A World of Transcendental Service

Srila Bhakti Sundara Govinda Deva Goswami Maharaja encap­su­lates the essence of our teach­ings and high­lights the most import­ant guidelines for our prac­ticing life. Originally pub­lished in Sri Gaudiya Darshan, 1995 Ratha Yatra Edition.

Our mater­ial life’s root is exist­ing in mis­con­cep­tion, and through mis­con­cep­tion we are now suf­fer­ing in this mater­ial world within the wave of death and birth.

Actually, everyone’s spir­itual form as atma is very clean, and in that clean pos­i­tion, his only duty is to serve in the tran­scend­ental ser­vice world to his dear­most Lord Krishna. There the ser­vice duties exist in a vari­et­y of ways. By the grace of hladini-sakti and through his earn­est and clean desire he gets a spe­cific ser­vice as appro­pri­ate for his devo­tional mood. That ser­vice comes within five forms of rela­tion­ship with his dear­most beloved Lord. That is the real and nor­mal pos­i­tion and ser­vice duty. Through that duti­ful mood, his eternal caste and creed auto­mat­ic­ally mani­fests within him. Actually all the healthy jiva souls are exist­ing within that tran­scend­ental devo­tional ser­vice plane, whereas the jiva souls here are liv­ing within the soci­ety of mis­con­cep­tion and need to take the oppor­tun­ity to render some ser­vice to Guru-Gauranga.

Attachment to Krishna can­not grow auto­mat­ic­ally within us, and no one who is bound within mis­con­cep­tion can give it to us. Your activ­it­ies must be for increas­ing your mood of devo­tion, and to do that you must fol­low the nine kinds of devo­tional pro­cesses (sravanam, kir­tanam, etc.) and also try to engage your self and mind for the sat­is­fac­tion of the Vaisnavas.

The nature of the mundane world is tak­ing birth, suf­fer­ing in so many ways, death; birth, suf­fer­ing, and death—repeatedly. It is only pos­sible to leave this mis­con­cep­tion by get­ting the good devotees’ mer­ci­ful con­nec­tion, and through that elec­tri­city we will get our real bene­fi­cial exal­ted ser­vice life. This is the main thing, and all scrip­tures show this. What more can I say!

The Srimad Bhagavatam said that we can­not be suc­cess­ful through our own endeav­or. It is only pos­sible through the sadhus’ grace and the grace of Sri Gurudeva. For that pur­pose and by the Lord’s grace, he appears in the form of Sadhu-Guru for uplift­ing the con­di­tioned souls. For the Lord’s con­nec­tion we will con­nect with his agent in the form of sadhu and guru.

Here all the duties, like the rivers’ flow, must be dir­ec­ted to flow into the ocean of ecstasy to Krishna—this is the main thing.

Srila Rupa Goswami, in his Bhakti-rasamrta-sindhu (1.2.255) gave:

ana­sak­tasya visayan yatharham-upayunjatah
nirb­andhah krsna-sambandhe yuktam vairagyam ucy­ate

Try to detach your­self from mundane affairs and mater­ial neces­sit­ies. Living within this mundane envir­on­ment some neces­sit­ies and requirements will come; take them in a har­mon­izing way for the peace and main­ten­ance of your body and mind. To become detached, try to see everything in rela­tion to Krishna and use everything for His ser­vice. Make the focus of all your activ­it­ies ser­vice to Sri Krishna—that is sadhana.


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