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Śrīdīp Nārāyaṇa Bhagavānakī, Devīśvara Mahādevakī, Mādhav Kṛṣṇa Bhagavānakī, Sanātana Dharmakī. Hari Om. Welcome to all of you, with many blessings of Gurudev and our dear brothers and sisters around the world. Today is a beautiful day, the first Thursday in this period of the full moon. Time is passing, yet we remain where we are. That is a great plus point—we wish to be where we are, in Brahman. When you think of this, where are we not? Holy Gurujī writes in the Līlāmṛt, "You buried or not?" He often taught this. Whenever Mahāprabhujī asked him to go somewhere for work, Gurujī, for whom Mahāprabhujī's words were supreme, would be sad to leave his presence. Mahāprabhujī would then ask him, "Do you think that I am now somewhere? I am not there." You say in the prayer, "Who is for me? Without you, there is no one for me." The second line is, Holy Gurujī said, "Of course, you are always right. But, there is no 'but'." In you, it is ignorance. We are at the center point of Brahmā. Yesterday, during the Brahmavidyā Kriyā, we were centered at the Maṇipūra Chakra, the navel. You realized, felt, or imagined that from this center, energy expands and divides into the fourteen lokas. We will continue this Brahmavidyā upadeśa in future seminars, as we still need to experience and develop this vidyā into jñāna. The difference between vidyā and jñāna is crucial. When jñāna is present, Brahma is present. Jñāna has different kinds, beautifully described in Patañjali and Vedānta with examples: pratyakṣa and parokṣa. Pratyakṣa means present, what you can see, smell, or touch—direct evidence. Parokṣa is something far away. For example, when the sky is clear and you see stars, but on the far horizon you see lightning. That is parokṣa; we can only imagine there must be rain and thunderstorms somewhere. Or we see distant smoke and infer there is fire. Similarly, pratyakṣa is parokṣa pramāṇa. When we attain ātma-jñāna, we become pratyakṣa. Vidyā is what we are now learning; the learning process itself. Through adhyāya (study, chapter) and viveka (discernment), your knowledge develops. Vidyā is learning, and learning is practice, abhyāsa. As long as you are in school, you are a vidyārthī. In Sanskrit, a student is a brahmacārī; in Hindi, vidyārthī. 'Artha' means wealth. Knowledge is the highest wealth. It is said that anyone can take material possessions from your hands, but no one can take your knowledge. The source of knowledge is endless; you can take as much as you like, and the source remains. What is in your destiny, your kismatā, your bhāgya, cannot be taken away. According to Rāja Yoga and Jñāna Yoga, our beloved Gurudeva, Swāmī Madhavānandajī, describes in a bhajan four kinds of techniques in Jñāna Yoga that lead to mokṣa. This involves ṣaṭ sampatti, the six inner treasures. When you realize these six treasures, you become the richest being not only in this world but in the universe. Material wealth does not go with you, but jñāna does. While studying, the study is a tapasyā, an austerity, which yields good fruits in the future. If you neglect your study and your interest wanders, you cannot perform tapasyā properly, and siddhi (perfection) is not achieved. At examination time, such a student becomes nervous and calls, "Mahāprabhujī, please!" Mahāprabhujī would reply, "But where have you been before? Where was your interest? You didn’t sit peacefully for one hour to learn." Without learning, without adhyayana (study)—svādhyāya—it is incomplete. In Yoga, under Yama and Niyama, the principle of svādhyāya is emphasized. Literally, svādhyāya means the chapter about a certain subject. In Vedānta and spirituality, 'sva' means the self, and 'adhyāya' means the chapter. Look within yourself: how many chapters have you completed in your life, and how many have you left unfinished? Some chapters you couldn't finish because they were beyond your capacity. How many disappointed chapters are there? You had to interrupt them. These are uncompleted chapters in the subject of your life, psychic problems that appear from time to time in dreams or when you sit alone. That chapter is left far behind, but you know that sooner or later you must finish it, or it will disturb you in this life and the next. It will return. There is a song: "Mūchra dekhali prāṇī darpaṇame." O human being—prāṇī means not only humans but all creatures with prāṇa, that light and energy of Brahman—look at your face (mukhara) in the inner mirror (darpaṇa). See how much good and bad, happiness and unhappiness, is there. You were not doing your complete svādhyāya. Now you are caught, like a bird in a cage. Another song says, "O bird of the cage, no one knows your pain. You are crying, nobody knows, no one can hear." There are two kinds of svādhyāya: study, and completing your inner chapter through your viveka, jñāna, and spiritual practice. You must complete all your debts, your riṇa, in this life. But we are not capable; we do not know how. The only way is spiritual work: Brahmajñāna, Brahmavidyā. In India, there are four broad social divisions, often called castes, like the brahmin, warrior, and weaver castes. It is said, "Brahmā jānettī brāhmaṇa." A Brahmin is one who knows Brahma. Such a one is called a Satguru, a Śrotriya, a Brahmaniṣṭha Śrotriya, which relates to that Adhyāya, that Svādhyāya. We have had many teachers: mother, father, brothers, sisters, friends, religious teachers, priests, school teachers, and university professors. They are all considered gurus. But a final teacher comes to us: the Satguru. Follow the Guruvākya. If you fail the Guruvākya, you could not complete your chapter. Changing the Guruvākya is not good; you lose your chapter. When will you complete it? There are chapters concerning our parents, our friends, even our house pets. When love awakens, our responsibility comes. You should think it over beforehand. To clear it all up, the Upaniṣad says, "tamaso mā jyotir gamaya"—lead us from darkness to light. Which darkness? The darkness of ignorance. Which light? The light of enlightenment, of knowledge. Enlightenment is not someone carrying a torch in your stomach or head. Enlightenment is knowledge. Which knowledge? Brahma Satya, Jagat Mithyā: Brahma is the truth, and the world (Jagat) is asatya (unreal). How can we say it is unreal? I am sitting here; you would not say, "No, Swamiji is not here." You are sitting in front of me; I would not say, "No, nobody is here." To whom am I talking? There is a tree with beautiful cherries, nearly falling into your hand—ripe, red, dark red, full of juice. You put it in your mouth, and it explodes, filling your mouth with juice. My svāda indriya (sense of taste) enjoys it. Is this not truth? The master says, "Wait a minute." After five minutes, where is that juice? It is not in the mouth; it has gone to the stomach. This is temporary. What is changeable is not reality. What is unchanging is reality. Seasons change; beautiful green leaves turn yellow and fall. This is a river flowing; you can only dip in the same water once. You dive in and come out, and the water has moved meters away. You will not get that water again; new water comes. Similarly, we are just dipped in this world and come out. That is jñāna: "tamaso mā jyotir gamaya, asato mā sadgamaya"—lead us from unreality to reality. What is reality? Brahma śakti jagat mithyā. That truth is within us, but we are caught by thorny bushes—our worldly pains, unfinished chapters. Day by day, we face complications. We alone cannot do it. We constantly think, "Mṛtyor mā amṛtam gamaya"—O Lord, lead me, guide me, liberate me from mortality to immortality. How does this come? In the sky, no one is sitting who will say, "OK, come, I take you to Brahmaloka." Many of us have flown in airplanes at 13 or 14 kilometers height, but we did not see even a little toe of that Brahman sitting somewhere. If he were sitting and came to take us, saying, "I take the whole airplane," all would say, "No, no. I have something very important to bring to my home—my parents, my house, this, that." We are all sitting today in this Dharmakṣetra, a holy place. Our awareness, our consciousness, is hooked in Brahman. Suppose he comes now, here—Brahman—and says, "My children, let’s go." We would say, "We didn’t mean it like that. We couldn’t think you would come so quickly. No, please. And how should we know you are Brahman?" Okay. He comes to me and says, "Swamiji, come, let us go." I say, "No, no, I have Guru Pūrṇimā Satsaṅg, I can’t come now." Speaking is so nice, listening is so sweet, but reality is very far from us because we do not have that complete Brahmajñāna. You and I are Vidyārthīs. We are learning, acquiring that richness, the prosperity of knowledge. The Kriyā you practiced yesterday, where you made yourself the very center of the entire universe—from where Oṁ begins, from where Svayaṁbhū begins, from where this Nāda, this divine vibration begins—you saw that you were expanding, not contracting. With inhalation, expansion; with exhalation, contraction. Because we are not sure, we go far and come back, like a small child who runs away from the mother and then runs back. We exhale but are afraid, so we run back to ourselves. Can you imagine if we exhaled and couldn’t inhale? That would be horrible. But when there is only expansion, you are giving, you are multiplying. At that time, you are called Sarjan, Sarjan Hara. Sarjan means creator. In a bhajan about Devpurījī, Mahāprabhujī said, "Deepakāya merī Sarjan Hārā"—Gurudev Devpurījī is my creator, the one who creates and expands. This Brahma Kriyā, Brahmavidyā Kriyā, is finally something great for us. Why didn’t I speak of it for the last 40 years? Why suddenly now, this summer? It depends on Devpurījī. He gave it to me and told me, "Give further." But I can tell you one thing: he has not yet given all. He is a little baby. The first day, he got solid food. Till now, I was only drinking mother’s milk. Now comes foreign nourishment. If you feed him immediately with chilies and spices, what will his stomach say? So, till today, you and I were enjoying only mother’s milk. Perhaps Mahāprabhujī or Devpurījī felt something—that yes, now this boy can become selfless. So let us see and wait. What will come? We will have a little practice and see what this boy can feel and what he needs. You will see tomorrow he has a headache and flu because he is so cold. You must bring my jacket, my wind jacket, boy. To those with us via webcast, I wish you all the best. The titikṣā (endurance) is missing; you must endure heat and cold. So I told Devpurījī, don’t be so hard with me. Either Vidyā or Titikṣā. Tomorrow morning at 10:30. And now we should have a technique. Dev Puruṣa Bhagavān, Dīp Nārāyaṇa Bhagavān, Satguru Svāmī Madhavānandajī Bhagavān. Oṁ Śāntiḥ Śāntiḥ Śāntiḥ. Thank you.