View source for Cooking you cannot avoid. As a householder you have to cook for yourself, you have to cook for your children, you have to cook for somebody else or for your own self

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<div id="Lectures" class="section" sec_index="4" parent="compilation" text="Lectures"><h2>Lectures</h2>
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<div id="Bhagavad-gita_As_It_Is_Lectures" class="sub_section" sec_index="0" parent="Lectures" text="Bhagavad-gita As It Is Lectures"><h3>Bhagavad-gita As It Is Lectures</h3>
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<div id="LectureonBG24849NewYorkApril11966_0" class="quote" parent="Bhagavad-gita_As_It_Is_Lectures" book="Lec" index="107" link="Lecture on BG 2.48-49 -- New York, April 1, 1966" link_text="Lecture on BG 2.48-49 -- New York, April 1, 1966">
<div class="heading">If you think that this cooking is done for God, then your God consciousness is there. The cooking you cannot avoid. As a householder you have to cook for yourself, you have to cook for your children, you have to cook for somebody else or for your own self. Just like I am cooking. I have no here family or children, but I am cooking for myself. So cooking you cannot stop. But if you cook with the understanding that "This foodstuff is being cooked for the Lord. The Lord may be offered first; then we shall take," this is God consciousness.
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<span class="link">[[Vanisource:Lecture on BG 2.48-49 -- New York, April 1, 1966|Lecture on BG 2.48-49 -- New York, April 1, 1966]]: </span><div style="display: inline;" class="text"><p style="display: inline;">So our life should be so formed that in our every activity there will be God consciousness. That is the technique of yoga-sthaḥ. You haven't got to separately being seated in meditation as yoga, generally as we understand. Now, how much you can devote your time to meditation? Suppose one hour in the morning or one hour in the evening you can devote. But if you mold your life in such a way that always, twenty-four hours, you are in meditation, that is the platform of yoga-sthaḥ kuru karmāṇi. I am earning for the Supreme Lord. Then, when I earn, I bring things for cooking, I am thinking, "Oh, this thing will be cooked for Lord." Now, your wife cooks, and she is also very clean because it is being cooked for Lord Kṛṣṇa. You see? Now, as far as I am concerned here, I also cook myself my food and offer to Kṛṣṇa, and therefore I ask my friends that unless it is offered to Kṛṣṇa, you please do not take it. You see? Sometimes I see that in your country, while cooking, they taste. They taste. But I request them that don't taste before the cooking is finished. After cooking is finished and when it is offered to the Deity, then you take as much as you like, as much as you like. So that means there is God consciousness, that "This thing is being cooked for the Lord." The cooking will go on. If you don't think of God, you require cooking because you want to eat. The cooking is there in the program. But if you think that this cooking is done for God, then your God consciousness is there. The cooking you cannot avoid. As a householder you have to cook for yourself, you have to cook for your children, you have to cook for somebody else or for your own self. Just like I am cooking. I have no here family or children, but I am cooking for myself. So cooking you cannot stop. But if you cook with the understanding that "This foodstuff is being cooked for the Lord. The Lord may be offered first; then we shall take," this is God consciousness. This is God consciousness. But is it very difficult thing? Anyone can accept this. Anyone can do it. It is not... Because your cooking business is not stopped. Simply the mode of thinking has to be changed. That's all. A small technique, that "I am earning for God. I am cooking for God. I am eating also for God. I am eating also for God." How is that eating you are...? "Now, because my body is dedicated to the service of the Lord, if I don't eat sufficiently to keep my body fit, then how can I work?" So your eating is also God consciousness. Your sleeping is also God consciousness. So that is the way. We have to mold our life's activities. Now, when I think that "I have to keep this body fit for working for God," so then that is not, I mean to... That is not bodily conception of life. Just like when you think that "My car has to be kept very nicely so that I can take nice work for it," then you are not identified with your car; you simply want to take some service of the car. Similarly, if you think that "This body is required for acting, for working on behalf of the Supreme Lord; therefore I must keep the body fit to work," so that is not your identification with the body. But if I use this body for sense gratification and therefore I make my body stout and strong to enjoy sense enjoyment, that is the cause of my bondage.</p>
<p>So it is a simple technique, and we have to understand it and we have to act it on the program as they have been made by experienced devotees, experienced devotees. Now, another thing. Take this... See the advantage of God consciousness. Now, if you have got determination that "I shall not take anything which is not offered to God," because your life is meant for God's service... You earn for God; you cook for God; you eat for God. Therefore the whole life is like that. Now, if you are cooking for God, if you are purchasing stores for God, then you have to know what sort of things can be offered to God because... Always remember that you are going to the store not for your own purpose. You will find in later chapters that pacanti te aghaṁ pāpāḥ... Er, no. The idea is that anyone who is doing everything for the sake of the Lord, he is freed from the reaction, but anyone who is doing anything on his own account, he is being entangled in that action and reaction. So that is the technique of becoming yoga-sthaḥ. Yoga-sthaḥ kuru karmāṇi.</p>
<p>In the next śloka, in next śloka, it is very clearly explained that</p>
:dūreṇa hy avaraṁ karma
:buddhi-yogād dhanañjaya
:buddhau śaraṇam anviccha
:kṛpaṇāḥ phala-hetavaḥ
:([[Vanisource:BG 9.49|BG 9.49]])
<p>Kṛpaṇāḥ phala-hetavaḥ. Now, here is... The word kṛpaṇa is very significant. Kṛpaṇa. There are two classes of men. The kṛpaṇa means miser, kṛpaṇa, miser. And just the opposite word of kṛpaṇa is brāhmaṇa. I have already explained to you sometimes that brāhmaṇa... Brāhmaṇa means who knows that "I am not this body; I am the... I am the... I am in spirit, conscious. I am soul, spirit, consciousness," one who knows perfectly well this understanding and the science also, that "I am qualitatively one with the Supreme Lord," ahaṁ brahmāsmi. The Vedic mantra says, ahaṁ brahmāsmi. That means "I am Brahman. I am not this matter. I am Brahman." So one who knows this science, he is called brāhmaṇa. And that doesn't matter who is he and where he is born. That doesn't matter. Simply knowing this science... Now, the opposite word is kṛpaṇa. Kṛpaṇa means miser. Whom you call miser? The miser is a man who has got enough money but does not spend it. He is called miser. Miser means who has got enough assets, but he does not spend. He simply sees his money and satisfied. He does not spend it, properly utilize it. He is called kṛpaṇa. Is it right, the miser explanation? So kṛpaṇa, who is kṛpaṇa, and who is brāhmaṇa? Brāhmaṇa means who has known that "I am spiritual identity. I am qualitatively one with the Supreme Lord. I am the part and parcel of the Lord." This knowledge, one who has developed highly and perfectly, he is called brāhmaṇa. And kṛpaṇa means who has not utilized this human form of body to understand that he is spiritual identity, Brahman, but he simply knows that "I am this body, and because this body is born in a certain place, so I am identified to that country or to that society or to that family." They are called kṛpaṇa. Kṛpaṇa means that he has not properly utilized the developed consciousness he has got in his asset. A human being has got the developed consciousness than other sub-human or the animal society. So he has to utilize. Just like you have got 100,000's of dollars. Now, if you properly utilize, it can be increased. It can be increased to millions of dollars by your intelligence if you utilize it. And if you do not utilize it, if you keep it as it is, that is also very good, but sometimes we lost the whole thing. They are called kṛpaṇa. Foolishness. Foolishness.</p>
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