Tapasya: Offering our preferences into the sacrificial fire
Rory Kinsella taking part in a yagya ceremony in Rishikesh in Northern India in 2016
In our Vedic theme of the month we have been exploring Tapasya: The Vedic Art of Delayed Gratification, where we surrender certain preferences in order to gain greater goals or desires.
We give up or go without things we enjoy in order foster discipline and increase our deserving power.
Meditation is the ultimate form of Tapasya where we surrender our preference to be engaged in activity when we are awake. What is our goal? It’s to be less stressed, have more energy and ultimately gain higher states of consciousness.
Outside of meditation, my specific Tapasya for January is to get up at dawn, surrendering my preference to lie in bed till 7am. I was doing quite well earlier in the month, but fell off my mountain bike at the weekend and have been prioritising rest to recover instead.
Rather than writing the whole thing off, I will instead start again when I feel better.
Click through the read more, including what I’m doing at a ceremony in India in the pic below.
If meditation helps us increase our wisdom credits and cope with more in our day, then practising Tapasya helps us increase our worthiness credits. When we’re able to do it, it will credit our account, but if we miss a day or two it doesn’t cancel out everything we have done so far.
The more we credit our worthiness account through showing the discipline to go without things we enjoy, the more worthy we will be of attaining our goals and desires.
As well as forming a key part of our meditation practice, the idea of surrendering preferences or making sacrifices can be seen in Vedic ceremonies called yagyas.
If you go to India, you may see a ritual or ceremony known as a yagya. In the pic above, I’m attending one in Rishikesh in Northern India in 2016 as part of my meditation teacher training graduation.
A yagya is a sacrificial offering of things like ghee, rice and flowers into a ceremonial fire, with mantras invoking Vedic aspects of consciousness, with the intention of attaining material or spiritual benefits.
Ghee – clarified butter – has historically been highly valued in India as it takes a lot of effort and resources to make. By offering it up to the flames where it burns dramatically, we are making a sacrifice that is intended to signal to the universe the strength of our intentions, the sincerity of our desires or goals.
By dragging myself out of bed at dawn, I am offering my delicious lie-in up for sacrifice in service of my greater goal.
While I’m happy to sense-check anyone’s goals or preferences to surrender, we generally keep our goals to ourselves.
As I practise Tapasya, I’m also cultivating a sense of discipline that will help me work more diligently towards all of my goals. And by getting up earlier, I will also have more time to work towards them!
What are you prepared to give up for your goals?
