Let me be honest with you about something that took me years to admit.
For as long as I can remember, my spiritual practice has orbited around one divine energy: Krishna. The blue-skinned flute player, the cosmic trickster, the beloved of my heart. And through Krishna, naturally, came Vishnu, the great preserver, the one who maintains cosmic order. This relationship felt complete. It felt like home.
But here's the thing about spiritual homes: sometimes we keep certain rooms locked. We walk past doors without opening them, convinced we already know what's inside. For me, that locked door had a name carved into it: Mahalakshmi.
The goddess of wealth? No thank you. I had bigger fish to fry.
Or so I thought.
The Label That Kept Me Away
If you've ever heard of Lakshmi, chances are someone introduced her as the "goddess of wealth and prosperity." It's not wrong, exactly, but it's a bit like describing the ocean as "a lot of water." Technically accurate, spiritually incomplete.
For years, this oversimplified label kept me at arm's length from her. I wasn't particularly interested in money. My spiritual seeking was about liberation, about dissolving the ego, about merging with the divine. What did gold coins and material abundance have to do with any of that?
So while I prostrated before Krishna, while I chanted Vishnu's thousand names, I basically nodded politely at Lakshmi and moved on. Like acknowledging your best friend's partner at a party but never actually having a conversation with them.
Looking back, I can see how arrogant this was. How limiting. How much I was missing.
When the Golden Light Broke Through
The shift happened during Navaratri, those nine sacred nights dedicated to the Divine Feminine in her many forms. I wasn't expecting a breakthrough. I was simply doing my practice, showing up, trying to stay present.
Then I heard the Kanakadhara Stotram.
If you're unfamiliar, this is an ancient Sanskrit hymn composed by Adi Shankaracharya. The story goes that he was a young monk begging for alms when he came to the house of an extremely poor woman. She had nothing to offer him except a single dried amla fruit, her last possession. Moved by her generosity, Shankaracharya sang this hymn to Lakshmi, and golden gooseberries rained down upon her home.
As I listened to the verses, something cracked open. The words weren't about wealth in the way I'd always dismissed. They were about grace. About being held. About a golden light that pours without condition.
And suddenly, I felt it, this warmth, this ease, this sense of being provided for that I hadn't even realized I was missing.
Meeting Mahalakshmi as "Amma"
Here's what I began to understand: Mahalakshmi isn't just about your bank account. Her four hands represent the four Purusharthas, Dharma (righteousness), Artha (prosperity), Kama (desire), and Moksha (liberation). She holds all four pillars of human existence. She's not interested in making you rich; she's interested in making you whole.
The lotus she holds? It blooms in mud but remains untouched by it. That's her teaching: you can move through the material world without being corrupted by it. You can receive abundance without losing your innocence.
But the biggest shift was simpler than all of this philosophy. It was personal.
I stopped seeing her as "Lakshmi, goddess of wealth" and started meeting her as Amma, mother. Not a distant cosmic force, but an intimate presence. An energy of ease. A feeling of safety so deep it makes your nervous system exhale.
Have you ever been held by someone and felt, just for a moment, that everything was going to be okay? That you didn't have to fight or prove or perform? That's the energy I'm talking about. That's Mahalakshmi when you actually let her in.
The Drama Triangle and Why It Matters
Now, let me connect this to something that might seem completely unrelated: psychology.
You may have heard of the Karpman Drama Triangle, a model that describes three roles we unconsciously play in conflict: the Victim ("poor me"), the Persecutor ("it's your fault"), and the Rescuer ("let me fix you"). We rotate through these positions constantly, in our relationships, in our inner dialogue, in our relationship with the divine itself.
Think about it. How many of us approach spirituality from a victim position? "Why is this happening to me? When will my suffering end? Why won't the universe help me?"
Or from a rescuer position? "I need to save everyone. I need to heal the world. I can't rest until everyone is okay."
Mahalakshmi's energy represents stepping outside this triangle entirely. When you're truly held by the Mother, when you're sitting in her lap, so to speak, you're no longer scrambling to survive or prove your worth. You're not a victim begging for scraps. You're not a rescuer exhausting yourself. You're simply provided for.
This doesn't mean you become passive or stop taking action. It means your actions flow from fullness rather than lack. You give because you overflow, not because you're trying to earn your place.
Can you feel the difference? It's subtle, but it changes everything.
An Apology Long Overdue
So here I am, decades into my practice, finally admitting what I couldn't see before.
Amma, I'm sorry.
I'm sorry I looked past you. I'm sorry I reduced you to a caricature, a cartoon goddess holding gold coins, irrelevant to my "real" spiritual work. I'm sorry I worshipped your consort while ignoring you, as if you could be separated, as if the masculine divine could exist without the feminine.
I'm sorry I thought I knew better.
The truth is, I needed you all along. That ease I was seeking through meditation and self-inquiry? You were offering it freely. That sense of being held, of being safe in an uncertain world? That was always your domain.
I was just too proud to receive it.
The Invitation Home
If any of this resonates with you, if you've also dismissed Lakshmi as "just the wealth goddess" or felt disconnected from the Divine Feminine in her gentler forms, consider this an invitation.
You don't need elaborate rituals. You don't need to recite Sanskrit perfectly. You can simply sit quietly, close your eyes, and ask her to come close.
Try this: imagine a golden light surrounding you. Not blinding or overwhelming, just warm. Like afternoon sun through a window. Let it touch your skin. Let it seep into the places that feel contracted, worried, afraid. And then, silently or aloud, say: "Amma, I'm sorry I ignored you. Please come back. I'm ready to receive."
That's it. That's the whole practice.
Mahalakshmi doesn't need grand gestures. She needs humility. She needs you to stop performing long enough to actually be held.
Beyond Wealth, Into Wholeness
During this Navaratri, something fundamental shifted. The Kanakadhara Stotram cracked open a door I'd kept locked for years. And behind it wasn't a treasury of gold: it was something far more valuable. It was permission. Permission to be provided for. Permission to receive without earning. Permission to rest in the lap of the Mother and trust that everything I need is already flowing toward me.
Mahalakshmi is not just about abundance in the material sense. She's about flow. She's about that golden light that enters when we finally stop clenching. She's about wholeness, integration, and the deep feminine truth that we don't have to struggle alone.
If you're curious to explore these themes further: the intersection of psychology and spirituality, the healing power of the Divine Feminine, or the practical applications of tantra in modern life: we'd love to support your journey at Tantric Journey.
For now, I'll leave you with this question: What door have you been walking past? What divine energy have you dismissed because you thought you already knew what it was about?
Maybe it's time to knock.
