Why desires are desirable Bangalore Sarjapur youth meeting – Chaitanya Charan

This is an AI-generated transcript and it might not be fully accurate:

To be here talking of you today and when I was in America a few months ago I wasn’t I was in conference of spirituality and mental health and in the last few years maybe last few days decades. You could say two, three decades, but especially in the last decade. There has been an increasing recognition that mental health problems are increasing a lot and uh spiritual methods are offering a lot of relief. So broadly we could say in terms of the reach you could say of funnism right now the maximum research has been done in mind mindfulness then and mindfulness that lots of studies show that it helps people to manage their mind. Then there is after that there is the research in meditation and then there is unfortunately very little research done on specifically on mantraik. So now There are research done in chanting of om chanting of bay nra some research has been done but it’s not a huge amount of research but if you want to consider scientific research there is a lot of evidence that all of these seem to improve mental health that now what happens whenever something spiritual seems to help people There is there are always people who are anti-spiritual. There are people who are atheistic or non-theistic. They try to disprove the results because it’s a threat to their philosophy. And they have documented some resurgence which seem to suggest that where there are that some spiritual practices and some spiritual belief systems actually harm people’s mental health and they tend to increase depression. And now where did this happen? It is not so what their argument is that spirituality actually is not always improvement it is and this is especially associated with places where or those spiritual strate spiritual groups where if you consider this is the mainstream society and the society also has some moral standards. Now we may say that a society people are little snake they have no moral standards. It’s a very simple if you in the west also if you see There’s a lot of free mixing among the genders. But in many western countries, especially in European countries and especially before there was immigration from the Middle East to Europe, no there there’s very very few rates. So the idea was that not that people are sense controlled but people respect concept that if a woman says no, no means no. You cannot force yourself on And that level of moral boundary is there. Now we see especially in the software world there’s a lot of free mixing on the genitals and there are lots of affairs that happen during the right but in the software world you will not hear rapes. Generally rapes happen where where people come from people who come from rural places where you know there is no sense of the value of consent. You know the word consent consent means Some the person says agrees. So there in the rural places what happens the male female separation is largely geographical. Males work in particular areas. Females work in particular areas. And in now I’m not saying this rural as Indian traditional rural psychology that if a woman is publicly out free that means she’s she is free. That is the so everybody has certain moral statements. So now it has Consent is not a high moral standard. Of course, it is not. A kha is the moral standard. But that is the point I’m making is everybody lives within certain borders. But the thing is that if a society has its moral standard very high above the general society moral standards. So if there is a religious group or a spiritual group whose moral standards are way higher than the general society moral standards then this creates there’s a huge distance this creates a certain level of tension now for example there are certain Christian groups the group called Amish where they absolutely don’t use any technology at all so let alone smartphone even smart one smartphones they even don’t have diaphones So they only have like they only have fixed phones in a few places in the entire community and so now when those people they their kids get exposed to mainstream society it creates a tension. Now what happens if the moral standards of a particular group are very high as compared to the health of society’s moral standards. Now this tension can lead to a sense of guilt. And that guilt can lead to depression. So it is not the spiritual practices that are calling. It is not it is not meditation or mindfulness or mantra chanting that is causing depression. What is happening? It is when there’s a huge tension and what happens if there is a certain social expectation that you should be living according to the standard. Most people People come to spiritual groups in today’s world uh not necessarily for spirituality. They come for a community. Modern society is quite lonely. And western society it may be polite but it’s not very personal. It is it is quite lonely. UK was the first country to create a official ministry for loneliness. Government ministry of home affairs foreign affairs. That ministry for loneliness and uh now they had a they had number of people who were in that ministry and one of the key person that ministry actually resigned because of loneliness. It’s unfortunate we laugh about it but it’s sad. The point however is something different over here. The point I’m making is that when people are lonely they come to a spiritual group because They want a sense of community. They want a sense of belonging. Now they do get that. But then if that religious group has very high moral standards and those moral standards, they feel that they are failing to stick to those to live up to those moral standards and they think that everybody’s expecting me to live accordingly and if I’m not able to live accordingly then they feel not only be guilty. When there’s a feel of guilty But they also feel even more rude because what happens they I cannot talk with anyone about this I just cannot talk with what people think about me and now they have left mainstream society but they can’t connect with mainstream society they have joined a religious group and there they are not they’re struggling to meet the moral standards of that religious group and then that guilt plus loneliness is a killer. It’s a straight pathway for depression. It’s a straight pathway for mental health problems. So, so the so basically this was the problem that was so spirituality and mental health conference. What of this particular so we had representatives from different groups. So we had so I was representing the Indian traditional but tradition and then there were other groups Christians there were Jews there Muslims and then they were saying How can we address this that we would like to offer mental health support to our our community? But if this is a problem created by our own practices or our own principles, then how do we deal with this? So now uh when this particular process I made a presentation over there. So I this is the context I’m going to get and I’ll bring it to our what is relevant for us. So generally speaking in spiritual traditions often what happens is desire gets as they say bad press. Desire gets demonized. Uh desire is bad. Desire should be desire should be decreased. Desire should be eliminated. Desire should be destroyed. However it’s not that simple. If we consider uh the practice of bacti yoga, the practice of sadabi, what is it meant to do? Let’s look at what Krishna says himself says in the bhagata the 12th chapter. The 12th chapter first he says that you try to fully absorb yourself in me. If you cannot absorb yourself in me then you practice. So let’s recite this verse. So what Krishna is saying over here is the purpose of practicing bacti. If you get fully absorbed in me that’s wonderful but if you cannot be fully absorbed in me then do a bhas practice. BTI yoga and the purpose of bacti yoga is mom in char get the desire for me. So desire is considered desirable over here. Now we say it is desire for it is spiritual desire and we’ll talk later about the difference between spiritual desire and material desire but the point is desire itself is not considered to be a bad thing. In fact getting desire is considered to be a good thing. If you consider what differentiated Shri Prahuad from many of his god brothers praupad was a gna who renounced the world at a little older age many of praad’s god brothers they were sasis they joined the spiritual master their childhood not their youth itself they had lot more association of spiritual mastery so many of them were much more they had much more time to study s earth and study the body scriptures himself while traveling study extensively praad train all over India days and that’s the time so praat was well read no doubt still the point is that there were others who were you could say the more renounced or more learned more in scripture more learned engine in sanskrit language and other things what differentiated praupad was that he had the strongest desire to fulfill his spiritual master’s desire that it was not that baktra sudas instructed prahuad alone go to the west so he had told many of his disciples couple of his disciples he had actually funded their mission to the west but for others he told go the best understanding instruction one sense for all his single leaders the praupa took that as his wish so if you see In many ways what differentiate prahuad so prahuad specialtity we could say what made him special there are many things we could say but it certainly is not detachment that he was more renowned than else that was not the point it is his desire desire to serve Krishna desire to glorify Krishna desire to

identity uh fulfill the prophecy of Chaitananya Maha. So the my point is desire is not itself undesirable. So now with respect to desire let’s explore this a little bit more when we talk about this how it works I’ll talk about two main concepts in the whole see there is there is desire as a feature of consciousness. Feature of consciousness means to be conscious is to be desirous. If we are conscious then when we are we observe things we’ll find something attractive. We find some things not attractive. So one feature of being conscious is having certain desires. So in that sense desire is this is natural necessary is a natural feature of consciousness. Now desire can also be something more. So when I say feature of consciousness means if you’re at the soul then from the soul when consciousness moves outwards then the consciousness moves outward then that consciousness will encounter certain various objects and when encounters various objects some of them it will find desire. So in that sense desire is a natural feature of consciousness. Now desire can also be something more. Now desire can be a force of the mind. Now this is of what we often think of as desire. Now what is the difference over here? That this if this is the soul and from the soul there is consciousness which moves outwards and naturally then we desire but we also have the mind inside us. We have the soul there’s the mind and then there’s the body and beyond the body there is the outer world where there will be various objects. So what happens from the soul The consciousness goes outwards. It goes outwards. It goes outwards towards various objects. Now when it goes outwards, the mind is not just a neutral transmitter of consciousness. The mind has certain conditions within it. We could call these conditions as impressions as samscaras. Now what happens when these impressions are present? So the these impressions transform the consciousness moment. So if two people pass by a bar maybe between their home and their workplace or the students between their uh host and their college there’s a bar around them. Now both of them may see the B. Now one of them has never drunk alcohol has no interest in any alcohol. The other person has drunk a few times. Now when from outside that sight of the alcohol or bar comes in. When for somebody there is no impression. If there is no impression then what happens? It is just that same bar. This is this is the bar. So if you have a bar over here now if in the case of somebody who has no impression the consciousness will just pass like that just it’s just some information okay there’s a bar over there but for somebody who has some impressions it reaches here and here suddenly expands and then that oh there’s a bar here it just fills the consciousness It’s like sometimes we have some small popup that comes up and that popup it is just there as a small pot but if you click it it becomes big. So now in in this case we don’t have to click it to become big just the impressions inside big. So in this way what happens the desires that they give get a force and that force Force is a force of the mind. So a force of the mind means that the mind multiplies or expands the focus on that and then we feel a pull for that. Now somebody’s for somebody who has you know this is inward also that that means that’s what consumes our attention and after consume our attention then from here from the soul there will flow outward and then we build this go towards this is what I want. So the impressions in the mind create a force. So now what we want to do is consider desire is a feature of consciousness. Now this actually needs to be tapped and desire is a force of the mind. This needs to be purified. So I’ll explain what I mean by this. But at this point I hope this point is clear that desire is something innate to the soup. And that’s why Desire is not undesired. But when the desire passes through the filter of the mind, the impressions of the mind, then it can go in in undesirable directions. So desire itself is not undesirable but desire can go in undesirable directions. So we can say desire another way to compare it is desire is like the power of sight. The power of sight is not a bad thing. It’s necessary for functioning. But with the power of sight we may see things which are which are impure which are contaminating which are agitating. So that power can go in undesirable directions. So with this understanding now let’s move to one more point about so we what we discussing is that can uh that when can spiritual practices or something like spiritual practices uh lead one to an aggravation of mental health problems instead of a relief or a mitigation from mental health problems. So what happens as I said we tend to demonize desire at times. So now if we consider desire itself in general when there is too much desire this is associated with rajog and means I want to eat this I want to watch this I want to buy this I want to touch this There so many desires are there says hundreds and thousands of desires are pulling this. So this is but actually when there’s too little desire this will be the so too little desire is not necessarily goodness or transcendence. See the I think A very important difference but one key point is from the external perspective Satwakura and Tamakura can look very similar. One time I used to program in one place in Pune and there’s one person who would always come first for the class but he would come first for the class but he would never seem interested in the class never ask any questions never respond to any questions. They were responding to interactive poems. He came for 3 12 weeks and then after the program I asked him know what inspires me to come so early you come first said actually he says this is my wife forces me to come here but you know this this mall at the corner of the wall is very comfortable I don’t so Oh now he come come come come come come come come come come come come come come come come come come come come come first but coming first is not because of spiritual ignorance he’s not coming to take shelter of Krishna he’s come to take shelter of the wall so so what happens in many ways rajoguna involves desire rajoguna involves energy and rajoguna leads to activity so a persona have a lot of desire and a lot of energy so In 14.12 theatna says that the characterist which cannot be pacified and then because of that what what happens a person keeps doing more and more and more things this that this that they keep doing lots of things that’s reju So now when is rajogan there is too much desire. But quite often if we try to decrease desire. If we try to decrease desire artificially then we may not rise to goodness. We may just go down to ignorance because the defining characteristic of go mode of good is like if you consider three Quran. So what this means is that basically in this particular case what Higher is what keeps us in rajuan. Now generally going upwards is difficult because it requires in general lifting anything up requires more energy. It requires more force. So if desire is what is holding us in at the level of rajas and the desire goes away then what happens? The person goes down. So tapas means what? A person doesn’t want to do anything at all you know. No, I just uh I just sleep in my bed not just 6 or 7 hours 10 hours 12 hours and just here and there watch something and even when we scrolling it’s not that we are reading like I don’t want any exercise for my brain sort something over you don’t even know what you’re watching so the point is that if desire is decreased it doesn’t necessarily lead people to goodness can very easily get them down to tas and that’s why says that that rajoga can be a good thing for people who are in tamura that tamagura is like poison and rajoda can be like the antidote the antidote for that for poison of tamoga that means what do we mean by this Sometimes we talk about spirituality means we need to give up go beyond both of those and that’s important but that is for the spiritual now after I started traveling to America I started from 2014 2015 and I spent a lot of time trying to do western outreach understanding the western mind so one big difference the Indians are the wealthiest minority in America We are the minority but we are the wealthiest minority and one reason for that is there are Indians generally uh in America how you know was it successful if they have 5 six 500s you know how much is the income income level of particular group you know how much do they depend on welfare and the government offer support how much they depend on government support you know how well are their children educated now how much is the criminality of wrong in this community like how many people commit crimes? How long do their marriages stay? So they have various sociological parame parameters Indians are always not just in the west they are at the top but Indian students also Indian children also do quite well academically and one reason they saying that Indians take parenting very seriously. Now what do you mean by that? Now in one person perspective there is uh the parenting can be quite rajasic. Rajasik means you have to work hard. You have to come first. You have to do well in your life. You have to choose careers which will be lucrative. Don’t just go after careers which you feel good about but you don’t earn anything better. There is that idea of the starving artist. Somebody artist but they can’t earn money out of it. So that’s starving artist. So Indians often choose STEM fields and there’s good career possible. So the thing is that really has raises and yes that is true but when I started going to America and talking with American people I came I didn’t understand what is parity what is tasic parenting just give two examples of this America the western world is very conscious of physical safety that means say if anybody has a heart attack uh they if you go to the hospital they emergency they want to ask any question do you have any money first on the saving and even if the saving requires a big amount of s expense they’ll do it consider life to be very important in India somebody might be dying and go to the hospital unless you pay money so the thing is they value life a lot and their logic is that uh children are very tender so small babies if they’re driving in a car they’re They not allowed to sit on the mother or the father’s lap because the idea is that if a car has a crash then the baby’s body is very tender. The baby will be baby maybe baby will kiss. So there is a baby seat behind it. Special baby seat it’s like a fortified baby seat. Fortified means it’s very strengthened. And if the baby is very small then the idea is the baby seat is turned backwards. That means what happens is that something the baby is hit. There’s a car from the front and there’s a back side which is not putting the wheel the front side is very firm. So there’s a lot of protection but what happened two three times it happened that uh that the young mother or the young father or both they got out of the car and they went away and forgot their baby was there. So when this happened in California the California government uh they like the state we have we Sabha like that California Californian government they said that all cars should have special sensors and special alarms that if the baby seat is occupied and all the doors are closed and the front seats are empty then the car will start. So if any any of the operate the car they don’t have authorized key and somehow they try to do something by they try to open the car the car starts beeping like you know car is being sold we should have a beeping sensor for it so there was a critic of that okay for this all cars you have to increase the express cuz you know you have to have sensors behind sensors ahead you have to bond it all the sensors wrap additional alarms so they know there’s a critic of this another American senator he said that no people who forget their children should forget the idea of having children.

So tamasic parenting means what? That we’re not even aware that some people get stoned with drugs and they’re so there’s one devote he told me that you know his especially in some communities in America it’s uh a significant number of children are born out of bed. There’s only single parent mostly it’s mother. So the father is never in the picture. And then his mother he said that when he was yeah when he was around six his mother started taking drugs and he said from the age of 6 to 12 it is I was practically taking care of my mother. So what happens is that they America they have food stamps. Food stamps means there are places where if you are poor don’t have particular amount of money then you get free food from there. So he said I would go there and I would get food for my mother and I would take care of her. So now uh my mother was suddenly so stoned with drugs and you can’t really blame my mother cuz she was well educated and suddenly she had a relationship with someone and that that person abandoned her and she got pregnant then she could not make she could not get a job thereafter. So whatever the reason tragedy behind it but the point he was making is many time conscious that I was existing and whether I was present I was living or on living will not be aware of that. Now rajasic parents they may have no interest in spirituality but if the child is sick they will move heaven and earth to make sure that the child is treated properly. So from purely from the perspective of humanity’s progression just humanity survival the parents need to be at least logistic the parents are pharmace Then what happens is they will just have no care for the children at all. So prahuad writes in the ajam section that you know by nature itself in all species when a progeni is that the child is their offspring is there the natural attraction between the parent and the offic. So this is raja sik but if thisa is there even that natural attraction is not there. So it can become terrible. So the point I’m making here is that we should not always demonize the ifra goes away then what comes is it does not necess if so if desires go away then what these results is very easily what can result is tamuka and one of the most defining characteristics of depression depression there is now sometimes there is general depression there’s clinical depression and you know the word Depression is somewhere overused. But broadly speaking, one universal characteristic of depression is the absence of desire to do anything. Okay? Why take a job? Why work? Why do anything at all? Why go out? In the west, there is a group of people who are called incel. Incel is what? They are involuntary celibates. into all these elements means what? They are so dysfunctional. They have no job. They don’t take care of their health. They don’t take care of their appearance. They’re completely disorganized. So no woman wants to even be with them and so they don’t want to be celibate but they’re involved in celibate. So now these people live mostly in the m. So the point is thinking is again the same point that if desire is just if desire dies then it’s very easy to swim into it’s very so so the point is when we are trying to come soma so I talked about too much desire is too little desire is tamas in between these two is satwa satwa is referred by two characteristics. One is the selection of desire. Not the rejection of desire but the selection of desire. And then after that there is regulation of desire. So what happens? There is domination of desire. Whereas there is elimination of desire. There’s no desire. So a satic person okay sic person will not have desire okay I want to buy a big house I want to get the latest phone I want to get a I want to do this I want to do that but that doesn’t mean sic person has no desires person will have desires to say read books gain more wisdom so there are desires and desires for understanding deeper truths or higher values of life So for us when we are trying to practice bacti it’s important that we emphasize more the selection of desires than the rejection of desires. So bi is more about selecting desires that that a serious devotey is defined by a serious desire that okay whatever happens this is what I’m going to do. So now that brings us to the point of spiritual desire versus material desire. So now what is the relationship between the two of them? So at one level how do we differentiate spiritual and material? Like we say that is this mic spiritual or material? What do you think?

Material depends.

Yes. Depends on what it is used for. So in terms of material structure, it may be material. Does the structure what it means of it? It is material. But used to share Krishna’s message, it’s become spiritual. So the spiritual desire can have multiple levels. So if you guys say I am okay. If I’m here in this world, Krishna is here. Now, spiritual desire can be we desire Krishna. That means I I just desirena. I want to remember Krishna. I love Krishna. I want to serve Krishna. The gopies they desired Krishna. When will Krishna come back? Now this is at one level desire that is spiritual desire but another thing could be at is desire for Krishna. What do desire for Krishna? Desire to offer things to Krishna. So I desire something so that I can offer it to Krishna. Now what the thing Maybe that can vary. But if Krishna is the end that ultimately I want to offer this to Krishna. So is that a spiritual design?

Yes. Of course you know we have this wonderful center that has come last one one year or so and now this is a desire to have a center. So it is a desire for Krishna for Krishna. The fora means it is it is meant to be offered for Krishna. So now that we have a desire for Krishna. So the idea is the soul is here. Around the soul the mind is there around the soul the body is sorry around the body is there and then beyond that there are the world with its objects. This is the self and above this is Krishna. So what happens at one level the pure devotey is that when the soul itself is offered to Krishna this is the purest level where the heart and soul is offered to Krishna. The next level is the mind is offered to Krishna. Now what is the difference between offering the soul and the mind? That means my mind is going here and there but I fix a condition. The next level is I offer my body to Krishna. So Krishna talks about this in 12.8, 12.9 and 12.10. So 12.8 is what the heart and soul offered to such a devotey lives in Krishna. If you cannot do that then what happens? Krishna says you offer your mind to So you offer your mind to me. Now if you cannot offer your mind to me then you offer your body to. Now what do we mean by another way to understand this? This is the state of samadhi. Samadhi is where our heart and soul completely is offered. This is the state of s where our mind is offered to. This is the state of where we use our body in Krishna’s service. Now beyond this is also where we offer the objects of the world. Now this is also at one level a form of sa. So for example some people may not want to physically come and do some sa okay clean the temple serum cook for Krishna. They say okay I want some money I’ll give the money. to sponsor us on deceased. So what is happening? They are offering the money to so the idea is at some level connection connection is developed for Krishna. So now we can say that the innermost connection is the best. That is true. But we also know that there are three levels of devotees and most devotey the level devotey and they and the starting devotey so what happens is those who are utadikaris their heart and soul is offered to Krishna and they just don’t care for the world they’re completely immersed in Krishna the uttikaris have to come down at the level of they’ll say okay this person is devotey this person is not a devotey this is how we can help them to come to so we could say that praupa was completely absorb in Krishna he was in Lunda when prahuat went to America that was because he wanted to offer the torishna so simply saying that okay that is the highest and everything else is lowest it’s not that simple the idea is that there are multiple ways in which we can serve and what we want is ideally speaking that as many ways in which our power of desire can be directed towards Krishna in time that so if our heart and soul be offered it’s wonderful but we want to offer our minds creativity we want our body’s energy we want to offer the resources that we have in the world also Krishna now if you consider the example of Yudishtra Maharaj Yudishtra Maharaj what did he do say Krishna is here now he in one sense he offered he offered the world to Krishna. How did he offer to the world to Krishna? Rajasuya. Now the to do the Rajasuya required a lot of effort and that effort we could say was material. He had to send his four brothers and they went in different directions and fought with various kings and most of them they didn’t have to fight. They subordinated They accepted Dishwara’s position and then they submitted then the Yi was performed. So now when he offered something that glorious to Krishna the result of that was Krishna screams he was able to because he was the sabra that’s how he could do the puja. Now of course that level of involvement with the world also comes at a cost. And then when we are going to offer something from the world to Krishna, what can happen is that we get so caught in the world that we don’t we forget to offer it to Krishna. So I was talking one demon said that Prahupad said you should give 50% of your salary to Krishna. He said I want to give 90% of my salary

but I’ll give 90% once I start earning $1 billion every month and till then you know till then I want to use every single dollar that I have to get to that level. So till then I cannot give you

now what is going to be happen this way this way now in trying to offer that that desire might be sincere also but the problem is in trying to earn $1 million per month What will happen is the person is going to get entangled in the material energy or not and if they’re already entangled in the m they were entangled with the material energy what will happen is that I was telling this to my broker disciple he’s quite sarcastic he said that what will happen is that the bank balance will increase but the person will feel I never have enough balance to be so what you feel is I want I want So the thing is how much of the world can be offered to Krishna that is something we each one of us has to be very honest about it. So again the point we’re discussing is that we there is selection of desire that all desires are not bad but we need desires in the world desires to offer the world to Krishna. So if somebody has singing ability then they desire that I want to sing very nicely. of him as somebody has speaking ability. Somebody has decorative ability. So we want to offer that ability to Krishna and that involves engaging with the material world to some degree. But the point is how much do I engage with the material world. So so this now I talked about the the importance of desires in bacti and that we select desires. What do I what does mean selecting desire means that if What is happening is is the desire actually going to take me towards Krishna or what happens is the desire I get trapped in the desire doesn’t go anywhere else so I stay there only so this is not healthy so which desire can I offer torishna that’s why selection has to be there and then even when we are selecting the desire there has to be regulation of the desire relationship pains and then you want to offer something to so okay let’s take a mundane example then come example suppose parents tell a child no you should do well in your school you should come first in class the child is not doing very well one day the child comes mommy daddy I came first in class oh wonderful how did you do that child says I worked very hard to learn computer hacking. I hacked into my teacher’s computer and I got all the questions beforehand and I already knew the answers. That’s why my kid was now what the parents say. The parents say shabash then somebody else will tell the parent madash. The idea is that the ends are important. But the means are also important that okay you want to come first in class but but what is the way by which you are coming first in class suppose some devotees say somebody wants to build a big temple we don’t have enough lakshi you know we’ve got some medications maybe we’ve got about we need we need we have 10 lakh right now so you know going to people and getting money from them is very difficult so what I’ll do this 10 lakh and invest in stocks and we take into one cr and then once it become 1. Now we invest in stocks what do we have that lang 1 cr more likely and likely become zero also so now is building a temple by investing in stocks and getting involved in stocks is that a thing to do is depend on what kind of stocks it is investment and there’s the speculative stocks in stock broking not all action in stock market is gambling see it depends on the key principle in gambling is what that we want returns without efforts that but there are some long-term stocks and they have performed a long time over the devotees also stock brokers and they do a fair job it’s not that they have to give up that job just because they are uh because that’s just because they become devoted. But the point is that speculation like that is not Hindi. So if somebody says that the ends are important but the means are also important. So even when we are pursuing some desire that desire needs to be regulated. The regulation there is the selection of desire and the regulation of desire. So what does this mean for us in terms of where we are right now that for us when we are practicing bacti now we can focus on reducing material desires but we focus on this we will sooner or later start feeling suffocated or I I’m devoted I should not do this I no I should not do that I should not do this now if you keep reducing material desires that’s what our focus what is our focus in or if we are if we have some we feel suffocated if we have tamara we won’t feel suffocated we will actually become stagnated we will not move anywhere in tamas we move So now what we want to do is the focus is not on reducing material desires. This is not the focus is on strengthening spiritual desires. The strengthening spiritual desire means that my desire I desire Krishna and I desire for Krishna. So the idea There is that is what we need to focus on strengthening and it could be there could be many things most of you are young enough so you know you it’s natural to have desires that’s just how biology psychology is born now it’s some for some people the desires may not go around even before and they grow old and that’s because of artificial artificial triggering of desires by the media and the culture desires. So directed that desires spiritually among his disciples. He told them when he came back in 1968. He was he had got a severe health challenge and he had to go to India or come to India. Then he went back to America 1968. At that time when he met that they had got a globe and told his disciples all of you pick one country. go and deliver that. Now this one was 18 19 years old and so what about us girls said we are not boys or girls we are souls you also pick up on that just had so much spiritual desire within that he just by associating with him just by hearing him speak devotees will get infected by their spirituality and for praupad Krishna was not some theory to be proved or realized in the future for prahuadrishna was a living loving person and those who are prahuad they felt that you know that is here and if we try to serve in Krishna will help us. So if you so that sense of the reality of Krishna that or not the reality the realness of Krishna that sense of the realness of Krishna not just a remote realness but the immediate realness of Krishna that Brahad at the capacity will infuse in devotees And by that they naturally had a desire for adventure, a desire for doing extraordinary things and Brahma encouraged them to do that for Krishna. So when the devotees were following the principles, when the devotees were uh when they were doing various things in Krishna’s service it was not that their desire was eliminated. So rajogura this is the last point I make and then we’ll have question answers. Let me talk about threeas. Satwa, rajas and tamas. There are two ways of looking at these. One is in a moral sense and the other is in a functional sense. What do you mean by this moral and functional? Moral means that satoga is better than the and if you want to live morally people in Satuna will be able to live more morally to grow spiritually satura is more favorable is not that’s true but then Krishna also says that so there are many places says transcendent the more rise to a higher more but Krishna also says that the material world is made of the material so from a functional perspective the The material nature is made of three modes. So in Ayurveda they do analysis of the moles and the ideal analys is 33% of each mo 33% of 30% are just 33%. So now uh I recently had some health challenges analysis they said that he told me that that you know there’s a problem since you have only 7% focus that’s a good thing isn’t it he said no that’s not a good thing

I said no the removed said that’s when I was introduced this concept and I started reading more about it talking to devotees so you see what happens is each of the modes has its function in the world so for example when we when we try to so one of the means I’m not getting sleep at all at night. So now what happens when you when we go to bed or lie down wherever go to sleep what happens at that time that tamas has to come upon us if tamas does not come see it’s like you know there is we just there are entire books written about the philosophy of sleep what is the philosophy in sleep But Vidanta talks about it also quite a bit. The point is that the shift from the waking state to the sleeping state that is actually not in our control. Now we can create the situation for the shift. That means okay we can lie in the comfortable bed. We can have silence around us. We can have darkness around us. We can create the situation for it. But the actual turning off the switch. There’s a particular moment where we move from the waking state to the sleeping state. That turning off of the switch is actually not in our control.

And if the is not enough then what happens is the mind either stays in rajuna generally is too far away at that time. So does it go to such like there’s one author He just had a lot of insane and he put it humorously. My bed is the magical place where as soon as I lie down, my mind reminds me of all the things I did not do during that and then it just becomes almost impossible to sleep. Oh, it did not happen. That did not happen. That did not happen. So the point is that in terms of sleeping when the tamoga comes that’s when the mind switches off otherwise the mind is constantly active. So there is the contemplative mind that is the active mind is in raju and the inactive mind is in the so each of the is important. One time I was in Pune and uh I was supposed to go to Mumbai. So this last one from Mumbai called me can you get to the So I was going by train it’s many years ago 20 years ago. So I had called one devotey that you know can you get this? I had already left for the train. So that devotey said so he came to the airport. I was calling on phone when are you reaching and he came to the the whistle had already been blown. So he came into the station just walking very gently said bro please come to the train leave. He said you know I want to be a food. Yes, thinking is good. But ultimately we have to get the job done. Is it whether it is for serving Krishna or whether it is for doing whatever you do if somebody’s in emergency duty in a hospital and they say I want to kill then you can’t be an emergency duty. People will die for a few moments delay. So One thing is that for functioning in the world certain programs are required at certain times some activities just do need to be done fast and now we say oh you can be fast in some well yes and no so there’s a difference over here see although can be 30 35% that’s the ideal but just because their percentage is the same does not mean that They are equally influential. Like a person can be in satuna. That means they make their decisions their major life values are little bit. But still for them to function in the world in a balanced way they need to have all three. So it’s like when a person’s ga is determined whether sati rajas that is determined Not just by okay how much time they spend in which guru that’s important but the important thing is in which ga they make their biggest decisions if somebody decides okay they drink a lot and they decide I want to invest money over here or I want to marry this person I want to divorce this person they’re taking all such decisions in tamokuna then that person’s not sick so the idea is that This none of the goodas need to be demonized. We don’t want to be controlled by any ga. We don’t want to be we don’t want to be taking our major decisions in the lower worlds. But from the compositional perspective of the material world all threeas are important. So there is the presence of the was and there is the influence of theas. So we want to be influenced primarily by the higheras by all are naturally present.

I logically say that 8 8 hours of the day say 11 to 9 to 5 is in tamuna or 10 to 8 to 4 is in tamuna and then 4 to 10 is in soda and 10 to then 8 is injur that can have some time wise distribution of that but the point is in nature also out of 24 hours 8 hours each of the months.

So the thing is that for us the I need to function in a way that works for me. So if we are chanting again I said that there’s a very there’s a great shortcut from su I will never ever get up when I’m chanting I only sit and chant yes I sit and chant and I sit and nap and Okay. Few mantras are sit and chant. Few mantras and few mas are sit and chant. Now what are we doing when only Krishna knows? So now of course if we have the sufficient excellent but if we don’t if we are sliding into the then what happens is it is better to bring some pjuna would be maybe walk at chant stand in chant maybe peace at place. You just move your bags over there. Bring some energy and activity. By the age at least. So overall for all of us when we when we talking about managing our desires. So we talk our topic of mind and managing the mind and making our mind our friend not letting our mind be our enemy. What it means is one of the key forces in the mind is desires. And not all desires can be controlled. Not all desires can be removed. So one key one there are many aspects to mind management but one of the aspects of mind management is that we need to channel our desires. So what I said over here that reducing material desires and strengthening spiritual desires. So strengthening spiritual desires is what happens by So in one sense both are important but it is only vagi without abasa that will not be sustainable. So these two both going together abasa means there’s a higher direction for our desires and vaga means there is the decrease of the lower direction. So now both are there that is the best. So it’s like there is a push Okay, let’s go this way. There’s a pull to Maya and then that will disqueeze to and then there is a push to Krishna and that will increase. So you want to decrease the pull towards Maya, increase the push towards Krishna. But the primary thing is you have to increase the push towards Krishna and that day bati So let’s summarize that we talked about mind management and within that a key focus was on desire management. So within desire management talked about three main things started by talking about the concept The concept was what? Desire is itself a feature of consciousness. To have consciousness means you will always have desires. Cannot have any kind of consciousness without desires. Now desire can also be a force of the mind and when that happens then we need to regulate that. So if I consider the soul from the soul the consciousness that comes out you always have some desire. Now that slows consciousness comes through the mind and the mind there are impressions and that’s where the desire can get distorted. So now so the point is desire itself is not undesirable. In fact desire is desirable as said the purpose of sad is we started that particular one the concepts then with respect to that in ter of sides. So what I talked about was three main thing I talked about in this that just desires there can be too much should be just too little would be so the character of spirituality is not necessarily just the elimination of desire character spirituality is the elevation of desire we have higher desires so These are the selection. We select we direct selecting these are the desires I want to have and these are the desires I want to direct towards Krishna and then by directing towards Krishna also how far can I go? So we discuss the example of how if I’m Krishna is here above me Krishna. So there’s the soul and there’s the mind there’s the body and And then that is the objects in the world. So you want to have as many channels towards Krishna as possible. The soul offered to Krishna is 1.8. Then 1.9 is the mind of Krishna. Then the body of Krishna is sa body of is also and that I was describing. So the idea is that that now how much can we do which objects can be offered that will depend on you trying to example you could offer certain things if we try to offer service people get entangled but for us the takeaway the key point was that if you consider the Quran there is a moral way of taking action and there is a functional of looking at them. So in a functional way for functioning in the world all three are required. Tamas is also required. This is also required to be provided but within the functional so you can say the in terms of presence all need to be present. But in terms of the influence influence means which is the more influence you want for that you want the influence you want the higher motives ultimately in terms of Krishna. not offer everything to Krishna. So when we are trying to continue desires our BI focus it is not so much on saying it’s not on reduction of reduce desire but if you say it’s material desire reduce material desire that is important but that should not be the focus that we strengthen spiritual desire and on spiritual desire strengthen autom automatically material desire will fall in place and here I started by discussing about how this too little desire can lead to thus and this is where depression can come and that’s how sometimes spiritual practices if misunderstood or disapp direct and letting lead. So that is what we do. We learn to do in month. Thank you very much. Krishna,

thank you for such a wonderful class. It was very deep and profound. Many things to learn. And uh I can it’s my personal also I can understand how difficult life becomes if you don’t get proper sleep. I also suffer from sleep disease since my early childhood and I can yeah but it becomes very so you know a compliment becomes a problem. So because I have seen over the years that you’re very thorough in your research and analysis. So I just wanted to ask a simple question that uh uh is are there some spiritual and practical ways so that we can regulate our sleep or induce sleep in a way that we can serve Krishna in better way. It’s generally the other way around but this is my humble question and my sincere prayers to the lords go to sleep so that you can get more and more better sleep time. The adults we try to find is not easy. Every mind is like a child. Like I was telling in the previous class that a parent may learn or read a lot of parenting books about how to take care of a child. The child is the child is crying how to pass a child. But when their child is crying no parenting will work. You each parent has to work out how things work with their child. So like that everyone has to work with their mind. So I was recommended shavasan, I was recommended this, I recommended that. So the only thing that has really helped me till now is that okay, you hear some soothing music, you hear some nature sound, you hear some people. So the only thing that help me to also does it work all the time. here very serious philosophy so philosophy it’s like to understand the philosophy I’m writing down on hearing if I hearing Krishna kata it’s like I feel intellectually undermployed

so when I very serious philosophy. I go into this just by understanding how it works doesn’t always work at that time because the philosophy is so serious intricate concepts analytical and all that so I am forced to sat at lera goes away from me and then if I’m lying down on bed and it is dark and I’m hearing the philosophy sata sometime lie down and that’s how I’m able to sleep So I think everyone has to find out. I have still not been able to see any any one way that works every day. So it’s like what my realization is now once you start doing a service regularly like say in fact now every day I give two three classes or at least one class. So now we pray before a class but because I give so many classes we don’t always feel the need for we know theoretically we know we need Krishna’s blessing but we don’t feel the need for So what I’ve realized is that throughout the day I don’t feel the need of Krishna’s mercy but every night I need. So it does become like that.

So I think each of us has to find out how to do that with our own mind.

Thank you for your answer actually that we all get good. It’s not a It’s not a trivial thing that uh uh if uh if sleep is not there from a biological or neurological perspective then most of the intellectual capacity of the brain then is rested and rejuvenated during sleep. So what they say is that there’s there’s this now this is a from a modern scientific perspective there’s something called RBM sleep rapid there is deep sleep So the amount of time we attend the sleep that is the primary time when our intellectual factor is these are rested and regulated and people who don’t get sleep they are the people who end up getting brain regeneration disases so there is unfortunate I have seen a number of praa disciples get lazy therein and one of the main reasons is lack of sleep So it’s not easy. Sometimes you say I want to work not for Krishna and that is good. It’s not that uh okay just doesn’t mean okay I need to sleep 8 hours so that I never never get Parkinson well throughout our life we’re doing nothing as we have Parkinson’s so we should fear of diseases for the future but it is unfortunate ly through that the brain regenerates faster if a person does not inadequate sleep. Now of course for some people there can be exceptions but in general regulating our life in such a way that we can sleep well that’s important now how practically you can do that it’s not easy to decide that it’s not easy to determine thank you friends for your answer the first technique I find philosophy that was supposed four or five hours hearing the lectures in the bed and then going to sleep.

Anyways, thank you. There’s no sure way. Uh one thing is like in youth there are some very common desires for everybody like the desire for fame, sexual desire. This is very common in all the course. when we come and we come to know that especially the desire for fame sexual desire these are like morally the spiritual organization is a very like downward and we hear especially in tradition we hear in China very so to control a desire for faith it becomes sometime a mental gymnastic oh I’m very proud or this sa will make me proud so I will not do this sa much better I will do that sa which I am not light and it’s it becomes a more kind of a mental gymnastic oh some some proud thought comes and we think that oh no my special mastering why you know sexual desire also like okay I saw this mi okay maybe I’ll block my eyes while I’m or any little sight of any lady it simply whether it really agitates us or not but That thought itself may make a person very agitated. So sometime it becomes a lot of suffocation. So can you please tell that how to deal with two types of I have no desire to answer this question. So like you there are certain desires like fame and sexual desire and we fight against them because of our spiritual standards then we get suffocated. Yeah. See with respect to desire management that there could be two ways of looking at it. One is a digital way of looking at it. Rather is an analog wave. Now what do I digital to analog that you know this is right this is but there’s one level is right everything below it is wrong it’s one or zero now analog is more that it’s like a scale it’s a range and in the range or a scale we can say there is a aspirational level And then there is a non-negotiable level. So now aspirational level could be interrog aspirational level might be that okay every day I want to wake up at this time. I want to complete all my sadena by this time and then I have my whole day. It’s aspirational level. It’s good to be at the aspiration. them but if we can’t get the aspirational level that doesn’t give you and I cannot do this is a non-negotiable so there’s a particular level of sad that that’s a non-negotiable so what happens is if we think of spiritual life simply as this is right and below is wrong then there’s a lot of suffocation but we have this range approach and the suffocation comes even more If we try to be at the aspirational level in everything you know aspirational level is that I’ll wake up very early in the morning and I’ll be aspirational level in my sadena I’ll be aspirational level in my preaching also ready to ask question till late night I’ll be there because I’m extending myself for so then if we try to be at the aspirational level in all areas we will completely burn our society so that’s why If we have that range approach then okay this is a level below which you can I want to read strange shastra every day and it’s good if I get rid of you can’t read every day you know in the at the in the weekend or sometime I find sometime and I read substantially it’s also good so like that is aspirational so each one of us when we are trying to manage any desire This is that range approach has to be there. So with respect to fame for example how might we apply this approach that is at a aspirational level only that whenever we do service you remember that I’m doing this for Krishna and the ability to do this come from Krishna whatever success I get whatever recognition I get it is all from Krishna. And then we consciously also offer it to Krishna. Krishna just this glory it’s all for him. The aspirational level would be that it’s almost everything what we are offering and what we are getting what we are offering and everything is now that would be a aspiration. Now a non-negotiable level at a basic level when we are able to achieve some success At least Krishna’s achieved now we speak that and we try to meet that. So now how much as devotees should we consciously try to avoid? It’s a difficult question because As we say that what is regulated, what is appropriate for everyone will be somebody is more of a brainical nature. Now for that person they just be happy in study and they get some fame from the study that’s nice but somebody has a respect of nature for them fame is a need that it is it is a natural it is ing thing. In fact, last time it is said that what is that says how great is the effort of the chhatrias that they cannot tolerate disorder and he’s appreciating that he’s saying that rua could not tolerate his owner and that’s why Now a small 5-year-old child he left his home and come to the forest and search for God. So now he was not interested in God in the kingdom but still kept search for God. So the point is that different people each individual is different and uh we have to find out what level helps us to focus most on Christ. So it’s not Like with respect to food, how much food should somebody be eating? Some people may be satisfied chapati. Some people make 10 chapatis. And the point is not how much chapatis be eating. It’s what do we do after the chapati? Do we have energy for serving Krishna or do we feel heavy and bloated or are we feeling completely starved and famished? So had a huge had little zero but both had enormous energy for youami is exalted soul that is true but does that mean va is not exalted soul not necessary so the at one level the body mind body this is just a machine and each machine will work in its own way so with respect to So just like how much food is appropriate for a person that that person has to decide. So the key principle is that food should not become a competitor for our attention when we are trying to offer our attention to Krishna. So the food is too little it will become a competitor. The food is too much it will become competitor. When it is appropriate then it will no longer be accompanied. So like that how much they sleep like some people said less sleeping is not good. There are people who live with 4 hours sleep but they never had any health problems. So you know the body different people the bodies are different and they come to the same how much is the right person how they function. So that’s why if somebody needs a little more recognition And then they see some circles which involve some level of visibility, some level of of uh fame and they want they see it. I don’t think that should disqualify them from practicing. Now there’s also a difference between appreciation and glorification. When the word feel, we use it in a general sense. So for example, if somebody has done a valuable service, Or if he had done some service then wanting appreciation is not the need of the ego it’s just the need of the heart right. So for example if if we we decorate the details or we are cook then we cook some nice delicious food and then some somebody comes in appreciious maybe the community or city comes in appreciious hey you did this very well that can be very encouraging for us. Now the difference is why are you telling me take this mic and tell everyone that is glorification. So appreciation is a deed of the heart that you know what I am doing is valuable is worthwhile is useful that we all we all have a a need to be evil that what I’m doing is some man and then that is recognized then we feel more connected. So I think that is perfectly fine. Now whether that glorification that gets I think we have to manage it accordingly and even with respect to sexuality I won’t go to the specifics but the idea is just like there is there is prasak food now there is food that is offered to Krishna food Food that is food that is cooked that is harvested by devotees that is transported by devotey that is cooked by devotees offered by devotees of devotees that’s all at the highest level of it from there if somebody is living in a country where there is or the situation they they just they just can’t get proper food they’re not able to cook maybe know somebody has a job if somebody is a medical and they have to work 20 hours They go for 24 hours, 21 hours, 2 hours a day. Now they have no time for anything. Some of they barely manage to do their basics and they’re not able to cook up that thing. They might get whatever food they get and they might offer it in the mind of Krishna and they take their food. Now is that a good standard? No. But is that no? So, so just as a fool the whole range from this to this. then we can always try to go for another thing but like there’s aspirational then so sometimes the sex is just a body function just like eating now of course it is much more consequential in terms of what happens so that consequentiality has to be recognized it’s just a biological function so there’s no need to fixate on it so much let’s say somebody may fixate on it that multistic People fixate on sex in terms of fulfilling it. Spiritual people can fixate on sex in terms of avoiding it. And you make the whole standard. You can make we define our whole spiritual life by our capacity to avoid sex. No, the essence of our spirituality is how much can we remember Krishna, how much we serve Christian. So now again, so there is a range over there. That’s why there different ashrooms and then there various facilities are there various levels are there. So again aspirational non-negotiable each one of us has to find that and then one situates on the call. So from sex only from procreation to sex within marriage that’s like offering like completely pure environment food to offering food to Krishna. So it’s a range that’s a and within that range each person has to situate themselves that they can and no last question. Thank you for class. If you see the uh creation of 24 elements there, the mind got created in ones the intelligence was in passion but the in real world it seems opposite.

Okay. Why is it say the mind comes from goodness and mode of passion? that there’s three level answer to it. So I will not go into all the three levels in detail because that’s how philosophy is very technical. What happens is we don’t really understand the SA world this one thing that stands out. Why does this make sense? So the simplest way to understand it is that goodness is associated with maintenance. Satwa is associated with maintenance and the mind maint maintains our material existence. Mind maintains a mental existence means okay eat this, watch this. The mind basically gives us proposes desires according to what we have desired. Okay, you you ate this, you watch this, you bought this, you drank this now this morning. So the mind maintains that existence. But now rajas is what creates rajas is what expands in essence. So now the intelligence is what creates new schemes for material enjoyment. So if there’s only the mind without any intelligence then okay whatever is easily available that’s what you okay this is a little bit but when the intelligence comes up okay say somebody in parallel control that and it’s okay within the parent control then this side I’ll visit I’ll watch this I’ll do this I’ll do that. And when the entrance comes in, okay, how can bypass I bypass the how can I take this or how can I how can I surf and then I give no footprint of that. Now it’s in Australia they banned social media for teenagers and within one week the sale of VPN has increased almost 500 times over there. So what is happening? People are changing their geocation trackers and this is accessing our social media. So the point is that the mind will stay within whatever is experiencing what is already but the intelligence will create various schemes. That’s why Krishna says that karma selfish desire was basically self-destructive desire is present in the senses is present in the mind and it is present in the intelligence also. So that’s how the idea the good has been talking about over there is what expands our existence and that’s how it’s associated with the mode of goodness sorry of passion one last question yes

yeah

you mentioned that three modes need to be present like category and like they should be fledged by some of them but not like but they should be present like equally like can you explain more than okay. So what do I mean by presence influence okay let’s take another example illustrate this that when we talk about the world so we function for example Consider deities the dity is Krishna. Now is the dity uh matter? Well yes it is made of matter. It could be marble, it could be wood, it could be whatever. But normally when we approach the dating our focus is not on the material. Our focus is on Mrs. Krishna. It’s like currency 500 500 rupee. The currency is paper but the currency is so much more than paper that the fact that it’s paper becomes incidental that only okay it should not get wet I should have accidentally ear it for that I need to be aware but the fact is that currency because of being authorized by the government it has become so much more than paper that we don’t treat it like paper that Does it mean that we we are forget that it’s no we are careful we don’t put in so like that for the dities we are careful that if we have dity we won’t b them with water they can identify we don’t b careful about that but beyond that this is Krishna we don’t really we don’t fixate on the fact that the dity is made of particular matter so now if a dity if a dity is fashioned Then or from we got some traditional road and from that system to be made the sheep they make it. So then when they make it the sculptors they have to have the proper balance isn’t it that the wood should be strong enough the wood should not be weak enough. So whatever is required for a uh for a particular statue to stand to hold itself is The head is very large and this is my body is not proportionally strong then everything will collapse. So whatever is required for functioning that is required and now beyond that the spiritual side which is the most important for us but just because the spiritual side is important does not mean the functional side has to be explained. The when the devotees at Buddhya started in San Francisco they had I mean America and North America Monta places the devotees came to UK first and they decided to and this devote was young and ambitious. So they said we will make our bigger than all the other aat so they made the huge in multiple direction but unfortunately they didn’t make the sufficiently large proportion and they were going on the roads and suddenly collapsed and now at that time nobody knew what the ratra was. So the devotees presented the press had come the media had been public had come the devotees presented to everyone as if the collapse of the was part of the festival but still it was it was a disaster. So then they throw to praoba and Rob did the card collapse because of our poor devotion and rob it collapsed because of your poor engineering. So what do you mean by that? That the material functional side is important. So like that if you consider the body and mind it’s a machine and from machine’s perspective from functioning a certain composition is required. So in that sense all three are functional components of the way the body functions. So if you consider in the body this constant creation maintenance disruption happening cells are dying cells are being created cells are monitoring. So all three needs to go on effort that’s from the functional perspective. Now for the moral perspective what it means is which is the best way for me to go closer to so when I making my decisions in life it is best that I make my decision when I see then I’ll be able to choose wisely I’ll be active that’s why that’s so that’s what we talking about so so what something is made of And what something is meant for the two different questions. So if a dati is made of made of particular elements then those elements have to be a proper balance for the dity to exist to be proper balance. What something is made of and what something is meant for the dity is meant for for for us to have a facility manifest in this world. And that’s what the primary purpose is. So what something is meant for is more important. But what something is made of is not unimportant. Somebody has diabetes and somebody gives them a nice big say this is rings. This is passage. You take pr the soul will get purified and sugar will get addited insulin gets sp. So the point is that there’s a material dimension should not so what do we do now we may take also small portion or we may take some we have to we cannot fixate on the materical side of things but we can’t completely nect the mical side of things so that’s the From the body’s functional perspective, the threeas are that need to be present. But when we are making decisions, we focus on we make a decision of not. Thank you very much.

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Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
I was in America a few months ago. I was at a conference of spirituality and mental health.
And in the last few years, maybe last few decades, you could say, two, three decades, but especially in the last decade, there has been an increasing recognition that mental health problems are increasing a lot. And spiritual methods are offering a lot of relief. So broadly, we could say in terms of the reach we could say it’s like a funnel.
Right now, the maximum research has been done in mindfulness. Then a mindfulness that lots of studies show, it helps people to manage their pain. Then there is, after that there is a research in meditation.
And then there is unfortunately very little research done on specifically on mantra chanting. So now there are research on chanting of Om or chanting of Gayatri Mantra, Hare Krishna Mantra. Some research has been done, but it’s not a huge amount of research.
But if you want to consider scientific research, there is a lot of evidence that all of these seem to improve mental health. That now, whenever something spiritually seems to help people, there is always people who are anti-spiritual. There are people who are atheistic or non-atheistic.
They try to disprove the results because it’s a threat to their philosophy. And they have documented some researches which seem to suggest that where there are that some spiritual practices and some spiritual belief systems actually harm people’s mental health. And they lead to increased depression.
And now, where did this happen? It is not so. What their argument is that spirituality actually is not always improving mental health. It is not improving mental health.
And this is especially associated with places where all those spiritual groups where if you consider this is the mainstream society. And the society also has some moral standards. Now, we may say that our society, people are not in the state, they have no moral standards.
It’s the very simplistic view. In the West also, if you see, there is a lot of free mixing among the genders. But in many Western countries, especially in European countries, especially before there was immigration from the Middle East to Europe, now there is very, very few race.
So the idea was that, not that people are sense-controlled, but people respect concept that if a woman says no, no means no. You cannot force yourself. And that level of moral boundary is there.
Now, we see, especially in the software world, there is a lot of free mixing among the genders. And there are lots of affairs that happen in the rights of women from the right. But in the software world, you will not hear rapes.
Generally, rapes happen where? Where people come from, people who come from rural places, where there is no sense of the value of concept. You know the word consent? Consent means, some person says, agrees. So there in the rural places, what happens? Male-female separation is largely geographic.
Males work in particular areas, females work in particular areas. And I’m not saying this rural as an Indian tradition, it’s just rural psychology. That if a woman is publicly out freely, that means she is free.
That is right. So everybody has certain moral standards. So now, consent is not a high moral standard.
Of course, it is not. Dharma is the moral standard. But that is, the point I’m making is, everybody lives within certain boundaries.
But the thing is, that if a society has its moral standard very high above the general society moral standards, say, if there is a religious group or a spiritual group, with whose moral standards are way higher than the general society moral standards, then this creates, this is a huge distance, this creates a certain level of tension. Now, for example, there are certain Christian groups, the group called Amish, where they absolutely don’t use any technology at all. So they don’t own a smartphone or a laptop.
Even a smartphone. Smartphones, they even don’t have dialogues. So they only have like, they only have fixed phones in a few places in the entire community.
And so now, when those people, they, their kids get exposed to mainstream society, it creates a tension. Now, what happens if the moral standards of a particular group are very high as compared to the general society moral standards? Now, this tension can lead to a sense of guilt. And that guilt can lead to depression.
So it is not the spiritual practices that are calling. It is not meditation or mindfulness or mantra chanting that is causing depression. What is happening? It is when there’s a huge tension.
And what happens if there is a certain social expectation that you should be living according to the standard. Most people come to spiritual groups in today’s world, not necessarily for spirituality. They come for community.
Modern society is quite lonely. And western society, it will be polite, but it’s not very personal. It is, it is quite lonely.
UK was the first country to create an official ministry for loneliness. A government ministry of home affairs, foreign affairs. They had a ministry for loneliness.
And they had a number of people who were in that ministry. And one of the key persons in that ministry eventually resigned because of loneliness. It’s unfortunate.
They laugh about it. But it’s sad. The point, however, is something different over here.
The point I’m making is that when people are lonely, they come to a spiritual group because they want a sense of community. They want a sense of belonging. Now, they do get that.
But then, if that religious group has very high moral standards, and those moral standards, they feel that they are freely interested to those people, to live up to those moral standards. And now they think that everybody’s expecting me to live accordingly. And if I’m not able to live accordingly, then they feel not only guilty, when there’s a feeling of guilty, but they also feel even more guilty.
Because what happens, they feel, I cannot talk with anyone about this. I just cannot talk with anyone. What do people think about me? And now they have left mainstream society, but they can’t connect with mainstream society.
They have joined a religious group, and they are struggling to meet the moral standards of that religious group. And then, that guilt plus loneliness is a killer. It’s a straight pathway for depression.
It’s a straight pathway for mental health problems. So, basically, this was the problem that was, in the spirituality, I mentioned there was a conference. All of this particular, so we had representatives from different groups.
So, I was representing the Indian tradition, Catholicism, that was basically a pure religion. And then there were other groups, there were Christians, there were Jews, there were Muslims. And then they were saying, how can we address this? That we would like to offer mental health support to our community.
But if this is a problem created by our own practices or our own principles, then how do we deal with this? So, now, when this particular person, I made a presentation over there. So, this is the context I’m going to get, and I’ll bring into our mailboxes that are relevant for us. So, generally speaking, in spiritual traditions, often what happens is desire gets, as they say, a bad place.
Desire gets demonized. Desire is bad. Desire should be, desire should be decreased.
Desire should be eliminated. Desire should be destroyed. However, it’s not that simple.
If we consider the practice of bhakti yoga, the practice of sadhana bhakti, what is it meant to do? Let’s look at what Krishna said himself, say in the Bhagavad Gita, the twelfth chapter. The twelfth chapter, first he says that, you try to fully absorb yourself in me. If you cannot absorb yourself in me, then you practice sadhana bhakti.
So, let’s recite this verse. Atacittaṁ samādhātum naśad no śrīmaiṣṭhirāṁ abhyāsa yogena tato mām iśvāpuṁ dhananjaya So, what Krishna is saying over here is, for the purpose of practicing bhakti, if you get fully absorbed in me, that’s wonderful. But if you are not fully absorbed in me, then do abhyāsa yoga, practice bhakti yoga.
And the purpose of bhakti yoga is mām iśvāpuṁ dhananjaya. Get the desire for me. So, desire is considered desirable over here.
Now, when we say it is desire for Krishna, it is spiritual desire. And we’ll talk later about the difference between spiritual desire and material desire. But the point is, desire itself is not considered to be bad.
In fact, getting desire is considered to be a good thing. If you consider what differentiated Shri Prabhupāda from many of his godbrothers, Prabhupāda was a grahastha who renounced the world at a little older age. Many of Prabhupāda’s godbrothers, they were sannyāsīs, they joined the spiritual master-bishops in their childhood, did not join the youth itself.
They had a lot more association with the spiritual master. So, many of them were much more, they had much more time to study Sanskrit and study the Gaudiya scriptures. Prabhupāda himself had been studying extensively.
Prabhupāda drove off, Prabhupāda went and trained all over India in yudha studies, and that’s the time he came to India. So, Prabhupāda was well-read, no doubt. Still, the point is that there were others who were, we could say, more renounced or more learned, more learned in scripture, more learned in Sanskrit language and other things.
What differentiated Prabhupāda was that he had the strongest desire to fulfil his spiritual master’s desire. It was not that Bhaktisiddhāsa Ṭhākura instructed Prabhupāda alone, go to the west. So, he had too many of his disciples, couple of his disciples, he had actually funded their mission to the west.
But for others, he taught the best, he was standing in structure in one sense for all the senior leaders. Now, Prabhupāda took that as his mission. So, if you see, in many ways, what differentiated Prabhupāda’s? So, should have Prabhupāda’s speciality, we could say, what made it special? There are many things we could say, but it certainly is not detachment, that he was more renounced than anyone else.
That was not the point. It is his desire. Desire to serve Kṛṣṇa.
Desire to glorify Kṛṣṇa. Desire to identically fulfil the prophecy of Caitanya Mahāprabhu. So, my point is, desire is not itself undesirable.
So, now, with respect to desire, let’s explore this a little bit more. When we talk about this, how it works, I’ll talk about two main concepts in the whole film. See, there is there is desire as a feature of consciousness.
Feature of consciousness means to be conscious is to be desires. If we are conscious, then when we observe things, we’ll find something attractive. We’ll find something not attractive.
So, one feature of being conscious is having certain desires. So, in that sense, desire is, this is natural, necessary. It’s a natural feature of consciousness.
Now, desire can also be something more. So, when I say a feature of consciousness is, if you have the soul, then from the soul, when consciousness moves outwards, when the consciousness moves outward, then that consciousness will encounter certain or various objects. And when it encounters various objects, some of them, it will find desire.
So, in that sense, desire is a natural feature of consciousness. Now, desire can also be something more. Now, desire can be a force of the mind.
Now, this is what we often think of as desire. Now, what is the difference over here? That, if this is the soul, and from the soul, there is consciousness which moves outwards. And actually, there will be desire.
But we also have the mind inside us. So, here is the soul, there is the mind, and then there is the body. And beyond the body, there is the outer world, where there will be various objects.
So, what happens? From the soul, the consciousness goes outwards. It goes outwards. It goes outwards towards various objects.
Now, when it goes outwards, the mind is not just a neutral transmitter of consciousness. The mind has certain conditions. Conditionings within it.
And we call these conditionings as impressions, as samskaras. Now, what happens? When these impressions are present, so these impressions transform the consciousness at this moment. So, if two people pass by a bar, maybe between their home and their workplace, or the students, between their hostel and their college, there is a bar around them.
Now, both of them may see the bar. Now, one of them has never drunk alcohol, has no interest in drinking alcohol. The other person has drunk a few times.
Now, when from outside, that side of the alcohol, a bar comes in, when for somebody there is no impression, if there is no impression, then what happens? It is just that same bar, this is a bar over here. So, if we have a bar over here. Now, if in the case of somebody who has no impression, the consciousness will just pass like that.
It’s just for information, okay, there is a bar over here. But for somebody who has some impressions, it reaches here and here suddenly expands. And then that, oh, there is a bar here, it just fills the consciousness.
It’s like, sometimes we have some small pop-up that comes up. And that pop-up, it is just there, there is a small pop-up. But if we click it, it becomes bigger.
So, now, in this case, we don’t have to click it to become big. Just the impression inside of itself, we can do. So, in this way, what happens? The desires that they give, gain a force.
And that force is a force of the mind. So, a force of the mind means that the mind multiplies or expands the focus on that and then we feel a pull for that. Now, somebody who has, because this is inward also, that means that’s what consumes our attention.
And after it consumes our attention, then from here, from the soul, there will be a flow outward and then we will just go towards that. This is what I want. So, the impressions in the mind create a force.
So, now, what we want to do, let’s say desire is a feature of consciousness. Now, this actually needs to be tapped. And desire is a force of the mind.
This needs to be purified. So, I’ll explain what I mean by this. But at this point, I hope this point is clear, that desire is something innate to the soul.
And that’s why desire is not undesirable. But when the desire passes through the filter of the mind, the impressions of the mind, then it can go in undesirable directions. So, desire itself is not undesirable, but desire can go in undesirable directions.
So, we can say desire, another way to compare it is, desire is like the power of sight. The power of sight is not a bad thing. It’s necessary for functioning.
But with the power of sight, we may see things which are impure, which are contaminating, which are agitating. So, the power can go in undesirable directions. So, with this understanding, now let’s move to one more point.
So, what we’re discussing is, that when can spiritual practices, or something like spiritual practices, lead one to an aggravation of mental health problems, instead of a relief or mitigation of mental health problems. So, what happens? As I said, we tend to demonize desire at first. So, now, if we consider desire itself, in general, when there is too much desire, this is associated with Rajoguna.
And Rajoguna means, I want to eat this, I want to watch this, I want to buy this, I want to touch this. There’s so many desires out there. Asha, Kasha, Dair, Baddha.
Vishnu says, hundreds of thousands of desires are full of this. So, this is Rajoguna. But actually, when there’s too little desire, this will be the Bhuvana.
So, too little desire is not necessarily goodness or transcendence. See, I’ll tell you about a very important difference. But one key point is, from an external perspective, Sattva Pura and Dabba Pura can look very similar.
I used to do a program in one place in Pune. And there was one person who would always come first for the class. But, he would come first for the class, but he would never seem interested in the class.
Never ask any questions, never respond to any questions, never respond to any interactive points. He came for three, four weeks. And then, one day after the program, I asked him, you know, what inspires you to come so early? You come first for all the time.
He said, actually, my wife forces me to come here. But, you know, this wall in the corner of the wall is very comfortable. I don’t know if he’s talking.
Now, he does not come first. But that coming first is not because of spiritual ignorance. He’s not the Mukesh Shankar of Krishna.
He’s the Mukesh Shankar of the wall. So, what happens? In many ways, Rajoguna involves desire. Rajoguna involves energy.
And Rajoguna leads to activity. So, a person, Rajoguna, which has a lot of desire and a lot of energy. So, In 14.12, the Bhagavad Gita, Krishna says that, the characteristics of Rajoguna are, the desire which cannot be pacified.
And because of that, what happens? A person keeps doing more and more and more things. This, that, this, that. They keep doing lots of things.
That’s Rajoguna. So, now, when there is Rajoguna, there is too much desire. But, quite often, if we try to decrease desire, if we try to decrease desire artificially, then we may not rise to goodness.
We may just go down to ignorance. Because the defining characteristic of God mode of goodness, is like, if you consider three Gunas, Sattva, Rajas and Tamas. So, Sattva, Rajas and Tamas, what this means is, that, basically, in this particular case, what desire is what keeps us in Rajoguna.
But generally, going upwards is difficult. Because it requires, in general, lifting anything up requires more energy. It requires more force.
So, if desire is what is putting us at the level of Rajas, and the desire goes away, then what happens? The person goes down to Tamas. So, Tamas means what? A person doesn’t want to do anything at all. You know, I just, I just slept in my bed for not just six or seven hours, ten hours, twelve hours.
And I just slept here and there, bought something. And even when we’re scrolling, it’s not that we are reading. Like, I don’t want any exercise for my brains.
It’s not something important. What’s something important? You don’t even know what you’re touching. So, the point is that, if desire is decreased, it doesn’t necessarily lead people to goodness.
It can very easily get them down to Tamas. And that’s why Bhaktivinoda Thakur says that, that Rajoguna can be a good thing for people who are in Tamoguna. That Tamoguna is like poison.
And Rajoguna can be like the antidote. The antidote for that poison of Tamoguna. That means, what do we mean by this? Sometimes, we talk about spiritual challenges, we need to give up Rajoguna and Tamoguna.
Tantraptas Tamo Bhava Kamalobha Deshe Go beyond both of those. And that’s important. But that is for the spiritual.
Now, after I started traveling to America, I started from 2014 to 2015. And I spent a lot of time trying to do Western outreach, understanding the Western mind. So, one big difference.
The Indians are the wealthiest minority in America. We are the minority, but we are the wealthiest minority. And one reason for that is, the Indians generally, in America, how do you know they are successful? They have five, six families.
How much is the income level of a particular group? How much do they depend on welfare? The government offers support. How much do they depend on government support? How well are their children educated? How much is the criminality among this community? I mean, how many people commit crimes? How long do their marriages stay? So, they have various sociological parameters. Nothing spiritual.
But among the sociological parameters, Indians are always, not just in the wealth they are at the top, but Indian students also, Indian children also grow quite well academically. And one reason they say that, Indians take parenting very seriously. Now, what do we mean by that? Now, in one perspective, the parenting can be quite narcissistic.
Narcissistic means, you have to work hard. You have to come first. You have to do well in your life.
You have to choose careers which will be lucrative. Don’t just go after careers which you feel good about, but you don’t want anything back. There is that idea of the starving artist.
Everybody becomes an artist, but they can’t earn money out of it. So, that’s starving artist. So, Indians often choose the same fields.
And there’s good career possible. So, the thing is, that you may call it a narcissistic parenting. And yes, that is true.
But when I started going to America and talking to the American people, I came to, I really understood, what is narcissistic parenting? What is narcissistic parenting? Just give two examples of this. America, the Western world, is very conscious of physical safety. That means, say, if anybody has a heart attack, you know, if you go to the hospital, in the emergency, they won’t ask any questions to a young woman.
First, only safety. And even if the safety requires a big amount of surgical expense, they’ll do it. Consider life to be very important.
In India, somebody might be dying, so you go to the hospital, unless you pay money. So, the thing is, they value life a lot. And their logic is that children are very tender.
So, small babies, if they’re driving in a car, they’re not allowed to sit on the mother or the father’s lap. Because the idea is that if a car has a crash, then the baby’s body is very tender. Maybe we’ll be, maybe we’ll kiss.
So, there is a baby seat defect. A special baby seat, it’s like a fortified baby seat. Fortified means it’s very strengthened.
And if the baby is very small, then the idea is the baby seat is going to turn backwards. That means what happens is, if the baby is hit, there’s a car crash in the front, and there’s a back service for the baby. The front side is very strong.
So, there’s a lot of protection. But what happened? Two, three times it happened that, that young mother or the young father or both, they got out of the car and they went away and forgot their baby was there. So, when this happened in California, the Californian government, they, like the state, we have a state sabha, like the Californian government, they said that all cars should have special sensors and special alarms that if the baby seat is occupied and all the doors are closed and the front seats are empty, then the car should start beeping.
So, if any of the modern cars, if somebody tries to break the car, they don’t have an authorized key, and somehow they try to do something by which they try to open the car, the car starts beeping. So, it’s like, you know, the car is being stolen. Like this, we should have a beeping sensor for it.
So, there was a critic of that. They said that, okay, for this, all cars, you have to increase the expense. Because, you know, you have your sensors behind, sensors ahead, you have to board it on the sensor, wrap, finish the alarms.
So, there was a critic of this, another American senator, he said that, no, people who forget their children, should forget the idea of having children. So, pharmacy parenting means what? That you are not even aware that some people get stoned with drugs and they’re so strong. There’s one devotee who told me that, especially in some communities in America, it’s a significant number.
Children are born out of wedlocks. It’s not a single parent, mostly it’s a mother. So, the father is never in the picture.
And then, his mother, he said that when he was, yeah, when he was around six, his mother started taking drugs. And he said, from the age of six to 12, I was practically taking care of my mother. So, what happens is that, in America, they have food stamps.
Food stamps means, there are places where, if you are poor and don’t have a particular amount of money, then you get free food from them. So, he said, I would go there and I would get food for my mother and I would take care of her. So, now, my mother was so stoned with drugs and I can’t really blame my mother because she was well-educated and suddenly, she had a relationship with someone and that person abandoned her and she got pregnant.
Then, she could not get a job thereafter. So, whatever the reason, the tragedy behind it, but the point he was making is, many times, my mother was not even conscious that I was existing. Whether I was present, I was living or not living, she was not even aware of that.
Now, Rajasic parents, they may have no interest in spirituality, but if the child is sick, they will move heaven and earth to make sure that the child is treated properly. So, from purely from the perspective of humanity’s progression, just humanity’s survival, the parents need to be at least Rajasic. The parents are Tamasic.
Then, what happens is, they will just have no care for the children at all. So, Prabhupada writes in the Jamila section that now, by nature itself in all species, when a progeny is there, the child is there, offspring is there, the natural attraction between the parent and the offspring. This is the Rajasic.
But if this Prabhupada is there, even that natural attraction is not there. So, it can become terrible. So, the point I am making here is that we should not always demonize Vajopada.
And if Vajopada goes away, then what comes is? It does not necessarily… So, if desires go away, then what is the result is? It’s very easy, what can result is Prabhupada. And one of the most defining characteristics of depression… Now, depression… Now, sometimes there is general depression, there is chemical depression, and the word depression is overused. But broadly speaking, one universal characteristic of depression is the absence of desire to do anything.
Why take a job? Why work? Why do anything at all? Why go out? In the West, there is a group of people who are called incel. Incel is what? They are involuntary celibates. Involuntary celibates means what? They are so dysfunctional, they have no job, they don’t take care of their health, they don’t take care of their appearance, they’re completely disorganized.
So, no woman wants to even be with them. And so, they don’t want to be celibate, but they’re involuntary celibate. So, these people live mostly in the mood.
So, the point I’m making is, again, the same point that if desire is… just if desire dies, then it’s very easy to swim into the water. So, the point is, when we are trying to come to sattva-bhuvana, so I talked about too much desire is tam prajas, too little desire is tamas. Now, in between these two is sattva.
Sattva is determined by two characteristics. One is the selection of desire. Not the rejection of desire, but the selection of desire.
And then, after that, there is regulation of desire. So, in tamo-bhuvana, in rajah-bhuvana, what happens? There is domination of desire. Whereas, in tamo-bhuvana, there is elimination of desire.
There’s no desire to be left. So, a sattvic person, okay, a sattvic person will not have desire, okay, I want to buy a big house, I want to get the latest phone, I want to do this, I want to do that. But that doesn’t mean a sattvic person has no desires.
Sattvic person will have desires to, say, read books, gain more wisdom. So, there are desires. And desires for understanding deeper truths or higher values of life.
So, for us, when we are trying to practice bhakti, it’s important that we emphasize more the selection of desires than the rejection of desires. So, bhakti is more about selecting desires. That a serious devotee is defined by a serious desire to serve Krishna.
That, okay, whatever happens, this is what I’m going to do. So, now that brings us to the point of spiritual desire versus material desire. So, now, what is the relationship between the two of them? So, at one level, how do we differentiate between spiritual and material? Like we said that, is this mic spiritual or material? What do you think? It depends on what it is.
Material. Yes, depends on what it is used for. So, in terms of material structure, it may be material.
It doesn’t structure what it made of it. It is material. But it’s used to share Krishna’s message.
It becomes spiritual. So, the spiritual desire can have multiple levels. So, if you can say, I’m spiritually, I’m here in this world.
Krishna is here. Now, spiritual desire can be, we desire Krishna. That means, I desire Krishna, I want to remember Krishna, I love Krishna, I miss out Krishna.
The Gopis, they desired Krishna. When will Krishna come back? Shunyatam jagat sarvam govindam hira darshanam. Now, this is at one level, desire, that is spiritual desire.
But the other thing could be that there is desire for Krishna. What is my desire for Krishna? Desire to offer things to Krishna. So, I desire something so that I can offer it to Krishna.
Now, what the thing may be, that can vary too. But if Krishna is the ends, that ultimately, I want to offer this to Krishna. So, is that a spiritual desire? Yes, of course.
You know, we have this wonderful center that has come over the last one year or so. And now, this is a desire to have a center that Krishna has created. So, it is a desire for Krishna.
For Krishna, means it is meant to be offered for Krishna. So, now when we have a desire for Krishna. So, the idea is, the soul is here.
Around the soul, the mind is there. Around the soul, the body is there. And then beyond that, there are the world with its objects.
This is the self. And above this is Krishna. So, what happens, at one level, the pure devotee is that, where the soul itself is offered to Krishna.
This is the purest level, where the heart and soul is offered to Krishna. The next level is, the mind is offered to Krishna. Now, what is the difference between offering the soul and the mind? That means, my mind is going here and there, but I fix it on Krishna.
The next level is, I offer my body to Krishna. So, Krishna talks about this in 12.8, 12.9 and 12.10. 12.8 is what? So, the heart and soul is offered to Krishna, such a devotee lives in Krishna. If you cannot do that, then what happens, Krishna says, you offer your mind to me.
अतः जित्तम् समाधातु नशानो सिमाइस्तिरम् अप्प्यास्योगेन्तो माविश्वात्तम् तरेचे। So, you offer your mind to me. Now, if you cannot offer your mind to me, then you offer your body to me. Now, what is the difference between offering the mind to Krishna and offering your body to Krishna? What do we mean by, another way to understand this thing is, this is the state of Samadhi.
Samadhi is, where our heart and soul completely is offered to Krishna. This is the state of Saadha, where our mind is offered to Krishna. This is the state of Seva, where we use our body in Krishna’s service.
Now, beyond this, is also where we offer the objects of the world to Krishna. Now, this is also at one level a form of Seva. So, for example, some people may not want to physically come and do some Seva.
Okay, clean the temple, serve Prasad and cook for Krishna. They say, okay, I want some money, I’ll give the money, the sponsors and the priest. So, what is happening? They are offering the mind to Krishna.
So, the idea is, at some level, connection is expressed. Connection is developed for Krishna. So, now we can say that the innermost connection is the best.
That is true. But, we also know that there are three levels of devotees. Uttam Adhikari, Madhyam Adhikari and Sons Adhikari.
The topmost devotee, the middle level devotee and the starting devotee. So, what happens is, those who are Uttam Adhikaris, their heart and soul is offered to Krishna and they just don’t care for the world. They are completely immersed in Krishna.
So, the Uttam Adhikaris have to come down at the level of Madhyam Adhikaris. Because then they’ll say, okay, this person is a devotee, this person is not a devotee. This is how we can help them to come to complete.
So, we could say that Prabhupada was completely absorbed in Krishna when he was in Vrindavan. When Prabhupada went to America, that was because he wanted to offer the world to Krishna. So, simply saying that, okay, that is the highest and everything else is lowest.
It’s not that simple. The idea is that there are multiple ways in which we can serve Krishna. And what we want is, ideally speaking, that as many ways in which our power of desire can be directed towards Krishna in time.
So, if our heart and soul is offered, it’s wonderful. But we want to offer our mind’s creativity, we want our body’s energy. We want to offer the resources that we have with the world also to Krishna.
Now, if you consider the example of Yudhishthira Maharaj. Yudhishthira Maharaj, what did he do? Krishna is here. Now, he, in one sense, he offered the world to Krishna.
How did he offer the world to Krishna? Through the Rajasmiya Yajna. Now, to do the Rajasmiya Yajna required a lot of effort. And that effort, you could say, was material.
He had to send his four brothers and they went in different directions and fought with various kings. And most of them, they didn’t have to fight. They supported him.
They accepted Yudhishthira Maharaj’s position. And then, they submitted him. Then the Yajna was performed.
So now, when he offered something that glorious to Krishna, the result of that was Krishna’s peace. He was able to, because he was the Vishwa Sampradaya, that’s how he could do the Agra Puja for Krishna. Now, of course, that level of involvement with the world also comes at a cost.
And then, when we are going to offer something from the world to Krishna, what can happen is that we get so caught in the world that we forget to offer it to Krishna. So, I was talking to one devotee who said that. Now, Prabhupada said, you should give 50% of your salary to Krishna.
He said, I want to give 90% of my salary. But I’ll give 90% once I start earning $1 billion every month. And till then, I want to use every single dollar that I have to get to that level.
So, till then, I cannot give in charity. Now, what is going to happen this way? Now, in trying to offer that, the desire might be sincere also. But the problem is, in trying to earn $1 billion per month, what will happen is the person is going to get entangled in the material energy of God.
And if they are already entangled in the material energy, what will happen is that, I was telling this to one of Prabhupada’s disciples. He’s quite sarcastic. He said that what will happen is that the bank balance will increase, but the person will feel, I never have enough balance to give to Krishna.
Because what you feel is, I won’t give. So, the thing is, how much of the world can be offered to Krishna? That is something, we, each one of us has to be very honest about it. So, the point we’re discussing is that we, there is selection of desire.
That all desires are not bad, but we need desires in the world. Desires to offer the world to Krishna. So, if somebody has singing ability, then they desire that, I want to sing very nicely and offer my singing ability.
Somebody has speaking ability, somebody has recording ability. So, we want to offer that ability to Krishna. And that involves engaging with the material world in some way.
But the point is, how much do I engage with the material world? So, this now, I talked about the importance of desires in bhakti, and that we select desires. What is meant by selecting desire? Means, that if, what is happening is, is the desire actually going to take me towards Krishna? Or what happens is, the desire, I get trapped in the desire, doesn’t go anywhere. So, I just stay there.
So, this is not. So, which desire can I offer to Krishna? That’s why selection has to be there. And then, even when we are selecting the desire, there has to be regulation of the desire.
Regulation means, when you want to offer something to Krishna. So, okay, let’s take a mundane example and come to spiritual example. Suppose parents tell a child, no, you should do well in your school, you should come first in class.
The child is not doing very well. One day the child comes, mommy, daddy, I came first in class. Oh, wonderful, how did you do that? Child says, I worked very hard to learn computer hacking.
I hacked into my teacher’s computer. I got all the questions correct. And I already knew the answers, that’s why I came first.
What do the parents say? The parents say, shabash. Then somebody else will tell the parents, badmash. The idea is that the ends are important, but the means are also important.
Okay, you want to come first in class, but what is the way by which you are coming first in class? Suppose somebody wants to build a big temple. We don’t have enough nakshatris. You know, we’ve got some traditions.
Maybe we’ve got about, we need one couple. You all tell that, right? So, you know, going to people and getting money from them is very difficult. So what I’ll do is, in this 10 lakh, I’ll invest in stocks.
And we’ll take it to 1 crore. And then, once it becomes 1 crore, we’ll visit it. Now, we invest in stocks.
What do we have? Where is the 10 lakh? When it becomes 1 crore, then more likely, 10 lakh can become 0 also. Visit it. So, now, if visiting the temple by investing in stocks, and getting involved in stocks, is that a good thing to do? Well, it depends on what kind of stocks it is.
Investment, speculative stocks, stock broking, not all action in the stock market is gambling. See, it depends on, the key principle in gambling is what? That we want returns without efforts. But there are some long-term stocks, and they have performed a long time over it.
The devotees also stock brokers. And they get no fair job. It’s not that they have to give up that job just because they are devotees.
But the point is that speculation like that is not easy. So, if somebody says that the ends are important, the means are also important. So, even when we are pursuing some desire, that desire needs to be regulated.
That regulation, there is a selection of desire in the regulation of desire. So, what does this mean for us in terms of where we are right now? That for us, when we are practicing bhakti, we can focus on reducing material desires. But if we focus on this, we will sooner or later start being suffocated.
Oh, I am a devotee, I should not do this. I am a devotee, I should not do that. I should not do this.
Now, if it keeps reducing material desires, that’s what is our focus. What is our focus in bhakti? Or if we have some vajopada, we feel suffocated. If we have tapopada, we won’t feel suffocated.
We will actually become stagnated. We will not do any work. Now, what we want to do is, the focus is not on reducing material desires.
This is not good. The focus is on strengthening spiritual desires. So, strengthening spiritual desires means that I desire Krishna and I desire for Krishna.
So, the idea is that is what we need to focus on strengthening. And it could be, there could be many things. Most of you are young enough.
So, in youth, it’s natural to have desires. That’s just how biology, psychology is wired. Now, for some people, the desires may not go on even before they grow old.
And that’s because of artificial triggering of desire by the media and the culture. It’s just that we could think about desires. So, Prabhupada directed the desires into the among his disciples.
He told them. When he came back in 1968, he had got a severe health challenge. He had to go to India or come to India.
Then he went back to America in 1968. At that time, they had got a globe. And Prabhupada told his disciples, all of you pick one country, go and deliver that country.
Now, there’s one, one Mataji was there. She was probably 18, 19 years old. Prabhupada, what about those girls? Prabhupada said, we are not boys or girls.
We are souls. You also pick up one country. And Prabhupada, just, Prabhupada had so much spiritual desire within him that he, just by associating with him, just by hearing him speak, devotees would get infected by that spiritual desire.
And for Prabhupada, Krishna was not some theory to be proved or realized in the future. For Prabhupada, Krishna was a living, loving person. And those who were with Prabhupada, they felt that Krishna is here.
And if we try to serve him, Krishna will help us. So that sense of the reality of Krishna, that, not the reality, the realness of Krishna, that sense of the realness of Krishna, not just a remote realness, but the immediate realness of Krishna, that Prabhupada had the capacity to infuse in devotees. And by that, they naturally had a desire for adventure, a desire for doing extraordinary things.
And Prabhupada encouraged them to do that for Krishna. So when the devotees were following the regulative principles, when the devotees were, when they were doing various things in Krishna’s service, it was not that their desire was eliminated. So Rajyoguna, this is the last point I will make, and then we will have Krishna answers.
We will talk about three Gunas, Sattva, Rajyas and Tamas. There are two ways of looking at these Gunas. One is in a moral sense, and the other is in a functional sense.
What do you mean by moral and functional? Moral means that Sattva Guna is better than Rajyoguna, Rajyoguna is better than Tamas. And if you want to live morally, if you do Sattva Guna, you will be able to live more morally. If you want to grow spiritually, Sattva Guna is more favourable, Tamas is not that favourable.
And that’s true. But then Krishna also says that, so there are many places where Krishna says transcend the more, the rise to a higher more. But Krishna also says that the material world is made of the three Gunas.
So from a functional perspective, the material nature is made of the three Gunas. So in Ayurveda, they do analysis of the mores. And the ideal analysis, the ideal composition in terms of the Gunas is 33% of each one.
33% Sattva, 30% Rajyas, 33% Tamas. So now, I recently had a health challenge, so I did some analysis. And they told me that, there’s a problem, since you have only 7% Tamas.
That’s a good thing, isn’t it? He said, no, that’s not a good thing. He said, no, the more has to be removed. That’s when I was introduced to this concept, and I started reading more about it and talking about it.
So you see, what happens is, each of the mores has its function in the world. So for example, when we try to sleep. So one of the things that has been happening for me, I’m not getting sleep at all at night.
So now, what happens when we go to bed, or lie down wherever we want to sleep, what happens at that time, that Tamas has to come upon us. If Tamas does not come, see, it’s like, you know, there are entire books written about the philosophy of sleep. So what is the philosophy of sleep? But Vedanta talks about it also quite a bit.
The point is that the shift from the waking state to the sleepy state, that is actually not in our control. We can create the situation for the shift. Hmm? That means, okay, we can lie in a comfortable bed, we can have silence around us, we can have darkness around us, we can create the situation for it.
But the actual turning off the switch, that particular moment, when we move from the waking state to the sleepy state, that turning off of the switch is actually not in our control. And if Tamopana is not enough, then what happens is, the mind either stays in Rajoguna, generally, Satsanguna is too far away at that time. So does it go to Satsanguna? Like there’s one person, one author, he just had a lot of insomnia.
And he put it humorously, he said, my bed is the magical place where as soon as I lie down, my mind reminds me of all the things I did not do during that sleep. And then, it says, because it’s almost impossible to sleep. No, this did not happen, that did not happen, that did not happen.
So the point is that, in terms of sleeping, when that Tamopana comes, that’s when the mind switches off. Otherwise the mind is constantly active. So there is the contemplative mind, that is in Satsanguna.
The active mind is in Rajoguna. And the inactive mind is in Tamopana. So each of the Gunas is important.
One time, I was in Pune and I was supposed to go to Mumbai. So this last month, one devotee from Mumbai had called me, can you get this? So I was going by train. It’s many years ago, 20 years ago.
So I had called one devotee, that can you get this? I had already left for the train. So that devotee said, yeah. So he came to the airport, I was calling him on phone, when are you reaching, when are you reaching? And he came to the, the whistle had already been blown.
So he came into the railway station, he was just walking very gently. I said, oh please come, go to the train, leave. He said, I’ll walk with you, it’s okay, go.
Now, yes, thinking that the Buddha is good, but ultimately, we have to get the job done. Whether it is for serving Krishna, or whether it is for doing whatever you have to do. If somebody is in emergency duty in a hospital, and you say, I want to look into the Buddha.
Then it can’t be an emergency duty. People may die for a few moments daily. So the whole thing is that for functioning in the world, certain gunas are required at certain times.
Some activities need to be done fast. And now you say, oh, you can be fast in sattva guna also. Well, yes and no.
So there is a difference over here. See, although sattva guna, arjuna guna, tapa guna can be 30-50% That’s the idea. But just because their percentage is the same does not mean that they are equally influential also.
Like a person can be in sattva guna. That means they make their decisions. Their major life values are determined in sattva guna.
But still for them to function in the world in a balanced way, they need to have all three gunas. So it’s like when a person’s guna is determined, either sattvic, rajasic, tamasic, that is determined not just by how much time they spend in which guna. That’s important.
But the important thing is in which guna they make their biggest decisions. If somebody decides, okay, they drink a lot and they decide, I want to invest money over here. Or I want to marry this person, I want to divorce this person.
They are taking all such decisions in tapa guna. Then that person becomes sick. So the idea is that none of the gunas need to be demonized.
We don’t want to be controlled by any guna. We don’t want to be taking our major decisions in the lower gunas. But from the compositional perspective of the material world, all three gunas are important.
So there is the presence of the gunas and there is the influence of the gunas. So we want to be influenced primarily by the higher gunas, by sattva guna. But all the gunas are naturally present.
Biologically it says that 8 hours of the day, say 9-5 is in tama guna or 8-4 is in tama guna. And then 4-10 is in sattva guna. And then 8 is in raja guna.
You can have some time-wise distribution of that. But the point is in nature also, out of 24 hours, 8 hours each is the most. So the thing is that for us, I need to function in a way that works for me.
So if we are chanting, and again I said there is a great shortcut from sattva guna to tama guna. So I will never ever get up when I am chanting. I will only sit and chant.
Yes, I sit and chant and I sit and nap. Okay, few mantras I sit and chant, few mantras I nap, few mantras I sit and chant. Now what are we doing when only Krishna knows? So now, of course if we can have sufficient sattva guna, excellent.
But if we don’t have, if we are sliding into tama guna, then what happens is, it is better to bring some energy. Raja guna would be maybe walk and chant. Maybe stand and chant.
Maybe pace yourself. Maybe just move your legs over there. Bring some energy and activity by the edge.
At least the tama guna will be shifted. So overall, for all of us, when we are talking about managing our desires, so we are talking about mind and managing the mind and making our mind our friend, not letting our mind be our enemy. What it means is, one of the key forces in the mind is desires.
And not all desires can be controlled. Not all desires can be removed. So, there are many aspects to mind management, but one of the aspects of mind management is, that we need to channel our desires.
So what I said over here, that reducing material desires and strengthening spiritual desires. So strengthening spiritual desires is what happens by Vairagya. And reducing material desires is what happens by Vairagya.
So in one sense, both are important, but if there is only Vairagya without Abhyasa, that will not be sustainable. So, these two, both going together, Abhyasa means there is a higher direction for our desires. And Vairagya means, there is a decrease of the lower direction.
So now, both are there, that is the best. So it’s like, there is a push. Okay, let’s go this way.
There is a pull to Maya. And then that will decrease to Vairagya. And then there is a push to Krishna.
And that will increase Abhyasa. So you want to decrease the pull towards Maya, and increase the push towards Krishna. But the primary thing is, you want to increase the push towards Krishna.
And by that, So I’ll summarize. We talked about mind management, and within that, a key focus was on desire management. So within desire management, there are three main things.
We started by talking about the concept. The concept was what? Desire is itself a feature of consciousness. To have consciousness means, you always have desires.
You cannot have any kind of consciousness without desires. Now, desire can also be a force of the mind. And when that happens, then we need to regulate that.
So if I consider the soul, from the soul, the consciousness that comes out, you always have some desire. Now, that soul’s consciousness comes through the mind, and the mind then has inflections. And that’s where the desire can get distorted.
So the point is, desire itself is not undesirable. In fact, desire is desirable. As Krishna said, the purpose of sadhana is Mahamuksha.
We started with that particular one concept. Then we discussed about that in terms of insights. So what I talked about was, there are three main things I talked about in this.
That with respect to desires, there can be too much, but you can adjust. Too little will be the process. So the characteristic of spirituality is not necessarily just the elimination of desire.
Characteristic of spirituality is the elimination of desire. We have many desires. So there’s a selection.
We select, we direct, we regulate. Selecting, these are the desires I want to have. And these are the desires I want to direct towards Krishna.
And then by directing towards Krishna also, how far can I go with it? So we discussed the example of how, if I am here, Krishna is here above me. And within Krishna, there’s the soul, there’s the mind, there’s the body, and then there’s the objects in the world. So we want to have as many channels towards Krishna as possible.
The soul offered to Krishna is, heart and soul offered is 1.8, then 1.9 is the mind offered to Krishna. Then the body offered to Krishna is Shiva. The body offered to Krishna is also 10.
And 10 is the definition that was described here. So the idea is that, now how much can we do? Which objects can we offer? That will depend on our income. In the example of Vishnu, Maharaj could offer several things.
If we try to offer certain things, we will get in debt. But for us, they take away. The key point was, when we consider the gunas, there is a moral way of looking at them, and there is a functional way of looking at them.
There is a functional way, but functionally in the world, all three gunas are required. Namas is also required, vastus is also required, samsara is also required. But within the functionals, you can say the gunas, in terms of presence, all need to be present.
But in terms of the influence, influence means, which is the more influential guna? For that, we want to have the influence. We want to have the importance. Ultimately, we want to be connected with Krishna, we want to offer everything to Krishna.
So when we are trying to cultivate desire, our bhakti focus, it is not so much on saying, it’s not on reduction of, reduce desire. When we say material desire, reduce material desire, that is important, but that should not be the focus. Strengthen spiritual desire.
And once spiritual desire is strengthened, then automatically, material desire will form gunas. And here, I started by discussing about how the spiritual desire can lead to gunas, and this is where depression can come. And that’s how, sometimes, spiritual practices, if misunderstood or sublime, can lead to mental health problems.
Now, without spiritual practice, one can get into addiction also. If you have too much desire, you get addiction. So, select, take it direct, and let it lead.
So that is what we do, we learn to do in bhakti. Thank you very much. Hare Krishna.
Thank you for such a wonderful class. It was very deep and profound. Many things to learn.
And, I can, it’s my personal, is also, I can understand how difficult life becomes if you don’t get proper sleep. I also suffer from sleep disease since my early childhood. And, I think, yeah, but it becomes very difficult.
So, sometimes, you know, a compliment becomes a problem. So, because I have seen over the years that you are very thorough in your research and analysis, so I just wanted to ask a simple question, that, is, are there some spiritual and practical ways so that we can regulate our sleep or induce sleep in a way that we can serve Krishna in a better way? It’s generally the other way around, but this is my humble question. And my sincere prayers to the Gods, so to speak, so that we can get more and more better sleep.
Yeah, I’m also trying to find it. It’s not easy. Every mind is like a child.
It has to be in the previous class. a parent may learn, we have a lot of parenting books about how to take care of a child. The child is crying all the time.
But when their child is crying, no parenting failure will work. Each parent has to work out how things work with their child. So like that, everyone has to work with their mind.
So, I was recommended Shavasana, I was recommended this, I was recommended that. So, the only thing that has really helped me till now, I was like, okay, you hear some soothing music, you hear some nature sound, you hear something like that. So, the only thing that has helped me to, really till now, and also it doesn’t work all the time, is to hear very serious philosophy.
So, when I hear serious philosophy, it’s like, to understand the philosophy, I write down all my hearing. If I am hearing Krishna Katha, it’s like, I feel, there is a huge anger involved. So, when I am hearing serious philosophy, I go into something, he is just a fan, he studied how it works, where does it always work.
It’s like, at that time, because the philosophy is so serious, intricate concepts, analytical and all that. So, I am forced to Satvapada. So, actually the Rajapada goes away from me.
And then, if I am lying down in bed, and it is dark, and I am hearing the philosophy, no, Satvapada sometimes lies down in the moment. And that’s how I am able to sleep. So, I think everyone has to find out.
I have still not been able to see, any one way that works, every day. So, it’s like, what is my realisation is, now once you start doing a service regularly, like say in fact, now, every day I give him three classes, or at least one class. So, now, we pray before a class.
But because I give so many classes, we don’t always feel the need for Krishna’s mercy. We know we need. Theoretically we know, we need Krishna’s mercy.
But we don’t feel the need for Krishna’s mercy. So, what I have realised is, that, throughout the day, I don’t feel the need for Krishna’s mercy, but every night I need Krishna’s mercy. So, it does become like that.
So, I think, each of us has to find out, how to do that with our own mind. Thank you for your answer. it’s definitely your technique, isn’t it? That we all get good sleep.
It’s not a trivial thing. That, if, if sleep is not there, from a biological or neurological perspective, most of the intellectual capacity of the brain, that is rested and regulated during sleep. So, what they say is that, there is a system, from a modern scientific perspective, there is something called REM sleep.
Rapid eye movement, there is deep sleep. So, the amount of time we attend REM sleep, that is the primary time when our intellectual faculties are rested and regulated. And people who don’t get REM sleep, they are the people, who end up getting brain degeneration diseases.
So, there is, unfortunately, I have seen a number of Prabhupada disciples, are getting Alzheimer’s, they are getting Parkinson’s, non-Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s. And, one of the main reasons is lack of sleep. So, it’s not easy.
So many people say, I want to work hard for Krishna and that is good. Now, it’s not that, okay, just, doesn’t mean, okay, I need to sleep 8 hours, so that I will never get Parkinson’s. Well, throughout our life, we are doing nothing, we are living as if we have Parkinson’s.
So, we should live with fear of diseases for the future. But, it is unfortunately, through that, the brain degenerates faster. If a person lives on a radical sleep.
Now, of course, for some people, there can be exceptions. But, in general, regulating our life in such a way that we can sleep, well, that’s important. Now, how practically you can do that, it’s not easy to the disciples.
Thank you, Prince, for your answer. The first technique that you told me is, in Australia, there was 4-5 years in that, I cried. I mean, 4-5 hours, getting the lectures in the bed and then going to sleep.
Yeah. Anyways, thank you so much. There is no surefire way.
One thing is, like in youth, there are some very common desires for everybody. the desire for fame, sexual desire. This is very common in all ages, of course.
In country, when we come, and we come to know that, especially the desire for fame, sexual desire, is there like morally, in the spiritual organization, is a very, like, down-to-earth and non-existent. And we have to, especially in our tradition, we have to So, to control a desire for fame, it becomes some kind of mental gymnastics. Oh, I’m very proud.
I’m honored. This seva will make me proud, so I will not do this seva much. Better I will do that seva, in which I am more emboldened, more enlightened.
And it becomes a more kind of mental gymnastics. Oh, some proud thought comes, and we think that, oh no, my spiritual master told me, why Indiana, who is coming, sexual desire also, like, okay, I saw this mother, maybe I will block my eyes, while I’m doing the office, or, or, or, any little sight of any lady, it simply, whether it really agitates us or not, but that thought itself, may make a person very agitated. Sometimes it becomes a lot of suffocation.
So, can you explain that, how to deal with these two types of gymnastics? I have no desire to answer this question. So, like you, there are certain desires, like fame and, sexual desire, and, we fight against them, because of our spiritual standards, then, we may be suffocated. Yeah.
See, with respect to, desire management, that, there could be, two ways of looking at it. One is, a digital way of looking at it, and the other is an analog way of looking at it. Now, what do I mean by digital analog? Well, you know, this is right, this is, there is one that everybody is right, everything is wrong.
One positive. Now, analog is, more that, it’s like a scale, it’s a range. And in the range, or a scale we can say, there is, an aspirational level.
And then, there is a, non-negotiable level. So now, aspirational level could be, you know, I don’t have anything. Say for example, my aspirational level might be that, okay, everyday I want to wake up at this time, and I want to complete all my sadhana by this time, and then I’ll have my whole day.
It’s aspirational. It’s good to be at the aspirational level. But if we can’t be at the aspirational level, that doesn’t give me a role of a guru, and I cannot do the sadhana.
It’s a non-negotiable level. So, there’s a particular level of sadhana that we need to do. That’s a non-negotiable level.
So, what happens is, if we think of spiritual life simply as, this is right, and anything below this is wrong, then, there’s a lot of suffocation. But if we have this range approach, and the suffocation comes even more, if we try to be at the aspirational level in everything, you know, aspirational level is that, I wake up very early in the morning, and I’ll be at the aspirational level in my sadhana, and I’ll be at the aspirational level in my preaching also. So, if you’re ready to ask a question, till late night I’ll be there, because I’m extending myself also.
Then, if we try to be at the aspirational level in all areas, it will completely burn our society. So, that’s why, if we have that range approach, then, okay, this is a level below which we cannot reach. We want to read Shastra every day.
And it’s good if I can read every day, because you can’t read every day. You know, at the weekend or sometime, I find sometime, and I read, substantiate it one day. It’s also good.
So, like that, this aspirational level, there’s a lot of issues. So, each one of us, when we are trying to, manage and be resilient, that range approach has to be there. So, with respect to fame, for example, how might we apply this approach? That is, at the aspirational level, we would see that, whenever we do the service, we remember, that I do the service for Krishna, that the ability to do the service comes from Krishna, whatever success I get, whatever fruition I get, it is all from Krishna.
And then, consciously also offering to Krishna. Krishna just prays, this is all for me. The aspirational level would be that, it’s almost everything, what we are offering, and what we are getting, what we are offering, and everything is Krishna.
Now, that would be an aspirational level. Now, a non-negotiable level, at a basic level, when we are attaching some success, at least with what we do, it’s Krishna’s business, to achieve this. Devotees are busy, Krishna is busy, everyone is busy.
Now, we speak that, and we try to meet that, isn’t it? So, now, how much, as well as devotees, should we consciously try to avoid fame? It’s a difficult question. Because, yukta har vihar asti, as we say, that, what is regulated, what is appropriate, for everyone will be. Somebody is more of a brahminical nature, now, for that person, they just be happy in study.
They get some fame from the study, that’s nice. But somebody has a little bit more Kshatriya nature, for them fame is a mood. That it is a natural thing.
In fact, with respect to Dhruva, last time, it is said that, what is that, what is, aho kshatriya tejasam, manamangam amrushalam. That Narada Muni says, how great is the effulgence of the Kshatriyas, that they cannot tolerate dishonor. Manamangam amrushalam.
And he is appreciating that. He is saying that, Dhruva could not tolerate dishonor. And that’s why, now, a small 5 year old child, he left his home, and come to the forest in search for God.
So, now, he was not interested in God, he was interested in human. So, he kept the search for God. So, the point is that, different people, each individual is different.
And, we have to find out, what level, helps us, to focus most on Krishna. So, it’s not, like with respect to food. How much food should somebody eat? Some people, may, may have 2 chapatis.
Some people may eat 10 chapatis. And the point is not, how much and how many chapatis we eat. It’s, what do we do after we eat the chapatis? Do we have, do we keep on serving Krishna? Or, do I feel weirdly heavy and bloated? Or, do I feel like, completely starved and famished? Bhima had a huge appetite.
Raghunath Das Goswami had, little zero appetite. But, both had enormous energy for serving Krishna. Now, you can say, yes, Raghunath Das Goswami is an exalted soul.
That is true, no doubt. But, does that mean Bhima is not an exalted soul? Not necessarily. So, at one level, the body, mind, this is just a machine.
And each machine will work in its own way. So, with respect to, just like how much food is appropriate for a person, that that person has to decide. So, the key principle, is that, food should not become, a competitor, for our attention, when we are trying to offer our attention to Krishna.
So, if the food is too little, it will become a competitor. If the food is too much, it will become a competitor. When it is appropriate, yukta, then it will no longer be a competitor.
So, like that, how much should we sleep? Like, some people have said, less sleeping is not good. There are people who have lived four hours sleep, and they have never had any health problems. So, you know, the body, different people, the body has to sleep.
And, we can’t even say, how much is the right amount. Each person has to decide, how much is the right amount. And, it is driven by, how they function.
So, that’s why, if somebody needs a little more, recognition, and then, they see some symptoms, which involve some level of visibility, some level of, faith. And, they want, they see that, I don’t think, that should disqualify them, from practicing one thing. Now, there is also a difference, between appreciation and gratification.
When we have the word, feeling, we use it in a general sense. So, for example, if somebody has done a valuable service, or he or she has done some service, then, wanting appreciation, is not the need of the devotee, it’s just the need of the heart. So, for example, if, if, we, we decorate the details, or, we, are the one who cook the food, then, we cook some nice delicious food, and then, somebody comes and appreciates.
Maybe, the community, or some senior devotee comes and appreciates. Hey, you did this very well. And, that can be very encouraging for us.
Now, the difference is, why are you telling me, take this mic and tell everyone. That is, glorification. So, appreciation is, the need of the heart.
That is, what I am doing, is valuable, is worthwhile, is useful. So, we all, we all, have a, a need to be useful. That what I am doing, is of some value.
And, when that is recognized, then we feel more connected. So, I think that is perfectly fine. Now, whether to give the glorification, I think yes.
So, I think, we have to manage it accordingly. And, even with respect to sexual energy, I won’t go into the specifics. But, the idea is just like, there is, there is prasad.
There is food. Now, there is food that is offered to Krishna. Food that is, food that is cooked, that is harvested by devotees, that is transported by devotees, that is cooked by devotees, offered by devotees.
Industry of devotees has offered. That is the highest level of it. From there, if somebody is living in a country where there is, or whatever the situation, they just, they just can’t get proper food.
They are not able to cook. Maybe, you know, somebody has a job. If somebody is a medical researcher, then they have to work 20 hours a day.
Otherwise, they have to work for 24 hours, 21 hours, 22 hours a day. Now, they are not, I mean, some of them barely manage to do their business. But, they are not able to cook at that.
They might get whatever food they get. And, they might offer it in the mind of Krishna. And, they take that.
Now, is that a good standard? No. But, is that making them to be successful? No. So, so, just like with the food, there is a whole range.
From, this to this. They can always try to go for another thing. But, like, there is aspirational, there is non-spiritual.
So, sometimes, sex is just a bodily function. It’s like eating. Now, of course, it is much more consequential, in terms of what happens.
So, that consequentiality has to be minimized. But, I mean, it’s just a biological function. So, there is no need to fixate on it so much.
It’s like, somebody may fixate on it, that, just like, monoplastic people, fixate on sex, in terms of, fulfilling it. Spiritual people can fixate on sex, in terms of avoiding it. And, you make the whole standard, sorry, you can make, we define our whole spiritual life, by our capacity to avoid sex.
No. The essence of our spirituality is, how much can we remember Krishna, and how much can we serve Krishna. Hmm? So, now, okay, so there is a range over there.
That’s why there are different ashrams, and there are various facilities out there, various levels out there. So, again, aspirational, non-negotiable level. Each one of us is defined.
And then, one situates oneself accordingly. So, from sex, only for procreation, to sex, within marriage. That’s like, offering like, completely pure and violent food, to offering food to Krishna.
So, it’s a range. Yes, sir? And within that range, each person has to, situate themselves, where they can, and know how to do it. Hmm? Any last questions? I will just, thank you very much for this wonderful talk.
So, if you see the, creation of 24 elements, there, the mind got created in goodness, the intelligence was in passion. But then, in real world, it seems opposite. Why did you say, the mind comes from mode of goodness, and intelligence from mode of passion? Well, there is a three-level answer to it.
So, I will not go into, all the three levels in detail. Because, that’s how Samkhya philosophy is very technical. What happens is, you don’t really understand Samkhya world, you know, this one thing stands out.
Why does this all make sense? So, the simplest way to understand it is, that, goodness, is associated with maintenance. Hmm? Sattva is associated with maintenance. And the mind, maintains our material existence.
Mind maintains our material existence means, okay, eat this, watch this. The mind basically, gives us, proposes, desires, according to what we have decided. Hmm? Okay, you ate this, you watch this, you bought this, you drank this, now who is this going to be? So, the mind, maintains our material existence.
But, now rajas, is what creates. Rajas is what expands. So, now the intelligence, is what, creates new schemes, for material joy.
So, if there is only the mind, without any intelligence, then, okay, whatever is, easily available, that’s for you. Okay, this is our material effect. But, when the intelligence comes up, okay, say, somebody has parental control, and it’s okay, within the parental control, then this side I’ll visit, I’ll watch this, I’ll do this, I’ll do that.
But, when the intelligence comes in, okay, bypass, I bypass the parental control. How can I delete this? Or, how can I, how can I, surf and then, I have no, you don’t put print on that. Now, in southern, in Australia, they ban social media for teenagers.
And, within one week, the sale of VPN has increased, almost 500 times over there. So, what is happening, people are changing their geolocation trackers, and they’re still accessing all social media. So, the point is that, the mind, will stay, within whatever is, experienced, what is happening.
But, the intelligence will create various schemes. That’s why Krishna says, that, Indriyani Mano Buddhiya Stya Nishtha Nucchati. That, karma, selfish desire, or specifically, self-destructive desire, is present, in the senses, is present in the mind, and it is present in the intelligence also.
So, that’s how the idea, the buddhi that we’ve been talking about over here, is what expands our bodily existence. And that’s how it’s associated with the mode of, sorry, mode of passion. One last question.
Yes, sir. Okay. Yeah.
Okay. So, what do I mean by presence and influence? Let’s take another, example to illustrate this. That, when we talk about, the world.
So, we function, for example, because of deities. The deity is Krishna. Now, is the deity, matter? Well, yes.
It is made of matter. It could be marble, it could be wood, it could be whatever. But normally, when we approach the deity, our focus, is not on the materialism.
Our focus is on Mrs. Krishna. It’s like, currency. You take a 500 rupee note.
The currency is paper. But, the currency is so much more than paper, that the fact that it’s paper becomes incidental. Okay, it should not get wet.
I should not accidentally wear it. For that, I need to be aware. But, the fact is that, currency, because of being authorized by the government, it has become so much more than paper, that we don’t treat it as paper.
Does it mean that we forget that it’s paper? No. It’s going to become wet. We are careful, we don’t put currency on paper.
So, like that, for the deities, we are careful that, if we have a wooden deity, we won’t bathe them with water. We won’t bathe them with water. We have to be careful about that.
But beyond that, Mrs. Krishna, we don’t really, we don’t fixate on the fact that, the deity is made of wood. So now, if a deity, if a wooden deity is to be worshipped, then, from, we have got some traditional wood, and from that, Jagannath is to be made. So, why are they naked? So then, when they make it, the sculptors, they have to have the proper manners, that the wood should be strong enough, the wood should not be weak enough.
So, whatever is required, for, for a particular statue, to stand, to hold itself, if the head is very large, and the body is not proportionally strong enough, then everything will collapse. So, whatever is required for functioning, that is required. And now, beyond that, there is a spiritual side, which is the most important for us.
But just because the spiritual side is important, does not mean the functional side has to be expected. When the devotees had built the Rathkarth, in London, when the Rathkarth was started in San Francisco, and they were doing it in America, and North America, in Monte Carlo places, the devotees came to, you came first, and they decided to build the Rathkarth. And these devotees were young and ambitious.
So, they said, we will make our Rathkarth, bigger than all the other Rathkarths that have been built. So, they made the Rathkarth huge, in vertical direction. But unfortunately, they did not make the width sufficiently large, proportionally.
And they were going on the roads, and suddenly the Rath collapsed. And now, at that time, nobody knew what the Rathkarth was. So, the devotees presented, the press had come, the media had come, the public had come.
The devotees presented to everyone as if, the collapse of the Rath was a part of the history. But still, it was, because the disaster is obvious. So, then the devotees wrote to Prabhupada.
And they said, Prabhupada, did the Rathakarth collapse, because of our poor devotion? And Prabhupada replied, no, it collapsed because of your poor engineering. So, what do you mean by that? That the material functions are important. So, like that, if you consider the body and mind, it’s a machine.
And from machine’s perspective, from what’s functioning, a certain composition is required. So, in that sense, sattva, vidya, sthamas, all three, are functional components of the way the body functions. So, if you consider, in the body, this constant creation maintains, destruction happens.
Cells are dying, cells are being created, cells are being manipulated. So, all three needs to go on and on. That’s what a functional person is.
Now, from the moral perspective, what it means is, which is the best way for me to go closer to Krishna? So, when I’m making my decisions in life, it is best if I make my decisions when I’m in support. Then I’ll be able to choose wisely, I’ll be able to act wisely. That’s what we’re talking about.
So, what something is made of, and what something is meant for. They’re two different questions. So, if a deity is made of particular elements, then those elements have to be in proper balance for the deity to exist.
In other words, it has to be in proper balance. What something is made of, and what something is meant for. The deity is meant for us to have a facility by Krishna manifesting in this world.
And that’s what primary purpose is. So, what something is meant for is more important. But what something is made of is not unimportant.
If somebody has diabetes, and somebody gives them Tirupati Vahajipustan, a nice big one. They say, this is sugar, please don’t take this. This is prasad.
You take prasad, what is going to happen? Well, the soul will get purified, and sugar will get added. This is going to work. The insulin creates fun.
So, the point is that, there’s a material dimension which cannot be neglected. So, then what do we do? Now, we may take a small portion, or we may take some non-significant prasad. We have to, we cannot fixate on the material side of things, but we can’t completely neglect the material side of things.
So, that’s the, from the body’s functional perspective, the three gunas are, that way, need to be present. But, when we are making decisions, we focus on living our existence as a guna, not in the moment.