Humility

Humility is not a weakness. Ignorant people think that to be humble is to be weak. Of course, material conception of humility - that may appear to be true, but that’s not humility. Real humility is to see that the power of God is within me and within everything. Real humility is to give up the ego that I am the doer. And thoroughly dive into the truth that Krishna is the doer. And to be an instrument of the highest power. Real humility is the greatest power in all creation. Because it connects us to the power of the Absolute truth. We cannot be connected as long as we have false ego. Its all around us. Humility tunes us in to the highest power. Ego tunes us in to the other frequencies and it just complicates our lives...This is why we remain in this material world, because we are blaming other people, blaming other situation for our situations, we really never seek a solution, which means turn to God. Gajendra didn’t blame the crocodile, he didn’t blame the family members and his friends for not being able to help him. He just understood, this is an opportunity to turn to God and he became perfect. He tried his best, we all have to try our best to deal with reversals.

-H.H.Radhanath Swami

What is Real Wisdom?

It is hard to have deep relations. The reason is that more you are controlling, more you become addicted and condition to controlling spirit. You want to control everything and everyone and you can’t have deep relationships as long as you are controlling. So there is little love for people who are extremely successful. It’s always been that way. The only way they can be is if you take a humble position and really accept people as your equals. So here is the promise, people are fighting, fighting to get there and then when they get there they can’t give up what they have and at the same time, it’s a very lonely and unsatisfying life.

Srimad Bhagavatam is trying to break through the misconception of this type of dream for happiness. That is why Srila Prabhupada was so strong when he spoke there is no really no happiness in the material world. All the so called happiness is just on the level of this ever chaning waves and foaming bubbles. In the 1st canto Prabhupada says, "All of our happiness, all of our possessions, all of our relationships in this world are like foaming bubbles on the surface of the ocean of material existence and all these bubbles any movement will burst into oblivion." So are we going to be attached to the bubble or we are going to be depth of what’s deeper in the ocean. He krsna karuna sindhu. Deeper down there is ocean of Krsna’s mercy, Krsna’s kindness, Krsna’s love. That’s where we want to dive deep. The entire ocean is Krsna’s love. We are attached to the foaming bubbles. Jiv Jago Jiv jago.

Mahaprabhu say’s wake up sleeping souls. Usually waking us means to get us out of the sleep, it’s disruption. Just like if you are having a really sound sleep and the alarm clock rings, what’s your first reaction. You don’t have to say it publically. First reaction is it’s a disturbance. Is it not ? You are sleeping, you are dreaming that you are having a vacation with your lover on a tropical island and all of a sudden. Today there are so many alarm clock’s, different bells. All of sudden (Maharaj makes sound of alarm clock). You just turn it off. It’s disruptive but wakes you up. So the problems in this world are like alarm clocks, the reversals and difficulties. Because when things keep going our way we just stay in our dreams. Yes, we stay asleep. May be good dream, may be bad dream. When reversals comes, it is like a alarm clock to wake us up. But we have a choice of actually waking up from that alarm clock, now they have snooze controls. Snooze controls means, "Yeah I know I should wake up, I should become serious about my spiritual life, but later. I will do it after this and this and this is complete, then I will do it.

So some people just turn off the alarm clock and just go back to sleep. Some people do the snooze control thing, which means I knew I turn it off, I am little wake up, I will become serious like Kailash of Narad Muni. He was always on snooze control. Yes Gurudev, I know there is suffering, I know I should be chanting the name of God and associate with saintly people, but I will do it later. Just let me do this more, let me sleep little longer, then I will do it. After all last night I didn’t got so much sleep, just a little longer. Wake up. Life is short. You should take advantage, take the opportunity now and the tragedies that come upon us transform them into blessings .That’s wisdom, wisdom is not memorizing slokas, wisdom is applying the slokas to your life and what does it mean, here is a sloka

Tat te anupamkam
Wisdom is when there are reversals which appear to be a curse however painful, distasteful and unacceptable it may appear, to transform it into a blessing by trying to go deeper not deal with it on the level of foaming bubbles in the waves but to go deeper and this Srimad Bhagavatam is taking us deeper.

--HH Radhanath Swami

Pralambasura...

Pralambasura is greatest of the demons. Do you know what he represents? He represents lusty inclinations. Lusty inclination towards sex and subtle sex, craving for profit, adoration and distinction. Whenever these influences come into your heart, you should recognize Pralambasura has come. And these particular anarthas are very much like Pralamabasura because they disguise themselves as our friends, with the promise of happiness, with the promise of relief. And this is how maya whispers to us. If you have a position, if you have prestige, if people honour and respect you, you will be happy. And then we motivate ourselves in order to get those things. What to speak of illicit sex, it is such a promise of happiness of pleasure, it is a demon in disguise. It can only be killed in the presence of guru and Krishna in your heart.

The desire for prestige is very deadly. Srila Visvanath Cakravati explains three reasons of falldown for devotees which are most prominant: kanak -desire to accumulate wealth; kama - desire to enjoy the opposite sex, desire for sex life; pratistha - prestige.

These three things are sure to corrupt our spiritual life.

As far as prestige goes, the desire for adoration and distinction is Bhakti Siddhanta Sarasvati said it is as abominable as the dung of a boar. It’s recycled stool through a boar.

It is abominable. That is how we should see our desire for prestige. But even in the spiritual societies, people are so driven by this desire for prestige, I am better than you, we learn the scriptures, if you know the scriptures, taking on the most fallen position and let me just learn this so I can serve my gurudev, the Vaishnavas then learning scriptures is very very good, but sometimes we become more learned than others and we think I am better than others. I am more advanced than you. How many slokas you know? How many people can you defeat? How many people can you leave spell bound when you give a lecture? It’s wonderful if you can do all that stuff providing its in the mood of the servant of the servant, but if you start thinking I am better than others, and you start longing for prestige, and when you do it you start expecting and demanding respect , what are you doing? You are simply tasting the dung of the abominable boar, according to Bhakti Siddhanta Sarasvati Thakur, our parampara guru. He was so graphic because it’s such a deep burning in people’s hearts.

Now the desire to feel valued, the desire to feel appreciated, it’s just natural within everybody but when we want honor, respect and prestige, it’s very dangerous form of sense gratification and it’s the major cause of falldown. It’s Pralamabasura disguising himself. I make you so happy, just get this position, get this prestige, get this honor, get this sex life, acquire and acquire, acquire more materialistic things. Disguised as your friend, this voice, but no, that voice is only out to destroy your bhakti. Hare Krishna! And that is a fact. That is maya’s whisper, that is Pralambasura ‘s whisper promising you everything, disguised as your best friend, but the only mode of invasion of all these influences is to corrupt the life, entangle you into material bondage and destroy your bhakti. Hare Krishna!-

H.H. Radhanath Swami Maharaj

mind- thing of its own

Everyone should be very humble. No one should be proud. No one should think they are great. Because as soon as you think that way you are already in the clutches of maya and all the rest will follow subsequently. So if someone like Lord Shiva or Lord Brahma or Vishwamitra muni or Saubhari muni, if they were bewildered due to inattentiveness if their minds drag them down into such embarrassing conditions then what is our position? Our position is very humble. Srila Prabhupad explains the remedy of not falling into Maya’s control...How does maya work..essentially through the mind?. Maya can create so many external phantasmagoria that is trying to either create attraction or aversion, but essentially, it is only successful if it affects our mind.....a great soul can be like a lotus flower in a very very muddy place of material world where there is distractions everywhere. By Maya’s potency there is distractions from the path of truth within & without, but maya can only be successful when maya diverts our mind. Emerson has said that mind is such a thing that it can make hell into heaven or it can make heaven into hell. What is this mind? You cannot touch it, you cannot taste it you cannot feel it, you cannot see it. Its so subtle subtler than air, subtler than space. But yet it is all powerful within this world. It is due to the mind alone that the conditioned soul is trapped within the repetition of birth and death. Where a head of state can take birth as a dog. Where a demigod can take birth as an insect. That is the power of the mind where a person with all facilities could take their next birth as a worm in the stool of a hog. That’s the power of the mind. And who are we to compete? Its very difficult. Vishwamitra muni lived in the Satya yuga and Treta yuga. He was a real yogi who can perform severe tapasya and who was able to control the mind.. If you cannot control the mind you cannot control the senses. That illustration in our Bhagavad Gita that body is like our chariot and the senses are like five wild horses that just want to taste, want to touch, want to see, want to smell, want to hear and what is the mind? The mind is the reigns and intelligence is the chariot driver. If we have good intelligence & we are listening, listening to the need of the soul, listening to Krishna, then the intelligence that comes through Guru, Sadhu, & Shastra....and through the mind we can control the senses and then our human form actually goes in the right direction. Otherwise there are 84,00,000(8million 400) species and the soul can end up in one of those chariots. So it is very critical to control the mind. But the problem is it is very difficult I don’t think anyone needs too many analogies or examples to know how difficult it is to control the mind. Does anyone needs to be convinced and anyone attempting to do so is already convinced. All day everyday mind is very difficult to control. Maya is all powerful in this world.--

HH Radhanath Swami