```json
{
    "title": "Monday Morning Greetings 2026 #40 – The Absolute Tooth II: A Medical Pilgrimage",
    "url": "https://wavesofdevotion.com/2026/10/05/the-absolute-tooth-ii-a-medical-pilgrimage/",
    "datePublished": "2026-10-05",
    "dateModified": "2026-10-05",
    "language": "en-US",
    "description": "I was a bit awestruck by the facility. Above my chair, the dentist’s workstation had a computer screen where he could carefully monitor my root canal, using a small camera…",
    "author": "Dhanurdhara Swami",
    "publisher": "Waves of Devotion"
}
```

# Monday Morning Greetings 2026 #40 – The Absolute Tooth II: A Medical Pilgrimage

I was a bit awestruck by the facility. Above my chair, the dentist’s workstation had a computer screen where he could carefully monitor my root canal, using a small camera that he occasionally positioned beside my mouth. He was repairing the mistake made during my last visit to my dentist in New Jersey, and the facility today was such an upgrade. Instead of requiring multiple visits to the dentist, he would complete the entire procedure — including making and fitting the highest-grade zirconia ceramic cap — in less than two hours in one visit.

 

My dentist explained everything so carefully and with such authority that I trusted him. But why was I so awestruck?

 

I was in Vṛndāvana just a minute from MVT, at Lord Krishna’s Multispecialty Dental Clinic. Who expected that?

 

It was certainly a far cry from the first dentist I had seen in Vraja fifty years ago: a simple man in a lungi, sitting on the floor alongside a shop in Loi Bazaar, with a rusted quart can for rinsing one’s mouth next to a set of pliers for pulling teeth. Above him hung a rudimentary little placard with an exaggerated painted smile announcing his services.

 

Anyway, dental work is never fun. Yet there was still a certain joy in lying on my back, mouth wide open to the Vraja sky, realizing that I was in the lap of God — and all for the cost of only 24,000 rupees ($250) for the highest quality work!

 

For this week’s

*Greetings*

, I will also share a re-edited version of the original

*Absolute Tooth*

post, in which I reflect on the main realizations I had after visiting a dentist ten years ago, following too many years of neglect.

*** ***

***The Absolute Tooth***

[\[1\]](https://wp.me/p2zwwk-1oE#_edn1)

 

I've been lying in a dentist's chair here in Cali, Colombia, for almost two hours. Oscar is drilling away. If he hits a nerve, he says, I may need a root canal. It’s not where I want to be, but I tolerate it. Yes tolerate — what's the use of studying transcendental knowledge if you don't apply it to your life. So many thoughts go through my mind:

* *

*Krishna’s pinch of mercy*

 

This last week in Shyam Ashram seemed like one of those rare, maybe never happens, occurrences in life — where most of one’s troubles are cleared and the world finally falls in line with one’s desires. My mind celebrates, “I can enjoy!”

 

Not so fast.

 

Bam! A toothache and an unexpected trip to the dentist. The prognosis wasn’t good, “Seven cavities to fill!”

 

I wasn’t happy to hear that, but deep down I felt some solace. Krishna won't let His devotee grow complacent and fall into the illusion that he or she is the controller. Such enjoyment is too superficial, immerses one in the bodily concept of life and inevitably winds up in more misery.

 

*Surrender*

 

When I arrived, Oscar carefully explained the procedure and asked if it was okay. I told him, "I am a soul surrendered unto you!" This, I thought, is Krishna consciousness. In every sphere of life, and especially in spiritual life, some people are authorities in a particular field. The best way to benefit from their knowledge, provided they are legitimate, is to humbly surrender to their direction.

 

*Dependence*

 

Oscar had been one of my students in the bhakti course at Shyam Ashram. Now I sat in his chair, helpless and dependent on him. He was sincerely trying to help me and wasn’t even charging anything. I felt his care and shelter and my affection for him grew. Our relationship with God is like this. If we are completely dependent on Him and humbly take His shelter, with the faith that whatever He does is best, then bhakti naturally arises in the heart.

* *

*And whatever Krishna does is best*

 

If I hadn't gotten this treatment now, I would probably have needed serious dental work later in Vṛndāvana, maybe even a root canal. Considering the facilities there at the time, it could have been a nightmare. Thinking this way, even though getting seven cavities filled with no anesthesia, I felt grateful and it helped me tolerate the inconvenience. The world is like this. We suffer, but if we tolerate there is inevitably a fruit of realization at the end that makes our future better. Understanding this helps a devotee stays patient and tolerant even in hard times.

* *

*Divine austerity*

 

When we indulge the pleasures of the body without regulation, we become ever more absorbed in the body so that we can experience sensual joy more fully. But the more we are immersed in the bodily concept of life, the more acutely we also feel the body's pains. In contrast, when we practice the austerity of a simple life, we instinctively withdraw from absorption in the body to lessen the discomfort. And because we have learned to tolerate the discomforts that austerity brings, we naturally become less affected by bodily pain as well.

 

As Oscar worked away, I realized that my years of simple living, with their natural austerity, had allowed me to stand just a little apart from the pain and tolerate it. Without some

*tapasya*

, the divine austerity that arises naturally from faithfully fulfilling one's responsibilities (

*dharma*

) and rendering service (

*sevā*

) despite the inconvenience, one remains deeply immersed in the bodily concept of life. Consequently, the dualities of this world that we must inevitably face, especially old age and disease, are felt all the more acutely.

 

*The illusion of expectation*

 

Expecting the drill, with its pain and its shrill whine, was worse than the drilling itself. The world is generally like that. Pain and pleasure are more intense in anticipation than when we experience them. This is especially true of sensual and egotistical pleasures.

* *

*Conclusion*

 

And that’s the Absolute Tooth!

 

[\[1\]](https://wp.me/p2zwwk-1oE#_ednref1)

This is a substantially edited version of an article I posted on September 19, 2016.