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Video Information: 17.03.2024, Vedanta Session, Greter Noida
Context:
~ Is Vedanta only for Hindus?
~ What is meant by egolessness?
~ How to get rid of ego?
~ If there is no desire for fruit, for whom does one perform that action?
~ How to get rid of the fear of making the wrong choice?
Music Credits: Milind Date
~~~~~
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: 17.03.2024, Vedanta Session, Greter Noida
Context:
~ Is Vedanta only for Hindus?
~ What is meant by egolessness?
~ How to get rid of ego?
~ If there is no desire for fruit, for whom does one perform that action?
~ How to get rid of the fear of making the wrong choice?
Music Credits: Milind Date
~~~~~
Category
📚
LearningTranscript
01:00So, first of all, thank you, sir, it's my first time I'm listening to you.
01:11So I have this doubt regarding the entire Vedanta model, like that I am a restlessness,
01:18a pecheni, what we say.
01:20And out of this incompleteness, this restlessness, all my desires, all my wants comes up.
01:26And then from this desires, what do you say, aham vritti in the Gita session, from that
01:30comes the thoughts or the logics to justify and then from there comes the actions.
01:34So it's like a model, it's a complete model.
01:37But then when I listen to Jiddu Krishnamurti ji, then he says then don't rely on any model
01:43or theorization, conceptualization ideas, because just like we discussed right now,
01:47that all ideas, all logics would have some sort of flaw.
01:51So and then I also know that, okay, everything ultimately is facts.
01:57That means that you see it yourself and then it becomes a fact for you.
02:01But then it becomes very confusing in the sense that you start navigating into the ideas
02:06as well.
02:07You start navigating into models.
02:10Model is an idea, Vedanta asks you to look into the ideator, who is making the model.
02:20It's not your creation that you have to be too concerned with.
02:26You have to look at the creator within, I, the I is not a model or is it?
02:33It is your living reality.
02:36So Vedanta says look into the I, it's not a model, it's who you are.
02:41But like then, okay, I asked you a question and then you give me an answer.
02:46That was also even a logical deduction, like A then B then C. So even that would have some
02:53sort of fallacy.
02:54Then how do we even reach any sort of definite knowledge?
02:59Answer is just an attempt, whether you can begin looking at yourself.
03:06The answer is obviously not the thing.
03:09It is an attempt at making the thing happen.
03:14A pointer to something, an encouragement, whatever you call it.
03:20So it itself does not contain anything.
03:22It does not.
03:24An answer by itself is a very helpless thing.
03:28It cannot do anything by itself.
03:32It's just a hope, you could say.
03:34It's just a hope that by virtue of the answer, the right thing might happen.
03:38But whether or not it would happen depends totally on the receiver.
03:44From which center I am listening?
03:47Whether there is now love strong enough to make things happen.
03:56So like even the entire model, like you taught us that okay, I am a restlessness.
04:02No, I didn't teach you I am a restlessness.
04:04I said you find out whether or not you are restless.
04:08There is a difference between taking it from me and finding it out for yourself.
04:14But like maybe I'm wrong in this, but if you listen it, that okay, there is a model going
04:20on that I am a restlessness and so on.
04:23And then you start observing, maybe you would just unconsciously, like you would force it
04:28in your things.
04:29That okay, see, I am restless.
04:30That's possible.
04:31That's possible.
04:32So then how will we know that this is a fact?
04:35Because sometimes when you have observed and you realize that, okay, this model is absolutely
04:38precise, it is explaining everything.
04:41But then when the right choice comes, when the time of choice comes and you're like,
04:45okay, I have to leave the bed and do the right thing.
04:48That's when the ego gives you logic, not the logic.
04:51At the end of the long winded answer, there are just these two words, look, look at yourself.
05:02Find it out.
05:04See who you are.
05:08So that's the only thing that the answer implores you to do.
05:15The answer does not say, remember the answer.
05:19The answer says, remember who you are.
05:23What if the knowledge itself says that any feeling of superiority or inferiority is to
05:49an inferior one?
05:51What if that is the knowledge?
05:54Yeah, right.
05:59To whom is the knowledge?
06:00Who is the knower?
06:01The knower itself is an inferior entity.
06:05Maybe that is the realization.
06:07But yes, I get what you are saying.
06:09What you are saying is these things must be discovered by oneself.
06:13Yes.
06:14If they are not discovered, they will become motivated.
06:17Very well said and that's a point well made.
06:22These things must be discovered by oneself.
06:25Otherwise anything coming from any source, any teacher, any book will cease to have any
06:34kind of right impact.
06:37I can keep telling you, oh there is restlessness within, but have you bothered to pause and
06:42see whether there is restlessness within.
06:45You are right.
06:46Just remain a model.
06:47Yeah.
06:48Because it feels like that.
06:49Sometimes I am just thinking about the model rather than living it, would you say, like
06:55that.
06:56And in Bhagavad Gita, Krishna says to Arjun that, see, these people are already dead.
07:02Ye to hai maro hai, Duryodhana.
07:04So that obviously, if someone listens to this particular line without knowing anything,
07:09without observing, they would obviously see that there is a superiority model.
07:13Arjun, Krishna, all these are superior people and Duryodhana are lower people.
07:16So on what grounds are you saying that this person is lower?
07:18The ground is the 72 verses that come before that, Gyan Yoga.
07:24That's all about knowing yourself.
07:27So when you know yourself, you also see there is a part of you that is exactly the same
07:34as the ones you are fighting.
07:37And you know that part of you is dead.
07:40So you know the ones you are fighting are dead.
07:43There can be no superiority.
07:44The ones you are fighting are all already present inside you as a part of you.
07:50So if you call them dead, you are acknowledging that you too are dead and that's okay.
07:54But like, shouldn't we give them an opportunity that okay, even though these people have some
07:59choice left, that maybe they can also come to hosh, they can also come to understanding.
08:04Maybe Duryodhana can come to understand.
08:07That opportunity was given in ample measure.
08:11If we are to get into the details of the story now, rather than the philosophy, the story
08:18says that there was ample opportunity provided.
08:23But those who were being fought refused to avail the opportunity.
08:31Just one last thing, like all the videos that you make, how are you confident that what
08:36you are saying is right?
08:37Like I hope I am not being rude or something.
08:40I don't care about being right.
08:44All I have is my honesty and I speak from there and when I am saying something to you,
08:53I just don't know whether it is right or wrong.
08:57I have no idea at all about what I am saying.
09:02Like what you say feels like a mathematical statement, like a theorem that okay, when
09:11you are angry, you are basically angry because you are losing on something, you want something
09:15and hence you are angry.
09:16So this is like a mathematical statement.
09:18If someone is angry, he won't ever say, okay, I want something, that's why I am angry.
09:23You see, when everything that is happening inside us is a game of atoms and molecules
09:30and things, obviously, mathematics applies on things, right?
09:38If what is happening inside me is a chemical equation, shouldn't it be honestly expressed
09:43as a chemical equation and all chemical equations deploy mathematics.
09:48So that's okay.
09:49I get your concern and I fully ratify it, you see, even the best of things coming from
10:11someone else will remain a bit alien.
10:19You have to go into the process yourself and that's the entire point of the one who speaks
10:25to you.
10:27He does not want to supplant your inner journey with his words.
10:34He wants to use his words to catalyze your inner journey.
10:39The words cannot be a substitute to self-knowledge.
10:48These are things that you have to know by yourself and for yourself.
10:53And this is for everybody?
10:55Everybody.
10:56Absolutely everybody.
10:57The words, they are not the reality or the truth.
11:00The words are at best an encouragement.
11:05But then it is said now that like you gave an example in a very old video that I am on
11:10my car and the car is not running.
11:12So it's basically the handbrake is pulled off.
11:14So either the guru comes and say, just put the handbrake down or you just know about
11:20the car, the engine and everything.
11:22And now you know that.
11:23So this is Dhyan Yoga and that is Bhakti Yoga.
11:25So in that particular situation, that the person is listening to a guru and then doing
11:29the action.
11:30And in this particular situation, I am knowing everything and then I'm doing the same thing.
11:35Irrespective of whether you do it or the guru does it, first of all, you must know that
11:40the car is revving and not moving.
11:44That is something that you have to individually do, right?
11:47If even that much has not been done, how can any helper help?
11:57You are in a running car and you feel it's all quite smooth.
12:03Will you listen to advice from anywhere?
12:07So first of all, there has to be an inner, honest and purely individual admission of
12:15suffering.
12:17After that, it could be your own strife.
12:23I am striving to know what is happening and I want to get rid of all this.
12:29It could be a purely individual thing or you could take help from whatever external
12:33sources possible.
12:35But irrespective of whether it's your own journey from there on or you take assistance,
12:42the thing is, first of all, you came to admit that there was something that was broken.
12:58And that nobody else can do for you.
13:00That is a thing of your own honest admission.
13:04You know the problem and then you decide that, okay, I will read the biology book or I will
13:07go to the doctor.
13:08Something like that.
13:09Yes, yes.
13:10Well captured.
13:11But first of all, and in that, nobody can impose himself on you.
13:19Nobody can make you do anything.
13:22It is a thing of purely personal volition.
13:27It's a sovereign choice of the consciousness to admit, yes, I am not all right, but I want
13:32to be all right.
13:36And there comes the faith as well, because consciousness just keeps forgetting that it
13:40is diseased.
13:42So at the time of forgetting, you have to have faith that, okay, I am diseased.
13:47More than faith, you need attention.
13:48You might forget that you have disease, but life will remind you.
13:52At that particular moment, you can just give attention and you're like, okay, all right.
13:57Life will give you one tight slap from here or there if you forget your real condition.
14:04My eyes are dysfunctional.
14:06I cannot see.
14:07I might forget that I have been blinded.
14:11But then as soon as I stumble, I will be forced to acknowledge that.
14:17So life serves great reminders.
14:22So the thing called faith, what is the purpose of it then?
14:26It's not the reminder.
14:30Faith is nothing but, in simple words, a reluctance, a fierce resistance against the finality of
14:42your current condition.
14:46I do not know what greatness means.
14:50I do not know what lies in store next.
14:54But what I certainly know is, this is not what I was born for.
14:58This is faith.
15:04There has to be something else.
15:05I do not know what, but there has to be.
15:08This cannot be the finality.
15:09I resist.
15:10I refuse to accept this as my destiny.
15:13This is faith.
15:18I have various doubts, but I guess many other people must be answered.
15:22You can continue.
15:23I'm enjoying this.
15:24Okay.
15:25So like there is faith.
15:28And if you like, I was observing on this.
15:31I was, I don't know what should we say, thinking, observing, what is the right word.
15:34But the ego creates the exact parallel of what is formed when you are in host.
15:40Like you have faith and then you have belief.
15:43You have frame, love, compassion, and then you have attachment.
15:46Attachment also the springs up like anything, like when a person is falls in love for a
15:51girl or something, they say that, okay, it just comes from my inside and all that.
15:56But compassion too comes like that only.
15:58It never comes like I want this and that's why I'm compassionate.
16:01So both comes without reason.
16:03Same goes like the thought in when I'm in host, like when you say that understanding
16:09gives you right action.
16:12I think also there are thoughts and they lead to action.
16:16And the same thing is happening when you are in Vijayani and a particular desire gives
16:21you thoughts and actions.
16:22So basically the ego has created exact parallel world so that you just keep remaining in that
16:30thing thinking that this is my home, like this is what I have to do.
16:34There are telltale signs, there are easy giveaways.
16:38You can know the real thing from the spurious one.
16:43It's not all that difficult.
16:45Because the real thing is the real and the false one is basically the...
16:49It's not a matter of poetry.
16:51When you look at yourself, you know, not just conceptually, but actually you know the markers
17:04of the wrong thing.
17:09You want to call a thing by a misleading name.
17:16That cannot go too far.
17:19Because what you are calling it as, that too has certain characteristics, even if those
17:25characteristics are expressed in the negative.
17:30If you are honest, then you will know that you have appointed a misleading name to the
17:36happening.
17:37It all boils down to your own inner honesty.
17:42You are calling attachment as love.
17:46It won't be too long before you detect violence in attachment.
17:51Now how can violence go with love?
17:54So there is a giveaway.
18:01The violence thing can also come with the love as well.
18:04That which is coming with love.
18:07That might appear like violence.
18:09But if you look closely at it, you will know what it is.
18:13Can we say that love gives you some actions, attachment also takes you to actions, but
18:19attachment can be known.
18:20It can be known that it is coming from a desire.
18:22But love cannot be known because it is coming from the unknowable.
18:26Love can be known if you probe the presence of desires around it and find nothing.
18:34Then you can be reasonably sure that as of now, the thing is not corrupted.
18:44You cannot detect that which cannot be detected.
18:50But you must detect.
18:51So detect that which is detectable.
18:54What is detectable?
18:56Desires are detectable.
18:57Greed is detectable.
18:58Fear is detectable.
18:59So look for them.
19:01And if you find them, then you must know something is amiss.
19:06One more thing that I noticed is that I try to just mathematize everything, like some
19:12sort of systematic mistake.
19:14For example, you said desire, greed, and everything.
19:18And how I see it, that desire is ultimately because of greed, sorry, greed is because
19:23of desire.
19:24So why not just use the word.
19:26There is no problem with mathematics.
19:28Mathematics is beautiful.
19:29I am basically a mathematics teacher.
19:33Mathematics is absolutely beautiful.
19:36Helps clear the clutter, helps put things very precisely.
19:40It's all right.
19:41And mathematics too can have a poeticity to it.
19:45Like when I see Kabir Das, and I'm like just totally blown away because he didn't have
19:53that much, what we say, scientific knowledge.
19:56In fact, everyone who comes 2000 years back and so on.
20:00So why do we, on the path of liberation, have to study this much?
20:06And this is coming from the point that I am like, I just love knowledge, like just keep...
20:11It's not that we are studying too much.
20:16If you look at most of the people who ventured and made a name for themselves in spirituality,
20:30most of them were very very well read.
20:32Today you have a category of books and scriptures that you read.
20:43Then they had their own particular category that they read.
20:48Some of those books or sources that they used have become redundant today.
20:58So we don't acknowledge the hard work that they did.
21:04But it's not as if things were happening spontaneously and effortlessly for them.
21:09And today you have to read a lot and put in some degree of great effort.
21:15No, no, that's not the way.
21:18Everybody who has dared to target liberation has put in mind-blowing effort.
21:33But the effort cannot surpass the scientific development.
21:38Now we know that there are genes, DNA and everything, which was obviously unknown, let's
21:42say 2000 years back.
21:44So how did they understood the entire thing?
21:48Observation of life, observation.
21:52You just observe what is going on and from that certain things become very clear.
21:58It's just that then they could not have expressed it in the language of science today.
22:07Today's jargon was unknown to them.
22:10Not that today's science was unknown to them.
22:14They would have never used the expression DNA for example.
22:20But they very well knew that the body of any organism is coming from a certain source,
22:32carries certain bondages, operates certain limits and certain compulsions and very broadly that's what DNA is about.
22:41Basically they have the idea that it is ultimately a machinery going on.
22:48Machinery going on which depends on its source.
22:52A lot about you depends on the source of your body and what the body is, is basically a
23:00bundle of limitations.
23:03So this is something that they could easily observe through just observation.
23:10So by observation, it can be...
23:12Obviously, you look at a horse, you look at a mule, you see the difference.
23:18You also see that two horses behave alike and so do two mules.
23:23Those things are not difficult to gather, if you are attentive.
23:29How did Darwin gather all these things?
23:31Was there a theory of evolution before him?
23:34Yeah, by a tour he had in that.
23:37Obviously.
23:38So he just kept observing all the seas, all the islands, one specific island in particular.
23:43So just as Darwin could know those things by observation, so could all the wise people
23:48before him.
23:53Just one thing that I have this thing that I am very curious.
23:57So when I listen to anything you say or any person, I become very curious from where is
24:02it coming from?
24:03Like the person I'm listening to and what is it doing to me?
24:07Am I instantly believing in it or I'm actually understanding and then I'm seeing it.
24:13But like the curiosity thing, sometimes basically it acts as a disturbance.
24:17For example, why am I understanding?
24:19It comes like I am a YouTuber, I have a YouTube channel and I teach maths for JEE in that.
24:26So my calling, my understanding says that I should teach mathematics in a way that people
24:32start loving it.
24:33They see the depth of it.
24:34They start understanding what the world is really.
24:37So this is my calling.
24:38But sometimes what happens that some sort of doubt arises and that I should say that
24:46it feels like some sort of an existential crisis that, okay, this entire Vedant thing
24:50is, it is like a, it is a lie.
24:53It is something that I have just listened and gathered.
24:55So these doubts are probably the best things that can happen because they will help you
25:03challenge the model, the model.
25:08Otherwise the model will become the truth.
25:10Yes.
25:11I somehow tried to just defend the model that, okay, the model is not the truth.
25:21And therefore, there must be these periodic questions and reminders from life.
25:29And the model will be put in its place.
25:32But like this comes so, so fastly that I am not able to do the action.
25:38It feels like, okay, this right, this right action now becomes an action which was coming
25:43from an old understanding.
25:45And hence now I don't know if the right action is not your responsibility.
25:49Your responsibility is just to understand.
25:53Action happens via the system, the physical system, which includes the brain as well.
26:00So action will happen on its own.
26:02You don't have to be bothered about it.
26:05You must just keep asking yourself, am I satisfied?
26:10Do I know?
26:14Is this all that there is to it?
26:20There is a joy in asking that question.
26:24There is also a joy in not receiving any answers to that question.
26:31That action happens by itself.
26:34One need not worry.
26:36It's like a constant ticking that okay, others are waiting as well and I'm just taking so
26:46much time.
26:47So, yeah, it was so nice talking.
26:50Welcome.
26:52Nice.