Be Responsible for Your Spiritual Life

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad
Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj
Kolkata-Worldwide, 28 June 2020, part 2

I have told you many times that we are servitors—we did not join Krishna consciousness to become masters. Sri Chaitanya Saraswat Math always says this. We must be always servants of devotees—this is a good designation in our spiritual life. We did not join Chaitanya Saraswat Math to be a leader, to be a master, or to be a manager.

At the same time, somebody also has to take responsibility for service. Our Guru and Vaishnavs always see who is a responsible servitor. We must be sincere and secure in our service. We must be responsible for our service, and we must be responsible for our spiritual life. It is necessary to have a proper sense of responsibility, otherwise Guru and Vaishnavs will not be happy. Being responsible for your service is one of the main qualities of a servitor. We must be conscious that our Guru and Vaishnavs rely on me.

Srila Guru Maharaj, Om Vishnupad Srila Bhakti Raksak Sridhar Dev-Goswami Maharaj, depended on Gurudev. He chose Gurudev as his successor because he understood that Gurudev was a responsible person and that Gurudev could properly maintain his (Srila Sridhar Maharaj's) mission. And Gurudev did increase Srila Guru Maharaj's mission through his preaching, through his love and affection—he gave everything to devotees. Gurudev gave devotees everything that is necessary. That is why, Srila Sridhar Dev-Goswami Maharaj had brought him from his householder life and gave him sannyas. Otherwise, Srila Sridhar Dev-Goswami Maharaj did not find any suitable person from his ashram among the brahmacharis. There were many brahmacharis living in the temple at that time, but he knew he could not depend upon them—Srila Sridhar Maharaj chose Gurudev; having brought him from his householder life, he gave him his chair and made him his successor. That is Srila Guru Maharaj's mercy.

Actually, we sometimes think or hope that we will become the manager, we will become the guru, we will become the president, but this is not how it works—attaining such a position depends on the Guru, it comes from above. This opportunity will not come to everybody, but when it does come, even if you think that you are the lowest person, that you have no quality, no qualification, but if Gurudev chooses you, you have to accept the responsibility. We may think that we are not qualified, but if Gurudev has chosen me for a particular service, then I have to do it. This should be our mood throughout. When the Guru and Vaishnavs give you some service, you must always accept it and try to do it.

A perfect guru will always guide you towards your proper benefit. A proper guru always shows the proper line. We must accept such a guru—we must take shelter in him and accept him as our guardian of devotion. Only a proper guru can give you real guidance and advice. This is very important for us, otherwise (if you do not accept the advice and guidance of a proper guru,) why is it necessary to take initiation, why is it necessary to take shelter? The main thing is that we must maintain our spiritual life, practising life. Anybody can take saffron clothes, anybody can take sannyas, but everybody must maintain their life properly, whether it is sannyas life, brahmachari life or any other life. It is not easy to maintain a proper brahmachari life. It is necessary to have proper dedication and it is necessary to always accept the advice of your guardian. We should not follow our mind—our mind always tells us something, but we should not follow it. If we can follow all these things, then it can give a proper solution to all our problems.

We stay together, but we always quarrel about so many petty domestic problems. We always think about petty things, but we must think that when big things await us, why will we run so much behind all these petty domestic things? These are all small and simple problems, it is such a small matter in our spiritual life. Sometimes, even senior devotees become very tired of spiritual life, they cannot follow any more, and they cannot adjust themselves properly in small matters. How will we preach Krishna consciousness? How will we run our mission? How will we keep our mission together? We must follow what our guardian, our Gurudev, has told us. Gurudev always told everyone, "Come under one umbrella," but, as one of Australian devotees said, "How, and why, will we all come under one umbrella when everybody has their own raincoat?" This is also correct in the sense that everybody's service is not the same. In Vrindavan, Lalita Devi serves in one way, and Visakha Devi serves in another way—there are different kinds of mood and different kinds of service; but the thing is that there everybody's mood, everybody's goal is to satisfy the Lord. We too may preach in many different ways, but our main point, our main goal should be one—that is, we must make our Gurudev happy.

When we are young, we sometimes cannot understand things and may sometimes go in a wrong way—sometimes, we may not be able to understand something clearly thinking that life is very easy and we may take a wrong decision—but even a small wrong decision can change your life. You can take one small wrong decision and your life will go in a different way. We must think first what we should do. Not only that—if you think first and take some decision yourself, that is also not good because you have a guardian, so you should take advice from your guardian. Your guardian can guide you, can give you some good advice—listen to their advice. It is necessary to have guidance in your life. So, when our guru-varga is waiting to give us advice, then we should ask them what is necessary, what we should do, and follow their advice. These are the main things for our spiritual life.

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