(Kadamba Kanana Swami, Chowpatty, 11th Dec 2010) Ashrama that’s a matter of choice. There is no ashrama which is free from austerity- every ashrama brings it’s austerities one has to simply adjust to it. Every ashram requires lots of adjustment but that is required for us to be successful to rise above the karma. We don’t know what karma is still there, the aprarabda karma is stored within the heart - it is stored in the heart, so many sinful reactions from so many lifetimes, we don’t know what is there. We don’t know what reactions are still to come.
It is mentioned that Ajamila at the time of being a student, he was a brahamin. It is said that he was the best student among all the others, he was exemplary and there was no one like him. So, his teachers were very impressed by him and they were just wondering what kind of karma does this Ajamila have and so therefore one day they thought let’s consult an astrologer.
So, the astrologer calculated the birth chart of Ajamila and he saw to his astonishment that soon Ajamila would go into a very dark phase and then he would fall down in his brahaminical standards and would get involved in illicit activities with a prostitute. He could see it in the chart and the teachers were shocked! ...
They knew it that, ‘ Yes the astrologer is qualified’
and therefore they immediately made arrangements for Ajamila to get married.
They said ‘You get married’ and they said:
‘You just stay here in the ashrama, no need to go looking for a job.’
They made maximum arrangements for his protection, but it was not successful because the sinful reactions stored within the heart from the previous life finaly caught up with him and over took him even though the stars seemed to be good. Therefore the nature of aprarabda karma cannot be over seen and obviously in the age of kali it is already going for 5000 years, we can appreciate that we have had many births before in this age of kali and most likely during those births engaged in so many sinful activities and if some of them were human then we are responsible.
The human birth is the one birth where one is held responsible - that we have to understand. We cannot accept that things will be smooth and that we will not be attacked by possiblly strong material desires.
We were studying in Mayapur the pastimes of Dhruva Maharaja in the Bhakti Vaibhava course and I was teaching, so I was really studying and reading commentaries and this and that and then I came across in the Vishnu Purana that it is stated that Dhruva Maharaja in his previous life was a brahamana. As a brahamana he was very qualified and in due course of time he became friends with the king and in his friendship with the king, Dhruva Maharaja started to develop desires to have similar opulence as the king - and then we see in his next life he becomes Dhruva. He is denied to sit on the thrown and is denied to sit on the laps of his father and becomes very angry and what does he want? ….a kingdom greater than his father and grandfather and where did it come from?
We can see it was a desire which was already there from his previous life and he carried it with him, just see. So, we cannot expect that we will not be attacked by some very powerful material desires since the aparabda Karma is not so good in the age of Kali. The un-manifested karma stored in the heart is not so good. Therefore it will happen to us, - we will be attacked with strong desires and we will develop the inclination to act against our better knowledge.
Then we should remember that now I am a victim of external forces - this is not me. I am simply a play ball on the waves of karma. I am simply being controlled by external forces, this is not me. One has to understand that karma works in this way and we become controlled simply by previous impressions. This way one must be detached of even what may come in the future.
One already has to have a detached attitude when desires come that:
‘I will not take it serious’
In this way we have to prepare a mentality that if material desire knocks on my door.
“No, sorry, no thank you, not interested - even if it is cheap I am not buying. No!”
Like that one has to fix himself. That is only possible for one who fixes himself while chanting the Holy Name. Try sincerley to conquer the mind while chanting the Holy Name and to fix our mind on hearing the chanting and if we simply do that then we can get the strength to be fixed also in ordinary dealings.
Just like inattentive chanting leads to inattentive service. I was just talking to the mridanga player of how mridanga playing is the most difficult thing.
Why is mridanga playing so difficult? It is difficult because it is not about different beats or of different bols or of different mantras, it is not about intricate rhythms, that is the secondary part - the primary part is all about hearing.
A good mridanga player is one who listens, who is totally attentive to the kirtan and is following very carefully to what he is hearing. That’s extremely difficult and that is only possible if one chants attentively. If one is an inattentive chanter one will be an inattentive mridanga player for sure. One will do everything inattentive, one goes through life as if in a cloud and just walking like that in the cloud one would inadvertedly do so many things that one later wonders why did I do that and later on forgets.
The sage, who when he was a child grabbed a little stick and pierced an insect and later was visited when he was an adult suddenly in the middle of the night by these strangers that came asking for shelter. He then gave them shelter and an hour later the soldiers arrived and they were arrested - they were all thieves and they were going to kill these thieves and the sentence was that they were going to be pierced by lance. The sage was almost pierced by a lance and somehow or other it was found out and the sage was released.
The sage got so upset, How is this possible? How is this that I was almost been pierced by a lance? I am going to find out and check this out with Yamaraja. So he went to Yamaraja to find out what it was and it turned out that it was his karma as a child piercing an insect with a stick.
Alright so, we are simply attentive in spiritual life, attentive to take shelter, attentive in our chanting, attentive to take shelter, attentive to act properly, attentive to act accordingly to the desire of Krishna.
(Kadamba Kanana Swami, Chowpatty, 11th Dec 2010)
