Sound Bhakti

We're eternal servants of Kṛṣṇa , and when we're able to find that seed which is given to us by association of pure devotees, that the only thing that is important to me ultimately is the sincere desire to serve Kṛṣṇa with no motivation, even if we're not able to act in that position yet, when we know and recognize that I have that desire seed within my heart, it will grow, and Kṛṣṇa will reward that. If He rewarded Pūtanā, if He rewarded Pauṇḍraka, and who can even find the desire seed within their hearts to serve Kṛṣṇa, how much more will He reciprocate with somebody who's sincerely trying, even if unable to do it? Kṛṣṇa gives such encouraging words in Bhāgavatam, like 'jāta-śraddho mat-kathāsu nirviṇṇaḥ sarva-karmasu veda duḥkhātmakān kāmān parityāge ’py anīśvaraḥ (SB 11.20.27-28)' He said, "You may know you don't want any part of the material world, but you're not able to detach from it because of so many present habits you've developed from past association." He said, "But don't worry, keep up. Just go o

(1) vibhāvarī śeṣa, āloka-praveśa, nidrā chāri' uṭho jīva bolo hari hari, mukunda murāri, rāma kṛṣṇa hayagrīva (2) nṛsiṁha vāmana, śrī-madhusūdana, brajendra-nandana śyāma pūtanā-ghātana, kaiṭabha-śātana, jaya dāśarathi-rāma (3) yaśodā dulāla, govinda-gopāla, vṛndāvana purandara gopī-priya-jana, rādhikā-ramaṇa, bhuvana -sundara-bara (4) rāvāṇāntakara, mākhana-taskara, gopī-jana-vastra-hārī brajera rākhāla, gopa-vṛnda-pāla, citta-hārī baṁśī-dhārī (5) yogīndra-bandana, śrī-nanda-nandana, braja-jana-bhaya-hārī navīna nīrada, rūpa manohara, mohana-baṁśī-bihārī (6) yaśodā-nandana, kaṁsa-nisūdana, nikuñja-rāsa-vilāsī kadamba-kānana, rāsa-parāyaṇa, bṛnda-vipina-nivāsī (7) ānanda-vardhana, prema-niketana, phula-śara-jojaka kāma gopāṅganā-gaṇa, citta-vinodana, samasta-guṇa-gaṇa-dhāma (8) jāmuna-jīvana, keli-parāyaṇa, mānasa-candra-cakora nāma-sudhā-rasa, gāo kṛṣṇa-jaśa rākho vacana mana mora TRANSLATION 1) The night has come to an end and the light of dawn is entering. O jiva soul, arise an

(1) (kṛṣṇa) deva! bhavantaḿ vande man-mānasa-madhukaram arpaya nija-pada-pańkaja-makarande (2) yadyapi samādhiṣu vidhir api paśyati na tava nakhāgra-marīcim idam icchāmi niśamya tavācyuta! tad api kṛpādbhuta-vīcim (3) bhaktir udañcati yadyapi mādhava! na tvayi mama tila-mātrī parameśvaratā tad api tavādhika-durghaṭa-ghaṭana-vidhātrī (4) ayam avilolatayādya sanātana! kalitādbhuta-rasa-bhāram nivasatu nityam ihāmṛta-nindini-vindan madhurima-sāram TRANSLATION Refrain: (1) O Lord Sri Krsna! I am offering a prayer unto You. Please let the bee of my mind be offered the nectarian honey of Your lotus feet. 2) Although Brahma in full samadhi cannot catch a glimpse of even a ray of the effulgence from the tips of Your toe-nails still, O Acyuta! Having heard of the waves of Your astonishing mercy, I long to receive Your grace. 3) O Madhava! Although I don't possess even a sesame seed of bhakti for You, still, by Your inconceivable power which makes the impossible possible, please fulfill the desire

The purpose of the creation, ultimately, is to give the living entities an opportunity to come out of this illusion. And Saṅkarṣaṇa, who is not intimately, but somehow indirectly—connected with the creation of the material world, as mentioned in the Fifth Canto of the Bhāgavatam, before He starts His destruction in the material world through the agency of Rudra, He becomes a little annoyed because He's given unlimited chances for the jīvas in the material world to come back to their senses and come back to Him, and then they say, 'Oh no, I'm not interested.' And it's in that sense of annoyance that the Rudras pop from His forehead and start their dance of destruction and burn down the material world. And then it starts over again, giving an opportunity for all living entities to come back to Godhead. So we can take from this many things. Two general things are that the material world is perfectly accommodating, and if we just adjust ourselves to Kṛṣṇa's purpose, then just as every living being is being full

(1) gaurāńgera duṭi pada, jār dhana sampada, se jāne bhakati-rasa-sār gaurāńgera madhura-līlā, jār karṇe praveśilā, hṛdoya nirmala bhelo tār (2) je gaurāńgera nāma loy, tāra hoy premodoy, tāre mui jāi bolihāri gaurāńga-guṇete jhure, nitya-līlā tāre sphure, se jana bhakati-adhikārī (3) gaurāńgera sańgi-gaṇe, nitya-siddha kori' māne, se jāy brajendra-suta-pāś śrī-gauḍa-maṇḍala-bhūmi, jebā jāne cintāmaṇi, tāra hoy braja-bhūme bās (4) gaura-prema-rasārṇave, śe tarańge jebā ḍube, se rādhā-mādhava-antarańga gṛhe bā vanete thāke, 'hā gaurāńga' bo'le ḍāke, narottama māge tāra sańga TRANSLATION 1) Anyone who has accepted the two lotus feet of Lord Caitanya can understand the true essence of devotional service. If one is captivated by the pleasing pastimes of Lord Caitanya, the dirty things in his heart will all become cleansed. 2) One who simply takes the holy name of Gaura-sundara, Sri Krsna Caitanya, will immediately develop love of God. To such a person I say: Bravo! Very nice! Excellen

Śrī Caitanya Mahāprabhu is Kṛṣṇa Himself, and He also comes as the ācārya. He's both devotee and Kṛṣṇa at the same time. So there's a double benefit. He's teaching Kṛṣṇa consciousness as a devotee, but He's also Kṛṣṇa. If one dedicates him or herself to the lotus feet of Lord Caitanya, which means to—in service, what it means to dedicate oneself to the lotus feet, it means to become a servant and think, 'How can I do something to assist the Lord Caitanya Mahāprabhu? What is His desire and how can I help Him?' And if one does this, then the person will know the true essence of devotional service. Then He goes on to say that the heart of anyone who gives submissive aural reception to the pleasing and sweet pastimes of Lord Caitanya immediately becomes cleansed of all material contamination— 'hṛdoya nirmala.' This contamination in the heart is completely cleansed if one gets on a regular schedule of hearing about Kṛṣṇa and about Lord Caitanya Mahāprabhu. Then He says, 'Anyone who simply chants the name of Śrī

If somebody unjustly takes your property, rendering selfless service doesn't mean, 'Oh, yeah, let everyone violate me, and I'll just sit by passively.' That's not what it means. That's why I say it's not mutually exclusive. One must do one's duty dutifully. If you're in the corporate environment, however, I know for sure that there's a sense even from the top of the big corporations—that's why they invite people like us to come there and speak all the time. I'm going there on Tuesday to give a presentation, and there's an open invitation from so many of these corporations to come and hear wisdom that talks about higher values, like gratitude, like selflessness, Because what corporations have come to realize is that people cannot survive just by the rough and tumble of competition—that 'let us compete, and then the best person wins,' and then there's a kind of social Darwinism. People come fatigued by that, and they also don't do as well. The research, social research, is showing that people who have high-mi

One other thought about the ocean comes from the Twelfth Canto of the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam (SB 12.13.2) When the Supreme Personality of Godhead appeared as Lord Kūrma, a tortoise, His back was scratched by the sharp-edged stones lying on massive, whirling Mount Mandara, and this scratching made the Lord sleepy. May you all be protected by the winds caused by the Lord’s breathing in this sleepy condition. Ever since that time, even up to the present day, the ocean tides have imitated the Lord’s inhalation and exhalation by piously coming in and going out.

The Lord's devotees have a special qualification in that, as Kṛṣṇa says in the Bhagavad-gītā (6.32): "ātmaupamyena sarvatra samaṁ paśyati yo ’rjuna sukhaṁ vā yadi vā duḥkhaṁ sa yogī paramo mataḥ." They're the parama yogīs because, He says, they have compassion. Atmaupamyena means they feel empathy towards others because they've been through it themselves, and they know what the material world's like. Although Kṛṣṇa oversees the material world and there's a sense of the suffering of the living entities, the ones who feel it most intensely are those who've been in it and then have been saved by the Supreme Personality of Godhead and are given the opportunity, then, as a lifetime occupation, to go out and give mercy to others. And He describes, as everyone knows, several ways in which this potency of Kṛṣṇa appears through the devotees in this world, through the seemingly incidental way in which someone may introduce somebody to Kṛṣṇa consciousness—the vartmana pradakṣaka guru, somebody who shows you the path. Kṛ

In Japan, where we go frequently, there's this little tranquil river that's barely flowing, but enough so that there's life in it, and it's beautiful. And retired people in Japan like to fish. Some do, and they'll stand by that little stream and they fish. When I go for my walks there, I watch, and I have never seen anybody catch anything, but what they do is they put the lure in the water, and then they pull it back and put it in and pull it back. With fishing, the fish has to see the lure and then get attracted to it and then bite. And so you can think of your mind like a fish. Fish are very fickle. They'll go off at any second; you look at them and make a wrong movement, they're gone. So you have to be a patient fisher and throw the lure and keep bringing it past. The mantra is the lure, and you keep bringing it past your mind. Keep bringing it past your mind, until the fish of your mind sees the lure. And then when you've captured it, when it's hooked on the mantra, then you've achieved a success. It's al

It's broken down by Viśvanāth Cakravartī Ṭhākur in the Madhurya Kadambinī. He says, when you eliminate certain obstacles, then you're known to be in niṣṭhā. And I mentioned some of them, like sleep, distraction, the awakening of lower desires—suddenly they come out in different ways, indifference; you're not distracted, you're not sleepy, but you just don't care. Meh! All of that evaporates in time by good association, by following the process, and then one has this sense of no obstacle. There's nothing holding me back from the process. And that's called niṣṭhā—steadiness, consistency. From that platform, then one can make further advancement in devotional service; otherwise, we're always knocked back. So it's recommended that we really invest ourselves in getting out of the mire of bad qualities by seriously practicing devotional service till we come to niṣṭhā, then we can proceed to the next stage, which is ruci, where it's noticeable that we really want to hear. -------------------------------------------

When we become frustrated to the point of despair, there's an opening for us. And that opening for Arjuna in the Bhagavad-gītā was that he gave up. There's so much effort I put into trying to organize everything in the world so it'll come out straight, and it always comes out crooked. Prabhupāda mentions in one of his purports, in the Second Canto of the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, that observing our own frustration can be enlightening because it means that we're incompatible with the nature of the world. And that's because, as he says, 'We are a different category of energy altogether.' We are consciousness, and consciousness can't be measured in the same way that material elements can. We have the controlled studies scientifically to come out with a predictable outcome, or as close as possible, so that we can say that there are certain principles that work uniformly in the world, but with consciousness, you can't apply the same measurements. It's impossible to use the same tools to measure it. We're subtler than mat

CC Antya 16.52 namas te nara-siṁhāya prahlādāhlāda-dāyine hiraṇyakaśipor vakṣaḥ- śilā-ṭaṅka-nakhālaye https://vedabase.io/en/library/cc/antya/16/52 CC Antya 16.53 ito nṛsiṁhaḥ parato nṛsiṁho yato yato yāmi tato nṛsiṁhaḥ bahir nṛsiṁho hṛdaye nṛsiṁho nṛsiṁham ādiṁ śaraṇaṁ prapadye https://vedabase.io/en/library/cc/antya/16/53/ SB 5.18.8 oṁ namo bhagavate narasiṁhāya namas tejas-tejase āvir-āvirbhava vajra-nakha vajra-daṁṣṭra karmāśayān randhaya randhaya tamo grasa grasa om svāhā; abhayam abhayam ātmani bhūyiṣṭhā oṁ kṣraum. https://vedabase.io/en/library/sb/5/18/8/ SB 10.87.1 (Prayers by Śrīla Śrīdhara Svāmī, quoted in the purport) vāg-īśā yasya vadane lakṣmīr yasya ca vakṣasi yasyāste hṛdaye saṁvit taṁ nṛṣiṁham ahaṁ bhaje https://vedabase.io/en/library/sb/10/87/1/ CC Madhya 8.5 “śrī-nṛsiṁha, jaya nṛsiṁha, jaya jaya nṛsiṁha prahlādeśa jaya padmā-mukha-padma-bhṛṅga” https://vedabase.io/en/library/cc/madhya/8/5/ SB 7.10,7 yadi dāsyasi me kāmān varāṁs tvaṁ varadarṣabha kāmānāṁ hṛdy asaṁrohaṁ bhavatas tu vṛṇe v

So, this is one of the very important lessons that Prahlād Mahārāj teaches us, is to become trained in the spiritual science. Don't neglect the Bhagavad-gītā. Or should I say it in the positive? It's better, isn't it, because that might go and you may think, 'Neglect the Bhagavad-gītā.' No. Read Bhagavad-gītā every day. How's that for a challenge? If one reads Bhagavad-gītā every day, then you won't have to make excuses for why you make mistakes, or why you made mistakes, or why you feel morose, or why you feel confused, and so forth, because those who read the Bhagavad-gītā every day don't get confused. They see things as they are, and they see the difference between matter and spirit. And that's fairly simple. Let me just check, do we have any Bhagavad-gītās? Just checking to see if we have them on site. Do we have any here? I heard that we've distributed over approximately 500 million books since Prabhupāda started book distribution, and we have a few of them here. Bhagavad-gītā is available. Do any of you

The third theme, besides sincerity and wanting to help others, that's so prominent in Prahlāda's prayers is that he said, "My Lord," when he's right in front of Lord Nṛsiṁhadeva, he says, "I just want to serve my spiritual master." Kṛṣṇa has appeared for him. He's right in front of him, and he doesn't say, "I'll serve You, my Lord." He said, "I'll serve my spiritual master to serve You." And that mood of being the servant of the servant, servant of the servant, he said, "Nārada Muni saved me. My spiritual master saved me. So how could I ever forget his service?" What's the verse? Say it loud. Evaṁ janaṁ nipatitaṁ prabhavāhi-kūpe kāmābhikāmam anu yaḥ prapatan prasaṅgāt kṛtvātmasāt surarṣiṇā bhagavan gṛhītaḥ so ’haṁ kathaṁ nu visṛje tava bhṛtya-sevām (SB 7.9.28) 'Bhṛtya,' I'll be the servant of my spiritual master. "How I was falling into a blind well full of snakes, but my spiritual master saved me from this. That's His mercy that I can see You." So he offers himself to a spiritual master. ------------------

In the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, Seventh Canto, ninth chapter, we get a kind of fruit because we hear the prayers that are coming from Prahlāda's heart, and from those we can learn many, many lessons. The fact that the Lord came to save Prahlāda and to answer his prayers, and hearing the prayers that Prahlāda offered, is an important exercise for the devotees because Prahlāda represents the foundational position from which one can actually enter into devotional service—that is, selfless service. As he says to Lord Nṛsiṁhadeva, who offers him benedictions, "I don't want anything," and he really means it because Lord Nṛsiṁhadeva had to ask him a few times. They said, "No, take something." And Prahlāda said, "No, you're my master. I'm your servant. I serve Your command, and that's what I do. I don't want anything, please." And so this is a foundational point for those who are entering into the realm of bhakti: "I don't want anything in return." This is where one starts to notice the reciprocation of the Lord in a ver

Of all the practices, japa is the most essential. It's the one that we do ourselves. We depend on our own sincerity to fuel the process. In the beginning, we also do it as a medicinal process, as when a doctor gives a prescription and says, "Take this many for the next two weeks, and then don't miss a dose. If you do, then make it up." And when the medicine acts, then we can see for ourselves its efficiency. In the beginning, we have to trust the doctor, and we have to trust the medicine. Śrīla Rūpa Gosvāmī uses this word, nirṇītaṁ. He said, "Don't worry, this medicine is highly potent. It's been vetted by all the best medical scientists in the world—spiritual scientists. And it's a doubtless and fearless way that one can make advancement in spiritual practice. ------------------------------------------------------------ To connect with His Grace Vaiśeṣika Dāsa, please visit https://www.fanthespark.com/next-steps/ask-vaisesika-dasa/ ------------------------------------------------------------ Add to your wisd

Prahlāda Mahārāja is the subject of the Seventh Canto. If you measure which topics are there in the entire lengthy seven cantos of the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, Lord Nṛsiṁhadeva makes a very short appearance. He just comes in, tears apart Hiraṇyakaśipu, and that's it. But Prahlāda is featured throughout as a tender child, offering instructions to his classmates and also praying to Lord Nṛsiṁhadeva. These are memorable prayers which have been repeated over millennia, people remembering what is the basic entry-level standard for the process of Kṛṣṇa consciousness, or bhakti, or what we call devotional service, and that is, "I don't want anything except to serve. I just want to serve Kṛṣṇa and Kṛṣṇa's devotees, and whatever I have for myself, it's only so that I can go on serving." And Prahlāda is the emblem of that. Interestingly, in the Bṛhat-Bhāgavatāmṛta, when Nārada Muni is trying to find the devotee who's received the most mercy from Kṛṣṇa and is interviewing different people, observing them, when he comes to P

We have a special treat, which is a bhajan written by Bhaktivinoda Ṭhākura, five prayers to Nṛsiṁhadeva in Navadvīpa. In a very revealing way. Bhaktivinoda Ṭhākura mentions that by his worship of Nṛsiṁhadeva, ostensibly in Nṛsiṁha Palli, and by rolling in the courtyard in ecstasy there at NṛsiṁhaPalli, the place where Nṛsiṁhadeva himself gives 24-hour darśana (the temple is never closed, because even if you go there and the door is closed, there's still a grid; you can look in and see Nṛsiṁhadeva), and of course, Bhaktivinoda Ṭhākura had a close relationship with Nṛsiṁhadeva in that Lord Narahari Deva had helped to reveal the actual birthplace of Śrī Caitanya Mahāprabhu. That is, that from the vantage point in Godrumadvīpa (which some of you may have visited), there's a balcony on the house of Bhaktivinoda Ṭhākura, or where he and Śrīla Bhaktsiddanta Saraswati Ṭhākura resided together and did many of their writings. Śrīla Bhaktivinoda Ṭhākura would look out and, curiously, in the morning time, just before m

Unauthorized or improperly parked vehicles will be towed away at the owner's expense." Means that if—if you leave your mind unattended and not engaged in Kṛṣṇa's service, it's like you just parked it somewhere in the wrong place, it'll get towed away. And when you get your mind towed away, if you've ever had your car towed away, you've got to go down to the impound and pay some exorbitant amount of money to get it back. It's not easy, and so don't park your mind in an improper place and just leave it there, because it will get towed so far away, you may not be able to find it again. Stay present in the mantra and in thinking of Kṛṣṇa ------------------------------------------------------------ To connect with His Grace Vaiśeṣika Dāsa, please visit https://www.fanthespark.com/next-steps/ask-vaisesika-dasa/ ------------------------------------------------------------ Add to your wisdom literature collection: https://iskconsv.com/book-store/ https://www.bbtacademic.com/books/ https://thefourquestionsbook.com/ -