Transformation Through Forgiveness |

Mahatma Das

thank you for all coming nice to see you nice to zoom in to london only took me
7:14
like one second nice to see you matt ma prabhu thank you so much for being back at
wisdom
7:25
welcome all nice to see you all um it's wednesday night we're back
7:32
here is shangri-vindadas from radhakrishnan temple in london and nice to see you all
friends helen
7:39
carrot ganadev d and those of you i haven't met yet dylan
7:46
so we have a very very unique and special guest tonight all the way from united
states florida
7:53
mahatma many of you i'm sure know him already and
8:00
i feel so fortunate and grateful that i have the possibility to you know to have his
association again
8:07
spend time with him and so it's
8:13
he's been practicing uh bhakti yoga for the last maybe 50 years over 50 years he's
the
8:19
disciple of his divine grace bhaktivedanta swami prabhupada
8:24
and his books his seminars so inspiring and um
8:31
they're all about you know making the the wisdom i think matt matt prabhu is
8:38
very expert at making that the ancient wisdom of bhakti very practical very
8:43
real fun very very possible
8:49
and um so thank you mahatma for being back how are you
8:55
i am hot it's hot here in florida hot and sweaty but we just
9:03
got some air conditioning in my office so i will survive
9:08
i don't think it's how's the weather in london now it's cooling down it's yeah it's
cooling down yeah
9:14
it doesn't cool down here until november or december yeah
9:21
basically basically april may june july august september
9:28
october six months it's quite warm 30 plus for six months yeah
9:36
and when i was in london no i was in ireland and the temperature got up to like 22 or
9:43
something and everybody was complaining it was so hot my daughter and i were
laughing
9:48
because that's that's like winter for us
9:54
so today we're going to be speaking about forgiveness and
10:01
forgiveness is a it's a very valuable topic to speak about but one of the reasons we're
going to speak
10:07
going to be speaking about it is about 15 years ago i went on a kind of
10:12
you could say a forgiveness journey within myself and then i began teaching it to
others
10:19
and subsequently i probably taught it i don't know 30 40 times probably given 30 40
lectures
10:26
on it and then three four years ago i developed two online courses which i guess we
10:34
could mention at the end how you can take them on the topic and as sean govinda
was saying
10:43
one thing i got occupied with was looking at this very interesting concept of karma
10:51
which we all understand that everything is a reaction to our activity
10:56
and then at the same time holding on to resentment which seems to be a
contradiction because if everything
11:02
is a consequence of our action why would i be resentful because i'm only getting
11:14
did i say something wrong i'm sorry i apologize i accidentally muted you i
11:20
didn't mean to sorry oh i said something wrong
11:29
no i'm only kidding yeah so um i i began
11:37
in teaching in studying forgiveness and teaching it this is one thing that
11:43
was staring me in the face that people who believe in karma were coming to me with
resentment issues and
11:49
i said this is very interesting because in theory if you believe in karma
11:55
you would accept that everything is a consequence of your action correct yes
12:03
so what i was observing and analyzing was that what you understand in your head
12:08
and what goes on in your heart may be in two different worlds because you might
say i understand i
12:15
shouldn't be upset but this is what happened i'm upset
12:21
but but it's just it has to be a reaction to something you've done either a minute ago
or a million lives ago
12:29
and you say i know but this really hurts so i was observing that and i was i was
12:36
realizing that there's a big problem when we take the
12:42
spiritual life and that we get things in our head but we don't always get them into our
life and this was kind of like the the
12:50
bridge that made me aware of how of how on many levels
12:55
we get things in our head and when we get them in our head we think we've got it i
understand it i
13:02
have it i know it but it's not true and sometimes it's really difficult
13:08
to understand that that just because you understand something
13:13
doesn't mean you've got it it just means you've understand it stood it because when
we understand something
13:19
it seems like we've got it doesn't it yeah i've got it i understand it i'm clear on it
13:26
but does that mean i'm living it does that mean i'm feeling it not necessarily
sometimes yes sometimes
13:33
no so this was the entrance way into this reality that i can understand something
13:42
in theory but respond emotionally or through lifestyle or through behavior
13:47
in the opposite way and that's why there's a saying the greatest distance is to get
from the
13:53
head to the heart so so this whole this whole thing opened up when i started
teaching forgiveness because i was
13:58
also teaching it to people who have been practicing bhakti
14:05
practicing krishna consciousness for 20 30 40 years and they were having issues
and and
14:12
i had an issue myself also and this this like furthered the contradiction okay it's not
just people who read
14:18
something about karma and say i believe it these are people who are living as monks
14:24
doing it full time and they were coming to the workshops with issues and i thought
this is interesting
14:32
that that to actually live what you believe that's a that's a
14:38
whole it's a whole world of practice and a whole so then i would i would joke with
14:44
people i would say do you know in the bhagavad-gita there's 19 chapters
14:49
and if you've read bhagavad-gita there's only 18. and they i'd say and i'd say what's
the
14:55
19th chapter i'd say the 19th chapter is your life so 18 chapters now write your life
and
15:03
see does that match up with the other 18 and everybody would kind of put their head
down
15:08
and say well i don't think it would match up entirely so the 19th chapter is our life and
and
15:14
then you analyze how well does that align with the other 18 and then you get the
shock the
15:20
realization uh not always so that opened up to me
15:27
something that i should have understood long long back but it made it it made it very
clear
15:36
and then i started to reflect on that in my own life and i i came to realize that how
difficult it
15:43
is to be objective about ourselves like has anyone ever told you especially
15:49
when you're married this happens if you're not married get ready for it because it's
going to happen
15:55
you do this and you say no i don't do that and your spouse or your friend says no
16:01
you do it all the time and you say no i never do it. and so what does that mean it
means
16:07
we're doing things we're not conscious of isn't it right we're doing it and we're not
aware of it
16:12
but everyone around us is aware of it because everyone else has objectivity towards
us we don't have so
16:19
much objectivity about ourselves so i started to see how
16:24
difficult it is sometimes to recognize our own defects even though they're kind
16:30
of obvious to everybody else and that's sometimes why we get in conflict
16:36
because everyone else is saying no you're like this and you're saying no i'm not i
never do that and they're
16:42
saying you do that all the time no i never do that like why why is there this paradox
because
16:49
it's so hard for us to see ourselves so then i began looking at forgiveness
16:54
is just a pivotal point but then there's kindness integrity compassion honesty just go
down the list and
17:03
and then i started to develop or try to develop a way to be objective about it
17:10
about am i doing these things and bring awareness to my behavior so that so when
people
17:16
say you always do this i don't just say no i don't i said oh let me think about this look
about this
17:23
let me look at this let me study this letting me see i'm actually doing this
17:28
and as i started bringing awareness i realized a big problem which i'm sure
17:36
we're all aware of for other people but we may not be aware of for ourself
17:42
that when you take the spiritual life or you take to yoga
17:47
or you take to bhakti there can be a big danger in the sense
17:53
that you start to think because i'm chanting or because i'm studying because i'm
doing save or something that
18:03
that means everything else i do is good you know it's like it's like the guy who
18:09
makes a lot of money so you know i'm good at making money means i'm good at
everything no you're just good at making money
18:15
you've been divorced 100 times you're not good at relationships but there's this you
know this blinder
18:21
you know i'm good at one thing it means i'm you know i'm smart i'm i can program
computers that means i could
18:28
run a country or in donald trump's case i can you know run an empire of businesses i
can run a country but it
18:34
doesn't work that way so and i think it's i think it's more
18:40
insidious and more common and more hard to understand it when you bring in
18:45
spirituality because when you become spiritual there's this subtle thing that i'm
18:51
better than others it's such a paradox because when you become spiritual you're
supposed to
18:56
think everyone's better than me that's the epitome of spiritualization that everyone is
better than me that's
19:03
what humility means it's it's like you know inconceivable that i would think everyone's
better
19:09
than me and then we take the spiritual life which is supposed to produce this
19:14
everyone's better than me and i start thinking oh i do spiritual life you don't i'm
vegetarian you're not i
19:20
chant mantras you don't you know you're a loser i'm not you know that that idea
19:25
starts coming and i'm better i'm more enlightened than you you know you know i
became vegetarian when i was
19:32
14 and you're you're you're like 28 and you're thinking about it you're a loser you know
what's wrong with you
19:37
so we start not i'm just joking but you get the idea
19:42
right we start thinking because i you know i get up every morning and i i do my
chanting and i i do whatever i
19:50
do that puts me in a special position and the problem with that is because i
19:57
do one or two or three things i think i'm covered you know it's like my insurance
policy covers everything
20:03
here in here in florida we have these things what do you call them they're called
20:10
sinkholes sinkholes and the ground just goes in because it's sand right and when you
get insurance
20:17
they check to make sure there's no sinkhole and they don't cover you for sinkholes
because because your whole house will
20:24
just sink into the ground and it's too expensive you'll see a lot
20:29
of ponds around florida where houses once stood that just they sunk
20:35
so it's like it's kind of like i'm chanting or i'm doing something
20:40
spiritual and we think oh my my policy covers everything i'm i'm perfect on every
level
20:46
it's not like that right so i started to see this as a huge problem that we were losing
20:51
uh those of us who practice practicing spiritual life were losing objectivity
20:58
and we had this very subjective experience kind of like you know i do good in a few
21:05
areas of spirituality which means i'm good everywhere and what i started seeing was
that
21:13
if you think that way you could never really really be introspective you can never
really understand
21:18
where you're at and you really need to understand if you're going to make any
spiritual kind of spiritual progress
21:24
right you need to be have objectivity in evaluating yourself so what i would suggest
to
21:32
all of us is understanding this reality try to
21:39
bring more presence to yourself when you're getting upset or you're becoming
intolerant
21:45
what are other things we do intolerance is common right we're not we're becoming
upset we're not accepting
21:50
something we're becoming critical have you ever criticized anybody
21:56
probably never right yeah we're criticizing even if the person did something wrong
still we're criticizing
22:02
right so you know we we want to justify in our mind well he deserves to be criticized
22:09
or he deserves to be chastised my anger was righteous and you know we have all
these like i'm
22:15
spiritual so my anger must be righteous right no so we want to stop and catch
ourselves
22:21
and say wait a minute what are you doing is this proper and if you can develop
22:26
that consciousness you'll be amazed at how many times you can catch yourself
22:31
doing something wrong that you never realized before that you justified before or you
didn't
22:37
even notice it because i'm spiritual i cannot do anything wrong so you don't even
notice it
22:42
isn't that interesting the mind is interesting machine isn't it it can it has the
22:48
capacity for major delusion you know i'm like i am so great i'm so
22:54
fantastic so this is by studying forgiveness this all came up
23:00
with it like why is this person doing this oh prabhu it's your karma no it's his fault now
23:08
then it it gets even more amazing you know how we were saying humility
23:14
means you think others are better and that's where you should be progressing
towards in spiritual life but sometimes
23:20
it becomes the opposite well there is an aspect of karma that is mind-blowing
23:25
amazing and i don't know if you've heard this before but
23:30
if you take the spiritual life it is said it absorbs you of your karma
23:37
but then something bad happens it's like well i thought i was becoming free of karma
why is something bad
23:42
happening and so sometimes something bad happens because you need
23:48
it you need it to learn you it's going to help you it's going to push you because we all
know that sometimes
23:54
unless we get pushed we kind of don't get out of bed so to speak you
24:00
need someone to i need a little earthquake to dump us out of bed otherwise we lay
there
24:05
you know our life just kind of lays there and so sometimes the karma's actually creep
grace mercy
24:13
to to move us and in one book shrima bhagavatam some
24:19
of you are familiar with this book it is said something amazing that
24:25
when you're practicing spiritual life and something bad happens you think okay this
is a lesson i have to learn
24:32
something but you also think actually i deserve worse
24:38
that who knows all the things i've done over so many lifetimes so there's so much
karma that's
24:44
surrounding me through lifetimes so a person thinks not that it's his fault
24:49
it's her fault but but thanks actually i deserve worse that's an amazing state
24:55
of consciousness isn't it i deserve worse what does that mean that means
25:00
that i have some karmic reaction coming but because i'm practicing spiritual life it's
been minimized
25:08
rather that is a complete opposite of resentment towards that person right isn't that
interesting
25:14
so as i as i was analyzing you know all these
25:20
these factors i was thinking you know spiritual life is a lot more than just chanting
25:26
when it comes down to behavior and developing saintly qualities and so forth
25:31
it's um it's not easy we have this verse some of you know this
25:38
verse
25:44
[Music] i made a little song and i'm going to
25:49
explain it because it's it's so amazing hold on a second
25:54
to not [Music]
26:08
day
26:17
so now i want to explain this these are this verse is what i call the four
26:22
impossible things that nobody can do that we all have to do
26:31
for these are four impossible things that are required for spiritual life that none of us
can do that we have to
26:37
do and there's a song that there was a
26:42
person practicing bhakti when he heard this verse he said i give up i can't do this
number one
26:51
you ready you're sitting down i hope because you might faint all right number one
you should feel
26:58
you should have the emotional experience that i am lower than grass then one blade
of grass i'm
27:06
actually lower wow how many of you woke up this morning
27:11
feeling lower than a blade of grass raise your hand okay it's unanimous nobody
27:22
why should we feel low in a blade of grass because the sole is one ten thousandth
the size of a tip
27:28
of a hair so we actually are lower than grass aren't we we're just we're my did you
27:34
know that the size of the soul take a hair cut it ten thousand times that's the size of
the soul
27:39
so grass is kind of big compared to the soul right but what does it mean to feel lower
27:48
than grass it means there's no false ego there's no ego that i'm number one i'm
27:54
special i'm the man i'm better i'm the woman
27:59
i'm better than you smarter than you more talented than you i can make more money
than you i have a better job than you
28:05
i have better this than that than you that's all that's all what we call false
28:10
ego not ego ego just means identity false ego that's false identity and so
28:18
more humble than a blade of grass means complete vulnerability complete
objectivity i see myself as i
28:25
am as a minute soul and i see my faults with
28:32
compassion not with self-denigration i see my faults i'm aware
28:40
so um can you imagine that level of humility
28:46
feeling like grass now some of you are listening to this and say i'm i already have no
self-esteem now if
28:53
i feel like grass i'll probably want to commit suicide right jump off the london what's
the bridge
28:59
what's the bridge the london bridge is that it over by the is it the is the london
29:05
bridge which goes over the thames is that it yes
29:11
yeah that's a good that's a good bridge to jump off right okay after class today you
know i'm i'm
29:16
going uh it's over you know i'm supposed to be more humble than a blade of grass i
already i already feel
29:22
like i already feel like you know i don't want to say the word
29:27
word but you know the word i would use i already feel like blank i already feel like
bleep and now um
29:35
i feel like lower than blade of grass what's the use of living and it's it needs living
without false ego
29:42
it means living without arrogance it means it means being real it means being
29:48
vulnerable it means not pretending that i'm someone i'm not
29:54
did you ever pretend you're somebody you're not kind of you know walk up you know
put
30:00
your put your special clothes on you know yeah
30:06
i grew up in los angeles right so everyone in los angeles when i grew up is like
looking like either a movie star
30:12
or a rock star because in those days when i grew up it was all that's all the movies
30:17
i don't know bollywood was like who would look at movies no one in the west and the
whole rock scene yeah i was there in london
30:23
but it was also california los angeles all the clubs and
30:28
famous nightclubs and hollywood and so everyone's walking around with you
30:34
know with their guitar case and you know looking cool you know
30:40
that was the mood you know trying to be somebody or not and i have i have friends
30:48
two of which are very famous musicians and two of which are fairly famous actor
and actress and when they walk
30:54
around they don't walk around like that at all they just walk around like normal people
31:00
isn't that funny the people who are actually doing what everyone else is imitating is
31:05
just they're kind of wearing you know t-shirt and some some plain shorts and
31:10
just you know being themselves so lower than the blade of grass means
31:16
um be yourself don't try to try don't try to impress people falsely
31:24
then the next one the next impossible one
31:30
be more tolerant than a tree okay first question does anything bother
31:36
you do you get bothered when like the tube is too crowded
31:43
or there's some strange person sitting next to you that won't look at you when
31:48
you look at them and you say hello and they won't look that's pretty common in
london i've noticed that i think the
31:54
phones have really solved that problem because everyone just gets on the tube and
looks at their phone that way they don't have to interact
32:00
right whereas if there's no phone and someone says hello you kind of have to it's
impolite to interact not interact
32:05
right the last time i was in london i think was november and i got on the tube and
everyone was staring at their phone
32:12
it was so interesting i think that was the world's record for phone stairs
32:18
china's i think number two from my experience so um
32:25
there's so many things to tolerate isn't it
32:31
isn't it like you have to tolerate rain and clouds and cold weather for like you know six
eight months a
32:37
year right nine months a year back you know 20 30 years ago summer only was like
one day
32:44
it's it's expanded now in london but
32:50
there's so many things you have to tolerate the traffic of a big city the air quality it's
just on and on and
32:56
on so this verse says the tolerance of a tree
33:01
and why is a tree used as an example because if you chop down a tree it doesn't
complain you could do anything you want to a tree
33:07
and it just gives you fruit flowers and shade it doesn't complain and fuel
33:16
and sometimes the word forgiveness and the word tolerance are used synonymously
33:23
because if you can tolerate you won't take action against correct you'll let
33:30
it go it's just okay tolerate let it go when we don't tolerate what happens
33:38
we take it with us we hold on to it we become disturbed we
33:46
become angry so
33:51
i think it's interesting if you
33:56
sometimes people say well how do you know what is spiritual and i say well you
know if i was right now
34:03
smoking a cigar and drinking a beer you might think wait a minute
34:08
you're saying he's spiritual but it doesn't look like it and then my three girlfriends walk
in in
34:14
bikinis and you're like okay that's it this guy is bogus right that's obvious isn't it
34:21
but i think tolerance is not we don't we don't register that as much like that
34:27
is not a sign of someone who's spiritually evolved that they're very intolerant
34:35
it's a sign of a spiritually evolved person isn't it so they say how do i know this person
is
34:41
spiritually evolved my spiritual master said you know the
34:46
greatness of a person by how much they can tolerate that's how you evaluate isn't
that interesting a magnanimous
34:54
person a great person can be understood by their level of
35:00
tolerance interesting right so
35:07
college and forgiveness they're really the same thing and we need to look at that in
our lives
35:13
when we're becoming intolerant we need to stop and look and say okay what's going
35:18
on here what's under what's underlying this what's what's
35:24
what's the consciousness that i'm lacking now that's causing me to be intolerant
because if you go deeper
35:30
you'll see there's a spiritual lacking that's causing that
35:38
yes d it's definitely true d says isn't there
35:44
a line between tolerating people's um abuse there is
35:50
so for the sake of this discussion yeah i wouldn't tolerate we we don't want to
tolerate abuse but for
35:55
the sake of this discussion we'll just talk about ordinary ordinary things you know
someone's driving and
36:01
they cut in front of you [Music] you know you're three minutes work uh
36:06
you're three minutes late to work and your boss gets upset with you things like the
36:11
normal things we have to tolerate the long lines in the grocery stores
36:18
there's a video of i wish i could find it it was a speech
36:24
given by this professor is like the hippie professor and he's telling the students what
your life's
36:29
going to be like when you graduate and go to work have any of you seen that video
36:36
i mean he's describing you know most of these people start working are single he's
36:42
describing you're going to go to work early in the morning you're going to get home
six and seven and then you're going to look in your
36:47
refrigerator there's nothing there and then you have to go to the grocery store shop
then you have to cook it clean your
36:52
pots been there done that right and when you're exhausted on the weekend then you
get to do your laundry
36:59
so he was describing that and somebody made a video of it
37:05
of what you know so it showed the person working you know dealing with all of that
and then driving home on the traffic and
37:11
then getting home opening the opening the refrigerator there's nothing in it and then
37:16
going shopping and then sitting in a long line and do you have coupons do you have
37:24
coupons in your country like you get things on a discount and you you have that yes
37:31
so it's just this this person you know was going to save like you know 25 cents or
with five coupons and
37:37
it was like it wasn't going well the coupons weren't scanning properly and they had to
call
37:43
the manager and this person who's playing the part of the person
37:48
that the professor's talking about one person played is sitting in line and right behind
him there's a girl on
37:55
the phone yeah you know i wouldn't do that you know like everyone in the store could
38:00
hear her and the guy in front of him is sitting in line and he's like big fat guy and he's
eating
38:08
potato chips and they're all over his face and all over his shirt and it was just it was
so real of what
38:14
life is like of what we have to tolerate that's life isn't it
38:22
you ever been on the airplane and the person behind you is talking really loud
38:28
and they haven't they'd talk nonstop for the whole flight about their daughter and
their son
38:33
and their father who's in the hospital with this and that and the whole flight they don't
stop
38:40
that's life and we're sitting there like you know we want to say something and
38:46
you know we're being disturbed and so these times this is like real test
38:52
this is real life test how are you doing in your spiritual life how's your tolerance levels
38:57
because this is as we as d said we shouldn't tolerate something that's destructive
but
39:06
in general this is a this is a quality we we are asked to develop be tolerant like
39:12
a tree the tree can take all kinds of all kinds of
39:17
tree can take anything without complaining all right so now i'm going to go to the
next one the next the third thing we can't do
39:24
that we have to do we can call this we can rename the class the four things we all
have to do that
39:31
none of us can do the four things we have to do to become self-realized that none of
us can do
39:37
but by the power of mantra we'll be able to do it though number three this is also
going to be
39:44
tough number three and four if you have low self-esteem this is going to make you
want to jump off the bridge also
39:50
so number three i'm going to say i'm both together because when you get them both
together it's
39:56
it's like two punches you know one may not knock you out but the second will you
have all respect
40:03
to others and not want any respect for yourself ah i already hate myself
40:08
now i'm gonna give all respect to others and i'm not gonna accept any respect for
40:14
myself what does that mean
40:22
okay i want to ask you to do something just try try this on for size tomorrow
40:32
if you're going out in the world try this on for size just think okay today i'm going to
try to respect
40:39
everyone and i'm not going to try to position myself so i look cool and everyone's
going to say
40:45
hey you're you're looking good you know i'm not going to do that i'm just going to
take the mood i want to offer
40:52
and not demand and not position myself to get any respect for myself hey did
40:58
you hear what i did yesterday yes you go on my facebook page it's amazing you
know we're not going to do that we're just
41:04
going to say oh we're gonna offer respect in any way we can try that and then you'll
understand how
41:12
important this is for spiritual life and it could be the most amazing day of your life if
you do this
41:18
like you could have amazing realizations by and and how do you respect everyone so
41:24
now you're saying you know how do i respect
41:29
there's there's a homeless man and there's there's a guy who just comes out walks
out in his gucci suit from a
41:36
rolls-royce i mean how how am i supposed to respect all these people equally you're
not respecting
41:41
them materially you're respecting them as spiritual beings you are a soul you're a
divine being you are part of
41:49
god i respect you you're a living being i can respect you
41:55
that's how you do it materially there's too many inequalities it has to be spiritual
42:02
you are a living being i respect you god is in your heart i respect you
42:07
if if yeah this would be good exercise walk down oxford street because there's
42:13
so many people and and try to see that the body is a vehicle
42:18
they're they're in the body as the soul and the super soul god the divine spark is there
with them
42:26
and just see that you will have the most enlightened walk down oxford
42:31
street of your life of all your lives because this is the reality
42:37
and if you do that then see how that affects your consciousness and how do you
start feeling you'll
42:43
start feeling you'll start feeling yeah we're all tiny souls we're all equal and this i
42:49
the the need to show off will be replaced by the bliss and
42:54
pleasure of respecting people if you show respect if you show
43:01
appreciation it's transformational so we do something in our forgiveness
43:06
course and i just heard a story which was similar there's this there's a video maybe
you
43:14
could put the link to this video in the chat
43:19
there's a video of a lady who was taken to a concentration camp when she was
43:24
very young and her all her family except her sister was
43:31
killed and later in life when i guess she was i don't know how old she was i
43:36
wasn't paying attention she got to meet the person in auschwitz that was torturing
her
43:44
and she got to forgive him but there was another person that did worse torture to her
and
43:52
her friend told her you should you should forgive that person said i can't forgive him
he did so many horrible
43:58
things she said just pretend that that person yeah just pretend that that person is
44:05
sitting in the room and just tell them i forgive you that's all whether you forgive him
or
44:11
not just say it she said i said it and it was an amazing experience
44:17
just saying it was an amazing experience i felt this burden just lifted off of me so
44:24
you know you might say isn't it artificial that i go out on the street and i pretend like
i'm seeing the soul
44:31
and yeah maybe maybe artificial but if you do it you will notice a
44:36
transformation if the person you're trying to forgive
44:41
if you can appreciate them you will notice a transformation how however hard it is if
you say
44:48
i forgive you if you write it down i appreciate i forgive you i know you were trying
44:54
your best this is all you could do i don't hold it against you you will see a
transformation by the
45:01
action it's very very powerful so offering all respects unto others
45:07
not wanting respects for myself that goes completely against the nature of the
consciousness of
45:14
practically everyone on this planet doesn't it how many people you know who
45:19
just are happy giving respect to others who never try to get respect from others
45:27
you know anybody like that [Laughter] have you met them yet yeah
45:35
that's spiritual life that's amazing that you know i think a lot of people don't
understand what spiritual life is they just think you know you get a blue
45:41
home t-shirt and you're in you know you're spiritual you know and you go to the yoga
center and like gentlemen
45:47
no but but we actually study it you see you know this is this is where it's at when
45:53
you develop these high levels of tolerance humility appreciation and so forth this is
46:01
this is where it's at this is this is what spiritual life is so
46:10
if this is an exercise from our forgiveness workshop if you
46:15
can try to appreciate the person who's harmed you who you're trying to like like
you're
46:20
trying to forgive you can just say words of appreciation and see what happens see
what happens to your heart see how
46:26
you feel because even if you don't have the
46:32
consciousness yet but if you can act the way a spiritual person should act you start
to become like that
46:40
this is this is very very important point because a lot of people feel well i shouldn't
act it because it's artificial
46:47
but the point is you can change the way you feel about something by acting that way
46:54
you know right you know from experience maybe you go out in a bad mood i'm in a
bad mood today and your friend
47:01
says just be nice to people just say hello it'll change your mood so you go out you're
really bad
47:06
have a good day you know like in five minutes you feel great because isn't it because
you're acting against
47:15
how you're feeling and thinking and if you go along with how you're feeling and
thinking then you're just going to like look at
47:20
everybody and say get out of my way i don't want to see you you bother me because
you're in a bad mood so you
47:26
don't allow that bad mood
47:33
gianna dave that's a good question doesn't that contradict walking around it's
different because because it's not
47:40
it's not ego based it's service based you're trying to you're trying to
47:45
improve yourself so say if i i want to learn how to be free from ego i want to learn
how to be
47:51
humble so let me start with it and
47:56
i could say walking around like a rock star will not make you a rock star but it might
put you in the
48:02
arrogant mood of a rock star but um you want to you wanna you wanna
48:09
find someone you wanna follow and the person you wanna be like and if you act like
them
48:15
you develop the consciousness i'd i'll tell you this story this is amazing story
48:20
we we did a workshop once and one of the assignments we got was to
48:29
try to imitate someone take on their postures their voice and so on so one
48:35
lady did martin luther king so she kind of had to enter into martin luther king so
48:42
she said you know i have a dream she did it really well and all the
48:47
and the intonations of the voice she did it all perfectly
48:52
and they said what did you feel like when you were doing that and she said i felt like i
was incarnating as martin
48:59
luther king you know like that that i felt something come over me in which it wasn't
me anymore i was
49:06
feeling like his compassion his magnanimity and so forth so that's interesting
49:12
when you try to act as if you were like that the way you would like to be you start
49:19
developing that mentality you don't have to take my word for it just do it and see
49:24
try it yourself and see what happens you but you already know this nice to people
you start feeling like
49:31
being nice to people isn't it kind to people you feel more kind compassionate
49:36
um i have this experience and i've seen this many many times in a lot of the work we
49:43
do we go out to people to share to give and a lot of people are not
49:49
appreciative and it's not always easy but as we give what happens is we want to give
more and the more we give the more
49:55
we want to give it just becomes spontaneous even though maybe earlier in the day
50:00
we weren't feeling so generous but as we give like sometimes we distribute
prasadam
50:06
spiritual food or we distribute kirtan or distribute books or
50:12
knowledge we and as we give we want to give more even if we didn't feel like it by
doing
50:17
it we start to feel like it so that's a challenge for you
50:23
you can appreciate the person you're trying to forgive you can see people spiritually
and deal with
50:28
them spiritually you can practice tolerance practice this living without ego just being
real
50:37
being who you are without trying to impress anybody and you know what's the irony
if you
50:42
really want to impress someone don't try to impress them because you'll be the first
person they ever met who wasn't trying to impress
50:47
them and they will be very impressed isn't that interesting the best way to
50:55
impress someone is don't try to impress them because they they'll say this is the first
person
51:00
i've ever met who wasn't trying to impress me or get something from me or
51:06
just just be a friend be real like that so we're gonna go is the idea we go five
51:12
more minutes and then we take questions is that correct yeah so i want to say um
51:19
i was this was i i thought what i said today is very
51:24
important because it was a lot of what i realized about being spiritual and i didn't say
so much about
51:29
forgiveness and i'm sure you want to hear about it and there's one main thing that
i've been thinking
51:35
of lately that i think is very a very powerful thought
51:42
you look at your life and you look what's important in your life
51:48
and then you look at any resentment you have
51:53
towards anyone or any envy or any ill feelings whatever it is
52:00
and you ask yourself this question do i actually have time to hate this person do i
actually have
52:08
time to resent this person and if the answer is yes something's wrong that i have i
have if
52:14
i have time to hate somebody something's wrong isn't it because we should be
feeling life is valuable
52:23
life is important right we always say life is short and especially if you're on the path
of
52:29
self-realization you need all the time you can get and you've really understood what
life's about
52:34
so having said all that do you have time okay now let's go and
52:40
think ill about this person and let's think about all the bad things they did to me and
52:45
let's get upset about it and let's do you actually have time for that the obvious
answer is no we don't have
52:52
time so i want to put that little thought in your head and you can apply this thought to
so
52:58
many things in your life do i have time for jealousy do i have time for envy
53:06
do i have time for this and that you can make up your list and that can be very very
helpful
53:11
because you realize that i'm giving time and energy to something
53:16
that's only having a negative effect on me isn't it like why would i give time and
53:23
energy to something that's having a negative effect on me it doesn't make any sense
does it
53:29
but we do it all the time don't we like here in america there's a lot of
53:36
people that really are upset with the way donald trump is running the country and
they're very obsessed
53:44
with thinking about him and they're thinking about how much they don't like him and
they can give you a laundry list of all the things
53:50
they don't like and there was once a spiritual teacher
53:58
who was giving a talk and he was you know very aware of this
54:03
principle how a celebrity or a political figure can absorb your consciousness
54:10
like so it's very easy for people to become absorbed in political figures they don't like
54:15
isn't it and they're always thinking oh you hear what he did you hear what he said and
it's like
54:21
so you know when people say to me what do you think about trump i say i don't think
about him because i have
54:26
no need to think about him or use and if i think about him i'll probably just get upset
54:32
so why why would i want to think about something that just upsets me so this
spiritual teacher was was
54:40
giving a talk like 10 20 maybe it was 20 years ago 15 years ago and there was a big
court case that was
54:46
on television in america about a football player named o.j simpson who was
54:53
convict not convicted arrested for murder it was a murder trial they thought that
54:59
he murdered his ex-wife and he is a big big high-profile
55:04
football player do you do you follow american football in england
55:10
anyway so imagine like you know you have your number one football player and now
he's on television in court in a
55:17
murder trial that he murdered his ex-wife that's a big thing so this football player he's
like
55:22
huge and this in the beginning of this talk
55:27
this teacher said i have one request for you stop watching this trial because it's
55:33
just deviating your consciousness from where you need to be and where you need to
go
55:40
so that's my question to you if you have a resentment issue or some
55:46
friction with someone do you actually have the time can you afford the time to put
into it
55:52
number two is try to understand that if someone did
55:59
something wrong to you and you allow yourself to be upset and you hold on to that
you're actually punishing yourself for
56:07
the wrong that another person did you're punishing yourself for what they did wrong
like
56:13
like we see this sometimes in traffic i don't know if your country you're more polite
than we are in america but i know in
56:19
italy because i've been there there if somebody cuts you off in italy they do one of
these
56:24
right yeah i don't know what it means but i know it doesn't mean i love you
56:29
yeah not the way not with the expression on their face right
56:35
so it's like okay this guy shouldn't have cut in front of you he made a mistake and
now for his mistake you
56:41
punish yourself by allowing yourself to become angry isn't that interesting i'm going
to punish i'm going to punish myself
56:48
because he cut in front of me that's like that's what we're doing so i i this person did
something wrong they
56:54
abused me and i'm going to spend the rest of my life holding on to this and feeling
upset about what they did no
57:03
so that's what resentment is it's a form of self-punishment and so when you
57:09
start to look at it these ways you start to realize that life is like this all the time
57:15
there's so many things that happen that we hold on to and by holding on to them
what are we
57:20
doing we're punishing ourselves today my boss at work you know you're on the
subway thinking about your boss
57:26
you're at home talking about your boss you have nightmares about your boss it's like
why do you want to take your boss home
57:32
with you you don't even like him if you like him take him home with you if you don't
like him leave him in the
57:38
office right so now we punish ourselves and we think we're actually getting back at
57:45
them because then we start telling everybody my boss is so bad and we think hey i'm
stabbing him i'm getting back
57:50
but all we're doing is punishing ourselves making ourselves feel worse and that's
what resentment is
57:58
we punish ourself in the name of punishing them and that's why nelson mandela said
resentment is like drinking poison and
58:04
hoping the person will die but he also said when he was being led out of jail
58:11
people are saying you know all these people imprisoned you like how are you going
to forgive them he said if i don't forgive them even
58:18
though i'm walking out of jail i'm not walking out of jail i'll still be in the in the prison
58:23
in the prison of my own consciousness of my own hatred so he understood it clearly
he had a
58:29
very clear understanding of this principle and he wasn't in any way denying that
58:35
they did anything wrong or trying to justify it he was just stating a fact if i don't let it
go i'll still be in
58:43
prison even though my body's outside of prison then this is this is very very powerful
because you can apply
58:50
this to so many things in your life and you see that so there's so much self-
punishment
58:56
and that's why in the in the bhagavad-gita there's a verse some of you know this
59:02
verse krsna says the mind can be your friend or enemy
59:07
and if you look at your lives you'll see so many problems you have would not be
59:14
problems if you looked at them in a different way isn't it this is a problem and your
59:22
friends are looking at and saying i don't think it's a problem oh yeah it's a problem no
it's not really a yes it is a big
59:28
problem and so you're making something a problem that doesn't have to be a
problem
59:34
because this is how your mind is processing it so then your mind becomes the
enemy
59:40
and here's the amazing thing and this lady in that video who was in auschwitz said
59:47
when she forgave those people she said i realized that it's my choice to forgive it's
no
59:53
one else's choice i could do it at any time right that's important it's an important
59:59
realization because otherwise we think we think
1:00:05
no it's how it is this is just how i feel no we're allowing ourself
1:00:12
okay and i want to say one more thing which i think will help us a lot
1:00:19
and that is this it's a question first i'm going to ask a question
1:00:24
does the world need more forgiveness or does the world need more resentment okay
easy question to answer
1:00:31
right you don't have to answer because i already know your answer okay but here's
the next thing are you giving
1:00:38
the world more resentment are you giving the world more forgiveness
1:00:45
that's a it's an important question to ask yourself what are you contributing to the
world
1:00:50
more resentment or more the world needs more forgiveness contribute to it it will be
helpful not only will it help you it'll help the
1:00:56
world and so and if we want to call ourselves spiritual and we're resentful it's a big
1:01:02
contradiction so these are you know within
1:01:08
the time we have these are some points i decided to to discuss and if you want to
see the
1:01:15
courses i have if you go to bhaktieducation.com
1:01:21
we have three courses two forgiveness courses there may be um one introductory
course
1:01:27
the short one like 20 minutes and one self-esteem course and
1:01:33
for those who are within our circle like all of you we made the course
1:01:39
absolutely free and if you like it and you want to help you can give a donation but that
is totally voluntary
1:01:47
so there's no you don't have to worry about how much does it cost if you if you if you
feel you need to go
1:01:55
further in this topic you can take the course but i would like to say also even if you
don't have a big forgiveness issue or
1:02:02
any issue there's so much value in the course it's there's so many things that come
up related to the
1:02:09
topic of forgiveness um that we learn about ourselves so i think it's an extremely
valuable course
1:02:15
i've benefited tremendously tremendously no tremendously i've benefited
tremendously
1:02:23
from developing the course and teaching it because it's it's a very it's broad
spectrum it covers life in a
1:02:29
big way and forgiveness is just the tip of the iceberg okay so now
1:02:35
we can ask questions and we have questions till when for another 24 minutes is that
it is that the plan
1:02:42
yeah i think we yeah 20 minutes a little more 25 minutes up to eight
1:02:48
o'clock uk time so yeah 20 20 to 25 minutes
1:02:53
so uh please guys far away with your questions jana dev yes please jana dev
1:03:01
here's a question you can just unmute yourself or your mic
1:03:06
um thank you so much
1:03:11
there was a lot of seeds there a lot lots of seas of wisdom um and they resonated
very much um
1:03:18
some of those questions that i was typing i couldn't get the nuances trying to type so
fast trying to listen to you at the same time so there were some
1:03:24
things that i missed out that you obviously answered but one of the main things i just
wanted to ask was that
1:03:29
maybe in your course you have it but i just wanted to find out if there are
1:03:35
exercises that you offer in the course or something that you could recommend i only
say this because
1:03:41
the forgiveness um element sounds or seems very it comes across to
1:03:47
me very similar to a meditation that the buddhists do and it's for forgiving like your
neighbor and then
1:03:54
your friend and then it just starts to think of all of these people that you love and
send in love out i think it's called the loving something
1:04:00
but i just wanted to find out if there is a meditation more so because sometimes i
feel that with the body well
1:04:07
not that i feel but it's proven scientifically that the body holds on to areas so
unconsciously
1:04:14
we take a lot of our pain and trauma into certain parts of the body and then you
mentioned about uh feeling
1:04:21
or referring to ourselves in in comparison to other people as less than nothing so
how does that affect
1:04:26
the body and the psychology of trying to let go and open up because when you were
saying that i felt my posture slouch and i was like
1:04:33
but if i'm trying to be a proud person that's carrying myself of pride with the light of
krishna to be shrunken down
1:04:41
and obviously i'm seeing krishna and shiva and everybody but how does that not
mean that i can
1:04:46
still carry myself with grace and poise because the body needs to open up my chest
and the hatter
1:04:52
needs to open up in order to receive love and give love so without going on any
further if you
1:04:57
could please just give me some advice if you could suggest thank you okay um so
1:05:04
yes we have many exercises in our courses we have a foundational course
1:05:09
and that has 10 exercises and 10 lessons and we have an intensive course that has
1:05:15
i think 33 lessons and 30 exercises and these exercises are amazing and they just
1:05:23
they start transforming your heart and consciousness exercise by exercise and
they're um
1:05:31
it just works it's just doing it it's fantastic so you you can take either course if you
1:05:37
have time take the intensive it's it's a little longer but the exercises are beautiful
1:05:43
as as i think one of the problems not that i think i know one of the problems that all
of us have
1:05:52
when we talk about humility is that the we we tend to look at it through a
1:05:59
material vision because when you actually have it it's not the way you think it's going
to be when you have
1:06:05
it you know because that's why i was saying with a low self-esteem
1:06:11
it's kind of like i'm already i already feel low enough i don't want to feel any lower how
how can i be empowered and how can i
1:06:18
do my work for the world if i'm feeling humble but
1:06:24
my realization of humility it just means that you become
1:06:30
you become an instrument it's like once the false ego's out of the way then you
become god's instrument and
1:06:36
that energy can just flow through you and it's really the pain you you feel inside it's
really the false
1:06:42
ego it's not it's not the humility is causing the pain it's that there's not enough
humility so
1:06:49
when when you're saying okay i can't do this but god can do it through me that's
when
1:06:55
the magic happens and you you like you do amazing things that you never thought
you could do and so you're empowered but the
1:07:02
empowerment is not i'm great i can do it the empowerment is he's great and he can
do it through me
1:07:08
and so you do you do much more but you know the i'm great i can do it that's the
1:07:14
you know that's just normal what everybody thinks and so it's really a question of
where you get
1:07:20
your inspiration you want to get your inspiration from i'm great i can do it or you want
to get your inspiration he's great he can do it through me
1:07:26
and that was the idea in bhagavad-gita arjuna said you know i can't do this and
christian said no i'll do it you just have to be an
1:07:34
instrument i'll do it through you and then he did it and when my spiritual
1:07:39
masters through the prophet came to america when he first came he thought this is
impossible we're going to
1:07:46
present this knowledge to western hippies how will they understand and so he
1:07:51
prayed to krishna just put words in my mouth i need to know what to say
1:07:56
i need to dance to your beat because i don't know how to do this and that's what he
did and that's how he was successful
1:08:02
so that's where the real power is it's you know the buzzword the last 20 years
empowerment it power means a spiritual
1:08:07
world it's actually in sanskrit it's called aveish a vases the word in sanskrit you know
1:08:12
empowered you have avatars who are aveish avatar means one who comes down
and aveish
1:08:18
means one who has power one who descends with power but also vase is also
1:08:24
for people like you and me aveish means empowerment so ordinary people get
special empowerment and then they
1:08:31
can do something very special so you can do amazing things
1:08:38
if you're humble the more humble you are the more you'll get the empowerment and
the more your ego gets in the way
1:08:43
the more you'll lose the empowerment so it's just you know redefining what humility
is it's
1:08:49
because when we say humility you think oh if i become humble everyone's going to
take advantage of me and i'll just become a loser and i can't
1:08:55
do anything no it's actually the opposite you'll be the most powerful because now
1:09:01
you're connected to the most powerful does that make sense
1:09:07
or you have more to ask good
1:09:14
fantastic now you're full of gun giant dave is now full of knowledge and
1:09:21
enlightenment okay next question
1:09:35
sorry i think sarah dear wants to talk but she's muted
1:09:42
and shyam you're muted also jardia do you have a question
1:09:48
um yes i do have a question
1:09:54
so my question what ma is how can we discern between the
1:10:00
difference between the need to forgive and the need to address you know an
1:10:05
issue or behavior that we know is wrong and might be harmful to us or might be
harmful to others
1:10:12
if we allow it to continue so how can we both forgive but make sure
1:10:17
that you know someone doesn't continue to do something which is ultimately also
1:10:22
going to be harmful to them yeah that's a good question and they're they're not
mutually exclusive either
1:10:29
you forgive or you punish or you do you deal with the situation
1:10:34
you don't forgive you don't deal with the situation you forgive they're not mutually
exclusive i i think
1:10:40
of the example that comes to mind for me as a judge
1:10:45
because the judge cannot be partial if he's going to judge a case and so he becomes
the murderer now if
1:10:51
the judge is holding on to like any kind of issue about murder then how's he gonna
1:10:59
how's he gonna abducate the case properly so he has to ask ask he has to have no ill
intent
1:11:06
no ill feelings towards this person then he can be objective and i think in the same
way if we truly
1:11:12
want to deal with a an abuse if we first forgive the person
1:11:18
and then take practical action to rectify the situation whatever that may mean in the
particular
1:11:24
incident that you're in then it's the best of both worlds and
1:11:29
it's the best way to do it number one you don't hold on to resentment so you're not
1:11:34
you're not contaminating yourself you're not harming yourself and number two you
can be
1:11:40
compassionately deal with the situation and compassionately dealing with it may
mean
1:11:45
that this person needs to to
1:11:50
be tried for their crimes that maybe and normally we would say why would you
1:11:56
try them for their crimes if you forgive them because like you said because
1:12:01
their their actions are destructive and would could continually be destructive
1:12:07
to me or to other people and for my own for my own well-being and the well-being of
others
1:12:14
in some cases it's necessary that legal action be taken against these people to
reform them or and stop what they're
1:12:20
doing but you can best do it if you actually forgive them then there's no
1:12:26
aggression there's no aggression there there's just that we practically need to deal
with this situation
1:12:32
let's say your business partner stole your money so you go to court you want to get
the money back it's not like
1:12:39
you're going to hate him for the rest of your life you hate what he did you're upset
obviously but you don't
1:12:46
want to go to court enrage you just want okay let him go he's did what he did but i
need to get this
1:12:52
back and no longer can we be partners so there's a fine line there but
1:12:59
my realization about this is if i don't do that if i think i need to hold on to these
1:13:05
resentment to rectify the situation materially then again i'm punishing myself i'm
1:13:11
harming myself i'm carrying this around i'd rather not carry it around it's it's it's very
harmful spiritually
1:13:18
but it's very harmful physically also and that i think it's something important for us to
know that
1:13:24
resentment is very harmful physically so it's you know toxic poison in terms
1:13:30
of emotional toxic poison you could say
1:13:35
so do what you have to do to rectify the situation or protect people from the behavior
of this person or make
1:13:41
this person's behavior known and the same time forgive them not mutually exclusive
1:13:47
does that make sense yes it does make sense
1:13:55
thank you very much can i just ask a short follow-up question
1:14:01
yes so we see like both in the case of nelson mandela you know who like
1:14:07
publicly stated that he forgave the people who imprisoned him for 40 years of his life
and this this lady
1:14:15
you mentioned eva who survived the holocaust and then publicly also forgave the
doctors we saw that there was like
1:14:22
this um you know publicly there was a lot of resentment towards them then for
1:14:28
forgiving so my question is because they they said like by forgiving you are you know
you are basically um
1:14:35
condoning you know consenting i think they're condoning yeah you're condoning
what has happened to you and to us
1:14:41
so my question is why do we associate resentment with some type of power that
1:14:47
we hold over others and why don't we associate you know forgiveness with power
1:14:54
i can speak for myself that before i really understood this topic then
1:15:01
i i more or less thought that way as well and holding onto resentment does give a
1:15:08
false sense of power that now i i can hold you
1:15:13
liable for what you've done all i have to do is just let the world know and and i i have
the right to punish and
1:15:21
so forth for what you did but if the whole world lives that way is the
1:15:27
world's bad enough as it is if the whole world lives that way it's going to be much
worse and i often ask the question what do you
1:15:35
think is going to be a better world a world in which people are forgiving or a world in
which people are not and of course everyone says
1:15:41
yes the world in which we're forgiving so the connotation that forgiving means
1:15:48
condoning that has to be cleared up and that's i think where people go off and i i
know someone
1:15:53
who's jewish and he said you know we shouldn't forgive what the nazis did and i
always say you forgive for yourself
1:16:00
you forgive for the world but you don't condone so you hate the sin not the sinner so
as long as we you know i think the fear is like
1:16:07
let's say with auschwitz and that whole thing the fear is that if we don't if we
1:16:13
forgive then we'll forget and then it'll happen again isn't it
1:16:18
isn't that kind of the but that is not necessarily true
1:16:24
we can forgive and still make the world aware this is what happened and this should
1:16:29
never happen again and we're going to move on in our lives
1:16:34
we're not going to allow we're not going to burden ourself with the pain because part
part of the problem is is
1:16:41
if you don't forgive you stay connected with that with that event and it just becomes
a
1:16:47
negative emotional experience albeit subtle for your whole life and it affects you
1:16:53
so you don't want to do that but you want definitely in this case you want the world to
know or
1:16:59
in nelson mandela's case he wants the world to know what went on during apartheid
1:17:06
but he knows it's not going to be effective to take aggression against the people
1:17:12
who imprisoned him because that's what they did to him and two wrongs don't make
a right so my understanding of it is is that
1:17:19
it's like you know you know the saying fight fire with fire but on a practical level you
never fight
1:17:26
fire with fire you fight it with water or other ingredients that put it out so i think not
forgiving is kind of like
1:17:33
we have to fight back with the same consciousness that came to us but the same
consciousness that imprisoned him is not the
1:17:40
consciousness that he wanted to fight back with he wanted to fight back with
something higher was forgiveness because he felt that
1:17:47
would be better and so it doesn't mean he didn't recognize what went wrong but he
didn't
1:17:52
want to take the same actions they took and so that's how i've understood it and if
you look at your life
1:17:59
you'll see this it's a huge temptation to fight fire with fire right somebody's aggressive
with you you're
1:18:04
aggressive with them somebody mistreats you you mistreat them but if the world's
going to be better
1:18:10
and we're going to be better we have to respond to lower consciousness with higher
consciousness
1:18:17
we have to respond to people not with the same negativity that they
1:18:22
throw at us but with something higher if we respond with the same negativity then
1:18:27
we're going to destroy the world isn't it i mean just think every person who hurt you
you hurt them equally
1:18:34
and we all did this what kind of world would this be we'd all be dead by now
1:18:39
and there's actually a statement in mahabharat where this point is made it was made
by
1:18:45
yudhisthira yudhisthira is a warrior and he said if we don't forgive we will kill one
another
1:18:50
because we'll just retaliate with aggression for the aggression that was put towards
us and will destroy
1:18:56
one another so that's how i understand it so your point is well taken
1:19:02
in it it doesn't mean we're condoning by forgiving it means we're raising
consciousness to
1:19:08
a solution that will be better because aggression is never a solution and if
aggression caused the problem how
1:19:13
does that become the solution and we see look at all the wars what have they solved
1:19:18
maybe they solved overpopulation you know maybe that's why there are wars
because
1:19:24
the powers that be want to reduce the population of the world but they haven't
solved anything and so
1:19:29
you we have to dismiss this idea of fight fire with fire it's it's not you don't fight fire
with
1:19:36
fire you fight it with water you fight darkness with light you don't fight darkness with
darkness
1:19:42
and that was nelson mandela's point i'm going to fight darkness with light i'm not
going to
1:19:47
fight it with darkness otherwise you just have more darkness does that make sense
is that okay or you have
1:19:56
yes thank you very much i appreciated that answer important point yes can i make a
comment
1:20:06
you can maybe it's also a question actually i found i found very um
1:20:14
interesting insightful and also yeah insightful the principle that forgives forgiveness
1:20:20
is is um is something that we should put into practice as you spoke
1:20:26
you spoke of the importance of for example showing appreciation to someone who
might have mistreated us
1:20:33
or someone who's who has hurt us and so forgiveness is
1:20:38
not just a feeling or it's just not an abstract abstract idea or
1:20:46
is actually is actually action i mean and this is i think this is something that i
1:20:51
struggle to understand sometimes because we study the books we actually we
might feel also fires we
1:20:56
might be intellectually very fond of understanding the spiritual
1:21:01
principles but the yeah until until we practice that principle
1:21:09
i think forgiveness is one of the quality of the brahmana in the 16th chapter but
unless we actually practice
1:21:15
it even if we haven't even if we're not convinced about it if we actually start
1:21:21
practicing it maybe indeed time will actually internalize it how come is so difficult
1:21:27
to put into practice even if we study or sometimes we forget
1:21:32
we have i'll tell you a story it indirectly answers the question then i'll elaborate this
this student
1:21:40
uh buddhism was given a mantra and this teacher said you have to chant this mantra
thousands of times
1:21:45
and he said why did so much and he said well for so many lifetimes
1:21:51
you've been chanting the other mantras you know all for me it's mine i want more so
now
1:21:56
you have to you have to you know get the scales up on the other mantras
1:22:01
so why it's so difficult is because of lifetimes and lifetimes we've been
1:22:06
thinking and acting in one way and so now when we understand what to do
1:22:11
we still have the momentum and the habit of those other lives and so that's what
predominates it's like
1:22:17
it's like here's the keyboard right we're playing and the teacher says no don't play it
1:22:24
like that i said but i've been playing it like that i've been holding my fingers like that
for 20 years they say no
1:22:30
you got to put your fingers like that and for me that's like torture because my fingers
want to go a certain
1:22:35
way and you say okay that's muscle memory but we have emotional muscle memory
we have consciousness muscle memory
1:22:42
quote-unquote muscle memory and so you know have you ever understood
something that's amazing
1:22:49
i've understood it and then like the next day you acted a total opposite way have you
ever done that yeah
1:22:57
or two days later or three days later or whatever it's it's it's the habit and and so
1:23:04
you have to consciously practice practice practice acting in the way that you know is
right and
1:23:11
gradually it starts to become the new program we are so programmed through not
just
1:23:17
this life this life is bad enough we're so programmed through this life what to speak
of all
1:23:22
the other lives how programmed we are and and that's why sometimes
1:23:28
you're thinking of something or you're desiring something and you're asking yourself
why am i desiring this i don't even want
1:23:34
it isn't it and the mind saying you should do this and you're saying to the mind why i
1:23:41
didn't want it i stopped doing that 10 years ago but it's like
1:23:47
you know it's like the stain on the shirt and you're trying to wash it out and use bleach
and use
1:23:52
every you know everything you could find on google and there's still this little stain
there it just doesn't want to go
1:23:58
away that's why and when you understand that it's very liberating because you
understand
1:24:04
it's actually not me that's saying do this it's the habit that's saying do this
1:24:09
and i have a voice in this i don't have to do it like i can talk to the heaven and say
sorry
1:24:15
habit i'm not i'm not doing that i have i have my own intention and this is what's it's
so
1:24:23
interesting about the mind because unless you separate from the mind you won't be
able to do that
1:24:28
the mind will say something and you'll say okay the mind said buy this let's go out
and buy it. the
1:24:34
mind says i need to have this let's go out and do it but if you think wait a minute
that's not what i want
1:24:40
that's just my mind saying and i don't have to then you start to get liberated and say
okay so now let
1:24:46
me act in the way i want to act even though maybe it's not natural but let me do it
and as i do it more and
1:24:51
more and more it starts to become my way of being and then i learn
1:24:57
from this that i can do that all the time with my mind it says do one thing but i don't
have to
1:25:02
i can say wait a minute mind i don't want to do that that's that's big and liberating
because
1:25:08
most people don't say that most people aren't that powerful they can say their mind
says do this and they
1:25:13
say no i'm not going to do that that's not good for me that's
1:25:19
that's a sign of very successful people they can do that right control the passions
and
1:25:25
i feel like doing this but it's the wrong time don't do it i i have i have to deal with that
every
1:25:32
day in the work i do because i'm my own boss so in a sense i could do whatever i
want
1:25:37
whenever i want but that's not the best way to operate i have to do what's important
and so the
1:25:43
mind says why don't you do this it's fun and then i have to say shut up mind
1:25:49
i have to do this other thing and then as i practice doing it becomes
1:25:54
easier right so that's the price we pay for having done all those crazy things
1:26:02
in our past in this life in the past lives you know it's like i i became a monk when i
was 19.
1:26:12
and that was 51 and a half years ago right so 51 in a year
1:26:18
and i grew up in the 60s so what's the 60s you know the 60s beetles stones whatever
else right
1:26:24
so the reality is i can remember all those songs
1:26:31
i can't i can't erase them they got in there right yeah yeah yeah
1:26:38
yeah it's in there yesterday it's in there we all live in a yeah
1:26:45
it's all in there i can't get it out but i don't go around all day singing
1:26:52
them i go around singing hare krishna so if that song comes to my mind then i'm
going to have to play the maha mantra for it
1:27:02
krishna instead of yellow submarine i have to sing that right so it's it's just what we
have to deal
1:27:08
with it's in there you know and we're trying to purify it
1:27:14
transcend it or engage it you know somehow rather right
1:27:20
that's what we have to do it got in there and maybe on very high levels of
1:27:25
spiritual life it's kind of erased it becomes more or less irrelevant because you lose
the taste
1:27:32
for it so that's it's a reality you are who you are and you know it's it's what you're
1:27:38
dealing with right now and so deal with it now then and desire to be someone else
but just don't
1:27:45
be depressed about where you're at now but you know to want to be more advanced
is fantastic
1:27:52
okay thank you so much thank you so much i think this is uh
1:27:58
such a relevant point to to accept i think that's the right word to
1:28:03
accept where you're at and yeah moving forward from that point rather than trying to
you know be someone you're not
1:28:13
yeah because i mean accepting where you're at is so simple because it's like i give
the example it's like
1:28:21
you turn on your gps and it says you are here and it's it's you're so far away and
1:28:26
you're like oh i hate being here it's so far well you know you're five hours from
1:28:31
your destination it's just where you are yeah but it's five hours and it's so long and i
don't like driving
1:28:37
yeah but you know it's just where you are and you'll get there just keep driving
1:28:42
so i think some of us are like that oh i hate where i'm at i hate who i am no you are
who you are and you are where
1:28:49
at where you're at and that's not going to change right now but as you're moving
forward celebrate you're going forward the destination is
1:28:55
there that's you know instead of being depressed about where you're at why not
1:29:00
celebrate where you're going you know i always joke you know you're
1:29:06
you know you're flying you're gonna fly you know to some island and you know
1:29:12
have this paradise and you yeah but the plane trip is so long and my luggage is so
heavy you know
1:29:19
we're going to this beautiful island why aren't you happy yeah but you know it's
gonna be such a hard trip and we have to get up early
1:29:25
people would think you're crazy wouldn't they i think you know why aren't you just
thinking about this island and the white
1:29:31
sand beaches and the aqua water and the palm trees and the coconuts and the
water is like so warm and it's a
1:29:38
beautiful hotel and everything's nice yeah but it'd be so hard to get there and you
know i hate to treat you know i
1:29:44
hate to travel and you know it's like that you know we're traveling on the
1:29:49
spiritual path you know why don't you be excited about it the destination is amazing
1:29:57
i am who i am right now at this moment and there's nothing i can do about it other
than try to be
1:30:03
better in the next moment that's all i can do and when you accept that you'll be shanti
shanti you'll be
1:30:09
okay you'll be much more peaceful wonderful um thank you so much for that
1:30:18
it's four four minutes past eight okay time's up thank you so much
1:30:24
uh mahatma prabhu for being with us thank you for your time so many so many
transformational points
1:30:32
and i guess we all agree that we don't wanna we don't wanna have time for
resentment
1:30:38
and no we're too busy with other things yeah and the goal of the spiritual world
1:30:44
and service and bhakti and bhakti life bhakti lifestyle is so so beautiful that there's no
really time
1:30:51
for or resentment and thank you so much for that we hope
1:30:56
you be able to join us again one day soon because it's so
1:31:03
it's also good and inspiring to spend time with you thank you for your time again for
your association and um
1:31:10
yeah should i put in the address did anyone put in the address for the
1:31:16
for the course for the yeah yeah well the education yeah
1:31:24
it said it's there yeah under
1:31:30
um that's that's a link to one of the courses and there's more so if you just bark the
1:31:38
education.teachable.com that will take you and it's under d
1:31:43
d put it in right ah okay let me post it yeah i will
1:31:50
share it once more i'll cop it yeah okay just the buck the education.teach
1:31:58
that's enough all right okay super thank you thank you again
1:32:05
a wonderful rest of your day in florida and hopefully to connect with you again
1:32:13
very soon hare krishna thank you
1:32:18
thank you all for coming we'll see you next time haribo thank you thank you
everybody