Whom to blame

Thursday, 01 April 2010 14:15 Written by Tulasi Vallabha Das

Sometimes we blame situations, people and ultimately GOD, for our unpleasant experiences. This world is undoubtedly a deadly place for such experiences at every step. We get allured into doing something imagining it to be the perfect remedy to our problem, but very often it ends up creating another problem for us. Somethings are easy to accept, especially if we have simple knowledge. But some experiences can be very difficult,  sometimes even traumatic, which drains us deeply and we cannot see any hope, logic or reason behind it.  This is when ordinary people like us get bewildered, loose our intelligence and begin the blame game and when we cannot find any object in this world to blame, we ultimately blame GOD. This situation cannot be avoided unless one gets the association of a real saintly person and submissively hears from him. Then we can realize the reality of our existence. And that is the point when we start to understand then nature of our most trusted enemy, our mind. By strong determination and practice one should stop ignoring the mind's dictations by listening to the higher instructions of Supreme Lord and saintly persons. This can be cultivated by taking shelter of amazing literatures like Srimad Bhagavatam, which are full of such descriptions and stories.

Srila Prabhupada in his wonderful purport to Srimad Bhagavatam 2.7.50 writes "One should not deprecate the Supreme Lord for the creation of this miserable world, just as one should not blame the king for creating a prisonhouse in the government. The prisonhouse is a necessary institution of the governmental establishment for those who are disobedient to the laws of the government. Similarly, this material world, full of miseries, is a temporary creation of the Lord for those who have forgotten Him and are trying to lord it over the false manifestation. He, however, is always anxious to get the fallen souls back home, back to Godhead, and for this He has given so many chances to the conditioned souls via the authoritative scriptures, His representatives, and personal incarnations also. Since He has no direct attachment to this material world, He is not to be blamed for its creation "

Also in Srimad Bhagavatam 11.23.42, the avanti-brahmana shows us the reality of our mind, which is the cause of all our distress and subduing such mind by engaging in the devotional service of Supreme Personality of Godhead is our only shelter.

The brahmana said: These people are not the cause of my happiness and distress. Neither are the demigods, my own body, the planets, my past work, or time. Rather, it is the mind alone that causes happiness and distress and perpetuates the rotation of material life.

Ultimately awakening and engaging in service of Lord Krsna is not a choice for all of us but its our only hope and shelter against our checked out minds. Lets not get "fooled" any more by our minds.