How to deal with uncomfortable emotions – 5 Ds

[Talk at Goldcoast, Australia]

Video:

Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
It’s not connecting over there. I won’t spend time on this. You can do it from there.
Oh, the Wi-Fi is not connecting. Somehow I don’t know what happened. Hare Krishna.
So I’ll speak today on the topic of how our emotions can take us towards Krishna and not away from Krishna. I’ll speak based on Bhagavad Gita 2.53. यदाते मोह कल्लं बुद्धिर्वति तरिष्यति तदा गन्तासि निर्वेदं श्रोतव्यस शुतस्यच शुति विपति पण्णाते यदास्थास्यति निष्चला समाधावचला बुद्धि सदा योगमावाप्सिसि Krishna says, once we become fixed in spirituality, then our worldly perceptions and the emotions associated with them will not take us away from Him. But rather will take us, will become more and more absorbed in Him.
So I’ll speak this based on 5 Ds or rather 5 DN. So dissatisfaction is something which we all experience in life. So dissatisfaction can lead to delusion and degradation or dissatisfaction can be seen with discrimination, with intelligence and then that can lead to devotion.
So these two paths we’ll talk about and then we’ll talk about how we can choose the right path. So let’s begin first with dissatisfaction or discomfort is something we all experience in life. Now discomfort may come because of loneliness, discomfort may come because of stress, it may come because of overwork, it may come because of anger, it may come because of poor health.
Discomfort is something which everyone experiences in life. And when the discomfort comes, right now also, may be sitting on the floor may be uncomfortable for some of you. Yeah, please sit if you want.
There are also spaces wherever you want. So now sometimes when discomfort is there, we try to avoid the discomfort. Sometimes avoiding the discomfort makes us go towards certain default course of actions.
All of us over the years have evolved our own ways of dealing with discomfort. Recently I was in America, Connecticut. So I was asked to speak at a conference on spirituality and addiction.
And there different people presented, I also presented. So what the theme I spoke on over there is that often people think of addiction or at least many people earlier thought of it as whether drug addiction or alcoholism or whatever. It’s as a person not having adequate willpower, a person not having adequate intelligence.
That’s possible, but that’s not the only thing. It’s basically a person not having a healthy response to discomforts of life. A basic level of discomfort all of us may experience is boredom.
We all get bored with life. There is a survey done in Europe and America about the average emotional states of people who are reasonably well-to-do and healthy. 5% of the time people are happy, 5% of the time people are unhappy, 90% of the time they are bored.
So the entertainment industry is primarily thriving on people’s boredom. So you could say the anti-boredom industry or you could call it the boredom industry itself. The point is that all of us feel discomfort in different ways.
And for some people from discomfort to delusion becomes like a rapid path. Delusion means say if somebody has abused alcohol once or twice, they drunk a lot and although they got the consequence of the hangover or whatever, but what happens afterwards later on the mind only remembers Oh, I went high. The mind doesn’t remember how low I went afterwards.
So what happens next time when they feel uncomfortable, they immediately gravitate towards alcoholism. Or nowadays there is net surfing. We can just spend hours and hours just surfing this and surfing that and surfing that and people can just spend their whole life like that.
So now when we feel bored, we want something to stimulate us, then we just surf on the net and read this, watch this, do this and then gradually that becomes like a default response for us. So as soon as dissatisfaction or discomfort comes, from discomfort immediately we move towards delusion. Delusion means we think this will relieve me.
Now any kind of indulgence like this, it may be smoking, it may be drinking, it may be binge eating, it may be binge TV watching, binge net surfing, whatever. So it gives us a temporary feeling of high, but afterwards we feel lower than before. So that’s why it’s a delusion.
What is the delusion? We remember later only the high but we forget the low. That is the delusion. So even when people after alcoholism they get a hangover, but the hangover doesn’t hang over for very long.
It stays for a few hours and after that what really hangs over, what stays with them is, Oh! I went high. So over a period of time, people gravitate almost unconsciously from dissatisfaction to delusion. And then from delusion the next step is degradation.
So when somebody gets deluded and gets compulsively into some habit, then they start squandering their money on it. They started wasting their time disproportionately on it. They may even spoil their relationships for it.
They may sacrifice their ethics. So in general, there’s a person from the Connecticut Police Department also, who’s one of the top officers, he spoke that in general if a person commits a crime, what we see is not just the person that committed the crime, but what is the person’s overall life. If somebody is an addict, then that is almost 100% guaranteed that the person is going to repeatedly commit crime.
Because that addiction has distorted the priorities. And now to get that addictive substance, anything and everything will be done. So basically, when all of us face discomfort, we come up with some responses, some ways to deal with the discomfort.
And if that way is unhealthy, it leads to delusion. And once that delusion captivates us, then we go down to degradation. Now Krishna talks about this in 2.62 in the Bhagavad Gita.
In 2.62 he says, When we contemplate on the sense objects, He says that the whole sequence goes on. So how it is? Just look at it, think about it. And then after that, you can imagine a snowball.
I had gone to Canada, I was speaking in Calgary, the university is high up. So we are going up the mountain with a curving road. And then we saw while we were coming down, like a small snowball rolling down.
And the snowball on top, you could just kick it with your toe and it would crack apart. At that time it’s not even a snowball, it’s a snow pebble. But as it starts coming down, coming down, coming down, coming down, it gains mass and it gains momentum.
And then by the time it has come down, it is not even a snowball, it’s a snow boulder. And then the same person who could have kicked it away, that same person would get completely crushed by that. So you could see actually snowballs coming down, the snowball is a pebble over here, it’s like a ball over here, it’s become a boulder over here, they’re all coming down like that.
So now, similarly, when it is on top, just look at something, we think about something. And then, Hey, that’s nice. So attachment, that’s nice.
Then, I want it. Kama is strong desire. Then, Who says I can’t get it? Anger.
Anger at whatever is restraining us, who says I can’t get it? Sammoha is delusion. What I said just now? So, delusion, we forget that this has some consequences which are not wanted. Then, our own memory of the past consequences gets wiped out.
So, as soon as we pursue some sensual pleasure, it’s like in a computer, the F2 button, delete. Everything gets deleted. Then, Smriti, Brahmashad, Buddhinasho, much of our intelligence is centred on our memory.
If we remember, then we can act intelligently. If we forget, we can’t act intelligently. I was in Portland, and there, one of the most, Portland is America.
So there, one of the very prominent surgeons over there, he had come there and somehow, he had got a brain stroke. And although he had recovered motor faculty, he could move about, but his memory had got wiped out. And the same surgeon, but now, he couldn’t even remember how to operate a scalpel properly.
So, you know, our intelligence is based on our memory. If our memory is lost, then intelligence is lost. The same principle applies to spiritual life also.
We forget scripture, we forget what we have learned from the saintly people, from our spiritual guides, then our intelligence is lost. And then what happens? Buddhinashat, pranashyati, we succumb to degradation, pranashyati. So now, here Krishna is talking about from contemplation to delusion to degradation.
Now, I am talking about something else. I am talking about dissatisfaction in the first place. Why would we contemplate on something in the first place? It might just be in our radar, but still we contemplate on it, because what we are doing is not very satisfying.
Say, a student is studying on the computer, doing some work, some assignment. And in India, they have a joke, an assignment makes you an ass. Assignment makes you an ass.
So it’s like, oh, so much work to do, you get bored by the work. And then when they get bored by the work, I want a break. Discomfort is there.
And what? Okay, let me surf on some sites. Let me read something, watch something, some news, some sports, some movie, and so many other degraded things over there. But then what happens by that? From that, the contemplation begins.
And then, it’s like this. So from contemplation to degradation, to delusion, that’s like the snow pebble growing bigger and bigger and bigger and bigger. So this is how our emotions, if they are not processed properly, they can drag us down.
Our emotions can delude us. So from dissatisfaction through delusion, from dissatisfaction to contemplation, and that’s the whole sequence, delusion and ultimately degradation. So it’s not so much a lack of willpower that could be there.
It’s not even a lack of intelligence. That could also be there. But it’s more a lack of awareness of how we gravitate towards an unhealthy response.
If we don’t know how to deal with the discomfort in a healthy way, we just like on autopilot gravitate towards the unhealthy response. And say somebody makes a resolution. From tomorrow, I’m going to be a new me.
I’m going to give this up. I’m never going to do it again. Oscar Wilde was a British author.
He said, giving up smoking is the easiest thing in the whole world. I have done it over a hundred times. So he gave up smoking, but smoking didn’t give him up.
So what happens, we make a resolution. I’m going to give this up. And I’m going to be a new me.
And then with iron willpower, there’s a new me for 2, 3, 4 days. And then when the new me just stops looking, immediately the old me comes back. And we revert to what we were earlier.
So this is how dissatisfaction leads to delusion and degradation. This was the first point I was going to talk. So any reflections or any comments about this? Any thoughts? How can we be aware of all the emotions? No, not the questions.
Questions will be at the end. Any point from this which spoke to you? Which struck you? Which you felt was something which you could relate with or you could carry home? We’ll have time for questions later. Yeah? There’s something that, you know, when we’re like travelling and coming back home, generally after, you know, when we come home and we are just so tired, at that time, you know, I think that I’ve experienced that, okay, now let me read something.
I will watch some movie or something else, like, you know, just to entertain my mind, just to relax myself or something like that. But then what happens is like, no, like I have to read something because I didn’t get a chance to read at least half an hour or whatever. So, I can see, I can see that every, most of the time when I get so tired or something, my mind generally goes towards something else rather than to a spiritual thing and it goes to somewhere else, like, okay, let me do, I would like, because I also watch cricket more, so I would, what’s the score, what’s going on right now in the sports or something else.
Yeah. Thank you for sharing that. Yeah, it’s true.
Actually, one discomfort is also tiredness. It could be physical tiredness, it could also be mental tiredness. I just need a break now.
So, now, sometimes some break can also lead to a breakthrough. But sometimes some break can lead to a breakdown. So, we have to be careful what kind of break we take.
Yeah. Any other reflections about this? Everything else. Like, everything becomes like a box.
Okay, I’m going to do this, I’m going to do this, I’m going to do this. And that in between, like, you know, I see, on the other day I was just seeing that I was driving and I was at the light, traffic light, and my, the car on my right-hand side, car on my left-hand side, the drivers, their, you know, their shoulder is down, because they’re on their phone, because they could do something quick and they feel more, I don’t know, more achievement in that sense. Whereas, I feel that it actually, you know, it’s more on the basis of impulse, that they’re doing something but actually not getting results.
Yeah, that’s true. I think devices can be used carefully and they can be very powerful if they’re used properly. But, you know, there’s only D between device and vice.
And that D is the D of discrimination, which I’ll talk about. So, if we’re not discriminating in the use of devices, they can drag us down very easily. So, yeah, all of us have certain default responses.
And if we can observe them, then we can monitor them. Some people just think, I’m doing so much work. I’m doing this, this, this.
If you’re doing work, that is good. But how much of it is actually necessary work and how much of it is self-created work? Self-created work means sometimes, you know, you get a message and you instantly send a message back. And then a small issue, we spend maybe minutes, several minutes and hours on it.
So, there’s no need for that. So, sometimes you just send a message, okay, gradually send a message back and things get dealt with. So, it could be that sometimes, as I said, we can’t make a blanket statement that those who are using devices are hooked to it.
But we also have a discrimination. Am I using it constructively or is it using me? Is it consuming me? Yeah. Thank you.
So, that was the first point that if we don’t process discomfort and discomfort properly, then they lead to delusion and what? Degradation. So, now, the alternative course is from dissatisfaction or discomfort, we move through discrimination towards devotion. Now, the word discrimination today has a negative connotation.
Like say gender discrimination or racial discrimination or religious discrimination or whatever. But discrimination in the dictionary itself has two meanings. So, I once wrote an article, don’t discriminate against discrimination.
The word discrimination has a philosophical sense or intellectual sense where you make distinctions. The capacity to perceive certain distinctions. That is the discriminating capacity.
And that is very much required if anybody is to be a sharp observer of things. Somebody, for somebody who doesn’t know music, anybody who plays music, it’s good. But somebody who is really good at music, somebody is playing karta.
Not very, not very well. Some beats are going off. Those who are discriminating, they can notice that.
So, discrimination is the capacity to pursue fine distinctions. And that is a necessary faculty. In fact, expertise in any field gives us a deepened capacity for discrimination.
So, what does discrimination mean over here? So, when we face dissatisfaction, the first thing to understand is that discomfort is itself neither unnatural nor unhealthy. It’s just the natural way of being in the world. Everybody feels discomfort at some time or the other.
So, in a sense, we need to become comfortable with feeling uncomfortable. What do I mean by this statement? Comfortable means it’s not, okay, I’m feeling bored. Okay.
Feeling bored is not like an earth-shattering event. It is a common thing which happens to everyone. So, it’s not that just because I’m bored, I have to get rid of the boredom at all costs.
See, when we think something is unnatural and unhealthy, it’s a tiredness. If I think it is unnatural, if I think it is unhealthy, then I will want to get rid of it at any cost. But if I understand, it’s just natural.
Just a part of being a part of life is we all will go through different emotions. Sometimes every one of us will feel lonely. Somebody might be physically alone and they might feel lonely.
But actually the greatest loneliness we feel is when we are around people who don’t understand us. That is the most crippling kind of loneliness. So, if people misunderstand us, judge us, then we feel as if we are starved of emotional oxygen.
Understanding is to the heart what oxygen is to the body. So, we all feel lonely at times. And when we feel lonely, of course, it’s an uncomfortable feeling.
But it’s not an unnatural feeling. Everybody feels lonely at times. So, to become comfortable with being uncomfortable means to recognise that okay, this happens.
And the key thing over here is these feelings, they don’t last for very long. When we are feeling bored, when we are feeling lonely, when we are feeling tired, when we are feeling stressed, when we are feeling overwhelmed, these feelings are there, they don’t last for very long. We just need to outlast them.
In discrimination, I want to talk about three things. First is that discomfort is not unnatural. It happens to everyone.
The second is that discomfort is temporary, it won’t last forever. We just need to outlast it. Many times when say somebody is feeling bored and they think let me take one drink.
It’s said that first the drinker takes a drink, then the drink takes a drink, then the drink takes the drinker. So, that’s how the person gets lost. So, now at that time, okay, I’m feeling bad, I’m feeling bored, I’m feeling low, but it’s a part of life.
It’s just like we have environmental weather, sometimes it’s hot, sometimes it’s cold. Sometimes we feel cold very uncomfortable, sometimes we feel heat very uncomfortable. But it comes and goes.
So, like that, emotions like these also come and they go. In the 14th chapter of the Bhagavad Gita, text 22-25, Krishna says, just become an observer of your emotions. This is discrimination.
Krishna says, just as if detached, you observe the emotions. This boredom has come, it will be there for some time, it will go away. I’m feeling lonely for some time.
Now, we may have to do something to develop healthier relationships. Of course, we need to do that, but we don’t have to overreact to it. So, it will come, it will stay for some time, it will go away.
So, to do this, we have to see that these emotions are, they are visitors in our consciousness. They will stay for some time and they will go. But the word Krishna uses is Udasinavad Asinam.
Vad is like, as if detached. He’s not saying be entirely detached. Because those are emotions coming in us.
So, in English there are two words. Disinterested and uninterested. If you read any English book on commonly confused words, these two words are confused by people.
Sometimes even dictionaries get confused. Not all dictionaries. So, does anyone know the difference between these two words? Disinterested and uninterested.
Anyone? You’re not interested in guessing also? So, uninterested is having no interest. Just don’t care for it. Disinterested is having no vested interests.
It is having no agenda. Disinterested is impartial. So, say if there is an umpire in a cricket match.
Now, say the bowler bowls a ball and the ball goes and hits the leg of the batsman and all the players appeal. And they turn to the umpire and the umpire says, I was not watching the match. What? What are you doing? What are you here for? He says, I am not interested in the match.
What? An umpire cannot be uninterested. But umpire should be disinterested. The umpire shouldn’t want one team to win.
So, even if the batsman is out, the umpire says, no, not out. What? Not out. So, the umpire shouldn’t be biassed towards a particular team.
So, the umpire should be disinterested, not uninterested. So, similarly, we also, with respect to our emotions, have to become like that. Be as if detached.
So, each emotion that comes within us, it’s like a player appealing. Hey, I am bored, I am angry, I am lonely. So, now, just because a player is appealing, doesn’t mean the default response of the umpire is out.
No, the umpire has to use one’s discrimination, intelligence. Is that really out or is it not out? So, like that, the mind says, oh, I am bored, come on, let’s watch this, let’s drink this, let’s do this. So, the mind is appealing, the emotions are appealing.
No, discrimination. Should I do that or should I not do it? We develop this capacity for discrimination. Then we will, ourselves detect, okay, if I go in that direction, that will lead to delusion, that will lead to degradation.
So, I don’t need to go in that direction. So, this capacity for discrimination is developed by our intelligence, is developed by our study of the Bhagavad Gita, by our associating with devotees and understanding the philosophy of Krishna Bhakti. When this discrimination is developed, then we can catch ourselves when we start gravitating towards the unhealthy response.
So, sometimes that unhealthy response comes up even without thinking. It’s like we go on autopilot. I feel bored, okay, let me just go and do that, let me just watch this, do that, do that.
So, but if we have the discrimination, then even before we start going on autopilot, we shake it off, this is what is happening. So, at that time, so the first part of discrimination is recognising that discomfort is natural, it’s not unnatural or unhealthy. Second is, second part of discrimination is just becoming a disinterested observer of the emotions and evaluating them on merit.
The third part of discrimination is developing a healthy response. So, for all of us, we all have various interests. There is something good within us, there is something bad within us and we need to work on our bad, work on the bad that’s inside us, but we need to work with the good that’s inside us.
So, work with the good means, say somebody has interest in music. Then, if they have a default response towards maybe drinking or excessive TV watching or device addiction, now for them, if you just say don’t do this, that’s going to be very difficult, that will create a sense of deprivation. But, if they like music and they decide, you know, okay, I’ll keep some music with me, either I’ll hear the music or I’ll play the music myself and keep that as easily accessible as possible.
So, then when that discomfort comes, we need to choose that response. At that time, we need a response that also activates our emotional energy. See, when emotion is pitted against reason, it’s almost always emotion will win.
It’s very, very difficult that in the battle again between emotion and reason, emotion means this feels good, reason says that’s bad. I don’t care how it is, it feels good, I want to do it. So, if there’s a battle between emotion and reason, almost always, emotion will win.
So, what we need to do is, we need to make emotion an ally of reason, not just the adversary of reason. Now, how do we make emotion an ally of the reason? By finding out some good activity which also feels good to us. So, if somebody, say, if somebody is feeling bored and they are getting tempted towards something and you tell them, okay, now read Bhagavad Gita.
If somebody is philosophical, they will love it. But for others, hey, not now. They can’t do it.
So, we have to find out, we have to make emotion our ally. When we make emotion our ally, then what happens? Then that emotional energy, even if it’s small, maybe the emotional energy going this way will be strong towards delusion, degradation. But this way, the emotional energy, even if it’s small, at least some emotion is there on this side.
And then, it becomes easier to resist that. So, each of us can take inventory to find out what are the good things that we can use to break this cycle of degradation. What are the good things that we also feel good about? And when we keep that as a resource for us, then that helps us counter dissatisfaction in a healthier way.
The Bhaktira Samrutsundu is a whole book about emotions and about how to develop pure devotional emotions for the Lord. And an advance book of Bhaktira Samrutsundu is Ujjwal Neelamani. Ujjwal Neelamani talks about very deep and exalted emotions of love for Krishna.
And there, Rupa Goswami uses a word called Uddhipan. Uddhipan is spiritual stimulus. Just as all of us may have sensual stimulus, say an alcoholic sees a bottle of alcohol and that is the stimulus that drags them towards alcohol.
So, I saw once a picture of a person is in front of a computer and that person is trying to turn away but from the computer, the tentacles or arms are coming out and catching that person, pulling them towards the computer. So, it’s like that. So, we all have certain sensual stimuli which pull us in certain direction.
But we can find out what are the devotional stimuli that pull us towards Krishna. As I said, for some people it might be kirtan. For some people it might be deities.
Just have a picture of the deities. Think of dressing the deities, decorating the deities, just beholding their beauty. For some people it might be verses.
Just recite verses. If you have this traditional recitation of Sanskrit verses, it can be very mellifluous and very uplifting. So, we find out the devotional stimulus that works for us.
And when we do that, then what will happen? The discrimination will take us towards devotion and that’s the healthier trajectory. This is the second point I made that when we feel dissatisfaction, we use our discrimination to understand that dissatisfaction is not unnatural or unhealthy. The dissatisfaction won’t last.
I just need to outlast it. So, I become a disinterested or uninterested observer. And on merit, I respond to the appeal of that emotion.
And if I can make emotion my ally and find out some spiritual stimulus or some higher stimulus that takes my consciousness towards Krishna, towards something constructive, then I can move from dissatisfaction through discrimination towards devotion. So, any comments or any reflections on this? Is it too complicated? Is it too personal to reflect on? Yeah, I had a practical example. Exactly the same thing is I would sometimes go to the library to study and after studying for some period of time, you get bored.
And then you look to your friends and they were just as bored. So, then you just start talking and there goes the whole day. So, then I thought if you need to get work done, you should probably stay at home and do it.
And then when you get bored, I had my instruments right next to me. So, I thought, okay, let’s learn some bhajan. And then you learn a bhajan in five or ten minutes and then you’re like, okay, that’s good enough.
That was enough. Beautiful. And then you go back to study.
So, it was good. It was a practical example of exactly the same thing you said. Yeah, it’s very nice.
Thank you. I also found that I write articles. I write articles on contemporary affairs.
I speak on contemporary affairs also. So, you need to be in touch with the world. So, I read news.
And I don’t like to read news itself. I like to read analysis of news. Because that analysis helps me to make some analysis.
But then, what happens is that nowadays, if you just go to Google News, one event, there will be like 50 reports of that. And then we just spend so much time in that. So, about a few months ago, I did an analysis.
How much time I have spent on reading and how much content did I get for speaking? So, I found that if I spend that much time in studying scripture, I can get far more content for sharing and I can use my creativity. I don’t necessarily have to read news. So, now what I did was, over a period of time, that has also become a default response.
When you get some time, just look for news. And then, what happens is, if you want to read news for analysis purposes, your intelligence needs to be strong. When you are bored at that time and then you are reading, it becomes clickbait.
One click, one click, one click. So much time goes in that. So, I have three friends who give me some content which I can comment on.
And then when they give me the content, then I read that, analyse that and use that. And when I get bored, I like quotes. So, I like spiritual quotes, philosophical quotes.
I have also tried to present the Bhagavad Gita in quotable quotes. There is a book, Gita Vadmi Veda. So, what I do is, now whenever I feel bored, I try to look at some quote.
And then, because even if it’s some quote written by someone else, I try to make it devotional. Reward it. Even if it’s some thought I have written down, I try to play around with it.
Make it a little shorter, make it a little more punchier. And that I find, it absorbs me and it also equips me for my classes. So, that response is from dissatisfaction to delusion, dissatisfaction to discrimination and devotion.
So, each of us can bring that about. So, I’ll make one last point. This is a short point and then we can ask some questions.
Now, in this cycle, from dissatisfaction, we may go to delusion and degradation or by discrimination, we may go towards devotion. Now, in this case, are these two cycles, like they are completely non-intersecting circles or do they intersect? That means, if I go towards delusion, is it that I cannot go towards devotion? If I go towards degradation, can I not go towards devotion? It’s not like that. It’s that this cycle, even if I have gone down in the cycle, we can always turn back.
No matter how much we have gone down, at any point, we can choose to turn back. Of course, the further we have gone down, the more difficult it is to turn back. Just like the snow pebble is much easier to stop than a snowball.
And that snowball is also much easier to stop than a snow boulder. But, even if the snow boulder knocks us over, still we can get up. And still we can resume.
So, in that sense, this cycle, no matter how much we have gone in the past and no matter how much we might be going presently also, but as soon as we realise it, we can stop. Okay, I’m going in this direction. यत्तो यत्तो निष्चलति मनः चंचलमस्तिरम् ततस्ततो नियम् यहित आत्मन्येयोशम् यहित Krishna says, wherever and whenever the mind wanders, bring it back under the control of the self.
So, the idea is that the mind will wander, but don’t let it, as I said, the mind may stray away, don’t let it stay away. It will go off track. But as soon as we realise it, bring it back.
As soon as we realise it. And it’s never too late. Every day can be a new day for us.
And by Krishna’s grace, even if we have gone all the way down, Krishna can lift us up from there. Krishna can lift us up and Krishna can raise us up, equip us with discrimination and take us towards devotion. That opportunity is never lost.
In that sense, it’s never too late to change course, to change trajectory. Not in an ultimate sense, in the sense of what kind of nature we have developed, what kind of habits we have developed, or even during a particular instance. Gone to this point, stop.
So, for doing that, again, we need to consult Krishna, not the mind. I’ll conclude with this example. Suppose there is a boxing match.
And in a boxing match, say, there is one boxer, and his other boxer is knocked down. He is knocked down, but not knocked out. The boxer can get up and fight again.
Now, to do that, whom should the boxer turn to? The boxer is knocked down and discouraged. The boxer should turn to the coach. Come on, get up.
Do this. But that boxer who has been knocked down turns towards the opponent only and asks, can I defeat you? Never! So, the other boxer has knocked him down. The boxer will want to intimidate you, dishearten you and defeat you.
So, if this boxer wants to fight, you should consult, not the other boxer, but the coach. Similarly, sometimes our mind knocks us down. The mind makes us do something which we have resolved not to do.
And then, we ask the mind only, will I ever be able to do this? No, never! The mind says with a vicious gleefulness. And then, we become disheartened. So, we never lose till we lose heart.
We never lose till we lose heart. And if we listen to the mind, we will lose heart. It will make us lose heart.
But instead of listening to the mind, okay, this happened, no problem. Let me turn towards Krishna. Krishna says, I am always there with you.
Krishna’s love for us is not based on who we are. We may be pure, we may be impure. Krishna’s love for us is not based on who we are.
It is based on who He is. He is the all-loving Lord. He is the well-wisher of all living beings.
It is said in the Bhagavad Gita that generally we talk about Krishna as Bhaktavatsala. Does anyone know what is Bhaktavatsala? He is the lover of His devotees. But in the Bhagavatam, it is said Krishna is also Krupadavatsala.
Krupada is very materialistic, self-centred people. Krishna says He is the lover of even ten. So, Krishna loves all of us.
No matter what situation we are in. And if we turn towards Him, from wherever we are, He can lift us up. So, instead of getting disheartened just because we are feeling bored or because we have become deluded or even if we have become degraded.
Whatever happens, whether we are at the state of satisfied, deluded or degraded, doesn’t matter. From wherever we are, we can turn towards Krishna. Take shelter of Krishna and He will lift us up.
That is the redeeming potency of Krishna. And by focussing on Krishna, we can have hope and strength from wherever we may be. And then we can make our emotions, our friends in our spiritual journey.
So, I will summarise. I spoke today on the theme of Move from dissatisfaction towards devotion, not degradation. So, I talked about two cycles.
One was dissatisfaction through delusion to degradation. So, we all feel dissatisfied, uncomfortable, discomfort because of loneliness, overwork, stress, anger, exhaustion. So many factors.
Then, we all have developed certain default responses to deal with it. So, some people might be drinking, some people might be smoking, some people might be overeating, some people might be just surfing on the net, TV, bingeing, whatever. Now, when we do these things, they give us a little high, but they make us a lot of low after that.
But we forget that low. Just remember the high. That is the delusion.
Over a period of time, we become degraded because we get hooked to it. So, addiction is often a predictor of criminality. So, this is an unhealthy cycle.
And when we go down the cycle, it is not so much because of lack of intelligence or lack of willpower. It is just because of a lack of a healthy response to uncomfortable feelings. I talked about the snowball, snowpebble being contemplation, the snowball being delusion, the snow boulder being degradation, coming down.
But we start contemplating also because we are feeling uncomfortable with what we are doing. So, we need a healthy response. What is the second chain? From dissatisfaction to discrimination to devotion.
So, in discrimination, I talked about three points. First is, we need to become comfortable with feeling uncomfortable. It is not unnatural or unhealthy.
Second is, we see this discomfort as a temporary visitor, like a player appealing. And we become like umpire who observes it in a disinterested, non-interested way. And we respond to it on merit.
And third is, we make emotion an ally by finding out some good thing, not just something which is good, but also feels good. And then we do that. That is our spiritual stimulus.
It helps us to move from dissatisfaction through discrimination to devotion. And then lastly, I talked that even if we have gone down this track from dissatisfaction to delusion to degradation many, many times, Krishna is so powerful and so merciful that He can lift us up. His love for us is based not on who we are, but on who He is.
He is not just Bhakta Vatsala, but also Krupana Vatsala. We never lose till we lose hard. So if you are knocked down in the boxing match within us, instead of consulting the mind, you consult Krishna.
Krishna says, come on, get up, I’ll help you. And then by Krishna’s grace, you can break this default cycle of dissatisfaction, delusion and degradation, but instead have that healthy chain of dissatisfaction, discrimination and devotion. Thank you very much.
Hare Krishna. So any questions or comments? Yes, you had a question. All good.
So you have fallen down repeatedly. How do you get the enthusiasm to get up? See, change usually doesn’t happen till the cost of staying where we are becomes greater than the cost of changing. So what that means is that if somebody has got a particular habit, say somebody is alcoholic, they are drinking, they keep drinking, they keep drinking and they don’t even realise there is anything wrong with it.
But sometimes they may drink. There was this person, I was also at a mental health care centre and there was this very brilliant person, Ivy League graduate, brilliant person, what had happened? He had gone into drinking and while drinking, drinking, he was once driving a car with his wife and child and his wife had said, don’t drive, I’ll drive. He said, no, I’m okay.
He had drunk too much and he had drunk and he drove and somehow he lost control and the car braked and he survived but his wife and child died in the car accident, in the car crash and then he had what is called a survivor’s guilt which made him almost like insane. That time he realised what a price I paid for my alcoholism. So, in our inner war, we have an inner enemy, our unhealthy habit, that is the inner enemy.
To understand that this inner enemy is cruel is crucial. It’s cruel. It can hurt us, it can hurt others.
What cost it can take, we don’t know. So, sometimes we may have to experience that cost ourselves and then we’ll be yoited out. But sometimes we can use our intelligence to understand where we are headed.
So, then we can ourselves assess, this is the cost I’ll have to pay and this is not worth it. It’s not worth it. So, it’s only when we can assess the cost.
Yes, I may feel I can’t give this up but when I say I can’t give this up, now for this, I am giving so many things up. Instead of thinking that I can’t give this up, we focus on what I am giving up for this. Like there is a beautiful pastime of Prabhupada when one of his disciples was smoking and Prabhupada said, do you want to let a cigarette come between you and Krishna? Small, temporary, insignificant pleasure, Krishna is the source of eternal joy.
So, we need to use our intelligence to assess the cost. So, if somebody says that, oh, I can’t give this up. Okay, but for this, if I spend a lot of time on net surfing, then I was talking with one devotee who has this compulsive net surfing habit.
So, I talked with him and I said, how much time do you spend? And then we talked about it and I told him that the amount of time you spend on that, if you had spent on reading the Bhagavatam, you would have completed all 12 cantos of Bhagavatam by now. And you calculated that at a normal reading speed, not a super fast reading speed also. Really? My God! Then it jolted him.
Oh God, so much time you are wasting. So, what happens is that temptation buys us on an instalment basis. It doesn’t ask for a huge down payment.
If somebody says that, oh, you have to pay a million dollars for this. I don’t want it. But you just pay one dollar daily.
Okay, one dollar is not a big deal. But maybe over the years we end up paying a million dollars for something which is not worth it. So, temptation buys us on an instalment basis.
Every day it takes little, little, little, little. But that little eventually becomes very large. So, if we use our intelligence to assess the cost, the cost what we have to pay for this, what we eventually will have to pay for this if things go wrong, which they will sooner or later, and the cost we are already paying in terms of giving up something, that will jolt us out.
And then once we get the desire to change, then Krishna is there to help us. So, instead of saying that, oh, I can’t give this up, you feel, how much longer will I give Krishna up for this? Just change the question. So, you are saying, I can’t give this up? How much more I will give up Krishna for this? And that will give us the inspiration to change.
Any other questions? Any comments? Just an observation. We talk about emotions. Is it really controlled by the emotions? Okay, good question.
If we are tired, the rational thing is to rest rather than drinking. What are we doing instead of taking rest? Yeah. So, is it that we are so driven by emotions that we can’t think properly? Why don’t we rest when we are tired instead of drinking? See, we all have an emotional side and a rational side.
Now, in different people, the rational, some people, emotional side may be very strong, some people, the rational side may be very strong. But even in people who know the rational side is very strong, sometimes their reason is an inspector of emotion. This doesn’t make sense, no need to do it.
But sometimes reason becomes an instrument of emotion. That means that emotion rationalises, emotion uses the reason to rationalise what we are doing. So, for all of us, we come from different backgrounds.
And based on the kind of conditionings we have from the past, something which may seem very easy for us, that would be very difficult for someone else. Say, if somebody were just a social drinker, that when I am with my colleagues, with my friends, I don’t want to be the odd person out, so I drink. And that person comes to a society or develops a friend circle which is not drinking.
And the drinking will go away. Say, I just left it so easily. But somebody else might be drinking as a stress relief mechanism or escape mechanism.
And then even if they come to association, good association, still, their urge for drinking was not because of bad association. It was because of their desire to get relief from stress. So, unless they find a healthier way to get relief from that stress, that craving will keep troubling them.
So, each of us, every unhealthy emotion is actually an unhealthy expression of a healthy need. It’s a healthy need. You want relief from discomfort, it’s a healthy need.
But it’s an unhealthy expression of that. So, that’s why the same activity may require different degrees of willpower for different people. And some people might be very reasonable and rational in one area of life.
And other area of life, they are just completely slave of their emotions. So, it just depends on the whole set of conditioning that the person has. Of course, everybody has intelligence and everybody has reasoning capacity.
But if we can activate the reasoning capacity, then they can begin moving towards the solution. But generally people who are very rational, they just can’t understand emotional people. Why do you do that? But that’s because it’s almost like the two of them are speaking different languages.
Now, imagine, I read somewhere, but I don’t remember the exact words. Say one language, you say hello. But if the word hello in another language means you fool.
Hello. Fool? Why are you calling me a fool? I said hello. Again you are calling me a fool? So, the person is saying one thing, but in the other language it’s understood entirely differently.
So, like that, when somebody is very emotional and they are indulging in something, it’s actually a call for help. It’s a need for relief. But a rational person at that time starts making judgement.
Why are you doing this? Don’t be so foolish. And then that person feels even more isolated, even more lonely, even more sorry for oneself. So, our emotions are real for us.
So, now the emotions may not be based on reality. The emotion says that if I am feeling lonely. Now, I may have many friends and actually I may not be lonely.
I just need to connect with them. So, my emotion may not be based on fact. But for me, my emotion is a fact.
When I am feeling lonely, actually I am feeling lonely. So, we have to acknowledge this person is feeling lonely and then address it. If you say, no, why are you lonely? You have so many friends.
Oh, but my friends don’t understand me, whatever it is. So, for people, their feelings are their facts. Their feelings may not actually reflect facts.
But for them, they are facts. And we need to begin by that acknowledgement. And then we help them to see, okay, you are feeling like this.
You are seeing only this fact. But what about this fact, this fact, this fact, this fact? Oh, you know, okay, I have so many people who care for me. Yeah, I am not alone.
Does that answer your question? Yes, sir. There is all this whole sort of entitlement. What? Whole culture of entitlement.
Yes. Everybody needs counselling. Everybody needs this and that and help.
And they have safe spaces in universities and schools. I can’t understand how things are going on. I mean, who can help anybody? They are not really themselves.
Yeah, that’s a big challenge. I think, yes, we do live in an age of entitlement. Where people feel that they have a right to things.
And when they don’t get things, they feel outraged by that. So, yes. They don’t want to help themselves and they expect others to help them.
Yeah, I think there are two, three factors in this. I have talked with a lot of college students. At least when I came from India here, it was a shock for me to see how many kids, American, I mean America, Australia, I mean more in America, how many kids are from single parent families.
And it’s very difficult. I was talking with one boy, coming regularly for my programmes. He said he grew in foster care.
And I asked him, what happened? Did your parents die in an accident or something? He said, no. Both my parents are alive. Really? He said, when I was five, my parents got separated.
And when they got separated, they both told me that this marriage was the biggest mistake of my life. And you remind me of that mistake. So, both of them said, we don’t want anything to do with you.
And despite having two parents, this boy became a ward of the state. So, now he just couldn’t process it. All this grown up now, he is in college and studying.
But still people get psychologically damaged. Not damaged because of the mad, but just that there is no healthy development. So, I feel that’s one factor that when the family structure collapses, people who grow up in unsteady families, they have a lot of psychological issues.
Another thing is that in the past, say, relationships or marriages, they were seen as an obligation. Of course, everybody wants pleasure. But it’s also a duty.
And people, if I get married to someone, I’ll stay with them. Now that obligation, responsibility, duty part is more or less gone. And it’s all for pleasure.
And when it’s all for pleasure, it leads to enormous insecurity. It’s enormous. One of the biggest fears, I studied, I did a seminar on fear in America.
So, I studied what are the top ten fears of the 18th century, 19th century, 20th century, 21st century. So, there are two new fears which have come up in the 21st century. One is the fear of terrorists.
And the second is fear of rejection. If I form a relationship and somebody rejects me and abandons me and goes away. So, because that kind of structure of that commitment relationship is not there, people themselves are very insecure.
And often, all the other issues that come up, they come from that insecurity. So, you don’t have parental love while you are growing up. And then you don’t have a steady relationship with a spouse or a partner.
You don’t have that. Then it becomes very insecure. And what happens? Even people who have this, who may have good parents, who may have good relationship, but by associating with others who are insecure, they also become insecure.
So, that’s why in colleges and universities, students have seen, they may put on a facade. I am so young, I am so attractive, I am so successful. But they are very insecure inside.
So, I don’t know whether there is any easy solution to it. But at least any solution will begin with understanding. So, at one level, it’s an entertainment mentality because what has happened? At a physical level, they have comforts much more than what our generation had.
And that’s why we feel, what’s wrong with you? But physically, they may be well provided for, but emotionally, often they are quite alienated. And third point is that the world has changed enormously in the last 20-30 years. You should say that the change in the last 20 years is more than what has happened in the last 200 years.
So, because of especially the internet and social media. So, what has happened? Every generation has a generation gap with the previous generation. But in this case, it’s not a generation gap, it’s like a generation valley.
It’s like the previous generation and the next generation, they just don’t understand each other. So, that also makes them feel judged and lonely. So, it’s a challenge and I try to counsel teenagers and youth.
It’s almost like I have to re-educate myself to understand them first. So, if I start off trying to educate them, but before I can educate them, I have to re-educate myself. Where are they coming from? What are they thinking? Why do they feel like this? It just doesn’t make sense otherwise.
So, we find their behaviour difficult, but they are also going through difficulties. It’s not just that they are creating difficulties for us, they are also themselves distressed. And they are seeking some relief.
Yes, ma’am. Beautiful point, yeah. You know, Prabhupada was so compassionate to everyone.
Somehow, you know, different devotees take up different things from Prabhupada. So, many preachers, they take up the idea, Prabhupada, condemn everyone, fools, rascals, this, that. And that’s what we often repeat.
But if you look at those who interacted with Prabhupada, it was not that philosophical rigour or vigour that attracted them to Prabhupada. It’s like Prabhupada’s personal love. Prabhupada also says in the Nectar of Instruction that the relationship, the Krishna consciousness movement is nourished by the sixfold loving exchanges.
So, we need to do that. Yes, if we show compassion, show kindness, then it helps people to come closer to Krishna. Sometimes, unfortunately, our spirituality, instead of making us more understanding, makes us more judgemental.
This is right and this is wrong. We have to have that kind of categorisation. So, I say that we have to make judgments, but we don’t have to be judgemental.
Yeah, that’s true. That’s why, you know, you say like, be like Bhakti Siddhanta Saraswati Thakur with yourself and be like Bhaktivinoda Thakur with others. So, Bhaktivinoda Thakur was very strict.
Bhaktivinoda Thakur was very accommodating. That’s another way of putting it. Thank you.
Yes, maybe last question. Yes. OK, that’s a good point.
So, can our emotions also lead to delusion within devotion if I start thinking I can do this better than others? Now, there is an objective aspect to it and a subjective aspect to it. The objective aspect is, say, some devotees can speak better than other devotees. Some devotees can sing better than other devotees.
Some devotees, they can do management very well. Some devotees do management and others have to manage them. So, there is an objective fact that not all devotees are equally gifted in all ways.
And we need to, in the name of humility, we cannot sacrifice objectivity. That, yes, this person is not so good at this and this person is good at this. Sometimes we may say, OK, I am also, you know, I can do this better.
Now, it’s just our own feeling, it could be subjective. But you talk with some senior devotees, some guides, some friends, yes, you have a talent in doing this. Then at that objective level, if somebody is good at doing some things, it is best that they be engaged in doing that thing.
They will be happy doing it. That thing will also get done well. At a subjective level, it’s important that we see our gifts, we see our abilities, we see our talents as our endowments, not our entitlements.
That means, yes, these are my talents, but they are not just my talents, they are given to me by Krishna. Paurusham Nrishu, Krishna says, I am ability in people. So, in 7.8, so whatever abilities we have, actually if we see that this is Krishna who has given me this ability, then even having that ability can create humility.
Once I was in India, there was a senior devotee who was giving class in English and I was translating into Hindi. And some devotee asked a question, so normally they speak one or two sentences and I would translate it into Hindi. Now some devotee asked a question and this devotee speaker, he forgot that it was translated and he spoke for 15 minutes in answer.
And after the answer got over, then he looked at me and everybody started laughing. But somehow Krishna has gifted me a good memory and I translated for almost 15 minutes. And then everybody clapped over there.
Then many devotees came up, how do you remember the whole answer? And then, now I had been trained that some devotee says, you have got such a good memory. I would just say, mechanically, it’s Krishna’s mercy. So then there was one senior devotee who was there for the class and he said, you know, it’s amazing you translated the whole answer.
It’s Krishna’s mercy. And then he looked at me and he said, if you remember that it is Krishna’s mercy, then that is Krishna’s greater mercy. So to have our abilities is good, to remember that our ability is a gift from Krishna, that is much much better.
So subjectively, we can prevent ability from stealing our humility by remembering that the ability is a gift. And if some devotee is doing some service, we don’t have to push them aside and do that service ourselves. But in a graceful way, we can tell that maybe I can do that better.
So if it makes us egoistic, if it makes us insensitive, then it becomes a problem. There was one devotee in India who was very good at music. And then, he was already very good at music and he said, I want to learn traditional Bengali music.
He was very desirous of that. So his spiritual master gave him permission. He went to Bengal and 2-3 years he studied how Narottam Das Thakur would do bhajans and learnt from the traditional Kavadai Vaishnavas.
And he came back brilliant. But then, in the temple, when any programme would be there, anybody who would be singing would find faults. You are not playing this properly.
You are not singing this properly. You are not singing this properly. And eventually he told the temple leaders, nobody in this temple knows how to sing.
So henceforth, all kirtans I will do. And then the temple leaders said that actually here, we are not singers. We are devotees singing for Krishna.
So everybody has singing ability. Whatever they have, they will sing. And then they encouraged him, you make your own kirtan group and you make specialised performances.
And then he started doing that and he is happy now. So he needed his space to have his expert kirtan. And his kirtan, I have in there, that kirtan is not a participation.
That kirtan is a performance. He will sing in such a tune that nobody can follow that tune. Wow! You can get impressed.
What a tune he is singing. So it’s nice to have such talented devotees in our community. But, so if our ability doesn’t steal our humility, then that emotion won’t take us away from Krishna.
So thank you very much. Prabhupada Ki Jai. Gaur Bhakta Vrinda Ki Jai.
Jitai Gaur Premanandai. This is Grace Chetanacharya Prabhupada Ki Jai. Prabhupada Ki Jai.