Makar Sankranti: Reaping the Benefits of the Season

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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.

This movement is also a significant aspect in the way we reap from this planet. There was a time when human beings could eat only what the earth offered. Then we learned how to get what we wanted from the earth; this is called agriculture. When we were hunting and gathering, we only picked up what was there. It is like when you were an infant, you ate or swallowed whatever your mother gave you. When you became a child, you asked for what you wanted. So we grew up a bit and started demanding and getting what we wanted, but still, you can only get what you want to a point that She is willing. If you stretch it beyond that, you will not only not get it, you will get something else. That is called industrialization. Agriculture is coaxing the Mother to give what you want. Industrialization is ripping her apart. I am not speaking against something. I want you to understand the way our minds are transiting, the way human activity is transiting from one level to another.

So this is a day when we remind ourselves that everything that we are is what we take from this planet. I see everywhere in the world, people are talking about giving. I don’t know from where they give. You can only take – either you take gently or you grab. Did you come with your own property from somewhere? What is there to give? You can only take. Everything is offered. Take sensibly, that is all there is.

The harvest festival

The Makar Sankranti festival is also known and referred to as the harvest festival because this is the time when harvesting is complete and there are big celebrations. This is the day we acknowledge all those who assisted in making the harvest. The farm animals play a huge role in harvesting, so the following day is for them and is called Mattu Pongal. The first day is for the earth, the second is for us and the third is for the animals and livestock. See, they are placed a little higher than us because we exist because of them, they do not exist because of us. If we were not here, they would all be free and happy. But if they were not here, we couldn’t live.

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.

This is also beautifully manifested in the planetary system in which we live. The diameter of the Sun is 108 times the diameter of the Earth. The distance between Sun and Earth is 108 times the diameter of the Sun. The distance between Moon and Earth is 108 times the diameter of the Moon. And there are 108 padas (steps) in one lunar year. Planet Earth takes 13 ½ lunar revolutions or one solar year to complete its orbit around the Sun. In this orbit it arranges itself in 27 nakshatras or 108 padas, almost like the beads of a mala. Makar Sankranti marks the completion of and the beginning of a new cycle.

Makar Sankranti – Festival of movement

So Makar Sankranti is a festival to recognize the movement, movement being celebration, movement being life, movement being the process of life and the beginning and the end of life. At the same time, the word ‘shankara’ is used to remind you that the one behind this, Shiva, is a still one; stillness is the basis of movement. Though all the other planets are moving, the most important one is not moving. If the sun also takes a walk, then we are in trouble. He hangs there not moving. That is why everybody else’s movement is okay. But his stillness is relative because the whole solar system may be moving; the whole galaxy may be moving. So beyond that, the space which holds all this is absolute stillness.

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.

People are trying to track the movement. Looking at the stars, looking at lines in their hands and looking at all kinds of signs including the tea leaves. People want to read the movement of their lives somehow. This struggle with movement, this paranoia about movement, is happening because there is no taste of stillness. If there was a taste of stillness in you, movement would not disturb you. It is something which sets a certain rhythm. Every rhythm has a beginning and an end; every movement has a beginning and an end. Movement means that which is in transition. Stillness means that which always is. Movement means compulsiveness, stillness means consciousness.

The significance of Makar Sankranti is that it is the time to remind yourself that celebrating movement is possible only when there is a taste of stillness within you.

Editor's Note: Find out more about the wonderful intricacies of Indian culture in this collection of Sadhguru’s articles on the subject.

Indian Culture