I know your mind...

Govinda Dasi: Around that same time I also painted a huge painting of the Pancha Tattva, perhaps 4 foot by 5 foot.  It hung in our temple room in the 1970's; now it hangs in Srila Prabhupada's room in our Honolulu temple.

While creating that work, each evening as I painted, I did so with the mood that Krishna was working through my hands. Before painting, I would meditate on Krishna, and on Srila Prabhupada, and ask that Krishna's beauty should flow through my hands and onto the canvas.  I would gaze at my hands and see that they were tools only; tools to be used in His service. I always did this before beginning every art work, and still do this even now.

But I had a special desire while painting that large Pancha Tattva picture. I desired that this painting of Lord Chaitanya and His Associates would be so spiritually beautiful, and so full of bhava, that Srila Prabhupada would be extremely pleased, so much so that he would even place his head at Lord Chaitanya's Lotus Feet. I had never desired anything like this before, and I never told anyone of this inner desire.

Many years later, this desire was fulfilled. It was in the late 1970s. I was in Srila Prabhupada's upstairs room at the Coelho Way temple in Honolulu. He was getting ready to leave for the airport. He was leaving Hawaii for some other preaching destination. The big Pancha Tattva painting was always hanging opposite his desk, so he could gaze at it while he worked. So he had to pass by it on the way to the door. Just when he came to the big painting, he paused, looked up at the merciful figures of Sri Pancha Tattva, then gracefully bent down to touch his head to Lord Chaitanya's Lotus Feet. I was astounded. I did not say anything, but I remembered my desire. And now, my desire had been fulfilled.

And I knew he also knew that was my inner desire. He once wrote me a letter from India, saying, "I know your mind." He knew everything within my mind and heart, and this was further proof of it. For example, he even knew that I loved the name "Govinda." I had uttered it repeatedly while reading Herman Hesse's book, Siddhartha, years before I met him, while still in college. So he named me "Govinda dasi" even though my first name started with a "B", for Bonnie. In that moment, I was reassured that he not only knew my heart then, but for eternity as well. And I am grateful to have been so fortunate to have come in contact with such a great spiritual personality as Srila Prabhupada. Surely, there is no greater fortune in all the three worlds!

Srila Prabhupada's letter to Jadurany, Sept 4, 1972, "If you think of me and work for me, then I am in your heart. If you love somebody he is in your heart. It is common thing, everyone understands it."