Overcoming discouragement 1 – Why we feel discouraged

[Talk at Brisbane, Australia]
Video:

Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
Thank you all very much for coming today. We will talk about discouragement and how to face it, how to grow through it.
And this is a subject which is Sorry to interrupt but I just thought of reminding please keep your mobile phones on silent or off please. Thank you. Oh, sorry.
I think we need to adjust this. This is loose. This one.
How do I move it forward? It’s not moving. Okay. Okay, good.
So discouragement is something which every one of us has experienced. And how do we go about dealing with it? One of the most discouraging moments I remember in my life was I always wanted to be a public speaker. Long before I was introduced.
And I was in my school and I was I was volunteering for a location competition. And what happens to me is whenever I get nervous some people when they become nervous they start stuttering. For me when I become nervous I go super fast.
So I had prepared a seven minute talk and just as I was going on the podium to speak something within me said you are going to make a fool of yourself. Later on I understood when I read the Bhagavad Gita that was the mind saying that. That made me a little nervous.
And then I got there and I started speaking. And it’s suppose sometimes you enter into a car and the person just drives the car the next moment at 80 or 100. You just get disoriented completely.
So my talk started off like that. I was speaking fast and nobody could understand what I was saying. So people were looking at each other and because nobody was paying attention I became more nervous and I spoke faster.
And the seven minute talk I had probably rehearsed it maybe 50 times before. But that seven minute talk I finished in three minutes. So after that one of my friends told me you’ll never become a public speaker.
So of course he attended one of my classes recently. He said that I’m happy to see my prophecy has gone wrong. But the point is all of us face discouragements in life.
And sometimes the discouragements are because of some mistakes we have made. Sometimes it is because of the situations that are unfavourable. Sometimes it could be because people have turned hostile to us.
So we’ll discuss about these various things. Broadly I’ll talk about we have about four hours. So we will have a break in between and I’ll be covering three main points.
Why discouraging situations occur? How to see them? And how to respond to them? So in the first part will be philosophical. But even in philosophy we’ll be having some the philosophy of the practical orientation to it. Understanding of destiny.
That when difficulties or discouragements come in our life, why do they come? So we will understand why discouraging situations occur. Then we’ll talk about how can we look at them in a way that is positive, that is resentful. That is not resentful, but that is grateful.
Understand our power in that situation also. And the last part will be how do we respond? So we’ll talk about all of these. We’ll have one one acronym which will summarise the content of that class and we’ll come to those acronyms.
So the last will be an acronym called TAB. So throughout the session if you have any questions you have chits over there. If you want to raise your hands you can raise the hands.
But usually at the end of each session and after a significant flow in each session we will have some questions. And say after an hour or so we’ll have a break. We are supposed to go to around 3.30. So we’ll have 2 or 3 breaks depending on how the sessions move.
And one break will be a longer break where we’ll have some snacks also. So let’s begin. Generally whenever we face discouragement it’s sometimes we have ourselves not endeavoured enough.
And then things don’t work out. It’s still unpleasant but that’s not as discouraging as if we have endeavoured a lot and still the results are not coming. Suppose we are given an interview, given an exam we’ve worked very hard but the results don’t come.
That’s when discouragement becomes almost unbearable. So actually for all of us just as a car needs fuel to move on we all need encouragement. Encouragement is the fuel for our heart.
You can use different words for encouragement, hope but we what is it that makes me move forward in life? That is some vision that the future can be better than the present. That’s the essence of hope or encouragement. Now there are different senses to the words but broadly speaking we all whatever we are doing in life we can move forward when we have the future can be better and I can play some part in making the future better.
But when our efforts to create a better future fail or worse still backfire that’s when we start becoming discouraged. So why do we need to understand destiny? Because destiny is something which affects how things work out in our life. We often think that my efforts are going to produce the result and if my efforts are not producing the result why is that happening? But if you understand that destiny is also playing a role then we won’t beat ourselves up unnecessarily.
So let’s look at it. So about destiny I will be talking about in four parts. Another word for destiny is fate.
So let’s look at the facts of life. We will begin from that. Then we will try to analyse those facts of life to understand what we can infer from them.
And then we will focus on the transcendence how there is a higher reality beyond the observed reality. And then expertise is how we can expertly function in our lives based on an understanding of the reality as it is. So what is the fact? So we all want to achieve things in life.
But what we achieve in our life depends on factors beyond our control. This is something which maybe in today’s world we don’t realise it so much. Maybe say a few hundred years ago society was much more stratified.
So for example India there was a caste division. In the western world there was a class division. So that means the place a person was born would more or less determine the trajectory of their life.
If somebody is born and say royalty they would have a comfortable life. Somebody was born as a peasant then they would have a relatively poorer life. And what we call as upward mobility was far lesser in the past.
Now that has changed in many ways. The facility for people to work according to their inspiration is a big plus in today’s world. But still the fact remains that our starting point shapes us.
And we don’t determine our starting point. Which country we are born in, which family we are born in, what complexion we have, what is the some people have outstanding memory. And some people have outstandingly poor memory.
So what can you do about it? That’s the way we are. Of course we can do something but about the memory itself that is already a given. So like that we may say no my success depends on my efforts.
Well it’s true but your efforts start from a particular point and that point is not in your control. So now that point we could say is determined by destiny. I’ll come to destiny little later but let’s look at the facts.
The facts is that the success that we seek in our life does depend on factors beyond our control. For example the starting point is not in our control. And our starting point does determine where we will go, how far we will go.
It doesn’t completely determine that but it does affect that. That’s one point. So basically we are looking at the facts to just understand this point that everything in our life is not in our control.
And that’s why when things go wrong because of factors beyond our control, we needn’t become discouraged. So discouragement often comes because we think that we have more control than what we actually have. So understanding what is the level of our control helps us to understand our capacities more realistically.
Another fact we could say is even we leave aside the starting point. And now right now in my life I can succeed if I work hard. Yes our performance matters but performance is not all that matters.
So if we consider somebody is steering a ship. Now some ships might be very big and sturdy, some ships might be small and unsteady. So the starting point is already fixed.
This is the kind of ship you have. Secondly a person might be a very expert captain in steering a ship but if they meet a big storm then whether they get to their destination on time or whether they get to their destination or not at all that’s not in their control alone. Now this does not mean that the expertise of the captain doesn’t matter.
But it is not all that matters. And few activities which are very prominent in our cultural imagination today. Few activities are as prominent as sports.
And few activities are as performance driven as sports. Say in a cricket match, a batsman or a bowler they have to perform. If they don’t perform the team will not succeed, they will not succeed.
But even in sports matches they, actually performance is not all that matters. Once I was travelling in Mumbai and I saw a big headline on newspaper. So it was a cricketer saying I knew God was on my side.
Oh really? I looked at the news, what was it? This was this Indian player who had scored a double century. And while scoring the double century he had miscued a hit and he had gone to a fielder and the fielder is normally a very good fielder. And the fielder had somehow dropped the catch.
He said when he dropped the catch, I knew God was on my side. Now that’s a very interesting inference. Now does God take sides in the cricket match? But what he is meaning by the word God is that for his performance there are things beyond his control also that matter.
And those things were going right. That’s what he meant by the word God. So it’s not that God made that player drop the catch.
It’s not literally that. But for our success along with our performance there is something which is beyond our performance that matters. And that’s why all sports players or many sports players have their own quirky superstitions.
About how they bat, what they wear and what sequels they put on their gear. So many things like that. There was an Australian cricketer he was quite a good batsman.
But whenever he would go out to bat, first he would go to the pavilion restroom and close the lids of all the commodes. And if he would get out early he would not come back to the pavilion he would go to the commodes and if any lid was open, he would go and berate his team members. Why did you keep that open? Because of that I got out.
Now what has what has the lid got to do with his batting? He is getting out. But that is his own way of conceptualising whether whatever is unknown beyond me that is favouring me or not. So basically we can laugh at the superstitions but the underlying principle is that even in a performance driven activity like sports, performance is not all that matters.
So this is also another way from another observed fact that we can understand that everything that happens in our life is not just about us. So now let’s try to make some analysis from this. This will be based on the dharmic text primarily the Mahabharata.
So for us to get a result a desired result, there are three distinct factors involved. In Sanskrit we can call as karma, daiva and phala, sorry kala. Karma, daiva and kala leads to phala.
In English we might call it 4D. So we have our duty that is karma, we have destiny that is daiva, we have kala that is duration. So duty, destiny, duration, all three when they come together, there is the desired result.
So often we think that my karma leads to the phala. I have worked, so I should get the result. And when we don’t get the result, we become discouraged.
But if you understand that other things are going on in life also, then we can respond to situations with greater maturity. By the way, if this mic tends to be a little too humble, so it keeps sliding down. If any of you are not able to hear me, please raise your hands and then we will adjust the sound or adjust the mic.
Till now, everybody was able to hear? Okay, thank you. So let’s look at a few examples to understand this point. A simplest example could be say farming.
That when a farmer sows the seed and ploughs the land, that is the duty. Then rains come on time in the right quantity, that is destiny. And then the harvesting season comes.
Time has to pass, there is a duration. And that’s when the harvest can be got. Or we could say if a couple gets married and then decides to have children, they unite, that is the duty.
That is the karma. But that alone doesn’t always lead to conception. So then there is destiny.
And then even if conception has occurred, they can’t have a child the next day. There is the period of gestation. So that’s duration.
So duty, destiny and duration, all three combine to produce the result. So now, if we neglect these two facts, the destiny and the duration, then we have an unrealistic expectation. Now this, sometimes this destiny and duration, they might actually even become invisible.
What do you mean by invisible? Sometimes, some actions might just give immediate results. Say for example, if there is a banana peel spilled over, lying on the ground. And if I walk on it, I’ll fall down.
Now that’s just immediate action, immediate reaction. So we could say that there, oh, I was inattentive and I slipped and fell down. If I had been attentive, I would have avoided that.
That’s true. So many times, it could be that these two may become almost invisible. But it’s not necessarily like that.
Just let’s complicate the situation a little bit. Say there are three banana peels fallen on the ground, and three people are walking along. And first person steps on it, slips and just falls on the ground and nothing is hurt except their pride.
The second person, that person slips on the banana peel but there is a tree branch over it, just grab it and they don’t even slip and fall. The third person, they slip on the banana peel, slip and fall and where their head falls, there is a sharp stone over there. And they hit the stone and that person gets brain haemorrhage.
So now, you could say all three did the small same mistake. But why did one person get such a terrible result? So here, even in situations where you could say A to B, simple correlation is there, but it need not be always like that. So sometimes, a small mistake can lead to a big catastrophe.
And sometimes, a big mistake might also not lead to any problems. And most often, what happens, our mind is quite selective in its memory. So we keep remembering all the times when we made a small mistake and still got into big trouble.
You know, life is so unfair, life is so unfair. But then, if we all can think in our times, we made big mistakes but we got away with it. Isn’t it? So, overall, we can say that destiny evens out.
But, the point I am making over here is that sometimes, destiny and duration may not become visible. Say, another example we could give is, normally, we eat food and we get energy. Now, if we eat too much food, then, either we fall sick or we become obese or various other things happen.
Normally, we could say that, if somebody is overweight, that’s because they have eaten too much. But, it’s not necessarily always like that. There are some people who might be genetically disposed towards obesity.
Some people might have some thyroid issue or whatever. If they eat a little bit more, their body balloons out. There are some other people who might be very healthy.
Their body is constitutionally very healthy. They treat their tongue like a conveyor belt. They eat anything and everything and still they remain not only healthy, slim, attractive, nothing happens to them.
So, we could say there is a normal correlation between what we eat and how our health and looks are. But, sometimes, destiny can intervene in an unfavourable way, where a small indiscretion can lead to a lot of trouble. And sometimes, it can intervene in a favourable way, where even a lot of indiscretion and no trouble.
So, but the point is that many times these factors may not be evident. And that’s why we may think my action is producing the result. And it’s true to some extent.
But it’s not always true. It’s like say, we eat food and we get energy. That’s natural.
But then, there is the whole digestive process that has to happen in between. Now, most of the time, this is invisible. We eat food, we digest the food, we get energy.
The only time we think about our digestion is when it doesn’t work. So, when karma doesn’t lead to falla, then we start thinking, what is happening? Then, either we can just get frustrated thinking life is so unfair, or we can become more philosophic. Socrates, who said that, he was asked once, should you marry? Should you marry? He says, yes.
If you are fortunate, you’ll get a good wife. If you get a good wife, you’re fortunate. And if not, then you’ll become a philosopher.
Well, it is not just about wife, it could be about any spouse. But the point is that, actually, when we don’t get the expected results, that is when we start thinking, what is going on in life? Is something wrong over here? So that’s when we start thinking about life’s deeper truths. You become a philosopher means, basically, you start thinking about, philosophically about what is happening in life.
See, karma leads to falla is action leads to result is a practical way of thinking. But when action doesn’t lead to result, that’s when we start thinking about philosophy. See, most people don’t suddenly wake up and start thinking, is there a God? We don’t start thinking about God suddenly.
We basically look at the world around us and we observe the world and then if we feel that we can’t make sense of the world, that’s when we think about God. So Prabhupada writes that all knowledge comes from God. That means God is present in our hearts as a super soul.
So all knowledge comes from God. But all knowledge doesn’t begin with God. It’s not that people suddenly start thinking about God.
We look at the world around us and we try to make sense of the world. And when we can’t make sense of the world, then we start positing higher realities to make sense of the world. So basically, our actions do have results.
But sometimes the results may not manifest. And sometimes even with a small action, a big result may manifest. So, duty, destiny, duration.
Now, for getting the desired result, sometimes, say for example if my body is overall healthy, then I eat food and I get energy. So in that case, duty is what I do and destiny is almost invisible over there. And duration is, okay, I eat food, 15 minutes later I feel strong.
So, at that time it might be very less. So sometimes destiny and duration might just be 1%. And duty might be 99%.
And sometimes, duty might be 1% and, I mean, I do everything that I can, but sometimes you fall sick. And you fall sick and then you’re trying to diagnose and trying to get some treatment and nothing is working. You’re trying, trying, trying, but if destiny is not favourable, you may not even diagnose the disease.
About 15 years ago, I was very sick for almost 2-3 years and nobody could diagnose the disease. So then, finally, I did some test, a very complicated test, and then doctor, I looked at doctor’s paper, I was going to meet them and said, when I look at the paper, he said that it’s P-U-O. I said, what is this disease? At least I thought some disease has been found out.
And then I asked the doctor, what is the diagnosis? He said, Oh, actually, I’ve not been able to diagnose. Oh, really? Then I said, P-U-O. He said, P-U-O means pyroxia of unknown origin.
Now, pyroxia is fever and fever for no, we don’t know the cause. Well, that I also know, I said. So, sometimes we might do everything that we can, but nothing seems to move forward.
So, in that case, our duty becomes almost like 1% or less than 1% and destiny just blocks everything. So, understanding this can give us a better perspective of what is happening in our life. So, a diagrammatic way of looking at this, can you see it from there? No.
Okay, there are no tables over here. But there are some chairs here. If you want, you can come here.
Some chairs are there here. Are you able to see from there or no? Okay. Yeah.
So, basically, what I said, the same thing over here. See, our current actions and the current reactions or the current results. Sometimes, it might just be a straight line.
I do the action and I get the result. So, in that case, destiny and duration hardly play any role. Now, sometimes, there might be some delay.
I do the action, but it takes some time to get the result. I keep trying this, I try that, I try that, and then I get the result. Sometimes, it might happen that my current action might go through a long cycle.
So, it’s like, this is basically the metaphor of a water tank. Thank you. This is a metaphor of a water tank.
The water is going in from this side and water is coming out from the other side. But, if you consider inside the water tank, there are multiple pipelines. So, then, sometimes, the water which is going in, it might go straight through the pipeline and come out from the other side.
Sometimes, it might go through a wavering pipeline. So, it may take longer time to come out. Sometimes, it might go through a long oscillating pipeline.
So, that’s why, now, I might be putting in, say, clean water from here. But, sometimes, clean water may come out from the other side. Sometimes, unclean water may be coming out.
Because, water coming out is not what is going in right now. So, what is being put in will come out eventually, but maybe not immediately. So, this is one broad way of understanding the concept of destiny.
So, immediate karma, delayed karma, further delayed karma. Actions and reactions as we are moving forward. So, basically, when we do something and we don’t get the result, what that means is that water is flowing through a delayed pipeline.
And we are working, but the result is not coming to us. So, now, moving forward here, another way of looking. So, there are… So, based on this understanding, you can say there are broadly two schools of thought.
In Sanskrit, they are called as Daivavad, and other is Karmavad. Daivavad, in English, can be called as fatalism. Daivavad holds that nothing is in my control.
Already, destiny has determined my whole life. And I can do nothing about it. Karmavad is that everything is in my control.
If I work, I will produce the result. So, going back to the earlier four factors, what Karmavad says is karma alone matters. Daivavad says that daiva alone matters.
So, some people say that, oh, my destiny is only rotten. I cannot do it. We have no free will.
We are all just puppets of destiny. And destiny makes us dance the way we want. So, I was once in America, in New York.
So, one person asked me this question. He said, actually, you know, we have no free will. Everything is destiny.
So, he said, and I said, okay, do I have the free will to answer this question? So, he said, he said, no, whatever you answer will be destined. Okay. Then I said, then why are you asking this question? He said, my asking this question is also destined.
Okay. Then, then the point remains, if everything is destined, if you say like that, we can go along in this kind of reasoning, but we never live like that. What do you mean we don’t live like that? We do strive.
We do strive to do things as well as we can. Nobody lives as if everything is destined. If we were living like that, what would be the motivation to do anything at all? Whatever is destined is going to happen.
So, why would you even try to cook food and eat the food? You can say, if it is destined, I will stay in my bed, the food will come in my mouth and drop it. It doesn’t happen like that. So, for practical matters, we never say everything is destined.
Isn’t it? So, when it comes to philosophical matters, like say, please come to a temple, please come to a spiritual programme. Oh, when destiny says, then I’ll come. So, it’s for practical matters, we never say that.
So, that idea that everything is destined is not something which we live according to. And, everything is in my control is what we may believe for some time. But, even a little experience of life shows us that everything is not in my control.
So, these could be two extreme ideas and broadly speaking, you can say that Eastern civilisations tend towards Daivabad. They are not entirely Daivabad, but they tend towards Daivabad. Accept, a lot is not in your control, so accept it.
Western civilisations tend towards Karmabad. Change it, you can fix it, you can change it, you can make things better. Now, both have their value, both have their utility, but extremes can be a problem.
So, now, Vidura tells Dhritarashtra in the Mahabharata that when Dhritarashtra is reluctant to stop his son Duryodhana from antagonising the Pandavas and causing the Kurukshetra war, at that time, Dhritarashtra says that if it is destiny, then all my sons will be killed. If our dynasty is to be destroyed by destiny, what can I do to stop it? So, at that time, Vidura says destiny determines the consequences of our actions, not our actions themselves. So, that means, if I study for an exam, whether I study for the exam or not is not determined by destiny.
After studying, how much marks I get, what kind of grade I get, that is determined by destiny. It’s not that we are, the knowledge of, so destiny and duty are not two contradictory factors. Because I believe in this, so I don’t believe in this.
No, both work together. And, mostly people go towards the extreme. Oh, if you think destiny is there, then why do you work? Or, if you start believing in destiny, then you will not work wholeheartedly.
No, we’ll understand what is the role of our work and what is the role of destiny. So, Daivabad, if it is taken towards the extreme, it leads to passivity. Just accept whatever is happening.
In fact, this is how the, I think it was the Mayan civilisation in South America, that was brought down by the by the Spanish invaders. The Catholics, Christians invaders went there. Basically, they had, one of the Mayan, one of the biggest tribes over there, they had a legend that if on a no moon night, if a riderless white horse comes into our village, then that is indicate that we are going to be defeated soon.
So, there was one missionary who joined with them, started giving them medicines, and became friendly with them. And gradually, as they became friends, they, the Mayans, they told about this legend to him. And immediately, he informed the imperialists.
And they came, these South Americans, they were numbered in thousands. And the Spanish will come there, they were just barely a few hundred. But they arranged for a horse to come into that village on a no moon night, a white horse, riderless.
And the next morning, these few hundred imperialists, colonists, they invaded the village. And they invaded that whole community. And they just surrendered without a fight.
Because they thought, oh, this is an indication we are going to be defeated. So, this can be very cynically abused also. Where do I go? This one? Okay.
So, daivavad is unhealthy. It can make us unnecessarily passive. But karmavad is also unhealthy.
Because what happens when we… Anger has various expressions. Anger, when it is directed towards the world, it leads to violence. Anger, when it is directed towards oneself, leads to depression.
Why am I not good enough? Why is my life not good enough? Why can’t I come up to the mark? So, when we believe only in karmavad, we think that I determine the success in my life. Then what happens? If I take the sole credit for the success in my life, then I have to take the sole blame for the failure in my life. And sometimes, it may not be my fault.
We are not saying that we shouldn’t take responsibility. There is a difference between taking responsibility and blaming oneself. I’ll talk about responsibility in the last part of our talk.
But here, blaming us simply beats us down. So, life has been tough throughout history. In fact, in the past, we could say, without the comforts of today, life was tougher.
But we don’t hear in the past, thousands and thousands of people getting depressed. Why is it that now it is happening? Now, of course, depression is a complex phenomenon. And sometimes, there is chemical depression which might require medication.
But broadly speaking, depression is a function of expectation. The higher the expectation we have from life, when life doesn’t turn out that way, we start getting depressed. So, karmavaj raises our expectation from ourselves and from the world very high.
I will work in this field, I will be a top-notch success. And if I can’t succeed, then I start thinking, I am a failure. I am worthless.
I am useless. But this can happen with respect to our career. It can happen with respect to our relationships.
It can happen with respect to our own hobbies or whatever. In any area, if we start with thinking that I determine the results, or rather, I alone determine the results, then when the results don’t come, we go into depression. So, broadly speaking, we could say that our topic, we are discussing about discouragement.
So, discouragement can come. One major reason could be because we over emphasise karma. We overestimate our capacity to change things, to do things.
And because of that excessive expectation, when things don’t work out, we become depressed. We become disheartened. We become discouraged.
So, any questions till this point? Okay. So, let me complete this. What is the acronym we are discussing? Does anyone remember? FATE.
So, okay. F was what? FACTS. We look at the facts that we alone don’t determine the results.
Then A was ANALYSIS. We discussed how we can analyse based on the Vedic text that there are three factors, three which shape the results. Karma, Daiva and Kala.
So, now let’s move on to TRANSCENDENCE. Transcendence means that what scripture tells us is that destiny can, so our existence is three level. There is body, mind and soul.
Now, destiny can affect our physical situation and can affect our mental situation. But destiny doesn’t affect us as souls because the soul is transcendental. So, destiny operates within the arena of matter.
It operates within the arena of material things. In the 13th chapter of the Bhagavad Gita and 21st text, Krishna says कार्यकारण करतृत्वे हेतु प्रक्रतृ उच्छते पुरुष सुखतु खानम भोकतृत्वे हेतु उच्छते He says that what happens in material nature is determined by material nature but how it affects us depends on our conceptions, depends on how we are viewing ourselves. So, transcendence, transcendental knowledge begins by understanding if I understand I am a soul, at the core, there is something to me which exists beyond my situations and beyond my emotions and that core is indestructible.
So, imagine if there is a there is a flood actually this happened to one of my friends he was in Florida, he had gone for a writing retreat and there was one of the biggest hurricanes which hit America, it was Hurricane Irene so it hit Florida and when it hit there Florida he was, because he was writing retreat there was no one with him and he was living in somebody else’s house which he had just got for a few, for a month or so so he was just all alone and one morning he woke up and he tried to turn on the power, power wouldn’t turn on then he tried to look at his phone, phone had no signal and then he opened the window and he saw it seems he was in the middle of ocean, all around was water and he could see nearby houses were also flooded and as he saw that the water level was rising, rising rising and it was just like a small house one level and he saw the water level rising, rising, rising, he became panicky what do I do and there was nobody anywhere in sight and the water level was rising becoming panicky but suddenly he looked around where do I go and because he had been so caught in writing and reading and thinking, he had not even really investigated the house much so he saw somewhere he had thought it was just a closet, it was a wooden door let me look at that and he opened the door and he found this narrow staircase and that led to a small attic so he just ran up and went to the attic and he stayed in the attic and the water level rose, rose, rose and the ground level was inundated and from the attic window he could see TV sets and computers floating in the water but because he was at that level 1 he was safe and after that the water subsided and then rescue workers came and he was saved so the point here is if he had stayed at the ground level he would have drowned but he discovered there is an attic and he went to that level and he survived similarly for us if we stay at the ground level that means we stay in material consciousness you could say our existence is material and spiritual, body is material the soul is spiritual for most of the times we live at the material level of reality but that is where we stay stuck always then when because of unfavourable destiny some distress come and hit us if that’s all we know about ourselves we will get drowned but if you understand I am a soul I am indestructible that’s like finding the staircase to go to a higher level now what happens at the lower level still matters his computer was there his luggage was there, he is concerned about it but our luggage getting damaged is not the same as we getting drowned it’s a different category of problem so similarly if we understand our transcendence then we understand that we exist above our situations and above our emotions and destiny determines our circumstances but if we understand our transcendence then we start understanding that our circumstances are like a carpet the carpet is meant to be below us what happens if the carpet goes above us two things darkness and suffocation so like that when our circumstances overwhelm us we feel dark we feel hopeless suffocated, just can’t do anything so transcendent knowledge is not just some hypothetical idea ok maybe there is something called soul actually this practical application of it is that we raise our consciousness above our situations and our emotions so this is where our spirituality can help us to deal with negative destiny whenever it comes upon us I’ll talk more about this as we move forward but this is about transcendence now moving forward from the transcendent perspective destiny if I am transcendental that means I have free will if I were simply a product of my situations and my emotions then there is no free will this is how things happen this happens to me, I’ll do this, that happens to me I’ll do that but nobody functions as if they have no free will suppose say the person sitting next to you suddenly turns to you and slaps you in the face why did you slap me? no actually I am just a biological robot so the programming of my brain told me to slap you probably we’ll say my programming is telling me to slap you now see none of us our whole society depends on the concept of responsibility, accountability justice system is based on understanding that people are accountable for their actions so nobody functions as if people don’t have free will so now we can say our free will itself is it fully free we can say the free will is free but there is free will and there is freedom the two are different things a prisoner also has free will but the prisoner doesn’t have freedom or their freedom is very less that means they can only if they want to go for a walk, they can only walk inside the prison they cannot go out so free will is our capacity to choose our inner capacity to choose and freedom is the outer circumstance in which we can choose so destiny determines the scope of our free will the scope means say if somebody is sick and is in bed bedridden, say they have got a fracture or something like that, they can’t move then destiny determines that they can’t get out of the bed but on the bed what do they do they can just complain or they can have a positive attitude so destiny determines the scope of our free will not our free will because we are transcendental beings so our free will exists beyond our situation and our emotions and we can choose and we will talk more about how to use our free will properly little later but let’s focus on this point now so another thing that understanding of our transcendence does is, we understand that ok, destiny can only block me materially I can’t do this, I can’t do that but it doesn’t have to block us spiritually so what does it mean, say if a river is flowing along and the river path is blocked, then the river can’t move forward but if there is some other path from which the river can move, then it can move there is another channel, another tributary along which the water can move distributary you could say, then the water will move so our spirituality reveals to us one channel that is always open other channels might get blocked, I may have no money, I may have no health I may have no relatives but still with whatever little consciousness I have I can remember Krishna and I can keep moving closer to Krishna so our spirituality reveals no matter how many blockages are there in our life our transcendence, our spirituality reveals that there is one channel that is always open and then we can move along that channel T and E what I am going to talk about here here we are talking about principles and how to apply that practically we will be talking in the next sessions but now let’s go to E now the essence of expertise we are talking about fate so what is the expertise that there is destiny and there is karma and there is daima so we all need to understand with our expertise what is in our control and what is not in our control and accept the things we can’t change and alter the things we can change now we might say this is common sense yeah it is but as they say common sense is not so common so our mind gets obsessed with the things that we can’t change and that’s where we lose our opportunity so let’s consider two examples of why expertise is required for this say consider a tennis match and now in tennis the players sometimes serve and sometimes they receive now when a player is serving at that time the player has much more control whether to serve on the forehand, the backhand into the body, how much speed, how much height they can control all that now when the player is returning they have very little control wherever the ball comes they have to somehow get the racket over there and get the ball back into play now the returner might be very good in the forehand but if the ball has come on the backhand, the returner says no my forehand is strong, I will play on the forehand well you will only hit empty air at that so when you are returning the area of control has become very less what is out of our control, where the ball is going to come is out of our control so sometimes in our life what we can change is very little and what we can’t change is a lot so if a player who is returning starts wanting to play like as if they are serving they will get nowhere, they will lose that game immediately but right now I am returning, right now my choices are constricted but within this how can I return as well as possible there are many grand slam champions whose primary strength was they were expert returners just return expertly and by that they would win matches so basically expertise is required to understand in our life when we are serving and when we are returning so as a simple example illustrate the differences, say right now I am giving a class so when I am giving the class I will choose the topic, I will choose the examples I will choose the flow, I will choose the structure so when I am giving the class I am serving now after this class when the question answer start then I will be returning I don’t know which question is going to come I don’t know how well I will be able to answer it I will just try my best now if while returning if when I am supposed to return somebody ask a question which answer I don’t know and I say why are you asking such a question, shut up if I start speaking like that I will be insulting my audience I can’t demand what question the audience should ask that time I have to return but if suppose I come for this class and after I come for the class I tell you I have not prepared anything whatever topic you tell me I will speak on that you will start thinking why did I come here so there is a time when we need to take control and do what we can using the control that we have and there is a time when we have to accept that things are not in our control and just work with that so we could say if you decide that after you complete your degree and you decide you have 2-3 choices, should I study more should I take a job or should I start my own company or whatever now this is the time when you are deciding you could say that time when you are serving but if somebody decide I am going to study more then once they decide that then to some extent for the next 1 year or 2 year whatever depending on the course their trajectory will be fixed and that is when they will be returning now I have chosen to study then I have to submit my assignments, I have to give exams all that I have to do so for all of us this dynamic dance between what is in our control and what is not in our control and we need expertise to deal with that so I will conclude with 2 examples over here yeah ok so in the Bhagavatam in the 10th canto there is a very interesting anecdote as to incident that what happens, most of you may have seen that picture of Kamsa holding the hair of Devaki and trying to about to lop off her head and Vasudeva is holding and stopping her, don’t do this so when Vasudeva is trying to stop Kamsa, he uses various arguments at that time and one argument that he uses is that Kamsa, birth and death are destined why do you if you are going to die you can’t avoid that but why should you comment such a horrible karma of killing Devaki, it’s like you know there is sin there is sin square and there is sin cube so what Kamsa was about to do was sin cube why sin cube he says, it’s for somebody’s hero it’s meant to protect women, not kill women, women are not even meant physically assaulted, what to speak of killed, so that itself is sin on top of that, this is not just any woman, this is his own sister he is all the more duty bound to protect her so killing her is sin square and on top of that, it is the day of her wedding on that day you kill her, what can be more monstrous so it’s sin cube he says, why are you doing such a terrible activity to avoid something which can’t be avoided, destiny is there, you want to die you want to die now when I read this for the first time I immediately had a question why is Vasudev not turning this argument around and thinking I am trying to stop Kamsa from killing Devaki, but if Devaki is destined to die, she is going to die no matter what I do he doesn’t think like that why am I wasting my time arguing with Kamsa, Kamsa is going to kill if Devaki is going to die, she will die he doesn’t think like that because he is focused on his duty as a husband, he is meant to protect his wife so he does not use the idea of predestination, predestination is that everything is destined, he does not use that as a rationalisation for inaction and the same principle you can see in the Ramayana also when Ram was sent to the forest, he accepted the exile as destiny but he did not fight against his father or fight against Kaikeyi he accepted it, but when Sita was abducted, he didn’t accept that as destiny he fought against it why? because his duty as a son meant that he should obey his father, so he went to the forest but his duty as a husband meant he had to protect his wife, so he had to rescue her so the overall emphasis is that we need to expertly understand what is our duty and focus on doing that so let’s conclude with this one point over here and we will elaborate on the next session now, we don’t know what the future holds, but we know who holds the future that the future is ultimately determined by Krishna he holds the future and if we learn to hold on to him then he will help us create a better future for ourselves so the expertise is to understand this balance what is in my control, what is not in my control what should I do, what should not do if we can understand, if we can connect with Krishna then Krishna from within our hearts will give us the guidance he will use the intelligence by which we can come to him and that way we can use whatever free will right now we have whatever is in our control, we can use it to create a better future for ourselves, so to summarise what I spoke today we are talking about overcoming discouragement I started by talking about why discouraging situations come upon us understanding destiny and how we see them we will talk about cultivating gratitude in the next session and then how we act in them, how we respond to them open a new tab in your life, we will talk about tap your power, we will talk about that in the last session then I talked about the concept of destiny we looked at the acronym do you remember fate, so F was facts if we look at the facts of our life our results don’t come from our actions alone a person might steer a ship expertly, but if the storm comes what can they do, a sports player may play very well, but if it rains and the match doesn’t happen, what can they do so performance matters, but performance is not all that matters then if something beyond us shapes the results then what exactly is that and how does it shape the results so to understand that we looked at A was analysis I talked about the equation does anyone remember what is it karma leads to pala in English duty plus destiny leads to desired result we discussed various examples of say farming or conception or say somebody slipping on a banana and falling so in these three factors which will be in what proportion that can vary sometimes the other two, the duration and destiny might almost become like zero and sometimes they might become 99% and everything that we do it doesn’t seem to change things but essentially all three factors are there and if we understand this then if the results are not coming we don’t blame RSS for it then we talked about the diagram which shows how water coming and water going out so what we do does shape the results actions do have reactions or results, but maybe not immediately sometimes it may be a long coiling pipe through which the water is flowing so we might gravitate towards two extremes to some extent some eastern traditions or some traditions went towards daivavad over emphasising that everything is destined nothing is in our control but that can lead to passivity as I talked about the South American example of how they were colonised by sending a white horse but we said that the dharmic traditions, the Indian traditions are not fatalistic because we talked about how Dhritarashtra told Viduram that you can determine that destiny determines the consequences of actions not your actions themselves so daivavad is one extreme which can lead to passivity, the other extreme is karmavad which can lead to depression if I take sole credit for my successes then I have to take the sole blame for my failures and people have always had difficulties in life, but now because our expectations have risen I think I determine my life then when I am not able to determine we become depressed and then we talked about once we understand that destiny is operating in our lives then what do we do we can’t change the way things are happening but we can rise above those things that’s what we talked about was transcendence I gave the example of my friend who discovered an attic on the first level and was able to go up during the floods so like that if we understand we are souls then we can rise above our situations and above our emotions we are still concerned about what happens at the physical and mental level but we don’t feel that person is threatened by it by our transcendence we can keep our circumstances like carpets below us not above us where they will blind and suffocate us and transcendence also means that we have our free will destiny determines the scope of our free will but we still have free will and E was expertise expertise essentially means accept the things we can’t change and alter the things we can change and he talked about tennis match there are times when our control may be very less when we are returning but our control will be more when we are serving so understanding what situation we are in and doing the best we can in that situation that is the expertise with which we can function in our day to day lives and then lastly I talked about this expertise will come if we look beyond the situation to Krishna rather than worrying about what the future holds we look up to see who holds the future and focus on connecting with him then Krishna has a plan for our future also and if we connect with him he will guide us to play our part in the unfolding in the manifestation of the plan that he has for us in future thank you very much Hare Krishna so are there any questions right now yes several times we have something called indicators of results as well like while the process itself is going on we get the indicators like what the results are going to be so to what extent we should give importance to the indicators so if you say that ok don’t worry about destiny we put in the effort put in our best efforts and the results is determined by them determined by the lord and by determining the karma and dharma and kala so to what extent we give importance to the indicators of what the future is going to be ok good question to what extent do we give importance to the indicators of future results we definitely are meant to use our intelligence and using our intelligence is a part of doing our karma so that’s where actually we have say professionals in any field say I might just feel some fever but doctor might say you have got malaria and for me this is just fever and some chills but the doctor with the educated eyes can see and they understand so that’s why that’s why having the intelligence and to understand the to understand the feelers that is important so if if say if I am just feeling chills I could say maybe just too cold or maybe I eat something cold I can neglect it so but if there is a doctor with me and the doctor friend tell me better you check for malaria and maybe I can prevent the malaria from getting aggravated because I check it earlier so basically how it is this was the concept I was going to talk in the last session but I will mention it here we all need to place situations in the right context what do I mean by the right context say for example right now if the screen goes off now we could say if the screen has gone off there could be multiple levels of causation for it maybe you know somebody touched the wire over there because of that the screen went off or maybe somebody the projector itself has got damaged so we could say we could put it in one box ok that this connection is loose another box is the projector has got spoiled another box could be that the power supply has got cut off over here another box you could put is that actually the power grid over here in this part of the country has gone down another box you could put in is terrorists have attacked New Zealand and all power supply has gone another box you could put in is that a solar flare has come from the sun’s orbit into the earth’s atmosphere and all electrical devices on the planet earth have shut down and that’s also possible actually if a solar flare comes from the sun and it enters into the earth that can happen just a simple thing as a projector getting off that we can extend the causal context of that to the solar flare from the sun thousands and thousands of miles away so basically now where do you put this we all need to use our intelligence to understand which causal context to put a situation say actually I was at a conference in America on spirituality and health and one girl was speaking over there about how she went to depression and how spirituality helped her to get out of it but she told how she went into depression she was studying in a college and while studying in a college along with that she was also to earn some money by the side she used to wait tables in a cafeteria nearby so once she was carrying a glass of water for a customer and that glass slipped from her hands and just fell with a loud noise and spilled and cracked and because of that incident she started thinking I am so useless I can’t carry even a glass of water what will I do in my life and that made her sink into depression now how many of us have had glass of water slipping from our hands so many times it has happened so now when the glass of water slips from the hand you could put the causal context in many different ways maybe the glass was slippery maybe my hand was also wet maybe the floor was slippery that’s why it slipped out of my hand maybe somebody spoke loudly and that’s why I got distracted or you could say maybe I was inattentive but to think that I am worthless because of that so what has happened when people go into depression or any mental health problem usually what happens is their intelligence doesn’t function properly so they take a stimulus and put it in the most damaging causal context some people are paranoid of fear paranoid they hear some noise somebody has come to murder me they become paranoid so now that noise might come because of so many other reasons so basically intelligence means to put things in the most constructive context we are not talking about right or wrong it is which is the most constructive context say right now I am speaking now sometimes when I give a class the audience starts looking at me as if they are watching a foreign language movie without subtitles now when that sort of expression comes out of their face now I could put that in various causal context I could say that I could say that maybe what I am speaking is a little difficult or I could say that if I put in that context maybe what I am speaking is very complicated then I will simplify it or if I start thinking this audience is dumb then I will get annoyed and I will just want to walk away from there or if I start thinking that people are not interested in spirituality at all so what am I doing sharing spiritual knowledge I am just wasting my time then I might become disheartened about giving any class in the future also so basically whenever any situation comes in our lives we need to know, we need to think and put it in the most constructive context so yes if you are getting some feelers if I am going to do this, this is what is likely to happen then try to put put it in the most constructive context this, so does this indicate I should not do this, if I am not going to do this maybe let me consult some other people who are experts and based on that let me understand so it is possible that sometimes we realise that we are in a sinking ship and then the water is coming, it is sinking what do I do, now I have to get out of it so if I don’t get out then I will drown, I will sink with it but I need to get out so definitely looking at feelers is important if you look at the Kurukshetra war now there are times when Krishna told Arjuna withdraw, withdraw at one time Bhima Ashwathama attacked the Pandavas with the Narayanastra and Narayanastra was such a powerful weapon that nobody could counter it and the more it was countered the stronger it would become so when that weapon started charging and Arjuna was fighting, Yudhishtira was fighting but it was just becoming burning higher and higher and higher and everybody was getting overwhelmed so at that time Krishna told we cannot counter this weapon this is Narayan’s weapon, the only thing you can do when Narayan comes is bow down all of you bow down on the battlefield lie down on the ground, put aside your weapons the weapon will whiz above your head it will go away, when it doesn’t find any opposition it will go away now everybody bowed down except for one person can you guess Ashwathama was shooting, from the Pandavas side who is one person who is very proud and angry and brave, brave kept fighting and he said all of you, I thought you are warriors, you have become cowards just because a weapon seems dangerous you are putting down your weapons what kind of warriors are you and he kept fighting now when Narayanas did not find any target it just attacked him and he was too proud to bow down but his whole body caught fire and was burning so at that time Krishna and Arjuna saw that and Arjuna shot the Varunastra towards towards Bhima and just filled his body with water so that atleast he was wet and the fire did not burn him and then Krishna and Arjuna ran towards him and they told him if this weapon could have been fought we all would be fighting it don’t be foolish and kill yourself Krishna said and pulled him down and Bhima was proud but he was not foolish he realised, he also realised when the fire was burning him that I will die if I do this so he was not ready to go down himself but as Krishna pulled he did not resist and then he came down so at that time when they saw this weapon is so powerful well better not try to fight it you get a feeler, so we have to use our feeler we cannot just, we cannot approach life with like a one size fit all formula this is what I am going to do in all situations no, if the situation is changed let me do this, let me do this that’s where our intelligence, our presence of mind our resourcefulness comes into the picture does it answer your question? thank you any other questions? if any of you want to write tips and send the questions that’s also perfectly fine Hi Krishna Prabhu you are talking about alter what we can change accept what you can’t change by altering can we change the situation in our favour in that case what will happen to performance the performance is that matters what will happen to our performance when we are altering the situation to our favour by altering the situation to our favour what will happen to our performance it will improve let me understand your question you are saying that if we are meant to alter the things we can change then by altering what will happen to our performance yes yes definitely it will improve but the question is whether the performance is not at all matter but that will come no performance is not all that matters that means it is not the only thing that matters but performance does matter say for example simple example could be say if we are driving a car and the it becomes very stormy, the road becomes slippery and then at that time we can’t change the fact that there is a storm that is we have to accept what we can alter is let me drive slowly let me carefully look at the road to see if there are any potholes ditches, anything dangerous on the road then when I do that my performance will also change in the sense that I am not driving that fast but I am driving slower but safer and if I had not altered myself I might meet with an accident but if I alter the way I drive I may not meet with an accident but in that case we are not situation is not changed situation is not changed in our favour so can the situation be changed in our favour yes that is another example say suppose it is something very simple say somebody is very angry with us and they are yelling at us and we get angry and we start yelling at them and then what happens is what is a small argument soon snowballs into like a world war but if at that time we just stay calm and we try to pacify the person we try to inform and say something which is reasonable and suppose that person may understand oh it was like this, I didn’t know it was like that their anger also disappears then the situation can be diffused not only does our actions are changed but we can change the situation also so now sometimes we might speak something reasonable and other person may give up their anger and sometimes they may not give up their anger so if they are not giving up their anger that means we could say that they are still involved, this person is going to be short tempered and I am going to have to deal with their situation but sometimes we might be able to change that’s why when we are acting how much of a positive result we get we don’t know the positive result could be altering the situation or it may not be at least we don’t worsen the situation we are not bothered about the results actually well I won’t go so far to say we are not bothered about the result certainly we are concerned about the result but it is that we shouldn’t be attached to the results that’s a very important point you brought it up so there is a difference between goals and results I was talking at MIT two years ago and there one professor said I read this Bhagavad Gita but it says work without worrying about the results he says I find this completely impractical he says we work for the results how can you work without attachment to the results so then I explained at that time there is a difference between goals and results the Bhagavad Gita is not against setting goals in fact just after speaking the Bhagavad Gita when the Upakuram Kshetra war started everyday the Pandavas would set goals today we will fight against this battalion, today we will attack this enemy most famously on the 14th day Arjuna said that today I will bring down Jaidrath or I will enter fire so when Arjuna is setting goals like this Krishna is not telling him hey you forgot Karmanyavadi Karasthi, you forgot my teaching in the Bhagavad Gita, he doesn’t say that because the point here is that goals are what we set before we do our work results are what we get after we have done the work so setting goals inspires us to work wholeheartedly and in that sense setting goals is good because to the extent we have some inspiring vision of what we want to achieve to that extent we feel motivated to commit ourselves to work hard so setting goals is desirable but after we have done our work then we let go now I have done my part the result is going to manifest, it will if not let go so in this Karma, Daiva, Kaala and Phala now when we are doing Karma we do want the phala we do care for the phala say if somebody is cooking food and they say I don’t care about the quality of food, I am following Bhagavad Gita I am detached that will not work we are definitely concerned we want to cook the food as well as possible so while doing Karma we do want the phala it’s not that we don’t care about the phala but sometimes if the phala doesn’t come we are not obsessed with that so we do we are concerned about the food but we are not obsessed or attached to the food thank you yes Hare Krishna actually I don’t know I may sound stupid but you said that our actions bring consequences so that may it means like we are the maker of our destiny as well because if our actions are bringing the consequences then at the end of the day destiny doesn’t matter ok good question so if our actions lead to the results then destiny doesn’t matter because we are the makers of our destiny yes see we are the makers of our destiny but we are not the masters of our destiny what is the difference that means our actions will produce the results whatever I am calling as my destiny that has also been produced by my past actions if somebody is born in a wealthy family if somebody is born in a poor family that’s destiny but why is the destiny like that because the person was born in a wealthy family did good karma in the past lives the person was born in a poor family did not do such good karma in the past lives so in that sense we are the makers of our destiny but we are not the masters in the sense that how destiny is going to manifest when in our lives that we don’t determine that means if I do good I will get good but when I will get that good I don’t control that I might do good right now, I might get good right now I might do good now and I might get good after 10 lifetimes and in that sense if you consider cricket match sometimes a player is out and the player is declared not out and sometimes the player is not out and the player is declared out now overall you could say that destiny evens out if a player plays for 15 years then the number of when he is wrongly judged out and wrongly judged not out when he is out they will even out but all wrong judgments don’t count the same thing, same magnitude sometimes if it is a critical phase of a match and the player is leading the team to victory and that time they get wrong decision and the team is well on a winning situation and even if the player gets out other players will take care of things so when that right or wrong decision comes that matters a lot also so similarly for us yes we are the makers of our destiny no doubt when we say we are the makers of our destiny it will inspire us to do our best in all situations but we are not the masters in a sense that sometimes despite doing our best we might not get the best results we might not even get good results we might get bad results so in that sense we are not the masters thank you any other questions yes please so for devotees as we have Krishna in the centre how much destiny how much destiny plays a role ok how much does destiny play a role because as devotees we have Krishna in the centre the two broad ways of looking at it I will explain both and then I will reconcile the two one is that the laws of material nature are impartial they are going to act so if we consider the law of gravity if say if a devotee steps of a 10 story building well I am a devotee so what the law of gravity is going to act so whether you are a devotee or non devotee the laws are impartial so if if we go out in cold weather without warm clothes we will get sick so we could say that the laws of material nature are impartial and whether devotee or non devotee doesn’t matter that’s you could say the mechanical way of looking at things and it has validity also but the other way is that we can say that when we surrender to Krishna Krishna protects us and Krishna takes away all sinful reactions and we are in Krishna’s care so whatever happens to us is by Krishna’s plan so then a devotee is not under karma at all devotee is under Krishna’s care then we may say sometimes devotees also still have problems why do they have problems then we could say it’s Krishna’s plan to be for their purification for their glorification for Pandavas they were great devotees Ram is a lord himself but Ram had to be exiled, Ram had to be separated from his wife it was agonising for him why did he have to go through all that because that is for teaching all of us how to face adversity with dignity so this could be another extreme that actually there is no karma for a devotee if the devotee goes through difficulty it is just for their glorification for setting an inspiring example for others now in between these two is this understanding is also true, this is also true but what is important is that we are neither here nor there we are not pure devotees who are acting only for Krishna’s pleasure we also have our own self-centred desires we also have our own agendas so therefore as devotees we shouldn’t think that we are beyond karma that if if a devotee faces some problems then the devotee’s humility is that devotee thinks that oh it’s my own karma because of which I am suffering I have done so many sinful activities because of that I am suffering and the devotee thinks, I will talk about how to see things positively in the next session but broadly the devotee thinks that although I am so sinful still Krishna has given me an opportunity to practise bhakti Krishna is so kind, let me take shelter of Krishna so once I was giving a class on karma in a college in India and after that one boy asked this question, he said that it is because of bad karma we suffer in life he said I saw that you had to walk with crutches so if you are lame that means you must have done some bad karma and if you have done some bad karma then what right do you have to instruct us about karma so then I replied, yes I have done many many bad karmas but God is so kind that He engages people even like me in His service you have not done any bad karma like me, if you become engaged in service you can do much more service so the point which I am making here is that as devotees we don’t think that we are beyond karma ok if I am suffering it is my karma but Krishna is still giving me an opportunity to serve and that is Krishna’s mercy and by serving Him I will go beyond karma but it is very inappropriate for us to apply that to somebody else say if you are serving some senior devotee and we respect that devotee and that devotee also we see they are very dedicated, very advanced and then say that devotee gets cancer and then if we start thinking I thought you are a great devotee but if you are getting cancer that means you must have done some terrible karma and I was mistaken to think you are such a great devotee no we should never think like that we should think at that time that I don’t know why this devotee has got cancer specifically but let me see this as an opportunity to serve this devotee let me serve this devotee and that way I can move closer to Krishna again since this devotee has helped me in my past so let me help him now so basically this is that a devotee should be able to translate life situations in a way that is favourable for our bhakti so if I am going to difficulty I shouldn’t think I am a pure devotee why am I suffering like this Krishna is unfair no I must have done many bad karmas but still Krishna has given me opportunity to serve but if some other devotee should think not that they are sinful that’s why they are suffering so this is with respect to attitude but going further when you practise Krishna bhakti the suffering doesn’t come just because of the situation the suffering also comes based on our attitude towards the situation so suppose somebody is sick and they are in pain now if they constantly keep thinking about their sickness their pain will multiply enormously but if they don’t think so much about the sickness ok I am sick I am in bed but let me think about what can I do with this maybe I can read something maybe I can hear something and they get out of themselves then they will not feel that much pain so basically we could say that Krishna gives us the means by which we can transcend our pain that means the Sri Madhva Sampradaya gives a nice example which I will conclude this session and then we will have a break or after a few questions suppose there is a child who has not done the homework and the teacher is very strict so if the child has not done the homework the teacher says have you not done your homework? no come here show your hand and the beat is a stick now of course today it will be considered abusive but anyway there is a strict teacher like that now the mother knows that the child has not done the homework the mother knows that the teacher is strict the mother at one level doesn’t want the child to be punished doesn’t want the child to be hurt at the same time the mother doesn’t want the child to also become lazy and irresponsible so before the child goes to school what the mother does is put a nice thick glove on the child’s hands when the child goes to school have you done your homework? no, come here show your hand the teacher beats and the stick hits but it doesn’t hurt it hits but doesn’t hurt noise comes but the pain doesn’t come so the example is that the teacher is like material nature Krishna is like the mother and we are like that student, that child and the glove is Krishna consciousness if we remember Krishna although life’s troubles will hit us they won’t hurt us that much because the problem that we go through if we are thinking about that problem constantly it becomes worse but if we are thinking about Krishna ok this problem is there thinking about Krishna gives satisfaction so somebody might be in pain but a materialistic person might just scream and scream, they may grunt in pain a devotee will call out Krishna and in that calling out to Krishna in that remembrance of Krishna there will be some relief so what Krishna primarily gives us is, sometimes Krishna may just like the mother tells the teacher please excuse my child Krishna can do that also but a devotee doesn’t demand that or do that for him but what Krishna does always gives us the glove if we put on the glove if we remember Krishna then even amidst difficulty we won’t suffer that much we won’t go through that much pain so that’s what we can surely expect from our bhakti our karma Krishna may or may not take away we don’t know what Krishna will do but what Krishna will surely give us is the opportunity to remember him so then what will happen is we may have to live with pain but we don’t have to live in pain that pain will be a part of our life but it won’t consume our life so unfortunately suppose a child is going to school and the child thinks this glove is so big and heavy why do I need to carry it child takes it out and throws it away and then the stick hits then it hurts quite bad so like that in normal times in our life we start thinking why do I need to be so serious about Krishna consciousness doesn’t matter you just put it aside and then the school of hard knock starts Krishna help it will become like that so if we take shelter of Krishna then life’s problems will hit us but they won’t hurt us that much so thank you very much and we will have is Krishna here we can have a break now we can have a break now so thank you very much Krishna Prabhupada ki Jai Gaur Bhakta Vrindaki Jai Jai Gaur Premanand Jai