Call and Response Podcast with Krishna Das Ep 80 | He Knew Everything. There’s Only One Life

“There’s nowhere to go where you’re not going to be. And there’s nothing that you’re going to be doing that’s somebody else is doing. You’re doing everything. So, all you need to add, all we need to add to our lives is paying a little attention to ourselves and why we do what we do and keep trying to clean up our act. That’s all. It’s not, there’s not two things going on. There’s only you and your life and your desires are beautiful. They will never give you what you really want, but that doesn’t mean you have to try to kill them, pretend they’re not there.” – Krishna Das

Q: You’ve described to us, what it was like for you and your devotees to be in the presence of Maharajji. If you could just maybe let us have some insight into what was your sense of Maharajji’s, did He understand the depth of the effect He was having on His devotees?

KD: He knew everything, you know? Everything.

Who was that? Where was the question from?

Ok.

Yeah, no, He knew everything. Past, present, future. He knew everything you were thinking, everything you were feeling. It was hard to get used to, living in the presence of somebody who knew everything about you, every miserable thought, thing you’ve ever done, and He loved you more than you could ever even imagine loving yourself, or be loved by anybody? That was really intense. And when we could open to it, it was fantastic. But the other times, we just couldn’t bear it, it was like trying to look at the soon.  You know, we were just like, whoa, you know? It was interesting. Opening, closing, opening, closing, and then He would look at us and giggle and we’d be open again. Because He didn’t care about our stuff at all. Not at all. He literally didn’t judge us. He knew everything, but He didn’t judge.

Q: So, He just loved you?

KD: He, well, no. He didn’t just love us. He loved us more than, loves us more than anything and He also was a siddha, is a siddha. A siddha is a being that has the ability to change the situation from the inside. He can ripen your karmas, He can change the way your life is going to unfold, and He did that for everybody that He, with whom He had work to do. And I have no idea how many people that was. It could have been millions and millions of people. You know, we were sitting with Him, I was sitting with Him and like, I was looking at Him and He went like this. So, He’s talking to people and all of a sudden, He goes like this and He saw me looking and He went, “The mind can go a million miles in the blink of an eye.” He just went… and I realized He had just gone somewhere and come back. It’s very extraordinary. It’s, I mean the closest we get to this stuff is kind of science fiction and comic books, you know. It’s just like, we don’t grow up with the capacity, almost, to feel something. It’s like, how many colors are there? Red, orange, green, blue? ROYGBIV, I learned that in High School. Red, Orange, Yellow, Blue, Green, Indigo, Violet. Seven colors? Am I right? But it’s like there’s an eighth color that’s visible to those who can see it. But our eyes, our senses only can see, only can see those seven colors and every combination of that. But there’s an eighth color that’s here all the time but we don’t see it. And that’s interesting because we don’t see it, so we don’t believe it. And you should not believe anything you don’t experience yourself, by the way. Just because we’re talking about this stuff, don’t think you need to believe it. That’s not important. We need to believe ourselves and in ourselves and we need to deal with our lives as they are. Not to fantasize that there’s some other way of being. We have to deal with our shit as it is and learn to let go of it and learn to accept ourselves for who we are as we are and allow ourselves to breathe, really breath and just be in this world. It’s not necessary to believe any of this stuff about India or any of this stuff. It’s not necessary. I’ve been in India more than half my life, more than half, Jesus. Five-Sevenths of my life. And I can’t, I don’t necessarily believe that that stone sculpture in a temple is alive and real, but they do. You know? And nobody ever required me to believe that. Maharajji didn’t make us, He loved us, loves us as we are. He didn’t make us Hindus. He didn’t make us this or that. He helped us become human. That’s amazing. Human. With other humans. Wow. People everywhere. And it’s ok. When we asked Him, “How do we find God?” He said, “Serve people.” What?  “What about, how do you raise kundalini, you know?” He said, “Feed people.” Feed people? What is He talking about? What is this? We just weren’t, we couldn’t handle it. It was too subtle. He was telling us not to think about ourselves all the time. Think about others. If we don’t think about ourselves, we won’t be unhappy. Because we won’t be thinking about ourselves. How simple is that? But how hard is it not to think about ourselves, right? It takes practice. So, He said, “Serve people. Feed people and remember God. Repeat the Names of God.” He was very big on that. And He said, over and over again, “From going on repeating these Names of God, everything is accomplished.”  He said it. Ok, maybe five percent. Maybe, after 50 years. So, it’s not easy. But that’s what He said. “From remembering these Names, from repeating these Names, everything is accomplished. Everything is brought to fulness and completion.” Period. Amen. That’s the deal.  Ok. Let’s get with the program.

“I think I want to watch the Giants game.” It’s not so easy. The vasanas of our, of our mind and our own karmas keep propelling us into limited programmed reactive ways of thinking and being in the world everyday. We just can’t stop the flow. There’s no button to push. Nowhere. So, we have to do something. We have to start paying a little bit of attention, add a little bit of practice into our daily lives, start trying to figure out what it is we want. How do we want to feel? What do we want to do? When I started singing with people, nobody else was doing this, really, the way this is. So, I had nobody to follow or to ask, how do you do this? I had to listen to my heart. I had to do what I wanted to do. That’s what I’m still doing. I actually, I can’t believe I can actually live, I can do what I like to do in my life most of the time. How amazing is that? That’s not, you know. I grew up on Long Island, what were the odds of that happening. Right? Not much. So, it’s extraordinary. So, everybody has to find that. And you do it right where you are as your life is, right this moment. Everything in our lives is there. This is our karmic predicament at this moment. Now what? So, there’s no eraser, there’s no spray eraser. You can do like this one, erase him from our life, now that one. No. We have to find a way to deal with this stuff and still learn to listen to our own hearts and what’s good for us, what we need to do. Sometimes we have to do what we have to do and then you’re doing what you want to do because taking care of business is good. And there’s all kinds of business in our lives.

Q: Thank you. I do want to thank you for all that you do. You, Nina and everyone, all that you do in giving us, I want to thank you.

KD: Ok.

Q: I would like to know, in your experience, understanding that Hanumanji is immortal, if you have ever experienced in your relationship with the Chalisa, that He has physically come to sit by you in your chanting, over your 50 years.

KD: First of all, about “immortal”: I don’t even know what it’s like to be alive, temporarily. So, immortal is kind of out of the question. I have no idea what that means. However, as far as Hanumanji coming and sitting by me, that would mean that, I don’t see Him that way. I feel a presence and I want to enter into that presence of Love when I sing. That’s my Guru, for me. He hasn’t come like a person or a thing as far as I can tell. That’s not the way I see it. Some people do see those things. They’re open in different ways. I totally honor that. It’s just not my deal. But when I sing, I feel it. That’s why I sing, is that the rest of the day sucks. The only time I’m really happy these days is when I’m singing, you know? But you would think I sang more, but I don’t. Like, I’m sure, you might think, “Wow, Krishna Das, He gets up in the morning, He takes a cold shower, then He eats some vegetables, then He puts on His dhoti and His holy clothes and He sits by the harmonium and goes into bliss.” That’s a nice fantasy. Maybe someday. Probably not this life. I’m doing the best I can. That’s all I can do. What else am I going to do? I try not to give myself too hard a time. But I’m not sure how successful I am most of the time. Ok?

Boy, I’m really good at avoiding questions today.

Q: Hi. Two quick things. They maybe slightly, they might be slightly different than my colleagues here, but, first of all, did you remember to record the UCONN women’s game before?

KD: I did.

Q: Good man. Good man. Secondly, it means a lot to all of us that come here and have practiced in this space with Dharma to have you here as the closing act, as it were.

KD: Oh, yeah. It’s next week. They’re moving out of here. Let’s stay! We won’t let them move us.

Q: I wanted to ask you, very selfishly, as someone who subscribes to the Sirius and listens to your channel often, if you might consider honoring Dharma’s kirtan band with a little more air time?

KD: You know, one of the first things I learned to say in Hindi, was “Dekhenge”, which means, “We’ll see.” Is that two question? Oh, yeah, it was.  I’m still avoiding them. Good. Keep going.

Somebody over here? There. Ok. Good.

Hi.

Q: Hey, KD. Thanks for coming.

KD: Yeah.

Q: I’ve heard you talk about there not being a divider barrier between the spiritual life and every day life. Can you talk a little bit about how you build up strength to bring those together?

KD: they were always together. There’s not two lives. Are you, like, do you roll out of bed on both sides in the morning? What? There’s only your life. And everything’s a part of it, you know. There’s nowhere to go where you’re not going to be. And there’s nothing that you’re going to be doing that’s somebody else is doing. You’re doing everything. So, all you need to add, all we need to add to our lives is paying a little attention to ourselves and why we do what we do and keep trying to clean up our act. That’s all. It’s not, there’s not two things going on. There’s only you and your life and your desires are beautiful. They will never give you what you really want, but that doesn’t mean you have to try to kill them, pretend they’re not there. That’s what they do. You know, that’s not a good idea, as we know from all the problems with the priests and all the different organized religions, the problem that they never deal with the sexual energy, wind up being destroyed by it. So, it’s just a question of being alive and being true to yourself and learning how to do that, finding out who you are and what you want. That’s spiritual. There’s no “worldly” or “spiritual” as far as I’m concerned, you know. And Maharajji was totally in the world. He was totally available all the time and yet He was also totally present all the time. He never, everything was within that, you know? It’s not like there’s, nothing’s ultimately all good or all bad. It’s always a mixture of stuff. The point is, Buddha was very clear about this when He came out of the jungle. He said, “Oh, monks. Shit don’t work.” “Stuff does not work. Happiness will never come from stuff.” There’s always some dissatisfaction with objects. They never give us what we think they will give us. What we hope they will give us. You can’t squeeze water from a stone. It’s not meant to happen. But if you keep trying to do it, you suffer. Once you give up that activity that causes suffering, then there’s no suffering. If you don’t expect, when you sit down to a big meal, you eat, you eat, you eat, you understand without saying that, tomorrow you’ll probably have to eat again. Probably every day you’ll need to eat again. That doesn’t bother you because you don’t think ultimate final satisfaction will come from that meal. You know, and that’s the way it is with desire. It always has to be one more. More, more, more. Ultimately, we recognize how to live with that by seeing it clearly for what it is. At some point, you might decide to take some time off from your desires and see how that works. Usually, it doesn’t work very well. But, it’s useful to play with that and see how you are. But then you can, you know, you have to look at yourself. Is it because I’m afraid? Am I afraid of my desires? And if I am, why am I afraid? What’s, what is it? What is that fear? You know, you have to see yourself. You can’t, it’s up to each one of us to move through those places. It takes tremendous courage. It really does. There’s no two ways about that. It really takes courage to face ourselves and the incredible level of bullshit that we tell ourselves all day long. It’s very very very fierce. One time, I was in Mumbai with Maharajji. We had trailed Him. Long story, but we found Him in Mumbai and so, we were in this, every day we’d go to this apartment building, this beautiful new building and He was hanging out there. It was the son of a devotee. So, one day I was sitting, He was up on the bed lying down and I’m sitting, doing my spiritual practice, which was…He would sit this way, then He would sit up, then He would lie down this way. And then all of a sudden, after hours, He sits up like this and He looks at me and He goes, “Courage is a really big thing.” What’s going to happen? So, the Indian guy there said, “Oh, but Baba, God takes care of His devotees.’ Maharajji shot Him a look that could have destroyed a tank or something, and He said to me, “Courage is a really big thing.” Then He laid down and went to sleep again. There have been times in my life that I just had this very vague memory of those words and it was enough to save me from falling off a cliff or jumping off a cliff. It takes tremendous courage to really look at ourselves and see how conflicted we are about letting ourselves be happy. How hard it is to overcome the programs and all the betrayals and all the broken hearts. It’s really hard. But what else are we going to do. Eventually, you just say, “All right, I’m going to deal with this,” and you try to find a way to be more kind to ourselves. Buddha said that you could search the whole universe and never find a being more worthy of kindness and caring than yourself. So. Is that how we feel about ourselves? I don’t know. Only each one of us has the answer to that question. So, the chanting is a way of letting go of the programs for a little while and planting seeds of something else in our being. So, like I said, with Ramakrishna, I didn’t really finish that whole thing. So, the seeds of the repetition of the Name start growing at some point when the causes and conditions are good and then they destroy that house and He said, that house is who we think we are, right? So, when we’re no longer thinking that, so a house is a temporary structure and it’s built for a reason and when the walls and the roof are gone, the space was inside the house is just becomes the space that was outside the house. The division is gone. The difference between me and you and me and all the other “me’s” that bounce off each other all life long. That’s gone, and you live in the oneness of it all. You can still see other people. And you can see, and you can react and act with them and interact with them, but you know yourself to be the living inner presence of all beings. You don’t lose anything by not believing you’re who you think you are anymore. You gain everything. So, and you notice what Ramakrishna didn’t say. He didn’t say it’ll feel like this or it’ll feel like that and then you’ll have this. Because it isn’t about that. People ask me, “what do I experience when I sing?” And I say, “How do I know?” I sing. And anything that comes up, I let go and I sing. I don’t write it down. “Oh, then he thought about this.” Why would I? That’s not the deal. The deal is to sing. One hundred percent. At least 100 percent of my usual three percent. I’m not interested. I have no idea what happens. I sing. That’s it. Next. Then I go home. But if you’re doing spiritual practice and you’re like, evaluating the whole way down, “Yeah, this is a really good meditation, this is fantastic, I haven’t had a thought in maybe four seconds. Wait a second, that was a thought, wasn’t it, wow that’s amazing. There’s no way out of this, is there?” Let go. Come back to the breath. That’s all you have to do. It’s not about, how do I feel now? That’s more bullshit. Who cares how you feel? I don’t care. And when you don’t care, you’ll be happy. That’s the funny thing. When you don’t think about yourself, you’re ridiculously happy. When I was going to kill myself, you know, I was going to. There’s a river out behind the temple and I was going to jump in the river. It was only six inches deep, but I figured I could get my head under a rock maybe, you know. So, Maharajji called me. He said, “What are you going to do, jump in the river?” “He’s not taking this very seriously.” He said, “You can’t die. You can’t die. Worldly people don’t die. Only Jesus died the real death.”

What the fuck is He talking about?

Why did He die? Why did He die? Because He never thought of Himself. That Being, there was no planet of “Me” in that Being. For the thoughts of “me, me, me” to revolve around, orbit around. That Being was liberated. There was no “me” left. Like any true saint, there’s no “me” there. There’s only presence, being, bliss, happiness, a sense of well-being and even in the face of suffering, that well-being, that core of ok-ness is not lost. It’s not lost. So, plant the seeds of the things you want to grow. Period. That’s it. Plant the seeds of what you want to grow. If you keep planting selfishness and shame and fear and greed and anger and all that stuff, that’s what’s going to grow. We do that, we can’t stop, so we have to plant, when we can, plant the seeds of the good stuff that we want to have in our lives. It’ll make a little less room for the weeds as time goes on. Nobody can do it except us. That’s the good news and the bad news.

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