Richard had chosen the life of a beggar, sleeping on riverbanks or under trees, searching for God by exploring holy places, and learning spiritual lessons on the way. He believed God was pushing him to seek more truths. From Varanasi, Richard travelled to Pashupatinath at Kathmandu Valley in Nepal. Being a foreigner he was rejected entry into the temple of Lord Shiva by the guards. Richard was crestfallen as he had travelled long distances in train and rear of trucks, with much hope to discover a spiritual meaning to life. At much risk, he covered himself with sacrificial ashes and attempted to enter the temple again. This time not only the guards didn’t recognize him, they dragged him to the central altar of God and honored him with an exclusive opportunity to see and worship God in the temple. Richard was overwhelmed by this turnaround and felt deeply humbled.
“Did he not recognize me in my disguise or was he aware who I was and simply honoring my determination? This I will never know. Whatever the reason, I was deeply humbled. I had defied human law and deserved to be beaten, but God is merciful. Standing before the altar, my limbs covered with ashes, my drab ascetic robes, and tangled, matted hair awkwardly covered with silks and flowers, I squeezed my tearing eyes shut, joined my palms and prayed that I would be shown my true path as I continued my journey.”
Reflecting on this incident, I felt it’s easy to be humble when we fail, but to be humble, prayerful and grateful during success reveals the substance of a person’s character. Before an important event in my life, like exams, a lecture programme or a critical meeting, I have been nervous and intensely prayerful. However if the event turns out to be successful, I am not as prayerful as before the event. I offer a customary ‘thank you’ to God and riding the wave of success, forget about the desperation I had before the event. There is pride in the heart and a feeling that my hard work and preparation merited the success. Reading Radhanath Swami’s mood of gratitude and humility after he made it to the altar of the temple has taught me a lesson on humility and prayer; it’s equally important to be humble and prayerful during success.
Radhanath Swami celebrates the success of his students but as a loving father guards them from the dangers of pride creeping into the heart. He says, “I become extremely happy when I hear all of you doing well, but I also fear that pride may enter the heart and spoil everything.” Once one of his students gave a series of excellent talks in Mumbai on spiritual science, and thousands attended daily. News of the glory of his student reached Radhanath Swami, who was at the time in America. He promptly wrote a letter to his student, thanking him for the service and congratulating him for the success. He also cautioned at the end of the letter, “Please be humble. Souls greater than both you and me have fallen away from spiritual life, due to arrogance and pride. Carefully guard against pride by cultivating humility, and never think yourself to be better than the most menial servant who washes pots in the temple.”
Radhanath Swami’s tireless efforts have created an excellent community of spiritual seekers in Mumbai. People from all over the world come to Mumbai to learn from him. When he was recently honored for this successful project, he humbly revealed his state of consciousness, “I am not responsible for all this success. I am simply a cheer leader, standing on the side, and watching it all happen. I simply keep cheering as all of you are doing wonderful things”. Despite engineering many successful projects, his consciousness is immersed in giving credit to his guru. “This is my guru’s sense of humor that he is allowing me to be used as an instrument despite my unlimited disqualifications.” Radhanath Swami is a shining example of one striving for excellence in pleasing guru and God, and simultaneously meditating on one’s own disqualifications.
Whether success or failure, Radhanath Swami says we should be humble and make this honest confession to God, “My dear Lord, I was nothing, I am nothing, I will be nothing and You are everything”.
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Founder-acharya of the International Society For Krishna Consciousness (ISKCON)
“Go to India” a sweet but commanding voice; spoke up in the heart of young Richard (later Radhanath Swami) who was immersed in meditation, his search for meaning in life has brought him to the Isle of Crete. Today he was ordered to go to India. Born and raised in the middle class suburbs of Chicago, Radhanath swami grew up in the 1950’s and 60’s era when popular musicians protested war, prejudice and social injustice. Radhanath swami would listen to these songs again and again, but their lyrics referring to God stirred his soul. Peter, Paul and Mary- the folk trio from Greenswich village sang in their debut album
“Early in the morning, about the break of day
I ask the Lord, to help me find my way”
This simple prayer was to guide Radhanath swami in the coming years of his life........
Pride destroys our material as well as spiritual life. Humility is the backbone of real,eternal happiness.
View CommentThanks for the lesson.
Maharaj always mentions we have to be humble then the blade of grass & more tolerant than a tree. He practically shown that example to never allow pride enter into his heart in spite of doing so much of seva & dedicating his life for the spiritual welfare of all of us.
View CommentH.H.Radhanth Swami is an excellant Teacher and spiritual guide…!!!
View CommentH.H.Radhanath Swami is an excellant Teacher and Spiritual guide…!!!
View CommentAn extremly difficult task in this material world to be prideless when succsess comes,forgeting stressful time before succsess, but still there is a hope against hope that we take shelter of Radhanath Swami’s prayers to the God and try our level best with utmost honesty to be humble and caring for others.Thank you very much.
View CommentRadhanath swami is really helping thousands & lakhs of peoples around the globe…just to become god conscious means ultimately happy
View CommentThis is true!Humility and Pride these are 2 qualities which we are always fighting for and against.Ordinarily people like us are more on the side of Pride than humility because it fans our ego.We resort to humility only when we are in difficulty and pretend to be humble.This is well pointed out by Radhanath Swami for us to be guarded against. Thank you Radhanath Swami. We hope that somehow we are able to follow this instruction of yours!
View Commentwonderful… simply wonderful. I could have a small glimpse of what a sadhu is… thank you for sharing this…
View CommentThank You Maharaj for reminding us again and again that we are nothing, nothing and nothing and God is everything.
View CommentSpellbound…
View CommentThis most difficult lesson of being humble during success and not get carried away, is made easy because of Radhanath Swami’s personal example and presence in his devotees’ hearts. Truly this is the Lord’s arrangement.
View Commentperfect statement, one must undeerstand that he is nothing and the lord is everything, thanks for sharing, regards, rajesh karia
View Commentvery powerful expereince of radhanath swami with great realizations, regards, bhakti
View CommentIt is not that Radhanath Swami considers any kitchen job as menial – that may be so by our calculations – Radhanath Swami holds both in same esteem.
View Comment“My dear Lord, I was nothing, I am nothing, I will be nothing and You are everything” – Radhanath Swami shows us our position and the atitute that we need to carry in life. Thank you.
View CommentThrough his personal example Radhanath Swami teaches time and again how to be humble and adopt a prayerful mood in any situation in life.
View CommentWow!!!Simply wonderful… Radhanath Swami is an exemplary teacher…
View CommentYes it is so true that we cannot be humble when we are successful. We may make a show of humility and give the credit to others, when we are successful, however, in our mind we think “I did it all. Lord was merciful on ME”.
I need to learn this ART of being “humble” which is possible only if sincerely implement Radhanath Maharaj’s teachings.
View CommentRadhanath Swami’s lessons on humility are glorious forever. Because he lives what he speaks.
View Comment“Whether success or failure, Radhanath Swami says we should be humble and make this honest confession to God, “My dear Lord, I was nothing, I am nothing, I will be nothing and You are everything”.” – This mood is really hard to have and just the fact that Radhanath swami has this beautiful mood and inspires his students to have the same mood is really really inspiring.
View CommentWhen we look at Radhanath Maharaj we can see a living example of a person who is humble and selfless. That’s why his words have such an effect on us.
View CommentRadhanath Swami is so concerned about the spiritual lives of his disciples.
View Commentyour observation is keen…and you speak out the heart of most of us. Radhanath Swami Maharaj, on the other hand is out of this world.
View Commentfrom this sharing one can easily get convinced that in this world of duplicity and show business, one even not doing anything claims his achievement and spread their success stories, whereas in case of radhanath swami inspite of doing so much endeavour for the mankind he simply out of humility passes the credit to his guru maharaj and the supreme god,
View CommentJust wonderful
View CommentSuch a wonderful lesson to learn on humility!
View Comment“I had defied human law and deserved to be beaten, but God is merciful” This statment is very touching. Only a great advanced devotee of the Lord can think in this way, that he is wrong and deserves punishment. Very very rare to find such type of thinking in today’s world. Thank you Maharaj for this wonderful lesson given at such a hard time of your journey.
View CommentRadhanath Swami has often mentioned that it is our attitude of humility and sincerity that attracts the Lord rather than big donations. In his book, we can find so many examples where he prays to the Lord with utmost humility and no trace of any pride.
View CommentRadhanath Swami’s intense desire for God has made him the great spiritual leader that he is. He does not teach that there is no God, or that everyone is God in all respects, but teaches that everyone is God’s eternal part and a loving servant.
View CommentAll Golries To H.H.Radhanath Swami Maharaj
Rightly said, though it is difficult to cultivate humility, and pride may come easy, it should be our constant endeavour to be as humble as possible wherever situations may make us unduly proud.
Hare Krishna
View CommentRadhanath Swami always emphasizes on Humility because he believes in the words Pride comes before Fall.
View CommentThis is such an important observation that Radhanath Swami prayed even after getting success in entering the temple. and how when we gt suvvess we just ride on it forgetting that couple of minutes back we were nervouslly praying to God for help..
View CommentThanking you so much for sharing this
radhanath swami maharaj puts a great emphasis on humility. so we all should put our heart to work upon it.
View CommentThank you. This is an inspiration to struggle to maintain humility in successful situations.
View CommentIn this experience Maharaj was being dissallowed Darshan only due to His external appearance..the guards were unaware of His pure consciousness and genuine spiritual quest..which teaches us that how one must be so careful not to judge people based on the surface but to go deeper down and try and see their hearts and touch their souls..
View CommentRadhanath Swami’s intense absorption in deep contemplation of the situations, circumstances that he has gone thru in his life, & the amazing heart-purifying lessons he teaches – this is something really worth following.
View CommentWonderful article. HH Radhanath Swami Maharaj teaching us the most important and most crucial lesson. How should our consciousness be at all turns of life be it Success or Failure. Especially how crucial it is to handle Success. Teaching us by “Acharan”. My humble obeisances to a Great Acharya.
View CommentI am very glad that his Book is scheduled for Release / Launch this month in various cities.
radhanath swami maharaj teaches here a great lesson of being humble not only at the time of failure, but at the time of success also, which reveals the substance of our character
View Commentwonderful lesson
View CommentThank you very much for sharing
View CommentAmazing Teachings of Radhanath Swami
View CommentThank You so much for sharing
View CommentVery Very nice article.
View CommentSimple souls are humble and they teach by practicing it. Thanks for sharing this wonderful meditation.
View CommentMaharaj has always followed the instruction of chaitanya Mahaprabhu.
View CommentAmazing
View CommentVery nice story.
View CommentRadhanath Maharaj’s caution against pride is really helpful and important as pride is always ready to creep in at any time in the mind even for small things.
View Commentit is very difficult in life at times to actually know whether the voice in ur heart is genuine or its ur own concoction
View CommentMaharaj teaches us that If we are not humble and always grumble then in japa we will just mumble and in devotion we will tumble
View Comment