We have got this body according to our past work. Karmaṇā daivā-netreṇa jantra jantor deha upapatti (SB 3.31.1). How one gets a particular type of body? Because according to his past karma. Nature will automatically act. Just like if you contact some contaminous disease, nature will act. You will have to undergo the process of disease or develop that disease. So nature's law is working so nicely. Prakṛteḥ kriyamāṇāni guṇaiḥ karmāṇi sarvaśaḥ (BG 3.27). Everything is being done by the laws of nature. So human body, when we are civilized, we should know that "Why I am suffering?" although under the spell of māyā we take suffering as enjoyment. That is called māyā. Māyā means what is not. We are thinking we are enjoying, but actually we are suffering. In this material body we have to suffer. Mātrā-sparśās tu kaunteya śītoṣṇa-sukha-duḥkha-dāḥ (BG 2.14). This example is given by Kṛṣṇa in the Bhagavad-gītā, that suffering means on account of this body. There is pinching cold, scorching heat. We feel these things on account of this body. At a certain circumstances, we feel pain; at a certain circumstance we feel happy. But actually, this so-called happiness and distress is due to the body.
- mātrā-sparśās tu kaunteya
- śītoṣṇa-sukha-duḥkha-dāḥ
- āgamāpāyino 'nityās
- tāṁs titikṣasva bhārata
- (BG 2.14)
Kṛṣṇa has advised that this material happiness and distress, they are on account of this body. They come and go. They do not stay. So long we are in this material world, this happiness and distress will come and go. Just like seasonal changes: it does not stay. It comes and again goes away. So we should not be disturbed. (aside:) If you want to stand, you can stand. It comes and goes. We should not be disturbed. Our real business is to realize ourself, self-realization. That must go on. It must not stop. That is human life. Suffering and . . . So-called suffering, distress, that will go on so long we have got this body. But we must come to the knowledge that "I am . . . I have got this body due to my past activities." That is knowledge. Karmaṇā daivā-netreṇa (SB 3.31.1).
So a sensible man should consider: "Is it not possible to stop this material body? Because I am spirit soul, it is simply covering." Here, that is human life: how to stop this contamination of this material body. So, so long we shall work irresponsibly,
- nūnaṁ pramattaḥ kurute vikarma
- yad indriya-prītaya āpṛnoti
- na sādhu manye yata ātmano 'yam
- asann api kleśada asa dehaḥ
- (SB 5.5.4)
We do not understand that this deha, this body, is always kleśada. Kleśada means giving pains. For the time being, we may feel some pleasure, but actually it is a reservoir of pain, not pleasure. The example is given in this connection . . . Formerly, this was done by the government servants to criminal, to take a man in the middle of the river and drown him, and catching his hair, and when he's almost suffocating, then they again draw from the water, and he takes little rest, and again put him into the water. So that was the system of punishment. Similarly, whatever little pleasure we are feeling, that is exactly similarly the man, when he's taken from the water, that's all. Again he's to be drowned. This material world is like that.