The Questions Goddess Mahalakshmi Left in My Heart

I have always felt unusually drawn towards ancient temples.

Srirangam, Tiruvannamalai, Kashi, The Jyotirlingas, The Divya Desams, The Shakti Peethas, Ashrams, Mahasamadhis etc.

Whenever I travel to a new city, even if the purpose of my journey has nothing to do with spirituality, one of the first things I find myself searching for is:

Is there an ancient temple nearby?

Perhaps because, to me, these temples are energy centers. These are places that have remembered and experienced God for centuries. Those collective energies are there for us to tap and experience. 

Imagine:

After thousands of pujas.

After countless mantras.

After the tapas of saints and rishis.

What the space must hold??!! In some sacred spaces, great Saints and Siddhars were enlightened.  In some, great beings are believed to have entered Mahasamadhi and left their life’s energies there. Around many temples live extraordinary stories of the relationship between the Divine and the bhakta with stories of love, protection, longing and grace.

And I have noticed something else over the years. My pilgrimage seems to begin much before I physically reach the temple. Sometimes a month or two before the journey, life itself begins cleaning me.

Something gets disturbed.

Something I had been holding on to comes to the surface.

Earlier, I would wonder why so much was happening just before a pilgrimage. Soon I realized that perhaps I am being emptied. When I am empty enough, I experience another dimension. Every sacred place has opened a new dimension in me. 

Some temples have shown me Absolute Peace.

Some have brought me into  Supreme Surrender.

Some have put me in Saakshi Bhava and many more dimensions.

So, when I knew that I would be travelling to Belagavi, my mind was glued to Kolhapur Mahalakshmi temple. 

I knew I wanted to go and my cleansing began. All I had to do was just to be available to my Divine for the process to take over. The day came where I had no clue if any dimension would open but She made sure that I was only focussed on Her. What opened before Goddess Mahalakshmi was something I had not expected.

Forgiveness.

Not forgiveness for some dramatic wrongdoing but something subtler. I suddenly saw myself seeking forgiveness for everything I had been given and had slowly begun to believe was mine. There are so many things about ourselves that we eventually start calling our strengths.

"I'm good at cooking."

"I’m good at numbers"

"I work hard."

And because these qualities have been with us for years, we start believing that they belong to us.

Yes, perhaps we practised for thousands of hours.

Yes, perhaps we worked extremely hard.

Our effort matters. But if we look a little deeper, how much of the foundation for that effort was given to us?

If I sing beautifully, who gave me the taste that could appreciate music?

Who placed me in a family where music was heard?

Who sent the right teacher into my life?

Who gave that teacher the knowledge they passed on to me?

Who created the opportunity for me to learn?

Who gave me the temperament to practise repeatedly?

Even the quality we proudly call hard work may have roots we did not consciously create like our genes, our role models, our circumstances, the people who encouraged us etc. And yet somewhere along the journey, we forget the Giver.That was the realization that stood before me at Goddess Mahalakshmi's feet.

This awareness I always had as an information. But experiencing it is something else altogether. Your entire body vibrates. Every cell realizes it. The entire system seeks forgiveness and not just the mind. You experience wholesome. The command comes from outside and not what I told myself. This feeling is no way I can produce myself.

And then came an even more uncomfortable question- Have I done enough Justice to What God Has Already Given Me? Perhaps every gift carries a responsibility hidden inside it and She made me ask eventually:

"How does what has been gifted become useful to the world beyond me?"

Let us take a pause and sit with that question.

That question changes everything. You stop looking at your gifts as your achievements that you can take it for granted. You begin seeing them as assignments.

Standing before Her, came the next Golden line- She made me say, 

“Forgive me for forgetting.”

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How powerful is that?!!

There was something deeply beautiful about these realizations arising in the presence of Her. We often go to Mahalakshmi seeking abundance. But she made me accountable for the abundance I was already blessed with. 

I came back from Kolhapur with these questions: “Have I done Justice to What God Has Already Given Me?” “ How do I use these gifts for a greater purpose that is beyond me?”

Maybe tonight, instead of listing everything we still want from life, we can sit quietly for a few minutes and ask “Show me how to use what You have given me for something greater?"

That was my Mahalakshmi experience!