Sadhguru Jaggi Vasudev

Makar Sankranti is famous for its sesame sweets and kite flying. But there is much more to this festival that is a celebration of the Winter Solstice. Sadhguru looks at the significance of this festival of movement, and explains how it is based on a profound understanding of cosmic and human geometry.

This article is also available in Hindi and Telugu

Sadhguru: Makar Sankranti is celebrated as a very important festival in India. Sankranti literally means “movement.” Everything that we recognize as life is movement. Fortunately, people who came before us have moved on, and people who come after us are waiting for us to move on – don’t have any doubts about this. The planet is moving and that is why it churns up life. If it were still, it wouldn’t be capable of life. So there is something called movement in which every creature is involved, but if there has to be movement, this movement has to be housed – this movement can only happen in the lap of stillness. One who does not touch the stillness of his life, one who does not touch the stillness of his being, one who does not know or has not tasted the stillness within and without, will invariably get lost in the movement.

Movement is pleasant only to a point. The planet earth is moving gently in such a beautiful manner – it is only changing seasons. Tomorrow, if it just speeds up, throttles up a little bit, then all our seemingly balanced minds will become imbalanced, everything will spin out of control. So movement is beautiful only to a certain point. Once it crosses that point, movement becomes torture.

The Significance of Makar Sankranti

The significance of the Makar Sankranti festival is that it marks the day where there is a significant movement in the zodiac – the arrangement of the earth’s dial around the sun – and this movement brings about a new change in the way we experience the planet itself. There are many sankrantis through the year; the two significant ones being Makar Sankranti, and right opposite, after summer solstice is Karka Sankranti. In between, there are many Sankrantis – every time the zodiac sign changes, it is called a Sankranti to suggest the movement of the planet, to understand that our life is sustained and nourished by this movement. If this movement ceases, everything about us will cease. On the 22nd of December, the solstice happened, that means in relation to the sun, the movement or the tilt of the planet reaches its maximum. Now, from this day onwards, the northern movement is strong. Things really start changing upon the earth. From Makar Sankranti onwards, winter is being relieved step by step.



The harvest festival


These festivals are a reminder that we need to craft our present and our future in a conscious manner. Right now, we have harvested the previous year’s crop. How to create the next one is being consciously planned by taking the animals also into a consultative process. You should see how it happens in remote villages. There are only a few remote ones left because in the last few years, everyone has a cell phone and even Internet kiosks. But in the remote parts of India, you must see how the future crops are planned in the village. It is something so amazing and fantastic. I have had the fortune of being a part of this and these meetings are done in such a way that the animals are also there. It is not that someone is going to ask them what to do, but they are also very much a part of these meetings. How they evaluate how the animals in the village are, what age they are, how strong they are, can they take something up or not, is a very beautiful and organic process.

Cosmic connect

So Makar Sankranti is a festival for harvest. But there are celestial and spiritual connotations to it as well. It arose from certain yogic practices that common people took up in ways that were relevant to them. This time is most important for yogis to make a new, fresh effort in their spiritual process. Accordingly, people who have family also make a fresh attempt in whatever they do in their lives.

Many aspects of the yogic system were evolved and developed based on the connection between the celestial system and the human system, in order to make use of the changes in position that happen in an incremental way, from moment to moment, minute to minute, hour to hour, day to day.

For example, the number 108 is significant in many ways in the construction of the human system and the larger solar system. Traditionally, if you wear a mala, it has 108 beads. If you chant a mantra or go around an energy space, it is 108 times. This is because there are 108 things that one needs to do if one wants to have a complete mastery over the human mechanism. In the human body, there are 114 chakras or points where the nadis or energy channels meet in the body. Of these 114, 2 are outside the physiological framework. Of the 112 chakras that are within the physiological framework, actual work needs to be done on 108. If you manage to activate these 108, the remaining 4 will naturally open up.


Makar Sankranti – Festival of movement


When a human being makes the necessary effort to touch the stillness within himself, only then he knows the joy of movement. Otherwise, people are bewildered by the movement of life. Every change that happens in their life they suffer. These days, the so-called modern life is like this ¬– any change means you must suffer. Childhood is tension, puberty is great suffering, middle age is unbearable, old age is abhorred and feared, and death is celebration – no that is pure terror. Every stage of life is a problem because people have a problem with movement, not understanding that the very nature of life is movement. You can only enjoy and celebrate movement if you have one leg stuck in stillness. If you know what stillness is then movement would be a pleasure. If you do not know what stillness is, if you have no contact with stillness, movement is bewildering.




Indian Culture

Image courtesy: Dilli Diwarja Patang by Meanest Indian