​What values can senior devotees impart to other devotees?

Answer Podcast

Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
What values can senior devotees impart to devotees in general? How should they conduct their life so that they can help others? Yes, in any course of action that we follow, when a student joins an engineering degree or joins an engineering college, the one thing that they see is, those who have passed from their college, what are they doing? If they are in good positions, if they have a bright career, the students will say, let me go there.
But if they see that, oh, this person is in engineering and now they are unemployed, living on loan, should I do engineering? They will start getting second thoughts. So, whenever we take up any process, we look at those who have followed this process, what have they, where are they situated? So, bhakti is a process of inner transformation. There is inner transformation which makes us devoted to Krishna.
Prabhupada was asked, how do you know, how can we know your disciples? Prabhupada could have given many answers. They are always chanting Hare Krishna. Since they wear tilak.
Prabhupada says, my disciples are perfect gentlemen, perfect ladies and gentlemen. And Prabhupada focused on behavior, gentle, proper behavior, sattvic behavior. Internally we are remembering Krishna, but internally the remembrance of Krishna should manifest as pleasing behavior.
So, if you are a senior devotee, we should be as kind and as gentle, as welcoming to new devotees. That is how, kindness, gentleness, sensitivity, that is what attracts people towards Krishna. And actually this is required not just for new people.
This is required even among devotees. Sometimes it is said that now when we come new to ISKCON, people feed us fried pakodas. And then after we become devotees, they fry us like pakodas.
We sometimes take devotees for granted. They are already devotees. No, at every time, whether they have been practicing devotional bhakti for 1 year or 5 years or 10 years, no, everyone has to, everyone has to get inspiration in bhakti.
And we are not going to get inspiration in bhakti from non-devotees. The inspiration for bhakti has to come from devotees only. That’s why, the most important thing that senior devotees, they deal nicely with new people, that is very good.
But how senior devotees deal with other devotees is important. Because when there is, ultimately people, people come for various reasons to spiritual organizations. The philosophy is only one of the reasons.
It’s an important reason, but it’s only one of the reasons. One of the main reasons why people come is people want a sense of community. People want a sense of belonging.
And that’s why if they see that here, people are so affectionate, people are so kind. Prabhupada writes in the Act of Instruction Purport that the Krishna Consciousness movement will grow, is nourished and it will grow by the six-fold loving exchanges between devotees. It’s interesting, six-fold loving exchanges are giving gifts and receiving gifts, offering prasad, taking prasad, revealing one’s heart, hearing others reveal one’s heart.
Actually preaching is not there in any of these activities. We think Krishna Consciousness movement will go by preaching, as we give classes to new people and attract them. Yes, it will grow by that.
But after people have preached, they will see how we are living. So the six-fold loving exchanges need to be there among devotees. So senior devotees, if they exemplify these loving exchanges, then that will definitely attract a lot of, inspire younger devotees and attract new people also.
So that value of proper behavior, of sattvic behavior, loving Vaishnava behavior, that is what can inspire a lot of people to come towards Krishna.