Our personalities can be classified based on the framework below –

1. Those who are liberated
2. Those who want to be liberated
3. Those who Do Not want to be liberated

For all the three personalities, Srimad Bhagavata is fulfilling who we are, and it is the BEST for all the three kinds of personalities. How?

• It is our biography, our experience if we are liberated
• There is so much katha and vedanta for us if we want to be liberated
• It’s most interesting for us even if we do not want to be liberated, the Suras and the Asuras, time travel.

There is also a fourth type of personality which is Pashugnath — literally meaning those who kill animals, but it is actually this butcher mentality that creation is to serve them alone. Bhagavata has nothing to offer such personalities as they cannot relate to it. We all fit into personality types 1 and 2 and nothing is more special or amazing than Bhagavata.

Bhagavan Brahma thought he was the OG — the Original God, and Bhagavan Krshna corrected him with actions instead of words. Bhagavan Krshna became all of those cows and cowherds that Bhagavan Brahma had put to sleep, and the reason He did this was to radiate joy. Imagine how the cows would have felt knowing that their calf IS Bhagavan Krshna; so more milk flowed. And all of the families that felt their child IS Bhagavan Krshna; we say our child is Bhagavan Krshna, but we don’t feel that. And Bhagavan Krshna wanted to bring more joy to Bhagavan Brahma too. It was a subtle way of teaching with constructive criticism, instead of destructive criticism of Bhagavan Brahma.

Bhagavan Brahma then goes on to offer a stuthi to Bhagavan Krshna. Here are some of the deep Vedantic points that need to be noted and contemplated upon. Bhagavan Brahma says:

1. Bondage and liberation are not facts; we are already free; we were never stuck
2. Bhagavan Krshna is only light, there is only luminosity. We always go into Vedanta with the thought that this is the illuminator, this is the illuminated. But Bhagavan Brahma is sharing that there is only illumination or light.
3. Bhagavan Krshna is the presence that we keep feeling and describing as ‘I’.
4. We are children and Bhagavan Krshna is the womb. We keep kicking, but Bhagavan is the gracious mother that naturally forgives the child that is kicking.

Bhagavan Krshna forgave Bhagavan Brahma and all of the children and calves came out of their sleep and they felt like they were not present for a moment, even though an entire year had passed. Bhagavan Krshna made it seem like a moment.

A brief review before we proceed with the katha — If we look at Bhagavan Shiva’s family, He rides a Bull and Devi Parvati rides a tiger or lion and Bhagavan Kartikeya rides a peacock and Bhagavan Ganesha rides a mouse. Because there is happiness in their family, all of those animals get along well. Asuras can come in lots of forms such as a Devi (Putana), a cart , a tornado, a calf, a crane, a python, a deva (Bhagavan Brahma) symbolizing arrogance, and now we are going to come across a donkey.

Skanda 10:15:37 — Rishi Shuka continues to explain to Raja Parikshita the leelas of Bhagavan Krshna. When this donkey turned around and kicked its back legs out, Balarama caught the legs of the donkey, spun the donkey around and threw it to the top of a Palm tree. Let us now see what events led up to this episode.

Some commentators describe Bhagavan Krshna’s life in two parts. The earlier part is called Purva when Bhagavan Krshna’s lifestyle is fairly simple and that is upto the age of ten. Uttara is after that which is more complex. Bhagavan Krshna’s family is thinking a lot about who He is now. Before they thought He was only a child, but now they are thinking that He must be more. Similar to how Prince Arjuna thinks — He is my cousin, and then that Bhagavan Krshna has to be more.

Vedanta: Here are some insights into their dialog about Bhagavan Krshna –

• Anyone who is born in Vrindavana is most fortunate. Imagine all the things that Bhagavan Krshna touched, the ground, the trees, the water, that is the hand of God. Bhagavan Krshna moved around so much, only so that He could keep on blessing. In fact this is the basis for holi. Holi is when we take the dust from Bhagavan Krshna’s feet, He has walked everywhere on Red flowers, brown soil, and we feel that joy and share it with others.
  
• Another insight was that all those who lived around Bhagavan Krshna put all that they had at His disposal — their materials, their children, their minds. So though they were farmer folk, imagine the shradha or trust they had in Bhagavan Krshna. We chant “Tan, Man, Dhan sab kuch tera”, but do we feel that?
  
• Bhagavan Krshna was actually the servant of all the people He interacted with. Anything they asked for, He would do it. So it shows that higher than moksha is Bhakti. When Bhagavan becomes your servant then that is called Bhakti. But we have to become His servant first.
  
• We all love ourselves the most, but those people in Vrindavana the way they loved themselves, they also loved those calves and kids. This was a fact in their lives.
  
• We often study that the cause pervades the effect, but in Bhagavan Krshna’s case the cause was with them, the cause was actually there. This was not intellectual, but experiential.

Now back to more katha. When Bhagavan Krshna and Balarama became six years old, they were given the responsibility to not only tend to the calves, but also the cows. So they would go farther into the jungle. Bhagavan Krshna would sometimes imitate a peacock. He would find peacock feathers and put it on His body and dance like a peacock. Picture Bhagavan Krshna dancing like a peacock, this six year old boy. Sometimes the cows would go further ahead as the boys would be playing, so Bhagavan Krshna would call each cow that went ahead by its name in a cowlike way in the way that it wanted to hear, and the cow would turn around and run back to Bhagvan Krshna.

Often in the middle of the day, when everyone was tired, Balarama would lie down and Bhagavan Krshna would massage his feet, similar to how Shri Lakshmana did to Bhagavan Rama. When Balarama was relaxed, then Bhagavan Krshna would relax. And all of those kids, some would comb His hair, some would pat His cheeks, some would massage His fingers, blow a fan at Him, some would sing His glories. In this way, He gave everyone the opportunity to lose their minds in Him and these kids did.

One of these boys knew that jungle better than Bhagavan Krshna and said that in a distant area, there were Palm trees with delicious palm fruit on them, but that the whole field was cursed by a pack of donkeys. And he told Bhagavan Krshna that he really wanted to eat Palm fruit. So Bhagavan Krshna said, “let’s do it”, and they all went into this field. As soon as they got there, Dhenuka Asura rushed towards Balarama, jumped up in the air and kicked him in the chest. Balarama just laughed, and the donkey spun around to kick Balarama again with its hind legs, when Balarama caught its legs and spun it around and threw it in the Palm tree and with the weight of the carcass, the Palm fruits came down.

Now Dhenuka had a large family, so many donkeys started coming out, trying to kick Bhagavan Krshna and Balarama, and they caught all those asuras and threw them into the Palm trees. It’s described as though the sky was filled with different colors as the donkeys were of different colors — beige, grey, purple — and all of those kids enjoyed eating those fruit.

Vedanta: Dhenuka symbolizes hoarding as no one else could go near this field or eat those fruits. How can we relate to this? When we still think that some combination of articles will make us happy, we keep on bringing more and keeping more. But eventually, whatever we are hoarding starts to kick us. It gets old, it requires more money to keep, then eventually when we have been kicked enough, instead of hoarding, we start sharing. In hoarding, I get, but in sharing I give and in doing so, I also get.

A simple way to defeat this asura is Aparigraha. Graha is to hold, and parigraha is to hold with one’s life. Once we add the prefix A, then it means — do not hold with your life, but rather give with your life. Another practice is, whatever we have right now, use it fully. Before we bring in more icons into our altar, have we formed a relationship with what we already have?

Skanda 10:16:63 — This is Bhagavan Krshna speaking to Kaliya. ”You had to leave Ramanakam (this is the place where Kaliya used to live) because of Suparna (the one with beautiful feathers or a name for Garuda). Because of Garuda you left Ramanakam, but now that your head has the markings of My feet, Garuda will not bother you, you have nothing to fear.” Garuda is a vehicle for Bhagavan Narayana.

Bhagavan Krshna one morning decided to take the cows out for grazing and He woke up all of His friends, except Balarama. After a long day of walking, they ended up near the Yamuna and those boys and girls started to wash their faces and drink the water and as soon as they did, they all died. Bhagavan Krshna knew what had happened and He just looked at their corpses and they all came back to life. There is Amrita at the bottom of the ocean, but also in Bhagavan’s eyes.

In the river Kalindi, another name for River Yamuna, there was a cavern and near it, the water was boiling with the poison that was being infused into this water. And everything around this cavern was dead, because even the water particles that were carried from here killed all the birds, and trees. This poison was coming from Kaliya, the serpent that lived in this river. He knew He had to challenge Kaliya, so He started slapping His biceps and His thighs. Then he climbed onto a tree, dove into that water and He started splashing around like a champ. Bhagavan Krshna was kicking His legs and moving His arms and this infuriated Kaliya. So Kaliya consciously bit Bhagavan Krshna in His vital parts (neck, near His wrists, near His heart). And after that Kaliya wrapped up his coils around Him and strangled Bhagavan Krshna and Bhagavan Krshna was just in that snake, motionless, right in the middle of that river. When those kids and cows saw their Bhagavan was a zombie, they became unconscious as they couldn’t deal with it. And all of those animals were just lost, purposeless.

At the same time, Devi Yashoda, Deva Nanda, they all started seeing and feeling fear, and they communicated with themselves that something wrong was happening. They decided that they needed to find their cows, kids and Bhagavan Krshna. Everyone was rattled except Balarama. This was all a leela for him, ‘All of you are being too dramatic. Pay attention to me.’ So they started tracing where their cows and children went. They were able to trace Bhagavan Krshna because of the uniqueness of His footprint as on His foot were the symbols of a discus and a conch. Then when they came to the river, they also saw Bhagavan Krshna as if dead, and all the kids unconscious, animals lost, and they were frozen.

Finally Devi Yashoda started ripping away from people to go into the river. Then Deva Nanda tried to go in, and Balarama had to stop him. When Bhagavan Krshna saw how devastated all of the humans and animals were, He felt it was enough of this leela and He started expanding His body and was able to release Himself from the coils of Kaliya. Then He started swimming in circles and so was Kaliya. They were both ready to fight it out and were circling each other. Bhagavan Krshna was fast and has clarity, but Kaliya does not as this has never happened before. Bhagavan Krshna quickly climbed onto one of the hoods of Kaliya and started dancing. All of the devas came and some of them started playing their instruments (tabla, mridangam ). Some started throwing flowers to be part of this celebration.

Bhagavan Krshna was literally trampling the heads of Kaliya as each one came up. Soon Kaliya started to bleed from every orifice and when he became so weak, he started to reflect on who he thought he was, and Who This Young Boy was who was on top of him. And in that reflection he came to that clarity that he was limited and the One dancing on him, was not just a six year old boy, but that this was The Infinite and then fainted. Watching all of this were Kaliya’s wives. They rushed over to where Bhagavan Krshna was, while Kaliya was just lying flat on the water and they started sharing lovely Vedanta.

Vedanta: They say to Bhagavan Krshna, “Our husband is blessed. Who else has so many foot marks on their being than our husband”. He is drowning, dying in that water, and the wives are saying how lucky he is. They say, “You are the one who resides in the elements.” We study about air, water, space, fire but think they are separate from Bhagavan. They say, “You are the one who lives in these elements”. So where is Bhagavan? Where is He not? They say, “You are the Seen and the Seer. When the Seen and the Seer are the same, then that is Oneness. There is no Seen and no Seer then. There is only being or light. They say “You are the manifestation of peace, so it’s natural for you to forgive our husband.” Those who are peaceful forgive more easily.

When Kaliya’s wives shared all this, it’s as if Bhagavan released the pressure on Kaliya’s body and Kaliya regained consciousness, but was breathing hard. He worshiped Bhagavan Krshna by circling around Him and then with Bhagavan’s permission, started to go to Ramanaka Island in the sea, taking with him his wives, children and friends. So Kaliya surrendered to Bhagavan as he was told that he had nothing to fear as he had Bhagavan’s marks on his head. From then, the Yamuna stopped being poisonous and started to become sweet.

Then Bhagavan Krshna swam back to the shore and all of the cows, kids and parents were so delighted that it cannot be described. One description of Bhagavan was that His curly hair would be covered in dust. So though His hair was black, it would often appear beige due to all the dust. And the attention with which everyone looked at Bhagavan Krshna was as if they had lost their hearts and then their hearts had now come back.

Vivekji now shared a story about how lucky every part of Vrindavana is, how Bhagavan lives in the elements. So relax the body, enjoy breathing, listen carefully with the eyes closed, feeling that we are the main character in the story and Bhagavan Krshna is speaking to us.

“You were on your way home when you died. There was a car accident. Nothing particularly remarkable, but fatal nonetheless. You left behind a wife and two children. It was a painless death. The EMTs tried to save you, but to no avail. Your body was so utterly shattered, that you were better off, trust me. And that’s when you met me.

• “What? What happened?”, you asked. “Where am I?”
• “You died”, I said, matter of factly, no point in mincing words.
• “There was a truck, and it was skidding”.
• “Yup”, I said.
• “I died?”
• “Yup, but don’t feel bad about it. Everyone dies”, I said.

You looked around. There was nothingness. Just you and me.

• “What is this place?”, you asked. “Is this the afterlife?”
• “More or less”, I said.
• “Are you God?”, you asked.
• “Yup, I’m God”, I replied.
• “My kids, my wife!”, you said.
• “What about them?”
• “Will they be alright?”
• “That’s what I would like to see”, I said. “You just died and your main concern is for your family. That’s good stuff right there.”

You looked at me in fascination. To you, I didn’t look like God. I just look like some man or possibly a woman, some vague authority figure. More like a grammar school teacher than the Almighty.

• “Don’t worry”, I said. “They will be fine. Your kids will remember you as perfect in every way. They didn’t have time to grow contempt for you. Your wife will be sad on the outside, but will be secretly relieved. To be fair, your marriage was falling apart. If it is any consolation, she will feel very guilty for feeling relieved”.
• “Oh!”, you said. “So what happens now? So do I go to heaven or hell or something?”
• “Neither”, I said. “You will be re-incarnated”.
• “Ah”, you said. “So the Hindus were right.
• “All religions are right in their own way”, I said. “Walk with me”.

You followed along as we strolled through the void.

• “Where are we going?”
• “Nowhere in particular”, I said. “It’s just nice to walk while we talk”.
• “So what’s the point then?”, you asked. “When I get reborn, I will just be a blank slate, right? A baby! So all my experiences in my life won’t matter”.
• “Not so”, I said. “You have within you all the knowledge and experiences of all your past lives. You just don’t remember them right now”.

I stopped walking and took you by the shoulders.

• “Your soul is more magnificent, beautiful and gigantic than you can possibly imagine. A human mind can only contain a tiny fraction of what you are. It’s like sticking your finger in a glass of water to see if it’s hot or cold. You put a tiny piece of yourself in the vessel, and when you bring it back out, you’ve gained all the experiences it had. You’ve been in a human form for the past 48 years, so you haven’t stretched out yet and felt the rest of your immense Consciousness. If we hung out here long enough, you would start remembering everything, but there is no point in doing that between each life”.
• “How many times have I been reincarnated then?”
• “Oh, lots, lots and lots, and into lots of different lives”, I said. This time around, you will be a Chinese peasant girl in 540 AD”.
• “Wait! What?”, you stammered. “You’re sending me back in time?”
• “Well, I guess technically, as time, as you know, it exists only in your universe. Things are different from where I come from.”
• “Where you come from?”, you said.
• “Oh sure!”, I explained. “I come from somewhere, somewhere else and there are others like me. I know you will want to know what it’s like there. But honestly you wouldn’t understand.”
• “Oh!”, you said, a little down. “But wait, if I get reincarnated to other places in time, I could have interacted with myself at some point.”
• “Sure, happens all the time. And with both lives only aware of their own lifespan, you don’t even know it’s happening.”
• “So what’s the point of it all?”
• Seriously?”, I asked. “Seriously, you’re asking me for the meaning of life? Isn’t that a little stereotypical?”
• “Well it’s a reasonable question”, you persisted.

I looked you in the eye.

• “The meaning of Life, the reason I made this whole universe is for you to mature.”
• “You mean mankind. You want us to mature.”
• “No, just you. I made this whole universe for you. With each new life, you grow and mature and become a larger and greater intellect.”
• “Just me? What about everyone else?”
• “There is no one else”, I said. “In this universe, there is just you and me.”

You stared blankly at me.

• “But all the people on earth.
• “All you, different incarnations of you.”
• “Wait. I’m everyone?”
• “Now, you’re getting it”, I said, with a congratulatory slap on the back.
• “I’m every human being who ever lived?”
• “Or who will ever live! Yes!”
• “I’m Abraham Lincoln?”
• “And you are John Wilkes Booth too”, I added.
• “I’m Hitler?”, you said appalled.
• “And you are the millions he killed.
• “I’m Jesus?”
• “And you are everyone who followed Him.”

You fell silent.

• “Everytime you victimize someone”, I said, “you are victimizing yourself. “Every act of kindness you’ve done, you’ve done to yourself. Every happy and sad moment ever experienced by any human was or will be experienced by you.”

You thought for a long time.

• “Why?”, you asked me. “Why do all of this?”
• “Because someday, you will become like me. Because that is who you are. You are one of my kind. You’re my child.”
• “Wow!”, you said incredulous, “you mean I’m a God?”
• “No, not yet. You’re a fetus. You are still growing. Once you have lived every human life throughout all time, you would have grown enough to be born.”
• “So the whole universe”, you said, it’s just?”
• “An Egg”, I answered. “Now it’s time for you to move on to your next life.”

And I sent you on your way.

This is from the story called ‘The Egg’ by Andy Weir.

Notes by Prashanti Gogineni