Books gave me everything

[Guruvani]

In opposition to the theory that one must have a living guru to get inspiration to pursue Krishna consciousness and love of Krishna, I would just like to describe my own experience and how the books and tapes of Prabhupada were all I needed to give up everything and join the movement.

 

My first experience of Eastern religion/yoga etc. came just a few weeks before I got out of the Navy in 1975. I was a jet engine Mechanic at the Naval Air Station, Oceana, Virginia. I was turning in some paperwork on a job we had just done and I saw a book on the desk of the clerk in the AIMD office. The book was "Autobiography of a Yogi" by Yogananda. As I put down the paperwork, the clerk noticed that I was looking at the book. He asked me if I knew anything about Yoga and I told him that I didn't know anything about yoga. He immediatly asked me if I would be willing to learn about yoga from him because he was a disciple of Swami Vishnudevananda and he was a yoga teacher in that line. I told that that I would be willing to learn about it from him. He asked me if he could come to my house and give me some yoga lessons and I agreed.

He came to my house and brought some books about yoga and vegetarianism. Then he took me to the book store and showed me the Metaphysical book section. I bought some books. It only took that one meeting with him to send me into an intense study of Eastern religion, yoga, meditation etc.

I was studying every yoga book I could find and also reading about Edgar Cayce, Nostradamus etc. etc.

At that point I had never heard of Hare Krishna or anything about Prabhupada or the Krishna consciousness movement.

I got out of the Navy in January of 1975 and went back to my home town to stay with my parents and figure out what I was going to do next.

Shortly after going back to my hometown in Indiana, I hooked up with some old friends and started teaching my new found yoga lifestyle to them.

One day I went the home of a friend to have a yoga class with a couple of my best friends. In the course of that evening, one of my friends told me that earlier that day he had got a book at the mall from some guy who walked up to him and asked for a donation for the book. He went and got the book and showed it to me. It was so beautiful. I was immediatly attracted to the picture of Radha-Krishna on the front and Prabhupada on the back. It was the small paperback edition of "Nectar of Devotion" that was being distributed back then.

I was browsing through the book but it all appeared so deep and new to me. Then my frined opened it up to a page where the Maha-mantra was underlined and he said that the guy who sold him the book said that you were supposed to chant this mantra. I looked at the mantra and said "Hair Kirzna Hair Kirzna", he said no that is not the way to say it. He then said "Harray Krishna Harray Krishna" and that was the first time I had ever heard the mantra. My friend asked me if I knew what the book was about and I said "no, but I am going to spend the rest of my life trying to understand this book".

I asked my friend if he would sell me the book and said that he wanted to keep it.

The next day I started going to book stores all over Indianapolis to try and find that book but I couldn't find it in the book stores. A few days later I went to a hippy-style record shop in Broadripple Village (Karma Records) near Purdue University and there is where I finally found the book. It was the older edition - the big white paperback from earlier printings. I also found some of the small books like "Perfection of Yoga" etc. and a couple of the Bhagavatam volumes.

I went home and secluded myself for several weeks and read all of these books several times each. My whole perception of life changed. The world of Krishna consciousness opened up to me. After that I found an edition of the Macmillon gita in a book store. I went into a few more weeks of seclusion and read it through a couple of times. I was completely convinced about Krishna consciousness and none of the other yoga books meant anything to me any more. I was exclusively converted to bhakti-yoga over all other yogas.

Soon, I found some BTGs at the record store. I ordered some of Prabhupada lectures and the Yoga system series. I listened to them all and was immersed in the pusuit of Krishna consciuosness.

I had never been to a temple in my life, never tasted prasadam, never seen a devotee, but through Prabhupada's books and tapes alone I had decided to commit my whole life and give up everything to go join the temple in L.A. a few weeks later.

After arriving at the temple I was the first devotee to enter Danavir prabhu's bhakta program and trained very strictly by him.

I remember how I was a little aggravated that sometimes new devotees who had come to the temple were trying to preach to me even though all they had ever read was one little book. I knew a lot more about the philosophy than them but because they had joined a few days before me they thought they knew more.

That was my little disappointment was that after joining the temple I found that I was only hearing the same things that I had already learned in Prabhupada's books. I didn't feel that anybody could really tell me anything I hadn't already learned on my own from reading Prabhupada's books.

I did learn some things about the practical habits of devotees and temple living and I did love being at the temple, though I have always been one whose real base is in Prabhupada's books and tapes and not the so-called living sadhu nonsense that you hear so much about today. I didn't need any so-called sadhu to bring me to Prabhupada or explain his books to me. I could read them for myself and understand it quite easily.

For me, the books have always been a source of the purest nectar and deepest connection to Prabhupada and I wouldn't trade Prabhupada's books for all the so-called living sadhus on the planet.