TV Channel

Oṁ, asato mā sadgamaya, tamaso mā jyotirgamaya, mṛtyormā amṛtaṁ gamaya. Sarveṣāṁ śvastirbhavatu, sarveṣāṁ śāntir bhavatu, sarveṣāṁ maṅgalaṁ bhavatu, sarveṣāṁ pūrṇaṁ bhavatu. Lokaḥ samastaḥ sukhino bhavatu. Oṁ śāntiḥ śāntiḥ śāntiḥ. Lead us from unreality to reality. Lead us from darkness to light. Lead us from mortality to immortality. May all be happy, peace be everywhere, harmony and fulfillment be everywhere. May the whole world be happy and live in peace. Peace, peace, peace. Deep Nārāyaṇ Bhagavān. A very good evening, dear brothers and sisters. It was a wonderful evening. We begin with our prayers and our sympathy for those of our brothers and sisters who were affected by the tsunami yesterday—not only the humans, but other creatures too. In these creatures, we, according to the Vedas and Upaniṣads, include the trees also, the grass also. There was beautiful bhajan, music, and singing. In the Vedas it is said, nāda-rūpa-para-brahma. If you want to see God, how the Supreme One, the Almighty, the Universal Cosmic Self looks, then His form is resonance, it is sound. And so we had the blessings of beautiful sounds from the instruments, and also our dear sister, who inspired us with beautiful singing, comparable to the beauty of our planet. In India, we say four saints or gods incarnate here on this planet for the sake of others. That's a beautiful poem: Sarvar, tarvar, sant, janā, chauthā bhārṣī mī paramārath kī, karne chāro dhārī he de. The four manifest states here on this planet are for the well-being of others. For example, first, the lake: all the ponds and lakes and fountains and waterfalls are not for themselves; they are for others. The lake doesn't drink water itself, but for others. If you wash your dirty hands and feet and clothes inside, the lake doesn't tell you, "Don't do that." If you drink water from the lake, the lake doesn't tell you, "Don't drink." If you bathe in it, do what you like. The lake is like a mother, and we are the children in the womb of the mother, and we do what we like. Don't tell us, "Don't do this." That is Sarvar. Second is called Tarvar. Tarvar means the trees. Trees live for others, not for themselves. Trees are not attached to those who are giving water, planting them, and loving them in the beautiful nursery, or in the garden, or in the park, or in the meadows, as we saw today. And the tree is not an enemy to those who chip the trees. If you throw a stone at the tree, she doesn't catch the stone and throw it at your back. But instead of that, she will give beautiful fruit, the cherries for you, the apple. There are millions of creatures surviving and living and having shelter under the trees, from very fine, small ones till big birds, and animals, and humans too. In the evening, you see the many birds come and sit on the tree. The tree gives place to everyone. She never says, "No, you are a naughty bird, fly away from here." See, they didn't say. Everyone had a peaceful night. In the morning, they fly away. The tree is not sad. "Why did they go away?" She said, "I am here when you need me." That's all. Like parents tell the children, "When you need me, we are here." Sarvar, Tarvar, Santajan. And the third one is the holy saint. His or her preaching and teachings are not only for one person; they are for the entire world. A lake is there. A river is there. You can go and drink water. You can take the water. If you have a one-liter bottle, you can only take one liter. You have a five-liter bucket, you can take five liters of water. According to your capacity. Similarly, the words of the saints, how much you can preserve in your memory, it's up to you. And that's why we need satsaṅg and this world of this eco-project, saṅgha. For every human, there are two paths or two ways, one of which you should decide. One is called uthān—progress, development, achievement, fulfilment, uthān. And second is pātan, distraction. And uthān and patan both have only one root, one seed: saṅgha. That's called saṅgha. Saṅgha means "be with." It is the unity. Saṅgam is the group. Saṅgam is organization. In our language, in front of the saṅgha, if you write "Ku," K-U, then it becomes ku-saṅgha, bad society, bad saṅgha. You can produce such pollution that all the vegetation, all the trees die. That's also bad saṅgha for those trees. And if you write Sat, Satsaṅg, the good society, better society, better companion with whom you spend the time. Jaisā kare saṅga vaisā lage raṅga. In which society you are, like that color you will take, meaning habits. Habit is the second nature of man. Slowly, slowly, your habits become like your nature. Good habits will be lifelong, your good friends. And bad habits will torture you lifelong. It is easy to get rid of the enemy, but it is very hard to get rid of the bad habits which you learn in kuṣaṅga, in bad society. So the saints, their satsaṅg, their words, are for all. And the fourth is the rain. When the rain is falling, rain doesn't say, "No, no... here is dirt, I will not fall here." It falls equally. Every plant, the thorny plants and the flowers and the poisonous plants and the good plants, the grass—the rain is like a mother's blessing, a father's blessing. So, these four are the holy: Sarvar, Tarvar, Sant, Janat, Chauthavar, Seve, Sarvar—lake, rivers and so on, or ocean; Tarvar is a tree; and Sarvar, Tarvar, Sant, the holy saint, and rain. These have automatically, they have a title of holy. You need not declare whether you are holy or not. It is declared by the nature, by the Universal One, because you are for everyone. So, in the Vedas it is said, even the tree has a soul. A grass has a life; it has a soul. You don't feel it. And there is one spiritual religious group, it's called Jainas, and they have a holy book. And they tell, if you walk on the gentle young grass, the fresh growing grass, it means that you are walking on the stomach of a pregnant woman. Such is sin. They will never walk on this grass. Trees are our life, trees are our future, and trees are the beauty of everything. We are nothing. If there is no tree, there is nothing. So one wise American Indian aboriginal said—"aboriginal," you say, or only the tribes, the Indian?—"When the last fish will die and the last tree will be chipped off, oh man, then you will realize that you can't eat your dollars." And so, to grow the trees, it's a spiritual work to take care of them. I'm also planting many, many trees, and with the premier of South Australia, we began to initiate planting trees. And he said to Swamiji, "He will plant now two million, and next time I come, no, you have to plant five million." And when I was there, he said, "Swamiji, five million is done." I said, "No, we have to plant eleven million." And you know how he does it? The government is providing the seeds to every household and tells them to grow these little seeds in anything, anywhere, any cup or anywhere, in your yogurt cup or your ice cream cup or anywhere. And then plant it anywhere, wherever you find ground, plant, plant. So millions and millions of trees grow on. We would like to turn South Australia into greenness. And in many places, here also on this corner of this small park, we planted a peace tree. In many, many countries, in many cities where I come, I plant a peace tree. So the tree stands there forever. The tree stands for peace, for love, for life. And the tree gives us oxygen. The large quantity of oxygen we are getting is from the ocean. But next is from the vegetation. So it was beautiful to see how... But there is a problem, one more. It's good that you have good water here. But there are some countries where it doesn't rain for two or three years. And to cultivate their trees is a little bit of tough work. So I think Christophe, no? What's his name? Christ and Nisha, I should invite them to the desert of Rajasthan, to develop for us a few hectares of the land, turning it green with trees and like this. I have planted several thousand trees in the last 10 years, about 250,000 trees. And it survived, I think, 60%. And there was no rain for a long, long time. And unfortunately, where I have this piece of ground, the soil is only about one foot six inches to two and a half feet. So there is a tough job because of the roots; they can't go, and then the water problem, and then salty water in many spots on the... Planet which has such a soil is difficult to get, but still, where there is a will, there is a way. Also, we have a water harvesting project, and for us, every drop of water is so precious. In certain parts of Rajasthan, the farmers, when they take a sip of water to clean the mouth, then we are thinking, "Where should I spit?" What a pity. So we look for some green grass or something green, and there we will put this water down so that we will get something better than nothing. Such a water... Many, many people, per head, three liters of water per day. What do you imagine? For everything, for your washing, for your drinking, you have to carry water from a far distance. Of course, our government is now doing a lot of work and making efforts to bring water from big rivers. We also have the rainforest, and we have the biggest rivers and very much water. But now the problem is that all the glaciers in the Himalayas are melting. Big problem. And now these melting glaciers bring the flood, and the rivers are overflowing. So there is a disaster. And why did it all happen? Through one thing, and that is the human brain, human mind. What is in that mind? The greed. And therefore, Mahātmā Gandhījī said, "Mother Earth has enough for everyone's need, but not for the greed." If we come to our limitation, we can save our beautiful planet. Otherwise, you know what's happening? Tsunamis. In one decade, if not even one decade, how many years? We have two tsunamis. When was the last one? In 2004. Now, you see, in eight years, nine years, eight years, a tsunami began. And we don't know how many tsunamis are in the brain of the people. We are taking everything away from Mother Earth. If you meditate and you can feel, if you can feel the earth, like our brother said that he sits and he likes to watch these meditative pictures of the horizon with the sunrise or sunset and the waves and the beach peacefully... If you can meditate and feel, Mother Earth is crying. She can't breathe. So many highways, how many million square kilometers of earth are completely pressed down, so that the earth can't breathe anymore. Why? Because we would like to have the best car, a good car, a quick car, and comfortable driving, and so on, but we don't think of this Mother Earth. If we can adopt the life of those, our ancestors, who were happy families with a small farmhouse, the whole family was living together. Now one man has two houses, and his children have their own apartment and one house. His daughter has two apartments, one house, and three garages. So we became very individual and selfish. So I used to say, the helping hands have more value than folded hands. So we should help what we can do, and definitely God has sent us here with this duty: to be a protector and not a distractor. So let us try to protect as much as we can. And if we can't give a better world to our children, then at least we should leave the world as we got it. It should not be worse. So, the program was nice. Thank you very much. And you all must be very tired. The program began at 9 in the morning. You came from home at 7:30, a long drive, and by 8 o'clock, the yoga teacher said, "Sit straight, don't move." It's very easy to say, "Sit straight and don't move." And after two hours, twenty minutes, you said, "Oh, no, we like this." So you are not meditating; you are concentrating on the pain in your ankle joints and feet. So hard, very hard ground. And I remember one story from one master. He announced, "In one month, self-realization." My God, I wanted to go there. In one month, self-realization and limited space. Register or book your place as soon as possible. And so limited space and so many people in one month self-realization, my God! We are meditating for years and years, and yet we do not see that we have made even one centimeter toward self-realization. So many people came, and there were strict rules, like a Jain master, you know, a Jain Buddhist master, you know, had to be very disciplined. So the people came and they booked themselves there, and they said, "Boys and girls, discipline, discipline. Without discipline, no self-realization." They said, "Yes." But you had to sleep on the ground with one grass mat, not even a cotton mat, you know, a raw grass mat, very thin, okay? Yes. And for one month, it was $51,000. Self-reliance is very cheap. Second, only once a day eating, yogic eating. There is no menu card. Whatever you get, of course vegetarian, but that's all. Third, you have to be completely alone. Do not touch anyone for one month. That's no problem. And next, no speaking at all. Who will speak has to go home. And no refund. No refund. Once a week, on Sunday morning, no, Thursday morning, 10 o'clock, the Master will come. If you have any problem, you can ask, and you will get an answer, only once. But the Master is very disciplined. All your questions and problems should be expressed in only two words, only two words, not more. And the answer will also be only in two words, no arguments. Okay? If you agree, please sign. If not, then there will be observation. There are 20 volunteers, 24 hours observing with a camera, if you are meditating or not. After one week, the Master came and sat there. The disciple was standing there. "Brothers and sisters, welcome. We are very lucky and blessed that the Master gives darśan; he is here. If you have any questions, please feel free to ask." Everybody is thinking how to express everything in two sentences. But many, they were in one week of meditation, they were so completely down or introverted. But one man, he was disturbed a lot. He was used to a comfortable life. So Master said, "Get up." Disciple said, "Yes, sir." Disciple said, "Eating cold?" (If they got a cold, eat a little.) Master said, "I know. For next question, next time." After one week, they went. The second week, they came again. Master said, "Bless you all." Disciple said, "Any questions?" Again, he got up. Speak: "Bed hard." Sleeping on the floor, bed hard. Master said, "Very good." Only were two words, "Very good." Hard bed is very good. Again, go third week. He came with a completely red face. Master came and said, "Bless you." All disciples said, "Any question?" Again he got up. Master said, "Yes, please, I go." Master said, "Good journey." That was the Self-Realization Seminar. So, if I talk long, then you will, one after the other, get off and go. So, I wish you already very, very... Good night, and God's blessings, good health, and all the best. Tomorrow we are in somewhere else, so they will announce it. Thank you from my side. Good night.