A single Diya or lamp holds infinite beauty and hope. Diwali is a celebration of victory over evil or darkness and the coming of a New Year. But if we think deeply, what is this darkness we want to remove?
Light means to follow a virtuous path such that our thoughts are always pure in heart, our words are sweet and peaceful and bring joy to the listener and our actions are always beneficial first to ourselves, and to others as well as to the environment. Darkness on the other hand is when our thoughts are negative and when these thoughts are reflected in our words or actions, they bring hurt and sorrow to others at every step.
In reality, evil or darkness does not have an identity of its own it exists due to a lack of goodness or light. Knowledge, power and all that is pure, are very real characteristics since they are part of us, perhaps hidden yet existing. The Festival of Lights is the fight against evil forces and creation of peace and happiness. Diwali brings up a number of things in the mind's eye sweets, new clothes, account books, Goddess Lakshmi, fireworks etc.
So instead of celebrating Diwali, LET'S EXPERIENCE DIWALI.
As we clean our homes, let's clean our minds and intellects too.
As we wear new clothes, let's also get rid of our old, unwanted, disturbing habits of anger, jealousy, worry.... and emerge our new but original qualities of peace, love, bliss and happiness.
Tonight, we will settle our old account books and begin new ones, simultaneously let us settle our old karmic accounts, any unpleasant relationships and begin our relationships in a new, positive way.
We are all aware of the pollution caused by firecrackers, but it is Diwali, we need to burn crackers, so why not burn all the crackers of evil characteristics within ourselves - this burning will in fact purify our minds and the environment.
As we exchange sweets let us also exchange meaningful sweet words, good wishes and blessings.
If we really experience Diwali we will succeed in invoking (calling upon) Goddess Lakshmi. Her name comes from the word, 'Laksh' meaning the GOAL', experiencing Diwali (as explained above) will help us reach our ultimate goal of heavenly perfection which Goddess Lakshmi stands for.
Worshipping Goddess Lakshmi is good, but what is even better is making the wealth of spiritual (Ruhani) knowledge and qualities (which Goddess Lakshmi has to offer) a part of our life. A divine character alone can attain prosperity and peace.
The key lies in lighting a single 'Diya' - my own conscient awareness. The Rajyoga meditation - connecting with the Supreme Diya, the Supreme Soul, helps me in doing that.
The True meaning of Diwali is not known to many & majority of Hindus in modern times. Generally, it is linked to Ram, symbol of Virtues winning over Ravana, symbol of vices. In fact, it should be celebrated as Universal Festival if its true meaning is understood by all. "
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Diwali is celebrated for various cultural reasons but historically, it is called Naraka Chaturdashi because Narakasura, a very cruel king, was killed. Because of that, this celebration happened in such a big way. The celebration is auspicious in so many different ways. On this day, it is said that if someone needs money, Lakshmi will come in. If someone wants health, Shakti will come in. If someone wants education, Saraswati will come in. These are all dialectical ways of expressing that it will lead to wellbeing.
Creating an Inner Light
Diwali is the Festival of Lights. On Diwali, we see every town, city and village is lit up with thousands of lamps everywhere. But the celebration is not just about lighting lamps outside – an inner light has to come. Light means clarity. Without clarity, every other quality that we possess will only become a detriment, not a gift, because confidence without clarity is a disaster.
Without the necessary clarity, whatever we try to do will be a disaster. Light brings clarity to our vision – not just in a physical sense. How clearly we see life and perceive everything around us decides how sensibly we conduct our life. Diwali is the day when the dark forces were put to death and light happened. This is also the predicament of human life. Like the dark clouds which brood in the gloomy atmosphere, not realizing that they are blocking the sun, a human being does not have to bring any light from anywhere. If he just dispels the dark clouds that he has allowed to gather within himself, light will happen. The Festival of Lights is just a reminder of that.
Life as a Celebration
In the Indian culture, there was a time when there used to be a festival every day of the year – 365 festivals in a year. The idea behind this was to make our whole life into a celebration. Today, maybe only thirty or forty festivals remain. We are not able to celebrate even those now because we have to go to office or do something else daily mechanically having too many worries in mind. So, people usually celebrate only around eight or ten festivals annually. If we leave it like this, the next generation will not have any festival. They will not know what a festival is. They will just earn and eat, earn and eat – they will go on and on with just this. It has already become like this for many people. A festival means they give us a holiday, and we wake up only at noon. Then we just eat more, go for a movie or watch television at home. And only if they take some external stimulants, will these people dance a little. Otherwise, they will not sing or dance. It wasn’t like that before. A festival meant that the whole town would gather in a place, and there would be a big celebration. A festival meant we got up at four in the morning, and very actively, lots of things happened all over the house.
Non-serious but Absolutely Involved
If we approach everything in a celebratory way, we learn to be non-serious about life but absolutely involved. The problem with most human beings right now is, if they think something is important, they will become dead serious about it. If they think it is not so important, they will become lax about it – they don’t show the necessary involvement. When someone says, “He is in a very serious condition,” that means his next step is we know where. A lot of people are in a serious condition. There is only one thing that is going to happen to them which is of any significance. The rest will bypass them because with anything that they think is not serious, they are unable to show involvement and dedication. That is the whole problem. The passage, the secret of life is in just this – seeing everything with a non-serious eye, but absolutely involved – like a game. That is the reason the most profound aspects of life are approached in a celebratory way so that we don’t miss the point.
The idea of Diwali is to bring that aspect of celebration into our life – that is why the firecrackers, to set fire to us a bit! So, the purpose is not just to have fun on this one day and go. It must happen like this within us every day. If we simply sit, our life energy, heart, mind and body must be exploding like a live cracker. If we are a damp squib, then we need a cracker from outside every day.
