# Matchless Gifts **Duration:** 22:02 <div class="video-container" style="position: relative; padding-bottom: 56.25%; height: 0; overflow: hidden; max-width: 100%;"> <iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/RrusnxynJs0" style="position: absolute; top: 0; left: 0; width: 100%; height: 100%; pointer-events: auto; z-index: 10;" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe> </div> [Watch on YouTube](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RrusnxynJs0) --- ## Transcript **[01:11]** I was wondering the street and some of the boys saw me and gradually they can to me and. **[01:21]** Actually I did not try for developing this institution, the boys did it. **[01:28]** They are all educated, they are not fool's. **[01:32]** Mr. Howard is MA, he is also BA, he is Dr Ph.D., so they're all educated. **[01:40]** So they are not fools that they're taking this blindly, no. **[01:44]** Most of my students, they were under the spell of this LSD but they have given up everything. **[01:53]** They are simply living on this chapati and some fruits, that's all. **[01:58]** They don't eat meat, they don't want wine they don't want cigarettes, they don't want tea, coffee, nothing. **[02:07]** and they chanting Hare Krishna, following my instructions. So I am getting good hope. **[02:17]** The meal is composed of rice, and this soup [which we call dhal], **[02:21]** and a combination of vegetables and chapati, which is made of whole wheat. **[02:36]** You see it's all vegetable and grain. Sometimes some fruit, there's fruit in the dhal. **[02:42]** No meat, no animal products, such as eggs. **[02:47]** This is because in the Gita Krishna has told us what He wants us to eat. **[02:53]** Namely fresh fruits and grain, not animal products. **[02:59]** So we have a very nutritious meal here, it is very cheap; it goes a long way, **[03:06]** it's quite easy to prepare, and we have a lot of fun. **[03:11]** Essentially these are foods that are prescribed according to orthodox Vaisnavite discipline. **[03:21]** So these foods are prescribed. But we don't necessarily prescribe them for everybody, **[03:27]** the main thing is no meat, fish and eggs. --Why not? **[03:31]** Because in the scriptures it states that certain foods Krishna will accept **[03:39]** so we have to offer our food to Krishna, we have to offer the food He will accept. **[03:44]** The food that He will accept is stated as vegetables, fruits, leaves, water... **[03:51]** Well we believe that vegetables have... also any living... life form has a soul, **[03:59]** Therefore the murder of a vegetable is not in any way different qualitatively from the murder of an animal. **[04:05]** But the thing is vegetables are our allotment according to scripture, **[04:09]** we can eat certain foods that are given to us to eat by God. **[04:13]** If we eat food that's not given to us to eat that's robbery. **[04:16]** Are there any tasks that you have to perform? **[04:20]** Well we're... There's no real task. We're here to learn and that's what we are doing and we also, **[04:21]** we have jobs to perform to keep the organization running, to keep the word of Krishna being spread. **[04:35]** How do you do that? **[04:37]** Well, we recently purchased a couple of mimeograph machines **[04:42]** and that's helping our printing. By word of mouth. By constantly being active. **[04:51]** Do you work? -Yes. We all work. **[04:57]** But you meet here every day. **[05:01]** Well I'm devoting all my time here so I work here all day. Money has to come in also. **[05:07]** Some of us work regular jobs and devote most of our money here, if not all. **[05:12]** Do you feel any different since you joined? **[05:19]** I feel very good and closer to God. **[05:27]** What introduced you to this group? **[05:31]** A friend of mine told me about a love celebration at Tompkins Square Park which was last Thursday **[05:37]** or the Thursday before last and I know that I had been seeking a guru for a while so Krishna sent me there. **[05:46]** I was there and after meeting some of the initiates I knew that the Swami had to be into something, **[05:53]** so I came the very next morning, and I've been here since then. **[05:57]** I came here, in America in September 1965. **[06:04]** My mission is to preach the philosophy of Lord Caitanya. Chanting of Hare Krishna. **[06:23]** This transcendental vibration will cleanse the dirty things of the mind. **[06:34]** It doesn't matter what he is, this transcendental vibration is equally appealing to everyone **[06:47]** Without any question of language, nationality, creed or caste. **[06:54]** Because it is coming forth from the depth of the soul. **[07:01]** This simple vibration can deliver the people of this age to salvation. **[07:13]** Human life is meant for getting out of the three-fold miseries of this material existence **[07:25]** and forgetting their life's aim. **[07:30]** They have become too much materialistic and the result is that actually they haven't got that peace of mind **[07:45]** or peace of the world which they are hankering [for] and if they take to this chanting, transcendental vibration, **[07:54]** their mind, the dirtiness of the mind will be cleared and they will clearly see **[08:04]** their actual identity as part and parcel of the Supreme Lord or Krishna **[08:14]** and dovetailing their activities in that relationship, everything will be sublime. **[08:25]** I think how we are different from drug people also is to realize that God is here and in my heart **[08:31]** and all the time but we are realizing this consciously. We know this consciously. **[08:38]** Not just to accept it once and enjoy. You know this moment to moment. **[08:43]** Well I've only tried maraujana. I've never taken anything else. **[08:49]** You might say I was fortunate enough to have my self realization and other changes without drugs. **[08:57]** Leary and some of the drug followers, **[09:00]** they are functioning high on a low level and we are functioning low on a high level. **[09:09]** Could you explain that? **[09:11]** They are functioning high, this feeling, this sensual perception which is extended so far that they **[09:22]** are enjoying their foods, their incense and colors and all these things. **[09:26]** This anyone can do. And we are not enjoying these things. **[09:30]** But we are functioning on this high level, on the level of God. **[09:33]** We must consider ourselves as the gopis so that we can love Krishna that much more. **[09:42]** That we devote our whole lives to Krishna and we must consider ourselves as females you see. **[09:49]** Be careful. It takes many, many lifetimes of perfection to get to be a gopi. **[09:56]** One has to be the supremely developed perfect in perfection to qualify as a gopi... **[10:04]** But the reason that one of the people mentioned before that being femine **[10:10]** is that the masculine love and the feminine are loved and that you are feminine **[10:16]** so that you can be loved by Krishna. **[10:18]** Well, does this have anything to do with being celibate or... **[10:21]** This has to do with the Supreme Being of course is male **[10:25]** because He is Purusa as they say in Sanskrit. **[10:27]** That is He is the origin, He is the creator. He is the seed. **[10:32]** He plants the seed in the material universe of which we are the result. **[10:36]** Therefore we are the feminine. The whole material creation, He is the Supereme Father. **[10:42]** Are you celebant? **[10:44]** That has nothing to do with it. I may be or I may not be, this has nothing to do with it. **[10:51]** I just came in and I was tired, so they said, "You're tired go to sleep, lay down here." **[10:57]** You mean this is your first day? **[10:58]** Yes **[11:00]** And this is your first chanting session? **[11:03]** Yes, this is the first time I have ever been into it at all. **[11:07]** I came about the first of August. Ray was here a little earlier I believe. **[11:12]** I came around the middle of August. **[11:14]** And then others of course have come within the last week. **[11:17]** But the one thing that usually happens is that the ones who come like this, **[11:24]** they come and they just never go. Once you come, you stay, **[11:28]** because the Swami has something which you are looking for. **[11:33]** The first thing he did for us was to give us our method of chanting **[11:37]** which is so powerful a method that it will work for anyone. **[11:41]** In other words you don't need to be one person in a million who can really be successful **[11:50]** in meditation and yoga where you have to spend years at that discipline without getting any place **[11:57]** and then finally achieve it. **[12:00]** Our method is so powerful that it will work for anyone in two days. **[12:03]** Should I bow down when I don't feel anything? **[12:06]** Should I say these words when I don't feel anything? **[12:09]** He says, "yes," because this is a training. **[12:12]** You see you want to train yourself, this is the most important, **[12:18]** then you'll gradually just fall right into it, if you work hard at it. **[12:23]** You must practice, and this is the main thing and then you'll be attracted. **[12:34]** How about now? Do you feel really good? -Excuse me. **[12:37]** Do you feel uncomfortable? **[12:39]** Oh no, I see all this practicing and work just had to be done for where I am now. **[12:50]** Anyone who chants Hare Krishna, have you got the whole chant? **[12:56]** Just the same as we are all sitting here but if I call "Stanley," **[13:02]** that's not the same as calling you. If I call your name that shows my attention is riveted on you. **[13:08]** So by riveting our attention on Krishna we are able to... **[13:13]** In other words if I meditated on the word: "Raymond," that wouldn't be the same at all. **[13:18]** The word "Krishna" is God, the word "Raymond," at least to my knowledge, is not. **[13:26]** Well you have to concentrate on these words, you have to be sincere about these words. **[13:31]** You have to surrender yourself to these words and through this, **[13:40]** this takes practice. It's not done in one session. **[13:45]** It took me maybe four sessions before I began to even chant, you see. **[13:51]** What happens when you do chant, when you're in it? **[13:54]** Well, that's hard to explain. I guess that each person has a different reaction but you do seem to open up. **[14:02]** It seems as if something flies out of you. It's like a door opens, **[14:10]** it slowly opens and then you walk in to the unknown, the unknown is beautiful, this unknown. **[14:19]** You have every muscle of your body engaged in the exercise. **[14:23]** You're singing, you're dancing, your mind is fully engaged in thinking about God. **[14:30]** What more could there be? This is the full aim of any kind of yoga. **[14:33]** It's to concentrate the energy to a point and in this kirtan your energy is concentrated on one point, God. **[14:42]** Hare Krishna Hare Krishna Krishna Krishna Hare Hare **[14:45]** Hare Rama Hare Rama Rama Rama Hare Hare **[14:48]** What more could you want?