So, Yoga and Pranayama are precursors. They are precursors so that meditation happens. We looked at it in Patanjali Yoga Sutras. People who have done Patanjali Yoga Sutras, a deep dive. It's a tough course, I am telling you. But there we look at it in great detail. What's the reason for doing Yoga? So the question presupposes that Yoga means Asanas. Otherwise, the whole process is Yoga. But when you are asking the question like this, I am presupposing that when you say Yoga, you mean Asanas. So, Asanas and Pranayama are precursors for meditation to happen. And there are things that we look at in Patanjali Yoga Sutras in great detail.

If you are interested, come for the next one. We are already halfway through the third one. So come for the next session if you want. You will get a deep understanding of why Asanas are done and why Pranayama is required. It's about signal-to-noise ratio. That's all I will say now. It's about signal-to-noise ratio. Reducing the noise so that the signal is felt. Maybe that's a non-answer but that's the answer.

Okay, yeah. So three-stage Pranayama is a technique that... Okay, how to say? Right, so any Pranayama that you do is to facilitate Yoga, the union with the infinity, which is the signal. This is what I was saying, the signal. Now to see the signal, the noise has to be reduced in the system. Now this will make no sense to you unless you come on the Patanjali Yoga Sutra deep dive session. Then it will make all sense. But this is the answer. To condition the body and mind to reduce the vibrations in it, Pranayama is done.

Now why do we do specifically the three-stage Pranayama? It is an interpretation of the Patanjali Yoga Sutras. In the Yoga Sutras, Patanjali gives some directions on, some guidelines on what is Pranayama and how to do. In three sutras he describes it. Do this, do this, do this. That's it. Now those sutras have to be made practical for people to implement. This is the role of the Guru. The Guru has understood the whole... because the Guru has been to infinity and back, so he knows. So the Guru, he sees Patanjali's path and he says, "Alright, for this thing, for these three sutras that define Pranayama, I will implement it my way."

That's what Guruji has done. He has taken the Patanjali Yoga Sutras and he has said, "Alright, we will do it this way." That's how the three-stage Pranayama comes. And other masters have interpreted it in a different way. So there are different versions of Pranayama. There is no one version of it. There are many versions of it. What we do in the Art of Living is the three-stage Pranayama, which is the path that Guruji has chosen. So every Guru has his own his or her own method. It doesn't have to be his. His or her own method. And this is the method from Guruji. So you can't say, "My pranayama is better than your pranayama." "My shirt is whiter than your shirt." "भला तेरी कमीज मेरी कमीज से सफ़ेद कैसे?" All this stuff you don't have to do. Pranayama is pranayama. Implementation of Patanjali Yog Sutras is different from different masters. That's all.

You are sitting with others and closing your eyes is not feasible? Why? Because those others are not very good people or what? Then you have to change the company. First, you sit with comfortable people. Sit with people where you can comfortably close eyes. Otherwise, pranayama and all will not happen. See what happens in eyes. Eyes are outward directing. These senses are outward directing. And when the senses go outward directing, then the inner stroke or the stroke of what is called the nivrutti, so there is a pravrutti which is the outward stroke, and there is a nivrutti which is the inward stroke. And the pranayama and all these kriyas etc. are the inward stroke. Now the process is designed for inward stroke, for the nivrutti, but when the eyes are open, the senses are pravrutti, going outward. So there is a conflict. So things will never settle down.

So that is why unless there is some major, like you have some traumatic situation inside that closing your eyes leads to involuntary like panic or something, then it’s a different problem. But usually, these are done with the eyes closed. And if it is the people around you that are making you uncomfortable, etc., then change the people, change the place. Go and sit somewhere else. Be comfortable पहले। First, you have to be comfortable. Otherwise, these techniques don't take root in you. If you are by definition uncomfortable, they will not work.

You know, it's important you ask this question. This question also happens when we teach these techniques to the prisoners. We go into the prison system and we facilitate the Prison Smart program where the inmates, they come to one room and then we facilitate Kriya for them etc. And then we give them a home practice. Now the problem is that when they are in their own cell, if the person they are in the cell with, if he or she has not also done the Sudarshan Kriya, then it becomes a little bit odd for them to do it. Because imagine you are looking so weird. The first stage Pranayama, then second stage like this, then third stage like this, then some weird Bhastrika you do. What is this? Crazy. They will become the laughing stock of the whole prison system.

So we realized that very quickly that oh my god, these guys cannot do their home practice. So then we made a request to the prison system that if possible, could you reorganize the, how do you say, I am not going to say assignment but whatever, who they are put in the cell with, so that the two people who have taken the Prison Smart Program are put in the same cell. So at least their home practice they can do. Their cell is not very big. It is just a bed with some things. So there is not much privacy there. So if at least two people are of the, they have both done the process, then it is easier.

What one inmate told me was that she would go, and this was in a women's correctional facility, she would go and do her pranayama, etc. in the restroom, in the bathroom. Because that was the only place where she could have privacy. I mean this is the kind of stuff that people have to deal with. So it is important to be comfortable. Otherwise, these techniques don't work.

This is a deep question. Okay, and I am not going to answer it over a cup of chai. It's not happening. So to know the answer to this, we will do a refresher. We will do a refresher of the Happiness Program where we will go into all these subtleties and all this stuff. But not on a... we cannot discuss the depth of Sudarshan Kriya over a cup of chai. That is like Satkara Sevito. It's not Satkara Sevito. It is not with honor and respect. But there is a reason for it. So I will give you the answer right now. When you are doing your home practice, on your own when you are doing your home practice, after you finish the last five long circles, you don't have to lie down. You sit. Immediately you go into Sahaj Samadhi or some meditation, whichever meditation you do.

When you are doing facilitated Kriya in Guruji's voice, either the short version or the long version, the instruction at the end of the Kriya is "Stretch your legs and lie down." And Guruji is a very nice guy. So he says, "If you feel like it, stretch your legs and lie down." That "if you feel like it" is to be ignored, it is an instruction. It's not a suggestion. It's an instruction. "Stretch your legs and lie down." Which means, do not sit and meditate. Because magic is happening at that time. At that point, magic is happening. I will not tell you what the magic is because I cannot explain magic over a cup of chai. But there is magic happening. So take my word for it. "Stretch your legs and lie down."

And don't be in a hurry to get up. "Oh, I have to be the first to get up." There is nothing to be gained by getting up right away. Nothing. Those two or three minutes that you save by immediately sitting up, you are not going to change the world in those two or three minutes. Take it from me. Not going to happen. So settle down. Settle down. And slowly you start rolling over to your right side. Start moving your toes a little bit. Then move your hands, etc. If you have done the weekly home practice with me, I give those instructions. So just follow those instructions and then you will be... You see, you get up in a very settled space. There is no need to hurry. So yeah. That's... For now, that's enough.

Deeply rooted with daily practice. Yeah. So if you do it every day, daily, then it becomes natural. At that point in the day, your body and mind automatically get into the mode of doing Kriya. And it is working on the subconscious. Like I explained it in Physics of Pranayama. The Kriya is working on the subconscious. And it's doing lots of great things there. Okay, like removing impressions and making the subconscious subtle and all this stuff. So it will become daily... I mean it will become an established practice only when it is done without interruption.

Nairantarya. Nairantarya means what? Without interruption. Without interruption means daily, not regularly. This word regularly, throw it out of the window. It is a meaningless word. Regularly means once every 18 days is regular. Boss, that's not going to work. Daily, every day. When you do that, you see within the first 20-25 days itself, it becomes a habit. And then we say take a 40-day challenge or a 21-day challenge. Right now it's a 21-day challenge for meditation. It takes around 20 days for a habit to form when it is done every day. So there is a method behind the madness. So 21 days, if you double it, 40 days. So if you do it for 40 days every day, you will see automatically your body-mind gets into the habit.

And one thing is, make a corner or a space in your room where you will do the practices. Don't do it once in this room, once in that room. If you go here and there, then the space doesn't hold the energy. If you have a space, that you go every day, you do a Kriya there itself. Maybe it's right on the foot of your bed or wherever. It doesn't have to be a special space, but it has to be THE space. Once you get there, automatically the body-mind starts settling down and Kriya happens. Pranayama will happen, Bhastrika will happen. And that space will hold the energy there. So next time you go there, again. Space holds the energy, man. It's amazing.

I tell you a story. I was in Rishikesh during the World Culture Festival in Delhi that happened. After that, we went to Rishikesh and then we visited all these things in Rishikesh. Then we went to Vasisht Gufa, the cave where Maharishi Vasisht meditated. Dude, I tell you, that was the most amazing meditation. We went into the cave, we sat down. I thought we meditated for maybe 7 minutes. It was 50 minutes. We lost track of time. I thought okay, we just sat and I said okay, 5 minutes is done, let's go. I looked at it, oops, 50 minutes. Dude, that place holds, I mean the Baap had meditated there, Vasisht. He is like the king. So that space holds the energy. It's amazing.

Constituents of the subtle body? Okay, how is your life going to change if I give you this answer? Tell me this. How is your life going to change? Boss, do you know the constituents of your physical body? Forget subtle. Do you know the constituents of your physical body? There are some medical people here. Dianna, you are a medical guy, right? If I give you all the ingredients, so much hydrogen, so much oxygen, so much nitrogen, so much whatever, all that stuff, can you make a physical body? No, there is no chance.

They did a study on this. Bill Bryson, he is a scientist and he is also a science writer. He wrote a book called "The Body: A Guide for Occupants." Read that book, dude. That book is amazing. You know how that book starts? The book starts by a study commissioned by the Royal Society of London where the question was what are the ingredients of Benedict Cumberbatch's body? What do I need to make Benedict Cumberbatch? You know who is Benedict Cumberbatch? Sherlock Holmes. Dude, he is an amazing guy. Benedict Cumberbatch.

So this is a study from the Royal Society of London and these guys went at it like proper scientists. They figured out all this stuff, so much hydrogen, so much this and that. And then he said, okay, what is the price of making it? So he says it will cost you maybe $6000 to get all the ingredients in place. It will cost you another $30000 to assemble the ingredients in the right combinations to make all this stuff. But you will still not get Benedict Cumberbatch. This is only if we are talking of the physical body. Forget about the subtle body.

Forget about the subtle body. So when you ask this question, what is the ingredients of the subtle body? What is the point of this question? How will it change your life? It's just intellectual gymnastics, this one. Because if you do your sadhana practices, you will know. There is no need. See life is an open book question. There is no need to mug up all this stuff. You can always look it up. But information is not knowledge. You understand the difference between information. You are asking for information. It is not knowledge. It is not coming from aha. It's not going to happen.

So forget about this. These are just obstacles for you to even experience the subtle body. See Guruji says, body is like the wick of a candle and the mind is like the flame. Have you ever seen a flame enveloping the wick of the candle? The flame is only going on top. Yes or no? But it is not like that. It is like that only in gravity fields. When you burn a candle out in space, it is exactly what Guruji says. The wick is there and the flame is a circle around the wick. This is in microgravity. Gravity force is weakest of the weak forces in physics. It is 30 orders of magnitude weaker than every other force. Even that subtle force distorts the way a candle and the wick combine in gravity field. This is physics. I am not making this stuff up. You can look at it. You can Google flame and microgravity. You will get all these fantastic pictures that NASA took up in the space station. They actually lit a fire there in the space station.

Now think about this. Consciousness and the subtle body are orders of magnitude weaker signals than gravity. Gravity is 10 to the minus 30 times weaker than all this other Coulomb force and all this other stuff. Imagine how settled the body and mind have to be to experience this signal. This is the yoga. This is the path of Patanjali. And when you are settling down the mind and body, all these questions are useless. Who cares? You will know the answer. Asking this question now is meaningless. You are not even ready for the physical body constitutes. Forget about subtle body. Forget about it. Leave it. I know it is not a satisfactory answer but that is my answer. You are not going to make any difference to your life. Yeah.

It is a great question. It is not rapid breathing that reduces life cycle. It is the rapid breathing that causes the heart to beat rapidly. That is what reduces the life span. I will explain you why. What they did was they took life span data from all the creatures. So from the ant to a dog to a cat, tiger, elephant, blue whale, all these.

So blue whales and tortoises live for a long long time and gnats and these small little insects, they live for a short amount of time. Then humans are somewhere in the middle of it and dogs and humans and all this stuff. And then what they did was a brilliant thing. What they did was they plotted age on one axis and the number of heart beats on the y-axis and it all lined up in one. The number of heart beats is constant. This is amazing. The number of times the heart muscle flexes is a constant number. The reason why these animals live for different ages is because the rate at which the heart beats is different. So the amount of time it takes to come to this critical number of flexing of the muscles is different for various species.

This is the answer. It is the number of times the heart muscle is flexing. That is a fixed one. It can only flex this much time. After that, it is done. This is the insight. It is amazing. So blue whales and tortoises their hearts beat at a much slower speed. So to get to that, I don't know what it is, I don't know, 6 million or whatever that number is, it takes, I don't know, 80 to 100 years or maybe even longer, 150 years. But for a gnat, the heart is beating very very fast. So the gnat's lifespan is, I don't know, a couple of days. Done. This is how it lines out. It's an amazing study. Look it up. It's beautiful.

So it's the rate at which the heart is beating. So when you are doing Sudarshan Kriya, your heart is not beating in sync with the breath movement. This is the beauty of the Sudarshan Kriya. There is a disjointedness between the bio self-induced change of breath pattern and the subconscious state of the body where the heart is beating. These are all subconscious processes. It's a disjoint thing. It's a beautiful thing. It's disjointed. So rapid breathing does not make your heart go fast. That's the difference.

Yeah, so this is a tricky question. Prana, firstly prana we can't measure. Prana is subtle life force. As a scientist we cannot say "Ah, here is prana". We don't know. So when we do pranayama, it is like, how to explain this? We essentially modulate the breath. That's what even Patanjali says. Do such and such and do such and such. Then such and such will happen. He is only talking about breath. He is not talking about prana. So prana and breath are totally linked but they are not the same. Breath is breath and prana is linked to the breath but it is not the breath. It is subtler than that. So the way to think about this is, think about a bee. You know this bee that goes "zzzz" - think about the bee as the breath and the wings of the bee as the prana. When the bee is flying you cannot see the wings. It is beating so fast you cannot see the wings but you can see the bee. But the bee cannot fly without the wings. You understand? That's the subtlety. So the bee is the breath and the prana is the wings. You can't see the prana but without the breath there is no prana. It is not the same. This is how to look at it. The bee is the breath and the wings are the prana and they go together and you can only see it when the bee is sitting. When the bee is not moving then you can see "Ahh here is the bee and here are the wings" etc. When the bee is moving, you understand, this is the subtlety.

So yeah, use the breath so that other things happen and life force happens and there are five types of prana. So if you want to look at all the five types of prana, I had a chat with Dinesh Kashikar. It's on the Physics of Pranayama channel. I asked him to explain what are the five pranas, the pancha prana and Kashi explained it very nicely. He did it like a chemical engineer. He is also a chemical engineer like me. So Kashi explained "Oh there is this transport process, there is this, there is this". It's all archived there. So go to the Physics of Pranayama channel, find the question and answer session with Dinesh Kashikar and you will find the answer to what are the five types of pranas and how they move around your body etc. Go and read that. I mean listen to that. It's a nice session.

Eyes are tired? Close them. Just close the eyes. There is nothing to see. Close them. No but it could be a physiological thing. There could be something going on in the eye. Go consult a physician or something. There are some dry eyes, then you have to keep them wet. There are overly teary eyes, then you don't cry. "Ro mat pushpa" - I hate tears. Like that. There are many options for many things. You can't ask an Art of Living teacher to "Oh what is the remedy for this?" and I will say "Do your Sudarshan Kriya". That's a completely lousy answer. There is physically something wrong with your eye, you go consult a physician. If you are staring at the computer screen a lot, then don't stare.

One thing that I learnt over my years is to keep the eyes from not straining, you have to change the focal process of the eye. You have to physically change it. So if you are looking at the screen for some time, after every 10-15 minutes you have to look outside the window at a far enough point. This is what is changing the focal... what is the word? Focal... I mean, you know what I am saying. How can you know what I am saying? I am not even saying what I want to say. How can you know what I am saying? This is a completely stupid statement. You know what I am saying? Of course I don't know what you are saying because you are not saying what you are saying. So here is what I am saying. The eyes are... muscles are contracted when they are focusing on near things. You have got to expand the muscles so you look far away. This relaxes the eye. This is a technique that is practically you can implement.

Let's say you're focused and looking at computer screens, etc. Go out and look to infinity. And one more thing is to remove the blue light filter from your screens. Remove the blue light filters. I mean, not remove, put the blue light. Filter out the blue wavelengths. Filter out the blue wavelengths. And when you're looking out of the window, look at green. Look at a tree or something. Look at green. Filter out the blue wavelengths. They will help your eye. These blue wavelengths are a mess. They completely destroy the... What do you call it? Your diurnal cycle. So what happens is the optic nerves, they go into your head and then they cross. You know, the right eye goes to the left hemisphere, the left eye goes to the right hemisphere. And where these optic nerves cross, there is a supra-sematic something something. It's like a complicated word. That's the part of the brain that is right on top of these optic nerves being crossed. That center is what controls the diurnal cycle. Diurnal cycle means what? The time of the day when you wake up and the time of the day when you go to sleep. It's in sync with the nature. The diurnal cycle. And the blue wavelength completely destroys that part of the brain and you are completely messed up in your diurnal cycle. That is why your sleep patterns are disturbed and all the rest goes to hell in a hand basket. These blue wavelengths are terrible. Nowadays, phones also, they have blue wavelength filters. Maybe your screen needs a blue wavelength filter if your eyes are tired. Focus on the green. Go look at the lawn if you have or a tree or something every 10 minutes. Look at green. See this plant here? Green. It's a reason here. I look at it. But then there is no focus. So I have to look outside the window. It's like this. You have to change the focus of the eye and look at green. Understand? This is one thing.

Yeah, that is tough. That is tough. So I'll give you one example. Losing a loved one is a tough thing. You feel, oh my God. A lot of sadness will come. So now I'll give you an example. Let's say there is a hummingbird that comes and hovers around outside your window. You say, wow, hummingbird. He is there. He is talking to you. You don't understand a damn thing he is saying. But he is saying a lot of things. And you say, okay. And he comes every like for one week, let's say. The hummingbird comes. And then on the last, on the seventh day, the hummingbird taps the window and flies away. And on the eighth day, the hummingbird doesn't show up. Do you feel sad? Do you feel as sad as if somebody died? No. Why not? Because you know that the hummingbird is okay somewhere else. He has just flown away. This understanding is there. The hummingbird spent some time with me, I don't know, four or five days. Now he is gone and doing his thing. You know, he met his loved one and they are singing some songs around the trees and all this stuff. The hummingbird is doing. Hummingbird is doing his thing. This is what you rationalize. Okay, fine.

Same thing is happening even for the person who is, your close one who has died. We just don't see it like that. We don't see it as a continuum. We see it as an end. We see it as a finite end. That person has just gone onwards on his or her journey. You are still sitting in the waiting room of the bus stop. Your bus will come, you will get on to that bus and go. This is it. When you broaden your perspective like this, then that feeling of sadness doesn't stay for a long time. Of course you will feel sad. You feel sad that the hummingbird is gone, but it doesn't stay with you for a long time. But the death of a person stays with you for a long time. You have to broaden your perspective. That person is gone on his or her next step. You will also follow. I give you an answer. I give you something that maybe you don't realize it. You are also going to die 100%. There is no escape from this mess. You will die. All of us will be dead one day. Just like that.

That person is like a hummingbird. They have gone somewhere; they are having fun somewhere. Broaden your perspective. This is not it. There is so much more. You have to change your perspective. That is the only way. It is a sad thing for sure. When I lost my mom, I thought that's it. Life is ended. Finished. That was in 1992. Here we are, 2020. I am still here. Talking some physics and talking all this nonsense stuff. But fine, I am still here. It's like that.

What is what? Adhyatma? Adhyatma is the study of what happened before the self. Atma is self. Adhyatma is before self. Study of what happened before self is Adhyatma. This is a complete answer in itself but you have no idea what I just said. This is like saying, what difference will it make if I tell you? How will it change your life? But maybe. So the problem here is when you say Adhyatma, it is the study of before self. So first you have to define the word self. Only then you can say what is before self. So it comes down to what is self and then we will study what happened before self.

And then when you know what is self, then you will question what is the meaning of the word before. Because when you understand what is the self, there is no passage of time. So how can you define something before when there is no passage of time? Let's say you are travelling at the speed of light. Let's say you are a photon. You are sitting on a photon and you are travelling at the speed of light. Time stops for you. There is no yesterday, there is no tomorrow. It is only now. Time stops. Now it is ridiculous to say before now. There is no other thing. There is only now. There is no after now, there is no before now. There is only now.

Now what happens? The whole thing breaks down. So first you have to define where is the reference point. What do you say is the self? Then you study what happened before self. Then you know that this reference point that was here is self. You study before self. You say wait a minute, this also could be self. So the reference point shifts to that one. Then you say what happened before that? Oh, then the reference point shifts to here. What happens before that? It is a method. It is another way of asking who am I? Adhyatma is simply another way of answering the question who am I? It is the same question. First you define I, then you say what happened before I, then you shift. It is a journey. It is a different way of journey. It is the same thing. It is the same process. Who am I? Self-referenced. That is Adhyatma. It is very simple. It is very complicated also.

So Guruji said that office politics, you have to be involved in the office politics. That's what he said, right? Yes, it should be done. You have to understand what is the meaning of politics. Can you have politics with one person? There is only one person. Can you have politics? No. When there are two people, can you have politics? No. Because what one does, the other knows. What you do, the other knows. So there is no politics. It's either yes or no or we know.

When does politics happen? When there are three people and the interaction between two of them is not known to the third one, then politics will happen. It requires three for politics to happen. At least three. What is politics? It is a loss of information. Some interaction has happened between a set of people which the others not included in that set don't know. This is politics. और कुछ है नहीं इसमें। This is what Guruji is saying. Unless you get involved in the politics, you will not be able to influence the outcome of the politics. Politics is simply some set of people agreeing or disagreeing to do some set of things, keeping the others out of the decision making process. This is politics. और कुछ नहीं है इसमें। It's a very simple thing.

Now how can you influence this without getting involved? It's like saying, I want to learn swimming. But I am not going to get into the water. There is no chance for you. Forget about it. You have to get into the water to swim. It's like that. That's what Guruji meant. Office politics करना ही चाहिए। Means you have to get involved. Otherwise you will just complain. That complaint has no meaning. I read all the 17 volumes of the book titled Swimming 101 by Michael Phelps. The punter got 9 gold medals. He knows what is swimming. So he wrote a whole book. 15 volumes. I read all that 15 volumes. You think I am going to swim? No chance. Jump into the water. It's like that. Get into the politics. Otherwise you will not be able to influence that.

Yeah. So now we have to deconstruct this. Responsibility. What is a human being's responsibility? Towards animals छोड़ो। Forget about it. Let's look at responsibility. What does the word responsibility mean to you? Responsibility का क्या meaning है? What does it mean to you? Responsibility is not about action. Is it about action? No. It's not about action. You think that of course responsibility is about action. I will give you an example.

Let's say, eventually the lockdown will end and my good friend Sabina will say come visit me in South Africa. I say alright cool. I buy my ticket and I go and visit her in South Africa. As I am leaving the airport, I see a banana peel and I see Sabina. I say I got to meet Sabina. Forget about this banana peel. Somebody will pick it up. As I am walking towards her, I hear a big thump. Somebody has slipped on the banana peel and fallen. Am I responsible?

Of course, I am responsible. Whether I act to pick up the banana peel or not, I am responsible for that person falling. It is not about action. Responsibility is the ability to respond to whatever is happening in the present moment. The ability to respond seamlessly is responsibility. Whatever is needed in the present moment, the ability to respond to it is responsibility. Now you look at it like this. Do you have the ability to respond to this stray animal? There can be many responses you can take. You can maybe take this stray animal to a shelter and then that shelter will take care of it. Or if you can't do that, then the stray animal is such and such, you give it some food, whatever. You have to respond to the situation to the best of your ability. This is responsibility. End of story.

Now whether it is right, wrong, or indifferent, it is your response. There are many responses, there are many orders of responses. So there is not one, is it right to give money to a beggar? At one level yes, at one level no. Depends on what your level is. Do you give food to a stray dog? At one level yes, at one level no. It depends on what your level is. What is your ability to respond? You got to look at it like that. There is no one answer. Your responsibility is don't make someone else or something else worse than what it was before. Something like that. That's a good rule to live by. Leave something in a better condition than what you found it. Seva, this is what is Seva. Seva is not enrolling people for a happiness program. That is not Seva. That is just used car salesmanship. That is useless stuff. Seva is leaving that person in a better state than what you found that person, place, or thing, whatever. So yeah, there is no one answer for this stray dog problem. 

We are called human beings. Beings means what? You be. Human beings means what? You be. We have become human doings. We want to do something. Yeah, I am feeling angry. I want to do something. You just be. The anger will drop on its own. The frustration will drop on its own. You just be. Human beings. Become human beings first. Human beings. Just be. When these topsy turvy emotions come, do nothing. Vairagya, supreme importance, do nothing. Simply observe it. Simply observe it. Just this mere thing of doing nothing but simply observing, that thing falls off immediately. It's gone.

Guruji has talked about this. He has a talk called Conversations with the Master. There he talks about it. Simply observing something, the false falls away and the true rises. False will fall away and the true will rise by simply observing and doing nothing. Human being, the word is used being, not doing. We have become human doings. We want to do. यार मेरे को करना हैं। क्या करना हैं? Just relax. When the topsy-turvy things come, just observe. When you see, it just drops away. 

So what happens in Stumbling into Infinity? Have you read the book Stumbling into Infinity by Michael Fishman? If you read the acknowledgement section, some are born great, some associate with greatness, some have greatness thrust upon them. I'm on the third category. I'm a useless guy where greatness has been thrust upon me.

So what happens? You know, I told you, right? In my house, there is a senior teacher. She's also my boss. She's the wife. When she says jump, I say how high? I don't say why. I say how high? So life is good. So Madhuri went for TTC. And she came back and at that time it was real TTC. I mean, now it is just a joke, but that time it was real TTC.

So she came back and the sankalpa was to organize a 100 people course. At that time, 100 people course in the United States was a big deal. So she came, she was fully charged up and she worked hard. She and one more guy, Hari, they worked hard and they got like 75-80 people something. And Mikey came to teach that course. Mikey, Michael Fishman, he came to teach the course. And he was living with a friend of ours. And somehow, I don't know how that happened, somehow that friend of ours was not very comfortable taking care of Mikey because Mikey is Michael Fishman. He's like the president of the Art of Living and comes with all this stuff. So they said, Sandeep, you deal with Mikey. You come and you take care of Mikey. I said, okay, I'll come. I had just done the Happiness Program. I had not done anything. I was not even doing Kriya. Forget regularly. I was mostly irregular in my Kriya. I was not even, forget regularly, irregularly. I was doing Kriya irregularly. Okay. So I had no nothing to lose. I said, fine, I'll take care of Mikey.

So I went and I made chai for him. He's a nice, he likes chai. So I also like chai. So I made chai for him. I made some breakfast. All this stuff, I was taking care of Mikey. And I just looking and seeing, and then I said, dude, this guy, this guy walks the talk. I mean, whatever he's saying, except people and this and that and that and that, he's totally doing this. So, okay. I don't mind being like this guy. Everybody else is just like, in my eyes, all losers. So I said, this guy is cool, man. Mikey.

And then what happened at that time, I had done some totally geeky stuff. This was like way back. This was, I want to say 2006, something. 2003, I did my course. So 2003, four, four, five, six, something like that. I had done something really geeky. What I had done was I had taken the Ashtavakra. At that time, there were VCDs. Remember video compact discs, VCD. Some random format. I had taken the Ashtavakra talks from that VCD and I had digitized them and put it on my iPod. The old Apple that, you know, the 32 gig, that old black thing looks like a cumbersome device now, but it was a pretty cool device at that time. The black iPod. I put it on that. And then when I was hanging out with Mikey, like everybody was there and I said, Mikey, I'll show you something. He says, okay, show me, show me something. I don't know. You know, Mikey talks like that. Show me something. I don't know. I said, I'll show you something you don't know. I connected my iPod to the TV and I played Ashtavakra and Ashtavakra came on TV and Mikey said, what have you done? He was like, total shock.

What has this happened? Because at that time, if you remember, the Silence Course teachers would travel with video cassettes and DVDs. So the organizers had to involve like 17 inputs just to show one video. What nonsense! So that was how it was at that time. So when I put this thing on the TV, Mikey was shocked. He says, "Wait a minute, what have you done?" So I showed him. You know, you take this disc and you run this program and it digitizes it and here's the input on the iPod. And now you have this connector and it goes on the TV. And a light bulb went off in his head. He says, "Wow! Now I can simplify the life of all the Silence Course teachers." Now if you look at today, all the Silence Course teachers, they come with only one iPod. All the videos are in the iPod. I'm the guy who started the digitization of that whole process. So now they can travel with one iPod. So this is what happened.

And then Mikey said, "Oh, this joker, he's not all that bad. Even if he does Kriya irregularly, if I give him some responsibility, he will do something." So then he says, "You know, Sandeep, I have written a book." "No, no, no, no, no. He played it very smart. He didn't tell me. He told Madhuri. He told Madhuri that Madhuri, I have written a book and I'd like someone to help me publish it." So Madhuri said, "Yes, yes, I will do." And I'm saying, "What the heck you will do? It's going to come on my head at the end of the day." And of course, it came on my head, but it was Mikey's way of getting me involved in the process. Because if he had asked me directly, I would have said no. So he asked Madhuri and when Madhuri asked me to do something, I cannot say no. He played a pretty good game, Mikey.

So anyway, so I got involved in that. And then we read the pre-publication version of the book. It was amazing. My God, I mean, I couldn't put it down. It was just brilliant. If you've seen the book, this is an edited version, but it's just as powerful. And I said, "Okay, good. I will get this published." Okay. So then what I did was, I didn't know how to get a book published. So I looked up and there were some things that you have to write a book proposal and this and that. So since I had read the book, I wrote my first version of the book proposal. It was a piece of crap work. It was completely bogus, useless. But it was a straw man. It was a framework. So I sent it to Mikey and he absolutely hated it. So he sent it to Jeffrey Ines. His name is also on the acknowledgement sheet. And Jeffrey is a writer. He's a professional writer. So he took my thing and he totally massaged it and wrote it properly. So that became the book proposal.

By that time, I was contacting all the publishers, sending emails and that. And for those four or five months, I was secretary to the president of the Art of Living. Because Michael Fishman was the president of the Art of Living and I was the secretary to the president. I'm like this big guy, you know, like that. So, okay, so Jeffrey did all the massaging of the book proposal. Once that happened, I started reaching out to all these publishers and we got rejection letters like every... No, sorry, no, so many rejection letters. I could plaster it on the ceiling of my whole house and I would have a beautiful ceiling with just rejection letters. It was so many of them. And eventually something happened and Harper Collins, somebody found Harper Collins and I sent it to Harper Collins. And eventually one editor liked it and he made some changes and Mikey edited it and now it's published.

So in the process, a lot of things happen. I mean, once Mikey called me and says, what are you going to do with yourself in your life? I said, huh? What do you mean? I'm helping you publish this book. What the heck? You're telling me what am I going to do with my life? I mean, okay, I know I'm a loser, but you don't have to say it to my face. Like, come on. And then he said, no, no, okay, what are you going to do? And then I said, I'll send some, I don't know what I said.

And then he played another smart trick. He sent this senior teacher from New York to come in because at that time we didn't have teachers. I mean, Madhuri was a teacher, but she was a teacher in the training. So Poonam came. Poonam Tandon. So Poonam came because Mikey sent Poonam. Then I interacted with Poonam and then Poonam said, why don't you start teaching? I said, what do you mean start teaching? Before I start teaching, I have to start doing Kriya less irregularly. So then Poonam said, come on, you can do it. So then I started doing my Kriya less irregularly or what people call regular.

Regularly. And then after that it became daily eventually, but it took me a long time, man. So that's how it all happened. So it's all Mikey and Madhuri is the thing. If Madhuri had not gone for TTC and Mikey had not, she had not organized this big course and Mikey would not have come, etc. I don't know, things would have been different. That's how it all happened. It was a good fun. For some time I was like one of these powerful secretary to the president type guys. It was all good. Yeah. That's the story.

So what is happening in satsang? There is a singer or the lead singer who is calling. So they say one line and then the audience responds. It's a call and response. Call, response. Do you understand? This is the satsang I know. Is that a different satsang that you guys go to? Same, no? Somebody sings. Then you will respond. But nowadays it is so complicated that there is no chance of responding. That is why you keep it simple. Some complicated 7 lines, 3 or 4 words. Jai Guru, Deva Guru, Om Namo Narayana, that's enough. Then the guy will say back. It is necessary to do this. Call, response, call, response, call, response.

You see people in satsang, they are sitting and closing their eyes and not doing anything. There is no response there. Then they are not getting the magic of the satsang. I will tell you why this call and response is required. Response can be either vocally you say the words or if you can't say then you clap or if you have some instrument then you play some dholak or some ching ching ching like this. But the response has to come. The call is coming and then some response has to come. Why is that required? Here is what happens.

Do you know what is a metronome? Metronome is a device that is used by musicians to keep beat. So it is a device that you can set it and it goes tick tick tick tick tick. It is a taal thing. It is like that. It is a metronome and you can change it. You can make it go slow tick tick tick or you can make it go fast tick tick tick tick tick and it will hold that beat. So then the musician knows. Now what happens if you take two metronomes tuned to two different beats and put them on the table they will hold their beat. The fast metronome will be fast, the slow metronome will be slow. That's it. On a table.

However, when you do something slightly different then something else happens. Here is what you do. You have the same two metronomes but what you do is you take bottles of let's say Pepsi, not bottles, aluminum cans. You know what I am talking about? The aluminum cans of Pepsi. They are like some cylindrical structure that can roll. The easiest example is an aluminum can of let's say Sprite or 7up or beer also is fine. Doesn't matter. You can have beer cans. No problem. Take those cans and keep them horizontally on the table. So they are like this. Cylinders on the table and on top of it you put a plank so that the plank can move and the cylinders can roll. You understand what I am saying? On the table the cylinders are there. They are rolling and there is a plank.

Now you tune those metronomes, the fast one and the slow one and you put them on the plank so that the plank can oscillate on the cylinders. When you do that coherence happens after sometime you wait. Those metronomes come in sync. Dude, this is a mechanical device designed to keep beat. When you allow them to interact on the plank, those metronomes will start beating at the same beat. This is amazing. This is called coherence. There is a physics term for it. Coherence. Coherence happens. This is how satsang works. Satsang works as coherence happening in the mind space. Call and response. The response is the interaction with the call. Call, response. Call, response.

Call, response, call, response. Then coherence happens in the mind space. This is amazing. This will not happen if you are sitting like this and meditating during satsang. That's wrong. When you have to meditate, you meditate. When you are in satsang, you do satsang. You don't cross the two things. Come on. Then coherence is not happening. You got to call and response, call and response, call and response. Then coherence happens on the level of the mind. Same way as coherence happens in the space, physical space, when the metronomes are allowed to interact with each other. Coherence is an amazing concept. Not concept, phenomenon.

This is how satsang works. This is the physics of satsang. It only works when you are participating, when you are responding. If you don't respond, then there is no coherence, then there is no magic. Forget about it. Then there is nothing. That's how satsang works.

Why do you want to know this stuff? How is it going to change your life? Firstly you believe in karma. Ok fine. You believe in grace. 5 minutes of grace. Remember those guys who were on Patanjali Yoga Sutra. 5 minutes of grace.

I will tell you the meaning of these words. I won't explain it. Explaining in detail is impossible. Ashaya is a bank. You put money in and you can take money out. If you don't put it in, you can't take it out. This is a bank, essentially. We call bank only financial, but there are emotional banks also. Ashaya is an emotional bank where emotions are locked. They can be brought out as needed. That's ashaya.

Then karma in spirituality is like entropy in physics. Nobody understands it. They just use the word. Entropy is going up. What do you mean? So karma is happening. In the realm of spiritual things, this thing called karma is a long feedback loop of some action or interaction that you did and it eventually comes back to you. This is karma. Ashaya is banking of emotions and that banking of emotions leads to a conditioned response.

Remember that Physics of Pranayama where the impressions of the subconscious are affecting what is happening in the mind and the body. So the banking happens, ashaya happens, and that leads to a conditioned response, conditioned action, conditioned thought, conditioned actions, conditioned everything, conditioned life. Ashaya happens, conditioned action happens. Conditioned action happens so there are consequences. Those consequences are banked again. Those are the bank of karma. And then that bank, that karma bank account is somehow linked to your user node. So wherever the user node goes, that bank follows it.

Then maturing of that, maturing of the karmas, thinning them out, etc., is the third word. Vipaka is the maturing of that bank. All this heavy stuff, what's the point of all this? How does it change your life? It does not. It just makes it more complicated in concept. Forget about all this stuff. Be light and easy. Because you don't understand. I can explain to you how entropy is just a construct. I can explain to you how karma is a construct. I can explain to you how grace is a construct. It's only going to disturb you. Unless you are at a certain level, it's going to make no sense to you. So leave it.

Oh, did you guys read that article, Aho of Physics? It's so amazing, right? I love it. And there's one of the good articles I wrote on Medium. Yeah, so that long thread comes from that reference from Richard Feynman, Professor Feynman, amazing scientist. I mean, he's my idol. Like there's Guruji and the next is Richard Feynman. Like top notch physicist, इतना clear thinker, brilliant guy.

So what Richard Feynman said is that he said that nature weaves its tapestry, tapestry is carpet. Nature weaves its tapestry using the longest of threads. It's a long carpet. Observing a small portion of that thread gives you the information about the whole tapestry. This is amazing. This is coming from a physicist. This is exactly what Guruji and the spiritual masters are saying. Simply observing yourself gives you the answer of the whole cosmos. Observing a small portion of the thread gives you an answer of the whole tapestry. In physics, observing yourself gives you the answer of the whole cosmos. There is no contradiction between high level spirituality and high level physics. They are the same. They're totally indistinguishable. This is what it means.

Self observation, swadhyaya. We talk about this on the Patanjali Yog Sutra deep dive. It's a tough course. Some people have taken Patanjali Yog Sutras with me. Oh my God! But it's worth it in the end, isn't it? Was it not worth it in the end? At least now you can say yes, just to make me feel good. You say, yeah, it was worth it. It was totally hopeless, but at least now you say it was worth it. This is it.

Just self-reflecting, swadhyaya. Looking at yourself. Looking into yourself how? With vairagya. Abhyasa vairagya. They go together. And nairantarya. For a sufficiently long time. It's so easy. Then everything happens. Magic happens. So the process is to go from irregular to regular to daily with honor and respect. That's it. Then magic happens. That's the journey.

[SK] Is there a who? 

[Presenter] God. G-O-D. God. 

[SK] Oh God. You asked me the question. Is there a God? Okay. To answer the question, whoever asked the question, you have to define to me what God means to you. Define God.

Who asked the question? Just raise your hand. If it's here, electronically raise your hand and then I will unmute you. You tell me your definition of God and then we'll see if it exists or not. You got to define something that if you want me to say, does it exist? You got to define it. What are you asking?

[Presenter] Yeah, this is asked by Mr. Mohinder Kumar. So should I unmute him? 

[SK] Where is he? Is he here on the talk or no? 

[Presenter] He is here. 

[SK] Yeah. Unmute him. Ask, define the question. You'll have to unmute yourself also. I think. I mean, Mohinder Kumar.

[Participant] In Hindu mythology, is there a God to believe? 

[SK] First define it. What is the meaning of God? What are you talking about? When you say God, define it. 

[Presenter] God means in Hindu mythology, he is creator. We are Jeev. We are Jeevatma and he is Paramatma.

[Participant] So, Hindu methodologies are getting confused. Different methodologies, different statements are given. There is no God. There is a system. You know. So, I want to get clear by you. If there is a God, should you believe in God or it is an automatic system with matter and Jeeva's we are coming and taking life and getting death. 

[SK] Yeah, so the confusion is coming from your limited definition of God. Now I understand. So, when you define it like this, you are inviting conflict. Inviting conflict. Because some will say, oh छोड़, this is of course not true because of 1, 2, 3, 4. It is because the definition is limited. You are saying there is a creator and then I can show by some clever arguments that certain thing is beyond any highly intelligent stuff from happening. Like for example, the argument given against this so-called God as the creator is, look at the complexity of the eye. And when you look at the complexity of the eye, it is impossible for this to be created. So, if the eye exists, there is no need for a creator. That's the argument. The problem is, it is in the definition of God as a creator.

Now, I will give you another definition. God is anything that is more than known. Anything that is more than known is God. Now there is no conflict. Because your circle of influence or your circle of known is always limited. There is always something that is more than known. And that something that is more than known is God. Whether he is a creator, destroyer, maintainer, whatever. I don't care. It is more than known. Now there is no conflict. Now even with the eye example, the complexity of the eye, there is more than known. We cannot design the eye even though we study the eye. There is something more than known even in the functioning of the eye, the complexity of the eye. Which means that person or that thing that is more than known is the Tattva, it is the God. It's a principle, not, principle is the wrong word, it's just the field, that's the field of God. And there is no conflict.

Even the atheist people who say there is no God, there are things that are more than known for them. That is the definition of God. It comes from there. It has been distorted over the years to oh there is this three-headed guy with a white beard sitting on a lotus, something, Brahma. Then there is this one guy lying down on a snake, you know, ocean, Vishnu. Then there is this dude with some, I don't know, trishul, this, that, he is Shiva. Arre boss, there are no such things. There are only energies, there are principles and there are time scales that are associated with these things. There are short cycles, there are longer cycles, there are even longer cycles. And these things unfortunately have been given the same names as the energies and that's leading to all the confusion.

We talked about this. So I had in one of the sessions on the Physics of Pranayama channel, go to the YouTube Physics of Pranayama channel, you will find all this stuff. I got Kashi, Dinesh Kashikar and I got Birju. Birju is a physicist. Kashi is a chemical engineer from IIT Bombay and I was the moderator. Unfortunately, Birju is from IIT Kharagpur but we cannot do anything about that. I mean both of us were from IIT Bombay and this guy was from Kharagpur, okay fine, we took him also. But Birju is a trained physicist and then I asked them what is this thing about cycles of time and this that because Kashi wrote a book many years ago called Time where he explains all this Brahma cycle and Vishnu cycle and Shiva cycle and many many things. It's a beautiful book, read it. It's a concise summary of everything that Guruji has talked about time. And then we looked at it from a spiritual point of view and from a physics point of view and there was no contradiction. The contradiction or the unfortunate thing was only in the way the words were used.

When Brahma time was assigned to this dude called Brahma, that's a mistake. There is no guy, there is no three-headed fellow. It's just a pictorial representation of a field, of an energy. There is no such thing as some guy lying on a serpent. It's all pictorial things so that very simple people can understand. Little bit some image comes. But there is no contradiction there. So this whole thing about cycles of time etc. They are existing in physics as well as in spirituality and there is no contradiction. They are the same. Listen to this segment on the conversation with Kashi and Birju on the Physics of Pranayama Channel. We talked about this in great length. So there is, yeah, the conflict comes, sir, the way you have defined, creator etc. Then you are going to get into conflict. You change the definition of the word God, then there is no conflict. It's like that.

[SK] Oh no, no, my God, it's a big hindrance. Don't become a teacher. Big hindrance. मस्त रहो तुम, do your sadhana perfectly. Why do you have to do all this झमेला? No reason. Now, totally destroys your foundation. Now, anyway, complete the question. What is the question? Is it necessary path then? 

[Presenter] Yeah, so is becoming an AOL teacher a necessary step in the progression on the spiritual path? Or can I make the same progress without becoming an AOL teacher? 

[SK] Yeah, yeah, you'll make much more progress if you don't become AOL teacher. Much more. I'm telling you. Not get involved in all this mess. You will not like this answer. Because you want to become a teacher, a sticker, वो लेबल चाहिए तुमको। That's why you are asking me this question. You want the answer from the horse's mouth. घोड़े से बुलवा लो ये question. No, I'm not going to say. You have to decide why do you want to teach. Why do you want to teach? I didn't want to teach. I absolutely didn't want to teach. Eventually I started. You have to understand the meaning of the word.

I cannot tell you because I have to give you the whole sequence. You have to come on the Patanjali Yoga Sutras. There is this technique of vrutti thinning. Thinning of vruttis is technique called Ishwara Pranidhana. Ishwara Pranidhana is what? Redirecting your vruttis for the betterment of someone else. And that is a nivrutti stroke that thins out your vruttis. Teaching is simply Ishwara Pranidhana. You are taking your skill sets and redirecting them. If this doesn't make any sense to you, then please don't become a teacher. If this makes sense to you, then with all means go learn how to teach this. Don't go just to get a label. That label is useless. What have you done? Nothing. It becomes a burden. People burn out heavy. Be light.

If you want to do Ishwara Pranidhana, if you want to redirect your vruttis, thin out the vruttis, the fastest way is to become a teacher. But go with a clear intention. Vruttis thin करना है। Thin out the vruttis. Redirect the vruttis. This is practical implementation of Ishwara Pranidhana. Ishwara Pranidhana doesn't mean just sit and say Om Om Om. No. Ishwara Pranidhana means redirecting your vruttis for betterment of other people. Then the vruttis start thinning out. Then the nivrutti stroke happens. I explain all this in the Patanjali Yoga Sutras. That is why it's tough. Because you break all your foundation. So called structure you are standing on gets collapsed. You say what the heck just happened? Some people are here who are like smiling because they have gone through this whole journey. It was a good journey, right? Yeah, so you have to decide for yourself. 

POP is called when you open a can of Pepsi, it makes a pop sound. That is what is POP. This is called POP. It's a very simple thing. You want Physics or Pranayama? That's what you are asking. 

Write the questions down. What is POP? I will explain. You want physics? The Physics of Pranayama is we look at it with a little bit of science background. What is happening when you are taking four breaths in? What is happening when you are holding four counts? Why are we doing all this? It looks so weird. Why are the hand positions in such funny positions? All this stuff we look at with some science. We first understand how the lungs are working. We go through some physics rules. Everything is set in science. Then you say how does this apply? Then you learn. What you understand you can master. Once you understand what is happening, it becomes easy. Then your commitment comes. This is Physics of Pranayama.

This is like asking a question, why do I do spring cleaning once a year or house cleaning twice a year? Do it every day, remove all the drawers, clean it all out, put it all back. Do it every day. Why every day? Do it twice a day. When will you do the rest of the work? When will you do other work? That is why some things are done only periodically. Once every 7 days. Not required anymore.

Same question you can ask, why should I brush my teeth only 2 times a day? I will brush my teeth 15 times a day. Go brush. 15 times a day you go like this. When will you do your work? In the middle of the meeting, zoom meeting, you will say wait, I have to brush my teeth. You will brush your teeth like this. It sounds so silly. So brushing teeth twice a day. Short kriya is once every day. Long kriya is once every 7 days. Like this, there are rules. Shower is once a day, maybe twice a day. Not 25 times a day. What is the point of doing 25 times a day shower? When will you do other work?

It's the Art of Living. It's not the art of becoming a yogi. If it's the art of becoming a yogi, you do Kriya 7 times a day. But this is the Art of Living. It means there should be time for life to happen. That is why you don't do it. There is no need for doing long Kriya more than once a week. 

Yeah, so, this is again not an easy question to answer. Especially over a cup of chai. This is all deep stuff. How to practice pratyahara? It automatically happens when you are sitting in Sahaj. Pratyahara is happening. When you are sitting, you are okay with all the noises that are happening. Means what? You already withdrew your sense of sound.

You are ok with it. I don't care about what the noises are. I am ok with it. Eyes are closed anyway. You withdrew your eyes. Sense of touch is there. What is the sense of touch limited to? You are simply feeling the clothes and maybe wherever your hand is touching the chair or something. That much you are feeling. You are not interested in anything else. Automatically the sense of touch is withdrawn. Hopefully you are not speaking. So automatically the sense of sound is withdrawn. If you are speaking during Sahaj, "Oh, I would like a cup of tea please after 20 minutes." "Hey, keep quiet. I am meditating. Keep quiet." Then there is no Sahaj happening there. So automatically the sense of sound is withdrawn.

I mean come on. It's already happening. When you are doing Sahaj, it's already happening. Then the meditation will happen after that. 

Why do you want to do twice a week? This is what I don't understand. I mean there are only certain situations where twice a week or even twice a day Kriya is advised. But they are very exceptional cases. If you want to do Kriya in Guruji's voice twice a week because now you have access to two Zoom sessions and then it makes it easy for you to say, "I don't have to do it myself. I will just sit and listen to Guruji's voice." The Kriya will happen on its own. If that is your intention, then you are just a damn lazy person. You get off your ass and do your Kriya. Don't run after these Zoom sessions. Once a week is enough. Don't become a Kriya junkie. No need. Once a week is enough.

The reason you are asking me this question is because your daily Sadhana is not happening seamlessly and effortlessly. There is a lot of effort there. So you are taking a shortcut and saying, "Anyway, that's short Kriya." There is some illogic, some wrong logic in your mind that, "Anyway, it's short Kriya. I am not violating any rules. Just because it's in Guruji's voice, is it ok for me to do two short Kriyas?" Because it is easier than doing the short Kriya on my own. This is the basic question. So put self-effort, make the short Kriya on your own, an effortless process. And then there is a gift from Guruji, the short Kriya. You do it once a week. Because we cannot facilitate long Kriya over the Zoom, so he has said, "Ok, do the short Kriya." That short Kriya is simply a replacement for the long Kriya version which is done in person. It's a replacement. Do you understand what I am saying? Look at yourself. The problem is with you. Your sadhana is not settled enough. So work on that first.

Nowhere. You let the mind go wherever the heck it wants to go. There is nowhere to keep any attention. Was it ever told on any of the courses, "Oh, when you are doing Sudarshan Kriya, please focus on the navel region." There is no such instruction. Wherever the mind wants to go, let it go. Free. There is nothing to be done except following the rhythm of Soham. That's it. That is the only thing we do. Guruji says, "So, you breathe in, Guruji says, "Out." That's it. Let the mind go. Wherever the mind wants to go, let it go. Mind doesn't have to be in the present. You don't even have to hear the word Soham as long as you are breathing. That's it. Amazing. It's a beautiful technique.

Let the magic happen, buddy. Don't do all this. Some people sit in this hole. What is it called? Chin Mudra. They sit in Chin Mudra. Who told you? Just sit with your palms open. That's it. No specific mudra. Tomorrow you will sit in Adi Mudra like this. Are you mad? Open your hands like this. Full. That's it. You sit in Mahamudra. And if the hands curl in the middle, it's fine. Just sit starting like this. Whatever is happening after that, let it happen. Effortless process.

No, no, you don't say that. For children, it is a good thing. That this dude existed in Kashi. It makes it real for them. And after they have grown up, you say, "This dude is just an energy form." See, the forms are created so that first the identification happens. If I just say, "Oh, there is this energy field that everything exists in," they will say, "What have you been smoking, dude? Talk normal." Like this they will say. 

So, you say, you know, this guy, when the churning of the sea happened, first all the poison came out, so somebody had to drink it. So this dude came, all right, I'll drink it. So then he drank it, and then he-- the poison stopped at the neck. So his neck is blue. That's why he's called Neelkanth. All these attributes you give, nothing wrong with it. When they're 18, 19 years old, eventually they come for one of these PoP sessions where we straighten that out. We say, boss, there is no such thing. Then they say, oh, Sir. We were thinking for so long, what is this? But by that time, they are comfortable with this concept of the preserver, the destroyer, because those tatvas are real. The tatva of the creator, something is created. The tatva of the sustainer, the tatva of the reformulator, the principles are correct. Whether they are human forms or-- the tatva of Mickey Mouse is equally correct. But Mickey Mouse is not a real thing. The tatva of Mickey Mouse is correct.

There's this guy who can do this. The tatva of Goofy is correct. The tatva of, I don't know, Superman is correct. The tatva of Batman is correct. The tatva of Spider-Man is correct. All these are correct things. They are manifesting different energies of different things in a different way. Superhuman means what? Not being bound by the limitations of the physical world. That's a Superman. In "The Matrix," you have seen, Neo becomes-- he realizes that he's not bound by all this nonsense, gravity, et cetera, rules. He can do other stuff. It's a tatva. It's a principle. Doesn't make Batman any more or less real than Brahma. They're both equally unreal. You understand? But I mean, in the small child mind, you tell him Batman is not real. [NON-ENGLISH SPEECH] Iron Man is real.

My nephew does all these chips, all this stuff. I mean, for him, like-- what's his name? Stork. Whatever, the guy who created Iron Man, he's like God. I mean, what do you mean he's not real? And I said, no, no, no. He's totally real, dude. He's totally real. Let's talk about what are the powers of it. And when you talk to him about the powers, and you say, see, he's a very gentle guy, but he now develops all this bio suit that gives him powers. See what I mean? It's a self-improvement process. You've got to explain it to them how they understand. Because for them, these guys are-- you know what he did.

You know what he did. He was going on vacation. This is my nephew, OK? Six years old. At that time, he was six years old. He was going for vacation. I was at home. My dad was at that time alive. So he was at home. So somebody had to take care of the dad. So I went from here to India because my brother was going on vacation. You know what my nephew did? My nephew took all his figurines, and he put them on the bed saying, these guys will protect you. Don't worry. And then he left. Imagine. I mean, he so believes in that. You've got to tell him it's not real. He'll start crying.

So I said, yes, yes, Sid. Thank you very much. I feel so protected. And he went happily. And when he came back, I said, these figurines are awesome, man. I slept so nicely at night because I was fully comfortable. See, he felt so good. Then you have to work with them. You have to tell them the qualities of what makes Batman Batman, what makes Spider-Man Spider-Man, what makes Superman Superman. When you explain it to them, then he understands. And then he's a big fan of you.

They so love you. I mean, he talks to me as if I don't know anything. He says, Uncle, you have not watched such and such? I said, no, I have not watched. Then he tells me the whole story. He explains to me all this thing. He's into Harry Potter now. So he's telling me, oh, Hermione did this, and Harry did that, and that, and that. And I'm saying, yeah, amazing. This guy is just too good. It's a tatva. It's a principle. It's like you tell somebody in this country that Santa Claus doesn't exist. Oh, my god, the whole world crumbles. No, no, no, he exists. It's a principle. It's a tatva.