Latest / The James Granstrom Podcast - Super Soul Model series / Peace Is Your Natural State | Asha Nayaswami

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Peace Is Your Natural State | Asha Nayaswami · The James Granstrom Podcast - Super Soul Model series

• 0:01
  SPEAKER_00: If you're open to feeling a little more peace, then this is just such a beautiful episode for you because I came away from this conversation I had with spiritual teacher Asher Nayaswamy, feeling such a deep, profound sense of peace for hours afterwards.
• 0:16
  SPEAKER_00: I hope you feel it too.
• 0:18
  SPEAKER_00: Enjoy the episode.
• 0:20
  SPEAKER_00: Hello and welcome to the James Grant from Podcast Super Soul Model Series.
• 0:23
  SPEAKER_00: Today I'm joined by Asher Nayaswamy, who's been practicing and showing the principles of self-realization for more than 50 years.
• 0:30
  SPEAKER_00: In 1969, at just age 22, Asher met her spiritual teacher, Swami Kriyananda, a direct disciple of Paramahansa Yogananda, author of Autobiography of a Yogi.
• 0:43
  SPEAKER_00: From that time, she dedicated her life to Korea Yoga meditation, devotion to God, and service to others.
• 0:50
  SPEAKER_00: Asher was a founding member of Ananda Village and Ananda Palo Alto and has taught and lectured internationally for decades.
• 0:57
  SPEAKER_00: Her classes, talks, and online content have reached millions worldwide, offering practical spiritual wisdom rooted in the teachings of Paramahansa Yogananda.
• 1:07
  SPEAKER_00: I've been fascinated by Paramahansa Yogananda's teachings for many years, over two decades now.
• 1:13
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm also have been loving Asher's message too.
• 1:17
  SPEAKER_00: So it gives me great joy to welcome to this week's episode.
• 1:21
  SPEAKER_00: Asher, welcome.
• 1:23
  SPEAKER_03: Well, thank you so much.
• 1:25
  SPEAKER_03: And it's it's nice to hear my own story told so simply.
• 1:28
  SPEAKER_03: I love it.
• 1:29
  SPEAKER_00: So Ash, take us back to 22 years old when you first met your spiritual teacher.
• 1:36
  SPEAKER_00: That's a tender age to meet a spiritual teacher.
• 1:40
  SPEAKER_00: So what kind of led you to number one, meet the spiritual teacher?
• 1:44
  SPEAKER_00: And what were you thinking?
• 1:45
  SPEAKER_00: Where was your life at at that time?
• 1:47
  SPEAKER_03: Well, okay.
• 1:48
  SPEAKER_04: This is 1969.
• 1:50
  SPEAKER_04: I'm in Northern California.
• 1:52
  SPEAKER_04: So the whole hippie movement, psychedelics, um, all the Eastern teachers coming to San Francisco, it was a very um really fun and just completely mind-bending time.
• 2:05
  SPEAKER_04: Um, I myself was 100% ready for it.
• 2:09
  SPEAKER_04: I was um I I grew up in a comfortable American family.
• 2:14
  SPEAKER_04: I was uh our family was educated, university was part of the picture.
• 2:20
  SPEAKER_04: I was expected, I I could have done anything, you know, that requires education and professionalism and so on.
• 2:28
  SPEAKER_04: Um absolutely none of it interested me.
• 2:32
  SPEAKER_04: I really had no idea what I was gonna do with my life because there was nothing in the world around me that I wanted to be part of.
• 2:41
  SPEAKER_04: And I felt I was very sensible, so I didn't I didn't go crazy with any of that, but I was quietly very, very, very, very desperate.
• 2:53
  SPEAKER_04: So there was a touch of psychedelics in the early story.
• 2:56
  SPEAKER_04: I was never really, I never liked drugs very much because I really liked my brain and I didn't like things that messed with my brain.
• 3:04
  SPEAKER_04: So, but I touched into it enough to get the idea that consciousness was everything.
• 3:11
  SPEAKER_04: And that even if it was just a chemical, but it changed your capacity to see the world in a different way, I realized that's what I was looking for.
• 3:20
  SPEAKER_04: But I didn't want drugs because they you just took them and they wore off.
• 3:23
  SPEAKER_04: And whatever was troubling you was exactly the same when they wore off as it was when it started.
• 3:29
  SPEAKER_04: So that just wasn't an answer.
• 3:31
  SPEAKER_04: So, right after that, actually, three years earlier, when I was 19, somebody handed me a book by Swami Vivekananda, who was a great disciple of Ramhansu Ramakrishna in India, an avatar in India in the late 1800s.
• 3:47
  SPEAKER_04: And that book immediately spoke to me.
• 3:50
  SPEAKER_04: And now I understand reincarnation and past lives as a yogi and so on.
• 3:56
  SPEAKER_04: But at that point, I just opened that book, and for the first time in my life, somebody was telling me something I wanted to know.
• 4:03
  SPEAKER_04: Because by now, what I wanted to understand was consciousness, and that book was about consciousness.
• 4:10
  SPEAKER_04: So for three years, I read books, and then I started reading, I read philosophy, and then I started reading books about saints and yogis and masters.
• 4:21
  SPEAKER_04: And I was much too terrified to go to India.
• 4:24
  SPEAKER_04: It was just, I couldn't even imagine.
• 4:25
  SPEAKER_04: I didn't have that kind of nerve.
• 4:27
  SPEAKER_04: I was raised in a Jewish family, so I couldn't join a Catholic convent.
• 4:31
  SPEAKER_04: I couldn't become a Catholic saint.
• 4:34
  SPEAKER_04: I couldn't become a missionary either, because I I had never devoted myself to Lord Jesus Christ, so I didn't know how to do anything with that either.
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_04: And so I I was like I knew what I wanted, but I didn't know how to get it.
• 4:47
  SPEAKER_04: And then a friend of mine, of course, because this is San Francisco and um Stanford University, which is I lived in the same town there, um, thought a fraternity thought it would be fun to invite a Swami.
• 4:59
  SPEAKER_04: So they invited a Swami and they had a big party tent.
• 5:02
  SPEAKER_04: They were a party fraternity.
• 5:04
  SPEAKER_04: They had a big party tent, they invited Swami Kriananda to come.
• 5:07
  SPEAKER_04: Friend of mine had already met him, and she said to me these words, I've met a true teacher and I think you'll like him.
• 5:16
  SPEAKER_04: So I went a mile from my home, and Swami Kriananda was in this tent.
• 5:21
  SPEAKER_04: It was a totally chaotic, crazy night.
• 5:25
  SPEAKER_04: But as soon as he walked in the room, he was the first person I had ever met.
• 5:33
  SPEAKER_04: Well, I I didn't know the words until later, but his his consciousness had no boundary.
• 5:38
  SPEAKER_04: And I I knew that was possible in principle, but I'd never met anyone who had really changed their consciousness.
• 5:48
  SPEAKER_04: And for some reason, by intuition and past lives, I just recognized immediately.
• 5:54
  SPEAKER_04: And the the way it came to me was he has what I want.
• 5:59
  SPEAKER_04: And this was the first time in my life I'd ever met anyone that I wanted to be like them.
• 6:04
  SPEAKER_04: And he was a disciple of Yogananda.
• 6:07
  SPEAKER_04: I knew about Yogananda.
• 6:09
  SPEAKER_04: I had tried to read autobiography of Yogi, Yogananda's seminal book.
• 6:14
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, but it's full of miracles and it's full of devotions and it's full of saints, and I was very intellectual.
• 6:21
  SPEAKER_04: And so all of that seemed a little too much for me.
• 6:25
  SPEAKER_04: So I I could I didn't read much of the book.
• 6:28
  SPEAKER_04: After I met Kriyananda, and Kriyananda was a disciple of Yogananda, had actually known Yogananda, had lived with him.
• 6:37
  SPEAKER_04: I realized that if Yogananda could create Kriyananda, then I was also interested in Yogananda.
• 6:44
  SPEAKER_04: And shortly after that, I left everything I was doing.
• 6:48
  SPEAKER_04: I moved up to the mountains where Kriyananda was starting a community, and I never looked back.
• 6:56
  SPEAKER_04: I've never done anything else except in a very expansive and interesting life, um, but all in the context of Ananda.
• 7:06
  SPEAKER_04: It was just, this is my destiny, and I grabbed it.
• 7:09
  SPEAKER_00: Lovely.
• 7:10
  SPEAKER_00: Wow, what an interesting story.
• 7:12
  SPEAKER_00: And, you know, it's just to feel the presence of somebody, you know, particularly in that time in the late 60s, probably early 70s, you know, you you're getting to be around a Swami.
• 7:23
  SPEAKER_00: And, you know, for those who don't know, particularly during that time, you know, there's a massive change in consciousness happening on the planet at that time.
• 7:33
  SPEAKER_00: And, you know, I didn't arrive on this planet until quite a few years later.
• 7:39
  SPEAKER_00: I always like to say the world was getting ready.
• 7:43
  SPEAKER_00: Uh or should I say, I was waiting for my perfect entry point.
• 7:48
  SPEAKER_00: And um, but anyway, going back to you, you know, going back to that point where you're in the presence of somebody who has that energy, who has that presence.
• 7:57
  SPEAKER_00: And I think, you know, you know, everybody that I interview has and on this podcast has this incredible presence about them.
• 8:06
  SPEAKER_00: And what I absolutely love is that you were in the presence of somebody who said, I want that for myself at such a young age as well.
• 8:15
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, to actually know that this and feel it viscerally is something, Asher, something really special.
• 8:22
  SPEAKER_00: And, you know, for those who haven't read the book, Autobiography of a Yogi, it is a quite a big, juicy book.
• 8:29
  SPEAKER_00: You know, it's quite a thick book.
• 8:30
  SPEAKER_00: And I remember reading it and devouring it, going, Wow, okay, wow, wow, okay.
• 8:35
  SPEAKER_00: And um, and for those who haven't read it, do read it.
• 8:39
  SPEAKER_00: And it's the book that actually Steve Jobs passed around to all his team.
• 8:43
  SPEAKER_00: And it was the bit he he passed that around because he was in Silicon Valley or around that time, at the same time as you, I suspect.
• 8:51
  SPEAKER_04: Absolutely.
• 8:52
  SPEAKER_04: He was yeah, right down the street from us, yeah, literally.
• 8:55
  SPEAKER_00: So, Asher, I have to ask, the name Asher and the name Nayaswamy, tell us what that actually means to people who may not know.
• 9:05
  SPEAKER_04: Okay, well, neither of those names were given to me at birth, as you can guess.
• 9:10
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 9:10
  SPEAKER_04: Um it it's it's long been a tradition in spiritual life that when you decide to give your life to God, when you decide to to that that um becoming becoming self-realized and sharing that grace with others is is your goal, or becoming a Catholic nun, or whatever you become, there's a line in the sand.
• 9:34
  SPEAKER_04: And the name that we use, that everybody calls us, becomes such a deep identity with us.
• 9:41
  SPEAKER_04: And if we're really trying to change into another reality, shedding your name is often very common.
• 9:48
  SPEAKER_04: In the Native American tradition, people the the people would change their name every time something significant happened that had a life-changing effect on them.
• 9:58
  SPEAKER_00: I didn't know that.
• 9:59
  SPEAKER_00: That's amazing.
• 10:00
  SPEAKER_04: I love that because think about it, think how many phases you've had in your life.
• 10:04
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, and if you keep the same name all the way through, you keep affirming, yes, of course, there's lots of things you can do, but you can see how dynamic it would be to take a name that describes who you've now become.
• 10:17
  SPEAKER_04: So, in in our in our community, uh, at the time that I was there, Swami Kriananda was of course still with us, and you could request, please give me a name that will have a spiritual meaning for me, and that will be sort of my my um guide guidance going forward.
• 10:36
  SPEAKER_04: So the name Asha is actually it's a common name in India.
• 10:39
  SPEAKER_04: It's a Sanskrit word, though, and it simply means hope.
• 10:43
  SPEAKER_02: Beautiful.
• 10:44
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, it's been perfect for me in every way.
• 10:48
  SPEAKER_04: I like it that it's simple, I like it that it's understandable, that I don't have to spell it six or seven times for people.
• 10:56
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, yeah, and that it's it's very positive.
• 10:59
  SPEAKER_04: I I don't have to strain to understand what the intention of it is.
• 11:04
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, Naya Swami is actually not a name, but it's a title.
• 11:08
  SPEAKER_04: I've taken Sanyas.
• 11:10
  SPEAKER_04: Naya, Naya, the word Naya means new.
• 11:13
  SPEAKER_04: Um it it in about 20 years ago, Swami Kriananda, when he was still with us, um, he felt that the traditional Swami order, um, which was created many centuries ago, there are many, many rules and traditions in it that nobody follows anymore because they simply don't apply.
• 11:33
  SPEAKER_04: And that there's a a certain uh disinclination to participate in in ordinary life that was appropriate at that time.
• 11:43
  SPEAKER_04: But what's happening in our time is that people are wanting to bring spirituality into everyday life.
• 11:50
  SPEAKER_04: And and very often um married couples are on the spiritual path together.
• 11:56
  SPEAKER_04: But the tradition of the sannyasis is that you would have to separate from your partner.
• 12:01
  SPEAKER_04: And so, and and there's other rules like you have to travel, you you can't stay any place longer than three days, you can't own property, you can't handle money.
• 12:10
  SPEAKER_04: And so all of these rules are honored in the breach mostly.
• 12:14
  SPEAKER_04: So Swami felt the inspiration to keep the sense of renunciation the same, but to to make it more appropriate for our time.
• 12:24
  SPEAKER_04: So he called it Naya, new Swami Order.
• 12:27
  SPEAKER_04: And it's still quite small because it's a new.
• 12:30
  SPEAKER_04: In fact, when Swami first started, he also changed the color.
• 12:34
  SPEAKER_04: You see, I'm wearing blue, which I always do.
• 12:37
  SPEAKER_04: Blue is the color that you see in the spiritual eye, that is the the vibration of Christ consciousness.
• 12:44
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 12:44
  SPEAKER_04: The traditional orange color is fire, and it represents your um renunciation, that you know all your attachments are burned up in the fire of renunciation, which is still the principle in the Naya Swami order.
• 12:59
  SPEAKER_04: But instead of looking at what we've renounced, we're looking at where we're going.
• 13:04
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, so it's forward looking.
• 13:05
  SPEAKER_00: I love that.
• 13:06
  SPEAKER_00: It's forward looking, yeah.
• 13:07
  SPEAKER_04: That's it's forward-looking and affirming of our new reality.
• 13:11
  SPEAKER_00: So it's I'm really fascinated because I was gonna ask you the question about blue, right?
• 13:15
  SPEAKER_00: Because it's it's a fascinating thing.
• 13:17
  SPEAKER_00: I've been I've studying colour.
• 13:19
  SPEAKER_00: One of my mentors who introduced me to self-realisation and Joganander's work, well, it's a lot 25 years ago, was and I was, you know, I was young at the same time, but I was she was a colour therapist.
• 13:33
  SPEAKER_02: Uh-huh.
• 13:34
  SPEAKER_00: And she told me about all the different colours.
• 13:36
  SPEAKER_00: And I was always attracted to a couple of colours, right?
• 13:40
  SPEAKER_00: I mean lots of colours, but particularly like blue.
• 13:45
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 13:45
  SPEAKER_00: Particularly blue.
• 13:46
  SPEAKER_00: And when I came across your content and and your work, I was like, Ashley's always wearing blue.
• 13:52
  SPEAKER_00: Why is she always wearing blue?
• 13:54
  SPEAKER_00: I was like, I know that there's something in it.
• 13:56
  SPEAKER_00: And I said, if I go back to, you know, my work and and having studied under my friend Kate, she she said that blue represents trust, it represents communication, uh-huh, it represents depth.
• 14:10
  SPEAKER_02: Uh-huh.
• 14:11
  SPEAKER_00: And obviously, blue is a deeply spiritual colour because it represents up here, it's the throat chakra, so communication.
• 14:18
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 14:19
  SPEAKER_00: All of the things that are required in this modern world if you really want to elevate.
• 14:24
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 14:25
  SPEAKER_00: And a lot of the work and business now that is required more than anything is for people to speak truth.
• 14:32
  SPEAKER_02: Isn't that funny, right?
• 14:33
  SPEAKER_00: Isn't that funny?
• 14:34
  SPEAKER_00: And I, you know, I've had this in the back of my mind going, how on earth am I going to ask Asha this question and articulate it?
• 14:40
  SPEAKER_00: But you kind of done it for me, so thank you for that.
• 14:44
  SPEAKER_00: But fascinating.
• 14:45
  SPEAKER_00: And I was just wondering, and you talked about Christ consciousness.
• 14:48
  SPEAKER_00: For those who may not know what that is, would you share what that type of teaching, that understanding, that type of energy is?
• 14:57
  SPEAKER_04: Okay.
• 14:57
  SPEAKER_04: The all all the great true religions in the world, Buddhism, Hinduism, Christianity, Judaism, all trace their their story back to uh some great figure.
• 15:12
  SPEAKER_04: Now, Hinduism is slightly different, although you can speak of Krishna as being one of the main spokespersons.
• 15:18
  SPEAKER_04: But Judaism, there was Moses.
• 15:20
  SPEAKER_04: Of course, Christianity had Christ in it, Islam had has um Muhammad.
• 15:25
  SPEAKER_04: Um because every individual has the potential to have infinite consciousness.
• 15:33
  SPEAKER_04: One of the anomalies that medical science can't figure out is why we have so much extra brain that we don't seem to use.
• 15:40
  SPEAKER_02: Yes.
• 15:41
  SPEAKER_04: Because the human nervous system is capable in when when when a soul is living inside a human nervous system, which is what we do, each incarnation, the capacity of that nervous system to perceive an infinite reality is present, but most of the time we haven't cultivated that side of ourself.
• 16:03
  SPEAKER_04: And so the ancient traditions of India, which they call Sanatan Dharma, uh the true uh teaching of India is not Hinduism.
• 16:12
  SPEAKER_04: Hinduism is recent.
• 16:14
  SPEAKER_04: The it's Sanatana Dharma, which the translation of that sometimes it's eternal religion, but the better word is that which is, which is the way that we're made and and what brings happiness and what brings suffering.
• 16:30
  SPEAKER_04: All of life, the the motivation of every sentient creature is to escape suffering and to find happiness.
• 16:38
  SPEAKER_04: It's it's it's extremely simple.
• 16:41
  SPEAKER_04: We make we every single decision that you ever make is in order to reduce the pain and to increase the joy.
• 16:49
  SPEAKER_04: Many of those decisions are extremely stupid, but nonetheless, the motivation for them, the motivation for them is because our level of understanding of that which is of Sanat and Dharma says that this is what's going to work.
• 17:06
  SPEAKER_04: And the reason we have to reincarnate so many times is because we have to have, we only learn from experience.
• 17:13
  SPEAKER_04: So we have to have that experience.
• 17:15
  SPEAKER_04: We have to get, we try it out.
• 17:17
  SPEAKER_04: We have the free will to keep trying until our own experience actually teaches us.
• 17:24
  SPEAKER_04: Now, the ultimate destiny of every human being is that we will achieve perfect infinite consciousness, we will discover the true nature of bliss and where it comes from.
• 17:37
  SPEAKER_04: We will become so desirous of that bliss that we will no longer be tempted by decisions that are not consistent with that which is.
• 17:46
  SPEAKER_04: And so, and the the way it works is that that souls who have achieved that state, and that state is also called Christ consciousness.
• 17:58
  SPEAKER_04: Jesus was the Christ, Jesus the Christ, and Christ meant the anointed one because He He'd been anointed by the Infinite Spirit.
• 18:10
  SPEAKER_04: And it's very interesting if you listen to the word Krishna and Christ, you can hear that they're similar, right?
• 18:17
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, right.
• 18:18
  SPEAKER_04: And Krishna also there was a title.
• 18:20
  SPEAKER_04: So what happens is the great saints, a soul who has no karma of his own, he has nothing left to learn.
• 18:28
  SPEAKER_04: You know, gender is it's it's not really a he at that point, but that's how we speak of it.
• 18:33
  SPEAKER_01: Sure.
• 18:33
  SPEAKER_04: Um they have nothing left to learn, but they come back to this plane of consciousness to teach us about that which is, so that we can make the right choices about happiness and suffering.
• 18:46
  SPEAKER_04: And they have a revelation, they have a perception of reality.
• 18:51
  SPEAKER_04: I mean, any great artist or scientist or saint, they perceive that which is.
• 18:59
  SPEAKER_04: I Albert Einstein did not invent or reason out what he saw.
• 19:06
  SPEAKER_04: He saw it, he had a revelation, and then he spent years making the math work so he could explain it to others, but he didn't need it to be explained, he experienced it.
• 19:16
  SPEAKER_04: So Jesus, Krishna, Buddha, Moses, all of these great masters have a revelation.
• 19:23
  SPEAKER_04: They share that revelation as much as they can during their lifetime, and over the ages, certain individuals, I'm I'm having the sun again.
• 19:33
  SPEAKER_04: Certain individuals, certain individuals share that revelation because they change their consciousness and they become equal to the master.
• 19:42
  SPEAKER_04: Jesus said, That which I do, ye shall do in greater things.
• 19:46
  SPEAKER_04: He wasn't just flattering his disciples, he was he was teaching them.
• 19:50
  SPEAKER_04: I'm not separate than you, I'm just I've learned something that you're learning.
• 19:54
  SPEAKER_04: But then after a while, revelation becomes religion.
• 19:59
  SPEAKER_00: That's interesting.
• 20:00
  SPEAKER_00: And so beautifully explained as well.
• 20:03
  SPEAKER_00: Because you can read everything, you can read different types of religious books and have dogma, but ultimately it's the experience, not the words.
• 20:11
  SPEAKER_00: And however many words or books that have been passed down for the ages, that's not the experience.
• 20:20
  SPEAKER_00: That's why I've always said, you know, let your experience teach you.
• 20:24
  SPEAKER_00: I can pass you a message, but you know, your experience is going to be the teacher, not me.
• 20:29
  SPEAKER_00: I'm just a messenger.
• 20:30
  SPEAKER_00: And when I've come across your beautiful work, you've always said, I'm I'm just a messenger.
• 20:35
  SPEAKER_00: And I love that because it kind of takes the responsibility out from saying, Oh, you said this or you did that, but because ultimately we have to choose for ourselves, and I think that's what gives us power to recognise that this is a good choice, or you know, in hindsight, maybe that wasn't a good choice.
• 20:55
  SPEAKER_00: So next time I'll choose better, or I'll choose perhaps a little bit more wisely.
• 20:59
  SPEAKER_00: That's why I think one of the things that I've noticed with your work so much and your message that I really love to articulate and share with the audience is it is so necessary to have discernment.
• 21:17
  SPEAKER_00: And as we become more aware of social media, more aware of different news coming at us, I think one of the things that is absolutely prime time for everybody is to be able to be discerning more now than ever.
• 21:34
  SPEAKER_00: Because there's so much information coming at you.
• 21:36
  SPEAKER_00: You have to discern what you decide to put on your plate.
• 21:40
  SPEAKER_00: You know, there's a buffet of everything, but it doesn't mean you need to put the whole buffet on your plate.
• 21:45
  SPEAKER_00: You pick the bits that are good for you, you know.
• 21:48
  SPEAKER_00: So I don't know.
• 21:50
  SPEAKER_00: What's your thought on that?
• 21:51
  SPEAKER_00: On discernment?
• 21:53
  SPEAKER_04: Uh y yes, yes, yes.
• 21:55
  SPEAKER_04: I mean, the first of all, just a generalized yes to everything you've said.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_04: Um we only learn from experience.
• 22:05
  SPEAKER_04: We do not learn from being told.
• 22:08
  SPEAKER_04: Sometimes we can be browbeaten into doing what we're told, or we can be terrified into doing what we're told.
• 22:14
  SPEAKER_04: But it's only f it's only when we know it from our own experience that we can really claim something as our own.
• 22:24
  SPEAKER_04: And what and and the shift from religion to revelation is, I mean, the the the age now is that people are just not willing to take somebody else's word for it.
• 22:35
  SPEAKER_04: So the whole concept of institutional dogmatic, do this and you're saved, do that and you're damned, our way is right, no other way is correct, it's disintegrating around us.
• 22:47
  SPEAKER_04: It's just disintegrating.
• 22:49
  SPEAKER_04: Right now it's not replaced by very much that's stable.
• 22:53
  SPEAKER_04: But people are going in the right direction because they are trying to make experience the criteria of their principles and of their life.
• 23:02
  SPEAKER_04: But in that process, we're we are disregarding a lot of things that we should pay more attention to.
• 23:09
  SPEAKER_04: You know, the con when I when I was coming into my spiritual life, people were very excited about the concept of gurus.
• 23:16
  SPEAKER_04: People are not so excited about the concept of gurus now.
• 23:19
  SPEAKER_04: And so people are elevating themselves.
• 23:21
  SPEAKER_04: I know as much as anybody.
• 23:23
  SPEAKER_04: Well, yes, you have the potential to know as much as anybody, but that doesn't mean you already know as much as anybody.
• 23:30
  SPEAKER_04: Self-realization is progressive.
• 23:33
  SPEAKER_04: And so we the main thing is for us to be moving in the right direction.
• 23:39
  SPEAKER_04: But inevitably, people have different stages of understanding.
• 23:42
  SPEAKER_04: It's it's true about every other area of life.
• 23:45
  SPEAKER_04: Why would it not be true about spiritual life?
• 23:48
  SPEAKER_04: Absolutely.
• 23:49
  SPEAKER_04: If you're trying to learn the piano, somebody who's been playing the piano for a long time knows more about it than you do.
• 23:55
  SPEAKER_04: And you can't always tell when you're when you're setting up habits that aren't going to serve you.
• 24:00
  SPEAKER_04: So this has always been the position of the spiritual teacher.
• 24:04
  SPEAKER_04: And the guru is merely the most elevated possible kind of spiritual teacher that you can have.
• 24:11
  SPEAKER_04: So what I'm saying by that is source matters.
• 24:15
  SPEAKER_04: And when when you when you hear something that that sounds interesting to you, it's very important to ask yourself, who's saying it and what qualifies to say them to say that?
• 24:26
  SPEAKER_04: But more profoundly, what is the what is the vibration of the person saying it?
• 24:33
  SPEAKER_04: Because if you follow a certain teaching, you will become like the people who follow that teaching.
• 24:40
  SPEAKER_04: And sometimes you're in no position, because the guru perhaps is long off the planet, the source of the teaching is long off the planet.
• 24:49
  SPEAKER_04: But if you look at those who follow that teaching, do they look like people that you want to be?
• 24:55
  SPEAKER_04: Because that's who you'll become.
• 24:57
  SPEAKER_04: And merely because someone can articulate a clever idea, it's their life.
• 25:02
  SPEAKER_04: And what do you know about the person that's articulating it?
• 25:05
  SPEAKER_04: These days you can, just as we're doing right now, you can present a little square on the screen, but you don't really know the life story, the true character of the person who's speaking.
• 25:18
  SPEAKER_04: So all of that has to be added in.
• 25:21
  SPEAKER_04: Then the other last piece of it is there's a great subtlety to spiritual progress, which has to do with, well, the grace of God is how it's always been described, but has to do with concentration and attunement.
• 25:35
  SPEAKER_04: You can't just do a little bit of everything and then really become dynamically strong.
• 25:43
  SPEAKER_04: At a certain point, you have to concentrate.
• 25:46
  SPEAKER_04: Anybody who has become good at anything realizes at a certain point they find the way that's going to work for them and they concentrate on that one way, and they're not always jumping off and trying something else.
• 25:58
  SPEAKER_04: Same is true for spiritual life.
• 26:00
  SPEAKER_04: It's just the same as it's just the same as anything.
• 26:04
  SPEAKER_04: It's just a different dimension of it.
• 26:06
  SPEAKER_04: People think, oh, well, I'll have more love in my life if I'm exceedingly promiscuous.
• 26:11
  SPEAKER_04: What's the point of being faithful?
• 26:13
  SPEAKER_04: You know, more is better.
• 26:14
  SPEAKER_04: Well, try it.
• 26:15
  SPEAKER_04: Live a few incarnations that way, see if it works for you.
• 26:19
  SPEAKER_04: You know, see what, see, see how well your children thrive when they're scattered all over the country because you've had so many partners in your life.
• 26:28
  SPEAKER_04: Like, how does this really work for you?
• 26:30
  SPEAKER_04: That's the actual question.
• 26:32
  SPEAKER_04: And and I use that as an extreme example, but it's like our first impulse is not always our best impulse, but we don't know that until we experiment with it.
• 26:43
  SPEAKER_04: And so in spiritual life, there comes a point where I really want to go deep.
• 26:48
  SPEAKER_04: I really want to change myself, I really want to focus.
• 26:53
  SPEAKER_04: Until then, you should take a little bit of everything until you figure it out.
• 26:58
  SPEAKER_00: Until you ask the question, what do I really want to focus on?
• 27:01
  SPEAKER_00: Right?
• 27:02
  SPEAKER_04: Right, exactly.
• 27:03
  SPEAKER_00: You have spent more than 50 years like being inspired by your spiritual teacher and yoga yogananda's work.
• 27:15
  SPEAKER_00: Tell us the basics of Yogananda's work so people can understand what you have devoted your life to.
• 27:23
  SPEAKER_00: Because this is really, really powerful for somebody who might not have read autobiography of yogi or may not be aware, considering he was late 1800s up until the 1940s, I think.
• 27:36
  SPEAKER_04: 52.
• 27:37
  SPEAKER_04: Still, that's a long time ago, before most people listening were born.
• 27:40
  SPEAKER_04: So yeah.
• 27:42
  SPEAKER_04: Um the essence of it is that we all have a divine destiny, and happiness is our birthright.
• 27:52
  SPEAKER_04: Uh uh unmitigated joy is our birthright.
• 27:55
  SPEAKER_04: It's an interesting point because if we were made for suffering, we wouldn't rebel so much against suffering.
• 28:03
  SPEAKER_04: You know, nope.
• 28:04
  SPEAKER_00: If we were to say that again, if we were made if we were made for suffering.
• 28:06
  SPEAKER_04: If we were made for suffering, we would know that that was our nature and we wouldn't rebel against it.
• 28:13
  SPEAKER_04: But whenever we're suffering or see other people suffering, we intuitively know that there's something wrong.
• 28:19
  SPEAKER_04: Isn't isn't that interesting?
• 28:21
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, because you can feel it, right?
• 28:22
  SPEAKER_00: We're human beings, we we feel each other.
• 28:25
  SPEAKER_00: You know, unless you absolutely close that out and your heart is absolutely closed, we can generally feel well, actually, you can walk into a room of people and you can feel whether it's a nice room to be in or not.
• 28:36
  SPEAKER_04: Yes, exactly.
• 28:38
  SPEAKER_04: But we know that we're supposed to be happy.
• 28:42
  SPEAKER_04: And that's why I said earlier, every decision we make, we we we think it's going to make us happier.
• 28:49
  SPEAKER_04: But a lot of times we're very confused about um about the nature of reality.
• 28:56
  SPEAKER_04: So Yogananda's teaching is entirely about where happiness comes from and what really causes suffering, which is very different than what the limited identified self see, and we are our divine nature is never compromised, but we we become falsely identified with the limited part of ourselves.
• 29:20
  SPEAKER_04: That's what ego is.
• 29:22
  SPEAKER_04: Ego is I am this body, and all the limitations that come with it.
• 29:27
  SPEAKER_04: If you think about everything that limits you, it all starts because you only have one body.
• 29:33
  SPEAKER_04: And that gives you an age, that gives you a culture, that gives you a language, gives you a look, all of these different things.
• 29:40
  SPEAKER_04: And if you think that is you, then the um egoic self likes pleasure and ease.
• 29:47
  SPEAKER_04: Good means pleasurable and easy, bad means challenging or painful.
• 29:52
  SPEAKER_04: But if the whole nature of the game is that this is like a this is like an obstacle course that we're running, and we're just supposed to get through it with courage and dynamic joy, and then learn how all the obstacles work so that we can be the master of it instead of the victim of it.
• 30:12
  SPEAKER_04: And then Yogananda's teachings primarily are is how to shift our sense of self-definition from this limited sense of reality to an ever-expanding sense of reality, and how to to live from the inner power instead of always being having our reality defined by what's going on outside of us.
• 30:38
  SPEAKER_00: So it's it's to to manage and master your internal dialogue, your internal world, right, rather than feel as though you need to manage the external world.
• 30:51
  SPEAKER_04: And of course, we should try to influence this external world for the better, but the the the real shift is when we understand that my reality and my experience depends on my inner reality, not on my outer circumstances.
• 31:10
  SPEAKER_04: Because you can't control the outer circumstances, because other people have free will, nations have karma, the globe has karma, people are doing things all the time that are constantly shifting, and it's unstable.
• 31:24
  SPEAKER_04: I mean, yesterday never comes back.
• 31:27
  SPEAKER_04: It's always today, and and so if you if you think I'm going to, and this is what people do.
• 31:33
  SPEAKER_04: I'm gonna get enough money, I'm gonna get the right relationship, I'm gonna get good kids, I'm gonna get the right job, I'm gonna get the respect, I'm gonna have the health, I'm gonna have the eternal youth, whatever it might be, and then what do you know?
• 31:45
  SPEAKER_04: It just wiggles away from you.
• 31:47
  SPEAKER_04: And so the teachings of all the masters and the self-realization, that's what Yogananda called it, I realize my true self.
• 31:57
  SPEAKER_04: And then all the techniques and attitudes and philosophy is basically that, which is real, and how can I live in my own greater reality?
• 32:08
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you for sharing.
• 32:10
  SPEAKER_00: Uh I think that's a really beautiful description.
• 32:12
  SPEAKER_00: You know, one thing that that really strikes me from having studied science and spirituality just for my own pleasure.
• 32:21
  SPEAKER_00: I dived into quantum physics like 20 odd years ago, and and I was like, oh, I don't even know why I'm reading this, but I'm reading this.
• 32:28
  SPEAKER_00: But quantum physics is offering also that internal is exactly the same.
• 32:35
  SPEAKER_00: So for any of the skeptics watching or listening right now, you know, there's quantum physics is saying exactly the same, Jogan Anders were.
• 32:44
  SPEAKER_00: It's saying it's it's just saying the same thing, it's just a different way of saying it.
• 32:48
  SPEAKER_00: You've been teaching awareness for so long.
• 32:53
  SPEAKER_00: Which is not something that you can go and get a college degree at.
• 32:58
  SPEAKER_00: It's something you actually have to chip away at on a day-to-day basis.
• 33:02
  SPEAKER_00: So So, what are the habits that Asher has been practicing for all this time that has helped increase her awareness?
• 33:12
  SPEAKER_00: That maybe the audience could think, wow, I could do that.
• 33:16
  unknown: Right.
• 33:17
  SPEAKER_04: Okay, a couple of things.
• 33:19
  SPEAKER_04: Daily practice of meditation is very helpful.
• 33:22
  SPEAKER_04: Meditation by some um studied and learned technique, not just sort of randomly hoping that if you sit if you sit quietly, it'll work.
• 33:31
  SPEAKER_04: You have to cooperate with the inner realities.
• 33:34
  SPEAKER_04: It, you know, the business about quantum physics is let me just put that in, because that's why Sanat and Dharma, the ancient teaching of India, is called that which is.
• 33:44
  SPEAKER_04: It's just that which is.
• 33:46
  SPEAKER_04: The physicist is not inventing that, he's perceiving it.
• 33:50
  SPEAKER_04: And it's it's natural that the the truest spirituality and the truest science would be the same, because there's only one reality, and then that reality has implications.
• 34:00
  SPEAKER_04: And what's happening in this age is that it's all coming together.
• 34:03
  SPEAKER_04: Now, the specific practices are because of the metaphysics.
• 34:10
  SPEAKER_04: See, there's physics and there's metaphysics, but the metaphysics are still physics.
• 34:14
  SPEAKER_04: It's the way we're made, and the way we're made, we have the chakra system within us, which is the energy body, which is the blueprint of the physical life we're living.
• 34:24
  SPEAKER_04: The chakra system is nothing but an energy pattern.
• 34:27
  SPEAKER_04: Every thought, feeling, and action that you have done in this lifetime or in any other lifetime has created that pattern, and that pattern is constantly being mutated by every thought, feeling, and action that you have right now.
• 34:42
  SPEAKER_04: So absolutely everything that you do influences that blueprint.
• 34:48
  SPEAKER_04: And today is the result of yesterday, and tomorrow is the result of today.
• 34:53
  SPEAKER_04: But because you built up momentum by repeating the same attitudes and affirming the same levels of reality and affirming the same decisions, this will make me happy, this will make me unhappy.
• 35:07
  SPEAKER_04: Um, that momentum makes it not so easy to turn the boat.
• 35:13
  SPEAKER_04: So you have to you have to dedicate yourself and realize every minute is important.
• 35:18
  SPEAKER_04: Yogananda said, take care of the minutes, and the incarnations will take care of themselves.
• 35:26
  SPEAKER_04: Because the incarnations are created moment by moment, registered in the chakras, which becomes the momentum of the next thing that happens.
• 35:36
  SPEAKER_04: Now, it's easier to go to just stick with the momentum and go with all the subconscious patterns that we've built up over incarnations of this is who I am and this is what I do, and this is how I think and I feel.
• 35:49
  SPEAKER_04: The superconscious part of ourself, which is right there.
• 35:52
  SPEAKER_04: It's just that we're not as as used to calling upon it, says, Oh, you can be so much bigger and so much happier and so much more in tune with the greater reality.
• 36:04
  SPEAKER_04: But it takes more energy than it to go toward the new understanding, the expanded understanding, than it takes to just go along with what you've already set in motion.
• 36:16
  SPEAKER_04: So the simple principle is, and I'm going to reduce it down.
• 36:21
  SPEAKER_04: There's many more serious things that I could say, but I'm going to reduce it down here.
• 36:25
  SPEAKER_04: In every situation, try to be a little more expanded and a little less contracted.
• 36:32
  SPEAKER_04: And I reduce it down even in every situation, do a little better than your worst.
• 36:38
  SPEAKER_04: We tend to think that we have to be perfect in order to change.
• 36:43
  SPEAKER_04: That's not true.
• 36:44
  SPEAKER_04: It's directional.
• 36:45
  SPEAKER_04: We just need to be moving toward.
• 36:47
  SPEAKER_04: In every situation, ask yourself, how can I be more expanded?
• 36:51
  SPEAKER_04: How can I be closer to what I think of as my ideal?
• 36:55
  SPEAKER_04: But make that pay attention to your feet.
• 36:59
  SPEAKER_04: Where am I standing?
• 37:00
  SPEAKER_04: What is my next step?
• 37:03
  SPEAKER_04: Always ask the question: how can I be closer to truth and move away from delusion?
• 37:10
  SPEAKER_04: How can I be more in harmony with my highest understanding in this situation, whatever it might be?
• 37:18
  SPEAKER_04: Somebody cuts you off on the freeway.
• 37:20
  SPEAKER_04: Do you start yelling and cursing at them alone in your car, calling them an idiot?
• 37:25
  SPEAKER_04: Um, something, or or do you just accept that this is what God has given to me now?
• 37:30
  SPEAKER_04: Why should I ruin my inner weather just because this man is an idiot?
• 37:35
  SPEAKER_04: I mean, that's a question right there.
• 37:37
  SPEAKER_04: Something that you really wanted to have happen.
• 37:40
  SPEAKER_04: Somebody does something stupid and it doesn't come out the way you want.
• 37:43
  SPEAKER_04: Do you rail against fate?
• 37:46
  SPEAKER_04: Or do you stop for a minute and say, well, God, what is what do you have in mind for me?
• 37:50
  SPEAKER_04: I mean, you can say, God, what are you doing to me?
• 37:53
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 37:54
  SPEAKER_04: Or you can say, God, what are you doing to me?
• 37:57
  SPEAKER_04: What am I in this circumstance?
• 37:59
  SPEAKER_04: What am I supposed to be learning?
• 38:01
  SPEAKER_00: So you see, you know, like let's look at some like real life challenges that that that seem like hard for some people, you know, when someone close to you passes away, for instance, and you'd be like, you know, like a mother losing a child or losing a sibling or losing a parent, you know, and it all seems quite young, and it just seems almost as like, why has that happened?
• 38:23
  SPEAKER_03: Yes, exactly.
• 38:25
  SPEAKER_00: So how would we then respond?
• 38:28
  SPEAKER_00: How would somebody listening respond to that?
• 38:31
  SPEAKER_04: Well, you see, in a moment of crisis, you will go according to pattern.
• 38:35
  SPEAKER_04: You can't create a new pattern in the moment of crisis.
• 38:39
  SPEAKER_04: That's why every minute matters.
• 38:41
  SPEAKER_04: Are you constantly asserting your will against what is reality?
• 38:46
  SPEAKER_04: Are you constantly declaring what reality should be?
• 38:50
  SPEAKER_04: Or is your attitude toward life, I have only a certain level of awareness, you use that word.
• 38:56
  SPEAKER_04: Everything that we call progress in life, if you look at it, is actually an increase in awareness.
• 39:05
  SPEAKER_04: And every time, if you look back in your own life, I'm sure you can do it just as I can.
• 39:10
  SPEAKER_04: Oh, now I'm aware of something I wasn't aware of before, aware of an inner attitude that I had that wasn't helpful to me, a way that, a way that I was impacting others that I wasn't, I didn't know.
• 39:23
  SPEAKER_04: But I become aware of it, and once I become aware of it, then I can redirect myself in a positive way.
• 39:30
  SPEAKER_04: How much else are we not aware of?
• 39:34
  SPEAKER_00: Well, probably quite a lot, I would have thought, isn't it?
• 39:37
  SPEAKER_04: There you have it.
• 39:38
  SPEAKER_04: So when I when something happens and I draw a hard line, this is good, this is bad, this is awful, this shouldn't have happened, this makes me very unhappy, this is terrible, is it possible that we're just not aware of another dimension in which the perspective on this would really change?
• 39:58
  SPEAKER_04: So we have to actually explore when it's easier when we're calm and not in crisis, what is the nature of reality?
• 40:08
  SPEAKER_04: Do bad things ever bring good causes?
• 40:11
  SPEAKER_04: Is reincarnation real?
• 40:13
  SPEAKER_04: Are all these near-death experiences that people are having and returning and talking to us about, are they really, are they really telling me something that I need to be aware of, which is this life is not what it seems?
• 40:25
  SPEAKER_04: And then therefore, when something objectively tragic happens, and I'm I I know it's objectively tragic, it it breaks your heart.
• 40:35
  SPEAKER_04: It's not that your heart doesn't break, but can there be another possibility that the heartbreak is going to bring me to?
• 40:46
  SPEAKER_04: Not that it's less of a heartbreak, but that I can learn something here that I wouldn't be able to learn without this experience.
• 40:53
  SPEAKER_00: You know, the there's that wonderful mystic uh poet called Rumi, and he wrote a quote.
• 41:00
  SPEAKER_00: He says, The wound is where the light enters.
• 41:04
  SPEAKER_00: And this just really reminds me of that quote that you've just been talking about.
• 41:10
  SPEAKER_04: I look at my own life, and some of the best things have been the worst things.
• 41:14
  SPEAKER_04: What can I say?
• 41:15
  SPEAKER_04: I would never have learned things that are absolutely essential for my well-being if I hadn't been, if I hadn't had to go through the worst things.
• 41:24
  SPEAKER_04: So what is good, what is bad?
• 41:26
  SPEAKER_04: You see, you get very your whole your whole simplic simple concept gets shattered if you increase your awareness of the possible.
• 41:39
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 41:40
  SPEAKER_00: From what you're telling me, we just need to stop labeling things, number one, as good or bad, which enters us into a state of possibility and freedom instead of restriction and constraint.
• 41:51
  SPEAKER_04: Right.
• 41:52
  SPEAKER_04: Now now don't you you can't be silly, and this is I mean, you have to be real.
• 41:56
  SPEAKER_04: You can be grief stricken, you can be crying yourself to sleep every night.
• 42:00
  SPEAKER_04: You can't say it's good in the sense that it's pleasurable and it's easy, or it's nice or it's kind.
• 42:07
  SPEAKER_04: I mean, a family I know their daughter was murdered.
• 42:10
  SPEAKER_04: It's like it's heartbreaking.
• 42:13
  SPEAKER_04: But but you can still ask the question, you know, what is that soul's journey?
• 42:18
  SPEAKER_04: What am I supposed to be learning?
• 42:20
  SPEAKER_04: What goodness could come from this, even though it's horrible.
• 42:26
  SPEAKER_04: It it it's more confusing.
• 42:29
  SPEAKER_00: I really love questions because questions sort of determine your response to reality.
• 42:35
  SPEAKER_00: Like I think the brain needs decent questions to input like the computer.
• 42:41
  SPEAKER_00: And um if you ask a good question, you're gonna get a good answer.
• 42:45
  SPEAKER_00: But if you ask rubbish questions, you're only gonna get rubbish answers.
• 42:48
  SPEAKER_00: And you know, a lot of us, myself, I'm looking at, have asked terrible questions and expected wonderful results, and you know you don't get it.
• 42:58
  SPEAKER_00: But you know, when you really want to transform your life, you need to start asking something that's actually going to take you on a trajectory that is opening you, opening you to something.
• 43:10
  SPEAKER_02: Yes.
• 43:10
  SPEAKER_00: And I really liked your question is well, what good can come from this?
• 43:15
  SPEAKER_00: Because someone listening right now or watching could be having something really traumatic happening in the experience.
• 43:21
  SPEAKER_00: But the question, instead of like ruminate ruminating it for for weeks, hours, or even months or years, is like, well, what good can come from this?
• 43:33
  SPEAKER_00: Can literally make you look at the whole thing as a potential opportunity rather than anything else.
• 43:41
  SPEAKER_04: I recently I I met someone who um there was a s a shooting in a school here decades ago.
• 43:49
  SPEAKER_04: Her son, her young son was killed, and basically she has spent the rest of her life on a path of compassion.
• 43:58
  SPEAKER_04: You know, not only For for parents who lose their children under tragic circumstance, but for the poor tortured soul who did that, it's like, what do I do from this?
• 44:10
  SPEAKER_04: Do I just fall into grief or do I expand into love?
• 44:15
  SPEAKER_04: And of course she would want it never to have happened, but it did happen.
• 44:21
  SPEAKER_04: And so is there is there a divine reality to this world?
• 44:25
  SPEAKER_04: Is there a greater wisdom coming emanating from levels beyond what we see with our physical senses?
• 44:33
  SPEAKER_04: You have to answer all of those questions.
• 44:36
  SPEAKER_04: I mean and your own experience is the beginning point where you realize how different it turned out from what from how it started.
• 44:44
  SPEAKER_04: So how many other things am I not aware of?
• 44:48
  SPEAKER_04: Am I not seeing?
• 44:51
  SPEAKER_04: My prayer, whenever I'm suffering or I see someone else suffering, I think of God as divine mother because mother love is the for me, I like the comfort of mother love.
• 45:02
  SPEAKER_00: Well, you know, I always think the mother love's like the soft love, and the father love is like the tough love.
• 45:08
  SPEAKER_00: You know, this is my interpretation, doesn't mean that's exactly what it's like, but you know, I but I I really love your interpretation.
• 45:16
  SPEAKER_04: So I like to be comforted, so I think of Divine Mother.
• 45:19
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 45:19
  SPEAKER_04: So I say, I say, Divine Mother, I just say, Divine Mother, what are you trying to teach me?
• 45:25
  SPEAKER_04: And I pray for others by saying, Divine Mother, whatever you're trying to teach them, help them to learn it.
• 45:32
  SPEAKER_04: Because if the only way a person could learn something they must learn for their happiness is by suffering, would you want them not to learn it?
• 45:42
  SPEAKER_04: Would you actually say, Don't teach them, mother?
• 45:45
  SPEAKER_04: And see, the mother image also works because mother and father both.
• 45:49
  SPEAKER_04: Think of the family.
• 45:50
  SPEAKER_04: If the mother, often the mother or the father has to discipline the child, even if the child is furious about it, because they have a perspective that says if you don't learn this lesson now, you will never have happiness in your life.
• 46:05
  SPEAKER_04: And so you just everything in this world is a symbol.
• 46:09
  SPEAKER_04: You think of the divine father, the divine mother disciplining their children, which is us, because we'll never have happiness unless we learn this lesson.
• 46:20
  SPEAKER_04: So do would we want that?
• 46:23
  SPEAKER_04: Would we not want to have happiness and learn this lesson?
• 46:27
  SPEAKER_00: You'd want happiness for your child, that's for sure.
• 46:31
  SPEAKER_00: But you also recognise that if you don't discipline them, they're going to be like a wild animal, and then that's not helpful either.
• 46:38
  SPEAKER_04: Now, from the point of view of the saints, that's what we look like, my friend.
• 46:42
  SPEAKER_00: That's a really lovely way to describe it.
• 46:44
  SPEAKER_04: It's like we look like feral children is what we look like.
• 46:48
  SPEAKER_00: And also this reminds me of like Christ's prayer, you know, like I grew up in a Catholic environment, and I sort of stepped out and sort of came into a bit more of a spiritual understanding because I had my own experiences of access to consciousness through meditation.
• 47:01
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 47:02
  SPEAKER_00: And one of the things that always strikes me when I was a little boy, I remember going to church and I didn't understand it, but I do understand it now, which was Jesus used to say, Forgive them, Father, for they know not what they do.
• 47:16
  SPEAKER_02: Exactly.
• 47:17
  SPEAKER_00: And that's exactly what you're saying.
• 47:19
  SPEAKER_00: And and when you were talking about the Christ consciousness earlier, that is the level of awareness or consciousness one has to have when you are perhaps at a higher altitude of understanding and awareness, given from where you were at previously, which were you know, in your formative years, you know, I've grown in awareness to recognise there's some things that I will do and some things that I will absolutely not do.
• 47:44
  SPEAKER_00: You know.
• 47:45
  SPEAKER_00: And it's not to say that I'm always perfect, but it's always to say that this is what I prefer to choose, because I know that this route serves me and this one will cause me you know pain and suffering that I don't need.
• 48:00
  SPEAKER_00: So I know that this makes sense.
• 48:02
  SPEAKER_00: So when you're hearing Christ say, forgive them, Father, for they know what they do, it's not to say I'm right, you're wrong, it's just to say you're learning.
• 48:14
  SPEAKER_04: They're children.
• 48:15
  SPEAKER_04: They're children from the perspective of our own potential.
• 48:18
  SPEAKER_04: See, we think children is just the size of your body, but it isn't.
• 48:23
  SPEAKER_04: It's the level of your consciousness.
• 48:25
  SPEAKER_04: And and that's why you know we use the phrase child of God and is is that help us to understand that we that just because we know things about this world and have grown to a certain age or size, that doesn't mean our awareness is complete.
• 48:44
  SPEAKER_04: That's why the saints come.
• 48:45
  SPEAKER_04: The saints come to say that look what is possible, and that which I do ye shall do in greater things.
• 48:52
  SPEAKER_04: And because it's our own destiny, they're not unique.
• 48:56
  SPEAKER_04: They don't come to show us how special they are, they come to show us what is possible for all of us.
• 49:03
  SPEAKER_00: And I think that's what a teacher is.
• 49:04
  SPEAKER_00: A teacher teaches through example, not words, and through attunement with that example.
• 49:10
  SPEAKER_04: It's very much like you know, in the Indian music system, I I'm not trained in that, but I have friends who have been.
• 49:18
  SPEAKER_04: It's the m much of the musical training is matching the note.
• 49:22
  SPEAKER_04: The teacher offers you the note, and then you have to find it.
• 49:26
  SPEAKER_00: It's like a tuning board.
• 49:27
  SPEAKER_00: You're like, Are you close?
• 49:28
  SPEAKER_00: Are you close?
• 49:29
  SPEAKER_04: Yes, exactly.
• 49:30
  SPEAKER_00: Can you hit a G or a C?
• 49:32
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 49:33
  SPEAKER_04: Exactly.
• 49:34
  SPEAKER_04: And so the saint comes and they they vibrate a level of consciousness, and then we try to attune ourselves to that.
• 49:44
  SPEAKER_04: And and it's we who have to put out the effort to attune ourselves, but what the teacher does is he just keeps playing the right note.
• 49:50
  SPEAKER_04: I I was 45 years in very close association with Swami Kriananda, and and there was a personality, he had a marvelous personality, he was utterly entertaining, extremely intelligent, great fun.
• 50:04
  SPEAKER_04: He has an Indian name, but he's an was an American man.
• 50:08
  SPEAKER_04: Um but it was just the vibration that was the teacher.
• 50:14
  SPEAKER_04: That vibration is as much present now that he's out of the body, and even when he was in the body, it was the vibration.
• 50:22
  SPEAKER_04: And it it was my it was like a pulse star, it was literally a pulse star.
• 50:26
  SPEAKER_04: And and I could tell when I wasn't there.
• 50:29
  SPEAKER_04: And I knew that when I was aligned with it, everything would flow better.
• 50:33
  SPEAKER_04: I that's I'm present tense.
• 50:35
  SPEAKER_04: When I'm aligned with it, everything flows.
• 50:37
  SPEAKER_04: When I'm not aligned with it, just as if I were singing in the choir or singing my own note when the the note was over here.
• 50:44
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, it's not gonna work.
• 50:46
  SPEAKER_00: It's very interesting because you could actually listen to a piece of music now and it can make you feel a certain way, and then you go off and have a day, you go off and have your day and pick up that song again in a few days' time, and you might not be anywhere near like a happy, good feeling song.
• 51:01
  SPEAKER_00: But if you play it long enough, it will annoy you until you tune to it.
• 51:07
  SPEAKER_00: And that's how it goes, right?
• 51:09
  SPEAKER_00: So it's a bit like I'm afraid you're out of tune, I'm afraid you're out of tune.
• 51:12
  SPEAKER_00: But then eventually you get tuned to it.
• 51:15
  SPEAKER_00: That's why I believe sound and music is so important to raise our frequency, raise our good feelings, raise our vibration.
• 51:26
  SPEAKER_04: When people ask me how to, you know, how to do, I always ask them, what kind of music do you listen to?
• 51:31
  SPEAKER_04: What's the message of the music you're listening to?
• 51:34
  SPEAKER_04: Not just the word message, but what's the vibratory message?
• 51:37
  SPEAKER_04: Is it ego-affirming?
• 51:39
  SPEAKER_04: Is it angry?
• 51:40
  SPEAKER_04: Is it tragic?
• 51:41
  SPEAKER_04: Is it, you know, always in emotional anguish?
• 51:44
  SPEAKER_04: Is it uplifting?
• 51:45
  SPEAKER_04: Is it calm?
• 51:46
  SPEAKER_04: Does it take you into another place?
• 51:49
  SPEAKER_04: Um and Nanda itself, my my community and Swami Kriyananda.
• 51:53
  SPEAKER_04: Swami was a musician and composer.
• 51:55
  SPEAKER_04: He wrote 400 pieces of music.
• 51:57
  SPEAKER_04: And we, you know, that music, and Yoga Nanda wrote music also and wrote chants.
• 52:02
  SPEAKER_04: And that music is one of the most powerful ways of finding who you are and how to be that person.
• 52:10
  SPEAKER_04: Look at your life.
• 52:12
  SPEAKER_04: You know, is it working?
• 52:13
  SPEAKER_04: What kind of music do you listen to?
• 52:16
  SPEAKER_04: Do you want to be that music?
• 52:18
  SPEAKER_04: And if you don't, be careful because you're becoming it all the time, just like you're saying.
• 52:24
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 52:25
  SPEAKER_00: And also it's like choose your environment.
• 52:27
  SPEAKER_00: Do you want to be in that environment?
• 52:28
  SPEAKER_00: Do you want to be like those people?
• 52:31
  SPEAKER_00: Because that's what you're going to become like, you know?
• 52:34
  SPEAKER_04: That's exactly right.
• 52:35
  SPEAKER_00: And if you're not like that, but you want to, try and put yourself in that environment.
• 52:38
  SPEAKER_00: Because, you know, like I I have this little saying, it eagles don't want to fly with pigeons.
• 52:43
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know if I learned that, I don't know if I said that, I don't know where it's come from.
• 52:46
  SPEAKER_00: So, but either way, it's very true.
• 52:48
  SPEAKER_00: Eagles only want to fly with eagles, so they're not going to go where pigeons are, right?
• 52:52
  SPEAKER_00: So it's kind of a fun philosophy.
• 52:54
  SPEAKER_00: But um, I just want to say, Ashro, just in closing, uh if you were to say somebody to somebody who's kind of just starting out, and they want to feel they feel like there's more to life and they don't really know where to begin, but they've been inspired by this conversation and the things that you've shared.
• 53:13
  SPEAKER_00: They felt the resonance of the energy.
• 53:15
  SPEAKER_00: Where would you where would you point them to initially?
• 53:19
  SPEAKER_04: Well, you know, I I I have to recommend when I've lived, um, my community is called Ananda, and there's a website called Ananda.org.
• 53:29
  SPEAKER_04: Very simple.
• 53:30
  SPEAKER_04: I mean, these days you can go online.
• 53:32
  SPEAKER_04: You can go online, and I would also recommend that you look into Swami Kriyananda and Paramahansa Yogananda.
• 53:39
  SPEAKER_04: You can find, you can just sit in your own home and find it.
• 53:43
  SPEAKER_04: Autobiography of a yogi is like that book has launched a spiritual revolution and it continues to guide it.
• 53:49
  SPEAKER_04: Swami Kriananda has multiple books, music, books, talks, Yogananda's online too, not a lot, but you can find it.
• 53:58
  SPEAKER_04: Be sensitive.
• 54:00
  SPEAKER_04: You know, just sort of like center yourself.
• 54:02
  SPEAKER_04: Don't just whirl around like restlessly.
• 54:06
  SPEAKER_04: Center yourself.
• 54:07
  SPEAKER_04: Really try to feel not merely what's being said, but the consciousness that's coming to you.
• 54:12
  SPEAKER_04: And if if it attracts you, follow it.
• 54:15
  SPEAKER_04: Don't don't don't mix up too many vibrations.
• 54:20
  SPEAKER_04: You know, you were saying we were talking about it a moment ago.
• 54:22
  SPEAKER_04: That's where the concept of teacher and guru comes in.
• 54:26
  SPEAKER_04: That you you really want to be able to to go deep.
• 54:30
  SPEAKER_04: But you you have to explore before you can do that.
• 54:33
  SPEAKER_04: But search out input that that has the vibration that you want to have in your own life.
• 54:42
  SPEAKER_04: And and search out individuals, the company you keep.
• 54:45
  SPEAKER_04: These days online you can meet people all over the world.
• 54:49
  SPEAKER_04: It's it's not hard to explore.
• 54:51
  SPEAKER_04: But once you find something you like at all, go you know, try to go deeper into it before you just go on to the next thing.
• 54:59
  SPEAKER_04: Because otherwise you'll always be on the surface and you'll never know.
• 55:03
  SPEAKER_00: Asher, thank you so much for sharing your wisdom.
• 55:06
  SPEAKER_00: It's been an absolute delight to speak with you today.
• 55:09
  SPEAKER_00: I'd just like to say I really love your message, but more importantly, I love your energy.
• 55:15
  SPEAKER_00: And I think that that speaks volumes, whether somebody's watching it right now or they're watching it long after it's recorded.
• 55:22
  SPEAKER_00: That energy keeps traveling and it keeps sharing.
• 55:25
  SPEAKER_00: This is what I've come to know like energy kind of never dies.
• 55:29
  SPEAKER_00: So, you know, even if they watch this in five years' time, the energy will still be here on this video or when somebody listens.
• 55:35
  SPEAKER_00: So I just wanted to say thank you so much for your presence.
• 55:38
  SPEAKER_00: And it's been a real blessing to speak to you.
• 55:41
  SPEAKER_00: So, Asher is this week's super soul model.
• 55:44
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you very much indeed.
• 55:46
  SPEAKER_04: God, thank you.
• 55:47
  SPEAKER_04: A joy to be with you.
• 55:50
  SPEAKER_00: If you enjoyed this episode, please remember to subscribe, follow for more, and share it with someone you feel might benefit.
• 55:55
  SPEAKER_00: And thank you as always for listening.