allen

This thread went exactly the way I had hoped. My motivation for this thread was to bring the attitudes to the forefront that I knew existed and that I knew to be the cause of the problems in the HK movement. They have been there for over 30 years and you guys, right on que, showed them once again. You guys really are so predictable. Lets review the facts. 1. The Hare Krishna movement in the US is in a deplorable state. The movement has been disgraced and westerners avoid it like the plague. It takes absolutely no qualifications to see this. All one has to do is open his eyes. 2. I also offered the reason for this deplorable state. That being mainly arrogance and the inability to deal with people as normal human beings in human relationships. 3. I offered what is a reasonable starting ground for turning the problem around and to get the movement going in the right direction. That solution is to start listening to people and being more understanding of their weaknesses, their trails and tribulations, and all of the complex differences that make up all of us. 4. The devotees contribution was,as always, to attack the messenger. It's like a thirty year broken record. We are superior to you because we have all of these qualifications that you don't. Even though people with all of the qualifications that they tout are the very ones that got movement into the mess it is in today. They neither admitted the problems or offered any possible solutions to them. Hear no evil,see no evil and speak no evil. Everything is just fine. Thank You. Do you think HDG would be saying that about the current state of his movement? So in summation the state of the HK movement is as I stated. It is a fact and it cannot be disputed. The people inside the movement who have all the qualifications and who have created all of these problems have no solutions and they will not listen to anyone outside the movement. In other words, the quintessential Catch-22. A paradox. The problem with a Catch-22 situation is that there is no way out of it. It will always stay that way. This is my last post on this topic. If there are other posts arguing against my posts I'm will not be responding. It won't be because the person has so called defeated me(HK members love to play the defeated him game) with his superior argument and I have given up; but because the thread and the topic has reached it conclusion. All points of view are clear on both sides and we obviously disagree. I will pray for members and as always will wish you well.HK

It's very easy to continue with a failing path. The secret is to never leave it and never change course. Guest once again cannot see the forest for the trees. It appears that it is due to his lack of experience,maturity and reading comprehension. He states that I said that people should not worry about regulative principles. Of course I never said that. Exaggeration is another form of lying. What I said is that people make progress with different disciplines at different rates and that people have different strengths and weaknesses. I also said that we should recognize that FACT of life and be understanding. I also said that the lack of that understanding is what has caused this movement more problems than any other and continues to do so. The problem started with the false notion that people who come from a culture that has for centuries not followed any of these regulative principles can, at the drop of a hat, adopt them all 100% of the time. Americans coming from their rigid judgmental background believed this. To think that a meat eating, alcohol drinking, sex crazed, gambling culture can instantly adopt vegetarianism, abstinence from alcohol,celibacy and no gambling without an adjustment period is naive and arrogant. To also adopt a religion from a TOTALLY different culture along with all of these other lifestyle changes without understanding and accepting the difficulties that come with all of those huge changes is, idiotic. Arrogance,self-righteousness and immaturity has caused this movement almost irreparable harm. People from India, where that culture has had millenia practicing this religion and these principles,are not following these principles today. The power of the Kali Yuga is very strong. Foolish Americans,being a foolish American I feel I can speak confidently, now think that they should make everyone in America adopt these principles and that they should follow them all 100% of the time. Yes of course that is the GOAL! By just stating a goal does not mean that one can instantaneously attain it. Even when people are trying to follow these principles, if they cannot follow them 100% of the time, they are berated. Even though people from the culture where these principles originated are unable to follow them 100% of the time, we are expected to follow them 100% of the time. You do not help people achieve their goals by berating them! That is not a concept that is hard to understand! Guest you do want people to follow the principles don't you? If so then inspire,understand and encourage. People who don't understand or study history are bound to make the same mistakes over and over. People from India have very good karma compared to Americans. They have hundreds of generations that have practiced these principles and many modern Indians grew up with this religion and these principles and they cannot follow them 100%. Get to know many of the Indian families that come to temple and if you can get close enough to be their friends, you will find that many of them do not follow all the principles all the time. Does that mean that they are not striving to follow them 100% of the time? No of course not. But they are human and sometimes they fall down. Are they hypocrites? No of course not. If they were not sincerely trying to be faithful to the principles and just gave them lip service and then just did whatever they wanted as soon as they left temple, that would be hypocrisy. Guest states that I'm trying to drag people down to my level. That statement shows his total lack of reading comprehension. He just cannot get it threw his head that many people,maybe even him, are at or below my level and many are above my level. What he needs desperately to understand is that WE ARE ALL AT DIFFERENT LEVELS. In some areas I maybe far above his level. In others I may be well below. He needs to be open minded enough to learn from other people at other levels, understand people at other levels and to use appropriate human relationship fundamentals in order to INCLUDE AND ACCEPT people at all levels. He also needs to understand how to inspire and encourage and understand how to help people achieve the goals of the movement. Alas his stubborn bull headedness and argumentative nature(Kali Yuga) only appears to allow him to continue to dictate. All he seems to do is robotically say Do it- Do it- Do it- Do it! I'm sorry Guest. It is not that simple. I know many people come to religious movements looking for simple answers to lives many difficult and complex problems. The fact is that life is difficult and complex and the solutions to the many difficult and complex problems are not simple. Guest states that if you are not DOING IT 100% of the time you are not even on the path. Well if that were the case all Hare Krishna temples would be completely empty 100% of the time. I dare say that Guest might not be following all the principles 100% of the time. Could it be that he continues to call himself GUEST because if he were to reveal his true identity that someone might know him and point out that he wasn't so pure after all? You know what Guest, the real point is that THAT IS OK! As long as you are really trying that is what matters. Guest also states the getting on the path as soon as possible is the main point. Doesn't he realize that people can be on the path and at times fall off of it and can then get back on? What he really needs to realize is that PEOPLE DO FALL OFF THE PATH! ALL THE TIME! It is a simple FACT! What I'm trying to get thru to you is how you handle them when they are not on the path 100% of the time or are on the path 100% in some areas but maybe only 60% or what ever number you want to use, in another area. The JUST DO IT YOU STUPID HYPOCRITE routine DOES---NOT---WORK! Never did and never will. HDG'S mission was to bring Krishna Consciousness to the west. Do you think HDG would be pleased to see only a handful of westerners at all of his temples in the USA every week? Are you helping HDG fulfill the mission by having so few westerners in the temples? Guest your way has not worked and it never will work. Aren't you suppose to be helping HDG fulfill his mission? If what you are doing is not helping the mission to be fulfilled are you then not following guru's wishes? You need to think about that Guest. So Guest if the whole point is to give up these sinful activities AS SOON AS POSSIBLE how do you define soon? Obviously if it has taken many souls from an Indian culture many lifetimes and many incarnations and they still aren't doing it; how long do we Americans with far worse Karma in this Kali Yuga get? Would we get there SOONER with encouragement, understanding and inspiration?

I am delighted to see this attitude in Guest! I commend you on your open mind and the kind heart you showed us with your last post. After all isn't that the purpose of the spiritual path? The love of God will make these qualities manifest in the true devotee and you have just displayed these qualities. I truly do see understanding and kindness in that comment. Thank You! I think sometimes we ALL(Myself surely included here!) get all wrapped up in the building of walls and forget what we are really trying to do. What I mean by this is that the regulative principles are there to help us remain on the path. Of course the path is the most important thing. The path is very narrow and straying from the path puts us in contact with all kinds of demons. Therefore the principles are there to act as guard rails or walls to help us stay on the path. Very very necessary walls and walls that serve a great purpose. Sometimes however we spend so much time stopping and concentrating on the walls that we forget that we are suppose to be moving along a path. We stop and try to keep building the walls higher and higher and thicker and thicker. We spend a great deal of time painting the walls very pretty colors. We decorate the walls and put pretty paintings and wall hangings on the walls. We appreciate the walls so much and see the great value of the walls that the walls become our main focus. Also decorating the walls are easier to do many times than the actual walking along the path. Sometimes we spend years staying in one spot because of our fascination with the wall that we forget the main point. Which is that we were suppose to keep moving down the road. Sometimes we move a little bit down the road and what we see is a little frightening or even a lot frightening, that we find it much easier to keep decorating the wall. We get so wrapped up with the walls that we spend much of our time criticizing people for not decorating the walls very well. Or constantly screaming that they are not painting the walls well enough. YOU MISSED A SPOT! As people sometimes pass them along the path they criticize, "Yeah he is moving past me but you know what? He is really not a very good painter or decorator!" We sometimes keep rigid score cards. We say,"Well we've given this guy enough time to reach this particular goal and he hasn't done it so it's time to start calling him names and degrading him in the hopes that shame and humiliation will get him to reach that goal." As if that could really ever inspire anyone to achieve anything. What if a person ,after lets say fifteen years, is a vegetarian 80% of the time, has an alcoholic drink a couple of times a week, is faithful to his wife, doesn't gamble,reads HDG's books every week and visits temple whenever he can. Is he welcome and should he expect to be treated kindly by devotees? You can change those percentages around and achievements or lack thereof, for each one of those categories and you will find that you could include many people. All of those people should be able to feel that they can meet a devotee and be accepted, loved and treated with understanding and kindness. That understanding and kindness and guidance should remain as they create a long term relationship with the movement and her devotees even as they sometimes fall back in some of those areas, make gains in some and work there way along the path. Even when they stumble and fall very hard and maybe fail in all those principles. A helping hand back up and a kind word is what is needed. I believe that if that had always been the case thousands more would be associated with the movement than is the case today. I also believe that if the movement will adopt that attitude of understanding and acceptance,of all people at all different stages of achievement with all principles and disciplines,then the movement can start to go in the right direction. I'm a 48 year old man. If I keep plugging along and let's say at 54 I'm able to follow all the regulative principles and have developed a deep love of Krishna and of his devotees( Without having achieved the latter the former is worthless) wouldn't that be a good thing? I think so and I hope all devotees would think so and be able to cheer me on and offer encouragement; even though at times they may cringe at some of my weak efforts. I'll make you a deal. I'll keep trying if you will! Hare Krishna:D

After discussing the current state of the Krishna Consciousness movement in the USA in another one of my threads( Transition to Vegetarianism-prematurely closed in my opinion by the admin.) it is clear to me why it is struggling to attract Americans. The views expressed by Guest are typical, from my past experience with the movement after Prabhupada's disappearance, of how many American devotees interact with other Americans. I had the pleasure of contacting the movement in 1974. HDG's spirit was still pervasive throughout the movement. And what a very different spirit it was. Loving,kind and joyous. Not the militaristic, dogmatic and judgmental attitudes and spirit that was clearly in evidence by Guest on that other thread. After having studied many of Prabhupada's books and gone to temple many times over the past 32 years , I even became part of the movement in the the early eighties, I feel I can speak about the glories and beauty of the deities and the glories of his Divine Grace without being called a hypocrite. After all the American devotees who were initially attracted to the movement saw the beauty and felt the love of Krishna by viewing the deities when they were still meat eaters. You see that is the problem with the movement that I was getting at but Guest just cannot comprehend. In his mind if you are not following all the rules all the time and you ever fall down then, in his opinion, you cannot enjoy the love of Krishna and feel the love emanating from the deities or comprehend the beauty that was HDG. If you say you do but cannot follow all of the rules 100% of the time, then you are a hypocrite. It is a simplistic immature attitude that is very hurtful to the movement and has been proven over many years to REPEL people from the movement and it definitely DOES NOT ATTRACT people to the movement. Attracting people to Krishna was HDG's mission. Again the figure skating example is a very easy one to apply here and should make it easy to understand even to the Guest. I'm sure there are many rules that apply to figure skating. I'm sure before entering a particular jump that you have to maintain the right speed, your arms and legs have to be in the right position at the start, in the middle and at the end of the movement. I'm sure there are many more rules about head position and foot position at the end of the movement. The instructor imparts all of these rules to the skater. The skater listens and understands these rules and then goes out and attempts to do the jumps. The skater frequently fails and falls down . The instructor, if he or she is a good one, patiently explains to his pupil where he went wrong in his attempt and encourages him to try again. The instructor may even perform the move himself to demonstrate how to perform the movement properly. The pupil tries again and fails and fails again many many times. Then perhaps they succeed in performing the movement. The they try again, sometimes they fail and sometimes they can do it. They may even get to the point of mastering that movement and then they move on to another movement and the process repeats itself. There may even be movements that the pupil attempts but just can never master and the instructors decides that those movements are beyond the capabilities of that particular skater. Then even if he has mastered some of the movements ther are times during competitions where they he fails to perform some of the movements properly due to the pressure of the competition or to some injury. Just because the pupil fails at performing all the movements correctly all of the time it does not mean that they cannot see the beauty of the movements and cannot love figure skating. The same is true in the spiritual life. We can know the rules and attempt to follow them all of the time but we do not always succeed. Just because we do not always succeed does not mean that we do not appreciate the beauty or feel the love of God. If we did not see the beauty or the feel the love of God what would be the motivation to keep on trying to succeed? So how long do you think the figure skater would continue to try to successfully complete the moves if the instructor stood over them every time they fell and called him a hypocrite and a disgrace to the sport of figure skating because they fell? There are drill Sargent types of instructors but they soon find that they have no pupils and their reputation as a bad instructor soon puts them out of business. Just as there are rules in the spiritual life there are rules in human relationships. If you do not follow even some of the most basic rules or even have a mind open enough to attempt to keep trying them, then you will not succeed in having successful relationships. Understanding that we are all flawed and imperfect is the most basic of rules in human relationships. Applying that rule is very important in attracting that other person to you and having a good relationship. If you want to repel people show them no understanding and dictate to them. It works every time. The dismal record of the modern Hare Krishna movement in attracting westerners,HDG's mission, is proof of that. Hare Krishna

On 3-25-06 at 8:15PM Guest stated," I did it so anybody can." Yes of course we are all the same. How stupid of me. I just didn't know. I also don't know why I didn't go to the Olympics a few months ago and participate in the figure skating competition. If they can skate around and spin and jump at lightening speed then I should have been able to do it. All I needed to do was toughen up. It all seems so simple now. All I needed to do was follow THE RULES of skating and I would have been able to do it. I wish I would have known that. I would have really liked to have participated in the Olympics. It really is all so simple! This is the immature, simplistic, hard-hearted and cold attitude that has rendered almost all the Hare Krishna temples empty of Americans. The reality is that we are ALL different. We all come to everything we encounter in life with different capabilities, strengths and weaknesses. The mature understanding of this FACT, coupled with patience and kindness would make the Hare Krishna movement once again ATTRACTIVE to others that we all want to come to Krishna. Attractive is the key word. The ATTRACTION to the beauty of the deities and the nectar of the Bhagavad Gita and the beauty that was HDG IS WHAT INITIALLY BROUGHT US ALL TO KRISHNA. What has repelled many of us is the behavior of many of the devotees. The immaturity of so many of the devotees is their responses to people who come to a temple is what has withered HDG's movement. This is a key problem that must be addressed if we want to revive and attract people to, the movement. Standing at the gates of the movement with both feet dug in and announcing that only people who can follow all the rules all the time and that you must IMMEDIATELY change everything is sure to extinguish the flame of the Hare Krishna movement. Very very few people can do that. There are many people however who can be guided along with kindness, guidance, encouragement and inspiration. It is vitally important to realize that if we are to continue to help HDG realize the goal of the movement, which was to bring Krishna Consciousness to the west, then meeting people where they are and gently guiding them where we want them to be takes great patience and understanding. People are drawn to those ATTRACTIVE qualities. The point of maturity is when ADULT men and women: come to the realistic acceptance of imperfection and of deficiency in themselves, in others, and in their most cherished institutions. Hare Krishna

When someone is trying to walk a path, that everyone hear agrees is the path to be taken, then it should be expected that there are going to be stumbles along the way. If ,you were a guide on a mountain path that you had followed for many years and were an expert on that path, and you were in charge of guiding people on that path, when someone fell(And we all do at some time and usually we fall many many times) would you run over to them and start yelling,"Get up and just start walking again you stupid fool and no I'm not going to take your hand and help you up." ?Then you slapped their hand away and yelled at them again to just get up. The key is to understand that everyone is different and we all have different abilities in different areas and are lacking in other areas. In areas where we are strong we can offer understanding and guidance or ridicule and shame. I KNOW that understanding works and guilt, shame and ridicule do not! Along the path we need to encourage, motivate and inspire. How do we do that? By showing understanding, example, kindness,compassion and guidance. You've all heard the saying that you catch more bees with honey than vinegar. And a spoon full of sugar helps the medicine go down in the most delightful way. They are old and many times repeated sayings because they are true and they work. So you have to ask yourself is puffing out your chest and showing someone how superior you are in a given area and making them feel inferior and shameful( And eventually making them leave the path) is more important than having someone join you on your path. I personally feel the path is more important than the individual. If Prabhupada had treated all the meat eating brothers and sisters the way you would have treated them Airicky do you really think His Divine Grace would have gotten the Hare Krishna movement off the ground? Of course not and His Divine Grace treated them with kindness, understanding and love. HDG bought all the food, prepared and cooked all of it and cleaned up all the dishes. The rest of the time HDG taught them about the love of Krishna. That is the example! Thank You all for the advice about going to temple. I will enjoy the prasadam and will be hoping to meet devotees that will be a fine example for me to follow. However if I percieve faults in them I will understand that they are walking a path that is good and I will try to see their many virtues. Are there any devotees in the Philadelphia temple that people would recommend I seek out? Hare Krishna

Airicky trying to make someone do something by trying to make them feel guilty or shamed is manipulation and does not work. Also there is a great deal of anger in your post. Honestly if your reply was the only one I got I would never try to be a vegetarian. If it made people that anger it would of no use to me or anyone. The reply by the guest yesterday at 7:55 PM is also no help what-so-ever. The old,YOU ARE A WEAK MINDED NINNY JUST DO IT, approach is dictatorial and shows no understanding or compassion. It is not that I have been brainwashed into a meat eating mindset. I did not feel up to par either physically, mentally or emotionally and somewhat unwell on the diet. I asked for help regarding those issues. The other suggestions were helpful and showed understanding and compassion. The comment regarding a vegan diet is misguided however. His Divine Grace recommended a high fat lacto-vegetarian diet; for that reason, the type of diet to be followed is not up for debate. Direction in how to follow that type of diet is the issue at hand and your helpful comments in that regard are appreciated. Hare Krishna

I've tried to change to a vegetarian diet several times but I found it difficult. I don't really know how to describe it but I felt strange. I just didn't feel like myself and I mean that in a bad way. It wasn't like what I felt was good or positive. It really was a negative experience. I also was much more short tempered. I know in my heart that a vegetarian diet is the natural diet for man and I want to be vegetarian. I would like any suggestions anyone has on helping me adopt a vegetarian diet.