Planet ISKCON

His Holiness Trivikrama Swami stands as one of the most steadfast and devoted disciples of His Divine Grace A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada. At the venerable age of 84, he continues to exemplify unwavering dedication to spreading Krishna consciousness worldwide through his preaching, leadership, and personal example. His journey spanning over five decades of service demonstrates
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For each of us, discipline can sometimes feel like someone else is imposing rules on us, and we just have to follow them. Last year, I was in America, staying with a devotee family. Their son was a young adult—actually, a teenager who had just received his driving license. He was kindly driving me to various programs.

One day, we spent a lot of time talking about different topics. I have a deep interest in English literature, so we naturally got into that. During one of our conversations, he said something very striking: “I feel as if my parents don’t love me at all.”

I asked him, “Why do you feel that way? Don’t they care about you and take care of you?”
He replied, “Yes, they do—but I feel like they love a future version of me. And they’re just tolerating me until that version arrives.”

That was a very insightful point. Sometimes, parents can have high expectations, and while those expectations are meant to inspire growth, they can sometimes make a child feel unloved in the present.

But it’s not that parents don’t love their child as they are, right? And similarly, it’s not that Krishna only loves some future version of us—when we become pure devotees. It’s not that He’s merely tolerating us until then. Not at all. Krishna loves us as we are, right now. Of course, He also wants us to grow and become better, but His love is present even now.

If we visualize Krishna in the center, around Him are many concentric circles of love. At the core, there are the Gopis of Vrindavan, then the Vrindavan vasis, the Vaikuntha vasis, pure devotees in this world, and so on. Ultimately, every living being is within one of these circles. The journey of bhakti is about moving closer to Krishna—into deeper circles of love. But even in our current position, Krishna loves us.

Now, when it comes to discipline, we shouldn’t feel insecure just because we don’t meet certain external standards. Discipline is best understood not as a burden but as a negotiation—a negotiation between the present me and the potential me.

Let’s consider an analogy. Suppose we’re caught in a storm, and all supplies are cut off. We have food that could last for a week, but today, I feel very hungry and want to eat a lot. If I eat too much today, I may have nothing left for the future. But if I eat too little, I may not have the strength to survive until that future. So, we have to find a balanced way to care for both the present and the future.

If we care only for the present, we may stagnate or even degrade. “Let me just enjoy now—sleep in, relax, have fun.” But that might leave us with no future worth enjoying. No degree, no career, no foundation.

On the other hand, if we care only for the future, we may suffocate. That’s what this boy was feeling—his parents cared only for the person he should become, and not for who he was. That kind of pressure can lead to resentment and rebellion.

So, each person has to find their own way of negotiating between their present and potential selves. This balance looks different for everyone. Even parents with two children can’t apply the same disciplinary rules to both—each child is unique. Likewise, each of us must find what works for our spiritual growth.

For example, I may choose to fast one day. But if that leads me to fall sick and go to the hospital the next day, that’s not sustainable. Or I may decide to wake up early, but if I’m groggy and unproductive the whole day, it defeats the purpose. So maybe I need to sleep earlier, or restructure my schedule. If that’s not currently possible, I should ask: What is reasonable for me right now?

That’s why I find it helpful to look at standards in an analog rather than digital way. In digital terms, it’s binary: if you do this, you’re a good devotee; if not, you’re a failure. But in analog terms, it’s a spectrum.

On that spectrum, I can define two key points:

• What is desirable for me (what I aspire to)
• What is non-negotiable (what I will do no matter what)

Maybe I aim to read the Bhagavad Gita for one hour daily. On some days, that’s just not possible. So, maybe I read just one page—that takes five minutes. Or I might say, “If not daily, I’ll read for two to three hours over the week.”

When we see our spiritual life as a spectrum, it becomes more sustainable. We honor our present capacity, while steadily moving toward our potential. And that is a much healthier way to maintain long-term discipline and devotion.

The post How do we overcome guilt caused by our inability to practice spirituality seriously? appeared first on The Spiritual Scientist.

Nestled amidst the serene landscapes of Alachua, Florida, the New Raman Reti community stands as a vibrant testament to the enduring legacy of the International Society for Krishna Consciousness (ISKCON). Established in 1977, this 127-acre spiritual haven has evolved into North America’s largest Hare Krishna community, blending ancient Vedic traditions with innovative sustainability practices. Through
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By Sukanti Radha devi dasi I had the wonderful opportunity to conduct a children’s programme at ISKCON Denmark, aimed at educating the young minds about the Temple of Vedic Planetarium (TOVP) during the TOVP Marathon EU Tour 2025. This initiative is crucial, as instilling an understanding of such significant projects at an early age helps
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Today is Srila Vrindavan dasa Thakura’s disappearance day. Sri Caitanya-caritamrta (Adi 11.55) states, “Srila Vyasadeva described the pastimes of Krsna in Srimad-Bhagavatam. The Vyasa of the pastimes of Lord Caitanya Mahaprabhu was Vrndavana dasa.” Srila Prabhupada elaborates in his purport: “Srila Vrndavana dasa Thakura was an incarnation of Vedavyasa and also a friendly cowherd boy named Kusumapida in krsna-lila. In other words, the author of Sri Caitanya-bhagavata, Srila Vrndavana dasa Thakura, the son of Srivasa Thakura’s niece Narayani, was a combined incarnation of Vedavyasa and the cowherd boy Kusumapida.” Srila Vrndavana dasa Thakura was the last initiated disciple of Sri Nityananda Prabhu.

In Sri Caitanya-caritamrta (Adi 8.33–40, 42, 44) Srila Krishnadasa Kaviraja Gosvami glorifies Srila Vrindavan dasa Thakura and his book Sri Caitanya-bhagavata (then called Sri Caitanya-mangala): “O fools, just read Sri Caitanya-mangala! By reading this book you can understand all the glories of Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu. Thakura Vrndavana dasa has composed Sri Caitanya-mangala. Hearing this book annihilates all misfortune. By reading Sri Caitanya-mangala one can understand all the glories and truths of Lord Caitanya and Nityananda and come to the ultimate conclusion of devotional service to Lord Krsna. In Sri Caitanya-mangala [later known as Sri Caitanya-bhagavata] Srila Vrndavana dasa Thakura has given the conclusion and essence of devotional service by quoting the authoritative statements of Srimad-Bhagavatam. If even a great atheist hears Sri Caitanya-mangala, he immediately becomes a great devotee. The subject matter of this book is so sublime that it appears that Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu has personally spoken through the writings of Sri Vrndavana dasa Thakura. I offer millions of obeisances unto the lotus feet of Vrndavana dasa Thakura. No one else could write such a wonderful book for the deliverance of all fallen souls. What a wonderful description he has given of the pastimes of Lord Caitanya! Anyone in the three worlds who hears it is purified. Srila Vrndavana dasa Thakura has written Sri Caitanya-mangala and therein described in all respects the pastimes of Lord Caitanya.”

In his purport to text 45, Srila Prabhupada writes, “Sri Vrndavana dasa Thakura’s Sri Caitanya-bhagavata was originally entitled Sri Caitanya-mangala, but when Srila Locana dasa Thakura later wrote another book named Sri Caitanya-mangala, Srila Vrndavana dasa Thakura changed the name of his own book, which is now therefore known as Sri Caitanya-bhagavata. The life of Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu is very elaborately described in the Caitanya-bhagavata, and Krsnadasa Kaviraja Gosvami has already informed us that in his Sri Caitanya-caritamrta he has described whatever Vrndavana dasa Thakura has not mentioned. This acceptance of Sri Caitanya-bhagavata by Krsnadasa Kaviraja Gosvami indicates his acceptance of the disciplic succession. A writer of transcendental literature never tries to surpass the previous acaryas.”

And he writes in his purport to text 48, “The subject matter of this book is so sublime that it appears that Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu has personally spoken through the writings of Sri Vrndavana dasa Thakura”—Srila Prabhupada explains, “The secret in a devotee’s writing is that when he writes about the pastimes of the Lord, the Lord helps him; he does not write himself. As stated in the Bhagavad-gita (10.10), dadami buddhi-yogam tam yena mam upayanti te. Since a devotee writes in service to the Lord, the Lord from within gives him so much intelligence that he sits down near the Lord and goes on writing books. Krsnadasa Kaviraja Gosvami confirms that what Vrndavana dasa Thakura wrote was actually spoken by Lord Caitanya Mahaprabhu, and that Vrndavana dasa simply repeated it.”

How blessed we are to receive knowledge of Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu through our glorious parampara—and to be engaged in their service.

Hare Krishna.

Yours in service,
Giriraj Swami

What is the Bhagavad Gita perspective or the Vedic perspective on IVF? I would say that the Bhagavad Gita offers us timeless principles and it is for us to apply them according to our time, place and circumstance. So it’s more that the Gita offers us a compass rather than a catalogue. A catalogue where exhaustively all choices and all circumstances are described.

So I will talk from both perspectives and then I will give my personal understanding. We could say that at one level it is the dharma of householders to have children and we have a debt to our ancestors and we fulfill that debt by having children, continuing the lineage. And we see that in the Vedic times, kings would often go to great endeavours and even extreme endeavours to try to have children.

Sometimes the yajnas would be elaborate, expensive. We can say that the yajnas also are falling within the purview of dharma and that is true. At the same time it’s an effort beyond the normal process of procreation.

So in that sense if one’s primary consciousness is that I want to do the dharma and therefore if I need some, in today’s world, yajna is seen as religion but yajna also that was technology in one sense. Even demons would perform yajnas and they did not do it in a dharmic perspective. They would perform yajnas to get power.

So yajna was technology at that time and today we may have a different kind of technology and we may use technology to fulfill our dharma. Now if we take it further, we are not just trying to adhere to dharma and fulfill our debt to our ancestors. We are also trying to practice bhakti where we would like to serve Krishna by being a medium for devotionally inclined souls to come into this world and to further facilitate their devotional journey so that they can do good in this world and also attain the ultimate destination beyond this world.

So this is the broadly the pro perspective from the perspective of dharma and bhakti. We take the precedent of whatever effort may be required according to context, we do that effort. Now the other side could be that one definition of dharma itself is boundaries.

The difference between devatas and dhanavas is not that the devatas don’t have material desires. Devatas also have worldly desires but devatas keep their worldly desires within the boundaries of dharma. So dharma means duty but dharma also means boundary.

So even for doing our duty we need to act within boundaries. So that’s why warfare was also meant to be fair. That yes you have to kill the opponents but you have to kill them in a fair fight.

So now from that perspective you could say that what boundaries are being violated over here, transgressed over here. So the main concern in IVF is that there are multiple embryos that are formed and when the embryos are growing it is natural to infer that there is a soul over there. Without that growth will not happen.

So those embryos often get wasted and sometimes they may be destroyed. Sometimes they may be preserved in the fridge for a long time to be used by one person or may be donated to others. But the point is there is a lot of wastage of embryos and sometimes the embryos may be considered unviable because they have certain biological deficiencies, neurological deficiencies whatever.

So there is certain amount of we can call it killing which may be a little harsh word. But certainly there is some damage, some serious damage is there. One may feel I do not want to go in that direction.

Now taking this perspective further we could also say that in every activity there is collateral damage. So even in the process of normal reproduction when the semen enters into the female body there are so many sperms over there. Now do all the sperms have souls? We do not really know.

We could say even normal reproduction itself is a wasteful process. So now we also say that depending on the consciousness of the couple at the time of union that kind of soul is attracted. But then we also heard that the soul is already present in the sperms.

So then one logical inference could be that there are many souls who are present in many sperms and depending on the consciousness at that particular time that particular sperm succeeds in reaching and ovulating eventually, contributing to ovulation. So the natural process itself to some extent involves some level of loss of life you could say or loss of the potential to gain embodied life for the souls who are in those particular sperms but which do not reach there. They perish on the way.

Now beyond that nature also has miscarriages. So now when we say we are interfering with nature or we are disrupting the natural process how do we define that? Because we could say that when it is hot and we use a fan are we interfering in the natural process? If we have got cough and we take a medicine, even if it is ayurvedic medicine are we interfering in the natural process? In one sense the very definition of human intelligence is to interfere with natural process that nature has made humans quite vulnerable and slow. It is by our intelligence that we have acquired, we developed weapons by which we could defend ourselves, by which we could become the most powerful species on the earth.

So is it that passively accepting everything that nature imposes on us is virtue? No it is not. It is said that the Pandavas converted the Khando Prastha into Indra Prastha. That is from a natural forest they made into urban place, not even rural, they made urban.

And that’s considered the mercy of Krishna. So here they were at one level destroying the environment. Of course they were doing something beneficial not just for corporate greed but for dharma and bhakti they were doing it.

So where do we draw the line? This is where interfering with the natural process is something which is objectionable. Now we could say that when our interference in the natural process causes harm to others but then destroying the forest caused harm to the living beings in the forest. We could say that those beings are demoniac living beings and who were killed over there.

That may be true but every single person was a demoniac or some beings were demoniac. There is always collateral damage and some people may accept that this is the collateral damage that I am ready to accept. So now if we take this further, when you go into consideration of karma, now my understanding is it is much more helpful to be Krishna conscious than to be karma conscious.

Of course a part of being Krishna conscious, Krishna conscious is like a big circle with that karma conscious is a smaller circle. We should be so karma conscious that we stop being Krishna conscious. Krishna conscious means how best can I serve Krishna in this situation.

Karma conscious is what are the karmic implications of the actions that I will do in this situation. So sometimes there may be some negative karma but if the service to Krishna is going to be facilitated by that anybody may accept that. So if there are less intrusive ways in which the problem of fertility can be addressed.

Say for example some hormonal treatment can be given and that solves the issue. Then that is definitely better than going for IVF. So now beyond that if there are embryos that are preserved and if we donate them to others then at one level somebody might say that we are failing in our responsibility to take care of that child which is our child.

Another way we could also say it is that we are blessing someone who does not have a child with a child. And generally those who are going to such extremes to get a child through this accepting as donation the embryo given by someone else they are unlikely to be careless parents. The fact that they are going through so much effort means that they are likely to care.

We cannot always control that. But then we can’t control how much caring we ourselves will be. We don’t know what we will be able to do in the future.

What condition we will be in physically, financially, emotionally. We can only based on the present knowledge that we have make certain decisions based on that knowledge. So in many ways let’s say if a couple or even a single mother who is not able to take care of a newborn child gives a child for adoption it’s a painful decision for her to let go of the child but then that may be the best for the child.

If she herself is not able to take care of the child. So I wouldn’t say that that necessarily means negative karma. Freezing the embryo for a long time will delay the souls acquiring a body.

Well yes that is true. But then to what extent do we draw that particular line? We could say that every time a man does not unite with a woman that opportunity for the soul that are there in the semen of the man are not getting the opportunity. We could take that further and say that somebody who is a celibate is depriving all the souls in their semen of having a child.

So once we start going in these directions we can go to any extreme in these directions. So this can lead to paralysis by analysis. Now of course there are answers over here that if somebody wants to follow celibacy there are other dharmas to be followed.

Giving a soul a body is one dharma. There could be another dharma of focusing on consciousness of Krishna and then inspiring others to come towards Krishna. So it’s not just that we are following one dharma.

We live in a world where there are many different dharmas and some dharma may be prioritized above another dharma. So it’s not just giving the soul a body. It’s also we have to take care of the soul afterwards.

And so if a couple decides to not have a child for some time that’s not depriving the soul of the body. That’s equipping themselves so that when they have children they can take care of the child properly. Now beyond all this if somebody wants to consider a more natural way that could be adoption.

With respect to adoption also there are different perspectives. For some people the idea is that we don’t know the karma of the child and therefore it may be very difficult if the child has very negative samskaras to actually take care of the child and help the child to grow up properly. That’s a valid consideration.

Now in the Buddhist tradition they also have the philosophy of karma although they don’t accept the atma but they accept the philosophy of karma. And there they consider adoption to be an act of great negative karma neutralization. That means their perspective is that when you accept a child whose karma you do not know you are taking a risk for the benefit of another living being.

And taking that risk for taking care of another living being is a laudable thing. So ultimately how karma works it could be read in different ways. In the Buddhist tradition as per I have seen the concepts of maintaining genealogical purity have not been emphasized that much.

In many ways Buddhism was a rebellion against the caste system and the caste discrimination. So that could be one reason. So you are saying traditionally it was not there it could have been added later as well.

No. And it became a rebellion toward the caste system. Yeah it was from the beginning itself.

One reason what we learn from the Vaishnava history is that it was to stop meat eating. But if you look at the secular history one of the reasons why Buddhism came separate was that Buddhism did accept the caste system. Oh I see.

So in that sense the idea of racial purity and preserving the racial purity is not that important in Buddhism. So among the various religions as far as I know Hindus have the lowest adoption rate. Christians have the highest.

And even then Hindus try to adopt from their extended family or from something like that so that they know the genealogy. So if that is a major consideration from us then that’s one cross for adoption. But if that is not a major consideration then the Buddhist perspective is not incompatible with the Vaishnava understanding.

It’s a service when we are also trying to do outreach. When we are trying to connect with people we don’t know what their karma is. And we are in one sense if we become mentors, counselors, somebody becomes a spiritual master they are taking responsibility of people whose karma they do not know.

Of course in that case those people have committed to a certain degree voluntarily and there is some indication of their spiritual seriousness. So there is some difference over there. But the point of whether the point of karma should be the sole criteria for deciding whether to adopt or not I would say that not the sole criteria.

Ultimately like I said it’s a compass not a catalogue. And each one of us may have to weigh which factor is most important for us. So there are two more points I will make with respect to this that when we are considering something like IVF it’s apart from the expense that is financial there is also a certain level of toll that it takes on the female body.

It’s not a very easy process many times. Sometimes there are much more complications than others sometimes it’s not that complicated. So I would say that there have to be some boundaries to how much one tries it also.

Otherwise repeatedly trying it can also create problems. And the other is that in general our movement is moving more and more towards a certain level of applicational decentralization. Applicational decentralization means that how devotees will apply the principles of Krishna consciousness in their life is something which devotees are deciding individually.

So for example when we were a monastic movement more or less with everybody staying in the temple. The temple authorities or the spiritual masters they were given guidelines for every aspect of life. But now as our movement is spreading different devotees engage with the world to different degrees.

And different devotees function in different ways. So for example what kind of food do we eat? We always eat food that is cooked by us offered in the deity. And then we eat some outside food which is offered mentally taken.

And we may say there are lower and higher standard that’s true. But it’s very difficult to mandate one standard. And some devotees may have a different priority.

Some devotees may consider the food is very very important. Some devotees may say okay I won’t spend so much time on cooking food. I can read scripture, I can talk with people, I can do so many other services if I don’t spend so much time on cooking.

So again within the bhakti hierarchy which particular principle a particular person prioritizes that may vary from person to person. So some people may adopt a more confrontational approach in their preaching because they say ultimately we want serious people. And some others may adopt a non-confrontational approach and they may say that we want people to at least take some steps towards bhakti.

Let them at least, even if they can’t go all the way, let them at least get some ajnansu, get some positivity towards Krishna. So who is right? I can’t really say only one person is right. It’s a matter of some people want to help people come all the way to Krishna.

Others will say at least let them take some steps. So ultimately I would say that we can consult others but it’s an individual decision. And as of now our movement is not intellectually or theologically at a place where it will come up with one statement on this issue.

I don’t see it happening for several years. And also because we are such a global movement, even if we come with one position paper, whether everybody will agree with that position is also open to question. So that’s why it’s something which we can deliberate, maybe pray to Krishna and write down our pros and cons and see what weighs more for us individually.

So in such situations where it’s not an absolute moral black and white, the moral weight of various parameters may be different for different people. So which parameter weighs how much for us is something which we will have to consider and based on that we can make a decision. Thank you.

The post What is the dharmik perspective on IVF or in vitro fertilization? appeared first on The Spiritual Scientist.

What is the Bhagavad Gita perspective or the Vedic perspective on IVF? I would say that the Bhagavad Gita offers us timeless principles and it is for us to apply them according to our time, place and circumstance. So it’s more that the Gita offers us a compass rather than a catalogue. A catalogue where exhaustively all choices and all circumstances are described.

So I will talk from both perspectives and then I will give my personal understanding. We could say that at one level it is the dharma of householders to have children and we have a debt to our ancestors and we fulfill that debt by having children, continuing the lineage. And we see that in the Vedic times, kings would often go to great endeavours and even extreme endeavours to try to have children.

Sometimes the yajnas would be elaborate, expensive. We can say that the yajnas also are falling within the purview of dharma and that is true. At the same time it’s an effort beyond the normal process of procreation.

So in that sense if one’s primary consciousness is that I want to do the dharma and therefore if I need some, in today’s world, yajna is seen as religion but yajna also that was technology in one sense. Even demons would perform yajnas and they did not do it in a dharmic perspective. They would perform yajnas to get power.

So yajna was technology at that time and today we may have a different kind of technology and we may use technology to fulfill our dharma. Now if we take it further, we are not just trying to adhere to dharma and fulfill our debt to our ancestors. We are also trying to practice bhakti where we would like to serve Krishna by being a medium for devotionally inclined souls to come into this world and to further facilitate their devotional journey so that they can do good in this world and also attain the ultimate destination beyond this world.

So this is the broadly the pro perspective from the perspective of dharma and bhakti. We take the precedent of whatever effort may be required according to context, we do that effort. Now the other side could be that one definition of dharma itself is boundaries.

The difference between devatas and dhanavas is not that the devatas don’t have material desires. Devatas also have worldly desires but devatas keep their worldly desires within the boundaries of dharma. So dharma means duty but dharma also means boundary.

So even for doing our duty we need to act within boundaries. So that’s why warfare was also meant to be fair. That yes you have to kill the opponents but you have to kill them in a fair fight.

So now from that perspective you could say that what boundaries are being violated over here, transgressed over here. So the main concern in IVF is that there are multiple embryos that are formed and when the embryos are growing it is natural to infer that there is a soul over there. Without that growth will not happen.

So those embryos often get wasted and sometimes they may be destroyed. Sometimes they may be preserved in the fridge for a long time to be used by one person or may be donated to others. But the point is there is a lot of wastage of embryos and sometimes the embryos may be considered unviable because they have certain biological deficiencies, neurological deficiencies whatever.

So there is certain amount of we can call it killing which may be a little harsh word. But certainly there is some damage, some serious damage is there. One may feel I do not want to go in that direction.

Now taking this perspective further we could also say that in every activity there is collateral damage. So even in the process of normal reproduction when the semen enters into the female body there are so many sperms over there. Now do all the sperms have souls? We do not really know.

We could say even normal reproduction itself is a wasteful process. So now we also say that depending on the consciousness of the couple at the time of union that kind of soul is attracted. But then we also heard that the soul is already present in the sperms.

So then one logical inference could be that there are many souls who are present in many sperms and depending on the consciousness at that particular time that particular sperm succeeds in reaching and ovulating eventually, contributing to ovulation. So the natural process itself to some extent involves some level of loss of life you could say or loss of the potential to gain embodied life for the souls who are in those particular sperms but which do not reach there. They perish on the way.

Now beyond that nature also has miscarriages. So now when we say we are interfering with nature or we are disrupting the natural process how do we define that? Because we could say that when it is hot and we use a fan are we interfering in the natural process? If we have got cough and we take a medicine, even if it is ayurvedic medicine are we interfering in the natural process? In one sense the very definition of human intelligence is to interfere with natural process that nature has made humans quite vulnerable and slow. It is by our intelligence that we have acquired, we developed weapons by which we could defend ourselves, by which we could become the most powerful species on the earth.

So is it that passively accepting everything that nature imposes on us is virtue? No it is not. It is said that the Pandavas converted the Khando Prastha into Indra Prastha. That is from a natural forest they made into urban place, not even rural, they made urban.

And that’s considered the mercy of Krishna. So here they were at one level destroying the environment. Of course they were doing something beneficial not just for corporate greed but for dharma and bhakti they were doing it.

So where do we draw the line? This is where interfering with the natural process is something which is objectionable. Now we could say that when our interference in the natural process causes harm to others but then destroying the forest caused harm to the living beings in the forest. We could say that those beings are demoniac living beings and who were killed over there.

That may be true but every single person was a demoniac or some beings were demoniac. There is always collateral damage and some people may accept that this is the collateral damage that I am ready to accept. So now if we take this further, when you go into consideration of karma, now my understanding is it is much more helpful to be Krishna conscious than to be karma conscious.

Of course a part of being Krishna conscious, Krishna conscious is like a big circle with that karma conscious is a smaller circle. We should be so karma conscious that we stop being Krishna conscious. Krishna conscious means how best can I serve Krishna in this situation.

Karma conscious is what are the karmic implications of the actions that I will do in this situation. So sometimes there may be some negative karma but if the service to Krishna is going to be facilitated by that anybody may accept that. So if there are less intrusive ways in which the problem of fertility can be addressed.

Say for example some hormonal treatment can be given and that solves the issue. Then that is definitely better than going for IVF. So now beyond that if there are embryos that are preserved and if we donate them to others then at one level somebody might say that we are failing in our responsibility to take care of that child which is our child.

Another way we could also say it is that we are blessing someone who does not have a child with a child. And generally those who are going to such extremes to get a child through this accepting as donation the embryo given by someone else they are unlikely to be careless parents. The fact that they are going through so much effort means that they are likely to care.

We cannot always control that. But then we can’t control how much caring we ourselves will be. We don’t know what we will be able to do in the future.

What condition we will be in physically, financially, emotionally. We can only based on the present knowledge that we have make certain decisions based on that knowledge. So in many ways let’s say if a couple or even a single mother who is not able to take care of a newborn child gives a child for adoption it’s a painful decision for her to let go of the child but then that may be the best for the child.

If she herself is not able to take care of the child. So I wouldn’t say that that necessarily means negative karma. Freezing the embryo for a long time will delay the souls acquiring a body.

Well yes that is true. But then to what extent do we draw that particular line? We could say that every time a man does not unite with a woman that opportunity for the soul that are there in the semen of the man are not getting the opportunity. We could take that further and say that somebody who is a celibate is depriving all the souls in their semen of having a child.

So once we start going in these directions we can go to any extreme in these directions. So this can lead to paralysis by analysis. Now of course there are answers over here that if somebody wants to follow celibacy there are other dharmas to be followed.

Giving a soul a body is one dharma. There could be another dharma of focusing on consciousness of Krishna and then inspiring others to come towards Krishna. So it’s not just that we are following one dharma.

We live in a world where there are many different dharmas and some dharma may be prioritized above another dharma. So it’s not just giving the soul a body. It’s also we have to take care of the soul afterwards.

And so if a couple decides to not have a child for some time that’s not depriving the soul of the body. That’s equipping themselves so that when they have children they can take care of the child properly. Now beyond all this if somebody wants to consider a more natural way that could be adoption.

With respect to adoption also there are different perspectives. For some people the idea is that we don’t know the karma of the child and therefore it may be very difficult if the child has very negative samskaras to actually take care of the child and help the child to grow up properly. That’s a valid consideration.

Now in the Buddhist tradition they also have the philosophy of karma although they don’t accept the atma but they accept the philosophy of karma. And there they consider adoption to be an act of great negative karma neutralization. That means their perspective is that when you accept a child whose karma you do not know you are taking a risk for the benefit of another living being.

And taking that risk for taking care of another living being is a laudable thing. So ultimately how karma works it could be read in different ways. In the Buddhist tradition as per I have seen the concepts of maintaining genealogical purity have not been emphasized that much.

In many ways Buddhism was a rebellion against the caste system and the caste discrimination. So that could be one reason. So you are saying traditionally it was not there it could have been added later as well.

No. And it became a rebellion toward the caste system. Yeah it was from the beginning itself.

One reason what we learn from the Vaishnava history is that it was to stop meat eating. But if you look at the secular history one of the reasons why Buddhism came separate was that Buddhism did accept the caste system. Oh I see.

So in that sense the idea of racial purity and preserving the racial purity is not that important in Buddhism. So among the various religions as far as I know Hindus have the lowest adoption rate. Christians have the highest.

And even then Hindus try to adopt from their extended family or from something like that so that they know the genealogy. So if that is a major consideration from us then that’s one cross for adoption. But if that is not a major consideration then the Buddhist perspective is not incompatible with the Vaishnava understanding.

It’s a service when we are also trying to do outreach. When we are trying to connect with people we don’t know what their karma is. And we are in one sense if we become mentors, counselors, somebody becomes a spiritual master they are taking responsibility of people whose karma they do not know.

Of course in that case those people have committed to a certain degree voluntarily and there is some indication of their spiritual seriousness. So there is some difference over there. But the point of whether the point of karma should be the sole criteria for deciding whether to adopt or not I would say that not the sole criteria.

Ultimately like I said it’s a compass not a catalogue. And each one of us may have to weigh which factor is most important for us. So there are two more points I will make with respect to this that when we are considering something like IVF it’s apart from the expense that is financial there is also a certain level of toll that it takes on the female body.

It’s not a very easy process many times. Sometimes there are much more complications than others sometimes it’s not that complicated. So I would say that there have to be some boundaries to how much one tries it also.

Otherwise repeatedly trying it can also create problems. And the other is that in general our movement is moving more and more towards a certain level of applicational decentralization. Applicational decentralization means that how devotees will apply the principles of Krishna consciousness in their life is something which devotees are deciding individually.

So for example when we were a monastic movement more or less with everybody staying in the temple. The temple authorities or the spiritual masters they were given guidelines for every aspect of life. But now as our movement is spreading different devotees engage with the world to different degrees.

And different devotees function in different ways. So for example what kind of food do we eat? We always eat food that is cooked by us offered in the deity. And then we eat some outside food which is offered mentally taken.

And we may say there are lower and higher standard that’s true. But it’s very difficult to mandate one standard. And some devotees may have a different priority.

Some devotees may consider the food is very very important. Some devotees may say okay I won’t spend so much time on cooking food. I can read scripture, I can talk with people, I can do so many other services if I don’t spend so much time on cooking.

So again within the bhakti hierarchy which particular principle a particular person prioritizes that may vary from person to person. So some people may adopt a more confrontational approach in their preaching because they say ultimately we want serious people. And some others may adopt a non-confrontational approach and they may say that we want people to at least take some steps towards bhakti.

Let them at least, even if they can’t go all the way, let them at least get some ajnansu, get some positivity towards Krishna. So who is right? I can’t really say only one person is right. It’s a matter of some people want to help people come all the way to Krishna.

Others will say at least let them take some steps. So ultimately I would say that we can consult others but it’s an individual decision. And as of now our movement is not intellectually or theologically at a place where it will come up with one statement on this issue.

I don’t see it happening for several years. And also because we are such a global movement, even if we come with one position paper, whether everybody will agree with that position is also open to question. So that’s why it’s something which we can deliberate, maybe pray to Krishna and write down our pros and cons and see what weighs more for us individually.

So in such situations where it’s not an absolute moral black and white, the moral weight of various parameters may be different for different people. So which parameter weighs how much for us is something which we will have to consider and based on that we can make a decision. Thank you.

The post What is the dharmik perspective on IVF or in vitro fertilization? appeared first on The Spiritual Scientist.

All glories to the Vyas of Chaitanya Lila, Srila Vrindavan das thakur, a dear devotee of Shri Chaitnaya Mahaprabhu and the disciple of Shrila Nityananda Prabhu, who wrote the Sri Chaitanya bhagawat, a book greatly treasured by all the vaishnavas. 

All gloried to this auspicious day, on which Shrila Vrindavan das thakur took birth from the womb of Shrimati Narayani devi, the niece of Shrivas pandit and the recipient of Shri Chaitanya Mahraprabhu’s unlimited mercy. Shrimati Narayani devi would always be blessed with Mahaprabhu’s remnants, the leftovers after he had eaten, and once on Mahaprabhu’s instruction she danced and called out to Krishna in ecstasy at the tender age of 4. 

Due to Vrindavan das thakur’s father’s untimely departure from this world, while he was still in his mother’s womb, Malini devi, the wife of Shrivas Pandit, brought Narayani devi and Vrindavan das thakur to her father, Vasudev datta’s home in mamgacchi, where he was raised with great love and affection and was cared for as a valuable jem, as stated by Bhaktisiddhanta in his commentary on Shri Chaitanya Bhagwat. 

Thereafter, at the young age of 16, he took shelter of the lotus feet of Shri Nityananda Prabhu and is said to be the last disciple accepted by Nityananda Prabhu. While traveling with him and preaching, he was instructed to remain at Denur and continue preaching there, which he did and his deities of Shri Shri Gaur Nitai are still present at Denur, mercifully bestowing their mercy on all those who go take darshan of them there. 

Later onward he also attended the first Gaur Purnima festival in Kheturi dham organized by Narottam das thakur, where he went with Shrimati Jahnava Ma, the eternal consort of Nityananda Prabhu. He continued preaching and authored the great book Shri Chaitanya Bhagwat, describing the wonderful pastimes of Sri Chaitanya dev, the life and soul of all the gaudiya vaishnavas.

His Shri Chaitanya Bhagwat has been glorified by Shrila Krishna Das Kaviraaj Goswami in the Chaitanya Charitamrita, where he has stated that Shrila Vrindavan das thakur has delivered everyone by writing this masterpiece. 

He further glorifies Vrindavan das thakur, by stating that he is the incarnation of Shrila Vyasadev, as he has written this most glorious book. Shrila Vyasadev had written all the Vedas, Upanishads and the essence of all, Shrimad Bhagwatam, and by appearing again as Shri Vrindavan das thakur he has now written the Shri Chaitanya Bhagwat, which could not have been written by any ordinary human being and seems to have been spoken by Shri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu himself through the lips of Shrila Vrindavan das thakur.

The 1960s marked a spiritual and cultural awakening across the world, and one of the most profound moments of that era was the arrival of His Divine Grace A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Srila Prabhupada in New York City in 1965. With little more than his translations of ancient Vedic texts and an unshakable determination, Srila Prabhupada
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Today is Earth Day, and I think of a prayer that resonated with me in my youth. “The earth is the Lord’s, and the fullness thereof; the world, and they that dwell therein. For He has founded it on the seas, and established it on the floods. Who shall ascend into the hill of the Lord, or who shall stand in His holy place? He that has clean hands, and a pure heart; who has not lifted up his soul to vanity, nor sworn deceitfully. He shall receive the blessing from the Lord.” (Psalm 24:1–5)

Later, when I met Srila Prabhupada, I came across a verse spoken by the Lord Himself, Krishna, which confirmed and expanded the same principle. “A person in full consciousness of Me, knowing Me to be the ultimate beneficiary of all sacrifices and austerities, the Supreme Lord of all planets and demigods, and the benefactor and well-wisher of all living entities, attains peace from the pangs of material miseries.” (Bhagavad-gita 5.29)

How, then, should we deal with the earth and its resources? “Everything animate or inanimate that is within the universe is controlled and owned by the Lord. One should therefore accept only those things necessary for himself, which are set aside as his quota, and one should not accept other things, knowing well to whom they belong.” (Isopanisad 1)

Thus, one should be happy and satisfied in Krishna (God) consciousness.

Hare Krishna.

Yours in service,
Giriraj Swami

A discourse by HG Madana-Gopala Prabhu, 4/15/2025, on passages from the Bhagavatam that describe the churning of the cosmic ocean of milk. The speaker analyzes this episode as a metaphor for spiritual growth and managing one’s own consciousness. Key points: The narrative context: The demigods (celestial beings) have been defeated by demons and approach Lord
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It’s the example is given, say if there is a mountain and there’s an ocean. Now there’s a trickle of water, some water which is meant going to flow towards the ocean. So that ocean is Krishna.

Now the material world is in the mountain and that drop of water is me, the soul. Now each soul has to find its path towards the ocean. Each soul is like a river moving towards the ocean.

But the important thing is that while the river moves towards the ocean, along the way the river also does a lot of good to all the life forms that are on the side, on its backs. So like that, for us, based on our particular nature, our particular talents, our particular interests, our particular stages of growth that we have come to and not yet come to, we all have some karmic debts from our previous lives which we need to pay or neutralize. So we will have to find our individual path to Krishna and in that individual path towards Krishna, we will have to heal from particular wounds, we will have to grow in particular ways so that individuality is also very much a part of us.

If we consider the Pandavas, they’re all great devotees but each of them was an individual. You look at the Mahabharata, actually you cannot think of a pair of siblings more different than Yudhishthira and Bhima. Yudhishthira was like a Brahmin, they were all Kshatriyas, they were all going to be warriors and protectors but Yudhishthira was more like a Brahmin.

He tried to resolve everything with peace even if it is a great personal cost. Yudhishthira was a Brahmin Kshatriya, Bhima was a Kshatriya Kshatriya, he was Kshatriya squared. He was just looking for an opportunity to use his prowess.

Both of them were united in their devotional aspirations. So there is abundant room for individuality in the path of Bhakti also.

The post Does our soul have a specific purpose for this life apart from the universal purpose for all souls to love Krishna? appeared first on The Spiritual Scientist.

Bhaktivedanta Academy Coimbatore Celebrates Its Grand Silver Jubilee at ISKCON Coimbatore The auspicious evening of April 13th, 2025 marked a significant milestone in the Coimbatore Bhaktivedanta Academy, as its celebrated Silver Jubilee marking 25 years of unwavering dedication to spiritual education and devotional service. The grand celebration took place at the serene premises of ISKCON
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This is. This is a book that is, and it’s titled ‘Plays’ inspired by the Bhagavad Gita. For me, among all the scriptures, the Bhagavad Gita is the book which is I have connected with the most. And the Gita’s verses are not just sources of wisdom for me. They are equal friends.

I feel like I have a relationship with all the verses, some more than others. And just like if you have a friend, then you want to know more and more about the friend. And one way you know more about the friend, our friend is by meeting them in different contexts, different places. You know somebody at work, then you meet them at their home, you meet them in some recreational place, you meet them in a temple, you meet them in some high pressure situation. So we learn more.

So like that, I have been when I was writing Gita in the articles and writing books on the Gita, I tried to approach the Gita’s verses from different perspectives. Shriyakopal also said that studying scriptures, cooking lines in the reading, studying from different perspectives. So when I had read Krishna Chitrakar’s commentary on the Gita, that’s one of my favorite commentaries, he approached he shows how the Gita is filled with so much devotion for Krishna. So, I was thinking about how when we approach the Gita’s verses, if we could approach them not just in a mood of understanding, but seeing them as sources of praying. If wisdom can inspire a well informed prayer within our heart.

And then I was going through Gautama Stotra, it’s a composition by Kulusekhar Maharaj, and there I saw something which to me seemed to be a literal application of this. In 12.6seven, Krishna says Desha ma’am samuddhata viptya samsara sahkaranat says, I will lift you out of the ocean of material existence. And, Because you have promised that you will do this, O Lord! So how can we take the Gita’s verses and offer prayers based on that? That’s what I’ve been trying to explore in this book.

So basically, when we have prayers, the prayers can be generally when we sing prayers, we have scriptural or traditional prayers. That means we have mangalati, vihanarsi maati, s o m e, krishna songs. And now these have the weight of authority to them. They are great. It’s coming from scripture.

It’s coming from tradition. And when we sing these, we recite these following the tradition that connects us with the Lord. At the same time, we could offer personal prayers because we all are ultimately meant to develop our relationship with our Sheena. So when you offer personal prayers, that brings authenticity, because this is what we are feeling. We are going through certain situations, we are facing certain challenges, and in those situation challenges, how can we approach the Lord?

So I thought that if we could have prayers that were scriptural plus personal, That means we start with the scriptural words and then compose a prayer based on that that will have the weight of authority and authenticity together. And Rishi Srila Prabhupada does this in his marking in Bhagavad Dharma, the song which he composed when he was approaching America. Then he’s pouring out his own heart, vorokurpa koiye krishna adhale ra prati. But in the middle of that, what he does is, he’s bringing bhagavadam voices. So what he is praying is actually very much based on the bhavatham.

So he prays for example that that if anybody hears Bhagavatam repeatedly, they will become they will become sober. And then Prabhupada is making this statement, but then he’s quoting the Bhagavatam verses where he says Shrutam, Sugata, Krishna, and the whole series of the darajastha mohava how one becomes sober, how one becomes zero? So this is my attempt to do that over here, something similar following with, Krushikar Maharaj and Prabhupada. There are five components in each of the players. The first is that we have the first is we have a beautiful picture of Krishna over here, and then with the picture of Krishna there are different deities from different temples.

Dvds deities they are mentioned at right bottom. Then, the way I am approaching this particular prayer The way I’m approaching this prayer, or this verse of this prayer, that is summarized in one sentence. So please change the memories replaying inside me. And then I’ve taken the Gita’s verse, which which it is based, and then I have translated the verse in English poetry. So, because the Gita is a song, and then when we forget that when we approach a philosophy, we look at a poetic devotional field I have or translate it at the end, based on that there is a prayer that is inspired.

So let’s look at this now. So let’s just recite the words together Most of us know the words, so not responsibly, but let’s do it together. For sense pleasures the wise person abstains, yet the taste in the heart remains, but seeing the supreme sweet and bright even that, craving, loses its might. So, param drishta vivartate. The craving loses its might.

This is Bhavita 2.59. So I would request different devotees to read one paragraph and then we will discuss the topic about Hanumanji today. Who would like to read one paragraph? Do you have a second mic? Or does anyone have a mic in their throat?

Yeah. Here, please. My dear lord, it is impossible to live completely free from exposure to temptation in a world that is filled with temptations. Yes. That’s a basic fact of life.

We can’t really close, guys. You can go ahead. It’s valuable. Yeah, please. Even when I resolve to turn away from them so that the images playing in front of my eyes do not get imprinted in my mind, my mind simply switches gears and replaces them with images from my past, replaying them on an endless loop.

Yes. This is our predicament. We can turn away from tempting objects in the outer world, but those impressions are there inside. And those impressions keep replay. Now temptations interestingly may as early as possible pleasure, but the mind is such that it replays memories not just of pleasure but also of pain.

If somebody has spoken something hurtful to us And they may have spoken it one year ago, but as soon as we see them, those memories get triggered. We start playing. And sometimes we decide, I don’t want to associate with this person also. But still, I’ll keep a distance on that person I feel those memories still stay. So for us, when technology is advancing so much, we have created so many comforts in the outer world, and we are creating more and more comforts.

But what we are terribly lacking in today’s world is the capacity to form healthy memories or the capacity to change the memories that go on ourselves. In fact, many people nowadays grow up with various kinds of trauma. And trauma means what? That some terrible thing happened in the past it may have some physical impact, but more than that, it has an emotional, mental, psychological impact. And, in many ways, the greatest cause of unhappiness in the world at a practical level is not the events that happen in the world.

Yes, there are many distressing, painful events that happen, but actually, it is the memories that are there inside. So the events can cause some unhappiness, but the memories cause far greater unhappiness. And when we say remember Krishna, this might seem just to be like a religious doctrine for those on the path of bhakti and it is true, but it is much much more than that. The process of remembering Krishna is meant to change the memories in our heart, the memories that keep playing inside us. We all seek to create happy memories.

If we go to some nice place, we take some photos. If we have some celebration, we take some photos. One keeps our memories. And those are physical memories. They’re important.

And those physical memories can trigger our internal memories. But irrespective of what triggers are present or not present there are certain memories that are playing inside us constantly. And when Krishna says Janma karmachime devyam he says he comes and performs extraordinary pastimes. One of the things that he does is through these memories, through these pastimes, and through meditating on these pastimes, we have the opportunity to form memories that lift us up, memories that purify and elevate us. So actually recognizing it’s that we have so much technological advancement, but there’s no technology to change memories.

Nothing you can put on your way back. All memories are changed. Now, you can wipe out the memory of a person. You can give them some drugs or you can give them some electric shocks, you can wipe out the memory sometimes. But then that person has become dysfunctional.

Does it change memories? Change memories for the better. Through technology, there’s so much entertainment available. Sometimes some entertainment, maybe they just consume entertainment and they forget it because they consume so much entertainment. Some entertainment may be very active, so it forms some memories.

And how do memories really better memories? So the purpose of performing leela, remembering leela, the lord is performing leela, and for our remembering the leela is to help us change the memories inside us. And among the various things, various pastimes purify us, the pastimes entertain us, the pastimes can captivate us, but through them all, in one sense the purpose of life- I’ll be doing this thing tomorrow also- if you want us from a psychological purpose- perspective It’s not a psychological perspective, no. But the purpose of life is to make our memory our treasury. Right now for many of us our memory might be our prison.

So our memory might be our prison means the memories that are plaguing inside us, they trap us in suffering. Now this person did like this to me. This happened over there, and this mistake happened. Sometimes the memories may be about what others did to us. Sometimes memories may be about what we did to ourselves also.

Mistakes we make. But we need to go beyond these memories. And Srila Prabhupada in Manaprasad Sammita Maunamato Nigra 17.16 Purport, he says the purpose to change the state of the mind is the purpose it is for changing the state of our mind that the Lord performs various pastels and we can turn towards those pastels, remember them and become purified. So with this context we’ll elaborate on this more again later but this just a couple of days ago was Hanuman Jayanti. So we’ll discuss some past tense of Hanuman, but before we go into this let’s get back to this theme of what our purpose is to change our memories.

And how do we change our memories? By finding within the pastimes something memorable. Memorable could be some point, could be some incident, could be some statement, whatever it is. And then that forms fresh impressions inside our mind. So when the lord’s past times are approached, lord’s past times, lord’s devotees past times, I talk about one philosophical thing tomorrow about the way in which you’re approaching the past tense.

But right now, I’m gonna talk about the purpose. So have any of you heard this word? What does it mean? Demigod? Devi and devuddha, yes.

Though I was at one. Actually where was I? Actually I was giving a talk at a, the English department in Cambridge, and there I used the word demigod. I said, this is a wrong using of the word. I said, what do you mean?

Then we had nice discussion on it, but it seems that now Prabhupada uses the word demigod almost in the sense of semigod. Like, somebody who is more powerful than us, but not as powerful as a supreme god. Now in the modern context, in the way the word is used, the word demigod is used in such a different sense. It’s like a demigod is a child of god plus human. That is the main video.

So for example, Arjuna would be considered to be demigod in today’s usage. So Arjuna was born of Indra and Kunti. Mhmm. So somebody who is so in that sense, is a partly god. So that is one way of using it.

So Prabhupada is using it more in the Prabhupada is using it more in the position. A person has a power greater than ours, but not as great as god’s. Now this con con current current usage is in more in terms of origin, that the person is more partly of humans and partly of partly of God. Therefore, not fully God. If a person is born fully of God, then there would be a God directly.

Right? So anyway, Hanuman, in this sense, is a demigod. Who were his parents? Bayu and? Bayu.

Anjina Devi. So now, Anjina was a human lady on the earth, and Bayu was a celestial lady. So now when he was born, there are many stories associated with his past with his past time, and I’ll focus on one particular theme. We’re gonna discuss the topic of maturity. Now children by nature are restless.

Now when she when Anjana was taking care of her child, she just kept her baby down and she went to a nearby room to do some housework. And, children, they’re naturally curious and normally if we have our home, we have a small baby, we’ll baby proof our home. Now Anjana was just sitting around. Anjana had gone next to Anuwa, and he was just lying there looking around. And he looked it up, and he saw, hey, that’s a shiny object, which, I kept by my mother for me.

Now, now, developmental psychology is a fascinating subject. Now, when children understand about things, so some children just don’t have a sense of distance. Not children, small babies. So he nodded. It’s not very far away.

He just jumped up. And he jumped up. He just jumped up and even he didn’t know how much power he had. He just kept streaking through the sky and streaking through the sky and he came closer and closer to the sun. Now this was not the blazing sun of the afternoon.

This was the gentle sun of the morning. So it looked red, but not blazing red. Yeah. It looked really red. And then, initially, when, Suriadev saw this child is coming.

First, he was worried about the for the child. This child would get born. What is the child doing? But when he saw the child kept coming and coming and coming, And the child seems to be charging right towards him. Then initially, he was worried for the child, and he was worried for himself.

You know, if we are going on a if we’re driving a car, and suddenly, you’re driving the car fast, and suddenly, there’s somebody standing in the middle of the road. Get out of the way. But then as, street lights fall, that person has a machine gun pointed at us. Then then from from that person for a hour since. So Surya Dev started increasing his race.

Kept increasing, increasing, but this child seemed unaffected by it. And then he panicked. And now there’s natural rivalry between Surya Devarindra. But in this case, Surya felt the emergency. I need help.

I need help. So he immediately went to Indra Dev. And he said, Indra, what happened? He said, ‘Hey. Look at him.’ So this child is tweeing straight even.

He was surprised. And now for Indra, Surya coming to his help, coming to ask for help was also a special thing he said. I cannot feel you. I have to show you my power. So Indra didn’t think care.

Of me. Just took his wajra and hold it at Hanuman. And Hanuman was a small baby at that time. Now Hanuman was powerful, but when we look at the stories, what happened was he was powerful. He was written on how powerful he was.

So first, this shiny object is coming and see another shiny object is coming. So he didn’t do anything. Now hit him on his face, especially in his jaw, and he reeled back. And he reeled, and he came crashing down on the ground. Now why you saw what was happening?

Like a like a father may see the child’s antics and be happy. So why was happy? Oh, what is that child doing? But then everything happened so fast. Why would it expect that Indra would throw a thunderbolt?

This is a small child. He’s mischievous. He’s not malicious. He’s not destructive. But when the thunderbolt was hit, my unit rushed forward and she softened the fall of the child.

Child fell gently on the floor. And then he became enraged. He said, what did you do with this small child? So Indira said, he was not acting like a small child. He said no, he was just a small child.

You would have stopped him anyway. He said no, this was the only way to stop him. So now what happens is that when some action is performed and that two people may have different evaluations of the nature of that action. Sometimes it’s very dangerous, sometimes it’s not all dangerous, it’s just fun. So Indra felt it was dangerous and why you felt it was outrageous or excessive use of power?

Sometimes it happens here in America, people have guns and there’s a small some stranger comes and somebody takes a machine gun and shoots the stranger. He says, no. Who knows the stranger might have a machine gun that should be? But sometimes the stranger might just be like a a harmless elderly person who is lost and doesn’t know and looking to find the way. So there’s always danger of excessive use of power.

So Indra used power excessively. Why you were then deranged? Why you said? You did this to my child. I’ll punish all of you.

And he suddenly stopped flowing. Now you stopped flowing. Everybody’s very suffocating. When everybody’s very suffocating, then the became allowed. And then they realized this is very serious.

But they all came to pacify you. And they realized the way to pacify you is to profusely bless you. You. And Hanuman seemed to be as if as if lifeless. But by the blessings of the deyotas, we all came back to life.

He came back to life. And of course, the blow that had retreated to my face, it slightly shifted the anatomy of his face. That’s how he got the name Hanuman. His name was Maruti. Now the biggest diktas blessed him.

And now when they blessed him he could do extraordinary things. Even without blessings he could do extraordinary things and now with blessings he became extraordinarily extraordinary and that is not a compliment. What happened is that. We’ll be discussing this broad theme in present world session. There is ability and there is maturity.

And maturity means the ability to use ability wisely. So, now, if you consider four quadrants over here, we have ability and maturity. So we could have ability but no maturity, no ability, no maturity, maturity but no ability, maturity and ability both. Now, which of these is the situation in which Hanuman was now? Sorry?

So which quadrant? Quadrant, yes. So now baby Hanuman was or maybe a child Hanuman was in this quadrant. Now as he grew up he had his extraordinary powers and he started doing mischievous things. So, Vivekanumar, he was mischievous.

But, that mischievous was no longer fun. It was dangerous. It is not dangerous for him, it is dangerous for everyone else. And then that became a problem. Now of course, for many people, if they have ability without maturity, they may go far beyond being mischievous.

They may become malicious. Malicious means they may use that power deliberately to hurt others. And they may not be hateful people, but at that time, a surge of anger, a surge of negative emotion comes and they may do something which they may themselves separate afterwards. So what we will be discussing in the program tomorrow’s session is this journey. So we have from baby Hanuman, the adult Hanuman that we see in the Sundarkandir and especially the Hanuman who goes to Lanka.

Now we could see these are transcendental characters and they’re always all perfect and that is true. But for as far as our learning lessons, we can see how the journey toward maturity happens. The best situation is where a person has ability and ability to use the ability wisely. That is where so we could say ability plus maturity, this is the person who is who is powerful and helpful. Their ability, they know how to use their ability.

Here what happens is, they’re powerful and helpful. Here they become powerful plus maybe helpful, maybe harmful. So we don’t know. Kaleidiasis would have a maturity. They’re powerful plus unpredictable.

Now some people are unpredictable and some people at this level may actually not be they may be predictable but they will predictably distort. That’s also not a good. Now if we have somebody who has no ability and no power, no no ability, no maturity, what happens? They are basically powerless. They may want to harm others, but they are powerless to actually harm others because they don’t have much ability.

Now if somebody has maturity plus no ability, what will happen? They they can do good, but they don’t have much ability to do good. So here, if you want to describe all of these in one word, this will be this person will be under effective because they don’t have some say, suppose a batsman has a very cool head, but the batsman doesn’t have a very good batting talent. So they they do not get hot headed, do not make a rash shot and get out, but the batsman can’t hit very very extraordinary exercise or anything like that. So that password is under effective.

Here it is effective. Here it will be ineffective. And the last will be it is destructive. Destructive in small or big ways. So when Hanuman was growing up, he was mischievous.

And initially his mother tried to restrain him, but soon he outgrew her in strength, in capacity yeah? So as he was growing up, afterwards now children often don’t have a sense of, sense of time place circumstance. You know what to speak when, how to what to do when. So it’s okay to be mischievous with other kids, but thou Hanuman was just mischievous in the forest, and in the forest there were sages. And sages are known for their ages.

Sometimes they get angry. If they get angry, they can be cursed. In the very context, being cursed by a sage is considered one of the most dangerous things. But Hanuman is carefree. Sometimes the sages would go out of their hermitage for some work and he would lock the hermitage.

I mean, they would be inside and he would lock them inside. Sometimes he would just they would be doing the sacrificial, sacrifices and they have to do a pile of wood which would be there for killing the doing the sacrifice and then you just take the whole pile of wood and go somewhere and then we again There’s no hope he left over here. So now he was not malicious, but he was displeased with us. And then the sages decided to what did they do? -Curse him.

-Now the word curse is a little harsh word. So, were they angry with him? Well, yes, they were displeased with him. But they didn’t really want to harm him. So they thought it was a very curious curse.

What was the curse that they gave him? He’ll forget his powers. Not that he will lose his powers. He will forget his powers. And for how long?

That seems very strange. You know? They they they curse someone, they curse him, and then they will have a response for it to rise him. And all the curses gone no longer affected. But the idea was the curse here, the point was that they wanted that Hanuman become mature.

That, so when he was reminded, it is. Somebody has to remind him that reminder has to come at the right time. So, a reminder has to come at a time when the world actually needed this power and needed it very acutely, where it was something which was vital. So normally when you think of the word ‘curse’ -curse it can have two different meanings: curse can refer to external, curse can refer to internal. Normally we think of curses as externs, you know, that if somebody suddenly loses their distance, somebody still gets a sudden sickness, you know, we feel it’s like a curse situation of a curse.

So we have curses where people’s external situation changes in one moment. So Nalukkor and Mani grew very powerful. You know what happened? One curse went just became like trees. Everything was lost.

So curse can be extraneous. So there can be an external loss that can be for the curse. But quite often when there is an internal loss, that can also seem like a curse. I started by talking about memories. Sometimes, if a negative memory just keeps replaying inside us again and again and again, we feel as if I’m cursed.

Something terrible somebody has done something terrible to us. We may go to a beautiful scenic place also. But even at that place, we feel as if that memory if the memory keeps playing inside us, then we think, oh, what happened over here? Why am I remembering this so much? We sometimes feel as if I’m cursed.

We want to sometimes we want to forget something, we want to forgive someone. But it just doesn’t happen. So, in one sense, if you consider memory, many of us think that the loss of memory is a curse. As soon as we are studying for exam, and we forget at the time something, we feel it’s a curse. We meet someone, and that person remembers us and we don’t remember that person.

And it happens very often. It just feels like a curse. And now some people have the they may have an innocent habit but it’s they they may be like, do you remember me? They were just actually anxious. So that’s understandable.

But when that happens, what happens is you feel as if the loss of memories occurs. But sometimes the presence of memory can also be a curse. That if I want to forget something, I just can’t forget it. So conversely, the loss can be a blessing. To it.

And the presence that can also be a blessing. So far, are we getting this? Sometimes we we lose memory of something unpleasant, something unpalatable. That’s a blessing. I was talking with one devotee.

He said he met some devotee recently and that devotee had terribly hurt him. So I told him how was it interesting? He said, it was quite nice. And then no one, nothing unpleasant. He said, no, it’d be nice.

And I said, it’s bumpy. I had forgotten it. So, I said, when he had told this to me, he was very hurt and he needed some counseling. I tried to pacify him. So I said, you know, I don’t know whether to appreciate your forgetfulness or to curse my remembrance.

-So, sometimes loss of memory can also be a blessing. And sometimes the presence of memory can of course be a blessing, that we understand that. So in that sense, memory is a funny thing. So now if we consider that when Hanuman was cursed to lose, you could say there is memory, memory is present, and memory is absent. And it’s a blessing or it’s a curse.

So now, at one level, Hanuman forgetting his power it was a curse. But was it really a curse? No, he was mischievous and his children were mischievous, but in that, that mischievousness, it was no longer having that power by which he would have explored any things. And in that sense his loss of memory Hanuman’s loss was it a curse or was it a blessing? How many of you think it is a loss?

How many of you think it is a blessing? How many of you think it is a blessing? How many of you think how many of you are lost to know whether it is a blessing? -Yeah. -So the point is that sometimes we cannot know in the situation what something is.

And that situation may feel something terrible, but it may not be. So, one aspect of humility, humility especially in bhakti, When something terrible is happening in our life, we feel, you know, why is Krishna letting this happen? Why is Krishna not doing anything to stop this from happening? So humility in bhakti, one way of understanding it is that understand that my finite vision is not the final vision. Humility means that I understand that a finite vision of a situation is not the final vision of the situation.

In my finite vision, this can seem terrible. And, yes, at that level, it may be terrible, but is that the final vision of the situation? Maybe, maybe not. So when Hanuman was cursed to lose something, in that process of losing something, he would end up getting something. So that loss of ability actually fostered his maturity.

It enabled him to grow further. Many of you know that I have polio that I need crutches for walking. So when I was one, my mother had taken me to a physician to get a polio vaccine, and I was very I don’t remember any of this. And we were staying in a small town in Maharashtra, and, unknown to our parents, my mother my father-in-law was stationed at that time, that particular clinic where the poly vaccine must be administered had a power outage the previous night and because of that the fridge temperature had risen and because of the rising temperature the germs in the vaccine had multiplied and then the attendant gave that particular vaccine to the doctor and doctor gave that vaccine And the vaccine, instead of preventing polio, ended up causing polio. Now I don’t remember any of it.

I was just learning to walk and I fell and I could I could never walk normally. But my first memory is about when I was two and a half or three, And at that time a distant relative had come to our place and she was consoling my mother. She said, oh, it’s so sad. Your son got polio.’ And I remember my mother’s voice calm, clear, confident. He said, whatever he lacks physically, God will provide him intellectually.

Now I don’t know why my mother said that. At two and a half or three, what intellectual signs I had see shown. I don’t know. But somehow that stayed with me. Not the God part, the intellectually part.

At least initially, the intellectually part. And as I grew up, I couldn’t play outdoor games like other kids could play. So part of it was part of it felt this is unfair. But then as I started studying, going to school, or even reading books, I found that I could read quickly, I could remember things well, I could articulate things clearly, and then a part of me said maybe I didn’t articulate it like that, but a part of me said that I could say that I didn’t do anything to deserve this physical disability and that is unfair. But then I didn’t do anything to deserve this intellectual ability also.

So sometimes we get less than what we deserve, sometimes we get more than what we deserve. In the big picture, life is fairly unfair. It is unfair, but it is. Sometimes we get more, sometimes we get less. And that’s why at that point, at a particular time, a particular thing might seem to be a curse.

But our finite vision is not the final vision of x. So I’m very grateful to my mother that she expanded my vision at that time. So so now Hanuman has been cursed, but his very curse or rather the loss of his powers whether you want to call it a curse or a blessing the loss of his powers will actually lead him to the development of his character. That when he doesn’t have any extraordinary powers to use, then what happens? Then one has to actually become mature!

To make two points, an actual journey towards maturity we’ll discuss in tomorrow’s session. So now sometime when I started this story, sometime and we talked about Suryadev when a child jumping up to the sun and catching the sun, and we say, oh, this is stupid. This is not unbelievable. These are kids’ stories. Unbelievable stories.

Now, yes, that’s one way of looking at it, and I’ll discuss this more tomorrow, but if you look at these scriptural stories, there are two ways in which you can see them. There are one way, some ways in which they are dissimilar to us. Dissimilar to our situations. And they are primarily in two ways. In the abilities that characters have.

For a kid to jump up to the sky, for somebody to have 10 heads. So all these abilities are extraordinary. And the arenas. Arenas means the places where these things happen. There is heavens, and there is this place, and that place.

We don’t experience those kind of places in today’s world. But there are very important means in which they are similar. And how are they similar? It is similar in that all the characters they have limitations. Every character has nobody they may have extraordinary abilities, but nobody has supreme power.

Now, of course, the god has supreme power, and that’s true. But even when god comes in this world to perform leaders, is it always described as is it always manifest? It’s omnipotence all the time. So just as we have limitations, our particular limitation may be different. So Hanuman, he could go right up to the sun, but he couldn’t counter the wajra of Indra.

So we all have limitations and and the characters in scriptures also have limitations. And the second is that everybody has accountability. Accountability means the actions that they make have consequence. So now the specific actions that they do and the specific consequences they have, they will be different. But these two principles that everybody has to deal with limitations, and everybody will make choices that will have consequences, and they have to deal with those consequences, they have to live with those consequences.

And it is this when you look at this, we can get some entertainment if we wanted, or explore the power someone has, or explore the domains people exist in. But this is where we actually get elevation, we get education, we get understanding of how to live in our life. Now, Rawan had the capacity to change his form and take on the form of a sage and whatever else he could do. But he still could not do everything. He had limitations.

He had wounds, but still he was vulnerable to humans. He was vulnerable to monkeys. And he made certain choices, and those choices had consequences. So you probably know this character Superman. Now, Superman, nowadays, this is the whole movie movie is about superheroes.

Superman was the first superhero. He. There’s some movie some character. Some author who developed in 1929. When America was in a deep depression, they wanted some character who would lift up the spirits of Americans.

And since then, it’s been going on. But around 1950s, something very curious happened. That as these characters are not created by only one person, you know, one person creates another, makes some more comics, and then it goes on and on. So what happened that as time passed, they started making Hanuman not Hanuman, Superman. Okay.

So as time passed, they started making Superman more and more powerful. Mhmm. His power started increasing. At one time, in some of the stories, Anuman Okay. But, you know, at one time, he could just look with his eye, his superman, and just blow up satellites.

He got enormous amount of powers. And what they found curiously, as his power increased, his popularity decreased. Why? Because generally in any story, if there is no tension, then there is no attention. That if if we write from the beginning only no this person is so powerful is going to win now we may know that he was going to win over the period but still we want to know how he’s going to win but if there’s everything is so predictive if superman is so powerful that any nobody can even touch him.

Then what happens is there’s no excitement. There’s no suspense. So when the when the power is enormous, then there’s no attraction left because you can just do anything. So then the hero then the comic creators, they created this whole concept of what is that? Kryptonite.

So Kryptonite by which Superman would become Muslim. And all his enemies would use that. And then that’s where the character’s popularity centralized him once again. So the point is that everybody, when they face limitations, that’s when in those limitations, how they act, how they grow, how they face those limitations, and how they grow beyond the limitations. That’s what makes the character’s story interesting.

So Hanuman had enormous power and his power will come back to him eventually. But when the ability is lost, that’s the time he takes to develop maturity. With limited ability, what can I do? How can I do it?’ And we’ll see in tomorrow’s session how Hanuman is developed through the choices he makes? And then finally, when Jam Bawand reminds him of his power, that’s the time his abilities come back, but he has developed great maturity by that time.

I was, giving a talk a couple of months ago, I was in The Middle East and, and as you know, I was telling a story about how Sita was abducted. And most of us know that story, how Maricha is finally shot by Ram, then he called out exactly in Ram’s voice, say. Lakshman! Sita! And that’s when Lakshman was told and Sita forced Lakshman to go to help Ram.

So one boy asked me this question that I. When Maricha called out. Lakshman, Sita, why did Ram call out? That’s not me. That’s Maricha.

The whole problem could have been avoided. So so I told him that Actually, Lord Ram is all powerful. But although Lord Ram is all powerful, if he simply were all powerful and that’s what he were doing, and he didn’t have to change the deal also, he couldn’t just have been there armed long and caught them here. So men, although the Lord is all powerful, this is the Lord, when he comes to the earthly level, he it’s said that he does naraleela. When he comes to this earth, he acts like a human being.

Now above the humans are the gods, and below the humans are the demons. Now this above and below is in terms of morality. Devatas are supposed to be better than humans, and the asuras are supposed to be worse than humans. But actually both the devatas and the asuras are physically stronger than the humans. And because of that, Marich because Marichya was an asura, his voice was much stronger.

And Rama’s being being, helped play because Rama was playing a human role, at that time his voice was not strong enough. And that’s why he ran back. So the point is even the Lord’s pastimes, they they become suspenseful, they become interesting when the Lord also acts within limitations and within the limitations the Lord does extraordinary things. Now of course the Lord’s limitations are not imposed on him by anyone The Lord is not cursed for anyone. He chooses when he’ll come out there.

Sometimes he acts like a finite being. And sometimes he will show extraordinary power. But when the power is lost at that time, that is when the character is seen. That what does the person do when power is lost? That person just becomes hateful, that person feels sorry for themselves, and they just become bitter.

Understandably, some does that. But it’s not very helpful. So Hanuman will see what he does in tomorrow’s session. The last one, I mean, you know what? Let’s see.

For all of us, if we have power and if we have character, the same one is ability and maturity. And I’ll just focus on something different over here. See, if there’s no power but no character, then the person becomes prideful. Now prideful is the least of the problems. From there, they can become hateful.

They can become vengeful. Because the power, they can use it for bad purposes. Now if somebody has no power and no character, then what happens? They become resentful. Resentful means why does anyone else have power?

Why is this person so good? Why is this person so good? Why is that person so good? It’s, this some people their whole lives are just filled with resentment. When communism started it promised that there’ll be wealth will be distributed, everybody will have equal wealth.

But what happened was that it’s not that everybody became wealthy, It is that communism was actually driven in real life not by compassion for the poor, but envy towards the wealthy. And then there’s some people who said, we will we’ll steward wealth equally. But then they had the power to decide whom to distribute wealth with. And so there’s a social commentator. He said that in communism, all people are equal, but some are more equal than others.

So basically, there’s a lot of worldview that is driven by resentment, and resentment does not do anything good. It just hates those who are doing something good. Those who have something good, those who do something good. That’s not very helpful. Now, if somebody has power and somebody has character, then they are grateful.

They are grateful. Hanuman will say, when he gains power, he never becomes proud, he never becomes arrogant. Hanman is grateful. Now somebody has character and even if they lose power, then they remain graceful. They don’t become resentful.

Yes? It is Krishna, give me power. Krishna took my powers away from me. It doesn’t matter. So, now, among these, if you consider having power without character, Both are harmful.

Being prideful and being resentful, both are harmful. And if we have character, whether we have power or we don’t have power, you know, it is always positive. So sometimes we may feel that some power has been taken away from us. The power could be the power of wealth. The power could be the power of some position.

The power could be the power of, good reputation. I mean, some people may just spread some rumors about us. That power going away is a painful thing. But we can see that power going away as an opportunity to develop our character, to grow in maturity. And that’s what will happen to Hanuman, and that’s what we’ll discuss in tomorrow’s session.

I’ll summarize what we’ll discuss today. Mainly discussed four points. I started to read out how life in one sense is defined not so much by wealth or power or things it is defined much more by memories. The greatest source of unhappiness for most people is not the events that happen in their life, but the memories that keep playing in their life. So, successful life is all about creating positive memories.

That is what the leaders to happiness. And bhakti is what enables us. And bhakti, the remembrance of the real law of the Lord. That is what is meant to help us create these healthy and happy memories. Within that, we discussed Hanuman’s story, and in Anuman’s story we discussed very three stages.

First was his being his his childish attack is okay, let’s put him on this way his infancy. In infancy what happened was, he had as a terror he had great blessings, and those great blessings became mischievous he was hit, and he was blessed further. So he had powers, and from the powers, he became almost lifeless. And after that, he became even more powerful. And that was, in verses, glorious what happened.

And then after that, we discussed about how he, with his ability what he started doing was his ability, and that is maturity. So was he cursed? Well, you could say the journey of Anubhana is from having ability without maturity to having both ability and maturity. It’s the journey we are going to discuss. And then we discuss about the forgetfulness.

Anyways, the series cursed him. So loss of not power, but loss of the memory of its power. So that, was it a curse or is it a blessing? It depends we discussed it. It could mean we have, we remember, and we forget.

And that could be a blessing, that could be a curse. So for us, whenever we look at life situations, we have a finite vision. And that finite vision should probably be seen as the final vision. What is a blessing? What is a curse?

We really told that at our stage that sometimes what seems like a curse could turn out to be a blessing, and what turns out seems to be like a blessing may turn out to be a curse. And then lastly, we discuss how when something something bad happens to us, how do we respond to it? So, Hanuman’s I talk about when you look at these stories, you see how how these stories are dissimilar and how these stories are similar. So dissimilar in terms of the abilities that they have and the arenas, the places that they do it, but similar in the sense that they all face limitations, and within the limitations they are all accountable. Accountable.

You do actions and those have consequences. So Hanuman also faced a limitation he says that his power suddenly went away. And then he was held it was not really cursed but he was held accountable. What you do at that time. So we discussed this journey, we may have power, and we have character.

So if there is power but no character, then what happens? Can you remember? Prideful. And that could be a waste of the problems. It can be much worse.

Is it that power now, character? Presentfulness. Presentfulness. Why should anyone have anything good in their lives? It’s very bitter.

There’s power and character? Then they’re grateful. Of course, they’re powerful naturally they have power, but they’re grateful for the power. Then some of the power goes away, then they are graceful. So in many ways we see that Hanuman’s geodomy will be where he will gain power.

So either way, having power without character is unhealthy and having character with or without power is healthy. But we all would like to go where we have power and character. That’s where Hanuman will, and that’s where how we can go through our life journey, that’s what we’ll discuss in our future session tomorrow. Thank you very much. Hare Krishna.

Is there any question or comment? Yes, sir. Thank you for the very nice presentation. I have two questions. The aspect of, not seeing the finite vision or sorry.

Not, taking the finite vision as the final vision. Where does where does that view our individual actions in the sense that in terms of changing or making events? Like, let’s say, whether it’s, to see the blessing or as it occurs. If you just say, okay, this is just a finite thing. I have not seen the final vision, so let me not do anything.

Would it lead to, like, a complacent attitude like that? Yeah. Definitely. See, there are two different things over here. When he says don’t see the finite vision as the as the final vision, that does not mean that the finite vision is always a wrong vision.

It’s just not the complete vision. So just yesterday, I was in my tomorrow, I had a whole class on this topic about how when some problem comes in our life, how do we see the cause of the problem? If right now I’m speaking, this mic stopped working, then should I think that, okay, why does the mic stop working? Maybe I did some Bhaskar mind in a previous life. No.

Generally, whenever we try to look at causality, say, if somebody eats on a cold night a dozen ice creams, At night they were saying ice cream ice cream I want more ice cream. The next morning they have a terrible throat and they say ice cream. Now now their throat is terrible. Is it because of past karma? Yes.

Well, yes. But it is not past life’s karma. It is past night’s karma. So generally, in Vedic logic, it’s called Nyaya. Whenever we are looking for the cause of something, causality is the principle of looking for causes.

So first we start with visible causes. Then we go toward invisible causes. And within invisible also, first we look at invisible material causes, then we look at invisible spiritual causes. That means that if the finite by the finite vision there is some explanation, then we should look for an explanation. And we should try to fix that.

But if by the finite vision there’s nothing that can be done, then move forward to something bigger. So the point is not so much what, how we look at our finite vision. It is more that how do we respond to it, in the sense that for all of us, it is our dharma, the right thing to do. That is the most important thing. Sometimes the right thing that I do will have an effect and sometimes the right thing that I do may or not have the effect.

So then I may say that okay my finite vision is limited over here but we should not use that as an excuse for not doing the right thing. Say, if we have cooked some food and say the it’s sweet rice but there’s no sweet in the rice Zombie rice. You shouldn’t tell somebody that there’s no sweetness. That’s your finite medium. That’s your finite perception?

No. Fix it right now. When it can be fixed, it should be fixed. But some so when, Ram is exactly the forest, at that time, Kaike, Lakshman is very enbreached by all that’s happening. And he wants to first, he’s angry with Ashwath, then he becomes angry with Kaikeyi.

And at that time, he says that his wife’s speaking very harshly about Kaikeyi, and Ram says, you know how much Kaikeyi loved me.’ Her love was like the flow of the river Dhunba incessant and pure. So that Lakshman is not done, he says. That’s what I can’t understand. How did the Ganga dry up in one night? And then Ram says, that’s why when I heard her speak those words, I understood this is the will of destiny.

When somebody’s behavior has no explanation as far as we can see it, then we can say my final conclusion isn’t complete. There’s something more going on over here. But if I have spoken so hurtfully to someone and then that person is cold with me, and I’m just, you know, this is for the past karma. No, this is not past karma. You did something right, doctor.

So we need to see what is the right thing for us to do, and our vision should be such that it encourages us to do the right thing, not that it justifies not doing the right thing. If a person is if some some person is very sick then if we can help them we should help them at that time. Take them to doctor, give them some treatment. But sometimes despite giving the best treatment, the person will not get cured. That’s when you understand a finite vision is not the final question.

Okay? I have a another question. This is more of a clarification. So Hanuman forgetting his abilities, out of that curse. So if somebody reminds him, is that a one time thing or and then all the memories come back and it will not go away or maybe require frequent reminders.

See generally the exact ways in which curses work and how curses are revoked – that particular mechanism is not talked about much in scripture. There is a mystical element to the curses, to how they act and how they are revoked. So now my understanding is here that the sages had a particular purpose. It was not to punish a numa, not to hurt a numa, not to deprive him. It was to help him grow.

Like sometimes, you know, some kids may just have phenomenal talents. Some kids maybe a three, four year old kid can pick up a musical instrument and be like a genius. Now, on one side, if some parents are gifted with such a child, they say gifted they’re gifted child, then it’s important for the parents to develop the gift of that child. But at the same time, it’s also important while the child is extraordinary and an extraordinary talent has to be developed, it’s just as important for the parents, the child also have a normal childhood. The child will naturally have that talent and will that talent is nourished but that is still a child.

The child’s normal growth also has to happen. Isn’t it so? Now both sides are there the extra the extra the extraverted side has to develop, but that is not if the child is defined only by the talent, then what will happen is that it can have many different psychological effects. The child will just think I am so special and everybody nobody has of any value. Child can become very proud and that’s not very good for that person to know.

All the child is are thinking that you know, I have no value without this dialect. So I was, I was trying to devote his home, and they have this this kid, you know, he was like, he at the year four he started playing chess. His father was playing chess with a friend and he said, ‘Daddy, I want lunch he says no, medium role in Lourdes, I’ll teach you’ he said don’t teach me now’ and he taught us his father taught him the first game as his father repeated all the way the second game he defeated his father And and I went to the eight and a half night and he was like the he was the Canadian under ten champion. He’s a brilliant boy. So I was staying at the home, I was talking with him.

So I my childhood, I also like chess quite a bit, so we were talking about it. So then he told me that out of all my little, I like my grandmother very much. This grandmother has no understanding of chess. So why do you know this? See, she loved me before I was special.

Now, this child is so insightful. So my point here is that sometimes we have to make sure that it’s a holistic growth. Singhs are not really cursing him. His powers were there with him. But he wanted to ensure that it was a holistic growth of the person.

Not we are not just performers, you know, we are persons. And we need to if we have we can perform, that’s wonderful. But we don’t want realignational growth. Thank you so much. And last question or any comment?

Okay. Two questions. That’s good. Okay. That’s good.

Well, thank you, Babaji. Very nice lecture. In the previous slide, you said with limitation, you can go you can get a elevation. Right? How is that possible?

With limitations, we get elevation. Yeah. In previous slide, like, couple of slides. No. I was here with limited how it’s Okay.

I’m saying with limitation and elevation. I was saying that studying scripture and looking at how even there the characters have limitations, and how within those limitations they act wisely. From that we can learn and can grow. Now if the only thing special about Anuman is that he could leap across the river and leap across the ocean, There’s nothing for us to learn from Anima. Because we can’t do that.

If somebody thinks the only thing I have to learn from Anima is one day I have to leap across the ocean. Then that character will become, okay, it’s a superhero character, nothing to learn from us. But even these characters have limitations some way or other. And within those limitations, or because of these limitations, sometimes they also feel they make such choices and they have consequences for the children. They are held accountable.

But in spite of that, they could. So the elevation happens not because of limitations. Elevation happens by focusing on this principle that how these great characters also act wisely. And similarly, we can also learn to act wisely. Okay?

Okay. Yes, please. Can you pass the mic Thank you so much for your wonderful class always. I have a question on the ability to maturity transformations. One of the point you mentioned that ability kind of converted into the powerful and if you do not have maturity, it is unpredictable, Right.

So Hanuman, he when he was an infant, he had the power but he was unpredictable. But in the same past time, if you see Indra and Vayu, right, you can also come to a conclusion that he was powerful, yet unpredictable when he threw the Vayu. Same thing with Vayu. He was powerful, but unpredictable by stopping the flow of the wind, right. Was there any transition for those act between innovative and good question.

YU you move from ability to the materialist? See, within the Vedic tradition, the devtas have a very curious position. Devtas are often objects of worship, but very rarely are the devtas considered to be role models. That often the sijis are considered to be role models. The wise people, the brahmanas, they are considered to be individual.

The kings are said to be the darshayati sreshtas. But often the devtas, they have this curious position within the universe that they are above us humans but they’re not they’re not in the spiritual world. So while they quite often the way they act often shows how even good people may misuse power, may get may get allured by pleasure, may get tempted, may get intoxicated. So, the Detshwar dhyutas, they are worshipped because they can use some blessings, but they are not considered as a whole mortals. And, other dhyutas held accountable for their actions?

Well, there are times when that also happens. It may not happen exactly exactly the same way it happens on Earth. See, one of the things that happens because of karma is that always action will have result. But if somebody has good karma, for example, then what will happen is the action will lead to a result after a very long time. How is that?

It depends. Like somebody is born if somebody wastes money, they’ll become a popper. But if somebody is born in a fabulously wealthy family, and they waste money, they will also become a pauper. They will also become poor. But that may take a long time.

So sometimes, karma can create an intuition between the action and the manifestation of its result. And devatas are beings who have gone to the heavenly domains because of past punya. And because of that past punya, their actions often don’t seem to lead to consequences. The consequences are there, but they take a lot some amount of time to manifest. So sometimes in the Vedic literature it is said that the law of karma doesn’t apply to the dildas.

It’s not that simple. It is the dildas are also held accountable in particular they offend the sages and they are held responsible. They have become reckless and attacked by the asuras. But because of the past phobia, they may not be held accountable immediately for their actions. But the principle of we having agency and we being responsible for our actions is a universal principle.

The exact way when it will manifest, that’ll be very. Say, you know, if to make a comment on the current political situation, somebody may gain power, and they can use that power as much as they want. They may think they’re using it for good, they may be using it for bad. Different people can have different opinions about it. Whatever it is.

But nobody has absolute power. While they have power, they can they can do good, they can do heroic. But then that power is going to end. Maybe the next elections comes up, the next the tenure ends, maybe whatever happens. So during that time, when a person has power, they can do a lot of things without any seeming consequences.

The consequences will be there, but sometimes the power can insulate one from the consequences for some time. So thank you very much.

The post Hanuman’s Journey to Maturity, Part 2 – 4 Characteristics of Maturity – HG Chaitanya Charan Das appeared first on The Spiritual Scientist.

How many of you were there yesterday? Okay. How many of you were not there yesterday? Okay. How many of you are not there today?

Alright. Okay. So We’re discussing on the topic of Hanuman’s journey to maturity, not a physical place. But we are going to talk about how we can grow toward maturity by learning from Hanuman’s example. Yesterday, we had played a game.

Can you also raise your hands how many were there yesterday? Okay. More than 50%. Thank you. 70%.

But this game will be for those who were there yesterday already. So I’ll give you a yesterday we had played a game where I give a word and then you construct a sentence based on the Ramayana or Mahabharata using that word. Today’s game will be a little different. A little difficult, a little easier. Both ways.

I’ll give you a word, and through a series of words that I give, we will construct a summary of yesterday’s class. So I’ll give you a word, and you can think of in what context that word can be used to connect with a point or especially a pastime, an incident that was described yesterday. Okay? Mischievous. Mhmm.

Yes? Lord Hanuman, he wanted to, he he had he thought that the sun god is fruit, so he wanted to go and grab. So that shows the mischievousness of the child. Yeah. So Hanuman was as a child, he was mischievous demigod.

Yeah. You said there are two connotations to that. You’re a semi god, what profile uses. But the other connotation is that it’s a child of a celestial being and a human. So Yes.

Hanuman ji falls in that category. Yeah. Actually, later I thought about Hanuman falls in both categories versus He’s also a great devotee. He’s a celestial being himself. He’s a devotee, so he’s not officially having a position of a devta.

So the second meaning is more appropriate. Good. So then, panic. Panic? Yes?

Moment while they stop the air, after seeing Hanuman in a, in a very, hurtful state, the Arduyutas go to panic mode. Yes. So when they saw Hanuman in a which state? Hurtful state. Hurtful.

Okay. In a lifeless state, you can say. Hurt state. Yeah. That’s true.

They they get panicking, then they shower blessings on him. Very good. Thank you. Oh, God. He’s moving forward nicely.

Now. Blessing and curse. Yes? Whatever, Hanuman got blessings from all the devatas because Voirideva was angry with the Correct. Yeah.

Some god. Yeah. It’s excellent. So you blessings twice and curse once. That’s good.

That’s good to very nice. Yesterday, we’re discussing that there is ability or power, and there is maturity. Okay. See, I don’t have much maturity losing this. Okay.

So we have so child Hanuman to adult Hanuman is this journey. Edibility, but not maturity. And we’ll today see how he went on this journey. And so when he was cursed, that curse was not out of hatred. That curse was also not so much out of anger.

It was more for protection. And then, we discussed later about graceful and grateful. Do you remember those two words? Yes, two? When, there is maturity, but power is there, then one is grateful.

But when power is not there, but maturity is there, one is grateful. Yes. Yes. I just use I use I try to use rhyming words. So ability and maturity are used, and later power with Character.

Character. Yeah. So if you have character, character and maturity are somewhat similar. They’re different, but we’ll explore that here. It is the same same point.

So if we can be grateful so there’s a there’s a four patterns that is called second pattern because so what are the four words over here? If we have power sorry. If I have power, if we have character. So we have both, then we are? Grateful.

If we have character and lack power, then we’ll be still? Graceful. Yes, Krishna. I accept gracefully whatever happens. If we have power but no character?

Yes, we become arrogant, prideful. And it means that? Resentful. This is where why is this happening? From resentful, we can also become hateful, you can become vengeful.

Why should anyone else have anything good in life? And then, Okay. So now I’ll be talking about Hanuman’s journey towards gratitude. And so not gratitude, towards maturity. So here also we will have the same word game, but in a slightly different way.

I’ll be talking about four incidents broadly, which indicates Hanma’s maturity. And after each incident, I’ll describe each feature I’ll describe. So I’ll stop and I will use a word which I have used in the previous section. That means, in that section, I have used the word. You can try to spot where I use that word.

Okay? So I’ll be using an acronym CARE. That mature when we have maturity, then we truly care. We care for the things that matter for us. Now if you see, one of the characteristics of maturity is commitment An immature person, somebody says when the going gets tough, what happens?

Tough. The tough get going. But there are other people, they get going away. They’re not so tough. They go away from there.

They don’t get going. So now the test comes. See, Hanuman’s right entry itself. When we have baby Hanuman. Actually this is described later now.

When we in the Ramayana’s natural narrative when Hanuman enters where is he? Where is the in which kanda does the entry happen? Yes. In the kishkin, the kanda. And then after that, in the he like sometimes, you know, sometimes in a movie or a TV series, there is some character that character comes in and then that character becomes the show stealer.

Mhmm. That character is so attractive that everybody is talking about that character only. So it is Ramayan but in Sundarkand, Rama is absent. And like Hanuman steals the show from Rama. He doesn’t steal the show, of course.

He is serving Lord Rama. But then his character is so captivating and endearing. So he enters into into the Ramayana in the section before that. So we have various kandas in the Ramayana. So what is the first kanda?

Palakanda. Palakanda. That is where Lord Ram’s Then? Ishkindakanda. Then?

Sundar Kanda. Then after that? Indakanda. Indakanda. And after that?

Utter command. Yes. So now Hanuman enters over here. Because Hanuman enters over here and then he becomes the central character over here. He becomes the guy as a show stealer over here.

So interestingly when he enters, he is it’s who is he with? He is with Sugri. Now, if you consider there has been a tragic misunderstanding between Sugri and Vali. And if we consider what happened, that Vali misunderstood Sugri first, and And so, he misunderstood that Wali is dead. And Wali misunderstood that, ‘Suguri tried to kill me so that he could take over the power.’ So now, Wali attacked Sugri, and Sugri had to flee to save his life.

Now, at that time, Hanuman had no obligation to go. Hanuman was not a blood relative. Hanuman was one manara in the Manara Kingdom. He was powerful in his own right. But he did not have to go with Sugriva.

And going with Sugriva meant that Hanuman lost everything. He himself said, Sugriva could not go back to Kishkirta. And Lakshman followed him. Now Lakshman is also nobody was obligated to do go. Sentence was only for Ram.

Sita insisted that she will go because she’s his wife. But when, Lakshman went, we could say that he’s his younger brother and so he went. And it’s not a it’s not an obligation, but he felt that I am duty bound because I’m the younger brother. But when Sugriva went to the forest, there is a brother’s wand over here. But when Sugriva was sent to the forest, Hanuman went with him.

And that is actually simply friends. And if you see, overall, it is not even friends. It is one of the servants born. The relationship between Wali, sorry, Sugriv and Hanuman is not exactly friendship. They’re always conscious that actually, Sugriv is the king, or Sugriv is a member of the royal family.

So Hanuman, the very fact that he left it all to be with Sugriv shows that he was a person of principles. He could have chosen you, this is not my fight, they are their misunderstanding, they resolve it all. But he did not do that. He stuck with Sugriyu. This also shows to some extent.

Sometimes Sugriyu has seen him, Sugriyu forgets his promise and other things. But and sometimes Sugriyu may not be seen as someone such a stellar character. Good character. But the fact that Sugriyoo would attract friends like this, that also shows his character. So Hanuman and Jamaran both came with him.

We’ll focus here on Nooman. And in general, what is the opposite of commitment? Abandonment. Okay. One is abandonment.

Let’s see. Abandonment. Sorry, in? Irresponsible. Irresponsible.

If committed, it’s irresponsible. Right? Indifference. Indifference, apathy. Not?

Not committal. -Non committal? Okay. That’s a synonym. That’s an antonym, basically, from the words itself.

But how will non committal be seen in terms of actions? -Um, it’s wishy washy. -Yes. Wishy washy, we could say. Some people are like a chameleon.

With whatever people you are, you take that form. And it’s basically somebody who does not have commitment for their primary criteria would be convenience. Whatever is convenient, whatever is ex the English word on the news is expedient. Expedient is whatever is the easiest thing to do. So some politicians, they just, they will blow whichever way the wind blows whatever position the voters want to hear they’ll speak those words and by that they say it is said about politicians before the election they shake your hands after that they shake your feet so what happened is sometimes people just they’re expedient so it could have been expedient for Hanuman.

I don’t want to get involved in this. But the fact that he was with Sugriha, that itself shows his commitment. And commitment is a sign of maturity. Maturity has many different meanings to it. One aspect of maturity.

Now, how is maturity related with commitment? It requires maturity to understand that good things they take time. They cost effort pain. Good things in life don’t come easy. That is commitment.

It can arise only when we understand it. So this is the aspect of maturity. A baby who is immature now, babies are immature not intentionally, but they’re just immature. Or a baby, they feel hungry, start crying. They expect that somebody else has to come and feed them.

That’s understandable. They can’t feed themselves at that particular point. But an adult person understands, okay, I cannot just depend on others to feed me. I have to make some arrangement. So for that, maybe I have to learn cooking, I have to earn money so I can employ someone who will cook for me, or I’ll go out and make some arrangements by getting at some food.

So that when somebody is immature, they just go by the path of least resistance. And the fact that Salman has chosen this particular option of being with Sugreen itself shows his great maturity. And that’s one aspect of maturity. And sometimes when we are criticized or we are unfairly accused or something that accusation itself hurts but there are people who we may not want enemies, but we all have people who are opposed to us in some way or the other. Now the harsh words of our opponents, it hurts us.

But what hurts even more is the silence of our friends. And at that time, those whom we thought we could count on, they don’t come and support us. And that feels very painful. We feel abandoned, we feel rejected. So that commitment, that’s where- that’s why sometimes it’s called fair weather of friends.

Now as long as the weather is good, then I’m afraid. As soon as the weather becomes bad, then goodbye. So those kind of friends are not not the kind of friends that we can count on. So commitment is whether it’s friendship or servitorship, servitorship in the mood of friendship, friendship in the mood of servutorship whatever is the particular flavor of the relationship that is there Hanuman shows his commitment. And to some extent, one’s maturity is seen by how one sticks through the tough times.

One of the truths that only a mature person understands is about happiness in the moda buddhi. What Krishna says in 1837, All the good things in life, they take time. So the mature person is able to see and push through the poison till they get to the doctor. This is a mature person. Now when there’s somebody immature, they look at the poison and they say, bye bye.

It’s too much. I can’t push through this. So sometimes it happens in youth. Sometimes, students want to choose a career. I was in Stanford a couple of years ago.

There was one young woman, young, girl and her mother had come, and they’re telling that this girl, obviously she’s in Stanford, she’s brilliant, but she this was her sixth year in the first year. So what happened? She’s been changing her major for six years. And I said, I wanna find my passion in my life. Well, there’s your whole life to find your passion.

First, get a degree. And sometimes people nowadays, this whole idea is that if you can’t find your passion, your life has no meaning. No. It’s not that you have to find our passion. Sometimes we have to create meaning in our life.

So uncommitted means that I’m not criticizing her in that sense, but it is you can’t be so fickle. You can’t just keep changing your ego from one year to the next year, second year. Commit to one thing. Sometimes this may not be the best thing for us, but but let’s do it, let’s learn, let’s grow in character, let’s grow in commitment, and then we can explore other things later. So commitment means that sometimes what happens is we ask a question.

We are all determined to a large extent by the question that we are asking. So when it is said that the the animals are always asking questions, where is food? Where is sex? Where is where is strength? Where is shelter?

That kind of things. So we humans can ask bigger questions. The question will be: what is the meaning of life? What is the purpose of life? But even then, commitment means that we could ask two questions: what is the meaning of life?

That’s a very important question. Now, that question is a philosophical question, and that takes time to find an answer to it. But we can ask a much more practical question: what can I do right now to increase the meaning in my life? What can I do right now to increase the meaning in my life? What does this mean?

Now we may say the meaning of life is you want to go back to Krishna. Okay, that seems we’re a long way away and we have a whole lifetime before that. What do I do in that lifetime? Okay, is there one service I’m meant to do? How will I find that service?

Well, maybe it’ll take time. Right now, what can I do? See, all of you, you know, you could have stayed home and watched TV. You could have done so many things just to come here. You hope to learn something meaningful.

Oh, I could have been in India. I’m traveling here because I feel that sharing the message of the Gita adds meaning to my message of Shastra that adds meaning to my life. Hopefully, it adds meaning to somebody else’s life. So it is it is this question, how can I add meaning to my life right now? What can I do right now?

Maybe I can speak one kind word, maybe I can learn this particular skill, maybe I can push through this project and complete it just so that I can learn the ethos of responsibility discipline. So commitment is a sign of maturity and Hanuman exhibits that. Children can be very fickle and that’s why parents have to push children at times. Parents. Children do not feel like studying but you have to study.

So his commitment shows his maturity. So this is the first part where anyone’s very entry is itself a sign of his maturity. That where he is. Okay, so the word here is? Okay.

Commitment. That’s not the word for a second. That will be too obvious. So. Misunderstanding.

Misunderstand? Where was that word used just now? In what was described? Yeah. Can you make a sentence good?

Mhmm. Duty bound. Thank you. Duty bound. Who was duty bound?

Yeah? Hanuman ji. He he he was no. Lakshman ji. He was duty bound to Savuddha Ram, and he also followed around to the forest.

Yes, very. As contrasted with. You’re on the right track. I did the beginning. Yeah.

Hanuman. Yeah. So you could say that, Hanuman was not duty bound because he was not a blood relative. But still Hanuman went and that shows his character. Okay?

So now after that Hanuman sometimes, if you consider a movie analogy I don’t want to remind you of movies. There are two ways you become Krishna conscious. One is, you bring Krishna into your consciousness. So, you bring Krishna into our consciousness. That means, we hear Krishna’s pastimes.

We chant Krishna’s name. We behold Krishna’s little pictures. The other is, we bring what is in our consciousness to Krishna. That means whatever things naturally interest us, we try to connect them with Krishna. So now if you consider movies.

Most of us have probably watched movies and we we live in a world which is. The culture is shaped by movies. So often the entry of a character is quite dramatic or it signifies how the character is going to be. So Hanuman’s entry seems to be a bit undramatic over here. Yes.

When the one when Rama and Lakshman are entering into Kishkinda, Rama is in agony, in pain, crying out, where is it, Dabi? Is she safe? Is she not safe? We see this? Sugriva, he’s out on top of the mountain, and from there he sees he gets, Ram, who are these people?

So when we see someone, we want to put people into some identifiable categories. If somebody comes in and, you know, is this person Indian? Is this person American? Is this person Indian, South Indian? Now, somebody looks like an Indian, but they have x, they have they have very much American accent.

I mean, it’s an American Indian, or Indian American, or whatever category you want to put it. Sometimes we can’t put in categories. Then there’s a little bit of a concern. So if we see somebody coming at night, that person looks like a relative. Okay?

This person’s a relative. But then we see they have come. Okay, this was an impossibility of my relative, is it? So when Suguru sees, he sees, oh, these people are dressed like sages, but then they are carrying weapons. Who are they?

He becomes alarmed. Are these people sent by Bali to assassinate me? The way Sugriev is living is a very fearful state. He’s constantly worried whether Vali is going to get him. And for Vali, it’s very frustrating.

It’s that Sugriv wants to punish him, wants to kill him, and Sugriv is right next to him. But he just cannot go there. Why? Because of her curse. So when I was in Singapore, I was giving this class and I said that you know, Vali felt about Kishkindh.

Sorry, Vali felt about this, Prischemak Mountain and that area where Sugri was there. Vali felt the way China feels about Taiwan. So he just couldn’t get there. But then, Taipei also, China will get back in some other way. So then, while Sukhuri went to Anima, he says, you find out who are they.

So then Anima went there. And now Lord Rama is in agony, and the first thing that happens is that as Hanuman approaches them and Mahan speaks that his words are so sweet, so soothing, that Hanuman speaks a few words, introducing himself, asking who they are. He doesn’t tell his identity, but just speaks very sweetly. And Ram turns to his animal, so it’s Lakshman, and he says, ‘Who is this person? This person must be learned in all the Vedas.

This person must be brought up by wonderful parents, this person must have created some scars from previous life. Just by those words he praises Hanuman so much. And this is where actually if we consider, he talks about two things, and the gopis also talk about the same two things when they talk about Krishna. So madhuraya gira is that they have Krishna has a sweet voice, and valguakyeya. Valguakyeya means pleasing, touching, loving words.

So the most effective speech is where a person has a sweet voice and speaks very pleasing words. Now, all comedies some people may have very sweet voice. And somebody may have a great singer. And because they have a sweet voice. But if you meet them backstage, one devoted friend he had before he came to Bhakti was big into music.

So he told me he was a big fan of a prominent Indian musician, and he had a voice which is, like, pure gold. So he finally got in that studio, and he went on the backstage. He wanted to be there. And that same person, he when he went on backstage, and that person with that same golden voice was literally hurling obscenities at all the studio stuff. Like you might hear on the streets of some of the more violent areas in his cry.

All kinds of obscenities, he said. It was just the biggest disappointment of my life at that time. Some people may have sweet voice, and they sweetly speak hurtful words. So Now so it’s good to have a sweet voice. Now some people just they can’t be help.

They have a they just have a raspy voice. Their voice is maybe because of some speech deformity or whatever, throat problem, whatever. We all have an actual voice from birth. We can’t control how sweet our voices, but we can try to please speak in a way that is pleasing. So Krishna says, ‘anutvega karam vakya’ He says in 1715 that the character and the austerity of speech doesn’t say speak sweetly.

That’s not in our control, in the sense that our voice is not sweet. We can try to speak sweetly in this and that. We can speak words that are pleasing, that are encouraging, that are appreciative. So Hanuman, hate, falls in this category. He has sweet voice, and he’s speaking pleasing words.

And life is tough. We all can find faults with each other, and there are many faults to find with each other also. But if we can just appreciate and encourage each other, one encouragement will just change the spirit of a person. Sometimes, you know, you speak some words of appreciation and the other person says, you made my day today.’ It will cause one heartfelt appreciation. You can mow a person for a whole day.

You sometimes You can mower a person for weeks. So Hanuman exhibits this ability that he is he at this particular point is a character. So interestingly, Haruman was earlier known for power. But now, he’s not his power is not seen only. He is subordinate to Sugriv also.

And Sugriva himself is not the most powerful monkey. Sugriva is being persecuted by Vali. So that same man who had such extraordinary blessings in his childhood, first we show his commitment. See his commitment. And then we see that he’s praised for his sweet speech.

And then what Hanuman does is, he ensures that there is an alliance formed between Ram and Sugriva. So what is the economy we are discussing? Care. So I’m right now discussing about alertness. Now one aspect of a mature person is they are they’re not just caught in their own head and their own thoughts.

They’re alert. Okay. This is the purpose I’m here for. And as a purpose that you are supposed to do. Do sometimes we send somebody to okay you go and inform them and get this from that place and they go there and they start talking with that person and they get so caught in talking and they come back oh did you get that why forgot you know they become yoga blessed when Sugri offers a seat to Ram, Sugri neglects Lakshman.

But you know Hanuman and Lakshman have a have a special bond. It’s because they are both in similar situations that Hanuman is there in the forest not because of any any target on him. So Lakshman is on the forest not because of any target. Right? So he offers a sleep to Lakshman.

And then later on, when Sugriva gives the kingdom back, then what happens? Sugriv has been, for years, in an area with no Wi Fi. And he comes to an area with full Wi Fi. And he goes on a four month Netflix binge. So he just forgets everything.

So now as these four winds go forward, what come to the end, then it is that Hanuman. Hanuman alerts him. So three people alert him. First is Hanuman alerts him. Then Tara alerts him.

And then after that, Lakshman. Lakshman just alerts him. Lakshman agitated him. Lakshman agitated and he educates him. But either way, at that particular time, true friendship is okay that when the friend is in trouble, you stand by the friend when they’re in trouble.

But true friendship also is when the friend is getting oneself into trouble, we don’t stand and go with them into trouble. We try to stop them. We try to warn them. That is also friendship. So his his alertness is seen and I am talking about alertness primarily in terms of his relation his so first, you know, when he enters, at this particular point, he doesn’t have a relationship with Ram.

So it is our cap. Generally a person’s character, a person’s maturity, a person’s virtues they are seen in relationships. It’s in isolation. I can be very humble when there’s no one with me. Isn’t it?

What does it require? As the American comedian said. I love humanity. It’s only human beings I can’t get along with. So most of our virtues are seen in relationships.

So here, first, he shows his commitment. His alertness is in forging an alliance for Sukhin. And then after that, in war mink. So both of these, he does. And in this way, again, mature person, one of the characteristics is that they’re alert.

They’re not just caught in their head. For many people, there’s so much drama going on inside their head only that they’re not even aware of what’s going on in the world or to speak of having an opportunity or noticing an opportunity and tapping an opportunity. So he’s alert over there. So so here so this is the second part. I’m going to the last two parts now.

But with respect to alertness, this particular incident, agony. Agony? I’ll be in agony if you don’t remember the word agony. Who was in agony? Yes?

When, when when Hanma was sent by Sugreev to, to find who these two persons were, Lord Rama was in agony in separation of the temple. Yes. True. Good. Good.

So category. Okay. Maybe category is a little complicated word over here. Just simple. What would you put in this context is?

Yes? Abhijit, Lakshman and Hanuman ji wearing the same Excellent. They’re the same category. Actually, I didn’t think of that side, but that didn’t translate to the mind. And we tried to put people into categories and we observed them.

So Sugri was alarmed because he could not put Ram and Lakshman in the category. Are they sages? Are they warriors? They’re sages, but they have weapons like warriors. He just couldn’t make sense, but that’s a brilliant sentence.

Thank you. So now, the third part we’ll discuss is responsible. Now if you see, after this what happens is that they decide to go on a search for Sita. And this is where Hanuman starts coming into his own that there is this whole concept of, like, leadership without position. Leadership position without position or influence without authority.

Sometimes somebody may get a position of being a leader. Now when the Vandaras start searching for Sita, the group that goes south who is the leader of that group? -Jamal. -Angat. So now it’s interesting that Sugriv and Angad have a bit of a tense relationship.

Although, Vali had tried to pacify things, Vali had told Angad, Don’t hold Sugriv responsible for my death. It’s my own karma that is guilty. And he tells Sugri, please, whatever I I persecuted you, but neither Anwar nor Tara had anything to do with it. Please don’t get back at them for what I did. So he tries to create reconciliation.

And yet for Angad, one day his father is the king and the next day not only is his father dead, but the person who was directly or entirely responsible for his father’s death is now the king and he has to serve that person. It’s not an easy situation for him to be in. And because Sugriv also wants to bond with Angad, So Sugriv goes out of his way to respect and accommodate him. That’s why he makes Angad the leader of the group. And this is the most important group because the Vanaras have seen Raoul going southwards.

And they also heard that Raoul is in the South. Whether he has gone to his abode or he’s gone somewhere else, we sit down, we don’t know. But that’s the most that’s the most clue that they have, and that’s why that’s the direction they are likely to find. So, Sugriva entrusts a big response into Angad. And that’s how he wants to have a relationship with him also.

Now interestingly, Lord Rama, whom does he entrust this particular task of finding Sita? Hanuman. He calls Hanuman, and he gives his own signal. He gives a, memento by which Sita will be able to identify and remember him. Hanuman could have said, ‘You’re tasking me with this responsibility.

You make me the leader of the group. You make me the official leader.’ See, many people, when responsibility is given, or when responsibility is available, they wait first for the position. Let me take the position. So, this is this book which I have written about ‘Mita for the CEO’ where I talk about these two things in leadership. There is the position of a leader, and there is the disposition of a leader.

Now, if we see Krishna himself never becomes the official king of Dwarka. Of course he’s glorified as Dwarka Dheesh, he’s the king of all kings, but he in the Dwarka’s hierarchy he remains the servant of Ukarsi, who is the actual king. So Krishna doesn’t take the position of leadership officially, but still he is the protector of Dwarka. So many of us, we feel, ‘Yes, I want to do a lot, but I just don’t have the resources, I just don’t have the position. Once I have that, then I do it.

So now the real test is that if we now we could say if we have position and disposition, we can be maximum effective. It’s true, but sometimes we don’t have that. So Hanuman, he earns the position of leadership and that is a remarkable journey. How he does that? So, being responsible.

Now, we could say, sometimes if we are responsible, we could be responsible in either of these categories. That we have the position and we use the position. But even if we don’t have the position, we can be responsible. And now he is given this special task, the bandra’s start off. And as they’re going south, they’re trying to search and search.

Initially, they have huge enthusiasm that they’re going to find Sita. But then as they keep searching and searching, there’s no clue of Sita anywhere. And then they start getting discouraged. And they go into the into a deserted area. Or it is an area where they can’t even find any water.

And they started getting out. What do you mean words today? So this is where Hanuman is observing. When Jamban is there, Jamban has become a little old. Hanuman is there, Hanuman is there.

So Hanuman is there, Harnaman is there. So Harnaman objects. Harnaman objects. There’s a cave, and there’s a bird coming out of the cave. And the bird is dripping water.

So, okay, Harnaman points to the other one, and the cave seems to be huge. They can’t see anything inside. And now Angad, he’s young, he’s born in royalty, and they respect him because he is the prince. But still, when Bali was the king, Bali was so powerful that nobody was there to threaten Kishkindha. That’s why Angkad does not have much experience of the real world war.

He is very powerful. He is a hero. And he has not let anyone experience any of that experience. He just doesn’t know how to do it. So Hanuman, without sidelining and without, minimizing his position, Jaindl suggests that all hold each other’s hands and go inside so that nobody gets lost in the cave, and they all start going inside.

They go in and in and in. For a long distance, they point to their cave, and finally, they see a light over there. And as they come closer, okay, where’s this light? And they see that there’s lush greenery, and there are fruits, and there’s a lake, and there’s wonderful water over there. And the vanara starts running to try to eat and drink.

And once he says, wait. Wait. Wait. They start to find out what this place is. And he keeps everyone to wait, and they look around and they see that there’s a yogini sitting over there.

He’s sitting, the effulgence coming from her body. And she looks very silly, Hanuman goes there and offers her respect his respects to her. Who is your meaning? Mata Anasuya. Sorry?

Mata Anasuya. Okay. Anasuya is whom? Ram and Ramakshmasita meet earlier. Yes.

This is Swayamprabha. Swayamprabha is a celestial male. She said that. She has been Indira long ago had an apsara whom for whom he had created a replica of heaven on the earth. And then later on, that apsara went with him to heaven, and she wanted to have this as a retreat center.

No. She said she had entrusted Svayun Prabha as the person to take care of it. And she is just, she explained all this. She says, you have come here, the servants of Brahma, you can have whatever you want. Vayampraha has mystical power, she’s aware, she recognizes who there.

And then the Vanalas eat and they eat, and they eat tree water, and they get rejuvenated. And then anger turns. It’s been a long long way inside. How do we go back from here? Can you tell us the way?

As Swami Prabha says, Indra has arranged so that anybody who comes in here will never be able to go back. So you’re telling this to us now. That anybody who comes in here will never be able to go out. Now Angad gets angry. Tell us how to go out, otherwise No one says, come down.

Gently, montage of jewels. He says, And we saw that bird going out. These birds are no threat to the treasure here. Yes. Yes.

We are also not a threat. We don’t want any of this wealth. We may not be able to go, but I’m sure you have the power. You please help us come out of this. And we are only here to serve, Lord.

We have no interest in the treasure over here. You have helped us, you have given us food, you have given us water, we are grateful. Please bless us so that we can go on our mission.’ So what Rams said earlier, Hanuman’s sweet speech, pleasing words, that’s not just a one time observation. That’s what Hanuman uses over here. So sometimes when we have to get things done, we can try to use force, and it’s required at times.

But generally, trying to force others to do things it over a period of time backfires unless we can actually connect with them and with our earnestness, with our sweetness, appeal to them. We can’t really be sure. So responsibility is like a leader is supposed to have power, but the biggest power a leader is supposed to have is not just over others. It’s a leader needs to have power over one’s own temper, one’s own emotions, one’s own speech. And that’s the responsibility that Bhumman shows over here.

So, Amprabha says, ‘Yes, I can help you.’ But he says, ‘I have I have to honor Indra’s words. Indra wants this place to be secret, and he says, all of you will have to close your eyes. Close your eyes, and then I will take you out. They all close their eyes their eyes are in one moment. So Emperorva uses mystic powers, and she brings them out.

And then she brings them out. Once they’re on the same side of the mountain, they’re on the other side of the mountain. And they’re closer to the ocean. And this is over here, we’re talking about how Anman you don’t have to have a leadership position. That influence without authority comes from capability.

If somebody has capability, they will be recognized. They will be able to fix problems. And now after this, they keep searching. And they search, and then what happens is that they hear. They’re searching close to the ocean, and they’re thinking that, okay, across the ocean is yes.

But then as they are waiting, they start seeing the huge ocean. And this ocean is so big what do we do? And now at this point they’re not even sure the lunga is across the ocean. They just see this is where it end we’re at end we don’t even know whether they should work or us. If you’re going to scale the ocean, they have to have some assurance that one guy has caused the ocean.

So as they’re sitting, they just they they work very hard, and they’ve not got anywhere and closer to find Seetha. One danger has passed, they seem to have come out of the danger, but then another danger is there. This is that Sugriva had told all the come back within one month. If anybody is later than one month, they will be executed. You say, that’s very harsh.

Why execute him? But the point is that you may not have executed them, but that was a way to ensure compliance that you could take this issue seriously. As Vandana, you can’t just wander around and eat fruits and not do your mission. So now one month has already passed. And the other two minds, when they go into Swam Prabhas Cave and come out, they realize that no time has passed.

And now some of the Vandana says that, you know, Subhriya told us to come back within one month and so on. We should go back. We should inform him what has happened. Adarmana said we should keep pressing on phalis phalisita. Adarmana said, down.

He’ll be angry, angry with you. And in hunger, you know, he he becomes he explodes, he says that. But if you go back, he’ll have all of us killed. And no one says, no, why would he kill you? He said he had no hesitation to get his brother killed.

Now if we go back and we have failed the mission and they’re also late in coming back, he will have us executed in front of all of our family and friends and we’ll be humiliated. So Angad still has that bitterness. Over here, this comes the biggest test of Hanuman. That’s the last part to talk about. What is that coin?

Care. So, let’s skip the part of the game which you’re having, because you wanna finish the class in time. So ‘E’ is empathy. Generally, in an army, at one level there is hierarchy. Where is your leader?

You have to follow them. Another level, speaking against the king or speaking against the leader. That’s considered, rebellion, that’s considered treason, that’s considered to be insurrection. A very serious crime. So now when Sugriv starts speaking when Sugriv is spoken of negatively by Angad, Hanuman faces a test.

Hanuman got a good anger with Angad. But Hanuman understands that Angad has been given this huge responsibility. This is the new political dispensation. Like, say, normally what happens is if one political party is in power, that political party goes, and quite often, many of the top leaders in diplomats or bureaucrats, they also resign. Because and they are also seeing the previous part.

New people come in. If somebody from the old dispensation is they have to prove their loyalty. Are you here for this? So so great. Angad has been given this assignment, and he’s not able to fulfill it.

He’s frustrated. So is he really, suspicious of Sogreep? Does he really think Sogreep is malicious? And should Anuman get on his case. Anuman just stays calm.

He’s an angad, he’s just at this point he’s a teenager. He’s a younger child, if not a teenager. He’s been interested in this huge responsibility, and quite often, anger or even hateful speech or hurtful words, they come not from a they can come from two different places. They can come from a place of enmity, you know, that or they can come from a place of insecurity. The two are very different.

Enmity is where that person wants to destroy us, and they’re just venting it out. They’re just bringing it out at particular times. But sometimes they can come from a place of insecurity. Somebody spreads some nasty rumor about us. What kind of person would do something like this?

It’s a terrible thing to do. But, you know, they could do it because they hate us, they’re enemies, or they could do it because, you know, I thought that, you know, you are so good now. If I, you know, if if everybody respects you, then nobody will care for me, and I’ll be lost. And I feel great fear because of that. It’s not a good thing to do, but some action coming from place of insecurity is very different from action coming from place of enmity.

Everybody has insecurity in their life. So, Anwar tries to pacify the answers. So greed is just ruler, and let’s try to stay calm, let’s make a decision on what to do. See, any big expedition, any big project that we try to do, there’ll always be differences of opinion. And now, when there are differences of opinion, there’s a problem.

How do you solve a problem? Sometimes the only way to solve- sometimes you just can’t solve a problem. Especially the problem that comes from difference of opinion, the only way to solve that is that Krishna sends a bigger problem. And that bigger problem forces us to forget our differences and unite to face that problem. So the vanaras, some of the vanaras, is for those we are not finding Sita, we are searched and searched.

And we cannot go back. We’ll be humiliated, we’ll be executed. It’s better that we end our life here since we will fast to death. And so there is- there is this act suicide. Interestingly, everything can be the three modes.

So there can be suicide in sathogna. Now how can suicide be sathogna? Normally we’ll think it’s tamas. Let’s do it say tamas normal. But suzary atogona means that if a person feels that there is no point for me to live anymore, then they decide that I will no longer maintain my body.

Just stop eating and stop drinking. And that can be done out of frustration, but that can also be done out of enlightenment. Some sages. This is called as. Traditionally this is called as Prayavratha.

Prayavratha. The first sannyasin ISKCON who got, got Parkinson’s dose, an Indian sannyasin in Marwada Maharaj. So he went to Rindavan, and it was incurable for him at that time, at once. This was many years ago. So he just stopped eating food.

So, somehow his godmother said, ‘Please eat something Maharaji.’ He said, ‘This body is meant to serve Krishna. If I cannot serve Krishna, why should I maintain this body?’ And then nothing another. He passed it for somewhere thirty two-thirty three days, and then very gracefully left his body. So Prayavrata is very different from suicide. Suicide is often where people use some artificial means to end their life.

But it has naturally stopped me. So the manaras decide that kids are going to fast with. And as they stand in their room, Hanuman is trying to pacify them, Hanuman is trying to encourage them, But things are just going out of control. And not all the mandaras sit there. But the annuman is torn.

Should I just go back? They keep searching. Should I abandon these mandaras? And at that time, a giant vulture comes over there. A giant vulture like being starts walking over there.

Walking. Not even walking properly, they’re not drawing and walking. And he starts looking at all the vanadas and licking his lips. Today, I’m going to feast. Apart by someone.

Or before I die, I’ll be the body’s going to be ripped apart. Who knows? So, Nirvana started panicking, and then Ambeda speaks, Alas, it seems that we are going to fail in our service to Lord Ram despite our best efforts, just as the valiant jitteryun failed in his service to God. Now, there is this whole thing called coincidence. Nowadays the word coincidence is not so much common.

In New Age there’s another word called synchronicity. Any of you heard this word? Synchronicity is where multiple things happen at the same time. So sometimes when we it is a coincidence that God’s ways of staying anonymous. Krishna is not something.

It’s when making two things happen at the same time. So now Angad, why would he remember Jatayu at this particular time? And why would he speak about Jatayu? That itself shows that how Angad was also dedicated, devoted to Ram’s service. Jatayu fought valiantly till his last breath and was just too much for him because he was elderly.

And Angad is thinking about Jatayu at a moment when he’s good about to pass to death and he sees this giant vulture going to eat them up. So that phrase, that those sentences itself and that memory itself shows his devotion to Ram. And Hanuman, he could have antagonized Angadha, he could have fought with Angadha, he could have criticized Angadha, but he saw he’s frustrated. But he basically still has that position. He wants to serve, he wants to serve Ram, he wants to be first sister, he’s just frustrated.

Everybody in life gets angry, And sometimes anger is not because the person is short-tempered. Anger is just because the person cares so much. Anger shows how much we care. Now, of course, anger is not the only way we show how much we care. If that is it, then it’s not good.

But Sukri, Anmaan, by his empathy, he keeps Anmaan. Although Anmaan doesn’t stop from wanting to end his life, his attitude is not lost for him. He speaks those words and suddenly then, Sampati? Jesus. Jesus, what did you say?

What happened to Jatayu? Oh, Maharaj, please tell me. -Oh, Vanaras, please tell me. Then the one suffers, so who are you? You know Jatayu?

-Yes, Jatayu is my younger brother. I am Sampati, and I have not seen him for many many years. Then, Sampati starts telling the story of how he and Jatayu had both tried to rise up high into the sky and close go close the sun. And then they both are getting burned, so Sampati, the elder brother, spread his wings to shelter Jetaey. So his wings got burned, and he fell to the ground, and since then they have been separated.

So then, Angadya tells Jetaeyu about the story of Jetaeyu, and Sampathis are lamenting. I protected my brother at that time from the sun, but how unfortunate I am that I could not protect my brother from this demon. I am old and weak and free. I cannot do anything right now. And we request the one that has said, Please take me by the waters and help me to do the ask to offer some water for my brother.

He did that, and he’s still avenging, and asked, I cannot do anything for my brother. I cannot avenge his death, I cannot punish the demon who killed him. And at that time, Angadhar thinks, just, you must have the sharp eyes. Do you see Rama going by? Do you know where Rama is?

And hearing this, some baddie perks up. He says, Yes, I can do some service for the cause for which my brother laid his life down. And he says, Although my body has become free, my vision is too sharp, as I can see that across the ocean Lanka there is Sita, and Rawal has her. And I feel confident that he will soon go there and find Sita and come back. So this is where the Vanara’s joint mission finally brings them to a place where now they can leave at Kosnaka.

And then all of them are eager to do the service, but none of them is capable of doing the service. And that’s when everybody is talking and falling silent. Then Jambavan turns towards Anima. And that’s when he reminds him of Hanuman. And then from here onwards, there’s Hanuman’s solo mission.

He’s alone going to Lanka and doing extraordinary things in the service of Ram. But before he gains his power back, he has shown how he has matured so dramatically. So that maturity is what will stand him in good stead when he faces the obstacles in the ocean, when he faces the obstacles in Lanka, and when he finally meets Sita and is victorious over there also. This is the journey of Hanuman to maturity. And as he- as Jambavan speaks to him, Hanuman, who has been silent all this time, till now Hanuman has done wonderful things, but it is not primarily by his power.

It is by his intelligence. It is by his expertise, by his sensitivity. One of the qualities of Hanuman is Buddhimatham Among the wise people, he is the best. So his wisdom, his maturity, his empathy, all these are seen over here. And then Hanma will go on his glorious journey to Lanka, which will be like a spectacular success for him.

So, we will summarize what we discussed today. Broadly, today we discussed about how an Hanuman regains his power before regaining his power that is his. How his maturity is seen. The maturity of Hanuman it is seen in broadly four ways. What is the acronym?

Care. C was? Commitment. So all the good things in life often require time and effort. So the opposite of committed is often fickle.

Like a chameleon. A person. Then things get tough, and some people just go away from those things. But hanuman sticks with sukhreev. So Hanuman being with sugrib, even when he had no reason to be in terms of a blood obligation, that shows that he has become committed.

That is self assigned of a possibility. A of maturity is alertness. For all of us, we all can think about our maturity in different ways. Can am I committed to things? Am I ready to persist in something even I will create difficulties?

Prabhupada is committed to sharing Krishna’s wishes no matter what happened. Prabhupada is alert to look for opportunities. Where can I serve Krishna? What can I do to serve Krishna? So, Hanuman’s alertness is seen in two ways.

One is his speech by which he forms an alliance with Supreme, and then alliance between Ram and Supreme, and then there is this warping. He doesn’t get get infatuated like Sugri does, but he keeps he brings well so. Sugri will come to separate. And r was? Responsible can be many different things, but But here, I specifically use a heads up heads up.

If you take the service take the service even without waiting for the position, the position may or may not come. So a truly responsible person somebody’s leadership quality is that they may have the position on their own other position, but they always have the disposition. So we discuss how an Oman, especially his his responsible nature is seen in his dealings with Swayampara in the cave. So there he does not lose his school. He does not attack.

He respectfully acts over them. Last was? Empathy. So this is especially seen with Angad. And Angad starts speaking rebellious words against Guru.

That is so his his hurtful words or his harsh words or his aggressive actions, you could say. His aggressive or rebel treasonous words, whatever you can whatever you use. Those come not from a place of enmity. They come from a place of Insecurity. Insecurity.

So sometimes when somebody speaks something which is very shocking, you say, how could you speak like this? You are committing a Vaishtha of Prad, you go to hell because of this. And so I said, okay. I don’t understand where the question is coming from. When Ram says, help me.

Thank you very much. Let us pray to Hanumanji that by his mercy we all can in our life and our service. We all can stay committed despite temptations, despite the appalling shortcuts, despite our mind’s tendency to be overcome. That we may all may always be all alert to find better ways to do our dharma, to do our seva, and try to improve by finding new ways as well as doing what we’re doing better. In this way that we can be responsible so that we don’t complain, we don’t have the facilities, but that we tap whatever opportunities we have without waiting for the position.

And then when we are working with other devotees, with other people, other family members, rather than judging them and condemning them, we can all have empathy by which we can help them go through difficulties and not just get breakdown, but rise up stronger and better. We have few minutes for questions. Any questions or comments? Question in one of the slides. You mentioned about, Krishna consciousness in two ways.

Can you please go back to that slide, Prabhijana? And can you please explain the difference between those two? I’m flattered that you consider these two as lines. Okay. Yeah, I can slide through them.

So now bring Krishna into our consciousness is something just straightforward. You all understand that. That it basically means that we come to a temple, we go to a holy place. And that’s how we bring Krishna into our consciousness. So now, what does bring what is in our consciousness to Krishna mean?

It means it can mean two broad things: one is that when we live in the world, there are certain internal things. Internally, we are attracted to certain things, and externally, there are some attractive things. Now we can call the external attractive things as maya, as sense objects. And that is true, but that’s one way of looking at it. We could call them as these external objects, we could call them as visaya.

Visaya is sense objects. But another way of looking at it is it is vibhuti. It’s what Krishna also wrote in the tenth chapter of the Bhagavad Gita. So there are many attractive things in this world And if we can develop the vision to see that the attractiveness of these objects comes from Krishna, then this is already in our consciousness and we can connect it to Krishna. So if somebody has a great interest for art or music or decoration or whatever it is that they have interest in, then those things will naturally be there in their consciousness.

And can they connect that with Krishna? Okay. So for them they can remember Krishna in many different ways but if they have to do some art they just get completely immersed. If they are like they are getting to some music they are completely transported to another domain. So what is naturally in our consciousness, that could be because maybe that person grew up in a place where there’s a lot of beautiful art, a lot of musical culture was there, whatever it is.

It Could be external. It could be internal. So internally, when we’re internally attracted to something, we can say that that is in a negative sense, it’s our vasana. We all have lust, anger, greed, all this. But our internal attraction could also be the vrutti that we have according to our varna.

Varna means this is not simply a category of brahmacharya shiva. It’s actually the natural attraction of our consciousness to certain things. So if we are naturally attracted to some things, then we could use those to connect with Krishna and to serve Krishna thereby. So what does this mean practically? That if we already have some natural interests or talents, so say if somebody has a lot of interest in say architecture, Then, let’s say their interest in architecture is mundane, or maybe they say I’d like to see different architecture, but let me look at say architecture that is connected with with sacred things.

Maybe what kind of temples are we building? What is the architecture in that? So the interest in architecture is already in our consciousness. We can bring it to Krishna. So to bring what is in our consciousness to Krishna, that is also one way to cultivate Krishna consciousness.

And that way, because that thing is already in our consciousness, it will be easier for us. We can very, you could say, comfortably and joyfully connect with Krishna in this way. So it’s important for all of us to find that. It’s important to help our children find that. I was in America and stayed at one devotee’s home and it wasn’t like America I see it all the time so I thought that so anyway so this, it’s the only that, mother is a double PhD, the father is a PhD, they’re brilliant, you know, those combined genes are there, they’re a kid.

So this kid, he was 10 and he was in the he’s in the part of the American National Robotics team. Apparently, the robotics Olympiad is there. And he was going to represent America. And talking with the kid was brilliant. And then his mother was telling me, till five he was very interested in Russia.

And then he discovered robots and he forgot Krishna. Oh, how does he say? I don’t know. He always is talking about robots and So then I was talking to the parent, then this boy came and started talking with him. And then I asked him that, when you make robots for these competitions, what kind of robots do you make?

So he said that, mostly it’s Amazon which is funding funding the robotics industry. They want very efficient robots for packing, unpacking, transporting. They want to replace labor with robots as it’s possible. So they are the main drivers. So robots with efficient movements of body.

That’s what we look for. So then and I’ll ask you a few questions about robots. It was he was so enthusiastic. It was like the Ganga flowing through his mouth. -When Nimal Pandit asked Kishokashvili to glorify Ganga, he spoke hundred verses spontaneously.

So I find he was so enthusiastic. -I asked him that, do you. In these robotic competitions, do they like innovative ideas? Yeah, innovation is appreciated very much. Then I said, what do you think about making a robot of Krishna speaking the verses of the Gita?

So I said, oh, that’s not a good idea. And he walked away. And he walked away. Then I continued talking with his parents. Then after five minutes he came back, you know, it’s not such a bad idea.

Nobody else would think like this.’ And then he said, ‘Nowadays there’s this whole emphasis on diversity and inclusivity.’ So, yeah, think about it. And a week later his parents called me and he says, you know, he’s now reading the Bhagavad Gita to find out which verses will sound cool or his robot. So the idea is that if there are some things you’re naturally attracted to, we don’t have to simply dismiss them as mundane. Sometimes we have to be a little more creative in seeing how those things can be connected with Kashi. So let’s bring what is in our consciousness to Kashi.

Okay? Thank you very much. Any other questions? So thank you very much. It’s wonderful to be here in Portland.

The post Hanuman’s Journey to Maturity 1 – How a curse can be a blessing – HG Chaitanya Charan Das appeared first on The Spiritual Scientist.

We humans are by nature, growth-seeking, wherever we are, we want to improve things. We want to improve things in different ways. But we all want to improve things.

We come and move into a home. We want to beautify the home. We want to visit a particular place.

We want to go and see the most beautiful places over there. So we want to improve the extremes around us. That’s natural.

But then, as I said, if that is all we are doing, that’s when it becomes a problem. So, we get our externals to a particular level of yukta-ahara. We have a particular level of functionality.

And then we keep some efforts to improve that. But that doesn’t become our driving force. And that’s when we turn inwards.

So, even in our spiritual journey, there can be dissatisfaction, which can be good or which can be bad. So, dissatisfaction makes us want to move forward. That is good.

But the dissatisfaction becomes a perpetual sense of guilt or frustration or unworthiness. That’s not healthy. So, why am I… I want to grow spiritually.

So, dissatisfaction, it can be good if it inspires us to grow. But three things, if it leads us to guilt. Why don’t I have so much spiritual hunger? Why am I not more serious about life? Or it leads to feelings of frustration.

In dissatisfaction, frustration is much deeper. Frustration when nothing is working, I just don’t know why am I here, what am I doing over here? Or that leads to feelings of insecurity. Maybe there is something terribly wrong with me, that’s why.

Maybe I will never grow spiritually. No. We will grow.

Our spiritual growth is the formation of a relationship. It will happen in its own way. Sometimes when we are chanting, we have to focus on Krishna.

Now, or sometimes, if you chant, like in this image, once I was not in focus, my mind said, let me be seriously. Then suddenly, I had this… I was looking at myself from above, you know, am I trying to control my mind and focus on Krishna? Am I trying to control my mind and push it towards Krishna? Or am I trying to control Krishna and push him into my mind? So, the thing is that it will happen in space. So one aspect of… If we are not the whole, we are not God, we are not the supreme, we are the servants of God, then we should also accept that we don’t have control over how fast we will spiritually grow.

We need to accept the ways in which we are growing. We can seek more. But that should not lead to resentment.

That should not lead to strong negative emotion. Either towards God, towards ourselves, or towards the whole process itself. Growth happens naturally.

So, just like a child is not going to grow up overnight. It will also grow up naturally.

The post Should we feel dissatisfied that we are not growing spiritually as fast as we should? appeared first on The Spiritual Scientist.

It is with shock and sincere sympathy that we learned of the death of Pope Francis, who for many years was not only the spiritual leader of the Catholic believers, but also the conscience of the whole humanity — his voice for peace, mercy, and justice. His life and service were exemplary: he humbly addressed
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This Srimad-Bhagavatam Class by HG Hamsarupa Prabhu covers portions of Śrimad Bhāgavatam Canto 4, Chapter 7, focusing on verses 52-53 which discuss the sacrifice performed by Dakṣa. The speaker weaves between direct commentary on the text and broader philosophical points about ISKCON’s mission and devotional principles. Key points from the lecture: Philosophical understanding: The verses
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A class specifically focused on relationships from a spiritual perspective. The main speakers are Partha Das and Uttama Devi, a married couple who are visiting NYC from Canada to give workshops on relationships. The lecture discusses how to develop healthier spiritual relationships by understanding: The physiological aspects of emotional regulation How our brain works (higher
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Badahari Prabhu stands as one of ISKCON’s most beloved and accomplished kirtan leaders, whose melodious devotional chanting has touched the hearts of countless spiritual seekers around the world. As a dedicated disciple of His Divine Grace A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada, Badahari Prabhu has spent decades refining the art of kirtan while deepening his own spiritual
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Srimad-Bhagavatam Class by HH Janananda Swami – 1.2.5, ISKCON Zurich, 8.11.2022 —– The importance of purifying one’s heart through chanting the holy names and following spiritual practices with sincerity How to deal with the departure of one’s spiritual master, emphasizing continued service to their instructions (vani) even in their physical absence The establishment of Varnashrama
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Notes on Appreciation Program for Sruti Sagara Prabhu collected by Krishna Kripa Prabhu [Sruti Sagara Prabhu was an Indian college student at University of Florida, who became a disciple of Kalakantha Prabhu and served as temple president of Krishna House for the last seven years. He is going on to serve as GBC for several
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SB 3.24.37 Dharma, Knowledge, & the Great Wave by Sankirtana Das (ACBSP) at New Vrindaban Bhagavatam class given at New Vrindaban, focusing on Vedic knowledge and dharma. HG Sankirtan Prabhu discusses several key themes: The Vedic paradigm and the relationship between the mind, intelligence, and soul, emphasizing that intelligence can either serve the soul or
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Chaitanya Charan Prabhu stands as one of the most influential contemporary spiritual teachers within the International Society for Krishna Consciousness (ISKCON), embodying the rare combination of scholarly intellect, spiritual wisdom, and practical guidance. His journey from a promising career in technology to becoming a globally renowned monk and author demonstrates a profound commitment to addressing
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Shri Abhirama Gopal Thakura  was also known as Shri Rama Das. He was a great devotee of Lord Nityananda.  On the order of Shri Nityananda Prabhu, he became a great acharya and preacher of Gaudiya Vaishnavism. 

He was a very influential personality, and atheists and blasphemers were very much afraid of him. Empowered by Shri Nityananda Prabhu, he was always in ecstasy and was kind to all fallen souls. It is said that if he offered obeisances to any stone other than a shalagram-shila, it would immediately burst into pieces. 

According to Gaura-Ganodesha-Dipika  (12) in Krishna-lila he was Shridama, one of the 12 prominent boy cowherd friends of Shri Krishna. He was Nityananda’s dear most devotee. Abhiram Gopal’s wife’s name was Shri Malini devi. 

Shri Abhirama Thakura had a bullwhip that was imbued with divine power. Its name was “Jayamangal.”  Whoever was struck with this whip became filled with Krishna prema.  One day Shrinivasa Acharya went to take darshan of Abhiram Gopala.  At that time, Abhiram Gopal touched him three times with Jayamangal. 

The Thakur’s good wife, Malini, cried out, “My Lord! Do not touch him again. Calm yourself. Shrinivas is only a boy. If you touch him again he will lose consciousness.” As a result of coming in contact with the whip of Abhirama Thakura, Shrinivasa Acharya became filled with Shri Krishna prema. 

The main points discussed in this Morning class given at the ISKCON Sydney Temple on Sunday 30th March, 2025 by HH Devamrita Swami are: Earth as a conscious provider: The earth is personified as a conscious entity that supplies all necessities to living beings when humans live in proper spiritual consciousness. Existence of various subtle
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Kalakantha Prabhu emphasizes the critical importance of character in leadership, especially within spiritual communities. The discourse draws from traditional Vedic principles while addressing practical challenges in modern leadership. Main Themes: Leadership by Example: Leaders influence others not just through words, but through personal conduct. Hypocrisy in leaders — saying one thing and doing another —
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In this insightful and lively class, HG Brahma Tirtha Prabhu discusses Canto 3, Chapters 33-34 of the Śrīmad Bhāgavatam, weaving scriptural wisdom with modern scientific thought and personal anecdotes. He covers themes like the limitations of atheistic and materialistic worldviews (such as Logical Positivism), the importance of consciousness in understanding the cosmos, and how ancient
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Thousands joined the colorful multi-day celebrations which reflects the diversity of the region’s rich diversity. Held at Durban’s north beachfront, the procession, festival-goers were treated to kirtans, prasadam, book tables, dance and cultural presentations, mantra meditation, spiritual discussions, and more. Short workshops and seminars were also held, along with many family-friendly activities, including fireworks, a
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By Dr Sahadeva dasa In the bustling city of Yekaterinburg, Russia, lives an unassuming woman whose quiet life of devotion and service has touched the hearts of many. Known as Rangala Dasi, she is a modern-day saint who has dedicated her life to the selfless mission of spreading spiritual wisdom, particularly through the Bhagavad Gita.
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Morning Class SB 9.4.41 – HG Bhakta Prabhu – 19 April 2025 O best of the Kuru dynasty, after he drank some water, King Ambarīṣa, meditating upon the Supreme Personality of Godhead within his heart, waited for the return of the great mystic Durvāsā Muni. After executing the ritualistic ceremonies to be performed at noon,
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Everybody needs a bit of pushing because spiritual growth doesn’t feel like a need for nuisance. So, that’s why a little bit of pushing is required. Now, we have to see whether the pushing is actually pushing them towards spirituality or away from spirituality.

So, I was in Texas, not this year, last year, few years ago and there was a car ahead of me and the bumper sticker had a quote Oh God, please save me from your preachers. Save me from your preachers. Normally, in the Christian tradition, God saves us through his preachers.

But if the preachers are too pushing, they are too judgmental, they are too fear-inducing earlier than now. So, we also need to recognize that spiritual growth for many people is a multi-lifetime journey and not everybody will grow at the same pace. So, maybe for some people, what may happen in this lifetime is the Gyan Sukhati.

That they get some favorable appreciation for spirituality. So, we would like everyone to go on the entire spiritual journey. This is spiritual appreciation.

Who knows? They may not take it up now, but it may be that it’s not just we are trying to help them become spiritual. Krishna is in their hearts and Krishna is also wanting them to have a relationship. So, if we open the doors for them, they may not walk through right now, but maybe they go through certain things in their life, one year down the line, five years down the line, and then a big thing happens.

And then if we have opened the door for them, they walk through. But if we open the door and drag them through, then yes, they are not worth it. They will have such a bad experience, they will go, and they will not want to come back.

So, I think little pushing is required, but we have to be observing. What is the pushing doing? If the person is becoming alienated, antagonistic, then don’t stop pushing.

The post How much should we push others to grow spiritually if they are not enthusiastic? appeared first on The Spiritual Scientist.

Diary of a Traveling Sadhaka, Vol. 21, No. 15

By Krishna Kripa Das

(Week 15: April 9–April 15, 2025)

Tallahassee, Alachua, St. Augustine, Gainesville, Tampa

(Sent from Brooklyn, New York, on April 19, 2025)

Where I Went and What I Did

For the fifteenth week of 2025, I remained living at ISKCON Tallahassee for first three days. I chanted Hare Krishna each day at Landis Green, behind the main Florida State University library. In Tallahassee I distributed four “On Chanting Hare Krishna” pamphlets and thirty-nine little cups of halava to promote our Krishna Lunch at the campus, and one Nepali woman joined our temple WhatsApp group. I stayed in Alachua Friday night, and Saturday I went to the St. Augustine Ratha-yatra and subsequent harinama, which attracted the attention of many residents and tourists there, much more than in other cities.

The Krishna House devotees who went to the St. Augustine Ratha-yatra were so enthusiastic, they did a harinama for nearly an hour after returning to Gainesville to benefit students celebrating a recent Gator basketball victory. Sunday I chanted for three hours in Depot Park in Gainesville by myself, except when a mom and son in the playground briefly chanted the response. At Krishna House there was a program of appreciation for Sruti Sagara Prabhu, who completed seven years as temple president there. He plans to go on to become GBC for seven southern states. Monday I chanted at Krishna Lunch in Gainesville for an hour and twenty minutes, part of the time with Satyahit Prabhu. Then I took a bus to University of South Florida in Tampa, where I chanted with Bhakta Bill for two and a half more hours. We made two videos of students chanting Hare Krishna with us that day, a guy from India and a woman from Peru. Tuesday Vivasvan Prabhu joined Bill and me in chanting at USF. Both days we met favorable people who joined our Bhakti Yoga Society there and accepted a small book for free.

I share a quote from Srila Prabhupada’s Srimad-Bhagavatam. I share quotes from The Delaware Diaries by Satsvarupa Dasa Goswami, which include many inspiring realizations. I share notes on a class by Kalakantha Prabhu, speaking in Gainesville, and notes on a class by Vivasvan Prabhu, speaking in Tampa. I share notes on the appreciation program for Sruti Sagara Prabhu at Krishna House.

Thanks to Dinabandhu Prabhu for his kind donation on the occasion of the St. Augustine Ratha-yatra. Thanks to Adhokshaj Govind Prabhu for driving me to Alachua and St. Augustine. Thanks to Jonathan for driving me from St. Augustine to Gainesville. Thanks to Jackson for driving me to the bus to Tampa. Thanks to Bhakta Bill of Tampa for driving me to and from the University of South Florida to Vivasvan Prabhu’s Tampa temple and for chanting with me at the campus. Thanks to Vivasvan Prabhu for letting me stay at his temple and for coming on harinama on Tuesday. Thanks to Bridget for taking the videos on Gainesville harinama in which I appear. I get by with a little help from my friends.

Itinerary

April 17–22: NYC Harinam

April 23: Flight to Brussels
April 24: Layover in Oslo
April 25: Kadamba Kanana Swami Vyasa-puja at Radhadesh
April 26: King’s Day in Amsterdam
April 27: Liege harinama
April 28–May 1: Paris harinamas
May 2: Sarcelles market harinama
May 3–4: Amsterdam Kirtan Mela and Sacinandana Swami seminar
May 5: harinama in Amsterdam
May 6: harinama in Rotterdam
May 7: Flight from Amsterdam to New York City
May 8–June 15: NYC Harinam
mid June–mid August: Paris
– June 22: Paris Ratha-yatra
– July 11: Amsterdam harinama
– July 12: Amsterdam Ratha-yatra
– July 13: Netherlands harinama

Chanting Hare Krishna in Tallahassee

A student of Buddhism who played the shakers for ten minutes during my harinama on Wednesday said he read a lot of Buddhist philosophy but came to the realization that if you do not do the practice you don’t really gain anything. He said it is like reading books about working out instead of actually working out!

Eduardo (above) told me he knew one of the devotees who used to live at our Tallahassee Krishna House who was a music major. I showed him a photo of Madhu from Facebook, and he confirmed that that was him.

I saw Josh, the student Jagat Trata Prabhu sold the Bhagavatam set to. He plans to read the Gita again over the summer before starting the Bhagavatam. I gave him my contact information. He is already in touch with Adikarta Prabhu.

One student was not interested in learning about the Krishna Lunch. She just said, “I love hearing you sing.”

The last day that I was in Tallahassee, the Krishna Lunch did thirty-five plates, one of the best days for the semester. I see that as Krishna encouraging me in my attempts to increase attendance. I only wish I could increase it more.

The Christian preachers generally quote a verse from John which says that Christ is the only way. The other three gospels, however, do not say that. I made the point to Evelynn, a Christian preacher who often talked to me, bought several books, and liked the halava, that the Christians should focus on the teachings of Christ that are mentioned in all four gospels rather than just one or two, because it is more likely that Christ actually spoke them. She became inspired to go through all four gospels and note down what they have in common. She gave me a pocket Bible when she left because I said the large Bible another preacher gave me was too heavy to carry on my journey. I said I would read one verse a day, and encouraged her to read one Gita verse a day, starting with the instructions of Krishna beginning in Chapter Two. I only lasted one day so far, but I will try to get back into it and inspire her to read the Gita over her summer break.

I was amazed that at least three Christian preachers regularly came by for the free halava. Maybe someday they will upgrate their spiritual practice by becoming vegetarians, as Srila Prabhupada would often advise them.

I share below my harinama statistics for the month of April and for the whole spring semester:

Chanting Hare Krishna in St. Augustine

Govinda Harris was the first kirtan leader to chant Hare Krishna in the St. Augustine Ratha-yatra (https://youtu.be/rHOohy6hP_Y):

At one point an onlooker really enjoyed playing shakers and dancing (https://youtube.com/shorts/feCxInjTagk?feature=share):

Here Dhira Prabhu, disciple of Srila Prabhupada living in Jacksonville, chants Hare Krishna (https://youtu.be/pQUkU16nBZg):

Visvambhar Prabhu was the final kirtan leader to chant Hare Krishna during the Ratha-yatra there (https://youtu.be/69hpsPPOass):

Visvambhar Prabhu chants Hare Krishna after the St. Augustine Ratha-yatra (https://youtu.be/HLT3jzQLn-0):

While Visvambhar Prabhu was chanting Hare Krishna after the St. Augustine Ratha-yatra, he urged the crowd to respond (https://youtu.be/kY9EPds4qF4):

As he continued chanting Hare Krishna, devotees danced, and Mrkanda Prabhu played flute (https://youtube.com/shorts/AR4fe_KRi1M):

Here Advaita Prabhu chants Hare Krishna after St. Augustine Ratha-yatra (https://youtu.be/Yg5dk3EL3sg):

After prasadam, we did harinama on a popular tourist street called St. George Street, and many people interacted favorably with us.

Here Amala Harinama Prabhu chants Hare Krishna on harinama in St. Augustine, and many are attracted (https://youtu.be/_GmEVLPTqaU):

Here three students from Flagler College play shakers and dance on St. Augustine harinama. The guy was from New Hampshire, the woman with the head covering was from Italy, and the other woman was local (https://youtu.be/W8L3x1x8EJM):

I showed the students our web site on the Florida Ratha-yatras, and I told them of details about Ratha-yatra in May on Jacksonville Beach.

Bhadra Prabhu chants Hare Krishna on St. Augustine harinama, and onlookers dance with devotees (https://youtu.be/DNQsaIhv6yg):

Onlookers watch St. Augustine harinama from a balcony (https://youtu.be/y_PkwjD5PYY):

Chanting Hare Krishna in Gainesville

The St. Augustine Ratha-yatra was amazing and the harinama after was more amazing. More amazing than that to me was that after driving nearly two hours each way, Nartana Priya Devi Dasi of Krishna House, seeing Gator fans in the streets celebrating a recent championship victory, decided to do harinama in Gainesville for almost an hour to share the mercy.

Here Nartana Priya Devi Dasi chants Hare Krishna with Krishna House devotees in Gainesville across from University of Florida (https://youtu.be/LxGicwEZsYU):

Jonathan chants Hare Krishna there too (https://youtu.be/wmq0v-QkxMs):

Jonathan even continued the kirtan on the side porch afterwards (https://youtu.be/PVxB-_WETug):

Champakalata devi dasi chants Hare Krishna at mangala-arati at Krishna House (https://youtube.com/shorts/DO4QyFtqjfA?feature=share):

Chanting Hare Krishna in Tampa

I chant Hare Krishna at University of South Florida, and Rajat of India chants the mantra (https://youtu.be/psbFdtdb-eA):

Later Ariana of Peru chanted with us (https://youtu.be/R1Y9jnpvCGU):

Krishna Joshi of Nepal is involved with ISKCON in her country. She was happy to learn of our Bhakti Yoga Society at USF.

When I told this petitioner at USF that I was from New York, he told me he saw the devotees chanting for years at Union Square when he lived there. The next day, we met two more favorable petitioners who had seen the devotees in NYC and elsewhere. I suggested they hold their clipboards in one hand and play shakers with the other, and one guy did so for ten minutes, until USF library security stopped us two minutes before we planned to stop anyway.

Insights

Srila Prabhupada:

From Srimad-Bhagavatam 4.24.28:

“Lord Shiva continued: Any person who is surrendered to the Supreme Personality of Godhead, Krishna, the controller of everything—material nature as well as the living entity—is actually very dear to me.”

Satsvarupa Dasa Goswami:

From The Delaware Diaries, Volume 2 (Tachycardia):

“The devotees practice akarma. Their actions are free from contamination. They do not act for their own interests and minimize their personal needs. I thought a bit about that during the japa. Was it special? It always is. Each day is a new opportunity to be steady and to improve. I can’t expect a particular session to be extraordinary. But gradually, almost without noticing it, you can improve.”

“Bhurijana teaches that each mantra should be fondled and paid attention to, one at a time. If you can chant one good mantra, you are successful.”

“I kept clinging to the idea that I was crying like a child for the mother, Mother Hara. I cried like a child crying to its mother in my chanting. I believe in the chanting because it has been given to me in disciplic succession and because I have chanted for many years with solidity. Chanting is real exchange. Chanting is Krishna Himself. I will never stop chanting, because of my vows and because of the taste I receive. I believe that I have to chant in order to practice for leaving this body and getting a next body favorable to Krishna consciousness. I will never stop chanting because I believe it is the highest form of worship of Krishna. It is easy, and it has been given to use in Kali-yuga as the only means for God realization. One should never think of stopping.”

“My need to be with You and worship You is greater than my need to eat or drink or sleep. It is the prime necessity of my life. It is the need of the soul. Please help me to be aware of this and to act on this.”

“I took shelter in spiritual thoughts, such as (a) reminding myself how important harinama is; (b) recalling statements from the scriptures about how dear the holy names are to great devotees; (c) reminding myself that if you ‘just hear,’ eventually you start perceiving the form, qualities and pastimes of the Lord; (d) asserting that the name is the same as Krishna Himself and is even more merciful than Krishna. You think of these along with your utterance, and it boosts you and keeps you steady.”

“You are the Supreme Person, and yet You are also the friendliest person. You give the most comfort and support. You are the most capable and loving.”

“To be dissatisfied while living in this material world is natural because it is not a satisfying place. But a true devotee remains satisfied in his relationship with You. The true devotee sees the world as joyful because he is with You.”

“My mind has not been wandering but has been staying fixed on the utterance of the names, so I’ve come to expect this. It’s a gain from my previous years’ chanting.”

“The names are absolute. You benefit just by touching them with your tongue. When you put your hand in fire, you’ll be burnt. When you say the Hare Krishna mantras, you become Krishna-ized.”

“Srimati Radharani thought that if Krishna did return and was unable to see Her, then He would be unable to live. So she decided to protect Her life.”

“Hearing of Radharani and the gopis’ yearning to meet with Krishna and hearing their transformations of prema produces a wonderful sweetness in the devotees, and they want to go on hearing without end.”

“I had a sense of enjoyment through the whole session. I really like to chant, and the early morning is the best time. I feel sorry when it’s over and would like to do more chanting.”

Kalakantha Prabhu:

People follow leaders because of fear, ambition, duty, and love.

Children are especially empowered to find your descrepancies.

In Toronto, the devotees do not allow cell phones in classes.

A leader must:
   1. Be exemplary.
   2. Put the needs of his dependents before his own needs.

Living in the association of devotees there is a constant sharing of Krishna katha which is enlivening for those devotees who have acquired the taste for it.

If we do not have a taste for the holy name, we will look for a taste elsewhere.

Mahatma Prabhu says that we have to make japa the most important part of the day.

We are dependent on Krishna to reciprocate with our sincere attempts to serve Him.

We are either serving Krishna or serving our own mental conceptions about how we will find happiness.

In japa we practice controlling the mind, a virtue that will help us in all circumstances.

The best way to learn something is to teach it.

Srila Prabhupada said that the acarya acquires knowledge, acts according to it, and shares it.

Krishna consciousness philosophy is great, but if we do not apply it, it is like having medicine on the shelf but not taking it or having food on your plate but not eating it.

Actual leaders are beyond the control of their minds.

Our legacy from Srila Prabhupada is to nourish those sincerely looking for God consciousness.

Comment by me: 
Regarding following a leader because of love, I recall this pastime:
“Everyone loves you, Srila Prabhupada!” one disciple exclaimed.
Srila Prabhupada replied, “Yes, that is because I love everyone.”

Vivasvan Prabhu:

Choosing real estate is all about location, location, location. If you choose a place where the neighbors do not like you, you can be forced out.

Vyasadeva was not satisfied by writing all the Vedas, but you can be satisfied by just going out and distributing a few books because the whole disciplic succession is pleased with you.

Someone said, “There is no perfect knowledge.”
I said to him, “Is your knowledge perfect?”

In the Sikh tradition, Guru Nanak was a devotee of Krishna, but future gurus became corrupted so they got rid of them and only worship the book.

Hridayananda Goswami used to say that you should read the entire Srimad-Bhagavatam every year.

Notes on Appreciation Program for Sruti Sagara Prabhu

[Sruti Sagara Prabhu was an Indian college student at University of Florida, who became a disciple of Kalakantha Prabhu and served as temple president of Krishna House for the last seven years. He is going on to serve as GBC for several southern states. Devotees at Krishna House decided to have an appreciation program for him. I share some of the many things that were said about him here.]

Kalakantha Prabhu:

Sruti’s father said before Sruti came to UF to study that he won a poetry award in India.

As a eighteen year old he became a undergraduate at UF because it was slightly cheaper than the other school he was accepted at. Soon he became attracted to bhakti. In the beginning he had a mustache to appear older but gave it up. He lost attraction to engineering which he was originally studying but changed to political science in which he excelled.

He helped out with college outreach in Maryland for four years.

I invited him to be ashram leader for a semester and then temple president for the last seven years.

He did amazing well handling COVID.

Prabhupada said coal becomes a diamond under pressure. He has matured wonderfully through dealing with challenging issues.

Sruti’s father:

In Delhi as a child of thirteen or fourteen he would do lots of social service. He would go to old age homes, etc. We did not realize his potential.

His poetry dealt with social issues.

Syamakisora Prabhu, board member:

I have known him for years. Most people from India come here to make it big materially, but he excelled spiritually.

Sruti’s fiancee:

I know him briefly, but I happy to hear all these nice things about him.

I feel so welcomed here.

Mukhya Nivasini Devi Dasi:

I’ve worked with you for four years.

I am lucky to have met you. You’re kind. You offer service.

Kumari Sakhi Devi Dasi:

You have become my brother. We had the pleasure of serving together. We brainstormed so many ideas in that office. We are excited to see you going forward.

Gopal Prabhu:

I know him from when he was 18, and he grew up to be our boss. I am proud of him. It is said that sruti is like our mother.

Jonathan:

I was convinced you were a good person when you talked to a homeless person and figured how to engage him in Krishna’s service and be transformed.

Naveen Shakti Devi Dasi:

You are down to earth. A true leader by example.

Brajananda Prabhu:

The people you meet in your foundational years have a special place in your heart.

We have done many things together.

Premamrita Devi Dasi:

Appreciating you is appreciating coming to Krishna consciousness. You were my first temple president. I am so grateful. You have been a mentor and a protector.

Amrita Keli Devi Dasi:

I am so happy to see this beautiful rite of passage.

I also met him at age 18.

He once ate so much halava at Thanksgiving that he rolled on the floor laughing.

In 2010 I went to take Bhaktisastri in Vrindavan, and Sruti’s family took such nice care of me. My family was also grateful for that.

I watched from Jacksonville as you did so many things here at Krishna House.

Thank you for encouraging us in our service.

Chris:

He was funny, he was a great singer, and he made me feel welcome. He engaged me in a lot of service.

Adi Shyam Prabhu:

You have always been caring and kind despite having so many responsibilities.

Ananta Vallabha Prabhu:

He is a leader who inspires others to become leaders. He was a leader of my sadhana.

I feel I was one of the difficulties during COVID that he had to manage.

He drove me all the way from Gainesville to Potamac for my initiation.

He asked me, “Tell me how I can improve.”

Narottama Dasa Thakura Prabhu:

Your relationship with Nanda was one of the most humorous things to see. Once Sruti really wanted Nanda to put jalapeños in the chili. She didn’t want to because they would be too spicy for some of the devotees. Finally he said, “As the temple president, I order you to put jalapeños in the chili.” That was funny because to speak like that was completely out of character for him. She didn’t care. She wasn’t going to put jalapeños in the chili no matter what.

He was deep and also funny and friendly at the same time.

Nitai Gauranga Prabhu:

He has been a big brother.

He personally upholds the Krishna House morning program, including singing the morning tune. He was very timely. He served the parampara.

Shyamala Kishori Devi Dasi:

You are the first friend who became a temple president.

You inspire new people in Krishna consciousness.

The strong desire to do something for Lord Caitanya and Prabhupada’s movement is not there in everyone, but it shines in you.

Nila Mañjari Devi Dasi:

Thanks for being supportive and personable.

I was inspired by your using Yamuna’s cookbook and encouraging people to do new things.

Advaita Acarya Prabhu, Krishna House manager:

You get to really understand someone when you work with them.

I am happy you are being upgraded.

He was available and showed kindness to everybody.

He does not let people take away his japa period, and I think that is a secret of his.

Hearing, sruti, is our first service.

Wife of Advaita:

We love you, Sruti. You have helped us through so many emergencies together.

Brahmatirtha Prabhu:

Management is a challenge because those above you think you are doing a bad job, and those below you think you are doing a worse job.

Srila Prabhupada supported his managers. He saw they had relieved him from a burden.

Sruti’s family raised him well.

We are not going to get anymore pandemics as the US has put a tariff on viruses.

Sruti: Especially from China.

In 1989 for weeks Krishna House cooked a feast for the police who were dealing the aftermath of four students being murdered. Similarly Sruti, during the COVID, served so many first responders.

Nate:

Everyone has an idea how to run Krishna House. Sruti had to deal with that.

He showed tolerance and had no fanatical mood. He encouraged me to go deeper.

Bruce:

You were available to talk.

Kunti Devi Dasi:

Although you are temple president, you manage through friendship, hearing and joking.

You have an open nonjudgmental ear.

Thank you for your friendship.

Kalakantha Prabhu:

Everyone give him your blessings to become County Commissioner of Alachua and GBC of ISKCON for the Southeastern US.

Sruti:

Thank you for your love and affection. That helps me grow in life.

I would serve prasadam and eat with the devotees, and hearing Kalakantha Prabhu reading Srila Prabhupada-lilamrita, I came to realize how amazing Srila Prabhupada was. I decided my desire to benefit society could best be achieved by serving Srila Prabhupada’s mission.

Krishna consciousness was lost after Krishna disappeared. Madhvacarya Prabhu revived it. Then Caitanya established it. Then it disappeared again. Then Prabhupada established it worldwide.

My inspiration is to keep serving Srila Prabhupada’s body.

As temple president of Krishna House I could serve and help Krishna’s mission grow.

I learned from Maryland, my hardest four years, that I should care about devotees.

I really have benefited whenever I took care of devotees. Krishna sees it and blesses you.

Krishna Kripa Das:

Niranjana Swami was my bhakta leader. Because he did that service nicely, he was promoted to temple president. Because he did that responsibly he was promoted to GBC. I see that the same is true with Sruti.

Sruti is respectful to senior people, which is a good quality recommended by Lord Caitanya that not everyone has. He was respectful even to me who am only senior by age. Once he asked if I wanted anything. I said I could use some nail clippers. Less than an hour later, he returned with some nail clippers. I had asked the temple president in Tallahassee for nail clippers two weeks before and had not gotten any, but Sruti surprised me by being right on top of it.

A lot of devotees go to bed at 8:00, 8:30, or 9:00 p.m., so you cannot interact with them after that. Sruti, however, I could count on talking to at 10 p.m., which was nice for me.
Sruti: You exposed me!

Whenever I came to Krishna House, I found Sruti was always welcoming.

One devotee: In America, people say, “How are you doing?” But they keep walking by before you can answer.

Sruti: I was told to ask, “How are you doing?” but not to disappear.

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These verses from Bhagavad-gita describe samadhi, the goal of the yoga system, a pleasure so great that it vanquishes all material miseries, and which continues without interruption. Would you all like to experience that? You can by chanting Hare Krishna, the most recommended spiritual process given in India’s vast Vedic literature for this age.

yatroparamate cittam

niruddham yoga-sevaya

yatra caivatmanatmanam

pasyann atmani tusyati

sukham atyantikam yat tad

buddhi-grahyam atindriyam

vetti yatra na caivayam

sthitas calati tattvatah

yam labdhva caparam labham

manyate nadhikam tataḥ

yasmin sthito na duhkhena

gurunapi vicalyate

tam vidyad duhkha-samyoga-

viyogam yoga-samjñitam

“In the stage of perfection called trance, or samadhi, one's mind is completely restrained from material mental activities by practice of yoga. This perfection is characterized by one's ability to see the Self by the pure mind and to relish and rejoice in the Self. In that joyous state, one is situated in boundless transcendental happiness, realized through transcendental senses. Established thus, one never departs from the truth, and upon gaining this he thinks there is no greater gain. Being situated in such a position, one is never shaken, even in the midst of the greatest difficulty. This indeed is actual freedom from all miseries arising from material contact.” (Bhagavad-gita 6.20–23)

Sometimes while trying to sell Bhagavad-gitas, I would use these verses to attract people to the books.

Kripamoya Prabhu, a beloved disciple of His Divine Grace A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Srila Prabhupada, has been a cornerstone of the International Society for Krishna Consciousness (ISKCON) for nearly five decades. Based in England, his life is a testament to devotion, teaching, and service. Through his books, music, classes, and personal guidance, Kripamoya Prabhu has inspired
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Dear Devotees and Disciples of His Holiness Gopal Krishna Goswami,

Please accept my obeisances. All glories to Srila Prabhupada.

I am very pleased to announce that from April 29 (Akshaya Tritiya – US) until May 10 (Nrsimha Caturdasi – India), I will be matching all worldwide donations during our TOVP Gopal Krishna Goswami 13 Day Matching Fundraiser. During these auspicious 13 days you can give a donation of any amount to help TOVP construction, or if you are a disciple of H.H. Gopal Krishna Goswami you can sponsor one of three unique medallions (gold, silver or bronze) with his image. Visit the webpage below for more details.

Over the last two years since the covid disaster, we have made significant progress in completing the TOVP. We finished the Nrsimha Wing and celebrated the Grand Opening in February, 2024. And this year we opened the historic A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Legacy Museum, which will eventually become the world’s largest museum for any single person in history, with a size of 21,000 sq. ft.

We are now on target to open the TOVP during a 3-month long celebration from December, 2026 until Gaura Purnima, March, 2027. And we need the solidarity of support from every devotee in ISKCON to make this possible for the pleasure and glorification of Srila Prabhupada and Lord Caitanya Mahaprabhu.

Please visit the Gopal Krishna Goswami 13 Day Matching Fundraiser webpage from April 29 – May 10 and do your part, whether for the first, second or even third time, to help us collectively achieve this amazing accomplishment, and I will personally match every donation, dollar for dollar, from any part of the world.

Thank you all for your support.

Your servant,
Ambarisa dasa

Please visit the Gopal Krishna Goswami 13 Day Matching Fundraiser webpage or use the QR codes below.

Sponsor a Medallion

General Donation

 

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Bhagavad Gita’s Teachings for Modern Life In a conversation on The Ranveer Show, HH SB Keshava Swami discussed the Bhagavad Gita’s relevance to contemporary life. The Gita’s wisdom, he noted, is not a linear progression of knowledge but rather a spiral, where repeated readings and reflections lead to deeper understanding. This ancient text offers a
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HG Mahatma Prabhu narrates the story of Lord Nirshinga’s defeat of the demon Hiranyakashipu, bringing relief to the oppressed. Various celestial beings celebrate the end of Hiranyakashipu’s reign of terror, highlighting the significance of divine intervention in restoring order. The class underscores the necessity of virtuous leadership and the unwavering protection granted to devotees. ISKCON
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A recent discourse at Bhaktivedanta Manor explored the essentials of community building within the Hare Krishna tradition. Speakers emphasized the need for respectful deliberation amid differing opinions, highlighting Lord Chaitanya’s example. The discussion underscored the value of cooperation over competition and the importance of engaging youth by providing them with meaningful roles and spiritual education.
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King Prataparudra, ruler of Odisha and a devoted patron of Lord Jagannath, yearned deeply for the grace of Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu. However, Chaitanya, adhering to a renunciant lifestyle, avoided interactions with royalty to shun worldly attachments. The king sought help from close associates like Sarvabhauma Bhattacharya and Ramananda Raya, who attempted to mediate but faced
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Gregg: This 8MM Reel to Reel I found. I made a movie from this Reel to Reel for your enjoyment. This is the only devotee film or Iskcon film that was found. Viviana: You can see how surrender they were, in a world where everything was against them they were so determine to serve Srila
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