(9/9) Inglorious Life

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad
Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj
Sri Ekachakra Dham, morning class
Sri Nityananda-Trayodasi, 7 February 2020, part 9
Translated from Bengali

Why is it necessary to practise Krishna consciousness in this human birth? If a tiger or a lion is not given meat, they will cry and shout, but even if humans eat meat the whole life, they can become vegetarian at any time. Those who come to this path are the evidence of that. Even if somebody has been eating meat for thirty-fifty years, if they come to practise Krishna consciousness, they can get supreme benefit. On the other hand, some cannot give up eating meat even at eighty and ninety—they feel greed for food even at such an old age. People feel happy to eat raw onion with tabacco... Just as prostitute always increase the lust power (tej-sakti) in their bodies, garlic and onion always blur, or confuse, intelligence and excite lust and anger, that is why it is prohibited to take them. We take sattvik foods. There are foods in the mode of ignorance (tamasik), passion (rajasik) and goodness (sattvik). We do not take that which is not sattvik.

"Kakhana e-katha nahi bale vijna-jana, e deja paranonmukha (কখন একথা নাহি বলে বিজ্ঞজন, এ দেহ পরনোন্মুখ): Intelligent people will never say [that they will practise later and enjoy now]; this body is perishable." (Kalyan-kalpataru, Srila Bhaktivinod Thakur). Those who have some good intelligence (sumedha) listen to Hari-katha and come to this path as the result.

There is no time left! How many times have you come here? Many have not been able to come, and many have left this world in the meantime. So, there is no guarantee that you will be able to come again or that you will not leave the world by the next year. When their health is good, when their mind and body are full of energy, people do not come to practise Krishna consciousness. They spend their youth on material enjoyment of senses. Just today I got a phone call from a devotee. He is over sixty years old now (he is my age, and I remember how, in Gurudev's time, he would drive me on a motorcycle). He called, offered me his obeisance and told me the news that he had got a new baby. [Devotees laugh.] What will I say? He is over sixty, but he has just had a child... How many children do people produce? Do they live and produce babies their whole life?? They will not practise Krishna consciousness, but they will produce babies at sixty! What is this? How unfortunate people are. They have only some ten years or so to live, but they do not understand the value of their life. They waste their time on sense enjoyment, on raising their children and taking care of their parents. Their life energy gets finished in this way. And when they cannot do anything in their old age, then they will call the Lord and practise spiritual life—many people think in this way, but those who have some intelligence begin practising spiritual life when there is still time, from a young age.

It is necessary to do first of all that without which your life will pass in vain. If you do not do other things, there is no loss. Your life will not be wasted without accumulating money and knowledge or without getting married or good health. Is there any harm in not getting married? If you get married and live a family life, when you get a wife and children, so many problems will come—you want this, that, you want money, you want grandchildren, you want a daughter and so on. Family life brings so many problems along with it. But if you do not serve Lord Hari in your life, your life becomes useless. We must do first that which is the most important in our life.

Just as when material people go to the market to buy vegetables, they always buy rice first because there can be no meal without rice; in the same way, if you do not serve the Lord, life is simply wasted.

Many people think that when they have strength in their bodies, they will enjoy. They say, "You are young now, live and enjoy!", "When I grow old, then I will practise Krishna consciousness." Such people cannot understand the importance of Krishna consciousness. We always give importance to earning money and accumulating knowledge and spend all our health on that, but we do not think about the Lord. Service to the Lord is the highest wealth in life, the most valuable thing in life. Those who are intelligent and clever come to the house of their Guru (guru-grha) at a young age and start serving the Lord. Those who sacrifice their life for the service of the Lord are very fortunate, and the life of those who spend the best time of their life practising Krishna consciousness is glorious.

Many come to practise Krishna consciousness in their old age—when their health and mind are broken, they come to the temple. They cannot do anything with their hands, they cannot have the darshan of the Lord with their eyes. Will you want to practise spiritual life at the temple, drinking only milk? Those who delay and think they will practise later cheat the Lord. When you worked ten hours a day, you lived for your sons and daughters. And when you cannot work even for two hours, you come to the temple. Even then, we say, "All right, come." If you come and do some service, chant the Holy Name, if you give charanamrita to visitors; you can also sit and cut some vegetables, stir the pots and so on. It is all right—you can also sit and chant kirtans during the programmes. Even that is good. But even if you tell people to come like that, they still cannot come to this path. When parents dedicate themselves more and more to Krishna consciousness, their children say, "You have given everything to the temple. Will you not keep anything for us, for our enjoyment? You have given five hundred rupees to Gurudev, but we have less money now!" Many people say like this. It is the truth; I wrote about it in Guidance, Volume 4

We must alwyas think about this.

Jay Srila Guru Maharaj ki jay.

Let us chant some kirtan now.

[His Divine Grace chants 'Parama karuna']

Prabhu, please chant kirtan now and gather everybody. Our parikrama will start soon. The parikrama is short; after we come back, I will give class again.

Jay Srila Guru Maharaj ki jay.
Harinam sankirtan ki jay.

By the mercy of Nityananda Prabhu, we will start parikrama just now. Please get ready.

— : • : —

{ 2001  |   2002  |   2003  |   2005  |   2009  |   2010  |   2011  |   2012 }
{ 2013  |   2014  |   2015  |   2016  |   2017  |   2018  |   2019  |   2020  |   2021 }

CLICK TO LISTEN TO THE LECTURE

Size: 30.6 Mb
Length: 64 min
Language: Bengali

READ OTHER PARTS:

1) Value Your Time
2) Gaudiya Vaishnavs' Service
3) Perverted and Transcendental Charm
4) Our Greatest and Only Friends
5) Faith vs Acceptance
6) Pull of Maya
7) Wrong Preoccupation
8) World of Uncertainty
9) Inglorious Life