To those who do not know: Balarama is elder brother of Lord Krishna, a great warrior and wrestler by profession. There was none in the world who could win Balarama in Wrestling. Lord Krishna needs no introduction.
On a full moon day, Balarama and Krishna was crossing the forest. Both have been walking for all day and was tired. As the sun set and started to get dark, they were searching for a place to rest.
“I know you are tired, so am I. But both of us cannot sleep at the same time. Let me sleep first and you keep guard of me. When you cannot control sleep anymore, wake me up and I shall guard you” said Krishna and went to sleep.
Balarama was guarding Krishna. Time passed by and it was almost midnight. The clouds were growing darker
All of a sudden, at distance, there was a huge roar of sound. Its neither sounds like human nor an animal. The sound was magnanimous and huge like thunder. Balarama saw a huge demon approaching.
The demon made a huge roar as if it was the biggest thunder one could ever hear. Balarama got scared. From the sound Balarama could feel that monster is approaching near. On its way the monster was uprooting the trees that was in its way. Another roar, Balarama was even more scared. Now he could see the demon clearly. The fear engulfed Balarama, the great warrior himself was surprised to see himself shivering.
The demon roared once again with its mouth too wide and the thick chain of saliva between the jaws were oscillating. The jaws were large, teeth were sharp and Balarama could see that they were in dark yellow. The eyes were red hot and its body was darker than the night. The nasty smell of the monster was overwhelming and it left Balarama suffocating.
Balarama and the monster was nearly face to face but at distance. The monster roared. At the sound of roar, Balarama, the undefeated wrestler, sweating and shivering saw himself diminishing in half of his size while the monster grew double its size. The monster roared once again. This time the sound was four times more than what he heard before. Balarama dreaded and shrink further half his size and the monster once more grew doubling its size.
Seeing the mammoth approaching near, Balarama ran near Krishna and cried Krishna’s name aloud before he fainted.
Krishna hearing Balarama woke up from sleep and saw Balarama lying down. Krishna was in deep sleep so he did not know what happen to Balarama and though that his brother was too tired that he was sleeping.
The monster followed Balarama’s trail and made the thunderous sound. This time it was not Balarama it was Krishna. Krishna saw a mammoth approaching him. Krishna shouted back “What do you want?”.The monster roared once again and Krishna once again asked “What do you want?”. Everytime Krishna asked “What do you want?”, he saw himself growing double his size while the monster shrinking to half its size.
The Monster shrank to Krishna’s thumb size and he picked it up and put the little monster in his waist pocket. Krishna kept guard of Balarama for the remaining night.
The morning sun glowed, Balarama slowly got his consciousness back. Suddenly the memories of previous night dawned upon him and so did the fear. Puffing and panting he ran to Krishna.
Seeing Balarama’s face gone white, Krishna asked “What happened?”
“Krishna, yesterday night, there was a huge demon, and it was roaring like thunder. It came to eat us both and last thing I remember is I came running to you. Did you hear the sound.. did you see the Monster?” asked Balarama.
Krishna smiled and said “Is this the little demon you are talking about” saying so, Krishna took the demon out from his waist pocket.
This is a fictional incident in the life of Krishna and Balarama story that the great Sage Vedavyas narrates using monster to be a metaphor for the problem we face. He beautifully explains…
If we worry too much, the problem seems bigger. Instead, if we stand up and face the problem, the problem becomes smaller.