Waves of Devotion

Home at Last![1]

October 6, 2000
Vrindavan

I left the arrival gate only to be greeted by a mob of drivers on either side of the exit pathway waving a myriad of signs searching for their pick-up. I wasn’t sure if the message announcing my arrival had reached Vrindavan. I searched for my name. What a relief to spot the smiling face of Gopal, our Brijabasi driver!

All my arrivals into Vrindavan are similar: the feeling of unworthiness, the grime of my long journey representing the contamination of a prolonged stay in America, the instant relief of a yamunā-snāna (bath), and the happiness of seeing my old Brijabasi friends.

As I was returning from the Yamunā, Dadu, the old ISKCON mailman, passed me in a rikshaw, but he didn’t see me. He was wearing a yellow marigold garland from the temple Deities wrapped twice around his head like a crown, a sort of transcendental Statue of Liberty. I see many people in America trying to standout by what they wear, but mostly it’s superficial, just based on the latest fashion. Dadu, however, seems truly himself. What he wears thus reflects his inner self, not Madison Avenue.[2]

The water at Keśī Ghat was deep and flowing swiftly. It was five o’clock and the sun was beginning to set in the west, sending a reflection of yellow light through its waters like a pathway cutting diagonally to the base of the ghat where I was sitting. I entered carefully into her waters and facing that shimmering golden pathway, I reflected on the unparalleled natural beauty of Vraja. After chanting my gāyatrī I waded like a child in her soothing waters.

After five minutes, Ramesh, the rickshaw driver who took me to Keśī Ghat, calmly pointed twenty feet to my left to the last step of the ghat. A large snake sat there with a fish in its mouth. I don’t know how to describe my reaction other than I tried to stay cool, but really couldn’t. Quickly placing my hands two feet above me on the steps I swiftly kicked my right foot up onto the first step of the ghat and vaulted myself out of the water or, I should say, tried to vault myself out of the water. I floundered and fell back in. I finally made it out and quickly moved up a few steps to where I had placed my things. As I looked to my right, about ten feet on the other side of the snake, I saw a sādhu calmly washing his lota. He was smiling and gesturing to me. He was laughing and flapping his right hand, which obviously represented to him my panic in getting out of the water. He laughed and laughed.

The Brijabasi childen, who were the only other people there and who had been sporting blissfully in the Yamunā when I arrived, were also amused, their cunning smiles and laughter representing the anxiety and carefree hearts of young, simple, Brijabasi children. Home at last!

[1] I arrived in Vrindavan last Wednesday. I thought it most practical and relevant to just post the first journal entry I ever wrote, which was about entering Vrindavan. Of note is that Gopal, my Brijabasi driver, was there this year again to pick me up, as has been the custom for almost forty years. I left Vrindavan last year on March 6, 2020, so this was the longest I have been out of Vrindavan since I arrived in May of 1976. My arrival a few days ago thus marks the forty-seventh year that I have had the fortune of touching this holy land. I love every minute of it. I suppose future entries will reflect that. As the above post was written twenty years ago, and hopefully my writing has improved, I took the liberty to slightly re-write it.

[2] A street in New York City that was the center of the advertising and public relations industries that has become a euphemism for their attitudes, methods, practices.

Chanting and Shelter

In the last few years, the world seems to be increasingly and rapidly moving beyond our control, causing duality and fear. Chanting, however, is an activity that I like and can do regardless of how the world moves around me. That’s my shelter—the only shelter—the holy name.

Chanting and Taste

Krishna is the taste of water. That divinity, however, can only be realized when water is unmixed with anything else, in other words, sweet. Similarly, devotion is the taste of the soul, which can be realized when devotion is not mixed with activities that have no value to devotion. Therefore ruci, the stage of true taste in devotion, manifests after the platform of niṣṭha, the stage of steady devotion. I thus pray to remain fixed and have taste for the holy name.

Chanting and Sādhu-saṅga

I received a voice message from a close god-brother. He spoke with conviction of Sri Radha and her mood of separation from Krishna. I began to hanker for Vrindavan. The depth and conviction of my japa increased. Bhakti moves forward by sādhu-saṅga, the association of advanced devotees.

Chanting and a Life of Devotion

When a drop of taste comes in the chanting of the holy name, I ardently pray not to lose it. But prayer is not enough. I must live a life of devotion.

Chanting and Realizing Our Relationship with Krishna

When will we be qualified to realize our eternal relationship with Krishna? When that objective becomes a “dire necessity”. In other words, understanding that one does not realize one’s relationship with God, one begins to want that more than anything else. Such deep feelings of Inadequacy and dependence foster utter humility, which is the beginning of spontaneous devotion. I desire to have that desire.

Chanting and Humility

One can be naturally humble or become humbled or causelessly gifted a moment of humility. Either way, humility is the substance of sincere prayer.

Chanting and the Helpless Heart

My mind was clear. I began to search for the helpless heart, where I can stand at the threshold of devotion and beg for mercy.

Chanting and the Killer of Meditation

“When will I be finished?” That killer of meditation, which shortens our focus on the eternal present and thrusts us into the oppression of time, suddenly arose in my consciousness. Neglect that thought and renew one’s effort to be present with even one mantra and escape the oppression of time.

The Significance of Chanting

The holy name is the Supreme Absolute incarnate in sound. Think how significant that is and how grateful we should be, and in a humble mood chant the holy name.

That was a term my mother used to describe me after asking me for the fifth time in a day if I had done my daily chore of taking out the garbage. What a rascal I was! But besides that obvious fact, I am bringing this up to illustrate a point based on a recent experience and consequent epiphany: just how much a sense experience, especially hearing, requires more than just the senses alone for us to be aware of that experience, and how important it is for a spiritual practitioner to realize this. In that regard, I want to concentrate on elucidating this point in reference to mantra meditation, to show that besides requiring the stimulation of the auditory sense to hear a mantra, just how much one also requires the proper attitude and concentration. Before expanding this point further, let me first share the impetus for writing this article.

I started to listen to readings of the Krishna Book when I lie down to sleep at night. To make sure that I hear clearly, I even use AirPods. I soon, however, fall asleep, only to wake up after some time. Today I was shocked that even though several chapters had been read, I was so deeply asleep that I didn’t have any sense that the recording had been on. A question immediately arose in my mind: although the vibration of the reading was certainly in my ear, did I truly hear those chapters or not? If the answer is no, and it certainly seems the case, it demonstrates that the full awareness of a sense experience requires, in addition to the stimulation of the sense of hearing, the focus of the mind towards the sense that has been stimulated.

This relationship between focus and awareness is an essential point for the foundation of any practice, especially meditation, because without the steady focus on a single object over a prolonged period, one’s awareness of that object does not take place and our meditation, which is based on awareness of the object of meditation, will bear little fruit. That’s why the Yoga Sutras specifically defines the practice of meditation in relation to four characteristics of focus: concentration itself, doing such focus without interruption, maintaining that concentration for a prolonged period, and meditating with an attitude that inspires focus.[1]

The necessity of focusing the mind for sense perception to take place is also precisely why the classic yogic texts on meditation recommend asana to make the body suhka (peaceful) and sthira (steady). When the mind becomes too focused on the body it can’t simultaneously concentrate on the object of meditation.

Gauging the effectiveness of meditation based on absorption is also specifically why bhakti-yoga is deemed in the Bhagavad-gītā as the topmost yoga.[2] Focus on an object is most pronounced when a person has an emotional connection with it, and therefore bhakti-yoga, which is based on the most consummate or absorbing emotion, love or devotion towards God, facilitates the deepest meditation.

Dwelling on these thoughts this week inspired me to put renewed attention to support my meditation in the following ways.

1. Even more strictly designating a time and place for reading and chanting. If we don’t reserve an exclusive time and place for God, our spiritual activities will be in competition with things that we may superficially be more attracted to.
2. Complete technological fast from late afternoon to after breakfast. Meditation requires reversing the flow of the consciousness from external objects towards the inner mind. If technology is on, whether we succumb to it or not, the option of using it will always push the flow of the mind outward.
3. Setting an intention before a devotional practice to remind me to remain focused and to not follow extraneous thoughts. We need to set intentions or vows to help the mind resist the waves of frivolous thoughts.

I was “mother deaf” when I was young, and I now pray to not be “Krishna deaf” when old.

[1] Yoga Sutras 1.13-14

[2] Bhagavad-gītā 6.47

My friend Satyahari dasa, one of the first disciples of Yogi Bhajan and later initiated into Gaudiya Vaisnavism, shared with me a statement from one of his teachers that I think is relevant to what I want to write about today: “When you translate words from Sanskrit to another language, they become impregnated with the history of their usage in that language.” At the time, he was referring to the translation of the Sanskirt word śaraṇāgati into “surrender”, which in English carries a meaning of force and oppression that is foreign to the usage of the word in Sanskrit, which means to take shelter (śaraṇa + āgati — “going (lit. coming) for shelter”). In other words, surrender in this sense is the loving submission to or the taking of shelter of one who provides refuge, and not a forced capitulation to an authority that has either no concern for you or intends to exploit you. I wanted to clarify this point before sharing a personal realization I had about surrender so that there would be no ambiguity in what I am trying to express. My personal experience:

Due to the COVID restrictions, I have been unable to return to Vrindavana for almost two years. This morning especially, I began to deeply hanker to return. What I realized, however, was that what is separating me from the holy dhāma more than anything else is not the COVID restrictions of the Indian government, but my consciousness and level of surrender. Being locked down during the pandemic, I had felt the necessity and had the time to study the pandemic more deeply. At the same time, I wanted to understand more clearly the political forces that were degrading society, especially in the USA. To cut to the chase, I realized that although such knowledge may be required to help one negotiate the world, at my age, in my ashram, and with my present spiritual aspirations, it was best to just shut off that internet spigot to the world. In other words, I felt to do this was God’s will, and thus I needed to surrender in this way to deepen my consciousness and qualify for Vrindavana.

This exercise furthered my realization of how surrender (śaraṇāgati) is always the door to bhakti and how we must seriously contemplate this in taking our next step forward on the path of devotion. The challenge is that although we are often called to take shelter of God’s will, and although His direction, whether from guru, śāstra, or the Lord in the heart, is always His blessing, we may mistakenly conflate such surrender with the impregnated negative conception of its English usage because taking shelter of God sometimes requires sacrifice. This attitude may be even further exacerbated because of the increasingly bad experiences people have with authority growing up in a postmodern world.

So, what does this type of surrender look like? On the most basic level, it is manifest in a person of character, who lives his life according to principles, rather than impulse. It is seen in loving relationships where the parent or friend sees the needs and desires of a child or friend before themselves. Ultimately, it is the pure devotee of Krishna intoxicated with Love of God, whose single desire is to surrender to and serve the desires of the divine couple.

In his book The Art of Loving, Eric Fromm defines narcissism as seeing the world according to one’s desires and defines love as the opposite. Surrender (śaraṇāgati) is thus the foundation of the art of loving, for, in essence, it is complete sacrifice for the pleasure of God, which opens one’s heart to serve and wish the best for all. Thinking about my own challenges to move forward on the path of devotion, it couldn’t be clearer that we all need to walk through that door, but first we must get it out of our mind that surrender is a dirty word.