Q: Can you throw some light on how our spiritual sadhana, let’s say Shambhavi Mahamudra, can help us manage time, information and energy?

Sadhguru: It definitely helps you to manage energy. And to manage your information properly, or to not succumb to the tendencies caused by past information, energy is a very important part. For example, when it rains, the roads to the ashram can become quite slushy. Sometimes, in certain places, you will see a whole line of vehicles – even buses – standing there, unable to cross, but I will cross and come because if you have enough energy in the vehicle you are driving, it will force itself through the slush. Otherwise, it will go wherever the rut is.

The old information causes ruts. Once the old rut has formed, if you don’t have enough power, you can’t get out of it. It will take you in the same rut. If you want to get out of it, you need some energy. So, if you generate sufficient energy, you can also handle the tendencies caused by the old information. Karma can be broken only if you have the needed energy. So the sadhana you are doing right now definitely serves these two purposes.

What It Takes To Manage Time

On a day when you got into the Shambhavi properly, 21 minutes felt like two or three minutes, isn’t it? Or is it feeling like 24 hours? If it is, that also is good, because you are making 21 minutes into 24 hours –you are multiplying time! If 21 minutes feels like two or three minutes, you are shrinking time. Above all, once your energies are in a certain way, what someone does in 24 hours, you may do it in six hours.

Subscribe

Get weekly updates on the latest blogs via newsletters right in your mailbox.

Karma can be broken only if you have the needed energy.

So all three things are being managed in a certain way, but specifically about time, if we want to have a grasp of time, then we would need a sadhana which is of a different nature. What you are doing right now gives you some grasp, but it is mainly focused towards handling the karmic information and the energy. If one wants to have mastery over time, it needs a different approach. If we have to go that way, either you must have an enormous understanding of various aspects of life – it will become extremely scientific. Or, you must be simply willing to listen. If you have either one of these qualities, it is possible. Enormous understanding will not happen in a short time. It will take lifetimes for people to understand how time actually happens. I know science has some explanations for time, they have taken a few steps, but it is nowhere near the ultimate reality of what time is. So, I would say, going into such sadhana right now limits itself to only those who will simply listen. If they are like that, we can do kala-related sadhana.

The Glorious Face

There is a story about Keertimukha. Every temple is adorned with the image of Keertimukha. Once, there was a yogi who gained some powers. He came to Shiva and started trying to bother him. Shiva ignored him but the guy would not leave. Shiva was in one of those moods, so he just created a creature, a demon in a human form, and said, “Eat this nuisance up.”

Keertimukha rose above time, space and everything. He is above gods means he has risen beyond all these dimensions.

When the yogi saw this, he fell at Shiva's feet and said, “Please, this once, let me go. I will never again bother you.” Then Shiva told the demon, “Okay, leave him.” But because the demon was created particularly to eat this yogi, he came with an empty stomach, so he said “You created me to eat him and now you are saying don't eat him. What am I supposed to do?” Shiva was in one of those blissed-out moods, and said “Ah, you eat yourself.”

After some time, he heard crunching noises, and when he looked, the demon had eaten himself up completely. The whole body was gone and in the end, he was eating up his arms. Shiva looked at him with his two arms sticking in his mouth – everything else gone – and said, “Oh, you are a glorious face. One who is able to eat himself up like this is a truly glorious face. You are above all gods.”

So every temple has the face of Keertimukha. He ate his own body up because Shiva said so. No reason, no sense, he simply ate it up. So he rose above all gods. What is being said is that he rose above time, space and everything. He is above gods means he has risen beyond all these dimensions, because even gods are subject to some of these realities. He is above all that.

Editor's Note: “Mystic’s Musings” includes more of Sadhguru’s wisdom on life, death and the human mechanism. Read the free sample or purchase the ebook.