“Swamiji you always say to pray to God, always, but I’m working on the outside. How will I attain the Divine?” ....

A few days ago, somebody asked me “Swamiji you always say to pray to God, always, but I’m working  on the outside. How will I attain the Divine?” I think many of you ask this question. The answer is simple. There is one sentence in the Gita about doing one’s duty. One can’t neglect one’s duty. In the Gita it said that the dharma, one has to do. No matter what, dharma is very important, but how one has to do it, that is the most important thing. There is one form of doing one’s duty, which is nishkama karma, which means to do one’s duty without expecting anything, to do one’s duty in rendering service to others without even thinking of the result. That is what the Gita said “Whatever one does, if one is attached to the fruit of the action, one will suffer.” It’s true, because when we expect certain things, when we do certain things, there is always certain expectation and when the expectation is not met, what happens? You get sad, no? You feel upset. Where does this come from? You created it. You make yourself sad.So when one does one’s duty without even expecting something that means that the mind is already surrendering to the Divine. In another way, the mind, when it has the sattvic quality, the mind doesn’t have any power into it. This is where whatever one does is a complete surrender to the Divine, but whereas when one gets a little mixture of rajasic quality with   sattvic quality, then one, always, says “I will do good to the world.” In that state we’ll see that the I is very big. Whenever the mind pictures the I, it doesn’t mean the I of the Self; it means, always, the I of the ego “I can do this; I can do that.” As long as you have not Realised your Self, the I of the ego is always big. That’s why it is said in the Scripture: Remove this I. Put Him, you know, the Lord, because as long as one has not realised anything, one has to remind oneself continuously that All is Him.Even what you perceive that you are doing yourself, actually, it is Him which is acting through you. That’s why the great Sages, when they have realised themselves, they always praise the Lord by saying “Lord, I am the vehicle, but you are the one who  is driving it. I am the chariot, but you are the charioteer. I am the wick of the lamp, but you are the light. I am the house, but you are the dweller of that house.” So in that state one has fully transcended the human nature seeing only the Divine working in everything. In that state, one sees the world in a different angle, not the same as with the egoistic mind point of view. Often people come, they say “Oh, Swamiji, I have seen this vision and that vision.” No, no, because people always want to think that they are special in whatever they do. Very often, without judgment, you see them very proudly “Oh, I have seen that. I have seen this.”, but what is that if it is not just pride? Because when one comes face to face with the Divine and really experiences something from the Divine, one doesn’t talk about it. One treasures it as the most precious treasure inside one’s heart.   In that state, the mere mention of the Divine Name will make one cry out of joy knowing that this experience that one has received from the Divine,  is real. And this is all due to the nishkama karma. Wherever your dharma is, wherever God has put you, no matter what kind of work he has lead you to, there’s a reason for that. Whenever you do your duty, it doesn’t matter where you are, it doesn’t matter what you do if you do it with a mind surrendered to the Divine, if you do it with your heart completely full of Love, even there God will come to you.

As Sri Krishna said in the Gita, “If you want to attain me, surrender yourself to your Guru and you will attain me.....”

Which type of people do we want to be? We are searching. We want to attain His Grace. We want to attain His Love, but we are so much stuck in our mind. We want to attain Him, yet how many among us will really surrender everything to Him? How many among us will surrender ourselves completely to Him, will say “Lord, here I am. Take me.”? We say yes, we want to do God’s will, isn’t it?  On the spiritual path we always want to do God’s Will. Yet in our ego self, we want to do our will also a little bit, but we say “It’s the Will of God.” As long as it makes us happy, as long as “I am happy” that’s it, it’s the Will of God, but when it’s not turning towards “What makes me happy”, it’s wrong. What do we do then? We start criticising, we start judging. Does God’s will have judgment into it? Whatever the Divine does is  always for the people. Whatever a Master does is always for raising the spirituality in the disciple.As I said in the beginning, you have to want Him. Then He will come to you. When you say “I want to realise God”, it’s not just superficial, you know? You have to really mean it. When you say “Really, I want Him,” there will be such Love inside of you, such great peace and calmness inside of you, that you will feel Him. Whatever He gives you, if you surrender into Him, if you are surrendered and you really trust that He, His will be done, then you have to remove your desire. You have to remove what makes you happy, but what makes Him happy, that’s the most important thing. Tat is called complete surrender. Such was the life of Madhava Puri. Madhava Puri was a 17th century Saint, who lived in Vrindavan. He used to go begging for his food, but it came to a point that the Love for God was so strong inside of him, that he stopped begging. He said “Whatever God gives me, I will eat.” For days and days he would go without food. On one occasion, he was around Govardhan, the holy mountain, which Krishna lifted with His little finger; he was there for four days. He didn’t eat anything, he sat there. One day, after four days of not eating, a boy, a small boy came to him with a pot of milk and gave him this milk and said “Madhava, drink this.” He looked at the boy and said “Who are you?” The boy,smiling, looked at him and said “Well, I heard some women talking about you not having eaten, so I brought you this milk. I provide for the one who doesn’t beg for anything. I provide for the one who is surrendered to the Lord.” Madhava Puri took the milk and he asked again the boy “Who are you?” He said “Don’t worry about who I am. You drink the milk. I will come later on to get the pot.” Madhava Puri drank the milk. It was like nectar. It was like milk he had never drunk before in his life. He was wondering who this boy was, and inside of him he said “Milk can’t taste like nectar. Milk can’t taste so sweet like that.”  As he was thinking and waiting for the boy to come back to get the pot, he had a dream. In the dream he saw Sri Krishna standing – the same face as the boy. He said “Madhava you didn’t recognise me. It was me who came to you. As I told you, I feed the one who doesn’t beg and who is surrendered to the Lord.” In the dream Krishna said to him “I’m guiding you to a well. Go there, deep inside this well, I am lying for some years. Take me out and do my service.”Early in the morning when he woke up, he was so much in Divine ecstasy. He was feeling so much great joy inside of him, he went around and started calling everybody “Come, let’s go to the well and remove Krishna.” Just as directed in the dream, he went and really they found the well. They removed the beautiful statue of Krishna out from the well and then he took Him out and made a nice temple for Him.They started doing lots of prayers and service to the Vigraha, to the Deity. One day Krishna came again in his dream and said “Madhava Puri, you know I was so long in this well, my body has so much heat from the sun. I need to get sandalwood paste from Puri (which is about 2,500 km up north from Vrindavan). I need to get this sandalwood paste so that I can cool down.”Without thinking, Madhava Puri rushed, left everything, gave the duty to one of his disciples to look after the Krishna. He rushed quickly on the way to Puri, walking. Without thinking  how he would go, without asking for the direction, anything. He just let himself be guided.At that time India was ruled by different kings. Each time you passed a kingdom, you would have to pay something to enter the kingdom, then they would let you in and go on. He didn’t even bother about it. His trust in the Lord was so great that he just walked. On the way, there was a famous temple of Gopinath. As he was passing by, he remembered having heard that in this temple their offering was so great that they would offer twelve pots of buttermilk to Krishna every day, and the buttermilk tastes like, really, like Amrit, like nectar. So he sat down there in the temple and he looked how they were doing their service to the Deity, and he said to himself “I will also do the same.”As he was looking how they did the offering to the Deity, he wanted to taste the buttermilk. Inside of him he had this great desire, but he didn’t dare to go and ask the priest “Give me some.” He was so scared that at night, when the priest had closed the temple, Krishna came in the dream of the priest and said to the priest “My dear priest, there is one of my devotees, one of my disciples, outside in the market. He is singing. I have a credit towards him. You have to take one pot of buttermilk. Go and give it to him. This is his.” The priest did according to what Krishna had told him in the dream. He woke up, took a shower and then took the buttermilk, and as the Lord had said that Madhava Puri was in the market place, he reached there and he saw Madhava Puri singing in ecstasy. He called to Madhava Puri “The Lord has sent this buttermilk for you. Here, take it.”When he heard that this was sent from the temple, from Sri Krishna Himself, he just drank it all. He was so happy that he started to eat even the pot afterwards. When he could not eat more of the pot, because the pot was  made of earth, he kept some. He said later on he would eat it. Of course news don’t stay in one place. They start spreading. So before the news spread, he left the place going towards Puri. As he reached Puri, of course, the news had already reached there. Nobody knew who the person was. The moment he entered the temple of Jagannath, the moment he was in front of the Deity, the Jagannath, he started dancing in Divine ecstasy. So much was his Love for God that there was no consciousness of the outside. The people knew it was Madhava Puri about whom they had heard the story. Of course, news travels faster than one walks, you know.For four months he stayed in Puri, and the devotees, the people there, enjoyed his presence very much. After four months, Krishna said to him in a dream “You forgot about me. I sent you to Puri to get me sandalwood paste.  Bring it to me. I am still waiting for you.” So after four months he went, he got his sandalwood. Big, big, lots of sandalwood he took on his back.He started walking back. Again, he passed by the temple of Gopinath. He stayed there for a few days and at night the Lord appeared in his dream and said to him “My sweet Madhava Puri, you have fulflled everything that I have asked you without even thinking. You have shown the greatest Love, the devotion you have inside of you. I am so pleased with it. You don’t need to bring the sandalwood to Vrindavan. Give it in the temple of Gopinath. I am, myself, there. Tell the priest to make it into powder and apply it on me.”This story shows how much one can surrender, if one wants to. Especially when we say we want to do God’s Will, we have really to do His Will, not our will. To know how the Will of God is, this will be the question, you know? When you pray there is always a feeling that awakens. If you are praying sincerely, and you are sincerely chanting the Name of God, there is this great longing and the great peace and calm that awakens. When this awakens inside of you, there is also the inner voice that will start awakening. When you hear this inner voice, it is even greater than what you have in the mind, because even if you want to do what your mind wants you to do, this one will be greater. You will know that. Your heart will pull you towards that voice.When you chant the Name of God, it’s not just mere chanting when you recite the sweet Name. It’s not just chanting it like that, but what it creates inside of you, what it awakens inside of you, because you see, it is said that the Name of God, and God, are one. There is no difference between the Name of God and God. So when you chant the Name, He is next to you.It is said that when you chant, first your Guru has to be in your mind. From the Master, the Lord will show Himself. So always, when you chant, always place the Master first. In that way, it will be like what Sri Krishna said in the Gita, “If you want to attain me, surrender yourself to your Guru and you will attain me.” To sing the name of the Guru is so easy. There are so many names. Everybody feels close with certain names, but in this age, as it is said, the sweet name of Sri Hari is the most important one. Chant always, and as you chant, let your mind be focused on the Divine. Don’t just do it mechanically, but do it and feel that the Lord is with you, and is standing next to you. 

Why “Bhaja Nitai Gauranga Radhe Shyam Japa Hare Krishna Hare Ram” ?

 End of May, Gurudev asked all residents, people living in Springen and guests to chant a certain mantra for 12 hours continuously each day, taking turns of 15 minutes each person. After the evening prayers last Tuesday Guruji came and joined us and we started all to sing the mantra. It was a real nice and joyous atmosphere and we sang until our little BalaKrishna had to go to bed (because he really gets put to bed in a pyjama). Guruji said the following about the mantra chanting:

Why “Bhaja Nitai Gauranga Radhe Shyam Japa Hare Krishna Hare Ram”? You see “Bhaja Nitai Gaur” – “Bhaja” here stands for seva. It stands for the service one is rendering. It´s not a physical service, but it’s a service to the world through vibration. The aim of human life is to attain pure love, so that you can truly say that you have loved God. Like I explained in the satsang: there are stages to reach sacred love - prem. In this yuga they say always “chanting the Divine Name one achieves that level”.  So why Gauranga? Gauranga is a combination of Radha/Krishna, so that’s why we are singing “Bhaja Nitai Gaur” – service to Nitai and Gauranga, which is service to RadhaKrishna. At the same time “Japa Hare Krishna Hare Ram” – at the same time you are chanting the mahamantra also. So how you will reach the love is by chanting and through the grace of Prabhu Nityananda - and Mahaprabhu can give Himself. Because if Nityananda Prabhu says something Mahaprabhu can´t refuse. It’s the same if Radha says something to Krishna, Krishna can´t refuse. That’s why it is said that Radharani is more wonderful than Krishna Himself.There is three kind of Love. When we talk about love, you say “I love you”, always – have you ever written a sms to Krishna, to God, to say “God, I love you and I miss you so much”? No, you never! People: Yes! (lots of laughter) But to all the people you say “I love you, I love you, I love you”, you know. Imagine how much love that He has – for you, and yet, you forget about it. You are mostly concerned about human love, relationship all this, which will last only for some time and finish and then you jump again on another thing. Misery, misery, misery, misery, misery, misery – always misery! When your soul aim is to attain – just love, through service to Him.By chanting “Bhaja Nitai Gauranga Radha Shyam Japa hare Krishna hare Ram”, these 15 minutes that you give of your time is a great contribution. Because everything is vibration, you know, everything vibrates. This time, when you concentrate and when you are chanting – He is here. And that´s what the mantra awakes. The knowing, that He is the Lord that governs everything. He is the Lord that governs your heart and He is the Lord of your heart and nobody else. In the Gita, it says “All the names that you chant are mine, all the forms are just inside of me, not out of me. Nothing can exist out of me. Whatever you see…”.You can say “yes, God is there, outside”, but the whole universe is inside of Him. How can you be out of Him? Without Him you would not be here. You can´t exist without Him! So that is what you have to realize: Even if in His cosmic form, He is deep inside everybody, He is in everything, but yet we are all part of His cosmic body. What you see outside is the yog-maya, which catches everybody, which veils everybody through ignorance. But it is also His maya. His maya also catches Him. And His maya is Radharani – He can´t escape Her. He can´t escape because Radharani is completely fully in love. “Bhaja Nitai Gaur”, oh Lord Nitai! How you surrender to Gauranga, how you surrender to love incarnate? Through the service I am giving. Make also this love awake inside of us, make us also part of this drama, make us part of this contribution that we can give to this world. That´s what “Bhaja Nitai Gaur” stands for, you know. In the Narada Puran, Krishna Himself said to Narad Muni “one can give big lectures, one can talk a lot, one can read a lot, but if they don´t have love inside their heart, it´s nothing.” So, it´s that what is important. To learn to love God, you know. Not superficial, but real. So, that’s in short that what the mantra stands for. Jai Gurudev!

Let the Love of God completely take possession of you.....

When He’s taking something out, let Him take. What He takes out 

will be replaced by Divine Love. You will feel this Cosmic Love inside 

of you. You will feel this Great Love of God inside of you, and in 

this Love you will cry, you will laugh, you will not even understand 

it with the mind what is happening to you. Let it happen,   don’t 

question it, because you have to let the Love of God completely 

take possession of you. As long as there is the mind, you will never 

understand His Love. 

Only when you renounce the mind you can understand His 

Love. You can’t analyse, you can’t understand Him, because 

understanding is with the mind and with the mind there is no 

point in  understanding Him. You have to renounce, you have to 

surrender to Him. When you surrender, you don’t question Him. 

You don’t question why it is like that, why it is like this. You just 

accept it, because you know He’s with you.

While you are going through this purifcation, know that the Lord 

is near to you in whatever form you call Him. If you like Him in this 

Nrsinghadev form, He will come in this form. If you like Him in 

the form of Jesus, he will come in the form of Jesus. You see, God 

is not limited to one form. He’s unlimited. That’s why He is God. If 

God were limited, then He would not be God. Then He would be the 

fashion of one’s mind, but God is not that. Even if you give a form 

to Him, He’s not that. He’s beyond our creation. He’s beyond our 

mind’s creation.

 When we invoke the Lord, we have also to invoke Him inside our hearts.  

                                When He takes full possession of us, we become Him.

“Help yourself and God shall help you.....”

When we look at a Saint who is in union with God – what is the name of the union with God? We have the Sanskrit name, samadhi, don’t we? What is  samadhi? Everybody longs for  samadhi but the state of  samadhi is without any discrimination, without any judgement. It is pure Love. As long as you see the judgement in your mind, as long as there is discrimination in your mind, you will still have to work to attain the non-discrimination state and then, only this real Love, this pure Love will awaken. When this pure Love awakens, it embraces you. It is not a feeling that you will say “Yes, I feel happy or I feel sad.” It is beyond that. If I could express it with words, it would not be what I’m talking about. This is the state where you find union with the Divine, where you realise your Self. As long as you are searching, you are just searching for that Love. When you find it, you will only find that Love. So don’t lose hope, no matter what, know that the Divine is always with you and wherever you are, whatever you do, it’s Him who is doing through you. Try your best from your side, you have always to try your best. The human being is not perfect and I’m sure later on it will not be perfect either, because when one becomes perfect, one has this quality that I just said before. When one becomes perfect, one becomes Divine, so one is not human anymore. But as long as one has this quality, one stays human. Try your best to become Divine. That is what all the great Masters have taught. Christ came and taught that, Krishna has taught that and all of them have taught to realise your own divinity, because only then real happiness will be there. Then you can say “Yes, I am happy,” because that happiness will not go away, it will stay forever. Otherwise you will stay in illusion. You will think and try to make yourself think that you are happy. As long as you have not attained that, keep trying. You will receive all the help needed as long as you give your hand because if you don’t make your effort, you can’t expect God to do His effort, do it for you. He is fully realised, but He is here to help you to realise your Self, but you have to give your hand. You have to do your part. Otherwise it will be like somebody who is thirsty sits down and says “I am thirsty, I’m thirsty, I’m thirsty!” Do you think the thirst will go away? No, it would not go away. The person has to get up, make the effort of opening the tap, take a glass, put it under the tap and bring the water to the mouth and drink it. Then the thirst goes away. It is the same if you just sit around and say “OK, I wait for God-Realisation to come.”  It will not jump from there on your head. It is only when you prove yourself and that you are making an effort that the Divine will help you. You know the saying that says “Help yourself and God shall help you.”