Did Bhaktiv know Thakur go through a phase where he was averse to the Bhagavatam and the Bhakti path, and was this a result of his reading of western philosophy and western literature?

Answer, yes. He did go through a phase like that. And from a transcendental perspective, if you want to consider it as a arrangement of the Lord, then just as Mahaprabhu exhibited a phase of a scholar and became highly respectable in the scholarly circles of Navadvip. And then he embraced the path of bhakti, thereby bringing respectability to the path of bhakti even among scholars who would otherwise dismiss it as a sentimental path.

The Lord arranging something similar for Bhaktinod Thakur also. At that time, the Bhartraloka was the term used for people who in Bengal who were very well educated and educated in terms of knowing English and educated in the Western in in this case, the British way of education and were employed and were quite well read. And Bhakkirath Thakur was the pioneer later became the pioneer in taking Gaudiya Vishnuism to that demographic. And so, he did become respectable among the Bhadraloka at that time through His writings, through His intellectual vigor and accomplishments and these were not devotional writings. He basically moved among elite circle, intellectual circles in Calcutta at that time And then thereafter when he embraced the path of bhakti, he brought the respectability of the belonging to the Bhadraloka to the path of Bhakti, specifically Gaudiya Vaishnav Bhakti which had fallen into disrepute because of various reasons.

So now that brings us to second part, did he was he averse to bhakti and averse to bhagavatam because of western education. That’s only part of the reason. And it is true that Christianity as well as western rationality, while they themselves were at war in Europe, both of them attacked Hinduism in India for different reasons. Christianity, because it was a pagan religion, considered Hinduism to be a pagan religion that had to be eradicated and Western rationality considered it to be irrational and superstitious and therefore that was their general attack on religion per se, not specifically on Hinduism. They were attacking Christianity in the West also.

So when we say West reading western thinkers led him to become averse. It is basically an inter religious dispute as well as a dispute between the rationality and the seeming irrationality. That was the issue. So, I think the bigger problem was that the reality of the Gaudiya tradition was itself quite reproachable at that time. Lot of people had become sahajaic and were doing immoral things.

Be it eating meat and saying the holy name could remove all sins. Not just the sin of eating meat, but others far worse sins also. Or be it imitating Krishna Dila with the gopis and saying that it is that the Avesh of Krishna has entered into them. The Avesh of the go of Radharani and the gopis has entered into the women they were polluting. So there was immorality and often that put off a lot of people who were moral and thoughtful and upstanding.

And also we know that Chetan Cherta Amrata which gives a theological understanding of Mahaprabhu’s teachings was not available at all. Chetan lila was known, but it was more through the past time oriented books like Chetan bhagod and Chetanamangal. So the Gaudiya tradition itself had lost both its moral and philosophical moorings or anchoring. So, my understanding is it was far more the state of the Gaudiya tradition that led Bhakti Vinod Thakur to not having any appreciation for it. And of course, there are valid western criticisms and Bhakti Natakur wrote essay on the Bhagavatam.

There he mentions three challenges with respect to understanding the Bhagavatam. The first is the cosmology which is a problem even till now. It just makes no sense to the rational mind And he tried to address that question in the Krishnasammita which itself became a controversial book and which is controversial even now. Although many devotees are moving towards some variant of that approach given by him, where basically he tries to separate the material knowledge in the Bhagavatam from the spiritual knowledge. It is a very simplified position, explanation of what he is doing.

The second was that the philosophy of the Bhagavatam seems complex and sometimes contradictory. Sometimes it seems to be supporting personalism, sometimes impersonalism and sometimes it seems to be a bit of a hodgepodge of Sankhya and other things. So, then he says that a great book will not be reducible to any particular way of reading rather than we trying to reduce the book to our frame of reference and evaluating whether it fits, we need to expand our frame of reference to see what the book is saying. Again, I’m paraphrasing. And the third question was about the immorality of Krishna’s dealings with the gopis and the subsequent immorality in society created by that example.

And it was when he read Chechen Charita Amrut and when he understood perkyurus from Krishna’s Guru, Rajaswami’s explanations and his own prayer to the lord that he was satisfied that this was transcendental. And again that problem is there even today. So overall my understanding is that rather than holding the reading reading western philosophy as being the cause of his negative feelings towards the bhagavatam and the bhakti path. It was the problems in both of these as they were practiced and the problems in these which are natural to any thoughtful mind that is rationally evaluating them. Those were the cause of the issue and he himself became an exemplar in demonstrating how these issues could be resolved.

That’s why Prabhupada also called him the founder of the modern day Krishna consciousness movement. And he said father of the modern day Krishna consciousness movement. And we also need to consider today that we face the same challenges and we also need to find out ways to address those challenges appropriately. Especially in today’s world telling people don’t read these books or and that will cause you to lose your faith is not the healthiest approach because people are anyway through the social media and Internet exposed to opposing views and we need to equip them to defend those views.

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Spiritualization of emotions. That emotions are an integral part of who we are and what we do. At the same time, our emotions can very easily drag us into trouble. So, is there a way we can spiritualize our emotions? Now, what does spiritualizing emotions means?

It broadly has two components to it, that we develop spiritual emotions. That means we develop emotions in relationship with the Lord, in relationship with his various manifestations. So he is himself the spiritual reality, and emotions related with him are naturally spiritual. So spiritualizing emotions has this one component that we develop spiritual emotions. And the second component is that that we transform material emotions into spiritual.

Whatever emotions we may have in our relations with others, into spiritual. So, these are two distinct aspects of what needs to be done for spiritualizing emotions. Now, interestingly, in the Ramayana, both of these happen naturally, because what we would normally consider as material relationships are in the Ramayana relationships associated with the Lord. So he has a father and a mother, and their emotions in relationship with him, his his brother, his consort, his associates, his friends, his servitors. They all have emotions in relationship with him and while these emotions are very relatable to us as human beings, at the same time, these are also real emotions in relationship with the Lord.

So in that sense, the example of how material emotions can be spiritualized is very nicely depicted in the Ramayana. So yesterday, I was talking on the theme of guilt and guilt management. So I’ll continue with that, but we’ll focus on examples from the Ramayan. Because while there are many emotions which we may have, and the principles for spiritualizing emotions are relatively similar. And, for example, when Ram goes to the forest, the agony that the citizens experience, that is described in vivid terms in the Ramayana of Valmiki itself, as well as in subsequent poetic renditions.

And the citizens feel as if their life has been pulled out of their body and their heart. They feel as if we just can’t live. Now, just as when the Gopis see Krishna departing, At that time, there is not much mention of each individual gopi over there. We know in the Bhagavatam, there is no explicit reference even to Radharani. The Gopis are referred to as a generic Gopis in the plural.

The celebrated Gopi Gita also it is said, So Gopi would be a singular. Gopi Uvache is a plural. So similarly, just as the Gopis are referred to as one community, the Ayodhya Vasis are referred to as one community. And they are all experiencing utter agony and heartbreak at the prospect of Ram departing. Now, this is an emotion which if we love someone and that person is going away, we may also experience that emotion of separation and of the agony that comes because of separation.

Now while such emotion is understandable, because it is a relationship with the Lord, it becomes spiritualized. So now if you consider yesterday’s talk, I’ll do a quick recap. I talked about how guilt, we were talking about Yudhishthi experienced immense guilt feeling that I am not worthy of becoming the king. And then in relationship with that, he felt that he should just renounce the world. Let’s see if this stays.

Okay. I won’t move this now. So what happens we discussed is that guilt can arise from various causes. So yesterday I discussed four main causes of guilt. We’ll be talking about the spiritual one is because of misdeeds.

Somebody has done something wrong, and that’s why they feel guilty about it. Second is mistakes. They didn’t intend to do something wrong, but something bad happened. Then misapprehension. Excellent.

That we may be just reading the situation wrong. That’s why we feel guilty for something that we have not done at all. And last is manipulation. So yesterday I gave one example of guilt from the Ramayan itself. What was that?

Sita. Was there a guilt over there? I was talking about being manipulated by So guilt can come by how? That said, don’t you care for your son? Your son may be threatened if Ram becomes the king.

Do something to protect him. Do you have no love for your son? So she manipulated him through guilt, or she manipulated her through guilt. So this is manipulation. Now, if we consider there are various other ways also guilt can come.

In fact, while Lord Rama himself is the supreme lord, there’s one time, Ravan is charging through the Vanara army destroying everyone. And at that time, Ram goes forward to challenge, and Lakshman says, I will challenge. Ram says, be careful. He’s dangerous enemy. And Lakshman fights heroically, stuns Rawan, and Rawan becomes enraged and uses celestial weapon, and he just pierces into Lakshman’s chest, and Lakshman falls, apparently lifeless.

And at that time, Ram breaks down and he says, you know, I might get another wife like Sita, but I would never get another brother like Lakshman. He sacrificed everything for my what face will I now show to his mother, Supra? What will I tell her? Fire on me that I could neither be with my father during his last moments, nor could I stop my brother from being killed in front of my own eyes. What use is anything for me?

He starts breaking down in lamentation. So at that time, Jambavan, Hanuman, Sugriv, they’re all aggrieved, and they have a physician among them, Nala. And he comes forward and he just touches Lakshman. And Lakshman is lifeless, but he whispers something to Sugriva. And then Sugriva comes forward and says to Ram that please do not lament.

There is a chance that he can be revived. So sometimes we may feel guilty that we are responsible for things, but it may be that we are not actually guilty. So Ram and Lakshmana’s fall. She thought he was dead. Now, sometimes there are some mistakes that we do.

And at that time, we may feel guilty. Now this happens with Dashrath. Now Dashrath has given two bones to Kaikeyi, and on that particular day, when he comes in a very jubilant mood, because now his beloved son, Ram, is going to succeed, a parent’s greatest joy is that the child become not just as good as, but better than them. Parents, whatever they get, they want it. The best of the world to be offered to their children.

So he is in a very celebratory mood, and he comes to meet his favorite wife, and he can’t find her anywhere. And then he asks the maids, where is she? So, she is in a particular chamber which is called her a sulking chamber. When she is upset, she goes in that chamber and sulks. Why is she there?

And he goes there, he is very concerned and he sees that he is lying on the ground, utterly in distress and disarray. So he says, what is the matter, dear? He says, I have no hope, I have no protector, I am abandoned. No. What has happened?

He says, no. My situation is such that nobody can help me. He says, no. Whatever you I will do whatever I can. Will you promise me that you will, you will give me whatever I ask for?

So, Dasharaj Mahavadi is so excited. Sometimes when we are too emotional, if we have one emotion, there’s a lot of happiness. And when we are extremely happy, if some problem comes up. Now we don’t want to lose that happiness. We just want that problem to be fixed as quickly as possible.

So he says, yes, whatever you want, I will give you. I promise you in the name of my beloved son, Ram, that I will do whatever you tell. Then when she asks, send Ram to exile for fourteen years and make Bharat the king, Dasharat feels as if he suddenly entered into a horrible nightmare. He just looks he goes through a whole series of turbulent emotions. Disbelief, shock, anger, betrayal, despair, and then utter agony.

That’s the time when he starts he tries to beg Kaikeyi to relent. If you want Bharat to be the king, so be it. But please don’t send Ram to the forest. He has never harmed you, he has just treated you like his mother. And I will not be able to live without it.

So he see, in a relationship, there are three if say, in a relationship there are multiple people involved. So Dasharat makes a very heartfelt appeal considering all the three stakeholders. He says, why target Ram? Ram has never done anything wrong. Then he says, as far as you are concerned, he has always been respectful and loving towards you.

And third is himself. Yes, I won’t be able to live without him. But she just does not relate. Then when Ram starts going to the forest and Dasharat can do nothing, at that time he feels as if he has failed his son. A father would want to protect and give the best to the world, best of the world to his son.

And here, he has to watch on while his son has to suffer for no fault of his. And not only can he not do anything to stop the suffering, it is he who is the cause of that suffering. So at that time, he feels guilt. Why? Why did I ever make such a promise to Kaike?

Why did at that time give such two blanket boons? Like that? So, now, when Dashrut feels guilt no. He had no intention to hurt Ram or anyone else for that matter. So it could be said to be a mistake.

We can give promises, but the blanket promises are dangerous. The blanket promises can actually bury us in a blanket only. You know, we can just get completely suffocated. Now, there are misdeeds. Who does some misdeeds?

Who is the person who does misdeed in the Mahabharata? Sorry, in the Ramayan? Rawan. Now does Rawan feel guilt? No.

So we will discuss that psychology also. Now misdeeds are done by Rawan, but Rawan feels no guilt. So on but there is one more character whose action could be said to be somewhere between a mistake and a misdeed, And that is sugriyu. Can you think when this happens? Yes.

He takes his own sweet time to come to Yes. See what happens is, Sukhree has been living for years in a no Internet zone, and then he gets full WiFi, and he goes on a Netflix blinch for blinch for four months. He forget that his four four months are over now. So he has been living in royalty, and suddenly he’s exiled into the forest. And then he his situation is worse than Ram in many sense.

In because he does not have his family with him, and he has his brother out to kill him. So from being in that situation, when he gets his kingdom back, and because of reigns, he just can’t do anything. So he just gets into the revelry, and he forgets completely. He forgets that he has to help Ram to find Sita. Again, that’s not an intentional misdeed, but it does happen from his side.

And it’s misdeed is generally meant with that it’s intention. But it’s not just a mistake over here. It’s something more. He got into a certain level of enjoyment, and that was unhealthy. But let’s look at these.

So now, we say that there are a variety of situations and a variety of emotions that arise from those situations. We are focusing on guilt and the spiritualization of guilt today. So let’s look at what is to be done for dealing with various situations. Now first of all, what is guilt? Now guilt can be defined in various ways, but at one level, guilt is when we feel bad on doing something bad.

It’s a simple way to define guilt, that we feel bad on doing something bad. Now, I’ll just become a little technical over here to differentiate a few points. See, there is also regret. Now regret is slightly different from guilt. Guilt is generally associated with moral things.

I did something morally wrong. Now regret is often associated with emotional. Say for example, if we spoke something in a way that hurt someone else. Now maybe we use some words which are considered or is considered offensive. And then that person felt hurt.

So there’s regret over there. Regret is not the same as guilt. That in the same direction, what I did was bad. Now regret can also be because of some practical damage. No.

We do something and sometimes that action causes harm to someone. So guilt is slightly different from regret. Now, in this same direction, there is these two are not exactly the same. Now, beyond that, there is one more emotion before I move out of this technical stuff. So, there is guilt, there is regret, And then, there is a third thing, which is reform.

Now, before reform comes remorse. Now remorse is more internal. Now regret can be internal as well as external. I feel regret and I suppose somebody invites us for a program, and we are not able to go for that program. I regret to inform you that I won’t be able to come for the program.

So that regret is not I won’t say I feel guilty that I can’t come for your program. It’s regret. It’s it’s often functional. Now reform, on the other hand, is external. So we may feel remorse when we do something bad, and then we do some we do something to change ourselves for the better.

Now all of these are to some extent associated with something called conscience. Conscience is the Viveka Buddhi. So remorse is is and then reform is Then as an expression of regret, we might do some atonement. That is Prayashchit. And conscience is Viveka Buddhi.

So now the conscience is broad. What what is it? It is our innate sense of right and wrong. The sense within us of right and wrong. This is good, this is bad.

This is right, this is wrong. We all have an innate sense, and that sense needs to be developed. So for example, say, if we are rushing on some urgent errand through a crowded room, and while we are walking through a crowded room, we notice that we have stepped on someone’s foot. As soon as we notice it, immediately we say, sorry, sorry. We might touch their body and touch it to our head, whatever.

Now imagine if somebody notices that they stepped on someone’s foot and they look at that person. Oh, it’s you. They deliberately raise their foot and bang it again on the other person. So, that is basically being evil. Where we not just hurt others, it’s like guilt is we feel bad on doing something bad.

But a person who is evil feels good on doing something bad. So, Brugari, when he half killed animals and he saw them suffering, he would feel joy in that. Now, we may not be physically malicious like that in hurting someone, but we can be emotionally malicious sometimes. That means we hear something about someone. And if that became widely known, that would hurt that person’s reputation, that could harm that person’s service.

But sometimes we just broadcast it. I am doing it in public interest. It’s not in public interest, it’s in personal interest. Isn’t it? It is.

It is because we want to get back at that person. So sometimes, our lack of conscience can be seen in when we gossip. Generally, for gossip to happen, two things have to come together. It is, we learn we need learn something we like. We come to know something we like, about someone we don’t like.

So when these two things happen together, when we hear something we like about someone we don’t like, oh, wow. This person pretends to be such a good person. Now I will unmask the reality of who they are. So this is when gossip starts off. The Sanskrit word for gossip is is a much broader category, but gossip will also fall in So sometimes people who gossip, they also have a distorted sense of conscience.

Their conscience is not working. So generally, if somebody has some challenges in their personal life, it happened with Srila Prabhupada that one of his senior leaders had some severe challenges. And he sent a letter and Prabhupada the letters that were sent to Prabhupada were read by his servant to Prabhupada. And this servant told this will happen in Mayapur. He told everyone that this has happened with this devotee.

This has happened with this devotee. And Prabhupada was very upset. He said, why did you tell like this? He wrote to me in confidence. One of the limbs of bhakti is guhyam akhyaati prucshati.

That guhyya, the confidentiality is very important. A, we truly want to have a community, we need to have in the community people whom we can trust. And that trust, one major aspect of earning trust is the capacity to keep confidences. So otherwise, surveys show that people in religious communities where there are high moral standards, such people actually feel more lonely than people in the secular world. Generally, pump people come to religious and spiritual groups because they want a closer sense of community, because the materialistic world is lonely.

But if we do not learn to keep confidences, then we will actually sentence people in our own community to far greater loneliness, because nobody will wanna share their hearts. Or whatever we call as sharing the hearts will only be where is the surface and we will not be able to connect at a deeper level. So anyway, so this is where guilt, if I have told something to others which was told to me in confidence, I should feel guilty about it. When we do something wrong, it is important that we feel that I did something bad. So guilt itself is not a bad thing.

Now guilt is actually a psychological protection mechanism. Just like there is a physical protection mechanism. Say, if let’s say there’s a current in this particular thing. A live current going on. I touch this and I feel current.

That immediately, I feel that current, I feel that pain, and my hand will not go over there. I’ll make sure that my hand doesn’t go over there. So just as that physical sensation of pain protects us from stimuli that will cause us pain, similarly, the emotional emotional sensation of guilt is meant to protect us from actions that are wrong, that are hurtful. So guilt itself is, is actually a necessary part of our psychological set up that Krishna has given us. So guilt is not bad.

However, there’s a problem that with respect to guilt, guilt can become misformed, misled, or misdirected. Now, when guilt is misdirected, what happens? Two things happen. We feel it when we shouldn’t, and we don’t feel it when we should. So feel it when not necessary.

So for example, I know one devotee here in America. He told me that he grew in a family, where for generations of course America doesn’t go for many generations, two hundred years, twelve, twelve fifty years old country. But he said for generations, they went into cattle breeding. And that was just their profession. So eating meat, beef, just a part of their profession, and that is a part of their family lineage.

So he said, when he started practicing Bhakti, and he started becoming a vegetarian, he said, I started feeling guilty as if I am betraying my family and my dynasty. So we eat meat all the time. At that time, he had showed me some cartoon. One point, one American asked another American, he says, are you a vegetarian? He said, no.

I am an American. So the idea is, as if I am American, that means, is of course I love you vegetarian. But, no, that’s not true. But, so sometimes, we may feel guilt when there is no reason to feel guilt. So, sometimes guilt might our sense our conscience may get culturally conditioned.

Culturally conditioned means that because of the family upbringing, because of the way everyone is doing something in a particular society, particular cultural setting, then if we do something different, we may feel guilty. But there is no need for that guilt. So when guilt gets misdirected, we feel it when not needed. And the second, which is more common is, we don’t feel it when it is needed. So So while the first can be damaging, the second can actually be devastating.

And this is not feeling guilt when needed, that is actually typical of the demoniac nature. Demoniac nature means, the way you are going, you are messing up your life. But, they blame that person only. Like somebody is an alcoholic and their family tries to help them give up alcohol and they blame that family only. You know, if you hadn’t been a better spouse, if you had been a better parent, if you had been a better sibling, then I would not have to drink.

So, this is actually called gaslighting. Gaslighting is where we deflect blame away from us to the very person who is actually helping us. So, the characteristic of demoniac nature is that they feel no guilt. Krishna talks about it in the sixteenth chapter when he says that, He says that the demoniac people just kill their rivals, and they think it’s a sign of their cleverness. Yeah.

You know, I eliminated this enemy, and I eliminated that enemy now. And just see how clever I am, just see how smart I am, just see how successful I am. So sometimes for warriors, killing may be required, but to get joy in that and to celebrate that, that may be harmful, that may be dangerous. So demoniac, now of course there are sometimes people who are villainous and they are killing, may be necessary, and may be celebrated also, but still, we have to be very careful about this. So when we do bad and don’t feel bad, that is really bad.

So, Ravan, when he abducted Sita, neither the thought of that plan nor the execution of that plan, never did he feel any guilt at all. No. All he felt was, this is Ram such an inconvenience. I just want Ram to get out of the way. Now, he was misled by Maricha or whoever, actually by Akampana, and Akampana said that Ram is so attached sorry.

Ram is so attached to his wife that he has brought her into the forest also. That means, he won’t be able to live without her. And if you take her away, then he will become weak and he will die. So sometimes crimes like rape are seen as rising from lust. But, you know, that’s only one part of it.

If somebody was just lusty, they could go to a prostitute. Rape and crimes like that arise more out of ego. Ego and pride that expresses itself through lust. So initially, when the Pankarawas wanted to disrupt Draupadi, it is not so much out of lust. It was to humiliate the Pandavas.

So when somebody, one person wants to dominate the other person and force them against their will, that forcing is not because of lust. That is because of ego and pride. It’s a complex combination, but Ravan, when he initially wanted to abduct Sita, he did not even know about Sita’s beauty much. Yes, Shorbankai told her about it. Initially when he thought about it, when a company told him, it was simply a way to get back at Ram.

But when he saw the beauty of Sita, heard about it from Shurparka and saw it himself, he said, this is not about getting back at Ram, this is just for my own enjoyment. So the point over here is whether it was lust or pride, that Rawan had no conscience and therefore he felt no guilt. This is where there are some criminals who are sociopaths and psychopaths, they just remorselessly kill people and that’s a deadly thing. So now, when we have done something wrong and we don’t feel guilt, what do we do at that time? So as I said, guilt is healthy and in some cases, guilt needs to be felt.

So for that purpose, actually, we need three things. We need education. Education, not just intellectual education, philosophical education, but education that leads to the elevation of our emotions, development of our emotions. Some people just don’t have that capacity for empathy. So, you know, here I’m talking about how conscience can be developed.

We need association. We need education. You know, education for emotions. And in many ways, bhakti is all about educating and elevating our emotions. Then most important for developing consciousness is association.

Association is where, if we associate people who have a strong moral compass, then we start thinking, hey, maybe what I’m doing so nonchalantly, maybe I should not be doing this. Some people just lie very casually and they say it’s a harmless lie. And sometimes you con to confront them also, it is, it is, they will just take it nonchalantly That they will focus on it as harmless. Now what happens is sometimes, it is a harmless lie they have spoken. Why did you lie?

They focus on the harmless and we focus on the lie. So why did you speak a lie? It is harmless, but it is a lie, but it is harmless. And sometimes they just not take it, they do not take care for it at all. So when we associate with people who have a very sharp moral compass, By that we start understanding, okay, now this is something which should not be done.

So, if we associate somebody who is, who is very sensitive about the emotions of others, you You know, if you if you speak this if you some suppose somebody in an authority position has to take some disciplinary action against someone, they have to be very careful, okay, what words am I using and how will those words be seen by others. So if we associate someone who is very, very careful about the words, then that helps us, okay, this is what I need also to be careful about. So association is very helpful. And of course, beyond that is purification. Now purification means that see basically, we could consider that our emotions are like our reservoir of energy, And this energy will go in some direction.

So if my emotional energy if somebody has like a hundred hundred watt power backup, and if that is used to charge your fridge, then your store will not work. Or if you are using it to charge your laptop, then your phone will not get charged. So like that, when we are impure, all our emotional energy goes in pursuing that particular desire. So it’s not that a person who is lusty or greedy is by nature heartless, in the sense of not considering others emotions. But they are so caught in their own emotions.

Like if say, if there are three cake pieces and they are meant for three people, and one person is greedy, they will just eat all the three pieces, and they wouldn’t think about the other person. It’s not that they wanted to hurt the other person, but their emotions are so caught in their greed that they just don’t think about the other person. Now what happens is, all these emotions like lust, anger, greed, they make us eye specialists. Not eye specialists, eye specialists. Which is become very self centered.

So purification, what it does is, it releases our emotions from wherever they are locked. So as we chant Hare Krishna and practice bhakti, we start becoming purified. That means the emotions that are locked in the greed, the emotions that are locked in the, last, the emotions that are locked in the jealousy, they start getting unlocked. And then, it’s so if we have a very lot of impurities, then all our emotional energy goes in just feeling what we want to feel, and not feeling what others are feeling or will feel at all. So that’s why purification is vital.

So through education, association, purification, the conscience can be developed and then we will have healthy guilt. Where we should feel guilt, we will start feeling guilt. And that is a good thing, that will make us more careful in actions that may hurt others. And eventually, of course, by the law of karma, hurt ourselves. So now I’ll talk about the last part.

So what do we do about unhealthy guilt? So our topic value is spiritualization of emotions. So we should feel guilt when it is necessary. So Sugri was so caught in his Internet surfing that he forgot his responsibility. But then, when first Hanuman reminded him, then Tara reminded him, And then when Lakshman came, Lakshman didn’t just remind him.

Lakshman started shaking him up. Not physically, Lakshman chastised him. And then what happened is, through all that forceful association, his sense of his responsibility, his sense of his right and wrong awakened. So, it is not that he is an impure person, but it was that he needed that shock. Sometimes that’s what is required.

Sometimes you have to forcefully remind others that of how wrong what they have done is or what they are doing is. So that’s association. Now beyond that, if we move forward towards dealing with the situation where guilt may be now there are some people like Rawan, no matter who reminds them, like, the if their moral compass is asleep, it can be awakened. But if he is dead, nothing can be done to it. Somebody is dead, you can shake them, you can slap them, you can kick them, they are not going to get up.

So Rawan’s moral compass was more or less dead. That’s why neither the good advice of his own relatives, Vibhishan and even, even Mandodari and Mandodari’s father. They all advised, but he didn’t listen to anyone. And nor did he take the warnings coming from Hanuman and Angad also. So either way, some places it just doesn’t work.

And then people who don’t have who don’t feel guilt on doing something wrong, they really have to be punished strongly. If we don’t punish such people, if we don’t forcefully restrain such people, they will keep doing wrong things. The leftist propaganda is that nobody is actually bad. That it is only society which makes people bad. And when people do bad things, it is because society needs to be changed.

So in California, during the pandemic, they had the rule that if anybody shoplifts, as long as they are shoplifting below $750, oh, people are poor, they don’t have bread to eat, they don’t have food, that’s why they are shoplifting. And they said, the police will not even press any charges against them, not even record a complaint. And what happened, people were going and shoplifting and now there are nobody shoplifting bread and food. They were carefully shoplifting iPhones and Louis Vuitton purses, but just below $750, and shoplifted one day and sell the next day on Ebay. So the thing is, that there are bad people.

Of course, everyone at the level of the soul is good, but there are bad people in the world, and they need to be punished, because if they if they do not have a conscience that guides them, then there is consequence that has to guide them. If there is no conscience and there is no consequence, then society will have to bear the consequence. That’s how it is. So for us, how do we stop wrongdoing? There are these only those two factors broadly speaking.

If somebody is doing something wrong, how do they stop? Internally, there is conscience, and externally, there is consequence. Now ideally speaking, both should come together. In the case of the consequence of Dashratha dying also didn’t awaken her conscience. But when Bharat came and chastised her, I said, What do you think you have done?

You think you have done this for my pleasure? She said, I am disgusted with this. She said, I reject you as my mother. So she was shocked. And she got that consequence of rejection from the very person for whom she had done everything.

Then she came out of her stupor, and then she actually severely repented for what she had done. She even came with Ram to beg him to come back from the forest. So now, this is with respect to guilt that is healthy. What about guilt that is unhealthy? That means, guilt that is unhealthy is when we are feeling bad despite not having done something bad.

So what do we do at that time? Now, this can happen because of three things. One is manipulation. So if somebody is deliberately making us feel guilty to control us, like I said, gaslight, like mantra, try to manipulate So at that such a time, we need to distance ourselves from such people. We need to keep a distance.

Such people, sometimes they may just not change. We can change them well and good. If not, at least we need to change the dynamic of our relationship. If there are some people who constantly make us feel bad about ourselves, then we have to see. Of course, there are things in our life we all need to improve.

But to improve, we don’t just need chastisement all the time. We need encouragement also. You know, if I was traveling in America over here and staying at one devotees home, and their their son, he was a young adult, he was driving me around. So we both had a lot of interest in English, so we became friends. And one day when he was driving, he told me, you know, I feel as if my parents don’t love me at all.

I said, what makes you say that? I’ve seen your parents with you. They care for you. Yeah, yeah. He said, they of course care for me, but I think that they love only a future version of me, and they are tolerating me till by if that future version of their dreams emerges.

Now, I think that’s a very insightful observation. So of course I told him that there are so many kids who don’t have parents, who don’t have anyone, who cares neither for their present nor their future. But sometimes it happens that some somebody who is guiding us, they may see where we can be and they want us to rise to those standards. But what happens is, the way they want us to rise to those standards is by constantly making us feel bad about where we are right now. They may not be intentionally manipulating us, and their intention may not be at all bad.

But what they are doing is that it’s as if I feel, if I start feeling that the present me is a terrible person. And so it’s like, nobody in any relationship will feel as if I will be loved only when I get there. And right now, I am being tolerated. And the tolerance may also break at any time. So when that happens, that relationship becomes very stretched.

So basically, there is everyone needs to have an inner negotiation. So, with this point I’ll be concluding, and then we can have some few question answers. What is this inner negotiation? This applies to others also. See, when we are guiding others or instructing others, we may want them to rise.

Now within all of us, there is the present me, and then there is the potential me. There is who I am right now, and there is who I can be. So now, if only the present me is cared for, then what will happen is, that the that means, oh, you know, you like to watch TV, watch TV. You like to go and play games, you go and play games. You like to hang out with your friends and party, do that.

Whatever makes you happy, do that. No. Say for example, if parents care only for the present child, then the child will stagnate. The child may even degrade. But on the other hand, if we so these are like two extremes of pendulum, if we care only for the potential me, That means if the parents care, oh, you know, you have so much talent, you can become a great achiever, or you can become a great devotee.

You know, you can do this, you can do that, you can do that. If we care only for the potential me without caring for the present me, what will happen is, the person will suffocate. That there is it’s only when I get there, I will be loved and accepted and respected. Until that time, I am barely being tolerated. Now, that is also a very unhealthy state.

If you feel suffocated too much, then what happens is, you just want to go away from that place. So, the ideal situation is, there has to be both, the present me and the potential me. So, the present me and the potential me, each person has to balance the needs of both of them. So, the present me needs to be accepted. And even not as accepted, but also appreciated.

It’s not that as I say, somebody accepted means it just as if I’m tolerating you. That is the basic level and definitely has to be there. But along with that, there is good in each one of us at present also. And that needs to be appreciated. Say, we can’t fast Nizjaloni kadashi.

We can beat ourselves, why can’t why don’t I fast Nizjal? Or we can we can appreciate ourselves. Okay. Maybe six months ago, I would not even be able to fast from one meal also, but now I am able to skip one meal. So the presently where I am, that also needs to be appreciated.

Now the potential me, the potential me, that is also very important. You know, there is each one of us can become so much better. And the potential me has to be fanned. Fanned means it’s like a fuel. It’s like a it’s like a fire.

The fan when you do fan, what happens it? It grows. Now it has to be fanned means the person has to be encouraged, the person has to be inspired. But fanning alone is not enough. Along with fanning, it has to be facilitated.

Facilitated means, okay, come on, you can do this. Yes. That’s good. But, you know, how do I do this? Suppose the child is trying to learn how to cycle and child keeps falling down.

The parent says, come on. You can do it. Come on. You can do it. Yeah.

But why am I falling down? Tell me that. Isn’t it? Maybe the child is pedaling too much on one side of the leg. And that’s why the child’s cycle is going off balance.

Okay. You know, don’t pedal so much with this leg. Paddle also with that leg also. Use equal force. That means you have to give practical help also.

What is it that you are not able to do? So the potential me has to also be found and facilitated. So when there is so if somebody is focusing only on the potential me and not caring for the present me, then the guilt that results over there can be unhealthy, because it can be very discouraging. That, you know, oh, I should be there and I’m not there, and because I’m not there, Krishna, Krishna is displeased with me. This beautiful letter of Prabhupada where he says that I am never displeased with any member of his god.

What Prabhupada means is that just by being a part of his moment, we please him. Now, of course, within the moment we can do more and more, and that will please him more and more. But the basic foundation is is a foundation of acceptance and appreciation. From there we grow forward. So the key point is that here, this is if I am here now, and Krishna is here, and say, some wrong action is here.

Some wrongdoing is here. What should happen is, guilt should act like a blockade. Guilt should be here, and it stops me from doing something wrong. And this guilt is positive. But sometimes, guilt ends up coming over here, where we feel, because of guilt, so discouraged that we feel as if, I’m just not capable of doing this.

I cannot do this at all. So I don’t want devotee. He was a very dynamic devotee when I I introduced him to Bhakti, then I moved to another place as a part of my service. I met him after many years. Now, I met him in California.

He is, he is now one of the biggest preachers and patrons of the Ramakrishna Mission there. So I met him when I came California. I saw one of the programs. He came to meet me. And I asked him what happened.

So he was introduced to what he he, when he was introduced, he was in one of the IITs in India. I used to go there regularly, so he would attend my classes. And we would have a lot of discussions. So he said, I loved the philosophy and I just felt that it was not practical for me. It’s just impossible for me.

And I got very frustrated. I felt very guilty about it. And then after finally I decided I cannot live with such a guilt, so I just left Krishna consciousness. Then I found a spiritual path that was more doable for me. So I said, okay, so what part of, of Krishna consciousness did you feel was not doable for you?

So he said, I was told that I should read only Prabhupada’s books. And since the age of five, every week I read two books. And not just like light novels. I like to write self help books, I read, non fiction. So every year I read at least hundred books.

And when they told me that you should read only Prabhupada’s books, I felt this is impossible for me. And when I said I would like to read other books, I was constantly made to feel guilty about it. And that’s why I decided I cannot live with this. Now, you know, we should read Prabhupada’s book. We should read Shastra.

But different people are different. Some people who have a more intellectual nature, they live with books. They will read a light variety. We should not be in the business of telling people don’t read this other stuff. Because when you read Shastra.

Now, there is no need for anyone to make him feel guilty for reading other books. And now this is such a trivial reason because of which somebody left Krishna conscious. That person who is a big leader in our movement could have done so much service for Krishna. So what happens is that sometimes certain people have certain needs. If somebody is intellectual, they will want to read widely.

For most people, to get them to read even one book is difficult. That’s why, okay, it’s true. Tell them, no, don’t read too many books. That is true. Now what when the Goswami say this, but you look at what the Goswami themselves They themselves have read a lot of books.

And they quote even from literature within the Vedic canon that is non devotional. And the whole Rasa tradition, they quote from contemporary authors also. So the point is, some people may have particular needs. Somebody is very much into music and you tell that person, if you no. If somebody wants somebody to be faithful to Prabhupadhyas.

So you if you are to be faithful to Prabhupad, the way is you should sing only Prabhupada’s Hare Krishna Dhun Kirtan. No other dhuns allowed. If you sing any other dhun, you are being a deviate. This person will feel musically suffocated. Isn’t it?

And of course, we don’t do that, but, you know, just as people have musical needs, people have intellectual needs. So, now of course, there are boundaries that need to be set, but different people may need different boundaries. And somebody who is very much into music, they may want to also hear some secular music. Okay. What kind of musical trends are going on in the world?

And they may want to present bhakti according to those musical trends. And they are not hearing music for self gratification. They are hearing it for service. So we cannot have a one size fit all for everyone. There needs to be some customization and accommodation.

So the idea is that everybody needs to feel accepted and appreciated where they are at. And then, they can be facilitated to grow further. So, when we learn to do this, either if we are feeling in our bhakti that I am not accepted and appreciated right now, then we need to find the devotees with whom we will be accepted and appreciated. Isn’t the devotee associate itself, there are some who will appreciate, some who will not appreciate us. But finding that is very important.

When you find that, then this unhealthy feeling of constant guilt, constant insecurity, constant inadequacy, that will go away. That doesn’t mean I am perfect. Of course, we have a long way to go. But here we are, we are accepted and appreciated. From there, we can keep moving forward step by step.

So I’ll summarize what I discussed today. We talked about Guilt Management, and in that, today’s topic was the second part. So first I talked about how the Ramayana is into basically the spiritualization of emotions. The spiritualization of emotions can happen in two ways. One is by directly directing our emotions toward Krishna, and other emotions also, we connect them with Krishna.

So when we do this, then our emotions can be spiritualized. And then within that, I discussed about specifically we focus on the theme of guilt, and when we are talking about guilt, how guilt is actually healthy. It is even necessary. It is positive because it protects us from wrongdoing. It protects us from ruining.

When we do something bad, we feel bad on doing that. And that is due to guilt. And for some people, this this comes from conscience. So we don’t have to increase our guilt, but we do have to increase our sense of conscience. And that can be done by three things.

That is our education. Education especially in terms of emotions and how our actions impact others, then association, associating people who have a strong moral compass, and purification, by which our emotions that were locked in something become freed, so that they are available for other things. We don’t remain eye specialists, and we start becoming more empathic towards others. Now, such a guilt is good. Now when we are trying to go through life, guilt can also be negative.

Guilt can become misdirected when we feel guilty when we need not, and we don’t feel guilty when we should. So if the negative will come because of constantly feeling of inadequacy. If the present me and the future me, or the potential me. So in the, if there’s only the present me is cared for, that’s not good enough, then we’ll stagnate. If the only the future me is cared for, we’ll suffocate.

So ideally speaking, what happens? In the balance, both the present me needs to be accepted, and not just accepted, but also appreciated. And at the same time, the potential me also needs to be fanned. Yes, you can do better. You need to be encouraged, and then also practically facilitated.

So when both of these are done, and we are provided association that enables us to do this, then that’s how a person will be able to grow. And every devotee, where they are, whatever the conditionings may be, the devotee needs to be accepted and appreciated, feel accepted and appreciated. And each devotee has the individual responsibility to find the association where we’ll be accepted and appreciated. And as a community, we also need to have the responsibility to cultivate that mood within the broader community. So let us pray to Lord Ramachandra that just as he is, my dear Lord, you have demonstrated beautiful emotions which all are centered on you and which bring closer to, everyone closer to you.

Please, oh lord, help us to also develop similar sublime and spiritual emotions and let our guilt bring us closer to you and never cause us to go away from you. Help us to gently cultivate healthy emotions of guilt that protect us.

The post Guilt Management 2: When Guilt is Healthy.. Houston – Chaitanya Charan appeared first on The Spiritual Scientist.

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Hare Krishna. I’m grateful to be here, all of you today, at the lotus feet of the lordship, Shraddha Nilamadha. And today and tomorrow, I will take a two part series on the topic of dealing with guilt. Here we see, Yudhishthir Maharaj is suffering from a severe attack of guilt. So when is guilt healthy, and when does guilt become unhealthy?

That will be the topic which we’ll be discussing today. So today, I’ll talk about it in two parts. Today we’ll mainly be looking at can this be seen for everyone? Okay. So guilt, healthy and unhealthy.

That will be the topic. So today, I’ll be talking more about the causes of guilt and when they are right and wrong. And tomorrow, we’ll be discussing more the cure for guilt, how to actually address guilt. So today, I’ll talk about three main points. The context, what exactly is going on in this section of the Bhagavatam, and why is Yudhishthira Maharaj feeling so guilty.

Then second is we’ll talk about the general causes of guilt. And then I’ll talk about one misconception about guilt, which can actually create a lot of trouble for all of us. So what is the context over here? The context is that the war has got over. And just now, we’ll go back from the context one by one, that Krishna is about to depart and Yudhishthira has just seen how Parikshit their their only successor who is surviving was so brutally attacked and was miraculously saved.

And before that, Kunti has offered prayers, before that, the war has got over. So now Yudhishthir is feeling immensely guilty and he’s saying, I cannot I cannot become the king. And he says that, I have been responsible for such a terrible war which led to such catastrophic bloodshed. And it is for my own greed for kingdom that I did this. And therefore, a person like me who is driven by greed and who has committed such wrongs is should not become the king.

And he is he is an intelligent person. He is already anticipating objections. So they may say that, actually, you know, even if you consider yourself guilty, you can always do Yajnas, and Yajnas are meant for atonement, and you can be purified by atonement. So he’s anticipating that and he’s replying, no. He says, my crime is so severe that those yagnas are meant for atonement and purification, but this was mass slaughter of human beings and so many human beings.

He says that, this cannot be counted. And Srila Prabhupada often in his purports is very clear about what he is trying to do. Srila Prabhupada has particular points that he wants to emphasize. And quite often for Srila Prabhupada the that is the Bhagavatam purport or the Bhagavita purport or the Chaitan Chartha Murth purport. Prabhupada is He’s one pointed.

His focus is on imparting principles of Krishna consciousness, which are especially relevant for people. So he immediately takes Ashwamedha Yagna and he says, okay, that is not relevant. Sankirtan Yagna is relevant today. And he emphasizes how we should be performing Sankirtan Yagna. Now within this context, let’s look at what triggered Yudhishthir’s guilt.

You know, if if you see the Mahabharata war okay. See the Mahabharata war, it was a catastrophic war. And what happened to Arjuna? Before the war, happened to Yudhishthir after the war. Arjuna had second thoughts about fighting, and at that time, Krishna had to pacify it, pacify him and reassure him, and now Yudhishthir has is having not second thoughts about the war, that’s already done.

But he is having second thoughts, especially about becoming the king. In fact, he could say he is not having second thoughts. He has decided I will not be the king and that’s where it is. Now what triggered it so much? The Pandavas won the war, but it was not a clean victory.

It was basically the victory that came to the Pandavas, it was it was costly, very costly. And it was a very unhazy victory, not a very clear victory. Hazy means what? That even the Pandavas had to do immoral things to win the war. Now we could think of how they surrendered to Krishna and how in the bigger contest, it was unethical.

It was ultimately ethical. But still, there, what was the cost? For him, the biggest there are two big costs. One was that all sons were killed And especially while all his sons were killed, Yudhishthir felt especially responsible for the death of Abhimanyu, because the Chakravyu had been formed by Drona to trap him. And he had said, Abhijvani, if you go inside, we will break in.

Generally, a parent or a parent figure is meant to be a protector of a child. Yudhishthir felt, what kind of king can I be? That I send my nephew who is like my son to his death all for my own protection. And then he had been he had his all sons first of all, Uriasana was killed. Sorry.

Abhimanyu was killed. And then after that, all the sons were slaughtered by Ashwat Dawa. We’ll come to that. But, after that, what really broke Yudhishthir was Kunti’s revelation that Karna was his brother. Throughout Yudhishthir, while Arjuna had animosity with the Pandavas, among the various people, Yudhishthir on the Kaurava side, Yudhishthir had strong negative feelings, especially in terms of fear about Karana.

And Karana had humiliated Yudhishthir on the battlefield on the seventeenth day. And Yudhishthir had celebrated when Karana had been killed. And now when he heard that the person whose death I celebrated was my own brother and that brother whom I thought was so cruel and so evil that he sided with Rirodhan, that very brother had a chance to kill me and kill my brothers. And he did not kill me because he had made a promise to my mother. And he was such an honorable person that he kept his promise.

So this just completely broke him. He was angry with Kunti. How could you have hidden this from me? But beyond that, some people have a lot of those who have a lot of ego, they become very aggressive in blaming others. But those who are relatively humble, one we’ll talk about this.

A misapplication or misunderstanding of humility can lead to we blaming ourselves. Now another another why was it hazy? Because he himself felt especially guilty about the way Drona was killed. Because he see, there are other killings that happened and it’s like the Khababhad war was such that nobody came out unsullied. Each of the Pandavas had to do something seriously questionable.

Bhima had to finally hit Duryodhan about below the waist. Arjuna had to shoot an unarmed Karana, and Yudhishthir had to speak a lie. Now he spoke a lie, and actually at that time, the Pandava’s plan was not so much to kill Drona as drop Drona. And if Drona lowers his weapons, Arjuna’s plan was, we will arrest him. We’ll keep him in house arrest till the war is over.

Because that day, Drona had started using celestial weapons against ordinary soldiers. So he felt Krishna told him that he it’s like in today’s world, if some head of state who has nuclear weapons, start using nuclear weapons in an ordinary war, where only conventional weapons are used. Then the other world leaders may be decided somehow or the other, this leader has to be assassinated. Otherwise, he can destroy not just the entire opposing army, the entire world can be destroyed. So it was with great reluctance that Yudhishthira agreed and he spoke the lie.

But then, the the the Sudyumna took the opportunity and lopped off Drona’s head in cold blood. And Arjuna was enraged at the Sudyumna and he wanted to attack him. And Yudhishthir had great ambivalent feelings at that time. And after that, everything that bad happened, Yudhishthir felt as if it is it is the reaction to my misdeal in speaking a lie that led to the death of my Guru. So this happened multiple times.

Ashwatthama, when he used the Narayan Astra, and that Astra just could not be countered. It is just destroying all of Yudhishthiras. Are we Yudhishthiras spoke? Oh, warriors. This was not not at the end, this was on that very day, fifteenth day only, towards the evening.

Yudhishthir started calling out, oh warriors, this weapon cannot be defeated. This weapon will kill all of us. Leave the battlefield and go wherever you can find shelter. I too will, if I survive this weapon, enter into the forest. This is the reaction for what I did to my Guru.

So he felt especially guilty for Drona’s Drona’s actions. And that was the justification for what Ashwatthama did to their sons. Ashwatthama felt that when your Guru was not awake, was in a trance, you killed him like an animal. Therefore, you deserve to be killed like an animal. He wanted to kill the Pandavas and he also lamented when he found out he had killed the Pandavas’ sons and Duryodh lamented.

And Yudhishthira understood what had happened. He said, you know, for what we did, I should have got for what I did, I should have got the reaction. But my sons got the reaction. And all of them were killed. What was this war for?

So he is completely devastated over here. He is crushed by what has happened. And the Mahabharata actually depicts the harsh nature of the world. That even good people who want to do good things also end up in big, big trouble. This is just the nature of the world.

So his guilt is understandable. And because of this, he’s saying, I just cannot I cannot become the king. So how is his guilt addressed? That we’ll discuss in the next chapter, which will start tomorrow. What exactly Bhishma speaks, we won’t go into the full argument, but specifically how he addresses guilt that we’ll discuss tomorrow.

So this is the context. Now in general, when I’ll go to the second point. When you talk about the causes of guilt, broadly, there are four causes of guilt. One is misdeeds. Now we have done something bad and we have done something wrong, and because of that, we feel guilty.

And generally, this kind of guilt is healthy. So here, we could say causes of guilt. Here, this is positive. The sense that we should feel bad after we have done something bad. So now to his credit, when Karuna acted in a very terrible way during the gambling assembly gambling match, he he was the person who suggested that Draupadi be dragged into the assembly and be disrobed.

He called Draupadi a prostitute. And he stopped Vikarna when Vikarna tried to stop the Dhrushraviya Draupadi. To his credit, afterwards, he at least regrets. He said, in trying to please Duryodhan, I went too far at that time. He doesn’t give up Duryodhan, so that regret in that sense is empty.

But at least he feels guilty. Does Duryodhan feel guilty? Not in the least. So, you know, to not feel bad or doing bad is actually very bad. That indicates that the person’s character if somebody has no remorse, like in today’s language, you know, some people who commit crimes and don’t even show slightest bit of remorse, they are psychopaths and sociopaths, very dangerous people.

So guilt itself is not a bad thing. If misdeeds are done, madam, we should feel guilty. Now sometimes it’s not misdeeds, it’s mistakes. What is the difference between misdeeds and mistakes? Mistakes are generally unintentional.

Misdeeds are quite often intentional. So now when mistakes happen, should we feel guilty? It can be positive, but with a question mark. There should be that that guilt, what it should do and what it should not do. We’ll have to discuss that.

In such situations, there can be some guilt, but we shouldn’t be beating ourselves up. We are all finite beings. We’ll discuss this. Now the fourth could be misapprehension. Misapprehension means we are holding ourselves responsible for something that we haven’t done, this kind of guilt is definitely negative.

So guilt is where it’s something which we have not done and still we are feeling bad about it. And this is the kind of guilt which Yudhishthir Maharaj is feeling, and that’s what will be addressed. So when we misunderstand the situation, say, a doctor gives a medicine and, to a patient and the patient dies. Now, was it because of medical malpractice? Did doctor want the patient to die?

Did the doctor not consider some side effects of of some pre existing conditions of the patient? If none of these are the case, and it is just that, you know, some completely unpredictable complication that happened. Then while the doctor may feel bad, nobody would want a patient to die. But when they die, there should not be guilt over there. It can be misapprehension.

So we are misapprehension means we hold ourselves responsible for things that were not in our control, that we just could not have prevented. Yudhish had tried his very best to prevent the war, but that had just not worked. So misapprehension, that’s a third cause of guilt. And the fourth is the most dangerous, that is manipulation. That people who are a bit insecure, often they can be manipulated by cunning people and by manipulation, they can be made to feel guilty and then they are made to do things that will actually make them guilty, that will actually harm them.

So this is what, for example, Mantra did to Kaikeyi. Now, when Kaikeyi first heard that Ram is being coronated, she was happy. She said to Mantra, this is the greatest news that you have ever brought. Here have this necklace. And Mantra said, what kind of foolish woman are you?

Do you not understand what conspiracy is happening over here? And she just okay. She just didn’t pay much attention. She was hearing. She didn’t take anything very seriously.

But, the mantra said, do you not see that if everything was above board, why does this transfer of power have to happen in the absence of Bharat? This is clearly a plan to sideline Bharat. And this is where it gets her attention. And seeing this, then Kaikeyi thrusts in for the kill. And she exactly accuses Kaushalya of planning what she is actually trying to do.

If you do not protect Bharat’s interests, Ram will always see him as a competitor and Ram will make up some case against him and have him persecuted. He will have him exiled or he may even have him executed. Do you not love your son? Do you not care for his welfare? And this is where lost it.

So there are people who manipulate and there are these self seeking people who manipulate others and make them feel guilty for things that there’s no reason to feel guilty about. So this kind of guilt is totally toxic. You could say this is negative. There’s like a negative square, you can say. This has to be we we should not feel guilty rather.

The guilt needs to be rejected. Now unfortunately, among the people in the world who are expert at using and inducing guilt through manipulation are most prominent are the religious leaders. There is this infamous Catholic guilt as they call it. So in the Christian tradition, the idea is, we are all born sinners. So sin is like a genetic defect that we have all inherited.

And because we are all sinful, even if somebody has not harmed anyone, of course, you cannot say that we live throughout the life without harming anyone. But the idea is, there is always this feeling of insecurity, inadequacy and guilt that is created so that people will feel the need for God. And they’ll feel that, oh, you know, I am so fallen. Without God, I’ll be doomed. I’m going to go to hell.

So the idea that in if you see in the Vedic tradition, it is not that of course, there’s a conception of right and wrong, but the focus is on the fact that the soul is pure. The soul is always pure. And when guilt is used in this way, there are religious leaders who will create impossibly high standards. And when the followers are not able to follow those standards, the followers will become feel very guilty. And when the followers feel very guilty, then they’ll say, oh oh, you leader, you are my only savior.

Whatever you say, I will do. And that’s how okay. You cannot follow the stand standard. You are so followed. Therefore, do this, do this.

They will do whatever the leader tells them to do. That’s how cults are formed. And cults can manipulate people. So when in the nineteen seventies, when our movement started growing in America, at that time, there was this great fear that we are also a cult. And one of the reasons was there was there were some cult leaders who had really horrendously manipulated people.

There was one, some person called Reverend Johns or whatever. He he had his own followers on a farm somewhere here in Texas, then he went to Mexico. And he did a lot of criminal activities and immoral activities. And then when he was about to be found, he said, now is the test of your faith. All of you are all of you are sinners, but if you do one act of faith now, you will be delivered.

What is that act of faith? All of you take poison. So first, you give poison to your children, then you take poison. And and when the police came over there, everybody there was dead. So it was all manipulation, and manipulation through guilt is extremely dangerous.

See, in our tradition, Prabhupada does talk about hell. But very rarely does Prabhupada emphasize that, you know, give up sense gratification, give up sinful activity because you’ll go to hell because of that. His focus is not on fear, inducing fear, but on empowering the intelligence. His focus is that we are not our physical shells, we are spiritual beings And we are meant for so much greater happiness. Why should we waste our life in pursuing this meager pleasure?

So it was that this is insignificant pleasure. We are meant for something bigger. So it’s not at all inducing guilt. It’s actually the opposite. It is more of inspiring greatness that we as parts of Krishna, have a great destiny.

We are meant for Ananda Mudhivardhanam and it is that we should seek that destiny that we are made for. So when there is this when there is religious teaching, it can go both ways. It can be either it can induce guilt and try to get compliance from people. You are so guilty, if you don’t obey me, you are going to go to hell. That’s a very toxic way to do things.

Otherwise, it can inspire greatness, That we are meant for great things. What Arjuna says, Arjuna has told Krishna, rise and attain victory. That is not just a message for Arjuna alone. That is Krishna’s call for everyone. So, I’ll now move to the last part, the misconception.

What is the misconception? The misconception has two parts that see, we are all told to be that we have to cultivate humility. And yes, we need to cultivate humility. But but humility, sometimes people think if I feel guilty, that will make me humble. But actually, humility and guilt are very different.

I’ll explain why, and I’ll conclude then you can have questions. There is ego, And often we think the opposite of ego is humility. And, I was in one college and I saw one quote. I I was one boy, he was wearing a t shirt, and he said, my greatest quality is my humility. So you’re proud of your humility.

So what happens is we generally it’s a fair thing that if you don’t have ego, you’ll have humility. If you have humility, we should not have ego. There’s definitely truth to that. However, the truth is also a little more subtle. Actually, they’re not just two components.

There are three components. On one side, there is ego. The other side is insecurity. And associated with insecurity also comes guilt. And in between is humility.

So that ego and insecurity are two extremes of the pendulum. Both of them are centered on our vision of ourselves. How do we see ourselves? So our vision of ourselves, ego is where I can do everything. I am everything.

I am God. So I can do everything that is ego. On the other hand, insecurities, I am nothing, I can do nothing, I am nothing. That is Shunya vad. So Srila Prabhupada came to free us from Nirubhishesh Shunya vadhi.

So we do not want we do not want impersonalism, where I am, I am everything, I can do everything. That is not what we want, but we don’t want this voidism also. That I am nothing, I can do nothing. What is the basis of humility? Humility is, So, I am something.

I am a part of Krishna, and I’ll always be a part of Krishna. So I can do some things. I can’t do everything, but that doesn’t mean I can do nothing. I can do some things and I am something. Something or someone, you can say in this context.

That, and Krishna says, sanatana. No matter how many bad things we have done, we will still always remain parts of Krishna. Krishna will never abandon us. Krishna will always be with us and he will always be there in our hearts as the Paramatma. So humility is acknowledging that I have weaknesses, I have insufficiencies, but my weaknesses and insufficiencies do not define me.

There is a core to me which is pure, which is potentially divine, which is the part of the divine. So this is a healthy relationship with ourselves. Oh, we all will fall short of many things. We will in the series of Anathya Nirodhi, it says that niyama kshama. There are many rules and standards which we may not be able to follow.

We may not be able to fast, we may not be able to do that, we may not be able to do this. And we can always aspire for more. But not being able to do something should not fill us with guilt. Krishna says, not We need to be filled with affection and gratitude that we have the opportunity to serve. That it’s it’s so the mind is so toxic at sometimes, that sometimes you tell somebody to that we should feel grateful for the opportunity for bhakti and just like lust can be a conditioning, this anger can be a conditioning, guilt can also be a conditioning.

I’ve seen I I do a journaling seminar where I tell people, you know, we can try to journal what we are grateful for. So one of the warnings I give is write what you feel grateful for, not what you should feel grateful for. Because, you know, we may theoretically say, oh, you know, millions of people. There are few who get bhakti. And it’s true.

I’m not saying it’s not true. But we may not really feel that fortunate on daily basis. If we go, I have to follow this rule. I have to do this. I have to do that.

So sometimes what happens is, if we try to cultivate gratitude based on not what I feel grateful for, but what I should feel grateful for, then we we start thinking that I should feel grateful for this, but I don’t feel grateful for this and therefore, I feel dreadful about not feeling grateful. And there is guilt at not feeling grateful. So guilt can be like a cancer that can completely corrupt our inner world. Not just corrupt, corrode our inner world. So we have to be very careful.

Yes. Should we feel insecure, or we should not never feel insecure? No. We will discuss this whole topic more tomorrow session about this toxic misconception about guilt and how to address it. But I’ll make one more point here, that our focus focus should not be on how fallen I am.

That should not be our focus. Our focus should be on how glorious Krishna is. And yes, there are expressions in our tradition of even say great soul like Krishna’s Kaviraj Goswami saying that, I am lower than a worm in a stool. I am more sinful than Jagayana Madhai. But that does not that statement does not make them feel discouraged about practicing Bhakti, about glorifying Krishna.

So what we want is to be focused on Krishna. That we our our Prabhu Shlapa did not come to start the International Society for Guilt Consciousness. Isn’t it? He came to start the International Society for Krishna consciousness. So to the extent our feeling, oh, I am impure, I am fallen, inspires us to take shelter of Krishna.

To that extent, it’s okay. Now what does this how do we define this extent? That I’ll talk tomorrow, but the key point is our focus should be not on the self. I am so great, that is one distraction. Another distraction is, I am so wonderful is one distraction, that is ego.

I am so dreadful is another distraction. Because in both cases, we are we are becoming self conscious rather than be Krishna consciousness. Have any of you heard this statement? I am a fallen soul. How many of you heard this statement?

You know? You probably already heard this. It’s one of the most common statement that comes. Now, sometimes what happens is, in this statement, this the fallen becomes so big that the soul becomes forgotten. From I am a fallen soul, it has become I am fallen.

Now we have to remember that this fallen is also a temporary designation. Just like to think that I am a male, I am a female, I am young, I am middle aged, I am elderly. All these are designations associated with something external to the soul. Their designations are associated with the body. Now there can be a signations associated with the mind.

I am an introvert, I am an extrovert, I am I have a Kshatriya nature, I have Brahmana nature. All those are important, but they are external to the soul. We shouldn’t identify too much with them. So the fallen should not become so big that we forget the soul. We are a soul.

We are eternally a soul, eternal part of Krishna, and presently we are in a condition that is fallen. But this is temporary, and by Krishna’s mercy and by our endeavor, this condition will be rectified. So let the focus be on Krishna and remembering Krishna. And we focus on those things that energize us to remember Krishna, not de energize us. So if guilt is energizing us, wonderful.

If guilt is de energizing us, then put that guilt away. We’ll summarize what I discussed today. I talked about the topic was dealing with guilt, understanding when guilt is healthy and unhealthy. So within that, I discussed three points. First, with the context, the context is Yudhishthir’s guilt.

And what is the reason for Yudhishthir’s guilt? There are two reasons. One is that he the cost, the cost is that all his sons had been killed. And often his sons had been killed for his sake. And now his grandson, Solsarab, might also have been killed, somehow have been survived.

And not only that, his brother, he had he had celebrated the killing of his brother, who had the opportunity to kill him and didn’t kill him. So that cost, he felt was too severe, and then apart from the cost, it was what he felt was the morality, the immoral immorality, especially it was killing of Drona. He felt that I lied, I played a terrible role, and everything that is happening to me is a reaction, and I deserve this and worse. So I don’t want to be the king. I don’t deserve to be the king.

Then broadly, we discussed the causes that may come because of guilt. And in terms of causes, we may decide which is healthy. So when is guilt healthy? First is when there are misdeeds. So here guilt can be definitely positive, then if there are mistakes, then yes, we might have guilt, but it should not be too much.

Then when there is misapprehension, when we are seeing things wrongly, when we are holding ourselves responsible for things that were not in our control, at that time, guilt should not be there. And when there is manipulation, when somebody uses our sense of right and wrong, our goodness to try to control us, then that greed is definitely talk guilt is toxic, and it needs to be rejected. We need to keep a distance from people who cause that kind of guilt for us also. And then the last one we discussed was the misconception about guilt. What are the misconception?

That we may think guilt is good, because guilt is equal to humility, or guilt will lead to humility. That will guilt lead to humility? Possibly, but frequently not. So we discussed how ego and humility are not exactly opposite. They can be, but there’s one more dynamic.

There is a feeling of insecurity, where that that can also very easily come with guilt. So when, guilt comes because of insecurity, then that is not humility. That keeps us self centered, self conscious. And our focus is we want to be not self conscious, either in the positive sense of how wonderful I am or in the negative sense of how dreadful I am. Both self consciousness positive and negative, both are unhealthy.

What we want is to be Krishna conscious, and we need to see that is my guilt helping me to become Krishna conscious, or is it obstructing me in my Krishna consciousness? And accordingly, we need to look at ourselves in a way that is healthy. Thank you very much. Let us pray to Krishna. My dear Lord, please guide me so that I can always stay conscious of you and keep coming closer to you.

And my guilt may bring me closer to you and never let my guilt become a weapon of maya by which she uses my guilt to keep me away from you or to go further away from you. Thank you very much. Are there any questions or comments? Yes, please. Maharaj, any comments?

Thank you. Thank you, my Rajas. You have blessings. Yes, sir. It seems like in Kali yuga, there’s it’s justified to say that it could be justified to say that everyone’s sinful and, you know, the Christians say everyone’s sinful.

So is it possible that when they think of Jesus being a forgiving and they could turn it into a positive I mean, like, there’s a lot of I agree with you that the guilt in Christianity seems very toxic, but is there any possibility of examples of Christians that, see Jesus in a very positive, loving way? Oh, yeah. Definitely. So two things. I won’t say that guilt is always toxic, and I won’t say guilt in Christianity is also toxic.

It can be. And and historically, it has been used like that, to make people compliant and to keep. So but it’s not intrinsically like that. That guilt can also what I said, like we can if our guilt inspires us to take shelter of Krishna, and that is what the focus is, to be Krishna conscious, then that is not a bad thing at all. That’s a good thing.

So similarly, their idea is that you desperately need Jesus. And because of that, if people take shelter of Jesus, and not just that that idea that, oh, you know, Jesus died for our sins so that we are free from all sins. No. Because of that. That is largely an idea that comes more from polyanity than Christianity.

Paul was one of the apostles of Jesus who didn’t never met Jesus actually. And he shifted the focus on Christianity from Jesus’ teachings to Jesus dying. And he said that by that you are all freed from sins. Now, of course, there is a lot of debate about this in Christian history, but the point is that if that inspires people to focus on Jesus’ teachings and live more morally and live more devotionally, then that is a good thing. Now, historians of religion also say that, to some extent the influx of Hindu teachers, and they mentioned his Swami Prabhupada, into America and their vision of a God of love rather than a God of judgment actually caused Christianity to soften their image of God also.

So in, many popular Christian movies now or popular Christian novels, one common character, one common trope trope is like a repeated theme that comes is that some young person is invited to a church and they go they say, I don’t want to go to church. I used to go in my childhood and I didn’t like that experience at all. And they say, when they come to a church now, and maybe they are 25, 30, 40, and they come and they say the pastor speaks a message of love, how Jesus forgives and he wants us to forgive those wrongs that have been done to us, our wrongs have been forgiven. And they focus more on how Jesus is a God of or Jesus or Christianity reveals a God of love and acceptance rather than a God of judgement. So that has happened to a large extent.

Now that can go to a complete extreme where, you know, God may accept everyone. This is the point I’m going to speak tomorrow. God accepts everyone. That does not mean He accepts everything. That certainly doesn’t mean He appreciates everything.

There are certainly things which are right and wrong. We will discuss that tomorrow. But yes, that effect has come in Christianity also. So they say, I grew up with a very critical conception of God, but now the conception of God in the church is so loving. So Protestants have adopted that wholeheartedly.

They very rarely, unless except for a few fringe branches of protestantism, God of judgement. Most protestants talk about the God of love only, and Catholics are also totally adopting that. Okay. Thank you. Yes, sir.

Hare Krishna, Prabhu ji. I have a comment and a question. Actually, the comment comes from CS Lewis. CS Lewis famously said, humility is not thinking less of yourself. It’s thinking of yourself less.

Yes. Now the question Yes. It is not about devaluing ourselves. It is about valuing something bigger than ourselves. Oh, I am so terrible.

I am so terrible. Not it’s not about devaluing ourselves. It is about, there is so much more to life than me. And I can be an instrument for something bigger than myself. I can be a part of something bigger than myself.

So yes, humility is at the same point of it’s phrased differently. Sometimes that play of words is good, but it doesn’t really clarify what it means. Not to think less of ourselves, but think ourselves less. What that means is humility is not about devaluing ourselves. It is more about valuing something bigger than ourselves.

Yeah, go ahead. Your question. So in the, six divisions of surrender, the famous verse goes and it ends with and the translation is given as, full self surrender for and karpanya is humility. So my doubt is the same word karpanya appears in the Bhagavad Gita where it is classified as a dosha, karpanya dosha. So can you explain what is the karpanya in Gita and what is the karpanya in this specific words?

Yes. See, words can have many different meanings. And, it’s a good question. Karpanya in the Bhagavad Gita so broadly, I’ll take about two distinct words. One is feeling helpless.

That kar panya is the helplessness that makes us feel the need for God. Sometimes devotees say we should feel helpless and hopeless. I have some reservations about that. We can feel helpless, but we should never feel hopeless. Helpless that I cannot do anything.

Draupadi was helpless, but she never became hopeless. Sometimes we can use that word as a rhyme to say that we should depend on Krishna, that I have no hope in myself. I have hope in Krishna. But then you even to take shelter of Krishna, we need to have some hope in ourselves. That I am worthy enough to take shelter of Krishna.

So, now the thing is that, specifically for us, that in the context of the six limbs of surrender is, it is what inspires surrender. Now when Arjuna is saying one says Arjuna is borrowing the language of Krishna. The borrowing of borrowing the language of Krishna is 2.23. Krishna has said that, So initially, Arjuna refuses. No.

He says, No. I am not being I am not being cowardly. I am not being petty minded. I am not being I am not being weak. I am actually being thoughtful.

It’s not easy to fight. How can I fight against my elders? But then eventually he says that, whatever it is, I am confused. My whole conception of life has been completely shaken. My very nature is being afflicted by weakness.

So I think the the word is the same, but the context is very different. In my journey from learning more about Christianity and then into my body and personalism, and like, unlearning a lot of the things that I thought about my thoughts and my feelings, and becoming isolated almost from my heart, and thinking that it doesn’t matter. That it’s just things that are arising. You spoke on things that we feel as though we should be grateful for, but yet are not in the moment. And one thing that resonated with me about that was the things that I’ve given up in the four principles that, you know, now that the parmama is working to purify my heart, that, you know, it’s like a burning sensation that I’m not familiar with, because I’ve been so disconnected with my heart space, and it’s very uncomfortable and unfamiliar for me.

And being in this unfamiliar territory, being in a space of helplessness and surrender to that, although I’m not comfortable with where I’m going, and I’m unsure of where I’m going and how it’s going to work out, just trusting that it’s going in that direction anyway. Yeah. Thanks for sharing your journey. I’d say two distinct points here that, one of the ways we may deal with, negative emotions is to just create a distance from the whole world of emotions. Like some people, if they’re betrayed, then they may just say that, you know, I don’t want to connect with anyone at all.

And that may keep our heart safe, but it’ll make our heart cold. And that’s not what we want. So now with respect to connecting with our heart space, I just start where we can. One of the meanings of this phrase, Somehow or the other, fix your mind on Krishna. That somehow or the other means start from where we can right now.

So is there something in the current, ambit of experience for us where we feel some softness of heart? Where we feel some emotion connect with something beyond ourselves in terms of something that is positive, something that is uplifting. If you see somebody in pain, and you feel, I should I should help that person in pain. Sometimes in Kirtan, sometimes we look at the details, we feel some special connection. We hear some stories, some pastimes.

So wherever we have that emotional connect, cherish that and try to see, you know, how that can be increased. Maybe look for similar themes, look for similar stories, look for similar experiences. And gradually, the the you could see the flower of the heart that has shrunk, It has shrunk not because it has become old and decayed, it has shrunk out of defensiveness that that flower will start blossoming. In fact, one of the metaphors that is used for the growth of Krishna consciousness is the blossoming of the flower of our heart. That will happen.

Start with wherever we can right now. And as far as what we should feel grateful for, because at an intellectual level we can have a list. It’s good to have that list. But at the same time, at a personal level, we may not feel grateful at that time for that thing. So we can look at what do we feel grateful for at that particular time.

If I before I came to America, I had a severe throat issue for almost seven, eight weeks, I was having cough constantly. Almost every class, I was coughing. So now now that cough is gone, I am grateful. But there are sometimes when I speak for more than one hour, one and a half hours, I feel my throat losing energy. Now at that time, I may not feel grateful.

At least I’ve got this much. My my throat has not come back to normal capacity. I am not feeling grateful at that time. You can say, look at people who are worse than you and feel grateful for that. But sometimes it doesn’t work.

We would like to be where we are. Okay. If I don’t feel grateful, don’t push yourself too much. Okay. What do I feel grateful for?

I feel grateful that at least I could come on this tour. I feel grateful that, you know, I had some good experiences, interactions, I could do some service. So to be that approach somehow or the other can also be applied to these positive emotions. Okay. Wherever I feel grateful for, let me start with that.

And generally, emotions see, with respect this is a big topic and I’ll talk about this tomorrow a little more. We only talk about with respect to the mind, we have to control the mind. And that is true, but it is desires that need to be controlled. Emotions can’t always be controlled. Sometimes they need to be comforted.

If somebody is feeling loss or pain or grief, at that time, you know, loss, pain, grief are not simply to be controlled and crushed. We need to be comforted at that time. So we cannot have like a one one size petal approach. So control is not the only way to deal with what has happening in the mind. We’ll talk about it tomorrow.

Okay? Thank you very much. I think we are going in lower time. You wanna take one more question? Do you tell me what?

Whoever is in charge? Yes, Prabhu. Last question. Radhakrishnanapur, do you have any comment? Just like saying, Vaishtrauma aaprat can be need not be done by associating with the Vaishnavas.

So we keep away from Vaishnavas, then we will not do Vaishnava Aparad. So in this world in this world, so many advertisement, so many influence comes. How to select the right thing? Okay. So we cannot avoid everything in the world.

So someone says somebody says that, okay, I don’t want to offend devotees, so I won’t associate with devotees only. Well, we may not offend devotees, but we’ll do so many other things which will be self destructive. So I would say the boundaries come at three levels. The boundaries is first what we see. Now sometimes we can just avoid certain things.

If I know I’m going on this road every day and there’s a holding which is quite obscene over here. So we can put some boundaries. So boundaries can be on what we see. Then boundaries can also on what we dwell, what we remember, what we replay in our mind. We have seen something, but we try to avoid replaying those things.

And then, certainly, what we enact. Just because I saw something, because something is going on in my mind, then that does not mean that I have to act on it. So this is 2.58, that is set boundaries so that we don’t see only. Then what we replay in our mind. So there are many places where Krishna says that we shouldn’t be contemplating the sense objects.

So for example, 3.6 he says that that if you are dwelling on the sense objects, that’s not a good thing. And then he says sometimes our mind may be agitated, but we don’t act out on that agitation. In 1842, he says, shamo dhamastapa shoucham. So shama is peacefulness of the mind. Dhamma is sense control.

That means sometimes it’s best we can avoid the mind getting agitated itself. But even if the mind gets agitated, we don’t act it out. B, may get agitated internally, but we don’t act it out. That itself this is also there in 3.41. So what happens is, ideally speaking, let’s try to avoid perception, but we can’t.

So if you can’t avoid perception, avoid action or contemplation. If you can’t avoid contemplation also, then at least don’t let it not go to the level of indulgence. And gradually, whatever is there, we are also perceiving Krishna, we are also remembering Krishna. Whatever we have seen in the past will also get purified. K.

Yes, please. History is his story. Correct. Yes. How many hiss we have to follow.

True. Nicely put. Yes. So whatever has happened in our past life also, in our past, you know, that we may say, oh, this is terrible. I have a bad history.

But even through whatever bad has happened in our life, Krishna is working. Krishna is planning, and Krishna can bring something good even out of the bad. Thank you so much. So I have written a few books, so So especially what I talked about guilt, not having a guilt centered relationship with Krishna, but more of a prayer centered relationship, a devotion, affection centered relationship. This is a book of prayers inspired by the Bhagavad Gita.

So there’s a poetic rendition of key verses from the Bhagavad Gita, and there’s a beautiful video feature of Krishna, and then there’s a prayer inspired by a particular verse. So more than my wrongs is your capacity to free me from those wrongs. So Krishna, this is in April in the Gita. Even if your sins are dark and vast, more than all who sinned in the past, the boat of wisdom when you firmly ascend, the ocean of illusion you will surely transcend. So if you would like to, have this book, it’s available.

And there’s another book, Gita for the CEO, which talks about leadership principles based on the Bhagavad Gita. So like simple diagrams which illustrate the concepts of the Gita are here, and it’s in the form of conversation between two people. One corporate leader who knows the Gita, another who wants to know the Gita. Very accessible way of sharing Gita wisdom, not only for our own application, but also with those who may not yet be ready to read the spiritual wisdom of the Gita. Thank you very much.

Hare Krishna.

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