Om gam ganeshaya namah |

      Om shree siddhi vinayakaya namah |
   On the occasion of Vinayaka Chaturthi let us pay our obeisance to Lord Vighneshvara and contemplate on Him and his vested powers. Lord Ganesh is the deity of muladhara chakra (basal plexus). He is the basic support (mula adhara) of all the living beings (jivarashi). Symbolically, the Lord is the first emanate of brahman. He is eulogised in the Rk Veda Samhita as the who knows all (kavinaam kavih) and He is the brahmanaspati. He is the knower of brahmn (brahmanam). He, the Lord of all beings (gana) is the supporter of the pious and wards of all evil forces that come in the way of their effort to attain liberation, mukti. As such, He, the  Lord Vighneshvara is the friend of the good and the foe of the evil-mongers and the mischievous. 

  The epics portray Him in different ways. He is endowed with great powers and has all the knowledge to sustain this universe. He is the vidhyadhipati. He is also the great Poet Laureate- kavinaam kavih  and the first born or the first manifest form of brahman- Jyeshtarajam brahman, the all-knowing- brahmanspatih, who writes the Veda and the purana in us. The strange event depicting him as one with an elephant face is just symbolic, and it only means how even Lord Shiva in his egoistic attitude and behavior lost his cool, his sense of 'the self', and treated Ganapati as 'an other'  separate from Him Self and beheaded him! For a moment, he, the Lord, Shiva forgets the fact that everything that is found is the manifest of His own Self and nothing else!
    The  elephant face is an indication of sharp eyes for details, keen sense of hearing and the long nose of sensing in advance what is to come and strength to ward of evil. 
    As regards the rat and the snake associated with the deity Ganesh, it is very important to note that the rat served the Lord as the vehicle, while the serpent tied as a belt is indicative of consciousness (chit-shakti) surrounding the body. The serpent is also associated with Shiva and ananta padmanabha as shesha naga shayana. It is indicative of the potency, virility, all pervasive consciousness. The muladhara deity who dwells in all the jivarashi is the 'I' seated on the Rat. This is what is Rat I on that's all- the Rational - thinking animal!

  Devi Gouri is, incidentally, the Mother Goddess, Bhu Devi. She creates all beings as the earthly creatures, She took a handful of mud, clay and mould a toy and infused life (prana shakti) into it. There comes the Ganapati, a living being according to Shiva purana. This is true of all of us who are the product of the earth, elemental creatures (bhtatmika). It is strange that people do not understand this earthen idol of Ganesh is brought and installed in our homes as symbolic of sentient, earthly existence. The Lord is worshiped in this archa avatara according to agama shastra. Again, symbolically, the idol is sent back to the tank, just as we return our mortal coils back to earth. Thus, lord Ganapati is none else but our Self.

      Now The powers of Ganapati as Kundalini shakti is very important. The deity of all that exists is Ganapti whose seat is the base.He is the Guru, teacher, gravitational force that keeps all in balance. If there were no Ganapati we would never sit, stand or walk! As the scribe of Vedavyasa, Lord Gahapati writes the epic Mahabharata Puarana. In fact this Veda is the ultimate knowledge of the Self.Lord ganapati inscribes the knowledge in our soul with his tooth! He writes on the tablet of our  heart.Seated in our  muladhara chakra writes the supreme knowledge of teh self in our anahata chakra. Thus, the Veda,upanishad, the purana and all that is not elsewhere outside of us; it is within us in the Atman. Atmai vedgm sarvam | The Atma knows all. \

  Now, who is Ganapati? Whom do we worship? The supreme Lord is established in the jivas as the pure consciousness (prajnya), and He operates the jiva as the prana shakti and He is vital airs,the vital airs. Al that is is brahmn. sarvam khaluvidam brahma is the Vedic doctrine.There is nothing besides brahmn. Hence all the living beings- jiva rashi, are created, sustained and dissolved by the will of the Lord.   
   The Atharva Veda eulogizes the Lord Ganapati in a number of ways. There is Ganesha Gita and Ganesha sahasranama. Now, Ganapati has become an integral part of the daily life of every conscious being since He, the Lord, is nothing but the embodiment of Consciousness.