Be True to Your Guru

The spiritual master who initiates us is called our diksha guru or our initiating guru. According to the great Vaisnava acharya, ISKCON Founder-Acharya: His Divine Grace A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada, just as we have only one father, we have only one guru, the spiritual master who initiates us. Others who teach us purely what our initiating guru has taught can also be considered spiritual masters. This is called the siksha guru or the instructing spiritual master. The instructing guru assists the spiritual master in delivering the disciple back to home, back to Godhead. If someone teaches differently from what our spiritual master has taught us, he cannot be accepted as an instructing guru.

At the time of our initiation our spiritual master absorbs the karma from our previous sinful activities to facilitate our becoming purely absorbed in Krishna consciousness. In this way he gives us a karmic clean slate so that we can practice Krishna consciousness without being impeded by our previous sinful reactions. Once initiated we must be very careful not to disobey the orders of our spiritual master because if we deviate from the path of bhakti our spiritual master will suffer reactions. Therefore once we take shelter and initiation from the bona fide spiritual master we must be very careful to always faithfully follow his instructions without any deviation. In this way by remaining true to our guru we will rapidly advance on the pathway back to home, back to Godhead.

Initiating a New Disciple

Sankarshan Das Adhikari - Initiating a New Disciple

Answers by Citing the Vedic Version:

Question: How to Be Humble Without Losing Self-Esteem?

When I left my childhood home where I was only criticized, never praised, often berated and humiliated I had no self-esteem or confidence. Once I was out on my own, I developed some self-esteem and learned I could stand up for myself. And I guess I ended up over-compensating, becoming defensive and ready to fight (not physically) anyone who I thought was wronging me. This has been my protection for many years now. So I am someone who had to build their confidence and sense of self from the ground up as an adult - something I had to work hard on. So now developing the devotional quality of humility is not easy, especially because it involves trust - trusting that humility will not lead to humiliation. I want to become a good disciple and a good devotee. I want to be able to say (as you taught in one of your lectures on the CD) "please point out my faults and correct me when I am doing something wrong," but I'm so afraid to make myself vulnerable in this way. How can I learn to be humble while also maintaining self-respect?

Forever your disciple,
R.T.

Answer: You Are One of the Most Respected People in the Universe.

Your sincerity to become a pure devotee makes you automatically one of the most respected people in the entire universe. Therefore you have plenty of space to develop humility without any fear of losing your self-esteem.

Sankarshan Das Adhikari

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