When germs infect us and we start feeling sick, we take treatment for driving out the germs. However, healing requires not just the driving out of germs but also the boosting of the body’s immunity; otherwise, the germs will infect us again, often sooner rather than later.

The same principle applies to our spiritual healing too. Gita wisdom explains that we are presently spiritually sick, being infected by the germs of self-centered desires. These germs misdirect our natural quest for happiness from the spiritual level – where we can delight in loving and serving Krishna – to the material level, where we seek pleasure in possessing and controlling temporary worldly things.

When these attachments start impelling us to sinful actions with their many complications, we become concerned and strive to free ourselves from them. Pertinently, the Bhagavad-gita (07.28) indicates that, to be situated in determined devotional service – our spiritually healthy state – we need to be free from sin.

While various yogas can act as antibiotics against worldly desires, bhakti-yoga alone acts as both an antibiotic and an immunity booster. It activates our heart’s natural longing to love Krishna and provides us multifarious practical ways for expressing and strengthening our budding attraction to him. As our heart and life becomes filled with Krishna, the germs of self-centered desires are automatically driven out. Thus, bhakti-yoga acts as an antibiotic.

More importantly, as our attraction to Krishna increases, loving and serving him becomes increasingly fulfilling. When our need for happiness is thus spiritually fulfilled, we no longer feel the need for spiritually-injurious worldly indulgences – thus, bhakti’s spiritual taste boosts our immunity against germs.

Given this paramount potency of bhakti, the Gita (18.66) concludes by urging us to surrender single-mindedly to Krishna, even if we may not yet free from sin.

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