Who is Lord Shiva in Mythology and Diagram with Symbols

Discover “Who is Lord Shiva in Mythology and Diagram with Symbols” and Enjoy the Connection to Chakras with a VIDEO Example of Meditation for Heart

Meditation with Shri Mataji for the Heart Chakra  – Sahaja Yoga Seminar in UK, 1988

“Please close your eyes.. Now we will all do the meditation ..

We will work on the left hand (energy channel) side.. (keep) the left hand towards me. Now first of all you put your (right) hand on your Heart. In the heart resides Shiva, is The Spirit. So you have to thank your Spirit that it has brought light to your attention because you are a Saint and the light that has come in your heart has to enlighten the whole world. So please now, in your heart you pray: ‘Let this light of my Love of the Divine, spread to the whole world.‘ With all sincerity and understanding that you are connected with the Divine and whatever you desire, will happen. With full confidence in yourself!

Now, raise your right hand on your Heart. Here you have to thank God that you have felt the ocean of joy and you have felt the ocean of forgiveness and the capacity to forgive .. (Say/pray: ‘We felt the capacity to Forgive’)as our Mother has, which we have seen is so tremendous(Say/pray:)  ‘Let my heart expand and encompass the whole Universe and my Love should resound the Name of God.’

The Heart every moment should express the Beauty of God’s Love.”

Subtle Knowledge about Shri Shiva – connections to Sahaja Yoga Meditation System of Chakras

Sahaja Yoga Meditation at Niagara College 2013-2
Sahaja Yoga Meditation at Niagara College 2013

Connection to Mooladhara centre  – Root Chakra: Innocence and Eternal Longevity

“One of the qualities of Shiva is that He is Innocence. He is extremely innocent. He is innocent like a child. He is innocence personified. So we have to put our carnal desires, dissolve them, dissolve them into the innocence. You have to dissolve it in the ocean of innocence. Innocence is something to be appreciated, to be understood, to be enjoyed. Like you see animals, they are innocent. You see children they are innocent. Flowers are innocent. Divert your attention to all these things.. “ (Shri Mataji’s Talk on Lord Shiva, Chiancian Terme, Italy, 16 Feb 1991)

“Shiva tattwa (the principle of Shiva within us) is innocent, absolutely innocent it is. It is very powerful and extremely innocent. So to a saint, He gives that eternal longevity which comes through Spirit. This is the blessing of Shiva tattwa.” (Talk on Lord Shiva – 11.02.1983)

Connection to Swadhisthana and Nabhi Chakras: Creativity, Attention and Aesthetics

“The desire for beautiful things – we can shift our desire, material desire, into Aesthetics, and have one thing but which is really aesthetically rich. Because that’s the quality of Shiva that he gives aesthetics to everything. Now supposing this looks very plain, simple and one may say mechanical (the microphone), but if it is Shiva’s job he would have done something beautiful about it. So the quality of Shiva is that he beautifies everything that is created by Brahmadeva (the divine principle governing the 2nd centre- Swadhisthana chakra) and evolved by Vishnu (the divine principle governing the 2nd centre- Swadhisthana chakra).

(Lord Shiva) He’s the one who does the subtle work of creative aesthetics.

Rain of Vibrations over Shri Mataji - the founder of Sahaja Yoga Meditation

You’ve seen my photographs many a times with so many lights, this, that, is all His job. He’s doing it. He throws lights in such a manner, he works out in such a manner, just he wants to convince you about me, it’s his job. So his job is to create aesthetics. Aesthetics of behavior, aesthetics of poetry. Everything that is created is made beautiful, is joy-giving, by Shiva. That’s his quality.

So whatever you desire, if you start working it out.. (like) desiring for something aesthetically handmade, nice things, gradually you’ll find you’ll end up with vibrations, because all beautiful things have vibrations. And to have the vibrations you’ll have to go to pure desire. So this (other/impure) desire which is madness, which makes you mad, which is so much dull and boring becomes pure desire because you have to dissolve all your desires into vibration. You start desiring nothing but vibrations after sometime.. So to say that he’s a destroyer is a very one-sided statement. He has both the powers. He has the power to give you vibrations. He gives you vibrations. The Goddess is the power, the Shakti (in Sanskrit). But he makes them vibrations. It’s like these are the fingers all right, but if they tickle you, then it’s Shiva. The fingers are that of the Goddess (the Shakti), all right, but if they tickle you,  give you joy, happiness, (then) it’s Shiva, is the Bhakti (devotion from the heart for the divine). The joy of bhakti comes from Shiva. (Shri Mataji’s Talk on Lord Shiva, Chiancian Terme, Italy, 16 Feb 1991)

Connection to Heart centre – Anahat Chakra’s Quality of Joy

“The Spirit is expressed in the Heart, is reflected in the heart. The center of the Spirit we can say is in the heart. But actually the seat of Spirit is above here, above the head (at the Crown chakra level), that this the Spirit of what we call of the God Almighty .. and you can call Him by any names which are said about the Lord who is God Almighty. At every center (chakra) you receive a different type of joy. Every center has a different type of joy. And there are names for every type of joy you receive at every center when the Kundalini rises.”

Connection to Vishuddhi centre – Throat Chakra and Virata: Detachment, Collectivity and Witness State

“Now because you are realized souls, not yet the Spirit – it has not yet come into your brain of course, but still you are realized souls. So what you can do is at least to watch your attention. You can do that, you can watch your attention very clearly by seeing where your attention is going. And then, controlling your attention also you can do. Very simple. To control your attention you have to just remove your attention from this to that. Try to change your priorities, all this has to be done now, after realization, a complete detachment.

All these things happen when your attention is diverted from criticizing, from reacting, just you watch, become the witness, try to witness everything. It’s not so very yet practiced, so far I’ve seen, that whenever even we achieve our realization we don’t realize that we have to witness everything. When you start witnessing through your Spirit, then you don’t see the bad points of another, but you see the good points. You just pick up the person with very good points. So once you see that the witness state enlarges and you start enjoying another person, you start enjoying everything that is there. Even a small blade of grass you can enjoy if you have that capacity. “

He makes human beings extremely beautiful, very noble, and He wants that people should love each other. There should be pure love among human beings. And also He makes you very delicately behaving towards other people, very sweetly behaving towards others. If you don’t have that, then you are going in the wrong direction. But His greatest thing is that He gives you the height and the depth. If you are worshiping Him, then you develop such heights that you see the whole world as a witness. He sees the whole world as a sakshi swarupa – as a witness. And so He is the knowledge, He is the pure knowledge. You may get your realization (Kundalini energy awakened), all right; you might feel cool breeze in your hands, all right; but do you have the knowledge? I have to tell you what finger means what, what hand means what, what are vibrations, I have to tell you. He is that knowledge, is the pure knowledge, complete knowledge of the highest level.” (extract from Shivaratri talk, Pune, India –25 February 2001)

Connection to Agnya Chakra – the Third Eye: Forgiveness and Power over Elements

Statue - Lord Shiva - from a Greek yogi's house - photo by Nicoleta

“The first power he himself has, is that he is a very forgiving God.  He forgives!  He forgives us so many of our sins, so many of our destructive activities, our horrible minds that try to create problems for everyone – up to a point!  But he has the greatest power to destroy.  His destruction comes so suddenly because he rules all the elements.  All the elements he rules – he rules the Mother Earth, and he rules all other elements.  Through their causal he rules, and he can destroy everything that he wants to if he finds there is a problem.

I have to tell you that earthquakes are managed by him. He is the one who sees what’s happening on this earth, what’s happening to the human beings. One has to understand this very well, that he has powers over all the elements. This is what he does – though he is very forgiving, he is extremely kind, he’s peaceful, but you should be aware of his powers.

 All those powers are used to protect.. the work of spirituality. It should be real spirituality, (then)  the protection will be always there, and Shiva will be very blissful. It’s extremely blissful.  And what he has given you is even more beautiful than you could think of. He is extremely forgiving; I should say he is the source of such forgiveness. If you have forgiveness in your heart, he resides in your heart. Otherwise, gradually, you start developing very difficult types of diseases.” (Talk on Lord Shiva’s Powers – India, Delhi, 25 February 2001)

Connection to Sahasrara centre – Crown Chakra: Thoughtless Awareness, Realization and Protection

Shiva - by Sahaja Yogi“So you must practice as to find out what stops your thoughts. What makes you the witness? Once you develop this habit you will station yourself nicely in the Thoughtless Awareness.” (excerpts from various talks on the Spirit – Sydney, Australia, March 3rd, – offered by the founder of sahaja yoga meditation – Shri Mataji Nirmala Devi)

“Now what happens is to be seen very clearly that when you give Realization (awaken Kundalini energy) to someone and he values it and he grows into it, then you are protected. You are completely protected.

 Who protects you? You may say the Adi Shakti (the primordial power –  seen as the ‘doer’ motherly life force in the Universe) , all right, but also there is a destructive power working in this world, not of negativity, but positive destructive power of Shiva. If He says that if Adi Shakti’s work is going on well, He’s happy. But He’s sitting there and watching each and every person, each and every work. Anywhere there is a calamity, we can say, like an earthquake or some sort of a hurricane, all these things come through the working of Shri Mahadeva (Lord Shiva). I can’t help you there, but if you really give Realization to people, all these can be averted. That is the work. That’s the kind of personality you should have. You have to do it in a very humble manner, in a very beautiful manner and you’ll be amazed to see how you are protected, how you are supported and how everything works out.”

“He gives us the great heights of Himalaya.”(extract from Shivaratri talk, Pune, India -25 February 2001)

(VIDEO) “Om Namaha Shivaya” Devotional Song – by Romanian ‘Sahaj Group’ – LIVE on National TV

(LIVE performance on TVR2 ( Romanian National TV – Channel 2) in TV show “Intalnire/”- broadcasted LIVE on 27.04.2010 -“Sahaj Group”  –  sahaja yogis from Romania, some of them are professional musicians – Western classical music though)

Simple  Short traditional Stories about Shri Shiva – from the Hindu mythology – with some elements from the above Diagram with Symbols

ShriShiva“The great God Shiva lives in his Heaven on the snowy peaks of Mount Kailash. He has many aspects. When dealing with evil creatures, he takes pleasure in destruction. He is also the Lord of goblins, demons and restless wandering spirits. “In his frightening aspect, he…wears a crown of serpents and a necklace of skulls. He dislikes being disobeyed and tramples furiously on the heads of rebellious demons. He is also greatly loved because death is simply a stage in the cycle of creation and represents release and rebirth just as winter is followed by spring. So Shri Shiva is ‘Mahadeva,’ which means the Restorer, as well as the Destroyer.

“Shri Shiva can change his appearance, and sometimes he has four arms and five heads with which to watch every part of the world. He is always very beautiful with a light skin and third eye on his forehead which has terrible power when Shri Shiva becomes enraged.

“When the world was being created, the many things that were to live in it were thrown up from the churning ocean of milk. The ocean’s first gift was the divine cow Surabhi, whose son Nandi, the snow-white bull, later became Shri Shiva’s constant companion. The second gift was a crescent moon which he took from the waves and placed on his forehead to decorate his hair, where it glowed forever more. The third thing to come from the ocean was a deadly draught of poison and this Shri Shiva drank in order to save the world from harm. Instead of swallowing it, he held it in his neck and the strength of its venom turned his neck blue.

“Once Shri Shiva decided to visit the Earth in the form of a man, to punish a group of ascetics (people who are quite extreme in the pursuit of spirituality) who had become unbelievers and spoke of a world without God. Their wives loved Shri Shiva’s great beauty as soon as they saw him even though they did not know who He was. The ascetics became jealous and using their combined powers, produced a tiger which leaped out at Shri Shiva from their sacrificial fire. Shri Shiva simply caught the tiger with one hand, and slung it over his body as a shawl.

“Next the ascetics made a large deer to pounce on him. Shri Shiva fielded it with another of his four hands and held it there ever after. Still determined to destroy him, the ascetics created a vicious serpent but, being himself the Lord of Serpents, Shri Shiva hung the creature round his neck as a necklace. Finally the ascetics created a hideous dwarf-demon who flailed at Shri Shiva with a club. Shri Shiva took away the club and held in in his third hand. He then pinned the dwarf-demon down with his foot. Shri Shiva was furious by this time and he began slowly to perform his celestial dance. This dance represents his five functions – Creation, Preservation, Destruction, Embodiment and Release, and it is said to cause the movement of the universe. Gradually, the momentum of Shri Shiva’s dance built up to a frenzied climax and the heretical ascetics and all the other creatures who watched its power were carried away by its beauty. It is said that they gave up everything in this and many other reincarnations for the promise of seeing it once more.”

(click!) The Psalm 23 – A Powerful Mantra for the Heart Chakra with Shri Shiva as The Shepard, Romanian Painting and Bach’s Cantata 122

Enjoy the recorded LIVE VIDEO Meditation session dedicated to Lord Shiva and Heart Chakra ** it includes guided meditation and ad-hoc feedback. LOVELY!

This Post Has 31 Comments

  1. ene garva

    Thak you for your work .

  2. pramita

    sister iona

    thanks for putting up such good references and excerpts.

    pramita

  3. paula erskine

    It is interesting to know what all the the elements in the diagram mean. I have forgotten where the painting originates? I missed the art & spirituality class. Would love to attend if you have it again. Thanks for providing this wonderful article.

  4. Deonarayan

    wounderful. Shri mataji please bless us to upload such articles.

  5. soma bakshi

    thanks very enlightening

  6. Tumpa shaw

    It’s a wonderful experience to read the above nothing to say but excellent &
    THANK U

  7. adrian

    Hear is what I think this article is about…

    Shri Shiva… I think of Heart Centered Love… And the word Love invokes in me the idea of “Truth”… to truly be loved and to be loving is to experience the Divine… through Truth…

    A hug is nice, many nice things are nice… humbleness is nice… fearlessness is nice… kindness is nice, giving is nice… receiving is nice… forgiveness is nice… they are all gifts of “self realization”…

    Yet I feel that All can be reduced to one thing… LOVE… in relation to Truth… it is truth that we seek… that connects us with the Divine… and then that is shown through us in the way that we choose to experience life…

    The closer we come to our Truth… the closer we come to realizing our connectedness to our True Self… and this is what I feel that Heart Centeredness is directing us toward… our ability to Truly Love.

  8. Sa'di Kooshandeh

    Thank you for this work

  9. Veni

    Loves begets Love, and creates ONENESS in the name of Love of the Spirit!

  10. Priti

    Thanks Ioana for sharing this beautiful article and all other articles, it was so joy giving.

  11. Lilli

    “The Spirit is expressed in the Heart, is reflected in the heart. The center of the Spirit we can say is in the heart. But actually the seat of Spirit is above here, above the head, that this the Spirit of what we call of the God Almighty .. and you can call Him by any names which are said about the Lord who is God Almighty.”At every center (chakra) you receive different type of joy. Every center has a different type of joy. And there are names for every type of joy you receive at every center when the Kundalini rises.”

    FOR ME THIS SUGGESTS A WONDERFUL FREEDOM, COMING FROM THE CHRISTIAN TRADITION. FOR NOTHING NEED BE DISCARDED OR DISPENSED WITH, THOSE THINGS THAT WE HOLD DEAR, WHICH ARE TRUTHS DERIVED FROM MANY SPIRITUAL TRADITIONS AND CAN BE JOINED UNDER ONE CANOPY.

  12. Debbie

    Thanks for sharing this knowledge about Lord Shiva. He represents forgiveness, innocence, love, release, rebirth and allows the cycle of life to continue. Not forgetting very importantly, helps us to become courageous and fearless.

    Lots of love always.

  13. astina

    Thank you for the “wonderful excerpts” on Lord Shiva.

  14. B.Rajvardhan

    Lord Shiva is the God of all Gods.

  15. Vishwanathan Iyer

    But you people have missed one important description,the holy ash on lord shivas forehead signifies simplicity and that one must not be proud no matter what he/she has. Even if he/she is the a billionaire or the best.

    1. Vishwanathan Iyer

      So as nothing is permanent in this world and we all will become ashes one day we should prey to lord Shiva to attain moksha and merge our soul with his supreme soul to get the ultimate bliss and true meaning of our life,by over coming our desires in this materialistic world!

    2. adrian kraayeveld

      I have a thought on simplicity…
      I am…
      I am this tree…
      This tree is me…
      The tree is you…
      The tree is the bird…
      The bird is the rock…
      The earth is the water…
      The water is you and me…
      I am water…
      The water is me and you…
      All is one…
      And One is All…
      The thread of Light is interwoven throughout…
      Light only sees light…
      Anf light is light…
      For it is light…
      We are a thread…
      We are merely a dot…
      We Are…

      Cannot be any simpler than that.

  16. Viswanathan Iyer

    I don’t think u can use more simpler words than that 😉

  17. Draupadi

    A wonderful BLOG-POST. Thanks for this waterfall of vibrations!

  18. anjali

    What a beautiful compilation assembling different talks of Shri Mataji to explain the connection of the spirit, of Shri Shiva with each of our Chakras. The bhajan by Romanian Sahaj group was so devotional and full of vibrations. Only in Sahaja yoga, can one really forego all boundaries of language in such a vibrationally powerful way. Thank you Ioana for this article..it really helped me touch and connect with and understand Shri Shiva. May be one day I will truly “realize” His love in my heart that can spread in this entire world.

  19. Sunita Srivastava

    Very nice.jai Shree mata ji

    1. Jolanta

      Very informative article, with transcripts of Shri Mataji’s talks, and beautiful performance by Romanian yogis – creating good vibrations.
      Thank you

  20. M.Siva Rama Krishna

    Om namasivaya omarunachaleswara. Om kalahasteeswara Om sambosankara. Om kailasavasi. Om kasi viswanadh om nageswar om rameswar om kedarnath. Om maha kaleswar om vydyanadh om bheemshankar om mallikarjun Om kaleswar Om somnadhOm thriyambhakeswar Om grudhneswar OM NAMASIVAYA

  21. Abha Adhikari

    Shiva, so innocent and yet powerful!
    Blessed to discover Sahaj Yoga
    JAI SHREE MATAJI

  22. Kavitha

    Beautiful compilation of Mataji’s talks about how Adi guru Shiva in connected to each chakra. Glad I found this article on this auspicious day of Mahashivaratri. Om Namah Shivaya

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