Letters to the editor

Hare Krishna, dear Gurudeva, Pamho, AGTSP!

I am writing to inform you that I had a very good conversation with Atul krsna prabhu about Bhakti Vaibhava. He sent me all the information and I qualify to take a special exam as a long-time preacher (22). He also sent me a bank of questions for the exam. I explained him that I studied Canto 1 to 6 with you, even up to Canto 11, following your “tava pace pace” study guides, which, although they are not official documents, are of great value and splendidly illuminate the Bhaktivedanta purports. I sent the information to your WhatsApp, but you probably missed it.

I want to ask you a big favor, if you could give me some suggestions for taking this exam. It would be great if we could have a special session to discuss the topic. Please grant me that mercy. I know you have many issues to discuss, I still implore your mercy.

I told Atul prabhu that I have had students too, but the thing is that the exam is in English and first I want to qualify myself and then continue working on the issue of making Chosica official as a Bhakti Vaibhava center, so that I can officially train my students, old ones and create a new generation of students with all the requirements of the official course.

At this moment I have classes from Monday to Friday and also my service with you on Saturday mornings. I need time to concentrate on the topic of the Bhakti Vaibhava exam. Therefore, I think I will take it sometime in January of next year because in February I start all the courses I teach again.

I did not spread the news of this grace that Prabhu Atul is giving me, because the documentation and the conversation was private and I am not authorized to talk about this topic, I think.

Waiting for your prompt response to the topic, your servant says goodbye,

Laksmana-agraja das

HpS - Super. We fell on our head while walking to the shower in the dark this morning and our toe appears to be only swollen not broken.

Seems like our body will make it one more year without eye, skin, ear, hear surgery is we are careful, but generally it practical estimate that we will be moving to the next within 2024 unless we die before that.

I would suggest that you get a study partner and do the Bhakti-vaibhava God Father Diploma study with them as a review of Cantos one-six using the questions as a study guide.

Involve as many others as you can.

Give classes with your partner(s) on the material you are studying.

There are nice devotees like Karuna Krsna Das et al who speak enough English to join, no?

Thank you!

More news as you can.

THURSDAY 9th November

• japa/writing.📿 📓📖
• fms - amd/cagd/dvd/kmdd/et al/et al. 🚹🚺🥁🔔
• atul/boex - moe web-page development.
• ramananda/madan - 5.19.23.. prayers by d'gods glorifying bharata varsa [iskcon].🙂
• dr. sashidhara/40% deaf. four kinds of medicine. difficult driving to dr. office. 🚙. $4,000 for good hearing aid. 😆
• Cell-phone amplifier [?] & Headphones. Sign Language.

What luggage did Dhruva take?

https://vedabase.io/en/library/sb/4/12/ Text 14+++

Narada takes his guitar?

https://vedabase.io/en/library/sb/1/6/37/

https://vedabase.io/en/library/sb/1/6/32/

I offer my respectful obeisances unto Guru Maharaj, dandavat pranaam Gurudeva.          I am going to my home town Imphal (Manipur) on 8/11/2023 and expect to come back to Vrindavan in Feb.2024. This is for your kind information. And excuse me for not using "Blog" as this happens to be a new thing to me for this time. I feel it very sorry on my part.              Looking forward to your coming back to India - Vrindavan/Radhakund. I pray for your mercy, Gurudeva.    Hare Krishna.

HpS/ASA - Thank, agtSP, you! Thinking about you: What has happened to GBGD??

Thank you.

Take help from others and try to learn how to use this Blog.

We can use it in our next lifetime also.

Parrots carry news in Goloka!

2023 Nov. 8 is Ekadasi. Start your journey today!

Find some way to send news: Who are your teachers, partners and students in your Sankirtan.

16-nice rounds + 4-principles we are in touch!

Thank you!

😃

brown and white here.

agtsp

paoho

we have all the mail caught up.

our political and administrative responsibilities are 90% under control for Kali yuga. Which is to say they are 70.2% under control, because maximum political/institutional perfection in Kali yuga is 78%.

The other 22% depends on Sankirtan Yajna, Guru krpa.

We need to keep taking little sips of water, and after hot-milk with sugar and black pepper.

At 7PM is program with Jagad-pavitram Das, Isvari radha Devi Dasi et al.

• Mrs. Desai cooked very nice:
• Subji
• Chapati
• Rice
• Pakora
• Dahl
• -
• Puffed rice

For Lord Nrsmha Deva.

Honoring the Prasada was very satisfying to our heart!

All the Blog posts are 99% caught up.

The consolidation of 20-years of stuff here in the Ashrama is going well.

The only solution is Kirtaniya Sada Harih!

We sent the link for DTC(UT) India for Critic's Review to NIOS Board of Directors.

O.K. See you in Hari Kirtan!

Hare Krishna, Maharaja, please kindly accept my most humble obeisances; all glories to Iskcon founder acharya-Srila Prabhupada; all glories to your good self for your ongoing service to our founder acharya.

I trust that all is going well with you in your devotional service.

HpS - Thank, agtSP, you for your association! Your trust is kind of like saying to Arjuna than you trust that all is going well during the battle of Kuruksetra, no? We are all getting shot my Maya's arrows. Perfect victory on one level does not seem possible in Kali-yuga.

Yet with divya drsti we can see that even the failures due to Kali yuga are orchestrated by Krsna.

I have been meaning to and wanting to write to you, but things have always gotten in the way; or else I find myself at a loss for words: feeling the need to say something, but not sure what to say, or how to say it, or why. But the need is there, just the same.

HpS - Ask your 'inner monkey' [🐒] to write.🙂

I think of my devotional service and how over the years I have tried to practice Krishna consciousness as best as I could.

There are times when I feel like a failure as a devotee because I am not out there performing some amazing service for Srila Prabhupada, such as opening up a temple, travelling and giving seminars in temples all over the world.

Is it just because of my worldly way of seeing things in life that I am so critical of my own devotional service?

I think about how the years have gone by, and I wonder how Krishna will regard me when it's my turn to leave this material body.

I wonder if I will be fortunate to have devotees assisting me at my own hour of passing, or if my death will be tragically sudden and without warning.

The Srimad Bhagavatam says that "with each rising and setting of the sun death comes closer for all of us."

Where is the guarantee that we will live to see another sunrise or another sunset? [Or another breath!]

In the Mahabharata Yuddhisthira Maharaja called it the greatest wonder of all: how we live each day as if somehow we will simply live on and on. I came to Krishna consciousness because I wanted to understand why I was born, why I have to die; fully convinced that God is there, though not knowing Him by His name as Krishna.

It's as if intuitively I knew that there had to be "something more" to life than simply existing for the sake of existence;

ASA - "Higglety Pigglety Pop! or There Must Be More to Life than This"a by Maurice Sendak. Some few, one in a thousand, have the same inquietude, no?

I just didn't know what that "something more" was, until I came to Krishna consciousness. I fell in love with Krishna consciousness because of learning these things: Now what shall I do???

I struggle with trying to find comfort outside of the physical association of devotees, and I wonder how it is that I find myself so distanced from the greater society of ISKCON, which I have come to love for so long, and now I feel so estranged from. One part of me says "I have been abandoned," whilst another part of me says "It's my fault because of choosing to keep away."

At other times I feel both are true. I am reminded of how one time Srila Prabhupada said "Everyday I was going to the docks to see when the next ship was going back to India."

So similarly, everyday I wonder if I'm doing the right thing in my own choices. I know that I can't compare to Srila Prabhupada, still, there is something about his experience that I can relate to. How he must have struggled; how can I expect anything less for myself?

Believing that Krishna knows my heart aids me. Confident that He knows my struggles and my sufferings, that He knows my strengths and my weaknesses, and that He knows how sincere and how duplicitous I am, provides a strange sense of comfort and security.

I can't really explain it, because there is so much internal conflict that I constantly undergo, and therefore I can't offer any explanation within the scope of my realizations.

I should close here, before I say things that I may regret, due to them being not proper because of wild speculations and offensive rhetoric.

I offer my deepest and most sincere humble respects to your grace, for you have given my wife and I shelter that we very likely don't deserve.

Still, you have saved us by being merciful to us in our greatest hours of anxieties.

Most certainly, without your kindness and mercy, we would be completely lost in maya. Even though I don't show it, I bow down to your lotus feet with great awe and reverence.

Your lowly servant,

Balabhadra dasa

HpS - Again. We experience things very similar to yourself. Even BIG devotees in the USA ISKCON Society feel lonely. It is our impersonal culture, and we are packaging it and selling it to everyone.

We are happy to get letters from you.

Join our Full Morning Service sometimes. It is 3.30AM for you, but sometimes you can join, no?

Visit Houston when we are there?

Contact five local devotees and see what you can do to help them in their service.

Work on making institutional changes in ISKCON?

Eg. There seems to be confusion about how Bhanki-bihari's properties and facilities are related to ISKCON.

We have some institutional adjustments that might be made.

😃

Hare Krishna Guru Maharaja,

Please accept my humble obeisances unto your lotus feet.

HpS - AgtSP. Paoho/BW. We think we have lettuce feet and are aspiring for lotus feet.

All glories to Srila Prabhupada. All glories to you Guru Maharaja.

Firstly, I am thanking you very much for reading and responding my letter, and giving me your instructions – which are my life and soul. Whatever you ask me to do I will try to carry it out with utmost care.

Guru Maharaja, I regularly read your BLOG posts. But I don’t use Twitter. Recently I have joined KAPI DHVAJA Facebook group. I am not used to with the group, but I am learning it.

Guru Maharaja, His Holiness Bhakti Ananda Haridasa Goswami Maharaja is the main person whom I am associating with. Due to my job, I am little away from the in-person devotees association, but I regularly take association of devotees through phone. His Holiness Haridasa Maharaja frequently comes to our village and I always attend his programs at our village. I like reading Nectar of Instruction very much.

What other books of Srila Prabhupada, Guru Maharaja prefers me to read?

HpS - Reading Krsna book (with others) frequently??

I do preaching to my job colleagues and friend circles. As you instructed, whatever I read I will tell/preach to my colleagues and friend circles. 

Guru Maharaja, please kindly give me the strength for enabling carrying out your instructions. In whatever conditions of life, please give me service of your lotus feet.

When Guru Maharaja comes to Radhakund, please stay at my house also even for some days. If Guru Maharaja wants, please stay there eternally. I am humbly begging this from you Guru Maharaja. Hare Krishna.

Your humble servant

Manjuali Devi Dasi

Kaptanpur, Silchar, Assam, India

HpS - Jaya! Expect Krsna to give you good Siksa gurus who can be local friends.

Expect to make rapid progress, but also not solve all the problems in one day. Look at life of Prabhupada, how much determination he had. Also, see what success he had, is having!