The Guru (spiritual teacher) provides us the means and gives us the instructions. It is up to us, then, how seriously we take it. Do we remember every day, “Okay, I have to practice this!” Because even that, although it sounds so easy, if we don’t make a determined effort to practice it; the next time we hear Shree Kripaluji Maharaj’s lecture telling us the same instruction, we’ll say, “Oh yeah, I heard that last week, and I forgot to practice it. Okay, let me start again.”
So how forgetful are we? It only depends on how important it is to us to find God in this life.
That’s why Roop Goswami, a principal acharya and teacher of bhakti, says,
आदौ श्रद्धा ततः साधु-सङ्गो’थ भजन-क्रिया ।
Ādau śhraddhā tataḥ sādhu-saṅgo’tha bhajana-kriyā |- Bhakti Rasamrit Sindhu 1.4.15
He says, “First you have to have hunger for God. Only then can you benefit from the association of the Guru.”
Otherwise, you can have the topmost Guru in the whole world, and you’ll hear his lectures and say, “Wow, this is amazing!”
He’s answering all my questions, and then we won’t take any steps forward because we don’t make the effort to practice. We agree with the theory that we hear, but we don’t actually practice. That’s why we’ve always come up short.
