OUT OF THIS WORLD

I’m getting a bit behind on my KC@uni journal, so although the title says recent, this event is not so recent:

On May 25th, we had the second session in a series of four at the UQ Bhakti Yoga Club. For all these sessions we used a clubs and societies meeting room, next to the Red Room (campus bar). The talk/discussion was advertised as “India’s Spiritual Wisdom” on the flier we made for this semester. I was going to give the talk but fortunately my spiritual master, HH Devamrita Swami was in town, so I asked him if he would be so kind as to bless the BYC with his association. He agreed to give the talk. He had arrived in Brisbane the night before and I only asked him about it on the morning of the talk, so there was no time to do any extra advertising, but we did send the message out by email to some of our regulars.

When we arrived at the room, we set it up for the talk. Campus rooms tend to be a bit stark and uninviting. In our regular room we have a pile of chairs (of various old-fashioned colours and shapes), a couple of round plastic tables, one rectangular table, and a big white-board that is propped up by two mismatched chairs. It’s not exactly the tasteful decor and comfortable setting of Atma Yoga, but there is not much I can do about it, and students seem to be immune to the austerities of university interiors anyway. I just try to do my best to arrange the chairs as well as I can and make sure there is not too much mess in the room.

Nobody came for the talk so Sukanthi Radha dd, Brisbane’s top book distributor, went out to distribute some fliers and invite people. One new person came in the that way - she was on her way somewhere else but Sukanthi distracted her from that and brought her to the BYC. A couple of regulars also turned up a bit late so we began. I introduced Devamrita Swami as a disciple of Srila Prabhupada who has been practicing and teaching Bhakti Yoga for over thirty years and I mentioned his books and his travelling.

We decided to make this a question and answers discussion session. I started the discussion by addressing one of our regulars (a student of international relations) who has been reading the Bhagavad-gita and I asked if he had any questions on what he had been reading. He did, and the discussion continued from there.

One of the first lessons that Devamrita Swami gave to the students was about how to read a book. It had come out during the course of the discussion that a couple of them had been reading the Bhagavad-gita by “dipping-in” wherever the book happened to open for them, reading a bit here and a bit there, sometimes at the beginning, sometimes at the middle or end. Devamrita Swami explained that you start at the beginning of the book, you go on reading through the middile, and you finish at the end. I have often heard him say that it is not enough just to give people the books these days, you have to hold their hand and take them through it. Here were some of the future leaders of society, already at university, being taught, by a monk, the basics of how to read a book!

Most of the discussion centred on how to best help society, and how to rise above material sense enjoyment. All those present agreed that material sense enjoyment is ultmiately meaningless, not fully satisfying, and a distraction from their higher, spiritual aspirations, but they did not know how to control it. Devamrita Swami explained that by experiencing the higher taste in spiritual activities, they will no longer feel so attracted to the lower, material pleasures. At one point, the new student protested “but isn’t it natural, I mean we have these bodies, right, we have these senses, so we should try to satisfy them?” Devamrita Swami pointed out that this argument was based on a misunderstanding of the real purpose of our body and senses - our senses are actually not meant for our own enjoyment, they are meant for engaging in spiritual activities.

We finished with a tasty carrot cake and cream, lovingly prepared by Sukanthi Radha dd.

On May 18th I gave a talk for the Bhakti Yoga Club called “The meaning of yoga.” There were nine persons present, including myself and a couple of the other club organizers. Mainly, I described the dhyana yoga process but we also discussed karma yoga, jnana yoga and bhakti yoga. I recommended the bhakti process as the best (of course).

Some of the students had some misconceptions about bhakti yoga, considering it to be only suitable for a certain type of person, so I tried to clear up those doubts. One student thought that bhakti yoga is only for people who are into loving all of Gods creatures and hugging trees etc, whereas he is more interested in martial arts. I explained to him that Arjuna was a warrior and that Krishna taught him bhakti yoga on a battle field in between two opposing armies.

We also had some discussion about the nature of the self and whether or not there is anything higher than the self. A common misconception about the self is that “I am everything” and that therefore “there is nothing higher than me.” I explained that, whereas such ideas are quite popular these days, and although such ideas might make us feel good about ourselves if we believe in them, there is really no substantial basis to these ideas and it is better to acquire some real knowledge of the self. That knowledge can be found in the Bhagavad-gita and it can be realized through the process of bhakti yoga.

By the end of the discussion the questions turned more to the specifics of the bhakti yoga process. Most of the students who came for the talk already had a Bhagavad-gita As It Is, so I recommended that they read that to find out more about what bhakti yoga is.

We ended with prasada - some halava from Govinda’s.

There are three different types of suffering

1. Suffering due to the body or mind
2. Suffering due to other living entities
3. Suffering due to natural disturbances

Recently I have been dealing with types 1 and 2:

1. I went back to the doctor about my knee. I found out I had an infection there and I needed to use the crutches for another week. Using the crutches made my whiplash worse too.

2. I was attacked by some small living entities. Somehow I managed to get head lice. At the same time, my room at the temple became infested with some kind of biting bug that you can’t see but it makes you very itchy. I threw out the mattress and the bed and that seems to have solved the problem.

Despite these difficulties, I can’t really complain. Krishna is actually very kind. I surely deserve much worse karma than this, considering all of my previous sinful activities. It is only due to the small service that I have rendered to my spiritual master that my suffering is reduced.

Sanatana Goswami asked Lord Chaitanya:

“Who am I? Why do the threefold miseries always give me trouble? If I do not know this, how can I be benefited? Actually I do not know how to inquire about the goal of life and the process for obtaining it. Being merciful upon me, please explain all these truths.”
Chaitanya Charitamrita, Madhya Lila 20.102-3

Lord Chaitanya replied that “Lord Krishna has bestowed His full mercy upon you so that all these things are known to you. For you, the threefold miseries certainly do not exist. Since you possess Lord Krishna’s potency, you certainly know these things. However, it is the nature of a sadhu to inquire. Although he knows these things, the sadhu inquires for the sake of strictness.” So Lord Chaitanya went on to explain the position of the living entity and told Sanatana that although a living entity has the facility to live in either the material or the spiritual world, when he comes to the material world he suffers the threefold miseries of material existence because he is influenced by nescience, which covers his constitutional position. Not only did Lord Chaitanya explain our fearful condition in material existence but he also explained how to become free:

“When the living entity is attracted by the material energy, which is separate from Krsna, he is overpowered by fear. Because he is separated from the Supreme Personality of Godhead by the material energy, his conception of life is reversed. In other words, instead of being the eternal servant of Krsna, he becomes Krsna’s competitor. This is called viparyayo ‘smrtih. To nullify this mistake, one who is actually learned and advanced worships the Supreme Personality of Godhead as his spiritual master, worshipful Deity and source of life. He thus worships the Lord by the process of unalloyed devotional service.”
Chaitanya Charitamrita, Madhya Lila 20.119 (quoting from Srimad Bhagavatam 11.2.37)

Lord Chaitanya further described and categorized various transcendental forms of the Lord and then he gave information about our eternal relationship with Krishna (sambandha), the process of devotional service (abhideya), and life’s ultimate goal – love of Godhead (prayojana).

At least one good thing has come out of my recent material suffering – I have become more motivated to reflect on these important topics, to engage more seriously in the process of devotional service, and to attain the goal of life.