That personification, personality, function of the supreme divine Consciousness, which breaks up all obstructions to our inner spiritual purity, progress and perfection, is Ganesha. It is that cosmic and supracosmic power of God, which demolishes all barriers to success and prosperity in the external and internal life of the human individual. It destroys all obstacles to human peace, happiness, growth, development, power, evolution.
For freedom from hindrances to the attainment of success on the path of spiritual life, or to the accomplishment of any good, or noble, or new undertaking, we have to greet and harmonise ourselves with that Power of God which eliminates failures from all endeavours; presides over, and secures, success, victory, fulfilment. This is done by repeating once, or thrice, this greeting to Ganesha: OM Sri Ganeshaya Namah. When this Mantra is repeated, we obtain the object of our pursuit without encountering trials and troubles. The fog on the path is cleared, the resistances to progress eliminated, and the best results are secured with minimum effort. For millenniums, this Mantra has been used with great advantages. Like all Mantras, it is revealed by the Supreme Being, through the Intelligence, Vision, Experience of the divinely illuminated and perfected sages and men of integral God-Experience.
The repetition of this Mantra should precede all prayers, all forms of meditation, or spiritual practices. Begin all works, spiritual or secular, with the utterance of this Mantra. Attune yourself with the Benevolent Powers in the Universe, with the various functionaries of God in the governance of all the visible and invisible worlds. Let the heart utter the Mantra, in faith, and the intelligence be lit up with the luminous knowledge pertaining to it. Love, faith, knowledge - these are means of human salvation, liberation, freedom, perfection, fulfilment, all attainments. Ganesha is the eternal Power of Knowledge, Success and Fulfilment. Your strength is multiplied when you are in touch with that which is supreme in that strength. Your successes are easily obtained, when something in your heart of love and reverence, faith and understanding, goodness and determination, is in contact with that Power which breaks up all limitations, barriers, obstructions, obstacles, difficulties, and makes available to you the sunshine of success, prosperity and abundance. All your strivings and efforts for peace, happiness, wealth, power, fame, cultural or mental or spiritual attainments, deserve full success, - and it can be obtained with least resistances, much assistance, many favourable circumstances and propitious conditions, by reverencing, through the utterance of the Mantra, God's Power and Grace embodied in Ganesha.
The elephant is the symbol of almightiness. It stands for royalty, power, invincibility, infinity, supreme success and victory. What is the biggest animal, in the animal kingdom? The elephant. Therefore elephant personifies the Absolute. What is the most powerful animal? The elephant. Therefore, elephant stands for omnipotence. It succeeds over everything, conquers and rules everything. It stands for kingship, dignity, greatness. Since that power of the Supreme God called Ganesha symbolises and carries in itself all these, it is indicated by the head of an elephant. Ganesha is the Lord of all the atoms in creation. When we recognize this darkness-dispelling and obstacles-breaking function of the all-powerful Grace of God, and adore God in this special aspect, He dissolves the concretion of atoms which act as a barrier to our progress, our happiness, our peace, our success, our prosperity, our development and evolution. Since He is a power and personality of God, all His actions are divine and what He breaks is what is undivine, unhappy, or whatever causes failure. Since He is all-mighty and infinite, He breaks all limitations, limitations to our knowledge, limitations to our peace and happiness, limitations in our spiritual experience and illumination, limitations in our worldly prosperity, physical health, intelligence, memory, common-sense and wisdom. Therefore, we profit ourselves immensely when we befriend, by our adoration, this grand aspect of the all-pervading, all-powerful God, called Ganesha, before we begin any new work, or start our prayers, or meditation.
Ganesha grants us all forms of success, knowledge, power, fame, prosperity. It is nonsense to think that this cosmic and supra-cosmic, eternal and timeless, power of God, called Ganesha, has literally the head of an elephant. Myth is not a reality, but a figure that stands for some reality that is invisible and as yet unrecognised.
Swami Omkarananda
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