How To Be Devoted to God?

In this talk, we give a comprehensive overview of the Path of Devotion:

00:00:00 How Bhakti Yoga Works: Vaidhi Bhakti (Devotion with Rules) vs Para Bhakti (Ecstatic Love)
00:04:30 The full moon of Bhakti, the scorching sun of Jñāna
00:05:47 An outline of  Swami Vivekananda's "Bhakti Yoga":
00:07:10 The definition of Bhakti: " the genuine and earnest quest for God that begins in Love, continues in Love and ends in Love."
00:10:30 The philosophy of Ishvara: the formless pure non-dual Consciousness (Impersonal Absolute), which is the ideal of Jñāna and Buddhism, is exactly the same as the form of God with qualities (Personal God), which is the ideal Bhakti.
00:13:20 Swami Vivekananda's definition of God: unfathomable love. God is Love itself, i.e L.O.V.E Personified.
00:15:00  Bhakti is about realization and for this we need a guru to transmit the wordless, invisible "quickening impulse"
00:16:30 Qualifications for aspirants: what kind of a student is required? Pining, patience and perseverance!
00:17:35 Qualifications for teachers: grounded in the spirit of the scriptures, pure in character and teaching for the right reasons (not for material profit)
00:19:10 The role of the Avatar in Bhakti Yoga in providing a concrete form for the mind to focus on in Devotion
00:26:03 How mantras work in Devotion (and the meaning of OM)
00:30:34 Technical Difficulties!
00:31:32 Technical Difficulties ends...
00:34:00 Invocation of Swamiji
00:34:23 The Worship of Substitutes and Images (and why its so important)
00:47:30 How this idea leads to the Harmony of All Religions
00:49:17 Ishta Nishta, Steadfast Devotion to the Chosen Ideal: while all forms are equally Brahman, we should choose one and dive deep into It without hating any other forms
00:53:19 depth vs breadth in spiritual life
01:02:22 worshipping all deities through your Ishta and worshipping your Ishta through all deities
01:08:00 How to practice Bhakti Yoga, the path of Devotion: the methods and the means.