Śrīmad Bhāgavatam Class
SB 4.4.26
Girigovardhana Prabhu
December 18, 2018About the speaker
Giri-govardhana Prabhu
Potomac, Maryland
Giri-govardhana Prabhu entered university thinking that his future would be a research laboratory, but by the time he left university, he had his sights set on asrama life and a different sort of research. An interest in philosophy sparked an interest in theology, which led to a fateful encounter with Srimad Bhagavatam. After several intervening years of regular reading, irregular chanting, and the following of a couple of the regulative principles, he mustered the courage to take the plunge and moved into the ISKCON temple in Detroit, where he spent the next fifteen years. During those years (1992-2007), he was initiated by H.G. Ravindra Svarupa dasa, lived for 10 years as a brahmacari, and was involved in a variety of services including: pujari service, tulasi seva, and temple management. He and his wife, Syama Kunda were a valuable members of the ISKCON Philadelphia temple where they served as the primary pujaris. They have been been in the ISKCON temple in Potomac, MD for the last 5 years where, in addition to other regular service, have gotten the opportunity to get involved in teaching, mentoring, and leading discussion groups. He gives morning Srimad Bhagavatan classes, and has taught Bhakti Shastri. He leads the Bhakti Lounge program which is a discussion group which meets on Sundays and is geared towards persons who are new to Krishna consciousness. He also conducts a Bhakti Lounge style discussion every Friday for experienced devotees which takes the place of regular morning Srimad Bhagavatam class. Giri-govardhana sometimes speaks or lead discussions at Bhakti Vriksha groups, home programs or at Bhakti Yoga DC which is a yoga studio in Washington DC run by an ISKCON devotee. He have a recorded presence on the ISKCON of DC SoundCloud page. https://soundcloud.com/iskconofdc where there are some of his Sunday Open House talks, a Bhakti Shastri course, and a section called Bhakti Basics.
Girigovardhana made the point that because the jiva wants to be the enjoyer he feels himself distinct and better than others. Others are seen as objects of enjoyment of competitors for their own enjoyment. According to the 3 modes our selfishness is greater or lesser. For example a drug addict in the mode of ignorance is completely selfish. A person in the mode of passion is less selfish being willing to be more charitably disposed with those that can help them in their own enjoyment. Those in goodness don’t care of material happiness and distress because they have so much happiness inside themselves, but in material goodness still feel themselves better than others. But those that are on the spiritual platform don’t feel superiority to other but rather feel gratitude for the fortune they have received and therefore want to give that same fortune to others.
Another point is if we feel either qualified or inadequate to influence other in Krsna Consciousness, both are faulty conceptions. No one can give bhakti. Bhakti is independent of anyone or anything. We can only present bhakti to others. It is up to bhakti to manifest is the heart of the other person.