asa[e] - guru-tattva, diksa and vartmana-pradarshika guru

Hare Krishna Maharaja,

Please accept my humble obeisances. All glories to Srila Prabhupada.

I hope you're well in your service to Srila Prabhupada. From where i see it, it seems that you are. My respectful obeisances unto you!

I'm writing to you after reading the recent Kapi Dhvaja. Have missed some so i'm not fully up to date but it seems there are changes happening. With a mixture of sobriety and relief i took notion of the new list of disciples, which has shortened. My name is missing. This was to be expected, judging from an earlier conversation where you told me that you no longer could serve as diksha guru because i didn't keep my part of the contract. It's the first time i ever heard such a thing within ISKCON, but it makes sense in a way and i can respect that.

I must say that i don't feel bad about it. Sad perhaps that things didn't work out as i envisioned them earlier. My resolve wasn't strong enough to maintain strict sadhana throughout my life. I came to ISKCON from past life connection to Hare Krishna somehow, and dove deep into it when trouble in my life overwhelmed me and i saw no other way out. After some years of living the Hare Krishna life i became your disciple. It made sense at the time and i managed to keep up for some years. I had two children and was living a kind of brahmacari life while being a grihasta. For many years i've tried to avoid wordly duties and fled in ISKCON.

I come from a family with not such good parental relations. I got involved in drugabuse and sexual addiction in my teens and this has been a thread throughout my life. Becoming a devotee helped a lot, but it didn't root out everything as i thought it would. I had high hopes from reading Srila Prabhupada's books, but i see things in a different perspective now. I don't hold any grudges to him. I guess i only took some of his points and not others.

So in my life after a few years of being your disciple, at some point i realized that if i wanted to keep my marriage alive and be a decent father, i needed to step up my worldly life. I hardly had an education, i had been a taxi driver for most of my life. It doesn't pay the bills, and my wife had the same. She is a twice initiated devotee from Russia living in the Netherlands, doesn't speak the language, and is too headstrong to take up a menial immigrant job. So it was on my plate. Krishna helped a lot. But i didn't keep up my initiating vows. Yes, i've always stayed connected to ISKCON. I do some service.

So now i read the new list. Next month in May it is ten years since my initiation. I hardly knew you, Maharaja! You see, i look a lot like my father, both inside and out. And like my uncles and aunts from his side as well. When i saw you the first time, you looked like the best of them, and this is how i connected to you. The wisest of this particular family of the universal form. Most spiritually evolved one of them as well. Unfortunately, i was not mature enough to open my heart and build the relationship which is so deeply needed for a 'contract' to stay alive. This had happened before; i couldn't remain in Radhadesh because i didn't connect to someone senior deep enough to share what's inside and help me overcome the hurdles.

But things are going well in my service to my family. Its hard work for small successes. Destiny made me a father. We weren't married and i hardly knew the lady. But i'm making the best of it. I didn't maintain my spiritual life like i did when i was living in an ashram. It never was my strength, it was the association and the temple program. Hare Krishna. My wife was already kind of out of it, and so am i now. But i pray to Krishna that i may not forget him, and that when the time is right, i can get back into it like never before. Perhaps later in life, when the kids are grown up (now 7 and 10).

HpS - You may not be my disciple as Diksa guru. That's important. It's like being religiously married to your wife. You should be, no? We should find a bona fide priest, and perform the rituals. They are rituals but not without meaning.

I don't know why the above turned black. Amusing.

Read this? Then try to get back to the Diksa level. Everything we try to do such as family, nation, humanity, will all be easier if we can be formally connected to Krsna.

Of course, there is informal relations too. If you want to advance in Krsna conscious and we are some inspiration to you in our actions and preaching. Then you are also our disciple. Vatmana pradarshika guru.

Really Srila Prabhupada is you guru in every sense and we are appreciating each other in roles in his institution.

Personally I often think about the incredible help you gave us in airports, temples, ashramas. We owe you so much debt.

Last month His Holiness Kadamba Kanana Swami left the planet. His passing was beautiful. It touched me more than i had expected. I always had a kind of tense and uneasy relationship with him. I see people, devotees, having good relationships and i want that too. I'm learning to be more vulnerable (don't want to say humble yet) and practicing to establish better relations. Perhaps you would be so kind as to bless me to find a suitable spiritual teacher when the time is right.

HpS - Why just one! Time is the external manifestation of the Paramatma. He is our Guru in the heart. We know when we are not being sincere enough, and we know that He knows. We also know that we are trying our best and He knows, even when other people neglect us.

I had wanted to come to Spain earlier this year when you were there. It would have been a risky trip financially. Yes, i could have trusted in Krishna, get out of my comfort zone. But i didn't. The reason for coming was to tell you this all personally. At least now i told you in writing.

Thank you Maharaja for picking me up and initiating me into Srila Prabhupada's family. It was very generous of you. I will keep the name, devotees know me and call me as such. But i know deeper what transpires here between us, and that's private. It makes me sad. I'm not sure how it all works on a spiritual level, but i guess i'll find out.

Your servant,

Raghava Pandita dasa

HpS - Read the above. Part of the Contract, as listed also above, is that people we initiate should at least once a year report to us. If Srila Prabhupada asks us, "Do you know if the people you are initiating are following their vows?", and we have to say, "No", then we think he will not be pleased.

Diksa guru is very practical.

Siksa guru can be more informal.

We must have both.

Because you did not make an Annual Formal Report, then Formally we are not acting as Diksa guru.

Is O.K.?

It is kind of German, no?

Our paternal grandfather was Austrian.

Make the statement right now: Srila Prabhupada, I will work to chant the Holy Names and follow the four principles to the standard that you set?

We would be super honored to help you come to that standard!!