I asked ChatGPT: Can you talk about one’s love for God or so-called self-realization in the context of the previous query on “transactional love” (https://selfrealization.blog/2026/01/08/chatgpt-on-transactional-true-love/)? That is, in what way is so-called Bhakti Yoga free or not of this transactional nature? And if it is still “transactional” how can such a love lead one to discover the Truth? Or, is it the case that as long as we are caught in maya we cannot but be in “transactional” mode even when it comes to love for God because the moment we are in Maya (that is, identified with the body as being one’s self), then how can we not “want” or “need” anything, and in a way isn’t Bhakti Yoga itself implying we “need” either the “love” of God or at least “grace” from him because we “need” or “want” release from the bonds of Maya and its earthly cares that do not quite give us the complete peace that we look for in life and keep failing to find it in all our relationships and pursuits and achievements? In that sense, does “love” at the highest level (or Bhakti Yoga) mean nothing but an erasure or a “desire” for the erasure of the ego?
ChatGPT answered:
Your question goes right to the paradox at the heart of Bhakti and, more honestly, at the heart of all spiritual seeking.
Let me approach it slowly, because this is one of those places where clarity only comes when we refuse shortcuts.
As long as there is Maya, there is transaction
You are right in your intuition.
The moment there is identification with the body mind complex, the moment there is a sense of “I am this”, desire is inevitable. Want is not a moral flaw. It is a structural feature of Maya.
If I take myself to be limited, incomplete, mortal, then I will seek completion, security, permanence. Whether I seek it through wealth, relationships, status, knowledge, renunciation, or God does not change the basic structure.
So yes
Bhakti, at least at its starting point, is transactional.
The devotee prays because
they suffer
they fear
they long
they want release
they want grace
they want peace
Even the longing for moksha is a longing.
Even the wish to dissolve the ego begins as an ego wish.
This is not hypocrisy. It is honesty.
To imagine a bhakta who has no wants at the beginning is spiritual fantasy.
Why Bhakti is still different from worldly transaction
Here is the subtle but crucial distinction.
Worldly transactions aim to improve the experience of the ego.
Bhakti, even when transactional, aims to end the tyranny of the ego.
In ordinary love, I say
Give me happiness.
Give me security.
Give me meaning.
In Bhakti, the prayer slowly shifts to
Take me as I am.
Do with me what You will.
Remove what stands between me and Truth.
Even when the devotee asks, the direction of the asking is different.
The currency of Bhakti is not pleasure, success, or validation.
It is surrender.
That single orientation makes all the difference.
Grace is still “wanted”, but what is being wanted changes
You are absolutely right to notice that Bhakti seems to imply dependence on grace.
But look closely at what grace means here.
Grace is not God giving you something extra.
Grace is God taking away what is false.
At the beginning, the devotee says
“Give me Your love.”
Later, the prayer becomes
“Take away my separateness.”
Still later, even that prayer falls silent.
Grace then is no longer something requested.
It is something recognized.
Like realizing the sun was always shining once the clouds move.
Does Bhakti lead to Truth if it is transactional?
Yes, precisely because Bhakti does not pretend to be free of desire.
Other paths often try to bypass desire by suppressing it or philosophizing it away. Bhakti uses desire, refines it, exhausts it.
The devotee pours every want into one direction.
Not toward objects.
Not toward outcomes.
But toward the source of being itself.
Desire does not vanish overnight.
It is purified through intensity.
Eventually something extraordinary happens.
The devotee realizes
“I am not loving God to get free.”
“I am loving God because nothing else feels real.”
At that point, the transaction collapses on its own.
The moment Bhakti stops being transactional
Bhakti stops being transactional when the question
“What will I get?”
is replaced by
“Can I disappear?”
This is the quiet revolution.
Love stops being a means.
Love becomes the end.
The devotee no longer says
“I love You so that I may be liberated.”
The devotee says
“Even liberation is Yours. I want only You.”
And then, in a final irony, even the “You” dissolves.
Is the highest love the erasure of ego?
Yes, but with an important clarification.
It is not the ego trying to erase itself.
That is still ego activity.
It is the ego being outgrown through love.
In Bhakti, ego does not die by violence.
It dies by irrelevance.
When love becomes total, the separate lover can no longer be found.
At that point, your earlier line reveals its full depth:
“Don’t be in love; become love.”
In Bhakti, this means
Do not stand apart loving God.
Become the love in which no separation remains.
Not union.
Not merger.
Not attainment.
Just the disappearance of the boundary that was never real.
Final clarity
As long as we are in Maya, love will carry traces of transaction.
Bhakti does not deny this. It sanctifies it.
By directing desire toward Truth itself, desire consumes its own fuel.
What begins as
“I need God”
ends as
“Only God is.”
And in that seeing, there is no one left to need, want, or ask.
Only love, not as a feeling, but as the ground of being itself.
Know Thyself 