On the Banks of Ganga Ma

I am standing barefoot at the burning ghats in Varanasi, and the ash beneath my feet is still hot.

I have to rise onto my tiptoes, shifting my weight from foot to foot to tolerate the heat. Just hours ago, this ash was someone’s body.

Along the banks of Ganga Ma in Varanasi, 200 bodies a day are cremated—twenty-four hours a day—as they have been for 3,500 years. Bodies wrapped in simple white cloth, sometimes adorned in bright colors, are carried through the narrow lanes on bamboo stretchers. They are laid carefully on wooden pyres, layered with sandalwood and straw, and offered to the fire.

As I watch, I silently chant Om Namah Shivaya. Tears stream down my face—not from sadness, but from the overwhelming beauty of it all.

Death is not hidden here. It is not sterilized or disguised. It is woven into daily life. There is little clinging to the body because the understanding is clear: the soul is immortal. If not liberated, it will take another form. The burning ghats are raw and unapologetically real. They demand that I contemplate my own mortality.

We are in Varanasi for Maha Shivaratri, honoring Lord Shiva—cosmic stillness and the great transformer. That evening, instead of joining the massive celebrations lining the Ganga, our small group gathers on a quiet stretch of beach. We light a simple sacred fire and chant.

As the flames rise, I see Kali Ma in the cremation grounds—time, death, destruction, and fierce compassion embodied. Then I see something even more startling: my own body lying on a pyre at these very ghats. I watch it burn. It is not frightening. It is liberating.

I notice, vividly, my hair burning.

The fire becomes a meditation on non-attachment. This body is a temporary dwelling place for an eternal Self. Death can come at any time. What am I doing with the life I have been given?

From Varanasi we travel to Prayagraj, to the vast grounds of the Kumbha Mela and the sacred Triveni Sangam—the confluence of Ganga, Yamuna, and the subtle Saraswati rivers.

India humbles me again: I have developed a mild case of food poisoning. But I am not going to let that stop me from entering the waters.

Our group boards a small wooden boat that carries us to the confluence. Boats crowd together around a floating altar where a pujari performs rituals for seekers before they descend into the river using bamboo handrails fixed to a small platform. Our Indian guides tell us it is quite uncommon for Westerners to make this pilgrimage.

Before entering, we offer flowers and milk to the Goddess.

The water is cold. My body is weak. I very much want to dip fully under, but my immune system has already been challenged enough. So I stand chest-deep and pray:

May I surrender fully to the Divine Mother. May I become an instrument of Her will. May I release all that does not serve.

The river vibrates with power. I can feel Her moving through me.

When we return to shore, the food poisoning overtakes me again and I vomit right there on the banks of Ma Ganga. I had prayed to surrender, to let go. It felt like a physical manifestation of those prayers—an embodied purging.

In Rishikesh, the mornings are cool. A brisk wind sweeps down the river valley from high in the Himalayas. The rocky path to the Ganga presses into my bare feet. Countless sadhus, saints, and seekers have worshipped along these banks for thousands of years. Their devotion is palpable—felt not only in temples, but in the air, the rocks, the mica-rich sand that sparkles beneath the sun.

We gather at the river’s edge and chant the Maha Mantra. We scoop up water in our hands and offer it back to Ganga Ma, to deities dear to our hearts, and to our ancestors. We sprinkle it over our heads in purification.

Ma Ganga is not merely symbolic of the Divine Mother—She IS the Divine Mother. Sitting on Her banks is as sacred as sitting before an altar in a temple.

In the evening we take tuk-tuks to Parmarth Niketan for Ganga Aarti. A towering murti of Shiva presides over the river—during monsoon season, the waters sometimes rise to His neck. Lamps shaped like cobras are passed through the assembled crowd, and I am blessed to offer one to Ganga Ma and to Lord Shiva.

Before the offering of light, a dharma talk reminds us that both Ganga’s Grace and destiny have brought us here. Destiny, we are told, is shaped by the choices we make in every moment.

I physically vibrate with the power of ancient Sanskrit mantra. Ganga is Shakti—the dynamic, flowing energy of the Divine Mother. Shiva is stillness, cosmic consciousness. The dance of the two is life itself.

One day we drive to a more secluded and even more mystical, magical stretch of Ganga’s banks.

We enter the cave of the sage Vashistha—guru of Rama and Lakshmana in the Ramayana. The cave is deep, dark, and narrow. At its end sits a powerful Shiva lingam. We offer water and sit in meditation until the pujari asks us to make space for others.

A short walk brings us to another cave associated with Vashistha’s wife, Arundhati—and later, according to local tradition, visited by Jesus during his years in India. The cave narrows toward a murti of Durga. Outside, the green Ganga flows below the Himalayan foothills.

Here, I decide to enter fully.

Before stepping in, I squat at the shoreline and offer handfuls of water back to Her and to my ancestors. I bring carefully to mind what I wish to release: fear of abandonment; feeling not good enough; feeling unworthy, inadequate, unlovable; patterns of attachment and seeking validation from external sources; the residue of childhood wounds and of staying too long in a marriage where I often felt unseen, unheard, or diminished.

So many storylines. None of them are who I truly am.

I move carefully into the cold, fast-moving river. The rocks are slippery and the current strong. I find a rock that allows me to sit chest-deep.

I pray to surrender fully. I pray to become a clear vessel for Grace. I pray to let go of all that is not aligned with Truth.

I dip beneath the surface nine times and sip a small amount of Her sacred water.

Then something shifts.

I feel and see golden light pouring into me through the space between my brows—through the ajna chakra. It fills me in a way that is both profoundly powerful and exquisitely tender. There are no adequate words. I know only that something has moved, loosened, healed.

When I come out of the river, I lie back on the sparkling mica-rich sand, my head toward Her. I can still feel Her current moving through me.

Later we visit the hermitage of Gyaan Maa, a rare female sannyasi. She speaks to us of keeping God always foremost in our awareness. “The Divine does not need these outer practices,” she reminds us. “We do.”

Something inside me solidifies.

That evening, in Rishikesh, I walk into a small salon and ask them to shave my head. I have thought about it for years but never had the courage. Now it feels urgent—necessary.

As the hair falls away, I chant to Shiva and to Ma Ganga. I remember the vision in Varanasi of my body on the pyre, and most vividly, my hair burning.

The outer shedding mirrors the inner one.

Each encounter with Ganga Ma built upon the last—ashes, fire, surrender, purging, caves, mantra, golden light. India once again brought me face-to-face with my “stuff” and simultaneously filled my spiritual cup to overflowing.

Yoga is the state of fullness—the state of missing nothing, as Sri Brahmananda Saraswati taught. This abundance is not material. It is not found in possessions or achievements. It is found in lived experience, in surrender, in the cave of the heart— the hridayam—where we remember who we truly are.

Standing in ash. Standing in water. Standing in wind and light.

Everything that is not essential burns away. Everything that is not aligned is carried away by Ma.

What remains is Grace.

With love,

Sharada Devi