There is a similar verse in the Bhagavad-gita 2.69:
What is night for all beings is the time of awakening for the self-controlled, and the time of awakening for all beings is night for the introspective sage.
Purport: There two classes of intelligent men. One is intelligent in material activity for sense gratification, and the other is introspective and awake to the cultivation of self-realization. Activities of the introspective sage or thoughtful man are night for persons materially absorbed. Materialistic persons remain asleep in such a night due to their ignorance of self-realization. The introspective sage remains alert in the night of the materialistic men. The sage feels transcendental pleasure in the gradual advancement of spiritual culture, whereas the man in materialistic activities, being asleep to self-realization, dreams of various kinds of sense pleasure, feeling sometimes happy and sometimes distressed in his sleeping condition. The introspective man is always indifferent to materialistic happiness and distress. He goes on with his self-realization activities undisturbed by material reactions. In the purport there was this sentence that a person at night remains inactive, covered by the darkness of night. But when awakening in the morning, the covering of night, of forgetfulness of the sleeping state disappears. So most people there, they are asleep. They are not awake to self-realization. Even sometimes people, they go out to enjoy in the night, go to the club or other places. So when the devotees get up in the morning, maybe around 4 o'clock, before 4 o'clock, these kind of people return home. They have been enjoying the whole night in the discotheque, or in the cinema, or in the club. And then, when night is almost over, they return home. But the devotees, they get up before 4 o'clock in the morning, go to mangala-arati and chant Hare Krsna or dress the deities. They are active in a different way than the materialistic people. And these two classes of intelligent men. One is intelligent in material activity for sense gratification. Most people are like that, maybe 99% in the world. Very active from morning to evening to satisfy the senses. And the other kind of person is introspective, and is awake to the cultivation of self-realization. And for a materialistic person, the activities of the introspective sage is like night. They cannot understand. They remain asleep in such a night because of ignorance of self-realization. And introspective sage remains alert in the night of the materialistic man. This Krsna is explaining in Bhagavad-gita the nature of a spiritually enlightened person, a devotee. This is in the beginning of Bhagavad-gita, the second chapter. And they have a different kind of pleasure. The introspective sage, they feel transcendental pleasure in the gradual advancement of spiritual culture. It's a gradual awakening. We can feel that. Even after 50 years, we're still not awake, we're not fully Krsna conscious, but still the process is going on. And otherwise, why would we rise early in the morning if we didn't feel any transcendental pleasure? It is a higher taste, also to give up sinful activities like meat-eating, intoxication, illicit sex life, and gambling. For materialistic people this is unbelievable. Especially sex life is the highest pleasure in the material world. And one could say that most people are working very hard day and night just so that they can enjoy sex pleasure at night with their wife, or with a girlfriend, or boyfriend, or in other ways. Because materialistic people, they are motivated like that. But the devotee, if he's advanced, he can live without sex pleasure, avoid... Like real brahmacari, or his brahma, absorbed in the brahman, in the spiritual dimension of life. It's a very advanced stage of spiritual realization. Even Jagai and Madhai, when Lord Chaitanya converted them to become devotees, they became brahmacaris. That being brahmacari during that time was a high position in society. It was difficult. So we feel a little pleasure to take prasadam, singing and dancing, and getting up early in the morning, and keeping ourselves clean also. Before we came to Krsna consciousness, we didn't know how to keep ourselves clean. Maybe we took a bath once a week, or something like that. But now we take bath one, two, three times a day, because we feel much better after taking a shower. It purify the body and the mind also. Water is a pure substance. If it is clean, it is one of the energies of Krsna.
So, what a materialistic man doing in his dreams of variety of sense pleasure, he is sometimes happy and sometimes distressed in his sleeping condition. It's very interesting, like people on the street are not really awake. They are walking, and they are working, and running in so many ways, but they are not really awake, they are asleep. Because the soul is not awake within them. If the soul was awake, then one would feel very happy and blissful, like Srila Prabhupada. Because he was so happy and blissful, and encouraging and positive, he attracted many young people to give up a life of sense gratification and to adopt austerities of spiritual life. Sometimes happiness, sometimes distress in a sleeping condition. So, that is a symptom of a materialistic man, sometimes happy and sometimes distressed. But the introspective man is indifferent to materialistic happiness and distress. Sometimes there is an accident, or there is a disease, or a relative die, or earthquakes. So, Bhakti Caru Maharaja had one friend who got cancer when he was 31 years old. But he lived three years more. But it was very difficult for him. Jananinatha was his name. Imagine, only 31 years old, and then the doctor say, "Yeah, you're going to die. You cannot live more than five months." But actually, he took it from the positive side, and he said that this last time of my life was the time when I felt most happy and had most realizations.
Q: Who was that?
A: Jananinatha was his name, friend of Bhakti Caru Maharaja, who left the body because of cancer. He wrote a book about it, Bhakti Caru Maharaja, about what was happening. They were very close friends. So, if a materialistic man get a terminal disease, he may become very depressed. But the introspective sage, according to Lord Krsna, is indifferent to materialistic happiness and distress, because on self-realization, activity is undisturbed by material reactions. Hari. Srila Prabhupada ki jai. There are many important verses in the second chapter, which is like a summary of the whole Bhagavad-gita. In the text 62:
dhyāyato viṣayān puṁsaḥ
saṅgas teṣūpajāyate
saṅgāt sañjāyate kāmaḥ
kāmāt krodho 'bhijāyate
While contemplating the objects of the senses, a person develops attachment for them, and from such attachment lust develops, and from lust anger arises. Therefore, one who is not Krsna conscious is subject to material desire while contemplating the objects of the senses. When one is not Krsna conscious, then you look on the sense object, a beautiful woman, a piece of chocolate, or something like that, a beautiful car, then one is feeling a surge of material desire within oneself, because one doesn't see it in relation to Krsna. Like a woman, we should see her like the energy of Krsna, meant for His enjoyment, like the gopis or something like that. Otherwise we become like Ravana, who is taking Sita for himself, for his enjoyment, taking her away from Ramachandra. So, if we contemplate to enjoy a beautiful woman or a beautiful man, that is kind of Ravana mentality, because all these jivas are for Krsna's enjoyment, not for our enjoyment. We rather should try to engage them in the service of the Lord, to give Him pleasure, instead of trying to enjoy them for ourselves. Whenever we go out, the temptation is there. And it is very difficult to control the senses, even a saintly person find it very difficult. And it's very easy to fall down, especially in modern society where the whole mood of modern society is to enjoy the senses, enjoy sense gratification to the utmost. If you have money, spend them for sense gratification. But if you have money, if you have wealth, if you don't use it for Krsna, who is the supreme enjoyer, then it cause us trouble, ultimately. So, Krsna is the proprietor of everything.
bhoktāraṁ yajña-tapasāṁ
sarva-loka-maheśvaram
suhṛdaṁ sarva-bhūtānāṁ
jñātvā māṁ śāntim ṛcchati
Everything belongs to Krsna. We cannot say that anything belongs to us, we just borrow it for some time. And when we die, we have to give it away, cannot keep it. Even if you are a millionaire, you have like a beautiful mansion, you have to leave it behind you, and then you go alone to your next life. Therefore, it is very important to practice Krsna consciousness so that when we die, we go to a higher destination, a better future life.
If we neglect Krsna, then we actually have to suffer in the next life, and then in lower karma. But the senses require real engagement. And if they are not engaged in transcendental loving service to the Lord, they will seek engagement in the service of materialists. So, therefore, we have the deities, we have the holy name, the prasadam, association of devotees, beautiful temple room, eyes to see the deities, ears to hear the holy name, tongue for chanting and tasting prasadam, and then they help us to stay out of this harm and danger, because the senses are like venomous serpents. How dangerous, cobras! The senses are like that, venomous serpents. So, we should be very careful. You see all spiritual people, they live in a secluded place, so the venomous senses will not spoil their life. But if you are advanced in spiritual life, you can convert others. But then you have to be strong in Krsna consciousness, otherwise you may fall down. This can happen also. So, the senses must be engaged in something spiritual. And we are very weak, insignificant living entities. Here Lord Prabhupada writes that even Lord Siva and Brahma, and other demigods in the heavenly planets, they are influenced by the object of sense gratification. You can imagine in the heavenly planets, the apsaras, the heavenly dancers, and all the opulences which is there, you forget about spiritual life. There is so much pleasure in the heavenly planets that no distress, no disease, no old age, no pain, just enjoyment. But you cannot stay there forever, you have to come down again into the material world when these fruits you accumulated in your previous life is exhausted. It is enjoyable, but when the result is ended, you have to come back again. One can say business between father, and sometimes a father, he gives his son investment, he gives him some money. Father is a rich man and he gives his son money which he can invest in business, in a project, so that he can make a nice business. But if the son doesn't take advantage of the investment, and spoil the money for sense gratification, and he go to prostitute or go to the bar, or whatever he want to do, then spoil the money which his father gave him, big investment. So, one can say that human form of body is like an investment that Krsna gave to us, which we can utilize for elevation of higher destination. Nice investment. But most people, they don't really care. They are asleep in their sense gratification, don't care of the value of the human form of life. So, Lord Siva and Brahma, these very great demigods, they also... Lord Brahma became attracted to his daughter, and Lord Siva became attracted to Mohini-murti, and put themselves into trouble. And this I maybe more same experience, that we can attracted to sense objects, and then we fall down. We fall down into maya, illusion. So, Lord Siva was deep in meditation, but when Parvati agitated him for sense pleasure, a greater proposal on the result that Karttikeya was born. These are, of course, a kind of lila, pastimes, one could say, but to give an example for us to be careful. On the other hand, Haridasa Thakura, who was Lord Brahma in his previous life, he was sitting in the forest chanting Hare Krsna, and then a beautiful young girl, who was an incarnation of Mayadevi, came to him and tried to bring him to fall down. One can imagine, sitting in the forest in the middle of night, then a beautiful girl is coming and showing her body in different sensual ways, it's very, very difficult not to become attracted. But Haridasa Thakura passed the test. Why? Because of his unalloyed devotion to Lord Krsna. So, the solution to this ever-existing problem is given in another verse in the Bhagavad-gita:
viṣayā vinivartante
nirāhārasya dehinaḥ
rasa-varjaṁ raso 'py asya
paraṁ dṛṣṭvā nivartate
Like we, the embodied soul, may be restricted from sense enjoyment, but the taste remain. If you force somebody who is not advanced in spiritual life, you don't give him any sense pleasure, it is not possible for him to remain in that position. Because unless one is cent percent engaged, it's not possible to save from sense enjoyment.
So what can we do? We can engage the senses in Krsna's service, and then they'll become purified. Like a sick person who cannot eat... like a toothache, doctors say you cannot eat solid food. If you eat solid food, you have toothache, then you can die, you have to eat liquid food. But the taste for eating solid food is still there, but unless you stop it, you can die. So artificially restricting devotees or people from sense enjoyment by rules and regulation, something similar, but artificial doesn't work. We cannot sit like a sādhu or to chant japa the whole day and night, you have to do something. Take some taste of prasadam, and if you maybe you need to get married, have a family, you cannot live alone. No one can do like that. Otherwise, if you don't have taste of prasadam or if you need family life, you become frustrated, or you become crazy even. So we have to adjust according to our consciousness. Otherwise... like this toothache patient, he doesn't lose his taste for nice food like halavā or samoṣā. If you give it to him, it's very very dangerous. He doesn't like it. And even like if you practice yoga, aṣṭāṅga-yoga, it's recommended for less intelligent persons. Of course, you can do some yoga for your health, but if you give up Krsna consciousness for just practice yoga, it's useless. So much yoga in the world today, but usually people don't have any spiritual aim. Just do it for the good health, to look beautiful, attractive, or to be more attractive to the opposite sex, even. They don't have better knowledge. So what is the secret to make advancement in spiritual life? One has to taste the beauty of Krsna. If you have tasted the beauty of Krsna in this advanced spiritual life, you don't have any taste more for dead material things. Even like a beautiful man, a beautiful woman is like a covering of skin. But under the skin, if you take away this of the skin, doesn't look very nice. So what is it that gives the body's beauty? It's not the body itself, but it is the soul within the body. If you have like a beautiful girl, but when life left the body, you don't want to stay in the same room. But if she's alive, it's a different thing. So we make that mistake, identifying the body with the soul. But it is actually the soul which makes the body beautiful, attractive. Otherwise, it becomes like in India, when somebody dies, what do you do? The corpse is there and you decorate it with beautiful ornaments and clothes, and then you bring it to burn it. Decoration of the body. But we can see like devotees are, even if they are a little bit old, they are attractive because they are awakened in their spiritual life. So the beauty is in the soul, not in the body. There is so much like people waste so much money in cosmetics, or sport. But if you neglect the soul, you don't gain anything. So restrictions are there for less intelligent people in the spiritual advancement of life. So such restrictions are only good until one actually has a taste of Krsna consciousness. When one actually has Krsna consciousness, he automatically loses his taste for pale things. Therefore, like there is something different with the devotees. When in the middle of the street when they sing a harināma, they have different vibration than people around them, because the soul is becoming waking up gradually. And the greatest gift to humanity to make a better society is to give them Krsna consciousness, spiritual life. Otherwise, like a poor child on the street, orphan, no father, no mother, and then you give him some food, or some clothes to wear, and he's happy for some time. But actually he has a rich father. And if you bring him home—he's forgotten his relation with the father, but if you bring him home to the father, he becomes happy completely. Otherwise, giving something to eat, clothes like that, the whole problem is not solved. The problem is our forgetfulness of Krsna. If a person is Krsna conscious, he's safe anywhere in the world, he's not dependent on external things. But here we must be careful, because the senses are so strong impetus, unwillingly, forcibly carry away the mind, even in a man's dispassionate endeavoring to control them. Even great learned sages, philosophers, and transcendentalists try to conquer the senses, despite their endeavor, even the greatest of them sometimes fall victim to material sense enjoyment due to the agitated mind. It is mind which is agitated, and then the mind is leader of all other senses. And because they are not... or intelligence is not strong, because we don't have sufficient transcendental knowledge, we become under the influence of the mind, and then under the influence of the senses, and then we fall down.
Most people, they are fallen, but they don't even understand it. They are unregulated. This society maybe sophisticated, but if it's a risky civilization, Prabhupada said, how long will it last? So sex life in the spiritual world is very pure. But in the material world, it is also very intense, but it degrades us to even to become animals in the future sometimes. So here, Yamunacarya:
yad-avadhi mama cetaḥ kṛṣṇa-padāravinde
nava-nava-rasa-dhāmāny udyataṁ rantuṁ āsīt
tad-avadhi bata nārī-saṅgame smaryamāṇe
bhavati mukha-vikāraḥ suṣṭhu niṣṭhīvanaṁ ca
Yamunacarya, he was a king. He had queens and beautiful women around him, opulence, money, everything. Everybody obeyed him. Ask for anything, they gave it to him. But then he met a devotee and he became a devoted saint, Yamunacarya. So he had all that experience, but he says, "Since my mind has been engaged in the service of the lotus feet of Krsna, and I have been enjoying an ever-new transcendental pleasure, whenever I think of sex life with a woman, my face turns from it and I spit at the thought." You don't spit at the woman, you spit at the thought in the mind. Actually Yamunacarya had that taste, so he could give up everything, even his kingdom, because Prabhupada said, he had tasted the beauty of the Supreme Lord Krsna and he could make further progress in Krsna consciousness. And here Srila Prabhupada write that Krsna consciousness is such a transcendentally nice thing that automatically material enjoyment becomes distasteful. Nobody wants to eat meat anymore because it be distasteful, or to smoke a cigarette, or not take a bath every day, and to gamble. All that, we avoid it because we lost taste for it, automatically. But if you go to a casino, you go to a brothel, it's not recommended anyway, because easily fall down because of that association with the people there. So better to not go to places where sinful activity is going on, because our mind can divert us to do the most abominable things. But it's a transcendentally nice thing, singing, dancing, worshiping the deities, taking prasadam, associate with the devotees. It's not difficult to do. It is just like if you eat something nutritious, you become satisfied. So Bhagavad-gita is a roadmap to help us to navigate through this difficult world, especially in Kali-yuga. I heard this morning, I don't know how many million or billion emails is sent every day. A lot like that. And usually the mails are not Krsna conscious. So we have to take shelter of Bhagavad-gita. There are so many news in the material world, but it's not anything new. It's the same old news. And the senses are very difficult to control. We went to hospital yesterday, Ramayana and I, and then we went to the supermarket, and all these hundreds and thousands of things. And there, one can easily become under the influence, buy this and buy that, look at that, look at that. So one has to be careful, because we still identify with the body. As a strong wind sweeps away a boat on the water, even one of the roaming senses on which the mind focuses can carry away a man's intelligence. Like a boat on the water, wind is coming, taking away the boat. So one of the senses, the eyes—for a man it is the eyes, and for a woman it is the ears—can carry away the intelligence of a man, because the mind focuses there. So we have to be very careful. It is good to read Bhagavad-gita and try to explain that that is what we are practicing. Okay, it's seven minutes past nine. Is there any question or comment?
Q: And you quote that for a woman it's the ear and for a man it's the eyes, that that's the sense that drags the person away, or what?
A: Yeah, I read in Vedic literature, Vedic spiritual culture, for a woman, probably you know that, for a man it's more difficult to control the eyes, for women the ears are more difficult.
Q: You mean that they hear praise of themselves or something like that?
A: Huh?
Q: If they hear praise of themselves, then they're taken away, or?
A: I don't remember the sentence, but...
Q: Music, maybe? Music, they become attracted to music or?
A: Well, it's in the book. I cannot give any example, but as she said, women are more sensitive in the hearing process or becoming diverted by hearing, and men in the eyes. And it's a nice book about spiritual culture about relationship between man and woman, that a man is a natural leader, and if the woman is submissive and follow the man, the family life is very nice. And she empower the man by her humility and service attitude, and then he can do so many great things, behind every great man is a woman. But if the woman try to compete with the man, then the family life is not happy. Not that she is subordinate or less than man, but her nature is like that, and the man's nature is to lead.
Q: I had a friend who said that women... yeah, I can say it in Swedish: kvinnor, de inspirerar männen till stora dåd, men de hindrar dem från att utföra dem.
A: Ja.
Q: Inspirerar männen till stora dåd, men de hindrar dem...
A: Inspiring men to great deeds, but they can hinder them from performing them, yeah. That was very good. Okay, shall we finish? Srila Prabhupada ki?
Q: Jaya!