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Good evening. Many blessings from our Siddha Pīṭha to all the bhaktas here on this island. Dear bhaktas, practitioners of Yoga in Daily Life, and practitioners of other spiritual sādhanās around the world, I welcome you to Swamijī TV and to all who are attending these five days of a spiritual Vihāra journey. Vihāra means wandering or traveling. This journey has brought us to this beautiful island in the beautiful country of Croatia, the Republic of Croatia, to this island called Pašman. Here there is a very spiritual center called Harmony. The owner of this complex is doing their very best to follow ahiṃsā and protect the environment and creatures, offering nice vegetarian, sāttvic, yogic, Āyurvedic food. I pray to Mahāprabhujī for their protection and prosperity. All dear bhaktas, you know we are here on this island not as tourists, but as guests. There is a difference. When you are a guest, you feel a relation. If you are a tourist, you feel nothing except that you have paid money and can do what you want. Unfortunately, many people come with such an imagination. The inhabitants of this island are our hosts. A host is ready to offer everything they have in the best way to their guests. But the dharma of the guest—not merely a duty—is to behave in such a beautiful manner that your host will remember you always. Such kinds of people have been here. After five days, regardless of how you spent your time or your 24-hour itinerary, I wish that we, as guests, leave behind a beautiful, everlasting, and permanent memory in the mind of our host. Guests must treat, respect, and protect the host’s property as their own, which means to take care. That is a part of Yoga in Daily Life. Many spiritual people try to achieve spirituality and divine consciousness. Our beloved holy Gurujī, His Holiness Śrī Svāmī Madhavānandajī, used to say often in satsaṅg: "Pranī mātrā sukhī kī icchā rakhte haiṁ, pranī mātrā sukhī cāhte haiṁ, duḥkh koī nahīṁ cāhtā hai." Every entity wishes happiness. No one wishes unhappiness or trouble. "Aslī sukha ātmā jñāna mein hai, brahma jñāna mein." Real happiness is in ātmā jñāna, brahma jñāna. Ātmā jñāna is given by Gurudev. This is a quotation from Gurujī. Many people try to find happiness. Some try in money, some in a partner, some in study and high position. It means everyone is hungry, starving. "Bhūk hī bhūk." Bhuk means hunger. Someone has a bhuk of money, a bhuk of beauty, a bhuk of partners. This kind of hunger, ambition, will never be fulfilled. Some try to get contentment through magic, tantra, different techniques. Yes, they may get some siddhi, but not mokṣa. Mokṣa only comes through pure devotion, pure sādhana, sāttvic sādhana. Spiritual sādhanā is where love is developing for all creatures. I remember once Holy Gurujī was telling a story in satsaṅg in 1968. Today, while swimming in the ocean, that memory awoke in me, as I told all of you. We are in the element of water. The ocean is holy. All the rivers, the saritās, flow into the ocean. The holy dust of the saints’ feet also flows into the ocean. Therefore, oceans should be adored, respected, and celebrated. Blessed are those who can think and feel like this. This water is not for your joking. It is not where you go in and are too lazy to come out to go to the toilet, so you make urine inside. Though in this Kali Yuga, people direct a lot of canalizations into the oceans, and that is not right. That is why humanity is suffering. The more they study higher education, the more atheist they become. They are only religious people three times in their life: at birth, marriage, and the death ceremony. And even many do not respect this. Unfortunately, many people go to temple, church, or religious places only because of social life. But people who stay with their family, farming and taking care of our nourishment, they are more spiritual and devout. If all would like to have only higher education and sit in an office, from where will you get your salad? No one wants to work in the field. Then we will have chemical salad and chemical tablets. Therefore, the life of a farmer, of country people, is not easy but also full of belief and devotion. God takes care of them more. Anyhow, while swimming, we try to keep discipline. We were like two strong, opposing forces. One side was the ladies, and the other side was like a scale in balance, and between them is that stick which keeps both sides balanced. It’s not easy. If you have to balance exactly milligram by milligram, then if one flies to the other side, it moves. In 1968, Holī Gurujī was giving beautiful satsaṅgas. He was making cāturmās. Chatur means four. Māsa means months. Four months, monsoon time—the sannyāsīs, the saints, the monks should stay in one place. No traveling, and where they stay, in a village or city, they give satsaṅgs. In Europe, it rains for 12 months. You never know when it’s raining. So it is called not catur māsa, but dvādaśa māsa. Yes, in Europe it is four months winter and eight months cold. So we have permanent... Seasons are not balanced because humans have become imbalanced due to pollution. I remember in 1968, I was sitting near Gurujī, and many bhaktas came to satsaṅg in the evening. One day Gurujī told a story about people who do black magic, going to the graveyard. They go and make prayers and ceremonies to get devil powers. But in the graveyard, there are no devils. There are only the bones of good people who died. But somehow they relate this with the dead bodies. There was one master, and he had one disciple. The disciple lived in a different part of India and got ātmā jñāna, becoming very spiritual. Unfortunately, after some time, his master became involved in magic powers, siddhis, going to the graveyard, sitting where the body is buried, sitting in Vajrāsana or on a horse, having dead skulls in their hands. I don’t know what they are doing, calling these priests—for what, I don’t know. He did so much that all the souls which were not liberated, who are still in the astral world—called Pitṛ Loka, the ancestors’ world—those ancestors who didn’t come to liberation, or svarga, or are not reborn still, they are hanging somewhere due to their karma. They need ceremonies and prayers from their children. That tantric master suddenly got siddhi. All these ghosts, spirits, came to him and said, "Yes, we are in your service. What can we do for you? Anything we can do, we are capable of doing everything. We can turn the earth upside down if you want." The master was very happy. "Now I have attained siddhi." He said, "When the time comes, I will call you and give you duties." From time to time, he used to go and wake them, anywhere in the forest. After long years, his disciple came back. He had a pure spiritual sādhanā: prayer, satsaṅg, helping, ātmā jñāna. He came to see his master. The master was very happy. At the end of the film, Dracula is killed. But suddenly you find someone has been bitten and says, "Oh, this is continuing. The seed is there." You know? So the Dracula, the blood of the Dracula is flowing in your veins, meaning that māyā, that lobha, kāma, krodha, krodha agni, lobha agni, moha agni, kāma agni, māyā—all this will not make a human happy. So, see your past. What have you done? God gave you one second, third time, fourth time, then God said, "No, finished." So, Patañjali—we are coming again to our great saint Patañjali. What Patañjali says in the Patañjali Sūtra, again I am coming back to the third sūtra of the Samādhi Pāda, where he says: "Tadā draṣṭuḥ svarūpe ’vasthānam. Vṛtti sārūpyam itaratra." I have told this three times, translated this, but I like it. That’s why I am coming again. The yoga sādhanā, why is it not successful? Patañjali said, "The inner obstacles awake in you, which are hidden in your subconscious." Outside, everything is okay, but it’s within you which disrupts you and others. Many times you find a very good partner, but you are the cause that makes him or her angry, and then he or she goes away. Love needs surrender. Love needs devotion. Love needs mutual understanding. Love needs confidence, and love doesn’t need all these physical things. Love is very gentle, very fine on the fine level. Love is a divine quality, and therefore it needs divine treatment. So there are obstacles, vyādhi. Vyādhi means some troubles, accidents, or diseases. Disease or accident or some troubles, astral, from the astral energy is coming. Astral negative energy is created through your negative thinking. Your phenomenon is full of dark energy inside. These are the nine kinds of obstacles which awaken in us. The first: in śarīra, in body, in indriyas, or in mind. In these three levels, disease awakes, and that disease makes you so unhappy. You lose your confidence, you lose your feelings; enthusiasm is lost. But you should know, śarīra vyādhi, śarīra is a temple of the vyādhi, a house of the vyādhi. This body is a house of the vyādhi. Vyādhi means illnesses, troubles. Don’t think that you will ever be so healthy that you can jump and do this and that. Time will come. You can go or run, but the time will come. It will take you half a minute to get out of your bed, unless you are healthy and have an accident and you die. For that person who died, it may be good, but for us, all who remain behind, it is not good. We will be more unhappy. "Oh God, how young he was, how healthy he was." So it means the old can die, the ill can die. You see how selfish we are. We are thinking always only of being young and healthy. What about others? Everywhere there are many conferences for children and youth. The youth are the culture of tomorrow, yes. But what about the seniors? How much treatment do we have? Very good treatment for seniors? Even they get retired pension, get very little money, hurry home. Because they think the seniors are that lemon which is juiced and taken away. It’s only lying in the kitchen, occupying the space. Remove it. In the last few decades, human consciousness has changed because of business life, the money life. When parents or grandparents died, we were very unhappy. Nowadays, when even the father or mother dies, the children say, "Well, my mother died; she was ill." That’s all. Love is lost toward the parents. Love is lost towards ancestors. Love is lost towards elderly people. So, how do you expect that you will have more love now? You lost it. So whose longing will not get, and whose not longing will get it? Mahāprabhujī said, "Don’t run behind money, then money will run away, then money will be for you like a horizon." What is a horizon? The horizon is as near as you come, that far it goes. If you will not run behind money, but run in the other direction, then money will run behind you. Don’t run searching for a partner; the partner will come and run to you. Yes? You know when your kishmat will awake. There’s a true story. One of the devotees, she was at this year’s summer seminar in Strelki Ashram. She said her dog died, an old dog. And she said, "Swamiji, I am so thankful to my dog." I said, "Why?" "Because my dog brought me to yoga." How? She said, "I was driving in Atlanta, and there was a traffic jam or something, and my dog jumped out of the car and ran into the yoga center." Into Yoga in Daily Life, and there she made a prema pūjā, and it was so nice. And since that day, I began to practice yoga. You see? So luck will jump to you. If you are suffering day and night, it will not come. I asked Mahāprabhujī one day, and he said, "If that person will meditate or pray at that mass, it will be quicker, everything there." But your thoughts, your feelings are somewhere else, not with God. We are praying to God only for half a minute: "God, please." And what are we praying? We are actually praying a few words and having so many wishes, two handfuls of wishes. Did you ever pray one day without any wish? Very little. Therefore, we should surrender our love to God. Let it be. Just give it. And when you have given, you have no rights over it. That’s it. If you borrow, of course, now you have the right to have it back. But when you said, "I gave you," so you gave it. You have no rights to ask for it back. That’s all. Vyādhi. So, the first: the illnesses of the body, indriyas, and mind. Second, suddenly you lose your interest in your sādhanā. In the beginning, you were doing mantras, fastings, getting mantras, ceremonies—oh, wonderful. Now, honestly, how many people practice mantras and meditations every day? And if you practice and you are asking, "Mahāprabhujī, please send me this. Mahāprabhujī. Om Prabhudeep Niranjan Sabduk Bhajan. My car is not functioning." So many wishes we have. So Mahāprabhujī said, "I am not a mechanic." So tyāga, tyāga, just be. That’s it. That’s it. The third: all strength which you have suddenly... You lose your energy, your confidence is gone, and you feel without energy. "Better today I will sleep than have five malas. Only one mala is enough. Mahāprabhujī is sorry, tomorrow I will do perhaps six." That’s it. He doesn’t need five malas. He doesn’t need meditation. Is it we who need? One told Mahāprabhujī, "I don’t believe in God." And Mahāprabhujī said, "And? What does God lose if you don’t believe?" So we love because we want God. That’s it. Look from which side are you? We are here as guests on this island. We need to be here as a guest. And therefore, we have to be good to the host. It is nice of them that they are giving hospitality. What do you think, with that you pay the money? Is money everything? Maybe you will pay 100 euros, and you destroy in the apartment about 300 euros in repairs. There are some people, you know, when they tear the curtains and this and that, many things. But yoga people are very clean and very nice. Even they have very little garbage to clear; remove it. That’s it. You are all very correct people, very correct, except a little bit of human mistakes. So the third, that you lose your confidence: "Will I get these fruits or not? Will my sādhanā bring me what I was expecting?" That means you lost it. That was an obstacle, that was a lemon in the milk, one drop, milk spoiled. Therefore, no doubts, confidence. It doesn’t matter how it is; you gave it, it is. When you are doing yoga sādhanā, anuṣṭhāna, the first day you are doing it with great love, the third day with full enthusiasm, and the next day you say, "All my body is aching, I think I will go for better karma yoga." Or you don’t do. "Today I will not do. Tomorrow I am going with a friend. The day after tomorrow I am going swimming." All these kinds of excuses are an obstacle on your yoga sādhanā. Don’t neglect anything. You see, on the church tower, there is a bell ringing every hour. The bell rings every day on time. This is a machine; it is not a soul inside. Even a machine can be so punctual, then what to expect from our side? We are different. So we should be better than this. Avalāna, it means to neglect or to have a doubt. That will not make you successful. The fourth and fifth ones are tamo guṇa: sattva, rajas, and tamas. Sattva guṇa, guṇa is quality, a pure quality. And this guṇa comes through nourishment. That’s why it is a sattvic, vegetarian nourishment—sattvic, pure quality. Rajas is food which makes you very angry, aggressive. Alcohol, beer, and certain kinds of food make you aggressive. And anger is that thief which will take away everything from you, from your door. It will not let you into your house. It will take away everything before you come to the house. Tamo guṇa, the rajas guṇa is an angle. Sorry, did I say rajas or tamas? Rajas. And tamo guṇa is laziness. Certain kinds of food make us very, very lazy. You eat, and then you say, "Oh, let’s go to sleep now. I can’t anymore." This is tamas guṇa. Prāṇa and apāna. Apāna brings the tamas guṇa out and directs it toward the brain centers. You feel so tired. Tamas guṇa takes over the strength of your muscles. Tamas guṇa takes the strength of your eyesight. So your eyelids begin to move down. Many of Swamiji’s lectures say that while driving, one is tired and one sleeps or has micro-sleep, and one dies. So tamo-guṇa, alas, the greatest enemy of the human is laziness, tamo-guṇa. Who have this ālasya and pramāda, neglecting the sādhanā and just playing that, "I am tired, and I cannot today, and no time." This is the greatest enemy or the greatest obstacle on our path, that we can’t be successful. Self-discipline is a key to success, and sometimes to follow the discipline is not easy; it’s hard. But to open this hard nut of the Brahma-jñāna, this Sahasrāra Cakra, you know. The Sahasrāra Cakra has such a beautiful sound, resonance, no? Your Sahasrāra is completely tight. There is no resonance. You have to awake, nāda. My God, that is something, no? So, ālasya. Sixth, then your indriyas. All your senses, you try to connect with desires. And when you have desires, then your meditation, your mantras, your sādhanās are only symbolical. Your being is somewhere else. Mirabai said, "I am living there where you are, O my beloved one, Krishna. Here is only my physical body." So you are doing your mantra, but you know where your thoughts are? There you are, in reality. And therefore, as your indriyas become more attached to desires, enjoying many kinds of enjoyment—swimming is enjoyment, driving is enjoyment, walking is enjoyment, dreaming is enjoyment, eating, many things. When your indriyas become slaves of this enjoying, that I used to say, the joy of the joy which you would like to enjoy is little joy compared to the sorrows of that enjoy. And that is exactly what Patañjali is warning us now. Therefore, give up laziness. And Holy Gurujī said in his bhajan, "Bhai tum jāgo re, terā auṣar bitā jāye." Bhai, tum jago re. So this was beautiful, no? Don’t you think? Thank you. Sometimes it’s good to make sure that, yes, you like it. Seventh obstacle. Yogśādhana ke sādhanā ko kisi kāraṇ se viparīt samajhnā, arthāt ye sādhanā ṭhīk nahīṁ hai. Aisā mithyā jñāna ho jānā, bhrānti darśana. Bhrānti darśana. Darśana means to see, and bhrānti means the doubts. Brantī means not reality. You walk on the road, and about 30 or 40 meters far away, there is a rope lying, and you say, "Oh, that’s a snake." And you come near, and there is no snake. It’s only a rope. So, bhrānti, that yoga sādhanā, towards your yoga sādhanā, you think, "Oh, this is not like that, this is other, and this." This is called mithyā bhrānti, mithyā jñāna. Mithyā means senseless. Mithyā means fake. Mithyā means doubtful. Mithyā is not authentic. When someone is talking and telling this and this, then you will say in India, "Don’t speak mithyā, it’s not truthful." It’s just self-made thoughts. And so also sometimes, if this is not like that and I could have done other and this and that, mithyā jñāna, bhrānti, then also you are lost from your spiritual path. Years and years, what you have done is destroyed through your mithyā jñāna. You drive on the road, and about 100 meters ahead, you see water on the road, but there is no water. It’s only reflection. It’s only the light reflection there. Or the heat comes out of the earth, which is a little humidity that comes with that in reflection. But there is no water of that kind; what you think is water. That’s also mithyā. Mṛtyu Kṛṣṇa. Mṛtyu Kṛṣṇa. And the eighth one: When one is doing yogasādhanā and doesn’t get any level of the change of consciousness, any experiences, then you lose your interest. Like that story which I told many times about one yogī who was sitting under the olive tree and making a mālā. Or it was a fig tree, you know. It was a fig tree. And under the fig tree, because he was so lazy, the fig will fall down and I will eat. And the fig was falling down, and he said, "No, if it goes in my mouth, I will eat." And making meditation, and suddenly said, "So many years I am doing, I got nothing, 68 years. Not even I could levitate my hand up. Whenever my hand has to be levitated, I have to use my energy. But I wish that automatically it will levitate. It will, automatically. You have nothing to do, but on that day, it’s finished." So he stopped his mala and looked, thinking, looking at the fig: "If this fig is sweet or not, but why should I stretch my hand till there?" An ant came. In the mouth of the ant was a grain of rice, and trying to climb the tree—somewhere was her nest. After half a meter, she lost the grain. Again she came down, again found the rice, again climbing. After 20 centimeters, she lost again, up and down, up and down. One hour she was climbing up and down, and always she lost the corn. And he was observing this one hour what the ant is doing, stupid ant, like me. He said, "This ant is exactly stupid like me." 68 years. Finally, the ant carried the rice into the nest where she was living. And he said, "No, she’s not stupid. She’s my master." Try again and again. Try and try and try. Don’t give up. You will get it. You will find it. Don’t give up. You do your duty. Practice, try, try,... try. And, finally, in the practice of yoga, in any part of yoga, any sādhanā, any bhūmikā, your citta-vṛtti becomes restless. A few days ago, some sādhak came to me and said, "Swāmījī, suddenly in my meditation now I have so many thoughts. Before I could meditate one hour, two hours without anything, I was very happy and very good. Very good. But now come the thoughts." This is the ninth obstacle which Patañjali is saying, that your citta, your concentration, cannot maintain on that one thing and is always fluttering, sometimes this, sometimes that. So these are the inner obstacles, inner rocks, inner fightings, inner kleśas, which every one of us is facing every day. And for that, it is said, to remove this duḥkha, the best is again God’s name. There are another five duḥkhās more. When this nine comes to it, then the fifth joins to it. And what is this fifth one, that we will tomorrow listen to nicely with some kind of stories again. Okay? So, I wish you all the best. Deep Nārāyaṇ Bhagavān Kī Jai. Mādhav Kṛṣṇa Bhagavān Kī Jai. Devīśvara Mahādeva Kī Jai. Oṁ Śānti. Thank you.