Transcribed By Madhumati Devi Dasi
(Kadamba Kanana Swami, Sydney 2010)
It is amazing how powerful peer pressure is, when everyone else is doing it and you feel out casted and then you also do it - but actually many times we don’t like it.
Talking about the whisky, I never liked it, not once, I can’t remember that I liked it...I thought it is disgusting and it is. Smoking, it is stupid, it costs money, you get addicted, risk of diseases, costs you a fortune and it is not intelligent. Totally stupid and still:
"Yeah! Have one, show you are a man"
That’s rubbish. One has to be bold. You have to really take shelter and say we have got something really good. That is the mode of goodness and in that way one stands for Krishna and one is not so much afraid of what will the neighbour think:
"Imagine if they see us in dhoti!!"
Someone asked me:
"What am I to do, my parents they wouldn’t know in Australia that I became a devotee and I am now going back home and I am going to Vrindavan and they are going to see me in a dhoti. Can I wear my pants?"
I said: "No coward, no you have to be a little brave. I am also a man in a dress! it is okay, it is not that bad!"
People will get over it and most people actually respect it even parents - but at first they get a heart attack but usually they survive it!
One of my disciples said "Whenever I go to my parents ...the parents still act as if I am the same as I was before I was initiated."
They may call you by your old name and sort of like put you subtly in your old identity and hope it will go away and just act as if the Krishna Consciousness is not there and that maybe it will go away.
"No, it is not going away.... Hare Krishna! It is here to stay!"
So that is required. We can go in this undercover James Bond style and for the other hand we must have courage to be what we are.
So, James Bond is okay when we are making bridges for people but we can’t hide ourselves behind the farsad - We must have courage to stand up for what we believe in and that’s what it takes - then our Krishna Consciousness will grow very quickly.
If you are always hiding your Krishna Consciousness then you are faithful, but you remain a little slacken also. You must take shelter - You must have courage!!
Transcribed By Madhumati Devi Dasi
(Kadamba Kanana Swami, Sydney 2010)
