If we feel dissatisfied while rendering a service how should we deal with it?

Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
question, how can we know which is the service most suitable for us sometimes when our services change we feel a little unsettled disturbed and start wondering whether this is the best way that we can serve Krishna how do we decide in such situations answer the services that we do can fall in three broad categories one is that they are totally incompatible to our nature and we feel unsettled because it’s just not our nature to do those services secondly we do have some second possibility is that we do have some capability to those services but we may have encountered some obstacles and failures in that service on the other hand we may find that others have done that service better than us and so we may be feeling a little insecure or even envious and third could be that we are doing a service that is very much according to our nature but it is the very function of the mind to keep us dissatisfied, perpetually dissatisfied and so despite our having a compatible service we are feeling dissatisfied so our dissatisfaction in service can be because of broadly speaking these three factors incompatibility in service obstacles and failures in the service and the intrinsic nature of the mind to be dissatisfied so it is helpful for us to keep a personal diary where we can note down our thoughts and if we keep a diary for a specified period of time say a week or a month and then we look at what we have written in the diary about our service and our feelings about the service then we will be able to get a clear understanding of where we stand with respect to these services basically writing a personal diary helps us to take and preserve a verbal snapshot of our mind just as we may want to cherish the memory of an external situation and we click a photo so that’s a visual snapshot which is available for future recollection so our minds, emotions and states keep changing and because we are so closely associated with our mind so we may have one emotion today and another emotion tomorrow and we identify with both the emotions and we are unable to discriminate which is our core emotion and which is our peripheral emotion so writing down a diary in itself brings about a certain objectivity because to write down about our emotions we have to observe them carefully and observation requires putting a certain amount of distance between ourselves and our emotions and once we have written down our emotions and then we look at our various emotions over a week or a month at one time then we can clearly say this was the time when the moods were affecting me too much and this is the time when what I normally naturally deeply feel is being expressed so by writing a diary and by comparing our emotions over a period of time we can understand what is the cause of the dissatisfaction and then depending on what is the cause if we will need to take action to remedy the situation accordingly so if we are finding that we are totally incompatible with a particular service then maybe it’s time to suggest to our authorities that we would be better off doing some other service, the change in service may not happen immediately and we also require surrender to continue the service till that time but over a period of time for our stability and longevity in devotional service it is best that we be engaged according to our own natures the Varanashram system was that every person was engaged according to nature so a Brahmana would engage in Brahmanical activities a Kshatriya would engage in Kshatriya type activities similarly with other Varanashrams, so therefore if we feel not just once in a while but regularly that that a particular service is just not compatible with the nature then we can ask for a change of service and then take up a service that we are more compatible with and the second situation is that if we have not got adequate success in our service and have faced reversals and failures then we may have to look at whether we are managing and organizing and executing our service properly because if we have the ability to do the service then over a period of time we will surely attain success but for ability to transform into achievement needs organization and determination so sometimes we may just set our goals too high and that’s why we may not achieve success and although we are doing modestly or reasonably well we might feel that we are failing so maybe we need to set a little lower goals so that we can achieve those goals and other times we may be not setting any real goals at all or we may be setting goals that are not so lofty and that’s why we don’t feel inspired to pursue those goals and that’s why we are not bringing our full ability to gear on a particular situation then maybe we have to set our goals higher and then we will those nobler higher goals will bring out our determination and our you know inspiration to strive more and attain success in that service but over a period of time whatever service we do we to persevere in that service we do need a taste of success so how to get that success by setting ourselves higher or lower will vary depending on the situation and what the situation is can be assessed using our personal diary thirdly if it is just the dissatisfaction of the mind that is troubling us and then we have to count our blessings at times when the mind just makes us dissatisfied despite we having a compatible service then it’s good to list all the ways in which Krishna has blessed us and have that list for any reference and then when we look at that list then we start seeing things in perspective means whatever be the factor because of which the mind is making us feel dissatisfied that factor is so tiny so trivial as compared to the huge gifts that Krishna has given me and these gifts should not just be theoretical oh I have got the opportunity to practice devotional service I am getting the opportunity to chant Hare Krishna I have got a human form these are so broad that they may not invoke a sense of gratitude we need to have more specific aspects of gratitude specific items that evoke in a real sense gratitude in our own hearts we may cherish the association of a particular devotee and we have got that association on a few occasions then we feel Krishna thank you for giving me the association of devotees and we may have got some particular devotional experiences which have deeply touched our heart and enriched our devotion strengthened our conviction and have become a source of enduring inspiration for us and then we can think back on those experiences and thank Krishna for giving us those experiences and in this way by cultivating gratitude we can have a sort of gratitude diary available for us and then the mind gets dissatisfied for no real reason then we can look at that gratitude diary and thereby get over the dissatisfaction of the mind thank you