What truth will our life story demonstrate?
We can choose what truth our life story will demonstrate: what is possible with God or what is inevitable without him. Our life is defined [...]
Three things we can do when we feel helpless
Suppose life puts us in a situation where we just feel that there's nothing in our control. Rather than giving into the feeling of helplessness, [...]
Grateful for unanswered prayers
When our prayers are unanswered, how can we stay faithful? By seeing how we can be grateful for unanswered prayers. If we look at our [...]
Be faithful not fearful
When we face great imminent dangers in our life, when our prayers seem to be going unanswered, at that time, we may become gripped by [...]
Pray to gain purpose not pleasure
Pray to God—not for pleasure, but for purpose. When we approach God through prayers, we often seek pleasure or, more specifically, the objects that we [...]
How to not be discouraged by our imperfections
As we function in life, we quickly come to realize our deficiencies and defects. Deficiencies refer to areas in which we can't do things as [...]
What to pray for amid distress
When confronted with a huge problem, especially one that causes acute or unbearable distress, we often desperately turn to God for help. We pray for [...]
What to expect from prayer — 2
Suppose we enroll for an exercise program meant to build our muscles. Suppose we are told to move some heavy objects. Moving those objects can [...]
What to expect from prayer — 1
Our conceptions of things shape our expectations from those things. Suppose we conceive of prayer as a means to get God to remove obstacles from [...]
What Krishna’s assurance about bhakti-yoga means for Arjuna
Toward the end of the Bhagavad-gita, Krishna promises Arjuna of protection if he becomes devotionally conscious (18.58). What does this promise signify? To understand, let’s [...]
Where is God amid problems?
When we face a tough problem, we may pray to God for help in getting rid of that problem. And if we don’t get any [...]
Why helping others doesn’t always help others
Suppose a person had a severe accident that immobilized them for a long time. As they recover, they need to start doing things for themselves, [...]
The size of our problems is inversely proportional to the size of our purpose
Suppose a truck is moving rapidly on a road on which a tree has fallen. If the truck is large and has high momentum, it [...]
Seek God’s help for doing his will, or you will need his help to get out of the trouble you get into because of not doing his will
Suppose a mildly sick patient has to take a bitter medicine. If they reject that medicine, their sickness will worsen. When they become unbearably sick, [...]
Problems are like burdens whose weight increases with the attention we give them
Suppose we have to carry a huge bag. We may struggle to carry it, but if that bag became bigger and bigger, the struggle would [...]
Look for the good in all situations, even in situations that don’t look good
Whenever life subjects us to terrible situations, we often obsess over how bad things are. Such obsession makes us feel frustrated, burdened and drained – [...]
Even if we can’t change what we live with, we can change what we live for
Suppose we are stuck with a slow, noisy, messy car in a congested and polluted place. If we can’t change our place or our car, [...]
When you feel like giving up, start looking up – not sentimentally, but spiritually
When life seems overwhelming, we may feel like giving up. As a last-ditch effort, we may look up. Whether looking up will help depends on [...]
Stronger than what faces us is what graces us
Life sometimes hurls at us overwhelming obstacles that we feel utterly unequipped to deal with. If we have a materialistic vision of life, we feel [...]
Even if we can’t see adversity as opportunity, we can still see opportunity in adversity
Some people say, “See every adversity as an opportunity.” While such an exhortation to think positive sounds good and can be helpful, it can be [...]
Problems may get stuck inside us, but we don’t have to get stuck inside them
Suppose someone writes abusive graffiti on our house wall. We will be annoyed. If the graffiti is written with indelible ink, we will be more [...]