Self-realization · 8 of 11
Sádhaná and Tantra
Sádhaná is the effort to get free. It is everyone’s duty, it asks no one to leave the world, and its practical science is called Tantra.
On each page the marked passages are the words of Shrii Shrii Ánandamúrti, from the books. The lines between them are ours and only lead from one passage to the next.
What sádhaná is
The word means effort. What matters is toward what.
An all-round effort for emancipation from the bondage of Prakrti is sádhaná or intuitional practice.
What is sádhaná? Sádhaná means practical effort. An effort to what? An endless effort to move towards Puruśottama, the Nucleus of the Cosmic Cycle.
Retracing the steps
The mind was built outward in three steps: the sense of “I am”, the doer, the mind-stuff. The way back is the same road walked the other way. It is given here as a principle only; the method is learned in person.
The influence of Prakrti gained a hold on unit consciousness gradually, and hence in order to get out of Her hold the unit consciousness will have to retract gradually. It will have to first retract from citta to ahaḿtattva, then from ahaḿtattva to mahattattva; and finally the metamorphosed projection as mahattattva will have to be withdrawn into unit consciousness for emancipation from the hold of Prakrti.
Not only for ascetics
The usual fear is that practice means giving up family and work. The fear is answered directly.
Intuitional practice, sádhaná, is the fundamental duty of everyone. Yet very few people perform this duty. Ordinarily people are afraid of doing sádhaná.
They regard emancipation as the privilege of ascetics, unattainable by normal worldly people. Neither is this a necessary requirement nor does it appear to be logical.
Merely leaving the human world and living in a jungle will not set one free. Avidyámáyá will go with you to the jungles and mountains and create obstacles in sádhaná by substituting the howling of animals for the bustling sounds of human society.
Tantra
Tantra here has nothing to do with ritual or the occult. The word is taken apart by its sounds: ta, dullness; tra, that which frees.
To resume our original discussion, ta is the acoustic root of inertness or staticity. Tantra is the spiritual practice which liberates one from the bondage of staticity (ta). It makes one active and dexterous in action. It exhorts people to work, to leap headlong into action, to run, to extend their hands and feet. This is the spirit of Tantra.
Tantra in itself is neither a religion nor an ism. Tantra is a fundamental spiritual science. So wherever there is any spiritual practice it should be taken for granted that it stands on the Tantric cult.
Progress is a fight
That is why Tantra speaks of struggle. An obstacle is not a sign that something has gone wrong.
Now this movement from imperfection to perfection, and in fact every movement in this universe, is not without obstacles. Fundamentally every movement involves opposition, and the resultant achieved during the fight against the obstacles is called progress.