Nobody is independent. He is dependent in some way or other under the laws of nature. The laws of nature at once can force the stringent laws, and he becomes subservient. So subservient, to become subservient, is your nature. You cannot alter it. The best thing is that instead of becoming subservient to this false, you should become servient to the Absolute Truth. Satyaṁ paraṁ dhīmahi (SB 1.1.1).
Therefore Bhāgavata instructs you that you just try to offer your respectful obeisances unto the Supreme Truth. That is your perfection of life. Satyaṁ damaḥ. Anartha-viṣaya-śrotrāder niyamānam. Damaḥ. Damaḥ means to control the senses. Anartha. Now you are sitting here. It is very kind of you. But you could go to a cinema house or hear some, I mean to . . . world noise by television or, say, something like . . . it is simply waste of time. So you have to control your senses in such a way that every moment should be utilized for your spiritual cultivation of life. You should not allow the senses to enjoy anything which is against the cultivation of spiritual life. That is called damaḥ, control.
You can eat. You can go to a restaurant and have very palatable dishes of meats and so many things. But you have to control it, "No. I shall not eat all this nonsense. I shall eat only kṛṣṇa-prasādam." Eating is not prohibited, because without eating you cannot live. That's all right. But you there are so many things. Just like even you don't accept Kṛṣṇa-prasādam, you try to become vegetarian. In your country, especially, I see you have got enough arrangement for vegetable dishes. I am here for the last more than one year. I am getting all nice vegetable dishes prepared by our nice student Kīrtanānanda. So you are also tasting them. They are very nice.
So you should not allow the senses to enjoy something which is against the advancement of your spiritual life. That is called damaḥ. And you have to learn this. If you cannot control your . . . a svāmī, a svāmī, this title, means one who can control the senses. He is called svāmī, master of the senses. Generally we are all servants, because our constitutional position is servant, subservient. So we are servant of this material nature means we are servants of the senses. That's all. We have got this material body, and the senses are prominent. We are active in material body means we are acting in sense gratification. That's all. So we are practically servant of the senses. And as soon as you become master of the senses, that the senses should not act according to their whims . . . the senses should act according to your order.
The same example. Suppose there is very nice performance of sense gratification, and one wants to go there. But if you can control your senses—"No, not to go there. Come here in this storefront. Hear Bhagavad-gītā," then you become master. You become master. That is svami. In similar way, if you can control your all your senses . . . now, the sense gratification . . . the most important task for controlling the sense is the tongue. I have several times explained that the tongue is the beginning of all senses. So if you can control the tongue, then you can control other senses also. And if you cannot control the tongue, then you cannot control other senses. So you should begin controlling the senses.
The tongue has two functions—to taste and to vibrate. Vibrate Hare Kṛṣṇa, Hare Kṛṣṇa, Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa, Hare Hare / Hare Rāma, Hare Rāma, Rāma Rāma, Hare Hare and taste kṛṣṇa-prasāda. Just see how you are making advancement. This is called damaḥ. So as soon as you are able to control your senses, naturally you shall be able to control your mind. That is called śamaḥ.
So these are the processes. So we have to practice this process and learn this process from reliable sources and assimilate them in our life. That is the real utilization of this human form of life. We should learn it, we should practice it, and make our life successful.