Is the prayer to get a good spouse a material prayer?

Transcribed by: Geetanjali Nath

Question:   Is praying for a good devotee spouse, a material prayer? that we should avoid if we want to practice pure devotional service, but we know that if a devotee want to enter grahastha ashram then one good material spouse is important for bhakti. So is praying for such a good spouse, is it material or is it something which we can do because it is favorable for our bhakti.

Answer:   Purpose in our bhakti, the purpose of everything is to develop our relationship with Krishna, and the stresses on purity is to bring intensity into that relationship. To bring steadiness and intensity to that relationship, it is not to check or ……….relationship, we can surely pray to Krishna for anything and everything that is important for us and certainly the decision about one’s spouse is critically important decision in one’s life, and praying for that is certainly important. so this as, when we come to practice any other forms of devotional service , now when we are hearing Krishna katha, when we are studying books , when we are chanting, now we aspire for purity , but even when we don’t have purity , do we stop doing that devotional activities ? no. When we are hearing a class or studying a book , now we are also looking for something which should be intellectual something which is humorous, something we can speak to others’, and there can be so many other motives which we may be having which we are studying. but that does not stop us from shravanam, no, similarly with chanting also. although with chanting the other motives which may have may not been so apparent, but the point is that just as by hearing we don’t stop hearing just because our motive is not pure, similarly while praying , first thing is to pray and then after that pure prayer will come. is like this devotional service and first thing is service, and that thing will become devotional service. We have to , Krishna gives multiple levels in 12th chapter , where he says in 12.8 that fix your whole mind intelligence and you will live in me, otherwise try to fix mind in me , otherwise he says work for me, . As sends the mercy ladder down wards , he extends from internal to externals. so at least continue the externals even if the internals are not there, so that’s why if we reserve our prayers only for those occasions when what we are seeking through prayer is pure then our prayer life will become very weak and will become very scarce, Scarce in the sense that we will not be able to pray much , at our level, as a sadhana we will offer the standards prayers which re given in the scriptures and which we repeat during at various program, that is good, but the whole process of bhakti is meant to bring an inter-lap and eventually an overlap between our emotional circle and Krishna’s emotional circle. So our emotion circle means the things which we feel strongly about. When I say feel, its not in just in a negative sense that, it’s not actually important, but they are not important, NO, they are important for us, for example a devotees carrier, a devotees’ marital relationship, or a devotee’s residence, or a devotee’s financial situations, all these are very important in our material day to day dealing in our practical situations and that practical situation does affect our practice of spiritual life. So now our emotional circle is thing which trigger our emotion, and Krishna’s emotional circle is , a thing which trigger Krishna’s emotions. He loves us so naturally anything that concerns us also concerns Him. But His concern is also not just for our immediate wellbeing, it is for our ultimate gain. Just alike a doctor, if a patient in pain, the doctor is concerned and the doctor may give pain killer for that, although the doctor may not just be satisfied by giving only the pain killer, so it’s not t6hat the doctor wants the patient to be in pain, if that pain is avoidable. The doctor wants eventually cure the patient, but along with that the doctor wants to minimize the pain which is there even in present. So like that we should not think that Krishna want his devotees to be suffering in present so that they will get eternal happiness in future. No Krishna wants us to be happy even how. And he does not says, ………………bhakti is joyfully performed 9:2, in the Bhagavad Gita , it is not that it will become joyfully performed in the future, when u do it purely. Yes it will be joyfully now and as we do it more and more purely, then the joy will also increase more and more, but the point is that we have to perform bhakti, and bhakti itself can give joy, so Krishna wants us to be happy even in this life. The thing is that he does not want us to think that this world is a place of happiness and we don’t Him and we don’t have to go bank to Him, that is important, but that does not mean that Krishna wants us to be miserable in this life. So whatever concerns us, also concerns Krishna, but then Krishna is also concerned about things which re of our ultimate concerns. So we should not think that our material life is utterly unimportant for Krishna. What is important in a relationship what is another person is important for the first person also, if the relationship has to develop, But conversely what is important for the second person is also important for the first personal also. It means, what is important for us is also important for Krishna, but then for the reciprocal relationship m what is important for Krishna would also be important for us, So therefore what we should focus on is, trying to philosophically understand ultimate concerns and also try to practically orient our lives, so that our ultimate concerns that means developing the pure love for Krishna, we give adequate time and energy for that. We do our sadhana well, we hear, chant and practice bhakti seriously,, that way we are creating an overlap between our emotional circle and Krishna’s emotional circle. and trying to take our emotional circle more and more towards Him, but then we also have to things which concerns us immediately, and they are also what Krishna is concerned about, because He loves us. So we3 can certainly pray to Krishnam, and of course such prayers can always end with Krishna whatever is your will I will accept that. So ple3ase give me the intelligence to make the right decision and strength to implement that decision. So certainly we can pray for anything that is important for us and the important thing is to start praying. the important thing is not to reserve praying only for the occasions when we are offering pure prayers. That means we may pray that Krishna please let my chanting improve, yes , and that is good, please let me more attentively, that kind of prayer is good, but then if that is the only thing that we pray about then our prayers will be very infrequent and they will not be very intense many times. because ofte3n in our day to day life there are many other concerns which burden us much more than the quality of chanting, that of course one may that say that is because I am not spiritually advanced. And, yes that is true I am not spiritually advanced. and I cannot imagine myself as certainly as spiritually advanced and unconcerned about various issues of practical concern, So important thing is to start praying and I would say two things, first is that we conclude the prayer with a surrender to Krishna’s will, that Krishna I will accept to whatever you give, and we ask for intelligence and strength to understand the right decision and to do the right decision, and we focus on prayer more as an ongoing process than as a inti….process for a particular result. that means often when we pray to Krishna and we expect OK Krishna will give result, and if we don’t get the result then we may feel that Oh prayers ( AUDIO FINISHES HERE LOOKS UNFINISHED).Thank you.

Hare Krishna.

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