What is thought? What is Peace? || Acharya Prashant (2020)

Acharya Prashant

‍♂️ Want to meet Acharya Prashant? Be a part of the Live Sessions: https://acharyaprashant.org/hi/enquir...  ⚡ Want Acharya Prashant’s regular updates? Join WhatsApp Channel: https://whatsapp.com/channel/0029Va6Z...   Want to read Acharya Prashant's Books? Get Free Delivery: https://acharyaprashant.org/en/books?...   Want to accelerate Acharya Prashant’s work? Contribute: https://acharyaprashant.org/en/contri...   Want to work with Acharya Prashant? Apply to the Foundation here: https://acharyaprashant.org/en/hiring...  ➖➖➖➖➖➖  Video Information: 14.09.2020, Shastra Kaumudi, Greater Noida, U.P.  Context: ~ How to control thought? ~ How to get rid of negative thoughts? ~ How to face challenges in life? ~ What is the difference between Dualistic and Nondualistic peace? ~ Can peace and disturbance go together?  Music Credits: Milind Date ~~~~~~~~~~~~~ .

Transcript

00:00 What exactly is thought? It seems as if it's not material, but there's also a heaviness to it at times, especially when done in excess. So what is it?

00:24 It is material, there is no doubt about it, because its content is never anything except material.

00:40 Further, in purely scientific and material terms, the activity of thought can be measured on a purely material scale.

00:56 When you are thinking, then there can be a needle sketching a graph, and a graph is a pretty material thing, right?

01:10 A graph that will almost accurately describe your brainwaves.

01:16 Now only material can probably be accurately described on a piece of paper, right? Not the para-material.

01:27 So thought is something material, it's just that we are accustomed to seeing material with eyes.

01:40 Material can have subtler definitions, right? Thought is that subtle material.

01:55 Similarly, can you say that peace is a subtler material because you can see it on, say, an MRI scan?

02:11 I guess to me I can't see both thought and peace. Peace seems subtler than...

02:18 You cannot think about peace, or can you? You can think about your definition of peace, but you cannot think about peace.

02:36 Peace can in no way be depicted on a piece of paper in the way that thought can be.

02:55 So there's no way to really quantify or define something that's not material, but it is possible to quantify and define something that is material?

03:04 Only material can be quantified, and if it can be quantified, it is material.

03:11 That's one way to avoid calling material stuff as mystical.

03:19 Can it be quantified? If yes, then don't call it mystical.

03:33 I guess what if I can't see the levels of, say, peace? There's a shallow peace, there's a deep peace.

03:41 There are levels of disturbance, not levels of peace. There are levels of disturbance.

03:50 Peace and disturbance are not a continuum. You cannot say that as disturbance reduces, peace increases.

04:03 Disturbance has its dimension. Peace does not lie in the dimension of disturbance.

04:14 Disturbance is a particular dimension. On this dimension, you can have a lot of disturbance and relatively little disturbance.

04:23 At no point in this dimension, on this axis, do you have something called peace.

04:30 You cannot say that as disturbance reduces greatly, then probably at some infinite point, we will have peace on the same axis.

04:42 It is something very important to be understood. Peace is here, up here, nowhere on this scale,

04:53 which means you can have peace in presence of disturbance.

05:01 If you hope for disturbance to subside to zero, to reach peace, then you will never reach peace.

05:12 Peace is either with disturbance or never at all.

05:20 Had peace been a point on the disturbance dimension, disturbance axis,

05:27 then there is really no difference between disturbance and peace, or is there?

05:32 What you are saying is disturbance is progressively thinning out and therefore peace is increasing.

05:38 No, no, no. Not that kind of a model.

05:42 So it's not a dualistic concept like happiness, sadness, peace, disturbance.

05:55 No, not at all.

05:57 There is something called dualistic peace and then there is non-dual peace.

06:03 What we usually call as peace is just dualistic peace and therefore it's not peace at all.

06:18 As long as you are alive, your being alive is in itself a disturbance.

06:29 If you will want total absence of disturbance to be peaceful, then you will never be peaceful.

06:41 So is it as simple, or at least it sounds as simple as just recognizing that and choosing peace even in the presence of disturbance?

06:57 That choice implies dislocating yourself from this axis.

07:02 Where are you sitting?

07:04 On the axis of disturbance.

07:08 If you are sitting on the axis of disturbance, you will never have peace.

07:11 You will be just playing the game of trying to minimize your disturbance.

07:18 That's the game everybody is playing.

07:20 What else do we want from each of our actions?

07:24 We want peace, right?

07:26 We want peace while sitting on the axis of disturbance.

07:31 And no wonder we fail.

07:34 You have to dislocate yourself, you have to disengage yourself from the axis itself.

07:44 Things will keep happening on axis.

07:47 Things must keep happening on axis.

07:50 You must not happen on the axis.

07:52 I guess what does that mean, I must not be on the axis?

08:03 Is it just observe the disturbance and not be there?

08:07 You have to see who is it who is disturbed.

08:09 Does that have to be necessarily you?

08:12 It's the prakriti of the disturbed one to be disturbed.

08:20 You will not succeed with him at all if you want peace.

08:24 Because it's his prakriti composition, predisposition to stay disturbed.

08:30 Disturbance is movement.

08:32 Don't you see that? Disturbance is a vibration, it's a movement.

08:35 And there is continuous movement in prakriti.

08:39 The question is, must you identify with the disturbed one?

08:48 Are you the disturbed one?

08:51 Can't you let the game of disturbance and composure and such things

09:00 just play out where it must play out?

09:03 Why must it play out in your insides?

09:07 In other words, in a more Kwan-like language,

09:14 can you stay peaceful and disturbed?

09:19 That's the challenge.

09:23 I like the way you put it because I was thinking that if I'm not disturbed,

09:29 I would not want to do anything about animal rights or do anything about anything in my life.

09:35 If you are disturbed and you want to do something about animal rights in that disturbed state,

09:42 then yours would be a disturbed effort.

09:46 How would you succeed?

09:50 So you have to stay peaceful and disturbed.

09:55 You have to stay peaceful while disturbed.

10:00 Peaceful in the middle of disturbance.

10:03 And that disturbance is not purely external, as in external to your body.

10:08 That disturbance can even be internal, in the way we use the words external and internal.

10:13 That disturbance can even be internal.

10:16 Your mind is disturbed and yet you are peaceful.

10:19 Do you have to be your mind?

10:22 Do you necessarily have to be your mind?

10:25 So the mind is disturbed, I am peaceful.

10:28 And that's the only way you can play this game.

10:32 Otherwise you are imposing a very very tight condition.

10:36 If you will ask your mind to be peaceful for you to operate in a healthy way,

10:45 that's a very stringent condition.

10:47 That condition will not be met.

10:50 You will be frustrated.

10:53 So it's possible that the mind is moving and is disturbed and yet there's a sense of...

11:00 It has to be made possible.

11:02 Peacefulness or even amusement at being able to watch how disturbed it's getting.

11:07 It has to be made possible.

11:10 And you know when there is peace and disturbance,

11:15 then that disturbance becomes subservient to peace.

11:20 And then that disturbance becomes a harmonious movement.

11:25 When there is just disturbance, then disturbance is just noise, chaos.

11:33 With peace, disturbance becomes a harmony.

11:40 It becomes musical, dance-like.

11:45 You said it has to be made.

11:51 Does that imply that there is a way to make it?

11:55 That implies that there must be the will to make it.

12:00 When there is that will, that way will appear.

12:07 Very cool, I like.

12:11 It's not necessarily complicated.

12:19 It's just that we are conditioned to dualistic thought.

12:23 So it's easier for us to operate in the language of A versus B.

12:29 A and B together is something that we just can't wrap our hand around.

12:37 And it's so easy. You can either hold this or you can hold this.

12:43 It's something we understand.

12:45 This is the language of exclusion.

12:48 This is the language in which you don't really have to make the effort to go beyond your dimension.

12:56 In your dimension you can hold one thing.

12:59 Yours is a dualistic dimension. In that you can hold only one thing.

13:03 So you're not being challenged at all when you are said either hold this or hold this.

13:08 You're comfortable.

13:09 But when you are told to hold this and this,

13:13 then you have to go not only beyond this and this, you have to go beyond your hand.

13:18 Because as far as this hand is concerned,

13:21 it's designed by Prakriti in a way that it can hold either this or this.

13:29 The challenge is not so much about this or this.

13:33 The challenge is about this.

13:36 And if we take ourselves to be this, then it's either this or this.

13:41 It cannot be this in the presence of this.

13:45 This and this. This while this.

13:48 And if it can't be this while this, then we'll just keep hopping from this to this.

13:55 So does non-dualistic simply mean this and this as opposed to this or this?

14:01 Non-dualistic means you are what you are.

14:04 Everything else is where it is.

14:07 This and that are both at their own place.

14:11 The right place.

14:13 And that's health. That's sahaj.

14:16 What do you mean when you say this and that are at the right place?

14:28 That the body is doing what it must.

14:31 Thinking, breathing, eating.

14:34 Mind is doing what it must.

14:37 You are relaxing where you must.

14:43 And isn't it possible, ask yourself, challenge yourself,

14:48 isn't it possible to be peaceful while agitated?

14:54 Isn't it possible to be in rest in the middle of fierce activity?

15:05 Fierce activity.

15:08 I notice my mind just wants to come to conclusions saying,

15:24 maybe it's possible, I haven't experienced it, or no it's not possible.

15:29 You have experienced it.

15:31 The same game is being played out on the screen.

15:35 How agitated are you?

15:37 Aren't your eyes looking at the activity?

15:46 Isn't your mind comprehending everything that is going on?

15:51 Why aren't you agitated?

15:53 But the moment it's about your favorite team, see how agitated you are.

15:59 So it's not as if you do not know what it means to be peaceful in the middle of activity.

16:06 You have experienced that.

16:11 Now can you experience that even when it's about your favorite team?

16:16 Can you experience that even when the "I" is involved?

16:20 That's the challenge.

16:24 [Music]

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