Sri Swami Vishwananda tells us a story .....

Someone asked me to ask Mahavatar Kriya Babaji to come and bless you all, and I said to him, “Do you want me to get beaten by him afterwards?” This reminds me of a story: Sri Lahiri Mahasaya didn’t believe too much in gurus and all that stuff in the beginning. After he met Babaji, his life changed completely. One day his friends were talking very badly about gurus and saints, saying all these gurus, all these saints are just always cheating people. Lahiri got a bit angry, thinking, “No, I know one real guru who is not like that. I can prove it to you!” Babaji had given him a special mantra so that whenever he was in need, he could call upon him, and he will come, even physically – but in need!

To prove that he was right, he asked to be closed in a room. Inside the room he was praying, crying, calling Babaji. Finally Babaji appeared and said, “Yes, what do you want?” He said, “You know, my friends don’t believe, so I want to prove it to them.” Then Babaji told him off by saying, “No, you should not do that. If they don’t believe, it’s their problem! You should never force anybody to believe anything.” Then he said to him, “OK, don’t do that. I will come to you whenever it’s needed. I myself, I will come to you.” Then Sri Lahiri Mahasaya was very clever, and he said, “As you are already here now, can you please bless all of them?” And he was so much filled with love, and so sincere, that Babaji could not refuse. Then he opened the door and everybody could see Mahavatar Babaji. And Babaji came out with them and he even ate and drank with them, and blessed all of them and then he disappeared again.

It is upon yourself to call for all devas, they can come if you really call from deep within your heart.

“From the form to the formless, from the name to the nameless.”

Today I would like to talk about the mind – a big subject. Many people are scared of this subject. Actually, you don’t need to be scared of the mind. The mind of its own is a great gift of God – because it is through the mind that you can achieve the Divine. But what is wrong with thought? It is said, the way you think, that’s the way you are. If you think you are Divine, you will become Divine. But if you think you’re just a mere human being, you will stay always this mere human being. So this is the power of thought. So, to control the mind is to control how you think – to control the thoughts. If the thoughts are good, the result outside will be good. However, if the thoughts are wrong, do you expect anything good will come out of them?

This is how our thought, how our mind, how our thinking works. Whereas if you look at our mind as a gift that God has given us, how marvellous it is! Imagine: your brain can record eight hundred memories per second. Do you think a computer can do that? And it can last seventy-five years without getting exhausted – night and day. Imagine this storehouse that the mind has. Imagine the storage that the brain has, it’s so small, isn’t it? But it can store about ten billion to hundred billion memories in a life time. Even a computer can’t keep such memories.

So if scientists had to build a computer that could store that much – I think this building would be one of the biggest buildings in the world, storing so much information. But how marvellous is this creation of God! That such a small brain can keep so many things inside! But people let the mind control themselves. They let themselves become the slaves of their thoughts. And they enjoy it. To control the thought – the thought will pass by. You know inside your heart whether it is constructive or destructive. It’s up to you whether you want to feed the thought with the right food or deny it. If our thoughts are negative, we keep feeding them with negativity and we become miserable. We create misery with unhappiness and problems. If the thought would be more positive, the mind would be more constructive. Then happiness, joy and peace will enter. Start by thinking positive about yourself. You can’t think positive of others unless you are positive yourself.

Sit quietly and start the conversation with the Divine within yourself. Because it’s only in silence that you will be able to control the thought. Talk less – because people who keep talking and talking – they are just running away. They are just scared of seeing the truth, that’s why they talk and talk. They talk without knowing what they are talking about.

If you want to start the communication with the Divine within yourself, be as much silent as possible. But if you want to start the communication with man, then keep talking! You know how beautiful it is to listen to the Divine inside you? It’s the most beautiful thing; I can’t even express it with words, because words are still limited.

Like I said yesterday, “From the form to the formless, from the name to the nameless.” This is the Divine in each one of you. And to be always in this place, to be always in this awareness and find that you are not separate from the Divine…it’s so beautiful, it’s so filling! Whenever you do something there is always a gap, something that is unsatisfied. But whereas – when you have discovered the reality in you – whatever you do – the satisfaction will be complete!

Christmaspackage

“Christ is born every day in the heart of man.”

- Sri Swami Vishwananda

To find the inner Christmas…

Every year, in all the world, we celebrate Christmas together, the birth of Jesus Christ, the One who came to redeem mankind, the great Master who is an example of humanness, compassion and devotion.

Swami says that in Mauritius, Christmas is not only a feast for Christians, but is celebrated by members of all religions: “The birth of Christ is something very mystical, because Christ renews his birth every year, whenever we celebrate it, in the heart of man.“

When we try to connect with God, Christ and the great Masters during Christmas time, we create a strong foundation for the New Year. Christ creates in our hearts a lasting landmark of love, so that we recognise that we are all children of the One God.

For this year’s Christmas we have put together a package, which is meant to help us, to find that inner Christmas in our hearts. The package contains a rose quartz heart and a bee’s wax peace candle, which have been blessed by Swami himself and are a reminder of Jesus’ light and love. With the light of the candle, blessed by Swami, we can light all candles of the coming year. The incense symbolises the gifts of frankincense and myrrh of the three Holy Kings. And on the new Christmas DVD, Swami shares his thoughts on Christmas and its meaning.

The proceeds of 29,-- Euros (plus postage) per packet go entirely into the renovation project of the Bhakti Marga Center “Shree Peetha Nilaya” in Springen. The Christmas package can be ordered online www.bhaktishop.de (If anyone can't order it online, they can order it also via email: daya@bhaktimarga.org)

We wish you a very Merry Christmas, much light and blessings!

Paartha and Naamdev

On behalf of the whole Bhakti Marga team.

PS: Friends of Bhakti Marga receive a discount of 10% ! If you are interested in joining Friends of Bhakti Marga , please send an email to tusti@bhaktimarga.org

The same way that God created the world – by the willpower, by the power of word – ......

Picture in your mind a beautiful forest. This forest that you are picturing is your own creation, the creation of God within you. The same way that God created the world – by the willpower, by the power of word

– create this beautiful forest inside you. This forest will wear your name, each one. And in this forest there is just peace and love.

Each tree in this forest is your own reflection. It is your Self… This is the kingdom of the plant…

Picture in the mind the animal you love most – you can also see lots of animals. Be in the super-conscious. You are part of the creation of the animal kingdom. See yourself in all the animals you are creating… There you are also present in the animal kingdom…

Picture yourself as being in a mighty mountain. You are also present in it. Each stone on it is your creation… See yourself as being the mountain. Create the whole sky with lots of stars. Each one of the shining stars is your Self…

Picture yourself in any Divine form that you like very much and say to this form, “You and I, there is no difference. We are one.” And listen to this inner conversation – between the form you have created and your self. Listen to it. You will see He is laughing at it. Finally, you understand. Finally, you have come to this point of knowing that you and I are one. You and all the whole creation are just one…

And finally, see the merging of all in your body – that whatever you have imagined, whatever you have created in the power of the mind is present in you. Your body is just light – pure consciousness of God. You are the Christ consciousness, you are the Krishna consciousness, and you are the super-consciousness. Now, slowly open your eyes…

How was it, this small journey? Well, practice it! Keep reminding yourself that you are Divine. As you all remind yourself of being human, you will be just human. It’s so simple, if you can just always remind yourself of being love. Yes, we don’t really need to do big mantras, big japas, it’s just by reminding ourselves that we are love – we will be love. We will be in this world, but at the same time we will be Divine. When the awareness that you are Divine blossoms inside of you, there will be no fear, no doubt, nothing!

This complete trust within you of being Divine will project so much joy and so much peace. But what I said before, be an instrument of the Divine always. So keep reminding yourself. Exercise, if you can sit down for an hour or more – every day. In this hour just be with you, your own Self and enjoy it. Enjoy being with your Self, and talk. You will see, deep inside there will be a voice coming out, each thing that you ask, you’ll receive an answer. If you want, you can write it down and meditate on it. Enjoy it, love it, and cherish it! That’s when you’ll be closer to yourself, closer to know and understand everybody.

Understand the whole creation of God – because actually it’s your own creation, the way you wanted the world to be – the way it is. Some people want war, they have it, some people want God, they also have it. Some people want illness, they also have it. Some people want the cure of the illness, they also have it. The way you make this mind think, you create it. If you want love, you will have it, if you want God, you will have it. It’s just that you want it! Want it without any doubt. Want it with a heart that really is calling for God, “God, I want You!” Because God is always with you.

You all know Shiva and Parvati.......

You all know Shiva and Parvati. Shiva is a renunciate. He renounced the world and He lived like a beggar, going around begging for His food. He was just wearing a tiger skin. And, of course, Parvati wanted so much to marry Shiva. To marry Him was quite difficult, but She did so much penance. Through her tapo shakti, which means the shakti of the tapasya, the penance that she did, she won Shiva. So when she won Shiva, She said to Him “Lord, let me always be with You. Whenever You meditate, I will sit next to You. I will just look at You.” Hearing that, Shiva just smiled. Time passed. Shiva was still in meditation and She was just sitting near Him. But after some time, even the thing that you love starts losing its quality, because it becomes so normal and because we always want to experience the same longing and feeling that we had in the beginning. So the same thing happened with Parvati. There She was just sitting, in the Himalayas, in the cold. And, as time passed, it became a bit boring for Parvati just to sit there in the cold. So one day She approached Shiva and said to Him “My Lord, I have been here for so long now. I would like so much to go into the world to see your bhaktas, to see your devotees.” Shiva didn´t say much, He just listened. So Parvati sat there again for another month. You know very well with matajis, when they have something in their minds, it is very difficult to get it out. And that is not a bad thing. It´s a good thing, because if you want God no matter what, you will get Him! So one month passed and Parvati said again to Shiva “My Lord, can I go into the world? I would love so much to see your devotees, to see your bhaktas.” Then Shiva said “Okay, fine. You go.” And Parvati was very happy. She came down from the Himalayas and, when She was down, She saw so many bhaktas who welcomed Her happily. They were so happy and made big parties and feasts for Her. So She started travelling and many years passed like that. Finally, She arrived in South India and for that great occasion they had built a huge temple for Her. But, as She entered the temple, even though they welcomed her with all these grand things, all of a sudden She became very sad. She started to feel the longing for Her Beloved. But during all Her traveling, what had happened? She had lost her way back. She searched for it again, but could not find it. Finally, Parvati turned to the Lord and said “Through all this travelling I blinded myself, so that now I cannot find even the way back home. How will I find You? The only way to get back home with You is if You come and find me.” So She cried and cried and cried. Shiva was pleased with it and He came to Her and took Her back to the Himalayas. In the same way, if you sit down quietly and empty your mind completely through meditation, through chanting, controlling the mind and, especially, knowing that all is One, the Lord will come, because He is sitting always in your heart. We look for Him outside and it’s good; outside is very good. We go to the temple and we pray to Him until He reveals Himself from inside of us. We say we want God, but yet, in our minds, God has to be our way. Of course, we all have a personal relationship towards the Divine and He will always come according to how we call Him. He is not limited, He has millions of forms, but we have to let Him do His Will. That’s the meaning of the word surrender. But, very often, we pretend to know better. This is the mistake that humans always make, to think that they know better than anybody else. There is this saying: “The wise one keeps quiet; the unwise one makes lots of noise.” The wise man knows the truth about himself and about everybody else. The unwise one doesn’t know much. That’s why He wants to have the attention of everybody. Have you ever sat quietly with yourself? How many of you have sat quietly? I’m not talking about meditation–meditation is something else – but just to sit and enjoy the moment quietly with an empty mind, without thinking of what the husband or the wife is doing or what the children are doing.You all know that we live in the world of energy. Whatever we do is made up of energy. If we don’t eat, our body will be weak. We need energy and this energy is always flowing, but there is also a greater energy that we always need. And what is that energy? That’s it–Love. And this energy is always flowing. Whatever we do is just to attain Love, nothing else; because in Love you will have peace, in Love you will find what you are looking for. But to attain this Love you have to make an effort, also. You can’t just sit around saying “OK, I have some love inside of me,” and that’s it. It’s there, but it can get more intensified. So, you can utilise this energy also to awaken yourself.

You can remember Him every day....

Humans are hanging onto the outside and not much onto the inside, because you don’t know about the inside. You know only what is in the outside, what you can see and what you can touch. From these two things, you think you will be happy, but you have one thing, which is not seen, and that is your Atma. You can talk about the Atma, you can say “Yes, we have the spirit inside of us, you know, we have the soul inside of us”, but how many really know about the Atma? Whenever you talk about death, people get scared. They don’t want to mention death. Well, you were born and you will die. This is not something that you will escape. You will have to go through that, but you, not your body, but your True Self is permanent. So, in realising the Atma, letting the Atma reveal itself to you, you will have the greatest joy, actually. You will always be happy. Even when problems come, you will be happy, because you will have attained the purpose of life, of lives! You will have attained the purpose not only of one life, but of lives. So, try your best to do your sadhana. Try your best to remember God in whatever you do, even if you don’t consider it as seva, but in whatever action you do in life, try to think of God. If you have five minutes during the day, try to sit down quietly. For these five minutes forget about husband, wife, children, everybody. When you sit in your prayer room, just sit - you and God. If you don’t have five minutes, then even two minutes are fine, because He is the One. Whenever you have problems you say “Oh, my God!” No? Then you look for God, but when you are happy, well, you don’t say “Oh, my God, I’m happy!” So, why do you have to wait for a problem to come to remember God? You can remember Him every day. I will not say all day, because you will not, but at least morning and evening, for one minute in the morning and one minute in the evening, you can remember Him. He has a multitude of forms that He appears in, you know. Each one feels close to a certain form of divinity, though it’s only one. It’s like when you look at a tree: there are many leaves, many branches, but all of them came from one seed only. Imagine from a small seed a huge tree can come out, with thousands of leaves, hundreds of branches, but yet, the seed is one. So, try to realise this unity and build up this relationship with the Divine. The more your relationship with the Divine becomes intense, the more He will reveal Himself to you. It’s like when you’re in love. At the beginning you say “Yes, I have a feeling for that person”, but yet, you don’t know that person. How do you know the person? By being close to that person, by being near to that person, you will start to know the person, no? So, the more you become close to that person, the more you know the person, the more the love grows, more and more. So, it’s the same thing with Bhagavan, you know. The more you remember Him, the more you chant His name the more He will reveal Himself to you. So, little by little you will start to feel Him. Little by little you will start to realise Him and that He’s next to you. Sometimes you will see Him in dreams and sometimes you will see Him manifested in front of you. Then, as time goes on, the objects wherein He manifested start to disappear, only He stays. So wherever you go, you will just see Him only. So, the more your Love grows, you will see Him inside of you, you will see Him outside of you and soon you will realise that it’s just Him. We’re just doing a big play. He’s just playing with all of us. He’s acting through all of us. He’s doing what He has to do through each one of us.

Love is the only thing that binds the Lord

See, we have to awaken the Love that we have treasured so much and keep always for ourselves. When you are in love, what do you like to do? To give, right? You like to spread this love. In the same way, when you are Awake, His grace will flow through you. You will come out of this dreaming state one always puts oneself into. This reminds me of a story. There was once a woodcutter. One day, after finishing working, he came home, sat down and fell asleep. In his sleep he was dreaming that he was a king who had seven wives and many children. He was enjoying the dream very much. Then, all of a sudden, a friend of his came–not in the dream, but in reality– and said “Wake up!” The woodcutter came out of his dream and started shouting at his friend, saying “I was a king and you came and disturbed me!” Then the friend said “But it was just a dream.” But the woodcutter was very annoyed and said “For you it was just a dream, but for me it was reality.” It’s the same for us; we are living in a dreaming state. When we become Awakened, we will see the Reality. But this Reality is not to be understood with the mind. It’s different. And that’s what human beings are here for, to attain this Reality of who they are, to see that they are not just this, as we call it, bag of bones. We will attain this Reality only through Love, Unconditional Love; only by loving in the same way that He loves us. Do you think His Love is bound by any limitation of what we understand of Him or how we dress Him? The Love of God is not bound by anything, except by the love of His devotees. When we look at the life of Krishna, what was binding Him? He was always free, ever free. He was born free. The only thing that binds Him, that limits him, is the Love of His devotees. There was a Swami from Vrindavan last week in the ashram in Germany. He told this beautiful story, which is, also, in the Srimad Bhagavatam, of when Krishna was small. You know He was very naughty, always breaking all the makan and butter pots, trying to annoy everybody, because He wanted all the attention to be on Him, only, and on nothing else. One day Yashoda had Him on her lap and she had some milk on the fire. Then the milk started to boil and to spill in the fire. This Swami was explaining how great was this milk. It was crying, because even when the Lord was so near to it, it couldn’t come to Him. Seeing the milk boiling, Yashoda put Krishna down and rushed to remove the milk. There are many great yogis who try to attain the Lord through meditation and penance, but they cannot. And there He was playing on the lap of Yashoda, but yet she let Herself be distracted to the outside, forgetting about the Lord. So He went and broke the pots of buttermilk and gave the butter to the monkeys, starting to feed them. When Yashoda came and saw the broken pots and monkeys all around, she knew that it was Krishna. Then she started to look for Krishna and to run after Him everywhere. Of course, Krishna with His little, little legs started, also, to run around and she couldn’t catch Him. Then, finally, He let Himself be caught by Yashoda. So she tried to tie Krishna with a rope, but every time She tried to tie Him, the rope was short by two inches. Then she would go and get some more rope, but again it was short. And she tried again, but again it was short. Finally, Yashoda became really, really tired. Then Krishna was looking at how much Love she had at that moment, He thought “OK, I succeeded in getting Her attention fully on me.” So He let Himself be tied. So Love is the only thing that binds the Lord. When we talk about love, about finding this love inside of us, it’s actually to find His Love inside of us, to catch Him completely and when we catch Him, then we can say “Yes, I have Him.”

When I am talking about devotion....

What I have to say is all about Love and devotion. All that we do in our daily life, in our work, in our spiritual path, it´s all to attain one thing: the purity of Love, to become Self-Realised, but you cannot attain this purity, you cannot Realise the Self without devotion. It’s possible only through bhakti, through devotion. Without bhakti, it’s difficult. Like Sri Krishna said in the Gita “Cast away all dogma. Cast away all that is from the mind and surrender to me.” Only then True Love can be Realised. The Jnanis, they stick only to the mind. I don’t say that it´s not good. It´s good, but it will lead you only to a certain level. It is very good to help, to do karma yoga, but if you are not helping with the right attitude, it will also bring you only to a certain level. Whereas with bhakti, like Sri Krishna said to Uddhava: Above all the yogas, I prefer bhakti yoga. I prefer the yoga of devotion, where the devotee and the Lord become One; where there is no difference left, whereas in all the other yoga, the difference stays.” When I am talking about devotion, I don’t mean the kind of devotion that will fade after one month, but pure devotion that lasts forever. There are lots of people who have devotion in the beginning. When they start their spiritual path they are very excited but, after some time, their devotion fades. But real devotion is like the Lord said: If you surrender to me, open your heart and say “Lord, take complete possession of my heart. It’s only you that I’m looking for.” In reality, all the happiness that you are looking for - whatever you are doing in the outside - is to achieve Satcitananda. Wherever you look, whoever you look at, they are all running towards this. The priest is praying, but why do you think he is praying? He is praying for real happiness. People on their spiritual path are, also, looking for real happiness. Even people who are taking drugs: why do you think they do that? They are looking for real happiness. too. Of course, our mind doesn’t see it in the same way, but in the end, they are looking for real happiness. And this real happiness lies deep inside of you. Through devotion, through singing the glory of God, all the dogma will be removed and you will feel that He is continuously present with you. You will feel His Love continuously with you. The more you feel Him, the more you become part of Him. Like it is said, also, in the Gita: When one chants the name of God, the Lord takes full possession of that person. The more you lose yourself, the more you lose your ego and pride, the more you will Realise the Divine, but the more you hang onto pride, the more you hang onto identity, the less you will find real happiness. So the easiest way that the Lord has given to us is to sing His glory. Just sing any Divine Name and, when you sing, let yourself be drawn into it and don’t try to think with the mind.

Sing with your heart.....

When you need something, especially when you are in an emergency, you have the courage and you forcefully call “Hey you, Tom, bring me this. I need that.” Here you are singing the name of God. You desperately want Self-Realisation. You desperately want liberation, so you are calling to God. So let the strength from deep within come out and sing loudly. You’ll see the more you sing loudly, the less there will be thoughts in your mind. So, the more you sing loudly, the more your heart will be open. So, don’t be scared of singing and be happy. Don’t be depressed. When you call God, you know, you don’t say “OK, God, I’m calling you, come.” He’ll look at your face and get so scared, that in the bliss of coming, He’ll run away. As He is sitting in the middle of your heart, deep inside your heart, when you’re calling Him to come, if you say “Come” like this, He’ll say, “Oh, my goodness, he says come, but he doesn’t really want me.” So in the bliss of opening your heart you will close it. So, sing with your heart.


Sri Swami Vishwananda singing Bala Mukunda....

Everybody wants to be close to the Divine....

All the practices that you are doing, your meditation, your Kriya, all you are doing is for what? It’s to Realise your Self, no? But many people think they are Realised and they become very arrogant and they are the ones who judge everybody. They are the ones who say “Oh, this is right; this is wrong.” He said it. It is part of the Gospel. Jesus said: The Father is present everywhere, in everything. It is not up to me to say it, but you will know about it. If you just take this part of the Gospel and you meditate only on that, you will have a whole truth in it – especially about Love. I always talk about love, love, love, always, you know. It is true that the world doesn’t yet know about it. And yet, you are working for that, all of you who are spiritual, all of you who are searching for the truth. It is not outside, it is here inside of you, but you have to want to change. You have to really say “Yes, I want to change.” Like He said: Even if you want to change, the world will be against you. It’s perfectly true! Ask yourself in your life, in your own life itself, when you took the spiritual path, how many people became against you–firstly in your own family? So, it is normal. The more you advance towards the light, the others will be jealous, because inside everybody wants that. Everybody wants to be with the Father. Everybody wants to be close to the Divine, but, yet, they don’t want to make any effort. They don’t want to make any change to their life. They want to get everything happily and for free. So, if you want this really and sincerely, then be sincere towards yourself and ask the Father. Ask God and you will have it. It’s simple. If you are sincere towards yourself, you are more free and you will enjoy whenever you pray. Whenever you sit for meditation, whenever you chant, you’ll be more free, because you are not bound by any guilt. The guilt is symbolised in the Holy Gospel as Peter. He was very guilty for so many things. So here, with the guilt that weamass on ourselves we limit ourselves. We constantly see, actually, our own mistakes. We speak very big, big words, because it is so beautiful for the mind. We have read about it being close to the Divine in books. It is a beautiful experience. We know it through books, yes, but experience this firsthand. It’s for everybody to experience and it is not limited. If you really want it, you will experience it. You will see very much that in this small piece we read right now, there is so much similarity to Hinduism. The washing of the feet, actually, is not a Jewish tradition. This is a very Hindu tradition – to wash the feet to show the humbleness. Also, like Jesus said, it is not about washing the body outside, but it’s inside that you have to wash. But the washing of the feet is symbolic. As you know very well, everything is present in the feet. All the organs that are inside the body are present in the feet. So, by washing the feet, you will wash the inside also. But the feet, you see how important they are. When you go to the Hindu Temple, the first things you see are the feet of the Deity. The first thing that you do is to bow down to the feet. When you go to the Master, you bow down to the feet. So, you bow down to the greatness, you bow down to the Divine inside, you bow down to the Father within the Teacher. And that is what Christ said. He said it word for word. I don’t even need to say anything about it. I don’t even need to comment on it. It’s just very clear about this non-duality of God within man and, also, very clear on the way of God-Realisation, the way of Self-Realisation, or whatever you want to call it. But you will not reach God-Realisation, Self-Realisation, with pride. You will not reach it being very arrogant. You will reach it only when you are humble, and He said: People will be against me. You know where you are going and you know why. So, meditate on that. Glory be to the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, now and to the ages of ages. Amen.

Let us build one family!!

When we look at humans, the way they are reacting is even worse than unpleasing to see. It’s about time to change one’s mind; the way we see things. It’s about time to look at ourselves and say “What can I change? What am I willing to change?” And I said: “If you really want the Love of God” because many people put the tag, ‘I love God’, but really they don’t. They only want the quality of God. They want only to get and get and get from God, but they don’t really want to receive and manifest the Lord inside, the Divine within themselves. And I tell you: if one doesn’t want to change, Mother Nature will make them change. Sometimes, if they don’t want to change in a certain way, Nature reacts in another way - sometimes painful, but there is a change.

Let us learn to become humble like Christ. Let us learn sincerely to love one another. Let us learn to be in unity with each another. Let us build one family. Like we say in Sanskrit: Vasudeva Kutumbakam, which means: “the whole world is one whole family”. And the peace can come firstly within you and

through you to everybody, only when you are in unity together. When you work together with each another, you will be stronger.But if you work against the others, you will be the weak one.

O God,Grace me with Love of You,and to love those who love you,and to love whatever brings me nearer to You.

That moment is between you and God......

We often hear people asking the question “Who is God?” I will ask you, now, “Who is God?” Well, it’s true, as long as you have not known Him, you can’t answer. Love is God, but how many Realise this Love? To which religion does God really belong? Is God Christian? Is God Hindu? Is God Muslim? Is God Buddhist? To which religion does He belong? Love….. Wherever you go, you will see that there is only one God and He is the Love in each one´s heart, but how to Realise this Love? We are so busy with this material world that we forget about the Divine Love. We try to look for this Love in the outside world. We try to look for this Love in other people. We try to look for this Love by travelling around the world, but we forget that we have to travel not outside, we have not to try to find this Love in other people, but we have to find this Love in our Selves. We have to Realise the closeness to this Divine Love which is here, inside our hearts. Some people will say that it is very difficult to reach this point, but I say that it is very easy. You just need to want it! People try to find an easy way and if they could buy Love, they would do it. But Love can’t be bought. Somebody might come and tell you “Listen, I will make you Realise this Divine Love”, but only the Guru can do that. Only by the grace of the Master can you do that.

This Divine Love, which is seated deep inside your heart, is like gold. And when gold is found in nature, it is with all the dust. Both gold and diamonds in nature are full of impurities. To get a beautiful jewel, a beautiful stone from a rough diamond, what do you do? You polish it. The same with gold: to get pure gold, you have to purify it, to remove all the impurities from it. It is the same with man. As long as you are stuck in the mind and don’t purify the mind, this Love will never shine. You will never Realise this Love. Even if you think you know it, because you have read about it or somebody has told you about it or Swami has said it, but as long as you don’t purify your mind, as long as you don´t purify yourself, it will be difficult to Realise this Love. And how is one to purify the mind? The easiest way to purify the mind is to chant, to chant continuously the Name of God. You were chanting the Mahamantra: Hare Ram Hare Ram, Ram Ram Hare Hare, Hare Krishna Hare Krishna, Krishna Krishna Hare Hare. It is said that just by chanting this mantra one can get liberation, but one has to chant it with faith. Mere chanting alone will not help, but chanting with the heart will help. And how is one to chant with the heart? How is one to train the mind to calm itself? It is by forcing it. When you discipline yourself and say “OK, today I will chant”, then you start by taking your japa mala or rosary and you chant your mantra so you are focusing yourself on it, you are dragging the mind and putting your focus on the mantra. The more you do it, the more you will see that, with time, you will not even need the japa mala. You will not need any rosary, because the mantra will automatically be chanted inside your heart. When you become the mantra, you reach a point of Realisation, you reach a point of elevation, but still it’s not the final one. There is still more to go. And how do you to get there? It’s only when you abandon yourself into the hands of God, when you say “Lord, I surrender to You. I surrender myself - my body, my mind and my soul - completely to You” [that you will get there] Don’t do it superficially, but sincerely. And how do you do it sincerely? Be sincere with yourself and say “Yes, God, I want You. I’m surrendering myself to You”. When it’s comes sincerely from your heart, it will happen.

When you are centred, when you concentrate, when you pray, when you chant the Name of God, that moment is between you and God.

“God Thy will be done!”

The moment you stop looking for fault in others, you will start truly loving everybody. And for that, you have to start looking within yourself, looking for what you have to change in your life. I’m not saying to judge yourself, but to look at the negative part of you and face it. But by looking at the negativity only, you will see that you create this negativity. To understand Love, it’s simple, it is just…absence of fear. You can’t understand Unconditional Love out of fear. But if people really want to understand Love, really want to understand who they are…they will. But often, the fear is so great that it makes a barrier, and then you ask the question, “If I realise who I am, what is then?” The fear of the Unknown stops the want of realising. But if you accept, whatever, as the will of God and say “God Thy will be done!” and Christ has shown it, by saying, “Thy will be done – God’s will!” you will realise that the will of God is also your will without egoism. The will of God is one’s own will; it is the will of the soul, the will of the true identity, which is without any egoism; the purity is in the Self, it is one’s Self. So, to open the heart: the yogis knew that it would be difficult in this age for man to really open up the heart because of how the world would be. Today, I put the TV on, just for a short while – looking at the war, it is never finished. So I was thinking: mankind is looking for security but, looking at the world, what security will the world give? Each one has to be secure with one’s self. And this security is only in the trust of God. Trust in yourself!

He is the personification of calmness....

Often there is a question that we all ask: who is our Satguru? Isn’t it a good question? Some lucky people know and some, who are to be lucky, they are waiting to know. This search actually is not only in one life, but has been for many lives. We search for our Satguru always, because it’s only the Satguru that will lead us out of this illusion. Only the Satguru can give us a blessing and guide us and make us Realise our True Self. But to find the Satguru is very often difficult. We go through many ups and downs. We keep searching, thinking we will find the Satguru. We pray to God “God, send my Satguru.” But yet, very often, when the Satguru is in front of somebody, they don’t know it, because in the people’s minds, how they fashion a Guru is completely different to how the Satguru is in reality. It’s the same when we look at Mahavatar Babaji. We have a beautiful murti, a beautiful Deity here. In our mind we have an image of the Jagat Guru, but yet I tell you, He is not like that. When we look at Him, He is strict. He is strict, when He has to be strict, but He is the personification of calmness. At all times, no matter what, He is always calm. And this is the quality of a Satguru.

The quality of calmness is very important. How can a master guide if he is not calm? And this is the greatness of a Satguru. No matter what happens, he will always stay calm. So now, you will all go and test your Satguru? Like I said during Guru Purnima, the best way is to ask the Satguru directly or the Guru directly. So, the search is to see this quality of calmness. When you have found your Satguru, surrender and stop asking questions. The mind, like I always say, is always full of doubt. If you don’t give the Satguru a chance to hold your hand and guide you out of it, you will move away from this. You will lose a chance. So, let the Satguru hold your hand and guide you. The feeling that you have, the joy when the Satguru is in front of you, the same feeling is reflected back to you. The Satguru will never show the feeling, but you will feel it. He knows it, but he wants you to know

it.