10 Elevation to Krsna Consciousness

the beginning of our birth when as a baby we were
tightly placed for nine months in the womb of a
mother. After birth, suffering continues; although a
mother may take much care for her child, the baby
still cries. Why? Because he is suffering. Either a bug
is biting, or there is a pain in the stomach or some
other malady. Whatever the case, the suffering goes
on. The child also suffers when he is forced to go to
school when he does not want to. The child does
not want to study, but the teacher gives him tasks
anyway. If we carefully analyze our lives, we will
find that they are full of suffering. Generally speak-
ing, conditioned souls are not very intelligent, and
therefore they go on suffering without ever inquir-
ing why. We should understand, however, that this
suffering is there, and if there is a remedy we must
take advantage of it.

The great sage Rsabhadeva instructed his sons in
this way: “My dear boys, in this life you have ac-
quired these beautiful bodies. Now you should know
that they are not meant for sense gratification like
the bodies of hogs and dogs but for spiritual realiza-
tion.” Essentially what Rsabhadeva is saying is that
a life of sense gratification is meant for stool eaters
like hogs, and now that we have a higher form of
life, we should not try to imitate the lower forms.
Recently we were surprised to see, while walking in
Central Park in New York City, that a group of
young American boys and girls were engaged in
worshiping hogs. While we were chanting Hare Krsna,
these groups of youngsters were chanting, “Hog!
Hog! Hog!” They were actually parading with hogs
in Central Park and bowing down before them and
