“Chant and be happy” is not just causal but also parallel (Bhagavatam 1.2.22)
Some today morning we're discussing from the 1 to 22 this verse comes in the conclusion of a series of oneself which starts from the sixth verse 6 to 22 is often called the bhagavad dharma section of the shaman bhagavatam these verses comprise the most often quoted section of the bhagavatam and ato is in a confusing sense ato is therefore therefore the kavayas because the wise people with them always so there is a beautiful sense of cyclic completion in this section so the sixth starts with a similar theme with the same point emphasised these verses from 6 to 22 essentially they're broadly divided into sections 6 to 13 talk about the supremacy of bhakti in comparison with all other processes that are there and then from 14 onwards till 21 talks about the efficacy of it efficacy means how it acts so the sixth verse starts talking about the highest dharma is of bhakti to the supreme lord then the seventh verse talks about okay but you know gyan and vairagya are talked about so much glorified this picture what about that they will come on to anything so same word vasudeva we're going to just come here it's also there in the seventh verse then after talking about gyan and vairagya this is the result of bhakti bhakti gyan and vairagya will come then somebody may ask what about varnashram so yes varnashram is good okay varnashram is good but the purpose of varnashram is bhakti if varnashram doesn't lead to bhakti then it's all of no use and someone may ask but what about dharma, artha, kama, moksha aren't they important the next two verses talk about that so where the bhagavatam where traditionally we have thought of four causal chain dharma will lead to artha, artha will lead to kama, will lead to moksha the bhagavatam says all four are meant for bhakti dharma is not meant for artha, dharma says apavargas so basically i will move the technicalities here the bhagavatam says dharma, artha, kama, moksha all of them culminate in bhakti and then then it describes that okay what is it that we i okay if everything else culminates in bhakti and what does bhakti culminate what does bhakti lead to then it says okay by the practise of bhakti we understand the oneness of the absolute truth that absolute truth who is brahman, parmatma, bhagwan he is one he is not multiple he is one absolute truth that is what we understand how do you understand that it talks in the next verse by practise of jnana and vairagya one can eventually realise and then so in this way everything else is shown to culminate in bhakti then how does bhakti work that is described from the next section about how the remembrance of krishna acts like a sword i won't go into the whole technicality here this is a section which supports it in his marking in half of the song that by hearing you become purified then not then one becomes situated in goodness one becomes cheerful one becomes cheerful then one becomes more and more elucidated and the whole change goes on in the previous verse it concluded in this is 22nd verse so the bondage of karma is cut off all doubts are gone and these attachments are gone three things directly make problems you know internally there is a problem externally there is a problem internally we have problem of desires and we have problem of doubts externally we have problem of reactions everything will go the desire the attachments they will get cut off the doubts they will get in the way and externally what are the reactions coming they will also stop at that time that atmani the soul one will understand the soul to be the ishwara what does it mean this has different explanations for this what it means essentially is that we understand the atma is not subordinate to the body the atma does not have to obey the commands in the senses in the mind the atma is actually the ishwara krishna uses the same point in 15.6 in the bhagavad gita he says that how we are parts of krishna 50.7 he says and then in the next verse so this was he says we are controllers we are parts of krishna uh we are but when we don't act as parts of krishna we are a part of krishna but we become apart from krishna now we become apart from krishna and what happens and they're struggling in mental existence but even if they're struggling the next verse points the ishwara so the soul comes into a body the soul yields the body and how does it this transmigration takes place this is the wind carries fragments so the soul carries different conceptions of life from one body to another the soul is entering the body and leaving the body but krishna says the soul is ishwara so what is the ishwara actually we are not absolute controllers but we have enough control to choose our control we cannot be with we don't have so much control that we can be the controller ourselves we can never be completely free from control but we have enough control to choose our controller either our controller can be krishna or if we don't choose krishna as our controller then our mind and senses will become our controller and then there is karshati which happens to us when we have no aakarshan towards krishna and then aakarshan towards krishna or the attraction towards krishna we serve him then the karshati the constant pull of the senses that doesn't drive us down the soul is the ishwara in the sense that the soul understands that i don't have to submit to my mind and senses i choose to submit to krishna one understand actually the soul is transcendental soul is beyond the body soul has its own proper life beyond whatever is the ups and downs of the body so in this way the soul recognises its true spiritual glory in one sense when we talk about humility we talk about you are not the master of your servants and we think that this is all very deep what about my individuality what about my personality what about ma what about me you'll be speaking the the more the pseudo me gets covered the pseudo me is the conception that we have acquired based on our body mind and senses when the pseudo me gets purified and the real me comes out and the soul actually becomes situated in its true glory transcendental to matter and so now after giving this background how bhakti is supreme and how bhakti is efficacious and how bhakti will lead to that ultimate result is so they both come from the same root that is the one who has knowledge people always what do they do do they perform bhakti and how do they perform bhakti so that is interesting thing over here they are saying that this bhakti will give joy to the soul but they're saying the verse is saying they perform bhakti joyful so is joy the result of the practise of bhakti or is joy something which we have to add in the practise of bhakti chant hare krishna and be happy so is it talking about a causal chain that chant hare krishna then you will become happy or is it talking about two things chant hare krishna and be happy are there two instructions chant hare krishna and be happy or are they describing a causal connection you do this then this will happen so actually both are true by the practise of bhakti we will become joyful so at the same time if we understand the potency of bhakti if we understand the glory of bhakti if we understand our fortune getting the fortune to practise bhakti that itself will make us joyful it's like a person who has been sick for a long time and has not been able to find any treatment finally they find that person find the patient find the treatment which works now that itself brings satisfaction because now i am on the path to recovery so the first with great joy they perform bhakti that refers to that and that gratitude that joyfulness that comes when you understand the potency of bhakti and you perform bhakti like this then what happens then bhakti will fill us with joy also suppose a porter in india we use the word pulley this time is coming from america then nobody knows what a is the word porter so suppose a porter has to carry 20 kg luggage it's difficult and the porter is going to pay for 20 kg and while carrying the 20 kg the porter puts 30 more kg on top and then tries to carry 50 kg you wonder why are you carrying 50 you're going to be paid only 20 why are you carrying we are going to wait only for 20 kg quite often we end up in this journey how is it we all face different kinds of problems in life these problems are like a 20 kg weight but when the problem comes the resentment of reality often occurs more than reality there is some problem and we resent the problem and that resentment itself you know it chokes us internally it paralyses our capacity to do anything suppose a person falls sick uh suppose say you are trying to go to your and go for yatra and fall sick okay now sickness there is some weakness in the sickness maybe there is some discomfort because there is fever or whatever but overall if you see sickness unless there are acute phases of fever or some severe bodily disorder sickness is usually not characterised by constant physical pain if it's a mild kind of fever you just have to take rest you have to be now you cannot go around doing all the things that we want to do but quite often what causes misery in the sickness is not the sickness itself but along with the sickness of the body there is a sickness of the mind oh i wanted to do this i wanted to do that everyone else is gone everyone else is enjoying i am just lying here helplessly over there so that resentment the sickness causes some discomfort but the sickness causes but the resentment causes far greater trouble so that resentment is like adding a 30 kg to the already existing 20 kg so resentment of reality often hurts more than reality and this resentment is what is a cause of what we would say as a mental paralysis we just don't can't do anything we get caught in it so in the process of bhakti also when we are going through life in the routine course there will be times when things will go wrong we want to do things a particular way maybe in our material life maybe in our spiritual life things go wrong and at that time if we become resentful then we waste a lot of energy one definition of tolerance tolerance means to call off our war with reality tolerance means to call off our war with reality okay this is okay i have fallen sick tolerance means i will not fight with reality i'll accept now this is not passivity tolerance doesn't mean that we passively accept whatever happens it simply means that we begin with where we are instead of simply craving about where we should have been oh i should have been in the yatra i should have gone there i should have been doing so the mind has its own narrative the mind is oh it should have been like this it should have been like that it should have been like that so for example if we are going on the road say we're going by a car from here to a programme and by chance we have taken a mistake we have taken a wrong turn and we are supposed to be at our destination at six o'clock but now we find that we are something like 10 miles away from there at six o'clock now by thinking oh i should have been there i should have been there i should have been there we are not going to get there what reality means tolerance means to call off our war with reality that means okay except i am 10 miles away now accepting that i'm 10 miles away doesn't mean passivity actually that is what can begin real activity i accept that i'm 10 miles away now let me turn around and go in the 10th direction and then i will reach that maybe a little late but i will reach but as long as we are presenting reality as long as we are fighting reality why am i here i should have been there and should have doesn't make any difference to happen to where we are so after we accept where we are then we have various options you may decide okay that programme was between six to seven by the time i reach there it will be seven so i'll cancel the programme i'll not go there that has or anything maybe there are some other devotee in that area maybe that devotee can go for the programme once we accept the reality then many options open up what we can do to deal with it but as long as we don't accept the reality no option opens up all that results in mental analysis so similarly in our practise of bhakti when things go wrong now tolerance is a virtue because tolerance helps us see what is the channel open for us when we don't have tolerance we are just obsessed with those channels which are closed down this has gone wrong this has it's one of the greatest deprivals of happiness in bhakti is this lack of tolerance when we don't have tolerance then our consciousness gets consumed by small small things and when the consciousness gets consumed by small small things then the big thing that is remembrance of krishna that we are no longer mentally available for that so suppose a mother you know once somewhere some small children are there they don't want to eat any food at all even if the food is delicious mother wants to give some kheer or some juice to the child are you shaking that no i don't want it i don't want it i don't want it mother has to drink and then once we know initially the child is so resentful why are you controlling me why are you forcing me to eat the child no no mother is holding the leg and putting it in the mouth no no and the child takes one spoon this tastes good still no i don't want to be forced no but the mother is fighting it's good it's delicious and the child starts eating happily after that so like that what happens with us when things go wrong in our life still the opportunity to remember krishna is always available for us that the nectar the nectar of remembrance of krishna is always available there is no happiness like the happiness of the remembrance of krishna i don't know any other happiness now when he said that i don't know any other happiness you can say oh he lived thousands of years ago he did not know the joy of playing video games no ultimately there can be various pleasures in this world but all pleasures are ultimately the forms may be different different but the substance is always the same and the forms may be different but the substance always remain the same the substance is the king and the best of pleasure that were available at that time he had experienced all of them he says there's no happiness like the happiness of remembrance of krishna now video games are a big addiction for many people you know essentially what is a video what is playing a video game the playing a video game is essentially doing second hand eating sleeping waiting defending the one is we do it ourselves video game what are people like we have police somebody looking police and this changing the thing somebody is trying to catch something somebody is doing this thing that thing it's essentially people are enjoying imagining that somebody else is doing something and if i was doing it would be so nice so it's second hand eating sleeping waiting defending that's all ultimately there is so here he's saying that there is no pleasure see even people go to watch movies you know when the hero and heroine hug each other people listen why do they listen so they even if i was there it would be so nice so it's all second hand pleasure and that's why quite often when people are watching t.v and watching movies they usually want something to eat everything is imaginary something should be real so here so he's saying there is no happiness which is equivalent to which is as good as the remembrance of haricharana smarana the remembrance of the lotus feet of lord hanuman now for us when we are practising bhakti we are trying to do certain things we have to do some service we have to get some job done we have to do this we have to do that well sometimes in this world whether we are devotees or we are not devotees things may not work out and when things don't work out it will become very essential why is this not working why is this not working out why is this not working out that consumes our mental energy and then even when we are chanting Hare Krishna even when we are attending Krishna we are hearing Krishna katha you know it's like the mother is pouring that juice but the child is shaking that no juice goes inside so we although the opportunity for remembering krishna is there when we don't make we don't call off our war with reality when we keep fighting with reality then we are no longer available for remembering krishna available means in terms of emotional intellectually in terms of our consciousness when parikshit maharaj was cursed to die in 70s first thing he did is call off the war with reality yes i accept okay that is going to come in 70s what do i do next so calling off the war with reality did not mean passivity okay he accepted i want to die but then he focused on the most important activity asmat bharata sarvaatma bhagwani shiva rohari shubhdev goswami told him that therefore you should hear about god and that's what he did the same verse similar words comes twice in the same section this was he says that he talks about that so he says this is the best thing to do and this will free you from fear the bhagwan consistently repeats that so for us in the process of practise of bhakti we feel as if bhakti is supposed to be joyful but i am not feeling any joy so there can be many causes of dissatisfaction bhakti but one of the main causes is resentment over trivial things going wrong by trivial i don't mean that the things are not important but as compared to the importance of remembering krishna those things are not all that important so if we are if we do not have this not cultivate this tolerance if we do not call off our war with reality it should have been like this he should have spoken like that he she should not have done that they could not have done this how dare this happen as long as we are caught up in the minds should and should not narrate it should have been like this it should not have been like that as long as we are caught in the queen's narrative of should and should not we are no longer available for krishna so raag, dvesha, mukta, isthu, vishayan, indhesh, charan, atma, vashya, udayatma, prasad, abhidheksha what i said here atma, prasad, abhidheksha the which brings joy prasad one siddha soul that same thing krishna talks about what they have to do raag and dvesha raag is the should have been dvesha means should not have been so vimukta is to put aside the my should have been and should not have been narratives and focus on what is and how can i remember krishna in what is so usually when something goes wrong what can we do about it so one thing i said is that but then when things go wrong the the wrong response to it is to just resent what has gone wrong if instead we withdraw our consciousness we focus on krishna we get some inner peace we get a higher satisfaction and when we get that higher satisfaction after that our mind becomes calm devotion makes our head clear and our heart pure what is bhakti to devotion it makes our head clear you know there are so many different ideas there is that that all that is going on in the air it makes our head clear and then it makes our heart pure heart pure means what ultimately i'm a servant whatever situation krishna puts me i'm going to serve and i'm a servant okay if things didn't work out this way okay i can serve in some way a specific form of service may not be possible for me but service is still possible so once our head becomes clear and the heart becomes pure then we can look at the situation with greater maturity so many possibilities can open so when something has gone wrong what can we do we can find some clear tangible means to set it right or we can decide okay it's going wrong but it's not the end of the world okay i'll just accept it and i'll move on with other things in my life or if things have gone wrong you may even say to walk away from that situation this is not a favourable situation for me so i'll walk away from it so for example when prabhupada was preaching in india and he did not get results so what did he do in some situations he didn't work at one place he tried another place he tried in delhi he tried in jhansi he tried with his godbrothers he tried when he mapped about it he kept trying various things so at one particular point he felt that no india things are not working he just walked away he went to a manual so possibilities open when we accept reality as long as we are resenting reality then we are ourselves closing our possibilities so one cause of dissatisfaction in bhakti is not that the process of bhakti is not working it is not that bhakti is not joyful it is that we are not emotionally available for receiving krishna and that's why we do not experience the joyfulness of the remembrance of krishna so apart from this apart from resentment of reality dissatisfaction can be caused also by incompatibility incompatibility means that there are certain situations in which we are just not compatible so at that time bhakti is not just about as i said call of our war with reality does not mean that we artificially try to put a circular peg in a square hole no circular peg cannot go in a square hole so bhakti is not something which necessarily means that our material nature will change our material nature will stay the same not may it will stay the same but what can change is our capacity to deal with incompatibility when there are situations which are not suitable for which are not compatible for us how do we deal with it one is just really we just resent it resent it resent it another is we redirect our energy and we find out what situation is compatible and we move on with the situation so in the mahabharata when the pandavas first come from the himalayas the pandavas have been born in the himalayas pandu had retired from his householder life more or less from his life as a king and he was living in the forest that's where kunti begot the five pandavas through the five devas and then when pandu passed away tragically at that time the seniors they told kunti now these are princess somebody has to train them so therefore take all of them back and then he says no take you you should not take all of them back we will come with you because this was what duryodhana had as why he wanted to hold on to the kingdom so one of the arguments which he needs sometimes would advance although no one would give him much credit for that no one would take it seriously and he would say that who knows that the pandavas are actually the sons of pandu he said that it was well known that pandu could not beget children he had a curse by which if he tried to beget children he would die so who knows that the pandavas are actually children of pandu so then actually here it was just his way to try to cast a curse but the sages who were there in the himalayas they knew this possibility and that's why they all came with kunti and they testified they told bheeshma they told ithrashtra it told all of them that these are the sons of pandu pandu had asked devdas to come and this sort of surrogate parenting what some surrogate parenting surrogate parenting means that somebody else acts as the father this was a standard practise not just in indian culture but if you look at the ancient history all over the world you know that the idea that the emphasis around the dynasty has to be continued and the dynasty has to be continued if because of some reason the husband cannot beget children then there will be someone else with some respectable person either brother-in-law which is what happened with bheeshma or if the brother-in-law was not available then someone else the point was not on the sexual contact the point was on the continuation of the dynasty and if that sort of surrogate parenting had been done on the instruction of the father on the instruction of the husband then the resulting children were called as the children of the father not of that particular man so it's called as yoga the sanskrit word for this is yoga so the wife they get children from some other man but they are considered the children of her husband it's called yoga and it is a sort of standard practise and the pandavas were regarded in this way and they were so now initially the pandavas lived like more or less like brahmanas because they were surrounded by brahmanas and having been surrounded by brahmanas they were brought up as pandavas and kshatriyas but he had renounced most of the kshatriya activities so they would do some exercising and they had impressive physical builds they had demolished but still their overall temperament had been brahminical and that's why we see psychologists say that there are multiple factors which determine human behaviour so one of them is one of the primary components of our behaviour is our upbringing so broadly there is our upbringing there is our association there is our free will and there is our past life nature which comes at birth so from the past life nature the pandavas and kshatriyas but from upbringing they were they had brought up in a brahminical and that is why initially the pandavas were very non-aggressive how it happened is that duryodhana because the pandu had gone and nobody knew that pandu had begotten children they thought pandu was not going to beget children and even children when pandu begot children also still there was no indication that pandu was going to come back or his sons are going to come back so everybody was assuming that duryodhana who was the eldest son of dhritarashtra he was going he was the heir apparent heir apparent means he was going to the next king and that's why everybody would pay attention to him everybody would dote on him he was the sign of all eyes and then suddenly so he had grown up as in what today language called a spoiled brat now he was a spoiled brat so he had been completely habituated to being the centre of attention and centre of pampering from everyone and then suddenly the pandavas came and now we found that first of all the pandavas were new and who are these children how are they and they found that the pandavas because of their brahminical mode of upbringing they were gentle they were courteous they were respectful and in terms of behaviour even the aggressive bhima was better than this abrasive duryodhana and duryodhana was no match for yudhishthira yudhishthira was virtue personified and suddenly duryodhana saw the whole attention shift away from him he just couldn't digest it and from that time he had in today's language many times when children grow up they have they have what is called an entitlement mentality entitlement is i'm entitled to this i'm entitled to that i'm entitled to that so duryodhana thought he had this duryodhana had this entitlement mentality i'm entitled to all this so they have taken it away from me and he became resentful about it and you know sometimes some people try to argue duryodhana was a good person but he was spoiled by shakuni if that's not true actually duryodhana tried to poison bhima even before shakuni gave it the picture it was just small children not not babies but they were just in there not even in their teens at that time and at that age to have that cunningness to plan a whole conspiracy he while he told the pandavas that oh i have invited you for a feast and then he had food filled with poison specially prepared for bhima and he told bhima oh you know you are my special friend and i have prepared a special feast for you and i'll personally serve it to you now bhima he he had a guideless nature he did not suspect anything so then he just ate all the food can you imagine this small children have some resentment children have some you know one child quarrels with another i'll not talk with you this thing can you imagine one child sometimes children get angry nowadays even we see in america especially because children have guns sometimes children get angry then they will run and shoot each other so that is bad enough but even they are not so diabolical as to plan a conspiracy in which you have a sweet mouth and poison food now he's speaking sweetly to bhima and he's poisoning him so now bhima there's a whole series of events but bhima survives and bhima comes back and he's hungry but when he tells yudhisthira yudhisthira says tolerate it he says we don't want to create a disruption in the royal family we don't want to create a disruption and as of now they may not believe people may not believe him so just tolerate it so about the panda it's a murder attempt it's a serious thing to try to poison someone similarly when the panda was attempted to be burned alive in varnavat at that time also they tolerate it at that time there is a whole incident happens by which they can flee from there and somebody else gets burned and the gauravas think that panda was getting burned but the pandas could have come back immediately at that time and why they again slip back and what is the guard that they take of brahmin so you know suppose somebody has come from maharashtra childhood they have spoken marathi and they come to bengal and they learn bengali and they speak in bengali but then if they have to go back and then they have to speak in some other language the first language they were speaking marathi because that's the language of their upbringing so like that the upbringing culture was brahmanical so yudhisthira shifted to the brahmanical mode of living and then you know nobody detected also they were anything other than brahmanas they were see it's one thing to be pretend to pretend to be brahmanas with people who are not brahmanas just like you know somebody can put on antikarta and say i'm harikrishna devotee and others think okay you're a harikrishna devotee but you come and live among devotees then devotees will say hey you're not chanting properly you don't know this rule you're not doing that so to act as a devotee among those who don't know what devotees are that is also difficult just excellence will be enough but to act as a devotee while living among devotees that requires some doing the mandavas were not just living as brahmanas but they were living among brahmanas and still nobody detected them why because brahmana had become more or less like a second nature and then eventually when arjuna won the hand of draupadi then because they had formed an alliance with drupada when drupada sent a message and dhritarashtra realised i cannot antagonise as it is i have antagonised people because people saw through it people loved the citizens loved the pandavas and when the varnamal palace was burned down the citizens in general blamed the kuru alliance dhritarashtra said i feel ashamed to show my face in public now because everybody thinks that i was a part of the conspiracy that led to the death of the orphan children of pandu in the vedic culture if a child does not have a father it's almost like he's considered to be an orphan the mother is there but she said they were my responsibility and they were killed so eventually he says get them back he says do you know what citizens are talking about you how much ignominy can you endure so dhritarashtra because of the pressure of the public because of the fear with drupada by the time drupada was a formidable king he get the pandavas back and even after having gone through all this you know dhritarashtra attempted to be murdered the pandavas themselves all of them were attempted to be murdered and even after that when the kingdom is offered they are offered a barren half of the kingdom you know which son if a father is giving inheritance father has two companies one company is very prosperous other is completely bankrupt and the father divides it into two because one bankrupt one son that son will rise and protest and be practically a fratricidal war among them again the pandavas don't protest they accept it but eventually in the gambling match at that time when the pandavas lose everything pandavas know durudana is this durudana is delighting and the pandavas are losing everything and the pandavas are angry but still they control their anger dhima is furious dhima controls his anger like the whole match is rigged how is it rigged see the pause say india is going to play a cricket match in zimbabwe and in india zimbabwe is not a very good cricket team so india sends the india 80 and then in india in zimbabwe suddenly zimbabwe gets the team of south africa out of it because you know you play with them you can play with them but that's a different match that will be a match between india and south africa if it's supposed to be a match between india and zimbabwe then the zimbabwe team has to be there you cannot have the south africa team over there so similarly yudhishthir makes the point that oh is it durudana if we are to gamble then you should be playing it's a match between yudhishthir and durudana durudana should be playing if shakuni is playing it's a rigged match understanding this point you cannot have someone else play for you then it is not a match between you and that person so it is a rigged match but still the pandavas right from the beginning in the match is rigged pandavas accept it when they lose everything they lose themselves also they accept it when they are they are practically become dishonoured they become slaves but when daupadi is dishonoured then then you know that kshatriya nature comes out at that time that nature cannot be controlled but because of the upbringing they are acting brahmanically but when daupadi is dishonoured kshatriya will shudder kshatriya one who protects people from hurt bheema becomes so angry he tells sahadev sahadev get fire he says i will destroy all the kauravas but before that i will burn the hands of yudhishthir these were the hands with which he cast the dice because of which draupadi has become a slave to wicked man just these hands should be burned now when bheema speaks this but the kauravas kauravas are delighted they want ascension among the pandavas so at that time arjuna catches bheema by shoulder and says bheema why are you how are you speaking such words don't you know that yudhishthir did not gamble by his will that he was forced to gamble and time and time he opposed the gambling match but only because his elders told him because he's so unctuous that he considers dhritarashtra to be like his father dhritarashtra's world to be like his father's command that is why he fought do not now all this reasoning bheema is such a play completely all this reasoning doesn't work so then see kshatriyas also have shrewdness one of the daaksham daaksham they're so foolish so arjuna is also shrewd arjuna knows that they're with brother brother they're living together so how is my work you know so he he says oh bheema why are you giving joy to your enemies he says yes you're right i had known that yudhishthir did not do this intentionally because if he had done it i would have burned his hands long ago he says now then he takes off he says you know this duryodhana he showed his thigh to draupadi i will break his thigh he says dushyasana is not as he can drag dhrupadi's arm and cut off his arm and all the pandavas take vows at that time so at that time when that provocation comes or they because of their upbringing they're consistently acted as brahmanas but when dhrupadi is dishonoured at that time the kshatriya nature bursts forth and it is that time that the rift between the kauravas and pandavas becomes completely broken it becomes completely broken so the whole mahabharat's mood so there is there is rivalry and there is enmity rivalry means there are two two players say that two tennis players two chess players they are rivals and then they they may be competing intensely but off the court they are friends but from rivalry to enmity means you know off the court also they are just spewing poison against each other the whole thing becomes very bitter after that so even for pandavas they had a brahminical upbringing and among the pandavas yudhishthir he is the most brahminical but still his kshatriya nature also gets aroused and he fights fear he takes the vow that i'll be killing shalya and he does kill shalya eventually so ultimately our nature cannot be suppressed or we may by cultivating certain kind of upbringing some kind of training we may be able to act in a particular way for a certain amount of time but our nature will surface soon at the same time we have to know that our nature is not very easy to discern that means that in the mahabharat itself there is a when there is a serpent when the king nahusha in the garb of a serpent he's there at that time this nahusha it's a long story but nahusha and yudhishthir has a question answers at that time nahusha asks yudhishthir how do we know a person who is a brahmin and then yudhishthir says he has various symptoms but then nahusha says but these characteristics are seen even in those who are not born in brahminical families he says then wherever these qualities are found that is a brahmin then in the nahusha asks okay if you say qualities are all determined in brahmin then what is the point of having this division by caste wherever we see qualities we only call quantas as brahmins why have this caste called brahmin at all it's only qualities he says no traditionally the qualities meant according to genealogy when the brahmin and brahmin united they would have a brahminical approach in general how this works is that from the biological point of view biologists tries to say that our characteristics are determined by our genes so our genes are not a complete explanation but these are part of the explanation so how it works is that if a soul has done certain activities which lead to the cultivation of a brahminical nature then the soul is likely to have a in the next life and that soul goes into a brahmin's womb in the next life and that's how this genealogy and genetics they match by past karma a soul who has a brahminical nature or soul who has cultivated a brahminical disposition goes into a brahmin brahminical brahmin's womb and that's how genealogy and genetics they match together and overlap and yet there are times when genetics and genealogy don't overlap it means there is for example Beethoven considered a very great musician and if you look nowhere in his dynasty anybody had a musical talent neither his mother nor his father sometimes they say sometimes researchers try to explain by saying genes of generations so how they do it they don't know but they say it happens I say okay the grandfather may have had some quality the father does not have but does grinds and doubles the genes jump generations but you look several generations up nobody had musical qualities even a musical genius like you so our qualities are not determined only by our genes there are what is called such as called as monozygotic twins monozygotic twins means that twins are formed in various ways sometimes two sperms enter and then two children are born but sometimes there is one one embryo that is formed one zygote is formed and that one zygote splits into two so then both the twins are genetically not just similar they're genetically identical and although they are genetically identical still they are behaviourally distinct so if we are determined by our genes then both the gene both the twins should be just clones of each other they're physically clones but they're really not clones they're behaviourally distinct so we are not just determined by our own genes alone so anyway the point here is that our nature so Yudhisthira says that at that time he's talking about 5000 years so even 5000 years ago we see Krishna is saying by the power of night time this knowledge has been destroyed so what this means is Krishna is saying the culture that is present at his time that culture is not the ideal culture sometimes people ask him why was Karna discriminated according to his birth yes he was discriminated by his birth of course that the whole he himself made wrong choices and that's how he got consequences for that the point is Krishna himself telling over there the culture at his time is not the ideal culture so the discrimination that happened against Karna that is not standard with the culture so Yudhisthira is reiterating the same point when he's talking here he says that by his time itself there has been many generations of interbreeding between different varanas and because of interbreeding between different varanas so now means he's saying at that time it is difficult to determine the Varana of a person just by birth so that's why we'll have to look at qualities and determine the Varana and again determining Varana or determining Svabhava can become even more difficult if there is interbreeding between different Varanas then genetically we get some disqualities some disqualities so people have not just one one Varana but they may have get Krishna Varanas so that's why determining our nature is not a very easy task and if we leave it to our mind what happens the mind says whatever you are doing that is not your nature whatever you are doing this the service you are doing is not your nature so that way the mind keeps us dissatisfied no matter whatever so determining our nature is not a very easy thing and if we start thinking if I am doing this service and I feel dissatisfied therefore this service is not my nature then we are making a mistake over here there is something which is dissatisfaction which is caused just because the mind should have been right it should have been like this it should have been like that it should have been like that any service that we do there are going to be problems even if we are doing several areas which we like to do still there are going to be problems nothing is easy in this world here Krishna is describing his pure devotees now and what is Krishna saying Krishna is saying that they serve me with great determination some people wonder you know we need determination because our senses are running here and there our mind is running here and there I shouldn't pure devotees be at the level of spontaneous bhakti why do they need great determination if he has if he has spontaneous attraction to Krishna then bhakti should be spontaneous why does Krishna say that they need great determination because they are serving in this world in this world even if someone is a pure devotee even pure devotees will face problems sometimes you say Prabhupada is empowered so he was able to spread Krishna consciousness all over the world but empowered does not mean that there are no obstacles for him empowerment doesn't mean absence of obstacles empowerment means perseverance amidst obstacles Prabhupada empowered means that no matter how many obstacles came how many obstacles came he kept persevering persevering persevering so even pure devotees require determination so if pure devotees who are serving Krishna require determination then when we are serving even if we are serving according to our nature still we will require determination so whatever you can be able to tell bhakti is not possible if we give into the resentment of the mind and it is also not possible if we are serving in a way in which we get carried away by the mind thinking that oh this is not my nature this is not my nature it's not my nature yes we do keep doing services whatever that we are told to do but at the same time we also observe okay what is it in general for us to know if something is our nature there are two main things guna karman bhava kashyam guna means but there's internal comfort in doing it and karma means there's external competence in doing it externally we are good at doing something and internally we feel happy by doing it that is a general indication that okay this is something which is likely to be by nature so we keep we keep doing services as we are told and we keep observing ourselves and as we keep doing this gradually we will gravitate towards the service according to our nature and then we will move on in our bhakti so rather than thinking that oh i am dissatisfied in bhakti so that means also the bhakti doesn't work but you see what is it that is obstructing us in the most subtle way so certainly we have anarthas and we have to deal with anarthas but i'm talking about something different last time there will be there but i'm talking more about other subtle ways in which the mind creates obstacles in our bhakta so it's all right jaya jaya krishna and be happy that means jaya jaya krishna is a sadhana bhakti be happy is a disposition so sometimes we think satisfaction i'm feeling satisfied i'm feeling dissatisfied satisfaction is not just an emotion satisfaction is also a decision satisfaction is not just an emotion it's also a decision that in the bhagavad gita krishna talks about austerity of the mind so manam prasad is satisfaction and krishna says this is austerity of the mind so sri more we think of the sense objects the more we become dissatisfied instead he says if you think about the past times of krishna the koranas are filled with satisfying stories about krishna if you think about them we will become we will gain satisfaction so all of us we have to find out which are the things which cause dissatisfaction for us and which are the things which bring satisfaction so satisfaction is a decision means that we should we decide okay i'll think about these i will channel my energy in these books then we can be satisfied in material life you will see that if we look at all the things that we don't have then we will never be satisfied the whole advertising industry what does it do it focusses on showing us the things which we don't have and in that way it drags it enslaves us to perpetually dissatisfaction and what applies to advertisement when the mind is like the internal advertising agent for mind the mind will always show us what we don't have i'll conclude one example of how the mind keeps us dissatisfied say if there is a feast but this is a special feast what is the speciality everybody has different food items he has a special feast he has a special feast everybody has got different items some items are similar some items are different and we have a feast in front of us but what does he have what does he have what does he have and the person oh i don't have that i don't have that i don't know what you have So like that, all of us have been given different gifts.
What we have is God's gift to us. What we become is our gift to God. What we have is God's gift to us.
We all have talents, we all have abilities, we all have certain gifts, but often we get to God and say, oh, this person can sing so nicely, this person can do this so nicely, this person can do this so nicely, and we neglect what we have. And in that way, although we have a feast before us, that feast stays as it is. And see, even when we have talents, talent doesn't automatically translate into achievement.
Talent plus commitment leads to achievement. When I have talent, I have to work. Even if a person is a very good batsman, very good bowler, very good, any field, very good, the talent has to be filled with commitment.
One has to practise. Any field will do. So we may have certain talents, and some people may have more talents, some people may have less talents, but whatever talents we have, if we become committed to developing that, we can improve and we can also achieve things in our life.
But if instead of, so we, as I talk about this feast, different people have different feasts, what I mean by that is, all of us have certain talents. And what we need to do is, look, I have commitment. But instead of commitment, what the mind does is, it makes dissatisfaction.
Oh, he has that. Oh, she has that. Oh, they have that.
I don't have that. And we stay dissatisfied. And that way, because we don't commit ourselves to developing our talents, we don't achieve anything.
And then we stay, we become another dissatisfied mind. So first dissatisfaction is thinking I don't have talents. Second dissatisfaction is because I have not achieved anything.
On the other hand, we avoid that. Okay, whatever talents I have, I use them, and I serve Krishna. And so this way, if we understand that our happiness and bhakti is not determined by what we have, our happiness and bhakti is determined by what we do with what we have.
Our happiness is not determined by what we have, it is determined by what we do with what we have. Somebody may have a brilliant singing voice. And every time that person sings, you know, everybody feels so captivated.
But if that person is thinking that I am singing so that everybody will be impressed. And each time that person is singing, that person will be looking, oh, who all is admiring? Who is not admiring? And that person is singing about Krishna, but that person is not remembering Krishna. There will not be much, there will be some egoistic satisfaction, but no spiritual satisfaction.
Somebody else may have a little talent, maybe some moderate, moderate singing voice is there. But while singing, that person offers that to Krishna. And that person will gain greater spiritual satisfaction.
So, in material life, our talents are significantly consequential. In spiritual life, our talents are not all that consequential. What is really consequential is our commitment.
If we have commitment to serve Krishna, even if we have less talents or more talents, it does not matter. We will get that connection with Krishna and through that connection we will experience spiritual satisfaction. laṅgyaṁ labdhvā cāparaṁ lābhaṁ manyate nādhikaṁ tathā kṣuṅgato duḥkhena guruṇāṁ pīcāriti Krishna says that the yogi, he is talking from 6.21 to 6.24 here, about the perfection of the yogi who has attained the level of samādhi.
And he says, laṅgyaṁ labdhvā, having attained this, na cāparaṁ lābhaṁ nothing higher to be achieved. manyate nādhikaṁ tathā The yogi accepts that nothing higher to be achieved and the yogi becomes satisfied in that. So like that, we don't have to bother about what all talents we have.
If we can direct our heart towards Krishna, with whatever we have, we can experience great spiritual satisfaction there. And this Buddha, if we can perform bhakti joyfully, and to the extent we perform bhakti joyfully, it is more and more pleasing to Krishna. And when it is pleasing to Krishna, then he is reciprocated by ātma-prasāda.
He will give us spiritual satisfaction. So to summarise, I started by talking about how, is bhakti, is joy something which we have to bring to the process, or is joy the result of the process. So I said both are equal.
It's like when there is treatment, the treatment will lead to good health and good cheer. But just the knowledge that now I have safe hands, now I have got good treatment, that itself brings relief and joy to the patient. So like that, we need to be grateful that we have this opportunity to practise bhakti and be joyful there.
What can take away our joyfulness is resentment. So for everyone, devotees and non-devotees, things will go wrong in life. And resentment of reality often hurts more than reality.
Reality is a problem like a 20 kg burden, but our resentment of it is a 30 kg burden on top of that. It crushes us, it paralyses us. Tolerance means to call off our war with reality.
If we have gone on the wrong track, no need to get obsessed with I should have been there, I should have been there. Don't bother our mind should have narrating, focus on where I am. And then you decide what to do.
So possibility is open when we begin from where we are. Then we can either correct the situation, we can just abandon the whole thing. Or we can decide to address it in some other way.
But devotion makes our head clear and our heart pure. By which we can find out solutions. Another thing which causes dissatisfaction, dissatisfaction in bhakti may be caused by resentment of things that are happening.
Dissatisfaction may also be caused by incompatibility. In that I talked elaborately about the Pandavas life. Because of the brahminical upbringing, they acted brahminically.
But when the provocations came, then the Shakla nature came about. So like that by brahminical training, all of us may act brahminically sometime. And that's how we should live in the initial stage of our bhakti.
But in new course of time, our nature will emerge and we will gravitate towards serving according to our nature. But we should not let our mind enslave us in the name of nature. Because mind will say whatever service you are doing, that is not my nature.
Every service will have difficulties. So rather than deciding, thinking that our nature is to be determined by what is difficult or what is easy for us. We basically do what our senses are told and we keep observing our nature.
That which we are internally comfortable with and externally competent at. That we will gradually understand to be our nature. And we are all having feasts.
But they are different feasts. Instead of watching at what others have got, we focus on what is in our plate and relish that. So talent plus achievement plus commitment will lead to achievement.
What we have is God's gift to us. What we do with what we have, what we become is our gift to God. Our happiness in bhakti does not depend on what we have.
Little or a lot, it depends on what we do with what we have. And that offering to Krishna what we have, that is always in our control. What we have is not in our control.
Sometimes we may have a lot, not much. But what we do with what we have is in our control. And focussing on that, we can all experience higher spiritual happiness.
Even in the sadhana stage. And as we become more and more purified, that happiness will increase more and more. Atma, prasadam, in bhakti we become joyful.
Thank you very much. Are there any questions?