Lord Balarama’s appearance. Today is also the anniversary of the Brahma Vimohana-lila, as I remember it. Not sure where this comes from, but I heard that Lord Balarama was not present when the cowherd boys were stolen (and hence wondered when he saw the effects on their parents of Krishna’s expanding Himself into their forms) because he was held home due to His birthday.

Here is something that arrived in my inbox this morning. Good advice:

All blame is a waste of time. No matter how much fault you find with another, and regardless of how much you blame him, it will not change you. The only thing blame does is to keep the focus off you when you are looking for external reasons to explain your unhappiness or frustration. You may succeed in making another feel guilty about something by blaming him, but you won’t succeed in changing whatever it is about you that is making you unhappy.

- Wayne Dwyer

All glories to the lotus feet of Sri Nityananda-Rama.

Sriman Caitanya deva tvam
vande Gauranga sundaram
Sacinandana mantra he
Yadi chudamani prabho

Look at the weaknesses of others with compassion, not accusation. It’s not what they’re not doing or should be doing that’s the issue. The issue is our own chosen response to them and what WE should be doing.

One hundred and eight is an abundant number and a tetranacci number.

It is the hyperfactorial of 3 since it is of the form

108 is a number that is divisible by the value of its φ function, which is 36. 108 is also divisible by the total number of its divisors (12), hence it is a refactorable number.

In normal space, the interior angles of an equilateral pentagon measure 108 degrees each.

There are 108 free polyominoes of order 7.

108 is a Harshad number (Sanskrit: “Great Joy”). This means that it is evenly divisible by the sum of the digits, i.e: 1+0+8 =9. 108/9 = 12.

108 = 6² + 6² + 6², the sum of the squares of the three equal numerals making up the Biblical-Apocalyptic “number of the Beast”, 666. (just thought I’d throw that one in there… )

It so happens that the distance between the earth and the sun equals about 108 (actually 107-odd) times the sun’s diameter. Likewise, it so happens that the distance between the earth and the moon equals about 108 (actually 109-odd) times the moon’s diameter. That sun and moon look equally big in the earthly sky is the immediate result of their having the same ratio between distance and diameter. Moreover, it so happens that the sun’s diameter approximately equals 108 times the earth’s diameter.

Read more at: Why 108? by Dr Koenraad ELST, Ph.D., and at Wikipedia.

Success seems to be largely a matter of hanging on after others have let go.

William Feather

It’s a fact.

You need others. But you need others for everything, really. In our part of the world, we have something called ubuntu. Ubuntu. Ubuntu. Ubuntu. The essence of being human. We say a person is a person through other persons. I can’t be human in isolation. I need you to be all you can be so that I can become me and all that I can be.

— Archbishop Desmond Tutu

Have you had the desire to isolate yourself recently? As conflicts arise in the workplace and remain unresolved, we may become convinced that we could work better alone. At times, we may also become convinced that we do not need others in our lives. The following story demonstrates why the exact opposite is true.

A boy was extended an invitation to visit his uncle who was a lumberjack up in the Northwest… His uncle met him at the depot. As the two pursued their way to the lumber camp, the boy was impressed by the enormous size of the trees on every hand. There was a gigantic tree, which he observed standing all alone on top of a small hill. The boy, full of awe, called out excitedly, “Uncle George, look at that big tree! It will make a lot of good lumber, won’t it?”

Uncle George slowly shook his head, then replied, “No, son, that tree will not make a lot of good lumber. It might make a lot of lumber, but not a lot of good lumber. When a tree grows off by itself, too many branches grow on it. Those branches produce knots when the tree is cut into lumber. The best lumber comes when they grow together in groves. The trees also grow taller and straighter when they grow together.” It is so with people. We become better individuals, more useful timber, when we grow together.
Author unknown

It takes more than one tree to make a forest. When there is a storm, the surrounding trees share the punishing winds, rains, and snow, sometimes affording protection to the trees in the middle. Such is the case with the people with whom we work and live. Their presence can help us grow tall and strong as we grow personally and spiritually.

While there is beauty in the many branches that a solitary tree may spawn, the knotholes may weaken the fiber of the tree just as isolating ourselves from others may weaken us.

Affirmation for the Week:

“I stand tall and strong, secure in the knowledge that the presence of other trees around me makes me even stronger.”

Here is a disturbing report of the systematic rape of women in the African nation of Congo by soliders. The use of extremely violent rape as a strategy has become increasingly widespread in civil conflicts.

When you read what these women have experienced - one lady was raped in front of her children and husband by a group of soldiers, her husband was then disembowelled, and she was then gang raped repeatedly for three days along with her 8 and 10 year old daughters - you should become serious about doing something about yourself. Stop sitting around wasting your life worrying about how you can make things more comfortable for yourself. The world is sliding into a dark pit.

The Art of Peace begins with you. Work on yourself and your appointed task in the Art of Peace. Everyone has a spirit that can be refined, a body that can be trained in some manner, a suitable path to follow. You are here for no other purpose than to realize your inner divinity and manifest your innate enlightenment. Foster peace in your own life and then apply the Art to all that you encounter.

One does not need buildings, money, power, or status to practice the Art of Peace. Heaven is right where you are standing, and that is the place to train.

Morihei Ueshiba, founder of Aikido, The Art of Peace

We must become the change we wish to see in the world

Mohandas K Gandhi

This world is burning! This world is burning! Wake up! Wake up and FOCUS! Get it into perspective and get moving.

Posted by Mark Wilson at Revitalize Your Church, it’s from a Christian perspective, but the principle is universal.

Peter Drucker, the leadership guru once said leaders of non-profit organizations should ask two questions:

1. What is our business?
2. How’s business?

Percentage of McDonald’s franchises that did not sell a hamburger last year: 0%
Percentage of Ace Hardware Stores that did not sell a hammer last year: 0%
Percentage of Kaybee Toy Stores that did not sell a toy last year: 0%
Percentage of Salvation Army Outlets that did not help a needy person last year: 0%
Percentage of State Universities that did not educate a student last year: 0%
Percentage of airlines that did not fly a plane last year: 0%
Percentage of Wal Mart’s that did not sell merchandise last year: 0%

Percentage of Methodist Churches that did not receive a member by profession of faith last year: 43%

My way of fighting the competition is the positive approach. Stress your own strengths, emphasize quality, service, cleanliness, and value, and the competition will wear itself out trying to keep up.

- Ray Kroc, founder of McDonald’s

From a great article by Guy Kawasaki entitled “How to Remain Sane” which is part two of “The Art of Driving your Competition Crazy“

Triyuga also mentioned that “positive buy in … paves the way for team evolution.”

This is a fact that Andy Stanley sums up with the mantra “Acceptance fuels Influence”.

Srila Bhaktivinode Thakura explains the principle in his essay “Light of the Bhagavat”, published over a century ago.

He is the best critic who can show the further development of an old thought; but a mere denouncer is the enemy of progress and consequently of nature. Progress certainly is the law of nature, and there must be corrections and developments with the progress of time. But progress means going further or rising higher. The shallow critic and the fruitless reader are the two great enemies of progress. We must shun them.

The true critic, on the other hand, advises us to preserve what we have already obtained, and to adjust our race from that point where we have arrived in the heat of our progress. He will never advise us to go back to the point whence we started, as he fully knows that in that case there will be a fruitless loss of our valuable time and labor. He will direct the adjustment of the angle of our race at the point where we are.

This is also the characteristic of the useful student. He will read an old author and will find out his exact position in the progress of thought. He will never propose to burn a book on the ground that it contains thoughts which are useless.

No thought is useless. Thoughts are means by which we attain our objects. The reader who denounces a bad thought does not know that a bad road is even capable of improvement and conversion into a good one. One thought is a road leading to another. Thus, the reader will find that one thought, which is the object today, will be the means of a further object tomorrow. Thoughts will necessarily continue to be an endless series of means and objects in the progress of humanity.

It would be one thing to sit back with arms folded and criticize Atma Yoga, but what we have to do is engage, discuss the issues vigorously, and do the best we can to guide its development and implementation with our own conscious contributions.

“Acceptance fuels influence” is Andy Stanley’s mantra, and “Contribution fuels influence” is its corollary.

I’ve been getting a lot of inspiration and philosophical orientation from Superchick over the past couple of weeks.

Superchick are a Christian band that I heard on the radio one morning on the walk to work. Popular music is the primary vehicle for philosophical instruction for youths and teenagers today, and in fact throughout human history (as Bhaktivinode Thakura was keenly aware). I would be happy for my son to listen to Superchick and get his philosophical instruction from there, and in fact I wish I had listened to them in my youth. Better late than never.

Here is what they say about what they believe on their website:

It is very simple. We believe that every person regardless of age, gender, size or any other reason you can come up with, was created on purpose and for a purpose. Every person has greatness in them and something special and unique to offer the world. The world doesn’t stand in our way. Other people don’t stand in our way. We are the only thing standing in our way. We are the ones who define who we are by the choices that we make every day and the things that we choose to believe about ourselves and about life. And don’t think that you can just remain unseen and not be affecting people because even by not doing anything that affects someone that you could have reached out to. We have a world out there that is a mess and looking for someone or something to give them a reason to live. It is our responsibility to start doing something. Don’t limit yourself or the impact that you can have in changing the world. You could be the next Mother Teresa that shows millions love or a janitor that shows one person love. It’s not in the big or in the small it’s in the doing…

As well as singing “radha krishna prana mora” and “je anilo prema dhana” (which always makes me think of Radha Damodara Vilasa), which are nice songs but a little hard for me to practically apply, I found myself singing verses from “Pure”, “Hero”, “We Live”, and “It’s On”, especially at crucial moments where I found my will flagging, or facing a particular hurdle that demanded a proactive response.

From Pure:

This is my brand new day starting now - I let go the things that weigh me down.

This is my prayer without ceasing, the negative releasing, and as I rise above my burden is easing.

This is my brand new day in the light, troubles rising up on the left and the right. I keep my eyes fixed on where I want to go, the rest will follow, and this is my prayer without ceasing, the negative releasing….

This is my brand new day starting now, letting go of the ways that I fall down. The old can be made new, the lost can be found. The lost will be found.

Whenever I felt overwhelmed I would say: “This is my brand new day starting now“, and then I’d just start over again. The mission of the sankirtan movement is to reclaim all the lost souls in the material world. The lost can be found - the lost will be found.

From It’s On:

It all comes down to this
You take your best shot, might miss
You take it anyway
You’re gonna make your move today
Got the will, you’ll find the way
To change the world someday
Grab this moment before it’s gone
Today’s your day

Today’s your day so c’mon bring it on!

And the view will never change
Unless you decide to change it
Don’t feel like it today
Just show up anyway
And though life will take you down
It only matters if you let it
Get up, go through, press on
Today’s your day

And though you wanna quit
dont think you can’t get through this
you’ve come too far to walk away
its not gonna be today.
and no matter how you feel
its what you do that matters
this is your moment to be strong
today’s your day

“It doesn’t matter how you feel - it’s what you do that matters” helped me to keep going when I really didn’t feel like it, as well as looking at the sacrifices being performed by the others on the team, who displayed remarkable leadership in this endeavour.

From We Live:

Waking up to another dark morning
People are mourning
The weather in life outside is storming
But what would it take for the clouds to break
For us to realize each day is a gift somehow, someway
So get our heads up out of the darkness
And spark this new mindset and start to live life cuz it ain’t gone yet
And tragedy is a reminder to take off the blinders
And wake up and live the life we’re supposed to take up
Moving forward with all our heads up cuz life is worth living

From “Hero”:

Heroes are made when you make a choice

You could be a hero
Heroes do what’s right
You could be a hero
You might save a life
You could be a hero, You could join the fight
For what’s right for what’s right for what’s right

Heroes are made when you make a choice. In every moment we have to choose the hard right over the easy wrong. That’s all it takes to become a genuine hero.

All of us just sat back and watched it happen
Thinkin’ it’s not my responsibility to solve a problem that isn’t about me
This is our problem
This is just one of the daily scenarios which we choose to close our eyes
Instead of doing the right thing
If we make a choice and be the voice for those who won’t speak up for themselves
How many lives would be saved, changed, rearranged
Now it’s our time to pick a side
So don’t keep walkin’ by
Not wantin’ to intervene
Cause you wanna exist and never be seen
So let’s wake up and change the world
Our time is now

Donald Miller, author of Blue like Jazz says we’re called to hold our hands against the wounds of our broken world, to stop the bleeding.

It is simply our duty. The mission has already been predicted and fulfilled. Now all that remains is for volunteers to step up and play the roles.

The art of love… is largely the art of persistence.

Albert Ellis

Warren: How have you raised up so many leaders in your church?
Cho: It is a main work to motivate the people. Through my experience, I have found that only 10% of the whole congregation will be motivated to work. So I would ask my Seniors to look for only an available person whom the Holy Spirit is already beginning to develop as a Cell Leader or as a Senior Cell Leader. So we are all looking for people in every section of our ministry - always looking - and I ask my Seniors to pick up those people.
Warren: What do you look for? What do you tell them to look for?
Cho: Naturally, those people who are available, and learn very much by themselves, and who are very much concerned about the lost souls; a heart for evangelism. Then those people are candidates for Cell Leaders.

Read the transcript of the breakfast conversation between these two preachers.

Just clearing up my hard drive and I found this short piece I wrote in New Zealand last year, in December, while listening to a song by local NZ funksters Fat Freddy’s Drop.

It has a repeating loop: “Hope for a generation - just beyond my reach, not beyond my sight”. I was inspired by that to write the following:

Hope for a generation – just beyond my reach, not beyond my sight

This generation is increasingly being lost. Young people are ruining their bodies and minds, scarring themselves with experiences that will permanently impact their psyches and their relational situations.

Impersonal and uncontrollable forces of economic development subordinate personality, community and society to render people slaves to a global juggernaut that is simultaneously destroying the external environment, and laying waste to people’s internal environment.

An increased cultural norm of focus on immediate pleasure and the supremacy of the individual’s immediate sense gratification is destroying the family unit and all social stability.

The prime necessity of this hour is that intelligent and compassionate persons must apply themselves to working to reverse this seemingly unstoppable tide.

One person alone will have limited impact. What is needed is a coordinated effort.

Maintenance of our individual situation must be balanced with the need to apply our energy to making forward progress in institutional development. Institutional development and maintenance must be carefully aligned with mission fulfilment. It is a long term work that involves creating sufficient momentum to progressively counteract the current negative trend of human society.

I have not been born at this time to try to enjoy living in this situation, but because it is my duty to participate in this fight. I have my destiny to fulfil in this work.

Let me maintain my internal conscious state such that I can remain aware of this, and keep my sensitivity to the pathway that I must tread.

I pray for guidance for each of my steps, and for determination to execute the order of Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu and my spiritual master.

In New Zealand concerned parents are marching across the country to raise awareness of the epidemic of drug use, specifically “P” - NZ’s answer to crack cocaine, which is laying waste to the youth of the country.

Without Krishna Consciousness there is no hope. The nature of this world is of darkness and a tendency toward decay. Both energy and order flow downhill. Systems tend toward disorder and decay.

Without a source of light the very fabric of space in this world is composed of darkness.

Without the organizing intelligence of the living entities the nature of the world is toward chaos.

Only through the energy input of the sun, worshiped as the representation of Narayana, the Supreme Person, and the intelligent organization of the living entities - the spiritual spark in contact with the material elements - is this tendency counteracted.

All the energy that we utilize in the form of electricity or oil etc. comes to us in this world through the medium of the sun. The sun, the source of all energy in the solar system, counteracts the tendency of this world toward energy death. All life in this world, the intelligence that counteracts the tendency toward chaos, similiarly comes from a source. That source is Krishna.

Science fiction scenarios tell us of what will happen after a nuclear war, huge volcanic eruption, or meteor strike that causes a dust cloud sufficient to cut us off from the sun - total devastation. Similarly, when we are cut off from Krishna, we experience the same thing. Without a spiritual focus to human society, civilization will simply crumble into chaos - total devastation.

Thought for the day:

I heard John Maxwell say once that “previously it was thought that if you could cast vision, you were a leader. But there is more than one thing to being a leader - in fact there are 21″ (a reference to his 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership).

I certainly know some people who can cast vision like anything, but I was left wondering - “why does this person sound like a leader, but have no-one following them, and not inspire me to follow them either?”

I realized that vision is not sufficient - it has to be credible vision to be effective. I wrote about that in a post on Effective Vision in May of last year.

Today’s thought is a re-expression of that.

Vision gains credibility as you execute on it and get results.

In the beginning perhaps no-one else “gets” your vision. No-one else pays it any heed, believes in it, or wants to contribute to it. But you don’t let that stop you (if you do you definitely don’t have a credible vision). You execute on it anyway, because your vision has at least enough credibility to have one person who believes in it (you), and as you execute on it and make it happen, it rises in credibility.

Here is an example:

My first job in the tech industry was assembling PCs in a small firm in Auckland, New Zealand, called Eclipse Technology. After about 6 months there the company went bankrupt. I remember bumping into the CEO, Carmel, in the hallway during the windup process. She asked me what I was going to do. I told her that I thought I’d be a sysadmin, maybe with Unix machines. Six months previously I’d come from a job I’d held for a year washing dishes in a cafe.

She looked at me and scoffed: “You’ll never do that - you’ve got no experience”.

I didn’t want to point out to her that as the CEO of a company that just went bankrupt she didn’t enjoy so much credibility with me. Obviously my vision of my employment future didn’t have so much credibility back then for people other than myself. Three years later, on the cusp of Y2K I was a sysadmin, albeit for Windows machines. Ten years later, I’m working administering Linux systems.

Ok, to round off this post - here’s another thought I’ve been having for a while:

Vision - if you can hold it, you can have it.

The bigger the vision, the more opportunities you’ll get to give it up, before you get it.

Three very inspirational stories for me from the sacred literature are the stories of Dhruva Maharaja as a child, and also his encounter with the mystical illusions of the Yaksas, and the life story of one of my personal heroes, Hiranyakasipu.

So far as recruiting men is concerned, we have to create men. Preaching means to recruite more and more men. This process is called gosthananda which means pleasure by seeing increase of followers.

- Srila Prabhupada, Founder-Acarya of the International Society for Krishna Consciousness

Si, General!

We require hundreds of bona fide students in Krishna Consciousness. The world is in need of this function. People are going to hell for want of proper guidance. No other religious institution are so much serious about God consciousness as we are. So you must train your contemporaries in such spirit of alertness, then we shall be able to open hundreds of centers, and the people in general shall be saved from being misguided.

-Srila Prabhupada, letter to disciple, 1970

Here is a great collection of Buddhist scriptures speaking about meat-eating, compiled by Kurma, the famous chef, widely known as “Australia’s vegetarian guru”.

Here is a Prabhupada pastime that came to mind yesterday:

During a press conference attended by several reporters Srila Prabhupada was being questioned by a young female reporter who had asked a string of questions in a very challenging manner. After a number of questions she asked: “Why do you shave your heads?” Srila Prabhupada, having patiently answered her queries up to this point now responded, without batting an eyelid: “Why do you show your legs?” in reference to her short skirt.

The reporter was caught completely off guard and was speechless. The question hung in the air for a moment, and then His Divine Grace continued: “We think it is better to have warm legs and a cool head,” with a big smile. Everyone in the room, including the young lady reporter laughed at Srila Prabhupada’s incredibly quick and disarming humour, completely free from malice.

I meditate on the lotus feet of Srila Prabhupada with the sincere desire that my words might also become free from malice and beneficial and pleasing to all who hear them.

Krishna Premi devi dasi:

hearing, chanting, serving, praying, submissively obeying
your teachings never leaving
your grace i’ll be receiving

Prabhupada, it’s such a debt
i have to you
but i forget
oh how i’m put to shame
my lust to blame

in my helpless state i pray
bless me so i may
dedicate my life to you
your servant through and through

i’ll serve your servants who are pure
knowing then that i’ll be sure
to please you free from pride
my desires are put aside

loving service at your feet
i’m begging all i meet
to come and take your love
Krishna’s message from above