If Vivekanand comes alive today, this is what he faces || Acharya Prashant, at BITS Goa (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: 12.01.23, BITS, Goa   Context:  ~ Has religion really been successful in its purpose?  ~ Is a man better off without religion?  ~ What is the role of religion in a man's life?  ~ What is the primary distinction between youth participation during the time of Swami Vivekananda and today?  ~ Are there more changes now than there were then?    Music Credits: Milind Date  ~~~~~

Transcript

00:00:00Today happens to be the National Youth Day on the occasion of Swami Vivekananda's birth

00:00:07anniversary. His mission was to bring about a change through mobilization of the youth.

00:00:12You too have been referred to as the Swami Vivekananda of today by many media articles.

00:00:17Since you work quite intensively with the young population, especially with the leading

00:00:21institutions of the country like IITs, IIMs, AMs etc. Sir, I would like to ask what you

00:00:28think is a major difference in youth engagement from Swami Vivekananda's time to today.

00:00:34Is it easier now or is it more difficult or are there the same challenges? I would request

00:00:40you to please throw some light on this.

00:00:43You see, the youth is always in a peculiar condition and the peculiar condition is that

00:01:01the body in a short span of, let's say, 6-7 years attains almost a sudden maturity.

00:01:15If you consider the lifespan of a human being, 75-80 years on an average, 6-7 years is almost

00:01:27sudden. And you are a very changed biological being at 18 compared to what you are at 12.

00:01:42It just happens. And you have attained biological maturity, which means you can do a lot of

00:01:56things that adults can and also you have energy comparable to other more grown-up adults,

00:02:07let's say those who are 30-35 years old. And all that has just happened when you were passing

00:02:23through your formal schooling and college or university education. Suddenly you find

00:02:31yourself a grown-up adult. Life has not yet given you too many years to gather experience

00:02:43from but it has given you the energy to shake things up, the power to procreate and the

00:03:04responsibility to build systems, engage with systems, earn for yourself. All these things

00:03:16have suddenly come to you. You think of the two important decisions that people make in their

00:03:26lives, which is choosing their education and career. That's the first part of the decisions.

00:03:37And the second one being engaging with another human being of the other gender and possibly

00:03:46marrying. Both these things get done right when you are quite young and you don't really know the

00:04:00world too much. So that's the condition of the youth. Having a lot of potential, having a lot

00:04:09of energy but not having enough understanding. Your schooling, your college education during

00:04:26which you are growing up does not cater to your inner development needs. That is taken as a given.

00:04:35It is assumed that the person is growing up in a physical way. Therefore the person is also

00:04:45gaining inner maturity parallelly, which is a huge assumption, which is an erroneous assumption.

00:04:53That does not just happen. So what happens is that all this energy that the youth has is driven not

00:05:03by the understanding of the youth but by the random forces of social, cultural, biological conditioning

00:05:15that operate upon you. That was the situation 100 years back, 120, 130 years back, if you are talking

00:05:27of Swami Vivekananda's times. And that is also the condition today and that will be the condition

00:05:32forever because that's how biology shapes up the youth. Puberty used to happen at a certain age.

00:05:44In Vivekananda's time it happens at almost the same age even today. So in that respect the youth

00:05:52was vulnerable then and the youth is equally vulnerable today. The blink of an eye, the kid

00:06:01who used to play at home is interested with the responsibility to earn, make life decisions,

00:06:09choose a career, choose a partner and all that happens I said just so quickly. Has the youth

00:06:19been equipped decently, responsibly to take all those decisions? No, that does not happen. So

00:06:29instead of understanding what we have is conditioning. What was the conditioning operating

00:06:37at the time of Swami Vivekananda? The conditioning was twofold. Biologically, in the physical sense,

00:06:50the youth of that time was not quite strong and mentally the youth had been conditioned to believe

00:07:03that life is all about weakness and misery and defeat and subjugation. The genius of that monk

00:07:16lies in challenging both these conditionings. He said first of all you need to be physically strong.

00:07:25If you are little and weak and sick all the time then there is not much that life can offer you.

00:07:41He said strength must be the first quality and weakness must be considered as the foremost

00:07:54problem even the first sin. Weakness must be considered extremely abhorrent. Any feeling

00:08:06of helplessness or subjugation has to be kept aside. So he said those things but if you see

00:08:17what he was challenging, he was not really challenging weakness, he was challenging

00:08:23conditioning. It's just that in those times conditioning expressed itself as weakness.

00:08:30If you look at the average height of a 20 year old today, you take a sample 100-200 youngsters,

00:08:44all 20 years old and you look at their average height and average weight, you will find the

00:08:49average height a couple of inches more than the height that was there in 1890 or the year 1900,

00:08:58Swamiji's times. Similarly weight, you all have gained in weight. The youth of that time was quite

00:09:06emaciated and if you look at girls especially, the difference in height and weight might be

00:09:14even more significant. Now I am saying this from my hunch, you can corroborate the data from

00:09:21wherever it is available, if at all it is available. I think the data will validate what I am saying.

00:09:26So there was a lot of weakness at that time and poverty and subjugation. India had simply

00:09:39been crushed and trampled over and there was so much illiteracy and the result was that the youth

00:09:51was in a state of complete lack of self-assuredness. Instead what the youth had come to believe was

00:10:03that misery, defeat, weakness, surrender, meekness is the only and inevitable way of life. Just bow

00:10:18down, bow down to life, bow down to oppressors, bow down to poverty, bow down to ignorance, lack of

00:10:29knowledge, bow down to all the random forces of situations that hit a human being. Swamiji said,

00:10:39no, no, no, that's not the truth. That's simply the way you are conditioned. Mind you, that's not

00:10:47the truth. That's simply the way you are conditioned. So it is important to remember that the central

00:10:55work of Vivekananda was not really against just weakness or ignorance or whatever. It was against

00:11:05conditioning. It's just that conditioning expressed itself at that time as weakness and illiteracy and

00:11:15helplessness and ignorance. Now you tell me, as the youth of today, what does conditioning express

00:11:26itself as today? Because had Swamiji been alive today, he would not have conveyed the same message

00:11:37he did a century and a quarter ago. The message would have changed because the conditions have

00:11:47changed. See, the work of a spiritual revolutionary is to bring the truth to you. And what is the

00:12:03truth? Truth is not a concept. Truth is not a statement. Truth is not a principle to live by.

00:12:11Truth lies simply in getting rid of one's inner patterns. That which you have believed yourself

00:12:21to be, drop that. And what remains is the truth. Whatever you have become by chance, by ignorance,

00:12:33drop that and what remains is the truth. So had he been around today, how would he have conveyed

00:12:42the message of truth? What has the youth of today become? Are we together? You see, his work

00:12:52lied in challenging what we have erroneously, falsely become. Year 1900, year 1890, that was

00:13:12the time when he was the most active. What had the youth become then? At that point, what was

00:13:24the condition of the youth? You remember condition, conditioning. How had the youth of that time

00:13:34taken shape? What was the condition? What were they thinking? What did they look like? What was

00:13:44their belief system? Think of that. What were they saying? Let's say you meet someone from that time,

00:13:50right? 20 years old or 25. And what is that person saying? What is that person saying?

00:13:58Come on, come on, please. First of all, how does he look, he or she? How does he look? Femished

00:14:09and skinny because famished and skinny. And is he well-read? What does he believe in? Superstitions.

00:14:23Wonderful. Lovely. When he looks at a white man, how does he feel? Inferior and afraid. And what

00:14:37else? How does he, for example, look at other castes? Let's say he belongs to one of the so

00:14:43called upper castes. How does he look at the so called lower castes? Now this fellow himself

00:14:50isn't tatters. But he is looking at a fellow human being, a fellow Indian as untouchable,

00:14:57probably. If he is a male, how does he look at women? Lower, inferior beings. And he is conditioned

00:15:09to believe all of that. Probably he is a flat earther. Quite probable, right? Does he know

00:15:19where America is? Quite possible he also looks at other communities with a lot of distaste. Right?

00:15:31How much geography or history or biology does he know? Not much. The literacy rates had plummeted

00:15:42to almost single digit levels in most parts of the country by that time. Such was the devastation,

00:15:54such was the havoc wrecked upon the education system especially after 1857. People were not

00:16:04getting to learn, to read, to write. The existing system of education had been devastated and no

00:16:15alternative, no mass-based alternative at least had been created. So people were largely illiterate.

00:16:23So that's his situation. And when you look at him today, what do you say? Oh, he is so blinded by

00:16:34his beliefs. You know, when you look at him, you will see a poor fellow. Inwardly that fellow is

00:16:45very very confident. He was so confident that in some way he actually managed to obstruct Swami

00:16:54Vivekananda. One of the reasons he died so early was because he faced such stiff resistance not

00:17:01from the Europeans or Americans but from the Indian population itself. He did the best he

00:17:09could and that was not really the age of technology. A lot of travel that he undertook

00:17:16was quite a burden on the body. Very painstakingly he traveled, sometimes on foot. He did not take

00:17:32care of his food, his health, his various diseases and before he could be 40 he was gone.

00:17:38Think, who troubled him so much? Who troubled him so much that he had to depart and he was a

00:17:50well-built man, strong, pretty strongly built. And it's not as if he miraculously just chose

00:17:58to disappear or depart at that young age. He was brought down by ill health and disease.

00:18:09Who troubled him so much? Think of it. Who? He is a strong man and he is a well-read man.

00:18:21I mean, well-read is an understatement. He is a champion author and there is somebody who just

00:18:34pulverises him to the ground. Who is this? That famished, ill-read, ill-bred, ill-fed fellow.

00:18:50He defeated Swamiji. Not in the final count obviously, but at least temporarily. He kept

00:19:04on saying, if I just get 100 suitable young people, I'll change the face of India. He didn't get that

00:19:17many. It's debatable whether he got even 10 of them. You do not need to kill a man always directly.

00:19:33He is asking for something. He is betting his life on something. You devoid him of that which

00:19:42he wants so desperately, that which he loves with all his heart, he won't be able to live.

00:19:49Do you see this? It's just that we never love anything that heartfully. So, we do not know

00:19:57what a real lover goes through. But if you ever want something really worthy, something really

00:20:06beautiful with all your life, with all your energy and you don't get it, you just don't feel like living.

00:20:20The youth of that time deprived Swami Vivekananda of what he wanted from them. And how did the youth

00:20:34deprive him? By blindly believing in whatever they believed in, whatever their concepts were.

00:20:46Today you look at that fellow we just talked of and you say, oh 5 feet 4 inches, can't even write

00:20:59properly. You ask him to just tell how many major rivers are there in North India, he might not know.

00:21:09Ask him where do smallpox and chicken pox come from, he will say divine curse. That kind of a

00:21:20fellow. But that fellow who is most probably racist, casteist, sexist, ignorant, that kind of a fellow

00:21:35manages to obstruct the work of a giant like Swami Vivekananda. That is the power of conditioning.

00:21:47It is conditioning that the Swami was fighting against. It's always possible and easy rather

00:21:59to look at someone else, especially from some other age and see very clearly that the fellow

00:22:08is conditioned. For example, today, if that fellow, imagine him standing here, imagine.

00:22:17Today that fellow tells you, women do not need to be educated. You won't even feel like countering him.

00:22:26Some of you would laugh at him, others won't even feel like laughing at him. You would simply want

00:22:36to look elsewhere at something that is more pleasant, more meaningful, more sensible. But that

00:22:44fellow is very very confident. He is saying, but you know women, they are for the kitchen and taking

00:22:54care of the kids and what do they have to do by studying, reading, educated. I mean, will they

00:23:03wear coats and pants and go out to work like men, ha ha ha. He'll be very sure of himself. He'll be, catch

00:23:14that word, he'll be very, he'll be very sure of himself. That's what. When you are so sure of

00:23:22yourself, then you can defeat even the most beneficial, most benevolent power that stands

00:23:35in front of you to help you, to uplift you. Conditioning manifests itself in, come on, come

00:23:47on, repeat the word, sureness. And what's the popular word for sureness? Confidence.

00:23:57That skinny fellow, if you send his blood to some pathology lab, he would be found deficient in 20

00:24:14things. In fact, he would be found deficient in everything. He might even be found deficient in a

00:24:23few organs. The fellow does not have a liver. That kind of deficiency. But he is not deficient in

00:24:35confidence. Deficient in everything, but not in... And that's what troubled Swami Vivekananda so much.

00:24:52He actually laid down his life. It's just that when you are killed by a gun, then you can see

00:25:04the blood flowing. Or when you wear a crown of thrones as Jesus did, again you can see the

00:25:20cruelty there, out there in a very obvious way. Or you find Socrates being made to drink poison.

00:25:40You can see it. Your eyes can see that. So you know this is murder. But when Vivekananda dies that way,

00:25:48you do not see the blood flowing. And you do not see the thorns. And you do not see the poison.

00:25:59You do not see a head being chopped off. Because you do not see. So you say, well, he just died out of some

00:26:10sickness. He was diseased. No, he was not diseased. He was killed. What killed him?

00:26:16The headstrong confidence that we have. You could call them headstrong jug heads. Extremely confident of themselves.

00:26:37And what they were then confident of, today we laugh at. Correct? What he was confident of that time,

00:26:45today we laugh at all those things. Don't we? Maybe someone else would laugh at the things that we are today confident of.

00:26:57And confidence continues to be a buzzword even today, especially in the youth. Does it not?

00:27:04You all like to be confident. And you all admire confident people. Look at your role models.

00:27:10Don't they all act very confident? The ego to sustain itself, all ignorance to sustain itself must act very, very confident.

00:27:25Now fast forward to 2023. What are we confident of? What are we confident of?

00:27:40And the inner confidence that we have is very, very stubborn. Times change.

00:27:49The ego tendency does not change. All change is just superficial, apparent, external.

00:28:01Internally, human beings continue to be the way they always were. What are we confident of?

00:28:15Obviously, if Vivekananda comes here today, he will not tell us to be physically strong.

00:28:21Most of us are already reasonably strong. You have gyms. The nutrition that you take is more or less okay.

00:28:37All kinds of sports facilities are there, right within the campus.

00:28:44So he will not talk of nutrition. At that time he was talking a lot about good food and he would say,

00:28:49come on, leave your ignorance behind. Get up, go and play football.

00:28:54Today he does not need to tell you to play football. You already play football.

00:29:03What will he need to address today? What are you confident of today?

00:29:10Hint, you will resist him every bit as much as that fellow from the last century.

00:29:24Nobody wants to accept a Swami Vivekananda. His lot, his fate is to be resisted.

00:29:35He was resisted then, he would be resisted even today.

00:29:40He was resisted by everybody including the youth then. It is the youth that would resist him even today.

00:29:48Now that's very counterintuitive because we love to talk of Swami Vivekananda as a youth icon, right?

00:29:57Swami Vivekananda, the favourite of the youth, youth icon, youth icon.

00:30:01And here I am asserting that were he to be here today, it is the youth that would resist him the most.

00:30:09Because the work of a spiritual revolutionary, of the knower of Vedanta and it is Vedanta that Swamiji was most fond of.

00:30:25He worshipped Vedanta, not any God. To him Vedanta was secret.

00:30:31His work is to challenge the conditioning of the day. In that alone lies the worship of the truth.

00:30:44Challenge conditioning. What are we conditioned as?

00:30:51What are you conditioned to believe in? Tell me please.

00:30:59His work would be equally difficult today.

00:31:05Beliefs have changed, the believer has not.

00:31:11The one who loves to live in beliefs has not changed.

00:31:17It's just that he has changed his beliefs.

00:31:21So there was one set of beliefs then.

00:31:26Be with me, come on. There is another set of beliefs now.

00:31:31But the tendency to live in beliefs has not changed.

00:31:37He will have an equally tough task today with you guys.

00:31:44You will not question him as a youth icon.

00:31:48After he is gone, then another generation would. Not you.

00:31:53You would not like to listen to him.

00:31:56Listening to someone who brings the truth to you is always a difficult task.

00:32:03The nature of truth is that it cannot be pleasant.

00:32:13Irrespective of how much you try to sweeten it or smoothen it.

00:32:26Are you getting it? Think of this.

00:32:29So many people would assemble to listen to him.

00:32:33When he returned from the States, a huge procession greeted him right at the port.

00:32:42But when he asked for just a hundred people who could be his soldiers, he was denied.

00:33:00Beliefs are superstitions.

00:33:02Just that it is easy to call the other's superstition as superstition.

00:33:12Our own superstition we call as a sacred belief or holy culture.

00:33:20Or passion.

00:33:22But in a non-religious, non-cultural context, your personal belief you will call as your passion.

00:33:32But even that is superstition.

00:33:36And when that is challenged, one does not like it.

00:33:42The superstitions of that time are quite evident.

00:33:47The fellow is for example saying that snakes live for 2000 years.

00:33:53Or that a certain tree turns into a beautiful lady every fortnight.

00:34:01And today you can laugh those things away.

00:34:04How about the superstitions of today?

00:34:07Have we tried to inquire the superstitions that we carry?

00:34:13Come on.

00:34:15Risk a guess at least.

00:34:20Can you watch me from there? Otherwise this seat is available.

00:34:24Come over to this side.

00:34:27I'll have to bend to look at you and same with you.

00:34:31What are the superstitions we carry?

00:34:34Please.

00:34:39Ha ha, consume, consume and consume.

00:34:45Ha ha.

00:34:48What is the superstition we carry?

00:34:50Please.

00:34:52Ha ha.

00:34:57Consume, consume and consume.

00:35:00Consume. Come on.

00:35:03Have more. That's the purpose of life.

00:35:06Happiness is the purpose of life and happiness is obtained through consumption.

00:35:14Happiness is the purpose of life and happiness comes through consumption.

00:35:20And Swami Vivekananda will again have to fight this superstition till his last breath.

00:35:29And he'll again be defeated.

00:35:33We'll not let him win.

00:35:39Consume everything you can lay your hands on.

00:35:44Consume your own body. Consume somebody else's body.

00:35:47Consume all the resources the earth does not even have to offer.

00:35:52Consume the plants, the animals, the mountains, the trees, the rivers, the air.

00:36:01Consume just everything possible. Have it.

00:36:07We don't like to call it a superstition.

00:36:09We'll say but you know it's a choice, it's a way of life.

00:36:14It's not even a way of life, it's a purpose of life.

00:36:17That's what he would do today.

00:36:30What is a superstition?

00:36:35What is a superstition?

00:36:37Believing in something without having enquired till the last detail.

00:36:48Right?

00:36:54And when I talk of the last detail, do you know what I mean?

00:36:58The belief is something here, out here, this is.

00:37:01When you want to go to the last detail, you have to think of the believer.

00:37:12Who is the believer?

00:37:18You have to look into the fact of the belief, obviously.

00:37:22And then you have to go into the mind of the believer and ask,

00:37:26why does he have to stick to this concept or assumption?

00:37:31Why does he have to stick to it?

00:37:33And that's when the enquiry is complete.

00:37:36And if the enquiry is not complete, whatsoever you hold as true is not only belief but actually superstition.

00:37:46Superstition and our education, the thing that we talked of right in the beginning,

00:37:52does not equip us to go into self-enquiry.

00:37:58We do not know why we think the way we do.

00:38:01We do not know why we desire the way we do.

00:38:06We all want so many things in life but we do not know why we want something.

00:38:10And if you do not know why you want something, whatever you want will be perilous to you.

00:38:17Irrespective of what you want, it will hurt you.

00:38:27Are you getting it?

00:38:32Come on, come up with a few more superstitions.

00:38:36It's fun.

00:38:42Come on, come on, come on.

00:38:45Yes, technology and technical growth can offer you redemption from your suffering.

00:38:53Technology can only do what you want it to do.

00:39:02Technology is a slave.

00:39:04Right?

00:39:06Your imagination comes first, your desire comes first and then comes the technology.

00:39:14Correct?

00:39:16To fulfil your desire.

00:39:18To materialise your imagination.

00:39:20That's what technology does.

00:39:21If your desire itself is a rotten thing, how can technology help you?

00:39:29Please tell me.

00:39:31Your desire is to kill the other.

00:39:33You come up with the most powerful fusion device possible.

00:39:37It's a state of the art thing.

00:39:41The greatest hydrogen bomb ever made.

00:39:44Where is that coming from?

00:39:45Your rotten hateful desire to kill the other.

00:39:53And why do you want to kill the other?

00:39:55Because he does not worship the same God as you do.

00:39:57Because you want a piece of land and the other does not agree.

00:40:02So you want to kill him.

00:40:05Such an animalistic desire.

00:40:08Right?

00:40:09But to fulfil this desire, what do you use?

00:40:15The latest, most modern, state of the art technology.

00:40:21What can technology bring to you?

00:40:24If you are inwardly rotten, what can technology bring to you?

00:40:27Technology will simply become an expression of your inner diseased state.

00:40:35Right?

00:40:41What other superstitions?

00:40:44I hope we are capturing this. This is very important.

00:40:50Yes.

00:40:51See, wherever there is desire, there has to be a wait for tomorrow.

00:41:12What does a life based on desire mean?

00:41:16Work today based on your desire and tomorrow you will have fruits of your action.

00:41:21So you will have to necessarily live in tomorrow.

00:41:25And what does that entail?

00:41:28Something very dangerous.

00:41:30What that means is you cannot live in love.

00:41:33You cannot work in love.

00:41:37You cannot do something just because you love it.

00:41:44This quest for tomorrow means that all the value has been postponed to the future.

00:41:52Where does value lie?

00:41:55Where does value lie?

00:41:57In the desirous mind, where does value lie?

00:42:00In the future because that's where the imagined fulfilment of desire is.

00:42:05No desire gets instantaneously fulfilled. Right?

00:42:08What is the nature of desire?

00:42:09You desire something, then you work to attain it and you attain it two days later.

00:42:14And two days later you imagine that you will be fulfilled.

00:42:17It's just that two days later there is something else.

00:42:20And you are never really fulfilled.

00:42:22But forget about the future.

00:42:24What does this continuous state of desire do to the quality of your existence which is right now?

00:42:32It leaves you deprived, impoverished.

00:42:37You have nothing right now.

00:42:39Everything has been scheduled to the future.

00:42:43All the goodness, all the fun, all the joy has been marked to the future.

00:42:52So how are you right now? That nobody wants to talk of.

00:42:55Come on, become something.

00:42:58Now all becoming again lies in the…

00:43:01So how are you right now?

00:43:03Bank.

00:43:07Nothing. I have nothing.

00:43:11I have nothing.

00:43:13But nobody wants to call it as a superstition.

00:43:16You see, the usual superstitions have all been killed by science. Mostly.

00:43:23Because they were objective superstitions.

00:43:25Like you must not take food at the time of the lunar eclipse.

00:43:35Now that's an objective superstition.

00:43:38It has something to do with objects.

00:43:40Which objects are we talking of?

00:43:42The moon, the earth and the food.

00:43:44All these three are objects.

00:43:47Now science will defeat all these superstitions because science is very well equipped to deal with objects.

00:43:53So all the objective superstitions are gone.

00:43:58Swamiji would be very happy.

00:44:01But then he will look at the other side, the subjective side and his face will turn pale.

00:44:15All the superstitions are now subjective.

00:44:21And how do you defeat them?

00:44:24Objective superstitions can be defeated.

00:44:27For example, it was superstition that let's say the Nazi blood is superior to and purer compared to the other races.

00:44:40How was this defeated?

00:44:42You just take blood samples and compare and science has defeated that, right?

00:44:46So we kept talking of the pure Aryan blood and nobody talks of that today.

00:44:49There is nothing called the pure Aryan blood.

00:44:52You could be an Aryan, a non-Aryan.

00:44:55You could be anybody.

00:44:57Blood is blood.

00:44:59Science defeated that.

00:45:01But if you say in your mind, for example, that getting settled quickly or getting retired quickly is the purpose of life.

00:45:11How does science defeat that? Tell me.

00:45:13Science has no answer there.

00:45:15And that's the superstition of today.

00:45:17Hustle.

00:45:19Un-quick bucks by doing any damn rotten thing.

00:45:22And then retire at 35.

00:45:27And if you don't feel like doing that thing, exactly because it is so rotten it cannot be done,

00:45:34then listen to some huge money bag, industrialist, capitalist, influencer or motivator.

00:45:43And push yourself back to that same rotten job so that you may retire early.

00:45:51Science has no answer to this kind of superstition.

00:45:54Because it is.

00:45:56Because it is. Come on, come on, be with me.

00:45:59Subjective. Science cannot deal with subjective things.

00:46:03You fall in love with a pig.

00:46:06Science cannot correct you.

00:46:08All that science can tell you that it is a pig.

00:46:11You still say it's my subjective decision.

00:46:14To roll in the shit with the pig.

00:46:18Science will remain silent.

00:46:21What can science do now?

00:46:23Science can at max tell you what all kinds of bacteria are present in that filth.

00:46:28Beyond that science can't do much.

00:46:31It's a subjective thing.

00:46:33And the superstitions today are all subjective.

00:46:38How do you fight that?

00:46:42Swami Vivekananda is saying the challenges of the last century were actually easier to deal with.

00:46:56At this moment the challenges are almost impossible to tackle.

00:47:02You could demonstrate to someone that his belief is a mere superstition.

00:47:06But how do you demonstrate that your subjective concepts, your way of life, your principles, these are all just worthless, false, baseless.

00:47:22How do you demonstrate that?

00:47:24It's very difficult.

00:47:26And the youth has been greatly indoctrinated today.

00:47:31Especially in a country like India because it's a young country.

00:47:33So if you can capture the youth, you have captured everything.

00:47:38You have also captured the future.

00:47:40The ones who are young today will be the earners of tomorrow.

00:47:45Catch them young. That's how they say.

00:47:48Catch them young.

00:47:52And you have been indoctrinated.

00:47:54That which you think of as normal is not at all normal.

00:47:59To that fellow, see he is still standing here. Do you see him?

00:48:03To that fellow it is very normal to think that the sun goes round the earth.

00:48:08And he says, but I see that happening everyday. Rises this side, sets that side.

00:48:14The sun obviously goes round the earth. It's a very normal thing.

00:48:18Don't you have common sense? Come on.

00:48:21When you will dispute what he says, what will he say?

00:48:25Can't you see the obvious?

00:48:27It's commonsensical. The sun goes round the earth.

00:48:30Think of what all is normal and obvious and commonsensical to you.

00:48:39Please do that.

00:48:41It is that which you take as common sense

00:48:45that is defeating you, that is a nemesis, that is killing you.

00:48:53That which you think of as obvious and certain and feel very assured of,

00:48:58so assured of that you don't even want to question it.

00:49:02That's what is defeating you.

00:49:15Am I making sense or is it?

00:49:17I'll do my B.Tech

00:49:21and three roads arise from there.

00:49:29Or maybe four or five max.

00:49:32A job, MS, MBA.

00:49:38Or I go and fall into the lap of my family and say I'll be part of the family business.

00:49:47That's all? That's all?

00:49:50Start, it's fine.

00:49:54How do you know that all this is not superstition?

00:49:57Come on, please.

00:49:58Now don't dismiss it as being obviously an insane question to ask.

00:50:06You all are very sane people.

00:50:09For the next hour, just bear being a little insane with me.

00:50:16You are all very sane people.

00:50:19For the next hour, just bear being a little insane with me.

00:50:25How do you know that this is not a superstition to choose just one among these four or five options?

00:50:39Please tell me.

00:50:47You are not a previous one.

00:50:50You are not a previous one.

00:50:53You are a current one.

00:50:56The previous ones are all dead.

00:51:01And they didn't live exactly glorious lives.

00:51:05Why do you want to emulate them?

00:51:09The friend we have standing here is also a previous one.

00:51:14Want to be like him?

00:51:16Why not?

00:51:18Why not?

00:51:20If the old is to be emulated, let's go for the older one.

00:51:26And why stop at the older? Let's go for the oldest one.

00:51:29The one who is in the cave, in the jungle.

00:51:32Sitting on the treetop.

00:51:36And chasing monkeys from there.

00:51:40Why not copy that one?

00:51:47Something to be said.

00:51:49Sir, we live in a country like India.

00:51:52Where the daily need of a person is to have a piece of bread and butter daily.

00:51:58So if you do not choose any of the four paths and try to think that I will speculate today.

00:52:03And maybe after 2-3 days I will go on to some other thing that will give me bread and butter.

00:52:09That is not how the life works.

00:52:12You can't stay impoverished for say more than 4-5 days.

00:52:17How do you know?

00:52:19It's just a question.

00:52:21A superstition involves something that you have not enquired into.

00:52:25How do you know that bread and butter is possible only via these 4-5 paths?

00:52:31How do you know? What's the basis?

00:52:34How much have you seen the world? How much have you enquired?

00:52:37How much knowledge, experience do you have?

00:52:39At this young age, how do you feel so convinced that unless you follow the well-trodden path,

00:52:47you won't even physically survive?

00:52:50We are talking of starvation.

00:52:52As extreme as that.

00:52:54Sir, I would like to counter that.

00:52:57Sir, see the thing is that when you are talking about living in this world,

00:53:02it is not only that you, that person as a whole is living.

00:53:06It is not Mahabharata going on that Lord Krishna can pause the time and everything will,

00:53:11and he can say any sermon and then that can be believed or he can do any action

00:53:15and ask other people like he, like, for example, when this Karan was killed,

00:53:23the brother of Arjun, step-brother of Arjun.

00:53:26Leave all that aside because all that is thought factor.

00:53:28Fine, fine, fine, sure, we'll leave that.

00:53:30Sir, so whatever happens in this world is a mutual thing,

00:53:35a mutual action by you and the surrounding how it reacts to you.

00:53:40So the thing is that if you are not doing some work

00:53:42or maybe you are thinking that there is some other path which may lead you to some work.

00:53:47Like you said that there are only four options after engineering, four to five options maybe.

00:53:52So in that way you would be, I think that that would be correctly the way to think as it is

00:53:59because if you do not work into a particular direction or if you are trying to choose a new path,

00:54:05it's most probable that the surroundings, the surrounding people would not react to you in the same way.

00:54:10How do you know?

00:54:12Sir, that's a known fact.

00:54:14How do you know? Again, that argument of obviousness. How do you know?

00:54:19Very obvious, like, sir, okay, fine, fine, I'll give you an example.

00:54:24No, no, no, my question is how do you know?

00:54:26Yeah, yeah, yeah, I'll give you an example.

00:54:28The question is how do you know, not give me an example. How do you know?

00:54:32It's an epistemological question. How do you know?

00:54:35How do you know?

00:54:37Sir, you give podcast on YouTube. Is it possible for you to say something against the Prime Minister of India today in your podcast?

00:54:45I actively say when I need to.

00:54:48Sir, but…

00:54:50Even the Prime Minister probably knows that.

00:54:52Sir, but that would lead you into trouble.

00:54:55Probably it already does, but fine. It's okay.

00:55:00So, sir?

00:55:02It's a subjective thing, right?

00:55:03My question was how do you know? Get into that.

00:55:07How do you know that you'll starve if you do not take these four, five paths?

00:55:11Sir, because it is scientifically proven.

00:55:13Scientifically proven?

00:55:15Which journal, which research paper, which lab, which scientist?

00:55:21Sir, that I do not know exactly, but…

00:55:23Then how do you know?

00:55:25Sir, because that is what we have been taught in our earliest classes.

00:55:28In your classes? Which book?

00:55:30Sir, textbooks.

00:55:31Which particular syllabus? Which board do you come from?

00:55:35Sir, ICSC.

00:55:37Any other person from ICSC here? By the way, I too am an ICSC product.

00:55:41Did you have any book that told you that you'll starve if you do not follow any of these four paths?

00:55:47Any course, any book?

00:55:49How do you know?

00:55:51Sir, you need money to survive, right?

00:55:53How do you know that you won't have money outside these four, five paths?

00:55:58Sir, you don't have time to speculate over that.

00:56:01Isn't there any other famous people?

00:56:04Mic, mic, mic. Quick.

00:56:07It's just that we have seen other famous people who are at a good position right now

00:56:12and we know that they have taken those paths.

00:56:14So, we try to replicate their path saying that if we take the path,

00:56:17we will also reach at where they are right now.

00:56:20How do you know wherever they are, they are actually feeling okay?

00:56:26How do you know?

00:56:27We don't know that, but because of the fame, the popularity…

00:56:31Somebody is famous.

00:56:33Look at the logic, please.

00:56:35You are saying somebody is famous, so I want to be like him.

00:56:38Now, anybody can be famous for whatever reason.

00:56:41Good, bad, whatever.

00:56:43You want to be like somebody who is famous.

00:56:46But how do you know that his own position is something that would give you whatever you want?

00:56:53Peace, fulfillment, joy, fun, whatever.

00:56:55How do you know?

00:56:57Just being famous itself.

00:56:59It's not…

00:57:01How do you know being famous will give you something that you would really enjoy?

00:57:06How do you know?

00:57:08You can be famous overnight.

00:57:10You can be famous tomorrow morning, right?

00:57:13It's quite possible in the age of social media.

00:57:16And you can actually plan it out.

00:57:18You want to be famous, you can be famous before the session ends.

00:57:22And all that happens.

00:57:24We know how things go viral and what all things go viral.

00:57:25How do you know being famous will bring to you something that would please you?

00:57:32How do you know?

00:57:34We don't know it until we reach that part.

00:57:36How have you chosen a destination without knowing anything about the destination?

00:57:43How have you…

00:57:45You can even choose.

00:57:47How have you simply committed yourself to that one thing as obvious and the right thing and the purpose of life?

00:57:56How have you done that?

00:57:58Our belief.

00:58:00Because it's our belief like…

00:58:02That's what, that's what.

00:58:04It's just blind belief.

00:58:07That's what he was fighting.

00:58:09Blind belief.

00:58:13You know, one of the beliefs of those times was

00:58:16that the white man is made to rule.

00:58:21And if you challenge that belief, you will have a hard time.

00:58:24Not among the white ones, but actually more among the brown ones.

00:58:30How do you know that you are not living in similar beliefs today?

00:58:35Similar in the sense of the believer remaining to be the same.

00:58:39The beliefs have obviously changed.

00:58:40How do you know anything you believe in is of any value?

00:58:49And it's not impossible to test things out.

00:58:53Inquiry is possible.

00:58:55And it's not as if it takes an entire life to inquire.

00:58:59You have a lot of time.

00:59:01A lot of things that we believe in would simply fall to pieces

00:59:07if we sincerely inquire even for a couple of hours or a couple of days.

00:59:13It is possible.

00:59:16We don't even Google properly.

00:59:18Come on.

00:59:20Look at most of the stuff that is circulated on WhatsApp etc.

00:59:24Have those people even Googled for the facts?

00:59:27Is it so impossible to know that what you are believing in is just hogwash?

00:59:38You want to be like someone.

00:59:42Have you even bothered to look at the facts of that person's life?

00:59:48Obviously you cannot enter his kitchen or bedroom and look for first-hand information.

00:59:55But have you even bothered to glean through the publicly available information?

01:00:00Have you?

01:00:02How then have you accepted that person as your role model?

01:00:05Role model.

01:00:14Asking you, please.

01:00:23Son, how do you know?

01:00:26The question has still not been answered.

01:00:30Still not been answered.

01:00:31Sir, the human brain works in the way the previous experiences have taught him to be like.

01:00:37In that way, if you could say that maybe 100-150 years ago Swami Vivekananda believed in a certain kind of ideology.

01:00:46No, he didn't believe in any ideology.

01:00:48No, I mean certain principles that...

01:00:50No, he didn't believe in principles.

01:00:52No, I didn't.

01:00:55The stubborn man had principles.

01:00:57Swamiji didn't have principles.

01:00:59He was a destroyer of principles.

01:01:01Sir, but eventually if you are destroying some principle, you are entrusting some...

01:01:05How do you know that destruction of principle is another principle?

01:01:08How do you know?

01:01:10Why do you come to such quick inferences?

01:01:15Sir, I think that's really the problem is we see what others are telling us.

01:01:20We don't go to the last details about everything.

01:01:23So that's what I think superstition was, is and will remain.

01:01:27Right. Now what to do about it?

01:01:28I don't really know what we can do about it.

01:01:31But you are already doing something about it.

01:01:33By acknowledging that that is the biological tendency of this animalistic brain.

01:01:40I think the first step itself is acknowledging the problem.

01:01:44Acknowledgement. Yes, that's the first step.

01:01:46Acknowledge that beliefs come quick and cheap.

01:01:51And they are most likely to be not only false but very very dangerous.

01:01:55They will consume your entire life.

01:01:59They will consume your entire life.

01:02:02You could even say a man is nothing but his bundle of beliefs.

01:02:08You have to be very very careful the bundle that you are carrying.

01:02:12That does not mean there are good bundles and bad bundles.

01:02:15All bundles are just bad. Just as there are no good diseases.

01:02:19That's what I really think.

01:02:22Yes, wonderful.

01:02:27No part of this recording may be reproduced

01:02:29without Mooji Media Ltd.'s express consent.

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