Spiritual growth-Two principles for changing our samskaras Gita 6.35 London Soho

To see notes, click here

Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
Thank you all for coming today and today I’ll discuss on the topic of what is spiritual growth so I’ll talk about this in three broad parts so I’ll be using this white board to write things our topic will be spiritual growth I’ll talk about in three parts what it is why we should seek it and how we should how we can actually grow spiritually so let me start with what spiritual growth is before that I would like to ask you if say now you are coming to this particular place you are coming to this temple at least certain practises say you want to grow spiritually what is your understanding of spiritual growth you can have 3-4 answers pray pray okay pray praying faith service okay aura connecting with higher self aura okay aura connecting with higher self self realisation that’s true stability of mind stability of mind humility humility okay okay so awareness of original identity you could say what about consciousness but what about consciousness we become more conscious of ourselves that’s quite a good variety of answers I think thank you so yes please so okay this is more like a means if you have good association then we will grow spiritually so all that you said is true it’s all a part of it so I will talk about this in terms of one image that what is the difference between a person who is spiritually unevolved and a person who is spiritually evolved for all of us a person is here for a person who is spiritually unevolved the world is big and god is small even if god exists okay when I started my spiritual journey about 30 years ago almost I tried to share with my friends and relatives so one of my uncles told me ya I believe in god he is happy there I am happy here so basically god being so small actually was irrelevant or not very relevant but spiritual growth means the world becomes small for us and god becomes big for us so for a spiritually evolved person god becomes the more important reality now when we say god becomes big see god is always the biggest reality but in our awareness in our perception in our decision making in our mental world when god becomes bigger when the pleasure of god when the satisfaction of god becomes more important than the praise of the world that is a person who is spiritually evolved so now when we do all this, one of the things that you mentioned humility will result, stability of mind will result greater awareness of our own identity will result, many times if we are constantly pandering we are trying to do whatever will please people we often lose track of who we are so we go away from our true identity, so all those are in one sense byproducts of spiritual growth now why does this matter why should god be bigger than the world for us two reasons that when the world is very big the world is characterised by ups and downs that is just the nature of the world in Hindi there is a movie, Kabhi Khushi Kabhi Ram not dumb dumb so this happiness, this stress those are dualities and when the world is very big for us then the result is the dualities of the world they become even bigger for us and thus we stay very unsteady now when the world becomes small for us that even the dualities of the world, we don’t get affected so one advantage is that when the world becomes small, there is steadiness that we are not so shaken by the world’s ups and downs and we will see that often a steady person is a reliable person if you want to do something important that person is just too shaken by things that person is too moody then we can’t come into it so steadiness is an important virtue even in the material sense so one result is steadiness why we seek spiritual growth is because it will make us steady but the other is that God is the source of the supreme happiness from the world also we may get some happiness but the world’s happiness comes and goes and good things happen we feel happy but bad things happen we feel unhappy but God is always there with us within us so we could say that there is steadiness and then there is steady happiness because once the connection with God is established that will never be lost that bond of love means that God is always with us, He is always with us actually but we don’t realise His presence the more we realise His presence the more we realise that there is a source of joy always there within us so it’s like if I am feeling very cold and I have a huge bottle of water with me then no matter how cold I feel I can always keep drinking the water so God is like an endless reservoir of happiness and when we have a connection with Him then we have unending happiness so steadiness and happiness that so sthirata and sukha, steadiness and happiness these are two among the many results of spiritual growth so why we seek spiritual growth so these two are the shorter parts but the major part is how do we grow spiritually so I will base this part on 6.35 in the Bhagavad Gita and we will talk about it also in terms of something from the Patanjali Yoga Sutra I talked about two things over here, see God is always the biggest reality but how do we see God this is small algebra for us so there is the fact that our mind and the impressions in the mind shape our perception of things so if I am here to understand how spiritual growth actually happens when you come to a temple, you attend some kirtan you take darshan, you feel good and maybe many people come there just because it feels good and that’s also good but there is much much more of a development so what happens is this is the soul then this is the mind then you could say this is the body and this is the conditioned self the soul, mind body and then beyond this is the outer world so now from the outer world say there is some object over here from the so basically from the soul consciousness comes out consciousness chetana is the energy of the atma so consciousness is say like this flashlight so the flashlight has a source and from that a beam of light comes out so the light source is the soul the light coming out from it is the consciousness now from the atma the chetana comes out the chetana comes through the mind and goes to the outer world and in the outer world we perceive things so chetana goes out seeks for information and comes back in with that information so for example right now you are listening to me so your consciousness is coming outwards and you are listening and then you are processing hey this makes sense, this is a little complicated you know I came to enjoy this is exercising my intelligence too much now so different kind of thoughts might be going on so your information is being sought and then the consciousness comes in so in one sense the mind is the transmitter of consciousness so sometimes the mind, soul, consciousness all are confused everything is all the same so soul is the root of consciousness it is the place from which the consciousness originates the mind is the root of consciousness it is the pathway through which the consciousness goes out to the body and to the outer world so right now, to put it another way this is the soul this is the body and the link between these two is the mind and through this link consciousness comes out so consciousness comes out through the mind so the mind at one level is the transmitter of consciousness both outward and inward and that’s why when we say somebody is absent minded so what happens is at that time say the soul is here the body is here so the eyes are here, the ears are here but the mind is somewhere here and then what happens is the soul’s consciousness is partly going here and partly going here and say we are hearing a talk while we are hearing a talk our mind goes for a walk and then if there is some humour, the mind comes running back hey I also want to laugh, what happened? so the mind comes running back so this is where there is distraction so basically the mind and the soul, the mind and the body need to be in one line for proper perception to happen so the mind is a necessary transmitter for consciousness so if the transmitter is off say then if I just show this phone now if the flashlight may be on but if the shutter is covered then what is going to happen is that it’s as if the light is not there only so if somebody’s mind is gone somewhere else, the consciousness is not coming to that place sometimes you are talking there, you are talking and the person’s eyes are just glazing where are you? come back to earth you have gone to dreamland, now come back then you say say like that so basically the mind is a transmitter of consciousness and sometimes it transmits properly sometimes it does not but the mind is not just a transmitter of consciousness it is also, this is the key point for how spiritual growth happens the mind is also a transformer of consciousness transformer of consciousness means what? that again if you go back over here this phone is here, I don’t know if you are able to see from here so say the mind is here and the external world is over here somewhere so now in the mind there are impressions these impressions are called samskaras samskara the word can also be written in English as some scar everybody has some or the other scar in their psyche and what happens say from here suppose somebody is an alcoholic and say this is a bottle of alcohol so when the consciousness passes the consciousness passes normally it will just pass linearly normally normally it will just pass straight but when they see a bottle of alcohol it comes and when it passes through this it starts, that same impression starts becoming huge so the consciousness the perception becomes transformed somebody might have gone to a party and if they are alcoholic they will be talking with their boss when can I drink and the boss goes on talking for a long time after sometime in their mind their boss body changes into the bottle of alcohol so based on the impressions in our mind the consciousness that is passing through gets transformed so if there are samskaras associated with something then those perceptions become enlarged so if somebody has been bitten by a dog in their childhood as soon as they see a dog their consciousness passes through their mind and their samskara they feel scared now that dog might be just a tiny sweet poodle but still they feel fear because the samskara is there generally the way to understand the samskara whether there is a samskara or not lets talk about samskara here in a negative sense impressions can be positive also but lets talk about it in a negative sense right now the presence of a samskara how do we understand that so basically if somebody is behind me right now and they wanted to talk with me and they tap on my shoulder now normally you gently tap on the shoulder of someone to draw their attention so if they tap on my shoulder if I scream what happens actually I had a sprain in my shoulder over here the touch it causes me so basically just like if there is some injury in the body a small touch causes a strong reaction so the presence of a samskara is seen by basically what there is a small stimulus but there is a large reaction so we all use this when we are talking with someone and suddenly that person seems to get upset or agitated did I touch a nerve did I trigger something within you that has agitated you so in general the way to know what samskaras we have is which stimuli trigger a disproportionate response for some people if they are very attached to cricket then as soon as they hear some news about cricket that’s what I want to know somebody has no impressions about cricket in America if you talk with Americans cricket they think of an insect not a game so basically if some stimulus triggers a disproportionate response that indicates that there is a samskara over there and when I said that the world is big and God is small what that means is inside our mind the impressions of the world are a lot so it could be about wealth, it could be about prestige it could be about beauty it could be about power, it could be about position it could be about so many things so when the impressions about the world are prominent in our mind then the world appears very big so basically the principle of impressions is something very simple you know that whatever we take in whatever we take in takes us in whatever we take in takes us in that means we take an impression and gradually that impression starts becoming bigger and bigger and bigger till it starts consuming our consciousness nobody is born with a bottle of alcohol in their mouth but they take alcohol first a drinker takes a drink then the drinker takes a drink then the drinker takes the drinker so the impressions that we take in they take us in they keep growing growing so this when I talk about this principle of spiritual growth at one level it applies to everything so somebody might say come from India to UK now India say football is not a very big UK I believe football is very big now football is the same thing but when I say it is very big I am talking about how popular it is how passionate people are about it so somebody coming from India they may have no much interest in football but when they come to college they see everybody is passionate about football they go for a few games and six months later the same game which they had no interest in now they are mad screaming about it so what happened? the same thing which was very small became big how did it happen? whatever we take in takes us in so whatever impressions we take in whatever perceptions we take in they form impressions inside us and those impressions start shaping our future perceptions and eventually they start shaping our life itself so this whatever we take in this is a universal psychological principle and Krishna points to this psychological principle in say 8.5 and 6 when he says whatever is the disposition inside us that will shape our perception and this applies at death this applies also in life now this universal psychological principle can also be applied in bhakti so when we are practising bhakti what do we do? the fundamental principle in bhakti is always remember Krishna never forget Krishna now you may say what is the point of this? what is this about remember Krishna don’t forget Krishna what difference does it make? but it is about psychology see if we want to change the impressions within us say somebody is an alcoholic and they want to give up alcohol so what is the way? Krishna basically says two things this whole talk is based on 6.35 Krishna says two principles for changing the impressions in our mind these words can be translated in many different ways but one of the ways is persistence and abstinence so persistence and abstinence so if somebody wants to recover from alcoholism one of the first thing that they need to do is stop drinking alcohol stop going to bars stop hanging out with people who drink alcohol especially in places where they are likely to drink alcohol so abstain from those impressions being reinforced so there are impressions already inside us if we further fuel them they will grow so abstinence basically starves the inner impressions so we need to abstain from the thing which we want to weaken the thing which we don’t want to grow inside us so abstinence starves the inner impressions but this alone is not enough because I mean abstinence starves the impressions from outside but still the impressions are there inside and they will keep tormenting us they will keep tormenting us and that’s why what happens is we need to be able to create new impressions so one of the keys to say giving up alcoholism is that we need to somebody who is alcoholic they need to create healthier habits so they need to find some other way of getting some relief getting some pleasure, getting some high so persistence creates new impressions so when both of these persistence and abstinence both of them are there that will lead to eventually transcendence so we need to gently pat ourselves towards transformation we cannot force ourselves, willpower is required but raw willpower is not enough like somebody has disease and somebody has some respiratory tract infection and they feel like coughing and they say my willpower I will not cough how long can you do that the cough is going to come if the infection is there inside the body it is going to come if somebody has digestive disorder they have loose motion it is not going to work willpower is required but willpower needs to be used in a refined way if somebody has a digestive disorder their willpower needs to be used ok, I will not eat any fatty foods I will not eat any foods which are going to cause a digestive overload to my body and maybe I will take this soap I will take these medicines so persistence and abstinence so willpower is not just raw willpower, many times when we try to overcome some bad habits, we try to use raw willpower, I will never do this again but most of the times it doesn’t work why? because we may be wanting to not do it but the impressions are there inside us and those impressions will keep proposing come on do it, it is so big, it is so wonderful how can you not do it so we need to change the impressions so persistence and abstinence so we abstain from the things that we don’t want to grow inside us and we persist in doing the things that will grow the impressions that we want to grow inside us so now this same principle is applied in bhakti so persistence is always remember Krishna now abstinence is never forget Krishna now what does this mean actually speaking you may say I have to function in the world I have to do my job, I have to take care of my family I have to do so many things what does it mean actually to always remember Krishna and never forget Krishna it basically means that Krishna becomes the unifying purpose of our life I may have a family, I may have a job I may have many interests and hobbies but I try to connect all of them with Krishna so for all of us to grow spiritually I said that initially God is small, the world is big we want God to become big and the world small, so this will happen depending on the change of the impressions within us, so what do we need to do this is the last part I talk and then we can have a few questions so persistence so persistence is for the practises or actions that create devotional impressions within us so now when we come to the temple, we take darshan of the deity we sing kirtans we sit and hear a class all this is creating impressions within us and the stronger the impressions that are there within us the faster will be the change somebody can come to the temple if they just come as a ritual why do you come to the temple? because my parents told me to come to the temple everyday my mother asks me, did you go to the temple? and we are in the temple but our mind is not in the temple at all our mind is in the TV that we want to watch our mind is in the pub that we want to go to our mind is in the party that we want to go to then if our mind is not there then no impressions are going to be formed then sometimes people come to a kirtan it’s an ecstatic kirtan but in an ecstatic kirtan they are completely static they are impressively unimpressed because their mind is completely elsewhere so no impressions are being formed so persistence is it’s not just physical presence, it’s openness of our consciousness so that the impressions are formed inside us and especially we have our devotional practises such as our sadhana we chant the holy names everyday at least for some time we need to immerse ourselves in God see whatever we take in, takes us in so there is at least some time we sit down and pray, we sit down and chant we sit down and study scripture so meditation when you talk about this abhyasam meditation is at one level a process of taking in when we do mantra chanting at that time through the mantra we are taking in God God is coming into our consciousness but mantra chanting is not just about taking in God it is going in to God what it means is initially we take God in as one small impression among the many impressions that are coming into our consciousness but grow slowly we start realising that God is a far bigger reality and our consciousness enters into God that’s why the perception of the enlightened souls it is said that that they see God in everything and they see everything in God they see God in everything means they are able to actually take God in from everywhere and they are talking with a person they see this person is a part of God and they are talking with that person but they are also aware of God’s presence so take God in but they also understand that not only God is situated in everyone but everyone is situated in God so at one level God is one impression that we are taking in but God is also the biggest reality so now it is magical if we just try to be prayerful if we try to be attentive if we try to be focused in our chanting in our kirtan eva in our darshan of the deities initially say you come to this room the deity is Krishna there are so many people in this room there are so many pictures, there are so many things and the deity on the altar is just one more thing maybe more attractively decorated just one more thing but as we focus on the deity we start realising that this is the biggest reality where Krishna contains everything so everyday if we are doing our prayer our sadhana at least for a few minutes we need to bring ourselves into that experience of the higher reality so when that abhyasa is done then that is what will lead to the transformation of our consciousness and then for us the vairagya that is needed the vairagya especially is from the things that agitate and captivate our consciousness each one of us has to find out what that is for somebody it might be political news some people just oh this person did like this and this person did like that and you just get so agitated by it politics has become the new religion for many people especially in America the political polarisation is so great in the past people from different religions would not marry each other in America there was a survey almost 75% of democrats and 70% of republicans they would say we would not marry the other person there from the other side so so politics has become the new religion so if politics is what is agitating us I have to be politically aware, ok true but regulate it, minimise it don’t get consumed by it for somebody else it may be thoughts of money, we all need money in life but there is one thing to seek money and the other thing to be it is one thing to possess money it is another thing to be possessed by money so it is one thing to think about money it is another thing to think only about money or constantly about money so the things which particularly agitate and captivate our consciousness we try to keep a distance from them so in that way whatever makes the world big in our consciousness, we try to keep it away from us and whatever makes God big in our consciousness we try to bring it close and by this dual practise of Abhyasa and Vairagya gradually it will start happening for us that Krishna will become the bigger reality and the world will become a smaller reality and when this happens the test that this is happening will be that the same thing, the similar kind of problem which previously had come in my life I would have been so agitated, so shaken but now that problem comes yeah it’s there and I have to deal with it at this stage when we are in the spiritually unevolved stage what would have something which would not have disturbed us agitated us, shattered us something which would have shattered us now we are just concerned about it yeah it’s important, the world matters for me so some problem here it may have shattered me when the world is very big and the God is very small when the world becomes small, that same problem will shake me, it will not scatter me the world’s problems are big but God is far bigger the world’s power to hurt us is great but God’s power to heal us is far greater so when we come to God also don’t focus on telling God how big the problems are we come to God and in the presence of God we tell our mind how big God is when we do that then our problems, even when we have the problems we may have here we are living we live in pain we live in fear, we live in distress here pain may still be there but we live with pain not in pain that’s one part of my life this problem is there, I have to deal with it but it won’t overwhelm us and that’s how the Gita says that even amid the most disturbing situations we won’t be disturbed so I’ll summarise what I discussed today we talked about the topic of spiritual growth I talked about three broad parts what is spiritual growth that is basically spiritual growth essentially means initially the world is big, God is small but what happens is the world becomes big and God becomes small now why spiritual growth it gives us steadiness in facing the world and gives us happiness which is inexhaustible which is inalienable from us because it is inside us and God never becomes runs out of happiness so this is why we seek spiritual advancement now the major part of the session was how, in that I talked about four broad things first was that whatever we take in takes us in whatever impression we form inside us, they shape us so this is a universal psychological principle in this I talked about how the soul, the mind and then the body and the outer world the mind is both the transmitter of consciousness and the transformer of consciousness so whatever is going through it, the samskaras are there the samskaras change what happens so now if we are to change the samskaras within us so if you want to change the impressions the key things required for us are basically it is not just willpower it is, you could say, refined not raw willpower, but refined willpower refined willpower is directed towards abhyasa abhyasa is persistence in doing the thing that will replace the unhealthy thing sometimes we focus too much on oh I’ll not do this, I’ll not do this we focus on abstinence but ok I’ll not do this, but what will I do instead that is important, so when there is persistence and abstinence together it will help us to get to transcendence, transcendence means so if alcoholic stops going to bars, stops hanging out with people who drink at the time when they drink and alcoholic also creates a healthier habit, maybe whenever they feel stressed, whenever they feel lonely, whenever they feel pain, they start singing music or hearing spiritual music, hearing cute words they create a healthier habit then eventually, even if somebody is drinking alcohol, they will transcend it, they will not feel the urge for it so persistence and abstinence now in bhakti what we do is for us the abhyasa is associated with the things the things or the activities that remind us of Krishna’s greatness, that Krishna is the largest reality and vairagya is from the things that make the world seem great to us so we need to find out what are the things and we need to individually take responsibility to keep a distance from those things and the last part I mentioned is that each one of us the test that we are growing is the thing which in the past would have shattered us now we are only we are not pathetically concerned about it, in the past we would have been living with, in the past we would have been living in pain, now we will manage to live, ok it’s one part of my life, I will deal with it, I will live with pain in this way, even in this life you can experience the benefits of spiritual growth, thank you very much Hare Krishna, thank you so much I’m very satisfied, would you like to have one or two questions quickly, questions and answers anyone have any questions yes people there can you explain subconsciousness can you explain subconscious subconscious subconscious basically refers to the impressions that are there inside us, which we are not aware of, say for example if as I said somebody touches my shoulder I feel pain, that means there is an injury over there, now I might remember oh that time I had fallen on my shoulder that’s why I got the injury, but sometimes I may not remember the injury, when I got injured, I just have that injury so what is in our subconscious also triggers us, that is again there is a small stimulus, large response but those are impressions that happened so much in the past that we are not aware of them but even then if we create healthy impressions now, what is in the conscious mind and what is in the subconscious mind all can be overwritten with time yes please yes Hare Krishna Prabhu, thank you can we say higher than Abhyasa is Sadhu Sangha and maybe you can say the lack of Sadhu Sangha in Kali Yuga Sadhu Sangha is also part of Abhyasa, Abhyasa means practise so practise of what practise of the limbs of Bhakti among the limbs of Bhakti association is very important see basically most people think that desires if I see an object and I get a desire for it, we think of desires as linear, I am here, the object is here, I get the desire for it well that is true but that is not the only way desires develop desires are also triangular say this person has a desire for it then seeing them I will not get the desire but seeing the person I may get the desire say for example how many people see a gym and get the desire to go to the gym and do a workout not many but if you see a friend who has actually been going to the gym and they look so much fitter and they are so much healthier and they have so much more energy seeing them, ok maybe I want to go and also do the exercise so in this case what is happening is the desires are triangular so in most cases with respect to material things especially rajasic and tamasic things the things appear visibly attractive and the desires often are linear but with respect to sattvic and spiritual things mostly the desires grow triangular how many people just see a Bhagavad Gita I want to read it, not many many people take Bhagavad Gita as it is and keep it as it is but when they associate somebody who is reading the Bhagavad Gita somebody who is getting fresh realisations from the Gita they are so enlivened by their Gita study hey all this is in the Gita, I want to find out what it is then they get the desire so the great gift of sadhusangha is that it taps the triangularity of desires so we may come to we may come to the temple and ok just ok Krishna as a ritual we take darshan but then some devotee just absorbed in taking darshan ok what are you perceiving over there I also want to know what is going on we may sing kirtan just as a ritual but somebody else they are singing kirtan with such intensity what are you tasting over there I want to taste it so sadhusangha is a very powerful abhyas thank you so any of the ladies have questions ok also this linearity of desire is affected by our attachment and aversion so we may be more averse to getting a disease than going to the gym so it’s not in abstract right all these desires happen within our attachments and aversion yes of course so attachment raga and dvesha they are both impressions inside us and they shape our perceptions say for example somebody may come to a temple and say the deities may be very beautiful but if somebody has had impressions in their past ok this is all idolatry this is all worship of idols and we are not going to worship idols even if they see the beauty of the deities these people are so foolish they are spending so much time and energy just decorating some idols so even the beauty of the deities may trigger some dvesha within them so if somebody has been say mistreated or abused by some religious authority figure in the past now they come to a temple and they associate with somebody who is actually kind and gentle and compassionate but there because of their past scars some scars what will happen is is this just a facade is this person just acting nice so that they can exploit me in the future so the way desires are triggered depends on the raga and dvesha the impressions that are there inside us good point thank you so thank you very much Shreemad Bhagwat Gita Ki Shreeda Prabhupada Ki Gaur Bhakt Vrinda Ki Sai Gaur Premanand Ki Shreemad Bhagwat Gita Ki Shreeda Prabhupada Ki so much of what I spoke today is explained in this book Living the Ramayana so this talks about the Ramayana not from the story perspective and the psychological and the relational perspective so when Ravan abducted Sita how was he able to violate her boundaries and abduct her whose mistake was it how can we ensure that people don’t transgress our boundaries when we are alone in difficult situations as Hanuman was in Lanka how did he maintain his morale and persist so how to find opportunity and adversity so about 10 essays are there in this book analysing the incidents and these are what we talked about creating new impressions these are 366 quotes inspired by the Bhagwat Gita one quote is just a few lines and if you can read one at the start of the day and each of these quotes is inspired by a verse from the Bhagwat Gita so when we fly into a rage anger promises us a terrific landing and delivers a terrible landing those who can’t face books seek shelter in Facebook in our today’s class in our consciousness what we welcome like that we become so watch what we watch so this is inspired by the verse I mentioned 8.6 so like that there are many attractively concisely phrased re-articulations of the Gita over here so this is also a very accessible gift that you can give to friends or colleagues who may not be interested in spirituality so both of these will be available outside if any of you want you can have it and I’ll also be available for answering questions or signing the books thank you very much Hare Krishna so of course we’d like to thank His Grace Chaitanya Swami again because he gave us a morning class this morning, this is his second class today, yet he still has another programme I believe in East London and in between he’s been meeting with devotees, answering questions and he’s giving us some nice guidance so we’d like to sincerely thank you for your nice efforts, we really appreciate that and he’s also helping us to present our Bhajra campaign which is a very important campaign because in these two months it is believed that anyone who distributes or gives a Srimad Bhagavatam on the full name of the month of Bhajra he will attain the Supreme Transcendental Destination once they give it up, and so so far the past few months we have distributed a total of 110 Srimad Bhagavatam sets so we have distributed 110 Srimad Bhagavatam sets and we aim to get 230 Srimad Bhagavatam sets and to emphasise the point, whoever distributes Srimad Bhagavatam set on the months of the Bhajra campaign will attain the Supreme Transcendental Destination that is how merciful Krishna is and His Grace Chaitanya Chandra Prabhu has mentioned leaving an impression out of persistence we can leave an impression on ourselves by having Srimad Bhagavatam at our house because we are personally inviting Krishna in his personal form as Srila Prabhupada has put it, the first and second cantos are his legs all the way up to his face and head, you know the 10th and 11th cantos, but also we can leave an impression on other people by giving them Srimad Bhagavatams so on that note you can have sets sent either in the UK or to India you can gift it to those who want to start a spiritual life if you’d like, you can even give the luxury in instalments if you’re a student or if you’re trying to afford monthly instalments, the sets are available in English, Gujarati and Telugu and you can speak to unto myself to give a Srimad Bhagavatam but on that note, if anyone wants to donate a Srimad Bhagavatam now for someone else or they want to take one for themselves they can raise their hands and start to break the ice and we’ll have a list here on the board with the fortunate souls receiving the mercy of Sri Sri Radha Vandanishwara so who wants to be the first person to break the ice Haribol what is your name? Ujwal Mataji Ki so we can have a second person because one is just beginning to break the ice so who else would like to be on the fortunate list of souls receiving more mercy in their Lordships it’s a hundred seventy five to print, it’s usually much more than that but for this Bhadra campaign you only pay for the printing cost 175 pounds only so much mercy you want to say your name? Neha Haribol Neha Mataji Ki what is your name Prabhu? Inder Das okay number two okay who’s number three is this getting exciting Chaitanya Charan Prabhu you want to see who’s number three because he blessed us with his presence we can also bless him by really pushing for the Bhadra campaign if you think I’m going to do a donation later sometime, now is the time I can promise you that much the Srimad Bhagavatam contains many beautiful stories that have shaped the minds of millions for millennia and Bhagavatam is recited and it’s faster than told even now in India but many people may not be open to hear it but if they can have the Bhagavatam in their homes at a certain level the vibrations are going to purify them, sanctify them and we may want, if we feel we are benefited by spirituality we want others to be benefited sometimes they may not be ready to come to programmes but the Bhagavatam 12 volumes 12 cantos, 18 volumes it’s a gift that people will not forget it will be there in their libraries it will be there in their homes and that will draw them in their time of need to read it Krishna going in and they may not read it today but later on when they feel the need Krishna will draw them and then that’s how they will also get an opportunity to create fresh impressions sometimes we cannot create fresh impressions in other people’s lives but we can open the doors for them so that they can receive those impressions when they are ready Alright, thank you so much Very true