Lord Shiva wants your flesh.

Yesterday we celebrated Siva Ratri here at the temple. Lord Shiva is considered the greatest devotee of Lord Krishna. He is a demigod and his jurisdiction is annihilation and destruction. In Krishna book, he is also described as the master of the three qualities of material nature, namely goodness, passion and ignorance. Prabhupada further explains that, especially in South India, there are two classes of devotees, one devoted to Lord Shiva and the other to the Supreme Lord Visnu. Lord Shiva lives as a poor man, although his devotees appear materially opulent. Whereas, while Lord Krishna or Visnu lives very opulently, His devotees appear to be poverty-stricken. Interesting, huh? The key word here is "appear." We all know that appearance can be misleading. Material wealth versus transcendental wealth, but one does not necessarily nullify the other. So don't worry Mom. Anyways, I don't know much about Shiva. He was created from the anger of Lord Brahma, and, contrary to popular belief, does not smoke marijuana. Pure devotees have no use for intoxication.

Three years ago or so, I celebrated Shiva Ratri in Palenque, Chiapas at the Rama Rama temple that used to be and may still be there. They had a really cool tree house but temple relations were shaky and there was talk of disabandonment. Anywho, I was travelling with a bunch of Neem Keroli Baba admirerors from the Hanuman Temple in Taos, New Mexico. Fifteen adults from the ages of 60 to 17, one 3-year-old girl named Sequoia, a converted veggie oil school bus and two months of spontaneous street theater in the streets of Mexico later, we pull up to this makeshift temple in the jungle surrounding the ruins of Palenque. At that time I didn't know the difference between Rama and llama, I just thought the folks were real nice and the vegetarian, communal meals were delicious. I learned how to walk on stilts in the front dirtyard of the temple and slept on the roof at night, hummed to sleep by the howler monkeys that sounded like elephants. I would wake up at sunrise and chant the Diamond Sutra mantra and Sita Rama. I was open to anything other than Christianity.

Shiva Ratri, "the night of Shiva", came around and I just watched. Basically, the ceremony started outside with a fire. I remember coconuts being cracked into a fire and a yogurt type drink being passed around. Activities moved inside and all night long, yogurt and various foodstuffs were dripped and dangledonto a phallic shaped stone found earlier that day on one of our daily waterfall exploration missions. Lots of offerings and chanting until sunrise, passing around of these offered items in one big bowl, lots and lots of yogurt, I fell asleep and I didn't have a clue what was happening.

Staying at that temple was my first exposure to no toilet paper usage in the bathroom and no use of onions or garlic in the temple kitchen. Other than that, I don't recall any sort of discipline or regulations. Nice sincere folks, really fun, really generous, but we all lacked discipline and proper spiritual authority. I used to think celebration was in and of itself the purpose of life. I was wrong.

About the Lord Shiva and flesh thing. It's not really true, but catchy, huh?

Hit the showerz..

"As the embodied soul continuously passes, in this body, from boyhood to youth to old age, the soul similarly passes into another body at death. A sober person is not bewildered by such a change."
-Bhagavad Gita As It Is (2.13)

I woke up this morning and felt really good. I thought to myself, I bet my alarm clock will go off right now. Two seconds later, sure enough. Got out of bed and performed the morning rituals. Took my cold shower (i've discovered the secret of cold showers, closes the pores, keeps ya warm all morning) then did some breathing exercises. Sang and danced during morning program, chanted Hare Krsna for an hour, made some dandelion-yarrow tea, and changed into my barn clothes. I stepped outside into 2-3 inches of "FRESHIES" (old snowboarding lingo for no tracks). The snow was still falling and I felt that "it's snowing and it's quiet, so quiet and everything looks so beautiful, even the crusty old trailer and the mess of tractor parts under a fresh blanket of show" feeling. Got to the barn and was greeted by Maggie Mae, a real sweet dog from down the road. I paid my obeisances to Mother Ganga, flipped over the milk crate, and sat down beside her. Twenty minutes and 17lbs of milk later, we were both pleased. As the calves were suckling, I brushed their soft behinds and tried to determine if the rumors of diarrhea were true. Madhava drops some solid stool so it must be Kesava. The mothers and I exchange some parting words of gratitud and I prepare to head back to the temple.
I pour Miss Maggie some milk and she comes running in all bloody-like on her right side. I smell trouble. Buckets clean, I leave the barn and notice Maggie's tracks heading into the woods. Fully intent on attending class, I still couldn't resist my internal Tom Brown. Into the woods, through the wild, multiflora rose bushes, under the barbed wire fence, past a couple dilapidated cabins, down the hill, across the creek, up the ravine, and heading south on a newly discovered trail later, I lost the tracks. "Oh well," I thought, I should be heading back anyways. And just as I turn around, there she is. A few yards in from the trail, a young deer is laying on her side, blood on the snow. Her leg moves and I realize she is still alive and breathing. Hare Krsna! I shed a few tears and began to chant.

"Whatever state of being one remembers when he quits his body, O son of Kunti, that state he will attain without fail." -Bhagavad Gita As It Is (8.6)

Prabhupada writes in the purport of this verse that chanting the Hare Krsna maha mantra is "the best process for successfully changing one's state of being at the end of one's life." so i chanted. i stayed on the path and wished her back home to Godhead. i continued to chant for a half hour or so until her body lay stiff. it was 9 o'clock. i missed class.


Today is a special day for Krsna devotees. Every 11th day after the full and new moon, we celebrate "ekadasi". I am told these days are extremely favorable for spiritual advancement. Ekadasi is observed by fasting, at the very least no beans or grains, and the extra time is used for spiritual inventory. The renunciate in me has taken to ekadasi nicely.
This was a special morning of an auspicious day. Thank God i was sober to understand what was happening. In fact, i consider soberness my only redeeming quality these days. Bhakti yoga is a spiritual path that slowly purifies one's heart. Therefore, lots of emotional gunk is surfacing, which i am told not to be ashamed of. To criticize one who has sincerely taken to the path of self-realization and Krsna consciousness, is like calling someone dirty while taking a shower. In that case, I'll be in the bathroom for a very long time, especially because i'm a girl.

The 12 Step Program- which addiction is it today?

1. We admitted we were powerless over our addiction - that our lives had become unmanageable
2. Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity
3. Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood God
4. Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves
5. Admitted to God, to ourselves and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs
6. Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character
7. Humbly asked God to remove our shortcomings
8. Made a list of all persons we had harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all
9. Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others
10. Continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong promptly admitted it
11. Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God as we understood God, praying only for knowledge of God's will for us and the power to carry that out
12. Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to other addicts, and to practice these principles in all our affairs

Help. I am totally addicted to self gratification. I say self with a lowercase "s" because endeavoring to please my own senses is far removed from Self gratification, which is endeavoring to please Krsna. It's just that I can't seem to understand that I am not this material body. I think I understand that I am an eternal soul, but I still show symptoms of bodily identification like pride (I'm very spiritually advanced but how come every says I am just now beginning my spiritual life?), envy (I wish the community loved me the way they love that guy), greed (I want the milk, why does that pujari always take all the milk, I'm the milker, i should have some milk!), and lust (I sure would like that turquoise shawl Krsna is wearing tonite). Silly, right? But I can't seem to think outside of my own desires for intelligence, beauty, renunciation, even popularity and power at times. OK, most of the time.
Some of you might be asking, what's the problem. One should strive for such endeavors and even better if you can get paid while doing it. The problem is that I have tried to fulfill my material desires. I have reached points in my life where I couldn't imagine anything could be much better but eventually the feeling faded and, there I was, left wanting for more. Again and again, I felt an emptiness in my restless heart.
In Chapter 2 of the Bhagavad Gita, Krsna says, "A person who has given up all desires for sense gratification, who lives free from desires, who has given up all sense of proprietorship and is devoid of false ego-he alone can attain real peace." In the purport, Prabhupada states, "To become desireless means not to desire anything for sense gratification. In other words, desire for becoming Krsna conscious is actually desirelessness. To understand one's actual position as the eternal servitor of Krsna, without falsely claiming this material body to be oneself and without falsely claiming proprietorship over anything in the world, is the prefect state of Krishna consciousness...Real desirelessness is desire for the satisfaction of Krsna, not an artificial attempt to abolish desires."
Because it has had a tremendous impact on helping my father and grandfather, along with countless thousands of other people, overcome their alcohol and -you name it- addictions, I think the 12 Step Program is awesome. Besides the fact that the program works universally, I like the 12 Steps because they recognize that when we find ourselves in powerless situations under the control of external influences, best to fully surrender to God and beg for help. Since God is the ultimate controller, with his help and guidance, one can overcome all material addictions and attain true love of God.
So let me take some of the advice of the 12 Steps and apologize to all those who I have negatively influenced or encouraged in some way to pursue mundane, material desires. I am striving to see all of creation as glorious, because, first of all, it is Krsna's creation, and, most of all, because it is our only medium for recognizing and glorifying God. Therefore, I will try not to abuse it any longer for my selfish, material wants. Please forgive me, o mortal bodied, eternal souls!

A visit from your Jewish grandmotha'

*The following is a letter I wrote in December to some friends of mine.*
Note: the offer still stands.

Yo kidz!  motha a-Leesh in the house.  after this intro anything i say
will pale in comparison but i'll try to be a transparent medium of some
sort, though very much unqualified.

"The serene sky, limitlessly expansive, is compared to the Absolute Truth.
The living entities are truths manifested in relation with the modes of
material nature.  The deep-bluish cloud covers only an insignificant
portion of the limitless sky, and this fractional covering is compared
to the quality of ignorance, or forgetfulness of the real nature of the
living being.  The living entity is as pure as the limitless sky.  He
becomes covered by the cloud of forgetfulness, however, in his tendency
for enjoying the material world.  Because of this quality, called tamas
(ignorance), he considers himself different from the Absolute Whole and
forgets his purity, which is like that of the clear sky.  This
forgetfulness gives rise to separatism in false ego.  Thus the forgetful
living entities, individually and collectively, make sounds like
thundering clouds: 'I am this,' 'It is ours,' or 'It is mine.'  This mood
of false separation is called the quality of rajas, and it gives rise to
a creative force for separate lordship over the mode of tamas.  The flash
of lightning is the only beam of hope that can lead one to the path of
knowledge, and therefore it is compared to the mode of sattva, or
goodness.
The limitless sky, or the all-pervading Absolute Truth (Brahman), is
nondifferent from the covered portion of the sky, but simultaneously the
whole sky is different from the fractional portion that is liable to be
covered by the dark cloud.  The cloud, accompanied by thunder and
lightning, cannot possibly cover the limitless sky.  Therefore the
Absolute Truth, which is compared to the whole sky, is simultaneously
one with the manifested living being and different from him.  The living
being is only a sample of the Absolute Truth and is prone to be covered
by the circumstantial cloud of ignorance.
There are two parties of philosophers, generally known as the monists and
the dualists.  The monist believes in the oneness of the Absolute Truth
and the living entity, but the dualist believes in the oneness of the
separate identities of the living being and the Absolute Truth.  Above
these two classes of philosophers is the philosophy of the truth of
simultaneous oneness and difference.  A sincere seeker of the Absolute
Truth is called a Vedantist.  Veda means 'knowledge'.  Any department
of knowledge is called a part of Vedic knowledge, and vedanta means the
ultimate conclusion of all branches of knowledge.  As philiosophy is
called the science of all sciences, Vedanta is the ultimate philosophy
of all philosophical speculations."
- His Divine Grace A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada


awesome, huh?  let me start with a shout out to Seattle, one to Portland,
East Coast stragglers, the random southern crusaders and an international
here or there.  much luv, for sure.  apologizes for the lack of
communication but ol' Maya had me so covered up i didn't even know there
was time for transcendental communication, much less keeping in touch with
the kidz.  but, alas, that is the duty of the material world, keeping the
human race in the clutches of passion and ignorance, sprinkled now and
again with some goodness if we're lucky.  on the advent of the ol' holiday
season, anyone feeling like intimacy just isn't that good anymore, or the
hangover wasn't worth it this time, or the weak MC was a waste of your
time last night, or that false ego has overtaken the world, or that it's
all useless, any attempt to do some good or god-forbid create something
rather than use and destroy, pointless? -(enter Gandhi quote here)- or
maybe just the opposite.  anyone feeling totally content with the
material world, decent job, satisfying partner, good eats with close
friends, fulfilling aikido classes, money in the bank?

i found myself in the former camp around this time last year, so i gave
up all my possessions and went to Mexico for my annual fix.  the desert
did a good job, she's full of tough lessons, the monarch wintering grounds
do a good number as well, and the street theater festivals, always an
upper, but i still felt a sense of loss of direction and purpose in my life. 
i came back to the states and moved to new mexico.  thus, i entered into
the latter camp.  good times with the Haskos and Lauren Angel-we all got
something to learn from that lady that is fo' sure.  but, that nagging
feeling came back just when i allowed myself to be sober enough to feel
it.  so 3 months ago i decided to do something different.
I met a Hare Krsna devotee at a national rainbow 2 years ago.  the first
thing i noticed about him were his eyes.  within their glance, i
encountered a profound sense of humility and respect that i had never seen
before.  because of his mercy, we stayed in touch and became good
friends.  at this summer's gathering, when he told me about a women's
retreat at the west virginia temple in early october, i thought it would
be a great excuse to visit and have an opportunity to ask many questions
and celebrate GOD with decent folks.  I quit both waitressing jobs, packed
up my house, had a few blowout grafitti parties, made black bean
enchiladas for the kids and headed back east.  the first few weeks at the
temple were tough.  i cried a lot.  ontheotherhand, i would catch myself
singing really loudly to myself, even laughing sometimes.  something
interesting was happening. 
temple life begins at 4am in the morn', shower, dress, in the temple
by 5, kirtan, chanting, more Vedic rock & rock, more dancing, then
class at 8.  class consists of reading a verse in sanskrit from the 
Srimad Bhagavatam, a portion of the Vedas (ancient scripture written
over 5,000 yrs ago).  the verse is translated, a purport or explanation
is read, the lecturer gives an expanded personalized interpretation
then Q & A.  i asked a lot of questions.  i thought i was quite
spiritually advanced and pretty smart, too, for my age.  well, 5,000-
year-old scripture has a way of humbling arrogance real fast, and,
3 months later, i'm still in the temple and still asking
questions.

when i cruised north for a Buffalo thanksgiving, i had no idea
how much my heart had been purified.  sober and celibate, no meat,
no eggs, no intoxication, chanting the maha mantra for 2-3 hours
everyday, i have new eyes, sharper ears, a discerning tongue, and
genuine, focused, directional guidelines for the rest of my life. 
on halloween, i asked my friend Balaram to tell me a Vedic demon
story and he said, "Balaram chants Hare Krishna."  this is coming
from a former punk living in Tuscon, BMX rider, born into a Native
American body, who has been a Krishna devotee and celibate student
for over 6 years. OK, how about...Alysia chants Hare Krishna. 
let's see...funky b-gyrl, Albuquerque, hip-hop cowgyrrl, pig farmer,
herbalist, mambo enthusiast, Greek body, 3 months.  BOO!

in the spirit of Christmas and my newly renewed spiritual life, i would
like to offer to all of yous a once in this lifetime opportunity.  now
remember, i too have criticized the "Hare Krishnas" as religious
freaks and hypocrites and now look who's talking.  we gotta remember that
the purity of religion will always be distorted and abused by its
practitioners.  yet, we must not allow this reality to hinder us from the
pursuit of Absolute Truth and spiritual journeys.  the fact is that we are
all eternal souls living in temporary, material bodies, trapped in the
endless cycle of birth & death.  if we have eternal souls then we must
have an eternal occupation, right?  will we merge into the blurry light,
the great infinite, the impersonal Brahman, maybe ascend into Heaven,
streets paved in gold, old friends and relatives with white hair, praying
very nicely, maybe we just melt into the earth and are nothing more than
fodder for the worms and carnivorous centipedes.  what do YOU think?
hint: consult 5,000 yr. old scripture

ok folks, you heard it here, the offer stands, i
will personally mail you a conveniently packaged, paperback edition of the
one and only Bhagavad Gita- As It Is, provided that in return, you mail me
your equivalent, "This book is the best thing that ever happened to me and
is the source of all spiritual knowledge and provides detailed
explanations on the meaning of life" and/or, but preferably AND, your
all-time favorite funk or hip-hop album that attempts to do the same.
Check it- this book is described as the owner's manual for human existence
and is considered the summarized essence of the entire body of literature
known as the Vedas.  Nothing to lose here folks except your false ego.
please give your mother the opportunity to send a nice care package and,
if you're good, she might even send, for no additional cost, some Krisna
conscious hip-hop for kicks.  Note:  the KRS in KRS-ONE stands for KRSNA!

at the very least, drop a line and call me a freak.  no cell phone
reception in west virginy, sorry for the unanswered calls.  throw out
some questions.  pray for me.  invest in your spiritual lives.  luv you
like crazy and look forward to hearing from ya'll.

your affecionate jewish mother,
mz. a-Leesh

To those who worship life itself...

Have you ever opened up a book and felt like that page was written just for you? Upon picking up Dear Sky, Letters from a sunnyasi, early this afternoon, I had a sneaky suspicion this is exactly what happened. Thus, I will share with you a page that hit me upside the head. The following is a letter written by H.H.Satsvarupa dasa Goswami in Trinidad on March 16, 1992:

To those who "worship" life itself,
Sometimes when I talk with people like yourselves I feel a little intimidated because you claim that Krsna consciousness doesn't give enough attention to life. In the Krsna conscious philosophy, we teach that the material world is actually an illusion because it is temporary. The material manifestation is real in that it comes from God and is God's eternal energy, but it is unreal because it does not last. Reality lies in what is eternal. However, we don't dismiss this temporary manifestation. Human existence is certainly poignant and full of opportunity. This life is a brief time in which a person can develop surrender to Krsna to the fullest extent. This assures his going to the eternal spiritual world in the next life. So that opportunity of this life is very precious.

I think my main point to you is this: your religion is contained within mine. By this I don't mean to deride or minimize your religion. Rather, I mean this as a prelude to a friendly exchange. We are part of the same family. But if one simply "worships" life without the transcendental goal, it is hardly a religion.

I have a particular viewpoint in Krsna consciousness. As someone who tries to serve through writing, I have a proclivity to capture the experience of life as it passes. This is Krsna's time and place: how can I reject it? And by writing down the day I can see how well I used this previous life. Krsna says in the Bhagavad Gita: "To one who always sees Me everywhere and sees everything in Me, He is never lost to Me and I am never lost to Him."

So I guess I'm also writing this letter indirectly to devotees of Krsna-to remind then that attention to temporary phenomena is important if the temporary phenomena includes our very life in this body and our attempt to become Krsna conscious. When we communicate with each other and share what is valuable, it's not just that we quote the sastra to each other or talk about the times that existed in Vedic culture five hundred or five thousand years ago. We have to talk about the present and share our love according to time, place, and person.

I request you, worshippers of life itself, please don't accuse this devotee of not thinking as you think. It's something that's always there consciously or unconsciously, even when I perform the transcendental activities in our temple. We can't escape it-the sensory input, the temporary thought, the sense of time passing, and the impossibly rich texture of this temporary life. This is especially true for someone like me who is in a transitional stage; I have two feet in this world and my eyes on the spiritual world.

I'm so grateful to Prabhupada that I'm not a confused piece of flotsam going through this life and making vain gestures or laments about the mutability of all things. I see this world, in all its mutability, as Krsna's energy. And sometimes I take a stronger attitude and see it as insignificant. But I have my moments of appreciation and an enduring respect that everything is sustained by Krsna, even in this material world.

Worshippers of life itself, I would like to hear from you, see any poems you write, or pictures you paint of this world. But my deepest hankering is for the spiritual world. Therefore my best use of this precious time is to absorb myself in the transcendental material that brings me directly to Krsna.

Vaisanva dasanudasa,
Satsvarupa dasa Goswami

Lookin' for freedom in all the wrong places...

My question is, what does it mean to be free?

I just watched the film Death of a Prophet, a weak biography on the assassination of Malcolm X. However poorly done, the film reminded me how inspired I was by reading his autobiography last year. Few people in this world are able to fully dedicate their lives for serving others in the way that Malcolm X dedicated his every moment towards the self-determination of the black man in America. My recommendation is that everyone reads the Autobiography of Malcolm X by Alex Haley. No exceptions. Young or old, black or Bengali, busy or not, just read it.

This autobiography is remarkable because one is carried through Malcolm Little's young life, from skinny red-headed, country hick to city slicker, hustling, pimping, usin' and abusin', the gauntlet. Finally in prison, after getting busted for some high-end robbery stints, he found Allah through the preaching of a minister named Elijah Muhammad, an exponent of Islam in North America who founded a Muslim organization called Nation of Islam in the early 50s. Malcolm, being an atheist, was hesitant to be receptive to anything involving the recognition of God. His brothers persisted and continued sending him letters, explaining how they were starting to organize a religious movement for black empowerment. He became inquisitive. I think his first devotional step was refusing to eat pork. His purification process greatly excelled from there.

In 1952, after his release from prison, Malcolm went to meet Muhammad in Chicago. It was soon after this that he changed his surname to "X", started outreach preaching programs and began opening up various mosques. The basic message was reclaiming the self-determination, dignity, and freedom of Black America through religious, black nationalism. As an impassioned, riveting, and confident speaker, Malcolm X opened up one hundred or so centers within a decade, installing healthy spiritual practices in thousands of households as the foundation for a successful revolution. Eventually, Muhammad confessed to extramarital affairs with his secretaries, and a crushed yet compassionate and forgiving Malcolm X eventually pulled out. Muhammad's jealousy of Malcolm's popularity and prestige, culminated into infinite numbers of death threats on Malcolm X and his family. Malcolm painfully resigned to leave the country.

Following a pilgrimage to Mecca in 1964, Malcolm converted to orthodox Islam. He was greatly moved and humbled by the diversity of the Muslim pilgrims and, thus, expanded his freedom movement to extend outside purely black participation. Less than a year later, before being able to reestablish himself and his expanded outlook, he was assassinated. I wonder what he was thinking at the time of his death? The Bhagavad Gita says, "Whatever state of being one remembers when he quits his body...that state he will attain without fail" (8.6). Might he have taken birth again as a white supremest?

Anyways, what does it mean to be free? Freedom by definition is as follows: (1) civil liberty, as opposed to subjection to an arbitrary government (2) political or national independence (3) a particular immunity or privilege enjoyed (4) personal liberty as opposed to bondage or slavery (5) exemption from external control, interference, regulation (6) power of determining one's or its own action (7) the power of frequenting, enjoying, or using at will.

These definitions are based on the concept of the material body without an understanding of the eternal soul. In chapter 2 of the Bhagavad Gita, Krsna explains, "As a person puts on new garments, giving up old ones, the soul similarly accepts new material bodies, giving up the old and useless ones (2.22)." He continues to explain that one who understands the difference between the body, the soul, and the Supersoul, will attain liberation from this material world.

The Bhagavad Gita explains that bondage is created by one's attachment to sense gratification for themselves and gratifying the senses of others without considering the gratification of the Supreme Lord's pleasure. Basic civil liberties or not, one remains a slave to the sufferings of birth, death, disease, and old age. Just as history continues to repeat itself, one people oppressing another people who in turn oppress another people who reclaim "stolen" land from another people who in turn appropriate new land for themselves and steal from others, so too is the endless cycle of karma, the law of action and reaction, and, ultimately, the endless cycle of birth and death.

Srila Prabhupada explains in the Teachings of Lord Caitanya that every being within this material world is inflicted by the suffering caused by the threefold miseries. Suffering is placed into three categories, that which is caused by the body and mind, that which is inflicted by other living entities, and that which is caused by natural disasters. Krsna instructs that one can not release themselves from the sufferings of material nature unless one takes to the path of bhakti yoga.

Because it explains freedom on a transcendental platform rather than a material platform based on one's association with a particular body, I am beginning to understand why striving to achieve Krsna consciousness is the ultimate liberation movement.

Nityodita shared in class the other day that Srila Prabhupada's guru, Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati, once said, "The material world is like a stool house. One should simply do their business and get out."

Did Malcolm X have a transcendental understanding of freedom? Certainly, the idea of equality, based on the principle that everyone is a child of God with intrinsic value, serves as a religious foundation, but not necessarily transcendental. His struggle was phenomenal, mostly because he installed strong religious codes and principles in the hearts of his followers. But I would argue that he presented a short-sighted and temporary vision of freedom. Regardless, his work was monumental in changing this nation's consciousness of discrimination based on the color of one's skin.

Today I was looking around the temple room, observing the eclectic peoples who have gathered here to dedicate their lives, working for the transcendental welfare of Krsna's children. Bengali, Estonian, British, African American, Hungarian, Native American, Hawaiian, and me, young and old, men and women. As one can determine a thriving ecosystem by its diversity, I judge healthy movements by the same principle.

The Krsna consciousness movement is about achieving the highest form of freedom. Based on the philosophy that we are not these bodies, only spirit souls, Krsna consciousness is assisting one's desire to eliminate the suffering of all living beings in the material world. Through the means of developing proper loving relationships with others, regardless of one's external bodily features, eternal liberation is found in the heart's of devotees at every moment. Bodies, bodies everywhere, yet not a one to remain occupied forever!

Transcendental fist fights?

While praying in front of the deities, I hear racket in the hallway. "Stupid idiot," shouts Mother Dhara. I faintly detect Atmarama Prabhuji mumbling something in Bengalii. Two minutes later I witness the both of them marching back to the kitchen with Janaka Prabhu, the Vice President of the temple, mediating the empassioned conflict that has will never be settled. Mother Tulasi, the cow, pooped twice within a half hour, some of it even blessed my skirt, while I was milking her this morning. In Srimad Bhagavatam class, Nityodita Prabhu asked the assembled devotees, "What is the conclusion of studying the function of the body?" Answer: "Everyone will die." "What is the conclusion of studying the universe?" Answer: "No one can stay."

Mother Dhara is hiding cauliflower, Jaya Sri is talking about red, white & blue stores, and Nitya Mukta is buying me dental floss in town today. The amazing part is, is that it is ALL transcendental and there is no other place I would rather be. I have totally fallen in love with the New Vrindaban devotees, the motley crew we are. Everyone is trying so hard to please Krsna. I am very grateful to have the association of these wonderful persons. Lord Nityananda, please shower us with your mercy.