“Why do people attend satsanga? Are they of any real benefit?”
Once a saint approached a lady for bhiksha, and this was the question that she posed to him. He in turn asked her to prepare buckets full of kheer for him the next day, when he would answer her query. The next day he came back with a bowl filled up to the brim with cow dung and asked her to pour the kheer in it. Dumbfounded, the lady poured buckets and buckets of kheer. Initially the kheer spilled on the earth but gradually, the cow dung spilled down with the sheer force of the kheer and the bowl became clean and filled up with the sweet kheer.
The saint explained, “I have demonstrated the effect satsanga has on a stained soul. Constantly pour satsanga on the hearts and minds filled up to the brim with lust, hatred, attachment, desire, selfishness and viciousness till complete clarity and total cleansing is achieved. Only then will you be able to purify your existence and understand things as they are.”
Srila Prabhupada explains: “By association with undesirable companions we have learned so many bad habits and similarly by association with pure persons or devotees we can become purified of our acquired bad habits.”
“Simply by associating with exalted devotees, anyone can attain perfection of knowledge and with the sword of knowledge can cut to pieces the illusory associations within this material world. Through the association of devotees, one can engage in the service of the Lord by hearing and chanting [shravanam kirtanam]. Thus one can revive his dormant Krishna consciousness and, sticking to the cultivation of Krishna consciousness, return home, back to Godhead, even in this life.”
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