Hare Krishna. Sir, thank you for coming today. And we’ll speak on the topic of teamwork based on the Ramayana. Broadly, I’ll talk from the Sundarkand, which is the time when the monkeys go out in search for Sita.
And we’ll talk about how Hanuman emerges as a natural leader despite not being the appointed leader. See, whenever we work in a team, at that time, there are different people with different abilities, different people with different levels of maturities. So to get all of them to work together is a challenge. Now one way we might say that in a team let’s let everyone be equal. Our current age is the age of egalitarianism.
Everybody be equal. Now functionally, conceptually, equality sounds very good. But functionally, equality can be chaotic. Or at best, it can be unproductive. Say, if you want to cook food and if you decide let everyone be equal.
Let everyone play equal roles while cooking. But some people might naturally be better at cooking than others. If somebody is more talented, more knowledgeable, more experienced, more talented, then it makes sense that they lead the effort. So then if they lead the effort, naturally, a hierarchy is formed. So we could say there are 2 things.
There is equality, and there is hierarchy. So whenever there is any problem that we need to face, and life gives us many, many problems throughout. So whenever any task is to be done, whenever any problem is to be faced, not everyone is equally competent at dealing with all problems. So in the interest of solving the problem and ultimately in the interest of everyone, it is best if those who are good at solving that problem, they are allowed to lead. So they then a natural hierarchy is formed.
So equality in concept sounds very attractive, but in practice, hierarchy is required. However, a lot depends on how the hierarchy is formed and how it functions. If somebody who’s at the top of the hierarchy is there not because they are really good. It is because somehow by some factor apart from competence, Maybe just power. It could be brute power, physical power, political power, whatever.
Financial power. By that, they get to the top of the hierarchy. And that does not lead them to actually doing the responsibility that comes at the top of the hierarchy. Then that hierarchy tend towards tyranny. So when we long for equality or when we want to avoid hierarchy, it’s often because there is this fear of tyranny.
That whoever is at the top of the hierarchy, they may exploit us. They may further their own interest instead of the team’s interest. So in any team, broadly speaking, there is there is a tension between these two factors. Every team member needs to be valued, and in one sense, there’s a longing for equality. But, also, for the team to function, there has to be a hierarchy.
But sometimes in the hierarchy, there can be tyranny. So either way, teamwork becomes tense. Normally, also there are, when people have to work together, there is some tension. Because different people have different opinions. But especially teamwork becomes difficult when there is a hierarchy that is formed.
And in that hierarchy, there is naturally some resentment. Why is this person at the top? Now suppose if we are cooking and we only have to eat the food. You know, I say sometimes simplified version of the law of karma is what you cook you will have to eat. So like that, if we consider that if we are going to eat the food and we are in a team cooking, then we would agree.
You are a good cook. You take the lead. Not that I want to avoid work, but it will not be good enough. So when the results of not functioning in a hierarchy are very immediately apparent to us. Say, for example, if we are going in a car and, say, we are not very good drivers, and it’s a tough road.
See, you drive. Basically, we are giving power to that person. But because there, what happens? The result of not functioning according to hierarchy are immediately visible. The car may be with an accident.
But quite often in life, the results of not working on hierarchy may not be so immediately visible. And then we may resent why is this person here? Say, I am here. This person is here higher up than me in hierarchy. Why is this person and some especially if we feel that we are more competent than the person who is higher up in the hierarchy.
That’s when it becomes very difficult to have a team spirit because, you know, actually, we are meant to do this, and I can do this better than this person. And why is this person giving orders and I’m following orders? And of course, it is very easy to think that we can do things better than the way they are being done. But actually, when you start doing things, everything is complicated. Everything seems easy till you start doing it.
Even cooking might seem simple, but when we cook and we burn food, I have eaten to cook food thousands of times, but I realize it is not easy. We may say, I speak all day. But once when I have to speak in public, hey, I freeze. Maybe it’s not that easy. So when whenever somebody else is doing something, it’s very easy to criticize it.
If this is not being done well, it should be done like this. But everything seems easy till we do it ourselves, till we start doing it ourselves. And then we start realizing the challenges. So often there may be a tendency to reject the hierarchy. But if the hierarchy is rejected, we may not have equality.
What we may have is chaos, or we can have even disaster. If say in a plane, if we say the pilot and the passenger are equal, anybody can Google the pilot. Nobody will want to sit in that plane eventually. So we can’t we if we look at our life itself, everywhere there are hierarchies. Now we agree to be a part of a hierarchy if we feel that our that whatever position we have in the pecking order, whatever position we have in the hierarchy that is beneficial for us.
Say for example, you come for a this class now. So in a sense there is a hierarchy. There is a speaker and there is a audience. You feel that maybe by coming for this class, you’re going to benefit something. So we participation in the hierarchy, we continue it voluntarily as long as we feel it’s beneficial.
Sometimes, of course, even when you feel it’s not beneficial, we might be obligated to be a part of hierarchy also. Then there is resentment. Why do I have to be here? Why do I be here in this position? So so this is the broad background about how hierarchy So, there is the desire for equality, but there is also the need for hierarchy.
And how do these two go together? That is the universal tension in every interpersonal interaction. Whether it be, in a family, between husband and wife, between parents and children, between, teams in a professional setting, between devotees working to do seva, do service, that there is a hierarchy, but there is also there is a desire for equality. There is also need for hierarchy. So, basically, now there are some natural hierarchies.
Natural hierarchies means it is parents who give birth to children. So, parents are in a controlling position. Children are in a obeying position. If there is a there is a law of the government, then there is the, say, traffic officers. They are at the top of the hierarchy.
All the people in the, who are driving, they have to follow the rules. So, there are some natural hierarchies which are essential for functioning. But whenever a particular task is to be done, say we form a team for that task, and then within that, a hierarchy is to be formed. Now, say we are doing this task for the first time, We may not even be sure how good who is at a particular task. So, then there might be what you call appointed hierarchy, and there might be an emergent hierarchy.
A pointed hierarchy means this person is at the top. This person is lower. But then as things are done, gradually, what happens? Oh, this person actually better. So let them take care.
Emergent hierarchy. So, for example, if we consider a team, say, a cricket team. Now in a in a in a cricket team, maybe there is some batsman who is very aggressive, and that person can score runs very fast. And then other players just play the anchoring room. They’ll just be there, give the strike to the player.
So that will be natural natural hierarchy. This person scores a lot. That person just feels the strike and gives the strike. But suppose on a particular day, so that that is you could say the appointed hierarchy. You be the attacker and the other will be the, anchors.
But then maybe on a particular day, the player is in a very good form. And although that player normally plays the role of a sheet a sheet anchor is anchoring the innings that person is in a very aggressive mood playing very well then even the person who normally aggressive he may say that okay. If you are adding well you 2 be the aggressor. I’ll play the sheet anchor role. So, what that means is there is an emergent hierarchy.
So, natural appointed hierarchy is the way things are planned. Emergent hierarchy is how things actually work out. And sometimes the hierarchies may change. So at one level, if the team is to form in the beginning itself, there has to be an acceptance of the appointed hierarchy. Okay.
This person is the leader. These are all follows. But if the so without that the team will not form itself. But once the team is formed, for the team to function, there has to be the willingness for emergent hierarchies. You might find, oh, actually, this person is better.
This person really knows this stuff very well. Somebody might be a team lead, but in a particular area, if a particular person is expert, they know about say, if it’s a software, you’re making software, and this person is really good at this particular area. Then although that person is not the official lead, they may become the emergent leader. So how these tensions are to be dealt with? First, the tension when an appointed lead is there then the tension when an emergent lead come emergent leaders emergent hierarchy comes up, an emergent leader comes up.
That’s what we will discuss how based on how the team was formed to search for SITA and how the dynamics within the team changed gradually as things moved forward. But at this point, this is the background. Any questions or clarifications or comments at this point? Yes. Just one question about the hierarchy.
The hierarchy is not fixed, but can it change when circumstances change? Example, let’s say, let’s say with the cricket, let’s say, when it’s very cold, for example, maybe someone else Yeah. It should be changed. It should be allowed to change when it is necessary. That’s what I’d say.
Basically, can hierarchies change? Yeah. See broadly speaking, there are 2, you could say, schools of thought. You see the liberals and the conservatives, or you could call them the left wing and the right wing. So the left wing, the liberals are generally against hierarchies.
So for example, communism had the idea that there are the capitalists, there are the owners of the means of production, and there are workers. And the owners exploit the laborers. So down with all destroy all the owners. So the in general, the left is against hierarchies. But they are you could say broadly speaking the liberals.
See, you know, let people do what they want. Be liberal about things. So they say that this is a hierarchy. Let’s see how we can bring it down. How we can, make things little more equal, horizontal.
Then there are the conservatives, which is the right. Now the right has often got a negative label because we often associate with that with the say right wing religious extremists or whatever. But in general, the idea of the right is that the right wants to stick to hierarchy, stick to order. This is how things have been done. Let’s continue the the area.
So now who is right? Well, it depends. Sometimes the hierarchy needs to be maintained for things to move forward, and sometimes the right is right. You know? Although there are problems in this hierarchy, every hierarchy has some problems.
But if the hierarchy is functioning and is delivering the goods, then move on. So, sometimes disrupting hierarchy can create a lot of problems, bigger problem than what we thought we were going to solve. So, but sometimes the left is right. The hierarchy is leading to a lot of people at the bottom of the hierarchy being exploited, being abused. Then things have to change.
So, you could say that both the Left and the Right, the Liberals and the Conservatives, they have to interact with each other. They have to talk and understand each other so that what is right for that situation can be understood. Generally, whenever there is any conflict, you know, there’s there is people tell their own story. So every story has how many sides? What do you think?
As many people as you know. Yeah. As many people. If there are 2 people who are in conflict, then how many sides of the story? 3.
My side, your side and the right side. So it’s not the right side doesn’t mean necessarily that see our memory even if oh this person did like this this person did like this When when one person tells the story and another person tells the story, it’s not even if both peep neither of them is, is manipulative consciously, but still our memory at a subconscious level tends to be selective. And that’s why we often remember the things which show us in the good light and which show others in the bad light. And if we have done something wrong, often we forget that. Not that you consciously want to forget that.
It happens that way. So actually, memory is a tool for the past. History is also a tool for the past. But, you know, memory and history are non interest are often not entirely overlapping. There are many things in history that are not in memory.
That means they happened, but we have forgotten them. And there are many things in memory that are not in history. That means they did happen, but we imagine they happened. So that’s called false memories. And the point is that whenever there is a conflict, both have to discuss.
So sometimes the hierarchy has to be maintained. This was the appointed hierarchy. This is how we will do things. But sometimes, the hierarchy can be adjusted. This is how things will work better.
So the emergent hierarchy comes up. Okay. Now now if you want to do this, this this is how it will work better. So, that’s so hierarchy in principle, hierarchy is required. In practice, whether the pre appointed hierarchy is the best way to move forward or we need to have a more of a horizontal structure or we have we have a new hierarchy that has to be seen.
So what will keep both the left and the right together, the liberals and the conservative together is not the focus on the practice, but focus on the purpose. Focus on the practice means this is how we have been doing. Zah we’ll keep doing all the time. No. But is this doing this leading to the result?
Now this is unfair. Let’s not do it. But this is producing the result. So let’s continue it. So if we get too caught in the practices alone, should it be done like this or should it be visible like that?
Then often the conflict can become interminal. But if we focus on the purpose, we are doing this. Is this the right thing to do? Is this the right way to do things? How do we decide that?
It depends on, the the purpose. Where do we want to where do we want to go? What do we want to do? Say, like, a say, before the pre GPS time, if we were driving a car, and now we know a particular way. And, say, okay.
I’ll lead I’ll drive the car. I’ll take it along. But then that road is blocked as heavy traffic. And then somebody else says, yeah. I know that way, and that will be free at this time.
Oh, okay. Then you take the wheels. So the original hierarchy of I’ll be the driver, but no. Should you be the driver or should I be the driver? The appointed hierarchy might be there, but the hierarchy will change.
Instead of I driving, you drive because the purpose is what needs to be focused on. So, if we keep focus on the purpose, then we can adjust things. Okay. Thank you. Any other questions?
Yes, please. One of my questions. Yeah. Because, I have the problem when I was studying doing the dance, and we have mixed syllabus. Right?
People who will stay in dancing and less experience dancing. So when you have a technical class, what they’re doing is That’s true. Yeah. You know, it depends a lot on context. Say for example, sometimes if, if a class is there, a lot of interaction in the class.
Now if it’s a philosophical technical subject which is the focus is more of educational, then maybe the speaker needs to speak more. But if it is more practical, then maybe there are group tasks, there is more interaction, then little things become learned more. So how the thing should function, that lot depends on purpose. Okay. Thank you.
Any other questions? Okay. So let’s start. The, in the Ramayana, when the monkeys are called by Sugri, they all assemble in different parts of the earth. They come and then Sughri tells him that all of you need to go and search for Sita.
And he appoints a group to go to the south because south is most likely where Sita is to be found. Let’s see Ravan flying the southern direction. Now, of course, it could be that, Ravan might be deceiving also. Sometimes, you know, you go in a particular direction and then you change directions. That’s how sometimes you say if somebody is is a car chase and somebody is pursuing someone, you create a decoy or a deception.
That is all the that’s why they, he send people in all four directions but but still direction, it was more likely that Ravan would be in the south because he also knew that Lanka, Ravan is king in the most on that side, broadly speaking. And even if that that awareness was not very clear, but still, of course, even if you say Lanka is there, whether he she’s gone to Lanka or gone somewhere else, you don’t know. And at that time, when Ravan was flying high above the sky, he did not perceive these monkeys down there as threats. There’s no need for him to deceive them. So so he formed the most, so Sugri, considering that Rahul was most likely to be Lanka, he formed a team to, search for Sita in the south.
Now in that team, there are many members, but 3 were prominent. Who were those 3? Hanuman. Hanuman? Anyone else?
Angad. Angad. Jamaban. Yes. Thank you.
Neil and others were also there, but these 3 were prominent. Now each of them had something, to commend them. Jamba 1 was senior. He was the oldest, most experienced, wisest, you could Then, Angad was royalty. He was the son of the previous king, the nephew of the current king.
And although he was young, he was also valiant. Now, Hanuman till this point has not really manifested his power in a big way. Till this point, Hanuman is primarily like assistant of Sugri. He has not fought any major wars. Does anyone know why Hanuman is not prominent till now?
Because he he was cursed to forget his own powers. Yes. He was cursed to forget his own powers. When he was a small child, at that time, he was very mischievous, and then he was cursed. So the sages didn’t want to curse to punish him, but they wanted to curse to curb him.
Because they said, you have we won’t take away your abilities but we will take away your memory of your abilities. So now, it’s interesting that he still had some abilities. That’s how when he wanted to approach Ram, he changed his form and he took the form of a brahmil. A wise person and first time approached brahm and they had a talk at that time. He still had some of his powers but it was not like a dazzling display of powers.
So Hanuman was also an important member, but Hanuman was not like the official leader of the team. Sometimes a I’ll because for most of us, cricket is familiar. So I’ll use some cricket examples. In America, if I use cricket, the first thing they think about is the insect. So anyone unfamiliar with cricket here?
Okay. Unfamiliar? Unfamiliar? Unfamiliar. Familiar?
Yeah. Okay. Unfamiliar. You are unfamiliar? Unfamiliar.
Familiar. Okay. Not familiar. Okay. Sure.
Okay. So, say, sometimes the star player in a team is a captain but sometimes the star player may be a great individual performer but might not be a good captain. When somebody says the captain, the star player is the star. So there are different ways in which things function. So now, among all the vanaras, the the first vanara that Ram had met was Hanuman.
And they had naturally bonded. Of course, at a spiritual level, we can say Hanuman is the eternal devotee of the lord. And, that’s true. But even at that functional level, they had bonded very nicely. And Ram had that indication or faith or whatever that Hanuman will be the person who will find Sita.
And thus, among all the people who are going in various directions, Ram gave his signet ring only to Hanuman. It’s interesting that Anghad was the leader, but Ram gave this to Hanuman. Now Angad was made the leader because he was born in royalty, and Angad was in a peculiar situation. At one level, his father had recently been killed, and it was like he had to be working with the person who had caused the death of his father. Now Angad did not in any way blame Ram.
Although Ram had shot the arrow, which led to the death of Wali, he knew Ram had no personal enmity with Wama with Wali. It was Sugri who had asked Ram. So he still had some resentment towards that. After all, his father had been killed. It is difficult for him to work.
But before dying, Wale had told Sugriyu that Angad and Tara, they are blameless. Angad was too small when all this happened. And Tara, my wife, she told me repeatedly to patch up to reconcile with you, but I did not listen to her. So please don t take out any of my anger again your anger towards me against them. And he told both of them to live under the shelter of Sugareem.
So, although there was some resentment, but because of that submission, because of the instruction of his father, that was like that was like his last wish. So Angad was living in living with Sugri and doing his will because he was also, although his royalty, still he was not the king. He was subordinate to the king. So, Sugri also knew that Angal had some, reservations about his leadership, about his position. So, sometimes he had to give people space.
So, he made Angad the leader. You are going in a group, although he was young, so you should become the leader. And everybody accepted that Hanuman as well as, Jambowin and others accepted that, and they started searching. Now, they were told that all of you have to return within 1 month. And normally, it’s whenever any service is given, accountability is required.
How well is the service being done? I say sometimes people work from home. And it’s difficult to keep track. Now, whether you are working from home or you are working for home. It’s difficult to keep track.
So any service accountability is required. Imagine you are in a plane and suddenly this is a pilot speaking, today I am working from home. Really? The The passengers we also want to go home now. We don’t want to be there.
So any service, some amount of accountability has to be there. So what Sugri, you said is, now when you’re going for searching, it’s a big task. So he any big task can become like a elephant. It can become like a whale. It can become huge.
So he said that all of you should search and come back within 1 month. Because, you know, any task that we do do, it has there has to be a cap on it. Because otherwise any task can become infinite. So if we are if we decide that, okay, you know, I lost my phone. Phone.
I want to search for my phone. Okay. Now you can search for it. But how much time do you spend searching for it? If you spend one day, you spend 2 days, you spend 5 days, then you think, you know, maybe it’s not worth spending so much time.
Better luck to get a new phone. So any task can be expanded unlimitedly. So he said all of you have to come back within one month because searching, it’s a phone lost in the places where we go that also is difficult to search. But somebody whom whom most of the monkeys had never met, somebody who don’t even know where they are, the search for that person is a very difficult thing. So come back within a month.
Now, generally what happens among kshatriyas, when instructions are given or when words are spoken often, there is a kshatriya spirit. You know, 2 warriors are fighting when say, today I will send you to the abode of death. Today your body will become the food of vultures. So there is that, rhetorical intimidation which is a part of Kshatriya culture. So as per that, Subhriya said, anybody who comes, who delays coming back, who’s a laggard, who doesn’t come within 1 month, they will be executed.
That is not that he’s going to execute them. But there has to be some fear, some threat you know, things have to be done. So now the Vanara started, with Hanuman carrying the signet and they all knew we had to come back within 1 month. And they went south They went toward the south. South, south.
And they went down, down, down. They searched in caves, they searched in forests, they searched in, wherever they could. They couldn’t find Sita anywhere. Eventually, they started feeling hungry, thirsty. They couldn’t they were they’re in such a wilderness patch that there was no water available.
They came near a big mountain and then they saw that over there, oh, from a cave, some birds were coming out and their wings were dripping with water. Oh, maybe there’s water here. So they decided to go. They peeked in and they saw it didn’t seem like a cave. It seemed like a catacomb.
It seemed like a whole network of dark paths inside. So, I thought outside their search, they couldn’t find any water anywhere. So, they decided, let’s go in. And then Hanuman went in the front and all of them held each other 1 by 1. Sometimes in the dark, it’s they are searching for something or going somewhere, but one possibility is gonna get lost.
So they all held on to each other, and they formed a long queue, and they went in. And then and then and then and then. Sometimes when you go into a dark place, when is it going to end? Is it going to end also? So as they’re going deep, of the monkeys are worshipping.
Hey. Now maybe we shall go back. Oh, I don’t know. We’ll we’ll find something over here. No.
But now we’ll be so tired that we will not be able to go back also if we don’t find anything. So naturally, some dissension started happening. Generally, when things are working, then people don’t complain. But when things stop working, then everybody starts complaining. You see what happens after the event, everybody is expert of how it should have happened.
Like recently, there’s a cricket world cup and India was expected to do very well when India lost in semifinals. And after India lost in the semi finals, like there are 100 of people you know saying, oh you know this batsman should have been sent first. This ball should have been given the ball. This one should have done like this. So everybody is expert about how things are to be done.
So the things don’t work, that’s how it is. So then they said, no we should not go, we should go, we should move on, we should not move on. But Hanuman kept relentlessly moving forward. And finally in the distance they could see some light. Now when they saw that light, what is it?
They came forward and then they saw it like a mystical place, there were trees which seemed to be luminous And those trees had beautiful lush, lush fruits or lush greenery over there and juicy fruits. And it seemed like a mansion over there along with well taken care of gardens with orchards with fruits and lots of food to eat. The monkeys became jubilant. He said, let’s go eat. Hanuman said, wait, wait, wait.
He said, whose is this? What is this? This is so beautiful, it just can’t be existing automatically over here. It must be belonging to someone. And he looked around and then as he looked around, he saw in the distance there was, somebody sitting and the body was effulgent and he looked forward, looked carefully and he saw that it was a it was a female, it was a yogini.
And as they went closer and closer Hanuman saw that there was effulgence coming from her body and he very respectfully approached her. And he told all the monkeys, monkeys are restless, and they’re already hungry, which makes them even more restless. But he stopped stopped here. And then he approached and he said that, no. Oh, lady, who are you?
And what are you doing here? Doing meditation over here? And what is this place? And then he introduced himself. I’m Hanuman.
I am the servant of Sugriva, and we are on the mission, given by by Ram. And this is he said, I am swayampraba. Swayampraba means self effulgent. And she said that, I’ll stay here as the guardian of this place. And this place is actually constructed by the architect, the celestial architect, Mayada now.
And it was used by him, but eventually, there was a fight between Indra and Indra Indra took it over. And Indra had a Apsara whom who used to live here. And then Indra asked her to come. So so he won this. And then he, Indra gave this to his this Apsara who was very dear to him.
But after that, Indra wanted that Apsara to be with him. So he took her to heaven. And then she asked me to be here as the guardian. And now Hanuman, sometimes when you speak something, people don’t voice a question but there is a question which is a question mark on their face. Yeah.
So Hanuman, how are you thinking? You know, this is a this is a forest, this is a big place and how is she going to guard it? And she said that, I have been so then she noticed that question, that thought, how are you going to guard this? She said that, actually, I have been blessed with yogic powers. It is by my yogic powers that I protect this.
Oh, Hanuman, if any of you had eaten the fruits without my permission without taking permission from me, you would have died. The protection was that nobody could disrupt things over there without being harmed themselves. So Hanuman’s maturity was when you see something wonderful, when you see something great, don’t presume it is for you. Don’t presume it is for you. Ask whose it is?
Hai. He said, oh, because you are in a cultured way, ask me. And because you are the because you are serving Ram, you can have these fruits as much as you want. And then, so here we see Angad was the leader but Hanuman was known to be good at speaking. Hanuman was expert at speaking in a way which could connect people.
Often, when we get upset, then we think we speak to give others a piece of our mind. Yeah. I’ll tell you what what you’re doing. Actually we should give we should speak to give others peace of mind but we give them a piece of our mind and then we take away their peace of mind and then they take away our peace of mind. Degenerates.
So at that time, Hanuman because he was expert at speaking and everybody knew that Hanuman was a good speaker. So, that’s why even earlier, when Ram and Lakshman were going through the forest and Subhiri noticed, who are these 2 people who come? He said, Hanuman, you find out. And when Hanuman spoke, at that time, Ram said, oh, he’s so learned. His speech is so sweet.
Just by hearing him speak, oh, all my anxiety of the mind has gone. All the tiredness has gone away. Some some people’s speech is very jarring. Some people’s speech is very soothing. So, his speech is very soothing and very sweet.
So now, here, with respect to this, although Angad was a leader, Angad also knew. Hanuman is expert at speaking. So, Angad naturally allowed Hanuman to speak. And Hanuman, because he was there, he was not an appointed leader, but he was in the in this particular ROCE per case, he was an emergent leader. As emergent leader, he saved the day for them.
He without even knowing they could have rushed into dangers. In this world, often pleasure seems to be present at many places. Nowadays especially on the internet, so many things thereis so many things free available. You know whenever any product is free, that means that we are the product. We are the real product.
You know. They give something free so that they will catch our consciousness. So, some programs some say say movie streaming channel or something they will say, 15 days free. And then in free, people watch so much and they get hooked to it. And then they become ready.
I have to pay this. So what happens, in this world, nothing comes free. And whenever anything seems too good to be true, it is probably too good to be true. Some things there must be some catch somewhere. So in this forest, in this wilderness where they were starving and suddenly, like, a magnificent, lush greenery and lavish natural abundance came up.
How did it come up? He says, this is not by chance. Probably this is. So Hanuman had that maturity. And then when Hanuman and Swaha Prabhava spoke, Hanuman said, okay, you can eat now.
And they all went and they drank water and they ate abundant food, and they rested and they got rejuvenated. Now the search for Sita. And so then Anupam turned towards Swayampraba, and he said that, how do we now, thank you for providing us this hospitality, this food. How do we go out from here now? See, in general, in our life journey, wherever path you want to go, there are broadly it’s an individual journey or a team journey.
There are 2, you could say, kind of obstacles that come. 1 is temptation and the other is tribulation. We are going on this particular path. Temptation means just go off this path, you can get some pleasure. Tribulation means that, oh, this path has so much trouble in it.
Why do you want to go? This path you can’t move on. In anything we want to do in our life, say, we want to we want to study for an exam. Then Then the temptation might be while we are studying, suddenly our phone gives a notification. Your friend has updated their Facebook profile photo.
Oh, let me just see that photo. And you click and see that one photo and maybe one more photo. And then what without will be 1 minute, may be 1 hour will go, 3 hours will go in that. So temptation, that’s one distraction. The other is tribulation.
Yes. Studying is too difficult. It requires too much effort. Maybe I shouldn’t be doing this. Maybe this is never going to work out, and then we may stop.
So this can happen at an individual level, this can also happen at a team level. So now the vaanaras, they face this temptation that, oh, just pounce on those foods and eat them. And that could have been the normal monkey tendency. But Hanuman said no. And they were protected from the danger that came because of the temptation.
Then now a tribulation came upon them. What was that tribulation? Sayyampraba, you see, when Hanuman asked, what is the way out from here? So she said, there is no way out from here. What?
He says, there is no way out from here. Now as soon as the monkeys heard this, they became angry. You know, see, it’s it’s good to be comfortable, but nobody wants to be confined. Somebody said, there’s no way out of there. What?
Tell me the way. There must be a way. So the monkey started advancing aggressively. And Raman said, stop, stop, stop. He says, what do you mean?
He said that those that when Indra asked me to guard this, one arrangement he made for protection was that even if those who could enjoy the fruits and luxury facilities over here, if they go out, then they will tell everyone else that there’s so much over here. And then people will come and plunder and ruin this. So for the protection of this place, Indra has arranged that anybody who comes in can never go out. Now this can be very scary to hear. Come here.
You can never go out from here. Hanuman just maintained his car. He said, okay. But then when we saw that there were these birds, they were flying out of here. And there wings with water, so they had also reached the water.
So so emperor Vasily said, yes, but they are not a threat to me. They are not a threat. So Anwan said, we are also not a threat. He says, No. You may tell you may tell other monkeys and they may come over here.
He says, no. No. We are not going to do that. He says, we want we are here only to serve Lord Ram. This is far away from our homes.
We are here on a mission to serve Ram, and we need to go urgently. So Anuban earnestly begged her. I told her that we are no threat to you. I’m sure there must be a way out. He said, yes.
The only way out is that you I can take you out, but then you will not know you have to close your eyes. If you cannot see. You will go out and you will not know how you the path out the path in. Back from this. He said okay.
He told all the monkeys to close your eyes. They closed the eyes and then Swayamprah Bha used their mystic powers. And they suddenly opened their eyes and they saw they were near a mountain and it looked, magnificent. They’re seeing the bright light of the sun, the big sky, and they said that now I brought you out. And as they were looking out here and there, they noticed that they had not come out with the same place they were in.
And so emperor Prahara said, now I am going back. And he says because they had this sincere desire to serve Ram, So what Swaimpapa did was, this big mountain range inside this cave was there. So they came in from this side and Swaimpapa brought them out from the other side. So that now they don’t have to go through the labor of scaling the mountain. And thus they came closer to their destination.
So again Hanuman s careful speech saved the day. We all can get angry. We all can get provoked. Now all of us would like to say give good speeches if we are called upon to give. And if you generally if you give a bad speech, we will regret it.
Oh, I didn’t speak so well. But if we get angry often when we get angry we will give the best speech that we will ever regret. Anger often makes us shed all our inhibitions. We might be shy we might be stage scared and whatever but if you are angry we will go out and speak. I will do the best speech that we will ever regret.
So we will speak without any reservation, but often we will speak something many things which you would regret afterwards which we should not have spoken. So for Janaka Pandita also says for a warrior, for a king who wants to conquer the world, the first skill to learn is the skill of the tongue. Not the skill of the sword, the skill of the tongue, skill of speaking. Because a king might be a great warrior and it is important for a king to them himself be good at fighting. But a victory does not depend only on the king fighting well, the king has to inspire the army to fight.
And that requires skill of the tongue to speak. So we see Hanuman’s expertise here where he naturally emerges as a leader. And then as they have emerged out, they start searching again. So, this is I will be talking about 3 main incidents. So this was the first incident where Hanuman starts emerging as a leader based on his speaking skills, his maturity, his emotional maturity, his verbal expertise.
The second incident, I will talk about my interaction Sampati. And the third interaction is our third incident will be about Hanuman preparing leap across Sri Lanka. So any questions at this point? Yeah. Well, are leaders born or are they made?
I’ve addressed this in I have written a book on 10 leadership uttas from Bhagavad Gita. I’ve addressed that in that. See there is, you could say 2 kinds of leadership. There is public leadership and personal leadership. Public leadership means, the ability to inspire others, the ability to lead a team per se, a group of people.
And that requires a certain set of skills maybe that as I said it requires eloquence verbal expertise that requires organization, delegation, accountability, keeping track. There are certain skills which are required for public leadership. And some people may have it those skills, some people may not have those skills. But more important than public leadership is personal leadership. Personal leadership is that means we should be able to lead ourselves according to our principles, according to our values.
We should be able to lead our mind, our senses in a way that is consistent with who we want to be. If somebody is a public leader without being a personal leader, they may lead for some time, but sooner or later, everything will collapse. So they might be very powerful like a like a king might be very powerful, good leader in terms of public leadership, good warrior, good speaker. But say the king is not able to have personal leadership, then the enemy might send some seductive woman and the king might just fall for her, and then she might poison and kill. So if the if there is public leadership without personal leadership, then there might be success for some time, but things will collapse.
But if there is personal leadership, then even if a person is not an appointed leader, still that person can inspire others. All of us through our day to day actions, actions, whatever we do, it influences others. Every action that we do has its influence, has its impact. So, therefore, personal leadership is something which every one of us can do. In terms of public leadership, there are certain skills which some people may be born with.
Now, can others develop it? We can, but it may not come naturally to them. And they may not develop them to as much extent as those who had them in born and had those coming naturally. So some people might be very good speakers, but they might not be very good delegators and organizers, strategic planners. Some people might be strategic planners, but they might not be very good speakers.
Some people might so these skills can be developed? Yes, they can be. But there is, an innate talent which, which cannot be replaced by a large amount of practice alone. So, personal leadership is something which every one of us can develop. Public leadership is something which, we are largely born with.
And that can also be developed, but not in a significantly dramatic way. May not be. So in that sense, we all can be leaders whether we whether we become public leaders or not that will vary from person to person okay thank you yes Which intelligence? Then? Emotional intelligence.
Then second one? Raw intelligence. You know, like, analytics. Okay. Raw intelligence.
Okay. Is emotional intelligence more important than, say, raw intelligence or analytical ability? Yes. It’s difficult to compare the 2 in the sense that both have their utility in their particular fields. So, if somebody is a mathematician and that is the field they are specialising in, then without having adequate IQ, without having adequate raw intelligence you cannot function in that field.
So, in certain specific fields, the raw intelligence is also required, and IQ is required for certain areas. But, emotional quotient is something which emotional intelligence is something which everyone needs. And especially if somebody is going to work in a team, work in a community, then emotional intelligence is more important than than intelligence. So, I just could say raw intelligence because raw intelligence may enable us to become to excel individually. But it is emotional intelligence, which will enable us to excel while working with others.
Okay. Thank Okay. Good question. So even in personal leadership, say, some people naturally are maybe more self controlled. They’re already born in goodness.
So then what is the difference between personal and public? Yeah. See, there are there is a soul, there is the mind, there is the body. Now you cannot rigidly differentiate between the mind and the body in terms of, what is an ability coming from where? Say somebody has singing ability.
Is that ability of the body or the mind? You could stay at one level of the body, ability of the body. Your throat is it produces very sweet sounds. But it’s not just that. The mind also has to be attuned to speak that, to to sing that way, to do what it takes to sing regularly.
In general, you could say that the, so you could talk about but still you could differentiate between abilities and qualities. Abilities are more functional skills to do certain things. Qualities are more character centred virtues. One way to differentiate it is you could call it talent and temperament. So talent, you could say it’s more physical.
Say somebody is, you know, an expert batsman. They just can hit shots which other players can’t even dream about. So that’s But temperament means to know when I should hit that shot or when I should display defensively. The maturity to choose, that’s temperament. So in general, achievement requires talent and temperament both.
So, based on our past karma, we get both the body and the mind. And among the body and the mind, which is more changeable? Mind. Yeah. You could say it’s more difficult to change, but it is more changeable if you work on it.
If, say, somebody has white skin and they wanna change it somebody has dark skin and they wanna change to white white hair. It’s s quite difficult, you know. If somebody is say 4 and a half feet and they want to become 7 and a half feet. Well, that s almost impossible. So at the level of the body the kind of physical attributes we have and the physical abilities we have.
Some voices are naturally sweet. Some voices may not be sweet. Now still you can speak in a sweet tone but speaking in a sweet tone is not the same as actually having a sweet voice, Isn’t it? So when I talk about, public leadership, I was talking more in terms of the physical abilities. So, of course, you could say that, speaking is it physical or psychological?
That’s why I said, it’s not a like a rigid differentiation, but it’s a broad indication of the differentiation. It’s a so that there are certain you could say certain things, which we get from the past, which fall more towards the ability side. And there are certain things which you get from the past evolved from which fall more towards the quality side. Now again, you could go into a hair splitting difference between what is the ability and the quality. Let’s not go into that direction.
But what Iim saying is that purse whatever is required for personal leadership, there is there is a greater possibility to change that. But what is required for public leadership, there there may not be that much possibility to change that. So, certainly, some people might be more suited to be personal leaders than others and that difference can also come from past lives. But the capacity for changing is more with respect to personal leadership than public leadership. Okay.
Thank you. Any other question? Yes, please. Charisma. Yeah.
Charisma is a gift. It’s a special gift, which some people have, which some people develop also over time. And that can be a very powerful tool for attracting leadership, charisma. It’s almost mysterious what concomprises charisma. But it’s also a challenge that leadership is, based on charisma.
It can be very powerful but it can also be very meteoric. It goes up like a meteor and it comes down. Often after a charismatic leader say their tenure ends or they depart, then everything can crumble. If everything is based on the charisma only, things can crumble. That is why in many ways, whenever any organisation is based on a charismatic leadership, then, then the succession becomes very turbulent.
And succession requires what is called in organization theory as the routinization of the charisma. That means the charisma has to be passed on to the structures of the organization. And that is often very difficult to do. So charismatic leadership can be very commanding but it it is not very sustainable. So, if you have charisma we use it if you don’t have still we do the best that we can.
Okay. Thank you. Okay. So before we go to the second and third instance, do we need to have break now? Should we have after 10 after about half an hour more?
What would we prefer? How many of you want a short break? 5-ten minutes? 12? Bells.
Maybe then. Because if I start the incident, let him go to 12:10. It’ll take a 25, 30 minutes. 12:10 is okay. 12:10 is okay?
Okay. Fine. So now after they emerged from that cave, they again started searching. And although initially they were lated, now they were nourished. They were having food, water, they were energized, but still they were no closer to actually finding Sita.
They started searching, searching, and soon they realized that they couldn’t find her anywhere. And despair started setting in. And as the despair started setting in, that is a time when the monkeys said, what to do? We have searched for so long. They had been in that Sohimbraha’s cave also for quite some time.
Before that also, they had been searching. Now 1 month had already got over. Some of the vanaras said that, let us go back and inform Bali of what has happened. He says, no. No.
No. We have come so far. Again, for us to come here will be difficult. Let’s keep searching. Let’s keep searching till we find.
So then, as they would keep searching, but eventually nobody was finding anything. They kept searching, kept searching, and then gradually, despair started spreading further and further. And he said, where are we going to find Sita? Let’s go back. And Angad said Angad became even more desperate.
You know? It’s like, say, he is young, he has been appointed the leader of the team, and the team is filled. It like, say, you have a new captain of a team and the captain goes for a cricket team and you go for a tournament and you just fail this money. Now sometimes, especially in India where people are very emotional, if you win there will be thousands of people welcoming you if you lose thousands of people will garland you with chappals with shoes. Now there can be a lot of disgrace and humiliation when you lose so Angad felt mortified thinking that, oh, if I how can I go back?’ He said, ‘I failed over here, and if you go back, we’ll be disgraced.’ And Angad’s imagination started working now?
See, imagination is a very powerful tool we have. But we need to know how to use imagination. If our imagination is channel constructively, then we can envision things and then we can get the inspiration to actualize those things. So, imagination channel constructively is very powerful. But imagination running wild can be very dangerous.
It can just we can conjure up all kinds of horrifying situations, and we can paralyze ourselves with fear. When this starts happening, you know, the mind can say, you don’t know the future. This may go wrong. That may go wrong. That may go wrong.
And it just becomes so fearful at that time. So when the mind starts conjuring fearful scenarios, and what happens is none of us know the future. So we will say, oh, this can happen. This can happen. So we can get overwhelmed by fear.
One way to deal with that fear is, yes, we acknowledge that we don’t know the future, but then our mind also doesn’t know the future. So just as we can’t forecast it, even the mind can’t forecast it. And if the mind can’t mind is forecasting it, that is also speculative. So we need to check that fear. So how do we so what did Angad started thinking?
Angad said that actually, Wali had Sugri had said that anyone who comes late, after 1 month, they’ll be executed. He said, no. No. That was that was not literal. Many times certain statements are made and just the context tells you that they are not literal.
But, you know, like, but sometimes people might take those statements are non literal literally. And then we all have this, there are so many metaphors that we have which if we take them literally, they can they can, they can be completely out of place. I was in Lester, I think, last last year. And I gave a class and there was a nice question answer after the class. It’s a call I think it’s a college program or something.
A lot of young people. And after that, the devotee had organized the program. He just came to me with a big smile on his face. He said, Prabhu, you killed it. What did I kill?
And why are you so happy about it? So then, I realized that he was using that in a non literal sense. So that phrase comes from the hunting metaphor. Either somebody shoots, you kill it. That means you you shot very well.
You did very expertly. So he was appreciating, but it was confusing for me. So this is not a literal statement. But what happens when we want to when our mind catches a particular narrative, mind going to a particular track, it starts finding everything to support that narrative. So just Surya said he’s going to kill us.
We’ll be executed if we don’t come back. And he said, actually, you know, Sugriva, he will already be seeing me as a threat to him. And he’ll just he will use this as a even if he doesn’t execute all of you, he will use this as a as a pretext to have me executed. And rather than being considered a failure in front of all my family and citizens and being humiliated and executed, better I’ll stay here itself. I’ll not go back.
It like, say, the Indian captain says I’ll not go back to India only. It’s No. You know, that’s too much. But he’s no. Nobody is going to so Hanuman, he naturally he heard this.
Angad was the leader. And when Angad started speaking like this about their king, that naturally causes concern. What we speak matters but what position we speak that matters even more. Now if if somebody has got a say may be some kind of swelling on their hands or swelling on their body somewhere. And I come and tell you you got cancer.
What? If I am not a doctor and I say you got cancer, you are pessimistic. And your doctor comes and says you got cancer. Oh, really? No.
So So what is being said matters but who is saying it also matters quite a bit. So if there is a hierarchy of leaders. So Angad is 1 leader and sugri with another leader. Sugri with the leader above the leader. So So, what happens is if in a hierarchy of if there is a team and if in the hierarchy of leaders, one leader speaks against another leader who is above them.
The result is what? People get demoralized. People get confused. So when Vali when when Anand was speaking like this, Anuman realized that this is going in a terrible direction. Let’s stop this.
So how do you stop it? He said, actually, Wali says, Sugri will never do like this. He is virtuous and you are his nephew. Now Angad was already desperate and Angad said, no. He said, you say Sugri is virtuous, but he had his own brother killed.
Had the first opportunity just to get the kingdom. If he killed his own brother, then what is what stops him from killing his nephew? Now, when he started speaking like this, he said that he said why Sugreen is so hungry for power that he can go to any extent. Now when he spoke this, all the monkeys became agitated. And Hanuman said no.
Now Hanuman was naturally very concerned by this. It’s like anger, this sowing, is accusing the king of grievous, horrendous things, and he is he is actually actively fomenting rebellion, insurrection against him. What do you do? What’s your time? So one man was trying to persuade Rama.
He says, no. Actually, Sugri will never do anything without Ram, without Ram’s consent, and Ram will never allow such a thing to happen. He said, no. No. Sugiri was very cunning.
You know, he influenced Ram to kill Vali, so he can influence Ram to kill me also. This is all his imagination going. At this point, going. At this point, hunger had faded. I am going to sit here and I am not going to go back.
And I am going to do prayabrata. Prayavrata is. Does anyone know what is prayavrata? Fast till? Till death.
Till death. Yes. Tomorrow Ekadashi would do Ekadashi Vrata. Isn’t it? Prayavrata is ought to be tried.
But, see, that’s a traditional way. If somebody feels my life’s mission is over, then let me end my life now. So he said, I’ll do Prayavrata. And Angad just sat down. And when Angad sat down because he was the appointed leader, what to do?
Many of the monkeys, they looked at Hanuman. They looked at Angad, and many of the monkeys sat down near Angad. Now somewhere left with Hanuman. Hanuman said, no. We’re going to find Seeta.
Why did you sat down, Praivrath? It’s like a big division. Now, you know, if Prabhupad said you love for me will be shown by how you cooperate. Now the most basic level of of cooperate is at least cooperate. You know, you operate here.
I will operate here. Well, let us both operate. Hey. What is really bad is if I I criticize you and you criticize me and most of our energy goes in that itself. We sing every morning samsara.
In the mangalati, there is samsara, dawana, liddalok. In the material world, like a forest fire. And bringing Krishna’s mercy, the spiritual master’s mercy, we are going to extinguish that forest fire. But quite often, when we are living in a community, we find most of our energy goes in extinguishing the fires that we ourselves have set. That means it is internally only so many problems come up.
So dissension is a big problem. Now what does one do at that time? Hanuman had tried his best. He tried to persuade Angad. Angad’s point, of course, he was very unreasonable.
From his perspective, it might seem reasonable, but it was not. This fear was just a wild imagination, but he couldn’t see it that way. Sometimes when we are faced with a problem and we’re trying our best, and nothing seems to be solving the problem. As devotees, we may remember the Lord. We may pray to the Lord.
So in the Nam Brahmayat, he said that Let’s recite recite this 2 words. Kapiwara santatta samsmrth rama. Can you repeat this? Kapiwara. I’ll just explain that because you’re kapiwara.
Kapiwara is monkeys. Wara is the best of the monkeys. Santat is always Samsmooth is remembered. So kapi var santat Samsmooth Rama. Var santat Samsmooth Rama.
And then he says, tudgati. In their progress, wignu. Is obstacle. The obstacle that came in their path, they were destroyed by whom? Rama.
So now what happened? Hanuman was praying. Hanuman was, you know, remembering Ram, what should I do in such a situation? Sometimes we have a problem and we’re not able to deal with the problem. And then we pray for help and then a bigger problem comes.
This is what happened? I already had a problem and I prayed for help. Something instead of a solution, a bigger problem has come up. So what happened? Something similar happened over there.
There, as they were as they were talking and discussing, and I was remembering the lord and thinking what to do? Pray? And suddenly they saw a giant vulture marching over there. Who was that? Yeah.
Yeah. And this vulture didn’t have wings, so he couldn’t fly. And he was just walking along and say, oh, providence is very fortunate. Providence is very kind to me. Today, I will get to feast on all these monkeys.
And all these monkeys were sitting in prayavrata and sat next to them waiting. Now it is one thing to know to know that I am going to die and to even agree to I will fast to death. But its quite other thing somebody is waiting for you to die then they are going to eat your body. It’s so all the monkeys became agitated. And now, Sampati was also very powerful.
It was big. The monkeys became alarmed, and they didn’t know what to do. And, actually, among all the monkeys, 1st person who had sat down was Angad. So Sampati went and sat right next to Angad. And Angad’s despair became even greater.
And then he said, alas, it seems that despite my best efforts, despite our best efforts, we are all meant to fail and die in the service of Ram. Our fate seems to be like that of Jatayu. Just as he died by serving Ram in vain, we also will die in vain. And there’s Sampatthi. What did you speak?
What did you speak about Jatayu? Angad has lost his own thoughts. He says, what? He says, what did you speak of Jataayu? And Langar repeated what he has spoken.
Says, Jataayu is dead? He he said, yes. Who is Jataayu to you? And there is giant bird suddenly started crying. I said, Jatai, he was my younger brother.
He said, I lost my wings because I was protecting him from the heat. Both of them had flown high into the sky to go near the sun. And when Jetayu started becoming very scattered by the heat, Sampati Sampati had spread his, wings, and his wings had got burnt. So he said, I sacrificed sacrificed my wings to save the life of Jeta Yu and Jeta Yu did. Tell me what happened?’ Then seeing this intense emotion, they all told the story of what had happened.
And somebody started crying, and he said, please help me go near the, river. Let me offer some water for my brother. And then he offered the water. And then they were all very moved to see his great distress and then they started thinking. Angad at this point, oh, if you had flown up to the sun, that means you must know where Lanka is, isn’t it?
Sampati had been Sampati had been Sampati had looked very dejected. He shrunk, and suddenly he pokes it up. Oh, he realized that there is something he could do about the death of Jatayu. He said, long ago, when my my wings had been lost, I wanted to die. But a sage told me that in future, you have an important service to do.
You will do a service for, for the servant’s servant. He says, now is that he realized that now is the moment for me to do that service. And what is that service? So I can tell you. He says, although my body has weakened, my visual is my sight has not weakened.
And he rose up, and he says, across the ocean, there is Lanka. And and he peered carefully, and he said, in Lanka, Sita is right now there. Lanka is across the ocean, and Sita is there. And as soon as the monkeys heard this, they all became jubilant. Yes.
Now we’ve got a clue. Now we know where to find Sita. So you see how rapidly fortunes changed. At one moment, the monkeys were ready to die, and they were even though they were not ready to die, they were cut utterly confused, not knowing what to do. Sometimes when we face a problem, at that time, we may ask for help.
But as I said, sometimes we ask for help and a bigger problem comes up. That’s what happened. But if we are having a sincere, desire to serve, sometimes to that bigger problem, our attention gets shifted from the smaller problem. So, 2 people might be quarrelling with the other, but then a bigger service comes up, a bigger challenge comes up, which is a common project, then they forget their difference. So, in this case, anger somehow you know, how things can work, we don’t know.
Anger needed to have spoken about Jataayu. Anger that, at that time for him to think about Jataayu and speak about Jataayu and to speak it exactly at the time when Sampati was right next to him. That, you could say, it’s a coincidence. But it is that coincidences are god’s ways of of remaining anonymous. So when we keep trying to move on, how things will work out, we don’t know.
Nobody could have predicted that Sampati would come there and Angad would speak this and Sampati would turn out to be a little jata yu and Hampati would know well, Anka is. They didn’t know it all. But and we are facing difficulties. Rather than letting ourselves get consumed by those difficulties, we just get out and try to move on. When we pray for help, sometimes help comes, but not in the way we had expected.
In fact, sometimes it may come in the opposite way itself. Like, in the, Mahabharata also, it happens that Draupadi, that when the pandas in the forest, Indurvasamuni comes, and he says he wants food. And Akshayapatra has already been washed and kept. So they say that, what do I do? So all the pandas are panicky, and Draupadi says that, let us let us pray to Krishna.
And she prays to Krishna for help in getting some food, and what happens? Krishna comes and tells her, I’m very hungry. Give me food. Now it appears like a bigger problem. Because once you couldn’t feed the priests feed the sages, and now I can’t feed our lord also.
Like one problem and a bigger problem. But through the bigger problem, sometimes Krishna solves a smaller problem. So, you know, when we are dealing with difficulties, we needn’t focus so much on the size of the problem. We can focus on the strength of our purpose. If our purpose is to serve Krishna, how big the problem is doesn’t matter.
The problem will be solved not it’s not because the problem is solved, we can solve it. Problem is small, so we’ll solve it. And because the problem is big, we can’t solve it. Actually, we have certain abilities, but far bigger than our ability is Krishna’s ability. So if we have a strong strength of purpose, then Krishna will make the arrangement.
How it will work out, we don’t know. But the strength of the purpose, strength of our purpose is what will help us move forward and deal with problems. So here we see it was in one sense Angad’s failure his losing losing of heart but although at one level he had lost his will or he had become dispirited. But still, within his heart, he had the desire to serve Ram. And it is only because of the desire to serve Ram that’s why he could compare himself with jumbo.
And he could say, oh, he I was not successful. I was successful. So sometimes, practically, we might not be able to do a service. But that doesn’t necessarily mean we have to just give up our spirit of serving. Just because some services are not possible for us.
So we may, we may be uns we may not be able to do a service, but we needn’t lose our service attitude. So doing a service successfully is not always in our hands. But maintaining a service attitude is in our hands. And if we maintain that service attitude, then we will find that we all can move forward. The doors will open we didn’t even knew existed.
And thus we can move forward. So we’ll have a break now. And whatever questions you have, we can discuss. And then we’ll go to the last part about Hanuman’s emergent leadership.
Thankyou
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Sri Caitanya-caritamrta, Adi-lila, Chapter Ten describes the branches of the tree named Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu.
We are entering the New Year, and on such occasions we take stock of what and how we did in the previous year and what we want to do in the next. Studies have shown, and probably many of us have experienced, that most New Year’s resolutions are broken during the first week. Still more are broken in the first month, and almost all are broken within the first three months.
By Vijaya Das