Hare Krishna. Today will be our last lecture. Unfortunately, I have to leave tonight. Tomorrow evening I have a meeting with the Ambassador of India and we’re going to have a very important and serious conversation regarding the Moscow Temple. Several Indian businessmen have expressed the idea or the desire that this temple is included in the official program of the interrelationship between India and Russia, and tomorrow we’re going to discuss this particular matter. So, please, pray tomorrow evening for the success of this meeting. (shouts of “Haribol” and applause) 

Today I’ll also have to finish earlier because it turns out that prasadam was delayed every day. So, we don’t have much time.

As promised, I’ll speak about one of the most fundamental laws of love or laws of bhakti, the law of reciprocation. I won’t have so much time to do justice to this important topic, but actually Srila Prabhupada has already said all that’s needed in his purport to the eleventh verse of the fourth chapter of the “Bhagavad-gita”: 

ye yatha mam prapadyante
tams tathaiva bhajamy aham
mama vartmanuvartante
manusyah partha sarvasah

TRANSLATION: As all surrender unto Me, I reward them accordingly. Everyone follows My path in all respects, O son of Pritha.

PURPORT: Everyone is searching for Krishna in the different aspects of His manifestations. Krishna, the Supreme Personality of Godhead, is partially realized in His impersonal brahmajyoti effulgence and as the all-pervading Supersoul dwelling within everything, including the particles of atoms. But Krishna is fully realized only by His pure devotees. Consequently, Krishna is the object of everyone's realization, and thus anyone and everyone is satisfied according to one's desire to have Him. In the transcendental world also, Krishna reciprocates with His pure devotees in the transcendental attitude, just as the devotee wants Him. One devotee may want Krishna as supreme master, another as his personal friend, another as his son, and still another as his lover. Krishna rewards all the devotees equally, according to their different intensities of love for Him. In the material world, the same reciprocations of feelings are there, and they are equally exchanged by the Lord with the different types of worshipers. The pure devotees both here and in the transcendental abode associate with Him in person and are able to render personal service to the Lord and thus derive transcendental bliss in His loving service. As for those who are impersonalists and who want to commit spiritual suicide by annihilating the individual existence of the living entity, Krishna helps also by absorbing them into His effulgence. Such impersonalists do not agree to accept the eternal, blissful Personality of Godhead; consequently they cannot relish the bliss of transcendental personal service to the Lord, having extinguished their individuality. Some of them, who are not firmly situated even in the impersonal existence, return to this material field to exhibit their dormant desires for activities. They are not admitted into the spiritual planets, but they are again given a chance to act on the material planets. For those who are fruitive workers, the Lord awards the desired results of their prescribed duties, as the yajnesvara; and those who are yogis seeking mystic powers are awarded such powers. In other words, everyone is dependent for success upon His mercy alone, and all kinds of spiritual processes are but different degrees of success on the same path. Unless, therefore, one comes to the highest perfection of Krishna consciousness, all attempts remain imperfect, as is stated in the “Srimad-Bhagavatam” (2.3.10):

akamah sarva-kamo va

moksa-kama udara-dhih

tivrena bhakti-yogena

yajeta purusam param

“Whether one is without desire [the condition of the devotees], or is desirous of all fruitive results, or is after liberation, one should with all efforts try to worship the Supreme Personality of Godhead for complete perfection, culminating in Krishna consciousness”.

*********** 

The meaning of our short discussion is to understand in what way exactly we must practice bhakti and what the practice of bhakti is. This is a very complicated thing. Yesterday our Indian friend was telling me that he has a sannyasi friend in Rishikesh who says, “I’m practicing bhakti but I’m no going to tell anyone in what way because it’s impossible. I can talk about kriya-yoga, about Vedanta-sutra, about philosophy, about this and that. Bhakti is love”. How can you explain bhakti, how can you explain how to practice love? “Now we’re going to love!” Nevertheless, – and this is the amazing achievement of our sampradaya specifically – in our sampradaya Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu brought and practiced Himself, and Srila Rupa Goswami explained it in such a way as to make it available to us – how one can gradually develop love in oneself and not just abstract love. Because people often speak of love, “Love, love, we have to love, ‘Divine love’”. What ‘Divine love’ is is not clear – I just sit in my armchair and love divinely. Srila Rupa Goswami, following Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu 

sri-caitanya-mano-’bhishtam

sthapitam yena bhu-tale

svayam rupah kada mahyam

dadati sva-padantikam

Narottam Das Thakur’s praising Rupa Goswami for taking what was in Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu’s heart and making ​​it available to us; each of us has the opportunity to look into Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu’s heart, touch it and to some extent feel at least a faint shadow of what He felt in his endlessly deep heart of the Supreme Personality of Godhead. And it’s an amazing thing associated with our sampradaya. And of course, our main method that has gathered us all here, on the shore of the Black Sea at the beginning of winter – is the joint chanting of the holy names of Krishna, when together, following the lead, we’re trying to understand what’s going on in His heart. But besides tist there are other ways which by no means should be neglected, although this method is the most important one. Because anukulyasyah sankalpah – I must accept everything that helps me develop love of God. I must eagerly grasp at anything that somehow or other helps me in this uneasy matter.

And our little talk is precisely about this, about how we should live in this world and what we should do so that love of God gradually rises in our heart. Today I will continue. But first I’d like to recall what we talked about in the previous lectures.

In the first lecture I said that there are three kinds of living beings in this world, or three types of people. What types? Asuras, raksasas and devas, demigods. Raksasas and asuras are those who’re trying to enjoy life in one way or another, using the opportunities provided by Krishna. Srila Prabhupada explains in this purport that all this was gaven them by Krishna, these are the opportunities of rajo-guna and tamo-guna. And in a sense they are successful in this, because Krishna’s given them these opportunities. If you want to enjoy rajo-guna and tamo-guna all the opportunities are there. And you can be successful in it, but – and we must clearly know that because we’re all a bit of asuras, we’re all a bit of demons – that the result of this is always disappointment, grief, stress, depression – ALWAYS. We must be absolutely clear about it, we must mark it well, that this happens not in 99% of the cases, not in 99.9% of the cases – precisely 100% or even 108% - ALWAYS! We shouldn’t have any illusions about that! Sometimes people think that “It didn’t work out with anybody but it will work out with me!” Sometimes we think we are clever Vaishnavas and we’ve learned to enjoy everything – this and that. No. If I try to use rajo-guna or tamo-guna the result will always be exactly the opposite. I’ll always be distressed or something. And what happens to such people ultimately? Their relationships break down, not to speak of their relationship with God, they don’t even set such a such before themselves. Even relationships with people break down because when I try to establish my relationship on the basis of the mode of passion, that is I want to get something from a person, get pleasure from him, exploit him, then I’ll have to treat him like a piece of meat, a speaking piece of meat. Sometimes it speaks, sometimes it speaks loudly, blathers something. And ultimately all relationships are broken.

This can be seen in children. Children, when they are given a doll – that’s roughly what people’s attitude to others is – it’s just another doll. In the beginning, when a child’s been given a doll’s, what does the child do? It dresses her up, “What a cute”, but then tears off her arms and legs. In the end all these dolls with torn off heads, arms and legs are scattered around. About the same thing is left behind on the battlefield of our life when it’s over: people whose arms and legs we’ve tried to tear off because they somehow haven’t satisfied our senses.

Therefore, the only way to really attain love …The laws of bhakti and love are one and the same. What we’ve said in relation to Krishna equally applies to those we associate with. If we want to get some sort of happiness even in this world, if we want to establish some relationships – and all happiness comes from love alone, from relationship alone – we must establish them on the principle of the mode of goodness. The mode of goodness means patience, truthfulness, chastity, peace of mind. All these are principles that allow me to be happy even here. The mode of goodness means commitment, because my mind isn’t so agitated and I can stay focused on my goal longer than for one ten-thousandth of a second. And in dealing with others the mode of goodness means respect, obedience, clarity, openness, sincerity, unwillingness to cheat. All these are principles which people establish their relations upon in sanatana-dharma. Srila Prabhupada, if you remember, in the purport we read yesterday about Krishna’s appearance when dharma is in decline, He says that the highest religious principle is sanatana-dharma. Because it allows one to gradually develop love of God eventually. Although in itself it’s not yet identical to the love of God, that’s the social structure built on the principles of sattva when life becomes a religion.

What do we see in modern life? I have my wife, my car, my job, my dog and I have my religion. Approximately with an equal status: the dog’s there, the religion’s there, the wife’s there, the car’s there. But actually sanatana-dharma means that my every single action must become a religion; everything I do in this world must become an offering to Krishna and that’s the principle of sanatana-dharma, the principle of the eternal religion of the living being. And this can only be understood by someone who’s somehow or other connected with sattva. Yesterday after the lecture I was given a note with a question: “Bhanu Swami said in his lecture that we are not concerned with sattva, that we don’t care about sattva, that we don’t cultivate it. Rather, we cultivate transcendental qualities. Please solve this contradiction”.

This is how the mind of a beginner devotee starts looking for a loophole so as not to cultivated some things. As a result, he’ll cultivate neither sattva nor transcendental qualitis, because Bhakti Vijnana Goswami said sattva, Bhanu Swami said transcendental qualities but as a result I won’t do anything, I’ll do what I want. Actually, there is no contradiction, absolutely no contradiction because we do cultivate bhakti by chanting the holy name, by hearing about Krishna, but bhakti will inevitably result in our mind getting gradually purified. Moreover, when we organize our environment so that it works or influences our consciousness under the laws of sattva it’s easier to think of Krishna. Sattva helps me focus on Krishna, because if I am in complete tamas and I cultivate transcendental qualities – I’ve woken up, dirty, grimy ... What does that mean, anyway? What does it mean that “we don’t have to cultivate sattva?” That we don’t have to wash, we don’t have tidy up, we can eat anything and as a result the transcendental qualities will develop in us by themselves and we’ll be grimy transcendentalists. 

Bhaktivinoda Thakur explains that when we take a shower in the morning – is that bhakti or not? No, it’s not bhakti, it’s a morning shower, but if we don’t take it will we be able to properly practice bhakti? Will we be able to focus on Krishna? No, we’ll be sleepy. Therefore, he explains that the principles of sattva help us understand Krishna more quickly and when we understand Him sattva naturally establishes in our mind, these are two inseparable things. Krishna explains that sattva equals dharma and dharma equals sattva. When I develop goodness, I acquire the tendency to think of Krishna. And when I think of Him, goodness naturally develops in me, these two things can not be separated. Only those who are trying to find some kind of benefit see a contradiction between these two. 

Yesterday we said – this is a very important point – that gradually the lower modes or the attachment to them, the passion for them, the pleasure we derive from the lower modes, goes away as we hear about Krishna, read about Krishna, think about Krishna, tell others about Krishna. And it’s a very powerful method (Bhagavatam, 1.2.17): 

srnvatam sva-kathah krsnah

punya-sravana-kirtanah

hrdy antah stho hy abhadrani

vidhunoti suhrt satam

Krishna Himself enters our heart, Krishna in the form of hari-katha enters our heart and starts cleaning it. Visvanath Chakravarti Thakur says that this is what happens when we hear about Krishna. Krishna in the form of those sounds, if we hear of Him, enters our ear and then remains in our heart. 

Yesterday a devotee told a wonderful story of how he was brought to Krishna consciousness. A friend of his gave him the First Canto of “Srimad-Bhagavatam” and told him, “Read it every day for an hour and then in a year a miracle will happen to you”. He thought, “Wow!” In some way that friend of his managed to awaken a little spark of faith in him and over a whole year he read for an hour “Srimad-Bhagavatam”. Whatever the circumstances, when it would be already eleven o’clock at night, he would think that he had only one hour left to read “Srimad-Bhagavatam” and he would rush home to manage to once a day read “Srimad-Bhagavatam”. And he says, “The miracle’s happened. Here I am sitting in front of you and asking you for initiation. (applause) The friend has gone who knows where but the miracle did happen to me!” I just kept on reading this book, I didn’t understand anything, didn’t know what was there and why but the miracle did happen”. 

And this is the miracle that Suta Goswami’s speaking about at the very beginning of “Srimad-Bhagavatam” and that is why “Srimad-Bhagavatam” is called hari-katha. Hari means thief, this is one of the most important names of God; and what is He stealing from us? At first the dirt, at first everything unnecessary, the abhadra, everything that in one way or another disturbs our heart, everything that in one way or another agitates us, but gradually, step by step, if we hear and read about Him, He steals our heart. I explained yesterday that first comes sattva – this is what hearing about Krishna brings about, and after sattva comes sivam. Or that’s sat, cit and ananda. Cit, our consciousness, is awakened. Sattvam sanjayate jnanam – Krishna explains that jnana comes out of sattva. Jnana means consciousness, not just knowledge. Jnana means that I start to be aware, that my consciousness starts to get subtle and it allows me to realize that the others are persons, too, because until then I treated them like dead instruments. People who look at this world in a materialistic way see around just dead matter, and the other people too, are dead for the most part, for they don’t feel their pain. If they felt their pain, how would they hurt others? People in the mode of ignorance do hurt others. How would that be possible, if I were able to feel their pain myself, I wouldn’t be able to do that! In a natural way, as one develops spiritually, gradually one acquires this cit, awareness, knowledge, or sivam – kindness or sensitivity. And what happens at this point when one develops awareness? At this point one is freed from the power of karma. We all love and all know and repeat it many times, that devotees are free from karma. As soon as I clap my hands what happens to the lines on my palms? They disappear, there are no lines anymore... For some reason they are still there. Actually, it’s a fact, an undeniable fact: the devotee is free from karma. But not any devotee. At a certain level, when my conscience is free, when I attain or feel freedom, I stop being a machine that’s programmed by its karma. Now I am a programmed machine. My reactions are programmed, everything that happens to me is programmed, I smile with a programmed American smile “Keep smiling”, but I’m just a karmic machine. But at some point, when I acquire consciousness, because consciousness makes me free and consciousness means total freedom, but this happens only when one’s consciousness has been completely purified. 

In the “Brahma-vaivarta Purana” Bhaktisiddhantha Saraswati Thakur Prabhupada quots this verse in the purport to the “Chaitanya-Bhagavata” and it’s said there that daiva or providence rules over everything in this world, that everything is under the control of providence, all people are slaves to providence. But further on it’s said that Krishna, it turns out, is higher than providence. And it’s said there, daivam vardhaktum shaktah ksayam kartum svalilaya – that Krishna can either increase my karma, or completely destroy it. By what? Svalilaya – it’s His lila that Krishna can do anything. Therefore it’s said there that devotees worship Krishna, they don’t worship daiva. Everyone else worship providence and trembles in its eyes. But devotees don’t tremble in the eyes of providence, they don’t go to astrologers, at least at the level when the lines on their palms have already changed. And further on it’s said na daiva badhas tad bhaktah ca vinasah ca nirgunah – devotees are not bound by daiva, by their fate or karma. Ca vinasah ca nirgunah – they never suffer defeat in this world and they are always beyond the influence of the modes of material nature. 

This is the next, the second stage on our path. First is sattva or satyam, then sivam or cit, consciousness, and eventually sundaram. Sundaram means beauty. How do I presently see the world? What do I see in the world? I see my own bhava in the world. One looks at the world through the prism of one’s resentful, mistrustful mind and one sees no beauty, just offence, pain, grief, things like that, one doesn’t see the world as it is, one sees one’s own mind, the defects of one’s own mind projected outwards. But the pure devotee sees God everywhere, he sees Krishna everywhere, sees this beauty everywhere, sundaram. 

Once some Hindu entered Srila Prabhupada’s room and saw Srila Prabhupada submerged in deep silence. The Hindu sat down in awe and waited. Ten minutes passed, fifteen minutes passed, half an hour; Srila Prabhupada sat motionless. In the end he came to his senses and the Hindu asked him, “Swamiji, were you meditating?” because Srila Prabhupada was looking at one point. Srila Prabhupada said, “Yes, I was meditating... on a mosquito”. All that time he was looking at a mosquito! The man says, “Why were you meditating on a mosquito? What’s so special about it?” Srila Prabhupada said, “Just look how perfectly Krishna has made ​​it! Krishna has even attached him a syringe instead of a nose!” How do we look at a mosquito? Our only attitude towards a mosquito is to kill it. A devotee looks at a mosquito and sees Krishna there, he wonders at the syringe, and with an automatic pump, too (laughter). It’s a different vision, one doesn’t see a mosquito, one sees the amazing beauty of Krishna, the beauty of God. 

And some people have had a revelation of that. Dostoevsky has very clearly understood that; though he wasn’t a devotee, he understood some things. Listen to what he says about beauty or about the ability to see beauty – be it in another person or in the world, “Beauty is the perfect connection to the perfect Beauty, which is God Himself”. I start seeing or discerning the beauty in another person only when I truly get at least a little spark of God consciousness. Therefore Srila Prabhupada starts the purport to our today’s verse with the words “Everyone is searching for Krishna”. Let’s repeat it loudly, “Everybody is searching for Krishna”. No one is searching for anything else. Everyone is searching only for Krishna in this world. Although we think we’re searching for money, for sex, things like that, actually we’re searching for Krishna. Therefore one can find satisfaction only when one finds Krishna, not before that, before that one will be unsatisfied. 

Here Krishna (I don’t know, I have ten minutes left or even less, six) formulates this law of love or the law of reciprocation which can be seen at various levels. At the various levels of depth we can see how this very law of reciprocation works. At the level of mechanics that’s the third law of Newton's mechanics: action equals reaction. What’s the more general case of this law of reciprocation? The law of karma. (reply from the audience: you give me, I give you) You give me I give you, yes, that’s a particular case of it. But the law of karma is a more general case of that same law, the law of love. But here Krishna gives the most general formulation of this. The law of karma is the same thing: I’ve done something and I get the consequences of it, as I’ve treated this world so the world will repay me. 

Just like one witty person formulated very nicely the law of karma. He says, karma is when we throw a brick over our head and when it falls back on our head we take offence at God because He didn’t catch it”. Has anyone taken offense at Krishna when the brick you’ve thrown up has fallen back on your head? For His not stopping it in the air? And generally people, to some extent, different people understand this law differently; they understand it but not completely. We must very clearly and thoroughly understand (I have no time) what this law of reciprocation means because if we understand it, we’ll be able to truly benefit from it.

Despite the lack of time I’ll tell a story that happened to me on the plane on the way here, it’s quite instructive. I was sitting alone; a fat man was sitting next to me who was slightly drunk and started saying, “Are you a Hare Krishna, or what?” I said, “Yes, I’m a Hare Krishna”. “Well, what a Hare Krishna is I don’t know. Islam I know, Christianity I know, I’m myself a Christian, I know everything, but Hare Krishna I don’t know, please tell me what Hare Krishna is”. Well, and to prove to me that he knows Islam and Christianity, he first explained to me what Christianity is. He said, “Christianity – everything’s simple with us. If you lead a bad life you’ll go to hell; if you lead a nice life, like me, you’ll to heaven (laughter). What about you?” I tried to explain that soul is eternal, things like that but I could feel that he didn’t get that at all. Then I asked him, he was slightly drunk, not quite himself, and I asked him, “What will happen to you wihen you die?” He said, “To me? What will happen to me? – I’ll die”. I said, “Well, how’s that? You’ve just said either to heaven or hell …” He said, “No, no, that will happen to those who have faith, but I’ll just just die, nothing will happen to me”. And then I realized that this man knows the law of reciprocation (laughs). That those who have faith they might go somewhere, but to me nothing will happen, I’ll just die. 

In other words, if a person thinks that “I’m a piece of matter” what will happen to him? Nothing will happen, one will just die and be buried. After that he’ll be born again, true, but he won’t remember anything. Something will happen only if we’ve developed a kind of reciprocaction. And here, of course, we must understanding very clearly this law. “Srimad-Bhagavatam” describes Krishna as vaydurya-mani. Vaydurya-mani is a special jewel – when you look at it from different angles, it looks differently, it’s of different colors. Sometimes it’s green, sometimes blue, sometimes yellow, sometimes it’s all the colors of the rainbow, sometimes it’s red. This vaidurya-mani is Krishna Himself, and other words that refer to Krishna in “Srimad-Bhagavatam" are bahur murthyayka murthikam – He’s the murthy, or form, which contains all forms. And when a devotee turns to Him in a specific mood, when the devotee comes to Him and turns to Krishna in this mood, what happens to Krishna? What does He do? He responds and shows the mood or bhava shown by the devotee. Actually, Krishna depends on our bhava. 

And the most important thing that I wanted to get across by all this seminar is that in the process of devotional service one must ultimately, having purified one’s consciousness, develop a specific bhava, a particular mood. This particular mood will be my eternal relationship with Krishna. Krishna will respond to my mood and before me I’ll see the one whom I want to see and our love will be perfect. If I purify my bhava – and there are certain stages by which this bhava is purified – then gradually I will ultimately be able to make Krishna, Who’s obedient to my own bhava, assume the form that I want to see Him in. That’s the greatest miracle that’s attainable for each of us.

I wanted to tell a lot of stories regarding this but I won’t be able to tell any because I have to finish my seminar so as not to delay the next program. But the point is precisely this, that when I chant the holy name, when I associate with devotees, when I sing a kirtan or hear about Krishna, I must feel bhava. Now, when we hear about Krishna, when we read about Him, when we hear some stories, for a moment this bhava or mood can rise in our hearts. Has anyone felt some semblance of love of Krishna, when hearing about Him? Hands up who has experienced this? It’s a fact, everyone has experienced it. Actually, we’re all already on the level of bhava, it’s long been clear, we don’t have to even discuss it. But, unfortunately, it’s not a permanent bhava, that’s the problem. Bhava appears, it rises as a drop of this of this ocean, we feel it and all of a sudden, at some point I think, “Really, what am I doing here? I really don’t need anything, I just want to love Krishna, I need only Krishna and I don’t need anything else!” Don’t I need anything? No, I don’t. But that lasts exactly until you start eating prasadam (laughter), then you’ll want something else. But the point is that in the process of my devotional service, if I’m doing it properly and I’m listening to the devotees and my spiritual master, this intermittent bhava can turn into a permanent one and this permanent bhava will be the foundation of our spiritual life and our love for Krishna.

Though I promised not to tell any stories I’ll tell one in a nutshell (applause.) ... The acaryas explain how this takes place. What should happen when we listen to a story? – We unwittingly put ourselves in the place of the character of this story. Having put ourselves in his place, we feel though it’s a faint shadow of what he feels, but even this shadow is sufficient to make us want to hear about it again and again. And we start to hear in a more and more focused way so that this bhava or mood gets thicker and thicker in our heart. And when it becomes so thick that it’s impossible to get away from it, then it turns into sthai-bhava. Sthai-bhava turns into a real experience of rasa. 

And this is a story from the “Brihad-Bhagavatamrita” about Gop Kumar when, during his journey, practicing vaidhi-sadhana, he found himself in Dvaraka. In rich Dvaraka he saw Krishna Himself. There’s ifinite opulence and the people there love Krishna; He’s got four arms, sometimes more, He sits on a throne and everyone worships Him, but still He was missing something. And once he shouted, “Hey, Gopal” because he himself comes from Vrindavan, from a village. He was hushed, “Are you mad?! Behave Yourself! You’re taking the liberties to call Him ‘Gopal, Gopal’! What Gopal? That lila of His was so long ago that was alsmost untrue”. But he had that little desire in his heart which he had once received from his guru, and at that moment Narada Muni called him aside and told him, “Look, you’d better get out of here, you don’t have any business here. If you want to start truly loving Krishna, if you really want to find youself in Goloka and truly love Krishna – and I can see you want that – then get out of heavenly Dvaraka and go back to Earth, to Vraja”.

He was born again in the land of Vraja, in this village, but what did he do there in that wonderful land of Vraja? – He was constantly thinking of Krishna and chanting His names. And in this mood he was constantly awaiting the appearance of Krishna. He wanted to be His friend and he thought, “When will I hear the bells on His ankles? When?!” And when he was thinking like that he suddenly heard those bells. At one point he would think, “Krishna’s God!” Then he would forget and would think, “Krishna’s my friend, my best friend!” Narada Muni told him that, “Krishna’s your friend, He is no one else, He’s just your friend”. And he thought, “When will my friend come to me?” And suddenly he thought, “When will I feel His fragrance?” He knew what Krishna’s fragrance was and at some point that fragrance would hit him in the nose. At another point, he thought, “Maybe one day Krishna’ll come up to me and touch me on the shoulder?” When he thought about it, he thought that Krishna’s touch is like the touch of the moonrays. When the moon touches our body it starts to rejoice and suddenly this Gop Kumar would feel as if Krishna was touching him. Thus he thought and chanted in this mood, Hare Krishna, Hare Krishna, Krishna Krishna, Hare Hare / Hare Rama, Hare Rama, Rama Rama, Hare Hare. Who was he calling? Not Krishna, he was calling his friend. And sometimes he wouldn’t sleep all night long, sometimes he would run around Vraja shouting, “Where are you, my friend, where have you gone? Where have you gone?” And ultimately Krishna came to him. And that’s what will happen to each of you (cries of “Haribol” and applause) ... IF you want it. If you don’t want it, it won’t happen because 

ye yatha mam prapadyante 

tams tathayva bhajam aham 

- As one relates to Me I relate to him accordingly. If we want to see Krishna as a stone, He will be a stone for us. But if we want to see Krishna as a friend, then He’ll become a friend. And we’ll be able to truly understand it when we hear our spiritual master. This is in a nutshell what I wanted to say; the material I still have is for approximately three lectures, but that will be some time in future. Thank you very much. 

I’ll tell you another very short story about the way the master teaches us to see Krishna everywhere. One day recently, someone approached and asked Sacinandana Maharaja, “How are you doing?” Are you sometimes asked that question? How many times a day? Listen to the reply Sacinandana Maharaj gave. He heard this question, “How are you doing?” and said ... (you need to be Shachinandana Maharaj to say that) – “I’m missing Krishna so much!” That was his answer to the question “How are you doing?” So, next time when you’re asked how you’re doing, remember this answer. Thank you very much. Srila Prabhupada ki – Jaya! Gaura Premanande!