The Great Power of a Positive Mind....

One person can change a lot. You have seen it in the past what the negativity of one person could do, here in Germany itself. 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 way, when one becomes positive, one influences the wholeness. 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. A few days ago I was talking with somebody who a few months ago found out that she had cancer. Of course, normally when people hear that, how do they become? Depressed and sad; it’s like the world is finished for them. Well, that person was very positive from the beginning. This positivity has changed her. She is getting better and better. That’s wonderful! You see, your positivity can influence everything. You influence yourself, for example, tomorrow morning, when you wake up, if your first thought is, “Oh, my goodness, another day, I don’t know how it will be” – do you think the day will be positive? It will not! If you wake up and feel happy, you will see how happy the day will be. Then of course everything around you will rotate into happiness, and at the end of the day, what you will say is “Today was a lovely day! Today was a beautiful day!” But this day, what made it beautiful? It is you who made it beautiful, because from the beginning you believed that it would be a beautiful day and that thought made everything beautiful. It’s not about the outside, it’s about you, nobody else. If you change, the world will change. If you change, peace will be here. You will be happy. Even one person being really happy will make a big difference.

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!

He gives Himself fully to His disciple.....

Whatever passes through the teacher, which is grafted to the teacher, will receive everything. That is why I said yesterday you become the pot of Amrit, also. You don’t just stay as you are, but you attain the fulfilment of the goal of life. This is how the Grace of the Divine manifests itself into the Guru. As we say “Guru Brahma, Guru Vishnu, Guru Devo Maheshwara. Guru Sakshath Parambrahma, Tasmai Shri Gurave Namaha”. The Vedas proclaim the Guru as Brahma, Vishnu and Shiva. Even in the Gita, Krishna said “Whoever will need Me, I shall come, and I shall be manifested as the Guru”. So the greatness of a Master, the greatness of knowing one’s Master and receiving the Shiksha, receiving the blessing and grace from the master is rare. And, once one has it, one carries it with him. One carries this blessing always. It is not that one day you say “Ok, today I am with this Master and tomorrow I am with that Master”. There are many people who do ‘Guru hopping’, you know. Well, it’s normal, because one is on a search, you know. Until one feels this Love, this attraction, this pull, one will always search, no? And once you have felt it, you have to grow into it and then you know “Yes, I am at home. I belong there”. You don’t say “I go to this Guru” no, you say; “No, I am going home, I am going where I belong, where I long to be”. You go there where you feel the Love of God inside of yourself, and where you will achieve the purpose of your incarnation. So this is, in short, how the Guru works. Through this manifestation, through this incarnation, He gives through these three forms - through thought, through sight and through touch. He gives Himself fully to his disciple. He gives Himself fully to the devotee. What the devotee has to do is to be like an empty receptable and receive everything.

So introvert yourself as much as possible and be in silence....

If I ask everybody now “What do you want?” some will say “I want Love”, some will say “I want God” or “I want God-Realisation.” Well, it’s beautiful, but do you really want that? If you really, sincerely want it, then be strong and have faith. Trust! Trust what the Divine is giving to you; trust what you feel inside of you. Like it is said, one has to have faith like a child, no? When you look at children, they are free. They don’t think too much. But what happens afterwards? Where is the child gone? The mind has taken over. You think you know more, so you need to reason. Sometimes you don’t need to reason. You just need to sit quietly and feel. Feel and listen, because when you feel of course, it’s not just feeling. When you are completely in silence, there is also the voice of God. The voice of God will not talk to you like in ancient times. He will talk to you from within you. Learn to trust this inner voice, and if you still have doubt about it, ask Him questions. Ask Him if it is really like this or like that. Then you test it yourself, so that you can learn to trust this inner voice. It’s not that you just hear it and accept it “OK, yes, it’s fine. It’s good like that.” No, you hear, ask certain questions and see if it is really happening this way, then give your full trust to it. This is one way of listening to your inner Self and to make it stronger and stronger.This example is given by the Virgin Mary Herself. When the angels appeared to Her and greeted Her with “Hail Mary, you are blessed among all the women. The Lord has favoured you that you will bear the Son of God inside of your womb” She didn’t say, “OK, cool, I like that.“ No, She said “How can this be possible? I have never been with a man.” So the angels were pleased with it, because this confirmed Her faith. She didn’t have doubt, but She questioned it. This is what the angels said “It will be done according to the Will of God. The Spirit shall come over you and overshadow you.”It’s important to learn to trust this inner voice, and to know for sure if it is real or if it is just a fantasy of one’s mind. You will do that by putting certain questions to that and yet you will be the observer of that conversation. The atma, the soul, will be the observer of that conversation. I will tell you something; this is the most beautiful thing you can do – to observe how the mind is talking to the Higher Self and what you are hearing inside of you.Like I said to you before, this will happen only when you are in silence. So introvert yourself as much as possible and be in silence, because when somebody talks, talks and talks, like I am doing right now, what happens? Of course it is joyful to talk, but afterwards you are tired. Of course, you will say “When I sit down quietly, I also will get tired,” but when the mind is calm, you will not be tired. This is where meditation comes in. Meditation is not only to sit in one place and close one’s eyes and meditate, like we know it in the traditional way, but meditation is also every time when you can look inside your heart and see the Divine.

When you give yourself completely to God, God will also give Himself completely to you....

If you want permanent happiness, it is possible only when you surrender completely to God. When your body, mind and soul have become one and are offered to the altar of the Lord, He will happily give everything to you. He will give Himself to you. The king surrendered to the priest, who had understood that real teaching is within us, not in books. When you give yourself completely to God, God will also give Himself completely to you. But if you give Him only half, don’t expect Him to give Himself one hundred percent to you. So, call upon the Lord from your heart. When your heart calls Him fully, when your mind is completely centred on Him, you will see that He will also completely surrender to you. Then you will be in
this bliss, in this Love, continuously. You will be continuously in love with God. You will be continuously in love with everybody and everything around you. This Love, you can’t understand it with your mind. It surpasses all the love that this world can say about love. You can attain this Divine Love, this Divine Ecstasy only when you surrender. Real happiness lies deep inside your heart. So surrender your mind, which is so proud and so egoistic, and don’t let it flatter you, so you are thinking that you know a lot of things, when actually you don’t know anything. As long as you haven’t come to a point of God- Realisation, you can’t call yourself Realised or think that you know. But keep trying and never lose hope. Know that He is always with
you.

Just be love! Nothing else, just love.....

We’ll talk about prayer, about love. Unity is God. We always come to the same point, where we talk about God. We talk about His love for all of us – this love that He has without condition. We start our spiritual way because there is something missing in our life, something that this world can’t give. This thing which is missing, you can only discover inside of you. Yet there is a saying – approach Him with love, reach Him in that love, meet Him in love, embrace Him with love and merge with Him and become Eternal Love! I find it so beautiful.So we start our journey to approach the Divine. Our first step is searching for Him. This is when in our life we feel the need to pray. Prayer is this essence of realising that there is something greater – whether you call it God, Light, Spirit… The search starts with prayer, and prayer makes the link, prayer makes the first step to this union. Then one will reach the next step by meeting and reaching that love. By prayer the heart opens up, firstly towards the outside, then towards the inside. We meet Him in love. Through the reciting and singing of God’s names, like you are doing, you reach the point where love is, where everybody is sharing one goal: the achievement of that love. Then there comes the point of meeting Him in love. This is happening in meditation, when you sit down and have the connection with your true Self. You meet the love within yourself and start this discussion, start this communication with the Self, about knowing who you really are. In this meeting we embrace that love, we become one with it and realise it more and more.
You grow more and more each day. And with this Divine love you will realise that there is no difference between the love that you knew at the beginning and now. And with this love there is no difference between you, me – anybody. But this Eternal Love, this Eternal Light resides in everything. It’s so easy, isn’t it?

What will lead to the Higher Love??.....

As it is mentioned in the Gita: Only when one develops Love, as Radha has for Her Beloved, will one attain the Beloved. Which means, like I have said: Only when one develops the Ultimate Love for God, will one reach the Divine. And how is one to develop this Love? In general, we know very well, that love is from the heart and we know it is there. You all know about it, no? Yes! We know that inside our hearts are full of Love, but yet, often we find it difficult to express it; we find it difficult to let it out. It’s because, in our mind, we are so limited by our barriers. We are so limited by our limitations. But if we know that Love is seated in our heart, why don´t we keep calling it? Let it out! It´s like this, let´s say, you go to my place and you know I am inside the house and you need me badly. What would you do? You would knock on the door; you would keep knocking. If there were a bell, you would keep ringing the bell. You would go around the house and try to find a way to get my attention. Am I right? You would do that. If this urge is really there, you will do anything for it. It’s the same thing with this Love that is present inside of you. But very often people say, “Ok, I want to feel it, but if I don´t feel it in a month’s time, I’m finished!” But it´s not like that. Love, whether it is for God or for somebody, love is love. We start by loving what is nearer to us, you know: what we can see, what we can hold, what will lead to the Higher Love. That´s why when two persons are in love, at the beginning, of course, there is this great love. But the love can grow more and more, if one let’s it grow. It is the same thing with the love for God that you have inside of you, if you let it out. Like I have said many times, you have to keep trying. It is seated inside, the Divine is seated inside of your heart. The real temple is not out there. It’s here where the real Lord is seated. The real church, the real mosque, is here and all of you know about it, whether you have felt Him or not. In the mind you know that God is seated in the heart and the mind, the power of the mind is so strong. You know it. When you worry a little, you can make the worry feel huge. It’s the same thing with love. If you know even in a small way that the Lord is seated in your heart, you can make yourself know in a big way. As you know very well, the power of Love is the only thing that
conquers everything. If you want to conquer God, conquer Him with Love. If you want to achieve Him, you will achieve Him only with Love. But the Love has to be pure and pure. It’s not saying, “Ok, I have been to the centre here, I have been to the ashram, I know. I have been to Shivaratri, so my Love is pure.” No, you have to make that Love pure inside of you. You have to train your mind to become positive. When your mind is positive and you know that the Lord is seated inside and you keep calling Him, there is no chance that He will not reveal Himself inside of you. Everybody, in the end, will reach the Divine, because the essence of your Self is only Him. And only through this Love, when this Love really gets awakened and becomes like Radharani´s Love, then there is no chance of not attaining Him. So, let Love rejoice inside of you, like I said, not only today, but always. And may you, by the grace of Radharani, become like Her. Like many other Saints, not only Radharani, but also among all the Deities who love the Lord, you will see that there is an expression of this Divine Love. If they could do it, we all can do it, also. If saints have achieved the Oneness with the Divine, be strong and say ‘yes’: you can and keep nagging the Lord inside of your heart until He opens the door and says, “Here I am, what do you want?” And be ready when He asks you what you want, to know, really, what you will ask Him.

Go into the fullness....

...the secret in the Name of the Divine, in the Name of God, is God Himself...if I chant the Name of Mahavatar Babaji, if I chant the Names of Krishna & Jesus, if I chant the Name of Allah, for sure They will come, because the Name of the Divine is the fullness of the Divine Himself.
So, in that way you will go into the fullness. The more you chant, the more you will go into the fullness of the sound within your Self and the more you will know the secret. You will enjoy the beauty that you have inside of you, because after some time of chanting in the outside, the chanting becomes silence within you. Even while you are sleeping, inside of you the chanting always goes on.

Devotion is to give yourself in fullness to Love.....

What is there, apart from God? There is nothing, no? So, what we want is we want Him. But yet we don´t want to surrender. We don´t surrender ourselves completely to Him. That´s why there is always incompleteness inside. But to surrender means to say to God, “Lord, I give myself, my body, mind and soul completely to You”. Isn´t that what spirituality is about? That doesn’t mean that you have to leave your family and renounce everything, but live in a detached way. Try to put God always first in your life. Like that, He can work through you. We all want to be somebody, we all want to Realise our Selves, we all want to know who we are in Reality, but with this mind, we will never be able to. We have to calm the mind. We need certain knowledge, yes, to achieve the Divine, to attain Him, but we need devotion, we need bhakti. When bhakti arises inside, we give ourselves completely. Bhakti – devotion is to give yourself in fullness to Love. Like I said in Algarve a few days ago, when you are in love, you always want to be with your beloved, no matter what. You will leave father, mother, everybody, you know. You will fight for your beloved, isn´t that so ? Yes or No? So you know it very well. The real Beloved is God, because He is the only one who is always fresh. His love always renews itself. Whereas all the other loves, they start very fresh, like a beautiful flower, and they, also, fade, the same as the other flowers. You know that. How many times in your life have you fallen in love? You have really fallen in love? And then to rise, it is a very difficult achievement to be made. About surrendering, there is a beautiful story about the flute of Krishna. You know Krishna always holds a flute in his hand, but there is a great story behind it. Everyday Krishna would go in the garden and say to all the plants, “I love you”. The plants were very happy and responded back and said “Krishna, we love You, too”. One day Krishna rushed quickly into the garden very alarmed. He went to the bamboo plant and the bamboo plant asked, “Krishna, what´s wrong with you?” Krishna said “I have something to ask you, but it is very difficult”. The bamboo said “Tell me: if I can, I will give it to you”. So Krishna said “I need your life. I need to cut you”. The bamboo thought for a while and then said “You don´t have any other choice. You don’t have any other way?” Krishna said, “No, no other way”. And it said “OK, I surrender to you”. So Krishna cut the bamboo, made holes in it, and each time, while he was doing that, the bamboo was crying with pain, because he was paining the bamboo so much. Krishna made a beautiful flute out of it. And this flute was with Krishna all the time. 24 hours a day, it was with Krishna. Even the Gopis were jealous of the flute. They said, “Look, Krishna is our Lord, but yet we get to spend only some time with him. He wakes up with you, He sleeps with you, all the time you are with him”. So one day they asked the bamboo, “Tell us the secret of it. What secret do you have, that the Lord treasures you so much?” And the bamboo said “The secret is that I´m empty inside. And the Lord does whatever he wants with me, whenever he wants with me and however he wants with me”. So this is complete surrender: where God can do whatever He wants with you, whenever He wants, as He wants. And for that you don’t need to be scared, you know, you have just to give yourself. And who is yourself in reality? It’s just Him! In the Gita, Krishna said: Everything is me. In the Bible, Christ said: Give what belongs to Caesar, to Caesar. And what belongs to God, to God. But what belongs to God? It is your spirit. It is your true Self. If you want to Realise your Self, be like the flute! Make your prayer like this, “Lord, do whatever you want with me, whenever you want with me, and however you want with me”. And in your mind don´t ask any questions. This is a poison, because the mind always doubts. The mind always thinks it knows best. And when you surrender this mind to the Divine, bhakti will arise, devotion will arise. And when devotion arises, the purity of Love will also arise together with it. It´s not a love where we just say “I love you, I love you”. It´s a Love where when we say “I love you”, there is no condition in it. It is not “I love you because of something. I love you because of your body. I love you because of your wealth. I love you because you are beautiful outside and if I pull the skin from your body, I don´t love you anymore”. But it’s because when you say “I love you” you love Him the way He is. And that´s the purity of Love, the Unconditional Love, the way God loves, the way your heart knows how to love. That´s why you do feel Love, but the moment you start to put conditions to that Love, it fades. But when you stick to this purity of Love, and make this Love grow, it will grow. Because Love is like a seed, which is inside the heart of man: the seed has to grow, has to blossom, also. It has to germinate and grow big; the seed can´t just stay like that. That´s what Christ said, also. There are so many similarities between Hinduism and Christianity. Christ said: If you plant a seed on a stone, it will never grow. But if you plant it in the heart of man it shall grow.” And this is the Love in the heart of man, when real Love is felt, when real Love starts to grow. It grows in six different stages, which are called: Sneha Prem, Pranaya Prem, Mana Prem, Raga Prem, Anuraga Prem, and Maha Bhav. These stages of Love - of course, I will now not go to detail about it - grow when this purity is there, which leads you to complete surrender to the Divine. But first, what is in regard to normal life, is to calm the mind and let Love itself start to grow inside of the heart. Only through this Love will you know who you are. And this is not up to me to tell you, it’s up to you to make the first step. The easiest way to calm the mind is to sing the Name of God, because you can sing the name of God anytime, wherever you are.

When one knows one´s path, one goes directly. Take this path and just go and Realise your Self!....

When you are centred, when you concentrate, when you pray, when you chant the Name of God, that moment is between you and God. Christ said: If you want to pray, don’t make it as a show. Run to the darkest corner where you and your Father, you and God are alone, where you converse with the Divine. And this corner where you can be quiet is your heart. The mind is never quiet. The mind is always thinking and you will make it quiet by chanting. When through chanting you train the mind to go inside your heart, in that deep quietness, you will Realise that God is sitting there and not because you know it in the mind, not because you have read about it, but because you have Realised it, because you feel it. We are all on the search. Of course, people will go left and right, looking for the truth. As long as one hasn´t found the spiritual path, one is never satisfied. It’s like a train which is going, but without knowing the destination. Like this train, people go left and right, but when one knows the destination, one goes directly to this destination. When one knows one´s path, one goes directly. Take this path and just go and Realise your Self! There was once a saint in India who lived as a hermit in a small hut made with grass. Once a couple came to him and said “Guruji, we love you so much that we would like to make you a nicer and stronger hut. Please come with us.” The saint answered “No, no, no, I’m happy where I am. I don’t want to come.” But after some time, he called the couple again and said “Yes, I will come with you, but can you do me one favour?” The couple were very happy and said “If you are asking, we will do anything for you.” The saint said to the couple “Let me come and live in your toilet.” The couple were wondering “We want to build a nice hut for you, so why do you want to come and live in our toilet?” The saint said “I would rather stay in your toilet than among devotees or people who are only looking for fame and glory. These people come to me and they are only looking for how to end their misery, but they are not really looking for God. If I stay in the toilet, I would rather bear the smell of the toilet than the insincerity of those people and, also, the smell of the toilet will keep them away!” This made the couple realise how people are. People are searching, yes, but they are not sincere towards themselves. Only when you are sincere towards yourself, you will find your path. When you accept yourself, when you accept the Will of God and whatever He gives you as right, you surrender to His Will, you surrender to His Love and then you say “Yes, God, I believe in You and I trust in whatever You are doing for me. I trust in Your Love and I don’t doubt You.” But when we doubt Him and question Him, we are not truthful. Then we say “God, You have made a mistake.” But how could God make a mistake when He is so perfect? How could Love, which is the purity of your True Self, make a mistake? It can’t. It can be a mistake only when there is doubt, when there is fear. But when all these things are cleared-up, when all of these things are put away by the Holy Names of God - which are thousands of Names - then you will see His glory, you will feel His Love. While singing, some people were dancing. When you are dancing for God, you are doing, also, a kind of dancing yoga. You are forgetting about your body, you are forgetting about your mind, you are just singing the glory of God, singing the Name of God. In this way, you are decreasing the power of the mind. You will notice that after moving, when you sit down and relax, your concentration is much better than if you just sit down. When you just sit, your mind is jumping left and right. When you dance in the right way, you are energising yourself; you are calling upon this inner Self to reveal Itself. And when you lift your hand up, you are calling to the Lord, to God “I’m in this illusion. I’m drowning in this illusion. Here, I’m lifting my hand up to You. Pull me out of this illusion. I’m surrendering.” You will notice that in all the Holy Scriptures, there is this phrase, which says: Lord, I’m lifting my hand up to You. Come to rescue me. You will find it in the Psalms, you will find it in the Koran and you will find it, also, in the Gita. So singing the glory of God transcends all religions, transcends all cultures, transcends all races, transcends all what the mind can create and you will find God inside of you.

What will give you real joy is hanging onto the Eternal Lord....

Last time somebody asked me a question "Does whatever we do in this life, whether it is in our sadhana or in our daily life depend on this life or our previous lifetime?" Well it depends on both, actually. The majority of whatever you do in this life depends on what you have done in your past life. Sometimes you have a great plan, but when you have such a plan it doesn’t turn out the way you planned it. How many of you have a plan in life? Has it turned out the same way as you have planned? No, it doesn’t turn out the same way, because in this life your mind functions in a certain way to create what you perceive you need to be happy, but still, there is karma from the past that you have to burn. So, that’s why, very often, when you have a plan, it doesn’t turn out the way you wanted because of these past karmas. When you look at this world, what is permanent in this world? Nothing! With time, everything changes. With time, everything gets destroyed, but, yet, one hangs onto these perishable things, forgetting the eternal. So, as long as one hangs onto perishable things, there will be suffering, because what will give you real joy is hanging onto the Eternal Lord. Only when you are wholly directed towards Him, He will turn wholly towards you. And you can do that through your sadhana. You do japam, chant the name of the Lord, you do your spiritual practices, and you do service. Through service, you realise that you are serving not out of ego, not out of pride, but you’re serving through your heart. Of course, when you start to serve, you know, there’s always the pride in it. You are proud of how much you are doing. You say "Look how much I am doing." I, the big I is always there, and you are forgetting that it’s only Him who is doing through you. The more you serve the more it comes to a point where it is transcended. Then you start to realise that whatever way you are serving, you are serving only Him, and it’s only Him who is serving. So then you have peace, because if you look for peace in this world, if you look for joy, you will not find it. Everybody is looking for peace. Who doesn’t want to be peaceful? Is there among you somebody who doesn’t want to be peaceful? So, all of you, you are just looking for one thing: to be peaceful. But looking at the world itself: in Sanskrit we call it Jagad. If you translate Jagad, it means ceaseless motion. It’s always on the move, you know. The world, however we look at it, is always on the move. When we take time and calmly we look at ourselves; when we look at human beings, they are constantly on the move. Even sitting here, they are far away, somewhere else, you know. They are sitting here, they are listening, but the mind is somewhere else, doing something else. So, how can there be peace, when one is not in peace within oneself, when one can’t take five minutes to sit down here and bring the body, mind and spirit here, in the same spot? And yet, human beings are looking for peace. So, to have this peace, one has to learn to calm oneself. It’s like everything else. You see, if you want your child to study, what do you do? You make the child sit and then you make the child study, no? First you have to make the child sit down, then study. In the same way, without an effort from you, without disciplining yourself and sitting down and practising your sadhana, it’s to find real peace. With everything else, today you have something,but you don’t know tomorrow if you will have it or not. It’s the same thing with real peace, you know: if you have attained real peace, once you have it, you will have it always. It’s the same Thing with Love, real Love I’m talking about, pure Love. Once you have realised it, you will always have it with you. You see, in this world, people like to hang onto their Problems and onto their worries. You see, whenever a problem arises, the solution is also there, but mankind is so easily focusing on the problem rather than on the solution. Do you like problems? No. So then, why do you let yourself be drawn towards your worry? Because it doesn’t give you peace, eh? So, the more you hang onto the problems, the more problems you will have; the more you hang onto the worry, the more you will not see the solution. But if you take a little bit of time, sit in your prayer room, and sincerely surrender to the Divine, the problem will get solved. Whenever there is a problem, what do you do? You run to the temple, no? Then you pray "Oh God, I have this problem," or "I have that problem," because you know deep inside of you that He’s the only one that can solve your problem, nobody else. You can tell your problem to a hundred people and what will they do? They will say "Oh, poor you, you have a problem." Very often they say "Poor you" outside, but inside they are saying "Good for you." 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. You see that, as long as there is happiness in life, people give very little importance to their spiritual practice. They say "When I become very old, then I will have time to do that." But that’s why often there are problems on the path, why there are problems in life, so that continuously we can remember God. It’s like the Pandava’s mother said. After the Mahabharat war finished, Krishna went to His aunty to take her blessing and He asked His aunty "What can I do for you?" She said "One thing You can do is You can give me enough problems that I will never forget You." This was how much Love she had for the Lord that she asked the Lord "Give me many problems that I can always remember you." This is how it is, also, in this life. Things happen in life so that we can always remember God. But we don’t like to continuously remember God, you know; we like to continuously remember the problem. We like to focus our mind, all our attention, all our energy, on the problem, thinking that we will get the solution. But you will not, because you have a certain limitation. You are limited with your mind. Your mind is limited to only matter. So, like that, if we concentrate on God, no matter what comes in our lives, we will accept it, we will take it in a positive way. We will not let the mind become negative, because when the mind becomes negative, we start to think negatively, and out of this negativity whatever you do in life will be negative. But if your mind is positive, then, whatever you do in life, the fruit of your labour will be positive. And it will get better and better all the time, but this is when your mind is focused on the Divine. So, like you are laughing and being happy hearing a joke, you have to be happy by chanting, by doing your prayer to the Lord, because He’s always with you. Your parents, your mum and dad, will be with you for some time, but He will always be with you. 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. This is not true about human beings, because whoever gives you a solution, any human being that gives you a solution, any friends of yours who give you a solution, they will always have an expectation behind it: they will give this, but you have to do that for them. Do you know about that, no? Yes, because each human does this, you know. It’s a human reaction. So, don’t forget that within this human self you are also divine, you have part of God inside of you. I said part, remember this word, ‘part’. You are not fully God, because you hang so much onto your humanness that the Divine part gets covered. That’s why the karma of the past can affect you. But when you realise your Self, realise that the Lord is within you and you have come to a certain realisation; that your Atma is part of the Paramatma, you will transcend this human quality. It’s the same thing when you do japam. Why is it that you do japam? You do japam to realise the Divine. You do japam so that your mind continuously thinks of and chants the Name of God. So the more you chant the Divine Names, the more His qualities will reflect on you. The qualities of goodness, love, compassion, joy, all these qualities will start reflecting on you, but this will be when you chant sincerely.

Throughout the day keep remembering that you are love, you are trust, you are peace, you are unity, you are joy! ...

The main desire of humans is: to want God! But you have to let go of this want and the moment you let go of this want, you will see the light! We call it antahkarana, “the light within”. Everybody wants to see the light. In order to see the light, stop looking outside. Whenever you sit down quietly, go inward, go deeper and deeper till you find yourself – complete stillness! In this stillness you can hear the voice of God within you, then you can hear your own inner voice and this is the voice of God. And when you hear it, don’t doubt it. Don’t say it’s your imagination. It’s true. Though, it will not happen today. Tomorrow you will come and tell me, “Yeah, I have heard the voice of God”. God will not tell you, “OK, do such and such a thing”. You also have the mind. The mind is maya; the mind is illusion. But the illusion is also part of God. God created maya to blind his creation; for humans not to take it for granted and to make man to strive for enlightenment! But He Himself is doing it. It is His own play. You just need to be the spectator, nothing else. The moment you have learned how to be the spectator and just see the creation in front of you, you will see the same way God does, and how He thinks about us. Our mind is like the mirror. The heart is like a mirror covered with grease. As long as there is grease over it, do you think you will see clearly? You will never see your reflection clearly. You will know there is a reflection, yes, but it will be very foggy. So, as long as you don’t clean it, it’s difficult to see the light, isn’t it? Since the thing closest to us is the body, first your body has to be clean. When your body is clean, the mind is clean; when the mind is clean, the heart is clean. And when the heart is clean, the Divine light will shine through you and everybody will see it so clearly. So start every day by saying, “I’m God’s child and I have to be like the child of God!” Do this for yourself, for your own growth. You know what is good for you, so try your best to change. Take this strongly inside you; put it in your mind. Throughout the day keep remembering that you are love, you are trust, you are peace, you are unity, you are joy! There’s no greater mantra. Just sing, “I am love!” By singing, “I am love!” you will always remember that you are a part of God. There is no big, big mantra that you have to do thousands of times to make you realised. One, only one simple mantra from your heart – that’s enough. Like I’ve said before, don’t make your prayer in quantity but in quality. The quality that comes from the heart is the highest. And that’s what all the masters, all the divine aspects want from humans also, that we become the quality of God and to realise this quality in oneself. For that one has to pass through the level of the child of God. Jesus said, “There is no other way than me. I am truth, I am light, I am the way.” Do you think he meant himself as the body? No, he didn’t mean himself as the body. He meant himself as Christ who is living in each one of you. This Christ has to become alive by putting what Jesus gave to humanity into practice and by understanding it: “Blessed are all those pure in heart, for they shall see God!”

Let us celebrate the Appearance of Krishnaji .....

We are celebrating the Appearance of Krishna. I will not say the birth, even when Janmashtami means taking birth, because He has never taken birth. Even His birth is just a manifesting of Himself. He was ever present and He is ever present. When we say that somebody is born, it means that there is also death, an end, but He who, is without beginning and without end, He can’t be born. He is just a manifestation of Himself – the Appearance that the Lord chose for Himself to manifest. You all know the story of Krishna, how He was born, so I will not tell the whole story again. He says in the Gita about His plan to manifest Himself: “Yada yada hi dharmasya glanir bhavati bharata abhyutthanam adharmasya tadatmanam srjamy aham” which means that whenever there is a decline, whenever there will be anything terrible happening in the world, He will manifest Himself. Of course, the Lord always manifests Himself, but in the minds of the people, they want a big manifestation, a bang, but He is everywhere. So Mahavishnu, Narayana, took this form to help Mother Earth, because Mother Earth appealed to Narayana, saying to Him: Help me. I am suffering so much. The demon Kansa is terrorising and hurting me. (Actually, it’s not hurting directly Her, but the people.) The Lord answered to Her: Yes, I will manifest Myself. I will come. Then He chose the right time and manifested Himself into the womb of Devaki. He was born in a prison. The mother and father were locked there, because an Akashvani, a celestial announcement, had said to Kansa that the eighth child of Devaki would kill him. Of course, everybody is scared of death. Even Kansa, who was a great and knowledgeable devotee
of Shiva, was scared of death, because death was unknown to him. This is because whenever we look at
death, we look at our limited self. Kansa was so scared that he wanted to protect himself. He didn’t want to be killed. He didn’t want to face his own death. So it so happened that there were Devaki and Vasudeva. They were in love and they got married. And on their marriage day, Kansa, who was the brother of Devaki, was happily bringing his newly married sister and brother back to his place. He said: You are my favourite sister, you know, I have to bring you to my place. But, as they were going, they heard a voice from the sky that said: Kansa, you fool, what are you doing? Don’t you know that the eighth son of your sister will kill you? Again, here you see the number 8. People who do numerology know very well how important is the number eight: it’s the number without beginning or end. So now the Akashvani had said to him that the eighth child of his sister would kill him, and, of course, that enraged him. At that moment he wanted to kill his sister, because he thought “no sister, no death”. But Vasudeva stopped him and said: How can you kill a woman? All the people will say that you are just a coward. Of course Kansa, who was very proud of himself, didn’t want that, so he said: Okay, I will imprison them. Then Vasudeva answered to him: Yes, OK, imprison us and every time, when she gets a child, I myself will bring that child to you, then you can do whatever you want with that child. So Kansa imprisoned them. He imprisoned, also, his father, because the father was, also, against him. Then he invited all his demons friends to come and rejoice with him that he had become
a king. Every year a new child was born and every time Vasudeva brought the child to Kansa who, without any mercy, would kill the child, but the seventh child of Devaki disappeared. When Devaki was pregnant with the seventh child, the child miraculously disappeared from her womb and appeared in Rohini’s womb. So, in the night Rohini was sleeping, and the next day she found herself pregnant. It’s scary, isn´t it? Matajis, what would happen if you would wake up tomorrow pregnant? So, the same way, Rohini was shocked, but she accepted it. She was old, but she got pregnant, so it should be considered as something miraculous.
So she accepted the will of God. Then they told to the King that Devaki and Vasudeva had lost their child. And the King, Kansa, was so happy, saying “Look, the child was not even born yet, but he was so frightened of me that she lost it.” He didn´t know, of course, that the Shakti was transferred to Rohini. Then a few months passed and Devaki got pregnant again. Here you have to see that it’s not in the same way that you all are thinking, when I say that Devaki got pregnant. It was not in the way how normal people got pregnant. You see, after she lost her seventh child, Kansa tied Devaki to one part of the room and Vasudeva
to the other side of the room and thought that, in that way, the eighth child would not be born and so could not kill him. Kansa was thinking, in the same way, that Devaki, his sister, would get pregnant in the normal way, not knowing that it was the Lord Himself that would manifest Himself. But even when Devaki and Vasudeva were tied to the different corners of their jail room, Devaki became again pregnant with the eighth child. And the night when the child was born, at the very moment the child was born, the prison room was filled with so much light. And when the child was born, Devaki and Vasudeva saw the true form of Sri Krishna, which is Mahavishnu, with Shanka, Chakra, and Gadha, standing in front of them. Then Mahavishnu said to Vasudeva: Take the child and bring him to the other side of the river, where there is Yashoda who is expecting and, when you get there, exchange the babies. There is another baby, a girl, there.
You should take her and bring that baby here. And you should leave this baby, your child, there. The chains were unlocked and all the guards, who were guarding them, had fallen miraculously asleep. When Mahavishnu was in front of them, they could remember all of their past lives; they could remember everything. Why Mahavishnu and they were there and why the Lord would have to manifest Himself through them, now, was because, in one of their past incarnations, Devaki and Vasudeva had been a king and a queen, who had wanted so much to have God as their child. They had done penance for thousands of years, Mahavishnu was really pleased with them and had promised to them: Whenever I will incarnate myself next time, it will be through you. Because of the Maya Shakti, they had forgotten about everything, but now, in
this moment when they were in front of Mahavishnu, they could remember everything and who they had been. So Vasudeva did according to what Mahavishnu said: he took the baby, put Him in a basket and carried Him from the prison. All the guards of the jail had miraculously fallen asleep and there was nobody stopping them. Vasudeva entered the water of the Yamuna carrying the baby and, as he was going deeper and deeper into the Yamuna River, Yamuna wanted so much just to touch the feet of the Lord. And the moment the feet of the baby Krishna touched the water of Yamuna, she became very calm. It was raining so much that Sheshnag, the serpent god, even came behind to cover baby Krishna. Vasudeva crossed over to the other side of the river with Him. Then he saw Yashoda and Nanda, her husband, sleeping and that they
had just got the baby girl. Yashoda had just given birth to a baby girl, but she didn´t even know that – such is the manifestation of His Maya. So Vasudeva quickly exchanged the babies. He took the baby girl with him and left baby Krishna there, as Mahavishnu had asked him to do. Then he crossed over the river to the other side and everything became normal again. The next day, when they all woke up in the prison, the guards
heard the cry of the baby and they rushed to the King and told him “Kansa, your sister has got again a baby.” Kansa rushed quickly down to the prison and opened the door and said “Give me the baby.” At that moment Devaki answered to him “No, my brother. It was said that my eighth son would kill you, but I didn’t get a son, I got a daughter.” Hearing this, Kansa calmed down. Then he started to think “Why did the voice say that it would be the eighth child? But this is a girl, how could a girl kill me?” Then his mind started to
reason a bit and he said to himself “What if this is Vishnu Maya? What if it is Vishnu Himself in that form?” With that resolution in mind, he took the baby and said “Yes, I will kill this baby. He took her and he was going to throw her on the wall, the same way like he had done with the other babies, but at that moment, the baby flew up and changed Her form to the form of Durga, Maha Shakti. Then She laughed at Kansa saying “You fool you want to kill me? You can’t. The One who will kill you is born already. Count your days!” So Kansa was really, really scared at that moment. Then he rushed back to his sister and said to her “What have you done? Tell me.” But, of course, Devaki and Vasudeva could not remember anything, because Mahavishnu had covered them again in Maya, so that they wouldn´t remember anything what had happened during that night. Vasudeva had even forgotten that he had taken the baby Krishna to the other side of Yamuna and exchanged Him with Yashoda´s and Nanda´s daughter. And now they heard that when Kansa had wanted to kill that baby girl, she had flown up and taken the form of Maha Shakti and warned Kansa. Of course, Kansa was not that stupid: He knew that if Maha Devi had said that the Lord had already manifested Himself and that he has to count his days, he would have to try everything possible to find and kill the baby. From that day on Kansa started his great killing. He killed all the children who were born around that time. He sent demons all around to terrorize the people who were praying, so that they would stop
praying. And his demons were very successful everywhere where he would send them. There was only one place, Gokul, that only when he sent a demon to Gokul, the demon would not come back. He got killed there. Then Kansa started to think “Why in all other places where I have sent the demons, they were very successful, but only in this one place the demon got killed and didn´t come back?” Like that he understood that the Lord had to be in that place – in Gokul. When Nanda and Yashoda woke up and saw the baby Krishna, it was a great surprise for them, because they were both very fair skinned, but when they looked at their child they saw that He was so dark. But they were so happy that they had a son. And this child was so
special that whoever would look at Him would automatically fall in love with Him, because He was the personification of Love. So, of course, they wanted to make a big party for the occasion. They were so joyful and everybody came to Yashoda and praised her, saying “How blessed you are, Yashoda, that even in your age,” because she was well-advanced in age, “you could bear a child! This is surely the will of God. And, look at the child: He is just so charming, so loving that nobody can go away from that child”. So Kansa had sent many demons, one by one, to kill the baby. The first demon that he sent was Putana. I will say how blessed is Putana, because even if she was a demon, she took the appearance of a mother. So she took the appearance of a girl who would roam around singing. Wherever she would go, she would feed every baby
that she found with her breast filled with poison. Of course all the children then died. So finally she arrived to the place where the baby Krishna was. She could enter the house because Yashoda didn’t stop anybody of coming to her house. So everybody could come in and go out as they wanted. So Putana, also, came in. She
was looking for the right moment to feed the child and then she took the baby and went to one corner with Him and started the breastfeeding. But this child was different: all the other children had died, but this one kept drinking and drinking all the poison out of her. He was even taking all the life from her. Blessed was she, you know. We can say that Putana was very lucky to feed the Lord. This was because in one of her lives she had been a yogini. She had done so much tapas, so much penance. She had, also, done penance to become the mother of God, of Narayana, but because of her karma she could not. But He is so merciful that
He said “It doesn’t matter. Your wish will be fulfilled, also.” So this time she took birth as a demon and, of course, when Krishna was there, He drank from her. But He drank everything, the whole surrender, the whole life itself. This is how He is, you know. And this is how Putana was: she was fully surrendered. Like that many other demons came, one after the other, trying to kill Krishna, but they were all very unsuccessful. At the age of sixteen, Krishna went to Mathura and, there, Kansa got killed and you know the rest of
the story of Krishna. Seeing the beauty of the Lord, we ask ourselves how did all the people in His lifetime feel when they saw Him? What did they feel? What did the Gopis feel? How was it for the people of Vrindavan to be near Him? We have read several stories about that. We read how beautiful He was, how great He was, but yet we ask ourselves ”But why not now? Why, when we pray so much, nothing happens?” You, also, would like to feel and experience this Love. You, also, would like to be so much in love with Him, but yet you find it very difficult, don´t you? Why? If we look at ourselves and we look at the people in Vrindavan, there, whatever they would do throughout the day, Krishna was the main important thing in their lives. Their minds were so much into Him. Whatever they would do, wherever they were, it
was just for Krishna. They would cook for their own family, but it was for Krishna. They would wash their clothes and, in their minds, it was for Krishna. Everything was for Him. They were so much surrendered, that every breath of them was Krishna. If every breath of them was the Lord Himself, of course, the Lord was
present inside of them at all times. Why cannot we concentrate on Him inside?” With all these things covering you, all these expectations, this anger and fear, it’s very difficult to concentrate on the unmanifested form

of the Lord, on the Love of God inside of you. That’s why He has given His outer forms for us to concentrate on them. It’s like when someone learns to shoot. First they start to shoot at big things,

no? And the more experienced and concentrated they become in shooting, the smaller things are given to them to shoot at. So it’s the same thing: as long as you have a mind, which is very active, always jumping around, you need something to focus on in the outside. When your mind is calm through your sadhana, then you will be able to concentrate easily on the Lord inside of your heart. So chant the Divine Name. Focus on His form first and through that, at the end, He can show you that He is inside of you. Krishna is Love Incarnate. Now, on His birthday, ask Him to be born inside of you. Ask Him to manifest Himself inside of you. He never refuses anything from anybody. If you sincerely ask for that, if you sincerely ask Him for Himself, you will see that He will give you Himself. 

Being in the present moment is the greatest gift.....

Life is running, you don’t know when you will die. Who knows when death comes? You don’t know. Maybe now a meteorite will fall and everybody will finish! So the moment of change is always the present moment. This is a great gift. If you want to change, change now, don’t say tomorrow, don’t say “I changed before and it’s finished”. Past is past. Past is dead, finished. If you want to do something, only now can you do it. You can’t do it for the future. It’s only now! So, if you want to change, it’s now that you have to change. If you take a certain resolution, it’s now that you have to take the resolution. So being in the now is the greatest gift. Being in the present moment is the greatest gift, so enjoy the nectar, enjoy the sweetness, even if, as I said before, you don’t perceive what you are receiving. You are receiving something which will contribute to your awareness and to your advancement, to attaining the Lotus Feet of the Lord, to the fulfilment of the human life, to the fulfilment of why you have incarnated here. Otherwise life is wasted. Always use your reasoning to understand things. Don’t use your reasoning to judge because whenever you judge it is the stupidity inside. If you follow the path of Love, if you follow your heart, you will grow. As the Master is, you shall be, also, you shall become a part of this Divine Nectar and you will be able to spread it and give it to many people. That’s what Christ said to his disciples: Go and grow in disciples, grow and help people. In the same way, you will also grow.

The Art of Controlling the Mind.....

What is concentration? What does the word concentration mean? It means to focus. Concentration, the word concentration, means to fix one’s mind on something for an amount of time without being disturbed by any emotions or anything. This means you sit down and you focus without wondering “What is this object, 
why is this object, for what use is the object?” Just sit and focus. Just concentrate on the object only for five minutes a day. At that moment, you should not think of anything. You choose the object and just look at the object and how it is. This will help you to bring your mind into a controlled state where, later on, you can utilise the power of this realisation. A part of this realisation is one’s greater power. We develop our inner strength. We are not just this human aspect that you see on the outside, but we also have a Divine Self. In that Divine Self there are many qualities. The qualities of the Divine Self are still only the qualities of the Divine, not the Divine itself. This gift comes when you can handle it, when you can control it. After that, you can meditate. Whenever you talk about meditation to people, first they sit and close their eyes. That’s what you will do when you talk about meditation. You make yourself straight and then close your eyes. When you close your eyes, what do you see? You see thoughts. How are these thoughts at that moment? They are jumping around! We have one word about the mind, which is manasa puja. When you do everything in a visualised form within yourself, this increases the power of concentration and this is considered one of the most powerful ways to control the mind, to control yourself and to attain the Divine. Manasa puja, have you heard about it? I will tell you a story. Once there was a great king. He wanted to build big temples for Shiva. At the same time there was a poor man sitting in front of the place where the king wanted to build the 
temple. Inside of him he was also building the temple for Shiva, but even bigger. When the temple of the king was finished, he sent an invitation to Shiva, which said “Shiva, my Lord, I have built up your temple and I request you, please, come for the inauguration of the temple”. Shiva sent a message back saying “My dear king, I would be very happy to come for the temple opening, but I have to go on the same day to another man. He has built a bigger temple than yours and he lives in your kingdom. His temple is much bigger 
than yours and I have to go, because he is opening it also and it’s at the same time as yours.” The king was wondering about this. He didn’t know that in his kingdom somebody else had been building a bigger temple, so he inquired. He found out that it was this man who had been sitting there, who Shiva had said He had to go to, because he also had been building a temple. The king went to him and said “You have built the biggest temple for Shiva in my kingdom. I thought I had been building the biggest one .” The man was shocked and said “What are you talking about? I am a poor man, I can’t build anything for Shiva.” The king replied, 
“Shiva said to me that you have built the biggest temple.” Then the man realised that in his mind, when they were building the temple outside, he was building a temple three times bigger than the one they were building. His concentration was so intense when he was inwardly opening the temple that Shiva was really present there. You see, the power of concentration is very powerful.Like it is said, man can use only five percent of the human brain and ninety-five percent is sleeping. As the mind is sleeping we also like to sleep and let it always sleep. After so many lives we attain a human body. A human is very special. A human is gifted with 
the grace of attaining and merging with the Divine and becoming One with the Lord, of realising the Lord within himself. Why do we always limit ourselves? Why do we always like this limitation? Why are we not free?It is there. It has been given to you, but you forget about it. Work to concentrate, to focus your mind, to make your mind positive. Work through increasing the power and the strength inside of you. When you know that the Divine is with you, you really know He is with you. Whenever you chant the Divine Names, don’t think that the Divine is far away. The Divine  is present, is nearer than your heartbeat. So close is the Lord, you know, but yet we see Him as if He is so far away. When we talk about attaining the Lord, it seems like some distance but, actually, it’s not that far. When you have learned to control your mind, when you have learned to concentrate and focus it, you will see that He is ever sitting in each part of your body, because the human body is not just made of flesh and bones like we say. It is indeed, but when we look at the mystical form of the human body, there are all the Deities present inside. A certain Deity is responsible for each part of your body. This is beautiful. If you can look beyond the physical body and see the Divine, which is seated in each part of you, you will learn to respect this body. You will learn to love it. 

The dissolving of the identity.....

..... which is the final state, what we call mukti, or liberation..., actually, this doesn´t happen on the mind level, So, it is not in the hand of man. That is why we say "Surrender to God". Why do you think we say "surrender"? Because that state, of complete merging into the Divine, is not in the hand of anyone. Only in Him. Great souls, they choose to keep this, but at will. they can finish it. Great souls choose to keep it, so they can come and help others. But they are not bound to it. That is why the ego identity, or the soul identity, when this is finished, when this has disappeared completely, one merges into the Divine. Then this question you will ask is "What will happen to me?" Well there is no you!! There is only Him!! We said, that we are all a drop of the Divine in the ocean, no? But when the drop is put into the ocean, can somebody remove the same drop out? No you can´t. You have similar qualities as the ocean, inside of you. You have similar qualities of Divinity inside of you, but the Divine is the Divine. Like the drop of water can´t call itself the whole ocean, it is a drop of the ocean. The ocean is huge. Same as God. The mind can´t comprehend God, that is why He manifests in many forms, so that the mind can dwell on the form and attain Him. Same, with the ocean and the drop of water. For example, take a glass of water from the ocean, from the river and put it back again, and I tell you to take the same water out. Can you do that? No, you can´t. Same thing, but with great souls, let´s say avatars, they can. For example, you see, we say "Paramahamsa" no? What is Paramahamsa? What is hamsa? A swan. Why do we call a great avatar a Paramahamsa? Eh? He can what? If you take milk and pour it in water, the Paramahamsa can drink only the milk. Strange, huh? But that is a great soul. They can help others to rise. And they can also rise whenever, they also can let go of their identity completely, at will. So this is the dissolution of the ego identity.

We create the illusion of being free......

We forget that if the mind could fathom God, we would not be slaves of the mind. But yet, we let ourselves be ruled by this mind. We don’t have it under control. We are never free, but yet we create the illusion of being free. We think about ourselves being the best. But yet, how will we find God? How will we find the Lotus Feet of the Lord, if we are so filled with this pride inside? Only with humbleness will one find Him, but not in the mind. You say to yourself, “Yes, I’m humble, I’m humble,” but it has to be here, within yourself, inside of you. When you think to yourself, “Yes, everybody is greater than me” you can learn things. There are so many things that you can learn. But, how many like to learn? Not so many. It is said that in this world there are four kinds of people: the one who is attached to the world, the one who is looking for freedom, the one who is ever free and the one who is liberated–well, actually, liberated, then ever free. These four kinds of people make this world, and where is each one situated in it? Are we trying to be liberated? Are we liberated? We can’t be ever free, because the ever free is only the Lord Himself. And, of course, whenever He manifests Himself, He’s ever free. He’s not bound by any law of karma, like people are, but yet, you see how humble He is: for Prahlad he killed Hiranyakashipu. The Lord manifested Himself into a form here, in this level, to show the greatness of devotion, how important the devotion of His bhakta is. The Lord limits Himself for his devotee. So, the Lord is ever free to take whatever form, wherever He wills it, but yet we fight. We say, “Ours is the best; yours is not,” forgetting that He’s the Lord. He has created everything and He’s not bound in the way people are bound with the mind. There’s this beautiful story that shows these four categories of humans. When a fisherman throws his net in the sea, the ever free will never get caught in the net. The fisherman can try as much as possible, but they are too wise for that. When the net of Maya is cast, the rest of them, the other three, get caught in it - the one who is attached, the one who is liberated and the one who is on the way to liberation. The one who is searching for liberation is like a fish caught in the net. The ones who are trying their best to be liberated see the net and they try their best to jump out of the net, but yet, they don’t succeed. They try and try and try and they can’t. But the liberated ones, they will jump out of the net, and then they will go! And the fisherman says, “Look at this big fish, he’s going away.” And the ones who are caught in the net are like the fish that don’t even try their best to come out. They don’t do anything. They think that, “Yes, I will be saved; let me go down deep in the mud and hide myself” but yet, forgetting that the net is caught in the mud. They will go and hide, forgetting that when the fisherman pulls the net, they will be also caught. They will come out inside the net. So, such are they who are caught in the world outside, who don’t even try their best to realise why they are here. They don’t even try and do something. They don’t even want to think about it, because they think, “Life is beautiful; let’s enjoy it!” Enjoy for how long-ten years, twenty years? They’re getting old; time is running on! And we don’t realise that, you know. We don’t realise that one day there will come a time where we will look at life and say, “What have I done?” We have danced in the routine all the time, every day. We have danced in the routine, which has made us a slave to this world. The merciful Lord has given a chance to change, but yet, we have not taken it. Then when you look at life behind you, you realise what a waste of life, what a waste of time has been. Then you will say to yourself, probably among you -you have even said it already, “Oh, I should have changed that time.” You realise that there were times for you to change, but you didn’t take the opportunity. Then you fall into the category of the fish that has been caught in the net, and when the fisherman pulls it out, you say, “Oops! Too late!” But it’s never too late. When you have practiced to surrender to God, when you have the Grace, take the chance and change! It’s not up to me to tell you to change, but it’s up to you to tell yourself to change. When you try, of course, it’s not in one go you will get the Divine. Of course, for some it’s easy, because of the past karmas. They can try and very quickly they receive the result. But for some, it takes time, but one should not lose hope. When the Divine sees that you are trying, He will send help. If you accept the help, He will lead you to liberation, but it’s up to you. This is the freedom that He gives to mankind. We choose the way we want.

Expectation limits the Divine.....

One day you will surrender completely, saying, “Open my heart. Here I am. I surrender to You – body, mind and soul is Yours! Do whatever you want to do.” For sure you will be guided. Do it. Very often people start to do it, but then doubt arises in the mind. You see, doubt arises because you expect limits. People think that when they become spiritual they have to see something; they have to see maybe some light, or some miracles, or anything that the physical eyes can see. But expectation limits the Divine. Do you think God can be limited when you say, “God I love You, I really want to feel You, I really want to know You”? And then you’re questioning about the light when He is the Light of all lights, and the Light that these eyes can’t even look at! Actually, it’s just that the inner eyes can see it. All of you have this light. All of you have these eyes. But open them! Don’t have fear to open them, no matter what you will see – focus your attention on the Divine! Focus your attention on God – on this light and love that you have inside you. And like a child, let yourself be guided. You will feel that – whatever you want to do, if it is not right – you will not go in that way. But for that you have to be sincere to yourself. You have to be sincere to the feeling that you are feeling inside. It’s not that your heart feels something and you say, “Oh no, it’s not that, it’s my own creation... it’s all just illusions of my mind.” Look at Mirabai, one of the devotees of Krishna. Do you know her story? Some of you might know it, and some of you don’t. She was a queen, and her love for Krishna was so great, it was beyond everything. When she got married, she said to her husband, “My love for Krishna is beyond all your love, that you can understand. I see Him in you and in all of you who are around.” Whenever she used to sing Krishna’s name or sing a bhajan, he was present there. Such was her love that the Divine manifested Himself there. Whenever you call from deep within your heart, whenever you call any aspect of the Divine, the Divine will take that aspect and come to you. Mirabai’s love was so great that at the end of her life they blamed her for so many things – but she was fixed and steady on her Krishna. There was a lot of jealousy around her. But this is normal. You see, when you have a power point, all the souls around want the same thing. But to get it, they don’t want to do anything. They just want to sit and be given it on a silver plate. You will receive it on a silver plate, yes, but first you have to make the effort. Otherwise the Divine will give you the silver plate, but your hand will be like this… it will fall down! That’s why I’m talking about opening the heart of man, opening your heart to love. Because you can love, you can love beyond what your mind is thinking about love. In the depth of this love you’ll be one with the Divine. Beyond all the duality that the mind creates is only the Self, and that’s what each one is here for. And no matter which path you are following, at the end, each path will reach that point. All paths are right but you have to be disciplined in them. When I say disciplined I don’t mean forcing or pressing. This is spirituality. Something that has to emerge from the heart of man, is like a flower that opens without any force. Let it open, and let it shine with beauty.

This identity, which has been given to you when you were born, is that really you? ....

Whichever name you feel close to, chant it! Chant until you become the Divine Name yourself. And it is possible, I tell you! It is not something that is not possible, you just have to try it! If you try it, you will succeed in chanting the Divine Name with every breath you take during the day. You breathe 21,600 times in 24 hours. So, if you practice consciously during the day, chanting the Divine Names all the time, you will be chanting even while you are sleeping. It will become a Japa Mantra - a mantra that is chanting by itself. It is not you chanting it, but it is chanting automatically inside of you. With each breath that you take in and out, you will recite the Divine Name and you will transform yourself. First, you will transform inside. You will feel the joy, you will feel the freedom, the happiness, inside of you and, of course, this will not just stay inside of you, but it will reflect also on the outside. You will become an instrument of this Divine Love; you will become an instrument of the Divine, so that you may become Divine yourself. You will realise this unity between you, which is the Atma, and God, which is the Paramatma. But the you which is gross on the outside, which is just made up of the Pancha Tattva – the five elements - will dissolve itself. This identity, which has been given to you when you were born, is that really you? It is to a certain degree. Whatever is created from the Lord is real, also, because He infuses Himself into everything. But this is not the Ultimate Reality. Only when this minimum reality that you call reality and which the world itself looks at and says, “That´s real,” dissolves itself, the Ultimate Reality can reveal Itself inside of you. So, practice! In simple words: chant the name of God all the time. Remember the Divine, whatever you do, wherever you are, the Divine is with you.

Once you drink the cup of Divine Love, you will see the world completely differently. This Love is pure nectar, and to understand it, one has to drink it.

Hanuman is considered to be the model of bhakti, He is considered how one has to be in one’s spiritual path, and how devotional one has to be.....

Hanuman is an incarnation of Shiva. When Rama came down, all the Deities manifested themselves in the form of Monkeys – Vanara Sena. And Hanuman is Shiva Himself actually. That’s why it is said: when you pray to Hanuman, you receive the grace of Gauri Shankar. And, as I have explained during Ram Navami, the name Rama is a mixture of Om Namo Narayanaya and Om Namah Shivaya. The first word of Rama is: Om Namo Narayanaya, which is Ra, and Om Namah Shivaya, which is Ma. So the name of Rama is infused in Hanuman through His devotion. He was initiated in the name of Rama from childhood and His devotion had no limit. Even till now, it is said: wherever the name of Rama is being read, He is the first one to come and the last one to leave. Hanuman is immortal. He travelled the world around, protecting, giving His blessing to Rama devotees, to whoever prays to Lord Rama. Tulsidas knew that he would not be able to attain Ram by himself. He knew that his devotion was weak. He had to strengthen his devotion and the only way to strengthen His devotion to Lord Rama was to take Rama Bhakta, and become a devotee of Lord Rama. That’s what Krishna said in the Gita, “Whoever wants to come to me shall be devoted to my servants. The devotee of my servants is dearer to me”. So Tulsidas took the word of what is written also in Rama Charitra Manas. He surrendered to Hanuman and asked Hanumanji for His help and, of course, he didn’t know who Hanuman was. So through his penance of roaming around for days and days, he reached a spot, he heard a voice saying “Go to Varanasi. Go to the temple where the Rama Charitra Manas is being read”. Then he
asked “But how will I know Him?” Then the voice said “You will recognise Him, because He is an old man who will come. He will be the first one to come and the last one to leave”. So he went there and, when he went to the temple, he saw only one old man sitting. Then people filled up and, when everybody left, He was the only one left, the last one to leave. So he knew that He was Hanuman. He went and held the feet of the old man and said “Please, Prabhu, you are such a great devotee of the Lord, please guide me to Him. And bless me with a little bit of your devotion that you have to Lord Rama”. Hanuman at this moment, because He was in disguise, said “No, no, no, what are you doing?” You know, He wanted to test him. He rebuked him, pushed him away, but Tulsidas would not let go of His feet. And Hanuman was pleased with his devotion and said “I bless you that Lord Rama will come, but you will have to recognise Him”. So, when a few days later Tulsidas was on the bank of the Ganges, preparing pure sandal paste, two young men came
to him and said “We see that you are preparing some nice sandal paste. Can we have some?” Then Tulsidas said “Well, this sandal paste is for the king, for royalties. And I see that you are royalties, so you can have the sandal paste”. Of course he could not recognise who was in front of him. Then Hanuman was up on the tree where Tulsidas was sitting. He called Tulsidas and said “Tulsidas, this is your Lord in front of you”. When he now saw the Lord in front of him, Tulsidas left and took the chandan and held the feet of Rama.
This is how Hanuman helped the devotees of the Lord to find Him. So He is a model of devotion. So we can just pray that a little bit you can change like Him.

Love is the only thing that binds the Lord.....

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.” Actually, all the Masters from all religions–not only Hinduism–Mohammed, Jesus, Krishna, all have come just to teach mankind to attain this Universal Love, to attain this Unconditional Love, because this is your true nature. Apart from that, there is nothing. All that you have you will leave here. You took it from here; you will leave it here. Once you have attained this Love, just give, because you will have become an instrument of the Divine Love, and let it flow always.