What to do in moments of inner darkness? || Acharya Prashant (2023)

Acharya Prashant

‍♂️ Want to meet Acharya Prashant? Be a part of the Live Sessions: https://acharyaprashant.org/hi/enquir...   Want to read Acharya Prashant's Books? Get Free Delivery: https://acharyaprashant.org/en/books?...  ~~~~~  Video Information: 11.03.23, Greater Noida  Context: How do you deal with inner darkness? What do you feel about darkness? आप अंधेरे के बारे में क्या महसूस करते हैं? How do you get out of darkness? How does Bhagavad Gita enlighten life by removing darkness in our mind?  Music Credits: Milind Date  ~~~~~

Transcript

00:00Pranam Acharya ji. My question is Arjun had many flaws and it took presence of Shri Krishna

00:09and 17 chapters of Gyan to really bring him to truth. We have many flaws too. We move

00:17in the right direction as we perceive. I don't know whether we move or not but we feel that

00:22when we listen to you, when we read Vedanta, when we read Gita, we feel that we are understanding

00:29but our bad conditioning is so strong. It is so strong and bad that it overpowers our knowledge

00:37or understanding. At many moments, it makes us think and say things which are inopportune

00:44and it makes us regret. It makes us feel as if our knowledge was of no use.

00:50So my question is how do we make truth emerge to forefront in such moments because for Arjun

00:56it took such a long time. I don't know whether we can get that kind of Krishnatva

01:06for us to emerge out of it.

01:13First of all, don't wait for the problematic moment please.

01:18You would require to be immensely lucky if you can get support, help right in the moment. That

01:28does not usually come. That's like being next to a hospital while having a heart attack.

01:41Usually, when you will have a heart attack or an arrest, you will find there is neither an ambulance

01:51nor a hospital around. Don't wait for the moment. Prepare so that those moments become very infrequent.

02:04Also remember that the onus of finding your Gita

02:22and staying close to your Gita

02:28is all upon you.

02:34Yes, while having the kind of personal attendance that Arjun seems to be benefiting from

02:47is difficult. But our task has been made easy by the ubiquitous availability of the Gita

02:56and I have no doubt in again and again asserting that Shri Krishna is just the Gita.

03:09The two are one. If you will keep asking for a physical form in the shape of Krishna,

03:19more often than not you will meet disappointment.

03:22Sometimes you might just be lucky. But usually, it's not going to happen that you actively get

03:31a conscious being to stand next to you and deliver the 18 chapters.

03:36But the Gita will never disappoint you.

03:42The Gita will never be absent in your moment of requirement.

03:59Equally, I am saying don't wait for the moment of requirement.

04:03Be with the Gita throughout.

04:08You can never be done with it anyway. So if you want to know it even superficially,

04:17you have to go again and again to it, which means continuously.

04:24Which means every verse has to be read n number of times.

04:28You know, I have spoken over these verses so many times now. Yet every fresh instance of intimacy

04:44with the verses is even more delightful to me than the previous one or all the previous ones combined.

04:53One could think that revisiting the same thing the sixth time must be boring.

05:05On the contrary, the sixth time is more delightful than the fifth one.

05:12I am looking forward to the seventh one.

05:14That's the beauty here. The beauty is not there. The beauty is actually revealed when your darkness

05:24comes in touch with the light of Gita. So your own darkness dissolves and your inner beauty

05:33then shows up and shines. So that is the beauty of the Gita.

05:41This immortal gift is with us, right? What more do we want? It's immortal and

06:01it is ever giving, inexhaustible.

06:06You can never say, I assure you that you are done with it.

06:13Instead, your thirst for it will keep increasing the more you go into it.

06:23That's the difference between food and the body and consciousness.

06:26Body and consciousness. The body is hungry for food, broadly speaking. The consciousness is

06:37hungry for realization, a light, let's say. Now the thing with body and food is, after you have

06:51had a certain quantity of food, the body does not want food. So the requirement or appetite for food

07:02reduces with the intake of food. Am I right? Yes. The appetite for food reduces with the intake of

07:09food. On the contrary, your appetite for light or knowledge increases with your acquaintance with

07:23light. The more you have it, the more you want it. And those who don't have it, they don't even want it.

07:32So instead of coming to a point of saturation, instead you find that the more you are exposed to

07:44the Gita, the more it is wetting your appetite. Those who do not know Gita, they will say,

07:55not only do we not know Gita, we also do not want to have the Gita.

08:02And those who get into it, they get into an infinite upward movement.

08:14Acharyaji, what do you do when you are with a person who doesn't want to know Gita?

08:18I usually do not allow myself to be in that situation. And that's the answer.

08:28I had to think, when was the last time I was with someone who was actively resisting it?

08:33I did chance upon something in my memory. And the next thing I could remember was, I was no longer

08:39If I am with someone who doesn't want the Gita, I'll ensure, I don't even need to ensure, it just happens, that I am not there for long.

08:53What am I doing with that kind of a person? Not out of any kind of disgust or anything,

09:02What am I doing with that kind of a person?

09:06Not out of any kind of disgust or hatred, just that there are far more eager people waiting for me.

09:15And I have a limited lifetime. How do I spend it on someone who neither wants it for himself,

09:23nor would allow me to go deeply into it?

09:32At the same time, I am not someone who ever gives up on anybody.

09:42I can never strike out anybody from my life. And it has been a puzzle to me how people are able to delete people from their lives or minds.

09:53How people say, now the relationship is totally broken, or I have not gone to my home over the last five years, I don't want to see my parents' face.

10:03Or that I have broken up from someone and now I even hate to remember that I was once with them. It just beats me.

10:13It's alright to not to spend time with someone purely because your time is better utilized elsewhere. That is one thing.

10:21But to start totally discounting someone or hating someone is not possible because the reason is simple.

10:31Gita is the destiny. Ultimately we all have to meet here. It is your destiny and it is my destiny.

10:39Ultimately we all have to meet here. It is your destiny and it is my destiny. It is his and her destiny. So how do I hate someone?

10:47We are all travelers and in some sense co-passengers. The paths are different, the attitudes are different, the pace is different, the intensity of love is different.

11:01But the destiny is the same, which means that one can ignore certain people for some time, but at the same time you wait for them.

11:14You wait for them to reach a certain ripeness and you keep an eye. When you perceive there is the right moment, then you approach.

11:26Then you strike because now the opportunity has presented itself. So you strike. Striking etc. is violence in language.

11:38So I don't mean that. I don't mean bombing or something. I simply mean being present with the right intentions.

11:47So till the time they are not right, maybe just continue with the inward journey and be a different self also.

11:56Is there an option? No. Is there an option? You can only wait. Try with your utmost sincerity and if still the fellow does not reciprocate,

12:09what else can you do? You cannot continue wasting yourself at a point, at a place where no returns are possible because the time has not yet come.

12:22And remember that you are a limited individual. So are all of us. We cannot make magic happen.

12:30We cannot perform miracles. The fellow does not want to listen to Gita and you cannot do some kind of Jantar Mantar that he becomes a self-knower within the next two hours.

12:47It's not possible. It requires a great deal of sincerity from both sides for the process to initiate and cover some distance.

13:02So I have come across people who somehow have a misplaced belief in their, what should I say, omnipotence.

13:12They say, I am a knower. I am a seer. I know the Gita. So I'll make my brother learn the Gita. You cannot make these things happen.

13:24You can attempt. You can remain present. You can wait. But you cannot force your way into somebody's consciousness.

13:34Pushing through these things cannot happen. That's the lesson I have learned.

13:40In my youthful exuberance, even I nurtured this kind of utopian belief that I can bring about miracles and I can forcefully have people change and accept the truth.

14:00That only meant that I grade very fast. Don't try too hard at the wrong place at the wrong time.

14:21Thank you, Acharyaji. Pranaam.

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