SDG Maharaja Health Update
“Sorry I have been remiss in my service of keeping the devotees in the loop with Satsvarupa Maharaja’s weekly health report. Hopefully I won’t have another relapse.
Over the last weeks a new phenomena has emerged. Three times he has tried to move from point A to point B without assistance. He fell twice, but fortunately there were no breaks or bruises. Our concern is growing. We are making a schedule of monitors so that Maharaja is not alone for most of the time. This puts more stress on the health care team, so it would be nice if volunteers come forward to help with this new service. The monitors do shifts upstairs while Satsvarupa Maharaja writes, chants, listens to tapes, rests, and sometimes engages personally with the monitor as he desires. It is a personal and necessary service, along with other services in the house or garden, such as cooking, cleaning, weeding, etc. Anyone interested in helping out can contact Krsna devi dasi at [email protected] or text her at (518) 822-7636. Thank you.
Hare Krsna,
Baladeva
If you would like to help, please contact Kṛṣṇa-bhajana dāsa at [email protected] or [email protected] and we will find you a service that utilizes your talents.
Just finished sixty-four rounds. The last three rounds were timed as 6.06 min., 6.08 min. and 5.50 min. I was chanting them at a rapid whisper, but I could hear each syllable and mantra as well as when I do it slowly. But you can’t hear it as loudly as when you actually come up to vibrating sound with the diaphragm.
******
Your thumb is a little stiff from all the bead fingering. Woke during the night several times. Hope this day I’ll be able to chant my rounds with care and attention. You discovered you can chant faster, but it’s got to be done carefully, in order to pass the test.
******
Last night’s meeting went for over an hour. I began by playing a tape excerpt of Prabhupada saying Krsna consciousness can be executed by the tongue, “Chant Hare Krsna and when you get tired, take prasadam.” I said let’s go strong for the last two days of vrata. (We never made a formal vow, but we keep speaking of it as a vrata.) I said we want to say it’s great and wonderful on this vrata, but we may have gut reactions that we wish it were over. So be honest, but let’s not go downhill or peter out at the end. Keep up our expectations and give heart to it.
******
What would Srila Prabhupada say of our chanting sixty-four rounds in seclusion? I answer that he said more than sixteen minimum was good. Also we are taking a rare increase for only a week with hope it will improve the quality of our normal sixteen. And Srila Prabhupada said that our chanting should be with priti, with love, not mumbled inattentively. Then I read from Caitanya-caritamrta, Adi 7, how Lord Caitanya followed the order of His spiritual master, who called Him a fool and told Him to always chant the Hare Krsna mantra. I said I feel like a fool, don’t know anything, but I go on chanting with faith. Chant constantly was the order of Lord Caitanya’s guru, and it is an order given in an exemplary way—in other words, the bona fide spiritual master continues to give us that order. We can’t study Vedanta in this age (or go to raganuga), so let us chant constantly. By chanting you can see the lotus feet of the Lord and render Him direct service.
******
Madhu spoke how early in the morning he’s been offering prayers along with his japa, saying Siksastakam in between rounds and personal expressions like, “Please accept me.” He quoted statements about the mood of prayer. I thought that was a vital addition to my talk which focused more on mechanical aspects. (I’d spoken how I discovered I could chant much faster, save three minutes per round, if I whisper them audibly and breathe differently.) But he said after lunch he has no energy to pray. (I thought Krsna must be just as pleased with him even when he’s tired, as long as he uses his available energy in the service of the Lord.)
******
Manu read a prayer of Haridasa Thakura’s from Hari-nama-cintamani where he begs Lord Caitanya for the nectar of the holy name. Manu said he feels he is better able to control his mind this week, breaking habits of staying up late at night and instead telling his mind to go to sleep. He admitted he has been looking forward to the end of this week, but now he wants it to be good in the last two precious days.
******
Bhakti-rasa responded to my statements by saying he’s not “jollying meself” to feel that it’s great to be here, but that he has deepened his appreciation for it. He said he already went mentally back to his temple in Newcastle and considered problems there and activi¬ties he’ll be doing there. He said when he is in Newcastle, he wants to be on a retreat like this, with me or in the holy dhama. So now that he’s got this opportunity, he wants to cling to it and only chant, only chant, sixty-four rounds a day.
******
I agreed with Manu that I too felt increased ability to control the mind. We make a simple mistake when we think that we are the mind. I’ve been dwelling on thoughts about the GBC’s resolutions from various points of view. It seems irresistible that I do so. But then I saw it was becoming like a mere curiosity, socializing, gossip. I said to myself, “Why should you gossip? Better stop this and turn to the priority of paying attention to chanting Hare Krsna mantra.”
“Just hear,” Srila Prabhupada said, and that will control the mind.
******
Chanting and reading form the life of a devotee. Very nice to apply yourself to those. When you hear about Krsna, it’s bhagavata-dharma. And that’s all you need to know. Turn your attention to hearing about Krsna. Then you’ll preach. Or else how can you preach?
******
So men, so me
whatcha gonna do today?
We is gonna chant
Hare Krsna mantras all day
like a man working on
the dock all day off-loading
bananas.
(Beware the tarantula)
Yeah, me handled them
deftly and carefully,
under the eye of the foreman,
“Chant, chant”
“Day-oh!
Daylight come and me
wanna go home.”
Harry Bellefonte sang
but did he ever work like
that? On stage with his shirt
open, the best good-looking guy,
he worked the nightclubs,
“Day-oh! Daylight come and me
wanna go home”—
back to Godhead.
We are not in that world.
But we may learn from them
rhythms and rhymes.
Our quest is good chanting.
It’s the means and the
end. It’s the medicine.
(Prasadam is the diet)
Even when it seems bitter to us
jaundiced souls
let’s go on with it.
******
Another day. This morning I deliberately indulged in feverish literary planmaking while chanting japa. I’m guilty of it. I saw it happening and I said, “Well, all right, let me do it, these ideas are coming, I need to write them down. I’ve been waiting for these ideas and now they’ve finally come for a next book. Anyway, this is service too, to Krsna.” Typical rationalizations that I make. So nevertheless, I’m going on with the sixty-four round vrata and I’m not so far behind schedule. But I just wanted to admit that here on the morning walk.
pp. 52-54
Before entering the ocean,
we bend down
and touch the water to our heads,
because Lord Caitanya
bathed the body of Haridasa Thakur
in the sea
and then declared,
“From this day on,
this sea has become
a great pilgrimage site.”
Haridasa Thakur knew
the Lord soon would close
His pastimes in this world.
And he didn’t want to see it.
In old age, Haridasa
slowed down his chanting
of 300,000 daily names.
And he begged the Lord
“Kindly let my body
fall down in Your presence.”
So the Lord came to Haridasa
with many devotees,
and they loudly chanted.
Holding the lotus feet
of Lord Caitanya
on his heart,
and taking the dust of the feet
of all the devotees
on his head,
Haridasa passed away.
And they were reminded
of the passing away of Bhisma.
On the beach
before the steady roar
the spewing of whitecaps
on a windy winter day,
I think of the Puri brahmanas
who say we are bogus.
Even when we chanted Hare Krsna,
they denounced us to the crowd:
“At any cost, you cannot go in!
No Hindu in Puri
should associate with you!”
But no one restricts us
from sitting on the sand.
The Puri sea
is open for all
just as the sun-god
pierces through the clouds.
And the Namacarya is blessing us:
there is nothing to be sorry for.
Our duties prompt us to leave Puri. We should not become overfamiliar in a holy dhama, thinking, “I have seen all the places. And I know well the mentality of the residents.”
But how to avoid an offensive attitude toward those who reject us? Don’t we have to defend against their slander of the holy name? At least we cannot agree with them and disbelieve in the power of the holy name to transform the most sinful. Isn’t their criticism a criticism of our Founder-Acarya? So how can we be silent? For myself, I have not remained entirely silent, but I have mostly let the panditas speak for themselves. There is no need to be personally angry or to seek confrontations with them. Certainly enough of Purushottama-ksetra was made available to us. We were even able to honor Jagannatha prasada and to chant outdoors within sight of Patita Pavana.
The residents of Purushottama-ksetra are fortunate despite their particular viewpoint. Somehow Lord Jagannatha engages them as His servants and that is His mercy. He allows them to chant His name and to live in His dhama. If He does not like it, then by His will—not ours—He will bring about change. We should not allow ourselves to be baited into calling others bad names just because we are called a bad name. When Lord Caitanya was offended by Ramacandra Puri, He said, “He has said nothing wrong. A sannyasi should be very strict.” Similarly, the panditas are right in noting that we are lowborn. In these bodies we were addicted to meat-eating, and they will not let us forget it. So it is up to us to tolerate these reminders and prove ourselves true followers of Lord Caitanya: Let them force us to be humble, lower than the straw in the street.
And they were right to point us out as ignorant, wearing shoes on harinama. “They don’t know anything!” they said. And when I was writing my notes in the house of Sarvabhauma Bhattacarya, a boy of that house remarked to Narada Rsi, “What is he writing? What does he know? I know the scriptures very well.” At first I took his words as outrageous pride. But if I look within myself, considering his words, I find they are true. It is I who am proud. I am proud of my material education and my modern American English expressions. I am proud of my so-called fair body although it is meant for death. I am proud of my “mleccha aristocracy” as an American, and proud of my material wealth.
The panditas say to their fellow Puri residents, “Ask these Americans for money. We can use it in the service of Jagannatha.” These words are also true—we must give up all our money for the service of the Lord. We prefer to spend for Krsna on the order of our spiritual master in the Krsna consciousness movement, but at least the panditas are right in reminding us that wealth is one of our very few qualifications. Thinking in this way, I find the goddess Saraswati speaking through the apparently insulting words of the panditas. And I feel relieved of my offensive resentment towards the residents of the dhama.
Even if the brahmanas did let us in the temple, would I be able to see Jagannath Swami with love? By not allowing us darshan, the panditas increase our eagerness: they create in us a mood of separation from Krsna. They turn us to the holy name as our only resort. For these things we thank them.
pp. 81-84
Always remember Krsna and serve Krsna. Literature devoid of krsna-katha is like a pilgrimage place for crows.
One professor yesterday—Chinese—said, “Who cares about this?” indicating that the important issues are starvation and politics.
They do not know our BBT books can alleviate all suffering conditions.
Yesterday I got another important, inspiring letter from His Divine Grace. He said service to Krsna is not stuck up in one particular service (such as book distribution), but depends on sincere service in any of the nine ways of service. Of the nine ways, sravanam kirtanam is very important. Lecturing is also sravanam kirtanam. I will try, therefore, to put together a preaching program, and at the same time, maintain the library program, which is so dear to His Divine Grace.
Also, the inspiring instruction he gave is that one has to render sincere service—whatever one can do or offer, that is suitable and best. “It is not inglorious” for one to think his own service is best. All departments of service are absolute, but one must try to do his service perfectly.
BECOME CONVINCED—I was recently reading books Srila Prabhupada wrote out in longhand as early as 1955 at the Radha-Damodara temple—Science of Devotion, Lord Chaitanya, His Sannyasa and Sankirtana—many of which were never published but were forerunners of his later works, The Nectar of Devotion, Teachings of Lord Caitanya. It is inspiring to meditate on my spiritual master writing so extensively in those days when he was all alone with no big ISKCON movement. I would very much like to write following in his footsteps, out of preaching mood and as sannyasa duty for self-purification. He wrote on and on and produced so many works, even then, which are now benefiting thousands of persons all over the world. Srila Prabhupada once wrote me that by always writing, one’s language will be sharper when he preaches, and one will always be forced—in choosing words—to think of Krsna. Topics later used, early versions of books, bases for philosophic themes are constantly developed as he writes.
Preach, preach, preach, preach. Two classes so far today; one more to go. Four tomorrow. The students were responsive, more or less favorable. It is a great challenge to speak Bhagavad-gita to groups of classes hour after hour. Now I am also getting them to chant. Professors are expressing sincere gratitude that we are coming. Go on with it.
Gave five classes today at Texas Tech., the last in Physics. Arguments with scientists. Afterwards I felt a vague sadness and am trying to understand it. It must be that I am sorry I am not a pure devotee and sorry that most people are not taking to Krsna consciousness.
I must not make myself out to be a special devotee or a special writer, but I should accept as much service as possible. I pray that Krsna will continue to engage me in His service and the service of my spiritual master I feel now that I must continue this college touring and lecturing with undaunted, undisappointed spirit. The real thing is to be absorbed in Krsna.
pp. 43-53
When I proposed
to our congregation that they should
simplify (quoting Thoreau)
one man objected.
He said, “That’s
nirjana-bhajana. We need to work
and form a society.” I said I’m
not against that, I’m just reminding
us not to leave out chanting and hearing
on the plea of money-work.
“That’s good for you but not for
me.” Or—”Who is he to tell
others to be happy? He chews
his fingernails. He’s a do-
nothin’ worrier.”
Say His names. Go ahead
say any name of
God you find in your
religion. Say it with love.
Just say it.
The rabbits go after the
green blades.
Ireland is cool
so the rabbits have a good coat
even in summer.
But they are tasty
to the carnivores.
Being alone is nice if you
have friends nearby. It gets
dry and you have doubts but
you reason it out:
I’m okay reading and
later I’ll travel and be with
people.
What about NATO and African
countries?
If one person becomes
a pure devotee he could transform the
whole world.
Anyone want to go for it?
There are many
spiritual virtues in the sastras.
How many do you possess?
You ought to be friendly, silent,
poetic, grave, attached to the
Absolute, tolerant, merciful, a
good preacher . . .
It’s a good idea to be silent
sometimes, to pray, but later to go
out and tell people about Krsna.
Groping your way . . .
Take the remnants of the pear.
It’s maha-prasadam. The
acaryas have given us these
happy ideas: if only I could feel
them as real as the pear.
Child abuse: I didn’t know
anything about it in my office
on Gurley Street. I was happy because
Prabhupada was pleased with our
pioneering school.
I campaigned that parents should
stay away.
Left that place and took sannyasa.
Ex-kids are angry now.
That’s another reason to stay apart, watch the rye grass,
no choice but to hear the rooks and the buffets of wind.
Spread Krsna consciousness. Like jam on a piece of bread? Like pushing it into their heads? No, by loving acts and vigorous preaching—the holy names, prasadam, sanctified temples and farms, examples of elders and young leaders too.
Go on your own, forward with friends, don’t unnecessarily kill
animals, read about Dhruva Maharaja and everything in Srimad-Bhagavatam,
don’t skip anything.
Happy is the man who
dies, Gargi, knowing the eternal self.
Happy the person who realizes his
loving connection with krsna-bhakti.
Happy the conditioned soul who meets
the bona fide spiritual master,
who recovers his eyeglasses
after the monkey has
stolen them (provided they’re still
in working order). Happy the
detached person who can accept
his fate philosophically—either
I get a house or I don’t. The
main thing is to be able to chant
on my beads.
A little while ago I felt I was going batty
banging my mind again and again
on Svayambhuva’s speech to
Dhruva, telling him how great
God is.
Thought I was loony
spaced out, asleep or grogged
or just bewildered but
loving the doggedness of
the attempt and knowing
I won’t give up.
Dhruva is a perfect gentleman, a
great warrior and devotee. He’ll
stop killing the Yaksas.
Srila Prabhupada says, “We are absolutely
incompetent.”
The heavy, cold wind
chills the house,
seems strange or wrong for almost-July.
But it’s normal for
Ireland, especially Rathdangan
in Wicklow. The house is
rattling with the buffets.
The pine trees nod.
Rabbits have buried themselves in
the grass as if to keep warm,
wind ruffling in
brown-grey fur.
Life is not an idea only. Neither
is it only happy. It’s a mixture
of body and soul, misery and
illusion of happiness. That’s
what the Sastras say. We’re
each a spiritual spark, eternal
servant of God who invites us
back to Godhead. You can take
it or leave it, you’ve got that
free will.
It was good to honor the dream
and let the conscious self go
with it.
He can give a million happy
ideas and their consummation
in a moment.
God is Truth, Love,
Beauty. All fear and bad
comes when you forget
Him, when you doubt
and disobey.
We’re each
persons, not impersonal.
We differ.
Let us not fight,
or kill, hurt.
Many admissions
come out
in a poem of happiness,
and I hope
something useful to
the solitary reader.
pp. 31-37
“Plate, plate.” He comes for our plates before we are even finished eating. I had to wait for the cleaning lady to leave before I could offer the food and eat. I ended up having to dress Prabhupada while she was here because she was taking so long. The mornings here are busy with treatment; the afternoons slower.
I find I have time here to face my inadequacies and my feeling about them—my lack of devotion to the holy name, my occasional feelings of alienation.
Is that someone knocking on my door? What next? The false ego makes us suffer. False ego means the concept that we are the body and that we belong to a certain nation or race. Or a pride in accomplishments. The real self is humble and contrite. T???d api.
When the emotions and thoughts are more than I can handle I lie down or ask M. to come over to speak about our time here. Will we actually stay here for an entire month?
Yes, I guess we will. But I don’t want to overreact. Just go with my present feelings and try to face them calmly.
It’s best to accept our aloneness. Be positive. I want to go beyond PR presentations of myself and find the core. Don’t stay melancholy, but feel the melancholy if it’s honest. Then ask to be picked up and guided.
Gone are the days of the one-hour writing sessions. I push to get in a half hour or to make a simple portrait in color.
******
Harping on something here: I won’t take orders.
Well, are you lazy?
I need to work in truth. It’s not easy. I wait for K???a to reveal to me and to give me the strength to carry out His will in my life.
Palm tree clack
and the Lord reveals Himself to
pure devotees. Doubters
get their doubts assured.
I drink coconut water
after offering it to my Lord.
The day is not hot, and
I lie 20–30 minutes in
the cold tub bath while a
gruff attendant,
who speaks only a few words
of English, stands outside
the bathroom listening
to the cricket match.
I feel uncomfortably cool, but slowly
sprinkle water on my chest as
they instructed me.
I wait and ask K???a
for direction.
******
Low points in day:
I didn’t count as low points admitting that I have no one to turn to. As a high point I wanted to ask someone to guide me. Then I realized it would have to be ?r?la Prabhup?da in separation. I also liked the “secret” thought that during the day of health regime, my mind may give me access to deeper things about myself and K???a. Be awake for it.
******
I jump, startled, when someone knocks on my door or makes a sudden noise outside.
That short “boy” (as the doctor refers to him) whom I call gruff, has a soft side. He looked at the altar and was curious about Prabhup?da. Twice he said it was, “Very nice,” and now in that gruff way he said, “Plate, plate.” He picked up the picture of the Six Gosv?m?s and naively asked if I was one of them.
No, I said, they are the Six Gosv?m?s of V?nd?vana. He couldn’t understand that; very little English. He picked up the picture of R?dh? and K???a, mostly to examine the plastic picture frame. Perhaps he has never seen one before. He asked if I was from America. Yes. I told him that the man in cottage #2 is Irish. No comprehend. Ireland, I said. No comprehend. He furrows his brow and repeats the word, “Ire-land,” but with no recognition of the name.
I said, “Ireland is near England.”
Oh … he says with a deep respect, “England.”
Mother England.
******
Drink your water, kiddies. They have given me six quart bottles, but I’m not drinking them down as fast as they expect me to. When they bring in a new bottle, I accept it, but stash the old ones in corners or in the closet.
Gruff-soft asked me, “How long?”
I told him we were staying a month. He repeated, “A month.” Seems like a long time to both of us. To him it means he brings me the bathtub every day for a month and collects my plate. After he left, I picked up the picture of the Six Gosv?m?s to see what he may have found. None of them wear eyeglasses or look the least like me. Our ISKCON painter has made them rather European looking, so perhaps that’s what he saw. Was I San?tana in his eyes? Gop?la Bha??a? If I spoke Hindi I could have said, “See this dirt they stand on? I’m not worthy of even a grain of sand in the land where they walked and did their bhajana.”
******
High points and low points—some are hard to distinguish. As I write, I hear violins from a TV drama. Prabhup?da has had his drink for enough time now. Go take the cup away and give him back his beads. He’ll look at you. He’s the friendly Gau??ya ?c?rya in this room.
******
There are four security guards in blue uniforms and berets, some with two stars on their epaulets. They stand around in a little sentry box and keep a record of timings and happenings. They give an air of protection to the place, which also has high walls with barbed wire on top. We inmates walk back and forth on the sandy path, and some of us chant while we can.
******
It will get darker later; I still have time to read. Gradually, as I learn the routine here, I may do better bhajana and not be so weak and tired from near-fasting and the left-over jet-lag.
But the self-centered
stuff doesn’t go away.
Was I better in my youth
(age 26)? Always see yourself
as the one who surrenders,
the one who is happy,
who works for the Swami.
I think I was pretty good,
surrendered and yet
I got married, something
I’d never do nowadays,
And …
******
I am in my last days. Maybe I have to be content to just preserve decency and that’s all I’ll achieve. Or maybe (one daydream) I am meant for some last burst of better attainment. I hope so.
pp. 121-23
Yesterday I wrote a prayer expressing my gratitude for all the wonderful gifts you have given me. I emphasized the big things—Your connecting me to Srila Prabhupada, Your placing me in the human form of life with a chance to go back to Godhead, Your instructing me in the chanting of the Hare Krsna mantra, whereby I can clear myself of sins and develop love of God. I would like to state some more thanks to You today, and maybe state some more particular, smaller things, for which I am grateful. I will write things freely, and I hope that I do not mention things which are not actually helpful to me. If I do mention things that are maya, please disregard them and don’t accept them as petitions from me. I only want from You what is best for me. But I am foolish, and sometimes I’m grateful for things for which I should not be grateful.
I thank You for the early-morning ventures to Lewes Beach, where we sit in the car and chant and then go out and take a walk. This is my substitute for going to Vrndavana dhama. I keep in mind Prabhupada’s purport in Bhagavad-gita that some people say one has to live in a holy town like Vrndavana, but actually anywhere in the world is as good as Vrndavana if you think of Krsna. The early-morning ventures to Lewes Beach are sublime. They are good times to concentrate on quality chanting. As for chanting, the even better gift is the early-morning chanting in my room, as soon as I get up until 5:00 A.M., when Narayana comes up to get me. Sometimes, like this morning, I oversleep and miss that great opportunity. But I’m grateful to You when I can chant eight solid rounds in the morning before starting my morning ablutions.
I thank You for letting me (through Your devotee Sastra) live in the “Yellow Submarine,” my bhajana-kutira. It is an ideal place of solitude and quiet where I get my daily sadhana work completed, where I can rest in peace. It is also a place I share with very close friends, whose association enlivens me.
I thank You for continuing to allow me to write in my Journal every day. I know it is not something I can take for granted. Yet every day You allow me to pray, to write prose poems, to write a japa log, to reach numbers of people on the website. Without this gift, my lift would be considerably drier and emptier. I take it as a gift from You. Thank You very much.
I thank You for life itself. As I grow older, I am suffering more bodily pains, and that is bound to increase. But my joy for life seems to be increasing also Just to be able to be alive in this body—to sleep and eat and rest and be active and see the pretty flowers and breathe the fresh air of Delaware and see the ocean every day and the sky and take short car rides—all these things are sources of joy. Life is a mixed blessing. It is filled with birth, death, disease and old age. So, as You say, it is not a happy place. It is not a happy situation. And yet, while living in this body and performing activities of happy place—yukta-vairitgya—carrying out even material activities in the Your service in renunciation—I feel content and happy. The little happy things in life all come from You and make material life bearable. To have joie de vivre is in itself not an illusion. To thank You for the things You have put into this material world, which are lovely, which are reflections of the spiritual world, is, I think, part of being Krsna conscious. Cloud formations, blue or dark skies, sunshine or rain, thunder, lunchtime conversations, hearing readings from Brhad-bhagavatamrta—all these daily experiences are sources of happiness and gifts from You.
pp. 24-30
They said we were too young to be steady
in Krsna consciousness—fanatics they considered us and that may have been true
but they were wrong about the other part—that we wouldn’t be steady and that we were too
young.
Oh, we were foolish and too young to know better or what to expect from ourselves our
Movement
our ideals
those tall orders we received
and worshiped from our beautiful brown-skinned mentor from India.
We told him we would serve him forever,
and perhaps we still will—we promised, after all, to give up everything for him and what’s ours was his, what’s his, ours.
We would sound off the Krsna conscious cannon in millions of cities—whatever
he wanted
us
to do.
Our youth was our asset. He promised us that we’d attain the love supreme.
Of course, our youth prevented us from knowing about Black Panthers and panes of glass broken in our faces
and the fear. We didn’t know
ISKCON would lose its potency
when it seemed so potential.
We’re older and wiser now, still blessed by guru, going steady
with a master who loved us then and loves us more now
that we have faltered and gone wrong but not left him.
I’m writing this letter to you while leaning back on a rock, my rubber rain gear keeping me dry even in this cold wet bog land in Ireland. It’s late October, and I’m in the hills of this poor rural country. Nobody around for miles but the sheep. The ferns and other bushes are now brown, but the grass in Ireland is always green. It’s 7:30 in the morning, and the sky has lost most of its grayness.
I have chanted sixteen rounds so far today, and I’m sitting here, wondering what it is I would like to say. I always have to think about whether or not to communicate when I’m out here, because thinking of speaking always creates a tension between wanting to communicate and the desire to enter a deeper communion with Krsna alone. Although I feel this tension constantly, I know myself well enough to say that no matter how alone I am, sooner or later I will want to retrieve something from my experience and share it with others. Because that’s what Prabhupada wanted of me—of all of us. We are preachers. Therefore, if I share the benefits of solitude for a contemplative Krsna conscious life, I am reconciled as a preacher.
As I write, I see three sheep walking down the hill into the valley below. I can’t hear them, but I see their innocent white bodies moving down a path into another pasture. It’s somehow a beautiful sight. Krsna’s creation bears a resemblance to Himself in a sense, and to our original home in Goloka Vrndavana. Rosy clouds remind us of Goloka, and birds here make us think of birds there.
The only thing missing in this world is the revelation of Krsna and the transformation that comes about in everything when He is directly present. If it were Krsna walking down that path barefoot, playing His flute, with boys running on all sides and calves and cows gamboling, I wouldn’t be sitting here leaning against a stone. I would run to join Him, to serve Him. If I could see Him, it would mean I was completely purified and not some lone philosopher. Everything in this world speaks to us about the necessity to become fully Krsna conscious. This world lives in separation from Krsna.
I’m writing in the goshala to the beat of cows being wildly milked
their calves tied nearby, my senses capture a piece of India,
Vraja—we call it the Krsna conscious fountain of youth—but when I really do remember Vrndavana, being there
I mean, I remember that perfume salesman begging me for baksheesh
and a mouse coming out from behind my dictionary. I
lit my candle anyway.
Why did I turn down that devotee?
I couldn’t trust him.
Why did I say I have a headache?
Because it always seemed to be true.
0 rural pen, I no longer want to run down hallways of a sterile life. I want to have courage to live and
paint even from a poor house
because artists aren’t supposed to be afraid
of anything. I nurse my head in private
then trip down the stairs holding my danda
behind a face showing surprise that I didn’t go for a swim in the Yamuna-.
They said I gave an all right class, but anyone could have done it. That’s the truth of me in Vrndavana.
Now calm down and confess. I sat quiet and coughed a little the slightest
disturbance I noted with a Geiger counter and cried tears for the earnest poet of private Karttika and prayed to never venture
into an Irish town but always to live
on my own with a few devotees
on Krsna’s brown earth that land
He lifted and where bhajanas play
again and again.
Readers will find, in the Appendix of this book, scans of a cover letter written by Satsvarūpa Mahārāja to the GN Press typist at the time, along with some of the original handwritten pages of June Bug. Together, these help to illustrate the process used by Mahārāja when writing his books during this period. These were timed books, in the sense that a distinct time period was allotted for the writing, during SDG’s travels as a visiting sannyāsī
Don’t take my pieces away from me. I need them dearly. My pieces are my prayers to Kṛṣṇa. He wants me to have them, this is my way to love Him. Never take my pieces away.
Many planks and sticks, unable to stay together, are carried away by the force of a river’s waves. Similarly, although we are intimately related with friends and family members, we are unable to stay together because of our varied past deeds and the waves of time.
To Śrīla Prabhupāda, who encouraged his devotees (including me) To write articles and books about Kṛṣṇa Consciousness.
I wrote him personally and asked if it was alright for his disciples to write books, Since he, our spiritual master, was already doing that. He wrote back and said that it was certainly alright For us to produce books.
I have a personal story to tell. It is a about a time (January–July 1974) I spent as a personal servant and secretary of my spiritual master, His Divine Grace A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupäda, founder-äcärya of the International Society for Krishna Consciousness. Although I have written extensively about Çréla Prabhupäda, I’ve hesitated to give this account, for fear it would expose me as a poor disciple. But now I’m going ahead, confident that the truth will purify both my readers and myself.
First published by The Gītā-nāgarī Press/GN Press in serialized form in the magazine Among Friends between 1996 and 2001, Best Use of a Bad Bargain is collected here for the first time in this new edition. This volume also contains essays written by Satsvarūpa dāsa Goswami for the occasional periodical, Hope This Meets You in Good Health, between 1994 and 2002, published by the ISKCON Health and Welfare Ministry.
This book has two purposes: to arouse our transcendental feelings of separation from a great personality, Śrīla Prabhupāda, and to encourage all sincere seekers of the Absolute Truth to go forward like an army under the banner of His Divine Grace A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupāda and the Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement.
A single volume collection of the Nimai novels.
Śrīla Prabhupāda was in the disciplic succession from the Brahmā-Mādhva-Gauḍīya sampradāya, the Vaiṣṇavas who advocate pure devotion to God and who understand Kṛṣṇa as the Supreme Personality of Godhead. He always described himself as simply a messenger who carried the paramparā teachings of his spiritual master and Lord Kṛṣṇa.
Dear Srila Prabhupada,
Please accept this or it’s worse than useless.
You have given me spiritual life
and so my time is yours.
You want me to be happy in Krishna consciousness
You want me to spread Krishna consciousness,
This collection of Satsvarūpa dāsa Goswami’s writings is comprised of essays that were originally published in Back to Godhead magazine between 1966 and 1978, and compiled in 1979 by Gita Nagari Press as the volume A Handbook for Kṛṣṇa Consciousness.
This second volume of Satsvarūpa dāsa Goswami’s Back to Godhead essays encompasses the last 11 years of his 20-year tenure as Editor-in-Chief of Back to Godhead magazine. The essays in this book consist mostly of SDG’s ‘Notes from the Editor’ column, which was typically featured towards the end of each issue starting in 1978 and running until Mahārāja retired from his duties as editor in 1989.
This collection of Satsvarupa dasa Goswami’s writings is comprised of essays that were originally published in Back to Godhead magazine between 1991 and 2002, picking up where Volume 2 leaves off. The volume is supplemented by essays about devotional service from issues of Satsvarupa dasa Goswami’s magazine, Among Friends, published in the 1990s.
“This is a different kind of book, written in my old age, observing Kṛṣṇa consciousness and assessing myself. I believe it fits under the category of ‘Literature in pursuance of the Vedic version.’ It is autobiography, from a Western-raised man, who has been transformed into a devotee of Kṛṣṇa by Śrīla Prabhupāda.”
The Best I Could DoI want to study this evolution of my art, my writing. I want to see what changed from the book In Search of the Grand Metaphor to the next book, The Last Days of the Year.
a Hare Krishna ManIt’s world enlightenment day
And devotees are giving out books
By milk of kindness, read one page
And your life can become perfect.
Calling Out to Srila Prabhupada: Poems and PrayersO Prabhupāda, whose purports are wonderfully clear, having been gathered from what was taught by the previous ācāryas and made all new; O Prabhupāda, who is always sober to expose the material illusion and blissful in knowledge of Kṛṣṇa, may we carefully read your Bhaktivedanta purports.
I use free-writing in my devotional service as part of my sādhana. It is a way for me to enter those realms of myself where only honesty matters; free-writing enables me to reach deeper levels of realization by my repeated attempt to “tell the truth quickly.” Free-writing takes me past polished prose. It takes me past literary effect. It takes me past the need to present something and allows me to just get down and say it. From the viewpoint of a writer, this dropping of all pretense is desirable.
Geaglum Free WriteThis edition of Satsvarūpa dāsa Goswami’s 1996 timed book, Geaglum Free Write Diary, is published as part of a legacy project to restore Satsvarūpa Mahārāja’s writings to ‘in print’ status and make them globally available for current and future readers.