Dare to Dream

The following is an article from the 12th edition of the Matchless Gift magazine, written by Her Grace Pallika Vrajagopi Devi Dasi.

The goals in life are near-one and the same for everyone: a hefty bank balance, marriage, and a white picket fence. …#liveyourbestlife, #couplegoals, #success are the running slogans in social media, where pleasure and achievement are emboldened to grow anew. The desires are never-ending.  Job opportunities, shiny cars, a house by the beach, traveling the world; an endless carousel of hopes and dreams! But life isn’t all sunshine and roses, is it? Old age and the trauma of sickness looms large in all our lives. The recent Covid debacle didn’t just leave deep scars on the economy, but death and destruction in its wake. I know of an elderly gentleman who lost both his son and son-in-law to this deadly virus. A daughter who lost a loving father and is now battling with depression. Death of near and dear ones can push anyone over the edge, but we tend to repress the painful reality while the demands of our senses tug at us like a centrifugal force, inadvertently losing ourselves in the chase. We’ve somehow adjusted to the fact that life has good and bad, ups and downs, positive and negative. People tend to view life as a game of snakes and ladders. Standing at the periphery of possibilities, just vying for the farthest jump. All this while tacking the ravages of time, war, pestilence, the apocalyptic impact of global warming, and the self-degrading characteristics of mankind that leaves us all hanging by a thread. We’re still, and desperately so, trying to squeeze every last drop of enjoyment.

A little insight into the Vedic scriptures revealed to me that there are literally millions of planets out there! Extra-terrestrials from higher and lower planets such as Gandharvas, Apsaras, Daityas, and Nagas, whose level of sense enjoyment far outweighs the lifestyle we’ve envisaged for ourselves. Unlike us, they are not limited by physical corporeality. These beings live for thousands of years, unaffected by old age or fatigue; sporting in picturesque landscapes with beautiful women while sipping on soma-rasa (a celestial beverage). Their bodies are full of vigor and vitality, their cities built with valuable jewels. While we move to the ebb and flow of negative emotions every single day, fear and anxiety are unknown in their realm. Those who are considered paragons of virtue and amassed copious amounts of piety ascend to these regions. When I first became privy to this knowledge, I felt rather foolish. Like betrayal smacked me in the face. I mean, here we are oohing and aahing to foreign vacays and Louis Vuitton handbags while there are whole planets out there that encapsulate pleasure and grandeur at a scale that is unprecedented. The most enviable quality is that while we suffer from sporadic bouts of pain coupled with the trauma of everyday sufferings, these superhuman beings are sitting on the crest of a wave. All-day. Everyday. As the Bhagavatam offered a bird’s eye view of the thought-provoking insight into our cosmos, I realized that we got the short end of the stick. We imagine that wealthy celebrities in our world have perfect lives, but even they are no exception to the rule. An article I read about Hollywood A-listers haunted by demons of their past was proof beyond a reasonable doubt that we grapple with a world brimming with chaos and evil. However, we’re trained to see the glass half full instead of half empty, to shoot for the stars. But knowing what I know of these subterranean and heavenly planets, I became aware that we’ve barely scratched the surface of material enjoyment.

But… there’s a catch. Even the residents of these heavenly planets eventually die, albeit living long and great quality lives. It has an expiry date, so to speak. Once your sukriti (pious credit) fizzles out, you’re bound to come tumbling down. As the Bhagavatam describes, conditioned souls in the material world traverse through various planets like unintelligent children on a merry go round. But beyond the Earth, and the lower and higher planets of the material universe, lies the spiritual world. As Christian theology would have us believe, God is not an old bearded man in the sky, passing judgment like a rigid dictator. It’s this very notion that’s made people keep God at arm’s length. God/Krishna is youthful, beautiful; the very name “Krishna” translates to being all attractive. In that eternal realm replete with bliss and knowledge, where water is nectar and land is touchstone, where the trees are wish-fulfilling and the homes are bejeweled; Krishna plays with His friends, tends the cows, hold rendezvous meetings with His girlfriends, and dances away to glory. A place where exultant devotees are joyfully engaged in service of the Lord, the one true and dear friend of all living entities. The air is laden with the sweet fragrance of flowers and the forest reverberates with the sounds of birds and bumblebees. So profuse is the opulence of this fabulous realm that the transcendental airplanes here are made of lapus lazuli and emerald, while the grounds are inlaid with jewels that shine like a million suns ablaze! Untouched by time, every moment is new and ever-exhilarating. There is no birth, death, old age, and disease. Its residents are the proverbial cream of the crop with men and women endowed with exceptional beauty beyond compare. Seeing which, no person would want to touch the material world with a bargepole. This is our real home. A flash of envy and the desire to enjoy independently got us plummeting down to Earth. While it may be too late to put that genie back in the bottle, there’s still a way to set it right. Thanks to Shrila Prabhupada, who so graciously handed us the key to the spiritual world in the form of the Maha-mantra. We still have hope. There is light at the end of this tunnel. We can either choose to rot in this cesspool of misery or make the best use of a bad bargain by chanting the holy name of Krishna. What’s it going to be?

Masquerading as a man with a reason

My charade is the event of the season

And if I claim to be a wise man

Well, it surely means that I don’t know

On a stormy sea of moving emotion

Tossed about, I’m like a ship on the ocean

I set a course for winds of fortune

But I hear the voices say

Carry on my wayward son

There’ll be peace when you are done

Lay your weary head to rest

Don’t you cry no more

                                                                                                                      –Kansas 

If you're interested, you can find the 12th edition of the Matchless Gift below.