divide and conquer

One of the most effective ways of preventing a group of people from succeeding in whatever it is they are striving to accomplish is to split them up by getting them to disagree on something.

A group’s strength lies in what they have in common.  The concept of “strength in numbers” only works if said numbers are working together.  Their common unity binds them together and makes them powerful while their weakness is what they do not have in common.

Even the most dynamic group will fall to pieces as soon as the individuals are more focused on their differences than their common goal.

This concept of divide and conquer has been utilized since before anyone can remember and due to its efficiency, it is the standard strategy employed in this world to keep us week and subordinate.  It is the killer of all revolutions.

Fortunately for us spiritual revolutionaries, this technique has no effect on us…  or does it?

The funny thing about spirituality is that, being transcendental to all things material, it is difficult to define in material terms.  Spirituality is a state of consciousness that cannot be externally observed because the determining factor that deems something either spiritual or material is not what is done, but the motivation behind why it is done.

Thus, a thing or an action cannot be considered inherently spiritual without considering the state of consciousness of an individual interacting with it.

Watercolour by Edgar Bundy, 1911

Therefore, everyone in this world is a unique mixture of materialist and spiritualist.  Our consciousness fluctuates between self-centric and God-centric.  Anyone who is honest will admit that they are not one hundred percent God-centric.

So even if we are highly advanced spiritualists, there is still the tendency for us to be subjected to and (temporarily) destroyed by the concept of “divide and conquer” when we lose focus of our true mission.

The reason i bring this up is because currently our “spiritual revolution” is being hampered by this unfortunate phenomenon.  Instead of working together we have started campaigning against one another over trivial matters that have nothing to do with spiritual principles.  We are caught up on details and it is dividing us.

Whether our disagreements are over dietary choices, wardrobe preferences, the details of our origin, the importance of public opinion, the concept of authority, who sits where, or any other such matter, none of these issues will make or break our ultimate goal of love of God.  We simply look like fools.

The spiritual movement is not weak because we haven’t resolved these issues…  it is weak because we are giving these material issues more importance than they deserve and we are not putting enough focus on the process of spirituality itself.

Material things or activities cannot hinder true spirituality.  The only thing that hinders a spiritual movement is our own materialistic consciousness.

When we put our focus on redirecting our consciousness then nothing can stop us.  But if we remain focused on petty details then noting can help us.

Let’s get back in the game, shall we?

i'm much more eloquent when i'm annoyed.

i’ve been wanting to get much more regular with posting blogs…  there was a period of time two years ago where i would post one per week…  i did this because i was in a place (both physical and mental) that was very annoying…  i was spending my tenth and final season working in a tourist beach town on the jersey shore.  What made that year more annoying than others is that the only reason i had to be there was to keep a promise to a very dear friend of mine.

In previous years i kept myself motivated by “keeping my eye on the prize”…  i was collecting money for what i considered to be (and still consider to be ) a much needed project that i had been striving to start for over a decade prior…  that was my motivating factor…  “it’s all worth it because this project needs to happen.”  It was my vairagya…  my tapasya.

But that last year was a different story.

During my 5^th Season i was able to secure enough funds to purchase a property to start the Bhagavat Commune project on…  the next few seasons allowed me to develop that property and then later to purchase a different property which was bigger and had fewer challenges as far as building restrictions and agricultural cultivation…  the funds collected during these seasons went toward building…  developing…  maintaining…  it funded three outstanding and memorable festivals.

But that last season was right after my world exploded…  it seems Krsna had different plans for me than to head that particular project at that particular time and place…  and despite what i considered to be clear and justified signs to put everything into that project,  (time, money, passion, blood, sweat, tears, life) it was all yanked out from under me in a matter of a moment.  It was quite dizzying actually.

So there i was…  sitting in a shop in a town that i loathed…  working a job that i didn’t like…  and there was no longer anything to motivate me to stay beyond a promise to a friend…  which was enough to get me to stay, but not enough for me to be happy about it.

So i figured that if i didn’t want my brain to melt and my spiritual life to spiral into the abyss know as wildwood, new jersey, i would have to increase my spiritual practice… 

so i wrote.

When i started the “forever endeavor” blog, i didn’t intend for it to be a weekly thing…  i just wanted to let people know where i was at…  that i didn’t give up on the project.  i was just in a strange state of transition.  i also wanted to write so that people would have a better understanding of my mission for the project…  the drive behind it…  the previous blog only touched on that aspect while presenting the stages of progress of the properties, festivals, construction, gardening, etc…  i didn’t have a property anymore, but i still had the dream for the commune.

So i continued to write.

Each week, on my only day off, i would go to the grocery store and the Laundromat…  and i would write…  that became my sadhana…  every thursday, like clockwork, i would churn out a short blog post on what i had been meditating about during that week…  and good, bad, or ugly, they helped me get through that last season…  i honestly do not know what i would have done without it.  it was my outlet.

Since then i have been traveling quite a bit…  a few weeks here, a few months there…  my biggest chunks of time are spent in india where life is much less annoying…  i still get ideas for things that i would like to write about…  in fact i have a long list on a sticky note so i don’t forget any of them, but now it’s different.  When i sit down to write about these ideas it no longer takes me thirty or forty minutes to clack away at a keyboard…  it takes hours…  and we’re talking broken up hours…  like ten minutes here…  then after a week another ten…  then after a month another twenty…  I went from 14 Consecutive weekly blog entries to 7 Random ones over the next two years…  and i realized that the reason i cannot efficiently churn out these thoughts is that i am not sufficiently annoyed.

i’m always a little annoyed…  its actually what drives me…  some people are driven by money, others by sex, fame or fear.  i am driven by annoyance…  and anger. 

In 1997 i coined the term “krodhamishrabhakti” to describe my personal devotional practice…  basically it means that i utilize anger to inspire spiritual growth.  i came up with the term while i was in a hardcore band called eighteen days (which is funny because five years prior to that, i couldn’t stand the sound of hardcore music)…  it wasn’t until i encountered devotees that i could begin to appreciate people yelling at me…  ha ha…  let me clarify.

i have been motivated by anger since i can remember…  but not in a destructive way…  i would see something that annoyed me and i would do something to counteract it…  i kept the anger inside and used it to fuel a positive change on the outside…   to me, prior to 1993, hardcore music seemed to be a bunch of people yelling and complaining about something instead of actually being proactive to improve their situations…  i perceived that as a weakness, and since i couldn’t understand a word they were saying (screaming) to me, it didn’t appeal to me in the slightest.

i actually met the Vaisnavas in spite of hardcore music.

One of the most important turning points in my life was in English class in high school…  the back of the t-shirt of one of my classmates (who became a life-long friend) said “quest for certainty”….   Hey, i confessed, i am also on a quest for certainty…  tell me about yours…   to which he replied, this is a hardcore band called shelter…  to which i replied…  oh, never mind.

Luckily, my friend further explained that these particular fellows followed a strict philosophical tradition…  one that i could hear all about on Wednesday nights on south street in philly…  and so i went, and i met my guru.

Once i encountered the devotees, i was subjected to a lot of hardcore music…  there were a lot of devotee bands back then, and their lyrics were surprisingly in line with where my head was at at the time…  my friend also gave me recordings of some other bands not affiliated with “the krishnas”, but had similar ideals.

And that is how my appreciation for people yelling at me developed.

i realized that their screaming wasn’t a weakness, as i had perceived earlier, and it wasn’t counterproductive…  it was actually inspiring others to see the world from a point of view outside of the one that society was force-feeding them…  and it was giving positive solutions to real problems…  and it was working.

Kids were abandoning destructive lifestyles of drug use and exploitative promiscuous behavior…  a lot of them…  all because of these people yelling on a stage…  and so i admired that.   and eventually i joined in with the yelling.

So, back to krodhamishrabhakti…  anger is valuable…  it can be destructive, but it can also be a powerful motivator.

Which is way i am much more eloquent when i am annoyed.

In that final season on the jersey shore i had plenty of fuel…  and so i was productive in this regard…  now the ideas still come, and occasionally i get annoyed enough to clack away at the keyboard and scratch another blog idea off the ever growing list, but its not the same.

i think i am going to try to become more regular with this again…  it was really helpful for me then, and i think it would still be really helpful to me now…  and while i’m not willing to subject myself to another season in wildwood to fuel this inspiration, i do hope that i can at least be more regular with it...  don't worry, the next one will be much better...  and shorter.

Forever endeavor!

...set it free.

Sometimes in life we have to make tough decisions and let go of something we hold dear in order to cultivate something that we will potentially relish even more.  This is the nature of relationships and of love.  Love without sacrifice is incomplete, for sacrifice illustrates that we hold another’s interests higher than our own.  Love is dynamic and it expands and stretches our limits, making us capable of accomplishing that which we previously considered impossible.  The process of bhakti is all about letting go of our selfish propensities so that we can cultivate and express our love to the Supreme Being.  It is about showing Sri Krsna that we love Him and would, if necessary, forgo our own comforts in order to contribute to His.

Three and a half years ago I let something go that was very dear to me because at the time it was beneficial to my service to the Vaisnava’s to modify my plans for the Bhagavat Commune.  Although we had around sixty beautiful acres with picturesque cliffs and waterfalls, the property we had then was not ready for full time residents due to periodic flash-flooding and difficulties (both financial and technical) with a proposed bridge construction.

Due to these circumstances and a few other considerations, we sold our first property in order to obtain a different piece of land with more acreage, more pasture/garden area, and most importantly a house for full time residents.

This second property served us quite well for a period of time, but as our situation changed and we no longer had full time residents, we realized that without the necessary manpower to maintain 180 acres, the new property no longer suited our needs and so we sold that one also.

As fate has it, this week I was able to purchase the original property back from a lovely couple who are also into natural building and who have another property nearby where they are constructing a timber frame workshop and an earth shelter.

Since the plans for the Bhagavat Commune have been modified, our needs have changed, and now this beautiful, satvic property perfectly suits our current and future needs.

It may be a few years before we begin holding events at the Bhagavat Commune again, but until then I will spend a few months of the year building natural structures to facilitate our workshops, retreats, festivals and sastric study courses.

In the mean time, I will continue to spend about half of the year in India doing my services for the Bhaktivedanta Academy and the Mayapur Institute, a couple months in Europe, and hopefully while I am in Kentucky during the summer months I will also be able to assist the devotees at Chintamani Dham with their workshops, seminars and other projects.

I look forward to updating everyone with pictures as I progress with the various phases of construction at the Bhagavat Commune when I get back to the states next spring.

Hari, Hari!

The thing about progress...

By carucandra dasa

When i was working on the second Bhagavat Commune property with my godbrother Radharadhya Prabhu and his family, i noticed something that gave me an important insight on life in general that i think most people who have ever been on a spiritual journey can relate to.

The 180-acre property that we purchased for our project comprised of about 120 acres of forest and 60 acres of thickly overgrown brushy pastures on rolling hills.  Mixed in the brush were various types of small trees and wild blackberry bushes making the land virtually impassable and unusable for farming/pasture land.  Those who have read our blog entry from October2012 may recall the photos of our tractor and bush hog clearing out the 9-foot tall brush in the back end of our property, transforming the area from a treacherous mess to a usable field with a lot of potential.

When we first started clearing the various areas around the property, there was a huge noticeable difference and a major sense of achievement as well as a more tangible and clarified vision of our goals for the space and for the project as a whole.

As we cleared more and more of the previously neglected overgrown pastures, however, the feeling of accomplishment no longer accompanied our long days of work.  Since we now knew exactly what the areas could potentially look like, every time we cleared a few more acres, instead of appearing like progress as it did in the beginning, it just seemed like that was the way that it was “supposed to look”.  In fact, eventually it started feeling like the more we cleared, the less we actually accomplished because instead of seeing the progress, we saw how much further we had to go before we had all 60 acres cleared.

We wanted to skip the rest of the first step and start the next (assembling the fences for the pasture areas, building barns for our prospective animals, planting fruit trees in the orchard area, etc.).  The problem with that idea was that if we had done it that way, the other overgrown areas, which were already neglected for nearly a decade, would have transformed from very difficult to manage to nearly impossible.  The wise and responsible choice was to continue our bush hogging until all 60 acres were cut down before we began the second phase of the fields’ transformations.

When we set off on our spiritual journey, several things happen.  One of the things that happens is we immediately notice a substantial amount of personal growth and transformation.  We tangibly experience the results of our spiritual endeavors and notice the progress that we have made compared to that of our previous lifestyles.  In this way we feel validated and we enthusiastically continue our progressive march toward transcendence.

Unfortunately, after some time this sense of accomplishment can seem to slowly fade away causing many to question the effectiveness of the spiritual process.  This is because, as in the example above, when we begin a long process we not only see the immediate results, but we also get a glimpse of the ultimate results of that particular step.

Having seen said future results, we feel as if we have already achieved them and therefore we begin to desire the results of the next step before we even finish the first one.  Thus, when we fail to attain the secondary results we essentially place the blame on the process for not working instead of rightfully keeping the blame on ourselves for not completing the prerequisite step.

Although it is naturally tempting to jump ahead on the blissful and illuminating spiritual path, if we attempt to do so without first addressing our base material attachments we are doing the equivalent of grabbing on to a passing train with one hand while firmly anchoring ourselves to a tree with the other.

Material life and spiritual life are like oil and water…  although they can superficially mix for some time, they naturally oppose one another and therefore they automatically separate.  There is a period of transition where we dovetail our material desires with spiritual life, but it is imperative that during this process we let go of our material tendencies and latch onto spiritual ones.  When we practice spiritual life in the material world we must carefully follow the guidance of a legitimate spiritual authority so that we can successfully transfer our consciousness from material to spiritual without getting lost in the mix.  If we maintain attachments to both matter and spirit we will naturally be torn apart.  This is why it important for us to finish the first step before we move onto the next.

This is also why we sometimes feel helpless in our pursuits.  Although we have made ample progress, we have also seen a clear picture of what we will attain if we continue the process.  Knowing that we must continue our efforts in order to gain said progress before we can move on to the next level can be daunting…  it can feel like a tease.  And so some people just give up.

Of course, when obstacles are thrown in front of us while we are pursuing our material goals we do not give up.  On the contrary, we tend to conjure up super-human strength and abilities to rise up against the odds to conquer all of the adversity keeping us from our enjoyment.  If we showed that much enthusiasm and vigor on our spiritual endeavors we would be in much better shape than we are currently.

So don’t give up on your spiritual pursuit, just take a closer look at what is really happening.  The progress hasn’t halted, we have.