21 – Krishna Conscious Business Coach – Nick Pereira (Nakula dasa)

Krsnendu: There’s a beautiful picture of Radha and Krishna behind you there.

Coach Nick: Yeah, thank you very much. I do that… I like to do that on purpose. It’s a little my sneak attack. It’s my Krishna promotion sneak attacks. I’ll be talking about business stuff, or whatever, but I sit right here on purpose.

Krsnendu:  Episode 21 of Successful Vaisnavas with Coach Nick Pereira from Canada.

It’s time to get inspired. Join us as we celebrate devotee success stories… Preaching… Business… Community Development… Leadership and Personal Growth… All from the point of view of Krishna Consciousness.

Our goal…. To help you to make your life successful.

Krsnendu: Hare Krishna, welcome back. It’s another episode of Successful Vaisnavas. And today, we are interviewing coach Nick. Nick Pereira from Canada. He’s been a very successful business coach and quite recently has become a devotee and it’s been interesting to see how he’s integrated Krishna Consciousness into his business.

In personal news with me.

Well at the time of releasing this podcast we’re coming up to the festival season. So Balarama’s Appearance Day is just around the corner as well as Janmastami and Radihastami and then after that before too long, it’ll also be Karttik. So that’s exciting.

In personal news in terms of Successful Vaisnavas…

I’ve begun work on a new course, which is a course basically about how devotees can take advantage of the internet to develop a business that’s connected with Krishna Consciousness. So it’s really describing the essential steps to take if you want to create it online business similar to Successful Vaisnavas.

You know… How to set up… How to identify your audience and the topic that you want to teach to that audience, how to get in front of that audience, those people… As well as how to build an email list and ultimately create products that can be of value to that audience.

So, That’s something that have been working on. I hope to release that shortly. I expect it’ll probably be another couple of months before it’s ready to be released but I just thought I’d let you know about that coming up if that’s something of interest to you.

I’ve had a lot of experience in developing Successful Vaisnavas as a Krishna conscious online project, as well as working with different clients and all kinds of different businesses in the general area of website development and marketing with Facebook advertising and YouTube advertising and things like that.

So I’ve got a lot of experience in that and I’m hoping that I can share that with devotees and devotees can use that in a way that can help them to 1. Create income for themselves and develop, you know get money that they can use for Krishna conscious projects, as well as find a way that they can make a living in a way that’s actually Krishna conscious. You know, just like Prabhupada set up the system that he wanted devotees to sell books.

And by selling books you make money, and with that money you can provide for yourself as well as have money to buy more books and to develop Krishna conscious projects. So this new course that I’m creating is with the same intention. It’s how we can set up a business that you make money at the same time that you’re spreading Krishna Consciousness rather than having to go and make money somewhere else.

And then when you get spare time, you do your Krishna conscious preaching. The idea is to set it up in such a way that you can put your full attention into helping people in a Krishna conscious way and at the same time, all your needs are met. So your attention is completely aligned and focused.

So, this can be helpful, whether you have a service that you think will be helpful for devotees in any area. It could be in health, finance, personal development, you know or directly some Krishna conscious training, or it could be a business where it’s something that’s attractive for outside people but through that business, you can connect it back to Krishna Consciousness. And help those people who may not know much about Krishna Consciousness now to help them come closer to Krishna.

And so on that topic now, it’s the perfect time to introduce the interview for today, which is with Nick Pereira and he’s a devotee whose done exactly what I was just talking about.

He has a business of business coaching. So what he does is he trains people how to run their business effectively. How to get more clients, how to make more money, how to be good at selling? He particularly focuses on spiritually-minded people. You know, people who are particularly in the area of helping others, like personal development coaches, perhaps some health practitioners. So people that have got a big heart that really want to help people. So those are his kind of clients and he helps them to run the business so that they can make a living but helping people in this way. So it’s been very interesting because as he’s become a devotee quite recently, he’s really integrated Krishna Consciousness into his business. You know, he’s shaved up.

He wears tilak whenever he does a video, which he does many videos almost every day. He has pictures of Radha and Krishna in the background. Then he often talks about his Japa and the importance of spiritual sadhana and he’s even changed the name of his Facebook group to Sangha.

I forget the beginning part… Freedompreneur is the name of us his program. We will put links to his website in the show notes and that will be over at https://successfulvaisnavas.com/CoachNick. And also whatever episode number this is I can’t even remember. I think it’s episode 21. So it will be https://successfulvaishnavas.com/21 or whatever episode number this is. You can also get to it there.

So a very interesting story about someone who has taken their business and converted it into a Krishna conscious business. He’s found a way that he can maintain his identity as a devotee without any compromise. And he’s been sharing Krishna Consciousness in a way that makes sense for his clients, that adds value to them, but also helps them to come closer to Krishna.

So that’s a really inspiring example, as well as his business as a business coach. He’s also just opened a Preaching Center in, I think it’s new Brunswick in Canada. And so it’s very interesting hearing about his experience of starting something, a new Preaching Center and we’ll be keeping in touch with Nick over time to see how it develops, you know from these early days.

From time to time we’ll catch up with them and see the progress of his preaching program. So Nick is a extremely generous person. I first met him when he reached out to me, he’d somehow or other come across Successful Vaisnavas and he got in touch and we spoke on Skype and he said that he liked the idea behind Successful Vaishnavas.

You know, he gave me a lot of inspiration and he also gave me some really good advice through the training that he has in his Freedompreneurs Coaching Program, which is really helpful. And he’s just got a really good outlook on how we can add value to people’s lives and get paid for it without feeling like we’re sort of cheating people or feeling like we’re compromising or something like this.

He’s a person of integrity and I really appreciate that about him. So you can hear for yourself right now as I interview coach Nick Pereira.

Krsnendu: Hare Krishna, this is Krsnendu Das here for another episode of the Successful Vaishnavas podcast and this time we’re doing it in video as well on Skype, which is a new thing.

Thanks to Nick’s inspiration here. So today we are interviewing known as Coach Nick, Nick Pereira. Did I pronounce that right?

Coach Nick: Yeah. You got it.

Krsnendu: All right. So this is Nick from Canada and next really interesting person because he’s actually, like a internet celebrity I would say. He’s got a coaching business that he does a lot of work online and, you know, he’s interacting with a lot of people through his business and I get a lot of inspiration listening to his classes and learning from him.

So I thought it’d be a great opportunity to meet up with Nick and hear about you know, his business, your business Varun, how it connects with Krishna Consciousness, and I know that you definitely, you link it together a lot, which I really like. You know, it’s not like I do my business over here. And then I go to the temple and do Krishna Consciousness here, you know. You’ve got a very integrated approach to the whole thing and you’ve recently started a center and its Krishna name.

What’s the name of the place again?

Coach Nick: Saint John New Brunswick in Canada.

Krsnendu: Yeah. There we go. So, yeah, it’d be nice to, Prabhu, if you could just introduce yourself. Give us a little bit of a background. And then, you know, tell us about your business and then it would be interesting to hear your experience opening a new Temple in the West.

Coach Nick: Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Well, first of all, thank you so much for inviting me to be here and for what you’re doing. I love your project. You know we were able to connect a while ago Successful Vaisnavas. I think it’s wonderful, you know in anything we can do as devotees to inspire each other and help each other grow in our Krishna Consciousness.

I’m just all for it and I think it’s a wonderful thing. A little bit about myself. So, I… From a young age, I was always drawn to a spiritual path. I actually grew up in a Catholic environment. I went to Catholic school and I really resonated with Jesus. But I never really got the… I would never really got into the church aspect of it.

It didn’t seem to resonate with me fully and I remember in Grade 9 specifically in religion class, I was asking the religion teacher a bunch of questions, and he basically told me that I needed to be quiet and have faith and that was it and he basically called me faithless because I was asking a lot of questions.

And I remember getting like upset and kind of being like, you know what I don’t know about this whole God thing and this whole religion thing and spirituality. So I put it all in a box and I tucked it away. And this was about that time that my life started to go off track, I would say. And, you know, typical sort of teenager at least here in the western world, you know got caught up in you know, partying and girls and drugs and all that, you know, whatever High School type of stuff. Eventually over time I had an entrepreneurial spirit. So I started my first business when I was 17 years old. And there’s something about entrepreneurship that’s quite interesting and when it comes to entrepreneurship and spirituality. See as entrepreneurs we have to rely on a greater… we have to rely on something greater than ourselves.

There’s a trust factor that comes with being an entrepreneur. So as I started going out and building my business, I actually ran into myself. I ran into a lot of challenges and struggles and I couldn’t make my business work. And so I ended up, through many years of struggle, I ended up coming and meeting a coach.

And I hired this coach. I’m not really understanding too much about coaching. But she said a few things to me in a meeting we had. She said “Nick there’s two things to be to grow a successful business. One, you got to work on your mindset. If you’re not willing to work on your inner world, then forget it.

You got to work on your mindset. If you're not willing to work on your inner world, then forget it. - Coach Nick Share on X

Just forget the outer world changing. It’s not going to work. And the second thing” she said, “is you need a strategy. If you look at anybody that’s successful in business, they have some kind of model that they’re working in and you should learn to master a model”. So that made sense to me. I hired my first coach and I got started in the process.

Now, what was interesting was that she had a tremendous faith about her. So sort of secretly, she also started turning me back on to God. And it’s a little bit of what I do in my own business. So it’s a little bit of you know, I could see how that she’s influenced me so much. Now she was from a Christian perspective, but she was, she understood that God is God is God and that there are different ways to approach God.

And so through this growing of myself and really diving into personal development, I started going to all these personal development trainings. I started going to all these seminars. Watching motivational speakers. I still felt like there was something missing in my own life. I was like, ah, like I’m like, I like it, I’m motivated but there’s something missing and I couldn’t tell what it was but I was like there’s something missing but I didn’t know what it was. So eventually I started to draw these correlations between these big successful motivational speakers and these, you know, sort of business coaches and people teaching success principles.

And I started noticing that some of the principles were the same in spirituality. So I really started to dive down my own spiritual journey. So I started back with reading the Bible. I then spent some time in Buddhism, you know, studying the teachings of the Buddha and the Buddha sutras and then that’s where I met somehow to Hare Krishna devotees on the street. And they were doing book distribution on the street and I ended up buying Prabhupada’s Bhagavad-gita and I was so drawn to it and I read Bhagavad-gita. And I was like, that’s it. This is it. This just makes sense to me. I felt it in my cells. Like I was even now that I’m talkin about it. I’m getting the you know, the shivers and I’m like “Ah! This is home”. This makes sense to me. And what I loved about Prabhupada’s Gita was that he didn’t hold back.

He just said it. Look this is the way it is and some of the concepts and some of the things that he brought up were very uncomfortable. And that’s why I knew it was home because I knew that it wasn’t all fluff, but this was it and so what ended up happening is I started, I was in a place, in Saint John here, New Brunswick where there is no Temple.

There is no devotees. There was no Krishna consciousness. And so I started just watching YouTube and I started listening to the Maha-mantra and I started to… I didn’t even know who Krishna was but I was like, hey, there’s a blue guy with a flute and he’s really cool and he sings Hare Krishna and I started just doing it and I was really drawn to it. And then circumstance had it where myself and my wife Sarah, we ended up going to Toronto for a couple years and that’s where I met bBhakti Marga Swami. And Bhakti Marga Swami, he’s the GBC for ISKCON here in Canada.

And he’s the resident Swami at the Toronto Temple. And so…

Krsnendu: When he’s not walking all over the place.

Coach Nick: That’s right. So you know. Yeah the walking club, right? So yes, so I met the walking Monk and I started, he invited me to be part of his plays.

So I started doing service by being part of his plays. Then I started taking Bhakti accessory course and I started attending Temple and that was it. I just started picking up the practice of chanting and then I started doing service with Bhakti Marga Swami which I still do to this very day. And that’s been my Krishna Consciousness journey and it’s been a very quick journey.

That was only just a few years ago. And and here I am, you know, and I now work with Krishna devotees, I work with devotees on teaching devotees as well as non-devotees how to grow their coaching and healing businesses. Spreading Krishna Consciousness is a type of healing or coaching service in its own way, right?

Like, it’s not exactly but it did, it’s definitely an elevated platform. But it is understanding how to go out there and sell. And Prabhupada was the master at this, you know, he was a master salesman. I mean if you watch Prabhupada go out and watch his videos and the way that he built ISKCON and the way that he empowered others to spread Krishna Consciousness.

There’s a lot that we can learn when it comes to growing our own business and growing Krishna Consciousness around the world.

Krsnendu: Yeah, that’s nice. So, tell us a little bit more about your business that you said that you coach coaches. Is that the basic idea? You trained coaches.

Coach Nick: Yeah.

Krsnendu: Tell us a little bit more about what exactly it is that you do.

Coach Nick: That’s right. So exactly what I do is so my business is called the Freedompreneurs club and the main purpose I talk about freedom on three different levels. So first I talk about freedom on sort of a material level, getting ourselves to simple living, high thinking. I’ve adopted that into the Freedompreneurs club and I really teach that and say let’s simplify our life so that we have time to explore other aspects of life.

So in the material world, especially most of us who are householders. We have to make money, we have to you know, these are the obligations that we have and we have to do our duties, right? This is part of Krishna Consciousness is we have to do our duties. So what I teach is how to build business where your whole life isn’t spent working.

So you can get out of the Rat Race, you can get out of the corporate environment. You can leave the sort of government industrial ways of them running the way and you can get into more free lifestyle. Once we’re able to do that, then we can speak about freedom on sort of a second level, which is freedom of expression. And you know, it lays it out right there in The Vedics right, we all express ourselves differently.

Some of us are more workers, mechanical in nature. We’re more, you know, we’re good at building things. Some of us are more entrepreneurial, we’re gonna move resources around. Some of us are more the warrior type we’re going to police, we’re going to be the chapter and we’re going to go and be the warriors and some of us are the brahminical type, we’re going to be teachers.

We’re going to be influencers in this way. This is what I call freedom of expression, understanding where you are, understanding your nature and then learning to use your nature in the world to be of service to Krishna and to everyone else around you. So that’s the second level because I really find that I for myself anyways find a lot of joy being a teacher. And when I’m teaching I find myself lit up, I find myself very joyful in the process and I think that if we all do our nature, then there’s a natural joy and freedom that comes with that. And of course the third level is you know understanding that we are spirit soul. Understanding that we are not our business and we are not these things that we do in the world. So we’re gonna do them, but to always remember that we are spirit soul, and that we are not the things that we do but we are the spirit behind what we do and to live from that place as best as we can.

Freedom of expression (is) understanding where you are, understanding your nature -Coach Nick Pereira Share on X Use your nature in the world to be of service to Krishna and to everyone else around you. - Coach Nick Pereira Share on X

Krsnendu: Yeah, it’s nice. Just progressively going up. I guess it’s a little like the hierarchy of needs, with Maslow.

Coach Nick: Yes, yes.

Krsnendu: Yeah, the basic requirements of living in this world and then more of a self expression and then beyond that to the spiritual understanding.

Coach Nick: That’s right. And so, in my own experience so far, it’s not to neglect one or the other but to bring our Krishna Consciousness to each moment. To bring our Krishna Consciousness to what we do, to our families, to our work. And in that way we can really be part of society and interact with society. But by our own energy and our own understanding we can also elevate the people around us. I really believe that we could create a Krishna consciousness, a God Conscious society just by simply going out and doing our work within Krishna Consciousness. Because there’s something about a Krishna conscious devotee. There’s something about a devotee where other people look and go there’s something about this person and they ask questions.

And so I use my business as a way to spread Krishna consciousness and I do it very openly. As you know, I integrate the teachings of the Gita, I integrate the teachings of Prabhupada into business principles. This way I’m able to reach people who aren’t Krishna conscious or who aren’t devotees yet. But introduce them to the principles of Spiritual Development and growth. Once they get a taste for it, then they go “Oh, well Nick…” just through our relationship they get to know. So even if you’re watching the… If you’re listening to podcast you’ll see or if you’re watching even the way I set up my screen right? I have Radhakrishna here. So I’ve got my business logo, but I also put Radhakrishna and I joke and say that’s sort of my sneak attack to spreading Krishna consciousness.

People may be listening to me because they want to grow their coaching and healing businesses and being able to generate more sales and I’m gonna give them that information. But I’m gonna use spiritual principles to share how you can go out and build your business, but still not be attached to your business.

So therefore that you can still not pick up the karma from their business and you can do it in a way which actually still elevates you and people around you.

Krsnendu: You know a question that I have is you had this business before you met devotees, is that right? You were already doing this coaching business?

Coach Nick: That’s correct. Yeah.

Krsnendu: So I’m curious, as you’ve become more into Krishna Consciousness and integrated more of it into your business, there could be a fear that devotees say that “Ah. I don’t really want to talk too much about Krishna. People might freak out or something”. So you’ve been very upfront and integrated a lot into your business.

Have you had any pushback? Has anybody sort of said to you “Keep your beliefs to yourself” or anything? What’s your experience with that? I’m really curious.

Coach Nick: Yeah, that’s a great… Well, first of all, it’s pretty normal. I had the same fear. Right. I had the exact same fear. I tried to keep it separate right like oh, well, I’ll do my Krishna Consciousness here and then I’ll just do my business but you know what?

Actually my business, since I’ve been openly speaking about Krishna Consciousness and just integrating it within the business, my business has grown exponentially. So yeah. So I encourage all devotees out there to you know, Prabhupada had no fear, right? He just went out there and said look, this is what it is. Prabhupada actually said that if a sincere soul goes out and preaches Krishna Consciousness that Krishna will send everything that person needs to support him. And from my experience so far that has been absolutely true. So in my business what I’ve actually noticed is that what’s been attracted to my business is actually more people.

They’re not necessarily Krishna conscious. They’re not devotees, but they are definitely on the spiritual path and journey, and so it actually makes the business a little bit more lucrative because people do come to the Freedompreneurs Club not just to learn about their business, but also to grow spiritually. And it’s a nice segue way into Krishna Consciousness. So I have some people who are working with me who are now chanting, right and they’re chanting, you know, they came to grow their business and now they’re chanting Hare Krishna and they’ve gotten the benefits of chanting the Maha-mantra. So my experience is that that fear that we experience is quite normal.

I experienced it. But you know, just you have to have faith. Let it go.  Just trust Krishna, that if you go and integrate Krishna into what you’re doing, Krishna will open up the doors for you. And yes, I’m not going to say that nobody, I haven’t had anybody like be negative towards me but I have had some people leave the my world or leave my space because it was, they don’t want that and that’s okay.

For the two people or three people that left, Krishna sends 10, 20, or 30 more so.. It’s okay.

Krsnendu: I guess it’s one of those principles of business too. You know, when you really stand for something, you attract more people of that nature and you also repel a few people it’s a polarizing type of thing. They say love me or hate me, there’s no money in the middle.

Coach Nick: Yeah. Yeah, that’s exactly it. Yeah, we’ve had, overall the response has been very positive. With a few people like I’ve actually had one client that said “Oh, you know, it’s going too spiritual for me and this is not why I joined” and I said, “I totally respect that” it’s you know, this is not but this is the way that I’m going and yeah, this is the way that I’m going and I’m not gonna stop. I’m not gonna not go there right? So I’m going there, I’m going there and that’s it. And since I’ve actually decided within myself or maybe Krishna blessed me with some courage to say, you know what? I’m no longer gonna hide who I am and what the path it is that I’m on, then in actuality my life both spiritually and materially has improved.

Krsnendu: It’s just all integrated and it’s aligned. It’s not like you’re sort of having to have a split personality or something as you can just be yourself and it’s so much more powerful and everything’s in one straight line.

Coach Nick: Yeah, I want to get up in the morning and I do but this was my goal. And this is what it means to be a Freedompreneur in my mind is I want to get up in the morning and just live my life. And I don’t want to think about oh I shouldn’t do this or shouldn’t do that or I’m gonna hide some aspect of my life.

I’m not, I don’t push Krishna Consciousness hard, like it’s the same thing in the way I teach sales. I’m not a hard seller. I don’t hard sell Krishna Consciousness and I don’t hard sell my business. What I do is as best as I can is I tried to sincerely and be a sincere as I can go out and serve people and meet them where they’re at.

And you know, I’ve watched a lot of Prabhupada videos and I listen to a lot of Prabhupada lectures. And Prabhupada was so good at meeting his audience where they were at. So if he was talkin, let’s say to a Christian audience, he wouldn’t just like just say hey, you gotta give that up and come, he would even say no this is not this that’s material.

I’m Christian. I am Hindu, I am… That’s material. What we have to get to is the essence. And in the same way if we don’t go out and hard sell, Krishna Consciousness or hard sell our businesses, people will get turned off by that. But if we find out what is going on with someone, you know, maybe someone’s going through something in their life.

Maybe they’re going through a hard time in their relationship. Maybe they’re going through a hard time in their finances. Maybe they’re going, maybe they’re having some health challenges. Then you can present Krishna Consciousness as a solution to that. Then they are more able to, they’re more curious about it because it’s something that they want. Then once they’re there and they see how Krishna can bless them and heal some of their challenges, then just they already did like they now they have the higher taste. They go oh and now they begin to go well, imagine if I really took to the practice and started following the principles and started chanting.

And you know Prabhupada says it’s a process. So in that way I try to introduce people slowly and let the process take over. Let, you know, Krishna will do the rest. I think we just have to just be there when we’re needed to be there and just sort of Krishna will take over and help them where they need to be.

Krsnendu: Yeah, that’s great. And I really like the way that you’ve got your concept of Freedompreneur. You’re giving the example here that’s like well, this is my expression in those that wanna come along, they can come along and those that it doesn’t fit, it’s no problem, let them, they can follow their freedom as well.

Coach Nick: That’s true. Yeah, you know, if we really want freedom, we have to give freedom to others right? We have to give our, if we, when we truly give ourselves permission to be free. This is who I am. And this is who I am and I’m gonna express myself and I’m going to and I’m gonna sing Hare Krishna and I’m gonna dance and I’m gonna go to kirtan and I’m gonna do these things. Then naturally, we just give other people to be free too. And so some people will go oh, well, that’s not for me. And that’s okay. You know what, I’ve actually had some people that I’ve worked with, they have been taking up Krishna Consciousness, but they’ve started going back to church.

If we really want freedom, we have to give freedom to others. - Coach Nick Pereira Share on X

Krsnendu: Right.

Coach Nick: Right and you know, that’s fine because they’re finding God in their time, in their way, in their path. So that’s fine. That’s okay right, as long as everybody finds God in their way. We’re all going back right, eventually. Eventually. So I just think that when we give ourselves permission to be free, naturally, we give other people permission to be free. And in that way, they’re actually more attracted to you because they can feel free around you.

So they don’t feel judged, and they don’t feel like oh I have right. I remember like again, you know, there’s a wonderful book and I might mess up the name, but correct me. Miracle On Second Avenue by Mukunda Goswami, you know this book?

Krsnendu: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Coach Nick: Yeah, okay. So I just so love that book and you know the way that Mukunda Goswami describes his own journey with Krishna Consciousness and how  he described his relationship with Prabhupada. Prabhupad allowed everybody to sort of be themselves.

But he inspired them through his being like he was such an elevated soul, right? He was so enlightened that it was just natural that you would want to be like, oh, well, whatever he’s got I want too. And he’s got Krishna. So now I want Krishna, right? So in that way, the more that we become Krishna conscious, the more naturally people around us will just be like whatever that person’s got I want it too and then when they ask you, well, what do you got?

And you say well look I’ve got Krishna, they’ll say well, what is that and you say come on, come on come on. Let me show you what a kirtan is. And I mean once someone’s experience the kirtan, there’s no turning back.

Krsnendu: And just sprinkle on a little Posada with that.

Coach Nick: That’s right. Exactly. Yeah. Yeah, you know sprinkle a little with that in their goal. Wonderful.

Krsnendu: Yeah, I think it’s such an important point, when we wanna welcome people into Krishna Consciousness, we don’t wanna feel forced. People like to feel that they’ve got their freedom. And when I’m secure in my own being, it allows me to have that security with others and often you find that those are very controlling it’s because they’ve got some insecurity of their own. It’s getting in the way. Yeah.

Coach Nick: That’s right. Yeah, we have to look at that. We have to look inside of ourselves. And that’s what the chanting does. If we really take to our chanting practice, it cleanses our heart. And it’ll cleanse us of our insecurities and our fears, but it’s also normal. I mean, we’re human. We’re all human just trying to you know, just trying to figure it out and trying to understand. And I think that as long as that we are sincerely putting in the effort. It all comes down to that sincere effort, right?

If we really take to our chanting practice, it cleanses our heart. And it'll cleanse us of our insecurities and our fears... - Coach Nick Pereira Share on X

Sometimes we get caught up on the material, how it looks and are you doing Arti the right way, and are you doing this the right way? I know it’s good to have the traditions. It’s good because it keeps us on track back and it keeps us moving forward. But we should always remember the essence behind it is that are we being sincere and are we coming from bhakti? Are we coming from love…devotion?

Krsnendu: Just like in the Bhagavad-gita when it says patram puspam phalam toyam… That’s Krishna’s not accepting the leaf or the flower, but it’s the devotion.

Coach Nick: That’s right.

Krsnendu: All of these external things can be really helpful, but at the end of the day, yes, that’s sort of a expression of our sincerity, hopefully.

Coach Nick: That’s right. That’s right, and we can try to be as sincere and as time goes on we grow in that and that’s how I teach. That’s what the Freedomepreneurs Club is all about. So we are gonna have business. Businesses is part of this world. So why not do business with devotion now? Now let’s learn to do business with devotion, right?

You know, I remember I was reading George Harrison had asked Prabhupada, “Should I become a monk?”. And he was so willing to do this. And Prabhupada said “No, you make music. Make music for Krishna.” So for me, I do business. I teach sales. I’m good at it. I like it. But I I try sincerely to do it for Krishna and give the results to Krishna.

Krsnendu: Yeah, it’s funny. I was listening to an interview with Russell Brand and he asked Radhanath Swami, he said “Should I become a Brahmachari?.Should I move into the temple? And Radhanath Swami just laughed and said, “I don’t think that it’s your dharma to become a monk”.

Coach Nick: You gotta do your dharma, right? You gotta do your work. I was just the last night at the you know, as you mentioned we started the Saint John Krishna center. And I was giving a class last night. We were doing a program last night and I said “Listen, do your work. Don’t try to you know, Krishna says it’s better to do your work in perfectly than do someone else’s work perfectly, right?”

So don’t, if you’re not, if you’re nature isn’t to be a monk. Don’t try to be a monk. If your nature isn’t to be a business person, don’t try to be a business person. Because you won’t find joy in it. You won’t find the essence. Do your dharma. Do your work. Trust that Krishna has put you exactly where you need to be so that you can learn, grow, and evolve. And focus on yourself.  When I say focus on yourself, meaning focus on your own journey and just forget the rest. Just be there with Krishna, he’ll take care of the rest.

Krsnendu: Just I guess it’s about listen to Krishna in our heart too, isn’t it and how he inspires us. Because many times we’re doing things which is because society tells us that’s the way it has to be or our families sort of that we have to have the occupation or whatever it is.

Coach Nick: That’s right.

Krsnendu: And actually Krishna is in our heart and if we listen we can get guidance and we can do, sometimes we can do things and we feel like, yeah, this is the right thing. You know, you just have that, you know in your heart, you know in your stomach.

Coach Nick: That’s right, you just know it. Yeah, you know it. And Prabhupada says, he says when you become Krishna Consciousness, your life becomes perfect because Krishna becomes the guide in your life. And for me, it’s a knowingness within myself.

Oh, this is it. This is because I’ve battled with that too. I thought oh, geez I want, do I have to become a monk? Do I have to give up family life? Do I have to do all these things? But it didn’t feel right for me. Right? So I’m like this is not for me. This is not my dharma. But I’m really good at business.

I’m really good at generating sales. I’m really good at teaching other people how to do this. So use the gifts you’ve been given again. It’s you know, do your work. And I think sometimes we think we bring our material attitude to Krishna Consciousness, right? We go oh, well, we should be brahmachari, we should be monk because they’re elevated in Krishna Consciousness, which they absolutely are. But I remember my friend does told me, he said to me, you know what, he says a bus driver could be more elevated than a monk. He says because if that bus driver is always chanting Hare Krishna and is always engaged in Krishna in his heart  while he’s driving the bus and the monk is not engaged in it in his heart and mind but he’s wearing the orange robe.

He said in actuality the bus driver is more advanced than the monk. So don’t get caught up on the material exterior. Some people’s dharma’s to be a monk and live that way and some people it’s to be the bus driver. So be the bus driver but be in Krishna Consciousness and you’ll find joy in it.

Krsnendu: I see. Yeah like Prabhupada says in the I believe it’s in Bhagavad-gita purport that it’s better to be a humble sweeper of the street than to be a charlatan meditator or something, right?

Coach Nick: That’s right. Yeah. Yeah, we should. That’s it, that’s exactly it. It’s the same principle. There’s that wonderful story about a very elevated Yogi. And this woman was coming to, she would cross the river to give him his milk every day. But she would show up late a lot.

And so one time this monkey, Swami he really he kind of chastised her really like oh, why are you always late. You can’t be on time, you know blah blah blah blah blah and she said well, you know, I have to wait for the riverboat and sometimes the riverboat is late and then he says oh, if I could show up on time you can show up on time.

He said all you have to do is you have to have faith, you just chant Krishna’s name, can’t just krishna’s name, chant the names of God and walk across the river right? So in the story the woman begins to show up on time. So this Yogi eventually asked her, “I’ve noticed that you keep showing up on time. What’s changed?” And she said well I took your advice and this is a very simple woman. She was very, just a you know like that and she said well I took your advice so I chant the whole names of God and I walk across the river. And he couldn’t believe it right.

This elevated Yogi, he couldn’t believe it. He’s like I have to see this so they go down to the river and she starts chanting the names of God and starts walking across the river and she says to him come. And you know, he grabs his dhoti and he lifts it up because he doesn’t want it to get wet and you know and he goes in and he can’t walk across the water. And she says “Oh ye of little faith. You told me to you know, you told me the chant the names of God and walk across the river and you’re unable to do it”.

So she is Krishna conscious because she was just so in faith. And even though this Yogi was he had all the exterior, he would sit in Lotus position and he would write, and he would show that he is so spiritual but in actuality he didn’t even take his own advice. Right?

Krsnendu: Right. So he knew the right things but he wasn’t able to actually apply it.

Coach Nick: That’s right. That’s right. So he knew what to say, but he wasn’t able to apply it. And so in that way, we should just do our work and be grateful and be thankful and chant Hare Krishna and do our work. And don’t worry about the exterior piece of it.

Krsnendu: Yeah, I actually some years ago, just before I started this podcast, I was, I mean to Experts Academy over in, California.

Coach Nick: Oh, Brendon…

Krsnendu: Brendon Burchard, yeah. And so when I was flying back from there, I just kind of got some inspiration to write a song so I wrote a song it’s basically called Do What You Love for Lord Chaitanya and just everybody’s got some unique talent and we have to find that. And you know, where do we get our inspiration use it for Krishna. It’s just reminded me of that.

I also wanted to mention about how this idea of Freedompreneur that you had I sort of stole it.

Coach Nick: Oh good!

Krsnendu: You know, when we spoke last time and took the idea of the Krishnapreneur.

Coach Nick: Oh, I love it!

Krsnendu: You know we’re looking for, using our initiative in a way to serve Krishna.

Coach Nick: That’s right. Well, we’re Krishnapreneurs, right? We’re taking our…I love that. I think that’s wonderful. You know, why not write like why not do business. If you’re gonna do business, right if you’re if that’s your nature and you want to do business then do business, but do it for Krishna. Remember it’s about your hearts about your devotion.

And here’s the secret. Okay, here’s a business tip. Here’s the secret if you do it for Krishna, you’ll find that you’ll be successful in it. If you put your faith in Krishna in your business, you’ll find that Krishna rewards your business and rewards you very nicely.

Krsnendu: Yeah. Yeah, that’s nice. So, let’s just move over and talk about the new center.

Coach Nick: Sure.

Krsnendu: Quite interesting and also one thing I’m interested in from the perspective of this Freedompreneur is how do you juggle your time in terms of running a center as well as this business that you’ve got. How does that work?

Coach Nick: Yes, so because I don’t I don’t see them like as separate. I see that the Krishna center and I see the Freedompreneurs Club is to help people in the business realm become Krishna conscious and become God conscious in their life and the Krishna center is now like the same mission but like a different let’s say a different spoke on the same wheel.

So the Krishna center is now directly, it’s Kirtan, it’s programs, Bhagavad-gita. It’s right. So, basically we started a Krishna center here and what we did is we started just with a weekly program. So we started a weekly program. We don’t do a Sunday Feast here, which I know most people do.

I know a lot of temples do the Sunday, we do a Tuesday night because that was the night available that someone donated their space to us. So we went with it.

Krsnendu: Krishna’s arrangement.

Coach Nick: That’s right, totally Krishna’s arrangement, it’s Tuesday night. So we said, okay, it’s Tuesday night. So what we do is we get together, very simple program. We do kirtan.

We do a little Bhagavad-gita class reading, we do more kirtan and then we serve prashad. And then what’s happened is so some regulars have started to come out and started to gravitate towards Krishna Consciousness. And then what we did is we ended up just, it’s all by donation. So we ended up the somebody said, hey, I’ve got a room inside of a wellness center and the room is empty and you know $100 you could have the room for your Krishna group if you like.

And so I put it out to our little core group and said look, we’ve been offered a room for $100 to have our own Center. Would you guys like it everybody said yes, and so we took the room and so it evolved to that. And then so we put up pictures of Caitanya, Radha Krishna, Lord Jagannatha. And we’ve got Prabhupada, we ordered some books.

So we’ve got a bookshelf in there. We’ve got some books in there now and we ordered some japa beads and and japa bags so we have that. And so now we’ve kept this Tuesday night program going, but now we’ve decorated the room. It’s a very beautiful room. And so Prabhupada said that anyone, any sincere soul who goes and starts a center, Krishna will send other souls to help. So myself and my wife Sarah we started the center, and we started growing the center and some Western followers came. But then there was a couple from India who just recently has moved to Saint John. And they started coming and they brought a few of their friends and they know how to play drum.

Krsnendu: Oh, yeah? Nice.

Coach Nick: Right? So we were just using karatals, but now they’ve added the drum. So now we have a Kirtan team. And that was by Krishna’sarrangement. We didn’t even know these people. It was so interesting. I did a Gaura Purnima here and this lady from India said she has grown up in India never attended, never attended a festival.

She came to Saint John New Brunswick in Canada. We’re a small town of 60,000 people. She came here. And she said she couldn’t believe she saw Hare Krishnas here. So she came out that night and it was, and then the next week her husband and a couple friends came out and they started playing the drums and we have a Kirtan now.

And now Bhakti Marga Swami was very pleased and he is now actually coming out. He’s actually arriving next week and he’ll be leading some programs at our Krishna center. And we also have some Brahmacharis from the Montreal Temple who are coming. And so just by the network that we have of devotees some devotees are now coming and they’re helping by amplifying it.

So, you know, it just went and started. We didn’t really have a plan to be quite honest. We just started. There’s no. there was nothing. Myself  and Sarah just wanted a group to do kirtan with and to chat with and so we just started. And just over the months more people started coming and we put a little Facebook. So you could check out our page at Saint John Krishna Center. And we started putting a page together and we started inviting people. And we didn’t even at first call it the Krishna Center anything. We just called it bhakti yoga mantra meditation, yoga philosophy and vegetarian food. So very easy to accept for the Western audience.

And then just as time came moved on then we gave birth to the Krishna center. So it’s been very organic. Very very organic. And as far as balancing the time, it’s a few hours a week. That’s it. It’s Just a few hours a week. It’s no different than I mean, we all go to Temple. We should you know, I think we should all be going to Temple or getting together with some devotees a few hours a week.

So if you’re listening to this and you’re living in a place that doesn’t have, maybe doesn’t have a center, doesn’t have a temple. You become the temple. But that’s what Bhakti Marga Swami told me. I said to him I’m going back out to Saint John, is there a temple or anything else there? And he said you’re the temple now.

I said, okay. So I just took that as my instructions to start a temple, start a Center.

Krsnendu: Yeah,nice. So that first Tuesday night program, you said someone offered you a place to hold it. Did you like advertise it or anything or you just started out quite organically in just three or small network that you have?

Coach Nick: Yeah, just very organically we put together a Facebook event page and because, so I do teach sales and marketing right? So I have a sales and marketing… I know how to spread the word on things right? So I did put together Facebook page and I used my own influence that I have on the online presence that I have.

So I used that to let people know about the Krishna center. And so to me, they just go hand in hand. It’s the same mission. We’re spreading spirituality, we’re spreading spiritual culture. Whether we’re doing it in our business or we’re directly doing it through a Krishna center, that’s what we’re doing.

And so I put together a Facebook event page and started inviting people through the Facebook. A good marketing plan is to actually market to people who are into yoga.  So if you present to people who are into yoga like the physical yoga, most people who are practicing yoga at least in the Western World don’t understand the philosophy.

So they’re doing it as an exercise. But something has led them to yoga. And a lot of them understand that there’s more to yoga, but they don’t know, they don’t have access to that information. So in actuality if you go out to the yoga studios in your area and you tell them you’re presenting yoga philosophy and bhakti-yoga, it’s a very nice easy way for them to go oh, this is yoga, this is mantras. Okay, we like mantras great, you do mantras. And then you just slip in a little Bhagavad-gita class and then they start to go oh, this is the source of yoga. That’s how I present. I said, okay. So like yoga. Do you know where yoga comes from?

Oh, well, you know, I think it’s an Indian thing. It’s an Indian… Yeah. I said, yes, it’s got it roots in India and here check out this book Bhagavad-gita where it talks about the four different types of Yoga systems. [00:52:00] And and then they go oh wow, and then you can now introduce them to Krishna Consciousness through the practice of yoga.

Krsnendu: Nice, yeah. So once again like you were saying earlier on meeting people where they’re at and just gradually, you know helping them to go to the next level from from there.

Coach Nick: That’s right. And culturally we have to remember that when we’re, depending where you are in the world, culturally it’s a little bit different.

Everybody’s a bit different. You know, one of the things I learned from Prabhupada was when Prabhupada started I believe, and somebody can correct me if I’m wrong, but I believe when he started that Los Angeles Temple, and it might be a little bit off with my facts here. So, excuse me, if I am.

But they kept the pews. They bought a church, you know and they kept the pews and he was okay, he said keep the pews and let them keep their shoes on. Because that’s what they know, so that’s fine. Keep the pews. Let them sit in the pews in the church. Let them keep their shoes on and chant Hare Krishna.

Krsnendu:  And he even wanted them to keep the organ.

Coach Nick: Oh, yeah, you know this. Yes.

Krsnendu: I’ve heard of it. It seems that the devotees got fired up and didn’t follow all of  that instruction. But you can see Prabhupada’s broad Vision there. It’s like, well they like to go to a church, so let’s keep it as a church, but we’ll put Krishna there.

Coach Nick: That’s right. Just put Krishna there and we’ll use it. And to me that’s why he was very, like I said, like if you actually study Prabhupada, he was just, he just knew how to spread it because he never, from my perspective, he never forced it. But he said he kept it at its essence. This is about love of God. And if you take up the practice of chanting Hare Krishna, this will lead you the way. And Lord Caitanya spread the Hare Krishna mantra freely, right? He was the most liberal Avatar. He spread it to everybody.

He said here freely chant Hare Krishna. So why don’t we take the same way and just spread the Hare Krishna Mantra and don’t try to necessarily make it all about coming to the temple and doing these things. That will happen as they get the higher taste and they get wow I really like this chanting and I see the results in my own life.

Then naturally they’ll say well let’s go to the temple and then let’s put it on ratha yatra and lets… And then it builds. So don’t you know from my experience and this is a general sales principle. Don’t be too anxious to sell but educate. Educate slowly. Let people take to the process at their pace and then they won’t leave. Because they’re coming at it at their pace. But if you try to make it go too fast, it could be scary and then people wanna leave they. Don’t wanna stick around.

Krsnendu: Yeah. It reminds me of a sales principle or business principle that nobody likes to be sold to but everybody likes to buy. The process of marketing and sales is to make people give them the space that they can choose themselves that they want to do the something.

Coach Nick: That’s right. Yeah, and people need to choose Krishna Consciousness. If we try to force it upon them, then we become no different than any other religious group out there that is trying to force upon people’s ideas. And that’s where actually people don’t want to come to religion.

Krsnendu: Yup.

Coach Nick: Because the people generally they don’t wanna be forced to do things. But when you make a choice to come to something then you have a free will in that. And I’m personally want to respect the Free Will of people hence the Freedompreneur part. Like I really believe in freedom as a whole so we should respect people’s freedom.

Krsnendu: Yes, that’s really good point. I just wanted to go back to a point that was raised up earlier. when you were saying that when you got into business, then you came up against yourself. I think that this is one of the great things about business or any kind of challenging endeavor is that we get confronted with our challenges. Like, in one sense you could say well, I was just thinking, just sit and chant and then you have to deal with your mind, the biggest challenge of all. But my point is that sometimes if we just kind of cruise along in life and do kind of like what everybody else is doing we might not really come, we might avoid some things that we could learn from. Whereas if we take up some challenges especially for Krishna, then it’s a wonderful personal development. Because like when I started Successful Vaisnavas,there was kind of two elements to it. One was general personal development, how we can become more Krishna Conscious by applying whatever technologies are out there, whether it’s the 7 Habits of Stephen Covey or if it’s some teachings from Tony Robbins or whatever or directly from Bhagavad-gita.

You know our personal development. And then from the other side it was like, how can we spread Krishna Consciousness in innovative ways is the kind of the two elements.

Coach Nick: Yes.

Krsnendu: And through one business mentor I had at one stage, he said that he had a business partner who was really into self development. But they found that it’s a hard thing to sell because it’s too abstract. But if you have a context for it, like all right, do you, like for me the best personal development apart from getting married? Apart from that was going on distribution, walking up to people and selling them books. You know, it’s like wow, do you get confronted by yourself?

And your ego, your limitations. And so this is a example of how you’re you’re doing something for Krishna, which is outside your comfort zone and because of that you can really grow in your personal development.

Coach Nick: That’s right. I totally agree. We should take on some challenges. Like Prabhupada said, devotee will take on all kinds of anxieties for Krishna.

And then remember it’s all about your heart right? It’s all about what’s going on inside of you. So if you take on some challenges, whether it’s growing your business, you know relationships, right? All of these, these are all challenges. But if we take it, if we bring Krishna Consciousness to it, it actually becomes, Krishna transforms it or spiritualizes it so it becomes actually our practice. It actually helps elevate us. So don’t shy away from challenges. Take them on with some gratitude. As it just be grateful because krishna’s arranged those challenges for you, for you to grow. Every time I come up against a challenge, either in my business, in our relationship, in our finances. These are all these areas. I always remember that Krishna is wanting me to grow. So therefore challenge, you know, it’s no different than going to the gym. If you want your muscles to grow you have  to feel the burn of the working out. You have to feel that burn.

So in the same way, we have to feel the burn of these challenges so that we can grow from them. And there’s a wonderful saying you can either get bitter or get better.  Don’t get bitter. Don’t get bitter in your Krishna Consciousness journey. You know, there’s challenges. Krishna Consciousness is not easy. Chanting 16 rounds a day, following the regulative principles, doing our readings.

It could become very difficult. Our ego and our self will challenge us because it’s… Look the body is designed to just want to be comfortable. The body’s just like oh, let’s just you know, why can’t I can binge watch Netflix and already up there maybe scroll on Facebook more.

You don’t feel like oh I should chant. I’ll just scroll a little bit more longer on Facebook. You [01:00:00] know, that’s because we’re identified with the body, right and the body wants to be comfortable. But when we more identify as spirit, then we can let’s say override the body or we can control our mind.

Well, the best practice for anything is chanting. I mean chanting has totally transformed my life because my mind now more than ever is under somewhat of control. I’m not gonna say that I’m some elevated Yogi or to say that it’s under control. But there is more of a control now than ever before which has allowed some beautiful things in my life to happen and as time… I remember a time where chanting one round was like holy smokes! And now I chant my 16 rounds and I chant more than that and I just chanting and chanting and there is an inner power of peace that comes with that and it’s a beautiful thing. So if you really take to the chanting process, it also helps you in all aspects of life. Like all aspects of life get better.

Krsnendu: Yes, we take up the challenge of chanting for a start.

Coach Nick: Take up the challenge of chanting for a start.

Krsnendu: And then take up any other challenge and as we continue to chant that gives us the strength to face those challenges with a Krishna conscious perspective.

Coach Nick: That’s right. But we’re coming in with Krishna conscious. We understand that we are also not the challenge so we can, we are the challenge is there and if Krishna’s arranged the challenge for it to be there, then don’t be mad at the challenge.

Krsnendu: For us to grow, right? Yeah.

Coach Nick: That’s right. Yeah. Remember that Krishna’s hand is in everything.

So if the challenge is in your life, Krishna’s trying to talk to you through that challenge. So you have to wake up and listen and go okay, what is my lesson here? What’s Krishna telling me? What does Krishna want from me? And try sincerely. Remember Krishna wants the sincerity of your heart more than anything.

So sincerely try to overcome those challenges and actually those challenges will elevate you.

Krsnendu: Yeah, that’s great. Well, it looks like we’re on the top of the hour now…talking for hours with you. It’s really really inspiring for me.

Coach Nick: Wonderful.

Krsnendu: Yeah, maybe at this point you can just, you know after listening to you speak it’s quite likely that devotees might like to get in touch with you. What’s the easiest way that they can get in touch with you?

Coach Nick: Yeah, so my website is coachnickspeaks.com. So coachnickspeaks.com. And you can register on to I’ve got a mailing list where I send out some daily inspiration. And you could find me at Saint John Krishna Center. So saint and it’s all spelled out. Saint John Krishna Center on Facebook and you can send me a message through there and you can reach out to me. I love to hear from you. I wanna know other devotees. It’s so important that we associate and we connect and that we help each other in our Krishna Consciousness.

And when we say help each other in our Krishna Consciousness, that means in all aspects of life because Krishna is all aspects of life. So we should help and support each other as a community.

Krsnendu: Yeah, I really love that. Yeah. Well, it’s been great talking with you Prabhu. I’m looking forward to keeping in touch with you as well.

And, I have to catch up again, a few months down the track and see how things are going in Saint John’s Krishna Center.

Coach Nick: I would love to thank you so much for inviting me and thank you for  starting the Successful Vaishnavas and doing what you’re doing. It’s very inspiring and wonderful. Thank you.

Krsnendu: Yeah, well, thanks a lot for your support, I look forward to getting in touch again soon. Hare Krishna.

Coach Nick: Hare Krishna.

Krsnendu: Thanks for listening to find out more go to successfulvaishnavas.com.

Sri Prahlad: Whatever little service that anyone can do it for Krishna is to be appreciated and [01:04:00] celebrated.

Jagattarini Mataji: Just give this life to Krishna.

Akrura Prabhu: We know that they have much more potential than they’re presently using.

Urmila Mataji: I’m into a place of relishing the activity and letting go of the result completely.

Srila Prabhupada: You just associate with pure devotees then you shall be able to cross over the ocean of nescience.