To worship the Lord, upacharas (services) are offered and performed to the Lord as an act of love to invoke His grace and blessings. These upacharas, as suggested in the Vedic Agamas, may be simple – in the quantity of services offered – or very elaborate; depending on how much time we have available to dedicate to the Lord. Listed below are the different upacharas presented on this website.

• pancha upachara puja = 5 services of worship
• shodasa upachara puja = 16 services of worship
• raja upachara puja = great number of services of worship
• sri thiruppugal vidhana shodasa upachara puja = 16 services of worship WITH the sacred Thiruppugal songs

Any of the above services may be adopted for daily sadhana. For interested sadhakas/devotees, it is suggested they adopt a puja method from the above list that suits their life-style – depending on the amount of time they are able to commit towards daily worship.

Satguru Sivaya Subramuniya Swami, founder of the Himalayan Academy, states in his book, “Dancing with Siva,” that “consistent daily sadhana is the most effective method of mitigating karma.” Hence, whatever the amount of time we commit, it is the quality – not quantity – and the consistency of our love that we offer to Lord Murugan that is important. The key components of quality sadhana are: faith, love, and consistency – same time, same place. By so doing, we obtain the discipline needed to propel forward in other more difficult spiritual practices such as dhyaanam (meditation), which cannot be done without a disciplined one-pointed mind. Puja allows the development of this one-pointed concentration and forms the basic foundation of bakthi yoga – which is the basic fundamental starting point of spiritual practice in Saiva Siddhantam.