Hayagrīva: There seems to be an inconsistency here when he says, "our personality, which is being built up with its accumulated experience." Now if personality is determined by experience and if death means a forgetting of our past experience, then a new personality must emerge when we take on a new body.
Prabhupāda: No. The..., your deeds in the past you may forget, but Kṛṣṇa does not forget. He therefore gives you chance that "You wanted to do this, now here is the opportunity, you do it."
Hayagrīva: At death it's said that we take the mind...
Prabhupāda: Death means the body is changed.
Hayagrīva: Yes.
Prabhupāda: But the soul is not changed. So soul continues with his reaction of past deeds, and even though he forgets what he has done in the past, Kṛṣṇa is there. He reminds that "You wanted to do this. Do it now."
Hayagrīva: The person is the same but the false personality changes then?
Prabhupāda: Yes. So this personality can change to become perfect if he follows the instruction of Kṛṣṇa.
Hayagrīva: Because obviously, say in my next life, I'll be a different personality.
Prabhupāda: Yes. According to your work, this karmaṇā daiva netreṇa (SB 3.31.1), by..., the body will be selected, not by you but by superior authority, that "This man has acted like this, so he should get this body."
Hayagrīva: If at death the soul takes the mind, intelligence, and ego with it...
Prabhupāda: Yes.
Hayagrīva: ...into a new body... If that's the case, isn't it possible for the mind to actually remember its past lives?
Prabhupāda: Sometimes he remembers. There are many instances, just like Bhārata Mahārāja. He got the body of an animal, but by the grace of Kṛṣṇa that he remembered everything of his past life. Therefore Kṛṣṇa said, mattaḥ smṛtir jñānam apohanam, "That I am." Bhārata Mahārāja's remembrance, it is due to Kṛṣṇa's mercy. He was a devotee, but he neglected his devotional service on account for being too much attached to a small deer. So at the time of death he was thinking of the deer, he got the body of a deer. But Kṛṣṇa, out of His great mercy, He reminded him that "You are in such a position now. You have become a deer. So don't forget Me, My service." So he did that. He was always staying with devotees, that "By my fault I have got this body, so let me remain in this life with the devotees." So next life he took birth in a nice brāhmaṇa's family, but due to his past experience, that "I fell down," he remained just like a dull brain, not associating with anyone, that "I cannot fall again." So even in the next birth Kṛṣṇa can remind him of his past birth and guide him.
Hayagrīva: Now if, as Bergson says, our personality, which by definition would include the mind, the intelligence, the ego, and the soul also, as a person...,
Prabhupāda: Yes.
Hayagrīva: ...if it shoots, grows and ripens without ceasing, then why or how could the personality or the individual jīva soul return to a lower life-form? That is to say, how could a greater experience regress to a lesser experience?
Prabhupāda: The..., everything is calculated at the time of death. That is nature's process. That I was talking in the morning, that these boys, they are too much addicted to these water sports. Twenty-four hours they are indulging in this water sport. They are creating a mentality to become aquatic animal. So naturally, at the time of death, he will think of all these things and nature will give him a body. Yes. That you cannot check. After death you are completely under nature's control. You cannot dictate. That these rascal do not understand. Therefore they, "Finish this business. There is no life after death. That's all."
Hayagrīva: Now how was it that a great personality like Indra, with his mind, intelligence, and ego all intact, how is it he could become a toad?
Prabhupāda: Yes, you can become. So long you are materially existing, your thoughts are under the modes of material mature. So sometimes the thoughts are in the modes of goodness, sometimes the thoughts are in the modes of passion, and sometimes they are in the modes of ignorance and act accordingly. So up and down it is going on. So in order to keep yourself on the standard platform, one should engage himself in devotional service. That is confirmed in the Bhagavad-gītā:
- māṁ ca avyabhicāreṇa
- bhakti-yogena yaḥ sevate
- sa guṇān samatītya etān
- brahma-bhūyāya...
(aside:) Find out this verse. Māṁ ca avyabhicāreṇa bhakti-yogena yaḥ se... (pause)
Hari-śauri:
- māṁ ca yo 'vyabhicāreṇa
- bhakti-yogena sevate
- sa guṇān samatītyaitān
- brahma-bhūyāya kalpate
- (BG 14.26)
"One who engages in full devotional service, and who does not fall down in any circumstance, at once transcends the modes of material nature and thus comes to the level of Brahman."
Prabhupāda: Yes. So one has to keep himself on the Brahman platform, then there is no difficulties.
Hayagrīva: No..., no karmic regression.
Prabhupāda: Therefore we are trying to keep everyone twenty-four hours engaged in Kṛṣṇa consciousness.
Hayagrīva: That, that would be what Bergson would call creative evolution.
Prabhupāda: Yes.
Hayagrīva: He saw, he saw change as maturation. He says, "We are seeking only the precise meaning that our consciousness gives to this word 'exist,' and we find that, for a conscious being, to exist is to change, to change is to mature, to mature is to go on creating oneself endlessly."