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We have a number of karma yogīs who worked with great love, and they are the beauty of our āshram because they made the āshram so beautiful—cleaning the garden, park, vegetable garden, and working in the kitchen. A few times a day, washing the corridors after every interval when you walk with your shoes, and when you come back to sādhanā, the karma yogīs were cleaning the corridors, washing with water that only comes from the heart. And that's love for seva; others cannot do it. Without love, one will not do it, so these karma yogīs will have more benefit from the sādhanā than those who merely understand sādhanā. Yoga is successful through karma, and without karma there is no success, and especially doing seva in the āshram is indescribable. But Kṛṣṇa, when he finished his school with his master, Gurū, Ṛṣi Sandīpa, then at the end of finishing the school, all the students should go home and lead their other life. So Ṛṣi Sandīpa organized a very big festival. So many, many Ṛṣis were invited, many yogīs, sādhus, paṇḍits, and many other people, and they were invited for eating and satsaṅg. Can you imagine how it was when all holy saints came together? All the brahmachārīs of the school, or gurukul, as they used to call it, took over the work, the seva, so Ṛṣi Sandīpa asked everyone who would like to do what kind of seva. Some said, "I will welcome the guests." Others said, "I will show the guests their place where they sleep or where they will sit." Some said, "We will be cooking." Others said, "We will serve." Others said, "We will serve the water." Others said, "We will wash the holy feet of all saints who come," and likewise. And Kṛṣṇa was standing there, so Ṛṣi Sandīpa asked Kṛṣṇa, "What are you waiting for?" He said, "Well, I am waiting till all my brothers have their choice. When something will be left over, that I will take." All work was taken over; Kṛṣṇa said, "Master, there is one very important work no one has chosen. And that is to remove the plates after eating, odstranit talíře po jídle a umít je. A to udělám," řekl Kṛṣṇa. So what do you call the dirty plates? "Dirty" is not a proper word for those plates; they are not dirty. But after eating, the plates—it is a tradition that all used to eat on the leaf of a banana because that's most pure from the viewpoint of hygiene too. So everyone gets a big piece of banana leaf, and you get on it your rice, your vegetables, your purīs, your samosas, your kachoris, your pakoras. And then they make a little bowl out of leaves also, where you get soup, where you get kheer, raita, and like this. And after eating, they move this all and throw it into the fields because it's recycling. So Kṛṣṇa said, "I will do this work because there is more benefit in it." So seva is very important; who does seva, who has a consciousness of seva, is purifying their consciousness more quickly, and there are some people who escape from the seva. There are many disciples; sometimes when I ask for some seva, they just wait till somebody else will say, "Yes, I do." So I don't want to mention the names because they will say again, "Swāmījī attacks us," but seva—so seva is very big. Therefore, you know in Līlā Amṛt, once Mahāprabhujī, full of light, full of radiance, full of his glory, divine glory, with great mercy, Mahāprabhujī came out of his room, and you can imagine it was something like lightning. And Mahāprabhujī asked Holy Gurujī, Holy Gurujī was sitting outside on the āshram veranda; Holy Gurujī sat on the verandah in the āshram with a knitting machine and made some bedsheets and cloths. Gurujī was also doing tailoring work in the āshram. Gurujī said in the morning when he got up, first he had to clean Mahāprabhujī's room, and then make the fire, warm water, and prepare for Mahāprabhujī's bath, and then clean his dress, and then do the pūjā. Mahāprabhujī is washing his feet, āratī, prayer, tilak, and then Holy Gurujī's duty was to go to the forest and collect the burning wood and so on, then go to the other village for alms and come back, and then working like tailoring or something, and cleaning the whole āshram yard, about 3,000 square meters, 4,000 square meters, every day sweeping, and the rest of the time massaging Mahāprabhujī's holy feet, singing holy bhajans, writing Mahāprabhujī some post, and so on. So Holy Gurujī had a very busy day from night till 12, 1 o'clock, and the day began at 3:30 in the morning. So Holy Gurujī said that when he was living with Mahāprabhujī, sometimes he was thinking, "Will I sleep one day in my life enough?" Because always Mahāprabhujī called him, "Come read that book." After reading half a page, "Today leave it. Go and sleep." After a half hour, call again, "Bring me that postcard which came last week, what he was writing inside." And like this, always, "Bring a glass of water. Now look outside, which star is how far it is, what is the time. Then go to sleep." Again called him, said, "Look outside, why are dogs barking? Perhaps some bhaktas came." So that was the līlā. That's God's līlā; that's Gurū kṛpā, you know. And Gurujī said he was so tired; sometimes he was so angry, so angry, Holy Gurujī said, "Unnecessarily, why does he disturb me?" But Gurujī said, "Now he has enough time to sleep; I didn't realize." Gurujī said, "Those divine, blessed days—you never know how precious is Gurudeva's presence." So one day, Mahāprabhujī came out of his room and asked Gurujī, "What do you want? If you want, I give you the kingdom of the whole three worlds," and Gurujī stood up and made praṇām to Mahāprabhujī and said, "Lord, if you want to give me something, then give me in every life your seva," and Mahāprabhujī said, "It will be, but you should have asked something more, something different." And Mahāprabhujī went into his room. Gurujī said to me one day, "You see, he could have wished anything: siddhis for flying, or all kinds of siddhis, all mokṣas, anything he could have wished, that would have been fulfilled immediately. But nothing is more joyful than to be with Gurudeva. If you have his seva, then your life is successful." Therefore, in one of the bhajans, Gurujī is writing, "Tīṣā Gurujī." And when Mahāprabhujī left this world, Gurujī said for some minutes it was so difficult for him, Gurujī thought he would also take his life. But he remembered again that Mahāprabhujī said, "Serving all is seva to me." Therefore, he decided to spread Mahāprabhujī's divine teaching everywhere. So seva bhāva, the feeling of serving, should come from the heart. And when once somebody refused, then Mahāprabhujī never asked again. That was the last, because Mahāprabhujī could feel what was going on in the heart of the person. So much work Mahāprabhujī used to do himself. It was a divine life with him. Recording location: Czech Republic, Strilky, Summer seminar