16 Rounds
In this letter H G Mahatma Prabhu replies to a devotee who explains that it is sometimes difficult to chant 16 rounds a day because she is a stay home mother with a young child.
It’s a matter of making a resolve to do 16 rounds and then adjusting your life to support that resolve. The resolve alone may not be enough if your lifestyle doesn’t support it.
Secondly, as I said before, chanting properly will give you a taste, which will then make it easier to chant more.
Of course, raising a young child is an additional handicap and it might require getting help to watch your son for a few hours a day so you chant peacefully and not be distracted.
Rather than thinking 16 rounds is difficult and a lot of chanting, take Srila Prabhupada’s attitude that, “16 rounds is nothing.” We’re lucky Prabhupada is not requiring that we chant 64.
If we approach a task in the mind set that it can be done, it’s not difficult, etc, we begin to see how it can be done and how it’s not difficult. However, if we approach it in the opposite way, then we experience the difficulties.
So many devotees are chanting 16 rounds consistently. Even my ten year old daughter chants 16 rounds a day. So certainly it’s not that difficult.
One American man was living in Sweden and was having a hard time learning the language. He was ready to give up when one day he was in the park and saw a man ordering his dog to sit, stand, run, walk, etc. He thought, “If a simple dog can understand Swedish, then certainly it can’t be that difficult to learn.” That was his breakthrough moment for learning the language.
So, if a simple young girl (and many of her friends her age) can chant 16 rounds a day, so can you. Just organize your life to support your chanting. And remember, solutions to problems don’t have to be complex.
Hare Krsna,
Mahatma das