SB 5.14.10 – Early to Bed, Early to Rise

Giriraj Swami: 

oṁ namo bhagavate vāsudevāya
oṁ namo bhagavate vāsudevāya
oṁ namo bhagavate vāsudevāya

We read from Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, Canto Five, Chapter Fourteen, “The Forest of Enjoyment,”

TEXT 20

sa eva punar nidrājagara-gṛhīto ‘ndhe tamasi magnaḥ śūnyāraṇya iva śete nānyat-kiñcana veda śava ivāpaviddhaḥ.

TRANSLATION

Śukadeva Gosvāmī continued speaking to Mahārāja Parīkṣit: My dear King, sleep is exactly like a python. Those who wander in the forest of material life are always devoured by the python of sleep. Being bitten by this python, they always remain in the darkness of ignorance. They are like dead bodies thrown in a distant forest. Thus the conditioned souls cannot understand what is going on in life.

PURPORT by Srila Prabhupada

Material life means being fully absorbed in eating, sleeping, mating and defending. Out of these, sleep is taken very seriously. While asleep, one completely forgets the object of life and what to do. For spiritual realization, one should try to avoid sleep as much as possible. The Gosvāmīs of Vṛndāvana practically did not sleep at all. Of course, they slept some, for the body requires sleep, but they slept only about two hours, and sometimes not even that. They always engaged in spiritual cultivation. Nidrāhāra-vihārakādi-vijitau. Following in the footsteps of the Gosvāmīs, we should try to reduce sleeping, eating, mating and defending.

COMMENT

So these four activities of eating, sleeping, mating, and defending, are common to human beings and animals. And if the human being is absorbed in these four activities he is no better than an animal, and most people are absorbed in these four activities. What distinguishes a human being from animals is dharma or activities performed according to religious principles for the pleasure of the Lord. Otherwise [Unintelligible 00:10:29] without dharma a human being is the same as the animal.

Now, these four principles of eating, sleeping, mating, and defending, may be considered necessities of life, for the conditioned soul, and so one does not avoid them. Even the Six Gosvamis, although they very much reduced eating and sleeping, they did eat a little and sleep a little to keep the body and soul together for engaging in devotional service, but they did not eat or sleep more than required. Now, we conditioned souls have a tendency not only to sleep but to consider sleep to be very important. As Srila Prabhupada says in the purport, of these sleep is taken very seriously.

At one stage in my illustrious career before meeting Srila Prabhupada, I somehow had the idea that I needed to increase my sleeping, this was during school holidays. I thought I must increase my sleeping. So, I actually kept a log of how much I slept and I was trying to keep the figures as high as possible, nine hours, ten hours; ten hours, that was really good. Actually, the opposite is true, not exactly the opposite, but one should be moderate in one’s eating, sleeping, and recreation, that is the instruction of the Bhagavad-gītā. And moderate means not too much and not too little, one should not eat too much or too little, one should not sleep too much or sleep too little. And what is the appropriate amount for each person has to be determined by each person, he or she knows. But then one should be disciplined and especially one should not sleep late in the morning, one should go to sleep early and get up early, and this is common knowledge. Even Benjamin Franklin said, “Early to bed and early to rise makes a man healthy, wealthy, and wise.”

Devotee: [Unintelligible 00:15:19].

Giriraj Swami: Yes, that is true. Actually, I am saying disciple, he actually never initiated him, but Dr. Narendra Desai, was a leading industrialist in Bombay and he surrendered to Srila Prabhupada but it was very close to the end of Srila Prabhupada’s physical presence with us so he was never initiated by Srila Prabhupada; he took initiation after Srila Prabhupada left. But he would get up very early in the morning. Once I visited him at his home very early in the morning without an appointment and I found he was sitting with his legs crossed and his eyes closed, very intently chanting the Hare Krishna maha-mantra. And he told me that he always gets up early and chants his rounds and that somehow in the course of chanting his rounds, or the period after chanting his rounds, he gets insights in how to conduct his business. His father was a very shrewd businessman, a very big industrialist, and people were thinking, after his father died, how he would conduct the business because they didn’t think he was as sharp or shrewd as his father. But actually the business grew, and grew, it multiplied many times. So yes, early to bed and early to rise, and in the case of devotees rise early to attend maṅgala-ārati, attend the temple program.

Now, more or less at the same time, during Srila Prabhupada’s time and the early years after Srila Prabhupada left, maṅgala-ārati was a necessity. You had to attend maṅgala-ārati, you could not miss maṅgala-ārati. And you had to fit in your sleep somehow or other but you had to attend maṅgala-ārati. But as time went on this idea of taking one’s sleep very seriously became more prominent, and then it is like, “Well, I will attend maṅgala-ārati if I feel like I had enough sleep. In Calcutta, we had a hired cook named Chantilal, actually quite a nice devotee, a nice person, excellent cook. And Srila Prabhupada said that you must attend maṅgala-ārati, if he wants to work for us and cook for us, he must attend maṅgala-ārati, and that will force him to take rest early and not engage in nonsense. So that was the principle. I myself am not the best example now. For thirty years I have never missed maṅgala-ārati, no matter how late I got back from the preaching program. Now in my old age, I get up early but I don’t always come to maṅgala-ārati. And sleeping through sunrise is considered very inauspicious, even according to Ayurveda, if one sleeps through sunrise one is affected by the mode of ignorance, tama-guṇa. Of course, we can try to counteract it by chanting and other activities, but it is really much better to get up before sunrise at least. And maṅgala-ārati means an hour and a half before sunrise, brāhma-muhūrta, which is the most auspicious time for spiritual advancement. And even other traditions are aware of the universal truth that the early hours before the sunrise are the best for spiritual advancement.

I had some friends or acquaintances in Bombay who were Ahmadiyyas, followers of Mohamed. It is a bit controversial amongst Muslims but you could say it is a sect of Muslims, and they came to the Juhu temple for maṅgala-ārati and they said that according to their understanding, God or Allah hears your prayers more seriously when you offer the prayers before sunrise. And in practically every mystic tradition, Muslim, Christian, Jewish, of course, it is taken for granted from the Buddhist, the practitioners rise early in the morning before sunrise and then immediately they bathe; in the case of devotees put on devotional dress, come to the temple. But one should not sleep too little also. In the Third Canto of Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam there is a discussion of the different elements of creation. This is called Sankhya, analyzing the different elements in existence. And so one of the elements is intelligence. And under intelligence one of the items is sleep. And in the purport Srila Prabhupada mentions that if one does not get enough sleep one’s brain will not function properly. So, one should not eat too much or eat too little, sleep too much or sleep too little. It is extremely dangerous to drive a car without having had sufficient sleep. It can also be very dangerous to run a machine, a big machine, if one has not had sufficient rest.

When I participated in His Holiness Indradyumna Swami’s Polish Festival Tour, I found that his driver was a very nice devotee; his driver would not attend the festival programs. So once I asked the driver, “Why? They are so blissful, so ecstatic.” And he said, “Guru Maharaja doesn’t allow me to attend because he wants me to take rest early.” He might had been allowed to attend maybe up till eight o’clock but the program was really getting going at eleven o’clock. “Yes, guru Maharaja wants me to have a nice sleep so I can drive attentively.” So that is important, not too much, not too little. It could be either but generally the problem is not too little, the tendency is more too much so we will discuss that. There was a time when we were in Gorakhpur, when Srila Prabhupada noticed that disciples were sleeping during his class. Earlier one disciple had approached Srila Prabhupada, and the classes were very interesting about Ajamila and the holy name. We didn’t have the Sixth Canto then so it was all new information, very interesting. So one morning one of the disciples said to Srila Prabhupada that, “That was a wonderful class, it was a wonderful class.” Srila Prabhupada said, “Oh, you thought so?” He said yes. “And what about the other devotees? What did they think?” And the disciple said, “Well, frankly speaking Srila Prabhupada many of them were sleeping.” And Srila Prabhupada said, “Yes, I know. Practically, I am speaking only for a few sincere disciples.”

So, it became a bit of a topic, sleeping. And one morning Srila Prabhupada was speaking and there was a very strong tendency to doze during the class. And Srila Prabhupada interrupted the class to discuss this matter, “Why? Why the sleeping? Why all this sleeping?” So, different devotees offered different answers, “We need to sleep earlier at night,” “We shouldn’t eat so much at night,” different things. But Srila Prabhupada didn’t really take those suggestions too seriously. He said that, “You will not sleep when you consider Krishna consciousness to be so important that you feel you can’t afford to miss it.” You might feel tired; say a parent may feel tired but if there is a crisis with the child, health crisis, accident, it doesn’t matter you felt tired, you wake up and you deal with it. Or if you heard there is a large sum of money waiting for you but you had to reach by at a certain time, even if you were sleepy you just shake it off and you just go. Because we consider these things important; material life, our children, life is so important. Money, money is the honey. So, Srila Prabhupada was saying that when we considered Krishna consciousness to be so important that we can’t afford to miss it, then we will not sleep more than necessary but at the wrong time, during Prabhupada’s class. And he said many great men didn’t sleep much. I could not remember if it was Alexander the Great or Napoleon but one of the great conquerors, he wouldn’t sleep. The only time he would sleep was on his horse. And I think Gandhiji also didn’t sleep much, when he was riding on the train he would sleep but otherwise he wouldn’t sleep. So when our sense of mission is so strong then we won’t want to waste time with sleep.

There is one incident in Juhu, it was very close to the end, in Srila Prabhupada’s last year. One member of parliament was arranging a meeting between Srila Prabhupada and the Prime Minister of India, Morarji Desai, and Srila Prabhupada said that he would not go to Morarji Desai’s home to meet him but he would meet him only if Morarji Desai came to the temple. And Prabhupada said, “I am not proud that I can’t go to see him but my meeting with him will be effective only if he has the right mood and if he comes to see me it will show that he has the right mood.” So we presented that to the member of parliament and the meeting was set for the next day, we were waiting very eagerly for the phone call. And finally the member of parliament phoned quite late at night, and it was, don’t remember exactly, but somewhere around maybe 11:30. And he said, “The Prime Minister would like to come to Juhu to meet Prabhupada but his schedule is too tight, but he could still meet him at his residence.” So I wasn’t sure what to say or do, so I went up to Prabhupada’s quarters. And yes, it was something like that, 11:30 at night, and I wasn’t sure if I should even go in. But anyway, I went around and it was a big room, upstairs. So I saw in the distance Prabhupada was sitting at his translating desk and he saw me and he motioned. So I came to him and I said, “I really I am sorry to come so late at night, I didn’t want to intrude.” And Srila Prabhupada said that, “Now that I am sick I can’t sleep and I can’t eat also.” And then he said, “Mating and defending, there is no question, so I guess I am liberated.” Yes, liberated, liberated from the bodily conception means we don’t identify with the body and we do what is needed but that is all, we don’t indulge.

But it was a very interesting discussion with Srila Prabhupada in 1976 about how people are not sincere in their work. And he was discussing the peons in Calcutta; peons are something like postman; every office would have  peons and then they deliver letters and so on. They have a register, and when they deliver the letter they get the signature. So, Srila Prabhupada said that he would see all the peons sleeping in Dalhousie Square in Calcutta, they would sleep for hours keeping their register under their heads as a pillow. And then at about five or six, just a little before it was time for the offices to close for the day, they would go back to their office and say, “I went to such a such place and the boss was not there, and I waited for so many hours, he kept saying he was coming but he never came, and then in the end I had to leave without delivering.” And Prabhupada said they consider it to be a very great profit if they could sleep for many hours during the day. They felt they had really gained by doing that. And then one of the disciples that Prabhupada was speaking with was saying, “Yes, it is the opposite of devotees, they feel sleep is a loss and if they can stay awake and do service it is a gain.” It’s a big topic for them..

So that is the material concept that if you do sleep you do everything more, do the animal things more, and devotees idea is to decrease them as far as possible for a higher cause, not just for the sake of performing some austerity, but for a higher cause, to develop a higher taste. But even if we don’t have a higher taste we do it as a matter of discipline. Srila Prabhupada gives the example in The Nectar of Devotion that in the beginning one will wake up by force, the spiritual master has ordered I must get up by four o’clock, I must go to the temple to maṅgala-ārati, to dress the deity. But later one will want to get up early, one will on his own, want to get up early and rush to the temple, see the deity, think of so many ways to serve the deity, dress the deity, serve the deity nicely; it becomes spontaneous. Some times in India you can really get a sense of that spontaneous devotion. There are many examples but a vivid example is the Radha-Govindaji temple in Jaipur. Early in the morning when it is still dark devotees are rushing from all over the city to Radha-Govindaji for maṅgala-ārati. It is so inspiring, there is so much devotion, it is really inspiring. I think many devotees who go through Radha-Govindaji temple have the same experience. They feel that their consciousness is uplifted by the association of these wonderful, spontaneous devotees in Jaipur.

And apart from the Govindaji temple there are some other temples that the Govindaji temple is in one of the gardens of the royal family and so one of the kings, one of the famous kings of Jaipur was Maharaja Jai Singh, and he had a son, and that son had two sons (I am not remembering their names). So those two sons were killed in battle fighting the Muslims and so their father, Jai Singh’s son, he constructed two temples, twin temples mirror images of each other, opposite each other, behind the Govindaji temple and to the side. And so on my last visit there His Holiness Indradyumna Swami visited the twin temples. So in one of the temples the deity is Radha-Gopal, Radha-Krishna and in the other one, the deity is Yamuna devi, Ganga Devi [Unintelligible 00:43:21] and there is a solid gold lota, urn, filled with Yamuna water and very nice. So we were speaking to the Pujari and the Pujari was in his sixties or seventies, and he said he had been coming to that temple every morning, getting up at about two o’clock and coming to the temple and reaching the temple say by three to do the worship. And he said, “If I were just living at home I never would have been able to get up that early, but I have so much faith in the service of Yamuna devi I don’t want to miss, and in all my whatever forty or forty-five years, I have never missed her, maybe once.” I think maybe he said never missed. So that is the mood and he admitted it frankly that, “If I was just home I wouldn’t have been able to get up that early but for the service of Yamuna devi I would always come.” And he said, “Even though I am so old in my seventies, I am in very good health and I attribute this to getting up early, to my healthy lifestyle and to the service of Yamuna devi, the mercy of Yamuna devi.”

So, association, yes, association is so important for a higher cause. And many devotees they get up early, two o’clock, and chant their rounds before maṅgala-ārati. The temple president in Los Angeles Pravasa dasa, he gets up at two and chants his rounds before maṅgala-ārati, because the Los Angeles temple is a very big community; the temple, a gift shop, a restaurant, so many departments, book distribution, BBT. So, he feels it is essential that he chants all of his rounds before there is any disturbance. Because once there is a disturbance, being a manager like that then you never know. We have the time to chant in the temple from maṅgala-ārati to deity greeting, but in a big temple with a big community of devotees and a number of departments something could come up even during that time. Something could come up at 5:00 in the morning or 6:00, and then you deal with that and it could take more time and then you haven’t chanted your rounds. So he said he wouldn’t want to take that chance. So I think other devotees get up at 2:00 and chant before maṅgala-ārati. So it is a matter of habit; you can pretty much do anything if you develop the habit, and so what happens sometimes is we have periods when we develop good habits. The whole temple program is meant for us to develop the habit of rising early, attending maṅgala-ārati, chanting our rounds, hearing the class. Of course, it gets complicated when you are married and even more so when you have children, but still, as far as possible, that is fair. And according to circumstances one might replicate the morning program in one’s home, still get up and do everything.

When we were traveling with Srila Prabhupada we didn’t always have the full morning program as in the temple, but we would always gather in his room early in the morning and just sing the samsara prayers; just be sitting down at his lotus feet and sing the samsara prayers. So it makes a difference, and many devotees who have gone through the phase of sleeping late, missing the morning program, later on after some years, they realize that they have been missing something, and then they try to again get up early again, have maṅgala-ārati or attend maṅgala-ārati, and chant their rounds, and so on. And they say what a difference; it makes such a huge difference. So yes, it is worth it. It is amazing how a small change for the good or the bad can affect you. I remember in the early days in Juhu when we just had the. . . Does anyone know what is going on? Now we are speaking about the deities. So yes, sometimes I go through a period when I was really struggling and you struggle, you try different things to make yourself feel better. Often it came down to something very basic like, “Yes I am not chanting all my rounds early in the morning or overeating.” There was a period when there was some disturbance, I couldn’t figure out exactly what it was trying, and I realized I wasn’t controlling my tongue, I was eating too much. So some little adjustments can make a huge difference.

Srila Prabhupada was very painstaking in setting up the routine for us and explaining what the standard was. I don’t want to embarrass him but our very learned and wise devotee Janaka Maharaja received an instruction from Tamal Krishna Goswami that he should attend class every day and if no one comes to give class he should read Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam to the deity. And he has been doing that ever since he got the instruction, that is faith, you have faith in the order of the guru. Our mind can think of so many excuses, rationalizations, justifications, how the situation is different now, but he has taken that instruction and so many other instructions from his guru Maharaja very seriously, and because of his faithful adherence to those instructions he is very fixed in Krishna consciousness. So that is a very important lesson. The Caitanya-caritāmṛta tells the story of a brahman at the Ranganatha temple. When Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu went to visit the Ranganatha temple in South India He saw this brahman in front of the temple with the Bhagavad-gītā and there were people around the brahman making fun of him, laughing at him, and the brahman himself was weeping. So Chaitanya Mahaprabhu approached the brahman, “What is happening?” And the brahman explained that, “My guru Maharaja instructed me to read the Bhagavad-gītā every day but I am more or less illiterate so I cannot really read properly. Sometimes I hold the book this way and sometimes I hold it that way, I don’t even know which way to hold the book so they are laughing.” “And why are you crying?” “Because when I hold the Bhagavad-gītā I think of Krishna, how merciful He was to drive the chariot of Arjuna and instruct him in the knowledge of Bhagavad-gītā, so when I hold the book this picture of Krishna comes in my mind and thinking of His kindness and mercy I weep.” And Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu approved and said, “You are the real knower of the Bhagavad-gītā,” and He embraced him. So that faith and the order of the spiritual master, even if one is not capable in a material sense not to execute it, but to have faith in the order and execute it, try to execute it, so that will help us. And that applies to this discussion about the morning program; it applies to every detail of the instructions that you have received.

Maybe two months ago I received excerpts from a new book being compiled from the teachings of His Holiness Gaura Govinda Swami Maharaja by his disciple Madhava Nanda dasa. And Madhava Nanda sent me some excerpts from the book because he wanted me to write a review. And I read it and at one place he really emphasizes that all of our advancement comes by the mercy of the guru, we cannot make any advancement by any other means except mercy. We do sadhana, we make our efforts to do sadhana but we don’t make advancement from the sadhana, we make advancement from the mercy. So one disciple asked, “Well, then why even do sadhana?” And he replied, “Because the guru has ordered us to do sadhana, so we have to follow the order of the guru.” But it is not that we make advancement by doing the sadhana, we make advancement by the mercy we get in the course of making the effort.

So, let us conclude with one story, it was actually the night before I left Vrindavan to go to Delhi, Bombay, and London, back to Santa Barbara. And I visited a garden or a compound that belonged to a devotee named Ramdas who had been the head Pujari in Los Angeles. And Ramdas became very elevated in Krishna consciousness at the end and he came to Vrindavan and he just stayed there until he left his body. And he had so much faith in Srila Prabhupada, his whole focus was to follow the orders of Srila Prabhupada. He was just fixed on Srila Prabhupada’s lotus feet, and at the end, I think he made a list of devotees and he wanted his wife to give them each a framed image of Srila Prabhupada’s lotus feet. And so some months later his wife came to Los Angeles and gave me one. So, I could say so much about him. One thing she mentioned, just by the way among so many other things as well, was that his philosophy as head Pujari was to take good care of the Pujaris. That if he took good care of the Pujaris, the Pujaris would take good care of the deities. So he had that service attitude to the Lord and the devotees. So anyway, he was a very mystical person, I think his wife was pretty mystical herself. He was black bodied, she is white bodied, and after he left he visited a number of devotees and he more or less gave them all the same message. And the message was that, “It is really good on the other side, you cannot imagine how good it is. Now, we read about it and talk about it but you cannot imagine how good it is. And so whatever difficulties you are facing now is all right, it doesn’t matter, just tolerate the difficulties and push forward to your goal because it is really good and when you get to the other side you will realize that whatever it took to get here was worth it.”

So yes, we should have the goal in mind and we should have faith and conviction that if we just continue with the process wholeheartedly we will reach the goal and then whatever hardships we encountered along the way, were most insignificant.

Hare Krishna.

So, any questions or comments?

Devotee: Maharaja, in your book, Watering the Seeds, [Unintelligible 01:05:08].

Giriraj Swami: Yes, Ravendra Prabhu was referring to when we were at the Ardh Khumba-mela in 1971. It was very cold; very cold December, January, and it is true, we didn’t want to get up and we were living in tents, we were in our sleeping bags. And when we got up we would have to go outside and there was a pump. We would pump this cold water and take a cold bath and go to maṅgala-ārati. So it was really easier and more comfortable to just stay in our sleeping bags. But it is true, there were a few very staunch men, Tamal Krishna Goswami and Hansadutta Prabhu, and they would get up early and they would go to the Ganges, they would take bath in the Ganges before maṅgala-ārati. But Srila Prabhupada detected that we were sleeping late and it wasn’t good for spiritual life, so one morning he got up early and he took bath in the freezing cold under a pump, and so the news spread, and that shook us up, and we all got out of our sleeping bags. And we knew he could do it again, he would keep doing it until we stopped sleeping late, and we didn’t want that. It was painful to see him in that freezing cold. So that shook us out of our complacency.

Yes Anthony

Devotee: Sometimes we know we should wake up early but we keep failing ourselves, over and over, so how should we lament about it? Or how should we fix that? How should we think about it?

Giriraj Swami: Well, a lot has to do with association in the beginning, later when one develops more taste and eagerness, but it is good to lament to repent. You shouldn’t get too depressed and go, “I am so fallen, I don’t even want to live, I am just going to close my eyes, go to sleep because I am just so bad.” We don’t want to come to that position but we should feel uncomfortable to counteract the discomfort, not blot it out by going to sleep or watching television but to actually work towards that.

I remember one night, Jai Advaita Swami and I happened to be together in Spain, sleeping together in the temple president’s office at night. So before we took rest he told me that, “At four o’clock or a quarter to four, I want you to wake me up, and I want you to do whatever it takes to wake me up. And if speaking to me and shouting doesn’t work you can pour water on my face, but you have to wake up. And if I say something different in the morning, don’t listen to me. Listen to what I am telling you tonight, don’t listen to what I might tell you in the morning.”

Yes, [Unintelligible 01:11:49].

Devotee: [Unintelligible 01:11:54].

Giriraj Swami: Very nice. Wonderful. That is true. Generally, for ordinary people sleep is just going into oblivion, ignorance, but for a devotee, you can have divine dreams like you said. And I think also, I am referring to [Unintelligible 01:15:11] but you go strictly according to ayurvedic shastra because there was a time when I was dreaming a lot and there is deep sleep and [Unintelligible 01:15:27], dreaming sleep and then wakefulness. So I was afraid that because I was dreaming too much that I wasn’t getting enough deep sleep so I mentioned it to him. So he asked what I was dreaming about, and at that time they were pretty devotional dreams and he said, “Well, that is all right, you have those kinds of dreams, that is all right. It will be all right. You don’t have to worry about not getting enough deep sleep without dreams.” So that is nice, we should all be so fortunate, so absorbed in Krishna consciousness.

I was going to call on [Unintelligible 01:16:38] and Sarvabhauma Prabhu.

Devotee: I just wanted to agree with [Unintelligible 01:16:46] in the earlier days of the movement because I originally joined in 1973 at the [Unintelligible 01:16:55] temple and it was like you had [Unintelligible 01:17:00].

Giriraj Swami: I guess a lot has to do with the leaders. There was a time when Shyamasundara Prabhu was coming to the morning program. There was a time he wasn’t and there was a time he was. And what I heard was that when he started coming then gradually more and more other devotees started to come. He didn’t preach about it as such, he just came, and just by his coming, gradually more and more other devotees started to come and the attendance was building up. And it really, from what I heard, it really increased their respect for him and it made the relationships among the devotees, between him and the other devotees, and just among the devotees in general, it made it very congenial and sweet. But then he had some health issues, a little stroke. I heard it was going very well and when he had that health issue he physically just couldn’t keep it up anymore. But [Unintelligible 01:18:55] what exactly did Gurudeva tell you about the class?

Devotee: In the beginning I was initiated and I was doing the deity worship every day, and coming in the maṅgala-ārati. At that time [Unintelligible 01:19:56]. At that time, Gurudeva came and asked why the Bhāgavatam class is not going on. And I told this whole story, at that time he told me that, “From now on you should have a [Unintelligible 01:21:17]. So this is his order and from that day [Unintelligible 01:21:37] it is going on 7:30 to 8:30 or 9:00. So we started every day, one day, one by one, the Bhāgavatam class. [Unintelligible 01:21:55]. So this is the program, we are carrying on now by the mercy of my spiritual master. I am talking about again the dream, and I told the dream also in [Unintelligible 01:22:36] one day I dreamed that I came to the temple [Unintelligible 01:22:45].

Hare Krishna, Maharaja. Thank you.

Giriraj Swami: All right, so we had a good discussion. As we discussed in our japa seminars that yes definitely it is best to chant all our rounds at a stretch in the early morning but if by circumstances one is unable to do so, and that is plan A, one should also have a Plan B just in case, and it could vary from person to person what the plan B is but it could be late afternoon, early evening. Many of Srila Prabhupada’s personal servants they couldn’t chant early in the morning because they were taking care of Srila Prabhupada, but then in the late afternoon, maybe four to six they were in Juhu, they just go to the beach and chant their rounds. So yes, we are presenting the ideal and we want to work towards the ideal but in the meantime there are other options. And the association helps, chanting in front of the deities helps, chanting in front of Tulasi-devi helps.

So, I also took a couple of days to try to recover from my travels but this evening there is a program in Sugarland, and then I am hoping to give class tomorrow morning and then, of course, there will be the evening class tomorrow. And Monday is Sri Madha Vrinda Puri’s disappearance day, so we will have a program in the evening. But it is good to chant together. It is really good to chant together. I was going to say one other thing but it slipped my mind. All right, maybe it will come out in the next class, so come back.

Srila Prabhupada, ki jaya!

Nitai-Gaura premānande Hari Haribol.

Giriraj Swami Maharaja ki jaya!