What Are You Doing?!

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad
Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj
23 October 2018, Kolkata, part 4

Mahaprabhu Himself told,

পৃথিবীতে আছে যত নগরাদি গ্রাম
সর্ব্বত্র প্রচার হইবে মোর নাম

prithivite achhe yata nagaradi grama
sarvatra prachara haibe mora nama

"My Name will spread and be preached everywhere, in every corner of the world!"

So, we must practise with the proper guidance of guru—we must practise in the way that Gurudev tells us to practise. Think properly about what Gurudev tells.

Gurudev said wherever you are staying, you must maintain your practising life, your spiritual life properly. You must do everything—mangal-arati, sravan, kirtan, practise everything, and practise properly. You can turn your house into a temple. You can live as a householder, you can live as you are, it is not a problem, but make Gurudev's altar there, make Deities' altar there and do mangal-arati, cook and offer the bhog, do archan, keep Tulasi and do Tulasi parikrama every day; you can sing kirtans every day with the song book. This is what practising life is. You can keep in touch with Krishna consciousness.

The problem, on the other hand, is that you are always busy with your own self, with your own life... I was just telling about it the other day—you think you are enjoying your life, but in the meantime you are actually destroying it. It is by a great fortune that you have got a human body, but you are now destroying it, you are wasting your life. It took so much fortune for you to get this body, it is very rare to get a human body, but you do not know its value—you do not know what this human body is for. You must understand the value and purpose of this human life by hearing about it from a proper sadhu. You are always busy with some karma, jnana, yoga, you always want to enjoy, but this is not the proper etiquette! This is the not a proper life! That is why, it is always necessary to avoid bad association, to avoid what is not favourable to devotion.

You must avoid bad association. These are not just my words. Srimad Bhagavatam says it. You can read Eleventh Canto, you will see there,

tato duhsangam utsrjya
satsu sajjeta buddhiman
santa evasya chhindanti
mano-vyasangam uktibhih

"An intelligent person should therefore reject all bad association and instead take up the association of saintly devotees whose words cut off the excessive attachment of one's mind."

(Srimad Bhagavatam, 11.26.26)

Those who are intelligent (sumedha), who have a proper brain, always avoid bad association and keep good association of the proper sadhu. Sadhus give proper advice, and with this great sadhu's advice, all unhappiness, all the suffering that you undergo in this world will be removed from your heart. I always tell you this, all the time. Sri Chaitanya-charitamrita also says the same thing,

sadhu-sanga-krpa kimva krsnera krpaya
kamadi 'duhsanga' chhadi' suddha-bhakti paya

"One is elevated to the platform of devotional life by the mercy of a Vaisnava, the bona fide spiritual master, and by the special mercy of Krishna. On that platform, one gives up all material desires and the association of unwanted people. Thus one is elevated to the platform of pure devotional service."

'duhsanga' kahiye—'kaitava', 'atma-vanchana'
krsna, krsna-bhakti binu anya kamana

"Bad association is called associating with those who are given to deception, self-deception, and those who desire anything else except for Krishna and devotion to Krishna."

(Sri Chaitanya-charitamrita, 2.24.97, 99)

Mahaprabhu also told,

niskinchanasya bhagavad-bhajanonmukhasya
param param jigamisor bhava-sagarasya
sandarsanam visayinam atha yositam cha
ha hanta hanta visa-bhaksanato 'py asadhu

Greatly lamenting, the Lord then informed Sarvabhauma Bhattacharya, "'Alas, for a person who is seriously desiring to cross the material ocean and engage in the transcendental loving service of the Lord without material motives, seeing a materialist engaged in sense gratification or seeing a woman who is similarly interested is more abominable than willingly drinking poison.'"

(Sri Chaitanya-charitamrita, 2.11.8)

You are taking poison! You are always mixing with materialists, you are always looking at ladies—what are you doing?! You are taking poison! You must avoid all this!

asat-sanga-tyaga,—ei vaisnava-achara
'stri-sangi'—eka asadhu, 'krsnabhakta' ara

"A Vaishnav should always avoid the association of ordinary people. Common people are very much materially attached, especially to women. Vaishnavs should also avoid the company of those who are not devotees of Lord Krishna."

(Sri Chaitanya-charitamrita, 2.22.87)

This is what bad association is. Try to understand this, and avoid such association, then you will get proper guidance and proper benefit.

So, I have told you today something about the sadhan-bhakti, about how you must practise. Always remember these things, these are very important things for our life, and try to follow it. Gurudev often said, and the scriptures also give this example—if you drink milk and at the same time also drink alcohol, then whatever benefit you get from drinking milk will be gone. What it means is that you must avoid what is unfavourable to devotion and you must accept only what is favourable to devotion. You must totally reject what is unfavourable to devotion. It is very important.

Jay Srila Guru Maharaj ki jay.

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