You remain committed to your service, and you encourage me in mine. 'Your seva will save you' is more than just a phrase to you; it's a core principle that you live by. Your natural curiosity and eagerness to learn have made you knowledgeable in many areas. Even when you cannot delve deeply into a subject, you learn enough to use it meaningfully in service to Śrīla Prabhupāda. You are never without a small notebook and pen. Time and again, I've seen you turn conceptual ideas into reality. Tireless and focused, with the help of many talented devotees, you bring valuable projects to life.

It amazes me how you can hold so many goals, ambitions, and services in motion and still remain productive and grounded. Your words are always honest, sincere, and straightforward. You have a rare gift for bringing out the best in others, whether during sankīrtan, as a spiritual guide, temple leader, friend, or husband. You are an expert at fanning the spark.

I love how life in Kṛṣṇa Consciousness feels natural and effortless with you, as easy as breathing. Together, we are blessed with a peaceful life that supports our devotional service, and we want for nothing. Though I already knew the answer, I once asked you, 'When are you happiest?' Without hesitation, you said, 'When I'm out on book distribution.' Then you added, 'or dreaming about being out, or also when I'm reading Śrīla Prabhupāda's books with a group of devotees.

(excerpt from the offering)

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All of you are taking Harinām initiation today. You may also say, 'Why is it that we take an initiation into a free mantra? I can get this downtown Palo Alto at Lytton Plaza. They just have to go and find the youth Harinām kīrtan and hang around, right?'

"They're not selling it down there. They're just giving it away free, and Lord Caitanya gave it away free. 'Why do I have to take all these vows?' Well, Viśvanāth Cakravartī Ṭhākur answers this question in his commentary to the sixth canto of the Śrīmad Bhāgavatam regarding the power of chanting the holy name. He says, 'If you can get the holy name from a Vaiṣṇav who's gotten it from a Vaiṣṇav, and that's the definition of a Vaiṣṇav—someone who has received the mantra from a Vaiṣṇav and is following the Vaiṣṇavs. That's why we call it Vaiṣṇavism.' He said, 'And you don't take it, then you're committing the third offense against the chant of the holy name.'

In other words, you've got an attitude problem because you think you can go it alone. We can't go it alone. We consider that any advancement we make, any step we take, is enabled by the mercy of Lord Caitanya Mahāprabhu, who's Kṛṣṇa Himself, allowing us the highest, the biggest dispensation ever given in the history of the world, in the history of the universe, in the history of all the universes. 'Anarpita-carīṁ cirāt karuṇayāvatīrṇaḥ kalau' means there's the biggest sale of all time going on. Lord Chaitanya is giving this process through his Vaiṣṇava devotees.

So we take the humble route, and we take the mantra, the Hare Kṛṣṇa mantra, from a devotee who's following a devotee who's following a devotee all the way back to Kṛṣṇa. And then Bhaktivinod Ṭhākur says in his Harinām Cintāmaṇi, 'Success of the highest kind is available to such a person.'

If one chants Hare Kṛṣṇa, incidentally, one can be freed from many sins. 'jaya nāmadheya muni-vṛnda-geya he' 'jana-rañjanāya param akṣarākṛte' 'tvam anādarād api manāg udīritaḿ' 'nikhilogra-tāpa-paṭalīṁ vilumpasi' (Nāmāṣṭakam Verse 2)

Somebody says it derisively, it can be cleared from many sins. But if someone becomes sincere and says that this is my sole purpose in life—to remember Kṛṣṇa and the process recommended by Śukadev Gosvāmī, by the Śrīmad Bhāgavatam—a whole canto is dedicated to it: how to be extricated from the material world, but much more than that, how to develop love for Kṛṣṇa. It's just by chanting the Lord's Names, what to speak of Caitanya Mahāprabhu coming and demonstrating how this is the process in Kali Yuga. Anyone can take. All of you who are doing this today will change the world by your stance of unwavering dedication to the chanting of 16 rounds every day, minimum, following the four regulative principles.

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We'll chant some of the Brahma-saṁhitā. Because in 1975, during an initiation ceremony in Chicago, Illinois, which we had the pleasure of being present for, Rohiṇī Kumar Prabhu, one of the founders of ISV, had organized a group of us to chant the Brahma-saṁhitā and the Puruṣa-sūkta in 1998. And Prabhupāda was present at an initiation, and afterward, he made it a point to tell the leaders there that he liked the chanting of Brahma-saṁhitā and Puruṣa-sūkta very much. So we continue that tradition by chanting Brahma-saṁhitā together.

(Initiation Ceremony, 21 Sep 2025, ISV)

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Lord Caitanya said 'devotee Vaidya.' The Vaishnava, is a doctor. Doctors got a little black bag. Doctors used to make home calls, and Lord Chaitanya says, 'What does he have in that little bag?' That little black bag? The doctor, the Vaishnava doctor, has hymns and instructions—two things to cure the disease of Maya. And it requires this personal touch. Somebody's going to knock on the door. Otherwise, what are they going to do? I'll give you one guess what they're going to do. It starts with an 'S' and ends with two 'L's: Everyone's scrolling! Used to be watching television, but now it's just scrolling. Nobody's doing anything but scrolling. That's why people can't pass a budget. That's why people can't get along. They're too busy scrolling.

So, until we knock on the door and say, 'Hare Krishna, and here, please, please be our friend.Radha Krishna bolo, Sange Cholo, ei matra bhikha chai. Our bhikha is only asking people, 'Why don't you just come and chant Hare Krishna with us?' Because you can't have any more fun than we're having in the Krishna conscious movement. It's impossible, because this is the spiritual world. It's just flat-out fun to be with devotees, to chant Hare Krishna, to read Bhagavad Gita. This is the real life. Everything else is a wanna-be life, and it just isn't working.

So Krishna again and again gives opportunity, and his touch is very personal. It's one point I'd like to make today: everything's personal. And I'm charmed, frankly charmed, when I read in the Second Canto of the Srimad Bhagavatam, 'kare spṛśan,' which means that Krishna shook Brahma's hand and he said, 'Bhadram te -Good luck, Brahma.'

"See, that feels good. Everyone wants to do that. If we go in sankirtan, if you're on a road with busy traffic and you see somebody on the other side of the street and you go like this (shows a fist bump), they'll cross traffic, risking life and limb of being run over just to do this, because everyone's missing that. They don't have the personal touch. They want somebody to reach out to them and say, 'Oh, please, touch my soul. Touch my heart.' They can't get it in the material world because everyone's busy with themselves, being frustrated again and again in the love that's professed here. Maybe there's a glimmer, but we can't hold it. People are looking for that deep, loving exchange with Suhrit, their old friend, Krishna.

So when Krishna starts the Sampradaya, he puts his good will into it. He speaks to Brahma; he shakes Brahma's hand. He tells him, 'Good luck with making this creation and also passing down the knowledge so that people can take it,' and it's an unbroken line of discipline succession. There are detours, but it's an eternal message that comes down, and Srila Vyasadeva helps to put it into order so that we can take advantage of it and distribute it to others. So we have a lifetime—or many lifetimes—of service, it's an eternal service to enter into that.

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I thank everybody for congregating here around The Holy Names and giving full attention. This is where we get strength, personally and also as a family, also as a community, also as a movement. It all comes from good japa. Any kind of adjustment you might feel in your life, you could trace it back to japa because:

māṁ ca yo ’vyabhicāreṇa

bhakti-yogena sevate

sa guṇān samatītyaitān

brahma-bhūyāya kalpate

(BG 14.26)

The only solution to life's problems and anomalies is to rise above the three modes of material nature. There is no other solution, and the only way to do that is by chanting the holy name of the Lord. Harer nāma harer nāma harer nāmaiva kevalam, kalau nāsty eva nāsty eva nāsty eva gatir anyathā (Bṛhan-nāradīya Purāṇa). So, let's make it our topmost priority and value to finish at least 16 rounds every day, and also to give full attention in the chanting and to avoid the 10 offenses in our daily lives from moment to moment.

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What is the ideal attitude for a practitioner eager to advance in devotional service? Śrīla Prabhupāda uses three adjectives to define it: strict, serious, sincere.

To be strict means to be rigorous with oneself in following one’s chosen method of practice. Śrīla Raghunātha Dāsa Gosvāmī, for example, was so strict in his daily routine that Śrī Caitanya-caritāmṛta (Antya-līlā 6.309) compares his devotional practices to “lines on a stone.” To be serious means that during one’s practice one is thoughtful and attentive to the details. It also means that one does not back down from doing the needful to attain one’s goal, even in the face of temptation, distraction, or calamity. In Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam (4.12.8), Dhruva Mahārāja is described as thoughtful and intelligent because when asked by the lord of wealth, Kuvera, to accept a reward for his austerities, Dhruva declined and in turn asked only for unflinching faith in and remembrance of the Supreme Personality of Godhead. The word sincere comes from the Latin sincerus, meaning “clean, pure, free from pretense or deceit; proceeding from genuine feelings.” To be sincere in one’s practice of devotional service means to accept and follow Kṛṣṇa’s directives without envy or ulterior motive.

(From the chapter on Stong Sadhana Means Proper Attitude, Ch 14, Our Family Business, quoted in the discussion)

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There is also a saying that it's impossible to understand the mindset of a pure devotee, so there is not always an exact, clear answer. And one of the ways the Bhagavatam also teaches us is because when do you ever get a completely clear answer when you're making decisions absolutely this and not that? Maybe when it's "take the Krishna consciousness," but then come all kinds of other decisions: Should I go back to school? Should I get a job and do Krishna consciousness? Should I get married, or should I just be a Brahmachari? It goes on constantly until the time of death. And at the time of death, you're thinking, "Okay, these people from Delhi say they have some new cure. Should I take it, or should I just settle into leaving my body?" And as long as we are in the material world, there's a complication. Even if you are a pure devotee, it's not always straightforward that, like, I understand how everything works, and there's some idea that there are no decisions to make, or that they're clear-cut. There's a little ambiguity involved, even for the pure devotees.

Prabhupada says, "When he had taken sannyas and he was walking along in a village, he got to watch out for cows, because if you get too close, you think, 'Oh, what a nice cow,' and they swing their heads. They swing for the fences. And if there's a horn there, it can slam you." I saw it right in front of me one day. I was standing out here, and some man was, you know, like, "nicey-nicey" with the cow, and she just swung and slammed him right in the belly. He was down. They had to call the ambulance. And it happened to Prabhupada right after he took sannyas, and Prabhupada says in a lecture that he was hit by a cow like that, and that he said when he hit the footpath and he was lying there, he said, "Krishna, what is this? I just took Sannyas. Now what happened?"

So, I bring that up as a point that you may say, "Okay, in the life of a pure devotee..," Prabhupada is a pure devotee, and he mentions in an assembly of devotees that "Krishna dismantled everything. He took away everything I had," and the devotees had a lighthearted response to it because they thought, "Well, what's it to you? You're a pure devotee. What do you care?" Because they only saw him as a paramahamsa in that stage of his life. But then Prabhupada retorted that, "No, when Krishna takes away everything, you become very morose." So Dhruva Maharaja is a pure devotee, but he's young. He hasn't gone through his whole life. And there are various ways in which you maneuver in the material world, even as a pure devotee.

So that's part of the beauty of the Bhagavatam—that it's got nuance, it's subtle, and it's relatable also. And we can see that, yeah, pure devotees go through stuff, and when you go through something, and then you think of Dhruv Maharaja, and you think of him, "Yes, this, but then no, I shouldn't do it," then come back. Then you can understand that that's the way to make it through the world: is to constantly be coming back to the center.

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Śrīla Śrīdhara Svāmī, the great commentator from antiquity says something that’s just so relatable and so enlivening, and it’s included in the first part of the purport that explains the commentaries of the great ācāryas, both Śrīla Sridhara Swami and Śrīla Vishwanatha Cakravartī Thākura. He gives this analogy. He says, "The son of a rich man has a primary duty in life: that is to stay alive. That’s very practical, right? What are you doing? Staying alive. Why? Because he’ll inherit the wealth." Similarly, he says, "The devotee has a singular duty: stay alive in Kṛṣṇa consciousness somehow or other." This is also the suggestion of Śrīla Rūpa Goswāmī, who says, "yena tena prakāreṇa manaḥ kṛṣṇe niveśayet," which means "somehow or other." This is from our main ācārya. He says, "somehow or other, you figure it out..." I love how Prabhupāda also says in a purport when he’s talking about how devotees should live in the world—because you have to make a livelihood—he says, "Be inventive. Figure out a way. It’s not that important what you do, just as long as you can survive somehow or other, be inventive." So he says, "somehow or other, stay alive in Kṛṣṇa consciousness."

And if I can consider this, rather than thinking that I have to be stellar in all my activities, the best in everything, and I have to show up in such a way that everyone sees that I’m faultless, if we simply accept this basic principle of staying alive, I personally find it encouraging. What do you think?

So I thought I would just mention a few points about staying alive, the ways that I stay alive or try to -habudubu. Habudubu means—as you well know, (just saying if somebody doesn’t know)—the sound of drowning. Habudubu, everyone say it three times. It’s bubbles on top of everything. Someone says, "You forgot to pay for the insurance, and the car just got hit, and her son ran away." That’s habudubu. Is it practical? How do you stay alive when what you expected didn’t happen, or something that is so disturbing to the mind—somebody criticizes you—that hurts right ? out of nowhere! And suddenly, you’re walking along singing a song, and next thing, you’re like, "Oh my God, maybe I’m doing it all wrong." So first on my list is to...

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So he (Lord Brahmā) says, "jñāne prayāsam udapāsya namanta eva jīvanti san-mukharitāṁ bhavadīya-vārtām." Jīvanti means "to live"—if all you do is somehow or other stay alive. Jīvanti san-mukharitāṁ, just so you can attend the Bhāgavatam class, that's all you do. What do you do? Just try to stay alive all day long so the next day I can go to the Bhāgavatam class. That's all you do. "Yeah, that's all I do."

Brahma says, "That's alright, jīvanti san-mukharitāṁ bhavadīya-vārtām," because by doing that—in whatever position you're in now—you don't have to change anything. It'll change from the inside out. "Sthāne sthitaḥ śruti-gataṁ tanu-vāṅ-manobhiḥ," because if that's your dedication, just to hear about Krishna, then ajita—jito—the unconquerable Ajita, becomes conquered by that person, praṇaya-rasanayā.

They begin to love Kṛṣṇa so much just by hearing about him. That was the case with Rukmiṇī Devī. She never saw Kṛṣṇa, but she wrote this letter, "yasyāṅghri-paṅkaja-rajaḥ-snapanaṁ mahānto

vāñchanty umā-patir ivātma-tamo-’pahatyai

yarhy ambujākṣa na labheya bhavat-prasādaṁ

jahyām asūn vrata-kṛśān śata-janmabhiḥ syāt"

(SB 10.52.43)

She never met Kṛṣṇa, but she heard about him in the court of her father. She's a princess, so they were talking about Kṛṣṇa. It's said the more she heard about it, it was like, "That's who I'm going to marry. I'm going to marry him." And she was so determined that she wrote this note to Kṛṣṇa and sent it to him. It was like, "Look, you marry me, or I'm going to kill myself through austerities." That's what this verse says. "Yasyāṅghri-rajaḥ-snapanaṁ mahanto" says, "Great souls like Lord Shiva, they purify themselves by taking the dust of Your lotus feet and putting them on their heads." She said, "If I cannot attain your mercy, I'm going to perform such severe austerities that I'll be forced to give up my life. And then maybe, after many lifetimes of doing this, you'll give me your mercy and marry me."

All she did was hear about it. And then the wives of the brāhmaṇas—all they did was hear about Kṛṣṇa from the marketplace. They went to the weekend market. What's that called? A farmers' market. They went to the farmers' market, and they were buying ingredients to assist their husbands in these yajñas. And there were some residents of Vṛndāvan there, and they were like, "Kṛṣṇa, this... Kṛṣṇa, that..."—Kṛṣṇa-kathā going on in the marketplace. They heard it. They overheard it. They discussed it. They fell in love with Kṛṣṇa, so much so that they're exalted way above their husbands. It's way above this so-called Brāhmaṇism, performing yajnas. It becomes a fact that one understands everything by Kṛṣṇa-kathā.

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Kṛṣṇa says in the 11th Canto of the Bhāgavatam, "mat-bhaktyā pūjābhyadhikā- better than worshiping Me is worshiping My devotees." This theme is illustrated in the story of Śrutadeva and Bāhulāśva. Kṛṣṇa, along with great sages, goes on a chariot to visit these two devotees. Śrutadeva is poor, and Bāhulāśva is a wealthy king.

Kṛṣṇa then expands Himself so He can go to both of their houses at the same time. Not only does He expand Himself, but He also expands all the sages as well. So they all go in different directions, but it's the same entourage and the same Kṛṣṇa. At the house of Bāhulāśva, the king gives Him a royal reception, washes His lotus feet, and he hears from Kṛṣṇa. He worships Him and performs ārati. At Śrutadeva's house, the same thing happens, but he gives Him simpler accouterments, just a small place to sit and some water.

Śrutadeva, especially was glorifying Kṛṣṇa with elaborate and effusive prayers. Kṛṣṇa stopped him and said, "All these sages are here; it is better if you glorify them. You are over-glorifying Me in the presence of these sages."

So this theme continues throughout the Bhāgavatam. It is based on the verse: "ārādhanānāṁ sarveṣāṁ viṣṇor ārādhanaṁ param tasmāt parataraṁ devi tadīyānāṁ samarcanam," which means, "Of all types of worship, the worship of Lord Viṣṇu is the highest. But even higher than that, O Devī, is the worship of those things that are dear to Him."

As Kṛṣṇa Himself says in the Bhagavad-gītā, there is no one more dear to Him than His devotees. Śrīla Prabhupāda put it simply: "Love Me, love My dog."

(excerpt from the answer)

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