BANGALORE : To keep our ego under check and balance we must always remember this golden truth of life and tell ourselves- "I am what I am because of my Guru because Guru is within me always."
This truth lingers in our mind and heart as the fragrance of the Parijata flower, known as the queen of the night or white coral jasmine. You can understand the significance of the Parijata tree as it emerged during the samudra manthana or churning of the milky ocean.
Lord Indra being the lord of the senses was completely enchanted by this beautiful celestial tree. Its golden bark, copper leaves, pretty snow white petals with red stock, lingering fragrance were so enticing that he decided to keep them in his Amaravati gardens of Indra loka - the heavenly world. He felt it was far too beautiful to be planted on bhuloka- the earth. It was the Vishnu avatar of Lord Krishna who brought it to earth in the pretext of gifting his consorts Satyabhama the plant and Rukmini the fragrant flowers. So, we clearly understand that only with the grace of the Guru (as Brahma, Vishnu and Maheshwara) can we get rid of the clutches of Indra.
Indra's clutches are so strong that we will be most tempted to sway towards bad habits and addictions towards intoxication represented by the Sura as the goddess of intoxication, vasanas or tendencies of the vices which are all Rambha and other celestial nymphs which also emerged from the ksheera sagara. Lord Shiva says, "Like the moon that reflects the light of the sun, a disciple should reflect and become luminous with the teaching and knowledge of his Guru. Then, I will adorn that disciple on my crown as a jewel."
This is exactly what Lord Shiva did. When the moon surfaced from the churning of the ocean, Lord Shiva wore it as an ornament. Then the churning of the ocean continued with the yearning for nectar by both devas and the asuras. Still there was no sight of it.
What came up was only poison. The naga devatas or snake gods drank as much poison as they could but still there was lots of it remaining. They could not drink it any further as they would surely be dead if they had consumed more poison than they had. So, to prevent any catastrophe Lord Shiva swallowed all the poison (halahala) and became neelakantha or nanjundeshwara. Likewise, while we are in meditation and the churning of our mind is taking place, although we will be pleased that lot of good things that were stored in us is coming out as skills and talents, we must still be highly aware and not get carried away.
This is because, we will still have strong residues of our past life vasanas as negativity. This suddenly crops up and we might be least expecting the same at that time. We have to completely empty the bottle of subconscious mind to be able to reach out to the nectar finally! Therefore Lord Shiva says that we must seek the refuge of our Guru. It is not an impossible task.
"Just surrender to your Guru and offer the fruits of all your actions at His Lotus Feet. Then, the Guru neutralises the negative vibrations within you as well as around you - in your aura."