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Gurur Brahmā, Gurur Viṣṇu, Gurur devo Maheśvaraḥ, Gurur sākṣāt Para Brahma, tasmai śrī gurave namaḥ. Mannātha śrī Jagannātha, madguru śrī Jagadguru. Mamātmā sarvabhūtātmā tasmai śrī gurave namaḥ. Om Śrī Alakh Purī Jī Mahādeva Kī Jai, Devādu Devadeva Viśvara Mahādeva Kī Jai, Śrī Dīp Nārāyaṇ Bhagavān Kī Jai, Hindū Dharam Samdhar Paramahaṃsa Svāmī Śrī Mādhavānanda Purī Jī Satguru Deva. Bhagavān Kī Jai, Viśvaguru Mahāmaṇḍaleśvara Paramahaṃsa Svāmī Śrī Maheśvarānanda Purī Jī Gurudeva Kī Jai. Salutations to the cosmic Self. A Hari Om and good evening to all of you who are present here and those who are watching through Swamiji TV. How are you? Good. So, many blessings of Gurudeva and much love from Bratislava. Happy to be back here. Happy to be sharing this beautiful evening with my beautiful family. Anywhere I go, whichever āśram, whichever country, Gurudev has created this beautiful family for us, so we never feel alone. We come here, we are together. We go anywhere, we are always together. Togetherness is unity. And we practice yoga in daily life, and yoga comes from the word yuj. And yuj in Sanskrit means unity, so unity is very important. If there is a bamboo, a single stick, and I give it to you, you can easily break it apart. But if I give you ten or twenty bamboos together, tied up, you cannot really break it. That is us. If we are united, if we are together, we are stronger. But in this beautiful, new, modern Kali Yuga, in this time, we love to be alone, do we not? We are alone because we cannot cope with people. Then, living alone or amongst the community will not make much of a difference. First, I always heard that the mind, our brain, is like a monkey. Because we are jumping—or not we—our mind is jumping like that. We are never in peace. We all want peace. We may all experience certain peaceful moments. But did we ever observe and try to see if we are living in that peace? If that peace is longer than a certain moment? We all have so many things to do. We have so many things in the day which are happening to us. From the second we wake up till the second we go back to bed. No pause. Nothing. Before going to bed, we think about something, then that comes in our dreams. And then we go deeper and deeper in our brain, in our dreams. And finally, maybe there is a cusp of half an hour where we maybe get some deep sleep without any brain functions. And maybe we will succeed during the night, when we get into a deep sleep and we do not think about anything. But that is exactly where meditation comes in. That is where yoga nidrā comes in. That is where satsaṅg comes in. At these times, our mind is at least somewhere. We all are sitting here physically, but mentally, are we all here? Do we have thoughts? What is happening at our home? What do we have to do when we get back? What is coming up tomorrow? Always we are thinking. We are listening to satsaṅg now, but still, are we thinking? We listen to this satsaṅg, but our mind is somewhere else. And when the body and the mind align together, and they both are sitting in that specific thing that we are doing, then there is somewhat of inner peace. There are so many things that make us anxious, that make us nervous. There are so many things that we are afraid of, that make us nervous, but we need to understand one thing: whatever is going to happen, happens. We cannot really change what is supposed to happen. Us worrying about absolutely everything else that we actually need to worry about, which is our own spiritual growth. One day a king had a dream, and in the dream he became a beggar. And when he woke up, suddenly he got a shock, so he woke up and then he saw again that he is a king. Then the question arose amongst himself, "Am I a king who is dreaming to be a beggar, or am I a beggar who is dreaming to be a king?" But what we need to realize is, neither we are the beggar, nor we are the king. We are just the observer. We are neither this nor that. When we get something new, when we buy something new, let us say we buy a new car. After buying a new car, you drive it for ten to twenty days until you get used to it or bored of it. And then that excitement which was there on the first day is not there anymore. Why? Because when we become happy, when something, some object, some person makes us happy, the movement of the brain reduces much. And we stop worrying about other things because we are happy. But if we grow spiritually, if we do meditation, if we follow our path, then that happiness is constant. And when the happiness is constant, then our mind is also more peaceful. When we see an old picture of us twenty or thirty years back—Rādho has many pictures of me when I was younger—or when I listened to myself singing twenty years back, we think, "That was me." Why? Because there is so much change happening. Our faces, our age, our way of living. Everything progresses or changes in a certain way. Nothing is permanent. Every day we are getting older and older. And universal fact, sorry to say, but we will die one day. We were born with nothing, and we shall go with nothing. But we get attached. We get attached to things in a way that it is hard for us to release or to let go. Vairāgya means having everything, but not being attached to anything. If we have it, we are okay. If it goes, we are also okay. Success will come, failure will come. Success will go, failure also goes. Nothing remains. And that ātmā is only the observer. Then automatically, we will be happy with anything and everything that we have. But if we hold on to desires, if we hold on to objects, if we hold on to everything, then we go somewhere else. If there is a lock, there has to be a key. And if there is no key, we break the lock. There is a solution to everything. We create the problems. We just have to find the solution. No one else is creating the problems for us. We create the problems. Until we try to solve that problem, we create ten new problems. And those problems neither I can solve, nor Gurudev can solve, nor anyone else can solve. You, yourself, us, we can solve it by ourselves—no one else. I am not able to solve it, neither I, nor Gurudeva, nor anyone else. We have to solve it ourselves. We do so many things in our lives. Do we do it consciously or unconsciously? Any move, any word, anything that is happening, it should be done with pure consciousness. With pure awareness, with purity in heart, because it is very easy to awaken our beautiful, nice friends slash enemies. Gurudev was repeating it for fifty, sixty years. I am repeating it for two years. Anyone remembers? There are five or six: kāma, krodha, mada, lobha, ahaṅkāra, īrṣā, which means jealousy. Best, our favorite, very easy to get jealous, is it not? We do not need to even know the person. We are driving on the street, and just next to us, there is a Porsche. Immediately, we get jealous. Why not me? Why do I not have this? I wish I would have this. Then expectations arise. And when we expect things in our lives and expectations do not come true, what happens? Sadness, anger, and envy, and that is also harmful. Did you ever see a lotus? We give lotus feet, lotus this, lotus that. Lotus is very, very beautiful, very unique, whatever you want to call it. Where does the lotus grow? In the mud. We all like gold. Gold. But gold does not smell. We like bamboo, but bamboo does not give flowers. Poor people have happiness but no money. And those who are wealthy are not happy, are not content, and are not at peace. The candana, the sandalwood, beautiful smell, no flowers. So everything in this world has a good quality, but does not have something. If we had everything in our lives, then we would not be working, we would be very lazy, many other things would go the other way around. So there is always something that we will not have, and something that we will have. The river is moving, but the river has good water, you know, sweet water. You can drink that water. My, you, we all have good qualities and bad qualities. And we can only learn from our own mistakes. Ten, twenty years, parents tell us, "Do not eat chocolates, do not eat this, your teeth will get bad, you will get sick." Ten to twenty years old, our parents tell us, "Do not eat this, do not eat too much chocolate, you will have toothache," but we do not listen to them. When we are young, the youngest generation, probably Gen Alpha, and already knows how to watch, open YouTube, open a video on YouTube, and watch it. If someone tells us, "Do not do this," we will specifically do that. Experience. So until and unless we fall down, we do not learn from our mistakes. We do not learn and grow from our mistakes. We are humans. When you heard that I am coming, or you meet me the first time, there are always expectations, right? And either the expectations are surpassed, or the expectations were not as you thought they would be. But if we accept everything as it is, in whichever way it is, we will be in peace, not me. When we accept who we are, we all wish to be someone. We look up to someone. Or we have a certain wish or a motive that we want to achieve this and this and this in our lives. You achieve it, you do not achieve it. It is good for you, it is not good for you. But it does not affect anyone else. Your happiness will affect you. Your sadness will affect you. Good example of this. Which one is this? Cheṭā Cheṭā Yava Jīva Gyānī Avasara Jāvere Guru Sama Jāvere. Can I have a bhajan book, please? Cheta Cheta Yava Jiva Gyanee, I still did not find the right pitch because before, when I was young, it was like, and then now it is like, and then now it is somewhere in the middle. If anyone says, "I am the perfect, there is no one better than me," run. If you go to any guru or any saint and they say, "I am the best," the first thing to do is run. Dhana dholata aura mahala khajānā, saba yehī reha jāve re. Dhana dholata aura mahala khajānā, saba jāve re. Anta samayī jīva jāya akelā, o saba yā vere. Andāsamai jīvajaya akelo sabāyai samajāve re. Pītāora Kuṭumba Kabīlo Yai Dhunā Lālacāve Re. Guru Samājhave. Guru samajhave chetā chetā yāvā jīva yāvā sarajhāve, satguru śaraṇ gayā binā mūrakh konmāvā paralāgave. Jai Jai... If you see a hole in front of you, we are going to skip the hole and go aside. Why? Because our viveka says it is not a smart idea to jump and break your legs. Or you come for satsaṅg, then our viveka says, "This is a good place to go." But it is not my viveka, it is our own. We all have viveka, and we all use it on our day-to-day basis. Any decision we take, if it is right or wrong, that is our viveka deciding. If we go on a wrong path, it is not that someone else sent us to that path. In the same way, as no one dragged you or pushed you to come tonight for satsaṅg, in the same way, if we go and do something wrong, it is not someone else; it is our own decision. But for us, we like good things, no? Something good happened in our job, we will give credit to ourselves. Something messes up, we will try to blame it on someone. When we point one finger at someone, how many fingers are still pointing at me? Only one is pointing there; the rest are pointing to myself. So if we are blaming others, first we should look at ourselves and see how many things are wrong inside ourselves. But because Rāvaṇa is stronger than Rāma inside us, Rāvaṇa symbolizes the negativity and Rāma symbolizes the positivity. Do not take me wrong, Rāvaṇ was the most knowledgeable person in the world. He was the greatest bhakta of Lord Śiva. But the only thing that brought him down was his own ego. Anything good happens, our ego spikes up. Part 2: The Incompleteness of Life and the Path to Inner Peace And that is why something is always left incomplete in our lives. If we had everything and everything were perfect, we would need to differentiate when that egoistic bhāva, that egoistic feeling, arises within us. Then we do some grounding, so that we come back down—to realize that this is who I am. Not who I am, but who my body is. This is the role which I am playing this time. It is said that dhan, daulat—the wealth, the house—everything will stay here; nothing will go with us. At the end of time, when we pass, only this soul, this ātmā, will go. Even the body will stay here. That is what the Gurudev is trying to explain to us. Mother, father, brother, sister, family, friends—all will stay. Yama is the lord of death. And when He is going to, a little bit, give us the repair for what we have done in our lives, who will rescue us? It means, if we do not go to a Sadguru, then who will liberate us or who will help us cross this very drafty sea? We can read books if we know how to read. So, first, our parents were our gurus, who actually helped us learn, talk, and read. Then our teachers were our second gurus. We might have a map in our hands. But many times, those maps do not even know the ways that an experienced person who has trekked that mountain would know. And a spiritual master is one who has trekked the mountain and knows the way, and he can just guide us and help us. That is where the Guru—he or she—their job ends. A Guru is a medium. A Guru is that light, that shining light which shows us that, oh, this is a rope, not a snake. We are surrounded by darkness, and there is something on the floor. Immediately we see it and we start shouting, "Snake, snake!" And silently someone comes with a lamp and shows it is not a snake, it is a rope. In the same way, that light is the one which shows us. It is the master who helps us see the path. We can get all the knowledge from the books, but to understand the deeper meanings of that, we need someone who is learned. In our Indian mythology, we believe that there are 8.4 million creatures in this world, divided into three aspects, three categories: Jalchar, Thalchar, and Nabchar. Jalchar means those who are living in the water; those who live on the ground like us; and Nabchar, those who are up in the sky. Finally, after crossing all of these creatures, after being a snake and a cockroach and an ant and mosquitoes, finally we get this human birth. Eating, sleeping, and reproducing are also done by animals. If we have this human birth, if we have this human life, it is something that we should not waste. It is very precious. It says that it is very rare to get this human birth, and we waste it. We waste that diamond; we waste it. It is very precious to gain this birth as a human being, and we will mourn it, we will mourn that diamond. Gayā vakt nahī āve pyāre, phir pachtāve re, guru samjhāve re. The time which has passed will not come back. Fir ham pachtāveṅge—then we will regret it. What happens in the past, can we really go back and change it? Can we? Something that will happen in the future, do we know about it? So if we do not know the past—I mean, we cannot change the past—and we do not know the future, then why are we so stuck in our heads in the past or future? Yes, every day we can learn something new from each other. Even if you hear me repeating the same things, every time you will hear something different, or you will get some other meaning out of it. Every time we hear something from someone, there is good and bad. That is why we have two ears now. From one ear we take all the information in, then we process it; what we like we keep, the rest we talk out. So instead of worrying about absolutely everything else, let us see ourselves and let us grow within ourselves. There was a lion cub, a child of a lion. And that cub, he was, since birth, brought up in the herd of sheep. He was eating grass, crying like a sheep. And then someone comes and says, look. After looking at his own reflection, he realized that he was also a lion, not a sheep. In that same way, we all know that we are that lion. Just that mirror is a little bit dusty. And that is why we have Gurudeva, who shakes off the dust and shows us that you are that lion. And later we progress in our own life, in our own ways. Śrī Rinpoche Bhagavān Dīp Nārāyaṇ Sutā Haṁsā Jāgave Reśa. Śrī Dīp Nārāyaṇ Mahāprabhujī is even showing and waking up the sleeping swans. The sleeping swans are us. Mahāprabhujī, Nāma Prabuddhasya Āpnoti Lābhaṁ Kāya. Mādhavānandajī, Bhajan Se Sab Sukha Pāve Re. Śrī Mādhavānandajī is telling us that with this bhajan we can learn and we can find all the happinesses in the world, because all the happinesses are residing within us. We just need to discover it. The problem is, we doubt ourselves too much. We are the best versions of ourselves. We know everything. We know what is right, we know what is wrong. We do not need validation from others. Just go within. Once we go within, we will get the answers to everything. Once you go within, you will find that peace which you are looking for. And then we will not need that momentary happiness which we get from partying overnight. Because inside will be a permanent party then. And once we get the taste of that bliss, of that ānanda—not only ānanda, paramānanda. Ānanda is happiness, paramānanda is the ultimate happiness. And that paramānanda we do not get from external things; we get it from within. Kouham Kadamedham Jatam Kouvei Kartas Sevid Dete. Every morning ask yourselves, who am I? What is the cause of my existence? From where did I originate? And once we get the answers to those questions, we will understand. If we do not want to do something, we will not. We always have time, but if we want to give that time to someone or something, we will. If we do not, we just say we do not have time. Things that truly matter to us, we surely will find time for. So if meditation, if yoga, if our mālā mantra helps us, then we will find time for it. How much did we ever notice? How much do we talk in a day? I was noticing. A few weeks back, I was up in the mountains in the Himalayas. No signal, no technology, boring life. What to do? Absolutely nothing. You cannot do anything because you cannot really go down. You are stuck in the camp for seven days. Then you start doing Self-Discovery Meditation by Viśvagurujī, and then you discover yourself, and we realize that that peace is really good peace, and you feel calm not only externally but internally too. And you realize that there is nothing that we need to do. Now do not listen to me in that serious way, that you stop doing anything and become jobless and sit at home. That is not what I meant by it. No, I am saying it because I gave some interesting advice, and it was taken very seriously. So, sarcasm does not really work always. So, being in inner peace will only come when we detach ourselves from other things which are externally there. In the Himalayas, I realized how much I talk. Because we were four, ten people, but five of us, and we were sitting and the whole day, at least we were talking. At least, because on normal days I am working, other guys are working, some are on Instagram, some are on Facebook, and we are all sitting together at the same table, eating, but all of us on the phones. But even up there in the mountains, where I did not have any calls, no consultations, nothing to deal with, no problems, nothing, but still, we were talking five, six hours continuously. And even there, when I did not have any lectures or phone calls, we talked for five to six hours. Then I realized, hmm, we talk too much. Do we need to talk so much? That is why I decided that we—at least me, but all of us—we should try at least to consciously become silent for a while. Mauna. When you wake up, before going to bed, whenever you can, consciously become silent. Do not say that, OK, I am going to sleep, that is my silence. But if we consciously decide, 30 minutes, 40 minutes, 1 hour, whatever we can, no words. And that 30 minutes is except your meditative time, where you are in silence. You still do all the work, whatever you need to do, just with mauna. Why? Because with the practice of sādhanā, now, with other things, the words which we say are very precious because they come true. You call it Vāksiddhi, or you call it manifestation, or you can call it whatever you want. But sometimes—many times, not sometimes—you do not say something to someone which you do not mean. You do not mean to hurt that person, but in the flow of anger, in the flow of anything, we do not have control over our mouth. And at that moment, something comes out of our mouth, which at that moment does not seem so massive, but later we realize that it was not the smartest idea to say that, or the other person feels really bad. How many times in our lives, when we were angry, we said, "Go to H-E-L-L"? Do we mean it? No. But it resides on our tongue, and on the tongue also Sarasvatī resides. Sarasvatī is the goddess of knowledge. Good catch. So, when Sarasvatī resides and we do not take care of what we say, Sarasvatī goes away. And most of the time it does not affect us, but it surely affects the other person to whom you said not-so-nice things. And you know what helps? Apologizing. And what is more effective than apologizing is forgiving. Because when you forgive someone, it is not for the other person. It is more for ourselves. It is more for curing and healing ourselves. We may say, "I forgive you," but inside we still hold that anger, that grudge, that animosity. But when you truly let go and say, "I forgive you," with the heart, then in our life, that other person—maybe they believe it or not—but we will surely be in peace if we truly forgive someone, because that energy, that negativity, that is out of us. And even if we do not have time to sit in meditation, all the time should be meditation. We do anything, it is done with a conscious mind, with pure intentions and purity in heart. That is already a meditation. Let us try to be more aware of our actions, of our words, of everything. Already when there is somewhat of grounding, when there is somewhat of awareness in anything, then that is a living meditation. We are aware of our breathing. And we know that every time we inhale, we are inhaling the vital energies, the prāṇa śakti. And every exhalation, we are taking out all the negativity, all the toxins, all the bad energy out of our body. And best is when you do not dream. It is easy. Because there are no thoughts, no movements, you are in bliss and peace. And if you are in the present, if you do not think—that is why I most of the time go out of the time limit. It is already 7:30, okay, I am still okay. But when you are in the flow, when you do not think too much about past and present, the clouds come and go. Problems, happiness, sadness—all are those clouds. The only stable thing is this Ātmā. And when this soul, this Ātmā, becomes one with that Paramātmā, with that Supreme Self, śāśvat ānandamaṅgalam. We have Guru Kṛpā and we are in ultimate bliss. That is it. And Holy Gurujī, Śrī Mādhavānandajī always said, "Higher than Guru Kṛpā is..." And what Mahāśvarānandajī always said, Mādhavānandajī always said, "Holy Gurujī, what is higher than Guru Kṛpā?" It is kutkī kṛpā, which means grace on ourselves. Kuṭkī Kṛpā, and that is grace on ourselves. Because even the Guru cannot force us to go on the right path; that, at the end of the day, will be our own decision. Many blessings from Guru Dev. Much love from me. Svasti prajābhyāṃ paripālayantāṃ nyāyena mārgeṇa mahīṃ mahīśāḥ. Go brāhmaṇebhyaḥ śubhamastu nityaṃ. Lokāḥ samastāḥ sukhino bhavantu. Om śāntiḥ śāntiḥ...