Question & Answers with Sri Sri Ravi Shankar

Sri Sri Ravi Shankar:

Yes. Otherwise you could never sleep. If the desire haunts your head, you can’t sleep. You let go of the desire so you can sleep. At different times, different needs arise in your body and mind. So, you do not sit here and worry about what you are going to have for tomorrow’s dinner. You know that you have come here for a different purpose. An intention is different from the desire. An example of intention would be the thought that you want to go to New York, and you sit in the car and you drive. You go through Philadelphia and New Jersey. You take the turnpike or I-95 North until you get to New York. This is an intention. Desire is when you sit in the car and say, “I am going to New York, I am going to New York, I want to go to New York, I want to go to New York.” Continuously chanting like this may lead you ending up in the mental hospital. You won’t end up in New York. This is the difference with a sankalpa (an intention). An intention with attention and it will manifest. If the intention becomes a desire, it only brings grief whether it’s fulfilled or unfulfilled.
You know, in the 1960’s and 70’s we had the Hippie Movement. It was created out of abundance rather than lack. All of these people had everything in abundance. People who go to drug abuse or who are indulging in alcoholism are lacking in spiritual education or knowledge. They are seeking an experiential validation of their spirit. That is what leads to depression. There are large populations suffering from depression in the world today. According to statistics it will rise to as much as 50 percent in the coming decade, half the population will be depressed. We need to change this and Prozaic is not the solution. The solution is meditation and yoga.

Sri Sri Ravi Shankar:

You should have a dream and passion. You should follow that, but not with the feverishness. If you want to go to Niagra falls, you go. Who said not to go? You make the necessary arrangements and visit the place. But if that deeply gets into your head , and you keep on thinking about it all the time, then you will end up landing somewhere else. With this feverishness, your mind loses clarity, and you don’t get right ideas or thoughts. Having passion and dispassion are complementary. Dispassion brings you centeredness, settles you down, and you become calm. When you have passion, and you are acting, it drives you to things that you want to have. Deep rest and dynamic activity are complementary. How can you be dynamically actice if you have not given deep rest to your mind and body? Someone who has never slept cannot feel energetic at all. Sameway, if you are not dispassionate, you cannot be passionate. You will only be feverish with desires and cravings in your mind, with no ability to act.

Sri Sri Ravi Shankar:

That is ok. Dream is another dimension where all these things exist, all the experiences come. So, when you wake up, be fully in the waking state.

Sri Sri Ravi Shankar:

Ego is a sense of seperateness, a sense of identity. There are three ways to see ego.

1. Ego is identity. I am this. This is one ego.

2. Ego is also I am not this.

3. Ego is also I am seperate from others.

How to dissolve this ego?

Either you expand your ego. I am this, I am that, I am that too. For instance, one ego is that you think you are an officer. But if you are stuck with only being an officer, and you come home and be officer to your kids and wife, you create a problem. Suppose you are a major or colonel in the military, and if you behave with your family in the same role, then you are stuck in your ego of being an army officer. Your one identity is that you are a colonel, but you are a father/mother with your children, you are a husband/wife with your spouse, you are a son/daughter with your parents and so many. When you balance all these identities in your life giving equal importance to all these, that is the way you dissolve your ego. Ego is getting stuck with any one identity. From that limited identity to identify with the unlimited divinity is the path of expanding, or you can call it dissolving identity. So you move from me to Aham Brahaman, I am somebody to becoming I am nobody, and I am nobody to I am everybody. Now this looks very philosophical. You can’t go to your office and say that you are nobody, nor can you say at your home that you are everybody. It is not going to work. So, I would say that the simple way to counter your ego is to be natural. Ego makes you feel uncomfortable, unnatural and seperate. Egolessness,or expanded ego or transformed ego is being at home, being natural with everyone in every circumstances. Rather, it is being like a child. I would say just be like a child.

One last thing I would like to say about ego is that if you find you have any ego, then don’t try to dissolve it. You can keep it in your pocket. Don’t meddle with it, and don’t bother about it. Let it be there. Ok?

Sri Sri Ravi Shankar:

When you are to do business, you do it with your head. When you are to do service, you do it from your heart.

More from the same knowledge session will be included in the next post.

Sri Sri Ravi Shankar:

Don’t worry, you can have them. It is said usually but don’t just eat only those vegetables. Mix with beans, greens and lentils. You can have them but not in excess. Everything in excess is harmful. Just don’t eat them too much, and don’t make them a daily routine. Our system is strong. It can counter the ill affects of lower prana.

Sri Sri Ravi Shankar:

Waking up to the reality. Knowing of this ’I’ can lead to a state of devotion, of love. It is spontaneous. There is no need of surrender because it is already there. It does not have to mean a painful part of the ego. It is knowing that everything belongs to the divine, the thorn as well as the roses belong to the divine. What happens when you surrender? A permanent peace dawns in you, a smile that no one can take away from you. You wonder that there was such an illusion. You smile and realize that there is nothing to give away. Suppose you fill a pot from the lake, and you are carrying that pot of water. Then you pour it back into the lake. What can you tell the person when he/she thinks that he/she is giving water to the lake? It brings back a feeling of connectedness, and annihilates the sense of separation which causes pain and suffering. Sense of connectedness always brings peace and joy. So with this self knowledge, practice of meditation, singing, becoming one with the sound of satsang, you become one and merge into one consciousness. Satsang is everyone sharing together the consciousness and energy, everyone is sharing the sound. In Satsang, the mind gets united, all minds get united with the cosmic energy. It brings more benefit in singing when your awareness is focused, and you have one pointed attention.

Sri Sri Ravi Shankar:

Only in moments of true confidence do you recognize true success.

Sri Sri Ravi Shankar:

Love, fear and greed. If you have an alcohol and cigarette addiction, and I tell you that you will get one million dollars if you don’t smoke for one month, you will stop. Won’t you? Greed can check your bad habit. If you promise someone love, even then they will get over addictions. There is a Catholic tradition as well as in India, that of confession. You confess and say, ”This is my habit, how can I change it?” Third is fear. If I say, you will die in a month if you do this, you will not do it. Fear can stop an addiction. I prefer love over other two.

Sri Sri Ravi Shankar:

If you recognize that you have ego, for God's sake don’t try to get rid of it. If you get rid of your ego, that itself will become the cause of a bigger ego trip. So if you find that there is ego, just keep it in your pocket. You know the only antidote for ego is being natural, or naturalness. Why do you want to get rid of your ego? Because it bothers you. More than others, your ego is bothering you. You are constrained, restrained and uncomfortable. You feel others don’t respect you or you are better than others. You compare yourself with others. So I would say, if you find that there is ego in you, let it be. We will not meddle with it. If it comes, let it come.