The spiritual poverty line, and how to get out of it

The current international poverty line is at about two dollars per day, enough to eat, but not to progress. Many may not realize, but there is also a poverty line in spiritual life. How to escape it?

The current international poverty line is at about two dollars per day. This is the minimum amount of money that is estimated to be needed for fulfilling the most basic necessities for sustaining his life. Less than that and one is considered to be in extreme poverty, where one does not have even enough to eat.

Although one who makes two dollars per day may be able to buy food in most parts of the world (as long as he restricts himself to basic ingredients), he will not be able to pay for a decent house, medical treatment, decent clothes, or other basic necessities. With this level of income, one will not be able to invest in his education, and thus he will be permanently entrapped in poverty, with little hope to get out.

The reason I’m mentioning this is that many may not realize, but there is also a poverty line in spiritual life.

Many of us are content in living in an apartment in some polluted city, working in an office or factory, eating industrialized food, associating most of the time with materialistic people, and watching YouTube or Netflix in our free time. We chant a few sleepy rounds of japa here and there, follow a principle or two, and call this spiritual life.

We may be able to maintain some level of spiritual consciousness by living in this way, and of course, anything we do for Krsna is never lost, but this is more or less like someone who is living on two dollars per day. It may be sufficient to maintain some level of spiritual practice and at least not forget Krsna, but this is the bare minimum, just to keep our heads above water.

The biggest problem is that it offers us little opportunity for getting out of the circle. It creates a situation where we can’t do much to improve our practice because we don’t have enthusiasm, and we don’t have enthusiasm because we can’t improve our practice, a chicken-and-egg problem. The result is that time passes, and we don’t make much out of life.

How can we break this cycle? We need to find a source of enthusiasm. For some devotees, it starts with meeting some advanced devotee who inspires them with his or her words, for others, it may start with hearing the classes from Prabhupada. For others, a japa retreat, or simply starting to wake up earlier to chant and thus becoming able to connect more, can be the beginning of transformation. The recipe may vary, but we need to keep trying until we can find it. When we get some of our enthusiasm back, we can improve our practice, cut on bad habits and distractions, start using our time better, and thus find the space to restore our spiritual practice and start advancing again.

One point to consider is that one who is in a very advanced stage may be able to prosper in spiritual life by just sitting and chanting, but most of us can progress only with frequent association with other devotees, combined and daily spiritual practice. For this, communities of devotees are a necessity.

One can form communities in many shapes and sizes. There may be some standards that may be considered ideal, but the first priority is to just find any format that works. Be it on a farm or in a city, on-grid or off-grid, self-sustainable or not, the goal is simply to find some group of like-minded devotees that we can live peacefully with, chant, and talk about Krsna.

To be in close contact with a few like-minded devotees, cooperate with them, and practice Krsna Consciousness together is not a luxury, but one of the most basic necessities in spiritual life. It may demand one to get out of his or her comfort zone, but we just can’t go forward without this step.

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