There is hardly a moment of rest for Daaji, especially during the seminar days. Early in the morning, he had already begun having meetings with important dignitaries. 

In his hotel room, Daaji met with Georgia State Senator Brandon Lamont Beach and Ajay Bhutoria, Advisor to President Biden for Asian Americans. After seeing the Brighter Minds demo, the guests were very eager to bring this training to the school systems. The Senator described how important it was for him to address mental health among the youth, given the rising cases of suicide and depression. They discussed how to incorporate these cognitive training and relaxation techniques into schools at an institutional level by training the teachers first to be able to teach the students. They also discussed ways to bring Heartfulness Polarity into hospice care and introduce it as a donation-based service for hospital patients struggling to sleep without medication.

In the evening, Daaji conducted meditation at the Georgia Ballroom.

Excerpts from Daaji’s talk: 

“Yesterday evening I had requested you all to go through one particular exercise before finally retiring to bed. That was to develop some level of reverence, love, humility, tenderness in the heart while offering the prayer. And sleep with that state of mind, state of emotion. Today I request you to meditate on the Atma chakra (point 2). Those who are very new to this practice – because I see almost 5% seated here are first-timers – simply offer the prayer as per the Heartfulness way. If you don’t know how to offer this Heartfulness way of prayer, you can pick up a booklet titled What is Heartfulness. It describes the hows, whys, when, and attitudes, of the Hearfulness prayer, the practice of meditation, the Cleaning process. So please pick it up if you’d like to have an in-depth understanding of the Heartfulness practices.

“The Heartfulness way is all about the inner spiritual journey. The yatra [journey] is not external, going from one holy place to another holy place. That doesn’t make anything out of you; it doesn’t transform anyone at all. It is the inner transformation, from one chakra of consciousness to another. This transformative journey is always internal. The theme of this seminar is ‘Neither Here, Nor There.’ I hope you have contemplated it. I had also given a brief message on this topic while I was in Europe. If you have not received it, please go through your mails and see if it is still unopened. Kindly go through it because I’ll be speaking on it tomorrow.

“More than anything, more than a practice, it is our attitude that determines the trajectory, the outcome of our journey. What is expected of our journey? It’s very simple – love. If this flower of love has not bloomed in your heart. Know it for sure you have not progressed.

“If you’re still entertaining the idea of revenge, competition, likes, dislikes, you are still stuck. Rise above all this. That’s what is exactly known as transcendence. No amount of practice can free us. All the religions have trapped us, these so-called religions. Though they started with great intentions, they are still dogmatic belief systems. We’ve read in history how many men, women, and children have been killed in the name of religion.

“It’s time that we move on beyond religion. What is beyond religion? Experience. Religion teaches us from very early on in childhood that there is something like God. Believe in God, which is good. But until we die, this knowledge remains without being actualized. And that is the problem with religion. Actualization, the realization is missing. 

“Some religions are monotheistic and some are polytheistic. Hinduism is perhaps the only religion where there is polytheism. Why does polytheism believe in multiple powers of nature? The earlier rishis [sages] of Vedic times, Upanishadic times, worshiped anything and everything because they could perceive divinity in everything. They perceived it in the stars, the sky, mountains, flowers, and the birds. Wherever they saw this, they felt divinity. So they worshiped everything. The belief continues even today. We do worship everything today also. The only difference is they felt, they perceived, and they meditated and worshiped. We worship without perception. That is the tragedy of Hinduism. Rituals have remained but the soul in it has gone. That’s why the questions arise. Children don’t believe. Though out of obedience, they’ll do everything we recommend. But the true conviction comes only when there is a heartfelt experience of divinity and that’s all about spirituality. Religion can never make one understand spirituality. Religion with its own belief system, ties us, imprisons us, saying that God is like this, God is not like that. That is religious imprisonment. I would say atheists who say ‘I have not experienced so how can I believe?’ are a lot more honest than those who believe in God. Today also, most of us do believe [in God]. What is the backing of any experience and any knowledge? Without the backing of experience, knowledge is empty and hollow. It’s just a burden. Imagine you're a doctor who doesn’t know why you do what you do—who would come to you as a patient? Perhaps you might even harm some of them.

“A few minutes back, I had an interesting interaction with a gentleman named Malik Arjun, who said, ‘I visit Balaji,’ a deity who is said to be everywhere. I asked, ‘Why do I need to visit Balaji when He is everywhere?’ It’s a logical question, no?

I would ask Malik Arjunji one more question – You are a worshiper of Balaji and this question applies to everyone, whether you are a Durga devotee, a Balaji devotee, a Jesus devotee, or a Krishna devotee, it hardly matters. What if Balaji comes up and tells you, ‘My son, I would like to spend one year with you? Hang around with you. Just give me one week with you.’ After one week, Malik Arjun will say, ‘Please God, go back where you came from. You are not letting me do anything.’ Balaji doesn’t have to come and go. He’s all the time within us. He's Antaryamin [one who dwells within]. Divinity is within us. Listen to that tender, feeble voice of the heart. Then you don’t need any Guru, the Guru is within you.

“Coincidentally, just a minute later, I met another gentleman from Tirupati, who said, ‘I am from the holy place.’ Crocodiles also lived in Ganges. The only difference is that crocodiles don’t have awareness that they are in the so-called purity. You may be living in the so-called purity, rubbing shoulders with Lord Krishna Himself, but His divinity may never touch you. You may never even have the fragrance of His divinity, perceived with your ignorant minds. 

“How many people who have read the Mahabharata can understand the divinity of others affected by the divinity of Lord Krishna? Hardly anyone. 

“Even when Lord Krishna showed his cosmic form (vishvarupa) to Arjun, Arjun begged him to return to his friendlier form because he could not comprehend the cosmic form. He was also deprived in a way because he could not fathom the cosmic form. Even with the real form, divinity could not touch anyone.

“How are you ever going to fathom the true divinity by worshiping fake forms and images? If at all, you might feel some level of satisfaction of having done something. We all worship – be it Christianity, Judaism, Buddhism, or Hinduism – out of temptation and fear. My great Master Babuji Maharaj said that religion uses only these two weapons, fear and temptation: either you do this to go to heaven, or you avoid this to stay out of hell. But spirituality is something else. Spirituality is love for the sake of love.

“We meditate with a prayerful heart on divine presence, on divine light, without assuming any form. We have this prayerful attitude during the meditation: ‘Lord, I don’t even know whether you are there or not, but I would like to experience your presence.’ And where can I experience the presence of the Lord? Within me, within myself. That’s why in Sanskrit, the definition of the Ultimate is summarized as Antaryamin – one who dwells within myself. So the search for that entity should be within. But where is our direction? Our direction is outward, the wrong direction. It’s like wanting to go to Washington, D.C., but pointing toward Los Angeles. How will you reach DC? Impossible.

“To those with a Hindu background, I’d like to ask: Have you seen Lord Shiva, at least in images or statues? How do we imagine him? Sitting on Mount Kailash, isn’t it? And doing what? Meditation. Now, the question is: Why does God himself need to meditate? What is he looking for? What is lacking in him? Upon whom is he meditating? Think over it. And if he needs to meditate, what about us mere humans?

After Daaji’s talk, Shri Ajay Bhutoria presented him with a plaque from the California State Senate proclaiming Daaji as an Ambassador of Love and Compassion, and a plaque from the California Legislative Assembly recognizing the Heartfulness Institute and its efforts to promote mental health and reduce stress. Finally, there was a third recognition from Congressman Ro Khanna, a Representative of California’s 17th District in the 117th Congress.

In the evening, Daaji dictated the message which he wanted to share for this particular seminar, building on his previous message of ‘Neither Here Nor There.’ His new message, "From Neither Here Nor There to the Lap of Eternal Now” was released online by satsangh the following morning!

After a quick dinner, Daaji walked over to the Main Hall of the American Telugu Convention which was happening in a building next to the National Heartfulness Gathering. The ATA Main Hall had dances, music performances, and ongoing presentations. When Daaji arrived, the audience in the main hall was very loud with several people chatting or speaking on their phones. Daaji began answering questions as part of his interview on the stage. In between, he asked the audience politely a few times to quiet down, but there continued to be so much noise that after a few minutes, he requested their leave and left. It was an important lesson for all in how to honor our Master’s precious time and doing our best to invite him to platforms where people are open and prepared to receive him.