Lecture excerpts from the Siri Singh Sahib Yogi Bhajan from August 7^th, 1991 in Espanola, NM

Prosperity. Root word purpose, achievement. Noun; prosperity, base, propose, proposal, purpose, projection, penetration, production, paraphernalia, prototypes. The base energy force is parallel and all come told is prosperity. Prosperity in combination. Prosperity looks as one unit, but it has two sides of the coin, it’s never single. Prosperity as a noun is never single. It looks single, it is considered single, its expression is single, but that is the biggest lie man lives on this Planet Earth. Prosperity has two sides to it, because to achieve prosperity you have to totally profile yourself, completely absolutely, meditatively, spiritually, rhythmically and timely to achieve something, and that’s prosperity, and all people will say, well, he is prosperous, that’s all, that’s all you get. What you get out of prosperity, people think you are rich, they give to you.

“Nirdan ko aadar koina dey.”

That’s what Guru says, man without money is not respected. If, Guru, it is a whole Shabad in Gurbani in Siri Guru Granth, that if a rich man goes to poor man house, he says God has come. But when a poor man goes to rich man house, he turn his back to him and it’s a fight between Haves and Have not’s and it’s a very powerful fight. So we concentrate, totally and stimulatingly on a prosperity. Prosperity gives us, people, trust us, people respect us, people have reverence for us, people feel we are comfortable, people feel we are successful, it is for feelings of the others, we want to prosper and with prosperity, we also feel, we will be comfortable. But mostly, we lose, we lose, what they call it, lot of our own maintenance, our own self organization or our own health, and sometime it is very taxing on our character, because we will go for any temptation.

Prosperity is a state of mind and it is extremely bewitching, it puts spells on us. It is hypnotic, it’s our inner urge. Prosperity, prosperity, prosperity, we dream, we think, we live to, we share, we compare, we work, at what cost, we never understand. Prosperity is for this Planet Earth and its Maya and mostly or many times and all the time all prosperity it takes away from reality, equal and opposite, because prosperity means where we put our whole being to make that prosperity your goal. Whenever there is anything in Maya our goal, we neglect our soul, that is how it is, it can never be wrong. Suppose, you are supposed to work, nine to five, what is success and what is failure? One step can decide it. Suppose you stay late to complete the work, that’s one step to success, and suppose next day you come late to work, that’s a declaration of unsuccessfulness. When you come at, stay at night and work hard and complete it, somebody may not thank you, but when you come late in the morning, everybody shall notice you, and that’s all it is.

Prosperity is a garb which we want to wear, it’s a mike God which we want to own, it’s a impression we want to create, it’s impressive too and ninety-five percent people lose their soul working hard for prosperity, why? They don’t organize, they don’t plan, they don’t strategize, they do not bring, into curse, into consideration, pros and cons, resources and sources. There are sources which you command, there are resources you may command, and that’s a common mistake in life. How many resources you have, there may be plenty, how many sources you have, there may be limited. Prosperity is a one word, it’s a Maya bait, why? When you become prosperous, you can’t handle it any more, you get bored.

The main problem with all rich people is they are bored to death, because all there mind is strained to earn, earn, earn, be prosperous and with all their effluence, they can think they can buy anything, well there are certain things which you cannot buy with effluence, one is self-respect, self-esteem, self grace, your own radiance, you can’t buy, health you can’t buy with prosperity, love you can’t buy with prosperity, nothing you can buy which is, which means anything with prosperity, all you buy is a general, solid impression.

Should we prosperous or not? Yeah, there is no way out, but it should be not at the cost of our soul, it should be at the cost of our, not even consciousness, but we should be consciously and intelligently control our projection. If we are prosperous and we control our projection, it means we will never have a negative reaction, it means it is Divine, otherwise, every great man has met this tragedy.

Prosperity is a reality to all of us like milk is a reality to a newborn, toys are reality to little grownup, friends are reality to teenagers and sex is a reality to adult and family is a reality to little grownup adult, and death is a reality to old person. But if with all along with the status of prosperity, we are not prosperously wise enough to handle it, then we cause major troubles. We have certain things in our personality which are destructive and they are constructive at the same time, same word applies to prosperity, moods. Mood, temperament and reputation. Reputation is a word, by repeated actions we create it.

Our repeating action reaches to people in experience and you will hear this word, “Oh forget that man, that is just a Wacko,” one word, Wacko, “Oh that person is spaced out, oh that super negative, oh that, oh forget it, that’s a bitch you want to be bitten on your heel, you better put high boots to go her,” and these kind of casual remarks are not taken seriously, but they are very, very, solid serious observation and so powerful is reputation, that wherever you go, it goes ahead with you, it is there, and if it is not there, first thing a person, other person will talk and check, what is the reputation of this man? So, it is a kind of a resume, a dossier, a History, a record, which you cannot wipe out. Actually, it is your code number, your mood, your mood makes model out of you, good or bad I am not discussing, that has nothing to do with it, your mood is your total sum of values, your mood is your total sum of your character, your mood is total sum of your personality, your mood is total sum of your reality, your mood is your chances to be.

Temperament. Temperament is your inner and outer strength, temperament is the cause of all your achievement, temperament is which gives people trust and negotiation, temperament is which love to create dialogue and temperament is which is the secret of your fulfillment and happiness.

Prosperity has a purpose and all purposes are planned out like seeds and you have to nurture them. They grow as a tree and take the fruits. It’s a very subtle, precise, intelligent and conscious behavior. The total sum of that conscious, precise, intelligent behavior, beyond commotions and neurosis and moods and all that, with a perpetual temperament of goodness and goodwill, you will be prosperous. Nobody can stop it and then you will enjoy prosperity. Should we enjoy prosperity or not? We should. Should we attach to it? No. Anything, which has a root in Maya, can change from your screen and elope without your notice and may not be traceable, the cause may not be traceable with all your efforts, that’s what Guru says,

“Kin Ma Rav Ranko Karki Ravrank Ka Daley.”

In the spur of the moment, He can make a king a grass cutter and He can make grass cutter a king. I have in my life an example to tell you, there was a very happy man, very innocent, very beautiful, he had three children, he was living well, everything was fine. He met a woman, she fell in love with him, she was very purposeful, prosperous, looked very pure, there is nothing you can even think negative, she got him. One thing led to other, she seeded the information to, her husband wanted to cover it, divorce was inevitable. In those days divorce was very new thing to India, everybody was sad, relative, everybody, divorce happened. After, six months later, marriage was announced, and look at the hand of God, she was dressing up and doing Pooja as a bride and all of a sudden the lamp was having less oil, this guy went to bring oil, to put in the lamp, so that, the Jyothi may continue, when he put all the oil, oil split allover, including her and the fire from the Jyothi caught her before anybody could do something, she was almost half cooked, eggplant.

Maya’s myth is great, but when clouds are gone, you can never believe it, they were there. You don’t have to learn from east anything, you can learn it from west, “Man proposes God disposes.” It’s a western proverb, is that true, uh, you understand it, you don’t care, you don’t care, you are not human beings, you are worst than animals, animals care it. Any person who doesn’t care for this proverb, has to eat his and her own shit, all throughout the life that’s a law of nature which can never change. This proverb established the domain of God, perpetual domain of God and it defines the man, man can only propose, purposefully, with all the means and the strength, but what that proposal, how that proposal is disposed off finally is God’s will, you understand that way? No, uh, uh, you don’t, you don’t even have a touch of it, you don’t even have a depth of it. You know what is truth, to you all, like newspaper headings.

Truth to a man in development today by nineteen ninety-one, is nothing but a news, I maybe excused for saying so, you only read the news, not the detail of the news ever to learn that God is owner, and it’s His ownership, and He is never going to let it go. A stinking man from India cannot teach you haughty Americans, that this is your damn own saying, but I can tell you one thing, you stink when you don’t understand it, in life. You proud, rich, sick people mentally and spiritually had this teaching from the very fact of the English language, but you have never cared to take it to heart and understand it, for that corruption and dishonesty, arrogance and ignorance and that deceitful bypassing and cheating all men, including women shall suffer. This is the root cause of suffering of not understanding. This English proverb, is beautiful, “Man proposes God disposes” it is a decisive fact of life. In Indian language, it is little polite,

“Banda Jode Palee, Palee, Ram Ludayeh Kuppa.”

It is little dramatic, but little politer, not direct like this.

Banda Jode Palee, Palee is when you take an oil and the smallest measurement of that oil is called Palee. Palee is equal to one diya, diya, one what they call diya, lamp, lamp, that small lamp, a oil which can put in a small lamp and lamp can be filled is called Palee, Banda Jodee Paleee, Palee, man collects Palee, Palee, small measurement of oil. Kuppa, kuppa is a skin pot, where they keep oil and kuppa can have almost a ton of oil, by weight. Ram, Ram means God, ludhaye means stretch it out, Ram Ludaye Kuppa, Ram can spoil the entire kuppa, equivalent to that you have in English here, “Man proposes God disposes.”

Now these days women says that they are not equal to men, therefore, what they propose happens, that’s why we have a divorce, that’s why we have a broken home, that’s why we have everything and will continue more seriously, because, the proverb is for men only, doesn’t include women, but in those days word man was inclusive of women. Prosperity is also very intellectual, romance, it’s highly comparative and competable, and standard of prosperity is un-measurable.

In Los Angeles I have a Indian girl, whose husband is a accountant, they started as accountant, they got into this Arab time deals and Iranian deals and their prosperity can be seen by a wonderful twenty-nine bedroom house, and that house, they are working on it, since they have bought it and it is always under repair and always changes are happening, and always something is going on, it is a bottomless sink and fortunately they are only husband and wife and perhaps now, after so many years they might have a one child, they have three maids to just keep the house going. Seldom there is a guest coming and it’s not something, seldom they have a guest or a party, but that’s how it is. That’s their standard of prosperity.

So prosperity is a prosperity, in such a variance that every individual alive have a different standard of prosperity. When we were hippies, our prosperity was how much we can look at the stars in the open sky and how much we can roll on the grass and how much we can space out and how long, that was the standard of the prosperity, now, which car we have, which watch we wear, which pen we use, which house we live, how our wives and children live, how our relatives treat us, how the city tax us, whom we know, how many we know and what for we know.

Prosperity is a moving force in the head of the man and it is endless, because once you reach a goal of your prosperity, it’s like a mirage, it goes further, further, further and further, is like a fire, you keep on putting wood in it, higher and higher it will burn, it’s like a desire. More you complete it, more bigger it becomes. I remember, somebody once bought a house, remodel it, at six time more the price, house was bought for six million dollars, forty million dollar was sunk into it, after sinking forty million dollar in Los Angeles, they bulldozed it and rebuilt it, and tragedy is, this hundred twenty million dollar house she cannot enter it, that’s the beauty of it. Moment she enter that house now, she gets allergy, swells up all over, next time you meet her in Cedar Senai can you believe that. They have gone to the extent to call which doctor to find it out the Psychologist, the Psychiatrist, these Tarot card readers and the witchcraft people and buddo(voodoo) people you believe, I later on found out, that her husband has gone to Brazil.

I said, “What for?”

“To find a budoo(voodoo) master.”

They think there is a ghost in that house, everybody else can live except her, she enters three steps from the door and her eyes start dropping, she will be in first room, her face is balloon and she runs back, and she has to go to Cedar Senai hospital for three days to just get out of it, can you believe, Man proposes God disposes, so evident in this case, nobody cares. Man did not find out what is the will of the God, he found out what standard of prosperity, all that man knows is, what is the standard of his prosperity, that’s all he is. But when man found out the standard of prosperity is unlimited, it’s like Infinity, he found out what does Infinity wants, and then he started developing a science of Kundalini Yoga or a source of intuition.

One thing out of many thing, on the practice of this Kundalini Yoga you get it, it is for the householder, it takes shortest possible time for a human and it give you intuitive tomorrow, conscious today and analyzed yesterday. The greatest pain in your life is yesterday, you do not know it is already gone. Yesterday’s gone, it has done its job, you are still sizzling with it, and there used to be a teacher called Yogi Bahan, he said once, to a great huge audience, those who live in past shall never have a future, people thought he is cursing. No, he was not cursing, he was telling the God’s will those who will live in the past shall never have future, all you can do is, let the past, let it be gone, be, let the be.

Let bygone be gone. Past is past, past is gone. You can’t recuperate it, you can’t get it back, there is no way you can relate to it. Whatever you learnt from the past, you learnt, whatever you lost from the past you lost, what is happening today is your direct question, what will happen tomorrow is your direct challenge.”

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