How to present spiritual principles amidst changing times

[Bhagavatam class at ISKCON, Chowpatty, India]

Video:

Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
Om Namo Bhagavate Vasudevaya Om Namo Bhagavate Vasudevaya Om Namo Bhagavate Vasudevaya Vasudevaya Om Namo Bhagavate Om Namo Bhagavate 11 chapter 14 entitled Lord Krishna explains the yoga system text 32 Shri Bhagavan Uvacha Samasana Asinaha Samakaya Yatha Sukham Hatshastam Utsang Adhaya Swanasagra Kruteksh Kruteksh Shri Bhagavan Uvacha Samasana Asinaha Samakaya Yatha Sukham Hatshastam Utsang Adhaya Swanasagra Kruteksh Shri Bhagavan Uvacha Shri Bhagavan Uvacha Samasana Asinaha Samakaya Yatha Sukham Hatshastam Utsang Adhaya Swanasagra Kruteksh Kruteksh Shri Bhagavan Uvacha Swanasagra Kruteksh Swanasagra Kruteksh Samasana Asinaha Samakaya Yatha Sukham Utsang Adhaya Swanasagra Kruteksh Shri Bhagavan Uvacha Samasana Asinaha Samasukham Hatshastam Utsang Adhaya Swanasagra Kruteksh Shri Bhagavan Uvacha Swanasagra Kruteksh Swanasagra Kruteksh Swanasagra Kruteksh Shri Bhagavan Swanasagra Asinaha Samasukham Utsang Adhaya Swanasagra Kruteksh Swanasagra Swanasagra Kruteksh SAMEH, having a level surface. ASANEH, on the seat. ASINAH, sitting.
SAMAKAYAH, sitting with the body straight and erect. YATHASUKHAM, sitting comfortably. HASTAU, the two hands.
UTSANGEH, in the lap. ADHAYAH, placing. SWANASAGRAH, on the tip of one’s own nose.
KRUTAH, focussing. IKSHANAH, the glance. PRAANASYA SHODAYEN MARGAM PURAKUMBHA KARECHAKAYI VIPARYAYEN API SHANAYIR ABHYASEN NIRJITENDRIHA Translation and purport by the followers of Srila Prabhupada.
Translation, the Supreme Personality of Godhead said, Sitting on a level seat that is not too high nor too low, keeping the body straight and erect yet comfortable, placing the two hands on one’s lap, and focussing the eyes on the tip of one’s nose, one should purify the pathways of breathing by practising the mechanical exercises of PURAK, KUMBHAK and RECHAK. And then one should reverse the procedure. RECHAK, KUMBHAK and PURAK.
Having fully controlled the senses, one may thus practise pranayam step by step. PURPORT According to this procedure, the hands are to be placed palms upwards, one on top of the other. Thus one may practise pranayam through mechanical breath control in order to achieve steadiness of the mind.
As stated in the Yoga Shastra, ANTAR LAKSHO BAHE DRUSHTHI SIRACHITTAH SUSANGATAH The eyes which generally see externally must be turned inward, and thus the mind is steadied and fully controlled. OM GYANATI MIRANDASYA GYANANJANI SHALAKAYA CHAKSHURON MILITAM YENA TASMAI SHRI GURUVE NAMAH NAMAH OM VISHNU PADAYA KRISHNA PRISHTAYA BHUTALE SHRI MATE BHAKTI VEDANTA SWAMI ITINAMINE NAMASTE SARASWATI DEVE GAURAVANI PRACHARINE NIRVISHESHA SHUNYA VADI ASHYATYA DESH TARINE VANCHA KALPATARU BHYASCHA KRIPASINDHU BHYAEVACHA PATITANAM PAVANEBHYO VAISHNAVEBHYO NAMONAMAH JAI SHRI KRISHNA CHAITANYA PRABHU NITYANANDA SHRI ADVAITA GADADHARA SHRI VASADI GAURA BHAKTA VRINDA HARE KRISHNA HARE KRISHNA KRISHNA KRISHNA HARE HARE HARE RAMA HARE RAMA RAMA RAMA HARE HARE HARE KRISHNA Yoga was traditionally understood and how it is understood in today’s world. Then I’ll talk about how spiritual traditions adapt according to time, place, circumstances.
How Srila Prabhupada did that expertly. And lastly, I’ll talk about how we can apply this principle of adaptation in our own lives. And after each section we will have a brief pause.
If any of you have one question, you can take one or two questions at that time and we’ll move forward that way. So we’ll have some question answers at the end but we’ll also have some in between. The 11th canto of the Srimad Bhagavatam is expanded rendition of the same message that is given by Krishna in the Bhagavad Gita.
So Krishna speaks the Bhagavad Gita to Arjuna and the same Krishna speaks the Uddhava Gita to Uddhava. And in this Uddhava Gita, there is more time the Bhagavad Gita is spoken in an emergency just before a war is about to take place. So Krishna speaks everything in condensedly, in condensation, in briefly.
But in the Uddhava Gita, he speaks more in detail. And he gives various parts for spiritual elevation. The idea is, if you consider the top of the mountain to be like spiritual consciousness and the bottom of a mountain to be material consciousness.
Then there can be different parts by which one can rise up from the bottom to the top. And Krishna both in the Bhagavad Gita and Uddhava Gita, objectively analyses the various parts. And he objectively explains in the Bhagavad Gita, how the path of Bhakti Yoga is the most recommended.
Once Prabhupada was asked, Swamiji, I don’t know the words but I heard Krishna says in the Gita that whatever you do, you will come to me. So, Prabhupada replied, if whatever we do will come to Krishna, then why does Krishna have to even speak the Gita? Isn’t it? So, this is a relativism where any idea is made equivalent to any other idea. The Bhagavad Gita acknowledges the purpose and the potency of various processes.
It’s like going the example of going up the mountain. Somebody says, any path you take, you will go up the mountain. No, some paths may be going down into a valley, some paths may be going away from the mountain.
So, we have to see whether a path is taking us up the mountain. Now, in the Bhagavad Gita, Krishna talks about various processes and he is very categorical that it is the Sarva Dharmaan Parityajya Maam Ekam Sharanam Rajah. Sharana is a part of Bhakti.
So, he recommends Bhakti Yoga. This idea that all paths lead to the same goal. This is actually a mistranslation of 4.11 in the Bhagavad Gita.
4.11 is Mama Vartamanu Vartante Manushyaha Partha Sarvashaha So, if you look at the literal translation, Mama Vartamanu Vartante, following my path are everyone. Manushyaha Partha Sarvashaha. Sarvashaha is all.
Manushyaha is people. So, all people are on my path. That means everybody is on the one journey towards Krishna.
But some people may be going towards Krishna, some people may be going away from Krishna. So, here Sarvashaha, that adjective applies to Manushyaha. All people are on my path.
But this mistranslation of the Gita, they take Sarvashaha and applies to Vartama. Vartama is the path. So, what Krishna is saying is all people are on the same path.
But some people translate it as all paths lead to me. Whereas Krishna is saying all people are on my path. So, this is a mistranslation.
And such mistranslations can easily happen if we don’t see the broader picture. See, there is reading scripture and there is reading from scripture and there is reading into scripture. What do I mean? Read scripture means read the text.
Read from scripture means that we look at scripture and try to understand based on the commentaries what the scripture means. But reading into scripture means that we have certain ideas and we impose those ideas on the scripture. And then we can completely misunderstand things.
In attempts at translation, which computers try to do, there is a apocryphal incident of how a computer can make a mistake. So, there was this biblical saying the spirit is willing but the flesh is weak. So, it’s a saying which means basically that we may want to do something spiritually, but our lower desires, our bodily desires pull us down.
So, they fed this to a computer algorithm. And the computer translated this into Russian and then from Russian they retranslated back into English. And the English translation was, the meat is good, but the vodka is rotten.
Sorry, the vodka is good, but the meat is rotten. The spirit is willing, the spirit became vodka. And the flesh is weak became the meat is rotten.
So, sometimes if you don’t understand the broader context, a translation can be completely misunderstood. So, the purpose of yoga, as Krishna tells in the Bhagavad Gita, especially Ashtang Yoga, is one method to raise one’s consciousness. And Krishna acknowledges potency but he recommends Bhakti Yoga.
Why is that? Because Bhakti Yoga channels the most important resource that we have. Actually, few things influence us as much as our emotions. And Bhakti Yoga channels the power of our emotions to take us towards Krishna.
The other parts focus primarily on denying emotions, saying that all emotions lead to illusion. So, get rid of the emotions. Just become apathetic.
Just become detached from everything. That has its value. However, denying our emotions is very very difficult.
So, Bhakti Yoga says, we don’t have to deny our emotions but we have to redirect our emotions. So, our emotions can power us on our spiritual journey if we can direct them towards Krishna. And of course, another factor is that it is not just our emotions that power us.
Our emotions connect with Krishna’s emotions. Then, our devotion attracts Krishna’s grace. And Krishna’s grace powers us.
So, to give another example, if somebody is at the bottom of a well and they have to come out of the well. So, all the yoga paths are like ropes which can help the person to come out of the well. But Bhakti Yoga is a path where, in all the other yogas, people have to hold the rope and pull themselves out.
And climb out, basically. But Bhakti Yoga is a path where we hold on to the rope and we are pulled out. So, we accept that there is a sentient being beyond who is merciful.
And we seek his grace. That’s why Krishna recommends Bhakti Yoga in the Bhagavad Gita. But other paths also have their validity.
So, the traditional understanding of Ashtanga Yoga, which Krishna is talking about here, sit in a particular posture, look at a particular, look at a particular object, see the tip of the nose. Krishna talks in two objects, he talks. One is Look at between your eyebrows or look at the tip of the nose.
The idea is, have some object of focus. One object, the mind is wandering, get it to focus on one object. First, there is an external object of meditation.
Then you go inwards and there is an internal object of meditation. There is Sampragya Samadhi and then Asampragya Samadhi. But actually, one meditates without even having an object.
One gets internally absorbed. So, it’s an elaborate process, but Ashtanga Yoga was traditionally practised by people who would renounce the world and go to the forest for realising the absolute by rejecting the world. Krishna says, Go into the forest, stay in a secluded, sacred place and practise Yoga.
Now, this was the traditional understanding of Yoga. The contemporary understanding of Yoga is very different. Yoga has spread across the world in a huge way.
In fact, I just came from America three days ago. So, I was at a Yoga conference and there they said that one out of every five people in America practise Yoga. And one out of every ten people in America are registered Yoga practitioners.
They have done some courses and they practise it regularly. It’s huge and it’s not just in America, it’s all over the world. But it’s interesting that while Yoga practise in terms of the asanas is being done, traditionally as I said, Yoga was practised primarily by renunciates and they were male renunciates who practised Yoga to transcend the world.
But in the western world, Yoga is practised primarily by females who want to make their bodies fitter and more attractive so that they can get a more attractive position in the world. So, the purpose has become completely distanced from the original purpose. Now, this could be a bad thing but this needn’t be a bad thing also.
How is that? Mahabharata explains that good and bad are determined not just categorically but also contextually. That means this is right this is wrong, this is good, this is bad. These are two categories.
But there are contexts. Contexts means in the same context something can be good and something can be bad. So, say if a parent has two children and one of them barely manages to pass the exam and gets 40% marks and another passes the exam with flying colours and usually gets 80%.
Suppose it’s an exam where you don’t get much marks, so 80% is the highest. That person gets 80% marks. And today, both of them come back with the results.
And both of them have got 60%. Now, the father will tell the first son, Shabash! Well done! And the second son comes forward and the father says, Badmash! What have you done? Now, both of them got the same percent. But why the difference? It is not just the content but also the context.
The context is that for a person to go from 40% to 60% is higher. For a person to come from 80% to 60% is lower. So, similarly, in the Balde Vidya Bhushan, in his commentary on the Vedanta Sutra, has a whole section devoted to the refutation of Yoga.
There are six systems of philosophy and Yoga is one of the systems of philosophy. And there he categorically refutes Yoga. He says, Yoga does not give us a conclusive understanding of the Absolute Truth.
So, what is the point over there? If somebody can understand the Absolute Truth, if they can get the level of 80%, for them to come to 60% is unhealthy. So, for them to practise Yoga and to come to some impersonal understanding of the Absolute, that is unwanted. But, in today’s world, where people are largely interested only in materialism, if they can practise some more holistic way of improving their health, instead of trying to just kick chemicals into their bodies and use all kinds of shape and look altering chemicals which harm them in the long run, so that they practise Yoga, then for people who are at 40% level, for them to practise Yoga and come to 60% is actually very good.
And from there, they can rise upwards. So, in fact, much of the outreach in the Western world, which we are doing to Americans or Western people, is through the Yoga crowd. I was in Chicago, I had gone to Wisconsin to the Midwest Yoga and Kirtan Festival.
There were 300 Americans who had come to stay there for three days in small camps, in small huts and small tents and stuff like that. They were camping over there, and they were there just to learn about Yoga. So, when I went there, I and the two devotees who were with me, we three were the only Indians over there.
Everyone else was American. And all these people, when they come there, it was a Yoga festival, but they were not interested so much in learning at the asanas. When the devotees wanted me to speak at the Yoga festival, I said, you know, these people are more interested in physical fitness.
I am not a sample of physical fitness. So, I said, I have no right to speak. He said, no, no, that’s not what they are interested in.
And then, classes, we had lots of question answers. So, those people, if there had been no Yoga, now they are interested not in Yoga practise, but in Yoga wisdom. What is the worldview of Yoga? What is it that they want now? So, because of the practise of Yoga, they have come from 40% to 60% now.
And now they are interested in knowing, if 60% is there something 80%? So, as per context, even if somebody is doing something, even if 1000 people practise Yoga, simply for improving their physical looks or physical health. But out of that, 1000, if 10 or 50 or 100 become interested, what is this Yoga all about? Then that is positive. We cannot completely separate the material and the spiritual.
I’ll come to this point a little bit later. But let’s look again traditionally. In the past, Brahmanas could provide material and spiritual benefits together.
Say, Brahmanas could do Yagyas by which, say, if there is a drought, Brahmana would do Yagya and rains would come. Brahmanas would do various practises by which people’s material needs would be fulfilled and then they would be more open to, oh, this thing works, let me know more. And they would become more open to spirituality.
That same principle, we can apply in today’s world. In fact, in the western world, there are four broad trends which indicate a rise of Sattva Guna. And in some ways, we can say that the West is, in some ways, moving towards Sattva and India is moving towards Rajas and Tamas.
What are these four things? I said, one is the popularity of Yoga itself. And along with Yoga, there are a lot of other things, Ayurveda, Astrology, all more holistic, harmonious Sattvic ways of maintaining health. The second is environmental consciousness.
It’s quite big, where people understand that we can’t live in the world and continue exploiting the world. So, to become more eco-conscious. Third is vegetarianism.
Where people, especially people who are becoming vegan, they become conscious that we are causing violence to others. In fact, to be vegan in America is considered to be cool. In fact, when we do programmes for Yoga people, actually devotees, after the programme announced, which of the food items are Prasad also, which food items are vegan and which are not vegan.
So, we say that we are very strict about, we take this food and we don’t take this food. But even among the food that we take, there are Yoga practitioners who will not take some of the food also. So, they are conscious.
This causes violence in the world, we don’t want to be a part of it. So, that is also indicative of a rise in spiritual consciousness. But unfortunately, we see in India, if somebody is vegetarian, they are considered old-fashioned.
And especially when students come from their homes to colleges, one part of their maturation process is you should start eating meat. So, actually, some ways we are going down in Rajas and Tamas. Of course, spirituality is growing in India also.
But broadly, this understanding that although the original purpose may not be directly being served, but still we can see the good that is there. And the potential for further elevation that is there. That is how Yoga opens many doors.
Yoga practise in terms of Ashtang Yoga practise, it opens many doors for people to come closer to Krishna. For people to start practising Bhakti. So, any questions or comments at this point? Okay, good question.
I deliberately didn’t speak the fourth word because I thought there will be no questions, so at least one question will come. Okay, thank you. So, broadly speaking, if we consider that, as I said, there is Yoga, there is environmentalism, there is vegetarianism, and there is mindfulness.
Mindfulness is where people who are enormously stressed, instead of taking just brain altering medication to improve their mental health, they want to attend seminars on mindfulness. Now, mindfulness is thought by many people to be a Buddhist concept. But actually, the Bhagavad Gita also talks about being mindful.
Mindful beings being aware of our situations and aware of our emotions. Just becoming aware of the present. So, in 18.54 Krishna says that Brahma bhuta prasannatma na shochati na kankshati That, be satisfied.
Do not hanker. Hankering is for the future. Lamenting is for the past.
And Krishna is saying, na shochati na kankshati That simply means, don’t bother about the future, don’t bother about the past. Be present in the present. So, that’s mindfulness.
And, I was in Silicon Valley, I spoke at a big company, Salesforce. And, Salesforce has been a pioneer, where the head of Salesforce had come to India and he was on a spiritual journey and he went back. Now, in their company, they have meditation rooms.
And they have seminars done by monks from various traditions. And, they encourage their employees to take these seminars. And they found that stress levels decrease.
And, of course, in the corporate world, it’s performance that matters. But, they find mindfulness is a way to improve performance. So, these are four broad ways.
Any other questions? Yes, please. Basically, in the future is the thing which always torments people. Because of the rising cost, because of the current situation.
So, when you say that, stay in the present and do not worry about the future, means, even if you see, even the richest people in the world or right from the common man is all concerned about the future only. The future is the thing which torments the most. So, how do you address that? So, in the future, there is so much uncertainty.
So, how can we say, just be in the present and don’t worry about the future? There are two different things. There is worrying about the future and there is planning for the future. Planning for the future is a sign of intelligence.
We need to do that. The difference between planning and worrying is who is in control. If we consider that, we are here, our mind is here and the world is here.
So, right now, you are looking at me. So, your mind is in between. If suddenly you remember, Oh, did I lock my house when I came here? If I didn’t lock, somebody will rob.
Why did I keep my key? Did I lock? As soon as you think this one thing, immediately on that inner screen, a movie starts. And then you get lost. So, although we are physically here, we may not hear anything.
So, basically, for us to perceive things, say, we are here, the mind is like our inner screen. And the physical reality out there is the outer scene. So, to be present in the present means that the seer, the screen and the scene are in one line.
Now, this inner screen, this mind, which is where the outer world gets reflected, this is meant to be like a window, but it can suddenly become a TV. And if suddenly it starts showing on a TV screen, a horror movie. This may go wrong, that may go wrong, that may go wrong, that may go wrong.
Worry is like the tax we pay on loans we haven’t yet taken. The problems have not yet come at all, but still, this may go wrong, that may go wrong. So, now, if we are just sitting and watching, we don’t realise that this is a horror movie going on, and we get horrified.
We get fearful. So, we are not in control that the inner screen is starting the TV over there. And then, if we are worrying, at the end of worry, we feel paralysed.
We feel overwhelmed. We may even get a panic attack. But, so, this is what happens when we are in tamas, in the lower modes, the mind is in control, and we are passively observing.
But if we are in sattva, if we are in the mode of in a higher mode, then we can consciously direct the inner screen to the future. And then, when we are calmly in control, then we consider, if this happens, what can I do? If that happens, what can I do? If that happens, what can I do? If this happens, okay, I can do this, this, this. If this happens, I’ll have to plan for it.
We’ll have to consult someone. So, when we are in control and we take our inner screen to the future, we take the mind to the future and consciously analyse possibilities, then we feel prepared by that. So, we need to prepare for the future.
And mindfulness is not against preparing for the future. But mindfulness is being aware of what we are doing. So, if we are aware and we consciously take our thoughts to the future, then at the end of such contemplation, we will feel more equipped.
We’ll feel more empowered. But if the mind is taking it to the future, then after worrying, we feel more disempowered, not empowered. Okay? Thank you.
Just one question? Yeah. Okay, yeah. So, when I said Krishna objectively analyses the various processes of yoga, what do I mean by that? When Krishna objectively analyses, that means, if you see, especially in the fifth chapter, Krishna says that, … … … … Krishna, somebody says, somebody is doing intellectual part of analysis, Sankhya.
And somebody is doing disciplined practise of physical yoga. … Somebody said, both of these are separate. No, Krishna is not saying they are separate.
See, both of them have the one common purpose. And in acknowledging that these various parts of Sankhya, Yoga, Bhakti, Karma, Karma Yoga, they are all having one purpose. Krishna acknowledges that one purpose and acknowledges their validity and their potency.
So, in that sense, Krishna is objective. But Krishna also, just because somebody is objective, doesn’t mean that they can’t be conclusive. Objective means that we are not biassed.
That, oh, this is… I want to somehow or the prove this is bad and that is bad. That is biassed. But objectively, sometimes if you say, okay, this person is this tall and this person is taller than this person.
That’s a conclusion which is objective and still it is factual, it is not necessarily biassed. So, Krishna objectively analyses the Yoga and then he gives a conclusion, conclusive declaration at the end. Okay, thank you.
So, I’ll move on to the second part. In the first part, I spoke about how the yoga tradition was originally understood and now how it is being understood in today’s world. And within that there is an opportunity to practise bhakti.
So the second point I will talk about is how religious traditions in general or spiritual traditions in general have to be adapting to their situations. Now, Gaurang Prabhu often gives the story of how when a hippie asked Prabhupada, Prabhupada, what is the bliss of Vaikuntha? So what did Prabhupada say? It’s like an ocean of LSD. The bliss of Vaikuntha is like an ocean of LSD.
Now, if somebody is ultra-sceptical, they say, in which shastra is this said? Vaikuntha is pure, transcendental. It is LSD. It is tamasic.
It is horrible. It is in the ego of ignorance. So somebody may even want to quote shastra and say, to give a mundane interpretation of the holy name is an offence to the holy name.
Now, is Prabhupada committing an offence? Obviously not. The point is, the point is not just to get it right. The point is to get it across.
The point is not just to get it right. If somebody comes to an audience where people speak English or Hindi or Marathi, and the speaker gives a class in pure Sanskrit, they will get everything right and they will get nothing across. Isn’t it? So the point is that we have to not just get it right, we have to get it across.
And getting it across means that the way people, language is not just verbal language. The way people think also shapes how we could say they are mental languages, how they perceive, what they can understand. So for a person whose only conception of happiness is taking drugs and going high, for them, if Prabhupada started quoting Brahma Samhita, Chintamani, Prakarasadmasu, Kalpavruksha, they will start yawning, they will not understand at all.
So, especially in adult education, the key parameter is relevance. Students who go to school, they have to go because they have to get a degree. But whenever adults take an education, it is unanimously agreed by experts that if something is not relevant, adults will turn off.
So the point is not just to get it right, the point is to get it across. And to get it across means people have to understand this, this is relevant to me, this connects with me. And so this is an example of Prabhupada’s resourcefulness, you could say even innovativeness, in explaining the bliss of Vaikuntha in very contemporary terms.
Now we don’t have to make a Shastra, we don’t have to find some Shastric words to say that the bliss of Vaikuntha is like LSD. Of course, there is the theme that Divyonmar, Divine Intoxication, that theme is talked about in Chaitanya Charita Amrit, but not specifically LSD. So when a spiritual message is to be communicated, it has to be communicated in a way that people can understand.
And I talk about this in three broad terms, that we can present a spiritual message in a prescriptive way, in a normative way and a descriptive way. Prescriptive means, you should do this and you should not do this, like a doctor gives a prescription, take this, don’t take this. Normative means, this is the norm, this is right, this is wrong.
Descriptive is, this is what I do and this is why I do it. So in the Western world, there is an enormous crisis of faith. People are so sceptical, that they just don’t believe in anything and especially any religious authority.
People don’t believe in that. Because they have seen so much exploitation going on in the name of religion, that people just don’t want to practise. In fact, if you look in American census that is done now, if you have to tell your religious affiliation, then they have one option.
Okay, you are Christian, you are Muslim, you are Jew, you are Hindu and there is an increasing option that is chosen by increasing number of people, that is called nun. We are nuns. Not N-U-N nun, but N-O-N-E nun.
So they say, we are not interested. So people are spiritually very apathetic. And why is that they are apathetic? Because they have had experiences of people moralising and condemning.
I was in Texas, and Texas is considered to be like a Bible-built state, where there are lot of evangelical Christians. I was going for a morning walk and doing japa, so at that time somebody stopped a car and he says, can I give you a lift? He says, no, I am just doing some, I am okay, I said. Okay, can I invite you for a Bible class? I said, yeah, sure, you can invite me, but I will also invite you for a Gita class.
Oh, really, what is Bhagavad Gita? Then we had a talk and then I gave him Bhagavad Gita and so he was the Bible preacher over there. So there is a lot of evangelical Christianity. So anyway, the point was, I was going in a car, and in front of the next car, I saw a notice.
People put some various slogans, humorous slogans on their car dashboards, on the back side of the car. So this was, Oh God, please save me from your preachers. Now normally, God saves us through his preachers.
But the preachers are moralising and holier than thou, condemning, fire and brimstone, that is the word that is used. If you don’t do this, you are going to go to hell. There are some religions which are exclusives, they say, my way or the highway, you are going to go to hell.
And there are even more extremist versions, and they say, if you are not following my way, you are not only going to hell, but we will help you get there faster. So, in this situation, people are just so apathetic. So apathetic and even averse towards any kind of authority.
It’s not that people are against. Many people, they say that we are SBNR. SBNR is spiritual, but not religious.
Their idea is, if you are religious, then you are narrow minded, you are dogmatic, you are ritualistic. We want to know about higher aspects of life. We don’t want to affiliate with any religious group.
So, for such people, if somebody speaks prescriptively, do this, don’t do this, who are you to tell me to do this? I don’t accept your authority. The scripture says this. Ok, why should I believe your scripture? There are so many scriptures and so many traditions.
So, as soon as somebody tries to claim religious authority and present things, then people feel alienated. So, traditionally, we, in our movement, we adopted a confrontational approach. This is wrong, this is right.
And at one level, education requires that. By the same time, people have to begin their educational journey. And the level that they are at, we have to present things accordingly.
Suppose, somebody is very poor and they are out like a beggar on the street and they are cold. And they have got one cloth, which also is torn. It’s not giving them proper relief from the cold.
But that is the only cloth they have. I will tell them, this cloth is torn, this cloth is useless, just throw it away and I will give you a better cloth. Now, if that is the only cloth they have, they, if you try to pull away that cloth from them, I will give you a better cloth, but give this up.
Even if that blanket is torn, it’s thin, it’s not protecting them much, but still they will not give it up. So, similarly, for people, they have followed something, they have experienced something and they have some conception of spirituality. They may have followed this guru, they may have done this process, they may have read this book and that has given them some spiritual idea.
And that is their understanding of truth. Now, it may be a very inadequate understanding of truth, but that is their understanding. And when we tell people to reject that and take up something higher, then they just can’t do it.
Because for them, that is what is giving them shelter. Oh, this world is a place of confusion, of illusion, of perplexity. This is one thing that has worked for me.
If somebody has done some breathing exercises and become a little calm. So, that is the small shred of truth that they have and if we reject that, if we tell them to reject that, all that will happen is they will reject us. And they will simply get alienated.
So, the important thing is that wherever people are at, in the western world, it may be yoga or Ayurveda or India, it may be a particular kind of worship of the Devatas, people may be doing. Some people worship demigods and some people worship semi-gods. Semi-gods is, say me God.
I am God. So, many people believe that, oh, this particular Devata is God. Now, it is interesting that many Indians are more interested in worship than in the object of worship.
People will go to a temple and fold their hands and pray and then they come out. Whom did you pray to? Oh, whatever was there on the altar. There was a devotee in Canada, he is telling me his experience that he was invited to a kirtan of a particular, this was a kirtan of a particular God-man.
He is saying, we are going to do a kirtan of this person’s names. And the devotee said, what will I do over there? I don’t want to go for such kirtans. But their neighbours, he had invited them for a devotee programme.
They had come, so he said, how can I not go? He went there. Now, his son is a very nice singer. And when they went there, they were doing this kirtan, he said, we know that your son sings very nicely.
He said, yes. Yeah, but he is comfortable singing Krishna bhajans. That’s okay, sing Krishna bhajans.
And all these people, they were singing their own God-man name and a few moments later, they all started singing Krishna bhajans. And for one, one and a half hours, all of them were singing Krishna’s names. So, the point is that if we try to tell people, reject this, or your blanket is torn, it’s dilapidated, give it up and I’ll give you something better.
People will not do that. But just give them the blanket right now. Let them experience the comfort.
Let them experience Krishna conscious wisdom and practise as it makes sense and as it gives them solace. And once that happens, then people will start connecting. So, Krishna says in the Bhagavad Gita, anuddhvega karamvakyam satyam priyahitam jayat.
Speak in a way that does not agitate people’s minds. Nabuddhu-bhedam janayena ajnanam karma-sanginam. In 3.26, that was 1715, in 3.26 he says, don’t disturb the minds of people who are ignorant and attached.
It’s interesting, the Sanskrit word Krishna uses is buddhi. What is the meaning of buddhi? Intelligence. Now Prabhupada translates that as the mind.
Krishna is telling, don’t create holes in people’s intelligence. Nabuddhu-bhedam. And Prabhupada says, don’t disturb the minds.
What happens for most people, their intelligence follows their mind. It is not that their mind follows their intelligence. That means most people start practising something spiritual, because first it feels good to them.
And then, why does this feel so good? And then some philosophy comes up over there. So, people’s intelligence is formed around their mind. And if something has felt good to them, and if you tell them this is bad, then what happens, it contradicts their experience.
And Sanatana Goswami says, in Brihadbhagavatam, that anubhav, experience, is the greatest pramana. That is pataksha pramana, shabda pramana, anuman pramana. Ultimately, we all need to get anubhav of Krishna.
We need to experience Krishna. So, from a people’s lived experience point of view, their anubhav is their greatest pramana. And whatever logic we may give, whatever philosophy we may give, but if that contradicts their anubhav, that contradicts their experience, then they will not reject their experience.
They will reject us. So, our purpose when sharing Krishna bhakti is to give people a positive experience. When we are distributing books, now the book distribution marathon is going on, we do want to get people to take books.
But even if somebody doesn’t take a book, if they feel, I met a nice person. I am a nice person. This Hare Krishna devotees are nice people.
They got a positive experience. And that itself will make them more open to Krishna in the future. And how do you give this positive experiences? Because I talked about this prescriptive, normative and descriptive.
So, prescriptive and normative approaches don’t work very well because people don’t accept authority. But descriptive approach means, if somebody asks, OK, why don’t you eat meat? Say, we are at work and somebody is taking non-vegetarian food. Why don’t you eat meat? Now, we could tell them that, oh, you shouldn’t eat meat because there is meat is so much violence, so much bloodshed, this, that, that.
Now, that, people will feel threatened by that. But instead of telling people what you should do or what you should not do, just tell, you know, I contemplated that, I found so much violence is there and I am not comfortable with that. I feel that for gratifying my tongue, I don’t have to take the lives of other animals.
Yeah, that makes sense. Why should I do it also? So, when we present our experience, rather than telling people, you have to do this, this is what I do and this is why I do it. Then any forum, we can present Krishna Consciousness.
Without making it feel that other people, you have to practise it. So, that way, what happens, we open door for people, but we don’t force them to come. Sometimes what happens for us, we open the door and if people don’t walk in, we bang the door in their face.
You are not interested in Krishna Bhakti, you are a demon. Well, they are not demons, there are sattva, rajas, tamas, there are many different kinds of people and not everybody is ready for spiritual growth at this stage. So, presenting the bhakti tradition in a way that makes sense to people, that is vital for us to enter into their heads and their hearts.
So, this is the second point. I just spoke about how religious traditions keep themselves relevant by presenting themselves in a way that works for people, that makes sense to them. Any questions or comments about this? Yes.
You can speak, I’ll repeat the question. According to some schools of post-modernism, there are three things. First is fact, which is an objective reality.
Everybody feels hunger, thirst, that is universal for everyone. There is fiction, Harry Potter, it is no one’s reality. And there is something which lies in between, that is myth.
Myth is someone’s reality, but it is not everyone’s reality. So, all the Vedic scriptures, they fall in this category of mythology. So, what is your opinion on this? Okay.
So, if we say that there are three categories, that is fact, there is fiction and then there is myth. So, fact is objective reality, fiction is just imagination and myth is personal reality, which may not apply to others. Basically, if we consider in the bhakti tradition also, there is a concept of tattva and there is a concept of rasa.
Rasa is personal reality. For Yashodamayi, Krishna is a small child. For Radharani, Krishna is an attractive youth.
For Shuddhama, Krishna is a teenage boy. And in the Anurandavan Jhampo, Kavi Karanapur explains that Krishna manifests the appropriate form so that he can reciprocate love appropriately with each devotee according to their rasa. So, when he is with Radharani, he manifests as a youth.
So, that Kaishora Rupa is the original form of Krishna. But from that Kaishora Rupa, the Kumara Rupa or the Bala Rupa may also manifest, if he is performing pastimes with the Sakhas or with his parents. So, basically, the concept of rasa is real and it is subjective.
So, it means there is objective which people consider as real and subjective they consider as false. But there is a third point, there is something which is subjective and real. So, the experience is subjective.
But just because something is subjective doesn’t mean it is unreal. So, if we consider the word itihas, the Vedic scriptures, are they fact, are they fiction, are they myth? See, the word fact itself is something which is a product of post-Newtonian-Cartesian duality. That means, after Newton, when science started growing in a particular way, there is an obsession with historical details and specific facts.
But if you look at historians like Homer, who is a Greek historian, when they would tell stories, Shakespeare retells the stories of Julius Caesar and others, the point of telling history is not to give a precise recite, precise account of specific facts. The point of telling about history is to learn moral lessons for our upliftment. Now, this does not mean that the history is not real.
But the point is that we don’t have to get caught in the historical specifics of things. The important thing is what we can learn and what we can grow. So, for us, when we study scripture, we study scripture primarily because it brings meaning and purpose into our lives.
And of course, scripture does have itihas, it is knowledge of what happened in the past. But at the same time, it is not history as it is understood today. History as it is understood today is primarily an account of facts and dates.
That’s not the purpose of telling history in the past. So, if the idea of myth is used, the word myth has a negative connotation and that’s why if you ask a devotee, are the Vedic scriptures myth? He will say, no, they are not myth. No, but words have different meanings in different people’s minds.
So, we have to see what is the thing which people have in their minds. So, for most people, the specific historicity of what happened when or where, that is not that important. There may be specific devotees who can do that research and they can establish what is called the historicity, the historical authenticity of things.
But that is not the primary purpose and we have to choose which battles we fight. So, Prabhupada in the first canto of Srimad Bhagavatam, the 10th, 11th chapters, when Krishna comes from Hastinapur to Dwarka, at that time Prabhupada in a purport says, the verses are describing how Krishna, what path he took. He went from this city to this city to this city to this city and then he came to Dwarka.
And Prabhupada in the purport writes that there are geologists who may try to retrace the exact path that Krishna took. And Prabhupada said, that is a very difficult endeavour because the surface of the earth keeps changing. Because of geology, the surface of the earth keeps changing.
And then Prabhupada says, as far as we are concerned, we are simply satisfied that Krishna has come to Dwarka and is going to perform pastimes with his devotees there. So, Prabhupada is not denying that these are historical facts. He is just saying that things change and we don’t have to obsess over this.
So, if for someone something is experienced as a personal reality, then that is good. Now, if the experience of the, as I said, there is truth that is false and the people say there is truth with a capital T and truth with a small t. That is what post-modernists say. But if the truth with a small t helps people to move towards truth with a capital T, that means the truth that I experience, the rasa that I experience takes me towards Krishna.
That is good. So, tattva and rasa can both go together. In some cases, we give tattva first and then we give rasa.
So, we give the philosophy and then people experience rasa. But sometimes some people may come just in the direction of the deities, just to participate in kirtans. Then they may get the rasa first and then they come towards the tattva.
So, we have to see according to context. If the lowercase truth, lowercase t truth, is used to deny completely the capital T truth, then it is a problem. But if the lowercase t truth helps people to trace or chart a path towards the uppercase T truth, then that is perfectly fine.
Thank you. So, I will conclude with the last point and then we may have one more question, two more questions. So, how does this apply to all of us in our practise of spiritual life? I will give two or three examples and I will conclude.
So, as I said, the point is not just to get it right, the point is to get it across. So, when we are practising bhakti, we will, especially in today’s world, as the world is becoming more religiously diverse, in metropolitan cities especially, we will feel that people have different kinds of ideas about spirituality. Not everybody follows the same thing.
Then, at that time, if we see that my purpose is to help a person take one step forward towards Krishna. If, say, I talked about in the start the metaphor that if there is a mountain and there are multiple paths up the mountain. So, sometimes we may say, I am, my path is right and your path is wrong.
If somebody is climbing up a mountain, now some people think the success of their preaching is to pull people down from their paths and pull them to our side and get them to march upon this path. That is not the success. The success is our purpose is not just to increase the numbers of a particular organisation.
Our purpose is to provide people tools to raise their consciousness. And based on our experience, if we have found that the tools and resources provided in the Krishna consciousness path, they help us to raise our consciousness nicely. That’s why we follow this and we encourage others.
But if we keep this purpose that how can I help this person move closer to Krishna. This person at this level, how can I help this person take one step towards Krishna from where they are. Then Krishna will guide us forward from there.
If we think I have to get this person to do this thing and if they don’t do this thing, then my life is a failure. Then we become very possessive and we become very domineering. This can apply in all our relationships.
About 25 years ago, I started practising Bhakti. So I asked Jai Duryodhana Maharaj, how do I preach to my parents? And Maharaj replied by letting anyone except you preach to your parents. So as long as I was trying to preach to my father, I just got out of the way and connected my father with the devotee community.
He is a Nasik and then he started taking up on his own. So sometimes we may take credit. I made so many people devotees.
So many people came to Krishna because of me. But there is no way to count how many people didn’t come to Krishna because of me. Sometimes the way I spoke, the way I conducted myself, I remember in the early days of my spiritual life, I was working in a company.
I was in Pune working in a company. It was a one-hour drive. So I was going to the company bus.
So when I would get in the bus, I would usually be reading a book or chanting. And then all the other employees would look at me. What is he doing? And they would continue.
Then one of my friends at that time made a mistake. What was his mistake? He asked me, what are you doing? And that one question, for me, we have a six session Bhagavad Gita course. So I decided to concentrate all six sessions in one hour.
And then I spoke everything and he was just dazed. I spoke everything and I thought I did a very good job. I thought I have made an intellectual achievement.
Six sessions in one hour. But after that, whenever I would go by that bus, I would get in the bus first and he would join two stops later. So whenever he would climb up, he would first look in, see where I was sitting and then enter from the other side.
So it was only later I realised at that time, I just gave him an overdose. It was just a casual enquiry. It was just a casual enquiry.
I didn’t have to give so much philosophy to him. When I was in Seattle, I met him again. Now he is coming to the temple, he started practising Bhakti.
At his pace, he has taken up. Sometimes what happens, when we are practising Bhakti, we feel this is so wonderful and we want everyone else to practise it. But we have gone through our own experiences, our own evolution.
That’s how we have come. So others will also have to go through their evolution, their spiritual evolution. And we provide them aids for that evolution.
So, if… Now Bhaktivinoda Thakur in Chetan Shikshanamruta says that there are different kinds of social occasions. So he says, as far as devotee’s heart is concerned, a devotee’s heart is in Vaishnav festivals. We have Janmashtami, Ram Navami, we have Pushpabhishek coming next month.
So these are festivals that devotees love to go to. But he says there are other religious festivals and other social festivals. If a devotee has to go for them, it’s the devotee goes and has a spiritual consciousness over there.
Bhaktivinoda Thakur lived a time when in Bengal, the worship of the Goddess was very big. So when you are going there, you don’t have to tell everyone. That is not the occasion to preach.
That is the occasion, if at all, if our family goes there, if everybody else expects us to go there, we go there and internally we pray to Krishna, we pray to the Goddess that please make me a better devotee of Krishna, just as the Gopis did to Katyayani. So that is not, people have not come to our forum. So if we are going to their forum, it is very, it is inappropriate for us to at that time see that as an opportunity for direct preaching.
Yes, if they are interested in the inquisitive, at appropriate place we can talk with them. But that place you have to see what can I do by which I can help people move towards Krishna. So when George Harrison became a devotee and he started practising bhakti and then in his kirtans, in his musical performance, he would ask people to do kirtans.
And now when people would come to his shows, they came for a musical performance, not for a kirtan. And he did in New York in a big stadium, he did a kirtan, he did a, was supposed to do a show and he asked everyone to chant Hare Krishna. And he got jeers and boos and it was terrible.
And his rating started plummeting down and then he met Sri Prabhupada. He said, Prabhupada, you told me to sing about Krishna but I am feeling that for every one person I am getting to Krishna, 100 people are going away from Krishna. 100 people are becoming hostile.
And Prabhupada told him, then use your intelligence. He described Yogeshwar Prabhu in his book, Here Comes the Sun, the biography of George Harrison. So then what he started doing thereafter was, he would write one song about Krishna and then have many other songs of the kind which people expected.
Sometimes he had the songs which people expected, but within that he would bring some devotional element. And basically he said, that’s how he was able to get people to come closer to Krishna. Not in a very direct way, but in a way that people could take at that place.
And that’s how they moved on. So we have to see at which place I am and how best can I help people to come closer to Krishna. When we do this, then in every situation we will see there is an opportunity, even if not for direct preaching, but for helping people raise their consciousness.
I will conclude with this incident and lesson from this. I was in a college in America and I gave a class and then after that one American girl asked a question, said that, why do religions fight among each other? So then I explained elaborately about how there are exclusivist, inclusivist, pluralist. People within each tradition, some people are narrow minded, some people are broad minded.
And what makes people fight is not just religion, it is their own mentality. Because of their mentality people will fight because of religion, they will fight because of race, they will fight because of nationality, even atheistic ideologies. Marxism and Communism are atheistic ideologies.
But that caused so much violence. In fact, far more than the number of people killed in religious violence, the number of people which Marxists killed in Russia and China when they were in power. They elaborately answered the question and then she was quite satisfied with the answer.
Then after the class I was talking with students, talking with all of them and then this girl came again and she told me that, this question, it had been burdening me for so long. I was so troubled by it. Your answer has fully satisfied me.
I am so grateful to you. And then she said, can I give you a hug? Now, in the western world, giving a hug is just a normal part of culture. So now, I was not prepared for this.
So I just looked at the devotee preacher who was with me and I signalled with my eyes, help, what do I do? Now he helped, but he helped in an entirely unexpected way. He said, he is a monk, on his behalf you can hug me. Now, when he said this, I was taken aback.
And then his wife was there over there. And she said, I am his wife, on his behalf you can hug me. So, from the point of people coming at a particular level, if this is not what we do, that will alienate them.
But just because they do something doesn’t mean we have to do those things. Now what I have found is, we just tell them politely in our tradition, we greet people by folding our hands. And some people like this, they also fold their hands.
For them it is a new experience. For them hugging is common, folding their hands is a new experience. So people do that.
But in every situation, rather than approaching the situation with, this is right and this is wrong, this is what I have to do and this is what I should not do. But we approach that situation as, what is right for this person? How can I help this person to raise their consciousness upwards? If we do that, then we will find that not only will we help people to move forward in their spiritual journey, but also we will move forward in our spiritual journey. And we won’t feel so much hostility.
Why don’t people understand what I am doing? I am trying to do good to them. Why don’t they understand? Before people can understand us, we have to understand people. And when we do that, we approach people in an understanding mood.
See ourselves as instruments. Krishna, how can I be an instrument for you to raise this person’s consciousness? As Prabhupada said, Krishna, make me dance. Nachao, nachao, Prabhu nachao se mate.
Kashtera putali yatha nachao se mate. So, just as a puppeteer makes a puppet dance, make me dance. So when we are going for distribution, it’s an opportunity to give people Krishna’s mercy in the form of this transcendental literature.
And our purpose is, how can I help this person come closer to Krishna? If we have that mood, then we will find that in every situation, even if people don’t go closer to Krishna, through that graceful effort, we will go closer to Krishna. And we will find many people will also be ready to move closer to Krishna. To summarise, I spoke on three main points.
I spoke first about how the yoga tradition was originally meant to transcend the world by renouncing it. So, Krishna gives various yoga practises and all of them are like going for paths from the bottom of the mountain to the top of the mountain or from going from the bottom of a well to the top of the well. The bhakti tradition channels the power of our emotions and accesses the emotion of the Supreme Lord, His mercy.
And therefore, progress is easier. But the other paths also have their validity. What is right and wrong depends not just on the category, but also on the context.
For a 40% student, 60% is good. For 80%, it’s bad. Like that, if yoga is seen as the absolute truth, then our Acharyas, they point out the problems with it.
But if yoga is seen just as a tool to a higher consciousness for people, then their openness to higher reality is itself very good. And we can tap that. The point when we are communicating with people is not just to get it right.
The point is to get it across. Like Prabhupada, the bliss of Vaikuntha is like the ocean of LSD. So we have to understand where people are at and not disturb people’s minds because their intelligence follows their mind.
So we, rather than being prescriptive or normative, this is right or you have to do this, we become descriptive. This is what I do and this is why I do this. So if we can give people a positive experience of Krishna Bhakti, then they will become open to experience something more.
Whatever little they have experienced, that’s like a cloth that is giving them comfort in the cold. Even if it’s a torn and tattered cloth. Rather than telling people to reject that cloth, we give them a better cloth and then they will give up that cloth.
And lastly I concluded by talking about how when we are sharing Krishna Bhakti, rather than thinking this is what I have to make this person do, we should focus, this person is at this level, how can I help them raise their consciousness. If you have that prayerful mood, Krishna will inspire us in a way that our sharing of Bhakti will become uplifting for them and more importantly uplifting for us. Thank you very much.
Hare Krishna. What is the role of a devotee in social media? And the other question is like when we are into social media as a devotee identity, sharing some Krishna conscious aspect of it or having something on Krishna conscious base, we also tend to become something like a Hindu nationalist. We try to become, we try to have a web war kind of thing.
We have war based on comments, questions, answers. We tend to become a hardcore fundamentalist, nationalist kind of a thing. So how to handle such situations.
Okay, so what is the role of social media for a devotee? I gave a class in America about internet in the three modes. That means that internet is just a way people interact. So it is the consciousness of the people.
There are many help forums. If you have a computer and your computer is not working, you go to this Apple help, Apple help, Apple forum or Microsoft forum. You ask questions, people give answers.
So and they are getting nothing over there, physically, financially speaking. So that is the sattvic culture of helping is there also online. And there is, there is so much violence, there is so much obscenity, there is tamas, tamas is also there.
And internet is also a reflection of the broader human society. Just as Rajas and tamas is more in human society, similarly Rajas and tamas will be more on the internet also. But just as sattva is there in the society, similarly sattva is there on the internet also.
So when we are on the internet, we have to be careful that we stay connected with the sattva, not with Rajas and tamas. And what happens is, as devotees physically, we may not go to Rajasik or tamasik place, we may not go to a bar or something like that. But the internet to go digitally is very easy.
So there has to be a little bit of caution and if you are purposeful, this is also just another forum for connecting with people. And if I take the necessary cautions and then we share Krishna’s message over there in whatever way is appropriate, then that is desirable. If we are not there where most people are, then we will not be able to connect with people.
Traditionally the sadhus would live in forests or in hermitages. Prabhupada built the temples in the cities because this is where people are. Just as I follow the same spirit of Srila Prabhupada, today people are on the social media, then we also need to be there.
But just as in the cities there can be so much contamination that can happen, similarly on the online media also there is so much contamination that can happen. So caution is required. And usually caution comes based on our intention.
If our intention is clear that I am here to try to share Krishna’s message or learn Krishna’s message also, then we can protect ourselves. Now as far as getting into sectarian battles online is concerned, confrontation is not the problem. Sometimes we do have to confront.
Somebody is speaking something wrong, we counter that. It is primarily how we do it. We don’t want to get involved in the digital equivalent of a street fight.
You know like two people are fighting with each other and like that people are name calling and this and labelling each other. Then better to make a dignified exit from that. There are forums where in a dignified way people can present their arguments and we can respond to them.
And we may present something, people may also respond to it. So if that is happening, that is good. But if it is largely name calling, as I said, there are people in Rajas and Tamas also and they may take over the whole discussion in particular places.
Then it is best to keep a distance from that. We all will be inspired by certain causes. Some devotees may feel inspired by vegetarianism, some may feel inspired by environmentalism.
Some people may feel, I want to distribute books. Some people may feel more inspired to practise or share broader principles of dharma. Some of us may feel inspired to talk about mindfulness and taking care, managing our emotions and mind.
So whatever it is inspired, we are inspired to do, we can do it. But we can do it in a sattvic way. And there are people who are like minded, who want to have serious discussions.
And there are people who are just out there to have a shouting match. So if that is the kind of people we are meeting, it is better to keep a distance from them and find out like minded people. So the same caution that we use while we interact with people physically, we have to use the same cautions while interacting with people digitally also.
Bhaktanath Thakur says that we need like minded people. Now like minded people, I try to elaborate it by saying that people with whom we share a definition of success. People with whom we share a definition of success.
So share a definition of success means for somebody, building a temple is a definition of success. And then if there we are having systematic bhakti shastra classes, memorising verses, say what are you doing? You don’t build a temple for the lord. What is all this studying hours and hours? What is that going to do? So if somebody wants to study shastra, they have to associate with somebody who is also inspired to study shastra.
Both are valuable services. One is good, one is bad. But different devotees have different definitions of success, even in spiritual life.
Similarly, if you are doing a particular kind of outreach, for some devotees, their definition of success is, I defeat the other person. I prove the other person to be wrong. So, for some people, it is just that, okay, let us provide the right understanding.
Those who want to take it, they will take it. Those who don’t, they won’t take it. So we will have to find out those, that association where we can share a definition of success.
And when we associate with them, we can move