To The Highest

Retrospective introduction, written on October 31st, 2024:

Leading up to writing this prayer or "letter to God", I was going through a period in which a certain fear kept surfacing in my mind. The fear was essentially of, in one way or another, missing the Highest, of accidentally directing my devotion to something other than God or to a partial manifestation in which the fullness of God was somehow missing. This fear had a serious impact on my spiritual practice and relationship with God, peaking at one point where I felt fear even in just sitting in front of my altar. Later in this period, I found certain intellectual arguments for this fear being unwarranted which satisfied my intellect. At the time, I thought these arguments would cause this fear to cease, but there was still this thin layer of fear deep in my heart that prevented me from having an unrestricted relationship with God.

This led to the day when I wrote the below post. In a time when I was thinking the fear had finally subsided, I suddenly noticed the fear subtly still present in my heart. This was an emotional moment because while I had the fear, I also simultaneously knew this very fear was keeping me away from my beloved, from God, who I long for most. In this moment, something switched in my heart, which made me feel I simply cannot be responsible for resolving this fear, or for using my human intellect to determine the "perfect" path or orientation towards God. If God is, She must guide my longing for Her such that it truly leads to Her. This prayer vocalizes that feeling I had. The most fascinating thing is that after vocalizing this prayer, it was as if the fear deep in my heart just melted. I sat before my altar afterward, and I was able to commune with God in an open and unrestricted way that I unknowingly hadn't been allowing myself to in months. Though the fear had felt so subtle, in that moment I saw how heavy it really was, and how light my shoulders felt having surrendered this fear to God. And in surrendering that fear, since writing this letter, I have felt my bhakti grow deeper, my karma yoga grow more intentional, and my jnana yoga become more integrated and manifest.

My hope in sharing this writing is that other spiritual aspirants who may share similar fears might find something they can relate to, and maybe find a movement by which all remnants of this fear, in the deepest recesses of the heart, can melt away to allow for a unrestricted relationship with God. May all this be an offering at the feet of Maa. Jai Mata Di!

To the Highest

My mind thrashes about in fear of missing the highest. Of my deepest intentions being misunderstood, or worse, of them not even being genuine, of them simply being an expression of an inner desire for fame, praise, grandiosity, self-righteousness. I am a sinner. I feel deeply aware of this. Left to my own devices, again and again I return to sin. Again and again I am presented choices between the Divine and mammon, and again and again, I choose the world and its pleasures. Yet, in this moment, I am certain that something in me, at the deepest of deepest levels of my heart is a genuine cry for the divine, for the highest, for God. Covering this deep longing are desires for greatness, for fame, for praise. But whenever I inspect these desires even a bit deeply for just a moment, their grounds crumble demonstrating their weakness. But as soon as I break through the illusion of one of these desires, another creeps in just as overwhelming as the last. But the one longing which never crumbles is that subtle longing for God I feel that keeps getting lost and covered in the dense jungle of these other desires, but which nonetheless always remains.

I have complete faith that this internal longing must be genuine. It is there somewhere in me. I do truly long for God. In this faith, I can view my fears. My spiritual practice takes its expression in prayer to the Divine Mother, to Durga. In addition to this, I engage in philosophy, in particular a very perennialist approach which seeks to find the relation to the Divine of all of humanity's seeking of it. In my engagement, I have learned about non-dualism, Kashmir Shaivism, Sri Ramakrishna's Vijnana Vedanta, Sri Aurobindo's Integral Yoga, Plato's Form of the Good, Gaudiya Vaishnavism's achintya bheda-abheda, the Incarnate Son of God Jesus Christ, Orthodox Christianity, Theosophy, Gnosticism, and more. Though learning about all these has been in many ways fulfilling and insightful, it has also been destabilizing, in great part because in each tradition or perspective I have found at least one thing which has not fully satisfied me. In my spiritual life, this feeling manifests as fear. When I pray to the Divine Mother, it is an expression of my longing for God, the highest. I truly do not seek to pray to a great spirit or a deva or to commit any other kind of idolatry, though I greatly respect and admire such manifestations of the Divine. I seek to direct my heart to God, the one God, the highest, eternal, and unchanging, to sarvamangal mangalyai, the goodness in all things good. My fear then is of this longing somehow being misdirected. The Christians will tell me that it is Jesus Christ alone, the Son of God, through whom I may reach who I long for. They will tell me that in worshipping the Mother, I am worshipping at best a benevolent spirit, and at worst a demon, but surely not the highest, not the Living God. As I engage in non-dual practices, searching for God within, the Vaishnavas will warn me, calling me a maya-vadin, that at best, I am worshipping a part, an emanation of the Divine, and in doing so am missing the wholeness of God, but in the worst case I am engaging simply in the glorification of the ego. Altogether, these things cause me fear, confusion, and instability.

But I return to my faith. I swear deep down I long for God, not a part, not on a condition, not anything less but the highest. And here I say as Sri Aurobindo does, God, if Thou art, Thou knowest my heart. God, you know it is you I long for. In expressing my longing for you my heart cries out Ma! Ma! Ma! But if this is misdirected then I know you will correct me. If the name of Durga Maa is somehow pointing in a direction which doesn't lead to you, then know God that when I use that name, I am not referring to that direction but to you. In my ignorance I use the language and expression available to me. And if, as my heart tells me now, in calling out to Maa I am indeed in the fullest sense calling out to you, then I know you will hear me and accept me in your arms as my Mother. So today, I want to put an end to these fears. God, I surrender these fears to you. I cannot be responsible for them, for you are my God and I know I can leave this much to you. I long for you. Right now, I see you as my Mother and I call out to you as Ma. If I do so at all in error, it is you who will correct me and bring me on the path which leads to you. In all cases, because of who you are, my calls to you cannot go unheard. I am certain of this. May my life be an offering to You, and may my mind and body be a vessel purely for Your will. Jai Mata Di, Jai Mata Di, Jai Mata Di!