On Seva

Seva does not simply mean to serve, seva means to serve with no egoism and no selfishness. Real seva means we are not considering what we will get in return. Seva is service with the intent to please the object of our service. Cultivating this attitude brings about real bhakti, real love. So in this sense, by external considerations, there is no big or small service.

Big and small are seen by Krishna only in reference to the content of our sincerity, and the purity of our love. One can build a magnificent temple with pure love and that is a great service, or one can offer a simple flower and that is just as good, may be even better, depending on the internal quality of how we are genuinely trying to please the Lord. One of the reasons our spiritual progress gets impeded is because we don’t really appreciate the opportunity to serve.

The human ego wants to be served. The human ego wants to be glorified. And to the degree we hold onto these attachments, we cannot really appreciate the supreme, eternal, infinite value of glorifying Krishna, glorifying and serving those who love Krishna.

— Radhanath Swami

Attracting Grace

For the treasure of divine love to awaken in our hearts, to overcome the ahankar, the false ego, and to free ourselves from the shackles of endless selfish desires and fears – all of this is only possible through grace. Why? Because there are powers beyond our intelligence, beyond our physical strength, beyond our will power that we are up against within this material manifestation.

This grace cannot be attained simply by our efforts. We could memorize entire scriptures, we could eat only one grain of rice a day, we could sleep only five minutes a day, we could build enormous temples, we could feed one million people, we could chant a billion names of God, but none of this will necessarily attract grace.

But when we are sincere, serious, humble and are eager to serve the Supreme Lord and all living beings through Him, with no ulterior motives, then Krishna is eager; Srimati Radharani, the feminine potency, the source of all grace, is eager to deliver us.

You cannot digest food if you have no hunger. This is the principle of Ayurveda. Digestion is the key to good health and you can’t digest unless you are hungry. So similarly grace is everywhere. Grace is all-pervading, just like the sunlight is all-pervading, but we have become so habituated to live in dark places. In order to digest and assimilate that grace we have to be hungry for it. We are beggars for grace. We understand the need for grace.

— Radhanath Swami

Need for a Strong Foundation

Everyone seeks happiness. True happiness is a product of inner fulfillment. Through the ages, sincere people have turned to spirituality to find a higher quality of life. The tendency in today’s world is to be trapped in a life obsessed with quantitative rather than qualitative values. This tendency can imprison the mind in endless superficialities. Today, stress and anxiety are often daily realities, and even those who excel are often prisoners of their own success. The more we have, the more work it takes to sustain it, and the more people try to take it away from us. It’s like battling to swim upstream in the river of competition.

Real wisdom is to build our life on a strong foundation. This world is a place of dualities and no one, whatever their position may be, can escape from these dualities. There is success and failure, honor and dishonor, pleasure and pain, happiness and distress, victory and defeat. If we build a strong internal foundation in life, then whatever comes in our life—the ups, the downs, the rewards, the trials—we can grow from, we can gain experience from. We can deepen our love through any situation that comes upon us. We see the world according to our unique state of consciousness. A really successful person is one who sees a positive opportunity in every situation in life. Even in the darkest tragedies and traumas, there must be something to learn, some wisdom, some growth, some opportunity.

A diamond is nothing but an ordinary piece of coal, which with the help of nature’s wisdom, has transformed into a precious jewel under extreme pressure. Pressure can make us, pressure can break us. Tragedies can make us or they can break us. And even success, honor and glorification can make us or break us. To make a positive transformation takes a strong foundation. We should perform our duties with full power and determination and enthusiasm, and not be attached to the results of our duties. A happy, clear-thinking and fulfilling life requires that we learn the art of controlling the mind rather than being controlled by it.

What greater need is there than the leaders of society, from all levels, to be exemplary in transforming greed into generosity, transforming envy into appreciation of others, transforming arrogance into humility, transforming our selfish passions into selfless love, service and compassion towards others, transforming despair into hope and seeing opportunities in whatever comes before us in life?

— Radhanath Swami

Understanding Meditation

There are different forms of meditation in every religious tradition and practically in every denomination of each religious tradition. In order for any of them to be effective, what is most important is our sincerity and the willingness to really absorb ourselves in that particular process. Some meditate on a silent mantra, some on a particular form, some on a particular prayer, some on a virtue, some on the breath, some on the different sensations of the body and some on the name of God, which is considered very divine and holy.

All these meditations are meant to purify our heart and bring our mind to its natural condition. Our consciousness is inherently pure, eternal, full of knowledge and bliss. But somehow or other it has been covered by and adulterated by so many misconceptions, so many desires, so many longings, so many anxieties about what we want and what we don’t want “I am a man, I am a woman; I am American, I am South American, I am Indian, I am Pakistani, I am Russian, I am African”— all of these are bodily conceptions. We are so much consumed by these things and it is all mixed into our consciousness. If we filter our mind through meditation or any genuine spiritual practice, it brings our consciousness back to its original state, which is pure.

Another example is a mirror. When you look into a mirror, you see yourself. But what if that mirror has been neglected for hundreds of years? There are layers and layers of debris, dust, dirt and filth. And when you look into that mirror, all you see is the dust and the dirt that is accumulated, and all that you think is “This is me!” But when you clean the mirror, little by little you start seeing the image of yourself. And when the mirror is actually clean, you see who you are. Meditation is for that purpose; prayers are for that purpose; spirituality is for that purpose: to cleanse our heart, to cleanse our life-style so that we can actually directly experience our own essence, which is eternal, full of knowledge and full of love.

— Radhanath Swami

On Harmony

When we are chanting the holy names in congregation, if the leader of the kirtan sings one melody and everybody in the group decides to sing whatever melody they like best, the resulting sound won’t be melodious. Therefore, whether we like the melody or don’t like the melody, everybody surrenders to sing the same. For a kirtan to sound beautiful and sweet it needs cooperation. Cooperation means the higher principle. We may have preference for a melody or a preference for a tempo or a style, but we all accept to follow the leader in unity. When the kirtan is harmonious with so many people, it’s a tumultuous beautiful sound. We can’t hear just one voice during the chorus; or rather we do hear one voice. But that one voice is actually the sound of everyone’s voice in harmony. That’s our offering to God. And why is it so pleasing to the Lord? Because we are all cooperating for a higher purpose. We are all united for the pleasure of the center, for the pleasure of Krishna, in spite of all our differences. —  Radhanath Swami

Self Satisfaction

It is the nature of human ego that we become so filled with anxieties when we have expectations – because, in this world, you always don’t get what you expect. If we expect good weather and it is bad weather, it is very disturbing. If we expect respect from our husband, our wife, our friends, or the world, we are not always going to get it. The more we expect, the more we suffer when we don’t receive what we expect. And the more we get, the more we expect, and when we don’t get, the more we suffer. This is human psychology.

Renunciation or detachment means to be self-satisfied – that is, we don’t need anything. When we are not self-satisfied, the soul tries to find satisfaction somewhere else. If we are not finding satisfaction in our love for God and our compassion for all living beings, we are going to expect it from somewhere else.     — Radhanath Swami

The Power of Time

Take a glass filled with a fizzy drink. Say Sprite. What do you see on the surface? Lot of small bubbles that fizzle out in a few seconds. Govinda Dasa, a Bengali poet, has said that our life in this world is as temporary and insignificant as a bubble of water on a lotus petal. Hence, the scriptures tell us not to aspire for a permanent settlement in this temporary world. All advances in technology and all attempts to prolong life in this world are akin to the attempt to prolong the life of a bubble in a glass of Sprite. In comparison to the sky of eternity, our life is as brief as a flash of lightning.

An old man and a young boy may both look at the same clock, but they see it differently. An old man is apprehensive and nervous as he sees the clock ticking away. A young boy, however, is impatient and wonders when the watch will speed up so that he can enjoy life. But the old man wishes that the clock stop moving. Well, a time piece may stop, but time won’t. When bored, we want to kill time, but no one can do so. It’s Mr. Time who kills all without discrimination.

– Radhanath Swami