The morning Sun was bright, the lawn was glowing with the newly acquired fresh silver green look. I was enjoying the wonderful pleasing early morning sight of the lawn when my son lazying due to his dusshera school holidays waking up late in the morning came to me and asked.
“ Dad, what are we doing during these holidays and what is our plan for Diwali?” Further he murmured, “I wish if there are Gods allocated to each month, so we can have more holidays.” Before I could answer his question, he asked.
“Dad, how many Gods are there? Can we have more Gods?”
His mind suddenly started racing, he said “Dad there are so many small and big places of worship on my way to school. Why are holidays not given for all these Gods.”
I realized that these are really tough questions to answer. So I thought, first I should explain the basics about God, the way I understand and not necessarily the way every body else understand or believe. I believe I am right in my understanding of God but may be others are also equally right the way they believe and understand God. Ultimately I am also a human being who can see things only within a small sphere and can extend the thought only up to a limited range.
I asked my son, “Do you see electricity?” Promptly came the answer “yes”, the TV is ‘ON’ and the fan is rotating. Then I told him, you are seeing a fan, a TV, a fridge working, but have you seen electricity? If I switch on the air-conditioner, it will work. If I switch on a bed lamp it will glow. Then what is electricity? He said “no, I didn’t understand your question. How can you see electricity?” Then I explained that due to something which you cannot see, the bulb, TV, AC, fan, locomotive, a bed lamp are all functioning. The moment that ‘something’ is removed and not available they all stop functioning. They are only the front ends to the invisible energy (electricity) and their ability is different depending upon the size of the fuse that draws the required current and the type of design and their making. We only feel the existance of electricity and do not actually see it. None the less we understand that there is energy that is doing all this.
He was totally lost on the concept that I was trying to drive through.
I said Gods are nothing but the front ends to the universal energy. We don’t switch on bed lamps when we want air, or a fan when we want cooling, though the same electricity controls all. The multiplicity of Gods, as understood in Hindu philosophy is the need based front ends of the universal energy or SHAKTI (the word that is generally referred).
That is why, there is a Fire God, a Water God, a Bull God, Elephant faced Ganesha, Brahama, Lakshmi, Vishnu, Maheswara and so on. All these Gods are the front ends of the abundant cosmic energy through which we seek the desired blessings and solutions/benefits.
We can have any number of Gods. Each God is the front end of the universal energy, through which the human beings, or the various creatures on earth are continuously seeking a source to fulfil their desires.
To summarise, all Gods are the front ends. But why not a single God? To understand this we need do understand the properties and the range of this universal energy, the Five Tatwas of the universe and their level of equilibrium.
For instance, when you need heat, you switch on the heater not the air conditioner, when you require a dim light you don’t switch on the 1000 watt bulb. Thus the front ends are the need based variations of the same universal energy.
He promptly asked the question “Dad, mummy does pooja daily to the God in the photo frame in the pooja room. Does that mean He will give whatever mummy asks and fulfil the need? I will tell mummy to ask God to take us to the beach this afternoon”.
I said yes, you can tell mummy. Then immediately he asked if we get whatever we ask from the God’s photo why did my friends’ family go to Tirupati temple with all the difficulty?
I realized he is upto a very difficult question again. Now I need to answer the subject with much more explanation. Meanwhile my wife signalled that coffee is ready.
I told my son, I will explain after our coffee break.
Hi Dad! You have finished your coffee break can you now clarify why my friends’ family has to travel all the way to Tirupati to see the God while they could have done the Pooja at home .
Energy states
‘Son!’ I said. Before I explain that, let me talk about some basic principles of energy as studied in physics, i.e. the potential energy and the kinetic energy.
I will keep a ball on the ground and push it till it touches you. Will you get hurt? No.
Now I take the ball to the 15th floor what happens? Visually nothing. If I drop it from there, and if it comes on you, it will hurt you. Why is that? Because in carrying the ball to the 15th floor, we invested some energy into the ball, which gets stored and is called potential energy. When dropped, the stored energy converts into kinetic energy on movement and the impact is equivalent of the energy that got stored into the ball in the process of lifting it to the 15th floor.
The potential energy, in simple terms, is the energy stored in an object and the kinetic energy is the energy generated in movement.
All energies in the universe are always in either potential or kinetic energy state. All living and non-living objects while static, have potential energy and continuously keep absorbing some more energy or reflect the incident energy or radiate part of the stored energy depending upon the energy difference in the nearby environment. Sometimes the energy also gets dissipated internally due to various improper conditions within the object. The dissipated energy generates internal heat.
To understand all this, let’s take some water, put it in the fridge. After sometime it becomes hard ice cube. What has happened, the heat in the water is taken out and it becomes hard. Similarly you take the ice cube and put it on a fry pan, first it will become water and then it will evaporate and disappear. What happened is that, in the first instance, when some energy is given out, it became hard and later when it absorbed some energy, it became water and with absorption of some more energy it disappeared.
In a nutshell, energy is stable when in solid form and is volatile in the liquid and gaseous forms. The gaseous form being a state with very high energy. In other words, the same object can exist in multiple forms depending upon whether energy is taken out or added.
Now, let us think of God as an idol at a place of worship. The quality of the material used in making the idol, the high kinetic energy transmitted into the idol through rituals at the time of installation, the orientation and design of the place (vastu) facilitate absorption of natural cosmic energy available around. The quantum of energy absorbed depends upon the site location also. Thus the energy available near the idol at a place of worship is vey high. When pilgrims visit the temple, the energy of the individuals being much less, there is flow of energy from the idol to the individual through radiation. The worshipper feels a strong happy feeling at that moment. To replenish the energy lost from the idol, regular ritualistic prayers , lighting of lamp and other prayer processes are carried out. That is why an unused place of worship does not attract devotees as the idol’s potential energy is weak.
So we have understood that every object is in a particular state of energy and the energy flows in either direction depending upon the energy gradient.
The energy at place of worship is of a very high order, which cannot be replicated in individual houses. The effect of place of worship on individuals is like a fire place in winter. When you feel cold, you can instantly feel the warmth by getting near the fire place and when you move away you again start feeling the cold. Instead of warmth, these places offer spiritual happiness and a sense of well being because of the positive energy from the idol. However this feeling is generally lost, the moment you move away from the idol.
Spirituality is the science to strengthen your body and mind to be able to receive this positive energy wherever you are without the need to go to a place of worship, as it is only a short-term quick fix solution. To understand, when you feel cold, you go to the fire place and if you protect your body with appropriate warm cloths , you will not feel the need to go to the fire place and can still be warm and move out freely. So visiting the temple is like going near a fire-place for comfort and through spirituality you can overcome the need.
Hi Dad! What are the characteristics of this energy?
Yes my son, I will explain.
Energy always travels in frequencies. As you may be aware a cycle per second is defined as the status of half positive and half negative cycle change of energy in a second . Because of the positive and negative shift, there is always a gradient of energy through which the energy travels. You see in the air around us (which incidentally, we all breath to live) if I say that there are so many radio channels , TV channels, mobile conversations, radar channels etc. existing, I am sure you will accept that. In the same way there could be violent sounds, unpleasant noises as well in the same air. The beauty is that while billions of such individual channels exist in this air around us, they maintain their individual identity without damaging the other. However you can see, listen and feel only if you have an appropriate receiver tuned to this. It is through various channels of the receivers you can experience their existence. Certain sounds you can directly listen/experience without the need of an external receiver. i.e. you yourself act as a receiver and experience that and for some others you need a receiver. The ability to directly receive the signal varies with individual object/being. While I can listen the other persons whisper, some other person may require a hearing aid. Also while I can see without spectacles some other may require spectacles to see.
So what an individual normally accepts is what the person is actually seeing/listening/experiencing, the way it works with that person While this experience is highly individualistic, just because somebody cannot experience the contents in this air, we cannot say that it does not exist.
Take the classic example, if I touch a brick nobody will know that I have touched it but any sniffer dog can find the scent even after many days and identify the person. That means, the specific energy though negligibly minute can be traced by a dog while human beings cannot. Just because we cannot sense it, we cannot say that it does not exist.
To summarize, the air around us is very powerful and within it, has all the energy components of specific energies which might have originated a long time ago. Thus it is a library of infinite number of events or for that matter, anything that happened in the universe. It is only that we need to have an appropriate sensitive and tuned receiver to be able to experience the contents of the air (universe).
Now God energy is that which when you receive, You feel absolutely contended, happy, desire nothing more and pray for a continued such state both physically and mentally. This state is neither dependent on how much money you have, what you eat, what comforts you have. While we all look for these external things in pursuit of happiness, the real fact is that you can directly reach that state of happiness, by developing the ability to receive God energy which is available plenty around in the universe. The other energy can be irritating, unpleasant to majority.
Dad! I am surprised that we can easily receive the God energy. Please explain how I can receive that.
Look Son! As I explained to you some of the energies we are directly able to receive while some or not, and this is highly individualistic. Look at our dog, if I seriously look at it, even without a word uttered, it is able to receive my body signals and expression of my eyes and it coolly goes to a corner and sits like a weak innocent fellow. So we all have the ability to radiate and also receive it. However majority of us need to train ourselves to receive and radiate such subtle energy.
Dad, tell me how do I develop this?
As I said earlier, the energy is always in a state of dynamic flow. The parameters of flow are defined by five attributes of the nature. Hence you need to understand them to receive this energy.
Dad! Then what are the properties of this energy so that we can understand and develop the skill to receive it?
Son! This energy has five attributes or characteristics. The energy will always exist in either only one or combination of some or in all five states. These characteristics are also called pancha tatwas in scriptures. Let us understand each of these characteristics of this energy.
Fiery: Energy can exist as fire/ heat. This energy is always pure and purifies the surroundings by burning the negativities.
Watery: This energy is cool and spreads .It makes the surroundings comfortable, happy and easily connected.
Earthy: This energy is fixed. It is totally in the form of potential energy. It doesn’t flow easily. The total energy is in a state of binding. It generally exists in static state.
Airy: This energy is highly volatile. Shifts and moves across the universe and easily connects with all objects. This is the life force.
Ether: This is the attribute of expansiveness, i.e. if you keep very little air in a big container, which is air tight, the small quantity of air spreads itself to cover the space available similarly if more air is pumped in, it shrinks to accommodate the complete air within the given container.
Thus the cosmic energy, which we cannot see, exists in either one or in multiple states as explained above. The full range of this energy is God energy.
Now we have understood about the existence of universal energy, the states in which it is exists and the type of information it holds within that.
Dad! Now how do we receive this energy and benefit from that.
Look we all breathe this energy continuously. Somebody is inhaling the air I exhale so we are all inter-connected through this air. We are all connected like the strings of the puppet and play different roles in the theme. The moment the string ( air) stops moving into the body we also stop moving. Hence the air is all powerful and we live with that. Every exhalation can have a question mark whether you will be able to take the next breath. So we all live in such a delicate state. The understanding of this gives comfort that we are all same and no different. This paves the way for better understanding of this air and strategies to benefit from the same through a positive life style.
Every receiver has a fuse, which decides the overall energy the system can receive. The internal components are similarly designed to withstand the flow of current that is going through those components. The energy that can be drawn from this universal energy by an individual is dependent on the body capability like the fuse. The quantum of energy drawn depends on the equilibrium of the five tatwas in the body. More the equilibrium, the better the ability to receive this universal energy.
All living beings are functioning on the principle of five tatwas in the Universe, i.e. Fiery, Watery, Airy, Earthy and Etheric (Aakash tatwa). So to receive this universal energy, the five tatwas of the being should perfectly match with that of the universe. If not, the energy received from the universe will be directly dependent on the unequal equilibrium of the subtle combination of the Five tatwas in the body. This unequal equilibrium in the body causes disease and sickness of mind/body leading to gradual deterioration.
It is generally known that the human body is made of millions of fine nadis (energy flow channels in body) through which the prana or the universal energy flows. Due to various reasons these nadis in the body function as clogged channels and cause impediments for the smooth flow of universal energy through the body. In idealistic condition, the five tatwas of universal energy when in perfect match with the five tatwas of beings, the person is able to receive all the signals, knowledge and energy from the universe.
The spiritual heads, are all those in whom the five tatwas were in absolute synchronization with the universal energy and hence could receive the universal energy, as much as required ,interpret the signals and see the past, present and future easily. They could create miracles because, they had the capability of managing the energy states of the universal energy to create objects.
Unfortunately the human bodies over generations have become imperfect and our internal equilibrium is out of synchronization with the five tatwas of the nature. This is due to various eccentricities adopted by our forefathers and now by us in our living style. The causes for these eccentricities are the taste, touch, sight, sound and smell (the five sensitive sensors which we all have). These five sensory organs act as the antennas to receive/ radiate and interact with the universe and internal body system. When human beings live in perfect synch with nature, these antennas facilitate smooth in and out flow of energies from nature. The energy signals received by the sensory organs need to be processed into intelligence like the receiver produces the intelligence from the signals received through the antenna.
The God energy is nothing but the ability to receive the full range of frequencies of the universal energy without any loss and internal dissipation and convert the signals into understandable intelligence. The God persons are those who had this ability of perfect sensory functioning along with their body components working at its best to convert the received energy into perfect intelligence. Hence they could understand, interpret and were able to see the present, past and future as the air is carrying all these components as explained earlier.
Dad! The whole thing is a very complex thing. From this does it mean that God is every where and we can receive the blessings from any where?
‘Yes’ you are right.
So Dad you mean to say that we can receive the God energy/intelligence like any other spiritual head? How do we achieve this?
Body has three components in itself. The physical body to receive the signals, the mind to translate the signal into intelligence The third one is the connectivity (the nadis) between the sensors and the brain (mind). All the three components of the body system should be in perfect condition to receive and interpret full range of signals and the intelligence in it from the Universe. To improve the health of these three components, Yoga, Ayurveda and Meditation are the three components of universal knowledge that is used. Similar practices with different names might be existing around the Universe Astrology is the science through the study of which, the pre disposition of an individual in the areas of body, mind and the energy channels can be interpreted. In addition astrology serves as a guide to individuals to identify the strengths and weaknesses and the possible corrective prescriptions to improve the balance of the five tatwas to lead a happy life in synchronization with nature to derive maximum happiness.
.Son I have covered a lot and I think a summary of the same will help you to dwell on all the views expressed. You can then ask your questions for any further clarification.
To summarize:
- Various God forms are the front ends of the cosmic universal energy. These front ends are either living beings or conceived objects, shapes based on their ability to receive and transmit the universal energy.
- Energy exists in either potential or kinetic energy formats.
- Energy travels as frequencies.
- There are five attributes/characteristics of the energy Airy, Fiery, Watery, Earthy, etheric/Aakash (space).
- Places of worship for a person seeking relief from stressed out issues in life are like the fire place for a person seeking warmth to overcome cold.
- The idols in the place of worship store a high cosmic potential energy due to multiple reasons like the Earth/Soil where it is located, the kinetic energy pumped in by way of rituals at the time of installation, the natural orientation of the premises (vastu) and the specific design followed in the construction.
- While it is good to visit places of workshop for instantaneous recharge of the universal energy, it is necessary to develop the capability of the human body to the sensitivities of this energy and be able to store this energy seamlessly by receiving it from universe all the time irrespective of where you are.
- The five attributes that exist in nature also exist in all the creations. Through a perfect match of these tatwas, universal energy can be continuously received.
- While the sensory organs work as antennas for receiving this universal energy, the mind is the actual receiver which decodes the signal and the nadis are the connecting wires between the body and mind. The specific combination of these five tatwas facilities reception of a particular signal. They function like the tuning coil in a receiver for receiving multiple channels.
- The mind when freed from all thoughts can receive the signals from the universe and can derive the intelligence and differentiate them like receiving multiple radio/TV or mobile conversations etc.
- Universal energy contains all the intelligence that exists, existed and likely to exist in future.
- Each of this intelligence exists in clearly identifiable format.
- All Gods or spiritual heads are individuals who had their five tatwas fully in synchronization with the five tatwas of universal cosmic energy because of which they could receive the full energy like a perfect fuse and were able to receive the signals of present, past and future.
Note: Readers of this article are advised to mail to info@astrovedicjyotish.com for any clarification on the concepts. The concepts are my perceptions and beliefs. Others may have their own views and perceptions which may totally differ with these and I fully respect them.
you can also post your comments on the facebook by pasting the following URL .
www.facebook.com/pages/astro-vedic-jyotish/130905180378559
The next article will cover the techniques to improve the energy reception.