Question & Answers with Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Sri Sri Ravi Shankar:
How to stop the wars between countries? As we develop the feeling to stop the wars it will stop. This feeling should come not only to us but also to the neighbors in the countries who are fighting. This has come to a little extent. Formerly this feeling never came. Formerly they promoted torture and killing. Now that itself has come back on them. See what happened, I will tell a story. Two brothers were living in neighboring houses. The younger brother was very angry with his elder brother. So the younger brother consulted someone to find ways to trouble the elder brother. That fellow told him bring a dog to his house. Now the dog would not do anything, he would only bark people passing by here and there. And because the dog realized that the neighbor was his master’s older brother, he would not even bark at him. So the younger brother got even angrier because the dog was not giving any trouble to the elder brother. So he asked his friend what to do. His friend told him to give an injection to the dog to make him crazy and delirious and then he will go and bite his brother. Only when the dog is mad, will he trouble other people. So the younger brother gave him medicine and made him mad. The dog which is mad does not realize who the younger brother is and who the older brother is. So he first bit the older brother and then began to bite the younger one also. This is exactly what is happening to our neighbors. They did it for us, but it is hurting them now.Sri Sri Ravi Shankar:
Prarabda karma. The meaning of prarabda is that which you have got. What is your height? 5.4’, this is prarabda karma. You cannot change it. What is your weight? 58 kilos, this can be increased or decreased.Sri Sri Ravi Shankar:
There is not even one person in this world who has not experienced joy. If there was only sorrow, one wouldn’t be aware of it. To experience sorrow there has to be an occasional experience of joy. You experienced a little bit of joy that is why you are able to experience sadness. But we tend to eternalize our difficulties; ‘I always have problems’, ‘I am always sick, everyone is sick.’ If ten or fifteen people around you fall sick, what do you say, ‘Oh everyone in Goa is sick.’ Everyone being sick is impossible! In the same way sometimes you say, ‘I always make mistakes’. I say, that is not true. Do not eternalize or generalize problems. Take a sankalpa (resolution) today that only good things will happen to me. As you sow so shall you reap; so have faith in yourself that you will be successful in whatever you do, okay!Sri Sri Ravi Shankar:
See, present Kaliyug is there only for five hundred years, and another twenty thousand years in the big cycle. But in the small cycle the good period has started. Now is the transition period and good period has started. Good people’s voice will be heard so don’t worry about having bad times. Kaliyug is not all that bad, you should remember. Even in Satyug there were four raakshasas (demons). They wouldn’t even allow you to do ‘Om Namo Narayana’ jaap at home. They would come with a ‘talvaar’ (sword) and cut your head. You have heard all that. So don’t glorify Satyug as though there was no crime then. I don’t think Kaliyug is so bad that all crime will be here now. So don’t sit down doing nothing but blaming the time. This is wrong, we shouldn’t blame the time.Sri Sri Ravi Shankar:
The fight against corruption should begin on one’s own effort. First you stop giving bribes. Do you know when we started this drive against corruption and against terrorism? On 1 March 2009 in Delhi. Then we went to fourteen states and in all the satsangs we asked everyone to take an oath, ‘I will not give bribe’. So it starts with us, by our not giving bribes.Sri Sri Ravi Shankar:
Give that person a surprise. Tell them, ‘wow, you said such wonderful things! How did you figure out these facts?’ Try this and see what happens. If someone criticizes you, you counter it with four criticisms of your own and the chain continues. Instead thank them for their kind words, and see what happens. The day you drop your defences that person will hang their head out of shame and embarrassment. They will not know how to respond. This is how we should confuse those who criticize. Have some fun in this situation. What is the fun in finding fault? Our life should not become a football of others’ opinions. Repose in the self!Sri Sri Ravi Shankar:
See there is will power and power behind a blessing. You can also do it. Those who have done the Blessings Course raise your hands. Are your blessings working for others? When we don’t want anything for ourselves, there is a power that can allow us to fulfil others’ desires. The main thing is one should not desire anything for oneself. One should be hollow and empty. The desire for moksha is enough, it will be attained.Sri Sri Ravi Shankar:
God is not an object who will appear in front of you and say, ‘My dear, I am very pleased with you, with your tapasya (penance)’. That will only happen in TV serials. God is that which is beyond the soul. First bring your awareness to your soul, ‘who am I’. Everything is driven by the power of God. Have faith and surrender, meditate. When we are in a state of restful awareness, our channel opens up.Sri Sri Ravi Shankar:
Well, it’s not possible to think all through the day. If the thought comes now and then, here and there, then they come and they go. Treat them like any other thought that comes and goes, doesn’t matter. We are all united in a very subtle level beyond the thoughts. Thoughts coming and going is natural. You can’t do anything about it.Sri Sri Ravi Shankar:
You know I have been saying the world is my family from a very young age. I don’t remember what age, maybe at eight or nine or ten, I have been saying the whole world is my family. So when any disaster happens in some part of my family it is my duty to go and do what I can; visit that place. It is not just my duty it is my consciousness which does not allow me to sit somewhere else when there is problem somewhere else. And I had been there when the Catherine T SAI disaster happened in America or tsunami in South Asia, everywhere I usually go. My coming is not that important but what I would like people to start doing is trauma relief workshops, meditation workshop, healing workshop, that has to happen. And that I keep inspiring our volunteers and teachers to keep doing Your second question, what Norwegians have taught to the world and what can we learn from this? First it is an astonishing thing that such a thing can happen in Norway. Nobody thought about it in their wildest dreams. It happens so often in India, it happens in Pakistan so often; in Palestine, in Middle East all over. But in a peaceful country like Norway if this could happen that means we need to pay more attention to our youths all over the world. We can’t take it for granted that youths are educated in some parts of the world and not educated in other parts of the world. So the ill-educated youths could be anywhere in the world and so the world will not be a safe place unless and until we bring the education of non- violence and compassion right into our education system. This is what Norway can teach the whole world, that doesn’t take it for granted your peace; there could be some crazy elements anywhere in your society. And what you can do, you can have a vaccination for these crazy elements not to spread or not to sprout in your place, by multi- culture, multi- religious education. This is what Norway can give to the whole world and also the way Norwegian press and the society has responded again is a beautiful example, without going into a blame culture. You immediately came into a love culture, spreading love and going to the Square with roses. Not being angry with somebody or the government or the police or anybody. It’s understanding that love and compassion has more power than hatred.