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God is dwelling in each and every entity

A spiritual discourse on Sanātana Dharma, yoga, and the nature of true friendship.

"If you protect the dharma, dharma will protect you. That is called Sanātana Dharma."

"Yoga means union... this is called jīvātmā and paramātmā."

The lecturer addresses a gathering in Wellington, explaining the eternal principles of Sanātana Dharma as distinct from dogmatic religion, using analogies like the ocean and its waves. He defines yoga as the union of the individual soul with the universal consciousness and outlines a practical path of daily practice encompassing body, energy, mind, and awareness.

Filming location: Wellington, New Zealand

Wellington is a city with very good prāṇa, energy, and little pollution. It is a city where one likes to live. Of course, many of you are not from here, but at present we are here, and it is good—thank you. I have been coming to this country for many years. Unfortunately, my time is very limited, so I cannot dedicate a long period, but I try to come for at least one weekend. Our dear President, our dear Naginbhai, as well as our Nivyapurī—what is your name from here? Treasurer. No, not Rajaraja. David. Okay. So, dear David, I gave him the name Divya Purī. Divya means divine, the divine consciousness. Our dear Mataji has been with us from the beginning, and many other bhaktas and friends, like Lakshmi, have also been with us for many, many years. So, it is a happiness to see our dear friends. Friends are different, and the audience is different. I come for the friends, not for a crowd of the audience. The quantity is not as much as the quality. And quality is in the friendship. There is a very nice word in our Indian language, in Hindi: dostī. This word means friendship. "Do" means "two," and "shakti" means "faithful." It means both are faithful to each other. One leads to the real path. That is a friend: dharma-dhīraj-mitra-arṇāri apat-kāl-parākhāyun-chārī. There are certain things which are very important to know to determine if someone is truly a friend or not. The first is dharma. Dharma is not religion. Religion is a philosophy. Religion is a way of thinking and worshipping different gods or the names of the gods. But dharma is very important. Bhagavān Kṛṣṇa said in the Bhagavad Gītā, "Arjuna, from time to time I manifest myself. I come on this earth to protect the dharma and destroy the adharma." So, what is dharma and what is adharma? When we understand this, then there will be no more war. There will be no more fight. But in this Kali Yuga, this iron time, this dark time, I would say that my religion is the best. But the other one is sitting in front of me and says, "No, no, my religion is the best." A third will say, "No, my religion is the best." And if you don’t believe in my religion, then get out from here. Others will say, "No." A fourth will say, "Whoever doesn’t believe in my religion has no right to live here." So that is religion. God is only one. God is only one. And that God is not visible; that God is omniscient and omnipresent in different ways. God never said or brought the idea that this religion is good and this is not good. No. So this is a kind of dogma which brings duality into society. Dharma is different. That dharma is called Sanātana Dharma. This is a Sanskrit word, and another problem is language. People fight because of language. If we all accept this exactly, then there will be no problem. So, dharmo rakṣita rakṣitaḥ. If you protect the dharma, dharma will protect you. That is called Sanātana Dharma. Now, what is Sanātana Dharma? I will repeat what Kṛṣṇa said: jīvā means the soul, jīvā means creatures. Every creature, even a small, tiny ant or a big elephant, has one soul, and they are all the equal light of God. So he said, "I dwell in each and every entity. All these creatures are a part of myself, my relatives." So we are not separated from God. God is with us, and we are with God, but not in that limited way. We might say, "God is only with me," if you speak Hindi. Then others will say, "No, no... God is only the one who speaks Latin." So language can confuse us, but belief and confidence are the reality. So, God is in everyone, everywhere, but is not visible to our eyes. Now, Sanātana: the sun rises and the sun sets. The sunset and sunrise, the process which we see, is sanātana. But the sun is not moving; it is the earth that is moving, creating day and night. If there were only day, I think we would have trouble. And if it were only night, we would also have trouble. Another explanation is the ocean. There is a big ocean, all the different seven oceans. The water we see is the ocean. It has a name: ocean. It has a beach or a shore. There are waves. It is ocean, it is water. There is no difference between water, waves, and ocean. If there is no water, there are no waves. So, waves and water are the same. Now, the steam or the prāṇa rises up from the ocean. And we say, "Oh, this is steam or fog that’s coming. Look, the fog is there." So now the ocean has changed into the fog and goes a little higher. "Oh, the clouds." The fog has become a cloud. And clouds, after some time, come lower, change the environment, and begin to rain. They say, "Oh, the cloud is raining." And then, dropping together, water is flowing. He said, "Oh, the water is flowing and becomes a little creek." It is a beautiful, small creek. It joins the river and we say, "Oh, beautiful, beautiful, mighty river." And the river flows always towards the ocean. And he said, "Oh, the river is merging into the ocean." Then the last name is a river, finished. Again, it becomes the ocean. So this is a process. That is sanātana. It will be; it is. The seed we put in the ground, whether we believe or not, sprouts, then grows, and gives more seeds. So, coming and going automatically, that is sanātana. Our soul is descending from the astral world, comes to this material world, and it goes into the water. Our soul, through nourishment, comes into the body, into the mother’s body. And five elements come together in the beautiful form of the human or other creature. This process is sanātana. There is no scientist until today who can make one drop of blood. No scientist is still there who can make honey like a honey bee makes honey. That is sanātana, changing, coming; that is sanātana. Water is sanātana, air is sanātana, the heat, the fire is sanātana. That is called the Sanātana, and this Sanātana Dharma is given to us. What is Dharma? That is Sanātana Dharma. To explain a little bit more about Sanātana Dharma: The husband has his dharma towards his wife, and the wife has dharma towards her husband. And if they both follow their Dharma, there will be happiness, understanding, and peace. The relation of the child to the mother and the relation of the mother to the child is the Dharma. The friend to friend is our Dharma. And so that Dharma people understand, like a religion. Yes, religion is also a very nice word, religion. And that is called, coming from "realize your Dharma," meaning religion. So, realize your relation to God is religion. Dharma, therefore, we call the value of Sanātana Dharma. So if we follow the Sanātana Dharma, the dharma will protect us. The trees are growing, giving fruits, everything—that is sanātana. The mother gives a baby—that is sanātana. So this is all through which we can become one with nature and then one with the cosmic light or God, whatever you believe. Dharma rakṣita rakṣitaḥ. So, if we protect or follow the dharma, dharma will protect us or will follow us. And this is the duty of humans. Animals also have their dharma to follow, but they have very low consciousness, while humans have more. Human—out of 8.4 million different creatures, one is the human. And humans have a very powerful tool, and that is called intellect. And we need education for our intellect. Whatever kind of education we get, like that we become. We study medicine, we become doctors. One studies engineering, one studies farming, one studies yoga, etc. So, like that, we will develop. Or nowadays, what is called the terrorist—that is also a kind of education, how they are educating them. What they can do, we can’t do, and we should not do, and we will not do. Yes, so that is dharma. And now, your dharma—I will explain to you more—is that if you really follow the dharma, then take care of your body. God gave you such a beautiful, healthy body, and now we don’t care about that: what we eat, what we drink, and what we utilize is something different, what they call drugs. It is not good. So, first our dharma is that we should take care of our body, that we are healthy, we are happy, we are relaxed, and we can help others. We want to live long to support, help, and protect the divine creation. And for that, we should take care of our body. It is not that we will live forever. One day we will pass away. One day we will go. Many came and went. But as long as we live, we should live happy and healthy. And so there are many systems in the world to be healthy. But one of those I would say—not only, but one of those—is yoga. Yoga is not only physical exercise. Physical exercise is good for our body’s movements, nerves, glands, digestion, joints, etc. Yoga is not only breathing, prāṇāyāma, or breath techniques, but that is good for our lungs and purifies the toxins from the body. So we need the breath techniques, but that is not yoga. We sit down and meditate or concentrate, yes, for coming to the one point. That is called relaxation, happy and healthy. We will die also one day; we are not immortal here, and we... don’t want to be immortal because it is a long... how do you say? It gets boring. So we want to go to some other lokas and see how it is looking there. If you don’t like it, then come back. So yoga, there are two words: "yo" and "ga." This yoga means union, union or becoming one. And this is called jīvātmā and paramātmā. Paramatma. Jīvātmā is our individual soul. Paramatma is the highest one. Now, this Jīvātmā is longing to come back to that universal one. But how? Separation was easier, but to come back again is not easier. Therefore, it is said: the thread of love, do not break it. It is very fragile, and if it is broken with some misunderstanding, then you can’t join it. And if you try to join it, it will become a knot between the two. Therefore, human understanding, human love to all creatures, and also to oneself. We should also enjoy our life. We should have all comfort, but constantly we should meditate that our awareness of the consciousness merges into the cosmic consciousness. This is what we call yoga. Yoga karam su-koshlam, and your yoga sādhanā practice will be successful if you practice every day. Not only for one weekend; we have to practice every day. If you practice only on the weekend, on Sunday and Saturday, and other days you don’t practice, okay? So you should eat also on Sunday, Saturday and Sunday, and the rest of the days you have no time? So you don’t eat anything? Oh yeah, that we have time. We do have enough time, but we don’t follow. Who smokes a cigarette? It doesn’t matter how busy he or she is, they will find time to smoke. Or who is an alcoholic? It doesn’t matter how busy he or she is, but they will have time to sit down and drink alcohol. So you can find time for that. So, can’t we find some good time for our physical, mental, social, and spiritual health? And that is through yoga practice. So, my dear, it is called yoga for body and beyond. Yoga for body, for our good health, and beyond means for awareness, for consciousness, for our soul, for our ātmā, for our emotion, for our mind, for our intellect. There are subtle functions in our body, but we can’t touch them, we can’t see them. It is within us. That is Sanātana Dharma. So, what a wonderful creation, and that he is here, but we can’t see. Mokuṅ kahā tū dhuṇḍe bande, maiṅ to tere pās mein. A Sufi saint said, "Mokun kaha tu dhunde bande, main to tere paas mein. Oh my friend, where are you searching me? I am with you." Seher se bār kutya hamārī. My hut is out of the city. Derā merā śvās mein. But my residence is in your breath. Khojoge to abhī milūṅgā, if you will search me really, you will see me immediately. Sojoge to abhī milūṅgā, pal bhar kī talāś me. Just that was searching me, like our eyelids close and one goes up. Eye, what you call, eye blinking. So, he is with us, but we will never see him in that way, like you want to see. And if he will come one day in front of you, you will say, "Look, he became like a God," but he is not a God. So, God will smile and say, "Yes, you are right." Do you know how God is? He said that also. I don’t know, he said. Okay, bye-bye. After, you will say, "Oh, God." And he said, "Yes, I was. Come back, please." He said, "Next time, it is time." So everything is with us. Body—first we have to take care of our body and know how our body is. And the body is surviving with nourishment. This is liquid nourishment, solid nourishment. These are two very important for us. So, jaisā khāī an vaisā rahe man. What kind of food we will eat, like that will be our mind functioning. Jaisā pīye pānī, vaisī bole bānī. What kind of liquid you drink, like that you will speak. And jaisā kare saṅg, vaisā lāge raṅg. With whom you are spending your time, you will get that habit or that kind of feeling. So, body. After the body is prāṇa, the energy. Our body has no strength if there is no energy, no prāṇa. But that prāṇa we can’t touch. Already we are out of the body. Then come our senses, and then from the senses come desires. Then, from desires, after that comes the mind. And after that, mind comes intellect, and after the intellect comes awareness, and then comes consciousness. After that consciousness, then we know our self. You may call it soul, ātmā, or thyself, which is one with God in God’s light. And this is a process, a program for the practice of yoga. So, I will be a few days here, and we will take this step by step: this subject—body, energy, senses, desires, mind, intellect, awareness, consciousness, and different levels of consciousness. So, yoga for body and beyond. Tomorrow, we will talk about energy, prāṇa, if you have heard the word prāṇa. And then it continues. We will see how it will develop. So, my dear, all yoga is our life. Yoga begins with our life, and yoga goes further with our life. Wish you all the best. Good evening, and 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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