Bhakti-devī dāsī: Can we decide what we want to be in our next life?

Prabhupāda: Yes, you can decide. Just like we have decided next life we are going to Kṛṣṇa. This is our decision: back to home, back to Godhead. Just like you become educated, after decision that you are going to be engineer, you are going to be medical practitioner, and in that objective you prepare yourself, educate yourself. Similarly, you can decide what you are going to do next life. If you don't decide, then material nature will decide. Just like a boy who is not nicely educated, without any future objective, the government will decide. If he's a criminal, then government will decide, "Go to jail," and if he's nicely educated, the government will decide, "You take this job." So everything is like that. We have got our future life, and if we don't prepare what is that future life, then we are like animals. The animals, they do not know.

(Room conversation-------New York).

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Can you explain, Prabhupāda, once again what action in action and inaction in action?

Prabhupāda: Action, just like you are active. You are working, you all Kṛṣṇa conscious devotees, you are also working. You are not sitting idly, but it is inaction. Inaction in this sense that it is not producing any reaction. It has no reaction. But others, those who are not acting in Kṛṣṇa consciousness, they are also busy but they are producing their reaction. So things which are not producing reaction, that is inaction. One who can see that "I am acting in this way, there is no reaction," that is inaction. And one who sees that "I am doing this but there is reaction," that is action. So it requires little intelligence to see how it is action or inaction. Therefore it is said that one who can see action in inaction and inaction in action, he is intelligent.

(Lecture------Los Angeles).

Puṣṭa Kṛṣṇa: Do most human beings fall down into the animal species?

Prabhupāda: Not necessarily. He can become a stool worm. (laughter)

Rāmeśvara: Śrīla Prabhupāda, what is the value for the living entity to automatically pass through all these different species? Does he get any knowledge?

Prabhupāda: To, to finish his life of imprisonment.

Rāmeśvara: How is it benefiting him?

Prabhupāda: He's corrected. Benefit is he's corrected. After undergoing so many species of life, he is corrected and again he is brought to the human form of life, civilized form of life. Let him make his choice. If he again makes his choice, go down to become a stool worm. Go! That is nature's.... Prakṛteḥ kriyamāṇāni guṇaiḥ karmāṇi-guṇa, according to qualities he has taken. Prakṛteḥ kriyamāṇāni guṇaiḥ karmāṇi sarvaśaḥ ahaṅkāra-vimūḍhātmā: (B.G.3:27) the rascal, being proud, "Now I have got this life, civilized life. I can do whatever I like to. Ah, there is no God." Then God comes as death and puts you again to become a worm in stool. That's all.

(Morning walk-------Los Angeles).

Hṛdayānanda: (translating) Do we have to liberate ourselves from karma in order to achieve Kṛṣṇa?

Prabhupāda: Yes. The karma is the binding. So long our mind is karma conscious, then we have to take another body. Therefore bhakti is defined, anyābhilāṣitā-śūnyaṁ jñāna-karmādy-anāvṛtam (Bhakti-rasāmṛta-sindhu 1.1.11). Karma. People are very much enthusiastic to be engaged in karma, fruitive activities, and some of them are very eager to speculative knowledge. That is called jñāna. Therefore bhakti is jñāna-karmādy-anāvṛtam (CC.2:19:167). It must be uncovered by the speculative knowledge and fruitive activities. By karma, you are bound up to accept birth and death; by jñāna, you can be liberated for the time being, but you again fall down; but by bhakti, you are firmly fixed up in your spiritual platform.

(Lecture-------Mexico City).