Monday Morning Greetings 2017 #33 – True Devotion: “I have none!”
Dhanurdhara Swami August 14th, 2017
Sadhu, be careful! The ego is so insidious. It can appropriate even our best qualities to make us proud, even our budding devotion, thinking that I am the best devotee, or even a devotee. This doesn’t happen, however, when one develops true devotion. Not only does one not become proud, one feels he doesn’t even have a trace of devotion. I love the description of Śrī Caitanya’s mindset as His feelings of devotion intensify:
“Wherever there is a relationship of love of Godhead, its natural symptom is that the devotee does not think himself a devotee. Instead, he always thinks that he has not even a drop of love for Kṛṣṇa.” (Cc. Antya-līlā 20.28)
Having intense devotion, but feeling none. How is that possible?
Bhakti is like a thirst or hunger, but a hunger to serve. As a hungry person feels deprived of food, one with bhakti hungers for devotion and feels humbly bereft of it. As this want of bhakti is bhakti itself compassionate sages like Śrī Nārada thus pray:
“Śrī Kṛṣṇacandra, please grant that no one will ever feel he has enough of Your mercy, Your devotional service, or pure love for You, the reservoir of ecstasy.” (Bṛhad-bhāgavātamṛta 1.7.135)
Just as the hunger for devotion actually enhances it, the complacency or sense that “I have bhakti” impedes it. The first symptom of unsteady devotion is therefore called utsāha māyī or “false enthusiasm”, where the beginner in devotional service sometimes feels falsely adept or advanced in devotion causing his yearning for bhakti and thus bhakti itself to naturally slacken. In fact any sphere where we feel accomplished and proud will damper our longing and consequently our devotion. Queen Kuntī thus warns the aspiring devotee:
“My Lord, Your Lordship can easily be approached, but only by those who are materially exhausted. One who is on the path of [material] progress, trying to improve himself with respectable parentage, great opulence, high education and bodily beauty, cannot approach You with sincere feeling. (Bhāg. 1.8.26)
Sincere feeling is the key in spiritual practice, and the basis of such emotion is the humble realization that we intensely need God’s mercy, a want or sense of lack that only increases when our devotion advances. By sincerely and attentively chanting the holy name this awareness of the glory of the holy name and our own lack of qualification will become progressively revealed. If even a speck of such humility graces our consciousness we should embrace it as the greatest treasure and consciously beg for the mercy of the holy name for ironically true bhakti is the humble feeling “I have none!”
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