Question & Answers with Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Sri Sri Ravi Shankar:
Ok. What is it that makes you crave for non-vegetarian? (The lady answered smell and taste). What brings the smell and taste to the food is spices. Ok, forget all about taste and smell and spirituality. You know, what is the latest finding of non–vegetarian food? One kg of meat is equivalent to the meals of 400 people. If only 10 percent of the world population become vegetarians, the problem of global warming will be reduced.On this count we have to save the planet. We will have to reduce the consumption of non-vegetarian food. For the sake of the planet, so that everybody gets food, for that we must be concerned. God has given us the sense to care for others and planet also! You have eaten enough, so consume a little less so that others who have nothing to eat can have a little at least, so that more and more people gets something to eat.
We are consuming 40 -50 percent more than we produce. Plant trees, be vegetarian, it’s part of being spiritual. Spirituality is not only meditation. India had 400 cows for every 1,000 people when we got independence. Now we have less than 100 cows per 1,000 people. In 20 years, there will be only 20 cows per 1,000 people. Children will not get the basic staple diet like milk, yogurt, ghee. We have to protect the animals, and save the planet.
Sri Sri Ravi Shankar:
There is a saying in Tamil which means that ‘God created the tail of the goat according to its capacity’. Be bold and face the problems. Don’t worry, only that kind of problem will come in life which you can handle, which is within your capacity to handle. So handle it, go through it all boldly.Sri Sri Ravi Shankar:
I think you forgot how you felt when you were five year old. When you were five, six, seven or eight- year-old, it was not a beautiful girl who attracted you it was beautiful food that attracted you!I will tell you a story. There were people of three generation- father, son and grandfather. They all went out for a holiday- vacation. So the youngest of the family, the grand child was so excited, he got good food.And the adult, the father, was so attracted with the beautiful girls at the camp. He said, ‘What a beautiful day! I saw so many beautiful girls here. I hadgreat time!’ Now the grandfather's turn had come. The grandfather said, ‘It was such a relief here. So nice. We came out to this holiday camp. I had such good bowel movement! I never had like that before! What a relief!’ He said, ‘You both talk childishly. He talks about food, you talk about girls but in my age you will understand what the really happiness is’. So when someone is so old if they have a good bowel movement, that is great relief for them. They get good sleep, that is heaven for them. So, wait for some more time and you will see what is more beautiful in life!Sri Sri Ravi Shankar:
Truth is contradictory. Completely opposite values together form the truth. This is also true and that is also true. Intense longing will take you to the goal and at the same time dispassion also takes you there. Dispassion gives you happiness.Sri Sri Ravi Shankar:
Sitting close by and listening is Upanishad. Upanishad is a collection of discourses of high knowledge, how it was transmitted from a Master to students. It is very interesting.In one of the Upanishads, it is beautifully said. Once a boy goes to his father who is also his Guru and asked what is God. Father replied, ‘Food is God’ for everything grows from food, everything is sustained by food and in the lack of it, everything dissolves and everything again becomes food. So the boy went and thought about it for several months, understood all about food and came back to his father, and again asked ‘What is God?’
The father, also his Guru, said, ‘Prana is God’. The boy went, thought and understood all about prana, how it is going in and out of the body, how many types of prana are there and read all experiments about prana.
He again came back to his father and asked, ‘What is God?’ The father looked at child’s face, so glowing and so vibrant. Father said, 'Ok, the mind is Brahman, mind is God.' Like that, the boy went and thought till he finds the ultimate bliss. Neither the student complaint to the teacher that he was told, ‘Food is God, but it is not the ultimate, you told me the wrong thing'. He simply came and again asked the question. So this is ancient way of teaching step by step – food, then prana, then the mind, then the inner spirit, then the universal spirit, bliss.
Bliss is Divinity, the space. You are like the space. Then he said, 'There is no difference between you, me and the infinite self. We all are one. The Self, Guru and the universal energy are not different. All are made up of one substance. Today if you talk to scientists who study string theory, who study quantum physics they will say the same thing that is said in the upanishads. In upanishads, it was said thousands of years ago, ‘God is not a person, sitting somewhere up in heaven but God is present everywhere. He is omnipresent and omnipotent, the energy of which you are also made up of, everything is made up of’.
Sri Sri Ravi Shankar:
One thing we need to remember is that the whole story will be finished here! All of us will be gone! We will all go under ground. Life will come to an end, right? If we look back and see so many people we once knew are now gone. Those who were with us, they are all finished. More will go. Everybody will go and one day we will also be gone. This is the permanent truth, the definite truth in life.I was just thinking today is my mother’s 10th death anniversary. Already 10 years have passed! Time goes, things change, when we see life from a broader angle what is emotional hurt then? Somebody said something and it hurt us and we cried; somebody said a good thing and we laughed. What’s the big deal about it? Sometimes you’ve said something and it hurt someone, but that was not your intention. Hasn’t this happened to you? How many of you have experienced this? You have scolded your daughter/son many times haven’t you? What if they hold on to that all their life and say I will not forget that you hurt me. What would you say to them? “Come on let it go, I didn’t mean it”. Isn’t it? Or “I was stressed I was upset, I was not in a good mood so I said something”. Don’t you expect people to let go of the hurt that you have caused them?
You want people to let go of the hurt you caused them. In the same way don’t you have to let go of the pain they have caused you? If someone has hurt you earlier, it is due to selfishness and because they don’t know how vast life is, how beautiful life is. They are selfish because they are afraid. They are selfish or self-centered because they don’t have knowledge in their lives. Nobody taught them how to love people, how to be silent, how to be in this beautiful knowledge. It is not their fault. Is it their fault? If you have not learnt how to read and write, is it your fault? Society teaches you. Your teachers, parents take you to school, make you learn and then you learn. In the same way there was no system for them to learn about life from a broader angle. So you can only be compassionate towards them. They have not had a chance to learn, there was no guide, no teacher. They were not exposed to spirituality. They were not exposed to mannerisms. So they were small-minded selfish people. That was their up-bringing. So what will you hold on to? “Oh you hurt me!” Come on let go! Life is moving. When you die, you will be asked two things: How much love have you given and how much knowledge have you acquired in your life? It shouldn’t matter what others have done to you but from your side you should be compassionate. If people are good towards you, be happy. If they do wrong, have compassion. Life can only swing between happiness and compassion. There is no third option. In our life we have lost people who have been very dear to us. What do we do? That is how life has been designed. We move on. We will also die one day. So let’s move on with commitment. When we are sad, we pray for strength and when we are happy we pray for the strength to serve.
Sri Sri Ravi Shankar:
Serve, serve and serve to break from attachment. When you find something beautiful, you get attached. You want to posses it. When we try to posses, then it becomes ugly. Beauty is that which you cannot renounce/reject or capture. That’s why it is called beautiful.Serve, instead of wanting to posses. Whatever is beautiful we want to posses it, and then jealousy comes, pain comes. When you find something beautiful, just serve.Sri Sri Ravi Shankar:
In silence, in service.Sri Sri Ravi Shankar:
There is only one air, one sun, one earth and one moon. and similarly one consciousness. In the inside of us, the consciousness which is wisdom, which is light is gurutatva. Tatva means principle. To begin with, the five tatvas are earth, water, air, ether and fire. These are five tatvas and then there is the mind, intellect ego. Then there is the maha tatva which is beyond the ego. The one who has gone beyond the ego is called Mahatma. Finer than the maha tatva is the guru tatva. The guru tatva is that principle of discrimination, of knowledge and when it dawns inside you, that is guru tatva. In knowledge then you have no dearth for anything. Life’s mission is complete. Guru tatva always brings joy, freedom from misery and upliftment of the consciousness.Sri Sri Ravi Shankar:
Linga is a symbol. Jyothi is light. A jyotirlinga is a symbol of light. Ancient Rishis and sages have meditated and done their tapas (penance) in such places and those vibrations were created in that space. Here (in Vishalakshi Mantap) you have a jyotirlinga, you can’t see the linga but the light is there. Swayamhi tirtani punamhi Santah. Teertha (holy spot) is where a saint sits. Every pilgrimage spot is a place where a saint has meditated has done tapas (penance) and then transmitted that energy to the stone, water, etc and the place becomes vibrant with that consciousness. When the spiritual energy in a place decreases, then conflict increases. Dhyana (meditation), puja (prayer), seva, and a spiritual life should be there. Then the Chaitanaya Shakti (spiritual energy) increases.