The highest prayer is the prayer to become a selfless instrument in God’s hands. As Saint Francis prayed, “Lord, make me an instrument of Your peace.” He prayed not to receive, but to give; to be freed of all selfishness and to be filled with selflessness. He prayed to be the servant. He prayed to see that every living being is his master in the sense, “Let me be the humble servant to uplift, to help and to care for all my brothers and sisters in this world.”
If you have boils on your body due
Hare Krsna
Please accept my humble obeisance. All glories to Srila Prabhupada
This is Maya. "Come on, come on, enjoy me." As soon as you enjoy, you become entrapped. Just like they throw the tackle and invite the fish. As soon as — it eats! Finished. The fish is losing his life by eating, by tongue. The deer by hearing; the hunter plays very nice flute and all of them assemble to hear. Hunter keeps the trap and it loses life. The elephant is caught by sexual attraction. A she-elephant is trained,
Hare Krishna.
28th April, 2014, Gurgaon.
For most of us, as we come into Krishna consciousness, the journey begins and we progress, at our own pace. A few days back HG Shyam Sundar Prabhu shared a quote by HH Radhanath. Maharaj said that we can see our progress in Krishna consciousness not by seeing last few years or months but by just seeing whether I have progressed in last 1 hour or half an hour, we can know how much we are progressing in Krishna consciousness.
Today morning when I looked ba
Hare Krsna
Please accept my humble obeisance. All glories to Srila Prabhupada
Nan-in, a Japanese master received a university professor who came to inquire about the Absolute Truth.
Nan-in served tea. He poured his visitor's cup full, and then kept on pouring.
The professor watched the overflow until he no longer could restrain himself. "It is overfull. No more will go in!"
"Like this cup," Nan-in said, "you are full of your own opinions and speculations. How can I show you the Absolute
Hare Krsna
Please accept my humble obeisance. All glories to Srila Prabhupada
One reason Hitler lost World War II was that he did not fully understand the situation. Bearers of bad news were punished. Soon no one dared tell him the truth. Not knowing the truth, he could not act appropriately.
Many of us are individually guilty of the same error. We do not like to admit to ourselves our mistakes, errors, shortcomings, or ever admit we have been in the wrong. And because we will not see the truth,
On recent travels around the country I met a lady who expressed frustration in her attempts to find God. She told me her story: two years of spiritual travels, countless nights of prayer, careful scriptural exploration and persistent introspection, but still no sign! “Will I ever find Him?” she asked. “I’m beginning to question whether He even exists.” What to speak of the ‘searchers,’ even the faithful often doubt that their Supreme friend is actually alive and active. A seeming lack of recipr
Last week, as we floated along the turquoise blue of the Caribbean sea, I was reminded of the amazing quality of water. How, for instance, a large ship can sit atop it and ply along as light as a feather, how many creatures can swim within the water while some things totally sink to the bottom. How the water itself can be calm (thankfully during my trip) or wild and furious like a raging monster.
We are water creatures in many ways – 65% of our body weight is water, the earth is comprised main
From Back to Godhead
A look at the causes and cures for faultfinding, a major obstacle to spiritual progress.
CONDUCTING A SUMMER therapy group with middle-school boys is always a challenge. Donte calls Michael a retard, and Michael calls Donte’s mother a crackhead. I intervene, sitting the boys down to cool off. This age group (11-14) is notorious for saying and doing things to hurt each other. I reflect on my own years in junior high school and recall some painful interactions with peers. Whi
When I stand in front of the individual altars at our Temple I have different experiences. In front of Rama I feel courage, in front of Krishna I feel love, and in front of Lord Caitanya I feel a strong sense of acceptance.
The gift of Lord Caitanya is the gift of acceptance. Lord Caitanya is Krishna himself in the guise of a devotee. He is not only teaching us how to love Krishna; He’s also wishing to experience that love Himself. In the Gita, Krishna asks us to surrender and trust Him before
Krishna: if you win the war you can become happy with your kingdom
Arjuna: I can't be happy even if I win a kingdom with prosperity and sovereignty like Demi-gods of heaven. All I want is only transcendental knowledge.
No one can get complete satisfaction by material comforts only, We see in the western countries where they have all material comforts to the fullest extent possible but still they have no satisfaction at heart. Why? because we are not these bodies but spirit souls. Arjuna had
INTRODUCTION
Hare Krishna PAM HO,
As the title suggests "cushion can be cleaned and maintained from outside but only a vacuum cleaner can remove the dirt from inside" its directly refers to a devotee's heart.
A heart of a devotee is like a soft cushion on which krishna as a parmatma resides, through which he instruct what is to be done at a certain situation and what not to be done, and this is done only when the individual has the knowledge of the soul and parmatma.
A non devotee doesn't know wheth
By Madhava Smullen
Three Rathayatra festivals in Trinidad – one in the capital Port of Spain on April 20th, and two following soon after in the villages of Dede and Chaguanas – are bringing devotees all over the island together in service to Lord Jagannath.
Trinidad’s first ever Rathayatra was celebrated in Chaguanas in 1991 with a flatbed truck used as the chariot. In 1994, devotees put on the first Rathayatra in Port of Spain, building a float onto a truck chassis. But it wasn’t until 2006 th
For the first time, by the presence of all prominent ISKCON Leaders of Bangladesh, “Servant Leaders Applied Training and Education (SLATE)” camp are successfully completed this week.
The whole camp was conducted by H.G. Radheshyam Das, Youth revolutioner, and president of ISKCON Pune, India. All the youth leaders of Bangladesh, especially general secretory of ISKCON Bangladesh, H.G.Charuchandra Das Brahmacari, joint secretory of ISKCON Bangladesh, H.G.Jagatguru Gouranga Das Brahmacari, ISKCON C
From Back to Godhead
By Syamananda Dasa
There are at least 300 books available at your online bookseller dealing with anger. Many of them just contain pop-culture variety of self-help advice on the dangers of uncontrolled anger. Anger is just one letter short of danger as these experts remind us. Lord Krishna, in the very beginning of the Gita encourages Arjuna to control anger and praises someone who has successfully done it as “a sage of steady mind.” It is quite natural to see many people to
Srila Prabhupada described Srimad Bhagavatam as the encyclopedia of spiritual life and Caitanya Mahaprabhu called it the amala purana (spotless Purana).
We all know the famous Gita Mahatamaya verse :
sarvopanishado gavo, dogdha gopala-nandanah
partho vatsah su-dhir bhokta, dugdham gitamritam mahat
All the Upanisads are like a cow, and the milker of the cow is Lord Shri Krishna, the son of Nanda. Arjuna is the calf, the beautiful nectar of the Gita is the milk, and the fortunate devotees of fine
We should understand that we are always accepted by Krsna through the prayer of our spiritual master. Therefore, we continue to remain indebted to our spiritual master. How often emails are exchanged between the Guru and the disciple does not define the relationship. We are living in a crazy world where the communication is bizarre – never have people tried to communicate through telecommunications as much as now – it is just insane! Sometimes I am asked, “Why did you not answer my email?” I co
By Meena Chand
The Bhakti-sastri and the Bhakti-vaibhava courses are a systematic study of Srila Prabhupada's books. Srila Prabhupada wanted ISKCON devotees to deeply study his books, so that they could become better preachers and teachers, and, very importantly, achieve a clear understanding and application of the beautiful science of devotional service.
This year the Vrindavan Institute for Higher Education (VIHE) has scheduled its English Bhakti-sastri course for the period starting July 5
By Radha Sakhi Dasi
On the eve of Saturday, the 14th of April 2018, the majestic city of Kanpur witnessed a Mega Youth Program ‘Xpression’ in ISKCON Kanpur under the supervision of Devaki Nandan Das (ISKCON, Zonal secretary). This yearly phenomenon has gained the love and support from the youth of the universities in the vicinity. ISKCON Kanpur has been enlisted under the ‘De-addiction and Value Empowerment Project’ initiated by the Indian Government, hence this event provided the perfect pla
Our first Ratha Yatra in Jaipur was a humble attempt. The devotees had just recently opened a small little centre. It was not much but they still wanted to have Ratha Yatra so we decided to keep it simple.
They had one chariot. A life member made a little stage and in India, it is quite common that the stage is built to the height of the chariot. When the chariot stops people go to the stage and make offerings to the deity. So they had one such stage at the end of the procession.
But as the par
