This is the purpose of man, to search for the Divine.....

God is not outside, God is inside, inside of you. That’s what also Christ said “In the future there will be lots of prophets. If a saint would come and say "Come, I will show you the Kingdom of God; it’s this place or that place" don’t follow them, because the Kingdom of God is not here and there. It’s inside of you.” This is the first place where you have to find Him, you have to realise Him. You have not to just say “Oh, I believe in God.” For sure, all of you sitting here, all of you say “Yes, I believe in God.” I believe very much that all of you believe in God, but believe in God within you. Believe in God that the energy, which is given to you to act in this world, is only Him. This is the first step. 

Once you have this first step, He will manifest Himself through you. It’s not just the energy that you have now. This is just 5 % of the whole energy that you use. There is much more. We say that the divine manifests Himself, no? Of course, He has the power to manifest also on the outside as on the inside. Once you start thinking like that, He will reveal Himself inside of you. In that revelation of the Divine within you, there is the removal of the duality, that you are separated from everything. This is where the saints always say that they have this deep communion with God and when one has this communion with God, all the duality of the outside disappears, because only the oneness of God consciousness which pervades everything stays. You Realise that you, your Self, from the beginning you are fully realised. Then you realise also how stupid you are, because you have been travelling around and looking for something which is just here, always with you. 

You have to empty your mind completely......

Jesus spoke of: “I am the Way, the Truth, and the light.” It is the ‘I’ of the consciousness, the ‘I’ of the Christ consciousness that leads mankind. Yes, each one of you. This consciousness is in each one of you. It’s waiting to become active. It’s very good that you come for darshan, very good that you sit for meditation. But you should not only do it now, you have to do it always! By receiving the blessing – prana hooti, it’s called – you are receiving and activating the light within you. That’s what I can do for you; the rest is up to you. I can take the food, crush it to puree and put it in your mouth, but I can’t swallow it for you. I will be happy to do it for you, you know? But this part is up to each one of you. Your question will be, “We keep trying, yet nothing happens?” But what I said before, remember that – I said if you try with an expectation, it can never happen. You have to empty your mind completely. The thought will pass by, let it pass – don’t feed it. You are not the mind, you are not the thought; you are more than that.

Sri Swami Vishwananda tells us today.....

We have been singing Jai Ma as the great feast day of the Divine Mother, the Mother which is seated inside your heart – not the mother who has given you this body, well she is also the mother – but the Mother who has given you this soul, who has given you the spirit, has given you this body to dwell in this world and has given you such a beautiful world to be in. At the same time a mother wants the child. A mother is always ready to care for the children. How can we make this Divine Mother happy? She doesn’t ask too much from us. She doesn’t ask that we change ourselves for Her. The only thing that She asks is that each one, by oneself, decides to change not for Her sake, but for their own sake. I was traveling and I went to a big city, looking at how people were busy on the outside. I asked myself this question “Do they really know that there is something greater than just this life that they are living?” I was asking my Guru about it. We can say “Yes.” Here, we are all thinking we know there is something greater in the life of man even if you, as a human being, have not realised it, yet you have this sense of feeling that yes, there is something greater and you want to achieve, to attain this. While walking, I was thinking how many among these people were really living a human life. How many were really knowing that life is not just what they were living? There is much more than that. They can be really eternally happy. They can really find this great joy, which nothing can take away. How many? I was wondering. Then a friend said something about a philosopher, a Greek philosopher, Diogenes. He went around during the day with his lamp and of course, everybody would laugh at him. They would laugh at him; they would ridicule him. He didn’t bother about anything and one day somebody asked him “Why are you going around in daylight with your torch lit, because it is funny!” His answer was very simple and clear “I’m looking for a human being!” There are many humans, but there are only a few human beings. What is the difference between a human and a human being? An animal can also be counted as a human. It has a body, it breathes, but we call an animal, an animal and a human, a human. The faculty of looking for something greater is only in the human being. But when you go around, as I was singing before in one verse of the song, that illusion, Maya, has caught us. Maya has caught human beings and she is making human beings play to the tune that she wants. This is exactly how it is on the outside, until you start to really search for the truth of your Self. When you start searching for the truth of your Self, then you disengage yourself from that grief of Maya, but as you know very well, it is not an easy task. It’s not something that is very easy to do at all. Everybody would like to, lots of spiritual people would like to, but only a few succeed. Why? Because their determination is weak. If your determination for the Divine is strong, nothing can move you, but if your determination is weak, then you will be weak, because you make yourself weak, like I said before. If you fully believe in yourself, if you fully have trust in yourself, you will fully believe and trust in God. Then of course, the Divine will always help you.

When you sing, if you want to make it more powerful, let it emerge from deep within you.....

When you sing the divine Name, let it come from deep within you, not just outside. This is the power of sound. And to make it more powerful, it has to emerge from deep within. That’s why when you say OM, you don’t just say OM from the throat, otherwise there is no vibration into it. When you chant OM, you chant from deep within you, from the microcosmos that you have inside of you. That’s what is said in the Vedas. They talk about the microcosmos, which is deep within humans, where the Divine is seated all the time. That’s why, also, when you sing, if you want to make it more powerful, let it emerge from deep within you, and you will have more power. That’s why when a lion roars, he roars from deep within. You never see a lion roaring very softly from the outside. That’s why he is the king of the animals. The roaring of the lion is so powerful that it sometimes shakes even the Divine! When Narasingha Dev appeared on Earth and roared, even the Heavens got scared of it. And it’s the same if you want to wake up the Divine, which is sleeping within your heart, call His name. Of course, one will say “We don’t really need to shout to call Him”, but He will enjoy your call. When He is lying down in your heart, He will enjoy your call. Why do we sing? Why do you think that people, when they sing, are in such a great joy? They forget about everything. Why is it? It’s because when we sing the power of mind is less in action. We are deeper into this Divine energy, because all the vibrations are cosmic energy. There is one technique called the Nada Yoga or Nada Kriya that explains the power of sound. And you will see that all the sounds emerge from the vibration OM and everything is vibration. Our life itself is a vibration.

Sri Swami Vishwananda sings OM.....

The Soul is shy.......

Very often we love God, no? Because He is the creator, we love Him, but we love the world also. Right? That’s the difference. That’s why I said urge, longing. We say superficially to make ourselves be happy, that we love God, but in reality what do we love? Tell me. What is this Love? If you have not yet known what Love is in itself, how can you say you love God? If you have not yet known your Self, you have not yet realised the Love inside of you, how can you say you love God? It’s easy to say, because scriptures talk about it. You come here; Swami said, “Yeah, love God” isn’t it? But what is this? Man is created, in a way, with three things; firstly the body, secondly, the mind and, thirdly, the soul. Let’s put it like that; the mind, body and the intellect, that’s what makes Man human. If we look at the combination of these three things, they are three things that dwell towards the outside. The body, which is bound by the senses, enslaves man. The mind is very difficult to control, because the mind always runs in the outside. And the intellect – what is the intellect? Not being too intellectual, but what is the intellect? The intellect is the search for the truth. It’s not in the mind, but rather it is in the consciousness. All three of these combined together dwell only in the outside, because these things need an object – the object of the outside.How will one know how to surrender? We talk about surrender, but the outside makes a lot of pressure. The easy way is to first, before the senses, mind and the intellect enjoy the object, to offer it to the Divine. Like that, in the mind there will be no question what one has to choose, because if it is already offered to the Divine, only what will benefit you will arise inside of you. The lower quality can’t access something which is in the higher level. In the same way, when we say we love God, until we discover the Love inside of us, we still have to search. We still have to dig deep inside, not outside. We all start here (pointing to the head). If you can’t calm your mind, if you can’t calm yourself, it’s very difficult. The first step is to try to calm yourself. Then what happens inside is that you will feel a little calmer. You will feel a little joy, but that’s not everything. Many people, they feel this and say “Yes, I have reached there” and then, one month later you ask, “How are you?” and they say “Well, I felt this Love only for two weeks and after two weeks it’s gone.” Or you come here and you feel it, then after two weeks it’s finished. Actually, this Love never finishes. It is there, but the mind covers it. What must happen to keep this love burning inside of you? Interact always with people. Usually when I say interact with people, what you will do? You will sit and gossip. That’s what interaction is nowadays, no? Talk about spiritual things, talk about what you feel, talk about God. The more you talk about God, the more this Love inside of you will grow more and more. Not only for two weeks, but it will always be with you. You will always feel it. That’s what Christ said: If two or three are gathered in my name, I shall be among them. This ‘two or three’ is this mutual Love – not in gossiping things, but in awakening the Divine Love within one’s Self. When this Love gets awakened, the longing, it’s like when you give a nice cake to somebody. You will always want this cake again. It’s the same thing once you discover the Love of God in you and around you, you will always long for more and more and this longing crosses over the body, mind and intellect. Then the soul reveals itself. Very often when people talk about the soul, it’s just mere words, because the soul in itself is very shy, in the same way that God is very shy. That’s why He shows Himself from time to time only. Until Love reaches a certain degree inside of you, the soul doesn’t reveal itself. That’s why when you do your sadhana, be sincere. When you do your work – any kind of work – be sincere about it. Do it with Love. You know this proverb I say: Work is worship, no? You know about it? That means, wherever you are, whatever you do, God is present with you. If you do it with the awareness that you are serving the Divine, He will reveal Himself. There is a saint who was a road cleaner who received the darshan of God where Krishna appeared in front of him, even Rama appeared. This is about how much Love you put in what you do. Often Love varies. When you sit in meditation, you are full of Love. When you sit for prayer, you are full of Love and then, when you go out, where is that Love? You left it inside the prayer room or you left it only in meditation. Be aware that, even if you don’t feel it, the Divine is always with you. As you long for Him, He longs more for you.

When you pursue God-Realisation or Self-Realisation – no matter what comes, you have to be strong....

Let light shine from deep within your heart to everybody. Often people say “But Swamiji, we would always love to have this Divine Light shining through, but it’s so difficult. Am I right? No? You see if you want it to be easy, you will do everything and anything possible to make it easy. It doesn’t matter how hard it is, you will do it. But if you make yourself weak by saying “difficult”, this word, which is so very easily used – it is a barrier and we create this barrier – we make it difficult and then we say “Oops, it’s difficult.” It’s the same when you say something is easy. What happens inside of you? You build up this confidence. You put this self- confidence on yourself when you generate this energy inside of you “Yes, I can do it” and you receive the blessing of the Divine to do it also. On the other hand if you already make yourself weak, then God will say “What’s the use of me giving the grace to this person if he can’t handle it? He’s already weak. It’s of no use giving the blessing or the grace to that person.” Actually, we ourselves stop the grace then. How do you think the light will shine? I was telling you the story of Rama. You see, his life was not that easy. He was sent into the forest and of course He encountered many challenges, but his challenges, He faced them. He didn’t make Himself weak. He didn’t run away or go crying. He didn’t say “I renounce my mission. I’m finished with it.” It’s the same thing when you pursue God-Realisation or Self-Realisation – no matter what comes, you have to be strong. Through this determination of being strong, the Divine will give you the energy, but this part its not God who has to do it, but you who have to do it.

Yearning for the Grace of the Divine......

 You have to develop faith, because if you don’t have faith, it’s difficult and faith is this yearning. You have to develop not only faith; you have to transcend faith to yearning. You have to yearn for God. As long as there is no yearning for the Divine, there is always emptiness. Into this emptiness, anything from the outside can fill it. That’s why you have to guard yourself always, otherwise the old one, the old you, will be back. In somebody who lives in the world, you see it very clearly. You see that somebody who lives in the material world, when they don’t have much they complain. They have a little bit, yet they are not happy. They always long for more. This is how the world, the material world functions. It never gives you real happiness, because the more you have, the more you will want to have. So having more, you will still not be happy. This reminds me of a story. There was a man who was passing under a tree and he heard a voice. The voice said “Do you want seven pots of gold?” He looked around, could not find anybody. He said, “OK, let’s try it.” He heard the voice again and the voice said “Go home. Your seven pots of gold are waiting for you.” He reached home very happy and he saw seven pots.  He approached and he looked inside. They were full with gold. Six of them were completely full with gold and the seventh one was only half full. He said “What is that? Why is this one only half full? I have to fill this up.”  What did he do? He took all his savings, changed it into gold and put it in the seventh pot. In spite of doing that, the pot was not full, so he sold all his utensils. He sold all his  furniture. Still the pot was half full. He started working, slaving himself, working very hard night and day to fill the seventh pot. He worked, starving his family. His wife and children were starving, because he tried to fill up the seventh pot with gold. He was getting depressed. He was working at the king’s palace, and one day the king said “What’s your problem?” He said to the king “I would like that you increase my salary. I’m not so happy.” The king said, “Alright, we’ll increase your salary, because you are a good person.” In spite of increasing the salary for a few months, the king saw that he was still unhappy. One day the king called him and said “Tell me, when your salary was low, you were happy, you were content, you were joyful. Now your salary is double, but you look more depressed. You look unhappy. What’s your problem? Have you met the yaksha, the demon of the seven gold pots?” He was shocked that the King could know about that, because he had kept it secret. Then he said “Well, yes.” and the king said, “Well, that’s a big mistake you have made to accept the seven gold pots, because this will never bring happiness, but only sadness and unhappiness. It will bring only misery to your life. Go quickly and return them.” Well he went and returned them. When he returned it, the seventh pot was still only half full. This pot can never be full. You can’t fill it up and it brings misery. When he returned the seventh pot, he lost everything. All his savings, all the money that he had put inside the pot, all was lost, but that’s what humans often do. Life after life, they want to fill the pot of misery. In spite of knowing that this pot will bring their own ruin, they like to play this game, but when you realise that this is bringing misery to you, do you like to play this game, or do you want to change something? You change your life, because you realise that the world we see outside will never bring happiness. Only your spiritual path will bring you this real happiness. On the spiritual path one has to yearn for the Divine. You have not to be superficial, because if you are superficial, you will get only superficial things. When you are sincere from within yourself, you know, with yourself you are sincere and call the Divine, He can’t refuse you. He will run to you.That’s why it is said “Have faith; have faith like a child,” because when the mother says to the child “That’s your sister,” the child, without asking a second question, will believe that. You should believe and have no doubt. That’s what faith makes happen. That’s what this yearning for the Divine makes happen. That’s why it has to grow more and more. It’s not that you ask for something and you don’t get it, so you say “OK, I will change.” Until you are pure at heart, keep trying. Then one will ask the question “How will I know if I am pure at heart?” Well, when you are pure at heart, you will notice the change inside of you. Your attitude, the way you look at things, will be more lovin and calmer, because the old you will have disappeared completely. Keep asking the Divine to give you this Grace and He will.

Look at the flowers........

“Look at the flowers. Look how beautiful they are. Look at them. They are living and acting now, without any hope for the future or any regret for the past. They are living and acting in the present moment, and finally they are giving their fragrance, without any motive, without any expectation – freely. They are living their lives fully. You understand what is behind it? Nature is doing its work, and humans can learn so much from nature – even from a rose. The rose is not expecting anything, but what do humans do? Instead of putting their lives into right action, they are wasting time, expecting always and bringing misery on themselves. And then what do they say? “Oh God! Why do you send misery to me? I have always done well to you. I remember you always.” But on the other hand they are always expecting. In this game that they are playing, they forget about their true nature. They forget about why they are here. And they like it, you know. They like to say, “Oh, I’m the poor one!” They don’t say, “I am the Divine, I am the creator of everything.” They like hanging around for the future, for what is to come in the future or what has been done in the past, they keep bringing it up all the time. Do you think this will bring happiness to humankind? No! Only misery. Even when they sit for meditation people expect to see some light, to see God in front of them. But I tell you, even this is an expectation and with this expectation in the mind, you will never see the light. You will never see the Divine. Only when you let yourself say, “God, I have tried everything. Now I abandon myself with all my expectations, completely, to you.” Then you’ll see the light. The light will reveal itself to you, because the light is yourself. However, the mind always covers it with perishable things, thinking this is the reality. So, abandon yourself completely – body, mind and soul. Just let go of it! Let go of this small egoism that says “I am this, I am that.” What is this ‘I’? Have you known this ‘I’? Have you realised this ‘I’? – No! As long as you have not realised this ‘I’, you can’t move forward. Why give much importance to something that you don’t know? What is so great about this egoistic ‘I’? Thinking this is the whole? It’s not. That’s what the cross stands for. Cut the ‘I’, and let only the Divine act. So when this egoistic ‘I’ disappears, what remains? The ‘I’ still stays, but this ‘I’ is a universal ‘I’, the ‘I’ without any identity of oneself. The ‘I’ which is equal in each one of you. And this is the ‘I’ that Jesus spoke of: “I am the Way, the Truth, and the light.” It is the ‘I’ of the consciousness, the ‘I’ of the Christ consciousness that leads mankind. Yes, each one of you. This consciousness is in each one of you. It’s waiting to become active. It’s very good that you come for darshan, very good that you sit for meditation. But you should not only do it now, you have to do it always! By receiving the blessing – prana hooti, it’s called – you are receiving and activating the light within you. That’s what I can do for you; the rest is up to you. I can take the food, crush it to puree and put it in your mouth, but I can’t swallow it for you. I will be happy to do it for you, you know? But this part is up to each one of you. Your question will be, “We keep trying, yet nothing happens?” But what I said before, remember that – I said if you try with an expectation, it can never happen. You have to empty your mind completely. The thought will pass by, let it pass – don’t feed it. You are not the mind, you are not the thought; you are more than that. You are the child of God. You are part of the Divine creation. So make this your achievement. Make this your goal in life. Wherever you are, remind yourself of this goal.

Whatever we do, wherever we are, our mind is always working, analyzing everything on the outside....but the mind has to be completely focused on the way to the heart....

Very often in our life, we have great confusion in our mind and in our heart. It is difficult to choose between the mind and the heart. Sometimes we feel something, then we try to listen to our mind, and we do not do what we feel. What happens? We suffer! Why do we suffer? Most of the suffering is because of our own critical thinking towards our own self. Aren’t all of us part of God, with the critical mind in it? God created the mind and the heart. So beautiful! He put everything perfectly into the human body. The mind is not here to make us a slave. It is here to enable us to analyze whatever we need to do in our daily life. Whatever we do, wherever we are, our mind is always working, analyzing everything on the outside. The mind has to be completely focused on the way to the heart. Then one will find the way to love. In our heart there are great sources full of love, waiting to be given to the outside, waiting to reveal itself. For this love to reveal itself – you should really want it. If you want something, you do everything for it, don’t you? If you love somebody, you may write hundreds of letters to this person to express your love. You don’t lose hope. Why then lose hope on this journey towards one’s own Self? It is like losing hope in the middle of the way. It doesn’t mean you have gone backwards, it just means you stopped. The love is still there, still waiting and knocking at the door and saying, “Let me out!” But you have got the key for this door, and it’s up to you to open it. If you want to love, love without expecting anything, pull the door open. The moment you start to expect something, you stop the door from opening. Then there is another factor that is coming in the way. The moment you start losing hope you will start suffering. You start to see everything as being negative. Then you forget your way. You forget the love that God has for you, the love that you have deep inside you. This is one thing that one should not forget: You are made in the image of God. In this way, you have to go back, back to this image, back to this complete love. First, start your spiritual way with this, to find this love. Then the rest will be revealed to you. The rest will come to you. We chant the holy names of God, Krishna, Narayana, Jesus, Allah and Babaji. All these names help us to open up more, open up our heart to love. Love cannot be only for oneself. You start it with yourself, you realise it, you know about it and let it expand and give it. This source is non-perishable. The more you give, the more you will feel that it is flowing, and the more you will want to give. The more you try to close it, the more you will make your own self unhappy. Then this unhappiness has to go somewhere – that is how many illnesses are created, because one does not want to open up. The more your heart is open, the more you are happy. The more you see life in a different way, the more the illness will keep away from you and the more all of the worries around you will cease. God loves us, but we should also start loving. Whatever comes on your way, remind yourself of His love; remind yourself through His manifestation around you, through the manifestation of this body. God has created humankind and placed Himself in each person equally. It does not mean that I am superior to you all, because I’m sitting here in a big chair. In your mind, it may seem like that, but in the Divine all is one. We form part of one body. Open up your heart and see the light that is inside you. This love you have, it’s everywhere, in all of you. This mind can’t stop it. Feel God’s love all the time – you may not succeed right now, but keep trying! You know, in India there are yogis who have been meditating for hundreds of years. That does not mean they don’t know this kind of love. They do know about it and they are enjoying it. This love of God that they are enjoying, you can enjoy it in the same way. Just want it! The main thing is that you have to lose yourself in this love. Lose the identity that you have attached to your body. Remind yourself that you are just the spirit, just part of God. Certainly you will realise it through practice and discipline. Not many people like this word, ‘discipline’. It seems so. Discipline is not something which should scare you, but you should be disciplined with yourself. Because when you start enjoying the love of God within you, it is you who will enjoy it – it’s nobody else first. So it is the same with the discipline, you have to be disciplined yourself. You have to really want it! All right?

You will become an instrument of that peace and Love wherever you are and whatever you are doing...

Once, somebody asked a Saint “How do you see the world?” The Saint answered “Well, each person creates their own reality in this world.” What we see outside is a combination of a mass reality. With this mass reality, of course one person can change and make a difference, a small one. It’s better when one person changes, introverts oneself, opening the heart to Love, because Love is the greatest thing in this world and Love is the only way through it. It’s only through Love that people will change and it’s only through that, that there can be peace and for that you have to open up. That’s what I was saying in the beginning, that it is a time to introvert oneself. Our mind is always running to the outside, so we always see the cruelty, the negativity. Whenever you read the newspaper, whenever you put on the TV, what you see is always negativity. This gets imprinted in you to make your own mind become negative. You believe what you see is very bad, so then what happens? You start to judge and the mind becomes very judgemental. This is like that

or this is like this. But are you changing? No, you are not changing. That is the same thing everybody is doing around the world, there is no difference. Does it contribute to bringing peace and harmony to the world? No

it doesn’t. When you introvert yourself you go into the peace which you have inside of you. You sit quietly and when you sit calmly, of course the mind will begin to rebel. After some time you don’t want to get up,

for some people they can’t get up, it’s painful, or they go to sleep. But when you go into the calmness of the depths of your heart, in total surrender through your heartfelt sadhana, you enter the chamber of peace - the true inner peace. Through that inner peace which you will project to the outside, you will bring changes. For

example, let’s say when you go to somebody you know who is nervous and very agitated, what do you do? Do you try to calm the person down and advise the person to be positive, or do you also sit and cry with the person? It’s the same when you go to the doctor. The doctor will ask you what kind of problem you have. It is the first question and then you say “Doctor, if I knew what I have, I would not have come to you.” Well, when you go to the doctor, you go because you don’t feel well and you open up and tell the doctor what you don’t feel well about. Does the doctor sit with you and cry? No, the doctor won’t do that. It’s the same with psychiatrists. They advise you to move away from the way you’re thinking and the way you see things. Moving away from this, changes certain things inside of you. It changes the way you are always looking at

it. We were just saying that we see the world and project it as being cruel. The media wants us to see all the cruelty. But there are always also good things and it just depends on how you see it. Very often, one will see one’s own projection of what one has inside of oneself. When one suppresses certain things inside of oneself, of course by suppressing energy deep inside, what will happen? Whenever something happens outside, the suppression will project itself. When that happens there will be complete judgement only. When you learn to accept yourself and learn to be in peace with yourself the way you are, you will see that there is nothing wrong with the world. Things can change and it simply depends on each one. But we can’t say “You change

and I don’t change.” No, instead you have to say “I have changed and now the rest will change.” If there are certain things inside of yourself that you do not accept, be positive about them. You have a choice, the choice is how you look at things. Either you place a judgement saying ‘this is bad’ or you can say ‘this is not for me’ in a positive way. This is the way you look at it differently, in a metaphysical way. The first thing is

to open the heart, open the mind, let peace rise inside of you, each part of you. Whenever you have peace inside of you there is no place for anything else. Whenever there is Love inside of you, there won’t be any place for anything else either. You will become an instrument of that peace and Love wherever you are and whatever you are doing.

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

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

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

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

We will talk about prayer.....

We will 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 it inside you. 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, because when we start our spiritual way, it’s always the approach for the Divine Love. We start our journey to approaching the Divine. We make our first step, we start searching for Him. This is when prayer starts in our life. Prayer is this essence of realising that there is something greater – whether you call it God, Light, Spirit… The search starts through prayer, and prayer makes the link, 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 of Divine names, 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. More and more, day by day, you grow. With this Divine Love you will realise that there is no diference between the Love that you knew at the beginning and now. With this Love there is no difference between you, me – anybody. This eternal Love, this eternal Light resides in everything. It’s so easy, isn’t it? I always recite the same: spirituality is very easy! It’s simply that you want it! It’s given to you already – inside of your heart.

Imagine if everybody transcended the mind...

Imagine if everybody transcended the mind and transformed everything which is negative into Divine wisdom. This can be done only if you become positive. Lots of illnesses can be cured just by changing the way man thinks. If you think of yourself as being ill, strongly, you will get sick, but if make yourself strong and say “Yes, I want to transcend this illness, I want to transcend this mind,” you will get cured. How is this done? Of course, the grace of God is there, yes, but this also depends on you. When you say “Yes, I want to take the first step” then you will have the grace of the Divine. However, if you just sit around and say “Yes, OK, I will meditate, I will not do anything else, God will do it for me” then the nice food you want to eat will not come to you. Then you will always wait. Whereas when you make your effort, you will see that even with just a thought – you want to eat something – you just need to think about it and God will provide. So many times it happens in your life that when you are in a certain state you have so much connection with the Divine that you just think “Oh, you know, today I would like to eat this” and during the day somebody brings it and gives it to you. How do you think it’s possible? It’s coincidence, but I don’t believe in coincidence, it’s you and the Divine Will together. In a light bulb you have two electrical charges – the positive and the negative. The negative charge is like the human being and the mind and the positive charge is like the Divine Will, the Divine Grace. When both of them join together, the light happens. So it’s the same way when you are attuned to the right frequency; He will know about it and He will send. So you see, my dears, that spirituality is very simple. Even when I talk about it, it seems so simple, but you have to take the first step. This is up to you to do.

You have to cross over everything......

Limitation is ignorance in man and knowledge is what removes ignorance. I mean the knowledge of the Divine, the inner knowledge, this knowledge that you have inside of you. When you have certain knowledge one day you will have to let go even of it, because you don’t Realise God either with ignorance or with knowledge. Knowledge will bring you only to a certain point of Realising the Divine, but to Realise God, to truly know the Divine, you have to cross over everything, go beyond all limitations.

Be as much silent as possible....

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

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

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

It’s about time to change one’s mind......

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

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

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

Love is the only thing that binds the Lord

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