Sadhana, devotional practice
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How to perform Sadhana
Geetika Jain, Dec 7, 2019 Times of India
‘Sadhana’ in Sanskrit and Hindi means ‘to balance’ through practice. Its spiritual connotation implies balanced self-control in all dimensions of life. Sadhana can be defined as a sadhaka or seeker’s conscious and sincere effort carried out with unwavering faith, clarity and understanding, to become strong enough to overcome temptation. Sadhana is a process of self-mastery that leads to self-purification.
Sadhana can, for instance, be via silent prayer, chanting, yoga, religious ritual or meditation. Whichever path fructifies into spiritual evolution is the right path for a sadhaka. The fruits of sincere sadhana are reaped at three levels – physical, mental and spiritual.
The general impression is that if a sadhaka devotes an hour or two daily to some form of sadhana, he gets purged of all bad karma. It is not so. Soon after sadhana, most people tend to revert to their usual negative behaviour and routine that they are habituated to. A true sadhaka can be identified as the one who always maintains the after-effects of sadhana throughout the day. Moreover, performing sadhana half-heartedly with little or no faith will not yield desired results.
Even years of such sadhana prove futile. Bona fide sadhana means living in a state of divine awareness from moment to moment. It is an all-time meditative state with open eyes; it is conscious, virtuous living.
The first sign of successful sadhana is a causeless, consistent feeling of peaceful joy that the seeker finds himself in. A close second is the fearlessness he achieves. The daily association bestows a sense of supreme security and confidence. Inner strength gets fortified. One tends to maintain evenmindedness and equanimity through the vicissitudes of life. By dint of daily inner sustenance, problems and setbacks tend to lose their formidability to a great extent.
Another prominent sign of effective sadhana is gradual subjugation of negative propensities and emotions. Focus starts shifting to the positives and blessings of life. Gratitude becomes an integral part of a sadhaka’s disposition. As sadhana progresses, there is greater control over one’s sense organs. Material desires are relegated to the background, gradually shrinking to only that which is necessary. Greed, restlessness and mindless pursuit of wealth are replaced by contentment and peace, enabling the sadhaka to strike a perfect balance between material life and spiritual life.
With sustained sadhana, discipline is established. The practitioner is able to sort out his priorities in life. One consciously begins to reduce clutter in the mind and at the material level. An aimless, dull life gets organised into a wholesome routine. Life blossoms into something that has profound meaning.
As one tenaciously progresses in daily sadhana, one’s infinite potentiality and dormant talents start surfacing. The deeper the sadhana, the stronger the inner connect and faster the spiritual elevation. Profound spiritual wisdom starts unfolding. Eternal laws and secrets of life become intelligible, life’s subtle functioning becomes lucid. Once the ephemerality of life dawns, worldly attachments recede. The sublime law of unity of all things becomes central in one’s life, promoting love, compassion, generosity and universal brotherhood. Over time, the seeker graduates into becoming a noble, complete human being.
What is sadhana?
Freedom From The Bondage Of Prakriti
Shri Shri Anandamurti, May 14, 2022: The Times of India
Sadhana, intuitional practice, can be learnt from a sadguru, great preceptor. And, emancipation can be obtained by its systematic practice. Nothing can be achieved by merely depending on the preceptor without doing sadhana. Everyone should carry out intuitional practice.
Some people are under the wrong impression that they do not have to make an effort and that they will attain emancipation due to the grace of the preceptor.
To deserve the grace of the sadguru, one has to follow the system of intuitional practice with devotion and faith, and not assume that the great preceptor will freely give everything without any effort on the part of the disciple. Some people think that since they are disciples of a great preceptor and the sadguru has come to elevate the fallen, the preceptor will take them all along when leaving, in the same way as a cowherd gathers all grazing cattle before leaving the pasture at dusk. This way of thinking is not correct. The great preceptor comes to liberate people, to elevate them to divinity. People must make a sincere effort to carry out their intuitional practice.
Sadhana is the effort to free oneself from the bondage of Prakriti. This subjugation is maintained due to the self-created distortions in the mind. To obtain liberation, the mind has to be restored to its natural state by removing these distortions. Emancipation is not possible until one has completely experienced the remaining reactions of one’s previous lives. Ordinary people experience these reactions in the normal way, and if any still remain when they die, they are reborn to exhaust them. Those who do sadhana don’t want to be born again to experience their remaining reactions. In their eagerness to attain emancipation quickly, they hasten to exhaust the balance of reaction in this life. So, they regard problems as a good sign, as they would speed up the exhaustion of one’s remaining reactions.
Sadhana is the effort to free oneself from the qualifying influence of Prakriti. Avidyamaya (the maya of ignorance) is also a quality that has to be renounced. If a tenant has been occupying a house for a long time, it will be extremely difficult to suddenly evict him by force. You will have to fight against all his manoeuvres and only when you have completely defeated him will the bully allow you to enter the house.
Similarly, as one has been at the mercy of avidyamaya for many lives, it will not leave easily when one starts doing sadhana. Like the bullying tenant, avidyamaya will throw all possible obstacles across one’s path when one tries to destroy its influence.
Sadhana, as taught by a preceptor, is the way to remove avidyamaya. Only success in sadhana can make avidyamaya loosen its hold. So, the beginning of true sadhana is often marked by great resistance from avidyamaya, which, through the obstacles it creates, tries to compel one to give up the intuitional practice.
Centenary celebration of Shri Shri Anandamurti is on May 16
