Yoga’s Superhighway to the Divine: Kirtan Chanting

Night after night for over 6 months we would all collect. 500 people stuffed in a space, resting on the difficult, cold, marble flooring, shouting in a call and action format. Singing kirtan.

Evening kirtan at the ashram was without a doubt my preferred time of day. After hours of karma yoga (which typically included routine jobs, done over and over again) the shouting was a method to channel and release energy and to let go.

One night an ancient looking swami got up to lead a kirtan. His dhoti (fabric twisted around his waist) covered his frail structure– below, skin and bones. He sat silently for a minute prior to starting to pump the harmonium. Out came his squeaky voice … off secret … tone deaf … dreadful.

All At Once, out of this male’s heart came pure love, crystallised dedication, a life time or more of devotion to the Divine that was palpable.

This Bhakti– this pure glowing love– filled the space, opened our hearts and influenced a craze of overjoyed chanting and dance that appeared to go on permanently. The space was buzzing; a website was opened, triggered and honoured.

Kirtan is the extremely highway to the Divine.

When we can leave our own method and let any type of ego judgment liquify, “I’m not a vocalist, I do not have an excellent voice, I do not comprehend Sanskrit” then an area is opened that permits something bigger then ourselves in. It is not an efficiency. It is not a sing-a-long. Kirtan is a co-creation in between the caller, the responders, and the Divine.

This is union. This is Yoga– the yoking of our private self with the universal.

Kirtan bypasses the mind and blows up the heart open; the power of vibration is among the most powerful kinds of improvement. Favorable noises and vibrations have a cellular result and can bring physical, psychological and psychological recovery.

Whatever seen and hidden is made up of energy and has a vibrational plan. Sound associates with different chakras or energies depending upon its tone and objective. Frequently disease manifests due to the fact that there is a clog or stagnancy of energy in several of the chakras. Through shouting we can start to open the energy focuses so that prana can stream properly and harmoniously.

The heart centre, anahata chakra, is the entrance, the middle point in between the lower chakras and the upper energy centres. Anahata chakra is the most effective energy centre, a lot more so than the electro-magnetic energy of the brain.

Love is the supreme therapist.

Permitting our heart to open is our ticket out of aggravation, judgment, discomfort, and anger. Bhakti yoga, the yoga of dedication, is among the fastest and most effective kinds to access the heart energy.

You can master your handstand or lower arm balance and not be practicing yoga, however it’s almost difficult to shout or sing from your heart and miss out on the superhighway leading back to your own wholeness and important nature.

It does not matter if you’re tone deaf or dislike singing in public (then the practice of kirtan is absolutely for you), coming together with similar individuals to link voices and raise your vibration upwards will change your life like no other asana practice will.

Opening the heart dissolves the psychological aggravations, judgments, and criticisms and leaves space for spontaneous happiness and inner peace to bubble up and spring forth– the best offering we can provide to ourselves and the world.

Image by Ali Kaukus

—