Making the next life Divine!

When a child is born, he neither knows how to smoke now how to drink, but through association he becomes a drunkard or smoker. Association is the most important factor.

Hence it is emphasized in Sastra: "varam huta vaha jvala - panjarantar vyavasthitih ; na sauri cinta vimuka jana samvasa vaisasam" - "It is better to accept the miseries of being engaged within bars and surrounded by burning flames than to associate with the non devotees. Such association is a very great hardship." (CC Madhya 22.91)

So, attaining a human form which gives us a chance to make our next life divine, we should make all endeavour to cultivate divine consciousness. This can easily be done through association. Through divine association, our consciousness is made divine and through demoniac association, our consciousness is made demoniac because whatever the mind focuses on, the deep impressions are immediately instilled upon the mind.

Therefore, our consciousness must be trained to be divine through proper association of those who are developing divine consciousness. By associating with devotees, one awakens faith in devotional service, one's dormant love for Krsna awakens and thus one's material and conditioned existence come to an end.

The Supreme Lord is pure and His kingdom is also pure. If one wants to enter His kingdom, he must also be pure. So, if we can free ourselves from material contamination we can go back home, back to Godhead.

Srila Prabhupada