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Karma, your activities, should be dovetailed in the matter of
satisfying the Supreme Lord. That is the way of devotional service.
But how karma can be engaged, that is prescribed in this verse, that
amayo yas ca bhutanam jayate yena suvrata.

Suppose you have taken too much milk and you become diseased,
dysentery, could not digest; have taken too much sweet rice or rabri,
so there is dysentery. The same milk preparation which has caused your
mucus, disease, it can be cured by the same milk preparation,
cikitsitam, but it should be medically treated. The same milk. The
milk is the cause of your dysentery, but the same milk, when it is
medically treated, can cure it. This is the secret. How? Rabri, you
take too much and there is dysentery. And cikitsitam, the same milk
converted into yogurt, add little black pepper, little salt and lime,
it will cure. The origin is the milk. So one way you become diseased
and the other way you become cured, but the preparation is the same --
milk.

Similarly, our activities in this material world with these material
elements, when we violate the laws, we become entangled. But the same
material activities, when it is turned into Krsna prasadam, dovetailed
with Krsna for hearing and chanting Hare Krsna maha-mantra, what we
are doing? We are also doing the same thing. Here is the temple. What
is this temple? The same ingredients, the same cement, same brick,
same stone, same worker, same plan as the skyscraper. But what is the
difference? Because it is cikitsitam, it is for Krsna. You spoil your
energy by the same purchase of cement, bricks, and other things for
sense gratification -- a theater hall, a dancing hall. The same energy
spent for dancing for Krsna, the same hall, you become liberated. By
one dancing hall you go to hell, and by another dancing hall you
become liberated. This is the secret.

So people have got the tendency for sense gratification. That is the
material disease. So instead of satisfying your senses, try to satisfy
the senses of Krsna. Then you become liberated. This is called
cikitsitam. There is sense gratification. Here when you chant and
dance, this is not your sense gratification; this is Krsna's sense
gratification: "Oh, these devotees, they are glorifying Me, they are
dancing. Blessed they are." Immediately you draw attention of Krsna,
because it is bhakti.

Simply by so-called activities you will be entangled in the law of
karma. And according to your karma, you will get a different type of
body and you will live for some time, again you will die, again you
will get body, again you will... And you do not know what kind of body
you are going to get. This is the entanglement. Yajnarthat karmano
'nyatra loko 'yam karma-bandhanah [Bg. 3.9]. So if we want to be free
from the entanglement of this karma, then we must work for Krsna.
Krsna's another name is Yajna, Yajnabhuja, Visnu. Yajnarthat karmanah.
This is the cikitsitam. The material activities you are becoming
entangled, and you are becoming more and more diseased. So you should
be treated. How? The same thing. Milk is... Rabri is also milk
preparation and dahi is also milk preparation. So you are becoming
diseased by this process. Now you take this process, you will be
cured. Then you will be happy.

Therefore it is said, tad eva hy amayam dravyam na punati cikitsitam.
Cikitsitam. We should handle everything material properly treated,
properly treated. As Caitanya Mahaprabhu has given us lesson that you
are jivera svarupa haya nitya-krsna-dasa [Cc. Madhya 20.108-109].
Every living entity is eternally the servant of Krsna. So instead of
becoming servant of your senses, just try to become the servant of
Krsna, then your life will be successful.


Srila Prabhupada lecture on Srimad-Bhagavatam 1.5.33
Vrndavana, August 14, 1974