Meat Eating and Deity Worship

Go ill together. Krishna is smart. He doesn't want to be offered meat. So He has made sure that those people who eat meat, take to those religions that discourage deity worship and offering of food to the deity.

Only vegetarian people who are personalists are inspired to take up religions that encourage deity worship. Or, if they come to the platform of appreciating deity worship, they are rectified, whereby they naturally give up meat, immediately or gradually.

The fun part is, that this spurs neophytes to breed envy. Oh, look at them, they eat meat. And oh, look at them, they worship idols. The hatred is equal and both ways.

However, at a higher level of understanding, both are given their respective ways to worship God without committing offenses. This is the glory of God. He does not let people commit offenses easily, because He wants them to be able to work through their sins and rejoin Him in His Kingdom as soon as possible.

Govinda Jay Jay. Gopala Jay Jay.

Recycled Karma

When you criticize someone, you get some of their bad karma. It's the great law of karmic recycling.

Speaking ill of others does not help with spiritual progress. Others are doing the best they can with the knowledge they have. Considering sinful people as worthy of hatred and punishment and not worthy of love is a miserly way of thinking. A big heart sees a potential saint in every sinner.

If you hate the disease instead of the diseased, you can save yourself from getting bad karma from others for the very things you would never do - like killing and abusing.

Likewise, when you are denounced or insulted, take shelter in the understanding that this is Krishna's plan to help you recycle your karma so you can chant His name with more purity than when you have all the karmic burden from the past.

Krishna's actions are always blessings. We simply need to tune in to the sastric point of view to appreciate this.

Sometimes we apologize even for things we didn't do, because no one understands us. At such times, we can check our ego's need to be angry by seeing that this is a chance to connect more strongly with grace. And we can pray that this same knowledge become available to everyone, so that no one has to get anyone else's karmic reactions for speaking ill about them.

My knowledge. Or is it?

I have believed for a long time that the knowledge I've acquired is mine. But it just is. It's universal and available to anyone interested. The fact that I am able to see that two different sources are both expounding the same concept, makes me realize that both are accurate and simply two different means to get that same knowledge.

The goal of life is to reunite with God in His pastimes, never to return to the earthly realm.

The Moment to Wait For

My poem, which I wrote when I was 13 or 14.

The sun glistened on the snow-covered peaks
The land of truth, beauty, and peace
Shone, hit by the first rays of the sun
At its mercy, waiting to be discovered

The slow wind groped for a way around the sun-strewn peaks
The shadows of the mountains were left in icy darkness
Some truth, yet to be discovered by the sun
Was left untouched on the cold hill's side
Waiting for recognition, demanding it
But the time had not come
It was a moment to wait for
Not to be spoilt by a quick move

This wait was painful for the sun
The time between the beginning and the end
The time signifying an advent to glory
The time, ever so slow, was a punishment
But the sun waited

At last the moment of truth arrived
The valley's deepest secret was luminous
There was no more fear

Did the sun have a choice, to choose his moment of triumph?
No. For if he had chosen to witness his achievement ahead of time
Then it wouldn't be a victory anymore

The essence lies in traversing the path of truth
And reaching the end at the right time
Not too soon and neither too late
For everything has a time of its own

The last moment is yours to deserve