I've been telling you to make God more important in your life. That doesn't mean that we have no use for the world and that doesn't mean we can be irresponsible in the world. Raganuga bhakti is not an excuse to be irresponsible and careless in the world.
Someone was asking me today that, you know, is it okay to excel in my worldly endeavors as well or am I not supposed to do that when I'm on the path of bhakti? So I told him you only have one mind. That ‘excelling switch’ in your mind that I have to do my best, that can't be turned on and off at will. So if you turn it off, it means it's off when you need it for devotion as well. If you turn on the lazy, careless switch in your brain, that means you're going to be lazy and careless in devotion as well. So we can't be careful and determined in devotion and careless in the rest of our life. We have to try to excel at work.
We have to carefully take care of all of our responsibilities in the family. We have to be good people. Raganuga bhakti means in the way you love God there's no restriction. It doesn't mean… see some people even take it to the point of, “Okay then, you know, let me just not follow any kind of schedule either in my devotion.” You know raganuga bhakti anytime, any place, right? That doesn't mean there's no benefit in saying I'm going to do devotion every day at 7 a.m. There's benefit in doing that. A raganuga bhakti person should also set a fixed time and do devotion every day at that time.
A raganuga bhakti person should follow a health regimen of exercise and carefully selected foods. We have to lead regulated lives. The whole object of devotion is to tame the mind, right? This mind is our enemy. The mind is the one that's caused us to waste uncountable opportunities in this human form. We have to tame it so that we can divert it towards devotion. But to tame it we have to lead a regulated life.
We can't be careless on the physical side and expect our mind to be under our control. You've heard Maharaj Ji say that by following external rules and regulations you condition your mind. Maharaj Ji says the more you let your mind get away with what it wants to the more it becomes stronger and stronger and more difficult to control.
You have to get it under control, make it follow some rules, and regulate it.
