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Part 1: Brahmacharya: The Deeper Meaning of Directing One’s Life Toward Brahman Let us continue our session on the yamas and niyamas with the fourth yama: brahmacarya. This is one of the most widely known and discussed principles, and opinions about it often conflict. In the common understanding, brahmacharya means to abstain from sexual relations—sexual abstinence or celibacy. We will explore this further and see that this is just one small aspect, and perhaps not even strictly necessary. Yet we are dealing with something very powerful, because our sexual energy is an immense force. We have ten sense organs: the five karma indriyas, the organs of action, and the five jñāna indriyas, the organs of sense perception. Controlling them is not easy, but two are especially difficult. There is a bhajan about this from Ācāryajī, and I would like to begin by singing it. Let us first sing the refrain and then go deeper into the meaning before singing the whole bhajan. It follows the melody of the bhajan “Do Din Kā Jag Me Melā.” It says, in the first refrain, that among the ten indriyas, two are particularly powerful. Do indriya prabala bala, hātha kiyā jagata saṁsāra, is tan meṁ indriya daśa, koī pūre yogī ke vaśa, par do kā nahīṁ itanā bharosā. These two indriyas are so powerful that they hold the entire world under their sway. In this body there are ten indriyas; only a few perfect yogīs can control them, but two are especially hard to master—and those two dominate the whole world. The second verse makes it explicit: Upastha aura raśanā, inake kāma-vikāra… That is the organ of reproduction—all of sexuality—and the sense of taste. Keeping discipline in eating and bringing sexual desires under control is most difficult. We also see how these indriyas influence each other: when we take certain foods, desires awaken. They produce countless desires and passions. The senses are interconnected, so working on one can affect the other. When we receive a mantra from Swāmījī, he already gives us a technique for this. Which one? Fasting. Through fasting we begin to consciously work at controlling at least one of these sense organs. Another technique Swāmījī offers is becoming vegetarian; it helps us keep the senses under control. Swāmījī also teaches us about the three guṇas. If we choose our food in a certain way, that too helps, and what we achieve on one level definitely influences the other levels. The bhajan continues: Brahmā, Indra, Surādi, Narāsura, Pakṣī, Paśu-ādi. Inake vaśa kiyā saṁsāra. Tinako praṇām hamārā. It mentions all the different beings: Brahmā, Indra, the Devas, humans, Asuras, birds, and animals. These two senses hold all of them under control. And yet those very beings have somehow attained the divine. My deepest salutations and adoration to them. The bhajan makes clear that we are not dealing with a small point of self-control. We have to respect this energy; it is not for playing or experimenting. If we truly want to practice brahmacharya in its full sense, we need the guidance of a guru. The topic is truly essential in our lives, because the energy we are dealing with is divine energy. That is why we must respect and understand it. The common interpretation of brahmacharya is celibacy, but that is only one understanding. Let us look at what brahmacharya really means. What is Brahma? Brahma is God. The word especially denotes the formless, Nirguṇa divine consciousness. Brahma is that which we want to realize, that with which we wish to become one. Ācārya basically means movement, change, any kind of activity—you can say our manner of behavior. Together, brahmacarya means directing our activity in the direction of Brahma: thinking of Brahma, letting Brahma guide our life. Whoever always thinks of God practices brahmacharya. Whoever tries to see that whatever exists around is God, is Brahma—that is the attitude of brahmacharya. We have a beautiful mantra that expresses this brahmacharya attitude of seeing Brahman in everything. Which mantra? Our eating mantra. It is a perfect brahmacharya mantra. Let us chant it together: Brahmārpaṇaṁ Brahma haviḥ Brahmāgnau Brahmaṇā hutam, Brahmaiva tena gantavyaṁ Brahmakarmasamādhinā. The word Brahma appears five times here. The background is a sacrificial ceremony. In India, when you perform such a ceremony, you have something to offer—some seeds, and with a ladle, a wooden spoon, you offer ghee as fuel so the fire burns better while mantras are chanted. A paṇḍit leads the ceremony. The mantra says: The one who offers is Brahma; what he offers into the fire is Brahman; this fuel, this ghee, is also Brahman; the whole act of offering is actually Brahman. It is offered by Brahman into the fire of Brahman. The fire that accepts and burns it is also Brahma. When we sing it as an eating mantra, we interpret it a little differently. The offering is our food; the fuel is the digestive fluids and acids that work on the food; the fire is Jāṭhara Agni, the digestive fire, which we can activate nicely through Agni Sāra Kriyā or Nauli. But you can apply this to every act of daily life. We could say: Here sits God, and He speaks to God; the sound waves are God, the room is God, the camera is God—it is just another way to express the same truth. Although it appears as an eating mantra, it is really a general mantra about the attitude of seeing God in everything. The second line captures the essence: Brahmaiva tena gantavyaṁ Brahmakarmasamādhinā. It says: One who lives in this way, who in every moment sees God in everything, will in the end become one with Brahman, one with God. That is the attitude of brahmacharya. That is its deeper meaning. Now, to direct the energy, another interpretation arises. Looking from the point of view of kuṇḍalinī yoga and the chakras as Swāmījī teaches us, we can say: we have an energy, and we should guide it upwards. This energy is generally called prāṇa, and in the special context of spiritual awakening we call it kuṇḍalinī śakti. This energy is actually the energy of the Divine Mother, and it rises to Sahasrāra, the center of Śiva, the Divine Consciousness. There we can say is our Brahmā. So direct the energy so that it flows toward Brahmā, and in the end it can unite with Brahmā. To understand this, take the example of a flute. A flute is empty and has holes. We blow air—one air, not two—and it flows through the flute, yet it can produce different effects depending on which hole we open. Similarly, kuṇḍalinī flows in a certain direction, and the effect depends on which chakra we allow it to manifest through. It is divine energy. When we speak of sexuality, we are essentially opening the second hole, the Svādhiṣṭhāna Chakra. It is divine energy, as we can see from the simple fact that through sexual energy we can create a child—we can create life, but we as humans cannot create life from nothing. By the result we can recognize that it is not merely sexual energy; it is divine energy, the divine kuṇḍalinī. In the Mūlādhāra Chakra you can use it for physical activities, the physical basis of life. In the Maṇipūra Chakra you can use it for power, to rule a country. In the Anāhata Chakra you can use it to create beautiful artwork, a poem, a symphony. In the Viśuddhi Cakra you can use it to understand others and help as a therapist. When the energy comes up to the head chakras—Ājñā Cakra, Bindu, Sahasrāra—the divine effects are already present. When the energy manifests in the upper chakras, we are slowly transformed into a saint, a real yogī. This is the background for understanding the common view of brahmacharya. There is no separate “sexual energy”; it is simply a certain manifestation of the one divine energy. But energy is limited in the sense that when we use it for one purpose, it is no longer available for another. If something is very important to you, all your awareness goes there, all your energy goes there, and you have no energy left for other things. So the point is how we use this energy. It is our decision; it is under our control. If we live unconsciously, the energy follows natural instinct—the instincts animals already have: first to eat, and second to procreate. That is why these two drives are so strong in us. We have lived as animals through millions of lives, and it is easy to forget that now we are human and have a chance to do something different. For a man, the concentrated sexual energy is in the semen. In Āyurveda they say there are different tissues, building up step by step over about a month. That means you work for a month to create something truly special—divine energy—and then you throw it away. Understanding the value of this energy is the underlying idea. In the female body, a very similar process occurs through the monthly cycle, also taking a month. This energy is extremely valuable and is a vital nourishment for the brain—not only for spiritual awakening but also for physical nutrition of the brain and its functions. When we use this energy too much, our memory can suffer. This energy is known by different names: one yogic name is Vīrya, another is Ojas, and we might call it kuṇḍalinī, which is a form of prāṇa. Now, to appreciate the importance of brahmacarya in this context, let us look at Yoga Sūtra 38. When someone becomes steadfast in brahmacharya, he acquires spiritual energy. The Sanskrit word used for energy is vīrya. The energy is already there; what happens is that we can truly make use of it. This energy, which is potentially spiritual, can then really work in us as spiritual energy and not for something else. This is the idea of sublimating the energy so that it can function as a true spiritual force. From this perspective, one can understand why many yogīs say that if you really want to achieve the goal of yoga, you have to practice brahmacharya in the sense of celibacy. But this is not a straightforward point. It is not possible for everyone, it is not advisable for everyone, and one must be very careful. We have to consider different life situations and different ages. We get closer to what brahmacarya means in concrete life when we look at the four āśramas—the different periods of life. In the traditional understanding, life is divided into four phases of about twenty-five years. The first phase is actually called Brahmacarya. When you are young, preparing for life and doing your studies, you should do two things: think about the aim of your life, and, once you are clear, never forget it as you grow older and move through the stages. This is brahmacharya—to think of God, to move in the direction of Brahma. Therefore, spiritual education is essential when we are young. Nowadays only material education is emphasized, preparing us to earn money, but that is not the aim of life; it is just a bare necessity. Giving a direction to our life when we are young is what matters. Traditional education takes place in a gurukula under the guidance of a spiritual master, where you also learn all the worldly things you need. During this phase you are not yet earning, you do not yet have the material base for family life, and you have not finished your studies. This period of focused learning and Godward orientation is the foundation. Part 2: The Stages of Life and the Practice of Brahmacarya In the first phase of life, one is not yet able to earn money. It is therefore logical that at this stage, sexual relations with a partner are not the point. In this initial phase, Brahmacarya should be practiced in the strict sense as celibacy. Swāmījī even says that when students observe this, they study much better. As we mentioned earlier, this energy is actually the best nourishment for the brain. When partner-related questions interfere, the mind becomes very distracted. Hence, it makes great sense to establish a firm boundary: “Not now; the next phase comes later, and then it is fine.” The second phase of life is the Gṛhastha Āśrama, the householder life. This means being married, having sexual activities, a family, children, and all the duties connected with them. Now one is prepared for this. Consider how much suffering arises when underage girls become mothers: the relationship with the partner is usually not yet serious, he might leave, and she is suddenly alone with a child. Even if the father is present, he does not earn money yet, causing financial and material problems. And the girl, still a child but already a mother, lacks the life experience to properly educate her child. So, for the first phase of Brahmacarya, it truly makes sense to say that it also means not having sexual relationships yet. Now we come to an interesting point: What would Brahmacarya mean for a married householder? Two people marry, and suddenly one says, “Actually, I want to practice Brahmacarya,” while the other had different expectations. This can be quite problematic. The normal way for a householder is to live the householder life with family and children. And we must understand how important householders are. From a material viewpoint, householders are the foundation of society: they earn money and possess material resources. The young depend on them, the retired depend on them, and the sannyāsīs, sādhus, and monks, who by definition are not in material life, also depend on them. So there is nothing wrong with being a householder. Yet the riddle remains: how can a householder practice Brahmacarya? We will come back to this. First, let us go through the other āśramas. Next is Vānaprastha, which means retirement. When you have raised your children and they begin living their own lives and taking over, there is no point in sexual activities anymore. For what? Do you want to go through that cycle again? The retirement phase is, by tradition, a phase of purification—a time to purify ourselves through quite strong sādhanā from our karmas and to prepare us again for the real Brahmacarya. Now, more seriously than at the beginning in the Brahmacarya Āśrama, we have gone through all phases of life, we have experience, we know it, and we approach the end of our life, which is also the aim of our life: to aim at achieving oneness with the Divine. Although younger people can also choose to enter this āśrama at an earlier stage—sannyāsīs need not necessarily be old. As we know from Swāmījī, for example, he became a sannyāsī at the age of seventeen, if I am not mistaken. So much for the overview. Now let us look at the Gṛhastha Āśrama. What could it mean for a householder to truly practice Brahmacarya while having a family and a wife? And what would it mean for those living family life to practice Brahmacarya while constantly with their family and partner? First of all, it means one very simple thing: if you marry, you marry one person and remain faithful to that one person. You have your relationship with one partner because with this partner you wish to walk the spiritual path together. We become like two halves of an apple, hardly separable anymore. If we truly love our partner, there is no thought of other partners or enjoyments elsewhere, because you have it in your family. This is the first step: taking seriously what you committed to. You committed to family life, so live it—do not live here and there. But we can go much deeper. In family life, we are man and woman, wife and husband. With children, we are father and mother. These are divine principles. What does Brahmacarya mean? To see God in everything. So you are married; now see God in your partner. That is it. You practice Brahmacarya exactly where you have chosen: in your partnership, in your family. As a man with your wife, see in her the Divine Mother. As a woman with your husband, see in him the Divine Father. All your love then goes to this divine principle. After prayer, we often say, “Mātā Pitā Guru Deva Kī Jaya.” This can be understood in different ways. The translation is easy: glory to the mother, father, and the guru. But there is a deeper meaning: Mother means the Divine Mother, Father means the Divine Father, and Guru means the guru tattva. These are the highest divine principles. If we hold these thoughts, they will entirely transform our family life and partnership—we will respect each other as we would respect God. In our modern time, it is hard to believe this could be lived, and I saw many skeptical expressions on your faces. But this gives us an orientation. If we can realize even ten percent of it, something will already change. Through yoga practice, we naturally work on ourselves and begin to see things from a different point of view. We start to live more consciously, and that is where it begins. Remember this old story from Swāmījī: When he was teaching yoga classes in Vienna, there was an elderly lady who came regularly, but her husband was not interested. After about a year, she came to Swāmījī with a question: “Swāmījī, I don’t know how yoga works. I don’t understand it.” He asked what she meant. She said, “You know, I always come to your classes and practice, but my husband is not interested. Yet I have observed for a long time that he has changed so much. He has become so respectful and loving, and our whole partnership has changed. How is it possible? I practice, and he gets the benefit.” Understand what happened? Of course, she changed. But these changes are so subtle that we are often unaware of how we ourselves change. And he reacted to that. Only through his change did she become aware that something was going on. You see, by practicing yoga seriously, we naturally move in this direction. This happens somehow naturally. This is what Swāmījī calls social health: through yoga practice, our social relationships improve naturally. And what I said earlier—to respect your partner as the Divine Mother or Divine Father—is actually the further aim. That this is truly possible, we have at least one example I know: the partnership between Rāmakṛṣṇa and his wife, Sāradā Devī. If you know his biography, he was married at a young age (child marriage was common then), but since both were children, they did not live together. He began his spiritual life deeply, and after some years, she suddenly appeared. He was quite irritated and asked, “What do you really want? You know, I have my spiritual path.” She humbly replied, “I want to serve you.” With this attitude, all problems disappeared. He accepted her, and they lived together with the attitude of serving each other and respecting each other as divine beings. He was already a devotee of the Divine Mother, working as a priest in a temple of the Goddess Kālī. So the Divine Mother was already his Iṣṭadeva. Now his wife became this Goddess Kālī. It is known—and seems to be the only instance in history—that a man truly worshipped his married wife. Practically, he placed her on the altar, gave her the mālā, gave her the prasāda, and worshipped her as a living goddess. Can you imagine this high state of consciousness? And for her to be in this situation—what happened? They both went into samādhi together. That is also a way to live Brahmacarya. As a side aspect, you may simply forget about sexuality, or you may choose to practice it with a very clear aim: that a divine soul will incarnate, and you wish to offer that soul spiritual guidance. It is the same as with food. When we think of food, we basically think of enjoyment. But if we look neutrally, it is simply necessary nourishment for the physical body. The same dualism applies to sexuality: most people think of it only as enjoyment, but what is its real point? That a child is born, a soul receives a body to incarnate. Just as we say, “Don’t eat when you are full,” we can say, “Don’t have sex if you are not ready for a child.” This would mean living the householder life on a higher level—a real spiritual life. And when we live our householder life with this consciousness, there is no loss of energy anymore. This is already like living Brahmacarya in its true sense. Now let us return to the sannyāsīs, who really should practice Brahmacarya. Why should a sannyāsī practice celibacy? Because that is the difference. When you have a partnership, you have a dharma: as a father, you must care for your wife and children, earn money, and provide a comfortable home. When you choose as a monk not to enter into that, you cannot suddenly decide to pick and choose. You choose either this dharma with all that is connected to it, or the other dharma with everything connected to it. Both paths are fully correct, but we must make a choice; we cannot jump from one to the other. Now, I think we also understand this sūtra: when someone becomes steadfast in Brahmacarya, he acquires spiritual energy. This can happen either by directing sexuality and energy into higher chakras, or by directing our life attitude and living it in daily life. For a householder, the minimum would be to be faithful and chaste towards one’s partner. Interestingly, we find exactly the same in the Bible’s commandments: the sixth commandment says, “You shall not commit adultery,” and the fourth says, “You shall honor your father and your mother.” For me, this echoes what we say: Mātā Pitā Guru Deva Kī Jaya. I think there is a deeper meaning here—not just the physical mother who gave birth to my body, but truly honoring the divine. When we see the connection between the different senses, especially the sense of eating, we can say that wherever we try to control one of our sense organs, that is definitely a good step toward Brahmacarya. Swāmījī, in his lecture, put it a little humorously: “I must not translate from German here.” Brahmacarya means to control yourself mentally and physically from enjoyment. This concerns not only the sexual life. For example, if you are addicted to eating apples, always wanting apples and eating them all the time, then you are also not a brahmacārī, because you are addicted to that. Swāmījī says that when you always just fulfill your desires, that is not Brahmacarya. This guidance can also help us in how we live our daily life, in our self-inquiry and meditation. So many things we do automatically, without really thinking. Here, it would be in the sense of self-control. Fasting is one way of doing it. When we understand Brahmacarya in this way, it is already a preparation for the principle that comes later: tapas. And, of course, sexual Brahmacarya, if we truly live it or try to live it, is definitely a kind of tapas. But here we must be very careful. Swāmījī gave a very clear warning: Brahmacarya in the sense of real sexual continence is not for the majority of people, and it can even be dangerous. We must understand that it is energy. The nature of energy is to move; it cannot just be fixed at one point. If we have this energy, feel it, but do not allow it to flow, something happens. If we say, “I want to live Brahmacarya, I do not want a sexual life,” and we do not give this energy proper guidance in another direction, it accumulates more and more like in a pressure cooker. If there is no exit, one day an explosion comes. That is why Swāmījī speaks in clear words: there is a danger of schizophrenia, you get completely confused, you don’t know what to do. Aggression, anger, and even mental diseases can arise. And this is not limited to the Svādhiṣṭhāna Cakra—it also affects your heart and head, circling in your mind all the time, affecting your behavior. You may go to kusaṅga, start eating at night, and do many other foolish things. So we must be clear: we are dealing here with the Divine Mother, the Divine Energy. This is not a game. As it is said, when someone sings, “I am playing with Māyā,” then Māyā is already playing with you. Swāmījī says that whoever really wants to live this Brahmacarya in the sense of celibacy should never try it without a guru. On the other hand, when we direct this energy towards Brahmā in all our thoughts and our whole life, the energy we can achieve is immense. Therefore, in India, the most highly respected are the so-called Bāl Brahmacārīs—those who took to the Brahmacarya path already when they were young, meaning they never married and never had sexual relations. Bāl Brahmacārīs as children never had any sexual relationship, which is, of course, a very exceptional path, only for very few who have a special karma. I hope that the different aspects of Brahmacarya and the different life periods have become a little clearer. Any questions? He is basically a kind of sādhu who is not initiated, so he is not a swāmī or a monk, but a sādhu on his own who practices Brahmacarya, and thus is called a brahmacārī. But, as I said, it would be good even in such a case to do it under the guidance of a guru. Because we should not underestimate this energy. Swāmījī even gives an example: “Okay, for half a year it works, for one year it works, for two years it works, but after five years, at the latest, you are out.” So you need not be an initiated monk, but you should follow a guru. OK, it’s also late, so I think we should stop now.