image not available5 BODY-YANTRA: SAHASRAKSHI MERU TEMPLE, DEVIPURAM 77 not seem to mind my direct questions as we talked (Fig. 5.3). I asked her since when she was practicing Srividya, and why, and she said, “No reason. My experience. When I was a child I saw the Mother.” Mani Prasanna first saw the Goddess when she was 14 years old. How did she know it was the Goddess? Did she have devotion to the Goddess at the time? Laughing, she said, “Not really, only during exams when I asked for help.” MANI PRASANNA: — When I slept, a woman woke me up and talked to me, I don’t know who she was. I was scared and wanted to go back to sleep and I never had any such discussions again. However, whatever hap- pened in my life I remember some things happened in the same way she Fig. 5.3 Mani Prasanna (Photograph by Mani Rao) Marepian, saxuueHvii asTopcbkum npasom