Ananda Vrndavana devi dasi
Dear Guru Maharaja,
Please accept my humble obeisances. All Glories to Your Divine Grace. All Glories to HDG Srila Prabhupada.
Thank you for sharing Your love for Krsna consciousness with us through Your classes and association. Thank you for being there as a friend and guide, every time we reach out to You, and staying so transparent and true to Yourself and the process.
In Harinama-cintamani, Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakura mentions that a devotee can feel the spiritual strength which is bound within the heart of another devotee. Through hearing from a sadhu, one gets an experience of this spiritual strength and presence. This spiritual presence is not an exhibition of some material talent or information. It is devotion, reverence and all these other wordly divine qualities embodied simply and humbly in the persona of the sadhu while He vibrates krsna-katha. And many times, through this last year, I felt I took shelter of this spiritual energy when I heard Your classes. I have not been in Your physical presence for more than a year, but associating with You through hearing has been very helpful in dealing with the many challenges that came our way this last year.
Srila Raghunatha dasa Gosvami in “Manah-siksa” states the first and foremost request to his own mind “O dear brother! O mind! Having given up all pride, please develop unprecedented and excessive attachment to Sri Guru.” The Sanskrit is “ratim apurvam atitaram” or “unprecedented excessive attachment”. So Raghunatha dasa Gosvami is not talking about some passive lukewarm gratitude, but an intense and excessive attachment to one’s Spiritual Master. Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakura in his commentary states that one must cultivate attachment to one’s Guru not only as a spiritual guide but also as a close and well-wishing friend. Someone you love with all your heart and for whom you can turn your whole life upside down. This is the first and the most important step that opens the doors to the spiritual dimension. When I look around in this material world, there are plenty of examples of unprecedented excessive attachments that are not so wholesome or long lasting. They are merely programs for gratification on a very low sensory level. Different modes of addictions and identifications that are so fleeting and destructive.
But Guru Maharaja, having You in my life gives me an example of what it is to really love, to develop and cultivate this unprecedented excessive attachment on the soul level to the right and fitting person. We are all so thirsty to experience real relationships but we have no idea how. I look to You and sense what sublime love is. Your steadfastness to the mission of Srila Prabhupada over several decades, while enduring all varieties of challenges and despair, is to me this verse of Srila Raghunatha dasa Gosvami in action. You embody this kind of sublime attachment. If not for Your presence in our lives, we would only read and speculate about such a dimension of relationships.
When I examine my own heart, I find myself dry and cold. I am strongly entrenched in identifying with my mind and what it projects. I am far far away from even comprehending the meaning of spiritual life, but I am very grateful for Your instructions and example, that break down the process of bhakti for us at our level.
Although I can “see” the whole landscape of bhakti (thanks to the theoretical understanding we acquire from an abundance of guidebooks and courses on bhakti), I am realising I need to pay attention to where my feet are right now. By looking down at my feet I get a sense of that, of the here and now, and then it is a matter of knowing where to put my next step. Your instructions over the years, about attentive sadhana, maintaining a strong mood of service with family members and devotees, having a spiritual conception of myself etc give me that focus and footing in my practical day to day life. My thoughts may be in the sky, but at ground level, my feet are stuck and I need to navigate the floor under me. Her Grace Krsna Lila Mataji’s guidance and friendship over the years has been one of Your best gifts to me! She helped me connect with my heart and body without which it would have been impossible for me to practice Krsna consciousness. And I am very grateful for the association of all the devotees and Vaisnavas in my life. I feel very very fortunate and grateful to be a confidante to many amazing vaisnavas – when they reveal their hearts to me, their Krsna consciousness seeps into my heart as well. That is my only hope to stay personal and enthusiastic in this process of bhakti.
I pray that I can cultivate this kind of attachment as enunciated by Srila Raghunatha dasa Gosvami to Your lotus feet and experience the fullness of my relationship with You.
Happy Vyasa-puja.
Your eternal servant,
Ananda Vrndavana devi dasi