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Break and connect

A spiritual discourse on meditation, the guru-disciple relationship, and preserving lineage wisdom.

"Your meditation and your sādhanā can be only successful when you break all worldly relations, finished. Jodo and connect, only Guru Bhaktī is successful."

"Meditation is a path. Mantra is a light. Like when you drive a car at night, you have the light. Light is guiding you, though you don’t see the light directly."

The speaker, addressing an audience, explores the depth of authentic spiritual practice versus superficial ritual. He emphasizes the necessity of a living guru, illustrating his points with a story of a seeker in Jaipur whose restless meditation was calmed only by the intercession of the guru's master. The talk uses analogies from nature, like the wasp and caterpillar, to explain the transformative guru-disciple bond and the process of becoming a true successor in a lineage.

Filming location: Fiji Islands

Oṃ vaitāni śāntir amṛtaṃ sarve bhadrāṇi paśyanto akācī duḥkha bhāga bhave śāntiḥ śāntiḥ... Śrī Deep Nārāyaṇ Bhagavān Kī Jai! Śrī Dev Puruṣa Mahādeva Kī Jai! Satguru Svāmī Madhavānandajī Bhagavān Kī Jai! Satya Sanātana Dharma Kī Jai! In meditation, practicing different techniques, you slow the ritual path. In every field, one is greedy. Businessmen, farmers, ritual practitioners—when you face a test, you try to search through different literatures and techniques. Everything is very good; there is no doubt they are authentic according to the ancient literatures. They were developed by the siddhas, mahātmas, masters—whatever you call them—who received them from ritual ancestors, namely the lineage, the spiritual paramparā. Sometimes they have some easy practices to maintain. One master has ten disciples. This master gave me so many practices. Each of the ten begins to present the wisdom according to the city. It’s not always the same; they all understand the same thing. Ten heads have ten streams. Those ten disciples now say they are masters, and they have twenty or thirty disciples. So in dividing, these two hundred will have more generations. If you can’t keep pure quality, then it disappears. Therefore, the system is called successor. The master loves all disciples equally. The problem is a disciple, but the successor should be that one who is capable of preserving the original, ancient time, Smṛti, Smṛti, Nīti; this all takes long. If you want to go and study the Vedas, one Veda is just learning chanting without any explanation, no meanings. For three to five years, every day, eight to fifteen hours chanting. If you ask, "What did you chant?" they don’t know. Only this, this... Veda, that’s all. Brahmavakya, Veda is a Brahmavakya, so like Guruvakya. It goes, develops in their business, then they have to learn two years, three years further for this Vedas’ grammars. When you learn the grammars in Sanskrit, then immediately you know what you were chanting and what the meaning is. So, for one Veda, a minimum of five to ten years. And who has time in this modern time to wait five to ten years? Now we want to study for two or three years and get a job and money. Forget everything else. They are thinking of the bread and butter. But for a spiritual incarnation, we are all incarnations who have this interest and thirst, this hunger for divine wisdom—what and how God made this and that. So the four Vedas, the long wisdom, the knowledge—in your body you become already that, you receive the Veda itself. Though you learn that much, still some things you cannot understand; you cannot express them in different languages. Now, very rare people remain who can exactly translate the Vedas from Hindi into English. It is a pity. Similarly, from one disciple who becomes a master, there is not an intellectual knowledge, not a capacity of organizing, like in companies. That person who you have always thought you are a disciple, though everybody calls you Guru. But if, when someone tells you, "You are my Gurujī," and then you say, "No, I am Gurujī now." When someone says, "You are my Gurujī," your inner self says, "I am a disciple of our Gurujī here." Many don’t understand, but reality is this. We should be linked from generation to generation. That one can come through. What were the Guruji’s or your master’s visions and wisdom that you have to keep? Not that you sit and now read that book, and now you need to practice that technique and this. So one day, one man came to Gurujī in Jaipur Ashram. He was sitting there. I was also there with a guy from Austria. Don’t say one guy. Two thousand guys, Gaushala. So I was very dear. Premanand Jī had a very nice time with Gurujī. We made a room for Gurujī on the floor above. But I asked Premanand, "How many times? How many times from room to kitchen, and kitchen to room, and room to downstairs, and to upstairs? Minimum 300 times, minimum." Did you tell him, "Go there, target, come back"? Call him again, he comes. So he comes up, yes, so many, many things. So he put it in the mail. You don’t hear. Sometimes we want to call him, so he made a bell. One may try to manipulate the clock, but that was exactly trading what Mahāprabhujī was giving. And Preman is never, never. He said, "Ah, too much, and this and that." Everything is hard, but everything is well. I was sitting with Gurujī. A few people came, and one man asked questions: "Gurujī, I’m doing so many things. I get up early, do my meditation for one or two hours, then I do my pranayama, then I read Bhagavad Gītā, then I read Rāmāyaṇa, then I read Upaniṣads, then... I practice that mantra, then I practice Hanumānjī sādhanā, and so on and so on." Guruji was this. Guruji said, "Good." He said, "I do that." Guruji said, "Good." But he asked, "Why have I no success?" Guruji said, "Good." He said, "What means Gurujī? Good. Is it good that I don’t have success?" He said, "Yes. Because you don’t go on the good way. Gurudev does so much. Children grow up. I have nothing to do. I am a pensioner, my grandchildren, my wife, my joint family." Guruji said, "You will be successful, or Jodo." What do you mean, Gurujī? Toḍo means "break," and joṛo means "joint." Say yes, this is the way. Jodo or Jodo. Can you explain it to me? Your meditation and your sādhanā can be only successful when you break all worldly relations, finished. Jodo and connect, only Guru Bhaktī is successful. That disciple becomes the successor. It’s not that you are making a successor, that you are very beautiful, and you are great, and this and that. You have knowledge about this, about that. That doesn’t help anything. Anything you have to go to the Ayurvedic doctor, and he will hold you on this pulse, nāḍī. Immediately diagnose the whole, need not to go to make their MRI, you need not to make this X-ray, that X-ray, this one, no. Only this one pulse and these three fingers, yes, they can tell you what you ate yesterday. We have still doctors. We have Nāḍī Veda. Nāḍī Veda knows the vibration and can read your pulse. He is the best. Similarly, Gurudev is the Nāḍī Veda. Gurudev can see and feel all your karmas, past, present, and future, and can understand what is going on in your heart and in your mind. Simple. We don’t need any higher education, what you call the university and this and that. That education of the love, that love, what we call jñāna, that jñāna is coming. So when you meditate for so many hours, Gurujī said, just sit and do this one, your mantra, the guru mantra. Have you a guru? Yes, I met many gurus in all, I like my gurus. He says, like, "like" and "have" are different ideas. It was interesting listening. Prem Anand was listening there, sitting. Guruji said, "Prem Anand, go and make chai." Okay, he went down. He came to the kitchen. Guruji, ring the bell. No, no,... it’s too hot. Come up. Come up. Yes, Gurujī. Don’t make chai. It’s too hot. Make lassi. He went out with the pail again. He asked Gurudev, "Unless he’s not from Yogī or Leman?" So, it was Gurujī. That man was sitting there. Then he said, "Can you give me a mantra, please?" You should wait. He said, "How long? How long should I wait? I think you should get a mantra from Māheśvarānanda. In a few months, he will come back from Europe. Then you should have a mantra. I gave him." He said he got a mantra. He had experiences. He said, "Gurujī, after getting mantra, I see Kṛṣṇa. But they’re so restless. I see him in meditation, and he goes there. I look there, and he goes there. He’s sitting, then I look there and he’s standing. What to do? My meditation has vikṣepa. Vikṣepa. You have to see the beautiful corals in the ocean, but there are waves, you can’t see. So you get these glasses, or put a big, nice, easier, beautiful, wooden window frame, about 40 centimeters high, and put it on that. All the waves are broken, and you have a completely peaceful view." Gurujī said, "You have to take the waves of your vṛttis." He said, "Gurujī, my vṛttis are good, but that only can do Mā Prabhujī." Now you see the difference between a living master and the master who is not in a physical body anymore. Doing everything, Guruji. Through Guruji, the Mā Prabhujī is working. And through Mā Prabhujī, Devapurījī is working. Through Devapurījī, Alagpurījī is working. And through Gurujī, we are trying to work. We’ll see how we succeed. Gurujī said, "Tell to Mā Prabhujī in your prayer, please control the Krishna." He was laughing. I tell to Maa, "Mahāprabhujī took control of Kṛṣṇa?" Yes. So really, he went and he was sitting in meditation. And again, he said he had the vision, and he asked Mahāprabhujī. Mahāprabhujī appears. Meditation. Mahāprabhujī tells Kṛṣṇa, "As long as he doesn’t finish his meditation, don’t move." Holding the ear of Kṛṣṇa, Mahāprabhujī said, "Don’t move." All vṛtti disconnected. As soon as his vṛtti is disconnected, then the aim of the divine, Kṛṣṇa, became also one with you and not try to escape here and there. But he needs the Gurudev. Now he is writing so many everyday experiences. He sent me a letter. He said, "Go to Gurujī." Gurujī said, "I can’t answer you. Send to Maheśvara Nanājī." I said, "Gurujī, please don’t put me so up and down. Falling down from up to down is painful. My decision, not yours. Okay." So what happens? All letters I collected. His name is Mr. Gathani, Shrotam Das Gathani in Jaipur. This is not a story, but a reality. All these letters that I got, I then let him translate into English his own handwritten letters. I printed it with the translation in English. Many of you have, no? Divine perception. So this is the evidence of what Gurudev can do. But Gurudev either will do through his master or that source of his energy, or then he knows that he will give his divine wisdom. This is a capable person. Then he will utilize this chance to do through him, doing his holy Gurujī. Prabhuji’s side and my other side is between is a holy Guruji, and still Guruji is doing that. Such a divine light of my holy Guruji had such great love he had, and he was also very, what we call, Bholenāth, Śiva, you know. Well, without this, therefore, our sādhanā, meditation, is the way. Meditation is a path. Mantra is a light. Like when you drive a car at night, you have the light. Light is guiding you, though you don’t see the light directly, focusing on your eyes. So this mantra is leading to the darkness of ignorance in this jungle. So, the way of the Guru’s work, the spiritual master’s work, is very difficult. We don’t understand. There is one story which is used in Vedānta about the caterpillar and the wasp. There are certain wasps that don’t give eggs themselves. They make a mud house, a little nest, and put many, many holes as air conditioning. The air conditioning technology is developed from the wasps, the ants, and the termites. English name, what we call the colony, is coming from the bees. The bees, the whole colony, is there. So the wasps come and fly on the field, searching for that kind of worm or caterpillar which will become the wasp. Vedanta is saying. So there are three kinds of Paṅkathīḍae, let’s say a worm or a caterpillar bus. One, when you hear the sound of that wasp hidden under the grass or somewhere, it’s stuck in your heart. Second, hear the sound. For a while, it runs away here and there. And the third one, there’s a quality which listens and listens and stands on the tail. And a wasp is flying round and round, and see that power? I know that this will become the best. It takes that and puts it in that mud house, which they made small, and gives an inject, a bite, a hormone, and closes the door. It is a very small, tiny space. For oxygen, there and coming, and again come, caterpillar irritated and can’t sleep because no, the sound will come, and it comes. He or she is concentrating when the sound is coming; that’s called Nāda Yoga. Nāda Yoga developed from this nature. That is developed from this humming or humming. One is inside concentrating, and then she goes away again. It comes. It’s hard work to have a child, hard work to have a successor. Then comes silently what is listening, that caterpillar imitating that sound. Things there must. Be something. Why is all the time making this down? So concentrating, concentrating becomes a memory, and because of this, hormones in the body, then memory knows that primary nose opens the hole, and poverty will say she makes the sound. Flies away, and that one flies behind, following that nāda. It becomes memory: so hum, so hum, so hum, so hum, so hum. So, the first mantra we repeat is called so hum. So means that Bhagavān, Brahman, supreme. So hum, I am Paramatma, Atma. Atma is He’s Paramatma. So these two words, when you repeat so, hum, so, hum, so, hum,... hum, so, ho jātā hai. So he’s, I am, he and he, I am, one day. So that Hummary flies behind, and that goes far and suddenly disappears. Look at nature. If you observe really, it disappears and becomes nervous. Where has it gone? Listening, and then it comes from behind, or somehow it becomes one. So the guru and disciple have this kind of relation of the caterpillar and the best. So the Paris stone, there is one precious stone called Paris, rare and rare and rare to... Fine, but it must be. Otherwise, why do we put it in the scriptures? When you touch the iron to the firestone, that pure iron becomes pure gold. But you touch to the Gurudev, that Gurudev doesn’t make you a disciple or from the human. To the perhaps some different creature, but he makes, Gurudev makes you good. At that time, Gurudev, his prāṇa, his breath flows in direction to that success. That will continue. If he or she will break the discipline, it is that the ātmā knows; reject it. Like a machine’s technology is very good when they are making medicine tablets or anything. If there is one milliliter, half a milliliter, or a liter, or if there is a milligram less, the machine will reject the tablet. In the medical factory, you see how many tablets are rejected. In the box with medicine capsules in the bottle, let’s say it should be about 50 capsules, and if there is only 49, automatically the machine will rejected goes again to the whole recycling. If one mistake you do, it, you have to recycle again, recycling of new birth and new beginning. So meditation is that technique. There are no techniques for meditation, no techniques. Meditation comes automatically, like when you sleep, lie down on the pillow and sleep. There’s no... Technique, and if you said, "Okay, I will practice yoga nidrā," that’s a good technique. But when yoga nidrā is finished, you are fresh; you can’t sleep anymore. Therefore, yoga nidrā should never be practiced in the evening. Yoga nidrā is a known time. Or, at some different time, when you need to come to yourself more consciously and not remain lying in tamas guṇa the whole time, there is only one technique: ek se jāye sab se jāye, sab se... Jai. If you practice this one thing, all you will get. If you practice too many things, this and that, and this book and that and that, you are learning, but you are on the surface, nowhere else you are. Those waves on the ocean, therefore, meditation is the way. But meditation, there is no technique. We are writing many techniques; these are okay. We try, we try. The technique is that it becomes a successor of that group, not your beauty, not... Your body, not your diplomas, and not your different kinds of learning and experiences, that doesn’t help to maintain the way to help to maintain the. Meditation with your mantra, and meditation means for me every minute more and more developed. Gurujī said, "By each inhalation and exhalation, O Mahāprabhujī, thy name here." So one word changes that person. Dodo or Jodo? Break and join. Dodo and Jodo, many cannot understand this. Is a wood broken and joined? No. A thread, broken and joined? No. That thread of attachment, which is again and again irritating your heart like that wasp. Many other wasps try to open that and steal that, or eat that. That’s why the mother wasp is all the time just watching that wasp. Unless you can’t break, you can do many things, but this is very important. And that was my decision in my very childhood. It was hard. Dodo, in the water, you can’t swim with some thread. But if you can break it and come out, otherwise die inside. All they are winning for Europe Saturday. Here, in this part of the world, there is no time, no days. This is humans created time. In reality, there is no time, therefore it’s... A one without second, beyond time and space. Worldly work we need. Wish you all the best, much love. Tomorrow we will have webcast later, because today all European bhaktas want to go to feed the sharks. You count how many went, and you count. How many came? Thank you. All the blessings, blessings from Gurudev. Love you again. Jai!

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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