The Grace and Blessings of Authentic Shaktipat

The Grace and Blessings of Authentic Shaktipat
by Kambra McConnel

Sat Chit Ananda Guru Ki Jay!

Over more than 10 years of immersing in Nityananda Shaktipat Yoga, I consistently benefit from the methods and the necessary leadership for increasing my spiritual witnessing awareness.

Time and time again, my direct experiences give rise to new and greater dimensions of being, loving, and life-changing skills that allow me to live in a state of Grace.

Here, Kedarji instructs us to contemplate the following questions:

• Do you wake up with your heart singing and dancing with Indescribable Joy?
• Do you experience this state throughout your day?
• And if not, why not?

The fact that I can answer “yes” to these questions more and more, over time, and that I can get back on track when I answer “no” – for me, that is what represents everything that sets our approach apart from other paths, especially thanks to authentic Shaktipat.

What is Shaktipat?

Authentic Shaktipat is a time-honored spiritual initiation – a blessing, a transmission of Grace.

In our approach, Kedarji describes authentic Shaktipat as “a spiritual awakening of Kundalini that escalates the experience of spiritual practice.”

Before crossing paths with Kedarji, I had never heard of Shaktipat.

My only experiences with spirituality were going to church, healers, guided meditation groups where we were taught to imagine various scenarios, and so on. In these ways, I searched for happiness and meaning in my life.

And I did get temporary relief from suffering, but all of my old habits, fears, and worries were still there, and I did not experience peace, joy and content on a lasting, uninterrupted basis.

I had no idea how to get to the root cause of my suffering and let it go. And I did not understand, or directly experience, the purpose of my daily mundane life: to retrace my steps back to God.

The Difference that Makes the Difference

In my experience, what is great – and very rare – about Nityananda Shaktipat Yoga and Kedarji’s leadership is that they are offered for everyone, and absolutely anyone can benefit from it.

It does not matter who you are, where you are, or where you are in your life. Everyone can benefit from the time-honored and proven methods that are instructed here.

Very importantly, it can help you gain awareness of the subtle ways in which you hide your True Nature of Joy, Peace and Love from yourself.

And from this state, you can lead a happy, fearless, free life.

And it is not about a quick fix or a short-term experience.

When I practice the methods taught here, and when I put forth the discipline and self-effort to nurture the many blessings of Grace inherent in our approach, then I consistently experience long-term – permanent – benefits.

The Many Blessings of Shaktipat

 Over time, receiving Kedarji’s Shaktipat Blessing has improved my experience of Indescribable Joy – the Bliss of the Self – in meditation, as well as in daily mundane life.

In my first weekend Shaktipat meditation retreat, in August 2015, I immediately felt my body relax when I received Shaktipat from Kedarji. My head went forward, and it almost touched the ground.

I experienced a sense of expansion…of no limits…of timelessness…of God meditating on God.

I felt clear-minded… and a release of my physical body into what we call a “loss of body consciousness.”

I even let go of not knowing all words of the mantra that I had just learned that day. And then, by my Guru’s Grace, I experienced those words coming to me inwardly, anyway.

It was such a beautiful blessing that gave me the direct experience of seeing how I had limited myself, based on what I thought and felt…and how easy it was, in an instant, to become unstuck…and that it was possible to stay unstuck.

So it was an absolutely beautiful experience, and so freeing. To this day, I am very grateful.

To share another example, when I received Kedarji’s Shaktipat Blessing in 2020, I experienced a lot of laughter, and spontaneous feelings of lightness and bliss welled up inside of me.

I felt peace, and a fresh sense of relaxation wash over my whole body. I felt grateful.

Thoughts flowed through my mind, and I passively observed them without getting wrapped up in them, like watching clouds float by in the sky.

I felt a sense of recommitment to my daily spiritual practice, and I felt grateful for Kedarji’s leadership on how to be more patient, and how to not get distracted, and how to ask for help. I felt that support was all around me.

So Many Blessings of Grace

By continuing to nurture my Shaktipat experience through meditation in my daily spiritual practices, over time, my experience of Joy in meditation has continued to deepen and improve.

So now, I can carry this Joy, Peace and Content throughout each day with patience, concentration, Love and support.

Now, I do wake up with my heart singing and dancing with Indescribable Joy.

And I do experience this state throughout most days.

And in moments when I do not experience it, now I have the spiritual leadership, methods, and highest understandings to get back on track.

Practice, Practice, Practice

To nurture my Shaktipat experiences over many years, in as many moments as possible each day, I imbibe the Grace of Kedarji’s wisdom, instruction and leadership, and I put forth the Grace of my own self-effort with daily spiritual practices as instructed – such as meditation, chanting, japa (mantra repetition), Witness Consciousness Centering Dharanas, selfless service (Guruseva), reading and contemplating sacred texts, and journaling.

My practice of putting forth steady effort to heighten my spiritual witnessing awareness creates a strong foundation that makes it much easier for me to remember to engage in other daily spiritual practices, in an instant.

My daily practice reminds me to consistently reach for and hold the highest understandings that give me expanding experiences of inner peace, joy and content, as well as recognition that my True Nature is perfection – the Indescribable Joy, Inner Peace, and Love that are already within me.

So there is no need for me to pursue anything or anyone outside of myself. All I need to focus on is going inside and staying there with my heightened spiritual witnessing awareness, without allowing it to contract.

There is No Experience Like Direct Experience

To share a specific example, in a recent weekend Shaktipat meditation retreat, Kedarji uttered the following points of wisdom:

“You do not engage in Sadhana (daily spiritual practice under the leadership of an authentic Shaktipat Siddha Guru) to become perfect. You do so to remove the ways in which you conceal your perfection from yourself.”

…and…

“All thoughts are expressed by the Self – all thoughts belong to the in-dweller, your True Nature, the highest Lord. Realize this in order to use all thoughts as a way to remember your Guru, the Self, God, the highest Lord. Use them to help you go back inside, and keep your focus there, so that you do not get upset by thoughts.”

I directly experienced these points of wisdom upon engaging in meditation, mantra repetition, contemplation, and my selfless service of offering this blog post.

I had been contemplating what to offer for a long time, and I could not decide where to focus.

I felt excited to share so many experiences, but the mere thought of actually sitting down to write them in a clear, concise way felt overwhelming, and so I got stuck.

Then, by my Guru’s Grace, I experienced a dawning of a heightened spiritual awareness that I am very attached to words!

When I am writing blogs, or writing long talks for our retreats, and even in my daily mundane interactions, I have a deeply rooted habit of internally reviewing past conversations, or trying to prepare for conversations that have not happened yet (and may never happen).

I want to express myself perfectly – yet when I forget to hold the understanding that my True Nature of perfection is already within me, I subtly focus on using words in an attempt to influence and control outcomes, and to be praised in order to avoid blame.

So to let go of this habit, I practice returning to my spiritual practice of performing a Witness Consciousness Centering Dharana (take three deep breaths, recall the form of my Guru, and repeat my mantra), which helps me go back inside and stay in the present moment, from moment to moment.

And then, with a quiet mind, in meditation, I can ask Kedarji, “What needs to be said? Please lead me.”

And this transforms my thinking from “It would be fun to share this story or that scenario because it will make people laugh” into a heightened spiritual witnessing awareness of how I can best serve – how I can make every thought and activity a blessed sacrament to the Lord.

And this transforms every thought, action and interaction into a true privilege to serve, filled with Joy, Peace, and Love.  

What Grace!

Om Guru Om

Kambra McConnel is the Treasurer of The Bhakta School of Transformation. She sits on our Board of Directors and also volunteers as a certified staff teacher and program leader for Nityananda Shaktipat Yoga.