The Importance of Sadhana and Its Impact on Our Karma

 "At first you may think that sadhana is a limited part of your life. In time you realize that everything you do is part of your sadhana." - Ram Dass

For those along the spiritual path, we're always looking for ways to deepen our connection with Self and all of existence. We understand how important the feeling of peace and oneness is towards our well-being and soul evolution. Despite this understanding, it can be tricky to find the practices in which helps us achieve these states and staying consistent with them as well. In this post, we explore the necessity behind sadhana and how impactful it can be towards our journey to wholeness and our karmic cycles. 

Sadhana in Sanskrit refers to one's spiritual practice/discipline. Sadhana acts as our tool for greater oneness and realization of the spiritual truth that lies within us and all things. With that being said, it's important to know that ANYTHING can be our sadhana! The way we talk, the way we move, the way we think and approach our day-to-day lives can all be our sadhana. Sadhana is a tool that must be used with effort of high intensity while maintaining a detachment to a goal. It can be paradoxical since sadhana is a tool to achieve a greater sense of peace and realization, however, we must detach from the goal to achieve it and allow ourselves to just be at one with the practice. Through just being do we allow maximum effort to come to the surface. Allowing ourselves to be fully present with our practice(s) is how we escape attachment to achieving a goal or any ego desire and fully be at one with this moment. 

If there's one thing I never shy away from speaking about, it is discipline, and sadhana must be met with discipline! Without discipline and attending to it daily, (even for 5-10 mins) it can leave you restless within your journey and often times ungrounded. It is also important that while sadhana can be anything and everything we do on a daily basis, we must spend time alone to practice so no outside factors can disturb us since we need the upmost focus on that moment. It's our constant dedication to our sadhana in which we become better servants to God and others, let alone ourselves. Just like with anything you seek to master, practice makes perfect! However, if you miss a day or become unfocused then don't sweat it. Daily sadhana isn't a normal task in the western world so finding your footing within it may result in mistakes from time to time. No one is perfect! 

Speaking of perfection, we must understand that Sadhana is a beautiful tool of realization and the awakening of our inner perfection. God, Spirit or whatever name best describes the Creator to you, lies within all things including ourselves. It is the deepest and truest part of ourselves. Sadhana helps us uncover that truth of who we are. It is the very tool that aligns our minds and bodies to our Spirit's frequency. Sadhana unveils what lies under the attachments we hold to the outside world and our thoughts and emotions. Sometimes, we tend to identify with thoughts and emotions of sadness, anger, unease and hate. With sadhana, we wipe away these identifications and see the truth to who we are and reality. 

Daily practice of sadhana can help us increase greater faith within our journey. To practice sadhana is to practice faith, and to practice faith is to practice surrender and detachment. It is only by letting go of the ego and desire do we truly understand faith and the role it plays in all reality. Sadhana is to lose control and grip to all things we hold dear to us and to just be at unison with the cosmos. It's a beautiful tool of nourishment to our being. The more we allow this nourishment, the more we ignite new realizations, possibilities and experiences into our lives. 

Sadhana is a great tool to help release ourselves from samsara, the cycle of life, death and rebirth that anchors us in this material reality. Sadhana not only peels the layers that have covered who we truly are but also shows us our karma and how we are the ones who dictates its course. Karma means action in Sanskrit and is the accumulation of our thoughts, words and actions throughout the course of our soul journey. To peel back the layers and to see what we have accumulated as our karma, we now put ourselves in a better position to control our karma (actions). 

I've stated before that our subconscious mind rules reality and that we must become aware of them and rewrite it. Karma and our subconscious minds are very much connected. The subconscious is very unaware of what's real so it's basically a memory bank full of accumulated thoughts, emotions and actions that were agreed upon by our conscious (waking) mind, unconsciously (what a mouth full!). It is our job to rewrite our karma and consciously create our own karma which reflects onto reality and releases us from samsara. Sadhana is the key tool to becoming conscious of and rewriting our subconscious mind which simultaneously helps us take control of our karma and, in turn, our own lives. To have greater control of one's actions is to have greater control of one's reality. Unawareness of karma and how it reflects within our subconscious ties us down within samsara. 

So, whether you choose walking, writing, yoga or transcendental meditation as your sadhana, remember that it's important that you find what works for you and that you remain disciplined towards it. Lack of discipline with sadhana is one step forward and one step backward. Discipline with sadhana helps us achieve greater peace, faith and freedom within our journey one step at a time. It is important to keep in mind that we must practice compassion while we do our sadhana. Become your own best friend during this journey. If you make a mistake or become unfocused, don't cling to it and move forward! Know that this practice is bigger than self-preservation but rather focuses on self-expansion. Sadhana cannot work with attachment to limiting beliefs and ideas the ego loves to entertain. Instead, be open to the unknown that comes with expansion and enjoy the fruits of the freedom that follows!

"Sadhana when all efforts are dropped. When you are totally relaxed, you experience true bliss." - Gurudev Sri Sri Ravi Shankar