Krishna Das shares chants and radiates wisdom around coming home, bearing witness, and doing what you want.
In this Hanging in the Heart Space session from April 8th 2021, Krishna Das weaves together bhajan chanting with ancient wisdom teachings from India, all aimed at helping us live in the heart through this often tumultuous modern age. Throughout this talk, he shares miracle stories involving Neem Karoli Baba, Swami Chidananda, and Swami Shivananda; before diving into the topics of coming home to the love in your heart, Bernie Glassman’s take on bearing witness, and the spiritual potency encased in doing what you want.
Open to Krishna Das & Michael Sternfeld’s new Bhakti course on the Ramayana: Hanuman’s Leap of Faith
Chants to the Divine Mother // Coming Home
Opening the podcast session, Krishna Das offers a dark and moving chant to the various forms of Divine Mother before bursting forth into a bright and radiant ‘Hey Ma Durga.’ After a moment of steeping in sweet silence, he begins the Dharma talk portion by discussing the inherent power of coming home to love that lives inside each of us. Next, he shares miracle stories involving Neem Karoli Baba, Swami Chidananda, Swami Sivananda, and the mantra ‘Sri Ram Jai Ram.’
“Whenever it comes over us that we’re really allowed to come home, that we really can come back to that place inside of us that is love that is home, it’s just so powerful because we’re gone so much.” – Krishna Das
Nina Rao, Devadas Labrecque, & Japna Tulsi share Neem Karoli Baba’s Windfall of Grace, on Ep. 79 of the Guest Podcast
Surrender & Bearing Witness (24:00)
Tapping into the Q&A portion of the show, Krishna Das speaks on connective spiritual topics like surrender and bearing witness, ego and suffering, chanting and enlightenment, shame and remorse, forgiveness and honoring your heart, aging and impermanence, Ram Dass and humor, as well as chanting and letting go.
“Bearing witness means to be with it without projecting your own stuff onto it… Bernie Glassman, the great Zen master—one of his main teachings was to bear witness to the joy and the suffering. Because beings suffer, and when we bear witness we are with them, and that lessens their isolation… We can’t take their pain away, but we can be with them.” – Krishna Das
Krishna Das shares on Bearing Witness to our Fears on the Be Here Now Network Awakened Heart Blog
Doing What You Want // Hanuman Chalisa (44:00)
Answering a question around discerning what actions to take in life when faced with a big decision that doesn’t have a clear answer, Krishna Das responds in simple profundity, “I do what I want.” Through this lens, he shares the last advice he got from Maharaj-ji in India before returning home. To close, he offers a powerful and flowing Hanuman Chalisa inspired by his friend Bernie Glassman. Om Shanti.
“When Maharaj-ji was sending me back to America after two and a half years in India, I said, ‘Baba, what should I do in America?’ He said, ‘Do what you want.’ Nobody in my life ever told me that, certainly not the way he meant it. ‘Do what you want.’ That put the onus on me to find out what I wanted.” – Krishna Das