(4/17) Relief from Reaction

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad
Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj
Bolpur, evening, 19 January 2019, part 4
Translated from Bengali

What is the goal of life, the highest attainment (sadhya-vastu)? It is the abode we have come from. Conditioned souls, we are struggling, floundering in this ocean of material existence. We have one family now, but fifty years later we get another body and enter another family (for example, a cow's family), then we die again and get another family (for example, a goat's family), then we die again and get yet another family (for example, a pig's family), and so on. We may have been born in a brahman family this time, but next time we can be born in the house of a sudra or be born in a Muslim home in Pakistan or Bangladesh. Nobody can say where each soul will get its next birth – we get a body according to our karma. So, our highest attainment is to return to our own home. Back to God, back to home.

This here is not your home. You have lost your address! The place where you live now is not your home – you are only a guard here. For example, your elder brother has built a house and said, 'I am the owner!' Then your brother dies, and you become the owner. When you die, your son will say, 'Oh, I am the owner now!' After him, your grandson will claim, 'I am the owner of this house!' Everybody claims to be the owner, but we are all pretend owners. Try to understand who the actual owner is. You can see Radha-Govinda placed here at the altar – They are the actual owners. Radha-Govinda and Mahaprabhu are the owners of everything, but we have forgotten about them. We must not be like that.

We are not telling anybody to leave their lives. It is said in the scriptures that we must give up karma. What does it mean? Does it mean that you must stop going to work? No. What does it mean to give up karma? When you do some karma, you become entangled in material bondage (karma-bandhan), and the result of material bondage is suffering in hell. I will explain to you what karma-bandhan is.

Those of you who have studied some science at school know that there is action and there is reaction to every action. One of the Newton laws says that every action has an equal and opposite reaction. So, when you perform some action, it brings about some reaction. We all do so many things in our lives, so we must reap the result for all our actions. We live in this world, but for us to survive, we have to kill millions of living entities every single day. We all breathe (if somebody puts a pillow on your face and you cannot breathe, you will die), and with each breath we take, we kill so many living entities that live in the air. We cut rice paddy, so we kill the plants. We eat rotis, so we cut wheat and kill the plants. You eat cabbage, so you cut cabbage and kill the plant. You eat some spinach, so you cut spinach and kill the plants. Whenever you do anything, you create some reaction. Everybody understands that when outside people eat fish and meat, they kill goats, chicken, cows, and so on, but even vegetarian people also kill living entities. Both kinds of people incur reaction. What is the solution then? The solution is there, and Srimad Bhagavatam, Sri Chaitanya-charitamrita and other scriptures tells us what it is. The solution is this. If you surrender your body, mind and soul at the holy feet of Lord Sri Krishna – if you surrender yourself to the Lord, His devotees, to Mahaprabhu – then the Lord will remove all reaction from you.

What does Krishna say in Srimad Bhagavad-gita? Remember this. He says, 'Everything that is created in this world is created for My pleasure. I have created everything for My pleasure." Because you are overcome with ego, you say, 'I am working (I am running a business/I work in an office/I do farming/etc.), I am earning money, and with that money I am runing my family, providing food and everything else for it.' No. You are enjoying the Lord's things! What you are enjoying belongs to Him, not to you. Because you have so much ego, you think, 'I am working, and my wife is running the family with my money,' and your wife thinks, 'I cook your food, so you will not manage without me.' Both you and your wife are overcome with ego. You must think who does everything and who makes you do everything. He who does everything though you is the one we forget!

'কৃষ্ণ-নিত্যদাস'—জীব তাহা ভুলি' গেল ।
এই দোষে মায়া তার গলায় বান্ধিল ॥

'krsna-nitya-dasa'—jiva taha bhuli' gela
ei dose maya tara galaya bandhila

'The jiva soul forgot that it is an eternal servant of Krishna. Because of this mistake, illusion threw its ropes around the soul's neck.'

(Sri Chaitanya-charitamrita, 2.22.24)

That is why Maya Devi (illusion) attacks us...

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Language: Bengali

READ OTHER PARTS:

1) Self-Realisation
2) Seek Soul's Solace
3) 'Why Am I Suffering?'
4) Relief from Reaction
5) Escaping Life of Sin
6) Highest Attainment
7) Learn to Love Lord
8) From Hell to Heaven and Back
9) Sadhus' Clothes and Sadhus' Hearts
10) Genuine Gurus' Mission
11) Money Does Not Buy Devotion
12) Higher and Highest Devotion
13) Learn the Conception
14) Start Practising Sincerely
15) Make Effort
16) Cure from Material Misery
17) Live for the Lord