CONCENTRATE ON THE ETERNAL!

We have 347 participants today. I will have to keep my Japa talk short today as I have to give Bhagavatam class again this morning to the Russian devotees. Some devotees were here with us in Mayapur for the festival and now they are back in their respective towns. I can see them on screen now. I was happy to see some Gurukul boys chanting seriously on this conference. Some Parikrama devotees are also chanting with us. I don’t know how are they managing, but some are addicted to this conference and so don’t want to miss chanting with us. I was thinking , these early morning hours is a time for chanting, at least for the devotees in India. They should be chanting with us. This is the most ideal time for chanting and chanting is Yuga dharma. We should be beginning our day with spiritual activities.

Each one of you should get more devotees to chant. They say , ‘Each one teach one’. So each one of you can teach another devotee. Here you just teach them how to join the conference. Try to reach out to neighbours, friends, colleagues, god brothers , god sisters , devotee friends. We should work on doubling our numbers. Then we will be more happy. In a few days we will be celebrating 100th day of our conference. From the 100th day to the 200th day we should double our numbers. That’s some homework for all the participants.

Sril Prabhupada would always remember those who were not present. He would come from overseas and give his arrival talk. While talking to all assembled devotees he used to inquire,” Where is Giriraj?” He would always remember, inquire and recall the absent disciples. Like that I am also wondering. We have over 100 disciples in Vrindavan and only three are chanting on the conference. And also this conference is not just for my disciples, but for everyone. There is so much scope for expansion, yet only a handful are chanting with us.

So keep chanting. Of course in our heart is the Lord. I was thinking while chanting, do not get influenced by the surroundings and the world around you, the forms around you, smells around you. That is all temporary and could be the cause of misery also. By contemplation upon objects of senses, all worldly objects, you become engulfed. They are young now , they will be old tomorrow. It’s an ever-changing world. So why focus on something that is ever changing and also cause of suffering. Why not focus on eternality and that’s the Lord in our heart and that Lord is everywhere. This holy name is the Lord. So why not focus, concentrate upon something that is eternal and the source of pleasure? We should convince ourselves like that. With the use of intelligence we should discriminate. neti !, neti ! , neti ! not this, not this! This is not what I am looking for . This is not good for me. Like King Parikshit, who was also doing Pariksha or examining everyone who was around him. Oh! This is not the Person I had seen while I was in my mother’s womb. Some other person entered there. I saw Him. But that is not Him! Not Him! He was doing this examination. That’s why his name became Parikshit. So we should be also following in the footsteps of Parikshit Maharaja and not get bewildered by things around us, the world of dvandva – duality. We get bewildered and lose our intelligence, but the Lord will give us intelligence. Our Guru Maharaja gave us intelligence. Our acarya’s could give us this intelligence, the right thinking so that we could focus on the right things and that is Krsna! That is the name of Krsna, form of Krsna.

We have been saying that the chanting of Hare Krishna is the intelligent persons job. sumedhasa – Intelligent persons will worship the Lord by performance of sankirtana yajna. Nama yajna. So be intelligent, be sharp and sharpen your intelligence. Tikshna Buddhi. So intelligence has to be in action while chanting. We have to control and govern the mind and all the thoughts arising in the mind. The function of intelligence is to discriminate all the thoughts arising in mind. Intelligence could process, all the thoughts arising in the mind. Intelligence could sort them out and decide that this thought should get out , this thought is useless! This is a right thought, this is a right thing. So like that we have to continue our mantra meditation. By practice we try to attend perfection, which is love of Godhead Or love for the name, love for the form, love for the pastimes and like that – love for the dham, love for devotees also, Krsna’s devotees. we love and we serve those who are devotees of Krsna.

All right! That makes sense. That was some food for thought for the day. I will stop here. You could think and further contemplate on what we just said. If you did forget, or have not heard it or grasped it , or not heard properly, then go back to our transcriptions. This Japa talk is being transcribed in Russian, Hindi and in English. So go back to those and try to understand it.

HARE KRISHNA!