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Yoga therapy will help You

A spiritual discourse using parables to address the loss of devotion and discernment in yoga teaching.

"we have in our subconsciousness those wrong ideas, and we don't want to spit them out. Therefore, you see everything as similar."

"when a yoga teacher or a disciple, through kuśaṅga or negative thinking, loses confidence and faith—when faith is lost, then you have lost everything."

The speaker narrates the parable of the ant with salt hidden in its gums to illustrate how subconscious biases prevent one from tasting the "sweetness" of genuine practice. He warns yoga teachers against losing devotion and spiritual discernment, using further stories about the sage Nārada creating discord and an artist abandoning his sitar. The talk emphasizes maintaining confidence, avoiding negative gossip (kuśaṅga), and experiencing the distinct benefits of practices like Sūrya Namaskāra and Kathā Praṇām.

Filming location: Strilky, Cz.

DVD 292

There is a story, told only once by Gurujī, from Vedānta. In Vedānta, they used to tell certain stories. There were two ants who met somewhere. One ant asked the other, "Sister, from where are you coming?" The other ant answered, "I am coming from the sugar mountain." How is that? Oh, it is very sweet and very pleasant. Then she asked the other one, "And from where do you come?" She says, "I am coming from the salt mountain." And she says, "What is that? How is that? It is salty." It is salt. You cannot eat much. So, the ant from the sugar mountain said, "Come to me, and I will give you the sugar, and you will taste how nice it is." So, the ant from the salt mountain said, "Well, I will come in ten days." She said, "I will come in 10 days." And after ten days, she came to the sugar mountain. She was a dear guest of her friend, the ant. The ant that came from the salt mountain, of course, ants are very wise and clever, thought: if sugar is uneatable, then I will starve. Better I should take my salt with me. So she took a very hard, solid piece of salt. She put a piece of salt under her gums, and she came there. The other ant brought a nice plate with the sugar. The sister enjoyed the sugar. She took the piece of sugar, chewed it a little bit, and swallowed. She said, "There's no difference." It's the same thing. It's the same color, and same taste, and same hardness. The ant from the sugar mountain thought, perhaps mistakenly, that some salt came in, so she chose the best part of the sugar and tried this. She said, "Yes, it is salt." Impossible. "Can I check your mouth? What have you under the gums?" She said, "This is salt." She said, "No, first you should spit this out. Should spit this out, and now let's go to the dentist, clean the mouth hygienic, and spit all this salt out." So they did it. The dentist was very nice, though it was outside his working hours; he received a complete mouth cleaning program. She returned home, and the ant from the sugar mountain, the host ant, again brought the same plate and gave it to the guest. She took this and said, "Wow, it's so tasty, so sweet. I never had such a taste in my life. Sister, can we be Rakṣabandhan sisters? And can I stay here? I think my family, the whole family, would like to immigrate here." And so they enjoyed sugar. This story means: we have in our subconsciousness those wrong ideas, and we don't want to spit them out. Therefore, you see everything as similar. When you have yellow glasses, then you see everything yellow. And when you have blue glasses, then you see everything blue. And that is a problem that many yoga teachers don't take seriously. Because they have a wrong impression, and that's why they can't get any benefit. But people who spoke, and they were experiencing these things—quite a few times, people said during Kathā Praṇām they had suddenly the vision of Mahāprabhujī. Now, every posture, every exercise is perfect. Sūrya Namaskāra is a very beautiful, very, very good practice. It is a salutation to the sun. The Sun is our life and light, and the Sun has got twelve names. These are the different positions. The rising sun has a different name. At the very beginning of dawn, when it comes, the Sun has a different name. So, these are the different positions which are influencing our biorhythm also. Sūrya Namaskāra you can do also with the breath, with concentration on the chakras. It has a stretching effect, and it has dynamic movement. It is good for the muscles and for the joints. So when we speak about Sūrya Namaskār, then Sūrya Namaskār has its dignity. But when we speak about Kathopaniṣad, then Kathopaniṣad has its dignity. It is a completely different thing, but you have, psychologically, the salt in your taste. And unless you brush this out, you will not find the difference, you will not enjoy the benefits. And if you cannot enjoy the benefits, then you are just saying, "Yeah, do it, let's do this." That's what many times, mostly the Viennese yoga teachers are saying: "Yes, this is also good." That time I am inside, so much wondering or surprised that this person has no taste, no experiences, did not realize deeply, everything. So, a yoga teacher must have the ability to analyze something. And a yoga teacher must be able to tell the differences of every posture. It is a very weak answer when you say, "No, it's not a big difference." That's a lack of your knowledge, a lack of your confidence, a lack of your interest, a lack of your practice, and a lack of your experiences. So, it means you are not still that kind of teacher; you didn't experience, therefore. Again, please, girls, do the Kathā Praṇām. Slowly sit up. The Kathā Praṇām exercises we put into our yoga and daily life system. The practice of Kathā Praṇāma is put into the system of Yoga for Everyone in Life. And we have determined a whole stage as Kathā Praṇāma. It was a Kathā program. Continue the practice. Practice Kathā Praṇāma. Slowly, slowly. The Hungarians should know, in summer camp, in my first summer camp in Hungary, near Budapest, one village called Pač, 1979. In 1979, we had a nice program on a small hill. Hungarians don't have very high hills, so it was a small hill like Kāṭu. And we designed, I designed the exercise Kathā Praṇām. First of all, it has a very great spiritual power. As many of you said, but you need this devotion. When devotion is lost, interest is lost. Then you are that bird which has lost its wings and is standing in front of the cat. The bird would like to fly away. And the bird knows the cat will now, very soon, kill me. I will be the victim of the cat, but the bird has lost its wings. Only muscles are moving, trying to fly away, but cannot. Similarly, when a yoga teacher or a disciple, through kuśaṅga or negative thinking, loses confidence and faith—when faith is lost, then you have lost everything. You know that a yoga teacher is not a physiotherapist, or it is not a physical instructor, but it is a very spiritual person. And spirituality can only be maintained when you have that confidence. You found it. But still, you have salt in your gums, so you don't taste anymore. And you are searching here and there, from one pilgrim to another pilgrim, because still you didn't taste what you wanted to taste. Mahāprabhujī said, "Kāśī jāve, Mathurā jāvo, cāro dāma phire." If you go to Kāśī or Mathurā, Kāśī is Śiva and Mathurā is Kṛṣṇa, and so on, all the four pilgrim places. But still, you will not find. If you have not found within yourself, you will not find outside. If you go from one place to another, but if you have not found within yourself, you will not find outside yourself. That's why many aspirants, many teachers, many disciples suddenly lost their spirituality. That's why many students, surprisingly, lost their interest. There is one bhajan, you know. Guru Dev, when I stand on my feet, I ask, who, who, who? When Guru Dev is standing beside me, now what should I expect, something more? You know this bhajan very well. Who doesn't know, hand up. You sang many times, but it doesn't matter because it's in the Hindi text. Now, girls, again, Ānandāsana. So that bhajan is called "Guru Devā mere jaba pāsa kade māyā sakarū kisakī? Guru Devā sakarū kisakī?" So this is the song. So, when there is one very famous artist, and he loved his instrument so much, he used to tell me that, "Swāmījī, my sitār is for me like my God." And so, Manjshiva was carefully taking the sitar with him, here and there. And every day, cleaning. And when he used to play, first he took his sitar and touched it to his head and to his heart. And before he would play the sitar, he would lean on his heart and his cello. And he was playing beautifully. Suddenly, he lost interest. He married a girl who likes to go horseback riding. And he fell into the horse interest, and he was also interested in horses. But you know that horses, guitars, and sitars are not in harmony. And he lost everything. He changed the flat. And he gave his sitar to a neighbor. Now, the sitar became a burden for him. An artist who is painting suddenly loses the interest in painting. Why did you come so late? Why did you go out? Thank you. Anybody who comes late should not come in. He is a yoga teacher. So he lost interest, and now he can't paint anything. One picture he couldn't finish in five years. In five years, they can't finish a single picture, because there is no interest anymore. Similarly, when you lose your devotion, your interest in being a good yoga teacher, and you lose interest, then you are searching for different things. Then you are making an Ayurveda course. Ayurveda is not bad. Ayurveda is as beautiful as yoga. Reiki is also very good. But you are searching differently because you lost it. What you had, and when you lose it, that's empty space. And that empty space will not accept anything, still. Whatever you try to fill it with, it will be rejected by your body. Like in your physical body, when doctors implant something and your body does not accept it, it means your body rejects it. So you are like that bird standing without wings, and you are the victim of the death of the cat. Therefore, the first thing is that you have to develop love for your profession. So, girls, now you make pranayama, sit up. Because we will come to the Nāḍī Śodhana prāṇāyāma. And so, when there is no love, then you lose it. And the problem of many people who lost the interest and love is this: always kuśaṅga. Like many of you are sitting here now, I don't want to mention the name, but you should know which country I mean. They are my best example of the always negative talking on the telephone, always. Blackmailing is always put in as a sweetness. So there is one nice story. You should know, as a yoga teacher, that things happen to you, not to me. As a yoga instructor, you should know that things happen to you, not to me. To me, nothing can happen. Whatever should have happened has already happened. So, I am only happening, that's all. So, you can call me a Happen. HP, you know, Holy Names Paramahaṁsa, happen. So there was one ṛṣi called Nārada. And Nārada always used to make some games. Sometimes, some jokes. But sometimes he was in trouble from his own jokes. So he saw Śiva and Pārvatī. That is how close they are, how happy they are, how perfect they are, how much they love each other, how much they trust one another. Shiva and Shakti, consciousness and matter, nature, Puruṣa and Prakṛti, you can't separate them. It is separate, but it is one. Consciousness can do nothing. And Prakṛti without consciousness can do nothing. Consciousness has no desire, and Prakṛti has desire. But Prakṛti can do nothing without consciousness, so there is a oneness. There is one disciple from me, his name is Graf Hoyos, a very nice person from Austria. And he was writing a book, and I don't think he finished. The name of his book was "Crossing of a River." And this river means some psychic situations, emotional situations in life. And he said once in his talk long ago, if I remember, when I close my eyes, I see myself with black hair. And in his lecture he said, in reality, in man exists more woman consciousness, because man is all the time thinking about woman. And in the women, consciousness is existing mostly in the men. All the time, they are thinking about the men. Which is not bad. It is in nature. When you are a small baby, you are thinking mostly about your mother. So women are not bad. Lucky are they who can think about women. But you also think about your father. So blessed are they who can think about the Father. So these are the conditions of the rivers going up and down. So it is natural that man thinks about woman, and woman thinks about man. So this is Puruṣa and Prakṛti, and both sides are like iron and magnet. But Puruṣa can do nothing. She has no desires. Desires are in the nature, but nature can't do anything without Puruṣa. So there is a perfect balance. It should be a perfect harmony. When disharmony is coming, then either Puruṣa will be separated, then Prakṛti is suffering, or Prakṛti is in imbalance; it will not be fruitful. So there is always connection. And so are Shiva and Shakti. Shiva is the Puruṣa, consciousness; Śakti is the nature. So the Ṛṣi Nārada, he was thinking how to separate them, how to bring disharmony. He is always thinking like this. There are some people who cannot sleep unless they have created some trouble. On the day when he or she has not created a little trouble somewhere, they cannot sleep. Then, what are they doing when they can't sleep? She takes her pillow and tells her husband, "I can't sleep here, you are snoring. I go in the kitchen and sleep there." I created trouble. Now she can sleep very soundly. So this is a psychic nourishment for crazy people. Unless you don't telephone someone, you don't talk negative, and negative talking is coming very sweet, and then this sweetness is functioning for your consciousness like a poison, and that poison kills your immortal bhakti, your confidence. And when that is lost, you are that bird, which will sooner or later be the victim of the cat. Nārada goes to Śiva. When Pārvatī was not there, he said, "My Lord, I am very afraid for you." First he said, "I love Divine Mother Pārvatī, and I love you, my Lord, very much." And how divine it is, how beautiful it is. Śiva said, "Oh, yes." He tried to gain the confidence of Śiva. Then he said, "But my Lord, I am afraid for you." About your life, you are very important for us, the whole universe. What will we do without you, Lord? The whole universe, what will we do without you, Lord? But why? Please don't misunderstand, I respect her very much. She's great, but I heard that time. At that time, she has hysterical, a true stand. What is that? At that time, the devil powers awake in her, and she's waiting to kill you, to eat you. And her aim is to eat you while you are living. Torture your body with your own teeth. But Lord, who can destroy you? Oh, you are the great one. And she will never do to you. It's my stupidity. I think it is like this. Take care. Yes, she doesn't come near to you at all. Only when you are taking a bath. Then she is rubbing your back and your shoulders and cleaning your back. I heard that tomorrow she will open her wide mouth and take out this muscle of yours. To make your hands powerless, please observe that. But you are Lord, nothing can happen to you. I pray for you, to you. This, he put the blackmailing in Śiva's subconscious. And Shiva said, "Oh, Narada, you are stupid. Don't talk about my Pārvatī like this. She is great. And it doesn't matter what she does, whatever she is doing is the best. Go." So Nārada went. But Śiva was thinking, maybe there is some truth in it. This is blackmailing, you know, blackmailing. And he went to Parvatī, and he told her the same thing. How great she is, and how divine she is. You are a divine Śakti. Without you, the entire universe is paralyzed. Consciousness can do nothing. Shiva can't do anything. We are all worried about us, you. She said, "Why? You see, for a long, long time I have wanted to tell you." I didn't want to offend you, and of course, also not Śiva. But for a long time, it has been disturbing me. Should I tell you, or should I not tell you? Okay, Divine Mother, I will not tell you. You know everything. And when someone tells you that, "I will not tell you," psychologically you say, "Now please tell me." So she said, "Please tell me, my son, Nārada. Tell me." He said, "But don't be angry with me. I know how much you love Śiva and how great he is; he is the Lord of the Universe." But you know, when he drank the poison from the churning of the ocean, where Dhanvantari appeared with the nectar of Amṛta Kalasha, before that, poison appeared, and now the gods and demons didn't know what to do with the poison. Wherever they will throw it on the earth, the earth will be destroyed. And these are the atom bombs now. Atomic reactors, now we don't know how to stop them. That's coming true, so we need now Śiva, who can neutralize this all. That time, Mother Pārvatī, this Śiva drank the poison and his body became blue. He couldn't digest it. And you are washing and touching him every day? We are afraid that you will be poisoned. And when you are poisoned, then the whole system will be paralyzed. She said, "Really, it's like this?" He said, "Yes, it is like this." But why didn't Shiva tell me? Yes, this is a question: why didn't he tell you? Maybe he has something in mind. It means I should not give him a bath. No, no,... you do everything. That's your thing. Who am I to say, "Don't touch Śiva?" But in your place, I don't want to be touched. You know, his body is so bitter. Tomorrow, when you are giving him a bath, very carefully, be sure that he doesn't notice what you are doing. When you wash his right shoulder, they tell Shiva, "How nice is that mountain, my Lord?" And he will look that side. You open your mouth wide. And from the middle part of the tongue, touch his chest, his skin, his shoulder. And Śiva was also observing what she was doing. Shiva followed what she was doing, and the time came. She told Shiva, "Look at the mountain." And he is looking at the mountain, and she opens her mouth completely. And Shiva noticed the shadow of her mouth. He looked at her, and she was with open mouth and said, "Oh, God!" Shiva quickly took his towel and ran away. And Parvati said, "My Lord, what happened?" He said, "I don't trust you, go away." And it created unnecessary trouble among them. But very soon they came to know that it was a play of Nārada. And like this, you have many Nāradas, and you lost that love. And when you lose the love, your confidence, what can we do? Therefore, it doesn't matter what happens, my confidence will not change. May the Moon and the Sun change their direction, but the Master's words will never change their direction. And so, even the whole Himalaya can say, but the devotion and confidence of the Bhakta will never say. Like it is said, when I die, look into the eye. Mutely they will say, "I will be Thine. Even if I go far, farther than the stars, still, my Lord, I will be Thine." And this is your confidence in your path, in your philosophy, in your interest, in your teachings; then you will be successful. And so it is yourself guilty that you don't know, and you have no knowledge. So every posture has immense energy and benefit. But when the doctor gives someone medicine, the doctor should know that this medicine has this and that content. Then you will not run to search this and that. That's it. So, there is a difference between Kaṭhā Praṇām and Prāṇāyāma, well, Sūrya Namaskār. But it does not mean that Sūrya Namaskār is not so good. Or it means not that Kathā Praṇām is not so good. And because the Kathā Praṇām is a young combination of the postures, and as he said, it is developed in yoga and daily life, it is dedicated to Mahāprabhujī, and those who have the love and respect or devotion to Mahāprabhujī, they gain everything. And those who have not, they gain nothing. That's it. And therefore, it's very important that you should experience every posture. And I'm very happy that my people from Czechoslovakia, Croatians, Slovenians, and Hungarians, they do really like research work on their teachings. I'm very happy that my students from Czech, Slovak, Croatian, Slovenian, and Hungarian are working and doing research on what they are practicing. And they have a number of classes. In some places, people are on the waiting list to attend the Yoga and Daily Life classes. But in some places, the teachers became commercial, and now they have to fight to find the people. So, the teacher should never think commercially to teach. On that day, you will lose two teachers. On that day, you will lose two things: your spirituality and people's confidence. And on the day when you surrender and do it really hard, with love, you will gain both. When you lose this spirituality and the other's confidence, then you have lost everything. Therefore, for yoga and daily life teachers, the first mantra is NAHAṂ KARTĀ. I am not the doer. My Lord, You are the doer. Only you are the doer. Then you will be successful. And remember, this system is designed to help all, without differences. Don't make differences. As soon as the teacher begins to make a difference, my students and their students, they are coming to me, "Why do they go there? You made a difference." Even within your guru brothers and sisters. Then you lost again the bhakti, the vairāgya, the tyāgya, and jñāna. Therefore, the yoga and daily life teachers, you have many points in your yoga and daily life book written already. Read, please, carefully, what a teacher should do and what a teacher should not do. Between āsanas and prāṇāyāmas, or meditation, you have an interval. So, don't give them free time. This is an interval where you can tell them, "10 minutes to relax," and those who want to go to the toilet can go and come back. Or those who want to drink something, they can go and drink. This is a pause in which you give them 10 minutes where they can relax, and if someone wants to go to the toilet, they can go to the toilet, or to drink something. That's all. So they can relax, and those who want to go to the toilet can go and come back and relax. There will be no discussions, there will be no chatting. So in many, many places, the yoga teacher thought that I should be more warm-hearted, welcoming people and asking, "How are you?" and this and that. Instructors think they should be more open to the practitioners, to ask them more about how they are, what they are doing. And when a person comes to you a few times, you naturally gain confidence, or they gain confidence, and you begin to believe in yourself, and then you begin to tell others about your problems. You miss the time, and the person is thinking, your student, "I went to yoga classes to get rid of all my tensions and problems, but I'm surprised that my yoga teacher is also having so many problems, and he or she became my..." Problem, and it's better I go home and have my problem with my partner, and you have to give confidence to your students. Some students don't like that you touch them to correct the posture, and some would like that you correct the position. So you should ask, if you allow me, that I correct your posture, and don't talk too much in the class. Don't try to explain all the time the same benefit. Don't constantly explain the same benefit from the same practice. Every time you can tell about Kathopaniṣad, but different. Or about Bhujaṅgāsana. But every time you must tell something positive, new. And also the negative, what can harm. So you must be able to perform the postures, but many of you cannot. Even I can't do the headstand or the handstand. So, certain things we cannot ask from you. But still, you should have knowledge about that. So, about yoga therapy, if you trust and make a yoga therapy, then you will say this is the best therapy in the world. But if you don't trust, and you are just doing it as a kind of occupation, something you are interested in, or a side income, or every day you have some friends around you. You did not understand yoga, and especially you did not understand the science of yoga in daily life. Then you lost it. You lost the wings to fly. So, once you make clear to yourself what you want, what it means for you, and when it is clear to you, then develop the love. Patañjali said, for the aspirant, their exercises or techniques are more than God Himself. Because these techniques will bring you to God. There is a very expert mechanical engineer. But that mechanical engineer can't do anything when he has no instrument. And when he gets bad instruments, it's a headache for him. And when he gets the proper instrument, he enjoys repairing something. It is a joy to do something, to correct something. So for the yoga teacher, it is a joy to help someone. But not that kind of joy like Nārada created between Śiva and Pārvatī. You are injected by those poison injects, and that infection doesn't let you believe, even if I talk now. Mahāprabhujī said, "You don't know, and you don't believe me. Now what can God do with you?" So even God can't do anything to you. So you have to open your heart. You have to gain again your Tyāga, Bhakti, Vairāgya, Tapā. Otherwise, you ask me how I am, and I will smile and say, "Yes, thank you." You ask me, "How are you?" I laugh and say, "Yes, I am fine." And then I will ask you, "How are you?" And you will say, "Thank you." But this was not from my heart, nor from your heart. It was only on the surface, and on the bottom lie stones and stones. Clear your heart, clear your consciousness, widen your consciousness, and develop the knowledge. I am 100,000% sure that this yoga therapy, according to your yoga daily life system, will help you. But do it. So, nāhaṁ kartā, prabhudip kartā. This was a task for you to make a difference between Sūrya Namaskāra and Kāṭha Praṇāma. We have Sūrya Namaskāra also in our yoga book. And we have Kathā Praṇām also. That's it.

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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