Vivekachudamani 32

svatma tattva nu sandhanam bhaktirityapare jaguh |
ukta sadhana sampannas tattva jijñasuratmanah |
upasided gurum prañam yasmad bandha vimoksanam ||
(Sankaracarya's Vivekachudamani 32)

Others say that bhakti means a constant inquiry into the Truth of one‘s own Self. One who has the above-mentioned qualifications and is desirous to know the Truth of the Self should, therefore, approach an illumined Teacher for redeeming himself from bondage.

Spiritual understanding is so powerful that simply by entering into a person’s ear it can at once give deliverance from the bondage of family affection. Family affection is an illusory manifestation of the external energy, and it is the only impetus for all mundane activities. As long as there is mundane activity and the mind is absorbed in such engagement, one has to undergo the repetition of birth and death in the current material nescience. People are most influenced by the mode of ignorance, and some are influenced by the passionate mode of material nature, and under the spell of these two modes, a living being is actuated by the material conception of life.

The mundane qualities do not allow a living entity to understand his real position. The qualities of both ignorance and passion strongly bind one to the illusory bodily conception of the self. The best among the fools who are thus deluded are those who engage in altruistic activities under the spell of the material mode of passion.

Anyone who misunderstands this perishable body to be the self and who works for it in the name of sociology, politics, philanthropy, altruism, nationalism or internationalism, under the false plea of the bodily conception of life, is certainly a fool and does not know the implications of reality and unreality. Some of them are above the modes of ignorance and passion and are situated in the mode of goodness, but mundane goodness is always contaminated by tinges of ignorance and passion. Mundane goodness can enlighten one that the body and the self are different, and one in goodness is concerned with the self and not the body. But due to being contaminated, those in mundane goodness cannot understand the real nature of the self as a person. Their impersonal conception of the self as distinct from the body keeps them in the mode of goodness within material nature, and unless they are attracted by Lord lila or stories, they will never be liberated from the bondage of material existence.

All sensible men and women of the world should connect themselves in spiritual understanding. In order to understand the pure knowledge one has to surrender to a bonafide guru who can cut off us from all material bondage.

By surrendering to bogus gurus one will accumulate more material attachment which will make us more misery than ever. Unfortunately in today's world people are more interested in bogus gurus who can make their lives more misery.