21 August 2013 - QA 7

Gurudev, how can I overcome laziness? It took me one month to even come up and ask this question!
Sri Sri Ravi Shankar: I will answer this question next year! (Laughter) Why should I hurry in giving you the answer? Anyway there is no use of giving you the answer immediately. Stay lazy as long as you like to be. One day or the other you will get fed up of it. Man gets bored very easily; and a lazy person gets bored even faster. The moment you are fed up of it, new paths will open to you. Why should I say anything and strain my throat? I will also keep forwarding the time ahead for your answer.

Maharishi Ashtavakra says, ‘There is no one happier than a lazy person’. He makes such lofty praises about laziness. He says, ‘Become so lazy that you stop desiring for anything in your mind’. You will run towards the kitchen or a restaurant only when you feel hungry. I would say stop doing even that! (Laughter) Even if you feel hungry today, you (postpone) and eat food tomorrow, or may be even next month. If you feel thirsty now, what is the hurry to drink and quench it? You can drink water later. Relax and keep lying down. Water will come to your mouth by itself! (Laughter) Similarly, be lazy even in getting angry or cursing someone. If you feel like doing some wrong deed or a scandal out of greed, then be lazy about that. But you do not act lazily in such things. In fact you do such things so quickly. If you have to curse someone, you do not think even for a moment. You do it immediately. You do not feel lazy at all in such moments. Is it not so? So if you become 100% lazy (in all aspects of life), then you have truly become wise. Then you have become a Nishkaam-Karma Yogi (one who acts without getting attached to the action or its results). But I tell you, this is the most difficult thing to do. It is very difficult to become totally and 100% lazy. Just as you cannot become an atheist 100%, in the same way you cannot become 100% lazy. It is next to impossible.