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This evening's subject is also about family. Most of all, you sitting here are family members, householders, mothers, fathers, children; many of you are great parents. Now, where we are speaking about Patañjali, all these citta-vṛttis, nirodha, discipline, and different difficulties in life, it's not that you run away from your family life. Those who try to run away are stuck in family life again, like honey and a fly; it's not easy. But for those who wish, it can be easy. Many of you, dear listeners around the world, are mostly householders, working in offices and different kinds of professions. How would you manage to follow the instructions of Patañjali? Can we achieve what Patañjali is saying, or can we not? It speaks about dharma, the principles, the obligations. So for the householder, their sādhanā, their spiritual path, will be completed if they are able to educate the children. When you have a child and you are not able to educate them, here is your clear picture that you have failed; you have failed on your spiritual path. It means the clear picture is within you that you are not able. If you would be capable to master thyself, then automatically your children will understand and follow you. For a householder, first dharma, first duty: dharma means duty, dharma means obligation, dharma means responsibility, dharma means principle, and dharma also means religion. Because religion also speaks of discipline and following the ethical principles in life and giving ethical education to the children. In this modern civilization, man has separated from man. Five members in a family, all are separated. Everyone becomes individualistic. Everyone has lost confidence in each other, and especially in the parents. How does it happen that your children lost confidence in you? This is your inner picture because you do not have confidence in yourself. You are not sure. If you would be, automatically your fellow family members would follow your footsteps. In our modern school education, unfortunately, the ethical education is missing. Just a handful of people make a kind of research work and write articles, and such education ministers we have in different countries who have no idea what education is. The ministers are chosen by the majority, but they are not selected by this minority of politicians themselves. The health minister doesn't have any idea about health. The health minister should be some professors, doctors, surgeons who have perfect knowledge about anatomy, medicine, psychology, and all other medicines, and to understand persons and illnesses. Then you will be a successful health minister. And such a health minister will implement in the country, in the schools, something which is good for the children and good for the people. There are ministers for nourishment, for consumption, and they have no idea about nourishment. And because someone would like to sell meat or alcohol, it is implemented, and they got the money from them. They have no idea about vegetarian life, healthy life, a healthy way of life. This is a problem. In old times, ancient times, people were chosen who had perfect knowledge about their position, their part of functions in the country. Now everything is with money power or some kind of protection. The victims are we. And in many countries, parents cannot say anything to the children. Yes, if parents have nothing to say to children, then who is going to say? So this is the vikṣepas, disturbances, kleśas, troubles, kliṣṭa, kliṣṭa vikṣepas. So sometimes one is sitting and thinking, "My God, if I had known this before, I would not have had children." But this is also not a solution; the humans will die out. But of course, all will not think like this, and we have enough people around the world. And if in your country there are fewer humans, there are many countries that would like to come and help you, no problem. Why not? Both hands clean together. Therefore the situation is this, that we do not have support even from the government side. If they knew about the subject, they would support us. There are rare countries that care about the spiritual growth of their people. There are no parties which would support them with open thinking, free thinking, tolerance, and making manana, the thoughts, for the spiritual and ethical development of their countries. All countries are running behind money, constructions, this, that, to become one day a superpower. It doesn't matter how hard you will work and whatever you have, you will never be a superpower. There's only one superpower, that's Almighty God. If you claim that you are the superpower, this can be destroyed within no time; that supreme power, cosmic power, comes and all your superpower is collapsed. Where are you? What do these people think? That is what we call higher education, academic education. The world cultures, fine spiritualities, and this is destroyed by so-called such highly educated people. They became one-sided and they lost the reality. Therefore, yoga is something which brings humans again back to their heart, and then from the heart comes back to the brain. Our thoughts, what we are thinking, should be colored in your heart with the color of love, with the color of compassion, with the color of mercy, and with the color of understanding, and with the color of that knowledge which will make everyone comfortable and happy, and spiritual development will be there. The thoughts from the brain going out without touching the heart or without the deep heart color, these thoughts are like a plastic apple. Therefore, we have to come back to the heart to understand. So-called we, the religious leaders around the world, are also fighting that my religion is the best. That is another war in the world: political war and religious war. And then there is a third war, that's called a cultural war: my culture, their culture, my mentality, their culture. So how do we imagine that, being a householder in this turbulent world, we cannot say this or that; we have to keep silent? Otherwise, you are in trouble. Yes, unfortunately, it is like this. So how, Patañjali, what is he advising us? What should we do? Well, it is said nothing is impossible. Nothing is impossible. Begin with the grassroots work, have self-confidence, and for the self-confidence to keep to your discipline, you have to face many, many obstacles. Yesterday and today we were walking; every day we are walking. We get up from our bed, we walk to the kitchen, to the bathroom, to the toilet, and so on. Today on the walk, when the hundreds of people, thousands of people were walking, one thousand people, how many feet, how many legs do we have? How did it come? Now, 2,000 feet walking on that particular space on the ground, and I saw there was a very gentle plant again; the ground stood up and was blossoming a flower on it. Yes, that was a will. Ask this small, gentle plant how many feet were on you. Yes, 12 days, every day, 2,000 feet, or let's say 1,000. So, 12,000 times was, how to say, crushed under your foot sole. But again, the inner strength, little drops of water came, and in the morning we went this time, and I saw how beautiful this is. And on the way, all are walking there, so that small, tiny plant gave me the vṛtti. But Patañjali speaks about vṛttis, and the subject is about the vṛttis. And abhyāsa, strength, confidence in the good power to achieve, to come there, it's not easy. The mountain peak looks beautiful from a far distance, but to reach that, you have to walk; it is not easy. Very often the thoughts will come, "My God, what am I doing? Why am I climbing this mountain up? No, I go back." But when you are at the peak of the mountain, then you don't breathe; you say, "Oh, beautiful." What a wonderful view; that is achievement. But if you stop your project, you stop your work, you stop your sādhanā, you will not come there on the peak. So, for a household, the first thing is, for everyone, for all creatures, for all creation, the first thing is good health. The first happiness is the healthy body or health. That's why in the Vedas it is said, "Peace for all and good health; all should be happy." This kind of thought is given to us. First is our health; second, your inner confidence. If you are not inwardly healthy, you will always change your opinion. You will change your path, you will change your mantras, you will change your masters, you will change wife or husband. Who is changing? I didn't experience this. Does the husband change the wife or the wife change the husband? This can only you answer. Always changing means inside you didn't find that what you were searching for, so also for householders and everyone, it is this: to find inner contentment. Without inner contentment, you will not be happy and you will not be successful. And constantly changing is not advisable because, let's say, you walk half an hour towards the peak of the mountain, then you change, you come again down for 15 minutes, then you again make your mind to go up, and then again you come down, then you go straight the other side, and then you will never come there up. And you will never get up like that. Another thing, the husband and wife should make a saṅkalpa and prayer, purify the body, purify the thoughts, and wait for a beautiful constellation. You should consult with a good astrologer. There are many astrologers, but this astrologer is Phil Gilogan. But there is a certain constellation when husband and wife decide to have a child, and on this constellation you will have the child, that sparkling star of the heaven. But now these children are born out of alcohol. The husband is drunken, the wife is scared and angry and quarreling. First, purify the environment. Purify the body, purify the thoughts, and pray according to that God which you believe, or you don't believe, but some principles, pure energy. But with this, the husband and wife must have a saṅkalpa that, "Lord, my child, doesn't matter daughter or son, my child should be that child which will continue my work, my path, my spirituality, and my humanitarian and veterinarian and the environmental projects, that my child will create." You are replacing your child; you give to the hand of your children the whole culture of your house, the tradition of your house, the relations of your house, everything you give in children's hands with this kind of confidence that they will lead further. And so is also the master, constantly praying for that disciple, which will continue this paramparā, which will have this light, this strength. So in sannyāsa, in the yogic way, there is a spiritual lineage, paramparā. But in the family, there is also this paramparā, what we call the dynasty. Every family has a dynasty. Your child is born to replace you. And when the child is born, you are happy, but you should know now the lord of the house is already here. Slowly, slowly, now, as Patañjali said, make vairāgya to hand over everything to your children, and you go for meditation, retirement. This retirement system, what we have now, is an ancient system. There are four pillars of life, the four quarters of the life: the childhood, the student, brahmacharya; gṛhastha, family life; vānaprastha, prepare for retirement; and sannyāsa, you are retired and detached. For a sannyāsī to go back to the home, it is a sin. You retired, you renounced; you cannot come back. For a sannyāsī, when he goes home, it is like you spit, but you say, "No, no, I will lick it back." Can you lick it back while you spit? Except chocolate, good. That's it. And similarly, for the householder, when you have children, then you prepare and you give it to them. And thanks to God, around the world, in this system of the governments, what you call, you have a pension; you get your retirement pension, and you live from that. Good, thanks to God they give you a little pension. Why? Because if you get more pension, then you have a pension; you are always planning, "Now I go to holidays there." "Now I go to holidays there." Why? All days are holy days. Remain, meditate. You don't need to go anywhere, and what you eat, very little. And that's why the pension is also very little. That's it. So, I admire some certain system of government is good, that you get less pay. You have no expenditure; all you have given to children: electricity, telephone, they should pay. You go and retire in a small hut. What do you need? A few potatoes and half a cup of milk. Don't eat more, otherwise you will die quickly. After 45 years, our eating should be reduced 60%. Then we can have more, 45%. So, we are not dying from not eating, but we are eating for dying. Do we live for eating or eating for living? Of course, we live for eating, and that is all the problem. We don't eat for living. It's very difficult to say no. Today I got my lunch: salad. Good salad, it was good. Then came some vegetables. Good chapati. I had one half chapati. Then came soup. And that I did not take. It was too bitter. Anyway. So, one half chapati, that much vegetable. I said I am full. Then came a bowl full of fruit salad with cream. And that is the problem of our health. Now it looks nice, sweet. Okay, I ate a little of this. And then came something more. This is this, too much. So good that you are alone somewhere in retirement. Or you and your wife don't have a lot of energy to prepare food, we will be eating, and we will not have much interest. So, the first duty of the household is to educate children in a good way. Second, maintain peace, harmony, love, and understanding within the family. Once I was sitting in a car; my family took me. I was on the road, stopping somewhere in Europe a long time ago. It was raining in the summer, and I had one suitcase. Some man stopped, and his wife said, "Okay, she will sit in the back, he can sit in the front." And there was written, "I know you are a good driver." So I asked him, "What does it mean, you write here you are a good driver?" He said, "Mister, it's not for you." I said, "Thank you." There are so many co-drivers correcting the driver: "Take care, red light." Of course, he's driving with open eyes. Why do you think about the red light? "Take care, somebody's taking over. Oh God, somebody's coming from the front." So, the person doesn't mean bad. The person would like to make sure that you know. But sometimes it gets on your nerves. And that person is called the soul, the nerve soul, the cutting nerves. It means that the partner, he or she at home, has so many arguments. So the joy or happiness and harmony of family life, for which you married, is lost. And many people have this problem. So quickly it's lost; you can't imagine. How was it when you got married and you decided to marry, and you got a wedding card and this and that? And how are your feelings now? Maybe you kept your wedding card at home. Can you read it again? So, second, that our family should have mutual understanding: husband and wife mutual understanding, children mutual understanding. Now, what do I mean to educate children? Educate yourself. You should behave, both husband and wife, in such a way that children automatically will learn how to live. You are an example for the children; you are that picture for them. But when you have no harmony and understanding, then children don't take it seriously. So, for your good health, practice āsanas, prāṇāyāmas, pray every day according to your beliefs, and love your children in such a way that they feel that, yes, really you love them. After two, three, four years, they don't feel that you love them. And they all go to sit somewhere and look at the television and this and that. I was in Australia, and one family was there, and they had one son. While his mother was cooking, she said to her son—he was about five years old only—"You can see the children's films," she put on television. And he came to his mother and said, "No, mother, I want to see how you are cooking. I want to be with you in the kitchen, and I don't want to see the television." She said, "Of course, you are welcome." She brought a chair. He sat on the chair because the work board is too high for this small child. And he was sitting there. She said, "No, not the knife. But you can give me one piece by one, and I will cut the vegetable." "Okay, mother." That child, I was observing him. The last 18 years, he became a very, very good person. Everyone admires him. And the mother didn't say, "Don't look at the television, come and sit beside me." So, how you behave, like that your children will behave. And lucky are they who have such children. There are some which are not like this, and then everyone is sleeping, and then you meditate. So the householder used to say, "My Lord, Lord, you gave me this life. My life is a ceremony to you. Merā jīvan terī pūjā. My life is worship for you. My entire being, whatever I do, is worship for you, my Lord. Take care of me." So, as a householder, you must have many vṛttis, and definitely we have good days, good news, bad days, bad news, health problems, school problems, job problems, many, many, many, many things, and we have to think. So, at that time, before 2500 years, Patañjali, when he was saying, there were not so many humans, and all were happy. They had one cow and milk, many fruits; wherever you go in the forest, they were so big, nice fruits, so sweet and good. You eat two fruits, and you didn't need to eat anything. Now when we walk to the forest, there are so few berries, and even these berries are poisonous; you can't eat. Thanks to God, they are only left for the birds. Nature disappeared; fruit trees disappeared. Look at beautiful agriculture and the thoughts of the farmers, let's say, in the Czech Republic or Slovakia and other countries of Europe. At the end of their land, they planted always fruit trees: apples, pears, peaches, and so many fruit trees. And now what we are doing? "Oh, these old trees, they are ill, we chip them off, and we put there some other kind of trees, not fruit trees." This is the thought. They were planting fruits for all who will walk, will have one piece of fruit. And now we said, "Oh, creating flies," we destroy the science. This was a science, a science for living, but now is living without any sense. There is no science in it. As a householder, you keep in your heart your mantra. You keep in your heart the presence of God. You pray to God for your happy family. Lord, that my family is healthy and happy and harmonious. And work to feed them. And create a beautiful relation with the neighbors. That becomes a society. And bring the spiritual, positive thoughts. We shall try to give trust to humans that, as your neighbor, I am not your enemy; I am your friend. But how many people do we not trust our neighbors? A neighbor doesn't trust us; this is the problem. So Patañjali is giving this instruction to those yogīs who had a nice wife. When the husband said, "I will meditate," she said, "Okay." And now when the husband tells the wife, "I will meditate," she says, "No." Go for shopping, but in Patañjali's time there were no shops for shopping, as everything was there, so there is a need for love and understanding. Then when you meditate in the evening or morning and pray, your thoughts will calm down. Automatically, many, many vṛttis: "Mera jīvan terī pūjā, my life is a worship to thee, O my Lord." The rest of the time: "Ab samp diyā is jīvan kā sab bhār tumhāre, ab samp diyā is jīvan kā, my Lord." All the responsibility of my life I gave to Him. That was, and that is still, not everywhere, but mostly in villages it remains. High, high life and very high education, what do you call doctor, doctor, doctor, daughter and the son also, I can't promise you from them. I speak about those beautiful, nice farmers. It was advised by ṛṣis, by great saints, cool gurus, the gurus of your dynasty, to have at home an altar. It doesn't matter which religion you believe in; in the home, in the corner, a nice place, while going out of the home, you greeted the altar to take care of your life, and while coming home you greeted also, before going to sleep, and as soon as the sunset was there they put on the candle or the oil lamp or the ghee lamp, and this agarbatti, or this, what you call, this kind of gum, dhūp. So we used to have a dhūp; this is some tree gums, and this smells nice. "Pūjā jis ghar me ho, terī āratī," in that house, in the Guru Gītā it is said, "O Lord, well, āratī to you, ceremony to you." So what happens in your house when you come? A person comes back; instead of agarbatti is a cigar. And instead of the holy water is vodka or cognac. What will God do there? There will come these asuras. You experienced asuras in heaven took over; asurī śakti is the most powerful one, and now also too. So culture, this tradition, throughout the whole world the humans had in their house their patrons of their house; when they traveled, it's not only blind belief, it is true, you are protected by some higher consciousness, and God is there with you in your such a belief. And that bhakta said, "Now give all my responsibilities, these sorrows of my life, in your hands. I don't care if now I will be successful or I will not be successful, because it is in your hands. Dīn bandhu dīnānāth, merī dorī tere hāth, O Lord of the weak ones, the rope or the string of my life is in your hands. Please sometime move the string towards you, that I may come closer." We are like the puppets in the hands of the Lord's divine will. In this way, the household, leading Karma Yoga, Bhakti Yoga, Jñāna Yoga, and Rāja Yoga, all hold different kinds of yoga at the same time, and the household is doing one of the biggest, greatest works for God. That they continue His creation. You are getting children; you are helping God. Yes, God is more happy with you, because if all will become sannyāsīs, then God will say, "Now where are my children?" No more help for them. This will be; the whole world will be dried out. So, don't be; God doesn't care if you are married or not. God doesn't care; He does care only how pure your heart and your thoughts are, and how you are content. "Lord, wherever I am, I am happy." In which condition and in which situations you are, remember God, and so through this we will fulfill the vākyas of the ṛṣis. So for a householder, vairāgya means to give up that anger, give up that greed, give up those conflicts and egos towards others; that is your vairāgya, simple but with higher thinking. "God forgive us, God be with us, Lord protect us, all of us." Not only in some countries they say, "God bless this country"; we said no, "God bless the entire world." All countries are God's country. And so this was instruction on how to lead a spiritual life as a householder, and the prime duty is that your children have that feeling and love and spiritual followers, that they will complete your spiritual life. They are your successors; their complete success will be your success, and their children's success will be theirs. One after another, a chain is uniting; chain work. If your children are not following you, then it means you didn't try enough to develop yourself spiritually, and you have no confidence, you have no certainty, and you have the fear, and that's why you couldn't do it; you failed. And when you failed to "Keiko chorāsī," who has failed, go again to this creation, chorāsī lākh, 8.5 million creature cycle, you are again in that line. So beautiful. Don't think, "What will I do?" You will do a lot. Work, begin with the grassroots, step by step. It can happen that in your family no one respects you, that you are spiritual; don't do that. You work step by step, continuously, step by step by step; one day they will be proud of you. One day they will be proud of you; that's it.