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Garden of spirituality

The mind is a garden you cultivate, yet a monkey within can destroy it. Through discipline, you create an inner garden of beautiful thoughts and feelings like love and wisdom. You are the gardener of this space. Conversely, some let their inner world become ruined and thorny. Devotees toil to sow seeds of devotion, creating beauty. But the mind is a monkey that can swiftly ruin everything with one negative thought, destroying peace and confidence. Therefore, devotion and faith are essential. Patañjali teaches that śraddhā—faith, vigor, mindfulness, and samādhi—leads to the wisdom of Self-realization. The practitioner is drawn toward this goal like following the scent of a fruit, guided until it is found.

"Yogīs and yatīs, through great practice and discipline, create a garden of bhajan—a garden of spirituality."

"Therefore, bhakti, śraddhā (devotion, faith)... 'Śraddhā vīrye smṛti samādhi prajñā pūrvaka itareṣām.'"

Filming location: Strilky, Czech Republic

Yogīs and yatīs, through great practice and discipline, create a garden of bhajan—a garden of spirituality. Your sādhanā within yourself is your own garden. Consider the beautiful flowers you have in your thoughts, in your chidakāśa (the space of consciousness). Consider the beautiful feelings you have in your heart—this is your inner garden. You are the gardener who has created such a beautiful garden of love, happiness, confidence, forgiveness, and wisdom. You have cultivated all this beauty. Conversely, there are some who make the garden ruined, thorny, stony, and discomforting. They fill it with disturbing creatures like mosquitoes and snakes and whatnot. So, yogī jātī koi mehnat karke bove bhajan kī badī hu—they toil and sow the seeds of devotion, creating a beautiful garden. A garden. But this mind is a monkey. Within no time, this monkey will destroy the whole garden. And which monkey is there now? You have tried hard for many, many years to make a beautiful garden or a park. But then one negative memory, one negative thought comes to you, and this is the monkey. This monkey destroys everything. You lose confidence. You lose peace. Love is lost. Everything is lost. Therefore, bhakti, śraddhā (devotion, faith). Patañjali presents it in a different way, explaining what it means for a yogī: devotion must have devotion and confidence, or śraddhā, towards thyself. "Śraddhā vīrye smṛti samādhi prajñā pūrvaka itareṣām." This will lead you to prajñā samādhi (the samādhi of wisdom). And that prajñā samādhi leads to the Self. Yes, the sādhaka (practitioner) is coming to it. Still, you haven't found it; you were searching for one beautiful fruit. You smell a mango tree, but you still don't know where it is. Yet, you begin to smell it. Ah, we are on the right direction, okay? That smell will lead you, pull you towards that direction, and you will go... yes, it's here, it's here.

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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