I had decided to spend this year's Gaur Purnima Festival in Sofia/Bulgaria and came already ten days earlier in order to visit other small devotee communities in Burgas and Varna. The devotees also drove me to a privately owned farm project three and half hours away from Sofia. Here, two twin brothers have a commercially set up farm with a huge area of greenhouses for growing all kinds of vegetables and flowers which they sell in the nearby cities; a farm project starting off with serious farming.
At this moment, there are around 6 to 8 devotees living in a big and newly built house, which also has a nice little temple room and Gaur Nitai Deities. There are a few more devotees living nearby, and the two brothers have more plots of land nearby. The devotees work very hard to get things off the ground and have big plans of building small houses for grihasthas and a little temple. They conduct a full morning program every day in order to set a spiritual foundation to their activities in the fields. They also have around 45 cows and get around 60 liters of milk every day, which they turn into paneer, butter and yellow cheese to sell it.
Everywhere we went, we conducted lively programs, and devotees were eager to welcome us and associate.
On our return to Sofia, we had several programs at the temple, gradually building up to the Gaur Purnima celebration. The day before the event I went to the flower market to choose the flowers which I arranged in vases for the altar and Srila Prabhupada's Vyasasana - my favorite service and devotional meditation tuning my heart into the upcoming festive event. The small temple room was packed with visitors and many nice and also senior devotees eager to attend the abhishek, lecture and kirtan. A sumptuous feast concluded the auspicious day, and many of my books reached the hands of eager devotees.
The evening before I left Sofia, a good crowd of devotees gathered in the nice and spacious house of one Vaishnava family to churn the topic of family life.
Everywhere we went, we conducted lively programs, and devotees were eager to welcome us and associate.
On our return to Sofia, we had several programs at the temple, gradually building up to the Gaur Purnima celebration. The day before the event I went to the flower market to choose the flowers which I arranged in vases for the altar and Srila Prabhupada's Vyasasana - my favorite service and devotional meditation tuning my heart into the upcoming festive event. The small temple room was packed with visitors and many nice and also senior devotees eager to attend the abhishek, lecture and kirtan. A sumptuous feast concluded the auspicious day, and many of my books reached the hands of eager devotees.
The evening before I left Sofia, a good crowd of devotees gathered in the nice and spacious house of one Vaishnava family to churn the topic of family life.
Married life can turn into a battlefield for our false egos and so much time can be wasted, trying to prove to each other who is right and wrong, who knows better, whose idea is better, and so on. This is our false ego at work – our constant companion and troublemaker. As a rule, those matters of dispute are insignificant and are often trivial little things. The real issue is that our false ego wants to win the battle and be victorious. Generally we don’t realise what is going on. We get completely caught up in all these subtle power games and ego battles over stupid little details, and sometimes we might wonder, “My God, why am I arguing about this?”
At the moment of death it will not have any significance whatsoever whether we were right or he was right. Even after some time has passed, it already loses its importance. Our false ego is pushing us, whispering all kinds of nonsense into our ears, “You are right. You better tell him that you know better …” And we respond, “Just see; I told you so! Why didn’t you do as I said?” Since it is rather subtle, it so often remains unidentified. Nevertheless, it gets us into trouble and creates our misery, often ending in divorce.
Indeed, so much time and energy can be wasted with these ego battles within any relationship, and especially within family life. These clashes are not only going on between husband and wife, but also between parents and their children. From both sides, the egos may flare up and create tension even when the children are still small. So often we spoil and even break our relationships altogether. Therefore, it is of great importance to be able to make the diagnosis and recognise the true culprit and troublemaker behind it as our false ego, rather than identifying with the conflicting situations and getting deeply drawn into them.
Every day, a mother may find herself in so many provoking situations when dealing with her children of all ages, no matter whether they are teenagers or small toddlers. So the quality of tolerance is of the greatest importance for every one of us, and especially for mothers, and for fathers also.
A widespread and typical occurrence within married life is for both partners to point the finger at the spouse, blaming each other for a problem. In contrast, we should rather take a look at ourselves to explore how we are contributing to the difficulty, and where we can correct our behaviour or attitude. It is in our power to change only ourselves – not others. If we work on ourselves, we have the best chance of influencing the behaviour and attitude of our counterpart.
People around us act as a mirror and reflect our own behaviour and qualities. If we are introspective and honest while looking within our hearts, endeavouring to ascertain why we are thrown into certain moments and situations, then we can embark on a journey of deep internal work; then, gradually, by Krishna’s mercy, we will be able to transform our unwanted patterns of behaviour, uprooting the anarthas from within our hearts. Family life offers daily opportunities to perform this internal work; and this is exactly where the deep purification lies.
In this process, we may require the help of a mentor. If we have a trusting and well-wishing friend, and both sides are open and willing to work on themselves, then any challenge or disagreement within family life can be resolved. All it requires is humility and willingness to work on oneself. We can regularly reveal our heart to our mentor and receive good counsel, so that major conflicts don’t even start building up, and can be avoided. Best to accept an experienced grihastha couple as counsellors, as he can advise and guide the husband, and she the wife. In this way, both sides receive constructive feedback and are offered guidance on how to improve themselves and keep their spiritual practice healthily balanced, so that they can nicely perform their respective roles as husband and wife, while moulding their family life into an ashrama.
On the 17th of March I moved on to Cologne/Germany
Your servant, Devaki dd
Please visit www.theholynameretreat.net
www.therootsofspiritualculture.net
https://www.facebook.com/instituteforspiritualculture/
At the moment of death it will not have any significance whatsoever whether we were right or he was right. Even after some time has passed, it already loses its importance. Our false ego is pushing us, whispering all kinds of nonsense into our ears, “You are right. You better tell him that you know better …” And we respond, “Just see; I told you so! Why didn’t you do as I said?” Since it is rather subtle, it so often remains unidentified. Nevertheless, it gets us into trouble and creates our misery, often ending in divorce.
Indeed, so much time and energy can be wasted with these ego battles within any relationship, and especially within family life. These clashes are not only going on between husband and wife, but also between parents and their children. From both sides, the egos may flare up and create tension even when the children are still small. So often we spoil and even break our relationships altogether. Therefore, it is of great importance to be able to make the diagnosis and recognise the true culprit and troublemaker behind it as our false ego, rather than identifying with the conflicting situations and getting deeply drawn into them.
Every day, a mother may find herself in so many provoking situations when dealing with her children of all ages, no matter whether they are teenagers or small toddlers. So the quality of tolerance is of the greatest importance for every one of us, and especially for mothers, and for fathers also.
A widespread and typical occurrence within married life is for both partners to point the finger at the spouse, blaming each other for a problem. In contrast, we should rather take a look at ourselves to explore how we are contributing to the difficulty, and where we can correct our behaviour or attitude. It is in our power to change only ourselves – not others. If we work on ourselves, we have the best chance of influencing the behaviour and attitude of our counterpart.
People around us act as a mirror and reflect our own behaviour and qualities. If we are introspective and honest while looking within our hearts, endeavouring to ascertain why we are thrown into certain moments and situations, then we can embark on a journey of deep internal work; then, gradually, by Krishna’s mercy, we will be able to transform our unwanted patterns of behaviour, uprooting the anarthas from within our hearts. Family life offers daily opportunities to perform this internal work; and this is exactly where the deep purification lies.
In this process, we may require the help of a mentor. If we have a trusting and well-wishing friend, and both sides are open and willing to work on themselves, then any challenge or disagreement within family life can be resolved. All it requires is humility and willingness to work on oneself. We can regularly reveal our heart to our mentor and receive good counsel, so that major conflicts don’t even start building up, and can be avoided. Best to accept an experienced grihastha couple as counsellors, as he can advise and guide the husband, and she the wife. In this way, both sides receive constructive feedback and are offered guidance on how to improve themselves and keep their spiritual practice healthily balanced, so that they can nicely perform their respective roles as husband and wife, while moulding their family life into an ashrama.
On the 17th of March I moved on to Cologne/Germany
Your servant, Devaki dd
Please visit www.theholynameretreat.net
www.therootsofspiritualculture.net
https://www.facebook.com/instituteforspiritualculture/
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