How to Purify Your Devotion in Bhakti Yoga

Can Bhakti Be Impure? Understanding Devotion and Its Divine Nature

Can something as sacred as devotion become impure? Can Bhakti be impure, and how is it purified?

Now, if you’ve been following this podcast, a natural question will be, “Wait! How is it possible for Bhakti to be impure?” Good question! Factually, Bhakti cannot be impure. It’s a spiritual energy that is fully vested with the power of the Supreme Absolute, and its essence is pure love. Therefore, there’s only one type of Bhakti proper – it’s an overwhelming, ecstatic love as a state of eternal being.

To begin to answer our question, though, we need to make a couple of distinctions. First, there is Bhakti as a tattva, or category of reality.

Second, there is Bhakti as practiced by a conditioned soul.

As we’ve heard, Bhakti belongs to the internal potency of Bhagavan. It is fully spiritual, or nirguna, which means it’s beyond the three modes of material nature: goodness, passion, and ignorance. Therefore, Bhakti itself is pure.

However, in the beginning, we most often engage with Bhakti in a tainted way. Before we’re completely pure in heart, we’re influenced by the gunas, or modes of material nature. Those gunas affect our motivation, expectation, steadiness, and orientation. Therefore, the expression of Bhakti can be covered, diluted, or mixed. The impurity lies in our inner intent, not in the devotional act itself. When Bhakti is approached through the lens of material identity or self-centered goals, it becomes covered by external influences. So while Bhakti itself is a pristine spiritual energy, our approach to it can be shaped by our desires and intentions, which in turn color our devotional practice.

Bhakti remains pure, but when practiced by a heart influenced by the gunas, it appears mixed, delayed, or covered in its expression. In this way, the gunas influence the practitioner, not Bhakti—but until we’re free of guna-based desire, Bhakti does not fully reveal her supreme nature as prema.

Considering these points, we can distinguish between:

• shuddha bhakti, or pure devotion, and
• mishra bhakti, or devotion mixed with other motivations

The Three Modes of Nature and Their Influence on Bhakti Practice

Let’s do a very quick review of the three modes of material nature, which are the unseen forces that powerfully influence us, so that we can see how our involvement with the gunas can impact our practice of Bhakti.

The three modes are:

• Sattva: Illumination/goodness
  Sattva gives us clarity, harmony, mindfulness, and virtuous behavior, making us clear-headed, calm, and service-oriented.
• Rajas: Passion/confusion
  Rajas impels passion and brings on confusion, making us restless, overly ambitious, and engaged in constant – oftentimes, unnecessary – activity.
• Tamas: Darkness/inertia
  Tamas influences us with darkness, dullness, inertia, and confusion, and disposes us to apathy, depression, or destructive habits.

When we are dominated by Rajas or Tamas, we tend to practice Bhakti for material gain, relief, protection, or power. And we practice impatiently, restlessly, or lethargically, with a transactional mindset: “Bhakti will give me _____.” We fill in that blank with any number of personal desires. Though Bhakti isn’t karmic, karma-based desire has entered our intention and affects our practice.

When Sattva predominates in us, we seek peace, detachment, clarity, and liberation. We practice Bhakti with reverence and discipline, yet we covet our own freedom or transcendence. This results in devotion covered by the aspiration for liberation. Crucially, even this is a covering, because the desire for liberation still places the self at the center rather than Bhagavan. The desire for liberation is subtle, refined, but still selfish. It was striking when I first heard that desiring liberation was a selfish, material desire. But as I thought about it, I realized the truth of the statement. The desire for liberation needs to be retired!

In other words, when we engage in Bhakti with ANY personal desire, then we’re not engaged in pristine, pure Bhakti. Luckily for us, this Bhakti still purifies the heart and welcomes Bhagavan’s grace; however, its full nature has not yet revealed itself to us. When Bhakti is mixed, it doesn’t manifest its full nature, and it’ll take a long time to achieve our goal. Put another way, with mixed Bhakti, the confidential gem of divine love remains distant from us.

So, we don’t want to practice Bhakti to achieve material desires or to be free from those desires. Wanting to fulfill material desires or to be liberated from them both stem from selfish motivations. Do you see the very subtle nature of desire here? It’s important to notice. If we seek anything for ourselves, then we remain the center of our thinking.

How Bhakti Purifies the Heart Beyond the Modes of Nature

So what are we to do? The modes of nature influence us always and in all ways!

We can’t manipulate or conquer the gunas directly. The secret lies in reorienting our heart toward the Sweet Absolute through Bhakti itself.

The gunas belong to material nature; Bhakti belongs to the spiritual nature. Our task isn’t to become free of the gunas first and then engage in Bhakti, but we engage in Bhakti while conditioned, and Bhakti’s intrinsic power gradually displaces material desire.

What does this mean in practical terms? First, we should acknowledge the influence of sattva, rajas, and tamas in our intentions and temperament. We are to renounce guṇa-driven goals like material gain, pleasure, liberation, or self-centered peace. We continue Bhakti with exclusive intent to please Bhagavan, even if that intent is initially imperfect. As we practice Bhakti without ulterior motive, it purifies our heart, and material energy naturally loses its governing power. Bhakti removes the gunas not by opposition, but by replacement. When loving service to the Sweet Absolute becomes our central motive, the material energy no longer defines our orientation.

At that point, Bhakti reveals her own pure nature, culminating in bhava. Bhava is when practiced devotion ripens into felt devotion, and love begins to reveal itself. And further maturing into prema, or pure sacred love. In summary, the conditioned soul transcends the modes not by first escaping them, but by practicing exclusive Bhakti, through which Bhakti herself gradually frees the heart from guna-based motivation.

Okay, so now, we’ve clarified what mixed devotion is; what exactly is the definition of pure Bhakti?

The Definition of Pure Bhakti According to Rupa Goswami

The gold standard of Bhakti is described by the Bhakti teacher and sixteenth-century saint Rupa Goswami, who gives a precise definition.

He says, “The highest form of Bhakti is that which exclusively pleases Bhagavan Krishna and is devoid of any desire apart from his service. It’s devoid of all material desires. It’s not covered by the idea that righteous, virtuous worldly duties can surpass Bhakti or are required to support Bhakti. Pure Bhakti is untainted by the knowledge that searches for the nonpersonal aspect of the Absolute. And it’s free of the meditational attempt to become one with the Supreme.”

According to this definition, Bhakti is free of selfish desires or ulterior motives and is undertaken as a perpetual, ardent endeavor, without diversion to anything else. Our loving responsiveness toward the Supreme Person will be friendly, unselfish, unadulterated, unmotivated, and uninterrupted.

I will be free of the notion that “I am God,” or that pious works can deliver a spiritual attainment. I know that neither action-yoga, knowledge-yoga, or meditation-yoga are means to attain Bhakti.

Bhakti is independent and all-powerful, encompassing all other paths. Other paths encourage us to advance through pious acts and work; to become liberated through exhaustive study of scripture using reason and logic; or through contemplation and meditation. Because Bhaktas act for the Supreme, they’re engaged in action-yoga or pious, virtuous works in the world. Since the Bhakti philosophy is rooted in Vedanta and offers transcendental knowledge, Bhaktas engage in knowledge yoga, using the mind and intelligence for higher pursuits. And because Bhakti brings one to samadhi, or full absorption in the Supreme, they’re engaged in meditation-yoga or the perfection of mindfulness and meditation.

Bhakti includes the strengths of all other paths and further offers us an intimate, personal relationship with our Divine Friend that is emotionally and theologically robust. It’s so powerful that it conquers the heart of the Unconquerable, and once conquered, the Infinite brings us into his company to share his world of love.

Bhakti offers the most comprehensive understanding of what divine love is and the means to achieve it. Additionally, Bhakti exalts divine love to the highest position, saying that love for Bhagavan is higher than Bhagavan!

Understanding these points, we ought to approach Bhakti and its extraordinary goal of divine love with single-mindedness and single-heartedness.

Other yogas award freedom from material entanglement, which ends suffering and the cycle of birth and death, and grants peace. And Bhakti offers us peace and gives us love. When our culture of Bhakti becomes continuous and fully mature, affection condenses into divine love, and we are transported, even before death, to our homeland where the Sweet Absolute resides.

How Bhakti Matures: From Practice to Prema

To wrap up our conversation today, we need another piece of insight to complete an answer to the question I posed at the beginning: What makes bhakti impure, and how is it purified?

I’ve explained what impure and pure bhakti is. So, now, how do we know when our Bhakti practice is actually becoming purified – not just philosophically, but in real life? How does purity show up in lived experience?

Our evidence is found in the maturation of bhakti itself. We recognize purification by how Bhakti ripens. Bhakti is one reality, but when practiced without ulterior motives, it naturally matures and reveals its deeper nature by transforming us.

As Bhakti is cultivated, it matures, sweetens, and thickens in purity and intensity of love. Bhakti that is maturing is sometimes compared to the ripening of a piece of fruit. For instance, a green mango is a mango that will, in time, become ripe, juicy, and tasty. It’s not one type of fruit in its green stage that will ripen into a different fruit. It is the same mango, simply not yet sweet. Given the proper environment and conditions, a green mango will become a luscious, relishable, ripe mango.

In the same way, bhakti practiced now, even imperfectly, will ripen into full sweetness when sustained with sincerity and exclusive intent. A Bhakti practitioner just stepping onto the path is like an unripe mango. Through the natural ripening process of spiritual culture, Bhakti progresses in response to the practitioner’s approach. By engaging in sadhana, or a culture, we apprentice, or learn the way of transcendence, as we live our daily lives right now. We refine and hone skills that will remain with us eternally because they’re actions that are inherently part of our nature as an atma. Thus, the analogy of the unripe mango is quite appropriate. An unripe mango is a mango that needs a little time.

The practice of Bhakti is divided into three stages: beginning, intermediate, and advanced.

These stages of Bhakti are:

• Sadhana: Practice
• Bhava: Feeling expression
• Prema: Pure love of the Sweet Absolute

At first, devotion is practiced as a sadhana, a discipline – sometimes out of duty, effort, or obligation. As the heart is purified, that same practice becomes attractive. What once felt like medicine becomes nourishment. As we become ready to move into the second stage, we begin to feel a genuine taste for hearing, chanting, and remembering Bhagavan.

This next stage is called bhava, which is the first awakening of pure love. Bhava is not produced by practice alone, but arises when Bhakti chooses to reveal herself in a purified heart. Devotion is no longer driven by fear, obligation, or desire for results, but flows spontaneously from a softened, purified heart. In other words, Bhava is the initial manifestation of Bhakti’s intrinsic emotional potency, a dawning state of loving attachment in which devotion becomes natural, steady, and heartfelt.

When Bhakti is allowed to mature without deviation, it culminates in prema, pure divine love—where we relish the unmatched excellence of divine love and swim effortlessly, continually, in an ocean of ecstasy, residing in a festival of unbounded joy.

This ripening is the true sign that our Bhakti practice has become purified.

Thanks for joining me today. I hope this episode gives you a deeper understanding of the inner dynamics of Bhakti.

In the next episode, we’ll explore what surrender means in Bhakti.

Until then, may your heart be steady, your motives clear, and your devotion ever-deepening.

Svasty astu visvasya: May there be good fortune throughout the universe and for you.