Hanuman’s Journey to Maturity, Part 2 – 4 Characteristics of Maturity – HG Chaitanya Charan Das

This is. This is a book that is, and it’s titled ‘Plays’ inspired by the Bhagavad Gita. For me, among all the scriptures, the Bhagavad Gita is the book which is I have connected with the most. And the Gita’s verses are not just sources of wisdom for me. They are equal friends.

I feel like I have a relationship with all the verses, some more than others. And just like if you have a friend, then you want to know more and more about the friend. And one way you know more about the friend, our friend is by meeting them in different contexts, different places. You know somebody at work, then you meet them at their home, you meet them in some recreational place, you meet them in a temple, you meet them in some high pressure situation. So we learn more.

So like that, I have been when I was writing Gita in the articles and writing books on the Gita, I tried to approach the Gita’s verses from different perspectives. Shriyakopal also said that studying scriptures, cooking lines in the reading, studying from different perspectives. So when I had read Krishna Chitrakar’s commentary on the Gita, that’s one of my favorite commentaries, he approached he shows how the Gita is filled with so much devotion for Krishna. So, I was thinking about how when we approach the Gita’s verses, if we could approach them not just in a mood of understanding, but seeing them as sources of praying. If wisdom can inspire a well informed prayer within our heart.

And then I was going through Gautama Stotra, it’s a composition by Kulusekhar Maharaj, and there I saw something which to me seemed to be a literal application of this. In 12.6seven, Krishna says Desha ma’am samuddhata viptya samsara sahkaranat says, I will lift you out of the ocean of material existence. And, Because you have promised that you will do this, O Lord! So how can we take the Gita’s verses and offer prayers based on that? That’s what I’ve been trying to explore in this book.

So basically, when we have prayers, the prayers can be generally when we sing prayers, we have scriptural or traditional prayers. That means we have mangalati, vihanarsi maati, s o m e, krishna songs. And now these have the weight of authority to them. They are great. It’s coming from scripture.

It’s coming from tradition. And when we sing these, we recite these following the tradition that connects us with the Lord. At the same time, we could offer personal prayers because we all are ultimately meant to develop our relationship with our Sheena. So when you offer personal prayers, that brings authenticity, because this is what we are feeling. We are going through certain situations, we are facing certain challenges, and in those situation challenges, how can we approach the Lord?

So I thought that if we could have prayers that were scriptural plus personal, That means we start with the scriptural words and then compose a prayer based on that that will have the weight of authority and authenticity together. And Rishi Srila Prabhupada does this in his marking in Bhagavad Dharma, the song which he composed when he was approaching America. Then he’s pouring out his own heart, vorokurpa koiye krishna adhale ra prati. But in the middle of that, what he does is, he’s bringing bhagavadam voices. So what he is praying is actually very much based on the bhavatham.

So he prays for example that that if anybody hears Bhagavatam repeatedly, they will become they will become sober. And then Prabhupada is making this statement, but then he’s quoting the Bhagavatam verses where he says Shrutam, Sugata, Krishna, and the whole series of the darajastha mohava how one becomes sober, how one becomes zero? So this is my attempt to do that over here, something similar following with, Krushikar Maharaj and Prabhupada. There are five components in each of the players. The first is that we have the first is we have a beautiful picture of Krishna over here, and then with the picture of Krishna there are different deities from different temples.

Dvds deities they are mentioned at right bottom. Then, the way I am approaching this particular prayer The way I’m approaching this prayer, or this verse of this prayer, that is summarized in one sentence. So please change the memories replaying inside me. And then I’ve taken the Gita’s verse, which which it is based, and then I have translated the verse in English poetry. So, because the Gita is a song, and then when we forget that when we approach a philosophy, we look at a poetic devotional field I have or translate it at the end, based on that there is a prayer that is inspired.

So let’s look at this now. So let’s just recite the words together Most of us know the words, so not responsibly, but let’s do it together. For sense pleasures the wise person abstains, yet the taste in the heart remains, but seeing the supreme sweet and bright even that, craving, loses its might. So, param drishta vivartate. The craving loses its might.

This is Bhavita 2.59. So I would request different devotees to read one paragraph and then we will discuss the topic about Hanumanji today. Who would like to read one paragraph? Do you have a second mic? Or does anyone have a mic in their throat?

Yeah. Here, please. My dear lord, it is impossible to live completely free from exposure to temptation in a world that is filled with temptations. Yes. That’s a basic fact of life.

We can’t really close, guys. You can go ahead. It’s valuable. Yeah, please. Even when I resolve to turn away from them so that the images playing in front of my eyes do not get imprinted in my mind, my mind simply switches gears and replaces them with images from my past, replaying them on an endless loop.

Yes. This is our predicament. We can turn away from tempting objects in the outer world, but those impressions are there inside. And those impressions keep replay. Now temptations interestingly may as early as possible pleasure, but the mind is such that it replays memories not just of pleasure but also of pain.

If somebody has spoken something hurtful to us And they may have spoken it one year ago, but as soon as we see them, those memories get triggered. We start playing. And sometimes we decide, I don’t want to associate with this person also. But still, I’ll keep a distance on that person I feel those memories still stay. So for us, when technology is advancing so much, we have created so many comforts in the outer world, and we are creating more and more comforts.

But what we are terribly lacking in today’s world is the capacity to form healthy memories or the capacity to change the memories that go on ourselves. In fact, many people nowadays grow up with various kinds of trauma. And trauma means what? That some terrible thing happened in the past it may have some physical impact, but more than that, it has an emotional, mental, psychological impact. And, in many ways, the greatest cause of unhappiness in the world at a practical level is not the events that happen in the world.

Yes, there are many distressing, painful events that happen, but actually, it is the memories that are there inside. So the events can cause some unhappiness, but the memories cause far greater unhappiness. And when we say remember Krishna, this might seem just to be like a religious doctrine for those on the path of bhakti and it is true, but it is much much more than that. The process of remembering Krishna is meant to change the memories in our heart, the memories that keep playing inside us. We all seek to create happy memories.

If we go to some nice place, we take some photos. If we have some celebration, we take some photos. One keeps our memories. And those are physical memories. They’re important.

And those physical memories can trigger our internal memories. But irrespective of what triggers are present or not present there are certain memories that are playing inside us constantly. And when Krishna says Janma karmachime devyam he says he comes and performs extraordinary pastimes. One of the things that he does is through these memories, through these pastimes, and through meditating on these pastimes, we have the opportunity to form memories that lift us up, memories that purify and elevate us. So actually recognizing it’s that we have so much technological advancement, but there’s no technology to change memories.

Nothing you can put on your way back. All memories are changed. Now, you can wipe out the memory of a person. You can give them some drugs or you can give them some electric shocks, you can wipe out the memory sometimes. But then that person has become dysfunctional.

Does it change memories? Change memories for the better. Through technology, there’s so much entertainment available. Sometimes some entertainment, maybe they just consume entertainment and they forget it because they consume so much entertainment. Some entertainment may be very active, so it forms some memories.

And how do memories really better memories? So the purpose of performing leela, remembering leela, the lord is performing leela, and for our remembering the leela is to help us change the memories inside us. And among the various things, various pastimes purify us, the pastimes entertain us, the pastimes can captivate us, but through them all, in one sense the purpose of life- I’ll be doing this thing tomorrow also- if you want us from a psychological purpose- perspective It’s not a psychological perspective, no. But the purpose of life is to make our memory our treasury. Right now for many of us our memory might be our prison.

So our memory might be our prison means the memories that are plaguing inside us, they trap us in suffering. Now this person did like this to me. This happened over there, and this mistake happened. Sometimes the memories may be about what others did to us. Sometimes memories may be about what we did to ourselves also.

Mistakes we make. But we need to go beyond these memories. And Srila Prabhupada in Manaprasad Sammita Maunamato Nigra 17.16 Purport, he says the purpose to change the state of the mind is the purpose it is for changing the state of our mind that the Lord performs various pastels and we can turn towards those pastels, remember them and become purified. So with this context we’ll elaborate on this more again later but this just a couple of days ago was Hanuman Jayanti. So we’ll discuss some past tense of Hanuman, but before we go into this let’s get back to this theme of what our purpose is to change our memories.

And how do we change our memories? By finding within the pastimes something memorable. Memorable could be some point, could be some incident, could be some statement, whatever it is. And then that forms fresh impressions inside our mind. So when the lord’s past times are approached, lord’s past times, lord’s devotees past times, I talk about one philosophical thing tomorrow about the way in which you’re approaching the past tense.

But right now, I’m gonna talk about the purpose. So have any of you heard this word? What does it mean? Demigod? Devi and devuddha, yes.

Though I was at one. Actually where was I? Actually I was giving a talk at a, the English department in Cambridge, and there I used the word demigod. I said, this is a wrong using of the word. I said, what do you mean?

Then we had nice discussion on it, but it seems that now Prabhupada uses the word demigod almost in the sense of semigod. Like, somebody who is more powerful than us, but not as powerful as a supreme god. Now in the modern context, in the way the word is used, the word demigod is used in such a different sense. It’s like a demigod is a child of god plus human. That is the main video.

So for example, Arjuna would be considered to be demigod in today’s usage. So Arjuna was born of Indra and Kunti. Mhmm. So somebody who is so in that sense, is a partly god. So that is one way of using it.

So Prabhupada is using it more in the Prabhupada is using it more in the position. A person has a power greater than ours, but not as great as god’s. Now this con con current current usage is in more in terms of origin, that the person is more partly of humans and partly of partly of God. Therefore, not fully God. If a person is born fully of God, then there would be a God directly.

Right? So anyway, Hanuman, in this sense, is a demigod. Who were his parents? Bayu and? Bayu.

Anjina Devi. So now, Anjina was a human lady on the earth, and Bayu was a celestial lady. So now when he was born, there are many stories associated with his past with his past time, and I’ll focus on one particular theme. We’re gonna discuss the topic of maturity. Now children by nature are restless.

Now when she when Anjana was taking care of her child, she just kept her baby down and she went to a nearby room to do some housework. And, children, they’re naturally curious and normally if we have our home, we have a small baby, we’ll baby proof our home. Now Anjana was just sitting around. Anjana had gone next to Anuwa, and he was just lying there looking around. And he looked it up, and he saw, hey, that’s a shiny object, which, I kept by my mother for me.

Now, now, developmental psychology is a fascinating subject. Now, when children understand about things, so some children just don’t have a sense of distance. Not children, small babies. So he nodded. It’s not very far away.

He just jumped up. And he jumped up. He just jumped up and even he didn’t know how much power he had. He just kept streaking through the sky and streaking through the sky and he came closer and closer to the sun. Now this was not the blazing sun of the afternoon.

This was the gentle sun of the morning. So it looked red, but not blazing red. Yeah. It looked really red. And then, initially, when, Suriadev saw this child is coming.

First, he was worried about the for the child. This child would get born. What is the child doing? But when he saw the child kept coming and coming and coming, And the child seems to be charging right towards him. Then initially, he was worried for the child, and he was worried for himself.

You know, if we are going on a if we’re driving a car, and suddenly, you’re driving the car fast, and suddenly, there’s somebody standing in the middle of the road. Get out of the way. But then as, street lights fall, that person has a machine gun pointed at us. Then then from from that person for a hour since. So Surya Dev started increasing his race.

Kept increasing, increasing, but this child seemed unaffected by it. And then he panicked. And now there’s natural rivalry between Surya Devarindra. But in this case, Surya felt the emergency. I need help.

I need help. So he immediately went to Indra Dev. And he said, Indra, what happened? He said, ‘Hey. Look at him.’ So this child is tweeing straight even.

He was surprised. And now for Indra, Surya coming to his help, coming to ask for help was also a special thing he said. I cannot feel you. I have to show you my power. So Indra didn’t think care.

Of me. Just took his wajra and hold it at Hanuman. And Hanuman was a small baby at that time. Now Hanuman was powerful, but when we look at the stories, what happened was he was powerful. He was written on how powerful he was.

So first, this shiny object is coming and see another shiny object is coming. So he didn’t do anything. Now hit him on his face, especially in his jaw, and he reeled back. And he reeled, and he came crashing down on the ground. Now why you saw what was happening?

Like a like a father may see the child’s antics and be happy. So why was happy? Oh, what is that child doing? But then everything happened so fast. Why would it expect that Indra would throw a thunderbolt?

This is a small child. He’s mischievous. He’s not malicious. He’s not destructive. But when the thunderbolt was hit, my unit rushed forward and she softened the fall of the child.

Child fell gently on the floor. And then he became enraged. He said, what did you do with this small child? So Indira said, he was not acting like a small child. He said no, he was just a small child.

You would have stopped him anyway. He said no, this was the only way to stop him. So now what happens is that when some action is performed and that two people may have different evaluations of the nature of that action. Sometimes it’s very dangerous, sometimes it’s not all dangerous, it’s just fun. So Indra felt it was dangerous and why you felt it was outrageous or excessive use of power?

Sometimes it happens here in America, people have guns and there’s a small some stranger comes and somebody takes a machine gun and shoots the stranger. He says, no. Who knows the stranger might have a machine gun that should be? But sometimes the stranger might just be like a a harmless elderly person who is lost and doesn’t know and looking to find the way. So there’s always danger of excessive use of power.

So Indra used power excessively. Why you were then deranged? Why you said? You did this to my child. I’ll punish all of you.

And he suddenly stopped flowing. Now you stopped flowing. Everybody’s very suffocating. When everybody’s very suffocating, then the became allowed. And then they realized this is very serious.

But they all came to pacify you. And they realized the way to pacify you is to profusely bless you. You. And Hanuman seemed to be as if as if lifeless. But by the blessings of the deyotas, we all came back to life.

He came back to life. And of course, the blow that had retreated to my face, it slightly shifted the anatomy of his face. That’s how he got the name Hanuman. His name was Maruti. Now the biggest diktas blessed him.

And now when they blessed him he could do extraordinary things. Even without blessings he could do extraordinary things and now with blessings he became extraordinarily extraordinary and that is not a compliment. What happened is that. We’ll be discussing this broad theme in present world session. There is ability and there is maturity.

And maturity means the ability to use ability wisely. So, now, if you consider four quadrants over here, we have ability and maturity. So we could have ability but no maturity, no ability, no maturity, maturity but no ability, maturity and ability both. Now, which of these is the situation in which Hanuman was now? Sorry?

So which quadrant? Quadrant, yes. So now baby Hanuman was or maybe a child Hanuman was in this quadrant. Now as he grew up he had his extraordinary powers and he started doing mischievous things. So, Vivekanumar, he was mischievous.

But, that mischievous was no longer fun. It was dangerous. It is not dangerous for him, it is dangerous for everyone else. And then that became a problem. Now of course, for many people, if they have ability without maturity, they may go far beyond being mischievous.

They may become malicious. Malicious means they may use that power deliberately to hurt others. And they may not be hateful people, but at that time, a surge of anger, a surge of negative emotion comes and they may do something which they may themselves separate afterwards. So what we will be discussing in the program tomorrow’s session is this journey. So we have from baby Hanuman, the adult Hanuman that we see in the Sundarkandir and especially the Hanuman who goes to Lanka.

Now we could see these are transcendental characters and they’re always all perfect and that is true. But for as far as our learning lessons, we can see how the journey toward maturity happens. The best situation is where a person has ability and ability to use the ability wisely. That is where so we could say ability plus maturity, this is the person who is who is powerful and helpful. Their ability, they know how to use their ability.

Here what happens is, they’re powerful and helpful. Here they become powerful plus maybe helpful, maybe harmful. So we don’t know. Kaleidiasis would have a maturity. They’re powerful plus unpredictable.

Now some people are unpredictable and some people at this level may actually not be they may be predictable but they will predictably distort. That’s also not a good. Now if we have somebody who has no ability and no power, no no ability, no maturity, what happens? They are basically powerless. They may want to harm others, but they are powerless to actually harm others because they don’t have much ability.

Now if somebody has maturity plus no ability, what will happen? They they can do good, but they don’t have much ability to do good. So here, if you want to describe all of these in one word, this will be this person will be under effective because they don’t have some say, suppose a batsman has a very cool head, but the batsman doesn’t have a very good batting talent. So they they do not get hot headed, do not make a rash shot and get out, but the batsman can’t hit very very extraordinary exercise or anything like that. So that password is under effective.

Here it is effective. Here it will be ineffective. And the last will be it is destructive. Destructive in small or big ways. So when Hanuman was growing up, he was mischievous.

And initially his mother tried to restrain him, but soon he outgrew her in strength, in capacity yeah? So as he was growing up, afterwards now children often don’t have a sense of, sense of time place circumstance. You know what to speak when, how to what to do when. So it’s okay to be mischievous with other kids, but thou Hanuman was just mischievous in the forest, and in the forest there were sages. And sages are known for their ages.

Sometimes they get angry. If they get angry, they can be cursed. In the very context, being cursed by a sage is considered one of the most dangerous things. But Hanuman is carefree. Sometimes the sages would go out of their hermitage for some work and he would lock the hermitage.

I mean, they would be inside and he would lock them inside. Sometimes he would just they would be doing the sacrificial, sacrifices and they have to do a pile of wood which would be there for killing the doing the sacrifice and then you just take the whole pile of wood and go somewhere and then we again There’s no hope he left over here. So now he was not malicious, but he was displeased with us. And then the sages decided to what did they do? -Curse him.

-Now the word curse is a little harsh word. So, were they angry with him? Well, yes, they were displeased with him. But they didn’t really want to harm him. So they thought it was a very curious curse.

What was the curse that they gave him? He’ll forget his powers. Not that he will lose his powers. He will forget his powers. And for how long?

That seems very strange. You know? They they they curse someone, they curse him, and then they will have a response for it to rise him. And all the curses gone no longer affected. But the idea was the curse here, the point was that they wanted that Hanuman become mature.

That, so when he was reminded, it is. Somebody has to remind him that reminder has to come at the right time. So, a reminder has to come at a time when the world actually needed this power and needed it very acutely, where it was something which was vital. So normally when you think of the word ‘curse’ -curse it can have two different meanings: curse can refer to external, curse can refer to internal. Normally we think of curses as externs, you know, that if somebody suddenly loses their distance, somebody still gets a sudden sickness, you know, we feel it’s like a curse situation of a curse.

So we have curses where people’s external situation changes in one moment. So Nalukkor and Mani grew very powerful. You know what happened? One curse went just became like trees. Everything was lost.

So curse can be extraneous. So there can be an external loss that can be for the curse. But quite often when there is an internal loss, that can also seem like a curse. I started by talking about memories. Sometimes, if a negative memory just keeps replaying inside us again and again and again, we feel as if I’m cursed.

Something terrible somebody has done something terrible to us. We may go to a beautiful scenic place also. But even at that place, we feel as if that memory if the memory keeps playing inside us, then we think, oh, what happened over here? Why am I remembering this so much? We sometimes feel as if I’m cursed.

We want to sometimes we want to forget something, we want to forgive someone. But it just doesn’t happen. So, in one sense, if you consider memory, many of us think that the loss of memory is a curse. As soon as we are studying for exam, and we forget at the time something, we feel it’s a curse. We meet someone, and that person remembers us and we don’t remember that person.

And it happens very often. It just feels like a curse. And now some people have the they may have an innocent habit but it’s they they may be like, do you remember me? They were just actually anxious. So that’s understandable.

But when that happens, what happens is you feel as if the loss of memories occurs. But sometimes the presence of memory can also be a curse. That if I want to forget something, I just can’t forget it. So conversely, the loss can be a blessing. To it.

And the presence that can also be a blessing. So far, are we getting this? Sometimes we we lose memory of something unpleasant, something unpalatable. That’s a blessing. I was talking with one devotee.

He said he met some devotee recently and that devotee had terribly hurt him. So I told him how was it interesting? He said, it was quite nice. And then no one, nothing unpleasant. He said, no, it’d be nice.

And I said, it’s bumpy. I had forgotten it. So, I said, when he had told this to me, he was very hurt and he needed some counseling. I tried to pacify him. So I said, you know, I don’t know whether to appreciate your forgetfulness or to curse my remembrance.

-So, sometimes loss of memory can also be a blessing. And sometimes the presence of memory can of course be a blessing, that we understand that. So in that sense, memory is a funny thing. So now if we consider that when Hanuman was cursed to lose, you could say there is memory, memory is present, and memory is absent. And it’s a blessing or it’s a curse.

So now, at one level, Hanuman forgetting his power it was a curse. But was it really a curse? No, he was mischievous and his children were mischievous, but in that, that mischievousness, it was no longer having that power by which he would have explored any things. And in that sense his loss of memory Hanuman’s loss was it a curse or was it a blessing? How many of you think it is a loss?

How many of you think it is a blessing? How many of you think it is a blessing? How many of you think how many of you are lost to know whether it is a blessing? -Yeah. -So the point is that sometimes we cannot know in the situation what something is.

And that situation may feel something terrible, but it may not be. So, one aspect of humility, humility especially in bhakti, When something terrible is happening in our life, we feel, you know, why is Krishna letting this happen? Why is Krishna not doing anything to stop this from happening? So humility in bhakti, one way of understanding it is that understand that my finite vision is not the final vision. Humility means that I understand that a finite vision of a situation is not the final vision of the situation.

In my finite vision, this can seem terrible. And, yes, at that level, it may be terrible, but is that the final vision of the situation? Maybe, maybe not. So when Hanuman was cursed to lose something, in that process of losing something, he would end up getting something. So that loss of ability actually fostered his maturity.

It enabled him to grow further. Many of you know that I have polio that I need crutches for walking. So when I was one, my mother had taken me to a physician to get a polio vaccine, and I was very I don’t remember any of this. And we were staying in a small town in Maharashtra, and, unknown to our parents, my mother my father-in-law was stationed at that time, that particular clinic where the poly vaccine must be administered had a power outage the previous night and because of that the fridge temperature had risen and because of the rising temperature the germs in the vaccine had multiplied and then the attendant gave that particular vaccine to the doctor and doctor gave that vaccine And the vaccine, instead of preventing polio, ended up causing polio. Now I don’t remember any of it.

I was just learning to walk and I fell and I could I could never walk normally. But my first memory is about when I was two and a half or three, And at that time a distant relative had come to our place and she was consoling my mother. She said, oh, it’s so sad. Your son got polio.’ And I remember my mother’s voice calm, clear, confident. He said, whatever he lacks physically, God will provide him intellectually.

Now I don’t know why my mother said that. At two and a half or three, what intellectual signs I had see shown. I don’t know. But somehow that stayed with me. Not the God part, the intellectually part.

At least initially, the intellectually part. And as I grew up, I couldn’t play outdoor games like other kids could play. So part of it was part of it felt this is unfair. But then as I started studying, going to school, or even reading books, I found that I could read quickly, I could remember things well, I could articulate things clearly, and then a part of me said maybe I didn’t articulate it like that, but a part of me said that I could say that I didn’t do anything to deserve this physical disability and that is unfair. But then I didn’t do anything to deserve this intellectual ability also.

So sometimes we get less than what we deserve, sometimes we get more than what we deserve. In the big picture, life is fairly unfair. It is unfair, but it is. Sometimes we get more, sometimes we get less. And that’s why at that point, at a particular time, a particular thing might seem to be a curse.

But our finite vision is not the final vision of x. So I’m very grateful to my mother that she expanded my vision at that time. So so now Hanuman has been cursed, but his very curse or rather the loss of his powers whether you want to call it a curse or a blessing the loss of his powers will actually lead him to the development of his character. That when he doesn’t have any extraordinary powers to use, then what happens? Then one has to actually become mature!

To make two points, an actual journey towards maturity we’ll discuss in tomorrow’s session. So now sometime when I started this story, sometime and we talked about Suryadev when a child jumping up to the sun and catching the sun, and we say, oh, this is stupid. This is not unbelievable. These are kids’ stories. Unbelievable stories.

Now, yes, that’s one way of looking at it, and I’ll discuss this more tomorrow, but if you look at these scriptural stories, there are two ways in which you can see them. There are one way, some ways in which they are dissimilar to us. Dissimilar to our situations. And they are primarily in two ways. In the abilities that characters have.

For a kid to jump up to the sky, for somebody to have 10 heads. So all these abilities are extraordinary. And the arenas. Arenas means the places where these things happen. There is heavens, and there is this place, and that place.

We don’t experience those kind of places in today’s world. But there are very important means in which they are similar. And how are they similar? It is similar in that all the characters they have limitations. Every character has nobody they may have extraordinary abilities, but nobody has supreme power.

Now, of course, the god has supreme power, and that’s true. But even when god comes in this world to perform leaders, is it always described as is it always manifest? It’s omnipotence all the time. So just as we have limitations, our particular limitation may be different. So Hanuman, he could go right up to the sun, but he couldn’t counter the wajra of Indra.

So we all have limitations and and the characters in scriptures also have limitations. And the second is that everybody has accountability. Accountability means the actions that they make have consequence. So now the specific actions that they do and the specific consequences they have, they will be different. But these two principles that everybody has to deal with limitations, and everybody will make choices that will have consequences, and they have to deal with those consequences, they have to live with those consequences.

And it is this when you look at this, we can get some entertainment if we wanted, or explore the power someone has, or explore the domains people exist in. But this is where we actually get elevation, we get education, we get understanding of how to live in our life. Now, Rawan had the capacity to change his form and take on the form of a sage and whatever else he could do. But he still could not do everything. He had limitations.

He had wounds, but still he was vulnerable to humans. He was vulnerable to monkeys. And he made certain choices, and those choices had consequences. So you probably know this character Superman. Now, Superman, nowadays, this is the whole movie movie is about superheroes.

Superman was the first superhero. He. There’s some movie some character. Some author who developed in 1929. When America was in a deep depression, they wanted some character who would lift up the spirits of Americans.

And since then, it’s been going on. But around 1950s, something very curious happened. That as these characters are not created by only one person, you know, one person creates another, makes some more comics, and then it goes on and on. So what happened that as time passed, they started making Hanuman not Hanuman, Superman. Okay.

So as time passed, they started making Superman more and more powerful. Mhmm. His power started increasing. At one time, in some of the stories, Anuman Okay. But, you know, at one time, he could just look with his eye, his superman, and just blow up satellites.

He got enormous amount of powers. And what they found curiously, as his power increased, his popularity decreased. Why? Because generally in any story, if there is no tension, then there is no attention. That if if we write from the beginning only no this person is so powerful is going to win now we may know that he was going to win over the period but still we want to know how he’s going to win but if there’s everything is so predictive if superman is so powerful that any nobody can even touch him.

Then what happens is there’s no excitement. There’s no suspense. So when the when the power is enormous, then there’s no attraction left because you can just do anything. So then the hero then the comic creators, they created this whole concept of what is that? Kryptonite.

So Kryptonite by which Superman would become Muslim. And all his enemies would use that. And then that’s where the character’s popularity centralized him once again. So the point is that everybody, when they face limitations, that’s when in those limitations, how they act, how they grow, how they face those limitations, and how they grow beyond the limitations. That’s what makes the character’s story interesting.

So Hanuman had enormous power and his power will come back to him eventually. But when the ability is lost, that’s the time he takes to develop maturity. With limited ability, what can I do? How can I do it?’ And we’ll see in tomorrow’s session how Hanuman is developed through the choices he makes? And then finally, when Jam Bawand reminds him of his power, that’s the time his abilities come back, but he has developed great maturity by that time.

I was, giving a talk a couple of months ago, I was in The Middle East and, and as you know, I was telling a story about how Sita was abducted. And most of us know that story, how Maricha is finally shot by Ram, then he called out exactly in Ram’s voice, say. Lakshman! Sita! And that’s when Lakshman was told and Sita forced Lakshman to go to help Ram.

So one boy asked me this question that I. When Maricha called out. Lakshman, Sita, why did Ram call out? That’s not me. That’s Maricha.

The whole problem could have been avoided. So so I told him that Actually, Lord Ram is all powerful. But although Lord Ram is all powerful, if he simply were all powerful and that’s what he were doing, and he didn’t have to change the deal also, he couldn’t just have been there armed long and caught them here. So men, although the Lord is all powerful, this is the Lord, when he comes to the earthly level, he it’s said that he does naraleela. When he comes to this earth, he acts like a human being.

Now above the humans are the gods, and below the humans are the demons. Now this above and below is in terms of morality. Devatas are supposed to be better than humans, and the asuras are supposed to be worse than humans. But actually both the devatas and the asuras are physically stronger than the humans. And because of that, Marich because Marichya was an asura, his voice was much stronger.

And Rama’s being being, helped play because Rama was playing a human role, at that time his voice was not strong enough. And that’s why he ran back. So the point is even the Lord’s pastimes, they they become suspenseful, they become interesting when the Lord also acts within limitations and within the limitations the Lord does extraordinary things. Now of course the Lord’s limitations are not imposed on him by anyone The Lord is not cursed for anyone. He chooses when he’ll come out there.

Sometimes he acts like a finite being. And sometimes he will show extraordinary power. But when the power is lost at that time, that is when the character is seen. That what does the person do when power is lost? That person just becomes hateful, that person feels sorry for themselves, and they just become bitter.

Understandably, some does that. But it’s not very helpful. So Hanuman will see what he does in tomorrow’s session. The last one, I mean, you know what? Let’s see.

For all of us, if we have power and if we have character, the same one is ability and maturity. And I’ll just focus on something different over here. See, if there’s no power but no character, then the person becomes prideful. Now prideful is the least of the problems. From there, they can become hateful.

They can become vengeful. Because the power, they can use it for bad purposes. Now if somebody has no power and no character, then what happens? They become resentful. Resentful means why does anyone else have power?

Why is this person so good? Why is this person so good? Why is that person so good? It’s, this some people their whole lives are just filled with resentment. When communism started it promised that there’ll be wealth will be distributed, everybody will have equal wealth.

But what happened was that it’s not that everybody became wealthy, It is that communism was actually driven in real life not by compassion for the poor, but envy towards the wealthy. And then there’s some people who said, we will we’ll steward wealth equally. But then they had the power to decide whom to distribute wealth with. And so there’s a social commentator. He said that in communism, all people are equal, but some are more equal than others.

So basically, there’s a lot of worldview that is driven by resentment, and resentment does not do anything good. It just hates those who are doing something good. Those who have something good, those who do something good. That’s not very helpful. Now, if somebody has power and somebody has character, then they are grateful.

They are grateful. Hanuman will say, when he gains power, he never becomes proud, he never becomes arrogant. Hanman is grateful. Now somebody has character and even if they lose power, then they remain graceful. They don’t become resentful.

Yes? It is Krishna, give me power. Krishna took my powers away from me. It doesn’t matter. So, now, among these, if you consider having power without character, Both are harmful.

Being prideful and being resentful, both are harmful. And if we have character, whether we have power or we don’t have power, you know, it is always positive. So sometimes we may feel that some power has been taken away from us. The power could be the power of wealth. The power could be the power of some position.

The power could be the power of, good reputation. I mean, some people may just spread some rumors about us. That power going away is a painful thing. But we can see that power going away as an opportunity to develop our character, to grow in maturity. And that’s what will happen to Hanuman, and that’s what we’ll discuss in tomorrow’s session.

I’ll summarize what we’ll discuss today. Mainly discussed four points. I started to read out how life in one sense is defined not so much by wealth or power or things it is defined much more by memories. The greatest source of unhappiness for most people is not the events that happen in their life, but the memories that keep playing in their life. So, successful life is all about creating positive memories.

That is what the leaders to happiness. And bhakti is what enables us. And bhakti, the remembrance of the real law of the Lord. That is what is meant to help us create these healthy and happy memories. Within that, we discussed Hanuman’s story, and in Anuman’s story we discussed very three stages.

First was his being his his childish attack is okay, let’s put him on this way his infancy. In infancy what happened was, he had as a terror he had great blessings, and those great blessings became mischievous he was hit, and he was blessed further. So he had powers, and from the powers, he became almost lifeless. And after that, he became even more powerful. And that was, in verses, glorious what happened.

And then after that, we discussed about how he, with his ability what he started doing was his ability, and that is maturity. So was he cursed? Well, you could say the journey of Anubhana is from having ability without maturity to having both ability and maturity. It’s the journey we are going to discuss. And then we discuss about the forgetfulness.

Anyways, the series cursed him. So loss of not power, but loss of the memory of its power. So that, was it a curse or is it a blessing? It depends we discussed it. It could mean we have, we remember, and we forget.

And that could be a blessing, that could be a curse. So for us, whenever we look at life situations, we have a finite vision. And that finite vision should probably be seen as the final vision. What is a blessing? What is a curse?

We really told that at our stage that sometimes what seems like a curse could turn out to be a blessing, and what turns out seems to be like a blessing may turn out to be a curse. And then lastly, we discuss how when something something bad happens to us, how do we respond to it? So, Hanuman’s I talk about when you look at these stories, you see how how these stories are dissimilar and how these stories are similar. So dissimilar in terms of the abilities that they have and the arenas, the places that they do it, but similar in the sense that they all face limitations, and within the limitations they are all accountable. Accountable.

You do actions and those have consequences. So Hanuman also faced a limitation he says that his power suddenly went away. And then he was held it was not really cursed but he was held accountable. What you do at that time. So we discussed this journey, we may have power, and we have character.

So if there is power but no character, then what happens? Can you remember? Prideful. And that could be a waste of the problems. It can be much worse.

Is it that power now, character? Presentfulness. Presentfulness. Why should anyone have anything good in their lives? It’s very bitter.

There’s power and character? Then they’re grateful. Of course, they’re powerful naturally they have power, but they’re grateful for the power. Then some of the power goes away, then they are graceful. So in many ways we see that Hanuman’s geodomy will be where he will gain power.

So either way, having power without character is unhealthy and having character with or without power is healthy. But we all would like to go where we have power and character. That’s where Hanuman will, and that’s where how we can go through our life journey, that’s what we’ll discuss in our future session tomorrow. Thank you very much. Hare Krishna.

Is there any question or comment? Yes, sir. Thank you for the very nice presentation. I have two questions. The aspect of, not seeing the finite vision or sorry.

Not, taking the finite vision as the final vision. Where does where does that view our individual actions in the sense that in terms of changing or making events? Like, let’s say, whether it’s, to see the blessing or as it occurs. If you just say, okay, this is just a finite thing. I have not seen the final vision, so let me not do anything.

Would it lead to, like, a complacent attitude like that? Yeah. Definitely. See, there are two different things over here. When he says don’t see the finite vision as the as the final vision, that does not mean that the finite vision is always a wrong vision.

It’s just not the complete vision. So just yesterday, I was in my tomorrow, I had a whole class on this topic about how when some problem comes in our life, how do we see the cause of the problem? If right now I’m speaking, this mic stopped working, then should I think that, okay, why does the mic stop working? Maybe I did some Bhaskar mind in a previous life. No.

Generally, whenever we try to look at causality, say, if somebody eats on a cold night a dozen ice creams, At night they were saying ice cream ice cream I want more ice cream. The next morning they have a terrible throat and they say ice cream. Now now their throat is terrible. Is it because of past karma? Yes.

Well, yes. But it is not past life’s karma. It is past night’s karma. So generally, in Vedic logic, it’s called Nyaya. Whenever we are looking for the cause of something, causality is the principle of looking for causes.

So first we start with visible causes. Then we go toward invisible causes. And within invisible also, first we look at invisible material causes, then we look at invisible spiritual causes. That means that if the finite by the finite vision there is some explanation, then we should look for an explanation. And we should try to fix that.

But if by the finite vision there’s nothing that can be done, then move forward to something bigger. So the point is not so much what, how we look at our finite vision. It is more that how do we respond to it, in the sense that for all of us, it is our dharma, the right thing to do. That is the most important thing. Sometimes the right thing that I do will have an effect and sometimes the right thing that I do may or not have the effect.

So then I may say that okay my finite vision is limited over here but we should not use that as an excuse for not doing the right thing. Say, if we have cooked some food and say the it’s sweet rice but there’s no sweet in the rice Zombie rice. You shouldn’t tell somebody that there’s no sweetness. That’s your finite medium. That’s your finite perception?

No. Fix it right now. When it can be fixed, it should be fixed. But some so when, Ram is exactly the forest, at that time, Kaike, Lakshman is very enbreached by all that’s happening. And he wants to first, he’s angry with Ashwath, then he becomes angry with Kaikeyi.

And at that time, he says that his wife’s speaking very harshly about Kaikeyi, and Ram says, you know how much Kaikeyi loved me.’ Her love was like the flow of the river Dhunba incessant and pure. So that Lakshman is not done, he says. That’s what I can’t understand. How did the Ganga dry up in one night? And then Ram says, that’s why when I heard her speak those words, I understood this is the will of destiny.

When somebody’s behavior has no explanation as far as we can see it, then we can say my final conclusion isn’t complete. There’s something more going on over here. But if I have spoken so hurtfully to someone and then that person is cold with me, and I’m just, you know, this is for the past karma. No, this is not past karma. You did something right, doctor.

So we need to see what is the right thing for us to do, and our vision should be such that it encourages us to do the right thing, not that it justifies not doing the right thing. If a person is if some some person is very sick then if we can help them we should help them at that time. Take them to doctor, give them some treatment. But sometimes despite giving the best treatment, the person will not get cured. That’s when you understand a finite vision is not the final question.

Okay? I have a another question. This is more of a clarification. So Hanuman forgetting his abilities, out of that curse. So if somebody reminds him, is that a one time thing or and then all the memories come back and it will not go away or maybe require frequent reminders.

See generally the exact ways in which curses work and how curses are revoked – that particular mechanism is not talked about much in scripture. There is a mystical element to the curses, to how they act and how they are revoked. So now my understanding is here that the sages had a particular purpose. It was not to punish a numa, not to hurt a numa, not to deprive him. It was to help him grow.

Like sometimes, you know, some kids may just have phenomenal talents. Some kids maybe a three, four year old kid can pick up a musical instrument and be like a genius. Now, on one side, if some parents are gifted with such a child, they say gifted they’re gifted child, then it’s important for the parents to develop the gift of that child. But at the same time, it’s also important while the child is extraordinary and an extraordinary talent has to be developed, it’s just as important for the parents, the child also have a normal childhood. The child will naturally have that talent and will that talent is nourished but that is still a child.

The child’s normal growth also has to happen. Isn’t it so? Now both sides are there the extra the extra the extraverted side has to develop, but that is not if the child is defined only by the talent, then what will happen is that it can have many different psychological effects. The child will just think I am so special and everybody nobody has of any value. Child can become very proud and that’s not very good for that person to know.

All the child is are thinking that you know, I have no value without this dialect. So I was, I was trying to devote his home, and they have this this kid, you know, he was like, he at the year four he started playing chess. His father was playing chess with a friend and he said, ‘Daddy, I want lunch he says no, medium role in Lourdes, I’ll teach you’ he said don’t teach me now’ and he taught us his father taught him the first game as his father repeated all the way the second game he defeated his father And and I went to the eight and a half night and he was like the he was the Canadian under ten champion. He’s a brilliant boy. So I was staying at the home, I was talking with him.

So I my childhood, I also like chess quite a bit, so we were talking about it. So then he told me that out of all my little, I like my grandmother very much. This grandmother has no understanding of chess. So why do you know this? See, she loved me before I was special.

Now, this child is so insightful. So my point here is that sometimes we have to make sure that it’s a holistic growth. Singhs are not really cursing him. His powers were there with him. But he wanted to ensure that it was a holistic growth of the person.

Not we are not just performers, you know, we are persons. And we need to if we have we can perform, that’s wonderful. But we don’t want realignational growth. Thank you so much. And last question or any comment?

Okay. Two questions. That’s good. Okay. That’s good.

Well, thank you, Babaji. Very nice lecture. In the previous slide, you said with limitation, you can go you can get a elevation. Right? How is that possible?

With limitations, we get elevation. Yeah. In previous slide, like, couple of slides. No. I was here with limited how it’s Okay.

I’m saying with limitation and elevation. I was saying that studying scripture and looking at how even there the characters have limitations, and how within those limitations they act wisely. From that we can learn and can grow. Now if the only thing special about Anuman is that he could leap across the river and leap across the ocean, There’s nothing for us to learn from Anima. Because we can’t do that.

If somebody thinks the only thing I have to learn from Anima is one day I have to leap across the ocean. Then that character will become, okay, it’s a superhero character, nothing to learn from us. But even these characters have limitations some way or other. And within those limitations, or because of these limitations, sometimes they also feel they make such choices and they have consequences for the children. They are held accountable.

But in spite of that, they could. So the elevation happens not because of limitations. Elevation happens by focusing on this principle that how these great characters also act wisely. And similarly, we can also learn to act wisely. Okay?

Okay. Yes, please. Can you pass the mic Thank you so much for your wonderful class always. I have a question on the ability to maturity transformations. One of the point you mentioned that ability kind of converted into the powerful and if you do not have maturity, it is unpredictable, Right.

So Hanuman, he when he was an infant, he had the power but he was unpredictable. But in the same past time, if you see Indra and Vayu, right, you can also come to a conclusion that he was powerful, yet unpredictable when he threw the Vayu. Same thing with Vayu. He was powerful, but unpredictable by stopping the flow of the wind, right. Was there any transition for those act between innovative and good question.

YU you move from ability to the materialist? See, within the Vedic tradition, the devtas have a very curious position. Devtas are often objects of worship, but very rarely are the devtas considered to be role models. That often the sijis are considered to be role models. The wise people, the brahmanas, they are considered to be individual.

The kings are said to be the darshayati sreshtas. But often the devtas, they have this curious position within the universe that they are above us humans but they’re not they’re not in the spiritual world. So while they quite often the way they act often shows how even good people may misuse power, may get may get allured by pleasure, may get tempted, may get intoxicated. So, the Detshwar dhyutas, they are worshipped because they can use some blessings, but they are not considered as a whole mortals. And, other dhyutas held accountable for their actions?

Well, there are times when that also happens. It may not happen exactly exactly the same way it happens on Earth. See, one of the things that happens because of karma is that always action will have result. But if somebody has good karma, for example, then what will happen is the action will lead to a result after a very long time. How is that?

It depends. Like somebody is born if somebody wastes money, they’ll become a popper. But if somebody is born in a fabulously wealthy family, and they waste money, they will also become a pauper. They will also become poor. But that may take a long time.

So sometimes, karma can create an intuition between the action and the manifestation of its result. And devatas are beings who have gone to the heavenly domains because of past punya. And because of that past punya, their actions often don’t seem to lead to consequences. The consequences are there, but they take a lot some amount of time to manifest. So sometimes in the Vedic literature it is said that the law of karma doesn’t apply to the dildas.

It’s not that simple. It is the dildas are also held accountable in particular they offend the sages and they are held responsible. They have become reckless and attacked by the asuras. But because of the past phobia, they may not be held accountable immediately for their actions. But the principle of we having agency and we being responsible for our actions is a universal principle.

The exact way when it will manifest, that’ll be very. Say, you know, if to make a comment on the current political situation, somebody may gain power, and they can use that power as much as they want. They may think they’re using it for good, they may be using it for bad. Different people can have different opinions about it. Whatever it is.

But nobody has absolute power. While they have power, they can they can do good, they can do heroic. But then that power is going to end. Maybe the next elections comes up, the next the tenure ends, maybe whatever happens. So during that time, when a person has power, they can do a lot of things without any seeming consequences.

The consequences will be there, but sometimes the power can insulate one from the consequences for some time. So thank you very much.