Question & Answers with Sri Sri Ravi Shankar

Sri Sri Ravi Shankar:

Listen, now that you are already here, why do you worry about the next life? Just be here. Make the best out of this life. We will see the other one when it comes.

Sri Sri Ravi Shankar:

(Guruji laughs) then how can you say you are complete? You will be complete with your wife. If you look at the needs of life, no one is complete by himself or herself. You do not make the cloth of your cloths yourself, somebody makes the cloth for you, a tailor stitches it, and then you wear it. You do not grow your food yourself. In our life we are dependent on others for a lot of things. However, with regard to your inner life, you are free to be happy (happiness is your choice). Whether your better half stays with you or not, you can remain happy. Many people are not happy even after getting married and many are unhappy being single. What I am trying to say is, as you go deeper in meditation, you experience that completeness. This cannot be experienced by someone telling you so, or by listening to something. When you become aware of this completeness, and it is reflected on your face, then you can bring comfort and satisfaction to others also. Then you won’t have to sing, ‘aadhaa hai chandramaa, raat aadhi’ (lyrics of a popular hindi film song – the moon is half full, so is the night). Only one who is fulfilled within can love completely.

Sri Sri Ravi Shankar:

Whether the monkeys had tails or not we will leave it to the researchers to find out. Now there are many monkeys without tails. The monkeys without tails are plentiful

Sri Sri Ravi Shankar:

Only three palm lengths to heaven means heaven is not far. Let us try a little bit, heaven is not far away, it is near here itself. From the head to the nose and to the heart it is only 3 palm length. Head connected to the heart is heaven but if the heart gets into the head then it is confusion

Sri Sri Ravi Shankar:

See whenever you see anything surprising it causes you to wonder. When so many surprising things are happening every day the wonder disappears. You think okay this is just ordinary. Is it not? When something which rarely happens takes place, then it creates a sense of wonder. In the same way, by observing the various wonderful happenings that are taking place in the world and absorbing the wonderful sights and scenes of the world, if a sense of wonder comes about, that wonder creates Yoga.

Sri Sri Ravi Shankar:

The horse was not being scarified. Do you know what Ashwa means? Shwa means for yesterday and tomorrow. Ashwa means atma which means self purification. So what were they doing for self purification? They used to let loose a chosen horse free to roam about and whatever ground he walked on was considered purified. Therefore it is nowhere mentioned that the horse used in the Ashwamehda Yagna was sacrificed. All this was imagination of people.

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.