The Gopis actually felt no separation between themselves and Krishna. Sometimes the Gopis didn’t even know, because for them they experienced Krishna everywhere. They didn’t know where Krishna began and He ended and where they began, or where they were and where Krishna was. It was a feeling of total oneness and perfect selflessness.
Naradji says that those Gopis thought only of making Krishna happy. They never thought of their own happiness. When He was asked to describe prem (Divine love), he said:
यथा व्रजगोपिकानाम्।
Yathā vraja-gopikānām.
- Narad Bhakti Sutra 21
He says, “The Gopis of Braj are the only example.”
And what was the love of the Gopis like for Krishna? He said,
“There is no example. I’m sorry, I can’t explain it to you because there is no example in this world.”
Because in this world, there is always some kind of selfishness in our love. See, take one example from the Bhagwat Mahapuran.
यत्ते सुजातचरणाम्बुरुहं स्तनेषु
भीताः शनैः प्रिय दधीमहि कर्कशेषु। …Yat-te sujāta-charaṇāmburuhaṁ staneṣhu
bhītāḥ śhanaiḥ priya dadhīmahi karkaśheṣu…- Bhagawat 10.31.19 (partial)
The Gopis are saying to Krishna, when He disappeared during Maharas (the ecstatic dance of Divine love) and they were looking for Him in the jungle, they decided to stop looking and come back.
Why?
Because they were seeing, “Oh, there are so many sharp pebbles, stones, thorns, and branches here on the ground in the jungle, and Krishna is walking barefoot through this! No, no, no! If we keep following Him, He may go deeper and deeper. We have to come back! We can’t bear the thought of Him suffering!”
See, they gave an example.
They said, “Krishna, those same feet, those same lotus feet of Yours that You use every day to graze the cows barefoot, are so soft that when we have been away from You for a long time and the fire of virah (Divine separation) burns in our hearts, we place the soles of Your feet upon our chest to calm that fire! But when we do that, we do it very gently so that nothing should cause even the slightest discomfort to Your feet!”
Now imagine, in this world, let’s say a young child went missing for three or four days, and then was found. The child comes running into the mother’s arms. The mother had felt separation from her child, and now, upon meeting the child, think of how much happiness she feels. However much pain there was in separation, that much happiness she is going to feel upon meeting the child. And when she meets the child, she squeezes him.
Why?
Because she is getting so much happiness from meeting her child. She might even squeeze him too hard. Why? Because she is feeling happy, and she wants to hold the child as close as possible. She squeezes him, and the child squirms and says,
“Mom, what are you doing?!”
See, she lost sight of her own child’s happiness because she was experiencing her own happiness. This is just an example of how there is always some kind of selfishness in our worldly love. But the Gopis...Do you know what their pain of separation from Krishna is like?
It is described in the Bhagwat Mahapuran that every moment of separation for them was like a yug (an age), meaning hundreds of thousands of years. How is that possible? Well, think about it. The more you love someone, the greater the pain of separation will be if you are separated from that person. So, how much happiness do the Gopis experience in milan (Divine union) with Krishna?
Unlimited. So how great would their pain of separation be? Also unlimited.
