When worry accelerates the imagination, let faith become the brake
Worry accelerates our imagination. When we face problems, worry paints dreadful pictures of the many further things that may go wrong, thereby sucking our mental [...]
We may fall down, but we don’t have to fall away
Falling down means that due to our past conditionings or present circumstances, we succumb to temptation. In contrast, falling away means that we give up [...]
Seek not higher material happiness, seek higher than material happiness
We want to make things better, to make our life better, to make the world better. This urge for betterment drives our various activities – [...]
The more we expect meditation to be a break from hard work, the more meditation becomes hard work
Our daily life, with its many obligations, requires hard work. So, if we make time to meditate, we expect meditation to serve as a break, [...]
Liberation is not just about what we are released from but also about what we are released to
Patients admitted in a hospital long to be discharged so that they can return home and be with their loved ones. Even while staying in [...]
Let determination enthrone, not dethrone, devotion
We may wonder: “Determination requires using our own willpower, whereas devotion requires depending on Krishna’s supreme power. How can we do these two contradictory things [...]
Seeing the infinite through finite filters makes finite illusions infinite
Skeptics deride Krishna’s pastimes like lifting Govardhan hill: “How could anyone have lifted such a huge object? How could he have found its center of [...]
The Gita is not self-contradictory, but self-revelatory
“That’s self-contradictory.” We may feel thus on reading some sections of the Bhagavad-gita. For example, the Gita (9.4) states, mat-sthani sarva bhutani “All of existence [...]
Krishna is not only the anchor to which we connect, but also the anchor by which we connect
A boat in an ocean keeps bobbing due to the unending waves. To stay steady, it needs an anchor. Similarly, the waves of unending dualities [...]
Spiritual growth depends on disposition, not position
Our normal material tendency is to go by externals. We form impressions about people based on how they look, where they stay, what they drive [...]
Our heart may not have a place for Krishna, but Krishna has a place for our heart
Sometimes life forces us to face so many problems that we feel we have no time left for Krishna. Not only that, the very presence [...]
Might we be sentencing to the jail those who need the hospital?
Falling from moral standards is an ever-present danger for all devotee-seekers in this world of temptation. When others don’t live up to our moral expectations, [...]
What defines us as devotees is not how we fall, but how we rise
When we fail and fall while practicing the moral standards expected of us as devotees, we often feel discouraged, “I will never be able to [...]
When the Absolute Truth doesn’t speak the absolute truth
In the Bhagavad-gita (09.31), Krishna asks Arjuna to declare boldly that devotees will never perish. Erudite Gita commentators explain why Krishna asks Arjuna to make [...]
Let reason be our minister, not our master
We may get the question: “Do I have to give up reason in order to put faith in the Gita?” Not at all, answers Gita [...]
Accidents are no accidents
The word ‘accident’ has become integral to our vocabulary, largely due to the many unfortunate crashes that beset our roads. Words, however, don’t just reflect [...]
Transcend the labor pains of devotion through loving anticipation
We normally don’t like pain. But when a to-be-mother undergoes labor pains, love shifts her thoughts from the present pain to the future child. Her [...]
The incomprehensible comprehensibility and the comprehensible incomprehensibility of the universe
“The most incomprehensible thing about the universe is that it is comprehensible,” wondered Albert Einstein. If the universe were just matter emerged by chance, why [...]
The world is in a mess – as usual
The daily news of natural disasters like hurricanes and human-made distresses like corruption show that the world is in a terrible mess. Seeing this, we [...]
Let Krishna permeate, pervade and possess our heart
Devotional advancement essentially means letting Krishna enter and rule our heart. This may happen in the following three progressive stages: 1. Permeation: Just as water from [...]
Go beyond captivity to futility and utility
As practicing spiritualists, we may face the question, “What should be my attitude towards the material world?” Let’s first look at the three broad attitudes [...]