Why this Kolaveri?

Om.
Why this kolaveri? We are all stuck in this kolaveri, in this madness. If you look around you, you only see kolaveri. Every one of you has this madness, called 'cellphone'. Even today it has been mentioned on the news that children should not have cellphones. Yet, to keep the peace, we parents give our children cellphones. Some of you seated here as parents are guilty of that. Just because you don't want your child to irritate you, you hand them a cellphone to have your peace. But while you're having your peace, there is destruction going on. This is the madness, the kolaveri, that we are caught in right now – cellphone kolaveri or cellphone madness. We're all guilty of it.

You leave your children with the most sophisticated phone, but you could leave them with a phone that just does the basics. Cellphones, besides being expensive, can do everything from sending messages, to receiving them and watching a complete video. Now, we have this thing called BBM. You'll rattle away, say things and do things without thinking. And this is the kolaveri that we're stuck in. It's so big that it's gone beyond our control, and yet I ask you very nicely to start controlling your homes. Once you start controlling your homes then we'll have less people and less children with cellphones.

Why do you need a cellphone? If you ask a parent why their child needs a cellphone, they'll answer: 'So the child can contact me'. That's strange. We all went to school, we had nothing – no walkie-talkie even, let alone a cellphone. The parents know what time their children finish school. School doesn't finish any odd time during the day. The school has a phone if they need to contact you in an emergency. Why do you give your child a cellphone? This madness is going to go to another generation, an even more delinquent generation. We are going to have worse situations. The next generation of children will become Blackberry children.

We need to look at ourselves as parents and ask ourselves if we have failed in our duties as parents. If we're giving our children cellphones just for our own peace, we are failing to parent the child. That is one kolaveri. Then we have another one. The Gateway Mall is another madness. Parents just drop the kids there and they walk aimlessly from one end to the other. I walk five minutes there and I'm tired. Many of the young girls are dressed in Edgars 50% off. Madness.

We're stuck in kolaveri, stuck in madness. Every one of you is stuck in cellphone madness. You can't leave it alone for a minute. Let's look at the scenario. Thirteen people are sitting at the last super. Judas' cellphone rings. What does he do? He picks it up and starts walking in a circle. All of you do that - every one of you here – because your whole life is a circle. Why do you do that? Because it starts to affect your brain. How many of you have the mental strength to put your cellphone off on a Friday at 6 o'clock in the evening, and only put it back on at 7 o'clock on Monday morning? None of you, because you can't live without it. But I can do it. To me the biggest burden is a cellphone, and I wish I was never introduced to it. To me it's the biggest load of rubbish. Things that can wait until later, now become urgent: 'Luvvie what did you cook? Did you put in extra chillies? I heard your conversation, Don.

Sometimes we travel to Port Elizabeth or East London and some of the passengers don't even know that we've reached our destination because they're on their phone. They photograph their coffee, send a picture and say, 'I'm having my coffee'. Then they see a dog passing urine on a pole and take a picture and send it and say, 'the dog is having a pee'. The best time to connect with God is when you are traveling, and somebody else is driving.

Please, everybody, as much as we're laughing, were laughing at ourselves as individuals, parents, grandparents, uncles and aunts. Go home and think about what I just said. Everybody's lost it. There was an incident in Tongaat when a teacher reprimanded a child. The child left the classroom, took a stone and smashed the teacher's car – this week. See the madness. Teachers have no control any more. They've lost it.

The law says we can't hit the children. Do you know that some of the children in schools are twenty-three years old? We never saw that when we were at school. If you didn't make it by the age of eighteen, you were kicked out, because we had teachers who ruled with the rod. I caught it from my teacher once, but karma caught up with him and and he ended up prostrating at my feet and became my disciple – how's that for karma? He hit me in Geography class. He gave me a tight one and I didn't say anything because it was my fault: two minutes before the bell rang I packed my bag and was ready to go. In 1994 he became a devotee of the Gayathri Peedam and a disciple. Every time I saw him I was amused because I used to think about the shot he gave me and I'd say to myself, 'This is your karma'.

I think I'm going to stop this topic of cellphones now. I'm tired. Instead of carrying your cellphone, carry the Bhagavad Gita. We've made a nice pocket-sized one. Instead of sending an SMS, turn to the pages and get a nice long message from the Bhagavad Gita. SMS means 'short messaging'. But some people send me an SMS and it is so many messages long. I don't know what they write because it comes incomplete: 'from Nitha incomplete' – I don't know what that means – is she not complete? Send one line at a time. 'I see kitty. Kitty sees me'. Do you remember that? 'I see ball. Kitty sees ball'.

Then we have another madness: drugs. Why is it that our children are so much into drugs and alcohol at this time? I had a principal tell me that one of his grade eleven pupils arrived at an award function drunk out of his mind (the principal used a different word). The pupil damaged three teachers' cars. So where is this going to? It's going to total delinquency – no control. That's what it means. This is the kolaveri we're in; the madness we're in. Yet we can change this whole thing and become evolved individuals.

We are just like water. Water is the only thing that can defy gravity. Did you know that? It is the only thing that can go against gravity. Just add some heat and you get steam. That's against gravity - it goes up. Put some steam in your backsides and you'll get to the cosmic world. I can't say it any other way. I'm really tired of saying it. Evolution is possible for everyone. It's not for the selected few. Krishna says that only a few wise men find the way. That means all of you are wise but only of a few evolve. Don't you want to rise like that steam? The same steam, if we change the temperature while it's rising, becomes ice. That's what you all are: blocks of ice. We have the potential to become steam, but we don't do anything about it. Are ice-blocks water? Yes. The molecules are cramped together in a block of ice. There's no space for movement. When there's free movement its called water. What's the beauty of water? It will always find its gradient, and it will flow down to the lowest spot. What do we do? We sit like ice in the fridge. We are useless. An ice block is useless in winter. You need to put some heat behind you. When I say heat, I mean get some spiritual bombardment.

I'll be gone one of these days, and laughing at you all because you're not taking this advice seriously, especially for your children. I can't change you, but at least make your children better people. Our parent duties and responsibilities fail if we give our children a cellphone. It's been mentioned today in the news and it something that we need to take seriously for the future. I know some of you are upset with me, but I really don't care. I have to do my job, and this is my job. I want you all to be like water – capable of defying gravity. You must be able to rise, spiritual levitation, spiritual connection. Then you come and ask me: 'How come we're not connected, Guru?' If you have all that nonsense in your head, how can you get connected?