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The Soul's Journey

A spiritual discourse on the journey of the soul through birth, death, and karma.

"Our soul—not the Ātmā, but the soul... the soul is individual, not universal."

"Only two will follow us: our good or bad karmas. And that becomes destiny. And against destiny we have no power."

A spiritual teacher explains the nature of the individual soul (Jīvātmā) as a wave of the universal resonance. He describes its journey through time, bound by karma, its entry into a physical body, and the rare opportunity of human birth. He emphasizes the inescapable law of karma governed by body, mind, speech, and wealth, and concludes that liberation comes through spiritual practice and the Guru's grace, which dissolves the soul back into the Supreme.

Filming location: Strilky, Czech Republic

Deep Nārāyaṇa Bhagavān is sound, Nāda-yoga, Nāda-rūpa-parabrahma. The form of the Supreme is known as sound, resonance, and it is that sound which is harmonizing and balancing the entire universe, as well as what is within the universe: tattvas or elements, stars, planets, suns, etc. Our soul—not the Ātmā, but the soul. Ātmā is the universal one. It is like a sky. That Ātmā is the sound, the resonance. Paramātmā is the highest one. Paramātmā znamená ten nejvyšší. So what we call our self, our ātmā, is the Paramātmā. To čemu říkáme naše já, naše ātmā, to je paramātmā. Sabī prāṇī okeś jubītr samāyā in every creature. That Ātmā is within that. You know this bhajan, but the soul is individual, not universal. A little example—it’s not exact, but approximately: the tree is the universal one, and the seeds are the individuals. The soul is the waves of that resonance. And through that resonance, the light comes. It may be called the sun ray, for example. Every ray has its name, and the very first one, when the sun rises—the first sun ray—it is not easy to describe. But there is one first. The second is divided 39 times. One second is divided 39 times. So that Ṛṣi who researched this could catch the first ray, and that ray’s name was Uṣṇā. And when that ray touches some stones or something, if you catch only that one, it becomes a diamond. But if a few come together, nothing at all. So it is very hard work, so don’t go for diamonds, okay? So we are the taraṅg, the waves. We are the ray, we are the Jīvātmā, the soul. Something is occupied there inside. And now that gets feedback more and more. As usual, I say that this soul is fluttering on the waves of time. Ages and ages, through darkness, through light. Experiencing joy and misery. Happiness, unhappiness. Pain, pleasure, disappointments, loneliness, fear—nowhere, no one is listening. In Ananta, the endless universe, this individual soul is fluttering. Nothing and nothing and nothing goes with. No material thing will follow us. No relations will follow. No friends will follow. Only two will follow us: naše dobré nebo špatné karmy. And that becomes destiny. And against destiny we have no power. When someone falls from a high mountain, from a high cliff, and says, "I don’t want to fall," you can say it, you can scream, but you cannot stop yourself. So when the soul goes out of the body, into nothingness, you may scream, but no one will hear. "Can you hear me? Can you feel me? My dear wife, come on, help me." She doesn’t listen to anything. Or, the wife comes and says, "My husband, help me." The husband is finally sleeping deep. In nothingness is nothing. In nothingness is nothing which can help you. There is only one thing, and that is thyself. Everything will be recorded. Every moment, every second, whatever you speak, whatever you do, whatever you write, everything is by destiny. Very quickly. Quicker than now, they have a printing machine for newspaper, you know? So quickly printed, even you can’t count one, two, three, four. And something is not good, rejected. Similarly, good karma, bad karma, good karma, bad karma. Oh, our good karma goes so high. The bad goes so low. Good goes like this. Then there’s no space for good things. So good comes from the bad things, and bad things are squished. Only good. Blessed are you. Or, good are little and bad are so many, there is no space, it falls on the good. Whatever you did, good things, they are also destroyed. There is no protection, neither with money, nor with the lawyers, nor with the politicians, nor with the friends. Only one: the Lord of Justice, Dharmarāja and Yamarāja, these are two. Dharma Rāja for justice and Yama Rāja for punishing. Yamarāj has no mercy. He’s like a butcher. In a butcher’s house, a slaughterhouse, how many animals are hanging by one leg, screaming, and persons with electric saws? They scream, they fear. That one has no mercy for these creatures. That action of the Yama, Dharmarāja’s protectors, we experience that which karma had. That animal looking, and it’s cut, you are screaming, you are scared, your pain, your fear. No one hears. There’s no windows, there’s no glass windows. If there were big glass windows, someone said, "Nobody will eat meat." Similarly, there is nothing. Therefore, O human, don’t be afraid of anything, only of the karma that you do through four things: tan, man, bhajan, and dhana—through the body, through mind, through the words, and through your wealth or social position. God sees. And so this individual soul is involved in such a complication of moha. And we think, yes, this is mine, so we try to attract from the astral world to somewhere, yes, it is mine, it is mine. Přitahujeme z astrálního světa, ano, to je moje, moje. Narodíme se. No, and that snowball begins to roll, to enlarge. Čím více se točí, tím více sněhu se na ní nalepuje, nabaluje. Dobré nebo špatné, ta sněhová koule se zvětšuje a zvětšuje. But when the hour will come, the day will come. The sun will shine. All that is collected will melt, so Devpurījī will appear. Mahāprabhujī will appear. Gurudev will appear. All these frozen things will be melted. All snow is melted. There is nothing. Water flowed away. Nothing. There is what we call camphor. Camphor? It’s beautiful. You light it, and it will burn quickly. And nothing remains. All burned. You don’t see anything. Similarly, when the Guru’s grace, or spirituality, appears, then this soul is completely dissolved. Ātmā begins again, one with Paramātmā. So when the time comes, it is said this soul is descending towards our earth, towards our solar system. As long as even the Ṛṣis did not find any planet in the universe like our Earth. There are many planets with different qualities and different effects. Each has influences, and moreover, these astrological people can tell you the influence of the planets. But the biggest one is our earth, and this is called Mṛtyuloka. Mortal world. Who is born will die, and who will die will come again. This is a workshop. This is a factory. This is a university. There you can be productive. So God is merciful that he sends us to this planet to get to the end of this journey in the endless. So, very soon as it comes into the sun system, this Jīvātmā is the mixer of ātmā and anātmā. Ātmā is Paramātmā. Anātmā is the mortal. But the ātmā is guiding, accompanying the jīvātmā. That’s why we call it Jīvātmā. As soon as it comes into the atmosphere of this sun, then we are still wandering in the astral. Lucky are they who come closer to this planet. So the Upaniṣad said, this soul, you cannot see with eyes. Someone is dying in front of you, the soul is going out, you can’t see. You can’t hold it. Otherwise, we will hold the soul of our father and again put it in his mouth. "Father! Father! My son!" God made a perfect system. There are no more records. So, and how the soul comes into the body, even the mother doesn’t realize; one time the soul takes its place. That is described in the Upaniṣads day by day. In medicine, it is also researched day by day. But which second, and which thirty-nine parts of the second, when the soul came? That is a real birth, from the astral world to the physical world of the mother’s body. So it is said that the soul comes in contact with the humidity, water elements. And through the water, through the rain’s energy, that comes to the earth and transfers into the vegetation, into the seeds. In the seed, every seed, there is a jīva. Doesn’t matter if it’s corn, rice, the seed of what you call the needles, or the nuts; what will grow again, what will sprout, has a seed, jīva. But what we call hybrid, the seeds, they are seedless. You can only grow once, and that has no consciousness and that energy for our body. And so, the jīvā, the soul, is filled in this. Around our Earth, if you can see, there are so many souls around, like a fog, like drops of the fog. Lucky are they, blessed are those souls that finally, by the mercy of the Supreme, got the human body. So it is finally said, you got punishment or whatever it is, you had to go through the entire universe. How many wounds you have, how many experiences you have, how much suffering behind you, how much torturing behind you, or how many happiness and blessings have you? Now you got this very rare, very rare human body. Don’t make the same mistake again. Be careful what you do with the body. What you do with your mind, what you do with your words, and what you think. And how you utilize your power, how you use your influence, your might, your position. And sometimes someone tells you, and you misunderstand. So, to judge someone’s mistake as guilty, that karma comes to you, not to that one. You are in a hurry to cross the railway line because of the ambulance. And the barrier is closed. Thirty seconds before you came. And you have some serious patients in the ambulance. Now, you ask the person who is working there to close the barriers and open. Patient died because the barrier was closed for three minutes, four minutes. You blame, you shout at the man that he did not open the barrier. Now, your shouting will not go to that person. You have yours out; it comes back to you. If one does it purposely, then it will go there. Karma is a very fine thing. So who are we to judge? And we humans will always judge selfishly what is good for us. The process of this jīva, the individual soul, it is not so easy still to come to mother’s body. Doesn’t matter which mother. The mother, which is the creatures in the water, the creatures on the earth, and the creatures in this space. But then there is again the destiny. Parents can give you only birth. They can’t give you destiny. They can give you education, but not the destiny. One mother has four sons. One became a holy saint. One became a king. One became a leper, and one became the hunter. My mother wished that all should be holy saints. Možná si ta matka přála, aby všichni byli svatí. A nebo všichni, aby byli králem, krály. Ale to matka nemůže vybrat. Otec to nemůže vybrat. Kdo to může vybrat? Váš osud. Jaký osud? To, co jste udělali v minulosti, tento život jste šťastní. You are enjoying, you do what you want. Yes, "I can do this, I can do this." Nobody knows, it’s my thing, okay? But this will come to you next life. Now, what you have is from past life, and something which you have, it’s the goodness and blessing of your parents. Your parents gave you a lot. What will you leave for your children? So the life of the children, from the parents’ side, they will get what the parents give them. As a blessing, education, knowledge, wealth, happiness, civilization, and the blessing. Spiritual practice of the parents is shared and reflected in the children. Like Gurujī said in his last days, he is doing his mala for his bhaktas. Many times, when a very terrible message came from some people who had problems, illnesses, or something, on that day Gurujī was fasting for that person and doing more mālās. What do you say? And that his fasting and his mālā, he was asking blessing of Mahāprabhujī. And the person was helped. And what do we do? Father is in intensive care, and you are sitting in a pizzeria and eating pizza. That’s it. Feeling. You should have the feeling for someone to do something. Gurudev sees everything. You may say, "No, no, it is not true. It is not like that." Like little children tell parents, "No, it’s not like this, no." And then the parents said, "Okay," but they know. And Gurudev knows. Mahāprabhujī can show you clearly. Devpurījī showed me many clear things. I’m surprised. Sometimes, what Yogesh is doing, but I can’t tell. I shouldn’t tell. And if I tell, that will be the last communication with Yogesh. So you can’t tell sometimes, so you pray that God will somehow forgive. Everything creates a barrier. It creates a certain barrier. Každý ten schod, ten krok, každý ten schod musíte vy vystoupat. A nebo máte dobrou kṛpā. A co je guru kṛpā? A to je výtah. Jenom zmáčnete knoflík své mály a už se vezete. Nemusíte šlapat po schodech národa. And the other way is to go slowly. Pozy, moj pozy, ma pravozy. That is it. Hard way. So this jīva enters into the body. Happy. Now comes to the physical connection. These three elements, there are four elements: air, water, fire, and earth. Space is there. So you are now in a limited space. And this jīva is not so happy and comfortable in the mother’s body. If you think, "Oh, the baby is so happy inside." Every mother talks about, oh, in the night, moving. Yes. This soul is in the flood of liquid, blood, hormones, limited. Everything is knitting, and you are sitting inside. The net is created around you. It means now you can’t run away. What a destiny. It’s not easy, my dear. Therefore Kabīr Dās said, that’s why Kabīr Dās said, nine to ten months, nine to ten months took Mother Nature to knit this body. They made this weaving stool. There are eight chakras. The material of the five elements does not take more than nine to ten months for the human body. You were praying. Please liberate me from this limited, compact space. And birth is taking place. Kabīr Dās said, "When I was born, people were happy." Oh, the haṅkā is born, the haṅkā is born. The hanka, the hanka... but hanka was crying. Jaghase, all was happy. Hamroi, but Hanka was crying. Why? After such a long period in the nothingness? Without ground. No base at all. No barriers. But you were conscious. Finally, you came to this earth and into some mother’s body. And you feel now limited, and now you are born. Let’s talk about humans. You were born, but as soon as you opened your eyes, oh God, again in the māyā. Oh Rām, Rām,... Rām. Every touch creates the feeling of māyā. I didn’t believe this. There were twins in the stomach. Brother and son, brother and sister. And sister said to brother, "You know, we will be born." What a stupid thinking. We will be born? What is that? From where do you get such ideas? "Be peaceful where we are, and you know, we will eat." He said, "We will eat?" "No, we are taking to the navel everything; we don’t eat. You know, we will open mouth." Sister, give up. And when they were born, Sister said, "Dear brother, now you are crying, opening your mouth wide." So Jaga has said, "People were happy." But Kabīr Dās said, "I was crying." After so many years of suffering in this material world, I finally left. And who was that who caught me and put me again in this prison of my heart? I thought I was free, but someone caught me. Destiny. As he, Karuṇikār, Chalo, do now such a karma. Ham Hase and Jagāroy: I am happy, and I will laugh and smile, but the people will cry. People will cry because of how nice this person was. So the result is at the end of life. If you will come back or not, that is also there. The result is there. Don’t celebrate the day too early. Some people are using their power, money power, intellectual power. There was one king who had ten villages. And the king was so terrible, very angry, punishing everyone. And if there was any program announced, all had to come. One day, his dog died. He had a little dog, a female dog. He loved her, so when his dog died, the whole ten villages came for the funeral. Because whoever didn’t come was punished. And when he died, no one went to the funeral. That is the result of life, and that is the result of karma. So this Jīva, Śaṅkarācārya says in one of his books: First, fortunate are they whose soul gets a human body. Second, the spiritual parents; third, that has its own spiritual interest. And fourth, get the spiritual master. Then he’s sure this soul will be liberated. So, now the soul is in the body. There is an immense amount of energy. So many functions. Every cell of the body has its own universe. O human! How can you say you are unhappy? You have all. It is that sun which is shining in every direction. Or is the sun only shining on one side? Go look behind. It’s like a ball. Every direction is shining. Only the shadow is from the earth. That’s it. When the astronaut goes up, they see about 18 sunrises within 24 hours. You know, with the speed they go. And then they see beautiful planet Earth. So when one of the Indian astronauts came back, they asked him, "You were so high up in space, it was beautiful, right? And you saw the Earth from above, what would you say?" And he says, "I was so high in the sky, but nothing is dearer than this planet. I saw it, I had such a feeling to come back. That is home, my home, that’s it. My sweet home, that’s it." So this jīva was now stuck in this body. So certain techniques are there, without damaging or torturing the body and without doing wrong things, we can awake those centers and energy, finally to come into the Brahman. So this is the aim of human life. If you think that the aim is to become the richest man in the world, that’s not the aim. Become the richest one in the universe. Means you get blessed. Give the blessings. You have so much. You are so rich. Give blessings. That’s it. Spiritual heritage, that is given from master to disciples. And now, disciples, give further. So, one disciple, now teaching the yoga and having five hundred disciples. And these five hundred, they will become teachers. Each five hundred has five hundred students. How many? Twenty-five thousand. Twenty-five thousand yoga teachers. Each has five hundred students. That’s it, how you multiply the wisdom. And there are some others, they are consumers, they are not manufacturers. Whatever they learn, they just consume for themselves. Finished. Therefore, we should give wisdom, love, and light to all who come to us. Many seeds will not grow. Some seeds are not capable of growing. One apple has four seeds. Maybe three will grow, one will not grow. Your duty is to, as I told you before, throw the seeds for three days. Let everyone eat. One day the swan will come. And that is the swan of your wisdom. Your inner self will awake. Therefore, Jag Jag Yab Jī, Chet Chet Yab Jī, Yab Yag Av Sar Jave Re Guru Sam, Chet Chet Yab Jī, Yag Yag Av Sar Jave Re Guru Sam, Nipnara and Bhagavān. So, I wish you all the best and the blessings of our holy lineage. Wish you a good journey. Many stayed here, and so you are going home. Drive carefully. Don’t eat too much, otherwise you will get tired. So, hungry is good. Liquid is good. More liquid, so it forces you to stop. And when you get out of the car and this, and then you get a little fresh. Bless you, and I’m happy that we are all here until the next programs, next week. Om Namah Karata Prabodhi Karma Karata Siddhip Nārāyaṇa Bhagavān Devī Śvarmadeva Śataguru Svāmī Madhvanājī Bhagavān. God bless you. God bless you.

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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