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Spirituality is developed through a way of life

True spirituality is developed not through exercises but through a way of life. It requires surrendering ego and selfishness, acting for the sake of God rather than personal desire. Service is only spiritually valid when performed without selfishness or ego. Techniques like meditation or pranayama cannot produce this inner change. The sole qualification is a heart filled with loving compassion and a readiness to serve. Disappointment in worldly life often leads one to seek shelter in the divine. The spiritual path is one of self-surrender and dedicated service, not of acquiring techniques or diplomas.

"There are no techniques to develop spirituality, but there is a way of life to develop it."

"The only qualification is that you have love to serve and compassion in the heart."

Filming location: Vienna, Austria

This story, which I have told before, illustrates a spirituality that is entirely different. To develop this spirituality, there are no exercises. You cannot develop your spirituality through exercises. Spirituality is developed through a way of life—through surrendering the ego, overcoming the ego. It is about surrendering ego and selfishness, not acting for the sake of your desires or ambition, but for the sake of God, for realization. You must take out selfishness and ego and replace them with surrendering and service. Service can only be accepted if it is without selfishness and without ego. Then, spirituality is developing. If we have selfish wishes and ego, then our service is accepted only in the material world, where there is no spiritual development. If one thinks that by meditating and meditating one will be spiritual, it cannot be. If you think that by practicing this Kriyā and that Āsana and that Prāṇāyāma you will be spiritual, it cannot be. There are no techniques to develop spirituality, but there is a way of life to develop it. Spirituality doesn’t need any diploma. It doesn’t need any qualification. The only qualification is that you have love to serve and compassion in the heart. The modern way of life is different; the situations and circumstances are different. But the people who were inspired and longing for spirituality, for realization, or God-realization—or whatever you call it, mokṣa or nirvāṇa, or freedom—they had to surrender and give. They used to come, go to the master, and the master told them once only what they should do, and that was all. That was their entire technique: seva, service, everything. The story is about one disciple who lived with the master. A very young man—his background I don’t know—but mostly people came at that time when they had a disappointment in material life. Do not think that family life was always happy. Do not think that partnership was always happy. Neither was that time, nor is this time, nor will it be. Destiny, we have to accept. Destiny is a product of our own deeds, our karmas. Disappointment is there because you don’t want to see this, you don’t want to accept this. But though you don’t want to accept it, it is and it will be. You don’t want to accept that we are already old, and we fight against being old and ill, so we take even extra medicines. In spite of all this, the process cannot stop. So disappointment in life also will not stop. Many think disappointment means only with husband or wife, but it is with business, with study, health, family situation, parents, children. It is said that when there is no hope, then the human seeks shelter at the feet of the holy person. Because in God’s shelter, everything is forgiven. Then one is there and knows now, "I have no way to go anywhere else." One holy saint, Sūrdās, a lover of Kṛṣṇa, was one of the greatest lovers of Kṛṣṇa. Sūrdās was blind. But when he used to sing, Kṛṣṇa used to come and sit beside him. Kṛṣṇa appeared, and how beautifully Sūrdās sings. Sūrdās, Kabīr Dās, Mīrābāī, Rām Dās—these few saints were there at that time. And Sūrdās is saying: "Lord, I am that bird on the big ferry. Perhaps mistakenly, I was sitting on that ferry, in that ship, and now it’s in the middle of the ocean. Distances are thousands of kilometers on every side. I would like to go away from the ship and try to fly away. I fly and fly. I see nowhere horizon, nowhere mainland. So just to rescue oneself, again I have to fly back and sit on this ferry. I try to run away, but I don’t find any place where I can sit and have a rest. Lord, I am that bird on that seat which flies away, has no shelter anywhere, and has to come back." This is such a disappointment. Such experiences and such things make a man take a decision. "I would like to go, but there is no place to go anywhere in the entire universe except God." So we have many disappointments. From your tree, you can have a disappointment. You plant a beautiful fruit tree, and it doesn’t give fruit. You bought a nice cow, but this cow doesn’t give milk and doesn’t give a calf. So there are many things. You buy a nice instrument, and it doesn’t function. Ultimately, the center is only one, and that is God. And that God is there where the holy person is. That’s why it is called guru-charaṇam yad sattirate. When you come to some really spiritual person, he is not going to tell you, "Now do chūmas prāṇāyāma, and now do this and that." He will simply give you a duty, that’s all. If you want to do it, do it. If you don’t want to do it, go away. But where will you go? After flying here and there, you come again there. So the Guru Vākya, the words ordered and spoken by him, will liberate us. There was one young man. He came to the master and said, "Master, can you accept me as your disciple?" "Yes, as you like." "What is my duty?" He said, "Your duty: go every day and bring alms, bhikṣā, begging. From a few houses, food for you and for me. And clean the whole ashram where we are, under the trees and this and that." There were not many buildings, just one room, a small room. A small veranda and one room, that’s all. So either we were both sleeping inside or outside, under the tree, that’s all. Just you had one mat, that’s all. Not a big, thick mattress. As comfortable, that makes us more lazy. As hard, it makes you... This we call tapasyā. And still there are many sādhus who don’t sleep on a bed. They have a very thin mat, and they sleep on the floor. But we have to take into consideration the temperature. Here it is cold. If you sleep on the floor, the next day you will have pneumonia. So, therefore, we have to take into consideration certain situations. "So sweep the entire ashram and go for bringing bhikṣā. And afterwards, bring the water from the water well." That was his sādhanā lifelong. That’s what Holy Gurujī also describes in his biography. The ashram in Khattu village, where Mahāprabhujī mostly stayed, and all this beautiful satsaṅg and this Śrīdīp Vijñān Gītā were all written and spoken there. But only Gurujī had to sweep this whole entire area. It was a double place at that time, more than that. There were no houses. All houses were up in the mountain. On the top of the mountain there, the last house was there where Devpurījī’s dune is. It was completely desert, and in the night it was completely dark, no electricity, nothing. Electricity came now. And in the morning, Gurujī had to go for bhikṣā, and then after sweeping the whole ashram, bring water for Mahāprabhujī for bathing, and then wash the cloth, and then go to the desert. There was no forest, no jungle, but without trees, you can say, and collect the dung of the camels to bring for the dhūnī, for the fire. That was his duty, that was his sādhanā, that’s all. And the name of Mahāprabhujī was repeating the mantra. That’s all. So the disciple served the master for a long time, and then one day the master said, "I will go now into samādhi. I will leave this body." This story that I told you, you know that. So when the Master said, "I will go to Mahāsamādhi," the disciple was standing; he came after bhikṣā, and he said, "Master, when you go to Samādhi, what will I do alone here without you? Whom will I serve?" So the Master said, "Well, if it is boring for you, we will go with you." And the disciple also said, both said in meditation and sent it over, and at the same time they both went out. Now, when we tell this story, either it is like a fairy tale or a joke. Unbelievable, people will say. But it was. If something happened like this, people will run. "Now, please, Master, wait five days. Can you tell us this technique? How is this technique to perform? Which meditation, which kriyā, which technique should we do?" There is no technique in this way. There are techniques just to keep your body healthy so that you can lead your prāṇas in a certain direction towards the sahasrāra cakra and the svara yoga. Of course, these are things which you can control, the elements. But spirituality is different. That spiritual need is self-surrendering. It means no selfishness and no ego. Seva bhāva. That is spiritual. Always be ready to help anyone. Be ready to help. Seva bhāva. You cannot help if you don’t have the inside compassion, inside love, inside feeling to be one with. You can be one with if you have the feeling that you are one with it. Otherwise, you cannot. Otherwise, it is like cooking iron balls. You have the iron balls, and you want to cook like a cannelloni. Boil and boil in water, you can stir and stir, they will not become soft. Spirituality is entirely an inner thing that has to be changed. Inre Einstellung. Lebewesen. Surrendering. We have too much body ego. Too much body ego. We are mostly proud of our body. And that is one of our ignorances. So, I was thinking that when we are sitting here in Mahāprabhujī’s... So the simplest way: prayer, seva, mantra. But it does not mean that tomorrow you will not practice āsanas, okay? I didn’t say that you need not to practice. I told you, you must practice, and very soon you will get in your hands this small health spiritual passport, okay? Which you can put as your identity card in a small booklet form. This. It goes in the pocket here. Don’t put it on the back side, because Mahāprabhujī is also inside. So for Bhaktas, to keep it on the heart side or in hand, back. And it is just very simple. It’s called a capsule program. Because now we are in modern civilization, and in this modern world, everything should go quickly, hurry, hurry, and that’s why it’s called the capsule program. Just capsule means you swallow it easily. Otherwise, you have to practice and run and this and that. The doctor said, "Take this one tablet against cholesterol." High cholesterol. Okay. Śloka done. That’s all. So this is a capsule program, Ghaṭu Praṇām, and it is like a harmonica. If you open, then it is opening in this way. Here it is coming. It is written here: Ghaṭu Praṇām, Agnisār Kriyā, Bhastrikā Pradāya, Anti-Stress Meditation, and Mr. Swamijī. And when you turn this side, then there is again Mahāprabhujī, Dil Amrit, and Yoga, and the life and hidden powers in humans, and spiritualness in short form. Then you open again something which is folded the wrong way. Tomorrow it will be folded differently. And when you open the other side, then you have a beautiful chart of Kaṭhopaniṣad. I was thinking, Christmas is coming and many people would like to give their friends something. So this would be a very good present for people to give, and it’s not very expensive, it will be very cheap, under one Euro. And if you buy some souvenir in some other shop, you can’t get something under a euro; you have to pay 5 euros, 10 euros. So with this, you are giving them some good health and information about yoga. Good idea? So these are 2,000 in German, 6,000 in Czech, 4,000 in Slovak, 2,000 in Slovenian, 3,000 or 4,000 in Croatian, 10,000 in English, and 20,000 in English and in different languages. Already they are in the printing press, and on the web it will be available. So the people or the publisher will give only to the country which ordered. And from that country, half the people, every yoga center, every yoga teacher can buy. This is new. That’s it. So, therefore, you have to practice. I told Mahāprabhujī, "Don’t open spirituality so quickly, lock it." Mahāprabhujī said, "Why?" I said, "They must practice." So this is for your practice. And now I wish you a very, very good night. Everybody is very tired. And Hari Om. Sleep well. Tomorrow we are in Gurujī’s ashram. And the weekend is in Hungary. And on the 5th of December, we will have an evening program for one or two hours from 6 o’clock onwards in Gurujī’s ashram. The 5th of December, you know, is Mahāprabhujī’s Mahāsamādhi.

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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