If others misjudge us what should we do?

Answer Podcast

Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
In spiritual life, we are often expected to do a lot more than others, in terms of being patient, tolerant. But if we are just to understand others, what should we do as disciples? There are 2-3 different things involved. First is, that we can never satisfy others.
The easiest way to make ourselves miserable is to try to make everyone happy with us. We just can’t do it. So some people, no matter what we do, they are going to be dissatisfied.
So we just have to understand what service I have to do in my life, and continue to do that service. And people will speak something about it. If we are consistently doing our service, then our actions will speak louder than words.
Having said that, there are certain devotees who are important for us, some of our spiritual guides, those who are in positions of authority, positions of what are they guiding us. With them, we can also give a clarification. Especially if we have one or two devotees who understand us well, then they can become as a bridge between us and others.
And through them, we can convey our side of the story, and then it can be clarified to others also. That’s the second thing. We don’t have to bother about what everyone is thinking about us.
But if important, people will clarify that is enough. But sometimes, it happens that nobody seems to understand us. Now, I am giving this whole answer based on the assumption that we are actually being misjudged.
Sometimes it may be that we have also done something wrong. That’s a different situation. But assuming that we are being misjudged, if whatever we do, nothing seems to be clarifying, if nothing seems to be resolving things, then that is the time we should know that this is the time for us to exhibit some powers.
Because what happens? Sometimes, certain karmic reactions come to us in particular ways. So it is not just that particular action to which we are making the reaction. It is a small thing, why are you making it so big? Do you understand that? It is not just a small thing.
Yes, a small thing has become big, but there is some karma involved in the past. If we look at our life and other situations, we may have made some big mistake, but we got away without any penalization for it. So in the long run, life balances out.
So when this happens, when we find that here there is misunderstanding, there there is misunderstanding, there there is misunderstanding, we just know that this is a bad patch we are going through. So when we understand this is a bad patch, what can we do? Stop it. When everything in life, everything in the material world is temporary, the pleasures are temporary, and the problems are also temporary.
So even if there is a misunderstanding, everybody, you know, in Tanuja, people’s memories are short. So today there is one controversy, there is one misunderstanding, tomorrow there will be some other misunderstandings, some other controversies. And once they go to second, third, fourth, by the time they come to fourth of it, the first one will already come out.
So we don’t even take it too seriously. Just at that time, know that we are going through a bad patch and don’t overdo it. Just continue doing what we are doing as well as we can.
And over a period of time, the misunderstanding goes away. So we should just focus on our service to Krishna. And as a service, we can try to clarify.
But if the clarification doesn’t work, we understand that the clarification idea, we should be attached to the fruits of our work. So sometimes we also have to apply that to clarification. We should be attached to the fruits of clarification.
Sometimes we may offer a clarification and things may not get clarified. We have to understand that as long as the main service to Krishna is going on, then sometimes some clarification may work, sometimes things may not work. If we are consistently serving, consistently doing our best, over a period of time, things will get clarified.
Great.