The fantastic spiritual superhero! || Acharya Prashant, on Bhagvad Gita (2020)

Acharya Prashant

Video Information: Month of Awakening, 11.01.2020, Advait Bodhsthal, Greater Noida, India  Context:  ~ Why we fantasize in spirituality also? ~ Are spiritual guru and great man were really superhero? ~ How we are working against us assuming them as superhero?  Music Credits: Milind Date ~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Transcript

00:00 Chapter 1, verse 30.

00:13 "O Krishna, I am not able to stand firmly and my mind seems to be whirling and I notice

00:23 the omens to be adverse."

00:24 Acharya ji, Pranam from the above shloka.

00:30 "I realize that at times I too feel paralyzed around my loved ones when it comes to taking

00:36 the right action.

00:39 My attachment towards them gets overwhelming at times and I find myself difficult to hold

00:44 steady.

00:46 Arjun, like me, seems to be giving all excuses possible for not doing the right thing.

00:55 He is willing to die but not ready to do the right thing.

01:00 In such situations, many times I have spent all my energy in maintaining my composure

01:07 which results in inaction and thus defiance of the right action."

01:12 Acharya ji, does the right action have to wait for my composure or can it proceed even

01:20 with trembling hands or unsteady mind?

01:24 Come on.

01:30 What makes you think that being the creature of this earth that you are, you will be able

01:42 to do the right thing without shaking, without having unsteady hands?

01:57 We seem to have romantic fantasies even in spirituality.

02:04 We have been fed a lot of spiritual notions it seems.

02:09 We carry images, rather long videos of how a really spiritual person is like, steady,

02:33 firm, unwavering, unshaking, doing the right thing without the least trace of discomposure.

02:46 Fantastic.

02:49 Heroic.

02:52 Superheroic.

02:54 That's what we want, right?

02:55 Superhero movies.

02:56 Juvenile.

02:57 So very juvenile.

03:02 What's your take on a spiritual master?

03:11 Some kind of a Batman?

03:20 Able to conquer everybody without getting even the slightest bruise.

03:35 That's what you find in superhero movies, right?

03:40 All the bad ones of the world are standing against your superhero and they are carrying

03:56 AK-47s, machine guns, stain guns, Tommy guns and a few nuclear reactors.

04:05 One or two bombs won't suffice, so they have brought along half a dozen reactors and

04:16 uranium and plutonium enrichment plants as well, so that bombs can be delivered in real time.

04:27 And then you're stood without so much as blinking his eyes, just whistles and blows them away.

04:44 That's what the movies have fed you, right?

04:50 And either willing or subconsciously, you have extrapolated the same story to the spiritual

04:55 domain.

04:58 How does the parallel scene look like in the spiritual domain?

05:04 Here is your realized master and in front of him are standing all the bad chaps.

05:11 Sam-krodh, mad-moh, loob, maya-mad, matsarya, bhaya and they are carrying all the destructive

05:31 weapons possible, property, sex, allurement, prestige, those are the nuclear weapons you

05:43 see to destroy you internally.

05:48 And then your spiritual master without so much as blinking an eye, just blows them away.

06:00 I command you to disappear by the power of the Lord.

06:11 Thy shall be no more and they're all gone.

06:19 Happy popcorn time.

06:25 That's your pop spirituality with popcorn fed to you by mom and pop.

06:42 You know what you have done to all the saints and the masters and the heroes who loved you

06:56 and fought for you, you have destroyed them, you have turned them into caricatures.

07:03 You have created images of their infallibility.

07:07 You have said they were supermen.

07:11 So I will not leave behind any trace of their fallibility.

07:17 I will not show that they too trembled.

07:19 I'll not allow it to be shown.

07:23 In fact, I will distort history to represent them as superhuman.

07:40 So Jesus for example cannot be shown to be afraid.

07:44 Buddha cannot be shown to be attached.

07:52 And if Krishna or Ram are shown to have human fallibilities, then there is a large hue and

08:03 cry and an uproar.

08:07 You say but how could Ram be so vulnerable to the opinion of an outsider that he really

08:17 shut the doors on his wife.

08:24 But if Ram is really an incarnation of Vishnu, why was he weeping so inconsolably over Lakshman's

08:38 fainted body?

08:42 If Ram is really God on earth, then why did he not know using his magical powers and clairvoyance

08:54 where Ravan had taken Sita away?

08:59 Why did he have to dispatch Hanuman?

09:11 Superheroes have to be perfect.

09:16 Superheroes can't have weaknesses, frailties.

09:21 Superheroes have to be cast in an image so distant, so distant that no relationship remains

09:35 possible between you and the image.

09:39 So that you can safely continue in your old rotten ways and say oh but that chap was superhuman.

09:49 He cannot be an example to me.

09:52 He could do what he did because he was extraordinary, special, divine, belonging to the beyond.

10:00 He was transcendental.

10:01 I am not.

10:03 He belonged to the skies.

10:04 I live on the earth.

10:06 So I have therefore no responsibility to learn from him or live like him.

10:15 Such an obnoxious inner conspiracy towards yourself.

10:19 Bad, very bad.

10:24 It is from that mindset that this question tonight is arising.

10:32 The questioner is saying that when I do the right thing, often I find myself trembling.

10:41 And then very innocently he asks, does the right action have to wait for my composer

10:47 or can it proceed even with trembling hands and unsteady mind?

10:52 Sir, madam, one hallmark, one unmistakable quality of right action would be that it would

11:03 require all your guts.

11:09 It is only false action that you can comfortably undertake.

11:17 Falseness is never troublesome.

11:18 Truth always is.

11:19 Whenever you will be doing something that would be real, you would know it by the discomfort

11:29 it would cause to you.

11:33 You are asking me, is it possible to act rightly with trembling hands?

11:41 I am saying you can act rightly only with trembling hands.

11:53 Understand the theory part of it.

11:57 The heart, the truth inside you acts rightly.

12:03 But it acts through your body and mind.

12:07 And the mind is habituated to falseness.

12:12 So through a false vehicle, the project of truth is being undertaken.

12:20 What will that project do to the vehicle?

12:27 Are you getting it?

12:32 Truth is like acid and you are supplying it through a pipeline that is clogged with rubbish.

12:47 You are using the pipeline just to supply the acid, supply the acid to the point of

12:55 action.

12:59 But in the process of transportation, what will the acid do to the pipeline, to the vehicle

13:07 of supply?

13:11 Cleans it, sir.

13:15 Cleans it.

13:17 This difference in description makes all the difference in life.

13:25 That which you call as erosion will be resented.

13:34 That which you call as cleansing will be supported.

13:39 The moment you call the action of acid upon the pipe as erosion, you will not support it.

13:48 So be very cautious in the choice of your description.

13:57 Are you getting it?

14:03 Whenever you will do something that is worthwhile, it would be characterized by a shake-up,

14:14 a tumult in your life.

14:20 And that is the reason now you know why so few people do anything that is truthful.

14:30 Who wants discomfort?

14:33 Who wants to feel unsettled even if the settlement is a false settlement?

14:40 Are you getting it?

14:46 So just because something makes you uneasy, do not drop it.

14:58 More often than not, unease is a sign of the approach of truth.

15:07 And just because there is something you can comfortably do, don't continue with it.

15:14 Chances are your comfort is a false and harmful comfort.

15:34 There is nobody, I'm assuring you, who has had it easy.

15:49 Drop the superhero myths.

15:51 Even they had it as difficult as you have.

16:03 What do you think?

16:04 Would Kulli walked out leaving Yashodhara and the toddler behind in the middle of the

16:15 night?

16:18 No, he was trembling.

16:30 He felt his insides crashing into a thousand pieces.

16:39 It was not easy.

16:44 After stepping out of the door, I tell you three times he pulled himself back.

16:55 Several voices within him told him, "No, no, no, leave it.

17:03 Alright, tomorrow.

17:05 Tonight is not the time.

17:10 See how peacefully she sleeps.

17:14 What will she see in the morning?

17:17 Tomorrow, tell her everything and then bid her goodbye."

17:28 And then another voice that said, "But what's the need to quit like this?

17:37 Can't it happen in the palace itself?

17:44 Can't you continue to be a prince or a king, a husband and a father and still get the clarity

17:53 that you want?

17:54 Can't you?

17:55 Can't you?"

17:56 It's never easy.

18:04 It is never easy for anybody.

18:07 Be it a prophet, a saint, a soldier, a scientist.

18:25 Our constitution is such that it opposes truth.

18:31 So if you want to live by the truth, you will have to live against yourself.

18:42 Just that if you are determined to live against yourself, with time, gradually, you find that

18:50 your internal resistance to truth drops.

18:58 But you cannot wait for that resistance to drop.

19:03 You are saying, "Should I wait to be composed before I undertake the right action?"

19:10 No, no, no.

19:12 Your resistance against truth will drop only when you commit to yourself that you will

19:19 stay with the truth in spite of the resistance.

19:25 You stay with the truth.

19:28 Don't mind the resistance.

19:29 Bear it.

19:30 Cry and bear it.

19:31 Weep and bear it.

19:32 Wince and bear it.

19:33 But bear it.

19:34 And if you keep bearing it, then your resistance realizes that it's futile to insist.

19:52 Resistance gradually drops.

19:54 Now there is just you and the truth.

19:58 The resistance is slowly fading away.

20:06 But that will happen after long.

20:10 You can't wait and that won't happen if you keep waiting.

20:14 So you have to start right now.

20:16 [Music]

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