Founder of ISKCON. His Divine
Grace A.C.Bhaktivedanta
Swami Prabhupada
A person in the divine consciousness, although engaged in seeing, hearing, touching, smelling, eating, moving about, sleeping and breathing, always knows within himself that he actually does nothing at all. Because while speaking, evacuating, receiving, or opening or closing his eyes, he always knows that only the material senses are engaged with their objects and that he is aloof from them. (Bhagavad-gita 5.8-9)
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Sravanam, Kirtanam and Smaranam   11.09.2010

Lets ask a ‘big’ question; “How to get more taste for chanting the holy name?” Answers will invariably be that one must come to offenseles chanting and more attentive chanting. So all right we will try to avoid the ten offenses in the matter of chanting the holy name.We will avoid blaspheming vaisnavas. We will try to bring our mind back to the chanting, whenever it wanders all over the universe from earth to the moon and back. Hmm… Srila Prabhupada said, attentive chanting means to hear oneself chanting. Ok, we are trying for that, somedays it works better than others. And then what? One matter is the relationship between sravanam, kirtanam and smaranam or hearing, chanting and remembering. For long I have been digging in the mines of the scriptures for jewels. I have collected many such jewels and stored them in my notebooks. Different drops of inspiration. For example Srila Bhaltisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura said, “When we touch our beads, we are touching Lord Caitanya’s lotus feet.” Now that’s a very nice statement, more than just appreciating hearing it (sravanam), it becomes a meditation (smaranam). How can we chant without a prayer to Lord Caitanya for his mercy while chanting? The more I meditate on Lord Caitanya’s mercy, the more I become enlivened. Srila Prabhodananda Sarasvati writes:”When will Lord Gaura Hari, who is more handsome than Cupid, more purifying than the celestial Ganges, more cooling than the moon,more sweet than madhvika nectar, more generous then the desire creeper, and more affectionate than a mother, appear in my meditation, and lovingly place His lotus feet in my heart.” I like this verse very much, because not only is it addressing the topic of meditation, but also about Lord Caitanya ‘appearing’ in our meditation. Imagine Lord Caitanya whose eyes like millions of rainclouds are shedding torrents of tears. Who can remain unmoved when the Lord appears in his meditation. Even now while meditating on the words of Srila Prabhodananda Sarasvati there is at least a little bit of a reflection of the Lord’s appearance in my meditation. Let me bring that meditation back to my japa, let me remember Lord Gauranga, take my beads and start chanting again.

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