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Part 1: Ayurveda and Yoga: Ancient Sciences of Body, Mind, and Soul Om Sarve Bhavantu Sukhinaḥ, Sarve Santu Nirmayāḥ, Sarve Bhadrāṇi Paśyantu, Mā Kāścid Duhkha Bhāgbhavet, Om Śāntiḥ, Śāntiḥ, Śāntiḥ. Śrīdīp Nārāyaṇ Bhagavānakī, Devādidev, Deveśvar Mahādevakī, Satguru Svāmī Madhavānandjī Bhagavānakī, Satyāsana. Good evening, dear sisters and brothers. Welcome this evening, and I am very happy to be again here in this ashram, Oakland. The subject given to us today is what we call Āyurveda and Yoga. We have many times spoken about the subject of Yoga and Āyurveda. Yoga is very ancient, and Ayurveda is also very ancient. Both are ancient or very old sciences of body, mind, and soul. For Āyurveda, there is a scripture book written—the first scriptures in the world, before the Mahābhārata’s time, before Kṛṣṇa’s incarnation. At Rama’s time, the Vedas were given to humans, the knowledge, the science of body, mind, and soul. It was given from the master to the disciple. First, there was not so much population. Second, people were few; people were studying. They were more like the people who used to live only in the forest. Now, we see more civilization and opportunities to study. But that study, what the saints were doing, the Ṛṣis were doing, is called Śruti and Smṛti. Śruti is that which was spoken, giving knowledge from master to disciple verbally. And smṛti means memory. Whatever you remember, you speak or you write. Their memory was a thousand times more than our memories now. In a few decades, humans lost immense amounts of memory. The cause of this is that we began to use technology, electronic technology. Wherever we begin to use the telephone or some different instrument, we begin to write. Previously, people were not writing; they kept everything in their memories. For a telephone number, for example, we began to write. We had maybe only 100 maximum, or 50 or 30 telephone numbers in the beginning. But we wanted to write it down. So, through this writing, writing, our memories went down. Now, in this time, when someone dictates a telephone number from a far distance, we repeat it three, four times. One speaks, and we write it again, and then, "Yes, please, can you once more tell?" Two, three times, immediately, what? Someone speaks to us, we can’t remember in the brain, or we have no more space in the brain. A second example is this: before six or seven decades, people were singing their folk songs by heart, many, many songs. Since they began to make writings to learn the pianos, the keys, etc., we’ve forgotten to sing by heart our folk songs. That means the memory is gone. We began to write the songs on a piece of paper always, and we kept it there. We lost the interest, and when we needed to sing, then we took a piece of paper in the hand and we began to sing. Now, the people, the tribes who are living in the forest, still they can sing by heart many, many of their folk songs. But we who are living in big cities, we have all kinds of facilities, but I don’t know—I don’t want to ask you the question. How many songs do you know perfectly by heart? Always we use these bhajan books for singing. Now our Dayālpuri was singing. But this bhajan he has sung at least 200 times, minimum, or 300 times. But still, he cannot sing by heart without opening this book. And looking, the same thing happens in my situation too. So, here we can say, did humans develop and become free? Or did humans again become dependent on everything? So someone said, "Don’t worry, if you don’t have it in your brain, you have it in your hand, everything." And so, for anything, then we look in our telephone or somewhere. So this is the difference between those great saints from many, many centuries ago. And what they wrote at that time is so perfect that we cannot change it. They researched; their research was more perfect than our research. So there is a smṛti. Now the smṛti is lost, but this word smṛti is so powerful, so powerful. If you lost the smṛti, the human quality is gone. It is like this: you had something but you lost it. You put your key from your car just in a hurry to go somewhere, and you put your car key in your house, but you don’t find where it is. You search in the car, you search outside, you search in the house everywhere, but you, or we, can’t remember that point, that place where we put the key. So where is our memory? Smṛti. And they said, those great scholars, the saints, the wise people, their chintan, which is the subject, will come after chintan. Both hemispheres of the brain were equally active. As long as we are of middle age, which is about 45—because after 45, our age is completed, we go down again. So we climb on the peak of the mountain, and now we have to come back. So we are going down. It took 40 days to climb up and 40 days coming down. So 40 or 45 years means 90 years of life. Now, people say this 90-year-old person is not useful anymore. Before, it was not like that. So our hemisphere begins to slow down because of that language which we speak. There are few languages that keep our hemispheres both in balance: Sanskrit language, Latin language, Old Greek language, Parsi language. There are few languages which are perfect for our brain to function forever. Until the last minutes of our life, we remember everything—brilliant memory, what we call. So Śruti, then Smṛti. From the Smṛti, I’m talking about Āyurveda, then meditation will come too. Because, thanks to Ayurveda, they give a certain diet. Now, medicine, even if we take one capsule, this capsule has a content of nourishment. So, what we call the capsule program. Nowadays, they say it’s a yoga program, a capsule yoga program. Now, what is a capsule yoga program? They want to just take one tablet, drink water, and it’s gone, and the stomach is functioning. Similarly, give me, please, some short program, capsule program. So when someone tells you "capsule program," then you should say, "Yes, I know." Okay, now you know. So what is a capsule program? Practice five rounds of "Kha Tu Par Nām." So you don’t need other exercises for prāṇāyāma. The "Kha Ṭu Par Nām" is a capsule program. Of course, if you do all, it’s much better, but it takes you every day one or two and a half hours of practice. We don’t have the time, therefore we swallow the capsule, but this capsule will not help you so long, or for that what it is needed? So smṛti, śruti. So who is speaking? So he said, the moon was giving it, kind of introduction: what is a master? So brahmaniṣṭha śrotriya. The brahmaniṣṭha means who have self-realized. And srotriya, what means? So brahmaniṣṭha srotriya. So śruti, smṛti. So śruti, śrota, and who is that third one? Smṛta. Srotriya, śrota. Srotriya, śrota, and śruti. So smṛti, my dear memories, how much memory do you have? Tomorrow, write down yourself by heart all your telephone numbers. How many do you know? So, smṛti is our memory. And so, Āyurveda has that kind of remedy, herbs. And you have many good herbs in New Zealand still; your forest is not so much polluted. There’s a very, very valuable herb. The herbs, don’t think that you have to take that much. Just one leaf, that is so powerful, can change all the systems in the body. But we should know which kind of herb. For example, in Āyurveda, they are speaking here of one kind of tea we call chai, and this tea leaves, and which kind of tea leaves? It’s called Tulsi tea. Tulsi is one plant; it is so powerful. It has so many good effects on our body, on our mind, or memory, etc. So the ṛṣis, the wise persons, the ṛṣis, were though both had physical as well as spiritual knowledge, they declared this plant as a holy plant. Even now, in the name of the holy, people will respect and preserve it. It is not any; they will not just chip it up and throw it away. So psychologically, when we said it is holy, we said, "Oh, thanks to God, prayer, prayer, this is holy." But holy is that which helps us, and that plant, if it disappears, is gone now. This tulsi leaf is just like the size of our nail, so two, three, four, five, or two leaves per day in the morning, just swallow it with water. Don’t chew it, though it is a very good plant, but if you will chew it, it will damage your teeth. So it is very important that you should not chew; you should just swallow it as it is. So, Tulsī has hundreds, thousands of good qualities and good effects on the body. But we should remember, here in your country there are also so many herbs; this is a blessing of Mother Nature. So not a quantity, but the quality. So if you think that I will take now every day twenty leaves, that’s not good; that can harm. A little, little, little drop of some medicine, that’s enough. If you say, "Okay, I take five drops," you will die. That’s it. But people want to, there’s a chūrṇa in Āyurveda, it’s very nice, very tasty and very good, but it should be taken only one month. Only one month in the winter time, when it’s cold. But for one month, you have to follow the principle, the discipline, that you should not eat this, this… Don’t eat tomatoes, don’t eat sour things—lemon is okay. But different: don’t eat beans, don’t eat root vegetables—so many, many things. When you take the medicine, Ayurveda—you will take Ayurveda, many know—Ayurveda needs prevention. So when you begin to take Āyurveda, then one week you should purify your body. Śaṅkha Prakṣālana in yoga prānāyāms, and don’t eat beans, potatoes, which make the gastric problems in your body. Quit it for one week, and then take this Āyurveda medicine, and during this also don’t eat certain things. Your doctor will tell what you should not eat, unfortunately. In this medical science of the Āyurveda, still in Western countries they don’t accept it as a medicine, and therefore they are taking all the supplementary or food supplementary, which is really very sad, unfortunately. But there is a real Āyurveda doctor now; the Āyurveda doctor will come, will prescribe the medicine both, allopathic and ayurvedic. You can take this allopathic, and that is not good. The milk and lemons cannot remain together. The lemon will immediately spoil the milk. So then you have very nice paneer. What do they call it? Yes, yes, something like a cheese. Paneer is a paneer. So, whatever you do, any medicine, follow the principles, the rules; it will be better for your health. So, Smṛti, Śruti. Śruti means that which was speaking, which was telling us. Then is a Śrotriya. Śrotriya is the master who then spoke to you. And what he heard from where? From Smriti. From Smriti, the past master. So the knowledge was given from one hand to the other hand. You take the water and then you give it to the plant. Similarly, the master takes from that ocean of knowledge now and then puts it further. Now, śrotā, we are the śrotā temporarily. For a while, I am a śrotriya, I’m a speaker, and you are the śrotā, who’s listening now. This was the best, the science on the whole knowledge and everything: smṛti, śruti, śrotriya, and śrotta. If you remember, this is a Sanskrit word, my dear, but I will say: smṛti means memory, and that was spoken again now. Who is remembering? He is talking to you, and now we who are listening. This is how the knowledge is given. But if you will write on this and this and that, and you don’t follow the discipline, then your writing has no more value. But in Kali Yuga it is different. In this Yuga, this time, what is written on the piece of paper is a truth, and what a human tells is not truth. When you come on the border, immigration, your passport is a paper that is authority, but you said, "I have not my passport with me, but I’m from India, or I’m from New Zealand." I said, "No, sorry, where’s your passport? Where did you lose it? Find out." They will not let you go here or there. So this paper nowadays, this is a modern knowledge. It can be lost, but you will not be lost. Then you will die, that’s also. Ayurveda is this, or yoga, the science is this. Both sciences of Ayurveda, unfortunately, people are writing some 5,000 years old, but this is a completely thousand times wrong. But they are putting this based on this, which is called a Caraka Ṛṣi, who wrote again this Āyurveda, one Caraka book, Yoga Āyurveda. Now they put it on that the Āyurveda is that old. But this is unfortunately not like this. Now, Ayurveda is from the time of the churning of the ocean, if you know the stories in Satya Yuga. It was millions of years ago. There was a big battle, or big struggle, to find the nectar, and that nectar. Śiva said the nectar is in the mountain in the ocean. All the treasures, all the best things, all the best jewels, everything is in the ocean, in the stomach of the ocean. So, search the nectar. The story is very long, I don’t want to tell you, but they were churning and they took out. First came poison. So, fourteen different things came. So now the churning of the ocean is that we are drilling for the oil. So this is how the story goes, in that kind of way. So finally, the last came, the nectar. And that nectar, we know what nectar means. Nectar, when we drink it, we become immortal. We become healthy, the best. But then there was a fight between both, the asurīśakti, the devils, and devīśakti, the devas, the goddess. Now, the devas wanted to be immortal, and the asuras, the devils, they wanted to be immortal. So there was a big fight for them, but who brought this nectar from out of the ocean was God Viṣṇu, that in the form of Dhanvantari. Dhanvantari was his name. Vishnu incarnated, he came, he appeared in the form of Dhanvantari. He had a pot in his hand, full of nectar. And that is the beginning of Ayurveda. Part 2: The Path Beyond Worry: Cintā, Citta, Cintana, and Svādhyāya Every year, there is a festival celebrated two days before Dīvalī. It is a festival that many remember, and people across India, especially farmers, still observe it. In the big cities, however, such festivals are largely forgotten. Everything is finished. We remember only "Happy New Year," and that is all. We have lost touch with our traditional festivals and systems, and in losing them, we are lost again. Āyurveda brought forth a nectar for humanity, and this is the gift of Āyurveda. Now, let us speak of humanity. Humans suffer from two kinds of disease. One is physical disease—what we call cancer, flu, heart disease, kidney disease, or any physical ailment, which often arises from mental tension. The second is mental disease. So, there is physical disease and mental disease. The cause of mental disease, of everyone's mental problem, is singular. I am not stating my own opinion; I am conveying what Āyurvedic science says. That cause is called cintā. Just one word: cintā. What is cintā? Worry. It does not matter what kind of problem you have; if you are worried, if you begin to worry and worry, it will make your entire inner body empty. It is like termites eating a tree. The wood looks fine on the outside, but inside, the termites are consuming the entire tree. Cintā leads us to die; it destroys our body. The second word is citta. Cintā and citta. Citta is the fire of the funeral pyre, the crematorium. Some are buried, and some are burned. So, there are two kinds of fire. Cintā is also a fire. Citta is also a fire. Cintā will burn you slowly, slowly, your whole life long. Citta will burn your body in no time: one hour, half an hour, twenty minutes. It depends. Previously, they used wood; now they use electronic means. This finishes the body as soon as possible. "Hurry home," it doesn't disturb. Then the body is burnt or buried. Therefore, in this whole world, there is disease. Consider, how old is this city of Oakland? Perhaps one hundred fifty or two hundred years. Let us say, eighty years ago, how many hospitals were here? And now, how many hospitals are there? Many, many hospitals, and no bed is free. How many people are ill now? How many were ill then? Why are so many ill? Cintā alone is the one cause—the cintā. Cintā means worry: worry about your child. A woman is pregnant. Now, father and mother both are worrying. "We hope the child will be healthy. We hope everything will be okay." All the time they are happy, but simultaneously, parallel to that happiness, runs the cintā: "Afterwards, how will it be?" The child is born, somehow not healthy, so family cintā. Then worry about money. You have enough; you have a lot of property. Now this is a cintā: you have a lot of property, but you worry about your money, how it will be managed, who will take it. Day and night, you are worried about your property. Those who have no property, who dig their potatoes and vegetables in the forest, eat, and sleep—they sleep till morning, six or seven o'clock, when the sun rises. But others, we have to swallow tablets to sleep. We have a watchdog. The dog begins to bark, and you get up. Someone gets up with a gun in their hand. I was in Los Angeles, and outside a house, in a little garden or on the door, was written: "Weapon. Not a weapon, but an armed answer." If you knock on the door, they will not speak. If you knock, it will be answered by a gun. That is how much fear people have. This is cintā. Now, think about your boyfriend, your girlfriend, your wife, your husband, your studies, your examinations—this, this, this. So, one after another, stone after stone, we are building a mountain of cintā. Cintā and citta run parallel. Cintā is worry. Cintā says, "What can I do?" Citta says, "Don't worry. Time will come. Then I will completely, at one time, destroy. But before that, you have to suffer your own." So, cintā and citta. Now, there is a solution: what Āyurveda tells and what Yoga says. Cintā, citta, and then they give a beautiful word again. Thanks to God that the ṛṣis have a good answer and a good solution. What to do? What should I do? We run to the doctor. We run to lawyers. We run to schools and professors, wondering what will be. We run to friends. We run everywhere. So, cintā is a worry. Please remember this; you can ask me tomorrow. And citta is that which is hidden within you. The ṛṣis of Āyurveda said... I brought today, though my memories are also perhaps fading, but as evidence I have this about... This Āyurvedic principle is one word. Yes, so there was a solution because it is said: "The evidence will never die. Evidence will never die." This is a mahā-mantra. You all know about mantras? A mahā-mantra. The best mantra, the best prayer for the layers. Mahā-mantra: the evidence will never die. So the ṛṣi said, similarly, that you don't forget. All begins with the same alphabet. Good? Now, what is cintana? Mr. Mohan, you know Sanskrit, tell us. Otherwise, you will say, "Swamiji, you are telling us, we don't know what it is." A little water, a cup of water... This is a very good remedy for all of us. It was here. I feel heat, warmth. Thank you. Cintana means when we don't find any way, no solution. Then finally, what do we do? Whom do we remember? God. Then we say, "God, God... please. Please, Lord, God, help me. Please help me." Now, this is cintana. We have two kinds of cintana. When we don't know how to find the way, when no one can help us, then it is called cintana or svādhyāya. Svādhyāya... means study. Study is of two kinds. One is svādhyāya. Now, what is in this? Hidden powers in the human book. When you have that problem, it is in that chakra, okay? Which chakra is there? Here it is the Maṇipūra chakra. So, he... this is an Adhyāna śāstra, so I will look in the book—and I like it—or it is your religious book, the Upaniṣad, the Bhagavad-gītā, the Bible, or the Quran, which you trust. You look in, and then you find some good words to find the solution. Svādhyāya. Going to school, studying all these books, that is also svādhyāya. But in the Sanskrit language, as used by the ṛṣis at that time, that is svādhyāya. Sva means the self, yourself, myself. It is my problem. I am searching the way for whom? For myself. So, sva means the self; adhyāya means the chapter. Any problems that appear in our life are mostly connected to our own life chapter. So, when you begin with any kind of subject, any relations, any work, studying anything, look within thyself. How many chapters in your life have you completed? How many chapters are still not completed? And how many chapters are closed, uncompleted? That chapter which you have completed, there is nothing more disturbing you or making you unhappy. Sometimes sorrow comes in a dream; you did not fulfill that. That chapter not completed means it was not fulfilled. That chapter is not completed. If you believe, then we use the word "other." When we, after this life, come to the astral life to go further, there Dharmarāja, the god of justice, will ask you, "What about this chapter? First complete this, and then you can go." So, how many chapters remain? Which chapters are ongoing? We have two things: certainty and uncertainty, happiness and unhappiness. Happiness is that you have a very good chapter now, and you would like to continue. But unhappiness is that, "I hope it will not end." Worldly life will end. If not by other means, at least by natural death. We love our mother or our father so much, but one day they will also say no. But at least that chapter was completed: till I helped my mother, I looked after my mother, I looked after my father, everything. This was my chapter. I did it. It is an example. It can be your husband or wife, your child, your dear dog, your rabbit, or anything. Svādhyāya. Adhyāya means chapter. So, do not leave this chapter half. Now you understand: first was citta, cintā—worry; citta—funeral. Then cintana, svādhyāya—study, thinking over. And this we find in the grantha, in the book, or you meditate. In meditation, you clear up all your physical, emotional, mental, spiritual, social subjects. Clear up cintana. So finally, the best way is cintana. And that cintana, the seed of cintana... Where we don't need to read so many big books, just close your eyes, meditate, and practice your mantra. That mantra is one of the best forms of cintana—that research, that prayer. Those thoughts will bring us to one point automatically. It will come there. It will take a long time. If you have cintā, worries, and you begin to do cintana, both will fight opposite each other. Now, who is strong in us? The strong power is our worry sometimes, so attachment—you can't forget. When you wake up, you remember this; when you go to sleep, you remember this. This is the cintā, and that makes your physical and mental trouble. But cintana will completely go behind your cintā. Though you have more attention towards your cintā, the cintana will go as a light behind us, and finally the light will win; the darkness will go away. So Āyurveda said: give up cintā, worries. What happened, happened; what is gone, is gone. And to solve this problem is cintana. Now, whichever god you believe in, whichever mantra you believe in from whom, or if you don't believe in a mantra, then at least close your eyes and meditate. Or in Yoga Nidrā, put your saṅkalpa. Did you practice? Some people, one single part? No. Who knows Yoga Nidrā? Please, one, two, three, four. You know your own era? Yes. You don't know? You know your nidrā? Okay, thank you. So tomorrow, probably we have a subject also on Yoga Nidrā, but I want to complete tomorrow also this about our... what you call them, Āyurveda. Āyurveda and Yoga. Āyurveda is not only a science of medicine, but it is also leading a person to the highest level of Consciousness, while following the principle and respecting this nature. This nature has all kinds of power. This plant here is very valuable in Āyurveda, but also this plant can kill you. At the time of the British in India, when... someone should not speak, or can't speak, they were giving this to them to chew with a gun, or that is this. So the whole throat and everything, the tongue lost its balance to speak. But also, others said... this is the other way. The other medicine is also very good. Everything in nature. And then it comes to self-discipline. Therefore, Yoga will say: "Now Yoga begins with a discipline." Meaning now, not tomorrow. No one has seen tomorrow. No one has seen tomorrow. There are only two days: one day was yesterday, and the second is today. Tomorrow we have not seen. Also, tomorrow morning we will see this today, but where is tomorrow? This tomorrow is tomorrow. So similarly, don't think that, "Okay, I will begin tomorrow." Like this: "I am now, I will, for example, give up drinking so much alcohol. Okay, tomorrow I will completely give up. Today, I drink everything." No. It is just now. Take your... I don't want to force you, but what disturbs you, what makes you sorrow, what makes you unhappy—try to give it up through meditation, so that within begins a nice inner chapter that you write. This is my path, final. Don't change. Always changing and changing, we will never come to our destination. We go fifty kilometers in that direction, then another direction. Then you go two hundred kilometers the other direction. "No, no, this was wrong." So, going there and there, and our life is finished? So decide yourself. No one should force you; no one should say, "Do it, do this. This will be the best." You should, or I should, or we should know what is good for me. That I will do. I will eat healthy. I will use my yoga practice. Do wherever you like. Not that you must come here. No, no, no. There is no must. You should decide yourself and do. But give up your cintā. Otherwise, your cintā will be lifelong torturing, lifelong torturing. What is lost is lost. What is gone is gone. Today is gone. That's all. Four nights are the moon nights; the rest are the dark nights. So these four days of this time, for us, use them to live happy, healthy. What is gone is gone, but now, whatever I will do or get, I will think over one hundred percent. Then I will begin a new chapter until that Cintana. Cintana means read some good books, yoga books, but not that kind of book. This is the best, only do this. These are all written after, all this kind of junk food. So these are junk books. So solid, ancient times books—that's the quality. So, cintā, citta, cintana, and abhyāsa, svādhyāya. These four points I explained to you. I hope you understood, because there are too many words: citta, cintā, citta, cintana. Now we are again like this. So again, clear words: Cintā is a worry. Citta is a funeral. And cintana: think over, study good books. And svādhyāya: that outer svādhyāya and inner svādhyāya. Are you next to the God of love? What is it? Oh, peace, peace, peace.