Our worship and devotional practices have no meaning without commensurate endeavors of refinement and improvement in our thoughts, behavior and deeds. The Sanskrit word for devotional worship is "Upasana", which literally means sitting nearby. Sitting near the fire makes us feel warm. Similarly, sitting near God should inspire us with His attributes. Sitting in the closed vicinity of a powerful source of energy would bestow the associated significant effects on us only if there is a linkage, a direct connection between the source and the beneficiary. A piece of wood becomes fire only when it sacrifices itself in the fire nearby. This is how "upasana" brings the desired results only if the devotee sets a live linkage of his inner self with the Deity of his worship. For this, he has to discipline and mold himself as per the inspirations of his God. We, the aspirants of the beatitude of Lord Shiva, should also consciously and ceaselessly attempt at transforming ourselves according to the ideals of His manifestation. We should endeavor opening our third eye (that means, awaken our intuitive insight and pure intellect). The very purpose of murti puja (idol-worship) in Indian Culture is to enable the masses to access and imbibe the teachings and inspirations of divine emanations. Every idol, every symbol of Gods manifestation represented here is indicative of some important teaching related to the spiritual evolution of human consciousness. Today, I gave you the example of Shankar (Shiva) in this context and tried to explain the principles, the occult implications of His worship and devotion. Unfortunately, we often get engrossed in worshipping the gross form the idol of God and consider the performance of some customary rituals, chanting of some prayers etc as all that is required for His devotion. Even if we have read or heard about the occult significance of the symbols of divine manifestations, we dont seem to remember anything. We just want to take shortcuts and regard ourselves great devotees simply by symbolic worship. The word "Shiva" in Sanskrit means highest good. Lord Shiva (Shiva) is the presiding Deity of eternal, auspicious well-being of all creation. But we, the so-called worshippers of Shiva never even think of global good. (Forget about global, we dont even attempt to expand the narrow domain of our selfish interests and engage ourselves in altruistic service and upliftment of the needy around us). We keep chanting "Om Namah Shivaya" but dont bother to know its meaning; in reality, Shiva (Shiva) is far away from our lives. We dont even know what is the true well-being of our soul or our own life and how to attain it? The japa (rhythmic chanting) of Shivas name will be beatifying if "Shiva" (Highest Good) is embodied in our attitude, aspirations, thoughts and deeds. It is time we realize that worshipping only the external, gross form is no better than not doing anything at all. Be Blessed by Shivas Grace: The Almighty God of Hindu religion for whom we observe fasting on Shivaratri, perform japa, ceremonial worship, sacred ablution (abhisheka) and what not cant He, the Omnipotent, destroy all evils and eliminate our adversities? Cant He help us in our progress? He indeed can and He will, if we are His deserving devotees. He loves all of us and wants to bestow all His grace upon us; but it is our infirmities, our vices that hinder or limit the flow of His blessings. His grace is like the water-laden clouds. (The clouds shower the treasure of rains without discrimination wherever they fall). But how much water a pond or a pot would collect from the rain depends upon its own capacity. If we deserve, we will surely be beatified by Shivas enormous generosity. His beatitudes will continue to grow as our abilities, our merits increase and we shall get everything that a true devotee of Shankar deserves.

- courtesy Akhand Jyoti