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Puja
protocol

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1. The Sense of Protocol

When attending a Puja or performing a Havan, or any other ritual,
we have to be present with body ánd Spirit.

Most yogis enjoy the plesurable, relaxed atmosphere of being

together with like-minded people in a spiritual congenial group.
Singing together, reciting mantras and religious phrases provides
a feeling of being carried away fgrom our every-day-obligations
and eventual negative connotations of work, household, the
community in which we are supposed to function.

If rituals, and especially Pujas and Havans, are limited to that

vaguely “spiritalizing” atmosphere, we miss the point.
A Puja is a respectful meeting with a Divine Person, and through
that Person, with a specific Aspect of the Divine Him – ánd –
Herself.

How will we ever be ready – spiritually sufficiently evolved

enough – to meet God Allmighty (Shri Sadashiva) via His Feminine
Form of Shri Adi Shakti Mataji, who makes His loving desire come
true in the creation of universes?

In the purely material world we can’t!

The material world is too limited, too full of maya, to transcend
that pleasurable state of togetherness into a more spiritual Unity.

Some yogis seem to be able to enjoy themselves and project a

meditative awareness during these rituals and afterwards being
involved in the roles that society attributes to them.
This can only mean that the spiritual impact of a Puja or Havan
can be rather restricted.
The same remark can be made when we see people working on
themselves or on each other, eating and drinking during Puja.
This is not only a lack of respect before the Goddess, but also a
victory of material needs on spiritual involvement. We probably
would never think of doing this when invited by the king or the
prime minister, not even by the mayor …But we seem to think
that the Goddess will not object.

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We have to be ‘spontaneous’, haven’t we?

2. Shri Mataji on Protocol

During a meeting in the castle in Cabella, just before a
Puja, Shri Mataji said: “Tell your people, please, not to
use Sahaj techniques during or just before Puja. They
should not work on themselves or each other. They
should not think they can do better than I do.”

Significance of Puja – Paris, 20.04.1980

I have told you before also, but again today I want to tell you the significance
of Puja. The significance is this, that when you do the Puja you recognize Me.
By your recognition and your surrendering the deities get happy. They’re
overjoyed that you have recognized it. You are fully identified yourself that you
are understanding Me in My full form, that you are coming closer to them. And
I tell the like, elder brothers feel happy when the younger ones are coming to
meet. So, they start releasing My vibrations with a greater force – much greater
force. You have seen that after Puja sometimes when you do not absorb the
vibrations, I get little tired because the vibrations start coming out of all the
chakras and you do not absorb, so the give-and-take process is not balanced. The
identification in the west is very slow because of mental activity. Your
attachment to your mental activity and to your rationality is very great. With
puja the vibrations try to detach you from your mental activity, from your
rationality and then you are stationed into the realm of divine existence.
Anything else, even My lecture, which is really [a]mantra – but even that gives
you a mental activity. You start thinking about it. Then, by thinking about it,
you think, you know about Sahaja Yoga. Then, by thinking that, you know, you
become egoistical. You think you know such a lot about Sahaja Yoga. That again
it, in a way, helps to bloat your ego. That you start thinking that you know so
much about Sahaja Yoga. The greatest grip on the western being is that of
rationality – analyzing. You start analyzing everything. Which is only through
puja you just … you are blown off, like when the fruit is ready, the petals of the
flower out of which the fruit has come out, blow off and the fruit remains.
This complete detachment is possible in even one puja. But that too takes time,
because even puja is rationalized. Puja should be done with your heart, feeling
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the love within you, that you are worshipping your Mother, who is an
Incarnation of Adi Shakti, is a very great thing. Do it with your heart, not with
your mind. That’s why you know we do not allow many people to come for puja,
because that creates another whirlwind of rationality. Once you are detached
from yourself, all your problems become so tiny as you see from the sky, from the
aeroplane, all the farfetched things which are not so important. And the
problems that are going in the houses down below, do not touch you. You go
beyond clouds and you live in the area of that space of divine love. Then all your
petty things, irritating things, all your so called problems of life, all disappear,
and then only you can be effective more, much more effective, because you
become a source of divine love. Puja is the only way, I feel, you can stop your
mental activity. Sahaja Yoga cannot be understood trough rationality. Mentally
it may be, but to become you have to detach yourself completely. You have to go
beyond it, because this limits your movement.
Everything that you are doing here is significant, but it’s not a mental
significance, it has a divine significance. For example, even painting My feet
now. What you do, is to recognize Me first of all. Then the bottom’s importance
of these feet: these feet have been working, have been dancing for thousands and
thousands and thousands of years.
Like we use lemons. Rationally we cannot explain how lemons can cure a
person, but they do, you have seen. People being cured of mental troubles, of
possessions. You cannot explain rationally. In the divine way one can explain,
that it has got a coefficient which can absorb the possessions which are foreign.
But why and how? That’s beyond your mind. You do not understand, you do
not have that instrument. So it comes, that Sahaja Yoga is to be accepted. It’s
the only way you can be a Sahaja yogi. Acceptance is the only way. Go on
accepting it, so that you can develop. Like a little plant starts accepting
whatever the Mother Earth gives it and grows. It does not try to understand the
Mother Earth. It does not. It just wants to grow on the riches of the Mother
Earth. That is what is puja, by which you are blessed by the divine so that you
shoot off from all your physical, mental, emotional and the so called spiritual
being, which was seeking into the realm where you have sought.
So, today we must determine that we’ll have no rational activity about it,
otherwise you won’t have the joy of Sahaja Yoga, which is your achievement.
Stop rationalizing it. With your heart you do the puja. All these things that you
are going to do has very, very great significance, which I’ll explain to you some
other time, but that explanation cannot take you too far. It is too minute to
enter into the gross understanding. So, best is to absorb it and absorb it and
enjoy it. Why do you want to enter into the whole machinery of electricity? You
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just use the electricity. All machinery is done for you, is prepared for you. Don’t
try to envisage it, to conceive it in your little mind. You must know that you
have to become the ocean and not try to understand the ocean with the drop of
your brain. If you realize that, then you can become the ocean. Your limits are
broken by puja and you become one with the Unlimited. It blasts you limits and
your limitations. Tell your mind not to come and trouble you during puja, then it
will work out.
May God bless you!

But you’re small children, so it does no matter. It’s a pleasant task. Little
understanding must be developed, that there is a protocol of this Incarnation
and you should not try to pass over it. The greatest protocol is humility, is
humbleness. Humility is the only way you are given this great opportunity to
worship Me. If you are not humble, you cannot worship Me. It’s not a ritual,
it’s the growing within our self. In yourself. Stop your mental activity now, just
don’t think, then only it will start working.
May God bless you!

→ Full video: Puja, Significance Of Puja,

Paris (France)

Puja Protocol: Durga Puja, Vienna, Austria,

26.09.1982
(Now, the Puja protocol begins. Below are a few of Shri Mataji’s comments made during
the Puja protocol.)

You can start washing My Feet. First, what we can do, that those who have
not washed My Feet, please raise your hands – so far. …He has washed? (s.y.:
“Everybody has.”) Everybody has. He has not washed? All right, come. (…)

Who are the people who want to do the puja? You. And who? Your wife. Let’s
first get Machindranath for the puja of Ganesha. Who else? She has done puja,
this lady? She has done. So, we can get one from, she’s from Switzerland,
another from Rome, two persons. That’s to help you out. All right. Let her come,
from Switzerland. (…)

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Give her some water.

That water could be in there, for washing. (…) It could go in that one. Or you
have something else, a jug or something? Or could we take it out as it is. (…)

Machindranath, you come here. You come here. You have to work. (…) Now
good. Now that’s it. He’s done his job. (…) Come along, rub My feet. Ah good.
It’s alright. Now it’s over, it’s alright, done it. Take him away. (…)

Now, what you can do, is to wash My feet with the water, or you take some
more water, (because) Machindranath has already spilt it. You can put it on the
Sahastrara of everyone. You put it on the Sahastrara of everyone. Now you
wash My feet. You rub your hands, then mine, you rub it like that. Your hands
must be rubbed. Rub your left because… left-sided, rub your left more…

(Recitation of names of Shri Vishnu)

These are the twenty-one names, these are the twenty-one names of Shri Vishnu,
which is the aspect of your evolution, of your dharma. First the sustenance and
then evolution. That’s the Father within you. And so first, because you are all
seeking your evolution, we invoke the twenty-one powers, twenty-one powers of
this Father aspect of God. Twenty-one powers. These are the twenty-one names,
which represent the twenty-one powers of evolution within us. Sushumna
channel has got twenty-one powers. (…)

Vishnu, Vishnu, it’s the Vishnu power or, we can say, the Narayana. Vishnu,
the Father.

This is to raise your right side, because it’s activity now going on. (Gayatri
mantra was read after.)

(Recitation of mantras for Shri Durga from Devi Mahatmyam.)

Krita Yuga. This is the Krita Yuga. ‘Krita’ means when where it will be
effective, when, where it is going to be effective. The work will be done. This is
the yuga, the times where it will be done. Krita Yuga. This is the special time
which is in between Kali Yuga and Satya Yuga, is the Krita Yuga, where things
will be done, work will be done. Resurrection time, where your hands will speak.
This is the thing. You see. Translate it. Krita Yuga. “Kri” means “to do.” (…)

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Ganesha Atharva Sheersha

Twam bhoomi rapo…. Mother stops the Atharva Sheersha to explain…..

See, svatojayte, means the principle, you awaken the principle of the whole
universe, the principle of the universe and ‘Pratye’ means you give also the
experience of that, so that He is the one who generates the principle and also He
gives you the experience. Pratye, pratye is the experience that proves, that
proves your existence, you see. You give your own pratye, means you give your
experience by which it proves that you exist.

(Yogi is reading translation of Ganesha Atharva Sheersha.)

Shri Mataji: So, the translation, somebody should read. Gregoire can read the
Sanskrit. So, when it starts, that Brahma Twam, what is it? (sy: Twam
Brahma, twam Vishnus, twam Rudras…) So, He is called as Rudra, see? But
not as Sadashiva, you see, because at Rudra state … because He’s the Tattwa of
everything, He’s the Tattwa, He’s the Principle. Rudra… (indicates Ekadasha
Rudra).

(They read then the Divine Essence to the Prayer to Shri Ganesha.)

Shri Mataji: It should be: ‘You are God in man, it would be better. God in
man…. He is not man, by any chance, how can you call Him?

(…)

Shri Mataji: Now for the kumkum. You people can come, and married girls can
come, with the water…

(Shri Mataji is rubbing something in Her hands, though we cannot see what, as
the video only shows upper.)

Shri Mataji: Keep a little bit for everyone and take it round and they can put it
on their hands. It’s good for them. G. you take it round. And give it in the hands
of everyone, so that they rub little little, so that…
Gregoire, you read your names that you have made, where are your names?

(Gregoire asks: “For Shri Shiva or Shri Mahakali?”)

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Shri Mataji: Yes….Shri Shiva…All this is for His enjoyment only, isn’t it?

Yogi: Om Twameva Sakshat Shri Nav Jerusalemeshwara –

Shri Mataji: Again!

Yogi: Om Twameva Sakshat Shri Nav Jerusalemeshwara – He is the Lord of the

New Jerusalem.

Om Twameva Sakshat Shri Adi Nirmalatma - He is the Primordial Self of Shri

Mataji.

Om Twameva Sakshat Shri Sahaja Yogi Priya - He is fond of Sahaja yogis.

Shri Mataji: So, this means that He is the Beloved of the Sahaja yogis.

Yogi: This is another name, there is another name, Mother, for this, Sahaja yogi
Vatsala.

Shri Mataji: Sahaja yogi Vatsala.

Yogi: Priya Bhakta, He is the favorite of the devotees.

Shri Mataji: Priya Bhakta; so, Priya is first, but if you put it last, you see –
Bhakta Priya means: He’s fond of bhaktas, you see, Bhakta Priya. But
supposing you put it that She is the Beloved, you see because the Priya, where
you put it, you see, then it is My name. So, I am the Beloved. You can switch it.
Premi, would be better – if you put it Premi, then it would be all right.

You can put it, Priya will be, Sahaja Yogi, Priya it’s all right, but if you put it
‘Priyaa’ then immediately it means just the other way round, because you are
addressing, you are making this thing according to Me – I become that Deity,
you see? Sanskrit is tremendous, little change here and there and makes such a
thing, because every, every consonant, every vowel has a meaning. Can you
imagine? Every consonant and every vowel has a meaning and has a mantra,
because it is a devanandra, it is understood only by the Devas, devanand created
by the Devas, so all these have such a tremendous effect when you combine all
these things, you see.

Sahaja yogi: I’ll read some names for You, Shri Mataji?

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Shri Mataji: All right.

(More names, all beginning with Nirmala.)

Shri Mataji: Beautiful.

The same comb in that photograph has come up as light. Have you seen that?
Just like a flame, this comb. Have you seen that photograph? In your, yes, in
your album.
Oil, Amla, Amla oil? (For hair. A yogi replies with another name.)

(Mother asks for khus perfume.)

Shri Mataji: I saw some Khus, Gregoire, in your bathroom I saw some khus, is
khus perfume. Khus. I saw one, it has to be “Athar”, you see from India because
let see, this one is also “Mogra”…

Here, the kind of perfumes people use are very dangerous, especially this ‘Tabac’
,is nothing from tobacco, you see, sort of people get addicted to it, because it is
an addiction.

Yes, this is all right, this is all right. This is hina – is it written ‘hina’ on that?
“Khus, same thing. Just the same. This is all right. Just the same.

You can apply to all the Sahaja yogis, this perfume khus. It clears all your
Vishuddhi, right Vishuddhi especially. Though if you have hina, is the best
because that clears out your right Vishuddhi very much, but this is good for
people who are speedy, heated up, for liver patients.

(Sahaja yogi is saying mantra.)

Shri Mataji: Let he do it when I hold the sword. I will hold the sword in this
hand.)

(Sahaja yogi is asking to read Lalita Sahasranama.)

Shri Mataji: 108 Names. Have we got copies of 108 names? (

Sy: No, But you can translate it.

Yogi (showing the saris to Shri Mataji): It’s my wife who selected it, I am
innocent.

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Shri Mataji: He selected and you put the blame on her. That’s why the wives are
there, to take all the blame.

(Shri Mataji explaining how the yoginis should fold it and put the sari around
Her.)

You have to open it the other way round, like that, half way – open half, you
see? That’s how you should take it, yes, fold it that side. (…) Now. You have to
bring it round, that’s the problem.

This is the way they had it at the time of Shri Krishna (pallu in front).

Take off My hair from the back and pull out My hair.

Did not have the modern watch. But I don’t believe in time!

(Garland is offered.)

Best combination is green, orange and yellow.

(Orange flower crown is offered.)

Flowers are the best above … around the head, they say.

Sign of beauty is that you cannot tolerate any imperfection anymore. This
[crown] is very beautiful, so you must make everything in relation to that, is to
be done. It’s done very well.

May God bless you.

Try to take complete photographs also.

(Weapons are given to Shri Durga. Shri Mataji takes the sword, but not the
club, saying:)

This I don’t need! (Then She asks for the conch.)

You can read…

(Aarti) Stand, it has to go down.

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May God bless you all, give yourself a bandhan.

(Yogis say Jagadambe.)

Say Lord’s prayer.

Shri Mataji: Once more.

Shri Mataji: Once more.

→ Full video: Shri Durga Puja, Mind Is Just Like A

Donkey Vienna (Austria)

Pujas are very protocol-minded, as Shri Mataji indicates,

but most important is respect to the Goddess, which
implies an aspect of politeness.
Protocol does not mean rules or regulations, but respectful
habits.

Let’s not forget:

“I am with you at every step, at every place. Everywhere. You may go
anywhere.
At every place I am with you, completely, in person, by mind and in every
respect.
Whenever you will remember me, I will be by your side with all my powers.
It is my promise.
But you have to be mine. This is necessary.
If you are mine, then it'll not take for me even a single second to come to you.
May God bless you all and give you wisdom.
Lead a life of wisdom.”
Extract from Talk to the Sahaja yogis, Mumbai, India, 29.05.1976

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“So, that is how it is, that the protocol should be that: “Yes, Mother has said
it, doesn’t matter. It may go wrong, doesn’t matter. Whatever She says, let’s
obey and see.” By experiencing only you will know, but in the beginning only
you will say: “No, we’ll not do this and that,” – it’s not good. So,
the protocol is the simplest of simple to do. So, that’s the essence of Sahaja
Yoga, the simplest of the simple is the protocol. If you understand
the protocol you don’t have to do anything, you will grow by it
automatically. But you lack in protocol and that’s how you do not know.
This is the point is, that to grow best in Sahaja Yoga is to know the protocol,
which you can ask others.”
Guru Puja, Pulborough, UK, 24.07.1983

“So, to this powerful Shakti you must all the time keep connection, and keep
Her pleased. Like the protocol– is very important, because all these, you see,
they have the protocol sense, because they’re fixed. You should also fix
your protocol properly. It’s rather difficult or embarrassing as a human being
for Me to tell you what should be the protocol of the Goddess, really. But I
had to tell you, because I don’t want you should be harmed. But the protocol
must be observed, and could be understood very well. Of course, it’s much
better now. First time they had My puja, in Delhi, they did My aarti with a
plastic plate and the kumkum was kept in plastic boxes, and I was so much
worried about these people that My whole body had shrunk like this,
controlling them: “Now don’t do anything.” If you see My photograph, you’ll
see Me very different. But I was so surprised they didn’t know what to do.
All right, now, please also pay attention to your protocol ….”
Tenth Day of Navaratri, Geneva, Switzerland, 23.09.1990

“The peetha, the seat of the Heart, is on Brahmarandhra. If your heart is not
open, in the heart if you do not have those responses built-in…they need not
be of awe or fear. But a natural protocol that develops. Then you can never
do wrong, because you know whatever is good in your heart.”
Sahasrara Puja, Ishia, Italy, 05.05.1991

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3. BUT WHEN IT COMES FROM THE

HEART …
If my memory doesn’t betray me, I saw Shri Mataji after
the Ganesha Puja 2000 in Cabella.
I had read that the beginning yogis in the seventies
were allowed to come to Shri Mataji’s house every

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evening to meditate. But before meditation they were

allowed to bow to Shri Mataji and put their forehead on
Her feet to cleanse them.

This tempted me so much that I asked Shri Mataji if I

could do this too.

She said: “You know this is against protocol?”

I said: “Yes Shri Mataji. I am sorry!”
But then Shri Mataji laughed and with Her big piercing
eyes She said: “But when it comes from the heart, there
is no protocol. Please do!”

The word "pūjā" is Sanskrit, and means reverence,

honour, homage, adoration, and worship. Puja, the loving
offering of light, flowers, and water or food to the Divine,
is the essential ritual of Hinduism. For the worshipper,
the Divine is visible in the image, and the Divinity sees
the worshipper. The interaction between human and
Deity, between human and Guru, is called darshan,
seeing.

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