Nimaihuset: Selected Posts on Krishna Consciousness: (17): Played by God

Wednesday, July 31, 2013

Selected Posts on Krishna Consciousness: (17): Played by God

Excerpts from The Loving Search for the Lost Servant

By Srila Sridhar Maharaj

(Headings, linebreaks, notes by me)

Played by God
We must accept victory or defeat in the mood of a player.
Everything is the play of Krishna.
When we think that somethng is a great loss, or gain,
then we are not seeing the lila of the Lord.
Then we are outside of the Divine flow; we are not in harmony
with the flow of the lila.
Then it appears that reality is not His lila, and we find some other
reason for being, see some other objects, conceive of relative interest,
and find loss and gain, victory and defeat, and so many other
misconceptions.
But everything is His lila.
And that is nirguna, faultless.*
In that plane, everything is all right.
Everything is perfect.
Every inch of movement there is perfect.

Perfect
Once, after the Kuruksetra war, the brahmana Utanka came to Krishna and said,
“Krishna, I curse You!”
Krishna said, “Why, my dear brahmana, do you want to curse Me?”
Utanka said, “Because You are the cause of all the disasters of Kuruksetra.
Because of You, so many widows and orphans are crying in distress. The bounds of their sorrow know no end, and You are the cause.”
Krishna answered, “You may have collected some power by your penances in sattva guna, but that will all be finished when you curse Me. It won't produce any result in Me, because I am situated in the nirguna plane.”
This is the nature of the nirguna plane: it cannot be checked — it is irresistable.**

Already there
The wave of the most fundamental plane is bhakti, devotion,
where everything follows the sweet will of the center — nirguna.
That divine flow can never be opposed.
We should take our stand in that plane.
Bhakti is nirguna.***
And it is causeless — that divine flow is eternally going on.
And it can never be checked by anyone — it is irresistable.
This is the nature of the flow of devotion.
Anyone who takes their stand in harmony with that flow
will find the same thing:
It can never be checked or given any successful opposition.
Bhakti is the highest function of the soul.

The perfect surfing of the perfect wave
Our duty must have its origin in the plane of bhakti;
we must be able to read and catch and utilize that flow.
Everyone's highest duty will be full submission
to the unseen, undetectable causal power,
which has no cause, no rhyme, no reason.
Then only will we find our soul's greatest satisfaction.
We will find real satisfaction
only when we come in touch with that most fundamental harmonious wave.
Then we can feel the highest ecstasy.
That is bhakti.

No attachment to outcome
Krishna tells Arjuna:
“Give full concentration
to discharging your duty
and not to the result of your work.
The result is with Me;
all responsibility is with Me.”

Closer to You
Whatever obstacles we must cross
are only small losses and gains, victories or defeats.
We should not let them disturb
our march towards the Truth.

Notes

* Nirguna does not mean that God has no qualities, it only means that God has no gunas, no material qualities — no inferior, imperfect qualities.