Presentation

[Guest guest]

I am new to this group, but I was lurking for a long time in the ShaktiSadhnaa

group, so I just wanted to make a short presentation.

 

The reason that I have not written anything, is that I am initiated Vaisnava,

and as far as I am told, Vaisnavas and Shaktas are enemies and have opposite

viewpoints. I am not so sure anymore that is so, though.

 

I am a Radha bhakta. Which I think requires some explanation. I see Radha, not

(only) as the girlfriend of the cowheard Krishna, but as the supreme female

power of everything, as Shakti, and as non-different from all the other

Shakti manifestations. So my interest and bhakti goes directly into the

Shakti realm. So I see Durga, Kali and the other manifestations as the same

person as Radha. It is just different forms for different purposes. For me

there is no difference.

 

Chaitanya Vaisnavism, as far as I understand, is in core actually quite

female-oriented, but as time has passed, for some reason, the male

(Krishna/Visnu) aspect has been more and more come in the foreground, and the

female element (Radha) has been put more and more in the background. When the

female element becomes forgotten, with it goes the philosophy about it, which

changes the shape of the whole philosophy to something else.

 

For me, in this life, I actually started out trying to worship Kali a little,

many, many years ago. But the I somehow was directed to Vaisnavism (by inner

direction), took initiation from my Guru and lived under his direction doing

sadhana in his asrama for many years. Finally it happened that my guru broke

with the other Vaisnavas and I remember his words to me "they are offensive

to Radha by mimimizing her". Somehow that mystically started a spiritual

process within me, and with it came the inner relization that I am not a

Krishna bhakta, but a Radha bhakta. I can't really explain it. It was like

Radha's Shakti just came to become my friend, and I started to see the whole

world with different eyes. And there was also when the female side of

spirituality opened up. In the lack of proper scriptures, proper gurus, there

was like I had a teacher within myself telling me about this mystic spiritual

path.

 

It is easy to see what happened. Spritual practice is mystical. It changes the

inside of yourself in ways that are not know in today's society. At some

point you in some way open up a channel to the spiritual reality, and for

some reason I opened up a channel to the female Shakti reality. So currently

in my life, I somehow try to learn more and more about that.

 

There is another story to my life. In my last significant life (in the 19'th

century) it appears that I was living in south India, together with my

current guru that was then my father. I don't know exactly what happened, but

that I have a strong feeling that I was a Shakta of some kind, worshiping the

feminine. Maybe a Kali worshiper, or something, as Kali was the first that

attracted my mind in this life. For some reason I in this life got trained in

the Vaisnava philosophy and practices under his direction, and that lead to

where I am now.

 

I am not a scholar, so when I write thing it is more in a kind of bhakti mode

than a scholarship mode. Some things I write are technically "wrong", but

most of the time there is a deeper meaning that I am trying to say. But

people often get hung up on the external technicalities, so often I am rather

lurking that saying anything. Let's, say that if I write anything here, it is

from my personal viewpoint. Maybe things just looks a little bit different

from this direction. I come from kind of a strange direction. I never want to

step on anyones toes, so if I do by mistake, it is not intentional.

 

My "mundane" name is Karolina Lindqvist, and I have kind of noted that it

contains Kali two times. First as my double initialis, and then in my first

name too. I take that as a kind of sign, and sometimes i also sign what I

write with my double initials. For me Kali is not something fearful, but just

Radha in a kind of fearful mode. She is not just the pretty girl that is the

lover of Krishna, but she is also the female Shakti, force-energy, of the

whole manifestation.

 

My initiated name is Prisni, which I also use sometimes.