What is Tantra? Secrets of the Left-Hand Path & Goddess Kali with Nishanth Selvalingam

[00:00:00] Speaker A: Very excited. I've been wanting to talk to you for a while, one on one, and here we are. [00:00:04] Speaker B: So I'm so grateful. Thank you so much for having me. [00:00:14] Speaker A: All right, well, I already know what you do. I already know who you are. But for anybody I do, you don't. Yeah, well, hey, work in progress, but I start off every podcast by the guest given a little bit about who they are and what they do. So could you give us a little synopsis of that? [00:00:34] Speaker B: Yes. I'm a priest, I think first and foremost of Mother Kali, But I like to speak about things regarding Tantra and specifically tantric non duality, which I think is where our shared interest is. [00:00:48] Speaker A: Cool. So how would you define tantra? What is tantra? [00:00:54] Speaker B: Beautiful, Beautiful question, G. Because often when we misunderstand one another, it's only because we're using the same terms but meaning different things by them. So, like words like kundalini, chakras, tantra, these are all very loaded terms. As one friend of mine said, it's like there's a difference between tantra and tantra, and that's not to demean the former or glorify the latter. It's just we're talking about different things using the same words. So the word tantra, I'll define it as a genre of spiritual literature present in the Indic subcontinent and became mainstream maybe 5th, 6th century A.D. probably around 6th century A.D. it started becoming like this mainstream genre, a Pan Indian movement. And the word specifically refers to a type of text. And usually this kind of text will be a revelation from a deity like Lord Shiva. Typically, it's Shiva giving a teaching to Parvati, but often it's also Parvati giving a teaching to Shiva. And so at least we can say that Tantra is a movement that first emerged within Shaivism as a scriptural tradition in which Lord Shiva is revealing certain spiritual teachings. And then later that format gets adapted into Vaishnava forms and Jain forms in Buddhist forms. So there's Buddhist tantra revealed by Manjushri, Vaishnava, Tantra, Jain, Tantra, all of that. But essentially, tantra is that spiritual genre in which a deity like Lord Shiva reveals spiritual teachings. And usually those teachings are of a ritualistic and ceremonial nature. [00:02:17] Speaker A: So where would you say it came from? As in, where was it or why was it imparted upon these people to write this in this fifth and sixth century? Right. Because Sanata, Dharma, and Shaivism has been here for a very long time. [00:02:36] Speaker B: Yes. [00:02:36] Speaker A: So was it like a revolution of the sword of the Dharma. [00:02:40] Speaker B: It's a good question, because the Tantric tradition doesn't conceive of itself as being outside the Vedic tradition. And as you know, the Vedic tradition is sanatana. It's endless and eternal. And so there are movements, like academic movements, secular academic movements in India and abroad that try to articulate tantra as a non Vedic movement, perhaps a Dravidian movement that was popular in the subcontinent, but like outside the Aryan fold, you know? So depending on how we see the Vedic tradition, there are some authors, like Devdut Pattanaik and others, who suggest, like, tantra might be a South Indian Dravidian tradition that's interjecting into the Vedic world. Or it might be a pre Vedic tradition, like in the Indus Harappan valley. Like, there are these seals that depict what look like images of Shiva or Durga, very popular Tantric images today. So perhaps it's pre Vedic, perhaps it's non Vedic. But we Tantrics within the tradition often say it's as vaidika as the Vedas, because our claim is that Lord Shiva, he incarnates in this incarnation of compassion. It's a mystical claim. And he has these five heads, and from these five heads he speaks these tantras, kind of like a mystical vision. And these tantras, according to the tradition, are none other than the Vedas represented for the people of this particular Yuga Kali. Yuga. Kali Yuga means this particular age of spiritual density where there's like a particular predisposition that most people, not all people, but most people have. And so tantra is just that same Sanatana dharma that was there in the Vedas, that is there in the Shaiva world, but is now presented in a way that's uniquely suited for the modern practitioner. [00:04:05] Speaker A: I see. So it's like a revitalization of the Dharma. [00:04:09] Speaker B: Yeah, it's a revamp. It's a. What do you call it? Like a re up at the rave. Yeah. [00:04:13] Speaker A: 2.0. [00:04:14] Speaker B: 2.0. [00:04:16] Speaker A: Wow. So now what does the revitalization entail? I know that's obviously a very big question, but if you could summarize that. [00:04:24] Speaker B: It's a great question. I mean, the Vedic world is essentially a world of mantra. The foundational metaphysic of the Vedic world is that this universe is vibration, which of course finds its echoes in modern quantum mechanics and whatnot. So the Vedic practitioner say the Brahmana performing a ritual has great faith in the power of the word to affect reality. So in the Vedica Dharma, one reason to do rituals is to Create worldly prosperity, worldly well being, and then to guarantee some kind of afterlife like enjoyment. And so the heaven here is not an eternal heaven. There are no eternal hells or eternal heavens in Sanatana Dharma. In fact, that would be a mathematical improbability. How could something start at one point and be endless? An endless series must also be a beginningless series. So any heaven that is attained through ritual is also necessarily lost when the punya or merit of that ritual runs out. So therefore there's a great urgency to doing these rituals because by doing them you ensure that the rain comes, the crops are abundant, there are cows, the enemies don't attack you. And then after you die, you can visit like Pitti Loka and hang out with your ancestors and like get a pint at the bar or something or whatever, Loka, Gandharva loka, where you make music with celestial musicians. Like, there's this very rich cosmology and all of it is oriented towards life affirming pleasure, joy, happiness. Now, the Vedas also present, as you know, the Upanishads, these gnostic contemplative teachings that posit a goal beyond merely like, well being in this life and in the hereafter. So the Upanishad say, we're not here to teach you how to get to heaven. We're here to teach you how to stop wanting to go to heaven and instead get something even better, something real and tangible and true, which is Gyana knowledge. So what you get in the Vedas is this twofold teaching. One is on action or ritual, the other is on contemplation or knowledge. And so the first half tends towards like, householder life where you might get married, you have children, you engage with society. Whereas the second path seems to be more of like an aloof, renunciant path where you step away from the world and maybe even move into retirement. And the two of them can be seen as parts of, like, a process, the first one preceding the second one. Or they can be seen as independent paths. But these are the two streams of the Vedas, Kriya and Gyana, action and knowledge. And both can be seen as two ways of understanding the same teaching. Now, in any case, though, the whole thing is told in mantra. If you want kriya action, you use mantras to affect change in the world. If you want knowledge, again, you use mantras like Om in the Manduki Upanishad to attain knowledge. So the claim here is that whether it's secular or spiritual, whether it's para or apara, higher or lower knowledge. It's mantra, the chanting of sacred formulas that creates the outcome. So tantra is exactly like that. It presents mantras and it presents a metaphysic that says if you learn mantras, if you use mantras, you can create change in the inner and quote, unquote, outer world for either worldly or spiritual benefit. [00:07:14] Speaker A: To me, how you just described it, mantra sounds synonymous with magic. [00:07:18] Speaker B: It is actually one to one. And Kaula marga vammachara is like very chaos magicky, actually in the Western ceremonial sense. [00:07:25] Speaker A: I see. [00:07:26] Speaker B: Beautiful. One must remember that Alistair Kroluji, he was very involved in, like, studying tantra. And when he came and he taught a lot of those practices that he taught, I think have a direct correlate. He would even use words like tattva and things like that. He was like directly quoting from this tantric, especially Kaulachara literature. [00:07:44] Speaker A: Yeah. Now, are you one to say that tantra also imbues in other traditions like Buddhism or Scandinavian traditions? [00:07:55] Speaker B: Buddhism is a great thing to bring up. G. Because like Vajrayana, Tantra has really innovated Tantra. Because arguably what happens is tantra is developed probably in the Indic subcontinent, like maybe in various parts of India. Right. But then it moves into Tibetan historically with guru Ninpoche ji and whatnot. But there it takes on a whole new flavor because it assimilates these Bonpo practices. And there are these great masters, like, so many of them, but they're all like, innovating the tradition actually beyond, say, Milarepa, how he innovated after Marpa and all of that is like, based on text that Marpa would acquire from India and then translate into the Tibetan. And then you get like Tibetan masters like Songkhapa and whatnot, and they're really just taking tantra to a whole new place. But you'll see that the fundamental structure is the same between Vajraya and a Buddhist tantra and Hindu tantra. There's a deity, there's a mantra associated with that deity. The metaphysical kind of formulation as to what a deity is might change between the two traditions, but the practice more or less is chanting the mantra to connect to the deity and then through the grace of that deity, attaining whatever it is that system prescribes that you should attain. [00:08:58] Speaker A: Okay, we're getting right into it, man. We're not even 10 minutes in. This is already very powerful. [00:09:03] Speaker B: Wonderful. [00:09:06] Speaker A: It's great stuff. So when you say a deity, right? Are you saying it's like this out there thing? What is a Deity. I know. Another big question. See, when I see deities, I see that as just something, a particular state of mind that I can reach, a particular energy that is within me that I tap into. How would you define deity? [00:09:28] Speaker B: These are wonderful questions, G. And just to your point, about the Scandinavian stuff, I don't have much experience with that tradition, but once I was sitting at a homa, a fire ceremony, which is the most Vedic thing you could do, and it's the centerpiece in Tantric ritual. And I'm making offerings into the fire. And often in between offerings, I like to, like, sing. And I'll sing songs, you know, Bengali songs, Tamil songs. And there was someone there at the fire. She had never before been to a homa. She was there with her friends visiting from the Pacific Northwest. They came specifically for Kali puja. But she has this background in, like, Scandinavian traditions, and she speaks Old Norse and things like that, or at least she has an understanding of Old Norse. So she starts singing a song, and it was so moving in that Old Norse. It felt like a hymn in Sanskrit. Like, you could feel the power of it, the ancient magic there, you know. And afterwards, I asked her to translate it for me. And it was a song that I think, you know, was in the. In the person of Freya speaking to Odin, ji And Freyaji is saying, like, something like Odin, you're questing after knowledge, but you're forgetting what's right there in front of you. And I was so moved because it's the most poignant Kaulachara sentiment that God is here and now embodied as everything and everyone. So when we say, like deity, I realize, like, wow. Like all the traditions in the world, not only do they have the same magic, but I think universally there's this understanding of deity, as you said, as something inward, something within, and it might find its correlate in the world without. Until we realize that the world without is nothing but a mirror. In fact, it's the world without alone that appears within. So even if I see a deity standing before me with a sword and a severed head, holding these gestures with long hair, even if she's standing in front of me and I'm looking at her as if she's outside, which is an experience that is worth having, that can be had, we argue in the tradition that should be had through sadhana or mantra practice or some spiritual discipline, that experience is actually as internal as a meditative experience. I'm looking at Kali. I'm looking at the goddess standing in front of me, But I never Feel like she's out there. So we'd say deity then, in the highest sense of the word, is a reading on reality. Each deity is interchangeable with every other deity because they're all just a way of presenting and reading and representing reality. Capital R, which you could say is God or brahman. And that reality, although the same, is approached differently by different people owing to maybe the infinite nature of that reality and the fact that we have different dispositions as people. [00:11:45] Speaker A: Well said. Yeah. So it seems like to me tantra and magic is really just psychological tricks we play ritual. [00:11:55] Speaker B: Exactly. It's body, mind, materials. That's it. [00:11:58] Speaker A: Yeah. It's quite simple in that regard. [00:12:00] Speaker B: Yes. And circle, triangle, square. Really? What more do you need than these things? [00:12:06] Speaker A: I like it. Oh, man. Okay, where do we go from here? [00:12:11] Speaker B: Let me take that deity thing in another direction. I like the question of what is a deity, because you can answer it in at least four ways. You could say the deity is in one sense a sthula or gross form. And that's what we were referring to earlier. When you're having a vision of someone like Freya or Kali, they seem to be distinct personalities that speak to us and that have anthropomorphic, or maybe zoo anthropomorphic forms, like Ganesh might have an elephant head or some yoginis will be described as having serpent heads and whatnot. You know, you can even think of the Egyptian pantheon here. But in another sense, the deity is not anthropomorphic. The deity can also be understood to be a mantra. And here the vibration of the sound of the deity's name is synonymous with the deity. The deity is like a sound field. No, no hands or legs or anything. Then even more subtly than that, subtler than that is, the sound can be rendered into image. So like, you know, we call it the cymatics or something. When the water creates shapes and the vibration like that, the sound for the mantra, for Kali is synonymous with this shape over here, which up until recently is a very secret diagram. Oh, you can't quite see it, but this is called a mandala or a yantra. Actually, there's. There's a better one behind me. That yantra, that five downward pointing triangles within a circle with a dot in the middle and some petals like that is Kali's geometric shape. Her sukshma shari. The subtle form. Then we claim not only is there a physical form, a mantra form, or sound form, not only is there a visual form, geometric form, but there is also the para form, which means the transcendent form. And this would be the formless, impersonal reality which actually becomes every deity. The way. The way waves in an ocean might arise from the water. Just like that, this formless reality becomes the deity that we worship through mantra, through yantra, and through puja. Mm. [00:13:58] Speaker A: Glad you took it down this route. So the essence is like tuning an instrument. We're tuning ourselves with sound or maybe with imagery to imbue the deity in within ourself. [00:14:09] Speaker B: What a beautiful way of putting it. Yes, we're tuning and each deity is a particular like scale or melody or key or something. And so the more you do the mantra, the more you look at the yantra, the more you perform the puja or the ceremony, the more like that deity you become. So you can often tell what deity a person is worshipping by just looking at them. You don't even look at their puja. You probably won't know what mantra they're chanting because these are quite secret and personal and they might not even show you their yantra. That also might be something they keep secretly, if even they have one. They might just draw a mandala, do the puja, and then get rid of the mandala, you know, like, so they're very secret about those parts. But like, if you look at them, you're like, okay, this is a Bhairava bhakt or Kali bhakta or Shiva bhakt or a Krishna bhakt. You can tell they take on the qualities of that deity. [00:14:50] Speaker A: That's funny because I was actually speaking to someone who was a Christian one time and he said the more that you study the text, the word Christ himself, the more you start to look like him, the more you start to view him. And I think it's the same essence. Doesn't have to be Jesus, but any of these powerful deities or vibrations of being, the more you start to see it outwardly or yeah, I guess expose yourself outwardly, the more inwardly you will just naturally form in an energetic sense, but also in a physical sense as well. [00:15:19] Speaker B: Yes. People look like their dogs and their spouses. [00:15:22] Speaker A: Yeah, exactly. Yeah, yeah. It's powerful stuff. So what would you say is the ultimate goal of us performing this magic, doing these rituals? You know, all of the stuff that we do, chanting the mantras, what is the end goal? Is it just enjoyment of life, would you say? [00:15:41] Speaker B: See, the Vedas are very life affirming in that way. And they present this like fourfold goal structure that they think is universal for all humans. Kind of like a Maslow's pyramid. So Here we have karma at the base of the pyramid, which is like one's desire for pleasure and gratification on all levels of experience. So it could be like eating chocolate cake. It could be an orgasm. It could be art. The experience of jazz music or fine art, like all of that is included in karma. Even aesthetic, poetic experiences can be considered a kind of sense gratification, of course, involving the higher faculties. Higher. But then we have this artha, which is interesting because some people might be interested in Arthur even at the expense of karma, pleasure, or desire, because artha is literally meaning. But it can be translated as like, leaving a legacy, becoming famous, or often it's translated as building wealth. So some people like to build wealth for its own sake. They don't even need to, like, spend that money to get, like, chocolate cake. They just like building that money and maybe even contributing to society, like philanthropic work, things like that. So that's called Arthur, and it's a different kind of enjoyment. Now, the pursuit of kama or artha without dharma, dharma, meaning like an ethical and like, metaphysically sound framework, will lead to unfortunately, like, some adverse side effects. So that's what the Vedic culture realizes very quickly, is that the goal of life is to get pleasure and wealth, perhaps. But the way to do that is to do it in the context of a society where we enter into a social contract of sorts. So dharma is like righteousness or ethics. And that's the foundation for one's pursuit of both kama and artha. So the goal now would be to live a happy, meaningful life in the world, to enjoy all that the world has to offer in terms of the senses, both physical and intellectual, to enjoy wealth building and to contribute to society, and to do all of that in this way that's like, enjoined by the text in an ethical and conscientious way. Now, arguably, that will never satisfy a human totally, though arguably there's something deeper, a deeper purpose. And that we just say is moksha, meaning liberation. But that's defined by different traditions in different ways. There are entire texts doing comparative studies as to what moksha is and what it looks like in one lineage as opposed to another lineage. Is it like the permanent ending of suffering only? Or is it the attainment of some kind of bliss? Do you preserve your individuality? Or like a drop going into an ocean, do you forget yourself and become the all? Or is it a kind of nihilistic nothingness where the dream vanishes and, you know, like. Like these conversations about what that looks like, but essentially it's eudaimonia, it's self actualization. It's like that having attained which nothing higher can be attained. And as Sri Krishna says, na duke, na Guru naapi vichalyate. Having attained this, not even the heaviest sorrows can shake us. Atyantika, dukkha, nivritti, paramananda, prabhupti. These definitions allude to what it might be like, the permanent cessation of suffering, the attainment of supreme bliss, more or less that which will actually fulfill us. Although the other things come close, this is what actually does it. So moksha is a spiritual goal, whereas kama and artha and dharma are considered secular goals. One is called para transcendent and the other is apara, imminent or sacred and secular. But the beautiful thing is that they're not seen as distinct or mutually opposed to one another, but rather like as parts of a process. Doing one will lead to the other and vice versa. Moksha might be the best bhoga, or enjoyment. And bhoga will eventually create an appetite for moksha, for liberation. Now the tantric world is like the Vedic world, super tolerant of each individual's unique orientation. So if somebody just wants to like hex their ex or something. Yeah, there are tantras for that. They're like ritual manuals to do that. And arguably that supports that individual's personal journey towards moksha. And that's the idea, like each one of us wants something different. Ultimately we want the same thing, but the way we're going to get that is so unique to each and every one of us that tantra just says, okay, whatever goals you have, we'll try to like accommodate it. But ultimately all tantras will have this goal, which is the attainment of something like moksha, like the attainment of some transcendental bliss that either involves the preservation of the individual or the annihilation of the individual. The perception of the deity in a physical form, or the perception of the deity as the all pervasive consciousness. But it's something spiritual. That's what makes tantra a spiritual tradition, because it's oriented towards this transcendental spiritual goal which the Vedas call moksha. [00:19:54] Speaker A: So we all want freedom, we all want to be free. [00:19:57] Speaker B: Yes, thank you. That's the best word for it. Freedom. Satantria. Freedom? Yes. [00:20:02] Speaker A: What is it? Satantria? [00:20:03] Speaker B: Yes. The. The key word in this shakta world of Tantra is sva, Tantria and Shiva. This reality is called swa oneself. Tantra means to expand. So here the word tantra doesn't refer to, like, the exegetical or scriptural tradition or genre of spiritual literature. Like I said earlier here, the word tantra refers to expanding. So sva tantra means to expand of your own accord, moved by your own will, in an unimpeded and unobstructed flow of expression. [00:20:30] Speaker A: I like that. Yeah. Unimpeded flow of expression. [00:20:33] Speaker B: Yes. [00:20:33] Speaker A: That's what I feel Freedom is. [00:20:36] Speaker B: Yes. [00:20:38] Speaker A: Yeah. I just gotta sit with that one for a second. That's good. An unimpeded flow of expression. [00:20:44] Speaker B: Vichitra prasara, vichitra sara, prasara bharitakara. That fullness which, in wonderment and poetic rapture, pours forth its essence without losing its essence. Or poor Namada, poorname, dham por naad, poor Namuda. From fullness comes fullness. Fullness remaining the same all the while. That is full, this is full, all of this is full. So that unimpeded expression. [00:21:11] Speaker A: Yeah, I think all in all. I mean, it's hard to generalize, but it seems like to me, all in all that unimpeded expression is like giving yourself to other forms of expression. Right. Service or bhakti. I think it has to do with, like, in your expression, you express. You express yourself in others in a way. You know what I'm getting? Yes. [00:21:35] Speaker B: Oh, this is profound. Because every tantra is rooted in a different metaphysic maybe than any other tantra. So they all have a different worldview. But my favorite, in my tradition, we argue that, like Shiv Ji, Shiva is pure consciousness, which is what I am and what you are and what alone is. And that Shiva is innately not only free but creative and expressive. So this entire universe appears within Shiva. And here, by Shiva, we don't mean a deity necessarily. We mean deity, capital D, reality itself, which is now this, like, creative being. And so within this deity, he just dreams this world. He just imagines it. And each, like Baba Gheri and each Nish Ji, like each person is like one node through which Lord Shiva is expressing himself. So if Nish wants to do X and if Baba Gary wants to do Y, then when Babaji does Y and when Nish does X, it's Shivaji actually doing both X and Y. Both are his inquiry into the infinitude of his own being. So therefore, whatever a person wants to do, whether it's eat chocolate cake or, like, be a jazz musician, if they follow that ichat, that desire, it's the Lord alone acting through them for no other reason than to Explore his vastness, for poetic rapture, for joy, for the unimpeded flow of his expression. [00:22:44] Speaker A: Yeah, that's it, man. I think we just figured it out. [00:22:51] Speaker B: We're here to be happy. And if you're happy and you know it, clap your hands. So we're here to just clap and be happy. [00:22:59] Speaker A: It's just art, right? That's the word that came in for me. It's just art for art's sake. Like, we're here to create. In your incarnation, whether it's niche or Gary or whoever's listening, you're here to create a form of art that only you could create. [00:23:10] Speaker B: Yes. [00:23:11] Speaker A: Unimpededly. [00:23:12] Speaker B: Unimpededly. And some people say this world is an illusion or it's a void. And so your job in spiritual life is to pierce the veil, like, see through the illusion. Wake up. That's one way of understanding the universe. Another way of understanding it is. It's kind of like a prison. And you're stuck here, and you need to do some work in order to get out, to get free, because the world impedes your freedom because of physical laws and various other things. Another way to understand the world is that it's like a bridge or a place of moral rectitude which God creates for our salvation. And so there's some other world. These are all different framings of the world. One way, I think, in and New Age and spiritual circles that we frame the world is as a school. Like, you know, take the curriculum, learn, and then graduate. But, you know, more or less, this is like saying the same thing in a softer way. It's, like, still described as a prison or as an illusion or a bridge, a means to an end, you know. But in the Shaiva world, this is so exciting. We have a wholly new metaphysic, an aesthetically oriented metaphysic that prioritizes creativity, expression, and play. So now the world is no longer a school. It's not even like a means to an end. It's the end. The world is a circus in which clowns are tumbling. And one Swami Vivekananda, he expressed that this world is a moral gymnasium in which we have come to build character. Years later, when he was visiting San Francisco, he said, this world is a circus. And he offended somebody because a lady was like, isn't it a school? You yourself said one time that it's like a school. Now you're saying it's like a circus. And he says, yes, madam, it's a circus. And here we are, clowns tumbling upon one Another. And she says, why must we tumble? And his only response is, because we like to tumble, madam. Because we like to tumble. So Shiva eva Grivitva Pashu BH Baha Lord Shiva, reality alone takes the form of a Baba ghere of a nish, of any of our viewers, of anyone in the world, of any animal. And Lord Shiva alone takes that form for no other reason than to express himself, to play, to enjoy the world which is none other than himself. Lord Shiva is established everywhere and always in every object of enjoyment, as the act of enjoying and as every enjoyer. [00:25:12] Speaker A: Beautiful. And that's the essence of the left hand path. Right is being able to enjoy the playthings of the circus. [00:25:24] Speaker B: So that's an interesting question because when we say vamachara left hand path, we get into some interesting waters here because I think that there's a very beautiful movement in the vamachara kavlachara which is like this. To be able to see pleasure and beauty not as obstacles to God, but as encounters with God. So here we get this aesthetic philosophy where you should offer things in your ceremony that are beautiful and pleasing to the senses, even when they might be transgressive. So like, say, wine. Abhinavagupta discusses wine. Because in the Vedic world, arguably there's like this conversation about soma, about being intoxicated. And there are all these verses in the Vedas saying that no God will come to your puja unless you give them this intoxicant and you yourself must ingest it. And only the intoxicated can worship God. So there's these hymns praising soma and intoxication, but we don't really know what that is. Is it a mushroom? Is it some kind of, like, stimulant? Or what is it? We don't understand really what it is. It could be metaphysical. Is it an astral thing? Who knows? But by the time you get to like smarta Brahmin traditions, like, what happens is we move away from that and we have this very, like, strict code that Manusmithi says, if you so much as smell wine, you must be reinitiated. You must take ritual baths of purification. What to say of drinking that wine? You can't eat meat, you can't drink wine. All of these things are pleasing to the senses. They're intoxicating. But because of that, there's something that we forbid. So in the vamachara world, it's like, what rule can impede the creative flow of Shivji? If he wants to drink wine and eat Meat. And if that's a beautiful and pleasurable and aesthetically enriching experience, he should do that. And he should do that as part of his worship. Another way to understand this, it's not for beauty or pleasure or aesthetic enjoyment. Rather it's for the sake of transgression itself, where, like a Brahmin needs to kill his ego of being so pure and so holy. So he ingests those things not for pleasure, probably. He's going to be very uncomfortable. It's going to be a horrible experience for him. He doesn't even want to drink this wine. But when he does it, the real wine, the real intoxication, is freedom from his construct of who he thinks he is. That's another way to understand Vahbach. A third way is just the path to power. And here it's not about the aesthetic appreciation, nor is it even about the psychological benefit of transgression. Here it's just the case that certain deities like certain fierce offerings, like meat, like blood, like wine. And those deities are fierce and if they are properly propitiated, they confer power and knowledge. So in like traditional vamachara, it's a path of power, actually. And you're offering these transgressive substances in order to, like, empower yourself by propitiating wrathful and terrifying cremation ground deities like Kali and others. [00:27:55] Speaker A: Wow. [00:27:56] Speaker B: Power. [00:27:57] Speaker A: Yeah. What do you mean by power? [00:28:01] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:28:01] Speaker A: Is that related with moksha? Like, you gain empowerment? [00:28:06] Speaker B: Yeah. And this is where, like, the conversation about moksha becomes important. Because some would say moksha is when you're free of embodiment, videha, mukti, they say, because as long as I have a body, I'm limited to this time and this place. So how can that be freedom? I can say I'm free, but I'm not actually free. I can't fly. Physical laws will bind me. And even if I develop occult powers, like the ability to levitate or whatever, there are still restrictions to that. I don't have unimpeded flow as this individual. So how can that be freedom? So the claim is that the only freedom is not the freedom of the individual, it's freedom from the individual. And that looks like forgetting yourself in a state of samadhi or something. Like you go beyond the body, beyond the mind. And typically this is a post mortem sort of thing. I must die for it in one way, shape or form, either in meditation or in like actual death, which is called a kind of meditation. So this is vidhehamukti. Now there's this Jeevan Mukti idea which is very interesting. The idea that I can be free and yet still be embodied. So is this like knowing I'm something other than my mind and body and knowing that even while I experience my mind and body, is this like a feeling of feeling like I'm all bodies or all minds? These are conversations worth having. And what does power have to do with it? Is freedom the freedom to will? Because some would say the moment I will, the moment I act, I've already implied a lack of freedom. I'm lacking something, I want something, therefore I act. So if I was free, why would I act? I wouldn't want anything, I'd be full. So the free is not willing and the willing is not free. Free will is a contradiction in terms. Then we counter that with the Bhagavad Gita we say no, no, no, There's a way to act not from emptiness or lack, but from fullness and expression. So Lord Shiva is active not because he needs anything, but because it's his nature to play. Similarly, I am Shiva, everyone is Shiva, everything is Shiva. And therefore power here is to enable Lord Shiva in that particular being to further express his Leela. So power is no longer demonized. It's actually seen as essential to the definition of freedom. A free person is now a powerful person, shakti. So one who is pervaded by shakti alone can be called free. And the worship of shakti Goddess or the energy of Lord Shiva is I think the vamachara trademark. [00:30:15] Speaker A: It's well explained. I think the problem is the colloquial definition of power is a little dirty in English language. You know how we use power, it's like dictating the will of others. [00:30:26] Speaker B: Exactly. And, and vachara is dirty. Like that's the problem. Like even the word vamachara because it's associated to power. The same cultural hang ups around power that are present in our modern day were also present in the classical tantric period. People really didn't like the idea of being empowered and they didn't like the idea of other people being empowered. So if there was a guru giving mantras that would empower their students, like that would be a problem because arguably how would you rule over empowered free individuals? So the Tantrika is almost a figure that's like marginal and liminal with regards to morality and ethics because they are sometimes interested in subjugating the will of others. It's called where they do magic in order to get certain outcomes. And maybe they're for hire. So I actually know a lot of people like this Tantrikas who do rituals, not for their own sake. They live in this mashan cremation ground. They're like, they're monks, you know. But people pay them, not always with money, sometimes also with narcotics. They get paid to do these rituals to get people to fall in love, to subjugate people, to scare people away, utchatana, sometimes to kill them, marana. These are all applications of power. And of course, tantra has gained a lot of notoriety for that use of power. But we don't reject that either. We think any kind of empowerment, whether it's magical, whether it's physical, whether it's intellectual, all of it can only help, never hinder. [00:31:44] Speaker A: Is there a Sanskrit word for power? [00:31:47] Speaker B: Shakti. Shakti. [00:31:49] Speaker A: Shakti is power. [00:31:50] Speaker B: Shakti means power, literally means power, agency, or, or I like the word kartritva, which means doership or agency. With shakti, one attains kartritva, but kartritva doership requires aishwarya, sovereignty. And that is rooted in freedom. So the word swatantriya, the word kartritva, the word aishwarya, all of that I would say are synonyms for the word shakti, Goddess or power. [00:32:14] Speaker A: I see. I've never heard it put that way. That shakti is power. [00:32:17] Speaker B: Yes. [00:32:18] Speaker A: I like it though. [00:32:19] Speaker B: Shakti is Shiva's power personified. [00:32:26] Speaker A: Okay, so this is a rather esoteric and out there question, but let's go there. [00:32:31] Speaker B: Yes. [00:32:33] Speaker A: How would you explain? Right. Once we are linked up, you could say to the will of Shiva. Right. We have this empowerment. What is Shiva's will? [00:32:44] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:32:44] Speaker A: What is Shiva trying to do through all of us? Is it just enjoyment? I know we could say it's, you know, we're trying to enjoy itself. But I mean, is there an end goal? Is Shiva trying to create something on earth? Like, is there a creation? I know this is a big question again, but what is Shiva's will? [00:32:59] Speaker B: Great question. Yeah. And there's like a Bengali couplet like amaricha versus Maa icha. It's a wordplay because ama icha means my will. And the question is, is it the same as ma's will? Maa Kali or maa meaning Shiva is Shiva's will the same as my will. And I think most religious traditions will say they're different because my will comes from this ego sense of being, this limited bound body, mind. And so my will is usually biological. You know, it's instinctual in that, like it's the desire to procreate, to survive. And that has psychological correlates. Like it's not enough to procreate now I must have a particular kind of relationship and enjoy all sorts of things. And it's not enough to survive, I have to have like this kind of house or this, you know, like. So my will is usually coming from a limited place and a limited sense of who I think I am. So often when I act out my will, arguably it leads to suffering. Like most of us when we try to do what we want. The Buddha's impermanence claim will be very powerful here. Like we become frustrated. So then we say, okay, either God doesn't have a will, but whether or not God has a will, I just have to stop doing my will. Like I have to like actually like, like discipline myself and do the hard thing, etc. Right? So this is, this is most religion. It tells you that what you want, you ought not want because the devil made you want it, or your biology makes you want it, or your conditioning, your karmas, your samskaras, your, your past lives are making you want it. And that's not freedom because you're under the thralldom of your past lives or some being. So get free and don't do what your body and mind tells you to do, instead do something else. But this is interesting because the only reason why you would do that other thing is if you got some kind of higher order pleasure or joy from doing that other thing. So if I would much rather stay in and sleep instead I get out of bed and I sit down to meditate. However hard it was to do that. The joy that I get from meditating arguably is better, is deeper, is cleaner. And that's what motivated me to overcome the hurdle of staying in bed. But if it was better to stay in bed, it would be sensible to do that. No, I mean it would be sensible to do what feels good and natural and right. And if it felt good, natural and right to discipline myself and get out of bed, that's what I should do. But if it doesn't feel good, natural and right to get out of bed, then maybe staying in bed was the more spiritual choice. This is where the shakta and vamachara world will offer maybe one of our most controversial teachings. And it's this. Whatever you want to do, whatever it is, that is synonymous with the will of God. Because God is within you, willing as you. So even if it's something frivolous like staying in and sleeping for another two hours, or eating chocolate cake, or helping the world with some global issue, or realizing God in a meditation cave somewhere. All of that, without any distinction, is the will of Shiva exploring his own being. And it cannot be towards a goal, because if Lord Shiva has a goal, then he has a desire. And a desire means he's not fulfilled in one sense. He's doing it just because, not for any outcome. If you wanted like a perfect world, like a utopia, that would imply time. And Lord Shiva is outside of time. So it's not like we're moving in an evolutionary sense towards something. It's all happening all at once, simultaneously within Shiva. Secondly, Shiva's full. He's poor Nama da. Poor Namidam. If that's the case, then there cannot be any end here. It's just, this is the end. The end is just to will and to carry out that will for no other reason than because it's my nature. To will. [00:36:08] Speaker A: Thy will be done, thy will be [00:36:09] Speaker B: done, my will be done, for it is one with thine. For I and my father art one. I can of my own self do nothing. Everything that I do, my father who art in heaven does through me. That's true for everyone. I think every individual is just moved by that divine will. What can we do? [00:36:23] Speaker A: Amen. [00:36:24] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:36:26] Speaker A: Now one would ask from that to be the devil's advocate. How do we differentiate between my will, that is, you could say kind of designated toward a goal, and Shiva's will? Is that actually the difference is like if you're doing it for something or not. [00:36:47] Speaker B: That's a beautiful way to look at the practical teaching from all of this. Metaphysical inquiry is like the things that you want to do for their own sake, with no thought of reward or consequence, are the things most worth doing and most fulfilling in this life. So you're right. Like Dharma is actually Swadharma. There's no external code that I should abide by. I should do what feels right for me. But the thing that feels right for me is often the thing that I'm going to do, whether or not anybody is around to see me do it, whether or not I get paid for it. So that's where creativity comes back. And like art. And you'll see in the Bhagavad Gita, this is the central teaching. Like Sri Krishna, God, allegedly God incarnate, much in the same sense as Jesus is God, like God incarnate is telling his best friend to go and kill his teachers and the holy men of his society and to go to war like God Is inviting this guy to do this thing. But this guy Arjuna, he, like, actually wants to do it. He's a warrior. His nature is to go and fight, and he believes in the cause. Actually, he just feels like he shouldn't. He has some moral compunction against it. He's, like, overthinking it. It's like a kid who wants to be a rock musician and she thinks, but how will I pay the bills? Like that. She wants to do something. But it feels impractical in Arjuna's case, even immoral. Think of somebody coming out of the closet or something. It's their nature to express themselves in that way. But they might be coming out in a community that tells them it's immoral to be gay. Often, morality and legality are used as ways to justify what we as a society call the practical choice. Like making money, making a living like that. Things that we really want to do might not always be moral, legal, or even practical. And yet we feel like doing them. So when we do that kind of thing, it takes great renunciation, great faith in oneself. That usually ends up being the most rewarding thing. But it doesn't have to be. The reward is not in the way that it, like, contributes. The reward is the feeling of doing what you're here to do, what shiva incarnated to do as you. So that's the teaching. Like, yeah. Shiva's will is to do things for its own sake. If I am Shiva from this point on, I should never do anything for anyone else in the sense that I think that I'm obliged. We hate the word duty. If I act out of service, it's not because I have a duty to you. It's because I love you. And out of love, I'm it. Doing this act. Not because I want to gain your appreciation or your respect or even some money. If I get that thing, it's okay. But if I don't get that thing and I feel upset, then clearly that wasn't an act of God. So we say, if you want to distinguish, and we can't distinguish all acts or acts of God as humans practicing the dharma. Any act that I do with no thought of consequence, whether reward or punishment, that act is most likely an act of shiva. It's most Shiva that shiva can be. And the individual willingness, that's love, man. That's love. Yes, love. We say will is willing from love. Love is a noun, not a sorry verb, not a noun. So shakti can be called love. The power is actually love. [00:39:33] Speaker A: I feel that I think we're touching upon the booty mind. Right. The discernment or intuition that comes about in this whole thing. I just know when something's right or wrong. And I've done what you're saying. I've done a lot of illegal things. Right, Technically, on paper, illegal stuff. But it felt right. It felt legal in the eyes of God. And that's all that matters. It's all that mattered to me. And it was all led by discernment. It wasn't led by some outward law saying not to do it. It was led by my heart, essentially. I know it sounds a little corny, but when you follow your heart, you follow God. [00:40:06] Speaker B: Yes, yes, precisely. And that isn't always the choice that is legal or moral, safe or practical. That's a profound reflection. Thank you for sharing that. Because we, I think, expect legal actions to be synonymous with God and. And when they aren't. That's why the Bhagavad Gita is important. Because what God is telling Arjuna to do or what he's telling Yudhishthira to do, like basically every character in the Mahabharata, they're all doing things that in one sense can be considered adharmic. In what sense then, is the Bhagavad Gita a text on Dharma, on righteousness, on. On. On God's will? You'll see. It's just exactly like you said. It's the willingness to have faith in what the heart says, even if it might lead to, like, death or crucifixion, as was the case for, like, every great spiritual teacher. [00:40:49] Speaker A: Yep. That's where this leads. Man is faith. That's really what they talk about, the Christians talk about, in terms of faith. It's not faith in some outward idol and, like, he's going to save me. No, you have faith in yourself, in your own righteousness, to lead the way. And sometimes it's faith in your own [00:41:04] Speaker B: modern faith, in your own martyrdom. Yes, that's beautiful. Faith in your own martyrdom. And that's why, you know, it's like we like renunciation. The word renunciation is important because it's almost like we say, whatever happens, I will do thy will. And thy will, O Mother, is that which arises in my heart whether or not society approves. And if I like through that discernment feel. It's interesting because Buddhi, I love the way you translated it where Buddhi has more of the connotation of intuition as opposed to, like, discernment or intellect. We can't analytically or logically think about what to do. Because our logic will often tell us that what we want to do, we shouldn't do because of this law, because of that code, or because of like paying the bills or whatever. But what we want to do, we know we should do with a different kind of reasoning. Faith being the reasoning of the heart. It's a knowing actually. It's never a leap of faith. It's never like blind faith. It's a deep knowing. But that knowing in the buddhi is. Is divine. Because it seems to be romantic. It seems to like, like laugh at all the mind's like, objections to why we ought not do it. [00:42:01] Speaker A: Yeah, right. Like there is a sense of humor that comes about when you follow your heart. It's laughing not necessarily at the world in a condemnation way, like holier than thou way. It's more so like laughing with it. You know what I mean? Like you're in on it. That's the power I feel. It's like you're laughing with it. You're no longer the brunt of the joke. You know what I'm saying here? [00:42:26] Speaker B: Yeah, I love that. Like you're the brunt of the joke until you realize, like, you're the. You're the joker and the whole thing is the punchline. Like, just like laughter. You're right. Laughter is the sound of the Om. We say Ma Kali laughing in the void is the sound of Om. [00:42:42] Speaker A: Really? I've never heard that before. [00:42:43] Speaker B: The whole thing is Kali's mad laughter. Mad because madness is the only way we can describe a being who acts like for her own sake, without any recourse to any logic or reason. Even if, like you say, there's a reason, already she's lost her freedom. Because reason implies cause and effect. Why did Kali become Gary? Well, because. If there's. Because cause and effect. So why did Kali become Baba Gheri? Just because she's mad like that. She's mad and drunk and laughing. And so in her drunken joy, she plays as Baba Gherry. However the legal system might think about it. You know what I mean? It's like, what? Who gives a fuck what society or law thinks about it? And that's when we accept our margin. So what, they crucify us? It's better to be crucified. It's better to be outcast living my truth than to be comfortable in the herd of sheep forever. Like pretending I'm something I'm not. [00:43:28] Speaker A: God damn mic drop on that one. Exactly. And you know, I also feel a Warrior spirit. You probably feel the same way. It's like we fight this battle, right? Kurok Satra. We fight this battle in our incarnation, in our martyrdom. There is just like a revolution, man. Like, I feel like I'm fighting against something, but it's not like the traditional way of fighting. That's the thing. We're not actually fighting fire with fire anymore. We're fighting with laughter, maybe with love. [00:43:59] Speaker B: Yes. [00:44:00] Speaker A: Right. [00:44:00] Speaker B: What a beautiful way of saying it. Yes. Because, you know, you've. You're touching on these bhavas. And in tantric. The tantric teachings, there are these three, at least three modes of tantra, which differs, like, from person to person based on who they are, their past, their spirit, you know. So some people, they say, others have veera bhava, and the third type is divya bhava, the animal, the heroic, and the divine dispositions. So the kinds of deities that they're drawn to, the kinds of puja or ceremonies that they like to perform, the kind of spiritual practices that they do, the kinds of people that they are will be determined by this bhava. And we argue those who come to Kali or to Bhairava or to in any capacity, vama, like left hand path practices, they have this veera bhava, the daringness to be different, to fight for something, and that it's an internal battle, is a jihad entirely wrought within the heart of just like being okay with shame, even the sense of digital death, like being canceled, being laughed at, being pushed out of a space. Like, there has to be a great courage in the heart. The word courage even implies that there has to be this hearty sense of fearlessness if you even want to tread the path of Kali. So you'll find that often those who worship Kali and Durga, who are depicted as warrior goddesses, they tend to have this veera bhava, whether they're like, actually warriors or not. Inside, they have this spirit. [00:45:17] Speaker A: I think that's what it is to be a human being, to be incarnate as a human being. One way or the other, we're all warriors. It just depends on what you're fighting for, Right? [00:45:25] Speaker B: Precisely. Right. [00:45:29] Speaker A: Do you feel like there is in the times that we're in another revitalization of the dharma of Tantra? I think, as you said, this came about in the 5th and 6th century, right? [00:45:40] Speaker B: Yes. [00:45:41] Speaker A: That was a long time ago. Do you think there's something going on where we are? Yeah, we're kind of reforming it in some way. [00:45:47] Speaker B: Yeah. I mean, this is a Touching question for me, because it does pertain to the lineage that I'm in and the view that we hold because we do claim, and the Hindu spiritual tradition has always claimed this, that from time to time, there comes this messenger who is God incarnate, who comes just perhaps to play, but part of that play is to do this revolution. And it must be again and again and again, because the times are changing. You know, as the great Rishi, Bob Dylan pointed out, it's like you need a new avatara for a new age, Avatara being the divine incarnation. And so what that avatara is saying is the same thing as every Avatara before her had said. But, like, that Avatara says it in a way that's uniquely, I think, suited for that temperament of that age. So our claim is that, like. Yes, like every couple hundred years or so, this tantra finds a new expression and often a more mainstream expression. So in the 6th century AD it was a very small group of people who knew about this, just like in the first 300 years of Christianity, which is a bunch of people, dusty monks in the desert. You know, like, it's. It's Paul, like, writing letters to small groups who would read the letters at dinner. You know, it's a very small movement, but then it quickly became mainstream. I think what happened in the 10th and 11th century is important because you had these great masters like Abhinavagupta, who were living in kingdoms where there was a lot of state patronage. We take, say, in the south, the Krishnadevaraya kingdom. There you saw kings who were deeply invested in the spiritual knowledge, in tantric spiritual knowledge. And they would invest a lot of money in, like, forming institutions, maybe patronizing these scholars and practitioners so they could spend their whole lives not making a living in a temple as a priest, but, like, doing spiritual practice, doing spiritual teaching and composing translations, exegetical, isegetical works. All of that was happening in this time, in the 10th and 11th century. So you saw, for the first time ever in the tantric world, the popularization of what otherwise might be very esoteric rural goddess traditions. And these were patronized by kings and widely disseminated up to the 20th century. You see kings like Deva Nandan, Raj, maybe they're currying favor with their people, I don't know. But they make it a point to pay money to scholars to compile things. Like in Bengal, the Shakti Sangama, which is the first of its kind, a compilation of esoteric worship manuals all put together and just printed and disseminated. People could just like access it on the market. How crazy. Now most of the time though, you wouldn't know what you. You wouldn't know what you'd be looking at if you found one of these texts. And you probably wouldn't know Sanskrit. So even though it's mainstream, it's like a Sanskritic tradition that although you can purchase a text, you have to be a certain kind of person to even want to purchase the text. So then what happens is in Bengal especially, there are these singers like Komalakanta Ram Prashad and they start singing in Bengali, like in the vernacular of the people at that time. The teachings that they're getting through their Sanskrit study, through their spiritual practice from those texts. So they act as a kind of bridge. Bengali poets like Rampashad. So now people have turned Kali from an esoteric cremation ground figure into a mainstream devotional image. And all Bengal they worship Kali. She's the mother of Bengal and of Kerala. So we say now there's a renaissance. Now for the first time, Icelandic bands, metal bands have Kali on their cards. People are having psychedelic experiences in South America. And seeing Kali, it's like she wants to be more present in the mainstream. And everything that's happened seems to be leading in that direction of mainstreaming Kali. As Acharya Timal Sinha once said, well, [00:49:05] Speaker A: what is Kali Yuga? [00:49:06] Speaker B: Yes, Kali Yuga. Kali is the deity of Kali Yuga. You're right. I think that's a big part of this, is that we've been working on something in India for a long time and other traditions have been working on it independently too. These ritual, ceremonial traditions grounded in this world affirming, Goddess oriented worldview. Now is the time we've developed it and now we're like presenting it as it were on the world stage and being like, here, look at this tradition. Maybe it's the kind of thing that will work right now. Maybe the other things are great, but they might not appeal to you that God is a judgmental, reasonable father. Maybe it's better to think of God as a drunk, happy woman. Maybe it's better to worship the body as opposed to demonizing it. These are all things that we as a tradition have valued, but that now I think have a new currency. Given the revolution we have in sexuality and women's rights in like political social changes mean, legality also has changed a lot. Now it would be legal for me to offer wine in puja to Kali, whereas a BRAHMANA in like 10th century India, I would have to do that entirely in secret, you know. [00:50:01] Speaker A: Interesting. Yeah. It seems like if Kali is power, Shakti, it's everybody having the access to power. [00:50:13] Speaker B: Yes, yes. [00:50:14] Speaker A: They're not having to be a middleman, especially with the Internet. [00:50:17] Speaker B: Right. [00:50:17] Speaker A: You can access your own power right now if you really want to. And I think that is the age that is Kali. It's like you find Kali yourself, you know what I'm saying? [00:50:27] Speaker B: An age of individualism, personal will. God's will is my expression, like, following that, like the new age. I think in many ways, for all of its drawbacks, I think that's one thing they're totally right about and that they preach often in the new age world. It's like, yeah, you make up what you want. Like, you understand these traditions. And of course, it can become very appropriating in a way. Like, he was like, kali is whatever you want Kali to be. She's like a justice deity who hexes your ex or whatever. But, like, the emphasis on the individual's own interpretation as being valid, I think that's valuable. And in the Tantric world, we value that. We value a person's ability to read reality along their own disposition. I can say Kali, someone else can say Krishna. It's important that we're talking about the same thing in different ways, because we're different people. So you're right. Like, back then, if I wanted a text, if I wanted a practice, if I wanted a community, I would have to go to a middleman, namely the guru. The guru owns the text physically in his house. The guru has access to the community and knows when they meet. And the guru, more importantly, will impart spiritual teachings which are often not in the text, but are orally conveyed. If I didn't have a guru, if I didn't submit to the authority of another human being, I wouldn't have access. But thanks to the Internet, the democratization of Tantric texts mean that you're right. Like, a person right now, if they knew what they were looking for, would have everything they need. A sangha, a community like your. Your community. Like, they would have access to teachers that could. Who never even have to talk to them. They can watch videos. They would have access to spiritual practices. And I think most importantly to me, the text. [00:51:49] Speaker A: Yeah, that's power, man. [00:51:51] Speaker B: That's power. That's democracy. Yeah, redistribution. [00:51:55] Speaker A: Yeah, redistribution. Decentralization of power. [00:51:59] Speaker B: Yes. [00:51:59] Speaker A: That is unlike any other era. [00:52:03] Speaker B: Yes. [00:52:03] Speaker A: Because as I said, there's no middleman. You don't have to have blind faith in somebody else's interpretation of the text. Yeah. Same thing with the Bible, too. I mean, really, any text but the Bible, it's always been, you know, the priest that knew how to read. [00:52:17] Speaker B: Yes. In Latin, you didn't have access to it. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And, like, I do really value the Sanskrit language. I think, like, from the conversation we were having earlier about mantra, there's something phonetically important about the sounds. But the beauty is that back then I would have to learn Sanskrit, and often I could only do that if I was born a male in a Brahmin caste. But now anybody can learn Sanskrit, and if they can access primary sources, like, back then they couldn't learn Latin. Now you could learn Latin and read the Bible in Aramaic and Greek and Latin. If they could access those primary sources and more importantly, access those sources in the language in which they were written and understand something of the cultural context in which that language was used, that would be most empowering. Even translations are interpretations. So in that sense, this is the best time for people to come to their own conclusions. And that's a large part of the controversy around me on the Internet is that people would expect me to take more of a traditional guru role. They want to see more responsibility and accountability on my part. But I often say I'm not a guru, although I'm giving mantras, I'm teaching puja, I'm offering exegetical lectures on texts. Like, I'm doing everything that a tantric guru would do, except I'm trying my best not to succumb to, like, 70s or 60s or 70s, like, American notions of the charismatic cult leader being the guru. You know, so here it's a decentralization in that the onus is on the individual. And I keep stressing that. And I think I've noticed people don't actually like that. Like, what they want is to be told what to do. They want a structure, they want authority, and they want rules. And then I'll tell them, you can do whatever you want. You can make of this text what you will. You're on your own. It's between you and God. And I can do my best to connect you to the material. But what you will do with that is. So I'm not a guru. God alone is the guru. You know, Like, I'm finding that even given the individualism, the decentralization, the empowerment, given the language that we use today about that empowerment, it's still scary, I think, for people to feel like no one is responsible for them or coming to save them, and they have all the power and therefore, all the blame and responsibility. [00:54:14] Speaker A: Yeah. That's the tough thing is because we were conditioned into a era or an age that is obsolete. So all of our conditionings, all of our upbringing was that somebody was going to save you. Whether it's your parents, the government, Jesus, whoever. Yes, they're going to save you in some way. But the new age that we're in is you save yourself. And that is very daunting. Very daunting to the ego. And there's no other way. That's the thing. [00:54:40] Speaker B: Yeah. Or the idea of. I want. Yeah, go ahead. [00:54:44] Speaker A: Sorry. [00:54:45] Speaker B: No, like, I was just like, the idea of, like, I can have my own interpretation of a text. Even that, like, what to say of, like, finding freedom and salvation on your own terms. It's like even trying to read the text and ask, what does this mean to me is scary. I'm noticing to people, [00:54:59] Speaker A: well, the devil's advocate would say, you have no right to interpret it yourself. [00:55:04] Speaker B: Exactly. And then Kali bhakta, say, who. Who gives the right? Like, what certificate do you have to have on the wall to give you the right to follow your heart and listen to your intuition? [00:55:13] Speaker A: Exactly, man. Yeah. That's why the spirit, the tantric spirit. Right. The. What we're talking about for the last hour is like, you're a rebel. [00:55:23] Speaker B: Yes. [00:55:24] Speaker A: You forge your own way, and you're gonna be a martyr in some way. You're going to be crucified in some way. Not necessarily physically, but there is going to be some kind of crucification from the people that want to hold on to the old ways. [00:55:35] Speaker B: Right, right. And that's always been true. Isn't that interesting? Like, every cultural period in which, like Kali Sadhana or like Shakta Sadhanas have emerged, they've always been in the Christian world. This is true also. They've always been in tension with the accepted conditioned way of being. And so then not to develop a martyr complex around any of this, but it's still kind of valuable to do the different thing because then the ego, which is conditioned to try to fit in and, like, survive by opting into the social contract that is destroyed. So Kali Sadhana is often not described as a path to worldly enjoyment. It's often described as a path to ruin. To worldly ruin, which is spiritually nourishing. [00:56:10] Speaker A: Yeah. Wow. So you're saying, though, you should learn Sanskrit. [00:56:17] Speaker B: Right. [00:56:17] Speaker A: Don't stop in English. [00:56:18] Speaker B: I think that would be empowering. I think, like, if people are going to study the Bible, they should try to study it in the language in which it was written. Otherwise you have to depend on King James telling you that pharmakia and Greek means which. Right. And that's what happens. People are really upset about like what I'm teaching at times because they think that it's newfangled or idiosyncratic or because the ideas are just so radical. But they're not my ideas. They're from texts. They're part of living traditions. And so I like to provide citation. I'm like, this is the text where I got this from. And even when it's my own interpretation, here's what I'm basing my interpretation on, reasoning based off these verses. And here's how I'm choosing to translate this word. Like I use a lot of texts as a reference and so I'm often pointing to texts. You know, I teach the vigyana bhairava paramaratasara, like paratis, like a lot of things like that texts. But, you know, it's hard for the people in my community to call me out or to check and balance what I'm saying if they don't have access to those texts, which they do, but if they don't know how to read those texts and come to those conclusions for themselves. So I think accountability here, and what will we do to create accountability in our community if not to empower people to read the Bible in language, to read the Tantric text in Sanskrit, it doesn't even have to be Devana Agri, it could be Sarada script, it could be Granti, it could be Bengali. But to access the Sanskritic Tantric tradition is the best way to be a part of that tradition. Otherwise you're practicing things that people tell you to practice without any ability to verify whether or not it's a thing. [00:57:40] Speaker A: Yeah. And Sanskrit has this power. If we talked about in the beginning of the conversation of tuning the instrument, Sanskrit, I think is just a very direct way to tune. There's something in just how it's saying. Right. You ever. Yes, you obviously you've done this. You ever say something in Sanskrit and then you translate it into English, it doesn't hit the same. [00:57:59] Speaker B: Exactly. Yeah. That's why earlier I was saying English words. They were so beautiful. But only because I was directly translating from the Sanskrit. And the Sanskrit is even more like, like, oh my God, it's like leftover, like a leftover meal at a Michelin five star restaurant. Like there's nothing like being there and eating it directly. You know, it's still good the next Day after you microwave it, but it's not the same. And so Sanskrit, like the people who are in the Tantric world, before they have a problem with Tantric teachers or quote, unquote, authorities, before they have a problem with the tradition, they ought to first go to the text. And they rarely do that. And when they go to the text, they can't read those texts. And yet they want to practice that tradition. They want to chant mantras that are in Sanskrit when they won't take the time to learn Sanskrit or read the Sanskrit text in which those mantras are presented. That's what baffles me. People want to be Tantrikas. They want to wear the costume, they want to do the sadhana, but they don't want to do the work to like actually be part of that tradition. And to me, that work looks like not getting diksha or like, not like putting on a certain costume, but like just reading the text. If tantra is defined as a spiritual movement that is based on an exegetical isagetical and scriptural tradition, then maybe we want to read those primary and secondary sources. Like, if it's a text based, traditional. Thank God we have the text. Let's read them. [00:59:10] Speaker A: Exactly. [00:59:11] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:59:11] Speaker A: Or more so sing them. [00:59:12] Speaker B: Right, Exactly. They're all songs. That's the beauty of. You're right. All the texts are like verses in meter and they're to be chanted and lived. We don't read it cover to cover, we sing it, we chant it, we contemplate it and it's there. Like the tantric world lives in these songs. And these songs are what we're passing down. And now, thanks to the written word, we can preserve them in a way that is like democratic and decentralized. And it's beautiful. [00:59:36] Speaker A: Yeah, it really is beautiful, man. Just the fact that it's all song. I mean, I think taking this to a greater extent, all of this is a song. This is the Bhagavad Gita. [00:59:46] Speaker B: Yes, yes. Brahma sings the world. [00:59:48] Speaker A: Yeah, exactly. And when you sing, you become part of the song. [00:59:52] Speaker B: Yes, yes. [00:59:53] Speaker A: Quite literally. [00:59:55] Speaker B: The tradition puts a lot of emphasis on chanting, like invoking and toning, but singing also. I think a Tantrika. Not everyone should learn Sanskrit, obviously. Not like, I'm not saying like Sanskrit is like, if you learn it, you'll be more spiritually nourished. Obviously not. But those who want to do tantra because it's a spiritual tradition based on text, they should learn Sanskrit. And more importantly, they should sing, they should chant, they should Use their voice. Because how can you participate in a Sanskritic scriptural tradition using voice and mantra if you yourself don't want to use your voice or sing or chant if you yourself don't want to read. [01:00:29] Speaker A: Exactly. It's so simple in that regard, in that way of speaking. It. It's just like if you want to become part of the song, you gotta learn to sing. Yeah. This is good stuff, man. Are you fluent in Sanskrit? [01:00:48] Speaker B: I wouldn't say fluent. It's one of those things that you study for your whole life, and I'm befuddled by it. Every day I study it every day, and every day I learn something new or I'm, like, confused again about something. It's just like. It's profound. It's like it's an endless study. And I really love the study of Sanskrit. [01:01:04] Speaker A: I gotta get hip. I mean, I know Sanskrit, obviously, from the popular mantras in kirtan, but you know a lot more than me, that's for sure. [01:01:12] Speaker B: And it's wonderful to meet, like, people like Anandji Bhairavanand, who is, like, the Sanskrit scholar in our community who teaches the classes. His understanding is oceanic. And, like, when I meet him and talk to him, and we sometimes converse in a little bit of Sanskrit here and there, I'll feel like I'm meeting the ocean. I'm like this little river. And it's so inspiring because there's so much more to learn. And it's a grammar, really, where one's mind is reprogrammed. Sanskrit, it's a timeless language. And that the grammar doesn't depend on the words appearing in a particular sequence. You could jumble up the words and the sentence would still make sense. And if you learn that language, you learn to think in that grammar. You fundamentally change your way of seeing the world. [01:01:49] Speaker A: Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. Wow. Sometimes I think our original form of communication was singing. [01:01:55] Speaker B: Yes. [01:01:56] Speaker A: We come from singing. And it's just deteriorated over the ages. [01:01:59] Speaker B: Precisely. And Sanskrit tries to preserve that, like, fluid melodic structure of sound. So even the way the letters are arranged like those are arranged as they are, because they're gutturals, they're on the back of the mouth. And you flow forward into sounds like Chuck palatals. And you flow forward into the dentals, the retroflex, dental labials. The sound. Like, the logic of Sanskrit is based on music, on melody, on sound. Take, for instance, when people want to chant a mantra, they don't know what the M with the dot on top of it is supposed to Sound like is it om or om, you know, like how do you actually pronounce the m with the dot? And the answer is that it depends. Say if I use the word no, it's not a good example. Say Sankirtana, the word kirtan. Kirtana means to sing. Now there's a ka sound. If I put some in front of kirtana, the M with the dot will morph to like sonically meld with the k. So the M becomes an ng, becomes sankirtana. But if I had a P or so if I had a C or let's say like a, like a J, it would become Sankirtana. Like it would sampradaya or something. The M becomes an n with if you see like the way that the like say dioyo nafprachodayat, it's not dioyo na prachodayat. The visarga melds with the pa, so it becomes dioyo nafprachodayat. So these logics, like grammar rules, are meant to preserve the song structure of the universe. [01:03:22] Speaker A: Wow, that's beautiful. [01:03:24] Speaker B: Yes. Wow. [01:03:25] Speaker A: Yeah. English is definitely not like that, that's for sure. [01:03:28] Speaker B: And each language is great in its own place. They each have its function. So English is good for things like this. It's a trader's language. It's easy to more or less like, easy to learn. [01:03:35] Speaker A: Trading ideas. [01:03:36] Speaker B: Trading ideas. It's good for this. But when it comes to, like Inuits in the snow, they have so many words for it because they're reality. Similarly, when it comes to the Rishi in consciousness, oh my God, there's so many words. And Sanskrit is the language par excellence. And by the way, unlike most languages like English or even like Hindi, which develop naturally and organically and spontaneously amongst people, Sanskrit is not like that. It's a coding language, like, like Python or C plus plus, it doesn't grow or develop, it's just fixed. The grammar is fixed. And it was revealed unto us by Shivji. So it's like a. It's a divine revelatory language, not a human natural language. [01:04:13] Speaker A: Yeah. You can just hear it, right? One can just hear it. [01:04:16] Speaker B: One can hear the difference. Yes. Yes. [01:04:19] Speaker A: Yeah, man. I like how you said it just flows, right? It like reforms on the go. Depending upon. Depending upon how you use the words in the sentence. [01:04:27] Speaker B: Yes. [01:04:28] Speaker A: Context forms itself. Yeah, it's fluid. [01:04:30] Speaker B: It's fluid, fluid. And each word has a dhatu, a root which is multivalent. So take the word you asked about, deity. What is deity? We'd say it's deva or devata. The root is div. But div has at least six meanings. A devata could be a shining of light, which is consciousness. Or the devata could be a playful one. Karida, one who plays is divine. How beautiful. A diva, right? A diva, like a musician or something. They are diva because they are like extroverted or whatever. They have a big larger than life personality that would be accounted for in the six or seven different meanings of the word div. The root for the word devata. Like that. So you can explain the word not just in terms of the context in which it lives, which as you pointed out, is fluid, but the word itself, even devoid of any context, is itself fluid and multivalent. [01:05:18] Speaker A: Beautiful. Wow, man. This is great. This is an awesome conversation. I think we can probably start to wrap it up, even though I do want to talk to you more. But I think we've Exhausted Enough Part 2. Tap in again in the future. [01:05:32] Speaker B: Always here. [01:05:32] Speaker A: Yeah. I thank you for trading ideas with me today, man. This was wonderful. [01:05:38] Speaker B: Such a stimulating discussion and great questions and precise. [01:05:42] Speaker A: Thank you, man. I wish you all the best, brother. That's it. [01:05:45] Speaker B: Peace and love, Baba Gary Ji. Thank you. Jaima Jai Jai Ma. [01:05:50] Speaker A: Peace and love, everybody.