how do you celebrate navratris and what is its significance for you?

Answer 1

I will try to tell from my true nature with intellect what does this mean. I feel Navratri is the celebration of the divine Mother: the entire perceivable universe (Chandi, The Highest Meaning of theGoddess) and the imperceptible subtle being (Chandi, Fourth Chapter)that is the source of everything, or the relative world and the absolute world. Mother can be described, but not known,using any of thoseintellectual constructs that pair what seem to be two opposites as one phenomena. The classic example uses fire and heat. Though they are intellectually objectified as two distinct parts, we experience fire as an inseparable entity. Mother is that way ,too. She is Hrim: The threeworlds and that which is beyond maniefestation, thus, she is the totality of existence.(Shiva Puja, Hriileka nyaasa). We experience her fullness of existence in every breath we take,yet we don't know that it is she who dwells closest to us.(Chandi, Rigvedoktam Devi Suktam)

So Navaratri is the celebration of the Divine Mother in all her diversity and how She helps us to regain our divine essence through recognition that we are none other than her. During Navratri we celebrate the victory of the Goddess over the forces of duality, the forces and energies which make us think that we are separate from Mother. The principal scripture, the Chandi depicts the pyschological drama through which we pass to come to realize who we are. The internal battles fought are ferocious and seemingly interminable especially the one fought with the Great Ego, the subtlest of all demons with his myriad cohorts and advisors of duality.

Navratri is a time for a conscious and rigorous examination of our own lives. For nine days, we pray to the three Goddesses: Mahalakshmi, Mahakali, and Mahasaraswati who wield many weapons to cut away at the demons, the confusions that keep us away from our divine nature.(Chandi, Navarna Vidhi) While the weapons are the attitudes we assume, and like weapons of war, their intention is to destroy, the goddesses are none other than our selves seeking to reestablish our divinity. During this self-examination we have to be very honest with ourselves and this attempt at honesty, what Swamiji calls Indra (Rule of the Pure),a new wave of demons and confusions arise who want to obscure the truth.

Answer 2

Is this an indian religious festival? If yes.......my parents fast