Om bhaktadaridryabhanjanaya namaha, Salutations to the One who is breaking up the poverty of devotees.
bhakta devotees SB 3.32.40, Adi 1.108-109,
bhakta devotee Adi 4.19, Adi 6.93, Adi 7.17,
bhakta the devotees Adi 1.32, Adi 1.38, Adi 1.81,
bhakta a devotee Adi 6.100, Madhya 6.257,
bhakta all the devotees Madhya 12.159,
bhañjana breaking Madhya 1.97
bhañjana breaking Antya 20.120
daridra poverty-stricken Madhya 2.40, Madhya 3.86
daridra poor Adi 9.30
daridra poor man Madhya 5.67
daridra jīvana—poor life Antya 20.37
daridra brāhmaṇa—of a poor brāhmaṇa Madhya 3.82
We may have poverty in the world, but poverty is known through comparison with another, or with another’s station in life, or with comparison of illusion. What is not illusion is the presence of the Divine Atma within. The Divine calls the human heart home, the Divine is hrudaya vasi, the indweller of the heart. And where the Lord dwells, there can be no poverty of spirit.
The mind may say that we are living in poverty, the Gross Domestic Product may rise and rise and peoples may merit pay rises through cost-of-living adjustments. Yet, good character cannot have any price. Integrity, tri-karana suddhi, the triple inner instruments of action, the thought, speech and action – do not have any economic value. The intangible things that emerge in devotion, the spirit, the joy, the bliss, the sense of Oneness with the Lord. These things are not matters of poverty, but richness of the inner spirit. The key is in the mind. Turn the mind to the world, there is poverty abounding. Turn the mind to the heart, the home of the Lord, hrudaya vasi, there is richness of spirit.
There is no paucity of books promising to help man to discover himself; there is no dearth of discourses to guide his steps to the goal. Bhadram is only one among a thousand whom you will have heard already. You have read much and listened to many more discourses. The body grows and even starts declining but the mind gets more complex and difficult to control; it waxes in restlessness in spite of this. Sadhana is either not taken up or even when started, remains stationary and fitful. Vedana or suffering can be overcome only by the A-vedana or Yearning for the Lord. You must yearn to be free, to be rid of the chains that are binding you now; the iron chain of poverty or the golden chain of riches. Yearn as helplessly as a baby which cries for its mother, as desperately as a calf mooing for the cow, as pitifully as a starving beggar prays for a morsel of food. Let the cry come from the depth of the heart, a heart that cannot bear the chain of attachments any longer. The Lord will not be drawn by noisy pomp or empty show. He will yield only to the claim of kinship, the call of Atma to Paramatma.
Carry back with you the silence of these hills, the cool comfort of the Alakananda, the warm affection of the hot springs that gurgle from the earth here, the spirit of sacrifice which brought sages and saints to this spot. Become better Sadhakas on your return, carry on that other Pilgrimage towards the Goal more resolutely hereafter. Like the Ganga rushing towards the Sea from where its waters are derived, the Jivi must hurry towards Brahmam from which it has separated. The Ganga does not allow any obstacle to stop its course. You too should proceed, as this Alakananda proceeds, laughing, rolling, tripping gladly over rock and boulder towards the goal.
Om bhaktadaridryabhanjanaya namaha, Salutations to the One who is breaking up the poverty of devotees.
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