From sky-diving to distributing Srila Prabhupada’s books.
Ragalekha Devi dasi: I had a difficult childhood. My twin sister and I were raised without a father, we never saw him. Mother died in early childhood, while we went to school. Since childhood, the Lord has led me through tremendous difficulties, there have been times when there was absolutely nothing to eat.
Then in my childhood there was one incident that greatly influenced my faith. When mom left the body, my sister and I became very sick. We lay in bed and saw how the ceiling flies, something luminous and shapeless. I was very scared because I didn’t understand what it was. But in my heart I said that it was mother, her soul. I felt her breath, I felt that she was very worried about us. I began to calm her down, tell her that everything is fine with us, you can leave. She flew over us for a long time and looked at us, my sister was also very frightened at that moment. A few minutes later she left and her heart was calm, it was the feeling that Mom calmed down.
When I grew up, I became involved in parachuting and devoted 10 years to this. I felt real happiness, as it seemed to me at that time, because my soul loves to fly, and this is at least some kind of flight. And at the same time it is very romantic. I made more than 2000 jumps, received a lot of medals, diplomas, tokens. She married a high attractive skydiver. And everything seemed to be good from the material point of view, but there was no inner satisfaction at all. I even wanted to die. Now comes the understanding that at that time the Lord fulfilled my material desires.
Once I came to visit my sister and saw one book on her shelf. My hand reached out for her. Inside, I had the feeling that this book would help me. It can be said that my sister brought me to ISKCON, although she was not a Krishna girl, she only gave me a book.
That same evening, at home, I began to read a book. I opened the twelfth chapter of “devotional service,” and as I read it, I roared all night. I understood, that the Lord gave me the most important gold of love, here it is happiness. These were tears of love, tears of revelation. My whole life has changed overnight. I realized that in this world there is nothing good for me. Difficulties in sports, dissatisfaction in family life, through all this, Krishna suggested that the goal of human life is quite different. Thanks to books, I understood what I was looking for, and if there were not all the difficulties in my life, then most likely I would not understand the value of this knowledge.
When I came to ISKCON, I gave all my parachute awards to the museum, gave all my old life. When I found devotees, I cried: “Krishna, why you didn’t take me to yourself before, I wouldn’t do anything about it.” Happiness then turns out to be in Krishna consciousness, and not in recognition, honor or reward.
Then Indradyumna Swami arrived at the recreation center for railway workers, and we went to his programs with our daughter. Gurudev said, spread books and all your problems solved at once. Since then, I have been distributing books for more than 20 years. For devotees a very important point - the instructions of the guru. The spiritual master is the mediator between us and the Lord. He takes away everything unfavorable, everything that hinders us on the spiritual path.
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