I was born in Slovenia and grew up in a small village surrounded by forests and hills. For my whole life nature was all around me and I was always astonished by how everything is connected, the trees, the plants, the animals all living in a balance, governed by an unseen force that is perfectly organizing all of these things.
However, when I started going to school, I was often times finding myself staring into the forests just through a closed window, not feeling as a part of the ecosystem, because as modern humans we are part of a different system, supposedly more advanced. A system of capitalistic, technological and impersonal network based on artificial necessities, governed by the modern science.
But is it really more advanced or have we just unnecessarily complicated life for ourselves?
After turning 15, I started questioning everything around me. I wanted to know how much truth is there in everything that we have unconditionally accepted as truth from the society.
This questioning mentality had eventually brought me to the realization that this whole system is very superficial and built on very unstable grounds.
Even though the whole economic infrastructure of the world seems very advanced since we are exporting and importing goods from all across the world, this is actually its greatest weakness.
Simply if one of the main factors, like oil gets disrupted or runs out, the entire web of connections will collapse and billions will be left without the basic necessities of food, water, clothes and so on.
For example, in the past the entire currency used to be based on gold, so it had a set value, but that has been changed and now it is based on nothing. The central bank is free to print as much money as there is needed and they lend it out as debt. The whole world is trillions and trillions in debt, and this practice is continiously increasing the inflation of money, which in turn decreases its value, creating the need for more money to be printed, creating more debt and in this way the circle goes on and on, untill eventually it breaks completely and the previously cherished money becomes worthless overnight, like it has happened many times before in recent history.
There is no doubt it can happen again very easily.
This realization has brought a good chance to inquire about the solutions.
We can do so many scientific and economical adjustments but we can not get over this fact that we need to grow food.
The only true solution is to grow food locally and strive for self sufficiency at all cost, which means a self sufficient house, self sufficient village and eventually self sufficient countries.
In this way, if one house fails to produce all they need for self sufficiency, the surplus of the village's produce can substitute the missing food or things needed.
By doing this, every household becomes like a strong stone, being independent and not relying on the unstable and uncertain importing and exporting of material goods and not relying on the imaginary value of currency, but instead relying on the concrete value of locally grown food.
The ecologists and scientists agree, the main problem of humanity is greed.
In this connection Stephen Hawking, a famous theoretical physicist with a doctorate in physics says this:
"We are in danger of destroying ourselves by our greed and stupidity. We cannot remain looking inwards at ourselves on a small and increasingly polluted and overcrowded planet."
There are many well known personalities that agree. We are abusing the resources of mother Earth and producing all kinds of waste, contaminating the air, earth and water, simply because of greed.
So how do we decrease this greed that has been driving this civilization for so many hundreds of years?
By making all our actions centered around God - Krsna!
For example, the United States of America, the most influential country in the world was created by God conscious founding fathers.
In his first Inaugural Address on April 30, 1789, George Washington repeatedly talked about God’s blessings upon America, saying; “No people can be bound to acknowledge and adore the Invisible Hand which conducts the affairs of men more than the people of the United States.”
This is the practical secret why America is such a successful country. Even the US dollar says "in God we trust".
Sri Isopanisad, a sacred book which is part of the ancient vedas teaches us with the first mantra:
"Everything animate or inanimate that is within the universe is controlled and owned by the Lord. One should therefore accept only those things necessary for himself, which are set aside as his quota, and one should not accept other things, knowing well to whom they belong."
We should know that Krsna or God is the supreme proprietor of everything, and in this way, we will naturally be greatful for anything we are given by Him. But if we are greedy and take those things not meant for us, then we are stealing and we must eventually suffer the karmic reactions. We can see now with the enviromental crisis, wars, social unrest and so many things, these are all the results of abandoning God.
We can reasonably conclude that the only position where humanity will reach a true unity and peace with each other, is in Krsna consciousness, or as mentioned above, a God centered society.
Krsna consciousness teaches that every desire is like throwing a stone in a lake of water, it creates a ripple effect. If we throw many stones, the ripple expands but ultimately comes in conflict with other ripples. This can be compared to our endeavours that are devoid of God consciousness. Everyone has some idea, but because he is lacking God consciousness, when they expand, eventually the ideas clash with one another.
But if we all have God - Krsna in the center, there is only one stone thrown, and from that central point all the ripples can expand and yet never clash with one another.
So this is my desire, to create a self sufficient farm community where many people can live in harmony with nature,
get trained up in Krsna consciousness, and at the same time, it can be used as a last resort for all the devotees of the Bhaktivedanta Lives In Sound Society across the world, in case the cities become unbearable to live in and unsuitable for preaching.
In that case we can all take refuge here, be completely independent of the cities and in this way continue with our devotional service activities and spiritual life.
And in the meanwhile the farm can run in conjunction with the BLISS London center and cooperate with the devotees in the big city.
We follow a great personality, our Spiritual master, His Divine Grace A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada,
who has given us the ancient, scientific knowledge on how to live a God centered life, focused on self realization and rendering devotional service unto God, which is the highest occupation for the human beings.
Srila Prabhupada is deriving his knowledge from the disciplic succession of perfected spiritual masters and he is presenting the spiritual knowledge from the ancient Vedas as it is, without the twisting of words, so anyone can understand its deep meaning and importance.
This knowledge that Srila Prabhupada has given us has also been appreciated in many universities and scientific circles.
Dr. Samuel D. Atkins, the Professor of Sanskrit at Princeton University states:
"I am most impressed with A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada's scholarly and authoritative edition of Bhagavad-gita. It is a most valuable work for the scholar as well as the layman and is of great utility as a reference book as well as a textbook. I promptly recommend this edition to my students. It is a beautifully done book."
The members of Bhaktivedanta Lives In Sound Society (BLISS), founded by His Grace Purujit prabhu, are taking guidance from Srila Prabhupada and respect him as the top most authority on Krsna consciousness.
We live by the instructions given in his books, lectures, conversations, letters etc...
One part of his perfect instructions also speaks about opening farms.
For example, Srila Prabhupada has written this in a letter to his devotee:
“Now we should have self sufficiency. This means to make our own food grains grow and weave our own cloth-like Mayapur. If we have good grains,milk, and cloth life becomes easy and we can save time for preaching and chanting."
-Letter to Mahamsa Swami, 19th January, 1975
Of course being self sufficient is a hard task and it does not become accomplished on its own.
I believe if we sincerely work together and put Krsna in the middle of all our activities, then we can succeed in this great endeavour and lead this world by example, while living simply and thinking highly.