Every one of us is searching after happiness, but we do not know what real happiness is. We see so much advertised about happiness, but practically speaking we see so few happy people. Happiness is generally perceived through our senses A stone, for instance, has no senses and cannot perceive happiness and distress. Developed consciousness can perceive happiness and distress more intensely than undeveloped consciousness.

April 1965: While approaching the Scindia Steam Navigation Company in Bombay to sponsor his passage to America, Srila Prabhupada received one of their complimentary diaries. He used it at first as an appointment book. Once his voyage to America on the Jaladuta began in August of that year, he made regular entries in the diary to record the events of the journey. Subsequently, the diary was kept in the safe of the New York temple until 1972, when Srila Prabh...

We are talking about Krsna as the perfect unifying agent. Insofar as His unifying power is concerned, He appeals, in His various manifestations, to all varieties of truth seekers. Essentially, there are three varieties of truth seekers: mental speculators, meditators or yogis, and devotees. The mental speculators are trying to understand the Absolute Truth in an impersonal way, without a personal form. And the meditators or yogis are trying to find Krsna within their hear...

Animals are always suffering, but they do not mind it. Recently I was in Hawaii, and in front of my house was a man who kept animals and birds for slaughter. I was telling my students that we could say to the animals, "Oh, my dear animals, why are you standing here? Go away. You are going to be slaughtered." But the animals don't have the intelligence to go. Even in the slaughterhouse they don't go away. Suffering without knowledge, without remedy, means anim...

Human civilization should help us love God, and not pull us down into ignorance. Human civilization means not to drag somebody who is already in the sattva-guna, or in a family of people in the sattva-guna, down to the tamo-guna. But modern civilization does that. The allurement of material civilization is so strong and so bad that those who, because of previous pious activities, were born in a brahmana family are being dragged to the tamo-guna behavior of t...

Lord Krishna teaches that the individual living entity, though possessed of the attributes of God, is never equal to Him. What is the objective of this Krishna consciousness movement? It is a process for purification of consciousness. In the Bhagavad-gita (2.17) Lord Krishna says, avinashi tu tad viddhi yena sarvam idam tatam: " That which pervades the entire body you should know to be indestructible." There are two kinds of consciousness. One consciousness is limited, and the other consciousness is ...

"My dear Lord," Prahlada says, "I am not very anxious for my own deliverance." Mayavadi, or impersonalist, philosophers are very careful that their personal salvation is not interrupted. They think, "If I go to preach in association with others, I may fall down, and my realization will be finished." Therefore they do not come. Only the Vaisnavas come-at the risk of fall down. But they do not fall down. They may even go to hell to deliver the conditioned souls. This is Prahlada Maharaja's mission. He say...

The qualified brahmanas are first-class men, the topmost class. The kshatriyas are the second-class men. And the third-class men are the vaishyas, the mercantile community. They simply think, "Where to get money?" They are third-class men, but at the present moment those who acquire money somehow or other are considered first-class men. It doesn't matter what their qualification is. If they have acquired some money some way or other, then they are considered first-class men. This is a symptom of Kali-y...

So this sankirtana movement, Hare Krishna movement, is also incarnation of Krishna. Nama-rupe avatara. Krishna can become incarnation in sound form also. Not even a physical form. Physical form also there; everything is there. But especially this age, Krishna is incarnated in His name.

My Lord, I offer my respectful obeisances unto You because You are the director of the unmanifested total energy, and the ultimate reservoir of the material nature. My Lord, the whole cosmic manifestation is under the influence of time, beginning from the moment up to the duration of the year. All act under Your direction. You are the original director of everything and the reservoir of all potent energies.

We can make our standard of living very comfortable, but with the purpose of attaining perfection in Krsna consciousness. You live comfortably. That's all right. But don't live like animals, simply increasing sense gratification.