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Happiness and Suffering

24 Jun 2020 1 Comment

by The Hare Krishna Movement in Buddha, Four Nobel Truths Tags: authority of the vedas, dukkha, four noble truths, happiness, live is suffering, Lord Buddha, magga, nirhodha, samudaya, suffering, the eightfold path

Ever since I was a small child, I have been attracted to the statue of Buddha. Don’t know why, but I had a statue of Buddha in my bedroom, and it was a Christian home. I didn’t really know about Krishna then or who the Buddha was…but I was so attracted to everything Eastern. As I learned latter in life Buddha was actually an incarnation of Krsna. “From the Bhāgavatam we understand that Lord Buddha is the incarnation of Kṛṣṇa who appeared when materialism was rampant and materialists were using the pretext of the authority of the Vedas.” (from purport Bg 4.7)

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Happiness and Suffering

28 Aug 2016 Leave a comment

by The Hare Krishna Movement in A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada, Buddha, Eightfold Path, Four Nobel Truths, Srimad Bhagavatam Tags: A.C.Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada, buddha, cause of suffering, Eightfold Path, end of suffering, Four Nobel Truths, happiness, Lord Buddha, nonviolence, province of Gaya, SB 1.3.24, son of Anjana, Srimad Bhagavatam, truth of suffering

The Four Noble Truths & The Eightfold Path More

Easy Journey to Other Planets

17 Apr 2015 Leave a comment

by The Hare Krishna Movement in A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada, Books by Srila Prabhupada, Easy Journey to Other Planets, Free Downloads, Free eBooks, Spiritual World, Srila Prabhupada's Books Tags: A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada, antiquated, bhakti yoga, Easy Journey to Other Planets, free scanned copy, happiness, His Divine Grace A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada, philosophers and religionists, travel to other planets, yogic processes

This morning I happened to pick up the book “Easy Journey to Other Planets” by His Divine Grace A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhpada, or rather it jumped off the shelf and into my hand. It was one of the Original Printings and it looked so Old and Antiquated, yet somehow so attractive and inviting. We share with you this morning as a Free PDF download, as well as a Free Scanned copy of the Original Easy Journey courtesy of Krishna Path.

Easy Journey to Other Planets
By His Divine Grace A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupāda

Preface

A living being, especially civilized man, has a natural desire to live forever in happiness. This is quite natural because, in his original state, the living being is both eternal and joyful. However, in the present conditioned state of life, he is engaged in a struggle against recurring birth and death. Therefore he has attained neither happiness nor immortality.

The latest desire man has developed is the desire to travel to other planets. This is also quite natural, because he has the constitutional right to go to any part of the material or spiritual skies. Such travel is very tempting and exciting because these skies are full of unlimited globes of varying qualities, and they are occupied by all types of living entities. The desire to travel there can be fulfilled by the process of yoga, which serves as a means by which one can transfer himself to whatever planet he likes—possibly to planets where life is not only eternal and blissful, but where there are multiple varieties of enjoyable energies. Anyone who can attain the freedom of the spiritual planets need never return to this miserable land of birth, old age, disease and death.

One can attain this stage of perfection very easily by his individual effort. He can simply follow, in his own home, the prescribed method of bhakti-yoga. This method, under proper guidance, is simple and enjoyable. An attempt is made herein to give information to the people in general, and to philosophers and religionists in particular, as to how one can transfer oneself to other planets by this process of bhakti-yoga—the highest of all yogic processes.

Free PDF copy; Easy_Journy_to_Other_Planets-His_Divine_Grace_A.C._Bhaktivedanta_Swami_Prabhupada

Free scanned copy; Easy-Journy-to-Other-Planets-1977-Scanned-edition

Dharma : “That Which Sustains One’s Existence.”

18 Oct 2014 Leave a comment

by The Hare Krishna Movement in A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada, Dharma, Dream Tags: A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Pabhupada, dharma, happiness, living being's eternal occupation, occupation, root meaning of the word dharma, Srimad Bhagavatam, Supreme Lord, that which sustains

This morning I awoke early, and before rising, I was just going over the dreams in my head. I was dreaming about the following verse from the Srimad Bhagavatam.

“The supreme occupation [dharma] for all humanity is that by which men can attain to loving devotional service unto the transcendent Lord. Such devotional service must be unmotivated and uninterrupted to completely satisfy the self.” (SB 1.2.6)

I have been very much absorbed in my worldly occupation of late, writing up contracts, submitting bills, paying employees etc. and have mostly been waking up with thoughts of work. But this morning I was dreaming about a specific verse from the Srimad Bhagavatam. Interesting! So I went to the Bhagavatam, and read the purport to this verse.

…We have purposely denoted dharma as occupation because the root meaning of the word dharma is “that which sustains one’s existence.” A living being’s sustenance of existence is to coordinate his activities with his eternal relation with the Supreme Lord Kṛṣṇa. Kṛṣṇa is the central pivot of living beings, and He is the all-attractive living entity or eternal form amongst all other living beings or eternal forms. Each and every living being has his eternal form in the spiritual existence, and Kṛṣṇa is the eternal attraction for all of them. Kṛṣṇa is the complete whole, and everything else is His part and parcel. The relation is one of the servant and the served. It is transcendental and is completely distinct from our experience in material existence. This relation of servant and the served is the most congenial form of intimacy. One can realize it as devotional service progresses. Everyone should engage himself in that transcendental loving service of the Lord, even in the present conditional state of material existence. That will gradually give one the clue to actual life and please him to complete satisfaction.

Somehow I feel more satisfied, more complete, after my reading.

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Material Life

08 Apr 2013 Leave a comment

by The Hare Krishna Movement in A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada, Ajamila, Lectures, Srimad Bhagavatam Tags: A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada, Ajamila, ass, back to Godhead, happiness, Lecture by His Divine Grace, Lecture by Srila Prabhupada, material life, mudha, sa evam vartamano, SB 6.1.26-27

This is a very nice lecture by His Divine Grace from the sixth Canto of the Srimad Bhagavatam, recorded July 12th, 1975, in Philadelphia, PA.

…We are thinking, “I shall be happy in this way. I shall be happy in this…” Nothing. You shall never be happy—this is perfect instruction—unless you go back to home, back to Godhead. Just like a mad boy, he has forsaken his father. His father is rich man, everything is there, but he has become hippie. So similarly, we are also like that. Our father is Kṛṣṇa. We can live there very comfortably without any botheration, without endeavor for earning money, but we have decided that we shall live here in this material world. This is called ass. … Therefore mūḍha. We do not know what is our self-interest. And we are hoping against hope, “I shall be happy in this way. I shall be happy in this way.” Therefore this word is used, mūḍha. They do not know what is actually his happiness, and he is trying one chapter, another, one chapter, another, “Now I will be happy.” The ass. The ass. Sometimes the washerman sits on his back and takes a bunch of grass and puts in front of the ass, and the ass wants to take the grass. But as he moving forward, the grass is also moving forward. (laughter) And he thinks, “Just one step forward, I shall get the grass.” But because he is ass, he does not know that “The grass is situated in such a way that I may go on for millions of years; still, I will not get the happiness…” This is ass. He does not come to his senses that “For millions and trillions of years I may try to be happy in this material world. I will never be happy.”

Relief from Distress

03 May 2012 Leave a comment

by The Hare Krishna Movement in Krishna Consciousness, Lectures Tags: A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada, adhibhautic, adhidaivic, adhyatmic, happiness, Jaya Gopala, lecture by Prabhupada, Madhudvisa, material comforts, material conditional life, material world, miseries, prabhupada, relief from distress, Tamal Krishna, Visnujana

…So sufferings are always there. But we are trying to adjust by patchwork. Sufferings are always there. Everyone is trying to get out of sufferings, that is a fact. The whole struggle for existence is to get out of the suffering. But there are different kinds of prescription… But according to Krishna consciousness movement, you can get out of all sufferings if you simply change your consciousness, that’s all. That is Krishna consciousness.

In any case you are only servant
Lecture given by His Divine Grace A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada
Seattle, September 27, 1968

So our program is to worship the original Supreme Personality of Godhead, Krishna. Govindam adi-purusam tam aham bhajami [Brahma-samhita: “I worship Govinda, the primeval Lord”]. In this material world everyone is trying to get happiness and to get relief from distress. Two things are going on, attempt. There are different processes. Material process is completely absurd. That is already proved. No amount of material comforts or happiness, so-called happiness, can give us the actual happiness that we are hankering. That is not possible. Then there are different other processes also.

There are three kinds of miseries due to our material conditional life: adhyatmic, adhibhautic, adhidaivic. Adhyatmic means pertaining to the body and to the mind. Just like when there is some disarrangement of the different functions of metabolism within this body, we get fever, we get some pain, headache—so many things—so these miseries are called adhyatmic, pertaining to the body. And another part of this adhyatmic misery is due to the mind.