Rama at home in exile 1 – The power of acceptance

[Seminar at ISKCON, Melbourne, Australia]

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Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
Hare Krishna Shreemate Bhaktivedanta Swami Itinamine Namaste Saraswati Devi Gauravani Pracharine Nirvishesh Shunyavadi Pashchatya Deshatarine Vancha Kalpataru Bhyascha Kripa Sindhubhyavecha Patitanam Pavanibhyo Vaishnavibhyo Namo Namaha Jai Shri Krishna Chaitanya Prabhu Nithyananda Shri Advaita Gadadhara Shri Vasadhi Gaura Bhaktavrinda Hare Krishna Hare Krishna Krishna Krishna Hare Hare Hare Rama Hare Rama Rama Rama Hare Hare Hare Krishna Thank you very much for coming today evening and I’ll be speaking on the past times of Lord Ram especially when he was in exile so the topic is at home in exile Ram in the forest I have written one book on the Ramayana and I’m writing a second book on it so I’ve been contemplating some of the past times of Lord Ram deeply and the theme that I’ll take over here is that acceptance and diligence take us to transcendence that by accepting things and by being diligent about things we can rise above our situations we can go to transcendence so the broad theme will be acceptance and diligence to transcendence and in this session we’ll have two sessions now till around 6.15 and probably around 7.15 till 8.45, 9 in this session I’ll focus primarily on acceptance and the second part I’ll focus on diligence and I’ll be taking three main points and since we are having two sessions so I would like it if you could reflect and speak some points so I’ll speak for 15 minutes about acceptance I’ll be speaking three points so after each point you can reflect and tell some point which you found striking as a carry home for you as something which you would like to share with someone else so that way we’ll make it a little more interactive and we can have question answers also but first some reflections and then some questions so all of us have times when things just don’t go according to our will we want to do something we plan to do something and it just doesn’t work out so right now I’m supposed to go from here to New Zealand but the New Zealand visa is not getting processed so I applied about more than 40 days ago but they’re saying it’ll take 71 days so I’ll be in America by the time I get the visa to New Zealand so when we make a plan and it doesn’t work it’s annoying but I was thinking about it that it’s just that I want to visit New Zealand for a few days and just when that plan is not working out I’m getting annoyed with it but it’s one visit not working out but imagine if you’re staying somewhere and suddenly you’re kicked out of that place and it sometimes happens we’re staying in a house and we get a tenant in that house and landlord says you have to leave this house at least they give some time maybe one month or something like that some decent amount of time is there but if suddenly we’re told you have to get out of this house even getting out of a house we may have some friends also at whose place we can go some relatives we can go still it’ll be so agitating for us what to speak of if somebody is told to get out of a country itself sometimes nowadays it’s happening in America I was at a devotee’s house or I was supposed to go to a devotee’s house I was going to stay at their place and then I was travelling from one city to another when I was going to go to that city I was going to stay at their place and about 5-6 days before that devotee called me and said I’m sorry I can’t host you I said that’s okay but what is the matter? he said we ourselves don’t have a home now what do you mean? he said he was applying for his H1B visa and that extension didn’t happen so he was planning to host me and organise my programme but before my programmes he had to leave the country so there’s so much insecurity and he had his whole life over there he had his job, his family, his children getting education suddenly he had to leave but even when he had to leave he was Indian staying in America he could go to India he had his parents, his larger family he had his property in India but imagine if somebody is evicted from a country and many of us are immigrants in a particular country and if we have to go back we have our home country to go to but if somebody is evicted from their home country itself and they cannot go to any other country they just have to go somewhere in a forest and live sometimes there are some adventure stories about how somebody is stranded on an island and then they try to learn to survive on that island that is it all sounds very good in adventure but just the situation that suddenly at one moment you have to just leave your home and go and generally when we have to accept something unfavourable or something unpleasant the magnitude of how unpleasant it is depends on how pleasant our present situation is like if we are having a job that is bad and we are fired from that job we won’t feel that bad in good riddance but Ram was the king of the member of the royal family is going to become the king so he had everything right not just that he had a house and a job he had a kingdom and suddenly one moment he had to just leave everything and go to the forest to exile where he had nothing so just trying to process something like this we all need to process change in life say all of you are sitting and hearing and for you to sit and hear a certain amount of stability and structure is required all of you have reasonable confidence that while you are sitting the person sitting next to you is not suddenly going to punch you on the nose so if you didn’t know who was sitting next to you or if you didn’t have that much level of trust in the person sitting next to you then maybe you will be looking half at the speaker look half at the person so we all do need to process change in life but there is a certain amount of structure and stability that is required for us to function and the less the structure and stability the more difficult it becomes for us to function so as I said if we are afraid that some person next to us might hit us then we would function but most of our functioning would be focused on guarding ourselves we would not be able to do anything else so generally when change comes up change consumes our attention because we have to deal with it or even if change is not coming up change is likely to come up then also we have to deal with it and that consumes our attention and the more unexpected or the more massive the change the more difficult it is to accept it so now it’s very difficult actually apart from sudden death there is so very little that can be a change like this at one moment a member of the ruling family and the next moment just out into the forest with nothing in fact later on when Bharat is back and Bharat hears that Ram has been exiled to the forest he is shocked he said that Ram cannot even conceive doing anything wrong and exile is a punishment reserved for the worst of criminals it is only one level below execution the worst crime is punished with capital punishment but just one level below is exile it means everything except your life is taken away from you so how does one process something like this there are times when things change against our will and our capacity to deal with that situation that determines whether we will be able to move forward in it or not some people just can’t deal with it so when Ram had to go through this sudden change one moment royal prince next moment a destitute exilee a huge change and when such change happens most of our energy goes in processing how can this happen just can’t accept it so the first point I am discussing is that the greater the magnitude and the unexpectedness of the change the more difficult it is to accept it the more unexpected and the more massive then it’s that much more difficult to accept it say if a student goes for an exam it’s a maths exam and the paper is more difficult than they expected it’s a little it’s ok how to deal with this but they go for a maths exam and they get an English paper hey what is this this is not fair so when we go for a particular exam we have a certain expectation this is what should come in the exam but something else entirely comes if it’s a little more difficult paper the student can take it ok it’s my bad luck it’s one thing to say something is bad luck but if a completely different paper only comes this is unfair this is not right this should not be happening so what happens life tests us in any subject at any time so life tests us in any subject at any time and that’s why it’s it can be extremely difficult and now at such times acceptance acceptance is vital now we may say ok but I don’t want to do this ok somebody may say like somebody is their visa extension doesn’t get sanctioned they just have to leave the country say I won’t leave the country well unless you want to become a undocumented immigrant you have to leave the country so of course undocumented immigrant is the American politically correct word undocumented worker for a person who is staying illegally so anyway if one doesn’t want to do that then one has to accept and even if somebody says I want to stay in the country illegally still they will have to accept that now I have to do a lot of covert activities I have to conceal my so many things so that I can continue so basically when the world around us changes acceptance is vital say if we are not able to accept then we keep wasting our energy futilely suppose somebody wanted to learn rowing and they went and took some rowing lessons and they learned rowing and then they call all their friends and somebody learns some new skills they want to exhibit their skills to their friends and they call all their friends and relatives see how nicely I am rowing and they had a whole dream in their mind I will row gracefully and the boat will move swiftly and people will click my photos people will click the videos and they will share it on social media and everybody will praise me and then they get into that boat and they start rowing and suddenly out of nowhere a monster wave comes the monster wave hits and it hits so suddenly and so forcefully at the next moment there is no boat and there are no oars they have been knocked out of the boat and the oars have also been knocked out of their hands now if at that time they still I want my photo to be clicked and they keep rowing well if they keep rowing what will happen what do you think will happen they will drown they will drown they want to keep rowing but there is no boat and there are no oars so at that time they accept ok these things have changed so now I have to paddle I have to swim and I have to somehow get to the coast first and later on I may have to do this again so with respect to a physical physically threatening situation like this it’s easy to understand that we need to do course correction what are you rowing now get out first nobody would be so stupid as to keep rowing over there but when it comes not so much to physically threatening situations but to emotionally threatening situations then we often find it much more difficult to accept so sometimes things have changed so much and metaphorically speaking we are keeping rowing we are rowing well there is no boat there are no oars why are you rowing so imagine that say somebody is giving a class and somehow say if I come and give a class and I speak in a language that nobody understands over here so now once it happened to me that I had gone for a I had gone for a programme and they told me you have to speak in English I prepared a whole class in English when I reached there they the organisation that had called us they just wanted because Iskcon was a big name they wanted somebody from Iskcon to come and there nobody could understand English at all so I had suspected something because when I had got the brochure the brochure was filled with English typos there were many typing mistakes so I thought they are having an English programme but the brochure is not treated properly but I thought okay maybe in India grammar is often treated with a chalta hai attitude so I thought maybe it’s okay but then when I got there I had prepared a whole class it was actually an interfaith meeting I had prepared the whole class and when I got there it was it was something which many of the concepts were such that I couldn’t even speak them in Hindi this one I remember once I tried to speak and then after I spoke that in Hindi so I was thinking in English and speaking in Hindi so I wanted to make the point that when some religions become aggressive against other religions so outer aggression is a distorted expression of inner insecurity so I spoke that in Hindi then I see all blind faces then I realised I have to change track I cannot speak all this so for I think so I had a 10 minute presentation so for at least 3-4 minutes it’s like I was rowing there was no boat at their nose then I realised I have to change track now I have to swim so for all of us when we are put in situations that we can’t accept or that we didn’t expect first of all then unless we accept that we can’t deal with the situation effectively whatever we do simply makes things worse so lack of acceptance prevents us from acting effectively rather lack of acceptance pushes us to act unproductively counterproductively unproductivity is no good effect counterproductive is bad effect you keep rowing not only you are not going to exhibit those skills you are going to drown so what happens is that we all need to learn this very vital art of acceptance so it is only when we accept that we can deal with things as they are so this was the first point I was going to make so Lord Ram how he was able to accept we will discuss this briefly now but the point that this is such a huge magnitude of change he suddenly had to accept and it is remarkable that he was able to accept it so any points any reflections anything that’s any example or any point that struck you yes acceptance is hard to come and even if it comes somehow it’s harder to say so what do you say about it is this a reflection or a question it’s a question because okay it’s a question things like this keep on happening yeah and the first thought which comes is to remember that acceptance is impossible somehow even if it comes then it doesn’t stay for long because the fear overtakes the notion okay yeah okay so can I come back to any reflections before we move forwards I’ll have questions yes please it’s a reflection it’s not a question yeah okay okay good point so we hold on to our plans lightly not tightly yes we make our plans and we would like to actualise our plans but we hold on to them lightly not tightly so that is to the extent we are attached to our plans or our expectations to that extent acceptance becomes difficult to the extent we are not that attached to that extent acceptance will become easy that’s a good point thank you any one more reflection then we can move on with questions yes physically challenged situations changes are easy to deal with instead of mentally challenging situations yes physically challenging situations are are more easy easier to accept than emotionally challenging situations just like say if a if a limb is broken and it’s painful to accept I was walking healthily I was moving healthily but it’s okay I can accept it I have to move on with it but suppose say we are emotionally broken down because our relationship is in trouble some big dream is not working out then that becomes much more difficult to accept to a large extent we function at the physical level so when physically something is wrong we see it and we can’t deny it that much but when emotionally something is wrong for a long time we stay in denial or we try to stay in denial no no it’s not like this it’s like this it’s okay it’s bad it’s not that bad so denial is the opposite of acceptance say one of the I was at a I was in Canada in Calgary so they had to the university that had asked me to speak on death and death rituals in Hinduism it was an unusual topic so so the idea was that they were studying the whole topic of Thanatology study of death and there they were studying how death is accepted or how is death dealt with in different traditions so in Hinduism they wanted me to speak so one of the questions that came up was that there was this boy asked if you love someone throughout your life how can you burn their body how can you suddenly stop loving them isn’t it brutal to just set their body on fire like that isn’t it much more dignified to actually put their body in a coffin and then bury it properly so see I explained that their every action has a world view behind it but one aspect of the ritual of burning the body on death and is seeing the body burning that is it helps bring closure because when somebody near to us dies it takes a long time to accept it also this person was there with me suddenly they are gone so when that physically graphic activity is seen the body is there and the body is burning and it is reduced to ashes so then that it’s definitely it’s graphic but it in a forceful way gets us out of denial and in a forceful way by making it’s clear this body is gone now this relationship is for this lifetime it is over now then it helps to bring closure that’s why something which is emotionally something which is emotionally traumatic having some physical gestures or physical actions that signify the end of that that signify the conclusion or the termination of that that can help us to bring closure so when something is simply emotional if you do something physical with it then that helps us to bring closure so that’s it’s a it’s a sobering point thank you for that yes yes so Muralidhar Prabhu has come from Perth to Melbourne because he got reports in the last 2-3 visits I created lot of trouble in his absence so he has come to monitor me now thank you yes Prabhu ok yes that is going to be the third point in this discussion I will talk about different acceptance at different levels I will talk about it thank you yes Shashi Prabhu we will come to your question now acceptance is hard to have and acceptance is difficult to maintain also so what do we do about it yes actually even that was my second point so let me move on to that so the first point was that that the more unexpected and the more greater the change is difficult to accept but if you don’t accept we waste our energy then now acceptance can be broadly with three perspectives acceptance can be because of powerlessness acceptance can be because of temporariness and acceptance can be because of purposefulness now there can be many categories within this also but let’s give some examples to illustrate this say if we come to we immigrate to a place where it’s extremely cold and there’s just nothing we can do about it so we are powerless to do anything about it so although it takes time but when we struggle struggle struggle I can’t do anything about it we come to some level of acceptance ok this has happened now now often when the acceptance comes because of powerlessness because of sense of power I can’t change it so I accept it and still the it’s not really genuine acceptance because still when the acceptance comes because of powerlessness there is still a strong sense of resentfulness it should not be like this but it is like this so and still there is some acceptance there may be a lot of anger lot of resentment but I accept it why because I can’t do anything about it and acknowledging that I can’t do anything about it also requires some amount of humility and maturity again with respect to physical things it’s easier to accept if my hand is broken well I understand it is broken I can’t do anything about it but if something more subtler is broken you may be thinking no it’s not broken it’s ok it’s still there so acceptance at the first level can be because of powerlessness just the situation is so big so overwhelming I can’t do anything about it but even this is good so we see this is much bigger and I am much smaller I can’t do much about it that is one level of acceptance so here when I am talking about acceptance talking about changing our consciousness so when we accept with powerlessness what we understand is that this is bigger than what I thought or I am smaller than what I thought I thought I could just get rid of this but I can’t like Gajendra in the 8th canto of the Shrimad Bhagavatam when the crocodile caught him initially that was just annoyance what is this crocodile where has it come from he was just having a party he was enjoying and suddenly this crocodile came and where has this come from he just tossed it away he tossed it away and he thought it will go away but it didn’t go away again he tossed it away again it stayed over there and then he realised this is not an annoyance this is a threat he started combating he started fighting with it but then eventually he realised this is not just a threat this is a disaster this is a catastrophe he was fighting fighting but eventually he realised I am powerless so for all of us sometimes problems come like that crocodile when they come initially no big deal it’s ok it just doesn’t matter so when that happens I just shake it off but it keeps holding on to us and he realised I can’t do anything about it so initially what was he doing he was underestimating the power of that crocodile and overestimating his own power but as that battle went on and on what happened he started over he realised that this crocodile is stronger than what I thought and I am not as strong as I thought so acceptance can come because of powerlessness there is just nothing I can do about it and at some level say like as I said the example of somebody suddenly having to leave a country or somebody not being able to enter a country yes, there are forces bigger than me so I have to accept it this also requires humility and maturity otherwise if we are too too egoistic we find it very difficult to accept it the second level was what humility sorry, acceptance because of does anyone remember temporariness so if you don’t want it but say we get into a we get into a metro say a local in Mumbai the local the compartment is for 50 people and there are 300 people in it and then now we are crowded squeezing everyone and we don’t like it we don’t want it but ok, it’s a half hour 45 minute I have to stand in the crowd and get squeezed but it’s ok so when we understand that this is temporary that also allows us to gain acceptance this is ok, this is there this is unpleasant but this is not forever now this is the level at which Krishna recommends Arjuna to have tolerance now tolerance is another word for acceptance the way Krishna uses the word tolerance is in the sense of acceptance just live with it so Krishna first says that if you are spiritual you are eternal then he knows and the next verse many of us know it so you can recite it after me so he is saying this is this is temporary even that is temporary hopefully yeah but then that’s a good example many times things are temporary but we don’t know how temporary they are we know a child is not going to cry forever but we don’t know how long he is going to cry but sometimes when we face problems we say ok I know it’s not going to last forever but how long if I know it I can tolerate it but if I don’t know I become more difficult so Krishna says beginning and it’s temporary therefore therefore tolerate it so tolerance can come by in a sense seeing the big picture ok this is this is temporary but there is going to be a bigger life much longer I am going to live so I can tolerate it to some extent when something bad happens to us the more we are attached to something the more that consumes our vision so we just can’t think of anything other than that attachment and because we can’t think of anything other than that attachment so even if it is temporary we can’t let go of it say suppose there is a sports match say there is India Pakistan match and there is a very intense tough match and say one particular team loses now some players in that team say that match was terrible they were devastated they just sank down and gloom and some others may say it is just a match it is a match they had a better day than us so they won whatever so now you will see that now some people may say this is the end of the world how could we have lost this match some others may say ok yeah we really wanted to win but it is after all a game it is a match no need to catastrophise it so it is a matter of perspective so the more somebody is attached to winning everybody wants to win no doubt but the more somebody is consumed by winning the more it is difficult to accept if one loses but if one is more attached to say playing well if I don’t win today I will win tomorrow ok I lost this match but tomorrow’s match I will win then it becomes easier to accept so you could say that attachment shrinks our vision so when the more attached we are we just can’t see beyond the present situation whereas detachment expands our vision ok yes now this detachment is not giving up I will talk about that little later but this detachment is ok we didn’t play as well in this match or they played better than us so let’s move to the next match so one way we can get acceptance is by recognising that whatever has gone wrong is temporary it can be terribly wrong but it is temporary now in the case of Ram how long was he exiled? 14 years and when Ram was consoling Kausalya he said that oh mother 14 years will go away just like 14 days he said go to the forest and before you know it I will be back don’t don’t don’t lament Kausalya was so devastated she said that actually although I was the senior most queen but after Dashrath married Kaikeyi she became his favourite queen and I was neglected and slighted because of that I tolerated I endured it all and my hope was that I would have a child. And then when I had a child, after long austerities, I had a child, a child like you. It fulfilled my dreams.
And when you grew up to become such an illustrious person, illustrious warrior, illustrious prince, all my dreams were that you will become the king. But now that you are being exiled to the forest, again I will experience all the slights and the neglects and the insults. I can’t live here.
He says, let me come to the forest with you. So Ram, first argument he uses is, actually 14 years will just go away quickly. Now, Kaushalya says 14 years, he says every single day will be like 14 years for me.
He says, I cannot live without you. Then, at that time, Ram tells her that your duty right now is next to my father. He says, my father, when I met him, I saw that he was extremely distressed.
He felt betrayed by Kaikeyi. He is not sending me to the forest with joy. He is sending me with great pain to the forest.
And when he has been betrayed by one wife, if at that time he is abandoned and rejected by another queen, it will be impossible for him to be here. He said, you need to be with him. So Ram here gave Kaikeyi a sense of purposefulness.
I said acceptance can come from three levels. It can come from helplessness or powerlessness, from temporariness and purposefulness. So he helped Kaikeyi, or rather not Kaikeyi, Kaushalya, to shift her vision of Dashrath.
Instead of seeing Dashrath, seeing that, oh, Dashrath is sending my son away. He helped her see not as a perpetrator, but as a victim or as a co-victim, that he is hurt by what has happened. In fact, everything that Ram does is amazing over there.
After he is banished, he hears that when actually that night Kaikeyi demands that the next day Ram is to be coronated. And the previous night Kaikeyi demands from Dashrath and Dashrath is so shocked. He can’t believe it.
He flees. When he comes back and he sees Kaikeyi’s cold, expectant eyes, demanding eyes, he realises it’s not a nightmare, it’s a reality. And he falls at her feet and begs her, he says, you can take everything from me, but don’t ask for this.
And finally he says that, if you want Bharat to be the king, let Bharat be the king. But don’t ask Ram to go to the forest. What way has Ram wronged you? I can’t live without him.
But Mantara has told Kaikeyi that as long as Ram is in the kingdom, Bharat, even if he comes back, Bharat will not accept the kingship. And even if Bharat accepts, the remaining citizens will not accept. You have to demand as firmly that Ram should go to the forest and Bharat should become the king.
So Kaikeyi is unmoved. And finally, when Ram is summoned to that assembly, to Kaikeyi’s palace where Dashrath is there, at that time Ram comes and he sees his father is dishevelled, is distressed. And when you come to a room, there are two people sitting in the room and there is some tension among them.
You can immediately sense that. If two people are having a good relationship, they may just glance at each other, they may be friendly, they smile. But if two people are having a tense relationship, they talk about the other person without even looking at that person.
Or they look, but they look as if they want to burn the other person. So it’s easy to sense if you’re coming to a room and there are some unpleasant vibrations over there. So Ram senses this and he’s just come from a very, he’s come with the expectation that now he’s going to be coronated and it’s a very cheerful mood in Ayodhya.
Immediately he recalibrates what’s happening. And then he asks his father and Dashrath Maharaj is so shattered, he thinks the son whom I was meant to protect, the son whom I was meant to give the kingdom, how can I tell him to go to the forest? Actually Dashrath Maharaj never speaks the words. And Ram asks Dashrath to stay silent.
And then Ram turns to Kaikeyi and he asks her, oh mother Kaikeyi, what is the matter? My father seems to be greatly distressed, please tell me. And then Kaikeyi says that he has something to tell you, which he feels will cause you great distress. And that is why he is hesitant to tell you.
Steal yourself so that you can hear these words. And then he says, please don’t hesitate, tell me whatever it is. If I can do anything to remove the distress of my father, I will do it immediately.
And then she says, based on two promises that he had given me long ago, he has decided that Bharat will become the prince regent and then the king. And you will go to the forest, exiled for 14 months, 14 years. These are two devastating news.
But Ram stays composed, unaffected. And then normally, when something as terrible or as unfair as this happens and we are supposed to tell someone, then we expect that person to protest. We expect that person to maybe counterattack also.
So Kaikeyi is preparing for that. Now Ram will protest. But Ram says that, oh, Mother Kaikeyi, I always treated you like my mother.
And I thought you also accepted me like your son. But today, it causes me great sadness to know that you never accepted me as your son. Now Kaikeyi may think that, here he will say, how can you treat a son like this? I treated you like a mother.
And is this how you treat your son? But Ram, when Ram sees that there is hostility, his whole effort is to decrease the tension. So he says, if you had truly accepted me as your son, then for such an insignificant thing as a kingdom, you wouldn’t even have needed to go to my father. You could just have told me and I would have given the kingdom to Bharat.
Now Kaikeyi is shocked. Now what is this? It’s the more, if we are materialistic, we think that everyone else is materialistic. If we are power hungry, we think that everyone else is power hungry.
And she just can’t compute. How can anybody think like this? Is there some false move, some trick over here? And he says, then he turns to his father. Oh father, I’ll prepare now to go to the forest.
And before leaving, I’ll come and take your blessings. And very calmly Ram walks out of it. And as he walks out, he’s come in the royal chariot.
But he walks out on foot. And he goes towards his own palace. And when he goes there, everybody is puzzled.
The courtiers would come with him. And then this kind of news can’t stay hidden for long. It is said that walls have ears and palace walls have very big ears.
So whatever happens in a palace is the smallest of things. There are so many people who are ready to tell about it. So the news starts spreading everywhere.
And of course, people tell each other, but nobody tells it to the directly affected parties. So Sita, Lakshman, Kaushalya, all of them, Ram himself has to tell it. And throughout it all, what Ram does is that instead of saying, you know, what unfair thing has happened to me? How dare something like this happen to me? This is so outrageous.
He basically just helps everybody to come to a level of acceptance for it. He helps, he accepts it and he helps everyone to come to the level of acceptance. So especially instructive is I’ll discuss about some of the incidents gradually, but let’s focus on the theme of purposefulness a little bit.
So I talked about how Ram gave Kaushalya a sense of purposefulness. Your husband needs you right now. You need to be with him.
So that way he gave her a sense of purpose. Similarly, he, now how did he himself accept it? What was his sense of purpose? Later on, when he is having a very strong argument with Lakshman, which I’ll come to later, but at this point that when Lakshman says, how can you accept this? So Ram says that it was as my duty to my father, as per his will, I was ready to ascend the throne. Now, as a duty to my father, he wants me to go to the forest.
So I’ll go to the forest. So here what happened is acceptance was easier for him because his purpose was clear. If his purpose had been to get to the throne, then that purpose would have been completely thwarted.
It’s unacceptable. It’s utterly unacceptable. We have Ram ready to just go to the forest just to honour the word of his father.
Before I came here, we had brought some, we had taken a group of about 25 Americans to a tour of Vrindavan. These were Americans who had not even gone to Iskcon Temple in America, completely new yogis. And for people outside India, one of the biggest attractions of India is Taj Mahal.
So they wanted to go to Taj Mahal. So now, I’ve been in India, I’ve never been to Taj Mahal. So I said that, you know, we will take you to Vrindavan, you can go to Taj Mahal.
They said, no, no, we want you to be our guide to Taj Mahal also. So I was wondering, we were having talks at different places in Vrindavan, what did you talk about in Taj Mahal? And of course, I talked about love and selflessness. So at that time, if you consider, there was Shah Jahan and Aurangzeb.
So what happened is, that Aurangzeb, he took his father when he was alive and imprisoned him, so that he could become the king. But what did Ram do? Ram exiled himself so that he could please his father. So it is the same Indian history, but Completely opposite values.
So here, the point is that Ram, how was he able to accept it? So for Aurangzeb, his purpose was, I want to become the king. And if my father is coming in the way, get him out of the way. But for Ram, his purpose was not to become the king.
His purpose was to serve his father. And because of that purpose of serving his father, Okay, I serve this way or I serve this way. So acceptance comes easier when we have a deeper purpose.
I’ll talk about purposefulness more when we talk about diligence in the second session. But acceptance can come from purposefulness. Say, it sometimes happens when I’m travelling.
So, say I go to a particular place and I’m supposed to do some programmes. And some senior devotee comes over there. Some sanyasi, some guru comes over there.
And once it happened that I was there at a place in America. And then at that time, my programmes, I usually plan three, four months before. But so it’s like there are different levels of preachers also.
So some of us are travelling preachers. We are like at the level of Vaidhi Bhakti. So the gurus and sanyasis, they are at the level of Raganuka Bhakti.
They can plan anytime to come anywhere and everything is arranged for them. So sometimes it happens that I was at this place. And then there are three, four programmes organised for me.
And then some other senior devotee came there, prominent leader, sanyasi guru of our movement. So temple president was there. He said that, you know, I’m sorry that we’d organised all these programmes, but he has come.
So he’d have to give the class. I said, it’s wonderful. I said, you know, I have heard his classes on YouTube.
I would love to meet him. I would love to hear his classes. So he was a little relieved.
He said, I was actually nervous. I said that he told me that some other preacher would come over there. And previously and someone else had come over there.
That preacher got so what is a plan for months and you just disrupt the whole plan. So then I was thinking that how was I able to accept. It’s not that I’m a very advanced, but I realised that because this devotee, the senior Vaishnava, the person whom I respected and who the association also looked forward to.
So if my purpose and now it’s not that I always have a high purpose, but at that time I was able to accept because my purpose in travelling is to not just speak about Krishna, but also to absorb myself in Krishna. So one way of absorbing is by speaking. In fact, I find speaking the most absorbing way, but hearing about Krishna is also absorbing.
And because this devotee’s classes, I like them. So I knew that I can absorb myself in Krishna. If my purpose is only to speak about Krishna, then if I don’t get a pleasure to speak, what is this? It will be a little more difficult to accept.
And it has happened with me also sometimes that sometimes I have a particular plan and the plans get disrupted. So there are times when we are able to accept, when times we are not able to accept. So that happens because if our purpose is very narrow and specific, very narrow, this is what I want to do.
And then that person who has started, we can’t accept it. But if our purpose is something bigger, if our purpose is to remember Krishna, yes, I can speak and remember Krishna, I can hear and remember Krishna. But if my purpose is to prove to the world how clever I am, how learned I am, then if I am just one among hundred people sitting in the audience, I can’t prove that to anyone.
I just become one among so many. So then it will be very difficult to accept. So in general, if we go towards a deeper or a bigger purpose, then acceptance becomes easier.
This I will talk about more in diligence, but this is the three levels at which we can accept. What are the three levels? Powerlessness. Temporariness.
And purposefulness. So powerlessness, I gave an example that, like Gajendra, he realised, I just don’t have the power. But temporariness, like we are in a crowded local, but it’s a short journey.
Purposefulness, I talked about how Ram’s purpose was to serve his father. And also, he gave Kaushalya the purpose. Don’t see yourself as a victim and Dashrath as a victimiser.
See that both of you are together in this. Your purpose is to serve him. So this was the second point.
Any reflections, comments, questions about this? Yes, please. In another lecture, I heard that Rishi Ram, he had this other… By the way, at his avatar, he wanted to sort of actually go and visit the rishis in the forest and all that. And in fact, the deity that he had, that he used to worship every day, so he was… Although he doesn’t need to pray, but I have heard that he was praying that he gets that opportunity to go and meet with all those rishis.
Beautiful, yeah. So, I said that Ram also saw this as opportune. His purpose was to associate with the sages and learn from the sages.
Yes. Actually, most of the reflections are stealing my future points. It’s very beautiful.
Actually, the courtiers in the kingdom, in the court, in the assembly, they said this is so unfair. It’s so terrible. And Ram says, what is terrible about it? He said that I have the opportunity to be an instrument in honouring my father’s words.
He says, we are in a glorious dynasty where we have always honoured our word. And I have opportunity to help my father honour his word. He says, I have opportunity to see or to have my younger brother Bharat, who is like my son, enthroned as the king.
He says that every father dreams that his son becomes the king. So, I have opportunity, even my youth, to see Bharat become enthroned like the king. And he says that for us who live in the world, we know that we need the association of the sages.
But we don’t get it till we retire and go to the forest. But I am so fortunate that in my youth, I am able to go to the forest, associate with the sages and enrich myself with the wisdom from them. So, he says, I see auspiciousness everywhere.
Where do you see unfairness? So, it’s a remarkably positive view. So, he does say that. Ram presents things in a way that will be appealing for everyone.
Now, of course, we could say ultimately this is all his leela and he wants to go to the forest so that he can confront the demons and he can kill the demons. All that is true. But generally, when the avatars of the Lord come to this world, they don’t always act like omniscient beings.
In fact, most of the time, they act like normal beings. And sometimes they exhibit their omniscience or omnipotence. So, therefore, Ram at this point doesn’t say that, oh, I have now got an opportunity to go to the forest so I will kill the demons.
That’s all going to happen. But at this stage, we are analysing, Ram is also, as we know, he is an ideal human being. So, how does he have this capacity to accept? So, yes, that is also one way, because the purpose of going and associating with the sages and learning from them, that’s also something which gave him purpose.
Thank you. Any other reflections? Yes, please. Yes.
Yes. You know when to push, when to pull, when to accept. Thank you.
It’s difficult to understand that. But over a period of time, we understand that. What is it called? The serenity prayer that, oh, God, give me the wisdom to accept the things that I can’t change.
No, no. God, give me the serenity to accept the things I can’t change. The courage to change the things that I can change.
And the wisdom to know the difference. So, that will talk about changing the things you can’t change, which can change, when you talk about diligence. So, this is the second point.
Any questions about this? Yes, please. Building on that situation and realise the purpose behind it sometimes. So, how do we train ourselves or how do we see purpose so that the acceptance is at a higher level? Oh, if we don’t have anyone to show the purpose to us, then how do we find the purpose? That’s why purposes exist at different levels of specificity.
And we have to find out the right level of how to see things. Okay. This is abstract.
Let me make it a little simpler. This is all. Actually, many of these points are coming as a part of the next part of the seminar.
But I’ll speak it now. See, for all of us, whenever something unexpected happens, whenever something unfavourable or unpleasant happens, we need to process it at the right level. Say, for example, if we are in an aeroplane and we are sitting on the seat.
And the person next to us is just putting their elbow on us. And they are just elbowing us and they are annoying us. Now, we could interpret this at various levels.
We could say, this person has no manners. This person is so domineering. Or we could say, this airline is so cheap.
They have such small seats. Or we could say, maybe I have become overweight. I always keep eating too much.
Or we could say that life always goes wrong for me. The same thing we could interpret at different levels. I was at a seminar on spirituality and mental health in Connecticut.
So there were people who had become addicts in different kinds of things. So they had come and many of them were talking also. I was talking with them.
So now sometimes, some people are very depressed. Some people are addicted. So I was talking with one woman, a young woman.
So she was saying, what triggered her depression? So she was a very intelligent student in a college. And along with studying in the college, she was also, to earn some money by the way, she also used to wait on tables in a restaurant over there. So then one day, she was just carrying water for a customer.
And somehow the glass of water slipped from her hands. It fell down. And she said, that one incident has made me feel, I am so useless that I can’t even carry a glass of water.
What will I do with my life? If I can’t carry a glass of water, I won’t be able to do anything in my life. Okay, a glass of water slipped. Just wipe the water and move on with life.
So what happens when people get depressed? They take the smallest of incidents and give them the biggest of meanings. So intelligence means to address problems or to place issues in the most constructive context. So for example, if the water has slipped, if the glass has slipped, now I could say that it could be because, maybe the glass itself was slippery.
Or maybe it could be because I did not hold it properly. Maybe it could be because I was inattentive. Maybe it could be because the water floor was slippery and in that process it slipped out of my hands.
Maybe it could be because somebody else suddenly spoke to me and I got distracted. There could be so many reasons for that. So, for us, we could start from a very immediate explanation.
We could go to a very broad explanation. And all of these may be true in different situations. But we need to place an issue in the most constructive context.
Say, if somebody is working, say there is a devotee who is well known to build temples. So he is like a project in charge. So there are travelling preachers and there are travelling temple constructors also.
So they go from temple to temple, they construct temples. So he had constructed a temple in America and then it came to India. And he was telling me, in India, every single permission you have to get, it is such a headache.
So now, India is so much tied by red tape. So now there was another devotee. He was working with another devotee.
This other devotee, I talked with him. He said, you know, this person, instead of building the temple, he is always complaining about India only. If he doesn’t like India, then why does he come here? I will build the temple.
I don’t need him over here. So what happened, for this devotee, he has never been out of India. So the way India works, that’s how he has always worked.
So when problems come, he doesn’t put it in the context of India at all. Yeah, this is how things are. You have to find a way ahead.
But because for the other devotee, for him, he has a context outside India. So what happens? It’s India. Now, it may or it may not be India.
But if you have to build a temple in India, you have to deal with the things in India. So attributing all the problems to India, from this devotee’s perspective, it may be true. But it is not constructive.
Okay, if you think India is like that, then don’t build a temple in India. If you want to build a temple in India, then stop attributing the problem to India. Find out some workable level of attribution.
Okay, you need more contacts. Try to develop the contacts. You need to influence more, put more pressure, or whatever you need to do, you do that.
So what happens is, we all need to frame whatever issue we are facing in the most constructive context. And that, sometimes we need to be in sattva guna to reflect on the situation. Sometimes we need somebody else in sattva guna to help us see it in the proper context.
Sometimes it might just be that Krishna sometimes gives us that insight. But that’s framing that issue in a constructive context is important. So for that, it’s also experience.
Say somebody gives a class for the first time. And then after they give, they speak about Krishna and they give philosophy class and somebody asks a question. And it’s such a difficult question that they just can’t answer anything.
And they feel so embarrassed, they feel so defeated. And that person says, I’ll never give a class again. Now it could be that they may feel, oh, I don’t know enough.
If people ask difficult questions, I won’t be able to answer, so I won’t give any classes. Now, okay, that particular question you could answer, you could frame it in that context, that I don’t know enough. But that may not be the most constructive thing.
There are some people who delight in asking difficult questions. One time we did a succession course on the Bhagavad Gita in Pune. So we’re trying different models.
Sometimes we would have one devotee giving all six sessions. And sometimes we had six devotees giving six sessions. And after that, we asked feedback.
So how did you find it? If we have different speakers giving different sessions, do you find it better? So this one person wrote, it’s very good because I can test the knowledge of all the speakers. So the same question you would ask all the six speakers and see how they answer it. So now it might be that it’s not that you don’t know, it might be that the questioner might be a troublemaker.
So the point is that we need to frame every issue that we face in the most constructive context. So if I’m not able to answer a question in a class, and I frame that issue in terms of my own incompetence, then I may become so discouraged that I may never give a class again. So that is framing the issue in a destructive context.
But okay, I talk with some other devotees, this person always keeps asking difficult questions. I sometimes go to temples and I’m known sort of to answer questions. There are two, three temples where before I go to the temple, before I start a class itself, the organiser comes and tells me, this person, these two, three people, they always ask crazy questions.
So if they ask, they raise their hands, don’t point to them. I say, I can’t do that, because what happens is, after every question, they’re the first to raise their hand. Then I said, no, no, you can answer the question, but answer the questions privately.
Just distract the whole mood. So now if somebody, now here what has happened is that I’m given a particular context, or sometimes you just, you answer a question and then they ask a counter question, and they answer a question, they ask a counter question, they just go on and on. They may take over the whole question and answer session.
So now, if devotee gives me the orientation, okay, then let’s talk privately. So basically, either by our own intelligence, or by intelligence got from consulting others, whatever issue we are facing, we need to frame it in the most constructive context. Here, it is not a right and wrong context.
Because right and wrong become moral or judgemental issues. So for this devotee from America, temple constructor in India, he feels, there’s so much red tape, so much bureaucracy over here. Well, you could say, is that right or is it wrong? Well, maybe it’s right, as compared to India, America, there might be more bureaucracy.
But that is not constructive. So rather than thinking of this in terms of the framing in terms of right and wrong, we see it in terms of constructive and unconstructive or destructive. So whatever issue we are facing, we place it in the most constructive context.
Then we will get a sense of purpose. If somebody is putting their elbow into my chest, and I think, life always treats me badly. That’s a destructive context, what can I do about it? But I can say, okay, maybe this person is overweight, and that’s why the person is also uncomfortable.
I just look around, maybe there’s a flight, some of the seats are empty. I ask the airline staff and shift somewhere else. So that’s a simple solution.
So basically, to have that sense of purposefulness, we need to place issues in the most constructive context. And that, so it’s like, say right now, if I take a photo. Now, when I take a photo, in that photo, I can put the framing in such a way that I can see only one person over here.
I can take the photo and frame it in such a way that I can see 10 people over here. I can take the framing in such a way that I can put 100 people over here. I can take the framing in such a way that maybe I can see this whole room with the 100 people over here.
So now, if I want to tell someone, this person was there for this programme, then maybe I’ll take the framing of that person. If I want to show how attentive people were, then I might take a cross-section of 10 people, show how attentively and eagerly they’re hearing the class. If I want to show how many people had come for the programme, then I might show the whole audience.
If I want to show someone, this is the kind of facility, nice facility for having satsang, then I might show the whole room with the people. So, all of them are right. Right in the sense that what is the purpose? So, we have to frame issues in the right context.
Not in the right, in the most constructive context. So, each context may be right for a particular way of dealing with it. So, I’ll talk about that purposefulness more.
But this, either by our intelligence or by others’ intelligence, we need to frame the issue in the right, in the most constructive context. Okay? Thank you. There’s a question here.
Yeah. You mentioned about the acceptance of powerlessness. Now, can it also be understood as the acceptance of helplessness? Because in the case of Narsad Maharaj, for example, he had given a vow, and then when he was fulfilled, then in one way he was powerless, because though he had a power in his feet, but at the same time, he was also helpless because… It’s bound by his word, yes.
So, powerlessness and helplessness, I think both are same. Powerlessness and helplessness are the same. Generally, when we say helpless, means that power means I don’t have the power.
Helpless means that I can’t do anything, and even others can’t do anything to help me. So, help often has the context of others also involved in it. I’m in a helpless situation.
So, if somebody has got an incurable disease, then they’re helpless at that time. So, I don’t think there’s much difference between powerlessness and helplessness, broadly speaking. Any other questions? Okay.
So, I spoke two points till now. What are the first point? Accepting change is difficult, but if we don’t accept it, our energy gets dissipated. And second point was? Acceptance through? Yeah, three aspects were? Powerlessness, temporariness, purposefulness.
Yes. Thank you. And now, the last point I’ll talk about is that acceptance is itself empowering.
Often, we think of acceptance as giving up. I just, if I accept, I’m giving up. Now, it may be like that, but it may not be like that also.
So, acceptance is empowering because it enables us to direct our energy constructively. How? Because acceptance means that wherever the energy is going to be uselessly directed, we stop doing that. Let me give a couple of examples for this.
Say, if we had to, you had to come for this programme, and you were driving along, and then Google showed you two routes. So, one was going to take 50 minutes, the other was going to take 55 minutes. And then the two are interchangeable in between also, when you take the 50-minute route.
And then suddenly, maybe there’s a traffic issue over there. For 50 minutes, it suddenly becomes 75 minutes. Then, what happens at that time? Okay, things have changed over here.
So now, if I don’t accept it, hey, maybe Google is wrong, and I keep moving forwards. Then the traffic comes, and you just don’t move. Just don’t move at all.
Then what happens? It’s just frustrating. But okay, I accept that this route is blocked now. I cannot go this way.
Once I accept that I cannot go this way, then I can make some plan. Okay, maybe I should take the other route. Or should I just call and tell them that I’m going to be late? Or should I just start doing something right now over here? Maybe hear something or prepare something? So, acceptance stops the dissipation of our energy in directions which are useless.
Another way to understand this is that if something has happened which has already gone wrong, then if we don’t accept it, it’s not accepting some situation is like pressing the brake of our car very heavily. If the brake is pressed, then no matter how much accelerator we press, no matter how much fuel we expend, the car is not going to move forwards. So, acceptance is like releasing the brake.
So, if there’s no acceptance, then the car doesn’t move forward at all. I sometimes speak at forums where there are people with special needs. Somebody may have lost an eye, somebody lost an ear, somebody lost a leg.
So, when I speak at such forums, after that when I talk with people, many times, not with everyone, but many people, what strikes me is that many of them are still fighting battles that have already been lost long ago. Somebody has lost their eyes. It’s for most of us, the prospect of losing our eyes itself is horrible.
And for somebody who’s born blind, they live with it. For somebody who had eyes and lost them, it’s extremely difficult. But that may have happened ten years ago, and still, they’re resenting it.
And then, it’s like, okay, it was terrible, but move on. It’s over now. Resenting what had happened at that time, it’s like, why did this happen? Why did this happen? Accept it, then you can move on.
So, after one such meeting, when I was reflecting, although I have polio and I need to use crutches when walking, I don’t remember myself ever being resentful like this. So then I look back, and then it struck me that one reason I was able to accept myself was because my parents accepted me. My parents never ever made me feel as if I was deficient in any way, that either my leg was a burden to them, or I was a burden to them.
Okay, this was the way I was, they just accepted me. And because they accepted me, I was able to accept myself. So now, when somebody sees me, the crutches are the first thing that they see about me.
And for me, obviously I can’t walk without crutches, but I hardly ever think about the crutches. For me, the crutches are like my glasses. I can’t function without them, but I don’t think much about them.
So, it’s like, okay, I need it to see, I need this to see, I need that to walk. But there’s not much emotional energy that is spent on it. Of course, a lot of emotional energy is spent when it doesn’t work.
Say, the crutches break down, or the glasses break down, that is in the convenience. But otherwise, there’s not much thought about it. So, the point I’m making is that acceptance is empowering.
Because I can see that for these people, again, not all of them, some of the people with special needs are also remarkably accepting. But some of them, so much energy is going in that resentment, in that refusal to accept. So, this is a very important shift that we need to make.
Acceptance is not giving up. Acceptance is not, in a sense, accepting defeat. Actually, acceptance is empowering.
Yes, it is, we could say, accepting defeat in one battle. But we are accepting defeat in one battle so that we can fight another battle. And that’s why, this will be the main theme of my next class, but I’ll mention the broad point of the theme.
To put something behind us, we need to put something ahead of us. To put something behind us. Put it behind you now.
But we can’t put something behind us unless we put something ahead of us. So, we can’t accept that, okay, I lost this battle, if we don’t have any other battle to fight. If there’s nothing else to do for us, then we just talk about, okay, this terrible thing happened, this terrible thing happened, this terrible thing happened.
But if we have another battle to fight, okay, this is over, let me move on to this. So, we need to, if we see that acceptance is not accepting defeat in the war of life, it is accepting defeat in one battle so that we can shift our energy to another battle. So, acceptance is empowering because it stops our energy from being dissipated in the battle that can’t be fought.
That is already lost, that is already over. And generally, if anything we accept, I talk about acceptance because of powerlessness, if we accept it with negativity in it, then some energy goes in that, a lot of energy goes in that. Now, we may accept it because of negativity, but there is a difference between accepting it because of negativity and accepting it with negativity.
If this seems too complicated, I’ll make it simple. See, something bad may happen, something negative may happen, and because of that we may have to accept it. Now, we didn’t want that bad thing to happen, obviously.
Nobody wants bad things to happen. So, because of that bad thing happening, we have to accept it. So, we made a plan to go out somewhere for outing, and just before that, we get flu and we fall sick, and then we are lying in our bed.
Now, because of that negativity, that negative thing that happened, we got the flu, we have to accept it. We just can’t do anything, we are powerless. But, if we are thinking, why couldn’t I go, why couldn’t I go? I’m accepting it, but I’m accepting it with negativity.
Okay, I didn’t want to do it, I wouldn’t want to stay in bed, but I have to do this, but what can I do in the bed now? Okay, I’m in the bed, what can I do in this situation? So, when to see acceptance as empowering, we have to focus on what we can do instead of what we can’t do. I repeat this, that to accept, we need to shift our focus from what we can’t do to what we can do. And this might seem like just a simple point.
Yes, but actually, it’s said that common knowledge is not common action. Common knowledge is not common action. Just because everybody knows it doesn’t mean everybody is going to do it.
And I have found this very helpful at times, that what I can’t do is what I can do. I assume that. So, once I was travelling in America, I was going from Seattle to Boston, and Boston I had a programme in the evening.
So, we went to the airport, and along the way, somehow, the traffic was very bad, we also started a little late, and different devotees have different driving competence also. So, sometimes we assume that whoever is driving is a good driver, and yeah, maybe everybody is a good driver, but not everybody is equally good. But sometimes the devotees just get confused, they get lost, and then, so basically, because of multiple factors, I ended up reaching late, and we missed the flight.
And on that evening, I had a programme in Boston, and I was so annoyed. Now, generally, when such things happen, either I can blame myself that I started late, I can blame the driver, why did you take this route and not that route, or I can just blame the situation, whatever it is. Actually, another thing that happened was, we reached there, but for me, I need a wheelchair assistant.
So, the wheelchair assistant didn’t come for 15-20 minutes. And because of that, we missed the flight. So, I could blame the wheelchair assistant also, or the airline staff for not sending the wheelchair assistant in time.
So then, now I could blame any people, I was so annoyed. But then, as I was thinking about it, I had an opportunity, I could take another flight after 4-5 hours, but then I would be in flight when I was having the programme. So then I called up the devotee, and I said, what can you do, we checked different flights, there was no flight going across.
Because what happened is, 3 hours, I hid in the time zone, so you can’t reach in time anyway. So then, they said, they had organised some, they had invited some special guests, and they really wanted me to come, we were planning their programme. So then, as I was thinking, what can I do? Somehow, that got taught, I just can’t do this, I can’t do this.
What can I do? And then I asked them that, is it okay that if I’m not able to reach physically, we can do a class on Skype? And he said, we’ve never done a class like this. Yeah, I said, that can be the first time for everything. What do you think about it? So he talked with 2-3 devotees, and he said, yes, we can try it.
So then I had an opportunity to go that evening at 5 o’clock, but then I decided, I asked the airlines, can you give us a ticket on the next day? Next morning at 5 o’clock. So they said, yes, we can do that. So then I came back, and I did the class.
And it went on very nicely. The internet was very good. And we did the class, a lot of good question answers.
And then it struck me that, just that one question, what can I do? Instead of, why can’t I do this? Why is this not working? OK, what will work now? What will work now? So what can I do now? Just if we shift that, then we will see acceptance as empowering. So this is where, if you consider Ram’s situation, at one level, from his father’s perspective, he saw that, I have to do my duty to my father, whether it is becoming a king, or whether it is becoming an exilee. But OK, if I have to become an exilee, what can I do in this situation? What I can do is, I can associate with the forest sages.
Now Ram had earlier also been in the forest. When was that? When Vishwamitra had asked him to come to the forest. That was a brief time.
But he had been in the forest before. So because of that, he saw that, and he said, yes, I can. He knew about forest sages.
He loved to associate with them. He said, I can associate with them. So he said, yes, this is a good opportunity for me to do that.
So in every situation, either I can keep asking the question, why can’t I do this? Why is this not working? Or I can ask the question, what can I do in this situation? And if we ask this question, what can I do? Then we will find that acceptance is not so much about giving up. It is about finding a way within that situation. And in that sense, acceptance can be empowering.
So that is the third point. Acceptance can empower us if we shift our vision from what we can’t do to what we can do. So any one question? We have time? OK, fine.
So if you have any questions, maybe you can note them down. And I’ll summarise, and then we can have a break. So I spoke today on the topic of Ram at home in exile.
So the theme I was talking was, how did Ram accept this terrible adversity of being the king to suddenly having nothing except his own life with him? So I talked about acceptance and diligence taking us to transcendence. So I focused on acceptance today. And I spoke three points.
The more unexpected and the more massive the change, the more difficult it is to accept it. But if we accept it, we can. If we don’t accept it, we waste our energy.
The second point I talked about is that, so in that I gave many examples. The second point was acceptance can be because of powerlessness, temporariness, and purposefulness. And we can find a purpose if we place a issue in the most constructive framing, in the most constructive context.
And last point was, acceptance can be empowering if we shift our vision from, why can’t I do this, to what can I do? So in the next session, I’ll talk about diligence leading to transcendence, that how we can get that sense of purposefulness. And how we can apply that sense of purposefulness in different difficult situations in our life. Thank you very much.
Hare Krishna.