Gita 18.37 – Long-term commitment & short-term sacrifice guarantee succes

Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
Thank you. Yathuto grevishameva parinamaya mrutopamam tat sukham sattvikam paroktam atma buddhi prasadajam This is Bhagavad Gita, 18.37. Here, Krishna is talking about a vital principle to guide us in our quest for happiness.
Yathuto grevishameva, that which tastes like poison in the beginning, parinamaya mrutopamam, but the result will be nectar. tat sukham sattvikam paroktam That is the nature of happiness in the mode of goodness. Atma buddhi prasadajam And this happiness takes us closer to Krishna.
So here, persistence for achieving a long-term goal is emphasized. A famous Harvard University research pointed out that if there was any one successful characteristic, one characteristic that all successful people had, that was a long-term vision. Willingness to work for a long-term vision.
Those people who had become even materially successful, CEOs of companies, champion athletes, or extraordinary performers in any field, they all had long-term vision, which enabled them to make many short-term sacrifices and persevere till they got the eventual reward. In today’s world, sports stars are often worshipped almost like God. They may appear superhuman the way they perform in the sporting arenas.
Effortlessly a batsman hits a sixer, or a particular tennis player serves with such precision and power, stunning the opponent with a barrad of aces, or in any force field like that. Now when they perform there in the stadium, they appear stunning. But if you look at their lives, we know that they have spent years and years and years of exhausting, painstaking practice to come to that level of proficiency.
Similarly, if that applies, if so much hard work is required with a long-term vision, for success even at the material level, then for success at the spiritual level, wherein we will attain eternal happiness, how much more endeavor, how much more we should be willing to endeavor. Actually in today’s world, the tendency is to act according to feel-good stimuli. So whatever feels good, I will do.
If a product makes me feel good, I will purchase it. Similarly, if spirituality feels good, then I will practice it. This feel-good spirituality or feel-good attitude towards spirituality can be our greatest enemy for feeling ultimately good.
Because even spiritual success requires a long-term commitment that begins with short-term sacrifices. Yes, certain music, certain sites, certain meditations may make us feel good immediately, but temporarily. Whereas, if we want to feel good sustainably, then that requires freeing ourselves from those impressions and conditionings that make us feel bad.
That not just make us feel bad, but that make us do bad. That means removing our impurities. And removing our impurities, that is purifying ourselves, is a process that requires sustained practice.
So when we chant Hare Krishna, we are committing ourselves to Krishna. We are committing ourselves to the All-Supreme Lord who, by His purity, will purify us. But because of our layers of conditioning, we have acquired impure tastes.
So, chanting requires concentrating on Krishna and disconnecting our consciousness from worldly things. And because of our current impure tastes, because of our current impure interests, it is difficult for us to focus on Krishna. And because of that difficulty in focusing on Him, and because of the affinity for focusing on worldly things, chanting can seem like a pain.
So, agre vishamiva, it may seem like a poison mission. But if we keep focusing on Krishna, then gradually we will develop taste for Him. And that taste can go on eternally.
It can help us to transcend whatever sufferings we may face in our life, in this world, and could take us ultimately beyond the suffering-filled world entirely. So by keeping this long-term vision in mind, we can get the determination and make the commitment to chant attentively, no matter how we feel. And thereby, we can attain everlasting happiness, which is life’s supreme success, everlasting happiness, in a life of pure love for Krishna.
That is the fruit that chanting will give us.