84
Perfect Questions, Perfect Answers
in Los Angeles and hope that I may personally hear you in New York.
Thank you for the kindness you have shown to a  very  undeserving boy.
Sincerely, Bob Cohen
A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami ISKCON Los Angeles June 16, 1972
Bob Cohen Springfield, New Jersey
My dear Bob,
Please accept my blessings. I thank you very much for your letter dated June 12, 1972. I have noted the sentiments expressed therein with great pleasure. I am very glad to hear that you are associating with us. I know that you are a very good boy, very intelligent, and your behavior is gentle, so I have all confidence that very quickly Krṣṇa will bestow all His blessings upon you, and you will feel yourself becoming perfectly happy in Krṣṇa consciousness. One makes his advancement in Krṣṇa consciousness by voluntarily giving up his attachment to material nature, or  māyā . Such renunciation is called  tapasya . But we are not very willing to perform austerities without good reason; therefore any man with a good scientific and philosophical mind, like your good self, must first appreciate what transcendental knowledge is. If you get knowledge, automatically  tapasya  will follow, and then you make your ad-