When we bow down before the Guru, negative energies get grounded and grace will flow in through our navel. Karma gets dissolved through the navel (naabhi). Divine feelings such as faith or Shraddha, devotion or bhakti, and surrender or sharanagathi all enter through our navel. The connection between our outer and inner worlds is established though our navel. So, after offering the Guru asanam, shayanam, vastram etc (as specified in the previous shloka), we have to perform saashtanga namaskara to the Guru or the Guru peetha everyday.
Sariram indriyam pranan
sadgurubhyo nivedayet
Atmadãrãdikam sarvam
sadgurubhyo nivedayet
Dedicate to the Guru the body, senses, prana, relationships and everything.
Lord Shiva is teaching us the samarpan bhava or feeling of complete surrender through the previous as well as this shloka. He is telling us step by step on how to offer everything we are gifted with to the Guru. This is basically because Lord Shiva now, wants to open our eyes to the reality that today everything we possess comes from our Guru and it goes back to him. Be it our body, mind, life force or prana and our soul, Our Guru is the eternal supreme master who takes us from darkness of ignorance to light of knowledge. Most importantly, the Guru should not be taken in the physical sense, but Guru should be rightly understood as the effulgent energy of light just like sun illuminates the entire universe. In this sloka, Lord Shiva is throwing light on the fact that Guru is the supreme creator, the supreme master, and the primordial source of energy. The Guru is the source and we are all resources drawing energy from the source. He wants us to feel this energy more and more rather than take it in the literal sense of the physical realm.
The Guru has created us, he created our loved ones, and he created our ancestors or forefathers, family, friends. The Guru is our life, Guru is our breath, Guru is our blood, Guru is our prana, Guru is everything. In actuality, the Guru doesn’t require anything from us because he is the sole creator and master. Lord Shiva is teaching us the divine culture or sanskaar of how to mentally offer our faith, belief and surrender to God through the things that we value the most today.
Unfortunately, we value our own physical body, our relationships, our food, clothing much more than we value God. All these are no doubt important to us for our existence and survival but we must understand that they sometimes please our mind and at times disappoint us. This is because we don’t heartily and mentally offer it to God.
The moment we offer it to God, it becomes consecrated and therefore it becomes God’s prasad. Even if a milligram of seva is offered to the Guru, our soul, the Guru returns it with abundant grace in tons and tons of immeasurable quantity. This is the beauty of our master - our Guru.
That is why many ancient scriptures in the sanatana dharma clearly declare that our Guru is our mother, Guru is our father, Guru is our bandhu - relatives and Guru is our sakha - friend. That is why when we mentally offer everything to the Guru- our soul, then not only ours’ but everyone associated with us also experience peace as everyone’s karmas get wiped away, not just ours. This is the beauty of the Guru’s grace. Individually, all our lives will prosper too.
That is why it is our inbound duty to offer everything to that supreme light and also teach our family members the sanskaar to do the same.
Excerpted from The Force of Nirvana by His Holiness Shri Shri Nimishananda Guruji.