Is service that which pleases Krishna or does it include that which we like?

Answer Podcast

Transcript

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yeah certainly it is more about pleasing Krishna than pleasing ourselves yeah, I mean it is not that pleasing Krishna always has to come at the expense of displeasing ourselves it’s like I mean, like say if somebody makes a joke in a class and then instead of laughing I start thinking, am I laughing for my pleasure or Krishna’s pleasure that would become hyper analytical so usually there is a big section where there is an intersection of the two I think the real problem comes when when something is essential for Krishna’s service and we refuse to do it because I don’t like it so that is when that is when the problem will come up but at least I am not at such an advanced level where I can only work for Krishna’s pleasure so it’s we all, I mean at least all of us have our natures and the whole principle of Varanashram in my understanding is to help us serve according to our nature and when we say what is our nature that simply means you know doing that is natural for me natural I can say also it means it’s pleasing to me for a brahmana to study shastra, study anything which is intellectually stimulating that is pleasing but then the austerity is to do that for Krishna’s, to do that for promoting Krishna’s cause so definitely there will be situations when we may have to do things which which we don’t like to do but in terms of longevity we do need to have something which which is according to our nature means we could say that it is, we find it pleasing but it is not that we are doing it only because it is pleasing for me, it is in the intersection of serving Krishna and it is also in the sense of what we like, what we like to do. I think there is that pastime of Shri Prabhupada which comes in the Nilamrit where one devotee asked Shri Prabhupada Prabhupada is in London and all the devotees London was like the western headquarters the European headquarters at that time and the devotees from different parts of the world different parts of Europe have come and they are reporting to Prabhupada you know this is how preaching is going here this is how preaching is going on here and there is this devotee who says everybody has something to do for Shri Prabhupada I don’t have anything to do so he goes and asks Shri Prabhupada Prabhupada what can I do for you then Prabhupada asks what do you want to do for Krishna whatever you want you tell me I will do it what do you want to do for Krishna so he never thought of this this is a test, Prabhupada is testing it whatever you want I will do for you Prabhupada says understand our philosophy find out what you want to do and do it for Krishna he starts thinking what to do Shri Prabhupada has to think about it and then he comes back after a few days and he tells Prabhupada I always had this desire to make some some some things artistic things with my hands I was thinking I will make these Mridangas with artificial material which is available in the west because we get Mridangas from India they break very easily so I will make them with unbreakable material they will be easily available and they will stay here we can make them easily and Prabhupada says yes Prabhupada says your western godbrothers are very passionate make them in such a way that even if they throw the Mridangas down they will not break does anyone know who is it Ishanthroo last year I met him actually Ishanthroo that is also one way of we find out what we want to do and we do it for Krishna so and in the long run my understanding is that that is what is sustainable because if we are inspired to do something we will do it even when nobody is pushing us to do it because if there is something which we are not really very inspired to do then there always has to be someone to push are you doing it and it is good to be accountable to someone but to make our bhakti dependent on someone else in terms of they having to prod us all the time that will not make our bhakti very sustainable so if we have that vision or inspiration where we want to do something for Krishna and we take the blessings of senior devotees now of course this should not be like a license for whimsicality I want to do this the nature of the mind is that the mind will say whatever you are doing right now that is not your nature that is how the mind will want to take us away from taking up responsibility in Krishna’s service so often what is our nature also takes some amount of time to discover so till then we just have to follow the seniors and learn and do whatever service you are doing but over a period of time that will be revealed to us about how we can sustain ourselves does that address your question so yes one last question I will come back to you