Your interests are not yours || Acharya Prashant, at BITS Goa (2024)

Acharya Prashant

Video Information: 03.09.2024, BITS Pilani Goa  Context: ~ What is real interest? ~ What is our job, purpose?  ~ Are our choices liberating us or rather confining us? ~ Where are our choices coming from? ~ How did you discover what to do in life?  ~ How to discover our calling?  ~ How to meet our highest potential?  ~ How to be successful in life and achieve excellence?   It is very difficult to see clearly when the mind is clouded with desires and ambitions.  Music Credits: Milind Date  ~~~

Transcript

00:00My question was regarding Vastavik Ruchi which means relevant interest.

00:12Now I find it very abstract to put in my head what does Vastavik Ruchi mean.

00:21More so you've also explained that Ruchi stems from the ego and you should choose something

00:26that is beneficial to all of humankind or this world.

00:32How do you submit yourself to a task that is beneficial to all of mankind or something

00:39that is indifferent to your interests?

00:45See, we'll have to get the framework right.

00:52What we call as our interests or the usual quick unconscious choices, where do they come

01:02from?

01:07In a macro sense, they come from our bodily composition, in a very macro sense.

01:17For example, you can choose to have this kind of food or that kind of food or that kind

01:29of food.

01:31In that you can have a choice, but you will never choose to have 500 kilograms of food.

01:40You can choose whichever type of food you want, but you will never choose 500 kilograms

01:46of it.

01:47Would you?

01:48Because that's not something that your body will allow.

01:52Similarly, you can choose red, blue, yellow, orange, any color from the spectrum, but you

02:02will never, if I ask you here, what's your favorite color, please?

02:10You will never respond with a color that stands at 2000 angstrom or 20,000 angstrom.

02:20You would always respond with some color that stands between 4000 and 8000 angstrom, the visible spectrum.

02:28Now within this very very narrow spectrum lies the infinite diversity of human choice.

02:37Does it not?

02:38So, we keep saying, you know, I like that, I like that, I like that, you know, I like that, no, no, no, I don't like that.

02:43I hate him because he likes that.

02:46I hate him because he likes that.

02:48I love him because his likes are similar to mine.

02:51But the point remains that all these likes and dislikes are between 4000 and 8000 angstrom.

02:59We have never had a human being who likes a color that stands at 2000 angstroms of wavelength.

03:12So, at a very macro level, our choices are confined by our physical constitution itself.

03:20That we rarely see.

03:27If I ask you, you know, alright, which finger do you like?

03:32Which finger do you like?

03:33So, you will say, you know, somebody will say this one, this one, this one.

03:38Being students, a lot of us will like the middle finger.

03:43But there would be hardly anybody who would say that I like the 22nd finger.

03:50Because your body itself does not support that.

03:52So, it sounds, in fact, so absurd, 22nd finger.

03:58What does he mean by that?

03:59Nobody is going to choose that, right, the 22nd finger.

04:04So, in the macro sense, choices are delimited by the body itself.

04:11What I said about the visible spectrum is also true about the aural spectrum, right,

04:1820 hertz to 20000 hertz.

04:23If you are hearing something, you are listening to something very, very attentively.

04:30What I can immediately know is that the frequency would be between 20 and 20000 hertz.

04:38No choice of yours will take you beyond these two boundaries, or would it?

04:45Then you come to the social impact on choices.

04:48First of all, as you are born, the body has already decided that from zero till infinity,

04:59you will choose only between 4000 and 8000.

05:03Do you see what kind of constriction it is of choices?

05:064000 to 8000, what percentage is it of the total electromagnetic spectrum?

05:15Please tell me.

05:18Please tell me.

05:2110%?

05:231%?

05:250.1%?

05:27Not even that.

05:29So, do you see that you are born into limits?

05:34Even as you are born, the birth itself has dictated your choices and we keep jumping

05:43and shouting, oh no, I need to have free choice, free choice, what free choice?

05:47All freedom is between 4000 and 8000.

05:51All freedom lies only between 4000 and 8000.

05:56The very event of birth has taken away choice, so to say.

06:04Do you get this?

06:05Now, having taken birth, if you are a Hindu, if you are a Muslim, if you come from an urban

06:16background, if you come from a rural place, if you come from India, if you come from China,

06:20if you come from Africa, again, even within this small spectrum that is given to you,

06:274000 to 8000, boundaries are set for you.

06:32Are they not?

06:36Now, whatever you choose is now narrowed down to a smaller domain and yet we talk of choices

06:48as if choices were something so fundamental, so great and so liberating.

06:56Are our choices liberating us or rather confining us, please tell me.

07:03You have been taught, for example, to some of us, let's say, some of us, the sound of

07:12the Azan, the tolling of the temple bell and there are different frequencies.

07:19Are they not?

07:20Different amplitudes, everything, the whole waveform is different and you say that's my

07:25choice.

07:26That's the sound of my choice.

07:31Very difficult if you are born in Germany that you would know of Tansen.

07:36Difficult you would have heard of Meghmalhar and not too many Indians would know of Beethoven

07:43and Mozart.

07:45Maybe the names are heard, but there would not be a taste into them.

07:49Think of choice, as a German, what do you say, I love, I love Mozart.

08:00You say that's my choice.

08:01Is that a choice or is that a fallout of your being a German, please tell me.

08:11You are born in India, hardly anyone does not play cricket.

08:16What if you go to Brazil or Argentina?

08:21So is cricket a choice or is it rather an imposition of the circumstances?

08:30I am asking you, you say you love cricket, do you really love cricket?

08:35Love involves a very very conscious choice.

08:38If cricket has come to you only because you are born in a particular country, how is cricket

08:43a choice?

08:45Now cricket is some kind of helplessness, choicelessness.

08:54What do I do?

08:55Being born in India, I'll have to love cricket.

08:59Is it choice then?

09:03Are you getting?

09:04So the first thing is not about asking, what do I choose?

09:09It's about seeing that all our choices are very conditioned things.

09:18That what we call as choices come right from our conditioning.

09:23They are not indicators of our freedom at all.

09:28In general, you say I need to have the freedom to choose.

09:32The fact might be totally different.

09:35The fact might be that your choices do not indicate your freedom, rather they indicate

09:43your lack of freedom.

09:44When you choose cricket, for example, in India, does it indicate freedom or lack of freedom?

09:50Please tell me.

09:53Lack of freedom.

09:58You couldn't have chosen otherwise.

10:00You had no option.

10:01Are you getting?

10:02So we are very interested in asking what to choose next.

10:12But is the question arising in a vacuum?

10:16Are we not constantly, every moment already choosing a lot?

10:21Is not the whole thing of choice a process?

10:26And if you are already choosing and choosing from a particular center, using particular

10:31criteria, from a particular state of consciousness, is it not more important to ask, why am I

10:37choosing this that I am choosing right now?

10:41Or must I ask what do I choose next?

10:47If I stand still here, please understand.

10:50If I stand still here, probably it makes sense to ask which way to go.

10:56Probably it makes sense to ask which way to go.

10:59But who am I?

11:00I am the mover, I am the runner.

11:03I am all the time, not just running, actually sprinting towards my desires, my goals and

11:10my goals are ostensibly my choices.

11:12I chose my goal.

11:13I choose that thing.

11:14I want that thing.

11:16I am already running towards something and that which I am running towards, I am quite

11:22convinced of it.

11:23Am I not?

11:24I want that thing.

11:27I want that trophy.

11:28I want those marks.

11:30I want that job.

11:32I want him to respect me.

11:34I want that boy or girl.

11:36I am already very confident of the direction in which I am running.

11:40And then this speaker comes in and you ask, sir, what should I move towards?

11:45My answer will be, but you aren't standing still.

11:51What should I move towards is a question that behoves someone who is standing still.

11:59Only he can ask.

12:00I do not know.

12:01Since I do not know, so I am standing still.

12:04So please tell me which way to go.

12:08If you do not know which way to go, what do you do first thing?

12:12You stop, don't you?

12:15Now is the time of the GPS, but let's say you are in the year 2000 and you needed to

12:22stop for instructions.

12:26Students won't know.

12:27They are not born then, but the elder ones would.

12:32So what do I do?

12:34If I am rushing towards a particular direction on a road, how do I ask anybody for instructions

12:40or help?

12:42And if I want to know the way, what is the first thing I do?

12:47I stop and I say, I have to go to Jaipur, how do I go?

12:53Or I have to go anywhere.

12:55Is there a restaurant here?

12:58You stop and ask, right?

13:00The first thing is to stop.

13:03Without stopping, you are just a slave of the unconscious choices that you are pursuing

13:10and if you don't stop and you ask that fellow, Bhaiya, kaha jaana hai?

13:14He won't respond or would he?

13:17Even if he responds, would you get his response?

13:22You would be gone by the time his response comes.

13:27Is that not so?

13:29So we are not sitting at the origin zero zero.

13:32We are not standing still.

13:37In a great unconscious momentum, we are flowing.

13:43The first thing is to stop flowing.

13:46The first thing is to drop out of the flow.

13:52A great stream is carrying you along.

13:57The first thing is to somehow manage to come ashore and then you sit there for a while.

14:05Let your mind be settled and then ask yourself, here, this is me, this is life.

14:10What do I do with it?

14:13But that question cannot be asked when you are already hurrying towards a particular

14:17direction.

14:18Are we not already hurrying?

14:19Please tell me.

14:20So, when you are already hurrying, how to get an answer, forget about an answer, how

14:28even to ask a question?

14:32First thing is to have the courage to stop and if you cannot stop permanently, stop at

14:38least for a while, it's called taking stock.

14:42Just to take stock, stop and then say, okay, this is what I have been doing.

14:48I am 18, 20, 25, 35, whatever.

14:52What is going on?

14:53What is really going on?

14:57It is very difficult to think on the go.

15:02It is very difficult to see clearly when the mind is clouded with desires and ambitions.

15:11The more you are desirous, the more you are goal-oriented, the more ambitious you are,

15:16the less you will know what you are actually doing.

15:21Desire will simply obfuscate your vision.

15:26Is that making sense?

15:29The thing is, we stick to our choices, we hold on to them like dear life, like the monkey

15:40does to her little one and sometimes the little one is dead and yet the mother monkey

15:51is holding it to her chest, thinking that there is some danger out there somewhere and

15:59she is looking suspiciously.

16:02She is not even looking at herself to see that the baby is already gone.

16:18I invite you to look impartially at your choices.

16:23This impartial looking is at the foundation, at the center of all wisdom.

16:35Otherwise life is just about being blindly attracted to something and then investing

16:42all your time, money, energy into chasing that thing.

16:47Is that not how it happens?

16:48Please tell me.

16:50You get attracted by something and then you just run after it, you just run after it.

17:00Money goes into it, time goes into it, energy goes into it, life goes into it and if you

17:06get that thing, you rarely find it satisfactory enough and what next?

17:12The next thing and life is limited.

17:20Soon enough you find that you have no energy, no time to chase things anymore.

17:28What is already going on must be reviewed.

17:34But we are more interested in asking what next to do?

17:37Dump that question.

17:40What next to do is not important at all.

17:43What is important is what am I currently doing?

17:49What next to do is not important at all.

17:54What is much more important is what am I currently doing?

17:58What exactly is going on right now?

18:01What is it that I am busy with day beginning till day end?

18:07That's the important question and if you can go into that question, what next to do emerges

18:15on its own.

18:18You don't have to answer that, you don't have to plan that up.

18:21It happens, happens on its own.

18:23If you understand what is going on right now, the future will organically spring from this.

18:31You won't have to plan out a future.

18:34So following up with that, you've said that what next is to be done will organically start

18:43spring up from whatever we are doing now.

18:45So again, the interest of the collective people.

18:51Is it automatically going to happen that what we, is it going to happen on its own?

18:58That was all my question.

18:59It's like this question, where is this particular question coming from?

19:06It's coming from the previous one.

19:10Was this question possible had the questioner not attended to the response to the previous question?

19:20So where is this question coming from?

19:22Had you planned it out?

19:25It just came.

19:27It just came.

19:28It just came out of attention.

19:30He paid attention to what was happening to the previous question and from there came

19:38the next question and this particular question has a certain authenticity.

19:44A planned, well-thought-out, cultivated question would never had this authenticity.

19:51It happens spontaneously, trust it.

19:56Your job is not to plan out a future.

19:58Your job is to lovingly attend to the present.

20:03The future will take care of itself.

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