Sunday, October 5, 2014

Music gives you life


LIVE TALK AIRED ON RADIO LOTUS AT SARASWATHI PADASALAI.


Om bhur bhuva swaha. Om tat savitur varenyum. Bhargo devasya dhimahee. Dhoyo yonaha prachodayat.

If we go to the Srimad Bhagavatam, cantor 12 (I pray that everyone of you sometimes read that), it talks about the youth of this present day. And what they say about the youth of the present day is very true. To defeat what is said there we have the Munian brothers who have collected all these youth, trained them and kept them off the streets with this beautiful music we heard now.

There's a thing called 'bhakti' - what is bhakti? It is devotion, dedication and discipline. If you have the discipline, devotion is easy to attain. But if you don't have the discipline you're going to lose the devotion and dedication. And today the Munian bros have allocated this day for Mother Sarashwati, the mother of wisdom, the mother of music, the mother of learning, and if you look at the picture of Mother Saraswathi she has a nadi in her left hand, a nadi is palm leaves on which the wise words of the great masters have been written. And one of the great masters who has written a lot about music is none other than Agasthiar Kumbamuni, the great saint of South India. Agasthiar said, as Shakespeare said, "Music gives you life". Without music there's no life. The continuous vibration in our body is music, and with music we are existing here, so music is life. And in that music we can enjoy that union and the highest level of yoga. The highest level of yoga is music - not the asana - music is the highest level because it is the easiest way to have this union with God and God alone.

We must have a guru, and both the brothers (I've met them personally) have done an excellent job making these children aware of that divine Mother Saraswathi. We all need to worship this mother because the constant vibration in our body - the beating of the heart, the breathing, the prana we breathe continuously - is based on music. In badranatam the breathing is more important than poses and postures. That's what Saraswathi is about - attaing the hghest goal on the material plane. And right now the whole material plane is in such dissaray that we have to get these young children into our fold and take them on the journey of spirituality through music. 

As I stand here, I pray that each one of you, before you leave, make a pledge to the Munian brothers to support them. The Gayathri Peedam will make the first pledge of R2500 towards their India trip. Saraswathi is that unique purity, and you will find that during navarathri you have a yellow sari, a red sari, and a white sari. That white sari says that you have attained the state of purity, and that purity can be attained by Saraswathi alone. Yoga is Saraswathi. Saraswathi is music. And the greatest union with God is through music.

Hari Om.