Krishna alone is life's true destination; all material pursuits are chewing the already-chewed sugarcane of sense gratification.Listen — Srila Prabhupada Uvaca
Prabhupāda: gatir bhartā prabhuḥ sākṣī nivāsaḥ śaraṇaṃ suhṛt prabhavaḥ pralayaḥ sthānaṃ nidhānaṃ bījam avyayam [Bg 9.18] [I am the goal, the sustainer, the master, the witness, the abode, the refuge and the most dear friend. I am the creation and the annihilation, the basis of everything, the resting place and the eternal seed.] The Lord is gati. Gati means the destination. We do not know what is our destination.
Due to our ignorance, due to our becoming overwhelmed by the illusory energy, we do not know what is our destination of life. Na te viduḥ svārtha-gatiṃ hi viṣṇum [SB 7.5.31]. [Persons who are strongly entrapped by the consciousness of enjoying material life, and who have therefore accepted as their leader or guru a similar blind man attached to external sense objects, cannot understand that the goal of life is to return home, back to Godhead, and engage in the service of Lord Viṣṇu. As blind men guided by another blind man miss the right path and fall into a ditch, materially attached men led by another materially attached man are bound by the ropes of fruitive labor, which are made of very strong cords, and they continue again and again in materialistic life, suffering the threefold miseries.] People do not know what is their destination of life. The destination of life is to reestablish his lost relationship with the Supreme Lord.
That is his destination. Unfortunately, people do not know what is the destination. They are simply thinking, destination of life, to have the greatest amounts of sense gratification. This is illusion. Because we are materially absorbed, and materially concept of life means these senses—we have no other information—so we are trying to squeeze out all kinds of pleasure from sense.
This is called illusion. They have no other information. They are earning, working very hard, and the ultimate goal is sense gratification. This is illusion. The ultimate goal is Kṛṣṇa, or the Supreme Lord, gati.
Gati means destination. Where you are going? Which way you are making your progress? "Oh, that we cannot say.
We make progress on sense gratification. The greatest amount of pleasure which we can derive out of the senses, that is our destination." No, the destination is God, Viṣṇu, the Supreme Lord, of whom we are the parts and parcels. By forgotting..., forgetting our relationship, we are struggling. mamaivāṃśo jīva-loke jīva-bhūtaḥ sanātanaḥ manaḥ ṣaṣṭhānīndriyāṇi prakṛti-sthāni karṣati [Bg 15.7] [The living entities in this conditioned world are My eternal, fragmental parts. Due to conditioned life, they are struggling very hard with the six senses, which include the mind.] Prakṛti-sthāni, in this material nature, the fragmental portion of the Supreme Lord, living entities, the senses and the mind, entrapped by the senses, they are struggling.
But this is not the destination. The Lord says, the Bhagavad-gītā says, that He is the destination. Na te viduḥ svārtha-gatiṃ hi viṣṇuṃ durāśayā, durāśayā ye bahir-artha-māninaḥ [SB 7.5.31]. Bahir-artha-māninaḥ means...