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Harih Om Tat Sat. Jai Guru. Jai Guru.
I sometimes wonder as to how many people really think about what they are, what their personality is, and how to refine the way of life that they are living. As I mentioned last night, our entire life is an interaction between oneself and the rest of the world. These interactions proceed from oneself and that too from the mind. Mind is the sole focus of our life. But the mind is invisible. It is not a physical part of the physical body. Because the body is consisting of matter and energy, both of them do not have the power to feel, think, understand, memorize and all that. But mind is doing all this. So you cannot call it a material component of the body. It is with the body, no doubt, associated with the body and we feel the presence of the mind. The mind itself makes itself felt. Besides this we cannot say anything about it. That is our problem.
How to bring about improvements and refinement in the mind is a question that nobody takes up. This is where all our religious thoughts, practices and values and ideals become indispensable. Though the entire religion is related to God, 'God is not pleased, He will be pleased, He wants you to be like this, you should go to Him, He should come to you', we are all speaking in the language of God relating our propositions to God. But in reality, you keep away God, even then these propositions are good. God will be pleased when you behave in this manner. So the focus is on God or on your behavior? God will be pleased when the devotee’s mind is pure. You cannot do anything with God, but you can do everything with your mind to make it pure. So the focus is on the mind.
How to bring about improvement and refinement in the mind, if you ask me, that is why we have all these chanting exercises. Imagine the Vedic followers, they only used the Vedas for their entire life. They learnt the Vedas. Learning the Vedas means learning to recite or utter them. Once they have learnt until their tongue is cut, the words and pronunciations will never be different. So much of implanting they do into themselves. No word will come out of the mouth unless the mind propels it. Though it is uttering, uttering with the tongue and mouth, in reality it is imprinting the mind with what you utter. So you have to use this sound in order to touch and involve the mind and improve it. That is why the recitation becomes very important. But in the recitation what I find is that after some time it becomes automatic, repetitive and monotonous.
bhūtakṛdbhūtabhṛdbhāvō bhūtātmā bhūtabhāvanaḥ || 1 ||
{Swamiji chants the slokas very fast}
Even without your intention the chanting will go on. When it comes to that stage, that is where you should shift to the recitation or your attention from the oral recitation to the mind level. This is where I say.
viśvaṁ viṣṇurvaṣaṭkārō bhūtabhavyabhavatprabhuḥ
You should listen to your voice. While listening to your voice, apart from uttering with the tongue, your ear gets employed. So there is a double focus.
viśvaṁ viṣṇurvaṣaṭkārō bhūtabhavyabhavatprabhuḥ
Listen to and make sure that the pronunciation is what you want, it is perfect. How will you know it? You know the letters, they have to be pronounced by the tongue, heard by the ear. Using your intelligence understand what are the letters you see and what are the letters, sounds that come from your mouth. Compare and contrast them, verify them, examine them and till you are satisfied, pay attention to the voice, correct it, correct it, correct it. You will find, if the attention is lacking or it slackens you will find, you won’t get the pronunciation you want. It requires maximum attention. Attention means mind-involvement.
Then if you can also bring using your intelligence the ideas, the ideas contained in the word. Viśvaṁ : means the universe. We are uttering the names of Lord Vishnu thinking that he is somewhere. But the first word says he is “Viśvaṁ : The Universe”. Don’t look for God in any temple and don’t look at an idol or a picture alone. Understand that the God whom you are praising, Vishnu, is the whole universe. As is an idol, so should become the earth, so should become the water, the air, the sky, the different stars, heavenly bodies and the space. So should become a creeper, a reptile, a bee, a fly, bug, everything. Everything should become, everything should become that Vishnu. So the word “Viśva” conveys a great deal of meaning.
“Viśvaṁ Viśvaṁ Viśvaṁ Viśvaṁ Viśvaṁ Viśvaṁ”. See whether the idea of Vishnu comes to your utterance when you hear it. So Vishnu should come to your eardrum, he should come to your tongue, he should come to your mind, the word ‘Viśvaṁ’ should suggest you no more anything else but Lord himself and the word 'Viśva' covers the entire range of universe. So your Vishnu, by uttering this word becomes all-pervading and omnipresent, encircling you on the one hand and in-filling you on the other.
Now you are using this word, utterance, for this wholesome, wholesome realization and expanse. My dear souls, if only you will use your utterance. I can devotionally explain, let your own voice be the offer to the Lord. We generally get materials from the market, cook them in the kitchen and hot food is offered to God. Does he ever take it? Have you ever found God taking the food you have given? You say, “I have given”. And then you eat it yourself. It is never taken by God. Now things bought from the market, cooked in your kitchen, offered to God and taken back from you, compared to that, in the living hot body if you can generate your voice and offer this voice to God, that will be far better. Only a living body can speak and utter, so use the heat in the body, the vocal system in the body, produce different words, praises, explanations etc. and offer them to God. You know, the sound will not stay in the atmosphere. As you utter, it disappears. So if you start offering your voice, God will have to be very alert and attentive to come to where you are uttering and receive it. So it becomes a compulsion for you and it becomes a great opportunity for you. This is one religious and devotional way of explaining. Offer it to God.
But I will go a step further and then say, “Listen to your word, make sure it is alright and also associate the meaning; the word gives you in the form of an import.” So to produce the sound, the mind is employed, the vocal system is employed to produce it, the ear is used to hear it, the mind and the intelligence are further employed to verify the sound and associate the meaning. How many different applications from your own personality are involved? If you do so well, the whole process will make you ecstatic, ecstatic inwardly, wholesome, pure and sublime. How blessed are the human beings if they realize this and use their voice and attention to become purer and more and more wholesome and sublime!
Harih Om Tat Sat. Jai Guru. Jai Guru.