​Why do we give more importance to our material relationships than our devotee relationships?

Answer Podcast

Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
So why do we give more priority to our family relationships than our external relationships? Personally that is not necessarily bad because our family relationships are also important and there are two extremes that we have our spiritual life and our spiritual relationships, spiritual practices and we may have family, professional and other practices. There is paradharma, there is aparadharma. Paradharma is transcendental religion and aparadharma is material religion.
Now aparadharma is also important and of course as compared to paradharma, aparadharma should definitely become more important but aparadharma is also important. So one misconception is that the paradharma alone is important and there is no need for any aparadharma. All the material relationships, they are simply material, they are unimportant, they are entangling, they are distracting.
I should focus only on my relationship with Krishna and only my relationship with those who are related to Krishna. Now this is a superficial understanding because we, even if we say that we are devotees or we are serious devotees, still we live in the material world, we still have material bodies and we still function in certain material norms in this world. So therefore for functioning in this world our aparadharma is also important.
So to reject the aparadharma is a superficial understanding of how are these practices sustainable. The other extreme is to take aparadharma itself as all important. Think that if I am taking care of my family, if I am taking care of my children, if I am ensuring that they are well educated, that they get married and settle, then I have done my duties, I don’t need to do anything other for God.
That is also a misunderstanding. So the balanced understanding is that both have to be given importance. And because we have relationship of blood or relationship based on the body with our family members and because although we are souls and we are trying to develop spiritual consciousness, we are largely at the material level of consciousness at present.
So naturally that’s where our emotions are more concentrated because things connected with the body. Wherever our consciousness is, that is where our emotions are. And so for example, somebody is attached to cricket, then something happens in some match far away and suddenly the person gets agitated.
Hey, how did this person get up? Why did this happen, that happened? Because the consciousness is there, the emotions are there. So our consciousness is in the material level. So our emotions are caught in the material level, in material relationships.
That is to some extent natural, but within our devotee relationships, we can find out those devotees with whom we can relate very nicely and focus on those relationships, on strengthening those relationships. And even if it’s one or two relationships that we can focus on and strengthen, and from that as those relationships become stronger and stronger, we will, not that our material relationships will become weaker, but our material relationships will be able to spiritualize more and more. So as we can, as our own heart becomes purified, as in our own consciousness Krishna becomes more and more prominent, then for those whose lives Krishna is more and more prominent, we will have more in common with them.
And then our relationship with them also becomes stronger. So it’s a process of gradual elevation of consciousness that will ensure that our Vaishnava relationships become significantly important for us. But in the sadhaka stage, we can focus on at least one or two relationships and make sure that we are duly committed in those devotional relationships.
And by that we will be able to go towards Krishna and spiritualize other relationships also. Does it answer your question?