The Nine Modes of Bhakti

The nine modes of Bhakti are the ways in which a devotee attains the Supreme Ideal of Life. Any devotee can take up any of these paths and reach the highest state.

The path of Bhakti is the easiest of all. The path of Bhakti is close to the nature of human inclinations. It slowly and gradually takes the individual to the Supreme without frustrating their human instincts. It follows the Arundhatee Nyaya or the Shakhachandra Nyaya of logic instead of the Bhramara-Keetaka Nyaya of the Vedantins. Navavidha Bhakti also will develop Bhakti.

Bhakti is not direct assertion of God, but a progressive realization of God.

Here are the 9 modes of Bhakti practice:
1. Sravana – hearing God’s virtues, glories and lilas
2. Kirtana – singing the God’s praise and glories
3. Smarana – remembering the Lord at all times
4. Padasevana – serving and worshiping the Divine’s Lotus Feet
5. Archana – offerings to the Divine
6. Vandana – prayer and prostration to God
7. Dasya Bhakti – the love of God through serving God
8. Sakhya Bhakti – friendship sentiment with God
9. Atma-Nivedana – complete self surrender to God’s will

How to Develop Bhakti?
These are the six means of cultivating Bhakti:
1. Service to Bhagavatas, Sadhus and Sannyasins
2. Repetition of God’s Name
3. Satsanga
4. Kirtan
5. Study of Ramayana and Bhagavad Gita
6. Stay in Vrindavana, Pandharpur, Chitrakuta, Ayodhya or any other place of pilgrimage

Summary of BHAKTI YOGA
1. Jnana (wisdom) and Vairagya (dispassion) are the two sons of Bhakti (devotion).
2. Without Bhakti, Jnana will dry up and dispassion will evaporate.
3. Without oil, the lamp will get extinguished. Without Bhakti, Jnana and dispassion will perish.
4. The proof that humans love God is first shown by loving their fellow humans.
5. Ask God to give you Grace that you may suffer willingly. Do not ask God to take the suffering from you.
6. With devotion, humility comes.
7. In the wake of devotion, renunciation follows.
8. Devotion is the master-key to attain divine perfection.
9. Bhakti includes the love of humanity.
10. Bhakti consists of the love of God, and through this, the love to all of humanity.
11. Love to humanity must be based on love to God; if it is not, it is bound to have a shaky foundation.
12. Love unites the individual soul with God.
13. It is only love that finds God.
14. God is the primal essence.
15. The vision of God is a gift from God. It is not an achievement attained by human effort independent of God.
16. God is revealed to those who love God and whose minds have been purified by devotion to holy scriptures and holy preceptors, practice of Karma Yoga and more than all, Prapatti or self surrender.
17. God is love who resides in every heart irrespective of caste and creed.
18. Loving remembrance is the method of reaching Him. I have drunk the elixir of God by which all other elixirs have become bitter and worthless.
19. Many saints came from lower classes. They were illiterate. They did manual labour to make both ends meet. They were persecuted by persons in power.
20. Without renunciation, Bhakti can never be cultivated in the heart.
21. God asks for complete self surrender from all devotees.
22. Love is a tremendous force in the world. It draws humanity together. It is quite  real, like electricity or magnetism or gravity.
23. All life is divine.
24. All love is basically Divine love.
25. A devotee makes total self surrender to God and is guided by God. The devotee lives by the grace of God.
26. The devotee makes their body the temple of the Lord.

…more on Dasya Bhakti by Swami Sivananda