When life doesn’t make sense Gita 1.30 Leicester | Chaitanya Charan

Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
So, basically, the Bhagavad Gita is a book spoken by Krishna to Arjuna, and it’s not a casual philosophical discussion.
The voice is going up and down. So, it is a serious crisis that Arjuna is having. And it is at that particular time that Arjuna is turning to Krishna, and he is expressing his angst over here.
So, generally, in life, for all of us, now, we have certain desirables. Now, what is the desirable? That may vary, but we see our life in terms of the pursuit of the desirable. Now, of course, life has another dynamic.
That is, there are things which are undesirable in life. And we also see life in terms of we don’t want the undesirable to come. So, if you come to a social gathering, a social event, there may be certain people you may look forward to meeting.
And there are certain people you may look forward to avoiding, or look around to avoiding. So, there are like that in our life also. Certain things are desirable, certain things are undesirable.
And broadly, our whole life is shaped by trying to attain the desirable and avoid the undesirable. That could be in terms of people, it could be in terms of some relationship, it could be in terms of some professional growth, it could be in terms of health, it could be in terms of financial stability or freedom. So, we’re looking for desirables and we’re trying to avoid the undesirables.
And broadly, we have a certain understanding of how life works. That if I do this, this will happen. If I do this, this, this will happen.
And that broadly gives us a sense of meaning to our life. That, okay, how does life make sense? If I take care of my health, if I exercise, if I eat rightly, then I’ll stay fit. But, if somebody does all the right things, they exercise, they eat right, they avoid exposure to polluting or radioactive or chemical things, and still they find that they’ve got cancer.
Then, what’s going on in life? So, when bad things happen, it is not just that, oh, why did this happen to me? That is one problem that is there, and it can be a strong feeling of injustice and unfairness. But, bigger than that is, what am I meant to do? How am I meant to live? The general understanding of life that we all have, at least at some level, is that, if I do good, then I will get good. And, with this understanding, we function in life.
But, if it happens that we do a lot of good, and what we get is instead a lot of bad, then, not only, the two questions over here, you know, why did this bad happen to me? But, that is a problematic question. But, even more problematic question is, what am I meant to do now? So, if we are very kind and helpful to someone, and we extend ourselves to them in their time of need, and then, when we need some help, rather than offering us help, they stab us, they betray us, they bad mouth us. So, one question is, how could this person do like this? But, the other question is, how am I meant to behave with people? Should I not be good? Should I not help anyone? So, that becomes a much bigger question.
So, this is basically a sense of resentment. How could this happen to me? But, why is this happening to me? But, what am I meant to do? How am I supposed to live? This is a sense of directionlessness. We start feeling directionless.
We feel lost in life. We may be resentful, but we may not be lost. So, Arjuna, at the start of the Gita, is in this state.
For him, the situation that he has to face is the stuff of the worst nightmares. Bhishma and Drona, this is 1.30, just a few verses before, Krishna has brought Arjuna in between the two armies and Bhishma, Drona, Pramukh, Taha, Sarveshaam che Mahikshitam. So, Bhishma and Drona are the prominent people who he is seeing.
And how Arjuna has to fight a war and he has to fight against Bhishma and Drona. Sometimes it is said that he has to fight against his relatives and he started chickening out at that time. That’s a very superficial understanding.
It was not just relatives. Bhishma and Drona were not just relatives, they were his elders. And they were not just any elders, they were the elders who had taught him archery.
And not just they had taught him archery, it was that it was for their pleasure that he had learned archery. Now there are many, we may have many teachers for us. But some teachers, we develop a very close relationship with them.
And then when we study, we want to please them by their study. So that was the kind of relationship we had with them. And now the people for whose pleasure he had learned archery, now he had to fight against them and kill them with that very same archery.
And when he came in the middle of the battlefield, he saw everybody on the opposite side fully ready to fight. Now Bhishma and Drona were, Bhishma was the person on whose lap he had sat and played. Now was that same Bhishma going to shoot arrows and kill him? So he just couldn’t process it.
He said, I just don’t want to be here. That my mind is reeling. I just don’t see any reason why I should be in this situation.
I see everything as lose-lose. So in one sense, there are different kinds of losses that we may face in life. When we, there can be a loss of opportunity.
We had an opportunity to get a good job. And the interview, we didn’t do well in the interview. So we could say that loss of opportunity is there.
That is a loss of means. The means by which we could have a sense of, we could have a better career. We could have more money.
We could have, we could make a bigger difference in life. So that’s a loss of means. But far more damaging is the loss of meaning.
What am I meant to do in life? So why didn’t I do this? Oh, I should have prepared for this interview better. I should have answered this question this way. At least we know what we should do.
We didn’t do it right. But when we just don’t know what to do, that’s the time life becomes completely, not just disorienting, but it becomes devastating. It becomes morale crushing.
So for Arjuna, his entire structure of meaning is collapsing for him. Now he has lived as a virtuous person. He’s always tried to be good and helpful.
And now he’s put in a situation where he has to fight against his own relatives. Can this be made tighter? Can we read the next paragraph? Who would like to read it? Yes, ma’am. In these moments of utter metaphysical dysfunction, that also trigger a physical dysfunction, I can neither think clearly nor I can answer it.
I beg you, my Lord, bless me so that I can see such moments as opportunities to become truly open to your structure of meaning. Yes. So there is a metaphysical dysfunction.
So not many people may really think about philosophy or metaphysics in general. It’s not a typical topic for small talk. Now we meet somebody for a party or a get-together.
What’s your philosophy of life? That’s not a typical question we ask. Now generally, what is philosophy? There is a simple understanding of philosophy. Philosophy is basically how to make sense of things.
Now we all have our own way of making sense of life, making sense of things in life. So for some people, their way of making sense of life might be that money is the most important thing. If you have money, everything will fall.
For somebody, it might be health is the most important. Therefore, stay fit. For somebody else, it might be that, oh, you have to have contacts.
If you have the right contacts, then everything will work in life. So we all try to make sense of life. When I say make sense of life means, how can I make sure that my life works out in a good way? So for example, somebody for whom money is the most important thing, then we could say that person is a materialist.
Not just a materialist. That person could be a very greedy person. But for them, that’s how they make sense of life.
For somebody else, they may think that, okay, I want pleasure. Now as many people as whom I can enjoy, that person could be a hedonist. That’s how they try to make sense of life.
This is what I should be doing. But when, whatever way we are making sense of life, it just doesn’t work. Somebody thinks, okay, family is the center of my life.
Everything is for my family. Family always comes first. And then, within the family itself, somebody betrays us.
What am I supposed to do? So when there is a metaphysical dysfunction, there can also be a physical dysfunction. That’s what is happening to Arjuna. The previous person described how his bow is slipping from his hand.
How he is just collapsing. His limbs are trembling. His hair is standing on end.
His throat is choking. There is a physical dysfunction. Broadly, we interact with the world based in, we do three main things.
There is the soul, the mind, the body, and these three together is the self. So normally, information comes in from the outer world. So we perceive things.
What is coming in, we perceive through our senses. Then we process it. And then based on the processing, then after that, we pursue certain things.
So everything that we do in life can be summarized in these three things. We perceive, we process, and then we pursue. So for example, you are hearing this class right now.
Now, if you find this is all becoming very complex and philosophic. So if you are not able to process it, then you may pursue. Can I sneak out of the door without anyone noticing? So, what we perceive, how we process, and what we pursue.
So now, what we perceive, to some extent, that is not in our control. Say for example, if a fire breaks out in a place, some place where we are sitting. We perceive that.
Now, when we say there is a breakdown, what is happening? A metaphysical breakdown means that he is not able to process. And then physical breakdown means, physical breakdown means he is not able to act. So Arjuna, what is happening in my life? There is a metaphysical breakdown and a physical breakdown.
Or metaphysical dysfunction and a physical dysfunction. And thus, so he is just not able to act. And it is in this situation that he is turning to Krishna.
For all of us, we may just tell you, come on, control yourself. That’s what Krishna tells Arjuna first. Come on, don’t be a coward.
Don’t give in to such weakness. Because Arjuna says, it’s not weakness. He says, Would you be able to fight against your own grandfather or your own guru? This is not just weakness.
I just can’t make sense of what I am, why am I here and what am I supposed to do? I need to be able to. So if somebody is, I need to be able to make sense of things before I can act. So Krishna, initially the idea is, come on, just weakness.
Come on, be strong. No, I cannot. It’s not just a matter of being strong.
I have to be clear before I can be strong. And the difference, be strong means you know what is the right thing to do. Come on, pull yourself together and do it.
But I’m not clear what is the right thing to do in such a situation. So he says, I have to understand that first. So let’s look at the third paragraph.
Who would like to read? Bless me, O Lord, that through my daily acts of devotion and devotional study, I may understand your glory a bit more with each passing day. Let these practices prepare me for those moments of crisis. Let me see the days when I can make sense of my life through my own analysis, not as proof that I don’t need you, but as a gift for you, granting me direction through my head on those days.
May I always remember that it is your grace, not my intellect, that guides me. Yes. So there are such situations which come in our life sometimes where things just don’t make sense.
Most of the times, yeah, some things don’t make sense. Say we meet someone and we greet that person and that person just neglects us. Or that person is rude to us.
We might just turn away from that person. Maybe they’re in a bad mood. Or maybe I don’t want to spend time with such a person.
We just turn away and we move on. This person is not a very important thing. So we use our own intelligence to normally process things.
And we try to make sense of things. And that’s what we need to do. So when we say that we are to make sense of things.
So generally we make sense of things in terms of cause and effect. That this was the action I did, this cause, and this is the effect I got. So for example, if after this class you come and talk with me and you are polite with me and I am rude with you.
And say, what is going on over here? It’s not to be expected. So when there is a particular cause, we expect a particular effect. And that’s how we try to make sense of things.
So there are times when the cause is positive but the effect is completely negative. That time how do we make sense? So basically whenever we make sense, we are putting things in a particular frame of reference. When I was just introduced to bhakti, there were a couple, two, three years.
So I was traveling with a senior devotee. And after that, so I had gone to a particular place with him. And after that, this senior devotee was very warm and loving and really extending.
Answered questions of people very politely. And I was there for one program. And one person immediately in the class came and started asking a question.
And this senior devotee didn’t even look at that person. This person was right over here and talking. And he called me and started talking with me.
I just paid no attention. I felt it was very odd, quite rude and quite out of character with that person. And then later on when I asked him, he said that I come here regularly.
And this person always asks complex questions and just doesn’t accept any answer. And there are some people who ask questions to gain knowledge. And there are some people who ask questions to show knowledge.
They will ask a question that will go on for five minutes. And that’s not a reason that I have spent a lot of time on this person. But now I have decided that I’m not able if I spend time on that person, I’m not able to spend time with anyone else.
So what happened over here in that case, if you consider that particular action, how he was acting, let’s put it here. So this person came and asked a question to the speaker. And the speaker, practically no response was there.
Now if I put it in this frame of reference, it doesn’t make any sense. But if I expand my frame of reference, what happens? The way the speaker was reacting or the speaker was responding was based not just on the present action. It was also based on a past action.
So the idea is that when things don’t make sense in an immediate context, we need to be able to expand the context. And we understand that. So when that teacher explained that to me, I understood, okay, we have to deal with people like this also sometimes.
We can’t let one person monopolize all our time. So we have a bigger frame of reference, then we can make sense of things. Now this bigger frame of reference can go, we can say, horizontally in terms of time.
That sometimes we might be doing something very well. Say, we might be saving money in a bank. But still, despite saving money, our bank account is showing a negative.
You have this much debt, you have this much debt. Now that may be because, not that the money we are spending is, money we are putting in the bank is all getting wasted. That maybe we took a huge loan.
We drew too much on our credit card. So what is happening is, if I put money in my bank, there should be saving over there. But if I’m putting my money and there’s no saving, that’s because there’s some action from the past.
So one way we expand the frame of reference is in terms of time. Now there’s another way to expand the frame of reference. So what are we discussing over here? That the structure of meaning when it collapses, how do we make sense of things? So one structure of meaning is, okay, I did this and you did this.
But we could have a bigger, not just a bigger in terms of horizontal, but we could have a vertically bigger structure of meaning. That above this all, above it all, there is Krishna. And through whatever is happening in my life, Krishna has some plan.
Krishna has some purpose. And Krishna’s plan can work in many different ways. So at one level, this person did something to me.
You know, I did something for this person, this person did something for me. But Krishna’s plan can act through the actions of that person also. So that person did something, but Krishna was also using that person to do something.
Now that does not necessarily mean that everything that that person did was right or good. Even bad things that people do, they can be a part of Krishna’s plan. Similarly, even our own actions can be a part of Krishna’s plan.
So from an immediate perspective, how is Bhishma fighting against me? Of course, Krishna and Arjuna had fought once before at Virat. But at that time, neither party had any intention of killing the other person. Sometimes there are like matches, more like exhibition matches.
So it was both sides fought, but neither had any intention to kill anyone. But in Kurukshetra, the stakes were much higher. One side would not go back alive.
So when Arjuna saw the situation that Bhishma is here to attack me, along with people whom I care for, and I have to fight against them. So Krishna gave him a bigger picture of what is happening. He said that you are not just fighting against Bhishma, you are fighting for me.
Sometimes we have to do certain actions which we may not want to do. But Krishna said that don’t think of this as, oh, Duryodhana did something to you. Arjuna was thinking, is really gaining a kingdom worth it? For a kingdom, do I have to kill my relatives? Krishna told him, you are not just fighting to gain a kingdom.
You are not fighting to gain revenge. You are fighting to establish the order of dharma in the world, to establish virtuousness and righteousness in the world. And this is a part of my plan.
It’s interesting, sometimes people say that, I was just in Australia a couple and a half months ago, and there a person asked me this question. He said, I read the Bhagavad Gita, and I like what Arjuna said. I don’t like what Krishna said.
He said, Arjuna is such a sensible person. He is trying to avoid violence and bloodshed and fighting, and Krishna is inciting you to fight. I don’t like Krishna.
So I told him, if Krishna had wanted to incite Arjuna to fight, then it’s a very easy way to incite someone. Krishna doesn’t have to speak philosophy to incite Arjuna. Krishna could just have reminded Arjuna about how the Kauravas had dishonoured his wife.
Krishna had just spoken a few words. Do you remember how Draupadi was so shamelessly dragged in by Dushasan? Do you remember her tears as they were flowing from her eyes? Do you remember her baleful glances as she looked at you for help and you could not help? That was the time you could not do anything. Now is the time you can punish those people.
That would have been an easy way. But it’s remarkable, in the entire Bhagavad Gita, Krishna doesn’t even once mention any of the atrocities that the Kauravas had done to the Pandavas. So the Gita is not a book that is insightful.
It is not inciting anyone. It is insightful. It is full of insights.
It is giving insights about the values by which to live. So the purpose of Krishna was telling Arjuna that don’t think what Duryodhana did to you alone. He said that if a person like Duryodhana who in public is ready to dishonour a respectable lady and if that person gets unchallenged power, what will that person do? You have to stop him.
So Krishna gave him a bigger purpose. I have a plan for the world and you be a part of my plan. So sometimes within an immediate perspective, things may just not make sense.
And that’s just true unfortunately about life. But even if things don’t make within the immediate perspective, there is a bigger picture. And the bigger picture is through whatever is happening in life, Krishna is in charge.
Krishna is always playing his flute. And Krishna has a plan for the world. He wants the well-being of everyone.
So the one thing that can always make sense is that I am meant to serve the Lord. The Lord is in charge and I am meant to be in His service. So, okay, I don’t know why this has happened.
I don’t know why this person is acting like this. But what I do know is my life is meant for serving the Lord. So how can I serve? How can I contribute? How can I? Some bad things have happened.
But instead of becoming bitter, how can, what can I do to make things better? So the Gita gives this bigger worldview. Let’s look at the last paragraph now. Who would like to read? Prepare me, O Lord, through these days of clarity.
For those days when you choose to give me the vision of the path ahead by sidelining my head and reaching straight to my heart. Let me embrace the days when you reach my heart through my head as preparation for the times when you reach my heart without going through my head. Yeah, so this might seem a little confusing, head and heart.
What I mean by that is that basically normally we try to make sense of life and okay, this person did like this or this happened over here. Therefore, I should do this. So it is we are using our head, we are using our intelligence to make solid, rational, well thought out decisions.
And that’s what we should be doing. But rather than thinking, oh, it is my intelligence by which I am making these decisions. We see that my intelligence is also a gift from Krishna.
So Krishna has given me a compass and I use that compass. But sometimes that compass may not work. Sometimes you will just not make, you will not make sense of things.
So don’t get so caught in the compass that we forget the person who has given us the compass. So we stay connected with Krishna. And sometimes in our life that when we are going through life, there are phases.
So in most of the phases in our life, we, things make sense. Okay, I do this and this will happen. Therefore, I’ll do this and I’ll not do this.
But there can be phases in our life when things don’t make sense. When things make sense means what is happening? It is our intelligence is working. Now we see that my intelligence is also a gift from Krishna.
So my intelligence is helping me to make these decisions. That’s a gift from Krishna. But if there are times when intelligence just doesn’t work, when things don’t make sense.
So at that time, what do we do in any situations? The intelligence is not working. So instead of looking here and wondering why it’s not working, we look upward towards Krishna. That Krishna, I’m going to serve you in this situation.
What can I do? I don’t know why this is happening, but I am going to be of service to you. When Shri Prabhupada came to America, at that time, the first person who seemed to be serious in becoming a devotee, his name was David Allen. And he was staying with Prabhupada.
Prabhupada was training him. And Prabhupada even wrote to some of his well-wishers in India saying that he may well become the first American Vaishnava, Gaudiya Vaishnava. And then he had a drug relapse and he went crazy.
He came to attack Shri Prabhupada. And Prabhupada was in a third story building, winding stairs. He had to just rush down.
And he was on the streets alone, homeless. Now, that was not just a physical danger. It was physical danger, but it was also a huge emotional trauma.
The people who he thought will become devotees, far from becoming devotees, if they start acting in a demoniac way, Prabhupada could well have thought, what is the point? Why am I even here? Why should I even try to share Krishna’s message? But his godbrothers had gone to the West. They had come here to UK and they had not succeeded. So this doesn’t work.
It’s impossible for Westerners to become devotees. That thought could well have been in Prabhupada’s mind. So things may not make sense, but still we can make sense.
What do you mean by we can make sense? That Krishna, you are my lord and I am your servant. Whatever happens, my wealth may go, my relationships may go, my reputation may go, my health may go, things may go chaotic, but you are always my lord. And with whatever I have, I will always try to be of service to you.
So when we keep this more in mind, then no matter what difficulties come upon us, we will see that Krishna’s mercy is there, not in the situations that we have to deal with, but in the fact that we still have Krishna’s presence within us. And by remembering Krishna, we can keep taking small steps ahead. So in these times, conclude with forget.
When we are to show faith in Krishna, faith means what in such situations? To take one step, even when the path looks dark. When the entire path is unclear, not just the path is dark, it’s like I’ll take one step. Sometimes our intelligence is not going to make sense.
But right now I’m in this situation. I do not know how things will work out, but I don’t want to make things worse. So in this situation, what is a small thing that I can do that will at least not make things worse, that will at least make things better? If our mind is agitated, then the first thing we can do is remember Krishna.
That will at least calm our mind. If we are feeling like yelling at someone, erupting at someone, I don’t want to make things worse. Let me try to be gentle.
So take one step, even when that whole path is not clear. That’s what Sri Prabhupada was doing. When Prabhupada said, Nachao, nachao, Prabhu nachao, Simhate Krishna.
Please make me dance. Please make me dance. As you want, make me dance.
Prabhupada was ready to take that one step. So at such times, our sense of meaning will come from the fact that Krishna is my Lord and I am meant to serve him. How exactly I am to serve him? How exactly things will work out? I do not know at this point.
But what I know is that Krishna is with me and Krishna is for me. So I will stay with Krishna and I will stay for Krishna. So in summary, what we discussed today, we talked about the broad topic of when life makes no sense.
When our whole structure of meaning collapses, how do we deal with life? So I talked about three main points. First, I talked about the problems that we may face in life. Problems can be, loss can be a loss of means.
That we may lose wealth, we may lose health, we may lose position. But much worse is a loss of meaning. So loss of means, what it means is that, say, I did something good for the other person, but the other person did something bad for me.
So I invested in good faith in a partnership, but this person cheated me. So this is the question, why? Why did this happen? And I lost money, that is a loss of means. But if after that I get the question, what? What am I meant to do? How am I meant to live? That will be a far bigger crisis.
This is a, how do I make sense of life? What will bring meaning to my life? So Arjuna faces such a situation. When Arjuna has to fight against Bhishma, he just can’t make sense of it. So problem when we lose meaning is far, far worse.
So then we talked about how do we, we change, we have to expand our perspective. So we talk about expanding perspective in two ways. One is in terms of time, that some person might be good with us, but we might not be.
And that is because this is a bigger perspective over there. In the smaller frame of reference, it does not make sense. If that person has been repeatedly monopolizing time and just wasting time, then we say I do not want to spend time with you.
So one way is we horizontally in terms of time expand our frame of reference. But the other is we expand our frame of reference vertically. In understanding that Krishna, there is horizontal expansion and there is vertical expansion.
So vertical expansion means that through whatever, whoever is doing, Krishna’s plan is working. So Arjuna could not make sense of what Bhishma is doing. And but for Arjuna Krishna said that Krishna has a plan and whatever we are doing or whatever the other person is doing, actually Krishna’s plan is working through the other person and Krishna’s plan is meant to work through us.
So Krishna told Arjuna, don’t fight because you want to get even. Fight because you want to establish dharma in the world. The Gita is not insightful at all.
It is what? It is insightful. Krishna could easily provoke Arjuna, but he did not do that. His point, not just to get Arjuna to fight, but to actually get him to fight in a way that is productive.
And then finally, what are the practical for us? What do we do? When life doesn’t make sense, we focus on that I am here. The path appears unclear or dark. So we can’t make sense in the horizontal terms, but we understand that Krishna is there.
And I am with Krishna now and I’ll always be with Krishna. So we focus on how can I serve? So let me take one step forward. Krishna ultimately wants things to be better.
So how can I serve means Krishna wants, Krishna is the well-wisher of everyone. Krishna wants things to be good for everyone. So in this situation, I don’t know why this is happening to me, but what can I do to make things better? We discuss faith means to take one step forward even when the full path is not clear.
So things may don’t make sense, but still what happens is I can make sense. I can make sense means in that particular situation, I will still choose the whatever is the best response. So if our intelligence is like our compass and the compass doesn’t work, we turn toward the person who is the source of the compass for us.
And that way we keep moving forward in life. At the end of the Gita, Krishna did not give Arjuna any flashback. Oh, in a previous life Bhishma was so and so and you were so and so and you did this and he did this.
And that’s why now you have to fight the war. Now this is the situation. I have my plan.
That’s why at the end of the Gita, when Arjuna says, what is he doing? He doesn’t say I’ll fight. He says, I will do your will. So when we study the Bhagavad Gita, that is the conclusion for all of us, Krishna.
I will do your will. So let’s conclude by offering this prayer once again. You can repeat after me if you like.
My dear Lord, prepare me for the times when nothing makes sense. Thank you very much. Hare Krishna.
Are there any questions or comments? Thank you, sir. As a perfect question for me to not answer. Why I am saying that is, this was the exact topic I was trying to discuss today evening.
That we talked today in the morning class. See, I started by saying that I’m going to speak about the Amodha Lila. I didn’t speak one word about the Amodha Lila.
But the point I was talking about the Amodha Lila is that there is our endeavor and Krishna’s mercy. So Mother Yashoda was endeavoring and in Krishna let that rope be tied. So in this session I was talking about how Krishna’s plan, Krishna’s mercy works.
So but our endeavor is also important. So how long should we keep endeavoring? When should we decide that I need to stop now? This is enough. That’s the whole topic we discussed today evening.
Prabhupada never stopped trying to preach. But he stopped trying it in India. So he shifted.
So we will discuss that if you don’t mind. Thank you. Any other questions? Yes.
I was just wondering, you were mentioning about how our action and the other person’s action are all part of Krishna’s plans. Like the heart in the middle. And we often times say that if something bad happens to a person that means the right person was in the right place at the right time according to Krishna’s plans.
I’m just wondering, is it hard for you to make sense with that concept of free will? Is that not interfering with each other? Yeah. If we say that a person, something bad happened to them, but then we also say that if it’s Krishna’s plan then what about their free will? Say somebody was hit by a drunk driver and they were going back home and they were driving safely. They could have taken one path back home, they could have taken another path back home.
They took one path and that’s where the drunk driver was. So now that they should be hit was that Krishna’s plan. So now it’s very important to understand that it is a part of Krishna’s plan that we can’t know Krishna’s plan.
That is the meaning that we are finite. See even when Yudhishthira is not able to make sense of what has happened. Arjuna has an attack of conscience before the war.
Yudhishthira has an attack of conscience after the war. And for him it’s not just that there’s so much bloodshed. It’s that all his sons have been killed.
And then the person whose death he celebrated, Karna, it turns out that was his brother. And his brother had an opportunity to kill him but didn’t kill him. And he celebrated the killing of his brother.
Yudhishthira is just completely shattered by that. And nobody can help console him at that time. Then finally Bhishma consoles him.
Now what does Bhishma say over here? Bhishma says that everything is within the plan of the Lord. But then the Lord is right there in front of him. Neither Bhishma tells him what was the Lord’s plan nor does the Lord tell him this was my plan.
Isn’t it? That the point over there is still he says that even the great sages try to understand but they cannot. So one part of participating in Krishna’s plan is to understand that we can never know what is Krishna’s plan for sure. It’s like suppose somebody is in a very top secret military operation.
Then what happens is everybody has their task. But if one person gets caught, they are spying in opposite territory and one person gets caught. And then if they know the whole plan, they are tortured or they are forced and they tell the plan and everybody else will be put in danger.
So what happens is there is the in-charge who knows the whole plan. But none of, no one person knows the entire plan. So like that it’s our situation that the way Krishna works nobody knows what exactly is Krishna’s plan.
When Prabhupada went to America, when Prabhupada says Krishna you must have some plan. Anumane, I guess that. But Prabhupada, on one side he said that there are temples and they are filled with devotees.
Only time is separating us from them. But on other side Prabhupada said I didn’t know whether to turn left or right. It was, Prabhupada never claimed that he had a hotline with Krishna.
And whenever he was meeting any person, Krishna was telling him this person is not going to become a devotee. Don’t waste time on this person. This person will become a devotee.
Spend more time on this person. Not like that. Prabhupada was using his intelligence, making assessments and moving forward.
And he tried many things, many didn’t work and many worked spectacularly. So that’s why exactly how Krishna will work through the particular situations that we are facing that is, there is no need to Krishna. So svayam evatmanatmanam vittatvam purushottama Krishna says, Arjuna says after hearing the Bhagavad Gita, after the chatur shloka he gets over, then Arjuna says you are parambrahma parambhama.
But then what does he say Krishna? Nobody can know you. You alone know yourself. So that means that how exactly will Krishna work? So when say when Dushyasan was disrobing Draupadi, was that something which Krishna wanted? No, Krishna certainly didn’t want Draupadi to disrobe.
Krishna didn’t want that Dushyasan do something terrible. But through that, what did Krishna do? Krishna exposed to the world how terrible people these were. When Krishna himself went as a peace messenger.
And what happened? He, God went on a mission and God’s mission failed. How can God’s mission fail? So like an expert planner always has multiple plans, plan A, plan B, plan C. So if plan A doesn’t work, plan B will work. So what was Krishna’s plan A? Krishna’s plan B was if he cannot avoid the war, then he will minimize the violence in the war.
So for plan A, he directly went to Dhritarashtra and Duryodhana and he tried to persuade them. And he didn’t listen. Then plan B was he went to Karna.
Because Karna was the person whom Duryodhana had the most trust. He knew that whether Bhishma and Drona fight wholeheartedly for me or not, Karna will always fight. So Krishna tried to persuade Karna to come out of the Pandavas.
That way either Duryodhana will lose the will to fight or even if he fights, the fight will not be so brutal. But when plan B also did not work, Krishna had plan C. What was plan C? That if the war has to happen, let the world know who is the cause of the war. Who is the actual cause of the war? So what happened nowadays, there is so much misinformation, disinformation.
Anytime conflicts happen between two people or two countries, who started it? You know, or if there is a ceasefire, who broke the ceasefire? Or even if war happens, who won the war and who lost the war? All that can be very difficult to determine. And there are some psychops and psychological operations that people try to, they try to keep people confused. But what happened, the way Krishna went, in fact Vidura asked Krishna, Krishna why have you come here? You know that Duryodhana is not going to listen to you.
So Krishna said that yes, but because the benefit of avoiding a war is so great, therefore I will try my best. And the war has to happen. I want to make sure that the world knows the Pandavas did not cause the war, the Kauravas did.
And then what happens when Duryodhana tries to, he not only rejects Krishna’s peace proposal, saying I won’t give him enough land to put the tip of a needle through. But then he tries to arrest Krishna. Then what happens? It becomes clear to everyone who is the cause of the war.
So like that human free will is there. So to answer your question, that now say Krishna may want to, Krishna’s plan may be that he wants to do something. So this might be Krishna’s plan that he want this to happen.
But Krishna can use a straight path through it. Krishna can use a more twisted path. Krishna can use a much more twisted path.
Now the straight path is if the soul, the jiva cooperates. If not, if the jiva gets distracted, then it might take a little longer. If the jiva, jiva is the soul, jiva opposes, then it might take much more time to get to the destination.
So when you say Krishna’s plan, you could put it more as Krishna’s purpose more than the plan. Krishna has a particular purpose and that purpose can be fulfilled in many different ways. Like say if you consider GPS.
What is GPS? What is the full form of GPS? Okay, God’s positioning system. So now the GPS tells us turn right and we turn left. What does the GPS do? You disobeyed me, get lost, stay lost.
No, the GPS doesn’t do that. The GPS, it reroutes, it remaps it, gives us a path. Now each wrong turn will mean a price has to be paid.
It will take more time, more free will. So sometimes if you just follow the GPS, we’ll go straight. But if you don’t follow the GPS, that doesn’t mean you’re lost forever.
So jiva’s free will is what Krishna uses to pursue his plan. So the plan is not necessarily one straight path. It is one destination.
Okay? Thank you. Any last questions? Yes, sir. Just a little scenario.
So the situation where you know that you’re right, but there’s something going on. So how far would you say to go and try to convince the other side how far you’re going to convince them that I’m right? Or do you stay on the other side and say, okay, I accept. So how far do you kind of balance that kind of scenario? Because maybe the other side, you’re convincing your reputational team like Krishna and the Shambhala Tantra, maybe? And the other side is we’ve got the Mahatma Gandhi, the sports commentary, right? So where does that balance sit? Yeah.
I mean, that’s a similar question to the first question. No, but I’ll quickly answer that because that’s an important theme. But so when say in a particular situation, it’s clear that we are right and the other person is wrong.
So should we, how much we try to persuade that person? I think it depends on three distinct factors. So first is how much, what is the importance of that particular issue for us and for others? So if say, if we are giving a class or we are hearing a class, in the class the speaker makes a wrong point and we say, okay, this is a wrong point. Now, how important is that point? Now, is it that everybody is going to quote that point afterwards and everybody is going to make a mistake? It’s a simple factual mistake, otherwise they can find it out.
So importance, that’s the first thing. How important? Importance of the issue, you could say. Then the second thing would be the influence we have over the person.
Because sometimes we may want to tell something to someone, but ultimately, but if we just don’t have an influence, then trying to tell that to the person will only alienate or antagonize them further. What do they say? Updesho himur khana, prakopaya na shantaye. Advice given to foolish people only provokes them further.
That’s what happened. Duryodhana got a lot of good advice, but he only became more and more insolent by that. Now, normally we don’t want to put anybody in the position of Duryodhana.
It’s not that, like, but generally how much influence do we have? So we see Shrila Prabhupada sometimes gave a lot of space for disciples, even if they had some plan which Prabhupada felt is not going to work. They were very enthusiastic, Prabhupada allowed them to do it. And then they learned, okay, this is not going to work.
Prabhupada accepted them. So how, but if somebody’s plan is, say, that, okay, I want to build a temple over here. And for building a temple, we need all the funds from all the squad temples all over the world for this project.
Prabhupada said, no, this is your project. You will raise money and you can do it. So how important is the issue? How much influence do we have over that? So broadly, all of these, they fall within what is called a Kshetra.
We all have a field of action. We have a field of action. So now if somebody in a class says that actually Krishna is God, but XYZ God, Brahman is also God, everybody is God.
Now that’s a critical philosophical point. And even if it may be like the etiquette is that we shouldn’t interrupt somebody who is senior or whatever. No, there is tolerance is important, but there are other principles also that are important.
Philosophical correctness is also important. So how much is the importance we have? How much is the importance of the issue for us? How much is the influence we have over that person? And beyond that, how much energy do we have? This issue might be important for me, but how much can I spare on this issue? See, we have two different approaches. Like you could put here, how much energy do I have? So we see that in both the Ramayana and the Mahabharata, there is one good person who belongs to the bad side.
Both of them, their names start from V. Who are they? Vibhishan and Vidura. Yes. So now if you see both of them take two different approaches.
Vibhishan goes to the opposite side. Vidura walks away. He doesn’t go to the opposite side.
Now there are contextual reasons for that. Vidura still has hope that Dhritarashtra can be changed. But as long as Duryodhana is in his life, he’s not going to listen to him.
But Vidura knows that if I am fighting on the side of the people who killed Duryodhana, then Dhritarashtra will always see me as his enemy that I killed his son and he will never be ready to listen to me. Therefore he decides let me just go away. Now Vibhishan on the other hand knows that Ravan is just not going to listen.
And for him, his concern is that I want to assure Lord Rama that your enmity is not with Lanka. It is with the current king of Lanka. It’s like some state that is attacking another state.
So they may say that, OK, we are not against you. It is the current political leaders of this particular state who are against you. So that way he wants to, he’s a member of royalty and he feels I have a duty to my citizens.
I have to protect them. So he goes over to the side of Lord Rama. So basically what happens is how much does he feel his sense of energy or you could say here, what is the most effective, what would be effective, what is the way to be effective in this particular situation? What would be the best use of our energy? So when Prabhupada was in Jhansi, he had a temple over there.
And when there was a post, he just walked away from there. When Prabhupada was in Juhu, he had a land for a temple over there. In Juhu, Jhansi, both places, he had property which could become a temple.
From Jhansi, he walked away. From Juhu, he refused to walk away. He fought.
He told Lord Rama, I wrote to one life, if he wants to steal Krishna’s land, he will have to go over my dead body. So for Prabhupada, that he was that much more invested. And so for him, Juhu was a much more important place.
Jhansi was a relatively small place. Juhu was Mumbai, financial quiet part of India. And then he also felt that he had greater influence because he had followers.
Now he was not just one lone Swami or one person at that time. And then he also had the energy that he wanted to do this. We can win this war.
It is important to win this war. And therefore, he decided to keep fighting. So we’ll talk more about this from a philosophical context.
But so how important is it? How much can I influence this person and how much am I ready to fight for this particular thing? So based on that, we decide. So thank you so much.