Janamashtami - Glories of Sri Krishna by HG Shyamsundar Prabhu

Krsna explains in BG, one who understand the reason of my appearance and disappearance in this material world. That person will actually go back to the Spiritual world. That is the greatness of somebody getting a glimpse of the Spiritual world. The original supreme personality, the primiveal lord, the source of all incarnations is Krsna. There are many many incarnations of the Lord but Krsna is the original personality of Godhead. When he decides to descend himself, he descends on this titthi of Janamashtami. In this material creation, Karanodakshayi - responsible of all universises, Garbodakhyai - responsible for this universe and Kshirodakshayi vishnu expands as the param atma in all living entities and he also carries out maintenance of this universal world also. For the smooth functioning of this material world there is Kshirodakshayi vishnu. 

Demigods are compared to the farmer. After the farmer puts the seed, he prays to the higher power to get rain. Similarly, the Demigods even though how great they are, yet unless they have the mercy of Vishnu they can't carry out any orders.Vishnu is the one who is needed. And Kshirodakshayi vishnu is actually just an amsha of Krishna. Why is he coming himself, Kshirodakshayi vishnu can take any inarnation and can come. Why does Krisha himself come? Because he has unlimited love and devotion for his devotees. Krishna's heart is longing to give a glimpse to my devotees on what leelas they are missing out on. By enacting the same pasttimes he is trying to enchant the jiva souls. We have forgotten that we were in the spiritual world and Krsna is thinking by enacting the same past times from Goloka Vrindavan will enchant these forgotten souls. He appears in a challenging setting. Vasudeva and Devaki have to go through a lot of turmoil for 8-9 years. 

The birth of Krsna in our hearts will not happen that easily. A lot of turmoil is happening as the dirt in our hearts, the anarthas are ripping out of conciousness and it is making us cling on material things and this is creating us to cling onto this material world. Only when we are willing to bring Krsna to our hearts with love, only then Krsna will appear in our heart. When we have to give up our attachment, then it is more violence because then it is trying to remove these attachments we have clung on. 

Vasudeva and Devaki were actually willing to lose their 6 babies, let go of the 7th one, 8th one is also gone. Vasudeva and Devaki inspite of all this, they were pure devotee because they had paitence and also kept serving the Lord with lot of love and devotion. They know Krsna has a plan and they are just following Krsna's instructions to give him pleasure. Hence this is an evolutionary process. Same way Brajavasis. 

Hence, Krsna's Janamashtami is all about - a moment when everything is just perfect, stars are alligned, most auspicious day in the year. Anyone who observes this thiti with lot of devotion will receive lot of benediction. 1. When you are here help Krsna in his mission and 2. Become completely concious of Krsna by remembering him always so he can take us home back to Godhead.

Try to have Birth of Krsna in our heart - very evolutionary and painful. The 6 children of Devaki are the 6 anarthas which are very dear to us and we need to give them up. Only when these 6 anarthas are vanquished, the termoil we see by letting these go away, then we prepare the heart by Balaramji or our Guru - we take shelter of the Guru so these anarthas are vanquished only then Krishna the supreme personality will take birth in our heart. 

We need to become more and more concious of Krsna. We need to only chant about Krsna, meditate on his name and serve him with all pleasure for his pleasure. Create our heart so Krsna can reside there. Only then we can get Krsna prema. Day and Day is passing by and we are being made to believe that everything is fine by Maya devi and is making it bereft day by day so we are in this material cycle. So we need to take some strong vows so on this day we can actually have the birth of Krsna in our hearts so we can go back home back to Godhead.

6 anarthas - Kāma, krodha, lobha, moha, mada and mātsarya—lust, anger, greed, illusion, pride and envy. And how can these be killed only by Kamsa that when we are afraid of material energy. We need to be afraid of maya devi. If we play with maya then she will consume us not only in this lifetime but also next time. Only when we become afraid of Maya can we kill these Anarthas. We need to see how we can dovetail all these anarthas into Krsna's service. Lust = love for Krsna, Anger = anger should be used to punish a demon who is envious of devotees, Greed = greed for Krsna's service, Illusion = Knowledge about Krsna, Pride =? , Envy = healthy competition for Krsna's service. http://vaniquotes.org/wiki/Kama,_krodha,_lobha,_moha,_mada_and_matsarya_-_lust,_anger,_greed,_illusion,_pride_and_envy_-_all_have_their_proper_use_for_the_Supreme_Personality_of_Godhead_and_His_devotee

We should not try to even do Vaishnava apradha. We need to be scared of maya a lot. Because this is Maya devi's trick to make us fall down. Hence, we should always remember Maya devi is very very powerful so we can try to have these 6 anarthas dovetailed into Krsna's service. How can you do this - chant your rounds sincerely, read SB everyday - nityam bhagavat sevaya - irrevocable service to Krsna will be established in the hearts of the devotees. Hence, BE MORE ALERT IN EVERYTHING YOU DO!

Balaram jayanti special by HG Shyamsundar Prabhuji

Krsna explains in BG that I am the source of all material and spiritual worlds. The wise you know this pray with all their hearts. He is the source of all the material and spiritual worlds. All of this originates from Krsna. He is the atmaram. He is enjoying unlimited pleasure in himself. But his pleasure increases he further expands into so many planery expansions to give pleasure to Krsna. The first expansion is Balaram and through Balaram all the other expansions come out. Krsna is the seva bhagavan and Balaram is the sevak bhagavan. He is the same as Krsna but in the form of Balaram he is actually serving Krsna. That is the role of Balaramji. The abode of Krsna is Balaram. Sesa sayya. He is very powerful. He not only derives pleasure in exhibiting his strength but also to give strength to others. He is the original Guru is Balaram. Why? Balaramji is trying to please Krsna. Serving Krsna - that is what he is doing. The conditioned soul, our purpose, our svaroop is the eternal servant of Krsna. But we have forgotten that. The conditioned soul is thinking I'm the seva bhagavan. Everyone is here to serve me and I'm the enjoyer. That is the sleeping state of conditioned soul. But Balaramji is actually the original spiritual master who is always serving Krsna. Till initiation we are always thinking we are prabhu. But after initiation we understand that we are actually dasa! We then understand that we are actually the eternal servant of Krsna. Even when he comes as Lakshman he forgets that he has a wife, his own family, he gives up his garments and puts on his mendicant garments and he is ready to serve the Lord. My Lord, my master is going to the forest, there is no question that I am going to serve them. For 14 long years he guarded them at night and didn't even sleep. He didn't even sleep during the day. He was absorbed in serving Ram and Sita without a break. But we are always looking to take a break from spiritual life. We feel oh we have done a lot of bhakti now let's take a break. NO! Be like LAKSHMAN. always uninterrupted seva. He was constantly thinking and serving Krsna. He wasn't even looking for any credit. On the contrary, Sita mataji criticizes Lakshan that now you are trying to not protect Rama but are actually trying to let him die so you can enjoy me. If it were us, we would have given up. But Lakshman, no matter what was always serving Rama and Sita. Just tolerate and continue to serve Krsna. That is what Balaramji came to teach us.

2 weapons Balaramji carries - club and plow. Both of them have a significance. Plow is indicating, that when Krnsa is a Gwala, Balarama is engaging the Bulls. The bull is tilling the land. When the cows are taken care by Krsna, Balaramji is engaging the bulls. He is preparing our heart so the seed of bhakti can be sown so bhakti creeper can grow. Balaramji is using the plow to penetrate the heart and is making it ready for bhakti. The spiritual master and his instructions are helping to soften the heart. The club is trying to smash our false ego. When our ego is crushed, Balaramji's club is at work. Balaramji was actually present in all the 5 rasas and he was serving Krsna.

Santa - as his abode
Dasya - servant of Krsna
Sakhya - as friend
Vatsalya rasa  - as his elder brother.
Madhurya rasa- Ananya majari

They had so many pasttimes with each other. Trees were bending to give him respect. 2 types of demons - some were killed by Krsna and other demons by Balarama. These are the special anarthas which can be smashed only by the spiritual master. For example - pasttime of Pralambasura - this demon signifies the gross and subtle sex desire LUST. We need the special mercy of the spiritual master to kill this gross and subtle sex desire. Gross desire is to enjoy the opposite sex and Subtle desire is to get some false prestige. Hence only by begging for the mercy of the spiritual master can we kill these demons of anarthas. Similar way we pray to the spiritual master and Balaramji so he is very merciful to help us remove all these anarthas.

Hence we should always keep praying to Krsna and Balaramji - that we have so many anarthas, please be very merciful so you can protect me and remove all these anarthas so you can soften my heart and it's ready for the bhakti seed to fructify in my heart. Dhenakasura signifies the demon of ass like mentality of the conditioned soul - just work hard for nothing. Guru helps us to come out of this mentality of working like an ass and also to help us curb this LUST or sex desire. All we need to do is pray to the spiritual master and balaramji everyday to help us remove these anarthas from our heart - the 2 anarthas can be killed by the gada of Balaram and the spiritual master. Mood to do this is to hear from spiritual master and engage in the service of the spiritual master and what is that mean?- serving the vaishnavas and to engage in the preaching mission by distributing books to others.

BG Chapter 13 - Verses 6-7 by HG Shyamsundar prabhu

The five great elements, false ego, intelligence, the unmanifested, the ten senses and the mind, the five sense objects, desire, hatred, happiness, distress, the aggregate, the life symptoms, and convictions – all these are considered, in summary, to be the field of activities and its interactions.

Ksetra and Ksetrajna has been explained. Ksetra is nothing but the body. The source of this Ksetra is the 24 elements. The unmanifested stage of creation, the beginning of this material universe, the entire material energy is concentrated as one big mass called the mahat tattva which is the 24 elements described here.

5 material elements we have heard of - earth, water, fire, air and ether and then there are the
5 sense objects - smell, touch, taste, sound, sight
5 karma indriyas - Voice, anus, belly, genitals
5 jyana indriyas - eyes, ears, nose and tonge
3 false ego, intelligence and mind

Then by the glance on the Mahat tattva the creation begins and the material creation begins. This body is a representation of all these factors. It undergoes 5 transformations - takes birth, grows, stays, reproduces and dies. Please read SB on how these elements interact and how this is created.

Field of activities - by HG Radhanath maharaj - How in this material world, most of the times, we expect things to happen in a certain way, but we don't see those things happening like that. That is the nature of the material world. It doesn't happen always in our favor. Just like Arjuna saw complete reversal in everything he saw. Devotee always thinks - how can I adjust with this current situation and take shelter of Krsna. However we become dissatisfied with the current situation, cry and are despair and are always unhappy about our situation. One of the quality of the devotee is that he is always satisfied by always taking shelter of Krsna and then we transcend and become happy by being close to Krsna.

Example of a lady - Texan - she is a famous business person in UK. Maharaj had an opportunity to meet her at TED talk. This lady was supposed to speak. She was sharing her life story with audience. She explained she was from Germany and when there was the big world war, all the jews were being killed. Her parents were very well to do. But due to the war, the parents were sending their children to UK to save them. She made one statement after her story - I like to go to the university and talk to the young students there, because they are not jaded by life. People who have lived in this world, they have been beaten by the world. So many people cheat you, they break your trust, so broken hearted, so many bad experiences. If you live here for a little long, you are beaten up. Most people don't even have homes and they don't care about what is the goal of life - how one can improve their lives. Young people actually have lot of hope - they have so much energy, they want to do so many things. Devotee of Krsna is like that - even though the material life is beating us up again and again and again - he still keeps hope because he is seeing Krsna. Krsna's shelter keeps him going for life. One who has hope in Krsna, they will never get hopeless. The determination to execute KC is what is KC all about. Everyday is a new day and to serve Krsna and his devotees. If we are finding solace in material things then we are wasting our time. This material world is only giving us problems. But we need to only dovetail alwyas by doing KC activities.

Another example - HH Radhanath maharaj saw an eagle hovering and he goes down and gets a fish. How this fish was so comfortable in this water. He was planning his family, his nice day etc and all of a sudden Eagle comes down and brings it out of this world. Similarly we don't know when the eagle of death will come and hence, at every step we have danger and we should always be in reality. We should always be aware that material world if full of suprises and when suprises come we should be prepared by making our KC program important. If the fish was swimming deep then the eagle woudn;t have got it - same way we should engage in bhakti with intensity and go deep deep - japa, seva, sharpen our mind and intelligence - so we are always thinking of Krsna as the object whom we are trying to please. Any activity you are doing - do it for Krsna. and how do you always remember this - by good japa thinking of Krsna, reading SB and reading and associating with devotees. In this way we should take full opportunity of this life after so many births - please don't waste it. So please take advantage and make this life successful.

Haribol!