19961204 Bhagavad-gītā 2.14

The following is a class given by His Holiness Jayapatāka Swami Mahārāja on December 4th, 1996, in Copenhagen. The class begins with the reading from Bhagavad-gītā 2^nd Chapter Verse 14

mātrā-sparśās tu kaunteya
śītoṣṇa-sukha-duḥkha-dāḥ
āgamāpāyino ’nityās
tāṁs titikṣasva bhārata

Translation: O son of Kunti translation the nonpermanent appearance of happiness and distress, and their disappearance in due course, are like the appearance and disappearance of winter and summer seasons. They arise from sense perception, O scion of Bharata, and one must learn to tolerate them without being disturbed. 

Purport: In the proper discharge of duty, one has to learn to tolerate nonpermanent appearances and disappearances of happiness and distress. According to Vedic injunction, one has to take his bath early in the morning even during the month of Māgha (January-February). It is very cold at that time, but in spite of that a man who abides by the religious principles does not hesitate to take his bath. Similarly, a woman does not hesitate to cook in the kitchen in the months of May and June, the hottest part of the summer season. “Especially in India it is very hot Denmark may not be so hot May and June in India is about 48 you don’t need fire to cook” One has to execute his duty in spite of climatic inconveniences. Similarly, to fight is the religious principle of the kṣatriyas, and although one has to fight with some friend or relative, one should not deviate from his prescribed duty. One has to follow the prescribed rules and regulations of religious principles in order to rise up to the platform of knowledge, because by knowledge and devotion only can one liberate himself from the clutches of māyā (illusion).

The two different names of address given to Arjuna are also significant. To address him as Kaunteya signifies his great blood relations from his mother’s side; and to address him as Bhārata signifies his greatness from his father’s side. From both sides he is supposed to have a great heritage. A great heritage brings responsibility in the matter of proper discharge of duties; therefore, he cannot avoid fighting.

Thus ends the Bhaktivedanta translation & purport of Text 14 Chapter 2 of the Bhagavad-gītā as It is Contents of the Gītā Summarised.

Jayapatākā Swami: So here the contents of the Bhagavad-gītā is describing two kinds of happiness there is a higher inner happiness which is not dependent on the material situation or body than there is the happiness of the senses the basic idea is that in the material life the very thing that one time gives us happiness will also give us distress just like right now a heater is appreciated because it is winter but If the heater was on in the summer it probably won’t appreciate everyone or a fan, in India there are many fans in the hot weather everyone wants the fan blowing to get some breeze but in the winter if you turn the fan on than people feel it is too cold so because our bodies are relative little different from the standard situation we feel inconvenience, so it is very easy for the same thing that gives us happiness to also give us suffering, something, so the purpose of human life is meant that we should actually try to realize who we are, where we come from what is the purpose of life in the higher sense, that is what human life is meant for otherwise there are so many different species of life according to the Vedas the humans did not evolve here in the earth as scientist they are always looking to find the missing link and they always say they are just about to find it. Sometimes even the archeologist have cheated like in England there was a famous case where they put orangutan jaw with the human skull called it plingtom man or something and for 40 years everyone thought that was the missing link than they had realized they had taken a monkey’s jaw and broken the chin down and filed the teeth down to look like human teeth and smashed the connection where the jaw connects so that you couldn’t  tell that it was monkey jaw as it really looked and later on they had found that it was actually a hoax but according to the Vedas we have come from another planet we have come here from Manu sent down from a higher planet and we are the descendants of Manu and mankind are endowed especially with higher intelligence to understand the difference between matter and spirit. Matter Is basically dull energy has no consciousness and the spirit is conscious energy so we are actually the spirit and this gross body is made of matter and it is like a machine “yantrārūḍhāni māyayā (Bg. 18.61)” that we are seated and we are getting information from the different parts of the body it is a very simple concept but difficult for many people to understand when the living force leaves the body the body is called dead, we are actual the living force we are not the body although the bodies are connected to us, just like people drive around in a Mercedes, BMW, Jaguar, Rolls Royce or small compact car people tend to identify the person with what car he is driving but that does not mean the person is really the car Hello Mr. Mercedes, hello Mr. BMW, Mr. Johnson, Mr.Olson so many other so but the mistake is happening in the modern world these people are identifying with the body and everything Is being put on the body whatever temporary happiness that the body feels pleasant sensation we think that is happiness but we cannot always feel pleasant sensation because the same things that make us feel happy will make us feel distress so there is always this problem we cannot get a truly happy situation as long as we are basing our happiness on the body. So, the Vedas say the human being have the intelligence to be able to rise above with this identification of the body and to realize we are the living force in the body and not the body. Just like the animals they have got intelligence for instance say that there Is a cat, cats like to eat fish now there may be a lady cooking fish in her kitchen and the cat would be just waiting outside the door and the lady goes somewhere else run in and steal the fish and run off so that means the cat has got intelligence has to wait till the lady went off or the cat is waiting to catch him out for eating they have intelligence for how to have to defend themselves in the fight they have intelligence they have all kinds of intelligence for the grosser things of life but they don’t have the intelligence to understand that I am not a cat, imagine trying to convince a cat that you are not a cat, try to convince a dog dear dog you are not really a dog there is no hope, see what we are really trying to do is convince all of you that you are not human beings that you are a living force within the human body but because you have a human body which has enough potential to realize this so therefore we are trying to explain to you when we call a meeting we get human beings here when we call meetings cats and dogs are not going to come but humans can come because they have this potential to realize the higher esoteric aspect of life. Know a days we have experience of this we had a big conference in Atlanta called couple of years ago where Bhakti Tīrtha Swami Mahārāja, myself and few para-psychologist and a regarding OHD, OBE out of body experience and there was one this para-psychologist that one person he had said he had done 10,000 regressions of different people by taking them back by hypnosis there previous life and then and also saw many other case of OBE out of body experience and what was really amazing was that my mother was their visiting the temple for the festival and when she heard the seminar going on and at the end we asked her comments and question she said I never realized this before that I had a out of body experience when they were operating on me I had a mannerism when a vein or artery gets busted In the head and were operating on her, I was floating around and looking at the doctors and a lady sitting up and I never realized it was me, know that you have explained this I realized that I have seen myself and I didn’t understand what was going on at that time and the para-psychologist was explaining how some people they didn’t believe it but in one case the person went out of the hospital room in his subtle body. According to the Vedas we have two bodies gross and one subtle, subtle is like an astro body and that body you can leave the gross body, this person was from Russia it was a big story I don’t remember all the details but somehow he went out and on the ledge of the hospital there was something a glove or something which was lying here but it was not visible from the window above or below because it is just a little you can only see if you are a bird or something that because he went out of the window for a second he happened to see that and came back, he saw the doctor’s speaking so when he came back they thought he was dead, he came back to consciousness and told them of what happened and then they said well you must have just over heard us the anesthesia must have not been complete, he said no but even I went out of the window and there was glove or something there on the ledge and then they went and looked and you know they had to really bend over and see and they found it was there, there was no other way of knowing so than they had to believe it that it is actually true, so many cases like this so the Vedas if you really understand who we are than we act not as a body but as a embodied living spirit we become much happier, if we act in a proper way we can actually achieve the real happiness but we need to prepare our self we need to build up our spiritual strength. Now there is a history probably you would have heard about the story of a young carpenter who went to the forest to gather wood in the jungles of Bengal, how many of you have heard about a tiger? So the tigers live in the jungle in Bengal. There was a young carpenter he wanted to go to the jungle to get some wood because in the jungle in those days it is an old story, they did not have forest rangers or ecological guards or anything like this so people could go to the forest at their own risk and get wood and he was a carpenter so he would make tables and book stands, what not different things so he was going there with his saw and his implements heading towards the forest and then an old carpenter spotted him where are you going? I am going to the jungle. What for? I want to get some wood, but what you don’t have any weapon you have to be very careful there is a tiger eating people, you should take some weapon with you to protect yourself otherwise don’t go into the forest without any protection ok thank you but then the young carpenter thought what does this old carpenter know I have got my saw if a tiger comes I will just saw a branch off a tree I will swing the branch around my head and I will scare away the tiger good idea that was his plan I don’t need any kind of weapon. So then he went into the forest and he was sawing wood and collecting so much wood and then he was in a little … and on the other side he saw a teeny baby tiger not very big only like about 3 meter long not like big 4 meters, 2.75 meters 3 to 4 years old and the tiger was slowly running to him so than oh my goodness he starts sawing quickly on the branch sawing, sawing, sawing, ohhh and the tiger just leaped on him and he was finished in a minute he just swiped his neck and break it there wasn’t enough of time it’s not that tigers give you now a warning here I come and he is going to saw a branch off it is totally a impractical idea you are going to have enough time to saw a branch off when a tiger comes. So, when the villagers heard that the young carpenter got killed by a tiger they were very unhappy very sad to hear that a young life was spoiled foolishly he didn’t take advice, again that night it so happened that the or the next day one Hare Kṛṣṇa preacher was visiting the village and he was chanting with them

Hare Kṛṣṇa Hare Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa Hare Hare
Hare Rāma Hare Rāma Rāma Rāma Hare Hare

Hare Kṛṣṇa Hare Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa Hare Hare
Hare Rāma Hare Rāma Rāma Rāma Hare Hare

So they chanted late into the night and they had a nice class of Bhagavad-gītā and they were very happy and then he took rest and when they got up in the morning they found the Hare Kṛṣṇa preacher was gone, so where is he gone, he is gone into the jungle oh no there is a ferocious tiger there and something may happen to him so all the villagers they took there shot guns and there bows and arrows weapons and they went in to protect, the devotee he didn’t know that there is a dangerous tiger there who had eaten a carpenter few days before. So, they were following his footsteps and they were following deep into the jungle than they heard some roaring and then they said oh no they got little closer following the footsteps and they heard some chanting

Hare Kṛṣṇa Hare Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa Hare Hare
Hare Rāma Hare Rāma Rāma Rāma Hare Hare

Hare Kṛṣṇa Hare Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa Hare Hare
Hare Rāma Hare Rāma Rāma Rāma Hare Hare

Haribol what is this chanting and then they looked through the jungle bushes looked and there they saw the Hare Kṛṣṇa devotee chanting and there were tigers dancing, deer were dancing, bear’s all animals were dancing and raising there head nobody was envious against one another they were all overwhelmed with love chanting in the forest and then they thought well if you have this kind of potency what do you need guns for you see they came to protect him but he is already in a very fearless position of course we cannot imitate this very great devotee haha but there are some devotees who have that type of pure chanting. So, this story is a analogical story to test you philosophical acumen whether what you can see who the different characters represent philosophically each of the character story represent a different philosophy of life. The first is the young carpenter who does the carpenter represent? Which philosophy of life is that? Any one knows here he was trying to control his senses, he was going to protect himself just at the moment of danger by taking some remedial action, what type of possessor of self-realization and things like that, you see the mystic yogīs, the mystic yogīs they are meditating through the haṭha-yoga meditation not all the time, everyday sometime and they are hoping that when there is danger they can just go into a meditation and be able to protect themselves from the danger of mental and physical agitation but when suddenly one gets disturbed it is very difficult for them to come into meditation, you see the disturbance comes without a warning and if it had to come it is difficult to protect yourself like that. So, the young carpenter is like someone who is doing a part time yoga and not really leading a life in spirituality therefore when they try to protect themselves from some disturbance all of a sudden that comes upon them if they are not able to do so on a consistent basis and eventually, they get overwhelmed, well than we have all the villagers with the guns and bows and arrows who do they represent? Karma. Karma-kāṇḍa. These are people who depend on their good works, no I am a good person I am doing good work so nothing is going to happen wrong. So, they are depending on their good pious activities there good works to protect them but therefore also like the weapons that they carry the good works to protect them but it is a fearful condition because danger can also come even if you have a weapon in danger you have to defend so they are not in a fearless position but they are keeping their equilibrium by doing good works, being charitable and kind to others but they don’t have the higher spiritual understanding therefore they are also in a fearful condition, they are good people but they are not transcendental so they are having fear also and now we have the Hare Kṛṣṇa preacher who was singing and getting all the animals to chant and dance in ecstasy this is probably the easiest kick. Who does he represent? Who is that guy? You are sure yaa he is representing Bhakti-yoga now here is the hard one all the animals that are dancing in ecstasy who do they represent? What do they represent? They don’t represent a philosophical but they represent some object in the material world something in the material world, the senses and the and the senses the you can say the wicked or the harmful tendencies that man, the vices, to be cruel, to be angry, to be mad or something those or anything in that area because the senses can become angry or can become illusioned. So, even good people do crazy things sometimes too so how to control that? Now the devotee he is always engaging his senses in Kṛṣṇa’s service therefore the senses are controlled, and they are no longer a source of danger. You see for everyone else the senses like the karma-kāṇḍī who is doing good work he keeps engaging the senses in good works more or less he can keep the things but not all the time, sometimes he will also do things he or she will regret and just like first the carpenter his senses sometimes go out of control even though he is doing bhakti-yoga and things but it is not all the time in control. If we want to be peaceful then we have to be able to have control at least over our own body and mind and be able to decide when we want to do something and when we don’t want to do something, otherwise we are just being carried away by the senses that puts us in all kinds of situations sometimes things make us very happy and sometimes things make us distressed. So the Bhakti yogī because of engaging his senses in Kṛṣṇa’s service he got all the animals to chant, so if we our senses to engage in Kṛṣṇa’s service than in this way it is very easy to control. You see the haṭha-yoga system or the eight-fold yoga system what one does is one is supposed to go deep within himself and stop sensual activity which hardly anybody can do this is very difficult. But the Bhakti-yoga system is that all the senses should be used in the service of Kṛṣṇa. So we have 5 knowledge gathering senses we have the taste the tongue, how do we engage the sense of taste in Kṛṣṇa service, prasādam how many of you like Kṛṣṇa prasādam we do have some prasādam today that we offer at the end, already everybody had, you had so that is how we can control the sense of taste by eating Kṛṣṇa prasādam, eating spiritualized food then we can control the tongue that way instead of saying don’t eat anything which is not possible have to eat something, so than we eat food which is spiritualized which is prepared and which is vegetarian spiritualized so that gives us the spiritual input through eating. The sense of smell how can we use the sense of smell? Flowers offered to Kṛṣṇa yaa we could, this were offered to Gaura-Nitāi you can pass it around and use your sense of smell, alright I don’t know if I will have all the objects available to satisfy all your senses. Then we have ok the sense of sight what can we use the sight so we can look at the beautiful picture of Kṛṣṇa, you can look at the beautiful deities, you can look at the devotees that is hearing how do we use hearing? Hearing Kṛṣṇa’s glories, hearing the chanting, the singing, hearing the lecture, hearing some kind of transcendental vibration so many kinds of music are now being used in Kṛṣṇa service so it is a wide range but something which will remind us of Kṛṣṇa will also continue our link, the idea is to remain linked with Kṛṣṇa, then we have the sense of touch how can we use the sense of touch in Kṛṣṇa’s service? What you said you can touch the devotees you can touch the devotee’s lotus feet, worshipping the deity, touching your japa-mālā, working for Kṛṣṇa, anything else, distributing prasādam even within this category one can have children for Krishan some different ways you can use your senses the idea is the purpose is always directed towards pleasing Kṛṣṇa so bhakti-yoga meditation that is why we sing and we dance and we clap our hands or we take spiritual food or we do some service use our bodies in different ways some active kind of meditation occasionally we do silent meditation few minutes in a day but generally we do different types of meditation in action. So in this way it is easy for anyone to do because everybody is already doing things it is not you know, it is very hard to tell someone to stop doing everything sit down and don’t think, stop thinking ok just think about this mantra

Hare Kṛṣṇa Hare Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa Hare Hare
Hare Rāma Hare Rāma Rāma Rāma Hare Hare

You can hear, you can chant and you can hear by hearing you just try to concentrate on that mantra. The mantra is transcendental vibration this way it is spiritualized just like if you put a piece of steel with a magnet than the iron becomes magnetized. If you put iron inside a fire then after a while the iron becomes red hot, it becomes just like fire, if we put ourself in contact in connection with Kṛṣṇa yoga means connection to link up when we are putting ourself in connection with Kṛṣṇa in pure spirit then we become spiritualized become elevated automatically so in this way we can tolerate different experiences we can understand that in material life there is ups and downs but eventually one starts to experience spiritual emotion a spiritual experience which is beyond sense perception it is just on a higher level a happiness which is not dependent on how our senses feel that is impossible to explain what that feeling is like just as much because it is a subjective realization. How many have you ever experienced that chanting Hare Kṛṣṇa doing service some kind of inner happiness which wasn’t dependent on the senses any of you experienced so many of you. The only way to experience is by doing it that is why we are always asking people please chant Hare Kṛṣṇa please people think, we don’t know what people think but the reason we are asking because we have experienced some special feelings some special emotion, special experiences by chanting Hare Kṛṣṇa and serving Kṛṣṇa and we like everyone to also feel that happiness as well. Many people have tried and experimented with sense happiness but then they find well sense happiness goes on we just try to control that in productive way level but the real thing is to be able to experience the higher happiness or bliss which is known in Sanskrit as paramānanda supreme happiness. The supreme happiness is not limited Lord Nityānanda Prabhu he once was inviting the whole world I request everyone to chant Hare Kṛṣṇa I want to give you spiritual happiness Kṛṣṇa conscious happiness this is a kind of happiness which is not mixed with suffering, you see here we saw that happiness distress it is just like a two sides of the same coin, when you are in freezing cold you come into the warm oh I feel so good to be in the warm after the cold so you fell warm you feel good because it is cold so our happiness is based upon because we were suffering it was too cold or if it is too hot you get into some cool oh I feel so good now because it is cool. So what we think as suffering is just that what we think as happiness is actually now we are not suffering it is not a pure happiness, little bit of sensation of happiness maybe there but by large it is also mixed with the fact that we were suffering you were feeling some distress and know we are relieved from that distress for a moment and we think oh now I am happy, so but this is kind of a like you give a little baby one of those rubber things they suck on placebo when you don’t have a bottle of milk, candy or something the mother is too busy to feed the baby than sometimes they put this rubber thing into the mouth and uchup uchup he is trying but nothing come out you know it looks like it has something but nothing comes, like that this is like material nature we know that we should get happiness, we know but instead we are given this material experience and we are trying to get happiness guess what we are not getting the real juice that we are looking for that is why we go from one thing to the next to the next looking for the real happiness. Well his Divine Grace HH Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupāda he can from India to the west to tell us if you want the real happiness, the real happiness comes under spiritual level the level of the self beyond the physical and the mental plane and this chanting of the Hare Kṛṣṇa mahā-mantra will elevate the consciousness to that level so that you can experience the pure unadulterated happiness and that is what Nityānanda Prabhu is saying I want to give you happiness which is not mixed or dependent on suffering a pure unadulterated complete happiness that is totally satisfying to the soul just to give us the chance to human being to be liberated from the material conditioning the spirit soul like the free light, the free sky we don’t want this conditioning of material birth and rebirth but now we are locked into it by the laws of karma. So, by the process of Kṛṣṇa consciousness, the process of bhakti-yoga we can become liberated from this material conditioning and we can experience the happiness which is on the level of the love of Kṛṣṇa. The love is the greatest happiness and the greatest fulfillment and that is what we are looking for everybody is looking for love but the real in this world you have to give up there is no real love so we think there isn’t any love but actually on a higher level there is love and that is known as prema or Kṛṣṇa prema. We have a devotee here who is known as Kṛṣṇa Prema Dāsa and Kṛṣṇa-prema means the pure love of Kṛṣṇa. So, I live in Māyāpur in India which is a place where it is said Kṛṣṇa-prema is easily available one can get this experience of love of Kṛṣṇa very easily over there, so people come from all over the world to spend few weeks there and try to get some experience of higher spiritual happiness fortunately some people do experience that in a period of time. Sometimes we go out camping for a week we go around the different islands just like in Copenhagen and in Denmark there are many islands, in Māyāpur we used to have nine islands some of these the rivers have separated the different islands have cooled up because of ecological problems but still some of the islands are there know not fully nine but spiritually we can see where the nine islands were so we walk to these nine islands some we go by boat some we walk and in this way we pass our time chanting Hare Kṛṣṇa and discussing about Kṛṣṇa. So, by performing this it is called the parikrama or circumambulation of the holy abode in Navadvīpa the nine islands one starts to experience higher state of consciousness very easily. So that is a special booster even our regular devotees come for that boost those who can make it Māyāpur we invite everyone to come, you can of course be charging your spiritual batteries by taking those five processes we said using all your senses in Kṛṣṇa’s service chanting Hare Kṛṣṇa, if you ever have a chance please come and visit us in Māyāpur our Gaṅgādāsa is also staying there with his family he came on this tour to assist me. So how much should I ask questions know or how much long should I speak.

On dhāma consciousness: We take the blessing from the holy dhāma and then we go anywhere in the world and spread the, spread the love of Kṛṣṇa around, one can live in the dhāma or one can also live in separation feel that, that’s my residence just like now people travel with there passport and they live in different countries but there ideal passport they think well I am Italian, I am Swedish, I am Danish or German like that but what is our original home spiritually the soul come from the spiritual world, spiritual world embassy in this world is Vṛndāvana and Māyāpur so it is that we are going to our embassy we really don’t belong on this planet we belong in the spiritual world where there is no birth, no death, no old age, no disease where we can eternally be with Kṛṣṇa and his associates. So, in that way if one can’t physically visi the dhāma you can mentally visit and remember Vṛndāvana and Māyāpur or one can, just by instance if you remember the Ganges even if you chant the name of the Ganges very loud you can also get the benefit of being bathed by Ganges water. In fact when you take a shower just shout Gaṅgā than you are getting the Ganges bath you can try this now withing one hundred thousand yojanas or eight hundred thousand miles of Ganges we are not that far away we are pretty close you shout out Ganga than Ganga will bathe your consciousness, so we can try Gangaaa!, Gangaaa!, Gangaaa! You didn’t respond I will do first and then you follow Gangaaa!, Gangaaa!, Gangaaa! By repeated bathing in the Ganges if you get association with the devotees that is even more effective you had a Ganges bath. Now we want to wherever Prabhupāda went he changed people just by being with him so what devotees do they voluntarily give association they are trying to uplift people who are in this material state of consciousness you have to be very patient and tolerant of other people conditioning just like a doctor can you imagine if a doctor was intolerant of disease. I will practice medicine but I don’t wont toe see any disease he is in the wrong profession right, so we need to have spiritual doctors who can but they have to be tolerant of people who are sick, who are diseased, who are conditioned by material conditioning. The nature of the spirit is sat cit ānanda to be eternally filled with knowledge, blissful always to be happy you don’t need to have artificial crutches, drugs or other things to be happy if we have happiness coming from the spiritual platform, so that is why we want everyone to be happy Prabhupāda said mission of the Hare Kṛṣṇa movement is that all people to be happy in general they should become freed from the liberated from the conditioning of material life the contamination of material life and thus when they leave the body they will be eligible to go back home to the spiritual world this is our purpose he wrote that in a letter in 1969 to Tamāla Kṛṣṇa Maharaj. So, who doesn’t want to be happy? Who wouldn’t like to be liberated from contamination? and who wouldn’t like to be able to go back to the spiritual world and  have eternal life at the end of this life so it is not something like we have a product for people should like but sometimes these people are not aware of the alternatives so you have to pay something else than so we take it like that I really like to be with Kṛṣṇa in Māyāpur, Vṛndāvana but because once Lord Caitanya said we should help the people in Denmark and all the people of the world because he predicted that in every town and village of the whole world his message would be spread therefore we are here to please him, to try to give people the love of God, Lord Caitanya that way we can be mentally living in Māyāpur and physically we may be anywhere. I hope so, I hope that I can live in Māyāpur wherever I go.

On yuga-dharma: Well in previous ages a person could be materially happy more than this age they could also achieve spiritual goals previous yugas, but where you have a situation that you can achieve your material goals sometimes people think well lets put the spiritual goal in the back and take care of my material goal first, so this yuga is considered to be very good for spiritual goals because it is such a horrible age materially that we cannot achieve any material goal haha even say a person you want to be happy so they plan and even they get money but than you now family life doesn’t work out or this doesn’t work out too much tax or whatever some you know, it is such a horrible time that no matter how much you try to make an arrangement to be materially happy we get frustrated in different ways so this very good for spiritual life materially it is not very good but of course there is happiness it is not that some people you know getting a momentary happiness but if you kind of added up it was very interesting. I wish I wanted to I take clippings from the newspapers but sometimes I don’t take it, when I travel around, I see something interesting thing I get I take it. Some scientist, scientist do all kinds of studies, there was this sociologist social scientist and he studied, he did a interview something like 10,000 people from all over the world different back ground to find out who is happy, you know who is the actually happy and he found that and what is happiness you know you are trying to put it into some scientific box this is happiness and interesting study. So, he found that generally his conclusion that nobody was happy haha he said that people would save up and go on a vacation and for two weeks on the vacation maybe they would feel happy knowing that I am on a vacation oh mentally you know phycid up for it and then they came back that euphoria would last about two weeks and after that they would be same whatever they were before there would be no change and there is a saying you get this little glimpse of momentarily feeling that things are really good but the general mood he said that they are not in the position they want to be they have so many other things they need to have to be really happy so he did the whole study had the percentages and everything he said only about 10% of the people at any given point of time feel that they are happy and that he said but that is also not permanent not that they are always happy it is just that, that happens to be, I forget It had all it was a big thing sounds like a interesting report because his conclusion was basically what we are saying what we already know but it takes a scientist to put it all in facts and figures to tell everybody what they know already, if let me tell one thing however In the Śrīmad Bhāgavatam it is said if you do one material goals to be achieved or if you want just to be liberated from material life and end the material condition life or if you are without any desire and you simply want to serve god serve Krishan and achieve love for Kṛṣṇa than in that case for all the three objectives one should render pure devotional service to Kṛṣṇa “akāmaḥ sarva-kāmo vā mokṣa-kāma udāra-dhīḥ

tīvreṇa bhakti-yogena yajeta puruṣaṁ param” you should do pure devotion to Kṛṣṇa unadulterated devotion you don’t put any condition just serve Kṛṣṇa and Kṛṣṇa knows what you want more than what you know. If you have all kind of material goals and if you chant Hare Kṛṣṇa, Kṛṣṇa will help you get your material goals also in his own way sometimes the person is not ready to get the goals that they want, if they have that goal they may actually fall apart. Like the famous movie star’s, they get so much fame they get so frustrated they commit suicide Marilyn Monroe and other famous cases Janis Joplin many rock and roll stars they end up over dosing or something they cant handle whatever they achieve. So, Kṛṣṇa first of all he will prepare someone to get whatever they want of course if someone wants something really destructive then Kṛṣṇa is not the right let me say it is generally a holistic kind of happiness something goal which is not for the destruction of anybody if someone’s goal Is to destroy the whole world well Kṛṣṇa will probably not help because he doesn’t harm others to give you what you want but to give someone any material goal he can do that unlimited wealth or fame whatever he can do that it is not that very easy for him. In fact, it is said Kṛṣṇa gives away material things very easily and gives away liberation very easily what he normally hides Is his pure love because if somebody become a lover of Kṛṣṇa than Kṛṣṇa become obliged to that person any way this is very esoteric, so actually the greatest thing to get is devotion of Kṛṣṇa but that is the hardest thing to get normally but Caitanya Mahāprabhu is giving away that very easily but whether you want bad or you have material goals or you have a combination of material and spiritual goals Kṛṣṇa can fulfill all this in this age the sacrifice Is the Hare Kṛṣṇa mahā-mantra there is a verse in the Bhāgavatam “Kṛte yad dhyāyato viṣṇuṁ” that in the Satya-yuga the process was meditation the sacrifice for achieving desired goal was meditation “tretāyāṁ yajato makhaiḥ” In Treta-yuga it was the fire sacrifice “dvāpare paricaryāyāṁ” in the Dwapara Yuga bronze age it was worshipping the deity in the temple “kalau tad dhari-kīrtanāt” and in the Kali-yuga the process is chanting the holy name of Hari “Hare Kṛṣṇa Hare Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa Hare Hare Hare Rāma Hare Rāma Rāma Rāma Hare Hare” now if you have all kinds of material goals and if you are chanting Hare Kṛṣṇa than Kṛṣṇa can give those also you have to watch out like Dhruva Mahārāja he was approaching Kṛṣṇa to achieve material goal he wanted a kingdom greater than his father he had a whole list of things that he wanted not a very long list a very short list but very big he wanted a planet that would be greater than his father, his father was a very big personality in the universe and finally Kṛṣṇa revealed himself to small Dhruva and then he told Dhruva what is it that you want, so Dhruva he was so amazed to be able to see the supreme personality the supreme Godhead the supreme spiritual being was so beautiful, so effulgent that he realized that whatever I wanted is nothing compared to be in connection with this personality so he didn’t ask for anything but than Kṛṣṇa said that no what is it that you want, he said whatever I wanted was like broken glass pieces but I got instead cut diamond piece. I simply want to serve you I don’t want to be separated from you now that I have achieved you whatever else I wanted is insignificant he said no but you wanted a kingdom greater than you father you wanted to have a long life so I am going to bless you for 60,000 years you will be the, you will be the undisputed king of your empire and after that you will have a planet, the planet wont be destroyed the north pole Dhruvaloka the planet of Dhruva so it is fixed here in Denmark you get to see the North pole when it is not overcast, you don’t know the polestar, so Dhruva said no I wanted those things but now I don’t want these I want to be with you he said no you wanted those I am giving you, so I am afraid what if I forget you, no I will also bless you that at the end you will come back to me you can have all your goals. So if you do have goals material goals Kṛṣṇa will also help you fulfill that you have to be careful if you really want to go back to Kṛṣṇa in the fast track you would want to reduce your material goals otherwise Kṛṣṇa may you know fulfill what you want he knows more what you want and make you happy, sometimes you go to Simon Sir I want a 1000 dollars or 10,000 Krones you get it oh nothing I can’t even buy a car with that I need a 100,000 so really I need a million I need a 10 million you go back again this person is never going to be happy with less than 50 million but if I give him 50 million know he will be finished. So, first I have to make him go through a few tests of life and build up a character a bit than I will give him everything he needs actually he is like that he, it is a package arrangement for than you have to watch out if you are really, he will give you what you desire in a positive way it may not be the best thing but if you want it he will give it to you. So, the devotees are advised better not to desire material, too many material goals nothing is in contradiction with our serving Kṛṣṇa because it may delay us in our path or something often, we can still reach if one has desires what to do. So, this is the best way If one has all desires no desires or just wants to get liberated.

On bona-fide Guru: Well how do you think how to analyze a spiritual master? Put him under a microscope? Anyone know how to analyze a spiritual master? Yes a very important thing is we should hear if you can tell about a spiritual master how he looks but what he says he should know the absolute truth, he should know the spiritual science should be able to dispel the doubts of the disciple, aspiring disciple because when we are in doubt when we are confused what to do, what not to do that time we go to the Guru he should have the capacity and we should have the faith to listen to what he is saying, so when that happens there is a symptom that this is a bona fide guru, so the guru should know the absolute truth, should know the Bhāgavatam and Bhagavad-gītā and should be living by it not that someone just knows it but doesn’t practice it but they should know it and also should be practicing it and they should be able to train others to do the same. It is like India you have many people that have …. Knowledge its like if somebody is really in touch with the spiritual source and everything then they should be having that spiritual happiness, so that means they will be independent of so many mundane sources of happiness. So there was one of the one of our preachers was visiting one temple in India there was a big speaker there the head of the temple and he was speaking afterwards he came to meet him in his quarters and their he happened to see the person open up his refrigerator and there he had beer and he had meat and then he said oh I thought you were a spiritual person but why are you having meat and oh what, what are you doing? He closed the refrigerator, "It is none of your business." Why are you having those things? He said whatever I speak in the temple is the real thing but my private life is my private life but that is not the bona fide Guru to be a Guru means you sacrifice a lot your private life your life belongs to Kṛṣṇa because you are guiding a disciple who belongs to them so there is no private life or very little householder have a little but for a sannyāsī disciple there could be no private life we are always with devotees we are always with others and our life has to be like a open book what we are doing there are no secrets so that should be according to what scriptures so we are doing devotional service, we are chanting Hare Kṛṣṇa we are living a pure sāttvika that means a life of pure goodness. So like that one has to see whether the guru is following what he said, if you ask questions he answers properly and whether we have the faith to follow his instructions so in that sense before taking initiation before taking shelter we must be sure that this Is a proper person. There are many people that so called gurus that come around you pay them money and they will give you initiation or they will give just some very freely they will give initiation both are not necessarily very useful one has to know, one has to see because it is an obligation. I asked one of these guru’s one time I said how many people have you initiated he said 2000 and I said you require that any of them should come up to some spiritual standard he said no I was just told to give them some mantras than to visit them and they give me some donation and like this so how many of you know that whenever you initiate someone you have to take responsibility for their karma’s and you have to guide them to become out of the material world so, really my father never told me that I will have to take all their karmas he said well that is what the śāstras….. this is very dangerous for me nobody told me like that. I said how many of the people you initiated are following he said may be 2,3 families out of 2000 so he had really you now, can you help me he said hahaha. So you know like that there are lot of people they really don’t know philosophy is following the kind of tradition and so this way the śāstras say before taking a guru one should know whether the guru knows the philosophy whether they are following the philosophy that is what is needed how do we know by asking questions, by doing some service, by seeing whether that guru’s disciples are also progressing spiritually it is also a symptom also if you want to know if the doctor is good you find out if the patients are getting cured right. If all the patients of the doctor are dying than it Is not a good sign somebody should get cured right, so those following Prabhupāda you see that devotees following Prabhupāda they are giving some spiritual advancement of course it depends on them to follow sometime they don’t follow than you can do, sometimes you go to the doctor and the doctor says go take this antibiotic take this and you are thinking I don’t want to take all these antibiotics so you don’t follow but than if you don’t get better you cant blame the doctor, if you do what the doctor says and still doesn’t work than you think the doctor didn’t give me the right prescription if somebody is following and they are getting cured than it is ok he is a good doctor so like that with a Guru is somebody is following the Guru they are getting they are becoming spiritually happy it is working that means the Guru is giving the proper medicine so in these different ways one can tell.

On preaching: I am also in ISCKON the minister of congregational preaching and our goal is that everybody all around the world should as I mentioned should be happy, they should be becoming free from the contamination of material life and they should be able to go back to God head. So, in Caitanya-caritāmṛta it is mentioned in the 9^th chapter that Lord Caitanya who orders all the human being’s man, women everyone that they should accept Kṛṣṇa consciousness they should distribute to everyone and he requested all kinds of devotees to cooperate together to see that the message gets spread. So, initially Prabhupāda he came and established many temples around the world but they are very old letters in 1967, 1968,1969 where Prabhupāda was instructing that the purpose of the temple should be to train people so that they can practice on their own in homes he said we don’t expect to get hundreds of thousands of people living in our temple but that everyone so many people, neighboring householders, students they can chant Hare Kṛṣṇa and they can make there home into a Kṛṣṇa Conscious environment, they come to our temple to learn about the mood of what is Kṛṣṇa consciousness and then put that in their own life, so in this way every home can become a Kṛṣṇa conscious temple mode. So, these were the instructions Prabhupāda gave us in the, in the enthusiasm of making temples around the world he just started to concentrate on the temple and of course he distributed many books but then he hadn’t given much concentration to the people practicing in their homes. So, now for the past couple of years with the centennial impetus the ISKCON leadership has realized that this is an area that is very important it became one of the petals of the centennial building congregation that from various angles of perception for instance for book distribution, many people believe in Kṛṣṇa living in their homes each if give out one book in a day, if a hundred people like that in every city where we have a temple gave one book a day to a friend or somebody even if he gave it as a gift or gave it for donation however they do put it in the library one book a day in this way 40,000 books can be given out in a day or 14.6 million in an year and if you analyze in every aspect of our Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement it would flourish much better when people become Kṛṣṇa conscious at home. So, from temple’s point of view try to encourage the temples that they should develop devotees in the congregation, encourage them to chant from the congregational point of view trying to create different programs and different manuals and guide so that they can find it easier to practice Kṛṣṇa consciousness from their home. Some people they are in the right situation in their life maybe they don’t have so many responsibilities or they might just be in the right circumstances for them living in the temple is a very good alternative whereas for the other people they maybe in their studies or they may be having family with children or there may be other responsibilities they have or they may not feel the environment in the temple suits their personal nature because of the kind of life style, regiment life style so, they may prefer to practice Kṛṣṇa conscious from their home, now how to provide back up for those people how to train them and take care of them this is the big question. Those who live right next to the temple can come regularly to the temple and get some guidance but for many people it is not possible to come every day to that temple to get that kind of guidance so that is why we are also forming special groups called Bhakti branch groups where members from the congregation and preachers from the temple they can participate in small meeting and they get some association like personal care given, they can learn to apply Kṛṣṇa consciousness in day to day life because it is a very practical thing because so many questions can come up. If some question comes up in the group than they can pass the question on to the coordinator of the program and get the answer. So, that is what the devotees of the congregation are more serious chanting a little bit everyday coming regularly sometimes and when they are serious about Kṛṣṇa consciousness but they are going to be living in their home, house so for them we are trying to organize this bhakti branch or bhakti vṛkṣa program small group they will meet during the week than and once a week everybody can come together in our main center and have association in a nut shell this is what basically the program is, that if we don’t have these small groups how can we give personal care when we have hundreds of thousands of people practicing in their homes. If you have only a few dozen it is ok but if the number increases and we want the number to increase to thousands of thousands of people than how is it possible without the small groups also that every small group they also take up some project for preaching in consultation with the coordinator for the whole program they get some assignment where they volunteer what type of activity they like to do. …. In Slovenia, and Lithuania there is one group of college students they have taken up food for life program right anybody here from that entry and they doing this food for life program to the prison to the drug rehabilitation, in to the old people and different people like that, so orphanages it is very enlivening for the student they chant Hare Kṛṣṇa and have regular meetings also so this way they become very serious about their Krishan consciousness. So, there are different dozens and dozens of kinds of activities that so many can do from the congregation to also help to spread Kṛṣṇa consciousness. When we help other to be Kṛṣṇa conscious, we get a special commission from Kṛṣṇa we get a special blessing, it helps relieve any because we have caused harm to other people consciously or unconsciously and that is an impediment for us to progress spiritually. When we help other people spiritually than that takes away lots of bad effects that was there because of the harm we caused to others in the past. So, it is a very important boost to help in spreading Kṛṣṇa consciousness. So, we hope that small groups will be able to coordinate different kinds of preaching also but there are many other like the introductory program, just like this kind of program to invite over and give some prasādam, class, question answer and then we go out and do programs in people homes. Peoples house programs, home programs sometimes we set up temples in small places where there is no fixed center, we have a home temple. What we want to do is to establish small groups called bhakti branch group because the small groups give us an opportunity to see that everybody get personal care. There are many things that people may not be comfortable to ask in big groups they can ask in the smaller group about how to apply Kṛṣṇa consciousness for a particular situation. What do you think? Each of the group consider that every group tries to bring in one person every year, each person tries to bring in another person through different programs. It may not be so difficult if we make many contacts then it works as a team effort. On an average double of the year or even two years over a period of time the number of devotees instead will increase. So, the idea is we try to build up everyone to practice in their own time and have proper consciousness to become happy in their own Kṛṣṇa consciousness and they can help others to be happy and that also increases their own experience of Kṛṣṇa consciousness in that way they keep on going but that small group with people little bit serious otherwise with so many introductory programs get more serious and want you want to have set up small group, bhakti vṛkṣa group to take care of them.

Hare Kṛṣṇa!