Love directed towards God is devotion, or Bhakti. This super highway of devotion to God has many lanes, nine of them from the Bhagwatam being the most popular ones. These nine forms of devotion are called Nav Vidha Bhakti. The sixth lane on this highway of devotion is Vandanam.
Vandanam literally means “Salutations” but it has various implications. It means praising the Lord, offering our gratitude by way of prayer, and it indicates acceptance and appreciation of everything as His grace.
Praising the Lord and dwelling upon and admiring His various forms is known as “stuti”. But why praise Him? Does God need our praise? God certainly does not need us to glorify Him. He is beyond all forms and attributes, and His glory is self-evident, reflected everywhere in all creation. Can we limit Swami to only the 108 names that we recite? The answer is obviously No.
Yet, if we cannot so limit Swami, why do we have the Namavali? It is not for Swami, it is for us, to help us in our Sadhana. When we are reciting the names with understanding (which we should always do), it helps us to focus our minds. Even if for some time our thoughts drift away, the names bring them back. At least for that time we are connected to God, we are calm and peaceful. With constant practice our concentration increases and this helps us in all spheres of our life, in our family life, at our jobs, in our studies, essentially everywhere and at all times.
Vandanam also indicates acceptance of everyone and everything that comes our way as having been sent by Him. We are blessed with so much grace: our family, friends, society, a beautiful nature to sustain us and this temple of God, our very own body with which we enjoy this world.
When we are faced with any difficulties in life we feel sad, depressed, and start to complain “Why me? Why me?” But we often take things for granted and forget to count our blessings. The highly revered Sadhu Vaswani said beautifully “I always cried that I had no shoes until I met the man who had no feet!”
We must have firm faith in God and believe that whatever happens there is a reason behind it. Swami says: “Rejoice in all that happens for in every incident and accident of life, there is a meaning of My Mercy.”
Yes, even in the difficult situations in life, God is ever merciful. His ways are mysterious. When Jesus was put through all that terrible torture, he did not blame anyone for his misery. He saw the Lord’s hand in everything that happened and took it all for his higher good. He said “You people cannot do anything to me unless HE sanctions the power to you.” Because of this attitude Jesus was still able to love the people who harmed him.
He felt they were only instrumental in handing to him his destiny. What came was not from them, only through them. It was from God, His Grace, and so how could he not accept it lovingly? He had laid down his all at His Feet.
Such was the strength of his devotion. Such is the beauty of Vandanam. We should all try to follow this attitude.
When dark clouds gather and it gets dark, we know the rains are to follow. As we are passing through this time, there are two ways we can bear it. We can either groan, cry and make ourselves, as well as others around us, miserable, or we can sing through it, accepting it as the Lord’s will, His Prasad, and learning our lessons during these cloudy days.
Guru Arjan Dev, one of the ten gurus of Sikhism, went through a lot of difficulties and still thanked his Guru: “Tera bhana meetha laage, Nanak naam padarath maaange”.
Often we may not see the good in a situation at the time when we are going through it, but later we realise that it was for our own good. A family of Sai devotees from Delhi went to visit Him. After a week’s stay when they were about to leave, He advised them not to go that day. However, the train reservations in India were difficult to get and the children had to appear for exams. They were not sure when they would get the booking again, and if they could not get the booking children would not make it in time for exams.
They were concerned but decided that since Swami had said not to go, they should not. The next day they discovered the train they were supposed to take derailed in an accident and most of the people on it lost their lives.
God may not respond to our prayers the way we want, but He gives us what is best for us. The following prayer sums it up well. This is how it goes:
I asked for strength, God gave me difficulties to overcome.
I asked for wisdom, God gave me problems to solve.
I asked for prosperity, God gave me brain and brawn to work.
I asked for courage, God gave me dangers to overcome.
I asked for love, God gave me troubled people to help.
I asked for favors, God gave me opportunities.
I received nothing – nothing that I wanted.
I received everything – everything that I needed.
Silently, unknowingly, all my prayers were answered.
Accepting everything as His Prasad, we must offer our gratitude, our salutations, to God in our prayers.
Most of us generally associate prayer with asking God for something. The Hindi word for prayer is “Prarthna” which literally means that. But as explained by Swami’s well-known devotee and author of many books on Swami, Sri N. Kasthuri: “Prayer is an expression of our gratitude to God for all that He has blessed us with.” So most of our daily prayers should be prayers of gratitude.
It may be a prayer like “Twameva mata cha pita…” from Hinduism; a prayer like “Tum Thakur tum pai ardaas…” from Sikhism; or a prayer like “Our Father who art in Heaven hallowed by Thy name, Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done...” from Christianity. All such prayers are just expressions of our gratitude and faith.
On the practical side, such prayers help us to connect to the higher power, the all-powerful, all-pervading Lord. And when we connect to the Supreme Power we derive positive energy, we gain courage and confidence, and we rise above our limitations. Above all, we overcome qualities like pride, arrogance and egoism which cause all the negativity within us and make us miserable, agitated, and unhappy in life.
Accepting all as His grace, praying to Him in gratitude, we offer our love and reverence as salutations to God. In so doing, we bow down to God.
When reciting the Namavali at the end of each name we say “Namah”, for example “Om Bhagawan Sri Sathya Sai Babaya Namah”. We must say it keeping in mind the meaning of the word as explained by Swami himself. He says, “Namah” means na-mama, that is, not mine, but thine. Same as in Christianity where it is said “Thy will be done” indicating surrender.
In many temples in India, especially in the south, the priests bow down by falling absolutely flat on the ground. This is known as Saashtanga Namaskaar. Sa-Ashta-Anga, that is, prostrating eight limbs: the knees, feet, palm, chest, intelligence (dhi), forehead, speech (the word), and sight (eyes directed on the lotus feet of the Lord). Thus, it indicates total surrender at the feet of the Lord, body, mind and intellect, all.
Even in the Gurudwara when we bow down to touch the ground with our forehead, we offer to God all our actions performed with our body, mind and intellect. The forehead symbolises our intellectual faculties.
In cramped Hong Kong we may not always be able to fall flat to bow, so we offer our namaskar with folded hands. When we fold our hands together, what does it signify? Swami Himself explains, “When you fold your hands and bring them together, feel that you are offering at the feet all the actions of five karmendriyas and gyanendriyas indicated by the ten fingers.” Again, this indicates total surrender.
The joint hands should also remind us of our true nature. How? The right palm indicates the Supreme, all-pervading consciousness that we call God – “Tat” or “That” from the Upanishads. The left palm indicates “Twam” – I, the limited Jeevatma. It reminds us that the ultimate goal of all spiritual practices is the merging of the two – jeevatma and parmatma. “Tat Twam Asi” – That Thou Art, or I and He are one.
How do we put this into practice? In the 10th chapter of the Bhagawad Gita, Lord Krishna says, “Aham Atma Gudakesha”. Baba explains this in the following words: “I am the inner Atma in the Lotus heart of each and every Being. So if you believe and direct your life on the basis of the belief that the inner atma in every being is ‘My Paramatma’, that is enough dhyana for you. Stick to it steadily, practice that belief, and apply it in your deeds, words and thoughts. Then the experience of Oneness, of your being ME and I being YOU, can be achieved.” (Geeta Vahini, pg 172-173).
Swami also says: “Andari Lonoo, Sai Uunaaru”, or “In all beings, there is Sai”.
At the Bal Vikas conference in Prashanti Nilayam in 2001, Swami declared that He was not going to allow padnamaskaar to anyone, anymore. WHY? He explained that He wanted His devotees to see Him in one and all. He said that the namaskaar we want to offer Him, we should offer to our parents, elders, gurus, etc. He said: “See me in your heart and in the heart of everyone you meet.” That is the ultimate goal of all spiritual practices, to see and serve the Lord in all His creation.
While going through these 9 forms of devotion, we must remember that they are not only for practising in the temple, Sai Centre, or any place of worship. These loving approaches to God can and should be practised in our daily lives while dealing with the many situations and people we come across. Only then will we truly succeed and progress.
Holding onto Him in love, we must use all our faculties wisely for serving others while performing our dharma, our daily duties. Seeing and loving Him in one and all is true devotion. We must live our life as Swami says: “With hands in society and heads in forests.” Let that be our consistent prayer, a true Vandanam.
JAI SAI RAM