Welcome to your second issue of Illuminations. In this issue we continue our follow up to my seminar on Prayer. In the last issue we talked about how change is your choice; it is within your power to change. In this issue we discuss how associating pain to your obstacles to bhakti (anarthas) makes it easier and more natural to overcome them.

May you always think of Krishna,

Mahatma Das

 

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Pain is a Stronger Motivator Than Pleasure
In the seminar you looked at your obstacles to bhakti and I asked you to consider why it is important for you to overcome them. Then I asked you to focus on the pain you feel when you allow these obstacles to impede your spiritual progress. I asked you to do this because if you do not associate significant pain to your anarthas, you won’t be motivated to give them up. It is said that people don’t change when they see the light; they change when they feel the heat.

We have all heard a great class or read something that really motivated you to change. But why do you often fall back into your old ways few days or weeks later? It is because we have not associated significant amounts of pain to holding on to some anartha(s).

Unless something disgusts you, unless you feel you can’t take it anymore, it’s unlikely you will change.

In the seminar I asked you to consider what your spiritual life would look like if you overcame your obstacles. I asked you to do this so you could see what these obstacles are costing you in spiritual advancement. When you see what they are costing you - what your Krsna consciousness would look like if you overcame your biggest anarthas - it will likely give you an impetus to take control of them for you see more clearly how they take you away from Krsna.

The idea is to link enough pain to maintaining anarthas that you deeply feel that holding onto them is more painful than letting them go. If you are not making a strong effort to overcome your anarthas it is because you still attach more pain to letting them go than to holding onto them.

And as Prahlada Maharaja said, matir na krsne parata svato, if you don’t want to be Krsna consciousness, no one can help you. You may suffer a million times doing something not Krsna conscious and still continue doing it. Why?

Think about something you have put off for a long time, years perhaps, that you could have easily done by now. Why haven’t you done it? It is because you feel it will be more painful to do it than to not do it. Fear is defined as an anticipation of future suffering. We are afraid to give up our anarthas because we think we’ll suffer.

Srila Prabhupada often describes the foolish materialist saying they would die without meat eating, gambling, illicit sex and intoxication. Maybe you also think you cannot live without holding onto some of your anarthas. But our real life in bhakti begins when these anarthas are removed, anatha nivrtti syat. At this stage real taste and attraction for bhakti develop (ruci and asakti). Your anarthas are preventing you from getting this taste. Are they worth it?

 

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Exercise
Write down two or three of your biggest anarthas or obstacles to bhakti. These could include the ones you looked at in the seminar if you wish to revisit them. Then write down why it is important for you to give them up. Include what it is costing you spiritually to maintain them (what your spiritual life would look like if you didn’t have these anarthas), and how carrying them in your heart makes you feel. Then write down how you will feel twenty years from now if you are still holding onto them.

If it helps you, use analogies. You can compare obstacles to painful diseases, vicious animals eating your bhakti creeper, poison destroying your heart, etc. You want to come to the point where these anarthas disgust you. Then when they surface you will have attached so much pain to them in your gut that you will naturally turn away from them, or at least be more conscious of what they are doing to you.

You can also do this with a partner if talking about it is better for you. But after this write it down so in the future you can refer to what you’ve written.

Once you have done this, compose prayers that will help you overcome these obstacles. *For example, in the Nectar of Devotion Srila Prabhupada refers to a prayer from Caitanya Caritamrita in which the devotee reveals to Krsna how he has faithfully served his masters lust, anger and greed but they have not given him any rest or peace. So he is revealing his heart to Krsna - how he is suffering by his attachment to these anarthas - and praying to that he can overcome them.

In the same way we may pray to Krsna that, “My dear Lord, for so many years I have been controlled by (put your anartha here) and it has only caused me pain. It makes me feel like……… It takes me away from you, causes me to forget you, and makes me suffer. I no longer want to serve this cruel master who is preventing me from coming closer to you. Please help me give this up. Please always reveal to me the price I am paying by my attachment to this obstacle”.

*This verse is from Caitanya-caritamrita, Madhya-lila 22.16. This is a poetic translation by Dravida Das

In how many ways have I sought to obey
The seductive demands of my wicked desires?
They’ve shown me no mercy, yet on I’ve gone, shamelessly
Trying to quench lust’s unquenchable fires.
But now I’m rejecting those hellish desires, for my
Higher intelligence now has awoken;
O Krsna, O shelter of fearlessness, please let me
Serve You with faith that will never be broken.