The nine steps in the pilgrimage of man towards God along the path of dedication and surrender are:
(1) Developing a desire to listen to the glory and grandeur of the handiwork of God and of the various awe-inspiring manifestations of Divinity. This is the starting point. It is by hearing about the Lord again and again, that we can transform our selves into Divinity.
(2) Singing about the Lord in praise of His magnificence and manifold exploits.
(3) Dwelling on the Lord in the mind, revelling in the contemplation of His Beauty, Majesty and Compassion.
(4) Entering upon the worship of the Lord, by concentrating on honouring the feet, or footprints.
(5) This develops into a total propitiation of the Lord, and systematic ritualistic worship, in which the aspirant gets inner satisfaction and inspiration.
(6) The aspirant begins to see the favourite Form of God, which he likes to worship, in all beings and all objects, wherever he turns, and so he develops an attitude of Vandana, or reverence towards nature and all life.
(7) Established in this bent of mind, he becomes the devoted servant of all, with no sense of superiority or inferiority. This is a vital step, which presages great spiritual success.
(8) This takes the seeker so near the Lord that he feels himself to be the confidant and comrade, the companion and friend, the sharer of God’s power and pity, of God’s triumphs and achievements, His shaka, in fact, as Arjuna had become.
(9) As can be inferred, this is the prelude to the final step of total surrender of Atma-nivedanam, yielding fully to the Will of the Lord, which the seeker knows through his own purified intuition. (S.S.S. Vol. VII - p. 186)
Shri Rama said that Bhaktas reach Him through nine paths. They are:
‘Shravanam, kirtanam, vishnohsmaranam, Pada sevanam, vandanam, archanam, dasyam, sneham, Atma nivedanam’ (Pre. V. - p. 54)
(Japamala)
Why 108 beads in a Japamala? 108 is the result when 12 is multiplied 9 times. 12 is the number of Adityas, luminaries that reveal the objective world, and so, symbols of the Sakara aspect (the world of name and form, of manifoldness, the seeming variety, the fleeting pictures); 9 is the screen on which the pictures appear, the basis, the rope which deludes you as the snake in the dusk,Brahman, the Nameless, Formless Eternal Absolute, 9 is the Brahman Number, for it is always 9, however many times you multiply it! It is immutable, for 9 into any number adds up to 9 only. So when you turn the beads, impress upon yourself the fact that there is both truth and travesty in the world, that travesty attracts, distracts and delights is deceiving you, diverts you into devious paths; the truth makes you free! (SSS Vol.7, p. 34)
Man breathes at the rate of 900 times per hour, 21,600 times per day, 10,800 during day time. With every breath, man is supposed to repeat Soham. ‘I am He’, and so the figure 216 and its half of 216, being 108, has a deep significance. It is also 9 times 12, 9, being the number indicative of Brahman, since it is always 9, however many times you may multiply it (9 x 12 = 108, 1 + 8 = 9 : 9 x 9 = 81, 8 + 1 = 9) and 12 is the number of the suns; also, the sun moves through 12 rasis or points, each rasi representing one month. Just as 9 is the symbol of Brahman, 8 is the number of Maya. (SSS Vol.4, p. 123)