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Part 1: The Silence That Allows Us to Hear Nobody dared to suggest a plan. So he came, and they welcomed him, and he sat down to speak. And again he asked the dreaded question: "Do you know what I’m going to speak about?" This time, nobody knew what to say, so there was complete silence. And he said, "Good, now you’re ready to hear." Then he started his lecture. Why that story? Everything we need for our spiritual path has already been given to us by Swāmījī. We just need that silence where we can hear it. When we are practicing, we are trying to silence those vṛttis which are constantly running within us, within our head, so we can actually hear the message he is giving. We hear the message which is within the mantra. I was thinking in the morning about karma yoga and the way Swāmījī constantly gets you to do something. He either changes what he wants, makes you do it again, or asks you to do it a different way. Perhaps many of you have felt that frustration, where in the end you just don’t know how to do it right—the same as those people in the crowd at that lecture, who finally didn’t know what to say anymore. When there was silence, they could hear. It is the same when you are doing karma yoga and Swāmījī is really working with you, constantly changing the rules. You come to a point where you don’t know how to think anymore, what to think about it. Then, if you have Mahāprabhujī’s blessing and you manage to keep going at that point, you just do it without thinking about whether it is good or not good. You just do it the best that you can. The other day I was reminded of a story about myself with Gurujī. I think I deliberately forgot it because it was too hard for me to remember. But when I was reminded, it became a good example of the way Swāmījī works with karma yoga. Gurujī was sick in a hospital in Jaipur, and the doctor’s orders were that he was not even allowed to take a drop of water for two days. I talked to Swāmījī about it, and he said, "Also, yes, of course, the doctor said it has to be done strictly." So for me, the job was clear. But Gurujī didn’t agree. He spent a day and a half where, at one stage, I remember that for half an hour the conversation went like this: "Give me water." "No, Gurujī." "Give me water." "No, Gurujī." This is a new form of japa. On and on this was going, all day. If somebody would come, Gurujī would swear to them about me: "This boy is trying to kill me, he won’t even give me water." I heard that so many times that day. Of course, everyone who came would look at me as if to say, "How could you?" This torturing of Gurujī went on and on. In the nighttime, he was just all the time at me: "Why don’t you give me water? Why are you doing this to me? You are torturing me." And here I am drinking water, by the way. But Swāmījī was actually in Jadan at the time, so he wasn’t there. He came the next day about lunchtime. The first thing Gurujī did was to start the same thing: "This boy is torturing me, he wants to kill me, he doesn’t give me water." The doctor said no water for another day. Swāmījī had already talked with the doctor. But of course, what is the first thing Swāmījī does? He says to me, "Why didn’t you give him water? Gurujī, here’s a glass of water." Now I’m in a double mess because Gurujī was only complaining to me before that I wouldn’t give him water, and the story was getting longer. Because now whenever anybody would come, he would say, "This boy tortured me for one and a half days, he wouldn’t give me water," and then Swāmījī comes and gives him water, and there’s no problem. Of course, when Swāmījī gives water, it is something completely different, and there was no problem. But I’m sure if I had given him a glass of water, there would have been a problem. At that point in time, your brain just goes numb. I just went about what I was doing, but I couldn’t think anymore. You just do your sevā, but what else can you do? You can’t worry about the fact. If it has to be done, it has to be done. When we practice, what does this do to help us? Karma yoga, of course, purifies us and purifies a lot of things within us which are there from before. But the other thing it does is it shows us how to practice without getting attached to what is happening—to just do the practice rather than looking at what’s happening from the practice. To constantly do the same practice, even though the result is not the result that we want to have. It somehow develops within you that quality of titikṣā, of steadfastness. Because that practice which we’ve been given, it’s again, you know, constantly doing it again and again and... failing. How to find that silence? You try, "I want to be silent now in my mind," and it doesn’t happen. But in that same way, when you’re doing karma yoga and Swāmījī is changing the rule or changing the way it should be, you just do it again and you just do it again. The same way with your practice. And constantly being patient, so that when you actually master one small part of the practice, then another issue comes up that you also have to master. So we just keep going on and on, dealing with that as it goes. And when the result comes, the result comes. When Swāmījī gives you the praise for your karma yoga, it comes. But if you think about when he is going to give me praise for it, then you may wait a very long time. Karma yoga is without expecting the fruits. And for our practice to work our mālā, our japa, also it has to be without the expectation of the fruit. Because as soon as you think about the fruit of the experience, then you lose the practice. As soon as you think about the experience you’re having, or if it’s a beautiful experience, that silence is lost in which you can hear that which is happening. There is one Dohā from Kabīr: Kabīr Śabad Śarīrame Bin Guru Bhaje Tanti Bahar Bitar Rāmiraha Tāṭe Chuṭi Bharanti. Kabīr heard that sound that was inside him. The other day, Gajānandjī gave a lecture about Oṁ and talked about the fact that it just came from inside automatically. So in this Dohā, Kabīr is saying that he heard that sound inside, that sound from his Anahat. It was the sound of a vīṇā playing which had no strings. The vīṇā is an instrument, but this looks like a sitar, but smaller. But this one was playing without strings. And then he says that sound was inside and outside. It was constantly circling. And when he heard that, then all of his doubts were gone. Now, that sound is constantly inside us—that sound of the love of God. Call it what you will: that inner joy, Mahāprabhujī, his voice, whatever you call it. But that joy and that love are constantly in there; it’s constantly within us. And to hear its song, we just have to be silent—to silence those vṛttis and expectations and that connection with the outside, that this joy will come from somewhere else. To be able to hear that it’s already there and it’s already singing. In some literature, they call it the song of love. The word anāhat also means the sound that is made when two things are not hit together, so it’s a sound that comes from nothing. It’s not voice because that’s wind hitting against your throat. It’s not the noise of the wind, because that’s the leaves hitting each other or things moving. But it’s that noise that comes from no friction, nothing hitting. That’s the meaning of the word anāhat, and that’s the sound that’s in there. So when that Swāmījī was coming for that lecture, and he was waiting until there would be silence, it’s that silence of our mind that we’re searching for—that we can really hear what Swāmījī is telling us, and then that silence where we can hear that message which is within us. I’d like to bring up one point that Swāmījī said last night in his Skyping. He said, "I hope you all become enlightened in this life." Now, let’s not say that we are enlightened. We may all have a long way to go, but Swāmījī has given a vākya there, and he has given his wish there. And just, I think, that we all need to take one thing seriously: is that for everybody? It is possible. It’s not up to us to say, "I am enlightened," or, "I am not enlightened." But when we practice, we have to practice actually believing that it can happen. Every single person has that within them, that knowledge. It’s covered, as they would say, that āvaraṇa is there, that curtain is there. We cannot see it. But although we may not manage in this life, when you practice with the conviction that it is possible, it changes completely the intensity of your practice. It’s a very big difference between, "I practice yoga so that it will give me flexibility and less tension," and another thing altogether to say, "I practice because I want to get enlightenment." Okay, I may not manage it in this life, but I’m going to give it a go. When you actually acknowledge that that’s a possibility, even if it’s the smallest possibility, when you wake up in the morning, you practice with a different intensity, and you practice with a different purpose. As we are all disciples of Swāmījī, and he’s the master, we all have the tools there to do that. If we’re going to leave the tools lying there and just sort of relax and twirl our mala, that’s one thing. But if we’re going to seriously pick up those tools and think, "Yeah, okay, we’ll make a house out of this, and I’m going to try to finish this job," then the practice is really, really very different. There’s one movie that many people have seen, The Matrix. There’s one point in that film where the main character, Neo, he starts doing things that nobody can believe, and the others are watching it in their ship and watching it on the screen. And they say, one of them says to the other, "What’s happening?" And the one who’s been his guide says, "He’s starting to believe." We also have to start to believe. We have everything in our hands: Swāmījī’s blessing, Mahāprabhujī’s blessing, the whole paramparā, mantra, sādhanā, kriyā, or karma yoga—whatever is the practice that Swāmījī has given you. But our place is to put that into practice and to apply it with our full dedication. It doesn’t mean leaving our job, leaving our family, or leaving our lifestyle and living under a tree. But it means applying that awareness and applying that possibility to every moment that we live—to make our whole life part of that practice. You’ll see an athlete before they’re going to a big competition, like, let’s say, a marathon runner. When they’re preparing, their life will still be going on, but even in the course of the day, everything is revolving around that race: how they’re eating, loading their body with carbohydrates, how they’re training, when they’re stopping, when they’re starting. Everything is focused toward that point. And when you make your goal there in yoga to actually realize something, then everything about our life gets pulled around: how we are eating, how we are practicing, how we are with other people. So I just urge everybody to think seriously about that. There’s no one here who is special? Everybody is special. Everybody has that potential within them. That sound which Kabīr is talking about is within everybody. The journey may be long, but we have to acknowledge that we can go on that journey. Many of us have been on the journey for a long time, but then just reaffirm that, yes, we really, really want to go there. Maybe along the road we got stuck at the coffee shop or something, and we enjoyed some experience so much that we stop there, and we’re just continuously drinking the coffee. But if you find you’re one of those people, then just finish that coffee and then get back on the road. As again and again Swāmījī said in the bhajans, Gurujī said in the bhajans, this opportunity—who knows when we will get it again. I guess we can never really know how special it is. Only Gurujī can try to explain to us how special it is. So, as we say in Australia, when we want to tell somebody to hurry up and do something, we say, "Get on your bike. Don’t walk this time. Get on the bike and start pedaling fast." Śrī Dīp Nārāyaṇa Bhagavān Kī Jaya. Śrī Śrī Devapuruṣa Mahādeva Kī Jaya. Dharm Samrāṭ Paramahaṁsa Śrī Svāmī Maravānanda Purījī Mahārāj Kī Jai. Viśva Guru Mahāmaṇḍaleśvara Paramahaṁsa Śrī Svāmī Maheśvarānanda Purījī Satguru Deva Kī Jai. You want to say something? Now I’ll have my water. Sorry, Gurujī. No, it doesn’t fit properly anymore. In the beginning, Jaśrat Spurījī spoke about karma yoga. And there came one experience to my mind. It was in Jadan, in a winter group. The whole group was involved. Maybe some of you were in this group and will remember. It was, I guess, in 1994 or 1995. So the main part of the ashram, where Holy Gurujī’s house, the White House, and the japa, and the kitchen were—this was all still under construction, not yet completely ready. And then they came and were bringing many trucks with coarse sand and spreading it into this whole area. So, and then everything was nicely leveled. And when this all was ready, then Swāmījī had an idea. And the problem was that the meditation hall—at that time it was the old meditation hall, where now it’s just a green grass ground—in monsoon, always the water was flowing there, so Swāmījī was thinking we should do something about that. So then in the evening, something like 8:30, 9 o’clock, when usually the satsaṅg is finished, and we would slowly go to bed, Swāmījī said, "I thought, maybe today we do half an hour karma yoga." And it makes sense to do it in the night because then it’s not so hot. We said, "OK, yes, let’s do it." Then Swāmījī said, "Yes, let us do that. The water will not always flow in the meditation hall, in the japa, and flood it. So we should level the ground so that it flows to one side." So now, of course, the first job was to remove all this sand, which just in the last days had been brought and spread in the whole area. And everyone was thinking, "Couldn’t you have had this idea one week earlier?" But okay, Guru Vākya. So we collected all this sand and made a huge heap of it. And then we started leveling the ground. But there was a certain resistance from the ground. It was really hard, and that means it was really hard work to break already this ground, to move it. So we all made about half an hour karma yoga from about 10 o’clock evening till 4 o’clock morning, and during the next days, because it was a big job. Some other half hours followed. And when everything looked nice, then Swāmījī inspected it. And then he had a better idea: "I think it would be better if the water flows to the other side." So some other half an hour followed. Finally, Swāmījī was satisfied. And, of course, then this coarse sand, this huge heap again, had to be spread over the whole thing. So now, after doing several days of really hard work, we were satisfied. Swāmījī was satisfied. There was only a slight suspicion; it looked somehow like in the beginning. And next winter, again, the meditation hall was underwater. Next winter, again, the meditation hall was underwater. I think some of you might remember this. It’s action. So then, of course, you have exactly this point, what Jaśrat said: what to hold on? What was the point of doing that all, missing the sleep, and so much sweating, and so much physical work? But Swāmījī, in between... He gave the hint. He said, "Leveling the ground means leveling the ego." So karma yoga basically does not aim at that physical result, what is now the outcome in the end, on that physical result which comes at the end of the work—maybe it doesn’t come. And how long? Always Swāmījī is there, explains everything, he stands there, and everyone is very strongly working. Then, after some time, Swāmījī disappears and goes to the next field where he has some activities. And then suddenly you see, oh, only half of the group is left. So this inner training—that’s the point of this karma yoga. That we work actually on us more than on the ground. How many doubts come up during such a process? How many thoughts about what is he doing here with us? In the end, the guru is just thinking all the time how to give us a chance to do the karma yoga, because it is for us to purify our karmas. And the best example for this, I experienced in Australia. It was in 2004. In Perth, there is a yoga group, and we were all together there. Then, with Swāmījī, we visited an Indian restaurant, and this is located at a very beautiful location. There is a river, actually big like a big lake, and just at the side of the river on pillars, so on the first floor there is this restaurant with a beautiful view over the whole lake. And this restaurant is run by a group of disciples of another Indian master. The speciality of this restaurant is that they don’t have a menu card. On the menu card, of course, the first thing is where you look always for the prices: how much is this? How much is this? The first thing you do in a restaurant is look at the menu to know how much the individual dishes cost. Here, you leave the restaurant; someone is standing at the door with a donation box and says, "If you would like to give something, you’re welcome." And if you gave $30 or $10 or $1, he would always say, "Thank you, please come again." So this whole restaurant is a karma yoga project run by this group of disciples of an Indian guru. I forgot the name. The restaurant is actually called Annapurna. Venkatesananda, but I’m not sure he sings Venkatesananda, but I’m not sure about that. And so, one day, he was sitting together with his disciples, which are mainly Indian disciples, and asked them, "What special abilities do you have? What could we do?" And they mentioned different things they could do, but he was not really satisfied. And then he said, "But one thing you surely can do, because you do it every day, is to cook Indian food." And in Australia, Indian food, that’s something special. So then he created this project and said, "Let’s open an Indian restaurant." So just to give his disciples a chance to do sevā. So now, some of them, they are shopping. Some are cleaning. Some are doing the office work. Some are doing the cooking. Some are serving. Everything is karma yoga. Now, when Swāmījī was there, he really liked that. And he asked, "But this is such a beautiful location here. How much do you actually pay for rent for that?" And if I remember right, they said an amount around $12,000 to $13,000 per month. And that’s not all. On top, of course, you have the expenses for the food, for the electricity, and everything. So then Swāmījī asked, "But does so much money come in?" And then they said, "Just so. Sometimes a little bit plus, sometimes a little bit minus. It somehow works." If you tell this to a Western economist, he will say, "That’s crazy." A whole group of people is doing hard work, hoping that in the end it will be plus, minus, zero. So here you can very clearly understand what really is karma yoga. It is not the point to earn money with this restaurant. The only point is to serve. So the first one who profits from this is yourself when you do it. But think, which message are they spreading in the city, in Perth? "We are serving you, and everyone is welcome without condition." What a beautiful message it is. And how is this uplifting the reputation of yoga and spirituality? The purpose of service is service. You know what Holy Gurujī is always praying for? His most beloved prayer, which he always wanted to be saying as a fourth part of the prayer, that was: Sevā hi bhakti hai, sevā hi pūjā hai, sevā hi paramātma kā dhyāna hai. And the attitude of Seva, you just want Seva. As you see it as a mercy when you can do Seva. Seva is bhakti in progress, practical bhakti. And if we have developed this feeling that we don’t actually want anything anymore, then the Guru knows we are ready. And then the Guru will know that we are ready. That means we become like an open vessel, ready to receive—ready to receive the mercy. Mokṣamūlaṁ Guru Kṛpā. That is what Jaśrat Spurījī spoke about, that we have to become like an empty vessel, open to receive. On my altar, I have a picture of a statue of an artist. It’s a woman as a beggar with such a gesture and the hand open. It’s in an art exhibition in Hamburg. And now this year, I went there again and I bought this picture. It’s for me a perfect symbol for how we should be: humble and open to receive. That’s all. Then we are ready. And then we are ready. Part 2: The Silence That Hears But now, no one dared to suggest a plan. They came and welcomed him, and he sat down to speak. Again he asked the dreaded question: "Do you know what I’m going to speak about?" This time, nobody knew what to say, so there was complete silence. He said, "Good, now you’re ready to hear," and then he started his lecture. Why that story? Everything we need for our spiritual path, Swāmījī has already given us. We just need that silence where we can hear it. When we practice, we try to silence those vṛttis constantly running within our head so we can actually hear the message he is giving us, or hear the message within the mantra. I was thinking this morning about karma yoga and the way Swāmījī constantly gets you to do something, then either changes what he wants, makes you do it again, or asks you to do it a different way. Perhaps many of you have felt that frustration, where in the end you just don’t know how to do it right—just like those people at the lecture who finally didn’t know what to say anymore. When silence came, they could hear. It is the same when you’re doing karma yoga and Swāmījī is really working with you, constantly changing the rules. You come to a point where you don’t know how to think about it anymore. Then, if you have Mahāprabhujī’s blessing and you manage to keep going, you just do it. Without thinking about whether it’s good or not good, you just do it the best you can. The other day I was reminded of a story about myself with Gurujī. I think I deliberately forgot it because it was too hard to remember, but it is a good example of how Swāmījī works with karma yoga. Gurujī was sick in a hospital in Jaipur. The doctor’s orders were that he was not allowed even a drop of water for two days. I talked to Swāmījī about it, and he said, "Yes, of course, the doctor said it has to be done strictly." So for me, the job was clear. But Gurujī didn’t agree. For a day and a half, at one stage, the conversation went like this for half an hour: "Give me water." "No, Gurujī." "Give me water." "No, Gurujī." This was a new form of japa. It went on and on all day. If somebody came, Gurujī would swear to them about me: "This boy is trying to kill me. He won’t even give me water." I heard that so many times that day, and of course, everyone who came would look at me as if to say, "How could you?" They thought I was torturing Gurujī. This went on and on. At night, he was constantly at me: "Why don’t you give me water? Why are you doing this to me? You are torturing me." And here I was, drinking water myself. Swāmījī was actually in Jadon at the time, so he wasn’t there. He came the next day around lunchtime. The first thing Gurujī did was to start the same complaint: "This boy is torturing me, he wants to kill me, he doesn’t give me water." The doctor had said no water for another day, and Swāmījī had already talked with the doctor. But what’s the first thing Swāmījī does? He says to me, "Why didn’t you give him water?" Then he says, "Gurujī, here’s a glass of water." Now I was in a double mess. Before, Gurujī was only complaining to me that I wouldn’t give him water. The story was getting longer because now whenever anybody came, he would say, "This boy tortured me for one and a half days, he wouldn’t give me water," and then Swāmījī comes and gives him water with no problem. Of course, when Swāmījī gives water, it’s something completely different, and there was no problem. But I’m sure if I had given him a glass of water, there would have been a problem. At that point, your brain just goes numb. I just went about what I was doing, but I couldn’t think anymore. You do your sevā, but what else can you do? You can’t worry about the fact. If it has to be done, it has to be done. When we practice, what does this do to help us? Karma yoga, of course, purifies us and purifies a lot of things within us from before. But the other thing it does is show us how to practice without getting attached to what’s happening—to just do the practice rather than looking for what’s happening from the practice. To constantly do the same practice, even though the result is not the result we want to have. It somehow develops within you that quality of titikṣā, of steadfastness. Because that practice we’ve been given involves constantly doing it again and again and... failing. How to find that silence? You try, "I want to be silent now in my mind," and it doesn’t happen. But in the same way, when you’re doing karma yoga and Swāmījī is changing the rule or changing the way it should be, you just do it again and you just do it again. The same way with your practice. And constantly being patient, so that when you actually master one small part of the practice, another issue comes up that you also have to master. So we just keep going on and on, dealing with that as it goes. When the result comes, the result comes. When Swāmījī gives you praise for your karma yoga, it comes. But if you think about when he is going to give you praise for it, you may wait a very long time. Karma yoga is about not expecting the fruits of our work. For our practice to work our mālā, our japa, it also has to be without the expectation of the fruit. Because as soon as you think about the fruit of the experience, you lose the practice. As soon as you think about the experience you’re having—even if it’s a beautiful experience—that silence is lost, the silence in which you can hear what is happening. There is one dohā from Kabīr, a poem. Kabīr heard that sound that was inside him. The other day Gajananjī gave a lecture about Oṁ and talked about the fact that it just came from inside automatically. In this dohā, Kabīr is saying that he heard that sound inside, that sound from his anāhat. It was the sound of a vīṇā playing which had no strings. The vīṇā is an instrument; it looks like a sitar but smaller. This one was playing without strings. He says that sound was inside and outside; it was constantly circling. And when he heard that, all of his doubts were gone. That sound is constantly inside us—the sound of the love of God. Call it what you will: that inner joy, Mahāprabhujī’s voice, whatever you call it. That joy and that love are constantly in there. To hear a song, we just have to be silent—to silence those vṛttis and expectations and that connection with the outside, that belief that joy will come from somewhere else. To be able to hear that it’s already there and it’s already singing. In some literature, they call it the song of love. The word anāhat also means the sound that’s made when two things are not hit together. It’s a sound that comes from nothing. It’s not voice, because that’s wind hitting against your throat. It’s not the noise of the wind, because that’s leaves hitting each other or things moving. It’s that noise that comes from no friction, nothing hitting. That’s the meaning of the word anāhat, and that’s the sound that’s in there. So when that Swāmījī was coming for that lecture and he was waiting until there’d be silence, it’s that silence of our mind that we’re searching for, so we can really hear what Swāmījī is telling us. And then that silence where we can hear the message which is within us. I’d like to bring up one point that Swāmījī said last night in his Skype call. He said, "I hope you all become enlightened in this life." Now, let’s not say that we are enlightened. We may all have a long way to go. But Swāmījī has given a vākya there, and he has given his wish there. I think we all need to take one thing seriously: Is that for everybody? It is possible. It’s not up to us to say, "I am enlightened," or, "I am not enlightened." But when we practice, we have to practice actually believing that it can happen. Every single person has that within them, that knowledge. It’s covered. As they would say, that āvaraṇa is there, that curtain is there. We cannot see it. But although we may not manage in this life, when you practice with the conviction that it is possible, it changes completely the intensity of your practice. There’s a very big difference between "I practice yoga so that it will give me flexibility and less tension" and "I practice because I want to get enlightenment." Okay, I may not manage it in this life, but I’m going to give it a go. When you actually acknowledge that that’s a possibility—even the smallest possibility—when you wake up in the morning, you practice with a different intensity and a different purpose. As we are all disciples of Swāmījī, and he’s the master, we all have the tools to do that. If we’re going to leave the tools lying there and just sort of relax and twirl our mālā, that’s one thing. But if we’re going to seriously pick up those tools and think, "Yeah, okay, we’ll make a house out of this, and I’m going to try to finish this job," then the practice is really, really very different. There’s one movie many people have seen, The Matrix. There’s one point in that film where the main character, Neo, starts doing things that nobody can believe. The others are watching it on a screen in their ship, and one says to the other, "What’s happening?" The one who’s been his guide says, "He’s starting to believe." We also have to start to believe. We have everything in our hands: Swāmījī’s blessing, Mahāprabhujī’s blessing, the whole paramparā, mantra, sādhanā, kriyā, or karma yoga—whatever is the practice Swāmījī has given you. Our place is to put that into practice and to apply it with our full dedication. It doesn’t mean leaving our job, family, or lifestyle and living under a tree. It means applying that awareness and applying that possibility to every moment we live, to make our whole life part of that practice. You’ll see an athlete before a big competition, like a marathon runner. When they’re preparing, their life still goes on, but everything revolves around that race: how they’re eating, loading their body with carbohydrate, how they’re training, when they’re stopping, when they’re starting. Everything is focused towards that point. When you make your goal in yoga to actually realize something, then everything about our life gets pulled around that: how we’re eating, how we’re practicing, how we’re with other people. So I just urge everybody to think seriously about that. There is no one here who is special. Everybody is special. Everybody has that potential within them. That sound which Kabīr is talking about is within everybody. I think the journey may be long, but we have to acknowledge that we can go on that journey. Many of us have been on the journey for a long time, but then just reaffirm that, yes, we really, really want to go there. Maybe along the road we got stuck at the coffee shop, enjoyed some experience so much that we stopped there and are just continuously drinking the coffee. If you find you are one of those people, then just finish that coffee and get back on the road. As again and again Swāmījī said in the bhajans, as Gurujī said in the bhajans, this opportunity—who knows when we will get it again? I guess we can never really know how special it is; only Gurujī can try to explain to us how special it is. So, as we say in Australia when we want to tell somebody to hurry up and do something: "Get on your bike. Don’t walk this time. Get on the bike and start pedaling fast." In the beginning, Jasrat Spūrījī spoke about karma yoga, and an experience came to my mind. It was in Jādon, in a winter group. The whole group was involved; maybe some of you were in this group and will remember. It was, I guess, 1994 or 1995. The main part of the ashram—where Holy Gurujī’s house (the White House), the japa hall, and the kitchen were—was still under construction, not yet completely ready. They brought many trucks with coarse sand and spread it over this whole area. Everything was nicely leveled. When this was all ready, Swāmījī had an idea. The problem was that the meditation hall at that time was the old meditation hall, where now is just a green grass ground. In monsoon, water was always flowing there. So Swāmījī was thinking we should do something about that. Then in the evening, around 8:30 or 9 o’clock—when usually the satsaṅg is finished and we would slowly go to bed—Swāmījī said, "I thought maybe today we do half an hour karma yoga, and it makes sense to do it in the night because then it’s not so hot." We said, "Okay, yes, let’s do it." Swāmījī said, "Yes, let us do that. The water will not always flow in the meditation hall, in the japa hall, and flood it. We should level the ground so that it flows to one side." Now, of course, the first job was to remove all this sand which had just in the last days been brought and spread over the whole area. Everyone was thinking, couldn’t you have had this idea one week earlier? But okay, Guru Vākya. So we collected all this sand and made a huge heap of it. Then we started leveling the ground. But there was a certain resistance from the ground; it was really hard, so it was really hard work to break the ground to move it. We all made about half an hour karma yoga from about 10 o’clock in the evening till 4 o’clock in the morning. During the next days, because it was a big job, some other "half hours" followed. When everything looked nice, Swāmījī inspected it. Then he had a better idea: "I think it would be better if the water flows to the other side." So some other "half hours" followed. Finally, Swāmījī was satisfied. And, of course, then this coarse sand, this huge heap again, had to be spread over the whole thing. So now, after doing several days of really hard work, we were satisfied. Swāmījī was satisfied. There was only a slight suspicion: it looked somehow like in the beginning. And next winter, again, the meditation hall was under water. Next winter, again, the meditation hall was under water. I think some of you might remember this action. So then, of course, you have exactly this point: what to hold on to? What was the point of doing all that? Missing sleep, so much sweating, so much physical work. But Swāmījī, in between, gave the hint. He said, "Leveling the ground means leveling the ego." So karma yoga basically does not aim for that physical result which is the outcome in the end. There might be some result, or there might not be, but it’s actually an inner process. It starts already with: Do I participate, or do I try to escape? And for how long? Usually, it’s always: Swāmījī is there, explains everything, he stands there, and everything is very strongly working. Then, after some time, Swāmījī disappears and goes to the next field where he has some activities. And then suddenly you see, oh, only half of the group is left. So this inner training—that’s the point of this karma yoga. We work actually on us more than on the ground. How many doubts come up during such a process? How many thoughts about what he is doing here with us? In the end, the guru is just thinking all the time how to give us a chance to do karma yoga because it is for us, to purify our karmas. The best example for this I experienced in Australia. It was in 2004 in Perth. There is a yoga group, and we were all together there. With Swāmījī, we visited one Indian restaurant. It is located at a very beautiful location; there is a river, actually big like a lake. Just at the side of the river, on pillars, on the first floor, there is this restaurant with a beautiful view over the whole lake. This restaurant is run by a group of disciples of another Indian master. The specialty of this restaurant is that they don’t have a menu card. On a menu card, the first thing you look for is the prices. Here, you go to the buffet, see the food, get the food, and can come again if you want. You can eat as much as you want. In the end, when you leave the restaurant, someone is standing at the door with a donation box. It says if you would like to give something, you’re welcome. If you gave $30 or $10 or $1, he will always say, "Thank you, please come again." So this whole restaurant is a karma yoga project run by this group of disciples of an Indian guru. I forgot the name. The restaurant is actually called Annapūrṇā. He sings Venkateśānanda, but I’m not sure about that. One day he was sitting together with his disciples, who are mainly Indian disciples, and asked them, "What special abilities do you have? What could we do?" They mentioned different things, but he was not really satisfied. Then he said, "But one thing you surely can do, because you do it every day, is to cook Indian food." And in Australia, Indian food is something special. So he created this project and said, "Let’s open an Indian restaurant," just to give his disciples a chance to do sevā. Some of them are shopping, some are cleaning, some are doing the office work, some are cooking, some are serving, and no one gets a dollar. Everything is karma yoga. When Swāmījī was there, he really liked that. He asked, "This is such a beautiful location here. How much do you actually pay for rent?" If I remember right, they said an amount around $12,000 to $13,000 per month. And that’s not all; on top, of course, you have the expenses for the food, electricity, and everything. So Swāmījī asked, "But does so much money come in?" They said, "Just so. Sometimes a little bit plus, sometimes a little bit minus. It somehow works." If you tell this to a Western economist, you just say, "That’s crazy." A whole group of people is doing hard work, hoping that in the end it will be plus-minus zero. So here you can very clearly understand what really is karma yoga. It is not the point to earn money with this restaurant. The only point is to serve. So the first one who profits from this is yourself when you do it. But think: which message are they spreading in the city, in Perth? "We are serving you, and everyone is welcome without condition." What a beautiful message it is, and how this uplifts the reputation of yoga and spirituality. The purpose of service is service. What is Holy Gurujī always praying for? His most beloved prayer, which he always wanted to be said as a fourth part of the prayer, ends with: "Please let me always, give me always the bhakti. Please give me the mercy that I always have the bhakti." The attitude of sevā—you just want sevā. You see it as a mercy when you can do sevā. Sevā is practical bhakti. If we have developed this feeling that we don’t actually want anything anymore, then the guru knows we are ready. That means we become like an open vessel, ready to receive, ready to receive the mercy. Mokṣa mūlaṁ guru kṛpā. That is what Jasrat Spūrījī spoke about: that we have to become like an empty vessel, open to receive. On my altar, I have a picture of a statue by an artist. It’s a woman as a beggar with a gesture and the hand open. It’s from an art exhibition in Hamburg. This year, I went there again and bought this picture. For me, it is a perfect symbol for how we should be: humble and open to receive. That’s all. Then we are ready. Just one very small thing, one request from my side: Swāmījī very much insisted that after the prayer, my name should also be said.