Remember Lord Krishna in all actions

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Hare Krishna,

The messengers of Lord Krishna have underscored the difficulty of obtaining human birth. It is only after several births in the lower orders of creation that a transmigrating soul, because of the merit it acquires during this process, gets the rare privilege of being born as a human being in the world. Twice blessed is one who has all his faculties intact and fortunate to be born in a pious family.

Among the several classes of living beings it is the human being who is best equipped to progress spiritually and be liberated from the excruciating trauma of being born again and again. This is the reason why Saints emphasise the privilege of human birth so that this opportunity is not frittered away in just material pursuits. All our actions must be attuned to this goal because spiritual life is not divorced from worldly life.

Man is essentially spiritual in nature but he forgets this because of the adjuncts that make his personality like the body and the mind. This mistaken identification arises because of illusion (Maya) and it does not stop with this. The attributes of the physical body, mind and intellect are transferred to the Self, which is pure consciousness, blissful and eternal in nature, due to ignorance and hence the limitations of the psycho-physical personality are imposed on the Self.

Likewise the ego becomes strong in an individual when he starts identifying himself with his worldly standing and achievements. When a person is wealthy, for instance, the feeling of pride that arises due to the status he commands in society distances him from his true Self.

How does a spiritual aspirant overcome this problem? Saints used to emphasise the importance of remembering Lord Krishna and chanting His names constantly. This practice does not allow materialistic thoughts to disturb the mind and helps the aspirant to remember that he belongs to Krishna. The saints say that the thumb rule to ascertain whether one is progressing spiritually is to check whether the action one is engaged in helps him to remember Krishna ; that which distances him from Krishna must be shunned.

The individual's identification with the body-mind-intellect personality continued till the dawn of knowledge of the Self. When the mind attains union with the Self this mistaken notion ceases. The person who has experienced this state of union (Samadhi) emerges as a Self- realised one for whom there is no more illusion about his nature. But this process of transforming the ego through knowledge is difficult.

The easy way out is to sublimate the limited ego into good ``I'' by affirming oneself as a servant of Lord Krishna (Dasa). However much the mind meditates on Lord Krishna, the ego will surface as soon as the awareness of the body arises. So the constant thought that one is Krishna's servant will not cause any harm as the ego will get obliterated. A devotee raised the doubt to a Saint whether the thought that one was Krishna's servant would fuel the ego, to which the saint categorically stated that this would not cause any obstacles and, in fact, would lead to envisioning Krishna by enhancing devotion.

The awareness that one lives only to serve Lord Krishna must become constant in a spiritual aspirant. Such an attitude to life will enable him to keep the distractions of the material world at bay and progress towards the goal of liberation .

Man must express his gratitude to his Creator for this rare favour. This feeling of indebtedness to Lord Krishna is expressed through devotion to Him. If one fails to be devoted to Krishna then human life loses its meaning and direction. The human situation can be likened to that of a person who desired for luscious mango and made all efforts to grow a tree to obtain the fruit. With great care he prepared the soil and watered it but forgot to plant the seed.

How then can he expect a mango tree to grow in his garden? Likewise, if man forgets to express his gratitude to Krishna through devotion for all that he enjoys he will not reap the fruit of his birth - liberation from rebirths. In this age devotion to the image form of Lord Krishna in temples is considered the best method to practise.

Lord Srinivasa at Tirumala was adored by devotees as the continuation of the Lord's glory in His Krishna incarnation in this Kali era. The Puranic tradition makes this connection through an incident which happened at Prabhasa during the Lord's manifestation as Krishna. Yashoda and Nandagopa, Krishna's foster parents, happened to meet Him in Prabhasa when He was living in Dwaraka with His wives, when Yashoda felt that she who had been blessed with the vision of even His cosmic form had not had the privilege of witnessing

His marriage.

It was to fulfil this desire that she was born again as Vakulamalika to take care of the Lord and see Him wedded to Padmavati during His advent as Venkateshwara. It was at the instance of Sage Narada that Lord Vishnu who resided in the Venkatadri hill during the three earlier eras and left for His transcendental abode returned to this hill shrine to bless humanity in this age.

Please Chant :Hare Krishna Hare Krishna Krishna Krishna Hare HareHare Rama Hare Rama Rama Rama Hare HareAnd Be Happy.

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