(H H Kadamba Kanana Swami, 27th March 2012, Cape Town, South Africa) Lecture: B.G. 2.17
Of course, there are some days where you wished that you had never gotten up, and it leads from one thing to the next. Yesterday I was breaking everything. I broke everything that I had touched. I put my towel on the rack in the bathroom and the whole thing came down! It was just my towel that went on there and it all came down.
The baby door that was on the staircase had just disintegrated, when I picked it up. I guess I’m not a baby anymore! So yes, things break in the material world. What can we do? There’s no end to it. So my point being is that when we come to hearing about Krishna then we can just deal with Krishna directly. This is spiritual and there is no anxiety since Krishna is present! But we still have some anxiety because we are bringing in the mind, and the mind is restless.
The mind is divided, where part of us is completely in the spiritual world, and the other part of us is somewhere out there on a journey. For instance my dentist has a video screen on the ceiling, and he is showing videos of Prabhupada. So he is seeing videos of Prabhupada and at the same time drilling into the nerves:
‘Where are you?’
‘Yes, a little bit in Vaikuntha and a lot in hell.’
But ultimately I’m in hell, and even the video of Vaikuntha is not going to work. That was an interesting experience. So the mind (even while hearing and chanting) may interfere, but still dealing with Krishna directly is actually a relief, and that’s the one thing. So just chant without complications and listen or sing to some kirtans!
So somehow or other we have to be absorbed in devotional service and give enough time for direct hearing and chanting! If we only deal with the material energy for Krishna, then in the beginning we would say:
‘This is so nice is this devotional service.’
But afterwards, we may feel that it’s like a burden:
‘Oh, I have to do all these things every time. It’s just too much!’
But when we are hearing and chanting then we get fresh inspiration to do it again! So this is really the essence, because everyone experiences this, since sometimes the service is not exactly full of nectar, but there are times when it is. Not that hearing and chanting may not be austere also, but that is what fills us directly – hearing and reiterating it again will give us new motivations in devotional service!
