Skip to main content

MANEUVERING THROUGH DISTRACTIONS

"Attraction to distraction causes serious inhibition in one's devotion."

When someone practices spiritual life sincerely, he or she is given all facilities for comfort and enjoyment. Why? For the simple reason that God wants to award the best of the best facilities for His sincere devotee. But, it is the onus of the devotee to use these facilities carefully for rendering better and better service to the Lord and not get allured and strayed away from the path of unalloyed devotion to God because settling for anything other than service to God is settling for less than the best. 

THE OCEAN OF DISTRACTION
Therefore, it is so important for devotees to refocus on a daily basis by diligently reading scriptures, by sincerely offering heartfelt prayers, by rendering menial service and by humbly associating with saintly devotees and thus remind ourselves on, what is truly valuable and what is a mere distraction to achieve that which is truly valuable. The illusions of this world is too tempting for anyone to resist. Only those who are extremely sincere and humble can hope to cross this ocean of unlimited material distractions and reach the shore of unlimited spiritual attraction to the Supreme Lord.

THE ISLAND OF ILLUSION
The scriptures are filled with examples of devotees from ancient times to recent times, who have showed integrity and focus on higher principles in the midst of irresistible temptations and allurements. We will see two such examples. One from ancient times and one from recent times. The first example and probably one of the best examples of a servant of the Lord who passed the test of distraction is the celebrated monkey god, Hanumanji. In his mission to search for Mother Sita, he had to inspect all the most beautiful and enchanting women of Ravana scrutinizingly studying them from top to bottom, trying to find out who Sita was. After all, one has to look for a women in amidst women, isn't it! 

But, the greatness of Hanumanji is that, not for one moment, he lost his focus on his goal and tried to enjoy these damsels even mentally in the name of service. Many times, where the service mentality ends and where the enjoyment mentality begins is very difficult to ascertain. Only one who is thoroughly honest and sincere can understand the difference between the two. No wonder, Lord Rama chose Hanuman to do this service. If it was for any other monkey, they would have probably not returned. The would have obtained a permanent visa for Lanka, the island of illusion and become a servant of Ravana and forsaken the service of Lord Rama. Probably, this is one of the reason that millennia later also people worship Hanumanji as one of their favorite deity because of his unwavering focus to worship his favorite deity, Lord Rama. 

THE PERSONIFICATION OF ILLUSION
The second example of a devotee from recent times who showed extreme focus and devotion to the Lord despite insurmountable distraction is Naamachrya Haridas Thakur. Once, Maya Devi herself, who is the personification of all illusion came to allure Haridas in a secluded place with all her prowess. Just imagine. We are attracted helplessly to a glimpse of Maya's power, what will it be if Maya appears in front of us and voluntarily proposes to enjoy with us? Just imagining is scary, what to speak of witnessing it. Anyway as the story continues, Haridas was so focused on his chanting the Holynames of Krishna that he was unshaken by her charms and gestures showing the world through his example that, the only way to safeguard oneself from the onslaught of illusion is to keep oneself busy and absorbed in the service of the Lord. The greatness of Haridas Thakur is that, Maya Devi fell at his feet, surrendered to him and became his disciple. 

THE PRAYER AGAINST DISTRACTION
Thus, let us be inspired by these heroes and try to be as focused as possible in our devotion to God and develop attraction towards Him that we can overcome the unlimited distractions of this world. I am ending this article with one prayer that can help us be focused on a day to day basis while maneuvering in this world of distractions. This is a super-excellent prayer from Sri Chaitanya Shikshashtakam chanted by Lord Chaitanya Himself.

na dhanaṁ na janaṁ na sundarīṁ
kavitāṁ vā jagad-īśa kāmaye
mama janmani janmanīśvare
bhavatād bhaktir ahaitukī tvayi

"O Almighty Lord, I have no desire to accumulate wealth, nor to enjoy beautiful women. Nor do I want any number of followers. What I want only is the causeless mercy of Your devotional service in my life, birth after birth."
 
- Achyut Gopal Das

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

BE EXCITED!!

How many of you want to see Krishna and meet Him? Here is a good news - Krishna is more eager to show Himself to us than we are to see Him. We just need to be excited to want to see Him. Krishna is always somewhere around the corner waiting to reveal His darshan to us. He could reveal Himself in any Mahamantra that we chant. He could pop out of any page of the Bhagavad-Gita or Srimad-Bhagvatam that we read. He can show Himself in any of His deity that we see. He could reveal Himself through any conversation we have with any of His devotees. He can reveal Himself in any of the Katha we hear or through any of the service we render. Doesn't this sound exciting. We should always be like a curious child waiting for magic to happen at any moment or like a child playing a treasure hunt game eagerly waiting to find the clue to the treasure. We need to be excited about spiritual life, about Krishna consciousness and about our prospects to meet and see Krishna face to face. It is t
Post a Comment
Read more

GAINING by GIVING - WINNING by SERVING

"Life is like a game of tennis - in order to win, you have to serve well." For two consecutive years, 2011 and 2012, we organised a contest for the school children across Goa called Gita Champions League (Henceforth referred to as GCL). We had a massive success with 3800 children participating the first year and 8600 children participating the second year. But, all this didn't come easily, we had to literally slog it out. Well, for that matter nothing wonderful comes easily, does it! THE BURDEN OF LOVE I took up GCL or rather GCL came to me at a time when I was going through intense personal struggles on literally every front - physically, mentally and institutionally. Yes, I was desperately praying for a service that could literally pull me out of the quagmire of my problems. I have always believed and witnessed the power of service. Service has always saved me in difficult times. The only reason, I am intact in my spiritual life despite the numerous challenges is beca
1 comment
Read more

GOD answers "KNEE MAIL" not EMAIL

I once heard a very interesting quote which said - " The distance between the problem and the solution is the distance between the knees and the ground. " It means that - when we are hit by a problem that seems too overwhelming, we need to hit the ground and offer our earnest prayer to God . This is called "Knee mail" - it is more faster and efficiently than email. You see, many problems can't be solved by us - they are too big for us but definitely not too big for God. When we bring God into our life by sincere, heartful prayers then problems eject out of our life. That is the power of prayers. The greatest power is to realize that we are powerless and thus seek refuge in the greatest power - the power of God. That is wisdom. This is the mood in which we offer our prayers, chant our rounds and participate in Kirtans - the mood of surrender. In Sanskrit it is called "sharanagati" or "prapannam" - it is the essence of all scriptures an
Post a Comment
Read more