Beyond Duplicity

Today I realized a very important key to advance in Krishna Consciousness. The reason most people start chanting and then either continue hopelessly or stop is because of this: crookedness.

Eventually, you come face to face with your greedy selfish motives, your laziness, your ungratefulness, your willingness to remain trapped in ignorance, your complete lack of faith in the goodness of God and inability to trust Him. What do you do? That determines what happens next in your life.

Can you maintain a sincere sober determination every single moment of your life for the rest of it? Can you stop yourself from slipping back into the behavioral habit of enjoying the senses and cooking for your tongue? Are you ready for surrender? Do you really feel remorse for your sinful past? Do you understand that you must cry and beg at the feet of Harinaam? Do you realize that you are nothing without the mercy of the Lord? Do you accept it? Can you give up your need to feel "fine" "safe" "self-respecting" and "contemptuous"?

Can you face this reality? I'm a prisoner. My Lord, not only did He forgive me easily, He came personally to dance in the streets to rescue me and His other parts. He owes me nothing. He can let me rot in hell forever, I chose it, He sanctioned it, end of matter. He didn't have to come back for me. He didn't have to choose to remember me. He could have reciprocated by forgetting all about me. This shows that He is kind. Now why do I have difficulty trusting Him? He helped me so far. So many things are all His mercy. I have everything to thank Him for. Why am I now thinking about His intentions and motivations? What is wrong with me? Why can't I become humble and surrender? What part of me is resisting this? Why do I want to continue awaking late, eating all I want, cooking only for the tongue? Why can't I stop and change? Why is it so difficult? How can this go on? How long can I go on chanting without changing anything? Don't I come to a point where I should be ashamed that I did not even attempt to give up my offenses in chanting the Holy Name?

When will I giving up all illusory concepts of happiness, engage fully in devotional service? When will I stop becoming the only hurdle in my own progress and allow the Lord to save me? When will I give up my lack of faith and whole-heartedly practice surrender?

The Lotus Petal Planet floating in Water

The Vedas describe the bhu mandala plane consisting of the petals of a lotus, the pericarp of which is Meru.

The earth, with all its continents, is located south of Meru, in the shape of a petal.



Buddhists describe the same location, south of Meru, with the shape of a blunt-nosed triangle with its tip pointing south.



Quran describes the earth as expanded out, stretched out, with a smooth surface, in the shape of an ostrich egg in the sand.

The Jews believed that by day the sun moves from east to west under the sky and at night the sun moves back from west to east above the opaque sky. Sadly they rejected their own scripture.

The opaque sky would be Meru.

Jews have this view: The distance of the firmament from the earth is a journey of 500 years, a distance equivalent to the diameter of the firmament, through which the sun must saw its way in order to become visible.^[9] The firmament, according to some, consists of fire and water, and, according to others, of water only, while the stars consist of fire.^[10] East and West are at least as far removed from each other as is the firmament from the earth.^[11] Heaven and earth "kiss each other" at the horizon and between the water above and that below there are but two or three fingerbreadths.^[12] The earth rests upon water and is encompassed by it.

And Christianity: The circle of the ocean - referring to its horizon gives away the same shape. Support below in form of pillars is also accepted in Vedic view.

Hare Krishna. I see the world with new eyes.