Story: A Brahmana who offered sweet rice to Lord Narayana within his mind

Story from Brahma-vaivarta Purana:

Once there lived a poor brahmana in the city of Pratishthanapura in South India. He was a very sincere devotee of Lord Narayana and was satisfied with whatever the Lord had given Him. Knowing well that his present material condition is due to his past deeds, he is always peaceful and grateful to the Lord.

He was very open-hearted and used to hear the glories of the Lord from realized souls. At one such meeting, while he was very faithfully hearing about Vaishnava activities, he was informed that these activities can be performed even by meditation.

As part of his daily routine, he used to take bath in river Godavari. After taking bath he would sit in a secluded place on the bank of the river and then started meditating on the Lord in his mind. When he had fixed the form of the Lord in his mind, he began to imagine in his meditations that he was dressing the Lord very nicely in costly clothing, with ornaments, helmets and other paraphernalia. Then he offered his respectful obeisances by bowing down before the Lord. After finishing the dressing, he began to imagine that he was cleaning the temple very nicely. After cleansing the temple, he imagined that he had many water jugs made of gold and silver, and he took all those jugs to the river and filled them with the holy water. Not only did he collect water from the Godavari, but he collected from the Ganges, Yamuna, Narmada, and Kaveri. He also imagined to physically collect all the required paraphernalia and offer them to the Lord mentally and performed arati.

He was doing this for years and one day he decided to offer sweet-rice for the Lord. He was preparing it in his imagination but was not satisfied as it was very hot. He wanted to make sure whether it has cool enough and so touched the pot and his finger was burnt. In this way, his meditation broke and he was surprised to find that his finger was actually burnt. When he was thinking like this, in Vaikuntha, Lord Narayana began to smile humorously seeing His devotee devotion for Him. He immediately sent a Vaikunta vimana that brought the brahmana to the Lord’s abode.

Moral of the story:

Thus, we can understand that things offered by the devotees even in meditation are accepted by the Lord, and they help one achieve the desired result. The Lord is so merciful that even if one is not able to afford to get the prescribed paraphernalia, the Lord accepts the offerings that are made mentally.