Let pleasing others be a decision, not a compulsion
We are social beings who thrive in happy relationships. To keep our interactions with others pleasant, we usually want to please them, or to at [...]
Education is meant for not just literacy or numeracy or prosperity; it is meant essentially for spirituality
Education is highly sought nowadays, with people paying millions to get prestigious degrees. But what is education meant for? Some common answers are: literacy, numeracy [...]
Ditch the road that ends in a ditch
Suppose we are driving along a road, and we find that it ends in a ditch. We would immediately look for a way to avoid [...]
Hearing is the heart of healing
Gita wisdom explains that we all are presently in a spiritually diseased condition. We are eternal spiritual beings, but are seeking pleasure in temporary material [...]
See the reality of our material situation – and see that reality is bigger than our material situation
Our present situation in material existence is precarious: a quake under our feet or a quake in our heart can kill us at any moment. [...]
The feelings that emerge from the mind can’t be evaluated by the mind
When things go wrong repeatedly, our mind may become filled with negative feelings such as worthlessness, powerlessness, hopelessness. To check such feelings, we can compare [...]
The ego can misappropriate everything, even humility
The Bhagavad-gita (13.08) lists humility as the first among twenty items of knowledge. The opposite of humility, ego, is extremely dangerous because not only does [...]
Spiritualizing our relationships means decreasing our expectations and increasing our contributions
In every relationship, each party expects something and contributes something. When expectations exceed contributions, the relationship becomes strained. When we become spiritual and connect with [...]
Life is not just a problem-solving exercise – it is essentially a consciousness-raising expedition
When we face problems repeatedly and feel disheartened, we may try to see problems as challenges. Thus, we may, knowingly or unknowingly, conceive of life [...]
Our life’s quality is determined not by how we look, but by what we look forward to
We are often obsessed with our looks. Undoubtedly, how we look matters, especially in today’s materialistic society where people are judged by their appearances. We [...]
Gita 13.34 explained
Link to purport by A C Bhaktivedanta Swami Srila Prabhupada Transcript of Bhakti-Shastri class on this verse by Chaitanya Charan Next two verse will describe [...]
To make sense of things by not thinking of the things that don’t make sense is self delusion
We humans innately need to make sense of things. Science, art and religion all are various means by which we try to find meaning in [...]
Gita 13.16 explained
Link to purport by A C Bhaktivedanta Swami Srila Prabhupada Transcript of Bhakti-Shastri class on this verse by Chaitanya Charan Bg 13.16 bahir antaś ca [...]
Gita 13.04 explained
Link to purport by A C Bhaktivedanta Swami Srila Prabhupada Transcript of Bhakti-Shastri class on this verse by Chaitanya Charan Bg 13.4 tat kṣetraṁ yac [...]
Life’s miseries are meant to be analyzed and addressed, not anesthetized
Suppose a distressed person on finding their pain decreased by anesthesia before surgery regularly starts anesthetizing themselves. This would deaden them in their capacity to [...]
In the war of egos, the winner is the bigger loser
When people disagree on an issue, the disagreement sometimes degenerates into a war of egos, where the issues are pushed into the background. People obsess [...]
Don’t let victory in the battle against temptation come at the cost of defeat in the war for devotion
While growing spiritually, we know that we need to resist certain anti-devotional temptations. But we may get so consumed by the effort to give up [...]
Happiness comes not by maximizing our possessions, but by minimizing our attachments
Today’s materialistic culture makes us believe that the more possessions we have, the happier we will be. However, such “happiness” lasts only as long as [...]
Let the sight of death transform into insight about mortality
Death. We see it around us daily, all the more so nowadays with the media bringing global news about natural and manmade disasters. Despite such [...]
Our fears increase with our years – and decrease with our ears
We fear losing the things dear to us. And ultimately we fear losing our very life, the basis for enjoying various things. In our youth, [...]
Study the Gita for transformational spirituality, not material technicality
The Bhagavad-gita is encyclopedic – not in length, but in scope. It addresses a wide variety of subjects, explaining them all in the context of a theistic devotional worldview. One such subject referenced by the Gita (07.04-05, 13.06-07) is Sankhya, a system of philosophy that analyzes material nature into various components.