So, this friend of Śrīla Prabhupāda said, 'Come see this nice sādhu.' But Prabhupāda was a little disillusioned with the sādhus that he'd met because his father was very open-minded, Gaur Mohan De, and he would invite sādhus to his home regularly to take prasādam. He'd actually opened the door in their home, saying, 'Anyone who's hungry, any sādhus who are hungry, come to my house, we'll feed you.' So, many sādhus came, some genuine, others not. Prabhupāda was a little, 'I've seen sādhus,' but h...
Dec 29, 2024•15 min
The spiritual master is receiving benediction from the ocean of mercy. Just as a cloud pours water on a forest fire to extinguish it, so the spiritual master delivers the materially afflicted world by extinguishing the blazing fire of material existence. I offer my respectful obeisances unto the lotus feet of such a spiritual master, who is an ocean of auspicious qualities. (Translation verse 1) ------------------------------------------------------------ To connect with His Grace Vaiśeṣika Dāsa...
Dec 29, 2024•18 min
But as he said, when he landed or arrived in Boston, New York, after a long, arduous journey with two heart attacks and, later on, several strokes as well, he said that the reason my mission in the West was successful is because I had faith in two things. This is very important for us because we want to become like Śrīla Prabhupāda, not that we can become Śrīla Prabhupāda, but follow in his footsteps. He said, 'I had faith in two things.' This is why his mission was successful and continues to e...
Dec 29, 2024•16 min
And this was what Prabhupāda claimed to be the fulcrum of power in his campaign to take Kṛṣṇa consciousness all over the world. He said that by taking the intention of my spiritual master and following his instruction, which he clarified as Mahārāja mentioned. Prabhupāda clarified it because he had received that instruction at Rādhā-kuṇḍa, and then later on, he had written to his spiritual master, just a fortnight before his guru had left the world, and asked, 'How may I serve you?' He had alrea...
Dec 29, 2024•19 min
Prabhupāda, from the simple instructions of Bhakti Siddhānta Sarasvatī, he went above and beyond the call of duty. This is a term we heard in the military. Every soldier wants to go above and beyond the call of duty. How did Prabhupāda go above and beyond the call of duty? He had his books, not only in English, but he ordered them, and to some degree, during his lifetime, had them translated into all the major languages of the world. That supersedes the instruction of Bhakti Siddhānta Sarasvatī....
Dec 29, 2024•36 min
This is something that I look forward to, from the day this Yātrā ends till next year. It's something... This is our third youth retreat, Global Youth Retreat, and I look forward to getting to know more of you. And as I said, it's something I look forward to. It's one of my favorite things this year. And proof of that is that Prabhu and I give up our own personal retreat to be with you all. That's how much we like doing this. So, I look forward to time with you here in Calcutta, where we'll get ...
Dec 28, 2024•1 hr 2 min
Prabhupāda has said that the Acharya, the guru, the śāstra, can give us hints for advancing in spiritual life, but we have to do the work. There's another related point to determination and effort. You may have a good lineage of gurus, and the śāstra is always there, but we're the ones who have to apply it. A couple of other points are: practice while you have the chance; if not now, when? And I think it was Akshina Maṅgala this morning who noticed that sometimes the doors for the deities close ...
Dec 28, 2024•29 min
When you look at all the books together, there's nothing wrong with that. If you look at them all together on one shelf, you might think, 'How could I ever read all these? Therefore, I won't read anything. It's too much.' So, I thought that at one time, and then I heard this lecture by a person called Brian Tracy, and he was talking about how to get things done. In the lecture, he said, any large task that seems to be beyond your capacity, you can break into small parts. And he called them slice...
Dec 27, 2024•1 hr 4 min
If I'm talking to someone who's explaining to me something extremely valuable, like last night, I stayed a little later at Prabhupāda's room with some godbrothers, and one of them was speaking about some history that was very interesting. At the same time, a thought came into my mind: I wonder how late it is. But I resisted looking at my watch, because if I just went like this, how long does that take? Approximately.. Audience : Half a second. Half a second, my interlocutor would have then said,...
Dec 27, 2024•21 min
This year's Live to Give motto is 'Make Earth Smart Again.' Prabhupāda writes in the second canto of the Śrīmad Bhāgavatam that the Bhagavad-gītā is the Vedic intelligence, that appears in the purport to Śrīmad Bhāgavatam 2.2.35. I've always appreciated that. What if you were able to have the Vedic intelligence in your hand and then be able to harmonize your mind and intelligence with that? What would your life be like? Well, it would be a lot better. And what if the whole world had a clearer id...
Dec 27, 2024•1 hr 3 min
Fade means to gradually grow weak. Generally, people don't give up japa immediately and just walk away, but it fades away. Their sādhanā fades. And this can happen on a weekly basis, monthly, or yearly basis. So, we have to be aware of the phenomenon called 'japa fade'. All practices fade without attention. All practices fade without attention. So, attention means to give special care. It's one of the meanings of attention. It also comes from the word ten, which means to stretch. We have to stre...
Dec 26, 2024•18 min
It was complete and perfect, and I appreciated many aspects of what you said, and will take them to heart. One was staying in association with those who are experiencing the happiness of hearing and chanting together, and how that carries us to a higher position, and also recognizing the pernicious effects of blasphemy. In the second-to-last sentence, you described blasphemy as a fall-down, and also that it makes us feel bad when we blaspheme. You had advocated for being aware of the effect of i...
Dec 26, 2024•1 hr 40 min
If you situate yourself in such a way that you can see the universe as a cosmic schoolhouse, "everything is meant for teaching me something and so that I can improve myself" - if I take it like that, then I take whatever happens to me as a way to learn something valuable. We may not see it at first, but if we're able to ask the question, we avoid the default question, which is, 'Why me?' And this leads to a sense of victimhood, which takes a long time to come out of—a lot of coaching and help an...
Dec 25, 2024•1 hr 15 min
How can he be satisfied in the self through this gratitude ? That is mentioned in one of the verses that Uddhava says at the very end of the Uddhava-gītā (SB 11.29.6), "naivopayanty apacitiṁ kavayas taveśa brahmāyuṣāpi kṛtam ṛddha-mudaḥ smarantaḥ," in which he says, 'When I think of you, Kṛṣṇa, the way you take care of me from within and without, I'm so grateful that I couldn't express that gratitude. Even if I had a few life spans of Brahmā, I wouldn't come to the end of it.' And based on that,...
Dec 25, 2024•11 min
If we look at our lifetime and our lifespan as a time to invest, if you stay in the market, no matter what you may be - 'sukhe duḥkhe bhulo nā'ko,' you may be happy or distressed. You may think, 'Well, I'm no good. I don't have a taste.' It doesn't matter. You stay in the market. It's not timing the market; it's how much time you spend in the market, and if you just stay the course, it's already chalked out. Do your due diligence and figure out that this is the only market that really counts. T...
Dec 25, 2024•38 min
Austerity of speech consists in speaking words that are truthful, pleasing, beneficial, and not agitating to others, and also in regularly reciting Vedic literature. BG 17.15 ------------------------------------------------------------ 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://www.bbtacademic.com/books/ (USA only) h...
Dec 24, 2024•13 min
So, here's your homework. Get a legal pad and a pen. Are you with me so far? What's the first part? Are you going to do it? I'm not convinced. All right, okay, so sit down and write at the top, 'Things I Do.' You got that so far? That's three words only. It's not so hard, 'Things I Do.' And then you'll make a list on the left-hand side. Leave a little space on the right. Make a list on the left-hand side of all the things I do. So, let's name 10 things that you all do: eat, sleep, what, work? Ok...
Dec 24, 2024•1 hr 5 min
These are thoughts to collect and keep on track. An author named Collins wrote the book 'From Good to Great' regarding corporations, and similarly, we should have our own book 'From Good to Great in Japa' and keep track of what it is that practically helps us to trend towards great japa, instead of trending back the other way towards poor japa, and poor japa that we fade away. It's one of the main processes. It is the main process for advancing on the path of bhakti. So let's try a little more. ...
Dec 24, 2024•17 min
Whatever result was obtained in Satya-yuga by meditating on Viṣṇu, in Tretā-yuga by performing sacrifices, and in Dvāpara-yuga by serving the Lord’s lotus feet can be obtained in Kali-yuga simply by chanting the Hare Kṛṣṇa mahā-mantra. ( SB 12.3.52) https://vedabase.io/en/library/sb/12/3/52/ ------------------------------------------------------------ To connect with His Grace Vaiśeṣika Dāsa, please visit https://www.fanthespark.com/next-steps/ask-vaisesika-dasa/ --------------------------------...
Dec 24, 2024•20 min
Appreciate The Personality of Godhead: So, when Kṛṣṇa speaks, His words illuminate. Kṛṣṇa is also not a normal person because He can be present in many places at once. In fact, He's ubiquitous. He's within every atom, and He's within all of our hearts. We all have a personal relationship with Kṛṣṇa, just as one may have a personal relationship in this world with someone as a friend, or sometimes as a parent to a child, and sometimes we have a romantic relationship. So Kṛṣṇa also has relationship...
Dec 23, 2024•1 hr 9 min
If you ever feel bewildered, don't feel so bad, because you're dealing with a very powerful force. But there is a solution, and it's given in the Bhagavad-gītā by Kṛṣṇa Himself. Near the end, He says, "What verse number is this? It's 18.58— 'mac-cittaḥ sarva-durgāṇi mat-prasādāt tariṣyasi, atha cet tvam ahaṅkārān na śroṣyasi vinaṅkṣyasi': 'If you become conscious of Me, you will pass over all the obstacles of conditioned life by My grace. If, however, you do not work in such consciousness but ac...
Dec 23, 2024•17 min
Regarding association, Śrīla Prabhupāda, before he was initiated, was pursuing getting initiated from his spiritual master, Śrīla Bhaktisiddhānta Sarasvatī Ṭhākura, and he was very busy. When his guru Mahārāja had a yātrā for 10 days, he only got to go for one day. And he went there and took such advantage of the opportunity that he had in that one day that his guru remembered him when he went to Allahabad. He said, "Oh, I know him. He's the one who sits up front and listens, and he won't go awa...
Dec 23, 2024•5 min
Kṛṣṇa Himself, by His spiritual potency, establishes our connection with Him, and that connection is the source of all spiritual knowledge. So Kṛṣṇa is availing Himself to us, and He's always availing Himself to us. As soon as we show a little inclination toward Him, then He begins to take proactive steps to move us closer. "Teṣāṁ satata-yuktānāṁ bhajatāṁ prīti-pūrvakam dadāmi buddhi-yogaṁ taṁ yena mām upayānti te," Kṛṣṇa says that if somebody sincerely turns their attention towards Him, then He...
Dec 22, 2024•1 hr 39 min
When I was flying back from Atlanta, there was a family that had a baby, and I was just noticing... I was thinking about the mood of the baby, which was just to be there with the parents, to be dependent. The baby didn't pay for the ticket, didn't see any credit cards coming out of the crib. And also the parents had all the paraphernalia for the baby, and there's a lot. Especially nowadays, there's some supersonic traveling crib they bring with wheels on, and it folds up and gets put down. And t...
Dec 22, 2024•14 min
Here's the simple rule, decide what you want and write it down. If you don't write it down, then you're not going to start going in that direction. What I've done is order several of those really large Post-its that stick on the wall. You know, they're this big. I have different marking pens, and I write the kinds of ideas that I'm trying to work on for the new year, the goals, and so forth. Then I put them up so I can see them all the time. Whatever way you do it, it's a good time of year to pl...
Dec 22, 2024•5 min
Lollipops are bona fide. In 1972, Bhakta Gopāl saw the Salvation Army giving out candy canes for donations, so he went and got candy canes. Then some devotees complained to Prabhupāda and said he's given out bhoga. And then Prabhupāda inquired a little further about what it was, and he said, "What is the harm? It's in the Vedabase." He said, "What is the harm?" He said, "In India, all the time, pūjāris buy simple sugar candies. They offer them to the Deities, and they give them out. They distrib...
Dec 21, 2024•1 hr 15 min
And there's a way that when we are chanting, we have our own history, we have our own desires. We're persons, but we have a relationship with Kṛṣṇa, and it's as if we're writing that letter to Kṛṣṇa: "Please come get me. Here I am." And when Kṛṣṇa hears that, when we send Him that letter through our chanting, He'll come pick us up. And it may be at the last minute when we're not expecting it, but when He does, His whole intention is that everything that's mine is yours. In a very personal way, H...
Dec 21, 2024•17 min
Oftentimes, people have a mental image of what it means to go out on book distribution. And the mental image is completely different from the experience itself. The mental image a lot of people have is that it's going to be hard, I'll be rejected, and people will hate me. And then you go out, and there's a world out there where everyone's bored. They're wishing that there was something interesting that would come along, and they're so happy to see you. It's important—that's a kind of purificatio...
Dec 21, 2024•6 min
You find a person, anybody in the crowd, and they want to say they want to hear Hare Kṛṣṇa. They want to come closer to Kṛṣṇa. And you go out of your way to facilitate them. You give them a chair, you give them water, you give them whatever they want, and let them be there and hear the holy name because you know that that's first-class worship of the Lord within the heart. Because tapyante 'loka-tāpena sādhavaḥ prāyaśo janāḥ paramārādhanaṁ tad dhi puruṣasyākhilātmanaḥ (SB 8.7.44).' Lord Śiva say...
Dec 20, 2024•1 hr 14 min
We'll just do a quick summation, and a question is, how much do you like japa? Do you like it? This is for our own edification, just to consider how much you like it. Do you like it enough to sit and chant all day long? Do you like it enough to sit for at least enough time to chant 16 rounds a day? Or do you not have appreciation for it and you'd rather not chant at all? Somewhere within that spectrum, what would you say if you were to measure it based on the idea that what gets measured gets im...
Dec 20, 2024•15 min
