Before I came to Krishna consciousness my life was completely impure. I was confused and indecisive about spiritual life and couldn’t help myself. But after I read that book, I lost my taste for materialistic activities. And now I understand that I was being cheated by maya, illusion.
Last night you had some dream, but now it has no value. It is gone. And again, tonight when you sleep, you’ll forget all these things and dream. You won’t remember, when you are dreaming tonight, “I’ve got my house; I’ve got my wife.” You’ll forget it all. So all of this is a dream.
So the first thing is that one should be searching after a spiritual master, just as when you search after some school, you must have at least some preliminary knowledge of what a school is.
Last year the printing total surpassed the previous year’s total by thirty percent, and BBT books appeared for the first time in Danish, Greek, and Kannada (a South Indian dialect).
When we go chanting Hare Krishna outdoors, under the blue sky, with drums and cymbals through the streets, who can measure the essence of that?
Swamiji says You always wear A peacock feather In Thy Hair And that Thy Feet And colored red And leave a lotus Where’er You tread
When we were chanting Hare Krishna My pleasure was so great I was afraid lest I be swept to heaven and given a chariot ride down the length of the rainbow.
Early one evening, I answered the phone. “Hello, Mom? I just want to tell you I’m at the Krsna temple in Potomac, Maryland. I live here now.”
The dingy loft, its rafters unpainted, was more like an old warehouse than a temple. The members of his audience, most of them musicians, had come to meditate on the mystical sounds of the Swami’s kirtana, his chanting.
The word karma literally means “action,” yet it also carries the import of “fate” or “destiny.” This is entirely reasonable, for it is our actions that determine our fate.
Yes. For meat-eaters, that is what the Vedic culture recommends: “Eat dogs.” As in Korea they are eating dogs, so you also can eat dogs. But don’t eat cows until after they have died a natural death.
Sivananda had not been in the temple more than a year when Srila Prabhupada came to Montreal. After a short meeting, Srila Prabhupada requested Sivananda to go to Europe to try to open a center there.
A young cowherd boy appeared before Madhavendra Puri and offered him a pot of milk. That boy was none other than Krishna, the Supreme Personality of Godhead.
Most people think they have no need for a spiritual master. In a sense, they are right. People interested only in an animal-like existence do not need a spiritual master. A spiritual master is required for a person who is inquisitive about transcendental knowledge.
First, set up an altar in your home at some convenient place. The altar is a place where you can perform meditation, offer devotion to the Lord, and receive the Lord’s love.
Attacked incessantly for one hundred years the five-hooded serpent began to lose his strength and Puranjana became extremely anxious. One may struggle against time for one hundred years, but eventually one’s vitality weakens, and one’s bodily limbs become feeble.
“His American church”—yes, Srila Prabhupada had hope and determination. There was life in his lectures and kirtanas (chantings), his morning and evening gatherings in the loft. At least he was acquiring a small, regular following. But from India there was no hope.
We see in the street that the cars are moving at high speed but they’re within their ‘orbits,’ their white or yellow lines of demarcation—because there is some brain, some management. So, similarly, with all these planets.
Birth and death apply to one’s embodiment in the material world. Fear is due to worrying about the future.
In West Germany, devotees have evolved a preaching strategy adapted from the nama-hatta program established by Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakura in India during the last century.