Can we have hobbies that are neither spiritual nor sinful?
So what about certain activities in our life which are not necessarily directly detrimental but they take time and we feel like doing them but at the same time we know that they are consuming our time and energy so how do we deal with them? see I'll give one metaphor which will address this many questions in this area that when we are living in the world our present existence is like a deceased condition and the practice of yoga yoga chikitsakam bhakti yoga is the chikitsa the medicine the therapy by which we'll be cured we are eternal beings but we are currently identifying with the temporary body and the healing is when we realize our spiritual identity so when a patient is sick at that time when the patient is sick they may be in pain so now the doctor will give a curative medicine and the doctor will also give a pain medicine so now the pain medicine is important in the sense that the pain medicine provides immediate relief and the pain medicine and the curative medicine work complementary so similarly for us the practice of bhakti yoga is like the curative medicine our whole material life in a sense is like the pain medicine so Krishna says that one who eats too little or eats too much such a person cannot be a yogi why? if we eat too much then again the mind becomes obsessed with food then we can't think about higher spiritual growth but if we eat too little then also we are constantly thinking of food so not having food is a pain so hunger is a big problem in the world but are all the well-fed people in the world happy? no, they have their own set of problems isn't it? so food is vital but it is like a painkiller it's essential so extending this metaphor further our whole material life whatever we need in it or whatever we feel we need also that is like a painkiller now when somebody is in a hospital there are two extremes one is to go on a campaign against painkillers give up all painkillers the other is to go on a campaign for painkillers thinking that oh actually I take this painkiller my pain goes why do I need to take this medicine at all? so the point is in material life if we become too with too averse to material life yeah I can't do this I shouldn't do this I shouldn't do that then again that's obsession we are obsessed with what I should not do so the whole point is our mental energy should be free for focusing on Krishna and on higher spiritual things in our life so if we are too strongly against material things that consumes our mental energy and conversely if we are too strongly for material things that also consumes our mental energy I want this I want this idea is that oh if I just get this one thing I'll become happy in my life so then both ways it is a problem now the dicey thing here is that with this metaphor is that different people require different dosages of painkiller so say for example somebody has been in a say born and brought up in a rural setting they live with simplicity not much technological amenities if they come to a city and they get a lot of technological amenities they can use them but they don't need them but somebody who has lived in a city and then you go in a rural setting without the basic technology basic technological facilities that itself becomes a big trouble so the point is that we have to decide what is the dosage of painkiller that I need so that I can focus so now just like with respect to food we learn by experience how much would I eat sometimes we eat too much and then we feel drowsy we feel heavy we become obese and this is just not worth it so same way with sleep sometimes we feel I want to work I want to achieve so I won't sleep but then we may sleep less at night but we're sleeping throughout the day so just as we learn to achieve and arrive at a balance ourselves similar with respect to food and sleep similarly with respect to material life in general whichever activities we may be involved in we arrive at a balance that way that means that if I get too obsessed with it then it consumes my thoughts and I am not free to think about higher things but if I am too militant against it then also it's a problem so usually with respect to our material desires we all have to learn how to deal with them no it is not that the formula for dealing with material desires which works for me will work for you or which works for you will work for someone else no we all have our own mind we all have our own background our own conditionings so we need to find out what is the level at which I can be in material life by which I can peacefully focus on my spiritual growth some of us may need to work through some desires some of us may have certain desires some of us can just hear about philosophy and we feel there's no point in indulging in this I'll just give it up some of us may want to fulfill some desires and gradually work through that that's fine so the important thing is that don't see the painkiller as a replacement for the medicine as my material life whatever I need to do I'll do it but I won't let it take up so much of my time that I can't practice focus on spiritual life so based on this broad understanding so there we could classify our material activities into three levels three kinds there is pro-devotional there is non-devotional and there's anti-devotional so for example alcoholism drugs these activities are anti-devotional and they need to be given up of course one can start practicing spiritual life even when one is doing these activities but they will impede the spiritualization of our consciousness very much so they need to be given up now pro-devotional activities are those things which we can use they're not directly devotional say somebody wants to learn music somebody wants to learn singing somebody wants to learn some talents say video processing so that's a talent we can use it's a pro-devotional activity now you can use it in devotional service then there are non-devotional activities they may not be directly usable in devotional service but they're not anti-devotional so if we could whatever our material needs and material desires are if we could find the fulfillment for them in the pro-devotional range of activities that is the best so I used to love words since my childhood one of my hobbies was just to pick up a dictionary and memorize words so now for me writing is an activity I simply love so I love writing but by Krishna's mercy now I'm writing for Krishna so if we can find out something in our see if we consider this one circle to be our material life and another circle to be our devotional life if you can find something that is at the intersection of the two and then we develop that then we will be able to not only develop the material talent wholeheartedly but also we'll be able to use it constructively in devotional service so that it's best to find something within the pro-devotional activities and then we can let them do but otherwise if there are some non-devotional activities also if you feel like doing then that's up to us we have to find out which consumes too much mental energy that oh I will not do it you're thinking so much about that so actually we're not doing anything constructive now our purpose should always be clear that we our focus is on the war for a devotion our focus is not on the battle against temptation the two are related but the two are not the same there are specific temptations which you have to fight and we fight against them but our focus is on the war for devotion do devotional activities wholeheartedly and while fighting that war one battle is the battle against temptation sometimes we just make the battle against temptation as the center of our whole consciousness should I do this? should I give this up? should I do this? should I give this up? it doesn't matter it's not that big focus on practicing bhakti and if you start practicing bhakti we start saying yes to Krishna then whether to say yes to other things how much to say yes whether to say no all that will settle fall in place on its own so focus on connecting with Krishna wholeheartedly and other things will fall in place does this answer your question? thank you.