I remember the time I first came to know about Goddess Baglamukhi. It was a relative who told me about her. She said this mahavidya was capable of paralysing the enemy’s tongue and render him harmless. I was quite young at the time and actually got scared of the goddess. What if she decides to hold my tongue! How would I speak then?

Time flew and some how or the other I kept encountering Mahavidya Baglamukhi at different points in my life. When life was tough, I was told to pray to her so that she could take care of the people who were troubling me..my so called enemies. Some how, I could not bring myself to pray for someone’s downfall. The law of Karma was quite ingrained in me and I believed that if I do something bad to someone, I would get it back.

Recently, I read the book ‘Shakti Rising’ by Kavitha M. where the author talks about the metaphysical aspect of Baglamukhi. It gave me a new insight into this power of the universe which was quite a revelation.

Baglamukhi is depicted as a goddess or the mahavidya who holds the tongue of a man (rakshas) with one hand while she strikes him with a cudgel using the other hand. She is said to grant siddhis or powers to her devotees and stun their enemies into silence, both physically and mentally.

Who are these enemies that Baglamukhi stuns into silence? Why does she catch the tongue of this rakshas and strike him at the same time? Why does she ride a bagla or a crane? The answers lie within us.

Baglamukhi is a mahavidhya or the knowledge that stuns anyone into silence. To be stunned into silence is to stop the incessant chatter of the mind which keeps repeating the same old stories all the time. Our life is built out of these stories which keep telling us how we are not good enough or the world is a bad place or how people don’t understand or love us.

The devil whose tongue has been caught is within us. That voice that keeps nagging us and tells us how things will never change or maybe how we will never find love or peace needs to be silenced before we can set out on a quest to find our true life’s purpose. Bagla or crane is known for its concentration and without concentration nothing can happen!

How can Baglamukhi grant siddhis or the powers of the universe? Quite simply if we understand what this power within us can accomplish. It can grant us the power of silence, it can stop the incessant stories that we tell ourselves which do not allow us to succeed, it banishes the fear that keeps talking to us in the dead of the night and does not allow us to explore our true potential.

The silence that dawns after Bagla’s hand catches the tongue of our insecurities and shuts them forever, is in the form of a blinding golden light which brings forth our latent powers or the siddhis as we call them. No wonder Bagla is also known as Pitambari or the one with the yellow colour.

As mentioned before, Mahavidyas are nothing but the unrealized powers that reside within us but are covered with incessant chatters, unrealistic insecurities and voices of our percieved inadequacies. When these noises of the ego are shut by Bagla with her power of concentration, the silence unveils the power of our own soul!