Prabhu (1): I have had an experience that a person lost trust in a leader of the community, and then he lost trust in the movement, too. So he stopped his Kṛṣṇa conscious activity, and finally he left the movement. So my question is, how can we overcome this problem, how can we maintain trust in a person? [How to avoid the situation where one] loses confidence in a leader or in someone else, in a person, but then projects this to the whole movement?
His Holiness Bhaktividyā Pūrṇa Mahārāja: See, there is the principle of trust and then there is the particular detail, or application. So if someone who has faith in the principle of trust, then they’ll apply… If there is anything that has come up where trust is lost, it is only applied in that one area. So in other words, the trust was lost way before they joined Kṛṣṇa consciousness. Most likely, it was already lost in their family. So it has to be something where just the principle of trust doesn’t function. Because if you want to be realistic, okay, you can’t trust, if you don’t trust the particular devotee, then no devotees, then the movement, how can you trust the material world? You have already messed it up before you even got here.
So the principle of trust has to be there, if you want to do anything, trust has to be there. You get in an elevator because you trust it will get you to where you want to go, or you get on a bus because you trust it will get you to that place. Right? You get on a bus here, and on the bus it says “Budapest,” so you think it is going to Budapest. And the bus driver, you know, locks the doors and then starts laughing and says, “We are actually going to Debrecen.” [Laughter] Right? So there is trust. Everything is based on trust. So it is the one thing you can count that still may have some validity in the Kali-yuga. You buy things on trust, so it is still, it’s working on that. So the principle is not the problem.
Means, someone has some ideology, and that is good. But if it doesn’t exactly work, it is not that there is a problem in that ideology. The problem is that it is the material world and things don’t necessarily go the way they should, so therefore one would just be more careful. In other words, if you don’t want to get hurt, you use your intelligence. It doesn’t mean that you don’t put yourself in the situations, I mean, any situation you put yourself in that there is a relationship there is the possibility to become hurt. But there is the possibility you won’t get hurt also. It’s like when you sit down to a meal, it’s possible it will be good, it’s possible it will be bad, so does that mean we don’t try? You know what I am saying? So the point is that we always try. You go to the pool, it may be warm, it may be cold. So you stick your finger in it first, or your toe. And so then, deciding what is there then you decide what to do. So, intelligence always has to be applied, even when you are dealing in relationships. So you deal appropriately, therefore you get the appropriate response. So trust is a principle that is there. And God is always there, but we don’t judge God’s presence or not on how nicely the material world works. You know, it’s like saying, “If there is a God, this dog won’t bark.” That is called miracle, we are talking reality. Do you want that every moment will be a miracle? You know what I am saying?
Things didn’t go so well for one of our preachers, but after 2,000 years people still have faith in his teachings. So if you look at that, means that even if you are really well connected, you are on the inside track, things don’t always go well in the material world. No? And what do they immortalize in their faith is the point in time that didn’t go well for this preacher, right? They don’t have, he is not generally just sitting there peacefully and preaching and all that, it is at the worst possible material moment you could find him in. The point is, material world is material world. One is born, is going to grow old and die. So religion and God consciousness is meant how to solve that problem, means, how to stop birth and death, how to go to the spiritual world. Religion is not to make this place nice. If you are in a toilet, it is a toilet. It is not that you make the toilet, so it is fabulous and it is wonderful and move in there. Does that make sense? You had something?
Prabhu (2): In the 4th canto, we read the story of Dhruva Mahārāja, and Nārada Muni appears in front of him and starts instructing him, and Dhruva Mahāraja says that although your instructions are very relevant, I am unable to accept them, because my heart is broken. And in the purport Prabhupāda also brings up this point that the heart and the mind can break, and this is something I would like to hear about to understand.
HH BVPS Mahārāja: Break means, you consider there is a particular relationship and then you at least either perceive or find that it is not like that. Because relationship means, there is a connection. So as long as the connection is there, relationship works, connection is not there, then it doesn’t work. So if you become dependent upon that relationship, but that depends upon that connection. So the connection then is not, if that is broken then naturally that is what it means by the heart or the mind is broken. Right? So it is based on that the relationship isn’t what you thought it was. Does that make sense?
Dhruva Mahārāja thought he had a strong relationship with his father. But his father didn’t pay attention to him because of the father’s wife who wasn’t his mother, that means his stepmother. So that meant, the depth that he thought it was with his father wasn’t there, that depth was there between his father and the stepmother. Therefore it is broken. Or between his father and his own mother it wasn’t as strong as he thought. So he found out his father’s relationship with his stepmother was stronger that with his own mother or with him. Right? So therefore then it was broken. Do you understand? So when a relationship isn’t what you thought it was, then it can create that phenomena. So the only way to deal with it, really, is intelligence and time. Of course, performance of spiritual activities will purify the heart that one will not be as affected or put one’s faith that strongly in material life.


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