Flowers - a symbol of love - are offered in puja. The Divine has come to you in love through so many forms: mother, father, wife, husband, children and friends. The same love comes to you in the form of the Master to elevate you to the level of divine love, which is also your own nature.Recognizing this flowering of love, we offer flowers.Fruits are offered, because the Divine offers you fruits in due season. You offer grain, because nature provides you food. Candle light and camphor light are offered; in the same way as the sun and the moon revolve around you.Incense is offered for fragrance.All the five senses are used in puja, and it is performed with deep feeling.Puja is honor and gratefulness, a mixture of imitation, honor, playfulness and love.Usually when you love something, you want to possess it. And in the process of possessing, you make the beautiful thing ugly. Puja is contrary to that: it means honor and worship, offering one’s self. Worship is just the opposite of wanting to possess.When you are in worship, you naturally want to offer something, you honor it.Puja - honoring - is a sign of divine love. You appreciate, you adore and you recognize beauty. Puja awakens bhakti, honoring leads to devotion.Devotion brings rest; surrender happens. Surrender to the Divine brings total rest from all wants.The mind always looks for charms, miracles, events, excitements. Yet once it goes there, the charm ceases to exist.‘Charm’ is a continuous mirage; it is always somewhere else. Charm is always an outside influence; it never lasts long. Devotion is an inner flowering. When the flame of devotion is lit, the craving mind melts away like wax. As the mind melts, the flame of devotion becomes more alive and intense.In devotion, all your feverishness will be transformed into love. Negativity pulls you down, while positive qualities bring pride and arrogance in you. Your whole life becomes a big weight.A Master is one who lifts burdens that you yourself cannot carry away from you - and kindles in you devotional love. Offer everything to the Master: your anger, your frustration, all your bad feelings and good feelings.When you offer it all, you become free. Devotion is your nature. When you rest in your own nature, there is no conflict.
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