19820502 Evening lecture

(Disclaimer: The following is a machine-generated transcript and may contain errors or inaccuracies. It will be reviewed and verified against the original audio soon.)

The following is an Evening lecture given by His Holiness Jayapatākā Swami Mahārāja on May 2, 1982 – in Atlanta, USA.

Attraction forms seem to grow more as I was that because of fences, as I. When I moved in. And as time progressed, it only lasted a couple of months this last time. But I can’t put my finger on what, you know, what the difficulty is, except Māyā, that’s all I can.

When do you have the difficulties you talk over with the senior devotees? Do you let them preach to you?

Usually hold them, kind of hold them to myself.

That’s your defect, you see, if you leave the thing inside, it kind of festers. You know, just like if you like something and it kind of rots inside and that makes your attitude sour. When you have some difficulty, then usually there’s a senior devotee that’s responsible for new men or otherwise. One takes the time and discusses with the temple president or GBC or some others. If there’s any other senior devotee or the guru, if he’s present and reveals the mind, if it’s something that he feels bashful about in public, then he asks for some little time. And so these are the anxieties I have, or this is the anger I have, you know, why do people take my tell or why this, that, or whatever? Then you get preached a little bit and how to see it from a different perspective.

He said that one needs association. Satsanga is association. You need a good guidance and a good association. If you get some conception, you just leave it inside. Then it’s like a weight on your heart. And then if you discussed it with a senior devotee, obviously the similar things that happen to other people, why they’re not being disturbed, you see, it’s because they know philosophically and practically how to see these things and how to understand them. So similarly that ignorance, when it’s pulled away from your eyes, then immediately the anxiety is relieved. When that type of white one situation will frighten a person. Just like if you go in a dark room and we see a snake will become afraid. Turn the light on, you see it’s a rope. Then your mind becomes at ease. So it’s like that.

You see something, you think this is something dangerous, you become afraid. But actually it may not be a snake, it’s only a rope. But because of the inability due to inexperience or due to just a more philosophical or spiritual understanding needed, you’re not able to cope with that particular situation. And there’s nothing wrong with that. I mean, it’s not expected that a new man is going to know everything like that. It’s not anything that one should be, you know, like try to show in immaterial, everyone wants to show they know everything or they already, they don’t need any help or something like that. But in spiritual life, rather, one takes the position that it’s something that you can’t learn except by asking. When you go to university, you can’t tell the professor you already know the subject.

So here it’s a much more personal thing. Most devotees have been already through these different stages that you have been encountering, or they have guided other people through similar stages. It’s not that it’s something foreign to them, probably. I wouldn’t give up. I mean, I would make a very good attempt at it. You have everything to gain, nothing to lose. If I am here, of course, I am not here that often, but if I am here, I will always be glad to hear what were the difficulties you’re encountering and try to advise in any way I could.

You kind of wonder when to draw the line between. When you’re being so used to being in the material world, no one has time for you, so you get used to thinking that way. Well, this guy’s business, though, and it seems like, well, the other thing is.

To read the books, that some things can be answered by discussion with senior devotees, and other things can be answered by reading the transcendental literatures, if one regularly. How long have you stayed in the temple when you have come?

It’s been a different time. One time, I think the longest was nine months, a couple years ago.

It happens that, you know, when a person comes, sometimes it appears very new and fresh and one gets into a certain difficulty. Is Goku Laranjin here addressing us? Do you have a question?

Yes.

You’re chanting Hare Kṛṣṇa.

I was. I had moved in here, Miami Ashley down there. They had a temple and I lived on the lower floor, you know, and I was doing what, you know, their thing, you know, I was chatting, just.

You know, doctor Roland.

Very nice.

He says sometimes he gets angry. One of the advice, I didn’t know the case history. I told him that, you know, sometimes you’d meet different things that were a little frustrating to him without, you know, going into details. I told him that at that time, if he discussed it with yourself or whoever the Bakhta leader was or was present, I was present like that. And let get it off his chest, so to speak, that this is a basic way of overcoming this, that, you know, if you get some little thing that kind of eats away at you and let it just remain there without curing it, then it builds up. He said, never did that very much, but I just. I didn’t know whether any more details, but seemed like a very nice Bakhta.

Oh, he is.

I see that. His Angus, usually just within himself. I know. I have never seen him express it.

Yeah, he never expressed it, you know, he felt maybe.

No, he just sort of just gets angry with himself. He goes away for a while.

Yeah, usually, you know, it’s.

He’s a very good drummer also.

Western drummer or indian passion?

Western drummer.

He’s very fast. Three drum band.

We find drawings, bro.

I have done a dozen and it wins.

Well, or at least it’s this temple, anyway.

Is this Doctor Rowland gonna make another attempt?

I said yes or no right now. I wouldn’t know.

I don’t know.

I wouldn’t being honest with you. Would you either ask.

I don’t know.

I am in serious night. That’s all I know right now. Serious night. Doing a lot of bad things. It’s hard to. Outside the temple. I slowly saw. It’s like a light bulb losing its light or something like I was chanting 16 rounds when I first left. And it started slipping to about ten. And it slip on down about six, then four, then two, then none, then a few days. And then the nonsense activity just starts looking more attractive.

I always feel it’s sort of. After all, you should. You know, I mean. Cause he’s tried to live in the temple many times. I don’t know if I am right or not, but I think that the best thing for him is to try.

He always lived here in Atlanta.

Yeah. Maybe he wasn’t tomorrow, but I sort of. Maybe tomorrow. But I just sort of feel that maybe he should, for time, just live closely and come every day. Because, I mean, he’s already coming down so much. If you can live closely somehow or other, and come every single day and chant and associate in that way. And to study it something like that for like, say, six months or so, then try to make that clear.

How does that sound?

That sounds good. Is there such thing as trying to rush in too quick? Because it seems like the situation, material world is so serious. I could be killed.

I could be killed.

When I leave here tonight, you know, where the things I have done in the past few weeks have to suffer that reaction. So it’s hard for me to decide that’s when I get in these things in my mind where I think I have got to get out of this material world. So I move in the temple. But then it’s like it just blows my mind or something when I move into town. I don’t know why. It’s just like culture shock or something, like on the turkey.

So then if you take, if you live nearby, excuse me, my son, Judy, if you live nearby the temple and come like that, then that way you can get over your culture shot. You can do service, the whole thing just, you know, just so you don’t have to go through culture shot, so to speak. Then you can keep on discussing. And if you actually feel strong enough, then the main thing in living in a temple is you, is usually having a service that a person can absorb himself in. So you can find that service even as you’re coming to the temple.

Actually, as far as my experience, I begin to get better. Right now. That’s the only space this would be. Somehow he’s engaged with ball budging. He’s probably everything.

Bhavan Andamaraj left five times.

Really?

There’s a lot of other devotees left a lot of times in the beginning that today are very big devotees. Sometimes they had to go, get kicked, come back, get kicked, come back, get kicked. And then finally they came. There we go.

Well, I would say to bathroom, every time he comes, he goes, he gets a little more advanced. Not when he’s out there. I mean, when he comes, when he’s back. That time.

He said that if somebody leaves and comes back, then Kṛṣṇa gives some special mercy to that devotee. Because it’s when you lose the cow or you lose, say, sheep, and it goes away. Then the owner drops all the other sheep and goes looking, where’s the lost? And when he comes back, he’s very happy. If you’re just there all the time. Of course. Not that anyone should leave, because when you were gone, he was in anxiety also, no doubt. So we don’t want to, but if a person is gone, naturally when they come back, then that’s a great source of happiness. Joyous. Lost sheep is back, lost cow. So now you’re putting us in anxiety because, you see, you’re in the loss condition. We will be very happy.

My problems are similar to what his. You know, I was in the Miami.

You know.

I was in the Miami temple.

How long ago?

About maybe four months ago. But I lived there. I think it was about a year.

I lived in that hotel.

I lived on the lower floor. And, you know, I have done chanting. I went to the morning programs, you know, and the evening programs. And then I thought, well, it wasn’t no good. But when I come up here, I can see how beautiful it really was, you know? And then when I come up here, I am getting this here anger. Some of this anger seeps out, you know, and it just. You know what I mean? The thing is, I have been in the material world for a long time, and I am not perfect, you know. And you have to be perfect to come into the temple.

Sometimes it’s easier for some people to live in a temple is, you know, very difficult in the sense that the type of personal privacy or type of personnel, every little mental freedom that 1 may enjoy when one is living in their own quarters is not there when one living in a. In a. In a communal atmosphere. You see, you may be actually in the wrong. You may be actually sitting down and just, you know, taking it easy for a minute, taking a little break. But then someone will say, oh, this person would be more actively better engaged in some practice of bhakti yoga, doing some service or some temple program maybe there, and say, come on, you should come and do this. And then you think, why is he getting off my back or something?

And then, you know, because of just, you know, not used to that kind of a total, you know, environmental engagement and service. So for some people, it’s easier to practice, as you said, nearby the temple and come and chant. And that initial type of cultural shock, as he termed it, or a cultural adjustment. Because it’s a whole different perspective to see oneself not as the body, but as the spirit soul. And to see actually what is the purpose of life. So that’s more important. And it is possible to do too much too fast sometimes. So a nicer person is if one comes and lives in the temple, then it’s necessary to really learn the philosophy very quickly. Because as the mind becomes restless, then one has to be able to conquer the mind with intelligence.

So if a person is not able to pick up the philosophy that quick, then when the mind becomes restless, it’s natural, because there’s an absence of different kinds of sense gratification in the temple. Just a subtle freedom of the mind to meditate on this and that. So many, actually, they’re useless things, but we’re just habituated to having that kind of indiscipline in our mind which is actually keeping us down spiritually. But sometimes the mind revolts if we try too quickly to subdue that. If we know the philosophy, if we develop a higher spiritual taste, then it’s very natural. Then it’s very natural. Like Śrīla Parva. Sometimes to bend an old bamboo, it can crack. And if a green bamboo, it can bend. So sometimes, especially people been in the material world a long time.

Then if they try to bend the bamboo too quickly, then it tends to crack. But if you oil it up a little bit and gradually bend it over a flame or something, even an old bamboo will bend, but it takes, you know, a controlled heat.

But, you know, I feel that I have failed in the material world, you know, and done a lot of simple things, you know. You know, I felt that Kṛṣṇa was nudging me somehow to keep my faith.

You should.

And it’s just like I just give up, you know, the struggle was just to. And I still haven’t got it together.

The struggle in the material world, it’s a lot less of a struggle to be Kṛṣṇa conscious. But it’s a question of motivation. In the material world, people are motivated because you get struggled a little bit. You merely get some money, or you get some sense gratification, or you get some immediate type of reward. Or even if you don’t get it’s frustrating. But at least you always have that hope. We’re conditioned to these type of temporary struggles. When it comes into the actual struggle to conquer over all these material temptations. And actually to develop higher taste, then we resent that. Our mind resents it. Because it’s not actually a devotee, it’s not a yogī. The mind is by nature very flickering. So the intelligence is the actual seed of our power.

By understanding Kṛṣṇa consciousness, by chanting Hare Kṛṣṇa, associating with devotees, then we can conquer the mind, which is just wandering around here and there, flittering over this thing and that thing. Bhagavad Gītā says, bahu saka sinanantas cha. That the mind becomes many branched. We have so many desires in the material world. We are thinking, I need this cigarette now. I need this tv show, and I need this record, and I need that and this, and then so many things. So we are always running after so many things that we need to be happy. We’re never satisfied with them, as was so eloquently spoken tonight. So a devotee, he becomes single pointed. That actually the real happiness is in spiritual realization. It’s in Kṛṣṇa. It’s in the supreme personality of Godhead.

And the other things, they will give us some temporary sensations which may be pleasant or maybe unpleasant, depending on our particular frame at that point. Just like I know that if I were to give you $2,000, just you probably think well, that’s very nice, but I know that in the same situation, people were given $2,000 and they thought it was a curse. This was india. There’s this thing called the Kubda Minar. It’s a monument built by the Muhammadans when they conquered overdose, northern India. And there was 45 school. There’s 150 schoolchildren went up in it to look from the tower, and somewhere there was a light failure, and they stampeded and 45 were crushed. Actually, it wasn’t even two. It was rs2000. But a rupee is almost like a dollar over there.

So then the government decided to give each of the parents or the nearest of kin of the. Of the crushed babies 2000 equivalent of $2,000. So then, you know, they gave a note, we’re very sorry, that here’s the dead body of your child, and then here’s $2,000. So they didn’t appreciate that $2,000 at all. So now it’s a little cool out. A little warm out, at least. So we take a little cold drink. It’s nice, but if it gets it too cold, then we will want some hot drinks. Chocolate or hot. Whatever? Hot drink. Okay.

Chocolate.

Hot milk is there. Can I ask for your blessings on having you to locate a job? You know, your prayers, your grace.

Dad, if you go into the deity in the temple and ask, then they can give all type of benediction as specific emissaries. We give, isolate ourselves. Because I am a sannyāsī, that means I renounce the world. I renounce the world. So I don’t give any more worldly benediction, you see, I only give the benediction to become God conscious, to conquer over birth, death. This type of benediction, you see, because the Brahmanas, who are not the householders, I mean, who are the householders, you see, the Brahmanas, they can give different kind of benediction. When you become a sannyāsī, then you renounce the world. So not only for myself, but for others.

I don’t want to entangle them, but I can give you advice anyway, as a liberal person, that if you go to the deity, since he’s the lord of the whole world, material and spiritual, he can give you anything you want, including a job. And then I will pray that your attraction to the deity and faith in Kṛṣṇa will increase, which will help you in this material life as well as to the spiritual goal. Kṛṣṇa, Matir Astu. It’s a blessing.

Yes, sir. Recently, we saw a delightful report that I think was compiled by the GBC of proposed planning for the transmittal city village, the city of Māyāpur in Jagannath, Malay.

You’re satisfied there, madam?

Yes. Somebody is waiting for you.

All right. I just want to know if you are satisfied.

Yes, thank you.

Hare Kṛṣṇa.

And I saw this really nice report that was sent to us and it told about proposed projects in Māyāpur. It called upon designs for the Betty planetarium. It suggested concepts in selling ashrams every three months to people in the whole cycle of the year. It also suggested sending good men from each temple to do service work. I guess it was six months to two years, the report said, in Māyāpur. And I was just wondering, with all the work within the local structure, people trying to study the shastra and learn things, could you give some helpful suggestions of how we can help with the transcendental city of Māyāpur?

Well, people can help in many ways. One thing you can always tell people that you meet about Lord Caitanya’s birthplace by building up the temples here as they distribute more books. About a certain percentage of the book distribution goes for building the Māyā for city. And first thing is you should become Kṛṣṇa conscious yourself, become very strong. Then automatically opportunities for serving the holy Dham will become more and more available. One can always meditate on the holy Dha in one’s eternal home and thus live in the holy Dhamm. Just like we said, this is a new panihati. Panihati is also a place of Lord Caitanya’s pastimes near Māyāpur. Not too far, but 202 hours drive and on the bank of again. So like that, we like to remember the pastime places of the Lord. The Lord.

He’s also come here because the devotees have invited him. So this is also a extension of the DA. So one can serve the dham directly and can also serve in separation. And separation means that thinking of the holy Dham and serving at a distance, or one can serve directly by being in the holy Da. Both are considered to be on the same transcendental platform. So you should develop first your Kṛṣṇa consciousness and then as you experience the holy Dhamm in separation, then more and more opportunities to serve the dhamma will arise. In the future, we can enlist people who will like those rooms on time basis or whatever. That’s one idea we have. But that will probably be mainly the indian businessmen who like those time.

Shares the vice within the.

So let’s let everybody get a chance because you will be here for class tomorrow morning, right?

Yes, I will.

Yeah. But many of these people may not make it. Do you have any questions?

Yes, I am not from United States. I am from country where this movement is not present.

Yugoslavia.

Yes.

And very few books you can find in my language, but somewhere in English about indian religion and such things.

Okay.

I don’t know too much about this, but professionally I am a scientist, and I am interested in correlation between this movement and nature of science. I know that you have some institute in the United States, maybe somewhere, as to what kind of activities you have in this institute.

Maybe Rukh Bernougaprab would like to talk to him in greater detail, to have a question like that, give more time. There’s another senior member here, senior devotee, Rupanugadar Adhikari, and he’s very much connected with that scientific institute. I know something about it. I know that they have many fellows, and some are researching in the mathematical and some in the physical science field, some in chemistry, some in different aspects, because the basic drive is to show that one of our objectives, I believe, of their objectives is to show through science that ultimately matter cannot generate matter, that there’s a higher principle or a higher order, which you could call.

Of course, the religious would call it spiritual, but scientists may call it something else, a dynamic principle or a conscious principle, which is a different type of particle, which is the basic cause for organisms to develop. And without that basic particle, which is like anti material or something, some other nature, that this type of natural changes will not take place in a human body. When that particle leaves the body, then the body stops to develop or to function as a human body. Of course, there are other parasite organisms which will decompose it and consume it. So I just know from this basic type of more a layman approach about this. But possibly RPa nugra Prabhup would be able to tell you in greater detail the working of the institute and answer, I am sure you will be able to answer about.

Good answer as well, if not better than I. As far as the scientific details of it, I am mainly dealing with the philosophical and the practical sides of this way of life, and that’s a very specialist field, I believe. Here we have some books just next to the Lord Kapila on the right hand side. Those look like monograms. And then we also have that life counselor. Here are some scientific monograms. And then here’s a little bit more from a layman. Both scientists and layman could assume this, and this is purely technical, with all equations. What is matter what is life? Demonstration by information theory that light cannot arise from matter, consciousness and the laws of nature. More. I think these two are more from the mathematical point of view, and this is written by.

But I know that they also want to write from the angle of natural science. Maybe you could look these over.

(Side B of the Cassette)

Different, but at least politically different religions. What’s the relation between movement like this and some religions like Christianity, Muslims, and this is the Kṛṣṇa consciousness? Religion or movement is based upon the Vedas. Vedas are original sanskrit texts which are historically written about 5000 years ago. And they’re handed down through a chain of spiritual masters. Tonight we had an observance of worshiping the chain of spiritual masters through a present day representative. And the vedic knowledge is far earlier than the Muslim or the Christian, which were religions that came up in a more isolated area of the Middle east. And now, of course, have spread to the western countries, but really haven’t spread to the east again. But they have more or less gone west, although there are some preachings going on in different countries of the world, even in Asia.

But philosophically, you won’t find much contradiction between Christianity or Islam and the basic principles of the Bhagavad Gītā. They’re all up to a point, they’re all the same. You start going into more and more subtle, more and more esoteric understanding of what is the cause of nature. Just like in the Śrīmad Bhāgavatam, they give a measure of time for vedic understanding that there’s a time, how we can measure time. So the measurement of time, which they define is the time that it takes for two molecules, for two atoms to form a molecule. That is a time given in the beta as the basic unit of time. And you multiply that by millions and millions, and then you get a second. I mean, that gives the equation that how you see. So, I mean, the Vedas, they have atomic energy.

It talks about how in the womb of the mother, how the seed from the father comes and how the sperm and the ovum join. And it gives a week by week description of how the embryo develops. And this time, they had no radar or any x ray machine or other way of knowing they are describing. And they didn’t dissect people. And then I put the embryos in formaldehyde or anything. I mean, it was basically, these ages have understood by realization and by revelation also from Kṛṣṇa. And they were describing the very detailed things of nature and what lies beyond nature. So the things in nature we can verify. As a natural scientist, you could study the science. Sankya yoga is a detailed examination of this material world, how it’s working, how its laws are working, how a person is bound up in these laws.

And then he goes beyond to say that there are higher laws whereby one can become transcendental or free from material loss. And we have no experience of higher laws. So that the whole approach in the VEdas is a very systematic, scientific. And I it goes in such depth that when we start getting into those depths, like reincarnation, that this anti material particle is indestructible. That before we had this body, we had another body. After this body, again, we will take another body. This concept was apparently originally in the Bible, but at the time of Constantinople it was edited out as being something that was not appropriate to his ideology. At that time he made some compromise with the Catholics and they edited it out.

But other Dead Sea Scrolls and other things which have been discovered as authoritative original christian texts before that period indicate that there was reincarnation in the original teachings of Jesus Christ and Jesus Christ himself. I mean, after he apparently died, he was resurrected all the way through. The fact that there is the spirit that lives after the body is the basic philosophy. Yet they claim they don’t believe in reincarnation. But the Buddhists, they believe in reincarnation. The Jains, the Zoroastrians, the Sikhs, every of the other ancient religions, they all believe in reincarnation. I believe even the Baha’is believe in reincarnation. It’s only that the more recent this Christianity is about 1982 years and Muhammadism is about 1200 years or 1400 years.

They don’t have a detailed explanation of reincarnation, although there are, if you go through it, there are a few places they missed in that they say John the Baptist was a reincarnation of Isaiah and they said that in previous time he was isaic. So that indicates he’s a reincarnation, he is reincarnated again. But apart from little slips like that, they don’t directly have a description of reincarnation in the Bible. This light, you will find that up to a point, the Bible and the Bhagavad gītā there already. But then, I mean, they’re the same when you start going into higher and higher explanations, what is nature, what is the world, what goes beyond then the Bible and the Quran, they leave you kind of in the dark.

And Jesus himself told his followers that I have so much more to tell you about my father’s kingdom, but you don’t even know, you can’t understand what I am telling you about this world. How can I go on and say things which are much more difficult to understand? So in that way, I think you will find that from a scientific point of view. I was a student of physical chemistry and university and I found that the Bhagavad gītā and the Suman bhāgavatam. To be very scientifically satisfying and to also give a very systematic philosophical understanding of who we are, where we have come from, what is the purpose of life and where we’re going, which I could never find in my own quest in other religious books. How text available in English? Oh, yes. Back to Ed, Jim. Any questions? No, no, Maurice.

I am just standing up.

What was the result with rupanuga?

It’s a bit too late.

Too late for him. All right. I am not. Kichi chilo abni horikishanam. Correct. We have a rakhiatra in Calcutta, which is about 1 million people. From Albert Road to Kamek street, park street, Charangi Central Avenue, Chittaranchan, Chotinder Mohan, then over to the Shambazar park. It’s a nine kilometer route. And up Chitterang and Cherangi, at least a million people. They stand there. The whole streets are packed with people to pull the Ruth because we have the telescopic rut, so it can go underneath the tram lines. Otherwise, other ruts.

If you pull the Chitharangan avenue, that’s.

Where you never cross any telephone line.

Or power line or anything.

We do, though, at Mahatma Gandhi road, they have one crossing and then up at gray street. So then we have to bring the cart down and go under. And the people, like they want, once or twice they should go up and down. Most other streets have so many. Khalid street is continuous.

Yeah.

That’S a very good street. And quite broad. About four lane.

Yes.

Hare Kṛṣṇa. Hare Kṛṣṇa. 03:00 two. I leave tomorrow. Yes.

Very old, unbendable twigs. But I am 55 years old and I came to the temple often under five years, and just about a month ago had a series of revelations that I felt sort of spiritually driven. And certainly the amount of devotees have offered me all compassion. So many people gathered here have been very compassionate to me and. But now that I have been in abundance of high am I in this movement? Some of the things I talk through worship to me seem to be, like, bordered on insanity. Oh, I am a very arrogant woman, very independent. I cannot be submissive. I cannot dial. But I stiffened, my mind deaf in my body, and I don’t know how I am here, but I keep coming. And then I was like, I was chanting, six months.

And every little thing that comes up against the grain is my personality and who I am. And I immediately want to run away, like being submissive. And then the last, most recent one was having it emphasized in class that men are more intelligent than women and all these things like they.

There are exceptions. It’s a general rule. One time they asked Prabhupāda that question. Then Prabhupāda just says how much they may. How many ounces? Apparently there’s more ounces. I don’t know. Depends on how much you use. Scientists, they only use a few percent. So if someone uses more, whatever they have, then if you become Kṛṣṇa conscious, then you will be more intelligent than 99% of all the men in the world.

Well, that was a good answer.

It was an intelligent answer, yes.

So it may be more difficult. It. That’s what they say to teach, make this. The Bengalis say it to make the old ripened bamboo bend. But with practice, anything can be done. And if one chants hare Kṛṣṇa chantse, especially Śrī Kṛṣṇa Caitanya, whose name by Lord Caitanya is the powerful mantra, then it’s possible for anyone, doesn’t matter what background to bend or to, it’s just a question of covering, you see, actually, it’s not really bending, in one sense, that Kṛṣṇa consciousness, for us is natural for everyone, but we. Kṛṣṇakan has been described by nārada muni as sarvupadi venir muktam tat paratena nirmala. So sarvupadi gupti means designations, sarva means all designations. And near muqta mukta means liberated. So to be liberated from all kinds of false designations.

So the more we have been here in the world, then the more designations that we have learned to identify with just by our being here, we identify ourselves as being young or old, or being a man or woman, or being black or white, or being an american or a yugoslavian or an indian or a russian or whatever. And as time goes on and we start to identify with what brand of cigarettes we smoke. If someone’s smoking, you know that, you know, he’s a Marlboro man or he’s a whisker, you know, or what brand of what political party and what this. And so in this way, gradually, he’s got all these designations, which are all just which, none of which he can take with him or she can take with him when we leave the body.

And then we start all over again, we take with him in our mind. That’s why, again, we have to come. Come back to this world, because we have all these attachments to various artificial designations. And so then we’re again brought back to reincarnation. So pure devotional service means that one’s free from all the artificial designations and realizes that actually all these things are very superficial, that I am something much deeper and much more important than all this. I am actually an eternal spirit. I am a spirit soul. I am an eternal living entity. And these things are all just relative associations I picked up by the particular conditioning of my social environment and of my activities in this life. But actually, where is the real me? Who am I?

Then, of course, we try to identify the real I with all these artificial or superficial things, and none of them are actually us. We are actually the part of Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa is eternal, we are eternal. We existed before this body, and we exist after this body. So then to understand this, of course, is very difficult. First we can philosophically understand, but actually what it is that we have to cleanse away our attachment for all the little designations that we pick up as we going out. It’s like when we walk out in the street, our clothes get dirty. Every day we wash our clothes. I mean, at least most people do. And if we don’t, then, you know, gradually the clothes start to smell and they look very soiled and like that.

But generally speaking, at least in a modern context, most people would say wash their clothes regularly in the ordinary civilization. But unfortunately, we go out into society and we’re born in this world. But every day we’re also picking up so many dirts on our consciousness, from our thoughts, from our association, from our bad habits, and even from good habits, and from all different kind of things. We gradually pick up so many different kinds of dirts on our consciousness, but we don’t wash it. So that’s why, as time is going on, the dirt is piling up. And then when we get a new body, then we have relatively less dirt superficially, but we still have so many subtle attachments. So what Kṛṣṇa consciousness is, what chanting Hare Kṛṣṇa is Catadharpana marjana, cleansing the consciousness. This is like a mirror, and it’s scrubbing the mirror.

So actually, everyone’s been here, millions of births. And even in this body, we may have a little bit more dust, or we may have a little less dust, but from this particular birth, which is like a superficial cover, and we go beneath that, then you will find that there’s even dirts from previous births that are also in our consciousness, subtle desires that are not even yet fructified yet, but those are cleansed away by chanting Hare Kṛṣṇa. If you continue chanting, studying the Bhagavad gītā, then gradually you will be able to see what is the real quality of yourself and what are just the superficial coverings, which, by identifying, you are actually only keeping yourself from achieving the natural happiness and peace that you really want. Just like today in America, everyone has a certain outlook.

But 1900 in America, I mean, they had a completely different outlook. And in the year 2000, hopefully, everyone will be chanting Hare Kṛṣṇa. But the science fiction writers, they would have us believe, you know, in another completely, you know, plastic society outlet. So the outlooks are changing based upon these different environments. And we can understand, if we just say a little, like, historical view, that how superficial are all these different designations which we are accepting as so real now. So it’s better that we should accept and understand who are we in actuality and reality.

And that we can understand by studying the designation, that we will understand by studying the Bhagavad Gītā, by associating with yogis, the devotees who are practicing Bhakti yogis, and by chanting Hare Kṛṣṇa, which is a powerful form of meditation, we will be able to cleanse our heart and understand who we are and understand who is Kṛṣṇa, what is the world. Everything becomes clear. It requires six things that are very helpful for that. First is enthusiasm. How enthusiastic one does it, that is very important. But then the next thing is patience, that sometimes people jump into something, but then they think that they want immediate result.

But this is something that we have been chronically conditioned by so many designations for so many millions of births that we may not just immediately, within one month, suddenly become, you know, realize God will take a little longer, usually than what we expect, but in this lifetime, we can be successful. But so one in this lifetime has to be patient, that then after patience, comes determination, that actually, by practicing, by sticking to it, I will be successful. That type of a faith or determination not based on just, you know, some kind of blind, dogmatic belief, but based upon a practical, spiritual, philosophical understanding from various viewpoints, from various angles. So one has to have that determination. Then one should follow some regulative principles which will keep us from putting further dirts or further dirts on our consciousness, further contamination.

Then one should associate with devotees, with like minded people, because that also helps us to identify on a spiritual platform. If we associate with drunkards or alcoholics, we will start to identify like that. We will start to take alcohol ourselves. If we associate with people who are shooting drugs or other kind of things, and we will start to get into that kind of thing, we should associate with criminals, who will start to steal or do other things. We associate with ham operators who probably buy a ham radio or something. You know, it’s just like. So the point is that we can choose our association.

So we’re making here friends of Lord Kṛṣṇa, friends of Mariah, that people that want to associate with devotees, they can feel the opportunity, the open house, to come and associate with devotees, to try to cultivate spiritual understanding and a spiritual way of life. Then the final thing is to be straightforward, to kind of face up to oneself and to the spiritual master and other devotees, and be straightforward in the dealings. These are the basic six aspects I recommend. So since an intelligent person will weigh everything, and it’s been advised that we have everything to gain and nothing to lose by being Kansas. Sometimes the material is criticized. Well, there’s no God, so why are you wasting your time? Why are you wasting your time? Of course, the devotees, you can see that they’re all very happy. They’re living a nice environment with friends.

They’re happy chanting Hare KṚṢṆA so the materialists, they say, well, this is a fool’s paradise. Of course, the devotees say, well, the materialists, that they don’t have any ultimate goal of life. They say at death, everything is over. So their whole life is a waste, because even though they do something, it ultimately finished. We’re also creating something nice for the society, but we also know that beyond this life, there’s another life, there’s our permanent life. So in this, if the materialist is right, then this whole life, he’s simply engaged mainly in just gratifying the senses and running here and there. And at the end of life, all right, everything is finished. But generally they’re anxiety.

They’re never satisfied, and they’re always envious of other people who appear to be either approaching what they think excellence they have achieved or who already superseded them, and they’re thinking that how to pull them down or how to get above them. This whole competitive, envious spirit is very prominent in material society and the devotee, so in this lifetime doesn’t have any anxieties depending on Kṛṣṇa chanting Hare Kṛṣṇa and very happy, peaceful life. And then, so if there’s no actually no life after death, if the material is to correct, then what did he lose? It’s in the life of the death, and you don’t lose anything anyway, because life is meaningless. And if, as every religion in the world, as the.

As the advanced bhakti yogis have experienced, even as today, modern science has experienced, that after, to some extent, they have documented things, they don’t know exactly how to explain it, but reincarnation has been documented through various researchers. They just don’t feel it’s enough to make it a scientific law for some reason. But there are many different kind of evidences that have come up, including, recently, a chiron photography of a person dying in Russia that took a high powered 100,000 volts photographs of people dying. And see that from their body, there’s some type of ephemeral light thing goes out. So if there is actually a life after this life, then the devotee wins and he goes back to Godhead. So you have nothing to lose in everything to gain. Welcome aboard.

I probably get it from Godhari for doing that. She’s my mentor.

So what deities does Doctor Rick have? And which deities does his wife have?

I just have a very nice picture of Ryan Narayan.

We like the majestic aspect.

Actually. It’s his wonderful smiling face that captivated. It’s a copy of one of the pictures out of that small Narayan. It would be standing in the water, and there’s like, all the foliage behind him.

He has the snake behind him.

The what?

The ananthesia. No, no, half in the water. Which one?

He’s standing on, like, on top of water. He’s standing lotus.

He’s blessing. Juvenile.

I think he said. I think he sounds like he’s talking about his forearms. Forearms. The bees are around. Yeah. He’s standing on the lotus and lotus is in the water, and there’s. Oh, yeah, I. His face is just. His face is just. That’s really beautiful picture. Just. What can I say? My wife has. Lord Jaggernaut has come to see her three times. And corianties also come and dine and.

Just three times, meaning is three juggernauts. Three sets or just three individual juggernauts?

All three of them have just kind of manifested some really kind of unusual, the way they have come.

How big?

One set that mother naughty cut for us when they were india, about this. About the size of your hand. And then some other very small, about like this. And then some that came from Ubuntu. Their nice little. Their own temple. They’re about this big. They have the doors to open up.

They make those nubendabo. Those are the ones that get me into India.

I think they came from India.

You can get the little doors open.

Yeah, right.

Andy Tigor. Yes.

And Rādhā. Dana. Mom.

And Rādhām Adenoma.

And also co pop. And Lakshmi.

And Lakshmi.

We found her in a very terrible condition in secondhand roses. She was covered with dirt and grime and filth in the window. No one knew what she was. She’s been very nice for a handmade brass temple. She was just kind of waiting there for someone to come and rescue her. We were driving down the road and my wife said, stop.

You know, there’s a whole story about that in Rādhā, you know, in the Govinda ji deity, when they installed it in Vrindavan and there was no Rādhārāṇī. And so one day they go back, came to a dream of the king and said that actually the deity, there was a certain deity. He said, I want my Rādhārāṇī. But she’s in Orissa. Everyone is worshipping her as Mahā Lakshmi. And there was this particular deity that no one knew. The history was ancient deity, and everyone was saying it was some particular Lakshmi was a very. I can’t remember the name, but it’s a unique name of Lakshmi that. And. But she only had two arms. And then you could see that actually she was like in a dancing or some other pose, which wasn’t a normal pose for Lakshmi.

But everyone thought that, you know, just worshiping is Lakshmi. And then the king went there and there was a whole thing, how he ultimately convinced the king of that place that this deity was, or maybe he was the king of that place. And Govindaji came to him. And so then he took the Radarandi to Vrindavan, and that’s how Rādhā and Govindaji were joined. Of course, now they’re in. They’re in Jaipur, but that time they were in. So you sure it’s Lakshmi? Is it Radaroni?

It’s Lakshmi.

It’s forearms. So that’s Lord Jagannath has a Lakshmi panchami called Hera Panchami. The fifth day after he goes out on Rathiatra. Then there’s the whole pastime with Lakshmi. It’s in the Ādi, it’s in the Caitanga character, how Lakshmi comes and starts arresting all of Jagannath’s devotees. She becomes angry because Jagannath, when he left home, you see, her mood with Jagannath is that she’s the wife. And so she thinks that Lord Jagannath is like a hempecked husband. Jagannath’s going off and meeting Rādhārāṇī at that time. And so the point was, then she came, and when five days were up, he still wasn’t back. She was angry. So then she came and.