In yoga practice, an aspirant may worship a form of God as a means of making accessible the One, formless Absolute. This chosen form of God is called one’s Ishtadeva. The only means of determining one’s Ishtadeva is through one’s own heart, and through experiences that may arise on the spiritual path. This is the story of my experience with my Ishtadeva.
In 1979, I had a profound experience in my apartment in Newark, Delaware while listening to water boil in a teapot. Perhaps the rather mundane circumstances and the unexpected nature of the experience confirm that God truly is omnipresent and will communicate to us wherever we might be. Once in a while, you can get shown the light in the strangest of places if you look at it right.
As I listened to the water begin to boil, I was presented with a vision of the entire human population — past, present, and future — in a type of pyramid of consciousness. At the bottom of the pyramid were the large majority of human beings: mundane personalities involved in mundane affairs. As the water in the teapot heated and produced sound, the energy seemed to spur my vision and I ascended higher in the pyramid. I saw that as the pyramid rose and became more narrow, there were fewer human beings, but they were of a more magnanimous and spiritual character.
As the sound and energy of the teapot gathered, I saw that different members of the human race had ascended to higher and higher levels of spiritual accomplishment. The higher realms included yogis and saints of all religions. As the water reached its boiling point, and as it whistled through its lid, I saw the very top of the pyramid, the pinnacle of humanity. There I saw one person, Jesus.
For a long time, I was reluctant to discuss this vision because the last thing I wanted was for people to think I was yet another dogmatist claiming that Jesus Christ is the greatest of all saints, the only son of God, who you must accept to save you from your sins, blah, blah, blah….. As I hope this essay will make clear, one’s experience of his or her Ishtadeva is just that: a unique, personal experience that cannot be generalized and certainly should not be used as a weapon of intolerance and judgment.
For many years, I had difficulty acknowledging the reality of the presence of my Ishtadeva in my life. Besides my aforementioned reluctance to contribute to our society’s Christian prejudice and misunderstanding, I was also, to be quite frank, turned off by the whole Jesus image. It was not until I got beyond the image to the reality itself that I became able to bask in the grace of this divine elder brother.
In sadhana, I had worked with different forms of the One formless God, and I had found growth and support in each of these. Yet each time I climbed towards the summit of devotion to one of these forms, I found Jesus at the end of the road. This is not to say that my journeys were wasted time. Hardly, for they each provided me with a series of experiences and a set of tools that clarified and solidified my spiritual identity and ability to teach and heal. Though the spiritual teachers I have studied under have had different Ishtadevas, they are my beloved mentors who have made possible the degree of God-consciousness I now experience. They each showed me, in their own way, that a path is only as good as the student who walks it, and that all paths lead to the Self. We find our true Self at the end of our chosen path by meeting, and then merging with, our personal Ishtadeva.
The concept of Ishtadeva, of a personally chosen form of God, may be difficult to grasp for many Westerners. We have been presented with a cultural myth that purports very dictatorially that there is only one true image of God– that of the stern but somehow loving Father. We have also been told that creating images of God is idolatrous, with some societally approved exceptions such as Christmas displays.
Such cultural myths are obviously chauvinistic and appear as such when seen in the light of many of the world’s cultures, particularly that of India. In India, the devout feel free to worship any of literally thousands of images of Gods and Goddesses. They may or may not believe theoretically that there is One Supreme God in these various forms. Regardless, each individual is welcome to choose a form attractive to him or her. It is even said light-heartedly that there exists a different form of God for each Hindu.
This, again, may offend our Western sensibilities, especially when we are confronted with the characteristics of some of these Divine Beings. Many of them are kind, but others are extremely wrathful. Some are ascetic, others quite lascivious; some care about human beings, others play with mankind as if we were made for their amusement. Others do not resemble the Divine in any way our Western minds could imagine: there are monkeys, fish, boars, and deities with several heads, arms, and legs. But monotheism simply means there is only one God; it does not mean that God will appear to all people in the same way.
If an ordinary American teenager can receive a revelation of Christ while listening to water boil, perhaps others can receive their experience of God by worshipping in a way that does not make sense to our Western conditioning. Here, perhaps, lies the lesson for us. For too long we of the Judaeo/Christian culture have been operating under the assumption there is an absolute truth that is in our sole possession. Considering how many foolish mistakes we make in matters far less transcendent, I suggest we critically consider the notion that we alone have access to the one ultimate, final Truth.
For anyone of a devotional nature, establishing a relationship with one’s Ishtadeva is a great boon to spiritual development. My experience with my Ishtadeva, Jesus, has taught me the demands and gifts of devotion. These include the willingness to acknowledge his presence, in spite of my desire to hide and to accept his guidance, in spite of my desire to ignore it.
To meet your Ishtadeva it is necessary to release pre-conceived ideas and expectations about yourself and God. Dive into your heart, explore the ways that God speaks to you, and play with different manners in which you are comfortable relating to God. Use your imagination, and allow it to grow into intuition. Then nurture your intuition until it blossoms into the realization that God is here to speak with you, walk with you, and guide your every step.
