Book Preview

Anyone who had the privilege of knowing Yamuna devi often experienced that rare quality of feeling an immediate connection of intimacy with her. She had the unique ability to bring out the inner devotional core of a person, often after a short association. Whether it be a friend of long duration or a humble cook…

I arrive home to an August clear blue sky, with east and west mountain ridges that parallel each other in our rectangular-shaped valley. Down its center, three glassy-smooth lakes mirror the images of thick Douglas fir and pine forests. No man-made sounds, just nature, pretty much as it has been for thousands of years. When…

My family came from the Catholic tradition and, as is so often the case, the elder women of the family were the most devout. They would tell us stories about saints and martyrs, about people who were noble and sacrificed themselves for God and mankind. I was fascinated by these stories and my interest in…

I remember you asked me to grocery shop for my sister’s wedding feast in the morning, and then assist you in cooking for the remainder of the day. First I bungled the shopping, and then made numerous blunders trying to make aloo kachori for the next several hours. By this time I thought I might…

Toward the end of the ceremony, Swamiji, smiling broadly, picked up a small bongo drum and said, “Now we will have kirtan.” His chanting started off slowly, and he appeared fully absorbed in it. His voice was vibrant and clear, the melody simple, the cadence strong and steady. I was relieved because this part seemed…

For me chanting became an amazing form of meditation. You could still work, still perform what were ‘mundane’ duties, but because you chanted, everything became different—spiritualized. How could three little words carry such potency? The one meaning that stayed with me was the most simple—chanting the Hare Krishna Mahamantra is an exchange of love between…

I remember how in San Francisco, we were informed by the New York devotees of your life-threatening stroke in 1967. And how, at your request, we stayed in the temple for almost twelve hours straight, praying to our Jagannatha Deities for your protection. I remember how, after some hours praying, the eyes of Lord Jagannatha…

When Swamiji was in India, Acyutananda das once sent pictures of him on Sankirtan in Calcutta. When we saw Swamiji chanting in the streets of India, all of us were just praying for the day we would be able to join him there. So, of course, Srila Prabhupada knew of my long-held desire to go…

In England, there were just six of us in the beginning. What happened in two years was incredible. It was just impossible. We didn’t know what we were doing. But we were just enthusiastic to try. That’s really something. So that is what I want you to try to catch—that ray, that moonbeam of Krishna…

One night an extraordinary thing happened. Prabhupada led the first kirtan and then gave a lecture. I sat on the floor just to his right with the harmonium, and after the lecture, I began leading the second Hare Krishna kirtan. All of a sudden, Srila Prabhupada’s voice cut through the auditorium with the potency of…

Srila Prabhupada’s harmonium playing was very unique. It had so much life to it, like a babbling brook, the water falling and hitting the rocks; and as it falls each rock makes a different sound. He would go all over and embellish in a way that wasn’t Indian or Western or any kind of style—it…

In Paris, they put us out in the snow in the fields without any coats on, spread out in a big field, chanting without a microphone under a rock, with Mandakini behind me. It was completely again surreal, but all part of the tour. There is a series of photos of Srila Prabhupada and me…

I remember that I wasn’t initially very enthusiastic at the prospect of recording the Radha-Krishna Temple album. My thinking was that I didn’t have the time. I had to almost be pressured into being involved in the record, because when you record there’s a lot of down time, like doing a movie. There’s playback time,…

Srila Prabhupada himself came from Calcutta on the 8th, and from the very beginning of our programs in Bombay, Srila Prabhupada became known as one “who is startling India with kirtan.” Our kirtans were full of so much excitement—they were so thrilling—we were like one throbbing heartbeat—the heartbeat of Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu’s mission of Krishna…

November 1970. The large iron key, sent by registered post, fell heavily onto the sandstone roof of the Delhi Dharmshala. Ten hands darted to retrieve it. We passed it around respectfully, knowing that it was our passport into Vrindavan, Lord Krishna’s eternal abode, whose counterpart in this world lay only ninety miles to our south….

How he dealt with us each individually was the greatest gift. I’m astounded when I reflect on it—he treated everyone on a personal basis and encouraged us in our practice of Krishna Consciousness. I felt that he genuinely loved each of us, and he exhibited that love through how he took care of us—with great…

Another special memory I have occurred during the mangal aratik in the dark of night. There were one or two low watt light bulbs hanging and a few candles on the altar. We began chanting the Guruvastaka prayers to the Spiritual Master and then, not far into the chanting, Srila Prabhupada spontaneously began chanting the…

I remember at the Ardha-Kumbha-Mela in Allabhad, when some of your disciples felt it was too difficult to rise early, take bath, and attend the morning program with you. Seeing this, you encouraged us by personally going outside in the dark of night, at 3 am, to bathe in unheated water and in near freezing…

“You must teach others what I have taught you.” This instruction was again repeated to me in Srila Prabhupada’s quarters in May of 1971 in Calcutta. At the time I was only visiting the temple in Calcutta, having been sent by Srila Prabhupada to assist with the pandal program at Chowringhee Maidan. Srila Prabhupada had…

Mr. Balu had a small temple in his home compound, and they had a set of beautiful, marble Deities of black Krishna and white Radharani who were the same size as what Srila Prabhupada called ‘Yamuna’s Deities.’ So the first day I arrived there with our Deities, They were placed on the altar in Mr….

The summer of 1972 was a challenging time for all of our small party. It was the first time in my life that I had undergone such insurmountable austerity. The heat was incredibly unbearable, and some people were going to the hospital with heat exposure. The temperature hovered around 115 to 125 degrees F, and…

I don’t know if any of you know, but Srila Prabhupada had an urgency.  Not only did he try to encourage us individually to really take what he was saying, but it was our responsibility to really hear him and then act upon it.  There are a lot of different kinds of hearing. There is…

This is just honesty and such a quality of a Vaishnava. Even for you to say that ‘my taste is gone,’ is so nice. All this is purifying. To sit here and to look at yourself is purifying. To sit here and even make the effort to be here is purifying. And I have a…

Dear Maharaja’s and Prabhus,   Hare Krishna!  My repeated pranam dandavats to all of you. What a week of Vaishnava sadhu satsanga this has been. I leave the richer having exchanged with my family members—old and new godbrothers, godsisters, nephews and nieces. While I feel most unqualified to speak to you today, I am honored…

The way for embracing and going into kirtan is endless. When a group of people gather together, we touch each other through sound vibration, and it’s endlessly exciting and changing and different at every moment, just like we are. Consciousness means that we’re changing; it’s nothing static. As we open ourselves through the chanting, through…

You need commitment! So to be committed you need to be focused. You can’t get chanting, you can’t get hearing, you can’t get desire, you can’t get serving, you can’t get any of it unless you’re committed to do so. That means we put our attention—we consciously become committed and focused on getting those things. And…

So Srila Prabhupada told us to try to just understand that Krishna consciousness will not always be easy, and then he said, “Three things are required for success in Krishna consciousness, and you must always rely on them—enthusiasm, will (or determination) and patience.” So now you can take just that one little instruction from Srila…

Everything that happens to you is the kindness of Krishna. It’s strange that, when challenges come our way we go, “What did I do to deserve that?”  Somewhere along your sojourn, to where you got to now, there’s something that happened that needs to be addressed and solved in this life. So whatever lessons and…

Vrindavan is received through all of our senses.  In a very special way it is drunk in using all of our senses. So when we leave the Dhama of Vrindavan, we have to bring that wherever we go. So as I was reflecting after leaving that Vrindavan and coming here, I thought how can I…

I feel so terribly grateful to Srila Prabhupada for the process of Bhaktiyoga he gave us. And my deepest, deepest, deepest prayer is that somehow we altogether try to preserve the purity of Srila Prabhupada’s process. That thing that he gave us: we don’t change it, we don’t merge it with something else that is…

When the false ego comes in, we can quickly become covered over by not following the process. Forgetting Krishna can happen really quickly—we know it in a day. And if you look at yourself in a twenty-four hour day, where your mind goes—it’s amazing; it can go all kinds of places. Can’t it?  In twenty-four…

Srila Prabhupada said that this whole material world is simply questions and answers. So from that I was thinking that if we ask the right question and the quality of the question is good, then it is just a matter of time, that through Supersoul, Krishna directs you to the answer, but there has to…

Prabhupada was able to understand each mentality, individually, in such a way that he was able to show us light from darkness, in every aspect of our Krishna conscious life. But unless we have someone there to reveal that to us, it is a little slow. But in the process of self-realization, we learn from…