How to Focus on God

Worship that lacks concentration is of no meaning…

Right from childhood, we are taught that we must worship God. And we worship God through different mediums like chanting (japa), penance (tapa), bhakti, aarti, meditation, etc. 

However, while performing this devotional worship, is our focus really on God?

Generally, we find that even though we are physically busy in these activities, our mind is actually wandering elsewhere. As a result, we do not get the desired outcome of our devotional worship.

So, how do we stay focused on God?

Concentration Comes with Interest

One has the ability to concentrate where he has an interest.

When we are counting money at home, or we are out shopping for clothes, do we realize how attentive and engrossed our mind is? How well does our concentration remain in the activity at hand?

If we have a similar interest in God, we will not have any difficulty in maintaining our focus on God either. When we are unable to concentrate on God, it means that there remains some lack of interest in God, on our part.

When the love for God arises within us, the mind will not wander and we will be able to concentrate easily. The mind wanders after things we deem valuable. The higher the value we place on something, the more we get attached to it.

God’s message is simple:

‘If you want to have attachment towards worldly life; go ahead and get attached to it; or else, get attached to Me. If you get attached to Me, you will get permanent happiness; and if you get attached to the worldly life, you will never find contentment!’

We get attracted and caught up in materialistic things, only as long as we have interest in those things. If we get interested in God instead, interest in materialistic things automatically leaves without having to do anything. Therefore, it is very important that our interest changes.

Why does interest in God not arise so easily?

It is because we have not seen God. We have seen clothes and their beautiful colors, so our interest develops very naturally for them.

But how can one develop interest in something he has never seen or experienced before? Things will drastically change, if we happen to see God.

But God cannot be seen. So, what do we do now?

Nurture interest in the Gnani Purush, the representative of God.

We can see the Gnani with our eyes, in person.

This makes it very easy to establish our interest in Him. And the Gnani is such that one does not have to do much to develop an interest in Him, it arises automatically. Everyone feels a natural attraction towards Him - we feel like seeing Him, we feel like being with Him all the time.

When our interest sits in the Gnani, that interest directly reaches God!