Everyone

Yashoda wiped her hands in the folds of her sari, and, creeping like a detective on the tips of her toes, she followed the path left by her son, step by buttery step.

O great sages! O demigods! O perfected devotees! Meditate upon the ruby glow of the lotus feet of the universal mother as she balances on her soft petal toes!

Our heart is capable of both noble and ignoble emotions. How we can cultivate higher emotions and curb lower emotions is demonstrated in the Ramayana through the interactions between the two pairs of inseparable brothers: Rama-Lakshmana, who are together in exile, and Bharata-Satrughna, who are together in Ayodhya. Of course, these brothers are divine and beyond lower emotions.

"Whenever and wherever there is a decline in religious practice, O descendant of Bharata, and a predominant rise of irreligion—at that time I descend Myself." – Bhagavad-gita 4.7

If one man conquers in battle
A thousand men,
And if another conquers himself,
The latter is the greatest of conquerors
– The Art of War, Sun Tzu

Chapter Five: Immersion

Two days and two nights on a dirty train and a bumpy, cramped ride on an antediluvian bus brought John and me to Vrindavan. It was past midnight, July 17, 1971. I was twenty-one.

His Excellency the High Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, I thank you very much for coming here and participating in this ceremony, Janmashtami, the advent of Krishna. Krishna says in the Bhagavad-gita (4.9),

Since my youth I have been interested in the concept of expressing ideas and stories through visual arts. Often it is far more effective to convey a topic with the aid of illustrations, charts, animations, and videos than to rely exclusively on words. I served a short stint at an art school in Pittsburgh after high school, and what I learned in that semester and a half was that I never wanted to do art as a career. Art, being an expression from within, works best when it is relevant and meaningful to the artist.

While the Vedas declare in their every breath the presence of the creator in every blade of creation, the Puranas (histories) vividly portray many occasions when the creator of the universe, Sri Krishna, called Param Brahman in the Vedas, intervened in the functioning of His creation. Krishna does that by taking special forms and acting in special ways. Those special forms of the Param Brahman are called avatars.

I was born in 1970 in upstate New York and had more or less a typical American childhood - that is, until age fifteen, when I began to perceive the shallowness of it. At that time, I started to read books on philosophy and psychology and to listen more carefully to the weekly sermons at our local Baptist church. I had a lot of questions - about God, about life - but no one seemed to have the answers.

Forty-one-year-old Krishna Dasa was already feeling elated as he stood in the crowd waiting to catch a glimpse of Srila Prabhupada. It was July 7, 1973. On the order of his spiritual master, Srila Trilocanadeva Maharaja, Krishna Dasa had come to England from India in 1966 to propagate sanatana-dharma, the eternal religion of the soul's relationship of loving devotion with the Supreme Lord. He had felt alone in his quest to follow the order of his guru.