Replacing 'Me' with God: The Bhakti Path

So, but the good news is that the not picking up of new conditioning takes care of the older. So in the Jnana path, no new conditioning is picked up at all. In the Bhakti path, all old conditioning is replaced by God. God is merciful. He is kind. He is powerful. He loves me. I love Him. You see, everything where the centrality is about God. You see, both lead to the same point. So conditioning is trouble when it is 'me'. I remember when Swamiji—I don't know, he keeps coming to my memory from point to point—that she had sent here. So this Swamiji was here and he struggled, you know. He was like, first he tried various things to escape what was being said. So then one day he just came and said, 'I just can't do this, you know. I feel something with you, I feel you are very genuine and all of that, but I can't do this what you're saying.' And I don't know what he said, some of you were here, and I remember just telling him, 'Okay, now if to remove yourself from the picture seems impossible, then you replace yourself with God in the picture.' You see, that is easier for you. Is that easier? Can you do that? But of course, I didn't make much in that case.

But so, when to just fall into empty seems very difficult, then at least we can replace the 'me' with God in our narratives. But many times our attempt to replace 'me' with God is in this way: that 'I had Darshan of God. I felt this when I said Krishna.' So then that is not replacing. Then God is in the way of our framing; then you are the central and God is secondary because it's about what you felt, you saw, you thought, you concluded. You see, it has to be: God is here. I am nothing, or He is everything. I am the tiniest grain of sand, authentically. Not just lip service—everybody can do that—but authentically. And that then deepens us. It makes us fall into the heart again. And the mind is not then interested in playing much. As long as the 'me' is not getting activated more and more, you see, then what happens is that the heart itself gives us ways to praise the Lord. The heart itself loves to pray. It loves to praise God. It loves to point us to the truth.