We ask ourselves if we are changing, in which way we are changing?

We ask ourselves if we are changing, in which way we are changing? Outside there are lots of changes: all the time new things come, and also inside, there are always new things; there are always ups and downs. It’s a time when you have to really say, “Yes I want to move forward. I want to move up in my spirituality”. And you will realise this great change within yourself, this great change that you will bring to the world. It’s not a change outside, but a change inside, because, like I said, with changes on the outside, new things always come and new things always go. If we focus on the outside, very often we find that it will bring pain. To focus on the outside brings expectation, and expectation brings misery and pain. All kinds of expectation bring pain, because the real expectation, the real things that our soul wants, is the true Love of God. And this true Love of God we can only find through devotion within our heart. You can go to a master and the master can show you the way, but it’s up to each one of you to really desire God, to really yearn for God, because as long as you don’t yearn for God, as long as you don’t really want God, you will always be searching. You will always be putting one foot in one place and the other foot in another. To find this real Love and really realise this deep connection to God within oneself, it begins only through bhakti, through devotion. When you surrender yourself full-heartedly, with full love from your heart, and say, “God I want you, reveal Yourself to me”, God will reveal Himself. God can’t say: “No” to you, because your Self can’t hide from yourself. This higher consciousness, which you have deep inside you, can be revealed when your mind is centred on God. So, yearn for God, call from deep within your heart, from inside, “God reveal yourself to me. I know you are deep inside somewhere. From time to time I do feel you. I know you are here, but I would like to feel you constantly, all the time”. Each one of you wants to feel the Love of God all the time, so why is it so difficult? So, why is it so difficult to love unconditionally? Is the mind too busy with the world outside? How long will you look for love in the world outside? As long as you look, you will get trapped in it, because you have to realise true Love here [Swamiji points at his heart] and feel it first here. If you realise God first and then step in the world, how joyful and peaceful it will be…But people choose the opposite. They like to step in the world first, then they want to realise God. Once you step in the world, you get trapped in the grip of Maya and it’s quite difficult to get out of Her grip. Her grip is so strong: once She grabs you, it’s only by chanting the name of God that you can get yourself released; only by saying, truly from your heart: “God I want you, I surrender completely to you. Do what you have to do with me”. Then She will let go of you. Don’t think that Maya only acts on normal people. She acts on spiritual people also. I think there are more attacks on them than on anybody else, but if the spiritual people are aware of it, they know whenever She is playing Her game and they know how to go out of it. And each one of you does know.

Sri Swami Vishwananda talks about........

It is said, “If you take a bath in the Ganges, or other holy rivers, you get purified of one birth”. But, when you are bathed in the divine name, whatever name, whatever deity you feel close with – the name of Jesus, Muhammad, Rama, Krishna, Devi -, if you get bathed in that divine name, you are released from many births. Misery is removed just by chanting the divine name. Liberation is granted just by realising the connection that you have with the Divine within you. This is where Kriya comes from. When you do Kriya, what you experience is through sound within your body, which, later on, gradually, will reveal itself as light also. Very often, when we talk about the spirit, when we talk about the atma, we have an image of a light. Where does this light reside? It resides within our Self. So in all our spiritual practice, we need to do that only, even if we take many lives, we will attain the lotus feet of the Lord. When praying, what do we pray for? We pray, we ask, and the Divine is not deaf. The Divine always hears the prayer of everybody. If He can hear even the small anklets on the feet of an ant, of course, He can hear our prayer also. But very often we expect, if we pray, that we have to have it very quickly. We are not patient. But the Lord has created us. He knows what is best for us, no? So, why don´t we trust Him? Why don`t we trust in His will? Christ has said, “Let Thy will be done, not my will be done”. This is a great statement that He Himself, being part of the Divine, teaches us to be patient and trust in the will of God. Of the whole of our search, the basis, actually, is trust. To trust what? To trust in whom? To trust in God. But yet, some will say, “I don`t know Him”. But it doesn`t matter; even if we don`t know Him, know that He knows us. When we start trusting in ourselves, trusting in the inner voice, trusting in the light within us, trusting in the inner sound inside of us, then He will start to reveal Himself.

Words of Sri Swami Vishwananda.......

Whenever we pray, we pray towards the outside. We say that God is there and we are apart from Him. We should really stop separating the Divine from us. It doesn’t matter in which way you are praying, but if you talk with God, you talk with your true Self inside of you, so do it from here [Swami points to his heart]. There is one major factor that stops mankind from achieving that: it is the mind. But the mind can be overcome by chanting any Divine name. You see, if you practice it regularly, it will be moresimple for you to focus the mind.

“I want to be One with you again.......

Our soul wants to be one with the Divine; our soul wants to reach the Lotus Feet of the Lord. A great example is Lord Chaitanya Himself, who was for some years living normally. Even though He was a manifestation of the Lord, He lived a normal life until the Lord called Him; when He received the Grace, realising that, “I’m not here just for this. I’m not here just to teach. I’m not here just to be in this world; there is something greater to be realised. That is who I am.” I was just reading, before, the prayer of Saint Augustine. He always prayed with one prayer, “Lord, make me realise who You are, and make me realise who I am”. This was his prayer that he was saying and his heart was burning with this Divine Love. You see, when we talk about a heart burning for the Divine, some of you may understand, some of you may not understand, because we look at things with our mind. Like I was saying at the beginning of the talk, if our mind could fathom the Divine, we would not be here, we would be with Him. That’s why He has given us so many aspects of Himself, so that our mind can be focused until we realise our Self. I will not say just until we realise God in our Self, but until we realise that we are part of Him. So, Lord Chaitanya reached a point where He showed that only through bhakti, only through devotion, can this Love be awakened. But, this devotion has to be really from your heart, because if you just try with the mind and say, “Yes, I have devotion”, you will be stuck only to the outside and the burning of the heart will not happen inside of you. You don’t need to be scared, because when the heart burns it is not like in science when you say there is heartburn, you have an acidic problem! It’s not like that. It’s burning with Love, which the saints really experience. It’s the same in all religions, because they are all searching for the Lotus Feet of the Lord. Name Him by whatever name you want, call Him by whatever name, picture Him by whatever form, but it’s the same Lord, you know. That’s why each one of you has your Ishta Dev. It makes it easy for you concentrating on your Ishta Dev, so that this longing for the Divine in that form may appear inside of you. So, may Lord Chaitanya embrace your heart also, and help you to love the Lord the way He loved the Lord, until at the end they became One. He could not live in this world. He could not bear the separation. It’s the same thing when our soul looks at the Lord. It has the same longing when we say, “I want to be One with you again. I long to go back to this state where I realise that I am One with You and You are One with me, all the time.”

Sri Swami Vishwananda tells us today.....

Hold tight to the Divine names, any Divine name that you feel close to – you don’t need to have ten Divine names, you just need one Divine name. If you have a guru mantra, just chant your guru mantra; if you have one Divine name, one form of the Divine that you feel close with, just concentrate on one. It will be more intensified than concentrating on ten Divine names. In the mind of man, they think that when they have ten, they will advance faster. They will not advance faster. Actually they will advance less fast, because one Divine name is like digging one hole and getting the water; ten Divine names is like digging ten holes to try to get water. You will not get it. So, if you want, just chant one name.

Only the Lord, only Him, nothing else

Focus on the true joy that you have inside of you. Focus on the Love of God that you have inside of you. Focus on the Divine, which is present inside of you and focus in a way that nothing on the outside can move you. No matter what comes, nothing can move you! Christ said it: Make your faith, build your faith on the stone. Be so strong that no wind can move you, that no wind can destroy this. Become a pillar of this faith. This kind of concentration you should have: when you’re focused, when you sit down for meditation, you don’t hear anything, you don’t think about anything, only the Lord, only Him, nothing else.

What is left is only Him......

When you start chanting the Divine Names, for the Lord to reveal Himself to you, you have to prove yourself, also. Of course, everything happens through His grace, nothing happens through your grace. Even moving, even for me to talk, it is only through His grace that this is possible. But, as man has a mind, you have to prove that you really want to let go of this mind. So, by chanting His Divine Names, you start to call Him. So, the more you call Him, the more you are tuning yourself into His tune and the old you becomes less and less, until only His grace starts to shine through. It’s very simple. For example, when you start chanting Krishna’s name, at the beginning you will feel tired about it, you know. You will feel “Oh, what is happening? Why is He not listening?” But actually, these are all different qualities that awaken, you see, even to be angry with Him, because you wish for Him. In the same way that you wish for Him, He wishes for you much more. Let’s say you get depressed or you say “Ok, I’m praying, all this, you know, but He’s not listening,” and it happens, you know, but actually, this is Maya, His game. When He doesn’t show Himself, it is for you to long for Him even more. Of course, we can talk about it, you can think about it in the mind, but when you are in it, it is completely different. For you, it’s like the world is going upside down. I was talking with somebody yesterday, actually. This person said to me “Swamiji, I would love to see Krishna!” And then he reminded me of something that happened about twelve years ago, when he had the wish to see and I, well, He showed Himself to him, but because at that time he was not ready, I took this grace away from him. Then he said to me “Look, what happened twelve years ago, you took it away. I would love to see Krishna and I want it back!” And I said “What would you do to get this?” Well, he said “Anything!” And I said to him “Are you sure?” You see, it’s easy to talk about, but when it comes to the act, when it comes to practise, it’s difficult. Many people say “Yes, we love God”, but how many really do everything so that this love may grow? Very few do. Like the Lord said “I can count them on my hand.” Well, His hand, His hands are not like a human hand, you know. He has not only one; He has many. So, in the same way, the more you chant the Divine Names, the more you tune yourself into this Divine Name, the more He starts to shine through you and the more He starts to act through you. But of course, not Him, only His qualities do. To get Him fully, you have to go deeper and deeper. It’s the same as when you dig the hole. First you get a little bit of water, which is muddy, but the more you dig you have more water, which is clearer. It’s the same with the qualities of Him. Because, you see, when people reach a certain degree of spirituality, they develop certain qualities. He gives them certain qualities, but the sad thing is that people get stuck to these qualities. They think they have already reached a very high level of spirituality, you know, and they think of themselves as being everything. Then, of course, nothing further happens. But whereas, when you forget about these qualities, don’t give them too much importance, but go for Him, He will not be able to deny you His presence. He will even not be able to deny you Himself. The way you give yourself to Him, He will give Himself to you. It’s so easy, actually, but yet, difficult for the mind to understand, no? You see, it’s because everybody wants to understand how to do it, you know. When I just say to chant the Divine Names, you know, just recite His name, think of Him continuously, well, you say yes, you will do it, but in between, what happens? If you analyse your day, very often you forget about Him. You actually forget about Him more than you think about Him. That’s why it doesn’t happen. And, also, when you tell somebody to chant the Divine Names, they just chant mechanically, you know “Because Swamiji said to chant, let me chant it, chant it, chant it”. No, it’s not like this, because when you chant His name, your mind has to have His vision, also. You have to have His image in the mind. Of course, just to chant His name, it’s very good to do it. It’s better than nothing, but if you really want to achieve Him, chant His Name and visualise Him. Visualise Him, like He, Himself, said in the Gita, visualise Him in your third eye, visualise Him in your heart, visualise Him in each breath that you are taking in and out. Let’s say you are chanting the Maha mantra: Hare Ram Hare Ram, Ram Ram Hare Hare, Hare Krishna Hare Krishna, Krishna Krishna Hare Hare. You don’t need to rush; you have all the time. When you have a party, you have all the time for that. It’s the same thing when you take time to chant the Divine Names, you have to take your time, you know. And you sit, chant, visualise Him sitting in your forehead, in your heart. In each breath that you take in and out, it’s only Him. So, the more you chant like this, the more you are aware that He is not outside of you, but He’s inside of you. You will not just know it, you will start to Realise it. Then, this identity that you put always to yourself, this I, I, I, will start to dissolve. It will become You, You, You. So, it dissolves this ego identity and what is left is only Him.

Words of Sri Swami Vishwananda.......

"He has millions of Names, He has thousands of Names, so chant! Sing His Name. ...Sing and dance in ecstasy. When you sing, feel Him with you. So, keep chanting whatever you are doing. When you are walking, when you are working, when you are taking your shower, chant! The more you chant, the more the mind will move away from the unreal to the Real."

Can we really love in this time that kind of Love?

On the spiritual path, on the path of searching, there is another kind of Love which awakens inside of you and in this Love it is not about letting go because this Love is always growing. So the question arises can we really love in this time that kind of Love? Well yes, it is possible because that kind of Love is unconditional Love which everybody carries through life from small, ‘til you reach your destination. You always carry this universal Love inside of you and whether you love in a different kind of love or the universal Love is determined by how you let it vibrate within you. So the question is, like I said, if it’s possible to love? Yes, it is possible to love this kind of Love. To be able to let it grow and awaken inside of you, you should learn first to accept. But accept what? There are so many things to accept. When you look around, everywhere is telling you to accept. Accept this because everybody says this is right or that is right, but it is not about accepting this or that; it’s about accepting yourself. Only by accepting yourself you develop this trust inside of you. When you have this trust inside of yourself, this Love will grow more and more. Of course I don’t say that doubt will not arise, but this is where you will learn to control doubt by controlling the pride. There is one thing which can be an obstacle in one’s path and that is spiritual pride. When you live in the world outside, you don’t bother about anybody. You do your things and people do their things. But on the spiritual path very often there is competition. Each one competing with each other thinking which one is the best. It’s like if this one is like that then I have to be like that, too. No; you are individual and your aim, your dharma is different from everybody. Often people say “Swamiji I am on the spiritual path but I am working on this and that, I am so busy. I can’t be there!” Well, God has put you there so you have to do your duty there and if He chooses to come to you in that way, He will come to you. He will awaken the cosmic Love inside of you wherever you are the moment you start to accept. Have acceptance of yourself and then control this pride because this pride will always stop somebody.

The only thing that He wishes for is Pure Love.....

When one longs for the Divine, one will have everything. When you long for God, God doesn’t say that you have to leave everything. He doesn’t ask you for anything; He has everything; He made everything. The only thing that He wishes for is Pure Love, that this love that you have inside of your becomes Unconditional and Pure, that you Realise this Love inside of you and give it. Then you will be free. Then He will reveal Himself in you – in everybody.

When somebody knows a song by heart their eyes are always closed.....

You see, when you sing bhajans, I noticed many people had their eyes wide open, but if you close your eyes, you will meet Him inside of your heart. The mind gets distracted very easily on the outside. By looking with these eyes, you get distracted. You say “Oh that is beautiful.” You think it is beautiful, but it’s not beautiful. The beauty lies inside of you. Even if you are looking at the beauty on the outside, what you have on the inside is much more beautiful, because what you see in the outside will fade, but what you see in the inside will never fade. So when you chant the name of the Lord, look inside and you will find Him. If you open your eyes and look in the outside, you will just see Maya. Maya, Maya, Maya. You will be in Mayajaal, nothing else! You will be in the play of Maya. That’s why, when you look at somebody who is really enjoying the bhajans, when someone is really enjoying the singing, what do they do? Their eyes are always closed. When somebody knows a song by heart their eyes are always closed. Why? It’s because their concentration is deep inside. It’s the same thing when you sing for the Lord: try to close your eyes and find Him inside of you. Don’t let yourself be distracted by the outside, because it will all disappear and so you will find the real One!

He’s neither male nor female.......

Someone asked me “Swamiji, why do you always say God as Him?” God is also Her, but in the world we always use words which have limits. God is beyond all these things, like Narayana for example. He takes the appearance of Mohini Devi or Shakti when He has to show that He’s beyond this duality. He’s neither male nor female. He’s beyond this concept. He loves everybody equally, but in the mind of Man there is this concept, there is this duality. As long as we think of this duality, we’ll have the duality, but if we think of ourselves as being the Spirit, like Christ said, we will become this Spirit. This is what you have to identify yourself as. The more you identify yourself with the body, the more you limit yourself. The more you identify yourself as the Spirit, as this droplet of the ocean, the more your longing will be to be back in the ocean. I guess that’s what all of you want, no? It has to be a “Yes” from within. It’s not about how loud it is. You can scream “Yes!!” or whatever, but if you don’t mean it, it will not happen. Somebody can be quiet, but when he’s meaning it inside, it will help.

Love is such a big gift!

Only think of the relationship with yourself. Do you know what treasure you will find? The biggest treasure of all, a treasure that nobody can steal from you and that’s – love. Love is such a big gift! We feel it with our heart, we know it with our mind, but to realise it, to become one with this love, to spread this love, unconditionally — this is the aim of mankind. The more you spread it, the more you reflect it, the more you will discover yourself.

When people say “I want to know God,” I answer “Know thyself.” By knowing your own self, you will know God, because when we want to know God outside, we automatically create a barrier, we create a limited form. We are this love, we are this light. We are not separate from God, we are part of God. To achieve this we must surrender. Surrender the mind which is always jumping around. Surrender the body, which is the temple of this light and love, and reflect this light always.

Who is your best friend?

So who is your best friend? Who is the real one looking after you? Who is the one really listening to you? It’s only Him. It’s only the Lord Himself…. He was with you from the beginning and He will always be with you until the end, until you Realise your Self and until you attain Him. He’s your best friend, He’s the only one that you can really trust and He’s the only one that gives you solutions for everything.

The only thing is to attain this unity......

Above all, Love is the most important thing and "Shree Peetha Nilaya" – the name which the Divine Mother has given for the Ashram – is an abode of the Divine Mother Herself, where Her Love is given to everybody; this Love which we all – every human being – long for; this Love which is the call of your true Self, who you are and who you will always be. The only thing is to attain this unity, to attain this oneness with the Divine. There is only one thing that stops us of realising this unity – the discrimination, the judgment. Of course, all of these qualities emerge from one’s mind. The control of the mind over us is what stops this Love. When we look at a Saint who is in union with God – what is the name of the union with God? We have the Sanskrit name, Samadhi, don’t we? What is Samadhi? Everybody longs for Samadhi but the state of Samadhi is without any discrimination, without any judgment. It is pure Love. As long as you see the judgment in your mind, as long as there is discrimination in your mind, you will still have to work to attain the non-discrimination state and then, only this real Love, this pure Love will awaken. When this pure Love awakens, it embraces you. It is not a feeling that you will say “Yes, I feel happy or I feel sad.” It is beyond that. If I could express it with words, it would not be what I’m talking about. This is the state where you find union with the Divine, where you realise your Self. As long as you are searching, you are just searching for that Love. When you find it, you will only find that Love. So don’t lose hope, no matter what, know that the Divine is always with you and wherever you are, whatever you do, it’s Him who is doing through you. Try your best from your side, you have always to try your best. The human being is not perfect and I’m sure later on it will not be perfect either, because when one becomes perfect, one has this quality that I just said before. When one becomes perfect, one becomes Divine, so one is not human anymore. But as long as one has this quality, one stays human. Try your best to become Divine. That is what all the great Masters have taught. Christ came and taught that, Krishna has taught that and all of them have taught to realise your own divinity, because only then real happiness will be there. Then you can say “Yes, I am happy,” because that happiness will not go away, it will stay forever. Otherwise you will stay in illusion. You will think and try to make yourself think that you are happy. As long as you have not attained that, keep trying. You will receive all the help needed as long as you give your hand because if you don’t make your effort, you can’t expect God to do His effort, do it for you. He is fully realised, but He is here to help you to realise your Self, but you have to give your hand. You have to do your part.

Faith and Willpower

“Our Mother Earth is the most beautiful planet in the whole universe, not only in our solar system, but everywhere else.” What is so special about her within the whole universe – the universes – is that all the other planets and all the other spheres, they are governed by only one or two elements. As you all know, we have five elements, Earth has all the five elements in Her. That’s what makes Her special. All that is coming out of Her, which is everything that we can see, is made up of these five elements. Even our body, which we took from this earth plane, is made up of these five elements, so we are part of this creation. We are part of Her. It’s sad to see nowadays, how people behave, how people think. This creates a great impact on her, our thinking. It’s so easy to become negative, but very difficult to become positive. I have met many people who ask how to change that. You see, if we analyse how quickly we can change ourselves, that means that inside us we have a very great power. We have a great energy that can change from minute to minute, from second to second, from positive to negative from negative to positive. Why does one get stuck in the space of negativity? Do you think this brings positivity to you? No, it doesn’t. When it doesn’t bring positivity to you, it also affects nature. When nature gets affected, it affects this world, the surroundings that we are in. One person can change a lot. You have seen it in the past what the negativity of one person could do. One person in India – take the example of Ghandi – just one person’s positivity can change a lot also. So imagine, if inside of yourself you can change so quickly and change also not only you, but you can influence the outside and change the outside, then imagine if you become positive, how much it will contribute to Mother Earth, how much it will contribute to Prakriti, to Mother Nature – a lot! For that positivity – if you look at it both ways – I have given you two examples. I don’t want to mention the names, but in these two examples, one which is negative and one which is positive, what has made them really able to change the world? It’s amazing! Both of them are amazing. This is because of the full trust they had in what they wanted. In both ways, each one thought they were doing good, but the intensity of how much they believed in what they were doing, that is what brought the changes. This intensity is present in each one of us, but in place of making us more positive and more trusting in ourselves or making us stronger in our own will, what do we do? We make ourselves weak. Of course, when one becomes weak, one can’t expect what’s around them to be different. It’s like with one’s body – if the hand gets hurt, doesn’t it affect all the body? It does! You feel the pain everywhere. It becomes a handicap that you can’t use the hand because it hurts. Just the same Imagine if you become positive, how much it will contribute to Mother Earth, how much it will contribute to Prakriti, to Mother Nature – a lot! Your positivity can influence everything. One influences firstly oneself – one influences the mind, the body, the spirit. From that, one influences one’s surroundings and the surroundings will also influence nature and nature will balance itself. It’s simple! Well, I can say it’s simple. That’s what many will say “Well, it’s easy for you to say it is simple!” Like I said, it takes everybody together. We want peace in this world, we want peace in ourselves, we want to be happy, we want to make the world happy, so then we have to change. Nobody can change us, only we can change ourselves. It’s not what I am saying that will change you. No, only when you say to yourself “I want to change” with intensity, with full belief in yourself, then you will change. When you change, it will affect your surroundings. It will affect you; it will change you.

The Love for God

If humans could understand the Love that they have inside of them, they would always sing the same way Radha sang the Name of Krishna, the same way that Mary Magdalene had Love for Jesus, the same way all the Saints in the world have Love for God. All of you can achieve this Love. All of you can become this Reality, because this is what you ultimately are – Pure Love, Pure Divinity.

Your heart is opening bigger and bigger.....

When you dedicate yourself to the Lord, every day is a new day. Every day you learn new things and every day you will see that there is great learning happening and that you are advancing nearer and nearer to Him. Your heart is opening bigger and bigger and it is filling with so much Love. What you have to attain is the grace of God. Attain the Love, so that it can fill you up fully. You can achieve really the purpose of your life, the purpose of your incarnation here. Start, firstly by praying and chanting the name of God wherever you are. What is chanting? You see, the more you chant the Divine Names, the more you will receive this love and understanding. Of course, with the mind you will never understand Him, Maha Jwala Narasimha. When you look at Him like that even among you, you say “Oh, my goodness, this is a bit scary, eh?” You have to see that God is not only beautiful. That is the mistake that one always makes. You picture God in the mind saying, “God is the only perfect One”, but He can’t be perfect if He doesn’t have any imperfections inside of Him. That is what makes Him whole, the imperfection and the perfection. Train your mind, which is full with ignorance. Purify it and transform it, so that when you reach your heart, your spiritual heart, it’s fully blossoming so that you can offer the flower to Him. How would you offer the flower to Him? Offering the flower is not just by taking it from here and putting it there, not by taking it and putting it here saying “swaha”. It’s not like that, you know. It’s through service that you offer the flower to Him, when you help people who are in need. This is how the more you help, the more you will have satisfaction in life. When you help somebody sincerely, it’s a greater joy inside that you feel satisfied with what you have done, but then what happens? You don’t hang onto it. You forget very quickly. That’s how it has to be in life. Once you have attained the grace of God, once you have opened your heart really sincerely, His grace will just flow, because it’s a great fountain inside of you, which is everlasting. The more you take, the more it shall flow. So practice and attain His grace.

The 84th Door.....

Close your eyes, drop inside your heart and feel this fullness. Feel the greatness of yourself, this greatness is you. This greatness is who you really are, without any egoism. Keep concentrating on this greatness inside you. This great love which is emanating from your heart. It passes through each cell of your body. Try to reflect it outside. Isn’t it beautiful to see each person as the full light body? Let the eighty-fourth door of your heart open up. And if your mind is troubling you, sing the name of God. There are so many of them.

Om Namo Narayanaya, Om Namo Narayanaya...

Guided Meditation

I would like to do a small meditation with you. It’s a very simple meditation. We will use our imagination. Like when a child is being a bit naughty, you just give it a game. Give a toy to the child and let the child play. The child is the mind. So, we’ll give the mind a game, and we’ll let him play his game.

If possible, it’s good to dim the lights.

• Try to sit straight, even in a chair. Make sure that your spine

is straight.

• Listen to your breathing. Listen to it. With the mind,

imagine OM on your forehead. Listen to the beautiful

melody of your breathing. Let yourself be drawn deeper and

deeper in it. Your mind will think. Let it pass. Don’t try to

stop it. Don’t use force to stop it. Don’t give any importance

to it.

• Keep your concentration on your breathing. Don’t hear

anything else other than your breathing.

• To stop the mind, let’s use it now. Let’s use it to imagine how

God is looking at us. Imagine yourself being God. Imagine

the majesty, the hugeness, the purity, the light. See your

physical body full of light. See your body radiating this light

very brightly. There is so much joy within that is coming out

from inside you. So much happiness.

• Now, imagine the people who surround you. Look at all of

them. See the same light in them. There’s no difference.

Visualize the town where we are. Everybody’s radiating

the same light. See the whole of California radiating light.

Imagine the animal kingdom. They also radiate the same

light. Imagine the plant kingdom. You see the same light.

See the ocean kingdom reflecting the same light.

• See the whole U.S. full of light. See the whole world reflecting

this brilliant light. There is no disharmony. There is no hate.

There is just peace and love. The whole universe is radiating

this beautiful light.

• Now, reduce all this light to one central point which is called

the heart. See yourself sitting in all this light around that

you have been imagining. See all this light shrinking and

entering one point – the heart. In the heart, you feel lots of

warmth… happiness… joy…

OM….. OM….. OM…..

Love is a Great Teacher.....

There are four kinds of yoga – Bhakti yoga, Jnana yoga, Karma yoga and Raja yoga. Any of these four kinds of yoga, can lead someone towards Self-realisation. What is karma yoga? Selfless service – some will also say working. But that is just the karma not the yoga. Karma yoga is selfless service, selfless help. What is this selfless service? People do a lot of service, but selfless service is very rare. There is this part in the bible, where Christ said “When your right hand gives, your left hand should not know”– it is better you cut your left hand and throw it away. Selfless service means, that when you render service, you have to forget about it, the moment you have rendered this service. Does the mind forget about it? Very rarely. You see, when one does service, there is always an expectation. Even the expectation of “thank you,” or “thanks.” When one doesn’t get a “thank you” he becomes very upset, thinking “I have helped that person, but yet he didn’t even thank me for that!” But selfless service is not like that – when you render service, forget about everything. Deep inside of you, you are rendering service to the Divine, but you don’t expect the pride of knowing that you are rendering service to the Divine, to rise. So erase completely the expectations of the mind – and that is selfless service.

The next yoga is Bhakti yoga, which is considered one of the easiest yoga. In bhakti, the first step you make but in that form of yoga, the first step that you make, the Lord makes ten steps towards you. You know your goal in life. In karma yoga, you have to walk towards that goal, you have to climb to the peak of that mountain. In Bhakti yoga, you are flying towards that mountain with a helicopter. Then, the third yoga is Raja yoga. Raja yoga is divided into many forms of yoga. That’s where your spiritual exercises come, like Atma Kriya, Hatha yoga; all these yoga fall into the Raja yoga. In Rajayoga you come to the point where you go into Samadhi. If you do your sadhana sincerely, when you do your spiritual practice sincerely, you come to the point of the samadhi state. What is the state of Samadhi? I said there is a mountain; in the first one you have to walk up there, in the second one you fly there and the third one, you don’t even need to carry your body. By will, you are there. Many great saints or sages have reached that point, where they could be in many places at once with this will. Like Christ – a man wanted Him to heal his servants and he said “Lord come to me, to my house, You shall heal my servant.” Christ said “Go home, your servant is healed.” This is the state, where you have touched the cosmic consciousness; you realise the infinite of your true Self. The last yoga is Jnana yoga. I will ask you; what is Jnana yoga? – tell me please – (someone: knowledge, knowing who you are). Yes, knowledge. The knowledge of the Self. But real Jnana yoga; very often people think that Jnana yoga can be found in books or one may find it or by practising, but real Jnana yoga is to have the wisdom, not just to know it, but to have the wisdom, that what you are looking for is that the beginning is the end, and the end is the beginning. With these four forms of yoga, anyone can attain Self-realisation or God-realisation. Each one is free to follow whichever path of yoga one wants to.

The main aim is to awaken this Divine Love, because without Love, you will not do anything. The key of all of these four kinds of yoga, is just the Love, the core of the heart. A love which consumes everything, a Love which will liberate you.

A teacher is not here just to give you good things, he has to teach you.

Through the grace of God.....

Paramahansa Ramakrishna used to say “The ones who consider themselves wise, are not wise, and the ones who consider themselves not wise are the wisest.” You see, you have to understand the truth that is behind this. Let’s take for example Moses himself. He didn’t have knowledge of anything, but he had the grace of God. Through the grace of God his mission was revealed to him, his dharma was revealed to him. Through the grace of God his way was revealed to him and through the grace of God he attained a very high degree of spirituality. Similarly, know one thing, that whatever happens in your life, you can make an effort, yes. But count not on your effort, count always on the grace of God. Like that, all that you will do will be blessed. All that you will do will be perfect, because it is not you who will do it, not as you in the form of pride and ego. This is how very often when men are focused, they try their very best. They try their maximum, but yet nothing happens without the grace of God. This is one little hint for you that will help you in releasing your pressure that you put on yourself. For example, there are so many great saints, great yogis, ascetics, which are meditating from morning until evening, they meditate in the Himalayas, no? They have become great ascetics through many years of penance, through many years of prayer and chanting divine names, and yet, they are still far away, whereas a simple person from a village, Moses for example, who comes from nowhere, He just takes him and says “OK, you will do this mission for me.” Like that, if you look at the life of Saints, they were not knowledgeable people, but they had the grace of God with them. Through that they have complete trust in the Divine that whatever the Divine is doing for them is for their own benefit and is for their own good. So if God has called you on to this way, if God or your soul has revealed your path to you and you feel this love, this unconditional love inside of you, then hold tight, no matter what, hold tight, be strong! When you make yourself strong, the Divine will give you more energy so that you become even stronger. So never cease to practice, never cease to ask the Divine for help. Make yourself ready, and remind yourself always of the love for God – wherever you are, whatever you do. Like that you will become Love. What is someone who is enlightened? We talk about enlightenment, no? Or self-realisation, what is that? Can somebody tell me? Tell me please, don’t be shy! (someone: “Remembering who we are.”) Yes, remembering who you are. Not only remembering, realise who you are! What is this word “realising” who you are? Enlightenment, who is the light? The Divine, no? Enlightenment means you are radiating the Divine Light, when you start radiating the Divine Light, you become enlightened.

When the mind is in a calm state, when the mind doesn’t bother you, and the pride is not there, you are like a white cloth, no? The Divine is like a golden cloth.

What happens when the white cloth is brought closer to the golden cloth? Automatically the white cloth will start to reflect the golden cloth, no? The golden colour, the same thing, the more you advance towards the Divine, the more you do your effort to advance towards the Divine, the more the Divine will move closer to you. The closer he moves to you, the more his reflection will be on you. Then you become also Divine, then you realise this Divinity – the Divinity which you are already. Then you start to radiate it, you start to reflect it, you start to let it go into action. So whenever tests come, don’t fall into them, be strong. Whenever you feel you are down, know that you are not alone. The Divine is much closer than you think.