The Śrī Kramam
Meditation can be compared to a flow. In fact, the word “nāḍīs” which they use are really misspelling of the word “nadī” or river. It is a conduit, a flow of awareness along a direction. For this flow of direction there are two banks. One bank is the male aspect and the other bank is the female aspect. When you are thinking of the power as Mother, then you are thinking of the female genital. When you are thinking of the power as the Father, as Śiva, you are thinking of the male genital. When you are thinking of the flow itself, of the river itself, when the two banks merge, the flow becomes thin, there is a thin line of separation between these two. They are in contact, in interaction. The flow is coming out of the union between Śiva and Śakti. The orgasm itself is the Kuṇḍalinī Śakti. The male is the undisturbed aspect and the female is the disturbing aspect.
In Tantra, the female is considered to be the Guru. She is the one who directs the flow of the pūjā worship. She is the one who decides what is to be done and at what stage. She controls the entire procedure. Without her approval, not one step can be taken forward. Constantly the awareness is kept on the female aspect or the male aspect or on the union aspect. There are only three modes of worship at the Mūlādhāra chakra. The mind tends to only get absorbed in happiness. It cannot focus itself on something it does not like. Even on things that it likes, it cannot stay there, it tries to move away. Therefore you choose for your meditation something which is very pleasurable and lovable. That is why she is called Bhagarādhyā.
Preparation of the Nectar
The Śrī Kramam is the preparation of the nectar, invoking the entire cosmic aspects into the nourishing drink that we are preparing here, by the taking of which you become the Devī Herself. This means throughout your entire day whatever you say will come true. Those who take the viśeṣārghyam remembering the Guru and offering it first to their heads and then taking it inside become the Devī and this takes effect until the next day. All their previous sins and whatever karmas they have done are completely washed out. That is the function of the viśeṣārghyam sthāpana. It plays a very important role.
The Śrīvidyā upāsanā means that you realize the truth of the statement that what you see is yourself. You are seeing yourself, your body, your mind, your thoughts — all these are yours. Not only that, you are also seeing all the articles of worship, the yantra and the Devī — all these are also yourself.
To establish the reality and the truth of this in an integral way, imagine that you are hovering like an angel over yourself and you are looking down where you are sitting. This is your nose. Devī is sitting here. The articles of pūjā are there. Here is the Śrī Cakra which is the link between the two of you. On the left side and on the right-hand side you are going to keep what is called Sāmānārghya and Viśeṣārghya. There is going to be a maṇḍala for the ordinary pot (sāmānārghya) and one for the viśeṣārghya, the nectar in which all the kalās are invoked.
You have to become a part of the entire structure. This is Her face, you are Her breasts and this is Her foot and this is Her yoni and this is Her navel. You are sitting on Her yoni, the Ādhāra Śakti — Her Mūlādhāra chakra. You are yourself the Svādhiṣṭhāna. The sāmānārghya and viśeṣārghya are the right and left breasts of Devī. This whole structure is Ardhanārīśvara, the right breast corresponds with Śiva and that is flat, and the left breast is full, it is the viśeṣārghyam, the Devī. The Devī is the icchā śakti, the Śrī Cakra and the Sāmānārghya and Viśeṣārghya are in the jñāna śakti sthāna and you and the Mūlādhāra are the kriyā śakti sthāna. As we mentioned, in the Vajra Pañjara Nyāsa, we are placing the three bījas, one in yourself, one in the connecting link of the Śrī Cakra and one in the Devī, in the kriyā, jñāna and icchā śakti sthānas. You are exchanging the icchā and kriyā śaktis and the connection is the jñāna. It is like a point which is a pinhole camera, where what you see is being reflected. Your right side is Her left side and your left is Her right side. You are making yourself, the pūjā articles, the nectar and the Devī one integrated structure through this process of ritual.
Sāmānārghya
The next step in the preparation is the purification of the water. We make a maṇḍala like this. A square, a circle, the point of which touches the square. Then you form a hexagon inside that. And then you form a triangle inside that. First you draw the inside triangle. Then you draw the hexagon. You go clockwise. You draw the circle starting at the upper left and going around clockwise. Starting with the īśāna koṇa, the northeast corner, you draw the square. When you do it this way you are following the Vāstu, the rules for architecture.
The central triangle represents the Ājñā chakra. The upper triangle represents the Śiva trikoṇa, and the triangle with the point down represents the Śakti koṇa. They are interpenetrating and they are in union with each other. This therefore represents the Svādhiṣṭhāna chakra, the six-petalled lotus. The circle represents the three circles going around the waist, the chest and the throat chakras. Mūlādhāra is the square, Svādhiṣṭhāna is the six-petalled lotus, the circle represents Maṇipūra, Anāhata and Viśuddhi granthis and the central triangle is the Ājñā. Up to the Ājñā the differentiation between Śiva and Śakti exists. The Sāmānārghya preserves this difference.
You say “trikoṇa” and draw the triangle, “ṣaṭkoṇa” — the six-petalled lotus, “vṛtta” — the circle, and “caturasra” — the square. When done say “maṇḍala vilikhya”.
The directions of the pūjā are self-explanatory:
“Offer a flower. Put a conch or a pot on top of diagram. Fill it with water. Into the water add one drop of milk, the special herbs, saffron, turmeric, etc. Imagine the diagram is transferred up into the water. Worship the aṅgadevatās with kumkum or sandal paste. Imagine you are also worshipping yours and Devī’s bodies as you do this nyāsa.”
On top of this is a base and a pot with water. Into this water we are invoking the limbs of the Goddess.
When you do the aṅgadevatā nyāsa you say:
“Ka… hṛdayāya namaḥ” (the heart) and touch the agni koṇa, the northeastern corner of the square;
“Ha… śirase svāhā” (the head) and touch the īśāna koṇa, the northwestern corner of the square;
“Sa… śikhāyai vaṣaṭ” (the crown of head) and touch the asura koṇa, the southeastern corner;
“Ka… kavacāya huṁ” (the arms) and touch the vāyu koṇa, the southwestern corner of square;
“Ha… netra-trayāya vauṣaṭ” (the third eye) and touch the center (madhye); and then
“Sa… astrāya phaṭ” (circle the head) and touch top side, right side middle, bottom side middle, left side middle and say “bhūrbhuvaḥsuvaḥ oṁ”.
Then you worship the central part of the triangle saying Aiṁ Hrīṁ Śrīṁ Ka… Ha… Sa… namaḥ. You touch first the tip of the triangle at the bottom, then the right side corner, then the left, going anticlockwise. This completes the preparation of the sāmānārghya.
Preparation of the Viśeṣārghyam
Now comes the complicated procedure, the invocation of all the kalās into the Mother’s milk. We have identified the viśeṣārghya with the Mother’s left breast. The milk of kindness, of compassion, of knowledge, of grace, of protection, of all these good qualities resident in the Mother are present here.
Like before, we are drawing the maṇḍala for viśeṣārghya. First you put the bindu, taking the water from the sāmānārghya, draw the maṇḍala with your ring finger. The ring finger represents Śiva, the ring is the yoni. So with the Śiva liṅga you are putting the yoni there. Again dip the finger and draw the central triangle. Surrounding that you draw the ṣaṭkoṇa like before. Then draw the circle and the square. Here you start from inside and go to the outside.
First worship the maṇḍala that you have drawn on the ground. To the left of the sāmānārghya is your normal pot of water and to the side of the viśeṣārghya you keep the milk. The articles of worship are on your right side.
You worship the maṇḍala from the center. Then you worship the three koṇas of the central triangle, the Ājñā chakra, looking into the eyes of the Devī and remembering your own eyes. Ka… namaḥ, Ha… namaḥ, Sa… namaḥ. Then you do the aṅgadevatā nyāsa. You go around the ṣaṭkoṇa clockwise, starting with the southern koṇa. Then you repeat the nyāsa in the same way that you do it for the sāmānārghya. All the chakras are included in this nyāsa. The bindu represents the Sahasrāra chakra. But in sāmānārghya only up to the Ājñā chakra is included. This establishes the female supremacy.
Then you place the bījas for each of the chakras. You start with the fire which you are going to invoke in the base on which you are going to place the viśeṣārghya pot which goes on top of the maṇḍala you have drawn. The pot represents the sun and the liquid, the milk is going to represent the moon. The agni is essentially the earth. Here is the sun and here is the moon. When these three are aligned then there is a sun eclipse. If you think of the moon here, then there is a moon eclipse. Why do we say that the earth represents the fire? Because except for the outer crust, out of the 6000 miles about 5995 is fire and five miles is the earth. The entire earth inside is molten lava. That is why we call the earth the fire.
The graha-kāla, the eclipse time is supposed to be a puṇya-kāla, an auspicious time. It is necessary that you do not move the viśeṣārghya pātra or this alignment until the pūjā is completely done. If you move it, then the power that you have invested in that, the eclipse is over, so it does not have the same effect. That is why it is said that as long as the pūjā is not completed, you should not move the viśeṣārghya or the sāmānārghya.
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