The Vānaprastha Adventure, Installment 34
What about my health? Medical emergencies? Where will I live? Who will take care of me? The joint-family system is broken. We have no children, or our children won’t be able or willing to take care of us. ISKCON won’t do anything for me. What do we do? Such are the questions that come up again and again. How shall we answer them?
As I’ve mentioned before, one should earlier plan one’s life in such a way that, as far as possible, some arrangement will be in place. And our Society’s culture should develop in such a way that sons will feel responsible for parents, and our gṛhastha members for the brahmacārīs, sannyāsīs, and vānaprasthas.
But this is only a future hope. Today ISKCON has next to nothing in place for the care of elders. The best we can say is that in cases of need our communities or individual devotees may respond and be helpful.
In time, like other religious and social institutions, the ISKCON community will likely develop better ways of taking care of its members. Meanwhile, the members of our pioneering generations can consider, “Should I wait for ISKCON to pull everything together so that I can have security, or do I have a higher vision?”
“I will take care of you”
There are limits to planning, limits to how much we can arrange for our own security. Even wealthy people can have everything pulled out from under them. Or even people who have next to nothing may somehow find that life is not very difficult. In the Bhāgavatam (7.9.19) Prahlāda Mahārāja says to Lord Nṛsiṁhadeva that ultimately a father and mother cannot protect their child, a doctor and medicine cannot relieve a suffering patient, and a boat on the ocean cannot protect a drowning man. It’s not that just by our plans we can guarantee security for ourselves or that without plans we’ll toss on the waves of disaster. Daivaṁ caivātra pañcamam. Finally behind everything is destiny, or the hand of God.1
In the Bhagavad-gītā Kṛṣṇa never says, “ISKCON will take care of you.” He says, yoga-kṣemaṁ vahāmy aham: “I will take care of you.” Ananyaś cintayanto mām: “Just depend on me, think of me, and I will take care of you.”2 So as vānaprasthas we’re called on to develop the confidence that Kṛṣṇa will do that (rakṣiṣyatīti viśvāso bhoktṛtve varaṇaṁ tathā).3
Kṛṣṇa is more reliable than ISKCON. Kṛṣṇa has taken care of all living entities since time immemorial. ISKCON isn’t feeding all the elephants, all the ants. Kṛṣṇa does that. So a devotee can develop confidence: “Well, if Kṛṣṇa takes care of all the elephants, all the ants, then why won’t he take care of his surrendered devotee?”
In many places in the Bhāgavatam, the aspiring devotee is encouraged to develop this dependence on Kṛṣṇa. No one else will save us. Gajendra couldn’t be saved by all his family members or fellow elephants. But when Gajendra finally surrendered to Kṛṣṇa, Kṛṣṇa saved him.4
Kṛṣṇa will give us intelligence
Going even further, Śrīla Bhaktivinoda Ṭhākura says, mārabi rākhabi yo icchā tohārā: “You may protect me, or you may kill me, but I am your eternal servant, that’s all.”5 We want to cultivate that consciousness.
In fact the vānaprastha āśrama is that institution in which time is provided to achieve these realizations. After all, one may in principle live in the vānaprastha āśrama for up to twenty-five years, and one is encouraged: “Detach yourself, detach yourself. Detach yourself and depend on Kṛṣṇa more, more, and more.” In the beginning one may be short on confidence, one may worry, one may be unsure of which way to go or what to do. But as one becomes more experienced and develops confidence by progressive detachment in Kṛṣṇa consciousness, Kṛṣṇa gives more and more direction and more and more opportunities. Dadāmi buddhi-yogaṁ taṁ yena mām upayānti te.6
After all, how have we been able to survive in householder life? Every householder takes a huge risk. We get married, and although some of us may be wealthy to begin with, so many young couples don’t really know how they’re going to make it. They don’t have sure sources of income. They don’t own all that much. And yet they embark on this course of family life. They don’t know what’s going to happen—“Will we stay healthy? Will we stay employed? Will we stay happy with one another?”—but they undertake the risk. And if they stick with it, then over some time they find themselves still alive—sometimes living better, sometimes worse, but still alive—and they can realize, “Kṛṣṇa is helping us.”
Having a child, too, is an enormous risk. We have no idea what will happen. Will the child be born healthy? Will the mother survive pregnancy and delivery? Can we afford this child? And what kind of life will the child have? Yet we accept these risks and move forward, and once again we find that Kṛṣṇa helps us.
Śrīla Prabhupāda said about gṛhastha life, “A sincere devotee of the Lord tries to invent some ways to earn his livelihood, and when he does so Kṛṣṇa helps him. Earning one’s livelihood, therefore, is not a problem. The real problem is how to get free from the bondage of birth, death and old age.”7
Similarly, for the vānaprastha the same principle applies. Kṛṣṇa is there, and one who depends on Kṛṣṇa will get intelligence and direction from Kṛṣṇa by which to progress and ultimately attain freedom from material existence.
Kṛṣṇa will do everything
Elsewhere I have suggested that there are steps one can take on the vānaprastha path that involve no risk at all. So let us begin. We can make modest beginnings, starting with steps that don’t involve much risk. As mentioned in the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam (3.12.43), vānaprastha life traditionally had four stages, and these were marked by increasing detachment—and, moreover, increasing confidence: “Kṛṣṇa will maintain me. Kṛṣṇa will take care.”8
Seeing things with a spiritual eye, one starts off on that path, and one gains confidence: “Yes, I have gone this far, and Kṛṣṇa has protected and maintained me. Let me go a little farther.” A caterpillar starts moving to a new leaf, gets a good grasp, and then moves the rest of his body.
So let us begin. Those of us who have more favorable circumstances, or greater determination and confidence, can be bolder. But bold or timid, let us go in this direction, and not merely slip into golden years of decrepitude, illusioned and weak in Kṛṣṇa consciousness. Let us be more and more engaged in Kṛṣṇa consciousness, and Kṛṣṇa will give us intelligence. Dadāmi buddhi-yogaṁ taṁ yena māṁ upayānti te.
This is so much better than being slaves to security, unable to free ourselves for a wider scope because we’re afraid—“What will happen? What will happen? What will happen?” Kṛṣṇa consciousness means getting free from that slavery and breaking through to freedom.
In a Vyāsa-pūjā offering, my godsister Jagattāriṇī Dāsī wrote to Śrīla Prabhupāda:
I discovered this quote from your class spoken in 1969 at New Vṛndāvana. I keep this message by my side when chanting and read it many times.
“The whole world is problem for ordinary persons, but to us it is not problem. Because we see everything Kṛṣṇa’s. If there is problem, it is Kṛṣṇa’s problem. Why my problem? Kṛṣṇa can know how to solve problem. So we have no problem practically. Kṛṣṇa’s problem. Kṛṣṇa will see to it.
“Just like Arjuna was encouraged that nimitta-mātraṁ bhava savyasācin:‘
You don’t worry about your victory. I have already arranged.’
“So we should have such faith and conviction and let us try. Let us do very sincerely and seriously. Then everything Kṛṣṇa will do. I haven’t got to do anything.”
You assure that Kṛṣṇa is in control of everything. Just as a chess player moves the pieces on the board, Kṛṣṇa is behind and within all that is happening. With this perspective that you have given me, I can understand what is my duty. As an insignificant servant, I must work on developing consistent realization of the fact that everything belongs to Kṛṣṇa, everything is Kṛṣṇa. That is my work. If I can do that, my responsibility is complete because then I will know my place and Kṛṣṇa will do everything. I will be freed from both fear and illusion.9
The pioneering generations of vānaprasthas are in a unique position. Either they’ll miss the boat, thinking, “No, I have family commitments. I need to keep working, or how will I live?” Or else they’ll take steps to move onward from family life.
———-
Our discussion of obstacles will continue in the next installments.
Notes:
1 Gītā 18.14.
2 Gītā 9.22.
3 Hari-bhakti-vilāsa 11.676.
4 Bhāgavatam, Canto 7, chapters 2‒4.
5 Śaraṇāgati (Ātma-nivedanam, Song 3, verse 3).
6 Gītā 10.10.
7 Bhāgavatam 7.14.5, purport.
8 Śrīla Viśvanātha Cakravartī Ṭhākura mentions in his purport to this verse that these four divisions are listed in order of progressive advancement.
9 Śrīla Prabhupāda Tributes 2020, p. 288. Śrīla Prabhupāda gave the class on May 24, 1969.
This is part of a draft
This is an excerpt from a new book I have in the works—The Vānaprastha Adventure, a guide to retirement in spiritual life. The book should be published in early 2026. Meanwhile I’ll be posting my draft here, in installments.
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