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Today is a good day because of a little rain. The Anuṣṭhān is much better today than yesterday. I remember all the time here in the museum during the afternoon program; it was really suffering. First, it was after lunch, and second, the humidity and warmth in the room, and always this problem with a little sleeping. But what to do? I know how it is during meditation when you are going down. From my experience, no coffee or anything will help you. You may drink a big coffee, nothing. But one thing is really functioning: you need to practice prāṇāyāma, not just today. If you start to practice prāṇāyāma now, every day... I said that many years before; Swāmījī said one hour per day. It is hard, but really it’s functioning. We said that in the morning program we would have some questions. Do you have any questions while we are waiting for Madhuram and people from the Anuṣṭhān? The first day there were two questions, now nothing. Oh yes, it’s coming. "How do we practice prāṇāyāma for one hour? Like we have the round of 20 breaths, and do we repeat this cycle, or do we count till 108, or how do we do this?" What is in the book? It is for beginners. You know, when people start to practice prāṇāyāma, they start to make 20 rounds on one side, 20 rounds on the other side, and in three minutes they are finished. Why? Because normal breathing, as medicine says, is that we have approximately 12 inhalations and exhalations in a minute. What does this mean for such a person? Twenty Nāḍī Śodanam: first twenty on one side is one and a half minutes, but that is just the beginning. If you just relax yourself and you are just at the beginning, you have the first class of yoga. You will see that after just relaxing and being aware of the moving of the navel, it is not anymore twelve inhalations and exhalations in the minute; they start to be eight. And with a little more practice, there is normally five inhalations, four exhalations in the minute. What does it mean in the beginning? Somebody is finished with the prāṇāyāma in three minutes, one round. But if you are relaxed, you have more. And because of that, talking about 20 or 100 or something in inhalation and exhalation is not correct, because somebody is breathing quicker and somebody is breathing slower. But you will see through your practice. Put once, twice, put a clock. And you will see how many rounds you have in half an hour. You will see that with time, you have slower and slower breathing. That means you will have fewer rounds. And you have minutes, something for relaxing, breathing with both nostrils, and you continue with the other nostril. Or, when you practice Nāḍī Śodhana, we start with the other nostril. Usually, I put a timer, and very nicely, I feel a peep, and I know, "Okay, now it’s finished," and I breathe for a minute or two minutes and continue on the other side. I like to repeat a mantra during the prāṇāyāma. And also, you will see and you will get the rhythm, because sometimes you practice one mantra inhalation, two mantra exhalation. But also, it’s depending; if you have Gurudīp, Gurudīp... you will breathe like a rabbit, and you will be in the most stress. But if you practice, they say that there is also Gāyatrī Prāṇāyāma. What means one Gāyatrī inhalation, four Gāyatrī retaining, two Gāyatrī exhalation, and four retaining kumbhak? That means you are one round and you are kaput. What means for everything you need common sense, and that is not a rule. I must do this; it’s like in the box, common sense. You know your ability, you know how long your mantra is, everything. And never force prāṇāyāma. You know, from the Guru Gītā, if you force the prāṇāyāma, you will not gain anything, only contra. But if you are in the state of love, what means this open heart and nice feeling inside, prāṇa and apāna, everything in your body comes in a nice, harmonious way, also common sense. Maybe 99% of us, including me, are a little lazy, and if I will do everything relaxed, good, not forced, I will remain in bed, or we are joking in Croatia, drinking coffee the whole day. And you need to force yourself a little, and to say no, and give discipline to yourself. But if you are fanatic and you are too much forcing yourself, in that case, relax a little. For everything, we need common sense: not to be fanatic, and also not to be lazy. It is very easy to see around yourself how the people are. And you will see that those who are lazy, all that kind of life, it is nothing accomplished in life. No business, no life, no family, nothing. No spirituality, nothing. Everything starts, but nothing completes. And for that we need discipline. And also, not too much stuff at the same time. I remember what Viśwa Gurujī said about Gurujī. That Gurujī said, "If you want to manage everything, you will lose everything. But if you keep one thing, you will master this." People start and say, "Oh, prāṇāyāma," and this morning we’ll do this prāṇāyāma, after that this prāṇāyāma, and five prāṇāyāmas in the same day. For what? In our book, there is one prāṇāyāma for three months. A könyvünkben az van, hogy egyfajta prāṇāyāma három hónap. No, no,... today, tomorrow afternoon I will do third, no, now I will do bass, no, one. It is boring. Unálmas. No, it is not boring. No, no, it’s not boring. But, that your prāṇāyāma is more interesting. Your prāṇāyāma is exciting, interesting. A side and a half hour will finish. Oh, my God, it’s already finished. And because of that, really, I don’t know how many rounds, because it’s depending on your rhythm of breathing. Try a few times with this clock counter, and after that, you will see how many rounds you usually have. But try for a really long time. Now, I am not practicing one-hour prāṇāyāma. But I remember that after 45 minutes, something started. What it means is we need a little longer prāṇāyāma. Also, you see, with the meditation, you need some time to start. Sometimes you needed less time, sometimes you needed more time. But you need some time. And really, it’s functioning because everything that Viśwa Gurujī said is finally true. If you’re in the beginning thinking, "Oh no, it is a little too much," or "I don’t know, this maybe is," you think that is not correct. But after some time, sometimes a longer or shorter period, you realize that Swāmījī was completely right. And you are angry in the end with yourself, because you were stupid not to listen in the beginning, but you needed something. But that is our situation. And also, if you want to chant mantras, you need air, you need to know how to breathe to sing. What Madhuran will do today with special, this flute, also is very important: how you breathe. For talking, breathing is very important. And it’s very important how you talk. Sometimes it’s more important, your voice and that energy in the voice, than what you talk about. And that is what I speak all the time, that is non-verbal communication. Position of your body and your voice. That is important. It is very important for the first impression. And you have āsanas to correct the position of your body. What is also correct is your self-esteem. And also, singing, talking—Maṇipūra Chakra is very important for voice. What does it mean? When you have self-esteem, your voice is different, and when you are in fear, unpleasant, your voice is completely different. And for that we need āsanas, we need prāṇāyāma, and we will have a good, strong Maṇipūra Chakra. And you know that from Maṇipūra Cakra starts our spiritual development. Now we have a special surprise today. This vibration, and how that vibration is functioning on our whole body. Through chanting Oṃ 108 times, many years ago Swāmījī said, "If you have any problem with allergy, also try to chant every day 108 times Oṃ." It was approximately 25 years ago, or even more, during one public lecture in Zagreb. And for me, it was completely, why? What is the connection between this and allergy? And I think 15 years ago, two scientists got the Nobel Prize about nitric oxide, NO. And everywhere you will find the humming sound is good for your high blood pressure, everything. Rhinitis, allergy, everything. And if you have a humming sound for approximately 10 minutes per day, in three days you are released from rhinitis, a runny nose. And everybody said, "Oh yes, yes, that is good, that is a good article." But 25 years, maybe 10, 15 years before that, Viśva Gurujī told us, and we, okay, forget. What means Swāmījī is much more in front of the time and science. But he told us in a little different way than what the science is. And sometimes we don’t; we need time to understand this. And this sound, flute, or anything else, all didgeridoo, also makes this vibration, which stimulates our body to produce this nitric oxide. And more about this, because it’s already Svara Yoga, a little Madhura. So, Hari Om, Pranām everybody, good morning. So, we will continue today with some musical Nāda Yoga practice, practices. Má fojtatjuk a zenés Nāda Yoga gyakorlatokat. And I remember this morning, a few years ago, before COVID, now we speak in the terms of before and after COVID. Viśwa Gurujī asked me to say something in Sri Lankan. And he gave the topic, "Yoga and Flute." Now, the good thing about the order from the Master is that he supplies also the answers when he asks to speak. You may know this. Sometimes it happens that he suddenly picks someone and says, "You speak about this," and you have this very kind of a blank mind, not knowing really what to say. And in one way, that’s the ideal platform to speak, really. To let something from within you say what needs to be said. Anyhow, so I was thinking about the material, first of all, from which these flutes are made, and some of you may know it’s made of bamboo. And in most of the countries, bamboo is considered as a weed, as a pest, and the reason is that it spreads very quickly, and it takes over within no time. There is not much use for it, unless the bamboo is big and thick, then it is useful. Otherwise, there is not much use for a bamboo. And on the top of this, what can happen is that when the wind blows and the bamboo rubs against each other, it can create fire. So almost everywhere, people want to get rid of it the moment they see it in the garden growing. And so you can see this instrument. This is the root of the bamboo. And so it grows; it can go up to many, many meters. But, yes, another thing is that the bamboo is full from inside. Originally, you can see here—some of you can see if you’re not far—that here is empty; there is a hole inside. But when the bamboo is fresh, it has something inside; it’s filled. So someone who has in his or her mind a vision of what he or she can make out of this bamboo that nobody really wants, slowly, it begins to remove from inside what is not needed. And it is a very long and delicate process. It can take up to six months to make one flute like this. And a good maker has to take time and always test the flute, then leave it, come back to it, and so on. But all the time, when he is working on this instrument, he can already see the potential and the end product that he wants to make. If he would rush and remove too much too quickly, it will not play. So in a similar way, the master has this kind of vision that he or she can see the potential within all of us. And it’s simply removing, slowly-slowly, what is covering up that inner potential, that light. And it also takes some time, and sometimes it’s not so pleasant. But when the work is completed, then both the master and the disciple, they both can see that it was worth it. And so, in some ways, our job or our part to do is through sādhanā, also to allow this process of, now it’s very much spoken in the world, the process of letting go. And surrendering to the Master, let him remove what needs to be removed. Because what remains, the final product, is who we truly are. And so we need to bear that a little bit; sometimes it’s not so pleasant. And interestingly, the master seems to even know how much that particular bamboo can withstand. Even we may think that, no, this is impossible, I can’t anymore. But through some kind of power that allows us to let go of the old ways or our limitations, suddenly we realize that we can go through something more than we thought. So, just these few thoughts about yoga and the flute. Now, this particular instrument that I showed you is coming from Japan. It’s called shakuhachi. And the flute of shakuhachi has many, many years of history. And it was played by one sect of the samurai monks. They called it komusō. And there is also an interesting thing to note here: they were samurai monks, so they had swords originally, but when they lost their master, they were proclaimed as dangerous, and so they were given the flutes instead of the swords. And you can actually defend yourself with this root at the back. If you take it like this, it’s a kind of weapon. And I think it was in Nepal or India when I went through the X-ray at the airports. I had to play, so they believed me. It’s an instrument, it’s not a weapon. And they killed so many of these officers, and they... So, originally there were no holes; this flute had only one sound. Something like in a didgeridoo in Australia, so when the monks were moving from village to village for food, for begging, they would announce with the sound of shakuhachi that we are here, please come and feed us. And later on, when the musicians took over, of course, one sound to play continually is a bit boring after some time. So they made these five holes inside. But still, this music of shakuhachi, called the honkyoku music, was very strictly limited to the temples only. And the music is very simple and not emotional. For them, it was a prāṇāyāma, really. And the way of developing concentration. And, plus, what we were talking with Swāmī Vivek Purījī, this resonance of the instrument. They were undergoing very, very austere training with this. There was one person, a quite famous player from Australia, his name is Riley Lee. And he learned to play this shakuhachi in Japan, in a Zen temple. And so they were sent early in the morning to go and play under the waterfall in January, where it was minus degrees. And under this flowing water, they were told to play until the icicle started to form from here on the flute. Only one tone. Many of the monks who still play this instrument today are given only one piece of music, which is about four minutes long. And they play this whole life, nothing else. So it’s kind of a mantra for them. So you see, there are different ways to discipline our minds. But also, at the same time, the sound is very attractive for our mind, for our awareness, for our attention. And so, while playing or listening, it is easier to focus or to relax, really, to stop. I’ve been playing for, let’s say, in the hospitals and for people recovering from strokes and different places. Or for elderly people in rest homes. And they are in, some of them are in this difficult situation. Because you can see that the mind has not really let go yet, or renounced the desires. But the body cannot anymore fulfill them. And so, there is a lot of suffering in that condition. Often, they are in one room and can’t move, really. But the mind still wants something, and sometimes when I play, then everybody goes to sleep. And I think it was Vivek Purījī who once told me that, you know, they play for a cobra and the cobra goes up. And you play to the people, and people go down. So, sometimes we don’t really realize how much the inner movements underneath are happening inside us. And we need to stop sometime, and we need to rest. But not resting with the television. Not resting is not engaging the senses and receiving more information. These kinds of seminars are really restful for us. That we distance ourselves from the continual rest. Receiving more, more, more from the outer world. We may encounter that there are some tensions in our body suddenly we didn’t know about. And so we have techniques from Viśva Gurujī on how to release them. But also how to do it with kindness, not with the energy of pushing it away. But as Swāmī Vivek Purī said, it takes time. And Mahāprabhujī just sings the bhajan, "My mind, dearer, dearer, manovā, dearer, dearer, ciao." So we need a little bit of patience, and give these techniques really a space so that they can reveal themselves fully. But anyway, I’m distancing now a little bit from our music, so let’s come back to it, and you can lie down if you have space, so that our spine, our back can have a little relaxation. If you have too much sun, come here, it’s more shadow here. Make yourself comfortable, you know the position for relaxation. Relax very well. Once you settle, close your eyes and take a few deeper inhalations, and relax. Relax your whole body. Feel the earth element beneath. With every natural exhalation, allow your body to sink deeper down to the floor. Let the arms become heavy so your shoulders can sink down. And the tensions from the upper back can be released. The collarbones are releasing, and your chest is opening to the breath. Then relax your face muscles, and finally your legs, feet, and toes. As you feel the whole body, take a deep inhalation, and with exhalation, try to double the level of relaxation in your body. Let your thoughts be free. Just like you would watch the clouds passing in the sky. Become a loving and kind space for everything that is within you. Holding nothing, resisting nothing. Bring your attention towards the center of your chest. The heart space. Just feel relaxed and happy. Worry less, peaceful one with your inner self. Slowly, we begin to regain once again the awareness of the whole body. And you’re being here in this room. Physically, mentally. Deepening your breath. Slowly, slowly, start to move your fingers. The toes, the arms, the legs. And with deep inhalation, stretch your whole body. As the space allows, after stretch, palms together, rub your palms, feel your face, muscles, your eyelids, open your eyes, and slowly, in your own mind, let us sit up.