Yogi Bhajan Lecture Archive
Lecture by :
Siri Singh Sahib Bhai Sahib Harbhajan Singh Khalsa Yogi Ji
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Lecture on: 06/06/1989
Category: Gurdwara
Location: Los Angeles, CA
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Today you have the Responsibility

Wahe Guru Ji Ka Khalsa, Wahe Guru Ji Ki Fateh!

It is has almost become a regular tradition to commemorate on the 6th of every month the martyrdom attack of Akal Takhat. So long one western Sikh will live in his memory, the attack on the Akal Takhat by the government army and the massacre shall be remembered. Not to misunderstand the fact that we are trying to revive a memory. We are trying to understand the meaning.

Sikh Dharma is based on two things. There are two words in Sikh Dharma which you will not find in the other 21 religions you can study. Hindu religion is a pictorial religion. One of the vastest pictorial religions which has "Chawgee karo ta dev te" -- The God aspect of two million, four hundred thousand aspects has been described, pictorially understood, spiritually explained, and in scriptures, defined. What a wonderful job. There's no reason to worry about it.

What is a religion? Every religion is based on one sound. Every religion is based on one sound. Let us take Judaism. "Yaa-Ho-Vaa." Sound is "Yaa." Let us take Christianity. "Haa-le-lu-ya." The sound is "Haa." Let us take Islam. "Laa-ay-laa." Sound is "Laa." Let us take Hinduism. Sound is Raam, "Raa." Let us take Sikhism. Sound is Saatanaam, "Saa." So basically there is a one sound.

But there are two things which this walk of life has for a very deep understanding. One is Akal Moorat. Other is Akal Takhat. A throne of immortality, ruled by spirituality and a Sikh defined as a shape and a face in a pictorial immortality. "Kal" means death. "Akal" means where there is no death. So there is a deathlessness which rules us and a deathlessness which lives in us.

Man has a very great fear of death. I can understand if you allow somebody to get rid of his apartment and tell him, notice him, "You are supposed to leave the apartment," they feel very upset. They go out and find another apartment, rent it out. People get very worried. But unfortunately when a the soul is asked to quit a human body, there's no other apartment soul knows is available. Had he had the consciousness... the applied consciousness... man would have known, after leaving human body, where he is going to go, there would not have been any difficulty. It is so unfortunate that in 50, 60, 80, 90 years, human has never understood from where he has come and what is his purpose of being here, and where he is going to go and when he is going to go.

I have never seen anyone who ever travels who does not make arrangements, who does not book seats, who does not buy tickets. There is a fare concession. If you book a seat 30 days in advance, it is much cheaper than if you buy it the next day. Now what is a religion? The same thing. You gotta go, so book a seat, and book about 30 days in advance. So you might not create harassment for everybody you love... neither you will be harassed at the time of going by something you didn't complete... and walk gracefully.

My God! This hotel earth is so dear to these mortals. They think whatever they build here, that's all it is. Their emotions, their feelings, their commotions, their dealings, their manipulations, their way of talking is to power over each other. The most beautiful, excellent thoughts... human mind... mind which can play to Infinity, consciousness which can experience the Creator and It's dignity, the Totality, the Reality... all has no meaning.

Every human being has been told, "If you do good, you go to heavens." Let us take Islam where heaven has been described. "There'll be rivers of liquor, 100 proof. There will be young boys available for intercourse. And young virgins will be available to you, but when you are on the earth, don't do it." Now this is their heaven. I'm not quoting out of memory. I am quoting from the very scripture itself.

Let us go to the Hindu heaven. "Peace, tranquility, there will be no disturbance." What is the difference? When you will be dead there will be no disturbance. None at all.

That is why Guru Nanak said, "I don't want heaven, I don't want hell, I don't want imperial kingdom and I don't want to be a beggar. I don't want anything. I just want to long to communicate with You through the shabad. You are my shabad and I am Your response."

Look at the relationship. Sikh religion has to be understood by the Sikhs also. Sikh religion has become the biggest pivot of Brahmanism. It has lost its track. It has gone astray. Nothing is understood.

I was in Rome and somebody was telling me, "We are the Khalsas, and we belong to Wahe Guru and victory belongs to Wahe Guru therefore Khalsa belongs to victory and victory belongs to Khalsa." I said, "What a wonderful conclusion." The only thing which Sikh Dharma offers you is a state of bliss-- anand -- in which there is absolutely a complete experience of desirelessness. And what is the will of the God? So long you desire, you will never know what God desires. Because you must understand, what you desire, somebody else desires, too. Life is meant to find what is the desire of the God, what is the Will of the God, what is the creativity of the Creator, and how to accomplish your achievement of that experience. Life is not to enforce your rule over others. Life is not to put your desires... "Hey, Sache Paatishaa! Oh My God! Bless me with a long life." To do what? To plough the fields? What do you want a long life for? "Give me the wealth, give me the territory, give me this,
give me that." Oh my God! You got everything, and after that, what?

Akal Moorat. "Give me perpetual shape, pictorial face, of Thou, Oh Lord. Let my presence, my sight, be that of Thee, Oh Lord." That's the base of Sikh Dharma. If you don't understand it, you are not a Sikh. A designated institution and an autonomy of reality within the concept of workability to enforce immortality in the mortal self. To be a Sikh is very simple. There is no complication. God runs this universe and a little tiny planet called earth and its tattwas and its gunas and its weather and its movements and its day and its night. When Guru Nanak finished the Japji, he said so: "Divas raat du-eh daa-ee daa-i-aa khelai sagal jagat." The whole world plays by the nurturing hand of the two maids -- day and night. Two attendants, day and night. "Changi-aa-ee-aa bur-aa-ee-aa vaachai dharam hadoor."

The nearness that you are near God or you are far away from God, is how good you feel and how bad you feel. And if those people who are sitting here, they may not know any other language, but they know language as a basic language -- English. God is G-O-D, God. Good is G-O-O-D, good. And Goods which you pray for all the time, put the 's' in the end... matter finishes. "Ekaa maa-ee jugat vi-aa-ee tin chele parvaan. Ik sansaaree ik bhandaaree ik laa-e deebaan. Jiv tis bhaavai jivai chalaavai jiv hovai furmaan. Oh vekhai ohnaa nadar naa aavai bahotaa eho vidaan." (From the 30th pauree of Japji Sahib.)

The surprise is that He knows -- you don't.

If you drive a road in your car and you do not know where you are going, which direction you have to take, what do you know? It is so difficult for this human to accept, 'this is my direction.' You do it every day in the life. Everybody at 1:00, whether one has to eat or not, says, "Oh, what about lunch?" At least at 5 years old or 50 years old.

What about going home? Talk death, and everybody will freak out. And then as Sikhs we are ruled by the throne of immortality. And in our Mool Mantra we are Akal Moorat. The hypocrisy which people practice in Sikh Dharma and the pretentiousness of achievement they want to show off is such a sales talk! I sometimes wonder where these people have come from. What do all of us think Sikh Dharma religion is?

That is why in Sikh Dharma there is a one beautiful thing: Guru Dwara. Gate. Guru's gate. You come in, then you have followed the rule of a guest. Guru is the host, you are the guest. "Waho Waho Gobind Singh, aape gur chelaa." A practical religion, a religion of understanding, a religion of concept, conception, and a religion of practical experience. Not a religion of a dogma. A living religion, a vibrant religion, ever living. A religion which can record itself in perpetual time where an ordinary person can find reality.

You know what you find all your life? Your psychological syndromes. Type A, type B, type C, type D, type Z. Why don't you become a typewriter machine and type and type? Are you ever going to become human? Type human?

A very funny thing happened. I was sitting in Hamburg, I was just relaxing, there was no big deal. Somehow my mind started listening to the play of the tape. And I started singing: "I am beautiful, I am blissful, I am bountiful," and whole thing. After a while I said, "What I am saying?" To experiment with this, there were three other people sitting. I started singing a little louder. They thought they should participate with me. So they participated, and I said, "Hey, they are trapped now." So I said, "After this, is something left?" They said, "We don't understand." I said, "You are saying something. It says you are beautiful, you are bountiful, you are blissful. Is there anything left after this?" Well, they gave it a thought and they said, "No." I said, "That's why you are Sikhs of the Nanak -- No no -- Na-Nak. Where there is no 'no.' All is 'yes yes!' "

Man is not afraid even of death. Man is afraid of incompletion. Nobody knows whether the visit to earth is complete or incomplete. Have I done my job? You know in your daily routine when you finish your work, you sleep, and you have a sound sleep. When you have not finished your job, you can't sleep. When you don't finish your job, you will weep. There's a longing. There is a hunger like a child. A child cries when he is hungry. Give him milk, he'll be satisfied. Give him food, he'll be satisfied. Soul has also a longing to complete his journey on the earth. It has come to experience. That is why Guru Nanak in his sixth self, gave us Akal Takhat. A throne of deathlessness. Because Guru Nanak, in his first life, gave us a shape of deathlessness. Akal Moorat, Ajoonee Saibhang, Gurprasad. Too much pride is being taken to explain the Sikh religion. Sikh religion is being presented today as a philosophy of gain and loss, richness and poverty. If Guru blesses you, you are rich.

I had a very funny experience. I was in Rome and I was asked to visit the house of a lady. I went there. I walked in those beautiful, many, many, many, many, marble rooms. I also saw the acreage of beautiful, beautiful gardens done. I am not very expert in art, but I think every little thing there has pricelessness to it. And I said, "What happened? Why you are so negative to your husband?" She said, "You see all this? This is nothing. I have much more than this. But he couldn't give me love and I couldn't live in love, in tranquility, in peace." I said, "You look highly like a philosopher." She said, "Yes, master. I have a great understanding. My soul is longing for that. All this around me is my cage." I said, "Why you want to misunderstand yourself?" She said, "I read your one poem, 'Rib cage.' I understand. I am not willing to accept the fact being condemned by time and space. I want to rise above it. I want to experience my identity as you call 'Sat Nam.' I want to
experience it. I just don't want to know it. I just don't want to feel that that's enough."

Guru, in his wisdom, gave us the throne to be ruled. And it is not a throne which you can shift, which you can change -- today it is in Amritsar, tomorrow you can make in Feirozpur. It is not a throne which can be anywhere. The blend of the life of a soldier and a saint is that is what Sikh Dharma is all about. When it comes to life, then it is a life of a soldier. When it is living, then it is a life. Inverted life of a soldier. Projective life of a saint. What a tragedy it is to be a Sikh and project as a soldier and invert like the opposite! Invert like a soldier, and project like a saint -- then there shall be balance.

Everybody wants to be a soldier for others, and saint for himself. Now this is a cross-selfishness which has no meaning in Sikh Dharma. Forgive me for saying that you do not make any sense. Discipline is for myself, and my kindness and compassion and my grace and my strength is for others. Here, I am saint for others and I am a soldier for myself. "Khalsa meraa satigura puraa." Soldier within you. What we are doing? We are a soldier to others, and a saint to ourself? For God's sake, you are going to rule this planet earth anyway! I can't stop it. But let me remind you, don't get off beat. Understand Sikh religion and its commands.

I had a very funny experience. I was asking a mother, I said, "How you feel about your child?" She said, "Yes, yes, yes. My child is very innocent. My child is very beautiful." She was saying about 20 minutes about the child. I said, "I am very grateful that God gave you a child with all these qualities." And she looked at me as you catch a thief while stealing something. She said, "Siri Singh Sahib, what is my responsibility?" I said, "Your responsibility is God gave you a child with all these qualities. See that you do not put any poison in it. See that you do not put your insecurity in him. See that you do not pollute the environment. See that you remain totally impartial and neutral and serve the faculty and the facet which God has given to you. See it happens!" "I am a very humble person. I am just a mother." I said, "This application you can write to God, 'I am just a humble person, I am just happen to be a woman and you selected me wrongly as a mother.' Then God will decide it. It is not my place to tell
you why God selected you to be a mother for this soul. My job is to just tell you what your responsibility is." I said, "My job is not to tell you to become a Sikh. That's not my job. My job is to explain to you what a Sikh is. My job is not because I am a wise or I am not wise. If you think I am wise, you listen to me. My job is to tell you to listen to YOUR wisdom." I said, "If you listen to my wisdom, it is a borrowed wisdom. You must live to your wisdom. Guru says you are the light, therefore you have the right to be enlightened."

Akal Takhat was attacked by Indian army for some reasons. Whatever those reasons were, it is unacceptable. Those reasons are not acceptable. Those reasons shall never be acceptable. Why? The throne of immortality was attacked by mortals, that's why. And that is why on every sixth we meet in Guru's place to understand that there is Akal Takhat within us and we should not attack it, and we should not destroy it, and we should not miss this chance of being human, and we must do our job to give our children a beautiful tomorrow.

What is spiritual urge? Spiritual urge is to be in the spiritual surge. Above me is me. Within me is me. I am, I am. For all what there is. And that is what Guru Nanak taught, and that is what Guru Gobind Singh completed, and that is what Guru Gobind Singh gave us forever in the embodiment of a living Guru, Siri Guru Granth.

You love everything? God bless you. You love your achievement? God bless you. You love your family? God bless you. You love your Guru? God bless you. You love God? God bless you. But you are useless. You are hopeless. What Guru says: if you do not experience love of Guru, love of God, you will become time bound. If what I say is, "Love of Guru won't work". You will question: "If my love of Guru won't work, what will work?" What Guru says, "Jo gur ke so kar kamaao," Live that. Guru says, "Akal Moorat." Hey, this is pro forma. It is a personality profile. Mool Mantra is personality profile. It is a profile. "Ik Ong Kar Sat Nam Karta Purakh Nirbhao Nirvair, Akal Moorat Ajoonee Saibhang Gurprasaad, Jap." How to get that? "Jap." There's a one command: Jap. Aad sach, jugaad sach, heibhee sach, nanak hosee bhee sach. The whole philosophy has been simplified in a very simple manner.

My personal feeling is that you have come to the Guru's gate by will of the Guru itself. As day and night are the maids through which the man plays; destiny and fate are the two directions through which man walks. During the day you are supposed not to sleep. But if you take a nap, nobody cares. During the night you are supposed to sleep, but if you work in the night, people do work at night, nobody is going to go after you. You can make the choice. If you want to give distance to your destiny, you have a choice. That's your free will.

Let me tell you something today. If you ever think that you need advice to know what is wrong and what is right, I don't agree with you. "Beej mantra sarab ko giaan." In the very seed everybody knows the knowledge of righteousness. All of us has a little voice, feeble, not very loud, but very feeble, little voice. It tells us what is right and wrong. In Rome somebody asked me a question, and the question was very wonderful. He said, "I have everything, but I have no peace of mind." I said, "It is very simple. Dissect your mind piece by piece and find out where trouble is."

We were very lucky this time. We started a dialogue with the Catholic church. We went to Vatican to have a dialogue. And we were communicating between ourselves. Dialogue was very wonderful. It was not an Archbishop. It was a Cardinal. We sat down. He said, "We recognize Sikhs. Beautiful nation." I said, "Not true. You only recognize five religions: Judaism and Christianity, and other than that Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism. You do not recognize Sikhs." "No, no, we dialogue with you." "Not true. You don't. I have come to dialogue. I have started the dialogue, and my dialogue is to let you know we are 18 million people, we are a nation, and we don't want to be ignored. That's our dialogue." "We are willing to do everything for you. You should ask the Archdiocese to recommend the case to the Vatican." I said, "It sounds like I should tell the Pope to go to Espanola and ask Mukhia Singh Sahib to recommend his case to me."

I said, "I am here. Let the dialogue start. I understand you have 108 acres and you are a sovereign and you have political relationships and you have the government and spiritual rule." I said, "We have one hundred and eighty acres, and we are very sovereign, we are Americans. We have a problem. We have never accepted other than being sovereign." I said, "America may lose everything in its thought, mind and situation, but one thing it cannot lose: its sovereignty. It is imbedded in us. Our issue is not whether you recognize us or not. Our issue is human rights. Do as human we have the right to be recognized by another spiritual group or not? That's it." I said, "I was very much in pain when I said, 'the Khalsa Council of the sub- region of Italy and allied territories.' I didn't recognize you, either. That's why I am here for a dialogue. The day you'll recognize us, we'll recognize you too." And I said, "Just remember, we have Akal Takhat. We have a throne of authority. We are ruled and we
are subjects and we have an object of spiritual immortality."

That's what I'm trying to ask you tonight. Recognize and reconcile that religion is not a satisfaction. Prayer is not asking for a better life. Meditation is not for asking for bread and butter. Yoga is not just stretching your legs doing exercise. Recognize and reconcile that it is a relationship to make three into one and one into three -- soul mind and body, body mind and soul -- into the unison experience of Godliness. It's very easy. I am talking out of experience. I am just letting you know this is the Guru's way, and this is the Sikh way. Recognize today and reconcile today that merger of these three, and experience of the one is the dialogue of Sikh Dharma. So let us recognize the dialogue has begun. Guru within is a Sikh in projection. Guru in projection is a Sikh within.

If you got up this morning to be successful... if you got up this morning and you dressed up this morning to be successful... to be victorious... and if you could not offer that victory to Wahe Guru, you forgot the very slogan of "Wahe Guru Ji Ki Fateh." You stole something which never belonged to you. You are no more or less than but a thief. And if, early in the morning, you got up and achieved the state of purity, crystallization and bliss, and you did not offer to Wahe Guru, because purity belongs to Wahe Guru, you did not earn the right to call, "Wahe Guru Ji Ka Khalsa, Wahe Guru Ji Ki Fateh." If you do not have the Satya, the truthful identity, within you, and you did not identify with the truthful identity, you did not understand the meaning of Sat Nam. You just utter it.

Well, there is a conflict. You will say: "If you say Sat Nam, you are going to be fine. If you say Wahe Guru, you are going to be fine." No, no, no, no, no, no!! Conflict is, you make up your mind by saying it, you can keep on skipping the experience. That's where you are a thief. Then you are performing a drama, you are having the rituals, and you are not diving deep... because it will not fit in with the Sikh philosophy and direction of "Ang Sang Wahe Guru." We are the combination of 30 trillion Wahe Gurus. There is one Wahe Guru and we are the aspect of those 30 trillion Wahe Gurus.

Therefore, we come on every 6th, we bring our wishes and our desires into the House of Guru, that we may really experience Akal Takhat. We may really experience Harimandir. We may really experience Aad sach, jugaad sach, heibhee sach...and over and above that...Nanak hosee bhee sach.

It is my prayer when the banner of power shall pass on to you, you shall be kind to the mankind. When the rule of authority, spiritual and imperial will come to your generations, you shall be kind and not content with how rich America is and not to show on your televisions how the Sudanis are dying. Not to feel that the voice of democracy is being met by machine guns. And you play the diplomatic role, governing the relationship. The vitality of the American mind and the spirit in victory enjoys the grace of the freedom. Those Chinese students, in their own version, in their own hands, raised the Statue of Liberty. They labored for it, they died for it, and they have become victorious. It is that deathlessness which we are remembering today. Sharing the vibrations and the understanding.

Today you have a responsibility. Rise above and go to the four corners of the world and take the message of Nanak so the mental poverty, spiritual degradation, and fear and phobia of the physical may disappear from mankind.

May this day bless you to walk strong and walk tall. I am very grateful to you all who are tall and who walk tall with me, who are physically short, mentally tall and walk tall with me, who are spiritually tall and walk tall with me. Let us walk tall with glory and grace to the House of Guru, the ultimate destiny, the God Itself, which is "Ik Ong Kar."
I fully understand the vibration will come, test will come, challenges will come, but just remember, whatever comes has come to go. "Jo upajio so bin se." Whatever grows, eliminates. So my feeling is, the changing of the time will put a lot of demands over you. Meet it so that you pass on the message of the Guru and serve the throne of immortality, Akal Takhat, forever.

Wahe Guru Ji Ka Khalsa, Wahe Guru Ji Ki Fateh!

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END OF TRANSCRIPT
6/6/89
YOGI BHAJAN
Transcript by Tej Kaur Khalsa, Los Angeles, CA

Above Article Copyright © Yogi Bhajan 2002. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.



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