Ashta Siddhis

First appeared: KaliPutra — GOT any SIDDHIS? CHECK YOURSELF Mode: SCHOLAR

Definition

The Ashta Siddhis (ashta = eight) are a classical taxonomy of eight distinct capacities or powers described across Puranic literature, the Yoga Sutras (Patanjali, Book III), and Tantric sources. They are traditionally presented as byproducts of deep practice — not goals, not signs of enlightenment, but markers that certain thresholds of development have been crossed.

Critical interpretive note: There are two distinct accounts of what the Ashta Siddhis are:

The literal Puranic account: Each siddhi is a physical/cosmological power — becoming as small as an atom (Anima), as large as the cosmos (Mahima), as heavy as a mountain (Garima), as light as air (Laghima), able to obtain anything anywhere (Prapti), possessing irresistible will (Prakamya), having lordship over all beings (Isitvam), mastery over all beings and elements (Vasitvam). Hanumanji's feats in the Ramayana are the canonical demonstration.
Kali Putra's psychological/social reading (the primary source here): Each siddhi is recognizable through an everyday psychological or social manifestation. The energy of the classical power shows up in ordinary modern life contexts — professional, relational, physical. Kali Putra presents this as a practical field guide for Bhairava Sadhana practitioners: here is how to recognize what is already showing up in your life, and here is how to groom it.

The two accounts are not necessarily contradictory — one may be the metaphysical architecture, the other the lived expression of it. But the relationship between them is unaddressed in current sources and constitutes an open tension. Until a second source explicitly addresses the psychological interpretation, it should be held as [PARAPHRASED — Kali Putra's reading] rather than received tradition. This page documents the psychological manifestation account. The literal Puranic account needs a separate dedicated source.

The Eight Siddhis: Signs and Grooming

All entries below are [PARAPHRASED from Kali Putra] unless otherwise marked. Context: Bhairava/Mahakali Sadhana path specifically.

1. Anima — Minuteness / The Ability to Be Unseen

Classical meaning: Becoming as small as an atom; reducing to imperceptible scale.

Kali Putra's manifestation: The ability to be present yet unseen — to exist in a meeting, an event, a community, without anyone registering your presence unless you choose to be seen. Not because you are unimportant, but because the deity protects you from unwanted attention and energetic drain. Distinction: this is chosen invisibility, not social invisibility because you have nothing to contribute.

Sign it is manifesting: You find that important meetings or events proceed around you without anyone pulling you in. You are physically present but not called upon, not noticed, not burdened. "People cannot point you. Like they would simply skip you over."

Grooming instruction: During Sankalp periods, deliberately practice being non-present. Do not project yourself as the center figure. Learn to be "inconspicuous, be non-present yet present." Practice in low-stakes environments; apply during Sankalp to protect sadhana energy.

Purpose: Protect sadhana from energetic drain in crowded or demanding spaces. Never for vanity or social avoidance as an end in itself.

Shiva Tattva parallel: Shiva is a non-participant in gatherings, indifferent to crowds, not to be found in social obligations. Anima is the capacity to embody Shiva Tattva in everyday life.

2. Mahima — Grandness / The Ability to Suddenly Appear Immense

Classical meaning: Becoming as large as a mountain or cosmos; expanding to vast scale.

Kali Putra's manifestation: Appearing small in ordinary life, yet being able to make one comment or take one step that stops a much larger event in its tracks — creating shock and chaos disproportionate to your apparent stature. "A simple comment, a simple step you take — nahi ye mat karo — because of two three things you voice out and things come to a stop."

Sign it is manifesting: You have made small, low-stakes interventions that stopped significant events or rattled powerful people. The size disparity is the marker: you are small, the thing you stopped was large, and you were safely able to exit afterward.

Grooming instruction: Do not go seeking situations to demonstrate this. But when you notice it has happened — you stopped something major with a small gesture — recognize it, do not dismiss it, and use it specifically for dharmic interventions: correcting misrepresentation of dharma, realigning what is going wrong.

Distinction from Garima: Mahima is episodic — a burst of immensity from apparent smallness, which then passes. Garima is permanent weight.

3. Garima — Heaviness / Permanent Immovability

Classical meaning: Becoming as heavy as a mountain; impossible to displace.

Kali Putra's manifestation: A settled weight of presence such that people recognize, even without being told, that you cannot be moved. Not loudly asserted — quietly known. Systems, bosses, rivals cannot displace you through normal channels; attempts to "buy system, loophole, push you aside" consistently fail.

Sign it is manifesting: Multiple sustained attempts to displace or marginalize you have not succeeded, despite those attempting it having more formal power. The heaviness is registered by others: "don't mess around with them." You are not pushed over by force.

Grooming instruction: "Keep on walking. Be righteous. Uphold Dharma. Keep walking." Garima is not performed — it is continued. The way to groom it is to not stop, not react to the attempts at displacement, and not take pride in the heaviness. The deity provides the weight; your job is to continue the direction.

Caution: Do not weaponize Garima for interpersonal dominance, neighborhood disputes, or workplace politics. It is "purely Brahma Tattva." Reserved for dharmic necessity.

4. Laghima — Lightness / Psychological Non-Reactivity

Classical meaning: Becoming as light as a feather; weightless, ungrounded by gravity.

Kali Putra's manifestation: The ability to be psychologically unaffected by any external stimulus — opportunity, threat, demand, obligation. "Like air" — present, observable, but passing through everything without being burdened or bound. Cannot be made to react. Cannot be put on a timetable. "Nobody can put a duty onto your head."

Sign it is manifesting: Large events — both favorable and unfavorable — arise and do not create a sense of urgency or burden. You can choose to respond or not respond from a place of genuine indifference, not performance of indifference. People find it difficult to engage you — not because you're absent, but because you cannot be burdened.

Grooming instruction: Practice Laghima as an internal state, not as social withdrawal. The distinction from Anima is precise: Anima is choosing to be unseen (you decide to be smaller); Laghima is being unaffected (nothing can land on you, including your own desire to be unseen or seen). "You are not affected."

Why this is the most critical siddhi: "If you can be air, unaffected, untouched by any external stimulus no matter whatever it is — you are unaffected. You cannot be made to react." This is Shiva Tattva most directly: Mahakal is Shunya always; Shiva is bound to nothing.

Distinction from Anima: Anima = choose to be small. Laghima = cannot be burdened regardless of size.

5. Prapti — Attainment / Doors Opening at Will

Classical meaning: Ability to reach any place and obtain anything; omnipresence.

Kali Putra's manifestation: Observable as things coming easily — career advancement, access, doors opening that should be closed. The power to go higher and higher in worldly structures if that is the direction of will.

Sign it is manifesting: Sustained upward movement despite obstacles; high-achieving people who seem to have been "bloodline-activated" — actors, politicians, business figures who rise dramatically — often have Prapti operating, though they don't recognize it.

Grooming instruction: Do not use Prapti to simply accumulate worldly outcomes. "The one who uses that to power their Sadhana — Prapti of what? Prapti of all siddhis so that you can power your Sadhana." Detach from the worldly attainment as soon as it arrives; use it to strengthen the sadhana foundation, not as a destination.

The bloodline dimension: Many high-achieving people access Prapti through accumulated bloodline karma. If they forget sadhana and use it only for personal advancement, they do not carry it to the next birth. "Every high-achieving actor, actress — they attain these heights and then they forget everything. They do not come back to the sadhana path, thereby repeating and being doomed."

6. Prakamya — Irresistible Willpower / The Fire That Cannot Be Stopped

Classical meaning: Irresistible will; the power to realize any desire.

Kali Putra's manifestation: Once a goal is fixed, the will to pursue it does not switch off — regardless of failure, obstacles, lack of resources, or lack of support. "Every month, every week this fellow is doing something and he's moving forward. He cannot be stopped even if you do not give him the ammunition."

Sign it is manifesting: You may fail at times but the will keeps returning to the goal. The fire does not go out. Others consistently observe that you cannot be stopped. Doors open because the will is sustained, not the other way around.

Distinction from Prapti: Prapti = outcomes arrive (attainment). Prakamya = the will toward the goal is unstoppable (willpower). A person with Prapti gets things. A person with Prakamya cannot stop working toward things. They often co-occur but are structurally distinct.

Grooming instruction: Fix powerful Sankalps. "Take powerful Sankalps, baitho baith jao." Use the willpower for sadhana goals, not only worldly ones. "The mind that can ascertain and sit on one specific goal and to not lose that goal in the middle path — that is the greatest siddhi."

7. Isitvam — Lordship / The Ability to Direct People and Events

Classical meaning: Lordship over elements and beings; supremacy.

Kali Putra's manifestation: The ability to motivate, direct, and align people around you — to fire them up, get them to act, coordinate events. The lighter expression: you can get people to do things. The fuller expression: you can redirect a crowd or movement through presence and speech.

Sign it is manifesting: People follow your direction naturally; you are able to coordinate groups; events bend around your interventions.

Caution — highest danger of misuse: "Isitvam and Vasitvam [are] the most dangerous two siddhis." Using Isitvam to manipulate people for corporate, personal, or ego purposes: "Do not power unnecessary things. Surrender it to the deities and keep it safe."

Grooming instruction: "Use it to create something — a revolution that will last next 10,000 years, 5,000 years." Reserved for dharmic alignment, not tactical advantage.

8. Vasitvam — Mastery / Dominion Over Beings and the Kalachakra

Classical meaning: Complete mastery over all beings and elements; subjugation of nature.

Kali Putra's manifestation: The most advanced siddhi; the speaker explicitly says most current practitioners are not at this level and it is not a subject that has immediate meaning. Two registers:

Outer manifestation: Ownership of an army, a police force, a movement; people bound to you through material or social obligation. This is "the lowest form of Vasitvam."
Inner manifestation (Vak Siddhi): "Merely by speech you have the ability to control and manipulate events around you, people around you, and animals."
Animal mastery: The deepest diagnostic. By look and energy exchange, you can communicate with and redirect animals. Deities are represented with animals because "it is only the animal who will worship you" — unburdened by prarabdha karma, an animal's atma can align fully with the master's atma. "The cluster of atmas" that forms around a Vasitvam-attaining practitioner is an extremely powerful kavach.

Sign it is manifesting: "Multiple deaths and rebirths in your single life" visible in the astrological chart; prarabdha and sanchita karma effectively burned; you are "nothing but one with the deity, operating as the deity."

Important caveat: "I specifically think Isitvam and Vasitvam is not a subject that has any meaning right now for most of us."

Evidence and Sources

KaliPutra — GOT any SIDDHIS? CHECK YOURSELF — only current source; psychological manifestation account; practitioner field guide for Bhairava Sadhana; all claims [PARAPHRASED]; path-specific to Bhairava/Mahakali Sadhana

Tensions

Psychological vs. literal account: The Ashta Siddhis in Puranic literature and Patanjali's Yoga Sutras III are described as literal physical powers. Kali Putra presents them as psychological/social phenomena. These may be complementary accounts (metaphysical + lived), but the relationship is unaddressed. Until a second source engages the psychological interpretation directly, this page represents one practitioner's reading, not established doctrine.
Taxonomy completeness: The classical taxonomy lists exactly eight. Kali Putra covers all eight, but discusses Isitvam and Vasitvam as currently irrelevant for most practitioners. This creates an asymmetry in the page — Levels 1–6 are fully developed; 7–8 are documented as advanced/inaccessible. This is the source's own framing, not an editorial gap.
Path-specificity: The entire framework is framed as specific to Bhairava/Mahakali Sadhana. Whether the same signs and grooming instructions apply in other Tantric or yogic paths is an open question.

Connected Concepts

→ Siddhis and the Attainment Trap — the ethical framework; the warning against chasing siddhis and misuse; the byproduct-only principle; the two-error framework (this page is the taxonomy; that page is the ethics)
→ Bhairava and Bhairava Sadhana — the sadhana path in which these siddhis manifest according to this source
→ Tantra as Upaya — the three-Bhava framework governs who is suited for the level of practice at which these siddhis emerge

Open Questions

What is the classical textual basis for the psychological interpretation of the Ashta Siddhis? Is there any premodern commentary tradition that reads Anima as social inconspicuousness, or is this a contemporary reframe?
The animal-worship dimension of Vasitvam raises a substantive question: does the Tantric tradition hold that animals carry atmas that can be spiritually aligned, and if so, what is the doctrinal account of animal consciousness and liberation?
Prapti as bloodline activation: the claim that high-achieving people (actors, politicians) are often running on ancestral/bloodline-accumulated siddhis without knowing it — is there doctrinal support for this, or is it Kali Putra's personal interpretive framework?
What is the relationship between the Ashta Siddhis taxonomy and the vibhutis described in Patanjali's Yoga Sutras Book III? Are these the same list, a parallel list, or overlapping but distinct?

Last updated: 2026-04-13