Live the Bhāgavatam · SB 11.28.30
Mukti· LiberationLive as the Lord’s Humble Servant
“An ordinary living entity performs material work and is transformed by the reaction to such work. Thus he is driven by various desires to continue working fruitively up to the very moment of his death. A wise person, however, having experienced his own constitutional bliss, gives up all material desires and does not engage in fruitive work.”
What the purport teaches
- Material desires drive the ordinary living entity to fruitive work until death. The reactions to that work tighten material attachment and perpetuate material defeat.
- A learned person in touch with the Supreme Lord within the heart understands the frustration of material work. Experiencing the self’s own happiness, such a person gives up material desires.
- The self-realized person does not consider himself the world’s enjoyer. He sees the cosmos as an insignificant expansion of the Lord’s potency and himself as the Lord’s humble servant.
Try this today
Before one task today, pause and remember, “I am the Lord’s humble servant, not the enjoyer of this world.”
Ask yourself
In my work today, am I seeking to be the enjoyer or the Lord’s humble servant?
Carry the question through the day, then answer it in your own words before sleep.
From Canto 10, chapter 14 onward, the translation and purports were completed by Śrīla Prabhupāda's disciples after his departure, and published by the Bhaktivedanta Book Trust.