Question & Answers with Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Q:
If everything is changing and transient, then what is the point in doing anything?
Sri Sri Ravi Shankar:
What is the point in asking this question? What is the point of understanding? You do because you can’t but do something in this world. So, even that is the part of the change. ‘Everything is changing’ – this is for an understanding. You have to keep doing, and if you do things that brings you peace, and which will take you towards evolution, it is like swimming along the current. And if you do something against the evolution, it is like swimming against the current.Q:
The history of ancient India is filled with the accounts of enlightenment, yogis taking on supernatural states of awareness and capabilities. Yet, to help me understand, how does one interpret such stories? Are these methodologies with allegorical significance, or they point to the untapped potential hidden in each one of us?
Sri Sri Ravi Shankar:
Do you know about the first airplane? Who flew the first airplane? (‘Wright brothers’ came the answer). This is what we hear or read in the books. Absolutely wrong. 50 years before Right brothers, one man from Bangalore, Subray Shastry, he went into meditation, in silence and then he went to meet a yogi. The yogi took him to deeper meditation, and he started recognizing the engines, he downloaded all that! He wrote a book called ‘Vaimanik Shastra’ and then he flew the plane in 1800 with a parsi gentleman. Parsis are the migrants of Iran to India who follow Zoroastrian religion. The parsi gentleman funded him to make the first plane. They flew it on the chaupati beach in Mumbai (or Bombay). This appeared in the ‘London times’ newspaper also. These two were put in jail by Colonial power, and they took and confiscated all the diagrams that he had made. A documentary of this came on television recently, with the newspaper cutting from England and the diagrams that he had cognized. He had made five different diagrams and this is available even today in a book called ‘Bhardawaj Vaimanik Shastra’ – The science of plane by Rishi Bhardawaj. He explained what type of engine that a plane has which takes off straight like a helicopter, and one which goes running and then takes off.You can find all the details in the website http://www.bharathgyan.com/
More from the same conversation in the next post..
Q:
Where do you go when you meditate?
Sri Sri Ravi Shankar:
I do not go anywhere, I just be everywhere.Q:
What is more important, ones upbringing or one’s cast? People who believe in cast system and religion are against intercast marriages. So what matters most-the values of that human or the cast and religion of that human?
Sri Sri Ravi Shankar:
One should see the humanity the most.Q:
How to control desire?
Sri Sri Ravi Shankar:
Be in the now. Desire is wanting to be happy tomorrow. Be happy and joyful now. Like children, if you ask them what they want, they will say nothing. Because they are happy with 'now'.Q:
Why does a desire arise? Where does it come from? What is the purpose?
Sri Sri Ravi Shankar:
All desires have got one goal, and that is happiness. If a desire brings unhappiness, it has not reached its goal. The goal of desires is to bring happiness. So, that is the purpose.Where does it come from? It comes when you are not aware of your Being, your Self. Desire is your wanting to stay in the moment. Desire is to experience joy. Joy is only in the moment. And when you are in the moment, there is no desire. When you are joyful, when you are satisfied, there is no burning desire at that time.
Q:
My husband practices Sudarshan Kriya but does wrong deeds. What should I do?
Sri Sri Ravi Shankar:
How can this be? Then he may be doing Sudarshan Kriya just as an excercise. Bring him for a follow up, or meditation camps. Or, may be what you see as a wrong deed is not perceived so by him. Talk to him.Q:
Present moment is inevitable. In spite of this knowledge the mind oscillates between past and present. What to do?
Sri Sri Ravi Shankar:
Is it better than before? Once you are here it will continue to get better.Q:
How important is self-love? Is it necessary to love oneself before we can reach out to the rest of the world?
Sri Sri Ravi Shankar:
Yes. But please don’t sit and chant “I love myself!” Do you chant “I am in Milwaukee!”? Your body, mind, consciousness are all made up of truth, love, beauty and peace. Take it for granted that you love yourself. Nobody can afford not to love oneself because you are love. That’s just an illusion if it appears that you don’t love yourself.Q:
For doing any work, I think Guruji is asking me to do it. It works, but it has hampered my normal living.
Sri Sri Ravi Shankar:
You should have a balance - what your inner voice says, what your gut feeling is, and then use your inner strength rest of the time. The one hampering you-that’s called ‘yoga maya’. Sometimes ‘yoga maya’ comes in mind and says things which are not correct also. That’s why we shouldn’t lose our intellectual discrimination ability while ordering and understanding to inner dimensional consciousness. This state happened to Sri Ramkrishna Paramhansa also, and to many enlightened people in the world that the inner vision comes, a voice comes. So, go with a balance. Go slow with both intellect and feelings. Got it? Your feelings are as important as your intellect. Many people survive only on intellect and some survive only on feelings. The best thing in life is to have a balance between emotions and intellect, between heart and the mind.
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Founded in 1981 by Sri Sri Ravi Shankar,The Art of Living is an educational and humanitarian movement engaged in stress-management and service initiatives.
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