Science Fiction Story

The Paradise Hotel
by Michael Dolan

“Dr. Hawk?” The voice in the clouds was thunderous, but sweet. A woman’s voice. Was God a woman?

“Dr. Hawk?” The sound echoed in his cranium. “You’re going to miss the conference.” Nancy Harding touched the sleeping research scientist gently but firmly.

“I know you’re tired, Dr., but we can’t keep them waiting.”

Hawk opened his eyes. The lobby of the Paradise Hotel hadn’t changed. Efficient uniformed attendants manned the reception desk. Polite Japanese smiles. 

A white-gloved hostess in a pressed wool skirt and blazer walking guests to the revolving glass door framed in brass fittings. Plush lobby chairs around a central fountain. Cherry blossoms. Holiday decorations. The Japanese Santa Claus sat on a candy cane throne near the glass elevator dandling a school girl on his knee. 

She plucked at his beard as he promised her toys. Hawk squirmed awake in the plush red leather chair.

He ran a hand through his hair and tried to remember where he was. Tokyo. The Paradise Hotel. Quantum Science Conference. He found his glasses on the floor under the chair where he left them and looked up at Nancy.

“What time is it?” He yawned.

Nancy handed him his briefcase. “We’re only five minutes late, Doctor. We can still make it if we hurry.”

“What am I speaking on?”

They stumbled through the lobby past the Japanese Santa Claus. She dragged him to the glass elevator. “The Quantum Leap,” She said, mashing the button. “You’re questioning the the speed limit of the universe, Einstein as time-cop.” She studied her reflection in the shiny stainless steel elevator doors while straightening his tie. A loud ding announced the arrival of the lift.

Hawk choked. “Ah Yes... Einstein’s Folly.”

As the steel cage of the glass elevator swallowed them she handed him a cup of coffee, black. They felt the swoop of the machine. He gulped the coffee; his brain cells revived.

The doors opened.

The conference center. Plush blue carpet with the company seal. Suits and ties milling around. Polls and stanchions. VIPs with name badges: Dr. Finch, Dr. Budge, Dr. Coolidge. Nancy found Art Congo from New York. Congo grinned, showing his teeth.

“Right this way Dr., You’re up next.” Hawk shuffled through the nerds to the podium. He heard himself announced.

“And now, Dr. Hawk.”

Hawk took the podium to polite applause. It was his first time in Tokyo. He looked over the crowd of well-dressed technicians. ExtraCorp was paying for the conference on robotics and metacognition.

A young Japanese scientist caught in the front row caught his eye. She smiled. There was a movement of her hands. Was she signaling to him? No, she was fumbling for her glasses. Fixing them on her nose, she straightened her hair and smiled again now that she could see better, and lowered her glance, folding her hands in her lap.

Hawk began, “Einstein set the speed limit for the universe. Nothing moves faster than the speed of light. Not even radio waves or Wi-Fi Internet signals. News of the last elections are only now reaching Alpha Centauri, some 3.5 light years distant.

But what if we could get there faster? If we could beat the speed of light, you could bet on a horse race knowing the winner before news of the race came. You could know the future before the future happened. That would be true time travel.”

Nancy looked at her watch. She knew what was coming. She had organized the Japanese conference. Hawk droned on.

“Einstein thought that the speed of light was the speed limit for the universe. Countless experiments have borne this out – it is pretty much settled theory that the speed of light is as fast as you can go. But who made Einstein the traffic cop? Who says that constants always remain constant? Is there no room for infidelity in the universe?

“Of course the universe is governed by the laws of nature – but I believe laws are made to be broken! One of the problems faced by modern physics is that there is no good explanation for the rate of deceleration and the expansion of the universe unless…”

A group of Japanese students shifted in their chairs as the girl with the glasses coughed.

“… Unless the speed of light was faster at the very moment of the Big Bang. That would imply flexibility in the speed of light. And if the speed of light is mutable, if it was faster at the creation and has gradually slowed down since the time of the Big Bang it means that if we could understand the singularity which provoked this anomaly in the speed of light, we might be able to control the velocity. We could actually speed past the universal speed limit. If we can travel faster than the speed of light we could send a message to the Mars station and receive an answer even before another message saying TV signals sent at the same time arrived there. That means any news, say the results of a horse race, could be sent to Mars with the winners of all the races before the TV signal sent at the speed of light. The anomaly in the constant, in other words, implies time travel ladies and gentlemen.”

The minute hand reached 12 on the big clock on the wall. Hawk paused for a round of applause. A smattering of hands met in polite Japanese applause. He was always amazed at how fast a crowded room could empty. As he finished his glass of water and glanced up from the podium he saw only empty chairs. The girl with the glasses had stayed behind.

Nancy was talking with Art Congo, from the New York branch. As Hawk gathered his briefcase, the girl with the glasses approached.

“Dr. Hawk? I am Tamiko Noguchi. I work with Dr. von Jensen at Tokyo University. You are familiar with von Jensen? “

“Yes of course. Thank you for coming. You can get a signed copy of my book Quantum Boogie in the lobby. Now if you excuse me…”

“Do you really believe in time travel?”

Nancy had finished with Dr. Congo. “We can make the 5 o’clock train for your flight at seven if we hurry.” She touched Hawk’s arm as if he were a doll. Hawk turned to leave.

“But do you really believe in time travel?” She said.

“Well, it’s theoretically possible. It makes a good money quote for the lecture. Also helps hide the fact there is nothing new in physics since the 1950’s. But go ahead and buy the book anyway, it’s a real page turner.”

Tomiko frowned. “But what about the anomaly in the constant?”

A man who looked like a sumo wrestler in a three-piece Armani pinstriped suit and dancing shoes approached gracefully. Security. His walkie-talkie belched. Hawk remembered Topjob from the old Goldfinger movie. All the security guy needed was a bowler hat to complete his look. It was time to clear the room.

Nancy began to walk him out. Tomiko looked forlorn.

“But Professor,” she said. “What about the anomaly?”

“I leave it to you for homework,” said Hawk making for the glass elevator escorted by Nancy.

They walked past the polls and stanchions, students in their uniforms, and wannabe geniuses. Nancy was absorbed in her travel plans. She had already called Uber. The driver could make the airport in 45 minutes. Arriving at the elevator, Hawk noticed the girl, following them.

“What if I told you that we had done this homework,” she said.

The elevator arrived with a ding and the doors slid open.

Hawk laughed.

“ I’d want to know what you’re smoking, and where you buy your stuff.”

Nancy had had enough. “Rick, really,” she sneered. “Young lady, I’m afraid you’re taking up too much of the doctor’s time.” She hustled Hawk into the elevator before the doors closed.

Tomiko ignored her. She jostled her way into the elevator. The doors closed, Nancy pushed the button for the garage. The glass elevator began its descent

Tomiko said, “What if I told you the results of this homework are here in Tokyo?”

Hawk blew into his glasses, fogging them. He polished them with a handkerchief and held them to the light to admire his work. He set them back on his nose. Through the bubble of the glass elevator he saw the skyline of Tokyo, thousands of points of light.

“I’d say you’re either blowing smoke up my ass, or Dr. Yakamoto put you up to this. Tell him I said hello. I’ll buy him a tequila if he ever makes it to Lawrence Livermore again. He sent you didn’t he?”

Nancy sighed as the elevator moved toward the garage. Tomiko was sincere. “Dr. Hawk I assure you I am not wasting your time. We’ve made significant progress on the anomaly. But we need your help. If you can meet us tomorrow at the physics lab in Daigaku University, I’m sure you will be impressed with the work.”

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

The cherry trees at Daigaku University were just beginning to bloom. The delicate pink blossoms painted the sidewalks in pastel colors. Hawk surveyed the scene. Japanese students in uniforms. Neat flagstones led to a gurgling fountain. He paused.

Which way was the physics lab? Nancy was furious at first, but saw the rescheduling as a chance to try some real sushi in Tokyo. Science had its whims. If Tomiko was right, Van Jensen of Daigaku University was sitting on an impossible discovery. If she was wrong, they were out a day’s work and a slight delay. But one didn’t visit Tokyo every day. Livermore would wait. She had dropped him off an hour ago. Uber would pick him up when he finished. Hawk watched a cherry blossom petal carried on the breeze settle on the rippling water of the fountain. A group of determined medical students wore doctor’s uniforms and rushed toward the hospital wing.

Nearing the fountain, Hawk saw the cherry blossom petal swirl in the water’s current. A pair of golden Koi fish lurked in the depths. With a glint of sunlight they flitted to the surface. The big one pecked at the pink petal in curiosity.

Hawk felt a gentle touch, a tap on the shoulder. It was the girl with the glasses, Tomiko.

He turned.

“Tomiko!”

“Dr. Hawk. Sorry for the mystery. I’m sure you appreciate the need for security.”

The large golden Koi fish blinked and submerged.

“This way,” she laughed and ran off down the walkway that led through the cherry blossoms. The garden with the fountain turned into a well-kept courtyard with newly swept bricks. Tomiko led him through a doorway marked “Physics” in Kanji, English, and French. The architecture was 1990s high tech: lots of steel tubes and glass, high ceilings, solar panels. She led him down a corridor with university classrooms. The steel doors were inset with windows for observation. Laboratories held students with safety glasses and white lab coats peering into instruments in teams. Teachers held clipboards and supervised the teams. They passed the lecture hall. A Professor held court with a huge blackboard painted with formulas. A crowd of students glared at their powerbooks with grim faces. Here they solved the problems of the world.

“Up the stairs.” Tomiko hurried along. They turned a corner, up the stairs. Administrative offices. The boiler room. Secretaries played solitaire on their computer screens or chatted with nephews on facebook, trying to look busy. Upstairs meant another flight, another long corridor. Older installations painted high school green; through the bulletproof windows of the locked doors expensive machines were being wrapped in yards of green plastic by technicians in blue space suits. The heart of the physics lab. Here, the dirty work of smashing atoms, colliding particles, laser crunchers. Tomiko raced on.

At the end of the corridor another flight of stairs. Through the windows Hawk saw the gardens below, the students like ants rushing to class. Another corridor. This one, almost abandoned, held one long machine in a huge room. It looked like a Atlas missile on its side. a wayward Death Star from an old science fiction movie.

Finally they arrived at a heavy steel door. They felt the hum of the machine through the door. Tomiko produced a set of keys and nervously fiddled with the lock. She cracked the door to let Hawk pass.

He squeezed through the door before it was shut automatically by a mechanism. As he moved through, Tomiko said, “I can come no further.”

The door closed. Hawk could feel the hum of the machine more powerfully now as it coursed through his body. It was not an unpleasant vibration. His toes tickled a bit. The twilight room was struck with lightning as a million volts from the Tesla coil sparked and flashed. Haw was blinded. He rubbed his eyes.

“You’ll need these,” a voice said in accented English. A pair of goggles was pressed into his hand. Donning them, he saw a goggled madman with wild hair grinning through broken teeth.

“Welcome, Dr. Hawk,” he said. “I am Van Jensen.”

Hawk blinked through the goggles as the room came into focus. He had heard of Van Jensen. A brilliant scientist at prestigious Institut für Physik of Humboldt University in Berlin, he had disappeared after the fall of the Berlin wall. It was assumed he had been absorbed into the Russian system, but he had effectively gone missing. He had been working in advanced particle physics and string theory with research into military particle beams.

He shook hands while searching his mind for a clue. "Van Jensen, yes, I've heard the name."

Dr. Erich Van Jensen had written a series of papers in the 1980s on wormholes in the fabric of the time-space continuum. Many considered him fringe, a lunatic. But what was he doing in Japan?

With a sweep of his hand Van Jensen waved at the device that filled the entire upper floor of the Physics building. “All very top-secret, I’m afraid,” he said, as the Tesla coil zapped another 10 million volts of lightning into the air. Hawk felt the chill through his jawbone. Through the halo of light, Van Jensen’s grin gleamed in triumph: “So, the great professor Hawk. Finally. Excuse me a moment.” He led Hawk down the machine to a long stainless steel table with electrical outlets and a control panel. Pushing a button on a cable-switch there was a loud whir and the Tesla coil crackled and wound down. Lights flickered. The machine cut off. The overhead lights came up.

“You must forgive my impertinence and the invitation with Tomiko. But something told me you might be interested in my little experiment. Come. I want to show you something.”

Van Jensen found a clearing amid the clutter of tables stacked with equipment. Lounge chairs formed a square with a coffee table in the center. Mismatched cups, a half-empty box of graham crackers and a pot of Kyoto Snow Blossom tea showed Van Jensen’s hospitality. He signaled Hawk to sit.

“Coffee? I’m afraid I only have instant. Or tea? I have some of the best green tea. It’s fresh.”

“Why all the intrigue?” Hawk slid the goggles off and looked around. “What is this? Frankenstein’s laboratory? Where’s the monster?”

“Tea it is, then,” said Van Jensen and began to pour two cups. “Sit.”

Hawk found a chair. “Look, I don’t have much time. We were supposed to fly back this evening.”

“The Japanese have a most acute sense of time,” said Van Jensen. “But the question is not whether you have time, but whether time has you.”

Hawk sat in one of the lounge chairs. He looked at Van Jensen. Without the goggles he looked even crazier. But the best engineers and scientists have the worst hair, he thought. Look at Einstein. The stranger the outfit the more advanced the scientist. He picked up his tea. The blue and white porcelain was Royal Stafford with a willow pattern, sparrows kissing in the air above a teahouse by the river.

“Japanese time runs backwards,” said Van Jensen, sipping his tea. “In Japan, time has traditionally been counted with incense sticks. As the incense burns down, your time burns up. The old Shinto priests used to count down from sunrise to sunset. So at sunrise they began the clock at 12 and counted down to sunset; when they reached the zero hour it was time for tea.”

Hawk looked at the mad professor. “I always thought the Japanese were sticklers for punctuality. But, seriously, Van Jensen, what’s this all about?”

“But I thought you knew. Haven’t you read my blog?”

“You disappeared from the scientific community years ago. I can hardly believe you have a blog. I thought you were in hiding.”

Hawk began to see tiny points of light dancing around the space between him and the madman who poured the tea.

“The speed of light is a relative constant,” he began. “It has not always been the same. At the beginning of creation, for example, when a massive singularity exploded into the known universe, light moved at a faster speed than it does now. Flexibility in the constant implies...”

Hawk removed his glasses and rubbed his forehead. “I see,” he said, clearing his head. He was obviously dealing with a madman. Tomiko had wasted his time. “Look, this all sounds like a lot of unsubstantiated parascience, like cold fusion in a pressure cooker. What proof do you have for any of your findings? You have a blog? Why haven’t I seen it? Do you have any proof? Can you reproduce your findings?”

“I was hoping you would ask. In facy, that’s why I brought you here.”

Hawk’s head was throbbing. The jet lag had played with his sense of time. He wasn’t sure if it was day or night. No more ten hour flights across the Pacific, I don’t care what the book deal is. The room began to dance. It was probably 4 O’clock in the morning back in San Francisco. Maybe he could still make the red-eye to Los Angeles.

“Look, I’m short on time. I delayed my flight until tomorrow morning, but I can only give you a couple of hours. I have to get back to the hotel, but if you have proof...”

“I’m sorry?” Van Jensen’s face was out of focus.

“I don’t have time.”

“Precisely, Dr. You don’t have time. Time has you.”

“I’m not sure, I understand,” said Hawk, sipping his tea. “What do you need me here for?”

“Quantum leaps. You’re the only one who gets it. Don’t worry, I won’t take more than an hour of your time. I can see you want proof. I have a little demonstration that might interest you. Come with me.”

Hawk set down the tea and stood. He had had enough. He was about to head for the door when Tomiko entered the room, smiling, with a pair of goggles on a tray. She bowed.

“You’ll need these,” said Jensen, picking up the goggles and offering them.

Hawk felt his head swim. Was it really jet lag or...the tea?

................................................................................................................................................

He remembered everything very clearly. Or did he? It had been about 15 minutes. As Tomiko strapped on his helmet over the goggles Hawk wondered if Van Jensen was truly mad or on the verge of a serious breakthrough. Einstein had found that time travel was indeed possible; could Van Jensen had discovered a wormhole in the fabric of time? After all, gravity waves had recently been detected flowing from a black hole: were time waves possible?

He sat in what looked like a dentist’s chair. The brain electrodes piercing the helmet barely tickled his scalp. What was in that tea? The tiny acupuncture needles tingled with a slight electric charge. The foam-padded headphones covered his ears almost entirely. He was listening to Bob Dylan’s Visions of Johanna from the Blonde on Blonde album.

Inside the museums infinity goes up on trial

Voices echo this is what salvation must be like after a while.

Through the bulletproof glass observation window he could see Van Jensen’s distorted face. Over the intercom he heard, “Dr. Hawk, can you hear me? Wiggle your left index finger if you can hear me.”

He wiggled a finger. “Wiggle again if you are comfortable.”

He wiggled again.

“The procedure will begin in only a few seconds. You’re probably wondering how a dentist chair firmly bolted to the ground can travel faster than the speed of light. The shaft above you opens to admit a carefully curated collection of time wormholes, anomalies we discovered with positron beam analysis. I can’t get too technical here, for time considerations, but if it works, we’ll blast off shortly. Wiggle again if you understand.”

He was firmly strapped to the chair, but he managed to wiggle his index finger.

The door to the capsule opened. It was Tomiko in a silver Haz-mat suit. She looked like a beekeeper with huge white gloves.

“Dr. Hawk? I hope you’re comfortable.”

Tomiko seemed much larger through the goggles. She smiled.

Hawk gritted my teeth and wiggled again. The sacrifices I have made for science. She flipped the visor up on his helmet.

“Open.”

He gritted my teeth wider. She inserted a straw. She held a strawberry-colored smoothie in a styrofoam cup with a plastic lid.

“The Triptamine compound is synthesized from a Japanese Hibiscus mushroom. It’s a local psilocybin analog. It will calm your nerves and prevent dehydration during the experiment.”

Triptamine? Psilocybin... Isn’t that?

Hawk slurped away. When I had finished, she strapped his wrists more tightly to the armrests, adjusted his goggles and flipped the visor back down.

“I think we’re ready,” she said on the intercom.

To Hawk, “Bon Voyage.”

Tomiko smiled and turned to leave.

As Hawks eyelids began to nod shut, he heard a twangy Midwestern Dylan singing into his brain, “And these visions of Johanna, they kept me up past the dawn.”

The lights dimmed. He felt the room vibrate and buzz as if a rocket ship was leaving earth. The hum of the Tesla coil released a shock of electricity in to the air. He bit down on the plastic mouthpiece and clenched his hands. WHOOSH.

The room went dark. The electricity pulsed through Hawk’s body. Another flash of lightning from the Tesla coil. The building pulsed. The milkshake had kicked in. In spite of the violent flashes of light and noise, he felt serene, distant. He was slipping down the rabbit hole. In the dark, he thought he saw the girl watching him through the porthole. He tried to stay conscious by counting prime numbers ...53, 57, 59... no 59 wasn’t prime. It was 3 times 19. Dylan’s voice droned on...”And these Visions of Johanna, they kept me up past the dawn.”

...........................................................................................................................................................

“One pill makes you larger, and one pill makes you small...and the ones that mother gives you don’t do anything at all....”

The psychedelic sounds of the Jefferson Airplane blasted through his head. He blinked. A grassy field. The sky was cerulean blue. Magical colors welcomed his eyes. He lifted the visor on his helmet.

“Where am I?”

The sound of drums over the loud rock music. People in saffron robes dancing. The women wore silken saris. He could smell strawberries in the smoke. Incense. They danced closer.

“Hare Krishna, Hare Krishna, Krishna Krishna Hare Hare...”

He had heard the melody before. The dancers swept him up as they moved forward. Were these the hippies of San Francisco? Where was Dr. Van Jensen? What time was it? Had the experiment worked?

He was in a park. He could see the Golden Gate bridge, children playing in green fields, brightly decorated kites floating on the wind. A fresh breeze cleared the incense smoke.

“Hare Rama, Hare Rama, Rama Rama, Hare Hare.

The dancers moved toward a clearing where a platform had been raised. The rock musicians were breaking down their instruments. Tie-dyed cloth decorated the stage. There were a huge pair of eyes with an exotic smile, some kind of massive Hindu doll or idol. The Juggernaut? A man sat on a giant throne.

The man was shining, a strange effulgence lit him as the sun began to set behind him. He reached down for a stainless steel tumbler of water. Raising it above his face, he let the water fall into his mouth without touching his lips to the rim of the steel. He set the tumbler down gracefully and surveyed the crowd of dancers as they approached. He grinned broadly.

Shaven-headed acolytes adjusted the speakers and equipment used by the rock band. Clad in saffron, they set the microphone before the man. Was he a guru? He smiled again as an assistant tapped the microphone. “1,2,3.”

Hawk was confused. Einstein had shown some theoretical evidence for time travel. But only into the future. Was this the future or the past? And how was he back in San Francisco? Had he passed out and suffered an attack? If Nancy had brought him home on the plane, perhaps he was having some sort of dissociative episode?

“Where am I?” he said to one of the hippies next to him.

“This is the material world, man. You’re lost in the material world. It’s a long strange trip, man. Let’s hear what the swami says.”

He focused on the guru on the stage. He had produced a pair of finger cymbals and sang a mystical song, perhaps a Hindu hymn of some kind. Jaya Radha Madhava... As the sun sank lower on the horizon the crowd fell silent. The Swami spoke:

“The transcendental vibration established by the chanting of Hare Krsna, Hare Krsna, Krsna Krsna, Hare Hare, Hare Rama, Hare Rama, Rama Rama, Hare Hare is the sublime method of reviving our Krsna consciousness. As living spiritual souls we are all originally Krsna conscious entities, but due to our association with matter from time immemorial, our consciousness is now polluted by the material atmosphere. The material atmosphere, in which we are now living, is called Maya, or illusion. Maya means ‘that which is not.’ And what is this illusion? The illusion is that we are all trying to be lords of material nature, while actually we are under the grip of her stringent laws. When a servant artificially tries to imitate the all-powerful master, this is called illusion. In this polluted concept of life, we are all trying to exploit the resources of material nature, but actually we are becoming more and more entangled in her complexities. Therefore, although we are engaged in a hard struggle to conquer nature, we are ever more dependent on her. This illusory struggle against material nature can be stopped at once by the revival of our Krsna consciousness. Krsna consciousness is not an artificial imposition of the mind; this consciousness is the original energy of the living entity. When we hear the transcendental vibration, this consciousness is revived. And this is the process recommended for this age by authorities. By practical experience also, one can perceive that by chanting this maha-mantra or the Great Chanting for Deliverance, one can at once feel a transcendental ecstasy coming through from the spiritual stratum. And when one is factually on the plane of spiritual understanding-surpassing the stages of the senses, mind, and intelligence-one is situated on the transcendental plane.

This chanting of Hare Krsna, Hare Krsna, Krsna Krsna, Hare Hare/Hare Rama, Hare Rama, Rama Rama, Hare Hare is directly enacted from the spiritual platform, and thus this sound vibration surpasses all lower strata of consciousness-namely sensual, mental, and intellectual. There is no need, therefore, to understand the language of the mantra, nor is there any need for mental speculation or any intellectual adjustment for chanting this maha-mantra. It springs automatically from the spiritual platform, and as such, anyone can take part in the chanting without any previous qualification, and dance in ecstasy.

We have seen this practically. Even a child can take part in the chanting, or even a dog can take part in it. Of course, for one who is too entangled in material life, it takes a little more time to come to the standard point, but even such a materially engrossed man is raised to the spiritual platform very quickly. When the mantra is chanted by a pure devotee of the Lord in love, it has the greatest efficacy on the hearers, and as such, this chanting should be heard from the lips of a pure devotee of the Lord, so that immediate effects can be achieved. As far as possible, chanting from the lips of non-devotees should be avoided. Milk touched by the lips of a serpent has poisonous effects.

The word Hara is the form of addressing the energy of the Lord, and the words Krsna and Rama are addressing the Lord Himself. Both Krsna and Rama mean "the supreme pleasure" and Hara is the supreme pleasure energy of the Lord, changed to hare in the vocative. The supreme pleasure energy of the Lord helps us to reach the Lord.

The material energy, called Maya, is also one of the multi energies of the Lord. And we, the living entities, are also the energy-marginal energy-of the Lord. The living entities are described as superior to material energy. When the superior energy is in contact with the inferior energy, an incompatible situation arises; but when the superior marginal energy is in contact with the superior energy, called Hara, the living entity is established in his happy, normal condition.

These three words, namely Hare, Krsna, and Rama, are transcendental seeds of the maha-mantra. The chanting is a spiritual call for the Lord and His internal energy, Hara, to give protection to the conditioned soul. This chanting is exactly like the genuine cry of a child for its mother. Mother Hara helps the devotee achieve the grace of the supreme Father, Hari, or Krsna, and the Lord reveals Himself to the devotee who chants this mantra sincerely.

No other means of spiritual realization, therefore, is as effective in this age as chanting the maha-mantra:

Hare Krsna, Hare Krsna, Krsna Krsna, Hare Hare
Hare Rama, Hare Rama, Rama Rama, Hare Hare

As he intoned these words, the guru once again picked up his finger cymbals and began to ring them together. He began humming the words of the mantra in a call and response sing-song. The dancers picked up the tune and started pounded on the drums and dancing. They looked at Hawk. Hawk smiled. He began to chant: Hare Krishna, Hare Krishna Krishna Krishna Hare Hare...

Time faded away. He had left the temporal world behind. He had discovered a place beyond time.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

“Dr. Hawk?”

“Dr. Hawk?” The voice in the clouds was thunderous, but sweet. A woman’s voice. Was this truly the realm beyond time and space? Was God a woman?

“Dr. Hawk?” The sound echoed in his cranium. “You’re going to miss the conference.” Nancy hiding touched the sleeping research scientist gently but firmly.

“I know you’re tired, Dr., but we can’t keep them waiting.”

To be continued...

It's a Barnum and Bailey World

On Madness

“You say it's only a paper moon Sailing over a cardboard sea But it wouldn't be make believe if you believed in me...” Yip Harburg

A Paper Moon

A friend of mine recently asked me to write on madness. In this Barnum and Bailey world of canvas skies and cardboard seas, its hard to keep your sanity sometimes. It’s a mad, mad, mad mad world.

Madness and sanity are questions for philosophy. Who's crazy? It depends on the difference between what's real and what's absurd, what has meaning and what is meaningless. Knowing the difference is sanity. Philosophy helps us understand the difference between what's meaningful and what's irrational. If you can't tell the difference, why then, you're crazy.

The basic problem of philosophy is meaning. We search for meaning in the universe. French existentialist writer Albert Camus explored this question in his novels, plays, and essays and came to the conclusion that there is no meaning. Life is absurd. It’s a mad and random world, and whoever tries to find meaning is irrational. So, according to Camus, we're all crazy.

Albert Camus: Life is absurd.

It sounds crazy, but Camus and his followers thought that life had no meaning, and that the search for meaning itself is absurd: “There is only one really serious philosophical problem," Camus said, "and that is suicide.” Camus reached rather dark conclusions. He felt that a true philosopher must realize that life is absurd. If life is meaningless and has no value, the only rational response would be suicide. Camus explores this thesis in The Myth of Sisyphus, where he argues that a philosopher ought to have the courage to practice what he preaches.  So, according to Camus, if you decide that it's all crazy, you should say "goodbye cruel world." Pretty harsh.

 The confession that life is worthless can only lead to suicide, said this Nobel Prize winner. Now, while this philosophy got him a lot of girls, it's really pretty dark. Camus has always been popular with gothic teens. They love it when he says "life is crazy and whoever looks for meaning is also crazy." Students use this to tease their teachers into a fury. I know. I've heard it from generations of newly enlightened teens.  Every two or three years a new student walks into the classroom with a dog-eared copy of "The Stranger," and challenges me to debate the absurdity of my life. Sometimes they have a pretty good argument. Strangely, while the Nobel-prize winning author once commented, “"I know nothing more absurd than to die in an automobile accident," his life ended by car accident. God, according to Camus, is dead. But while He may have been an absurdity to Camus, I seriously doubt that God died in a car accident.

Camus felt that God would have to be either a psychopath or an imbecile to tolerate the cruelty of the universe. While humans can undoubtedly be cruel, I don’t see how cruelty is an aspect of universal law. To assign cruelty to the universe is a literary fault. The universe has no personality and can neither be cruel nor kind. To say that the universe is “cruel” is absurd and irrational.

Since God’s behavior is irrational according to the standard of Camus, he must not exist. I don’t see why irrationality negates existence. There is nothing rational about the teenage girls who read Camus’ books and smoke french cigarettes. But somehow, their irrationality makes them more charming. And while they seem irrational, no one would deny their existence.

Modern Irrationalist Follower of Camus

There is a bit of a paradox here. Camus says the universe is irrational and then critiques God for being irrational. If everything is absurd, shouldn’t God also reserve the right to be absurd?

My favorite work by Tennessee Williams is a play called “The Night of the Iguana.” A defrocked Episcopal clergyman leads a bus-load of middle-aged Baptist women on a tour of the Mexican coast and comes to terms with the failure haunting his life. John Huston filmed the movie in Mexico with Ava Gardner and Richard Burton. When Elizabeth Taylor joined Burton in the sleepy fishing village where the film was made, it put Puerto Vallarta on the map. Years later my mother brought us to Puerto Vallarta and now I live in Mexico. Life is absurd.

Richard Burton with "senile delinquent" John Huston on set of Night of the Iguana in Puerto Vallarta

There’s a great line from the movie. Richard Burton as the defrocked clergyman is drunk. They ask him why he left the church and he says, “God is a senile delinquent. All your Western theologies, the whole mythology of them, are based on the concept of God as a senile delinquent.” 

God as Senile Delinquent

Western philosophers hate the idea of God as a senile delinquent, since He does not conform to the logic they learned from Kant and Wittgenstein. 

But what if God were a juvenile delinquent?

The Krishna conception of divinity acknowledges just such an idea. There’s nothing attractive about a senile delinquent. Senility is another form of madness. Who wants to see a toothless grandpa with a beard raging in the heavens? But a juvenile delinquent is always attractive. Think of James Dean in Rebel Without a Cause, or Marlon Brando in The Wild One. The juvenile delinquent is the model of a movie star. Misunderstood and charismatic. Who is more misunderstood than Krishna?

Nietzsche said that if God exists, he must be dancing. The Krishna conception of Godhead satisfies the criterion not only of Tennessee Williams and Camus, but even Nietzsche. Krishna moves in a crooked way. We cannot understand his movements. But the absurdity is ours. We live in the world of misconception.

God lives in the sublime world of Goloka where all movement is dance, all speech is song. He dances on the heads of Kaliya. As a juvenile delinquent, Krishna steals yoghurt, and even worse, he dances with the gopis. But as the mad prince Hamlet once told his old schoolmate, “There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio,  Than are dreamt of in your philosophy.”

But if even the mundane world is absurd, why should God’s behavior conform to mundane logic of the absurd world? Who’s crazy? God or the cigarette-smoking existentialist followers of Camus ? And again if God is all-powerful by definition, if he is “By Himself” and “For Himself,” then shouldn’t he reserve the right to be as absurd as we are? Who are we to question the ways of God? We must be crazy. The followers of Krishna have often been called crazy, especially by Western followers of the senile delinquent persuasion. 

"Who is Crazy?"

Srila Prabhupada once wrote an essay on madness, called Who is Crazy? I reproduce it in full below.

WHO IS CRAZY?

By His Divine Grace A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupāda

Founder-Ācārya of the International Society for Krishna Consciousness

[Reproduced from

Back to Godhead magazine

Issue #66]

The whole world is divided into factions, and each accuses the others of being crazy. But if there are no criteria by which to judge sanity, then who can decide?

man-manā bhava mad-bhakto mad-yājī māṁ namaskuru
mām evaiṣyasi yuktvaivam ātmānaṁ mat-parāyaṇaḥ

“Engage your mind always in thinking of Me, engage your body in My service and surrender unto Me. Completely absorbed in Me, surely you will come to Me.” (Bg. 9.34)

Here Krsna says that one should always think of Him, be His devotee and worship Him. This is the process of devotional service; it is not very difficult, and anyone can execute it by thinking of God, offering obeisances and rendering some service unto Him. Generally people identify with some party, either socially, politically, economically or religiously. In America there are the Republican and Democratic parties, and on the international scale there are the capitalists and the communists. Religiously, people identify with a party as Christian, Moslem, Hindu and so on. In India there are social parties also, like the brāhmaṇas and kṣatriyas. In short, to avoid belonging to some party or other is not possible. Spiritualism, however, means that we should identify ourselves with God’s party.

On this platform also there is “party-ism” in that the spiritualists call the materialists crazy, and the materialists call the spiritualists crazy. We have formed a Society for Krishna Consciousness, and those who do not like it say that we are “crazy.” Similarly, a person in Kṛṣṇa consciousness sees a person who is acting in material consciousness as a crazy person. Who, then, is actually crazy? Who decides? How are the parties involved capable of deciding? Indeed, the whole world is divided into parties, each accusing the others of being crazy, but if there are no criteria by which to judge sanity, then who can decide? If we ask any man, any common man on the street, what he is, he will reply, “I am this body.” He may give some further explanation by saying that he is Christian, or Hindu, or Jewish, or that he is Mr. So-and-So, or whatever, but all these are simply designations he attaches to the body. In other words, they all arise from the body. When a person says that he is an American, he is referring to the body because by some accident or reason he is born into the land of America and so takes the title of an American. But that is also artificial because the land is neither American nor French, nor Chinese, nor Russian, nor anything—land is land. We have simply artificially created some boundaries and said, “This is America, this is Canada, this is Mexico, Europe, Asia, India.” These are our concoctions, for we do not find that these lands were originally divided in this way. Three or four hundred years ago this land was not even known as America, nor was it even inhabited by white men from Europe. Even a thousand years ago Europe was inhabited by different peoples and called different names. These are all designations that are constantly changing. From the Vedic literatures we can understand that this whole planet was known as Ilāvṛta-varṣa, and one king, MahārājaBharata, who ruled the entire planet, changed the name of the planet to Bhārata-varṣa. Gradually, however, the planet became divided again, and different continents and sectors became known by different names. Even recently India has been divided into a number of countries, whereas earlier in the century India had included Burma, Ceylon and East and West Pakistan. In actuality the land is neither Bhārata-varṣa, India, Europe, Asia or whatever—we simply give it these designations in accordance with time and influence.

Just as we give the land designations, we also give our bodies designations, but no one can say what his designations were before birth. Who can say that he was American, Chinese, European or whatever? We are thinking that after leaving this body we will continue as American or Indian or Russian. But although we may live in America during this life, we may be in China in the next, for we are constantly changing our bodies. Who can say that he is not changing bodies? When we are born from the womb of our mother, our body is very small. Now, where is that body? Where is the body we had as a boy? We may have photographs that remind us what the body was like in past years, but we cannot say where that body has gone. The body may change, yet we have the feeling that we do not change. “I am the same man,” we think, “and in my childhood I looked like this or like that.” Where have those years gone? They have vanished along with the body and everything that came in contact with it. But although everything is changing at every moment, we are still sticking to our bodily identification so that when we are asked what we are, we give an answer that is somehow or other related to this body. Is this not crazy? If a person identifies with something he is not, he is considered crazy. The conclusion is that one who identifies with the body cannot really be considered sane. This, then, is a challenge to the world: Whoever claims God’s property or earth as belonging to his body, which is constantly changing, can only be considered a crazy man. Who can actually establish that this is his property or that this is his body? By the chances of nature a person is placed in a body and is dictated to by the laws of material nature. Yet in illusion we think we are controlling that nature. Therefore Kṛṣṇa says in Bhagavad-gītā:

prakṛteḥ kriyamāṇāni
guṇaiḥ karmāṇi sarvaśaḥ
ahaṅkāra-vimūḍhātmā
kartāham iti manyate

“The bewildered spirit soul, under the influence of the three modes of material nature, thinks himself the doer of activities that are in actuality carried out by nature.” (Bg. 3.27)

Prakṛteḥ kriyamāṇāni: Material nature is pulling everyone by the ear, just as a stern teacher pulls a student. Every individual is under the dictations of material nature and is being put sometimes in this body and sometimes in that. We are now fortunate to have acquired a human body, but we can easily see that there are many other types of bodies (8,400,000 according to Padma Purāṇa) and by the laws of nature we can be put into any type of body according to our work. Thus we are completely in the grip of material nature. Although this lifetime we may be fortunate in acquiring a human body, there is no guarantee that the next time we will not have the body of a dog or some other animal. All this depends on our work. No one can say, “After my death, I will take my birth again in America.” Material nature will force us into this body or that. Since we are not authorities, Bhagavad-gītā informs us that everything is being conducted by the supreme laws of nature, and it is the foolish man who thinks, “I am something. I am independent.” Ahaṅkāra-vimūḍhātmā: this is false reason. Although the living entity is different from the body, he thinks, “I am this body.” Therefore Śaṅkarācārya basically preached the same message over and over: ahaṁ brahmāsmi, “I am not this body; I am Brahman, spirit soul.”

Nonetheless, even when we have resolved to take to the path of self-realization, māyā or illusion persists. By self-realization a person may come to realize that he is not the body but a spiritual soul. What then is his position? Void? Impersonal? People think that after the demise of this body there is nothing but nirvāṇa or void. The impersonalists similarly say that as soon as the body is finished, one’s personal identity is finished also. In actuality, however, the body can never be identified with the living entity any more than a car can be identified with its driver. A person may direct a car wherever he wishes, but when he gets out of the car he does not think that his personality is gone. In Bhagavad-gītā Kṛṣṇa speaks of the living entity in this way:

īśvaraḥ sarva-bhūtānāṁ
hṛd-deśe ’rjuna tiṣṭhati
bhrāmayan sarva-bhūtāni
yantrārūḍhāni māyayā

“The Supreme Lord is situated in everyone’s heart, O Arjuna, and is directing the wanderings of all living entities, who are seated as on a machine, made of the material energy.” (Bg. 18.61)

These various bodies are like cars, and they are all moving. One person may have an expensive kind of car, and another person may have an inexpensive one; one person may have a new car, and another person may have an old one. Should we then think that when we are out of the car of the body the personality no longer exists? This is another kind of craziness. The void philosophy, which maintains that after death we become nothing, is also a craziness that has been contradicted. We are not void but spirit. When one attains spiritual realization, knowing himself as spirit outside the body, he can advance further by inquiring about his duty as spirit. “What is my spiritual work?” he should ask. Realizing one’s spiritual identity and asking about one’s spiritual duty is actual sanity. So much individuality and discrimination are displayed by the living entity even in the body. Should we think that at death one’s intelligence, discrimination and individuality no longer exist? Although we may make such great plans and work so hard within the body, are we to assume that when we leave the body we become void? There is no basis for this nonsense, and it is directly refuted by Kṛṣṇa at the very beginning of Bhagavad-gītā:

na tv evāhaṁ jātu nāsaṁ
na tvaṁ neme janādhipāḥ
na caiva na bhaviṣyāmaḥ
sarve vayam ataḥ param

dehino ’smin yathā dehe
kaumāraṁ yauvanaṁ jarā
tathā dehāntara-prāptir
dhīras tatra na muhyati

“Never was there a time when I did not exist, nor you, nor all these kings; nor in the future shall any of us cease to be. As the embodied soul continually passes, in this body, from boyhood to youth to old age, the soul similarly passes into another body at death. The self-realized soul is not bewildered by such a change.” (Bg. 2.12–13)

Thus the spiritual identity of the individual soul continues after death, for Lord Kṛṣṇa assures Arjuna of the eternality of all the individual souls assembled on the battlefield. The spiritual spark or self is within the body from the moment the body begins to form within the womb of the mother, and it continues existing in the body as the body undergoes all of its changes through infancy, childhood, youth and old age. This means that the person who is within the body is present from the moment of conception. The measurement of this individual soul is so small that the Vedic scriptures approximate it to be no larger than one ten-thousandth part of the tip of a hair—in other words, as far as human vision is concerned, it is invisible. One cannot see the soul with material eyes, but the soul is there nonetheless, and the fact that the body grows from the shape of a pea to full-grown manhood is proof of its presence. There are six symptoms of the soul’s presence, and growth is one of them. If there is growth, or change, one should know that the soul is present within the body. When the body becomes useless, the soul leaves it, and the body simply decays. One cannot directly perceive the soul’s leaving the body, but one can perceive it symptomatically when the body loses consciousness and dies. In the Second Chapter of Bhagavad-gītā Lord Kṛṣṇa gives the following simile to illustrate this process:

vāsāṁsi jīrṇāni yathā vihāya
navāni gṛhṇāti naro ’parāṇi
tathā śarīrāṇi vihāya jīrṇāny
anyāni saṁyāti navāni dehī

“As a person puts on new garments, giving up old ones, similarly, the soul accepts new material bodies, giving up the old and useless ones.” (Bg. 2.22)

Although the soul takes on new bodies, the soul does not select the bodies himself, the selection is made by the law of nature. However, the mentality of the soul does affect the selection, as indicated by Kṛṣṇa in the following verse:

yaṁ yaṁ vāpi smaran bhāvaṁ
tyajaty ante kalevaram
taṁ tam evaiti kaunteya
sadā tad-bhāva-bhāvitaḥ

“In whatever condition one quits his present body, in his next life he will attain to that state of being without fail.” (Bg. 8.6)

As one’s thoughts develop, his future body also develops. The sane man understands that he is not the body, and he also understands what his duty is: to fix his mind on Kṛṣṇa so that at death he can attain Kṛṣṇa’s nature. This is the advice of Kṛṣṇa in the last verse of the Ninth Chapter:

man-manā bhava mad-bhakto
mad-yājī māṁ namaskuru
mām evaiṣyasi yuktvaivam
ātmānaṁ mat-parāyaṇaḥ

“Engage your mind always in thinking of Me, engage your body in My service and surrender unto Me. Completely absorbed in Me, surely will you come to Me.” (Bg. 9.34)

Every embodied soul is in the constant act of thinking. To refrain from thinking something is not possible for a moment. The duty of the individual, therefore, is to think of Kṛṣṇa. There should be no difficulty in this, nor any harm; Kṛṣṇa has pastimes and activities, He comes to earth and leaves His message in the form of Bhagavad-gītā, and there are so many literatures about Kṛṣṇa that thinking of Him is neither a difficult nor costly task. There are enough literatures on Kṛṣṇa to last one a lifetime, so there is no shortage of material. Thinking of Kṛṣṇa, however, should be favorable. If a man is employed, he may always be thinking of his employer: “I must get there on time. If he sees me late, he may deduct from my paycheck.” This kind of thinking will not do. It is necessary to think of Kṛṣṇa with love (bhava mad-bhaktaḥ). In the material world when the servant thinks of the master, there is no love; he is thinking only of pounds, shillings and pence. Because that kind of thinking will not save us, Kṛṣṇa requests that one just be His devotee.

Thinking of Kṛṣṇa with love, or devotion to Kṛṣṇa, actually means service. The spiritual master prescribes various duties to enable the neophyte devotee to think of Kṛṣṇa. In the Society for Krishna Consciousness, for instance, there are so many duties assigned: printing, writing, typing, dispatching, cooking, and so on. In so many ways the students are thinking of Krsna because they are engaged in the service of Krsna.

What is the duty indicated by Kṛṣṇa? Mad-yājī māṁ namaskuru. Even if we are not inclined to obedience, we must obey and offer respects (namaskuru). Bhakti, or devotion, minus respect is not bhakti. One should engage in Kṛṣṇa consciousness with love and respect and should thus fulfill his designated duties. Then life will be successful. One can never be happy by identifying himself with the material body and engaging in all kinds of nonsensical activities. For happiness, there must be consciousness of Kṛṣṇa; that is the difference between spiritualism and materialism. The same typewriter, dictation machine, tape recorder, mimeograph machine, paper, ink, the same hand—on the surface, everything is the same, but everything becomes spiritualized when it is used in the service of Kṛṣṇa. This, then, is spiritual. We should not think that something has to be uncommon to be spiritual. The entire material world can be transformed into spirit if we simply become Kṛṣṇa conscious. By ardently following the instructions of Kṛṣṇa in Bhagavad-gītā and following in the footsteps of the great ācāryas, teachers of Bhagavad-gītā in the line of disciplic succession, we can spiritualize the earth and restore its inhabitants to sanity.

Are you living a lie?

As I approach one thousand blogs posted, a few observations:

In the last two years a lot has changed. Repressive regimes around the world are doing their best to stop any ideas they consider "dangerous." Electronic and social media were once considered as innovative ways to change the world. Now they are used as means of control.

In Russia, friends of mine had to fight in court after being arrested for talking about Yoga. In Mexico, journalists are regularly killed for writing about violence. In China, this blog and many other internet sites are banned for presenting ideas considered “subersive.” In the United States, religious groups are “extremely vetted.” Yogis, Vegetarians, and Vegans are simply considered "crazy," and not worthy of any serious discussion. 

Repression of ideas is easy when people are unable to ask questions. Around the world in Mexico, Ukraine, Thailand, and other developing countries, educative models encourage young people to learn how to continue running the system. No one is allowed to seriously question the system. Even if they were allowed to ask questions, often young people don’t know how. They have not been educated to ask questions, but to follow protocols.

Addicted to their cell phones, unable to maintain a five minute conversation, young people have lost their ability to think creatively. Schooling ensures nothing more than that they can be useful cogs in the machine. They can be creative at running the machine. Never mind that the machine is a violent failure.

I won’t waste your time with examples. Take a look around. You know what I’m talking about. The Iron Age, Kali-yuga, is upon us all. It’s in the milk we drink. 

We live in a time of lies. We can study how we got to this place; but what amazes me is that so few voices are allowed to criticize. But thinking and dissent have been quashed and quarantined to spaces like this blog.

It surprises me that the voices that question the machine are from groups who want a piece of the action. Developing countries want economic growth without questioning its effect. Globalization destroys ecology, economy, and culture. But as long as the smart people at the top are getting rich, who cares? The best critical minds who rage against the machine only want to use the machine themselves.

Oil companies need us to burn more gasoline. Car companies need us to buy more cars. Their executives don’t care about the consequences. Why should they? They’re laughing all the way to the bank. Does anyone question the need for oil or cars? Not really. What if we proclaimed a week without petroleum? Who would survive? Where does it end?

We live in an age of lies. We accept on faith paradoxes that defy common sense. Carbon is black as coal, but now, thanks to the magic of Hollywood, coal is “clean.” Ignorance is Knowledge. Homosexuals want marriage rights, but what about gay divorce rights? Feminists want equality with men. Films like Wonder Woman are hailed as a great achievement for women. Now, women can star in blockbuster movies filled with gratuitous violence and promote the values of war and exploitation just as men have done for generations. We need war to keep the peace. War is Peace. What progress!

Everyone wants a piece of the pie, but the pie has been shrinking. A million dollars isn’t what it used to be. Ask the President. Globalism promises an equal piece of the pie to countries all over the world. But as everyone fights over the shrinking pie, cultures and traditions everywhere are destroyed. Values like purity, family, and spiritual truth are disappearing, replaced by the values of sex, drugs, and rock and roll.

It’s said that of the four pillars of religion, cleanliness, austerity, chastity, and truthfulness, truth is the last to go. We live in an age of lies.

I don’t know if I have the courage to tell the truth. I’ve tried to hold to my convictions as far as I have any. As I approach a thousand blog posts, I wonder if honest speech still has any value. Most of what passes for honesty is mere rage. I’ve tried to tell the truth as I see it, based on my own journey to surrender.

I’ve done my best to raise a few points. I thank you for your patience.

Ram vs. Ravana

Inclusion vs. Exclusion. Vaikuntha vritti

Inclusive vs. Exclusive Mission

Vaikuntha vritti

by Michael Dolan, B.V. Mahayogi

Sometimes I lose heart when I see so many devotees of Krishna fighting over the quotidian application of dharma.  It is wise to remember that in the  End of Mahabharata Duryodhana and company went to heaven while the Pandavas went to hell.  Duryodhana followed all the rules very carefully, and he and his brothers went to the heavenly planets. 

The Pandavas bended the rules and ended in hell. The purport of the Mahābharata is that Krishna-bhakti transcends the ordinary rules of dharma. Western devotees especially should be careful about absolute insistence on the rules. Mercy, after all, is above justice. We do not aspire to divine love through rule-following, but by the mercy of Krishna and the devotees, even if it means going to hell.

I enjoy seeing the photos of devotees around the world on facebook. But I am sometimes surprised by what I see as a petty attitude. When I look to my friends on facebook for inspiration, I see recrimination by one group of devotees against another. These discussions descend into "debates" and often become offensive.

"Be humble as a blade of grass"

It is important, I think, to remember the simple instructions on humility and tolerance, not only with saintly persons, but  in our every day dealings.

"Be Tolerant as a tree"

While promoting "love of God," some followers overlook the importance of affectionate dealings with other human beings.  We claim that it is important to be kind to the animals, but become so absorbed in ideologies that we shame and insult other devotees for their dietary habits.  Diet is important; taking prasādam is paramount in devotional service, as is following ekadaśi.  But instead of shaming others for their short-comings, we should be careful to avoid offenses, especially offenses to Vaishnavas. 

By going to great lengths to exclude others from our creed, we run the risk of extremism. Extremism is dangerous and leads to a cult mentality. We should not spend all our energy figuring out how to exclude others; rather as preachers our task is to include others in the dance of sankirtan, the celebration of the holy name.

Bhaktisiddhanta Saraswati wanted an inclusive mission.

Bhaktisiddhānta Saraswati Ṭhakura liked the idea of Vaikuṇṭha vṛtti, where everyone may be included in this celebration.

I was personally present when Śrīla Śrīdhara Mahārāja spoke on Vaikuntha Vritti,  but I quote Goswāmī Mahārāja's version here as a more authentic remembrance than my own.  

Śrīla Śrīdhara Mahārāja was surprised by the idea of "vaikuntha-vritti"

"Once Srila Saraswati Thakur said in Bombay, "I am thinking, if the Western people have some objection to coming to the Math for Hari-katha, and it is based on the restriction of the diet, we can arrange from a hotel nearby some non-vegetarian food for them."

Srila Guru Maharaj, who is a high class Brahman Bhattacharyya was really shocked to hear this, and said, "I think the end result will be contamination in our Ashram, from this policy. We will be contaminated by implementing this."

And he said Saraswati Thakur's words struck his heart like a thunder bolt when he turned around and said: "Oh you don't know? I decided this ten thousand years ago. We have to employ Vaikuntha-vritti, if we are going to entice the Western world." And Vaikuntha-vritti means no limitation on extending; there won't be any disqualification or any limitation that will obstruct this flow, this current." Parikrama Lecture