This is my fist ipad sketch using Autodesk SketchBook Pro and Wacom’s bamboo stylus . It is an image that came to me as this verse from Śrī Rūpa Gosvāmī’s Upadeśāmṛta was playing in my mind as I adjusted my diet to combat candida. It is a make or break of spiritual life explaining that starting with the tongue a true spiritual guide must be in control of their senses.
vāco vegaṁ manasaḥ krodha-vegaṁ
jihvā-vegam udaropastha-vegam
etān vegān yo viṣaheta dhīraḥ
sarvām apīmāṁ pṛthivīṁ sa śiṣyāt“A sober person who can tolerate the urge to speak, the mind’s demands, the actions of anger and the urges of the tongue, belly and genitals is qualified to make disciples all over the world.”
Sri Rupa Goswami
This is not hype cultivated through effort or force but a natural outcome of being attracted to a higher transcendental substance than what is found through the external senses.
viṣayā vinivartante
nirāhārasya dehinaḥ
rasa-varjaṁ raso ‘py asya
paraṁ dṛṣṭvā nivartate“The embodied soul may be restricted from sense enjoyment, though the taste for sense objects remains. But, ceasing such engagements by experiencing a higher taste, he is fixed in divine consciousness.”
Sri Gita
Only Beauty can subdue the beast.
