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Those of you who know me, this is normal.
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You know, wherever I am —
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believe it or not, the only place where I had
no problem with the sound was India.
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Isn't that amazing? Wherever — Europe,
United States, everywhere — trouble!
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You know, listening to talks
is about the same as reading recipes, right?
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You can listen to talks as long as you like; it doesn't satisfy you.
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You know, just like you read recipes.
You have to eat. Then you are satisfied, right?
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And so it is, lectures, you know, that's fine.
But you have to apply what we are saying.
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Some of you are not familiar
with the teachings of Paramahansa Yogananda
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or Self-Realization Fellowship.
Self-Realization Fellowship is simply the organization which he founded
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with the purpose to keep the teachings pure and to spread it worldwide.
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But I want to say first that this is not a new sect;
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it is not a new religion. So what is it?
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Paramahansa Yogananda was the last in a line of God-realized masters
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whose mission it was to bring back the esoteric teachings
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which is underlying all the great religions.
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And that teaching, that esoteric teaching,
was lost in the Dark Ages.
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I think most people still think that civilization
gradually evolved to now,
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and now we are on the highest point ever.
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Not true. There were much higher civilizations in the past.
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Civilizations go in ascending and descending cycles.
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And you have heard from the mythologies
of the ancient Greeks and Romans,
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Egyptians, India, and others.
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They talk about the Golden Age of enlightenment,
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Silver Age, Bronze Age, Iron Age of darkness.
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And we have not so long ago left
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the ascending Dark Age. We are going up
— believe it or not, we are going up —
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and we have started in the Bronze Age,
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and that is why you see the tremendous development of science,
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technology, in the last hundred years or more.
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But mankind per se is still very much in a dark age —
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in regard to
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understanding what life is all about,
in regard to behavior, attitudes, that sort of thing.
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But the advantage of the new age now is
they brought back the knowledge of the finer forces
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in the universe: energy, electricity, atomic energy, that sort of thing.
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And that is control of energy — I'm going to explain a little later.
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Control of the energy, this is the scientific key to — we call it yoga,
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but it is really the scientific key of the esoteric teaching
that underlies all the great religions.
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Externally, the external aspect of religions,
there you find big differences — obvious.
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Because they have been sent in different times; they have been sent
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to different people according to their understanding and
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the development, or whatever, the needs of various people.
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And so therefore — and you find differences in dogma,
in terminology, in rituals, in ceremonies,
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and all that sort of thing. And then also,
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these various religions are
deeply rooted in the history of certain people,
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the history of the great saints and masters,
prophets of the various religions.
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And so therefore you cannot possibly bring them
all together in an external way. No way!
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I remember, particularly in 1993, when we went to Chicago
to the World Parliament of Religions.
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There were about four hundred different spiritual paths represented.
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And some of them didn't even come,
because they didn't want to join us “heathens,” you know?
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And so, it wasn't long before Paramahansa Yogananda’s passing
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when a professor came from a university from India to interview him —
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he came to Los Angeles — and among other things he asked him,
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“You claim that there is an underlying unity of all religions.
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How come there is quarreling — even war,
certainly conflict — between the different religions?”
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And the Master said — when I say “Master,”
I mean Paramahansa Yogananda —
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he said, “You read this same thing
even in the ancient scriptures of India.
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There are those who are worshipping Shiva;
that is to them the Supreme God.
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And others who say, 'No, no, it is Vishnu
and his incarnations of Rama and Krishna; he is Supreme.’ ”
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And then he said — and I often have heard him say that —
“If you could bring together in the same room
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all the great saints, the great masters,
the great prophets of the various religions,
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there would be perfect harmony.
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And you bring their followers together
and they are at each other's throat.” And he said, “Why?”
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Because the great ones, they have the full vision
— and I mean experience — of God.
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And the others who do not have that experience,
they go by dogma.
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And there, of course, are differences.
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And so, we have to understand: The key to religion is
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experience, not just belief.
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Paramahansa Yogananda used to say,
“Your religion has to be something compelling.”
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So that it is not just a one-hour-a-week affair,
and the rest of it, “forget about religion.”
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He said, “It has to be compelling.”
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And he didn't mean it in the sense of: compelling
— that you're afraid that if you don't practice you go to hell.
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It's a little different, you know.
There was one time a man came to the Master and asked him,
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“Is there really such a thing as hell?”
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And Master's eyes were dancing with laughter.
He said, “Where do you think you are now?”
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This is it! Believe it or not.
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This mortal consciousness and the idea that
this body and this material world, this is the ultimate reality.
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In India they call that maya, delusion.
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He meant, when he said “compelling,”
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he meant it in the sense of:
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If you have a strong desire for something,
that is a compelling force for you, isn't it?
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Because it compels you to do everything possible
to fulfill that desire.
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He meant it in that way.
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And now we come gradually to the essence, the fundamental point,
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not only of religion but life:
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What you want? What you want from life?
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Did you ever sit down and ask deeply, “What do I want?”
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And then, when you ask different people, you most likely
will get different answers, right? Because people are different.
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Some say, “I want money and everything that money can buy.”
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A person that has poor health may think, “I want health.”
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Another one wants fame.
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Another one — or two other ones — may think,
“I want to become President of the United States,” right?
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Spend millions of dollars. That's the only thing
they think about: “I want to become President.”
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But it's not enough. Now you think about it.
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A person wants to become President of the United States, what is that,
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compared to the size of the universe,
you know, billions of galaxies?
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And how long does it last? Four years? Eight years?
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What is that compared to eternity?
It's peanuts, isn't it? It is less than peanuts.
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But they're not thinking that way, because most people don't.
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It's all right if they run for President;
it's part of the show, you know, the cosmic drama.
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But we have to go deeper.
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And most people do not go below that superficial aim or desire.
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We have to go deeper. And then we come to the Source,
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not only of life but of religion, in a practical sense.
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And there you come to, then, two things
that every single human being maybe doesn't want yet
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— they are still thinking of the surface —
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but they will not have peace until they have those two things.
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And these are like two sides of a coin.
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Number one: I tell you what you want, okay?
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What you need. You will have no peace until you have it.
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Number one, you want to be free from suffering,
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because suffering we all know, we have all experienced that.
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You want to be free.
Not just for a little bit, but once and for all.
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Now let's go into that. I want to show you.
This is in all the various scriptures of the various religions.
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Krishna said in the Bhagavad Gita:
“Get away from the ocean of suffering.”
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Jesus said: “In this world ye have tribulations”— that's suffering —
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“but be of good cheer, because I have overcome the world.”
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And that is not understood yet, I think,
by most people, what he meant by that.
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Those great ones, they're not saying: “Look at me, I am different,
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I am supreme, and I am perfect, and you are, you know.”
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No. Those great ones, they came as examples.
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And they say, “Come on, I show you the way,
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and you can attain the same state of consciousness that I have.”
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Buddha said: “Suffering exists.
There is a cause for suffering. That cause can be removed.”
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And then he boiled it down to one thing:
What is the cause? Desire.
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As long as you have unfulfilled desires, you have no peace.
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That's the state of suffering. It's not complete.
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So now what do we want?
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That's the other side of the coin.
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What is the strongest instinct in man?
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Self-preservation, right?
Nobody wants to die. You don't want to die.
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That's the deep-seated desire: we want eternal existence.
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And not just eternal existence.
We want that existence to be blissful,
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and that's higher than the ordinary joys
or sense pleasures and elations —
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intellectual and emotional elations, and all that sort of thing.
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That is supreme, that is beyond,
that is not a joy which goes away.
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That is supreme bliss which is ever-increasing, eternal, infinite.
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Most people do not think big enough, you know? But that's it.
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That's what we want.
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And in India they have a name for that: Satchitananda.
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And that's the name of God.
God-consciousness is infinite bliss-consciousness.
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And we are part of God. The soul is part of God.
The soul is God within.
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We will not rest until we have that.
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And this is called, these two — overcoming suffering
and attaining infinite bliss consciousness —
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that is called Sanatana Dharma in India.
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And that means the Eternal Religion.
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And that's usually the name given to Hinduism,
but it is the name, it is the essence
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of all the great religions in the world.
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Now comes the point: how do you get that?
That will come, you know, a practical thing.
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You cannot find it in the things of the world
— that's a tough one —
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or outer conditions.
You cannot find it there, and that's a tough one
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because everybody is seeking fulfillment outside, isn't it?
In the things of the world? Conditions?
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You cannot find it there. Why?
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Because this creation is built on the principle of duality.
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Science says that. There is no single force in the universe.
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It's contrast. You cannot have manifestation unless there is duality.
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And so you have
— in this world, with your human experience —
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pleasure and pain, birth and death.
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You read it in the Bible; it's there. Isaiah:
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God speaking through this great prophet,
says: “I form the light,
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and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil:
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I the Lord do all these things.”
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In order to have a creation He had to create duality.
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And that's why you cannot find it in the things of the world
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and in outer conditions. It's duality.
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So what is the solution?
We have to transcend duality and go beyond that.
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In one of the most important passages
in the "Autobiography of a Yogi" by Paramahansa Yogananda, is this:
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“To surmount maya”— that's delusion,
maya, that is creation, that is the duality.
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“To surmount”— meaning to transcend —“maya
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was the task assigned to the human race
by the millennial prophets.”
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He doesn't say Hindu prophets or Jewish prophets, or whatever.
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It is “by the millennial prophets.”
They all have taught the same thing.
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“To rise above the duality of creation
and perceive the unity of the Creator
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was conceived of as man's highest goal.”
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Now think about this.
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Usually our aim is to find pleasure,
all the nice things in this world, right?
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And avoid all the suffering,
the dark things, the painful things.
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Do you know what that means?
That means that people are hoping
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to split duality and have only the good,
and leave off — escape — the painful.
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You cannot do it. You cannot cut duality in half.
Right? Not possible.
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So where do you find it?
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They all say the same thing, the various religions.
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And in the external religion that is usually taught now,
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they are not teaching it. And they have it in the scriptures.
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Jesus said: “Kingdom of God is within you.” Right?
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Saint Teresa of Avila, great Christian saint, sixteenth century,
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she had the title Doctor of the Church,
a great reformer of the Carmelite Order, she wrote to her nuns:
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“My sisters, if you want to find God,
you have to search for Him within yourself.”
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And then she said, “Remember what Saint Augustine said.
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He had been searching for God everywhere
and then finally he found Him within himself.”
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And then she used a very interesting illustration.
She said, “Like a turtle
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withdraws its limbs into the shell,
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so you have to withdraw your faculties within,
and there you find it.”
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That's strictly yoga. Because Krishna,
in the Bhagavad Gita, says exactly the same thing,
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uses the same illustration of the turtle,
withdrawing the faculties within. And there it is.
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Not the Infinite yet; the soul. And knowing the soul
comes then automatically oneness with the Infinite.
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That's yoga. Yoga means union, and implied is:
union between your soul and the Infinite.
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What is the greatest commandment in the Bible?
Old Testament, New Testament:
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“Love God — with all your heart, all your mind,
all your soul, all your strength.” Right?
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That is in one sentence the whole principle of Raja Yoga.
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I'm not talking about Hatha Yoga,
standing on your head and putting your
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body in a pretzel, and all that sort of thing.
I mean, that's okay, but I'm not talking about that.
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I'm talking about Raja Yoga, a science
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which eventually leads to samadhi.
Samadhi means “union with God.”
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And samadhi literally means “to direct together.”
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And so that great commandment in the Bible is exactly that.
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And “love God with all your strength?”
Today yet they do not know what it means.
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They do not know what it means.
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It means energy. It means energy.
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And the principle is very simple, you know:
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the energy and, with that, the consciousness.
Master used to say, “Where the energy is, there is your consciousness.”
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Now, within us we have six
— they call it chakras —
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spiritual centers of light in the spine,
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and the seventh one is in the head, in the brain.
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This is not physical; this is spiritual centers.
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These are the centers of consciousness and energy.
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And when the energy comes down and goes
through the coccyx out into the nervous system,
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and from there, from the nervous system, goes in every cell,
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in every organ, in the sense organs,
and we become body-identified.
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And we are completely identified with our sensory experiences,
and then the outer perception in the world.
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Now, the principle is what?
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Withdrawing, going, as we have descended and gone out,
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you go in and go up, and there you are.
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It's as simple as that, in principle.
It's not so easy to do because of our wrong habits,
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of always going out, out, out. But it is within.
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Patanjali in the Yoga Sutras — one of the main keys,
one of the main steps, of yoga is
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pratyahara, interiorization.
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In the Koran, holy book of the Moslems:
“Remember thy Lord within thyself.”
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They all say the same thing. And you can go
anywhere now, and in any church or temple or whatever;
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are you taught, “Go inside; God is in there”?
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No. They say God is somewhere in heaven, you know,
behind the clouds somewhere. He's far away.
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And He's watching very carefully — if you should make
a mistake, you're going to go you know where.
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And so now I'm going to show you
how this whole principle is in the Bible.
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But before I go into that, I want to talk about something else. Namely:
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the foundation of every religion is basic rules,
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so that we live in harmony with God's laws.
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In yoga, it is called yama-niyama, the do's and don'ts.
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In the Bible you have the Ten Commandments, right?
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And if you read in the Old Testament,
again and again the prophets say, “Keep the commandments.
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Keep the commandments that it may
go well with thee and thy children.”
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And when you see the history of the Hebrews,
whenever they did that, there was peace, prosperity.
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When they turned away from God and away from the commandments,
nothing but trouble and suffering. Right?
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That is the history of every nation in the world.
And that is the history — this is what's going on in the world now.
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Because to a great extent modern man
threw those laws out the window. Why?
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Modern man wants to be free — no restrictions,
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do as you please, do your own thing. Right? That's not freedom.
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That's not freedom. That's slavery to the lower self —
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to our passions, to our quirks, to our moods
and our selfishness, all that.
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And I tell you, mankind has to go
back to the commandments.
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You cannot go against the laws of God and have peace within.
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It creates a contrary negative vibration within.
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That is why this — these laws — this is the foundation
of yoga, of all the great religions.
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And then comes the science — as I said before,
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how the energy and consciousness
has descended and gone out.
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Now I show you.
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It's even more clear than Genesis. Ezekiel:
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“Thou hast been in Eden, the garden of God.”
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That's not a place. They say it's somewhere in Iran.
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No way. That's not a place. It's a state of consciousness.
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“Thou hast walked up and down
in the midst of the stones of fire.”
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Those are the chakras of light.
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“Thou wast perfect in thy ways
from the day that thou wast created,
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until iniquity was found in thee.”
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And “By the multitude of thy merchandise
they have filled the midst of thee with violence,
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and thou hast sinned.”
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Now this is exactly that consciousness, energy went out,
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and man became so engrossed in external pursuits
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that he lost the divine consciousness.
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And so he says, “Therefore I will cast
thee as profane out of the mountain of God:
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and I will destroy thee from the midst of the stones of fire.”
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The mountain of God is the highest chakra in the brain:
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from here, the medulla, and the thousand-rayed lotus in the brain;
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that's the seat of cosmic consciousness within you.
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That's the fall of man. That's the “original sin.”
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And so, now, what do we do?
As we have descended and gone outward,
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become body-identified and identified
with all the sense pleasures and stuff,
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we go back, isn't it?
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Withdrawal through yoga techniques,
withdraw the energy and go up, and there you are.
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That's the “spinal highway;” that's what the Master called it.
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He said all the religious bypaths lead eventually to that
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because everybody has to go back into the spine and up.
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Now I’ll show you; it's in the Bible, believe it or not. Isaiah:
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“And a highway shall be there
and it shall be called the way of holiness.”
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That's the spine — the inner spine, not the physical.
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“The unclean shall not pass over it.”
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Meaning those that are not interested in anything spiritual,
that are completely engrossed in outer pursuits.
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“But the wayfaring men, though fools”
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— Saint Francis was called a fool
by the whole population there in Assisi
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when he started his search for God —
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“though fools, shall not err therein. No lion shall be there,
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nor any ravenous beast shall go up thereon,
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but the ransomed of the Lord shall return, and come to Zion”
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— Zion is another name for the holy mountain,
thousand-rayed lotus —
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“with songs and everlasting joy upon their heads:
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and they shall obtain joy and gladness,
and sorrow and sighing shall flee away.”
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And there you have it. If you understand this — you know,
the symbolic language — Sanatana Dharma.
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“Sorrow and sighing shall flee away.” Suffering eliminated.
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And eternal joy, bliss consciousness.
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I'll give you another one, also Isaiah:
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“And in this mountain shall the Lord of hosts make unto all people
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a feast of fat things.” Now he is talking, you know,
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what people usually — what they think.
What is joy? It's a good meal. Right?
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So, “a feast of fat things, a feast of wines on the lees,
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of fat things full of marrow, and
wines on the lees well refined.”
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What is that wine? You know we have a book by that title,
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“The Wine of the Mystic.” They call it that way.
It is the bliss of God.
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Just like in the Bible — the disciples of Jesus, you know,
when they had received the Holy Ghost, they were “like drunken men.”
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It is that bliss consciousness.
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“And he will destroy in this mountain
the face of the covering cast over all people,
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and the veil that is spread over all nations.”
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What is that covering, what is that veil?
You find it in the Bhagavad Gita.
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It is delusion, that you'll think this material world
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and your physical body is the only reality,
that there is nothing else.
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“And He will swallow up death in victory;
and the Lord God will wipe away tears from off all faces.”
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There again, mortal consciousness is gone.
Eternal life. Death is conquered.
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“And the Lord God will wipe away tears
from off all faces.” Suffering is eliminated.
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“And it shall be said in that day, Lo,
this is our God.” That means experience of God.
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“We have waited for him, we will be glad
and rejoice in his salvation.”
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It's the whole story — the science of yoga.
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You know, I remember when in the fifties and sixties,
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it started — people became
more and more interested in yoga.
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We got all kinds of calls from colleges and churches, and so on.
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“Could you come, could you send somebody to give us a lecture on yoga?”
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It was not really understood yet.
And it was really not taken seriously.
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It was more like a novelty, or as a form of entertainment.
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And we went to colleges, we gave lectures, and so on.
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And one call came from a Jewish community in Los Angeles:
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“Could you send somebody to
give us a lecture on yoga?”
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And so I went. What did I take?
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Nothing but the Jewish prophets.
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Showed the whole thing is there.
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And I tell you, that was a very attentive audience.
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And afterwards people came to me and,
you know, asked some questions. And one lady said,
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“What you people are teaching
is actually our Jewish religion, isn't it?”
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And I said, “You are absolutely right.”
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It's the essence, it's the esoteric teaching of Judaism.
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But not only Judaism. It's the esoteric teaching
of Christianity and Hinduism, and whatever.
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It's there. It's there.
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Now, with all this I did not mean to say
that you should neglect your outer duties, your outer life.
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But this earth is a school
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— most people don't know that.
The Master used to say, “This is not the kingdom of heaven;
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it's school.”
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And our outer life, our outer duties also
are part of the spiritual discipline,
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that we do it in harmony with God's laws.
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And that is why the Master said,
“Our spiritual and material duties
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should work together, like two stallions
pulling the car of life harmoniously
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and uniformly to one happy goal.”
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And I remember — you know,
I came to America after the World War.
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I got an invitation to study with Frank Lloyd Wright,
who was at that time the king of architecture.
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And we were in this community,
we were about sixty architects and students
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from all over the world.
It was very interesting experience,
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because some of the people had been
fighting on the battlefields against each other,
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and there they were together — community.
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And on Sunday — we didn't call it church,
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but we were together: community breakfast, and Frank Lloyd Wright was there,
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and after we had our breakfast,
he talked about philosophy,
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about architecture and art, and so on.
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And one student one time asked him,
“What if I don't become a great architect, then what?”
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And Frank Lloyd Wright said, “Well, no problem.
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You'll come back and try again.”
He believed in reincarnation.
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And I thought, “Is he happy?”
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Because by that time I had read the
"Autobiography of a Yogi" and "Science of Religion"
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by Paramahansa Yogananda, and I knew,
according to what he said,
364
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you cannot find absolute fulfillment
in anything in this world,
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including fame, and all that sort of thing.
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And Frank Lloyd Wright, you know,
he celebrated his eightieth birthday while I was there.
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And he was still on the peak
of his creative ability. And he really,
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you should have seen — telegrams, letters, honorary degrees
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came in from different universities from the around the world
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— big celebration. And he was a great man,
I mean great genius, creative.
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And I watched him like a hawk, watched him.
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Is he really happy? Fully happy? Totally satisfied?
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And one day he let it out — still frustrated, still frustrated.
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And I thought, there! That was one of
my greatest experiences of seeing that
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no matter what peak you reach,
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outwardly speaking, it is not enough.
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And then I thought — I had seen in Italy
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some of the great paintings of —
and particularly Fra Angelico, fifteenth century.
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And he was a saint. It was said that
when he was painting he had tears of devotion.
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And I thought, “That's it, that's it.”
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00:40:20,383 --> 00:40:25,630
He did not seek fulfillment through fame
or the beauty of his works.
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He had found it in his relationship, his experience of God.
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And his work, he did it as an offering to God.
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00:40:38,561 --> 00:40:44,095
And that's the key. This is how you spiritualize
your outer actions.
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And it doesn't matter what you do,
what your occupation is. Because if you look at the saints
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of the various religions throughout the centuries,
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you find them in any possible occupation.
388
00:41:00,000 --> 00:41:05,824
You find them on any level of the social ladder,
from kings to beggars and everything in between.
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00:41:06,236 --> 00:41:10,828
You find them among householders, monastics —
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different lifestyle. It was not the outer which made them saints;
it was their inner attainment.
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And you can — you know, it's very simple.
Whatever you do — most people work for ego satisfaction. Isn't it?
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I, I, I. And if you do whatever you do,
393
00:41:38,388 --> 00:41:42,280
and once in a while you inwardly offer it to God:
394
00:41:42,280 --> 00:41:46,976
“I do this for You.” Because He is
the “movie director.” You know? We are all actors.
395
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If you say, “I do this for You,” you spiritualize your action,
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00:41:52,855 --> 00:41:56,842
you spiritualize your outer activities.
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00:41:58,698 --> 00:42:07,570
But I want to — particularly now,
I want to ask you to think about life.
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00:42:10,705 --> 00:42:19,476
You have heard, possibly, of a very famous woman,
Dr. Elisabeth Kübler-Ross.
399
00:42:20,548 --> 00:42:29,015
She’s Swiss, like I am — was.
She is in America now.
400
00:42:29,015 --> 00:42:31,451
I am an American too now.
401
00:42:33,761 --> 00:42:40,832
And she made it her life work to work with
people who had a terminal illness —
402
00:42:43,678 --> 00:42:53,580
helping them, counseling them,
encouraging them; at the same time observing,
403
00:42:57,169 --> 00:43:03,692
studying them. She wrote books.
I didn't read any, but I read an interview that she gave.
404
00:43:05,136 --> 00:43:11,085
And she said a remarkable thing, observation.
405
00:43:11,992 --> 00:43:18,851
She said, “You would think because
the strongest instinct" — as I said before — “in man
406
00:43:19,717 --> 00:43:26,223
is self-preservation.” Right?
Not only in man — in animals, in plants.
407
00:43:27,749 --> 00:43:33,960
And she said, “You might think that
this is the greatest fear — fear of death.”
408
00:43:35,692 --> 00:43:41,789
She said, “There's something worse.” What is it?
409
00:43:44,058 --> 00:43:52,620
“The feeling at the end of life, ‘I have not really lived.
410
00:43:54,022 --> 00:43:58,167
I have not really lived.’ ”
411
00:44:00,000 --> 00:44:06,700
And when they saw that they feel, “I came into this world
and I wanted to accomplish something,” and sure,
412
00:44:06,700 --> 00:44:12,497
everybody is busy with career, family, all sorts of things.
413
00:44:13,404 --> 00:44:19,548
Then at the end of life something essential is missing:
414
00:44:20,744 --> 00:44:28,911
“I have not really lived.”
And they don't know what it is.
415
00:44:30,602 --> 00:44:38,997
And I can't blame people, because they have not been taught.
Those that should know, and should teach it, do not know.
416
00:44:38,997 --> 00:44:49,336
We are not physical beings. We are children of God.
And there is a spiritual dimension which is neglected.
417
00:44:51,563 --> 00:44:56,118
And I know, because every once in a while
somebody — from our members or whatever —
418
00:44:56,118 --> 00:45:01,119
writes to us or comes and talks for consultation, and says,
419
00:45:01,119 --> 00:45:05,019
“I feel I have a mission to fulfill.”
420
00:45:05,844 --> 00:45:08,913
And they think in terms of external mission.
421
00:45:11,512 --> 00:45:19,778
And we say, “You’re right. You have a mission to fulfill.
And the greatest mission is to find God.”
422
00:45:21,098 --> 00:45:27,365
And we do not mean this in the sense of
— as it’s usually used — in the sense of belief in God.
423
00:45:27,365 --> 00:45:30,725
I mean experience of God.
424
00:45:32,829 --> 00:45:37,830
And so we have to think about that, you know, deeply:
Why am I here?
425
00:45:38,614 --> 00:45:42,987
And you don't have to wait until the end of life, you know.
426
00:45:43,317 --> 00:45:51,009
Because God sends a warning about halfway through.
427
00:45:53,896 --> 00:45:58,785
Have you heard of it? Mid-life crisis?
428
00:46:01,012 --> 00:46:05,538
That's very real, you know? Hits most people.
429
00:46:06,569 --> 00:46:14,839
Before that, when you're young, sure,
“Death? Never mind, doesn't happen to me; life is eternal.”
430
00:46:14,839 --> 00:46:19,835
It says in the Mahabharata, one of the great writings of India
— Bhagavad Gita is part of it —
431
00:46:19,835 --> 00:46:25,643
it says there the astonishing thing is
that people see people dying, acquaintances, and so on.
432
00:46:25,643 --> 00:46:30,521
Happens everywhere. Nobody believes it will happen to him.
433
00:46:31,593 --> 00:46:40,320
But in mid-life crisis, then people think,
“Wait a minute, I have been very, very busy:
434
00:46:41,640 --> 00:46:49,096
building a career, having family,
and all that sort of thing and I’m not really satisfied.
435
00:46:49,756 --> 00:46:54,912
Something is missing.” And then they look ahead:
436
00:46:54,912 --> 00:46:59,135
“What am I going to do with
the rest of my life? Same thing?
437
00:46:59,424 --> 00:47:05,612
I'm not really happy, not really satisfied.”
And then comes death.
438
00:47:07,221 --> 00:47:09,686
You know? Panic!
439
00:47:11,130 --> 00:47:16,827
And some people go to extremes, they do really crazy things,
440
00:47:16,827 --> 00:47:19,698
trying to — hoping they can catch it.
441
00:47:21,430 --> 00:47:26,635
A man will leave his family, run away with a young woman,
442
00:47:26,965 --> 00:47:31,737
or go to another country or completely
changing his lifestyle and whatever,
443
00:47:32,191 --> 00:47:34,927
thinking, “This is it.”
444
00:47:36,288 --> 00:47:41,010
No Way! Or women have come to us:
445
00:47:42,330 --> 00:47:46,570
“I’ve been busy all my life so far.
I have been working, building a career,
446
00:47:46,570 --> 00:47:50,585
and I didn't think of time and years went by. And now
447
00:47:51,286 --> 00:47:59,940
the biological clock is ticking away and here I am,
and I'm not married yet and I want to have a child.”
448
00:48:00,559 --> 00:48:04,994
These feelings are very real. It's panic.
449
00:48:05,406 --> 00:48:10,532
And people think in terms of external solutions.
450
00:48:11,481 --> 00:48:15,968
And nothing external is the solution.
451
00:48:17,370 --> 00:48:26,588
Why? Because we are the soul. We are the soul.
452
00:48:27,660 --> 00:48:36,426
And in one of the old scriptures of India,
it says, “The Self” — meaning the soul — “is self-luminous.”
453
00:48:37,168 --> 00:48:44,049
Like the sun is self-luminous;
it doesn't need any light from another planet or star.
454
00:48:44,791 --> 00:48:49,616
We are the soul — and that soul is never touched
455
00:48:49,616 --> 00:48:53,640
by any of the external experiences, believe it or not.
456
00:48:55,414 --> 00:49:01,236
Has nothing to do — is not touched
by any biological urges or whatever.
457
00:49:01,735 --> 00:49:05,704
The soul is self-contained because it is God within.
458
00:49:06,158 --> 00:49:11,030
And the Master used to say to us,
“Your soul is waiting,
459
00:49:11,030 --> 00:49:15,821
with infinite patience, to be redeemed” —
460
00:49:15,821 --> 00:49:20,981
meaning, so that you become conscious of it,
that you know who you are.
461
00:49:21,558 --> 00:49:26,491
I want to read to you one of my favorite passages.
462
00:49:26,862 --> 00:49:32,346
Paramahansa Yogananda’s interpretation of the Bhagavad Gita.
463
00:49:34,161 --> 00:49:39,171
It's actually what I have already talked about: success.
464
00:49:41,811 --> 00:49:47,015
“Success in obtaining material goals and pleasures
465
00:49:47,015 --> 00:49:53,542
is relatively easy in a world fashioned for this purpose.
466
00:49:55,563 --> 00:50:02,934
Thus man pursues the obvious,
immediate gains — the tangibles —
467
00:50:04,831 --> 00:50:13,749
all of which are treacherously evanescent”
— meaning, they don't last, they go like a mirage.
468
00:50:14,698 --> 00:50:24,944
Now comes, “Lasting success consists
in freeing the soul from the threefold sorrow.” That's suffering.
469
00:50:27,419 --> 00:50:33,581
Threefold: physical, mental, spiritual.
470
00:50:34,901 --> 00:50:40,846
"The threefold suffering which is inevitable in the limited human being
471
00:50:42,042 --> 00:50:47,367
and in attaining the bliss of final liberation.”
472
00:50:48,769 --> 00:50:57,604
And there you have it again: Sanatana Dharma.
Overcoming of suffering, attaining eternal bliss.
473
00:50:58,676 --> 00:51:06,706
That's it. Keep this in mind. That's it.
And because that is where yoga comes in —
474
00:51:07,572 --> 00:51:12,977
of learning to go within and to become still.
475
00:51:13,431 --> 00:51:16,673
Not making the mind a blank, but being deeply concentrated,
476
00:51:16,673 --> 00:51:22,193
absorbed in meditation, in the presence of God within.
477
00:51:22,894 --> 00:51:30,321
It says in the Bible, Forty-sixth Psalm:
“Be still and know that I am God.”
478
00:51:31,971 --> 00:51:37,728
That's yoga; that is the definition. In Patanjali's Yoga Sutras
479
00:51:37,728 --> 00:51:44,238
he gives the definition of yoga:
stilling the waves of consciousness.
480
00:51:44,815 --> 00:51:49,491
What causes the waves? Energy activating the instruments.
481
00:51:50,233 --> 00:51:56,151
Withdrawing the energy, stilling the faculties,
and there it is: soul-consciousness.
482
00:51:57,842 --> 00:52:07,040
And that is why Paramahansa Yogananda said,
“Your real nature is calmness.
483
00:52:07,040 --> 00:52:12,290
You have put on a mask of restlessness,
but you are not that mask.
484
00:52:12,661 --> 00:52:22,094
You are pure, calm Spirit. It is time
you remember who you are: the blessed soul.
485
00:52:23,125 --> 00:52:32,779
Take off the mask and face yourself” —
meaning go in, through meditation, inside, in the inner stillness.
486
00:52:34,388 --> 00:52:41,492
Now, he used to say to us, “You know, when you get up in the morning
and you look in the mirror and what do you see in the mirror?”
487
00:52:42,853 --> 00:52:46,068
He said, “That is not the image of God.
488
00:52:50,000 --> 00:52:54,520
That is the image of worry and mortal consciousness.”
489
00:52:57,284 --> 00:53:03,408
But people think — this is the maya,
this is the suggestion — this is you.
490
00:53:03,408 --> 00:53:11,483
And then, depending of what you are, I mean outwardly speaking,
if you are a man, you'll think, “I’m a man.”
491
00:53:11,730 --> 00:53:17,745
And if you are a woman, you see a woman's face in there
and you think, “I am a woman.”
492
00:53:17,745 --> 00:53:23,752
Then you go a little further and you think,
“I am black” or “I am white” or “I am Oriental,” or whatever.
493
00:53:24,618 --> 00:53:29,252
And it's not true. It's a lie.
494
00:53:30,985 --> 00:53:36,813
This is only the mask which you have put on
to play this particular role in the drama of life —
495
00:53:36,813 --> 00:53:38,348
now, this life.
496
00:53:42,019 --> 00:53:43,755
It's only the mask.
497
00:53:44,085 --> 00:53:47,716
I call it the package. You know why?
498
00:53:47,716 --> 00:53:52,840
Because inside of the package is the soul.
That's the diamond of the soul.
499
00:53:52,840 --> 00:53:56,196
The package is going to go, right?
500
00:53:56,468 --> 00:54:03,230
I mean, we all have the experience:
The body changes, eventually gets old, and it dies.
501
00:54:03,230 --> 00:54:11,064
But you are not the package. You are the soul.
The soul is eternal life. That's the true Self.
502
00:54:11,765 --> 00:54:18,663
So when death comes, if a person has been meditating
and he has had the experience of something deeper
503
00:54:18,663 --> 00:54:24,354
than just the body — death? No problem. Because you're not going to die.
504
00:54:24,684 --> 00:54:28,238
But if a person thinks he is the body and death comes,
505
00:54:28,238 --> 00:54:32,087
that's a terrible experience, because you think you’re dying.
506
00:54:32,087 --> 00:54:38,036
You're not. You are not dead
when you take your clothes off, right?
507
00:54:41,377 --> 00:54:48,856
We are the soul. The life that we have that
we think is the body — the body is just an empty shell.
508
00:54:51,578 --> 00:54:57,148
Inside the body, the life that we have
is first of all the soul,
509
00:54:57,148 --> 00:55:02,867
then is the causal body, then is the spiritual body,
the astral body, body of light.
510
00:55:03,486 --> 00:55:09,929
When the body drops, no problem.
It's just “good riddance,” you know, of the body.
511
00:55:09,929 --> 00:55:14,887
If you know about people who have had near-death experiences —
512
00:55:14,887 --> 00:55:20,156
they died, they left the body, they were on the other side,
and then later on they were revived.
513
00:55:20,156 --> 00:55:23,715
They had to come back,
and most of them didn't want to come back.
514
00:55:23,715 --> 00:55:27,187
They say, “Oh, it was wonderful to get rid of the body.”
515
00:55:27,682 --> 00:55:32,260
On the other side, some of them
— mostly it is young women who had little children —
516
00:55:32,260 --> 00:55:36,046
they wanted to come back because they felt,
“I have to take care of my children.”
517
00:55:36,046 --> 00:55:39,869
But usually, the other ones, they didn't want to come back.
518
00:55:40,405 --> 00:55:46,840
In fact, there was one of them, there was a doctor,
and a friend of his, a doctor friend, revived him.
519
00:55:46,840 --> 00:55:52,803
And when he was revived he said,
“Carl, don't you do that ever to me.”
520
00:55:52,803 --> 00:55:57,517
He was as angry as could be.
And he said, “What do you mean? I brought you back to life.”
521
00:55:57,517 --> 00:56:06,467
Then later on he explained, “I was on the other side. It was so wonderful over there.
I didn't want to come back. You brought me back.”
522
00:56:08,488 --> 00:56:13,710
And so, think about that. Think about what you are.
523
00:56:17,257 --> 00:56:21,369
I mean, you know, in America people are usually practical people.
524
00:56:21,369 --> 00:56:25,580
You are not dreaming of investing your money,
525
00:56:25,580 --> 00:56:30,156
all your money, in something where
you know it's going to be lost. Right?
526
00:56:31,765 --> 00:56:36,239
But when it comes to life itself, most people do exactly that.
527
00:56:36,239 --> 00:56:41,825
They invest everything
— all the work, all the thoughts and emotions, everything —
528
00:56:41,825 --> 00:56:45,824
in the package. And you know,
the package is going to go.
529
00:56:45,824 --> 00:56:50,620
In fact, your loved ones have to give money
to somebody to dispose of it.
530
00:56:51,032 --> 00:56:53,847
You know, I mean —
531
00:56:56,982 --> 00:57:03,184
Think about it, what I said. It's not what I say,
it's what Paramahansa Yogananda taught,
532
00:57:04,174 --> 00:57:11,105
you know, what life is all about.
And the bliss consciousness, I tell you —
533
00:57:12,425 --> 00:57:17,715
I just tell you a little story.
The the first time I saw him,
534
00:57:18,664 --> 00:57:23,644
he had given a Sunday service.
After Sunday service — just a little temple —
535
00:57:23,644 --> 00:57:28,844
and after the service, most people went to him to greet him.
536
00:57:30,000 --> 00:57:33,730
And when I stood in front of him
he didn't say a word, I didn't say a word.
537
00:57:33,730 --> 00:57:36,803
He just took my hand.
And the moment he touched me
538
00:57:36,803 --> 00:57:41,440
I was drunk. And completely drunk.
539
00:57:41,440 --> 00:57:47,045
Now, that was the real stuff,
that was the “wine of the mystics,” you know. That was not — y'know.
540
00:57:49,107 --> 00:57:52,733
You know, I thought I had experienced joy before.
541
00:57:54,465 --> 00:57:58,829
Then I knew. He talked about bliss consciousness.
542
00:57:59,778 --> 00:58:04,126
And I knew. He gave me just a little more than I could hold.
543
00:58:06,436 --> 00:58:12,917
Unbelievable. Bliss. First time I had a little touch of bliss.
544
00:58:13,866 --> 00:58:20,471
And I walked out; I was completely drunk.
I couldn't walk straight. I was like this, you know.
545
00:58:21,750 --> 00:58:27,047
Not only that. I was alone and I couldn't contain it.
I laughed out loud.
546
00:58:27,047 --> 00:58:33,052
Just completely drunk. And people in the street,
they were utterly disgusted.
547
00:58:36,476 --> 00:58:41,048
They shook their heads and went way out of my way.
548
00:58:41,048 --> 00:58:45,537
I didn't care. It took me several hours to simmer down.
549
00:58:46,238 --> 00:58:52,552
So that was the first experience.
The second experience was when I had an interview with him.
550
00:58:52,758 --> 00:58:58,467
And he asked me questions about my studies,
and about my life, and all that sort of thing.
551
00:58:58,879 --> 00:59:06,068
And I saw that the way he phrased the questions,
I knew he didn't need any information.
552
00:59:06,068 --> 00:59:08,974
He knew me better than I did.
553
00:59:10,000 --> 00:59:16,809
And that is a remarkable experience,
I can tell you, if somebody knows you completely.
554
00:59:18,624 --> 00:59:22,078
No ordinary human being can do that.
555
00:59:24,759 --> 00:59:28,587
And that can be, you know,
if somebody knows everything about you,
556
00:59:28,587 --> 00:59:31,904
all your mistakes you have made and everything.
557
00:59:32,399 --> 00:59:36,669
But there was more. There was understanding.
558
00:59:39,268 --> 00:59:43,137
No judgment. There was understanding
559
00:59:44,899 --> 00:59:46,661
and unconditional love.
560
00:59:48,393 --> 00:59:52,959
And that is a combination — you know,
you cannot find this in the world.
561
00:59:56,341 --> 01:00:00,326
You know, you read in the scriptures sometimes
that God is an angry God,
562
01:00:00,326 --> 01:00:03,732
and God is a judge, and all that sort of thing.
563
01:00:03,732 --> 01:00:13,267
That's not true. This is a very crude-language-expressed
reference to the law of karma, cause and effect:
564
01:00:13,638 --> 01:00:16,801
“As ye sow, so shall ye reap.”
565
01:00:17,473 --> 01:00:21,750
God doesn't judge. We judge ourselves.
He created law —
566
01:00:21,750 --> 01:00:25,166
had to, in order to keep everything in balance.
567
01:00:28,260 --> 01:00:35,835
In the bible, when it talks about the last judgment —
oh yes, it exists. But it is not a final judgment.
568
01:00:38,351 --> 01:00:45,238
It is at the end of life each person has a review of life.
569
01:00:46,104 --> 01:00:53,513
Whole thing. And then comes the idea, “Are you satisfied
570
01:00:54,503 --> 01:00:59,011
with mistakes you made, and things like that?”
Think about it.
571
01:00:59,011 --> 01:01:04,688
And that is the judgment which determines
whether we have to come back to school
572
01:01:04,688 --> 01:01:10,702
to have a new opportunity to make good, you know,
to learn our lessons which we haven't learned yet.
573
01:01:10,702 --> 01:01:12,702
That's the last judgment.
574
01:01:15,569 --> 01:01:18,691
But it is not the final condemnation.
575
01:01:19,640 --> 01:01:25,480
We come back. Oh, yes, hell —
you know, we are here now, believe it or not.
576
01:01:25,480 --> 01:01:30,048
We come back, compared to
the higher spheres, higher planes.
577
01:01:30,543 --> 01:01:33,363
But God does not judge.
578
01:01:33,858 --> 01:01:37,960
And God cannot be angry.
There was a saint, Christian saint, who said that
579
01:01:37,960 --> 01:01:43,902
after having visions of God,
she said, “God cannot be angry.
580
01:01:45,181 --> 01:01:50,845
Anger is a perversion. You find this
in human beings, not in God.”
581
01:01:50,845 --> 01:01:57,558
And believe me, if He would be angry,
he would wipe you out of existence, right?
582
01:01:59,167 --> 01:02:07,850
She said, “God is love, God is wisdom, God is compassion.”
583
01:02:09,706 --> 01:02:15,992
If you have a wrong concept of God,
you have to make adjustments because
584
01:02:16,982 --> 01:02:21,007
you have to have a loving concept of God.
585
01:02:22,286 --> 01:02:25,887
Like our president, Sri Daya Mata,
when she says sometimes,
586
01:02:25,887 --> 01:02:28,910
she talks about her experience with God, and she says,
587
01:02:29,322 --> 01:02:35,310
“I am in love with Love,” meaning God.
588
01:02:36,589 --> 01:02:42,067
And so, when meditation comes, you go into that Presence
589
01:02:42,067 --> 01:02:46,392
and commune with that Presence.
And if you see nothing, you hear nothing,
590
01:02:46,392 --> 01:02:50,476
there is no concept, there is no experience —
591
01:02:52,992 --> 01:03:01,531
There was a saint who said,
“His absence, too, is one of His manifestations.”
592
01:03:01,531 --> 01:03:06,236
Because God is omnipresent; He cannot be absent.
593
01:03:07,350 --> 01:03:14,895
He may seem to be absent, but you are
in the light of God right now. All the time.
594
01:03:14,895 --> 01:03:19,202
You are embraced by the love of God all the time.
595
01:03:20,000 --> 01:03:21,915
But you are not thinking that way.
596
01:03:23,359 --> 01:03:28,204
And if you are cultivating that thought, your life changes.
597
01:03:29,771 --> 01:03:33,366
You are children of God, not children of matter.
598
01:03:35,470 --> 01:03:39,771
Think about it, alright? God bless you.
599
01:03:41,545 --> 01:03:45,865
This is the way of greeting in India
and some other Eastern countries.
600
01:03:45,865 --> 01:03:53,446
You know what it means?
“I bow to the God within you.” God bless you.
60617
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