How to Protect Our Mind from Bad Influences
Бхакти Вигьяна Госвами · Coimbatore · 2011
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Oṁ namo bhagavate vāsudevāya, namaṁo bhagavate vāsudevāya, Oṁ namo bhagavate vāsudevāya oṁ namo. Bhagavate vāsudevāya Oṁ namo bhagavate vāsudevāya.
Introduction to self-healing and health
yaṁ taṁ praviśya mamavācama-prasuptaṁ saṁjīvayaty-akhila-śakti-dharāmv-anyām hasta-caraṇa-śravaṇa-tvag-ādīn prāṇān namo bhagavate puruṣāya tubhyam.
So good evening to everyone. Doctors asked me to give some talk and they gave me the topic of this talk. The topic will be self killing not killing healing. Self killing we all know. And it will be a very basic talk.
Let me first introduce myself. I have a scientific background. I have a PhD in molecular biology, but for over 30 years I have been studying Vedic philosophy, Vedic practices and spirituality.
So I'm more coming from this angle rather than from scientific angle. Since some scientific conditioning is still there in my mind. Anyway, I'll talk a little bit and then maybe you will have some questions about this.
I will base my talk on the philosophy of uh Bhagavad-gītā and Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, but it will be on the topic of self-healing.
In Sanskrit, as you know, there are for every uh term or for every concept there is many, many different words.
And for the health, there are many words in Sanskrit, and one of them particular which is relevant to our discussion is svastha. Literally svastha means to be established in the self.
In other words, there is a very deep concept behind this understanding. To be healthy means to be established in the self.
It basically means it may mean many different things. It may mean you be in harmony with yourself, not in conflict with yourself, it may mean that you know who you are and act accordingly.
It may mean many different things, but I will particularly stress on this particular point of knowing who you are. Because uh it's a definition of a healthy person is that he knows who he is and acts accordingly.
If you don't know who you are, you will not be able to act properly and if you don't act properly then for sure you will uh create some troubles, some problems for yourself and ultimately there will be imbalance in your life, ultimately, there will be some health problem and all kinds of other problems.
So the starting point, the point from which we have to understand whether health is coming from is to understand who we are.
The three levels of human existence
And Vedas explain very beautifully that a human being is not just a body, and it's not just a body and mind, it's body, mind and soul. There are three basic fundamental levels of a human being.
And unless we know all three, how they all three together, how they are combined, how they are connected and how they're working together.
We will not be able to maintain balanced life, we will not be able to act properly and we will not be able to be healthy. And ultimately we will not be able to be happy. The ultimate goal of a human life is to be happy.
Everything else is the means to be happy. Health is not the goal in itself. Health is only the means to become happy.
But happiness is in ultimate sense coming from understanding who we are and everything else is just follows this basic understanding.
So the Vedas are very emphatic about this simple fact, which are not so simple for the modern people, and that we are the body, there's no doubt about it, this
we can very visibly see. But we are also mind, that we also can understand to a certain extent. But besides that, we are also soul, which is behind body and mind.
And interestingly enough, because we are taking Ayurvedic treatment and we are more or less connected with Ayurved, our Vedas also suggests that there are three basic kinds of treatments.
Treatment for the body, treatment for the mind and treatment for the soul. There is a divine treatment. There is treatment for the body and there is uh treatment for the mind which is called sattva viapashvaya.
So, but uh Ayurveda, as all Vedic signs are more subtle than modern scientific understanding. Basically, the modern scientific paradigm is dealing with the body and treating us as the body only.
You know, keeping in mind that we are combination of three: body, mind, and soul, I will speak a little bit about the mind because this is the central point. Body we can do something, but uh body is more or less fixed.
The nature of the body is fixed, and uh you know any Ayurvedic doctor can confirm that uh in the time of conception the nature of prakriti of our body is designed.
We cannot really change our doshas, the combination of the doshas, maybe some little fluctuation, but the basic nature of the body is the same, and it will remain the same throughout the life.
And as much as the body is consisting out of three dosas, the mind according to Ayurveda and Vedic philosophy, and first of all, according to Bhagavad-gītā, mind is consisting of three elements as well. And these three elements are sattva, rajas and tamas.
And the sattva, rajas and tamas, which constitute our mind, they are the changing element in our structure. The body is fixed, the soul is also fixed. Soul is unchangeable.
Soul you cannot change, and basically, you can only realize your soul through the process of spiritual development or spiritual practice. But mind you can change.
And this is the turning point or the crucial point in all the understanding of the Vedic philosophy. The bodily constitution is the same and it will remain the same.
But mind, even though we are born with a certain mind, and a certain constitutional certain influences, certain energy are there in the mind from the time of our birth.
In Parāśara Śāstra and the Astrological Jyotiṣa, Parāśara Muni explains how you calculate the constitution of your mind.
He basically says that if the tamasi planets in your chart are very strong, then you will have tamasic constitution. If Saturn and Mars are very strong in your chart, then you will have Tamasic or ignorant tendencies.
Tamasic people or people with tamasic mind, they're slow, they are greedy, they're sleepy, they want to sleep, they tend to be under some depression.
There are so many different characteristics of tamas, which is the slow and kind of stable constitution in our mind. And every one of us has tamas. Without tamas, we would not be able to sleep. Every one of us sleeps.
Sleep means the influence of tamas. So in everyone's mind, these three elements are there: tamas, Rajas, and Sattva. And as I said, you know, the ratio, the The proportion of each is fixed from the time of birth.
If you have tamasic planets like Saturn and Mars strong, then you will have tamasic constitution.
If rājasic planets like Mercury and Venus are strong in your chart, then you will have mostly passionate rājasic constitution and rajas means activity. Rajas basically means abundance of desires in your mind.
You're torn apart from many, many different desires.
And then there are three sātvika planets: Jupiter, Sun and Moon. And if the Jupiter, Sun and Moon are very strong in your chart, then you will have sātvika uh tendencies, which basically means that you will be inclined to spiritual life.
You will believe in God. At least you will have a spiritual inclination. You will believe in a power which is behind and beyond yourself. And uh you will try to develop some relationship with this power.
You will be kind, you will be helping, you will be inclined to support other people and not harm other people.
Transforming the mind through sattva
That's sattvic constitution.
But the beauty, and this is the most important point of uh out of everything which I wanted to say today, because the subject matter is healing, is that you can change the constitution of your mind.
Even though the tendencies are there, inborn tendencies are there, but Vedas are very strong about this point that the karma which is there, which is fixed in your mind from the time of birth can be changed.
The karma is a changeable element in our life, and you can change the constitution of your mind by increasing the sattvic influences in your life.
Ayurveda is very clear about the point that all the diseases are coming from tamas and rajas. If the tamas and rajas or ignorance, if they are very dominant in our mind, then we will tend to make mistakes,
then we will lead the lifestyle which is harmful to our body, which is ultimately very harmful to ourselves, and that's self-killing, killing as we said in the beginning.
And so many people leave this suicidal course of life. You know, if we look around, if we look in the people, even in the people of India, they somehow or other lost the connection with this original sattvic culture.
The modern culture is very much connected with these two modes of nature, rajas and tamas. And because of this connection, people are becoming more and more lost.
They are losing connection with themselves because it is said in Bhagavad-gītā, then if the sattva-guṇa, the mode of sattva, the mode of goodness, is prominent in your life, then you can have knowledge.
This is the first and foremost characteristic of sattva. Sattva gives you understanding what is right, what is wrong. Sattva gives you understanding who you are.
Sattva gives you understanding of how to relate with this world and with other people and how to lead the proper life. And sattva gives you happiness.
These two most prominent characteristics of sattva are very important in our life. And Vedas are very, very emphatic about this point. You have to become sattvic, For yourself, for the sake of yourself.
If you want to be happy, if you want to behave properly, if you have uh if you want to live the proper life, then sattva is a must. It's not an option. It's not that we are in a free world, democratic world.
I vote for Rajas, you know, I like Rajas more. It's fine. You're free to do this, you can do this, no problem. But you have to know the consequences of it.
And consequences of it, uh Lord Krishna explains in the Bhagavad-gītā that Rajas tastes good in the beginning. It tastes very bitter in the end. And it's a law. You cannot change this law. It's the nature of this world.
You know you may follow your desires, you may gratify your senses and it will taste good for some time. It will inevitably turn into something really bitter.
And on the contrary, sattva, why sattva is such a difficult proposition? Even though Vedas are so strongly speaking for sattva and say that sattvic life is the way of life.
If you are a human being, the sattva is your choice. You don't have other choice, even though you may prefer some other choices, but ultimately as a human being you have to choose sattva.
But sattva is a difficult proposition because again in the Bhagavad-gītā Krishna explains that sattva and the happiness in the mode of sattva, in the beginning, sattva tastes like very bitter. You know, we all know this.
To get up early is bitter. It's bitter in the beginning, but then it's it's very sweet. Ultimately if you develop this habit then you will uh really like it.
But all the sattvic procedures and even sattvic food, like now we're eating sattvic food and it's really not uh I want to have some more spices so but it's sattvic and sattva you don't like sattva in the beginning, you have to get used to sattva.
But sattva has always a positive effect. Sattva at the end, sattva brings you happiness, sattva brings you happiness and knowledge and understanding of everything which you need. So that's the theory so to speak.
The theory is that we have to go sattvic life and that will change the constitution of our mind, that will change our habits, that will change our relationship, and it will ultimately bring us happiness.
Now the question is how. And this is a practical part of my little talk. I'm not going to talk too long. Because you know everyone is in Ayurvedic treatment and the concentration is limited.
You feel like sleeping some tamas increased to a certain extent. But the Vedic scriptures they very beautifully and particularly Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam explains that there are certain agents around us
which serve as something which would increase particular influences in our mind. Even though we may have the same background of the mind.
As I said from the very beginning, from the very time of birth, we have certain kind of set-in or built-in tendencies in our mind.
Factors influencing the mental constitution
But still, we can change it greatly if we surround ourselves by the agents which are conducive for the influence of a particular mode. In Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, this list of agents is listed as ten.
There are ten different constituents of ten different influences in our life, if we keep it of sattvic nature, then our mind will be more or less fixed in sattva, or at least the influence of sattva in our mind will gradually gradually increase with all the consequences of it.
We all know, you know, I remember very much when I had to change my lifestyle, when I realized that something is wrong in the way I'm living and some higher truth somehow or other dawned on me, it was very difficult for me to get up early.
Before that, if I would get up at six o'clock, it was it was uh I would consider myself a hero for one month. For the rest of the week I would sleep till ten o'clock as normal.
But uh so but uh you know when the constitution of your mind changes then all these things becomes very natural for you. You will not be able to sleep very long.
In fact you will feel very bad if you sleep even till six o'clock. Now if I sleep till six o'clock I I feel that something is really wrong with me.
You know I usually get up at three, three thirty, sometimes four o'clock, sometimes during japa-mala treatment a little later to take it easy.
But normally between 3 30 and 4 o'clock I get up. And it's very easy and natural. Why? Because the mind has changed. Then mind changed the habits. Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam says that the first factor which influences us is Agama.
It is says Agama Apah Prajah. The three first factors and then Kala Desha Karma. Three next. The six first out of ten are most important.
And the first is Agama, and Agama means the book. Agama means literally scripture or the book which is the most influential in your life. We all base our life on some knowledge.
And there are different books which claim importance in our life. Many books try to claim importance or prominence in our life. And you know these different books they explain different concepts
of understanding of what human life is all about, what we should do in human life, how to achieve happiness, how to achieve this most desired end.
So sättvic Agamas or sättvic scriptures are those scriptures which will explain to you that you can find happiness not in increasing your desires.
There are so many different scriptures or books which claim to be of the status of scriptures guiding our lives, which will tell you that you will become happy if you increase your desires.
Once I was giving lecture for some psychologist, alternative psychologist in Israel, and I was talking about the mind, how the mind works, mind intelligence, ego, and everything.
And I was talking ultimately about attachment and love, difference between attachment and love and about the desires. And I was little careless.
And in this volatile audience, I mentioned that to have too many desires is not so good. One lady exploded at the moment. She was furious at me. She couldn't really understand. She couldn't relate to this concept.
Because she's so used, so programmed that the only happiness in life is to increase your desires, to have your incessant desires increase, increase, increase, increase, increase.
And this is basically the teaching, the fundamental teaching of the modern life. So what I want to say is that if you want to increase sättvic influence in your mind, you have to be very careful as per which book
you allow to guide yourself? You more or less allow influence your life in a very significant way. So the criteria for this is that the book which teaches you that the proper way of life is to decrease your desires.
Because the life is not about increasing desires, the life is about understanding who we are. And the increased desires is the main impediment for understanding. Is the main impediment for understanding our inner nature, even the main impediment for understanding of our external nature.
If we have too many desires, desires will basically turn us apart. So Agama is the first factor in our life.
And of course, you know I'm personally big not big but fan or follower of Bhagavad-gītā, which I I find is amazing because this is the book I have been reading for uh thirty-one years now.
Practically by way or one way or another I read this book uh practically every day. And every time uh even though it's only seven hundred verses, seven hundred verses, uh uh I find something new in this book.
It's an amazing book which uh can give you the most profound understanding of what we should do and what we shouldn't do and what is the life, what the life is all about.
The role of water in mental health
So that is the first factor uh which influences the constitution of our mind, the book, the prominent book in our life, which is the guidebook for our understanding of life.
And next, amazingly enough, very paradoxically enough, in the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, they said Apah. And Apah means liquid. Āpaḥ means water. And it's very much in line with the modern
thinking because we know that water has the capacity of influencing our mind to greatest extent. If the water is not clean, if the water is not really. or if if we like usually if people want to get high they drink, right?
And that immediately changes your mind. You know you drink little arista, little extra rich little wine, little liquor. And then immediately your mind changed.
The nature of your mind changed and you feel you know a completely different person. Because who we are? We are our mind. And the liquid form, liquid has a very profound influence upon ourselves.
Therefore, Vedic scriptures they are very, very again careful about what we drink particularly.
The water should be clean and uh what I want to say is that bottled water, which is usual drink which we have is not very good. According to Āyurveda or Vedic scriptures, it's a tāmasika liquid.
Because it's sealed, it's stale, it doesn't have contact with air. In the scriptures, it is said that the water which is flowing is the best.
Because the water which is flowing naturally is full of air and full of prana and because if we drink the prana comes with the drink, with water. And prana energize our body and energize our mind. It is said that one third of uh the drink of water which we drink goes to the mind and can uh immediately uh you know influences the mind.
And usually, you know, that's what we drink. Sometimes we drink Pepsi-Cola and of course, you know, I will not tell about Pepsi-Cola. Not to commit Pepsi-Cola paradha. Pepsi-Cola offense of Pepsi-Cola.
This is all these drinks which we usually drink are not really conducive.
As I said, this Ayurvedic treatment for the mind, which is the most important and central in Ayurved and in spiritual life is called sattva-vājyāpahāra. And literally, if it is translated from Sanskrit, sattva-vājyāpahāra, it means we take shelter of sattva.
In other words, we're taking, you know, we're taking help of all the sattvik things which are there in life which is given to us by God.
And by taking shelter in them we are healing our mind and by healing our mind we will heal our body. Ultimately all the diseases are coming from the mind.
The body is just a you know reflection of what is going on in our mind. According to Ayurveda, the main cause of diseases is called prajñāparādha. Prajñāparādha.
Prajñāparādha means an offense against the mind. A fence against your intelligence. And uh in other words, if you do something which is against the common sense of
intelligence and you will do this only if the tamoguṇa, tamas and rajas will be dominant in your mind. So we are talking about the second important factor. Second important factor is apah or liquid.
So liquid has to be you know basically water clean, uh nice clean water which is rare commodity in in the cities it's practically unavailable, you know. Here in the countryside you may get it if you're lucky.
But still, as much as possible, it should be clean, it should not be bubbled, and it should be just nicely.
You know, if even if you take some water pour it a couple of times then it will get some prana in in it and it will be better.
Actually in the uh in the Vedas it is said the the importance of water is uh cannot be overemphasized.
In Vedas, you know, if you go to a holy place, a holy place is called tīrtha. And tīrtha means a bathing place where you can take bath. Why?
Because in this particular place the water has taken the subtle influence of this place. And the water is particularly clean and it can influence your mind.
So when Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam says apas for increasing sattva in your mind, it means that you have also to take bus every morning uh and uh it has to be with also some fresh water. The water should be not very hot.
It should be because hot water is not good for the mind especially it should be uh you know, cool water. Um I'm living in Russia it's very difficult to do it in in in December.
You need something to to heat yourself up, but uh but ultimately the best uh water is some cool water uh and it has to be fresh.
The importance of saintly association
And the next uh according to the importance, the uh the list is given according to the influence or importance, the first is the scripture, second is water, and the third one is your association, prajña.
The association is of course, you know, if we all know how association influences our mind. You know as soon we as soon as we associate with people who are full of desires, we also get so many of their desires.
Desires are it's an infectious disease, it's contagious disease.
You associate with somebody who is very ambitious, who is living with this grand world of grand desires and grand ambitions, and you immediately become infected by this. You immediately become affected by his way of thinking.
Prajña means, and that, you know, and in fact there was a German philosopher, very famous one. I forget his name now.
Uh uh who said basically it is said in Vedic literature, but he said that there is no contact which we have in our life, which was n would not leave impression in our mind.
You know, and therefore in Vedic scriptures it's so much stress is given to sādhu sangha. You have to have proper Sangha. Sangha with people who are sat. Sadhu means saintly person or sat.
Sat means he is established in truth. He is established in reality.
Sadhu means somebody who is uh who has both of his feet firmly established in reality, not in this illusory flickering kind of very strange world which we are.
So the Vedas say sādhu-saṅga sādhu-saṅga sarva-siddhi hoy lava-mātra sādhu saṅga sarva-śāstra-hoy lava-mātra sādhu-saṅga sarva-siddhi hoy just by a moment of association with the saintly person, you can get all the success, all the siddhis, all the all the basically good things which we need.
So, therefore, the third factor is extremely important in our life, and we have to increase. We have to consciously work on increasing all these elements, sāttvika elements in our life.
Satvik scripture, Satvik water, Satvik association. And then three more things I will not tell about more because it's already getting late. But three more important things. Next is karma, kala andesh.
Karma we all know it's our activity and our activity is very much influencing our mind. How we conduct our activity is is uh an art.
In Bhagavad-gītā it is said karmasu what is this kuśalam? That Krishna is teaching in Bhagavad-gītā the art of work. Kuśalam means art.
It's a special art how you can work in this world without being negatively affected by the work.
It's not uneasy because usually uh we get so much passionate in our work and we uh it's just a whirlpool, we are into this in in this whirlpool of activities and uh uh it's usually affects our mind in a very negative way.
But we have to act. There is no question of not acting. Therefore, we have to understand this art of acting and not being affected by the work.
I recently went to Gujarat and I met with uh the prime uh chief minister of Gujarat Narendra Modi.
He's a very busy man, you know, you know, just when we came to his audience there was I don't know how many people, at least hundred people. He had so many different rooms, and all the people were waiting to see him.
You know, and you know, very strict. So many people want to get something from him, you know. He's a big man, very influential man.
When our turn came to see him, I saw a man who was completely calm. He was very relaxed and was happy and he was smiling and he was joking and you know he at least before us at least met hundred people and you would go crazy if you would mean because and every one of these people would come with his mind and his desires and wanted to have something from him.
He was totally calm.
And I at the end of my little talk, we had some 15 minutes with him. At the end of my talk with him, I asked, you know, how you remain at home? He said, I do some little yoga, some meditation and I don't care about anything else. For the rest of the day I don't care.
He's busy and he's very successful. He's very organized. Very, you know, very together person. Brilliant orator, you know, brilliant person.
Well he said I don't care. It means he has detached. And he has learned this detachment from Agamas from the scriptures. And detachment is the main element of proper work.
You will be negatively affected by work 100% if you don't know this art of how to work and not be affected by the work and not be negatively affected by all this, you know, goals which you set.
You have to work, you have to set your goals, you have to achieve your goals.
Aligning lifestyle with natural time cycles
That's proper, but you should do it in a proper mood, in a proper thing. And then two more, two last things which I can tell you is kala, kala means time. And we all know time has profound influence on our mind.
In the morning sattva-guṇa is predominant. During the daytime when the sun is high up, the rajo-guṇa is very prominent and everyone is running, running, running, and you you also feel like running away from this Ayurveda cleaning.
It's too sad. Yeah. And then when the, you know, when the sun sets tamas becomes more prominent. And there are certain activities which are prescribed for particular time of the day.
And it's very important this routine, according to our Vedas or according to Vedic understanding, it's very important to keep this routine. You have to get up early in the morning.
Actually this one one simple rule if you get up very early before sunrise at least two hours before or sorry not before sunrise before sunset before dawn and before the sunrise
if you get up at least two hours before sunrise then you will be able to keep uh sattva element or your mind will be proper, your mind will be really tuned up in a proper way. Your mind will become much more clean.
The most important mistake which people of modern civilization, do is that they sleep when the sun is already up. This is the most harmful for the body and it is the most harmful for the mind.
You know, if the sun is up and you are not up, you will increase ignorant influence in your mind very very much.
So this kāla, respect to kāla, respect to the natural cycle of time is extremely important if we want to increase sattvic influence in our mind.
And that basically means that we have to do proper things in the proper time. Like now is the time of Sandhya.
Sandhya means the connection between the different periods of day. Like sunrise and now sunset. Sandhya means dusk.
It is said in the laws of manu in the of course in Ayurvedic scriptures that you should not eat at this time.
Because if you eat at this time, either on uh when the uh sun is rising or when the sun is setting, it's not very good for the mind and for the body. Either you have to eat before sunset or after sunset.
Better before sunset, but never in the dusk, never in this junction period between the two times.
And basically it means that you have to respect the natural the natural cycle which is there in our body in our mind according to the uh thing and do proper things and it means basically that you have to go to bed early.
There is modern investigation, I mean it's amazing, you know, people now spend millions of dollars, hundreds of millions of dollars to investigate what are the good effects of going to bed early and rising early.
Just read Bhagavad-gītā you will know I'm saying no need to stand to waste all this.
You know really I read recently that you know they they conducted big investigation, ten years of investigation. Finally they established you have to go to bed earlier, you have to rise.
The influence of environment on consciousness
And that's uh that's color. That's how color or time influences our mind and uh how we should uh try to tune in uh to this color influence. And the last is Desha. Desha means place.
And uh we all know that the place, people who come to particular place, they leave their energy and if we come to this place we uh imperceptibly we will be influenced by the energy of this place so naturally
we will have to avoid the dirty places, places where the sinful activities is going on. Because you know it will influence in Mahābhārata there is a very funny story.
You know the whole plot of Mahābhārata is about Pandavas.
And Pandavas the one of the main teachings of lessons of Mahābhārata is that how Pandavas were together and how all the five brothers respecting the elder brother Yudhiṣṭhira. You know, there was no quarrels and they were baying, even though sometimes Yudhiṣṭhira would do some mistake.
The younger brothers of Yudhiṣṭhira were always very obedient. So in Mahābhārata, there is a small episode which illustrates very beautifully this point about Desha.
That once they were crossing some river, and Bhīma uh was the strongest uh among the five brothers of Pandavas.
So he just jumped over the river. It's no problem for him. Jumped over. And when he jumped over on the other side of the river, all of a sudden, he turned away and he started shouting at Yudhiṣṭhira.
He started saying, You fool, you rascal, because of you, we are in this condition, we are in the forest, we lost our kingdom. And Yudhiṣṭhira was shocked. They were in exile and of course that was the fault of Yudhiṣṭhira.
Yudhiṣṭhira made this gambling match and he lost and they were exiled for twelve years. But Bhīma, even though he was very strong, he never would manifest this disrespect because you know senior means guru.
You cannot offend your guru, you cannot you cannot disrespect your guru. So and Yudhiṣṭhira he was very intelligent and he said Bhīma jump back. There must be something wrong. All of a sudden your mind changed.
Your mindset completely became completely different, you know. You it's something very unnatural for you. So he said jump back. And when Bhīma jumped back he said oh please forgive me I said
something wrong so this is this is how the Mahābhārata illustrates this influence of place you know the you know we of course you cannot be completely protected, we have to travel in different places, we have to do this.
Achieving self-healing through mental purity
But if you uh at least if you firmly establish yourself in the sattvic habits in, a sattvic lifestyle, then your mind will be greatly protected from the influences of external influences.
So and that's the method of self-healing. If we want to heal ourselves, we have to heal our mind. Because the main disease and the main problem is there in the mind.
And when the mind is sāttvika, when the knowledge of sattva dawns in the mind, when we really understand this uh that when the sattvic influence becomes prominent in the mind, which is normal condition of the mind.
In the Vedas it is said that the normal condition of the mind is sattva.
If the sattvic influence or normal natural influence become prominent in your mind, then you will increase your spiritual inclination naturally, because sattva means dharma and dharma means sattva. And vice versa.
If you are practicing some spiritual sādhana or spiritual life, tendency to become more sāttvika and to live more sāttvika style will also become more prominent in your life. And ultimately, that's the way to heal ourselves.
Our main disease is ignorance about understanding of the inner nature of the self. And you can only cure yourself from this disease if your mind is sāttvika, if your mind is calm, if your mind is happy.
If you are depressed under the influence of tamo-guṇa or if you are too much passionate under the influence of rajo-guṇa, you will never be able to
understand what is the purpose of life, what is the ultimate goal of life and uh what is the meaning of life. Your life will remain meaningless, empty. And you will never be able to feel real happiness.
So basically that's the the whole topic. Thank you so much. Yes. Anybody wants to ask us questions of anybody wants to ask some questions? Yes. Uh it's on the notes the uh practical notes on the water.
So um w you were I heard you mentioned about the w inevitably the only source of reliably clean drinking water is bottled water.
I heard you y we heard something about you like pouring it a couple of times at least yeah to try to infuse yeah yeah a little bit of uh whatever flavor into it. Yeah.
And um since like you know I live in a big city so and I probably the most convenient way of getting water, that kind of water,
you know, that qualify the, you know, to drink water is put a filter, like a Brita filter into a bottle, you know, a container. So that is that do I have to for this purpose like go through this process? It's always good.
You get some little prana and Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam has explained that prana is coming from the ether, from the space. If somebody is contained in a in a very you know in a closed space then there is less prana there.
And it becomes stale. So you know by doing this you not only get some air there but you get some prana inside, some some space inside. So this water will become a little more light.
Otherwise this bottled water is heavy and it has the tamasic kind of element in it. kind of element in it. Anyway, thank you very much.