Bhakti liberates

Bhakti liberates- Anant Sri

Bhakti liberates. This small sutra from Vigyan Bhairav Tantra is not actually a technique but a way of life. In this sutra, Shiva says that devotion frees. The sutra is simple and easy yet whatever is easy is also equally difficult. It is the journey of Love. Love is in the middle, below love, on a lower plane is काम वासना i.e. sex and desires; and above love and  transcending love is Bhakti, a journey from desires to love and then from love to Bhakti. They move together as well as they have their own journey separately too.

Sexual activities are basically using another for deriving pleasure. Here the I is prominent and the other is just a means for gratification. And when this I becomes important and the other being insignificant, then in such cases exploitation and sexual violence are possible. What one gets here, is just temporary, and then frustration and delusion are the outcome.

When you journey in love, then the other is more important. You begin to live for the other and go to any extent for the happiness of the beloved. Here also sex may find a place but as an expression of love and not for exploitation or as a means for gratification. In love you begin to dissolve gradually and only the other is important. In love you don’t think, it is a kind of दीवानगी, an attitude of taking no cognizance of things blocking your way. Your focus is only on your beloved and that is why they say love is blind.

Love is blind just like a river, that too is blind. A river flows blindly irrespective of the obstacles coming in its way. It has to flow, and it flows, whether running into the valleys, or winding round the hills, or jumping over rocks, through caves and caverns, or through the cities and fields, it doesn’t bother about anything. Same way a person in love is blind to the obstacles in his way. He does not investigate the benefits and losses, he just lives for his love and if need arises, he dies for love. He can willingly give his life for love.

There is also a possibility of taking life for love. But there is a difference in taking life for love, for then here again the I becomes more important and your happiness counts the most, so you take life for your satisfaction.

In love you dissolve, and you become light and unburdened. This unburdening is due to the melting of your limitations, the fading away of your boundaries leading to your expansion and lightness. Interestingly it is found that people in love are so satisfied within themselves that they eat less. However, those who lack love tend to overeat and gain weight. Now it does not mean that all those who are obese, lack love, it is just that when you are happy and contented you don’t require a lot of food for maintaining yourself.  Love and food are closely related and in love you offer the best of the food to your loved one, expressing your love in the form of concern for his or her life.

The beloved is all in all for you, becomes God for you and you go in complete dissolution. And then in this love there is a point when you are no more, only love pervades, for when you are not there, then how long will the other stay, you become one and love graduates to bhakti. And in this bhakti when there is no duality, you are free, for there is no other, all is one consciousness.

In Bharat, prayer and puja etc were incorporated in daily life to attune one to this love for God that would become an opening for the love of all turning into bhakti. It was Meera’s love for Krishna that reached the heights of bhakti that made it possible for her to journey into divinity in the most beautiful manner.

Even in relationships in Bharat, when they said पति परमेश्वर, they meant that if you totally live in the love of a person, you can transcend your limitations and enter into bhakti. This, in no way meant that husband is to consider himself God for his wife. It had to be her love, her feeling to see her husband as God that would help her evolve and dissolve her ego to know her true nature.

Love for God, love for Guru is this complete annihilation of ego, where there is no individuality, only indivisibility.

You love one person and then your beloved becomes an opening for the love of all. A person is a combination of the five elements of nature and the entire creation is also made of these five elements in nature namely earth, water, fire, air and space. When you love a person, you love these and beginning from one, you love the entire creation.

When you love your Guru then there comes a time when you cannot take it any further for your ego is threatened and you become frightened for how you can allow yourself to be wiped out, and this disturbs, it is scary. How can you trust your Guru to allow complete annihilation of your identity, but then there is no other way out. Or else you may choose to dropout but in case you choose to proceed then you must have full trust on your Guru. And then when you walk with him, you attain to realization. In case things go wrong, do not mistrust the trust, forgive, it is not the trust that has failed, it is just that the person could not reach up to the level of trust. Trust is never shattered, it never fails.

There are two types of people found in the society, the heart oriented and the mind oriented. Though I have always said that they are together, yet they are expressed in different ways. There are, one type of people who can relate easily to the heart and there is another type of people who can relate better to the mind. Not that any of these is superior or inferior. It is just that these differences are found in the beginning. Some proceed with thought in preference, and some proceed with feelings in preference, however deep down they come from the same source so ultimately, they are one.

One type of people will calculate, work out the details and then move. There are others who will just go by their instinct, there will be no justification. When these people go in love then also the difference is seen. The mind-oriented people will calculate the benefits of loving and move cautiously while the heart oriented will just proceed for love. It is not that those who move with caution will not love; they also love with the same depth. Likewise, those who are heart oriented will not be illogical or unreasonable at times. It is just that in the end both transcend all reasons, all logic. Once you move in totality, then at the consciousness level, whatever activity comes through you, whatever happens, is the right thing.

Here at Anant also there are two types of people who come to me. There are those who are inclined towards what I say, what meditation techniques I give, the solutions to their problems, the answers to their queries, and they journey towards their transformation. Then there are those who are here for me, they do because I am the one giving out the techniques, they listen because I am doing the talking. They are here for love irrespective of their growth. They too are transforming but their attention is not on that. Their entire attention is directed towards me. This love, this complete trust, this surrender is love that transforms into Bhakti.