Does loving Krishna always protect us from all heartbreaks?
So, that is the sequence that is being talked about over there. Does making Krishna the object of our love ensure us against all heartbreaks? Does devotee not feel pain when say the spiritual master departs or when some respected devotee has a fall or when a similar such, when a trusted person, even if not a devotee, betrays, does all this not cause heartbreak to a devotee also? Answer, when we talk about developing love for Krishna, we should not think of Krishna as disconnected from everything else. It is not that Krishna is somewhere up there in the sky and we love him and we would love anyone else.
So, actually when we love Krishna, it is a love that degrades everything else and connects us everything with Krishna. So, certainly a devotee feels great distress when the spiritual master departs and in such situations, the pain can often be greater than the pain that there is when there is a heartbreak in material relationships. But the difference is that even in this bereavement, the devotee's relationship with Krishna deepens.
If the devotee has loved the spiritual master independently of Krishna, then the relationship, even with the spiritual master, if it is just based on the physical looks of the spiritual master or on the external characteristics, then that separation because of the departure of the spiritual master can cause a lot of trauma. But when the devotee has seen the spiritual master as connected with Krishna, our whole Guruvashtukam, which we sing in the mornings at Mangalarthi time, is based on glorifying the spiritual master for the spiritual master's connection with Krishna. So, it has to be a connected vision.
So, when we feel when the spiritual master departs, if we have seen the spiritual master as representing Krishna, as presenting Krishna to us, as connecting us with Krishna, then we feel grateful to the spiritual master for having given us Krishna and we feel inspired to carry on that legacy. So, the whole event takes Krishna deeper into our heart and the spiritual master doesn't want us to love him independent of Krishna. So, the spiritual master has come to help us develop our relationship with Krishna.
And naturally, we understand that our relationship with spiritual master is also spiritual when we are focused on Krishna as the center. Even in the spiritual master-disciple relationship, if Krishna is not at the center, if the spiritual master comes at the center, and not the devotional aspect of the spiritual master, but the external aspect of the spiritual master, then that can cause a lot of virium, to such an extent that the person may even stop practicing spiritual life. And if the person stops practicing spiritual life, that means Krishna was never really firmly established at the center of the heart of that person.
So, for a serious devotee, we don't say that there are no emotions in the spiritual path. Definitely emotions are there and emotions are desirable. So, actually any emotion connected with Krishna, whether it appears externally positive or externally negative, it is joyful because it deepens, it intensifies our remembrance of Krishna.
That's why when the gopis are in separation from Krishna, they seem to be in agony, crying for Krishna. But their deepest ecstasy, because any connection with Krishna is joyful. It is like sweet nectar and bitter nectar.
It is nectar. So, remembrance of Krishna, when it is filled with joyous occasions, it is like sweet nectar. When remembrance of Krishna is induced by momentously painful occasions, like say that dispatch of the spiritual master, that also increases the remembrance of Krishna and in its own way it is sweet.
So, then if a respected devotee has a fall, that time also the devotees do feel pain and that pain can be like a heartbreak. But again, if our faith has been centered on Krishna and we are seeing the devotee as a representative of Krishna, then we understand that ultimately it is Krishna, whatever inspiration, whatever guidance we had got from that devotee, it was Krishna who was giving us through that devotee. So, then that means Krishna is giving us a shelter so that we can ultimately attain his shelter.
So, if this shelter lets us down, then we understand that I have to take greater shelter of Krishna. So, that way certainly there is pain. There is no point in saying it is not true that for a devotee there are no emotions.
Emotions means there are positive as well as negative emotions, joyful as well as painful emotions. But Krishna always remains in the center of the heart of the devotee and that's why the happiness of the devotee in connection with Krishna, it always becomes deeper. Even in separation, the devotee's joy becomes greater all the time because the remembrance of Krishna is always very soul-less giving, strength giving, stability giving.
And if a devotee experiences some upheaval in the maternal relationships, a devotee may also have family members or acquaintances or friends who may not be devotees and if there is a heartbreak in that relationship, then devotee understands that actually all relationships, they may be giving me some love but it is Krishna who is giving me that love through all those people. So, we are surrounded by many people who may offer us love. There may be some devotees, there may be some non-devotees also.
But ultimately, whoever is loving us, it is Krishna manifesting a bit of love for us through those people. So, therefore, we focus on going to the source and we take all the love that we are getting from different people and we understand it's just a drop as Dhruva Maharaj told by his mother, the Lord Vishnu can offer you more of love than what thousands of mothers like me can offer. Therefore, when we get love from others and say that relationship is lost either because of bereavement or betrayal, then we understand, okay, this is a drop coming from here.
That drop can cause so much emotion, positively when it is there and negatively when it goes away. How much more emotion will be there in the ocean? And Krishna is the ocean of love, Prema Sagar. So, when we focus on Krishna with this understanding, then everything that happens in this world, though it may cause some turbulence in our emotions, but it tightens our hold on Krishna's lotus feet.
It inspires us to bring Krishna more and more into our heart, to take his shelter more and more and thereby gain the supreme stability and ecstasy in that relationship with Krishna. So, when we use the word heart breaks in material life, a person loses any point to live itself. A person feels that life itself is worth living, not worth living, but for a devotee, because Krishna is always there and the relationship with Krishna is always there, life is always worth living.
And whatever events negatively happen, they inspire the devotee to go deeper and deeper into the relationship with Krishna and thereby gain the supreme stability. Thank you.