The myth of the happy family || Acharya Prashant, in conversation (2020)

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: 07.12.2020, Interview Session, Rishikesh, Uttrakhand  Context: ~ How to set priorities? ~ How to be free? ~ What is freedom? ~ How to deal with domestic violence? ~ Are we living in a happy family?  Music Credits: Milind Date ~~~~~~~~~~~~~ .

Transcript

00:00You know I would just say this example of people from happy families or normal

00:07families seemingly happy families whatever and people who have a bona fide

00:12past of a trauma like you know domestic violence and abuse and mind games and a

00:22lot of lowly things that do happen and you know in India I've spoken to a lot

00:32of women whether they are in cities or they are in towns or in small places

00:39everybody has had some case of molestation or sexual abuse no matter

00:45which strata of society they belong from mostly some choose to speak about it

00:51some don't so the whole point is when it comes to all these different you know

01:00faces again transmutation of one evil from another or the curse of the broken

01:07family so how do you exercise your demons like I have exercised my demons

01:13but then there are times when I do come back from work and the memories do

01:17sometimes come back to haunt you sometimes it it does right so how is it

01:23is it possible to transcend them and there are you know people around me who

01:31I know very closely young girls literally 10 11 year old girls who still

01:37are living in that kind of a hell that I know I have gone through personally and

01:46I feel because you know I have these aspirations in the sense that you know

01:50work in animal work and everything else that you aspire for in your life and do

01:55and then I just feel so helpless in trying to you know just go and how do I

02:01just help these girls out who are like my very close ones like how do I help

02:06them because it's it's a very rational and you know I can see it happening

02:10right in front of me so so it's it's a huge history of trauma and I know that

02:15trauma is being built here and history might repeat itself you know because

02:19younger generation so how do you come to terms how do you exercise the demons or

02:25as Krishna says you know the Kalyan Ashram you said two things I want to

02:32reconcile them you said there are happy families and there are unhappy families

02:38and then you said that most women or girls you have met have had some kind of

02:50a history of sexual abuse or molestation or domestic violence irrespective of

03:01whether they have disclosed it or not yes pardon I'll just interrupt you not

03:04domestic violence but molestation sexual abuse are definitely rampant and people

03:09choose not to domestic violence I wouldn't find I didn't find many in my

03:13so hence I always found myself to be very I'm taking sexual abuse as domestic

03:21violence so in that sense so if most women you have met have reported sexual

03:34abuse in their experience where exactly are the happy families you are talking

03:39of where they don't exist right we just presume that at least they didn't have

03:57conflicting parents who are just you know the games are happening manipulation

04:03and gas lighting and you know the silver screen is where they exist okay

04:09right that deceptive chimera you think such a thing exists that thing is just

04:24an idea so this is just an idealism of the harmful kind idea just an idea now

04:43let's probe that if you say that most women or girls even if it's not most

04:52let's say significant number of them 60-65% let's say 30% to assuage the

05:03cynical ones who might be watching this conversation at a later point even if a

05:10third of them half of them are suffering from this kind of violence and even

05:21confiding in you that they do suffer is it something isolated rare incidental

05:43I'm asking you I'll frame my question differently there is this room if half

05:58the people who enter this room report suffocation what do we infer this is T

06:15if half the people and you said most I'm not even taking most I'm just a much

06:21prodding and yes going up and then you have to make allowance for the

06:28probability that many of them might not be disclosing to you because they don't

06:33want to confide right for the sake of family honor or because they just want

06:37to keep themselves in the dark yeah it didn't happen or keep up the image or

06:41keep up the image I didn't happen with me I can't be so unlucky I have a loving

06:46family and loving people and such things happens with you know others not with me

06:53so let's take the most optimistic scenario even if half the people or a

07:05quarter of the people who come here reports suffocation or distress of some

07:10kind what do you infer if even a third of people who sip this tea feel unwell

07:19within what do you infer that it is not just the meager amount or number of

07:28people that we think are suffering what do you infer regarding the reason of

07:33their suffering the cause is you know here it is very prima facie because it

07:41is happening in your family so you can't even not say that oh it is my imagination

07:47it is actually happening with you sharper what do you infer people who

07:51have entered this room reported suffocation in a large proportion yeah

07:57they are they are suffocated so suffocated so what do you infer they are

08:02suffering they are suffering so what is the reason the reason is because they

08:10are unable to let it out somewhere yeah does it have to do with them or does it

08:16have to do with the society people who enter this room report suffocation so

08:24the suffocation has to have something to do with the environment in this

08:30particular setting room room yeah we don't talk of the room yeah what's the

08:36room room is an environment that we are staying in the social context what is the

08:42room in which these women are suffering families environments that's what yeah

08:50so the very institution is flawed it's not even flawed it's designed in a way

08:56that's going to breed violence in some way or the other if not physical there

09:06are psychological games and you know I mean that's deeper you know so when I

09:10say violence yeah what do you imagine you think of a bomb blast you think of a

09:18nuclear war you you think of massive layoffs you think of a highly

09:29transmissible virus right okay now put your feet on the ground practically what

09:42is it that most of us suffer from have you suffered from nuclear war have you

09:50suffered from a terminal illness have you suffered from an alien invasion what

10:01is it that the bulk of the earth's population really suffers from we suffer

10:09in our relationships we don't suffer because the neighboring country has

10:15launched a nuclear-tipped missile right we suffer in our relationships if you

10:21look at if you look at a person's a man or a woman's life and if you could

10:27quantify the suffering the person has gone through and then divide it according

10:36to the source of the suffering you will find that a great amount of suffering

10:42comes from the institutions we cherish so much so how how does a 12 year old to

10:50you know I mean save herself from this see if you will make attempts at that

10:57micro a level you will not succeed rather you will succeed in just

11:04consoling yourself that you have done something meaningful for some one person

11:11some one person you'll not be able to bring about any real or widespread

11:18change because you're not addressing the root of the problem the root of the

11:25problem if you're talking of these things the things that women face to

11:35extent men also maybe yes I found I've spoken to men as well yeah powerful men

11:44as well yeah so the the root of the problem there is the very way our

11:50relationships are defined in the society right the images that a woman carries

12:05about herself about family about having kids about the very purpose of life

12:11about the man in her life and vice versa the images that a man carries about the

12:19charming person in his life and such the third we do not address these we think

12:30that these issues are not very important so we talk of climate change

12:36we talk of disarmament we talk of colonizing Mars just pushed under the

12:44rug most of the time and what we do not realize is that we want to run away to

12:49Mars precisely because we are suffocated in the family but we want to talk of

12:57Mars we don't want to talk of mama and her problems so that's what you see we

13:10are born incomplete one clear expression of that incompleteness is our gender the

13:19woman is a woman she is not a man the man is a man craves for woman the very

13:26birth is incomplete you know you're not given both the genders you are given one

13:32with a craving for the other I don't know how we miss to see these basic

13:38things and then there is the education that we receive in the family in the

13:50school and more viciously through the media and that totally distorts

13:58everything in the head everything our minds are badly distorted by the

14:07influence of so many undeserving factors so be it sexual abuse or whatever

14:24molestation rape a lot of that comes from there you know and it does not

14:33limit itself to the sexual area I have often said that one major cause of

14:47corruption is relationships and I'm talking about corruption in organizational

15:00systems here yes one would not very intuitively want to relate that to

15:05something like molestation something is happening in a government department one

15:13would not want to relate that to the relationship between a man and a woman

15:17but these things are related yes why does a person a man or a woman become a

15:25bribe seeker one has to ask unless we have clarity about who we are and

15:38therefore what we should be doing we will keep getting into very messed up

15:47situations and violence is an offshoot of ignorance where there is ignorance

15:54there is bound to be violence you cannot remain indifferent towards a system of

16:04ignorance and want to address sporadic cases of abuse or molestation you will

16:12not succeed because these attempts have been continuing since long you know it's

16:18like allowing the slaughterhouse to run and caring about the life of one

16:24particular cute lamb maybe you will succeed in saving that one lamb but the

16:30slaughterhouse will run the way it always does so all that you will get is

16:36some gratification that there is this particular lamb I could rescue nothing

16:42more than that so there is this 12 year old girl you want to rescue maybe you

16:47will succeed and I think you must succeed I pray you succeed but I don't

16:51want you to succeed in such a small way

16:55you have to address the root cause the root cause is ignorance the root cause

17:01is the bad way we are all raised the root cause is the fact that highly

17:09ignorant people in their 20s or 30s become teachers to their kids it really

17:16beats me how you know I've been teaching since two decades now and my students

17:28have all been in the reproductive age right all of them have been over 17 years

17:35of age so biologically they are all eligible to reproduce and I have seen

17:41how kiddish and how immature they are right and that's not an insult or an

17:51allegation I'm not it's a fact not a pejorative right they would happily

17:59acknowledge they are immature right if they have been my students and I have

18:04succeeded if even a little with them then they would readily accept they are

18:09immature now they are immature and they could be 17 years or 27 years old or

18:16even 32 or 35 and I know and they know that they are immature and tomorrow they

18:26give biological birth to a kid and they become their teachers it defies all

18:34sense but that's happening everywhere happening everywhere the the man or the

18:40woman is not fit as yet to take any decisions regarding her own life but

18:53she's a mother now and she has assumed the responsibility of making decisions

19:00regarding another life and she'll be the first teacher she'll be the educator and

19:07it's a train wreck situation it's a train wreck and it's it's a it's goosebumps

19:15when you think what kind of training is happening between the the father and the

19:24daughter or the mother and the son and when the such things are happening is it

19:31any wonder that we have kids getting into drugs at the age of 8 or teenage

19:41pregnancies or all the kinds of the things we see happenings with kids and

19:46teens and molestation and such things now how are these two not very closely

19:58related to each other not part of the same family no the the brother has

20:05become a drug addict the daughter is experiencing molestation

20:09molestation may be within the family may be outside the family if she is being

20:13molested outside the family then it's somebody from some other family

20:18molesting her yeah absolutely much the same thing right the fellow who's

20:22molesting too is a product of training teaching and education coming from

20:27somewhere right so he's coming from ignorance actually so how do children

20:35under such situations persevere I mean I understand we have to go and target the

20:40root cause of you know educating the entire society about what your you know

20:47acts are if you ask me and if I have to act in such a situation I'll take away

20:51the kid there's no other way how it happens in the West like they basically

20:57completely detain the children and they have their own commune systems and they

21:02raise the kid has to be taken away if if the kid is experiencing something like

21:07this she cannot be allowed to stay anymore with the family but again you

21:13know this kind of a thing goes against the grain of the family system especially

21:19the Indian family system yes yes exactly the the parents are supposed to be the

21:25best educators of how the kid should come up

21:30Amara bachcha hai. What do you mean by Amara bachcha hai? You yourself are kiddish

21:39maybe biologically you could give birth mentally you're just not fit to be

21:43parents

22:00you

Category

Transcript

Recommended