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"Planet ISKCON" - 98 new articles
- Phanisvara das, Mayapura, IN: "my sweet lord," nina hagen
- Sri Nandanandana das: Ancient Hindu Temples Found in Indonesia
- ISKCON Melbourne, AU: Re-scheduling of Bhakti Vaibhava 1
- Japa Group: Naturally Brings A Mood Of Devotion
- Madhava Ghosh dasa, New Vrndavan, USA: The Trees Indeed Love You
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: 10 SUCCESS TIPS
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: FOUR WIVES
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: Las Cuatro Esposas
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: POWER OF QUESTIONS
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: FULLY ALIVE
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: WHAT IS LOVE
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: Let The Maya Go
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: The Trim Tab Factor
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: PRASADAM POWER
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: DO SOMETHING EVERY DAY
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: ONE MOON
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: WHEN THE MOON WILL RISE?
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: BECOME A SUN AND MOON
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: VOICE
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: SPIRITUAL WISDOM
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: LEADERSHIP Q&A
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: SPIRITUAL CONFIDENCE
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: RUNAROUND DILLEMA
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: FOR OTHERS ALSO
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: ONE MOON IS SUFFICIENT
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: EVERYONE WILL BENEFIT
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: IF THERE IS ONE MOON
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: AT LEAST TEN PERCENT
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: HOLISTIC SPIRITUAL LIFE
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: SOUMYA
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: I DON'T WANT MILLIONS
- ISKCON Melbourne, AU: Daily Class - Kadamba Kanana Swami
- Giridhari das, Brasilia, Brazil: 6 Hour Kirtan and Gaura Purnima in Brasilia
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: ACRES OF DIAMONDS
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: SELF
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: THAT IS THE TEST
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: SUCCESS
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: EVERYTHING HAS A PURPOSE
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: QUEEN OF DENIAL
- HH. Satsvarupa das Goswami: 365
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: IN HIS OWN WAY
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: THE GOLDEN HEART
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: YOUR SITUATION TODAY
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: TIME MANAGEMENT TIPS
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: 10 WAYS TO GET THE MOST OUT OF THE BHAGAVAD GITA
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: 23 ways of how can you have a great relationship with your spouse
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: Krishna Consciousness Is All-auspicious
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: Is Life Coaching For You?
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: WHY WE HAVE BAD LEADERSHIP?
- Ekendra das, Alachua, USA: Preaching To The Air
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: GARBAGE TRUCK
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: NEW PERSPECTIVE ON YOUR LIFE
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: FEAR OF FAILURE
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: GREAT EXERCISE
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: COOPERATION
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: DEVOTEE CARE
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: MACEDONIAN YATRA
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: The Four Agreements
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: YEAH, BUT ... !
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: MY EXPERIENCE
- On the Web: The hand of fate…
- Japa Group: Please Join the Japa Group
- On the Web: From Hari-sauri prabhu's diary
- Srila Prabhupada's Letters
- Srila Prabhupada's Letters
- Srila Prabhupada's Letters
- Srila Prabhupada's Letters
- Srila Prabhupada's Letters
- Srila Prabhupada's Letters
- Srila Prabhupada's Letters
- Srila Prabhupada's Letters
- Ananda Subramanian, Iowa, USA: Ardi
- Gaura Sakti das & Adi Radhika dd, New Vraja Dham, Hungary: Today we celebrated Gaura Purnima
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: WISDOM ACCESS QUESTIONS
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: THE BEST WAY TO FORGIVE
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: GITA COACHING YOU TO SUCCESS
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: MATCHLESS GIFT
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: FLYING INTO HEADWINDS
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: HOW I JOINED ISKCON
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: RELATIONSHIP
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: I Wanted To Change The World
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: Do It Anyway - The Paradoxical Commandments
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: INSTANT POSITIVE CHANGE
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: LONDON RADIO 4 COVERS 40TH ANNIVERSARY OF SRI SRI RADHA LONDONISVARA
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: SELF FORGIVENESS
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: HOW TO OVERCOME FEAR
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: ARE YOU DEVELOPING YOUR HABITS OF EFFECTIVENESS
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: JAGATPUJYA FROM OSIJEK
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: EXCUSES FOR NOT PREACHING
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: THEIR LIFE BECOMES SUBLIME
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: PRACTICAL PSYCHOLOGY
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: SPIRITUAL PLEASURE: BEING HAPPY FOR OTHERS
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: FROM MAHATMA PRABHU
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: CIA
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: What is Coaching?
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: KRSNA IS GRATEFUL
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: WHY SHOULD YOU LISTEN?
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: WORKING COLLABORATIVELY WITH OTHERS
- Akrura das, Gita Coaching: EVEN A LION HAS TO WORK
- Search Planet ISKCON
Phanisvara das, Mayapura, IN: "my sweet lord," nina hagen
Phanisvara das, Mayapura, IN: "my sweet lord," nina hagen
Furioso Paul Schwartz
de fenixdiazplasencia | 05/05/2011i really like this one; found it on facebook, posted by varnadi prabhu
Sri Nandanandana das: Ancient Hindu Temples Found in Indonesia
Source: www.nytimes.com
YOGYAKARTA, INDONESIA, February 24, 2010: Last August when the private Islamic University of Indonesia decided to build a library next to the mosque. In the two decades the university had occupied its 79-acre campus outside Yogyakarta, no temple had ever been found. But chances were high that they were around. By Dec. 11, a construction crew had already removed nearly seven feet of earth. But the soil proved unstable, and the crew decided to dig 20 inches deeper. A backhoe then struck something unusually hard. The crack the backhoe left on the temple wall would become the main sign of damage on what experts say could be the best-preserved ancient monument found in Java, a Hindu temple.
Researchers from the government's Archaeological Office in Yogyakarta headed to the campus the next day, excavated for 35 days and eventually unearthed two 1,100-year-old small temples. "The temples are not so big, but they have features that we haven't found in Indonesia before," Herni Pramastuti, who runs the Archaeological Office, said, pointing to the rectangle-shaped temple, the existence of two sets of linga and yoni, and the presence of two altars.
Historians believe that Hinduism spread in Java in the fifth century, followed three centuries later by Buddhism. Kingdoms hewing to both Hindu and Buddhist beliefs flourished in Java before Islam in the 15th century. But Islam itself incorporated beliefs and ceremonies from the other two religions. Just as some unearthed temples in east Java have a Hindu upper half and a Buddhist lower half, some early mosques had roofs in the shape of Hindu temples, said Timbul Haryono, a professor of archaeology at Gadjah Mada University here and an expert on Hinduism in Southeast Asia. Early mosques faced not in Mecca's direction, but west or east in the manner of Hindu temples.
"Things didn't change all of a sudden," Mr. Haryono said. "Islam was adopted through a process of acculturation." In Indonesia's arts, like the wayang shadow puppetry that dramatizes Hindu epics, or in people's private lives, traces of the earlier religions survive, he said. Food, flowers and incense still accompany many funerals for Muslims, in keeping with Hindu and Buddhist traditions. "Hinduism was Indonesia's main religion for 1,000 years," he said, "so its influence is still strong." "This is Indonesia," said Suwarsono Muhammad, an official at the Islamic University. In the long history of Indonesia, we have proven that different religions can live peacefully."<!– for IE
ISKCON Melbourne, AU: Re-scheduling of Bhakti Vaibhava 1
Japa Group: Naturally Brings A Mood Of Devotion
The main thing is to fix your mind on the sound of the chanting. As you strain and yearn to keep your attention fixed, this naturally brings a mood of devotion. This is the way you serve the holy name. Just as when cooking, if you try very hard not to burn the preparation, to spice it nicely, and to keep it cooking nicely, then you express your devotion in this way.
From Japa Reform Notebook by SDG
Madhava Ghosh dasa, New Vrndavan, USA: The Trees Indeed Love You
“Simply by chanting the Hare Krsna maha-mantra, one can become free from all misery, but because they are enchanted by the illusory energy, people do not take this movement seriously. Therefore those who are actually servants of Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu must seriously distribute this movement all over the world to render the greatest benefit to human society.
“Of course, animals and other lower species are not capable of understanding this movement, but if even a small number of human beings take it seriously, then by their chanting loudly, all living entities, including even trees, animals and other lower species, will be benefited. When Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu inquired from Haridasa Thakura how he was to benefit living entities other than humans, Srila Haridasa Thakura replied that the Hare Krsna maha-mantra is so potent that if it is chanted loudly, everyone will benefit, including the lower species of life.”
Adi 9.40
Merton’s Voice: “The trees indeed love You without knowing You. The tiger lilies and corn flowers are there proclaiming that they love You, without being aware of Your presence. The beautiful dark clouds ride slowly across the sky musing on You like children who do not know what they are dreaming of, as they play.
“But in the midst of them all, I know You, and I know of Your presence.”
Merton, Thomas. Thoughts in Solitude. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1999, p. 99.
Filed under: Thomas Merton
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: 10 SUCCESS TIPS
1. Give personal and written thank-yous.
2. Make time to meet and listen to people.
3. Catch people doing something right.
4. Create an open environment.
5. Provide timely access to important information.
6. Involve everyone in decisions.
7. Reward high performers.
8. Allow everyone to have a sense of ownership.
9. Provide opportunities to grow and learn.
10. Celebrate successes
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: FOUR WIVES
He also loved the third wife very much and was always showing her off to neighboring kingdoms. However, he knew that she could leave him at any time.
He also loved his second wife. She was his confidant and was always kind,considerate and patient with him. Whenever the King faced a problem, he could confide in her, and she would help him get through the difficult times.
The King's first wife was a very loyal partner and maintained him in every way. However, he did not appreciate her and neglected her.
One day, the King fell ill and was told he had only a short time to live. He thought of his luxurious life and wondered, "I now have four wives with me, but when I die, I'll be all alone."
Thus, he asked the fourth wife, "I loved you the most, pampered you, did whatever you asked, and showered great care over you. Now that I'm dying,will you follow me and keep me company?" "No way. It is simply not possible for me to go with you," replied the fourth wife. And she walked away without another word.
Her answer cut like a sharp knife right into his heart.
The sad King then asked the third wife, "I loved you all my life and took good care of you. I was so attached to you. Now that I'm dying; will you follow me and keep me company?"
No, I can't!" replied the third wife. "Someone else will love me and become attached to me just as you did." His heart sank and turned cold.
He then asked the second wife, "I have always turned to you for help and you've always been there for me. When I die, will you follow me and keep me company?" "I'm sorry, there is nothing I can do to really help you," she replied. "The best I can do is walk with you to your grave." Her answer struck him like a bolt of lightning, and the King was devastated.
Then a voice called out: "I'll go with you. I'll follow you no matter where you go." The King looked up, and there was his first wife. She was very skinny as she suffered from malnutrition and neglect. Greatly grieved, the King said, "I should have taken much better care of you when I had the chance! You were really the most important part of my life but I never recognized it."
In truth, we all have the four wives in our lives:
Our fourth wife is our body. No matter how much time and effort we lavish it, it will leave us when we die.
Our third wife is our possessions, status and wealth. When we die, it will all go to others.
Our second wife is our family and friends. No matter how much they have been there for us, the furthest they can stay by us is up to our death. They can't save us from death.
And our first wife is us, the soul, often neglected in pursuit of wealth,power and pleasures of the world. However, the soul is the only thing that remains after all in this world in gone. Cultivate your spiritual life seriously, strengthen and cherish it now. Nothing else lasts.
Akrura das, el entrenar de Gita: LAS CUATRO ESPOSAS
Érase una vez un rey muy rico que tenía cuatro esposas. Él amaba a la cuarta esposa mucho y la adornó con los trajes más ricos y precioso y la trataba con exquisita delicadeza. Él solo le daba lo mejor.
Él rey también amaba mucho a la tercera esposa y le demostraba siempre el pago de los reinos vecinos. Sin embargo, él sabía que ella podría dejarlo en cualquier momento.
Él también amaba a su segunda esposa. Ella era su confidente y tenía mucha clase, ella era considerada y paciente con él. Siempre que el rey hiciera frente a un problema, él podía confiar en ella, y ella le ayudaba a conseguir resolverlo y en los tiempos difíciles siempre era a ella a la que recurría.
La primera esposa del rey era una amiga muy leal y le mantenía de todas las maneras. Sin embargo, él no la apreció y la descuidó le. Un día, el rey cayó enfermo y le comunicaron que él tenía un tiempo corto de vida. Él pensó en su vida lujosa y se preguntaba, " Ahora tengo cuatro esposas conmigo, pero cuando muero, estaré solo."
Así, él le preguntó a la cuarta esposa, "Yo te he amado mucho, y te he cuidado con mimo, siempre he velado por su seguridad, hice lo que usted preguntó, y regué gran cuidado sobre usted. Ahora que yo me estoy muriendo, usted me seguirá y me me protegerá?"
"De ningún modo. No es posible que me vaya con usted, "contestó la cuarta esposa. Y ella se fue sin decir nada más.
Su respuesta fue como una profunda puñalada aguda en su corazón.
El rey triste entonces le preguntó a la tercera esposa, "Le amé toda mi vida y tomé le cuidé muy bien. Es de esta forma que me siento atado a usted. Ahora que me voy a morir ¿usted me seguirá y me hará compañía?"
"No, yo no puedo" contestó la tercera esposa. "Alguna persona me amará y se casará conmigo apenas usted muera." Su corazón se hundió y se volvió frío. Él entonces preguntó a la segunda esposa, "He estado siempre a tu lado y te he hecho mi consejera, siempre estuvieste conmigo cuando yo te necesitaba. ¿Cuándo yo muera, usted me seguirá y me hará compañía?"
"Yo estoy apesadumbrada, allí no hay nada que yo pueda hacer para ayudarle realmente," ella contestó. "Lo mejor que puedo hacer es caminar con usted a su lado." Su respuesta lo pegó como un golpe de relámpago, y el rey quedó devastado.
Entonces una voz dijo en voz alta: "Yo iré con usted. Yo le seguiré donde usted vaya." El rey miró hacia arriba, y vió a su primera esposa. Ella estaba muy flaca pues ella había sufrido de desnutrición por la negligencia del rey. El rey dijo, "grandemente afligido; ¡Debía haber tomado mucho más cuidado de usted cuando tuve la ocasión! Usted es realmente la persona más importantes de mi vida pero nunca lo reconocí."
En verdad, todos tenemos las cuatro esposas en nuestras vidas:
Nuestra cuarta esposa es nuestro cuerpo. No importa cuantas horas y esfuerzos que le prodigemos, nos dejará cuando muramos.
Nuestra tercera esposa es nuestras posesiones, estado y abundancia. Cuando morimos, todo irá a otros.
Nuestra segunda esposa es nuestra familia y amigos. No importa cuanto tiempo estén con nosotros, ellos permanecerán junto a nosotros hasta nuestra muerte. Ellos no pueden salvarnos de la muerte.
Y nuestra primera esposa somos nosotros, el alma, descuidada a menudo por la búsqueda de la abundancia, de la energía y de los placeres del mundo. Sin embargo, el alma es la única cosa que nos sigue después de que todo en este mundo se haya ido.
Cultive su vida espiritual seriamente, ahora consolídela y acariciela. Así hasta el final.
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: POWER OF QUESTIONS
Questions immediately change what we're focusing on and therefore how we feel.
Questions have the power to affect our beliefs and thus what we consider possible or impossible.
Questions change the resources available to us.
Questions open up new worlds and give us access to resources we might not otherwise realize we have available.
What do you think? How can your job be improved?
At any moment, the questions that we ask ourselves can shape our perception of who we are, what we're capable of, and what we're willing to do to achieve our dreams.
Learning to consciously control the questions you ask will take you further to achieving your goals.
Often our resources are limited only by the questions we ask ourselves.
The only thing that limits your questions is your belief about what's possible.
Create a better question, and you'll get a better answer.
Our life experience is based on what we focus on, and questions change our focus.
Samples:
What's great about this problem?
What can I learn from this problem so that this never happens again?
How can I use this to my advantage?
What is my life really about?
What am I really committed to?
Why am I here?
Who am I?
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: FULLY ALIVE
To "be alive" is much more then "living". Living could mean simply not to be dead. In Germany there is a saying: "The epitaph of an average German may read: he died with 20 and was buried at 80".
This means he lived for 60 years but was not alive.
To best express, what I mean with "being alive" I would like to break down the word in its five letters and give an explanation for each one: A - L - I - V - E
A : to be alive is to be aware.
L : To be alive is to be in love.
I : To be alive is to be intuitive.
Intuition is the voice of the Lord in the heart - Paramatma. To the devoted and receptive soul the indwelling Lord is constantly trying to give instructions, guidance and inspiration. Let's learn to ask and listen.
V : To be alive is to be victorious.
Victorious over what? Spiritual traditions teach us that there are two tendencies within us - the positive and the destructive. They fight like two dogs with each other. Ultimately that side will be victorious whom we give food. To be victorious is to resolve that inner conflict by inviting the Lord into all decisions.
E : To be alive is to be excited.
Excited by what? By recognizing Lord Krishna in everything. Learn to meet Him not only in the holy name and the sastras but in the exchanges, your life-situations and all and be excited about one word: SEVA or devotional service. It´s the key to the kingdom of God.
To be spiritually alive means to be aware, attentive, full of love, with an often used intuition. To be alive means to be victorious and excited. To be alive means to say yes to the spiritual adventure of growth in Krishna consciousness.
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: WHAT IS LOVE
guhyam akhyati prcchati
bhunkte bhojayate caiva
sad-vidham priti-laksanam
But if you do not even know the person, then where is the question of love? Suppose you love some boy or some girl, then you will give some present, and he or she gives you some present -- that develops love. You give something to eat, and whatever he or she gives you to eat, you eat. You disclose your mind: "My dear such-and-such, I love you. This is my ambition." And he or she makes some disclosure. These are the exchanges of love.
But if there is no person-to-person meeting, where is the question of love? If I claim to love somebody, but I visit his house only once a week and ask,"Please give me such-and-such," where is the exchange of love? Love means there is some exchange. If you love somebody but you have not given anything to that person or taken anything from him, where is the love?
The conclusion is, religion means to love God, and that means you must know who God is. There is no alternative. You must know the person who is God. Then you can have loving exchanges with Him. That we are teaching. We are asking our disciples to rise early in the morning and offer mangala arati, then bhoga arati, to the Lord in His form as the Deity in the temple. Are we such fools and rascals that we are wasting time worshiping a "doll"? Sometimes people think like that. But that is not a fact. When you enter the temple, you know definitely, "Here is Krsna. He is God, and we must love Him like this." That is the superexcellence of this Krsna consciousness movement. We do everything definitely, on the positive platform.
- Srila Prabhupada, Civilization And Transcendence
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: Let The Maya Go
"Krishna and light, Maya and shadow. Light or shadow," Srila Prabhupada
says, "Krishna or Maya. It's your choice which side is up. It all depends on
your desire. So, let the may go."
"I've come to Vrindaban because I want Krishna," I say, "but I'm torn. It's
like two people sitting here: Hayagrivadas and Howard, Dr. Jekyll and Mr.
Hyde."
"So, let the maya go. Howard is born with this body and dies with this body.
Hayagrivadas is the eternal personality of the soul, the real you."
"I think at death he turns back into Dr. Jekyll," I say.
"That depends on your thoughts at death."
"Then I have to learn to think of Krishna."
"My problem is the false ego won't stay dead," I say, "even though I want him to. Why?"
"That's also Arjuna's question," Prabhupada says. "He asks Krishna, 'Why does a man sin, as if forced to?' And what is Krihna's reply?"
"Kama," I say. "Lust"
This is not a sectarian process. The Lord has millions of names, and His transcendental potencies are in all of them."
excerpt from Vrindaban Days by Howard Wheeler (Hayagriva Swami)
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: The Trim Tab Factor
Expand Your Positive Influence
In practical terms, being a trim-tab means:
o You avoid complaining, criticising or being negative - and view these actions as shallow attempts to shift the blame from your shoulders to someone else.
o You empathise with your boss - and try to anticipate the pressures he or she is operating under. Whenever you're given an assignment, you pause and consider the "why" this matter is important. Then take the initiative and provide more than was asked of you. This will make a big impression.
o You have to be constant - and encourage your peers to stick to sound principles and good business practices rather than twisting and turning with every social wind that blows.
As you do these things consistently well, your boss and others in formal positions of power will have increasing trust in your ability to perform. That, in turn, will lead to more opportunities for you to take the initiative. Over time, you will be able to substantially build focus within your organisation by creatively trim-tabbing your way through.
"We must become the change we seek in the world."
- Gandhi
The Trim-Tab Factor
In your own personal mission statement, see yourself as a trim-tab factor. See yourself as a change catalyst. By making some changes in your part of the ecosystem and believing that through a process of patience and diligence you begin to have reverberations on other parts of that ecosystem, you will become a person we call a "transition figure": one who stops the transmission of tendencies from one generation to another. For instance,
Transition figures, those who are trim-tab factors inside a family, can stop the transmission of undesirable tendencies if they will internally develop their proactive, empathic, synergistic, and self-renewal muscles. They can become an enormous source of influence in causing their small inner Circle of Influence to get larger and larger.
Some might say it will take forever; however, it is amazing how rapidly such transition figures, such change catalysts, such trim-tab factors, start to influence an entire culture. Sometimes change occurs in a matter of a few months, sometimes in a year or two, sometimes in just a few weeks. Try it in you're your environment for 30 days. You will start to see the whole ecosystem altering because of this positive energy source.
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: PRASADAM POWER
Prabhupada: Yes. You go on simply eating, that's all. (laughter) And all of my devotees, they have come to me simply by eating pras€da. You are also? (laughter) So we give all facilities. If you cannot do anything, please come and eat with us. All right, thank you very much. (end) Bhagavad-gita 13.4
—
Miami, February 27, 1975
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: DO SOMETHING EVERY DAY
Success is more likely if we work diligently on our goals every day.
2. Imagine you were going away tomorrow for a month and you had to get caught up on everything before you left. Work as hard and as fast as you do just before you leave for vacation.
3. Practice tight time planning. Imagine that you only had half the time available to get the job done and work with a sense of urgency all day long.
4. Continually ask for more responsibility, and when you get it, complete the task quickly and well. This one habit will continually open doors of opportunity for you.
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: ONE MOON
Lecture Excerpt -- New York, April 12, 1969
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: WHEN THE MOON WILL RISE?
Prabhupada: Ninety-five percent may remain non-brahmana. But this 5 percent, if they are strongly brahminical, then others will follow. Ekas candras tamo hanti na ca tarah-sahasrasah. [Canakya Pandita: "If there is one moon, that is sufficient. What is the use of millions of stars?"] You have got millions of stars. Nobody cares for them. But people are looking after "When the moon will rise? When the moon will rise?" That one moon is sufficient than millions of stars. So this is the suggestion.
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: BECOME A SUN AND MOON
So try to preach this cult. But not that everyone will accept, but even a few percent, one percent of the whole population accept. Just like in the sky, there is one moon only and there are millions of stars. They're useless. What is the value of the millions of stars? But one moon, oh, dissipate the whole darkness of night. Similarly, at least those who have taken to Krsna consciousness, you become, each of you become a moon and enlighten the world. These so-called glow-worms, they'll not be able to do anything. That's a fact. Don't remain a glow-worm. Just become a sun and moon. Then you will..., people will be happy, you will be happy.
- Srila Prabhupada, Srimad-Bhagavatam 1.15.1 -- New York, November 29, 1973
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: VOICE
To find our voice means to engage in service that genuinely taps our talents and fuels our enthusiasm. It means to do something significant with our life – to sense an unmet need among people and then to fully harness all our talents and enthusiasm to meet that need. To find our voice means to think big and shoot for the rhino rather than settling for false humility.
Once we've found our own voice, we can continue to increase our advancement by helping others to find their own unique voices as well.
To inspire others means to recognize, respect and create meaningful opportunities for others to express their voices. The word inspire is derived from the Latin inspirare which literally means to breath life into another. This is exactly what we do when we encourage and positively influence others to find their voices.
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: SPIRITUAL WISDOM
BY BHAKTISIDDHANTA SARASVATI
1. We are put to test and trial in this world. Only those who attend the kirtana of the devotees can succeed.
2. Every spot on earth where discourses on God are held is a place of pilgrimage.
3. Possession of objects not related to Krsna is our main malady.
4. Let me not desire anything but the highest good for my worst enemies.
5. As dalliance with the body in luxury increases, so wanes the spirit of service of the Lord.
6. Those favored by God find their paths set by thorns.
7. There is no peace or happiness in our worldly life. Circumstances create turmoil and annoyance.
8. Chant the maha mantra loudly and with attachment. This will drive away inertia, worldly evils and pests.
9. Be indifferent to bazaar gossips, stick firmly to your cherished goals, no lack or impediments of the world will ever stand in your way.
10. Pay due respects to the extroverts of the world, but do not be appreciative of their manners and conduct. They are to be shaken off from your mind.
11. A devotee feels the presence of God everywhere, but one averse to the Lord denies His existence anywhere.
12. You cannot appreciate transcendental matters with the reasoning of the world. It is sheer nonsense to decry them with the measuring stick of your intellect.
13. To recite the name of Sri Krsna is bhakti.
14. Life is for the glorification of topics on Hari. If that is stopped, then what need is there to carry on life.
15. Physical illness with Hari-bhajana is preferred to physical fitness without Hari-bhajana.
16. Our span of life on earth is short. Our life will be crowned with success if the body wears out with constant discourses on Hari.
17. We are here on earth not to work as artisans for making big buildings with wood and stone but to work only as messengers for the teachings of Sri Caitanya Deva.
18. A sycophant (a person who acts obsequiously toward someone in order to gain advantage; a servile flatterer) is neither a guru or a preacher.
19. To transform the adverse desires of the jivas is the supreme duty of the most merciful. To rescue one person from the stronghold of Mahamaya is an act of superb benevolence, far superior to opening innumerable hospitals.
20. Unless we are devoted to God, secularism shall not leave us.
21. Look within. Amend yourself, rather than pry into the frailties of others.
22. In this world of Maya, averse to the Lord, full of trials and tribulations, only patience, humility and respect for others are our friends for Hari-bhajana.
23. The Lord, Gaurasundara, puts His devotees in various difficulties and associations to test their patience and strength of mind. Success depends on their good fortune.
24. When faults in others misguide and delude you – have patience, introspect, find faults in yourself. Know that others cannot harm you unless you harm yourself.
25. I wish that every selfless, tender-hearted person of Gaudiya Math will be prepared to shed two hundred gallons of blood for the nourishment of the spiritual corpus of every individual of this world.
Akrura@pamho.net
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: LEADERSHIP Q&A
1. Who is really a leader?
One who takes responsibility.
2. What is the crucial difference between a leader and a manager?
You lead people and manage things. Leadership is doing the right things. Management is doing things right.
3. Can someone be a good leader but not a good manager?
Yes.
4. Is leadership an inborn quality or can it be developed?
Leaders are both born and made.
5. What is the greatest challenge a leader faces?
His ego.
6. What is the worst fault a leader can have or the worst error he can make?
To Misuse his power.
7. Where does a leader derive his power from?
From his conscience. Ultimately, from God.
8. What are the three qualities an excellent leader has?
Character, competence and service attitude.
9. Which one is most essential and why?
Character, because he will serve based on principles (God's laws).
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: SPIRITUAL CONFIDENCE
The successful execution of Krsna conscious activities requires both patience and confidence.
A newly married girl naturally expects offspring from her husband, but she cannot expect to have them immediately after marriage.
Of course, as soon as she is married she can attempt to get a child, but she must surrender to her husband, confident that her child will develop and be born in due time.
Similarly, in devotional service surrender means that one has to become confident.
The devotee thinks, avasya raksibe krsna: "Krsna will surely protect me and give me help for the successful execution of devotional service."
This is called confidence.
- Srila Prabhupada
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: RUNAROUND DILLEMA
Because we don't know what is really important to us, everything seems important.
Because everything seems important, we have to do everything.
Other people, unfortunately, see us as doing everything, so they expect us to do everything.
Doing everything keeps us so busy that we don't have time to think what is really important to us.
- Anonymous
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: FOR OTHERS ALSO
To achieve the ultimate goal of sreyas, or good fortune, one should engage everything, including his life, wealth and words, not only for himself but for others also. However, unless one is interested in sreyas in his own life, he cannot preach of sreyas for the benefit of others.
...
The Bhagavatam says that it is the duty of an advanced human being to act in such a way as to facilitate human society's attainment of the ultimate goal of life.
- Srila Prabhupada
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: ONE MOON IS SUFFICIENT
Ekas candras tamo hanti na ca tara sahasrasah.
If one disciple is enlivened with Krsna consciousness, he can work as the moon.
Otherwise so many foolish followers, what they'll do?
Just like stars.
Thousands and millions of stars, they cannot do anything.
One moon is sufficient.
Ekas candras tamo hanti na ca tara sahasrasah.
So this Krsna consciousness movement, it is not required that everyone will be follower.
That is not possible, because it is very difficult.
But still, if one follower, sincere follower is there, it will go on.
It will go on.
Nobody can stop it.
[The Nectar of Devotion -- Bombay, January 9, 1973]
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: EVERYONE WILL BENEFIT
The Krsna consciousness movement introduced by Lord Caitanya is extremely important because one who takes to it becomes eternal, being freed from birth, death and old age.
People do not recognize that the real distresses in life are the four principles of birth, death, old age and disease.
They are so foolish that they resign themselves to these four miseries, not knowing the transcendental remedy of the Hare Krsna maha-mantra.
Simply by chanting the Hare Krsna maha-mantra, one can become free from all misery, but because they are enchanted by the illusory energy, people do not take this movement seriously.
Therefore those who are actually servants of Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu must seriously distribute this movement all over the world to render the greatest benefit to human society.
Of course, animals and other lower species are not capable of understanding this movement, but if even a small number of human beings take it seriously, then by their chanting loudly, all living entities, including even trees, animals and other lower species, will be benefited.
When Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu inquired from Haridasa Thakura how he was to benefit living entities other than humans, Srila Haridasa Thakura replied that the Hare Krsna maha-mantra is so potent that if it is chanted loudly, everyone will benefit, including the lower species of life.
- Caitanya-caritamrta Adi 9.39 Purport
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: IF THERE IS ONE MOON
Why a few selected persons come here? Because it requires background of pious activities. Otherwise it is not possible. We do not expect that cent percent of people will become Krsna conscious. That is not possible. But if there is one ideal Krsna conscious person, he can do benefit to many thousands. Ekas candras tamo hanti na ca tarah sahasrasah. If there is one moon in the sky, he can illuminate the whole universe, na ca tarah sahasrasah, not these twinkling stars. It is not possible.
Sri Caitanya-caritamrta, Madhya-lila 20.112 -- New York, July 20, 1976
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: AT LEAST TEN PERCENT
At least, ten percent of the population become Krsna consciousness -- there is guarantee, peace in the world. Because ekas candra...
We do not require many moons in the sky.
Only one moon is sufficient to drive away the darkness.
Varam eka guni putra na ca murkha-satair api.
Canakya Pandita says, "It is better to have a qualified son than to have hundreds of fools."
So the modern civilization is going on in that way, godless civilization.
If some percentage of the civilized human beings become Krsna conscious, that will bring forth peace.
Sri Caitanya-caritamrta, Madhya-lila 20.124-125 -- New York, November 26, 1966
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: HOLISTIC SPIRITUAL LIFE
The secondary rules are of three types: rules regarding self; rules regarding society; rules regarding the afterlife. Rules regarding the self are of two categories: those for the body and those for the mind. Those rules to keep a person's body properly nourished so that they can remain healthy are the bodily rules. Such things as regulated drinking, eating, sleeping, exercise, and for sickness, prescriptions for cure, are bodily rules.
If people do not follow these rules, they cannot pass through life smoothly. If they do not follow the mental rules, their power of realization, concentration, imagination, contemplation and judgment will be weak and will not properly function. There will be no advancement in arts and sciences, and moreover one will not be able to take the mind from material thoughts and direct it to thoughts of God. As a result, sinful thoughts and atheistic attitude will dominate the mind; finally a person will become no better than a beast. Therefore these bodily and mental rules are very necessary for success in human life.
Bhaktivinoda Thakura, Caitanya Siksamrta
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: SOUMYA
I would like to share with you a couple of incidents in my initial days of Krishna consciousness. Krishna's holy names are not different from Krishna. It has great power in strength ... sweet in taste. Everybody enjoys it if they attentively chant. It even attracts little kids to become Krishna conscious without parents' intervention.
I started practicing Krishna consciousness three years back. By the mercy of Radha Mohan Prabhu who was my colleague in the office, I came to know about Hare Krishna movement and Krishna consciousness.
Radha Mohan Prabhu brought beads for me from Vrindavan and I started my chanting at home. My daughter Soumya who was five years old at that time used to observe me chanting daily. Once she asked me that she wants to chant on beads. I discouraged her and told her that she is too young and she can't hold the beads properly. Also I tried to convince her that once she grows up she can start chanting.
The next day I observed that Soumya drew 108 boxes on the white paper and marking each box while chanting Hare Krishna Maha Mantra. I was very surprised with her idea and strong desire to chant Maha Mantra. After completing her round of chanting I asked her how she got that idea. She replied, "Dad, you told me that since I am just five years old, I can't hold the beads properly. So I got this idea of drawing 108 boxes and marking each box while chanting. In this way I can count 108 times without holding beads. I think you have no objection now."
I then realized the power and taste of the Hare Krishna Maha Mantra.
I still remember, that day was Friday and we had a Bhagavad-gita class at Dinabandhu Prabhu's house. I told Dinabandhu Prabhu about Soumya's chanting and asked him whether it is ok to encourage kids to chant at this age. Dinabandhu Prabhu told me that we should encourage kids to chant if they have that desire and he gave beads with bead bag to Soumya. By the blessings of that great devotee, from that day my little daughter started chanting and practicing Krishna consciousness for the past three years.
This is really a wonderful experience in my life to realize that there is no age limit and everybody enjoys Hare Krishna Maha Mantra once they taste it.
Soumya's Preaching
Soumya used to prepare gift cards in MS Word or Paint Brush with Krishna's picture and the Hare Krishna Maha Mantra. When I made a printout of those cards at my office, she used give these cards as gifts to her friends. When I asked her why she is giving them, she said, "This is one way of preaching. My friends who are Muslims and Christians and don't know about Krishna will see Krishna's beautiful face and read the Maha Mantra written on the card at least once. It gives them some spiritual benefit."
I was quite surprised by her answer. We never taught her to do like that. I think that is because of the mercy of great devotees and the Supreme Lord.
(Written by Bhakta Radha Krishna Murthy, ISKCON Manchester, UK)
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: I DON'T WANT MILLIONS
I want one student who follows my instruction. I don't want millions. Ekas candras tamo hanti na ca tara-sahasrasah. If there is one moon in the sky, that is sufficient for illumination. There is no need of millions of stars. So my position is that I want to see that at least one disciple has become pure devotee. Of course, I have got many sincere and pure devotees. That is my good luck. But I would have been satisfied if I could find out one only. There is no need of so-called millions of stars.
Srila Prabhupada, Arrival Lecture -- San Francisco, July 15, 1975
ISKCON Melbourne, AU: Daily Class - Kadamba Kanana Swami
Daily Class - H. H. Kadamba Kanana Swami - Srimad Bhagavatam 11.18.13
Srimad Bhagavatam 11.18.13 - The sannyasa order is a nice niche for serving Krsna.
16.2MB
Posted by Tirthapada Dasa at 4/3/10; 8:39:27 AM to the Daily Class dept
Daily Class - Kadamba Kanana Swami
Daily Class - H. H. Kadamba Kanana Swami - Srimad Bhagavatam 11.18.13
Srimad Bhagavatam 11.18.14 - Pay no attention to endless glitter of material energy. Continue your duties of devotional service and go back home, back to Godhead.
Giridhari das, Brasilia, Brazil: 6 Hour Kirtan and Gaura Purnima in Brasilia
Our Gaura Purnima Festival in Brasilia was the first major festival we’ve held at our new Hare Krishna center. Though we only used word of mouth and our email list to invite members one week before the event, we had more people than we could fit!
We started six hours before the publicly announced time so as to do Brasilia’s first 6 hour kirtan.
After the kirtan I presented a slide show lecture on Mayapur, since my wife and I just came back from spending two weeks there (she took lots of nice pictures while I was in the GBC meetings!). It was a presentation with a few fun additions. I surprised them with a bottle of Ganges water when I showed them slides of the Ganges river. Everyone had the chance to sprinkle some drops on their head. I also passed around a small twig of the neem tree from the Yoga Pitha when showing that. They loved it.
After the presentation on the glories of Mayapur Dhama, we had more kirtan! This time an ecstatic, massively energetic kirtan led by Devananda Prabhu, a devotee from Trinidad and Tobago currently residing in Brasilia.
The crowd jumped and danced with such enthusiasm, I feared for the structural integrity of the 3 story building in which our Hare Krishna center is located!
After the kirtan we served prasadam, including Lord Chaitanya’s delicious birthday cake.
You can see lots more pictures here.
We’re so happy to have our own center now! But we still have lots of debts from the purchase and renovation of it. If you can help, please send us a donation through PayPal – gd@pandavas.org.br.
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: ACRES OF DIAMONDS
An old African farmer became very excited one day upon hearing from a traveling merchant of men who had gone off into Africa, discovered diamond mines and become fabulously wealthy. He decided to sell off his farm, organize a caravan, and read into the vast interior of Africa to find diamonds so he could crown his life with fabulous wealth.
For many years, he searched the vast African continent for diamonds. Eventually, he ran out of money and was abandoned by everyone. Finally, alone, in a fit of despair, he threw himself into the ocean and drowned.
Meanwhile, back on the farm that he had sold, the new farmer was out watering a donkey one day in a stream that cut across the farm. He found a strange stone that threw off light in a remarkable way. He took it into the house and thought no more of it. Some months later the same merchant, traveling on business, stopped for the night at the farm. When he saw the stone, he grew very excited and asked if the old farmer had finally returned. No, he was told, the old farmer had never been seen again, but why was he so excited?
The merchant picked up the stone and said, "This is a diamond of great price and value." The new farmer was skeptical, but the merchant insisted that he show him where he had found the dia mond. They went out on the farm to where the farmer had been watering the donkey, and as they looked around, they found an other diamond, and another, and another. It turned out that the whole farm was covered with acres of diamonds. The old farmer had gone off into Africa seeking for diamonds without ever looking under his own feet.
The moral to this story was that the old farmer did not realize that diamonds do not look like diamonds in their rough form. They simply look like rocks to the uneducated eye. A diamond must be cut, faceted, polished and set before it looks like the kind of dia mond that you see in the jewelry stores.
Likewise, your acres of diamonds probably lie right under your own feet. But they are usually disguised as hard work. "Opportuni ties come dressed in work clothes."
Your acres of diamonds probably lie in your own talents, your interests, your education, your background and experience, your industry, your city, your contacts. Your acres of diamonds probably lie right under your own feet if you will take the time to recognize them and then go to work on them.
Remember the words I quoted earlier from Theodore Roose velt who said, "Do what you can, with what you have, right where you are." You don't need to move across the country or to make a major upheaval in your life. In most cases, what you are looking for is right at your fingertips. But it doesn't look like an opportunity on the surface. In many cases, your great opportunity will simply look like hard, hard work.
(From "Maximum Achievement" by Brian Tracy)
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: SELF
Sukadeva Gosvami told Maharaja Pariksit that every living entity is actually most attached to his own self. Outward paraphernalia such as home, family, friends, country, society, wealth, opulence and reputation are all only secondary in pleasing the living entity. They please only because they bring pleasure to the self. For this reason, one is self-centered and is attached to his body and self more than he is to relatives like wife, children and friends. If there is some immediate danger to one's own person, he first of all takes care of himself, then others. That is natural. That means he loves his own self more than anything else.
The next important object of affection, after his own self, is his material body. A person who has no information of the spirit soul is very much attached to his material body, so much so that even in old age he wants to preserve the body in so many artificial ways, thinking that his old and broken body can be saved. Everyone is working hard day and night just to give pleasure to his own self, under either the bodily or spiritual concept of life. We are attached to material possessions because they give pleasure to the senses or to the body. The attachment to the body is there only because the "I," the spirit soul, is within the body.
Similarly, when one is further advanced, he knows that the spirit soul is pleasing because it is part and parcel of Krsna. Ultimately, it is Krsna who is pleasing and all-attractive. He is the Supersoul of everything. And in order to give us this information, Krsna descends and tells us that the all-attractive center is He Himself. Without being an expansion of Krsna, nothing can be attractive.
Krsna Book 14: Prayers Offered by Lord Brahma to Lord Krsna
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: THAT IS THE TEST
If you accept bhagavad-bhakti-yoga, devotional service to the Lord, you shall be prasanna-manasa. You shall be always feeling jolly. If I am not jolly, if I am not prasanna-manasa, that means maya has attacked me. A bhagavad-bhakta shall never be aprasanna, not joyful. Always joyful. If he is actually in contact with Krsna, how he can become morose? No. If he is morose, if he is unhappy, that means maya has attacked him. This is the test. ...
Spiritual life means anandamaya. There is no displeasure. Always ananda. That is spiritual life. Spiritual life means ananda, and material life means anxiety. You can distinguish. If you are always put into anxiety, that is material life. And if you are always jolly, that is spiritual life. Anandamayo 'bhyasat.
Srila Prabhupada, Srimad-Bhagavatam 1.2.20 -- Vrndavana, October 31, 1972
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: SUCCESS
We have to purify our existence, and get out of this repetition of birth and death. That is success of life.
We are all parts and parcels of the Supreme Lord. Therefore our business is to act in such a way that the Supreme Personality of Godhead is satisfied. That is success of life.
If you simply try to understand Krsna, the, His transcendental appearance, disappearance, activities, if you try to understand, then your life is success.
The highest perfection is that when you understand God and you are in love with God. That is success.
When there is pure chanting, that is success.
The successful life means to make our consciousness changed into Krsna consciousness.
If you somehow or other you can remember about the Supreme Personality of Godhead, about His activities, about His form, about His name, anything, form, name, quality, paraphernalia, anything, if you can remember, then that is success of your life.
The success is if we can remember Narayana at the end of life.
- Srila Prabhupada
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: EVERYTHING HAS A PURPOSE
There are no coincidences. Because the universe is controlling higher agencies, each encounter has come to us for a particular reason. We are subject to a spiritual law similar to a law of physics: every action produces a corresponding reaction. Therefore, we can try to discover the lesson in every occurrence. The exercise is to turn negative events into positive ones and positive events into even better ones. If we learn from all events, then everything that happens can become a positive occurrence because we have become wiser.
Bhakti-tirtha Swami
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: QUEEN OF DENIAL
Have you ever known anyone who thought that if they ignored it, it would go away? I call people like that the Queen or King of Denial. Denying that something doesn't exist doesn't make it go away. Usually, it only makes it worst. The first step in solving an issue is to acknowledge that it is there.
The longer we ignore a situation the longer it will persist. Usually, the longer we ignore it, the worse it gets, until what started out as a small problem escalates into a major problem. I certainly have played the role of Queen of Denial from time to time. I actually can be very good at it. Unfortunately, reality has a way of catching up with me and it is never pretty. My lesson from this is that denying a problem doesn't exist, doesn't make it go away. It simply allows it to get worse. If we handle situations when they come up, we can avoid the problem that ignoring them creates.
A dear friend ignored the pains in her stomach for years. When she finally could no longer make the pain go away by drinking bottles of that chalky stuff, she went to the doctor. She was diagnosed with
stomach cancer and died several months later. Ignoring the signs of a problem will not make the problem go away. If life is giving you warning signals, don't ignore them. Listen to what they have to tell you and handle whatever it is in the moment. It will save you in the end.
Coaching
Sometimes it may seem like it is easier to ignore a problem than to face it and take care of it, but it is always better to handle it than wait. Waiting only causes more fear and frustration to build up within us. Denying something doesn't make it go away. By ignoring the situation, we are allowing it to grow and get worse. Facing the problem head on and dealing with it is best. That way we do not let it become a crisis.
- Rachelle Disbennett Lee
http://365daysofcoaching.com
HH. Satsvarupa das Goswami: 365
3:58 A.M.
I slept peacefully and woke up at 2:30 A.M. I spoke with Narayana for awhile and then got down to my chanting. My head was clear, but my eyes were heavy. It was not my soul or my heart but just my eyelids. I don't know what the problem was. But I plodded on and made good time. I've now chanted twelve rounds. I chanted without distraction to other topics but not with deep diving into the glories of the holy names. I might have put on a little bit of music to wake me up, but I didn't think of it. I need a little jolt. I turn to my journal now, my japa poem and then back to the remaining quota. I hope my eyes will lift.
I feel like a football
player who has been knocked
around. I don't know
why. It just may be
the aging body, the fatigue.
It was hand to hand
combat for my first
twelve rounds as my
eyelids weighed heavy
on the eyeballs.
But I am not about
to concede defeat. We have
made a commitment too deep
for that. We fight back,
wash water on the face
and recommence the
yajna with determined
grit.
Prabhupada Smaranam
This is a picture taken during Srila Prabhupada's July 1971 visit to the Boston temple. He made four visits to Boston and this was the last one. He came mainly to install Radha Krishna deities at my request. During his earlier visits the movement was still small, and he did not have many temples. He visited once for a month in 1968, once for two weeks in the summer of 1969, and once only for only a few days in the winter of 1969. By 1971 he had been traveling and preaching with a group of devotees holding pandals in India, and he had recently been to Moscow and Paris. It was his kindness to stop and visit Boston which was now a smaller temple with the exodus of the devotees of ISKCON Press. He went out of his way to come, and I have always felt it was a personal reciprocation just to do the favor of rewarding me for sticking it out in Boston and his rewarding the temple for persevering. Besides, we had about twenty devotees ready for him to initiate. And I had written him several times asking him to come to install the Deities. He had personally purchased them in India. They were identical to the Radha-Madhava brass deities he had installed in Mayapur.
We had two separate fire sacrifices, one for the initiations and one for installing the deities. Here I am functioning as the priest in my householder dress, and Prabhupada is looking on. He also read from the verses of Brahma Samhita. It was during this visit that I made the mistake of renting the VIP suite at the Boston Sheraton for Prabhupada to use as his rooms. We did not have first class facilities at the temple and didn't prepare a room for him. We also just had only one men's bathroom. That was used by all the men, and the women had their own. When Prabhupada first arrived he came to the temple and lectured and met with the devotees afterward. Then I informed him it was getting late and that he could go to the hotel we had carefully prepared for him. He flatly refused. "I will stay in the temple," he said. He quoted the saying that living in the forest was living in the mode of goodness, living in the city was living in the mode of passion and living in the brothel or liquor house was living in the mode of ignorance. When I had paid for the hotel the lady asked me why we were getting the VIP suite for a spiritual master if he was a renounced person.
She even supplied long stemmed roses, but there was no cooking allowed in the room. We planned to smuggle in an electric burner. (I told her that our spiritual master was the most important person to us and deserved the best treatment. But it turned out I had missed out the concept of yukta-vairagya in this case, and I was trying to put my spiritual master in what he considered a brothel.)
The room at the temple was very simple, and all we had for a chair was a rocking chair, and it was sometimes a little awkward with our making the men and women share the second bathroom in the house. But he seemed to accept it all without any disturbance and liked staying at the temple. When he left Boston and went to New York (where they had lavish quarters for him in the temple) I wrote him a letter of apology for giving such run-down quarters in Boston. He wrote back and said there was nothing to apologize for. He was a mendicant, he said, and accepted what ever his disciples could offer, but the principle should be to present the first class thing to the spiritual master. I was relieved he wasn't angry but aware we hadn't given him first class facilities.
Hearing Krishna's pastimes
1.
The gopis say that Krishna does
not deserve the name acyuta
or infallible one because He
has failed to show Himself
to them. And now again they say
"You are certainly infallible
in Your obstinacy." In so many words they talk
back and forth accusing
each other yet confessing their love.
I'm not qualified to
write of the intimate
dealings so it's better I
am quiet. But something should be said. In Caitanya
Caritamrita, Lord Caitanya says
the food offered to Krishna
becomes the nectar mixed with His mouth and to
taste it as prasada is
to taste His amrita. It's hard to avoid the
intimate nectar of His
pastimes.
But actually we have no realization of the
original adhara-amrtam
of Krishna's lips. We would be sahajiyas
if we claimed that.
Only the gopis know
that taste, and they
hanker for it more.
We should hear Krishna's pastimes and
taste the nectar in
that way. Hearing pacifies
the heart of lusty desires
and elevates the soul
to pure devotional service.
2.
Ah, but sometimes I
don't know what to
write. Too much about
the gopis isn't right.
I hear a blues tune
and try to take a Krishna
conscious lesson from its marrow.
Krishna's in the forest, there's no denying it
and I am drawn in that way.
He plays a flute and the cowherd maidens
stop what they're doing
and run out of the house past
their relatives. Some have less than perfect feelings,
and they can't get past their
husbands, brothers or fathers.
They leave their bodies in
the fire of separation.
But when the ones who reach
Him came upon Sri Krishna, He
treats them formally and
coldly tells them, "Why
have you come here in this
dangerous night? I'm glad to
welcome you, but you really
should go home as chaste
girls." Years later in a
letter He sent by Uddhava, He admitted
that night He meant just the opposite
of what He was saying.
But He eventually gave into
their tears and toe scratching and angry
words and gave
them the rasa dance.
I can't help but to speak
upon that subject. It's
like a magnet. It is
not wrong to sing. Just be
careful you don't treat
it profanely with
lust or triviality or with
symbolism or any indulgence.
You can say what happens
on the autumn night if
you say it nicely with
the parampara of Sukadeva
and Prabhupada's Krishna
book. It is not forbidden. Just be sure to give time
to all the other lilas
and avataras as they occur in
his books. Whatever Sukadeva told Pariksit
Maharaja is worth hearing, and I will tell it
to you in due
time.
Free write
This is not a humorous picture. The sheep appears doomed. He has somehow come down a right mountain peak and is standing on a rock wedged precariously between the two peaks. The peaks appear too steep for him to climb back up to their sheer faces, although mountain goats have been known to make miraculous climbs. He is stuck. The sheep most likely stood there for some time, then he tried to climb up the cliff and fell and was killed, plunging down the rocks, his body bouncing off them and finally landed in the water. What else could have happened? No one was going to rescue him with a helicopter. The photographer took the picture just as a oddity, a curiosity, a freak of nature but for the sheep it was his death of life.
We can be sympathetic but what can we do? Most living entities, including humans, are in a similar situation. There's a saying "I'm between a rock and a hard place" and there's the expression "you've got me between the devil and the deep blue sea." We come in to this world with karma, get ourselves further entangled with impious acts, and we face an inglorious death (with an inglorious next life). Of course we can reform if we meet a pure devotee and get out of the entanglement, but once you're in as bad as this sheep, it's very hard to get out. A mountain climber with ropes could try to pull the sheep up, but it's highly unlikely anyone would risk his life for this lowly animal.
Let us pray never to be so foolish as to wander around a mountain like this and step down unto a wedged rock. We do act as foolishly in our own ways.
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: IN HIS OWN WAY
Everyone has got some way he can contribute himself for serving the Supreme Personality of Godhead, everyone. Now conduct your preaching in such a way that when anyone becomes attracted to get something from us he may be induced or allured into serving Krishna in his own way as he likes to do it, not being forced to do something else he may not like to do, that will discourage him and no intelligent men will come.
- Srila Prabhupada, Letter to Bhagavan, Ahmedabad 13 December, 1972
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: THE GOLDEN HEART
The heart of one who is highly elevated and grave is compared to gold. If one's heart is very soft and gentle, his heart is compared to a cotton swab. When there is an ecstatic sensation within the mind, the golden heart or grave heart is not agitated, but the soft heart immediately becomes agitated.
To offer another example, a grave, magnanimous heart is compared to a great city, and a soft heart to an insignificant cottage. There may be many lights, or even great elephants in the big city, but no one will take particular notice of them. But when such lights or elephants are seen near a small cottage, everyone can distinctly point them out.
A hard heart is compared to a lightning bolt, to gold and to shellac. The lightning bolt is very strong and never becomes soft. Similarly, the hearts of those who are engaged in severe austerities and penances do not become very easily softened. The golden heart becomes melted at high temperature, as in ecstatic love. And the shellac heart is very easily melted in slight temperature.
A soft heart is compared to honey, to butter and to nectar. And the condition of the mind is compared to sunshine. As honey and butter become melted even in slight sunshine, softhearted persons become easily melted. Nectar, however, is by its nature always liquid. And the hearts of those who are in pure ecstatic love with Krsna are by nature always liquified, just like nectar.
A pure devotee of Krsna is always specifically qualified with nectarean qualifications and sometimes with the qualifications of butter and honey. On the whole, the heart in any of the different conditions mentioned above can be melted under certain circumstances, just as a hard diamond is sometimes melted by a combination of certain chemicals. In the Dana-keli-kaumudi it is stated, "When love develops in the heart of a devotee, he cannot check the transformation of his sentiments. His heart is just like the ocean at the rising of the moon, when the ebb tide cannot be checked: immediately there must be movement of high waves." Although in its natural state the ocean is always grave and unfathomable, when the moon rises, nothing can check the ocean's agitation. Similarly, those who are pure devotees cannot on any account check the movement of their feelings within.
- Srila Prabhupada, Nectar Of Devotion
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: YOUR SITUATION TODAY
Imagine if you would have the understanding that your situation today is exactly what you need at this moment for your own personal growth and development and your spiritual advancement.
Every part of your life is exactly as it should be.
Everything you are facing or you are dealing with contains within it possibilities that you can to turn to your own advantage to achieve the kind of life you want.
Whatever it may be, you can use your current experience as a springboard, rather than sitting there and whishing the things will improve.
How?
You need ideas.
Great ideas and their application are key to your bright future.
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: TIME MANAGEMENT TIPS
1. Organize and execute around your highest priorities
2. Ask yourself often during the day: What is the most valuable use of my time - right now.
3. Manage time based on relationships not tasks
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: 10 WAYS TO GET THE MOST OUT OF THE BHAGAVAD GITA
1. Develop a deep, driving desire to master the principles given in the Bhagavad Gita.
2. Read each chapter twice before going to the next one.
3. As you read, stop frequently to ask yourself how you can apply each instruction.
4. Write down instructions most relevan to you in your journal and read them every day.
5. Review the Bhagavad Gita each month.
6. Apply the Bhagavad Gita's principles at every opportunity. Use it as a working handbook to help you solve your daily problems.
7. Make a lively game out of your learning by offering some friend a dollar every time he catches you violating one of Bhagavad Gita's principles.
8. Check up each week on the progress you are making. Ask yourself what mistakes you have made, what improvement, and what lessons you have learned for the future.
9. Keep a journal showing how and when you have applied Bhagavad Gita's principles.
10. Teach the Bhagavad Gita as much as possible.
And take Gita Coaching in order to apply the Gita effectively in all areas.
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: 23 ways of how can you have a great relationship with your spouse
By Amarananda dasa
1- Listening to each other, it should be done in attentive way otherwise the other side will feel that you are just pretending for hearing but your mind is in somewhere else!!!!
2- Tolerating one's faults, limits, lacks, and sudden changes in one's mood. Tolerating comes from believe that everything will change and will be alright. Everything is temporary in this world.
3- Clarifying what is hard to be tolerated and if that happens then try to react in the sweetest way and try to manifest the best aspect of personality.
4- To have trips and vacation together.
5- Showing empathy and sympathy to each other at the time of need.
6- Cooking nice Prasadam together.
7- To have a loving exchange. (Sweat words, gifts and …)
8- Visiting families and friends some times.
9- Helping each other for progressing in spiritual life by encouraging and supporting each other to have qualitative Sadhana.
10- At the time of sickness, disturbances and so on, try to be with and take care.
11- Show love or at least respect to both sides family members.
12- Show respect to both sides friends.
13- Go biking, hiking, swimming and etc together.
14- Invite devotees, serve them, provide lovely environment for their pleasure.
15- Try to be strong in ups and downs.
16- Try to associate with Gurus, Sadhus and devotees as mush as possible.
17- Try to create an acceptable financial security that could cover the living's costs and trips.
18- To have a vision of doing especial service that will be extremely pleasing for spiritual master and Sirla Prabhupada.
19- To translate spiritual books, articles and so on that those are useful and important for everyone's progress.
20- To learn some musical instruments that can play together.
21- taking care of bodily health, appearance and cleanliness of each other.
22- When both sides are agreed, have a child!
23- Try to learn how to forgive each other and be merciful.
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: Krishna Consciousness Is All-auspicious
Srila Rupa Gosvami has given a definition of auspiciousness. He says that actual auspiciousness means welfare activities for all the people of the world. At the present moment groups of people are engaged in welfare activities in terms of society, community or nation. There is even an attempt in the form of the United Nations for world-help activity. But due to the shortcomings of limited national activities, such a general mass welfare program for the whole world is not practically possible. The Krishna consciousness movement, however, is so nice that it can render the highest benefit to the entire human race. Everyone can be attracted by this movement, and everyone can feel the result. Therefore, Rupa Gosvami and other learned scholars agree that a broad propaganda program for the Krishna consciousness movement of devotional service all over the world is the highest humanitarian welfare activity.
How the Krishna consciousness movement can attract the attention of the whole world and how each and every man can feel pleasure in this Krishna consciousness is stated in the Padma Purana as follows: "A person who is engaged in devotional service in full Krishna consciousness is to be understood to be doing the best service to the whole world and to be pleasing everyone in the world. In addition to human society, he is pleasing even the trees and animals, because they also become attracted by such a movement." A practical example of this was shown by Lord Caitanya when He was traveling through the forests of Jharikhanda in central India for spreading His sankirtana movement. The tigers, the elephants, the deer and all the other wild animals joined Him and were participating, in their own ways, by dancing and chanting Hare Krishna.
Furthermore, a person engaged in Krishna consciousness, acting in devotional service, can develop all the good qualities that are generally found in the demigods. It is said by Sukadeva Gosvami in the Fifth Canto of Srimad-Bhagavatam, Eighteenth Chapter, verse 12, "My dear King, persons who have unflinching faith in Krishna and are without any duplicity can develop all the good qualities of the demigods. On account of a devotee's high grade of Krishna consciousness, even the demigods like to live with him, and therefore it can be understood that the qualities of the demigods have developed within his body."
On the other hand, a person who is not in Krishna consciousness has no good qualities. He may be highly educated from the academic point of view, but in the actual field of his activities he can be seen to be baser than the animals. Even though a person is highly educated academically, if he cannot go beyond the sphere of mental activities then he is sure to perform only material activities and thus remain impure. There are so many persons in the modern world who have been highly educated in the materialistic universities, but it is seen that they cannot take up the movement of Krishna consciousness and develop the high qualities of the demigods.
For example, a Krishna conscious boy, even if he is not very well educated by the university standard, can immediately give up all illicit sex life, gambling, meat-eating and intoxication, whereas those who are not in Krishna consciousness, although very highly educated, are often drunkards, meat-eaters, sexmongers and gamblers. These are practical proofs of how a Krishna conscious person becomes highly developed in good qualities, whereas a person who is not in Krishna consciousness cannot do so. We experience that even a young boy in Krishna consciousness is unattached to cinemas, nightclubs, naked dance shows, restaurants, liquor shops, etc. He becomes completely freed. He saves his valuable time from being extravagantly spent in the way of smoking, drinking, attending the theater and dancing.
One who is not in Krishna consciousness usually cannot sit silently even for half an hour. The yoga system teaches that if you become silent you will realize that you are God. This system may be all right for materialistic persons, but how long will they be able to keep themselves silent? Artificially, they may sit down for so-called meditation, but immediately after their yogic performance they will engage themselves again in such activities as illicit sex life, gambling, meat-eating and many other nonsensical things. But a Krishna conscious person gradually elevates himself without endeavoring for this so-called silent meditation. Simply because he is engaged in Krishna consciousness he automatically gives up all this nonsense and develops a high character. One develops the highest character by becoming a pure devotee of Krishna. The conclusion is that no one can truly have any good qualities if he is lacking Krishna consciousness.
Srila Prabhupada, Nectar Of Devotion
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: Is Life Coaching For You?
"Our chief want in life is somebody who will make us do what we can."
-- Ralph Waldo Emerson
* I am ready to create more balance in my life.
* I am ready to improve my personal or business relationships.
* I am ready to make real and positive changes in my life.
* I am ready to find and live my life's purpose.
* I am ready and willing to overcome self-limiting beliefs and behavior.
* I am ready to create plans and take action to achieve my goals.
* I am ready to achieve a sense of fulfillment at work and in my life.
* I am ready for more fun and contibution in my life.
* I can benefit from someone who will help me to stay on track.
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: WHY WE HAVE BAD LEADERSHIP?
In the modern setup of democratic states the citizens can have no cause for grievances, because the whole administration is conducted by the people themselves. If the people themselves are dishonest, the administrative machinery must be corrupt. Although a damned government of the people may be given a good or fancy name, if the people are not good they cannot have good government, regardless of which party governs the administration. Therefore good character in the consciousness of the mass of people is the first principle necessary for a good government and equal distribution of wealth.
- Prabhupada
Ekendra das, Alachua, USA: Preaching To The Air
Reminds me of a song (Tom Petty, Don't Do Me Like That, Damn the Torpedoes
, 1979).
I was talking with a friend of mine the other day. Reminds me of a song (Tom Petty, Don't Do Me Like That, Damn the Torpedoes, 1979). Tom Petty has distinguished himself (among other accomplishments) as The Guy Who Made The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Crowd Chant Hare Krishna. God bless him for that.
You Don't Have To Live Like a Mleccha Karmi
To brahminical scholars, everything reminds them of verses from the Vedas. They can recite the sloka, the verse number, the speaker, the exact scripture. Everything reminds me of lines from old pop songs. I can take any phrase and show you where it appears in great works of modern literature, such as "You are a Magnet and I am Steel," or "Love is Like Oxygen." Such is my vast learning.
I almost began this whole thing with "Got a call from an old friend. . ." (Billy Joel, My Life, 52nd Street, 1978). I remember rooting for that song every Saturday morning, hoping it would stay at number one on American Top Forty. However, I'm not aware that Mr. Joel has ever said "Hare Krishna" on national television, or indeed anywhere. I highly recommend Mr. Joel start doing that. It could be a significant career booster.
Anyway, I really was talking with a friend of mine—one of the few people from my pre-Krishna past who keeps in touch. I was so happy to hear from him that I didn’t mind pacing the freezing backyard for half an hour to get decent cell phone reception. We talked about music—bands we like, songs we like, writers we admire—which we still agree on. Then he mentioned the Dalai Lama, someone he's become a fan of. "He doesn't believe in God," he said, "but of anyone from any religious tradition in the world, he most exemplifies to me the kind of selfless loving and giving spirit of Jesus Christ."
I'm glad he digs the Dalai Lama. I really am. We've come a long way from dancing around listening to "Now I Wanna Sniff Some Glue (The Ramones, The Ramones, 1975)." At least he's into some kind of philosophy these days. But the "not believing in God" thing stuck in my head, like finding a pebble in a mouthful of oatmeal.
Now I Wanna Learn Somethin' 'Bout God
I thought to write a smokingly incredulous blog post about "how can people think that God is some kind of metaphysical, theoretical being they can either believe in or not—as if anybody's belief has any effect whatsoever on any aspect of reality?" I prepared statements. I went on and on, making solid philosophical point after solid philosophical point. They were smoking. They were hot. The more I wrote, the less happy I got.
I realized I was arguing with no one. The phone call was over days ago. My friend hadn't asked me for my opinion. I was basically "air preaching," like some people play air guitar. In the mirror of my mind, I was absolutely unstoppable, convincing, compelling. In reality, I was wasting time, energy, and ink.
I sometimes have dreams where I'm about to fight someone. I'm in a total rage, winding up to deliver a knockout punch. When my fist makes contact with the face I'm hoping to smash, though, it does so with the force of a hankie, as if I was gently stroking the person's cheek with the backs of my fingers, my wrist limp as overcooked spaghetti. It's so frustrating.
My occasional philosophical rants have about the same effect on the world. I wish they could be more like the old "Srila Prabhupada Speaks Out" feature in Back to Godhead magazine, in which he expertly and totally dismantles the philosophical construct of any view opposing the conclusions of Krishna consciousness. I feel like a guy at a boxing match when I read those. "Yeah! Pow! Get him, Prabhupada!"
Tamal Krishna Goswami developed an effective strategy—for deciding whom to talk with about Krishna consciousness—on the Radha Damodar bus tour. Students would be eating their lunch of Krishna prasadam, listening to the Vishnujana Swami Kirtan band rocking away. TKG would go from person to person and ask, "How do you like the music? How do you like the food?" If they replied, "Oh it's great!" he would stay and talk with them a little. If they said, "Eh, okay," or shrugged their shoulders, he'd move on to the next person. Breath is precious. Why waste it?
Tamal Krishna Goswami
In one conversation with John and Yoko, Prabhupada warmly encouraged them to give Krishna consciousness a try. They said they were into "their own thing," but couldn't articulate what that thing was. Prabhupada made a few philosophical points. They missed them. I’ve heard the recording. It's painful to listen to—it always sounds to me like John and Yoko would rather have snipped off their toes with garden shears than accept anything Prabhupada was trying to give. Finally, after twenty or thirty minutes of dealing with Causeless Unwillingness to Surrender, Prabhupada asked someone to bring them lunch. I imagine the scene as a game show: "Sorry! you don't win the grand prize, today, John, but here are some lovely parting gifts!"
After all these years, my old friend still thinks Krishna is like Santa Claus or leprechauns. Fine. God bless him. I think I'll send him some granola.
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: GARBAGE TRUCK
Got this story today:
One day I hopped in a taxi and we took off for the airport. We were driving in the right lane when suddenly a black car jumped out of a parking space right in front of us.
My taxi driver slammed on his brakes, skidded, and missed the other car by just inches! The driver of the other car whipped his head around and started yelling at us.
My taxi driver just smiled and waved at the guy. And I mean, he was really friendly.
So I asked, 'Why did you just do that? This guy almost ruined your car and sent us to the hospital!'
This is when my taxi driver taught me what I now call, 'The Law of the Garbage Truck.'
He explained that many people are like garbage trucks. They run around full of garbage, full of frustration, full of anger, and full of disappointment.
As their garbage piles up, they need a place to dump it and sometimes they'll dump it on you. Don't take it personally.
Just smile, wave, wish them well, and move on. Don't take their garbage and spread it to other people at work, at home, or on the streets.
The bottom line is that successful people do not let garbage trucks take over their day.
Life's too short to wake up in the morning with regrets, so ... Love the people who treat you right.
Pray for the ones who don't.
Life is ten percent what you make it and ninety percent how you take it!
Have a garbage-free day!
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: NEW PERSPECTIVE ON YOUR LIFE
Begin this process of by reflecting on parts of your life—past, present and future.
As an exercise in awareness, start by imagining that, before you were born, somewhere on the other side of the cosmos, you had evolved over many lifetimes to become a particular type of person with a particular set of qualities, interests, talents and abilities. It doesn't matter what you think about the idea of reincarnation. This exercise is just that: an exercise with a point that will become clear.
Continuing this line of thought, imagine that you deliberately chose your parents, that you chose the situation you were born into and brought up in. You did this because, at your stage of personal growth and evolution, there were specific lessons about yourself, about life and about other people that you had to learn, and which .You could learn in no other way.
Imagine also that the person you are today, especially the good qualities you've developed, evolved largely or partially as the result of the difficult experiences you had growing up and especially as the result of the problems you had with one or both of your parents.
Here is an important question: If you learned that you had deliberately chosen your parents and that the person you are today has come about as a direct result of your choice, how would this discovery change your attitude toward your parents and the experiences of your childhood? Would you be more positive and accepting of them? Would you see yourself and your past experiences in a different light? Would you become more philosophical and objective toward what might have appeared, up to now, to have been a difficult time of your life?
As you begin to think about this idea, about having deliberately chosen your parents, you begin to see possibilities that you had totally ignored up to now. Instead of seeing yourself as a passive agent or victim caught up in circumstances beyond your control, you begin to see yourself as an active participant in your own evolution.
Let's take this exercise a little further. Imagine that you are here on this earth to do something wonderful with your life, to become an exceptional person and to make an important contribution to your world. Imagine that this is all part of a great master plan that has been carefully designed with your best interests in mind, and that every event and circumstance of your life is an indispensable part of a big jigsaw puzzle, the outline of which you can only begin to see when you stand back and start to look at your life from a higher plane.
Assume, as a general rule, that whatever your current situation or difficulty, it is exactly what you require, right now, to teach you something you need to know before you can continue on your upward journey. With this perspective, you can see that every expe¬rience is a positive experience if you view it as an opportunity for growth and self-mastery.
Now, project backward, and with calmness, clarity and a positive mental attitude, think about how every previous experience and situation of your life might have been sent to you, at exactly the right time for you, to teach you something you needed to learn so that you could continue moving toward the wonderful life that awaits you.
Imagine that the events of your life could not have been other¬wise than they were, especially if you were operating on autopilot most of the time. As you stand back and appreciate the incredibly complex, interconnected events that have brought you to where you are in life right now, you will begin to develop the perspective of the philosopher, of the superior intellect. You begin to superimpose on your experience what is called a "sense of coherence," an attitude and a feeling that your life is part of something greater than yourself and that everything fits together and happens for a reason.
As you think of your life as a series of events and experiences that are conspiring toward your achieving some great goal or making some great contribution to mankind, you begin to develop a "sense of destiny," the hallmark of potential greatness as a human being.
- Brian Tracy
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: FEAR OF FAILURE
Srila Prabhupada said that failure is a pillar of success.
*
The fear of failure is the great obstacle to success in life. It is what keeps people in their comfort zones. It is what makes them keep their heads down and play it safe as the years pass by.
The fear of failure is expressed in the attitude of, "I can't, I can't, I can't." It is learned in early childhood as the result of destructive criticism and punishment for doing things your parents disapproved of. Once entrenched in the subconscious mind, this fear does more to paralyze hope and kill ambition than any other negative emotion in the human experience.
The major reason for the fear of failure is that most people don't understand the role of failure in achieving success. The rule is simply this:
It is impossible to succeed without failing.
Failure is a prerequisite for success. The greatest successes in human history have also been the greatest failures. In the same year that Babe Ruth became the home run king of baseball, he also struck out more than any other player.
Success is a numbers game. There is a direct relationship between the number of things you attempt and your probability of ultimately succeeding. Even if you were the worst player in baseball, if you swung with all your heart at every ball that came over the plate, you would eventually get a hit, and if you kept swinging, you would finally get a home run. The important thing is to swing with all your might and to keep swinging, and not worry about striking out occasionally.
Thomas Edison was the most successful inventor of the modern age. He received patents for 1,093 inventions, 1,052 of which were brought into commercial production during his lifetime. But as an inventor, he was also the greatest failure of his age. He failed more times, in more experiments, attempting to develop more products, than any other living scientist or businessman. It took him more than 11,000 experiments alone before he finally discovered the carbon-impregnated filament that led to the production of the first electric light bulb.
There is a story about Edison that, after he had conducted more than 5,000 experiments, a young journalist came to him and asked him why he persisted in these experiments after having failed more than 5,000 times. Edison is said to have replied, "Young man, you don't understand how the world works. I have not failed at all. I have successfully identified 5,000 ways that will not work. That just puts me 5,000 ways closer to the way that will."
Napoleon Hill said, "Within every adversity is the seed of an equal or greater opportunity or advantage." The way to deal with temporary failure is to seek within each setback for the valuable lesson that it contains. Approach every difficulty as if it were sent to you at that moment and in that way to teach you something you need to learn so you can continue moving forward.
Become an "inverse paranoid": Tell yourself that everything that is happening is moving you toward the achievement of your goals, even when temporary failures seem to be moving you away from them. Keep looking for the good. Great successes are almost always preceded by many failures. It's the lessons learned from the failures that make the ultimate successes possible.
Decide, in advance, to take every setback as a spur to greater effort, especially in business and sales, knowing that you are getting closer and closer to success with every experience.
Look upon temporary defeat as a signpost that says "STOP, go this way instead." One of the qualities of leaders is that they never use the words failure or defeat. Instead, they use words like "valuable learning experiences" or "temporary glitches."
The great football coach Vince Lombardi had the right spirit. After a game in which the Green Bay Packers were defeated, one of the reporters asked Lombardi how he felt about losing. Lombardi replied, "We didn't lose, we just ran out of time."
You can learn to overcome the fear of failure by being absolutely clear about your goals, and by accepting that temporary setbacks and obstacles are the inevitable price you pay to achieve any great success in life.
- Brian Tracy
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: GREAT EXERCISE
Make a list of all the things that you want to see in your life.
Write down everything that you can think of: great Krsna consciousness, happiness, health, good friends, travel, prosperity ... let your imagination run freely.
For the next twenty-four hours, think and talk only about the things on your list. See if you can get through one entire day without criticizing, condemning, complaining or getting angry, upset or worried about anything.
See if you have the willpower and strength of character to think about only what you want for one whole day.
This exercise will give you a real insight into where you are in your development, and it will also show you how far you have to go.
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: COOPERATION
A devotee learned this in his corporate training.
Three Forms of Cooperation
Co-opreration is not enough - Co-operation has 3 forms:
Compromise - 1+1=1/2
Co-operation - 1+1=2
Synergy - 1+1=11
Synergy is :
a. not tolerating differences, but celebrating differences
b. not working independently but team work
c. not thinking you're always right, but open-mindedness
d. not compromise, but finding newer and better ways
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: DEVOTEE CARE
Devotee care program provides services by extending care to all areas of devotee community including temple devotees, congregational devotees, the elderly, families, women, children and guests. Thus the care reaches every devotee irrespective of his age, sex, social status or occupation.
Devotee Care Program applies the principle enunciated by Lord Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu: Service to the Vaishnavas is the highest religious principle. It solely aims at Vaishnava Seva. The prime focus is to instill and implement the idea that every devotee is cared for within the Vaishnava community.
Sometimes devotees are insensitive to other devotees, while in some cases devotees don't want to express their concerns, for whatever reasons. Either they think 'I don't want to complain to anyone' or they feel that 'nobody is interested in them', anyway. There are several examples where devotees don't feel cared for. For instance, devotees feel their authority doesn't care for them, spouses think that their partner doesn't care for them, some devotees feel insecure about the future and the practical aspects of dealing with hospitalization, old age etc. The Committee hopes to address these and many more concerns of the devotees.
Visit
http://devoteecareiskcon.com
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: MACEDONIAN YATRA
Dear Vaisnavas all around the world,
Hare Krishna. Please accept our humble obeisances. All glories to Srila Prabhupada.
Here in Macedonia we have enthusiastic devotees who very much want to advance in Krsna consciousness and spread the mission of Lord Caitanya Mahaprabhu. We have great opportunities for preaching and we would like to invite devotees from all around the world to come and give the people of this country a chance to advance. We are a tiny yatra, but foreign devotees who have visited us had a first-hand opportunity to witness the potential in the people in general, for example, how they respond to an enthusiastic downtown harinama. We have able musicians, cooks, lecturers, and most importantly, we have recognized the need for improvement in the quality of our service. Most members are still young, although some of us have been around since the inception of the yatra, which was somewhere in 1987-88.
The yatra and the temple may be tiny, but the potential is enormous. Help us develop it. With a little help from fellow devotees who have the resources we don't , we can very soon achieve a great expansion in our harinam, prasadam, book distribution and preaching, and any other aspects and forms of devotional service. Due to various reasons, fully known only by the Lord, despite various efforts we haven't realized even a small part of the potential Macedonia has to offer as a preaching field.
We cordially invite all travelling preachers in ISKCON, as well as all other devotees, to visit Macedonia and have a first-hand experience.
Devotees are also welcome to visit the website www.karakamchev.com.mk for high quality dentistry services by a devotee professional, Vraja Kishor das (Vasko Karakamchev) and his team of dentists, who are all acquainted with his spiritual background. Several ISKCON gurus and other preachers can vouch for the quality and the prices are much lower than in the West. Just this is worth taking the trip. You won't regret it.
We have a website under construction. Stay tuned. For any details, you can write to:
Ishan Caitanya dasa ishko108@yahoo.com
I beg to always remain in the association of Krsna's devotees,
Your servant, Ishan Caitanya dasa
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: The Four Agreements
Agreement 1
Be impeccable with your word - Speak with integrity. Say only what you mean. Avoid using the word to speak against yourself or to gossip about others. Use the power of your word in the direction of truth and love.
Agreement 2
Don't take anything personally - Nothing others do is because of you. What others say and do is a projection of their own reality, their own dream. When you are immune to the opinions and actions of others, you wonA ' t be the victim of needless suffering.
Agreement 3
Don't make assumptions - Find the courage to ask questions and to express what you really want. Communicate with others as clearly as you can to avoid misunderstandings, sadness and drama. With just this one agreement, you can completely transform your life.
Agreement 4
Always do your best - Your best is going to change from moment to moment; it will be different when you are healthy as opposed to sick. Under any circumstance, simply do your best, and you will avoid self-judgment, self-abuse and regret.
- Don Miguel Ruiz
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: YEAH, BUT ... !
Adele Sheely, a career counselor I once had the pleasure of sharing a workshop with, said: "The number of 'yeah, buts' is in direct correlation to the depth of your fear".
Are you a 'yeah, but' person? Do you know any 'yeah, but' people? You might have thought they were argumentative and maybe really smart, but what if all they were was just really afraid? Afraid of change or afraid of entertaining anyone else's point of view. If we are indeed describing you, which one is it?
The process for finding your new direction has offered many, many opportunities for fear, your ego and/or your inner critic to pop up with perfectly logical reasons why considering any kind of change is just a ridiculous notion. Writing your fiction will be another ripe opportunity for doubt and fear to pop up. It's perfectly normal, so please don't judge it or yourself. If you are not experiencing any doubt, but are just excited about it all, hold on because we will be addressing that in a moment. If you are feeling somewhat resistant, just keep going, even if you think it's only to go through the paces. If you are not sure if you are being resistant, but just sure that your common sense is kicking in to save you from yourself, let me spell out some examples that might address your issues and calm your fears.
Austin had recently moved his entire family to Seattle from Kansas for a job opportunity. He had never left his hometown and had uprooted his family away from all their friends, cousins, grandparents and extended family. Barely two years after moving, another, even better, opportunity came up within the company, but it meant a move to Chicago. Austin really wanted the job, but his 'yeah, but' was the kids. "Yeah, but what about the kids? I can't uproot them again!".
Austin had written five fictitious scenarios that included among other things, commuting, moving everyone to much delight, staying and getting other opportunities. The one that kept resonating with him was everyone moving happily. Without even talking to his wife and kids, he was letting the 'yeah, but' be so definitive that he hadn't even thought of asking them what they thought. With a big nudge, he did so and after an initial shock, the family became excited about the possible move. The kids had always wanted to see a big city like Chicago. His wife was excited about the schools she had heard about for the kids. They even liked the idea of experiencing winters like they never had before.
Austin was shocked. It was not what he had expected. And to think he almost let the 'yeah, but' stop him. It was his fear, not his family's necessarily. That illustrates the sophistication of your fear. It knows how to spin things just right, so it sounds so logical and reasonable.
Another common 'yeah, but' and point of contention for people is the whole issue of not being 'ready'. "I'm not ready to date." "I'm not ready to make a change." "I'm not ready to go for the dream." Whichever version has crossed your lips or your ears as you listened to someone else, I have no doubt that you know what I mean.
Lydia had found her 'it' to be teaching. She already had her certificate after having completed the necessary course and requirements. Her fiction established her as a popular teacher through many different venues and scenarios. In reality, she found herself looking at the want-ads and applying for jobs outside of teaching. She was behaving as if she had not taken all the steps to enter her new chosen field. She still felt she needed to do other things first to prove she was ready. Her 'yeah but' was that no one would hire her because she hadn't gotten her bachelors degree in education or childhood development or something that proved her ability to work with children as a teacher. She didn't feel ready. She felt she needed to know more.
When she was made aware that the 'yeah but' was a reflection of being afraid, she agreed to slowly take the steps to secure her place in her new profession. After a couple of months, she did indeed get a teaching job and saw many of her fictitious scenarios as a popular teacher come to be.
One of my favorite lines from a very silly movie speaks to this topic very well. In Pee Wee Herman's Big Adventure, Pee Wee says to his new friend, the waitress, after she just finished describing her life's dream to him and then followed it with a huge sigh and a "But....": "Everyone I know has a big 'BUT'."
What's yours?
Exercise:
Take a moment to write down a 'yeah but' that may have recently cropped up for you. In writing, work your way through it by recognizing it as fear. Record what it is you are really afraid of and take action or have the discussions needed to help you get past it. Conquering this one, should help keeping future 'yeah but' attacks at bay.
- Laura Berman Fortgang
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: MY EXPERIENCE
A friend asked me today to write to him about my current experiences. I share it here with all my readers.
***
Wherever I go devotees treat me kindly (which I do not deserve).
Devotees need coaching everywhere but few are ready to take it up seriously.
Many want success. Not many are ready to pay the price.
After 26 years of chanting Hare Krsna I have developed a taste for - prasadam. :)
I am listening to an exciting coaching audio book that Mahatma Prabhu kindly purchased for me online and reading Maximum Achievement book, thus learning more ways how to Help Devotees Succeed.
I give classes and courses and sing Hare Krsna wherever I visit.
One kind devotee from Macedonia gave me an iPod Classic (120 GB) so now I have all Prabhupada's classes and music in one place to listen and learn how to work on myself and Help Devotees Succeed - directly from Srila Prabhupada.
And ... I am active on the Facebook as Akrura dasa, where you can get info where I go and what I do and get many free success tools for yourself (text, audio, video, etc.) and for your friends.
On the Web: The hand of fate…
"At first all the followers of Advaita Acarya shared a single opinion. But later they followed two different opinions, as ordained by providence."
Japa Group: Please Join the Japa Group
Please share your realisations with other devotees from around the world...simply send me an introduction email and I will be happy to make you a member:
rasa108@gmail.com
ys
Rasa Rasika dasa
On the Web: From Hari-sauri prabhu's diary
Here is my first person account of the final meeting between Srila Prabhupada and his Godbrother Srila BR Sridhar Swami. This is from my diary. It has not been edited and is not yet in print
Srila Prabhupada's Letters
1967 March 4: "The money and society is yours. You can spend in any way but it is my duty to give you guidance as ever well wisher. You wrote that you are not going to pay a farthing unless you are in possession of the house. Do not sign the check if you are not satisfied."
Prabhupada Letters :: 1967
Srila Prabhupada's Letters
1968 March 4: "Prepare different dresses for Radha and Krishna, and Their eight Sakhis. Dress somebody as Nrsimhadeva and Prahlada. I am very glad that Krishna is dictating you how to make perfect the sankirtana party. There is no doubt about our success if we can make this Kirtana party successful."
Prabhupada Letters :: 1968
Srila Prabhupada's Letters
1970 March 4: "I have got ambition to start at least 108 centers. Now we are purchasing a church on Venice Boulevard in Los Angeles, and we shall invite many important men of the city and convince them about our high philosophy."
Prabhupada Letters :: 1970
Srila Prabhupada's Letters
1972 March 4: "I am glad that you are trying for city commissioner. Take advantage, preach widely and sell our literatures. But our platform must be very simple - there is no other sacrifice necessary for the well-being of the citizens save and except this Sankirtana yajna."
Prabhupada Letters :: 1972
Srila Prabhupada's Letters
1972 March 4: "Krishna says one should surrender to a bona fide spiritual master. He also says that one should "Surrender unto Me." So there is no difference between surrendering to God and surrendering to God's representative."
Prabhupada Letters :: 1972
Srila Prabhupada's Letters
1973 March 4: "Just yesterday I have arrived here in Calcutta and by the end of the week I expect to visit our new construction at Mayapur. Arrangements are being made for a very grand celebration on the Appearance Day of Lord Caitanya Mahaprabhu."
Prabhupada Letters :: 1973
Srila Prabhupada's Letters
1974 March 4: "We have not gone an inch forward. The application is still lying there and they do not say yes or no. Our position is not clear. I require your help very much. Things are standing in the same position as when you left."
Prabhupada Letters :: 1974
Srila Prabhupada's Letters
1974 March 4: "Always follow our principles and actively preach. Krishna will protect you. Establish something substantial there and develop it. This is just according to the order of Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu so He must be very pleased upon you for assisting me."
Prabhupada Letters :: 1974
Ananda Subramanian, Iowa, USA: Ardi
Ardi also known as Ardipithecus ramidus is a fossilized hominid skeleton. They are millions of years old. Ardi share features that are common to both human and ape. Scientists speculate that Ardi might be the "holy grail of anthropology", the famous missing link between humans and apes.
This is precisely my point, why should one consider Ardi as an intermediate or link species? Why can't it be seen as its own species (not as an intermediate species) that lived simultaneously with other species but happened to have elements of human and ape? The scientists over the years have created a linear time frame model based on fossils and soil stratification (as far as I know) and try to fit in the fossils within this time frame model. The assumption is older species evolve into newer ones over time depending on where they are placed. This linear assumption is fine as long as we can prove that species did not coexist at the same time.
The null hypothesis in this case is that Ardi is not an intermediate or link species. Therefore the scientists first of all should have enough evidence to reject the null hypothesis that Ardi is an "intermediate/link" species between ape and human and at the same time also prove that Ardi did not exist simultaneously during the period of apes and early humans. Only this can show without doubt that Ardi is indeed in-between species suggesting the concept of link or intermediate species. This still does not prove an ape species evolving to Ardi species evolving to human. Testing this hypothesis will only put Ardi type species in a time frame between an ape and human suggesting a link.
Perhaps genetic mapping between the species can establish the concept of link but still does not isolate the question of simultanoeous existance.
I guess I am not convinced fully that merely by placing a species in between a time range and similar physical and other features makes it a link?
Hare Krishna
Gaura Sakti das & Adi Radhika dd, New Vraja Dham, Hungary: Today we celebrated Gaura Purnima
We celebrated Gaura Purnima, Lord Caitanya’s appearance day. All day long there was kirtan, variuos slide and video shows. Later in the day, the full moon appeared under the evening sunset colors enchanted everyone.
Radhe Syama was in fascinating colors, resembling sunset.
One of the important speeches was given by our food for life team, showing pictures and videos from the recent Haiti earthquake disaster and how they distributed prasadam.
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: WISDOM ACCESS QUESTIONS
What do you want?
What are you afraid of?
What is this costing you?
What are you attached to?
What is the dream?
What is the essence of the dream?
What is beyond this problem?
What is ahead?
What are you building towards?
What has to happen for you to feel successful?
What gift are you not being responsible for?
What are your healthy sources of energy?
What stops you?
What's stopping you?
What's in your way?
What would make the biggest difference here?
What are you going to do?
What do you like to do?
What can I do to make you happy right now?
What do you hope to accomplish by having that conversation?
What do you hope to accomplish by doing that?
What's the first step?
What would it be like to be with the excitement and the fear at the same time?
What's important about that?
What would it take for you to treat yourself like your best client?
What benefit/payoff is there in the present situation?
What do you expect to have happen?
What's the ideal?
What's the ideal outcome?
What would it look like?
What's the truth?
What's the right action?
What are you going to do?
What's working for you?
What would you do differently?
What decision would you make from a place of abundance?
What other choices do you have?
What do you really, really want?
What if there were no limits?
What aren't you telling me that's keeping me from coaching/helping you?
What haven't I asked that I should ask?
What needs to be said that has not been said?
What are you not saying?
What else do you have to say about that?
What is left to do to have this be complete?
What do you have invested in continuing to do it this way?
What is that?
What comes first?
What consequence are you avoiding?
What is the value you received from this meeting/conversation?
What is motivating you?
What has you hooked?
What is missing here?
What does that remind you of?
What do you suggest?
What is underneath that?
What part of what I said was useful? And how so?
What is this person contributing to the quality of your life?
What it is that you are denying yourself right now?
What do you need to put in place to accomplish this?
What is the simplest solution here?
What would help you know I support this/you completely?
What happened?
What are you avoiding?
What is the worst that could happen?
What are you committed to?
What is your vision for yourself and the people around you?
What don't you want?
What if you knew?
What's your heart telling you?
What are you willing to give up?
What might you have done differently?
What are you not facing?
What does this feeling remind you of?
What would you do differently if you tapped into your own wisdom?
What does your soul say?
CONVERTING INFORMATION QUESTIONS INTO WISDOM ACCESS QUESTIONS
Instead of Asking Yourself / Ask
Why is this happening to me? / What do I need to get through this?
Why am I such a failure? / What will get me what I want?
Why aren't I better at this? / What can I do to improve?
Why can't I get it? / What do I need to know to understand?
Why can't I have a charmed life like ____? / What can I learn from _____ ?
Instead of Asking Others / Ask
Why did she say that? / What could have made her say that?
Whose fault was it? / What is the solution?
Who did what? / What would have made a difference?
What happened [seeking details] / What happened? [seeking outcome]
Why would they do that? / What could be learned from this?
How will you do that? / What will you do?
Laura Berman Fortgang
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: THE BEST WAY TO FORGIVE
Akrura dasa: Isn't gratitude the best way to forgive?
Mahatma dasa: Yes, if you can be grateful that the person who hurt you is your teacher and is helping you learn and grow and forcing you to elevate your consciousness above revenge. But that realization may not be possible right away, or for everyone. Otherwise, resentment is dealt with by most people by blaming.
It is how they process their hurt, just as others process their hurt with alcohol, or sex or some form of escape. Yet blame and retaliation never release the resentment, they only mask it for awhile.
Visit yogaofforgiveness.com
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: GITA COACHING YOU TO SUCCESS
The Gita Coaching program is designed to help you get the focus, training and accountability you need to achieve the consistent results you want in the most important areas of your life.
Just as a personal fitness trainer helps you raise your standards for accelerated results in your body, your Gita Coach will challenge and support you in attaining the results you desire and deserve.
Focus brings power.
The first step will be for you and your coach to truly define with clarity the results you are committed to achieving.
Next, you will assess, with absolute candor, where you are right now and where you want to be – and what's in between.
Your coach will help identify the things that keep you from achieving the results you want – and then work with you to create an action plan.
Your plan is your Pathway to Success. It is not based on hope. It is not based on theory. It is modeled after those who have already achieved great results.
You will work with your Gita Coach selected to closely match your individual needs.
You will take massive, intelligent action to achieve your goals.
Your coach will assist you by holding you accountable to the commitments you make.
Your coach will help measure, monitor and manage your progress, and along the way support you to take consistent action that leads to the results you desire.
You have an opportunity to enter a partnership that will change your life.
We take that responsibility seriously – and we deliver support and challenge. You must step up as well and commit great enthusiasm and a determination that your life deserves.
This system of spiritual coaching has helped a hundreds of devotees get substantial results.
We don't say that our partnership will be effortless, but if you're committed and driven to make it work, it will be extraordinarily rewarding.
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: MATCHLESS GIFT
"There is no vow like chanting the holy name, no knowledge superior to it, no meditation which comes anywhere near it, and it gives the highest result. No penance is equal to it, and nothing is as potent or powerful as the holy name. Chanting is the greatest act of piety and the supreme refuge. Even the words of the Vedas do not possess sufficient power to describe its magnitude. Chanting is the highest path to liberation, peace and eternal life. It's the pinnacle of devotion, the heart's joyous proclivity and attraction and the best form of remembrance of the Supreme Lord. The holy name has appeared solely for the benefit of the living entities as their lord and master, their supreme worshipful object and their spiritual guide and mentor. Whoever continuously chants Lord Krishna's holy name, even in his sleep, can easily realize that the name is a direct manifestation of Krishna Himself, in spite of the influences of Kali-yuga."
- Bhaktivinoda Thakura
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: FLYING INTO HEADWINDS
This article is not the absolute truth, but it could be useful in many ways.
Flying Into Headwinds
When you set off toward a new destination or goal, like taking off in an airplane, you will have an idea of both your departure time and your arrival time. You will set a schedule for yourself and expect to arrive pretty much on schedule. But as soon as you take off, you will experience what pilots call "unexpected headwinds." The situation in your life is similar. As soon as you embark on a new journey, you will experience headwinds as well: everything will cost twice as much and take three times longer than you anticipated. You should estimate how long you will take to achieve certain milestones and then triple that time to get the actual time period required.
Types of Headwinds
venture, you will be amazed at how difficult it is to get customers to buy your product or service for the first time. Your customers will disappoint you in that they will buy less than you expected, take longer to buy than you expected, pay slower than you expected, and complain more than expected. Remember that the customer is always right. It is not what you produce but what people buy that counts.
Financial Headwinds
Another form of headwinds that you will face has to do with money. Some people will tell you that it is easy to make all the money you want just by thinking positively and visualizing yourself as wealthy. Everyone wants to believe that this is true, and many people embrace the idea of effortless wealth with their whole hearts. But that doesn't include those people who have actually achieved financial success. People who have made a lot of money have learned through bitter experience that the only thing easy about money is losing it. As the Japanese proverb says, "Making money is like digging with a pin; losing money is like pouring water on the sand."
Personal Headwinds
You will experience headwinds personally in that you will discover, much to your surprise that you lack specific talents, skills, and knowledge that you need to succeed. You may find that you are a poor time manager or that you lack self-discipline. You cannot seem to focus, concentrate, and apply yourself single-mindedly to your most important tasks. You waste time and feel overwhelmed with too much to do and too little time in which to do it. You may lack financial, analytic, marketing, or selling skills. You may not know how to plan and organize your business, advertise effectively and attract customers, or persuade your prospects to buy from you. Fortunately these are all learnable skills. But the starting point of mastering these essential skills is for you to admit that you need them. After that, the education can begin.
Action Exercise
Because of your incredible mind, you can learn any skill you need to learn to achieve any goal you can set for yourself. You must never allow yourself to be held back because you lack a particular skill. Figure out what skill you need to increase the quality of your life, and then set out to learn it.
Brian Tracy
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: HOW I JOINED ISKCON
In the early eighties I started reading books on yoga and religion and I came across the translation of Isopanisad and Raja Vidya: The King of Knowledge. Somewhat later I got a few Srila Prabhupada's books in English, which a friend got from a book fair: three volumes of Srimad Bhagavatam and one volume of Caitanya Caritamrta. These books looked so authoritative that I wrote to devotees in LA.
Parallel to this, I was listening and trying to play Indian music with some friends at weekends and my schoolmate's sister got a vinil record in London from a devotee. It was a beautiful music by the Krsna devotees, but I had no idea that the books I read related to this music, so I also wrote to the devotees in London.
Both US and UK devotees replied, sent me a Back to Godhead magazine, Bhagavad Gita As It Is, japa beads, and even some little maha prasadam in an envelope. I was so inspired by their letters that in December 1982 I decided to visit the temple near Florence in Italy - Villa Vrndavana, and the Vienna temple in Austria.
Back home I started raising at 3 or 4 am and chanting 16 rounds, translating Back to Godhead magazine, talking to my friends about Krsna consciousness and singing Hare Krsna to them with a guitar. I was also in a band at that time and we sang Hare Krsna at the student club at my farewell concert, for I decided to leave the band to join the temple in Zagreb, Croatia. I joined on Sunday 20 March 1983. My parents gave me a lift half way and the train got me to Zagreb.
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: RELATIONSHIP
I asked one devotee what does it mean to have a relationship with someone. This is the answer:
- You listen to me and I listen to you.
- You don't judge me whatever you hear but always give me a chance to explain.
- You are not afraid to speak the truth to me - no matter how unpalatable - and know while I may not like it I will still respect you and our relationship.
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: I Wanted To Change The World
By Unknown Monk, 1100 A.D.
When I was a young man, I wanted to change the world.
I found it was difficult to change the world, so I tried to change my nation.
When I found I couldn't change the nation, I began to focus on my town. I couldn't change the town and as an older man, I tried to change my family.
Now, as an old man, I realize the only thing I can change is myself, and suddenly I realize that if long ago I had changed myself, I could have made an impact on my family. My family and I could have made an impact on our town. Their impact could have changed the nation and I could indeed have changed the world."
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: Do It Anyway - The Paradoxical Commandments
People are illogical, unreasonable, and self-centered. Love them anyway.
If you do good, people will accuse you of selfish ulterior motives. Do good anyway.
If you are successful, you will win false friends and true enemies. Succeed anyway.
The good you do today will be forgotten tomorrow. Do good anyway.
Honesty and frankness make you vulnerable. Be honest and frank anyway.
The biggest men and women with the biggest ideas can be shot down by the smallest men and women with the smallest minds. Think big anyway.
People favor underdogs but follow only top dogs. Fight for a few underdogs anyway.
What you spend years building may be destroyed overnight. Build anyway.
People really need help but may attack you if you do help them. Help people anyway.
Give the world the best you have and you'll get kicked in the teeth. Give the world the best you have anyway.
Kent Keith
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: INSTANT POSITIVE CHANGE
1. Start chanting attentive rounds
2. Pray to Krsna regularly
3. Be grateful for everything Krsna gave you
4. Take responsibility for your past, present and future
5. Stop whining, complaining and blaming others
6. Forgive everyone who has ever hurt you
7. Speak sweetly
8. Give something in charity every single day
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: LONDON RADIO 4 COVERS 40TH ANNIVERSARY OF SRI SRI RADHA LONDONISVARA
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: LONDON RADIO 4 COVERS 40TH ANNIVERSARY OF SRI SRI RADHA LONDONISVARA
Download: Akrura das, Gita Coaching: LONDON RADIO 4 COVERS 40TH ANNIVERSARY OF SRI SRI RADHA LONDONISVARA
On Sunday 22 November 2009, the fortieth anniversary of installation of Sri Sri Radha-Londonisvara, BBC Radio 4 who have an estimated audience of over one million listeners in the United Kingdom and the British Isles aired the news of "40 years of the Hare Krishna movement in the UK".
The piece included interviews with Jai Nitai Prabhu (current Temple President), Shyamasundara Prabhu (Founder), Mother Yamuna (Founder), Gurudasa Prabhu (Founder) and Antardwip Prabhu (Leicester Congregation Member) + Live singing of "Hare Krishna Maha Mantra" + partial "Govindam adi purusam" by Mother Yamuna + partial "My Sweet Lord" by George Harrison.
Until this Saturday 28 November 2009, you can download the podcast from BBC's official website:
http://downloads.bbc.co.uk/podcasts/radio4/sunday/sunday_20091122-0817a.mp3
The 40 years news is sandwiched between various other news pieces. The relevant news is from 9:00 minute mark to 16:24 minute mark. That is a good 7:24 mins of air time on Britain's most popular radio station! And millions had the opportunity of listen to the Hare Krishna Maha Mantra.
*Terms of Use*
The BBC Podcasts are for your personal non-commercial use only. All title, ownership rights and intellectual property rights in and to the BBC Podcasts shall remain the property of the BBC or third parties. You may not edit, alter, adapt or add to the BBC Podcast in any way. The BBC Podcasts are made available by the BBC on an "as is" and "as available" basis and the BBC gives no warranty of any kind in relation to the BBC Podcast. To the maximum extent permitted by law the BBC will not be liable for any loss or damage which you may suffer as a result of or connected to the download or use of
the BBC Podcasts.
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: SELF FORGIVENESS
Illuminations - A Spiritual Self Help Newsletter "God Helps Those Who Help Themselves"
Issue 47 December 4, 2009 Published Monthly by Mahatma Das
YOU ARE ENCOURAGED TO FORWARD THIS NEWSLETTER TO FRIENDS
Change of address and unsubscribe are at the end of the newsletter
Self Forgiveness
Website for Touchstone Training
[http://www.tstrain.com/] www.tstrain.com
The site is full of useful information: articles, spiritual self-development principles, interactive exercises and back issues of Illuminations newsletters. It is intended to be a practical tool to aid your spiritual progress.
Dear Devotee
In this audio issue of Illuminations, I talk with counselor Arcana Siddhi about self-forgiveness. Those of us on the spiritual path have high ideals, ideals which we often don't meet. And especially for those who tend to be perfectionists, this can result in a lot of self hatred, guilt and shame.
We fall short of our ideals, or worse, sometimes we fall flat on our faces and may not be able to forgive ourselves for it.
Or we have a self image of a good person, a good devotee, a good this or that, yet we inevitably confront the reality that we often act in ways totally incongruent with that self image, and again, we can't forgive ourselves. This inability to forgive ourselves makes our lives difficult. And it makes it all that more difficult to forgive others.
I ask Arcana Siddhi how, considering the above realities, we can forgive ourselves. As a professional counselor she deals with this problem often and was able to shed great light and insight on the topic.
Also, I wanted to let you know about my new website
[http://www.yogaofforgiveness.com] www.yogaofforgiveness.com and blog
[mailto:yogaofforgiveness@blogspot.com] yogaofforgiveness@blogspot.com
As many of you know. I have been teaching workshops on forgiveness for years. This site gives more details about the workshops. The blog is entirely dedicated to the topic of forgiveness and contains many ideas from my workshop. Feel free to share this site and blog with your friends and associates. As you will see, it is written for a broad audience, so those who might not be so spiritually inclined will get a lot from it.
The more I do the workshops, the more I see how needed and beneficial forgiveness is for ourselves, for relationships, for minimizing conflict at home and in the workplace, and for dealing with all the bigotry, hatred and prejudice in the world. Ours is a culture of "If I am wronged, I get back." Most people's accounts of all the injustices and hurts that were done to them is overflowing and they use these accounts to justify blame and anger. They build up these accounts and carefully save them. Anytime someone performs some horrible act, you can know for sure their victim account is overflowing.
Our culture loves retaliation. Movies are full of it. The hero is wronged and the whole movie is about him taking "justifiable" revenge. So our kids grow up thinking, "If someone hurts me, I must take revenge," that forgiveness is a sign of weakness (even though it takes so much courage to forgive).
People guard their victimhood. It is a story upon which they can justify their failures. If they lose that story, how can they justify their blame and anger? Anger makes them feel powerful. Ask them to forgive and they fear they will lose their power. But all anger and blame does is hide their pain, pain they don't want to face. Forgiveness is the only door out of the prison of this pain.
Because forgiveness is so much needed in our world, and because practicing forgiveness brings people to a higher level of God consciousness, my intention is to expand these workshops around the world by training a team of facilitators to deliver them.
If you know anyone who might be interested in organizing a workshop please direct them to the site. Or consider contacting someone at your school, office, community center, yoga studio, temple, etc. to discuss the benefit of having such a workshop.
May you always think of Krsna,
Mahatma Das
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: HOW TO OVERCOME FEAR
Bhagavad Gita gives clues:
The great generals who have highly esteemed your name and fame will think that you have left the battlefield out of FEAR only, and thus they will consider you insignificant.
In this endeavor there is no loss or diminution, and a little advancement on this path can protect one from the most dangerous type of FEAR.
One who is not disturbed in mind even amidst the threefold miseries or elated when there is happiness, and who is free from attachment, FEAR and anger, is called a sage of steady mind.
Being freed from attachment, FEAR and anger, being fully absorbed in Me and taking refuge in Me, many, many persons in the past became purified by knowledge of Me -- and thus they all attained transcendental love for Me.
Shutting out all external sense objects, keeping the eyes and vision concentrated between the two eyebrows, suspending the inward and outward breaths within the nostrils, and thus controlling the mind, senses and intelligence, the transcendentalist aiming at liberation becomes free from desire, FEAR and anger. One who is always in this state is certainly liberated.
One should hold one's body, neck and head erect in a straight line and stare steadily at the tip of the nose. Thus, with an unagitated, subdued mind, devoid of FEAR, completely free from sex life, one should meditate upon Me within the heart and make Me the ultimate goal of life.
Intelligence, knowledge, freedom from doubt and delusion, forgiveness, truthfulness, control of the senses, control of the mind, happiness and distress, birth, death, FEAR, fearlessness, nonviolence, equanimity, satisfaction, austerity, charity, fame and infamy -- all these various qualities of living beings are created by Me alone.
O all-pervading Visnu, seeing You with Your many radiant colors touching the sky, Your gaping mouths, and Your great glowing eyes, my mind is perturbed by FEAR. I can no longer maintain my steadiness or equilibrium of mind.
After seeing this universal form, which I have never seen before, I am gladdened, but at the same time my mind is disturbed with FEAR. Therefore please bestow Your grace upon me and reveal again Your form as the Personality of Godhead, O Lord of lords, O abode of the universe.
He by whom no one is put into difficulty and who is not disturbed by anyone, who is equipoised in happiness and distress, FEAR and anxiety, is very dear to Me.
Anyone who gives up prescribed duties as troublesome or out of FEAR of bodily discomfort is said to have renounced in the mode of passion. Such action never leads to the elevation of renunciation.
Abandon all varieties of religion and just surrender unto Me. I shall deliver you from all sinful reactions. Do not FEAR.
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: ARE YOU DEVELOPING YOUR HABITS OF EFFECTIVENESS
Dear friend, Hare Krsna,
Here's a fresh set of tips and thoughts for you today. Our theme this time is developing a sense of purpose.
Why not begin today with a mental image or a picture of what a specific outcome you're trying to achieve actually looks like. And then use that picture as your frame of reference by which everything else is examined.
Create affirmations with these basic ingredients: They're personal, positive, in the present tense, visual and emotional. For example - I am becoming an effective public speaker. Then each day visualise the realisation of these affirmations. Or you can pray to achieve the same. You'll find that your behaviour and circumstances will change for the better.
Write down your philosophy of life, focusing on what you want to be (character) and do (contributions and achievements) and on the values or principles upon which being and doing are based.
Identify the specific roles you have in different areas of your life (eg., businessman, parent, friend, coach, mentor), and then think about the long term goals you want to accomplish in each of those roles. Then 'chunk' those down into short term activities that will build toward achieving the long term goal. Roles and goals give structure and direction to your personal sense of purpose.
My best to you,
your servant
Akrura dasa
Gita Coaching - 'Helping Devotees Succeed'
http://vedicilluminations.com/gitacoaching
http://gitacoaching.blogspot.com
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: JAGATPUJYA FROM OSIJEK
This devotee had distributed Bhagavad Gita to a woman who was considering abortion. He politely asked her to read the Gita. After reading it she decided to keep the child.
He is very kind and loving with people he meets and is convinced that Krsna consciousness is the highest welfare activity. Bus drivers and other people greet him with Hare Krsna.
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: EXCUSES FOR NOT PREACHING
Recently in Belgrade we had a little brainstorming about why we do not preach as much as we could. Here's the list:
1. I do not have enough knowledge
2. Who am I to preach
3. I have no time
4. World belong to the young
5. I am bad in self management or time management
6. I have no good sadhana
7. I am lazy but time passes quickly
8. I am anemic
9. I am afraid
10. My parents obstruct me
11. I am waiting for a sign from Krsna to start
12. Lack of integrity
13. When I lived in the temple I had a better sadhana
14. I am not qualified enough
15. I need training, association, a coach
16. I am running around making money
17. It is hard to preach in front of many people
18. I am waiting for a second initiation
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: THEIR LIFE BECOMES SUBLIME
Gopi-kanta: Srila Prabhupada, what is the exact benefit if a person just takes a Srimad-Bhagavatam on the street and gives some donation to help out the printing costs or whatever?
Prabhupada: That is already explained. They will read. They will see the picture of Krsna. Immediate profit is: they will ask "What is this picture?" And you will say, "Krsna." "Oh," they say, "it is Krsna?" Then... (laughter) From the beginning of the, what is called, cover, the benefit begins, because the uttering the word "Krsna" is benefit. Then, if he reads... Of course, if he pays for the book, he will read. So you give a chance to the person to know about Krsna. Their life becomes sublime.
Lecture Srimad-Bhagavatam 2.1.1-5 -- Melbourne, June 26, 1974
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: PRACTICAL PSYCHOLOGY
Those who are experienced in practical psychology know the dangers of the uncontrolled mind and constantly endeavor to bring the mind under control.
They (Krsna and Balarama) learned practical psychology -- how to influence another's mind and thus induce another to act according to one's own desire. Sometimes this is called hypnotism.
There must be department of practical psychology to see the students, in which class he belongs to. Either he belongs to the first-class, brahmana class, or second-class, the ksatriya class, administrator class, and the third-class, mercantile, or business man, and the fourth-class, sudras, worker. If education is given according to the quality and position, then there will be complete system in the whole human society.
- Prabhupada
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: SPIRITUAL PLEASURE: BEING HAPPY FOR OTHERS
In the material pleasure, if I see you happy, I am unhappy; If I see you unhappy, I become happy.
This is nature.
I may say otherwise, but material nature is, if one is put into difficulty, then I become very happy, and if I am happy, others become envious.
This is material pleasure.
Whereas spiritual pleasure means that when one sees Krsna is happy, a devotee's happy, the other devotee becomes happier.
That is spiritual pleasure.
In the spiritual world there is competition, but when one is advanced, the competitor become happy:
"Oh, he's so advanced. I could not do so."
There is no enviousness.
In the material world, if one is advanced, other, who is not advanced, he's envious.
This is the difference between spiritual pleasure and material pleasure.
It is not difficult to understand.
Material pleasure means if you are happy, I become unhappy; if you are unhappy, then I become happy.
This is material pleasure.
And spiritual pleasure means by seeing your happiness, I become happy.
By seeing... But there is no distress in the spiritual world.
Simply by seeing the happiness of other devotee, another devotee becomes happier.
- Srila Prabhupada Lecture, The Nectar of Devotion -- Vrndavana, November 3, 1972
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: FROM MAHATMA PRABHU
I just did a training and they asked, "What do you want people to believe about you?" Then they asked, "What are three things you do to make people believe that about you."
It was meant to show how we put a false face to the world so people will think we are something we are not.
They also asked, "What three errors do you see in others?" They then asked, "Do you sometimes notice those same errors in yourself?" This helps you realize you are seeing your faults in others.
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: CIA
And perhaps you'll be surprised that our sale collection from the books is not less than one lakh of rupees per day, sometimes five lakh of rupees per day.
So this movement has captured the ideas, spiritual ideas of the Western people, by the grace of Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu.
And as His foretelling or you are expecting, ambition, prthivite ache yata nagaradi grama, that is being done.
And unfortunately in India they are not received very well.
The government is thinking they are, what is that? CIA. A CIA has become (?) to become Vaisnava dancing in Vrndavana. (laughter)
Just see their intelligence.
Srila Prabhupada, Speech to Devotees -- Vrndavana, April 7, 1976
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: What is Coaching?
source: CoachesPlus.com
Coaching is a partnership between a coach and an individual that supports the achievement of results, based on goals set by the individual.
The individual chooses the focus of the 'conversation', while the coach listens and contributes observations and questions as well as concepts and principles which can assist in generating possibilities, potential and actions. Coaching can be seen as a collaborative process in which clients discover answers for themselves through the coach's use of questions. Through the coaching process the clarity that is needed to support the most effective actions is achieved.
Coaches are trained to listen, to observe and to customize their approach to individual client needs. They seek to elicit solutions and strategies from the client; they believe the client is naturally creative and resourceful.
Coaching presupposes that it is not the coach's responsibility to 'fix' the client. The client is an expert on themselves and the skill of the coach, and their role, is in allowing the person to come up with their own solutions. This doesn't mean that the coach brings nothing to the relationship – they have knowledge based theory, methods, exercises and questions that help the person move forwards. Nevertheless, the coach's skills are based around processes, not solutions.
In essence, coaching has two main facets. First it is performance focused, which means it is concerned with helping individuals perform tasks to the best of their ability. Second, it is person-centred, which means that the individuals being coached are seen to have the important insights.
Coaching is:
an equal partnership of trust between the coach and the person being coached. involves 'conversation' rather than advice giving, discipline, or therapy. built on client accountability results orientated is a fairly short-term activity and time bound consists of one-to-one developmental discussions or whole team/group sessions in team/group coaching – these can take place face-to-face, or over the telephone and can be supported by online interaction focuses on improving performance and/or developing/enhancing individuals' skills. works on the belief that clients are self-aware and do not require a clinical intervention. focuses on current and future performance/behaviour rather than the past a skilled activity
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: KRSNA IS GRATEFUL
Any person who is conscious of his friend's beneficent activities and never forgets his service is called grateful. In the Mahabharata, Krishna says, "When I was away from Draupadi, she cried with the words, 'He govinda!' This call for Me has put Me in her debt, and that indebtedness is gradually increasing in My heart!" This statement by Krishna gives evidence of how one can please the Supreme Lord simply by addressing Him, "He krishna! He govinda!"
The maha-mantra (Hare Krishna, Hare Krishna, Krishna Krishna, Hare Hare/ Hare Rama, Hare Rama, Rama Rama, Hare Hare) is also simply an address to the Lord and His energy. So to anyone who is constantly engaged in addressing the Lord and His energy, we can imagine how much the Supreme Lord is obliged. It is impossible for the Lord to ever forget such a devotee. It is clearly stated in this verse that anyone who addresses the Lord immediately attracts the attention of the Lord, who always remains obliged to him.
Another instance of Krishna's feeling of obligation is stated in connection with His dealings with Jambavan. When the Lord was present as Lord Ramacandra, Jambavan, the great king of the monkeys, rendered very faithful service to Him. When the Lord again appeared as Lord Krishna, He married Jambavan's daughter and paid him all the respect that is usually given to superiors. Any honest person is obliged to his friend if some service has been rendered unto Him. Since Krishna is the supreme honest personality, how can He forget an obligation to His servitor?
NOD
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: WHY SHOULD YOU LISTEN?
Sometimes we tend to try to fix things for others. I am becoming more aware of the need to take time to deeply understand the problem first, to a level where I can reflect back that understanding to the other person.
Create opportunities to interact one to one with your superiors, children, partner and work colleagues. When you listen empathically you learn, which opens the door to creative solutions and mutual trust.
Through empathic listening and reflection, we can developed the skill of showing that we really understand where another person is coming from. How they see it, how they feel about it and why it is important to them. This will significantly increase the ability of developing collaborative solutions.
Empathic listening means listening with the clear intention of understanding. Not listening to give advice, or to ask probing questions, or to pass judgement. This type of listening gets you inside another person's frame of reference and helps you assist them better.
Akrura das, Gita Coaching: WORKING COLLABORATIVELY WITH OTHERS
I now don't take insults personally. I sidestep negativity and look for the good in others. I can utilise that good as different as it may be, to improve my point of view and enlarge my perspective.
John Meredith, www.championsclubcommunity.com
Srila Prabhupada, Lecture Bhagavad-gita 2.40 - London, September 13, 1973
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