How can the common man make better decisions in life? || Acharya Prashant (2021)

Acharya Prashant

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Transcript

00:00But I also see a paradox in how we live our life.

00:07We get born, we get inducted in the societal norms, situations, we start living our life.

00:15And for a large part of the life, not all of us have the benefit to be aware of how

00:19we are living our life.

00:21And then we get into actions which become like a compulsion and we continue to do that.

00:26Few of us get the opportunity to drift away from this.

00:30So for a common man, firstly, how does he understand what is karma?

00:34What is right karma?

00:36What is karma?

00:37Is it only action or is it words, thoughts?

00:40So what is the algorithm for him to be aware?

00:42It is not so difficult at all while I fully concur with what you initially said that given

00:49the way our societies, our families, our education system is, we just keep drifting along.

00:57And yes, we do in that drift often take decisions that have very far-reaching effects and obviously

01:05they are irreversible.

01:06And then one thing sits upon the other and they get multiplied and so much happens that

01:10just captivates us.

01:13All that is alright.

01:14But the thing is, wisdom is so easily available at every point in life, especially in India.

01:23The question, what to do, what to choose, what's worth living for, has been at the

01:30heart of all spiritual pursuit.

01:34So it's not merely about Krishna.

01:38You go to any of the scriptures, you go to sages, saints, seers and you will get the

01:46same idea.

01:47It's not difficult at all.

01:49So if a person comes and says that this book feels very very new, it means that there has

01:59been a lot of misguidance.

02:02The fellow has either never willingly gone to the great books that are so ubiquitous,

02:14so easily available or he has been willingly choosing the wrong kind of teachers.

02:21He maybe has gone to books, but the wrong kind of books.

02:24So either of the two cases has happened.

02:27Otherwise it's not difficult.

02:29I mean, you don't have to know Sanskrit, you don't have to follow philosophy.

02:36Even if you can go to the couplets of the very common sages, even the folk songs, the

02:49regional folk songs, even they are imbued with wisdom.

02:54So how can somebody say that the concept of right action has totally eluded him?

03:03But it's happening.

03:04So while at one hand I express surprise and disappointment, on the other hand I see it

03:10happening.

03:11Obviously it's happening.

03:12Which means that there is an abundance of the false kind of teaching.

03:20And that's dangerous.

03:23Sure.

03:24And in the book it very clearly lays out how to choose the right action, will the right

03:30action give the right result and lastly action that reforms the actor.

03:35And across chapters there is a lot of focus on why and what.

03:40But if somebody is in this vicious circle, he is in a loop, he is acting out of his condition,

03:44the results are wrong, he is again acting out of his condition, so it's a vicious circle

03:47for him.

03:48So how does he come out of the whirlpool?

03:53What is that one thing that he could do for himself to come out of this whirlpool?

03:58You see, even if I tell you the way to get out of this room, that would only mean that

04:07you emerge intact out of this room and the entire purpose of the spiritual demolition

04:15process has been defeated.

04:19Compared to what, how is a very mischievous question.

04:28What is there makes us look squarely at the actor.

04:35Who is the actor?

04:38What is his nature?

04:39No, you are looking at the actor.

04:42When you say how does the actor reach a particular goal, as you said emerge out of the situation,

04:50then we are not challenging the actor, we are letting the actor stay as she is and we

04:57are guiding her to emerge out of her predicament staying as she is.

05:04Now that is exactly what the actor wants, to not change.

05:08So, all methods and all advices that focus on how to, are not only bound to fail but

05:21actually deteriorate the situation.

05:24A while back we were talking of bad teaching.

05:27A lot of bad teaching comes from this point, you know, how to be better, how to make the

05:34right decisions, 11 ways to choose in a tricky position.

05:42So, even if you have taught me how to choose, I as the misled one, I as the false one have

05:58remained at my place.

06:02What's more, I now have two more tricks in my hands to continue with my mischief in

06:09an even more vicious way.

06:13Is that not so?

06:14Yeah, I got the perspective, yeah, indeed.

06:16So, the ego is not to be reformed or given methods and tricks.

06:26The ego is to be introduced to its own reality.

06:30The ego needs to look at itself in the mirror and see that it is needlessly both ugly and

06:38suffering.

06:39And it takes a lot of courage as well.

06:41It takes a lot of courage if we are accustomed to doing the things the other way.

06:47Otherwise, it's a fairly simple thing.

06:49And if we have a deep desire to let go of our suffering.

06:52Great, great.

06:53It depends on how dearly you firstly love yourself.

06:57If you really want to be free of suffering, then you will do what it takes.

07:01Else, you will keep finding roundabout routes and such things.

07:05Sure, and you also mentioned that right action is something which gives you joy and contentment.

07:11Now like the ego is a false self, so what we continue to get misled again is that we

07:17consider the momentary gratification as joy and contentment.

07:22So as a seeker, somebody who is not aware, it's simple.

07:26And you also said one very profound thing that if you don't know anything, then life

07:30is still easier.

07:31But if you know some bits of it, and the more you know, the more suffering you have.

07:36So what is the advice or what do you guide people from?

07:41First of all, what's false must be called out and kept aside.

07:48Joy, the way the word is currently being used, it's been falsely represented as some

08:01kind of a synonym of happiness, exaggerated happiness.

08:07Joy is not happiness at all.

08:09Joy is just freedom.

08:12So in the name of joy, people continue with their false pursuit of fleeting freedom, of

08:21fleeting happiness.

08:22That doesn't take them anywhere.

08:26Joy is a negation of the kind of happiness that comes necessarily with sadness, of the

08:35kind of happiness that rides necessarily on tension.

08:41And that's the unfortunately only kind of happiness that most of us know.

08:48Happiness that's always feeling threatened.

08:52Happiness that's always bordered by, shadowed by the prospect of misery.

09:01Happiness that needs to be protected.

09:05And if we want to act a little spiritual, then we start calling this same petty happiness

09:13as joy.

09:14And that's what unfortunately teachers over the last few decades or in the last century

09:20have been teaching us.

09:22So the real meaning of anand, joy, is lost upon us.

09:31And the repercussions are horrible.

09:37You look at the state of this planet, you look at the pandemic, you look at the mental

09:44disintegration of population, the neurosis, the very decline in humanness which is reflected

10:00in all kinds of atrocities, today man is inflicting upon various life forms, the depletion

10:08of biodiversity, the hanging down of woods, forests, the rivers are gone.

10:17And having burnt the planet to ashes, we now want to colonize Mars.

10:25And all these kinds of stupidities, they are essentially because of false spirituality.

10:31In some sense, everybody is spiritual.

10:35It's just that most of us have a wrong spirituality, a wrong philosophy we are living by.

10:44And we need a course correction immediately.

10:49Sure, I think one tip that you've given in the book is, the right duty is to find

10:54a way to help others.

10:56And you gave Gandhiji's example of what the world needs.

10:59And would you just throw light on that, so that one of the ideas of this session is that

11:04people take back something which they can apply in their lives, some words of wisdom

11:07or your energy.

11:09So what would you help them take back on this?

11:15In context of helping others?

11:17In context of doing one thing in our own lives.

11:21No, first of all, we have to realize what our life is like.

11:27I can't change something without firstly understanding its processes and its actuality.

11:33I want to change something about this ceiling fan.

11:37Can I do that firstly without knowing a thing about what magnetism is?

11:43So first of all, I must know what this thing called my life is.

11:47We keep living without knowing a thing about life.

11:53And we are blinded by names and identities.

11:56We keep saying fine, so this is my house.

11:59And that becomes such a strong, not merely an identity, that becomes a thing taken for

12:08granted.

12:09But what exactly is a house?

12:12We never ask such simple questions to ourselves.

12:16What am I doing here?

12:18Not that we must run away from our houses, but we at least need to know, right?

12:22That's a place we invest so much of ourselves in.

12:24So what is this construct called the house?

12:28What is it?

12:31I go and I work somewhere and I earn from that place.

12:35What is this thing called livelihood?

12:37What am I doing with all these hours I spend there?

12:41So that's the first thing.

12:44Secondly, there has to be a very honest, a very ruthless observation of who I am and

12:54what I am doing and how am I living.

12:57Once that is there, then light starts glimmering on its own.

13:03You come to see how much of it needs to be built upon, how much of it needs to be just

13:12put aside and there is, you know, a series of mini-epiphanic explosions.

13:24You keep realizing a thing every hour or so or every second day or so, there is something

13:31that is there, I never noticed it.

13:33We don't even look at our faces properly, do we?

13:38We are so busy, you know, running this treadmill of life, we hardly have any time to pause

13:47and ponder.

13:49So that's the first thing that's needed.

13:51So I am sorry I won't be able to give any quick takeaways for people to drive home or

13:59carry home.

14:00I will firstly ask them what this thing called home is.

14:08The saints have kept asking, where is your real home, where is your real home?

14:16What are you doing here?

14:17Is this really your home?

14:19So how do I give them something to carry home, when the word home itself stands very nebulously

14:30defined.

14:34I am sure, like me, lot of us will think about it today.

14:38And you've also mentioned, like we always hear in scriptures, our dharma is to liberate,

14:44to find moksha.

14:46So what I, this is my personal view and my personal limitation that liberation is not

14:52perceivable with whatever we are.

14:56So even if we've heard, we've only heard from sages or heard in scriptures or read somewhere.

15:02So something which is not perceivable, so how do we go towards it?

15:09That is our end purpose.

15:10Again, again you have returned to the how to, the how to part.

15:16You see, liberation is not a point to go to.

15:20If I am in bondage right now, if I go to some point, I will be going to that point with

15:27all my bondages.

15:29So most people who claim to be liberated are actually liberated beings, so called liberated

15:36beings with all their bondages.

15:41And that's the point.

15:42You don't have to focus on liberation, you must focus on your slavery.

15:47Because that's one's immediate reality.

15:50There are a thousand things that encircle us, circumscribe us, limit us, prevent us

16:00from flying free, from expressing who we truly are.

16:06We have to talk about all those things.

16:09Liberation as a word, as a concept is just a utopia.

16:16It drugs us.

16:18It helps keep our servility in continuation.

16:28So I can perfectly entertain myself, liberation, I am coming towards you, see I meditate, see

16:36I do this, I perform that trick, spiritual trick, I sing those kinds of songs and I visit

16:42those particular shrines or pilgrimages and I do all these things.

16:49And even as I am doing all these daily rituals, I am handcuffed.

16:59Prostrating before the deity I am handcuffed, meditating I am handcuffed.

17:04And one thing I don't want to talk about is the handcuff.

17:10Because to that handcuff is linked my identity.

17:13And it's very painful.

17:14It's very painful and I am attached to it.

17:17So I don't want to look at my real problem.

17:20I just want to keep talking of a utopian solution, which doesn't make sense.

17:29And there is just too little emphasis on looking at one's life and firstly honestly acknowledging

17:38where the bondages are, where we really are in shackles.

17:45We don't want to look there.

17:46It's as if the bulk of humanity has agreed to conspire against itself.

17:56Unknowingly I think.

17:59I suspect quite knowingly.

18:02And it's a mutual thing, you know.

18:04I won't call your bondages out and you repeat or return the favor.

18:14And if I do honestly point out at something, then I will be called insensitive and crude

18:21and out of place and the odd one out and all those things.

18:27So to belong, to belong, to belong to your flock, to your family, to your workplace,

18:35to your society or even to your ideology, you have to necessarily remain blind to something.

18:47So it just can't be ignorance.

18:50I see a lot of deliberate connivance in this and it's costing us very very dearly.

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