Vedic Secrets of Peace and Love
Бхакти Вигьяна Госвами · Лондон · 2016
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Invocatory mantras and introductory remarks
So I will chant some mantras, invocatory mantras and then I'll speak a little bit on the topic. Om namo bhagavate vasudevāya. Oṁ ajñāna-timirāndhasya jñānāñjana-śalākayā cakṣunmīlitaṁ yena tasmai śrī-
gurave namaḥ. Śrī-kṛṣṇa-caitanya prabhu-nityānanda śrī-advaita gadādhara śrīvāsādi-gaura-bhakta-vr̥nda. Hare Krishna, Hare Krishna, Krishna Krishna, Hare Hare Hare Rama, Hare Rama, Rama Rama, Hare Hare.
Namuna. Sri Krishna Chaitana. Prabunitananda, Sri Dvaitta Gadhathara, Srivassadigura Bhta Vrida Hare Krishna, Hare Krishna Krishna Krishna Hare Hare Hare Rama Hare Rama Rama Rama
Hare Hare Ajanalambi tchowkanakavada, samkirthanaika bitarupa malaya tak swiambaru dvicha varu dharma palma. Vandeja batpriakaru karuna vatariana tah pravi mama vachima Tavaivasmi tavaivasmi na jivami dwavina tirigyātivi tum nayanam chanandigam.
So I'm very happy to speak in front of all of you on the occasion of the fifth anniversary of this Vedic society. And I will speak a little bit about the Vedic secrets of peace and love as, I was asked to speak about.
People very often use these words so often that that the original meaning of these words is practically lost. Everyone speaks about peace and everyone is trying to do something for peace, or at least many people.
There is Nobel Peace Prize, which was recently given to Barack Obama before he started the war. It's just a little example of how confused people are about what peace is and what to speak about love.
Love is so misused and even abused. This very understanding or notion of love is so cheap now that again the original meaning, the very deep and profound meaning which is there in these worlds
is practically unaccessible to So I'll speak about Vedic understanding of how to achieve peace and what is love and what are the means to achieve love. Is it really achievable?
Global crisis of bodily identification
And what is the state of love which we are all hankering for? Basically, we can see that the whole world is in the state of unrest, turmoil. And the reason for this is simple.
The reason for this is that everyone in this world is more or less, especially at one point of the world's history, started identifying himself as the body.
The understanding of people who they are and their particular purposes in life is very much dependent on this let me say like this.
Our purpose in life and our subsequent actions to achieve this purpose is very much dependent on the understanding who I am. This concept of who I am is the foundation for everything else we Do in this world.
Because this is something, this is the starting point. First of all, I have certain conception of who I am, and then from this conception, everything arises, everything springs out.
What I will do, and what is my goal, what is the meaning of my life, and everything else. So the crisis and not just little crisis. You know, little crisis here and there everyone is used to.
Now it's a global crisis from all sides, in a universal crisis. The crisis is the crisis of the system.
You know we not only have ecological crisis with global warming and everything, we have all this political crises with wars in Syria and so many other things. We have economical crisis, of course.
We have health crises because you know, despite all the endeavors, health of people is deteriorating, especially the psychic health, emotional health.
We can see that the whole civilization is in a state of, you know, it's more or less impasse.
The whole civilization is in a state of turmoil, and the reason is very simple because at one point people made a very fundamental and very subtle mistake. They sort of identify themselves with the body, with the flesh.
And flesh is supposed to die, and because flesh is always demanding, our physical needs are there, and uh our body is always demanding to take, you know, people started building the civilization as if they are body and therefore the happiness which the conception of happiness which people have in the modern civilization is that my body should be happy, my body should be comfortable, my senses should be comfortable, my stomach should be full.
And we're not denying that this is a necessity, but if we take this as a meaning of life, very profound and very undesirable consequences are following through from this initial mistake which people made. If we consider ourselves as a body, then the competition, the unrest, the fighting is practically inevitable. Because if we consider ourselves as a body, we develop our envious nature.
If our understanding of happiness is the happiness for my senses, then I will always be looking for some more sense gratifications. And the problem with this conception is that senses are never satisfied.
No matter how much you try. You know, we all know we want to eat. And we want to eat even when our stomach is full. And our desire to eat is much bigger than our stomach.
Our stomach is already full, but desire is not satisfied yet. And all other senses, whatever sense we take, it's basically insatiable. In Vedic literature, the craving of the senses is compared with the fire.
And the attempt to satisfy the senses is compared with putting some oil, some ghee, some melted butter in the fire. And if we put ghee or clarified butter in the fire, the fire will only grow and grow and grow more.
And we all know people are trying to satisfy their senses and they're never satisfied. They always want more. I know people they say, yeah, I need some good wealth. So maybe one million dollars is enough for me. Forget it.
When you get million dollars, you will definitely want to have 10 million dollars. And when you have 10 million dollars, you will want to have 100 million dollars. And even this is not enough.
And even if you are Bill Gates, you will still want to be more. You will still want to have more. All these attempts of people to have to satisfy their senses fail.
You know, we know all these rich people, they are not really satisfied. They're really looking for something else. There is no satisfaction. Why? Because we are not only the body.
The needs of the body have to be satisfied, there is no doubt about it.
But if we only trying to do this, then we will get dissatisfaction on the level of the on the level of the mind and ultimately we will destroy our body.
Because the more we try to satisfy our senses, the more destructive it becomes. The overuse of the senses, according to Ayurved, one of the main reasons of disease is overuse of our senses. Or underuse of our senses.
When we are trying to overuse our senses in this futile attempt to satisfy it more and more and more, ultimately we destroy our physical frame.
You know, people now they have more diseases, even though they have enough food. Actually, there is much more people who are dying from the food effects than people who are dying from hunger.
Very few people are dying from hunger, but many more people dying because of the wrong food, because they overeat ultimately.
Because they eat all this unhealthy food and trying to satisfy the craving of the tongue and other senses and the stomach and everything else.
In America it's practically almost number one disease, that obesity. There are so many obese people, you know, fat people, you know, and uh uh I you can you cannot even call them fat people because this is an offense.
You have to call them how you call them how you call them? Whatever. Some politically correct term is there. You know, they're challenged because they're too wide.
But this consumerism, this very notion of consumerism, this whole civilization
Three levels of human existence
is based on this notion of consumerism and ultimately the consumerism is stemming out from the conception that we are body and we have that the happiness is to satisfy the senses.
Then according to Vedic paradigm, there are at three levels of our existence. The physical level is definitely there, we all know this, and that's visible. And because that's visible and kind of obvious, people go for this obvious solution for the problem.
Let's satisfy the physical level. But then there is emotional level, which is on the level of the mind.
Emotional or intellectual level, there are different divisions in this second level of the human existence, which is subtle body. We have our mind with its needs, emotional needs, intellectual needs.
And again, if people only try to satisfy this, if people are more or less identify themselves with this subtle body or subtle understanding, subtle uh subtle body mind, still it's wrong. It's not going to work.
Because the need of the subtle body, the need of our mind is basically to be loved.
And this craving is very strong, but we all know when the small body is born, his main craving is for food and for this emotional satisfaction of the mind. He needs love.
And especially if this need for love from others is not satisfied in the very young age, in the childhood age, when people when little babies are completely dependent on this, then the whole life they are looking for somebody who will love him.
Usually these people they become pop stars or cinema stars or whatever movie stars. Why? Because they're very much craving for love. They're standing there on the stage and wow. Everyone loves me.
Everyone is just sending their vibrations and they want it. But again, the problem with this sort of thing is that it's very immature in one sense.
When you're a baby, it's fine to have this selfish notion that everyone must love me, everyone must give me his love.
But if we carry on this sort of conception in life that everyone must love me and I want to be loved and I need love, if everyone is living with this craving for others' love,
then he will never be able to fulfill the innermost desire which is there hidden in the soul.
Yes, this need is there uh in our mind uh and we feel we all know we feel very good if you know we manage to attract somebody's attention
you know, if somebody says something nice to us, oh, it sounds really, it's better than an under song so nice, it's so pleasing to the ear, oh, you're so nice, oh, yeah, yeah, I'm so nice. Yes, you're right.
This craving is there. We do want. And again, as I said, as much as there is nothing wrong with physical needs to be satisfied. There is nothing wrong with emotional needs to be satisfied.
But if it's only this, if we don't go any further, ultimately we will remain unsatisfied.
As I said, as much as people are trying to satisfy their physical needs and fail, in the same way people who are completely mad after being satisfied in an emotional sense, trying to do this, become the pop stars and you know movie stars or whatever, you know, they're ultimately not satisfied.
We know these tragic stories of Michael Jackson or whoever, you know. He was this, you know, this craving was so much. He wanted to have love, but ultimately he was so lonely. He was so completely emotionally damaged.
Again, because there is something wrong. Because the understanding of the essence of the human being is not holistic, is not complete.
Need of the soul to love
Therefore, the Vedic paradigm is extremely important for us to understand.
We really have to understand what human being is. The human being is the very tight and very I mean it's a very complex system which consists of body, mind and soul, spirit.
And usually, unfortunately, people in their attempts to become happy, they neglect the most important part of our existence, that is soul.
And the need of the soul, as much as the need of the body is to have some nice food and to have nice situation around them, to have nice food not only for the tongue but for other senses. As much as the need for the mind is to feel love.
The need of the soul is to love, which is different. And people very often when they speak about love they mean yes, love means somebody should love me, but
love the need for love is not that somebody should love me. The need for love is that I need to love somebody. And this understanding is actually very rare in a human society.
What to speak about real love, even the understanding, even the concept, even the theoretical concept is very rare. It's very rarely you can really get the complete or proper definition of love.
Because ultimately the need of the soul is to love and love means service. Love means to give. Love means to do something to others without expecting anything in return.
And because our lower levels of our existence, body and mind always want to take.
The only part of our existence, which is the foundation of our existence, which is the very essence of our existence, the soul wants to give. So what we have in our material life is the conflict.
The soul wants to give. The soul just wants to serve. And the body says, no, no, wait a second. I need something. I need to take. And the mind is crying. Yes, yes, I need love. Somebody should love me.
And people, they're wasting their life just trying to satisfy the needs of the body and the mind. Neglecting the very essence of our being, the soul.
And the Vedic paradigm in a very peculiar way explains that if you satisfy the soul by the means of service, by giving the soul the opportunity to serve, the meaning in life, the opportunity to serve ultimately God, who is our original source of existence, then the emotional need and physical need, first of all, they become pacified.
When speaking about these two concepts of love and peace, and they're very interconnected. You can only have peace if you have love. There is no question of peace without love. Because peace basically means satisfaction.
You're satisfied.
And the ultimate satisfaction descends upon you if you satisfy the most fundamental need which is there in the soul, the need to serve, the need to do something, the need to be selfless, the need to give, and to be happy just because the object of your love is happy.
The real love is the ability, which is very rare, really rare ability, to be happy just because somebody whom you love is happy. You don't need happiness for yourself. You're just happy because somebody else is happy.
You're doing something for him, you're doing something selflessly, and he's happy, and you look at him, and you become even more happy than him. And you're completely satisfied.
So the magic of the Vedic paradigm is that it takes the complete picture. It doesn't omit any parts of the picture. We are body and we are mind but we are also soul.
And starts solving the problem from the highest possible level, from the level of the soul, not from the level of the body.
If you try to solve the problem of happiness, the need for happiness from the level of the body, you will never solve the problem.
You will only have modern civilization where there are big bodies and completely unsatisfied souls within these bodies.
I remember I was a couple of times I was in America and I went to some supermarket and I saw very peculiar scene from behind. There were three big bodies completely round.
You know, totally completely, there is no shape, you know. One is very big, another is little smaller, and another is considerably smaller.
But the same round shape is there and all of them are pulling in front of them cars you know filled with different garbage. You know, and I I was really wondering what what are the creatures?
And you know, I ran a little up and I saw and I realized that one is man, another is woman and another one is child, you know, but really undistinguishable.
Even the the sex of the child was not really you know, it was not clear.
And you know, you can only uh distinguish between them by the size you know one is bigger uh obviously it's a male you know somebody smaller is a female maybe I don't know.
But what I mean to say that, you know, they're dissatisfied. They just want to consume and consume and consume.
And uh interestingly enough, uh the whole modern economy is uh is only surviving because they need to uh uh sparkle in people, ignite in people this dissatisfaction. The modern economy would not really uh cannot really afford satisfied people.
If all of a sudden people will become satisfied, the whole economy will crash in no time. So nobody is trying to give real satisfaction to people.
Three levels of happiness in Vedas
And nobody is even disclosing this secret or speaking very boldly about this secret that you can only be happy ultimately if you are satisfying the most important need, the need of the soul to serve and to love.
So, having said this, I would also say something about three kinds of happiness which is available to the human being. And these three kinds of happiness are described in Vedic literature.
Ultimately, the goal of any human pursuit, the goal of any human endeavor is only one. It's happiness. You know, sometimes people think my goal is to become rich. But for what?
You know, to become rich, to become wealthy is not the goal in itself. It's intermediate goal for you to become happy.
People want to become rich because it gives them the sense of security, the sense of, you know, some sort of, you know, that they they think that they can buy happiness from this money. And ultimately they want to buy love and everything else.
So, whatever other goal which people can pursue in this world, we can take, it's not the ultimate goal. It's just an intermediate goal to achieve something else. I need money to achieve something else.
I need health to achieve something else. But what is this which we want to achieve? It's only one thing: happiness. And to really correctly act and deal with other people and correctly set the priorities in our life.
To do this, we really have to understand what kind of happiness are there. And in Bhagavad-gītā there are two kinds of happiness, but in Vedic literature we can see that there are three kinds of happiness altogether.
And we have to be very clear what kind of happiness I am striving for. The first happiness I already described is the happiness for senses.
And I already said that this happiness for my senses, happiness for my body, is ultimately not a very healthy conception of happiness because ultimately it's not that the thing can give
me happiness, uh you know, uh, can the food give me happiness? Please tell me. The food in itself can it give me happiness? Can it give me satisfaction? It can. Only if you are hungry.
If you're not hungry, the same food will not give you satisfaction. And if you're very saturated, and somebody is trying to push the food inside you, it will give you what? Suffering.
So to be happy, please note this very carefully. If our conception of happiness is satisfaction of the senses, then we have to understand that you know the very thing which gives me happiness is the source of miseries.
To become happy in material sense, I first have to uh uh undergo some misery. Does the heat uh can the heat give me happiness? Only if you are cold. Can the cooling wind give me happiness? Now there's plenty of cooling wind.
Nobody is enjoying the cooling wind. Why? Because it's cold. So only the cooling wind can give me happiness, only if I'm hot, so to speak.
So this kind of attempt to get happiness from the senses is self-contradictory, self-defeating.
Happiness derived from self-realization
It's not the highest concept of happiness. The second concept of happiness is much higher, but it's still not the highest. The second concept of happiness is the happiness which I derive from inside, from the soul itself.
Like Ananda was chanting these beautiful mantras or Sanskrit verses from the second chapter of Bhagavad-gītā, Ajo nityaḥ śāśvato 'yaṁ purāṇo na hanyate hanyamāne śarīre, where in Yamsasvata Yam Purana, Nahanyatehanyamane Sharira, where in the beginning, in the very beginning, Krishna explains the eternal nature of the soul. And if somebody is in contact with this eternal nature, it gives immense satisfaction to you.
The problem now, because of our disturbed mind, that's according to the yoga, the psychology of yoga, because of our disturbed mind, we are separated from the soul.
Even though the soul is the source of existence, the soul is the source of our consciousness, but because of the disturbed mind which is always agitated, which is always in the state of agitation, so because of this, we don't really feel the real condition of the soul.
The real condition of the soul, original condition of the soul, is full of happiness. We all can feel or have little glimpse of what the state the soul is when we are in deep sleep.
In the state of deep sleep, we kind of enjoy. And deep sleep is actually the greatest happiness in this world. You know, just imagine that you cannot sleep for one week, for two weeks, for three weeks.
You will give all your money just to get little sleep.
And we all know how good you feel when you just, ah, it's so nice, When you wake up after deep sleep, when there is no worries in the mind and the body is completely rested.
So and according to Vedic literature, it's not really the condition of the soul, but you can get some little understanding. You know, nobody we can have a nice, wakeful state or miserable wakeful state.
We can have nice dreams, nice pleasurable dreams, or really miserable dreams. But when it comes to deep sleep, there is only one state, it's nice. Does anyone have bad deep sleep? Oh, it's so bad. No, it's nice.
It's always nice because you're there, you're disconnected with your subtle body and with the gross body and you feel what uh the soul really feels. Uh it's nice, you're there.
So, Bhagavad-gītā and yoga is actually teaching how to reach this state. Yoga is ultimately teaching how to reach the condition of the soul in itself as the source of consciousness without being disturbed by the mind.
The very concept of yoga is yogas citta-vṛtti-nirodha, how to pacify the mind so that you will have awareness of your soul. And that's greatest achievements. That's what samadhi is.
Samadhi basically means that big yogis, they are trying to achieve samadhi, and when they achieve samadhi it's the condition of the soul proper without any subtle body or gross body without any disturbances and pains and sufferings which are associated with our gross body and subtle body, but with awareness.
The difference between the samadhi and deep sleep is only one. In deep sleep, there is hardly any awareness. The soul is there, the consciousness is there.
It's peaceful, but there is no awareness. Samadhi is the same sort of situation, but you're fully aware of it. And therefore, it's much more pronounced, it's much more deep and much more pleasurable.
So all the people who reach Samadhi, and Krishna explains this in Bhagavad-gītā of course in the sixth chapter, he says that this is where you feel the happiness through the transcendental senses, not through the senses which we have.
You also can see the colors and you can hear sounds. People who go through yogic experiences they can hear amazing sounds, very beautiful sounds, sounds of the bells, sometimes sound of the flute.
You know, there is this whole branch of yoga which is called Nāda-yoga, which describes the experience of those people who can hear the sounds not by the external ears, but the sounds within. The sounds from another realm, from another realm of existence.
So and as I said, this is the second concept of happiness when you try to achieve the happiness of the soul or you try to come in contact with the soul because now you're separated by your disturbed agitated mind.
But and this is much higher, and this is much more how shall I say it? Much more holistic. Because in the attempt to achieve this happiness, you're not destroying anyone.
Cultivating inner peace and non-violence
Unfortunately, in the attempt to achieve material happiness, you inevitably will develop some hatred towards somebody else, some envy.
Because you will see somebody is enjoying his senses, and your senses are not satisfied, and you see, and you you you really feel that this is unfair. He's enjoying, and I'm not.
And you want to encroach upon his enjoyment. So people become violent.
That's basically the beginning of Bhagavad-gītā. The beginning of Bhagavad-gītā and the whole meaning of Bhagavad-gītā is that you remain violent and you will inflict sufferings and you will consequently suffer yourself because you will inflict sufferings because of this egoistic conception of happiness, because of selfishness, because of ego. You will be violent and ultimately, you will kind of attract violence in return.
You will not be satisfied, you will not be peaceful. So, the recipe of Bhagavad-gītā: become peaceful yourself, then you will know what is peace, and then you will be able to give peace.
It is said that Patanjali Muni in his Yoga Sutra he explains that those people who achieve perfection of ahimsa, and ahimsa means non-violence, when you give this vow of not inflicting pain to any living being.
Patanjali Muni says that the perfection of, if you achieved perfection in this non-violence in Ahimsa, then whoever comes in contact with you will feel completely peaceful. Even the wild animals, carnivorous animals who are eating other flesh, they will become vegetarian.
Sometimes people who become vegetarian they become so aggressive and they start aggressively preaching, everyone has to become vegetarian because you're killing innocent.
You know, somebody was complaining to me, one parent was complaining to me, his daughter became vegetarian and he said she's not eating meat but she's eating meat. That's that's what it is.
Because people are not really they're supposed to be non-violent by being vegetarians, but the violence is still there. The peace is not there.
So when you achieve this state of complete non-violence, perfect non-violence, then you will spread the peace, you will emanate the peace around you. And whoever comes in contact with you will feel very peaceful and very non-violent, and the whole problem will be solved.
There is this story about one Sufi mystic Rabia. She used to live in a cave in a mountain and all the...
and many saints in different traditions they displayed this: that the animals, the cruel animals would become very peaceful in their presence, like Serafim Sarovsky or whoever else you can take.
You know, in Indian tradition, there is plenty of these stories. Even snakes give up their envious nature in the presence of such people. So this is the second conception of happiness which is much higher.
And Bhagavad-gītā is about this, and Bhagavad-gītā is trying to explain to us what the peace is.
The peace is to achieve the peace in the soul, and for that you really have to behave a very sattvic way of life and do meditation and do yoga and do something good.
And ultimately, when you achieve the peace inside, then you will achieve peace. Any other attempts to establish peace in the world are useless. All these united nations, oh my goodness, it's such a failure.
United Nations is supposed to establish peace, but did it work? No, forget it. How you can establish peace if people are not peaceful in the heart.
Highest happiness through divine love
So Bhagavad-gītā teaches this. But as I said, there is much higher concept. Much higher concept of happiness. That is the happiness of love. Which is not even revealed in Bhagavad-gītā.
Which is the most secret understanding and this path of bhakti yoga which we are following is about this: how to achieve love.
Because love is even higher than the happiness which we achieve when we are in contact with ourselves. When we really realize our soul its greatest achievement. But not the greatest.
It's a very great achievement, very significant achievement. But the greatest achievement is is to learn how to become happy by doing, by making happy, by making somebody else happy. That's what love is.
Love is something very mysterious, the real love. The real love is that our ability to experience happiness just because we see that somebody else is happy. And ultimately, the object of our love is God.
And if we try to make Him happy, if we try to satisfy Him, if we behave in a certain way which satisfies Him, then the happiness which we achieve is much higher.
The last song which Ananda was singing is such a beautiful song. It's about this. It's about this beginning of love. Because love is something achievable.
Even though in this material world we know that love must happen with us, it's not something which we can artificially produce. You know, it's useless for me to say just love God.
Sometimes all these big preachers they say, you know, you just love Jesus. And everyone says, yeah, right. But how to love?
The amazing part of the Vedic teaching is that it systematically teaches you how to prepare yourself to achieve love. You can't achieve love yourself, it's a grace. It has to come from above.
The love, the real love, not the love, uh, not the fake love, not the false love which is there in this material world, but the real love, completely selfless love, is the energy, direct energy of God. And it's His gift.
It has to descend upon us. But the Vedic teaching, Vedas teach us how to systematically prepare ourselves and our heart for this descent, for this amazing descent of this spiritual energy upon us.
And the last song which we have heard and sang, it's actually about this. We all know this last song is about complete surrender. We all know this situation in our life when we feel completely helpless.
Like in this story which is being described when she is being disrobed in front of many powerful people, men, males. She is about to be dishonored in front of everyone.
Can you imagine the horrible condition and the state of her mind in this in this situation? And she naturally tries to protect herself.
As we all would do if we were in her place, she's trying to somehow rather protect herself from this horrible event. But then ultimately she realizes it doesn't work.
And in this situation she does what we are all supposed to do ultimately if we want to achieve the highest experience in life. She just raises both of her hands in the air and starts crying for God's mercy.
Completely, totally fixed in this desire. I don't need anything else. And even before she gets the mercy, she gets the amazing feeling of happiness and protection.
Because this act in itself, this act of surrender, this act of understanding that I am dependent on God in all situations of life, that I need his protection, his shelter. This act in itself is the beginning of love.
And when we do this, when we are in this state of helplessness and we are crying for help from God, understanding that we are completely dependent on His mercy, we feel satisfaction and He is very satisfied, and immediately he will reciprocate. His reciprocation will not fail.
Many, many people experience this. When they have this desperate attempt to really surrender themselves, to really surrender their so-called freedom and their so-called independence.
You know, the problem in this material world is that we all feel independent.
But if we voluntarily surrender our independence and say, you know, I'm dependent on you, I'm yours, I belong to you, if we admit this reality, which is reality, it's nothing special. It's just a fact.
We're dependent on God. We're dependent on everything. He gives us food, He gives us air, He gives us everything. He gave us this body, he gave us this mind.
If we admit this fact, if we are honest enough and grateful enough to admit that we are not independent, we are dependent on Him, and we sincerely pray for this connection. Then we feel the connection.
And through this connection we feel immense happiness. Because this is what we're all hankering for. We're all hankering for this connection with God.
And He is the complete source of happiness, complete source of bliss. And when the connection is established, and connection in Sanskrit is called yoga, when this yoga or connection is established, then through this connection, through this and through this beautiful channel, we'll get immense surge of happiness.
Practical process of Bhakti yoga
Immense, we are overwhelmed by His happiness. His happiness is coming upon us. And of course, as I said, there is a systematic discipline to prepare ourselves. We have to really prepare our heart towards this experience.
But really, we have to understand that ultimately this is the highest goal, highest possible goal in human endeavors. The highest possible goal in human endeavors not to become, you know, not to fill up our belly.
The highest goal of human endeavors, not even to get somebody's love, but the highest goal of human endeavors to give love to God and
to feel His reciprocal love. The love which is coming in return to our feeble endeavor to satisfy Him. And this is the whole science. And this science is called bhakti-yoga. This is a beautiful science.
And Śrīla Prabhupāda, the founder of our movement, he would say that this is not religion, this is science. This is very scientific, it's not sectarian. It's not that we are promoting some sort of Hindu God called
Krishna, you know, there's this funny Hindu God Krishna. No, it's not Hindu God. It's God. But he's called Krishna because he's attractive. And ultimately, that's the definition of God. He's attractive.
We all feel something missing in our life. And we all feel that our heart is somewhat empty. So therefore he's called Krishna. But ultimately, again, as I said, that's a scientific approach towards spirituality.
How to realize the spiritual nature of ourselves, and how to realize the spiritual nature of the whole universe, of whom God is the ultimate source.
How to realize the spiritual nature of existence, not only our own existence, little individual existence, but the complete existence of this world. And that's this discipline is called Bhakti Yoga.
The scientific process of connecting our individual consciousness, the spark of spiritual fire with the original fire. As we know, we all want to come back to our origin.
The little baby, he's attached to mother. Why? He's not attached to father. Little baby is never attached to father.
Especially if you take, for example, take little calf. Calf doesn't even know who is his father. But he knows perfectly well his cow mother.
And he is very attached to mother because he wants to be connected with the source. The fire is going up. Why the fire is going up? Because the source of the fire is what? Sun. The water is flowing down.
Why is the water flowing down? Because the source of the water is the ocean.
And in the similar way, the spark of consciousness, which is our soul, wants to achieve its source, the original source of consciousness, which is called God.
This desire to be connected with God is there, and it's very strong, and because of this desire, there are so many different processes, and ultimately the success of these processes is only when the connection is established.
And the connection of our individual soul with the supreme soul, complete soul, absolute truth called God is established. And then all our desires are fulfilled. We're filled with love.
And this state is not static, it's dynamic.
Ultimate secret of Vedic teachings
It's a very amazing state of existence and the ultimate goal of our endeavors. And that's what the ultimate teachings of the Vedas are. The Vedas teach so many good things: Yoga, Ayurveda, astrology,
you know, through astrology you can know your future. Well, you know, we all know we will die, so that's the ultimate astrology. But everyone is interested when. Ultimately it's not so important.
And you know as far as Ayurveda or health is concerned, it's nice, it's fine, it's good, it's very holistic. But we all know ultimately it's hopeless because the body will be sick one way or another.
And one way it will be imbalanced. So no matter how much you try the balance.
But as I said, with all these good things which are there in Vedic culture, important things, yoga is important, Ayurveda is very important, astrology is very important.
But the most important gift of Vedic culture is this understanding of pure love. And how to achieve this love. Not by your own endeavor, but by attracting the mercy of God, the grace of God. How to behave and to live in this world to attract the mercy of God.
That's the ultimate secret of Vedic teaching. And that's the ultimate state of happiness which we can achieve. And that's why we are in this Vedic society trying to achieve peace and love.
And as I said, peace is the preliminary. But when you achieve love, you achieve everything. You achieve peace, it's all included, all in one.
You know, you achieve the satisfaction of your senses, you become happy on the physical level, you become very balanced in your physical approach, and you are not so you know, you you will not overdo over it or whatever. You will become emotionally very satisfied.
You will have peace in your soul, being
in contact with the soul, but much more than this, you will feel the grace of God upon you, and that's the greatest achievement and the greatest happiness and the most secret teaching of the Vedas. So thank you very much.