How my life took a 180 degree turn
Due to more than 30 years of quiet sadhana
My words may seem harsh.
They are my truth.
Take no offence if you choose to read.
Objective: to share what my experience so far has taught me.
If you met me in my mindless teens or in my thirties, you will not find that “me” anymore. I no longer pretend to be who I am not. Once I used to do that to fit in. I no longer seek appeasement from connections. That need has disappeared, by divine grace.
Nobody is mine, and I’m nobody’s. That is the ultimate relief. I no longer care who likes me or who does not. Or who loves me or who does not. Sadhana allows the divine to take over.
I have been quietly doing sadhana, yes, mantra sadhana, for more than thirty years. I didn’t start because I had some kind of great bhakti, or a special kind of love for it. No, it wasn’t. I still don’t have any bhakti.
Because bhakti happens.
Bhakti comes from practice.
You can’t pretend or falsify it.
But yes, slowly the Devi, the great consciousness, took over. Bhakti is her problem, not mine. Everything is her problem, not mine. This feeling took over, as if I were wrapped in a divine kind of love.
This journey started with my inner turmoil. I was very unhappy from within. Some of it came from this lifetime, some from past karma. But those were all blessings in disguise. They were there to propel me to take a different path, one most people wouldn’t dare to venture.
A brief insight into my background. I spent almost half of my life in the West. I had significant successes. I had great mentors in both Europe and America.
Despite everything, a hollowness remained, much like before I came to the West. I didn’t know what it was, and nothing could wash it away. As years passed, I became more and more intense with my sadhana, and more frustrated too, because I was getting no answers. Sometimes ten or twelve hours a day during weekends. I don’t know how or why I did it, but I knew this was all I had in this lifetime.
I’m sharing all this because maybe you can learn a thing or two from an ordinary person like me. With sadhana, things changed. My thoughts changed, and so did my level of inner confidence. There was no need to read any books anymore. Understanding came automatically. What I needed to know came, as if Devi were whispering to me.
Great gurus started appearing. I don’t want you to believe this at all. I also started to feel that I didn’t care whether I lived or didn’t live in this body anymore. That fear was taken away. Everything felt useless. Everything felt momentary.
But one thing became stronger and stronger. Seva, the will to serve, and dharma, to do the right things. Maybe that’s the freedom I was looking for.
There is a lot of wrong information out there. False and corrupt people in robes spread misinformation about the Vedas and the Upanishads. Don’t be let down by them. Veda is science, yes, ancient science. Approach it like a scientist. Don’t trust, and don’t distrust either. Verify the truth for yourself.
Sadhana works. Everything mentioned in the Vedas works. But one has to put in the effort. Let me give a figure, just for your understanding. One crore (ten million), mantras is the bare minimum required to cut through the rut of accumulated karma. Without it, there is no way to see beyond. No way to see reality or truth. But remember, nothing happens overnight.
You already know everything, but you can’t see it because of the dense fog between you and the truth. Mantra helps cut through that fog. Mantra is not a religious thing. No, it is not a Hindu thing. I will explain this more later.
Why one crore mantras.
Because this changes your energy significantly. It gives you a head start. But even this is not enough (if you have lots of bad karma). You need to do more if you are serious about gaining spiritual understanding. My goal in this lifetime is to spread this message of the Veda in the West. That’s it. Nothing else.