Unfortunately we are under the influence of maya, we accept this spot life of only a few years as our permanent existence and thus we are illusioned by our material possessions such as family, house, land, wealth etc. And we are very much attached to these illusory possessions and serve them instead of diligently serving the Lord.
Krishna is present in the form of His transcendental name, and we can contact Him immediately by hearing His name. Simply by hearing the name Krishna we immediately become freed from material contamination.
Recently we all have witnessed an Adidaivic misery in the form of Tsunami sea waves, which struck coastal areas of India and a few other countries. Amoung those who had lost their lives were many children and youths. I was wondering whether Krishna is showing through this incident the importance of his instruction
Many times we tend to argue with senior devotees or sometimes even oppose them. As Maharaj always puts it, seniority is not only in terms of how old is that person or how many years he is in a bhakti mission
One who with undeviating attention constantly recites this literature at every moment of every hour, as well as one who faithfully hears even one verse or half a verse or a single line or even half a line, certainly purifies his very self.
The form of the Lord can only be perceived through unflinching, unmotivated and pure devotional service unto Him. His divine grace Srila Prabhupada writes in purport that the word "tu" is specifically used here to indicate that no other process can be used
Kuntidevi knew very well that Krsna is the primeval Lord who lives in everyone's heart as Supersoul, Paramatma. Srila Prabhupada mentioned in his purport that another name of Paramatma feature of the Lord is 'Kaala' or eternal time. He is Supreme Controller as confirmed in Brahma Samhita
In the pastime of Lord Narasingha dev, we see how the undeviated bhakti of child Prahalad saved him from his father who was the extremely powerful demon king Hiranyakasipu. Krishna is impartial. He has no personal likes nor hatred and does not favour one against another.
There was once a king named Janashruthi, who ruled over the kingdom known as Mahavrasha. He took nice care of his subjects by building rest houses along the roads of his kingdom, building hospitals and homes to care for the sick and needy.
As I was reading the chapter of Jaya and Vijaya cursed by the sages, I came to these interesting verses which explain the reason behind the Tsunami and other disasters. Truly Bhagavatam once again proves that inside its pages rests the answer to every question.
In order to fulfill our material desire of sense gratification we are falling in our own pitfall of lust. Nobody can say he has zero desire and even after fulfillment of a desire we still hanker to have more and more, ie., Lobha (Greed). When Lobha is not getting fulfilled we get Krodha(Anger).
The conditioned living entities in this material world undergo three kinds of miseries. Miseries arising from the body and mind, miseries caused by the other living entities, and miseries caused by natural disasters. One such misery - Tsunami, we saw happening few weeks back.
Men of small intelligence worship the demigods, and their fruits are limited and temporary. Worship of demigods may be useful for a limited time, but the result is ANTAVAT, perishable.
We tend to tolerate, accept and attempt to overcome aatyathmik and adhi-daivik miseries at a faster pace than adhi-baudhik miseries. We brood upon it all day and waste our time and energy in narrating the miseries to others and loose our peace of mind.
The beauty of these conversations is that Srila Prabhupada reveals so many sublime instructions in a casual and practical manner. Somehow I feel that hearing these conversations are so much more effective because when we hear Srila Prabhupada speak, the tone of his voice and the intensity pierces directly through our heart without any effort from our side.
Krishna's service, as we know what is meant by service: you carry the order of some person. That is service. Master orders, and the servant carries out the order. This is service. Just like in the Bhagavad-gita the master, Krishna, orders Arjuna to fight.
In our day to day to life we also like to be glorified by others even though we do not deserve it. We know very well that without Krishna's mercy even a blade of grass cannot move.
Most of us although believe in Krishna, many times doubt His words or His existence. When we face problems in life we start losing faith in Him and our devotional service suffer badly. A real devotee never leaves his devotional service instead his faith increases in the Lord when he faces troubles.
One day King Akbar asked Birbal, "Why is it that your God behaves so strangely? Doesn't your Lord Krishna have any servant? Each time a devotee calls for help, the Lord runs himself. Surely he can employ others to do such work?"
Once there was a businessman whose only motive was to earn money. His son was very much concerned that his father is so money-minded. One day a person came to his shop and requested for charity to go for pilgrimage.
But due to laziness and being driven by mind we say, "we will chant tomorrow" and when tomorrow comes in the form of today we say again tomorrow. Like this days are passing and finally death comes and we loose the opportunity (human form of birth) which is very rarely available."
According to Brahma-samhita, the Lord is served very respectfully by hundreds and thousands of goddesses of fortune. The association of the Lord is so inspiringly newer and newer that they cannot quit the Lord for a moment, even though they are by nature very restless and are moving about.
Once when a sage was passing on his way, he met a prince, the son of a king, and he blessed him, saying, "My dear prince, chiran jiva- may you live forever.
We all know that Human life is very rare to obtain but still we do not understand the seriousness of devotional service and tend to procrastinate it.There is a nice story told by His Divine Grace BhaktiSiddhanta Saraswati Prabhupada in this regard.
Srila Prabhupada says, "Devotees know that their position is to be eternally servants of the Supreme Lord and never to be one with Him. Therefore they are called sama-mati or jitatma.
Prabhupada says, "People are lazy, not only materially but also in the matter of self-realization." We also experience this when we request somebody to attend the satsang program, they find 100 reasons to avoid it.
Nowadays, generally everybody is busy in making plans and the world is full of short terms plans, long terms plans, strategic plans, etc. Srila Prabhapada in a lecture on ..
Once upon a time there was a very strong woodcutter. He asked for a job from a timber merchant, and he got it. The pay was really good and so were the work conditions. For that reason, the woodcutter was determined to do his best. His boss gave him an axe and showed him the area where he was supposed to work.