The test of advancement: you are jolly.
Srila Prabhupada: That is the test. How you are advancing in chanting will be
tested how far you are free from material anxieties. That’s
all. Then real life begins.
As long as you are perturbed by material disturbances, you
should know that your spiritual life has not begun. This is
confirmed everywhere.
If you are actually brahman-realized, the symptom will be
that you are always joyful, no anxiety.
When you forget Krishna, or God, and think there is
something else than Krishna, then you are afraid. And those who are convinced and realized that there is nothing but Krishna, have no cause for fearfulness.
From a lecture by Srila Prabhupada in Hamburg,
Germany, Aug. 27, 1969