Video Information: Shastra Kaumudi, 20.12.2021, Rishikesh, India
Context:
~ Why there is so much suffering in life?
~ Do we suffer by our own choice?
~ How to avoid pain and suffering?
Music Credits: Milind Date
~~~~~
#acharyaprashant
Context:
~ Why there is so much suffering in life?
~ Do we suffer by our own choice?
~ How to avoid pain and suffering?
Music Credits: Milind Date
~~~~~
#acharyaprashant
Category
📚
LearningTranscript
00:00 We said that nothing has inwardly changed, so we are essentially inwardly the same people
00:08 who are roaming the jungle.
00:11 So, but a question comes in that definitely somewhere during the course of evolution we
00:22 became this human species, so there has, so somewhere there has been inward evolution
00:28 also or has there been no inward evolution?
00:32 There has been no inward evolution.
00:35 Let us discuss that.
00:41 Look at an amoeba or a paramecium.
00:48 Don't you see that its basic instinct is just the same as that of the most evolved human
00:58 being?
01:06 It wants to exist.
01:09 You want to exist.
01:12 What has changed?
01:13 You are still the amoeba.
01:16 You can contradict me in a thousand ways possible.
01:21 What I am saying is so vulnerable to arguments that you can trash it in no time, but with
01:37 some empathy and understanding try to get into the truth of it.
01:44 With all our evolutionary gifts, intellect, memory, muscle, the subsequent development
02:01 of a suitable and comfortable ecosystem aided by technology, are we still fundamentally
02:14 different from any other kind of conscious life form on the planet anywhere else?
02:23 Tell me please.
02:27 An amoeba reproduces.
02:31 So do we.
02:34 An amoeba eats.
02:37 So do we.
02:38 No sir, but you know there is so much that we do not share with amoebas.
02:47 Let's see please.
02:50 Is there anything that you do that is fundamentally not centered on stuff that amoeba does?
03:00 An amoeba wants its space, its territory.
03:08 Even a little plant does, a blade of grass does, the most primitive being does.
03:21 See what do you use your knowledge and your skills for?
03:29 Aren't your resources, your money going so much towards acquiring space and territory,
03:42 both physical and psychological?
03:45 Tell me please, an amoeba wants to have personal space, space that it can declare as its own,
03:56 territory that it can monopolize.
03:59 That's what even an amoeba wants.
04:09 You could say we do so much, but aren't we doing so much just to do what the amoeba does?
04:18 The amoeba obviously doesn't go to the office every day.
04:21 You do go to the office, but you go to the office to do what the amoeba does.
04:34 Amoeba has no laboratories, it does not develop technologies, but we have laboratories and
04:40 we have developed technologies to do what the amoeba does.
04:48 The amoeba does not have language, we have language.
04:52 What do we use language for?
04:55 To do what amoeba does.
05:03 What do you speak for, please tell me?
05:06 We said the session today started late because the people around were playing loud music
05:12 and such stuff.
05:15 What were all those songs about?
05:22 They were about reproduction, you see, let's put it bluntly.
05:28 The fellow wants to mate, he is using words to invite the other human, the other human
05:39 of the opposite gender to mate and that's what we call as songs.
05:46 At least that's the kind of songs we use on celebratory New Year Eve.
05:55 So you have language, what do you use language for?
05:57 You use language to mate.
06:02 That's also what the amoeba does without using language.
06:09 In fact the amoeba is more efficient.
06:13 You use so many words just because you are wooing a female.
06:18 Words and instruments and loudspeakers, goodness.
06:31 You know amoeba is so efficient that not only does it not need words, it does not even need
06:37 a female.
06:43 It just multiplies on its own.
06:48 It's both a male and a female.
06:49 It's neither a male nor a female.
06:55 Is there anything that you do that is fundamentally different from what an amoeba does?
07:02 So where is evolution, please tell me?
07:08 Whatever we do, we do for the sake of existence.
07:12 We want to remain, we want to remain as we are.
07:16 That's also exactly what the amoeba wants.
07:19 How are you different?
07:33 Today we have taken the amoeba, at other times I have taken up the dog.
07:39 We will find that offensive.
07:42 So I said fine, amoeba.
07:48 But I still maintain that the dog is more handy.
07:53 If you look at all that a dog does and you look at all that you do, it would be so easy
08:01 to establish a clear mapping, a very direct correlation.
08:13 There is not a single thing that you do and a dog doesn't.
08:18 Where is your evolutionary superiority?
08:22 Tell me please.
08:25 But we read, for what?
08:31 For what do you read?
08:35 You read to feed yourself, you read to clothe yourself, you read to acquire physical, psychological
08:45 space.
08:49 A dog manages all of that, even without reading.
08:58 You need to draw international boundaries.
09:01 The dog just has to lift his leg.
09:09 The dog doesn't have to appoint a commission, MacMohan or something to draw a meticulate
09:20 international boundary.
09:24 This is my territory.
09:25 How do I mark it?
09:28 By peeing.
09:33 That's the truth of all territorial occupation, all territorial obsession.
09:39 You want territory so that you can pee and shit over it, irrespective of whether that
09:46 territory is physical, mental or bodily.
09:53 Why do you want to acquire territory in the form of a human body?
09:57 I own you, you are mine, you are my territory.
10:00 Just as that's my scooter, that's my car, that's my bungalow, that's my wife or husband.
10:08 What do I do?
10:09 How do I acquire the territory?
10:11 I'll pee over it.
10:20 That's already offensive, but can't help it.
10:29 What else do you do once you have acquired a man or a woman?
10:32 Think of it, please.
10:35 There was one thing that you could not do without acquiring that person, spoil his or
10:40 her body.
10:42 Once you have acquired him, then...
10:48 Literal shit.
10:51 No?
10:54 No, but we keep our houses clean.
11:19 And why are you saying that we acquire territory?
11:23 To spoil it.
11:24 Once we acquire territory, in fact we make additional efforts to keep it clean.
11:29 That's what.
11:30 The cleanliness that you are talking of is shit.
11:37 You acquire territory to use it to maintain yourself.
11:44 The dog uses territory to suit its own personal purpose.
11:51 That's what we are calling as spoiling or dirtying.
11:56 So, it might appear that you are keeping your place very clean, but still the purpose is
12:05 very dirty.
12:06 The purpose is continuation of my existence as I am.
12:12 My place will be used to provide me comfort and security.
12:18 That's a very dirty purpose.
12:31 Evolution will not take you beyond the body or the self.
12:39 Wisdom would.
12:41 That's why I keep hopping.
12:46 Don't attach too much significance to age.
12:53 No age is small enough to prevent you from moving into wisdom.
13:13 And no age is advanced enough to prevent you from moving into wisdom.
13:24 Evolution will not help.
13:26 Experience will not help.
13:27 Age will not help.
13:30 Only wisdom would help.
13:31 If you think that experience will deliver wisdom to you, you are badly mistaken.
13:41 If you think being called a senior citizen will deliver you from Maya, you are in a fool's
13:55 paradise.
13:57 So, we as human beings do have the possibility of going beyond what is fundamentally the
14:10 same with all other animals.
14:13 Because if we as human beings we can perform these five steps and go towards liberation
14:22 which an animal cannot do.
14:25 An animal does not want to do.
14:26 That's not how it is biologically constituted.
14:30 So, this quest, this potential, is this also biological?
14:36 Yes.
14:37 This potential is the potential of your body.
14:45 Only your body is designed in a way that the consciousness attached to it can seek freedom
14:59 from it.
15:04 You could even say that only man is unfortunate enough to not remain contended with the body.
15:17 All other life forms are contended with the body.
15:26 Only man is born with a special urge.
15:32 This you could take as his superiority or his misfortune.
15:41 No animal experiences the angst that a human being does.
15:52 Animals don't have to go through so much tension and inner strife.
15:58 They don't turn depressed, neurotic, suicidal so easily.
16:10 We do because we are special.
16:15 We are special animals.
16:18 Hello.
16:20 Not that we are absolutely special.
16:22 We are just special animals.
16:30 Acharyaji previously in the answer you specified that there is nothing evolutionary which is
16:38 in us.
16:39 But in our Vedas and scriptures, in the ten avatars, we were marine first and then gradually
16:52 the last stage is the meditative man.
16:55 That has been described.
16:58 And meditative as in the current state which has the potential of, which is able to discuss
17:05 this.
17:08 And while we see that this is the potential which has come through the evolution which
17:13 we just came to, but you also straight away disagree that there is anything biologically
17:24 evolutionary that is going to come which will uplift us.
17:29 So how to reconcile?
17:32 The problem is potential is a very deceptive word.
17:38 You use the word potential to defend your notion that man is special.
17:55 You say man has the potential for liberation therefore man is special.
18:01 You say man has the potential for liberation therefore man is better than animals.
18:08 I take potential as a phantom, as Maya, myth.
18:22 Potentially we are all divine.
18:24 Potentially we are all the true self, Atma.
18:26 So what?
18:28 So what?
18:29 Where is that potential expressing itself in your life?
18:36 The only use you have for that potential is that you use it to defend your unreasonable
18:47 sense of grandeur and superiority.
18:50 We are potentially great.
18:52 Two hoots to your potential.
18:57 What are you really?
18:59 What are you living as?
19:00 Potentially yes you could be sage Angiras.
19:06 What are you living your life as?
19:07 Tell me that.
19:08 You are living your life as the amoeba.
19:12 Therefore I will call you the amoeba.
19:13 I won't call you Angiras.
19:19 You might be born with so much potential.
19:24 That's actually unfortunate because you will die with so much potential.
19:28 Would have been better had you been born with no potential because that potential is never
19:36 going to fructify.
19:38 You will just die with it.
19:41 With you it would be turned to ashes.
19:48 What's the point in talking of that mythical potential and singing and dancing around it?
20:03 You know our possible glory or current debauchery.
20:20 I want to talk of the latter because without talking of your current debauchery, your possible
20:32 glory is anyway always going to remain just myth, a utopia, a chimera.
20:57 Like people talk of their great ancestors.
21:10 You know I come from the line of the great king who once used to rule Delhi.
21:19 How does that help you?
21:20 Look at your life.
21:21 How does that help you?
21:28 I come from the line of the Buddha or Mahavir.
21:31 Who are you?
21:34 Who are you?
21:36 Look at your life.
21:40 All the time you are violent and you are talking of Buddha and Mahavir.
21:47 What do you know?
21:51 I come from the line of sage Agastya and even as you say this you are spitting chicken bone
22:08 out from your mouth, steeped in ignorance.
22:19 You are talking of this glory, that glory, this highness, that beauty.
22:36 Potentially you could have been the topper of your class.
22:40 No?
22:44 I want to know what you actually did.
22:52 Potentially you could have won 8 Nobel prizes by now.
23:01 But I know you couldn't have graduated without cheating.
23:04 That's your reality.
23:17 Isn't it actually a disgrace that in spite of having a potential we live the life of
23:27 an amoeba?
23:29 Doesn't that not only make us equal to but rather worse than the amoeba?
23:39 The amoeba never had the potential of being anything beyond the amoeba.
23:44 You had the potential and you still lived as the amoeba.
23:48 Now tell me are you better or worse than the amoeba?
23:52 Worse than the amoeba.
23:53 That's the reason I keep saying the dogs are better than us.
23:59 They are at least performing to their average.
24:03 You know there is a tailender, I am talking of cricket.
24:10 His average is 10, batting average 10.
24:15 He has no more potential.
24:16 His batting average is 10 and he comes to bat and gets out at 10.
24:25 Is that bad performance?
24:26 Not at all.
24:27 He is performing to his average.
24:28 You are a top order batsman.
24:34 Your average is 58.
24:36 That's your potential right?
24:37 You could have made 58 or more.
24:41 And you come and you get out at 10.
24:47 Who is better?
24:48 The tailender or you?
24:50 So the dogs are better than us.
25:05 Happened with me.
25:08 I stood third in my class, class 4 or 5 and got bashed up at home.
25:23 Wasn't a bad performance by any means.
25:27 Stood in a class of 40 or 50, got beaten up.
25:38 And then I rebelled.
25:44 I said this my sister, she never even manages a single digit rank.
25:57 But happily she carries her report card, comes in, throws it away and starts rolling on
26:05 the bed.
26:08 And nobody utters a word to her.
26:13 All the time she is just happy.
26:19 I burn the midnight oil.
26:22 She keeps snoring.
26:27 She comes 13th in her class, I came third.
26:34 She is still happy.
26:38 I have been bashed up.
26:40 This won't do.
26:51 My mother said you have done far worse than her.
26:54 I couldn't really grasp.
26:58 Now I think I do.
27:08 If you have potential and you don't live up to it, life will offer you the harshest
27:20 punishment.
27:26 Because you have failed in your one duty as a human being, to materialize your potential.
27:34 That's your only dharma.
27:37 Your potential, the Upanishads call as Atma.
27:45 You have it and yet you do not have it.
27:52 (electronic music)