war, with just Sanjaya as an assistant. They had all become old, so they went to the forest to die there, rather than in the palace. Though Dhritarashtra was blind and stupid in many ways, that much awareness was there, which is missing in the world today. Now that her children had become emperors, Kunti, who had suffered all kinds of hardship in her life, could have enjoyed the palace, but she also decided to go and die in the forest.


So they went into the forest and climbed up a very steep hill. There was a forest fire. Since they were old, they could not run or fight the forest fire, so they just decided to offer themselves to the fire. So Dhritarashtra told Sanjaya, “You have served me very well till now, but you are still a young man – go away. The three of us will give ourselves to the fire.” Sanjaya refused to leave them, and all four got burnt in the forest fire.


If you die among the family, you will die with a huge sense of attachment, which, in the future, will not bring wellbeing. You know that in India, even today, people go to Kashi to die, because it is a holy place. They want to die in the grace of Shiva. They don’t want to die with their family throwing their emotions at them.
http://blog.ishafoundation.org/lifestyle/dying-process-moment-of-death/

Sadhguru on the tradition of Annadhanam

We owe our spiritual wealth not just to the sages, seers, masters, and enlightened beings who walked the path, but also to the community that nurtured them. In our tradition, serving spiritual seekers and monks has always been of utmost importance. This can be a path in itself. The most beautiful expression of this is the Annadanam– the sacred offering of food.”

- Sadhguru



At the Isha Yoga Center, Annadanam, the sacred tradition of offering food, is made twice a day to over 1000 people including residents, volunteers, sanyasis, brahmacharis, students, and all daily visitors. This vital offering sustains the work of the sadhakas who have dedicated their lives to working in the various spiritual, social, environmental and educational initiatives of Isha.

Taken in complete silence, the meal is preceded by an invocation, a powerful arrangement of sounds, which is designed to make a person more receptive to the food consumed.



A group of residents share their experience of receiving Annadanam at the ashram every day.

We bow down….

We bow down to the hands of the farmers who tended the soil that grew the fruits and vegetables, the grains and spices. May they know how many grateful beings they nourish with their effort.

Blessed are the hands that brought it here, and those who donated it out of their love to nourish us.

We bow down to the hands that carefully cut, chopped, peeled and grated it into the softest contours, and the hands that prepared it, day and night, every day, without ever missing a meal, no matter how tired they were or how many people came.

And last but not least, bless the hands that served this food, with grace, with love, with the tenderness of mothers and the humility of devotees.

We cannot sit in this Bhiksha Hall even once without shedding tears of gratitude, not having to think, worry, trusting that every day, everyone here is offered nourishment of the best quality.

Source Link : http://blog.ishafoundation.org/inside-isha/announcements/sacred-offering-food/

Sadhguru on Sanskrit Language

Sadhguru: The Sanskrit language is a device, not necessarily a medium of communication. Most of the other languages were made up because we had to refer to something. Initially, they started with just a handful of words and then multiplied them into complex forms. But Sanskrit is a discovered language because today we know that if you feed any sound into an oscilloscope, every sound has a form attached to it. Similarly, every form has a sound attached to it. Every form in the existence is reverberating in a certain way and creates a certain form. This happened to me as a child: I would be staring at someone who would be talking. Initially, I heard their words, then just the sounds. After some time, I just saw some crazy patterns happening around them which so engrossed, amazed and amused me that I could just sit staring at them forever, not understanding a single word because I was not listening to the words at all.

Sanskrit is one language where form and sound are connected. In English for example, if you say “sun” or “son,” in utterance it is the same, only in spelling it is different. What you write is not the criteria. The sound is the criteria because today modern science is proving to you that the whole existence is just a reverberation of energy. Where there is a vibration, there is bound to be a sound. The whole existence on one level is in sound form. When you realize what sound is attached to a particular form, you give this sound as the name for that form – now the sound and the form are connected. If you utter the sound, you are relating to the form – not just psychologically, but existentially, you are connecting with the form. If you have mastery over the sound, you also have mastery over the form. Sanskrit is like a blueprint of the existence. What is in form, we converted into sound. A lot of distortions have happened. How to preserve it in its right form has become a challenge even today since the necessary knowledge, understanding, and awareness is largely missing.

That is the reason why when Sanskrit is taught, it has to be learnt by rote. People just chant the language endlessly. It does not matter whether you know the meaning or not. The sound is important, not the meaning. Meanings are made up in your mind. It is the sound and the form which are connecting. Are you connecting or not? – That is the question. That is why it has become the mother of almost all Indian and European languages, except Tamil. Tamil did not come from Sanskrit. It developed independently. All the other Indian languages and almost all the European languages have their origin in Sanskrit.
Source Link : http://blog.ishafoundation.org/lifestyle/sanskrit-connecting-sound-form/

How Can We Experience Krishna? - Sadhguru

Who is Kali? Sadhguru

Once the Guru leaves...........................................

Questioner: Sadhguru, we are all on this bus journey with you as the driver. At some point, you may decide to hop off the bus. You have two types of passengers. Those who are focused on the destination – even if you put the bus on auto pilot, they should be okay. But you also have passengers who are focused on the driver – the destination doesn’t matter to them. What happens to them if you put it on auto pilot?

Sadhguru: People have gotten interested in the driver only because of the destination that he represents. If you have a dream about going to a certain destination, the man who drives the bus becomes a part of your dream. You may be thinking “Sadhguru” with tears in your eyes, but if I go to the next village, they are not even bothered who I am, because they are not interested in going anywhere. They have not even thought about it, so what I represent does not mean anything to them.

Your interest is the destination, but the destination is abstract, while the driver is something that you can relate to. Therefore, in your understanding, the driver has become important. But actually, the important thing for you is the destination. The way the mind understands, knows, and perceives things is like this: “If the driver is not there, will we really get to the destination?” You have no trust in the technology of auto-piloting. You think if it is put on auto pilot, it will not happen, which is not true.

The question is, “When are you going to go – before me or after me?” Maybe I will outlive you – I have not made up my mind when to go. Does this mean I have an unbounded amount of time? Right now, no. If one wishes, one can earn that. But it needs a lot of hard work, just to drag on for a few more years, and I am not the kind to do that. Suppose I leave tomorrow, is your spiritual journey going to end? Definitely not. Instead of piloting it from outside, it could be piloted from inside. The initiations that you have gone through, whether it is shoonya or anything else, are not empty procedures or a bundle of instructions – they are a huge investment of life energy. If you keep it as a seed in your belly, you do not feel its presence. You have to create the necessary atmosphere for it to become a big tree, then there is no way you cannot feel its presence.

The unfortunate reality for most masters in the past has been that the spiritual processes that they started gathered much more momentum after they left. The physical absence makes the other presence very powerful – it always greatly enhances the other dimension. If I went tomorrow, it would also be to your benefit, so there is no need to be concerned. But it will not happen tomorrow – sorry to disappoint you.

Will Isha's Charities expand beyond India? - Sadhguru answers

Twilight Moments: Pancha Bhuta Aradhana - Adoration of The Five Elements