Divine Love, my encounter with the crazy world of Bhaktas

Are you a bhakta? How far does your Bhakti go? Will you take the leap, close your eyes and trust me and let go?

"No" would most likely be the answer. How then do we go on this path of faith, ahem blind faith. Blind faith which is not so blind that you take anything that’s given but blind faith that is informed on whom you take it from and what they have to offer. And yes, you had better know your faith better, way better because whoever you go to, won’t teach you that. 

Faith is what you make of it, it is not what you see in a group of people as to what they make of it. It is not a war of symbolism, it is not a war of numbers, it is not a war of belief (whether my belief is greater than yours or not). It is a STATE OF MIND. It is yours for you to manage, like your home, your work, your kids... faith is all about managing the creature called you. Why, because guess what ... you spent your whole life managing everyone and everything else around you but yourself. 

I belong in that world, the world where we think managing ourselves is way more important that managing others. We manage ourselves and define what principles and virtues we want to live up to and define who we really want to be...in the divine world. I discovered a handful of others who have tried as much to do the same thing with themselves and succeeded. And we have a common goal, the goal is to seek the divine, the goal is to exploit what we have in abundance - sheer love. 

Love - not the chemistry between a man and a woman, not a spark that defines a human relationship - but love that is free of human definition. You and I are capable of it. I discovered a man, I read his poetry and now I am deeply in love with his ideology, deeply in love with his craving for the Goddess, deeply in love with his purity towards the divine. And every line in his poetry just makes my heart cry out for him. Oh where is he, the great lover of the Goddess, who looks so dejected because he can’t find me. 

Alas, we are born in two different eras...we are born never to have ever met before. And as I scroll through his divine verses to the Goddess... I feel the pain of what he feels. We are simple people, we don’t know the ways of the world, and we just know one thing, deep love, just love for the divine Mother. 

He writes:

A Country Fair (Excerpts) 

Drive me out of my mind, O Mother
What use is esoteric knowledge
or philosophical knowledge
Transport me totally with the burning wine
Of your all-embracing love
Mother of mystery, who imbues with mystery
The heart of those who love you
Immerse me irretrievably
In the stormy ocean without boundary
Pure love Pure love Pure love

The Poet Stammers, 
Overcome with longing:
When? When? When?
When will I be granted companionship 
with her intense lovers. 
Their holy company is heavenly
A country fair for those mad with love
Where every distinction between master and disciple disappears

 - Ramprasad Sen (Shakta Poet, 18th Century, West Bengal)

Yes it’s a mad world when one true bhakta meets another, it’s a mad world of freedom from the hypocrisy of men. Out here there is truth, there is pure love and deep faith that pulsates, binding us together. We sing each other’s praise, we view each other as an extension of ourselves. We realize just what we need beyond the world of earthly human love and existence. And the divine mother drives us, like horses tied to her chariot as we run in directions of our own choice, of our own freedom. The harness of love keeps us steady and doesn’t let us stray away.

He taught me well. He taught me to love the Goddess. He taught me to look into the mirror and see him as a reflection of me. 

That is truly when the divine illusion of the Great Mother falls and she sees herself face to face with herself. We are but a figment of her imagination. Ma Kali meets Ma Kali, I am you seen through her eyes and this illusion too shall fall. 

At last... I have realized the meaning of true love.

The Search for Lord Shiva

We are a bunch of mad men fighting about who or what the great Lord really is, fighting about who or what that supreme experience is all about, fighting about who is higher in the rat race to spiritual enlightenment. Isn’t it sad that such a sacred path to attainment can go so horribly wrong when we decide to pump in our ego and intellect and greed into it!

It has made me stop and think. I have blogged and blogged for years, I have sat and worshipped for a duration of time (nothing to be proud of really) and I have gone back to the texts to verify the conservative way whether I am doing it right. I realized just how far away we have gone from it.

I have been at this for a while, spent most of my time on it and if you ask me who the great Lord Shiva really is, I still draw a blank. I have enough theory but when it comes to practise I am doing something wrong which is not helping and I don’t know what it is. But yes, the only thing I really learned over a period of time is just how much I fell in love with him - The Perfect One. The only one to whom I managed to surrender myself doubtlessly.

This run is costing me good, it’s keeping the vigour alive, its keeping the mind active, its keeping me sane in a mad world. But am dejected, a little tired but the perseverance will continue. HE will come, he will reveal and I will not settle for second best.

In this mad world everyone has an impression, everyone has an opinion, but no one has the luck or the grace. It’s so sickeningly human to fight ruthlessly despite knowing clearly within our half-baked understanding that we are just a useless mass of flesh if we don’t get this right! What’s the point in fighting over a bunch of opinions, end of the day its wasted sound waves that could be used better, its wasted energy that has no decent outcome and its wasted emotion that could been spent better of holding on to faith - Bhakti.  Yours verses mine, seriously does it help?

Everyone, you and I have potential, we are built that way naturally, and we just need to tap our own resources. We have learned well to steal the natural resources from this earth, now let’s apply the same greed on ourselves. I am not your enemy and if we do this together we can achieve the higher realm. They say spiritualism is a lonely path. I agree to some degree but then we can go our separate ways when we are confident that we have found the right path. Meanwhile, let’s help each other spiritually.

Love the Lord, read about Him, understand Him, and try to realize Him. He is just a breath away and all we need to do is feel that freedom. That freedom beyond ordered society, that freedom beyond rules, that freedom of the inner self, that freedom towards enlightenment.

Here are a few thoughts from the Shiva Purana that I really thought relevant for us today.

Mental sin is wiped off by meditation

Verbal sin is wiped off by japa

Physical sin/karma is wiped off by emaciation

Sins committed by wealth can be removed by daanam

Sprinkling of water over the head suppresses the idea of committing sins/karma

 - Shiva Purana

And its so true. When we meditate we arrest the wavering mind. When we do japa we condition the tongue to speak only sacred syllables, it forgets everything else. When we moderate the food intake, the body is light and manageable, we feel positive energy within us. When we learn the joy of giving, we kill our greed. And when we think of the Lord for those two precious minutes we forget to do the wrong deed!