My name is Arjun, and a year ago, I did something I still struggle to name out loud. I betrayed someone I loved, and the shame had clung to me like wet earth. No matter how many times I bowed before the altar or bathed in the Ganga—our sacred river—I didn’t feel clean.
I had stopped going to the temple. I didn’t avoid God exactly… but I avoided his gaze. I thought, maybe if I stayed quiet and kept my head down, the divine wouldn’t notice someone like me.
One afternoon, as the summer heat wrapped itself around the village, I sat alone by a quiet banyan tree just beyond the rice fields. My shame sat heavier than the sun on my back. I picked up a small pebble and rubbed it between my fingers, hoping the world would forget me.
Then, I saw Mira, my neighbor’s daughter. Maybe six years old, with anklets that jingled when she ran. She came skipping with a brass lota in her hands, headed for the well.
She paused, tilted her head at me, and said, “Uncle, are you sad?”
I didn’t know what to say. I just nodded.
She thought for a second. Then pulled a tiny packet from her pocket—prasad from the morning puja her family had offered to Lord Krishna, the lord of compassion and divine play. She placed it gently in my hand.
“Take it,” she said, “It’s God's laddoo. He said don’t be sad today.”
My throat tightened. I wanted to thank her, but my voice had long since tied itself into silence. So, I just held the sweet and watched her skip away, her joy unscarred by the heaviness I carried.
That night, I sat before my home altar again. I lit a small diya and kept the laddoo there, uneaten. I prayed—not grand words, just whatever trembling truth came up.
A verse from the Bhagavad Gita surfaced in my mind, one I hadn’t thought of in years: “Even if the most sinful person worships Me with devotion, he must be considered righteous, for he has made the right resolve.” (Gita 9.30)
Part of me resisted. Could it really be true? And yet… hadn’t Mira offered that laddoo without asking what I’d done? Hadn’t Krishna touched my shame through a child’s kindness?
The next morning, I went to the river. Not to wash away sins with ritual, but just to sit. Birds skimmed the surface of the water. The breeze rustled the leaves like whispers from something holy.
I thought of Sita from the Ramayana—how after all her trials and the questioning of her purity, she still returned to the earth with dignity. Or how Ahalya, once cursed in stone for her mistakes, was freed by Lord Rama’s simple presence and grace.
The sacred never asked for perfection, I realized. Only presence. Only the courage to return.
So I did.
I offered that laddoo into the river—my shame with it.
And the water kept flowing, untouched, unchanged.
Like grace.
My name is Arjun, and a year ago, I did something I still struggle to name out loud. I betrayed someone I loved, and the shame had clung to me like wet earth. No matter how many times I bowed before the altar or bathed in the Ganga—our sacred river—I didn’t feel clean.
I had stopped going to the temple. I didn’t avoid God exactly… but I avoided his gaze. I thought, maybe if I stayed quiet and kept my head down, the divine wouldn’t notice someone like me.
One afternoon, as the summer heat wrapped itself around the village, I sat alone by a quiet banyan tree just beyond the rice fields. My shame sat heavier than the sun on my back. I picked up a small pebble and rubbed it between my fingers, hoping the world would forget me.
Then, I saw Mira, my neighbor’s daughter. Maybe six years old, with anklets that jingled when she ran. She came skipping with a brass lota in her hands, headed for the well.
She paused, tilted her head at me, and said, “Uncle, are you sad?”
I didn’t know what to say. I just nodded.
She thought for a second. Then pulled a tiny packet from her pocket—prasad from the morning puja her family had offered to Lord Krishna, the lord of compassion and divine play. She placed it gently in my hand.
“Take it,” she said, “It’s God's laddoo. He said don’t be sad today.”
My throat tightened. I wanted to thank her, but my voice had long since tied itself into silence. So, I just held the sweet and watched her skip away, her joy unscarred by the heaviness I carried.
That night, I sat before my home altar again. I lit a small diya and kept the laddoo there, uneaten. I prayed—not grand words, just whatever trembling truth came up.
A verse from the Bhagavad Gita surfaced in my mind, one I hadn’t thought of in years: “Even if the most sinful person worships Me with devotion, he must be considered righteous, for he has made the right resolve.” (Gita 9.30)
Part of me resisted. Could it really be true? And yet… hadn’t Mira offered that laddoo without asking what I’d done? Hadn’t Krishna touched my shame through a child’s kindness?
The next morning, I went to the river. Not to wash away sins with ritual, but just to sit. Birds skimmed the surface of the water. The breeze rustled the leaves like whispers from something holy.
I thought of Sita from the Ramayana—how after all her trials and the questioning of her purity, she still returned to the earth with dignity. Or how Ahalya, once cursed in stone for her mistakes, was freed by Lord Rama’s simple presence and grace.
The sacred never asked for perfection, I realized. Only presence. Only the courage to return.
So I did.
I offered that laddoo into the river—my shame with it.
And the water kept flowing, untouched, unchanged.
Like grace.
