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The soil of this country is sandalwood. Every village is a land of penance. Every child is the idol of the goddess. Every child is Rāma. Every child is Rāma. This body is like a temple. Every human being is a helper, where the lion has become a cow, where the cow is lovely. Where in the morning the monk plays, the lorry sings, the evening is every child’s statue. The child is the child, the child is the child. Baccha Baccha Rām, jiske sainik samar bhūmi meṁ jāyā karte Gītā hai, jahāṁ khet meṁ halke niche khelā kartī Sītā hai. Jīvan kā ādarś jahāṁ par Parmeśvar kā dhām hai, har bālā dī pratimā Baccha Baccha Rām hai. Baccha Baccha Rām, jahāṁ karma se bhāj badalte. Śrama niṣṭhā kalyāṇī hai, tyāga aura tapa kī gāthā gaātī, kavī kī vāṇī hai. Jñāna jahāṁ kā Gaṅgā jalasa nirmala hai, abhirāma hai. Hara bala pratimā bacchā bacchā Rāma hai, bacchā bacchā Rāma. Candana hai isa deśa kī māṭī, tapobhūmi hara grāma hai. This evening is dedicated to speaking about spirituality in everyday life. The word spirituality exists in every language. What is it? Often, people ask, or we call someone a spiritual person. From where has the word "spirituality" been taken? After searching in many lexicons, after searching through meditations and discussions with many spiritual seekers, we come to this point: spirituality means purity. Crystal clear, pure. This purity refers to our ātmā, our inner self, which is crystal clear and pure. Impurity is in our actions and in our thoughts. Where there is impurity, there is ignorance and darkness. The word "Guru" means darkness, impurity, or ignorance. And "Ru" means the light, clarity, purity. "Tamaso Mā Jyotir Gamaya," the Upaniṣad says, "Merciful Lord, lead us from the darkness to the light." This kind of thinking is already a principle of the Guru, a principle within everyone. We do not realize, or we are not aware of, the spirituality that is dormant in us. There are some examples. It is said in Vedānta that there are three obstacles. To remove these three obstacles, all holy saints of this world—it doesn’t matter from which belief, tradition, culture, or religion they come—according to their teaching, they are trying to remove those three obstacles to realize that spirituality. When they are trying to live that spiritual life, then we call them a spiritual person. Mahātmā Gāndhī said, "We hate the action, not the person." Therefore, it is the actions, our deeds, which make us impure. We call it in Hinduism or Buddhism karma, and in Christianity they call it sin. We call it puṇya, and they call it virtue, good. So three obstacles are very clearly described; they are called Mala, Vikṣepa, and Āvaraṇa. Mala means impurity. If a mirror has a lot of dust on it, you cannot see your face. We have to clean the mirror. How you clean it is your job; there are many ways. That mirror is our chitta, our consciousness, our inner self. When you close your eyes and meditate, you see your inner mirror. You can see how clear it is. You can see all very clearly with closed eyes. If you can’t see anything, then your inner mirror is still not clean. Impurities are of many different kinds, creating this pollution: physical impurity and nourishment—nourishment is very important—and then mental purity, thinking. Pure thinking. We know that mental pollution is the most dangerous pollution. What is happening in the world? All of it—wars and so on—is mental pollution. All that we have polluted, rivers and oceans, is mental pollution. Which mental pollution? Money. We see money, money, money. As I said yesterday and this morning, a wise American Indian said, "When the last tree will be chipped off and the last fish will die, oh man, then you will realize that you can’t eat your dollars." You have bags full of money, Australian plastic dollars. You have a lot of money, but if you are somewhere in the Australian desert, hungry and thirsty, you cannot eat your dollars. This is making humans crazy. Mental impurity brings impurity in actions. Then we do many things which are not appreciable. People give money to kill someone. The second obstacle is called vikṣepa, disturbances. You are living here on the beach by the beautiful Indian Ocean, but you cannot go swimming. If you go, you can’t see what is on the bottom. There are so many waves. What do you do? You bring a glass window with high frames, two-meter frames, and place it there to break the waves. Then you can see everything. The ocean has waves and movement on the surface, but on the bottom there is no movement. A wise person has vṛttis, movement, and things like anger only on the surface. In the heart is mercy, kindness, love. We have many disturbances now. Illness suddenly makes us worried. Illness in the family, problems with your business, illness with neighbors and colleagues, an accident—all make you worry. Suddenly, a telephone call tells you this and that. Every day, many problems are constantly going on. You meditate, and inside you see waves of thousands of thoughts. So many waves are going on that you can’t see what is inside. Vikṣepa. Worries and worries. As much as you come in touch with the outer world, that many thoughts you have. That’s why people go on retreat. That’s called Ekānta Nivāsa. Yogis always suggested having an ashram or hut in the forest—less connection with civilization, more with nature—to calm down. People now go for holidays or have a second house in the countryside to go and relax. Nature is very calm and gives us calmness. We learn again from nature, from the birds, butterflies, other creatures, and flowers. Relax. Vṛttis will slowly, slowly clean out more. Go somewhere where no newspaper comes, no television, and where the mobile has no range, and sleep. You need sleep. That’s good meditation. Eat and then sleep. Sleep 24 hours or 84 hours. Eat and sleep, eat and sleep for 84 hours or a little more. Then wake up, stretch your body, take a little walk, wash properly, relax, and meditate. You will feel like a completely different person. Sleep is a kind of meditation because, in sleep, your whole body regenerates. All brain centers regenerate. We need sleep. We are so much in stress day by day, which is why the system says, "Go for holidays." But what do people do on holidays? They go to resorts with discos or nightclubs, loud and noisy. Again noisy. That means you try to come out of the frying pan and fall into the fire. Vikṣepa doesn’t let us know our inner purity, our spirituality. You are very spiritual. You have everything. You are divine. You are divine-born. You are an incarnation. Incarnation means born; it is a word used in religion and spirituality, while birth is used in normal language. You were a very beautiful baby, very pure, clean, innocent, divine, and you still are. But certain actions, complexes, jealousies, desires, and actions have made us completely confused. We have forgotten who we are. This vikṣepa can be overcome through meditation. Every day, relax and meditate. Observe the thoughts. In your yoga and daily life book, there is an eight-step guided meditation called self-inquiry meditation. It is very practical, point by point. One point is: thoughts come, let them come. If they go, let them go. Just observe them. Don’t try to analyze them carefully. Just let them come and go, come and go. Suddenly, thoughts will disappear. Finally, the third obstacle for our spirituality is called Āvaraṇa. Āvaraṇa means curtain. Our window is very clean, but we have a very thick curtain and can’t see through. We don’t know what is behind this wall. Similarly, there is Āvaraṇa, which means ignorance. A very thick, dark layer of ignorance lies between our real self and our present consciousness. That’s why we don’t, or can’t, realize that spirituality. Love, kindness, mercy, forgiveness, understanding—all this develops our spirituality. To remove the āvaraṇa, the curtain of ignorance, it is very good to read nice books, holy books, as well as very nice books. Many great personalities and saints have written many books. But do not read books that lead you only in one direction, saying only this is best and others are wrong. Close such a book, put it away, or take it back to the shop. We need freedom because knowledge has freedom. Freedom is our birthright, and yoga means liberation, freedom. This is a universal principle called Sanātana Dharma: freedom, happiness, love. Joy is the divine principle. It is not a principle given by a particular religion. Even a small ant would like to be happy. Put a piece of corn or sugar in front of an ant; she will take it. You can see on her face she’s smiling. She brings it somewhere, or she stands on her two legs and dances. Every creature longs for happiness. Holy Gurujī, my master, always used to say, "Sabhi prāṇī sukh kī prāpti aur duḥkh kī nivṛtti cāhte haiṁ." Every creature wishes to attain happiness and to overcome unhappiness. Because that happiness is a universal principle, it is your real reality. That is the spirituality which can lead you there through the practice of your mantra, meditation, prayers, and coming to satsaṅg, which is very, very important. If you can’t go to satsaṅg, you cannot be happy, and you cannot develop your spirituality.