Yogi Bhajan lecture

Yogi Bhajan lecture - Legacy

Yogi Bhajan Speaks – “Legacy”
Class Lecture Excerpts 4/24/91

Virtues are virtues and wishes are wishes. Every human being wants to have more virtues and wishes much more than virtues. The question is: how to have it. It is not that you go to a restaurant and have a thirty-six course meal and enjoy the evening. That is possible; but the question is, whether your stomach can take it or not. The question is not how you live; you have the right to live as you want. The question is: are you living within your understanding of who you are? The question is not whether you are virtuous or wishful. The question is: have you understood your commitment and the depth of your commitment?
This is the full life system. What you would call, "I am living a full life." Full life is when a person has his commitment and an understanding of his commitment, and even death cannot change it. Guru Nanak had a commitment, death couldn't change it. Jesus Christ had a commitment, death couldn't change it. Moses had a commitment. Forty years he carried the Commandments through desert. No change. When someone has spiritual ecstasy and elevation - forget about temptation. Even death can't change him. Then such a man creates a legacy. Then man dies and legacy lives. This is the only beauty granted to a human being.
It is not how material and immaterial you are; what matters is whether death can lose you or you can lose the death. It is true that Jesus the Carpenter set the renaissance; Gautam Buddha the Prince set the renaissance; Guru Nanak set the renaissance; Mohammed set the renaissance. Did death eliminate them? No. Death is as life is. Jo upajio so binseh. “Whosoever has to be born shall die.” You have found the purpose of life when death cannot kill you.
Man can kill a man, poison can kill a man, disease can kill a man, will of the God can kill a man. It is all true. But is it true? No.

Is Jesus dead? No. Is Guru Nanak dead? No. Is Buddha dead? No.
It is a distinct nature of the soul that it comes on the earth to deliver you forever by merging in the creator. We call it God. It has price - and that price to pay is taught as a science by dharma (path of righteous living), whichever dharma it is, and the art of living is what its dictates are. Every religion is beautiful. You can change to any religion, to any form and shape, but it's whether you have understood reality or not that matters. You are a human. Have you understood what 'human' is? That matters. That you are a good person, bad person, rich person, poor person, religious person or a fake, doesn't mean a thing.
You can do whatever you want to do but when it is a matter of fate and destiny then let it be. No interference is required. Between a person and God there are two paths, the path of fate and the path of destiny. Those who distance their destiny, shall fall into the path of fate. When you walk on the path of fate you may feel very happy and egomaniac, but when the death comes, you will be lost again. When you walk on the path of destiny, it doesn't matter what distance you cover, when the fatal blow of death comes, you shall be liberated. That is the difference.
All the chanting, the religious rituals, and the religious ceremonies we do are for that last moment: "Was I true to my dharma, or was I not?" because right before death, there are moments when you, your destiny, and your fate in that trinity are judged. It is your decision, nobody else can do it. That is why we open up the sixth chakra, why we do yoga, dharmic practices, and rituals; it is all a reminder and a re-reminder to develop that habit. That is why prayer is powerful. When you are helpless, you are absolutely gone, you are nothing, just hanging on by this little thread between life and death, the question is whether what you have done in life reminds you of God or not.
Take a girl, take a boy, make love, go through, have a marriage and all that. They go on their honeymoon, and come back. If the man is impotent, how long will their marriage last? It won't. It is that impotency of karma which takes away dharma from you. You start the sequence of consequences and finally you lose the game. Why? Because you do not have your intuition under control; the divine guidance is not there. Whenever a man is guided by his ego, an insult in the court of God is guaranteed. Dharam na vidah, homeh nal varodh heh. “God's kingdom has a direct animosity with ego.” Ego and divinity will never walk together. Where you burn a candle, darkness will go away; put out the candle, and darkness will come back.
There is nothing bad in the world which I have not gone through. But I have gone through it in the ecstasy of prayer. A headache is a headache. Tylenol doesn't remove the cause of headache but you don't feel it. That is spiritual. When you don't feel the pangs of negativity, anger, commotion, vengeance, then you are saintly. And that is the beauty of the sixth chakra. That is the beauty of the third eye. That is the human beauty. It is not that you look like a human and live like an emotional idiot. That is not beauty. that is survival. The question is not whether you are a person or not, the question is whether you have endurance or not. The question is not whether you are religious or not, the question is if you have perpetual endurance or not. Are you even enough to survive against every odd? There is only one way to do it but you must have your own intuition and your spirit must talk to you.
It is my dedication to the renaissance which started America to be America again. It is my reverence to twenty million Americans who started the calling of the soul and sacrificed their lives, so that we in this country may move from maya to dharma. It is my dedication to those who survived with their commitment - may it live to continue until the last breath of their life. God bless you and thank you.
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