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Swamijis morning lecture, London, 5th of September

The three guṇas shape existence and are regulated through prāṇāyāma and diet. Sattva Guṇa is purity, bringing health, peace, and absence of negative thought. It is cultivated through sattvic food and association. Rajas Guṇa is activity and heat, necessary but requiring control through sattvic principle. Tamas Guṇa is dullness, inertia, and is fostered by stale, spoiled food. Prāṇāyāma purifies the body's energy, preventing and curing disease. It circulates prāṇa like fresh air entering a stale room. The techniques involve inhalation (Pūraka), exhalation (Rechaka), and retention (Kumbhaka). Correct practice expands lung capacity and brings calm. The sequence is physical āsanas, then prāṇāyāma, then meditation, leading to inner bliss. Daily practice of techniques like Kapālbhāti transforms one's quality of life. Diet must be fresh, vegetarian, and sattvic.

"If we have Sattva Guṇa in our body, we sleep well, we will not feel unhappy, we will not feel lonely, we will not be scared or anxious because there is purity."

"Within you is the ocean of bliss. Within you is the fountain of joy. Within you is the immortal Ātmā."

How are you today? Good. One weekend is too short a time. There are so many meetings, so many rotations; time is too short, we need to expand. You performed Pūraka Prāṇāyāma, which has a very good definition. It means nature—it doesn't matter whether human or animal—it means the soul is gone, and cement, two bricks together. It is an arrangement of the three qualities. According to the science, it is an arrangement. We are just walking, and there is no one. It is grass; it is wild nature. We call it untouched nature: beautiful, healthy, truly pure. That is called Sattva Guṇa. If we have Sattva Guṇa in our body, we sleep well, we will not feel unhappy, we will not feel lonely, we will not be scared or anxious because there is purity. There is no guilt, no negative thinking, and no negative actions. Sattva Guṇa is the key. We can attain that Sattva Guṇa through our food and the society with whom you associate. It blesses you; it is good. The second is Rajas Guṇa, which involves more activity. More activity is also connected with anger; that is heat in the body. We also get nourishment, yogic nourishment, we meet. Rajas Guṇa is also very important for our existence. It should not be eliminated, but it should be controlled. How? Through our sāttvic, ethical, objective principle. Then the third is called Tamas, which means dullness. Dullness means laziness, inactivity, and inertia. This is like nourishment that was cooked a few hours before. Food should be cooked within one or two hours, then you can eat it. Always, for a child, feeding is very fresh. It has another quality. Other milk remains, changing the quality. Traditionally, someone is cooking, and everyone is sitting at the dining table and eating immediately when it is time. So you all come at the same time and have your refreshments. Then you walk, and again you taste. That food is completely tāmasic. Many people do not understand this nowadays. Day before yesterday in the ashram, I went downstairs, and the food was there from morning till evening, night, 11 o’clock, 12… it was already there. And people were sitting, and some were coming and taking one bread and then… That food was, to my eyes, feel the energy. It was a date, date food. There is Western culture; there is no word we cannot explain, and people don’t understand. Purījī, Purījī… That food is not good for our digestive system, for our solar plexus. There is a priority: fresh fruit, fresh juice, fresh vegetables. Too many spices, if they are fried, belong to the Rajas Guṇa. And spoiled food, all this belongs to the Tamas Guṇa. Fresh milk, fresh fruit, fresh vegetables, and fresh bread made—what we call chapatis, you may call pizza. So we do the prāṇāyāma, we purify energy from the body so that illnesses like cancer, skin disease, digestive disorders, constipation—many, many diseases we can control and cure through techniques of prāṇāyāma. A very simple example I would like to give you: Let’s say we are sitting here in this room. All the windows are closed. And we are sitting for a long time, a few hours, and then we have candles, and then we are eating inside, and so on. We don’t feel anything. But a person who comes from outside into the room will say, "Oh, the air is very thick. What do we do? Open the windows." So we take fresh air in, and this fresh air which comes will take the other energy away. It will circulate, and again we feel fresh, very good. Get up more, still tired, but you should open your window for a few minutes, and immediately you will refresh. Because you have sāttvik energy, good prāṇa. Similarly, the energy which is stuck in our body, we can reduce it or refresh it, and circulate the energy. In yoga, there are three prāṇāyāmas: Pūraka and Kumbhaka. These are only three. Pūraka means inhale, Rechaka means exhale, Kumbhaka means to hold the breath, retention outside or inside. When you hold breath inside, it’s called Antar Kumbhaka. You hold the breath outside; it’s called Bāhir Kumbhaka. There are different techniques to regulate the breath. These techniques are many different techniques. That’s called Nāḍī Śodhana, purification of the nerves; Sūrya Bhedana, Chandra Bhedana, purification of the Chandra Nāḍī, the moon, the sun, the lunar principle, the solar principle, or sympathetic, parasympathetic. This, how we can influence through our breath, is very hard to regulate through physical exercises. So, after doing some āsanas—physical postures, exercises—we must do the prāṇāyāmas. Then comes Anuloma, Viloma. So, we inhale from the left nostril and exhale through the right nostril. Then inhale through the right, exhale through the left. After that, we do some Kumbhaka, retention of the breath. Breath has three levels. One is we breathe up to here in the chest. This is a very short breath, like dogs, rabbits, and cats, and they have a short life, not a long life. So this is not good for us, and we can see if someone is angry or nervous, that is, he is breathing like this, like this, or after running. The second breath is from here, our diaphragm. We expand the entire chest, the ribs. But that is also medium, good. The first is through the abdomen. Now, we cannot breathe in the abdomen. What does it mean? It means that we train our stomach muscles. When we inhale, we expand our stomach. It means that the diaphragm goes further down and has more volume to take more air inside. So, if we test ourselves on one machine, how many liters of air or oxygen do we have? Many of us may have very little. They let you blow once. This is the… you have done many people, maybe this test, you know. And who is smoking has only one karat capacity. But those who practice only the prāṇāyāma and Bhastrikā have a two-and-a-half-liter capacity. That’s very vast. And so, here in the manual, we always advise to inhale from here. But it does not mean that your air is going all the way here. No. We expand the muscles and give space through the stomach. So, the diaphragm can go further down and expand our chest more, so that the respiratory system gets more air. So, in Bhastrikā, we breathe from here, not from here. That’s all good. There is no breath. You are empty. Do like this. It is like nothing. You are eating. You are eating just like a sponge. And when you look on here, oh, like you eat a juicy cherry. Mmm. Imagine a very nice, ripe cherry on the tree: big cherries, hard cherries. And you go and take one cherry in the mouth. It explodes in the mouth, the juice. All the grains, they are all happy, you know. And so it is also with the air, fresh air. From here, in a few minutes of this exercise, you sit in meditation for one minute. But your body and your mind and your whole being will say, "No, one minute more, please, one minute more." Then Swamiji said, "We will chant Oṃ." They said, "No, one minute more meditation." So, it means you feel so calm, so relaxed, so pleasant. So, techniques, but correct techniques. Otherwise, you can harm more. So, at home, I will then put one hand down here. Not like this. This is wrong. Then, lift your shoulders up and down, only from here. Like, we don’t have that locomotive, you know. With the cone, the train. In the beginning, otherwise, when the train was starting, the locomotive, and you know how the engine was going, then was coming the tunnel, going a little up. Very good. So this is how you train your lungs. That will increase your life, and suddenly you feel in your brain a lot of oxygen and freedom. Now, listen to the sound in the brain. Something happens, the tension is gone. You are doing movements here. But suddenly the brain is relaxed, empty from the tensions, and feels very happy, pleasant, and relaxed. And this was Kapālbhāti, which has slow Kapālbhāti, like this, mild Kapālbhāti, which you were doing, that was like this, and quick Kapālbhāti, but that you should do after practicing for three months. So, if you do the complete course of the prāṇāyāmas, then you will enjoy your life and you will enjoy happiness in your life. So, that’s why first physical exercises, the āsanas, then prāṇāyāmas, and then meditation. Without any instructions, without any imagination, you will be so deep within thyself and one with thyself. Happiness. Within you is the ocean of bliss. Within you is the fountain of joy. Within you is the immortal Ātmā. Kill this little "I" and lead a divine life. Within you is the immortal Ātmā. So, through these techniques, what yogīs give has in it something. Nowadays, people make out of yoga, I don’t know what all. I am an old person from an old tradition, from a very ancient, very original, first-hand information, first-hand techniques. So, yoga and its life is that which is based on ancient scriptures, ancient wisdom. Ancient wisdom for the modern time. That’s it. So, every day, practice five rounds of Kapālbhāti and then meditate. It will be beautiful, and you will have a different quality of life. Suddenly, you will see the world with different eyes, happiness, and beauty, and you will enjoy living. That’s what we want. And also the food, we should have good food. Sāttvik, quality, vegetarian, and fresh. Now, unfortunately, a lot of vegetables are sprayed with many pesticides, and all that poison goes into our body. What to do? Move to the countryside, have a small garden, and grow your own potatoes, your own tomatoes, and all your own vegetables, and so on. What to do? Lucky are they, blessed are they who can live in the countryside with a few hectares of land and have their own agricultural production and one cow for their own milk. You know, how much milk is manipulated in the dairy is, unfortunately, we don’t know what is in that milk at all. But if you take fresh milk from a cow, it is completely different. So, with this, the seminar is finished. It’s already, I am half an hour late, as usual. Now I have to go from here to Coventry to make some visit, and then to the, where? Birmingham program and so on. If you come, I will see you there. If you can’t come and if you have a website at home, you can watch all lectures live. Swamiji TV, okay? Hari Om. Om Pratapudhi Karata Mādhavike. Om Śānti Śānti… Purījī.

This text is transcribed and grammar corrected by AI. If in doubt what was actually said in the recording, use the transcript to double click the desired cue. This will position the recording in most cases just before the sentence is uttered.

The text contains hyperlinks in bold to three authoritative books on yoga, written by humans, to clarify the context of the lecture:

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