Social media and your life || Acharya Prashant, with IIT-Hyderabad (2022)

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: 26.04.2022,  IIT-Hyderabad, Greater Noida, India  Context: How to get rid of mobile addiction?  How to overcome the fear of missing out? How to be free from addictions? What is freedom? How to live rightly?  Music Credits: Milind Date  ~~~~~

Transcript

00:00Namaste Acharya ji. First of all, massive respect to you. I mainly was touched by your

00:09work through the art festival and the things that you talked about karma was very interesting to me

00:14and I hope you will revisit them today which I'm looking forward to. I am a PhD student in

00:20my fourth year in the design department and I am mainly working with educational games

00:24and how we can use games to harness some sort of education because I've seen a lot of

00:29village children learning vocabulary through playing games like PUBG and other things. So,

00:34I thought why not try to you know intentionally harness that. So, that is what I do. My question

00:40to you was so I was reading somewhere that Chanakya in Arthashastra and I might be mistaken

00:47so sorry about the specifications apologies about that pointed out the fact that a king if he needs

00:53to be successful and wants to rule his kingdom successfully not just with dictatorial absolute

00:59power but successfully he or she needs to pay attention and extract the power of alcohol. So,

01:07Chanakya did not pass judgment on whether alcohol is good or bad but he did understand that a tool

01:12which is powerful has to be understood by the person who is leading the kingdom. So,

01:18that is when I was struck with the idea that ancient text might have ancient texts and you

01:23know knowledge that has been written in olden times might have some answers or some insights

01:28into the contemporary problems that we have. So, I was wondering that in the contemporary

01:34current intellectual discussions that happen in India I often see a lack of or at least an

01:39inadequate importance that is put upon the role that social media plays in our current

01:45consciousness. I see that they do discuss it but they hand wave it as a technology that it is there

01:50and it has some influence but I rarely see that in Indian discussions we really dive into it of

01:56what the problem it is creating or benefits. I understand that cognition has been manipulated

02:02throughout centuries by newspapers, television channels and several other range of mediums.

02:07However, they were local or they were national or at least they were tangible in the sense that

02:12they could be held accountable or could be rectified if the need be. That isn't the case

02:16with social media. It is mostly private owned. The incentives of the owners are at least not,

02:21we don't know what their incentives are and the incentives also keep changing with time and I'm

02:25not saying that it is bad by any means just that it is extremely powerful and yet to be understood

02:30completely in its impact. My question here is that do the Vedantic teachings have any insight

02:37on a spectacle like this or if it did try to comment on such a contemporary phenomenon,

02:42how would it perceive social media and its ever-increasing role in our current society?

02:48And a small question would be what would it comment on about the ever-increasing lack of

02:53attention that we are gradually and but continuously getting, a diminishing attention span.

03:01Thank you. Sorry for the long question.

03:07Vedanta investigates the mind and whereas the deepest desire and the

03:23ultimate destiny of the mind is liberation yet it is habituated

03:35to all kinds of bondages. That's the condition of the mind.

03:50You can call that as human consciousness.

03:53Our inclinations, our tendencies, our habits are at odds with our welfare.

04:12We need to be liberated

04:16but we want and slip towards bondages. So, that's what the mind is. An entity

04:36at odds with its own real interests.

04:40So, the mind is very easily attracted towards form, show,

05:00sexuality, display of riches.

05:04It likes to be entertained so much that it sometimes even deliberately wants to keep itself

05:21in illusions. That's how the mind is. The mind slips easily towards falseness

05:30but requires discipline and deliberate effort to rise towards

05:45knowledge, understanding and liberation.

05:49Now, with the mind being like this, you have the social media technology in front of you

06:04and it is one of the things of the mind to feel lonely since birth

06:12and clamor for company and social attention.

06:21And now you have Facebook or Twitter and you want attention.

06:30You want attention. That's your mind. The others want to be entertained and titillated

06:42that's their mind. You do not really want the truth. You need the truth though

06:49but you do not want the truth. That's your mind and the others too equally

07:00want to avoid the truth even though they equally need the truth. That's the

07:06other's mind. Humanity has one mind. Its expressions are varied but fundamentally the

07:16tendencies of the mind are the same and equally the final destiny of the mind is one.

07:28So, what do I do? I feel lonely. What do I do? I look around for attention. I look around for

07:40attention. The easiest way to gain attention is to peddle mischief. Why? Because the others

07:51others too are attracted towards mischief.

07:57The lowest common denominator has a tendency to catch on spread like wildfire.

08:09All that is worst about us will be the fastest to spread. And we just said that that

08:22which is sublime in us, worthy within us, requires first of all effort, time, patience, discipline

08:36to cultivate and a lot of equal effort to propagate. Whereas mischief spreads on its own.

08:49Now, falseness is contagious.

08:58One person with the inclination to spread false ideas or information

09:09can do it very easily. Whereas somebody with the intention to counter falseness

09:17will have to work 10 times as hard.

09:22So, now you see when we get a propagating machinery like social media in our hand,

09:31what use is it going to be put to? It has amplified the worst within us.

09:43Though it's just a technology, as you put in your question,

09:49but we being the users of that technology, we have put it to the worst use as is our habit

10:00to put everything at our disposal, at the service of our lowly tendencies.

10:09And so, social media too has been made a servant to our lowly tendencies.

10:22So, you rightly put it, there is no accountability. Anybody can say anything

10:29and that gets magnified very soon. In fact, the worst the kind of content,

10:44the faster the speed with which it spreads and that becomes known to all.

10:53And we all are hungry for recognition, prestige, attention. So, we very quickly

11:06take the hint. We very quickly see what is it that sells, what is it that brings instant rewards

11:15and also a lot of money is at stake.

11:22If you can become a good YouTuber or a recognized social media personality

11:31that fills up your coffers as well. So, now a very easy, a very cheap formula has been revealed.

11:46Do the worst kind of nonsense and make a fortune out of it.

11:54And this formula has been picked up by the society in general, by politicians, by corporations,

12:02by everybody. So, that's what is happening. When you had regulated bodies,

12:14then they were answerable and you knew the names and faces of those who were in charge.

12:25When it comes to social media, hardly anybody is in charge.

12:30Now, the mischief maker is faceless, anonymous, because there are just so many of them that you

12:35cannot call out or point out one single face. Anonymity does not consist of

12:50nobody having a face. These days anonymity really means

13:02billions of faces. When there are billions of mischief makers, how many will you block?

13:13How many will you call out?

13:15So, that's what has happened. And regulation cannot be the answer now,

13:24because regulation is now impractical, impossible.

13:29You cannot regulate so many people and you cannot have laws that punish people

13:36for their intentions. Of course, if there is explicit content, you can punish it.

13:46If somebody is saying something that is factually misleading, you can punish it.

13:51But then mischiefs can be of thousand kinds and those kinds are all very subjective.

14:00You cannot identify them. So, regulation has become impossible. What then is the way ahead?

14:13The only solution then is individual responsibility. And individual responsibility cannot

14:19come by way of legislation or regulation.

14:28Then the only solution is a cultural environment with spirituality at its center.

14:43Only then can people be self-regulated.

14:50Or you could have a situation similar to one in China,

14:59where the state has a million eyes and hands

15:08and is clamping down on everybody and anybody who dares to transgress.

15:15But obviously, we do not want that to happen. Firstly, that benefits no one. Secondly,

15:22that will very soon prove ineffective. So, then you need people with

15:35their minds awakened.

15:38You need people who can operate from a position of

15:50internal discipline. And this is not a mere utopia. I'm not talking idealism.

15:59I'm talking of the only practical solution possible now.

16:04So, what do we do then? Real spirituality has to be promoted.

16:12You cannot leave it at the mercy of blind social forces or market forces, or even

16:24the whims of democracy. A few things have to be recognized as being fundamentally important

16:43and therefore be patronized by the society.

16:49I'm talking of Vedanta here. I'm talking of core self-enquiry here.

16:58That has to become a part of mainstream education.

17:07Education cannot now remain a means to just earn your bread.

17:19Education cannot be just about building a career.

17:29We are into rough terrain and choppy waters now.

17:40Humanity does not have much time left.

17:44We need to be awakened very quickly. It's a historical emergency.

17:54The problems that you see with social media are but a tiny reflection

18:02of the real catastrophe we unfortunately have at hand.

18:08So, that needs to be done.

18:17The real inner center being promoted, self-enquiry being promoted

18:27is the most important need of the hour and I'm saying that

18:35not as an exaggeration but with very careful deliberation over long years.

18:43There is nothing more important today than awakening the individual.

18:51It was always important historically but today it's a do or die thing.

18:58You do not do that and you will find us slipping more and more

19:09into a dark abyss, into the bottomless lowly levels of consciousness.

19:21There will be no end to how low we can fall

19:29and probably the fall would be interrupted only by our final and complete ruin.

19:41So, that's where we stand.

19:46The worst has become mainstream because the worst will spread the fastest

20:04and will therefore become mainstream.

20:06The ones who actually need to be in asylums and

20:22and sometimes probably in jails have become social media idols and superstars.

20:31So, you see what is happening.

20:39The bottom most is expanding

20:49and taking all of us in its fold.

20:54The worst among us is overpowering the rest of us and threatening the highest.

21:08Right now, the worst is winning hands down extremely comfortably

21:17and we are unable to see beyond our ideals of freedom of expression

21:30and democracy and equality with such ignorance of spirituality.

21:40We are unable to perceive that whereas animals are all equal to each other, human beings

21:53are greatly different. They are not merely different in terms of consciousness.

22:00They are higher and lower and that needs to be accepted.

22:04And the freedom of expression of the lower has to be checked, limited.

22:13Otherwise, as we said, the lowly will become the mainstream.

22:22You allow the worst tendencies that we have to propagate themselves

22:34and those tendencies will gain in popularity because there is the evil within us

22:48just waiting to express itself.

22:52And when it sees its reflection in others, it feels emboldened, empowered.

23:00Oh, that person is creating such mischief and getting away with it, not only getting away with

23:07it, but is actually being rewarded for it. What prevents me from creating similar mischief?

23:16That kind of tendency sits within all of us.

23:19Therefore, the ideals of the European renaissance,

23:30the ideals that lie at the bottom of the modern world, have to be reinvestigated.

23:40So, I'm talking of these things,

23:56unchecked freedom and

24:02things like equality and such things. We know of these ideals.

24:10Not that I'm against these ideals. I'm talking of now going beyond these ideals.

24:19I'm not talking of something in opposition to them. I'm not talking of their dualistic

24:26counterparts. I'm talking of transcending those ideals now, so that we may have something that

24:35is better and more suited when it comes to challenging the calamity facing us.

24:52Thank you, Acharyaji. Do you have hope, if it boils down to individual responsibility,

24:59do you have hope in the current humans that spirituality can be made as contagious as the

25:06phones in our pockets, the ordering food at a whim, shopping at a whim, browsing sexuality at a whim?

25:12There is no option. And when you are optionless, then hope becomes irrelevant.

25:22Even if there is no hope, you have to work towards the right. You have to try till your last

25:33because there is no option and it's not as if only the evil can succeed.

25:40Your foundation, when it comes to social media,

25:50works very hard to increase its social media reach and it's not as if we fail all the time.

25:59It's not as if nobody wants to go through the content we put on the various platforms.

26:10So, obviously, success is possible, though it's going to be difficult. The task is onerous.

26:22It's far easier, as we said, to propagate mischief and truth is a difficult thing

26:33to propagate, to take to others. But if you try hard enough, then you may succeed.

26:44And when you try hard enough, it is truth that empowers you to propagate itself.

26:57It's not even your own personal energy that comes to serve the truth.

27:03You might find this a bit complex or whatever, but just stay with this. So,

27:16when you are on the right side of consciousness, then obviously, the task is tougher.

27:26But that tougher task is made easier by being on the right side.

27:33The rightness itself supports you from within. So, it does not remain that tough after all.

27:47And all in all, it's a better deal to be on the right side of consciousness.

27:54Thank you. Thank you so much.

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