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The esoteric master Gurdjieff defined crystallization as a point when a student of esoteric knowledge decides, "Ah, now finally I know everything I need to attain complete enlightenment." Unfortunately, such crystallization usually occurs prematurely or on a wrong platform, making it impossible to advance beyond a certain point. Thus the best policy for continued spiritual growth is to avoid crystallization as long as possible.

When I was in High School, it seemed that everyone was in a competitive race to grow up and become an adult. I had a musician friend who was one of most popular girls in school. She married the captain of the football team right after graduation. I went away to college and lost touch.

Years later when I returned from India, I looked her up and visited her. She told me a long sad tale. Once out of school, all their friends moved away to go to college. She and her ex-football team captain husband became increasingly isolated. They had two children in quick succession. He was trying to make ends meet by working as a gas station attendant. After some time he started drinking and became physically abusive. She divorced him and now faced a difficult life as a single mother.

This is a perfect case of premature crystallization. This couple had it made in High School; they were perfect little adults at the top of the High School food chain. The problem is, High School doesn't last very long, and as an artificially insulated social system, is a terrible preparation for the real world. The social skills this couple perfected in the artificial environment of High School failed them miserably and set them up for a disastrous life experience.

Most spiritual groups are like High School; they are insulated little social systems, food chains set up for the benefit of the people at the top. The value of such artificial environments is that they may help us concentrate on learning particular skills; the danger is that the knowledge they make available is limited, and will not help us advance in the real world of spiritual life.

If we are successful in the limited context of a particular spiritual group, we may mistakenly assume that we know all we need to know. This crystallization is very dangerous; later on when conditions change (as they must in a temporary material world ruled by time) we will find that our limited understanding and competence are insufficient to deal with a broader context of experience.

One of my Godbrothers, for example, was very successful in ISKCON as a book distributor, administrator and sannyasi. Then after Srila Prabhupada's disappearance the situation changed, and he found himself a political liability. Pretty soon he was out of ISKCON and had to deal with a much broader social context. He greatly reduced his spiritual practices and preaching, because suddenly he had to develop the skills needed to survive in general society.

He suffered a lot because he had become complacent and allowed himself to crystallize, confident that he had all the knowledge and skills required to continue a successful career in the insulated environment of a religious organization. This lesson, while painful, contains the secret of how to prevent premature crystallization. We must always be prepared to uproot ourselves from a comfortable situation and start over. If we don't make ourselves do it, then time and change will force us to do it.

I think of this periodic starting over as a kind of tapasya. Tapasya is a difficult concept for most Westerners, but I explain it as 'preemptive suffering.' We all have committed sinful activities in the past, creating karma that will cause us suffering in the future. Tapasya means accepting voluntary suffering in the present so that we will not have to suffer involuntarily in the future.

The point is that by periodically uprooting ourselves and deliberately starting over whenever we find ourselves becoming too comfortable, too complacent, we refresh the adaptive skills that keep us learning until we actually do reach a platform where we have enough knowledge to attain complete enlightenment. And by not waiting until time and change force us to adapt, we do it on our own determination. This is a very important secret that you will not find stated directly in any book. It is the secret of the true sannyasi, the avadhuta who is not dependent on any material situation.

For many years I would not stay in any one place. I traveled five times around the world, visiting nearly 30 countries. I visited great industrial cities and obscure tropical islands. Everywhere I went, I taught the glories of the Holy Names as a servant of my exalted guru. Even when I was in household life, I moved every six months. I never let the cobwebs of complacency cover over my sense of adventure, my thirst for challenge and change.

Internally (because that's what this is really about) I never allowed myself to be satisfied with my current level of understanding. I always sought more knowledge; and even after I had read everything available in our disciplic line, I sought a deeper understanding of what I had read. This was not simply an intellectual quest for knowledge, but a deeper journey toward maturity of intuition and emotions. I sought to integrate intellectual, emotional and physical understanding on a very deep level.

Finally I came to the supreme platform of rasa-tattva: the devotional service of the Lord as seen and understood through the science of rasa, or transcendental emotion. I realized the deep ontological meaning of the Hare Krsna maha-mantra and the kama-gayatri-mantras given as initiatory mysteries in our line, and finally my path was complete. However, this was not my decision or determination; it was declared by the Lord Himself.

When our knowledge, practice and realization are complete, the Lord Himself will appear before us and accept our service. There are so many stories in the scriptures, especially Srimad-Bhagavatam, confirming this principle. Until that time, we should strenuously avoid crystallization, because we will crystallize on an incomplete platform. The only result of that will be that, voluntarily or involuntarily, we will have to suffer to break down our insufficient understanding and motivate us toward a new cycle of learning.

A big part of my responsibility as a spiritual teacher is to keep you from premature crystallization, to spur and prod you relentlessly toward a higher understanding and a better realization of the Esoteric Teaching. You may be uncomfortable, you may not like it, but I would be failing you if I did not do this. Any time you become too comfortable, too satisfied with your progress, you can expect a rebuke from me. If, God forbid, you have actually crystallized, you may need to be completely busted down to buck private and start over on the path from the beginning. Being a real spiritual teacher can be a thankless task; but without this tapasya of continually refreshing your understanding, you will never reach the goal of complete self-realization.

So to recap, there are two big lessons here. One is never to become complacent with our understanding of spiritual life until the Lord Himself recognizes our service. The other is that the exalted and recondite transcendental science of rasa-tattva is the highest platform of spiritual understanding. Until one can easily and naturally understand the final chapters of Nectar of Devotion, his knowledge and understanding of spiritual life are incomplete and will not lead to self-realization. Guard against the complacency and false pride that lead to premature crystallization, and always be willing to start over until you really understand and fully realize this Esoteric Teaching.

I used my friends from High School as an example, but actually the point was that many spiritually-inclined people exhibit the same unfortunate tendency to live in the past, relishing faded glories. The salient tendency of this world is that nothing remains the same for very long. We have to be willing to adapt and adjust, or rapidly become irrelevant. I hope and pray never to stop learning.

Please do not confuse setbacks and tests with tapasya. The difficulties of life come unbidden; tapasya is entirely intentional and voluntary. Actually it is a way to fend off the involuntary suffering of life by accepting intentional suffering of one's own choice. When one completely surrenders his will to God's will, his enjoyment to the Lord's pleasure, this great tapasya nullifies all karma and dissolves all suffering. This extraordinary power of tapasya has to be experienced to be appreciated.

A couple of weeks ago Uddhava and I were in a heavily polluted, seedy section of town shooting footage for the 2012: Matrix Singularity video. Uddhava remarked that the last time he passed through this neighborhood, he became depressed just by seeing the suffering going on there. But because we were there to serve Krsna, there was no inconvenience; in fact, we were feeling very blissful. The very same impressions that had been a cause of suffering in ordinary consciousness were transformed into a cause of happiness for us because we were engaged in Krsna's service.

I love that line of Yoda's: "Do or not do; there is no try." So either we love Krsna or not; 'trying' to love someone is just an excuse for not loving them. Actually love is not something one can 'do'; it is a spontaneous attraction in response to the attractive features of the beloved. So if Krsna reveals Himself to us, we will be attracted by His unprecedented beauty and other transcendental qualities, and love will be the natural result.

What we have to do, then, is purify ourselves so that He will open up to us and reveal Himself.

So "there is no try," but just by chanting without ceasing we become purified. Such pure devotion is rarely achieved because we are causelessly reluctant to allow Bhagavan to operate our mind and direct us according to His pleasure. Our experience in material existence is that when we surrender to someone, we are cheated and exploited. But when we surrender to Bhagavan, we feel transcendental pleasure. By many experiences of this transcendental pleasure, we gradually develop the trust to surrender more and more of our independence to Him.

I stay fresh by continually evolving my approach to my service. I find that if I get stuck in a rut, things stop working. Variety is the spice of life, even to Krsna. Don't you think He gets bored with the same old rituals, day after day? After all, He is a restless young boy. He likes to see creativity and originality in worshiping Him.

Too much self-analysis leads to becoming dry. Use transcendental pleasure as your measure of how much you are pleasing Krsna. Why do you think I am doing a series of videos on the 'Matrix' theme? (BTW I'm surprised no one has asked this question on the forum yet.) The same old literal approach got dry. The Matrix story makes a great metaphor for being stuck in the world of maya and struggling to achieve real consciousness. Don't worry: after I finish this series of videos, I'll do something even more unconventional. After all, we don't want Krsna to get bored!

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