Asana - Pranayama - Japa

The threesome wholesome lifestyle

What the eye can do, the ear cannot. What the ear can do, the nose cannot. What the nose can do,
the mouth cannot.  Yet, they are very well integrated with one another and work in unison. They are
not against one another. Everything is working in totality.

Now, we have three components as such - body, senses, and mind and then there is the breath
which integrates them. To be more precise, it is the prana which binds body, senses, and mind, and it
is the prana itself which disintegrates the body and the union of body and mind. So, we have to cover
up all the three components.

This means that we have to take care of the body, which is the vehicle; we have to take care of the
breath which is running it as the fuel of the body, and we have to take care of the mind, which is the
engine of the vehicle. So, you cannot say that because I have cleaned my car’s exterior I do not have
to get fuel. You have to get fuel too to run the car. Now, you cannot say that my car is clean and I
have got its tank filled with fuel, so I do not need an engine. Well! Your car cannot move without the
engine, so the engine too should be in perfect condition. Therefore, the engine, the fuel, and the car -
these three things as such are not three. These three things are one.
Similarly, we have to bring a system into our life through which we take care of our body, breath, and
mind. This means that doing asanas is important. Asanas are going to bring the much needed health,
vigor, vitality, energy and strong immunity. Secondly, when you do pranayama, you are not only
breathing deep and taking in more oxygen, but you are taking in more of the pranic energy which is
the cosmic energy. Thirdly, when you do your mantra chanting or when you do some kind
of meditation and most importantly, when you listen to such words, this wisdom makes your mind
stronger.

You cannot say that I am not going to do asanas and I will just do pranayama, or I will not do
pranayama and just do asanas. You cannot say that I will not do asanas and pranayama, I will just
listen to Gurumaaji. It will not work. When you prepare a dish, for example, an Indian curry, you need
salt, you need pepper and you need tomatoes. To make an Indian curry you need all these
ingredients. You cannot say that I am not going to use tomatoes or I am not going to use salt or I am
not going to use spices. No spices! Well! Then it is not Indian curry. It is definitely not! You cannot
make your curry without spices.

Similarly, pranayama is the spice for your body and your mind. And asana is the spice for your body.
It is this which is going to bring in the zing, the zing called energy! You may eat the best foods which
are available in your respective countries. However, even after eating all this good food, even after
drinking milk, even after drinking pint after pint of orange juice, you still do not have enough energy
in your body. You are still wearing glasses. Glasses are a sign that your vision is deteriorating, else
why would you need glasses?

Swami Buaji, my  hundred and twenty-five year old friend, I have to say hundred and twenty-five
again and again, because this is going to shock you, that how is it possible? He does not use any
glasses. You give him the smallest font, he reads that perfectly. He has no memory loss. His memory
is functioning right. His brain is functioning right and he can eat like an elephant.

He was there with me in my Ashram for almost a month. Often, we would eat together. He loves me
so much that he would not eat without me. He would say, “Amma comes, I eat!” So, Amma has to go!
Amma is forty-two and her son is hundred and twenty-five! And he would sit and eat more than me!

He is very fond of sweets. If he likes some dish like rasgulla, he is not going to use a spoon to eat a
rasgulla, he will just pick up the whole thing and put it in his mouth! There is a Bengali sweet called
malai chap. It is quite long and thick. One day, he picked up the whole thing and he kept holding it in
front of his mouth, saying, “Should I take it whole? Should I take it whole?” And before anyone could
say anything, he put the whole sweet in his mouth! It was difficult for him to close his mouth too, it
was so big! But he ate it, not one or two or three but four of those!

He never, ever says that I have indigestion. He never says that I have flatulence. He never says that I
am constipated and after a sumptuous meal, within half an hour he is fond of drinking hot milk.
Nothing cold for him; ice is bad for the human body. Everything should be hot - he can drink such hot
milk that you cannot even imagine and that too with a straw! When you take in any liquid through a
straw, it hits your palate first and the skin of the palate is the softest, but he would just take it in!

One day, he inserted the straw in his nose. He said. “Today I am going to drink from here.” I said, “Go
ahead!” I knew he could do that. So, fine, do it! And he was drinking through the nose! This is the
mastery over the body. It is not a game. It is not something which is supposed to be exhibited but it is
just the sign that how deep is his control on his muscles, on his glands, on his stomach, on his
elimination. Why will he not enjoy long life then? Scriptures say that the human body is meant to live
two hundred years. So, if I accept this, then hundred and twenty-five is not a very big number.
However, we abuse our bodies so much - we do not eat wisely, we abuse our sleeping hours and we
just want to make more and more money. Fine! Go ahead! You will have money, but you will die early
and someone else is going to enjoy your money. Go ahead! Do it! Kill yourself! You are killing yourself
slowly if you are not respecting Nature. Remember this - if you fight with Nature, you lose. You
cannot win against Nature. Therefore, we need to do yogasanas to stay healthy and live a balanced
life.

Maybe someday you can come to me in the Ashram and spend a week or fifteen days there. Learn
theright method of doing asanas, because every body is different. So, we need to know the
complete details - your schedule, your lifestyle, your food habits, what you eat, when you eat, how
you eat and so on.

How you eat is very important. How do you eat? Do you chew your morsel 32 times? No one does
this. You just gulp down the food. You do not relish the food. What a stupid thing! You earn to eat
and yet you never enjoy your food! So, it has to be an integrated discipline - time for your asanas,
time for yourpranayama and time for your chanting. Also, it is time to know all these things, learn
them and then imbibe them.

There has to be an integration of all these three things, else you will end up wasting this precious life
and nothing can be as precious as your life. We do not consider this fact, so we do not think about it.
We are just following the rat race, working more than is needed. At the end of the day, how much
food can you consume? There is a limitation to that. How many dresses do you need?

We earn so much and then we buy so much. We then hang all these clothes in our closets and they
are just lying there. It eats away your precious time when you have to decide, “What should I wear?
What should I wear? What should I wear?” As you have so many things, so much time goes in
choosing. “This does not go with my purse. This does not match with my pagri. This does not match
with my shirt. This does not match with my shoes.” So, you have to match everything then, right from
the shoes to the turban!

Well! If you are not a Sikh, then the turban thing is taken care of, because you are just going to comb
your hair. But if you wear a pagri, then the pagri is another added value. You have to worry about
what color it should be, how it should look and so on. “It should come right. It should not be so big. It
should not be so small. It should not be looking clumsy.” How much time does this take? This is not
living wisely, actually. I will just say that this is not living wisely. At the end of the day, you just need
a bed to sleep in, but you want your bed to be in a palace! You do not want your bed to be in a
smaller cottage or a smaller apartment because you do not live for yourself.
The truth is that we live for others. “Others should see how I live. Others should see how I dress.
Others should see what I eat. Others should see what I see.” “You know, I went to see this,” or, “I
went to eat there”, - this is what you really want to announce all the time.  I say that the human
mind is now more of an advertisement company, always throwing lines to people and dropping
names. “I know this, this and this.” “I went to that place!” If only you could use your wisdom rightly,
then you will begin to say, “Oh! I do not need this; I do not need this; I do not need this; I do not
need this!” Now you say, “I want this; I want this; I want this!”

When you have time, just sit down with a notebook and pen and write down what you need
and what you desire. The desire list is going to be too long, and the list of what you need would be
too small if your lifestyle is right. Asana, pranayama, japa - if you practice them regularly, you
never fall sick. You do not need so many medicines, you do not need so many doctors, nor do you
need so much medical treatment. This means that you do not need a bigger medical insurance!

So many things are inter-related. When you are happy with yourself, then you do not have to
go shopping to feel happy. People go shopping because they are depressed. They go shopping
because shopping makes them happy. But if you are happy within yourself, you know that it is just a
matter of closing your eyes, sitting in a posture and following the chant and enjoying it. Why then
would you want to go to a place to buy unnecessary things which you are not even going to use?

See, we do have needs. When we are alive, the body needs some things, right? However, the body
can live without so many of those things which were actually never, ever needed.

So, you do need to learn yoga. You do need to learn pranayama. I believe that if in the morning one
hour can be put aside, then a right schedule can be made. I am reducing everything to one hour. This
means that if you are devoting thirty minutes for asanas, then you may do fifteen minutes
of pranayamaand fifteen minutes of silent sitting.

When you are doing pranayama, there is a way I can teach you in which, while doing your
pranayama you can do your mantra too. So, two things can be combined here. If you begin to follow
this one hour schedule, soon this one hour is going to grow on you and it is going to grow so nicely,
that while driving to your workplace, your mind could think about a billion stupid, foolish things but
your mind will stay solid in your mantra.
This means that it is just a forty or forty-five minute drive and you have already used that time too as
your japa time. Right? You can play a discourse CD too; listen and broaden your mind. I say you
might be the busiest person on earth, but you still have these two hours or one and a half hour when
you drive to your workplace and back. If you use this time sensibly, then you can do your chanting or
listen to adiscourse. This way you are not wasting your time.

When you are taking your bath, you have to do something because your mind cannot do without
thinking. I teach ways in which you can use your shower time as a meditation time, your meal time as
a meditation time and so on. It is a more Zen-like approach to life.