‘Icons of Grace: Twenty-one Lives that Defined Indian Spirituality’ is a book by respected ISKCON monk Nityanand Charan Das who is showing a path of spiritual understanding to all the readers.
The inspirational book ‘Icons of Grace’ has become a national bestseller. In the book, the author has introduced the readers to the lives of 21 extraordinary people, such as Mirabai, Ramanujacharya, Sant Tukaram, Adi Shankaracharya.
Nityanand Charan Das revealed to WION what inspired him to write the book. He also talked about his personal experiences and his journey.
He weighed in on the challenges he faces on a regular basis when he interacts with the youth of this generation.
WION: Tell us about the book – ‘Icons of Grace: Twenty-one Lives that Defined Indian Spirituality’. What was your inspiration?
Nityanand Charan Das: The book talks about the 21 most prominent spiritual saints that have ever walked on this planet. India is known for spirituality and countless souls have shown the forgotten path. ‘Icons of Grace’ describes the exemplary lives of 21 such greatest personalities in detail.
In my years of being on this path, one thing that keeps coming up again and again as the essence of devotional life is that the lord is extremely pleased when he is glorified but he is pleased more when his devotees are glorified. He says, “Devotees are my heart. They know no one but me and I know no one but them.” “Worship of my devotees is greater than the worship of me.”
The main inspiration for me was to please the Lord. I realised there is much more than what this book does as it reminds us of our great spiritual legacy and spiritual culture. This is our real history.
We thrive on spirituality but very few people are aware of who has given this to us. So this must be known especially to the present generation to preserve our spiritual legacy. Else it’s getting lost.
I have realised that these saints deserve this glory for the great work they have done. We find solace and shelter in spirituality and thus this book is an act of gratitude to these great personalities for their contribution to making our lives better.
So in essence,
1) To please Krishna
2) To preserve our spiritual legacy
3) To make the present generation aware of their roots
4) To glorify the great souls for what they have given us
WION: You have introduced readers to the lives of 21 extraordinary people who served as spiritual guides. Tell us about them. What readers shouldn’t miss while reading the book?
Nityanand Charan Das: The personalities mentioned in the book serve as role models for anyone who wishes to either start his spiritual journey or as inspiration to continue on this path. We all are spiritual by nature and thus spiritual life is our natural life and the more we connect to our natural environment, the more we stay happy. So these saints set the highest standards that we can aspire to reach.
One most important lesson that they have taught us is that no matter who we are, trials and tribulations are inevitable. But then how we respond is what will decide whether we are happy or miserable.
WION: You are a practising monk and you wish to revolutionise the current urban scenario by helping people to lead a peaceful and purposeful life. What are the challenges you face when you interact with the youth of this generation? Do you have any suggestions for the younger generation?
Nityanand Charan Das: The main challenge while interacting with the youth is that they are distracted. Moreover, mental health is an issue and to help them develop that faith in the higher power to deal with their challenges is an uphill task. To make them have faith in something that will help them in the long run rather than simply focus on some immediate gratification is tough.
Things may be behind our control but they are never beyond His (God’s) control. Life is not just hard work. It’s grace too. We must work as if everything depends on us and we must pray as if everything depends on God. Both must go hand in hand. Effort plus grace is what will help us. For grace, we need to connect with Him deeply.
And it’s not that we will have to give up anything in life. We will simply have to add Him to our lives. Spiritual life is a life of connection, not rejection. So don’t be afraid to add something valuable to your life.
WION: In a world that is chaotic, how a common man can find the path to spiritual understanding? Most people are busy with their jobs and have lesser time for self-awareness, how should they reconnect with their roots? Tell us why is this important?
Nityanand Charan Das: We must prioritise. If we don’t do it, we will never end up doing it.
We must dedicate some time every day for spiritual progress, ideally morning hours. Chant the Lord’s names and regularly hear from scriptures like Bhagavad Gita and Shrimad Bhagavat.
Associating with saintly devotees of the Lord regularly is the way we will be able to maintain a divine consciousness that will help us to make the right decisions in life.
A pencil that is blunt can’t be much of a help, to sharpen it might seem to be time-consuming but it’s not. It’s only going to help us write better. Similarly, taking out time for our spiritual practices every day is not a waste but something that will help us write the script of life better.
WION: From aspiring to become an army officer to practising monk, how your journey has been?
Nityanand Charan Das: My life is filled with some inexplicable experiences that people may not necessarily believe but the burden of love is such that even though we don’t want to be known, we cannot serve without sharing — so let me start at the beginning.
I was born in a small village in Himachal Pradesh, into an army family. My grandfather served in World War II and my father was an army man as well, so since the beginning, my deepest desire was to become an army officer.
Of course, we would pray and chant, but nothing related to Krishna. However, when I was a young boy, I would have a recurrent vision in my mind of wearing saffron-coloured clothes and leaving home to become a sadhu— but I didn’t pay much attention to it.
I attended an army school in Jharkhand, and when I reached the 12th standard I prepared for my entrance exam for the NDA. In my entire schooling life, I had been a topper and for these exams, in particular, I had prepared well. My father’s seniors in the army had interviewed me, I had undergone intense training in Chandigarh and was confident that I would clear.
Before the exam even started I knew one thing— the army officials don’t tolerate lies. It was okay if didn’t know something, but if you lied about it — they wouldn’t trust you and therefore not select you.
My exam began and we had a number of tests… extempore, command tasks, group exam, psychological tests and a lot more.
I excelled in all except the command task. After that, I had a formal interview where the army official, who was interviewing me, already had all my test results. He asked me, ‘did you face any difficulties?’
I had undergone training, I knew I had to be honest but I replied saying ‘no, I didn’t face any difficulties’. Even though I had performed miserably in the command task. He asked me again, ‘are you sure?’ and I said ‘yes, I’m sure’.
I stepped out of that interview and all of a sudden it hit me… what had I done? As if I was in a trance and some unknown force was controlling me in that interview — and I only came back to my senses once I was out. I was devastated.
After two days, there was a second round of interviews with 15-20 army officials from different boards and here comes the shocking part — the same man who had interviewed me earlier was present and again he asked me the same question — ‘did you face any difficulties?’ and involuntarily my answer was the same ‘no’.
Again, I had no control over this and I was rejected from the NDA.
Back then, I had no explanation for this…I just wept for days to come because my biggest dream was taken away from me. Looking back now, I can connect the dots that this was all part of a much larger plan.
After being rejected, I didn’t even come out of my room for a few days. At that age, it’s easier to find solace, so when one of the teachers at that army school told me that both Amitabh Bachchan and Shah Rukh Khan had been rejected from the same academy, I began to think that maybe there was something else planned for me.
I enrolled myself in a BSC course near Himachal, where I developed a new ‘pass time’. Every time I would see a bookstall I would run to find books on mystic perfections – the tantra, mantra of it all fascinated me.
After this, I applied to study engineering, but somehow I only got a placement at a college in Baramati near Pune. It was kind of a village so I really wasn’t that happy, but if I cleared all 10 of my subjects in the first year, I would be able to transfer out.
I cleared five subjects in the first semester and again, I was fully prepared for everything in my second semester. For the mathematics 2 paper, I had solved all the questions at least three times. In fact, the day before the exam I ended up teaching my roommate because he was panicking about the paper.
The next day, when I saw the question paper in front of me, I recognised each and every question but my mind drew a complete blank. In those three hours, I could only attempt 27 marks! Imagine my roommate passed the exam, but I didn’t and that’s why I couldn’t transfer. At that point, I didn’t have any idea what was going on.
But like I said, when I look back, I understand how everything was orchestrated. In my next semester, on my way to college, I saw a blue coloured bus with the words ISKCON on it. I ran to it, to look for books of my interest but didn’t find any.
Disappointed, I went back to my college. The next day, an announcement was made that a seminar would take place ‘The Secret to Happiness’ and college would end early and all of us were thrilled. We decided to skip the seminar and play cricket instead.
On the way out I saw two sadhus walking in — one in saffron and the other in white and it was as if something was drawing me to them. Never before, had I dropped cricket for anything but that day, I told my friend — ‘let’s go listen to them, they speak good English!’ and I didn’t even know how those words came to me. I had never spoken to them before and that’s how it all began.
We ended up having Geeta classes at our cottage every week and with every passing session, I felt more connected. I had strange experiences — like one day after our class I was on my way to dinner and singing the Keerthana, entirely absorbed in the clear, starry sky when all of a sudden I felt a force has moved me from my path and placed me across the bridge.
I was physically lifted to the other side by some invisible force and I had no explanation but I was too happy to question it. It was only once I got to dinner that my friend told me the usual path we took to dinner was obstructed and he had fallen down on those stones and injured himself. That’s when I realised who that force was… I had deliberately been moved.
It’s written in the holy book that Krishna will fulfil all your material desires so things even started happening in that direction. First, of all places they could find, two army officers came to my college in Baramati to randomly interview and select two students for training and of course, I was selected.
When I reached Prayagraj, I realised that I was in a different world; that I couldn’t relate to anyone there — my biggest desire of becoming an army officer left me without warning…even though it was within my reach.
I also had another attachment that came back into my life during this time. Somehow, through my prayer, even that desire gradually left me. I had realised then that I was given access to all my desires, but I myself didn’t feel the need to reach for them.
It was also during the college days that I had the most out of the body, spiritual experience. One of the devotees sent me a box of books to read, and as I started to go through them it hit me that I had been to all those places before.
I knew them, I recognised them and that was the moment it was all over for me. For the next four days, whenever I started chanting, the tears would just flow. I’m still waiting to relive those days.
I officially became an engineer in 2006 and as a prerequisite to start our training here at the temple, we have to work outside so that we know what the other world’s like and never feel like we’ve missed out. I finished getting my work experience and in 2007, I left the other world and came here to become a monk.
It isn’t easy being a monk in Bombay [Mumbai]. From desiring to be an army officer to becoming an engineer — to finally end up becoming a monk! Of course, when I undertook training, it was difficult to convince my father that this is what I had decided.
I knew I had a responsibility towards them, but I had blind faith that ‘to the degree, you surrender to God to that level he’ll take care of your near and dear ones.’
That’s exactly what happened — both my brothers found their passion and their lives changed for the better; my father found his calling and my mother was happy.
Through spreading this message, I feel that my family has grown to millions of people. I share their pain, I share their happiness. I’ve visited so many homes in Bombay and the one thing in common is that no one likes to share! Every person thinks that the other person is happy so let me not share why I’m unhappy but let me tell you this world is a ’25Paise circus’.
The story goes, that in a village in India an announcement was made that in 25paise only, one can see the best circus. The only catch was that people could only enter one by one.
The morning of the circus came, a man stood in line for many hours to make sure he enters the circus first. When he entered he saw it was empty and there was only one big tall man present. When he asked this man, ‘where is the circus?’ he said – ‘I’ll show you!’ and he beat the person up black and blue.
When this man left the circus from the backside he thought to himself – ‘let me not share this humiliation with anyone’ — so he dusted himself and went to the other villagers waiting in line and said ‘wow, what a great circus all of you must go and enjoy!’
One by one all the villagers went into the tent and received the same treatment, but not a single one of them warned the others. At night when they all gathered at the village square, some spoke of clowns, others of elephants but no one said what actually happened.
Every person felt bad that night because they all thought ‘everyone else saw such great things, it was only I who suffered!’ In this world everyone goes through struggles and trials, why must we pretend?
We think we are the only ones but actually, everyone is passing through an exam, just that the question paper is different. We see our question paper and we think mine is the toughest.
It’s absolutely ok if we are going through some trials as we are living in a material world. Ups and downs are a part of life. Some give up and some don’t and they eventually grow and come out victorious, provided they have a strong shelter which is Krishna as we read in Mahabharata.
We should not be ashamed of our struggles. In fact, we must set an example for others as to how to deal with them and that is the greatest service we can do to others is to let us try and put a smile on everyone’s face by giving them shelter in Krishna.
Unless we connect to our supreme father, we shall continue to struggle and it’s a fact that’s our calling but we don’t know.
Wherever and whatever we are, we must simply connect with Krishna and he will turn our adversities into opportunities and curses into blessings.
The book ‘Icons of Grace: Twenty-one Lives that Defined Indian Spirituality’ is available on Amazon.