Holi is the festival of colors. The festival signifies the arrival of spring and the end of winter. In India, this is the last full moon of the year and 15 days after this full moon is the New Year in India. So before that last full moon, the tradition is to just take all the old stuff and put it in the fire and play Holi with colors.
There are many stories associated with Holi - of it being a beautiful full moon day, of welcoming spring , and of Krishna dancing with all the Gopis (devotees of Lord Krishna) while playing Holi.
Holi is a festival when we break all the barriers and feel a sense of oneness with everyone. This is the message of this vibrant festival. As we apply colors on one another and wish each one the very best: “Let your life be colorful.”
If you leave a group of kids in a room that come from many different backgrounds (rich, poor, intelligent, not-so-intelligent), do you know how they'll play? They will play without finding any distinction between themselves. Similarly, Holi is one such festival that unites people of diverse backgrounds and professions.
Society divides people - sometimes on the basis of profession, gender, age groups. Holi is the time when we break all these barriers of gender, nationality, race, and religion. From the elderly to the young! You hug everybody and put colors on them. It's a unifying celebration.
The essence of Holi
There are different colors associated with our feelings and emotions. For instance:
- Red - anger
- Green - jealousy
- Yellow - vibrancy and happiness
- Pink - love
- Blue - vastness
- White - peace
- Saffron - sacrifice
- Violet - knowledge
Each person is a fountain of colors that keeps changing its hues. If your life is like Holi, where each color is seen clearly, then that adds charm to your life. Harmony in diversity makes life vibrant, joyful, and more colorful.
Like Holi, life should be colorful, not boring. When each color is seen clearly, it is vibrant. When all the colors get mixed, you end up with black.
Similarly, in our day-to-day lives, we play different roles. Each role and emotion needs to be clearly defined. Emotional confusion creates problems. When you are a father, you have to play the part of a father. You can't be a father at the workplace. When you mix roles in your life, you start making mistakes. Whatever role you play in life, give yourself fully to it.
Learning from colors
All colors emanate from white, and when mixed again, they become black. When your mind is white and consciousness - pure, peaceful, happy and meditative, different colors and roles emerge. We get the strength to play various roles with full sincerity against the background.
We have to dip into our consciousness time and again. If we only look outwards and play around with colors outside of us, we are bound to find blackness all over again. Between roles we have to take deep rest, in order to play each role sincerely.
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In ignorance, emotions are a bother; in knowledge, the same emotions add color. Tell yourself that you will do justice to all the roles you play. You can play all the roles: a good spouse, good child, good parent, and a good citizen. Assume that you have all these qualities in you. Just let them blossom
The Story of Holi
There is a famous story associated with the festival:
The word purana comes from the Sanskrit word ‘pura nava’, which means 'that which is new in the city'. It is a new way of presenting things. Puranas are full of colorful illustrations and stories. On the surface, they may appear to be a mere fantasy, but actually they contain subtle truths.
An asura king, Hiranyakashyap, wanted everyone to worship him. But his son Prahalad was a devotee of Lord Narayana, the king's sworn enemy. Angry, the king wanted Holika, his sister, to get rid of Prahalad. Empowered to withstand fire, Holika sat on a burning pyre holding Prahalad on her lap. But it was Holika who was burnt, Prahalad came out unharmed.
Hiranyakashyap symbolizes one who is gross. Prahalad embodies innocence, faith and bliss/joy. The spirit cannot be confined to love material objects only. Hiranyakashyap wanted all the joy to come from the material world. It did not happen that way. The individual jivatma cannot be bound to the material forever. It is natural to eventually move towards Narayana, one's higher self.
Holika stands for the past burdens that try to burn Prahalad's innocence. But Prahalad, so deeply rooted in Narayana Bhakti (devotion to Lord Narayana), could burn all past impressions (sanskaras) and joy springs up with new colors. Life becomes a celebration. Only after you burn the past, can you gear up for a new beginning. Knowing the essence of the festival, enjoy the day with wisdom.
Did You Know?
The burning of Holika (the bonfire that is burned on the night before Holi) has an effect on the coming monsoon.
In southern parts of India, Holika dahan (burning of Holika) is also known as kamadahana which refers to burning of desires.
Gurudev Sri Sri Ravi Shankar says that the biggest impediment to experiencing deep rest is desire. “Desire means stress. Even petty desires cause high stress - the higher goals give relatively less botheration! Desire tortures the mind at times.
So what does one do?
The only way out is to focus attention on the desire and surrender it. This act of focusing awareness or sight on desire or Kama is called 'kamakshi'. With awareness, desire loses its grip and surrender happens and then nectar flows out from within.
The goddess, Kamakshi, holds a sugarcane stem in one hand and a flower in the other. The sugar-cane stem is so hard and has to be squeezed in order to obtain sweetness, while the flower is soft and collecting nectar from it is so easy. This truly represents life, which indeed has a little of both! It is far easier to obtain this bliss from the inside than it is to try to extract pleasure from the outside world - which needs a lot more effort.
In some villages in India, people perform fire-walking but nothing happens to them – not a single blister on their feet! Faith has great power, and it contributes to life. This is the message behind the burning of the Holika.”
