There is no power greater than the right action at the present

vasishthA Said:
Even as water is water whether or not there are waves on it, so is the wisdom of the realized man even as the external appearance keeps changing. The difference is in the eyes of the ignorant spectator. So, Rama, listen to this instruction carefully, it is sure to remove the darkness of ignorance.

It is seen that everything that is gained in this world is through Self-effort. Where the desired objective is not gained, it is seen that there is slack in self-effort. This is obvious, but what is called Fate is fictitious and is not seen. Self-Effort, is that mental, verbal and physical action which is in accordance with the instruction of a Holy one well-versed in the scriptures. It is by this self-effort that Indra become the King of Gods, brahma the creator and other deities attained their positions.

Self-effort is of two kinds - one of former births and one of the present incarnation. The latter effectively counteracts the former. So, what is called Fate is the self-effort of the previous incarnations. There is constant conflict between the two and whichever is more powerful overcomes the other.

Self effort, where it is not in accordance with the scriptures, is motivated by delusion. If the self-effort does not lead to fruition one must see if there is such action motivated by delusion and this should be corrected immediately. There is no power greater than the right action at the present. Hence, one should take recourse to self-effort, and grinding one's teeth, overcome the evil by good and fate by self-effort.

A man influenced by laziness is worse than a donkey. One should abandon laziness and strive for liberation seeing that life is ebbing away every moment. One should never revel in the filth called sense-pleasures like a worm revels in pus.

One who says "Fate is directing me to do this" is brainless and the goddess of fortune abandons him. Through self-effort one must constantly strive to acquire wisdom and realize that the self-effort is not without its own end, in the direct realization of the truth. If there were no laziness on this earth, who will be illiterate and poor ? It is due to this laziness the people live the life of animals, miserable and poverty-stricken

vAlmikI said:
At this point it was time for the evening prayers and the assembly broke up for the day.

Knowledge base of Scriptural literature with Meanings and Explanation

Today I came across a wonderful site maintained by the The Bhaktivedanta Book Trust International, Inc. which contains a knowledge-base of books written by the founder of the ISKCON. The website is accessible at http://vedabase.net/en3

It makes quite inspiring reading and the way in which the site(s) have been setup makes it very easy and pleasurable to browse. For instance, individual chapters within Srimad Bhagavatam are available as single-page summaries with links to detailed verse-wise explanations.

I enjoyed reading chapter 9 and chapter 12 in Canto 6 which explain the story of vritrasura and his fight with Indra. I quote from one verse translation (6.12.14) I really liked:

"
Since everything is dependent on the supreme will of the Personality of Godhead, one should be equipoised in fame and defamation, victory and defeat, life and death. In their effects, represented as happiness and distress, one should maintain oneself in equilibrium, without anxiety.
"

Also enjoyed the little sidekick on verse 6.9.11 which I have read earlier in Deivathin Kural.

Finally, there is an entire translation of Śrī Īśopanishad at the same site :-)

I am impressed at the amount of information presented. At the same time, the website is very user-friendly. There are four versions of all the documents (I have linked freely between 2 of those in this post) and I quite like the clean way these are presented.

Kudos to the creators!

Life history of St. Thyagaraja annotated in Songs!

Recently I came across this video in google videos, which is a "hari-katha" by Mrs. Vishaka Hari on the life and works of St. Thyagaraja, the foremost doyen and the father of carnatic music. Here it is for your listening pleasure.

Once again creadit and tons of gratitude for the uploader of this video. Mrs. Vishaka, I pray the Lord that you continue to enthrall us with such vivid and living imageries of the legends and continue to make them accessible to mortal minds forever !

Google suggests quite well!

Got a small gift from Google by doing all my research while logged into my iGoogle... in today's recommendations it threw me up this video.

Many thanks are due to the uploader of this video.

IshAvAsyam idam sarvam

"IshAvAsyam idam sarvam" means "Ishvara is [in] all of this". It is one of the great upanishat mahAvakyas that express a coherent and many times repeated truth in the great scripture that is "the upanishads": All this is Brahman or the absolute reality, the plurality is but an illusion. This thought repeats in many places in the upanishads.