Krishna Goes to the West

Question 1:

Nothing in existence perishes, nor does anything new come into being. Forms change, appearances change, but the deepest mysteries of life remain ever the same. Individuals come and go, waves in the ocean rise and disappear, but that which is hidden in the individual, in the wave is eternal.

We have to look at Krishna in two different ways, and then we can look at ourselves in the same way. We exist at two levels - one at the level of waves and another at the level of the ocean. As waves we are individual human beings, and as the ocean we are the supreme being.

Krishna's physical form, his voice, his music are like the waves. His soul, hidden inside the body is like the ocean. Waves come and go, but the ocean Is everlasting. While the forms of existence change, its soul, the spirit which abides in its elan vital is deathless. eternal. The spirit was there even when Krishna was not born and it is there when he is no more. It was there before your birth and it will be there even after your death. Krishna was like a wave that arose from the ocean, danced for a while with the winds, and disappeared again in the same ocean.

All of us are like Krishna, but there is a small difference. When Krishna is dancing as a wave he is aware that he belongs to the ocean, he is the ocean itself. But as far as we are concerned we know ourselves only as waves; we forget that we are the ocean. This is the difference between us and Krishna. And since we know ourselves only as waves, we fail to understand the oceanic form of Krishna.

Krishna's physical body, his picture and statue can be used to come in contact with his soul. But it is just a play that belongs to the world of appearances. And to understand it we have to approach it from two or three sides.

Even today we can make contact with the oceanic form of Krishna - his soul. In the same way we can come in contact with the souls of Mahavira and Bud&a. And to contact the essential Krishna we can make use of his physical form as a medium, an instrument.

When statues of men like Krishna were first made, they were not meant for worship. In fact, these statues came in the wake of an esoteric science which has become almost extinct. Before leaving their physical forms, the awakened ones had given a promise and a technique to their lovers, their disciples, that they could contact their oceanic life by meditating on unconscious mind that whenever you repeat the process he will go into sleep, and then his unconscious mind will begin to operate on him.

The power of our unconscious mind is enormous; what we cannot do in our conscious state we can do with the help of the unconscious mind. Man's unconscious mind is much more sensitive than his conscious. What we cannot hear in the conscious state becomes audible to the unconscious. In deep hypnotic sleep you can see things you can never see while awake. It is not the talisman, but the post hypnotic suggestion associated with it that works.

If a person like Krishna, Buddha or Christ is about to leave this world and some of his close lovers or disciples who have been in intimate contact with him, who have imbibed his vibes, request some techniques to contact him after his departure, the master in his compassion can give them such a technique. He can ask them to go into a state of meditation and then tell them that whenever they will meditate on a particular form of his - through a statue or a picture - they will immediately contact him even after his death. This is the esoteric science for which statues of Krishna, Buddha and others like them were first made.

These statues and symbols were specially given to chosen disciples in a meditative state. So your ordinary statues are not going to work, nor can ordinary seekers come in contact with them through these statues. To establish contact with Krishna one will need to have a special symbol and an inner suggestion given to him in his meditative state.

Before persons like Buddha, Mahavira and Krishna, depart from this earth, they leave such techniques and instructions with their most trusted group of disciples; those who are worthy of it.

This generation of disciples takes full advantage of this special transmission. And if this generation passes it on to a second generation of disciples, it can work their statues. It was for this purpose that their statues were first made.

To explain this esoteric science I would like you to know something about hypnosis. You must have watched a magician demonstrating his magical plays by the wayside. One of these plays is like this.

He makes a boy, who happens to be his assistant, lie down on the ground, and covers him with a piece of thick cloth. Then he puts a talisman on his chest which sends the boy into hypnotic sleep.

He then asks him many strange questions, and to the amaze ment of the spectators the sleeping boy answers them The magician then moves to one of the spectators and asks him to whisper his name into his ear. The spectator whispers his name so that even the person next to him can hardly hear It, but the sleeping boy immediately relays his name to the whole gathering. The magician moves to another spectator who happens to have currency in his pocket. He asks the boy to tell the note's number, and he shouts out the exact number. This casts a spell on the gathering, and then the magician tells them it is the power of the talisman that works through his sleeping aide. And he sells a few talismans - which are his only source of earning.

The magician uses hypnosis here, but he lies when he says that it is the power of the talisman. So when you take the talisman home and try it you meet with disappointment. The talisman is absolutely useless, except that it brings the magician some money. The magic really lies in hypnosis. In this case, it is post-hypnosis.

There is a simple technique for post-hypnosis. You put a person into hypnotic sleep through suggestions, and it is a very simple thing to do. After he goes into sleep - which is different from ordinary sleep - you ask him to look closely at the talisman and then tell him that whenever this talisman is put on his chest while he is lying down, he will go into sleep. This suggestion will sink so deep in the person's with them as well. But with the passage of time usually the science, the technique is lost and only statues and their rituals remain in the hands of succeeding generations.

Then it turns into a dead and fossilized tradition without any significance.

Now whatever you do sitting before a statue of Krishna, nothing is going to happen. Now no rituals are worthwhile, they are a sheer waste of time and energy. It is as if you buy a talisman from a street magician and it does not work, because you don't have the necessary technique - the post-hypnotic suggestion with you.

As I said, a statue, an icon works as an esoteric bridge between the disciple and his departed master's soul, his spirit. In the same way an awakened master's name can be used as an esoteric bridge, provided the name is received in a meditative state. Now any number of gurus are going about whispering name-bearing mantras into their disciples' ears, which is of absolutely no use.

It is not a matter of whispering a name in one's ear; that is just stupid. If a competent master transmits a symbolic word to his disciple, who is in a meditative state, the word becomes alive with esoteric energy. And when the disciple remembers it rightly, chants it, his whole consciousness is transformed. Such words are called beej shabda or seed words, and they are packed with something subtle, sublime.

If Krishna's name is really your seed word, it means that it has been sown in the innermost depth of your psyche when you were in a meditative state and that the necessary suggestions have been associated with it. Remember, a seed is always sown in such a way - it lies underground for a while and then alone it sprouts and grows into a tree, which is always above the ground. Such words are pregnant with immense possibilities. Because of such a seed word Ramakrishna was often put into any number of troubles. It became difficult for him to pass through a street without going through such troubles.

Once he was going somewhere and on the way someone greeted him with the words, "Jai Rama"

- meaning victory to Rama - and he immediately fell down and passed into samadhi, the highest state of meditation. At another time he visited a temple where devotees were chanting the name of Rama, and he again sank into deep samadhi. Rama's name was like a seed word for him; it was enough to transform his consciousness.

Since it will be difficult for you to understand the case of Ramakrishna, I will explain it to you in your own framework. There are situations which work like seed words for many people. Hearing some bad news, someone becomes worried and immediately puts his hand on his forehead. If you prevent him from taking his hand to his head, he will become restless. Another person sits up in a particular posture the moment he is faced with a serious problem. He will be in chaos if you prevent him from sitting in that posture.

Mr. Harisingh Gaud, a renowned lawyer of his time, has mentioned an extraordinary episode in his memoirs. He was once arguing a case before the Privy Council in London. He had a strange habit.

whenever he was faced with a complex and difficult point of law and he needed some inspiration to help argue his case rightly, his hand almost instinctively reached for the top button of his coat and turned it right and left, and soon he got on very nicely. Those who had worked with him in the legal profession knew that as soon as Dr. Gaud started turning his coat button his argument took on a new and powerful thrust. Then he was unbeatable. It was a big case, and the lawyer on the opposite side was smarting under the power of Mr. Gaud's arguments. So he bribed Gaud's chauffeur, asking him to remove the top button of his master's coat before he came to the court the following day.

The next day Dr. Gaud was going to conclude his case. When he was proceeding before the court with his argument, a moment came when his hand automatically moved to his coat button. He was shocked to find the button was missing. Dr. Gaud could not proceed any further, he just collapsed into his chair. He later wrote in his diary that for the first time in his life, to his chagrin, his brain stopped functioning and he found himself in a vacuum. He then requested the court to adjourn the hearing until the following day on the plea that he had no energy left to proceed further.

It seems strange that a little button had so much power over the mind of a mighty lawyer. This is what psychological association does. If a mind is used to being activated by the touch of a button, it is bound to fail if the button is not available to it. This syndrome is known as conditioned reflex in psychology.

In this same way a name, or a seed word, or a mantra can be used. Like Dr. Gaud's button - which for him was not just an ordinary coat button but a powerful lever to turn his mind on and off - a name can be used to transform your consciousness. But an empty word won't do; it has to he charged with a master's energy; it must be a seed word. A seed word is one that is implanted in the innermost depth of your unconscious in such a way that its very remembrance can bring about a mutation in you.

The names of men like Krishna and Buddha and many other words and mantras have been used for this purpose. But now people are repeating them meaninglessly. You repeat "Rama, Rama" a thousand times and it doesn't work. If it were a seed word it would work at the first chanting. And it is not necessary that only names like Rama and Krishna can be used; any word can be transformed into a seed word and implanted in the depth of your unconscious. But unless a word or a mantra is charged with meditative energy, it won't work as a transforming factor in your life. The difficulty is that very often the basic know how is lost and we are left with empty words and superficial rituals.

Day in and day out someone is chanting "Rama, Rama", and another is chanting "Krishna, Krishna"

and nothing happens. Do what you can till the end of time, nothing will happen.

You also want to know what kirtan, or singing hymns of praise to Krishna can do to enhance devotion.

It can do a lot if we do it rightly. The way we are doing the second stage of Dynamic Meditation can be used for singing or dancing as well. It has been used in the past by those who knew its real meaning. Those who don't know the real meaning just dance and shout - which is a waste of time. If kirtan can be done in the way of the second stage of the Dynamic Meditation, it can be of tremendous help.

If you can dance with abandon, you will begin to see yourself and your body as separate from each other. Soon you will cease to be a dancer; instead you will become a watcher, a witness. When your body will be dancing totally, a moment will come when you will suddenly find that you are completely separate from the dance.

In the past many devices were designed to bring about this separation between a seeker and his body, and singing and dancing was one such device. You can dance in such a way and with such abandon that a moment comes when you break away from dancing and clearly see yourself standing separate from the dance. Although your body will continue to dance, you will be quite separate from it as a spectator watching the dance. It will seem as if the axle has separated itself from the wheel which continues to keep moving - as if the axle has come to know that it is an axle and that which is moving is the wheel, although separate from it.

Dancing can be seen in the same way as a wheel. If the wheel moves with speed, a moment comes when it is seen distinctly separate from the axle. It is interesting that when the wheel is unmoving you cannot see it as separate from the axle, but when it moves you can clearly see them as two separate entities. You can know by contrast which is moving and which is not.

Let someone dance and let him bring all his energy to it, and soon he will find there is someone inside him who is not dancing, who is utterly steady and still. That is his axle, his center. That which is dancing is his circumference, his body, and he himself is the center. If one can be a witness in this great moment then kirtan has great significance. But if he continues to dance without witnessing it, he will only waste his time and energy.

Techniques and devices come into being and then they are lost. And they are lost for the simple reason that man as he is tends to forget the essential and hold on to the non-essential, the shadow.

The truth is that while the essential remains hidden and invisible like the roots of a tree, the non- essential, the trunk of the tree is visible. The non-essential is like our clothes, and the essential is like our soul. And we are liable to forget that which is subtle and invisible and remember the gross, the visible. It is for this reason when someone comes to me to know if kirtan can be useful, I emphatically deny it and ask him not to indulge in it. I know that now it is a dead tradition, a corpse without soul, as if the axle has disappeared and only the wheel remains.

Question 2:

No, Chaitanya achieved the highest through singing and dancing. He achieved through dancing exactly what Mahavira and Buddha achieved through meditation, through stillness.

There are two ways to come to the axle, the center, the supreme. One of the ways lies in your being so steady and still - just at a standstill - that there is not a trace of trembling in you and you arrive at the center. The other way is just the contrary: you get into such terrific motion that the wheel runs at top speed and the axle becomes visible and knowable. And this second way is easier than the first.

It is easy to know the axle if the wheel is in motion. While Mahavira comes to know it through stillness, through meditation, Krishna knows it through dancing. And Chaitanya surpasses even Krishna in dancing; his dance is magnificent, incomparable. Perhaps no other person on this earth danced as much as Chaitanya. In this connection it is good to bear in mind that man has both a circumference and a center, and while his circumference - the body - is always moving and changing, his center - his soul - is still and quiet, it is eternal. And the question of questions is how to come to this unchanging, eternal center.

The second stage of the meditation that we are having here in the camp schedule, is a device and an attempt to bring about that stillness and silence through motion and restlessness. I am not using kirtan because the word kirtan has become too much loaded and obsolete in this sense; it has lost its original meaning. Words like money lose their value through too much use - too much wear and tear - and they go out of usage, and a time comes when they have to be replaced by new words.

That is why you will often find it difficult to understand me because I am doing the same thing, I am minting new devices for the old ones which have become out-of-date. It is in the very nature of things: they are born, they grow into youth and have vigor and vitality, and then they grow old and die. The old coins are so worn out that one cannot say if they are coins or junk. Therefore, every time we have to begin from the beginning, and we do so with the awareness that again these new coins too will wear out through long usage and become antiquated, and again someone will have to declare them trash and mint anew.

Ironically we have to fight with the very things for which we live; we condemn the old coins and manufacture new ones in their place so the great work they are meant for gets going as ever. We oppose and fight old and worn out devices and fashion new ones in their place so that the dead ones go out of use and new ones take their place, and their great work comes alive once again. But through long association you get so attached to the old ones that it feels very painful to give them up. And then the fear of the new comes in your way of accepting the new devices, new techniques - you become resistant to them.

This is what happens with religion every now and then. Religion that is alive and dynamic at the time of its birth grows old and dies, but we refuse to part with them, we carry their dead bodies on our backs and get crushed under their dead weight. But whether you like it or not they have to be buried or cremated and a new alive religion has to take their place and keep the wheel moving.

Kirtan, singing and dancing can play a great and unique role in spiritual growth. But the difficulty is that if I ask you to use it you will take it to be the same old kirtan that you are familiar with, and your mind will think that you already know it. And this is what makes me wary; what your mind thinks is right can never be right, because mind itself is wrong. Therefore I cannot support the kirtan that you know and do; if it was right you need not have come here. You are not right; with all your singing and dancing in the old way you have not reached anywhere. So say goodbye and forget it.

When I speak about kirtan I mean the kirtan in its pristine form, which was used to separate you from your body and settle you at your center. I speak about the significance of names and statues in the same sense. I have nothing to do with statues that adorn your temples and houses; I am consigning them to the dustbin. They are no longer of any use. This does not mean they never had any significance. They had, but it is gone. The truth is that because they original!y had great significance we continue to carry them thousands of years after they have lost their meaning. The fact that man persists with them long after they have ceased to be useful shows that the memory of their past significance lies buried deep in the recesses of his unconscious. Otherwise it would not have been possible for us to live under their dead weight for so long.

If you treasure some trash, it simply means you once had a glimpse of a diamond hidden behind it.

If a wrong custom perpetuates itself, it means sometime in the past it embodied some truth which now is no more. That is why many outdated names and mantras and statues are still in vogue.

Question 3:

It is going to fit for sure. Among the lovers of Krishna, Chaitanya's name is the most outstanding.

In the term achintya bhedabhedavad, the word achintya - which means the unthinkable is precious.

Those who know through thought will say that either matter and spirit are separate or they are one and the same. Chaitanya says they are both one and separate. For example, the wave is both one with and separate from the ocean at the same time. And he is right. The wave is separate from the ocean, and so we call it by a different name - the wave. And it is virtually one with the ocean, because it cannot be without it, it comes from it. Therefore the wave is both separate and inseparable from the ocean.

But all this is within the realm of thinking; one can mentally think out that the wave and ocean are different and the same together. But Chaitanya adds another word to it, another dimension - that is achintya or unthinkable. And this word is very significant. He says that if you come to know through thinking that the world and God, matter and spirit are both separate and inseparable, this realization is worth nothing. Then it is nothing more than an idea, a concept, a theory. But when a seeker comes to it without thinking, without word, when he realizes it in a state of no-mind, beyond thought, then it is his experience. Then it is worthwhile; it is real, and great.

It is good to go into this question of thinking and that which is beyond thinking. What we know through thought is Known only in words and concepts. And what we know by living it, by experiencing it, is a realization beyond words. This is what Chaitanya means by calling it the unthinkable; it is beyond mind, beyond word and thought.

Someone wants to know what love is and he reads huge scriptures on love. Perhaps on no other topic has so much been written as pundits have written on love. There is a huge amount of literature on love in the form of poetry and epics and philosophical treatises. He will become knowledgeable about love, he can write great treatises on love, yet in reality he will not actually know what love is.

There is another person who has not read a word about love, but has experienced it, lived it. What is the difference between this man and the one who has gone through a huge pile of literature on love?

This man knows love through experiencing; the other man knows it through words and concepts.

Experiencing is always unthinkable, it does not happen through thinking; in fact, it happens before thinking. Experience precedes thought, and thought follows experience. Experience comes first and thought follows it by way of its expression.

That is why Chaitanya says that unity and separateness of the world and God is beyond thought.

When Chaitanya says this is unthinkable, he means much more than what meets the eye. Meera will say it is unthinkable, but she was never given to serious thinking - she was through and through a woman of feelings. But as far as Chaitanya is concerned, he was a great logician, renowned for his sharp mind and brilliant logic. He had scaled the highest peaks of thinking. Pundits were afraid of entering into argument with him. He was incomparable as a debater; he had won laurel after laurel in philosophical discussions.

Such a rational intellect, who had indulged in hair splitting interpretations of words and concepts throughout his life, was one day found singing and dancing through the streets of Navadeep. Meera, on the other hand, had never indulged in pedantry and scriptures; she had nothing to do with logic.

She was a loving woman; love was in her blood and bones. So it was no wonder when she walked through the streets of Merta with a tanpoora in her hands, dancing and singing hymns of love. It was just natural. But Chaitanya was her opposite; he was not a man of love, and he turned to love and devotion - which was a miracle. This one-hundred-and-eighty-degree turn in his life demonstrates the victory of love over logic. He had defeated all his contemporaries with his logic, but when he came to himself he found it to be a self-defeating discipline. He came to a point where the mind lost and life and love won. Beyond this point one can only go with life and love.

That is why I said that among people who walked the path of Krishna, Chaitanya is simply extraordinary, incomparable. When I say so I am aware of Meera, who loves Krishna tremendously.

But she does not come near Chaitanya. It is unthinkable how a tremendously logical mind like Chaitanya could come down from his ivory tower, take a drum in his hands, and dance and sing in the market place. Can you think of Bertrand Russell dancing through the streets of London?

Chaitanya was like Russell - out and out intellectual. And for this reason his statement becomes immensely significant. He makes his statement that reality is unthinkable not with words, but with a drum in his hands - dancing and singing through the streets of his town, where he was held in great respect for his superb scholarship. It is in this way that he renounces mind, renounces thinking and declares that, "Reality is beyond thought, it is unthinkable."

Chaitanya's case demonstrates that they alone can transcend thinking who first enter into the very depth of thinking and explore it through and through. Then they are bound to come to a point where think ing ends and the unthinkable begins. This last frontier of mind is where a statement like this is born. That is why Chaitanya's statement has gathered immense significance; it comes after he crosses the last frontier of mentation. Meera never walked on that path; she came to love straight away. She cannot have the profundity of Chaitanya.

Question 4:

This event has deeper implications.

The movement for Krishna Consciousness is growing fast in America and Europe. Like the villages of Bengal of Chaitanya's days, the streets of New York and London today are resounding with God's songs. And this is not accidental.

The whole of the West today has collectively reached a point where Chaitanya had once reached individually. It is the same last frontier of mind and intellect, where Chaitanya absolutely tired of thinking and realized that it leads nowhere. In the same way the West is now tired of thinking. From Socrates to Bertrand Russell, the West has long tried to find truth through thinking. It was a great and unique adventure to search for reality through reason and logic, and the West has consecrated all its energy to this quest. The West has always refused to accept that truth is beyond the boundary of intellect and reason, that reality is illogical and unthinkable. It has trusted only mind and intellect.

For twenty-five hundred years the West has traveled the path of intellect with dedication, and yet failed to have a glimpse of reality. Many times its great minds felt reality was within reach, but it continued to elude them. Each time they had only ideas and concepts in their hand, not truth. And now the whole of the West feels fed up with mentation.

Today the collective consciousness of the West is exactly where Chaitanya had found himself individually a few centuries ago. It is now on the brink of an explosion, a transformation which is every day coming closer. The first flowers of spring have already blossomed and new winds are blowing. Cracks have appeared in the old order and the young generation is rebelling against old ways and decaying values - against tradition itself. And they are now turning their ears to the music and message of that which is unthinkable the mysterious.

And if the West has to go in the direction of the mysterious, Krishna is going to be its hero. He is the best representative of the truth that is beyond mind and its logic, that is mysterious. Mahavira and Buddha cannot serve that purpose. Mahavira is very logical; even when he speaks about the mysterious he uses the language of logic and reason; he sticks to the process of consistent and logical thinking. As far as Buddha is concerned, he persistently refuses to speak about the mysterious whenever he is asked about it. He just says it is inexplicable. He goes only as far as logic, not beyond.

The mental stress and tension the West is suffering from today is the direct result of too much thinking. The anxiety and anguish of the West comes from thinking stretched to its ultimate; it is suffering under the crushing weight of the mind. Consequently the younger generation is in revolt.

And it is natural that when a whole generation rebels it does so in many different ways. On their journey to the unthinkable, some are singing "Hare Krishna, Hare Rama" and many others are taking drugs like LSD and mescaline. The same people are now traveling across India and wandering through the Himalayan mountains. In the search of the achintya, the unthinkable, they will go to Japan and squat in its Zen monasteries. The quest is the same all over.

In its search for the mysterious, it seems the western world will be coming increasingly close to Krishna. LSD cannot take them far; travels to India and Japan are not going to last long. Eventually they will have to discover their own consciousness, their own soul; they cannot live long on credit.

That is why their boys and girls are restless chanting "Hare Krishna" in the streets of New York, London and Berlin.

It is remarkable that when young men and young women of the West dance and do kirtan, they do it with an abandon and joy that cannot be found anywhere in India today. Go round this country where kirtan has been in vogue for centuries and you will nowhere come across that enthusiasm and joy among people who do kirtan here. For us it is a well-traveled road, a routine. For us the kirtan is now a worn out coin; we know it is worthless. For the westerners it is a new coin which is valuable. When a group passes through the streets of London singing and dancing, even the traffic police watch them in amazement. They think their youth are going crazy. No one in India will think like that; here it is an accepted ritual.

But remember, real religion is run by mad people, it is not the job of the so-called wise. Whenever and wherever a breakthrough happens it always happens with the help of those who are called crazy by their contemporaries. Now singing and dancing is not thought to be strange in India. It was considered strange when Chaitanya danced through the towns and villages of Bengal; people thought he had gone out of his mind. But tradition sucks down everything that comes its way and puts it in its closet. Even madness is tamed by tradition.

The West is on the brink of an explosion, a breakthrough, a revolution. That is why when young people in the West move through the streets dancing and singing, there is a newness and simplicity, beauty and charm in their performance. Certainly it is a preparation, but not for Krishna's birth; it s a preparation for the birth of Krishna consciousness in the West.

Krishna consciousness has nothing to do with Krishna. It is a symbolic term which means that now a consciousness is dawning in the West which will make them give up work and embrace celebration as their way of life. It is just symbolic. Work has become meaningless. The West has done plenty of hard work and hard thinking; it has done everything that man is capable of doing, and now it is tired, utterly tired of all that. Either the West will have to die or it will enter into Krishna consciousness.

These are the two choices before the West. And since death is not possible, because nothing really dies, Krishna consciousness is inescapable.

Christ has ceased to be relevant for the West, and the reason is again tradition. For the West, Christ symbolizes tradition and Krishna represents anti-tradition. Christ is an imposition on them and Krishna is their free choice. And then Christ is very serious, and the West is fed up with seriousness. Too much seriousness turns into a disease ultimately. So the West is trying hard to get rid of its seriousness; the cross has proved much too heavy on its soul. Jesus hanging on the cross seems dreadful, and the West in its heart feels disturbed, uneasy with it. So the cross is being taken down and the flute ushered in. And what can be a better substitute for the cross than the flute?

For these reasons Krishna's appeal to the West is growing, and it will continue to grow. Every day it is going to come nearer and nearer to Krishna.

There are some other reasons for Krishna's incursion into the West. Only an affluent society can gather around Krishna; a poor society cannot afford him. A society steeped in poverty and misery cannot have that leisure and ease so necessary to dance and play a flute. The society in which Krishna was born was highly prosperous in its own way. There was no lack of food, clothes and other necessities of life; milk and yogurt and butter were available in abundance - so much that when Krishna wanted to play pranks with his numerous girlfriends, who were milkmaids, he went on breaking their containers full of milk and yogurt.

Judging by the standard of living of his time, Krishna's society was at the peak of affluence. People were happy, they had plenty of leisure; a whole family lived well on the earnings of one of its members. It is only in such a society that flute and raas and celebration take center stage. The West today is at that height of affluence which the world has never known before. It is not surprising that Krishna has such a great pull on the western mind.

Ironically, Krishna no longer has any appeal for the present day India, ravaged by poverty, squalor and disease. She will have to wait long to deserve him. At the moment Christ has more attraction for this country. It is natural that a country hanging on the cross should think of Christ as the right person to alleviate their pain and suffering. That is why a striking and unexpected event is taking place: Jesus' influence in India is growing every day, while it is declining in the West. And it is not enough just to say that Christian missionaries are proselytizing Indians through devious and questionable means. What is equally true is that the Christian symbol of the cross comes closest to the agonized mind of this country. It is because of this affinity between the two that the missionaries are succeeding here in their efforts.

On the other hand the golden statues of Rama and Krishna, symbolizing royalty and richness are becoming out of tune with the poverty stricken people of this country. The day is not far off when the poor of India will not only mount an assault on the rich but also on the statues of Krishna and Rama.

It is just possible, because they can no longer put up with their glittering gold. And they are going to fall in love with Christ on the cross, symbolizing their pain and misery. The possibility of India turning to Christ and of the West turning to Krishna is growing every day.

For the western mind the cross has lost its significance, because people there are no longer in suffering and pain; they have everything they ever longed for. The truth is that now their only pain is that which stems from affluence. Their affluence is frightening; they don't know what to do with it.

Now for certain a singing and dancing religion is going to be very close to the western heart. So it is not surprising that youth in the West are chanting Krishna's name with great enthusiasm.

Question 5:

No, I did not say that no one was poor in Krishna's time, or that no one is poor in the present-day West. There are poor people in the West, but their society as a whole is affluent. In the same way, although poor men like Sudama existed in Krishna's time, his society was very prosperous. A poor society is one thing; the existence of a handful of poor people in a rich society is different. The Indian society today is definitely poor, although there are Tatas and Birlas among us. The presence of Tatas and Birlas does not make the society affluent. Similarly, in spite of the Sudamas, Krishna's society was prosperous and rich.

The question is whether a society on the whole is rich or poor. There are rich people even in an utterly poor society like India's, and similarly there are poor people in the very affluent society of America. The society of Krishna's time was rich; good things of life were available to the vast majority of people. The same is true in today's American society. And only an affluent society can afford celebration; a poor society cannot.

As a society sinks into poverty it ceases to he celebrative, to be joyous. Not that there are no festivals in a poor society, but those festivals are lack-luster, as good as dead. When the Festival of Lights - Diwali - comes here, the poor have to borrow money to celebrate it. They save their worn out clothes for Holi - the Festival of Colors. Is this the way to celebrate a festival like Holi? In the past, people came out in their best clothes to be smeared with all kinds of colors; now they go through it as if it is a kind of compulsory ritual. The festival of Holi was born when Indian society was at the peak of prosperity; now it is only dragging its feet somehow. In the past people were pleased when someone poured colors on their clothes; now in the same situation they are saddened, because they cannot afford enough clothes.

The West now can well afford a festival like Holi. They have already adopted Krishna's dance; sooner or later they are going to adopt Holi as well. It does not need an astrologer to predict it.

They have everything - money, clothes, colors and leisure - which is necessary to celebrate such a festival as Holi. And unlike us they will celebrate with enthusiasm and joy. They will really rejoice.

When a society on the whole is affluent, even its poor are not that poor; they are better off than the rich people of a poor society. Today even the poorest of America does not cling to money in the way the richest of India does. Living in a sea of poverty, even the rich people of this country share the psychology of the poor. Their clinging to money is pathetic.

I have heard that on a fine morning a beggar appeared at the doors of a house. He was young and healthy and his body was robust and beautiful. The housewife was pleasantly surprised to see such a beggar, he was rare, and she gave him food and clothes with an open heart. Then she said to the beggar, "How is it that you are a beggar? You don't seem to be born poor."

The beggar said, "It seems you are also going the same way. I gave away my wealth in the same way you gave me food and clothes a little while ago. You will not take long to join me in the street."

Clinging to money is characteristic of a poor society; even its rich people suffer from this malady.

And clinging disappears in a rich society; even its poor can afford to spend and enjoy what little they have. They are not afraid, they know they can make money when they need it.

It is in this sense that I said Krishna consciousness happens in an affluent society, and the West is really an affluent society.

The questioner also wants to know why the revolt, the breakthrough in the West is being led by people like Ginsberg, who are irrationalists. It is true that all the young rebels the West, whether they are existentialists, the Beatles, the beatniks, or the hippies or the yippies, are irrationalists who represent a revolt against the excessive rationalism of their older generations. It is also true that the intellectuals of the West are yet uninfluenced by these offbeat movements. In fact, irrationalists appear only in a society that goes to the extreme of rationalism. The West has really reached the zenith of rationalism. Hence the reaction; it was inevitable.

When a society feels stifled and strangled by too much logic and rationalism, it inevitably turns to mysticism. When materialism begins to crush a people's sensitivity they turn to God and religion. And don't think that Ginsberg, Sartre, Camus, and others who speak about the absurd, the illogical are like illiterate and ignorant villagers. They are great intellectuals of irrationalism.

Their irrationalism, their turning to the unthinkable is not comparable to the ways of the believers, the faithful. It is a one-hundred-and-eighty-degree turn, like Chaitanya who after stretching thinking to its extremity, found that it was unthinkable.

So if Ginsberg's statements and his poetry are illogical and irrational, it has nonetheless a system of its own. Nietzsche has said somewhere, "I am mad, but my madness has its own logic. I am not an ordinary madman; my madness has a method." This irrationalism is deliberate. It stands on its own ground, which cannot be the ground of logic. It is a candid, ingenuous refutation of rationalism.

Certainly it will not base its assault upon logic; if it does, it will only support rationalism. No, it opposes rationalism through an irrational lifestyle.

Somewhere Ginsberg is reading his poetry to a small gathering of poets. His poetry is meaningless; there is no consistency between one concept and another. All its similies and metaphors are just inane. Its symbolism is utterly unconventional; it has nothing to do with poetic tradition. It is really a great adventure; there is no greater adventure than to be inconsistent and unconventional. He alone can have the courage to be inconsistent who is aware of his innate consistency, his inner integrity, whose innermost being is consistent and clear. He knows that however inconsistent his statements may be, they are not going to affect the integrity and consistency of his being.

People lacking in spiritual consistency and innate harmony weigh every word before they make a statement, because they are afraid that if two of their statements contradict each other their inner contradictions will be exposed. One can afford to be inconsistent only when one is consistent in his being.

This Ginsberg is reading a poem which is full of inconsistencies and contradictions. It is an act of rare courage. Someone from among his listeners rises up in his seat and says, "You seem to be an audacious person, but to be audacious in poetry is nothing. Do you have the courage to act with audacity?"

And Ginsberg looks up at the questioner, takes off his clothes and stands naked before his listeners saying, "This is the last part of my poetry." Then he says to the man who has interrupted him, "Now please take off your clothes and bare yourself."

The man says, "How can I? I cannot be naked."

The whole audience is in a state of shock. No one had thought that poetry reading would end like this, that its last part would come in the form of the nude poet. When they asked him why he did this he said, "It just happened; there was nothing deliberate about it. The man provoked me to act audaciously, and I couldn't think of anything else. So I just concluded my poetry reading this way."

This is a spontaneous act; it is not at all deliberate. And it is wholly illogical; it has nothing to do with Ginsberg's poetry. No Kalidas, no Keats, no Rabindranath could do it; they are poets tied to tradition.

We cannot think of Kalidas, or Keats, or Tagore baring himself the way Ginsberg does. Ginsberg could do it because he rejects logic, he refuses to confine life into the prison of syllogisms. He does not want to reduce life to petty mathematical calculations. He wants to live and live in freedom, and with abandon.

A man like Ginsberg cannot be compared with a gullible villager. He represents the climactic point of a profound rationalist tradition. When a rationalist tradition reaches its climax and begins to die, people like Ginsberg come to the fore to repudiate the rational. I think Krishna too, represents the peak point of India's great rationalist tradition. This country had once scaled the highest peaks of rationalist intelligence and thinking. We had indulged in hair-splitting analysis and interpretation of words and concepts. We have with us books that cannot be translated into any other languages of the world, because no other language possesses such refined and subtle words as we have. We have such words that only one of them can cover a whole page of a book, because we use so many adjectives, prefixes and suffixes to qualify and refine them.

Krishna comes at the pinnacle of a rationalist, intellectual culture that had left no stones unturned.

We had thought everything that could be thought. From the VEDAS and Upanishads we had traveled to vedant where knowledge ends. VEDAS itself means the end of knowledge. Giants like Patanjali, Kapil, Kanad, Brihaspati and Vyas had thought so much that a time came when we felt tired of thinking. Then comes Krishna as the culmination, and he says, "Let us now live, we have done enough of thinking."

In this context it is good to know that Chaitanya happened in Bengal exactly at a similar time. Bengal reached the zenith of dialectics and reasoning in the form of the navya nyaya, the new dialectics.

Navadip, the town in which Chaitanya was born, was the greatest center of learning and logic. It was called the kashi of the logicians. All logical learning of India found its apex in Navadip, and it became known as navya nyaya, which represents the Everest of dialectical reasoning. The West has yet to reach that peak. Western logic is old; it is not new. It does not go beyond Aristotle. Navadip took logic beyond Aristotle and carried it to its last frontier.

It was enough to say anywhere in the India of those days that such-and-such a scholar comes from Navadip - nobody dared enter into a debate with him. He was supposed to be invincible as a dialectician; nobody could think of defeating him in polemics. Students from all over India went to Navadip to learn logic. Scholars of logic went there to debate with their counterparts, and if once someone won a debate he immediately became famous all over the country; he was acclaimed as the greatest pundit - the scholar laureate of India. Often enough it happened that someone who went to Navadip to debate got defeated at the hands of some scholar and became his disciple. It was impossible to defeat Navadip; the whole town was full of logicians; every home was the home of a scholar. If someone defeated one scholar there was another round the comer ready to challenge him. The town was a beehive of scholars.

Chaitanya was born in Navadip, and was himself a towering scholar of logic. He was the top logician of the Navadip of his time, held in great respect by all. The same Chaitanya one day said goodbye to scholarship and went dancing and singing ecstatically through the streets of Navadip saying that everything is unthinkable. When such a person says something it is bound to have tremendous significance. Chaitanya too represents the climactic point of a great tradition. After exploring and analyzing every nook and comer of thinking and intellectual understanding, after going to the very roots of words, concepts and their meanings, he renounces knowledge and returns to his basic ignorance and declares he is now going to sing and dance like a madman. He said that he would not argue any more, not search truth through logic, he would simply live and live with abandon.

Life begins where logic ends.

Question 6:

Words are not the truth. Not even the word truth is truth.

Truth is found in a state of wordlessness, in utter silence. Even if one has to express truth, words cannot do it. Truth is best expressed through silence. Silence, not word, is the language of truth. As I said this morning, silence is the voice of truth.

If it is so then a question arises how a word, as I say, can serve as a seed and a basis for spiritual discipline. There is no contradiction in the two statements; in fact, they are just different dimensions of approaching the same thing. I said this morning that words are not the truth, but if those surrounded by untruth want to attain to truth they will have to take the help of untruth, there is no other way. Of course, if they can make a leap, they can go straightaway from word to silence.

But in case they lack the courage to make a leap, they will have to get rid of words gradually, step by step.

When one is given a seed word, it means with the help of this single word he has to drop all other words which infest his mind. If one does not have the courage to drop all words together, once and for all, he is asked to hold on to a seed word, and to get rid of all other words with its help. But ultimately he will have to get rid of the seed word as well. The seed word cannot take him to the truth, but it can certainly take him to the gate of the temple of truth. At the gate you will have to leave this word, just as you leave your shoes there. You cannot take it into the temple's inner sanctuary.

Even the seed word will impede your entrance into the temple, because however tiny, it is after all a part of noise. All words are noisy, and a seed word is no exception.

Even those who stress the importance of seed words say that in the final stage of their practice the seekers themselves disappear; this is the measure of their fulfillment. From japa or chanting one has to go to ajapa or no-chanting - wordless chanting. A moment comes in their discipline when even japa drops and ajapa, silence, enters. It is the same whether you drop words at the very first or the last moment. All words have to go, so that silence happens. Silence is the ultimate, there is nothing higher than silence. A courageous person will give up all words together, but one who cannot should for the time being hold on to a seed word. dropping all others. But in the end even this last word will have to go.

As far as I am concerned, I am in favor of a complete jump from word to silence. As far as possible a seeker should avoid getting involved in things like japa, because they are likely to turn into an impediment in the last stage. It really happened with Ramakrishna, and it would be good to understand it.

Ramakrishna's spiritual journey begins with remembrance - the chanting of the Mother's name. He has been worshipping God in the form of divine Mother Kali, and a moment comes while chanting the Mother's name when he reaches the final stage of the journey - the name has to be dropped.

Beyond this stage there is no way to go on with the name; now he can enter the sanctum sanctorum all alone. Mother Kali serves him well traveling the path, but when he reaches the temple itself, Ramakrishna must face the problem of parting with the Mother. It becomes the biggest problem of his spiritual life. For years he has given all his love and devotion to Kali; he has grown with her, he has danced and laughed and cried with her, so much that she has entered into his blood and bones, has become his very heartbeat. And when he is asked to drop her altogether, he finds himself in a terrible dilemma.

At this stage, Ramakrishna is under the guidance of a non-dualist yogi named Totapuri, who insists that he give up the name, part with the Mother. According to Totapuri, a name, a seed word, a symbol has no meaning whatsoever for a seeker who wants to attain the non-dualist state, the one, the absolute. Ramakrishna closes his eyes again and again and tells Totapuri that he cannot give up Kali; he can easily give himself up but he cannot part with his Mother. His Master persuades him to try again and again - because if he gives himself up and not the Mother, he will be left on the doorstep of the temple the Mother will be inside it. It will do him no good. If one is to attain to the non-dualist state, nothing short of absolute aloneness will do. Two are not allowed to enter its inner sanctum - the passage is utterly narrow. Ramakrishna tries again and again for three days, but fails and declares his helplessness.

Totapuri now threatens to leave Ramakrishna, he is not going to waste his efforts on him.

Ramakrishna begs for another opportunity; he is aware of his thirst for the unknown, the ultimate reality. His life cannot be fulfilled without knowing it.

Totapuri comes to Ramakrishna the next day and brings with him a sharp-edged glass. Ramakrishna sits before him with closed eyes and his Master says, "With this glass I am going to make a cut on your forehead exactly above the seat of the third eye, the ajnachakra. The moment you feel the pain of it you take up a sword and cut your mother in two."

Ramakrishna is startled. He protests, "What do you say? How can I behead my Mother with a sword? It is impossible. I can behead myself if you ask me to do so, but how can I raise a sword at Mother? And then where am I going to find a sword?"

Then Totapuri says to Ramakrishna, "You are crazy. You have to find a sword from the same source where you discovered the Mother who is not. If your imagination, your will can materialize a non- existent Mother, it can also materialize a sword. It is not that difficult. I know you are skilled in this art. It needs an imaginary sword, a false sword to kill a false Mother. She was never real."

Ramakrishna is still hesitant, but he knows Totapuri will leave him if he does not listen to his instructions. He is aware that this Master does not believe in gradual progress, he stands for a headlong leap, for sudden enlightenment. He closes his eyes again, hut he still feels reluctant. Then Totapuri says reproachfully, "Shame on you!" and cuts his forehead with the edge of the glass.

As soon as Ramakrishna feels the hurt he gathers courage to take up a sword and behead the Mother And as soon as the Mother's image vanishes, he enters the state of samadhi - the supreme state. And on his return from this state he exclaims, "The last barrier is down."

The seed word, the mantra is going to be the last barrier for all those who use it as their spiritual discipline. And like Ramakrishna, one day they will have to take up swords to finish it too. And it is going to be a painful process. That is why I don't recommend it, because I am aware that both you and I will have to work hard at the end. It is better to be finished with it from the beginning.

You also want to know if aum is a word or something else. You quote Krishna as saying, "If someone can remember me in my aum form and live in aum at the time of his death, he will attain to the ultimate, the eternal."

This aum is an extraordinary word, a rare word. It is extraordinary just because it has no meaning whatsoever. Every word has some meaning, this aum has none. For this reason this word cannot be translated into any other language of the world, there is no way. If it had a meaning, it would be easy to find an equivalent word with the same meaning in any language, but being meaningless this aum is beyond translation. This is perhaps the only word on earth which has no meaning whatsoever.

People who discovered aum were in search of something which could be a bridge, a link between the word and silence. While the word has a meaning, silence is neither meaningful nor meaningless; it is beyond both, it is the beyond. Really aum came as a bridge between the word and silence. It is constituted with the help of three basic sound forms: a, u, and m. A, u, and m are the basic sounds of the science of phonetics: all other letters of the alphabet are their extensions and combinations.

And the same a, u, and m constitute the word aum, although it was not written as a word; it remains a distinct and distinguished symbol. Aum in its original form is available in Sanskrit, where it is a pictorial representation of aum; it is neither a word nor a letter. Aum is not a word but a picture. And it represents the space where the finite world of the word - of sound - ends, and the infinite world of silence begins. It forms the fron-tier, the borderline between the word and the wordless; there is no word beyond aum.

Therefore. Krishna says if someone can think of him in his aum form - which is beyond word and meaning - at the moment of his death, he will attain to reality, to truth. Because aum is at the boundary line of the world and the beyond, one who can re member it at the time of his departure from the world is destined to be carried to the beyond.

India's genius has packed this word aum with far-reaching meanings and immense significance.

Aum became tremendously meaningful - so much so that it has no more any meaning. And its significance is limitless, infinite.

But aum is not meant to be uttered and chanted; it has to be really heard and experienced. When you go deep into meditation, when all words disappear, the sound of aum will begin to vibrate. You don't have to say it; if you say it you can have the illusion while meditating that you are hearing it. Then you will miss the authentic aum. For this reason I have not included aum in the Dynamic Meditation. If you chant it during meditation you can miss the real music of aum, which is very subtle.

This real aum is heard when all words disappear, all noises cease. When mind and intellect, thought and word all come to an end and silence begins, then an extraordinarily subtle vibration remains, which this country has interpreted as aum. It can be interpreted in other ways too, but they all will be our interpretations. It is like you are traveling in a railway coach and you hear whatever you want to hear in the rattling noise of the moving wheels of the train. The wheels are not making noise for you, nor do they have any message for you, but you hear whatever you want to hear. It is all your projection, your construction imposed on the sound of the wheels.

When the immense emptiness comes into being, it has its own sound, its own music. It is called the sound of the cosmic silence, it is called the anahat, the unstruck, the uncaused sound. It is not caused by anything. It is the aum. When you clap your hands, the sound of clapping is created by striking one hand against the other. This sound is caused; so is the sound of a drum which you beat with your hands. But meditation is a journey into silence; when all sounds disappear, when there is no duality, when you are utterly alone, then the causeless sound comes into being. India's sages have called it aum.

Variants of aum are found in other lands and languages. Christians use a word "amen" which is a variation of aum. Mohammedans also say "amin" which is the same. Every invocation of the Upanishads begins with aum and ends with "Aum shantih, shantih, shantih." A Mohammedan ends his prayer with the word Amin. This amin is also meaningless; it is the same sound of cosmic silence.

The English language has three words: omniscient, omnipresent and omnipotent - all of which are constituted with the word aum. Philologists may not be aware that omniscient means that one who has known the aum, omnipresent means the one who is present in the aum, and omnipotent means the one who has become as powerful as the aum.

The aum has been found in many forms all the world over. It is available in both the ancient sources of religion - Hinduism and Judaism. If there is anything common between Hinduism and Jainism it is the aum. Aum occupies the same exalted place in Buddhism as in Jainism. It is the one universal word. Amin and aum are words that are not manmade; they have been heard in the depth of meditation. It is difficult to say which of the two, amin and aum, is the more authentic, but one thing is certain that they are one and the same. It is the ultimate sound. When all caused sounds disappear the uncaused aum comes into being. It is the cosmic sound.

Zen sages ask their disciples to go and find out the sound of one hand clapping. The sound of one hand clapping is something unheard of! This is Zen's own way of saying the same thing - the anahat, the unstruck sound. So Zen Masters direct seekers to go in search of one hand clapping - which really means the uncaused sound. Clapping with two hands make for sound, and one hand clapping is aum or amin.

Knowingly I did not give aum a place in our meditations. It is deliberate, because if you utter aum it is caused by you, it cannot be the uncaused aum. I wait for that real aum which will appear when you completely disappear. This aum will arise from your inmost depths, but it will not be caused by you:

And Krishna is right in saying that if one comes to know aum rightly and lives aum with awareness till his last breath, he will attain to the ultimate. But this is not the aum that you will utter with your mouth; it will be a waste of efforts if you keep chanting aum at the time of your death. Then you will not even die peacefully.

The real aum is an explosion; it emerges from the depths of your innermost being. And it happens.

Let us now sit for meditation. And I hope you will now begin your journey to the real aum.

Don't talk, and sit at some distance from one another. Stop talking altogether, and leave some space between you and the other persons sitting next to you... Those who are just spectators should leave the compound and watch, if they want to, from the outside. Spectators should not remain inside the enclosure. Please move out.

I want you to sit at some distance from one another so that if someone falls down on the ground in the course of his meditation, he does not disturb his neighbors. There is enough space here, so you need not be miserly. Please spread out all over the place. Friends may fall down, and many are going to fall down, so make room for them. And don't think others will move, other's don't move.

Each one of you has to move and make room for others.

Spectators are requested not to talk; they should remain completely silent so they don't cause any disturbance in meditation.

Before you begin please understand a few things rightly. You have to meditate in a sitting posture.

This will be very useful and good.

For the first ten minutes we will breathe deeply. After ten minutes deep breathing your body will begin to shake; then allow it to shake freely. Someone will feel like shouting and screaming, another will feel like crying, Allow yourself to yell and cry without inhibition. After ten minutes, begin to ask yourself, "Who am l?n "Who am l?" This will continue for another ten minutes - with the difference that you will do so sitting. If someone falls in the meantime, he should not worry about it, he should just fall down.

Inside the compound no one will keep his eyes open.

Now, fold your two palms together and utter this pledge, this resolve. "I resolve with God as my witness that I will bring all my energy to meditation."

"I resolve, with God as my witness, that I will bring all my energy to meditation."

"I resolve, with God as my witness, that I will bring all my energy to meditation."

Now, constantly remember your resolve, and remember that God remembers it.

For ten minutes breathe deeply. Deep breathing will stimulate and arouse a great deal of energy, a lot more than when you breathe standing... With the stroke of breaths the energy is bound to rise... and it will run through your body... electricity will run through the whole length of your body...

Breathe with energy... Don't withhold yourselves. If the body shakes let it shake, let it tremble.

Breathe deeply and energetically. Energy is beginning to rise, let it. Breathe deeply and let energy rise. It is going well, very well. Let each one of you do his best, no one should lag behind... Energy is rising, allow it. Let the body do what it wants to do, but keep sitting.

Deep breathing, more deep breathing, still more deep breathing. Cooperate with your rising energy.

Don't withhold yourselves. Breathe deeply.

Breathe deeply, breathe deeply, breathe very deeply. It is going well. More and more friends are being energized. Let your energy rise freely, don't hinder it. Let go of you. Hit your energy with deep breathing, deeper and deeper breathing.

Be blissful, be filled with joy and bliss... Breathe deeply and joyously... Breathe deeply and be blissful. Breathe deeply. more deeply, still more deeply. And rejoice.

Your bodies are getting electrified. Cooperate with your bodies... Breathe deeply and joyously. Be filled with bliss and breathe... breathe deeply.

Intensify breathing and bring greater and greater joy... Be joyous and breathe more deeply, still more deeply. Bring all your energy to breathing... Don't withhold. Be totally into it. Then we will enter the second stage. There are four minutes to go; put all your strength into it.

It is gaining momentum; cooperate with it fully. Exert your best. Sometimes one misses it just by a fraction of an inch, so bring all your energy into deep breathing. And breathe joyously, blissfully.

There are three minutes to go... Go ahead and ahead. Bring all your strength together and breathe deeply and joyously. Go inside your being, enter your interiority, and breathe deeply.

Energy is rising. Let go of you. Your bodies will shake and dance. Keep sitting and dance if you feel like dancing. You will feel as if you are not your body. Let it shake, let it tremble, let it dance.

Don't hinder... Don't withhold... Breathe deeply and more deeply... Everything is going well... Keep breathing deeply. Let the body shake.

It is getting into the right momentum, bring all your energy with great joy and bliss. Only two minutes are left, breathe deeply... Breathe deeply and more deeply... When I say one, two, three, then put all your energy, every bit of your energy into it. Be filled with joy... Rejoice... breathe deeply and let the body shake.

Let go of yourselves.