Questioner: I understand that all the actions that we perform will generate a reaction. But what about the thoughts in our mind, the bad thoughts that we don’t act upon?
According to the scriptures, during Satya-yuga, Treta-yuga and Dwapara-yuga, humans were responsible according to laws of karma for every thought. This was because people had much control over their minds in those ages. But in the current age, Kali-yuga, the mind is like a hurricane. It’s very difficult to control the desires and thoughts that come into our mind. Therefore, we are not responsible for the karma of our thoughts but we are responsible for the karma of our words and actions.
We always have the free will to contemplate on either good or bad thoughts. If we contemplate on bad, selfish and egoistic thoughts, the mind will force us to speak and act accordingly in due course of time. When those thoughts and desires appear within our mind, we must neglect them by our intelligence and we must choose to focus our mind on God. Then we can overcome those negative thoughts. The easiest way to fix our mind on God whenever a bad thought comes is to take the shelter of God’s holy names.
How does the chanting of God’s holy names work?
It begins by regular chanting like treatment of a disease begins with regular intake of medicines. Then we try to go deeper into the holy name by living according to the qualities of a true devotee, i.e. to live our life with humility, with tolerance and forgiveness, offering respect to others, while demanding no respect for ourselves. We should live by the principles of morality, integrity and mood of servitude to others. Then the holy name will take our consciousness deeper and deeper to understand our own spiritual essence and our relationship with God, the all-beautiful.
When we actually experience the beauty of God within our heart, it’s such a higher taste and experience that whatever happens in the world, we may deal with it, but nothing can take away that unlimited love and satisfaction of our relationship with God. And we just want to share this with everyone. That is the result of chanting properly.
We are logical and rational beings but still why do we find it so tough to identify with the soul and stop identifying with the body?
All of us are conditioned since time immemorial by our own activities and choices of seeking temporary and flickering pleasures for this body. Therefore, to evoke our consciousness back to the qualities of the soul and build again a relationship with God will require a total transformation of our life.
We have to completely recondition our entire thinking and our entire value system, which is not easy. If we want something valuable in life, we have to pay a price. If we want broken pieces of glass, we can pay anything for it but if we want a diamond, we have to pay a high price. To recondition our life and rejuvenate our values, we have to come out of the mainstream of common men and separate our way of thinking. We have to accept God as the goal of life and chant the holy names.
It is not very difficult but because of the social conditions around us, it appears difficult. Nowadays, the environment around us is so greatly contaminated by illusion, ignorance, greed, lust and pride that we get easily distracted. But if we associate with saintly persons, it becomes much easier to recondition ourselves. That is why association with saintly persons is the most important part of our spiritual development.
Krishna is so kind that he has given us a simple process to perfect our lives. He appeared as Lord Chaitanya Mahaprabhu some 500 years ago in Bengal, and freely gave the holy name, which is the only way to eternal peace for everyone. We just need to chant the holy names.
Sometimes someone causes us so much pain that even if we forgive that person, the memory of that incident keeps coming back to our mind. We want to forgive that person completely but somehow we find ourselves helpless. How do we deal with that situation?
Real forgiveness must come from the heart. In the beginning we may forgive on a superficial platform. For real forgiveness to come from the heart, it may take time. If our experience had been traumatic, it may even take a longer time. But we should have that aspiration to really forgive, we should have that prayer. God understands our intentions and prayers even if we do not have the power or the ability to do it right away.
In the Bhagavad-Gita, Krishna states that for those who aspire to take shelter of him, he preserves what they have and carries what they lack.
On our own, we don’t have the power to forgive. But we know it is the right thing to do. We know that by forgiving, we’ll be relieved of the poison of hatred. We know it will be pleasing to God and I’ll be forgiven if I forgive others.So we should pray to be relieved of this disease of hatred. We should pray to God for that power; we should go to saintly people and reveal our hearts and ask for their help; we should try to cleanse our hearts through chanting God’s names and meditating on him. Then God will help us.
The author is the spiritual leader of ISKCON