Eating is one of the main forms of sense gratification, not only to human beings but to most other creatures. Maybe because it’s so intrinsically connected with survival, the impulse to eat is very difficult to control. Usually when one is capable of controlling the tongue one is capable of controlling all other senses. Usually, only people who are extraordinarily determined (or spiritually advanced) can do that. We may be able to restrict eating temporarily for some purpose, but we can’t sustain it long-term.

However, just because eating is so hard to control doesn’t mean we should indulge in all kinds of things. Spiritual life (and human life in general) means discriminating between good and bad, positive and negative. We are supposed to stop indulging in prohibited things and instead eat only prasadam.

Because Krsna is so kind to us, He doesn’t restrict us to a certain menu. Surely, He has His preferences, but still, he accepts what we offer to Him, as long as it’s offered with devotion. The basic principle, however, is that (apart from fruits and other natural ingredients) we can only offer to Krsna things that we prepare ourselves or things prepared by other devotees since Krsna doesn’t accept anything cooked by non-devotees. This is something I believe can cause obstacles in our spiritual life. We are not expected to become ascetics who can radically suppress their eating, but we are supposed to at least limit ourselves to pure food that can be offered to Krsna.

We all understand that the ultimate goal for all of us is to attain pure love for Krsna. Srila Prabhupada explains that service to Krsna is the original, eternal position of the soul, and this original consciousness is simply covered by different layers of material contamination, in the form of the false ego, the mind, and so on.

The problem is that somehow or other we become attached to these coverings, and we remain attached to it even after we start practicing Krsna Consciousness. There is always the possibility one may be able to get rid of his or her material conditioning quickly by sincerely chanting the holy names, just like many can quit smoking by simply stopping, but most of us need to go through the gradual path of reconciling our perceived material needs and our spiritual practice. We need thus to find ways to harmonize our material needs with the practice of Krsna consciousness, being able to advance in the spiritual path while still dealing with the material world and accepting different types of roles and responsibilities.

Generally speaking, there are two paths to self-realization:

One is Nivritti-marga, the direct path, which is achievable for the ones who are bringing very strong realization from previous lives, receive special mercy or are especially determined, etc. The second path is Pravritti-marga, which is the path for… well, everyone else.

The path of Nivritti-marga is characterized by celibacy and austerity. This is the part for the ones who already learned their lessons and don’t want anything to do with this world apart from helping others to advance in the spiritual path. That’s what makes this path so hard: it requires us to abruptly break with our conditionings, which is not something many of us are prepared to do on short notice.

The path of Pravritti-marga is based on family life and pious life. This is a path for the ones who still have material desires and need an environment where he or she can satisfy such material desires to a certain extent. The idea is to live a balanced life, so one can be peaceful and be thus able to advance in the spiritual path.

These material desires can be divided into three groups: desire for gross sense gratification, desire for material possessions (house, furniture, car, etc.), and desire for relationships, which also includes things like fame, status, and so on. In people with a gross consciousness, the desire for gross sense gratification as well as for material objects may be very strong, but it gradually diminishes as a person evolves in the spiritual path. Instead, the need for relationships gradually becomes stronger.

For most of us, that’s the real problem that needs to be addressed. When the need for relationships is not fulfilled, we tend to fall back into gross sense gratification, which is not very positive. We can see cases of men who would leave their families, trying to become renounced, just to fall down into having an illicit sexual relationship with some other lady later on. Unless one is truly on a renounced platform, it’s much safer to cultivate healthy relationships than false renunciation. This brings us to the path of Pravritti-marga, which is centered around the idea of cultivating material relationships, but doing it in ways that also help us to advance spiritually.

The problem with relationships is that they demand the cooperation of other people. Someone has to play the role of our wife, husband, children, and so on. In this way, one who is traveling across the path of Pravritti-marga needs the cooperation of many people to be able to satisfy his desires for relationships and thus achieve success in the path. A child needs to have good parents, a wife needs to have a good husband, a husband needs a good wife, parents need good children, and so on. One goes through these different stages in life in succession, and the combination of healthy relationships and spiritual knowledge allows one to gradually develop detachment.

One who has loving parents can grow in a healthy way and enter adulthood with confidence. Having a good wife or husband, one can conceive and grow good children and thus satisfy his needs for these relationships. If at the same time, one cultivates spiritual knowledge, he has the opportunity of realizing these different spiritual topics during his life and achieving a platform of renunciation in the end. Having satisfied his remaining desires for relationships in this world, he may be ready to develop a relationship with Krsna.

If, on the other hand, he doesn’t receive such an opportunity, getting abusive parents an abusive husband, etc. the tendency is that these unsatisfied desires will remain very strong inside the heart and will, in the end, bring us to another body, where one will again try to satisfy such desires. Sometimes, this type of material suffering may give birth to renunciation, but this usually happens only with the ones who are bringing strong realizations from previous lives. In most cases, it’s not positive. We can practically see that there were many children in our movement who were neglected or even abused in previous decades, and we can observe that these traumas make the spiritual path much harder for them compared to the children who were adequately loved and protected.

Therefore, by being good husbands, good wives, and good parents and at the same time cultivating and sharing spiritual knowledge, we can help our dependents to advance in the spiritual path. That’s why being good husbands, wives, and parents is part of our service. We can practice it keeping in mind that it’s something that is satisfying to Krsna because it gives these souls the best chance of coming closer to Him.

When we are starting in spiritual life, we may have the idea that purity is just around the corner: just a few years of serving and following the principles strictly and we may get there.

Unfortunately, after a few years of practicing, we often realize that becoming a pure devotee is not as easy as we initially thought. What seemed to be just a sprint of a few years becomes a long slog against our material conditioning. Material desires that we were suppressing at the beginning start to creep back and we realize that it’s going to be a tough, long battle.

Another factor that may affect us is the observation that many devotees who have been practicing for many years are still fighting the same uphill battle we do. It would be reassuring if all devotees who have been practicing for ten or twenty years would be pure devotees by now. In this case, we would see that it’s just a matter of time until we could also reach a similar level. Unfortunately, this does not always happen, and this can make us unsure about our potential, or even start to question if the process works at all.

When Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakura was leaving the planet, he famously said that he was leaving with half of his work unfinished, because he was not able to establish varnashrama. Similarly, when Srila Prabhupada was leaving, he said he only completed 50% of his mission — the other half being the establishment of varnashrama, which he tried but didn’t have time to complete.

Both Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakura and Srila Prabhupada were able to successfully teach the path of Nivritti-marga, or the direct path of renunciation in full surrender, which is the shortest and ultimate path for obtaining love for Godhead. Prabhupada spoke about it extensively in his books, and that’s what most devotees were trying to practice in the early days of our movement.

The difficulty is that this is a very difficult path, usually feasible only under the direct guidance of a pure devotee. Therefore, while it was possible when Srila Prabhupada was present, it became harder after he left. Still, Srila Prabhupada said to keep following what he taught without change, which in my understanding means he wanted a core of devotees to continue following the direct path of Nivritti-marga, being thus an example for others.

In the Sri Isopanisad and other books, Srila Prabhupada explains that conditioned souls have four defects: imperfect senses and intelligence, a tendency to make mistakes, a tendency to be illusioned, and a tendency to cheat others. He mentions that even great historical personalities like Gandhi and Kennedy made mistakes and ended up losing their lives due to that, so what to say about others?

This of course opens our eyes to the risk of following imperfect political leaders and so-called avatars, but there is also another implication, which is our own capacity for obtaining true knowledge.

What we call reality is just the way our mind and intelligence interpret the input received from the senses, which is in turn just electrical signals coming to the brain. We obtain information using imperfect senses, such as our eyes and ears, and this imperfect information is processed using our imperfect intelligence, and then further transformed due to the workings of the mind. As a result, what we believe to be reality often has very little resemblance to what reality is. Many people people don’t believe in God or the soul, for example, just because they can’t see it. Many think that the Earth is flat, and so on.

Prabhupada explains that the only way to receive perfect knowledge is through the Vedic literature, which offers us perfect knowledge because it comes directly from Krsna. Perfect knowledge can’t be produced by any imperfect being from this universe, it has to be imported from the transcendental realm. This imported transcendental knowledge is then transmitted through the chain of disciplic succession and reaches us without suffering adulteration.

However, if our senses and intelligence are imperfect, how can we be sure we are properly understanding this transcendental knowledge, even when we receive it from a proper representative, through a book or a lecture, for example?

Some devotees who come to Vrindavana and Mayapur are quite wealthy and do not care much about money. That’s the stereotype many locals have, at least. In practice, however, most devotees come on a budget and need to stretch the rupee, so to speak.

These are a few tips for visiting or living in Mayapur and Vrindavana on a budget, and getting honest prices according to my experience:

Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakura describes in his writings 13 apasampradayas or non-bonafide Vaishnava schools. These groups include factions such as the Smarta Brahmanas, the Caste Goswamis, Ativadis, Saki-Bekis, and so on.

These different apasampradayas are not just historical descriptions of groups that existed in India more than a century ago but represent different tendencies that we, as conditioned souls, carry in our hearts. This explains how deviations such as the hereditary transmission of posts, impersonalism, cultivation of spiritual life as a way to attain fame and power, and so on tend to reappear at different times and in different groups, even when such groups are not directly connected.

There is however another reason understanding these apasampradayas is relevant for us, and it may be a little shocking.

The conditioned souls are called “Nitya Baddha” or “eternally conditioned”. Some take it literally, thinking that we were never anywhere outside this material creation, but the scriptures are very clear in stating that this is not the case. Krsna has the spiritual energy and the material energy, and the souls are not a product of the material energy. We came from outside of it and somehow or other fell here at a certain point.

Srila Prabhupada explains that “eternally conditioned” just means we are here for so long that it is not possible to trace the beginning. In other words, eternally conditioned just means “so long that is practically eternal”.

On his purport to SB 2.5.19, for exemple, he mentions:

“Because they are between the internal and external potencies, the eternally transcendental living entities are called the marginal potency of the Lord. Factually, the living entities are not meant to be so conditioned by material energy, but due to their being affected by the false sense of lording it over the material energy, they come under the influence of such potency and thus become conditioned by the three modes of material nature. This external energy of the Lord covers up the pure knowledge of the living entities eternally existing with Him, but the covering is so constant that it appears that the conditioned soul is eternally ignorant.”

We can break this into points to make all the ideas in this passage evident:

• The souls are eternal and transcendental.
• Krsna has three potencies, the internal potency, the external potency (matter), and the souls, who are the marginal potency. Marginal means we can choose between being under the spiritual or material potencies. There is thus a component of free will.
• Souls are spiritual, and thus not meant to be conditioned by the material energy. In other words, the souls come from outside the material creation and somehow become bound here.
• The souls become entrapped in the material energy due to the desire to lord over it.
• Because of this false sense of lordship they become conditioned by the three modes of material nature and are forced to act in different ways by them.
• Souls have pure spiritual knowledge that eternally exists within them. However, when in contact with material nature this spirtual knowledge becomes covered.
• The covering by the material energy is so strong and resolute that when conditioned it appears that the conditioned soul is eternally ignorant, although such conditioning actually has a beginning.

To better understand how the eternal spiritual souls can come under the influence of material nature and become “eternally conditioned”, even though such conditioning actually has a beginning, we must first understand the difference between the eternal spirtual time and material time. This is a delicate subject that is frequently ignored in such discussions.

In his commentary on the Brahma Samhita (5.7), Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura mentions that when Lord Maha-Vishnu glances in the direction of the material energy, His glance carries not only the souls who desire to take part in the material creation but also kāla, the time energy.

In the word meanings given by him, tyakta-kālam is translated as “by casting His glance in the shape of sending His time energy” and sisṛkṣayā as “with the desire to create”. In the purport, he mentions: “The deluding energy as the maidservant of the spiritual (cit) potency Ramā, serves the manifested plenary portion of Godhead consorted with Ramā, the time energy representing the force of activity and instrumentality of Ramā; hence there is found the process of masculinity or the creative force.”

This may sound a little complicated due to the language, but similar points are described in SB 7.1.11:

“King, the Supreme Personality of Godhead, the controller of the material and spiritual energies, who is certainly the creator of the entire cosmos, creates the time factor to allow the material energy and the living entity to act within the limits of time. Thus the Supreme Personality is never under the time factor nor under the material energy.”

If we break this passage into individual points, whe have:

• The Lord controls both the material and spiritual energies and he is the creator of all material universes.
• He creates the time factor (by casting his kala energy by glancing over the material nature).
• This time factor allows, in turn, both the material nature and the souls to act within the limits of time. Matter is originally inert, but it is agitated by contact with time, leading to the creation of all different material manifestations that are enjoyed by the souls.
• Although He is the creator and maintainer of everything, the Lord never falls under the control of the time factor or the material energy.”

Time exists eternally as energy (kāla), but its influence over the material creation has a beginning. It starts when Lord Maha-Vishnu casts His glance upon the material nature, a glance that carries both the souls that desire to participate in the material creation, and the time energy that agitates the material nature and makes it work in different ways.

In other words, kala or time is eternal as an energy, but its effect on the material nature has a beginning, and this beginning happens after the souls are put here. The material time we are currently experiencing has thus a beginning, but it can’t be calculated from the material perspective, because all material manifestations exist inside the boundaries of material time.

There is however a different, eternal time, that exists outside of the limits of this material manifestation. That’s the eternal time that governs the spirtual planets, where there is no past and future. This is the place where eternality exists in its true sense.

Once the difference between material and spiritual times becomes clear, we can examine again the meaning of the term “eternally conditioned”.

Apart from meaning “for so long that it’s not possible to trace the origin”, another meaning is that we have been here since before the beginning of time. It’s therefore not possible to trace the beginning of our conditioned life according to material time since we have been here since before time started. From the perspective of someone inside the material world, we have been always here.

This however doesn’t mean our conditioning is eternal in the literal sense, but just that we lack the means to calculate when it began. For this one has to become free from the influence of the material time.

There is another reality that is outside, the spiritual reality, which is independent of the material time.

Just like there are two separate natures (the material nature and spiritual nature), apart from the material time (this force that puts the material creation into motion and reminds us of its temporary nature), there is another time that exists outside this material time, which is eternal. This is the eternal time that governs the spiritual planets. There, times does not exist as an oppressive force. Everything is eternal and there is no past or future. Everyone and everything is eternal and all inhabitants live in eternal happiness immersed in their relationships with Krsna.

Srila Prabhupada explains this concept on CC Adi 4.43: “This material world is only a perverted reflection of the spiritual world, where everything is manifested without inebriety. There everything is in its original existence, free from the domination of time. Time cannot deteriorate or interfere with the conditions in the spiritual world, where different manifestations of the Supreme Personality of Godhead are the recipients of the worship of different living entities in their constitutional spiritual positions.”

Krsna explains this concept in the Bhagavad-Gita (2.16) when He mentions “nāsato vidyate bhāvo nābhāvo vidyate sataḥ”. In the context of the Bhagavad-Gita, this verse is taken as meaning that the body is temporary and the soul is eternal, but in a broader context, it means that everything that is real (spiritual) is eternal and there is no change for it, while for everything that is illusory (material) there is no endurance, since it passes through many changes that inevitably leads to its dissolution. Everything spiritual is under the effect of the eternal time, in which there is no change, while everything material is under the material time, and thus passes through the stages of creation, change, and dissolution.

The souls are called the marginal energy of Krsna since we have free will to choose between staying under the shelter of the spiritual or the material energy. However, the soul is not part of the material nature, like inanimate matter. We are originally part of the spiritual energy, and our ultimate goal is to go back to this original position. That’s what Prabhupada meant by “Back to Godhead”.

One point that Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakura emphasizes in his teachings is the process of Sambandha, Abhidheya, and Prayojana. You probably heard these three terms.

Sambandha means the philosophical understanding we need to follow the spiritual process. To be able to chant with the proper mentality, for example, one needs to understand that Krsna is a person and that we have an eternal relationship with Him. If one thinks that God is impersonal, or that there are many Gods, or that we are all one, or that he himself is God, chanting the holy names inoffensively will be impossible.

Abhidheya is the process itself. What exactly does it mean to practice spiritual life? What rules and regulations should we follow, what kind of sadhana we should practice, and so on. Without understanding Abhidheya one may go for the wrong process, accepting Siddha-Pranali from some Sahajiya Babaji, for example.

Finally, there is Prayojana, which is the ultimate goal we aim to achieve. As Vaishnavas, we usually understand that the ultimate goal is to achieve love for Krsna and serve Him eternally in a personal relationship, but we can see that Mayavadis, as well as other groups, have different ideas. Many of the apasampradayas mentioned by Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakura in his works, such as the Ativadis, for example, had the understanding that they were serving Krsna with the ultimate goal of merging with Him. Sakhi-Bekis would often imagine they were serving one of the Gopis with the idea of ultimately merging with her, and so on. These are examples of wrong understandings of Prayojana.

Something common in the early days of our movement was for devotees to completely abandon their families and everything else and try to jump straight to a platform of complete renunciation. Although renunciation is recommended in the scriptures, especially in the Srimad Bhagavatam, it’s important to understand that this is a conclusion for a process that one is supposed to start much earlier and not a mechanical or external process. Immature devotees who try to imitate Lord Rshabhadeva can create a lot of havoc, as sometimes observed in the past of our movement. True renunciation is very positive, but artificial renunciation can have very negative consequences.

When I joined, in the 1990s, for example, it was common for new devotees to completely reject (and burn) their families and go to live in the temple, just to want to go back to their parents’ houses after one or two years. Of course, this contributed to the image of a cult many people had from our movement since in many respects we (at least where I lived) were behaving like one. To me, this is an example of the negative sides of artificial renunciation. In this connection, the Bhagavad-Gita mentions: “One who restrains the senses and organs of action, but whose mind dwells on sense objects, certainly deludes himself and is called a pretender.” (BG 3.6)

As described in this verse, artificial renunciation is based on rejecting the world while one is still attached to it, trying to negate and suppress one’s desires and inclinations instead of positively using them for Krsna. This can lead to erratic behavior and all kinds of psychological problems, which can be quite negative both for the individual and for the community he or she is part of. We can observe the negative effects of artificial celibacy in the form of many scandals that plague the history of our movement, for example.

We can see that Krsna rejects this process at the beginning of the third chapter of the Bhagavad-Gita, and gives a positive alternative in the form of the process of Karma-Yoga (detached work), described in the subsequent verses.