Straiht Wikid Crew, a one-man project of Hare Krsna rapper Jason Fladlien from Muscatine, IA, has released his debut album “Kali Yuga Demolition Vol. 1″.

“On ‘Kali Yuga Demolition Vol. 1′, rapper Jason Fladlien easily exceeds the humorously low expectations that accompany being a Hare Krsna rapper from rural Iowa,” Eric Clark of The Gazette writes.

“Kali Yuga Demolition Vol. 1 has been described as ‘more mack daddy than meditation, more hip hop than Hare Krishna’ by Todd Beemis of Indie-Music.com.

I haven’t heard it, so no comment from me. Original heads up from the Utah Krishna’s site. Word.

I sent this letter this morning.

Dear Sir,

It is with great concern that I read recent reports of events transpiring in your good country in the province of Almaty.

My first contact with Kazakhstan, as with many of us in the West, was through the personality of Borat, the alter ego of British comedian Sacha Baron Cohen.

Your government spent a lot of time, money, and effort to counteract the perception that he created that Kazakhstan is a backward nation filled with bigoted, primitive people and with a repressive ruling regime. I, and many others like me in Australia and around the world, took note of your government’s communication and its intention. The 4 page ad campaign that you ran in the New York Times last year went some way towards correcting the perceptions created by Mr Baron Cohen’s show, but the recent events in Almaty threaten to undo all this public relations work.

Forum 18 (www.forum18.org) and ISKCON News.net (www.iskconnews.net) are both filled at the moment with news of the treatment of the Hare Krishna devotees in Almaty. If this continues it threatens to ignite a grassroots movement of international awareness and support for them. The international Hare Krishna community mounted an effective campaign of public awareness during the Soviet regime of Mikhail Gorbachev that was very damaging to the public perception of his government’s stance on human rights.

I implore you to communicate to your government that this action by local authorities threatens the recent good work that you have done in promoting your country internationally as a modern nation with a commitment to the modern ideals of democracy, tolerance, and freedom.

Over and above the publicity implications, I think this must be due to some mistake or oversight, as it is not at all consonant with the presentation that we have received on Kazakhstan’s values and commitment to the values of the international community.

with warm regards,
a well-wisher of Kazakhstan,
Joshua J Wulf
Engineer
Brisbane, Australia

Update: This information is from the Australian Department of Foreign Affairs website:

Australia established diplomatic relations with Kazakhstan in 1992. Australia opened an embassy in Almaty in 1995, but closed it in 1999 due to resource constraints. Kazakhstan opened a Consulate in Sydney in January 1996, but closed it in March 2003 for similar reasons. In January 2005, Australia established an Honorary Consul in Almaty. Australia’s current Ambassador to Kazakhstan is Mr Robert Tyson, resident in Moscow.

If you hadn’t heard, at the moment it appears that the Hare Krishna devotees in Kazakhstan are being unjustly persecuted. They have a farm community over there called Palace of the Soul, and the government has seized the farm, and the police are evicting the devotees and bulldozing their residences. You can see a video and read more about it here.

You can also read more on in the ISKCON News.Net archive for the 27th of April, and on Forum 18 news.

If you live in Australia and wish to register a protest against this, then contact the Kazakhstan Consulate at:

144 Clyde Street
North Bondi, Sydney
NSW 2026 Australia

phone:(612)9365-3011,
fax:9365-3044
consul@bb.com.au

Update: I tried emailing this address, but it bounced. I called to speak with the Consul, and left a message on the voice mail for them to call me back.

On the subject of Google Ads, I just started a Google Ads campaign for Atma Yoga. We’ve had a number of people email or phone from our findyoga.com.au listing, where we’re number six down on the right in the list of schools.

While we were debating the new name for the school I mentioned a principle that Guy Kawasaki had talked about around that time in a post entitled “The Name Game“, about choosing a name for a company.

Guy said:

Begin with letters early in the alphabet. Here’s the scenario: you bought a booth at a massive trade show like Comdex. The list of exhibitors in the show guide is alphabetized. Would you rather be listed in the front of the guide or at back of the guide? Another scenario: A reviewer analyzes a dozen or so products. She lists them in alphabetical order in the review. Would you prefer that your product be at the beginning or end of the list?

Ka-ching. The only way to ace the findyoga listing would be to call the place 108 Yoga.

Candidasa hassles me every now and then about our non-appearance in Google searches for yoga in Brisbane, so let’s see what the Google ad campaign does.

Don’t be surprised if you don’t see any sponsored links for Atma Yoga in Google - the campaign is targeted to Queensland, Australia, where we are physically located. No sense in advertising to people in Iceland. I might widen it to Australia. We’ll see what happens.

We also got 10,000 flyers yesterday. Elliott and Maha-mantra reckon that they’ll distribute 500 a day, finishing the lot in 20 days. We’ll see how they get on. Again, carpet bombing is not as effective as targeted assassination, to use a military analogy. Bunker busters haven’t taken care of Mr bin Laden…

The personal referral beats the mass marketing campaign any day, or at least it does today. If you didn’t check it out when I previously mentioned it, and you have some time on your hands and the capacity for it - check out Greg Stielstra’s site Pyromarketing.com. Greg was the marketing manager for Zondervan who oversaw the marketing for The Purpose-driven Life.

So we find that people come if a friend invites them or tells them about it, or if they meet a staff member in the street. We trust what our friends tell us because we have similar tastes - that’s why we’re friends. What a stranger tells us is good is less reliable.

At the same time, a good military strike involves air and artillery support accompanied by a fast moving mechanized infantry wave. Boots on the ground. So Google Ads is part of that metaphorical strike - at least that’s how I think of it.

I’ve added a Google Adsense banner to this page. I’m interested to see what ads it will choose as being relevant to the content that I post here. I’ll be keeping an eye on that to get an idea of Google’s algorithm for choosing relevant ad content, and also to get some kind of sense of the topic of this blog over time (I just think about each post as I make it).

I can block ads that I don’t want to appear on the site. I’ll watch it for a while and see if it produces ad results that I think are a useful service to readers.

Otherwise after some time I’ll take it off. It’s a little common, but if it can add value and useful content, then it’s all good!

Unless of course it starts generating megabucks, in which case I’ll give up the day job and become a professional blogger.

Gen-Y’s opt-out vision, an editorial piece from Christian Science Monitor that talks about a growing disillusionment with the previous generation’s work ethic.

Park and Write - from the BBC, a piece about an intelligent, educated lady who lives in her car. It talks about the psychological and sociological factors that lead to homelessness. The support networks of family and community are becoming increasingly thin.

The Dying Art of Conversation - again from the BBC. This piece talks about talking, and about the death of conversation in common society, accompanied by its rebirth in the form of reading groups. Sounds like Sacred Pathways at Atma Yoga on Tuesdays.

I’ve been meditating more and more on the realization shared with me by a friend recently:

As I was reflecting on how easy it is to become in a “victim” mentality I thought how your “lead, follow, or step aside” is also relevant there in a similar way. You can either lead your life, follow your life as it drags you around, or you can step aside. Goodness-passion-ignorance.

Here is what I think about this:

The outcomes of the decisions we make are partially dependent on the paradigms and methodologies we employ when we make them. The outcomes are also dependent on the will of Providence and our previous karma. In that calculus the only thing we can change are the paradigms that we employ to make our decisions. The only way we can help others is by helping them progressively improve the paradigms and methodologies they have at their disposal and utilize in their decision-making.

We own the responsibility for the paradigms and methodologies we employ. The rest we should accept as the will of the Lord. No-one else can be blamed for what happens to us.

The best methodology to employ is to get good guidance, to be open to transformation, knowing that transformation is the only advancement and is the goal of all activities, and to make a conscious decision to not be a “victim of circumstances”, but rather a “servant of the situation”.

We are where we are as a result of our own choices and the will of the Lord. We can’t choose what happens to us, but we can choose how we respond. In every moment we should accept the situation as just, and ask ourselves the question: “Now, how can I serve?”

Our friend Marisol Da Silva came and took photos of the residents of the Red Hill Ashram for her photography class. She had an assignment where she needed to take photos of 10 people who share the same values. So she photographed us. Mantra, Rasika, and Zoe weren’t there at the time, so there are no portraits of them.

Wait for the page to finish loading completely and click on the thumbnails to be able to view these photos using the new Lightbox JS 2 plugin. (Please note that this will only work if you’re viewing them at www.urbanmissionary.info). You can also view these photos at higher resolutions in the photo gallery.

Gobby - collaborative editing over a network for Windows, Mac, and Linux. It’s useful for meetings and brainstorming sessions - bring your laptops, use a wireless network, and edit the same document in real time. It frees up one person from taking all the notes. It’s like SubEthaEdit for the Mac, which Candidasa recently mentioned, only it’s cross platform, and is free.

Lightbox JS 2 is out. There is a Wordpress plugin for it available also. Lightbox JS is the method that I use for displaying photos without opening a new window. Give me a minute to put together a post using the Lightbox JS 2 plugin to show you how it works.

In relation to the “professional kirtaniya” idea in the previous post - I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again:

We need to have a professional attitude without having a professional mentality, and we should be careful to not confuse the two.

Yat karosi tat kurusva mad arpanam: “Whatever you do, do it as an offering to Me” means that we need to strive in all endeavours for the highest quality. Everything is Deity seva. Everything is Deity paraphenalia. Everything is Krishna’s and should be used for His service.

Everything should be done to the highest standard - a professional standard - but without the professional’s profiteering mentality.

Here are a couple of kirtans from Sunday night.

These are two of the kirtans from the beginning of the program.

Vamsidhari’s Varshan melody (Sita-pati das)
Kirtan (Maha-mantra das)

The cartals feature quite prominently in these recordings, but otherwise they’re okay.

Cristian suggested that the tune that Vamsi sang at the Taupo retreat should be a standard at Sunday Feasts, and I agree with that assessment.

With our new stage setup at the Sunday Feast (check out pictures here) there are some issues. Previously we used the small 15W Ashton amplifier that we use on harinam as a fold back monitor. There is nothing worse than not being able to hear the harmonium when you are leading. With the new stage setup there is no room for this, and besides that, in order to turn it up loud enough to be useful, it becomes loud enough for the audience to hear, interfering with the sound levels.

The solution is to get in-ear monitors - something that we’ve known for some time, but have to face up to soon.

You can hear when Mantra changes key in his kirtan that he has trouble locating the note. While the harmonium is audible in the front-of-house mix that the recording comes from, on stage next to the mrdangas and cartals is a different story. Compounding the problem is that he is over-pressurizing the harmonium in an attempt to increase the volume onstage, with the result that he is deforming the reeds, pushing them off-key. This is the reason why so many harmoniums, played by enthusiastic amateurs all over the world, are horribly out-of-tune. Over-pressurization.

Indulge me in a brief digression before I return to the subject of in-ear monitors.

I went to buy a harmonium from an Indian gentleman who imported them a number of years ago. (If you’ve heard the story before, bear with me). I sat down in front of one and began to play one of the Vaiyasaki tunes that I had spent so long mastering, eager to display my mastery of the instrument.

I was shut down immediately by the irate gentleman who scolded me: “That’s the problem with you ISKCON devotees - you pump the harmonium with no thought and over pressurize it!”

It was a particularly biting reprimand, and one which I have never forgotten. “Aggressive Grace”, Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati would term it.

I read a book on driving, and it explained many things, among which was this: if you are driving up a hill, you may be using too much gas. You can tell by easing up on the pedal until you actually notice the engine revs begin to drop. It is possibly to flood the engine with more petrol than it can use.

After reading this, I practiced it and found that yes, you have to be conscious about the amount of petrol that you feed the engine at a given rev range in a given load situation. The same goes for the harmonium. Overpressurizing the bellows compartment results in long-term pressure loss through leaks, and also puts the harmonium out of tune by deforming the reeds. Overpressurizing will also cause the harmonium to play out of tune as the reeds deform immediately.

And worst of all - it cuts a really, really dumb profile. I never noticed it before, but I can see why that gentleman became irate seeing it.

Anyway, now you know the science - pay more attention. When you practice develop the feel needed for the art of harmonium playing. Back off on the pressure, notice when it needs to be pumped. Feel the pressure in the harmonium. Don’t just pump away mechanically with no real idea of what you are doing or why. Don’t overpressurize.

When I studied with Dr Talochan Singh he taught me to hold the heel of the hand that is pumping the harmonium on the top of the harmonium itself. Don’t have that hand “free swinging” - that’s a recipe for over-pressurization, and besides that it’s incredibly amateurish. We’re not about being “professional kirtaniyas”, but there is nothing wrong with doing things properly.

Anyway, end digression and return to the nectar of in-ear monitors:

The ABC’s of Configuring a Personal Monitor System
Can I use more than one Shure PSM receiver with one PSM transmitter? Yes
Shure Guide to Personal Monitors

Today I did three and a half yoga classes - five hours in total.

Usually Monday morning is a wipe out after the Sunday Feast. Now with the Yoga Teachers Training Course that we are on we have to be at the yoga studio at 6 am for a two hour led practice session.

Last night I got to sleep after midnight, then got up at 5 am, showered, chanted 7 rounds, and went to the studio. Two hours later I was feeling great, after an hour of pranayama and 45 minutes of asana.

I came home and took breakfast, then chatted with various Atma Yoga staff members about the program, then Param, Prahlad, and I went over to the temple. Our god sister Carana Renu is arriving in Brisbane tomorrow. She has a Ph.D in astrophysics, and will be doing some programs at the university. We went over to the temple to prepare a room for her to stay in.

Param stayed and did that, and Prahlad and I went to visit the lawyer to sign some documents and pick up his bill. I tell you - if I had known that it would require $40,000 just to open Atma Yoga, I would never have taken the first step. Reason - not because I have too little money, but because I have too little faith. Amazing how Krishna can use you as an instrument even when you are so disqualified. And you know I didn’t have $40k up my sleeve, so as they say: “With a little help from my friends”.

Then I made it to Elliot’s Hatha Yoga class at Atma Yoga at 1.30pm. It was a Gentle Hatha ™ class, as only myself, Rasika, and Jody were there. All four of us were at the mega kirtans at the temple on Saturday night and at the Sunday Feast last night so we were wiped.

Afterwards I conked out in Shavasana and stayed on the floor for the next hour and a half until 4 pm. Then I went back to the ashram, chanted my rounds, helped Zoe jump start her car, and rode my bike back in to catch the last half of Mantra’s Slow Deep Stretch ™ class, and catch Channell’s 90 minutes of Atma Power ™.

The classes were low in attendance today. Tomorrow’s a public holiday, so people are chilling in their cribs, I’d imagine. It’s been a pretty yoga intensive day. Oh yeah, I didn’t have to go in to my day job today, so I maxed out the yoga practice.

For those who haven’t heard the news, Gurudeva (H.H. Devamrita Swami) was in a vehicular accident in Los Angeles. He’s still going and doing his preaching engagements, but he’s walking wounded at the moment with whiplash. The car he was in was struck from behind at a traffic light. Got the head’s up from Candidasa’s blog.

Update:
I spoke with Candidasa in Manchester via phone this morning and he told me that Gurudeva is not in any danger or severe acute problem.

I also spoke with Guruvani in New Zealand and she told me PLEASE DON’T CONTACT HIM. He’s okay, but he needs to rest up - so inundating him with emails and calls won’t help.

REPEAT: PLEASE DON’T CONTACT HIM.

If you want to express your feelings then do it through prayer.

Building Church Leaders.com has a great article by Ken Blanchard, author of The Secret: What Great Leaders Know and Do.

I once asked Don Shula, longtime coach of the Miami Dolphins, “What are your goals next year?”

He said, “I think goal-setting is overrated.”

“What do you mean?”

“Everybody in professional football has a similar goal,” he answered. “If they have halfway decent players, they want to win the playoffs. If they have good players, they want to win the Super Bowl. So I haven’t won more games because I have better goals. I’ve won more games because I’m willing to roll up my sleeves and do whatever it takes to make it happen.”

Leadership demands that we have the ability to realize our goals—to turn vision into reality. Those who have given themselves to leadership know how difficult this is. But effective leaders have a way of getting to the real issues.

In 2001 Vrajadhama and I spent the night in Don Shula’s resort in Miami (it’s a long story). Don wasn’t there, but I must say I was very impressed with his digs.

I like this point of his too. If we don’t set any goals, we’re not even in the game. People who actually have goals are on the playing field. Doing the work needed to achieve those goals is where the real differentiation comes in.

One thing that I noted in Prema Padmini’s recent presentation on Bhakti-vrksa (we have a podcast on that coming up), is that there was definite goal setting - there were statistics of performance, targets, and then measurement of success or failure in achieving those targets.

On Geoff’s recommendation I obtained a copy of First XI: Winning Organisations in Australia. The first section of this book is entitled “Effective Execution”. The top performing organisations in Australia all have in common that they pre-announce their goals, then get them.

I’m sure that there are organisations that pre-announce and then fail on execution, but the fact of the matter is that you have to have goals, and you then have to achieve them.

Here’s a quote that I read recently:

A vision without a task makes a visionary
A task without vision makes for drudgery
A task with a vision makes a missionary

Now that you’ve read my ten cents worth, check out the full text of Ken’s article Turning Vision into Reality, in which he talks about the practicalities involved in turning vision into reality, with reference to church and business situations.

A friend writes:

As I was reflecting on how easy it is to become in a “victim” mentality I thought how your “lead, follow, or step aside” is also relevant there in a similar way. You can either lead your life, follow your life as it drags you around, or you can step aside. Goodness-passion-ignorance.

We’re currently in the market for an additional ashram. Here is the specification:

• 5-6 bedrooms
• 2 bathrooms
• Timber floors
• Gas
• Good kitchen
• Oven
• Easy to maintain yard
• Walking distance from the existing Red Hill facility, on the city side
• Rent up to $400/wk

This is in Brisbane, Australia. If you know of this place, please drop me a line.

Here are some excerpts from my personal notes on the first chapter of Bhagavad-gita that relate to effective and authentic leadership, which relate to the previous post.

It’s important to distinguish between the two. Within all organizations there are leaders and managers who are more or less effective, in terms of their capability to effect change. Then there are leaders who are more or less authentic, in terms of their alignment with universal principles. Ideally we need leaders who are both effective and authentic.

However, if we have to choose one or the other, we prefer inefficiency over inauthenticity.
————————-

What is Leadership? There are many definitions of leadership that highlight its different aspects. John Maxwell, author of “The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership” defines leadership as “influence, nothing more, nothing less. He who thinks he leads but has no-one following him, is simply taking a walk.” This is a functional definition of leadership, one that basically says that a leader is someone who has followers.

Leadership has been described by leadership educator Todd Duncan as “a total commitment to purpose, accompanied by the determination to carry it out.” This is a characteristic definition that describes the personal qualities of a leader.

My personal definition of leadership is “the supply of vision and direction in a situation of confusion and uncertainty”. This is a definition that highlights the identity of the leader as a service provider.

In his 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership John Maxwell presented the idea that leadership can be described as a set of principles that can be learned and applied. When practices align with these principles, leadership is effective.

In his book Principle-centered Leadership Stephen Covey takes this a step further. Not only are the practices, or the “how” of leadership governed by principles, but the actual direction and goal of leadership, or the “what” and “where”, are also subject to universal principles.

No-one can deny that Adolf Hitler was a leader in the sense that he effectively mobilized and directed the energy of many followers toward the pursuit of distant goals. However, not many people would be comfortable with a book entitled: “Leadership Secrets of Adolf Hitler”. We are sure that he is not a leader worthy of emulating. We have a sense that leadership in not only its form, but also its function, is governed by moral imperatives. These moral imperatives, signalled by our conscience, or our “internal compass” in the language of Covey, indicate fundamental principles of the universe. Leadership which conforms with these principles in terms of its form is Effective Leadership. Leadership which conforms with these principles in terms of its form and function is Authentic Leadership.

In these terms Hitler may have been an effective leader, but he was not an authentic leader. It’s not just how you lead the people that is governed by principles that you should be aware of and consciously align with – where you lead them is also governed by principles. With great power comes great responsibility. Those who lead not in accordance with these principles, intentions not withstanding, are guilty of misleading.

Bhagavad-gita describes these fundamental universal principles – the underlying framework of the universe that reflects the purpose of the universal architect. Leaders who align their practices with these principles will be effective leaders. Leaders who align their goals and the goals of the organizations they steward with these principles will be authentic leaders – leaders who are empowered to create a better world.

Leadership is absolutely crucial. As the oft-repeated saying has it: “everything rises or falls on leadership”. Failures or lack of leadership can be found near the root of all problems. At this present moment in time, with so many social and environmental indices tottering toward the red line, the world is crying out not just for effective leadership, but for authentic leadership. Bhagavad-gita contains the timeless principles that will empower leaders to be effective and authentic leaders. The greatest need at this point in time is for those people who have been called to lead to step forward and take up the Service of Leadership.
———————————–

In contrast to the conchshell sounded by Bhishma, the conchshells sounded by Arjuna and Krishna are described as “transcendental” (divya in the original Sanskrit). This is an indication that the leadership of Arjuna and Krishna is in accordance with underlying universal principles, as will be further explained in this work.

Effective leadership follows principles of practice which empower it to effect change. Authentic leadership follows principles of purpose which empower it to effect holistic positive change. Duryodhana was expert in applying the principles of practice, and as such he was able to amass a large force of capable, competent leaders. However, he had no interest in any purpose other than his own - the goal and direction of his leadership was not in accord with principles, therefore he was misleading these people. Leadership which follows principles in its form but deviates from or ignores universal principles in its function is actually little more than manipulation. A leader has been given a gift in the form of their ability to lead. With great power comes great responsibility. A leader exists within the context of a universal order, as do the people he or she leads. It is the responsibility of the leader to know what that universal order is, and to lead in accordance with it. Bhagavad-gita is just for this purpose.
——————————-

Krishna had vowed not to fight in the battle, but to join one side of the conflict. His army would fight on the other side. Duryodhana elected Krishna’s army, and Arjuna chose to have Krishna on his side. The inner meaning of this is that leadership which is lacking in effectiveness, in efficacy, due to a lack of understanding of the principles of practice is preferable to leadership which is lacking in alignment with the principles of purpose. It’s better to be going in the right direction at 5 miles an hour, than off a cliff at 100.

For all the efficiency of modern western civilization we see a number of alarming statistics, among them rates of violent crime, suicide, divorce and other indicators that efficiency is not everything.

Nityananda-kari dd asks:

(You) said ‘Level 5 leaders hold organizational priorities above ego priorities because they value the mission above themselves. ‘ and ‘level 5 leaders are committed above all to the mission. Followers or leaders who are not committed to the mission will destroy the organization.’ What’s the standard of a level 5 servant? If I know that I’m not a leader, but want to be a good follower, what guidelines should I follow? Can you put some light on this?

Thanks for your questions Nityananda-kari. I will do my best to reply.

Leaders and followers are both servants. After all, jivera svarupa haya, krsnera nitya-dasa. In his book The Courageous Follower, Ira Chaleff makes the point that followers do not orbit around leaders - both leaders and followers orbit around and serve a higher purpose. Just as teachers and students form a “learning circle” around a body of knowledge, similarly leaders and followers form an “action circle” around a common purpose.

Take away the knowledge, and the teacher-student relationship disappears. Take away the purpose, the mission, and the leader-follower relationship disappears.

Both followers and leaders work together in order to advance in an organized fashion toward common goals.

The term Level 5 Leader comes from Jim Collins, and was first introduced in an article that he wrote for the Harvard Business Review, entitled Level 5 Leadership: The Triumph of Humility and Fierce Resolve. The idea was expanded and fully explained in his book Good to Great.

You can read about the concept of a Level 5 Leader on Jim’s website.

Here is a graphic from there that describes the hierarchy:

OK, so your question is, if I understand it correctly: “How can I be an effective follower?”

We are actually all leaders, because our actions influence others. There will always be someone who looks up to us, and even apart from that our actions contribute to an overall culture by reinforcing it. Even a follower leads by setting an example of how to follow. The best followers are leaders.

By asking this question you have already demonstrated a leadership quality - proactivity. You are not sitting back waiting for someone else to do something - you are doing something about the situation.

His Holiness Bhakti Tirtha Swami, in his book Leadership for an Age of Higher Consciousness, explains that people end up with bad leaders because they do not know how to choose good leaders. Our present-day governments are elected democratically, so the people bear some responsibility for the leaders they end up with. Of course, the fairness of the electoral system in many countries is disputable, but in other arenas of life who we choose to follow is our own decision.

The first duty of a follower is to know who to follow. The qualification of a disciple is that they should know who is a real guru. Srila Prabhupada gives the example of gold - if you want to buy gold, then you had better know what real gold is, or you will be cheated. Similarly, if you are going to follow, then you had better know who is a real leader.

Blind following is condemned. We sometimes give the example of a soldier who kills on the command of superior officers and is thereby immune to prosecution. The analogy goes that this same person killing on their own prerogative is held accountable for their actions. This example is given to illustrate the idea that one who acts following the directions of the Supreme Personality of Godhead does not enjoy either the fruits or the reaction of their work.

However, to continue with this analogy, we find that the Nazi German soldiers who tried to use this defense at the Nuremburg trials after World War Two had it struck down. The court would not accept that they had “simply followed orders”.

Following these trials, every serviceman around the world now knows that they have a duty to refuse to obey illegal orders. This means that the soldier must know what constitutes legal and illegal orders. It is not enough to be a mindless automaton.

Similarly, we must know what are valid directions. We may not be able to take responsibility for other people, we may not be able to courageously initiate action, to inspire others to action, and to strategically navigate the way through a metaphorical battlefield, but we should still know enough to be able to recognize someone who can, and to know whether or not they are headed in the right direction.

If we are not a front-line person who leads the charge, but rather a second-line person who comes in directly behind lending support, then other second-line persons, and third-line persons will look to us for cues on who they should line up behind.

One of the arguments for Krishna being the Supreme Personality of Godhead that Srila Prabhupada would give was: “Vyasadeva has accepted, Madhvacarya has accepted, Ramanujacarya, Lord Caitanya, Srila Bhaktivinode Thakura and Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati have all accepted. Therefore we also accept.”

We exist somewhere in a hierarchy. Both in front of us and behind us others are linked in. Our service is to lend our support in all directions. This is called 360 degree leadership. Whether our role is to demonstrate leadership in cleanliness by washing the floor with a cloth every morning, leadership in sadhana by rising early and chanting as an example for others, whatever it may be, we also have the responsibility to show others how to link into the hierarchy.

As Duryodhana exhorts his men: “Now you all show support from your different positions in the phalanx to Bhishmadeva” (Bg. 1.11).

So I would say this: Learn to recognise authentic and effective leaders, and follow them. Back them up. Help them by lending support and giving honest feedback, in that order.

You may not exercise leadership directly in a formal role, but you should still seek to learn about it in order to be able to recognize and support those who do, and in order to take responsibility for your influence on others. This is a very important service.

Thank you for your questions and the opportunity to respond to them. You have already taken the first step in your leadership development journey by asking them. I hope some of the above points are of service to you.

your servant,
Sita-pati das

A6, double-sided, colour, glossy white paper. $605 for 10,000 for those who like to know about those kinds of things. I also saw some DLE (that’s 1/3 of an A4) on card, double-sided, colour, that a mate had done - $600 for 6000. Those are Australian dollars, but it’s about 1 to 1 for the Kiwi, isn’t it?

You can read details of the programs on the Atma Yoga website.

Props to Bhakticandrika for laying it out. It’s been a long process with a lot of changes along the way.