When Does an Otherworldly Shakti Begin Supporting a Sadhak on Its Own?

The speaker opens by asking: when does a stage arrive where any kind of otherworldly, divine shakti begins supporting a sadhak or sadhika of its own accord? He says anyone connected to the paralaukik field will, from time to time, hear of a sadhak who went somewhere and felt certain he would be caught in some calamity and unable to get out — yet somehow got out anyway, guided by an experience of some kind of otherworldly power, in a place where he knew no one. He says the same is seen in the Bhagatvaal field, whether rural bhagatvaal or the tantra field: when a tantrik is in the middle of removing a tantra-badha connected to an enemy, and his own hard-earned siddhis and powers start running low, outside support reaches him too, of its own accord. At an ordinary level, he adds, even a devotee or sadhak who simply performs a daily sadhana receives the support of outside powers. The question, he says, is how all of this happens — when does some shakti start helping a sadhak on its own, in whatever field.

This support, the speaker says, can take different forms. First, when a person is caught in a crisis, various thoughts are sent into their mind, and through those thoughts they are guided out of it. Second, guidance is arranged through another person. Third, a shakti itself takes on some form and helps directly — he admits this sounds close to impossible, but says many people's lives still carry episodes of exactly this kind.

Beyond these forms of help, the speaker says the more important question is who receives this support, and when — a question worth thinking through carefully. First of all, he says, people who keep to a nitya niyam — daily offering arghya to Surya Bhagwan and to Tulsi ji, doing their regular worship, and japa-ing a fixed minimum count of a chosen Ishta Devata's mantra with dedication — are the ones whose help is bound to come, because they hold to their niyam with steadiness. He explains why: a person who lives by a daily discipline, even with only a little shraddha and surrender and a little genuine reflection on their mantra, will think fifty times before doing anything wrong in their life. What is often seen and heard — someone doing 15, 20, 50 or 11 Malas of japa every morning and then spending the rest of the day abusing and thinking ill of others — is, he says, mostly something shown in TV serials and movies, not how someone with real, sustained daily discipline and seva-puja actually behaves.

If a person is genuinely keeping his daily niyam of seva-puja and still ends up doing something wrong, the speaker says that, after some time, the very powers he worships give him a kind of punishment for it — enough that he corrects himself on his own and recognises he should not be doing such things. He stresses this punishment isn't one that brings great loss; it is only meant to awaken discernment (viveka) within the person, so small hardships enter their life and, through them, the point sinks in. Sometimes, he says, those same powers also arrange other means to save such a person — so that he gives up the wrongdoing, brings a little more surrender into his steady discipline, and purifies his chit (mind) as well, because if the chit is not kept pure, none of this bears fruit.

The second point the speaker makes: whenever a person takes hold of any fixed niyam — say, only a chalisa path daily, or only a Kavach path, or perhaps just five Malas of japa — and that becomes a bound-in niyam which is kept up continuously for three months, six months, or a full year, then no matter how large or how bad the person's PrarabdhaThe portion of destiny already set in motion by past actions — spiritual practice and good deeds can lessen its severity, but not eliminate it. is, if there is real SamarpanaThe dedication of Japa and worship's accumulated merit to one's chosen deity — performed by taking water in the right hand at the conclusion of practice and reciting a formal dedication formula before offering the water. (surrender) within them, if their shraddha toward the ishta whose mantra they japa is not hollow, it simply cannot be that they go unhelped. He warns that people around such a person may mock them when trouble still comes — saying they did so much puja-paath, and look what happened — but the person themselves must never let that thought take root inside, that they kept their worship going and calamity still arrived.

The speaker gives an example: someone's father-in-law does a great deal of paath-puja, does naam-japa, even a hundred Malas daily — yet trouble comes upon his body, and his daughter-in-law calls to ask what good all that daily recitation did, since he is having to bear so much suffering in his old age, and the devta he worships isn't coming to fix it. His answer is that people who raise this kind of complaint should consider: if this much suffering can still come to someone who did that much practice, what will happen to someone who does far less — so this should be treated as a warning rather than a proof that worship failed. What is really happening, he says, is that the person is working through their own PrarabdhaThe portion of destiny already set in motion by past actions — spiritual practice and good deeds can lessen its severity, but not eliminate it.. The divine does not always appear bodily to serve someone directly, but instead provides sons and daughters-in-law of exactly this kind, who serve the elder through that old-age prarabdha and, through that very service, help bring it to an end more quickly.

But, the speaker says, if this same feeling arises within a sadhak themselves — that person begins thinking, what good did it do that we did so much japa daily, so much seva-puja, so many Navratri vrats, and still this calamity came upon us — then the very moment this thought of a broken surrender, this ashraddha, arises and the connecting thread with one's ishta is severed, everything arranged for that person up to that point starts becoming fruitless. He adds that a person in whom this ashraddha takes birth might even think or say that it is God's own duty to help when faith wavers within someone — and the speaker affirms that the divine certainly does help in that situation. Speaking directly to anyone listening who currently feels this exact doubt rising, he says: out of a hundred crore people, barely a thousand may be listening to a talk like this, and if you are one of those whose faith is breaking, then in some way this is exactly what is being sent to you — to hear this, understand it, and not let the discernment within you die, not to snap the thread of your faith, to stay surrendered, because this state you have reached is your own karma, and you will come out of it.

The speaker says these are his own words on the matter, and then turns to the Gita, where Bhagwan Shri Krishna has said that carrying the yoga-kshema — securing what such a person lacks and protecting what they have already gained — of one who depends entirely on him is his own responsibility; such a person will be brought out of their trouble by him, in his own way. Yet, the speaker observes, people keep reading this passage again and again and still keep raising a finger at the divine, asking again and again what responsibility has actually been carried out, since nothing seems to be done. He adds that it then becomes the person's own duty as well — and in what manner the divine chooses to act is entirely his own wish.

The speaker says that raising a finger at the divine all day, essentially saying he does not do anything, itself means the person does not fully trust his word — and when there is no trust, the work does not happen either. He adds that this cannot then be waved away by saying, well, since you had no trust, that is why the work did not happen — because on real reflection, whatever devotion (samarpana) a person feels toward any devta or ishta, whatever puja-paath they began, traces back to some motivation that sparked it in the first place — someone else's experience heard, or something read and understood.

The speaker says that even if none of the earlier forms of motivation apply, and a person is simply reading a Purana, or reciting some Kavach whose text states that whoever recites this kavach daily will attain a certain thing, and that if it is made siddha in this manner and recited again it will bring Lakshmi, cure disease, and bring the divine's own help — many such PhalashrutiThe closing section of a hymn or scripture that lists the benefits and results promised to whoever recites it. (fruits of recitation) are written into these texts. Reading that phalashruti is what kindles shraddha within a person, he says, and that is what leads them to begin their own daily niyam of recitation.

But then, the speaker says, someone else may tell the sadhak: we too used to recite this Kavach a hundred times daily, and even then such calamity came upon us. Hearing this, if the sadhak lets their own shraddha shrink — thinking, we are doing this too, he is telling the truth, nothing is happening within me either, nothing is happening in my life either — then the very shakti-forms that had been supporting that person's life up to that point, through whose support things had been going well, also begin to withdraw their support.

The speaker draws the point together: however many paralaukik shaktis there are, helping a person directly or indirectly, they do so only for as long as the person does not change the bhaava (disposition) of their own mind — as long as they keep their thinking surrendered to their ishta, and keep carrying out, with dedication, whatever daily niyam is theirs.

Hardship and calamity keep arriving in line with our own karmas regardless, the speaker says, but as long as we stay surrendered, a path out of it keeps opening up too. If we do not stay surrendered, breaking is inevitable. This holds for everyone, he says — for him, and for the listener — each person carries their own karma. We break, and others will too. However much comfort and ease we may live in, one day, as our accumulated Punya begins running out, our hardships will come. If it is not meant to come to us directly, then people within our own family bear that hardship instead, and we in turn owe them service (karma) in return. This, he says, happens in family life too — but it should not become a reason to break down or run away from it.

The speaker says he hopes everyone listening will understand this and hold on to their bhaava of surrender. He says that even in adverse times, even amid suffering, one's surrender and shraddha should not be allowed to die — instead, they should be kept alive with viveka (discernment), that surrender should be deepened further, and one should look into what mistakes one has actually made in one's own life, letting go of every thought that would give rise to ashraddha (loss of faith) within. He adds that if people stay properly surrendered and keep faith in their ishta, that ishta will certainly support them, and whatever powers and energy surround them will support them too.