7 February 2013 - QA 12

Gurudev, how can I live in this world without any fear; fear of loss, fear of death, fear of failure and fear of the known and the unknown?
Sri Sri Ravi Shankar: Fear is love standing upside down.
If there is love, then there is no fear, and if there is fear then there is no love.
See, fear, love and hatred are all made up of the same energy. When there is hatred in a person, he is not afraid of anything.
When there is deep love in a person, then also there is no fear. It is one energy that manifests in these three forms - love, hatred and fear.

On 2 February 2013, I visited Tihar jail, and I inaugurated the opening of a skills training centre, a canteen and a hospital by The Art of Living. The amount of reform that has taken place over there is really touching. It is worth seeing how these people who were rude criminals have changed. They have started to enjoy music, painting, and learning new things.
So I told them, use the restaurant and the skills training centres but don't use the hospital.

The health of a society is indicated by the empty beds in the hospitals and the empty cells in the prisons. Today, the prison that has a capacity of only 6000 people has 12000 people. So we need to work outside prisons as well to ensure that people do not go in there. This can happen when we bring a wave of human values and a sense of belongingness.

These people in the prisons are beautiful people, but they had no fear when they committed the crime because hatred took over them.
That is why, if people engage themselves in doing service activities, and practising ujjayi breath and meditation, then the same energy which one experiences as fear, anxiety and tension, flips over and becomes love and compassion for all.