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Part 1: The Path of Patañjali: Āsana to Dhāraṇā Who knows the book called the Patañjali Yoga Sūtra? Please raise your hand. Thank you. So, it means those who didn’t raise their hands do not know it. Who is that one? And who does not know about Patañjali’s Yoga Sūtra? Thank you. Patañjali lived approximately 2,500 years before Christ. He is known as the father of psychology. The great saint Patañjali researched the entire being of the human: body, emotion, chakras, intellect, memory, different levels of consciousness, soul, and ātmā. Very systematically, with lots of examples, he guided his students. Patañjali put the yoga system together, but yoga is not limited to Patañjali. Yoga is very, very ancient. As I said on the first day, I told about Bhūta Yoga, the universal principle of balancing, harmonizing, and uniting. Patañjali says first, āsanas. I want to give you the information very short about all these definitions. Āsana is not exercise. Āsana is known as postures, that comfortable posture in which you feel comfortable, relaxed, happy, and you can concentrate or meditate. That is followed by Yoga Vyāyam. Now, Vyāyam means exercise. It means yoga exercises are divided into three parts: dynamic movements for body warming, then comes the stretching to remove the stiffness of the body, and then come the postures where you can sit comfortably, relaxed and more relaxed. Prāṇa Śakti, life energy, flows in the body. So, āsanas. After that, the second level comes: Prāṇāyāma. Prāṇa-vyāyāma. Here it means the exercise of the prāṇa through breath control. Prāṇa is like cement, which holds bricks together. Similarly, this physical and astral body of a living being is held together through the prāṇa. Prāṇa is not oxygen. Prāṇa is completely different from this. And prāṇa is divided into ten different qualities: five prāṇas and five upa-prāṇas are the sub-prāṇas. Prāṇa, Apāna, Vyāna, Samāna, Udāna, these are the five prāṇas. They help us to live healthy, relaxed, and comfortable. The sub-prāṇas, they have a fine quality of the Prāṇas, Kṛkal, Dhananjay, and so on. The fine quality of the prāṇas, which are sitting near our eyelids. Because the eyelids are one of the parts of the body which react very quickly, very fast. They need super petrol quality. The heart beats constantly. Our best servant is our heart. It doesn’t matter what we are doing, but the heart is constantly serving our life. We neglect our heart. We don’t think of our heart. We do eat and do whatever we like. We never ask our heart, "How are you, my heart?" And we never say to relax our heart, you know. Don’t tell this to your heart. Relax. Then we will be permanently relaxed. So these are all different kinds of energies in the body. Prāṇa is inhalation force. Apāna is exhalation force. If there is some disturbance in your apāna or prāṇa, you cannot pass urine, you cannot pass stool, and you cannot exhale. So, Mother Nature, what created or gave to our body is unbelievable. And all this has been researched by Patañjali, and he gave what is good for our prāṇa to keep pure energy and healthy, prāṇāyāma. Now, when we go to the prāṇāyāma definition and the techniques, then there are only three prāṇāyāmas. You understand me? Or who doesn’t understand? What did I say? I’ve forgotten. Thank you. So, only these three prāṇāyāmas, and that’s called pūrak, inhalation; kumbhak, retention of the breath inside; recak, exhalation; and bāhir kumbhak, retention of the breath outside. So, kumbhaka means the retention of the breath either inside or outside. This is one. And inhalation and exhalation, these are two. So, three prāṇāyāmas. Now, how to guide over these three levels of prāṇāyāms? These are then different techniques. Begins with nāḍīśodhana, purification of the nerves. And always begin with the nāḍīśodhana with the left nostril. Because the left nostril is controlling our left hemisphere, which is connected with our emotions. From the ājñā cakra, it then goes to the right and from the right to the left. You have to read the book called Hidden Powers in Humans. Those who do not have this book should have it. The right nostril controls the right hemisphere. So after completing the left nostril breathing exercise, then we do the right. That’s Nāḍī Śodhana. Inhalation, exhalation, like we did yesterday. This technique you have to practice for a minimum of three months, twice a day, for a minimum of half an hour in one sitting. Just inhale and exhale. Three levels of breathing: one is abdominal breath, one is from our diaphragm, and one is from the chest. Whoever breathes short breaths through the chest has a short life. Who is breathing? From here, it is the medium. But whoever has a long breath has a long life, slowly. Like a crocodile or a turtle, they breathe so slowly and have a long, long life. Why do we breathe so quickly? Because of a lack of oxygen. So Prāṇa Vyāyām is exercise for gaining more oxygen in the body. Our memory, our immunity in the body, the functions of the different organs in the body, all this depends on healthy oxygen. Then comes the Anuloma Viloma, inhalation through the left, exhalation through the right. Inhalation through left, exhalation through right. After twenty or twenty-five times, then inhale through the right, exhale through the left. Right inhale, left exhale. Right inhale, left exhale. What does this mean? Now, this is that the left nostril is responsible for our emotions. And the emotion belongs to the mind. Man kā Devtā, the principle of the mind is the moon, and the moon is changing constantly. Similarly, our thoughts, our mind, our decisions, our emotions, and our feelings are constantly changing. So, to balance our thoughts, emotions, and clarity is very important to control Iḍā Nāḍī, which is from the left side. Intellect is controlled by Piṅgalā Nāḍī, that’s the right nostril, which belongs to the sun. Meditation, that is our intellect, our knowledge, our activities, our temperament, our creativity. So meditation comes then when both hemispheres are balanced. Now, what to do? We activated both hemispheres, emotion and intellect. Now we have to create a balance. And for that comes Prāṇāyāma mode, it is called Anulom Vilom, the second step. Inhale through the right or through the left, exhale through the right, inhale through the right, and exhale through the left. This is one round. Now, that means it creates the balance. Now, that will help you to have good concentration, alertness, and self-confidence through Anuloma Viloma, because of the immunity in the body and because you are doing the prāṇāyāma. After this, what I told you is nine months of exercises. First, it was only through one nostril, then from one to the other, and now both sides. Three, three months. After three months, this; after three months, that; and after three months, this. Nine months. After nine months, you look in the mirror, your skin, your color of the face, your eyes, everything will be so beautiful again. The more you are very beautiful, but it will be more beautiful. Very healthy skin. You will not need too many creams here and here, you know. The whole body, the skin, everything. Yes, we will be old, but still, prāṇāyāma will make your skin very soft, very gentle, very smooth. After nine months of practice, then you come to the kumbhak. Kumbhaka means retention of the breath. With correct ratios, inhale while counting: one, two, three. Pūrak. Exhale six. One, two, three, four, five, six. One, two. So inhale. Inhalation is quicker, exhalation is slow. That will train your diaphragm. That will train your lungs. That will purify your respiratory system. And that will give you a very clear, clear... consciousness. Then comes the inner kumbhak. So, you do this for three months. Only inner kumbhak, bāhya kumbhak. Before that, you are doing only the inhalation and exhalation ratios. In the beginning, if you do it, you will harm your health, you will harm your body. And you will not be able to do it, because now, let’s say I will inhale five times. One, two, three, four, five. Now I will exhale slowly. One, two, three, four, five, six. I didn’t come to ten. After five or six rounds, you will be sweating. That means you are doing wrong. When you do breath exercises, prāṇāyāma, there is no sweating. If you begin to sweat, then it’s the wrong technique. Means you are giving too much strength to your lungs and to your heart. You have to follow that your heartbeat doesn’t increase when you do all this prāṇāyāma. Prāṇāyāma course, if you want to do complete, that is three years or five years course, which I have completed, nicely written. Five years. After five years, you go in the swimming pool and dive, and for a minimum of five minutes, you can sit inside. Then we will see on the surface some bubbles come. Arteries, veins, nerves, this is all together. So nāḍīs. Nāḍīs are the fine, subtle channels outside of the body, which lead cosmic light into the body. And that connects our nerve systems, our channels, everywhere where the liquid is flowing, and purifies that. That’s why it’s called nāḍī-śodhana. It reduces toxins from the body. So prāṇāyāma, āsana, prāṇāyāma, then comes pratyāhāra. Pratyāhāra means now learn to withdraw your senses from the external world. Those whose senses are not protected or controlled, and pratyāhāra is not mastered, cannot sleep. You cannot endure the outside disturbances. You are sleeping, and your neighbor is snoring; you can’t sleep. But those who have practiced pratyāhāra are happy when the neighbor is snoring. I am happy that this person is sleeping so deeply and soundly. How nice! Now I will concentrate on his or her breath. And I will breathe with her or him. I asked once, a lady told me that my husband snores so much. I said, can you also sleep? So, she said, "Yes, when he begins to snore, then I concentrate on his breath, and I breathe also deep and relaxed, and suddenly I sleep." I don’t hear him. I said, you practice good pratyāhāra. So this is self-control. Pratyāhāra, you can control your senses: sound, smell, light, thoughts, different problems. One man went to meditate. Before going to meditate, he told his daughter-in-law, "Someone is coming at 10 o’clock to meet me. I have a meeting, but I am a little bit late today. So tell him that I am meditating, and after 10:30 I will meet him." And he went to his meditation room. 5 to 10, the bell was ringing. The young lady opened the door. One man came and he said, "I want to meet your father-in-law. Is he at home?" She said, "No, he went shopping for shoes." Father-in-law is meditating. She lies. I told her that I am meditating here; tell him. Now she said, "I went for shopping." She said, "Please sit down. Would you like to have some drink, and this and that? But he will be here at 10:30." Well, at 10:30 he came from his meditation, had a meeting, and went away. And then he asked his daughter, "My daughter, why did you lie? I told you that I am meditating, and you said I was shopping." She said, "Yes, my father, I know, but I couldn’t lie." Why couldn’t you lie? I was here. She said, "Yes, your body was there, but you were thinking about buying shoes." His mouth and eyes remained open. That’s true. But how did you know this? What kind of yoga are you practicing? And what did she answer? I practice yoga in daily life. So, pratyāhāra: withdraw your senses from external objects. That is the first step of your meditation: meditation to develop the power of meditation. Now, you withdraw from external objects. Then comes dhāraṇā. Dhāraṇā means concentration. How much concentration you have, only you know. How long can you concentrate? So, I have one exercise for you to find out how strong your concentration is, or how much concentration you have. Should we do this? Yeah. Okay? Stand up. And put your hands sidewards, stretch your hands sidewards, palms facing the ground. Okay? And hands down. Such a nice tea. That’s good. They will concentrate, and I will drink. That’s the best technique. Okay? Now, help to put your one leg on the thigh, support it on the thigh, or just put it like this on your thigh, above the knee. And look here, on this point, there is something like, or if you can see, look at my microphone, yes. This is a concentration point. Now, don’t look here. Look here and there. You will see how your stability is missing something. Now, stretch your wings to balance the turbulence. Beautiful concentration you have. And now I would like to check your concentration. You will check yourself, so remain like this, motionless. Close your eyes. Okay, thank you. Now maybe with the other leg is better. So change the leg. This time we do hands up, perhaps, for more balance. And now, gently close the eyes. You have to be emotionalized. Close the eyes, don’t dance. That’s it. Thank you. Sit down. So, this is what we know concentration means. So, it’s not easy to concentrate. It takes a long, long time to develop concentration. And that is what we call the tratak, a very good practice of looking at the candle flame. And then you close your eyes, you see a flame inside. Now, how long you can keep that flame depends on your concentration. Or how long you can remain without any thought, thinking of one thing. If you think of one thing, let’s say you think of Mahāprabhujī, and suddenly Swāmījī comes. Part 2: The Path of Concentration and the Power of Meditation Then you say, "No, Swāmījī, I want to think only of Mahāprabhujī, only Mahāprabhujī." So when you say only Mahāprabhujī, then it means you already have the vṛttis, the thoughts. So we have to become one-pointed in concentration. Like rope dancing. The person who can dance or walk on the rope, we all look at it and say, "Oh, beautiful." And a person looks at you and smiles, you know. But the balance and concentration are there, so that the legs do not lose the balance. Walking on the rope requires long practice. You can learn, but don’t try to walk on the rope on the hard ground. Hang your rope over the swimming pool. So if you fall down, you fall in the water. Similarly, your concentration is like this. Or practice like Indian village ladies. Now, the country and city ladies are already spoiled. A village lady had a water pot on her head, and her other friends were also with her. All these ladies also had water pots on their heads, and they were talking and saying, "Yes, and how nice," and, "You look there and this," but the water pot is still there; it doesn’t fall down. And when we put it and look a little bit, this is falling down. So concentration, after the concentration, after the dhāraṇā, then comes the dhyāna, samādhyāna, meditation. Now, through the concentration, you adopt dhāryate dhyāna, that from the dhāraṇā to dhyāna, so pratyāhāra, dhāraṇā, dhyāna. Dhyāna means oneness. You are one with it. Take care that nothing comes between. When your child goes to school, then in Hindi parents say, "Betā, yā betī, dhyān rakhna. Dhyān se sadak par karnā." Child, take care, be careful. Cross the road very carefully. So, dhyāna, nothing comes between, take care. And if your dhāraṇā śakti and the pratyāhāra śakti both are strong, withdrawing yourself from the external world and remaining on one point, dhāraṇā, then your meditation will develop. That’s called the power of meditation, how to develop it. Now, you have only one aim, so the meditation leads then to samādhi. Now, samādhi means where three becomes one. Three merges into oneness. Which are three? The first is yourself. The third is the wish to know the knowledge. Someone is talking there too, and what you would you like to know? So, the knower, the knowledge, and the object. So, we are the knower. Between the object and us, what we want to know, that is knowledge. Our navigator leads us directly there, and now we are at our destination. So, then self-realization. So, three becomes one. There is no knower, no knowledge, and no object; there is only oneness. All three merge into oneness. That is the highest consciousness, samādhi. Samādhi has different definitions, Patañjali says. Sabīja samādhi means you are under the highest consciousness level, but still there is a vṛtti; the seeds are there. Bīja means seed. Nirbīja Samādhi, the seedless. There are no more thoughts, no this, all karmas. You are above all this. You are just living. You are doing the things which your body needs, that’s all. But you are above this. You are doing, but you are not doing. You are not doing, but you are doing. It is oneness. And that power of the meditation leads you to that level of consciousness. This is called the eightfold yoga, or Aṣṭāṅga Yoga, or the eight levels of yoga, or integral yoga, which was put together by the great sage Patañjali. Āsana, Prāṇāyāma, Pratyāhāra, Dhāraṇā, Dhyāna, and what is missing? Yes, Yama and Niyama, that is missing. My God, I said the eighth. Before the Pratyāhāra, Yama and Niyama, that is it. Yama means that you control your senses from the outer world to bring them in. Niyama means you observe your senses so that they don’t run with their own will outside. Ethical principles, and in this ethic, Niyama, Niyama is like Ahiṃsā, non-violence; Satya, the truth; Aparigraha, not to collect. So, there are how many? Ten points. And these ten points are exactly, many of them are described or written in the Bible, as now in the Ten Commandments. Āsana, Prāṇāyāma, Pratyāhāra, Āsana, Prāṇāyāma, Yama, Niyama, Pratyāhāra, Dhāraṇā, Dhyāna, and Samādhi. These are the Aṣṭāṅga, the eighth part of yoga, which leads to that power of your meditation. And of course, the core of this all is your mantra. Mantra, Mantra Mantrāpti. When you are thirsty and you drink water, then you say, "Now my thirst is quenched, I am satisfied." Similarly, the mind has so many desires running here and there, but through the mantra, all are fulfilled. The second definition of mantra: "mantra"—"man" means mind, and "tra" means liberation. It is the mind liberated from all these vāsanās. And another one, mantra means that your mind adopts one name of the Supreme God in the form of some sentences. Because in reality, it is your words that you pronounce. If you tell someone, "Hey, stupid one," he will be angry. And if you tell someone, "Dear sir, my God," he will be happy. Same tongue, same mouth, same prāṇa, same energy coming out, but how do you formulate this sound? How do you tune that? And so the mantra is that energy tuned, the cosmic energy, the subtle energy, all from these different principles and coming, becomes in favor to you in a positive way. And that’s why the mantra is there. So Patañjali is saying, already in Samādhipāda, Īśvara Praṇidhāna, finally the yogī has to surrender to Īśvara, to God. Repeating his name constantly, finally when the yogī achieves that highest level of consciousness, then he or she has two techniques to do continuously. First, Īśvara Praṇidhāna, surrender completely in devotion, and second, the God’s name, your mantra. If you don’t do this, your ego comes, "Oh, I know everything now." I know all, I can practice, I have a higher level of consciousness, I don’t need mantra, I don’t need guru. So now, this is where your distraction began. You are not going upwards, but now you are going downwards. Therefore, be ready that anytime there can be an attack from the āsurī śaktis, and suddenly you lose your confidence. You should read Patañjali’s Yoga Sūtra. I think he has them in English bookstores; there must be some available. And read one book from Śaṅkarācārya, that’s called Vivekacūḍāmaṇi, Cūḍāmaṇi. Beautiful, beautiful. And read all the four books of Swami Vivekananda. There you will also come to know what is the power of meditation, and Īśvara Praṇidhāna, Guru Seva, Guru Vākya, and Guru Kṛpā. Read this Līlā Amṛt, which you have; our Gurujī wrote it. Read authentic books, neutral books. Not that only, "Come to me, follow me, I am this, I can give you this." Who are you that you can give this? I will try to help you. That is a wise word. Even a perfect doctor, professor, or a chirologist—what you call them—a surgeon. He will not tell you that, "Okay, I will make you healthy, and you will live." He will say, "I will try, I will do something." Let’s try. So let’s try that we work together, and we will do something. So this is the way to come to the deep prāṇāyāms, levels, and meditations systematically, and that’s what you have in yoga and daily life, and that’s why we call it the system. Yoga in daily life, the system, is very comfortable, very beautiful, and very easy. Everyone can practice and utilize it. Now we will have an interval for 15 minutes. After that, 15 minutes will be for questions if you have any. If not, then meditation. Hari Om. If you come systematically back to prāṇāyāma and then do kumbhaka slowly, that can do good for you. So you can try only inner kumbhaka, antar kumbhaka, retention of the breath inside. But this is one of the good things that you reminded me I wanted to tell all of you. Recently, I got one very nice recipe against heart problems and blockages in the arteries, and it cleans in a beautiful way. About 10 days ago, or maybe 15 days already, I had the sonography of the blood circulation towards the head, what you call this, what you call these arteries here. Śrī Śrī... Sometimes one can see a person between 18 and 22 years old, but she was surprised to see mine is this, so I asked her, "But do you think I am old?" She said, "No," and this is, I can tell you, a result of those recipes which I got. We got an email from New Zealand from one person who had a heart problem and must go for bypass surgery. And then he spoke with his old friends, saying that in twenty days he must go for bypass surgery, and so on. So some of his friends, perhaps from Africa, because he is Indian, were living in Africa, in Kenya, and then in ’72, ’73, immigrated to New Zealand. And he took that medicine, or that kind of self-made medicine, and after 20 days he went, of course, to the hospital, and they made, before surgery, a bypass, they made another angiography. And the doctor was three times checking his name and asked, "What is your birth date?" He was completely free. It was not necessary to operate anything. Not even angioblasting. He said, "What have you done?" And they compared them with his pictures from twenty days before, where they took all these pictures and so on. And then he told this story. And they said, "It doesn’t matter what it is, you can run. There’s no problem." So this is something useful for all of us, no? Would you like to know? So you must write it down if you want. I will not repeat. And even if you don’t have a problem with the heart, you should take it. Now, where do we come now? The power of meditation through the heart. Okay, ready? So, let’s say we have to keep some measurement. So, let’s have a measurement. One cup, one teacup, or one small glass of garlic juice. Now, it’s very hard to take garlic juice out, so you have to grind it, then put it in a cotton cloth like this, and then slowly turn it, press it, and the juice will come out. What rest remains, you make chutney, something to eat. So, one cup garlic juice, one cup ginger juice, and after pressing this ginger out, what remains, you mix it with garlic, so it will be a very good chutney. Gatani, and one cup lemon juice, this small lemon with a thin skin, there are some lemons very big, but there are some other small lime, you call lime, yes, and one cup apple vinegar, now we have four cups, all. Together, mix it, and with a low heat, not very strong heat, with low heat, boil it. So while boiling, slowly, slowly, this four-cup liquid, it remains only two cups of liquid. Keep it in your kitchen window, closed, before your neighbors knock on the door. Now the two cups remain. Put them, leave them in the kitchen at room temperature, and let them cool down. When it is at room temperature, cooled, then take it. If you have diabetes, then take it only. One cup of organic honey inside. If you have no diabetes, you can have two cups of honey. So now there remain three cups, no? Now, mix these three cups and fill them into one or two small bottles, or three bottles. And store it in a cool room or in the fridge. Every morning, before your tea or coffee or breakfast, you take one tablespoon. After 10 to 15 minutes, you can have your coffee or whatever you drink. So drink this all. I don’t know how long it will take—one month, two months, or three or four months. This is a complete course. Then make an interval for one year or half a year, prepare again the same thing, and again do it. And those who have a heart problem and this, they should take a constant teaspoon every morning. Very simple, very powerful, very, very good, okay? The heart and all the veins and everything. It is a cleaning. It cleanses all. No water. You just take it; it is very tasteful. One tablespoon, you just drink it, take it in your mouth; it is very tasteful. Ah, yeah, better to keep in a cool place, okay? It must not be in the freezer, but in America it is always cool, so you can put it in your cooler for storage, okay? In India, we have 55 degrees, or, ah no, 45 degrees, 47 degrees. Then, of course, whatever you touch is hot. But in London it is ever cold. Four months winter and eight months cold. Okay, so let’s come again to our subject. So this is very, very good for everyone. And if you are reaching fifty years, then you should begin. It is high time. See the miracle, something very great. Okay, we will come to meditation if there is no question. Yes, that is how to get in connection with Swāmījī to get an answer through meditation, yes? Okay, tell him he can get an answer through SMS, okay? As long as I am alive. Where is he now? Cooking, that’s very good. Tell him good cooking is the answer to his question. Make everyone happy. Which Rampuri, from Hungary or from the Czech Republic? Yes, please, Bansal, receive more. Yes? Is it also good? Okay. Okay, we come to meditation. Amṛtsāgar, you are very stiff today. Your back hurts? Sit on the chair. So, we will come to the other level of meditation. Yesterday we had a creative meditation. And today we will have a meditation for the purification of the inner systems. To come closer to meditation and create inner protection from nonsense thoughts. Good idea? Repeat after me. Nāhaṁ Karatā Prabhu Dīp Karatā Mahāprabhujī Dīp Karatā He Kevalam.