Importance Of Ishta Devatha or Chosen Ideal

 ॐ हरिः श्री गणपतये नमः अविघ्नमस्तु

ॐ: लोक: समस्त: सुखिनो भवन्तु:॥


I dedicate this humble work to Lord Narayana. He is everything. 


Dear Friends,


In this post, i am trying to share some of my understandings about Ishta Devatha. The main discussion topics of this post are, What is the importance of Ishta Devatha or Chosen Ideal in once's spiritual life and why it has considered as the decisive factor in making one's spiritual life successful.


It is only by the blessings of the God we find our Ishta Devatha and be able to worship the God in the form of Ishta Devatha. A devotee worship the God in the form of Ishta Devatha and God pours his blessings to a devotee in this form. No other forms of the God gives such blessings to a devotee than in the form of his Ishta Devatha. 


It concentrates all our devotion to a particular Divine form of the God and develops pure Bhakti. Through Bhakti one reaches to God.


This understanding teaches us about how significant is to worship God in a particular form. 


You may heard the very famous quotes from Rig Veda,

"ekam sat vipra bahudha vadanti" - means, the absolute truth is one and wise men call many.

This quote is truly a diamond from the treasure of Vedic knowledge.  This stainless gem clearly reflects the light of Veda and removes the darkness of ignorance around we live. 

Whenever an experience a darkness of doubt or confusion on various matters of spirituality, we need to remove the darkness from the light of Vedic Knowledge. Otherwise we may fall from this this slippery path into darkness. 

In whatever path we follow to reach to the God, we encounter a series of diversions along the journey. It is nothing but the knowledge of the Veda help us to take the right decision on each diversion. 

The purpose behind why i brought Veda into the discussion of Ishta Devatha is, i also think that one should start understanding about the Ishta Devatha under the light of Veda. Otherwise it only creates wrong ideas in one's mind. 

Ishta Devatha is the backbone of the path of Bhakti. One who travels in the path of Bhakti usually find his Ishta Devatha and focus their worship on that particular Devatha mainly and reaches the highest goal of the Bhakti path. 


God can be realised by various paths they are as, Bhakti, Karma and Jnana


The ultimate goal of these three paths take a sadhaka to the God. This is the ultimate goal of the life itself.  A Bhakti yogi realises or sees God through his Ishta Devatha. 

In this aspect we understand the importance of Ishta Devatha in the path of God realisation. 

A yogi very much aware of the value of the God realisation sees the Ishta Devatha with highest devotion and love. All the efforts of a yogi is directed at the lotus feet of his Ishta Devatha. It is only by the blessing of the God he can take atleast a single step in the right direction. 


How do we know which Deity is our Ishta Devatha? 

I know there are many ways to find out Ishta Devatha either by the grace of the Guru, or through Astrology etc

The above methods are not for a general public. There should be a method which available for an ordinary man. I belongs to this category and i could not find a supporter in my path also. But i found a solution to find out my Ishta Devatha, it requires some efforts. 

Before i give the answer, i would like talk about the main subject that is, what is an Ishta Devatha? 


Ishta Devatha is nothing but God. If you want to know about what is God then you have to read Vedas and Upanishads. They call God, Brahman. It is the ultimate truth and ultimate purpose of the human birth. 

Gurus tells us, no one can understand what really is God but they describe him Satchidananda - Absolute Existence Knowledge Bliss

Yogis experience him in Nirvikalpa Samadhi. It cannot be described in any way to an ordinary person. This only idea what we know about God. Only through his blessing we know him. Everything entirely depends on his mercy. 

To receive his grace, we need to surrender completely to his lotus feet. Then only he blesses us. 

From these golden ideas we got from Vedas, Gurus, Bhakti Sutras and life teachings of various Bhakti Yogis we get some idea on how to proceed in this spiritual journey. 

Ishta Devatha is the heart of Bhakti Yoga. Pure Bhakti means complete surrender to our Ishta Devatha. It is not possible for a beginner of the path to complete surrender in one overnight. It may take some time and each day we get closer and closer to our Ishta Devatha. We should never lose our patience. Later you would recognise them as the biggest steps taken in your life. 

Ishta Devatha makes our spiritual life practical and bear fruits for all the efforts we make for the God realisation. 

This is the big question for all the spiritual aspirants. Whether this spirituality is practically possible in the current time or not. 

Spirituality is entirely based on an individual. It is the nature of a person and it is the root cause of one becoming a spiritual person in my opinion. In nature, it is the truthfulness or sincerity makes one very serious about spiritual matters. 


Such people continue their spiritual practises throughout the life even if it does not give any result to them. They cannot live without spiritual thoughts. That's why i told you, it is the basic nature of a person which drives his thoughts in a specific direction. 


So spiritual practice is said to be continued through out our life. Then only it makes any meaning otherwise it is just a temporary mentality or we have to know that we are not really sincere towards it.

Now i come to the answer to the above question, if spiritual activities you carry through out your life does not obstruct the right duties and responsibilities as a family man, professional and social being then it should be considered as practical. 

It is a common misconception that spirituality would be a hinderance to the worldly life. Yes, it does shape one's life in a certain way and also it looks bit different from others point of view about a life. But it can live with you and grow with you. 

It is not about renouncing one's worldly life or escaping from the duties of one's life. It is about living the life through out with a right awareness about the ultimate aim of the life. 

With the right awareness, we have to welcome God to our life, he is the ultimate source of all goodness. You can observe yourself that the spirituality will grow as the time goes by. One day it will become as strong as to influence you to drive your entire life in the right direction. He will be the driver of the of this divine journey. 

Life and God does not contradicts each other if you read about God. Incorporating spirituality into one's ordinary life is the idea behind the Bhakti path. It supports one's life. 

The good experiences we get from our life is the real strength we can use for the God realisation. Such effort will bear fruits in spiritual life. 


Ishta Devatha represents a particular bhava of the God. Lord Krishna is different from Lord Shiva and Lord Shiva is different from Vishnu and so on. But we should keep this in our heart of the heart that is, they are only different forms of the one and only same God.  

We would like to see God in a special divine form. We would like to hear stories of that particular Devatha and our mind develops a love for him while worshiping him. That's your Ishta Devatha. 

Which Deity develops a love or an attraction for you is the real question to ask to yourself. If  you developed a love for him from the early days of your life and it stills live with you then no need to doubt again it is your Chosen Deity or Ishta Devatha. 


Prayer, Japa, Meditation on him quickly absorb whole of your mind. It is like our mind found out someone who is very fond. It gives a clear satisfaction to your devotion. 

Worshiping him is like pouring a drop of water to one top node which reaches to all the parts of the whole body of roots of a tree.  

Each repetition of his name touches very deep into our heart. Our mind quickly concentrated when you meditate on him. Gradually it develops a pure love in your heart. This is the goal. What else you need in your life. 

The real purpose of human life is to acquire this divine love. You don't need to study how to do a right meditation after this, he is the meditation for you. Such love gives everything needed in your spiritual life. 

In the early days, one should repeat sacred name of Ishta Devatha. One can repeat different names of the Ishta Devatha but one should only one name for japa that is the mantra of you.


Mantras are sacred names of Devathas. One should repeat the right name of the Chosen Deity. The sacred name itself is the mantra body of the Devatha. 


Japa is the early form of meditation. It is easy to do because of the involvement of physical activity of repetition. It helps you to build a good concentration and naturally leads to meditation. 


Meditation is a mental activity no doubt but it is very difficult to do such mental activity with untamed mind. It should start from macro level and gradually progress to micro level.


Before you start meditating on the desired form of the Deity, with the help of a Dhyana sloka, imagine each of the part of the Devatha body. After that start japa with mantra.

After repeating the Dhyana sloka many times, your imagination power develops to see with eye closed. Initially you may face difficulty to visualise correctly but the Dhyana sloka helps you for this purpose.

 

Never try to make it perfect and start the japa and meditation. Always remember it is the  practise which alone makes any improvements. 


One should do japa every day at a fixed time. Morning or evening. Before having any food.

It will direct your mental current in a new direction. Day after day it will become easier for you to do. 


When you repeat a mantra during japa, it is advised by Gurus to visualise the Ishta Devatha in your mind. 


Reading books develop pure love towards the Chosen Deity is widely accepted method in Bhakti yoga. 


For example, if you are a devotee of Lord Vishnu, then reading Srimad Bhagavatam is beneficial for developing love and it increases our mental strength for meditation on Lord Vishnu. 

If your Ishta Devatha is another one, then read the Bhagavatam of that particular Deity. 


There should be something to think and love about that Deity right? 


When we concentrate our mind on a particular subject, we should know or read as many thoughts related to the subject as possible. It creates a vast meadow for the mind to play around and it will lose its interest to leave the subject (the place) if it gets more places to oscillate. That's the nature of the mind. As a result of this, without wasting lot of energy on controlling and bringing the mind back to the subject, it naturally does that job. 


When you develop love for your Ishtam, it creates a natural interest in the Chosen Deity for you to think about him always. Whenever you get time, you naturally interested into indulge in the thoughts of him. It is like, your Deity attracts you just like a magnet attracts iron piece. The concentrated thought come and fill the entire mind and we plunge into the thought sea. In that state, all the thoughts arise centered around our Ishta Devatha. This state is called meditation.


That's all my dear friends. 

In this post, i have tried my best to give you the message of, how Prema or pure love towards the God is getting highlighted over other external devotional activities like rituals and ceremonies. 

Pure love for God easily bestows us the result of all the difficult spiritual practices. For that reason itself how important is love towards him and how important for one is to choose the right Deity to develop such a love. 


Choosing the Ishta Devatha is the crucial  for a Bhakta's success. 

Pray for Faith, Pray for Bhakti and Pray for Prema. These are the real prayer of a true Bhakta. 

Surrendering completely on him, through his grace, one receives his vision. That is the goal of a spiritual life. 


I conclude this post with famous quote of Sri Ramakrishna Paramahamsa, 

" The winds of grace are always blowing, but you have to raise the sail "


Thank you all for spending some time and energy on this blog spot. I hope you have got anything good from this post. 

I believe it is the God alone behind all the activities. 


Thank You Dear Reader. 

I love you. God bless you.















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