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Part 1: Yoga: The Path to Peace and Health Yoga is the path to non-violence and peace. There are two kinds of peace. One is the peace we can create in the whole world: peace in the space, peace on the earth, peace in the water, peace in the vegetation and herbs, peace in the supreme, and then peace in the self. Secondly, we are all searching for inner peace. And that’s yoga. If we have no good health, we have no peace in our mind and in our feelings. When the doctor declares something—unfortunately, you have this and this disease, and you have to be operated on—very rare people will say, "Okay, doctor, do it, no problem." But many will have no insight, no peace. "Oh God, why do I have this illness and must be operated on?" God can be avoided. The doctor will say, "Yes, you can avoid it, but then you will not be peaceful." You will have pain, you will be restless. Yes, that’s true. So, peace begins with our own heart. Charity begins at home, and compassion begins with all, and that is the way yoga can show us, can bring us to that path. Health is not everything, some philosophers said. Health is not everything, but everything is nothing without health. Keshe Namsepan, thank you, friend. This is my rosary. Do you have one also? This is my passport to the cosmic Self. So it is said, health is not everything, but everything is nothing without health. And in order to gain health, we have to work ourselves. We cannot buy health, but we can gain health. So, yoga—you have heard many times about yoga, and in America, yoga was there before the Europeans came to America. What you call the natives, or the Mexicans, or the other cultures, they all had this kind of faith and kind of herbs to be healthy, so that was yoga. Now, if you see the yoga practice and yoga booklet or advertising posters, then if they show such a posture, so people, young people like we all, that’s not for us. We will break our leg, we will break our neck, we will break our hands, etc., etc. I came for good health and peace, and what did I get? So, this yoga nowadays has become for the young kids. They can move their body quickly, and this and that. But when they are old, they will have big problems with the spinal column, with the joints. So, unfortunately, everyone is concentrating on the young people. And we, we are very young, and nobody looks at us. Our age is 60, 70, 80, 90, etc. So yoga is that which can be for every walk of life. Yoga begins with the mother’s body, and it begins with harmony and peace, understanding and love, and good nourishment. That begins the life. We are born old. We get old in our mother’s body, no? How old did your child become in your body? We were minus, plus; we are born already nine months old, continuing, continuing. Another thing is that it doesn’t matter what we do, our life, one day we will pass. This is one subject. There is life and death, and death is walking with us like our shadow, only waiting for some chance to take you. And one side is our health and our immortality. So both are walking together, left and right. So it doesn’t matter how much we try to do good health and this and that; sooner or later, one day we will pass away. So, the subject comes after the illness, the fear. Fear—maybe we are not afraid of death, we are afraid of how the death will be, which kind of pain we will suffer. In the fire, some building falls over, we are still alive, many limbs of the body damaged, nobody listens to us, how painful it is. In such a situation, we are, every second we die, and there is a lot of fear, etc., etc., etc. So we are not afraid of death, but we are afraid of how we will die. So the best is that we pray to God, that one day God takes us with Him, just like that. We have one very loyal friend with us in our body, and that’s our heart. Our heart is a very loyal, very loyal friend. It doesn’t matter what you do—whether you’re swimming, running, jogging, flying, sleeping deeply, or fighting—your heart, our heart, is constantly balanced and working for us. Did we ever ask our heart, "How are you?" Did you tell your heart, "You can go for a retreat"? That will not, we don’t want. So, there are many loyal things with us, but have we thought about how to keep our heart healthy? When we smoke, we are not thinking of our heart. When we drink alcohol, we are not thinking of our heart. Many, many things. So, in yoga, there is nourishment and movement: nourishment, movement, environment. In what kind of environment are we? What kind of healthy food do we take? So, yoga in daily life, which you have heard, this system developed long, long ago. It began already in 1962 or ’60. And I began to work by teaching a little from my 66, 1966. And now, then I came to Europe and was teaching yoga, but people were not happy. They were complaining. I said, "What? Is there in yoga any system?" We have yoga class today, and you are all practitioners, advanced practitioners. You have been practicing for five years. New ones are also practicing with you, but the new ones do not know. For that, one is too difficult postures. Or, advanced people said, "What are we doing?" All the time, new is coming, and we are explaining then, and we are not going forward or back. So then we developed a system called, systematically, the system. So from nursery school or kindergarten until university. And this practice we gave the name Yoga in Delhi life. How did the name come? I was teaching for 20 years in Soviet Union territories. And, of course, they did not accept some spiritual religions or many things. So they gave me instruction, or told me, that three things don’t do here in our country. I said, "What?" Don’t talk about politics, don’t talk about religion, and don’t take any movable property, money, gold, etc. Then you are welcome here. So for 20 years, I was going, traveling as a national guest. Anyhow, so we gave the name called Yoga in Delhi Life. Everyday practicing. Our whole life should be a practice of yoga. Now, not only physical postures or this and that, but our way of living should be like a yogic life. Then we can be healthy. We shall learn to say no to ourselves. If you can say no to yourself, you can say no to others also. Otherwise, the doctor drinks the alcohol and tells the patients, "Don’t drink alcohol." This is a little bit difficult. So, we have to become an example. And this example, what we get, is our everyday practice. So now, I know that you have practiced some yoga, you are disciplined, you are living healthy, everything. But because I came here today, and this space is from the hospital, definitely someone is coming from the hospital, or some doctor, or some have health problems. So, let’s begin with how our day should begin. So, the way of thinking we change, everything changes. So when you get up in the morning and open your eyes, what do you think? Sometimes there are some people who say, "Oh God, I woke up again. I don’t want to live anymore." It’s a horror. There are some people. They tell Swamiji, "Again I woke up." I say, "Thanks to God that you woke up." So, in my case, when I get up, when I wake up, my eyes open, I look at my best pictures, photos of my master or some divine person, some god or mother or father. First, I look at that happy face of my dear one. So the best is that when you wake up, you look at your child, a photo, or this and that. Don’t put aggressive pictures. Animals are very good, but not for the sleeping rooms when you wake up. We love them, but if you have a house pet, it’s okay because you love that one with you. So first, you open your eyes and see what you see. Second, I do, said, "I am human. I am human." Now, what happens when I said "human"? Then it’s what we sometimes call, "Don’t do such things, it’s not human." What humans should do and what humans should not do, that is protecting us, that is warning us, giving us good feelings and instructions. So, I am a human. Definitely, there is a difference between animals and humans. So, we are human. Second thought, what makes me human? Not this body only. In the body also sits the devil. In the body sit some cruel persons. So, what makes me human? And that makes me a human, the qualities, the best qualities, human qualities: peace, harmony, joy, love, understanding, forgiveness, compassion, helping, etc. These are the qualities of the human. The next question comes: how to develop these qualities? Because the parallel is going: anger, hate, jealousy, cruelty, and the thieves, criminals, etc., etc., there is another quality there. So humans have these two paths. Which path should we go? Path of compassion, or path of cruelties, torturing? And believe it or not, it’s called karma. Destiny is coming from our deeds. So what we did, what I did, that will come one day to me. Every action will have a reaction, and every reaction will have an action. Sooner or later, it comes back to us. So, we discuss what these qualities are and how to develop them. These are the thoughts. Rest for half a minute, or two, three, four, ten seconds. And then you get up and you go to the bathroom. First time in the morning, when you touch the water from your water tap, how do you feel? Water. Thank God. And feel this water. Water is life. It means the elements, water. You open the window and say, "Ah, good air," or quickly close it again. There’s so much traffic. It depends where, which side your window is. And then whatever we get, breakfast, anything, thanks God that you... So, like this, we occupy ourselves with healthy, happy, and comfortable thoughts in our life, and they will guide us the whole day and through everything. Then, if you believe in God, you make prayers. If you don’t believe, it’s your choice. There are not two gods. There is only one God. There are three cups of milk or tea or anything, three cups, glasses, and every glass has a different color, different size, but in every glass is a nice, pure water. So we are not thinking of only the glass, but what is inside, that water. So I like water, you like water, he can’t live without water, he is thirsty, that. So, water is water, only one. So, God is God. Don’t see the form of God, but God is that love. So, in yoga and in life, there was one story someone told me about a primary school where there were about 35 little children, students, in the class. And one master comes to the classroom. The children were standing up. Said, "Good morning, sir." They also said, "Good morning, kids. How are you?" And they were sitting, and that master said, "I have something for you today." They said, "Yes, what?" Children are always curious. So, Master said, "I have ten dollars in my pocket, and I want to give this ten dollars to one of you who answers my question." So they said, "Yes, sir. Tell me, where is God?" So, children were raising their hands up for everyone. One said, "God is in my mother, in my dog is my God, in the church is God, now my grandmother," etc. Children whom they love, there is so much love. There are some subjects: my dog, my rabbits, this, that. Then the master is listening. Well, thirty-four children, they said something, what they liked, my friend, this. One child was there listening, so the teacher said, "What about you?" Then he stood up and said, "Do you have an answer?" He said, "Sir, I have no answer, but I have a question, Master." I said, yes, but you know, I don’t have ten dollars. I can help you clean your car windows and glass. I said, no, it’s okay, no problem. Ask a question, please. Sir, tell, where is there no God? The teacher said. What are your parents doing? The boy said, "Sir, my parents do yoga in their life." Sir, practice yoga every day. The same teacher comes after a few months and asks again. Every day, the teacher was asking something. And the student was asking, and the teacher was answering every question. And there was one boy in the yoga class. He was already about 15 or 18 years old, and he was very jealous of his master. Why? He knows everything. Anything we ask him, he answers. I want to know one day that he doesn’t know the answer. But whatever he asks, his master now answers. So the student decided, "I will do something and ask the question, my teacher, and he will say, ’Sorry, I don’t know.’ Then I will have a chance to say, ’Master, you also don’t know,’" because we all students think, "Oh, you are a wise one, a great one, but you also sometimes don’t know." I will today show him that he also does not know. Part 2: The Bird in Your Hands So, a student caught a small bird in his hand. Five minutes later, he came into the classroom. He entered and said, "Good morning, sir." The teacher replied, "Good morning. You came late today." The student said, "I’m very sorry, sir. I came late, but Master, I have one question today." The teacher said, "Yes, sit down and tell me." But the student said, "No, no... Master, I won’t answer immediately." The Master knew that something was going on. He said, "Yes, please." The student asked, "Sir, can you tell me what I have in my hands?" The Master said, "In your hands you have... you caught one word: 'Master, I love you. I am proud of you. You are my master. I know that you know everything. How stupid I am that I am asking you questions.'" The master said, "Okay, okay, alright, sit down." The student insisted, "No, no... Master, I have still one question more." The teacher said, "Yes." Now the student was thinking, and he made a plan. He decided to ask the master, "The bird is in my hand. Is it life or death? A dead bird or alive?" He thought: If the master says it is a dead body, a dead bird, then I will let it fly and say, "Master, you don’t know, it is life." Or if he says, "It is a life," I will squeeze it in my fist and say, "Master, you do not know either; it is a dead body, a dead bird." Whatever he says, he will be wrong. Then, today I am successful. I am the right one. The student said, "Sir, you know everything, my dear. And how stupid I am, I am always asking you nonsense questions. But please, sir, I always have doubts, and you clear my doubts. How nice it is." The teacher said, "Yes, come on. What is it?" The student asked, "Is the bird alive or dead?" The Master said, "My dear, I don’t know." The student was surprised. "Sir, this is the first time in my life you said you don’t know." The teacher said, "Yes, I don’t know." The student asked, "How is that possible? Just tell me, is the bird life or death?" He said, "My child, the life of the bird depends on your hands." Then the student let the bird fly and said, "Thank you, sir." Similarly, our health, our life, everything is in our hands. So we shall practice and begin today. We will become healthy and healthy... You can, you will definitely achieve what you want to achieve. It will take time, but slowly, slowly, and with a very simple exercise. As simple as it is powerful. And it is so powerful that you don’t dare to do it. That’s powerful. When someone is angry with you, and you are angry, and the other is angry, and you are so angry that now you want to give a slap on the cheek. But how quickly the hand goes, that is not energy. Go, and then slowly, slowly, in this way, your hand will go down. You have no power, no strength to do something. So, doing slow exercises slowly is more powerful. Come on, there are chairs open for free. So, when I entered the hall, I saw Prem Pūjā was giving you some exercises, very simple yoga for daily life. So now, I will give you two examples, and then I will finish my talk. First, close your fist and open it, close and open. Now you can look at your palm, close your fist, open the palm, close your fist, open. It doesn’t matter what you feel, how much you feel, but now I will tell you what you feel now, so I wish that you feel a minimum of a hundred times more. Same movement, same exercise, but one hundred percent more. So, close your fist, thumb inside. Now, close the fist. And with the right hand, hold your left wrist tight, very tight. Open the palm and look at your palm, beautiful, pale color. Look at your palm. Look at the tips of your fingers, the whole palm. Observe. Don’t look at me. Look at the tips of your fingers. Now, jerk your palm, feel your palm, release your right hand. How do you feel? And is there a difference between the two? This one is relaxed, very light, and looks healthy. And this one is heavy. Well, both have to be in harmony. So let’s do it now with the right one. Pump a little bit like this and close the fist. Yes, try it. And with the left hand, hold your right wrist very tight, open the palm, and this time you will do it consciously, and you will look at your palm. You will see how the circulation is going. There is no miracle. We block the blood circulation, and now we will release it, and see how quickly the blood is shooting. So, look at the palm and release. This means when you do the yoga postures, there are three types. The dynamical movements, that’s called the body warming postures or the movements. After that comes the stretching, that is the dynamic, slow movement and stretching. And third is holding for a long time, that is called a posture. So, yoga practice is kept at different levels, slowly, slowly... and slowly. This is number one. Number two, the second experiment is this. Look again at your palms. Beautiful. Our hands are beautiful, yes. Now, hold your fingers like this, and you feel the sensation like some needles, no? I want you to feel not 100%, but 500% movement. Therefore, bring the palms together, from the tips of the fingers to the wrist. Give the pressure. I want to see the fire fangs falling down. Don’t worry, we have here the fire brigade. Come on, come on. Oh, you see, you should support me because I said 500. And if you will not, it will be only four hundred eighty percent; there is twenty missing. Come on, let’s do it. Only one inch difference, fingers together. Slowly move like this. The needles are moving. All you do like this. This is a self-healing energy from our palms, from our body. Now, fold your palms and close your fists. So, we can help others, or we can help ourselves by giving energy and healing. If you have stomach pain, you can do this: while inhaling, bring the energy in, and while exhaling, release it out. It will release the pain. It can be here, it can be here on the body, anywhere, or somebody else, or someone has a headache. So yoga is that self-therapy. You don’t need anything. Just have a little cloth or yoga mat, and lie down or sit and practice. And if you can’t sit, sit on a chair and practice yoga in daily life. Very simple. Then he is going to exercise until the head is standing, then the hand is standing. If you do a handstand now, you will fall down and break some part of your body, some bones. You come to the doctor. The doctor will give treatment and will ask you what you did. You said, "Well, I was standing on the hands." He said, "Oh my dear, God gave you hands not for standing. He gave the legs for standing, so stand on the legs." So don’t do yoga with extreme movements and twisting. Take time, slowly, slowly, like you grow from childhood till now, slowly. Like this, it grows again, back slowly, slowly to the young. Oh my God. In five years, I tell you that I will not recognize you, that you were that one who was sitting here, young guy. No? It will be different. So the whole system will change in your body, regenerating, which we call kāya kalpa, regenerating the body’s health. Bones, the glands, muscles, tissues, all organs, everything will be renewed. How nice! And you will enjoy your being a human life. So, yoga, never do too quickly, and don’t torture. Peaceful and slowly inhale. When we close the fist, then all the blood goes away. And then, when we open, the blood comes back. So, the postures have been researched in Europe about yoga, and their life books are the postures. So, there are two kinds of postures, the same but in two forms. One is called, that is called a cobra pose. So, we don’t have, does someone have a yoga mat here? It’s very good. And who will demonstrate? Shanti, you will do? Asara, you will do? Are you a good yoga teacher also? Where are you going? He’s okay. You know, we are live today, not dead. We are live today. It’s going out to the whole world. So, Bhujaṅgāsana. So, do the Bhujaṅgāsana as far as you can go back, as much as you can go back. Elbows stretching, stretching the elbows, going more back, head down, and more, head, back side, okay. So, more than this, some people can twist their back more. Yes, but she is the best yoga and daily life teacher, so she doesn’t dare to do the posture, which is wrong, in front of the master. Yeah. Okay. Very good. Come and lie down. So, this was called the cobra posture. Why do they call it the cobra? When the snake is angry or aggressive or something, then he comes and looks up. When everything is okay and peaceful, then he goes back. So, there is, at the end of the spinal column, down, there is one center, the Svādhiṣṭhāna center, and our anger, our burning anger, is there in that cakra. So it comes up, but when the cobra comes up for a while, then that energy is released, and it is no longer aggressive. It goes down and goes further. So now the exact cobra posture was, she was doing, she was doing very exactly, she didn’t want to do it wrong, but no problem, but it was a little wrong. Now, they said, for example, put your hands parallel to the body, yes, and now slowly raise the upper part of your body up, and that’s all. So now when we do this, then really the whole back muscles are in tension, and all blood goes away. And then, when she releases, come down, please. Then, an immense amount of blood comes to the back muscles. Now, this is because there were five doctors who did research on yoga and death, and each did not know the other. Then it came in a scientific magazine, and there it was explained that while coming up, you should take 10 seconds. So come up in 10 seconds, and now count 15 seconds. Stay there: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, and then come 10 seconds, 5 seconds down. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. Now, this kind of movement, what we call Bhujaṅgāsana, in this way, has a healing effect. It will remove all the tension from your back, and it will be very good. It will support your lungs, even. And it will support the spinal column. So, like this, the far line muscles of the back will be removed. So, yoga is a process which holds our spinal column, and the same thing is then śalabhāsana. So, yoga in daily life is a scientific system. It is like a treatment for your body to make you happy and healthy. Thank you, Zara. So, we will do a few minutes of meditation, okay? So, this is straight. If you can, take off your shoes so that you can feel more energy in the soles of your feet. Hands on the thighs or on the lap, like this. It’s your comfort, either hand touching, palms touching the thighs, or upward, palms towards the ceiling. These two fingers, thumb and index finger, are touching, and they say this is chin mudrā, and they say that this calms down your thoughts, the restlessness, tension releases. And these two fingers, thumb and index finger, recently one doctor was giving commentary on the yoga and mudrās, this is mudrā. And they said this, both are connected to the pineal and pancreas, the gland. Hello, we are healthy, so no problem, but we shall hold like this. And if you want to see anything more in this room, look at it. Afterwards, we will close our eyes, so you need not open them, because nothing will be new here. Okay? So please close your eyes. Withdraw thyself from the external world. Relax the whole. Place your hands on your thighs or your knees. Be aware of your being in this hall. Deep inhale. Exhale. We will chant once. We will deeply inhale. Chant with me. Three times: mantra, peace, śānti, oṁ, śānti, śānti. Body, feel your being here. Be aware of your being here. Deep inhale and exhale. Place your palms together. Rub your palms. Place the hands on the face. Gentle massage to eyelids. So, for today, that is enough. This meditation is very nice, very simple, very good. It will help you very, very much to relax and gain good health. After practicing this technique for two or three months, you can then take the second technique, developing concentration on certain organs or limbs of the body. If you have some pain or something, send healing energy through meditation for two or three months, not only for one day, two days, or one week. You have to practice long to take care of the inner organs. Like this, likewise, there are many other techniques to add on to this meditation technique that is called self-inquiry meditation, self-healing meditation. And then you have here Prema Pūjā, and our dear Sara and these other yoga teachers, yoga and life teachers, they will help you. God bless you, wish you all the best, and today’s Hari Om from my side.