A Little More Water, Please

Some months ago, during a serious drought, I adjusted the small automatic watering system in our backyard, lowering the volume and the frequency. Within two and a half months the garden had quietly given up — leaves dry, growth stalled, the figs paused mid-effort.

Two weeks ago I increased the daily water by five percent. Just five. The garden has begun to perk up: green tips returning, the figs filling out again, even a rose or two emerging from the brown.

The arithmetic of practice

It is hard not to see in this a small parable for spiritual life. A five-percent increase in one's daily bhakti practice — a slightly longer round of chanting, one more chapter heard, a few more minutes given to service — is often enough to revive a wilting taste for it. The change need not be dramatic to be real.

The bhakti scriptures advise us, accordingly, to keep a careful eye on our daily intake of devotional water. Not because the soul is fragile, but because attention is. Adapted from a reflection by Vaisesika Dasa.