Extreme choices and behaviours || Acharya Prashant, with IIT Kharagpur (2022)

Acharya Prashant

Video Information:  IIT Kharagpur, 04.02.2022, Greater Noida, India  Context: ~ What are humiliation and insult? ~ How does suffering help the one? ~ How to realize one's true strength? ~ Why we have extreme possessiveness? ~ How can one overcome anger issue?  Music Credits: Milind Date  ~~~~~  #emotion #acharyaprashant

Transcript

00:00Acharya ji, I have observed a trend that in the recent past, the number of people who

00:09are resorting to extremities for any reason, be that be political, be that be religious,

00:15be that be just social extremities have just increased in number and this specifically

00:24if we put this in a world view context, this is a problem that is gonna emerge and haunt

00:32specifically our culture in the coming future and I feel that it is, that we just see a

00:40trend where extremities is, extremity as a behavior is penetrating things that were not

00:46extreme to begin with and this has been more of a reactive kind of mechanism, say I'm talking

00:53about the people who associate themselves with Sanatan Dharam or people who associate

00:58themselves with specific ideologies that are non-extreme and there have been sects and

01:04there have been people who have resorted to extremities more of as a reaction because

01:11they see no other way out or whatever may be the reason that they cite but then what

01:15like do we as a society want to see ourselves develop in that fashion or how exactly should

01:26we have a vision of the future like where exactly are we heading and should we be heading that way.

01:35See every extreme denotes a thirst, be it the extreme food consumption of somebody recuperating

01:58from a fresh breakup, the extreme possessiveness of a protective husband, the extreme competitiveness

02:26of a job seeker, the extreme anger of a jilted lover, all these extremes denote a thirst.

02:48Do you see this?

02:56Extreme anger, extreme anything.

03:03If today you are seeing so many extremes in all ways in the society, they are indicative

03:12of a central common problem and there is not just religious extremism.

03:26Even global temperatures are rushing towards an extreme, are they not?

03:32Even sea levels are rushing towards an extreme, are they not?

03:39And I am inviting you to see that all these are interrelated.

03:49The global forest cover currently stands at an extreme.

03:54What kind of an extreme?

03:56Minimum.

03:58It is lower than it ever was in history.

04:07Animal flesh consumption both in absolute and per capita terms today stands at an extreme.

04:18Humanity was never killing so many animals per minute ever in history.

04:26The average person was never consuming so much flesh ever in history.

04:39The quantum of fissile material, weaponized fissile material with the world today stands

04:44at an extreme, does it not?

04:55Material processing speed today stands at an extreme, does it not?

05:03Would you want to see how all these extremes are linked?

05:07We said all extremes come from a certain thirst, rather a central thirst.

05:20Religious extremism is gross, it's very visible, it's right there on the roads.

05:26It carries banners and flags, so it's obvious because there are slogans and often there

05:34are riots as well, so it's obvious.

05:38But think of this age of extremes as one composite unit.

05:51All of this is arising from the kind of despondency in the human mind that is unequaled in history.

06:06Have you ever had such a large proportion of humanity in a state of neurosis?

06:19Such a huge mass of people suffering from all kinds of mental disorders, was it ever

06:26the case?

06:28The average anxiety levels in the population today are at an unthinkable extreme

06:43and the world today is more prosperous than it ever was.

06:49The per capita average global income is an extreme today.

07:01Mankind has more knowledge than it ever had.

07:10Do you see what is happening?

07:14What is common among all those extremes is that they are all external, they are all external,

07:24they are all external extremes, be it the processing speed part, be it the consumption

07:34part, be it the knowledge part, they are all outside of the human being.

07:46In the external world, man is rushing to deeper and deeper extremes.

08:02Actually the reason is that the void in our center today is deeper than ever and this

08:16internal hollow, its extreme hollowness is causing us to rush to extreme measures in

08:30the external world.

08:43Where is this internal hollowness coming from?

08:47This internal hollowness is coming from a combination of mainly two things.

08:58One, a state of technology that can produce more and more for consumption and a state

09:09of philosophy that is liberal enough to deny liberation.

09:24So there is the factory yielding more and more goods and there is the philosophy telling

09:31you that consumption of these goods is the purpose of your life.

09:40But the purpose of your life is something else and that purpose sits as a deep unaddressed

09:49extreme hollow in our chests.

09:56Technology, economy and philosophy have combined to bring humanity to probably its lowest state

10:11in terms of consciousness in its history and that's why you see all kinds of extremism

10:18everywhere in the world.

10:25Because of the misdoings of organized religion, the last two to three hundred years have been

10:36of the decline of religion ever since the Enlightenment period in Europe.

10:46There was a lot in religion that obviously deserved to be rejected but the core of religion

10:57which is the spiritual urge to be liberated had to be preserved as the most precious diamond

11:05mankind can ever have.

11:09Instead we chose to throw the baby out with the bathwater.

11:19So liberation has been junked along with religion and consumption has been foisted upon us,

11:34mandatory consumption.

11:41That's the reason why you see people running to all these extremes because it's scary.

11:48We need meaning, we need purpose to life and when we do not find meaning and purpose in

11:54life we do stupid things like religious extremism.

12:02Like extremism in merrymaking, people want to go to the Mars to get some pleasure, an extreme step.

12:20Acharyaji, just another thing which is slightly off from this but then I feel that that has

12:31been something on my mind ever since you talked about liberalism in the current society

12:38and all of us these external extremities relating with the hollow that is in our chest is a

12:47common observation about people or intellectuals claiming how a liberal society should be but

12:56in fact not doing it and I mean that's a statement but then I want to know your opinion

13:04about say how recently we have seen a surge in the people who say that they are homosexuals

13:16and who say that they associate saying that sexuality is fluid is one thing but this has

13:26extended to the point where people say gender is fluid people say I mean it's not far away

13:32when they would even claim that age is fluid there have been cases where there have been

13:38some specific say perversions claiming some sort of there has been this specific case in UK where

13:51a specific group of people have claimed some sort of security under the LGBTQ plus movement

13:59and I just want to know your opinion about this particular thing why the rise on this

14:04because this is something which is relatively internal I feel but then again we as a society

14:11are moving to its extreme. Is it not obvious Devan? I mean you want something in life when

14:19you don't get it at several places you try it at this place as well and if you start seeing

14:28some little success in playing with your sexuality then you just squat there and you

14:39start insisting that this maybe is the thing that will take me all the distance.

14:50The little kid wants the real thing it cannot get that

14:59so it starts sucking its thumb or its big toe

15:06it starts playing with its own body but its own body is not what it wants

15:13that which it really wants

15:18we have assigned to test bin in the name of progress in the name of liberalism in the name of

15:25science atheism in the name of several

15:35modern and postmodern ideologies

15:40the real thing is there and if you will be restrained from having the real thing

15:48you will do a lot of strange things that's what we find humanity doing today

15:55strange and self-destructive we are closer to self imploding today than we ever were

16:07think of this extreme think of the doomsday clock

16:11think of the doomsday clock

16:15think of all the Kyoto protocols and the Copenhagen thing and the Rio de Janeiro and

16:21the Paris thing think of what kind of extreme failures they have been

16:30think of why mankind is so suicidal today

16:34and you will know what we are missing. We are missing the real thing we are born for.

16:41In the long run like right now in the present state the society is in a manner moving towards its self-destruction

17:10so is there any way is there any particular way we can always have these sporadic set of

17:18individuals who have been a little more enlightened than the masses who have served

17:24as guiding poles for the masses in general but then do we see a future for our society

17:33where we might not directly be led to that doomsday

17:41you see you have to do things if you want to

17:51avert what clearly awaits us

17:59you need to have a thousand such discussions happening every minute at a million places

18:08across the globe

18:15we have started a little initiative called Gargar Upanishad

18:19it's just too small it needs to be amplified a million times

18:28this is what needs to happen we clearly know what can save us

18:32we know that it's just that we we need to work on it we need to feed resources into it

18:43we need to build an opinion and understanding around it

18:54we need to

18:55we need to have more and more people enrolled by way of understanding

19:09there needs to be a lot of information dissemination a lot of a lot of publicity

19:17a lot of propaganda

19:25so

19:37yes this is it

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