Shivaratri rituals are nothing but Vedanta. Shiva means Yoga. Shivaratri is therefore very important for yogis and for those who seek liberation. Do not talk unnecessarily today. Today Shiva will be present with his 24 kalas. They are very powerful rays and it is not advisable to miss these rays. All day and night concentrate on your japa. Your doubts and problems will be resolved. Those who seek health will be blessed with good health. Those who seek knowledge will get knowledge.
Every being knowingly or unknowingly seeks liberation. For spiritual practices, body is the medium. Do not encourage weak thoughts as to whether your spiritual practices will be enough to grant liberation and so on. At the same time don’t be egoistic that you are a great spiritual aspirant. There is peculiarity about this sadhana. The body is the cause for all our wavering intellect (buddhi), instability, diseases, sins, talking ill about our Guru or parents and many similar evils. But to cross all these evils, we need to rely once again only on our body. We should treat it as a beautiful flower gifted to us by the Lord and with this attitude we should use the body to overcome our evils. We should not misuse the body.
The body and the mind that have been designed for spiritual practices are being misused and diseased with this wavering mind and other habits. Therefore it is essential to use the body to overcome these defects.
Shivaratri teaches us to use the body so to overcome these evils. It is wrong to associate Shivaratri with some certain special rituals only. It causes confusion. Endless Bhagavan Nama (reciting the name of God) is itself Shivaratri vrata.
–Glimpses of Bhaktimala
