[Participant] Very good. 

[SK] Very good. Okay. It's okay to be not good also. There's no requirement for it to be good. You could say, I'm doing lousy, buddy. I'm doing so shitty in my life right now. Perfectly fine answer. 

[SK] Just to make yourself a fool. That's it. There's no other reason. You feel like a child again. 

[Participant] I don't understand. 

[SK] That's it. Because you have become too old. You have to become like a child again. When you ask a child to hold a cup, they don't ask, why should I hold a cup? They just hold a cup. Because you are fully in the moment. Unlike adults, I want a reason, I want this, I want that. Then there is no smile on your face. If you just look for reasons, there is no smile on your face. Be like a child. If you ask a child to hold a cup, he will get the most, best designed artistic cup. They don't get some loser cup. They get a really fancy cup. You can also get some cup. 

See, चाय का क्या है? Okay, let me ask you this question. I went to IIT Bombay. All these guys, Bawa, Dinesh, Kashi, ये सब, we were all at the IIT at the same time. If you ask any of these people, where the maximum learning happens on campus, you know, where does the maximum learning happen on campus? It is not in the classroom. It is at the chai ka tapri. Because that is where all the stories are shared. All the legacy stuff, some seniors will tell some story, यह हुआ, वोह हुआ, ऐसा किया, यह prof ऐसा है, उसका end sem paper ऐसा set करता है। यह सब information chai ka tapri में मिलता है, not in the classroom.

And that same thing happened many, many, many, many, many years ago. When people did not have Netflix or Amazon or nothing, no internet, the only way to share stories was by, I mean, to share information was by telling stories. So they would sit at the night around a fire because they want to keep the wild animals away. So there will be a fire in the middle. And they would share stories. One guy will say, yaar, आज मैंने एक trap लगाया था। लेकिन भाग गया, वो deer भाग गया। Trap तोड़ के भाग गया। Then some old guy will be there. He will say, अच्छा, अच्छा, अच्छा, if the trap is not set like this, then the deer will run away. But you can track the deer. उसका footprint जाके देख। How the blade of grass has been tilted, you go and see. Then you know which direction the deer has gone. And then you do all this stuff and you will find where the deer is. All that information happens only around the fire in terms of stories.

So now that young guy knows how to set a trap for the deer. And also if the deer runs away, how to track the deer. All this stuff happens over, around the fireplace in the night. Same like how the information is shared at IIT. It's happening at the chai ka tapri. So the chai is simply a nimitta. It's just a mechanism of keeping people in one place so that they are doing some mundane activity of drinking chai. But the main activity they are doing is sharing their life experience so that everybody's life is enriched by each other's experience. This is why chai and coffee and eventually daaru and all of this stuff came because of that. So that everybody's life experience is enriched by sharing of stories. Then it became even worse. Then charas, ganja, everything came because of that only. Because they want a place to share life experience. But that's why, that is how chai has come. To make some mundane activity. So that experiences can be shared.

It is like asking, की यार मेरे को marathon भागना है, but I don't want to learn how to walk also. How are you going to do that buddy? How are you going to run a marathon without even learning to take five steps? It's not possible. Realizing the self is the marathon. Doing the science is the training you need to first take one step, then two steps, then five steps, then learn to walk for an hour, then run to run for 20 minutes, then extend the running from 20 minutes to 40 minutes over the time to three hours, you have to run a marathon. All the training is required. So in the process of studying material science or what we call the physical sciences, you're training your mind to become sharper and sharper and sharper. And once the mind is trained to be sharper and sharper and sharper, for example, you think your mind is sharp. Okay, why? Because you learned F is equal to MA, you know Newton's laws. I give you a problem now. There is a turntable. Turn table means LP record, you know. [speaking in Hindi] And the ant from the ant's perspective is walking directly to the center of the record. Now plot the motion of the ant. It's impossible for you to solve it by F equal to MA because your thinking is not clear. You have to set it up as a Lagrangian. Once you set it up as a Lagrangian and you differentiate the Lagrangians, then the equations of motion come out on its own. But this training you will never get if you don't study physics properly. Now with this training, you are now qualified to understand the first chapter of Patanjali Yoga Sutra when he says अनुसाशन, Discipline. अभ्यासा-वैराग्य it’s in the first chapter। अभ्यासा-वैराग्य करने के लिए this Lagrangian understanding is must somewhere in the back of your mind. It is like learning to walk. You cannot understand Patanjali without understanding material sciences first. It is impossible. So you have to learn to walk before you can run a marathon. That's the reason to understand physical sciences before you can understand the self even begin to ask the right questions. 

Who told you it's created? No energy can ever be created. See the problem is this understanding. You think Sudarshan Kriya is creating Prana. It is humbug. Who told you this? निकाल दे all these thoughts from your mind. Sudarshan Kriya is harmonizing the Prana that is already in your system. It's a harmonizing Pranayama.

Sudarshan Kriya is a Pranayama by the way, when you look at the technical definition of what Pranayama is that Patanjali has said, Sudarshan Kriya falls squarely as a Pranayama. In the Ashtanga Yoga path, Sudarshan Kriya is Pranayama. And what the Pranayama does, I mean this is Guruji's insight, that when you do the Kriya in these three different cyclic rhythms of the breath, indirectly you are harmonizing the balance of the Prana in your system.

There are five types of Pranas. And those five types of Pranas when they are in imbalance, your system doesn't function efficiently. It is like when the French municipal workers went on strike, the streets of Paris had garbage all on the streets. It's a beautiful city. I've been there during the strike. It's a beautiful city but when the garbage removal system went on strike, the city became dirty.

This is what happens when the Prana that is responsible for elimination of toxins in your body is not as active as the other Pranas, then ill health comes. So the Sudarshan Kriya what it does is it harmonizes all the Pranas in your bodies for optimal functioning. It doesn't create Prana energy. Who told you that? No, that's how the Kriya works. It's a harmonizing Pranayama.

So, this is an imprecise question. Define to me what you mean by control. For a lethargic person, control could mean energize. For an overactive person, control could mean subside. Control is a very nebulous word, and when you are talking of prana and pranayama, you have to be precise in your question because you are talking about extremely subtle things. This prana is even subtler than your breath. It is not even part of your physical body; it is part of your subtle body. And you will randomly ask a question, I want to control prana. What does it even mean? So, form the question correctly in your head and ask it again. If you are live on the session, maybe at the end you can ask your live question. But this question is meaningless. How do, which pranayama is the best to control your nervous system? It does not even have any physical meaning.

Yeah. So, games as a game have no purpose. Correct. It is simply an exercise in spontaneous activity. You look at children. When you put five children in a room or forget the room, when you put five children outside in the backyard, they will come up with stuff that you didn't even think is possible. They will take some sticks from somewhere. God knows where they find the sticks. They will do that. They will make something so small, yet for them, it will be a big castle, and then something else will happen and all this stuff. That is a game. It is pointless. It is simply an expression of their inner creativity and their expansive mind. That is, they're just, it's just happening. That is what Guruji means. A game in its pure form is pointless. It is simply an expression of the inner energy.

What we in the commercial world have called a game, IPL is not a game anymore. IPL is a business to make money. We call that a cricket game. It is not a game. There, there is a purpose to win 1 million dollars. That is no longer a game. That is a thing of skill. You have to practice for 15 hours, and you have to figure out your off-drive and how to hook a short of a good length ball—all that you have to learn. But there is an objective. Why? You want to be selected by the highest winning team or highest paying team. It's no longer a game. It started off as a pure game in the very old days. Maybe the first guy threw a rock, and the second guy had a stick of wood and he hit the rock. At that point, it was a game. And then it became more and more systematic and then it became a 5-day test match, and then the pride of the nation came and England versus India or India versus Pakistan, and all this other stuff happened. Now, it's no longer a game. But when you look at children playing in the backyard, that is a pure game. It's an expression of life. Game is simply an expression of life inside a child. That’s what Guruji mean by this statement.

Yeah, so if I had to choose, I would say spiritual is better than religious. Why? Again, it is not my sentence. It is Guruji's. So if you think of a banana, think of a banana. The yellow peel of the banana is religion. The inner core, that white portion of the banana, is spiritual. Religion is only a covering on top of the pure science of spirituality. When the pure science of spirituality gets covered by the dogma of stuff, it becomes religion.

In the pure science of spirituality, everything is allowed. You can ask the hardest questions. You can question the master's word. Master says, I give my example of the master. Guruji says the sun is round because there is a dark matter something pushing on the sun. There is no law, there is no law of physics that shows even remotely this to be true. I have looked, there is nothing. I have looked at experiments where people have done where they took something that was spherical in shape, and then they change the forces acting on it from the outside versus inside. All of this, they put it in a vacuum, they put it in a pressure chamber, they did all of this stuff. The shape becomes round because of the principle of minimization of surface energy. It has nothing to do with compressive forces of black matter or dark energy or all this other stuff, but Guruji keeps talking about it.

In a spiritual organization which is correctly spiritual, I have the full freedom of rejecting the word from the master. I say, Guruji, I don't believe you, and it's perfectly fine. You cannot do this in a religious organization. You do this in the religious organization, you will be shut out. That's the difference between spirituality and religion. Spirituality allows full debate between any two people, treating them as equal. There is no senior teacher, by the way, in spirituality, which means Art of Living is not truly spiritual because there is a senior teacher, very, very senior teacher, very, very junior teacher, Lallu volunteer. No dude, everybody is on the same level. When will people realize this there is no such thing as a senior teacher. So anyway, not every organization is perfect; ours is also not, but that's the difference. Spirituality allows for clear debate between anybody with everything, tarka is valid in spirituality. It is not valid in religion. That's the difference.

Yeah, that is tough. If your job situation is like this, then it is like this. If your prakriti is such that you cannot adjust to this job situation, then you will be miserable, your body will rebel against it. You might get headaches, you might not be well, you might fall sick, whatever. If you have a choice, then change your job. If you don't have a choice, then you have to live with it, but you can manage, you can manage it. For example, in such circumstances, you can do twice the daily Sudarshan Kriya, once in the morning, once after you come back from your late night job, you do the Kriya again. It is okay in some exceptional circumstances to do Kriya twice, like for example, people who work in trauma rooms like in hospitals are encouraged to do Kriya twice. In addition, go for the deep rest programs, so go for the Silence, the Silence courses maybe once every three months, six months, at least twice a year, once every six months minimum if your lifestyle is like that that you are not able to conform to the prakriti or the times where you are supposed to eat food and take rest and all this because of your shift schedule etc, you have to go to Silence courses to regenerate your system. The regeneration process has to happen just as frequently as the detuning of the process is happening. The detuning of the process is happening every day in your lifestyle, so you are retuning of the processes has to happen with equal efficiency. That’s what you have to do.

Yeah. Increasing inner strength means to make the muscles of the stomach strong. No, I don't understand what it means. Who says this increasing inner strength? Maybe they mean emotionally be strong. That also means nothing. Emotionally being strong means what? What I think it means is be as supple as a blade of grass. However much the storms will blow, the blade of grass simply bends, and then when the storm is over, it comes back. Be supple like the blade of grass. That is strength. If you're rigid like a tree, a storm is going to knock down a tree. You look at when storms happen; trees get knocked down, but a blade of grass remains almost untouched. You don't even know that after four or five days that there has been a storm here. Make your emotional resilience like the blade of grass, as supple as the blade of grass. That's what it means by inner strength according to me.

[SK] When did I say? It is so easy to deflect a question. You see, when you ask a question like this, you said, I can simply deflect by saying, when did I say? I don't even have to answer the question. I just say, when did I say? End of story. Finished. You ask the question what you want to ask. You do this prelude business. Oh, you said, I said this. You give me an option to deflect the question as a glance down the leg to fine leg for four runs. Effortless stroke, you know. Okay. So what's the question again? Sorry. 

[Presenter] Rama's character was supreme than Ravana. So universe supported him. So what is the definition of character? And the next part is, as Lord Rama also let down Sita for no fault and also killed Bali from behind. 

[SK] Yes, so what? Killing Bali from behind, does it show flaw in character? No. It had to be done like that. Only a man of strong character can do something willfully wrong for the greater good. It needs strong character to do that. Ram, the one thing that Ram has going for him in all other aspects, he's a loser. He's not the best in warfare. There are other people better than him. He's not the best in governing a country. There are other people better than him. He's not the best in strategy. There are other people better than him. There's only one thing he has going for him. It is his character which is why it is the Ramcharitramanas. The character of the man, the highest possible is Ram. But that does not mean that he will not do the right thing for the bigger picture. He had to make Sita go through all the crap that he made her go through for the bigger picture. He had to do it. You might not agree with what he did. That's a different question. I don't agree with what he did also. That's a different question. But that had to be done like that and a man of firm character as firmly established as Ram is the person who also does these things for the better good, for the bigger good. That's the meaning of the character. Ramcharitramanas.

Family members are toxic. क्या कर सकते हैं life मैं? See you cannot choose family, you can choose friends. You agree with that or not? You can choose friends but you cannot choose family. Like this, there are some karmas that you have come to execute and some karmas you can avoid. Family, all this is prarabdha. वो तुम लेके आए तुम्हारे साथ में। You are stuck with them. Because you have that debt somewhere to pay off.

So I tell you, have you heard of the lepikas? You know who the lepikas are? The lepikas are the contract signer people. When you come into the world, the lepika and you sit across the table, like this. And lepika has a list, कि यार तेरा ये dues है, this is your debit, this is your credit. तेरा next life में तेरेको क्या चाहिए? Which part of the debit do you want to take and which part of the credits do you want to take? And then you and the lepika sign a contract, की मेरेको ये ये debit चाहिये, मेरे को ये ये credit चाहिए, next lifetime में I will execute all of this stuff. And then you forget about it.

And then you, when you are born into this world, that memory of the lepika is erased from you. And you come with the baggage that you have agreed on the contract with the lepika already. So you have already agreed, कि I will go to these four jokers that I call my family members who are like shit people and completely toxic. But you have already agreed for that in the contract. What are you complaining about it? It is your contract, you already signed it. पहले सोचना चाहिए था before signing the contract. Now it's too late, अभी भुक्तो contract. What can you do yaar? It is owed to you, some things are owed to you, you owe people something, those two people come together and finish it off. This is life, this is how the karma things work. Some are owed to you, some owed to you like this. And those two people only come and the karma is exchanged and it's done. So once you understand this, then that whole why me, why my family is toxic, ये ऐसा क्यों है, वैसा क्यों है। वो तो पूरा song बनाया, "मैं ऐसा क्यों हूँ, मैं वैसा क्यों हूँ।" अबे वैसा ही हैं तू, what can you do?

Not only you, everybody else is like that. Once you understand this, then there is no "hmmm, aah, vaam" Everything gets closed. That's it. You just accept and move on. You ignore. What does, Narad gives the good example of this. When Narad says that when there is an emotional conflict that you encounter, the one thing that you do is invoke ignorance. You ignore that. Whenever that emotional conflict comes, you ignore it. You don't want to do this. And you move on. This way you maintain your emotional purity. You don't let your emotional state get contaminated by all this other shit that is happening in your life. Narad is the guy to go to. And he already, we looked at it. In the deep dive of Narad Bhakti Sutras, we have looked at it. You know. So those of you who have not done it, somebody will send a link of the recordings. You can buy it and listen to it. We went into great detail in all this stuff. How to maintain emotional purity, all this stuff. Do it.

Don't let go boss. Hold on to everything. Let me see how long you can hold on to. Hold on to. Don't let go at all. Eventually you will let go. It will be unbearable. Until it is unbearable, hold on to it. Don't let go. Forgive. Whoever told you to let go, I am asking for your forgiveness because they are ignorant people. Whoever told you to let go, don't listen to them. I am telling you, hold on to it. Hold on to it. It will become so pleasant or so miserable. Only two can happen. Either it will become so pleasant or so miserable. Most likely it will become really miserable. You will leave yourself. I don't even have to tell you to let go. Till it becomes unbearable, please hold on to it. What a stupid question is this?

[Presenter] The next one is, you were telling on one level grace is there. 

[SK] When did I say? End of story. हाँ बोल।

[Presenter] On one level grace is there and on another level there is no grace. Can you please elaborate on this? 

[SK] Yes. The answer to the question of can you is yes or no. Can I open the door? Yes. I don't have to open the door. I can open the door. Can I pick up this cup? Yes. I can pick up this cup. I don't have to pick it up. So the question is, can you explain why there is at level grace and at some level no grace? Yes, I can explain. End of discussion. Next question.

Yes. There is no role of Guru Kripa to attain smooth breathing during pranayama. Nothing. And you can attain extremely stable states of mind without what you call Guru Kripa. Yes. Patanjali has made it extremely clear. He has not put a condition that Guru Kripa is needed for pranayama to work. It is not written in the original text of Patanjali. Where did this Guru Kripa nonsense come from? Someone has spat it in the middle. Remove all this. There is no need for all of this stuff. Do the pranayama like the Guru has explained to you to do because it's a sadhana pad. Patanjali does not tell you how to do pranayama. Patanjali simply says what is pranayama. The Guru has to interpret what Patanjali has said and make it a practice for his or her students. This is what the Guru's role is. They have to interpret what Patanjali has said and make it an actionable item. This is what Guruji has done. He has taken the Patanjali's Yoga Sutras. There are only three or four who describe what pranayama is.

And Guruji has interpreted those. Why Guruji? So many other masters have interpreted those and they have come up with the processes of pranayama. What we learn as the three-stage pranayama is Guruji's interpretation of the instructions from Patanjali. That's it. And you take Guruji's instructions and you execute. What you're doing is you're following the Patanjali instructions in a way that you yourself could not have followed. But now with Guruji's instructions you can follow. That's it. There is no need of Guru Kripa to be injected into this equation. There is no need for it. 

Can you? I think you can. You're a very vocal, audible kind of guy. I think you can read it out. Yes. 

Patience. Infinite patience. Be like Nandi. Be like Nandi. Nandi is simply sitting there. Doing what? Not waiting for Shiva to come. He is simply sitting. Waiting. You think Nandi is waiting for Shiva to come? It's a humbug answer. Nandi is simply waiting. Can you simply wait? Once you can simply wait, things will come to you in double force. The problem is we don't wait. We wait with an expectation. That is not waiting. Simply wait. Have infinite patience. It is there in, where? I don't remember. Now, all these texts are muddled up in my head, but it's there in something. किसमें था, we have discussed this in one of the sessions, right? Infinite patience. I don't know. I mean, if I don't remember, how the heck will you guys remember? Okay, that's my fault. But yes, infinite patience. Invoke infinite patience. Especially when things are not working. Because, at that time, when you do lots of effort and things don't work, you are flowing against grace. And when you do a little bit of effort and things work a lot, then you're flowing along the grace. Do you understand? In a loosey-goosey manner, I'm answering the question of grace also. At one level, this is true that there is grace. At the other level, there is no grace. But that is not for Chai and Why session. That is for a different discussion. But yes, when things are not working, invoke patience. Remember Nandi. At that point, remember Nandi. Nandi is only waiting. 

Oh, so you're not able to do the spiritual practices because your life is very busy and like this. That's the question. Is your life so busy that you're not taking a bath every day? What is the big deal about taking a bath? Don't take a bath every day. What's the big deal about eating three meals a day? सुबह का नाश्ता, बाद में lunch, बाद में दुपहर का chai, बाद में dinner. कितना wasteful है ये सब activity. मत कर। उस के लिए सब के लिए time है। हाँ, baath लेने के लिए 15-20 minute bathroom में जाके पता नहीं Kishore Kumar का गाना गाके, you have time to take a bath after singing a song and you don't have time to sit and do pranayama for 10-15 minutes. Don't give me nonsense reasons. It's not priority for you because you have not seen the benefit of it. It's a slow acting process. It takes years for the effect to manifest. But if you stop it in the middle, that slow action finishes. It does not continue. You don't get the benefits of it. Once the benefits start kicking in, it's like compound interest. When you invest 1 rupee the day your baby is born on a compound interest scheme, by the time your baby is 30 years old, they have lakhs of rupees. If you invest 1 rupee earlier, by the compounding interest, you will have lakhs of rupees. Does anybody put 1 rupee also when the baby is born? No, because you are fools. You don't understand the meaning of compound interest. These pranayama kriya processes are compound interest processes. The more continuously you do them, the effect starts compounding. If I have to choose 20 minutes to do Kriya meditation versus 20 minutes to do shower, I will do Kriya meditation. Screw the shower. In 5 minutes, I will wash my face, comb my hair, do some beard. Good enough. I can go to office like that. You guys sit in the bathroom for 40 minutes, sing and take a shower. Can't you do Kriya for 20 minutes? Don't give me nonsense answers. 

This question is confused. I also get confused how to answer confused questions. What do you want me to say? What does confusion mean? Confusion simply means lack of clarity in the mind. Mind is not clear whether to do this or that. I give you an out for this. Is there any confusion between a bad choice and a good choice? Something that is clearly bad and something that is clearly good. Is there any confusion? No, you take the one that is clearly good. The confusion is happening because it is the choice between good and better or between bad and worse. On the good side, the confusion happens between choices that are good and better. On the bad side, the confusion happens between choices that are bad and worse. At that point, it makes no difference. Choose something. It makes no difference. Whether you choose good or better or you choose bad or worse, it makes no difference. Now you will never have confusion. Because if you have confusion, it's only between two options that are almost equally good and two options that are almost equally bad. There is never a choice or a confusion between a clearly bad option and a clearly good option. Done. There is never a confusion. You just have to act on it. Good कर, better कर, doesn't matter. Just do something. Simple. There is never confusion. 

Who said I control my phone interactions? I am addicted to my phone. Now. Oh God. What kind of assumptions have you made? But I mean, come on. This is a tool. This is not a bondage. This is a tool. If I see something interesting, I take a video of it and I make a reel. It takes 90 seconds for me to make the reel. 

And I delete it from my phone. My phone doesn't have any of that shit on it. Once it's uploaded to the cloud, I delete it. Then I have Sumit who will do an archive of it and all this other stuff he does. I don't do any of that shit. He does it. I don't do it. So you have to use technology like it is. Like I cannot remember anybody's birthday to save my life. Barely I remember my own birthday. My wife already knows this. So she got married on my birthday. So I will not miss our wedding anniversary because there is only one date. I will remember at least one date. But all of my students are so happy when I send them, "Hey, happy birthday." They think I remember. Are you crazy? It's on my phone in a reminder. Hello? Are you kidding me? Is it in my mind to remember thousands of people's birthdays? Are you mad? No. You have to use technology to your benefit.

Like when you are roasting peanuts, for example. You want to make dana-hacha-koot? So you roast the peanuts. So you put it in the oven and then you think, "I have to shake it for 10 minutes." But with my kind of life, I am doing this, that, I am going to forget 10 minutes. So what I will do, I will say, "Hey Siri, set a timer for 10 minutes." There you go. Now I can continue doing my work. And in 10 minutes, the timer will come. And then I will say, "Oh, I have to shake dana-hacha-koot." So I will go and move the peanuts. Put another, "Hey Siri, set a timer for 5 minutes." Then I will do other stuff. You have to use technology to your advantage, buddy. See? 5 minutes starting now. Siri already said it. Siri, just, "Hey Siri, cancel timer." It's cancelled. See? It's so easy. You have to use technology.

You guys, all these Physics of Pranayama volunteers, do I not wish you on your birthday? You think I remember any of your bloody birthdays? Not a chance, man. I got it all archived somewhere. 

But you feel so good. "Oh, brother, thank you." You feel, "What's the matter, man? It's all on the thing." Then you have to use it to your benefit. It's not like that. That doesn't mean I don't like you guys, okay? I really appreciate what all the Sewa, you do, all that. But, okay. Now I'm not remembering your birthday. Not a chance. I remember my own birthday for a single day. And, by association, my wedding anniversary. Because they are the same day. I don't remember anything else.

All the discussions. So, we looked at it from, we means, I looked at it from the point of view of physics. And I walked people through it. And it was quite helpful for them. So, all these recordings of our discussions is available for other people to also view. For a fee, for a donation. And the donation money is going to the World Culture Festival. You know about the World Culture Festival, right? Happening in the United States, Washington, D.C. September 29th to October 1st. So, it's a very expensive event and needs lots of fundraising. So, one of the ways of doing fundraising from my side is to make these discussion sessions for these knowledge series available for people to purchase. For a donation. And you can watch on your own time.

So, you watch Guruji's video, then you watch the corresponding discussion session and then you understand. And if you have any more questions on top of the discussion. Once a month, you will have a session where everybody can ask questions live. Like this. Whatever you have not, maybe you have missed a point or not very clear to you or something. You can ask in that once a month session.