Dear Krishna,
A very happy birthday to you!
Everywhere I look, people are celebrating your birthday. Temples are beautifully decorated. Lamps are glowing. Little footprints are drawn on the floors, as if little Krishna has just walked into our homes. Devotees are singing, praying, fasting and waiting for midnight to welcome you.
How are you, Krishna?
Are you doing alright? Did you get enough rest? I know you must be tired.
Every day, millions of people call out to you from different corners of the world. They come to different temples, stand before different idols, light different lamps and say different prayers.
Everyone has something to tell you. Someone wants a job. Someone wants good health. Someone is worried about a child. Someone is carrying a broken heart. Someone is desperately waiting for something to happen. Someone has come simply to say thank you.
And you patiently listen to all of them.
You never seem to say, “Not now, I am tired.”
So, I sometimes wonder…
Do you ever get a moment for yourself?
Do you get enough rest between all those prayers?
Don’t laugh at me, Krishna. I am asking as a friend because somewhere along the way, you have become less of a distant God to me and more of someone I can talk to.
Perhaps that is what growing spiritually has slowly meant to me. I have begun to understand that the rituals I perform are not really for you. The pooja, the lamp, the flowers, the chanting, the fasting, the visits to the temple… You don’t need any of these things.
I do.
I need them because my mind is restless. My thoughts wander. My priorities get mixed up. I get carried away by anger, ego, fear, jealousy, disappointment and desire.
So perhaps these rituals are not ways of pleasing you. They are ways of disciplining me. They give my restless chitham (mind) a framework. They remind me to pause, to become quieter, to look within.
To slowly make my mind shuddha (pure)— a little cleaner, a little calmer, a little more capable of knowing what is right.
You don’t even need my prayers. But I need the person I become while offering them.
Then there is something else I have slowly begun to understand. You don’t take care only of those who remember you every day. You take care of those who have completely forgotten you too. People who perhaps don’t even believe in you and still, when they stumble, somehow you find a way to hold them.
I must admit, Krishna…
I am one of those people sometimes.
There are days when I remember you and there are days when I don’t. There are days when I sit quietly and talk to you and there are days when the noise of life becomes so loud that I completely forget you exist.
There have been moments when I have allowed anger to speak instead of kindness. When ego won over humility. When convenience won over what was right. When I hurt someone knowingly or unknowingly. When I chose an easier path even though I knew the better one.
Looking back, I know there were moments when I must have let you down. I don’t want to hide those moments from you. You already know them. You know me better than I know myself.
I simply want to ask:
Am I making you happy with the way I think, speak and live?
Not through the number of temples I visit, the prayers I chant, or the rituals I perform, but through how I treat another human being, how I conduct myself when no one is watching, whether I choose truth when a lie would be easier, whether I can forgive, whether I can help without expecting anything in return, and whether my thoughts are steadily becoming kinder.
I no longer believe that every difficulty that comes into my life is a test from you.
Why would you need to test me? You already know me by heart. You know what I can handle. You know where I am weak. You know where I am stubborn. You know where I will fall and rise again.
So perhaps the difficult moments are not examinations. Perhaps they are lessons. Perhaps you are shaping me, mentoring me, strengthening me. Sometimes by giving me what I want. Sometimes by refusing to give me what I desperately ask for. Sometimes by opening a door. And sometimes by making me wait outside one.
So today, Krishna, I don’t want to ask you to remove all the obstacles from my path. I don’t want a life without challenges. I don’t want you to make everything easy for me.
I have just one prayer.
Hold my hand and help me keep walking on the path of Dharma. That’s all. If the road is difficult, let it be difficult. If there are stones, let me learn to walk over them. If there are mountains, give me the courage to climb. If there are storms, let me learn to stand through them. I don’t want to keep worrying about the destination as I am holding your hand…
If I ever start walking away from the path, gently pull me back. If ego blinds me, remind me. If anger takes over, calm me. If fear makes me weak, strengthen me. If success makes me arrogant, humble me. If failure makes me lose hope, remind me that the story isn’t over.
And Krishna… Before I leave, I have one last question.
Did you have your food?
And please…
Get some rest tonight. You have another very busy day tomorrow. Millions of people are waiting to talk to you.
Your friend,
One among the millions who sometimes remembers you, sometimes forgets you…
but is slowly learning that you have never forgotten him.
Yatho Krishna, Thatho Vijaya (Where there is Krishna, there is victory). Hare Krishna!