5.1 Lift me from material infatuation to spiritual dedication

ki bhāve bujhāle tārā 

bujhe sei rasa

How will they come to understand,

The taste of your love so deep, so grand?

My dear Lord, Srila Prabhupada highlights the vast gulf between the materially infatuated and the spiritually dedicated. Those who are constantly seeking, scheming, and dreaming of sensual pleasures often have no inner space left to perceive spiritual joy.

O Lord of all joys, sensual pleasures are gross in both form and feel—loud in their visibility, insistent in their contact between senses and sense objects. They parade before us, demanding attention. Yet where the world sees luxury, the saint sees loss.

In stark contrast, spiritual pleasures are subtle and invisible to the materially conditioned eye. During his tumultuous journey to America, while still recovering from two heart attacks, Srila Prabhupada was nourished by reading your pastimes. The tender ways you love your devotees, and the countless ways they love you, are nearly impossible to grasp without saintly association.

O merciful Lord, through the words and lives of saints such as Srila Prabhupada, the inaccessible tastes of devotion become not just accessible but irresistible. Bless me, O Lord, to taste that devotion myself, and let its sweetness flow through me to awaken others.