Question & Answers with Sri Sri Ravi Shankar

Sri Sri Ravi Shankar:

Good. You have come to the right place. If you wish to get rid of a bad habit then there are only three ways for it. The first is your love for knowledge, the Divine or some dear one - whether parents or Guru. By promising some dear one that you will quit the habit, you will be able to get rid of it. This is the best way out. The second way is greed. If you will not consume intoxicants for six months, then you will get ten million rupees, or that your luck will shine and you will succeed in everything. The third is fear - if one day you do consume intoxicants, then you will suffer a loss of one million, or you will have to suffer from a major ailment. If such a greed or fear enters you, even then you will be rid of your addiction. Along with these three ways, do yoga and pranayama. The best is that along with yoga and sadhana (spiritual practices), you take a vow that you will not indulge in addictions. Take a vow for forty days, then six months and then a year. After that, you would have come out of the habit and won’t look back at it.

Sri Sri Ravi Shankar:

Don’t try to overcome both. Tackle them one by one. I say, stop the resentment and agree to be angry. Anger and resentment have a chain reaction – you get angry and then you resent; resentment will then turn to anger. Either you are angry with somebody or you are angry with yourself. You are angry with yourself and this causes anger towards somebody else. You may be angry with somebody else but then, as soon as your anger fades, you resent yourself and feel, “How could I lose my temper like that?” So, first decide to be just angry. It does not matter. Just get rid of resentment. This is the first step you can take. Anger is part of your life. As a child you would get very angry. Look at a small child who is holding a toy; just take the toy away from him and see his reaction. His whole body shakes and he gets angry. He yells and shouts, but he is normal the next instant. It doesn’t take a child very long to do this. You get angry but the next moment bring the smile back to your face. Don’t resent. Laugh at your own anger – “Oh, I had a big blow-up today! It was fantastic. It is such fun to watch others’ faces when I get angry! How they reacted to my anger! How soon they caught on to it!” You will soon see that the anger in you turns into alertness; into awareness. That is where pranayama and kriya will come to your aid over a period of time. The resentment had stopped earlier, now the anger will gradually disappear.

Sri Sri Ravi Shankar:

If you are unconsciously stopping it, it will unconsciously stop also. Why do you consciously want to stop? Let it be. Got it? Your trying to stop it consciously becomes a problem. You get stuck. So just relax. Just relax and continue more meditation, more Advanced and Silence programmes. These will de-program you from that thing.

Sri Sri Ravi Shankar:

The moment you recognize, you stop it. That is it. If you are asking for someone else, then they (themselves) only can come out of it. Only meditation can help. Do advance course.