Citi, Shakti and liveration

O Celestial One, grant that I may overcome


The enemies along your path,

The sense-thieves

Who conceal the highest reality.

The sensual world consists of Citi, divine consciousness as the body of Shakti; the sense and the physical body that confines one to bondage also constitute the vehicle for liberation. Thus the well-known tantric adage: “The very poison that kills becomes the elixir of life when used by the wise”

It is for this reason that not only are the sense acknowledged, but they are to be strengthened:

Nourished by the nectar

Of pure devotion rippling within,

Let my body become fit for your worship.

It is for two reasons that the senses are to be strengthened: first so that they be a strong vehicle for the descent of the power of Siva, which constitutes not just a feeling of emotional wellbeing, but a true force of the power of nature; shaktipata is the descent of shakti, or power of Siva in the form of the natural world. This shakti is akin to lightning, electricity, and ultimately the atomic energy that Shiva “dances up” in the dissolution of the universe. Second, by becoming a vessel for divine power, the practitioner is also emulating nature itself, just a step away from the body of Shiva, made of pure consciousness. Embodied by Shakti, nature is also then a vessel; Utpala refers to Devi as the “treasury of all powers”