Isn’t forcing ourselves to thank God for bad things self-repression?

Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
Thank you.
Hare Krishna. Question, isn’t thanking God for bad things, self-repression, when bad things happen to us, and we feel devastated, we feel heartbroken, at that time, forcing ourselves to thank God, isn’t it like brainwashing? Answer, there are two different issues here. One is what happens to us, second is our response to it, and our attitude towards God.
So, at one level, at the level of our day-to-day action, there are good things and there are bad things. And we do naturally differentiate between them. So, the more we advance spiritually, the more we realize that what happens at the material level is not very important.
It is important, but not very important. We are concerned, but not disturbed by those things. It is just like a person at the ground level sees a skyscraper to be very tall, but a person in an airplane sees the skyscraper to be small.
Similarly, when we rise in our consciousness, then material things don’t matter so much. So, now depending on our level of consciousness, depending on the strength of our connection with Krishna, material things will seem devastating, or material things will seem not so problematic. But it is a fact that at a material level, there can be good things and bad things.
So, now bad things, say somebody gets a terrible disease, somebody has an accident, somebody loses a job, these are bad things. It’s not that we are artificially meant to somehow imagine bad things to be good. We recognize that a particular thing has gone wrong.
Now, when we say we should thank God, what does it exactly mean? Now, before we go to the thanking God, when things happen like this, they have happened, what has happened has happened. What can’t be changed, can’t be changed. And what’s gone wrong has gone wrong.
So, this is simply a fact of life. Now the question comes, how best can we respond to it? So, one level is that we become frustrated, we become resentful, either when that frustration and resentment comes up, either if it comes out externally, we become snappy, we become violent, we become bellicose. Or if it goes internally, then we become suppressed internally.
You know, people develop inferiority complex, we get into chronic depression. So, these are both means when the negative events have happened and when the response comes out, either response, both responses, just bursting out with our emotions and suppressing and just letting, trying to bury those emotions. Both can be unhealthy.
So, the point is when life gives us a raw deal, we have to move on with life. We can’t change things. So, what a disposition, what attitude can help us to best respond to these situations? So, now when we say we should thank God, is it that we’re thanking God the bad thing has happened? No, not exactly.
We are thanking God for the opportunity for the blessing of having higher spiritual wisdom that enables us to see the bad things in proper perspective. So, standard, the most celebrated example of thanking God amidst bad things. So, there is a difference between thanking God for bad things and thanking God amidst bad things.
When you thank God for bad things, that means that, is it that we want more and more bad things to happen? Now, at a very exalted level, Kunti Maharani prays like that, Rupadaha Santu Taha Shashvat. She is saying, please send the calamities more and more. Because they will help me to remember Krishna.
So, again the point is that, we get the, what we want to be thankful for is the shelter of God. Kunti Maharani in the first canto, she prays this, she is saying, why do I want, why should the calamities come? Because in the calamities, we seek your shelter and you come and protect us. So, that, what is the thank-worthy thing is the connection with Krishna, the shelter with Krishna.
And if bad things serve as an impetus for taking shelter of Krishna, then the bad things are good. But it is not that we have to go out of our way to seek bad things and thank God for the bad things. We can transform the bad things into an impetus for remembering Krishna.
And we thank Krishna, not specifically for the bad thing, but for the opportunity to remember Krishna, for the shelter that he is offering to us, even amidst whatever happens in this world. So, the bad things, it is not that we have to artificially repress our emotions and somehow be thankful to Krishna. No, what has happened at a material level is bad, we accept that as bad.
And if there is some venting out of emotions, then the devotees around that person should be understanding, should not become judgmental, oh, you are having doubts in Krishna. No, we see that, where Krishna told Arjuna to be detached from the body and to be detached from putradara-griha, from wives, sons and other things. And yet, when Abhimanyu was slaughtered by the Kauravas, Arjuna was devastated.
And there is almost a whole chapter in the Mahabharata which describes Arjuna’s grievous outpouring. Now, it is not that at that time Krishna or the other Pandavas or the other kings said, hey, have you forgotten the philosophy? What is this? They all, actually, they lend a sympathetic ear and Krishna is very concerned and compassionate. So, there is the aspect of emotional sensitivity.
So, when there is a sudden grief, when there is a sudden severe grief, cause of grief, at that time to express one’s emotions, we shouldn’t see that as something which is undesirable or which is a sign of lack of faith or anything like that. But once the event has happened, once we have expressed our emotions, after that, what do we do? We have to continue to act. So, what did Arjuna do? Arjuna increased his service to Krishna.
He did not give up his devotion to Krishna because of what had happened, but rather he saw how can I correct the situation and how can I increase my service to Krishna. So, when we say we should thank God for bad things, what it means is not that we want the bad things to happen and we are grateful that the bad things have happened. Rather, we are grateful that we have the buffer of devotion.
We have the shock absorber of remembrance of Krishna by which we can tolerate and transcend that. And it is that the bad thing can act as an impetus for going closer to Krishna, for realizing the shock absorber of Krishna, of remembrance of Krishna. There is a devotee, an American devotee, who wrote a series of meditations, of reflections called Battlefield Bhajans.
So, he was in America and he had joined the American army and then he became a devotee. So, he had to go to the Middle East for fighting wars as part of the American army. And there he said when the Middle East insurgents would launch ambush attacks and would threaten the people.
So, he would take shelter of the name of Krishna and by chanting Krishna’s name he would stay calm. And he was able to lead his contingent through several dangerous situations and he was able to lead them successfully. So, he said that, he wrote in one of his reflections that actually I would be chanting Hare Krishna for a long time.
But it was in the war fields of the Middle East that I realized how wonderful the name of Krishna was. So, now when one has to go to the war field it is not that one thanks Krishna, please send me to the war. No, it’s not that a devotee unnecessarily codes danger and misery.
Rather, when danger and misery comes of its own accord a devotee thanks Krishna because he has been given the opportunity to transcend the danger and misery for having, by the process of devotion and he can thank the bad thing not because the bad thing is good in itself but because the bad thing becomes an impetus for us to remember Krishna, to take the shelter of Krishna and to experience the magical transcending potency of the remembrance of Krishna. So, we see in Brahmaji’s prayer So, there what is he saying? What is your anukampa, I see, my dear lord? I see with my eyes. So, when some bad things happen we understand it’s Atmakrita.
It’s because of my own past karma. But, what is the that I offer my obeisances to you respects to you, why? Because by your anukampa you have minimized the suffering and you have given me the opportunity to remember you by which I can transcend the suffering. So, in this specific verse what is the anukampa is not specified by Brahmaji.
So, the anukampa can be seen as that Krishna has minimized the sinful reaction which I am getting. Now, we may not know, we don’t know what sins we have committed and we may not sometimes feel very convinced that my sinful reaction has been minimized. Because when a big disaster happens we may feel this is already so big how has it been minimized? So, we understand the anukampa at that time is not the, we may not perceive the distress as being minimized but the anukampa is the opportunity to tolerate and transcend that by remembrance of Krishna.
So, if somebody has a painful disease, you know, a person who does not know about God that person will simply be, ah, oh, he is screaming. But a devotee will chant Krishna’s names and by chanting Krishna’s names, Krishna, Krishna actually the devotee will gradually be able to rise above suffering and so, we thank Krishna. Now, brainwashing or repression is when we just try to suppress our emotions.
Now, there has to if we are feeling bad about something then there has to be some sympathetic devotee association where we can express those bad feelings. We don’t have to express the bad feelings to everyone in general but we can express those and that devotees those devotees have to be sympathetic in terms of understanding that this is a natural emotional reaction but a devotee does not have to wallow in that natural emotional reaction. After the emotional reaction has been there then a devotee takes shelter of Krishna and transcends that negative emotional reaction and experiences the positivity of bhakti.
So, positivity of absorption in Krishna. So, that way it is we process our emotions and we choose responses that enable us to grow that enable us to respond in the best possible way to that situation. So, it is not repression but rather it is selection.
Selection of the best response that is possible in a negative situation and that is the dynamism of bhakti. In the Purana it is said that Lord Shiva is saying this Mahavipatthau samsare when in samsara one experiences the great misery yah smaret madhusudana if somebody remembers madhusudana vipatthau tasya sampatthi that vipatthi becomes a sampatthi so now that means what the vipatthi is at one level of vipatthi but by the remembrance it becomes transformed into sampatthi. So, we don’t thank Krishna for the vipatthi per se we thank Krishna for the for the opportunity to remember him and for the and for the vipatthi not because it has happened but because the vipatthi becomes a impetus for us to realize the sampatthi of Krishna bhakti to realize the realize the glory of Krishna bhakti and thereby increase our devotion to Krishna increase our realization of the reality of Krishna and Krishna and the potency of Krishna consciousness to give us shelter and strength even amidst adversities in life it is for that we are grateful so when in the Radha Gopinath community a group of devotees had gone for a yatra and they passed away in an aircraft crash so as soon as Radhanath Maharaj told the viriyu that you know don’t suppress your tears but let your tears be tears of gratitude so we don’t suppress the tears but let the tears be the tears of gratitude that we still have the shelter of Krishna by which we can tolerate and transcend this tragedy that has happened so I have written an article on my website also tears of sorrow tears of gratitude so those who want can read it further for understanding this the principle is it’s not repression but it’s selection of the healthiest possible response when we choose to thank Krishna amidst bad things thank you