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Good evening once more, and welcome. Today is Sunday, and we have already been here for ten days. In these ten days, you must feel the effect of what we have been practicing. Many of you have changed and moved to a new group. I hope you feel comfortable and relaxed. For the last ten days, we have been continuously talking about the Patañjali Yoga Sūtra. Unless it is clear and aspirants do not behave accordingly, there is no more progress, or it cannot be explained further. If you see improvement in the students—meaning they follow what you are teaching—then there will definitely be improvement. If there is no improvement, it means the discipline was missing. It is not only physical, thinking, "Okay, I will keep silent, I will not do this," but it is also mental. What Patañjali is speaking touches the core problem of aspirants: why there is no development. Those who are honestly practicing and would like to achieve can see the progress. We were speaking about vṛttis, kliṣṭa or akliṣṭa vṛttis. Kliṣṭa vṛttis are disturbing factors. We spoke about the three jñāna-indriyas which have a very intensive influence on our vṛttis. First, through vision, our eyes. Whatever we see, it is natural that we give judgment, we think about it, we know what it is, but still we are thinking about it. This can be kliṣṭa or akliṣṭa. This can be good or bad. If it is good, it supports you. If it is restless, it will not support you; it will not give you calmness. Say you are coming somewhere, and there is a very nice bush full of blossoms, with a beautiful smell and very nice appearance. You come near; your eyes are pleased to see, your nose is pleased to smell. This creates in you harmonious thoughts. But at the same time, we should know that these fragrances are temporary. This smell will be temporary. When it is gone, then you will be unhappy. So it depends on what we see and how we judge that. But you can say, "Well, next season it will be again." Then it is okay. So this is an akliṣṭa vṛtti. It means beautiful thoughts, harmonious thoughts, good thoughts, supporting your sādhanā, creating within you happiness. Now, a kliṣṭa vṛtti: suppose you walk and suddenly you see a wild tiger sitting there. Now, which kind of vṛttis will awake in you? What will happen? This vṛtti will disbalance your entire physical feeling and psychic state, both. The tiger was nice enough; he excused you, and he stood up and disappeared in the forest. But this thought remains in you all the time, for many, many years, and will create fear. So this is a kliṣṭa-vṛtti, disturbing. Similarly, with sound: there are kinds of sounds which you like to hear, which are harmonious. Or you are waiting for someone's call, and the telephone rings, and you hear the voice; you are very happy. But there are different kinds of disturbing sounds, and you are not happy. Sleeping at midnight, your neighbor begins to work in the bathroom, fixing the tiles or boring. Now the sound is disturbing you. So here, both kinds of thoughts and sounds, though temporary, are disruptive. So what to do? Try to protect yourself as much as you can, and let those sounds come which support your spiritual development or your vairāgya. When you see a beautiful bush with nice flowers and smell, it creates in you rāga, moha, or attachment. It creates the thought that you are bound again more to this visible world, the material world. That will push you again and again back. So in this way, this is a kleśāvṛtti. The tiger immediately created in you fear, and you would not like to see it again or meet the tiger like this. You will avoid it, and that will support that you are careful, and your vairāgya develops because you want to renounce. Without renouncement, your sādhanā cannot be fulfilled. Third, smell. Good smells or bad smells. Good smells you like; you feel happy, relaxed, comfortable, a feeling of freshness, calm. And some bad smells make you ill; it disturbs your whole inner system. Now, which is a bad smell? It is a kliṣṭa vṛtti. Which is a good smell? It is akliṣṭa. But now, with this good, you became attached to this smell. You would like to have this smell. So it is an obstacle for your progress. The bad smell always makes you alert to avoid such places or such smells, and that makes you careful, alert, and renouncing in your feelings. Now, if you cannot smell anything, then you are completely free and neutral. That bad smell, if someone puts it on your hand, does not matter; you do not smell it. Or a good smell, perfume put on your hand, but you do not smell anything; it is nothing. So how in our consciousness the information is given creates the vṛtti. Know the vision, the sound, and the smell. These three are very difficult to control. Eating, the sense of taste, is okay. As long as you did not taste, you do not know, and you have no feelings. You ate and you say, "Okay, it must not be." This you can avoid easily, but smell, sound, and vision. Let us say that you cannot hear anything. Now, it does not matter even if the people are making noise, the neighbor is working the whole night for you; it does not matter. In Prague, I was once there, and someone who had hearing machines—we had a program, but he went—he always used to go to sleep earlier. He forgot to take the key out from the door. He locked himself inside, took his machine away to sleep, and you cannot believe, even we were knocking on the window so loud, no sign. So for him, it does not matter if you are boring or plumbing or anything you are doing. Finally, we informed the neighbor. He came; the neighbor had a big ladder. He came, but it could not help. Also, we were knocking directly on the room where he was sleeping. Then we had to break the glass door to go in and open it. So it is that when you are detached, then it has no influence on you, whether it is like this or not. So, kliṣṭa or akliṣṭa vṛttis. Also, there are what we call the evidence, or we are pramāṇa, meaning the witness. That is the right word. How can we gaze and create the vṛttis? It is said there was no rain at all here, and a flood came. What can be? Somewhere it was raining, and that is why the flood we see. Somewhere there is smoke, but we do not see the fire, so we will gaze. Yes, there must be some fire; without fire, there is no smoke. So, without any regions within us or outside, it will not disturb us, or it can disturb us. So, Patañjali, what he is trying to say is: master your mind. Now, mind has many definitions, but here it means master your thoughts. Now, how to master the thoughts? This is not very easy, and of course, if it were very easy, then Patañjali would not speak about it, and so it is difficult. Now, how will the wise person do it? We will hear, give the judgment, and finish. Do not carry it with you so long. You know the story I taught, I think two, three times. Many of you know, many do not know. There was once in the forest a monk living, and these monks, they had white robes, and they were only traveling by foot, no shoes, no vehicles, using walking through, and wherever it is sunset, or when the sunset time was, it does not matter where they are, they stay overnight there. Masters used to give them a hard training; it is always the test. To pass the test is not so easy. Nowadays, we do not have time for that. If the master tells something, we say, "Oh, okay, I go." But the real seekers, the real aspirants, will not decide something different. They follow the Guru's word. That will come through. You think that twenty million people are practicing and all will get this enlightenment? Twenty million self-realized souls on this planet. Can you imagine? Wow! My God! This planet will be heaven on earth. But be happy if out of twenty million, one is self-realized. So where are we? Or it could be that some of you are that one, and people are the billions of people in the world. So in one million, one, maybe all of you are that one, one. But do not think now, like Nārada said, "Ahaṁ Brahmāsmi." That was only imagination. That was only the thinking, the thoughts. Reality and thinking are different. Therefore, even though you are that one, you have to be humble, surrendered, calm, and so on. So to go through these practices, we need a great, great support from the spiritual masters. We need to follow their footsteps, we need to follow their words, and however hard it is, we have to follow. It is what we call a hard nut to crack, a very hard nut to be opened. Well, the master had two young disciples who wanted to become monks. So there was a training for them on what they should do and what they should not do. So the master told them, "For twelve years, do not come back to me. Do not go to your home, do not go to your friend's house, do not go to your birthplace, do not go anywhere in the villages, stay outside, or if it is a village, then stay in the temple. There are humanitarian centers in the temple, there, or in the forest, where Agyā and to achieve is not so easy. Everything we can digest, but our attachment we cannot. That is very painful. Who cannot digest is painful, and those who can, they will come through. That is all." Those great saints who thought for a long, long time gave some disciplines, physical and mental disciplines. That is why Patañjali's very beginning said, "Atha yogānuśāsanam," discipline. If you have discipline, come to me; otherwise, go. Hari Om. So you come to me and say, "Can a mantra master?" I said, "Yes, after twelve years." Okay. In the newspaper, there is one seminar with some master there. Oh, I go there. So you go somewhere else. There you get a mantra immediately. Then what happens, you know, after. To have a mantra is not enough; you should not ask. You should be asked to become, that is it. So for twelve years: do not eat after sunset, do not sleep, Brahmamuhūrta, one and a half hours before sunrise you must get up, do not sleep during daytime. So there were some disciples like me who said, "Okay, Master, we will not sleep, but can we do Yoganidrā?" You know how clever we are? We have many. Do not carry anything with you. Do not touch the money anyone gives you. Say, "Thank you, no, keep it." But still, if they want to give it, then tell them, "Please give that to poor people." All these twelve years, no touching any money, yes. And twelve years, no touching any woman. And to women, it all: no touching a man, so please, ladies, do not be angry. That is why we are so lower caste? No, no, you are very higher caste. It was not like that. Well, after five years traveling through the forest and so on, one day at lunchtime, they had some nice fruits, bananas, mangoes, or some kind of apples. And they were sitting near the bank of the river. It was very hot weather, and both brothers decided to have some fruits. They were eating fruits, and one young lady came, the same age like them, and she came and said, "Hello, brothers, how are you?" They said, "Very good, thank you, sister. How are you? Would you like to share some fruits with us?" She said, "Well, no, but I have one request." What? "If you can help me, yes, of course. What can we help you?" "I have to go to that village, the other side of the river, and I do not know how to swim. If you can help me to cross the river." They said, "No problem. We are also going to the other side, so we will take you to cross the river." So one of them, who was stronger, said, "Okay, you will hold my shoulders. I will swim, but do not hug me like this. Otherwise, I cannot swim. Just hold it tightly, and we will come to the other side." So she did. He is swimming. Then all three of them came to the side of the bank. He dropped her on the bank of the river and said, "Okay, here you are. Take care." She asked, "Thank you very much. And what can I do for you, because you helped me?" They say, "Thank you. We do not need anything. It was our pleasure that we could help you." She said, "Yes, but you can tell anything, or any time you need, please let me know." So the man, or the monk, who was carrying her said, "Yes, one thing: learn swimming, so next time you do not need the help of anyone," and went away. Well finished, she went to the village. They went to their path. They never meet again; they never saw each other. Now, seven years passed about this story, and now this was the twelfth year, and Guru Pūrṇimā is coming. And you cannot imagine how happy they were that this Guru... Guru Pūrṇimā is going to be twelve years finished, and we will see our master. We hope he is alive. At that time, there was no SMS, no telephone, and nothing, you see. There was no communication system at all. Maybe through the horses, riding, ox, car, horse, coach, that is all. Or human to human, or there were pigeons, but they were happy. Oh, we will see the master. How will he look like? Twelve years must have become old and have gray hair. And oh, he will be also happy to see us. One day before Guru Pūrṇimā, the sunset was about twenty-five kilometers far, or thirty kilometers, and they stayed there overnight, could not sleep. Beautiful moon, shining one day before full moon, is nearly full moon. Nice weather, beautiful, peaceful. There was no noise at that time, no cars, no sound pollution, except the birds. Now they could not sleep, so happy they were and talking, "How will he recognize us? What will he say to us? Will he say, 'Come, my sons, how are you?' Will he ask us, 'How were the twelve years?'" and so on. And then the other one said, "Yes, brother, really, I am excited how it will be. But brother, what will you answer to the master?" Said what? "The master said, 'Do not touch any woman, do not touch any ladies.' But you did not touch her, but you carried her on your back. What will you say to the master?" The brother smiled and said, "Yes, you are right, my brother. But what will you say? Say, why?" "I did not touch her." He said, "Yes, I know. But you know, I carried her to cross the river, and I dropped her there seven years ago. But I am surprised that you are still carrying her in your mind." What will you answer to the master? And that is what Patañjali means: those vṛttis. These vṛttis will disturb you your whole life. These kliṣṭa vṛttis, or afflicted mental modifications, you will forget them. But the kliṣṭa vṛttis will remind you and torture you lifelong. As long as we cannot root it out, nirvīja, like sabīja samādhi, nirvīja samādhi. So, Nirvikalpa vṛttis and Savikalpa vṛttis. So, how many vṛttis do we have in our mind, good or bad? From what happened from very childhood till today, it is an individual thing, you know. Are you capable of purifying this, to understand logically and give the answer forever to free it? That is it. Therefore, the entire practice—your meditation, your malas, your kriyās, your anuṣṭhānas, your prāṇāyāmas, your prayers, and whatever you are doing for spiritual development—where are your thoughts stuck? Where is your feeling stuck? And these vṛttis, even if they will not let you free in sleep. Patañjali is saying that sleep is also one vṛtti. Sleeping, you think you are sleeping very deep, but Patañjali said no. In sleep, still you have thoughts, and vṛttis are active. He is giving an example. For example, when you are in deep sleep and you get up in the morning and you say, "Oh, I slept so well, I did not even have any dreams." That is all. That is it. How do you know that you slept so well and you had no dreams? So constantly you had a vṛtti that you are sleeping, so good. And therefore, the deep meditation and the sleep, in some way, are the same, equal. But in reality, it is not equal. The meditation leads you to the higher development, higher consciousness. And sleep leads you to just physical refreshment. We need sleep. When we are sleeping, then the entire body is finally good and relaxed. Many organs are relaxed and have time to work naturally, accordingly. A lot of oxygen, naturally, easily, we are inhaling. And all the kinds of toxins we are exhaling, a lot. Sleeping deeply is like a deep ujjāyī prāṇāyāma, deep, very tired and sleeping. Some are snoring, some must not be. That one is snoring. Snoring begins after thirty-five years, thirty years, thirty-five years, and so on. It depends on the vocal cords, tonsils here, and mostly snoring when you sleep on the straight on back; if you sleep sidewards, is less snoring. Anyhow, we are not talking about the sleep problem, but this is also connected with our vṛttis: that I slept very good, or I did not sleep very good. Similarly, in dreaming, so many vṛttis are going on. In dreams, things remind you, you remember, and at the same time you have new vṛttis and thoughts. Yes, this is like that, but I know from the past it is different. So you have an argument with yourself, you give the judgment, you acknowledge the situations, you create more thoughts, or you try to better the situation, or the situation should last long. Therefore, dream and sleep, according to Patañjali, are also a kind of vṛtti which we shall overcome. Smṛti, now that is also a very big problem. Smṛti means memory. You meditate, and suddenly some thoughts from old times come to you: "Oh, it was like that, oh it was like that." So smṛti is also a fact that cannot let you develop further; it will not let you go further. It will bring you back to your material attachment. One farmer died, and he had good karmas. So from the heavens, the angels or goddesses, whatever you call them, they came to take him to heaven, svargaloka, and the door opened, the door to heaven, and they said, "Come, please. This is for you. We welcome you here." He said, "What is all there?" He said, "Everything is beautiful. You will become very young immediately, and you will look ever young. And everything is pleasant, like time is standing there. Nothing is changing, and so, you all, you have been eating these." That everything, prāṇa, really, I will get everything. The farmers are more clever than us, you know, to be sure. And then the farmer said, "Yes, will I get my water pipe?" They said, "What? In heaven, there is nobody smoking tobacco. There is no water pipe." Then the farmer said, "Sorry, I think I was in the wrong place," and he went back. So it is that when we are on the door of some enlightenment, and suddenly the smṛti, the memory, the thoughts come out and create in you negative feelings, disappointment, aggression, doubts, anger, hate, jealousy, greed, and what not. Because you remember one situation, one thought, or you got some beautiful thought. Suddenly your Vairāgya became Tīvra Vairāgya, which means a very strong Vairāgya. All things dissolved. Nothing is there; just disappeared. And beauty, love, oneness, harmony, everything just awoke in you. And that smṛti, the thoughts, will bring you to the divine feeling, to the divine achievement. That will support your sādhanā. And therefore, Patañjali, in the entire book, in the Patañjali Yog Sūtra, is not talking about materials and this and that, but about the psyche of the person, the intellect of the person, and all the different levels of the consciousness: unconscious, subconscious, conscious, superconscious, and so on. And of course, he will come to the prāṇāyāma, āsanas. Now here Patañjali talks about āsanas. You can take any posture which you like. Many things I can meditate on lying down, like sleeping or yoga nidrā. Patañjali tells that there is a danger that you will fall asleep. On the right time, the door comes, you fail. Oh, God. And then you wake up there, where you have been, so you did not come any further. There was a story. Should I finish the story in three minutes? There is a story. There were three family members: a child, a husband, and a wife. They had always been a little bit of conflict, like every family may have. The husband was angry with her, and she was angry with him, and they were angry with the child, and the child was angry with them, but still they were a family and very poor. So one day, again, of course, Lord Śiva, who can be other? Lord Śiva and Pārvatī. We will see, I think today or tomorrow, Pārvatī will be born, you know. So Pārvatī was a little bit disappointed, and she said, "Lord, I cannot understand you." I said, "Why?" "What happened again? Look, there are so many people, they have more than what they need. And this is a poor family. They are so poor, cannot you give them something?" Śiva said, "Well, their destiny is not…" She said, "What do you mean, destiny? You can give a new destiny. You are a lord of lords, a universe. You can give. Just tell that you do not want to give." He said, "Well, I will give them, but you will see they do not take. Okay, go and give. I will look if they take or not." God always gives indirectly, not directly. Śiva appeared. The family was happy, and they said, "Are you?" So he said, "I am Śiva." "Oh, you are that guy who fulfills all wishes." He said, "Somehow, yes." Wow. So he said, "Do you have any wish?" Pārvatī was thinking that they would ask for money, or eating, and cloth, and some comfort of life, and so on. So ladies are first. So he asked her, "What do you wish?" She smiled and said, "Oh, really? You will give me?" He said, "Yes, I will give you." "Then make me so beautiful, so beautiful, that there is no female on this planet more beautiful than me. The king will take me in and make me the queen." Her husband was, but Śiva promised, so he said, "It shall be," and she became so beautiful. And the king took her as his first queen. Now she is enjoying her life with the king. She said, in one word, in one wish, I gain everything: beauty, king, kingdom, money, everything. But she did not care about her husband and child. Well, Śiva asked that man, "What do you wish, Bhakta?" He said, "Lord, you are the Almighty. Impossible things you can make possible, and what is possible you can make impossible. But in this situation, what do you think a husband will wish? Such a situation, and you…" Understand my heart, my Lord. Said, "Yes, I understand you. Did you have such a situation, Śiva?" She was a carry-on. "What you want, do not ask me the question. My family situation is not other." Pārvatī is looking only one wish. Ask. He said, "Lord, I…" Deeply disappointed, my wife, I did not think of her like this, that she will disappoint me and disappear like this. I wish to make her a monkey in the desert. There is not one tree, and she was it. It will be now. Monkeys are very hungry. Hungry all the time, eating, eating,… And full of desires, and so the queen disappeared from the palace. The king sent a message everywhere, but nowhere. And that lady was, became a monkey, sitting on the hot sand in the daytime, looking, "Where are the trees? Where is the water?" Hot, screeching here, screeching there. Well, the number came from the son. He was about twenty-five years or twenty years. God asked him, "My son, what do you wish? Your father, your mother, they asked what they want. What is your wish?" He said, "Lord, whatever it is, you are a great one to forgive everyone. To say the truth, without a mother, it is lonely at home. So make my mother as before she was at home." Śiva said, "As it will be." And she came home, and Śiva disappeared. So they remained as they were. Śiva said, "Pārvatī, something more?" She said, "Lord, your Līlā, your Māyā, you know. I am sorry to trouble you." Therefore, there are some who have such qualities, and their vṛttis, their desires, their own thoughts are against them. No one can help them there. Therefore, Patañjali is saying that you should master chitta vṛtti nirodha, all the prapañca of the world, and ignore it, take it away, and be above that. All these whom you think are mine, one day they will shout at you. Nothing is thine. Not even this body. You will be so disappointed with this body. Therefore, to achieve that higher consciousness and to become one with God and free from all these troubles is the way to master our mind, master our senses, master our life, and try to reduce or purify all the thoughts which are in the conscious, in the subconscious, or in the unconscious. Then we will also be free from birth and death. So, tomorrow Patañjali will again tell us something more. Today was this because some people ask, "Why did not Swāmījī talk about Patañjali?" I am sorry that they did not understand. They do not understand what I am talking about all the time. Patañjali is just not in my hand, but with me. So tomorrow, same time. Today, I wish you a very good evening. Have a good dinner, and our dear brothers, sisters, bhaktas, devotees, practitioners. In different countries, I wish you all the best, and if you go to sleep, good night.