Sundarangi devi dasi and Prajna
My dearmost and most respected spiritual master and eternal father,
Hare Krsna! Please accept my most humble obeisances in the dust of your most merciful divine lotus feet. All glories to Srila Prabhupada and Lord Nitai Gaurahari.
om ajnana timirandhasya jnanajana salakaya
caksur unmilitam yena tasmai sri gurave namah
“I offer my respectful obeisances unto my spiritual master, who has opened my eyes, which were blinded by the darkness of ignorance, with the torchlight of knowledge, therefore, I offer my respectful obeisances unto him.”
nama om visnu-padaya Krsna-presthaya bhu-tale
srimate romapada-svamin iti namine
“I offer my humble obeisances at the lotus feet of my spiritual master Srila Romapada Swami. He is the dearest servant of Krsna in this world having taken full shelter at His lotus feet.”
Srila Gurudeva, I still remember the first time when we met in Phoenix in a home program where you mentioned that the spiritual master connection is eternal. I have personally experienced that if one sincerely desires and prays for spiritual guidance, Sri Krsna reciprocates and manifests externally as Sri Guru and Sri Guru finds you, to rescue you from the quagmire of this repeated birth and death cycle. You have given us the facility to access you through your personal association, through emails, through your lectures and through your disciples in parampara. All these resources were made available for us without much endeavor.
The regular hearing of His Grace Parama Rupa Prabhu’s lectures has been very helpful to us for understanding the importance, humility, and mood of developing attachment to guru and Krsna. Prabhuji’s lectures are filled with acarya upasana. We always remember the words Prabhuji and Mataji shared with us, we should become determined to become merciless to ourselves in following the instructions of the spiritual master and be merciful to others by constantly reminding ourselves between each other and questioning, “If our spiritual master is standing before us, will we be able to say what we just said and will we be able to do what we are doing?”
The series of verses from Srimad-Bhagavatam 4.28.50–55 are highly instructive to make us understand our relationship with our spiritual master. We have studied these purports over and over again. They present wonderful gems of how we should relate to our guru and how much determined and dedicated we should become in furthering the mission of the spiritual master.
Srila Gurudeva, you emphasize a lot on how one can cooperate with the desire of Srila Prabhupada, to work as a gear, as a nut, as a bolt, as a wheel in the huge machinery of ISKCON for the purpose of uplifting each and every soul. How to develop strong relationships to remove the impurities from the heart, to move to the next step? You will be the happiest person to see that people are progressing in Krsna consciousness with cooperation and at the same you are aggressive in resolving the issues to make that happen.
We always remember the time when you prayed for our entire family during Mayapura yatra. You also guided me on how certain relationship issues should not affect our daily chanting. And to make sure that they don’t touch the heart because of false ego. You are excellent Srila Gurudeva in communication and coaching irrespective of what the subject is. This is possible only because you are a pure representative of Lord Sri Krsna. When we met in Phoenix last June and you came to know that Prajna is in a camp, your response with utmost compassion and concern was amazing. I still remember you saying “What she is eating and where she is staying, a teenage devotee outside eating is not recommended.” I could see how much you spent time for immediate arrangement. Out of ignorance I started arguing with you, that it will be difficult for other devotees to deliver prasadam for her. Then Srila Gurudeva immediately you convinced me saying that I need to do the same service if some devotee teenager is in need of help. Your caring nature and compassion is outstanding. Your explanation of the situation and convincing others is just outstanding. There is no one in this life or next who can care like you Srila Gurudeva. Thank you very much! For being loving, compassionate, sincere, caring, patient, and merciful. We as parents easily forget what my daughter needs and get swapped easily with other material things. But it is amazing on how you remember and remind us without hurting our parenting ego.
Even though it is super-hot burning in June month, in spite of all the inconveniences, You visited Phoenix out of your causeless mercy. You are highly stable and tolerant always with a beautiful smile on your face. You don’t ask for help nor delegate your work to others, rather you want to do your work. Your tolerance towards the Srila Prabhupada cause is unimaginable. At the same time, you think a lot on how to give mercy to each and every person, based on their current situation.
We still keep all the emails you sent to us personally and by reading them repeatedly we always feel the love and mercy, which flows from your words to us. You always connect us to Lord Krsna, no matter how low and unqualified we are. We remember how you compassionately strengthened and guided us to Him when we were bewildered by work and health issues. We remember how you sincerely coached us when we were jumping into individual decisions. One key point consistently I learned from your coaching Srila Gurudeva is to always coach for peak performance in devotional services by creating positive environment, and always engage the mind continuously non-stop in devotional activities. Even though I have a lot of impurities and not even a single good quality, you never pointed to my negative performance, rather you spent time patiently to find a few positive qualities in me, which I don’t know either and try to improve those qualities and along with that automatically developing an atmosphere that will sustain and strengthen my sadhana and my connection and faith with Guru and Gauranga. You are our father who patiently and gladly answers even small and silly questions from us personally. Srila Gurudeva, how can we serve you?
Ever since I started traveling last year, I’m remembering you more and appreciating you more Srila Gurudeva. It is not easy to travel with ears popping, lots of time being wasted, sadhana timings being affected, with legs swollen… This reminds me of Srila Prabhupada’s purport in Sri Caitanya-caritamrta, Madhya Lila 4.186: “It is natural for those who have developed intense love for Krsna not to care for personal inconvenience and impediments. Such devotees are simply determined to execute the order of the Supreme Personality of Godhead or His representative, the spiritual master. In all circumstances, even amidst the greatest dangers, they undeviatingly carry on with the greatest determination. The intense lover of Krsna is never deviated from his service, despite all difficulties and impediments brought before him.”
Srila Gurudeva, many times when I introspect and think about what my life was and what it is now due to your presence in my life, the answer that comes is it was fearful and full of miseries but because you’ve given me the supreme shelter I feel myself to be saved from that fearful miserable condition. Srila Gurudeva you always teach by example where you never compromise with the principles. You are always my all-time role model. We got totally shocked when you followed up with us on the Houston japa retreat and similarly we are super surprised and are very happy for your extraordinary compassion when we received your email on the day when we reached Dallas and all your gentle reminders on retreats, and there are many more to share and express our deep gratitude for Srila Gurudeva. I really appreciate all the precious gifts that you’ve given me and beg your blessings that I may be able to properly utilize them in awakening my dormant love for Krsna. I apologize for my many shortcomings as a disciple and beg for your blessings that I will be able to follow in your footsteps of becoming a proper disciple/devotee.
There is a wonderful verse in Srimad-Bhagavatam 11.9.29, highlighting the importance of this human birth, “After many, many births and deaths one achieves the rare human form of life, which, although temporary, affords one the opportunity to attain the highest perfection. Thus a sober human being should quickly endeavor for the ultimate perfection of life as long as his body, which is always subject to death, has not fallen down and died. After all, sense gratification is available even in the most abominable species of life, whereas Krsna consciousness is possible only for a human being.”
I beg at your lotus feet so that I always remember the importance of human birth and try to make the best use of it to attaining the success of this life.
Appreciate your time and help as always. Thank You Very Much as always.
A servant of your servants,
Sundarangi devi dasi