If once it finds its inner happiness it will not wander outward :

1.

There is the kind of Bhakti which is called Vaidhibhakti (devotion as enjoined by the scriptures).

Repeating the 'name' of God a certain number of times, fasting on certain occasions, making pilgrimages to certain shrines, worshipping with certain articles―these and other observances constitute Vaidhi-bhakti.

Practice of this for a long time leads one to the higher aspect of devotion known as Raga-bhakti.

Love is the one thing needful.

Worldly ideas must go away completely; the mind should be set on Him "in all its sixteen annas" (i.e., wholly) and only then you can reach Him.

Without Raga-bhakti one cannot attain Him.

2.

A devotee: Is it necessary, Sir, that one should first get one's senses controlled by right discrimination (Vichara) ?

The Master: Well, that is one path-the path of right discrimination.

In the path of Bhakti, self-control comes of itself and it comes very easily.

The more one's love of God increases, the more insipid become the pleasures of the senses, even as parents cannot think of physical enjoyment on the day they have lost a child.

3.

Mr. B. C. Das asked why the mind cannot be turned inward in spite of repeated attempts.

M.: It is done by practice and dispassion and that succeeds only gradually.

The mind, having been so long a cow accustomed to graze stealthily on others’ estates, is not easily confined to her stall.

However much her keeper tempts her with luscious grass and fine fodder, she refuses the first time; then she takes a bit; but her innate tendency to stray away asserts itself; and she slips away; on being repeatedly tempted by the owner, she accustoms herself to the stall; finally even if let loose she would not stray away.

Similarly with the mind.

If once it finds its inner happiness it will not wander outward.

Sri Ramakrishna to Devotees

Belur Math