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My dear devotees. All Glories to Srila Prabhupada. It is my happiness to share this Pandava Nirjjal Akadasi with all of you.
Help me to make the page VNS.st more lifely
Please help me to make the page VNS.st more lifely. It is the only page that informs the world about the Vrinda activities. Most people do not know that. We get very few visitors, and there is hardly any feedback. Letters etc. It is true, English is not so much used in most Vrinda temples. But Gopananda Prabhu, Aranya Maharaj and other English-speaking devotees should all help Manah Siksa to make this page full of the news of our different activities. We shall also try to print the web address on little papers and distribute amongst our friends. Because Manah Siksaji spends so much time on this page and it is a shame that most devotees and friends do not even know the page exists or visit it.
Costa Rica
I am very happy today to see so many English-speaking devotees on our chat. Now I am in Puriscal Costa Rica. Here Prabhu Sadhu Sanga has opened a Yoga centre and another one for martial arts. It is very beautiful here. Costa Rica is a bird paradise. Wild Toucans fly around the house. We had a class yesterday, and today we will give a class to the local boy scouts. Another devotee has together with his wife purchased, a big farm in the jungle, two hours from San Jose, next to one of the largest nature reserves.
Brajendra is constructing cabins there to receive visitors from all over the world to have spiritual retreats. So many beautiful places are here. But to create spiritual oasis, free of ego and full of desire to serve, is really a mayor challenge. Costa Rica has a great potential. Is only missing a real brahmacari ashram. All devotees here are married.
Yoga Planetarium
We were in Peru and with great happiness opened the Yoga Planetarium. This project can help our preaching all over the world. It is truly unique. Funny - " Truly" unique. Unique Trulys… People will feel attraction to even visit Peru to see them. Together with Cusco, where the devotees have a beautiful temple and restaurant, we can preach to many people. And now we are working hard to make the CD-rom of the Gopa Kumar Truly virtual CD-rom tour. The project is about 30% done. But it is also unique, and without Sabda Brahma prabhu it would be impossible. He has really done a wonderful starting job, which was presented on the mela. The art and all details in the project are almost finished.
Also thanks to Ambarish Prabhu, Vicitraji and Mahamrita who did wonders. Last details are another marathon and cleaning. Then we have to wait for more plants to grow. We are establishing the first class yoga monastery there, so that anyone visiting from anywhere in the world will leave with their hearts full of joy and spiritual enthusiasm. That is our job in Peru. Your job is to send people there. Fortunately Berthold from Germany came with Raji and filmed a lot so that you will get to see soon some filming details of the project.
Other projects
We have also officially started the project Gopesvara , the dance school for Girls directed by Hare Krishna dasi in Arequipa. She has a very good group of Vedic dancers with the basis in Bharat natyam and some other styles as well like fusion , odissi etc. And Rahmacarini ashram is being established so that devotee girls who want to study dance there in the Gopesvara group can sta , preach and live nice ashram life. Gaura Artik is responsible for the ashram.
The mela was filled with so many wonderful artistic presentations that it would take a long time to explain all. One outstanding feature was a gigantic moving marionette of mother earth. We also had the first time of a marching band playing Vaisnava tunes in our walk through Lima. It was really blissful with so many local artists dancing and chanting in the national costumes.
We received new CD productions in the mela from the imli tala group in la Serena and Ashram Maharaj presented the first of two Andino Bhagavat Gitas. Much work is going on and again and again we have to work hard to find out when our individual egos are interfering with the community ideals. The community making is part of self realisation because we always live in some kind of a community, unless we are a sannyasi who really sleeps under a different tree every day. But this challenge is the real bliss.
Ramananda Prabhu, who made the Mother earth puppet and the marching music is also working on a movie project and composition called opera magna. (His information is soon to be on the web site http://consciousart.de.)
The Truly Ashram has such a potential, that even the local political and tourist authorities have discovered its potential and are cooperating with us. The same happened in Arica, where everyday a busload of tourists visit the ashram and receive an introduction lecture, prasadam and tour of the trullis. And the local tourist train goes by the farm in the Valle de lluta, and believe it or not, stops at the temple, so that the passengers can get down and eat prasadam and visit the temple. First train stop in the world at Gaura Mandal Nitai Gour Mandir in a beautiful truly.
The Harmony School of Conscious Art
That is very interesting. The art site of the Harmony School of Conscious Art is becoming better and better, but still only 20% of our Vrinda artists are reported there. It is amazing how much expression exists to glorify Krishna and his message. Manah Siksaji has really done the service to make this possible. Before it was almost death the page for a long time, and still it is so hard to get the artists to scan their work, write their bio data and give some feedback. We are really giving them a small free Internet page that they can use as much as they want, but they do not realize that. It is slow, but already has the feature of a real serious group of artists. The opening of the trullis gives us a great boost, since that is a community conceived and developed jointly with the Harmony School of Conscious Art.
Communication is the important tool today. We are not using it enough. For South America the Internet presents a new way of realizing the presence and capacity of the other projects and ideas. Previously in Latin America there was no UPS, the mail would disappear and the telephone much too expensive to use. The devotee would only hear from me that other projects exist, or see someone who came to a rare visit. Now every Sunday we all meet and can exchange files of all nature. Unfortunately prajalpa as well. That is the reason the hotline has the absolute restriction not to speak ill of anyone. Otherwise I would close this service if we start offending on the Internet, amplified by the massive power of distribution. We should only mind our own business. Surrender! This is what Srila Sridhar Maharaj advised all of us.
So I ask you again, if you know any conscious artist who is not on our page yet, take all his or her information, name, etc., their work and send it to Manah Siksa didi (manahsiksa@yahoo.se). This is very important; in this way we enthuse many other artists to make conscious art. This is already happening, and we always have to be very humble. Only by remembering the supreme artist and lover of all, Sri Krishna will we really be a conscious artist ourselves. One of the best arts is to engage others in devotional service. To enthuse others is a great service. Those who enthuse others will be enthused to go on in their struggle against maya.
I am feeling that the language of art is one of the best ways to reach people in this age. Last not least Sri Mahaprabhu started a singing movement. Congregational, joy, dance. In the perverted world that becomes the love parade, and in the real world of love, it is the congregational glorification of Krishna in thousands of different ways.
CD production
And if you consider that we have over 100 CDs of our own music production which is not at all well known even amongst the devotees. This music has been produced and recorded with thousands of hours of hard work and is in the Seva files saved to accumulate dust. Uff! Because it is not easy to communicate the different achievements of the devotees. We are overburdened with information in Kali Yuga. Internet is 8useful and full of danger as well. You easily get carried away. The service gets invades by useless reading and gossiping. How to do it? How to share?
You know, companies like Sony Music record 3o musicians, but only promote to fame 1 or two of them, the rest is only show. People are not capable to receive so much stuff at the same time. But our work is not useless and has no motivation of name, fame and gain. Still it is difficult to promote. And preaching means to promote the teachings of the acaryas in an attractive way. The Seva Bogota has come up with the idea to have a special CD stand in all temples, where you can flip through the CDs easily and it takes up little space. But in order to put up such a stand filled with CDs, the temple has to invest at least 5oo us to have the CDs at hand .
Vedic Wisdom
The same is necessary with the Vedic wisdom papers. They have already proven to be one of the best preaching tools. But how to show 6o different booklets to the people? Again the Seva in Bogotá came up with a good idea. Acrylic stands where you can see all the booklets and can choose easily. And I am anxiously waiting for the box which includes all the booklets to buy in one block. But only to translate, produce and distribute all these different productions, takes a mayor effort. MAYOR. And when we are ready, we discover that people have been waiting for us to bring them easy understandable instructions.
Pandava Nirjjal Ekadasi
The Bhima ekadasi or Pandava Nirjjal Ekadasi has this special name and position due to a story. Bhima has a great difficulty. He sometimes breaks the Ekadasi because he feels so hungry. He cannot control himself. So he was very unhappy and others were making fun of him and his uncontrollable hunger. When Krishna came to visit, Bhima went to see him and revealed his problem to Krishna. "What can I do? I am lost. Please help me, my Lord." Sri Krishna said: "Ok Bhima, you are a special case. I will give you a chance to live in peace. If you abstain on this Bhima akadasi even from a drop of water, the other ekadasis that you failed, will be forgiven to you."
Bhima was relieved, and if anyone in the devotional community accidentally has broken Ekadasi during the year, it is recommended to do the full fast today and you will be forgiven from your mistake. If someone has no care for holy days, such as Ekadasi, his devotion will be ruined. The Vaisnava calendar is meant to increase our love and appreciation to all the great helpers of this world. It is a good idea every chat, to put the holy days of the next week to remind devotees who have the tendency not to look at the calendar.
The enemy of love
Indifference is the enemy of love. Somehow we have to manage to become GRATEFUL. This is the first step. Then you become COMPASSIONED with those who do not know anything about their eternal soul and spiritual dimension. If you are indifferent to those who help you or have helped us in the past, our ego is really a disaster. Materialistic influence would say. And if you are indifferent with the suffering and ignorance of others, you loose your appreciation for the nectar that you received, which saved you from degraded live. Thus in practise, practising and preaching is a question of spiritual life and death. That is the reason why Srila Prabhupada sent us out to preach from the FIRST DAY in the temple.
Some people are surprised. I even heard a famous preacher in Vrindavan say: "First you study and practise for 30 years, and then you can preach." But Srila Prabhupada had the vision of Sri Nityananda Prabhu. He had mercy and mercy, and mercy again. And I gave my first Sunday lecture after three months in the temple. There was nobody else.
Preaching means to repeat what you heard from the people you love and trust. Without trust why should I go into any direction? If I meet a wonderful person who answers my most important questions and makes me very happy, shall I not tell others about it? Srila Prabhupada said: Preaching gives me life. When we preach we also confirm our own conviction. Others say that only after perfect self realisation can you really help others. But Srila Prabhupada tells us that by following the order of Sri Guru we act perfectly. So we follow in Vrinda this line of instruction I received from my Gurudeva.
MP3
Let the world know as much as possible about Vedic wisdom and the books of our acaryas. Here is one request to our technical devotees. Let us put all the lectures of the past into the MP3 format. Many lectures are lost in boxes in the Sevas and English speakers get little material. Since I have all the lectures of Srila Prabhupada on the MP3 player hard disk I have heard more classes then ever. It is wonderful. And it has become more and more cheap to have this the 15 gig dell machine with 2o hours of batteries rechargeable life sells for 2oo us Believe me I am not a salesperson from dell, but to listen to many classes will help you so much and is made so easy now. But for this we need to put the old classes into mp3 format and organize.
Please find who can do this in the Sevas. Suggest Berlin, Sofia, Lima, Bogota co-production, to have different languages all together. Lalita Madhavaji in Berlin, Prakasanda Jaganath en Bogota, Quito Govinda, Kalki in lima and Dira Krishna, Antofagasta and Sofia, Bhakti Shakti. Prakasanda can make the list and put it finally all together. Lectures, Vrinda music. It will be about 10 Gigas I think. And thus we can share and finally hear more Krishna Katha on the road. In the last flight to Costa Rica I heard 4 classes of Srila Prabhupada. I know what I am talking about. Many times we walk, travel and even speculate, better listen to a class and get fired up. The laws are made for civilized people , otherwise they are useless. The technology not used for Krishna is also useless.
I also want to remind all the devotees who have a spiritual retreat project to report in English or Spanish the details with photos to Bhagavat Purana. We are just finishing the promotion CD-rom of the destinations of Vedic wisdom. This will help to bring more people to visit the ashrams and have an exposition to the Vaisnava world. But without the information of your project it will be unattractive. Even the details of facilities for the visitors are necessary. Courses you offer. Interesting tours you take the people too in your area.
Mystical tourism
Mystical tourism is more difficult, but there are many people looking for it and we are trying to promote it. I also need to bring more people to Vrinda Kunja to finance the monthly maintenance of 12oo us every month, which now I collect myself alone from the donations of the devotees I can get. These are the reasons all temples need more visitors, and to be able to maintain nicely. And that is the reason that we HAVE to learn how to treat our visitors with utmost care and affection. This is an art. We better learn it and preach wonderfully or we stay ogres like old angry man and spoil the project or at least hamper the progress.
Actually, to plan the preaching is one of the most important parts of Krishna Katha as well. Who else but Krishna himself has inspired such a forum as this? We were all reluctant to start using computers, but today computers are used in so many wonderful devotional services. This is amazing. And all things happening around us in this world are also planned by Krishna; the foundation of the appreciation of the values of Bhakti Yoga requires many other developments.
All people, in one way or another, serve the purpose of Krishna. The Protestants' fight with the Catholic Church has created the foundation of religious freedom in South America. Buddhists are creating new acceptance to the monastic life style with their peaceful presentation without jumping in the streets and singing wildly. Science and abuse confirm that without spirituality and Vedic wisdom there is no chance to know about the infinite. Even the continuous abuse of others in this world helps to make people more aware that we need a path of divine love and not more weapons. But only the Vaisnavas know about the positive and progressive immortality. And even the Christian foundation of love for God is of value to understand Mahaprabhu.
Friedrich Rueckert studied Mayavadi teachings and was charmed, the abuse of the churches were of no enchantment for him. But the part of love versus the impersonal merging created within him a thirst to maintain this love alive. Mayavadi has no information about divine love. They are like scientists, without faith in God, who think that love is some kind of maya altogether, that it is an accidental idea that love could be achieved on an eternal platform
The pioneers of all Vaisnava projects ki jai! It is wonderful that all of you are serving Srila Prabhupada and his world vision. Let us work hard and not be attached to the results. That is the test; even Arjuna and Srila Prabhupada had to path, what to speak of all of us.
Haribol!
A cordial hug to everyone.
B.A. Paramadvaiti Swami
Translation: Manah Siksa Devi Dasi
manahsiksa@yahoo.se
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