Nirguna Bhakti and Saguna Bhakti - Part 5 of 5

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But here the thing to which we get attached is not for being possessed by us.

Instead it should possess us; that is the anguish with which we get attached.

What should go is the so-called individual self or ego.

To whatever we attach deeply for that very purpose, that is Love, that is Bhakti.

But just because love or Bhakti is but a deep attachment to something, it does not mean such an involvement in chess or cricket or being a bibliophile is Love or Bhakti.

Because such attachment is all for fattening the individual ‘I’.

In other words it feeds the ‘svayaM’ (the outer self). On the other hand feeding the ‘svayam’ (to the Self) – that is, the ‘svayam’ is to be fed to the Self -- is Love or Bhakti.

This is the grand ‘svayamvaraM’ wherein the bride is ‘fed’ to the bridegroom!

Nirguna Bhakti and Saguna Bhakti - Part 4 of 5

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However, if there is the thought that it might still be better if there is a saguNa-mUrti for directing our Love, especially at the beginning of this advanced stage of SAdhanA, then certainly there is the Guru.

Pour all your Love and Bhakti on him.

He will lift you up and make you direct your Love towards the nirguNa.

Has not our Acharya said:

*prasAdena guroH seyaM pravRttA sUyate phalaM* (See KDAS-46: Sec. 29)
–‘By the Grace of the Guru, the effort will become pravRtta and will give the desired result’.

After all what is Love?

Is it not what goes and attaches to you wholly?

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Nirguna Bhakti and Saguna Bhakti - Part 3 of 5

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Gratitude, that is very important.

The Bhakti that arises out of this gratitude – gratitude to Him who has directed us into this most remarkable advaita -- raises its head now and then. Of course we may have to maintain it for a very short time and quickly resume our journey.

However, this Bhakti of short duration is so intense that all that bhakti that we did long ago for the one-pointedness of the mind pales into insignificance.

When we were carrying on that Bhakti almost incessantly, it was like a routine, and sometime lifeless.

But now on our jnAna path, a certain bhakti shoots forth as if from an underground spring, along with a sense of gratitude, and even though it is only for a moment, it is full of life.

But since our objective is nirguNa, even from this, the mind has to be turned off.

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Nirguna Bhakti and Saguna Bhakti - Part 2 of 5

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If you want you may believe that the nirguNa brahman, in order to shower its grace on you, works for just that moment like saguNa, and then after sending you inside the core of your heart, within there it remains nirguNa and takes you over. Instead of resorting to such wishful thinking, the best thing would be to go forward with shraddhA and shraddhA alone!

Memory does go back to the Ishvara (saguNa brahman). As long as there is a mental action, thinking of anything good does bring back the memory of Ishvara, who is the aggregate of all that is good.

Except for advaita, all the other schools of thought earmark him as the destination.

How can an advaita-sAdhaka not think about Him?

But when that thought does occur, start thinking: “Oh Lord, it is because of your Mercy my mind has ventured into advaita. And by Your Grace I am moving on this path little by little. I know you are doing all this, in your great compassion, to take me over finally into your advaitic oneness. So if I now worship you as a saguNa deity, I will be going against your own sankalpa. Please help me go forward on this same path”

- This is a kind of expression of gratitude for the path so far trodden and a prayer for the path that is remaining, so that the mind still stays on the nirguNa principle.

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Nirguna Bhakti and Saguna Bhakti - Part 1 of 5

Just now I talked about the Atman that tests, the Atman that reveals itself, the Atman that does the action of taking over the surrendering self.

“Do all these mean that the Atman is not nirguNa but only a saguNa that does actions? If it is saguNa then that is not our objective. How can that be so?” – such questions may arise.

This is where one has got to bring in shraddhA (Faith)!

Our Acharya, who takes great care to show us the way, has already created this bodyguard of shraddhA for our protection!

“Don’t ask questions about saguNa and nirguNa. The very Upanishads which have talked elaborately about the nirguNa Atman has spoken at this point only thus.

Take that in full faith and give yourself up to the Atman with Love. Thereafter you will be taken only to the nirguNa Absolute, so say all the Upanishads. So proceed just on faith” – this is what you have to repeatedly remind yourself and function.

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