by Srila Bhaktivedanta Narayan Maharaja
What are you doing? Don’t allow your eye lids to drop down. Rather, continually drink that Vaiṣṇava’s words with your eyes and ears, and also with your mouth. By this process Śrī Śukadeva Gosvāmī, the personification of transcendental knowledge and the embodiment of bhakti, may come to you. This is the process.
Freedom from Anger
Try to hear this very carefully. If you want to do bhajana, you will have to remember this śloka of Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam – not the śloka, but its meaning and mood. Without such remembrance you will always be angry and beset with many problems. You will always be upset, and you will not be able to do bhajana.
tat te 'nukampāṁ su-samīkṣamāṇo bhuñjāna evātma-kṛtaṁ vipākam hṛd-vāg-vapurbhir vidadhan namas te jīveta yo mukti-pade sa dāya-bhāk (Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam 10.14.
One who seeks Your compassion and thus tolerates all kinds of adverse conditions due to the karma of his own past deeds, who engage always in Your devotional service with his mind, words, and body, and who always offers obeisances unto You, is certainly a bona fide candidate for becoming Your unalloyed devotee.
What is the meaning of su-samīkṣamāṇo?
It is the careful consideration or judgment of what is good and what is bad. Su means that ‘considering.’ We consider that everything in this world, both good and bad, is due to the mercy of Kṛṣṇa. We determine:
“Kṛṣṇa is arranging everything, good and bad, for my benefit, for my auspiciousness.”
Considering Kṛṣṇa’s Mercy
When the Muslims were beating Śrīla Haridāsa Ṭhākura in the market places, he considered:
“Kṛṣṇa wants to teach the world tolerance, and He wants to use me as an example of that. He wants to glorify me throughout the world. Kṛṣṇa has mercifully done this; Mahāprabhu has done it.”
We should see something good in whatever happens to us. We should see how Kṛṣṇa has arranged all circumstances for our benefit.
What is the best way to think when a problem comes?
“Kṛṣṇa has sent this. There is certainly something good here for me.”
We will have to reconcile everything in this way.
Why has Kṛṣṇa sent what He has sent?
su-samīkṣamāṇo bhuñjāna evātma-kṛtaṁ vipākam
What is the meaning of this phrase of the above-mentioned śloka?
Why are all the troubles, miseries, sorrows, suffering, and problems coming to us?
Kṛṣṇa is not the cause. Such conditions are the results of our past activities; they come to purify us. it is the arrangement of Kṛṣṇa that reactions must come as a result of whatever actions we perform, and we will have to be ready to taste these results.
No One Else Is Guilty
“No one else is guilty, and Kṛṣṇa is also not responsible, for any troubles that fall upon me.
Who is responsible?
I am. I am responsible for whatever activities I have performed.”
By thinking like this, we will always be happy – even if we have millions of problems. Thinking in this way, a devotee offers obeisances and considers:
su-samīkṣamāṇo bhuñjāna evātma-kṛtaṁ vipākam hṛd-vāg-vapurbhir vidadhan namas te
"O Kṛṣṇa, You have sent this to purify me from all the results of my past activities."
High-class devotees think:
"O Kṛṣṇa, you are very tricky. By this situation You want to glorify me by using me to set an example. How merciful You are."
vidadhan namas te.
The devotee always offers praṇāmas to Kṛṣṇa. If problems and sufferings approach, then vidadhan namas te; he offers praṇāmas by folding his palms. Hṛd means ‘by the core of the heart,’ and vāg means ‘by speech.’ The sincere devotee prays:
"O Prabhu, I am guilty, I am worthless, I am stupid, and I engage in more nonsense than Jagāi and Mādhāi. I am more insignificant than the worms in stool. You are merciful, so merciful, that You have invested Your whole power in Your name – and I can chant that name. Thus I will very quickly become free of these impurities, and I will be able to attain Your service. By having given me this difficult situation, You are creating the process by which I can very soon reach You and serve You."
Even if a father has not written a will, still, when he dies, his property automatically goes to his son. His son is his natural heir. Similarly, by rolling on the earth in appreciation of Kṛṣṇa’s mercy, a devotee can become the heir to the Lord’s service and attain prema. Kṛṣṇa will automatically give that devotee vraja-prema.
Toulouse, France: July 1999
