“One day everything will be well, that’s our hope. But everything is
fine today, that is our illusion.” – Voltaire
We lack the ability to call out to Krishna helplessly like Gajendra
because of following three reasons.
Firstly we are not aware that we are in the jaws of the crocodile
called Maya or the material energy or our own wicked mind.
It’s like a You Tube video that showed a frog swallowed by a snake
slowly, but surely. Even as the snake was gulping in the frog, the
frog stretched his tongue wide open to catch a flying insect. Even as
we are reduced to insignificance by the all-powerful time, we stay
oblivious and busy catching daily insects in form of our petty
materialistic goals.
Secondly, even if we realize we are suffering in this world, we
imagine that the crocodile of maya would get tired and eventually let
us go. “She can’t keep biting me for ever”, we delude ourselves, “she
has to let go sometime.”
Sorry! She never lets go! She is never tired! This crocodile of Maya
never sleeps!
We foolishly hope that things will get better in this world. A German
saying that translates as: ‘Hope dies last’ has been around for ages,
yet in material world things never really improve. The crocodile of
Maya will never relax. The only way to get relief is to surrender to
Krishna completely.
Third reason why we don’t surrender is we falsely assure ourselves
that we have surrendered to God because we practise many rituals. We
may learn verses or visit holy places but none of this can match the
qualitative surrender of Gajendra who cried out to Krishna for help.
Until we take complete shelter of God, the crocodile will continue to
bite us.
Radhanath Swami, in one of his talks, says, “Even during the cosmic
annihilation when there is complete darkness all around, Maya is awake
and active. She always has us in her grips.”
What is the way out?
The hope for a living entity that’s suffering in this samsara is:
complete shelter of Krishna. Krishna in the form of His Holy Names can
give us complete relief from suffering. And when He reciprocates with
our sincere effort in chanting, we’d see the crocodile as a blessing!
Until then, we will only see and experience suffering in this world.
To be continued…
