Rama Navmi class – How Rama’s selflessness decreases others’ distress

[Ramayana series 2, Talk at New Goloka, Hillsborough, USA]

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Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
Jai Jai Jai Jai Jai Jai Jai Jai Hare Krishna Today we are assembled on this extremely auspicious day of the appearance of Lord Ram and I will speak on the topic of how Lord Ram exemplifies facing adversity with dignity how we can go through difficulties in life without giving in to them without giving up or giving in so broadly I will speak this in three parts I will talk about one incident from Lord Ram’s life we will discuss some analysis and application concluding how bhakti can help us to apply these principles better every world tradition has some stories which are considered secret and the idea is that these sacred stories are like a mental home for people all of us we have a physical home where we go to whenever we are in trouble or rather when we are tired, when we are exhausted, when we are that’s where we want to go to so just as we have a physical home, we need an inner home where our consciousness can rest in fact Prabhupada also points to this when he is talking about the great devotees, the Bhagavad Gita has four verses which are considered its Chatur Shloki Gita, does anyone know which are those? point 10, 8, 10, 9, 10, 10, 8, 10, 9 10, 8, 10, 9, 10, 10, 8, 10, 9 excellent, thank you you get an out of 10 good so now in 10.9 Krishna uses the word Machitta Sarva Durga Machitta Madhkata Prana Bodhayanta Parasvaram Kathayantashyama Nityam Dushyanti Charamanticha Dushyanti Charamanticha so Krishna says Machitta now we could translate this simply as where consciousness is fixed on me but Prabhupada translates it so insightfully, Prabhupada’s purports you can say are pregnant with wisdom there is wisdom over there and as we contemplate on it then he writes that as their thoughts reside in me their thoughts dwell in me so a devotee doesn’t just think of Krishna, for a devotee Krishna is the home for the thoughts for the consciousness and normally what do we do when we go to home that’s a place where we are comfortable that’s where we get rest we get energy, we get love that’s the place where we go to be rejuvenated from the world’s struggles and what applies to our body also applies to our consciousness so the Lord’s pastimes are meant to be like our inner home and when we dwell on these pastimes we can get rejuvenated by that and in fact when the Lord descends to the world there are multiple purposes one purpose is contextual and one purpose is eternal the contextual purpose is that he descends to destroy Adharma at that time and establish Dharma and Krishna talks about this in 4.7 and 8, these are the verses which are often quoted about the Lord’s descent so Krishna comes to establish Dharma to empower those who are supporting Dharma and to disempower those who are opposing Dharma and that’s what he did as Ram also but along with that there is a timeless Dharma because the world is such a place even if Dharma is established by the power of time things will change, everything will change see if you keep this milk like that the milk will get spoiled but if you want to make milk into butter then you have to follow a particular process, you have to handle the milk carefully, the milk will not become butter automatically so by the power of time change will inevitably happen but the change will be destructive not constructive so constructive change requires effort and that is something which Krishna leaves as a legacy for all times and that’s what he points to in the next verse he says the timeless purpose of his descent is to reveal his past times, by meditating on them, by understanding them, by becoming absorbed in them we become elevated our heart becomes attracted and then ultimately we attain him we need to understand the philosophy without the philosophy Krishna’s past times are amusing Ram’s past times are also amusing oh there was a demon who abducted a woman and then he went and killed and got back his queen it’s amusing it’s entertaining but with the philosophy Krishna’s past times become amazing not amusing but amazing God himself descends to this world and does astonishing things so this is a timeless purpose and how does this timeless purpose serve? that is when through the past times we become attracted to him and God has two primary aspects one is his greatness and the other is his sweetness so we need to understand his greatness so that we develop some submission to him and simultaneously we need to understand his sweetness so that we can develop affection to him and submission and affection together lead to strong devotion it is only affection without submission that is devotion but is sentimental if there is only submission but no affection then that is more like a boss employee kind of relationship there is no personal connect over there so we need to appreciate both the lord’s greatness and the lord’s sweetness then there is devotion that is transformation that is a combination of great affection and submission so today with this background I will focus on the sweetness of Ram Leela as revealed in one particular past time and to understand his sweetness we will focus not so much on his greatness although we understand his greatness but his greatness is not his omnipotence his greatness is in his character so Ram was young, virtuous and powerful and sometimes there are some small children and some children are so good that they are just like prime for success, they are talented they are dedicated, they are courteous everything that is good for them for making it big in life it is there so Ram was like that as a young boy, as a teenager and then he went with Vishwamitra and he fell great demons who were terrorising the area he was heroic also and then he won the hand of Sita so there is a beautiful Naam Ramayan which is 108 names of Ram that describes one one past time of Ram so we will recite some, I will just mention that name and then you can try to follow it so that we can contemplate on Ram so this describes how Lord Ram won the hand of Sita so it says Trambak Karmuk Bhanjak Ram so Trambak is Lord Shiva, Karmuk is his bow Bhanjak so he had to pick up the bow but he didn’t just pick it up, he broke it he just broke it so in today’s terms if you want to talk suppose somebody has to somebody is playing a cricket match and they have a last ball, they have to hit the sixer and they not only hit a sixer but the ball breaks the ball of the stadium and goes out it’s out of the scope itself so Ram was lifted to lift up the bow and string the bow and nobody else was able to do it but what did he do? he didn’t just lift and string the bow he tied the string with such strength that the bow broke and so they celebrated for that and then what happened? Sita came to him Dashrath signalled to her he is indeed an undisputed champion so sometimes there is a close competition say somebody gets 90 points somebody gets 91 points or 92 points but here like everybody else was 5 points he was 500 points there is no class only there is no competition itself so Sita Arpita Varmalik Rama Sita Arpita Varmalik Rama she offered the garland the garland indicated their marriage so basically Ram’s life was following a perfect trajectory he overcame demons he won a beautiful princess and then he came back to his kingdom and he was going to become the prince regent in the kingdom so normally the more life goes the way we want it to the more we dream it to then what happens? when it doesn’t go the way we want it becomes very difficult to accept it so many times when we face problems it is how unexpected or expected the problems are that determines our response so if we know that say yesterday evening we had a programme many of you came for the programme so there was a storm so we know we have to go slowly so we go cautiously but suddenly out of the blue something comes up that it is a little more difficult to deal with it so Ram was going to be coronated as the prince regent and that night a sudden conspiracy happened and when he went to his father’s place he was told by his step mother Kaikeyi you are exiled you have to go to the forest for 14 years and Bharat will become the prince regent actually exile is extremely brutal punishment it is only one level below the worst punishment that is execution when you are executed your life is taken away when you are exiled everything except your life is taken away everything your wealth, your friends, your social circle your possessions, your prestige everything is taken away you have to get some small idea of what it is like many of you are say Indians who might be an H1B visa so if your visa is not extended then suddenly I have to leave the country now I have my job over here I have a home, I have a family I have a life over here suddenly I have to go but for us we have a home in India we have relatives we can build a life over there but for Ram it was just one movement everything leave and go and there is no fault of his at all generally even if we are faulty we don’t want to admit our fault it is said that success has many parents and failure is always born an orphan when something wrong happens nobody wants to take responsibility for it who did that so like that even when we have a fault we don’t want to admit it but if there is no fault at all and then even a small wrong happens it is difficult to deal with but when such a catastrophic wrong happens everything is taken away how does one deal with it at that time so Ram exemplifies this the Ramayan begins with the question which is asked by Valmiki Muni to Narada Muni what are the characteristics of an ideal person who is an ideal person and a list of characteristics are described and thereafter it is said that Ram is such a person who demonstrates the ideal characteristics generally when something bad happens to us a normal human tendency is to feel sorry for oneself and it is understandable why did this bad thing happen to me but sometimes self-consciousness that means just thinking about oneself self-consciousness is like a black hole and the more we think about ourselves, the more we feel sorry for ourselves it starts becoming darker and darker that’s how resentment grows first we become resentful of this person then resentful of other people then we become resentful of the whole world and there is this tendency nowadays, many people feel that I am a victim and it’s not just a matter of feeling, it’s true we may have been victimised because we live in a world which is a difficult place and everybody has snakes inside them we are all human beings but essentially we are human beings but all of us have snake-like weaknesses within us snake-like desires within us and sometimes those snakes just pop out and bite some person who seems to be a very nice person suddenly they start behaving so terribly why is this person doing like this what has happened is some snake inside them has come out and it’s biting us so that’s what happened to Kalki so all of us we might externally look like civilised human beings but in spite of that these snakes are still there and we try to control those snakes as much as possible but sometimes they just come out and then the magnitude of the biting, the magnitude of the wounding the magnitude of the poisoning that can happen nobody can know that how much it will be so when this happens Raham, how does he respond it’s extraordinary he says actually he has gone to the Dashrath’s palace Dashrath and Kalki are there and he can see that there is a clear tension between the two of them sometimes the two people just by the way they look at each other you can make out whether they are affectionate or they are antagonistic sometimes people go to great efforts to not look at someone they talk with that person they look everywhere as if that person doesn’t exist and talk with them so there is attachment we constantly look at a person aversion means we constantly endeavour to not look at that person so when there is tension between two people it’s like easily palpable sometimes you go into a room also and it’s like walking into a minefield one step wrong and one minefield will explode another step wrong, other minefield explodes so you just got in between them so Ram could sense that there was tension between the two and he could see that his father was in great distress and Dashrath also was aware of what a terrible atrocious wrong was being done to Ram but he couldn’t stop it because he was obligated to honour his word and he actually never spoke those words he had to go to the forest it was Kaikeyi who spoke this the king in order to honour his word to me has told you to go to the forest for 14 years and when Ram saw this as I said when we think of our problems we just sink into that black hole but if you think about others when we are in distress it is not just we who are in distress it is people around us are also in distress if they have some concern for us even if they have some affection for us or even if they have some connection some obligation towards us or through us say if we fall sick say if we get a fracture or we get some disease now we are in the hospital we are miserable naturally it is painful but some people when they are sick life has made them sick and miserable but they make it their life to make others miserable isn’t it they complain, they nag, they yell and then nobody wants to be with such a person so yes we cannot change the fact that we are sick but we can we can make sure we can at least behave in a way that we don’t make others sick of course one level is we don’t make them sick by infecting them with our disease but we can make others sick of us as a person constantly complaining, blaming sometimes you feel life is so unfair I am so helpless sometimes you may feel that this situation is so terrible I am helpless, I can’t do anything I am powerless has any of you ever been in such a situation when you felt you are powerless yes yeah so now when we are in such a situation when you feel I am powerless you can ask us this question can I make things worse what a question who will want to make things worse things are bad enough already we are not talking about actually making things worse we are investigating the possibility say if I got a fracture in one foot of my mind and I am badly hurt can I make things worse I can take a hammer and crack my other knee also so no matter how bad things are we can always make them worse the point is not that we should make them worse the point is to recognise that we are not as powerless as we think if I can make things worse that means I can make them better also its a counter intuitive thought but if I can make things worse I can make them better also and one way to make them better is to stop thinking about our own problems so Ram’s first thought is not that how dare how dare I be exiled like this he recognises that there is tension between Kaikeyi and Dasharatha so his first thought is how to decrease the temperature how to decrease the temperature and he says oh mother Kaikeyi I always thought of you like my own mother non different from my mother Kaushalya and I also thought that you treated me like your own son just like Bharata but today it causes me great sadness to see that you never accepted me as your son now when he sees this she was probably preparing for attack against her how could your own son you send away to a forest like this but Ram says if you had truly accepted me as your son then for such a small thing as a kingdom you wouldn’t have needed to trouble my father could just have come to me and told me and I would have given the kingdom to Bharata now this is not what Kaikeyi is expecting to hear generally what happens usually whenever we have to hurt someone before hurting them we have to depersonalise them depersonalise them means we have to think that this person is not a good person or worse than this person is not a person so whenever terrorists kill some people they don’t think of other people as human they think of other people just as agents of evil we have to remove so when we have to hurt someone to some extent we have to depersonalise them but here what Ram is doing is Ram is just taking the wind out of her attack she is thinking I will defend myself I will readily give the kingdom so by this he is trying to decrease her hostility towards him and her hostility towards her husband because if Ram also opposes if Ram resents Ram rebels then Dashrath will be further torn so what does Ram do he sticks in gracefully and then he turns to his father and he says father please do not grieve it is my privilege to ensure that your word of honour is protected I will immediately prepare and go to the forest please have Bharat called and let him be enthroned as the prince agent and he offers his respects to both Kaikeyi and Dashrath and departs Kaikeyi is stunned by this turn of events she is expecting a fight but Ram doesn’t fight at all and normally there are no secrets in the world most people when they tell you can you keep a secret that means they are not able to keep the secret when they can’t keep a secret they tell others to keep a secret so especially anything that happens in a royal palace there are always attendants who are hearing and when this is such a devastatingly sensational news so immediately the news starts spreading and Lakshman comes to know about it now Sita and Kaushalya they are in their own prayer rooms they are praying for Ram Lakshman comes to know Lakshman is furious and Lakshman is like a angry young man he is he says how dare how dare such atrocity happens what fault have you ever committed how can the kingdom be seized from you and you be sent to the forest when we are angry usually we need someone to blame its fine to blame destiny but what do you do what do you do with destiny whom do you blame Bhaktisaraj Thakur gives the example that like trying to blame god or blame destiny is like spitting at the sky all that happens is the spit comes back on our own face so we usually need someone here and now to blame so Lakshman first gets angry with Dashrath and he says that the king is so angry that he does not even refer to Dashrath as his father he says the king is maddened by lust lust for his youngest wife there is three queens and the scriptures often talk about polygamy but almost every incident of polygamy is accompanied with big problems almost everywhere so what happens is Kaikeyi is the youngest queen but she is she is the one whom Dashrath gives maximum attention so anyway there is already a tension among them and then he says he is maddened by lust that’s why he is favouring her son in such a blatantly partial way so Ram is very angry he says he is her father and I was with him he said he is not doing this out of infatuation he is doing this out of obligation it gave him no pleasure I could see how much pain he was in his god obligation he had promised Kaikeyi that he will give her two moons generally when when we have arrived at some conclusion it’s like whatever evidence is against that conclusion it’s like I have already made up my mind don’t confuse me with the facts some people are like that so Lakshman says now what is this boon I think it is a story we have never heard of these two boons so you know our father he is a honourable person why would he make a story like this and then Lakshman says Kaikeyi she is so selfish so now his anger shifts from Dashrath to Kaikeyi he says Kaikeyi is so selfish how can she always treated you with such affection and now she has become so brutal so he says that Ram says don’t speak harshly about her you know how much she loved me her love for me was just like Kaushalya’s love for me it was like the flow of the Ganga Lakshman is still angry that’s what I can’t understand how did the Ganga dry up in one night and then Ram says that’s why when I saw her disposition so completely different from a normal decision I understood that this must be the working of destiny and this is the work of destiny now this is a very interesting reason see generally we try to look for a cause effect connection in things say if a child comes back from school with a black eye what happened I just turned black what do you mean I turned black what happened something must have happened normally we look for a cause effect connection if the child has not had a fight you got some infection what kind of infection causes a black eye like this so normally we look for a cause whenever we see an effect we look for a cause and usually we look for immediately understandable causes just like if somebody say on a cold night eats 10 ice creams 1,2,3 10 ice creams enjoy it but the next morning ice cream its terrible now if they got a terrible throat the next morning is that because of their past karma yes past nights karma so generally when we see an effect we try to find a cause for that effect and we try to look for some immediate causes but sometimes when no immediate cause seems to be there then we have two options one is everything happens by chance and I was just unlucky and this is the materialistic way of looking at things but and people say that there is no cause effect in the world atheistic may say like that but nobody lives like that even atheists when they are raising their children will they tell their child whether you study or don’t study its not going to make any difference everything happens by chance now whether you clean your bed or not how the bed will be by chance nobody lives that way so even if something we can’t make sense of why it is happening we don’t lose faith in the cause effect correlation say for example we go to a doctor and we have some small swelling on the body doctor says you got cancer what we first ask what caused the cancer cancer is one we see its very difficult to pinpoint the cause but then once we go beyond the denial we accept it, what is the next thing is it treatable what is the treatment so when we are asking what is the treatment that means that we have not lost faith in the cause effect this effect why the cancer came I don’t know but still what can I do by which the cancer effect can be mitigated so we may not be able to make sense of one cause effect connection particularly but that doesn’t mean we lose faith in the cause effect connection itself we still always have that faith so what the scriptures tell us is that when the immediate cause effect connection doesn’t make sense that is where we consider destiny destiny is basically something which is like accumulation of our past karma coming upon us now so destiny its purpose is to help us make sense of those things which don’t make sense to make sense of those things which don’t make sense so normally people would behave with us based on our reciprocation if we are kind to them they are kind to us but if somebody who has been kind to us suddenly turns cruel why is this? we try to figure out did I do anything to offend a person but sometimes we may have done nothing to offend the person of course we can’t say I never offended them in the course of life we all offend each other but sometimes the action of the person may be completely out of proportion to whatever wrong we may have done so at that time you can see that this is destiny this is reality that is how we can gain some acceptance and move on now here Lakshman is still angry he says destiny only cowards consider injustice to be destiny and accept it heroes fight against injustice this is not this is not destiny this is injustice fight against it and Ram says am I considering and Lakshman is so angry he says we should fight against this rise in rebellion against our father and I will make you the king if anybody stops you from becoming the king they will have to face my arrows Ram becomes very brave he says Lakshman your first arrow will have to be shot at me he says he completely says Lakshman is angry Ram completely deflates him over it so he wants to fight for Ram not fight against Ram isn’t it so then Ram says for me the most important consideration is what is my duty as a son in service to my father I was ready to ascend the throne now as a son in service to my father I will go to the forest so throughout Ram he is not trying to collect sympathy and make people feel sorry for him he is actually trying to decrease the temperature so that things can move on and there are different ways in which we can understand who is a great person one definition of greatness is such person who works very hard and makes life bend to their will this is what I want to do and this is what I will do no matter what goes wrong that’s one way of one parameter for understanding greatness people who are super achievers that’s greatness that’s true but there is another much more important parameter of greatness and that is not just making life say yes to us but accepting when life says no to us because sooner or later life will say no to everyone of us and what do we do at that time so either we can keep resenting or we can start recalibrating either we can be resenting or we can start recalibrating recalibrating is ok what is the best way forward suppose say we are we are we have learnt rowing or we plan to learn rowing does anyone know rowing over here ok good we say what is there to learn in rowing we just move the row and everything seems easy till we actually do it so we start rowing somebody will plan I want to row and I want to row very smoothly elegantly I will move my arms gracefully and boat will move swiftly and everybody will click photos and put them on facebook and everybody will appreciate how what an expert rower I am somebody plans like that and they call their friends to have their exhibition in rowing and when their exhibition is about to start suddenly a monster wave comes from nowhere and that monster wave just knocks and now there is no boat under them there are no oars in their hands and still they are playing their mental movie they are still rowing all that will happen is they will sink they will drown so now if the reality has changed so drastically then what do you do you have to recalibrate what do I do now let me paddle let me swim let me get to the coast first so like that if we are here reality is here and our expectations are in between our expectations help us to shape reality positively I want to build this kind of house I want to have this kind of career I want to have this kind of family so many things we plan even in our service we may plan no I want to make a dress for the evening like this I want to be able to speak like this I want to sing like this whatever so we are here the reality is here our expectations are here and our expectations can help us to shape reality but sometimes things change in such a way that what happens is we are here the reality is here and the expectations have gone here that means it’s a complete mismatch so if we keep thinking about the expectations oh I want it to be like this I want it to be like this basically the expectations then start coming in the way of dealing with reality sometimes expectations can help us to deal with reality and sometimes expectations can come in the way of dealing with reality because the expectations we are just rowing there is no or and no or so like that things just change sometimes completely so at that time either we can be resenting why is there this gap between reality and expectation or we can start recalibrating ok this is the reality how can I deal with it and as long as we are obsessing on this gap between reality and expectation that is the time we will be extremely resentful and we will not be able to deal with the situation at all so the situation is bad but actually as long as we are focussing on the gap between these two the situation appears much worse than what it is so for Ram you can imagine the gap at one moment he is going to be a prince and next moment he has to go into the forest with nothing it’s very difficult to imagine any bigger gap between the reality and the expectation it’s very difficult to deal with something like this very very difficult but it’s a it’s a test of character can you recalibrate so we all have expectations in life it’s just human to have expectations but the problem is when we become attached to our expectations psychological rigidity means that we just deal with our expectations psychological flexibility means ok my mind was thinking like this but now things have changed so instead of focussing on the expectation let me refocus focus on the reality and deal with it so Ram demonstrates this psychological flexibility then when he goes to his mother actually each one of these incidents is very moving his interaction with his mother, his interaction with Sita his interaction with other citizens so we will discuss some of them briefly till what time is the class? ok don’t set up unrealistic expectations it’s ok so so then when he goes to Kaushalya at that time I’ll not talk about Sitalpa, that’s a whole chapter itself but I’ll talk about Kaushalya and I’ll talk about citizens so basically at that time when he goes to Kaushalya and he tells his mother what had happened his mother is aghast she says everybody has their own life is a tough the world is a tough place everybody is working through their own tragedies no matter how successful they look they scrap a little below the surface they find that everybody has had some terrible things going wrong in life when we see how can a person be so bad so actually speaking if we see how bad life is for everyone we shouldn’t be shocked that people are so bad we can be surprised why people are not worse it’s actually easy it’s easy to become resentful it’s easy to become revengeful and it is a testament to the resilience of the human spirit that bad things don’t make people bad some people do become bad because of that but many people everybody if they start claiming to be a victim they can become vindictive they can become vengeful everybody has reasons to complain in life so now Kaushalya has her own sad story she was the first queen, the eldest queen of Dashrath but she somehow was neglected in favour of King Dashrath that was a very great sorrow for her but somehow she lived with that then she thought at that time for a king to have an heir is very important but somehow although they tried Dashrath just couldn’t have any children and she performed a lot of austerities and penances they did yajnas she prayed and prayed and then finally after a long time like a long dark night for her soul after that she had a son and not just a son but a son like Ram such a glorious son the fulfilment of every dream of a mother just now she was thinking that now after all that period now Ram will become the prince Ram will become the king every mother naturally dreams that her son will become glorious sometimes we are going through a long dark tunnel and then we see a light at the end of the tunnel we feel relief and then we realise that that light is a train rushing at us laughing then we had to jump out of the way what happened so for Kaushalya it was like that he thought oh I got my son he is a light in my dark life and now that son has been sent to the forest He says, how will I live without you? If so publicly the king has spurned me in favour of Kaikeyi, what will he do afterwards? When Kaikeyi has the power by which she has her son as the king, what will she do with me? She says, I can’t live over here.
Oh Ram, if you are going to the forest, please take me also with you to the forest. I cannot live here. Now Ram, generally what happens is when something bad happens to us and somebody has done something bad, so we want everyone to gang against that person.
He is bad, he is bad, he is bad. Yes, do you agree with me? That person is bad. But Ram doesn’t think in those terms at all.
Ram says, oh mother, I was with my father and I could see that he was shattered by Kaikeyi betraying me this way. When he said that, okay, he is a husband and she is a wife, I will give you two boons. He said, okay, what will she ask? She will ask for jewellery, some this, some that.
He never dreamt that she would ask for something like this, like rip his heart apart. He told Kaikeyi also, if at all you want Bharat to be the king, let him be the king. But don’t send Ram, I am not able to live without him.
So she said that, the king has already experienced betrayal from his one queen. If at this time he experiences rejection from you, oh mother, he will not survive. So he completely recast things.
Rather than, when Kaikeyi, Kaushalya sees that Dashrath has done such a great wrong to him. He says, Dashrath is not the wrongdoer. Dashrath is as much as a victim of the situation as you are.
So generally, you know, we need to see the brother in the other. The brother in the other means that the other person is also human being like us. Other person is also suffering like us.
So then we won’t become so vengeful, so vindictive. So what is Ram doing? Again he is trying to maintain, make sure that bad things don’t become worse. If mother also rejects and goes away, the whole royal household will break apart.
So he is bringing things down. He says, oh please be with my father. He needs you now more than ever to go.
Kaushalya is very grief struck. But she remembers her duty. She says, oh Ram, how will I live for 14 years without you? Mother says, oh mother, you just take care of father.
14 years will just go like 14 days. And soon I will be back with you. Now both of them know it is not true.
But sometimes, you know, speaking a lie is the kind thing to do. Not that we want to keep the other person in darkness. But we don’t have to by our words put salt on somebody’s wounds.
So the wound is there, it will go like 14 days. It’s basically decreasing the wounds. And then he has to go and pacify Sita.
I’ll skip that part. I’ll come to the last part about the citizens and the courtiers. So when they are there, at that time, they are also, they are up in arms.
What kind of atrocity is this? They all love Ram. They all expected Ram to become the king. Become the next king.
So at that time, they say that this is a great injustice. And Ram, he recognises that if they also rebel against the king, it will be a problem. So Ram says, what is the misfortune? What is the injustice? He says that for all of us who are householders, we are entangled in worldly life.
We need the wisdom of the sages. And generally, we get it when we retire from household life and go to Vanaprastha. But he says, I am so fortunate that I have the opportunity to go to the forest and enrich myself with the wisdom of the sages.
Even now, when I’m young. He says, older brother is like a father. So the father’s dream is that his son becomes greater than him.
He says, for me, if in my presence Bharat becomes a king, it’s a dream come true for me. So the king is able to honour his word. And he says, for me as a son, what greater joy can be there than to honour the word of my father? He says, I have the opportunity to honour the word of my father.
I have the opportunity to fulfil the desire of my stepmother. I have the opportunity to see my younger brother enthroned as the king. I have the opportunity to enrich myself with wisdom from the sages.
I see only opportunity everywhere. What is the adversity? There are two kinds of people. Some people see solutions to all problems.
And some people see problems with all solutions. So Ram, he’s not just talking positive. He’s living that positive reality.
So by every situation, we can look at how bad it is. Or we can look at what is the good in the situation. And bad things do happen in life.
But by our attitude, we can make the bad situation worse. Or we can make it not so bad. I’ll conclude with this point.
That for all of us, our mind, whatever is happening, our mind is passing a commentary about it. Say if we are attending a class, this class is going too long now. Constantly whatever is happening, our mind is passing a commentary.
And sometimes the mind’s commentary about a problem is a bigger problem than the problem itself. Like sometimes, say if the weather is very bad, it’s very hot. So some people, right from morning, it’s like they are like a sound player just stuck on one audio.
The weather is so hot, the weather is so hot, the weather is so hot, the weather is so hot, the weather is so hot. And after sometime, the heat is not as irritating as their complaining. So similarly, what happens is, when we have a problem, our mind is like that inner complainer.
It’s so bad, it’s so bad, this is so bad, this is so bad. And in that way, the mind is complaining about the problem becomes a bigger problem than the problem itself. So we need to shift our mind somewhere else.
And where do we shift the mind? See, our culture is primarily a culture of demanding rights. I have a right to this, I have a right to that, I have a right to that. And yes, rights are important.
Now rights can provide us freedom. But it is only responsibilities that can provide fulfilment. It is only when we take a responsibility, any situation can look in life.
Look back at your life and think of the happiest moments in your life. Yeah, now we might at a superficial level say, oh I watched that movie, I watched that cricket match, I am so enjoyable. Okay, that’s entertainment, that’s deletion.
But some really deeply happy moments of our life are when we did something meaningful. We did something worthwhile. No, we were absorbed in something bigger than ourselves.
And when through that we were able to achieve something, that is what brings fulfilment. That is what brings fulfilment. So, when life treats us badly, we can keep agitating about our rights.
This shouldn’t have happened. Why is this happening? Why is this person treating me like this? And that doesn’t help us. Because the reality is the way it is.
You can’t change it. But no matter how dreary the reality is, we can always take the responsibility to make it better. So, claiming or demanding our rights, it doesn’t make anything better.
That doesn’t mean we don’t have rights. It just means that whether in a particular situation, demanding our rights is the right thing to do. If reality has changed and sometimes these bad things happen.
So, at that time, this should not happen. Okay, yeah, it should not have happened. But it has happened.
No, it shouldn’t have happened. Well, it has happened. No, it shouldn’t have happened.
Okay, I agree it shouldn’t have happened. But it has happened now. So, sometimes demanding our rights is just not the right thing to do.
So, at that time, you can shift from rights to responsibility. The responsibility that at least, let me not make things worse. Let me see if I can make things better.
And all of us, no matter how small, how insignificant we may be, we can take the responsibility to enrich our reality. We all can take the responsibility to enrich our reality. To enrich our reality means that we can make things better.
So, Ram, throughout, he is considered the ideal human being for many glorious qualities. But here, he is taking the responsibility to not make bad things worse. Taking the responsibility to make things as less bad as possible.
So, bad things just happen in life. And Ram demonstrates how to respond to that. We all can take the responsibility to enrich our reality.
And if we decide to take that responsibility, Krishna Consciousness can empower us in extraordinary ways. Krishna Consciousness is also a choice. It’s also a choice we have to take.
Krishna Consciousness is also a resource which we have, but we have to take that resource. Sometimes, while preaching we may say, the only problem in the world is a lack of Krishna Consciousness. But then we come back to the temple, we come back to our home, we come back to our community and we say, the only problem in my life is this devotee.
If only this person would not behave like this, my life would be so much better. Okay, yes, what happened to the only problem in the world is a lack of Krishna Consciousness? That is for preaching. Not like that.
Yes, sometimes we can become very cynical even while practising Krishna Consciousness. Our devotees are like this only. People are like this only.
This is like this. Now, if we take the responsibility to enrich our reality, then Krishna is there to empower us. Krishna is there to empower us.
But if we don’t take the responsibility to try to be Krishna Conscious, then even Krishna can’t help us. Krishna can help us only when we choose to take his help. So, we see in Prabhupada’s life, so many things went wrong in his life.
If somebody wanted to write a story of how a person’s life can go terribly wrong, till the age of 65 or 69, Prabhupada’s life was like that. He tried to start a business. It was for noble purpose.
He said, through the business, I can sponsor and support my future master’s mission. But one time a fire burned up his place, another time a servant just robbed him. And overall his business didn’t work.
Then he tried to work with his God brothers and he tried to assist them. But they had a very narrow vision. He wanted to expand the magazine.
He said, no, no, just keep it as it is. Then he tried to start his own magazine. And on the streets of Delhi, he fainted in exhaustion.
Nobody was ready to take the books. A cow ran into him and knocked him down. Then he started an organisation League of Devotees in Jhansi.
And the same people who were supporting his organisation, they turned against him. And he had to leave from there. And finally, after great effort, he got an opportunity to go to America.
And when he was going to America, the only resource he had materially was his body. And that body collapsed in two terrible heart attacks. He eventually got to America and then he was living at a place, but he was not allowed to speak over there.
Because the other person’s philosophy was different. Then he went to another place, but there the janitor only stole his dictaphone and typewriter. That was the only thing he had.
Then he shifted to another place and there was another boy who was staying with him. And he seemed very enthusiastic. Prabhupada wrote a letter to him.
He said he will become the first American western Vaishnava, western devotee. And then that boy, he took drugs, went mad and came to attack Prabhupada. And Prabhupada had to literally run away from that place.
If somebody had to complain, Prabhupada had so many reasons to complain. Finally, he decided he wanted to establish a centre in America. And he actually got a sponsor.
He himself, by writing letters to India, got a sponsor from India. Now, those of you who raise funds, you understand. Even by going and meeting people, raising funds is difficult.
And just by writing a letter, he conveyed his earnestness and got a sponsor from India to sponsor for a temple in America. But at that time, the Indian government was very strict about releasing foreign exchange. So then Prabhupada wrote to his godbrother.
He first wrote back with a sponsor and said, let’s not make a big temple. He said, let’s make a small centre right now and eventually we’ll build a temple. But for that person, it was a matter of religious pride.
I want to build a temple. He said, he has to have a proper structure. Otherwise, he felt that what is the religious pride for him.
So he said, no, we have to build a temple. Then Prabhupada wrote to his godbrothers. And he said, one of his godbrothers had met the president of India, one had met the prime minister of India.
He said, just talk with them and let them sanction. And they didn’t even reply to him. So, if Prabhupada had to become bitter, he had so many reasons.
But through it all, he stayed faithful. Let me see how I can serve Krishna. And he just remained Krishna conscious and he tried to give Krishna consciousness to others.
And what happened? Krishna, in his time, did astonishing things. Within 10 years, for the last, for the first, you could say almost 60-70 years of Prabhupada’s life, it was like one reversal after another, after another, after another. And generally, you know, people start with big ambitions in their life.
Like somebody may say, I want to become the next president of America. Okay, with a small child, he may say, I want to become the president of America. As they grow up, okay, maybe not the president of America, at least, you know, I want to become the wealthiest person in my state.
As they grow further in their life, life beats them down, beats them down. And then, okay, by the time they graduate, if I get a job, it will be great. So, life’s adversities keep beating us down, beating us down.
But Prabhupada, he never gave up his dreams. Because his dream was not for himself and it was not based on himself. It was not for himself and it was not based on himself.
It was for Krishna and it was based on his faith in Krishna. And so, the last first 70 years of his life was like a dark life. Many dark chapters.
But the last 10 had such a dazzling light that now, all the previous 70 years become like an inspiring contrast. And so, similarly, Prabhupada’s strength was that he was always conscious of the Lord. He didn’t complain, he didn’t become bitter.
So, what Lord Ram demonstrates? Staying beautiful amidst distress. Not complaining, not resenting. Prabhupada demonstrated that in his own life.
So, Prabhupada Ki! So, for all of us also, we can choose whether I am going to blame, that this is not right, why is this happening? Or I am going to take responsibility. If we take the responsibility, in a small way, can I make things better? At least, what can I do? Instead of blaming this person, thinking about this person, thinking about this problem, let me think about Krishna. Let me pray to Krishna, let me remember Krishna.
And as we remember Krishna, we will find that calmness and clarity will come into our lives. Generally, bad things happen to everyone in life. The insight that Bhakti gives us is that, greater than what faces us, is what graces us.
Greater than what faces us, is what graces us. So, Krishna and His mercy is there to grace us. But, instead of looking at what is facing us and resenting, we look toward Krishna.
That is the enduring lesson of the Ramayan. That, instead of resenting situations, we take responsibility. And when we do that, we will find that, we will discover, by Krishna’s grace, strength that we did not know we had.
And we will be able to create, we will become like a light in the darkness. And not only we ourselves, we will be able to inspire others to light their candles. And thus, we may not be able to brighten the whole world, but we can brighten our world.
We may not enrich the whole world, but we can enrich our reality. And like Prabhupada’s example, Krishna can empower people in extraordinary ways. Of course, we are not always like Prabhupada.
But, the adventure of life is to discover how much good we can do by God’s grace. If we take the responsibility of enriching our reality, how much we can enrich, that no one knows. Krishna can empower us to do things far greater than what we think ourselves capable of doing.
And that is what we can pray to Lord Ram. When bad things happen, instead of resenting, let us take responsibility. And thus, we can move forward in our life.
I will quickly summarise. I spoke today on the theme of Lord Ram’s beautifulness amidst distress. I first talked about how the Lord has a contextual mission to establish dharma, and an internal mission to give us His pastimes, by remembering which, they can act as an inner home for us.
An inner home where our thoughts and our consciousness get rest and rejuvenation. And devotion has understanding God’s greatness, which brings submission, and understanding His sweetness, which brings affection. So, I talked about how the Lord does not act as God, He acts as a human being.
And He exemplifies how we can act as a responsible human being. So, Ram, for no fault of his, was exiled. But, instead of railing at the injustice of it all, He tried to make things better.
He diffused Kaikeyi’s anger. I would have done this willingly, if you had just told me. He diffused Lakshman’s anger by shifting the blame from his father or his mother, Kaikeyi, two of them.
Our destiny is responsible. And He focused on His duty. So, sometimes we feel life is so bad.
But no matter how bad things are, we can make them worse. And that means we can make them better also. So, it’s attaching to our expectations, trying to row when there is no boat in the oars.
We understand when our expectations are helping us to shape reality, and when our expectations are coming in the way of reality. Then we have psychological flexibility to let go of expectations, and deal with reality as it is. And for that, when He was dealing with Kaikeyi, with Kaushalya, He helped us to see Dashrath not as a wrongdoer, but as also a co-wronger person.
And that way, we have to see the brother in the others. See, others are also suffering like us. And it’s easy to become resentful, but it only makes things worse.
And lastly, I talked about how He saw positive and lived positive with talking about His citizens. He looked at opportunity everywhere. The mind’s commentary about a problem sometimes makes the problem bigger.
But if in that, we can stop the mind’s commentary by not demanding rights, but taking up responsibility. How can I make the situation better in whatever small way I can? And look at Prabhupada’s life. He had so many reasons to be resentful.
But Prabhupada remained purposeful in trying to serve Krishna. And Krishna, after 70 years of difficulty, gave 10 years of dazzling prosperity, spiritual prosperity. So, for all of us also, if we take responsibility, then to enrich our reality, at least we can light our world.
And who knows, Krishna can empower us to do much, much more. So, let’s conclude with a prayer to Lord Ram. The same prayer we recited in the beginning.
Shri Ram Chandra Sirsa Namami Shri Ram Chandra Vachasa Grunami Shri Ram Chandra Manasa Smaraami Shri Ram Chandra Sharanam Prapadye Shri Ram Chandra Bhagwan Ki Jai Shri Ram Navi Mahamaha Utsav Ki Jai Srila Prabhupada Ki Jai Gaura Bhaktaranda Ki Jai Gaura Premananda Ki Jai Shri Ram Chandra Vachasa Grunami