Kṛṣṇa does admit in the Bṛhad-bhāgavatāmṛta when He meets Gopā Kumāra, He says, "I made special arrangements for you, although I'm neutral with everybody. I made you take birth in Govardhan, and I came personally. That spiritual master that you met, that was Me. I came personally because I've been waiting too long." So there are ways that Kṛṣṇa tries to bring us back to Godhead, and especially when we take a step towards Him, then He takes license to pull us further. I love this whole section.

There's a story I heard from H.H. Girirāja Mahārāja about how in Bombay (Mumbai), when he was the temple president, there was a young man who was helping with the translation for the Marāṭhī Gītā. And he would come to see Prabhupāda regularly to check the translation and ask him philosophical questions. I don't know if Prabhupāda spoke Marāṭhī, but his father would come with him because he his father wanted to get some darśana with Prabhupāda. And the father had a habit of smoking, and he was ashamed of it. So Prabhupāda knew that, and after a few times visiting and knowing that the man was ashamed of it, and Prabhupāda asked, 'Are you still smoking?'" And he said, "Yes," very ashamed. He said, "I need your special mercy to give this up." And Prabhupāda said, "Yes, you can get Kṛṣṇa's special mercy, but it means that you become so miserable that you'll be forced to give it up." Then he said, "Would you like special mercy?" And the man said, "No, no, no, no, I'll do it myself. I'll volunteer." So there's a little push-pull going on. You can do this—they used to say—you can do this the easy way or the hard way. If you want to do the easy way, just make up your mind: sarva-dharmān parityajya, "that's it, I surrender."

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