Understanding how bhakti addresses anxiety

[Program at ISKCON, Portland, USA]
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This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
to Krishna. Does that answer your question? Thank you very much.
Hare Krishna. I’m grateful to be here amongst all of you at the Lotus Feet of Sita A. Sachinandan. I’ll try to serve something in some small way.
What Jai Sachinandan Prabhu has spoken about me is actually his exalted consciousness. I hope one day I will come to that level of dedicated service. But I see that as his good wishes.
I seek the good wishes of all of you also so that I can try to share the message of Krishna and Sri Prabhupada. So, I’ll speak today on the topic of how bhakti addresses our anxiety. Yes, I answer questions on my website, thespiritualscientist.com. And one devotee asked a question recently.
We normally tell people that if you chant Hare Krishna, your stress will go down, your anxiety will go down. Now that I started practicing bhakti, you know, how to do my sadhana, how to find time for my chanting, how to find time to balance all my life, that is actually causing me stress. So my anxiety is not going away.
My anxiety seems to be increasing. So how exactly does bhakti address anxiety? In the Bhagavad Gita, in the 18th chapter, Krishna says in 58th verse, mat-cittah sarva-durgaani mat-prasadah tarishyasi. He says, if you become conscious of me, you will pass over all obstacles by my grace.
So when we talk about anxiety, I would like to talk about it at three different levels. First is the anxiety caused by situation. The second is the anxiety caused by disposition.
And the third is the anxiety caused by identification. So these are anxiety caused by situation. Now whatever be the word we use, worry, fear, anxiety, they all convey insecurity within us, caused by uncertainty.
Now some anxiety is caused by the situation that we are in. Say, if we have to get to an important meeting on time, and we are caught in traffic, we worry, will I get there or will I not get there? When there is external uncertainty, the anxiety is there because we need to get certain things done, and we are not sure whether we are able to do them or not. And this anxiety is just a part of being finite beings living in a world in which much is not in our control.
So this anxiety is there for everyone. And anybody who thinks that I can never get rid of this anxiety, that person is an illusion. Because when we have to work in this world, in every situation, no matter how powerful we may be, how much comfortable we may make our situation, still there will be some things outside our control.
We may try to increase the things in our control, but still there will be things outside our control. And although these things are outside our control, they matter to us. So for example, when a student is studying, he may say that, I have to study, but will I get marks in my exam or not? I do not know that.
So then the studying is to some extent in the student’s control. But the exact kind of question that will come in the exam, the exact marks that the student will get, that is not in the control. So say, because of that, there is anxiety.
We may grow up and say, now I do not have to give any exams, now I have graduated. But sometimes we find that when we get on a job, it is not that we do not have to give any exams. Sometimes every day is like an exam.
Every day we are assessed. Every day may be a day where we may make some mistake and it can have disastrous consequences. So in a sense, no matter how much we try to increase our external control, which is fine, we need to do that.
Say, if I worry, what if my health gets spoiled, so I have health insurance. So yes, we can organize situations externally by which the uncontrollable elements, they can be decreased or their influence on us can be decreased. We can increase our preparation.
So this anxiety caused by situation is something which is just intrinsic to life in this world. But this is not the kind of anxiety that is mostly plaguing people in today’s world. We consider the third world countries and the first world countries.
Broadly speaking, in the third world countries, the external uncertainties are relatively more. If we turn on a tap, say in a remote, in a rural place in India, there is no guarantee water will come out of it. In America, we may not have that uncertainty.
So externally speaking, the uncertainties are less in the first world and in the third world. And yet, researchers, sociologists have found that anxiety levels in the first world countries are more than in the third world countries. In India, sometimes in the news, it comes how there are farmers who are in great poverty and they commit suicide because they are not able to repay their debts.
And this is often seen as a sign of how primitive and backward India is. Well, it is sad. It is heartrending that they are committing suicide.
But actually, India’s suicide capital is not any farm area. It is actually Bangalore. And Bangalore is the software capital of India.
So there are people who are in the software field and they are doing very well. But they often succumb to the pressures of life and they commit suicide. So this means that the anxiety levels have become so unbearable that they feel that ending their life is better than continuing on with life and facing the struggles.
So again, the point which I am making here is that even when we increase our control over our external situations, which should decrease our anxieties, but that is not happening. Even those who have greater control over their external situations, they are seeming to have greater anxiety. So, then we talk about anxiety caused by situation.
Then there is anxiety caused by disposition. Disposition means that we all have different minds. So basically, our existence is at three levels, the physical, mental and spiritual.
So we are souls who are having physical bodies and we also have minds. So at the physical level, there is uncertainty and that causes anxiety. But there is the anxiety which is caused by the disposition of the mind.
Disposition of the mind means that if the mind gets attached to something and there can be specific attachments to specific things which can cause anxiety. Say, somebody is a cricket fan and they may be sitting here in America and there may be a cricket match going on somewhere, say in Sri Lanka. But if that match goes to its final stages and it appears as if India is losing, then the person may be in great stress, anxiety, panic.
Oh, is India going to win? Is India going to lose? So what has happened over here? The anxiety is caused not because of any physical situation. Physically, that person may be sitting in their air-conditioned house comfortably on a sofa, on a couch. So the anxiety here is caused not so much by the physical situation, but it is by the mental disposition.
The attachment that is present in the mind, that causes anxiety. So in the Bhagavad Gita, in the 13th chapter, oh, 13th chapter, 22nd verse, Krishna says that, He says that, Purusha, the soul, becomes situated in material nature. Why does the soul become situated? Because of the desire to enjoy the products of material nature.
Because of this association, the person experiences good or bad in this world. And in the verse before this, Krishna says, in 13.21, that he talks about the relationship between the situation and the emotion. This is, that cause and effect.
This happens in the realm of material nature. This action produces this reaction. This is under the purview of material nature.
But these events, these changes in situations that happen in material nature, they cause happiness and distress to the person. Why? Because of the conception that I am the enjoyer, because of the desire to enjoy. So going back to the earlier cricket example, the person is situated somewhere comfortably in their home in America.
But the cricket match is going on in India. Now the event is happening at one place. But the effect of that on the person is because there is the desire to enjoy, which has caused the connection.
So actually, experiences matter. But more than events matter, but more than events, it is our conception of the events that matters. Suppose, say, there is a stock market crash, and there are stock brokers and stock investors, they’re looking at a big screen where the graph is there, and the stock market is crashing.
They’re holding their heads in panic. Now, if we see, physically speaking, some event has happened somewhere. But somebody who is, say, not educated in economics, you wonder what happened? Just a line went down on a screen.
Why are all of you panicking? Now, in this case, we could say that this person just doesn’t have the knowledge what actually that line means. But still, the point here is that there is an event, and there is the experience of the event. And the connection between the event and the experience of the event is based on the conception that we have in our mind.
So the conception or the disposition, which is there in the mind, which may be of attachment, which may be of excessive infatuation with something, that causes anxiety. So if we look at many of the anxieties that we face in life, researchers have found that most of the time, people get worried when they have time on their hands. The time when people have done their work, and now they’re going to relax.
During their leisure time, the mind works overtime. During the leisure time, the mind starts working. What if this happens like that? What if that happens like that? What if this? What if that? If I’m working in my office, at my workplace, okay, I do this, I do that, I do that.
Then I come back home, and I start thinking, you know, my boss gave a strange look to me today. Is my boss planning to fire me? So now we see something, and then we interpret based on that, and based on the interpretation, we start worrying. So worry is a result of the conceptions that are present in the mind, the disposition of the mind that is there.
And most of the worries that we have, they are not so much immediately about the physical situation that we are in. The soul has come to the human body from the animal bodies through spiritual evolution. So although the physical body has changed, the mind has remained the same.
And because the mind remains the same, the tendencies from the animal world also come to the soul in the human world. So in the human body, the soul responds in ways that are more situated for functioning in the animal world, but less situated for functioning in a civilized human world. For example, if an animal faces danger, say if a deer senses that a tiger is swooping down on it, animals generally face danger in two ways, fight or flight.
This tiger is too powerful, I cannot fight, so just fly, just run. If two tigers want the same mate, and then this tiger will size up the other tiger, say I am going to fight for this. So in the animal world, fight or flight is the defining response for danger.
And we could say from the perspective of the three modes of material nature, there is mode of goodness, mode of passion, mode of ignorance. So in the mode of passion, the response is fight. I want to control, I want to dominate.
In the mode of ignorance, the response is flight. I cannot control, so I will run away. So the modes are basically subtle forces that shape the way we think and act.
And each mode shapes our thinking and acting in particular ways. So the modes themselves are very complex subjects, but when we apply them to the subject of worry, we can say that going back to the earlier dynamic, that there are some things in our control and some things not in our control. And we need to assess carefully how much is in my control and how much is not in my control.
The different modes cause this assessment to happen in different ways, with different degrees of accuracy or inaccuracy. So in the mode of passion, we usually overestimate our capacity to control. And by contrast, in the mode of ignorance, we underestimate our capacity to control.
So for example, if I am getting late for an important meeting and I am in anxiety, a person in the mode of passion will start thinking, I will get there by hook or by crook. Some people get a sense of thrill in being speed demons. Yes, race by.
One of my devotee friends is an orthopedic surgeon. So once he was going in his car in Mumbai and there was this young boy. He was driving on a bike like crazy, just going left, right, veering across cars and getting a big kick, saying, how fearlessly I can drive.
So they came to a signal and this boy had stopped at the signal and this doctor came up to him. His car came next to the boy and he said that. He took out his car and said, I am an orthopedic surgeon.
You are going to need to see me soon. So in the mode of passion, we tend to overestimate our capacity to control. You know, I can go at very great speed and I can still stay in control.
Nothing will happen to me. On the other hand, in the mode of ignorance, we underestimate our capacity. And some people, oh, I’m not going to get in time for the meeting.
Oh no, what is this? What am I going to do? And they become so panicky and so petrified that they don’t even get into the car. So I’m never going to reach in time only. So they get so caught in their mind.
Okay, you may not reach in time for the meeting, but at least you’ll reach for a part of the meeting. No, just because some things are out of their control, they think that everything is out of their control. Or rather, because some things go out of their control, they just give up the capacity, give up the endeavor to control anything.
And that way, they just can’t do anything. So we can say that these two are broadly related with the fight or flight responses. The fight response comes from the mode of passion, because I think that I can control the situation.
And I’m usually overestimating my capacity. And this may work out in relationships also. Last year, when I had come to America, I gave a series of seminars on dealing with fear, overcoming fear.
So I was discussing about how there are different fears, which have been defining feavers at different phases in human history. So some phases are common. Some fear, people have fear of death, people have fear of public speaking, some fears are common.
But there are two fears, which have become prominent in the 21st century, which were not so much there in the past. The first is the fear of terrorists, which understandably after 9-11 has hiked up. The second is the fear of rejection.
The fear that when people try to develop a relationship with someone, and they’re afraid, what if the other person rejects me? Even while I’m trying to start a relationship, or even after I started a relationship, just leave me and go away. So the fear of rejection is a very deep rooted fear. Now, this fear, we can again correlate with respect to the modes.
When we form a relationship, we may observe this person has this problem, this person has this problem. And we may think, I’m going to fix this person. If we think I’m going to fix someone, actually, every relationship begins with the promise that we will be the controllers.
And it soon gives us the realization that we are not the controllers. Parents have children thinking that we will, we will have the children and we will, we will help the parents have good intentions, we want them to grow up into wonderful people. But the children have a mind of their own.
And especially when children come to teenage, sometimes the parents start wondering, you know, my sweet little boy, my sweet little girl, where is she? Where have they disappeared? Who is this sullen, uncommunicative, gruff kind of person who has come over here? So what happens is we can’t control for too long. So in the mode of passion in relationships, we overestimate our capacity to control. And when we are unable to control, that causes anxiety.
We are not able to control as much as we expected we’d be able to control. That causes anxiety. On the other hand, in the mode of ignorance, we underestimate our capacity.
That means if we are in a relationship and something doesn’t work out, maybe the other person behaves in an unexpected way, unreliable way, insensitive way, irresponsible way, then we start feeling sorry for ourselves. Nobody cares for me. Everybody treats me like a doormat.
Nobody loves me. So we go into what can be called a pity party. We start feeling sorry for ourselves.
So instead of doing something which we could to improve the relationship or at least improve our part in the relationship, we just start feeling sorry for ourselves. We feel the world is only bad. I can’t do anything about it.
This is my fate. And just see how unfortunate my fate is. So in the mode of ignorance, we underestimate our capacity to control.
And both these responses cause anxiety. In the fight response, we often overestimate our capacity to control. And when we find out actually I can’t control, that causes anxiety.
In the flight response, we underestimate our capacity to control. And because of that, we start feeling the world is so bad. People are so bad.
Life is so bad. And because we still have to live in the world, so all that negativity comes up as fear, as insecurity, as worry. And thus we are not able to deal with the situation.
So the external situation is there. And the external situation when there is uncertainty, when there is some specific uncertainty that is there, then there is a specific action that can be done. But as I said, if a predator is attacking, if a lion is attacking a deer, the deer can just run or deer can, deer can’t confront.
But if there are two lions, they can confront each other. But most of the situations that we human beings face, they are much more subtle and complicated situations. We can’t use the fight or flight response.
Sometimes if we have some relationship issues, we just calmly sit and discuss. We find a proper time. So fight or flight response will not lead to any solution.
We can’t have any sustainable way of functioning if we are simply functioning based on fight or flight. So when we function in the mode of passion and ignorance, then we aggravate the problems created by the situations. The situation as an issue is out there.
It is a problem. But the attitude with which we approach that situation, that causes far greater problems. If I approach it with fight, I’ll fix it.
And I can’t fix it, then I become angry. And I approach it, oh, what can I do? Life is so bad. Then again, I’m not doing any, what I could have done.
And that way also we worsen the situation. Now, in the mode of goodness, we go beyond fight and, or flight to sight. We calmly look at the situation.
Okay, what exactly is the problem? Okay, this person had promised to do this, but they didn’t do it. This person spoke like this about me here. This person did this.
Look at the action and then address the situation. So in the mode of goodness, we will be able to better assess what is in our control, what is not in our control, and then act appropriately. So this is anxiety caused by the conception in the mind or the disposition of the mind.
By this conception or disposition, I refer to the attachments present in the mind, or the overall modes that are infecting the mind. Now, we’ll be address, we’ll be later discussing how bhakti addresses all this. But let’s go on to the third part.
The third level of anxiety is caused not just by conception, but by identification. There is circumstantial anxiety, and at the deepest level, there is existential anxiety. If we conceive that we are just bags of protoplasm who have somehow come alive, that we are living in an uncaring vast world, which is ultimately pointless, then the much more deeper anxiety is, does my life count at all? That anxiety is actually foundational.
It may not even be visible, but that anxiety causes us to overreact whenever other anxieties come up. Say, it is a tree. Now if a storm comes, the tree will shake naturally.
Some trees have greater capacity to shift, to bend. Some trees have lesser capacity to bend. So that’s just natural.
But if the tree doesn’t have any good roots, its roots are weak, then it will not just bend, it will just fall completely. So similarly, the roots of the way we act is how we identify ourselves, what we conceive ourselves to be. As long as our identification is based on materialism, anxiety is going to be immeasurable.
In the 16th chapter of the Bhagavad Gita, Krishna says in verses 11th and 12th, चिन्तां अपरिमेयाम्च प्रलयान्तां उपश्रितहं कामों पभोगः परमा एतावधिति निष्चितहं चिन्तां अपरिमेयाम्च There are anxieties which are immeasurable. So we all face anxieties in life. And there are specific situations which cause specific anxieties.
But in this case, immeasurable anxieties. And till what time? प्रलयान्तां उपश्रितहं Till the moment of death they go on. In fact, प्रलया can refer even to the time of the cosmic destruction.
The anxieties will go on life after life after life. And what is the cause of this anxiety? कामों पभोगः परमा एतावधिति निष्चितहं काम उपभोगः परमा Because one has decided that worldly enjoyment is the essence of life. It is the prime necessity of life.
When we identify ourselves as materialistic beings, which Krishna has talked about two or three verses in 16.8, असत्यम प्रतिष्ठम् ते जगदाः रनेश्वरम् अपरस्परसं भूतम् किमन्यत् काम है तुकम् People think that I am a material being and material enjoyment is the goal of life. What other goal can be there to life? So this identification of ourselves as material beings, this is the cause of anxiety at a foundational level. And as long as we identify ourselves this way, there will be great insecurity.
Because we will think, what is my life? We may do this, we may do that. Usually, if we are secure ourselves, then if somebody insults us, somebody disrespects us, we won’t be so affected. But if you are already insecure, if you’re already thinking that people don’t value me, people don’t care for me, we are already insecure, having low self-esteem, and then somebody under respects us, neglects us, criticizes us, there will be overreaction at that.
So that is because of our fundamental identity crisis that is there. So when we identify ourselves as materialistic beings, then our very existence becomes in the atmosphere of non-existence. Prabhupada talks about this in the introduction of Bhagavad Gita as it is.
So then even small situations can trigger manic reactions. Small uncertainties can cause immense anxieties. And fundamentally, this identification of ourselves as material beings, when we identify ourselves as material beings, how do we define ourselves? We define ourselves by our capacity to control the things in the world around us.
I am so intelligent, I am so attractive, I am so wealthy, I am so powerful, and I can control these things. So it is not for a person who is a materialist, their particular profession or their particular social role, it is not just a role, it is their very identity. People define themselves by their material position or their material position.
We will all define ourselves like that. But that is our only definition. If I define myself, say as a public speaker, and tomorrow I get some throat problem and I lose my throat, I can’t speak, what is the point of my life? I will have a devastating identity crisis at that time.
But if I identify myself as a soul who is a servant of Krishna, and as a servant of Krishna, my service is speaking. So if Krishna gives me the facility, I’ll serve. If Krishna does not give me the facility, I’ll find some other way to serve.
So we can’t deny our connection with our functional roles. And we do have to identify with them in a practical way. But if they become our sole identification, then any problem in that causes unbearable anxiety.
If I identify myself as a mother or as a father, and that is my prime identification, then if something wrong starts happening with my child, if my child starts going on the wrong track, then it’s not just the child going on the wrong track. That makes me think as if I am a failure, as if my whole life is waste, because that has become my sole identification. If I identify myself primarily as the husband of someone or the wife of someone, and there’s some turbulence in that relationship, then I get a question, who am I? It’s not a philosophical question.
It becomes more of an emotional question, because we have identified ourselves in a particular way. So now I will, this anxiety caused by identification with something other than who we actually are, that is the most foundational anxiety. And that leads to the other anxieties that we have in our life.
So now I’ll talk about how bhakti addresses these anxieties. So we started from situation to disposition to identification. But for addressing, we’ll move from identification to disposition to situation.
So bhakti is not just about, say, chanting Hare Krishna or coming to the temple or associating with devotees. Yes, these are very important activities. But the essence of bhakti is to change our defining identity.
We identify ourselves as souls who are servants of Krishna. We may do all the activities of bhakti, but if we continue to identify ourselves by our social roles, then there will not be much transformation that happens in our life. The essence of bhakti is that I should be able to identify myself first and foremost as a servant of Krishna.
As a servant of Krishna, I’m a public speaker. As a servant of Krishna, I’m a mother. As a servant of Krishna, I’m a husband or I’m a wife.
So my identity is that I’m a servant of Krishna. That’s my fundamental identity. And as a servant of Krishna, I may have different functional identities in this world.
And I act according to those functional identities responsibly because through them all, I can serve Krishna. But I see them as ways of serving Krishna. I don’t see them as my defining identity.
To give an example for this, suppose there’s a river that is flowing towards the ocean. This metaphor is commonly used in the Bhagavatam to talk about how a devotee’s consciousness flows towards Krishna. In the first canto, 8th chapter, 42nd verse, Kunti Maharaj is praying, that my dear Lord, just as the Ganga always flows towards the ocean, let my consciousness always flow towards you.
Now, for our consciousness to flow towards Krishna, how will it flow? There are different channels that are going on in our body. There are different channels that are going on in our consciousness. The channels can be our relationships.
The channels can be our roles, our services. So for example, we chant Hare Krishna. Chanting is one channel by which our consciousness flows towards Krishna.
When we come to the temple and do worship of the deities, that is another channel through which our consciousness flows towards Krishna. So broadly, our activities of sadhana bhakti, they are channels through which our consciousness flows towards Krishna. And similarly, the various services we do.
We may be temple managers, we may be preachers, we may be pujaris, devotional service roles, and even our social roles, familial roles, husbands, wives, parents. These are all channels in which our consciousness is meant to flow towards Krishna. We see others as parts of Krishna, interested to our care, and we try to serve them and serve Krishna through them.
So now, when Kunti Maharaj says, let my consciousness always flow towards you, what does it mean? It means, why does she need to pray that let my consciousness flow towards you? Because there is always the possibility that the consciousness flow towards Krishna will be blocked. It may get dammed, blocked because of the construction of a dam, and it may get misdirected elsewhere. So sometimes in our life, particular channels just may not work.
So suppose a devotee, as devotees, we take vow to chant Hare Krishna every day. But suppose a devotee gets some throat problem and can’t even speak, then how do they fulfill their vow? They can’t speak by chanting. They chant in their mind.
So the channel of speaking allowed, that may get blocked because of some situation. But that doesn’t mean the relationship with Krishna is blocked. The relationship with Krishna can go on still.
Maybe we do physical services, but if we fall sick, we may not be able to come to the temple, do pujari services. But still, we can sit, we can just hear some classes, have some books read out to us, read or hear some audio books or whatever, and that way we can connect ourselves with Krishna. So when we consider that, when we understand that the various services that we do, various responsibilities that we have, they are channels by which our consciousness is meant to move towards Krishna.
Then we are careful to make sure that the channel is clear so that the consciousness moves towards Krishna. But if somehow something goes wrong and a particular channel gets blocked, that doesn’t mean our life stops. There are other channels through which our consciousness can keep moving towards Krishna.
However, when I identify with something excessively, if I identify with one role, that if I identify myself as a public speaker, that is my only, that is not, I don’t think I am a servant of Krishna who is serving as a public speaker. I identify myself as a public speaker. Then when that channel gets blocked, I don’t know what I’m going to do.
Because that is by defining, that has become my defining identity and that has become the only channel through which my consciousness is moving towards Krishna. Similarly, if I think that I am the mother of someone, I am the spouse of someone, and in that relationship there’s a problem, our whole life gets blocked because that is the only channel through which our consciousness is flowing. So bhakti gives us a defining identity that is safe beyond upheavals of the world.
Our identity, our functional identities in this world, they can be shaken by the world’s uncertainties. We may be relating with a person in a particular relationship, but people change, we ourselves change, and sometimes the dynamics of relationships may change. And if we have defined ourselves by that alone, that relationship alone, the anxiety will be unbearable.
But if we define ourselves as a servant of Krishna, functioning in this relationship, we will be responsible because it is service to Krishna. But at the same time, we won’t be obsessive. We won’t feel ourselves worthless, rejected, or devastated just because one channel gets blocked.
So bhakti is meant to first and foremost change our sense of identification of who I am. And to the extent this is happening, to that extent we are internalizing our devotion. Otherwise, we may be religious, but we may not be spiritual.
We want to be religious. Some people say I just want to be spiritual but not religious. That is not so easily possible because spiritual is a state of consciousness that has to be attained.
And we have to follow some process to attain that. I can’t just become spiritual. There has to be a process to follow to attain to the spiritual level of consciousness.
And whatever process we follow to attain the spiritual level of consciousness, that is our religion. So in that sense, we need religion to become spiritual. So bhakti, especially as we practice at Yonmachala Prabhupada, we are religiously spiritual.
We seriously follow our religious activities. We chant, we worship the deities, but we also have the spiritual philosophy. We try to internalize the philosophy and thus we are religiously spiritual.
But being spiritual means identifying ourselves based on our spiritual identity as souls who are servants of Krishna. If that identification is not happening, then I am being religious but not spiritual. So bhakti is meant to, bhakti actually if we do it diligently, it changes our identification.
And that change of identification gives us a fundamental security, a foundational security that has a cascading effect. Cascading positive effect in dealing with anxiety at other levels. This means that if I have securely identified myself as a servant of Krishna, then even if I have a disposition which is attached to certain things, I have situations which are very uncertain, there will be a foundational security within me.
And that will decrease my anxiety substantially. Second level is, so this is addressing anxiety at the level of identification. Then addressing anxiety at the level of disposition.
So at the level of disposition means we may be inordinately attached to some things and that’s why we may subject ourselves to great anxiety. Like I said, somebody or something happens in a cricket match somewhere and I feel devastated. There are cases where for fans they lose, their favourite team loses the match and they just go into depression because of that.
There are cases where some fans even have committed suicide. It’s because their favourite team lost. The players don’t commit suicide but the fans commit suicide.
It’s so tragic. So the players, they are in the game but they understand this is a game. They will also feel bad they lost the match.
But their infatuation with the game is not as much as that of the fans. So when we start practicing bhakti, this conception, this infatuation with worldly things that is there, that substantially decreases. Because it happens again at two levels.
One is just the practice of bhakti, it raises our consciousness upwards. Why do we get infatuated with certain things? Anxiety is caused by our infatuation with things which are not in our control. So like excessive infatuation with cricket matches.
Now why do we get infatuated? Because we are looking for pleasure. I think as watching this match will give me so much pleasure. But as we start practicing bhakti, we start understanding that this pleasure is so superficial.
So there is a deeper level of pleasure that comes by my connection with Krishna. And as we start experiencing that higher pleasure, then the craving for pleasure through external things, that goes down. And when that goes down, then the anxiety which I face because of it will also go down.
An example, suppose I am driving a car and I come to a signal and I stop and suddenly I feel a bump and somebody has hit the bumper of my car. Now if it’s a brand new car, I’ll turn around. How dare you? I’ll just go furious.
There’ll be enormous reaction. Sometimes there is road rage. Now if people have a gun, they may take a gun and shoot someone behind them also.
So why is that? Because the attachment with the car is so much. Suppose I had a car and I sold the car. And then I’m driving in my new car and I see somebody driving my old car and they come next to me in the scene.
And then somebody hits that car. I won’t have that much reaction. Why? Because it’s no longer my car.
I’m no longer so emotionally invested in it. Now yesterday that was my car, today it is not my car. So yesterday some car hitting my car’s bumper, hitting that car’s bumper would have caused a wild reaction.
Today there’s hardly any reaction because we are not so emotionally invested in that car. So similarly for us, when we practice bhakti, we become emotionally invested in Krishna. We get our satisfaction by our connection with Krishna.
That doesn’t mean we become uncaring or inert to everything in the world. But we are no longer so invested in that. And when we are not that invested, then we don’t face that much anxiety.
So the anxiety decreases because our infatuation with external decreases. Our infatuation is caused not so much because those activities give us pleasure, those things give us pleasure. They do give us pleasure.
And you may think I want to become detached. Then I’ll not have that anxiety. Yes, but as souls, as conscious beings, it is very difficult for us to simply be detached.
The best way to become detached is to become attached to something higher. When we become attached to Krishna, then detachment comes naturally. And detachment comes in a healthy way.
Sometimes devotees ask, what is the difference between detachment and irresponsibility? If I’m becoming detached, am I being irresponsible? The main difference is detachment is after doing the activity. Irresponsibility is before doing the activity. If a student has an exam and the parents tell the student, you have to study.
He says, no, I’m detached. You’re not detached. You have a duty to study.
And to say that, oh, I’m not going to study because I’m detached. That is not being detached. That is being irresponsible.
So, if we are in a particular social role and we are expected to do certain things, then we have to do those. So, wanting to make sure that I study properly, that is not attachment. What would be attachment is after I have done my studies and now I’m worried.
Oh, what will happen in this exam? What will happen in this exam? What will happen in this exam? If after I have done it, either it can be a particular activity or it can be a particular role. After I finish that, I keep obsessing over it. That is attachment.
So, detachment means we do our part and then we distance ourselves from it. So, when we are attached to something higher, if my attachment is to serving Krishna, then yes, the study is a service to Krishna. Therefore, I’ll do it well.
But this is not my only service to Krishna. Now, my studies, my exam is over. Now, I want to do other things for Krishna.
I want to learn music. I want to learn shlokas. I want to participate in this kit.
I want to do this service. And I want my consciousness to be available for that. So, I don’t want my consciousness to be obsessing over that thing, that exam which is over.
So, detachment, as I said, is best cultivated by having attachment to something higher. So, bhakti gives us attachment to Krishna and that brings about detachment in a healthy way. So, we do our part, but we move on.
So, this infatuation of the mind caused by its disposition or its conceptions, that gets decreased substantially because we don’t need for our pleasure the external situation. We’re getting that pleasure from somewhere higher, from our connection with Krishna. And lastly, with respect to the situation, as I said from the beginning that the situations are going to come up in our life, whether we are devotees or non-devotees.
Situations where things are not in our control are going to come upon us. But if we are practicing bhakti, we will be able to realistically assess what is in our control and what is not in our control. I said earlier, in the mode of passion, we overestimate.
In the mode of ignorance, we underestimate. But in the mode of goodness, we’re able to estimate properly. In the mode of goodness, I see, okay, this is in my control, that is not in my control.
So, let me focus on this which is in my control right now. Say, I have an important interview tomorrow. I don’t know what they’re going to ask in that interview.
So, I can worry, oh, what will they ask, what will they ask? Or right now, okay, I have four hours today, maybe two hours tomorrow. So, let me study, let me prepare. That is in my control.
So, in the mode of goodness, we can see what is in our control, what is not in our control, and focus on that which is in our control. And when we practice bhakti, there’s something more that happens. When in bhakti, we also understand, when we have a devotional worldview, we understand that that which is not in my control is in Krishna’s control.
And therefore, Krishna will take care of it. And we see both our doing our activity responsibly, our doing that which is in our control responsibly, and our leaving that which is not in our control in a detached way. We see both as ways of serving Krishna.
Normally, when we think of surrender, you may think that, yes, Draupadi raises her hands up and Krishna, I surrender to you. That is one way of surrendering. It’s dependence on Krishna.
But there is another way of surrendering, which Arjuna exhibits. Krishna tells Arjuna, sarva-dharmāntarityajya mām ekaṁ śaraṇaṁ vraja, surrender to me. And Arjuna says, yes, karishye vacanam tava.
In 18.73, he says, yes, I’ll surrender to you. But how does Arjuna surrender? That is not by raising his hands up in dependence. Arjuna picks up his bow in readiness to fight.
So that is also surrender. So there are different situations. Draupadi was in a situation where very little was in her control.
She had tried to protect her honor, but she was being publicly dishonored and there was nothing she could do. In her case, she just depended entirely on Krishna. That is a surrender.
Arjuna was a warrior about to fight the most important war of his life for which he had trained throughout his life. So for him, it’s a responsibility. He picked up his bow in readiness to serve Krishna.
So our devotion to Krishna is expressed by both dependence on Krishna and by diligence for Krishna. So dependence on Krishna for the things that are not in our control and diligence for Krishna in for the things that are in our control. So in bhakti, when we see both ways, yes, I’m going to do this service and for that, I will do my part responsibly.
So if we are diligent in doing what we are meant to do, okay, I have to go for this important meeting. I’ll plan properly. It takes this much time.
Let me ensure that I have that much time. I don’t. So we’ll be diligent in organizing ourselves in estimating our capacity.
And that way, the anxiety which comes because of our disorganization, because of our functioning in the modes of passion and ignorance, that anxiety goes down. And similarly, the anxiety which comes because of obsessing over things that are not in our control, that will also go down because we will be learning to depend on Krishna. Yes, that is not in my control, but it is in Krishna’s control and Krishna will take care of it.
So in this way, bhakti enables us to perform responsibly whatever we are meant to do while also minimizing our anxiety. So going back to the starting question, is it that our sadhana, our seva, that seems to increase our anxiety because we have to do all this? You know, I have so many things to do which are causing me anxiety and now devotion means I have to do so many more things. That is only going to cause me more anxiety.
No, it may appear at a superficial level like that. But bhakti is not just another thing to do. It is not just another to do in our life.
Bhakti is another way to do. It’s another way to do wherein we learn to depend on Krishna and be diligent for Krishna. So for us, when we, if you become conscious of me, you will pass over all obstacles by my grace.
What that means is that there can be looking at the obstacles which will cause us anxiety, this problem, that problem, that problem. Now we want to become conscious of Krishna. Now becoming conscious of Krishna may also cause us some anxiety because our mind doesn’t stay on Krishna.
But actually when we become conscious of Krishna, anxiety will be addressed at the most foundational level. So if you are thinking of chanting as just another thing to add in my life, then I think this is only going to increase my stress. But if we see chanting as a part of a self-transformational process, which is going to change our fundamental identification, is going to change our disposition, is going to change the way we deal with our situations, then we will see that this is going to empower us.
And we will find that as we keep practicing bhakti steadily, our anxieties will start going down substantially, both at a conscious level by our capacity to deal with situations effectively, plan better, respond better to uncertainties, as well as at a subconscious level by the decrease of our infatuation with worldly things and by the stabilizing identification of ourselves with Krishna. So I’ll summarize what I spoke today. So we talked about how does bhakti address anxiety.
So is bhakti just another to-do that adds to our stress and anxiety because there are so many other things to do? I talked about what causes anxiety. Anxiety because of situations, things that are not in our control, but they matter to us. Say I have to get to a meeting but there’s traffic.
That is situational anxiety, which is just a fact of living in this world. But that is not the primary cause of anxiety. In the first world, situations are much more in control than the third world, and yet anxiety levels in the first world are more than in the third world.
That’s because anxiety has a deeper cause. I talked about anxiety because of disposition, the kind of infatuation or conception the mind has. So I may be sitting comfortably in India, in America, in an air-conditioned room, but I’m worried about what is going to happen to a cricket man in a cricket match that is being played somewhere in Sri Lanka.
So the kind of attachments that we have, they cause us great anxieties. And at a deeper level, I talked here about, it’s not just specific attachments, it’s also the modes. So in the mode of ignorance, we talk about, we underestimate our capacity to control.
In the mode of passion, we overestimate our capacity to control. So the soul coming from the animal species to the human species has the fight or flight responses. These roughly correlate with the mode of passion and ignorance responses.
But the situations which we face in our day-to-day lives are quite complex. And these simplistic responses don’t work. So relational anxiety, the fear of rejection, is a major fear in today’s world because, for many reasons, but one reason is that we approach relationships with this fight or flight response.
If somebody is doing something wrong, I start thinking, I’ll fix this person. Or that’s the mode of passion response. Or I think, nobody treats me fairly.
I start feeling sorry for myself. That is the mode of ignorance response. So thus, the modes in which we function, the kind of infatuations that we have in our mind, they increase our anxiety beyond whatever is because of the physical situation.
So situations alone don’t cause anxiety. The interpretation of our situations by our mind, like a stock market crash, line going down, causing anxiety, it depends on the interpretation. And lastly, I discussed the level of identification.
It’s like a tree may bend when a storm comes, but if it has no roots, it will just crash. So similarly, if at our core identity, we are insecure, then at a surface level, our overreactions, our reactions to uncertainties will be excessive. So in materialistic conception of life, we, our life itself has no meaning beyond this immediate existence.
And because we have no enduring sense of identity, we compulsively hook on to whatever functional identity we have. If I define myself as a public speaker, I lose my speaking ability. It’s the end of my life.
If I define myself as a mother, if I define myself as a husband or a wife, as a problem comes in the relationship, it’s devastating for me because I have identified myself with that. So when we talk about bhakti, how bhakti addresses anxieties, at the level of identification, bhakti is not just about doing some religious activities. It is about getting a spiritual self-conception.
My defining identity is I’m a servant of Krishna. And as a servant of Krishna, I will do various responsibilities. They are like channels for the river of my consciousness to move towards the ocean of Krishna.
If some channel gets blocked, still I’ll find some other channel and keep moving on. So bhakti gives us the fundamental security that I’m a part of Krishna, Krishna loves me always, and I will always stay a servant of Krishna, no matter what happens at the situational levels. With that security, we can face external uncertainties much more maturely.
And then talking about the infatuations that are there in the mind, when you start practicing bhakti, because we get higher happiness through the connection with Krishna, therefore, we don’t become so over dependent on externals. And that’s why the change in those externals doesn’t cause us that much anxiety. So we go beyond fight and flight to sight, understand the situation properly.
So we become detached, but not irresponsible. Irresponsibility means we don’t do our role at all. Detached means we do our role, but see it as just a role and understand that I have other roles to play also.
And at a situational level, bhakti addresses anxiety by helping us understand that the things beyond our control, it helps us first of all to come to mode of goodness by which we assess properly what is in our control and what is not in our control. And beyond, when it brings us to transcendence, we see that what is out of our control is in Krishna’s control and he will bring good out of whatever is happening. So we express our devotion through dependence on Krishna, like Draupadi, for the things that are not in our control, and through diligence for Krishna, for the things that are in our control, like Arjuna.
And in this way, when we function in devotion, seeing devotion not just as a religious activity, by which we may become just simply religious, but not spiritual, we become religiously spiritual. And bhakti is not just another to-do, but another way to do, where we function based on our fundamental identification as servants of Krishna and thereby progress in our life. Thank you very much.
Hare Krishna. Are there any questions or comments? Yes, Tom. Good question, yeah.
So if somebody is attached to a dharmic cause, and they want, they are attached, and so if a political party that promotes that cause, it means they become happy. And if we stay indifferent to it, they say that we are being escapists. So how do we deal with that? We see that there are different levels of consciousness at which people will function.
And we could say ultimately our aspiration is that everybody becomes Krishna conscious. At the same time, not everybody is ready for becoming Krishna conscious. So if we could help people to elevate their consciousness from where they are to one step up, that is also a success.
So if somebody from the mode of ignorance comes to the mode of passion, so somebody who is a non-vegetarian becomes a vegan. They may not be taking prasad, but at least they come one level up. That is good.
Srila Prabhupada told Peter Barwash, who became his follower, but not became an initiate follower, told him, you just bring people to the level of giving up meat to bring them to some level of goodness. That is what he did. Peter Barwash was a famous tennis player.
So Prabhupada talked in that way to different people. So we see our mission when we are interacting with people to raise their consciousness upwards from where they are to one step up. And if we try to raise them too much up, it’s like say somebody is climbing up a stairs and they can take one step up.
But if we stand 25 steps up over them and we stretch out our hand, they can’t link with us at all. So we have to see where they are and how I can help them take one step up. So na buddhi vedam janayet agyanam karma sanginam, joshyet sarva-karmani vidwan yukta samajh.
In 3.26, Bhagavad Gita, Krishna says that do not disturb the minds of people who are attached. It’s significant. Krishna says that they are attached and they are ignorant.
Na buddhi vedam janayet agyanam karma sanginam. Agyani and karma sanginam. They are attached.
But still, joshyet sarva-karmani. Don’t tell them in such a way that they can become a limit. Vidwan yukta samajh.
This is the way the wise person acts. It’s interesting that the Sanskrit word is not mind, it’s not mana, it is buddhi. Na buddhi vedam janayet.
That means when people have a particular mental conception, they use their intelligence to justify that mental conception. And when we speak something which is radically contradictory to that, it’s like their whole worldview comes collapsing down. So it just becomes unbearable for them.
So what we say is, okay, if they are working for a dharmic cause, then encourage them to focus on the central principles of dharma. Yeah, we can talk with them at their level. And then, okay, if we want to work for propagating dharma at a political level, then we can focus on at a what can be done, what may not be done, because of political ground realities or whatever.
So rather than just rejecting that, we can see how that can be connected. And yes, based on whatever, wherever their emotion is invested, they will feel good or they’ll feel bad. And to some extent, we don’t have to exhibit our lack of emotion, just in front of them to alienate them.
And Narada Muni says in the seventh canto of Srimad Bhagavatam that your relatives will always give you suggestions for economic development. You do this, you do this, you do this. And Narada Muni says that don’t just reject them.
He says, nod your head and do what you’re doing. So if we just start confronting everyone who has every single idea that they have, our whole life will go in that. So we may just express some sympathy.
Somebody says, if India loses a cricket match, India-Pakistan cricket match, somebody loses. And people are just devastated by that. And then at that time, we just take a holier-than-thou attitude.
It’ll just alienate people. So we just have to act appropriately at that time. Act appropriately means that we have to see in this situation what is the response by which I can help people come closer to Krishna.
So we can’t act too otherworldly in worldly situations. One of Srila Prabhupada’s most influential followers was George Harrison. He brought the holy name to millions of people.
So there’s a biography of his written by Joshua Green, Yogeshwar Prabhu. So there he describes how he went through a difficult phase. After he started following Srila Prabhupada, Srila Prabhupada was very inspired.
Prabhupada encouraged him to write devotional songs. So he started doing that. And some of his songs became very popular.
But on a few occasions, when people had come to hear his music concerts, on the dais, he started telling people, chant Hare Krishna. And people just started booing him in public. They had not come there to chant Hare Krishna.
They had come there to hear him perform music. And then his popularity in the charts started going on, going down terribly, and he started getting scathing negative reviews. And then he came to meet Prabhupada.
And he said, Prabhupada, I’m feeling as if, you know, I did all this to get people come to Krishna. But I feel that for every one person I’m getting to Krishna, I’m sending 10 people away from Krishna. Because so much negativity was coming and he was, why George Harrison become like this? Because he’s involved with those Hare Krishnas.
That was the idea that was coming. Then Prabhupada told him, use your intelligence. Use your intelligence and do it in a way that gradually elevates people.
So then after that, he started composing some ordinary songs and introducing maybe some little bit devotional motifs in some, maybe in between a number of songs, then started singing one devotional song. So he had to find a healthy balance, which enabled him to serve his clientele at the same time, help them to raise to Krishna, higher level of Krishna consciousness. So we just, if we are in a worldly situation, we have to act in an appropriate way.
Imagine, say, if in India cricket is a big fan, say India’s most famous cricketer, say Virat Kohli becomes a devotee. And say this India Pakistan cricket match, and India loses that match. And after that, post-match interview is there.
Why did India lose this match? Win-loss is all temporary. Important thing is chant Hare Krishna. Actually, you can’t imagine anything that would do worse anti-preaching than that.
Isn’t it? So we have to act in a way that is appropriate. So if in a particular situation, a particular emotion is expected, we express that. Bhaktivinoda Thakur says that devotees delight in participating in Vaishnav festivals.
But if there are some other social festivals, a devotee may participate in that. A devotee’s heart is not in that, but for social obligations. At that time, the Devi Puja was going on in a big way.
Bhaktivinoda Thakur says, we may go for the worship of the Goddess also. We will go in the mood that she is a devotee of the Lord. But we don’t have to tell that to everyone.
Just go there, so certain things we may have to do according to social expectation. We don’t have to just be too otherworldly over there. Bhaktivinoda Thakur says, okay, their favorite political party has lost.
They are feeling bad. Just empathize with them a little bit and move on with our life. Okay? Hare Krishna.
Yeah? Yeah. So there’s a concern that sometimes we may just speak so mellow that people don’t get benefited. Prabhupada always spoke strongly.
So how do we, how can we actually speak effectively in our particular situation? See, strong speaking is not just about the content of what we are speaking. Mahabharata explains that the rightness or wrongness of action is determined by three things. The intent, the content, and the consequence.
That means, why did I do it? A doctor may perform a surgery with a good intent. But they may make a mistake. It’s wrong that they made a mistake, but the intent was right.
So sometimes there may be a complication because something else happens. So I may do the right action with the right intent, but the consequence comes out wrong. So how do we know what course of action is right or wrong? All these three factors that we consider.
Intent, content, and consequence. So we have to see what is the effect of whatever way we are speaking on others. So sometimes strong speaking is what is required to get people closer to Krishna.
And sometimes gentle speaking is what is required. So it’s not so much about strong speaking in terms of strong words, it is in terms of an effective consequence. So the desired effect should happen.
There are many times when Prabhupada will speak very strongly in terms of exposing people’s misconceptions. But there are times also when Prabhupada would speak strategically. So when Prabhupada himself interacted with George Harrison, before Prabhupada had met George Harrison, he had been in touch with many Indian gurus.
And during his interaction with Prabhupada, he said, you know, this Swami says this, this Rishi says this, he was quoting all those people. And Prabhupada was just non-committal. Without commenting anything about them, he was focusing on the teachings and addressing those teachings in the light of bhakti wisdom.
So before that, there were two big musicians who connected with Prabhupada. One was Allen Ginsberg, he was not that big, but he was there in 1960s and early 1970s, Prabhupada connected with George Harrison. So Allen Ginsberg was also quite impressed by a particular Indian Swami.
And when he spoke about that Swami to Prabhupada, Prabhupada said, he is just a foolish old monk, something like that Prabhupada said. I was so shocked. He said from that point, he said, at that time I was a little sentimental, respecting all monks and they must be good people.
But Swami introduced a criticality in me. So it was healthy, but one result of that criticality was that I started evaluating Prabhupada also like that. And he didn’t commit to anyone.
He didn’t commit to any other Swami, he didn’t commit to Prabhupada. He helped Prabhupada in many ways, but he never became any kind of committed follower. So we have to see what is the effect.
These are what happens for us when we hear Prabhupada’s classes or when we hear about Prabhupada speaking as reported by his followers, the tendency of the human mind is to look for sensational stuff. And Prabhupada’s strong words, fools, rascals, they are like, they are like catchy sound bites. And they catch our attention and when speakers speak, then they also, speakers also catch other’s attention.
But that is not the way Prabhupada spoke most of the time. I did an elaborate study of Prabhupada’s works. So I found that if you look at Prabhupada’s lectures, he uses say words like fools and rascals, strong words, maybe around 300 times.
This is a rough figure, I have the statistics, but roughly around 300 to 400 times. But if you look at his books, he uses it less than 50 times, the word rascals. And if you look at those books which he wrote as books, many of his books like the Science of Self-Realization, Journey of Self-Discovery, there are lectures which are made into books.
What he directly wrote as books is Bhagavad Gita, Bhagavatam. The word rascal comes, I would say, less than 10 times. And those words that Prabhupada wrote are, like Prabhupada wrote 100,000 words, what he spoke out, 70,000 or 100,000 words.
So 10 times he has used it. So actually, by thinking that we should speak strongly, are we really representing the mood of Sri Prabhupada? We have to assess it honestly. So Prabhupada spoke in a way that was effective.
And Prabhupada clearly said that what he wanted mainly to be circulated was his books. In fact, there is a clear instruction, there is one devotee in 1976, he wrote to Prabhupada saying that, Prabhupada, in order to understand your message, I want to transcribe all your lectures. Prabhupada said, that is atya, that is prayas, excessive endeavor, there is no need to do that.
He said, whatever I have given in my books is enough. So what he wanted for mass distribution was his books. And if you look at his approach in the books, it is very calibrated in nature.
So we have to be, we definitely do not want to compromise. But we do not have to have, we do not have to equate sensitivity with compromise. We have to, and we do not have to equate necessarily strong speech with effective speech.
If I speak strongly in terms of using judgmental words, and that alienates people from Krishna, then it is not effective, it is ineffective speech. So we have to see what is effective. Oh yeah, okay.
So is it that Prabhupada wanted everyone to go on the fast track to Krishna? Yes, definitely. But if you look at Prabhupada, the way he presented Krishna Bhakti. In America, practicing Krishna Bhakti meant moving into the temple.
Because the American culture was so radically different from the Bhakti culture, that becoming a devotee meant moving into the temple. Now when Srila Prabhupada went to India, at that time, Indians were not interested in moving into the temple at all. So Prabhupada created the program of life and worship.
And Prabhupada’s main preaching in India was, you just go to people’s houses, take prasad at their houses, speak something, and ask them to become life members. And he went to hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of people’s houses like that. Now if you see, becoming a life member means they are not committing to chanting, they are not committing to following the four agenda principles.
Of course, many of them were already following, but there is no wow committing them to that. Nor were they committing to sadhana bhakti particularly. But Prabhupada was satisfied with that connection.
Of course, he wanted them, he gave them their books, led them to come to the temple and stay in the temple. So both intellectually and culturally, they will have the opportunity to come closer to Krishna. But Prabhupada was real.
He saw that at that time, Indians were not ready. So he was ready to have that life and worship as a way to connect them with Krishna. So there is the fast track of connecting with Krishna, which is, following the rules of sadhana bhakti, and becoming committed, becoming initiated.
That is wonderful. That is what we would like to do. But that doesn’t mean that any other thing is wrong.
It is that Prabhupada making people into life members indicates that he was happy with people coming at this level, but he was also accepting to people being at this level. Now what should not happen is that we think that this level is the standard. That is not just everybody becomes a life member, gives some donation to temple and that’s all.
There’s nothing more. But that is unlikely to happen because Prabhupada’s movement is a preaching movement. We speak the philosophy and we encourage people to come here.
So it’s not this or that. It is this and this. That means we encourage people to take the fast track to Krishna bhakti, but those who are not ready, we don’t reject them.
We tell them take whatever track you can and move onwards towards Krishna. Does that answer your question? Thank you for clarifying your question also. So when our expectations are not fulfilled, we get frustrated.
So from a devotional perspective, how should we look at expectations? Expectations are not the problem. It is attachment to expectations that is the problem. That means it’s just a normal human way that we expect, we have some expectation.
If I go to meet someone, it’s just normal human tendency that I expect them to at least greet me, speak nicely with me. I’ve come to meet them and if they don’t do that, I will feel a little bad about it. That’s just natural.
But if it is my service to go and meet people, then just because people are not talking nicely with me, I give up that service. Then I am becoming attached to that expectation. So we can have expectations, but we don’t make our service, our role, our responsibility tied down to the fulfillment of that expectation.
So if we look at Srila Prabhupada, he was serving in India trying to share Krishna’s message and people didn’t respond, people didn’t take up. Prabhupada kept doing it, but then eventually when he saw that his expectations are not being met, he decided I’ll go to America. So if our expectations are not being met, that doesn’t mean we just keep doing the same thing again and again.
It will be like beating our head against a wall. We may have to change some practical thing, but Prabhupada’s purpose did not change. His purpose was to serve Krishna, to glorify Krishna, to get people to Krishna.
But the process he used, the arena in which he spoke, that changed. So if our expectations are getting frustrated, then we have to see is there something which I can do better? Is there something which I can do right? My purpose will remain the same. If I’m a student who I’m studying to have a career and I’m just not doing well in my exam, I’m not getting good marks, I’m not getting the subject, I’m not liking the subject at all.
Now as a student I have to build a career, so I have to study. And if I don’t, I’m not getting good marks, I’ll be frustrated. But then if I’m repeatedly getting frustrated in a particular area of study, then I may have to introspect and see is this the area in which I want to go in my career? Maybe I should go, maybe some other field is my interest, maybe I should go over there.
So if we have, if we have no expectations, if we are told to have no expectations, that is almost like denying our humanity. It is not possible. But if we become attached to our expectations, then we will not be able to persevere in our purpose.
So we stay fixed on our purpose and depending on the kind of reciprocation that we get, we decide whether this path to take towards that purpose or that path to take. Does that answer your question? So last question, yes please. So if in the devotee community, taking somebody’s plate, that’s considered a little off, it’s considered that’s not approved or encouraged.
Should we let others take our plate or should we ask others to let us take their plate? There are specific etiquettes, but there is a generic purpose. The purpose of having etiquette is to have warm devotional interactions with each other. So we see ourselves as souls who are trying to serve Krishna together.
So we have that common bond among each other. Now in specific situations, specific actions may be pleasing and in other situations those actions may not be pleasing. So the purpose of service is not just to do the service.
The purpose of service is to please the object of service. So if by doing a particular action, if somebody, if we want to take somebody’s plate and they just become too disturbed by it, why are you doing this? Then that is, then you’re not pleasing that person. A more graphic example could be that, we touch somebody’s feet and they don’t want us to touch their feet.
And in the scriptures, it is said, if touch a devotee’s feet and take their dust, we make a lot of spiritual advancement. Now, if somehow when the devotee is not watching, we just go and touch their feet. And then are we going to make spiritual advancement by that? The point of touching the feet is that our consciousness becomes so submissive, seeing the devotee’s exalted qualities, that we want to offer ourselves in humility to that person in submission.
And that devotee is also pleased so much by our submission and devotion that they want to give us their blessings. So if that, that, that essence, that inner substance of that interaction is not there, then just going through the external form will not be very beneficial. You know, I may tell to some devotee, I want to touch your feet and I struggle to touch your feet or I want to, I want to carry your plate and I struggle to carry your plate.
But then if I don’t have a devotionally appreciative attitude, in front of them I may touch their feet or carry their plate, but behind them I am bad mouthing them. I am not going to make much spiritual advancement by that. So, of course, we may not be doing this, but I just giving this as a graphic example to illustrate that there are, there are, there are particular actions and there are particular purposes for those actions.
So, if, if doing a particular action doesn’t please the devotee, doing a particular service doesn’t please the devotee, then better not do that. So, now, as far as offering our plate to someone is concerned, it is generally best to, as they say, do in Rome as Romans do. Because we may just, we may not mean anything, but if we offer our plate to someone, where nobody offers their plate to anyone, then we will come off as very proud.
We are taking service from others. So, it is best to not disrupt the mood of the community, whatever it may be. And we can try to understand why devotees think in a particular way, why they act in a particular way.
And the most important thing is etiquette is meant to please. It is meant to please and to have pleasing interactions. So, certain specific forms of etiquette may, in specific situations, may not lead to that pleasing interaction.
So, we can avoid that and then we can have some other forms of interaction where it may be much more pleasing. And suppose a devotee is carrying a suitcase and I say, can I touch your feet? And that devotee says, please carry the suitcase. No, I want to touch your feet.
So, in every situation, there is a particular kind of service that is more needed than other services. So, we look at what service is needed in a particular situation. And if we do that, we will be able to please that devotee.
And even the purpose of the etiquette will be served much more because we will advance in our bhakti by pleasing that devotee and pleasing Krishna by pleasing that devotee. Does it answer your question? Would you like to add some comment on this? Yes, anything specific about this? So, thank you very much.