What is the starting point for bhakti yoga?

Answer Podcast

Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
we call it a b c d a is association whatever if we wish to do it all begins with association the kind of association we have that’s how we will become the sangha sanjayate kamaha with us is in 2.62 that by our association our desires are shaped so if we want to become spiritually interested then we need to associate with spiritually interested people so if we have a group of friends who are interested in bhakti by their association our questions will be answered our interest will be nourished and we’ll move forward so the first is association this is indispensable without association our spiritual spiritual inclination will soon get submerged under the deluge of materialistic influences that are there in today’s culture when b is books books is like the bhagavad gita when we study the books then that gives us intellectual conviction association gives us social support when we study ourselves we go deeper and our intelligence gets hold it gets sharpened many of us we may have been introduced to bhakti and to bhakti the whole process of some some kind of devotional practices as a cultural practice and that is a good enough good introduction but something that is we simply see it as cultural then we feel okay i may do it i may not do it so it just remains like a artifact from our past but when we get intellectual understanding of why we are doing it then we see the cultural not cultural as a means to the spiritual so the philosophical understanding is what helps us to see these practices as meant for transformation so for example visiting a temple or chanting the names of god or doing any bhakti activities they are vehicles to self transformation and that understanding of not just seeing them as cultural practices but as transformational practices that comes through study so that is books c is chanting now in this particular age it’s called as kalyuga the recommended method for raising our consciousness is the chanting of the holy names so there are different methods in different ages that are recommended so in the earlier age sitting in meditation in deep into meditation it was doing yajnas fire sacrifices it was doing temple worship deity worship in the temple chanting of the names of the lord so the other methods are also useful but the most potent method in this time is chanting so there are many different mantras which can be chanted and similarly in the kalisa the upanishad called the kalisantra upanishad it specifically talks about how to navigate the kalyuga and there the hare krishna mahamantra is recommended hare krishna hare krishna krishna krishna hare hare hare ram hare ram ram ram hare hare this 16 letter mantra is the means to overcome the ocean of kali so we chant this holiness and by chanting we connect with god so it is a very accessible way of spiritualizing our consciousness wherever we are and d is diet we spiritualize our food we take pure food and in a mood of devotion we offer it to god and then take the food as his mercy so by all basically the idea is whatever practical activities are there in our life we spiritualize them gradually so there are specific activities spiritual specific activities which we adopt for our spiritual growth and whatever routine activities we are doing we spiritualize them so food is something which we are going to eat anyway so like association books chanting is something which we add to our life we of course have some association by spiritualized association the whole process of bhakti is not the process of rejection with the process of connection of redirection of our connection so whatever we were doing in the normal course of our life we read something we meet with people we speak some things we eat something so all those things we just channel them spiritually and that way we can move forward in our spiritual journey