To the Devotees

Letter to the Devotees, 19 March 2016

Dear Devotees

Please accept my blessings, all glories to Srila Prabhupada.

I am writing this letter from Vrndavana, outlining my plans for this upcoming year. As you may know I am going to be 67 years old this year and to be honest I feel it. As Srila Prabhupada said, travelling takes a toll on a preacher. I feel that toll.

A turning point came after I surfaced from the bliss of participating in this year’s Prabhupada marathon. The physical strain seriously exacerbated a neurological condition that effects my spine, a condition with which I have been coping for the last two years. I won’t get into the details, but the physical effects are intense and unrelenting. If the condition gets out of hand, I could become disabled. Obviously I don’t want that to happen. There are other, currently secondary ailments, but in short, my body is rundown. So, I feel that the prudent thing to do is to both change my lifestyle and take a semi-break for this year.

By a change of lifestyle I mean that I will come to Hungary as planned, but I will not travel to other centres in Hungary, UK, Romania or Turkey. I will stay only in Budapest and New Vraja-dhama and make use of modern internet technology to give classes and to communicate with those places where I cannot physically go. And of course those devotees are welcome to visit where I am.  

As for a semi-break, a period for recuperation, I plan on spending half the year in the Hungarian yatra s apartment in Mayapura. That means being in India this year for most of July and August, October and November, and for  the next year from January to April. In total I will be in Hungary for five months, with one brief visit to Istanbul and London.

Those rest periods will also give me an opportunity to spend further quality time in chanting and reading. So in effect it will be like a partial sabbatical. However I will continue to be accessible and I shall be on line to maintain contact with the yatra s leaders and with devotees in general.

That is it in short. No doubt you will hear me explain this in further detail, in person. I look forward to seeing you all soon. 

Hoping this meets you in the best of health and Krsna consciousness

I remain you ever well-wisher in the service of Srila Prabhupada.

Sivarama Swami