How character is deformed and reformed – Ramayana wisdom

Hello, Krishna. It’s wonderful to be here among all of you once again. And I’ll speak today on the Ramayan on the topic of how character is reformed and how it is deformed. How sometimes things change for the good, good, and sometimes things change for the bad. So I’ll start with we’ll discuss 3 case studies on the Ramayan about how change happens, and we’ll talk with 3 concepts.

So Hold on. Wickedness, wickedness, and goodness. So now we can make this into, like, a table Yeah. With 3 further columns. Well, add the characters over there.

Sure. So here when we are talking about these three things, goodness, weakness, and wickedness. So let’s begin with the middle, weakness. So, yeah, 3 over there. So as the you can be seated here, and I’ll tell you what to write over there.

Sure. So, basically, what is thank you. All of us have weakness. Weakness means sometimes we get angry, sometimes we feel greedy, sometimes we feel envious, sometimes we feel lusty, whatever. So these are weaknesses which are there within every one of us.

Simultaneously, there is some goodness with all of us. There are some good qualities, some virtues, some good habits. So so goodness, weakness, now normally we talk about good and bad or virtue and vice. But here, I am dividing this. Goodness is virtue, but vice, you can divide into 2.

Weakness and wickedness. What is the difference? In weakness, one does wrong, but after doing wrong, one feels bad. I shouldn’t have done this. Basically, within us, there are two forces which can guard us from doing wrong.

It’s our conscience and our intelligence. Our intelligence guides us rationally. Hey. It shouldn’t have a legs and gives us the reasons why I should not do this. And our conscience guides us emotionally.

That means if we have a strong conscience and we do something bad, we feel bad about it. And the bad thing, I don’t want to feel like this. I’m feeling terrible. I’m feeling burdened by guilt because of what I did. I won’t do this again.

So both of these are like our inner guards, conscience and intelligence. So in people who have weakness, this conscience and intelligence are there, but they are temporarily over powered. So suppose somebody is, in a tempting situation. Say for example, nowadays in America, even in India, there’s a in colleges, there’s a big, fear of drugs. People get addicted to drugs.

So now student life, like all phases of life, is stressful. And sometimes the student might just want, I need some I need some relief. So much stress. This this this. I need some relief.

And maybe some friend tells them to take this truck to feel good. And in a moment of weakness, they drink the truck. So that is bad. But still after that, they will what did I do? I didn’t come here for this.

This can lead me down a very dangerous path. I’ll not do this. So in weakness, we may do something wrong for some time, but we come back on the right track. But different from weakness is wickedness. Wickedness is where that person’s conscience has almost become dumb in number.

The conscience doesn’t speak and the conscience doesn’t feel also. So numb means you don’t no sensation, numb dumb means no expression. So the conscience has become numb and dumb and then there are some people who nonchalantly do terrible things. And I was once in Calcutta. We were told Mayapur and just in the bus we were there.

We’re watching some some boys, they’re just chatting with their friends and all of them are nonchalantly, like, they’re picking up chickens and cutting the chickens and cutting and chatting. You know, like, we will cut they’re catching and cutting or lopping off their neck and then it’s cutting into pieces. How is the real life? I mean, in public, in front of everyone, like, it’s literally, like, we might talk with someone casually while cutting vegetables, they’re cutting like that. So now I wouldn’t want to call those children as wicked, but the point I’m making is that sometimes the conscience can become completely downward.

So if that’s what they have seen their parents doing, that’s what is their profession, then they just get habituated to do it. So to not feel bad on doing bad is terribly bad because then one inner safeguard that we have from doing bad, that has been removed. So, conscience has been dumped and with respect to intelligence, some intelligence can get perverted. When the intelligence gets perverted, the intelligence instead of controlling desire, it gets controlled by desire. That means that person uses their intelligence to do wrong in such a way that they will not get caught by it.

They’ll do wrong, and then they’ll carefully cover up their tracks. Once a person was pulled over by a cop because the speed the cop he asked the the the cop asked him, did you see the speed limit? Yes. I saw the speed limit. I just didn’t see you.

So the idea is doing wrong is not the problem. Just be smart enough that you don’t get caught while doing wrong. So when the intelligence becomes a servant of the lower desires, servants of the wises that we have, then so when both of these happen, when the conscience is silenced and the intelligence is perverted. The the the word is conscripted. Conscripted means that somebody, like, say, an Indian soldier is captured by a Pakistani army and then somehow that soldier is made into a Pakistani.

I think you change the party itself, so conscripted. But then for such people, what they have is not weakness. It is wickedness. Wickedness is where they do wrong and they sometimes not only not feel bad about doing wrong, they delight in doing wrong. They think it is my cleverness, see how much wrong I did, and I got away with it.

And this is the mentality Krishna talks about in the, in the 16th chapter. He says, this enemy, I have eliminated. That enemy, I’ll eliminate him. In this way, I’ll become the controller. I’ll become the enjoyer.

Who is there like me? I am great. We can almost envision that Krishna, when you’re speaking these words, maybe he was thinking of Duryodhana. The the demoniac this is what Duryodhana was doing. He was trying to eliminate the Pandavas.

So there are demoniac people and what they have is not weakness, but wickedness. So wickedness is basically wickedness is evil. Weakness is not evil. Weakness is just weakness. Wickedness is where, you know, to one aspect of this to in to do something wrong and then cover it up.

Other aspect of wickedness also is that to cause pain for the sake of causing pain. All of us during the course of our life, sometimes, we cause pain to others. Say, if you are walking on a, in a crowded road and we are rushing for some urgent work, you might step on someone’s foot and you might not even notice it. Now if you notice it, most of it will apply. I’m sorry, sir.

Now imagine if somebody is rushing along and they step on someone’s foot and they notice it. A person said and then they delegate a stab on their foot. Well, that would be evil. They are causing pain for the sake of causing pain. So that is also wickedness is associated with evil.

So Ravana in the Ramayana is said to be evil. He is he was wicked and he was evil. So he will cause pain and delight in causing pain. So, basically, for all of us, the topic we’re discussing is how his character reformed and deformed. So we’ll take 3 stories from the Ramayana of how, a character was affected.

So, let’s start with the first, you could write here kaikei and manthara and kaikei, that is weakness, manthara is wickedness and above here the goodness, you can write Bharat. So, basically, now weakness everyone has. Before I go to this case, one more point to establish for it. Weakness everyone has. Wickedness, few people have.

But what is especially dangerous is if weakness and wickedness come together, then wickedness will exploit the weakness. It’s like I talked about this, say, student who might just occasionally take some drugs, and I feel very bad about it. But suppose there’s a drug peddler over there and that drug people spots, this this student is a little weak and deliberately dangles drugs, gives free drugs and he will send his drugs to various to people. Then what happens? Weakness is exploited by wickedness.

Then weakness also ends up acting in ways that are wicked. That same student, you know, that student might be very honest and upright, may not lie to parents, may steal money from their parents place and may be rob from elsewhere. Addiction is often a very common predictor of criminality. Mass Opposmiculitis, they go down. So, a person who has weakness, if they become attached to somebody with wickedness or they come or they come close then they will degenerate.

So now this is what happened in the Ramayana with Kaikai and Nantara. Kaikai had a normal weakness. Every relationship, when you go close, there are tensions. I met a devotee recently. He’s a marriage counselor, and he said, I have seen only 2 kinds of families.

He said He was also talking about western families. He’s a westerner. He’s a constant western families. He says, there are there are 2 kinds of couples. Those who quarrel with each other and those whom you don’t know very well.

So you don’t know very well, so you don’t know that they’re quality. So it’s 2 people that they come together, always there’ll be differences. Mhmm. Now if you see in the shastras, in our scriptures, we have many cases of polygamy. Say, 1 king has many queens, but you will see on every situation that leads to trouble.

In almost every time, you can see in the 6 in the Bhagavatam, Chitraketri. Imagine if somebody poisoning a baby and add to the co queens, co wives. So in the case, something similar happens in the Shruth Maharaj’s case also. Among these queens, Kaushalya is the senior most, but Kaikeya is the youngest and she’s the most attractive. So Dashod becomes more attached to her.

And because Dashod will be more time and attention see, in administrative hierarchies, in in official administrative situations, there’s like official hierarchy. This person with a higher post, this person lower post. But in in familial situation, there’s no official hierarchy like that. There’s more informal hierarchy. So what happened because Rashidwar would pay more attention to Kaikeyi, spend more time with her.

So Kaikeyi’s stock in the royal family started rising, and Kaikeyi became more influential than Kaushali also. Now Kaushali actually felt bad, but she was not resentful. Overall, things were fine, but still there was tension. And Mantra exploited that natural tension between cowboys. Now Mantra had her own axe to grind.

She had been a hunchback, and she had often been, the butt of jokes for many people. But in this case, because she was a favorite maidservant or the favorite queen of the king, she had risen in the royal staff, and she didn’t want to lose her position. And so she spun a whole story of how Ram’s upcoming coronation is actually a scheme to deprive Bharat. And not only that is bad enough, but she made it even more personal. Actually, this whole thing is orchestrated by Kausaliya so that she can become the king’s mother, and then you will have to become her maidservant.

And then she will get back to you for having to serve your her position for so long. And none of this was true, but in this case, what happened was she somehow believed it. And she believed it, and she ended up acting in horrendous ways. It’s one thing was, of course, that Bharat become the king. That’s okay.

Let’s understand why every mother may desire that my son should become great. But to have Ram send him into the forest for 14 years, for no fault of it, there is outrageous. So what happened here? She he was she had weakness. The weakness was that she was attached to the position that she had got, and that attachment was exploited by by Mantra, and she ended up acting in a wicked way.

And it was so serious that eventually not only was Ram exiled, not only was the whole Ayodhya drowned in agony, but eventually Dashruth also died. But still, that did change her. It was only when Bharat came back. Now in her case, she was vulnerable to mantera, but she was attached to Bharat also. And when Bharat chastised her, so what have you done?

Did you say you’re doing all this for me? You think this is going to make me happy? Sometimes some people create an imaginary conception of someone who they want to please. Like, sometimes in some cases, some disciples do something thinking that they’re doing this for the spiritual master. But they do a lot of things, and then they then the spiritual master will say, I didn’t want you to do this.

And if you know all that I’m doing is for Guru Maharaj. Do your spiritual master ask you to do something like this? If not, then don’t imagine things like this. So, anyway, when when Bharat reproach her, severely, he said that you are not my mother. You are the goddess of destruction incarnated in our family to destroy our whole dynasty.

That was the time she was jolted out of her stupor, and then she came to her senses. But by that time, it was too late. Dashwood had already passed away, and Ram had gone to the forest. Now but she truly repented. And the repentance was that she one part of the repentance was that she went with Ram.

She went with Bharat to call Ram back and implore him. Of course, Ram was firm and he didn’t come, but still the point was that although she was vulnerable to wickedness, she also had a connection with goodness. And that’s why she although she became deformed temporarily, but she was also reformed. So within us, if there is weakness, if we all have weaknesses. So if we if our attachment to wickedness becomes stronger than attachment to goodness, then we’ll be deformed.

And if there’s no goodness, then we may deform forever. But if the goodness comes back, then good here we’re referring to goodness not as a quality, but as people with goodness. So this is this is association with wickedness, association with person with people with wickedness, and people with goodness. Now let’s look at another case study. Here we have Ravan, Vibhishan, and Indrajeet.

K? So where will Vibhishan fall? Goodness. Goodness. Yeah.

We can just write. Vibhishan. The pen has become weak. Okay. Vibhishan.

And division. And then this now where will Raul fall over here? Wickedness. Okay. And where would Rajit fall?

Really? Why is it in weakness? It was attached to his Okay. Let me not make it so let me, let me make it more specific, not generic. See, Raul and his demonic associates, all of them.

Where would they fall? Yeah. They so here, we have both. Ravan and wickedness and Ravan and associates. You can write both over here.

Ravan and Indejit or This is Ravan you can write. And you can just below, you can, yeah. Yeah. Access us. This right access us.

We use our access as this. So now here also what happened that now Ravan was not just it was not just an, a moment of weakness when he felt attracted to Sita. It was a whole conspiracy that he planned, and that was not weakness. That was wickedness. So now in this case, when Raman, he started doing all this, there was okay.

There are not just Vibhishan. There are others also. So, of course, came with the picture when he activated. You sit back. Don’t hold on.

It will call the destruction of your whole dynasty. I have another whole, I’m writing a second book on the It’s called Ravana head. It is one article that is Ravana head 10 heads with 0 grades. So 10 heads is what? I shared out of if 10 people gave advice to Ravana, and they all tried to advise from different perspectives.

But even those 10 people could not put one brain in his head even instead, unfortunately. So, anyway, the point was that Ravan did not listen to anyone. Now we say Yes. There are there are some things which are non translatable. If you try to translate this into English, the ghosts of kicks don’t learn by words.

It doesn’t make any sense. So, he he would not learn simply by some instruction, but when he saw demonstration of the power of Ravan of Hanuman, sorry. Hanuman alone penetrated on Lanka and broke free from his guards and then burnt half of Lanka without any weapon at all, just the tail. So it was so it’s like Hanuman’s tail, p a l e. Hanuman’s tail is centered on Hanuman’s tail.

T a I l tail. So it is Hanuman’s tail with the chipmunk. Then after that, Vibhishan strongly spot him. He said, if one monkey can do so much, what do you think around this whole army will do? Says return, Sita.

You have so many queens. Just give up your desire for her. So, actually, initially, when Vishal spoke this, Ravan became a circumspect. And Ravan, he says suspended the assembly. He said we’ll talk tomorrow morning.

But the next morning, when the division went first privately talk to him. So what had happened all night, Ravan had been craving for Sita, and an unseated desire had blinded him again. And although Ravan seemed a little cautious the previous night, the next morning, he uses back to his insolvent self. And then, Bhishan spoke to him, but Ravan didn’t listen. And then in the assembly, Bhishan spoke again.

And at that time, when Bhishan spoke that we will quote destruction if we antagonize Ram if we keep Sita. So at that time, various generals, they spoke. Prastha spoke, he said. Why are we afraid of a mere monkey? It’s not that he is strong.

It’s just that he caught us by surprise. If they come back again, it is they who will be in for surprise. We are so poor. Other monkeys Parashar said, actually, we should not even wait for them to come here. Let’s all send an army behind and destroy them where they are itself.

And Indrajit said, why do you need to send an army? I alone can destroy them. Just order me right now. And all of them started bragging. And in that, the Vibhishan’s voice was drowned out.

So what happened is, generally, if somebody is in wickedness, then it’s very difficult to reform them. It’s possible but it’s extremely difficult. And especially if somebody has wickedness and they are surrounded by people who are wicked who have wickedness, then reformation is almost impossible. So this is a we could say here there is not a happy ending, but the happy ending is that Kaikeyi was reformed and Kaikeyi and Ram and, Sitao all reunited after the exile was over. But here, there’s only destruction.

So this is again a different subject, which is brief mention of this that in general, we say we should always forgive. Forgiveness is a spiritual virtue. But then our scriptures have wars and war means people are killed. So why is there a forgiveness in these situations? Forgiveness is to be given to weakness, not to wickedness.

Giving forgiveness to wickedness is foolishness. It’s like somebody is armed terrorist and the person just going killing around people indiscriminately, and then the police finally call another person. The anti terrorist squad, and they will know, oh, please forgive me. Please forgive me. I’m sorry.

And then this person lowers the gun that goes in pounds, don’t pick another gun, shoot you. There are people who are wicked, and they have to be dealt with strongly. So forgiveness is important, but duty fullness is also important. Duty fullness means we all have to do our duty, and we have to create facility that which people do their duties. And wicked people will not do any let anybody do their duties, And sometimes punishment is required strongly.

So the second case. The third case is of sugriva. So sugriva will come in the category of weakness and yeah. There. And you can put Tara in goodness.

So which incident are we talking about here? Yeah. But which incident? Can you guess? We have no?

Not death of Bali. Something after that. Yes. Lakshman comes. Basically, we could what happens is that Ram and Subria form a deal, and he will help Mali to Ram or Subhriya to get back his wife in kingdom, and then Subhriya will help Ram to find Sita.

So but at that time, after Subhriya becomes the king, suddenly the chaturbans starts. And normally, we might think, you know, somebody is lost or somebody is being abducted. Just because of rains, you won’t stop the search. But in this case, what had happened, Wali was the son of Indra. And because Wali had been killed, so Indra was angry.

And Indra showered down unseasonally heavy rains, so nobody could move at that time. And that’s why they decided to suspend the search for 4 months. And during those 4 months, Sugri, who had been living in Royal Comfort, is a warrior, but he had been living in Comfort for a long time. And then when he had he had to flee, he had to live in Spartan austerity. It’s extremely difficult.

And then suddenly he came back, and now he had all this royal luxury with him. So he lost himself in revelry. He lost himself in drinking and doing all kinds of things. And then the 4 months got over, the rain stopped, and still there’s no sign of Subhri coming. Then Ram said Lakshman.

And even before Lakshman went, Hanuman noticed what was happening. Hanuman noticed that Subhri was got lost over there. Now what happens in traditional societies, hierarchies are very important. So Hanuman couldn’t directly instruct Subhri. Although, Hanuman is much more powerful than Subhri, till now, he has not manifested his power.

It’s only when Jambavan speaks, then his power gets manifested. And even when his power manifests, still Hanuman identifies himself. He says, I am a servant of Sugriyub who is serving around like that. So he couldn’t directly instruct, but Hanuman talked with Dara. And then Dara came and spoke to Sugriyav.

He said, you know, you had promised this to Ram, and Hanuman also came and then said yes. Yes. Yes. And then immediately he realized and he summoned he sent summons to get monkeys from various parts of the world to come. But after issuing those summons, what happened?

Again, he relaxed. Again, he lost himself in the same sensuality. And then Lakshman came over there. Lakshman heard all these sounds of, reveling going on, and he became furious. He charged into the place where Sugri was there, and he said, ingratitude is the worst of sins.

You know, after I received a great favor from your friend, from one whom who has considered you a friend, now you’re betraying him. You deserve to be punished. Seeing Rakshma’s anger, Sugri was stunned. He didn’t know what to speak. So at that time, Tara intervened.

And Tara said that Lakshman was angry, but Kshatriyas at that time they were cultured. And generally, no matter how angry Kshatriya might be, if a woman would come, they’ll calm themselves down. So he is angry. He tried to control himself. And Tara said, oh, Lakshman, don’t be angry with Sugri.

He said that temptations she said the temptations are so strong that even great failures sometimes fall into temptation. And Sugriva is just a monkey, and he’s been deprived of pleasure for so long. Still, he has not forgotten his duty. He’s already arranged for monkeys. And then Sugriva, he spoke, and then Lakshmi was specified.

So in this case, what happened was there was weakness. Fortunately, there was no wickedness around. The dancing girls and whoever were there were there, they were not out to particularly exploit exploit, Sugri. They’re just doing their job. And there was weakness and a situation of temptation, so there was some deep some fall.

But because there was associate because there was goodness, and he was he was open enough to listen to goodness, so there was reformation. So there was temporary deviation, there was reformation. So in this way, these three cases, we can analyze to understand how are the character of a people can change or can be deformed or can be reformed. Now for all of us, we have weaknesses, and we can’t just get rid of those weaknesses. What we can do is three things.

1st is, we try to create a distance from wickedness. Now wickedness is not just people with some horns coming out of their head. There are all kinds of people. Jaydutt Manath writes article in back to godhead is called who is a demon? And then he says, demons are not just mythical creatures with horns around them.

It is no. Your local politician might be deep. Your grocer might be deep. Your neighbor might be deep. You might be deep.

So it’s a mentality. It’s not a it’s not a form. So the point here is that we all have weakness within us, and there are also people around us who have wickedness. So when there is wickedness, then what happens? Now it’s not that again, this is we’ll put it this way then.

It is some people have wickedness and some people are wicked. That’s also difference. That means some people have wickedness means with respect to one thing, they really are manipulative. They will speak with this over there, speak that over there, and they’ll do this and do that. Some people love to gossip.

It’s like they that’s their if you don’t get, then you get gossip. Just speak something. See, what happens is now what is gossip? Talking about others. You know when gossip begins?

Gossip begins when you hear something you like about someone you don’t like. What? When you hear you like about so you don’t like. Oh, this person like this? I I everybody this person portrays such a good person, but this is not I’ll tell everyone now.

So there are some people, they may not be they may not be they may not be wicked, but they have wickedness about something. With respect to this, they will speak this over here, they speak this over there. And I’m traveling across the world, I see so many places. Like, it can be in a family with the husband and wife. It can be between, 2 devotees in the same community.

So many misunderstandings come up because usually, those 2 people can get along. There’s some third person who comes in from somewhere and just gets those 2 people against each other. So if that is happening, then wickedness if it is there now we don’t have to label people as wicked, but if somebody is acting in a way that is that is wicked for us, then we need to keep a distance from them. Keep a distance. Basically, there are some people who somehow bring out the worst within us.

Sometimes they intend to and sometimes they don’t intend to, but they bring out the worst within us. Then keep a distance from them. Keep a distance from them. So that is first, avoid wickedness. 2nd is strengthen your ties with goodness.

Right? That whatever good association we have, you strengthen those ties. What does strengthening the tie means? It basically means not just that, say, when 2 day bodies come together, how tightly they hug each other. That’s not strong association.

Like, that could be one part of it, but that’s not the essence. The essence of strong association or strong association is strong moral devotees is that that, even if somebody speaks strongly to us, that won’t break the relationship. Basically, what is happening, we are here. Our mind is here, and people are here. So we look at everyone through the filter of our mind.

If anybody speaks nicely to us, then we start then I mean, immediately our mind says, what does this person want? Why are they speaking so nicely? So we see everything through the filter of the mind. But for people who are very close to us, what happens is we see them separate from the mind. That is the mind is saying, this person has treated me so horribly.

This person is saying, actually, no. That person was under big pressure, and that’s why they did. There’s nothing personal against you. Oh, okay. Now I will believe my mind, but if I trust someone, then what happens?

If I trust someone close association means we trust the person as much as our mind, if not more than our mind. At least we hear an alternative. That’s all cartoon. 2 people are quarreling, and one person is trying to speak something. He says, whatever you say, I disagree with you.

It’s like, I just don’t want to hear you at all. That’s that’s unfortunate. So strong association means we try to create bonds. Strong bonds so that even if we do something wrong now we won’t we won’t wanna cover it up, we won’t wanna deny it, and we won’t hesitate to speak it. So we need that strong bond with goodness.

Sometimes we cannot avoid wickedness in the world. That’s just the way the world is. We have to work with people and some people are exploited. I mean, you just have to it might be a family member. It might be a relative.

It might be colleague. We can’t avoid that. But we can strengthen our bonds with goodness, and this can make a big difference when we start getting on the wrong track. If there’s someone who’s watching us and someone we tell them, then they will tell us how to protect ourselves. And third thing, this would come in this anal analytical framework.

So there is weakness, wickedness, goodness, and beyond that is god. So it’s connection with god, connection with the lord. So with goodness, yes, we are pulled up, but, ultimately, we can’t depend only on association for our protection. We also want purification. So by the connection with Krishna, so we could put God above this and then we could I don’t give you a space.

So what happens is if somebody connects with God, and from wherever they are, we can rise even from weak wickedness to goodness. We can rise from weakness to goodness. Now can you think of somebody who, by chanting the names of god, rose from wickedness to goodness? Somebody who took joy in hurting others. That is wicked half killing animals.

No. That was that was Bughari. Bughari and he to join that, but then he gave it up. So the connection with god can actually raise us even from wickedness, and definitely it can raise us from weakness. But often that takes time.

That transformation inner transformation takes a lot of time. So we need to we need outer protection also. And if we have this outer protection, then each one of us from wherever we are, we all have a vulnerabilities, but we don’t have to become overcome. We can keep stay protected and gradually get purified. So I’ll summarize what I spoke today.

So I spoke on this theme of how character is reformed or deformed. I introduced 3 main concepts. Weakness is we we mostly talk about good and bad, but within so goodness is there, but in bad, I introduced 2 categories, weakness and wickedness. Weakness is where we have our conscious and intelligence are 2 emotional and rational protectors, but sometimes they are overcome overcome by the force of the situation. But afterwards we feel bad and we come back on track.

But wickedness is where the consciousness is numb and down and the intelligences or worded so that intelligence indulges and covers up. So and and now most of us have some weakness, and how weakness can be pulled down to wickedness or can rise to goodness, we discussed through through three case studies. So in the case of Kaikai, was she was manipulated by Mantra and that she acted wickedly, sending her stepson who was like her son, who respected her like her own son, sending him away to the forest for no fault at all. She caused the death of her husband. Fortunately, because there was goodness and she was more attached to that goodness, That is Bharat.

Prashila came to her senses, and she regretted. She repented. And the damage was there, but it was minimized. In the case of, Robin, he himself was wicked, and he was surrounded by people who were wicked. So although Vibhishan’s goodness was there, the bridge was, like, too far to go from goodness to wickedness, and he couldn’t be saved.

So he listened more to his own wicked desires and to the counsel of the wicked people around him rather than the goodness around him. So here, he had to meet a bad end. So forgiveness, the the scriptures don’t talk about violence and war because forgiveness can be given to weakness, but not to wickedness. And then we talk about last case, which is which is could say more hope giving for all of us that we all get deviated at times. Like Subhreeva got deviated after getting luxury, after having a after being in the forest for a long time in deprivation.

But in his case, although there was weakness within him and he succumbed, but there was no wickedness. Nobody was there to exploit him specifically, and there was goodness. There was Tara. There was Hanuman. There was Lakshman, and he soon came back on the right track.

So there was very little damage because within all of the 4 months, he was delayed, but the 4 months were anyway, the rain delay was there. So there’s although there was deviation, but there’s very little damage over there. In this case, there was lot of damage. In this case, there was a irreversible damage. So how what can we do to reform our character and ensure it doesn’t get deformed?

Talking about 3 things. 1 was stay away from wickedness. We don’t ever label people as wicked, but sometimes they have wicked influence on us. They bring out our worst. So stay away from the wicked.

The other was second was? Yeah. Connect strongly with goodness. Wish with some people in goodness, our bond should be stronger than when are born with our mind or at least equal to so that we don’t see them through our mind. We see our mind through them.

We evaluate our mind through them. The third is connection with god. So we can’t depend only on association for protection. We need purification internally also. And the connection will go on and raise people even from wickedness to goodness and certainly from weakness to goodness.

So all of us can stay protected and become purified. Thank you very much. Hare Krishna. So any questions or comments? Yes, people wickedness actually manifest in life through goodness.

That is, you have some good qualities like helping others or something and wrong kind of people who come into your life and start exploiting you because of your goodness. And then you are further dragged away from goodness because now you think that since I’ve helped that person, he gets exploited. Now you don’t wanna help anyone else. How do not fall into that trap? Good question.

The question is that when we have goodness, then sometimes people with wickedness exploit us, and then we get burned by that. And then we we don’t want to even to help others. We we give up our goodness so that we can have our protection. Yes. That is also illustrated in some ways in the Ramayana.

Compassion has to be balanced with caution, and not balancing with caution is what is demonstrated through the example of Sita Venkirna. It’s not exactly compassion. It’s a virtue. There’s a sage or a person who looked like a sage, and Sita wanted to serve. But Lakshman had told her, don’t go out.

Now in this case, we can’t really blame Sita because it is a service attitude. At the same time, we get there with good people, and we can’t be naive in the world. So, basically, there are, I think everybody in the industry can wipe this off. Okay. Oh, okay.

Interesting. You can send it to me also then after. It’s a good idea. So if we consider in our dealing with people, Mhmm. The brave body, the way we relate with them can go like a pendulum.

So one is one extreme of this pendulum is naivety, and the other is cynicism. That means naive somebody is naive, they think everybody is good. And if you are naive, we will be crushed and crushed. There are people who are exploitative and people exploit us. So we will all experience this kind of betrayal or exploitation or whatever.

So we can’t live in the world while being naive. See, we should be nice with people but not naive. Nice means we are kind, courteous, polite, but it’s not that we can indiscriminately trust everyone. So naivety is bad. And quite often from naivety, both we go towards cynicism.

Cynicism means every every from everybody is good to everybody is bad. There’s a prominent European philosopher who’s a atheist, and he was asked, do you believe in hell? No. Obviously, the expertise was no. Because he’s a atheist.

He said, yeah. I believe in hell. Oh, really? What is your conception of hell? So hell means other people.

You can imagine what kind of misogyny is the not, misanthropy is there. Misogyny is hatred of women. Misanthropies hatred of humanity itself. So people can get burned at and go to their cynicism. Now in between these 2, in between naivety and cynicism is the courage to trust.

As you’re trusting someone, it doesn’t have to be act of naivety. And being cynical is not necessarily a sign of cleverness. It’s it’s a courageous act to trust them, but that courage has to be exercised cautiously. Courage cannot be foolhardy. A soldier cannot just attach him to an enemy camp thinking I’ll defeat the whole hour.

But be courage, but cautious. So basically, we will all when we do something good for someone and it it just backfires on us, we all will naturally go from naivety towards cynicism, but we can’t steer cynicism. It’s we will think I’m protecting my heart, but, but it is actually we are freezing our heart. It’s not protecting. It will become cold hearted.

It will become lonely. And we don’t want the virtues within us to go away. So the virtue that we exercised properly. So Sita, she, in some ways, was naive over there, and the demon came and exploited it. So it’s not that she’s to be blamed.

It is that she’s a victim, but still, it’s a part that it was a mistake on her part for her to do that. Of course, now here, we’re analyzing all these characters from a ethical perspective to learn something. So a tangible perspective, it’s all the. And then you don’t consider that when somebody I mean, it’s all character did something wrong. It’s for our learning purposes.

So when this has happened, we need to just become more cautious. So virtue, is, one part of virtue is also caution. So if we just if, say, somebody just give charity, anybody ask for money, they give charity. Well, that’s not always a virtue. If somebody is a drug addict and you give them charity, that’s the worst.

I mean, if especially if you give them money and they take drugs, they’re actually harming them. So we have to be so giving charity is good but if it is having a bad result then it is not good. That doesn’t mean we stop giving charity but we have to we have to learn to become cautious. These are emptiness. So this is in between is the courage to trust.

So that’s how we have to work. Did I answer your question? Thank you. Yes. Yes.

I was just wondering whether that person has a bad experience and when they go to cynicism, what do you tell them to make them trust again to go back to the middle? Okay. Good question. When a naive person has a bad experience and they go to cynicism, what can we tell them so that they can trust? Basically, when somebody is wounded, sometimes we can just be a part of the healing process.

And it’s, say, if somebody’s hand get fractured. So emotional wounds can be better understood with if we compare them with physical wounds. If somebody’s hand is fractured, then there is a during recovery, there is a phase when you just have to keep the hand at rest. Talk to your cast and just keep it at rest. So, yes, if somebody has been hurt, they may have to go through a phase of withdrawal, which I don’t want it to do anything to with anyone.

Give give my speech. That’s okay. But afterward, another part is that you have to start exercising. Although it’s very painful, a part of a part of the recovery is that you have to start exercising, moving the hand. So similarly, it’s it’s understandable that the person may be drawn to a shell for some time, but afterward they have to come out.

And usually at that time, we can try to help them remember that many times when people were good to learn. The mind often obsesses so much on the bad that it blinds us to the good. Yes. People have been bad to us, but people have to go to us also. So we need to expand their perspective.

We can’t deny that people have been bad to them. But then, see, we may have to live with pain, but we don’t have to live in pain. We will live in pain when we focus only on the pain and our consciousness gets reduced to that. But we will live with pain. I can’t deny that it happened, but that wound is there.

There’s only other good thing in my life. So if you know them well enough, then try to gently help them think about the times that people were good to them. Not everybody is untrustworthy. So gradually, as that sort of that sort of memory comes in, then they will open up. So reminding them first, helping them heal and seeing what phase they are in.

If they need space, give them space for some time. But then not forever. Then guide you to have them come out, remind them of the good in people or the good that people have done for them. And then maybe based on your experience, your intelligence, whatever, we all we can just discuss we can just discuss with them and help them understand how they can be cautious while trusting in future. Like, in no area in life do we have guarantee of safety or success safety or success.

Even when we’re driving a car and the cars make me fail, We might get a heart attack while driving the car. Maybe the next person coming around might be drunk. So risk is there, everywhere in the world. You know, you’re the safest place in the world. Okay.

Great. Yeah. That’s a that’s a good answer. It’s a bit extreme. But in many ways, a prison is the safest person, safest place.

Especially, they’re not like violent gangs and you know part of 1 gang and another gang attacking you. You could be safe in prison. And do we want do we want that kind of safety to the complete loss of freedom? No. So life has a trade off.

We have to make a trade off of some of our safety so that we can have some facilities, some freedom. So if somebody says, I will I will I want to keep my heart safe. So well, that’s like you’re living in an emotional prison, and nobody has locked you. You have locked yourself in over there. And such people will become very lonely, and that is also a pain.

We are meant to connect with people. Yes. So ultimately, we are meant to connect with Krishna. We don’t connect with Krishna immediately. We are meant to connect with people.

So it’s it’s a gradual process, but generally, we can help them in that healing journey. K. Thank you. Good question. Yes.

Can you hear me, Swati? We know one person is a kid. He has, armed a lot of people. Lord Ram had Liberty 2 would kill Ramon, but we do not have and we are bounded by law. So what is our duty in that case?

So damage, you know, to so fast these will can be minimized. If somebody’s killed and they have hurt many people. Now Ram Ram could kill, but we can’t. We have to follow the law. It is not just Ram was god, Ram was also Kshatriya.

Kshatriya have to administer the law. So all of us have to consider, our context primarily. That means, see, Vishwamitra, when he was troubled by these demons, because he’s a Brahmina, he did not he go cursed and killed them, but he asked Ram to he asked Prashant to send Ram. So, generally, when something is wrong in our life or in around us, it depends on how strongly we are affected by it and how strongly we feel about it. If you wanna make that a cause, that’s what I feel strongly about it then, and we may have to resort to the appropriate legal means to bring that person to justice.

And that might be a long process, but in some cases, that’s what is required. And that’s what is required, and that’s what we feel if it a lot depends here on individual. Some people may feel that it’s it’s a battle I don’t want to get into. I just let me go on with my life. It’s also okay because we can’t change everything in the world.

There are many bad things in the world and as devotees, what we are trying to do is, we are changing the world by not just, like, connecting people, but by changing the forces that make people do wrong. Most of the crimes in the world happen because of lust, anger, and greed. Lust is the cause of more sexual violence. Greed is the cause of most corruption and financial irregularities, and violence is the anger is the cause of most violence. So we are trying to cleanse ourselves of these things.

And if we wanna focus our energy on that and we want to help others do that, then we just focus on those who are trying to change that and not bother about this. But it’s it depends again on context. If you look at life, he had the temple in Jhansi, the league of devotees. And the same people some people turned against him and there’s a click, and he just said, it’s not worth fighting. Just left.

He could have he could have he had legal expertise. He had experience in business. He could have made a court case and he could have protected that land, but he decided that this is the small city. The people here also not that serious. It’s not worth the fight.

But later on, when the Juru temple was very threatened, in the temple of Mount Temple, the land was there. At that time, Brahma fought. He fought fiercely and he said, you know, I will not this mister m will have if he has to steal Krishna’s temple land, he will have to do it over my dead body. He’s going to that point, and he fought anyone because he felt Mumbai is very important place and now he had a vibrant movement in the west and he wanted a good place in the financial headquarters of India, and therefore, he felt it was worth fighting. So we may have to decide whether it’s worth fighting for us, and then based on that, we do.

K? Thank you. Great. Yes. If they come, they’ll be wonderful.

I see that they come and somehow, you know, the goodness can be transformed. That’s true. See, we all it’s one thing to be tested, but it’s quite another thing to be manipulated. Sometimes people are wicked people, they are so they are so cunning that you don’t even realize you are being outwitted, that you are being manipulated. Some people are just so expert at that.

It’s like they they wrong others, and then they portray that they are the wrong person. It’s amazing how they do that. Some people just expert at that. So, you know, we it can it can lead to a lot of problems. Of course, we don’t want to reject everyone from even from the path of Bhakti.

But again, we can’t be naive. If we everybody’s welcome, but what is the effect of certain people on us, we have to see. But it’s it’s good to see such optimism in the potency of devotion. Thank you. Yes.

Any other questions? Yes. Probably it is, it’s very easy to see or to assume that I’m not wicked, and I’m good. And and to feel that I am being troubled by the wicked people. It’s it’s easy to see that I’m I’m good.

I’m not wicked, and I’m troubled by wicked people. But the fact may be that I have some wickedness, which I’m I myself do not accept it or do not know of it because I’m so used to being wicked. And and the people whom I see as wicked, they’re not really wicked. It’s just my assumption, my imagination, or my misunderstanding. So so it’s very common to see that like, even the wicked person thinks that I am good, and I am being, I’m being troubled by the wicket.

And so how do we how do we see our own wickedness when we are convinced that we are good? Sometimes we may have wickedness, but we think others are wicked. So how do we see our wickedness? It’s it’s difficult. You could say the example of Durovan.

Durovan during the then Krishna had come with the peace proposition. Durovan said that even after great introspection, I don’t see anything along the time. And he said, I assumed we acted according to my nature. So if anyone is to be blamed, blame the creator who gave me my nature. That’s a great excuse.

I see I see our past can explain our emotions, but our past doesn’t excuse our actions. Sometimes some people may just be very suspicious, very short-tempered, and they may have had such they may have that that kind of upbringing, that kind of experiences. So how we feel, that can be explained by our past. We can’t really that much control our feelings, but we all have the capacity to control our actions. So it’s our past can’t excuse our actions.

So in this particular case, it’s like Durvya Dhan doesn’t even think that I’m doing anything wrong. In that situation, I think 2, 3 things are required. Sometimes we just have to go through the school of hard knocks. That means, you know, we really are knocked around and we bear the consequences and then we realize, hey. It is I won’t is I won’t wrong?

And another part of it is also that, okay, even if it is true that, that I am being exploited by wicked people. This is this is this is difficult to apply, but even if there’s conflicts, if this can be applied, it’s a very powerful way to resolve conflicts. Let’s say 2 people have an argument, heated argument or whatever. Then first thing is both of them separate. They calm themselves down, and then think seriously what did I do to cause this conflict.

It might be that what I did to the 1% and the other percent and 99%, but but admit that I shouldn’t have done this. Let’s start with that one. What did I do? See, basically, when something bad is happening with us, there are 2 possibilities. Either I am bad or the rest of the world is bad.

Now saying that the rest of the world is bad may be good for my ego, but actually it’s disempowering because are you going to change the rest of the world? Well, good luck with that. It’s it’s good in a sense if there’s something wrong with me. It’s It’s not that, I am just saying that, oh, it’s all because of me. But if there’s something wrong with me, then there’s some chance that I can fix it.

If I’m missing nothing wrong with me, the world everything is wrong with the world. Well, then that’s that’s that’s not a very pleasant thing. Usually, it’s not true, but believing that is very disempowering. It’s like suppose you go to a doctor. You’re sick.

And the doctor says, the kind of symptoms you have, I’ve never heard of it. Well, that’s not a very pleasant thing to hear. My ego would think, what a unique disease. But that means the doctor has not heard, the doctor can’t cure, isn’t it? So for us, we only have control over ourselves, and that also we have limited control.

But at least we have some control over ourselves. With other people, we have very, very little control. So it’s good to try to begin with ourselves. K? K.

I feel maybe this person is exploiting me, this person is abusing me, but am I doing something? Am I also doing something wrong? This is not to say that others are not doing something wrong because that is very difficult for us to accept. But am I doing something wrong? That is if you start with that okay.

Then I’m doing this. Let me send this right. So it will be very difficult for us to accept that there is wickedness within us. But we can say at least weakness is there, and let me try to reform that. And if the capacity for introspection also grows by exercise, If today I can admit, like, maybe 1 person fall within myself, that tomorrow, the ego makes us feel that if I if I admit a fault, I’m going to die.

It’s like one friend I recently had a he’s a devoted friend of mine. He is he’s a robot. He is very friendly. He said that, you know, some people think that apology will kill them. They just can’t apologize.

They’ll hem and haw and everything. They said this. One simple apology is what the other person wants, but they just can’t give it. But if we admit one fault, one person fault that we admit, then we realize, actually, this apology didn’t kill me. So no.

It might seem like joking, but it’s not. For some people, death is preferable to an apology. They just can’t do it. But if you understand that apologies don’t kill, then gradually, they okay. I can admit 1% fault.

Maybe next time I can admit 2% fault. So gradually that happens. So we have to begin very gently. And in in our transformation is not, is generally not very dramatic, not very rapid. Sometimes it may be, but generally, it’s gradual.

So those are some tips. That makes sense? Okay. Any other last question? Same question or similar question?

No. I think I had a question that It’s kind of how how to deal with that. So if I understand right, is the question there. How do we deal with our own oscillation between goodness, weakness, and wickedness? Yeah.

There are okay. Let’s use general word wise. The wise can manifest sometimes as weakness and sometimes as wickedness. So we are the wise within us often has urges or rather because if if you use the word urges, our urges have surges. So we might have a certain level of anger, but sometimes just zooms out, shoots out.

Some it’s similar with lust or greed or attachment or anything like that. Now some when those they shoot up, we might just be powerless. So even if we can’t resist the urges, we can persist between the urges. Okay. That time that thing happened, I couldn’t do anything.

Okay. And it may happen again. But in between, what am I doing? In between, I just give up. I can never change it.

And in between, I just keep beating myself up. Why did I do that? Or in between, I try to connect myself with goodness. So sometimes we wickedness may over progress and if we can if in between we are connecting with goodness, we are strengthening ourselves. And gradually, what will happen is when we when we even wickedness comes upon, we’ll be strong enough to resist it.

So at least persist between the urges. I write on the Gita everyday on githadaily.com. So one article I wrote was that we may fall down, but we don’t have to fall away. Fall down means when the urges have surges. We used to do something wrong, But fall away, you just give up the practice of Bhakti.

I can’t do this. So we may fall down, but we don’t have to fall away. That’s the first thing, purses between the urges. Second thing is try keep a distance from provocations. So what sometimes something external causes the self issue, and if you know something, just keep a distance from it as it is possible.

And 3rd is a little tricky to understand, but if you understand it, it’s a very transformative insight. It’s that even the urge comes, it’s a growing growing growing growing and we feel it’s just going to grow forever. And if I resist it, it’s a losing battle. I may resist now, but it’s going to go further. It’s going to grow further.

It’s going to grow further. How long can I resist it? And then we give up. But this urge is not going to grow forever. It will grow, grow, grow, grow, grow, grow.

It will attain a peak, and then it will go down. So it is something like, you know, arm wrestling. It’s like a our battle with our urges is like a arm wrestling match. We are trying to hold, we are just trying to push us down. But the critical thing is here it’s like a timed arm wrestling match.

That means, say it’s a 3 minute round and in 3 minutes we do get that hand out. Now that the upper hand will be so strong, we just got our hand down down down. It’s almost touching. So much pain, but the minutes are ticking. At 3 minutes, we just hold on hold on.

Then if we just survive that present round, the next time when we begin, it will not be from here. It will be from neutral ground. So if you understand this urge is not going to go on infinitely, then it becomes easier to resist that. It requires strength. It requires, determination, but it is if you think this is better forever yeah.

It the urge may come again also. The surge may also come again, but next time it won’t I won’t be here. I’ll be here. The urge has to get me down from here to here. So if you understand, it’s like a timed arm wrestling match.

So it’s not a we always have to battle with temptation at one level, but that intense temptation or intense whys that we have to battle with, that’s not 24 hours a day. So if you understand that, that also gives us some impetus to resist. And, ultimately, of course, we have to find out something that connects us with Krishna strongly. That means that there are see, there are some things which we like to do and something that are good for us. If these 2 were identical, life would be wonderful.

Of course, but it’s not necessary that the 2 are entirely disjointed. If you can find out somewhere these 2 intersect and hold on to that, make that as easily accessible as possible. So if you like music and you have some girdos ready with you, if you like deity worship, then have some attractive Darshan picture of Krishna with you, and then look at it. Pray to it. Pray to that picture.

Pray to Krishna through that picture. So whatever it is that we is good for us and what is also what we like. Because at that time, if something is good but we don’t like it, it’ll be very difficult for us to redirect our thoughts there. But in that, we can redirect our thoughts. So then gradually, by that, we can resist.

So we can so persist between the urges, then protect yourself from provocations, then know that the pattern doesn’t go on for that the urge also doesn’t last forever. It’s like a timed arm wrestling match. And to gain strength during that, find out something which is good for you, which is like some like, something is a circle of bhakti and circle of what you like to do. Just find something within that. Then it’s possible to resist it.

Okay? So now the last question. Okay. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. There is the hand that you did. Yeah, please. If someone we know very well is overcome by wickedness, how can we help them to come to goodness? First thing is that if we are drowning, we can’t save anyone else.

So if somebody has succumb to wickedness, if we go there to help him, instead of we lifting them out, they will pull us down. So we have to be cautious. Compassion or concern for others shouldn’t blind us to realities. See, it is that I was giving a seminar to to mental health care providers who who take care especially of people who are addicted. And I was talking about this principle, but then one of them spoke it very articulately.

He said that that actually in such fields where somebody is addicting, they’re trying to recover and they have relapses, he said that if the caregiver are not to get exhausted, that is what is called as compassion fatigue. Just you see so much suffering and then you just don’t have so much, you know, capacity left to empathize. So there, the point is this, they say don’t work harder than your client. Don’t work harder than your client means what? This addiction carrier provider that they want to okay.

You know, when this happens, do this. If it does happen, do this. Come and talk with them. But if the addict doesn’t want to change, then you don’t get worked up by it. It’s sad to see somebody going down, but you can’t afford to go down with it.

So that’s the first principle. If somebody has become wicked, then you we have to make sure that we don’t go down with them. 2nd is that there has to be some desire to change within them. If there is no desire to change at all, then not that we abandon them, but we may have to suspend our efforts for the time being. Keep the door open.

They want to change, we are there to help them. But don’t, we can’t force anyone to change. The standard example for this is sometimes say a car is not starting and then a group of people come around and they start pushing the car. The person from inside is trying to steer and move the car, move the outside pushing as to when the car starts. But suppose people from outside are pushing and the person inside has gone to sleep, then the people are, why should I push?

Or worse still, the person inside is pressing the brake, and the people from outside are pushing. It’s vain effort. So we can help the unable, not the unwilling. We can help the unable, not the unwilling. So there has to be some desire within them for help.

We can always be there as a friend, but we don’t want to be dragged down. And, having said that so these are 2 cautionary notes that we shouldn’t be dragged down. Secondly, we should, that they should have some desire to help. But broadly, how do we help them? See, any transformation, there’s only 3 ways in which one person can help another person.

Basically, you could put it as engagement, sorry, enlightenment, engagement and encouragement. Enlightenment means that show them, help them see the future if they continue on their path or the future if they can achieve their path. So help them see, sometimes you tell them this is bad, don’t do this. That doesn’t help. That sounds like moralizing.

Here enlightenment means help them to see the consequences of their actions. It’s very important that we don’t just give rules. This is bad. Don’t do it. You explain why it is bad.

So enlightenment means not that I am instructing you, but this is what I have learned. So show the consequences. That’s one thing. Then second is engagement. Engagement means we help them to have a path to change.

Okay. I mean, say somebody is falling falling forgetness because they have that kind of friend circle. Then maybe, you know, we try to invite them to our friend circle. Maybe if they are, in some extracurricular activity, then some place and sports, and that’s where their friend circle is. Then maybe get them into some other sports.

So we have to provide them some engagement as much as we can. And 3rd is encouragement. Whenever anyone tries to change themselves, there are going to be false. They are going to be, relapses. Then we need to encourage them.

Yes. You can change. I was in UK, and one devotee came and told me. After many years, now I have developed pronunciation. Oh, really?

I said, what do you mean? I have developed pronunciation to a renunciation. So sometimes people just give up, but we need encouragement. Yes. You you need to slip and fall, you can rise again.

So encouragement. So we have to see these three things basically that knowledge, facility, and hope. Put another way. Knowledge of the consequence of actions, facility to do the right thing, and the hope that you can choose. So enlightenment, engagement, encouragement.

If you give these three things, it’s definitely possible that we can we can become an instrument for them to come back to goodness from forgiveness. Did I answer the question? Yeah. Thank you. It was very thoughtful question.

So thank you very much.