Hinduism makes me lonely! :( (warning: long!)

[Satyamavejayanti]

Gaura Priya;3284349]Okay, so I'll bite the dust.

I will not give you advise on how to live your life or how to see your self or what religions to follow, let your own Intellect guide you on that.

I will provide one quote to help you decide whatever it is you need to do.

Let a person lift them self by them self; Let them not degrade the self: the self is their own friend and the self is their own enemy. BG 6.5

 

[Maya3]

I´m so sorry that you have been going through this. I can only imagine how painful it must be to suddenly get rejected by your own spiritual community.

It bothers me that people can be so cold and without any compassion at all.

I think they have behaved extremely unenlightened and discriminatory. I would not go back to that temple honestly. They don´t deserve you. Yes you are there for Krishna but it will be too hard to concentrate if the other devotees are not nice.

Are there any other Hindu temples near where you live? Even if it is not a Vaishnava temple they may have a Murti of Krishna.
Are there any ashrams near where you would feel comfortable?

Maya

 

[Gaura Priya]

Part of the problem there is that the people know your history.

And I think that's where my problem actually lies!

 

[Gaura Priya]

I´m so sorry that you have been going through this. I can only imagine how painful it must be to suddenly get rejected by your own spiritual community.

It bothers me that people can be so cold and without any compassion at all.

I think they have behaved extremely unenlightened and discriminatory. I would not go back to that temple honestly. They don´t deserve you. Yes you are there for Krishna but it will be too hard to concentrate if the other devotees are not nice.

Are there any other Hindu temples near where you live? Even if it is not a Vaishnava temple they may have a Murti of Krishna.
Are there any ashrams near where you would feel comfortable?

Maya

It would be very unfair of me to characterise the entire community being non-accepting, when a good amount of ISKCONite devotees do!

However, that does not stop from creating trigger moments for me when I go into that temple.

I happened to bump into one guy (let's call him 'Raghupati'). Raghupati is a British man who spent many many years dedicated to service at the ISKCON temple here. He was actually a saffron-clad brahmachari, and a year or so ago, stopped wearing saffron and donned the white dhoti instead!

He's back doing what he loves and working for his daily living. He told me that Krishna consciousness shouldn't be confined to the temple. He is also similar in the way my thoughts are right now, and the temple is not approving some of his activities (giving workshops on mantra meditation, for example). Raghupati has been a friend for years, and both of us understand that we do not need the temple to be good Vaishnavas, but the hurt is still there nevertheless.

For me, I regard Vaishnavism as the religion of practice, and I do not know if any non-Vaishnava temple would cut it for me. Just as Vinayaka has said a few times, the broad free-for-all approach is not without it's disadvantages, one being the watering down of centuries of tried-trusted-and-true practices and philosophies of such sampradayas. I love Vaishnavism, and it has been my way of life for so long, I don't think I could have it any other way.

 

[Jainarayan]

And I think that's where my problem actually lies!

You know the Spanish word 'confianza', right? My spelling may be off. My father used to say (Italian dialect) "too much coomferenz"... too much "conferencing" with other people... familiarity breeds contempt. Sometimes I think the old people had it right. When people know too much about you, they use it against you. I'm sure someone will one day use my self-revelations today against me, but meh, wth.

I found that out at work. I'll (try to) be brief. I work with a woman with whom I was lulled into a false sense of idle chit-chat... about the Addams Family, er I mean my in-laws day to day things, life in general. Well, I don't know how many times she'd bring up in front of a third party, a subject we talked about. If I wanted that other person to know, I would have told them. I didn't need her to break confidence. So I learned to keep my mouth shut and keep a distance. But the genie was out of the bottle, and he wasn't going back in.

 

[Gaura Priya]

plus, re: returning to Christianity- i think at this point you have cultivated such a love for Prabhupad, the bg, guru shishya system as well as love for Sri Krsna that youd find much lacking not to mention your previous beliefs looked down on. You could be leaving only to be welcomed by ppl who would view transgender ppl the same way. Accept that you dont need ppl to agree to your sweetness and beauty inside and out to recognize it yourself.

Aww, thank you so much, hunny! I really do appreciate it.

In terms of Christianity, Srila Prabhupada was very liberal. He said that one could be a Christian and praise Jehovah, or be a Muslim and praise Allah, and they would be worshipping the same Lord Vishnu. He said that people do not need to convert to another religion, but just simply chant the names of God of their respective traditions, and for him, Jesus is the Son of Krishna, Muhammad is the Messenger of Krishna, and Krishna is God Himself.

Srila Sridhar Maharaj, however, was stricter in his beliefs, saying that one should go beyond Christianity to find that inner wealth and fountain of knowledge from the recesses of Vaishnava culture.

 

[ratikala]

I love Sri Vallabhacharya's mood of devotion to Sri Nathaji. If only I could learn more about His pure sentiments to Krishna!

I promiced to send you details of the wonderfull little book on the pastimes of srinath ji

I found it for sale on a site called exotic india , it is well worth a read :namaste

 

[Gaura Priya]

You know the Spanish word 'confianza', right? My spelling may be off. My father used to say (Italian dialect) "too much coomferenz"... too much "conferencing" with other people... familiarity breeds contempt. Sometimes I think the old people had it right. When people know too much about you, they use it against you. I'm sure someone will one day use my self-revelations today against me, but meh, wth.

I found that out at work. I'll (try to) be brief. I work with a woman with whom I was lulled into a false sense of idle chit-chat... about the Addams Family, er I mean my in-laws day to day things, life in general. Well, I don't know how many times she'd bring up in front of a third party, a subject we talked about. If I wanted that other person to know, I would have told them. I didn't need her to break confidence. So I learned to keep my mouth shut and keep a distance. But the genie was out of the bottle, and he wasn't going back in.

Thank you so much for the little ancecdote. I think that's very true, actually. Since both of us were raised Catholics, I am sure that both you and I know how chaotic a Sunday Mass can be. People flood the parking lot to find a spot to go to Mass, and then people rush out of the church as soon as the service finishes and we get a traffic jam at the parish!

BUT the one thing that there wasn't much going on, was 'fellowshipping,' and maybe that was a good thing. Especially when people can use that behind your back. Maybe I should be more private about my own life outside of these situations; I go to temple for God, not necessarily to engage in idle chatter.

 

[Vinayaka]

I go to temple for God,

That is me, absolutely. Now I don't want to come across as judgmental or conceited about it, but I'm always somewhat impressed when I go on a down time, and another person is there, just to see God. I think to myself, "Now there goes a true devotee." It;s like back when we were kids and we went to a movie theatre, and this one kid just says, "I don't want to go to this movie, but this other movie." The guy can think for himself, in other words.