Because I’ve been wallowing in negativity and self-pity for a while now, I thought I’d use my excessive emotions to try to force myself into a more positive place. That’s why today I want to talk about bhakti yoga, the way to God through love. It seems to be right up my alley at the moment since, as Huston Smith puts it, “To the bhakti, . . . feelings are more real than thoughts. . . .”
We’ve already talked about the other yogas, or paths to God: jnana (the way to God through knowledge), karma (the way to God through work), and raja (the way to God through meditation). Bhakti yoga is the most popular path, and one that has many similarities to other religious faiths, especially Christianity. It simply suggests that we should direct all the love in our hearts toward God, to adore God with everything we have.
Bhakti yoga tells us to love God and God alone. That’s not to say that we can’t love other people. We just do so in relation to our love for God. We love other people because they, like us and everything around us, are reflections of the one great divine. Okay, I can get on board with that.
The trick, however, is that we’re supposed to love God just because it’s God—not for any other ulterior motive—not because we’re hoping for some kind of benefit or redemption or even because we wish to be loved in return. Bhakti yoga ways we must love God for the sake of love alone. That part might be a little bit tough, at least for me. I’m not so good at doing anything without wanting something in return. Okay, okay. I know. I’m a selfish, horrible person. Let’s move on.
There are a few different ways to approach bhakti yoga. One is called japam, which just means repeating God’s name over and over. The idea behind this idea is that saying God’s name all the time makes us associate even mundane activities, such as cooking spaghetti and doing the laundry, more closely with our love for God. Hindus tell us to “Keep the name of the Lord spinning in the midst of all your activities.” That seems easy enough. But I’m pretty glad I work at home. I imagine I might get some weird looks if I were still working in a cubicle and kept muttering to myself all day.
Another feature of bhakti yoga is referred to as “ringing the changes on love.” It describes the fact that we love different people in our lives in different ways—in a supportive way with our friends, in a sexual way with our romantic partners, in a protective way with children. Ringing the changes on love encourages us to see all these forms of love as ways to strengthen our “real” love—for God. All types of love are simply expressions of a deeper love for God.
The other method of practicing bhakti yoga is to focus our attention on one particular form of God—our own chosen ideal, our “adopted form of the divine,” or ishta. Once we choose our own ideal form of the divine, we develop an attachment to that form that should last a lifetime.
Because Hinduism says that God comes in too many forms to be counted, there is no one “right” form that we all have to worship. We get to choose whichever form we like, whatever works best for us. Not to beat a dead horse here, but for me, you just can’t do better than good old Ganesha. Yeah. I think I could handle that. Just me and the elephant-headed god. Sounds good. I think I’m even feeling a little more cheerful.
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