Monday, August 5th, 2013
→ The Walking Monk

A Question Came

Leamington, Ontario

A question came from one of our retreat members as we had some time to kill.

“When I approach people about this higher consciousness, they sometimes express disinterest, ‘The problem I have with all of you religious people is each one of you expresses the same self-righteousness. You say we are the only true faith or this is the highest form of religion or there’s the classic, only one way. How do I know which way is right? Maybe you’re all wrong.’ What kind of a response can I give these people that I meet?”

To answer such a sincere question, here’s my take on it.

Answer: As an objective and sincere seeker of the truth one can see that there are many many choices around there, around the globe, and people have benefitted tremendously from participating in the various spiritual functions. We would like to affirm that any system that brings you closer to the Divine is valid and can be honoured. Any program that especially subdues ego is to be praised, and blessed are those who have acceptance, beyond tolerance, for anyone whose approach is different from their own.

Now, how to know the right path? You are at liberty to scan all that’s available to you, and when you get to the Hare Krishnas just check out the delicious sponsored vegetarian feast, the drumming and the singing of ancient mantras and have a look and hear an ancient wisdom rich in philosophy. See the smiles and the happy faces, hear about a dancing God who’s also musical and tilts His head to a curious gesture that reads, “Won’t you celebrate with me?"

That’s how I would answer it.

10 KM

The capacity for austerity
→ KKS Blog

(Kadamba Kanana Swami, 30 June 2013, Vrndavan, India, Srimad Bhagavatam 6.16.34)

bhismaarrowbedOften, when I read the Srimad Bhagavatam, I think of Bhismadeva with the hundreds of arrows that pierced his body yet he was still totally peaceful. He was still instructing Yudhisthira, whereas we – with one arrow, then call the ambulance. And we wonder which would be louder, our scream or the siren of the ambulance! So it is like we have such little tolerance and such little determination. We have no training or austerity.

I have been on Indian unreserved trains. You have these people, they can sit on the door for ten hours. I cannot sit on the door for ten hours!  It is not a yogi but an ordinary villager who can sit on the door for ten hours. I can sit on the door for ten minutes then a certain part of my body turns black and blue. Literally, on these trains, by sitting on the floor I have bruises. I was not made for these kinds of conditions - did not grow up with that.

So what is our capacity for austerity? Coming from the West to modern India, it is catching up quick that gradually we become really soft. I was once carrying suitcases with cash on the train as a service for some purchase of land. So I took a first-class air-conditioned coach and it cost just as much as a plane.

jelly fishOn this train, you have a bell. It was just me and one other man in the compartment. This man, he was like extremely soft; I was not sure whether there were any bones inside of him. He was draped on the seat and he had this button. Whenever he pushed the button a servant would come and he would say, “In ten minutes the station is coming, go and see if there are any samoosas…”  He would send this guy onto the platform to buy something more to eat. At every stage, he would call by ringing the bell.

Gradually, we are all becoming like that – no more bones but soft and jellyfish like - just pushing buttons to satisfy the senses so what austerity can we take!?

 

Recover spiritual health by regular cultivation of Krishna consciousness
→ The Spiritual Scientist

Nescience… is compared to the disease called jaundice, which is caused by bilious secretions. Attacked by jaundice, the tongue of a diseased person cannot palatably relish sugar candy. Rather, a person with jaundice considers something sweet to taste very bitter. Avidya (ignorance) similarly perverts the ability to relish the transcendentally palatable name, quality, form and pastimes of Krishna. Despite this disease, if one with great care and attention takes to Krishna consciousness, chanting the holy name and hearing Krishna's transcendental pastimes, his ignorance will be destroyed and his tongue enabled to taste the sweetness of the transcendental nature of Krishna and His paraphernalia. Such a recovery of spiritual health is possible only by the regular cultivation of Krishna consciousness.

Nectar of Instruction 7 purport

The First Two Processes
→ Japa Group



While thinking of something to post on the Japa Group, I sometimes struggle to come up with a new or interesting quote or video/audio recording but then I remembered Srila Prabhupada's instruction that all devotees should write daily realisations.

Today I wanted share a realisation - our spiritual life hinges on chanting the Holy names, it's the basis of Krsna consciousness....sravanam and kirtanam hearing and chanting as enunciated by Lord Chaitanya.

When we understand the importance of these two processes....then we can realise how this affects the rest of our sadhana - for example attentive Japa will mean we can hear class with attention.

The first two processes of devotional service are the most important.

Sugam Karnatica Kids have Fun at the Farm
→ ISKCON Malaysia

BY GOKUL DAMODARA DASA

  


JANDA BAIK - A total of 80 kids of Sugam Karnatica’s Sunday School gathered excitedly at 8.00 a.m on 28th July 2013 at the Taman Jaya carpark to make our way to the HareKrishna Goshala (cow- farm) located at Janda Baik, Pahang. The kids, accompanied by facilitators of Sugam Karnatica and parents boarded 2 buses which had been chartered to take us there.The bus left at 8.30am and we reached Janda Baik at about 10.00 a.m. The bus had to stop along the mainroad and we had to walk along a narrow road for about 3 kilometres before we reached the farm.

 

 
When we reached, we were briefed by Goloka Prabhu of ISKCON Malaysia, which is the body that runs and operates the farm. We also had a short video presentation and briefing by Goloka Prabhu, where he explained how an entire community lived on a farm in Hungary. The video showed us how the people there live with natural resources, yet they are fully equipped with all facilities such as schools and other amenities.

 

After that, we joined in a bhajan chanting session led by the devotees of ISKCON Malaysia. During the bhajan, we were treated to ‘Bliss Bars’ – sweet white and brown chocolate bars made from pure unadulterated cow’s milk! Yummy!

Soon after, it was time to bathe and feed the cows. The group was broken into two and took turns bathing and feeding the cows. We used a hose to spray water on the cows and brushes to brush their coats.

 

As for feeding, the cows were fed with grass and brown sugar, which they truly relished! It was fun feeding the cows, especially feeling the rough surface of the cow’s tongue on our palms. An experience to remember!

 

The children also took the opportunity to stroke and pet the cows. It was a wonderful hands-on experience for all the kids, and for most of them, this was the first time in contact with a real life cow.
By noon, everyone was exhausted and hungry and treated to wonderful prasada.

 

Then it was time for some pop quiz. Many students were successful in answering the questions posed and won Krishna and Shiva masks!

This was followed by a presentation of cheque of RM1000 to the Hare Krishna Goshala, contributed by all Sugam Sunday School students. Very soon, it was time to say goodbye to the cows and the lovely people at the Hare Krishna farm, but not before we had a round of extremely yummy fresh ice cream made from cow’s milk in various flavors – strawberry, green apple and chocolate. All in all, we had a fun and enjoyable time while learning more about Mother Cow.


Thank you Sugam Sunday School and ISKCON Malaysia! Till the next field trip! Hare Krishna

 

PlanetISKCON.com 2.0 Launched
→ Dandavats.com

Nityānanda Chandra Dās: Hare Kṛṣṇa dear devotees, we would like to announce that www.PlanetISKCON.com 2.0 has launched!  What is PlanetISKCON.com? PlanetISKCON.com is the best place on the web to get ISKCON related content from around the world.   Blogs by many sannyasis such as H.H. Giriraj… Read more ›

07.09 – Rise from “willpower is power” to “willpower is his power”
→ The Spiritual Scientist

We all need willpower for doing anything worthwhile. In fact, willpower is the power that unleashes our other powers such as undeveloped talents. Without willpower, potential geniuses end up becoming prodigals instead of prodigies.

Strong willpower is a great power to have, but it’s not all that great if it’s divorced from spiritual reality. Let’s understand how.

Gita wisdom offers us a vivid vision of spiritual reality. We are all souls, parts of Krishna. All our abilities come from him – even our willpower, as the Bhagavad-gita (07.09) indicates. We can glimpse this truth when the willpower we think is ours sometimes suddenly deserts us, leaving us struggling to do the things that we normally do effortlessly.

As long as we think that willpower is our power, we labor under the illusion that doing the things that we want to do will make us happy. But we as souls can't be satisfied by anything except spiritual love for Krishna. We keep erecting new goals and maybe even attaining them, but happiness keeps eluding us. Still, our willpower intoxicates us with vanity, making us pretend to be happy at our achievements or making us believe that the next achievement will make us happy.

To end this vain intoxication, we need to see willpower not as our power but as Krishna’s power. This vision inspires us to surrender to Krishna and use all our willpower to serve him single-mindedly. Such service wins his heart, and he grants the supreme power of love for him. When we are animated and guided by the power of love for Krishna, our willpower enables us to do wonderful things in his service. These devotional achievements enrich and flavor our love for Krishna, thereby propelling us towards an everlasting life of love with him.

**

I am the penances of all ascetics.

 

A Few Words Related to “Falldowns” of “Swamis” and “Gurus”
→ The Enquirer

Everyone falls down. Gurus fall down, nobodies fall down. Men fall down, women fall down. Old people fall down, young people fall down. People who write books fall down, people who never say a single word fall down. People who practice rāgānugā-sādhana fall down, people who practice vaidhi-sādhana fall down. Brahmacaris fall down, grhasthas too, sanyassis too, and “that other āśrama” as well; even those who are uncultured on both ends of the spectrum fall down. People who travel and preach fall down, people who stay in one place fall down. People in Vrndavana fall down, people in Govardhan fall down, people in Radha Kunda fall down, and people in Nebraska fall down too.

The purusha abhiman can regain its beginningless hold over the miniscule jiva at any point in time, anywhere, under any circumstances. I don’t think its profitable to overanalyze the circumstances, therefore, pretending that the circumstances cause the falldown. It is the purusha-abhiman which causes the fall down, the circumstances it exploits to do so can be anything.

The best advice is therefore to continually try our best to always do Harinam-Samkirtana; not feeling respectable, but always feeling respectful; very meek like grass, and very patient like trees.


Causeless mercy
→ KKS Blog

(Kadamba Kanana Swami, 30 June 2013, Vrndavan, India, Lecture to the kirtan group)

KKS in Aindra Prabhu's roomKrsna is so kind, he gives us the spiritual world. I often think about that. Krsna thought to himself:

“Oh, there are those living beings who have turned away from me. Things are not complete without them. Let me do something for them. Let me give them some mercy. But why would I give them only some mercy? Why don’t I just give them all the mercy? Why would I hold back and give them only some? I’ll give them all the mercy!”

And then he placed the spiritual world in the material world. How it mathematically fits, the tripada-vibhuti fits into the eka-pada vibhuti – that I leave to the mathematicians. But Krsna did it, you know. He did it! He put it in! So that is something.

When I think about that, then I know that Krsna is not just supplying us with mercy in reciprocation for our service but even causeless mercy.

 

You Must Reform
→ Japa Group


"Japa is an important part of devotional life. If your japa is not up to standard, this is serious. You must reform. That is, out of your regret may come success. Prabhupada used to say, ‘Failure is the pillar of success.’ Assess yourself, and try to improve your chanting of Hare Krishna."

From Japa Reform Notebook
by Satsvarupa dasa Goswami

Jakarta
→ Ramai Swami

IMG_0320

IMG_0316

Vyasapuja das from Jakarta manages the affairs of the Indonesia BBT. He told me that recently he printed ten thousand Bhagavad-gitas and twenty thousand  small books like Chant and be Happy and Coming Back.

He is also a good artist and started painting going right back to his college days. Over the years some of his paintings have been used on the covers of various BBT books. He says it’s good to use paintings of Balinese, Javanese and other area styles because Indonesian people appreciate that.
In the pictures we see scenes of different Krsna Lilas like Krsna dancing on Kaliya, the twin Arjuna trees, Krsna stealing butter etc. At the moment he has an order of twenty five paintings for the opening of the new temple in Penang, Malaysia at Janmastami.
IMG_0319

path to freedom
→ everyday gita

Verse 4.9: One who knows the transcendental nature of My appearance and activities does not, upon leaving the body, take his birth again in this material world, but attains My eternal abode, O Arjuna.

"Stop the world, I want to get off!" It's a thought that crosses my mind often. Normally this occurs when I'm experiencing a sense of frustration and disappointment with living life in this material world. To all those who are trying to practice the path of bhakti yoga, a word to the wise. Don't despair when encountering this since it can actually help you!

Although bhakti is about experiencing the positive, in order to do so, we must leave those things that hinder us behind.

Or in other words, the loss and emptiness that we may experience actually serves to help us if we look deeper than what meets the eye or emotion. It signifies that we deserve more than what this material world promises us and that we are the proverbial fish out of water.

We are eternal beings who are sojourning through this world. The soul is seeking permanency and shelter - a true home. Encased in this material body, we try to do our best to make our bodies our home to no avail. After all, ever body undergoes birth, death, disease and old age. So how does one get out and find their true home?

This verse gives the yoga seeker the "path to freedom". The Gita is teaching that by understanding the world of transcendence and the soul's connection with the Divine, just by remembering that at the time of death, one escapes the cycle of birth and death. It's a simple as that.

Although it sounds simple, it takes practice. After all, thinking of the Divine isn't as easy as turning a light switch off and on. Our minds are constantly filled with numerous thoughts and often they are the same ones running through over and over and over again. That is why the key practice in bhakti yoga is that of mantra meditation.

Sound has such a powerful effect and by repeating the maha mantra daily, it starts to remove the layers of dust off of our soul. That dust which has accumulated from numerous births is what prevents us from realizing that we are the soul and not this body.

In tandem with practicing mantra meditation, hearing and reading about the Divine fills one's thought with remembrance. By nature we are curious about others and so we can engage that natural propensity to learn more about the one who we've forgotten.

That's why the practice of bhakti yoga is so simple and joyful. It's about engaging our normal tendencies of hearing, talking and remembering and centering it around a focus point: the Divine. Just by doing that, we can leave this world of temporality behind and experience true eternality, knowledge and bliss.