The Subtle, Complex Nature of Dharma | Thinking Bhakti Ep. 46

In this special episode recorded in Toronto, Swamiji speaks with Pandit Mayuran about his political career in the UK and the wider issues affecting the Western world at present. Although a contentious topic, Hinduism has never shied away from open dialogue and exploration in order to better understand the nature of dharma and our role in its development. What follows is a discussion on the Mahabharata, nuance, pragmatism vs idealism, the balance between compassion and conservation, material identifications and much more!Connect with the Community:📍 Visit us in NYC: Join our community at Bhakti Marga NYC in Manhattan - https://bhaktimarga.nyc🕉️ The Ashram: Filmed at the Paranitya Narasimha Temple and Ashram in Elmira, NY. - https://bhaktimarga.us/📸 Instagram: Follow Swami Revatikaanta at [@svrevatikaanta]Subscribe for new videos every two weeks.Think deeply. Love fearlessly.Jai GurudevWatch Thinking Bhakti on YouTube:https://www.youtube.com/@SwamiRevatikaantaofficial

In this video Swami reflects on a conversation he had with a friend during this summer's Just Love Festival. The conversation centered around our inability to stand by our choices in life, with genuine acceptance and contentment. People that should be speaking of love, gratitude and the celebration of life, so often fall into the trap of complaining and victimhood to earn the pity and compassion of others, while hiding from their own responsibility and agency. Swami offers important perspectives and advice for how to tackle the issue!Connect with the Community:📍 Visit us in NYC: Join our community at Bhakti Marga NYC in Manhattan - https://bhaktimarga.nyc🕉️ The Ashram: Filmed at the Paranitya Narasimha Temple and Ashram in Elmira, NY. - https://bhaktimarga.us/📸 Instagram: Follow Swami Revatikaanta at [@svrevatikaanta]Subscribe for new videos every two weeks.Think deeply. Love fearlessly.Jai GurudevWatch Thinking Bhakti on YouTube:https://www.youtube.com/@SwamiRevatikaantaofficial

In this special lecture delivered during the 2026 Gurupurnima celebrations at Shree Peetha Nilaya, Swami speaks about the 5 different stages a spiritual seeker will progress through in their relationship with their Satguru. Drawing parallels between the role of the teacher and life itself, Swami explains how to best navigate and understand each stage, giving concrete examples and insights into how to ultimately take their relationship with their guru and with themselves to the next level!Connect with the Community:📍 Visit us in NYC: Join our community at Bhakti Marga NYC in Manhattan - https://bhaktimarga.nyc🕉️ The Ashram: Filmed at the Paranitya Narasimha Temple and Ashram in Elmira, NY. - https://bhaktimarga.us/📸 Instagram: Follow Swami Revatikaanta at [@svrevatikaanta]Subscribe for new episodes every two weeks.Think deeply. Love fearlessly.Jai GurudevWatch Thinking Bhakti on YouTube:https://www.youtube.com/@SwamiRevatikaantaofficial

In this episode, Swami Revatikaanta explores the struggle between immediate gratification (Preyas) and truly doing what is good and beneficial in our lives (Śreyas). From birth, society conditions us to seek pleasure at every moment. However, this relentless pursuit of convenience, prestige, and pleasure often comes at a severe cost to our personal growth, inner peace, and true Divine connection.Drawing from the Katha Upanishad, Søren Kierkegaard and St. Augustine, Swami unpacks how we can change our ways, moving from pleasure-seeking to dharmic living and eventually pure love.Connect with the Community:📍 Visit us in NYC: Join our community at Bhakti Marga NYC in Manhattan - https://bhaktimarga.nyc🕉️ The Ashram: Filmed at the Paranitya Narasimha Temple and Ashram in Elmira, NY. - https://bhaktimarga.us/📸 Instagram: Follow Swami Revatikaanta at [@svrevatikaanta]Subscribe for new episodes every two weeks.Think deeply. Love fearlessly.Jai GurudevWatch Thinking Bhakti on YouTube:https://www.youtube.com/@SwamiRevatikaantaofficial

People often ask Swami a very specific question: "What kind of God do you believe in?" But in truth, they aren't just asking for a name. They are asking about the fundamental nature of the "type" of God he believes in.Today, modern seekers are often forced into a frustrating dilemma. As the famed historian Yuval Noah Harari points out, society seems to present us with only two options: the "Mystery God" (a vague, unknowable cosmic energy that asks nothing of us) or the "Lawgiver God" (a petty cosmic dictator obsessed with micromanaging our daily lives and punishing our mistakes).It is completely understandable why so many people — including Harari himself — run away from the Lawgiver God. When religion is used to control or oppress, rejecting it is a profound survival mechanism. Hence the rise of the "spiritual but not religious" movement.But is this a false choice? In our justified rush to escape this "Cosmic Dictator", have we accidentally over-corrected into a state of personal comfort and complacency masquerading as spirituality and "seeking"?In this video, Swami deconstructs this potential ego trap. We explore the lost etymology of the word "religion" and its connection to yoga, and we look at how the Bhagavad Gita offers a solution to Harari's false binary. It presents God not as a giver of absolute laws backed by the threat of eternal damnation, but rather as an offerer of a user manual for our consciousness, backed by the endless patience , mercy and love that we all intuitively associate with the true figure of God.Connect with the Community:📍 Visit us in NYC: Join our community at Bhakti Marga NYC in Manhattan - https://bhaktimarga.nyc🕉️ The Ashram: Filmed at the Paranitya Narasimha Temple and Ashram in Elmira, NY. - https://bhaktimarga.us/📸 Instagram: Follow Swami Revatikaanta at [@svrevatikaanta]Subscribe for new episodes every two weeks.Think deeply. Love fearlessly.Jai GurudevWatch Thinking Bhakti on YouTube:https://www.youtube.com/@SwamiRevatikaantaofficial

In this episode, Swami Revatikaanta sits down with Sarvamohini Dasi (Kristina Margolin) to discuss the role of numerology and astrology in understanding our nature and purpose.In this personal discussion, Sarvamohini Dasi opens up about her realization that while these ancient sciences can explain the patterns of our lives, they cannot fully satisfy the heart's ultimate desire for divine love. We discuss what it means to honor these tools that help us navigate this world, while ultimately giving our hearts to the spiritual practice that takes us beyond it—a graduation that led her to the shelter of Paramahamsa Vishwananda and the path of pure Bhakti.Connect with the Community:📍 Visit us in NYC: Join our community at Bhakti Marga NYC in Manhattan - https://bhaktimarga.nyc🕉️ The Ashram: Filmed at the Paranitya Narasimha Temple and Ashram in Elmira, NY. - https://bhaktimarga.us/📸 Instagram: Follow Swami Revatikaanta at [@svrevatikaanta]Subscribe for new episodes every two weeks.Think deeply. Love fearlessly.Jai GurudevWatch Thinking Bhakti on YouTube:https://www.youtube.com/@SwamiRevatikaantaofficial

How can we reconcile the miracles of different, seemingly contradictory religions? If they all claim to be the only truth, who is lying? For the atheist, if every religion claims exclusive miracles that contradict each other, the most logical conclusion is that they are all making it up. The typical religious response, claiming our miracles are from God and theirs are from the devil (or just fake), is intellectually unsatisfying and only fuels tribalism.In this episode Swami Revatikaanta challenges these positions through the Hindu lens by asking the questions, “What if God is truly universal? What if He responds to the sincere longing of a person's heart, rather than the theological accuracy of their institution?” He opposes the typical apologist response from Frank Turek and grounds Alex O’Connor’s expectation of compassionate reciprocation from God in a Vedic framework. Drawing on the profound, macro-level vision of the Bhagavad Gita and the Rig Veda, Swami explores how Sanatana Dharma solves this dilemma without invalidating anyone's profound personal experiences.Connect with the Community:📍 Visit us in NYC: Join our community at Bhakti Marga NYC in Manhattan - https://bhaktimarga.nyc🕉️ The Ashram: Filmed at the Paranitya Narasimha Temple and Ashram in Elmira, NY. - https://bhaktimarga.us/📸 Instagram: Follow Swami Revatikaanta at [@svrevatikaanta]Subscribe for new episodes every two weeks.Think deeply. Love fearlessly.Jai GurudevWatch Thinking Bhakti on YouTube:https://www.youtube.com/@SwamiRevatikaantaofficial

In this episode, Swami Revatikaanta sits down with Ananta Das (Franco Erazo) to explore the world of psychedelics and earth medicine in the spiritual world.Following a successful corporate career, Ananta Das immersed himself in the world of shamanic earth medicines—specifically Kambo and Bufo (5-MeO-DMT). In this mature conversation, Ananta Das shares his gratitude for these sacred tools, highlighting how they served as powerful catalysts to wake him up and point him toward the Divine.Together they explore how a deep respect for shamanic traditions led Ananta Dad to step beyond them—meeting Paramahamsa Vishwananda, taking Vaishnava devotee initiation, and finding a lifelong path to carry him upwards and onwards.Connect with the Community:📍 Visit us in NYC: Join our community at Bhakti Marga NYC in Manhattan - https://bhaktimarga.nyc🕉️ The Ashram: Filmed at the Paranitya Narasimha Temple and Ashram in Elmira, NY. - https://bhaktimarga.us/📸 Instagram: Follow Swami Revatikaanta at [@svrevatikaanta]Subscribe for new videos every two weeks.Think deeply. Love fearlessly.Jai GurudevWatch Thinking Bhakti on YouTube:https://www.youtube.com/@SwamiRevatikaantaofficial

Why is it that despite doing all the "right" spiritual work — the meditation, the yoga, the reading, the workshops — we still feel empty and frustrated?In this episode, Swami Revatikaanta explores the trap of "Spiritual Consumerism." For many of us, especially in an impatient results-oriented world, we’ve been conditioned to think of the Divine as a vending machine: if we put in the time, the effort, or the money, we expect an immediate "hit" of peace and love in return. It is this misunderstanding of the nature of spirituality and God that keeps us chasing the elusive experience of spiritual fulfillment.Drawing on the wisdom of the Bhagavad Gita and the social critique of Erich Fromm, Swami discusses why a "quick fix" approach to these issues always leads to a dead end. Instead, we explore how to move from a transactional relationship to a service-based relationship, shifting from the limited and superficial "having" into the real and fulfilling "being".Connect with the Community:📍 Visit us in NYC: Join our community at Bhakti Marga NYC in Manhattan - https://bhaktimarga.nyc🕉️ The Ashram: Filmed at the Paranitya Narasimha Temple and Ashram in Elmira, NY. - https://bhaktimarga.us/📸 Instagram: Follow Swami Revatikaanta at [@svrevatikaanta]Watch Thinking Bhakti on YouTube:https://www.youtube.com/@SwamiRevatikaantaofficial

Why is it that for so many people, the "smarter" they are, the harder it is to have a relationship with God?In this episode, Swami Revatikaanta explore the internal friction between two archetypes we all carry: The Rationalist and The Poet. The Rationalist demands facts, logic, and efficiency. But the Poet doesn't allow those things to limit what the heart feels. Drawing on the wisdom of the Bhagavad Gita and the Western philosophy, Swami discusses why you don’t have to abandon your intellect to become a devotee. Instead, we explore how to marry the "Rationalist" who reasons with the "Poet" who loves.If you’ve ever felt like a "spectator" in your own spiritual life—watching and critiquing from the sidelines but never actually getting on the court—this video is for you.Watch Thinking Bhakti on YouTube:https://www.youtube.com/@SwamiRevatikaantaofficial