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NAVRATRI: THE POWER OF SHAKTI, THE WISDOM OF SHIVA

Writer: Sasha Tanoushka BCH IACT
Sasha Tanoushka BCH IACT
13 minutes ago
7 min read

Why balance is not always 50/50, desire is not necessarily the enemy, and conscious living requires more than positive thinking.

By Sasha Tanoushka | Verus Human Optimization


A 6-minute read | Spiritual philosophy • Behavioural science • Human potential


The Myth of Perfect Balance



We hear so much about balance. Balance between work and relationships, ambition and contentment, masculine and feminine energy, action and rest. Somewhere along the way, balance has come to mean dividing ourselves into equal portions, as though a healthy life requires us to remain perpetually calm, agreeable and emotionally neutral. But neither the human nervous system nor the Shiva-Shakti relationship can be reduced to a permanent 50/50 arrangement.


During Navratri, when the divine feminine is celebrated through the many manifestations of Goddess Durga, I find this distinction particularly meaningful. Shakti represents power, dynamism and the creative capacity through which life manifests. In several nondual Shaiva traditions, Shiva represents consciousness while Shakti is its inseparable dynamic power. Rather than two competing forces, they can be understood as interconnected aspects of existence, although interpretations vary considerably across Hindu philosophical traditions.

Perhaps the goal is not equal amounts of stillness and movement. Perhaps it is knowing when each is needed.


Desire Is Not Necessarily the Enemy


An intriguing question lies at the heart of many spiritual and psychological traditions:


what do we do with desire?

Some Hindu traditions emphasize renunciation, while others recognize desire, or kāma, as one of the legitimate aims of human life when appropriately guided by dharma. The Bhagavad Gita also asks us to examine attachment, motivation and the consequences of our actions.


There is no single Hindu teaching that simply instructs everyone to indulge every desire or destroy every desire. For me, this is where contemplative wisdom meets behavioural awareness.


Ambition, attraction, anger, jealousy, creativity and the longing for connection all carry information about our internal experience.


But an impulse is not automatically an instruction, and an emotion is not necessarily an accurate assessment of reality.

The opportunity lies in learning to recognize what arises before deciding whether and how to act. Desire becomes more useful when accompanied by discernment.

This principle matters in relationships, entrepreneurship, recovery and leadership.


We can desire love without possessing another person, seek financial success without abandoning ethical responsibility, and experience anger without turning it into aggression. We can pursue great ambition without sacrificing every relationship or our health along the way. Consciousness does not require the disappearance of passion; it helps us determine what deserves our energy.



Three Powers: Intention, Knowledge and Action



Certain Shaiva-Shakta philosophical frameworks describe three interconnected powers: Icchā Shakti, the power of will or intention; Jñāna Shakti, the power of knowledge; and Kriyā Shakti, the power of action. These offer a particularly useful framework for contemporary personal development. Although they arise from a spiritual and metaphysical tradition, they can also inspire practical questions about how we make decisions. Importantly, these concepts should not be mistaken for experimentally validated neuroscience models.


Icchā Shakti asks us to examine what we genuinely want and why. Jñāna Shakti invites knowledge, investigation and discernment, including the willingness to question our assumptions. Kriyā Shakti turns understanding into meaningful action rather than endlessly rehearsing intentions. Together, they remind us that wanting, understanding and doing are related but distinct capacities.



Think about the founder who has tremendous ambition but repeatedly exhausts their team, or the artist who has extraordinary knowledge but hesitates to release their work. Consider the person who understands their relationship patterns intellectually but continues repeating them. These are not simply failures of motivation; they can involve habits, emotional responses, learned expectations and environmental pressures. Progress often requires more than desire alone.



Shiva, Shakti and the Science of Regulation




Modern neuroscience provides a useful parallel, although it does not prove ancient metaphysical teachings. The nervous system constantly adapts to changing demands, mobilizing physiological resources when action is required and supporting recovery when demands subside. Researchers describe part of this adaptive process through allostasis, or maintaining stability through change.


Chronic activation without adequate recovery can contribute to what researchers call allostatic load.


This makes me question the popular idea that a regulated person must always look peaceful.


Sometimes healthy regulation means speaking firmly, setting a boundary, confronting a difficult problem or moving decisively toward change.

At other times, the appropriate response is rest, quiet reflection or allowing an emotional experience to unfold without immediate action.


Psychological flexibility involves adapting our responses to circumstances rather than rigidly relying on one habitual strategy.

There is another important distinction: regulation is not suppression.


Suppressing outward emotional expression can sometimes increase physiological strain and does not necessarily resolve the experience beneath it.

Acceptance, cognitive reappraisal, mindfulness and appropriate emotional expression can all have roles, depending on context.


A well-regulated nervous system is not one that never becomes activated, but one that retains or regains the capacity to respond flexibly.

What Durga Teaches About Power


Durga’s imagery is among the most compelling in Hindu religious art. She is frequently depicted riding a lion or tiger and carrying weapons associated with divine power and the defeat of destructive forces. Her fierceness is not simply aggression, and her compassion is not weakness. Within the devotional narratives surrounding her, strength and protection are intimately connected.


This symbolism offers a meaningful contemporary reflection, particularly for those who believe that kindness requires endless accommodation. Compassion does not demand tolerating humiliation, and spiritual maturity does not require abandoning healthy boundaries. Equally, confidence is not a licence to dominate others, and power without ethical responsibility can become destructive. What matters is not simply how much power we possess, but how we choose to use it.



Across cultures, people have interpreted spiritual duty through the expectations of family, marriage, gender, service and sacrifice. Some interpretations have empowered people, while others have reinforced roles that leave individuals overburdened. That tension deserves thoughtful examination rather than a romanticized account of tradition.


Ancient wisdom remains most useful when we approach it with respect, historical awareness and the willingness to distinguish enduring principles from social conditioning.



Why This Matters for Relationships


One of the most interesting applications of this framework is in the way we relate to people we love. Too often, relationships become negotiations between competing emotional habits: one person pursues reassurance while the other seeks distance, one over-functions while another withdraws, or one constantly rescues while another grows dependent. These patterns can be influenced by attachment experiences, learned family dynamics, stress and individual differences.


Recognizing them gives us an opportunity to respond differently without reducing either person to a label. An awareness-based approach does not ask us to abandon care or become detached from human relationships. It asks whether the way we express care is strengthening connection or unintentionally sustaining an unhealthy cycle. Sometimes love requires tenderness, sometimes accountability, and sometimes the courage to stop doing what has always been expected of us. The aim is not perfect harmony every moment, but a relationship in which both people have room for agency, repair and growth.



A More Useful Understanding of Human Potential


The framework I work with is REGULATE • CONNECT • LEARN • LEAD. These four ideas offer a practical way to organize the relationship between inner experience and outward behaviour. They are not substitutes for medical or psychological care, nor are they ancient doctrines repackaged as scientific facts.


They are a contemporary structure for encouraging thoughtful, purposeful development.



REGULATE means developing awareness of our physiological and emotional responses, and learning ways to respond rather than merely react.


CONNECT means strengthening relationships through communication, mutual respect and healthier boundaries.


LEARN involves questioning inherited beliefs, examining patterns and remaining receptive to new information.


LEAD means turning intention and understanding into responsible action, whether in our homes, communities, organizations or creative lives.


This is also why I resist the idea that human optimization means constantly improving measurable performance. A person can become extremely productive while growing progressively disconnected from family, community and themselves. Someone can develop formidable discipline but have little capacity for joy, intimacy or recovery.


A fuller understanding of human potential includes responsibility, meaning, adaptability, connection and the freedom to make conscious choices.

This Navratri, I Am Not Seeking Perfect Balance


I am interested in becoming more responsive to life without surrendering my capacity to choose. There will be moments that require enormous courage, periods that demand endurance and times when the most intelligent action is to stop. There will be desires worth pursuing and others that require examination before they become habits. That is not inconsistency; it is part of being human.


Shiva and Shakti invite us to contemplate consciousness and power, stillness and movement, awareness and manifestation. Contemporary neuroscience invites us to examine adaptation, regulation, learning and behaviour. Anthropology reminds us that spiritual ideas live within cultures and that their meanings shift across historical and social contexts. Each perspective offers something valuable, without needing to collapse them into a single explanatory system.


This Navratri, my reflection is simple:


May we have the awareness to recognize our desires, the wisdom to discern their direction and the courage to act when action is required. May we learn to exercise power without domination, experience love without possession and practise compassion without self-erasure. May we be flexible enough to rest when tired, confront what matters and change course when we learn something new. And may we remember that living consciously is not about becoming perfectly balanced, but about learning to participate more fully and responsibly in life.

Not permanently still. Not endlessly striving. Conscious, compassionate and capable of choosing. 🔱🌸🔥


Sasha Tanoushka BCH, Verus Human Optimization REGULATE • CONNECT • LEARN • LEAD



Academic and philosophical reading


These sources support the philosophical context and neuroscience parallels, rather than establishing that Shiva-Shakti concepts are themselves scientific mechanisms.

 
 
 

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