Festivals in India, have always been associated with celebration of some religious affiliation or rituals. Every festival has got some religious specific concoction for e.g., Holi is celebrated signifying the dedication of Bhakta Prahlad, towards the worship of Lord Vishnu and his Narasimha Avataar, who slayed ‘Hiranyakas-hyap’ the wicked and cruel king who wanted to kill Prahlad, due to his worship and dedication towards Lord Vishnu. Yet another story tells us about the eternal love between Lord Krishna and his consort Radha and how Krishna used to go to her place in Gokul, from Vrindavan to play Holi. Holi is also called the ‘Festival of Colors’ as we smear and throw colors on each other without any discrimination. Similarly the festival of Dussehra or Dasera signifies the victory of good over evil and how Lord Rama eventually defeated the demon Ravana in order to rescue his wife Sita from his clutches. The ‘Burning of the Effigy of Demon King Ravana’ signifies the penultimate day after the penance and fasting filled nine days of ‘Navratri’ that the devotees spend praying toward ‘Maa Durga Devi’. We also celebrate it as ‘Durga Puja’ for six days till Dasera or Vijayadashami Day.
Now the most important and the last festival is Deepavali that is celebrated by all the communities in India, irrespective of class, case, race, community, sub-caste, caste, jaati or any other kind of social stratification etc. For businessmen it is important as it heralds the start of a new financial year for them, for new account books to be opened and started, old accounts to be settled so that no debt remains, the ‘Lakshmi and Ganesha Pujan’ is a very important aspect of the festival on the ‘big deepavali day’ as the entire household gathers to do ‘aarti’ and pray to the Lord Ganesh. The previous day is celebrated as ‘choti deepavali’ or Narak Chaturdashi, when we light 14 Diyas and candles to ward off the evil or ‘alakshmi’ from our house. On the day before choti Deepavali we have the Dhanteras festival, when we purchase at least one utensil or one piece of ornament depending on our capacity. The festival concludes with the last day i.e. Bhai Dooj festival when the brothers visit their sisters and get ‘tikka’ done to show the love and dedication towards their respective brothers and sisters. On the ‘badi diwali day,’ we light up our households and hearths with Diyas and candles, electric bulb or LCD bulbs on wires or coils so as to lit up our houses and of course before the start of the festival we clean our houses, bring out all the accumulated waste of the whole year and get our houses painted or whitewashed. We also purchase new clothes for all the members of our families and exchange sweets and namkeens with our neighbors and acquaintances. This in short, is the Value and Essence of celebrating Deepavali, the festival of lights, new clothes, new hopes and new aspirations.
According to Saral Vaastu concepts, its scientific approach calls for giving due importance to this festival of lights as Saral Vaastu has got a special bond with the celebration of this festival Deepavali. As described earlier we as a part of Diwali ritual, cleanse our whole house and start the process in which we throw out all the ‘janjal’ or unwanted clutter and materials lying unused or disused, in the house. We also get a new coat of paint applied on our house walls and ourselves wear new clothes, celebrating the festival with firecrackers, sweat meats, sweets, delicious foodstuff and new gifts given to each other or exchanged as part of Deepavali ritual followed, on this day. In disposing off the old clutter, old newspapers, old unwanted disused or unused things, we are cleansing the environment around us with positive vibes and energy, filling our atmosphere with new renewable positive energy sources, thus getting rid of all negative energy sources or old leftovers of the previous years and before. While following the norms of not letting the negative energy accumulation inside our house by disposing of all things old, we should take ample care so that all the negative thoughts in the minds of the inmates too, are banished forever as just like old unusable things, unfeasible talks, unnecessary thoughts and anxiety about old things, leave a big impact on our minds and the other residents of the house. If we continue harboring old negative thoughts and let them thrive in our thought process, such negative thoughts will not induce any positive gains in our lives.
Getting rid of such unwanted materials not only gets us active in keeping our houses neat and clean, but minimizes the negative energy and allows more and more positive energy to enter our premises of our homes and workplaces. Even at the time of Lakshmi Ganesh Pujan, the god and goddess are decorated with flowers, garlands, incense sticks burning, ‘lobaan and dhoop’ burning, camphor being lit for ‘aarati’ and the ‘paanchpradip’ being lit with wicks dipped in pure ghee, beating of gongs & bells, blowing of conch shells etc are all rituals, associated with creating the right environment of piety and holiness at home during the pujas, creating positive vibes among the devotees i.e. family members, further creating a magical atmosphere of devotion, filled with Positive energy emanating from such a cumulative positive atmosphere, reaching a crescendo where the accumulated positive energy from all present family members helps in the enhancement of the flow of positive energy, throughout the house, in every nook and corner, making our homes, the exact holy abode of the goddess Lakshmi, who would never try to leave such an atmosphere of piety at any given moment. Thus the whole household will be overflowing with positive energy and positive vibes. Even our ancestors were quite aware about the concept of positive energy and negative energy; the positive energy they used to address as ‘Lakshmi’ and the negative energy they referred to as ‘Nazar’or ‘Boori Nazar’ or ‘Panauti’.
The Darkness of the night of Deepawali is called as ‘Amavasya’ that signifies Negative energy and the lightening up the night with electric bulbs, LCD bulbs, Candles, Earthenware Diyas, bursting of Fire Crackers etc, shows the pumping of more and more positive energy so. As to drive away the negative energy of dark night, from our houses forever on the Deepavali day. We also keep the doors and windows open that leads to the Puja room so that Goddess Lakshmi can enter our households by being happy with our driving away of the darkness and creating the right positive atmosphere for her to enter and reside permanently in our households. This is a very popular belief held by the majority of people in India who insist the most lit up house during deepavali will have the most positive energy floating in the air that will definitely enter our household. This infusing of our households with positive energy will have cascading effect on the positivity of our thought process, enhancing our earning capacity, making us think positively and also act positively. Just as the light forces the darkness to move out, similarly Saral Vaastu will also enlighten and lit up people’s lives and minds from the dark illusions, created by the currently practicing, so called ‘pseudo Vaastu pundits’ and by unscrupulous, fly by night and conning Vaastu experts, scholars and wicked people whose only job is to fool people and make the most of hay, while it shines. These kinds of false vaastu experts really falsify the good work being done by genuine Vaastu experts, like those we have at Saral Vaastu who will forever tell you genuine predictions and how to solve your Vaastu defects through simple, scientific and easy to understand solutions of Saral Vaastu.
Removing of darkness or defeat of all negative energy sources present amongst us, so that all the positive energy sources rejuvenate to light up our lives in a similar manner as Saral Vaastu does to all mankind by removing the ill-conceived knowledge ingrained in the psyche of the people throughout the ages, due to unscrupulous experts and Vaastu books and creating just the proverbial ‘light at the end of the tunnel’ through the wisdom filled words and their application as given by ‘Saral Vaastu principles’. Its absolutely clear that the main objective of Saral Vaastu and our organization is to enlighten & illuminate the lives of all the people around by the correct interpretation of the ancient Vaastu principles and theories so as to make the common public realize the true worth and importance of our old Vaastu principles and traditions, by feeling proud of our ancient Vaastu heritage and finally creating ‘a sense of awareness’ among the people so that they can accept the Saral Vaastu principles, wholeheartedly without an iota of doubt, unwillingness or fortitude. I envisage a world, free of all problems, filled up with really happy people who achieve their life goals and commitments in an everlasting positive manner, their lives filled up with eternal peace and tranquility, that never goes out of their lives. Real ecstasy and satisfaction reigns with Saral Vaastu.
